Jeremy’s Little Corner Of The Web…

I revisited the "Your top 5 (or so) freeware/shareware apps for OS X?" thread at MacNN tonight, and thought I would post my favourite freeware and shareware apps of the moment…

1. LaunchBar

Absolutely can't live without this app! You really have to see it to believe it, but you can basically type in the name of an app, document, contact, etc into a menu that pops down when you press command-space, and it will launch for you. You can add custom folders and index anything you want. It's kinda like spotlight, but also for applications as well.

2. Adium

I use this to connect to ICQ, MSN and AIM… and I love its customisability. All I'm waiting for are meta-contacts (grouping different accounts into one), which is coming…

3. M-Beat

(Not so subtle plug here :)) I use M-Beat to control iTunes without having to switch to iTunes… Instead I just press a key combination to do it.

4. BluePhoneMenu

A little bit like Salling Clicker, but freeware, and doesn't allow the phone to access the Mac. It displays calls and allows me to write SMS from the computer.

5. SSHKeychain

Maintains my SSH keys (through ssh-agent) and adds and removes them as necessary. Since I sometimes need to SSH into some machines at work, and also use it for Subversion authentication, it's very, very handy!

6. Peripheral Vision

I just downloaded this last night, but I'm liking it already. When a new device is recognised (such as an iPod, camera, etc) a floating window similar to the volume and brightness controls is shown with the device… I was planning to write an app to do this, but it seems someone's already done it!

7. CalendarClock

Just downloaded this today… It replaces the clock in the menubar (but it can look the same). When you click on it, a calendar with the days of the month is displayed, as well as the events or to do list for the current day. You can also access iCal from it by double-clicking on the day or event.

8. PulpFiction Lite

I used to use NetNewsWire Lite, but it didn't have Atom support, and I found NewsFan to be OK, but a bit sluggish and expensive. So… I'm now using PulpFiction Lite, and it works great! It's not perfect, but it works quite well, and has an interface similar to Mail's.

Anyway… hopefully someone finds this useful!