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Fri, 27 Dec 2002

My top freeware picks for 2002

Here are my picks for the top freeware & shareware products of 2002.



  1. Chimera It's still not finished, but Chimera is already the fastest & most usable browser for Mac OS X without the bloat or quirks of the others. If you haven't already checked it out, try it - you'll be pleasantly surprised.




  2. NetNewsWire Lite A news aggregator that brings the latest stories from your favorite web sites directly to your desktop. The shareware version, NetNewsWire Pro, also features weblog editing.




  3. Carbon Copy Cloner A fast & easy way to make a bootable copy of any hard disk




  4. Fire A single instant messaging application that supports AIM, ICQ, MSN, Yahoo Messenger, Jabber, and ICQ.




  5. Apple's iApps (iCal, iSync, iChat, iPhoto, iTunes). These may not be the best in their class, but their integration and synchronization capability makes them truly useful. I used Palm Desktop for many years, but with he introduction of iSync I switched to Jaguar's built-in address book and iCal since I can easily synchronize them between my G4 and my iBook and download my calendar & contacts to my HandSpring Visor and my iPod.




  6. TigerLaunch adds a very convenient launch menu to your menu bar which lists all of your applications. You can configure it to show additional folders & elminate any applications. It can also optionally add a project menu listing all CodeWarrior & ProjectBuilder projects in a "Projects" folder in your home directory.




  7. Youpi Key A simple keyboard macro & automation utility similar to QuicKeys.




  8. Fink provides a safe & convenient way to install open source Unix software such as X11 and MacGIMP without disturbing any standard system components.



  9. MU Menu lists the latest software updates from MacUpdate in your menu bar.




  10. Application Enhancer. Unsanity's Application Enhancer system provides a way to enhance and extend OS X applications.




Add your comments and picks here.

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Unsanity release Labels X 1.1.1

Labels X adds file labeling features into Mac OS X. This means, you can apply various color tints to file icons, and sort the files by label. This gives you more freedom and options in organizing your files. Additionally, Labels X shares file label information with Mac OS 9, so no matter, where you label your files - you will see the labels in both Mac OS 9 and Mac OS X (file labeling is a built-in feature in Mac OS 9).

Features:



  • Applies color tint labels to Finder icons;

  • Adds "Label" column to Finder list view to sort files by label;

  • Easy-to-use contextual menu to view and change labels for files;

  • Simple preference pane with an ability to change label names and colors;

  • Only $7 with lifetime free upgrades.



New for v1.1:



  • Labels X are now compatible with Mac OS X 10.1 as well as Mac OS X 10.2 "Jaguar".

  • File labels are now shown in Dock popup menus containing file listings.

  • Labels contextual menu will be disabled for files you do not have correct access privileges for.

  • Fixed the issues with mis-coloring of icons in the toolbars, search results, and window proxy icons.

  • Fixed a bug with non-English label names displaying incorrectly in the Labels contextual menu.

  • Updated for Application Enhancer 1.2.

  • New installer.

  • Misc code cleanups and bug fixes.



New in v1.1.1:



  • Fixed a bug with Labels X affecting Recent Items functionality in Mac OS X 10.2.



For more information or to download a copy visit http://www.unsanity.com/haxies/labels/.

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Humane OS X replacement

The Humane Environment is an open source alternative GUI in OS X, created by Jef "creator of the Mac" Raskin. Still in development and very much a proof-of-concept.

When Raskin created the Macintosh project at Apple, his fundamental insight was to design a popular-price product starting from the human interface. Instead of starting with the sexiest processor or the coolest operating system as others did, he went from the user's needs to creating hardware and software to support the desired interaction. Combining then-current trends (many of which had been developed or improved at Xerox PARC) with his own interface inventions (such as click-and-drag for making arbitrary selections and moving objects), and the work of many colleagues, the result of Raskin's project became a major factor in the industry changeover to the modern Graphic User Interface (GUI). Computers became much easier to learn, and accessible to a wider range of users.



But interfaces have not moved with changing times. After a decade of research into cognitive psychology and by paying attention to people's constant computer complaints (and his own annoyance), Raskin realized that today's GUIs are fundamentally flawed. The interface-building tools that companies and open-source prouducts provide enforce bad interface design practices. They are wrong. Period. Raskin figured out how to fix the problems. His popular book, The Humane Interface (Addison-Wesley, 2000) explains all this in some detail.



Now, a few of Raskin's ideas have been turned into usable, open-source, open-ended software so that you can try them for yourself. The initial system, built without funding (or the chains that come along with it), when described, doesn't sound like much. It consists of a Python programming environment that is also a word processor, or perhaps the other way around (in any case, it's its own IDE), and which has some other interesting abilities. But two things about it take it far beyond this pedestrian description: its user interface and its API.



The Humane Environment (THE) is as easy to learn as a GUI (or easier) yet as fast to use (or faster) than the command-line systems we struggle to learn but love to use. It is easier to add new software to than any previous interface-based system.



For more information or to get involved with the project, visit http://humane.sourceforge.net/the/.

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