software

Looking at several free or inexpensive Mac softwares from the Many Tricks people. I'd originally wandered over to look at Desktop Curtain (hide your desktop clutter for screenshots, tutorials, etc.) but the Witch (cycle through windows) and yFlicks (manage and view your movies) and Name Mangler (batch file renamer), among others, look very interesting as well.

I don't know about you but I've been on a Mac for like 15 years and I still have to stop and think what the weird option keystroke symbol means. Hurray, now you can download this (locally produced) Best.Widget.Ever and only be one quick peek away from happy.

A good overview of current font management software -- both free and commercial -- for us Apple folks.

This is a post brought over from Emma's Friends, a now retired Mac blog. Originally published 2/25/2008. Author CF. You know about IconBuffet's free delivery of tasty wee icons, right? For a while, I was so enamored that I even signed up as a VIP for an extra $6 or so a month. That, plus the months preceding and following, gave me an unwieldy blob of icons to mush through.

Via a Mac person in McCall, reports of problems with the 10.5.6 update. He was successful but had to do a double restart. (Thanks to Brad for the report.) Some sites he provides: Apple discussion list BetaNews forum MacFixIt

A recent thread on the mailing list focused on tools to get back some space eaten up by files and programs and who knows what. With permission, I post the cherry on the cake:

Ed, thanks for the most beneficial program I've ever downloaded. GrandPerspective enabled me to see where all my memory was being wasted. I used it and went from 8.2 gigs to almost 21 gigs of free HD space. Doc

I'd say that's a pretty good endorsement of GrandPerspective, a free (donations accepted) program that simply does one thing really

There's an inquiry out on the mailing list as to whether Silverlight, Microsoft's Flash-ish plug-in/software, is problem free.

First, a quick aside to let members know that the latest Apple Users Group Bulletin has been added to our members-only area. I've got to say that it gives me one more reason to wish that I had an iPhone (or at least a video iPod): the (free!) TubeTV software can "rip" YouTube (and other) videos for later viewing on your AppleTV, iPhone, or iPod.

TubeTV is a freeware program for Mac OS X Tiger, Leopard, and above which enables you to search for, save, and convert YouTube and many other flash videos to a format suitable for p

Email spam is a perennial problem for everyone, whether their computer runs Mac OS, Windows OS, Linux, etc.

Perian, the "Swiss army knife for QuickTime", is a free application that lives in your system preferences, and which can -- amongst other things -- let you play YouTube videos in QuickTime. (Note: requires Mac OS 10.4.7)