Freeware for Mac: Desktopia

If you are like me you really like the ability to change the desktop images on your Mac, but I have found that changing them hourly still seems to run into trouble in the fact you never kow what your going to get unless you get real specific in creating a directory and such to draw from. Enter Desktopia a simple little app that allows you to choose the image you want for your desktop when you want it, in other words a picture at a specific time of day. Check it out, it’s free.

Download Here!

Freeware for Mac: Adium

iChat is a great way for Mac users to use AIM, but iChat gets a little hairier to use with Google Talk, MSN Messenger or other chat networks. Adium is the best IM tool available. Enabling iChat for non-AIM protocols generally requires registering for a free account at open source chat provider Jabber.org. Adium connects to AIM as well as Google Talk, MSN, Yahoo Messenger, Jabber and many other protocols. Its all-in-one interface allows for tabbed chats in one window, smooth screename switching capabilities and skinned chatting. Currently, iChat’s primary advantage over Adium is its well-integrated video chatting, but a video chatting plug-in has recently been introduced for Adium as well. If you're not convinced, check the instant messaging category - you are sure to find one that suits your needs.

Download here!

Freeware for you: Quicksilver

This single key launch application creates a catalog of frequently performed searches and tasks. Assign shortcut keys to frequently performed actions and frequently opened files, folders and applications. It’s more than Spotlight (the live search feature built into OS X since 10.4) on steroids. It’s like a mini-Finder and Spotlight in one.
Some users even report that it works faster than Spotlight. A December 2007 Lifehacker interview revealed that the current developer does not have plans to take Quicksilver much further, but since the program is open source, anyone can ride to the rescue. For now though, you can download the latest version here.

Windows archives on Mac

Working with a lot of Mac users over the last few years I have realised that they just don't seem to have enough tools to do what is commonplace o windows and one of these is using a rar compression or the more upcoming 7zip format. Here is an opensourde program to get it done for you.

Uncompress RAR, 7zip, tar, and bz2 files on your Mac. Many new Mac users will be puzzled the first time they download a RAR file. Do them a favor and download UnRarX for them!

Download Here!

Tweak your Mac OSX

Are you left unfulfilled by the meager set of preferences Apple has left you with? If so, you just might be a Tweak Freak. Here is what you require to get going with it. The best news is that it completely free.

Finder / Window Options...

Configure Scrollbar Arrows*
Add "Quit Finder" to Finder Menus
Enable / Disable the "Snap to Grid" animation
Enable / Disable window "Zooms"
Enable / Disable Launch Animations
Show hidden Files in the Finder
Change the Dialog Sheet Animation Delay
Backup / Restore Finder Preferences
Force Empty Trash
Dock Options...
Change Dashboard Mode between Active, Inactive or Developer.
Change the Minimize Effect*
Set placement of the Dock*
Set pinning of the Dock
Enable / Disable Translucent Icons for Hidden Applications
Enable / Disable the Launch Bounce
Enable / Disable the Dock Shadow
Enable / Disable the Exposé "Blob"
Backup / Restore Dock Preferences
Unix Tweaks...

Run Daily, Weekly, and Monthly Scripts
Update Prebinding
Repair Permissions
Empty caches from all major browsers
Empty the System's Font Cache
Optimize Network Buffers for Dialup or Broadband
Renice User Processes

Other stuff...

Change Screenshot Format
Get Uptime Report
Clean DS_Store files
Disable DS_Store File Creation on Network Volumes
Disable Spotlight Menu
Configure Safari*
* contains additional options not available in System Preferences

Download for Mac OS X 10.4
Download for Mac OS X 10.3

Free Download for Mac: Gimp is a good substitute for Costly Photoshop

Photoshop is way too costly for any hobby photographer to afford. Gimp is the real solution. Download here and enjoy. Here are all the versions of Gimp that you might need. They are all latest and differ only in the platform that you might need it for

MacOS 10.5 (Leopard) Intel
build: 6th June 2008

Gimp requires:
MacOS 10.5.2
X11 (XQuartz 2.2 or Apple X11 updated to OSX 10.5.2 version)
build by: theonehorst

The X11 package you can find on a OS X 10.5.0 install disk is too old to run GIMP (it will crash), and it can't be updated through software update. See the installation manual for more information.

MacOS 10.5 (Leopard) PowerPC
build: 1st June 2008

Gimp requires:
MacOS 10.5.2
X11 (XQuartz 2.2 or Apple X11 updated to OSX 10.5.2 version)
build by: Chachi

The X11 package you can find on a OS X 10.5.0 install disk is too old to run GIMP (it will crash), and it can't be updated through software update. See the installation manual for more information.

MacOS 10.4 (Tiger) Intel
build: 14th April 2008

Gimp requires:
X11 1.1.1 or better
build by: theBB

MacOS 10.4 (Tiger) PowerPC
build: 1st June 2008

Gimp requires:
X11 1.1.1 or better
build by:
Auria

GIMP help 2.4.0
build: 4th December 2007

Gimp help requires:
Gimp 2.4.x installed in the Applications Folder. (not fully up to date but possibly useful nonethless. Visit docs.gimp.org for the latest docs.)

Free Download for Mac: Ipod As Regular Disk

Copy music off your iPod in the finder, like a regular disk drive. This is a must for all iPod users. Download Now and Enjoy... 

DOWNLOAD HERE

Free Download: Crystal Sudoku

Crystal Sudoku is a free version of sudoku with no numbers! It has four difficulty levels and you can create numerous profiles. The game remembers your personal best time and the number of wins for each difficulty level.

Download it absolutely free here... just follow the link below.

Download Now

Free Download: Sweet Home 3D

Sweet Home 3D is a free interior design application that helps you placing your furniture on a house 2D plan, with a 3D preview. Sweet Home 3D is available in English and French and may be run on Windows, Mac OS X 10.4, Solaris and Linux.

The Mac version can be downloaded below.

Download Now.

Firefox 3 - The Basics

Here is what the people at Firefox have to say about the new Firefox 3. I am hoping that all that is promised is delivered. 

Firefox 3 is based on the Gecko 1.9 Web rendering platform, which has been under development for the past 34 months. This new platform includes more than 15,000 changes to improve performance, stability, rendering correctness, and code simplification and sustainability. Firefox 3 is built on top of this new platform resulting in a more secure, easier to use, more personal product with a lot more under the hood to offer website and Firefox add-on developers.

More Secure

• One-click site info: Click the site favicon in the location bar to see who owns the site and to check if your connection is protected from eavesdropping. Identity verification is prominently displayed and easier to understand. When a site uses Extended Validation (EV) SSL certificates, the site favicon button will turn green and show the name of the company you're connected to. (Try it here!)
• Malware Protection: malware protection warns users when they arrive at sites which are known to install viruses, spyware, trojans or other malware. (Try it here!)
• New Web Forgery Protection page: the content of pages suspected as web forgeries is no longer shown. (Try it here!)
• New SSL error pages: clearer and stricter error pages are used when Firefox encounters an invalid SSL certificate. (Try it here!)
• Add-ons and Plugin version check: Firefox now automatically checks add-on and plugin versions and will disable older, insecure versions.
• Secure add-on updates: to improve add-on update security, add-ons that provide updates in an insecure manner will be disabled.
• Anti-virus integration: Firefox will inform anti-virus software when downloading executables.
• Vista Parental Controls: Firefox now respects the Vista system-wide parental control setting for disabling file downloads.
• Effective top-level domain (eTLD) service better restricts cookies and other restricted content to a single domain.
• Better protection against cross-site JSON data leaks.

Easier to Use

• Easier password management: an information bar replaces the old password dialog so you can now save passwords after a successful login.
• Simplified add-on installation: the add-ons whitelist has been removed making it possible to install extensions from third-party sites in fewer clicks.
• New Download Manager: the revised download manager makes it much easier to locate downloaded files, and you can see and search on the name of the website where a file came from. Your active downloads and time remaining are always shown in the status bar as your files download.
• Resumable downloading: users can now resume downloads after restarting the browser or resetting your network connection.
• Full page zoom: from the View menu and via keyboard shortcuts, the new zooming feature lets you zoom in and out of entire pages, scaling the layout, text and images, or optionally only the text size. Your settings will be remembered whenever you return to the site.
• Podcasts and Videocasts can be associated with your media playback tools.
• Tab scrolling and quickmenu: tabs are easier to locate with the new tab scrolling and tab quickmenu.
• Save what you were doing: Firefox will prompt users to save tabs on exit.
• Optimized Open in Tabs behavior: opening a folder of bookmarks in tabs now appends the new tabs rather than overwriting.
• Location and Search bar size can now be customized with a simple resizer item.
• Text selection improvements: multiple text selections can be made with Ctrl/Cmd; double-click drag selects in "word-by-word" mode; triple-clicking selects a paragraph.
• Find toolbar: the Find toolbar now opens with the current selection.
• Plugin management: users can disable individual plugins in the Add-on Manager.
• Integration with Windows: Firefox now has improved Windows icons, and uses native user interface widgets in the browser and in web forms.
• Integration with the Mac: the new Firefox theme makes toolbars, icons, and other user interface elements look like a native OS X application. Firefox also uses OS X widgets and supports Growl for notifications of completed downloads and available updates. A combined back and forward control make it even easier to move between web pages.
• Integration with Linux: Firefox's default icons, buttons, and menu styles now use the native GTK theme.

More Personal

• Star button: quickly add bookmarks from the location bar with a single click; a second click lets you file and tag them.
• Tags: associate keywords with your bookmarks to sort them by topic.
• Smart Location Bar: type in all or part of the title, tag or address of a page to see a list of matches from your history and bookmarks; a new display makes it easier to scan through the matching results and find that page you're looking for. Results are returned according to their a combination of frequency, and recency of visits to that page, ensuring that you're seeing the most relevant matches. An adaptive learning algorithm further tunes the results to your patterns!
• Library: view, organize and search through your bookmarks, tags and browsing history using the new Library window. Create or restore full backups of this data whenever with a few clicks.
• Smart Bookmark Folders: quickly access your most visited bookmarks from the toolbar, or recently bookmarked and tagged pages from the bookmark menu. Create your own Smart Bookmark Folders by saving a search query in the Library.
• Web-based protocol handlers: web applications, such as your favorite webmail provider, can now be used instead of desktop applications for handling mailto: links from other sites. Similar support is available for other protocols (Web applications will have to first enable this by registering as handlers with Firefox).
• Download & Install Add-ons: the Add-ons Manager (Tools > Add-ons) can now be used to download and install a Firefox customization from the thousands of Add-ons available from our community add-ons website. When you first open the Add-ons Manager, a list of recommended Add-ons is shown.
• Easy to use Download Actions: a new Applications preferences pane provides a better UI for configuring handlers for various file types and protocol schemes.

Improved Platform for Developers

• New graphics and font handling: new graphics and text rendering architectures in Gecko 1.9 provides rendering improvements in CSS, SVG as well as improved display of fonts with ligatures and complex scripts.
• Color management: (set gfx.color_management.enabled on in about:config and restart the browser to enable.) Firefox can now adjust images with embedded color profiles.
• Offline support: enables web applications to provide offline functionality (website authors must add support for offline browsing to their site for this feature to be available to users).
• A more complete overview of Firefox 3 for developers is available for website and add-on developers.

Improved Performance

• Speed: improvements to our JavaScript engine as well as profile guided optimizations have resulted in continued improvements in performance. Compared to Firefox 2, web applications like Google Mail and Zoho Office run twice as fast in Firefox 3, and the popular SunSpider test from Apple shows improvements over previous releases.
• Memory usage: Several new technologies work together to reduce the amount of memory used by Firefox 3 over a web browsing session. Memory cycles are broken and collected by an automated cycle collector, a new memory allocator reduces fragmentation, hundreds of leaks have been fixed, and caching strategies have been tuned.
• Reliability: A user's bookmarks, history, cookies, and preferences are now stored in a transactionally secure database format which will prevent data loss even if their system crashes.