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SlCKB0Y

macrumors 68040
Feb 25, 2012
3,426
555
Sydney, Australia
All of these suggestions are free and/or open source, and many are the best app in their category.

TextMate2 - My favourite text editor
iFileX - Great for searching
Adium - Multi IM client
MPlayerX - Much better than VLC
Caffeine - Menubar app to keep your mac awake
Chicken of the VNC - VNC client
Colloquy - IRC client
CoRD - RDP client
Cyberduck - FTP/SFTP/FTPS/Google Cloud Storage/Openstack swift/Webdav/Amazon S3/Azure/Rackspace client
Filebot - Movie and TV show renamer
Handbrake - Video encoding
Keka - Compression utility
Mactracker - Database of Apple products
Namechanger - Bulk file renamer
Onyx - System utilty
OpenEmu - an amazing multi-emulator system
Sequel Pro - Excellent MySQL client
Telephone - SIP client
Transmission - The best torrent client
Evernote - cloud notes
DiskWave - disk usage utility
Virtualbox - Free alternative to Fusion/Parallels
http://tvshowsapp.com - When used with transmission and Filebot this overs full PVR automation.
Homebrew - A BSD Ports-like system for OS X.
Angry IP Scanner - scan for hosts on an IP range
Boxer - Emulate DOS games.
Burn - Best DVD burning software.
ClamXAV - Antivirus when dealing with Windows users' files.
iStumbler - WiFI scanner
iTerm2 - Terminal app.
The Unarchiver - decompression utility.
CheatSheet - Hotkey to display all keyboard shortcuts for the current app in a popup window.
Seashore - Excellent basic image editor (Gimp engine but great UI).
KeePassX - Password manager.
 
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darmr

macrumors member
May 26, 2014
43
0
In no particular order:

Logic Pro
iReal Pro
Pixelmator
iA Writer
Mail
Safari
Terminal
VLC
AcupointsUltimate
Guitar Jam Tracks
 

aqnew

macrumors newbie
Nov 27, 2014
3
0
My list of the most useful OSX apps

Hi guys,

iPhoto
Safari
Of course Skype
Notifier Pro for Gmail (this one is a great replacement for old google notifier)
SublimeText 2
bmGlyph (I use bmGlyph to make custom fonts)
Precious Disk (a French app that keeps your Mac clean)
 

aqnew

macrumors newbie
Nov 27, 2014
3
0
about google notifier

Hi,

If you are interested in Google Notifier, I can recommend you an app that does exactly the same thing: Notifier Pro for Gmail for OSX 10.9+

I hope this information will be helpful for you.
 

Mr. McMac

Suspended
Dec 21, 2009
2,968
363
Far away from liberals
Apps (more than 10)

Chrome
Google Drive
Copy
PostBox
Lastpass
Evernote
TextWrangler
uTorrent
Hangouts
Microsoft Office 2011
ArcSoft Photo +
VLC
Audacity
HandBrake
Vox

Utilities (less than 10)

iStat Menus
Carbon Copy Cloner
App Cleaner
OnyX
Grab
ClamXav
Audio Switcher
 

MLinneer

macrumors regular
Mar 18, 2013
154
23
Sherman, TX
Most useful depends on your particular definition and circumstance. The ones I use at least on a daily basis are:

Safari
Massages
Mail
iTunes
RealVNC
Numbers
Pages
Evernote
Unison
Quicken Essentials

I guess I could include Dropbox but that is more of an extension now and I run it on all my devices.
 
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Jessica Lares

macrumors G3
Oct 31, 2009
9,612
1,055
Near Dallas, Texas, USA
CloudApp
Yoink
GoodTask (I use Fantastical on my iOS devices, I have never cared for the Mac version of it. It sorta does the same thing I use Fantastical for. My shortcut for it is Fn-F1 which works very well!)
Locko
Soulver (I actually just bought it last month, it replaced CalcNote which I was using for awhile. The sync with the iOS apps is great. When I wasn't using these apps, I was always using Google since it has basic calculation tools.)
Write
The Unarchiver
iMazing
Image Capture
Preview
 

magnumpi

macrumors member
Sep 24, 2012
41
0
A couple of apps nobody mentioned I think:

  • Wunderlist: Great app (and free!) to organize your tasks up to three levels. It supports chats for colaborative work, file attachment and there are available apps for iOS and Android as well.

  • DayOne: Simple but useful journal. I use it mainly to consolidate work related thoughts and ideas. Usually I write the stuff down on my iPhone and later I polish it on the Mac app.

  • OneNote: A powerful note organizer, better than Evernote IMHO when it comes to complex notes.
 

Chloec

macrumors member
Nov 27, 2014
59
13
+1 Wunderlist
+1 Evernote
Chrome
Gmail
Gmail Contents Exporter
Preview
Numbers
VLC
Duplicate File Finder
 

simonsi

Contributor
Jan 3, 2014
4,851
735
Auckland
  1. Airmail
  2. Aperture
  3. Moneywiz
  4. Dropbox
  5. Wunderlist
  6. Teamviewer
  7. Simplemind
  8. Grab
  9. Cloud Commander
  10. Office 2011 (not Outlook, don't use that any more)
  11. Deskconnect
  12. Battery Guard
  13. BarTender
  14. CCC
  15. Zoom It

Thats in addition to iCal, Notes, Safari etc etc
 

Traverse

macrumors 604
Mar 11, 2013
7,688
4,399
Here
I was just about to revive this thread, lists like these helped me find several great apps!

My top 10 (not necessarily the most used, but the most important for me, in nor particular order):

  1. Lightroom
  2. Dropbox
  3. Scrivener
  4. Better Touch Tool
  5. Moom
  6. Microsoft Office
  7. Pages '09
  8. iState Menus
  9. Write
  10. Stock Apps: Safari, Mail, iTunes, and Reminders

Kind of cheated with the stock apps, but I wanted to stress third party apps because those were the most useful when I was finding new apps.
 

randy98mtu

macrumors 65816
Mar 4, 2009
1,454
140
My most used apps/utilities (stock, free and paid)

iTunes
Safari
iStat Menus (paid)
MenuTab for Facebook (paid version)
MailTab for Gmail (paid version)
iPhoto
Lightroom (monthly creative cloud version)
Last.fm Scrobbler (free - wish they'd update it for Yosemite!)
Dropbox (free, but I've purchased more space)
 

rhett7660

macrumors G5
Jan 9, 2008
14,219
4,294
Sunny, Southern California
Here is my list: (not in order)

Photoshop
Illustrator
iTunes
Notebooks (Have it on OSX and all my iOS devices) in conjunction with:
Outline+ and
Evernote
MS Office (Mainly Excel and proofing word documents)
Pages
Comic Life 3
Curio
Comic Collector
Firefox
Dropbox
 

PsyOpWarlord

macrumors 6502
Nov 11, 2010
334
26
Colorado Springs, CO
Here are the non-stock/non-Apple apps I've been using.

1PasswordAppCleaner
Burn
Carbon Copy Cloner
Deliveries
Handbrake
iDentify
ImageOptim
iNet Network Toolbox
iStat Menus
M4VGear
MakeMKV
PavTube ByteCopy
PhoneView
Pixelmator
Skype
The Unarchiver
TotalFinder
Transmission
Transmit
Turbo.h284 HD
VLC
WiFi Explorer
 

vineydhiman

macrumors newbie
May 13, 2015
1
0
Jawali
Best Must Have Mac Apps and Utilities

In this thread I decided to cover some of the best must have mac apps and utilities. Please check and also suggest some other good mac apps.

The applications which you will check in this article are totally free and developed by third party developers. By using these app you can be more productive and help you to do things which are not possible to perform on Mac.

So without wasting a single second, why don't you have look at some of the best essential apps for mac

1. Infinit.io

With this app you can send files and folder of any size from mac to any other device like, iPhone, iPad, Windows PC, Android phone or Mac itself.

2. Spectacle

Its an amazing utility for organizing and positioning windows on your screen without the use of a mouse.

3. Duet Display

With Duet Display you can use your iPad as an external display.

4. Knock

Knock let you unlock your Mac without a password using your iPhone and Apple Watch.

5. ImageOptim

ImageOptim is a free app that makes images take up less disk space and load faster, without sacrificing quality.

6. HiddenMe

This amazing application let you hide your desktop icons with a single click.

7. SiteStuck

Automatically downloads Web sites from the Internet by asynchronously copying the site's webpages, images, PDFs, and other files to hard disk.

8. AppCleaner

Small application which allows you to thoroughly uninstall unwanted apps.

9. Download Shuttle

Download Shuttle is a blisteringly fast download accelerator and manager, and it’s free.

10. Toggl

Toggl’s time tracker is built for speed and ease of use.

11. Fluid

Fluid lets you create a Real Mac App (or "Fluid App") out of any website or web application, effectively turning your favorite web apps into OS X desktop apps.

12. Transmit

Transmit for Mac is a full service FTP client for the OS X platform.

13. Caffeine

Tiny program that puts an icon in the right side of your menu bar.

14. NoSleep

NoSleep extension will keep the screen awake even when the lid is closed.

15. Air Browser

With Air Browser, all your favorite websites are pre-loaded in the background, easily accessible from menubar.

16. MacDropAny

Sync any folder on your Mac with your favourite cloud storage service.

17. Self Control

Lets you block your own access to distracting websites, your mail servers, or anything else on the Internet.

18. Gas Mask

Cool hosts file editor for Mac using which you can permanently block access to certain websites from your computer.

19. Pixel Winch

Pixel Winch is a screen measurement app with a unique approach. It combines aspects of a traditional image editor with the quick access of a modal interface (similar to OS X's Launchpad or Dashboard).

20. Buffer

Any link, text, picture or video you want to share, just add it to your Buffer.

21. Hocus Focus

Hocus Focus automatically hides application windows that have been inactive for a certain period of time.

22. AirDroid

AirDroid connect Android phone to your Mac and let you access, messages, manage photos, transfer files and more.

23. PushBullet

Pushbullet saves you time by moving your notifications, links, and files wherever you go.

24. Unarchiver

Unarchiver is a small and easy to use program that can unarchive many different kinds of archive files.

25. iBrowse

Browse is a simple app that lets your Mac or PC access an iOS device file system. Simply connect your device to your computer and you can read and write to the device's media, app and root* directories.

26. GIF Brewery

GIF Brewery is the best video to GIF creator on Mac OS X. It let you convert clips from your video files to GIFs.

27. Karabiner

A powerful and stable keyboard customizer for OS X. You can easily customize from prepared settings. You can also add your own settings by XML.

28. BetterTouchTool

Allows you to configure many gestures for your Magic Mouse, Macbook Trackpad and Magic Trackpad. It also allows you to configure actions for keyboard shortcuts, normal mice and the Apple Remote.

29. Hazel

Hazel is a System Preference pane that works silently in the background, automatically filing, organizing and cleaning.

30. Helium

Helium is a floating browser window that allows you to watch media while you work. Your content will never fall behind your other windows even as you switch tasks.

31. Dropzone

Dropzone makes it faster and easier to copy and move files, open applications and share files with many different services.

32. RSS Bot- News Notifier

RSS Bot is your perfect companion to keep up to date with all of your RSS feeds in a simple, sleek and friendly manner.

33. F.lux

f.lux fixes this: it makes the color of your computer's display adapt to thetime of day, warm at night and like sunlight during the day.

34. EVE

EVE helps you to learn shortcuts, in order to increase your productivity with MAC OS X. Every time you execute an action using the mouse, EVE will teach you the matching shortcut.

35. Bootcamp

Quickly boot into Boot Camp. Contribute to BootChamp development by creating an account on GitHub.

36. aText

aText accelerates your typing by replacing abbreviations with frequently used phrases you define.

37. Flashlight

Search the web, save a note, add a reminder, or do over 190 other things, just by typing into your Mac's Spotlight search box. Or write your own plugins

38. Disk Inventory X

Disk Inventory X is a disk usage utility for Mac OS X 10.3 (and later). It shows the sizes of files and folders in a special graphical way called "treemaps".

39. Alfred

Alfred is an application launcher and productivity application for Mac OS X. It saves you time when you search for files online or on your Mac.

40. BitTorrent Sync

Sync helps you keep files and folders on all your computers and mobile devices in sync with each other but without using the cloud. There are no size limitations either.

41. Bartender

Bartender lets you organize your menu bar apps, by hiding them,rearranging them, or moving them to Bartender's Bar.

42. CloudUp

Amazing app developed by Wordpress that lets you quickly upload and share local files and screenshots from the menu bar.

43. Unclutter

Unclutter is a new handy place on your desktop for storing notes, files and pasteboard clips.

44. TextBar

TextBar is a tiny but powerful app that lets you add any text to your MenuBar.

45. Handbrake

HandBrake is a tool for converting video from nearly any format to a selection of modern, widely supported codecs.

46. Soundflower

Soundflower is a Mac OS X kernel extension that enables audio to be passed between applications. It acts as a virtual audio device, with both inputs and outputs. With it, any audio application can send and receive audio.

47. QuickCast

QuickCast is amazing app that make screencasting more easier. With this app you can record, publish & share, in seconds.

48. MuteMyMic

MuteMyMic provides you with easy way to control Input Volume from the status bar or via keyboard shortcuts.

49. Oynx

It provides access to hidden settings, you can perform system maintenance tasks and also configure system apps like Finder, Spotlight and Dock.

50. Control Air

ControlAir provides magical touch free control over media applications on your Mac, such as iTunes, Spotify and others. Just raise your finger in the air to control volume, skip songs and pause. A finger raised to your lips will mute the sound.

51. Pixelmator

Pixelmator takes full advantage of the latest Mac technologies, giving you speedy, powerful tools that let you touch up and enhance images, draw or paint, apply dazzling effects, or create advanced compositions amazingly simple.

51. Vox Player

Vox for Mac plays more file formats than iTunes, including FLAC, a smaller file that doesn't compromise on quality.

52. Things

Things is a delightful and easy to use task manager. It’s the perfect companion for everything you want to achieve in life, offering a great balance between ease of use and powerful features.

53. Tabular

Tabular is a tablature editor that lets you read and write music for guitar, bass, drums and much more. It's the best way to learn new songs, write your own songs and run through practice exercises for nearly any kind of stringed instrument or drum kit.

54. Living Earth

Living Earth is the best and most beautiful world clock and weather app for your Mac. With a single click from your Mac menu bar offering easily accessible world times and weather for millions of cities around the world.

55. Gear Player

Gear Player allows you to easily manage your Google Play Music and YouTube music collection, without the difficulties of a web browser or Flash Player.

56. Geektool

GeekTool is an application for Mac OS 10.6+. It lets you display various kinds of information on your desktop via 3 default plug-ins: File plugin to monitor MacOS X activity with /var/log/system.log, or any file that you want to follow

So these are some of the best mac app which you can try on machine. Also let me know your favourite apps which I forget to mention in this opinion piece.

Source: What's With Tech
 

HDFan

Contributor
Jun 30, 2007
6,451
2,751
A Better Finder Rename - use it to rename thousands of picture files when I return from a trip
A Better Finder Attributes - use it to adjust timestamps on picture files so that my GPX tracks will correctly place pictures in Aperture
Movie Collector - cataloging DVD's Blu-Rays
Music Collector - cataloging SACD's and DSD's which won't go into iTunes
MkMkv - ripping Blu-Rays
MacThe Ripper - ripping DVDs
Cinematize Pro and Cinematize Pro HD - when you want just parts of a DVD or a Blu-Ray
Crashplan - Unlimited cloud backup (~6 TB in my case) for $60 a year!
DiskWarrior - for recovering disks that crash
MediaInfo - quickly see metadata for video files (bitrate, codecs, etc.)
CarbonCopy Cloner - for disk backups, bootable complete image or backup just specific folders
Whatsize, DaisyDisk - for determining where all my disk space has gone
Toast Titanium - for burning ISO image files
Araxis Find Duplicate Files - for comparing large directories to figure out what the differences are between them
Kindle - for Amazon books
Zinio reader - for reading Macworld on my Mac
Tidal ($20 monthly subscription) HIDEF music service. Can be over 1400 Kbs vs 320 Kbps (best) for Beats, Spotify, etc.
Beats Music - annual subscription. Has better artist information, sorting and searching tools than Tidal but has low fidelity playback. I find things in Beats and they play them in high definition (CD quality or better) in Tidal.
Plex and Playback media servers. Playback is the simplest and easiest way to stream Blu-Ray content with DTS-MA audio to media players but has been discontinued. Plex is more complicated, a bit harder to use, but does have a nice graphical interface.
INet Network toolbox. For searching my network to figure out what's on it. If I'm having network problems on a device I use it to figure out whether the device is connected.
VirusBarrier, Netbarrier - antivirus and firewall
Witopia -VPN allows you to watch Netflix in local countries overseas which are IP restricted
Parallels - use this just so I can use Qucken for Windows since the Mac version is crippled
Chrome, Firefox - helpful to diagnose browser problems and to organize windows. For example I run all of my audio (Tidal, Beats, Plex) in different Firefox tabs. That way when I can't figure out where that sound is coming from I just have to go one place rather than search through all of my browser windows.
Evernote - keeps records of my web purchases, web clippings that I want to keep as reference and search at a later time.
GPSBabel - for converting GPX tracks. Not easy to use, even with the graphical interface.
Starry Night Pro - great tool for figuring what you're seeing in the sky
PTGUI Pro - for sticking together photos. Although the latest Photoshop is supposed to be better at stiching these days I haven't tried it.
 

Chin Lee

macrumors newbie
Aug 16, 2016
2
0
Hi All,

I just bought a Macbook and looking for some essentials features. Can someone recommend some productivity apps for my new Macbook.
 

hobowankenobi

macrumors 68020
Aug 27, 2015
2,052
852
on the land line mr. smith.
Howdy -

That's kind of broad. Perhaps you can narrow it down? Specific things needed....or similar apps you used on previous platforms?

If you are fresh to Macs, sure.....there is the Apple App store. But you can find more diverse, interesting, and alternative options and some useful reviews at MacUpdate.com. Find something you like, and check the linked alternatives at the bottom of each app page.
 
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