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Give me inspiration

S

semaja2

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Dec 12, 2005
576
18
Adelaide
Note to Mods: I posted here as im not looking for developers but average users

Heres the deal guys,
What i'm looking for is ideas on small utilities that you guys think MacOSX needs, any ideas even if there small applications are great as i'm sure other developers will like some inspiration as well.

So post your wackiest ideas, i really like making those small utilities that are just fun to have or have a very strong purpose, Also any software that costs money and theres no alternative are great to make as i am a student and cant afford all the software out there so i love to atleast have a open source alternative.

Unfortunately my programming skills are not as advanced to make some popular software like QuickSilver and Transmit and such but still suggest your ideas and if i cant do it then im sure another developer might try it out.

Please post some ideas, im low on ideas :( :p
 
Try making an OSX OBDII reader.

basically the USB port for your car.

Scantool.net

makes windows based solutions.

someone needs to make a mac solution. though this required you buy an OBDII reader and a serial to usb converter.

IMO this software, or even just a friggen codeable interface, is worth alot of money OR at least a lot of recognition.
 
Sdashiki said:
Try making an OSX OBDII reader.

basically the USB port for your car.

Scantool.net

makes windows based solutions.

someone needs to make a mac solution. though this required you buy an OBDII reader and a serial to usb converter.

IMO this software, or even just a friggen codeable interface, is worth alot of money OR at least a lot of recognition.
Click to expand...

Unfortunately i cant do it with out the hardware and doubt my skills in that area to even attempt it, but still post these ideas and who knows another developer may take them up.

Keep suggesting guys
 
These might be larger than you wanted but figured I'd post them anyway. Perhaps you can draw some inspiration from them. Also of note, I'm a recent switcher, coming from XP so some of my wants might actually exist already, and I just know about them yet. Suggestions welcomed.

1. App to turn my Bookmarks into an HTML web page, that can be saved locally. I'd like to ftp this to my web space for easy outside the home access.

2. Newsreader ... along the lines of how Outlook Express worked in XP. I'm currently using Unison but not entirely happy with it. I don't need anything for binaries..just a simple reader, with panes, settings to auto expand threads, filters, etc... And something that works online, not offline. And no need for mail functions.

3. Thumbnail creator and viewer ...something simple that allows me to create, view, and open the full image in my app of choice or within its own viewer.

4. Photo app besides iPhoto ... Something similar to Google's Picasa only made for the Mac. I don't like the way iPhoto stores and saves my images in folders by date. I'd like to have something thats a bit more customizable.

5. Tweaking utility ... simple app to get to all the hidden OSX tweaks that most of us switchers know nothing about. Think performance, and explain what each setting is for..pro's and con's.

6. Lightweight music player ...something that plays my iTunes purchased tunes as well as mp3's.

7. Defragger that works within OSX. I know OSX claims it doesn't need defragging but old habits die hard. I'd feel better if I could see the fragmentation level and defrag if needed, from within the OS itself.

Thats all I can think of offhand but am sure more ideas will come eventually. Anyway..hope it inspires you. :)
 
i think what the mac os x people need is an alternative, more customizable music-player (that perhaps can work with the itunes library).

many users don't like that itunes is eating more and more resources.
 
I'd like a program that would have more advanced power management tools. Like the ability to set the brightness to a user-defined level that is switched to automatically when I'm on battery, and then back to full brightness when I'm charging. Optionally, I'd like for bluetooth and airport to be included: a toggle to automatically have bluetooth on when I'm charging, and off when I'm on battery.

Make mine first. :)
 
Not really OS X independant, but I would _love_ to have a cross-platform bookmark synchronizer that is OS agnostic, browser agnostic, and format agnostic.

Export/Import via XML or CSV.

Additional features:
-Server option to post bookmarks centrally
-Ability to "share" with other users similar to something del.ico.us
-Organization via a parent-child tree relationship
 
Ladybug said:
4. Photo app besides iPhoto ... Something similar to Google's Picasa only made for the Mac. I don't like the way iPhoto stores and saves my images in folders by date. I'd like to have something thats a bit more customizable.
)
Click to expand...

Once pics are in iPhoto you dont need to mess with the folders. Just use the pics right from iPhoto and organise them how you want. It works exactly the same as iTunes.

:)

In all the years I have been using OSX I have never opened my music or iphoto images folder. Theres no need to.
 
stuartluff said:
Once pics are in iPhoto you dont need to mess with the folders. Just use the pics right from iPhoto and organise them how you want. It works exactly the same as iTunes.

:)

In all the years I have been using OSX I have never opened my music or iphoto images folder. Theres no need to.
Click to expand...


Great to know Stuartluff..thanks for the tip.
 
some cool ideas in there, i really liked the bookmark ideas, now all i need is some time some coffee and to learn how to make it happen :p :D
 
stuartluff said:
Once pics are in iPhoto you dont need to mess with the folders. Just use the pics right from iPhoto and organise them how you want. It works exactly the same as iTunes.

:)

In all the years I have been using OSX I have never opened my music or iphoto images folder. Theres no need to.
Click to expand...

but iphoto doesn't deal with raw images that well and more than 50GB of photo data the internal disk is full in no time.
i think the library-stuff-management is crap.
 
The bookmark sync idea sounds good to me. I currently use google browser sync with Firefox, and it works like a charm. However, I wish you could see your bookmarks online. If I go to someone's computer and Firefox is not installed, or I don't want to install google browser sync on their machine, I have no way of using google browser sync to see my bookmarks.
However, to circumvent this problem, I created an account at mybookmarks.com and periodically update them.
A bookmark sync that worked with all browsers, all OS's (well at least windows, Mac OS X, and Linux), would allow viewing of the bookmarks online, and posting of certain bookmarks to sites like del.icio.us, would be amazing.
 
Razorhog said:
The bookmark sync idea sounds good to me. I currently use google browser sync with Firefox, and it works like a charm. However, I wish you could see your bookmarks online. If I go to someone's computer and Firefox is not installed, or I don't want to install google browser sync on their machine, I have no way of using google browser sync to see my bookmarks.
However, to circumvent this problem, I created an account at mybookmarks.com and periodically update them.
A bookmark sync that worked with all browsers, all OS's (well at least windows, Mac OS X, and Linux), would allow viewing of the bookmarks online, and posting of certain bookmarks to sites like del.icio.us, would be amazing.
Click to expand...

I was thinking of making a small application to export to a html file which then you could upload to a website, but well the hardest bit is to read the bookmarks from like firefox/opera/safari
 
semaja2 said:
I was thinking of making a small application to export to a html file which then you could upload to a website, but well the hardest bit is to read the bookmarks from like firefox/opera/safari
Click to expand...

I don't believe it is that hard. I know at least Firefox already stores your bookmark in html format, in a specific location for each user (profile). If you can programatically determine where it is, you can read it in and extract the bookmark information from that. I'm assuming that would work both ways.

I would be surprised if opera, safari and IE are any different.
 
semaja2 said:
some cool ideas in there, i really liked the bookmark ideas, now all i need is some time some coffee and to learn how to make it happen :p :D
Click to expand...

I'm looking forward to seeing what you come up with Semaja2. If you need testers, please don't hesitate to ask. Best of luck
 
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