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OS X equivalent apps question?

B

belltree

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Feb 17, 2008
395
60
Tokyo, Japan
I am planning to make the switch to OS X in the near future (finally!) but ahead of that I am trying to find equivalents apps to what I am currently using in Windows XP. Appreciate any help from you folks in the know:

* Symantec Ghost/Acronis True Image - best disk imaging software for OS X?
* Winzip/WinRaR - best file compression tool for OS X?
* Beyond Compare - best app for comparing two different files/directories.
* UltraEdit - awesome text editor, great for debugging...OS X equivalent?
* SyncToy - Tool for sync'ing directories/files. Time machine or other?
* GoogleTalk - Seeing as google hasn't released an Mac version. Is there an alternative?
* Process Explorer - awesome for seeing every process running under windows. Is there an equivalent for OS X?
* Nero 6 - best cd/dvd burning app for OS X?
* Smart FTP - best FTP app for OS X?
* Ethereal - best network protocol analyzer (packet sniffer) for OS X?
* TCP View - GUI netstat for Windows. Similar app for OS X to see all network connections?
* TeraTerm Pro - Terminal emulation software (telnet, etc)
* TreeSize Professional - Great tool for keeping track of what's going on with your data (disk space and data management).

* Divx/Xvid codec support on OS X (where to get them)?
* DVDShrink - best tool for ripping/converting DVD's on OS X?
* Utorrent - best bittorrent client for OS X?

* iDailyDiary - Diary software that the wife uses. Anarchysoft Diary 1.3 was suggested to me. Does anyone have any expierence with this app under OS X and that can vouch for it?

* TrueCrypt - Best personal encryption solution! Yay, just released this month for the Mac!
 
Winzip - Compression is a built in feature, right click and select Compress.
SyncToy - I use Chronosync
Googletalk - Adium, allows connection to AIM, MSN, GoogleTalk, Yahoo, and others.
Nero - Roxio Toast
SmartFTP - I like Cyberduck
TeratermPro - OSX has a terminal app built in
TreeSize Professional - WhatSize
Codec Support - Install Perian and Flip4Mac
 
* Symantec Ghost/Acronis True Image - Built in, or you could use Roxio Toast
* Winzip/WinRaR - Built in, or you could use StuffIt
* Beyond Compare - no idea
* UltraEdit - TextEdit? i dunno, ive seen a few "advanced" text editors around
* SyncToy - Built in? i dunno, i never sync.
* GoogleTalk - Adium
* Process Explorer - iStatPro widget
* Nero 6 - RoxioToast
* Smart FTP - CyberDuck
* Ethereal - KisMac
* TCP View - Dunno.
* TeraTerm Pro - built in
* TreeSize Professional - Finder?
 
Transmission for torrents. There is Divx for Mac. Go get Perian and Flip4mac to support all file types in Quicktime.
Transmit for FTP
Activity Monitor tracks all your processes. Built in.
 
Symantec Ghost - built in, but you could also try Carbon Copy Cloner (donationware)

Winzip: again, much of the functionality is built-in, but there's always Stuffit Deluxe

Beyond compare: again, Unix has built-in tools for this stuff. Some programmers editors also have comparison functions built-in.

Ultraedit: Textmate or BBEdit

SyncToy: Depends on exactly how you want this done. Take a look at Chronosync, although it may be more powerful than you need.

GoogleTalk: It's just jabber, so iChat (built-in) will handle it out of the box. Otherwise try Adium.

Nero: Toast

Process explorer: Activity monitor (built in)

Smart FTP: Cyberduck, Interarchy, Transmit or Fetch

Ethereal: it started off as a Unix tool, so works on OS X. Grab it via Fink

Teraterm: Depends on what you need. Terminal may handle everything you require, if not, then the fink package manager as above has a number of alternatives.

Treesize: Again, there are a number of alternatives. OmniDiskSweeper and Whatsize come to mind - you'll find 'em (and most of the other stuff I've mentioned) on Versiontracker

Divx codec. 3ivx or maybe VLC

DVDShrink Handbrake or Mactheripper

Diary: vijournal or possibly DevonTHINK (which is not primarily a diary app, but can be used that way - one of the best applications on the platform IMHO - I've used it for years).

Bittorrent: Transmission, I guess (I use BT very rarely, so see what others suggest).

There are many alternatives to the majority of software I've suggested, and I'd suggest spending some time on VersionTracker, reading a few reviews and trying out a variety of software.

Also bear in mind, given that OS X is Unix, that the majority of open-source software available for Unix/Linux can also be run in an X11 session on OS X - this gives you a massive variety of software to choose from.
 
My humble opinions, where relevant:

* Symantec Ghost/Acronis True Image - SuperDuper! - creates a perfect bootable clone of your HD. Much better IMO than CarbonCopyCloner
* Winzip/WinRaR - OS X can handle most compressed formats (including .zip) natively. For other formats, use The Unarchiver (freeware), way more elegant than StuffIt.
* Process Explorer - Activity Monitor (built-in to OS X)
* Nero 6 - OS X itself and sometimes Disk Utility (built-in to OS X) can be useful, else Toast 8 Titanium.
* TeraTerm Pro - Terminal built into OS X.
* TreeSize Professional - WhatSize? or OmniDisk Sweeper or Disk Inventory X (all free or 'almost free')
* Divx/Xvid - Get them from the DixX website.
* DVDShrink - Mac The Ripper and HandBrake.
 
belltree said:
I am planning to make the switch to OS X in the near future (finally!) but ahead of that I am trying to find equivalents apps to what I am currently using in Windows XP. Appreciate any help from you folks in the know:

* Beyond Compare - best app for comparing two different files/directories.
Click to expand...

/Developer/Applications/Utilities/FileMerge.app

...it is called 'opendiff', when invoked from the Terminal

Don't know why Apple hides this gem so deeply in the filesystem. The rendering of differences in files is the best that I have ever seen so far.
 
Symantec Ghost
I use SuperDuper for my OS X partition and WinClone for my XP BootCamp partition. Both are excellent. I also use 'Do Something When' to automatically trigger a refresh of my SuperDuper clone whenever I connect my backup drive.

Winzip/WinRaR
OS X's built-in compression for ZIP, UnrarX for RAR.

Beyond Compare
I'm a unix nerd, so I use the terminal tools for this. But there are some very capable GUI wrappers for those tools available.

UltraEdit
I use a combination of Coda for web languages (PHP, etc) and the unix 'nano' editor with syntax colouring turned on.

SyncToy
More unixness - I use rsync.


GoogleTalk
Adium. Easily the best multi-protocol chat application on any platform, full-stop.

Process Explorer
Activity Monitor - part of a default OS X installation under /Applications/Utilities/

Nero 6
90% of my disc-burning needs are handled by OS X's built-in Disk Utility. OS X will handle nearly all disk image formats natively. For advanced tasks (such as video conversion before burning) I use Roxio Toast.

Smart FTP
Panic Software's Transmit. Very simple, but very well designed and a joy to use. For frequent FTP'ing, you can use OS X's built-in Automator software to make 'droplets' to automatically do FTP tasks based on what's dropped onto the droplet. Also, Transmit (like virtually all OS X applications) is fully scriptable using AppleScript (built-in to OS X).

Ethereal
I use Cocoa Packet Analyzer, but there's a wealth of these apps available.

TCP View
I use the unix 'lsof' command, piped through 'grep' to filter for the protocols and traffic I'm interested in. Again, I'm sure there are plenty of GUI wrappers for that.

TeraTerm Pro
iTerm.

TreeSize Professional
Grand Perspective.

Divx/Xvid codec
Either get the official codec from divx.com or use Perian. Perian is the 'swiss army knife' of QuickTime codecs, with support for a huge number of formats.

DVDShrink
MacTheRipper for ripping, Handbrake or ffmpegX for converting.

Utorrent
I use Azureus (with the stupid Vuze interface turned off). In fact, I run it 'interfaceless', preferring to access it via its web interface plugin.

iDailyDiary
Can't comment on this, since I mainly just use iCal. But there's a massive and varied amount of these apps on OS X - one of the platform's really strong points.

TrueCrypt
As well as the Mac version, you have a couple of other choices. To encrypt all user data, simply enable OS X's FileVault. I prefer a targeted approach where I encrypt one folder only. I use MacFUSE with EncFS for that.

----

Overall, I suggest browsing around sites like http://www.macupdate.com/ to see what's available. Remember that there's also a huge amount of Open Source/Linux software which runs on Mac OS X, so check their project pages or google around to see if there's a Mac binary available if an OSS project catches your eye.
 
I use Wireshark in replacement of Ethereal.
Cyberduck will work for FTP. I don't like it much though to be honest. If you don't mind forking out money, Transmit might be the way to go.

Just a few observations:

There is no equivalent to UltraEdit on the Mac. There are some nice text editors out there, but nothing really compares. You can get close with TextWrangler, but it still lacks some of the features I loved with Ultraedit.

Mac also gets the big shaft with instant messengers. iChat is decent if all your buddies happen to use AOL. The alternatives are all dumbed down or in perma-beta status. Adium is decent, but it's sent messages to the wrong people on a few occasions (showed as going to one contact on my screen, but actually went to another one entirely). I REALLY can't have that happening.

Also, since OS X is built on Unix, it has SSH built in. Because of that, it seems no one cares to build a decent SSH client equivalent to what windows has. To be fair to iTerm, I have not tried it.

And of course, your results may vary...
 
Azureus is the closest you'll get to µTorrent functionality on OS X. I use version 2.5.0.4; accepted at all public and private sites.
 
Journler

Journler is a pretty neat Journal application. It's password protected, although there IS a way around it if you happen to know how the program works, but it should still be sufficient. You can even drag and drop internet links into a "drop" folder, and they will import into the application. It has smart folders and all kinds of stuff. Pretty cool. You should have her check it out.
 
winzip: stuffit sucks-get away, the unarchiver chokes on big files. "UnrarX" is the alternative if unarchiver chokes.

instead of divx codecs get VLC player, it handles files better than quicktime if you ask me
 
*best file compression tool for OS X?
Click to expand...

Stuffit.

*awesome text editor, great for debugging...OS X equivalent?
Click to expand...

eMacs or BBEdit.

* GoogleTalk - Seeing as google hasn't released an Mac version. Is there an alternative?
Click to expand...

AdiumX

* Process Explorer - awesome for seeing every process running under windows. Is there an equivalent for OS X?
Click to expand...

Activity Monitor utility (comes with OS X), or run top in Terminal.

* Nero 6 - best cd/dvd burning app for OS X?
Click to expand...

Toast.

* Smart FTP - best FTP app for OS X?
Click to expand...

Transmit.

* TCP View - GUI netstat for Windows. Similar app for OS X to see all network connections?
Click to expand...

LittleSnitch (maybe?)

* TeraTerm Pro - Terminal emulation software (telnet, etc)
Click to expand...

Terminal.

* DVDShrink - best tool for ripping/converting DVD's on OS X?
Click to expand...

Handbrake.

* Utorrent - best bittorrent client for OS X?
Click to expand...

Vuze or XTorrent.
 
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