What applications shall I install on my new macbook?

[aoaaron]

Can someone please suggest me must have programs for MBP?

I need programs which can:
1) switch to windows quickly when needed
2) poker playing software and possibly poker tracking software
3) download manager? by this i don't mean something to show me whats downloading and not but on my university page, we have about 20 links which you need to right click and save as... is there a way to select them all at once on a mac?
4) pdf combiner to combine my pdfs
5) office software - at uni i use microsoft office, is pages etc. good enough or shall i buy office for better compatability?
6) calculator/notepad widget
7) i love windows future of dragging folders to sides of the screen so they resize to half the screen? any ways to do this on the mac?
8) file management is still a worry for me. i dont understand it. on windows, i have 5 very easily accessible harddrives from my taskbar: documents/videos/music/pictures/work/dropbox... is this possible on the mac? i use lots of subdfolders etc.

also im a medical student so any useful apps people can reccomend?

anything else you can reccomend? thanks!

 

[simsaladimbamba]

1. Command (⌘)+TAB or Exposé + Spaces (all built into Mac OS X)
4. Preview can do that, again built into Mac OS X
5. MS Office for better compatibility, but Pages will do fine
6. Open Dashboard via the F4 key and look for the little + on the bottom left to add widgets you like. Or use Stickies and Calculator in your Applications folder.

Helpful Information for Any Mac User by GGJstudios​

 

[Jolly Giant]

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[exegete77]

Can someone please suggest me must have programs for MBP?

I need programs which can:
1) switch to windows quickly when needed
2) poker playing software and possibly poker tracking software
3) download manager? by this i don't mean something to show me whats downloading and not but on my university page, we have about 20 links which you need to right click and save as... is there a way to select them all at once on a mac?
4) pdf combiner to combine my pdfs
5) office software - at uni i use microsoft office, is pages etc. good enough or shall i buy office for better compatability?
6) calculator/notepad widget
7) i love windows future of dragging folders to sides of the screen so they resize to half the screen? any ways to do this on the mac?
8) file management is still a worry for me. i dont understand it. on windows, i have 5 very easily accessible harddrives from my taskbar: documents/videos/music/pictures/work/dropbox... is this possible on the mac? i use lots of subdfolders etc.

1) switch to windows quickly when needed:

I use Witch

4) pdf combiner to combine my pdfs:

If you need more, this one is free: Combine PDFs

5) office software - at uni i use microsoft office, is pages etc. good enough or shall i buy office for better compatability?

That depends. I had used MS Office for many years as a power user. With a job change, I still get Office documents, but I do not use MS Office nor Pages. I have found that NeoOffice/Symphony/LibreOffice/OpenOffice sufficient for my needs to exchange files.

8) file management is still a worry for me. i dont understand it. on windows, i have 5 very easily accessible harddrives from my taskbar: documents/videos/music/pictures/work/dropbox... is this possible on the mac? i use lots of subdfolders etc.

On the Dock, you have a button for Finder. The view can be adjusted so that you can see every device installed; look at the top of the Finder window and you will see four buttons. Click each to see the differences in views. Most likely the third button will help you the most.

I find that the Mac organization and Finder is better (for ease of use and access) than anything on the Windows side, having used everything from Windows 3.1 up to Windows 7. But this is strictly personal opinion. YMMV.

I recently purchased (greatly reduced price!) TotalFinder and find it even better for control, access, and ease of use.

And you can check out Quay, which gives even more options for stacking on the Dock.

 

[dj-anon]

2. I use Full Tilt Poker for online poker, their mac version is great.
5. Try NeoOffice for a couple of weeks, then investigate exactly what iWork and Office for Mac do and make a choice.
6. Calculator + TextEdit/Stickies or use the dashboard and click on the + icon to manage widgets.
8. Finder is extremely powerful, you will have to learn it.

On top of that I'd recommend the following apps:

Evernote - full featured note management ala OneNote.
Cinematica - Video clip manager, video library ala itunes.
Flip4Mac - Makes OS X and lots of apps compatible with wma/wmv.
MPlayer OSX Extended - better than VLC.
StuffIt Expander - the only thing you need if you only need decompression.
Perian - Makes quicktime compatible with mkv and many other formats.
xACT - audio format converter.
Keychain - built-in password manager.

Remember that the App Store and macupdate are you friends when it comes to finding software for mac.