Mac ReviewCast
March Madness of Freeware for the Mac
by Tim Verpoorten
We've been getting bombarded with stories in the press about all the Mac viruses and worms, well if you remember last week, Robert Pritchett and Jeff Powell and I all talked about the overblown coverage that press and bloggers who either have an ax to grind against Mac users or are too ignorant to really understand what these threats are and what they can do. The two worms that were released in February are simple and easy to deal with, just update your Mac OS X version via your software update option in system preferences, and do not open attachments to emails. We also had a vulnerability in Safari show up last week. Robert and I talked about the freeware program called ClamXav found at www.clamxav.com, which can scan your system for any Worms or Trojans that may have snuck onto your Mac, and this week, Unsanity software, makers of some great Application Enhancer and haxies for the Mac came out with another haxie that I wanted to talk about;
Paranoid Android
http://www.unsanity.com/haxies/pa
A vulnerability in Apple's Mac OS X results in a potential situation in which a malicious person could execute arbitrary commands on your machine through safari. This vulnerability involves the use of URL "schemes". These are the part of a web address that specifies what program should be used to handle the address. Paranoid Android can protect you from this potential vulnerability until Apple makes an official fix available. It does this by watching the URL schemes that are requested and delaying them until you've had a chance to say whether you'd like to proceed or not. If you know that the url that's being loaded is legit, go ahead, but if it looks suspicious, Paranoid Android gives you an opportunity to cancel it. A further vulnerability in the way Mac OS X handles strong document bindings can lead to documents opening in a different application when opening a document causes an application to launch. This can lead to an arbitrary execution of code. Paranoid Android has been updated to address this new vulnerability. If the application that will be launched is not the one you expected to be launched, Paranoid Android gives you an opportunity to open the document in the default application for the file type. Until Apple makes an official fix for safari available, Paranoid Android can help protect you.
The next program I want to tell you about is called;
Pastor
If you read our www.Surfbits.com blog, which you all should be doing religiously... you'll remember Jeff Powell telling you about YoJimbo from BareBones software. Pastor is similar to that. Pastor is a tool to store all your passwords, website logins, program serial numbers, etc. RC4-encrypted and password-protected. With built-in password generator. It's simple, beautifully designed and totally Mac. Check it out for yourself and make your online experience a bit more secure.
On the subject of security, let's look at a program called;
Espionage
http://www.mindquirk.com/apps/espionage/index.htm
This is a simple little program to code your conversations with friends. Just write your text into the program and convert it to unreadable cipher. The new version has the capabilities of placing your cipher directly into iChat. This app isn't a professional encryption program like PGP, it's just a simple cipher that can be translated with anyone using espionage.
Let's change speeds and look at an application for the TV watching listeners out there;
MacProgramGuide
http://www.coolmacsoftware.com/mpgmain.html
If you're looking for a program guide for your Mac-based Home Theater, well look no further. MacProgramGuide harnesses the power of Web Services and the Internet to provide program schedules, episode, cast and crew information. MacProgramGuide provides search capabilities to allow you to find out when your favorite shows or movies are on. MacProgramGuide presents data using a familiar grid style interface. If you need a TV guide for your Mac, check this out.
SoundSource
is a freeware app from our friends at Rogue Amoeba software. You can find them at www.rogueamoeba.com and they are the developers for such topnotch Apple apps like Audio Hijack, Airfoil, and nice cast. Like all great Mac software developers, they give Mac users freeware that is unique and functional. Besides the Soundsource application, Rogue Amoeba also gives us Linein, which you can use to play sound coming in through a microphone or any other device plugged in to your Sound In port, just as was once available with OS 9's "Play input through output device" option. MemoryCell, which gives you a quick menu list of the ram that's being used for each application running. Also Detour, which allows you to switch to different audio output devices and lower the volume of certain applications relative to others. So you see that many of the great shareware companies in the Mac family are also great freeware developers for the community.
Here's another one that you may want to check out;
Sound Menu
http://www.aspirine.li/public/softwareup.php?ID=1
Sound Menu allows you to switch your default audio input and output. All available (and only available) audio inputs and outputs are listed. Supports every sound card, USB card, USB audio gadget which is supported by Mac OS X in system preferences. Mute and system sound option are present. It works off the menu and is as handy as any Audio switching programs I've seen.
SizzlingKeys
SizzlingKeys allows you to control iTunes with keyboard shortcuts from any application your in at the time. iTunes is the best music player out there, but don't you wish you could control it without interrupting your task at hand? Now you can. Control iTunes. Whether it's to pause the player, adjust the volume, skip a track or rate a song, you can do all that and more with simple customizable keystrokes. Also it's great to see what's playing. Why bring up iTunes just to see what track is playing? SizzlingKeys features a floating window that shows you the current song name, artist and more. Place it anywhere you wish on the screen by simply dragging it. SizzlingKeys let's you Control iTunes, Rate Songs, Select a playlist, Search for Songs, and control your current song all without bringing up the iTunes application.
1001
1001 is a desktop client to be used in conjunction with Flickr, the online photo-sharing website. 1001 not only uploads photos to your Flickr account, it notifies you anytime new photos from either your contacts, everyone, or your favorite tags are uploaded. 1001 allows you to step into the stream of photos passing through Flickr and to quickly see what's new at the moment. Just run the app in the background and if triggered, 1001 pops up a small unobtrusive window to notify you of new photos. 1001 comes with a Flickr screensaver that will incrementally display the latest image from Flickr. You do not need to have 1001 installed to use this screensaver.
No Gravity
http://www.realtech-vr.com/nogravity
I loved the computer game series Wing Commander, played them all and even had guts enough to see the movie at the theaters. No Gravity is a space shooter in 3D ' a la Wing Commander'. The player is controlling a space ship view from the first person. In each mission, the player need to accomplish some objectives, like shoot and destroys enemy ships or base, escorting some ships, clearing mine field, etc. No Gravity invites you to a fantastic and futuristic universe made of five intergalactic worlds. An arcade type game with great playability, where it is easy to plunge into space battles against spacefighters, space stations and more! Fifty-five hard hitting missions plus ten training exercises will help you to enter this real time textured 3D environment. Missions set not only in deep space, but also inside enemy structures will have you patrolling high risk sectors, on reconnaissance in enemy space, escorting friendly ships or defending your space stations and even sneaking in to sabotage enemy weapons. No Gravity is a must check out game for any arcade shooters out there.
Alarm Clock
http://www.robbiehanson.com/alarmclock/index.html
This handy little application runs unobtrusively in the status bar so it won't get in the way and it won't take up space in the dock. Use it to set as many alarms as needed, either one-time alarms or repeating alarms. Then choose anything in the iTunes library to wake to: songs, playlists, even radio stations. The application takes care of the rest, even waking the computer from sleep if needed. When it's this simple, why even bother with older alarm clocks? With this little application you can wake up to the sounds you want. You can configure your snooze duration to the length you want. You can even increase/decrease your snooze time right from the alarm window! And, if waking up to blaring alarms in the morning isn't your cup of tea, there's an "easy wake" option which will gradually increase the system volume over time. And even this is configurable for you!
Esperance DV
http://www.mparrot.net/index.php?page=freewares&lang=en
Esperance DV is a module for System Preferences making a RamDisk. A RamDisk is the use of a part of read-write memory (RAM) as a hard disk. It has the option to re-mount the RAM disk on login, which is great, and also shows up in /Volumes, which is also great.
Write performance is stunning, as high as 500 MB/sec on a
dual-2GHz G5. Read performance is also much faster than your standard disk, at
around 240 MB/sec on the same G5.
Snail Mail
http://nixanz.com/products/snailmail/README.html
Snail Mail is an envelope addressing and printing application which interacts directly with the Address Book database in Mac OS X 10.3 or higher. Its primary function is to quickly address and print single or multiple envelopes based on entries in the Mac OS X Address Book database, but it also allows ad-hoc manual entry of addresses directly onto the envelope. Batches of envelopes can be based on Address Book groups, or ad-hoc lists selections of addresses. Snail Mail can print barcodes for more efficient mail handling.
TrailRunner
http://www.trailrunnerx.com/english.html
This is a great program for all you joggers or hikers or walkers out there.
If you ever asked yourself how long your workout routes are and what route you should choose for this evening - then TrailRunner should be your training-partner. A list of features include:
* Geographic display of your workout area.
* Plan routes interactively.
* Collect routes.
* Route description and direction signs at crossings.
* Timed-checkpoints according to your pace.
* Rate your favorite tracks.
* Plan routes automatically with target distance and as many favorite tracks as possible.
* Export route descriptions onto your iPod as Notes-Text or NanoMap-Photos
* Collect your workout data in a Diary.
* Send to and exchange routes with friends and workout partners.
* Import GPX-Tracklists from GPS-units.
SyncTunes
http://www.nesfield.co.uk/synctunes/index.html
SyncTunes copies tracks and podcasts from iTunes to a mounted volume (e.g. such as a SD card in a card reader, or a PDA's expansion card using Missing Sync). In short, many people with a Mac, iTunes and a PDA or phone with audio playback capability, or non-iPod music player. From user reports, SyncTunes transfers files that work with Palm PDAs, Sony PSP, Sony Ericsson K750/P910/W800i, no-brand MP3 player. It is probably compatible with other audio players too, except iPods which have a special database file.
ViJournal Lite
http://freespace.virgin.net/jeremy.dronfield/skoobysoft/vijournal/lite.html
viJournal Lite is
a free lightweight version of viJournal. It's designed as an analogue of the good old-fashioned page-a-day
bound diary - the kind you buy in a stationer's. You write your entries under
dated headers and save them collectively by month and year. viJournal has many powerful features, such as a parallel
notepad, export to HTML and PDF, file encryption, password protection. All
these tools have been added in such a way that they do not clutter the
interface or detract from the original purpose of having viJournal work like a traditional bound diary
OKFont
http://www.supercustomized.com/
If you ask most graphic artists about their Mac OS X problems they will more than likely tell you that they either have font problems or permission problems. What you may not know is that occasionally permission issues come together with your fonts to give you a new set of problems from the combination. The purpose of OKFont is to quickly unlock and change the permissions of font files (and only font files) so that they are easily accessible for all programs and users on your system.
VodCaster
http://www.twocanoes.com/vodcaster/
Vodcaster allows you to quickly drag-and-drop audio and video files, and create podcasts and vodcasts to share. Whether you want to put your Podcasts on your own webserver, add them to the iTunes Music Store Podcast Directory, or some other service, VODcaster allows you to enter in all the important information without having to know XML. If you just want to record your podcast and not worry about all the other coding you need to do, this is a great piece of software for you. And it's free.
NMS
http://slicedapple.ath.cx/nmsutility.html
If you live on your laptop, a huge pet peeve is probably laptop Insomnia. It has plagued many Apple laptop users, even before Mac OS X (although sleeping then was so unstable it was best to avoid it). Slowly (or not so slowly) your system would loose the ability to sleep automatically, although sleep could usually be restored with lots work consisting of some combination of permissions repairs, combo-udpate re-installs, Open Firmware and/or power manager resets, or even dissassembly to remove the PRAM battery. It is a pain, sleep always eventually failed again, and invariably progressed to the point where it could not be fixed without a wipe and reinstall. Whats worse is if you have systems that are so not-sleepy that they run the battery totally dead and then turn off the slow-die way which quickly kills a $100 battery.
NMS is a utility to force system sleep at a set idle time or on Screen Saver activation. It can follow Energy Savers settings in an "install and forget" way or operate completely independently.
Cashbox
http://wbyoung.ambitiouslemon.com/cashbox/
Cashbox was designed to be a quick and simple to use application for managing personal finances. As it has evolved, it has become more feature packed while keeping with the original goal of simplicity. Today Cashbox's robust feature set includes: The ability to import files in the Quicken Interchange Format (QIF) so you can easily import information obtained from online bank accounts or other sources. Need your account information on paper? Cashbox can now print out your reports. Cashbox can also search accounts, generate reports, and reconcile accounts. One little bit of info for you, the developer of Cashbox is also the same one that gave us Senuti which is iTunes spelled backwards and the best freeware solution for placing your ipod songs into your computer's iTunes. It shows that good Mac software developers keep creating good Mac software.
iBackup
http://www.grapefruit.ch/iBackup
iBackup is a simple to use backup/restore utility for scheduled backups of files, folders, applications and your system preferences like the dock, desktop picture, time settings, firewall, bluetooth and system applications like AddressBook, Mail, Stickies, iChat, iTunes and more. You can edit these preferences settings and add your own. This is version 4.1.4 of the program.
Monolingual
http://monolingual.sourceforge.net
Do you have a Mac that has a hard drive ready to burst? Monolingual is a program for removing unnecessary language resources from Mac OS X, in order to reclaim several hundred megabytes of disk space. It requires at least Mac OS X 10.3.9 (Panther) and also works on Mac OS X 10.4 (Tiger). One caveat, make certain you never remove the English files or their subsets, it will cause your OSX to become inoperable.
NeoOffice
http://www.planamesa.com/neojava/en/index.php
NeoOffice is a fully-featured set of office applications (including word processing, spreadsheet, presentation, and drawing programs) for Mac OS X. Based on the OpenOffice.org office suite, NeoOffice has integrated dozens of native Mac features and can import, edit, and exchange files with other popular office programs such as Microsoft Office. Released as free, open-source software under the GNU General Public License (GPL), NeoOffice is fully functional and stable enough for everyday use. The software is actively developed, so improvements and small updates are made available on a regular basis.
Seamonkey
http://www.mozilla.org/projects/seamonkey/
This open source application, available as a free download from its mozilla.org-hosted website, features a state-of-the-art web browser and powerful email client, as well as a WYSIWYG web page composer and a feature-rich IRC chat client. For web developers, mozilla.org's DOM inspector and JavaScript debugger tools are included as well. SeaMonkey 1.0 is one of the most complete, powerful, and secure internet software packages available today. SeaMonkey comes with the the look and feel familiar to users of its predecessors, the Mozilla Application Suite and Netscape Communicator packages, but adds many new features as well as back-end changes that improve security, stability and performance. Some highlights are: drag&drop reordering of tabs, phishing e-mail detection, support for a single shared inbox when using multiple accounts, and support for Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG).
ScummVM
Do you have any old computer games that won't play on
your new Macs? Well this may help, ScummVM is a program which allows you to run certain classic graphical point-and-click
adventure games, provided you already have their data files. The clever part
about this: ScummVM just replaces
the executables shipped with the game, allowing you to play them on systems for
which they were never designed! Some of these great old adventure games include
Monkey Island, Day of the Tentacle, Sam and Max and more LucasArts along with
Adventuresofts, Revolutions, and others. They keep adding games, so check out
the website and see if this program works for you.
CoconutWiFi
http://www.coconut-flavour.com/coconutwifi/index.html
This app displays a small aqua-bubble at the top of your screen in the menu, which indicates whether you're in range of a wireless network or not. The app also tells you if the wireless networks in your range are encrypted or open, so you won't miss the next open wireless network any more. It's simple and handy.
See you next month with our April List of Freeware!
