What this lawyer uses on the Mac

Following on from my recent post on my Windows XP setup and apps, here is a similar take on the Mac.

Stuff that is mostly the same as on Windows

1. Firefox, largely with the same Extensions as for XP

2. Evernote — has largely replaced Yojimbo for me, though that is largely for the portability between systems.

Mac-specific

1. DEVONThink Pro – this is not a million miles from Evernote, though it is vastly different in terms of searchability, organization and the ability to pick out strands and threads of thought. Where Evernote is 1-dimensional (and excellent), DT is more 3-D in approach (if I can put it that way).

2. Tinderbox – “Tinderbox stores and organizes your notes, plans, and ideas. It can help you analyze and understand them. And Tinderbox helps you share ideas through Web journals and web logs.” It’s an odd program in many ways, and takes a bit of getting used to, but it can be very useful in circumstances where nothing else will do. I’ve written about its practical applicability to, e.g., legal work here.

3. Skitch — how often do you want to post a picture on your site, or email it to someone? Often, if you’re me, and Skitch is easily the best clipper for this. Easy to resize graphics and has a handy drop-shadow tool as well. I’ve junked SnapzPro now.

4. Textmate — best text editor. I often use it to write html in Markdown, and the project management while not as good as BBEdit is sufficient for me.

5. TextExpander – like PhraseExpress for Mac, use it to trigger words, phrases, code etc. Indispensable.

6. PDFPen — from the same stable as TextExpander, it’s a useful tool for dealing with PDFs.

7. TaskPaper — Jesse Grosjean’s excellent, simple, lightweight task tracker. Fed up of all that GTD malarkey and faffage? Use TP. It has just enough in it to be very useful and enough NOT in it to stop you futzing with endless options and parameters.

8. Scrivener — bit of an oddball choice, this one, as it’s mostly designed for writing books, screenplays and so on. But I found it’s writing interface excellent for doing away with distractions (full screen, nothing extraneous) and its research are is good for jotting down notes and collating source material. “Literature & Latte is not a software company… [It] is one guy with lofty writerly ambitions, who has written a piece of software designed to aid in the process of writing”. And a great job he’s done of it, too.

9. Quicksilver or Launchbar — get to anything on your machine or a website you’ve visited in a simple Command+Space. Once you’ve used it’s almost impossible to go back to not having it installed. I was a longtime QS fan but I’ve recently switched over to LB which, while it’s paid for, seems more robust.

10. 1password – because life’s too short to spend it trying to remember all those pesky passwords. I’ve only recently come to this, but it quickly proved invaluable.

11. SuperDuper — top-notch and easy backup app. Don’t leave home without installing it. I also use ChronoSync, but less so now. However, their new v4 looks good.

12. AppZapper — easily get rid of all those apps and their attendant doo-dads that you tried out but didn’t like. Makes a great noise, too!

13. Transmit — the Mac king of ftp apps. Had it for ages and wouldn’t be without it. Very simple, very secure, very reriabrl (nod to VW Golf ads of early 80s)

14. CSSEdit — Mac OSX does not have many CSS editors. This is the best, and very good.

15. xScope – you may not need this app very often, but when you do, I doubt you will find anything to match it. What is it? “a powerful set of tools that are ideal for measuring, aligning and inspecting on-screen graphics and layouts”. Very useful for making minute adjustments to website designs.

I’ll think of more, I’m sure, though everyone has their favourites and I’m sure there are alternatives to many of these.