When I first installed the OS X public beta in the fall of 2000, it
felt like watching The
Wizard of Oz for the first time and suddenly, like Dorothy,
emerging into a new land, where everything glowed in Technicolour - and
everything was very different.
With the release version the following spring, it was apparent that
Apple had listened to many of the criticisms made about the public
beta. The release version, while still different from the classic Mac
OS, was much more Mac-like than pre-release versions. The Apple Menu
was back in the left-hand corner and actually did things. There were
drive icons on the desktop by default. The Finder worked in ways that
were more comfortable for long-time Mac users.
Still, there's more that can be done to get the best of OS X's new
features without tossing out everything that worked well in previous
Mac environments. In last week's article, Alan's
Favorite Things, I wrote about several freeware and shareware
enhancements for OS X, adding (among other things) WindowShades
and the Application Switcher to the new interface. (Reader Tod Abbott
wrote to recommend ASM as a
free Application Switcher enhancement.)
Besides making OS X a little more (dare I say) Mac-like, it may also
be a relief to know that increasing numbers of favourite Mac
applications are showing up in OS X-native versions. This is true for
many of the big companies' products (Microsoft Office, most of Corel's
graphics products, some Adobe and Macromedia products), but it is also
the case for many of my favourite shareware and freeware
applications.
Some of my long-time favourites that have reappeared as OS
X-native:
GraphicConverter. The
title is more-modest sounding than this $30 German shareware gem
deserves. Far more than a mere file conversion program, this powerhouse
does most of what I need when working with graphics. It slices, it
dices.... Well, it resizes, changes colour depth, converts between a
huge of number of PC and Mac file formats, can be used with scanners,
and can be used with filters. It lacks Photoshop-like paint tools, but
for prepping graphics for print or the Web, it does everything I need
faster (and much cheaper) than Photoshop. This Carbonized version runs
under both OS X and OS 9.x. As with other GC updates, the
OS X version is free for anyone who has registered an older
version.
Eudora
Pro. OS X comes with Apple's Mail application, but I would
rather stick with Eudora, which I've been using since I first started
on the Internet around 1994 or so. Like several recent versions, Eudora
Pro 5.1 comes in several flavours, all from a single installation
version. Users can choose a full-featured free version with ads (but no
spyware), a lite (and still free) version without ads, or register for
the paid (US $40) version with all the features and no ads. The Pro
versions include support for multiple email accounts and powerful, but
easy-to-use, filters, among many other features. Like GraphicConverter,
the new Carbonized version runs both as a native OS X application,
and under OS 9 as well, but there's a hitch.
By default, Eudora (running under OS 9) wants to store mail (etc) in
a Eudora Folder inside a Documents folder. Under OS X, it wants to
use the Documents folder that's inside each user's named folder inside
OS X's Users folder. As a result, on my system at least, I get
different sets of saved mail and settings when I run Eudora under
OS 9 and OS X. (Yes, there's probably a work-around for this
- and if you know what it is, please let me know!)
Glider Pro
demo. Games are also coming out in native OS X versions. A
mere 237 KB download updates the cavemen in cars game from Pangea, for example, while the
Mac-classic no-frills Klondike
Solitaire was an early addition to the OS X download list. I
first came across Casady and Greene's addictive Glider in a black and
white version for compact Macs. Over time, it gained colour while still
keeping its basic premise: Users maneuver a paper airplane through a
series of rooms in a house. You can buy the full product for US$20, but
the downloadable demo is free and lots of fun in its own right, even
without killing anyone.
All of these, and lots of other programs, can be downloaded from
Apple's Mac OS X
download page. OS X users have an instant link hard-wired into
the non-customizable blue Apple Menu: click on "Get Mac OS
softwareÖ" and explore. (If you want a little utility to allow you
to customize that blue Apple Menu, check out Unsanity's FruitMenu - a
bargain at $7.)
You can have OS X and the best shareware of the Mac's past, too.
is a Vancouver
(BC, Canada) computer-using elementary school teacher and technology
journalist. He publishes two regular columns in Business in Vancouver,
a local newsweekly. These and his other writing are available on his
website, www.zisman.ca. He also
writes Mac2Windows for Low End Mac.
