Keynote 2 Keynote

Adium: This is “THE” instant messenger client for the Mac. Although iChat its nice, Adium allows you to communicate through all of the major IM services. AOL IM, Jabber, MSN Messenger, Yahoo! Messenger, ICQ, .Mac, and Google Talk are all supported by Adium. (free)

Photoshop CS2: Photoshop is the defacto in terms of image editing, processing, and creation. If you’re serious about producing stunning images or want the power of a full featured image editor look no further. With layers, channels, action scripts, and filters you have all the tools to unleash your creativity.

Cyberduck: Occasional to regular FTP use can be handled by this full featured FTP client. I use Cyberduck everyday while working on this site and it suits my needs just fine. It offers secure transfers through multiple protocols, bookmarked servers, external file editing, and server/host synchronization. (free)

Firefox: I don’t know why, but I just can’t get used to Safari. Maybe its because I come from the Windows world and have just gotten used to Firefox. I just love the all the great plugins that are available for Firefox. (free)

Google Earth: Ever wanted to visit the Colosseum in Rome, or Ayers Rock in the Australian outback but don’t have the time/money to get away? Nows your chance. Google Earth provides fairly high quality satellite images that span the globe. This tool also gives you information about roads, restaurants, and even 3D models of buildings. (free)

iEatBrainz: Everyone has those mp3 files that have no ID3 tag information and the filename doesn’t provide any clues either. Enter iEatBrainz. By looking at the audio fingerprint of music files iEatBrainz is able to determine the artist, track name, album and more. If you’ve been struggling to tag your mp3’s give this tool a shot, it’ll save you loads of time. (free) My Full Review

ImageWell: Although Photoshop is full featured and can do just about everything, for the smallest of tasks its a bit overboard. When all I want to do is crop an image or compress it a bit I use ImageWell. Its quick and does the trick. (free)

iStumbler: I use iStumbler to collect information about the WiFi networks in my area. It tells you the MAC addresses, channel, signal, and noise information about any access point. If you have to do any site surveys or troubleshooting iStumbler will come in handy. (free)

Keyword Manager: One of the readers of this blog recommended this iPhoto plugin to me. Its hard to put into words how much time Keyword Manager has saved me. I was able to quickly add keywords to my photos. This plugin even allows you to set up hierarchies of keywords. This allows you to do things like add city, state, and country tags all at once.

Microsoft Officer 2004: Not much to say about Office that’ll be new to any of you. One thing thats important to note is that Office 2004 is not a universal binary, so it runs a bit slow. Supposedly the next version will natively support Intel processors, which will bring it up to speed.

Quicksilver: I have yet to master Quicksilver, and I doubt that I ever will since there are so many features. Using a few simply keystrokes you can open applications, email pictures, and move files. This is the most powerful launcher you’ll ever find. (free)

TextWrangler: While working with code one of the most important features of a text editor is syntax highlighting. TextWrangler not only highlights syntax but provides tabs for open files. I still don’t have much time under my belt with this application, but the more I use it the more I like it. (free)>

Transmission: Want to effortlessly download a torrent file? Install Transmission and never struggle with torrents again. Other than selective file downloading this application does everything I could want in terms of torrent transfers. (free)

WhatSize: You only have so much hard drive space. Its best to keep tabs on your available space before things get out of control. WhatSize informs you of exactly whats eating up that precious storage space. (free)

You Control: Tunes: Listening to iTunes while you work is pretty common. But nothing kills your productivity more than tabbing back and forth to iTunes to skip or repeat a song. You Control: Tunes places back, forward, pause, and play buttons in your menu bar. Even cooler is that it allows you to rate the currently playing track via the menu bar as well. (free) My Full Review

Show Desktop: If you’ve made the switch from the Windows world you might miss the ’show desktop’ button in the quicklaunch bar. Well this application mimics that. Throw Show Desktop in your dock, then simply click it to hide all applications and minimize all finder windows. (free)

iStatPro: If you’re into stats you’ll love iStatsPro. Literally any statistic you might want to know about your Mac is displayed in this widget. CPU, memory, hard drive, network, battery and temperature information is all displayed. (free)

RadMovieTimes:Need to find out when the latest blockbuster is playing at the cinaplex? Fire up your dashboard, select your theater, then tab through until you find your movie. This widget has saved me many visits to Fandango. (free)

TV Tracker: My cable TV package doesn’t include one of those user controllable TV guides. I only have the old school guide that you have to wait while it scrolls through all of the channels. With this widget however, I can surf the guide at my own leisure and even select which channels I want to appear in my personal guide. (free)

Image Shackle: A few days after getting my MBP my wife asked me how she could easily resize images to send to friends and family. The simplest solution I could find was Shackle. Just drag your photo onto this widget, select your size and click ‘Shackle’. The resized image will appear next to the original. (free)

ImageShack Dashboard Widget: To post images online to use in forums or comments this tool is amazing. Simple yet powerful. Just drag the image you want ImageShack to host onto the widget. You’ll then be provided with a link to the image that you can use as you see fit. (free)

Gmail: This widget allows me to see unread mail messages in my Gmail inbox strait from the dashboard. There are many similar widgets to be used with other email services. For Gmail this was the best that I found. (free)