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The Apps I Use

Entry 1782, on 2016-04-02 at 17:58:33 (Rating 2, Computers)

I work in IT doing general computer support and web programming (and anything else to do with Macs and other Apple stuff). Sometimes when looking at problems my clients are having it is suggested I am a bit negative about the programs they are using and have been asked: well if you don't like (whatever program is under discussion, usually Microsoft Word) what do you use instead?

That's a good question and I thought I might answer it here. My main computer is a 15 inch i7 MacBook Pro with a high resolution screen, an SSD, and 16G of RAM, so it's a moderately high-spec machine but not outrageously so. The programs I use could be used by almost anyone else with a fairly modern computer - as long as it's a Mac, of course.

The programs I use most are in my Dock so to answer the question of what my alternative apps are I'll just list all the stuff in the Dock and briefly say why they're there...

General System Tools

Finder. This is Apple's program which creates the desktop environment for file management. It is a standard part of the system so it might seem pointless listing it here, but there was a long period of time when I did use an alternative called "Path Finder". That is a great app (like the Finder on steroids) but in the end it just didn't offer enough extra to replace the good old Finder.

Helium. This is a small app which displays a web page in a floating window. On my Mac I have the Dock and menu bar hidden so I created a small web based app (using PHP) to display the information which would normally be in those two locations (plus a bit more) such as battery level, wifi signal strength, my public IP address, etc.

Astrill. This is a VPN service I use when I want to maintain privacy or make it look like I am actually in another country. I won't say anything more about this!

Cisco Secure Client. This is the VPN service I use at work.

Server. This is Apple's server suite which includes services such as web serving, file sharing, and many others.

Parallels. Sometimes I need to run Windows apps (I estimate about 10 minutes per month) just to check that my web-based programs work OK on Windows. Apart from this I have no need for Windows at all. In fact I spend about 10 times as much time maintaining it as I do using it!

Remote Desktop. This is Apple's remote management service which allows me to take control of other computers screens, install new software, get status reports, etc. I use it a lot to do remote control of other people's Macs to help with problems and to monitor and maintain remote servers.

Productivity Apps

Notes. This is Apple's notebook app which automatically syncs with my iPhone and iPad. I keep all sorts of temporary information here which needs to be accessible from all the Apple devices I use. For example, I might write a note here on the iPad about a wine I am trying and copy the synced version into the main database on my laptop later.

Maps. I use Apple's map program more than Google Maps, although I do use the Google street-view feature sometimes so I do have both installed.

Reminders. I use this to keep track of my list of things to do. It syncs across all of my devices.

Calendar. I have several calendars, mostly on Apple's iCloud service, where I keep track of my tasks for the day. These also sync across all devices so I get reminders on my iPhone for appointments entered on the laptop.

Contacts. I use Apple's address book program synced to other devices through iCloud for keeping all my contact information. I have photos for most of the people in the list so I see a picture of the person calling, emailing, or messaging me on all my devices.

Programming Apps

Skim. This is a nice PDF viewing program which I use to read documentation files. It has some useful features but the main reason I use it as an alternative to Apple's Preview program is just to keep the documentation in a separate place from all the other PDFs I work with.

Script Editor. I use AppleScript (Apple's scripting language) quite a lot of small tasks on my computer (connecting to servers, launching apps, etc) as well as for more sophisticated applications I have created to automate processes on servers.

XCode. This is Apple's program development environment. I'm not doing any "real" programming at the moment but I have used this in the past, and it has useful utility tools as well.

FileMaker Pro 11. I have to maintain this older version of FileMaker to open older databases I have created and not moved to the newer version yet.

FileMaker Pro 14. If I am creating a serious database I prefer the MySQL/PHP/Apache environment but I quite like FileMaker for creating simpler desktop databases.

BBEdit. This is my main text editor for programming. It has excellent syntax colouring, keyword autocomplete, multiple file handling, and search and replace facilities. I also use the GREP system in this program to do complicated text processing.

Safari. Apple's web browser is the one I use for testing and debugging my web sites and apps. It has good analysis tools and follows standards well so it is well suited to this.

Terminal. My favourite app! The command line is the "killer app" for the Mac. I love the Mac's graphical user interface but I also like getting behind the scenes and using all the power of Unix, including Apache, MySQL, PHP, and shell scripts.

Internet Apps

NetNewsWire. This is an RSS viewer. I don't tend to use RSS feeds as a source of information much, but I use this to check that the feeds I create for my blog, etc all work OK.

Chrome. I use Google's browser for most of my web browsing. I like it because it is fast and reliable and handles lots of tabs open simultaneously (I just checked and I currently have 33 tabs).

Messages. This is Apple's messaging app which syncs with my iPhone and iPad so I can send and receive text messages from my computer (also phone calls and iMessages).

Mail. Apple's Mail program has a few faults but overall it is very clean and fast. I check 8 email accounts which I use for different reasons here: my main Apple account on iCloud, my work Exchange account, and 6 GMail accounts I use for special purposes. I do have a few sync problems with some of my Google accounts but just quitting Mail and restarting it (a few seconds) usually clears them.

Skype. I don't use Skype much but occasionally people want to communicate with me this way so I keep it ready. BTW, I don't count this as a real Microsoft program (see below).

Media Apps

iTunes. I think we all admit that iTunes has its faults but once you get over the confusing user interface it can do a lot and there really isn't a realistic alternative for managing iPhones, etc.

Photos. Apple's photo storage app is simple but fast, reliable and efficient. I just use it to store and display photos because I do my photo processing in more powerful apps before adding the photo to my library. Photos also syncs my photos between my computer, iPad, and iPhone through iCloud.

General Purpose Apps

Dictionary. Apple's dictionary program looks up multiple dictionaries as well as Wikipedia. I have over 30 dictionaries installed but usually only have about 6 active. It also integrates automatically with most programs to allow word lookup from anywhere.

TextWrangler. This is a free, slightly scaled down version of the BBEdit text editor I mentioned above. I use it to open general text files separately from my programming files.

Preview. Apple's PDF app is surprisingly capable and I use it instead of Adobe's clunky Adobe Reader and Acrobat. It does almost everything most users need and is really reliable and easy to use.

Pixelmator. I am a big photography fan do I need a good photo editing program. I have used Photoshop since the first version was released, but I now find Adobe apps clumsy and slow, and I don't like their licensing. So I use Pixelmator instead. It does most of what Photoshop can do, but because it is designed specifically for the Mac it is much nicer to use.

Pages. I use Apple's Pages for word processing. It is so nice to use a word processor which works reliably, and quickly, and fits in with the rest of the system. I would never go back to Microsoft Word which I believe is probably the single worst program ever written (because of the frustration it causes for so many users).

Numbers. Of all the Microsoft programs I have used Excel is probably the one I find most useful. But, while it is quite powerful, it is still horrible from a user interface perspective so I usually use Apple's Numbers app instead.

Keynote. Using Apple's Keynote instead of PowerPoint is such a luxury. I know it will work reliably, that movies will play, and that graphics will always display. Plus it has a much nicer user interface and works better with the rest of the system.

So that's it. Notice that I am Microsoft free (apart from Skype) and Adobe free. I do still have Office and Creative Suite installed but I almost never use them (really only to help other people who use them and have problems). This is partly political (I don't like big corporations) and partly practical (I like elegant, well designed software). And yes, I do know that Apple is a big (evil?) corporation but I can't really work in IT without teaming up with one corporation (Microsoft, Adobe, Apple, Google, Oracle, etc) so I guess at least Apple is the best choice out of all of them.

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