Freeloader Friday Download of the Week

Apr 27 2009

Shiira, iBackup and More

Shiira

Yes, I know, another web browser? I’m a firm believer that there is a web browser for every style of user. Shiira builds some interesting and useful features into a clean interface.

shirra Shiira, iBackup and More

Build on Web Kit, it uses Safari’s stable base. Unique features include sidebar management of RSS feeds, advanced download management, access to Safari and Firefox bookmarks and a sidebar page holder.

iBackup

Like browsers, there are plenty f OS X backup solutions. But this one excels in its user friendliness. While applications like Carbon Copy Cloner are great at making full bootable backups, iBackup goes a different route.

ibackup Shiira, iBackup and More

This free backup application backs files up to another location (with support for remote servers), but the refreshing approach to selecting what you back up is what makes it great. iBackup lets you select system and application prefs, pictures, movies, music and more by the folder or file. With iBackup, it is easy to be selective in what you back up and restore – and you are saved from having to root around for preference files.

Gcal.app

This is an ultra simple way to directly access Google Calendar with all its AJAX goodness, outside your browser. Gcal is basically nothing more than a dedicated, streamlined browser that gets you straight to your calendar.

gcal Shiira, iBackup and More

That’s my list for this week. I’ll be back again with more of the Mac’s best free software next week.

Brian

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Apr 27 2009

Attack of the Firefox Clones

Firefox clones share the rendering engine and extensions support of Mozilla’s flagship browser. So, rather than load up and slow down your Firefox with every feature on the web, you can spread your browsing over multiple browsers.

The Clones:

Netscape 9 beta

Back to where we started: the new Netscape browser is a Firefox clone with a few added features.

netscapeb Attack of the Firefox Clones

There are Netscape.com-specific features like posting to Netscape’s version of dig and interaction with your Netscape email. There’s also a cool mini-browser and link pane where you can stash items for reference later.

Flock

Flock has been around for a while, and integrates cool social media features like easy bookmark and photo sharing.

flockb Attack of the Firefox Clones

Flock makes a great dedicated blog-poster, with built in posting to multiple blog sites and systems. It also has a very nice feed reading interface.

Wyzo

This new kid on the block is a media-centric mutation of Firefox. Wyzo comes bundled with e BitTorrent client and a new look.

wyzob Attack of the Firefox Clones

Wyzo also has a defaulted media search page that makes searching for images and video easy. Combined with other media-centric extensions Wyzo could make a great media manager.

SeaMonkey

SeaMonkey is the extension of the legacy Internet Suite that started with Netscape Communicator. It shares a rendering engine with Firefox and supports many extensions.

seamonkeyb Attack of the Firefox Clones

The main appeal of SeaMonkey is the integration with a mail and chat client as well as an HTML editor.

With this collection of Firefox knock-offs, consider tailoring the browsers around function. You may want to dedicate a streamlined browser to editing TiddlyWiki files. Another you might want to outfit for Web Design with developer extensions like DOM Inspector and Web Developer tools. For your media browser, don’t forget the Scrapbook extension or a Fast Video Downloader.

Give your Firefox a break. There’s no reason to burden your primary browser when you can summon the clones to help.

Brian

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Apr 27 2009

Special Feature– ThinkFree Office

I hope this doesn’t invalidate all the work I’ve done in the name of free software. This week I’m going to feature a piece of software that is not free. However, I think you’ll find it hard for any freeloader to pass up.

I’d like to note here that I am in no way affiliated with ThinkFree, and my excitement for this software comes purely from the application itself. That out of the way, let’s get down to business.

What could be so good to distract me from my pursuit of free software? Well, picture a full office suite including word processing, spreadsheet and presentation software, all wrapped up nicely in one suite for $49. Now, imagine if it could read and write files in Microsoft Office’s format? That would be ThinkFree Office.

First off, I’d like to say what ThinkFree Office is not. Think free should not be confused with the open-source effort to subvert – er – replace Microsoft Office. This effort currently underway is called Open Office and is an extension of Sun’s free office suite. Also, ThinkFree is not AppleWorks. In my testing experience, ThinkFree at it’s worst is more compatible with Microsoft Office than Appleworks at its best. Not to pick on Apple, but Appleworks is a half-hearted office suite. Not so with ThinkFree. This is full fledged professional software.

thinkfree Special Feature ThinkFree Office

ThinkFree Office is a composite of three main applications, Write, Calc and Show. These work as Word, Excel and PowerPoint respectively. You’ll find much of the interface familiar.


I did mention that ThinkFree handles Microsoft Office files better than AppleWorks. To be more specific, ThinkFree opens, without breaking a sweat, Word, Excel and PowerPoint files. However there are limits to what ThinkFree can handle. These are roughly comparable to the format loss experienced when trading files between different versions of Office (ex: Word 98 to Word X).

word Special Feature ThinkFree Office

Specifically, Macros are lost in Excel, Highlighting and Data Merge formating are lost. But, even in its weakness, ThinkFree has a strength. When you open an Office document and ThinkFree Office encounters formating it can’t convert, it warns you. This way you at least know what you’re missing.

write Special Feature ThinkFree Office

Now, ThinkFree isn’t exclusive to the Mac. Since it is written in 100% Java it is fully compatible with Mac OS 9 as well as Windows. It also has the added ability to manage your files in an online “folder” to be accessed from multiple computers. A nice touch.

And, though this software is $49 (and is worth more), you can download a free 30 day evaluation version from ThinkFree’s website.

And you thought there wouldn’t be anything free today. Shame on you.

Brian

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