Apr 27 2009
Back to Basics Mac Freeware
Remember the good old days, when your Mac time was spent composing text documents and editing images? These days you can pass on the pricey image manipulation programs and expensive office suites.
This week we’ll look at a couple of the coolest freeware apps I’ve seen lately and a third that will banish old unused apps without a trace.
LiveQuartz is a fantastic image editing application. It supports layers and effects – which are rendered instantly. LiveQuartz also has powerful tools, including duplication, background eraser and gradient tools.
LiveQuartz supports a number of file formats and its effects include sharpen, blur and color adjust. All these features make this the most powerful free native image editor for the Mac.
After years of word-processor mediocrity, Pages has raised the bar. But, for quick editing (and for free) you can enjoy the fast, smooth interface of Bean. This word processor includes grown-up features like word count, auto-save and style options.
Bean imports and exports Word documents, stores natively in RTF and exports PDF. It also does tables and images. All this fun for 2 megabytes.
The previous to freebies should replace at least a few other apps on your Mac. But don’t just drag the app to the trash – at least until you’ve installed this preference pane. This system addition lives in System Preferences and kicks in when you trash an app.
Once the app hits the trash can, AppTrap kindly offers to delete all the system files associated with the to-be-trashed program – making your Mac a cleaner place.
Grab these two apps and clean house.
With the nearly scratch-proof glass face and metal back of your iPhone or iPod touch, you can probably get a long without a case, right?