STILL_SPARKLING  Adium is perhaps the single most famous, high-quality free app that makes Windows users gnash their teeth in envy. The praise it receives is richly deserved: it's been a stable, full-featured workhorse on most Mac users systems for years. Yes, video chat would be awesome, but from the steady pace of updates Adium receives, I know if this were possible, we'd already have it. It's still the best chat client on the Mac platform, imo.

Keeping that in mind, I'd like to offer a bit of constructive criticism:

1. The Adium homepage really needs an update. There's nothing "wrong" with it per se, but, considering the amount of traffic it must receive, it could use a refresh to make it more streamlined and user-friendly. A bit of color wouldn't hurt either.

2. The Wiki and videos and are nice, but most news users don't want to watch videos or plow through a wiki after installing a new app, they want to start using it right away. This is especially important for visual apps like Adium. A QuickStart guide with plenty of screenshots would be a helpful addition to the homepage.

3. The app itself could use a bit of a touch-up from a user interface standpoint. One of the most common features of any chat client is the ability to make the window(s) stay on top of other apps. In Adium, this is hidden under Preferences-->Advanced-->Messages-->Window Handling (uncheck "Hide While Adium Is In The Background). There are further, separate options for the Contacts list and the Status Window. Clunky and confusing. A simple solution is to use View or Window "Stay on Top".

4. The Xtras: one of the best things about Adium! The Xtras should be able to be browsed and installed from within the app, much like Unsanity's Shapeshifter. Those bozos from Unsanity may have cashed out and left their users in the lurch, but they did have an elegant way of browsing through and installing themes. I think that method is superior to the one Adium uses, where you have to click each individual item on the Xtras page to look at and/or install something. Failing that, add some javascript to the Xtras page so the user can hover over an image without clicking, to get a zoomed view of the contents.

Okay, I'm off to donate again. I really do love Adium and appreciate all the hard work that goes into it. Thanks, folks!  
(Version 1.3.7)

STILL_SPARKLING  I disagree, BillJacobs. The older comments are important to show the historical praise and complaints of the apps, as well as the developer's attitude toward responding to any bugs. People should have this info to help decide if they want to buy an app.

If someone is too dumb to look at the date and filter comments accordingly, that's their problem.  
(Version 2.1)

STILL_SPARKLING  ICONZ113, isn't there a bridge somewhere desperately in need of your trolling services?

We get it. You don't like Quicksilver. Congrats. Now move along and find something else to do with your much too abundant time.

The rest of us would like to see Quicksilver succeed and have grown-up things to discuss.  
(Version 1.0b56a7)

STILL_SPARKLING  Nice smooth update this time; no delays caused by Micromat's servers.

And a very timely update indeed because one of my internal drives decided to cr@p the bed this morning. TechTool Pro wasn't able to rebuild the drive (neither could DiskWarrior), but it at least warned me before the drive totally failed and I was able to rescue all of my files. The files included my iTunes library, which, even though I have a backup, would have been a pain to restore.

Thanks TechTool Pro (and MacUpdate for offering TTP in the bundle)!  
(Version 5.0.6)

STILL_SPARKLING  Sorry, I think your review is a bit too harsh. You're giving the entire O/S upgrade a low rating just because you can't get your printer to work? I understand your frustration, but everyone knows that HP printer drivers are cr@p -- on both Mac and Windows. If I were relying on an old (but still functional) printer as a necessary part of my workflow, I would not upgrade to a new O/S without personally verifying it works. Even if the test builds of Snow Leo claim compatibility, HP drivers are so notoriously buggy/finicky, you can never trust them for any length of time.

You have my sympathy though. Good thing you made a backup of your Leopard drive.  
(Version 10.6.1)

STILL_SPARKLING  Doesn't work for me. Crashed immediately after install, "quit unexpectedly", hitting relaunch had no effect. So I followed the instructions to manually place it in my iTunes script library, same result: crash. Error code given: 10810.

Oh, well. Maybe you'll have better luck.  
(Version 1.02)

STILL_SPARKLING  I haven't experienced extreme bugginess with Postbox (been using it since February of this year). Can you elaborate? I'm still trying to decide if it's worth buying.  
(Version 1.0b16)

STILL_SPARKLING  So I've gone back to Apple Mail and Entourage to try and get used to them again since Postbox will start charging for this app soon. I'm torn.

One thing that Postbox does better than both Entourage and Apple Mail is Junk Mail handling (at least that's been my experience). It seems to have a more intelligent filter. Often times I'll email a web link to myself so I can read it later when I have more time; Entourage and Mail constantly send these emails from myself/to myself straight to Junk Mail. Even though the mail is from my own account, and no matter how many times I check "allow messages from this sender", they both Junk it. Postbox delivers the mail correctly every time.

Another feature that Postbox has that the others don't is excellent editing. Threaded conversations are well laid out and it's easy to insert additional text into any portion of the email and re-send it, or save it and file it. The Searching capabilities of Postbox are also stellar and far outshine its competitors.

However, one thing I really like about Apple Mail (that I keep hoping Postbox will emulate) is how it handles misspelled words. Sometimes your email program will think a word is misspelled because it's unusual, or a person's name, or not in the dictionary; YOU know the word is correct, but most mail apps will insist on stopping at the "misspelled" word until you either add it to the dictionary or click ignore. Apple's Mail will allow you to double click "send" and doesn't force you to interact with the spellcheck dialog box at all; it just assumes you know how to spell and sends it. It's very fluid and saves time. Every other email app that I've tried, including Postbox, botches this simple act by forcing you to deal with the spell check dialog box. Why?

I'm knocking it down a star because it still has the bug of bolding your email account name (on the sidebar) to signify new messages have arrived, but when you click on the account, no new messages are there. The message(s) will show after you close and restart the app. Annoying.  
(Version 1.0b16)

STILL_SPARKLING  Yikes! Sorry for writing a novel down there.

My mini-review: Concentrate has a labor-intensive setup process which hampers its utility. In my opinion, it goes about things the wrong way. Instead of making the user choose which apps s/he want to run, a much quicker option would be to have everything dis-allowed upon startup and let the user chose which apps or websites to run by checking them off a list all at once, rather than scrolling down a long window and adding them one at a time.

Nice, clean GUI except for the giant white background window and tiny fonts.

Generous 60 hour demo.

Ultimately too expensive when superior free apps like Think are available.  
(Version 1.0.2)

STILL_SPARKLING  Concentrate has a clean and simple UI, but there are a few problems that keep it from reaching its true potential.

-Setting up blocked apps and websites can be a chore because you can only pick one app/site at a time. When choosing websites to block, you must manually enter the names of each site from memory(!), one at a time, rather than multi-selecting a group from your bookmarks. A program such as this really should have a streamlined selection process; as of this version, Concentrate does not.

-The same annoyance is true of blocking unwanted apps: you must add them one at a time from a dropdown list and every time you finish one, the window closes and you must start over again. The window is also annoyingly small (so you have to scroll to see all of your installed apps); you can resize it, but it doesn't remember the larger size, so why bother? A better solution would be to have an open window showing all installed apps and letting the user put a check mark by the apps s/he would like to have open.

- A default group containing frequently used apps like TextEdit, Dictionary, and the user's default music playing app would be nice to have setup immediately after install. You can make such a group yourself, name it "Default" or whatever, and duplicate it repeatedly from within the app, but it's a tedious process due to the abovementioned annoyances.

-There should be an option to block all websites completely instead of just individually. Such an option would come in handy when you want to work with files on the network, but also want to prevent the distractions of browsing online.

-If you run Little Snitch, there will be interruptions every time Concentrate asks permission to access the network. This is especially irritating if you have apps that insist on phoning home to check for updates every time you open them, like the satanic Adobe updater.

-The desktop is not blocked out; Writeroom and Think perform this function automatically.

-When the timer finishes, an eye-searing white screen drops down to inform you that you are done. There is no way to change the color of this white background window, so the interruption is abrupt and unpleasant.

-GUI is too small for users running high resolutions on large monitors. Non-adjustable font sizes.

-Too expensive, especially when apps like Think and J-Dark are free.

Despite all, I think Concentrate has real potential, especially if it fixes the problems I mentioned above. One area where it could be useful is as a program that forces you to take breaks (by locking down the entire computer for a few minutes), or as an app that keeps you on task when you need to do a single activity, like exercise. Concentrate could play your pre-loaded dvd and prevent you from doing anything else until your 30 minutes of working out is complete.

For multi-task activities though, I prefer Think; it's more elegant and seems to flow more smoothly than Concentrate when switching between apps. However, I do really like the timer implementation in Concentrate, so I'll be keeping an eye on it to see how it develops (and if the price drops).  
(Version 1.0.2)

STILL_SPARKLING  I don't get all the hate.

Do you complainers use just one app to process your camera's RAW files? Or just one app to watch movies on your computer? How about writing? I sure don't. I have at least 3 apps for each of those categories because some work better than others depending on the task at hand. So why do you expect Transmission to be any different? It can't be all things to all people. Like any application it has its strengths and weaknesses.

In my opinion, it's the fastest, the most reliable, and has the most logical interface of all the Mac-based bittorent clients. Every once in a while, there's a bad update and I'll have to go back a version, but for the most part, Transmission performs like a champ. Every once in a while I might have to use another client like Vuze (formerly Azureus), but I always come running back to Transmission. Vuze is ugly, bloated, and slow by comparison, but I keep it around for the same reason I keep an extra RAW processor installed: you never know. Sometimes the spare app will come in handy.  
(Version 1.74b1)

STILL_SPARKLING  Of all the available email apps on the Mac platform, Postbox, while still technically a beta product, stands head and shoulders above the rest. From its clean, well laid out interface to its innovative tabbed handling of messages, its quite obvious a lot of thought and care went into Postbox’s development.

I’ve been using it since spring of this year and, other than the tiny fixed font size of the GUI, can find very little to criticize. Once you get it up and running with all of your accounts configured, it is a marvel to behold. Fast, stable, and polished. Postbox seems as if it incorporated every awesome feature of other email programs and added a few new twists of its own to make the Ultimate Email App.

Power users who spend a lot of time in their email program will love this app. Me? I’m on the fence. While I do have multiple email accounts, I don’t consider myself a power user. I appreciate Postbox’s superior organizational capabilites, but when I’m handling my email, I want to get in and get out as quickly as possible. Postbox allows me to do this, but then again, so does Apple’s Mail, GyazMail, Entourage, Thunderbird and several of the other apps I’ve used over the years. Postbox does it better, of course, but is that worth the $40.00 it will cost me for a single user license when it comes out of beta? In my case, the answer is “no”, but if you haven’t tried Postbox yet, you really should and decide for yourself. Right now while it's free, it can't be beat.  
(Version 1.0b15)

STILL_SPARKLING  Daisy Disk really has no peer in drive visualization, so you can pretty much ignore the suggestions for similar apps. The gorgeous UI, speed, and stability make it a pleasure to use. Add to that the stellar customer support from the developers and you have a real winner.

Yes there are other apps that can do the same thing, but DaisyDisk's method of color-coding each area of your drive is so fluid and intuitive, you won't want to use anything else. It makes getting rid of space hogging apps and files a breeze.

The are two things I don't like:

1. The price. I think it should be at least $5.00 cheaper.

2. The fact that it isn't built into Leopard automatically. Come on, Apple -- add this puppy to Snow Leopard!  
(Version 1.3.5)

STILL_SPARKLING  This app is wonderful; a real timesaver. Even though it only grabs images from Amazon, it's fast, stable, and free. I just tested this new version on an 82 song playlist with missing artwork and of those 82, it only grabbed one mistaken cover, and that was for an older soundtrack. Not too shabby. It also gives you two options that I really appreciate:

1. The option to preview the artwork and selectively not import covers that are a poor match.

2. The option to overwrite coverart for songs that are already tagged. This is turned off by default, unlike some other apps, so you won't accidentally ruin your song library if you aren't paying attention.

It would be nice to be able to see super high resolution covers from other sources like albumartexchange, allcdcovers, and google images though. Hopefully that will be added in a future update.  
(Version 2.5)

STILL_SPARKLING  Very useful program that works exactly as advertised. I use it to keep my Documents folder and my Music folder in sync between my main computer and my external drives because those are the folders I save to most often. SyncTwoFolders works great when you don't want to do a full SuperDuper backup or copy things over manually.

Four stars because the French to English translation could be better, but the app itself is 5 stars.  
(Version 1.4.4)

STILL_SPARKLING  Apple should pay these guys $1.00 for every Mac sold (or better yet, include the app on every new system as part of the O/S). Using 1Password is truly pleasant and seamless, it enhances your computing experience so greatly, you sometimes forget that you’re working. I know that sounds over the top, but it’s true. The only app that can possibly compare to the same state of computing nirvana is (was) the last stable version of Quicksilver.

Some things you may not know:

The Agile keychain is stable - much, much better than Apple’s imho. In all the time I’ve used the Agile keychain, it has never corrupted, unlike Apple’s, which used to corrupt every 6 months or so on my system, despite my best efforts to prevent it.

Previous versions of 1P required you to close all browsers before applying the updates; that is no longer necessary.

If you add a new browser to your Applications folder or add a new profile to Firefox and don’t see 1P in it’s familiar position, don’t panic. Simply open 1P, hit command + , (comma) to open the prefs, and check the box next to your new browser or profile. 1P is now ready to go.

Someone below asked if 1Password was as good as Roboform. Well, I have a Windows computer (rarely used these days) and Roboform is not even in the same league as 1Password. It’s adequate, probably the best password manager available for that platform, but like most Win apps, it’s an ugly, jumbled mess and cludgy to use, esp for new users. See for yourself. Go to 1Password’s homepage and look at the screenshots, then go to Roboform’s and look at theirs. After you stop your eyes from bleeding, go back to 1Password’s homepage and download the trial. You won’t be disappointed.

But let me warn you: once you start using 1Password, it will be torture to use any other computer without it.  
(Version 2.9.24)

STILL_SPARKLING  ZeusDraw has enormous potential. Very intuitive for making quick strokes and simple shapes. The individual tools are easy to get the hang of, but the pen tool takes getting used to for longtime Illustrator users. ZD has a unique way of manipulating Bezier curves that might frustrate some users. Personally, I draw much faster with the Illustrator pen tool, but that’s because I've been using Illustrator for years and I’m used to it. I think ZD’s way offers many benefits over the old and dated Illustrator way and it’s worth getting to learn this alternative (arguably superior) method. Additionally, ZD is stable and has a very small footprint (less than 80MB of Real Memory after several hours on my system); a welcome change from the bloated, crash-prone Adobe Illustrator.

Cons:

The menus and palettes could be better organized. ZD lacks the ability to tear off and dock frequently used palettes together like Illustrator.

GUI is way too small for large monitors and high resolutions.

GUI looks like it’s stuck in OS9.

Needs proper color mixer palette. The current color palette is not intuitive to use.

Needs proper brush palette. The Brush Library palette is especially lacking -- non-adjustable size and way too small, even for the default brushes, which means you must scroll through your brushes.Ugh.

No context menu items. Boo!

No text on a path.

Email artwork only works for Mail and Entourage; no PostBox, GyazMail or any other app.

Too expensive, all things considered. A lower price would encourage wider adoption and lead to a better app in the long run.

Overall, I think ZeusDraw is a great app with enormous potential. Once it addresses the issues on my cons list, it will no doubt be a strong contender for people who are looking for an alternative to Illustrator and the late, lamented Freehand (R.I.P.).  
(Version 1.3.3)

STILL_SPARKLING  Dear Developer,

We appreciate the fact that you are constantly trying to improve your app, but please try to stay focused and do not add “features” that are the opposite of what your app is about and counterproductive to what your users want. Ecoute is supposed to be a small, lightweight interface for manipulating iTunes media, not some bloated social media app.

When I turn on Ecoute, I want it to load quickly and play my music in the background using as little processor power and demanding as little of my attention as possible so I can get my real work done. I don’t want to “share” anything. I don’t want to look at links to Twitter and YouTube and the frigging iTunes store. I don’t want a “Social” pref pane for Facebook and last.fm and the rest of that crap. I want Ecoute to load up, play some music, and get the hell out of my way.

Instead of that “Social” pref pane, how about one for “Shuffle”? It would be great if Ecoute could be set to shuffle between one or more playlists; we have requested a shuffle feature several versions ago.

In short, thanks for the bugfixes, but don’t get carried away with the social media garbage. Keep Ecoute small and unobtrusive. That is supposed to be its purpose, right?  
(Version 1.2)

STILL_SPARKLING  This used to be a handy little app, but I don't know what happened to this version. Previously, you'd install the app and a context menu item became available whenever you'd right click on a file or folder. You were then able to edit a single or multiple files in one smooth motion.

Now, however, the context menu item isn't available at all and when you open the program, it makes you navigate through a maze of folders from Finder just to edit one file. At a time! Or, you can drag the file or folder onto the Dukko icon. Laughably, it even nags you to donate after every operation.

Very sad that such a great little app has been degraded.   
(Version 1.6b5)

STILL_SPARKLING  I'll wait and survey the carnage before applying this one.   
(Version 10.5.8)

STILL_SPARKLING  After months of flawless performance, PandoraJam is giving me problems.

1. Does not auto load my user account and stations unless I specifically open Pandora.com via my browser (Firefox or Safari) and sign into the pandora.com website first. I then have to close the browser and re-open PJ. If I don't login via the browser first, PJ stays in the "new user" state and doesn't respond to attempts to login from within the program. Very annoying!

2. Song and artist info are garbled together in the “Song” field in iTunes; this makes it necessary to manually edit each recorded item and separately download cover art too. Ugh!

3. Sometime iTunes will not auto open even if the songs from PJ are set to auto record.

4. App does not respond to clicks on the menu (i.e. thumbs up, thumbs down, skip song, etc.).

5. Tons of errors in Console (but that’s nothing new; previously I just ignored them because the app worked fine). Ex. 8/3/09 2:49:52 PM PandoraJam[5113] *** -[WebHTMLView sendNullEvent]: unrecognized selector sent to instance 0xd849db0 or 8/3/09 3:01:09 PM [0x0-0x24d24d].com.bitcartel.pandorajam[5248] AtomicParsley: option `--genre' requires an argument.

All of these things used to work properly prior to this version. I do not have a PandoraOne account and wonder if these bugs are due to the implementation of new features for PandoraOne users.

I wish I’d kept my previous version. Does anyone know where to download the older, more stable versions?  
(Version 1.3b256)

STILL_SPARKLING  I'm so glad I resisted the urge to buy this app when it first came out a couple of years ago. Don't get me wrong, it has a gorgeous interface and it does give you a fairly smooth way to browse your files, BUT that is ALL you can do: browse. You can't delete, move, or copy between folders; you can't flag, group, or otherwise manager images, you can't assign ratings or edit in any way, shape, or form. What a joke! The most gorgeous interface in the world can't make up for such a lack of basic functionality. There are free apps that can do more than FileBrowse.

And considering the glacial pace of updates (there have only been two measly .1 releases in 2 years) and the $25.00 price tag, this app is ridiculously overpriced. I feel bad for the people who've wasted money on this thing.  
(Version 1.1)

STILL_SPARKLING  This app is fantastic. A couple of years ago I had a bad experience with an Apple EFI Firmware Update which, after install, made the fans on my MacPro sound like a jet turbine; the sound was ceaseless and unbearable. The Apple tech who worked on my MacPro agreed that the fans were running too high. Luckily, I was still under AppleCare because he ended up replacing the entire logicboard.

Ever since then, I've used smcFanControl with great success and never touched another Apple firmware update that "adjusts fan behavior". smcFanControl lets me keep my default fan settings nice and low -- I like a quiet system -- for most tasks, but also allows me to crank the fans up, individually or globally, when needed. It also allows you to easily create and save different profiles; with these profiles you can switch, in one click, to higher or lower fan speeds when you need to adjust the cooling.

SMCFanControl is an outstanding addition to my arsenal of essential Mac apps. It's cool that it's free, but if you depend on it every day like I do, you should donate to support its development (especially with Snow Leopard right around the corner).   
(Version 2.2.2)

STILL_SPARKLING  Great app. I hope it's ready to go when Snow Leopard hits. I tried iTweax and while it does perform many of the same functions, it's still quite buggy so I'm back to Onyx.  
(Version 2.0.5b1)

STILL_SPARKLING  Anyone know what the deal is when the Parallels drive refuses to show up under the Startup Disk? I installed Parallels 4.0.3844 on a spare internal drive running Leopard in my MacPro and everything was fine. Windows 7 RC1 installed also without a hitch. A few hours later, I rebooted with my main drive as the startup disk and the Parallels drive was nowhere to be found -- just an icon with a question mark on it that says Network Startup.

The next day, I reformatted the Parallels drive and reinstalled Leopard on it, then reinstalled Parallels, then reinstalled Win 7. After playing around for a few hours to make sure everything was working, I rebooted back to my main HD and again, the Parallels drive disappeared. Double U Tee Eff?! This suuux.

Any help anyone can offer would be greatly appreciated.  
(Version 4.0.3844)