NONTROPPO  B57 is already out and significantly better than B56a7, *lots* of fixes and speedups (uses Clang etc):

http://github.com/tiennou/blacktree-alchemy  
(Version 1.0b56a7)

NONTROPPO  Another disgruntled user here. There are several significant focus bugs, which the developer has been aware of and says are going to be fixed in the mythical Awaken 5 - but that has been ongoing for a year with no bug fixes making the version I paid for. Having clear acknowledged bugs hanging around because the developer went off to work on iPhone apps is not really ideal from a users point of view. Shame, as otherwise this app is nice.  
(Version 4.0.21)

NONTROPPO  I really can't understand why the author doesn't just allow preferences to change background colour freely; two supported apps with different version numbers that do the same thing yet that differ by one trivial prefs setting is ridiculous!

Or at least call it myTexts 3.2 Snow Edition or something...  
(Version 1.1)

NONTROPPO  This is a very simple, but very useful app. Most importantly it uses OpenMeta (which they first developed), which means the metadata tags and ratings are usable by many other new tagging apps. I use Tagit along with the awesome Openmeta tagging plugin for Quicksilver, allowing very fast tagging and retrieving across applications.  
(Version 1.2.0)

NONTROPPO  After struggling to get Tunnelblick work on 10.6, I gave Viscosity a try, and boy am I happy I did. It does what it needs and no more; a sleek and functional UI, I like the details pane showing throughput and its configurability. Checking the forums, the developer seems very friendly and fast/consistent answering queries and problems. This is definitely worth the money.  
(Version 1.0.7)

NONTROPPO  The new updates for Snow Leopard are fantastic, my CPU use has dropped considerably. This is a very solid media player, and I use both this and VLC as each have their respective strengths and weaknesses; both a substantially better than Quicktime + Perian for my needs.  
(Version rev12)

NONTROPPO  Wow, a really nice app. Very useful graphical display and very low resource usage and stable. I normally use iStat Menus, but sometimes would prefer something more like a normal app I can run and not have to uninstall if I don't want it running. This does the job perfectly.  
(Version 2.1.2)

NONTROPPO  This app is the way Stuffit keep their proprietary format and company alive, they force you to install this if you want to open an archive or something from their new connect service. The other formats this supports are all open-able with many alternatives.

If someone you know is dumb enough to use SITX (7zip or RAR are better) or Stuffit Connect (many online sharing services don't lock you into proprietary formats) when better solutions exist, then by all means use this.

But for everything else, The Unarchiver or BetterZip are much better and less bloated improvements to Stuffit.  
(Version 14.0)

NONTROPPO  The FAQ gives lots of useful info for working with the new builds:

http://groups.google.com/group/blacktree-quicksilver/web/faq?hl=en  
(Version 1.0b56a7)

NONTROPPO  Well, the fact that Quicksilver is the first and only launcher to get OpenMeta support shows you that QS still can provide new functionality the other alternatives can't! And for users of Things GTD app, plugin support works for QS, QSB and Launchbar, showing QS is still being actively supported by 3rd party developers.

QS, even if it is not actively "enhanced", is still technically superior to all other alternatives, so even if QS doesn't move forwards, it will still take time for others to catch up.

But moreover, some work *is* being done on the trunk branch, where alcor left a new triggers and plugin architecture for others to advance forward.

I do think that QSB is getting a big shot of active and new development, but sadly the UI is uselessly constrained and it seems to be a management decision to make it that way - there are hundreds of votes in their bug system to add a third-pane ala QS and triggers but it is ignored...  
(Version 1.0b56a7)

NONTROPPO  Why are you posting the same wrong comment again??? QS is opensource and being actively updated, bugs fixed, and new plugins written. Whatever Alcor (the original developer) said last year in an interview (before anyone took over the project), as this is an opensource project, development doesn't depend on Alcor any more...  
(Version 1.0b56a7)

NONTROPPO  QS is most certainly not dead, and still working significantly more usefully than QSB or Launchbar. Support if you do run into problems is not ideal though, but otherwise b56a7 works great with the latest OS X.  
(Version 1.0b56a7)

NONTROPPO  b56a7 works brilliantly for me on Snow Leopard 10.6.1. The core plugins all work well. The only one I was missing was file tagging plugin, but recently an OpenMeta plugin has been added which is far better than the old &comment tag method, and interoperable with lots of new metadata management apps on OS X. The display of characters in the triggers dialogs is broken, but triggers themselves work fine; this is just a cosmetic annoyance.

Quicksilver, even in its opensource community guise, is still significantly more powerful and elegant than Google's QSB or Launchbar.

Openmeta plugin available here: http://groups.google.com/group/blacktree-quicksilver/browse_thread/thread/df03c483786ca2da/  
(Version 1.0b56a7)

NONTROPPO  And why are you incapable of responding without being abusive and aggresive? There are already some reports that people using the aborted Apple R/W driver are running into problems.

Releasing a "free" tool doesn't mean one should abrogate their responsibilities to provide knowledge to their users. If you choose to still use it then that's fine, but this tools website mentions nowhere that the driver this enables was not activated by Apple, we assume for some good reason...  
(Version 0.3)

NONTROPPO  As this is a feature that was not allowed to go into Snow Leopard, it seem imperative that there is a FAQ with some information on *why* Apple thought it wasn't usable by default, and what the caveats of using this are. Data loss is serious stuff, and unsupported NTFS drivers sound a ripe area for triggering such loss...  
(Version 0.3)

NONTROPPO  Mark Russinovich wrote a great article about how memory optimizers are hoaxes:

http://windowsitpro.com/article/articleid/41095/the-memory-optimization-hoax.html [1]

The home page uses technobabble to sound authoritative, but it seems to do exactly what all these hoax optimizers do, force active and inactive RAM page out of memory. The kernel is tuned to handle this most efficiently, applications like this just disrupt the memory manager's work.

Until the author provides proper technical information of how he is doing something innovative here instead of the technobabble of his homepage, this is snake oil and hoax, just as with Windows "memory managers". iFreeRam, another hoax app used to have "benchmarks" on his page showing how it really helped, his benchmarks were artificial and he eventually removed them as they were worthless.

----

[1] Get a free reprint of his article via this: http://license.icopyright.net/user/serviceGroup.act?gid=2&inprocess=t&tag=3.7009%3Ficx_id%3D41095&urs=WEBPAGE&urt=http%3A%2F%2Fwindowsitpro.com%2Farticle%2Farticleid%2F41095%2Fthe-memory-optimization-hoax.html

[2] If you want to buy snake oil, iFreeMem is cheaper than this and does the same thing.  
(Version 1.0a)

NONTROPPO  Horrible interface, buggy, poorly featured, slow program updates. The only reason Endnote exists is that many people don't research the software they buy and Endnote lives off its name (our Department buys a site licence only for this and not other better options). Both Bookends and Sente are significantly better, and their developers are very receptive to input.  
(Version X2.0.1)

NONTROPPO  This is a wonderful tool; simple to use yet with a whole set of different optimization options available. Drop your images and let it do its magic. It gets a precious space in my dock...  
(Version 1.0.1)

NONTROPPO  DMG works fine here (9.26)  
(Version 9.26)

NONTROPPO  M86: Just delete the application and the preference files and you will be fine (Opera does *not* install outside of Application support/Preferences and cache files). What you are seeing is probably the version of Opera bundled by Adobe in the CS suite, don't worry about it.  
(Version 9.26)

NONTROPPO  Conceptually, I like the concept behind Filedefense. I like to have control over what new applications do and don't do on my machine.

But the implementation of this program is horrible. First, I encountered a number of glaring bugs: 1) "Allow All" often asks me more than once for the same app. 2) On restarts, applications I've already whitelisted keep reasking for validation.3) The ON/OFF button fails to keep state on restart.

Then the UI is so inflexible. I may wat to allow read access but not write access, or limit access to Application Support/* — but I cannot do this. I can only allow/deny on a per file basis any file operation. That causes a requestor hell that makes Vista look good. The program UI has a horrid application list that is not editable, and an always visible help file for no reason. The application list is the real problem, no filter, no sorting, no fast editing.

I want to like this application but it is so badly implemented it makes it far more tedious to use than it needs be. I hope the developers seriously expand its flexibility and usability and prompt me to write a more positive review. Additionally, I'd like to see it more like a Sandbox, with the ability, like the windows nagware SandboxIE to allow new apps only to work on copies of files. That would make OS X solid against future trojan attack.  
(Version 1.0)

NONTROPPO  Noraa: try deleting what.xgestures.plist in your /Library/Preferences/  
(Version 1.7.3)

NONTROPPO  For free, this is great, does most of what Candybar does. Thankyou Julien!  
(Version 1.3b)

NONTROPPO  XGestures is the best $5 you can spend on software for OS X. Mouse gestures are an incredibly effective interface addition. I normally work in mixed keyboard / mouse mode but sometimes I'm far from the keyboard. Gestures allow full navigation and triggering of all your apps. Navigate in Finder, Forklift, Safari, FF using the same gesture for back, much faster than using their back buttons. Toggle side panels, run applescript.

The only issue is with Wacom tablets. The developer knows about this and will try to fix it once he geta a tablet to use. I stopped using my Wacom tablet, as I found disabling XGestures just to disruptive to my overall workflow!  
(Version 1.7.3)

NONTROPPO  Latest versions work flawlessly in Leopard, including the all-new AAC full VBR decoder. This is great software  
(Version 20071119)

NONTROPPO  Scrivener has the perfect balance of simplicity and feature-set. It allows you to manage your research items without clutter or undue complexity; dynamic search, smart-folders, item notes, keywords etc wrapped up in an elegant UI. Writing allows split-pane mode to keep another document in view, and additional notes to be be always present. Outlining and corkboard give you semantic overview of your writing and research. And you can easily strip it all out into a minimalist page to just write. The elegant writers-apps space is pretty full on Mac, but Scrivener seems to be top of the bunch for my needs.  
(Version 1.09b)

NONTROPPO  Fantastic, I've had no problems and being able to write, while not blazing fast, it better than going over the network as I had to do before. Thank you for such a simple package, and to the NTFS and Macfuse teams.  
(Version 1.1004u2)

NONTROPPO  Excellent user interface and the perfect blend of necessary features.

I've had no reliability issues. I send my Macbook (10.4.9) to sleep (Aurora can play you songs for a set time before sleeping) and it always wakes up at the right time.  
(Version 3.3.2)

NONTROPPO  Memory managers are a dubious area of software. Users appear critically sensitive to the amount of free RAM, and assume the larger this number the faster things will be. Operating systems designers and many systems engineers believe the opposite.

For informed opinions, please see:

http://www.bitsum.com/winmemboost.asp

http://www.windowsitpro.com/Article/ArticleID/41095/41095.html

Both articles are highly critical of memory 'optimization'.

I have tried using iFreeMem for a several days. Now, in the limited scenario that I am starting an application for the first time, that i have lots of other apps open BUT don't care about their performance, iFreeMem creates a bit of headroom. But the whole system becomes more sluggish. The benefit of slightly reduced loadtime of data is offset by the severe performance hit as *every* other application has to page its data back in. Most usage scenarios I tried simply caused my machine to beachball for seconds after "optimizing" my memory.

In general if you are using more than one app, you will significantly damage your performance until everything is paged back into memory which gets you back where you started. If you don't mind grinding your disk only to get one app to have more headroom, then go ahead. In terms of design, it appears well programmed and the memory monitor is nice.  
(Version 1.3)

NONTROPPO  Try:

http://nontroppo.org/-/media/mainbar.htm

to learn how to make your address entry *above* your

and:

http://my.opera.com/dstorey/blog/show.dml/861522

for the details to macify a bit more. For more detailed hardcore tweaking, the Opera Wiki has listd of the acton commands for manual editing of menus / toolbars / key bindings / mouse gestures. As an example, to toggle most UI elements on and off using a mouse gesture:

GestureLeft,GestureRight,GestureLeft=Set alignment, "hotlist", 6 & Set alignment, "document view toolbar",6 & Set alignment, "Personalbar", 6 | Set alignment, "hotlist", 0 & Set alignment, "document view toolbar",0 & Set alignment, "Personalbar", 0  
(Version 9.20b1)

NONTROPPO  Tomis: see my link below yours to help get you the interface you suggest.

The issue is that there are lots of existing Opera users who Opera will upset if they start hacking away all the UI specificities. I am a recent OS switcher who sees no issue with Opera's UI. You can make opera *more* minimalist than safari in about 8-10 clicks.

Indeed I know of one opera user who has no address bar, no tab bar. He has *no* UI chrome, just a page! He uses option+tab to switch tabs, or the window panel linked to a mouse gesture. The window panel can be customised to accept a find box so you can "spotlight" search your open tabs (he usually has >100 tabs open); then gestures to close the panel.   
(Version 9.20b1)

NONTROPPO  A very comprehensive and innovative browser, it is cross platform and so may feel a little odd, though they are slowly improving the macification with each release. The user interface is very customisable; to macify it some, see here: http://my.opera.com/dstorey/blog/show.dml/861522  
(Version 9.20b1)

NONTROPPO  Beware: Bootcamp V1.2b caused a significant decrease in the performance benchmark running under Matlab, up to 2X worse.

There are also issues with the keyboard mappings corrupted (I had to revert from apple's UK mapping to US english).

Trackpad seems to work fine here however...  
(Version 1.2b)