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Author
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Topic: I bought a Mac
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Stibbons
SuperBlabberMouth!
Member # 2515
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posted April 20, 2011 18:15
I've finally bought a Mac. 2nd hand MacBook with lozza software and three months warranty left. Winner.
So I'm wondering what software people recommend? Anything useful science-wise? Productivity? Games?
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Fancy reading a typical whiney student blog?
Posts: 1115 | From: Cambridge, UK | Registered: Dec 2003
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littlefish
BlabberMouth, a Blabber Odyssey
Member # 966
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posted April 20, 2011 19:30
People I know swear by papers for mac to organise pdfs. I can tell you that the ipad version is not a great standalone app. ![[Frown]](frown.gif)
Posts: 2420 | From: That London | Registered: Nov 2001
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spungo
BlabberMouth, a Blabber Odyssey
Member # 1089
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posted April 20, 2011 23:32
I think "Foot Heater" is a great application -- just leave it powered on and upside-down under your desk, and then rest your plates o'meat on it whenever it gets parky. ![[Razz]](tongue.gif)
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Shameless plug. (Please forgive me.)
Posts: 6509 | From: Noba Scoba | Registered: Jan 2002
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Grummash
Gold Hearted SuperFan!
Member # 4289
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posted April 21, 2011 06:47
Carbon Copy Cloner. - For bootable backups. Time Machine is great for incremental backups but if your internal HD goes tits-up you need a backup drive you can boot from.
OpenOffice - for work 'n' stuff. It used to be iffy but I think the current version is really good.
Splash ID - password manager. A phone app/desktop app combo that means I only have to remember one big long password.
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...and yet, across the gulf of space, minds immeasurably superior to ours regarded this earth with envious eyes...
Posts: 2335 | From: Lancashire,UK | Registered: Aug 2005
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Ugh, MightyClub
BlabberMouth, the Next Generation
Member # 3112
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posted April 21, 2011 07:03
GIMP is pretty good for photo editing if you need such a thing, and it's free / open source which is always a plus.
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Ugh!
Posts: 1612 | From: Ithaca, NY | Registered: Dec 2004
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Zwilnik
Solid Nitrozanium SuperFan!
Member # 615
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posted April 21, 2011 07:51
Pixelmator is a good step up from Gimp without being anywhere near as expensive as photoshop. (native OpenGL based rendering too, so it's pretty zippy). Not perfect yet, but getting to be very handy.
Grab the iWork apps (Pages, Numbers, Keynote) as they're all pretty damn useful, and make sure you've got the latest iLife set.
I'm a bit of a Chrono-Sync fan for automatic backups and syncing between my Macs. and Handbrake is a great free app for converting your DVDs to more portable data for when you're travelling or want to view them on your iPhone/iPad etc.
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The Universe is entirely made up of elements.
The most important of which is the element of surprise.
Posts: 1040 | From: West Sussex, UK | Registered: Dec 2000
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littlefish
BlabberMouth, a Blabber Odyssey
Member # 966
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posted April 21, 2011 09:49
Not sure what kind of science you do, but gnuplot may be worth a look, and if you are a student then photoshop has huge discounts and elements is worth having rather than gimp (IMHO). I'm enjoying portal 2 so far, but my MacBook does not have a good enough graphics card to run it so it's on the ps3.
I have iWork but don't find it that useful. Office is much easier for collaboration and also does cheaper than list versions for many. I Still try to use LaTeX where possible though.
Posts: 2420 | From: That London | Registered: Nov 2001
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dragonman97
SuperFan!
Member # 780
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posted April 21, 2011 16:14
Besides the factory shipped stuff, the /main/ app I use on my laptop is Firefox.
Glancing in my ~/Applications folder reminds me of a few other apps† I use not infrequently:
CoRD (a rather good open source RDP client)
Google Chrome
OpenOffice.org (consider LibreOffice)
Seashore (a native but stripped down version of Gimp)
SimplyBurns
Skim (handy for fiddling w/PDFs)
Skype
SuperDuper (see Carbon Copy Cloner above - use one or the other...just use one!)
VLC
Xee (used for precisely one thing - lossless JPEG rotation)
One reason I'm so willing to use OS X these days is Terminal, and all the stuff that makes my open source heart go pitter-patter, so 'apps' aren't always that relevant to me.
† n.b. /Most/ are open source, some are not. They are all free-as-in-beer, though.
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There are three things you can be sure of in life: Death, taxes, and reading about fake illnesses online...
Posts: 9037 | From: Westchester County, New York | Registered: May 2001
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Stereo
Solid Nitrozanium SuperFan!
Member # 748
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posted April 22, 2011 01:09
BBedit for coding; GraphicConverter is a nice graphic software too; Nisus Writer for word-processing and page editing.
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Eppur, si muove!
Galileo Galilei
Posts: 2286 | From: Gatineau, Quebec, Canada | Registered: Apr 2001
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