Your essential Macbook Air Software

[barebackbadger8]

sorry if this should be in the Software section, but this is a specific MBA question:
now we know the 11" only comes with either 64gb/125gb SSD and 256gb on the 13"
so especially for the 11" users/owners. with storage space at a premium, what are your must have apps/software??
do you just generally install everything you want to??
or are do you just have the bear minimum?

 

[altecXP]

sorry if this should be in the Software section, but this is a specific MBA question:
now we know the 11" only comes with either 64gb/125gb SSD and 256gb on the 13"
so especially for the 11" users/owners. with storage space at a premium, what are your must have apps/software??
do you just generally install everything you want to??
or are do you just have the bear minimum?

You can use Xslimmer that pulls all the unneeded languages and binary's out of apps. Saves about ~1GB.

 

[Lbatson21]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_2_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8C148 Safari/6533.18.5)

You can also remove printer drivers you dont need and i'm guessing xslimmer is like monlingual the removes languages but i remember saving like 3 gb after doing all this

 

[macproguy77]

I don't have an air yet, but here's a start to what I'd call essential

Evernote
Angry Birds or Portal (LOL)
Firefox
NetNewsWire
VLC Media Player
DropBox
Facetime (or Ichat)

Toodledo on MBA synced with appigo todo for iphone
TinyGrab (screenshots)

 

[afireintonto]

my 13" has the 256 flash storage, so i just treat it like i would any other machine. (this is my new main machine)

but i always use,
iwork
transmission
safari(i prefer this browser over all others)
candy bar
i do lots of work in garageband, dubstep mostly
and of course itunes.

 

[kory108]

For Air specific apps, I use Monolingual to remove all of the extra language packs and the old PPC code from applications. This saves me about 3 GB.

I also removed Garage Band and its related loops in the Library folder to save space.

If you're looking for extra battery life, I'd recommend CoolBook. I have it installed on my Air running at the highest CPU setting (1.4 GHz) and the lowest voltage and squeak out an extra hour or so of battery life.

 

[Retops]

Office
Evernote
Devonthink
Tinderbox & Twig
Dropbox
Jumsoft money

 

[jdavtz]

I don't think many people will have problems with the space taken up with apps. It's the associated media files that can cause problems.

A vote here for Coolbook, and all the same apps as on the iMac (Aperture, Pixelmator, Office 2011, OsiriX, Skype, Google Earth, Dropbox, etc.)

 

[shootingstar64]

No question about that:

NO. 1 essential Software on my MBA is "Slink",....

... for remotely accessing all my media and work files when abroad!

 

[barebackbadger8]

its great seeing all the different apps/software people have on there macs.
when i get mine i think i will go with:
office 2011/iworks
itunes (a defo)
logmein (i have a pc aswell, not sure of any other software that allows remote access between mac & pc for free)
I use chrome, but might go back to Safari
VLC Player
FM2011 (although fm2012 might be out by then)

and as long as i can get my gmail account syncing properly on mac (calendars, contacts) ill be happy, because the calendar on my iphone NEVER updates my google calendar

 

[champ01]

- Perian codec eliminates VLC and lets you play almost anything using Quicktime. (add divx web player to view some streaming sites)

- Mobile Me keeps everything just easily organized (Mac/PC/iPod/iPhone/iPad) and gives you some cloud storage.

- Little Snitch denies websites and applications to send information from or to your computer.

- Iwork or Office for Mac (whatever you like best)

- Pixelmator is a cheap but usefull paint program (or if you want real basic stuff download Paintbrush)

These should be standard on every mac you use from now.

 

[Bakari45]

Nope, don’t import everything. Maintain the minimalist form of the Air.
My essentials include:

Dropbox
Hazel for automatic file management
Spirited Away to hide apps I‘m not using
ClipboardSharing
Butler for file launching and other stuff
Default Folder X—essential for any Mac
MarsEdit and Scrivener for my writing and blogging

I’m testing out DragThink and Berokyo for file management and quick access to stuff, but both seem kinda buggy.

 

[barebackbadger8]

-Nope, don’t import everything. Maintain the minimalist form of the Air.
My essentials include:

- Mobile Me keeps everything just easily organized (Mac/PC/iPod/iPhone/iPad) and gives you some cloud storage.

this will be my main computer though so i need itunes etc

mobileme if it was cheaper i would do e.g £20 a year! but not at what it currently is
i can use google mail and dropbox for nowt!

 

[AMDGAMER]

Is there a facetime app? I heard I could facetime with iphone 4 owners but I'm yet to see the app?

 

[champ01]

mobileme if it was cheaper i would do e.g £20 a year! but not at what it currently is
i can use google mail and dropbox for nowt!

You'll forget the price tag once you use it everyday. (its getting an nice update soon too!)

Got my iPhone back when I lost it thanks to Mobile Me.
Plus iDisk almost feels like its there on your internal drive (only slower of course)

 

[tom vilsack]

not air owner...but use on my G3 ibook (20 gig drive)..always looking for fast,free,small programs

-monolingual,removes languages ect
http://monolingual.sourceforge.net/
-camino browser,fast,built in flash/ads turn off ect
http://caminobrowser.org/
-flash
-mactubes,utube viewer/downloader
http://macapps.web.infoseek.co.jp/mactubes/index_en.html
-vlc player,does video fast and simple
http://www.videolan.org/vlc/
-seashore,graphics (based around gimp)
http://seashore.sourceforge.net/The_Seashore_Project/About.html
-paintbrush,simple paint
http://paintbrush.sourceforge.net/
-carbon copy,simple imaged backup
http://www.bombich.com/index.html

 

[macproguy77]

Is there a facetime app? I heard I could facetime with iphone 4 owners but I'm yet to see the app?

Yes there is an app.. its in BETA but works pretty well. Probably not in the app store, since its beta, but google for it.

 

[Bakari45]

this will be my main computer though so i need itunes etc

mobileme if it was cheaper i would do e.g £20 a year! but not at what it currently is
i can use google mail and dropbox for nowt!

I have MobileMe and iDisk, but I still use Dropbox more for syncing between Macs. You can though possibly get MobileMe cheaper on Amazon—at least in the States.

 

[zulumonk]

Mariner Write
Adium
Inkscape
Evernote
AppCleaner
Google Chrome

 

[ZenoVT]

For my MBA 11.6" I have the following:

Microsoft Office
Google Chrome
Movist
MoneyWell
Twitter
Plex
Dropbox
Caffeine

and that's pretty much it.

 

[MultiFinder17]

A far as stuff that doesn't come installed on the machine already, here's my list:

Alfred - Similar to quicksilver, but streamlined and actually supported
iWork - Productivity
Jitouch - For a zillion more trackpad gestures, some of which I've come to depend on
DoubleCommand - Swapping around the function keys
SmartSleep - Turns off safe sleep unless the battery is low, letting the machine sleep faster
Menumeters - Meters in the menu bar showing system stats
Colloquy - IRC client
TextWrangler - Programming
Bean - Quickie basic word processing - throw it in Pages later for final tweaks
Pixelmator - Think photoshop lite
Xcode - Serious Business™ programming
DeepSleep - Forces safe sleep and power off for when I'm not going to use the machine for a while

 

[Bakari45]

Jitouch - For a zillion more trackpad gestures, some of which I've come to depend on

Thanx for sharing this app, but I can get it to work on my Air. Is there some trick to it?

 

[DarwinOSX]

I like to use fast light apps in keeping with the fast light but not processor intensive nature of the MBA.
Bean for word processing with Office installed just in case.
1Password which every Mac, iPad, iPhone user should have.
Fission for sound editing.
Appzapper for keeping apps off the SSD that I don't use on a regular basis.
Caffeine for keeping the MBA from sleeping when i don't want it to.
Burn for fast lightweight CD/DVD burning.
Carbon Copy Cloner
Cocktail
Safari
Dropbox
Ecoute iTunes player
Grand Perspective for keeping an eye on disk usage
Kindle for easy eBook reading
PandoraJam
Pixelmator
Ripit
TextWrangler
Pacifist so I can selectively install OS X apps.
Looking at XPad for a TextEdit replacement.

Some other odds and ends but these are the apps that are more specific to MBA usage.

Check the One Thing Well website for other apps that are fast and light.
http://onethingwell.org

 

[macnerd123]

chrome to play flash videos

 

[T4R06]

Slink
RDC