Mac OS X Software - You Need The Best Apps!

This page is dedicated to Mac OS X Software that has not been written by Apple.

This page will cover software from third party developers who spend hours creating some spectacular software for our Macs.

Here we will review the latest software releases and then provide links to reviews, guides and tutorials depending on what task the software performs and how complex it is.

So where exactly do we find software that is not written by Apple. In reality there are three main avenues open to us, which we will summarise here and look at in more detail below.

The first option, which is probably becoming the most popular, is to visit the Mac App Store from the comfort of your desktop. Find the software you want, read reviews, and then purchase it.

Some of the big names in the Mac OS X Software business don't need to promote their products through the Mac App Store, people already know where to find them. So along with a few smaller developers opt to sell their software through their own websites.

The final source is what is known as Open Source software. This is often free to use and is constantly developed by a community of software developers who just get pleasure from creating great Mac software.

We will be looking at Mac software from all of the above sources. In fact there are no rules, the software can be from any developer, paid for, or free, in the Mac App Store, or not!

All of the software we list and review, in this section will be installed on our own Macs, running in a real working environment. So all reviews are real, and will be performed over a long period of time, and regularly updated if we suddenly discover something new!

Mac OS X Software from the Mac App Store

This section covers probably the bulk of the software available for the Mac computer today. The Mac OS X software reviewed here is available from the Mac App Store, and as such is downloaded directly onto your own Mac.

The categories that we will look at follow the same naming as those in the Mac App Store, which will avoid any confusion. The categories are listed below, simply click on the category to open the new page.

Mac OS X Software Direct from Independent Developers

Parallels Desktop for Mac Image courtesy of Parallels

Although the Mac App Store is incredibly popular there are still developers who don't believe in the business model adopted by Apple. In other words having to share their profits with Apple.

Instead these developers have decided to maintain the old approach of selling their software directly through their own websites, or even through an affiliate network.

An example of these developers are large companies who are well known in their own right, and also produce software for other platforms like Windows or Linux.

An example are VMWare and Parallels who both sell Virtual PC software for the Mac, allowing users to run Windows, Linux or Mac OS X in virtual windows.

But there are also small developers who are avoiding the Mac App Store. My favourite text editor is called Sublime Text 2. It is developed by a small developer from Australia who sells licenses through his website.

Sublime Text 2 - Text editor for the Mac

The Best of the Mac Open Source Software Available

We are very keen on using Mac Open Source software and have used it now for many years. Some people think that Open Source is just an excuse for geeks to play around developing unreliable software that nobody really wants!

This is far from the truth. In fact Apple themselves are big supporters of Open Source software with many parts of the underlining Unix infrastructure of Mac OS X coming from Open Source projects.

Thunderbird - The Open Source Email Client for the Mac

Some of the more popular Mac Open Source software titles include the following titles. They are all FREE to use and can simply be downloaded from the projects website.

The Firefox - Web Browser
Thunderbird - Email Client
Libreoffice - Office Suite
Cyberduck - FTP Client
BlueGriffon - Web Editor
Eclipse - Integrated Development Environment
ClamXAV - Anti-virus software for the Mac

In order to keep you upto date with the latest developments in this field for the Mac. We have decided to create a dedicated Mac Open Source Software page which contains links to downloads, information, reviews and tutorials.

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