But what if you took the simple but powerful platform of Notational Velocity, and started adding some amazing features like Markdown, Textile and MultiMarkdown support (with a preview window to see your formatting), a widescreen layout, the ability to hide the notes panel, and some very nice stylistic improvements? The result is a fork of Notational Velocity by Brett Terpstra called Notational Velocity ALT, and it's a thing of beauty.

At this point I have to tell you that I've been lucky enough to use Brett's software for years now. In addition to writing software, Brett's a blogger for TUAW, a sister site of Download Squad, and when I was writing for TUAW I was lucky enough to get involved with using the Mac text editor TextMate with a bundle Brett wrote. He built it to allow writers to write for Blogsmith -- the CMS that runs TUAW and Download Squad -- using Markdown, but with a bunch of added features to make the writer more efficient, and their life easier. It's brilliant software, and it's what I'm using to compose this post.

I'm sharing this because it illustrates that Brett's role of writer puts him in a position to really understand the headaches writers run into, but his role as a coder empowers him to solve those headaches.

Notational Velocity ALT is already the best note taking app I've ever used, but what excites me even more is that Brett's plan is to make it not just a fantastic note taking app, but a fantastic text editor optimized for people who write online. I'm looking forward to the day when I write everything I intend to post online in Notational Velocity ALT, and that day may not be terribly far away.

Based on what Brett has already done with Notational Velocity ALT, and what he's done writing software for writers, this software's future is very, very bright.

Notational Velocity ALT, the supremo Mac note-taking tool, goes 1.0 originally appeared on Download Squad on Sun, 12 Dec 2010 14:24:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

wunderlist is a minimalistic, pretty to-do list manager. Here's a quick rundown of what it can and can't do:

Pros:

• Looks: It looks quite pretty. You can change the background, and it's generally just lovely.
• Simplicity: That can also be considered a bad thing, I guess, but wunderlist is very simple. There are no nested tasks, for example.
• Multiple lists: You can easily create extra lists for different contexts and move items between lists.
• Fast search: Search is "live" and updates as you type. It's very snappy, but I only tested it with a tiny list.
• Quick filtering: There are quick links to see tasks due today, tomorrow, within the next seven days, etc. You can also filter by "starred" tasks.
• Online sync: When you save the file, it's automatically synced to wunderlist's online server. Then you can run wunderlist on another computer and keep working on the same task list. I love this feature.
• Cross-platform: It works with OS X and Windows at this point. The Windows version doesn't feel "native" at all, though - it feels like a Mac app running in a Windows window.

Cons:

• Simplicity: There's no smart text processing. If I tell it "Buy food tomorrow," it doesn't realize "tomorrow" is a deadline. It's the same for "Talk to Josh @work" - it doesn't make a list with "@work" (or add to it if it exists).
• No documentation: I know people never read it, but come on, technical writers have to earn a living somehow! Seriously though, I would expect at least an HTML page (other than the "Features" page, which is marketing).
• No mobile app (yet): An iOS app is coming, but there's no talk of Android yet.
• No global hotkey: And that's the deal-breaker for me; as I've said elsewhere, quickly capturing ideas and to-do items is crucial for me. There is currently no way to bring up wunderlist's window with a hotkey.

Bottom line: It's nice, if you like pretty software, and it shows a great deal of promise for the future (if the "cons" above are addressed).

wunderlist is a cross-platform free to-do list manager originally appeared on Download Squad on Mon, 22 Nov 2010 11:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Computer benchmarking applications abound for Windows machines, but what if you want to judge the capabilities of your current Mac against one you're considering buying? Though I'm in that situation far less often than I'd prefer, when I do need to measure the relative performance of two different Macs, I turn to Xbench.

Xbench is a free performance benchmarking utility that measures the following items: CPU, Threads, Memory, Quartz Graphics (2D), OpenGL Graphics (3D), User Interface, and Disk. For a full list, including the sub-categories of what Xbench measures, check the bottom of the Xbench homepage.

When you run the app you can run all or only some of the tests, however running the entire suite only takes a few minutes. When you're done, you're presented with a report showing how your machine performed in each area.

By itself, it isn't that interesting, but if you send your report to Xbench's website using the Submit button, you can then compare it against other machines' scores.

Xbench performance benchmarking for Macs originally appeared on Download Squad on Sat, 20 Nov 2010 13:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Flight Control lands on Mac and PC via Steam originally appeared on Download Squad on Fri, 19 Nov 2010 16:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

AirPrint on Mac OS X with Printopia and FingerPrint originally appeared on Download Squad on Fri, 19 Nov 2010 07:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

For better or worse, Adobe's latest iteration of Reader is now available for both Android and desktop OSes. From the sandboxed Reader 'protected-mode', to the new multimedia implementations, there's quite a bit in the new Acrobat X suite of software.

Gallery: Adobe Reader X for Android

Continue reading Adobe Reader X now available for Android and desktop OSes

Adobe Reader X now available for Android and desktop OSes originally appeared on Download Squad on Fri, 19 Nov 2010 04:54:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Mozilla Labs Rainbow updated to version 0.2 -- now works with Windows and Linux as well as Mac OS X originally appeared on Download Squad on Thu, 18 Nov 2010 08:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Microsoft Office 2011 for Mac is significantly faster than 2008/2004 originally appeared on Download Squad on Thu, 18 Nov 2010 05:18:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Camino 2.0.6 released, fixes security and stablility bugs originally appeared on Download Squad on Wed, 17 Nov 2010 05:10:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

AirPrint Hacktivator for OS X -- Enable AirPrint on Mac OS 10.6.5 with one click originally appeared on Download Squad on Mon, 15 Nov 2010 06:11:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

• Apple Mail should now play more nicely with Microsoft Exchange servers.
• You can now use SSL with iDisk, to securely transfer your files to and from the cloud.
• Address Book contacts can now be dragged to iCal without issues, and they can also be synced to Google Calendar/Google Contacts.
• On the hardware compatibility front: Bluetooth now works more reliably for Apple's Magic Trackpad, third-party displays that use InstaPort should now work, and HP printers now work with Apple's Airport Extreme.

Apple releases Mac OS X 10.6.5, with tons of little fixes originally appeared on Download Squad on Wed, 10 Nov 2010 18:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Microsoft Office 2011 for Mac gets update two weeks after debut originally appeared on Download Squad on Wed, 10 Nov 2010 05:47:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Screen capture

Continue reading Snagit for Mac comes out of beta -- First hands on

Snagit for Mac comes out of beta -- First hands on originally appeared on Download Squad on Tue, 09 Nov 2010 13:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Adobe Audition for Mac beta now available originally appeared on Download Squad on Tue, 09 Nov 2010 11:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Viewfinder - a Mac app for finding the right image on Flickr originally appeared on Download Squad on Mon, 08 Nov 2010 15:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Skype 5 Mini brings better-looking chat to Skype 5 for Mac originally appeared on Download Squad on Sun, 07 Nov 2010 14:45:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Skype 5.0 Beta now available for Mac, with group video calling and Address Book support originally appeared on Download Squad on Thu, 04 Nov 2010 11:45:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

TweetDeck v0.36 released, now with real-time Twitter streaming originally appeared on Download Squad on Wed, 03 Nov 2010 13:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Phone Disk free till December 1st - turn your iPhone into a mass storage device originally appeared on Download Squad on Tue, 02 Nov 2010 10:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

iPhoto '11 updated to squash "extremely rare" library bug originally appeared on Download Squad on Tue, 02 Nov 2010 08:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.