Without certain applications and utilities, life on my Mac would not be the same. Here are a few of my favorites:

Konfabulator is a little hard to describe. It bills itself as “anything you want it to be” and that description is not far from the truth. Konfabulator itself is simply a “shell” program into which you can download and install what are called widgets. There are hundreds to choose from. The widgets display on your desktop and each offers a different degree of functionality.

For instance, you can download a widget that gives you the weather. Another can search Google, Amazon or even eBay right from your desktop. Another still will give you a live update of your available system memory. There are clocks, picture frames, RSS news readers and much much more. Because these are developed by a large and active community of independent developers, the possibilities of what these widgets can do seem endless.

LaunchBar by Objective Development is, in my opinion, the fastest way to launch items on your Mac. The way it does this is amazingly simple. LaunchBar runs as an application is triggered by typing Command-Space.You simply type the name or abbreviation (MSW for Microsoft Word for example) for the application, document, file or website you want and, once found in LaunchBar’s super fast list, hit Return to open that item. What’s more is that LaunchBar learns from you so the item that matches what you typed always comes up first.

WindowShade X gives you back a long missed feature of the Classic Mac OS – The ability to reduce any window to just its title bar. The Windowshade feature is handy if you want to get a quick look at something underneath a window without having to move or resize it.

Windowshade X does even more than it’s predecessor though. It also offers a nifty “Minnimize-in-Place”; feature that shrinks windows down to icon size. It’s your choice. Windowshade, Minimize in place or both at the same time.