1. Mozilla Firefox (Internet Browser)
Although it’s not on par with the windows version, Firefox is still one of the best browsers available for any platform. Thanks to it’s vast community it has a huge number of addons that would be suitable for web developers, gamers or anyone from any background.
If Firefox isn’t your thing then I hope you settle for Opera.
2. Adium (Instant Messenger)
This software supports almost all instant messaging clients such as MSN, AIM, Yahoo etc which makes life a lot easier if you use more than one client. Unlike most IM clients, Adium looks very aesthetic and even if you don’t like the look of it you can customize it to your taste.
If you’re looking to use the iSight for various webcamwhore adventures then Amsn is for you.
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3. VLC (Media Player)
The thing I like about this media player is that once it’s installed it can play almost everything - no need to fiddle around for codecs every time you try to play a weird video. It can even be used as a streaming server, if you’re into that sort of thing.
4. Textwrangler (Text Editor)
I was recommended this app as an alternative to BBEdit which I was going to use for coding. Textwrangler is a free alternative which I feel is much better than having to pay $200 for BBEdit.
TextWrangler vs. BBEdit vs. BBEdit Lite
TextWrangler is a very capable text editor. What sets BBEdit apart is its extensive professional feature set including Web authoring capabilities and software development tools. BBEdit's additional features for professionals
TextWrangler is considerably more modern and capable than BBEdit Lite. Among other things, it can open files from (and save them) to remote FTP servers, offers a significantly more powerful grep engine, supports multi-byte and non-Roman text files, can perform Find Differences on pairs of files, and can be invoked from the Unix command line.
5. Quicksilver (General)
Quicksilver is a great tool that has many uses. There is so much to it that a lot of people deem it essential.
In the end, Quicksilver has one very important effect: the effort of frequent tasks fades into the background and you are able to act without thinking. After an adaptation period, Quicksilver becomes an extension of yourself; the process fades away leaving only the results.
6. Imagewell (Images)
Imagewell is an image resizer which also allows you to upload via FTP. I’ve used this so many times and I’m almost as dependent on it as I am for my morning cup of tea.
7. Feedpopper (RSS)
FeedPopper allows you to get RSS feeds off your favourite websites. Unlike other RSS applications, it offers a unique way of displaying the latest headlines on your desktop, by showing small elegant popup windows that automatically appear and disappear.
8. Fugu (FTP)
Fugu is my preferred choice for any mac based FTP client. As well as being secure (SFTP) it has a huge arsenal of features at its disposal which make uploading and downloading more easier.
9. Coconut Flavour (General)
Coconut Flavour is a collection of 3 small apps concerning the battery (much more detailed information than macos x gives), identity (detailed history on your mac product) and wifi (much better notification on access points). All of them are very useful and quite essential in everyday usage.
10. Unrar (.RAR)
As .RAR files are becoming more and more common, Unrar is rather essential in opening the files. It can also restore corrupted or missing archives.
There we go, all of these applications make life a lot easier for any mac user. Best of all they’re all FREE! So get downloading!