Mac Equiv. Applications?

Hi,

Before I buy a MBP, I need to know if some analog of these applications are available. I've listed the 40 apps I use on my PC, and figured out how to replace most of them. Here's the last few I'm not sure about. Can I find programs to perform these functions?

Productivity Apps

• Anagram (intelligently grabs and interprets the contact info at the end of an email and creates an entry for the address book)
• Dictionary with spoken pronunciation, rich definitions + etymology
• USAToday Mileage Tracker (tracks frequent flier / hotel rewards / accounts)
• EZ Vinyl Converter (turns records into MP3 files, imports into itunes)

Networking Apps

• TFTP Server
• SecureCRT (Serial port access / SSH / Telnet)
  
• Wireshark (sniffs Ethernet packets). Looks like the Mac version is immature.

You may want to take a look at one of the first posts in this forum, titled "Switcher's guide to Mac OS X software." Not sure what's in there, or if you'll find what you're looking for, but it's worth a shot.

As for what I can offer:
Mac OS X has a built in dictionary, and you can use VoiceOver (also built in) to pronounce that or anything else you want.

The little SSHing that I do I do through Terminal.app, but this may not be powerful enough for your needs.

I think Little Snitch may be what you're looking for to replace Wireshark. It's basically a gatekeeper to show what packets are being sent over what ports to where.

For everything else you're needing, check out www.macupdate.com. It's basically where you can go to update/install any Mac software you can think of. I've used it many times to find the type of software I need.

EZ Vinyl Converter

Spin Doctor - comes with Roxio's Toast burning software - which is a must buy (by the way)

Well here my 2¢ worth. And I hope it's helpful.

Anagram: - Can mail do these features? I think it can. Not so sure. If so this might help.

Dictionary: You can use voice over
http://www.apple.com/accessibility/voiceover/
to speak the words, and something like www.rhymezone.com for the definitions. And just copy the word into your favourite text editor and get voice over to say it. Might not be an ideal situation but it should work.

USAToday Mileage Tracker: Would this application suit your needs?
http://homepage.mac.com/fredtaub/comets/

EZ Vinyl Converter: Try Audacity or Garageband or CD Spin Doctor.

TFTP Server: Would an OS X version work for you?
http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/11116

SecureCRT: Would Jelyfissh be suited to your needs?
http://www.grepsoft.net/jellyfissh.html

Wireshark: tcpdump might suit.
Or maybe Etheral might do it for you. But you need to follow these instructions if you choose the Etheral path. (Etheral being the app name.)

1) Download and install Fink and Fink Commander (http://fink.sourceforge.net/).
2) Launch Fink Commander and search for Ethereal. Fink will automatically install the dependencies.
3) Highlight "ethereal" and click the "install binary package" button
4) When it says you're done launch XDarwin.
5) Choose "Full Screen" and when it launches, type "sudo ethereal" without the quotes. Enter your root password and voila! Sniff away.

Lastly there is always bootcamp, fusion and Parallels to run windows on OS X if you really can't find an os x alternative to suit your needs.

Hi,

Thanks for all of your helpful suggestions.

The built-in Apple dictionary isn't rich enough for my needs.

"comets" doesn't track mileage and hotel program rewards.

Jellyfish doesn't seem to support terminal-based connections (serial port).

anagram is a amazing program for the Windows crowd and it doesn't look like there's a way to do that in Mac-land.

But I can live without many of these things, or run them via Fusion. I had already planned to run Fusion for a bunch of other apps that don't have Mac equivalents, such as the New York Times reader, etc.

I can suggest a Mac alternative for SecureCRT - dataComet:

http://www.datacomet.com/

It's not free, but it works very well for SSH and shell/terminal sessions. In fact, the University of Pennsylvania posts a list of recommended/supported applications for both PC and Mac for various uses:

http://www.upenn.edu/computing/product/

Unless you're affiliated with Penn you can't download anything from the page (because of licensing agreements with the various vendors), but I thought the list itself may be useful as a comparison of PC/Mac apps.

boberonicus said:

anagram is a amazing program for the Windows crowd

Click to expand...

I'm sure it's an amazing program for the crowd that doesn't have Data Detectors.

technologist said:

I'm sure it's an amazing program for the crowd that doesn't have Data Detectors.

Click to expand...

I'll have to search and see if I can find out more about that, it sounds great! Probably much better than http://www.getanagram.com

Robert

If dictionary is not good enough, it also has an integrated Wikipedia search.

you need a dictionary to audible pronounce words for you? I cant imagine that is the deal breaker when choosing a a computer, most dictionaries including the osx one spells out the pronunciations; you should try saying words for yourself, its fun

FYI, there is also the Command+Shift+D trick, where you hover over any word in a Cocoa application like Safari or Pages, and it will pop out a little dictionary meaning for you. Of course, it's also integrated with spotlight search and you can get dictionary meanings from Quicksilver as well.

Doesn't OS X come with SSH capability installed and ready to go?

caloge said:

you need a dictionary to audible pronounce words for you? I cant imagine that is the deal breaker when choosing a a computer, most dictionaries including the osx one spells out the pronunciations; you should try saying words for yourself, its fun

Click to expand...

Thanks for your kind advice. The ability to say a word out loud is not a deal breaker. In theory, there are no deal breakers, anything that isn't available natively on the Macbook can be emulated (EM-you-late-ed) in Fusion. I do need off-line access to a more studly dictionary than the one built into the Mac. Unfortunately, neither the OED nor the American Heritage has a Mac version.