Like many people, since YouTube came along I've stopped watching TV and now spend all my evenings looking at people making an idiot out of themselves or watching old episodes of Transformers. As I'm sure you're aware of by now, you don't even need to be logged on to the YouTube site to watch these vids because there are now scores of programs that let you download the movies for playing back at any time or transferring to your mobile phone or the PSP so you can watch them on the bus.

Flash Video Downloader is one of the easiest to use video downloaders available for the Mac, and does its job almost automatically. There are loads of options for batch downloading and you can even set the program to shut down your Mac for you once it's finished doing its business. I can think of some other features I'd like to see, such as the ability to auto-download videos based on your interests, but nevertheless Flash Video Downloader is a great way to pilfer YouTube and other social video sites without any fuss.

Download Flash Video Downloader 2.1 in Softonic

With Awaken you'll be able to get up to the sound of your iTunes library in the morning.

The application, presented in a smooth and well designed interface, is essentially a digital alarm clock with a wide range of features. You can set up alarms different times and associate them with any song, playlist, podcast from iTunes, or just one of the built in sounds. It won't work with anything that's on an external hard drive though. When a song is played, Awaken will show its album art and information in its interface.

Setting up alarms is a cinch, and even if you fail to hear your wake up call, Awaken will launch a backup alarm for you. It also features snooze for those dark and cold mornings when you just can't get out of bed. If you'd like to use it for short tasks, you can work with the egg timer which can be adjusted to a few minutes or seconds.

We were also glad to see that Awaken works seamlessly with the Apple Remote, so even if your Mac is far away from you you can still control the alarm clock. However, you should know that alarms tend not to launch if an update of Awaken is available. Make sure you have the latest version of the program frequently to avoid falling out of bed.

Fitted with a beautiful interface, Awaken is an excellent alarm clock for Mac which works seamlessly with iTunes. It could just make you want to wake up in the morning!

Download Awaken 4.0.14 in Softonic

Time Machine is one of my favorite new Leopard applications, yet I have to admit that it fails to provide sufficient information on backups.

This where Time Machine Buddy comes in. This little widget structures and displays all backup logs from the application, letting you know in real time what is being saved. The program sits in your Dashboard and is normally inactive until you decide to launch Time Machine.

Once the program is running, all you need to do is open up Time Machine Buddy to monitor the logs. For most people, the information found in them might probably be just a scramble of words. However, if you look more closely at the logs you'll be able to understand what is being saved.

Time Machine Buddy logs backups every 15 minutes and you can refresh it manually to ensure it has all the latest info.

Time Machine Buddy, by displaying full logs, makes for a good companion to Apple's backup program.

Download Time Machine Buddy 1.02 in Softonic

For anyone that has Mac OS X Tiger and is using Boot Camp, Winclone comes in really handy. The application makes it much more simple to clone multiple partitions. In this latest version, you can finally clone Microsoft Vista or you can stick to Windows XP. One of the nice features of the program is being able to clone on a separate drive or on the one where you have your Mac OS X partition. You can effectively manage multiple partitions of different operating systems on different drives, making it ideal for programmers and games and program testers.

What's more, Winclone will allow you to create a Boot Camp partition from the application itself and create image documents that can be stored on any media. Winclone is fairly speedy and is a great tool to have in a professional environment. All in all, it's a bit odd that Apple haven't included such a feature in Boot Camp.

Winclone is an excellent utility to clone multiple Boot Camp partitions quickly.

Download Winclone 2.0.9 in Softonic

They said it would come but I never believed them - live TV on the Internet, that is. Zattoo brings genuine TV to the Mac via peer-to-peer technology, indicating the appropriate selection of television channels based on the country you live in, something that no Internet TV app has done successfully to date. After registering for a Zattoo account online and installing the client, you'll get an overview of the available TV stations in your locality.

For viewing things like live sport, Zattoo is a dream come true. You simply click on your desired channel and the transmission begins within a few seconds. Providing you have a quick Net connection, the streaming of the broadcast will work very smoothly, with only a few seconds delay from the live television show itself.

Zattoo finally brings genuine live TV to the Mac, after a very long wait, and because the program provides channels local to you, you don't have to endure commentary in gobbledegook. Although the image quality leaves a lot to be desired, with a fast Internet connection, Zattoo gives you genuine live television in a way no other application can do at the moment.

Download Zattoo 3.2.4 Beta in Softonic

TeXShop is a TeX previewer for Mac OS X, written in Cocoa. Since pdf is a native file format on OS X, TeXShop uses "pdftex" and "pdflatex" rather than "tex" and "latex" to typeset; these programs in the standard teTeX distribution of TeX produce pdf output instead of dvi output.

TeXShop uses TeXLive and teTeX, standard distributions of Tex programs for Unix machines. The distributions include tex, latex, dvips, tex fonts, cyrillic fonts, and virtually all other programs and supporting files commonly used in the TeX world.

Download TeXShop 2.18 in Softonic

Worried how long your kids are spending on the internet? Well Watcher can help you by setting-up clear boundaries between your children and their computer.

Watcher allows you to introduce time-limits on internet activity including surfing, messaging and even playing games. Simply input start and end times from Monday to Friday and at weekends and Watcher will do the rest. You can also fix time-limits if, for instance, you don't want your kids to be using the computer before school. Disk limits of your choice also ensure only a defined amount of space is ever available.

Best of all is the Dashboard widget which sets up a credit system for children to negotiate how they want to spend their total hours of computer access across the week. Instant statistics then give you immediate access to the past day's, week's or month's activity.

Watcher is a well-designed program that offers parents real peace of mind. The only problem is that your children might not be too happy.

Download Watcher 5.0 in Softonic

When I first started to access newsgroups on my Mac, I found that sometimes, after a binary download was complete, I'd be left with various .RAR files and at least a couple of .PAR or .PAR2 files too. A quick Google search for how to work with PAR files led me to the excellent MacPAR deLuxe, a free, simple and easy-to-use utility for Macs and PAR/PAR2 files.

MacPAR deLuxe works extremely well in its main function: analyzing and joining large archive files that have been downloaded from Internet newsgroups. Simply right-click a PAR file in Finder and open it with MacPAR deLuxe. The program will immediately start analyzing the PAR file and checking that you have all the necessary constituent parts to rebuild the original file, generally a RAR compressed archive.

After checking that you have all the correct files, MacPAR Deluxe starts the process of joining them together. This doesn't take much time at all (in fact, the process has become even quicker recently on Intel based Macs). As soon as the joining process is done, the program starts extracting the contents of the compressed file. What's more, MacPAR Deluxe can even repair and recover some problematic archive files.

Another feature of MacPAR deLuxe is is PAR creation. Simply select (or drag and drop) the files you're planning to upload to your favorite newsgroup and MacPAR deLuxe produces the PAR file for you.

If you're working with newsgroup binaries on a Mac, MacPAR deLuxe is a truly essential piece of software. It's simple, uncluttered, clear but most importantly: it works!

Download MacPAR deLuxe 3.8 in Softonic

Coda unites all your different web development tools under one beautifully designed interface.

From text editor to previewer, CSS editor or terminal, Coda includes all you need to write up, review and upload your web pages. The program is flexible: projects are considered as sites, which sync perfectly with your server and maintain all your changes. You can connect to any server and thanks to the Transmit Turbo Engine quickly upload changes remotely.

In terms of editing, Coda offers up advanced features like auto completion, block editing or syntax coloring. You can also drag and drop clips of text anywhere. As of CSS, Coda offers two editing modes: visual and text, the first being more user friendly and the second best for advanced users. Coda has also thoughtfully integrated a terminal window, so you can run MYSQL queries quickly or connect to a local shell.

But it's the design that really stands out in Coda. Winner of the 2007 Apple Design Award, the program has been redesigned with a sleek Leopard GUI. Full of colors and smooth animations, Coda is a real pleasure to use and very well structured. The program even features a collection of reference books if you need a spark of knowledge to help you build your site.

Coda is a beautiful, all in one web development tool you can't go without if you're building web sites.

Download Coda 1.5 in Softonic

File Juicer helps you extract anything you want from a file, whether it be an image, a video, sound or text. Just drag and drop your file or folder on the File Juicer interface and the application will get to work.

File Juicer organizes extracted files in clean folders and the application will open up a new Finder window once the extraction process is done, so you can reach those files immediately. I've noticed that File Juicer tends to create a text file every time you extract something, although it's not always necessary.

You don't need to limit your use of File Juicer to simple extraction though. The program can also be used to examine cache files, turn PDFs into Word documents or recover text from corrupt files. If used well, it can be a really handy tool to have around.

If there's something you need to extract from a file or folder, File Juicer can get it for you.

Download File Juicer 4.9.9 in Softonic

Scanning your hard drive periodically is a good way of knowing how much space files are taking and deciding on what to keep and what to trash. Baseline combines tools to scan your disk with features to act upon cumbersome files. We've found the program to scan a disk fairly quickly, although that can also depend on the size of your hard drive and what files you've got stored up. We quite liked being able to save baselines, comparing in time what has been added and removed. Leopard users will probably be unimpressed though as they can do exactly the same thing with Time Machine.

After scanning your hard disk you can act upon those bothersome files. Depending on your needs, Baseline lets you compress, archive or delete these. Those functions are directly accessible from the interface, sparring your the burden of having to open up a separate application.

Baseline not only lets you scan your hard disk from cumbersome files, but also allows you to act upon these. A handy application to have around.

Download Baseline 1.3.8 in Softonic

grabUp is a preference pane item which allows you to grab any part of your screen and automatically post it online and share with your friends.

Since we had the program page open while we were testing out grabUp we knew that you have to hit CMD + Up + 4 to start capture and then CMD + V to save your image. Although that information is pretty easy to remember it would have been nice to have it in the preference pane menu.

grabUp can be activated from Preferences and will then show up in your menu bar. Clicking on the little icon will bring up a list of latest images. You can't change their names though and will have to remember the date and time at which you took a picture. grabUp automatically displays pictures on the web, with its own url included so sharing with friends is literally just a case of sending over the address. It's a shame that you can't store your images on your drive beforehand though.

grabUp will be of most use to people looking to send over screengrabs via the web. However keep in mind it is limited to basic features.

Download grabUp 1.1.0 in Softonic

Indigo can literally control and automate all processes in your home. HAL 9000 anyone?

To be honest Indigo isn't as frightening as the artificial intelligence from 2001: A Space Odyssey. The program can actually become quite useful, if you have the patience to learn how to use it, and like any true geek, dream of controlling every switch in your home from your Mac.

Via the client/server architecture, you can gain remote access to devices in your home like lights, alarms or computers. You'll certainly need to have a good level of knowledge to learn how to establish connection between devices.

From Indigo's interface, it's fairly easy to know what actions to trigger, set launch times and dates and even organize actions by groups. The separate log window also ensures you always have a record of what actions you performed. An added plus: Indigo comes with a widget to control your home from your Dashboard

If you have enough technological skills, Indigo can enable you to automate hardware in your home all from the comfort of your Mac.

Download Indigo 3.0.4 in Softonic

System administrators, this tool is for you. CommandCenter consolidates scripts and keeps a list of the servers you use, both UNIX and Linux.

CommandCenter makes it easy to execute or push any script in any language (Perl, Python, bash...) onto a server. If you work with multiple servers, you'll find CommandCenter gives you a focal point from where to handle them.

The quick run box is great to launch simple commands without wasting time.

The application also keeps full detailed logs of every action, every time you run a script or command run.

CommandCenter lets you set up an SSH session if you need a secure connection.

True, the interface isn't the most attractive you'll find for a Mac program, but CommandCenter gets the job done, which is what as a system administrator you are really looking for.

CommandCenter is a good solution to work with multiple UNIX and Linux servers.

Download CommandCenter 1.0.9 in Softonic

Sound Studio 3 is an easy-to-use Mac OS X application for recording and editing audio digitally on your computer. Digitize tapes and vinyl records, record live performances, create your own mixes with crossfades, tweak the levels and EQ, apply digital effects, and save in all major file formats with Sound Studio 3!

With Sound Studio 3 you can record professional sounding Podcasts and other audio dialog. Check out the article on Suggested Recording Hardware to find out more about how to mic properly and other useful audio information. Positioned perfectly between more expensive programs with steep learning curves, and far less robust apps, Sound Studio 3 is for anyone who needs to record or edit audio.

Download Sound Studio 3.5.7 in Softonic

Cooliris delivers an immersive, full-screen experience for viewing images on the web. If you have an online photo account and if you use iPhoto and Safari, or if you enjoy photography, his is the program for you.

Currently Supported Sites:

• Flickr
• Photobucket
• Facebook
• Google Image Search
• Yahoo Image Search
• Ask.com Image Search

The free Cooliris plug-in enables you to:

• View photos in full screen with a single click
• Glide between photos from within full screen mode
• Play a slideshow of image search results and photo albums
• Browse online photos with your Apple® remote

Download CoolIris 1.8.0.4273 in Softonic

The Free Flickr eXporter iPhoto Plugin lets you send your pictures from your iPhoto library straight to your Flickr account. A number of similar applications have popped up all around, filling in a missing feature in the iPhoto application.

So what would make you choose Free Flickr eXporter iPhoto Plugin over another similar app? First of all it's free, and very simple to install. Free Flickr eXporter iPhoto Plugin is accessible from the Export section in iPhoto. You can start using it as soon as you are logged in.

Free Flickr eXporter iPhoto Plugin lets you set the typical restrictions, such as whether to show to only family or friends. You can also set the safety level and content type. An added security measure is to hide pics from public areas.

Note that Free Flickr eXporter iPhoto Plugin also lets you restrict image size in case you need. Your photos can be placed in existing photosets or new ones. Although you can tag your rating I didn't find an option to type in your own tags.

Free Flickr eXporter iPhoto Plugin is a solid program to send your photos from your library to your Flickr account.

Download Free Flickr eXporter iPhoto Plugin 0.4.1 in Softonic

Breakaway offers a little feature that you won't find in iTunes: it will automatically pause the media player when the jack of your haedphone is plugged out. This will prevent you from embarassing situations, especially if your music is on really loud.

Breakaway only takes a few seconds to set up. Make sure you check 'headphones mode' to make it work and 'resume play on reinsert' to automatically restart your music once you plug your headphones back in. You can also set a mute key and have it force open iTunes.

Breakaway is what we like to call a niche application. It those one specific thing, but does it well. If you find yourself listening to your music with your headphones most of the time and don't want to find yourself in the unpleasant situation of having it blaring out of your Mac when you remove your headphones then this is for you.

Breakaway is a niche program to pause your iTunes music when your headphones are removed.

Download Breakaway 1.75b in Softonic

ProPresenter is a presentation system that utilizes two screens, empowering users to quickly and easily present slides on one screen, while controlling the presentation with another screen.

For example, churches that display song lyrics on a big screen while a song is being performed live on stage can dynamically change the slide order for a worship song. Depending on the reaction of the audience, the band leader may choose to sing another verse, end the song early, or repeat the chorus several times. Typically these lyrics are presented through linear slide shows, but the limited flexibility of these programs make them very unpopular because of their inability to function dynamically.

This program allows an operator to click on a slide in our "Control Panel", at which point the projector screen immediately transitions to the new slide. What's more, the program supports QuickTime, and can synch slides with an audio track for canned music presentations. ProPresenter also allows you to change your backgrounds dynamically and, of course, you can integrate ProPresenter with your video production system to key the words over live or taped video.

Download ProPresenter 3.4.1 in Softonic

Creating invoices can be a pain, so it's always good to find a good application that can streamline the process for you. We found Invoice to be such a program. It allows you to create elements like documents, projects, customers or tasks, organize them and print them out. We liked how you start out with a new store, or use an example to build up from. You can also build up a catalog of products with elements like price or product tag. The dashboard where you can pin projects looks nice, but we wonder if it is that useful though.

Invoice offers a good looking and simple interface yet is full of the elements you can expect of an invoicing application. Being able to drag and drop elements into your invoices makes it much easier to create them. The program can also schedule your tasks and add flat fees and hourly rates. This program should definitely make managing your invoices a simpler process.

Download Invoice 3.03 in Softonic