I’ve put together a list of apps that I tend to use. The ecology of apple apps is so rich at this point. In any case, here they are:
Password Management
1Password
- 
- Excellent password manager
 
 
Menu Bar
Alfred 3
- 
- Application launcher and more
 
 
Amphetamine
- 
- Keeps my mac awake
 
 
Display Menu
- 
- Quickly adjusts the display size
 
 
Little Snitch
- 
- Limits the traffic apps seem to think they have the privilege of using
 
 
Sound, Music, and Broadcasting
Audio Hijack
- 
- Useful for broadcasting music from Cubase
 
 
AudioTunes (no longer made)
- 
- really useful for making quick changes of audio format
 
 
Boom 3d
- 
- magically makes music sound better
 
 
Capo
- 
- Useful for reverse engineering music
 
 
Cubase 10
- 
- my standby Digital Audio Workstation
 
 
Gameshow
- 
- Useful for broadcasting live performances
 - about to be discontinued and taken over by Wirecast.
 
 
Grand 3
- 
- A solid piano VST
 
 
iTunes
- 
- Good stuff
 
 
Loopback
- 
- Very useful for routing music from one app to another
 
 
ScreenFlow
- 
- Standby screencasting. This with Keynote were the main apps for Being Productive
 
 
Soundsource
- 
- Simple menu bar app to direct sounds to different places
 
 
Syntorial
- 
- Super cool app for learning the useful workings of a synthesizer
 
 
VLC
- 
- Powerful, free media player
 
 
VOX
- 
- Another very useful media player
 
 
Wavelab 9
- 
- Sound wave editor. Great for anatomically dissecting sound
 
 
File Management
A Better Finder Rename
- 
- Quickly rename a bunch of stuff
 
 
Big Mean Folder Machine
- 
- Quickly separate or merge files in folders
 
 
Carbon Copy Cloner
- 
- I have an external hard drive regularly copied to another drive as backup
 
 
CrashPlan
- 
- Has been my a solid online backup service for years.
 
 
DEVONthink Pro Office
- 
- Useful for siloing different parts of my work and life. Deserves more than a couple of sentences of explanations.
 
 
Dropbox
- 
- A reliable cloud service for files
 
 
Dropzone
- 
- I’ll use this to send files from one computer to another via a Dropbox folder and a Hazel script
 
 
Finder
- 
- Main file navigation
 
 
Forklift
- 
- FTP client of choice
 
 
FreeSpace
- 
- Tells me how much space I have left on my hard drive
 
 
Gemini 2
- 
- Great for finding duplicate files and removing them
 
 
HoudahSpot
- 
- Powerful search
 
 
Hazel
- 
- An excellent file manager. Set some rules and Hazel keeps my files tidy. See my post on using Hazel to sort.
 
 
OmniPresence
- 
- Keeps my OmniOutliner files synced
 
 
Path Finder
- 
- Another approach to Finder files. I like its preview set up.
 
 
Space Gremlin Pro
- 
- Excellent visualizer for space used in my disk drives
 
 
Time Machine
- 
- Backup!
 
 
VisualDiffer
- 
- Another one of those apps that I don’t use often, but when I need it, it is excellent for what it does.
 
 
Productivity
Bartender 3
- 
- Hides or shows my menu bar items
 
 
BusyCal
- 
- My favorite calendar app – I particularly love the 2-week view
 
 
Due
- 
- My favorite timer. I love the nagging feature.
 
 
Flashcard Hero
- 
- When I need flashcards.
 
 
Freedom
- 
- I don’t really use it anymore, but it was useful to block websites
 
 
Hook
- 
- A really neat bi-directional linking system and more (Hook & OmniFocus)
 
 
Howler Pro
- 
- a fun alert
 
 
Keyboard Maestro
- 
- an excellent tool to manage key commands and more (Posts integrating Keyboard Maestro with OmniFocus)
 
 
Moom
- 
- window size and placement management
 
 
OmniFocus
- 
- my task manager of choice
 
 
OmniGraffle
- 
- great for designing concepts and spaces
 
 
OmniOutliner
- 
- an outliner that works well as a project house
 
 
Paste
- 
- copy and paste management
 
 
TextExpander
- 
- a deluxe text management app – type a few letters and make many more (posts integrating TextExpander with OmniFocus)
 
 
Workspaces
- 
- an app that can link to a number of files and documents
 
 
Figures, Billing
Banktivity
- 
- my financial tracking program of choice
 
 
Calca
- 
- a neat text-based program for quick doing calculations
 
 
Moon Invoice
- 
- for simple invoicing
 
 
Numbers
- 
- a solid spreadsheet tool
 
 
Interfaces
Firefox
- 
- internet browser
 
 
Google Chrome
- 
- internet browser
 
 
Epic Games
- 
- video games!
 
 
Firestorm
- 
- Second Life client
 
 
GOG Galaxy
- 
- video games!
 
 
Kindle
Mailplane
- 
- great for managing multiple Gmail accounts
 
 
Steam
- 
- video games!
 
 
TweetDeck
Origin
- 
- video games!
 
 
Plex Media
- 
- watch my movies on other devices
 
 
Writing, Drafting, and Text Editors
Audiobook Builder
- 
- helps me make audiobooks
 
 
BBEdit
- 
- for when I’m doing rudimentary php coding, trying to break my websites
 
 
Folding Text
- 
- a text editor to focus on individual sections
 
 
Hemingway Editor
- 
- great for helping me improvinate my sentences
 
 
iA Writer
- 
- a text editor for focus
 
 
Keynote
- 
- a solid presentation device – used for the bulk of making Being Productive
 
 
Pages
- 
- A solid word processor and text designer
 
 
MindNode
- 
- great for mind-mapping
 
 
Scrivener
- 
- the workhorse of all text programs. This is what I write books with
 
 
Ulysses
- 
- a nice all around text manager
 
 
Zettelkasten
- 
- 
a notetaking app I’ve been recently experimenting with and really excited by
 
 - 
 
Zotero
- 
- a free research assistant app
 
 
PDF Management
PDF Expert
- 
- a PDF editor
 
 
PDFpenPro
- 
- another PDF editor
 
 
Preview
- 
- an unsung hero of default PDF tools
 
 
Images
Capto
- 
- great for managing and marking up screenshots
 
 
Pixelmator
- 
- solid image editor
 
 
ScreenFloat
- 
- for when I need a screenshot to continue floating above other windows
 
 






What do you use for iOS? That’s what I’m also curious about
Hi Brandon – that’s a good idea. I’ll add it to my list of potential posts…
You may want to check out SoundControl by Static Z. I found them a couple years ago when I was looking for an easy way to switch between my monitor’s built in speakers and my laptop speakers. Since then they’ve really built out the app and I use it to switch to certain sound sources automatically or even adjust specific app’s sounds. For instance, if I’m watching a YouTube tutorial and there is no music in the background but I’d like there to be I can have iTunes or whatever open and choose a specific low sound playing while also keeping my browser volume at a higher setting. Another use for varying sound controls is setting a specific app you’re waiting on notifications from to a high volume but keeping the volume of all your other working apps low. I’m not affiliated with them at all – just passing along a good piece of software I like.
Oh, and Yoink, too! Great app by another dev present on your list (ScreenFlow). I use that little app almost daily when composing tutorials. My workflow is take a screenshot via ScreenFlow and then drag from the small thumbnail icon in ScreenFlow to the Yoink ‘box’ in a specific corner. Once the screenshot is in the Yoink box I can drag it into whatever composition tool I’m using (Bear, for now). Yoink is great for more than just screenshots though – I use it for pretty much any type of file. Again, no affiliation.
Thank you for the suggestions, Victoria!