In one of my more misguided attempts to do away with digital clutter, I uninstalled a piece of software from my Mac that I'd long forgotten about. It was only then that I realized how much I relied on it:
SideTrack is a replacement driver for Apple PowerBook and iBook trackpads. With SideTrack installed your standard trackpad becomes a powerful multi-button scrolling mouse. [Features Include:]
- Vertical scrolling at left or right edge of pad.
- Horizontal scrolling at top or bottom edge of pad.
- Map trackpad corner taps to mouse buttons 1-6 or simulated keystrokes.
- Extensive control over accidental input filtering.
Actually, it's that last feature that really takes the cake. I don't know how many times I was typing something and accidentally hit the trackpad, which really messes things up when you're trying to type a sentence. It took a couple of days before I realized the problem - Sidetrack had been taking care of all my accidental input in the background.
While you're there, you should pick up MenuMeters, which is another piece of software I've come to rely on. It gives you a highly-customizable set of monitoring tools, so you can see things like network, RAM, hard drive, and processor activity. Coming from a PC, I found it kind of strange to not have those flashing lights on my computer case, which indicated that the computer was still chugging away when it seemed like nothing was going on. With MenuMeters, you get a much more useful view of your computer's internal goings-on sitting conveniently next to your clock. Plus, it's free. Can't beat that with a stick.
