Now, obviously my choices will not suite many programmers. For this reason, please bear in mind that I’m a PHP developer, and my choices focus on PHP/HTML/CSS development. There are going to be a few repeated apps, simply because there’s a fine line between the two subjects.

Ok, lets get started!

10. VMWare Fusion
As any web developer will know, getting your sites to work properly in all the major browsers can be a nightmare. Especially when you’ve got to work around IE. For this reason, I needed to have a way to test out my work on Internet Explorer 6, 7 and 8, as well as some other, less well known Windows only browsers. VMWare fusion lets you install, and run Windows on top of your existing OS X system. You can effectively run windows and mac applications side-by-side seamlessly. This is great when testing our your work in those Windows browsers. VMWare has a few alternatives such as Parallels, or the free VirtualBox by sun. All of these apps provide a great way of getting Windows, Linux or any Unix based OS up an running inside your Mac!

9. Snapz Pro X
Snapz Pro X is a screenshot application, that replaces the standard CMD+Shift+3 screen capture combination with a range of options. For example, instead of saving the screenshot to your desktop, you can put it in the clipboard. In addition to this, you’re not forced to capture the entire screen. Snapz X Pro lets you capture a small selection, a window (‘objects’) or even take a video! It’s a very lightweight application and has some great features!

8. Dropbox -
Where o where would I be without my Dropbox! Dropbox provides you with 2GB of free storage. It acts like a folder on your mac, but whenever files are updated (locally or by another computer with access), the files get synced. Whats great, is that because the files are synced, you don’t need Internet access to use it. I generally use DropBox for storing files that I’m working on, allowing me to access them on my iMac, or my MacBook Pro. There’s also a great revisions system, which means if you accidentally overwrite a file, you can log into their site, and retrieve it, similar to a subversion setup. If you use THIS LINK to get a Dropbox account, I get some extra free space, and so do you. If you dont want to use that link, you can go directly to GetDropbox.com and register.

I’m currently using the free 2GB, however for $9.99 /month (or $99.99 /year) you can upgrade to 50GB storage. They also offer a 100GB option for $199.99 / year.

7. Active Collab
I only really started using this over the last month, however have found it to be fantastic for managing my web projects. It lets you track release versions (and their individual tasks, documents, etc), projects, files, staff, time tracking, etc. Its fantastic. There are a few free alternatives out there, and a fork was made off of the first release of Active Collab before it stopped being a free app.

6. Web Developer Toolbar (Firefox)
The Web Developer Toolbar is a Firefox addon. Ok, its not technically an App, but its as good as. It lets you perform a range of options on a website, including disabling images, javascript, css, etc as well as add custom stylesheets, resize windows, etc. It’s a must-have for web developers. You can download it for free from the Mozilla addons site!

5. MAMP Pro
MAMP pro is the paid add-on to the free MAMP application. MAMP is basically Apache, MySQL and PHP for your Mac, all ready to use. MAMP Pro adds on an attractive GUI to allow you to setup virtual hosts, and configure custom settings per domain. I use it for splitting up projects into separate local sub-domains.

4. Transmit
Transmit is a paid FTP application, with a fantastic GUI and range of features. It’s made by Panic, the same guys that brought you Coda. Transmit is a fantastic FTP application, and supports all major functions. In addition, it supports Amazon S3, WebDav, SFTP and SCP.

3. Photoshop
I think this one goes without saying. I’ve been using Photoshop for over 5 years and have yet to find anything remotely similar. Even GIMP, an application that Linux lovers swear is just as good as Photoshop, really does not come anywhere near the features of this great Adobe app. I’m using CS4 on my MBP, and CS3 on the iMac (simply because I’ve not really needed to upgrade yet!)

2. Terminal
I’m a heavy Terminal user when developing. I generally tend to keep terminal open 24/7 because it allows me complete control of my Linux server. I use it to debug, test and install software. If you’re strictly dealing with a Mac, you’re not going to be needing this, however its a handy tool to have when you’ve not got a GUI handy!

1. Coda
Yes, Coda’s done it again. You will recall, Coda made it to the top of my last ‘Top 10′ post, for the simple reason that there is nothing like it! Coda provides a complete web development suite; A site management system, a file browser, a code editor, a css editor, a terminal, books and a web browser. What more could you need?!

So, those are my top 10, what are yours?

When I was out in Florida over Christmas, I bought myself an Acer Aspire One netbook. Basically this little thing has very similar specifications to my Mac Mini which has recently had lots of problems….problems that would be very expensive to fix.

Anyway, I decided I would have a go at getting OS X Leopard running on the Aspire One. I had read that it was possible however without wireless and in some cases sound. Plus I would have to sacrifice the use of the SD expansion port and other media ports. That’s not really something that bothers me though as I use my main computer for anything relating to cameras.

So I installed OS X using Kalyway’s great distro (also I may note that I do own a separate OS X license for this computer) and got everything working except wireless. I found that the Atheros based wireless card in the Aspire wasn’t supported by OS X. So I purchased a broadcom based dell card from eBay for £12 inc P&P. Once that arrived, I fitted it and it worked first time. At the same time I took the opportunity to replace the 512MB RAM module with a 1GB module, taking the system memory up to 1.5GB’s

Overall I’m very happy with the result. I got a great portable laptop / server running the best operating system around for just $349 USD in Walmart!

Unfortunately I cant post any snaps up at the moment as I’m in the middle of moving from Flickr to my own gallery, however will update you once I do have a bunch of images to show off!

1Password on the iPhone

I’ve been using an application called 1Password for about 5 months now. I purchased it through the MacHeist Bundle for a really low price. I wanted to share a bit about this app, as they have just announced that they are releasing an iPhone version that will allow you to sync all stored passwords from your mac! Not only that, but the iPhone native application is set to be FREE for a limited time!

These guys have provided me with free updates and are now providing an entire application, free! The new application will allow pushing of passwords to an from the iPhone. It will fill out all saved forms, and submit them without you needing to touch anything!

This post is really just to thank Agile Web Solutions for their fantastic work and updates to 1Password. I thoroughly recommend it to anyone with a mac. It uses browser plugins to work with all major Mac browsers such as Firefox, Safari, Camino and Opera, plus it can be used across more than one mac at a time!

Take a look at the link below for some great screenshots and details about the upcoming iPhone App!

Switchers’ Blog » 1Password Coming Soon to an App Store Near You.

(NOTE: None of the links in this post are affiliate links. I simply want to thank the developers for their fantastic work!)