Productivity & Utility

Applications used to produce documents, spreadsheets, diagrams, bibliographies, or to accomplish clerical work and applications that are either a component of the operating system or helps to extend the operating system in some way including applications to visualize operating system environments. As well, applications focus on the direct transfer of files between two computers.

Grab

August 21, 2014 by Andy Voelker
Categories: MultimediaProductivity & Utility

grab_icon_in_flurry_style_by_flakshack-d4n477d

Availability: Mac Labs  |  Built in to Mac OS
Comparable: Snipping Tool

Grab is an application created by Apple Inc. for Mac OS X that is used to take screenshots.  It supports capturing a marquee selection, whole window, whole screen, and timed screen.

This application is pre-installed on all recent Macintosh systems.  It can be found using the Spotlight function (keyboard shortcut: CMD SPACE) or in the Utilities folder under Applications.  The Grab utility can also be found in the Finder as a menu item by selecting “Services”, then going to “Grab”.

The only image format for screenshots taken by Grab is TIFF.

Inkscape

October 30, 2014 by Andy Voelker
Categories: Design & VisualizationMultimediaProductivity & Utility

Availability: Free Download
Comparable: Illustrator

Inkscape is professional quality vector graphics software which runs on Linux, MacOS, and Windows. It is used by design professionals and hobbyists worldwide, for creating a wide variety of graphics such as illustrations, icons, logos, diagrams, maps and web graphics. Inkscape uses the W3C open standard SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics) as its native format, and is free and open-source software.

Inkscape has sophisticated drawing tools with capabilities comparable to Adobe Illustrator, CorelDRAW and Xara Xtreme. It can import and export various file formats, including SVG, AI, EPS, PDF, PS and PNG. It has a comprehensive feature set, a simple interface, multi-lingual support and is designed to be extensible; users can customize Inkscape’s functionality with add-ons.

Tags: graphicsvector

Inspiration

March 18, 2015 by Andy Voelker
Categories: Productivity & Utility

i9logo

Availability: Download
Comparable: Dia, FreeMind, yEd Graph Editor

For visual mapping, outlining, writing and making presentations, use Inspiration 9, the ultimate thinking and learning tool. Brainstorm ideas, structure your thoughts and visually communicate concepts to strengthen understanding with the Diagram and Map Views. To take notes, organize information, and structure writing for plans, papers and reports, use the integrated Outline View to focus on main and supporting ideas and to clarify thinking in written form. With Inspiration’s Presentation Manager, transform your diagrams, mind maps and outlines into polished presentations that communicate ideas clearly and demonstrate understanding and knowledge.

For a quick overview of the software, go here.