If there's one thing you've probably learned over the years from reading TUAW, it's that backups are important. Many of the bloggers here are obsessive about backups, doing Time Machine backups, SuperDuper! bootable backups, and using services like BackBlaze for offsite backups -- and that's all for one Mac!

With the importance of viable and easy-to-create backups for your Mac, it's not surprising that Belgium development firm Dare to be Creative has just announced a new backup utility, Parachute [US$39.00]. The application is Snow Leopard-ready, and can be used to back up your Mac's data to your primary hard disk (definitely not recommended by our team), external disks, FTP or SFTP servers, USB drives, network volumes, and even your iDisk.

Parachute has many features that are found on other backup utilities. For example, you can schedule backups to run hourly, daily, weekly, or manually. The application also does incremental backups after the initial full backup, so subsequent backups take much less time. There is one feature that does appear to be unique to Parachute, and that's the ability to create multiple backup tasks for different files and folders on your Mac, and use a variety of destinations for each task.

There's a 15-day full-functioning trial available for download here. While you are in your tryptophan-induced coma after tomorrow's Thanksgiving Day feast, you can set up some Parachute backups and rest assured that your data is safe.

If there's one Mac application that has seemingly been around forever, it's StuffIt. This compression and archiving utility was the tool to use for compressing files years ago, and I'll still occasionally run into a .sit file extension when pulling up old files. The original application was the source of a bit of Mac folklore, as it was developed and supported for quite a while by a young student by the name of Raymond Lau.

Mac OS X did its best to kill off StuffIt by adding built-in support for Zip compression, but the utility has continued to flourish over the years. During the last week, Smith Micro released the newest version of the application, StuffIt Deluxe 2010 (US$79.95, with an introductory price of US$29.95 through October 15, 2009).

Since compression has been part of Mac OS X for quite a while, you might think that this application would have limited usefulness. Smith Micro is spinning StuffIt Deluxe 2010 as a better way to share large files over the Internet. How does it work? Read on, my friends...

Every "point-oh" version of Mac OS X usually brings some small bit of pain, as I find some little utility no longer works. Snow Leopard has been no exception. I had been using the version of Screen Sharing from 10.5.4 because it had some "hidden" features which I liked. Unfortunately those "hidden" features were also "unsupported" features. When 10.5.5 came out, they were gone, but I continued to use the version of Screen Sharing from 10.5.4 which worked until 10.5.8. Sadly for me, it does not work at all in 10.6.

The biggest drawback of Screen Sharing was the removal of the Bonjour Browser, which showed a list of computers available for Screen Sharing (both locally and via Back to My Mac). Now I had to type them in manually, which isn't such a big deal when you are trying to connect to a machine on a local network. If you are trying to connect over the Internet, however, you need to use the full hostname, which may look something like this: macbook.yourname.members.mac.com. Plus, it just seems like one of those things that the computer ought to do for me. [Side note, if you are looking for a handy way to see all the Bonjour services on your local network, check out Tildesoft's free Bonjour Browser utility.]

While looking through a bunch of old files in my ~/Downloads/ folder, I found a version of ScreenSharingMenulet. I checked its webpage and saw what I was looking for: "ScreenSharingMenulet 1.7.1 and higher is compatible to Mac OS 10.6 Snow Leopard." ScreenSharingMenulet sits in the menu bar along with your other menu extras. Simply click on its icon (shown above) and choose which computer you wish to connect to via a dropdown list. In my testing it worked very well over a LAN although it did not seem to pre-populate with the machines over the Internet. Given the flakiness of Back To My Mac over ther Internet, I can hardly fault this program for that shortcoming.

ScreenSharingMenulet is free (donations accepted) from Stefan Klieme who has several other handy-looking utilities at his website. If you use Screen Sharing a lot, it's definitely a handy tool to have around.

The world was looking bleak and dreary after Snow Leopard arrived last week, for my little menu bar friend, iStat Menus for Mac, was incompatible with the new version of Mac OS X.

This morning, however, the sun is shining, the birds are singing, fluffy kittens are playing again (see image at right for proof), and all is right with the world! iStat Menus 2.0 has arrived, and now my CPU monitor, calendar, and clock are back in the menu bar where they're supposed to be. The new Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard compatible version is running just fine, and less than a week of darkness filled the hearts of all of those who love iStat Menus. You can download it for free, although a donation is requested.

While iStat's developer, iSlayer, has resolved this disturbance in The Force, there's still a dark and evil presence in the universe. Apple, taking on the role of Emperor Palpatine with gusto, recently forced all iPhone developers to remove or retool apps that use a Free Memory function to display memory usage and/or clear out wired or inactive memory. As a result, iStat for iPhone [App Store] version 1.1 was released with the Free Memory function removed. Bjango (the iPhone arm of iSlayer) has kindly posted instructions for how to use version 1.0 to keep the function intact, but we're all wondering why Apple decided to axe all apps that performed this useful function.

Since this latest kerfuffle has forced Bjango to release a feature-limited version of iStat for iPhone, the company has reduced the price to US$1.99. There's no word from Apple on why they chose to kill all of the Free Memory apps. When you're the Emperor, you don't have to give any reasons for stomping on kittens.

One of my favorite new tools is Dropzone from Aptonic Software. Cory mentioned it back in early beta, but it's come a long way since then. Dropzone lets you set up "destinations," and when you click its icon in the dock it pops up a HUD-style window with icons for each destination. You can drop files and text onto each icon, or have them launch apps and run scripts with a click. It comes with ready-made destinations for everything from Flickr uploading of dropped images to zipping and emailing a collection of dropped files. The beauty of Dropzone is that the average user can set up all of the destinations they would normally launch other apps for, but users in more advanced stages of geekery can construct their own destinations using the Ruby-based Dropzone API.

My personal Dropzone setup includes destinations for creating projects or opening files in TextMate, opening a folder in GitX, sending files to my Amazon S3 account (puts a publicly-accessible url in my clipboard), filing based on OpenMeta tags, mounting and unmounting FireWire drives, making quick Backpack reminders, and the list goes on. I've even got one that scans dropped text for "http://" links and creates a linkbun.ch for me. Some of these scripts I've written, some were just a matter of customizing the existing destinations. Either way, I've got all of these capabilities no more than a click or drag away.

Creating your own destinations just requires a little Ruby-fu. "But I'm the farthest thing from a level 12 Ruby Mage," you say. Don't sweat it, let the community do it for you. Several scripts from my personal setup, along with a great selection of others, are available in the user-contributed actions section of the Aptonic Software website. Additionally, included actions like the application launcher allow full customization just by selecting the application to trigger.

Dropzone is available for a free trial, and can be had for $10US. Give it a try and see if it doesn't speed up your workflow. If you create any scripts you'd like to share, be sure to let the author know!

Convert is, as you might suspect, a tool for converting ducks to witches. No, wait! It's a simple conversion tool for your iPhone or iPod touch. Convert bears a slight resemblance to ConvertBot with a big, blue readout and simple gray icons, but I prefer Convert's simpler interface. You'll find the same features as in any converter, only in a compact, easy-to-use format.

Polar Bear Farm gave us 40 promo codes to give away, and that's what we're doing over the weekend. To enter, tell us if you prefer good ol' English units like inches and feet, or the nefarious but accurate Metric system, beloved by nerds all over the world. As per the usual, the giveaway is only good in the US (we didn't make that rule), you must be over 18 and winners will be chosen randomly. Good luck!

Here are the rules and a link to the legal statement:

• Open to legal US residents of the 50 United States and the District of Columbia who are 18 and older.
• To enter leave a comment indicating your preference in unit measurements: English or Metric.
• The comment must be left before Monday, August 10, 11:59PM Eastern Daylight Time.
• You may enter only once.
• Forty winners will be selected in a random drawing.
• Prize: Promo code for one copy of Convert (Unit Converter by PBF), US$1.99 value
• Click Here for complete Official Rules.

Some apps are almost universal. Chances are you may find a use for one of these apps in your daily goings-on, just as I have. All links are iTunes links.


Flicktunes, $0.99
Remember our chat about driving and using your iPhone? Flicktunes makes controlling the iPod in your iPhone (or touch) much easier when you have to focus on other things -- like driving. Flick your finger left or right to navigate your playlist, up or down to start or stop the music. The album art is all you see, plus a speaker icon indicating playback. It's super easy, a simple app, but very useful if you're driving or otherwise occupied while jamming out.

Army Knife, $1.99
If you need to measure something in a jiffy, Army Knife is a 9-in-1 tool with several measuring tools. There's a protractor, a caliper and a tape measure, plus a level and a "heart monitor" (you tap as your heart beats). There's a unit converter with distance, volume, weight and temperature conversions, and a flashlight and whistle. The flashlight, yes, is just a screen of white, but the whistle is kind of fun and will irritate your pets (please note: I do not condone irritating your pets, please do not flame me for hating animals).

Todo, $9.99
If you use Remember the Milk or Toodledoo, you should know that Todo syncs with them. There's also a free sync app for your desktop, which is essentially a backup... except there's a way to sync Todo with The Hit List via iCal. Is it optimal? No, but until THL has an iPhone app (not criticizing the developer as I'd rather it be done right than fast) this does the trick to an extent. Todo even without sync is a beautiful thing to behold and full of flexibility. In fact, the flexibility of the app is a little shocking, given the lowly status of the "to do" genre of apps. If you need a listmaker/to do/checklist app with or without sync capabilities, this is one of the best out there. Worth the $9.99 for what you get.

CardStar, free
If you're tired of carrying around a dozen membership or discount cards, CardStar will help you out. There are templates for many retailers and discount systems (air miles and so forth), and you can choose from a variety of barcode types. I was able to experiment with the codes a bit and test things at each of my errand stops (Blockbuster, Kroger, etc.), eventually winnowing my keychain down to just 2 keys and a door opener.

BigOven, free
I've toyed around with a few cooking apps, but if you're out and about (and have a signal) BigOven is a great way to throw a dish together based on an ingredient. BigOven basically makes everyone an Iron Chef -- at least as far as cool recipes goes. It can't help you cook things, and the text rendering could be a little more clear, but you can favorite stuff (with a BigOven free account), and copy an entire recipe for emailing. I'm not saying the interface is great, but the BigOven database is huge and stocked with what looks like good recipes.

I'm a sucker for Mac maintenance utilities.

That's not to say that I run them on a regular basis like I should do, but whenever I find a new one I like to give it a try and see how it's going to work for me. Dare To Be Creative Ltd. recently released version 2.0 of MainMenu, a collection of Mac utilities that resides in your menu bar.

The US$10 application takes up very little real estate in your menu bar, displaying a small rounded square icon with a plus sign in the center (you can choose other icons as well). Clicking the icon unveils the menu seen at right.

Each of the clearly identified "buttons" leads to a submenu of functions designed to clean up or optimize some area of your Mac. Under the System submenu, for example, you can repair disk permissions (usually done with Disk Utility), run the daily, weekly, and monthly cron scripts for cleaning up log files, clean caches, rebuild the Launch Services database and the Spotlight Index, and update prebindings (not really necessary since OS X 10.4) and the Whatis and Locate databases.

You can also create your own batch files to run a number of the tasks at the same time, restart your Wi-Fi and flush your DNS cache, perform many user-related tasks, and more. When tasks complete, you get Growl notification.

MainMenu 2 is my Friday favorite because it puts a lot of maintenance mojo a click or two away; there's no need to use the CLI or dig into the Utilities folder, and yes, I am a very lazy person. What's your favorite Mac utility? Leave a comment!

The Missing Sync line of software from Mark/Space has been around long enough that just about every handheld operating system made can now sync data with a Mac. As a result, it's not surprising that Mark/Space has announced Missing Sync for Palm Pre.

The $39.95 Mac application (also available in a two-license Business Edition for US$89.95) starts with the usual tasks of syncing contacts and calendars whenever you're in Wi-Fi range of your Mac, but then adds syncing of music, videos, podcasts, and photos to the mix. There's a built-in ringtone editor for creating your own ringtones from your music, and syncing PDF, Word, Excel, and PowerPoint documents is a snap.

If the screenshots of the application are any indication, Missing Sync for Palm Pre uses the tried and true user interface found on its siblings. Mark/Space has also announced that they are developing a Fliq app for Palm Pre (four Fliq apps are currently available for iPhone) to provide syncing of Safari bookmarks.

I'm sure there are a few Palm Pre owners out there who read TUAW; if you're one of them, could you let others know how this product works by leaving a comment?

If you prefer to keep your fingers on the keyboard and away from mice or trackpads, MercuryMover will allow you to do something simple: move and resize windows with the keyboard. There are a number of hotkeys for wiggling the windows into place, in 2 different increments, and a method of resizing windows via the keyboard.

Highbrow gives you fine control over which browser opens a certain link. For example, if someone sends you a link in IM and you want to open in it Firefox, but your default browser is Safari, you'd have to copy/paste that link into Firefox, or Safari will open it instead. But with Highbrow, you can quickly choose which browser opens what. Instead of mucking around in Safari prefs, Highbrow sets the default browser via handy menu bar item. Plus, you can opt for a floating window each time you click a link, and choose on the fly.

MercuryMover is $20 and a free trial is available. Highbrow is $12 and a free trial is also available.

Ever wonder what files your Mac is hiding from you? Maybe not, but once in a while there's a need to peek at the stuff OS X keeps you from viewing. Finder does a nice job of hiding the "guts" of some folders, you see, but there are occasions (troubleshooting, setting up a web server, looking for some folders, etc.) when you'll need to view and/or edit these files or folders. Enter hiddenfiles, a simple and unobtrusive widget that'll show those hidden files and folders.

Sure, you can use Onyx or Terminal and do some command line work. But it's much easier to drop into Dashboard, hit "Show" on the blue button and have Finder relaunch, showing all invisible files. I had to click on Finder in the Dock to actually launch it again, but when I did there were those lovely .DS_Store files, staring me down. I use this to remove the hidden _files off my daughter's PC-friendly MP3 player. That way she doesn't have to scroll through resource-fork versions of her songs.

The widget is free and available from developer Matthew Hansen's page.

You can find Mac applications that have been around longer than Retrospect, but not many that have the same ratio of copies installed to jobs/sanity saved. The venerable backup tool, now in its third decade and published by EMC Insignia (original developer Dantz was acquired a few years back) has been revitalized in version 8, now shipping, with scores of features that bring it to reasonable parity with the Windows version of the app.

The new Retrospect, which EMC previewed at Macworld Expo, breaks the administrative UI away from the underlying backup engine and allows backup managers to control multiple instances of the tool from one console. Simultaneous execution is supported now, along with advanced disk-to-disk backups, faster catalog rebuilds, single-write/multi-read operation, improved networking and tape drive support, and media & catalog cross-platform compatibility with the Windows 7.6 version. Video tutorials for the new v8 are here.

Retrospect 8, for the moment, only runs on Intel machines but can be used to back up PowerPC clients (PPC support is coming in a near-term update, the company says). Pricing starts at $129US for the Desktop edition with support for 3 client machines (a maintenance plan adds $120), and ranges up to $1700 for the Multi-Server, Unlimited Client version; there are also Single Server 20-client and unlimited client licenses available at intervening price points. Upgrade pricing is available through the EMC site.

R-Name is a simple, single-purpose application that takes the names of files and folders on your Mac and renames them one at a time or in batches. I use it almost every day. Yes, there are a dozen ways to batch rename files. I like R-Name for a few reasons:

• It's fast, both in loading and renaming
• Easy to rename just files, folders or recurse folder
• Hard to mess things up because you have to preview the new names before committing
• Drag and drop (Apple forgets how important this feature is all too frequently)

Here are the functions you can perform with R-Name: find and replace, number sequentially, add characters (beginning, before extension, at end), remove characters with the same options, change case, add/replace/remove extensions. There are some smart prefs too, but that's icing on the cake.

Oh, and did I mention: it's donationware! The author asks you to make a donation to UNICEF. Unfortunately, R-Name appears to be abandonware -- the author's site is currently down (thus the source code is unavailable) and best I can tell the app is only supported to 10.3. But it works for me. What renaming tool or workflow do you use?

Instead of rounding up 16 apps in one review, I'll just tackle five. Links from the title of the app take you directly into iTunes and the App Store.

WideNoise measures the noise in an area (using the mic on an iPhone, of course) and registers that online with your location. WideTag will show you regions of loud and quiet on a global, interactive map. My area shows "feather" because I took a recording in an empty house. The app looks like a prop from Fallout, with distressed metal and an analog meter, and I found the readings to be comparable to Decibel, which I've reviewed before. This might be good for finding quiet places in urban areas, provided people take the time to use it. I'm not sure $1.99 will have this flying off the virtual shelves, either.

Wooden Labyrinth 3D is exactly that, the classic game of a metal marble in a wooden, moving maze. We've seen several iterations of these on the store, but I think this version nails it. The physics are superb, the 3D is flawless, and the soundtrack is relaxing and pleasant. Plus, unlike real-world versions, you don't have to keep dozens of wooden mazes around -- there are several themes in the game which lead to several puzzles in each theme. In short, you're looking at a wide range of gameplay in this one app. My only complaint is one of organization: I would have preferred groupings based on difficulty, or some way to know how hard a level is before launching it. Is it worth $2.99? Considering the polish and replayability, I'd say yes. True, there are freebies out there, but none match the elegance of this app (and some which cost more aren't as good).

Penalized is billed as an "adult" party game, but it's a bit less provocative than you might think. There's no explicit adult content, this is merely hinted at. The game is a series of challenges, like "Impersonate Ray Charles" and if the player can't perform the challenge, they must be penalized somehow. The adult part is in the penalty, so removing a piece of clothing is an option. So is chopping a cord of wood, you know, adult stuff. Penalized does include a lot of challenge cards in 6 categories, but the $1.99 may seem a bit much. Especially if you carry around a deck of challenge cards in your pocket already. This is also something you could cook up with TileStack, I think.

Keep reading for Pure Sleep and Army Knife, two apps I use on a daily basis.

Whenever we write about Mac OS X utilities for system maintenance, our readers always remind of us one freeware utility that does a lot of work at no cost -- OnyX from Titanium Software.

This multifunction application does verification of your Startup Disk and System file structure, performs a lot of miscellaneous tasks for system maintenance and cleanup, and lets you configure some hidden parameters for the Finder, Dock, Dashboard, Exposé, Safari, the Login window, and even some of Apple's applications.

The improvements in OnyX 2.0 include faster operation, and deleting the applications cache, Internet cache, and logs has been improved. Most of these improvements are due to the application now being complied with the latest version of Xcode. One new feature lets you rebuild Mail's envelope index in the automation panel.

While the version 2.0 download is only available for Leopard, you can also download earlier versions for Tiger, Panther, and Jaguar. Support is pretty good; it's done through Titanium's forums and there are always answers available for most of your questions.

If you don't use OnyX, what's your favorite free Mac system maintenance utility?