Free Download A Day

Juice Receiver is all about podcasts. Those little media-rich RSS feeds are a way of like for many of us. Juice plays the part of the aggregator of content.

You can set Juice to receive podcasts the way you want to collect them. Whether it's once or twice a day, or even every 30 minutes, you get to call the shots. You can also configure it to grab all back-episodes that you might have missed along the way.

Juice doesn't incorporate a media player, so you can use it in conjunction with your favorite player. It interfaces automatically with iTunes, Windows Media Player, and Winamp, or you can choose "No player" and have it use your default media player, or you can even handle the details yourself. Either way you will know that you have the latest and greatest and that you will get to listen and view the latest podcasts on your own terms.

Power users can even set Juice to run a command, batch file, or shell script after each download, making Juice even more useful as you get your fix.

Juice Receiver is available for Linux, Mac (OS X 10.3+) and Windows (Windows 2000+).

Download Juice Receiver

Okay, the truth is out: we all love Legos! There's always been something very satisfying about the look and feel of those little plastic blocks. From the simplest construction–look, I made a cube!–to complex animated beasts, everything just kinda' looks cool when it's made out of Legos.

In fact, the only real drawback with these little Danish blocks is when you step on them in the middle of the night. There is nothing in the world as sharp as those little plastic corners at 4:30 in the morning when you've just GOT to go.

Logo Digital Designer protects you from that danger, while giving you much of the fun of the Lego experience. Whether using a pre-built model as a starting point, or just starting with a blank screen, you can build just about whatever you want. The Camera Control lets you rotate your virtual model, and to zoom in and out, getting a better view of your handiwork from all angles. You have an unlimited number of bricks, so you'll never run out. Once you're done, you can check the Price Window to see how much your project would cost if constructed with real Lego bricks. Heck, you can even click through to the online store to buy them right now.

Lego Digital Designer is available for Windows (XP) or Mac (OS X 10.3+).

Download Lego Digital Designer

Air guitar is all the rage. Keyboard simulators are pretty easy to find. What if your predilection run more toward the percussive end of the spectrum?

MacDrumset is a drum simulation app for the next Buddy Rich (or John Bonham, without the whole dying part). Using nothing but your computer keyboard, you can play your heart out on a virtual drum kit with a kick drum, three snares and toms, two cymbals, and even hand claps to round out the collection. There are also a couple of built-in rhythms, for times when you just feel like phoning it in.

There's nothing too fancy about MacDrumset, but it is a fun little diversion, and hey, if you're going to be drumming your fingers on the desktop, why not include a good rimshot or crash from time to time.

MacDrumset is a MacOS "Classic" app. It runs under OS 9 or in "classic" mode for OS X systems so equipped.

Download MacDrumset

Are you an air guitar aficionado? Do you lust after that sunburst Strat hanging in the music store window? If you've got a computer keyboard, this may be your lucky day.

Frets On Fire is a keyboard-based guitar playing game. Using a combination of Function keys and the the Enter key, you play along with individual notes and chords to rack up a big score. You can start at Easy level to learn the moves; graduate to Medium as you gain confidence, and eventually you'll be at Amazing, shredding with the best of them. There are tons of songs available, or you can import from Guitar Hero, or even create your own songs.

It may not be time to quit your day job yet, but with Frets On Fire, you'll feel like that big recording contract is just around the corner.

Frets On Fire is available for Linux, Mac (x86 processors), and Windows.

Download Frets On Fire

Mark Twain suggested that "everybody talks about the weather, but nobody does anything about it." While WeatherSnitch can't do anything about the weather, it can keep you up-to-date with current conditions and forecast information.

WeatherSnitch is always available, running in your menubar, meaning that you lose no space on your desktop. By default, it displays current conditions for your selected location. You can configure it to add additional locations, so you can enjoy basking in the sun in San Diego while keeping track of the latest storm in Buffalo, where your brother is.

You can configure WeatherSnitch to specify how often it should update its information. You can cycle through your locations, so they will each appear in turn on your menubar. Click on the menubar to open the detail window for more info. With built-in links to weather.com (The Weather Channel's website), you can drill down even further for complete weather information for your selected locations.

Maybe you can't really do anything about the weather, but with WeatherSnitch you will certainly know all there is to know about it.

WeatherSnitch is a free Mac app that requires OS X 10.4.

Download WeatherSnitch

Your iPod is a favorite bring-along item no matter where you go. You can jam a lot of stuff into that little package, and be on your way. Music, podcasts, all kinds of stuff to keep you occupied. What about bringing something other than audio content along with you?

podLoadr is a neat little tool that allows you to easily add text to your iPod. Using the Notes feature that was introduced in third-gen iPods, you can jam text into your iPod and bring it along. Whether text documents, web pages, RSS feeds, or other content, it's easy to upload them to the iPod, and then you're off and running. To look at your additions, just choose Extras > Notes and then select the item you want to view.

Because of the iPod's architecture, there are certain limitations here. Large documents will be broken into 4k chunks, and you can't have more than about 2000 individual notes.

podLoadr is alpha-level software, so be sure you have a good backup of any data or media files on your iPod, in case the unthinkable happens and you have to reformat it.

podLoadr is cross-platform, being built in Java. That means you will need to have the Java developers' kit or runtime installed on your system to use it. After that, it should run on anything that supports Java.

Download podLoadr

YouTube is arguably the Next Biggest Thing. Unless you're not online. At that point, it's just another resource that's not available to you. Until now.

TubeTV is a slick app that allows you to convert YouTube videos into a format that's usable by your iPod, phone, or even AppleTV. YouTube, Google Video, MySpace, and others use a special Flash Video format for their movies. Those flv files aren't readily accessible by your run-of-the-mill media player, but TubeTV can take those files and convert them into other formats that are usable by your other apps.

To use it, just download your movie, convert it, and there you go. In addition to various video formats, you can also rip the audio track alone directly to MP3, so even your pre-video iPod can reap the rewards.

You will need to have QuickTime on your machine, and the Perian plugin (link available at the site) to complete your conversions.

TubeTV is a Mac app and requires OS X 10.4.

Download TubeTV

If you have a question about a Mac, you’re going to find the answer in MacTracker. Processor speed, original operating system version, expansion slots–it’s all here.

MacTracker is the ultimate resource for all things Macintosh. Starting with the Lisa (Macintosh XL), you can see every computer and Apple-branded Mac-compatible device, such as printers, displays, scanners, operating systems, and extras (remember the iPod, kids?) that came out of Cupertino: pictures, specs, and even room for your own notes, with links to relevant Web sites and documents. There’s even a section for Mac clones. You can create your own “Smart Categories” to search and group information based on your own criteria, including your notes.

Along with the nitty-gritty specs, there are some cool images included with MacTracker. The info page for each system has a picture of the system, and for the computers, you can play the “Startup Chime”, and for some of the older systems, there is also a recording of the “Death Chime”–not a happy sound, that. Interesting historical tidbits are included also.

MacTracker is available in versions for MacOS 8.5+, OS X, Win2k+, and even iPod.

Download MacTracker

Fish is an aquarium simulator for Macintosh systems. With Fish, you become the master of your underwater domain, adding fish of various tropical species and customizing the underwater environment to your liking. You can control the numbers and speed of your fish, as well as their sociability and even the speed of their metabolism. Feed your fish manually or automatically, and if the unthinkable happens–the inevitable “trip to the toilet” that befalls many a tropical fish–you have a Revive Fish button that will re-animate your piscine casualties.

Along with a normal human’s-eye-view of the onscreen action, you can choose from several other camera angles, including a fish cam, that allows you to view the world from the perspective of any of your fish. A full screen mode is available, making it easy to get totally caught up in your undersea world.

You can save your fish and aquariums from session-to-session, and there is even network capability, allowing you to share your fish with other users via Rendezvous.

Fish is compatible with all versions of OS X.

Download Fish

Did you sleep through all the astronomy lectures in college? Do you still have problems finding the Big Dipper? Stellarium may be the answer.

Stellarium is an open source planetarium application available for Linux, Mac, and Windows. Set your observing position and see the sky as it appears. Did you ever wonder what it all would look like from the moon? You can choose any moon or planet from which to observe, as well as any terrestrial location. How about a different time? Set the time and date, and you can travel back, or ahead, in time.

Now about that Big Dipper: turn on labels to show you what you’re seeing. Fire up the constellation overlays and see if that really looks like a goat up there (Capricornus), or just a bunch of stars. You can dig deeper and look at deep sky objects among the constellations.

Stellarium features over 120,000 stars, as well as all the planets and their moons. There is a scripting feature that allows you to record and play back your own shows, and you can even use Stellarium to drive a telescope.

It’s too late to improve your grade, but you still have time to find Orion’s belt.

Download Stellarium