Forget The Finder, Dock, Or Spaces. Conjure Different

Whatever happened to the Think Different mantra? Mac OS X Snow Leopard didn’t bring much in the way of insanely great new technology. In fact, not much has changed, at least, on the visible surface.

In my never ending quest to find the next great thing, I ran across a Mac application that defies definition. Conjure is more than the sum of its parts, yet the individual parts make it surprisingly unique. I hesitate to call it a virtual desktop, since the Mac has a desktop already, and via Spaces, even more desktops, and yet the two are not remotely similar.

Divide & Conjure

The world seems to be a divided place. Rich man, poor man. Mac vs. Windows. Left brain and right brain.

Conjure is a decidedly right brain utility that does the unexpected in traditional ways, yet is wholly different than traditional Mac tools. Does that make sense? A single definition just doesn’t do the job.

Forget your Mac’s desktop metaphor, or the multiple desktop in Spaces, even the Dock metaphor doesn’t fit. Indeed, Conjure thinks different.

Defining Moments

I’ve often prided myself on being somewhat ambidextrous. Evenly left brain and right brain, able to move between the two worlds with little effort.

That said, Conjure leans heavily into the visual, the graphic, the creative, and, via the sum of the parts, becomes more. It’s the kind of Mac utility that you need to see before you can decide it’s something you need or want.

Hence, the ConjureBunny web site is loaded with videos which describe the various Conjure functions.

Summing the Parts

Here’s a summary of what Conjure does. First, think of it as a different desktop on your Mac. A desktop that has tools. Use it to make diagrams and drawings—right on the desktop.

Second, Conjure is also a notebook of sorts, so you can save items that might be saved by a separate Mac utility. Conjure launches applications, so it’s like the Dock. It’s a file organizer, so it’s like the Mac’s Finder.

To write a note, just start typing in Conjure. It knows what to do. To draw, click the spacebar. Various keystrokes move between tools for creating objects, lines, circles, etc. In other words, the desktop metaphor becomes a repository of action tools, rather than simply displaying the structure of your files and apps.

Think Differently

Before I dig into the details of what Conjure’s desktop does and how, it’s important to understand that not everyone thinks the same way.

Most of us, Mac or Windows PC users, understand the basic desktop, point and click, and hierarchical file structure. We know when to type, when to click, and how to navigate around the known areas of our Macs; the Desktop, Documents folder, the Dock, Music, Pictures, and Movies folders.

After those basics we tend to separate in widely differing capabilities as users; some of us are power users, others tread lightly and get lost trying to find files that have gone who knows where.

In other words, we don’t all think the same way, yet we use a complicated device with a somewhat rigid structure to get things done. What about those very creative people, highly intelligent, who view how to do what they do differently?

Conjure is a Mac application made for them. Click Here for Page 2 and the seven things Conjure does very differently.