Let the record be clear. I love one-trick pony apps. Any app that does what it says it should do is worthy of my time and money.
I like the Mac App Store. It’s a quick and convenient way to shop for apps, and get updates without having to do much. What happens when you put the two together? Except for a few smart Mac app developers, it’s becoming a trend of growing frustration.
Try, Then Buy Is The Way To Go
There are a few exceptions to this rule, but I’m a charter member and firm believer in the try before you buy club of Mac app users.
In other words, if an app requires money, I should be able to try it out first.
Exceptions? Yes, a few. I’ll buy OS X Lion for my Mac without trying it out first. Why?
History is on my side. Apple’s previous line of kitty cat operating system versions have been A-OK with me; steady improvements, few disappointments. The days of waiting around for version x.1 are gone.
Highlight That Mouse Pointer
One of our favorite Mac app developers is Boinx Software. They’re the folks who make BoinxTV, FotoMagico, and other cool Mac presentation apps.
One of them is Mouseposé, a nifty one-trick pony app that simply highlights the area around your mouse pointer onscreen while dimming everything else on the screen.
It’s an app that helps presenters visualize keystrokes and mouse clicks on screen, a perfect way to highlight functions or features in a screen video or presentation.
During a video or presentation using a Mac, keystrokes and mouse clicks can get lost from view. Mouseposé fixes that problem a variety of ways. It dims the screen around the highlighted area. It’ll draw red circles around the mouse pointer.
It even turns on a sound when the mouse is clicked. Left and right clicks have different colors (so much for the one-trick pony aspect, huh?).
Mouseposé also highlights a focused window so your viewer can see detail onscreen, then see the window in context. There’s plenty more where those functions came from, so if you create onscreen instructions, presentations or videos, and need to highlight something onscreen, Mouseposé is a good fit.
It’s also available on the Mac App Store, so once you install it, future updates are simple and easy. And, doing it the right way, Boinx makes a trial version available, too. Yes, you can try it before you buy it. That’s the way God intended.
