In this week’s roundup of Mac apps, you’ll find an app that shows you the world, one that helps you track your location inside it, and one that makes sure you don’t accidentally wake up your coworkers in the wee hours of the morning.
Developer Sam Birch’s $20 Adze ( Mac App Store Link) helps you manage and edit geolocation files with a handy graphical interface.
Designed for trekking enthusiasts who like to keep track of where they’ve been, the app supports the popular GPX format, can automatically identify rest stops, and is even capable of optimizing your files to remove redundant data points.
Serif’s $40 Affinity Designer ( Mac App Store Link) is a vector graphics editor designed with professionals in mind.
The app takes full advantage of the many technologies that come with OS X, from OpenGL to Core Graphics, to deliver a design experience that is as Mac-like as they come—including the ability to zoom things to a whopping 1,000,000-percent factor.
Ever wished you could create your own crossword puzzles? Jim Graham’s $15 Crossword Editor ( Mac App Store Link) can turn your dream into a reality.
The app supports a number of common crossword formats and can automatically lay out the puzzles for you, starting from a list of words and clues.
3Planesoft’s $1 Earth 3D ( Mac App Store Link) gives you a beautiful three-dimensional look at the Pale Blue Dot, with a unique interface that highlights humankind’s most beautiful and prominent architectural works.
The app supports multiple monitors, and can even display a global weather map, although that will set you back an extra $2, alongside a couple other in-app-purchases.
Bright Vertex’s $8 EasyRes ( Mac App Store Link) makes easy work of changing your Mac’s resolution at any time.
The app sits quietly in your menu until called upon—at which point it shows a realtime simulation of what your desktop will look like at any given resolution—and, of course, lets you switch to a new size with the click of your mouse.
Developer and blogger extraordinaire Brett Terpstra’s $10 Marked 2 ( Mac App Store Link) generates a Markdown preview in realtime while you compose your document in the editor of your choice.
While the idea behind the app may sound odd, its flexibility and focus on a single task make it the ideal companion for those who take writing seriously.
Developer Alfons Schmid’s $20 Notebooks – Write Documents, Manage Tasks, Organize Files ( Mac App Store Link) saves every bit of information you ask it to: Text, images, PDF files—you name it.
In addition to working on its own, the app also features a WebDAV server that can be used to share information on your local network.
Ready Tap Go’s Time Travel ( Mac App Store Link) is the perfect tool for those who work in distributed teams or travel frequently.
The app allows you to quickly correlate the time at different locations and take notes relative to multiple places—all ideal tools for keeping track of to-do lists and meetings.
Mac behaving strangely? Systweak’s $10 Tweak and Tuneup keeps an eye on your system’s health and helps you identify and clean up potential areas of concern.
The app can look after your stray files, optimize app removal, and even identify websites that are tracking your activities online.