As a new Mac owner, I had a lot of catching up to do when it comes to figuring out what applications will best suit my needs. Some are easy to figure out – the Adobe Creative Suite CS4 Master Collection, Microsoft Office 2008 Mac, iLife ’09 and iWork 09 were early acquisitions.

But then it came down to the nitty gritty. The little daily-use apps that help workflow, help me remember things, and generally get stuff done. So I turned to my friend Mike Tighe, a web developer in Calgary who I met when we were both working at Critical Mass. He’s a wealth of information and he didn’t disappoint when I asked him what applications I should download for my shiny new Mac. So without further ado, I give you Mike’s list of the best, the brightest, the all-time must-have Mac apps.

• 1Password for storing login information and autofilling forms on the web.
• Adium for MSN, Google Talk, AIM and Facebook Chat
• AppZapper for uninstalling programs
• Coda for web development – coding, text editor + file transfer + svn + css + terminal + books + more = whoah.
• Evernote for note taking
• Google Chrome for fast browsing
• Jing for screencasts and screen grabs
• OmniGraffle for diagrams / information architecture
• OmniOutliner for notes
• OmniFocus for time management
• Silverback for UX testing
• Versions for SVN
• Twhirl for Twitter (Mike likes Twhirl, my suggestion is Tweetie)
• Transmit for FTP
• VLC for video

I have to say that I’ve not tried all of these apps just yet but the ones I have started using have been really useful. Below, I’ve added a few of my own favourite apps that weren’t in Mike’s list.

• Skype for cheap long distance / video chat
• Growl for notifications + GrowlTunes for iTunes notifications
• Chromatic Tuner for tuning guitars + other instruments
• Logic Studio for music production
• Final Cut Studio for video editing
• Handbrake for DVD ripping
• Toast for CD/DVD burning
• Picasa for photo organizing (if you don’t like iPhoto)
• Parallels Desktop for running Windows apps

I couldn’t imagine really needing much more software than that … but if you guys can think of anything essential that I’m missing here, by all means, comment away. And by the way, thanks Mike!