Keyboard Maestro - 3.5

I used the competitor for years (QK)
and now this is incredible, loads faster and
compatible with 10.6 SL

excellent product

Any program that frees up my time is worth a lot and Keyboard Maestro does that in spades. We used it on Journey to the Center of the Earth to control some very labor intensive but completely repetitive and mindnumbingly dull tasks in the creation of dailies DVDs for executives who needed to be able to see any given shot from any given day. KM interfaced with Final Cut Pro in a great way and we made specific use of some of the mouse specific macros to do some fairly tricky work--literally replicating perfectly what an assistant editor would have to do otherwise for thousands of repetitions. I had no worries going home at night with KM running. It was more reliable than several people I could name. :)

I am TRYING to move from WIn to MAC, which if you just look at the OS, it is an easy decision. But I am a loyal Thinkpad user which is exceptionally good and sturdy hardware with the little red nipple thingee which is so much better than any track pad, even the greatly improved one on my new MCP. Taking my hands off the keyboard to go to the track pad was driving me crazy, why can't I assign what is considered the "right click" to a keyboard command? You can't, and that was driving me crazy! Then I found KM and it is very possible it saved a marriage between me and MAC. Now if i need a right mouse click, I don't have to put two fingers on the track pad anymore, I just slide one thumb down to the command key and the other thumb to the space bar and voila, right click nirvana baby! Mr. Jobs should send the guy who made program a commission as I just ordered the new 17" MacBook Pro. I it was not for KM I would be getting a new T500 Thinkpad instead. This is a great program.

I use KM for a vast variety of things. From integrating Applescript or Unix into your everyday work flow to making it so you can stop and start iTunes from any app, KM makes it fast and easy to automate anything on your mac. It lives quietly on your menu bar waiting to make life easier. Even if you start out using it for one thing you'll find yourself adding more and more to it. An essential part of my work day and now with iPhone capabilities it's a welcome part of everyday life.
KM is an essential tool to any mac user.

with time and experience i'm finding TypeIt4Me easier, more versatile and much quicker to use for expanding typed abbreviations into my commonly used text entries, and both iClip and PTH Pasteboard to be more intuitive and easier-to-use multiple-clipboard utilities. it could just be that it's at odds with the way i'm used to working, but i find setting up both of these functions in Keyboard Maestro to be oddly involved for a utility whose purpose is to save the user time and effort.

the other macro functionality seems very cool though. i've used KM to circumvent and change keyboard commands i don't like in a few different apps and it works like a charm. if you don't mind running multiple utilities to get all the functionality (and more) of Keyboard Maestro, then my personal recommendation is TypeIt4Me for text-string macros, iClip or PTH Pasteboard for multiple clipboards, and Keyboard Maestro for macros. but if you insist on getting all this functionality in one piece of software, then KM is probably your best bet.