Here’s a common scenario. You’re working away on your Mac and you want to know what time it is. What are your options? Watch? iPhone?
Or, for most Mac users, do the obvious and glance at the Mac’s clock in the upper right side of the Menubar. You can set the time so it displays seconds, as well as date and day, but you’ll need to strain to see that tiny little clock. Is there a better way?
Big Is Better
Looking around for a clock screensaver I stumbled across Fliqlo, which is a simple and free flip clock screensaver that mimics the appearance of those retro flip clocks that existed in the time of dinosaurs. The Fliqlo flip clock screen saver is visually pleasing and it’s available for Mac users.
To answer my own question I don’t think there’s necessarily a better way to tell time while you’re using your Mac than a glance to the Menubar’s time. I mean, how easy is that? It’s always there, always visible, mostly accurate to the second, and the only effort is a simple glance.
What if you want more variety? Variety is the spice of life. Mac app developers specialize in apps that do what Apple’s software does not. Enter Dock Clock which does more than the app’s name implies. It’s a colorful clock for the Dock, but it’s also a clock you can enlarge and display anywhere on the Mac’s screen.
Dock Clock is a traditional clock so it displays the time to the second (and it’s just as accurate as the Mac’s Menubar clock), but also displays date and day. Click on the Clock and get a larger day, date and month display.
The app can run in the Dock where it is more easily visible, or within the Menubar. Almost everything is adjustable and it’s easily moved around the screen.
Take at look at the variety of clocks you can choose to display on the Mac’s screen (or, Dock).
What about features?
Everything you need and nothin’ you don’t. Hey, it’s a clock. It tells the time. The added bonus is the number of different clocks, and an option to display day, date, and month.
The Menubar icon has a few useful features, including one which removes some of the features visible on the screen clock. Click the icon and you see a larger day, month, and date display. What you get is just a collection of clocks that happen to live in the Dock or on the Mac’s screen and the whole package won’t set you back two dollars.
Bargain time, time bandits.
Have you noticed some of the cool new screen savers in Mac OS X Mountain Lion? Many of them have nice effects like flashing and rotating colors, moving text, word of the day, iTunes artwork, and photo slideshows. Sure you can add the time to any screen saver that you choose, but what if you want your entire screen to display a clock?
An elegant alternative to Mountain Lion’s default screen savers is a simple flip clock – appropriately named FlipClock. This screen saver does one thing only: displays the current time. It’s a simple, yet comes in handy and looks nice.
So how do you get it on your Mac? Easy, just follow these steps:
1. Download the FlipClock file from the website, unzip the file.
2. Click on the .saver file in the FlipClock folder to install the screen saver; you can install it for all users or just yourself – useful if you have more than one user account on your Mac.
3. Type in your user password when prompted, to complete the installation.
4. Now select the FlipClock screen saver, listed under the “Screen Savers” section.
5. You’ll also want to disable the “show the clock” feature, since your screen saver itself is a clock. Surely you don’t need two clocks on the screen.
The final result is a large flip clock with a dark background.
Note: This screen saver only works with Mac OS X Lion (10.8).