Any power user spends a great deal of time searching their hard drives for files, and searching various aspects of the internet for different types of information. Firing up an app or web browser in order to perform a search can interrupt your train of thought and means that a simple task takes longer than necessary. Alfred is a free app that may be able to help, providing local and web based searches that can be accessed without moving your hands from the keyboard.

When used as a simple search tool, working with Alfred is pretty self-explanatory. As well as providing a quick and painless way to search for files and find information online, Alfred can also be used in a number of other ways. When performing a search of your Mac, the application can be used as an app launcher, and over time Alfred will learn which apps you use most frequently and provide even faster access to them.

Custom searches can be created that not only perform searches you want to repeat, but thy can be customised in such a way that search can be performed within individual applications, used to add events to your calendar or provide instant access to your favourite web sites.

Alfred can also be used in the same way as Google to perform quick calculations without the need to launch the calculator app. This is such as versatile tool that there should be no hesitation in downloading an installing it - this is an installation you will not regret for one second.