Apple’s Mac App Store is set to launch this Thursday – bringing some of that iOS app store mojo to the desktop for Mac users. I may be the last one to realize this – but there is already quite a nice little app store for the Mac – called Bodega.
I only heard of Bodega around a week ago (via a post at TUAW) and have been playing round with it a little on my MacBook Pro since then. It doesn’t feel as slick as I expect the Mac App Store will be, but Bodega is quite a capable and comfortable app store for finding Mac apps.
Here’s just a few quick notes and impressions on using it:
— It offers a pretty good range of Mac applications – from games, entertainment apps and widgets to system utilities, development tools and business applications.
— There’s a Featured section as well as a range of categories to browse through.
— A single click on an app icon will show you a quick mini description and the price of the application. A double-click takes you to a good details page for the application with three tabs (Description, Reviews, Press).
— You can choose to download a trial or buy an application with a single click as well. Purchases are all done via a jump out to the individual developer’s store.
— Bodega’s interface is mostly quite nice to work with, though it does have a few places where it could be better. For instance, there’s no Back button – which would be nice when browsing around and viewing individual applications.
Bodega doesn’t seem a direct rival to the Mac App Store, but more of a nice alternative for those users who are not enamored of Apple’s store for whatever reasons, and certainly for developers who don’t fancy sticking within Apple’s rigid criteria for App Store entry (and from what I gather they also keep a bigger cut of sales).
If you want to give Bodega a try, you can download it for free here:
Have all of you known about Bodega for ages? What do you think of it?
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