One challenge to using the MacBook Air is memory management. When working I typically run OmniOutliner, OmniFocus, iCal, Mail, Bento, and quite often some concoction of Parallels, Safari, Scriviner, Pages and Microsoft Word. I then spend my time bouncing back and forth between them as required. That is a lot of applications to keep in just 2 gigs.
I recently bought a $19 license to iFreeMem which seems to help. iFreeMem puts a nice little meter in my MenuBar.
When I notice the green area vanishing and the yellow and red areas getting too big, I simply click the MenuBar icon and the friendly one button fix drops down.
I then give it a clicky and it takes less than a minute to reshuffle the memory usually ending up with gobs of recovered memory. While it is running, the computer is frozen so that is a good time to go make tea. Things definitely run more snappy afterward. On my MacBook Air I do this two or three times a day. You probably get a better ‘flush’ with a restart but this is much easier and it is so gratifying watching the green pie grow.
I noticed that there are some Applescript hooks in iFreeMem too. I’m toying with the idea of designing a script or automator action around it but I’m not sure if that would be a good idea since I want to be in complete control of when my computer freezes for a minute.
Anybody else using iFreeMem or have suggestions for memory management?