Ever since that crazy Wells-inspired Superbowl commercial for the first Apple Macintosh in 1984, the cultural divide between Mac and PC has been epic. To most, the argument is black and white, but for me, I use both on a daily basis and enjoy using each platform for certain tasks. Apple has stolen from Microsoft probably as much as Microsoft has stolen from Apple. Whatever the case may be, I like to find useful third-party software that brings better functionality from one platform to the other. In this post, I'll show you how to adopt one of Windows 7's best features, Aero-Snap, into OS X.

One of my favorite features in Windows 7 is Aero-Snap. Basically, you can drag a window's titlebar to the left side of the screen to resize that window to the left half of the screen. You can do the same for the right side, or you can drag to the top to maximize the window to fullscreen. I find this feature incredibly useful for comparing documents and websites or for simple tasks like dragging a file from one window (snapped to left side) to another window (snapped to the right side). It's one of Windows 7's greatest and most useful features, and it beat anything on the Mac - until I found a little program called BetterTouchTool.

BetterTouchTool is actually a fantastic piece of freeware (meaning free software) that adds more magic to your Magic Mouse. If you use a Magic Mouse with your Mac, I highly recommend downloading BTT here. I use BTT to add two gestures: TipTap left for Expose and TipTap right for Show Desktop. But I digress - although this tool is mainly for tweaking your Magic Mouse, it also comes built-in with a simplified version of Aero-Snap!

Once you have BTT open (you can access it from your menubar or in System Preferences), click the "Predefined Actions" tab at the top. You'll notice there's a section for "Window Snapping" - window snapping should be a default, but if it isn't, just check the boxes for left, right, and top snapping. Although it's not as flashy as Windows (you don't hear that very often when describing anything Apple related), it works just as well. Oh, did I mention it was free?

One more thing: you don't need a Magic Mouse to use BTT. You can use BTT simply for the Window Snapping feature, or for adding new gestures for your trackpad. If you do use a mouse with your Mac, I STRONGLY suggest you plunk down $50 for a Magic Mouse - I can't imagine ever going back to a regular scroll-wheel mouse.