SideTrack is a replacement mouse driver for your iBook or PowerBook. The hardware used on Mac portables is the same as in PC portables, and this software takes advantage of this fact. I started using SideTrack in October 2003, and it has gone through three betas since then. This beta, beta 0.8 is a major update to this killer little utility.

The main reason I use SideTrack is so I can tap and get a right-click on my trackpad. I also use it for vertical and horizontal scrolling. What is new is corner hot spots. I now have Exposé settings set to three of the corners of my trackpad.

The other major update in this release is different acceleration modes for the mouse. There are three choices:

MacOS X trackpad acceleration (standard)
MacOS X mouse acceleration (faster)
Redmond switcher acceleration (fastest)

Redmond, ha ha. That doesn't mean Windows now does it? I really apreciate this new setting, and I prefer the mouse acceleration curve, or the "faster" setting.

Back when I used OS 9 I would install the Kensington MouseWorks driver to accelerate the mouse in OS 9. MouseWorks in OS X does not affect the acceleration like it did in OS 9, but SideTrack does the job quite nicely.

I said it before, and I will say it again, this utility will be worth paying for once it is finally released mainly for the right-click tap ability alone. It is so nice not having to use my Control key all the time. (When the heck will Apple realize that two mouse buttons need to be used in their portables?)

Here are some screenshots from this release. The first time you launch SideTrack you have to calibrate your trackpad.

These are the four tabs. The previous release had no tabs. The options are broken up better, not to mention there are more controls in this release.