iClipboard 2.1

iClipboard is one of those applications that leave you scratching your head. Why didn’t Apple think of this?

iClipboard expands on the standard clipboard that Apple provides and turns it into a way to store, organize, and use an unlimited number of clippings. A clipping can be just about any type of content, from plain text to rich multimedia content. And although retaining every item you ever copied to the clipboard may sound intimidating, accessing the items is easy because of how iClipboard lets you organize and even name the clippings.

iClipboard from Chronos L.C. is a clipboard manager that stores everything you copy to the standard Mac clipboard. While there are a number of third-party clipboard managers that provide the same type of unlimited clipping storage, iClipboard goes a step further and provides powerful ways to access, organize, edit, and use the clippings.

iClipboard installs as a preferences pane, allowing it to run in the background and monitor all of your copy/paste actions, no matter what application you are using. Every time you copy an item, iClipboard grabs the Mac’s clipboard data and stores it in its own database. This method of working leaves the standard Mac clipboard working just as it always does; there is no need to relearn the shortcut keys necessary for basic use.

iClipboard’s user interface is based around a slide-out window that Chronos calls the clipping shelf. The shelf sits along the side of your display, with only a small tab visible. Clicking the tab reveals a window that holds all of the clippings iClipboard has saved for you. You can drag and drop clippings onto and off of the shelf, assign hot keys, or use the iClipboard menu, which appears whenever your mouse pointer is hovering over a clipping, to copy or paste data.

With unlimited clippings, organization has to be paramount, or utter chaos would prevail. iClipboard solves this dilemma by letting you organize clippings in projects. You can have unlimited projects, but a clipping may only be assigned to a single project at a time. Additionally, clippings must be assigned to a project one clipping at a time.

Another helpful organizational tool is the option to give each clipping a name. Once you name a clipping, you can paste it in an application by referencing the name. Named clippings are useful, but some applications don’t seem to be able to make use of this capability.