Interarchy 4.1 Publisher: Interarchy Price: $35 (upgrade and education discounts available) Rating: (4.5 out of 5)

If there is one app that tries to do as much as possible concerning internet communications, Interarchy is it. Formerly Anarchie, the popular FTP client, Interarchy is an all-in-one FTP, HTTP, and TCP/IP tool.

Every day, I'm finding new things Interarchy can do. Originally I used it solely for uploading files via the standard file transfer protocol, FTP. Then, I started noticing some of the more advanced features. Interarchy lets me find out what internet ports are being used on my computer. It lets me ping a remote host. I can convert an IP address to a domain name, and vice versa. I can watch exactly what data is being sent and received from this computer. I can do a traceroute, Finger, Whois, pretty much anything.

One of my beefs with Interarchy was the interface - it took a little getting used to. However, once that was out of the way I'm back into business, doing things quickly as possible. Interarchy is like Photoshop - it took a little getting used to, but once I did it's the best, period.

Finally... the greatest FTP client for Mac is for Mac OS X, too! Interarchy worked great on Mac OS X, except for one problem, a keychain bug in the Mac OS. It would not let me open Interarchy. The bug affects many common applications, according to the company, and can be fixed. Unfortunately, the website is pure crap - made out of a Kagi template, and all the useful information is on the User Group website (hosted by Yahoo! and not too reliable). Here is an excerpt from a message on the user group list, on how to fix it:

"If you are getting a crash on launch with mac OS X 10.0.3, it is probably because you have a file called "(null).plist" in the ~/Library/Preferences folder and this is confusing the Keychain Manager for some obscure reason. Apple knows about the problem, so hopefully it will be fixed in 10.0.4.

In the mean time, you can probably just remove this file. Also, if you have any idea where it comes from please let us know, as it obviously only appears on a small number of Mac OS X machines."

To finish, I'll let you see some screenshots, then you can read the pros and cons. But to really understand how useful this is, download the demo. Interarchy is a fine tool that combines many functions into one app, where much of the world is expecting you to buy a piece of software for every little thing you want to do.

-David Norton

Pros: Super powerful. Can do pretty much anything. Works on Mac OS X Cons: Tough interface. Website not very helpful at all.

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