Mac Software?

I have brewpal on my iPhone, and one of the features I like very much is the 'compare to BJCP style' to tell me exactly what style my recipe falls under. This way, I can dial in a recipe to fit a category for a BJCP style, as well as tell me why a particular beer recipe does not fit into a specific category. This is very helpful for preparing recipes for competitions, but also teaching you how ingredients and quantities affect the style of beer being made.

But, for databasing my recipes, I like working on the computer. Is there a software package for the mac that has this compare function, or what style is it evaluator, or brew it to style function?

Beer Alchemy, the only program you can run without an emulator anyway, has you choose a style when you start making a recipe. It then tells you how that recipe stacks up against the style and you can change it.

I've always been very happy overall with Beer Alchemy.

another vote for Beer Alchemy. there are other Mac native ones out there, but Beer Alchemy is by far the best one. I've tried several. Downloaded Beer Alchemy and spent a whole ten minutes playing with the trial version before I bought it. its that good. reasonably priced too.

Supposedly BeerSmith 2.0 will be on the Mac when it comes out.

QBrew also works on Mac. I haven't tried it. I've heard good things about Beer Alchemy.

I use BeerSmith under an emulator on OS X (bought it a few years ago, and it works for me).

Im a big fan of beer tools pro... but Ive never tried beer alchemy. Just download a bunch of them, take a recipe youve done before, put it in each, and see which one is more accurate for your system and/or which one is the most intuitive. It seems like they all have slight differences, but one should stand out as preferred if you put them through their paces. good luck

BTP vs Alchemy - in my quest to buy American, BTP always had an edge in my trials. I'm happy with it and the support has always been excellent to any issues that cropped up.

I hope brewpal is put on the mac once the mac app store goes live soon.

Airborneguy said:

Beer Alchemy, the only program you can run without an emulator anyway,

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Not so, my friend. There are other programs that run natively on OS X:

• Beer Tools Pro
• BrewTarget (open source and free)
• Brewsta (open source and free)
• Strange Brew (open source and free)

As mentioned previously, Qbrew will also run on OS X, but it does not include tools for calculating mash times/volumes.

I see that now.

To me, Beer Tools was just too complicated in how it keeps track of the recipes and each brew session. Beer Alchemy does that ten times better.

beeralchemy user here. It has an Ipod touch/iphone app i use on brew day, and then sync back to my mac. It has a comparison to BJCP style, but it won't go from your recipe to style, you have to tell it what style you want and will compare your recipe to that (I hope that made sense...).

Beer Tools Pro here. It thinks the way I do.

I might add that the developer for BrewTarget is a member of this forum, and is very open to suggestions and feature requests.

+1 to Beer Alchemy. I use it on my Mac and have the mobile version for iPhone/iPad. Great software.

iBrewmaster for iPad is also pretty good but not as full-featured and user friendly as Beer Alchemy IMHO.

Cheers!
Kevin

culturejam said:

Not so, my friend. There are other programs that run natively on OS X:

• Beer Tools Pro
• BrewTarget (open source and free)
• Brewsta (open source and free)
• Strange Brew (open source and free)

As mentioned previously, Qbrew will also run on OS X, but it does not include tools for calculating mash times/volumes.

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I appreciate you posting this list, but I don't think everything on this list is a viable option. I downloaded brew target and brewsta seeing them listed here. It has been so long since strange brew was updated that I didn't even bother. Brewsta opened right up, but I noticed that it hasn't been updated in years either. Anything that hadn't been updated since 2007, in my opinion, should be avoided. Beer tool pro I had already been tinkering with and I really like it. I am also a paid user of beer alchemy.

So I downloaded strange brew and I cannot get it to start. I found on the site instructions to download qt files, which I did, but they will not install, thus strange brew continues to be unusable. It is very possible that the problem lay with qt files (whatever that is), but an app should not be this difficult to start up. I can't judge it, but I plan to avoid it.

So for me, the only two options or beer alchemy and btp. I really like both a lot and I don't think you'd go wrong with either. I'm a novice brewer, mostly extract and partial mash, and both are more than adequate. Btp seems to have a more complete database than beer alchemy, but beer alchemy may be a bit easier to use, and btp may be a bit more flexible. I do prefer the way alchemy organizes batches. One thing with btp is that I can't figure out hoe to set what type of hops I'm using (pellet vs whole, etc). It's very easy in alchemy. I'm sure the newer is right there, but I've been tinkering for awhile and can't find it. I've created one recipe, and since it's not using pellets (as far as I can tell), my ibu's are off. Had I not realized it, my recipe would not be as expected. One other thing of note is that btp is connected to it online network. If I'm away from my Mac and inspiration hits me, I can go on the website, create the recipe, and then later download it into my computer software. I like that !

I'm very pleased with both and happy to be a paid member of both and will continue to support each.

mhochman said:

I appreciate you posting this list, but I don't think everything on this list is a viable option.

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They all work on my computer. I'm sorry you are having trouble with some of them.

mhochman said:

Anything that hadn't been updated since 2007, in my opinion, should be avoided.

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Generally, I agree. I feel the same way about Pro Mash, which hasn't been updated since early 2003. I probably wouldn't have listed Brewsta if someone asking about Windows software, given that there are far more options.

mhochman said:

So I downloaded strange brew and I cannot get it to start. I found on the site instructions to download qt files, which I did, but they will not install, thus strange brew continues to be unusable.

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You mean BrewTarget. Strange Brew is java and will run on any platform that has java support installed.

Yes, you have to install the Qt base files. Well, you have to on OS X or Windows because they aren't something that is common to the base OS. It's part of the default system on most Linux versions.

It's a shame you can't figure out how to get Qt properly installed. BrewTarget is an excellent bit of software. I like its mash editor better than BeerAlchemy, actually. All of them do recipe formulation well (that's the easy part), but I'm picky when it comes to how the mash interface works. But I get that someone people just don't want to do any hoop jumping for free software. That's cool. It takes all kinds.



By the way, with just a little hoop jumping, you can get Beersmith running on OS X. So that's also an option, but it won't install itself, haha.

mhochman said:

I'm very pleased with both and happy to be a paid member of both and will continue to support each.

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Me too. I'm a paid supporter of both. They are both quite nice.

culturejam said:

They all work on my computer. I'm sorry you are having trouble with some of them.


Generally, I agree. I feel the same way about Pro Mash, which hasn't been updated since early 2003. I probably wouldn't have listed Brewsta if someone asking about Windows software, given that there are far more options.


You mean BrewTarget. Strange Brew is java and will run on any platform that has java support installed.

Yes, you have to install the Qt base files. Well, you have to on OS X or Windows because they aren't something that is common to the base OS. It's part of the default system on most Linux versions.

It's a shame you can't figure out how to get Qt properly installed. BrewTarget is an excellent bit of software. I like its mash editor better than BeerAlchemy, actually. All of them do recipe formulation well (that's the easy part), but I'm picky when it comes to how the mash interface works. But I get that someone people just don't want to do any hoop jumping for free software. That's cool. It takes all kinds.



By the way, with just a little hoop jumping, you can get Beersmith running on OS X. So that's also an option, but it won't install itself, haha.


Me too. I'm a paid supporter of both. They are both quite nice.

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No problem tinkering or jumping through hoops here. I've downloaded plenty of open source apps that required adding this or that. I haven't given up and will definitely revise my opinion if I get it going. And yes, I mean Brew Target. I will edit my post to avoid confusion. I'm not all grain yet, so the mash schedule isn't important to me, but I do plan to go all grain during 2011, so that's more incentive to get brew target working.

I did some digging and found the method for adjusting for hop pellets in BTP. It is not straight forward and easily found, but it is VERY adjustable and flexible. Decide which is more important for yourself.

And to repeat, the others worked, they were just sold old I didn't think it was worth spending time on.

One more feature I should mention for those looking to decide. This has already been stated, but the iOS version of Alchemy is excellent and its ability to sync with the desktop version is a killer feature. I love tinkering with recipes when I'm with my phone and have nothing to do.

+2 for Brew Alchemy. I have been using it for 2 years along with the iphone version for brew day. I put my numbers from brew day into my phone, then syncing the two is very easy.

D-Ring said:

+2 for Brew Alchemy. I have been using it for 2 years along with the iphone version for brew day. I put my numbers from brew day into my phone, then syncing the two is very easy.

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Now that's a cool feature.

culturejam said:

Now that's a cool feature.

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Not just numbers, but you can add your notes right there in the phone, then those transfer as well. The iPhone app has calculators in it, so you can do quick conversions if needed (I've used the gravity correction many times).