6 January, 2026
Here we go again with a quick look at three small desktop applications which, while you might not always use, definitely can come in handy when you need them.
Let’s jump in!
Wordbook
If you don’t have a dictionary handy or can’t be bothered getting up to grab one off a bookshelf, Wordbook is a solid alternative. It’s a simple, quick, and effective way to look up the definition of a word or two.
To use it, type a word in the search field at the top of the application window. If Wordbook can find the definition, that definition displays as shown below:
Wordbook also keeps a history of the words you’ve…
6 January, 2026
Here we go again with a quick look at three small desktop applications which, while you might not always use, definitely can come in handy when you need them.
Let’s jump in!
Wordbook
If you don’t have a dictionary handy or can’t be bothered getting up to grab one off a bookshelf, Wordbook is a solid alternative. It’s a simple, quick, and effective way to look up the definition of a word or two.
To use it, type a word in the search field at the top of the application window. If Wordbook can find the definition, that definition displays as shown below:
Wordbook also keeps a history of the words you’ve looked up so you can go back to one if you need to. Here’s an example:
You can also click the hamburger menu in the top right of the application’s window and select Random Word. That, as you might have guessed, displays the definition of a word that Wordbook selects out of the blue (and which is also added to the search history).
Mini Text
Every so often, you need a place to quickly record something that suddenly pops into your head — a thought, an idea, a quote, or a bit of code. That often happens when you’re focusing on another task.
Sure, you could fire up a text editor or note taking application, but why not turn to a scratchpad1? A simple, minimalist scratchpad comes in the form of Mini Text. It’s billed as ephemeral, meaning it doesn’t save what you type into it. Mini Text is just a way station for text, a place that text stays until you can move it elsewhere.
It’s a blank canvas to start, as you can see below:
Until you need it, Mini Text stays out of your way. When the time comes you can jot down what’s in your head and then go back to what you’re doing. Here’s an example:
Just remember to copy and paste what’s in Mini Text elsewhere before you close it. If you don’t, you’ll lose everything in it!
Converseen
Converseen is a bit more complex than most of the utilities that I look at in posts like this. You can see that below:
That doesn’t make Converseen any less useful. So what does it do?Converseen is a utility for converting multiple images to another format in one go. You can get it to rotate, resize, rename, scale, and change the resolution of those images. You can also strip the metadata from images, apply filters, and change the quality of images.
Here’s what Converseen looks like when you’re ready to do a conversion:
The number of image formats that Converseen supports is impressive. It handles many that I haven’t heard of, and others I haven’t thought about in years.
While I only tried it with batches of a dozen or two images, Converseen worked very quickly and the quality of the conversions was excellent.