Review of Screen Rulers for Mac OSX

xScope 1.0****

• Price: $14.95
• Pros
  • All the features are implemented cleanly.
  • The ruler can be rotated to an arbitrary angle.
• Cons
  • The ruler cannot be moved by arrow keys.
  • The opacity cannot be changed. However, the default setting works fine except that the ruler tick marks become invisible on top of a complete black background.

charlieX Screen Rulers***

• Price: $15
• Pros
  • Drag ruler: The unit and opacity can be changed on the ruler (without going through menus).
  • Drag ruler: There are buttons to move the ruler for fine adjustments.
  • Screen Lines: You can show and hide the lines, without losing its position.
  • Screen Lines: The handle for the lines can be moved anywhere.
  • Screen Lines: The distance between two lines is displayed.
• Cons
  • Drag ruler: The tick marks are only on one side.
  • Drag ruler cannot be rotated.
  • Screen Lines: Only two guide lines are available in each direction.

Aquaruler**

• Price: $11
• Pros
  • Drag ruler: Opacity can be changed on the ruler.
  • Drag Ruler: There are buttons to move the ruler for fine adjustments.
  • Guides: Multiple guide lines can be made.
  • Guides: Distance between any pair of guide lines can be measured.
• Cons
  • It quits unexpectedly.
  • Drag Ruler: The movement of the ruler is not smooth.
  • Drag Ruler cannot be rotated.
  • Guide: You cannot hide and show guide lines. Once you delete it, the position is lost.
  • Guide: x-lines are horizontal and y-lines are vertical. What do you think you want to measure??

ARTIS Scrren Tools**

• Price: $9.95
• Pros
  • Screen Ruler: Tick marks are on the both edges.
  • Screen Guide: Multiple lines can be made, even with equal spacing.
• Cons
  • Screen Ruler cannot be rotated.
  • Screen Guide: You cannot HIDE the guide lines. If you remove it, you lose the position.
  • Screen Guide: The distance between the lines are not shown.
  • Screen Guide: The handle for moving the line and its close box are too close, and you can accidentally lose the line.
  • Screen Guide: You have to select "Screen Guide" before grabbing grid lines.
• Note: The Screen Tools have evolved into xScope, under a collaboration with iconFactory.

RulerX = 定規X 1.1.1**

• Price: free
• Pros
  • The ruler can be rotated to any angle.
  • It looks like an old ruler made of bamboo.
  • The scale can be changed.
• Cons
  • When you change the size, the position moves.
  • This is not made to measure in pixels. It is a feature.

Tape Measure X**

• Price: $5
• Pros
  • Tape measures can be pulled out to 4 directions.
  • Tick marks are on the both edges.
• Cons
  • You cannot put the origin to the top-left corner.
  • It is slow to adjust the length of the measure.
  • It cannot be rotated.

Trilithon Rulers**

• Price: $9.95
• Pros
  • You can put 0 at either edge, or at the center.
  • You can move tick marks to the other side (although the button is not so responsive).
• Cons
  • The rulers do not float above other windows.
  • When an external monitor is connected, the cursor arrow disappears in the external monitor.
  • If an external monitor is connected, and Virtual Desktop is used, then the cursor position in the external monitor is completely screwed up.

Free Ruler 1.6**

• Price: Free
• Pros
  • Simple and free
• Cons
  • Rulers do not float above other windows.

DoubleBoth*** (for cross-hair)

• Price: Free
• This is not a ruler, but it comes with a cross-hair lines showing the position of the mouse cursor. This is useful for reading graphs, and also checking alignments. You can also assign a key combination to show the cross-hair, so there is no need to launch a ruler application.