A QuickLook plugin for CSV files.
The plugin will generate Icons for csv (comma separated) and tsv (tab separated) files and show a preview, along with some information (like num rows/columns).
To download, visit the project page at http://code.google.com/p/quicklook-csv/.
QuickLook plugin for FB2 e-book file format. Creates thumbnails using cover image. In preview mode displays some additional information like authors and title.
More information available on the developer’s website: http://bluezbox.com/fb2ql.html
A plug-in for viewing PVR textures.
This plug-in ships with atPeek, but is also available as a free download from:
http://atpeek.download.atpurpose.com/PvrUncrush.zip
The atPeek project page which uses this plug-in is at:
http://www.atpurpose.com/atPeek/
A QuickLook plug-in for viewing iPhone crushed Png files (native iPhone format).
From the developers, atPurpose Technologies:
The direct download link to PngUncrush QuickLook plug-in, which is free to download and use, is:
http://atpeek.download.atpurpose.com/PngUncrush.zip
The atPeek project page which uses this plug-in is at:
http://www.atpurpose.com/atPeek/
“This is a QuickLook plugin for MacOS-X 10.5/10.6 that allows QuickLook preview of Animated GIFs. The current GIF support in the Finder doesn’t show animations. This plugin extends the Finder to allow QuickLook to display the GIF in its animated form.”
It has been brought to our attention that some plug-ins do not work with OS X 10.6/Snow Leopard.
Since we do not actually develop the plug-ins we list on this site, we cannot investigate each one. Instead we thought we would setup this post to allow for users to comment and allow for discussion on tips and tricks for getting plug-ins to work with 10.6.
So feel free to leave a comment with your experience and especially if you have tips for getting plug-ins to work with Snow Leopard. All comments are moderated, but will be published at least once a day.
The first Quick Look Plugin geared specifically for photographers.
From the plug-in’s website:
“With SneakPeek Photo simply click on the unopened photo file (no matter where it is, even on your card reader) and hit the space bar. Up pops the picture into a large view that immediately gives you the detailed information you need. On the top bar, the much needed basics such as the type of file, its size, f-stop, focal length, color Sfile (sRGB, ProPhoto, etc) even a mini histogram. But there’s much more. Also on this view you’ll see buttons which will give you Exif data, all the camera settings, a Loupe View with high resolution zooms, and a large Histogram to see the blueprint of your shot. If the photo is geotagged, you’ll not only see the coordinates, but a nifty map of where the picture was taken. Plus there’s even a link to a more detailed map online.”
Cost: $10
You can get more information by visiting the plug-in’s website at:
http://www.code-line.com/software/sneakpeekphoto/
ImageFolderQLGenerator is an open-source QuickLook plug-in that creates thumbnails and previews for folders that contain image files. The thumbnails and previews it generates look like the normal folder icons, only with small thumbnails of some of the contained images overlaid on top.
More information and download at ImageFolderQLGenerator developer’s website.
QLFits 2.0
Preview FITS header+images/spectra directly inside the Finder!
Released: 2009-07-16
http://www.softtenebraslux.com
QLFits allows you to see FITS files right into your Finder, without opening the file! It automatically generates on-the-fly a colorized header, with images and/or spectra below! It even supports multi-extension fits files. Even better, it detects ESO keywords, and build automatic links to the proposal abstract, the file summary, and even the weather conditions!
Features:
• Colorized header.
• Quick summary + Full header
• Automatic detection of ESO keywords
• Links to ESO archive seeing/prog id pages (when possible)
• Support for multi-extensiom FITS files!
• On-the-fly preview of 2D images!
• On-the-fly preview of 1D spectra!
• For 2D images: On-the-fly thumbnail of 1st extension that contains data
• For 1D spectra: On-the-fly thumbnail of the spectrum
• Display of the value of the “OBJECT” header keyword, with large fonts.
Notes: images pixels are scaled linearly (it produces in general better results than linear or logarithmic-zscaling). If no data are present in the FITS, only the header is shown.
Thanks, Cédric!
This Quick Look genÂerÂaÂtor disÂplays the conÂtents of a metainfo “.torrent” file.  Useful if you ever have to sort through torÂrent files that are named by 10 year old chilÂdren, but donÂ’t feel like firing up your client just to see whatÂ’s in it.
More information can be found on the developer’s site.
Download qltorrent-1.0.dmg here.
Thanks, “Crankie”.
This plugin allows iPhone/iPod touch application packages (IPA files) to be previewed in the Finder and other applications.
Please check out the project page : http://code.google.com/p/quicklook-ipa/
The direct download link is : http://quicklook-ipa.googlecode.com/files/IPA%20Quick%20Look%20Plugin.dmg
Reader Javier writes:
I’ve created a free plug-in for displaying DPX pictures (useful in digital cinema and post-production environments).
It is at its first release but I expect to improve it quickly:
https://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=250729&package_id=311742
Thanks, Javier!
Reader Blaine Lewis writes:
This may look pretty familiar as I have adapted it from the Matroska Video File “plugin”. After having seen that one I figured you could do it for any file format (at least for Quicktime). So here is one for DIVX.
1. First you need DivX/Perian for .divx support in Quicktime :
http://perian.org/, http://www.divx.com
2. Then you need to add a Uniform Type Identifier in Quicktime Player :
- Edit QuickTime Player.appÂ’s /Contents/info.plist
- Add the following code just before the last 2 tags
<key>UTTypeConformsTo</key>
<array>
<string>public.movie</string>
</array>
<key>UTTypeDescription</key>
<string>DivX Video File</string>
<key>UTTypeIconName</key>
<string>generic</string>
<key>UTTypeIdentifier</key>
<string>com.apple.quicktime.divx</string>
<key>UTTypeReferenceURL</key>
<string>http://www.divx.com/</string>
<key>UTTypeTagSpecification</key>
<dict>
<key>public.filename-extension</key>
<array>
<string>divx</string>
</array>
</dict>
</dict>
</array>
3. In Terminal.app
touch /Applications/QuickTime\ Player.app
BrushViewQL allows you to see the contents of Photoshop brush files. Now you no longer need to load a brush file into Photoshop to see its contents.
Quicklook for Adium, the multi-system IM application’s, chat logs (.chatlog).
Thanks, Gordon!
QLFits allows you to see FITS header right into your Finder, without opening the file! It automatically generates on-the-fly thumbnail and preview of the fits header, with colors. Even more amazingly, it detects ESO keywords, and build automatic links to the proposal abstract, the file summary, and even the weather conditions!
Supports NES, FDS, SNES, VB, GB, GBC, GBA, NDS, N64 and more planned.
Thanks, Matthew!
A Quicklook plug-in for Mobipocket ebooks (.mobi and .prc).
You can download the plug-in from here.
Thanks, Paul!
GISLook shows various vector and raster formats used by GIS (Geographical Information Systems), e.g ESRI Shape, E00, ArcInfo Coverage, ESRI ASCII Grid, USGS DEM.
More information can be found on the GISLook webpage.
Thanks Bernhard Jenny!
With Vvidget Code you can easily build Quick Look plugins and browse your data files using Cover Flow, Icon and List views in the Finder. The picture below shows an icon view of Vvidget documents made by a Quick Look plugin programmed with Vvidget Code.
More information can be found here.
The Unofficial Apple Weblog has a post up today about how to set up your Mac to automatically preview all downloads with Quick Look.
FJNWebArchive allows viewing of Safari WebArchive files.
Download at QLPlugins, another great site for QuickLook plugins.
Allows for QuickLook previewing of Commodore 64 disk image files in the following formats: *.d64, *.d71, *.d81.
This plugin supports Entourage 2008 email for messages located via spotlight.
Randy Saldinger, developer of Suspicious Package, writes:
Suspicious Package, the QL plugin for examining Installer packages, has been updated to version 1.1.
This version adds mpkg support, fixes problems where install locations were not always displayed, and adds more information about the package — including administrator password and restart requirements, and what install scripts it contains.
Get the new version, still free, from:
http://www.mothersruin.com/software/SuspiciousPackage/download.html
Displays previews of QuarkXPress 7 files in Quicklook.
More information:
http://labs.quark.com/projectdetail.aspx?did=14
Randy writes:
I’ve written a Quick Look plugin that someone might find interesting: it lets you preview standard Apple installer packages to see what files that will/would install.
The plugin is called Suspicious Package. It is free, and can be gotten from http://www.mothersruin.com/software/SuspiciousPackage/
Nathan writes:
I just wanted to mention that QLColorCode (a popular source code highlighting plug-in) has been updated to version 0.4.1 and that the screenshot you’re showing is somewhat out of date. The highlighting engine has changed and thus the appearance has changed as well.
Thanks, Nathan. Here is a new screenshot:
Reader Phouty sent in:
QuickChm is a quicklook plugin which lets you preview a CHM (compiled html) archive in quicklook.
Reader Matthias writes:
Janome Embroidery Machines (e. g. the MC350E) uses a proprietary file format for patterns. Most machines are able to preview these files, but sometimes you want to check them directly at your computer without the hassle of transfering.
JEFview previews JEF files.
We are interested to find out exactly which Quick Look plugins our readers would like to see developed. Which plugins would be most helpful in your day-to-day use of OS X 10.5?
Please leave your thoughts in the comments of this post, and we’ll follow up with a “most requested” post soon.
Update: Comments have been closed — thanks for participating! A tally of those most requested will be posted soon.
Reader Richard writes:
Bonjour, few words to let you know that the 3DCG software Shade got a free QuickLook plugin available here :
http://shade.e-frontier.co.jp/download/freeware.html
Note : even if the Web site is in Japanese, the installation is a mater of drag and drop and will work with any .shd (Shade 3D scene file format) files.
More infos on Shade can be found here : http://www.e-frontier.com/
The C64 Images plug-in that had previously been posted has been updated to support additional formats Hi-Eddi (.hed) and Fun Painter 2 (.fp2).
Wade from Panic sent in:
CandyBar from Panic (www.panic.com/candybar) has a Quick Look plug-in built-in for previewing iContainers.
Note that this plug-in comes as part of CandyBar, which costs $29, with discounts available for previous users.
Reader Fred Duck has submitted a way to enable Corel Painter Essentials 4 Quick Look previews. Thanks, Fred!
Fred noticed that the free preview of Corel Painter Essentials 4 includes a Quick Look plugin for Painter files. The filename is “Corel Painter.mdimporter”. To avoid licensing issues, we have decided not to host the file, but rather direct users to the article where this is mentioned:
http://journal.mycom.co.jp/news/2007/12/10/041/index.html (Google English translated version available here).
Here is a neat trick that I am sure could be expanded to include even more file types, as submitted by reader Frantz. Thanks, Frantz!
I’ve found a trick allowing me to display Matroska video files in Quicklook without the need of a plugin :
1 / First you need Perian for mkv support in Quicktime : http://perian.org/
2 / Then you need to add a Uniform Type Identifier in Quicktime Player :
- Edit QuickTime Player.app’s /Contents/info.plist
- Add the following code just before the last 2 tags </dict></plist> :
<key>UTExportedTypeDeclarations</key>
<array>
<dict>
<key>UTTypeConformsTo</key>
<array>
<string>public.movie</string>
</array>
<key>UTTypeDescription</key>
<string>Matroska Video File</string>
<key>UTTypeIconName</key>
<string>generic</string>
<key>UTTypeIdentifier</key>
<string>com.apple.quicktime.mkv</string>
<key>UTTypeReferenceURL</key>
<string>http://www.matroska.org/</string>
<key>UTTypeTagSpecification</key>
<dict>
<key>public.filename-extension</key>
<array>
<string>mkv</string>
</array>
</dict>
</dict>
</array>
3 / In Terminal.app
touch /Applications/QuickTime\ Player.app
Et voila that’s all:
This plug-in shows the Koala image .koa format — a common format on the Commodore C64. According to the developer, the plug-in will support more formats in the near future.
A plugin for text clipping file (.textClipping). and picture clipping file (.pictClipping).
Quick Look plugin for Adobe Illustrator®, Adobe InDesign® & Encapsulated PostScript.
Requires a payment of $5.
A plugin for source code files that produces colorized output for the following languages:
This QuickLook generator renders QuickLook previews for certain filetypes using the TextMate syntax highlighter. Currently itÂ’s configured to highlight Perl, PHP, Ruby, Shell, C headers and Obj-C(++) files.
Requires that TextMate be installed and running.
Enables QuickLook previews of Illustrator (AI) files saved with PDF compatibility.
Brainsight QuickLook is a Quick Look generator plugin that allows medical images in the MINC1, MINC2, DICOM, and NIfTI file formats to be previewed in the Finder and other applications.
(It is assumed this requires additional software.)
Extends QuickLook functionality to be able to display previews and thumbnails for eps files.
