The Insomniac Mac

As computers become more of a part of the home, keeping a system turned on and at-the-ready is almost essential. There's no greater buzzkill then waiting for a computer to start up before you can look up a nugget of information or check to see if a friend is online. But when you're not using your Mac, having it go to sleep courtesy of the Energy Saver preference settings, is a good way to reduce electricity consumption and noise.

On the other hand, sometimes you definitely want your computer to stay awake and operate at full throttle, even when you're not actively using it. Computers that are dedicated as servers, or home automation controllers, are obvious examples. In these cases, you'd want to adjust the Energy Sever settings so the computers are always ready to perform.

But if you only occasionally need to induce insomnia in your Mac, such as during long-computing tasks or because you've setup an alert for when a friend logs into iChat, remembering to change your Energy Saver preferences is a pain. Another example that I recently read about is keeping your Mac awake during lulls in note-taking during classroom lectures. (See Dustin Bachrach's blog for more tips for students.)

An easy solution that I use is the freeware Jiggler from Stick Software. It works by, well, jiggling your mouse every few minutes. It's like a little invisible hand has reached and gently nudged the pointer. It's enough to keep your computer awake, and it is completely unobtrusive thanks to the thoughtful preferences settings that are available. With the right settings, you'll never know its running but you can rely on it doing its job when you need it.

If for some reason you prefer a hardware solution, then check out Mouse Jiggler from Wiebetech. It's a USB dongle that constantly broadcasts mouse-movement signals and keeps your computer wide awake. It looks to be much more intrusive than Jiggler, but is guaranteed to work and doesn't require that you install any software. In fact, that is a main selling point—it's endorsed by forensic investigators and prankster alike.