Ever since I no longer have a Mac at work, I’ve been seriously missing several functions that certain apps gave me on OSX. Skitch is one of those apps that gave me superior screenshot ability, to be able to take a partial screenshot, annotate right then and there with text and arrows, and then just drag the image into an email or onto the desktop or wherever.

Last night, a friend mentioned he’s been using Jing on OSX, and that there’s a Windows version available. pity there’s no Linux support.
Speaking only of the Windows version here, Jing is not quite as feature-rich as Skitch is on OSX, but it there are certain things it does better, such as selecting a window to capture, instead of, like in Skitch, having to precision-select a box around the window.

Other really useful functions, however, Jing has, where the last version of Skitch I used, didn’t. It has auto-uploads to Flickr, or to Jing’s own screencast.com. Jing can also record video in the specified selected area on-screen, so you can do screencasts and upload them wherever, including capturing of the microphone.

Jing is a magic little app, and even though it’s not something I do every day, it’s a nice addition to an arsenal of little apps that just improve every day (and not so everyday) life on your Mac or Windows PC.

And yes, Jing is free.