Merlin2 Project Management Software for OSX

Since leaving Refinery in 2002 to help start Imulus, I’ve been on a quest to find decent project management software for OSX. At Refinery all project management was handled in Microsoft Project; however when we started Imulus, I chose to go with OSX as my primary operating system which then severely limited my project management software options.

I first started with FastTrack Scheduler only to be very disappointed in it’s usability. We then decided to use 37Signal’s BaseCamp, which we still use today. There is however limitations with BaseCamp. It works very well as a client facing tool to manage deliverables and thread conversations yet it fails at managing large projects with various task / activities and resources.

I now believe I’ve found the perfect answer to my project management woes, Merlin2. I started using this software 2 weeks ago and it is immediately intuitive, easy to use and it produces excellent reports which clients and project teams clearly understand.

Merlin2 has all the primary features that Microsoft Project and then some. Other then the reports, two of my favorite features are the utilization view and the document versioning. Under utilization view I have a quick visual as to the resource allocation across projects. The document versioning let’s me save edits on my documents as various versions so I can have a documented history on the project.

I highly encourage any project manager or development lead to give Merlin2 a try. I’ve been extremely pleased by this well built, intuitive software.