Alternative Desktop Software to Help You Do More Without Spending Money
I'm a fan of both freeware and free software. Nowadays, you can find free alternatives to most of the software products that you see on the shelves at your local retailer. I've grouped this article into several categories: Office Productivity (including communications and scheduling), Web browsing, Graphics and Video Editing, Children's Titles, and Miscellaneous. Each application listed here is available for free download and use. You can click on the images to see a larger screenshot of each application.
Office Productivity
OpenOffice.org is an office suite which provides applications for word processing (Writer), spreadsheets (Calc), presentations (Impress), and image editing (Draw). It is mostly compatible with Microsoft Office (I say mostly, because there is an occasional document that will be formatted differently in OpenOffice.org than in Microsoft Office). OpenOffice.org allows you to open and save documents in .doc, .xls, .ppt and export to .pdf and .swf formats (click the links to download sample files). As an example of the compatibility between Microsoft Office and OpenOffice.org, the following Word files were created, one with MS Word 2003, and one with OpenOffice.org 1.3: download file 1, and file 2. I would be surprised if you can tell the difference between the two files if you open both of them in MS Word. The answer as to which file was created by which application will be provided at the end of this article.
Thunderbird is a free POP3 and IMAP email and newsgroup client. It is both fast and customizable. Together with Sunbird, a calendar suite, you have both email and scheduling capability.
PDFCreator is a print driver which allows you to create pdf files from any application. Pdf files are useful for archiving web pages (such as the order confirmation page you see during an online purchase, in other words, your online receipt), when sending files to others and you don't know if they would be able to open .doc or .xls files, and is also useful to preserve the format of a document for printing. Using PDFCreator is as easy as printing a document from an application's File -> Print menu.
Web Browsing
Firefox is in a separate category because of the number of unique web browsing features that it provides. First of all, it allows you to browse the web. Secondly, it has a built-in search box that defaults to searching the Google.com website, but can also search other sites like Amazon.com by changing the dropdown search option. Third, tabbed browsing allows you to open separate windows but keep them inside the same window. The first benefit is that it allows you to open multiple websites, but not clutter up your taskbar buttons with extra buttons. The second benefit is that the tabbed windows run within the same process on your computer, so the separate tabs use less computer resources than separate windows would. The fourth feature that Firefox provides is called "Live Bookmarks". These special bookmarks are automatically updated and allow you to view the latest headlines from your favorite websites without having to keep separate windows open for each website. For information on how to set up Live Bookmarks, visit the following link: http://www.mozilla.org/products/firefox/live-bookmarks.html.
Graphics and Video Editing
The Gimp is an image editing and composition application that can be used for retouching and cropping images, or creating new graphics. This is the application that I use most often for cropping and adjusting the colors in digital photos. The Gimp is available for free download and use. Before you can use The Gimp on MS Windows, two files need to be downloaded and installed. Here are links to file 1 and file 2. The screenshots for this article were captured and modified using The Gimp. The Gimp website also provides a user guide to help you get started.
Photo Story 3 is a software application which allows you to import photos, record narration, add music, and add special effects to digital photos.
Windows Movie Maker is a freely available video editing application. It does have its limitations, such as export file types (it is limited to .wmv and .avi files). Its feature list includes the ability to import a variety of video formats, still photos and music. It allows you to view the project in both storyboard and timeline layouts, and provides quite a few video and transitional effects. Windows Movie Maker is only available for Windows XP.
Children's Titles
My daughter, who is three years old, loves to use Tux Paint. Tux Paint is a drawing application that was designed for young children. It has a variety of stamps, brushes, and background pictures. It's large buttons and variety of stamps keep my daughter's attention and allow her to create a masterpiece on the computer.
Miscellaneous
Scanner is an application that will scan your hard drive and display a concentric pie chart to help you determine what files are using up the most disk space. This application has come in handy a couple times when I find that my hard drive is almost out of space. After running this program, I know which files need to be backed up and/or deleted from my computer to free up more space. I found this application from a link on the TinyApps.org website. TinyApps.org is a guide to small file size, free of charge and free of use software for Windows. I highly recommend that you visit TinyApps.org if you need a utility application such as Scanner.
FileZilla is a feature-packed ftp client. Ftp clients allow you to download and upload files to ftp servers. Ftp servers are computers that have web addresses that start with ftp (for example: ftp://kevin.watson.name/pub/). FileZilla features drag-and-drop window panes (for transferring files from one machine to another), a history drop down to quickly connect you to previously used ftp servers, and an address bar to allow you to type in the ftp address and your username and password so that you won't have to wait for the login prompt when you connect to an ftp site.
Conclusion
The freeware and free software applications listed in this article are available as the result of the work of some very generous people. Most the time the only compensation that these people receive is recognition for developing the application. I have listed the free applications that my family and I use on a regular basis, in hopes that you will find some of them useful. Feel free to post any comments on the above software titles, or any additional titles that you would like me to review.
Pros: Free software that does the same job as software that you see for sale in the retail market. The great thing about freeware and free software is that you can try out the product, and if you like it, you can continue to use it indefinitely without opening up your wallet. If you don't like it, you can simply uninstall the application without having to worry about a return policy, or, in most cases, throwing away the money that you spent on it.
Cons: Free software is great, but it has its limitations. Often, especially in the case of office suites such as OpenOffice.org, saved documents in one application (OpenOffice.org Writer) may not be 100% compatible when the same documents are opened in another application (MS Word). It often takes some experimentation to find the application settings which will make them work well together.
Requirements:
Windows 98 or above
Internet Connection to download files
Links:
The answer to the question from paragraph #2:
File 1 was created in OpenOffice.org 1.1.4, and file 2 was created in MS Word 2003
Office Productivity
OpenOffice.org is an office suite which provides applications for word processing (Writer), spreadsheets (Calc), presentations (Impress), and image editing (Draw). It is mostly compatible with Microsoft Office (I say mostly, because there is an occasional document that will be formatted differently in OpenOffice.org than in Microsoft Office). OpenOffice.org allows you to open and save documents in .doc, .xls, .ppt and export to .pdf and .swf formats (click the links to download sample files). As an example of the compatibility between Microsoft Office and OpenOffice.org, the following Word files were created, one with MS Word 2003, and one with OpenOffice.org 1.3: download file 1, and file 2. I would be surprised if you can tell the difference between the two files if you open both of them in MS Word. The answer as to which file was created by which application will be provided at the end of this article.
Thunderbird is a free POP3 and IMAP email and newsgroup client. It is both fast and customizable. Together with Sunbird, a calendar suite, you have both email and scheduling capability.
PDFCreator is a print driver which allows you to create pdf files from any application. Pdf files are useful for archiving web pages (such as the order confirmation page you see during an online purchase, in other words, your online receipt), when sending files to others and you don't know if they would be able to open .doc or .xls files, and is also useful to preserve the format of a document for printing. Using PDFCreator is as easy as printing a document from an application's File -> Print menu.Web Browsing
Firefox is in a separate category because of the number of unique web browsing features that it provides. First of all, it allows you to browse the web. Secondly, it has a built-in search box that defaults to searching the Google.com website, but can also search other sites like Amazon.com by changing the dropdown search option. Third, tabbed browsing allows you to open separate windows but keep them inside the same window. The first benefit is that it allows you to open multiple websites, but not clutter up your taskbar buttons with extra buttons. The second benefit is that the tabbed windows run within the same process on your computer, so the separate tabs use less computer resources than separate windows would. The fourth feature that Firefox provides is called "Live Bookmarks". These special bookmarks are automatically updated and allow you to view the latest headlines from your favorite websites without having to keep separate windows open for each website. For information on how to set up Live Bookmarks, visit the following link: http://www.mozilla.org/products/firefox/live-bookmarks.html.Graphics and Video Editing
The Gimp is an image editing and composition application that can be used for retouching and cropping images, or creating new graphics. This is the application that I use most often for cropping and adjusting the colors in digital photos. The Gimp is available for free download and use. Before you can use The Gimp on MS Windows, two files need to be downloaded and installed. Here are links to file 1 and file 2. The screenshots for this article were captured and modified using The Gimp. The Gimp website also provides a user guide to help you get started.
Photo Story 3 is a software application which allows you to import photos, record narration, add music, and add special effects to digital photos.
Windows Movie Maker is a freely available video editing application. It does have its limitations, such as export file types (it is limited to .wmv and .avi files). Its feature list includes the ability to import a variety of video formats, still photos and music. It allows you to view the project in both storyboard and timeline layouts, and provides quite a few video and transitional effects. Windows Movie Maker is only available for Windows XP.Children's Titles
My daughter, who is three years old, loves to use Tux Paint. Tux Paint is a drawing application that was designed for young children. It has a variety of stamps, brushes, and background pictures. It's large buttons and variety of stamps keep my daughter's attention and allow her to create a masterpiece on the computer.Miscellaneous
Scanner is an application that will scan your hard drive and display a concentric pie chart to help you determine what files are using up the most disk space. This application has come in handy a couple times when I find that my hard drive is almost out of space. After running this program, I know which files need to be backed up and/or deleted from my computer to free up more space. I found this application from a link on the TinyApps.org website. TinyApps.org is a guide to small file size, free of charge and free of use software for Windows. I highly recommend that you visit TinyApps.org if you need a utility application such as Scanner.
FileZilla is a feature-packed ftp client. Ftp clients allow you to download and upload files to ftp servers. Ftp servers are computers that have web addresses that start with ftp (for example: ftp://kevin.watson.name/pub/). FileZilla features drag-and-drop window panes (for transferring files from one machine to another), a history drop down to quickly connect you to previously used ftp servers, and an address bar to allow you to type in the ftp address and your username and password so that you won't have to wait for the login prompt when you connect to an ftp site.Conclusion
The freeware and free software applications listed in this article are available as the result of the work of some very generous people. Most the time the only compensation that these people receive is recognition for developing the application. I have listed the free applications that my family and I use on a regular basis, in hopes that you will find some of them useful. Feel free to post any comments on the above software titles, or any additional titles that you would like me to review.
Pros: Free software that does the same job as software that you see for sale in the retail market. The great thing about freeware and free software is that you can try out the product, and if you like it, you can continue to use it indefinitely without opening up your wallet. If you don't like it, you can simply uninstall the application without having to worry about a return policy, or, in most cases, throwing away the money that you spent on it.
Cons: Free software is great, but it has its limitations. Often, especially in the case of office suites such as OpenOffice.org, saved documents in one application (OpenOffice.org Writer) may not be 100% compatible when the same documents are opened in another application (MS Word). It often takes some experimentation to find the application settings which will make them work well together.
Requirements:
Windows 98 or above
Internet Connection to download files
Links:
- OpenOffice.org
- Thunderbird
- PDFCreator
- Firefox
- The Gimp
- Photo Story 3
- Windows Movie Maker
- Tux Paint
- Scanner
- FileZilla
The answer to the question from paragraph #2:
File 1 was created in OpenOffice.org 1.1.4, and file 2 was created in MS Word 2003
posted by Kevin at
1/31/2005 09:00:00 AM
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2 comments
