What are your "must have", free (gratis), programs?

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[+34] [126] flybywire

[2009-07-19 17:51:43]

[ software-rec freeware must-have ]

[ http://superuser.com/questions/8671] [DELETED]

Poll: What software must you always keep handy? I don't care if it is open source, freeware, or demo, as long as its price is $0.

Neither do I care if it is for desktops, handhelds, netbooks, web based, cellphones. If it is free to use – and essential to your happiness and well-being – put it in this list.

Rules:

Please, list only ONE application per answer, so that people can vote up the items that they prefer.
Please do not post applications that have already been posted - instead, up-vote the existing answer.

(5) At least provide guidelines e.g. only one piece of software per answer etc... otherwise this kind of questions just end up like a big mess... just like the must have firefox addons... worthless like it is now! - fretje

(4) @fretje I find most of these lists to be worthless anyway, no matter what structure was provided by the original post. There's other sites devoted to this kind of topic. - jtimberman

@jtimberman: same here. But i am enjoying being able to edit CW posts... - Shog9

(1) I presume you're asking about for-pay environments, like Windows or OS X. Otherwise I could post lots of answers with many of the Linux programs I use. - staticsan

(1) For Windows, also see superuser.com/questions/1241/must-have-windows-software (for other environments there are related questions as well). - peSHIr

No, just... no. - random

[+128] [2009-07-19 18:24:44] musicfreak [

ACCEPTED]

Mozilla Firefox!

(7) I know it's heresy here, but I haven't run Firefox in a long time on my personal machines - I use Chrome, IE, Opera, and Konqueror. - warren

(6) Chrome doesn't even touch Firefox yet, IMO. :) Although I think Opera is pretty close... - musicfreak

(6) @warren: IE? are you kidding? - LiraNuna

(6) Firefox is so bloated and slow... I use Opera and Chrome, so my much faster and smoother :) - Svish

Mozilla Firefox for sure! the addons are the secret of FF!! - studiohack

[+107] [2009-07-20 20:53:48] Shog9

7zip ^[1] : A free compressed file manager. Works like a charm with zip, tar, rar, and it's own 7z.

[1] http://www.7-zip.org/

[+73] [2009-07-20 20:54:42] Shog9

Notepad++ ^[1] : An extensible programmers text editor. It's great if you come from WinWorld, otherwise, stick to VIM.

[1] http://notepad-plus.sourceforge.net

(4) +1 for the "otherwise, stick to vim" part :) - Martinho Fernandes

[+70] [2009-07-20 20:46:05] Bob

Google Chrome ^[1]

Google Chrome is a browser that combines a minimal design with sophisticated technology to make the web faster, safer, and easier.

[1] http://www.google.com/chrome

Can you put a master password to protect saved logins, or not yet ? - Manu

I don't save any of my login information :| sorry, not sure - Bob

(1) @Manu: No, not yet (using dev branch). - Alex Barrett

@Manu on Mac it uses the system-wide Keychain which is encrypted using your login password and can be easily tricked into using a different password than that. - donut

[+68] [2009-07-20 20:54:15] Shog9

VLC ^[1] : The cross-platform open-source multimedia framework, player and server. When it works, it's great, otherwise, it can be a bit problematic regarding subtitles.

[1] http://www.videolan.org/vlc

(2) problems regarding subtitles? never had. - Donotalo

[+68] [2009-07-20 15:27:56] Laserallan

Putty and all its related tools is crucial for SSH usage in Windows.

http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/putty/download.html

[+63] [2009-07-21 08:08:14] Mark Cidade

Process Explorer ^[1] is a must-have Task Manager replacement.

[1] http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb896653.aspx

[+58] [2009-07-19 18:40:17] Joseph

GNU/Linux.

(2) Why does this only have 38 votes? - Josh

(2) Because I hadn't shown up yet to add my upvote. - Broam

[+57] [2009-07-20 01:20:36] JP

TrueCrypt ^[1]

[1] http://www.truecrypt.org/

[+53] [2009-07-21 18:27:07] Boofus McGoofus

Paint.net ^[1] : freeware image editing.

[1] http://www.getpaint.net/index.html

[+52] [2009-07-20 20:51:08] Shog9

Adblock Plus ^[1]

[1] http://adblockplus.org/

definitely a PLUS of Firefox! - studiohack

(2) +1 - I wouldn't have thought of FF plugins. Every time I use a browser w/out Adblock Plus installed, I'm completely stunned: I keep forgetting the Internet has ads :) - bedwyr

[+50] [2009-07-20 21:46:41] Swanny

FileZilla ^[1]: Free FTP client, I use this on my Mac and Windows machines, nothing beats it in my opinion.

[1] http://filezilla-project.org/

[+49] [2009-07-22 04:56:35] community_owned

TortoiseSVN ^[1] is a really easy to use revision control / version control / source control program for Windows. Since it's not integrated into a specific IDE you can use it with whatever development tools you like.

[1] http://tortoisesvn.tigris.org/

[+45] [2009-07-20 22:17:17] skamradt

ccleaner ^[1] to remove all of the junk that I didn't want to save in the first place.

[1] http://www.ccleaner.com/

I include ccleaner in my VMs to clear out all the cruft that accumulates. That and XPLite. - Jim McKeeth

I would upvote twice if it was possible... - Moshe

[+45] [2009-07-19 20:42:46] Jeff Leonard

WinDirStat ^[1] for figuring out how I managed to fill up that 1TB drive and how to get the most space back with the least amount of effort.

[1] http://windirstat.info/

It would have to be Spacemonger for me. - Umber Ferrule

[+41] [2009-07-20 20:54:56] Shog9

OpenOffice.org ^[1]: The Free and Open Productivity Suite

Doesn't matter what some say, I like it better than MS Office, as it fulfills my needs and doesn't have as much tendency to corrupt complex documents.

[1] http://www.openoffice.org/

[+40] [2009-07-19 19:13:23] voyager

Launchy ^[1] : An extensible program launcher. Really handy and similar to the stock program launcher from KDE4.

[1] http://www.launchy.net

(1) +1 for Launchy, I can't live without it now. - Jon Erickson

(1) The only bad thing about ClamWin is the lack of on-access scanning capabilities. Otherwise, it's a good piece of software. - Isxek

+1 for 7zip and Firefox, -1 for Notepad++ and OpenOffice - Joe Philllips

why? notepad++ just blows every other editor out of the water! - RCIX

No little discription as to what each one does? - Petey B

(1) lauchy saves my productivity when I have to work with windows. Quicksilver and GNOME Do on mac and linux respectively also deserve a mention. - jweede

Executor is SO much better. more customization, etc. - studiohack

[+38] [2009-07-20 01:21:43] Joe Philllips

Media Player Classic ^[1]

It is much faster than VLC if you are watching high quality movies, will play some files just fine which lag in VLC.

[1] http://sourceforge.net/projects/guliverkli/

i too have experienced this - Petey B

MPC requires external codecs while VLC has them all build-in. - Teddy

(1) Doesn't matter if its too choppy to watch the movie. It could have all the features in the world - Joe Philllips

[+36] [2009-07-20 20:45:59] Shog9

Vim ^[1] (the best modal editor in the world)

[1] http://www.vim.org/

There can be 2 best ones? ;) - becomingGuru

(1) There, isn't that enough? I know, I know, Eight Megabytes And Constantly Swapping also has a modal mode (how meta!), but VI is the Modal editor by excellence, what people (or should I say geeks?) think when talking about modal apps. - voyager

[+34] [2009-07-26 20:26:32] Zac Thompson

Gmail ^[1]

[1] https://mail.google.com/mail/

Is it a program? I'd call it a service. - Jonik

(2) The Q doesn't "care if it is ... web based". I guess there are web-based programs that are not services, but I can't think of any off-hand. - Zac Thompson

[+32] [2009-07-21 08:01:45] pelms

Dropbox ^[1] for syncing with other computers (Win/Mac/Linux).

[1] http://www.getdropbox.com/

Such a great app. I install it on all my machines and never have to worry about it again. Can't wait for the iPhone app! - spilth

I personally prefer SpiderOak as it makes much better use of compression and pooling across different devices. - Subtwo

I prefer box.net for this use. - eidylon

[+31] [2009-07-19 20:40:06] Alister Bulman

On Microsoft Windows, for image viewing, IrfanView ^[1].

[1] http://www.irfanview.com/

VLC is legendary. - T Pops

please split into two posts - Jason S

IrfanView? What makes it great. If i want to see a photo, Windows has a preview mode that works fine. On Mac, "Preview" does it all. I've seen this program recommended for a long time in many places as an image editor. I downloaded and was sorely disappointed. Sorry. Not my cuppa' tea. - Moshe

[+29] [2009-07-21 05:37:28] M4dRefluX

ImgBurn ^[1] The best free ISO burner.

[1] http://www.imgburn.com/

[+27] [2009-07-21 08:10:14] pelms

KeePass Password Safe ^[1] to store/generate all my passwords.
The portable version works great in conjuction with Dropbox ^[2] and there's versions for Win/Mac/Linux plus many mobile OSs.

[1] http://keepass.info/
[2] http://superuser.com/questions/8671/what-are-your-must-have-free-gratis-programs/9889#9889

[+26] [2009-07-28 08:53:15] mundeep

WinMerge ^[1]

WinMerge is an Open Source differencing and merging tool for Windows. WinMerge can compare both folders and files, presenting differences in a visual text format that is easy to understand and handle.

[1] http://winmerge.org/

[+24] [2009-07-21 08:52:36] Avery Payne

VNC ^[1] in all ^[2] of its ^[3] variants ^[4]. Nothing says "sharing" like a program that lets you remotely control your work desktop from home...along with all of the servers...and workstations...handheld devices too...

[1] http://www.tightvnc.com/
[2] http://www.realvnc.com/
[3] http://www.tightvnc.com/
[4] http://www.uvnc.com/

[+23] [2009-07-20 20:49:48] Shog9

Thunderbird ^[1]

[1] http://www.mozillamessaging.com/en-US/thunderbird/

And Thunderbird-Tray! Minimizes it to a nice Tray icon. sourceforge.net/projects/tbtray - rlb.usa

[+23] [2009-07-19 18:53:25] facepalmd

CDBurnerXP ^[1]. It's no Nero, but it's the best free CD/DVD burner out there.
It's for Windows, gratis, not open.

[1] http://www.cdburnerxp.se/features.php

Hmmm, I tried using this on an Acer laptop. Didn't recognise the DVD burner, had no drivers for it. Searching around it seems this was quite common. So that's put me off this now. I'd -1 if I had enough Rep to do so. - ianfuture

I usually use IsoRecorder. Between it and the Explorer-integrated burning, that covers 90% of my needs. - Jason R. Coombs

[+21] [2009-07-20 22:37:35] Shog9

Eclipse ^[1] (a must have for Computer Science students, and others alike)

[1] http://www.eclipse.org/

[+17] [2009-07-20 23:16:14] staticsan

Opera web browser ^[1].

[1] http://www.opera.com/

[+15] [2009-07-20 15:32:46] umegastar

foobar2000 ^[1] light, fast, awesome music player.

[1] http://www.foobar2000.org/

[+15] [2009-07-19 18:21:54] Motti

ClipX ^[1] stores a buffer of copy operations.

[1] http://bluemars.org/clipx/

(1) +1 sweet! never heard of this before. - Jon Erickson

[+15] [2009-07-28 12:21:44] Lunatik

PowerToys for XP ^[1] - Surprised not to see them on this list already. I can't live without Command Prompt Here, and the Image Resizer, ClearType Tuner and a couple of the other toys are great aswell.

[1] http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/downloads/powertoys/xppowertoys.mspx

+1 - good for xp. - Moshe

Command Prompt Here is built-in in Windows 7 (Vista too maybe) when you hold Shift and rightclick, and ClearType Tuner is built-in in Windows 7 too and Microsoft also has an online variant. - horsedrowner

[+14] [2009-07-20 06:09:03] bobby

Screen ^[1]

[1] http://www.gnu.org/software/screen/

FWIW... i split this up. - Shog9

[+14] [2009-07-20 15:21:09] Trey Jackson

Emacs ^[1] (the best editor in the world)

[1] http://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/

I beg to differ. I love the way *nix systems seems to be developed by someone thinking "I'll make sure each program only does one thing, but does it really, really well." And then comes Emacs, and tries to do everything, but fails to do anything (except editing plain text files) better than really, really poorly... - Tomas Lycken

(1) @Tomas Well, I didn't add "the best editor in the word" text, but would argue that many people find it to be ... a very solid tool. At some point people generally move away from just using the tiny programs that only do one thing well and start using/creating larger tools (e.g. web browsers, IDEs, etc.). - Trey Jackson

[+14] [2009-08-31 21:38:24] lox

GIMP ^[1] - The GNU Image Manipulation Program

[1] http://www.gimp.org/

[+13] [2009-08-23 04:30:16] Eder Gusatto

VirtualBox ^[1] for Virtual Machines.

[1] http://www.virtualbox.org/

[+13] [2009-08-31 22:04:46] community_owned

subversion ^[1]

[1] http://subversion.tigris.org

[+13] [2009-07-21 10:55:32] dertoni

THE most important FireFox plugin for me:

NoScript ^[1]

[1] http://noscript.net/

[+12] [2009-07-21 02:50:44] Evert

Ubuntu and everything that comes with it.

Can't wait for version 10! - Moshe

[+12] [2009-07-21 05:32:36] docgnome

Git ^[1]

[1] http://git-scm.com/

[+12] [2009-10-20 13:05:27] Dave Webb

Skype ^[1] because no-one needs to pay for international calls anymore.

[1] http://www.skype.com/intl/en-gb/

[+11] [2009-10-20 12:55:07] Paolo Gibellini

Blender ^[1], a free open source 3D content creation suite.

[1] http://www.blender.org

[+10] [2009-07-20 20:47:04] Shog9

Netbeans ^[1] (a must have for Computer Science students, and others alike)

[1] http://www.netbeans.org/

(4) I prefer Eclipse. :) - musicfreak

Fair enough... superuser.com/questions/8671/… - Shog9

[+10] [2009-07-21 08:12:13] pelms

Google Earth ^[1]... fantastic piece of software and a great community.

[1] http://earth.google.com/

[+9] [2009-08-03 14:48:24] tinmaru

Unlocker ^[1] : Very usefull when you want to move or delete a file open by a process.

[1] http://ccollomb.free.fr/unlocker/

Good for removing stubborn viruses manually too. - Moshe

[+9] [2009-08-03 18:13:23] sean e

FLAC ^[1] - Free Lossless Audio Codec

[1] http://flac.sourceforge.net/

This is not a program. - Nathan Long

The FLAC encoder is a standalone program. - sean e

[+8] [2009-08-03 18:06:18] sean e

Sumatra PDF ^[1] - A PDF Viewer for Windows

[1] http://blog.kowalczyk.info/software/sumatrapdf/index.html

[+8] [2009-07-19 22:04:42] cschol

For Launchy fans, under Linux in Gnome there is gnome-do ^[1].

[1] http://do.davebsd.com/index.shtml

Gnome Do is win. - jweede

[+8] [2009-08-23 04:09:21] user1129

Autohotkey ^[1] and AutoIt ^[2] to automate just about anything on Windows.

[1] http://www.autohotkey.com/
[2] http://www.autoitscript.com/AutoIt/

[+7] [2009-07-20 20:39:13] Bob

InfraRecorder ^[1]

InfraRecorder is a free CD/DVD burning solution for Microsoft Windows. It offers a wide range of powerful features; all through an easy to use application interface and Windows Explorer integration.

InfraRecorder is released under GPL version 3.

[1] http://infrarecorder.org/

[+7] [2009-07-20 20:51:53] Bob

Rockbox ^[1]

Rockbox is an open source firmware for mp3 players, written from scratch. It runs on a wide range of players:

Apple: 1st through 5.5th generation iPod, iPod Mini and 1st generation iPod Nano (not the Shuffle, 2nd/3rd/4th gen Nano, Classic or Touch)

Archos: Jukebox 5000, 6000, Studio, Recorder, FM Recorder, Recorder V2 and Ondio

Cowon: iAudio X5, X5V, X5L, M5, M5L, M3 and M3L

iriver: iHP100 series, H100 series, H300 series and H10 series

Olympus: M:Robe 100

SanDisk: Sansa c200 series, e200 series and e200R series (not the AMS models)

Toshiba: Gigabeat X and F series (not the S series)

[1] http://www.rockbox.org/

(1) +1 Rockbox is much better than the original Sandisk Sansa software; in terms of speed, userfriendliness, features and customizeability. Moreover, nowadays it is very easy to install. - Dimitri C.

[+7] [2009-07-28 09:51:44] Chris S

Logmein.com ^[1] remote login web-base software (it's Java) that works through corporate firewalls and is free.

Update: It will also work with just a Firefox plugin

[1] https://secure.logmein.com/products/free/register.asp

LogMeIn Free makes a mockery of the overpriced BS that is GotoMyPC - love it. - Lunatik

(1) LogMeIn Free is so much more high quality than all those openVNC programs, etc... - studiohack

[+7] [2009-07-21 07:56:18] Jeff Widmer

Windows Live Writer ^[1] - For writing blog posts.

[1] http://windowslivewriter.spaces.live.com/

[+6] [2009-07-26 20:28:13] Zac Thompson

Google Reader ^[1]

[1] http://www.google.com/reader/view/

I'd vote that up, but it's a webpage. - Yelonek

From the question: "Neither do I care if it is for desktops, handhelds, netbooks, web based, cellphones." I guess you could stop reading the question at the title, though, if you want. - Zac Thompson

[+6] [2009-07-20 20:53:26] tj111

Jing ^[1] - Great little screencasting tool. It makes taking screenshots/videos really simple, and allowing some inline editing capabilities to windows. Plus it makes it simple to upload the screencasts to a web application or save them locally, whatever you want. Here's an example screenshot ^[2] and video ^[3] I just made while writing this post.

[1] http://www.jingproject.com/
[2] http://screencast.com/t/oWx3xFiFg
[3] http://screencast.com/t/3M23yYYdUIR

[+6] [2009-08-31 21:54:34] ymasood

Textpad is excellent and the free version is great. I've used it for over a decade now.

I wasn't aware there's a free version. Their site explicitly states you can download for a free evaluation, but must pay if you keep it. Also, current version is free for registered users of previous versions. So is there a hidden link to a gratis version I'm missing? - Michael Itzoe

I have a paid version, yes you can evaluate it. I haven't been to this site lately so I'm not sure if everything is behind a login now. Thanks! - ymasood

[+6] [2009-08-03 19:22:53] ondatra

Total Commander ^[1]

[1] http://www.ghisler.com/

[+6] [2009-08-31 22:10:16] community_owned

mplayer ^[1]

[1] http://www.mplayerhq.hu

[+6] [2009-09-01 16:37:52] Don Salva

VirtualDub ^[1], Video Editing Software. I use it a lot with Fraps for my gameplay videos.

[1] http://virtualdub.org/

[+5] [2009-07-20 02:35:39] Eric

The Combined Community Codec Pack ^[1] for video playback, best option I've found in terms of compatibility with various media formats. (decent bit better than just MPC:HC)

[1] http://www.cccp-project.net/

[+5] [2009-08-03 18:10:18] sean e

Exact Audio Copy ^[1] - CD ripper.

[1] http://www.exactaudiocopy.de/

[+5] [2009-07-21 10:52:00] dertoni

For the Mac

Perian ^[1] Codec Pack with QuickTime Components

[1] http://perian.org

[+4] [2009-07-21 07:59:39] Jeff Widmer

Old Space Monger ^[1] - Graphically display the disk space on your computer. The old one (Version 1.4) is completely free. The newer 2.0 one is not free.

[1] http://www.sixty-five.cc/sm/v1x.php

Pity that even the paid app isn't really updated any more. - Pauk

[+4] [2009-07-21 07:31:41] peSHIr

On Windows: PureText ^[1] - paste w/o formatting. Windows hot-key (default is Windows+V) that allows you to paste text to any application without formatting.

So for the number n of window switches you need to get to the correct application window, it enables you to simply do Ctrl+C, n × Alt-Tab, Windows-V instead of needing to jump through the complete Ctrl+C, Windows+R, N, O, T, E, P, A, D, Enter, Ctrl+V, Ctrl+A, Ctrl+C, Alt-F4, n × Alt-Tab, Ctrl+V hoop. ;-)

[1] http://stevemiller.net/puretext/

[+4] [2009-08-03 18:54:30] Huppie

MediaMonkey ^[1] is one of the best music-manager/player around i.m.o. Their 'Free' edition isn't as good as gold but has worked for me for years (until I read this ^[2] blogpost and switched to gold).

[1] http://www.mediamonkey.com/
[2] http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/000735.html

+1 I used the free version for a little while, then bought a Gold license. It's so much better than all the other music managers and players I've used. - MetalMikester

I tried MediaMonkey several times, on different computers, and it never worked right. It would freeze, wouldn't show all my music, wouldn't allow me to update my library right. All sorts of problems. It looked promising, but ... just didn't work. - eidylon

[+4] [2009-07-19 23:24:09] leander

I still prefer the sunburst chart of Scanner ^[1] to the treemap of WinDirStat ^[2]. Scanner is free. There's even source available, although it's marked "simplified".

[1] http://www.steffengerlach.de/freeware/
[2] http://windirstat.info/

scanner is awesome! :) - eidylon

[+4] [2009-07-20 15:38:19] umegastar

speedcrunch ^[1] is a nice replacement for the default calculator

[1] http://speedcrunch.org/

+1, I was moaning about the windows calculator about an hour ago! - Laserallan

[+4] [2009-07-20 20:54:50] Chris Thompson

BatteryBar ^[1]. I install this on all my laptops and all my family and friends' laptops. It's a great battery meter for Windows with an extremely accurate time remaining prediction.

(Full disclosure: I'm the author, but the program is free)

[1] http://osirisdevelopment.com/BatteryBar/index.html

[+4] [2009-08-31 22:10:51] ymasood

FireFtp for Firefox!

[+4] [2009-08-03 19:50:25] sean e

FeedDemon ^[1] - Windows desktop RSS feed reader

[1] http://www.newsgator.com/Individuals/FeedDemon/Default.aspx

[+4] [2009-10-20 13:01:33] Paolo Gibellini

POV-Ray ^[1], a fast and free raytracer, with an intriguing SDL.

[1] http://www.povray.org

[+4] [2010-03-26 16:39:09] rlb.usa

Cygwin ^[1]! : ) A unix terminal and utilities that can be run on windows.

[1] http://www.cygwin.com/

[+4] [2010-07-14 07:43:26] shiki

Remote Desktop ^[1]

[1] http://support.microsoft.com/kb/925876

[+3] [2010-04-07 17:29:42] ScottS

Foxit PDF Reader ^[1] much much faster than Acrobat.

[1] http://www.foxitsoftware.com/pdf/reader/

[+3] [2010-01-15 10:25:41] tinmaru

Teamviewer ^[1] : the most simple way to control another computer.

Very usefull to solve friend problem or if you need support!

[1] http://www.teamviewer.com

[+3] [2010-03-11 18:39:49] JDB

Everything (www.voidtools.com) helps on my NTFS drives when I can't remember where I put something - much quicker and easier to list lengthy results than Launchy (also good)

[+3] [2010-03-12 00:06:55] studiohack

Microsoft Security Essentials - light, simple, and easy to set up.

[+3] [2009-09-28 15:52:59] ldigas

Notepad2 ^[1]

[1] http://www.flos-freeware.ch/notepad2.html

[+3] [2009-07-20 15:28:32] Laserallan

Rapid Environment Editor is a nice tool for editing environment variables in Windows. http://www.rapidee.com/en/about

[+3] [2009-08-03 18:23:53] Ken Pespisa

Microsoft's Live Mesh ^[1] for sharing files between PCs. This wasn't a "must have" until I started using it, now I can't live without it!

UPDATED: Live Mesh has been replaced by Windows Live Sync ^[2].

[1] https://www.mesh.com
[2] https://devices.live.com/

I believe Live Mesh has now been discontinued, with (part of?) the functionality taken over by either Skydrive or Azure services? - peSHIr

It has been replaced by Windows Live Sync, which works even better, although doesn't give you quite as much insight as to what's happening behind the scenes. It is still free though, and a must-have! - Ken Pespisa

[+3] [2009-08-03 18:16:48] Ken Pespisa

CDex ^[1] - For ripping CDs to MP3s

[1] http://cdexos.sourceforge.net/

Yes - it's a great, lightweight program. It doesn't try to be a media manager, library organizer, player, and tomato slicer; it just rips CDs to .wav or .mp3, and you can customize where it puts the files and how they are named. - Nathan Long

[+3] [2009-07-22 01:39:18] scunliffe

Songbird ^[1] - Free music player with addons, skins ("feathers"), etc. Built on the same technology that Firefox and Thunderbird use. Can sync with your iPod, iLike, Last.fm, SHOUTcast etc.

alt text

[1] http://getsongbird.com/

[+2] [2009-07-20 20:55:42] Shog9

ClamAV ^[1] ( ClamWin ^[2]) : Open Source Anti Virus. Only lacks real time scanning of running processes.

[1] http://www.clamav.com
[2] http://www.clamwin.com/

[+2] [2009-07-20 20:49:33] Shog9

Nautilus ^[1] (with thumbnails of RAW files, it makes photography easy)

[1] http://live.gnome.org/Nautilus

Dolphin and Konqueror have always rocked hard, but the fact is that Dolphin(KDE4) is a bit slow on fast machines... But then again, KDE and GNOME have always needed beefier machines than the rest of Desktop/Windows Managers. - voyager

[+2] [2009-09-28 15:37:22] Optimal Solutions

Belarc Advisor ^[1] is a nifty tool to get an inventory of installed everything and even the registration keys. It has come in quite handy upon a rebuild of my machines. What I do is run this prior to reformating, save it in the archive and refer to it as I rebuild the machine. Most specifically I get my Windows Vista key back without going to look for it and can copy/paste it during the install. Not to mention referring to the inventory of software I had installed prior..

[1] http://www.belarc.com/free%5Fdownload.html

[+2] [2010-01-15 12:10:13] Donotalo

FastStone Image Viewer ^[1]: viewing/slidshowing/quick editing images in Windows.

[1] http://www.faststone.org/

[+2] [2010-03-10 21:41:06] pukipuki

Avast antivirus ^[1]. Home version is free and quite effective.

[1] http://www.avast.com/

[+2] [2010-03-10 21:47:53] pukipuki

Comodo firewall ^[1]: free but one of the most bulletproof solutions.

[1] http://personalfirewall.comodo.com/

[+2] [2009-10-20 13:17:49] Paolo Gibellini

Imagemagick ^[1], a free image conversion tool, useful to perform batch conversion of images in a variety of formats.

[1] http://www.imagemagick.org

very neat and really powerful; it goes well beyond conversion - bandi

[+1] [2010-03-26 16:40:53] rlb.usa

XAMPP ^[1] - a powerfull, fast, free, and easy to set up LAMP environment. Great for playing around with Drupal.

[1] http://www.apachefriends.org/en/xampp.html

[+1] [2010-03-26 16:47:04] rlb.usa

Trillian ^[1] - IM client that supports AOL/MSNM/Yahoo/ICQ/Bonjour/FaceBook/Jabber/Skype/Twitter...

[1] http://www.trillian.im/

[+1] [2010-04-07 17:31:04] ScottS

Cute PDF Writer ^[1] a printer driver to generate PDFs.

[1] http://www.cutepdf.com/products/cutepdf/Writer.asp

[+1] [2009-10-20 09:26:41] mouviciel

iTunes ^[1] for Mac and Windows.

[1] http://www.apple.com/itunes/

[+1] [2009-08-03 19:54:37] Electrons_Ahoy

Infrarecorder ^[1]. The best CD/DVD/IMG/ISO burning program I've ever used.

[1] http://infrarecorder.org/

[+1] [2009-08-23 04:42:04] Eder Gusatto

PSPad ^[1] editor is a freeware text editor and source editor intended for use by programmers.

PSPad has many software development-oriented features, such as syntax highlighting and hex editing, and is designed as a universal GUI for editing many languages including PHP, Perl, HTML, and Java. It integrates the use of many project formats for handling and saving multiple files. Other features include autocompletion, tabs, FTP client and find/replace using regular expressions.

[1] http://www.pspad.com

[+1] [2009-07-20 20:47:03] tj111

Enso ^[1] - I love this launcher much more than launchy. I find it much more natural to use than Launchy/Gnome-Do. Plus it finally puts Caps Lock to good use.

[1] http://www.humanized.com/enso/

I don't like the fact that you have to type "open" before the application's name. This makes Launchy much more efficient IMO. But otherwise a fairly good app (besides the fact that it steals my Caps Lock button, which I do actually use). - musicfreak

[+1] [2009-07-21 20:03:47] DHayes

Clonezilla for imaging

Whenever I am looking for a utility, I always search sourceforge to see if something comes up. Great site when you want an app, but don't have a specific one in mind, and don't want to pay for it.

[+1] [2009-07-22 04:48:37] Matt

ExamDiff ^[1] - simple, lightweight file comparison tool.

Technically, I guess it's freemium, because they also sell a "pro" version, but I've never had any complaints with the free version.

[1] http://www.prestosoft.com/edp%5Fexamdiff.asp

[+1] [2009-07-28 12:11:46] Lunatik

PrimoPDF ^[1] - Free PDF printer/writer

Small footprint and excellent compatibility.

[1] http://www.primopdf.com/

I prefer doPDF. - eidylon

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[+1] [2009-07-28 12:17:19] Lunatik

The Wonderful Icon ^[1] - tray app that allows extensive manipulation of program startup behaviour and, its pièce de résistance, allows you to minimise any program to the tray with a right-click. Runs as a service so you don't even see it once installed and configured.

[1] http://www.thewonderfulicon.com/

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[0] [2009-08-03 18:21:27] Ken Pespisa

Simplify Media ^[1] - for sharing my MP3 file collection to my iPhone or other PCs

[1] http://www.simplifymedia.com/

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[0] [2009-08-03 14:31:34] Paul Schifferer

TextWrangler ^[1]

[1] http://www.barebones.com/products/textwrangler/

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[0] [2009-07-21 06:26:07] community_owned

digestIT 2004 ^[1] allows you to easily calculate or verify an MD5 or SHA-1 hash by right-clicking on the file in Explorer. Copy the results to the clipboard or save them to a file. Can calculate the MD5 or SHA-1 for multiple files.

[1] http://download.cnet.com/DigestIT-2004/3000-2248%5F4-10387706.html

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[0] [2009-07-21 08:01:38] Jeff Widmer

WhatColor ^[1] - Tool for determining the RGB values of a pixel on your screen.

[1] http://www.hikarun.com/e/

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[0] [2009-07-20 20:48:19] Shog9

Brasero Burning Software ^[1] (really easy and underrated)

[1] http://projects.gnome.org/brasero/

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[0] [2009-08-23 04:35:22] Eder Gusatto

TUGZip ^[1]. Free archiving utility with Windows integration, script support and ZIP-64 for huge archives.

[1] http://www.tugzip.com/

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[0] [2009-09-28 15:57:50] eidylon

baregrep ^[1] - for grepping (searching) through files rapidly, with the ability to search for patterns matching regular expressions. great for searching through log files, documents, source code, etc.

[1] http://www.baremetalsoft.com/baregrep/

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[0] [2010-03-11 16:09:58] rogelio

grepWin ^[1] Regular expression search and replace for Windows

[1] http://tools.tortoisesvn.net/grepWin

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[0] [2010-03-11 18:35:34] JDB

Infrarecorder ^[1] is a quick, small and convenient disc burning utility that I use on WindowsXP.

[1] http://infrarecorder.org/

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[0] [2009-10-20 13:10:20] Aaaaaaaaaha ERLEBNIS

Virual Clone Drive

Mount images just as easy as burning them!

AVAST antivirus

Free, good support, decent recovery database making it possible to clean files after they've been infected unnoticed.

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[0] [2009-10-20 13:14:02] Paolo Gibellini

Moria ^[1], one of the best games ever... ;-)

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moria%5F%28video%5Fgame%29

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[0] [2010-03-12 00:48:56] Dave

Happy Lad Image Mapper http://www.indiepages.com/diyhtml/index.html

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[0] [2010-03-12 01:54:03] Fake Name

XCALC ^[1] - Because a calculator that doesn't use RPN ^[2] sucks.

[1] http://www.tordivel.no/xcalc/
[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reverse_Polish_notation

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[0] [2010-03-12 05:07:22] jini

Hijack This ^[1]

[1] http://free.antivirus.com/hijackthis/

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[0] [2010-03-11 18:46:05] JDB

Colibri ^[1] (http://colibri.leetspeak.org/) is a must have navigator/launcher on Windows - it remembers frequently used locations.

[1] http://colibri.leetspeak.org/

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[0] [2010-03-11 23:35:49] Dave

InfoZip ^[1] free DOS based zip / unzip utility (Works better than windows zip functions)

[1] http://www.info-zip.org/

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[0] [2010-03-12 00:05:15] studiohack

Executor - similar to Launchy but way way more powerful - has customized keywords and internal commands, very easy to tweak and set up - also VERY LIGHT on system resources. a MUST HAVE!

(1) Link - executor.dk - Fake Name

@Fake Name: Thanks! I forgot about that. Appreciate that! - studiohack

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[0] [2010-03-12 00:06:19] studiohack

WinPatrol - keeps computer running in lean form!

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[0] [2010-07-14 07:28:46] pramodc84

GOM Player ^[1] alt text

Powerful subtitle support
Play Broken AVI Files
Easy Navigation of Video play with different speeds

[1] http://www.gomlab.com/eng/

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[0] [2010-07-29 01:42:18] Xavierjazz

Microsoft Security Essentials. It is doing a very good job for me.

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[0] [2010-07-29 01:43:41] Xavierjazz

Musescore Music Notation Program. Open source and great support. http://musescore.org/

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[0] [2010-01-10 13:53:04] Jason R. Coombs

IsoRecorder ^[1] is a great Explorer shell extension to enable burning and ripping of CD/DVD images. Between that and the integrated burning capabilities of Media Player and Explorer, that's most of the burning I ever need. IsoRecorder is clean and non-intrusive.

[1] http://isorecorder.alexfeinman.com/Vista.htm

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[0] [2009-10-20 12:48:04] eric.a.booth

Others have mentioned text editors...my preference is Text Wrangler ^[1].

[1] http://www.barebones.com/products/TextWrangler/

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[-1] [2009-10-20 09:23:07] mouviciel

Apple's Safari ^[1].

[1] http://www.apple.com/safari/

(2) Ouch! Poor Safari. It's not going to get any love around here? - Josh

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[-1] [2009-10-20 12:38:09] Chuim

LiberKey ^[1] - IMHO the best free portable/local app bundle you can find! It comes in 3 sizes, you can easily add any other supported app from their site list, it's auto-update is a bliss! And the best: it already contains most of the apps listed here! :)

Quote from their site: "LiberKey includes a lot of free software. True "swiss army knife", it offers local and/or portable use"

[1] http://www.liberkey.com/en/

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