gordlwilliams.com

The state of affairs when it comes to freeware is better than ever. Instead of buying someones really glichy expensive program (Office, Windows – though thats improving, Adobe anything..) you can find a freeware alternative put together by talented programers that does the job.

It may or may not do the heavy lifting of certain programs, but for instance I use a spreadsheet not quite like how some people who can actually make sense of how to make a decent chart can. I plug numbers in and some time ago wrote the formulas based on someone elses. In short I generally sleep at night.

For me having a proper office suite at $400 doesn’t make sense. Nor does having a graphics program at the same amount or an audio editor. Unfortunately I did pay the price on some of this stuff as freeware wasn’t there yet at the time. Right now I can point you at programs that either are the real deal (IM programs are mostly freeware) or do as good a job. No downloading in the middle of the night with the lights out from here forward ok? Promise? I don’t have to check do I?

I will run through Ninite http://ninite.com/ in order with my thoughts.

Browsers

• Chrome is now number 2 and is amazingly fast. It has good compatibility with things you use like ssl websites, citrix. Previously, say a year ago, a bit dodgy in places. Mostly I resisted the paradigm. Now Internet Explorer and Firefox is much like Chrome.

Messaging

• Skype is a defacto VOIP and IM but it stand s on its own, unfortunately. Now that Microsoft has bought it, it probably will. It would be great if it was interoperable with other IMs and you could have phone/im in one bundle saving space and computer memory by having one computer program open. Skype is the go to call for webcam and free computer to computer calls with phone costing $2.99 a month for North America.
• I would go with Pidgin for the rest, it handles all your IM accounts. No ads or junk.
• Digsby stay away from, it does stuff like send out invites. Trillian is alight, but its becoming a clunky interface. Google talk, AIM, and Yahoo, why? Pidgin does it all.
• Thunderbird is a great email program. Though I opted for an inxepensive commercial one, I would not be upset if I had to go back, very reliable.

Media

• Too many choices. To me Windows media player works. Grab klite codecs FULL and have a party. Don’t skip Matroska is very popular these days, though I just heard of it recently. Best to be able to play anything.

Runtimes

• All of them, all of the websites use them somewhere.

Imaging

• Gimp is a great alternative to photoshop, though the interface is a challenge. Not a programer of plugins so for me its just fine. Not down to using a Nikon with special lighting yet. May revise this.
• The rest depends on your taste, but mostly pass.

Office

• Office if you don’t mind paying. Libreoffice if you don’t.
• Don’t bother with PDFs if you take libreoffice, it handles it enough for most.

Secuirity

• Get something, no recomendations here as they all push reminders and emails at you to do something, usually upgrade. I went with my ISPs supplied anti virus, or you could go with windows defender if you don’t like the concept of constant reminders.

Other

• Dropbox is a good idea. Back up to the cloud.
• Evernote in place of Onenote if you like to take stuff down.
• Steam is about games and is only an interface to buy them.

Utilities

• CD Burner and Imgburn I would grab for burning
• Glary for keeping the system in shape and get troublesome apps to uninstall

Compression

• 7 Zip does it all

Developer tools

• If you have an FTP account anywhere, Filezilla

The rest is a matter of taste or use as I mentioned earlier. You can download all of these separately. Google them find out the website and read if your not sure.

Enjoy.