Open Source Thread

[Creeping Death]

I've been wanting to do this for a while. There are some great open source products out there that I use on a daily basis, and wanted to make sure people knew existed. There are a bunch of us on here that have a nice collection of free and open source software. I'd like to sticky a list at the top of this forum, so we'll have a reference for people to find good open source projects.

Lets stick to desktop software for now, and we'll do another thread for Open Source server software.

Here are a few off the top of my head. I'll add more later, and list a comparable software if I can think of one. Maybe I'll even be nice and add some links at some point. You have google, use it.

OpenOffice - Office
GIMP - Photoshop/Illustrator
Audacity - Audio/Sound
Pidgin - Instant Messenging
Combined Community Codec Pack (CCCP) - Audio/Video Player
uTorrent - BitTorrent client
ClamWin - Antivirus

[FBJ]

OpenOffice is, in my opinion, every bit as good as Microsoft Office. I've run docs back and forth between the two (have Office on the desktop and OpenOffice on the laptop) and haven't had any issues.

[RoyalPain]

This is going to be a great thread and I will contribute as much as I can to this to help people realize just how many programs there are out there that are free and just as good as the software we pay for.

[RoyalPain]

I've been wanting to do this for a while. There are some great open source products out there that I use on a daily basis, and wanted to make sure people knew existed. There are a bunch of us on here that have a nice collection of free and open source software. I'd like to sticky a list at the top of this forum, so we'll have a reference for people to find good open source projects.

Lets stick to desktop software for now, and we'll do another thread for Open Source server software.

Here are a few off the top of my head. I'll add more later, and list a comparable software if I can think of one. Maybe I'll even be nice and add some links at some point. You have google, use it.

OpenOffice - Office
GIMP - Photoshop/Illustrator
Audacity - Audio/Sound
Pidgin - Instant Messenging
Combined Community Codec Pack (CCCP) - Audio/Video Player
uTorrent - BitTorrent client
ClamWin - Antivirus

FYI Audacity is not just for Audio Sound but for recording and editing music
Also another good program that can be installed in Windows is Amarok by installing the KDE runtime environment.

The KDE on Windows Project - Welcome to The KDE on Windows Project (http://windows.kde.org/)

[KingThomas]

Linux Ubuntu 9.10 Operating System!! New life in an old PC!!!

I have been having major issues with an old PC. Everything from registry issues, malware, spyware, ect. Basically accumulated junk from using a pc over 6 years. After many attempts to clean, fix, and upgrade, a complete system format was necessary. I installed a new XP operating system, and my old key wouldn't work! I could go on about why, and why windows genuine advantage sucks, and microsofts telephone support is lame, but every solution resulted in me spending money on tech support or a new key. Microsoft can f*off.

Linux Ubuntu is 100% free! Open source is excellent!

This is my first experience with linux. I must say, the GUI is great! Just as good as any windows OpSys or even OSX (linux based kernal?) The software suite INCLUDES MOST of the programs mentioned above and an installer for many many more. The biggest drawback so far is setting up hardware (like Logitech) items that only offer Windows support and network configuring with windows based machines. Most issues can be resolved by reverting back to a command prompt outside of the GUI and placing some pretty tricky codes in appropriate places. THere is PLENTY of online support for this though. All in all I'm a happy guy!

Posting this running Ubuntu with Firefox.

Anybody familiar with Linux? Issues, drawbacks, positives?

GoKingsGo

[SuperCalo2000]

Is there an ubuntu I can install on an ancient celeron 800 that was running Windows ME ?

[RoyalPain]

Is there an ubuntu I can install on an ancient celeron 800 that was running Windows ME ?

Yes! the x86 32 bit version will work fine.

[RoyalPain]

Linux Ubuntu 9.10 Operating System!! New life in an old PC!!!

I have been having major issues with an old PC. Everything from registry issues, malware, spyware, ect. Basically accumulated junk from using a pc over 6 years. After many attempts to clean, fix, and upgrade, a complete system format was necessary. I installed a new XP operating system, and my old key wouldn't work! I could go on about why, and why windows genuine advantage sucks, and microsofts telephone support is lame, but every solution resulted in me spending money on tech support or a new key. Microsoft can f*off.

Linux Ubuntu is 100% free! Open source is excellent!

This is my first experience with linux. I must say, the GUI is great! Just as good as any windows OpSys or even OSX (linux based kernal?) The software suite INCLUDES MOST of the programs mentioned above and an installer for many many more. The biggest drawback so far is setting up hardware (like Logitech) items that only offer Windows support and network configuring with windows based machines. Most issues can be resolved by reverting back to a command prompt outside of the GUI and placing some pretty tricky codes in appropriate places. THere is PLENTY of online support for this though. All in all I'm a happy guy!

Posting this running Ubuntu with Firefox.

Anybody familiar with Linux? Issues, drawbacks, positives?

GoKingsGo

I have been running Ubuntu on all my home machines for the past 2 years. There are a lot of great things about the OS and a few issues but most of the issues will never show up in the system if you are using it for daily use.
Hardware support is getting better and thanks to Google Hardware drivers will be getting better for Linux.
The only issue I have ran into was the new EXT4 file system and working with Large files 512MB+ in size where the system hangs and you have to reboot it. but if you are not manipulating large files then all is well.
Now if you are using the EXT3 file system you can do anything without problems.

Linux is a lot faster on boot and shutdown than both Mac and Win. Data transfers are on par with Mac OS and above Win. Linux will run Windows Programs and with the correct emulator Mac programs can be run although it is still very early to get this part running solid. but it is going to happen.

Mac is good for what it does
Windows is good for what it does.
Linux is good at doing both what Mac and Windows does and more.

btw Mac OS is a BSD UNIX base similar to Linux but not Linux. BSD is a rock solid OS hence why Apple choose to use this OS to build OSX on top of. The only problem with OSX is Apple closed off BSD so you can't make changes to the OS like you can with BSD/Linux.

[Dawdler]

Knoppix 5.1 is also great I use it as a live CD, it has helped me find viruses on a Windows machine as well as virus infected USB's and I've also been able to recover files from a corrupted Windows hard drive, great tool to use

[RoyalPain]

Knoppix 5.1 is also great I use it as a live CD, it has helped me find viruses on a Windows machine as well as virus infected USB's and I've also been able to recover files from a corrupted Windows hard drive, great tool to use
Knoppix is an amazing tool for recovering systems and data. I have used it a number of times to recover data myself and have never had a problem I couldn't resolve when using it.

[Creeping Death]

Yea, another thumbs up for Knoppix from me too. On the subject of bootable and live CDs, I have been using Hiren's Boot CD for a few months now, and its a pretty invaluable tool as well.

[Dawdler]

Yea, another thumbs up for Knoppix from me too. On the subject of bootable and live CDs, I have been using Hiren's Boot CD for a few months now, and its a pretty invaluable tool as well.

I have Hirren's in my collection but I haven't used it yet, I've been to lazy to see all it has to offer, any chance of a quick rundown?

and I had no idea that Utorrent is now available for Linux and I'm going to give ClamWin a try.

VirtualBox is also a good alternative to VMWare

[SuperCalo2000]

Eek ! Ubuntu won't load on the old Dell Celeron 800. What should I do ? Throw the sucker away ?

[RoyalPain]

Eek ! Ubuntu won't load on the old Dell Celeron 800. What should I do ? Throw the sucker away ?

are you getting an error message?
I got my cousin to load Ubuntu on his PII 250 with 64MB of RAM. Or is the issue the GUI won't load if that is the case the Video card is probably not supported.

[RoyalPain]

I have Hirren's in my collection but I haven't used it yet, I've been to lazy to see all it has to offer, any chance of a quick rundown?

and I had no idea that Utorrent is now available for Linux and I'm going to give ClamWin a try.

VirtualBox is also a good alternative to VMWare

Ubuntu has a number of Bit torrent clients. I use Transmission. utorrent runs under Wine a windows emulator and it runs just fine. if wine is not installed you can install it from the Software center or you can open a terminal and type "sudo apt-get install wine" and it will ask for your password and it will download and install wine.you will get a single question asking if you want to install this program type "y" and it will continue when the screen gets back to a prompt close the terminal and run wine from the program menu.

[RoyalPain]

Yea, another thumbs up for Knoppix from me too. On the subject of bootable and live CDs, I have been using Hiren's Boot CD for a few months now, and its a pretty invaluable tool as well.

Hirens is awesome too. A couple other good ones are Ultimate Boot CD and Backtrack.

For those of you who are still hesitant to use Linux you can create an Ultimate boot CD with Windows which will create a live windows CD with tons of tools to help you recover data and fix system problems.

But if you are hesitant to use Linux, give it a try you may like it. Download any distribution and boot from the CD just about every distribution has a Live CD and you can boot to the live CD and give the OS a try. Also remember that if you decide to install it on your system it will be faster than it is while running from a CD.

My old laptop boots in 16 seconds 1.5Ghz Pentium M and shuts down in 14 seconds.

[Dawdler]

Ubuntu has a number of Bit torrent clients. I use Transmission. utorrent runs under Wine a windows emulator and it runs just fine. if wine is not installed you can install it from the Software center or you can open a terminal and type "sudo apt-get install wine" and it will ask for your password and it will download and install wine.you will get a single question asking if you want to install this program type "y" and it will continue when the screen gets back to a prompt close the terminal and run wine from the program menu.

thanks for the info, I've never used wine, I usually just use VMWare Server which is also open source, I think I'll give wine a shot.

I've been using Linux Mint but just installed Ubuntu 9.1 to test it out.

I've tried Transmission but prefer Deluge for the time being for my torrents

[Creeping Death]

UBCD (Ultimate Boot CD) is also a great product.

Hiren's is a collection of utilities such as...

Partition Magic
Ghost and Acronis
GetDataBack
Winternals
Memtest86
Just about every disk diag tool
Offline Password Changer
7zip
Ghost
Bunch of DOS apps (attrib, fdsik, pkunzip)
ccleaner
Superantispyware
Malwarebytes Antimalware
Hijackthis

Pretty much a collection of every useful software tool I've ever used while repairing a PC. Except l0phtcrack.

http://www.hiren.info/pages/bootcd

[quix]

Kompozer - a great WYSIWYG editor.
FileZilla - FTP/SFTP client/server.
Dia - alternative to Visio

There's a site I use to find open source alternatives to commercial applications. It has worked really well for me.

Find Open Source Alternatives to commercial software | Open Source Alternative - osalt.com (http://www.osalt.com)

Enjoy. Hope this doesn't kill the thread :)

[RoyalPain]

UBCD (Ultimate Boot CD) is also a great product.

Hiren's is a collection of utilities such as...

Partition Magic
Ghost and Acronis
GetDataBack
Winternals
Memtest86
Just about every disk diag tool
Offline Password Changer
7zip
Ghost
Bunch of DOS apps (attrib, fdsik, pkunzip)
ccleaner
Superantispyware
Malwarebytes Antimalware
Hijackthis

Pretty much a collection of every useful software tool I've ever used while repairing a PC. Except l0phtcrack.

Hiren's BootCD 10.1 - www.hiren.info (http://www.hiren.info/pages/bootcd)

I might know a place where L0phtcrack can be found. To bad Symantec bought it and killed it. But it is out there with Keygens ;) Another good thing about the UBCD is you can add programs and utilities to it that you might need.

[Dawdler]

thanks guys adding some more stuff to my repertoire

[quix]

Some of these might be for advanced users, but here are some more:

Cyberduck - Excellent ftp/sftp application that you can also use with Amazon's S3 buckets (MAC)
Notepad++ - Much better than notepad. Great scripting/coding tool (Windows)
TextWrangler - Similar to Notepad++ (MAC)
Evernote - Can't live without it. Much better than Microsoft's OneNote, IMO. (Mac, Windows, Mobile)
Adium - Great instant messaging app that supports AIM, Yahoo, MSN, Jabber, ICQ, etc. (MAC)
RealVNC/Chicken of the VNC - Remotely connect to your computer and use it as if you were sitting in front of it. Requires some router/firewall configuration. (Windows/MAC)
Thunderbird - Can't believe so many people haven't heard of this awesome E-Mail client Mozilla put together. (Mac/Windows)

... more to come.

[KingThomas]

Hello all, I'm starting a new basic Java EE programming class this week.

I have experience with other programming languages like PHP, and developing apps with Visual Basic, so I'm not that intimidated by learning the Java syntax, but I want to know what the good open source IDEs' are!

Can anyone tell me the pros and cons of NetBeans? Should I just use notepad++?

I do have CS5, can I develop in Dreamweaver?

I start my first programming assignment tomorrow. Any tips will be appreciated! Thanks in advance!

[Birdman]

Adium
Open VZ (Open source version of virtuozzo)

[SuperCalo2000]

Just loaded Ubuntu Netbook Remix 10.10. So much better than Windows 7 Starter. Loads and runs fast.

Any programs I should download ? Keep in mind it's a netbook with 1Gig of RAM.

[lath19]

Nice. I've wanted to try out Linux or Ubuntu for a while now. My laptop and desktop both have windows 7 which runs phenomenally so I have no intention of changing those. Maybe I'll pick up an old laptop and give ubuntu a try.

Good thread.

EDIT: Maybe I'll try running a live version from a USB drive. I'm assuming ubuntu live is small enough to fit on a 16gb thumb drive.

[SuperCalo2000]

You are right. It will take a while to load though.

Update: I love ubuntu but the new "netbook remix" interface is kinda crappy. I found it kind of restricting. Went to the "desktop" view and am even more happy. The little champ still zips. I want to get a Tony Stark type theme like I saw some dude online showed online.

[KingThomas]

Nice. I've wanted to try out Linux or Ubuntu for a while now. My laptop and desktop both have windows 7 which runs phenomenally so I have no intention of changing those. Maybe I'll pick up an old laptop and give ubuntu a try.

Good thread.

EDIT: Maybe I'll try running a live version from a USB drive. I'm assuming ubuntu live is small enough to fit on a 16gb thumb drive.

You could always try a partition with your choice on boot up? It's an option.

You should be fine with size thumb drive. I think the full installation allocates a little over 13g, but a live version will run off a dvd, so 16gb should be plenty.

[RoyalPain]

You could always try a partition with your choice on boot up? It's an option.

You should be fine with size thumb drive. I think the full installation allocates a little over 13g, but a live version will run off a dvd, so 16gb should be plenty.

uh Ubuntu will fit just fine on a 1GB thumb drive with room left over to add files if you wish.

Ubuntu will use 13GB when installed but is not necessary to use it.
Also Ubuntu will also run on old hardware just fine. :) as will most Linux distributions.

[KingThomas]

uh Ubuntu will fit just fine on a 1GB thumb drive with room left over to add files if you wish.

Ubuntu will use 13GB when installed but is not necessary to use it.
Also Ubuntu will also run on old hardware just fine. :) as will most Linux distributions.

LOL, yeah I guess I worded that a lil weird, but you clarified for me :)

[RoyalPain]

LOL, yeah I guess I worded that a lil weird, but you clarified for me :)

It's all good :) If you have Linux questions feel free to ask. I use Ubuntu at work and home on all my systems.

[SuperCalo2000]

I am looking into getting a nettop and possibly making it a HTPC later. I just can't seem to find a USB TV tuner card for Ubuntu.

[SOBER]

Ill try?

Snort
OSSEC host based intrusion detection
Centos
Ubuntu
Trucrypt (encrypts drives/folders)
Dvdshrink
Cain and abel

[King Smokey]

I am a techie. I am mcse and mcdba and I want to learn Linux. I can self teach pretty easy. What do Linux people recommend? And specific book or method? Where do I get started?

[->Raza<-]

I am a techie. I am mcse and mcdba and I want to learn Linux. I can self teach pretty easy. What do Linux people recommend? And specific book or method? Where do I get started?

Use the Slackware distribution..........................just kidding.
Tell me what are you interested in linux? Basic usage of the GUIs, installation of servers, programming, word processing....??

To start using Linux install a friendly distro like Ubuntu (Unity) or OpenSUSE (KDE) without generating a dual boot you can install Ubuntu like a program in Windows.
Say, you try the Ubuntu distribution, to install it you can check out this simple
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iW1V6TuZZmc.

Some basic programs are installed with the operating system installation like OpenOffice (or LibreOffice) which is a Microsoft Office like package of programs as well as a browser (Firefox) as well as a few music, video, pdf viewers/players so you should be ready to go right after the installation.

For a beginner that uses ubuntu I guess you should use this online book (pdf) (http://ubuntu-manual.org/) to help/educate/learn yourself how to set up wifi etc. It's really easy and you should be able to use your new OS and its advantages in no time.
If you have any problems you can ask me via pm or jump to the Ubuntu forum (http://ubuntuforums.org/forumdisplay.php?f=326) which has a fine beginners community that should help you with your questions/problems.



-------------------------------------------------------------------------
That should be enough for starters.



Then later you can try some other things like the linux shell, different desktop managers (linux GUIs), package managers etc.
If you really like to know/learn Linux you should learn the shell (http://linuxcommand.org/learning_the_shell.php) (similar but way more powerful then the MS DOS).

If you are a masochist you will later try out installing other things like some powerful tools like nmap or tools from the back track distributions hehe.

[KingThomas]

I have had Adobe CS3, CS4, CS5 and now CS5.5. So anytime I've needed to edit any type of graphic over the past few years, the defacto editing software has been a Creative Suite program.

I had a client send me a vector image with a .CDR file extension. Adobe does not play well with CorelDRAW, and I sure as hell did not want to pay for a software license, so I downloaded Inkscape (http://inkscape.org/).

I am so impressed. Extremely powerful, very intuitive (if you're familiar with graphic editing), cross platform, and it will open and save as any type of scalable vector graphic file extension to work with other software!

A new must have for every machine I work on!!!

http://members.gamedev.net/trapperzoid/ia/images/inkscape_main_screen_diagram.jpg

[Homer Simpson]

I have been using open office on a home laptop without telling my wife and she thinks it is MS. She is having no problems with it at all.

[King Smokey]

I've found a great boot up disc... Trinity Rescue Kit and it has the best local account password reset tool I've used. Piece of cake. If you can boot up a windows computer, you can get in to any and all local accounts.

I also use VLC for audio and video. It plays everything.

[jccawdrey]

I guess my cold war experience has got me, CCCP,...really?

[KingThomas]

I guess my cold war experience has got me, CCCP,...really?

Codecs for all according to their need comrade?

[King Ludwig]

I know that I'll be missing a bit with this Linux post...but feel free to add your recommendations as I'm nearly ready to start my new Ryzen 5 5600 G build...

I know that Linux Mint (original Ubuntu base) has upgraded to 20.3 and now the Debian edition is now at version 5... Zorin is too buggy for my taste and won't recommend it to any friend...but will to Ucks/Sharts/Showers fans... This coming from a guy who started out on S.u.S.E 4.2 and took a small vacation away from Linux to see how bad Mike Rowe's Soft really was... XP wasn't bad...but when they tried to force an unnecessary upgrade...I went back to Linux to stay (Mint to this very day)... The more I use Mint...the better it gets... I prefer to use the terminal for updates rather than the installed package manager... Outside of this and security functions...it's maybe 3-4 times a month to just make sure the rust doesn't settle in...

PopOS! Is a no go until they fix that bug that wants to delete it in the terminal before you even start it...

Since the Audacity takeover it's getting harder and harder to recommend it due to the massive amounts of spyware in it now... Will recommend OceanAudio because without it...some of the audio codecs on several motherboards won't work... Sometimes an update leaves you feeling as if you went deaf until you find the right codes in getting it back...and...like I stated before...OceanAudio is the first step... Not sure about Tenacity (a fork of Audacity)...just haven't had the time to test this since leaving the hospital...

I'm torn between LibreOffice and OpenOffice... Either would be a great add on as an office suite to any Linux build...but I tend a wee bit more to the former as the two Excel and Access alternatives are included...

For the Mike Rowe's Soft emulators...either WINE or Play On Linux will do...

They never used to be this friendly with AMD chipset drivers...but over the last year or two...Linux has gotten more AMD friendly... It took a while for my older chips to work...but once they did...nothing shy of a power outage could stop it...

Still no Blu-ray playback as I'd suggest hooking a Blu-ray player to your monitor (or in my case a $250-300 non-smart 42" TV which is a lot cheaper than any monitor currently in use)... It could be that my server chipset from 2004 needs a major upgrade... I might just swap the cases and throw out that ancient Cooler Master case and rebuild the server with an El cheapo purchased off of Amazon...

[King Ludwig]

I came across a great autocorrect program for the Linux terminal...but it's a certain four letter word containing the sixth letter of the alphabet that will be censored here... After 25 years of wanting to type that word in some stubborn codes that didn't want to work for me...either with me typing between keys or the code is defunct...this one is ideal for anyone who wants to effing use it...

The video with the program is posted in the random video thread... This guy has found some obscure codes that make the Linux terminal fun again... I will recommend his Linux Experiment channel as well as another one I frequent (not his) called Switched To Linux... I do have a wrench on the latter's chats...so watch your funny bones there... I see a straight line in the chat and I'll drive a truck through it...even if I have to push it now because it ran out of gas...