subject: Top 5 "Open Source Software" Which Have Saved My Life! [print this page] Top 5 "Open Source Software" Which Have Saved My Life!
Open Source Software (Free software) comes in all shapes and forms for all different operating systems. Some work really well and others are just a plane waste of time. There have been some Open Source programs that have really gotten me out of sticky situations, and all for free. I personally use Mac's OSX operating system, but I believe all the software I am going to list will work across multiple operating systems.
My top top top personal favorite, my number one, has to be Virtual Box. Virtual Box runs different operating systems at one time straight onto your computer. I use virtual box on my MAC 10.4.11 Tiger Operating system to run Windows XP (Soon to be up grading to Leopard on the Mac and Windows 7) Virtual Box can run the operating Systems either seamlessly or in a separate window, I prefer the Seamless mode which lets you use windows programs on your mac desktop. My main use for having windows on my mac is that I develop websites which need to be checked across all web browsers, but you can run any windows programs.
* although VirtualBox is freeware if you want to run windows or mac as the additional OS you need to purchase the OS from either windows or mac. You can install Linux OS for free.
Number two on my list has to be FireFox. FireFox is a web browser that is any web developers dream. There are so many free plugins that you install into firefox for so many different uses, from blogging to finding keywords, ftp'ing to Bookmarking. The plugins help you manage multiple jobs in one go and all in one place. It defiantly has my thumbs up and was close to becoming my number one chose.
Coming in close at number three is Audacity. Audacity is a cross platform sound editor which allows recording, editing and exporting of a virity of formats such as mp3, aiff and M4A. I use Audacity for editing sound from a tie clip mic which has been captured on on a ZOOM H2 SD recorder before importing it FCP to paste over my movie clips. The amount of editing this free baby does is outstanding, and has saved me loads of money on paid alternatives.
A life saver for my Mac at number four is VLC player. For those whom make DVDs may like to use MV2 compression of their movies for the best quality to burn to DVD. (I know some are going to say H.264 is better, but I prefer Mv2) The problem I face is that Mac do not support play back of this file type apart from on DVD Pro Studio or if you buy a Quicktime plugin from them for 20. I like to watch the exported footage through before importing it into my DVD Pro Studio project, and some of you out there might just want watch Mv2 (or Mpeg2) files without having to compress them to another format. This is where VLC media player comes in, it is the only media player that I have found that will play Mpeg2 videos on the mac with out the Quicktime plugin needed to be installed.
In at number five is Gimp. Gimp is an open source alternative to Photoshop which also supports layers. I teach a few students a month web design, and for imagery tutorials I use Gimp as it is just as effective as Photoshop with out the price tag. When I teach I like to use software which is fully accessible to those I teach, rather than them having to fork out loads of money on programs.
Download VLC Player to compare and see all its features and the media playable.
