No, they’re not mine. But that doesn’t mean they aren’t really cool and useful! I’ll only list freely available programs here, so you needn’t worry about shelling out the big bucks. I don’t claim to endorse all of these (only some) and it’s certainly not a comprehensive list, so don’t complain.
Browsers
Mozilla Firefox - It’s time to rediscover the Internet. Again. The celebrated Firefox browser has updated to version 2, complete with an improved tab system and spell-checker for online forms, among other things. Check it out. I guarantee you’ll like what you see.
SeaMonkey - Derived from code from the application formerly known as “Mozilla Application Suite” (which you can still get here), SeaMonkey is designed to be an all-in-one program containing a web browser, a mail and newsgroups client, an HTML editor, web development tools, and an IRC chat client in a single, nice and neat package. Cheers!
Opera 9 - Not as cool as Firefox, but just as free and useful and available for many different platforms, including Linux. Big draw: Speed Dial, which displays 9 of your favorite sites in a grid, allowing for quick and easy access.
Netscape 9 - Yes, it’s Netscape, the aging parent of Mozilla and Firefox. It works. Sort of. It’s cross-platform, so it’ll work on Windows, Mac OS, and Linux. At the same time!
Internet Explorer 7 - IE7 works like a dream compared to earlier versions of the program. With tabbed browsing among the things added, it should really be called Internet Explorer Firefox edition. Just kidding. FF didn’t invent tabs. Anyways, IE still suffers from massive compatibility problems and proprietary junk like ActiveX, but it gets the job done. Better than IE6, at least.
Camino - Mozilla for Macs. Using the Gecko engine that made the Mozilla and Firefox browsers uber-popular and designed specifically for Mac OS X, Camino aims to meet the high standards of quality and design that Macintosh users prefer. And no, I didn’t rip that from the Apple website.
Galeon - Galeon is a Linux browser designed for the GNOME desktop environment. It (like many other browsers these days) is based on Mozilla’s Gecko rendering engine, so it’s sure to work well.
Konquerer - If you’re running KDE on your Linux, you’d best go with Konquerer. Not only is it a web browser, it also functions as a file manager and a universal viewing application, so you can see what files contain without opening them. Can anyone say “multi-tasking”?
Email Apps
Mozilla Thunderbird - The email companion to Firefox, Thunderbird is just as skinnable, just as extendable, and just as easy to use. A lightweight and free alternative to Outlook Express, er, Windows Mail.
Eudora 7 - Big changes with Eudora. It used to be offered in Paid, Sponsored, and Lite modes, but Paid and Lite are no more. You can still get Sponsored (cluttered with ads), but Mozilla is apparently looking at creating an open source (and free) version of it.
Pegasus Mail - Apparently one of the longest continually-supported email clients out there, first released in 1990. It’s completely free and packs a whole lot of features.
Office Productivity
OpenOffice.org - Undoubtedly the best free open-source office program available. It’s functionality rivals that of Microsoft Office, and it’s a heck of a lot more lightweight. If disk space and money are issues, OpenOffice is for you. No email client, though, but that’s what Thunderbird is for, right?
AbiWord - AbiWord is simply a standalone word processing program that can open a variety of documents, including Word files. It’ll run on a mere 16MB of RAM and on almost any platform available.
Instant Messenging
Pidgin - No doubt you’ve heard of multi-protocol IMing, where you can log into many different IM accounts (such as AIM, Yahoo, or MSN) with only one program. Brilliant! you say? Indeed. Pidgin is but one of these programs, and open-source to boot. (Note: Pidgin is what used to be called Gaim, savvy?
Trillian - Trillian is another multi-protocol IM client, but a little easier to use than Pidgin. Unfortunately, most of the IM goodness of Trillian requires you to pay for Trillian Pro, while the cheapskates among us must settle for Trillian Basic, which is nearly the same, but somehow not. Obviously the work of the capitalist pig-dogs. (If you must know, you can’t video chat on the free version of Trillian.)
Windows Live Messenger - The age-old MSN client got a name change and quite a bit of a makeover in the newest version. Not only did they add improved voice features, but you can use Windows Live Messenger to talk with your Yahoo contacts. This is my favorite of the IM clients, and I have to say it’s been getting steadily better.
Yahoo! Messenger - Yahoo is yet another IM giant, specializing in funny-looking emoticons and putting odd exclamation marks in their program names. But! it’s! still! a! good! client! to! use! Indeed. The newest version of YIM has voice messenging, which is nice if you don’t have a phone. Or don’t like the idea of plastic things on your ear. Also, you can chat with MSN contacts using YIM. Good deal.
AIM 6.5 - AOL has finally released version 6 of it’s instant messenging client. It’s definitely better than past versions I’ve used, but it the installer gives you a bunch of other AOL-related stuff along with AIM, so if being bugged by AOL doesn’t bother you much, AIM is for you.
ICQ - ICQ offers some nice community action along with your instant messenging, although the privacy really sucks. Or at least it did when I last used it. I got IMs from at least five people not on my contact list…all spam. But it can be useful for meeting new people.
Awesome Utilities
MozBackup - Ever had to reinstall Firefox or Thunderbird and end up losing all your profile info? Well, MozBackup provides a simple remedy for that. It can backup information from any Mozilla application including bookmarks, mail, contacts, history, extensions, cache and so on. Excellent backup action right there.
FireTune - And with this you can tweak Firefox to your liking based on internet connection and computer speed to increase Firefox performance. All for free, just like Firefox.
Notepad2 - An amazing replacement for the Windows Notepad program. Notepad2 features syntax highlighting and line numbering, among other things, that make it useful for HTML text editing.
Nvu - Designed to rival web authoring programs such as FrontPage or Dreamweaver (I prefer the latter), Nvu claims to allow anyone to create a website without really knowing how. Free and open-source.
FileZilla - FileZilla is an easy-to-use freeware FTP client. Excellent when combined with Nvu and a few cold drinks. It also comes with secure FTP capabilities, in case you were wondering.
Audio / Visual
GIMP - GIMP, which stands for GNU Image Manipulation Program, is a freely distributed photo-retouching, image composition, and image authoring program, much like Adobe Photoshop. It works on a wide variety of operating systems, and packs quite a bit of punch for a free program.
Paint.NET - Developed jointly by Microsoft and Washington State University, Paint.NET is a freeware photo editing program intended to replace Windows’ ancient Paint application and challenge some commercial editing programs. From what I’ve seen, it ranks at least up there with Adobe Fireworks, although special effects seem to be a bit limited. Worth a try, at least.
Audacity - Free audio editing software. This program can be quite useful and provides a lot of leeway in editing your audio. The latest version also offers improved background noise removal.
