Texas Open Source - joel Sampson / N5LXI

This data was previously served on Texas Open Source.com. I merged it with my radio site to make all my technical info available at one web site. I provide consulting on most of these software applications. The cost is only $50.00 per hour, with a three hour minimum. Contact joel for more information on our services.

While often associated with Linux, Windows XP is a great Open Source platform. Open source applications run in the native Windows GUI, and when you need commercial applications or specialized (like radio) applications they are available for Windows. We have successfully ran these applications under Windows Vista Ultimate with no problems.

As the name implies, Open Source Software has the source code available, if you would ever want it. It is also Free Sofware. The legal difference usually only matters if you want to resell the software. For example, Apple OS X is based on Free BSD, an open source operating system. The Open Source Initiative has useful information.

There are thousands of open source applications. You are encouraged to download this software, install it on all your computers, computers at work, give it to everyone and tell them to do the same thing! Here are some of the best open source and other free software for Windows, plus a free other platforms too.

CD Image

If you have high-speed internet access, download the Trinidad and Tobago Computer Society OS WIN CD. It's an .ISO image full of the best open source Windows software. It has a great user interface that makes it easy to install applications. Download it and use BurnCDC to burn a blank CD. It's a free, but not open source utility, that is easy to use.

Business

Open Office - a complete office suite and more. Compatible with MS Word, Excel, Powerpoint plus had drawing, painting applications and more. It has imported every M$ Office document I have ever tried to import. It also supports open and many file formats. I run my business with Open Office.

AbiWord - If you want a free, open source wordprocessor but not an entire office suite use this!

Sunbird - is a new open source Calendar project. It's a little rough, but I have been using it.

Graphics & Audio

Paint.Net - is an open source bit-map editor, similar to Photoshop. It's fairly easy to use and has considerable documentation. Written in C#, it requires downloading the free MS .NET framework. Paint.Net is for the Windows platform only.

GIMP - is a complex, full-featured graphics editor for bit map images, like digital camera captures.

Inkscape - is an open source vector drawing program, similar to Illustrator or Corel Draw.

Audacity - Audio recorder and editor.

Internet

Firefox - Fast becoming an industry stanard brower.

Thunderbird - Powerful mail reader with many features.

FileZilla - FTP program that is both powerful and easy to use.

Azureus - My favorite Bit Torrent client. Many cool features and easy to use. Great for downloading Linux and other large files.

Utilities

7-Zip - Compression utility.

Text Editors & Development

You need a text editor to write HTML and other plain text documents.

Notepad++ - My current favorite editor. It handles other platforms end of line terminators and easy to use. It does not have a built-in spell checker.

Cream - A powerful text editor based on VIM, a Unix favorite. It's easy to use and has a spell checker. It does not handle variations in end-of-line characters well, which is a problem converting from Linux or OS X.

Perl - and other open source languages are available free from ActiveState Software.

SmallBASIC - is a nice port of the BASIC language. There are lots of examples, good documentation and it also runs on Palm and Linux systems.

Ch - This C / C++ interpreter is not open source, but it's free. Very comprehensive manual it's good for learning and small to medium applications. It's a great product!

Free text

Project Gutenberg - over 20,000 free books on-line! Very cool!

University of PA - Over 30,000 on-line books.

MIT Open Courseware - Over 1800 courses!

Wikipedia - Wiki free on-line encyclopedia.

Free Code Momma - Download free technical books.

Tutorial

In Pictures - Tutorials for Open Office as well as M$ Office. Funded by the U.S. Dept. of Education. Not open source.

Open Source Collections

OSS WIN - List of Open Source applications for Windows from Sourceforge.

Sourceforge - Largest Open Source directory on the web! All platforms.

Palm OS

Palm Open Source - For Palm, Sony & compatible PDAs.

Linux

UBUNTU - If you want try Linux, this is one of the best releases. Easy and many great features! Install it on an old PC.

Free OS - Resources and Linux comparisons.

Linux for Ham Radio

Hamshack Hack - Knoppix live Linux loaded with ham applications.

radio.linux.org.au - Radio applications for Linux