Free and/or Open-source Alternatives to many Common Programs

[lutzee]

I prefer Foobar2000 myself..not sure if either are available for Linux, though. I know Foobar2000 isn't.

 

Neither are, hence why as a linux user I use cmus for my music player

Of course its super basic, Banshee is the alternative to iTunes, including the fact that it can sync music to iPods. 

[lutzee]

MPC-HC is better than VLC in just about every way...

 

Open source and freeware, but is only available on windows. Therefore VLC is still the preferred option for linux and mac.

[lutzee]

You should mention in your intro section that although these are free alternatives they are not replacements, you will not have all the options that the paid applications have. For example GIMP is in no way, form or shape close to the feature set of Photoshop CS6 (or even worse CC). But will be enough if you don't use all those extra settings.

 

Maybe you can add development tools?

Visual Studio Express is free, and considering the price of VS people should really look into it (windows only).

Eclipse is open-source (works both on linux, mac and windows).

Code::Blocks again open-source (works both on linux, mac and windows).

 

Most developers probably already know these, but this thread is very useful for those who are just starting out.

 

Also Sublime text

IntelliJ

NetBeans

[rashdanml]

Updated with new suggestions. 

 

@LinusTech - Appreciate the tweet!

[TSegers]

Also Sublime text

IntelliJ

NetBeans

Sublime (as much as I once used to like it) is neither free as in beer, nor free as in freedom. Just thought I'd throw that out there.

 

Other free (both as in beer and freedom) tools I can recommend are:

- Deluge as a uTorrent replacement (cross platform)

- Evince as a replacement for Adobe Reader

- TexLive (LaTeX) as a replacement for MS Word (only/most useful for scientific documents)

[rashdanml]

SublimeText does have a free, unlimited trial. Whether that's all features or not, no idea. 

 

Will add in a section for Torrent clients and PDF tools, since that's a popular document format. 

 

Edit: and done!

[TSegers]

SublimeText does have a free, unlimited trial. Whether that's all features or not, no idea. 

 

Will add in a section for Torrent clients and PDF tools, since that's a popular document format. 

 

Edit: and done!

Then I'd change the title of the thread to "Open-Source and/or free alternatives to many common programs" (and if you'd want to get anal about it replace free by gratis), as many of the programs here are free of charge, but by no means Open-Source or FOSS.

 

That aside, the main post if becoming a really complete guide on alternatives to paid/proprietary software. If only I had this when reaching into the world of FOSS and Linux. One thing to add (if possible), would be an "index" on top of the list, as it is growing quite large in size and complexity.

[rashdanml]

Then I'd change the title of the thread to "Open-Source and/or free alternatives to many common programs" (and if you'd want to get anal about it replace free by gratis), as many of the programs here are free of charge, but by no means Open-Source or FOSS.

 

That aside, the main post if becoming a really complete guide on alternatives to paid/proprietary software. If only I had this when reaching into the world of FOSS and Linux. One thing to add (if possible), would be an "index" on top of the list, as it is growing quite large in size and complexity.

Hence the split between Freeware and open-source. I tried to focus primarily on the open-source options and mention a couple of good freeware for that reason. Part of the reason I started this thread was exactly your situation - there wasn't a unified list of open-source alternatives, so I spent time researching every major category of software individually and built up a list for myself. It felt appropriate to share that experience. 

 

I'll add an index as soon as I figure out if LTT supports the [anchor] tag Doesn't appear to be the case. 

HTML doesn't appear to be an option either. 

[GoodBytes]

As you now take Freeware...

XBox Music for iTunes. As not only you can manage your music, but you have free music streaming of 30 million+ songs with ads (pay service to get unlimited music download, streaming and no ads). It also, like any music player, can do playlists, manage your music (acquired yourself or via the service). Has iOS and Android app, and web browser HTML5 access.

[nothingspecial]

PDFLite (http://www.pdflite.com/) is another good open source PDF reader and printer package.

[neon]

For a music player MusicBee in my experience can't be beat, it's not open source that's why I didn't mention it before, but now you are including other free software I can recommend it.

[rashdanml]

Added in the suggestions. Cheers!

[rashdanml]

-sneakily bumps thread for folks who might be looking for it-

 

Also added in a new suggestion for Game recording/streaming on Linux. 

[lutzee]

-sneakily bumps thread for folks who might be looking for it-

 

Also added in a new suggestion for Game recording/streaming on Linux.

Another option for streaming on linux would be this nice minimal shell script

https://github.com/wargio/Twitch-Streamer-Linux

Uses avconv (fork of ffmpeg which FFsplit uses, hence the name)

This actually captures the image from the X server, so don't move the windows around, you can't have anything overlayed on top of what you want recorded, or you can because sometimes Its useful!

[rashdanml]

Another option for streaming on linux would be this nice minimal shell script

https://github.com/wargio/Twitch-Streamer-Linux

Uses avconv (fork of ffmpeg which FFsplit uses, hence the name)

This actually captures the image from the X server, so don't move the windows around, you can't have anything overlayed on top of what you want recorded, or you can because sometimes Its useful!

Added it in. Came across it while looking around earlier, forgot to add it. 

[Giddyguy]

Just a general question about Lightworks, how is it? Is it a bit difficult to get used to, I've heard the learning curve is steep? I've used Premiere Pro before.

If it is easy to use I think i'll try it over Windows Movie Maker (awesome and simple, but a bit limited).

 

 

Great List to the OP!

[TheMissxu]

+1 for Blender.

 

Too bad it doesn't have proper AMD OpenCL cycles support.

[rashdanml]

Just a general question about Lightworks, how is it? Is it a bit difficult to get used to, I've heard the learning curve is steep? I've used Premiere Pro before.

If it is easy to use I think i'll try it over Windows Movie Maker (awesome and simple, but a bit limited).

 

 

Great List to the OP!

Personally haven't actually used it, but from what I can tell, the interface is pretty standard from what you'd expect from a non-linear editor. There may be some small learning curve involved. Apparently, it also allows you to set keyboard profiles (shortcuts, etc) from other video editors like Final Cut and some others (not sure how many separate profiles are available), so that could ease the transition coming from other video editors. 

[IdeaStormer]

-sneakily bumps thread for folks who might be looking for it-

 

Also added in a new suggestion for Game recording/streaming on Linux. 

 

Why isn't it stickied? (not asking you rashdanml)

 

Unless LTT is officially sold out and won't let the people find a cheaper/free solution to their software woes. Truly sad it hasn't been stickied... :huh:

[alpenwasser]

Nice thread, somehow overlooked it up until now.

Why isn't it stickied? (not asking you rashdanml)

 

Unless LTT is officially sold out and won't let the people find a cheaper/free solution to their software woes. Truly sad it hasn't been stickied... :huh:

Maybe we just need to ask somebody? Anything you can do about this, @MG2R ? Or anyone

else? I do agree that this would be an excellent topic for stickification.

[IdeaStormer]

I've tried out PlayonLinux and i must say i am extremely impressed. The UI is very intuitive and simple, and stuff like installing a game off GOG or Steam just by giving it your login is awesomesauce.

 

Also, the fact that installing a native linux game of a tar.bz package always goes wrong just makes me amazed by linux-steam

 

This should be a sticky btw.

 

 

Nice thread, somehow overlooked it up until now.

Maybe we just need to ask somebody? Anything you can do about this, @MG2R ? Or anyone

else? I do agree that this would be an excellent topic for stickification.

 

I think I reported it to be stickied before, and others have obviously stated it.

[rashdanml]

Especially with SteamOS out and people trying it out, would be nice if the topic didn't get kicked off the front page.

-sneaky bump until then-

E: I should include Geforce experience as a recording/streaming solution assuming it makes it its way to Linux. Still a good free solution for now.

[rashdanml]

Sneaky re-bump. 

 

I'll be looking over the topic again to see if I can make more additions. 

[rashdanml]

Added in a new Office Suite called WPS, which was formerly known as Kingsoft Office.

 

(Pardon the bump >.>) Will be revamping the topic at some point within the week. Stay tuned!

[IdeaStormer]

Should add MobaTerm in the X-Windows category. I just dumped Xming, MobaTerm does more and works much better.

http://mobaxterm.mobatek.net/

 

(PS: no need to pardon a bump on this thread, we'll back you up if the powers get testy)