Open Source Alternatives
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Contents |
[edit] News
Mozilla CEO John Lilly: “World Domination is Overrated” – A frank and intriguing interview with Mozilla’s John Lilly. Originally published by LinuxInsider via the San Jose Mercury News, October 5th, 2008.
OpenOffice.org Upgrade Sets Download Record – The update for open source office suite OpenOffice is downloaded three million times its first week. Originally published in PC World, October 15th, 2008.
[edit] Operating Systems and Firmware
Ubuntu - A Linux distribution known for its ease of use. Ubuntu is considered by many to be the most popular alternative OS on the market today.
Kubuntu - An Ubuntu derivative that uses the KDE desktop instead of the "traditional" Gnome environment.
PCLinuxOS - Another easy to use Linux variant. PCLinuxOS is widely considered to by Ubuntu's top rival.
Suse - A popular distribution backed by Novell. Suse has been criticized by many in the Linux community due to its ties to Microsoft.
Fedora - A powerful, though not necessarily user-friendly, Linux distribution. Users and programmers are sometimes referred to as "Red Hats" due to their affiliation with open source developer Red Hat.
Linux MCE - A Linux distribution similar to Microsoft's Windows variant "Media Center."
WattOS - An Ubuntu derivative geared towards older systems.
Free BSD - Easily the most popular out of all of the BSD desktop derivatives.
Rockbox - An open source replacement firmware for many mp3 players. Rockbox is noted for supporting audio formats that many other firmwares tend to overlook, such as OGG, FLAC, and WavPack. Several models/variations of the iPod currently support the alternative firmware.
[edit] Web Browsers, Email Programs, and Instant Messaging
Firefox - The web browser from Mozilla, the creators of the legendary Netscape browser. Firefox is the first major browser to make tabbed browsing a standard feature. It is also considered to be the main alternative to Internet Explorer.
Chrome - Google's entry into the browser market. Since its debut in September 2008, Chrome has been called everything from "the next step in computing" to "just another fad."
Konqueror - A Linux-only browser designed to run on the KDE desktop environment. Konqueror's rendering agent, KHTML, was used as the basis for WebKit.
Camino - A Mac-only browser designed to compete with Safari.
SeaMonkey - An Internet "suite" (web browser, email client, IRC client, and HTML editor) similar to the now defunct Navigator. In fact, SeaMonkey is considered by some to be true successor to Netscape Navigator.
K-Meleon - An open source, lightweight browser based upon the Gecko rendering engine.
Pidgin - The popular open source, one-size-fits-all instant messaging service. Pidgin was formally known as Gaim.
[edit] Graphic Packages
Blender - A powerful, yet open source, 3D graphics engine. Blender was used in the production of Spider-Man 2.
ArtWeaver - An open source, Photoshop-style editor from Germany.
GIMP - Open source image editor. Many consider the GIMP to be Photoshop's chief rival.
[edit] Media Players/Streamers
QuickTime Alternative - An up-to-date free alternative to QuickTime.
Real Alternative - A free alternative to Real Player.
Songbird - A Mozilla-powered music player similar to iTunes.
VLC - The popular open source media player.
[edit] Office Suites, Organization, and Desktop Publishing
[edit] Office Suites/Word Processing
OpenOffice.org - The world famous open source alternative to Office.
Lotus Symphony - An OpenOffice derivative enhanced with IBM’s Rich Client Platform technology.
AbiWord - Open source word processing app.
[edit] Organization
OpenWorkBench - An open source answer to Microsoft Project.
Sunbird - Mozilla’s calendar app.
UberNote - Leave notes and writes lists. UberNote is a free alternative to Microsoft OneNote.
[edit] Desktop Publishing
Scribus - User-friendly, open source desktop publishing application similar to QuarkXPress.
[edit] Programming
Moonlight - Open source Silverlight.
Cappuccino - Free version of Apple’s Objective C.
[edit] Search
Yahoo BOSS - Use Yahoo create your own search engine.
