Useful Freeware, Handy and Necessary

Here I have shortlisted applications (including web-based apps), based on years of sieving and experimentation. You’ll find many of them very handy. The amazing thing is – they are all freeware!

E-mail: Gmail. Not exactly a software since it’s web mail, but its hands down the best email managing system IMO. (and I’ve used other email clients before like Outlook, Lotus, Yahoo).

Browser: Google Chrome. I switched from Firefox last year. It took some getting used to in the first week. But after that, I started loving Chrome. I love that it lets you shift your tabs around, unlike Firefox. It also lets you “pin” your frequently accessed pages so it becomes a small icon on the navigation. It’s fast, minimalistic in interface, and very reliable as a browser.

Calendar: GCal. Keeps all my schedules in check, and it’s web-based so you can access it anywhere – even your phone if it has the web-surfing function

Task Shuffler: Ever felt the need to move the programs around in your task bar? I know I do. This is an extremely handy program that allows you to do just that, simply via clicking/dragging/dropping. For Windows only.

Screen Capture: Snipping Tool if you are using Windows Vista (in built), Zap Grab if you are using other platforms. Just click and grab any part of the screen, and you have your image. Extremely useful.

Automated Computer Shut Down: Switch Off. Automatically Shuts down/ Hibernates/ Restarts/ Logs Off your computer at a time you input. Great if you are downloading something which is taking a while but you need to leave your computer before it finishes.

Audio: Audacity. Free, open source software for recording and editing sounds.

Document Processor: Libre Office. This is almost a direct clone of MS Office set (Powerpoint, Word, Excel) – about 99.9% similar. I find it hard to believe that this is free! The only issue I’ve experienced so far is the slight change in formatting when you convert to MS office extensions (.doc, .xls) – but it’s manageable.

PDF: PDF Creator. Libre Office already comes with an inbuilt pdf creator. But if you want to create PDFs from other applications, PDF creator is for you. As long as there’s a “Print” option, you can generate a pdf from there.

Graphics Editing: GIMP. Very similar to Adobe Photoshop. Some functions are named and organized differently than Photoshop, so if you are a Photoshop user you can download GIMP Shop to change GIMP’s interface similar to Photoshop. The amazing thing is how GIMP packs with so much graphic editing prowess in such a small program (installer is 15.2meg, while Photoshop is over 700meg).

FTP: Filezilla. Excellent FTP program that does its job well. You got to love open source projects.

Chat: GTalk. Extremely low-resource and fast chat application with functions that supersede MSN (example: logging of chat history which is integrated with and automatically saved in Gmail Chat folder). For even more functions (emoticons, group chat, etc), check out Gtalk Labs Edition.

Blogging: WordPress.org if you are looking to host your own blog and WordPress.com for the free hosted version. Personal Excellence is using WordPress.

Journal: Daily Diary. A very simple yet effective free journaling application that lets you type and store your entries on your computer. Comes with password protection and multiple journal creation for different purposes (e.g., record of different goals, areas of your life, etc)

Video player: VLC Media Player. The best multi-format media player. With so many different media formats out there, this one is a catch-all player that plays almost anything. And it’s resource light too.

Information Storage: Ever Note. Storage central for information captured across any environment – Computer, Web, Phone.

To-Do Lists: Remember The Milk. Very effective for getting your tasks in check. It’s web-based, which means you can access it anywhere.

Post-It Notes: Morun Sticky Notes. Minimalistic post-it notes on your desktop. Convenient placeholder for storing commonly-accessed or used information.

Mind Mapping: Free Mind. It’s a great open-source mindmapping software. Great tool and very user-friendly.

Timer: E.gg Timer. This is a web-based app and not an actual software. It’s an online stopwatch you can time yourself and it’ll beep at the end. Very useful if you want to timebox when doing a task, exercising, etc.

Internet Calls: Skype. Gtalk works great too as a backup. Both support video conferencing.

HTML Editor: NVU is a free, open source web editor, which you can use to build your website via a WYSIWYG editor (what-you-see-is-what-you-get). According to the website, it rivals programs as Adobe’s Dreamweaver and Microsoft’s Expression Web even, in functionality. Usually I use notepad for webpage edits outside of the WordPress platform, but when there’s heavy coding involved, NVU is a great time saver. I used it to build the PEBook and 30DLBL