Top 10 Open Source Applications

Who says that just because something is 100% free that it can’t also be good? In this post, it is my mission to debug myths about open source applications being poor quality. Here are the top 10 (in no particular order) open source applications.



1. Amarok

In my opinion, Amarok is the best (on any platform) media manager and audio player on the planet!
The minute you add something new to your collection, it already updates
it before you even have the chance to check if it’s there or not.
Amarok is a Linux only application that works natively with the KDE
environment. If you have a Linux distribution, Ubuntu recommended, you
can download it and experience the wonder of this amazing program. Get it!

2. Firefox

Everyone’s favorite web browser, the free and open, Firefox. This browser is lightweight, has tons
of great extensions and themes, and is one of the most secure browsers
out there now. Firefox is unique because it works on Linux, Windows,
and Macintosh. Not many browsers could say that, now could they? Get it!

3. OpenOffice

One of the greatest office suites out there today has to be OpenOffice. Unlike Microsoft Office, OpenOffice is free and open
which means anyone can get and edit the source code. It also has
features that you need to pay for in Microsoft Office, like foreign
language spell checking. OpenOffice is available to everyone using a
Windows or Linux operating system, so next time you need to write a
document or make a slideshow, think OpenOffice. Get it!

4. VLC Media Player

In my opinion, VLC is the best media player I’ve ever used. Never
have i had a codec problem, syncing problems, or compatibility
problems. It’s also lightweight, and free and open (like everything on
this list). VLC works on both Windows and Linux operating systems with
flying colors. Get it!

5. Pidgin

Pidgin is an open and versatile
instant messaging program for both Windows and Linux. It combines AIM,
Yahoo, MSN, Jabber, ICQ and many others into one application. Pidgin
also supports video conferencing (Thanks John), chat rooms(including IRC), voice conferencing and tons of addons. Get it!

6. XChat

What would this list be without an IRC client? If you’re looking for a good
one, you’ve found it! XChat supports everything a normal IRC client
would except more. More than 100 addons, support for python scripts,
the list is endless! XChat currently works on both Windows and Linux operating systems. Get it!

7. Frozen Bubble

As
you were reading this, you may have asked your self, “Where are all the
games?” Well, heres one! It’s called Frozen Bubble, it is a nice
relaxing game you can play any time. Heck, I’m
playing it in between writing this article. It is currently available
for Linux only but a port for Windows and Macintosh is in the works. Get it!

8. OpenArena

Here’s yet another game, it’s called OpenArena. OpenArena is a fast paced FPS based on Quake III Arena plus it is free and open source. Luckily, OpenArena is available to anyone with Linux, Windows, and Macintosh operating systems. Get it!

9. The Gimp

Can’t
leave the computer graphics enthusiist out now can I? The Gimp is a
free and open alternative to Adobe Photoshop. It has many of the same
features and some people even prefer The Gimp to Photoshop. The Gimp is
available to anyone with a Windows, Linux, or Macintosh operating system. Get it!

10. Virtualbox

Virtualbox is THE BEST virtualization software out there today. Unlike VMware, it is 100% free and open
and supports more operating system types than VMware. Virtualbox was
recently acquired by Sun Microsystems so there’s bound to be even more
improvement. It currently runs on all Linux, Unix, Windows, and
Macintosh operating systems. Get it!

So far, these are the best open source applications in my opinion. If you disagree, why don’t you comment this article and tell us all which applications you like best?

Credits:

http://www.tadbit.com/2008/02/25/top-10-open-source-applications/

Toshiba to Offer 128 GB Flash Drive

Toshiba Corp. and Toshiba America Electronic Components, its subsidiary
in the Americas, today announced their entry into the emerging market
for NAND-flash-based solid-state drives (SSDs) with a series of
products featuring multi-level cell (MLC) NAND flash memory.

Offered in a range of form factors and capacities, Toshiba's
solid-state drives are designed primarily for notebook PCs and will be
showcased at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, from January
7th to 10th. Samples and mass production will follow from the first
quarter (January to March) of next year.

Toshiba's first
solid-state drives offer three capacities: 32 GB, 64 GB and 128 GB, in
three form factors - an embedded module, and 1.8-inch and 2.5-inch
drive enclosures.

The new SSDs integrate an original MLC
controller supporting fast read-write speed, parallel data transfer,
and wear-leveling, and achieve performance levels comparable to those
of single-level cell NAND-flash-based SSDs. By applying MLC technology,
Toshiba has realized a 128GB capacity in a 1.8-inch form factor. It
expects the launch of its MLC NAND-based line-up to speed up the
acceptance of solid-state memory in laptops and digital consumer
products.

The new products utilize NAND flash memory fabricated
with 56nm process technology, along with controller chips and DRAM, on
a 70.6mm (L) x 53.6mm (W) x 3.0mm (H) platform. The maximum read speed
is 100MB per second, and the maximum write speed is 40MB per second
with the SATA II interface (transfer rate of 3Gbps), which is compliant
with a high-speed serial interface.

The rated operating life is 1,000,000 hours.

Source:
http://www.tech2.com/india/news/general/toshiba-to-offer-128-gb-flash-drive/23454/0

Linutop

Overview

Linutop is a miniaturized ready-to-use desktop PC, designed to reduce
maintenance costs.

Low maintenance

The Linutop operating system is stored on an internal flash memory and cannot be altered by virus or mishap.

Initial state is recovered at each restart.

Low deployment costs

Linutop is delivered with free standard ready-to-use Linux software:

Firefox, Open Office, VLC Media player... and can be easily customized
with additional software.

Energy saving

With no moving parts, Linutop offers a completely silent (0 dB), energy-efficient operation in an extremely small package.



Linutop customers are:

- Hotels, Museums, Public Terminals...

- Shops, Bars, Point-of-Sale Terminals, Kiosks...

- Schools, Offices, Factories...

Screenshots:




Internet Desktop Display

Website:
http://www.linutop.fr/

World's First Powerless Air Cooler on a Mainboard!

World's First Powerless Air Cooler on a Mainboard!
MSI presents the "Air Power Cooler" chipset cooler with ECO concept at CeBIT 2008!

Taipei, Taiwan – Micro-Star International (MSI), one of the leaders in
mainboard technology, will bring new life to old technology with new
concept on mainboard products. While everybody is looking forward to
have a more ECO friendly design, more mainboard makers are trying to
save energy on the mainboard side with PWM design, MSI already has very
efficient power design, but we research more than only PWM design
enhancement, trying to offer the total ECO solution we now give you the
heat transfer power concept on mainboard cooler design!

MSI unique ECO cooler concept, over 70% heat transfer!
The
amazing of nature power has taught humans a lot, with the earth's
resources running out and fuels such as petroleum to run-out in this
century, now is the time to work harder and find the replacement
resources and use what we have learnt from earths nature. After MSI
concept solar power notebook system, MSI continued to survey in the
pursuit of innovation & ECO power to find other new technology for
mainboards, today we introduce to you a solution that's heat and air
power!

Maybe you have already heard about "Stirling Engine
Theory", but in Taiwan, we have great companies that not only work hard
on selling products, but also try to investigate future energy
solutions. Thanks to MSI and our great partners, we would like to
introduce the "Air Power Cooler" based on Stirling Engine theory with
great support from Polo-Tech Taiwan, the exclusive heat transfer
technical design company with their own patent rights.

The "Air
Power Cooler" transfers the chipset heat into air momentum, when the
air becomes hot, the air will expand then push the fan to rotate and In
doing so cooling the heatsink immediately. After the air moves from the
bottom to top of the piston, the air will become heavy to push the up
piston down. The better air piston design can transfer over 70% heat
power and transfer to air power, that's great efficiency transfer from
Stirling engine theory. In a comparison with solar power the transfer
rate is only around 20~30% requiring more surface and as a result cost.

MSI "Air Power Cooler", more then just saving watts!
MSI
will present a live demo of our "Air Power Cooler" concept product in
MSI's ECO area block on the MSI booth in CeBIT Hall 21 B34. You will
see the electricity-less fan which was powered only by the movement of
heat and air, the fan speed will change relative to the chipset
temperature. The prototype "Air Power Cooler" is our first attempt to
investigate how the Eco concept can work in tandem with the evolution
of the mainboard "ECOlution" and joins the theme for MSI at Cebit08. We
will continue to co-work with our great partners and try to turn this
early concept into mass production in the near future.

MSI
believe that "less is more" and currently use less power but with more
efficiency. MSI philosophy for good mainboard design is not about
simply adding more components to PWM phases, to then turn off some
phases to make a power saving. Today MSI introduces a new ECO concept
using recycled energy giving you real-world environmental and power
savings! For features. MSI once again shows our market leading
credentials and why our slogan is "Innovation with Style".

More detail about the Stirling Engine!

• The history of the Stirling engine.
– The Stirling engine theory and prototype was invented during1600's.
– In 1816, Robert Stirling of Scotland revised and then make it as "economizer".
– With that addition the early age air engines started to use Stirling's idea.
– Many other applications adopted the principle of the Stirling engine to replace existing applications.

• The theory of the Stirling engine.
– The Stirling engine, cycles through four main processes: cooling, compression, heating and expansion.
– This is accomplished by moving the gas back and forth between hot and cold heat exchangers.
–
The hot heat exchanger is in thermal contact with an external heat
source, e.g. Chipset, and the cold heat exchanger being in thermal
contact with an external heat sink.
– The heat transferred the outside becomes air heat and pushes up the inside pump.
– The warm air cools, and the inside pump falls down again.
– The cycle restarts again.

• Usages of the Stirling engine.
– The striling engine is still used in some submarines and to power toy airplanes.
– The evolution of the Stirling engine has become a replacement energy solution.
– Heat transfer power, small electrical generator and internal power engine.

• Advantages of the Stirling engine.
– Max transfer rate over 70% heat transfer capability, solar power is only 20~30%.
– Smaller size than solar power, only heat, no extra fuel needed when working.
– Lower total cost and continued power output with continued heat resource.

Source:
http://global.msi.com.tw/index.php?func=newsdesc&news_no=591

Smart FTP

What is SmartFTP?

SmartFTP is an FTP (File Transfer Protocol) client which allows you to
transfer files between your local computer and a server on the
Internet. With its many basic and advanced features SmartFTP also offers secure, reliable and efficient transfers that make it a powerful tool.

SmartFTP can be used for:

• Web site publishing and maintenance
• Upload and download of images, documents, movie and music files
• Share your files with your friends and coworkers
• Backups of local or remote files

SmartFTP 2.5 Build 1008 released

What's New

• Remote Edit settings to configure editors.
  
  To change the settings go to menu: Tools - Settings - Remote Edit.
• Used space calculator in Remote Browser
  
  Right-click on a folder then select Properties from the context menu.
• Drop Folder
  
  To create a Drop Folder right-click on a folder and select New - Drop Folder.
• Right-click context menu in Local Browser / Explorer
  
  Easily add files to the Transfer Queue from Windows Explorer.
  

• Change Log
• Download

Localization Projects

The latest version of the SmartFTP Client is available in 20 languages

Website: http://smartftp.com/

Firefox Add-ons: Recommended Add-ons

With so many great add-ons available, there's something for everyone. To get you started, here's a list of some of the most popular. Enjoy!

BlogRovr
by marc meyer, Jean Sini
You don't have time to read ALL those Blogs! Let RovR do it for you. Rovr fetches posts from your favorite blogs about anything you're browsing, and shows you summaries you can open read posts without leaving the web page you were on. Blogrovr also suggests popular items AND lets you Twitter about any site you're on too.
Version 1.1.771 — January 14, 2008

BlueOrganizer
by Alex Iskold
BlueOrganizer is the new smart-browsing technology for Firefox. It automatically recognizes things like books, wine, travel destinations and offers contextual shortcuts between your favorite sites. With BlueOrganizer you can instantly send books to your Amazon Wishlist, find wines with similar taste on Wine.com, lookup maps on Google - all from one simple, personalized menu.
Version 3.4.1 — February 22, 2008

Zotero
by Center for History and New Media
Zotero [zoh-TAIR-oh] is a free, easy-to-use Firefox extension to help you collect, manage, and cite your research sources...
Version 1.0.3 — February 4, 2008

Wizz RSS News Reader
by Mike Kroger
A constantly improving RSS and Atom feed reader. It is fairly powerful, feature rich, well supported and has comprehensive online help.
Version 2.1.9.8 — November 29, 2007

iMacros for Firefox
by iOpus
If you love the Firefox web browser, but are tired of repetitive tasks like visiting the same sites every days, filling out forms, and remembering passwords, then iMacros for Firefox is the solution you’ve been dreaming of! iMacros was designed to automate the most repetitious tasks on the web. If there’s an activity you have to do repeatedly, just record it in iMacros. The next time you need to do it, the entire macro will run at the click of a button! With iMacros, you can quickly and easily fill out web forms, remember passwords, download information from other sites, scrape the Web (get data from multiple sites), and more. You can keep the macros on your computer for your own use, or share them with others by embedding them on your homepage, blog, company Intranet or any social bookmarking service. The uses are limited only by your imagination! ***Whatever you do with Firefox, iMacros can automate it.***
Version 6.0.3.1 — February 28, 2008

Greasemonkey
by Aaron Boodman
Allows you to customize the way a webpage displays using small bits of JavaScript. ...
Version 0.7.20080121.0 — January 21, 2008

Firebug
by Joe Hewitt
Firebug integrates with Firefox to put a wealth of development tools at your fingertips while you browse. You can edit, debug, and monitor CSS, HTML, and JavaScript live in any web page...
Version 1.05 — April 24, 2007

Web Developer
by Chris Pederick
Adds a menu and a toolbar with various web developer tools.
Version 1.1.4 — June 5, 2007

Yoono
by Yoono
While you are surfing, Yoono instantly suggests what others have discovered: websites, people and articles. Create a rich scrapbook of your favorite stuff with the new "Buzz It!" feature, one-click grab and share videos, photos and texts from any web page. Yoono keeps your scrapbook and original Firefox bookmarks synchronized across your computers. To see a demo : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AwIzjJrbfq4
Version 4.0.3.5488 — August 7, 2007

Adblock Plus
by Wladimir Palant
Ever been annoyed by all those ads and banners on the internet that often take longer to download than everything else on the page? Install Adblock Plus now and get rid of them.
Version 0.7.5.3 — September 24, 2007

Download Statusbar
by Devon Jensen
View and manage downloads from a tidy statusbar - without the download window getting in the way of your web browsing.
Version 0.9.6 — February 12, 2008

Delicious Bookmarks
by Yahoo! Inc.
The Official Delicious Add-on seamlessly integrates your browser with del.icio.us, the leading social bookmarking service on the Web.
Version 1.5.44 — October 16, 2007

FoxyTunes
by Alex Sirota
Do you listen to Music while surfing the Web? FoxyTunes lets you control almost any media player and find lyrics, covers, videos, bios and much more with a click right from your browser.
Version 2.9.5 — August 2, 2007

ScribeFire
by Christopher Finke
ScribeFire (previously Performancing for Firefox) is a full-featured blog editor that integrates with your browser and lets you easily post to your blog.
Version 1.4.6 — February 26, 2008

PicLens
by The Cooliris Team
PicLens instantly transforms your browser into a full-screen 3D experience for viewing images across the web. Our new interactive "3D Wall" lets you effortlessly drag, click, and zoom your way around a wall of pictures for an extraordinary viewing experience. The new search box lets you search the Web in full-screen using Google, Yahoo, SmugMug, Flickr, Photobucket, and DeviantArt. Just type a query and view all the results in the PicLens wall.
Version 1.6.1.1029 — February 5, 2008

ChatZilla
by James Ross, Samuel Sieb, others
A clean, easy to use and highly extensible Internet Relay Chat (IRC) client.
Version 0.9.81 — February 16, 2008

StumbleUpon
by StumbleUpon
StumbleUpon discovers web sites based on your interests, learns what you like and brings you more.
Version 3.16 — November 21, 2007

Clipmarks
by Clipmarks
Clipmarks lets you clip and share pieces of web pages. Instead of having to bookmark entire pages, our Firefox add-on lets you "clip" the best parts (text, images and video).
Version 3.0.2 — January 31, 2008

Forecastfox
by richwklein, Jon Stritar
Get international weather forecasts from AccuWeather.com, and display it in any toolbar or statusbar with this highly customizable and unobtrusive...
Version 0.9.6 — September 13, 2007

ThumbStrips
by Intuit Innovation Lab
Find what you seek -- visually.
Version 1.5 — December 28, 2007

LinkedIn Companion for Firefox
by Jerry Luk
LinkedIn is an online network of more than 10.5 million experienced professionals. LinkedIn helps you be more effective in your daily work and opens doors to opportunities by helping you develop and manage your network of business...
Version 3.0.1 — April 30, 2007

PDF Download
by Denis Remondini, Nitro PDF Software
PDF Download relieves the pain experienced when encountering PDF files on the Web. Whenever you click on a PDF file, PDF Download lets you know before trying to open it, and then offers you choices such as downloading, opening, or converting it straight to HTML.
Version 1.0.1.1 — February 26, 2008

Cooliris Previews
by The Cooliris Team
Cooliris Previews gives you the power to browse and share Web links and rich media faster. Just mouse over any link, and the Cooliris preview window immediately appears to show you the content. To email it, just click.
Version 2.6 — January 30, 2008

Interclue
by Some Clueful Kiwis
Interclue tooltip windows display content previews, useful extra information and relevant next actions for almost any link on the web. A truly user-centric design, "Clueview" tooltips show you only the most relevant content from linked pages, and can provide embedded viewing for images, mp3s and YouTube videos.
Version 1.5.2 — February 13, 2008

Foxmarks Bookmark Synchronizer
by Foxmarks Inc.
If you use Firefox on more than one computer, you'll want Foxmarks. Install Foxmarks on each computer, and it will work silently in the background to keep your bookmarks synchronized. You can also log in to my.foxmarks.com to manage your bookmarks from any computer.
Version 2.0.43 — January 29, 2008

Firefox Companion for Kodak EasyShare Gallery
by Mozilla Corporation
Organizing and sharing your pictures is easier than ever with Firefox Companion for Kodak EasyShare Gallery. Upload photos directly to your Kodak EasyShare Gallery, all within your browser. Drag, drop and arrange pictures adding photo titles, and...
Version 1.0.9.2 — February 14, 2007

Firefox Companion for eBay
by eBay, eBay Inc.
Keep an eye on your eBay trading wherever you are on the web when you install the eBay Companion for Firefox. It’s a free tool built with eBay users in mind that will help you get more out of your buying and selling.
Version 1.1.1 — November 28, 2007

Source:
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/recommended