By the time you read this, the holiday shopping season will be over and many of
you will be trying to figure out what to put on your new computer. It seems
fitting, then, to make a few suggestions of programs you will find in your Web
browser-based shopping center, the Mall of Free and Open Source Software, or the
Mall of FOSS. All of the suggestions made here are suitable not only for users
of Linux and BSD, but also for Windows diehards. In some cases, other operating
systems, such as the Mac and Solaris are supported. So fire up your computer and
head on out to the Internet highway. Oh, and you can leave your credit card at
home, for the goods at the Mall of FOSS are priced most attractively: free.
Screensavers
The holidays are really meant for the child that resides in all of us, and all
children want to have fun. So spice up your PC with some fun items. Start by
stopping at the Really Slick Screensavers Web site at
http://www.reallyslick.com/. Here you will find out-of-this-world, mesmerizing
screen savers that range from “psychedelic” to “nauseating.” One includes great
sound effects. They all perform best with hardware-based video acceleration, but
that should not be a problem with recent hardware. Once you see these, you'll
never go back to the flying Windows or pipes again.
Web browsers
Is your gift recipient still using Internet Explorer? Head on over to
http://www.mozilla.com/ to get Firefox for him or her. Firefox is a great Web
browser with such features as tabbed browsing, configurable security, extensions
that provide additional features, and themes that change the look and feel.
Firefox version 2.0 was released Oct. 24. Or you can shop for a newer browser,
Flock, at http://www.flock.com/. Flock is based on the same page rendering
engine, Gecko, that the Mozilla family of browsers is built around. But Flock
focuses on sharing and connecting with other people online, with enhanced
support for blog posting, RSS feed integration, photo posting on Yahoo Flickr,
and saving your bookmarks on the Internet for sharing between all the computers
you use.
Instant messaging
Maybe your giftee spends time in the world of instant messaging. If so, get
Gaim, a multi-protocol instant messaging (IM) client, from
http://gaim.sourceforge.net/win32/. Gaim will work with several different
protocols, including AIM, MSN, Yahoo!, Jabber, ICQ and others, so it could
become the only IM client anyone needs. If someone prefers the more traditional
Internet Relay Chat (IRC), consider getting Xchat (http://xchat.org/windows/) or
Kvirc (http://www.kvirc.net/) for them.
Juice Receiver
Has someone on your holiday giving list complained about using iTunes on
Windows? That person may enjoy receiving an open source replacement, Juice
Receiver, available at http://juicereceiver.sourceforge.net/. It has access to
many of the same podcast indexes that iTunes provides, as well as a number of
indexes that it does not.
Bittorrent for file swapping
If you have diehard computer geeks on your list, they most likely share files
with their friends. The standard file- swapping protocol is bittorrent, and you
will find bittorrent clients for them at http://www.bittorrent.com and
http://www.getazureus.com/. Perhaps they have always wanted to create their own
dynamic Web site but have balked at the price of commercial Web server software
for Windows or the Mac. If so, head over to the XAMPP for Windows store at
http://www.apachefriends.org/en/xampp-windows.html. XAMPP for Windows will give
them everything they need to build a robust, full-featured, dynamic Web site,
and it is ready to go out of the box.
CLAMAV
Does anyone on your list need or want to try a different virus scanner? The shop
at http://www.clamwin.com/ has the open source scanner, CLAMAV for Windows,
available for you to give. They'll be getting a GUI-based virus scanner, free
and automatic signature updates, and scheduled virus scanning.
Outlook alternatives
The shops at http://www.mozilla.com/thunderbird/ and
http://shellter.sourceforge.net/evolution/ offer alternatives to the Outlook
e-mail client. The former site has Thunderbird, an easy-to-use product of the
Mozilla project, while the latter provides Evolution, which sports additional
support for calendaring and Microsoft Exchange e-mail servers.
GIMP
Moving on to applications, if there is one on your gift list who does any sort
of work with images, ranging from doctoring photographs to graphics for a Web
site, you owe it to them to stop off at http://www.gimp.org/windows/ and pick up
a copy of the GIMP. Somewhat mischaracterized as the “Poor Man’s Photoshop,” the
GIMP provides a large range of image processing tools and plugins, as well as a
framework for writing custom plugins. With the GIMP, they’ll be able to do just
about anything they'd ever want to do to their pictures.
Audacity
Or maybe you are looking for something for someone who is into sound recording,
someone who perhaps was a Mr. or Miss A/V in high school? They undoubtedly would
really enjoy receiving the Audacity sound recorder, editor, and writer. Look for
it at http://audacity.sourceforge.net/. This powerful program literally will
turn a PC into a full-featured sound recording and production studio. Pair it
with a professional-quality sound card, and it is hard to beat at any price.
DVD-capable media players
Many of those on your gift list also want to be entertained, and maybe they'd
like to watch a DVD while working at their computers. A couple of DVD-capable
media players they would like can be found at http://www.mplayerhq.hu/ — which
offers the MPlayer media player — and http://www.videolan.org/ — which offers
the VideoLAN VLC player.
Office applications
Chances are the computer users on your holiday gift list use traditional
applications such as word processing, spreadsheets, presentations, and the like.
There are several gifts in this category that you cannot go wrong with.
OpenOffice.org is possibly the most popular open source office application suite
available. The latest version, which can be found at http://www.openoffice.org/,
is highly compatible with Microsoft’s Word, Excel, and Powerpoint formats, and
all but the most complex of documents can be shared in both directions.
OpenOffice.org also supports out-of-the-box export to PDF and Flash formats.
OpenOffice.org is certainly not the only option in this arena. The Abiword word
processor from http://www.abisource.com/ is a mature product offering a range of
features. Since it is a lightweight user of computer resources, it runs well on
older hardware that might bog down under OpenOffice.org, Microsoft Office, and
Vista.
GNUmeric, from http://www.gnome.org/projects/gnumeric/, is a nice, mature
spreadsheet program that has all the options and features your giftee wants for
the spreadsheet work. If someone would like something to help create pretty,
Visio-like organizational and flow charts, stop over at
http://dia-installer.sourceforge.net/ and pick them up a copy of DIA, a
diagramming tool.
PDFCreator, Scribus
Do your giftees need to produce PDF documents? If so, they’ll be grateful to
receive PDFCreator, which is available at http://www.pdfforge.org/. PDFCreator
works with any application that prints to the Windows printing system, making it
easy to create not only PDF documents, but PNG, JPG, TIFF, BMP, PCX, PS, and EPS
as well. Or maybe they want to create professional-looking documents like
brochures, booklets, or newsletters. For them, take a trip to
http://www.scribus.net/ and get them Scribus, a desktop publishing system with
many of the same page layout and formatting features you expect to find in the
more expensive commercial systems. Scribus also runs on the Mac.
Web page design
Do you have a Web designer on your giving list? He or she might like to receive
Nvu (pronounced n-view, and found at http://www.nvu.com/), a WYSIWYG Web page
editor that will remind you of Dreamweaver. With its integrated FTP client, it
may be all an e-designer would need. Perhaps they prefer to develop their Web
pages from scratch (or someone on your list might like to get an advanced text
editor). If so, stop off at http://notepad-plus.sourceforge.net/uk/site.htm and
pick them up a copy of Notepad++, which is what Windows’ Notepad might be if it
consumed strong steroids. It will give your recipient syntax highlighting,
auto-completion, WYSIWYG markup, bookmarking, zooming, multi-document viewing,
and much more.
I hope this gives you some ideas about which stores to look at for your holiday
gift-giving needs. And do not forget the most important person on your holiday
gift list: you! If anything here looks interesting as you read about it, make
sure to get yourself a copy. The great thing about all the stores offering FOSS
software gifts is that they always have a great two-for-the-price-of-one sale
going on, the perfect holiday sale.
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as it is kept in context with proper credit given the author. The Editorial
Committee of the Association of Personal Computer User Groups (APCUG), an
international organization of which this group is a member, brings this article
to you.
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