The Sanctuary
Technology => Technophiliacs & Technophiles => Topic started by: Arnox on August 26, 2014, 08:29:39 pm
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Decided to post a large list of all the programs I find really helpful in my day to day use of the compooter. Share your own or share something even better here if you know it.
1. 7-Zip
Really great file archiver. Can read, create, and edit a massive load of formats from .iso to .rar. My only complaint with it actually is that you can't open images in it. You gotta extract them first.
2. Audacity
A program for recording and editing all sound files. If there's problems with a certain music/sound file or I just want to edit it, I use this. Also use it as a last resort to get songs playing from the internet onto my computer by recording what the speakers are playing. Make sure you get the LAME encoder to work with MP3 files though.
3. Bittorrent
A program for downloading torrents. Not much that needs to be said here.
4. Daemon Tools Lite
Program for mounting and running .iso's and other disc images. If you're any sort of game pirate at all, you're gonna need something like this.
5. Search Everything
I have a massive folder of awesome and funny pictures but the problem is, when you want to find one of them, Windows Search just blows. This simple but powerful search program fixes that. However, to be fair, for search needs besides the images I have, Windows Search does a decent enough job so this may not be for everyone.
6. Foxit Reader
For reading PDF's. Actually I had a good reason for using this over Adobe's but I can't remember exactly why anymore. Sorry, I know that's really unhelpful. But anyway, it's pretty darn solid and I highly recommend it all the same if you're looking for a replacement for Adobe's.
7. Google Chrome
I've tried Firefox for a while but a bunch of small things about it just really didn't go well with me. I think the final thing that pushed me in favor of Chrome though was the omnibox. (Chrome's address bar) Simply type your search terms and google will immediately plug it into its search engine and give you the results. Very handy. Firefox didn't have a plugin that could do this last time I looked so I switched in the end.
8. HexChat
IRC client. I used to use XChat until I realized that you had to pay for that nonsense and then promptly switched over to this which is pretty much the same program except free. Either way, very nice IRC client.
9. LibreOffice
It was a toss up between this and OpenOffice. In the end, I just went with LibreOffice though. If anyone knows a significant advantage that OpenOffice has over LibreOffice, I'd love to know.
10. Paint.NET
It's basically MS Paint turned up to 11. It's simple enough to where new users can quickly understand it, but flexible enough to where it can scale according to your needs. It's very moddable too and there's literally hundreds of useful plugins people have made for it. If you do anything with images at all though, I'd definitely recommend this.
11. VLC Media Player
It's deceptively simple looking, but underneath, it's pretty darn powerful. Not very strong in terms of Library support or anything like that but it can play just about any media format you can throw at it. Although I must say, Windows Media Player has definitely gotten a lot better over the ages so I can safely recommend that as well if you don't care too much about functionality.
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Google is an evil unholy bastard spawn of the Ford Foundation, CIA, and NSA. I will cry with pure joy and happiness the day they burn in hell.
Gimp
Like paint but with a lot more features
Firefox
It'd not Google and I use duckduckgo for searches, not Google
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Gimp
Like paint but with a lot more features
It's overly complex though for the average user IMAO. However, having said that, if you need something like Photoshop, I would recommend it.
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I would replace Chrome with Comodo web browser. Its everything chrome has but stripped of google so its super secure. Its beautiful and works with plugins for chrome as well.
Link:
http://www.comodo.com/home/browsers-toolbars/browser.php
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I would replace Chrome with Comodo web browser. Its everything chrome has but stripped of google so its super secure. Its beautiful and works with plugins for chrome as well.
Link:
http://www.comodo.com/home/browsers-toolbars/browser.php
I actually like Comodo's portable virus scanner too on the occasions that I need it to clean up someone elses computer so it may very well be worth a look.
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Not sure if all these are free as in freedom, but:
Thunderbird - Like outlook.
Synergy - Sharing mouse and keyboard.
Filezilla - FTP and SSH file transfers
Edit: Chromium is also stripped of google bs as well.
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Adblock.
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What's a good, free app to assist with referencing?
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javascript
ghostery
trackmenot
https everywhere
cryptocat
better privacy
cookie manager
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So many good programs listed here.. I'll personally vouch for Comodo, and just picked up ghostery and trackmenot just for Mozilla.. and Privdog.. All seem to be worthy thus far. Haven't found anything satisfying.. some quick little upgrades in security and privacy if your not doing anything at all..
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I prefer Microtorrent over Bittorrent (even though they are from the same company) since Bit torrent was banned on the PT I use, and a few others.
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Vouched for by prism-break.org (some real gems I didn't know about):
Adblock Edge - Automatically blocks all advertisements unlike adblock plus
I've heard not good things about ghostery. The disconnect addon I believe accomplishes the same thing (possibely not as many trackers idk).
Disconnect search addon cause duck duck go sucks, but so does giving google your info.
And the self destructing cookies addon.
Also i2p is interesting. It is like tor in some ways, but you have to participate in the network (passing along encrypted data) and they encourage torrenting - would be useful for people in dorms.
Stellarium - for looking at the stars. Especially fun if your fucked up. Speed up the time and just watch the sky 'above you' change as thousands of years pass.
Pidgin for all instant messaging needs.
Sublime text editor
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javascript
ghostery
trackmenot
https everywhere
cryptocat
better privacy
cookie manager
These are all plugins, guys. Not programs.
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Ccleaner - cleans out junk files and other bullshit as well as the registry cleaner. I've got nothing but good things to say about this program.
Defraggler - disk defrag. Has an option to replace Windows defragmenter. Works great.
Easus Partition Magic - partition management. Unlike the previous programs, this isn't freeware, so torrent it.
Acronis True Image - disk backup and cloning. Same as Easus. You'll have to use a cracked version.
HTC Home - desktop weather widget. Dat forecast.
There's more but I'm too tired to list them.
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Puran File Recovery - If you've deleted something, and haven't filled up disc space, then there's a good chance you can recover it. I've personally used this on many times.. for many different things. You can use it on anything you can plug into a computer.. cell phone sd cards (find those deleted images/videos), random found usbs (you'd be surprised), and possibly may be able to recover stuff deleted off non-apple smart phones in general.. already tried and failed on that one, but I do know there is a program out there for that brand specifically.
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Eclipse - A nice IDE with few bugs that works well for JAVA and C++
Burpe Suite - An easy to lean web application security testing program
Blender - An easy to learn 3D modeling program
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I used Eclipse for a little while. The vim emulator was really solid, the best I've seen in an IDE (I think it was actually running a vim subprocess on replaying buffer edits or something). That, however, is as much as I can say for it. I never got why people like a file browser bolted onto their editor when you only use it every now and then. CtrlP style navigation is nicer anyway and it doesn't take up a chunk of your screen 24/7. It takes ages for eclipse to start, I never found a look I really enjoyed. And I guess fundamentally with IDEs, I never got the appeal of incorporating the build process to your editor. Like the strong point of Java is supposed to be that it has all this great static analysis tooling, you shouldn't be rebuilding a project every 30 seconds so it shouldn't be a significant time saver. What's left? IDK, to each their own I guess.
Aaaannyway, one of my favorite pieces of software I have installed in the standard last.fm scrobbler. I know last.fm was kind of like a early highschool thing for a lot of people but I just opened an account a year or two ago and it's fun keeping an eye on your musical habits and the reccomendation engine is pretty good as that sort of thing goes. The normal client is just an attractive little piece of software though, aesthetically and in the sense that it's just dead simple and does a few things well.
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The Linux kernel - needs no explanation.
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I used Eclipse for a little while. The vim emulator was really solid, the best I've seen in an IDE (I think it was actually running a vim subprocess on replaying buffer edits or something). That, however, is as much as I can say for it. I never got why people like a file browser bolted onto their editor when you only use it every now and then. CtrlP style navigation is nicer anyway and it doesn't take up a chunk of your screen 24/7. It takes ages for eclipse to start, I never found a look I really enjoyed. And I guess fundamentally with IDEs, I never got the appeal of incorporating the build process to your editor. Like the strong point of Java is supposed to be that it has all this great static analysis tooling, you shouldn't be rebuilding a project every 30 seconds so it shouldn't be a significant time saver. What's left? IDK, to each their own I guess.
I don't like IDEs but the sublime text editor is awesome. I like having the file browser in the side, that plus tabs make it really easy to jump between files. And you can split the editor into rows or columns or a grid for viewing multiple files. The file browser and tabs hardly take up any space, I care more about vertical space.
I never really tried to learn vim or emacs so maybe I'd be singing a different tune.
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I used sublime for a long time and left it with a still favorable impression. The built in CtrlP file navigation was great, and I used the tabs/window-split a lot too. People make fun of the minimap over on the right and I think it's a little justified, I rarely used it, but I still think it was a nice piece of eyecandy and I'd install it if it existed for vim.
The thing that drove me away from sublime is the thing that drives me away from everything: the vim keybinds were crappy. You needed an extension to even get exmode and everything was subtly off. A lot of trickier op/movement combos would be off by a character relative to vim, some text objects were broken, and sublime never seemed to know what it was going to do at the end of a line. ActualVim looked promising but development seems to have stalled and it's not in a usable state as it stands.
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Good to see you posting Rustyshackleford.
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For installing and keeping most of that stuff up to date, use ninite.com . You check off the boxes for all the programs you want, and it downloads a customized installer script. The installer will include the most up to date version, fully clean, nothing extra (like browser extensions, search agents or any other bullshit). Every couple weeks, rerun the installer. Anything that's been updated will be downloaded and reinstalled.
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Good to see you posting Rustyshackleford.
Thanks man, you too. I've contemplated not coming back or going elsewhere, but this is the best community. I always end up back here when I get sick of the other bullshit.
For installing and keeping most of that stuff up to date, use ninite.com . You check off the boxes for all the programs you want, and it downloads a customized installer script. The installer will include the most up to date version, fully clean, nothing extra (like browser extensions, search agents or any other bullshit). Every couple weeks, rerun the installer. Anything that's been updated will be downloaded and reinstalled.
No shit, that's cool. It's like the linux repositories for windows. It is imo one of the bigger problems with windows is the free for all way of installing and updating software. They should really get a universal software center. Apple already has one I think?
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No shit, that's cool. It's like the linux repositories for windows. It is imo one of the bigger problems with windows is the free for all way of installing and updating software. They should really get a universal software center. Apple already has one I think?
Apple has an app store but I don't think anyone really likes it because, well, it's a store and 90% of stuff either has to be bought or is a demo of something you need to buy. For dev tools and stuff there are two package managers, macports and homebrew, which are both nice proper package managers but they don't really interact with the "apps" world. Nowadays most things ship as .app files which is just a self contained directory structure with a manifest file for the OS. I actually kind of like it, installation is simple, uninstalling is clean, configs live in the app. It does complicate upgrading a bit and it loses the nice config/binary separation you see in linux, but for a consumer desktop OS I think it's a justifiable move.