We have seen many Open Source or Freeware Applications competing with Paid apps of course in terms of qualities. It's not true that all free apps are of no use. There are many free apps that are very powerful and as worthy as to use them daily.
Here I am listing a few such free apps. You might be knowing many of them (but everyone is not as clever as you).
NotePad++
NotePad++ is a free and open source text editor.
If you feel notepad is too limited, then NotePad++ is what you need.
This small program can be opened as fast as your good old NotePad, but
with tons of extra features.
Multi-tab, Syntax Highlighting, and support for Regular Expression
Search/Replace are three nice feature included in this program.
Web site: http://notepad-plus-plus.org.
Web site: http://notepad-plus-plus.org.
7-Zip
7-Zip is a free and open source file compression utility. The user interface is little bit outdated, but it is one of the best alternative to Winzip. Most common compression file formats are supported by this program and as a bonus this program also comes with it's own file format, 7Z. 7Z file format is more superior than standard zip file format and it's efficiency can be compared with the more popular and commercial RAR file format.
Web site: http://www.7-zip.org.
Gimp
Gimp is a free and open source cross-platform image manipulation program. It is designed with Linux in mind, hence the user interface might looks strange in Windows world. Also it still use multiple windowing system that look rather odd for today standard. Still with all of it's oddness, Gimp is the best free alternative for Adobe Photo shop. From simple photo enhancement to complex digital retouching technique can be done in Gimp.
Web site: http://www.gimp.org.
VLC Media Player
VLC Media Player is a free and open source cross-platform multimedia player.
Ability to play a large number of multimedia file formats is one of the most praised feature of VCL Media Player.
MPEG-2, H.264, DivX, MPEG-4, WebM, and WMV are just a small list of file formats supported by VLC Media Player.
Recently major update of VLC Media Player, v2.0, was announced. The VLC Media Player 2.0 "Twoflower" brings a quite long list of improvements and new features. Highlighted improvements include faster decoding on multi-core, GPU, and mobile hardware and support for HD and 10bits. Click here to get complete list of VLC Media Player 2.0 new features and improvements.
Web site: http://www.videolan.org/vlc.
Recently major update of VLC Media Player, v2.0, was announced. The VLC Media Player 2.0 "Twoflower" brings a quite long list of improvements and new features. Highlighted improvements include faster decoding on multi-core, GPU, and mobile hardware and support for HD and 10bits. Click here to get complete list of VLC Media Player 2.0 new features and improvements.
Web site: http://www.videolan.org/vlc.
FileZilla Client
Filezilla client is a free and open source cross-platform FTP client. It is one of the best FTP client you can find today, even it can easily give commercial FTP client a run for it's money. Simple user interface and support for large number of protocols are what make the program so great.
Web site: http://filezilla-project.org.
Filezilla client is a free and open source cross-platform FTP client. It is one of the best FTP client you can find today, even it can easily give commercial FTP client a run for it's money. Simple user interface and support for large number of protocols are what make the program so great.
Web site: http://filezilla-project.org.
Free Download Manager (FDM)
Free Download manager (FDM) is a free and open source download accelerator.
Just like any other download accelerator program, FDM main features are to increase download speed and resume broken downloads.
But this application grows to be more complex over time, many new feature added in each new release.
Two new nice features added in the latest version are BitTorrent support and Flash video download.
Web site: http://www.freedownloadmanager.org.
Web site: http://www.freedownloadmanager.org.
VirtualBox
VirtualBox is a free and open source cross-platform virtual machine.
It is the best free alternative to commercial virtual machine, such as
VMWare and Parallel.
Unlike it's commercial competitors that have limited host support to
Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux, VirtualBox running on all major operating
systems.
VirtualBox is also known to have a far better 3D support on Linux and
BSD.
Unfortunately DirectX support is still in experimental stage, hence
playing 3D game on Windows guest won't be as good as on VMWare.
Web site: https://www.virtualbox.org
Microsoft Security Essentials
Microsoft Security Essentials is a free anti-virus program. This application is really what an anti-virus program should be: comes with simple user interface, fast file scanning, do not slow down computer, frequently updated virus and mall-ware database, and the best of all it's cost nothing.
Web site: http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows/products/security-essentials.
LibreOffice
LibreOffice is a free and open source cross-platform office suit. Despite it's outdated user interface, LibreOffice is a very capable replacement for Microsoft Office. All you can do in Microsoft Office can be done easily in LibreOffice. To maintain compatibility, LibreOffice can open and save document in Microsoft office file format. For more greater comparability, document created with Libre Office can also be exported to PDF.
LibreOffice currently offers six feature-rich applications for all your document production and data processing needs: Writer (word processor), Calc (spreadsheet), Impress (multimedia presentations), Draw (graphics and diagrams), Math (mathematical equations) and Base (desktop database management).
Web site: http://www.libreoffice.org.
Web site: https://www.virtualbox.org
Microsoft Security Essentials
Microsoft Security Essentials is a free anti-virus program. This application is really what an anti-virus program should be: comes with simple user interface, fast file scanning, do not slow down computer, frequently updated virus and mall-ware database, and the best of all it's cost nothing.
Web site: http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows/products/security-essentials.
LibreOffice
LibreOffice is a free and open source cross-platform office suit. Despite it's outdated user interface, LibreOffice is a very capable replacement for Microsoft Office. All you can do in Microsoft Office can be done easily in LibreOffice. To maintain compatibility, LibreOffice can open and save document in Microsoft office file format. For more greater comparability, document created with Libre Office can also be exported to PDF.
LibreOffice currently offers six feature-rich applications for all your document production and data processing needs: Writer (word processor), Calc (spreadsheet), Impress (multimedia presentations), Draw (graphics and diagrams), Math (mathematical equations) and Base (desktop database management).
Web site: http://www.libreoffice.org.