Software

Desktop and laptop computers are great tools for organizing our worlds of things and ideas. The FOSS world of Linux applications offers perhaps more choices for cataloging and categorizing our collections than any other platform. This week's Linux Picks focuses on applications to help you track your...

If anyone had doubts that Richard Stallman dislikes Google's new Chrome OS, he laid them to rest in an interview with the Guardian Tuesday. The Chrome OS will push people into careless computing by forcing them to store their data in the cloud, said Stallman, who's the founder and president of the F...

Project management applications are a popular inroad for winning business converts to the Linux desktop. The software category provides some well-endowed tools to maximize business knowledge and techniques for project planning and progress monitoring. More than just a planning scheduler, project man...

Mind map tools offer users a system to graphically think through complex ideas in a somewhat controlled space on the computer screen. This type of software makes it easy to link related ideas with lines, branches and multiple colors in much the same way you would "think" about a topic with a scratch...

The advantages of open source software really become evident when it comes to using design applications. This category of software is one that not everyone needs -- that is, unless you need software to help you create illustrations for Web design or print publication projects. The Linux OS has a bev...

LINUX PICKS AND PANS

3 FOSS PIM Apps, 3 Personality Quirks

New app choices have a habit of getting in the way of older favorites. Sometimes, a new approach or design can tempt you to give up one approach to solving a computing need by replacing it with another. That is the case with personal information manager apps. Open source software gives us Linux user...

It used to be that only hard-core film buffs carried video recording equipment on vacations. Unless your job required working with film, film editing software was not on most computer users' must-have list of tools. Maybe that is why until recently, few really useful film editing apps existed for th...

LINUX PICKS AND PANS

3 Free Personal Finance Apps You Can Take to the Bank

The Linux platform has several really good financial applications that are more than capable of handling both personal and small-business accounting operations. GnuCash, HomeBank and Skrooge are among the best financial apps I've found for Linux. In terns of features and performance, all three are a...

Google on Wednesday released mod_pagespeed, a module for the Apache HTTP Server that will automatically perform various website speed optimization tasks. This includes 15 or so on-the-fly optimizations. Google claims mod_pagespeed reduces average page load times by up to 50 percent. However, mod_pag...

LINUX PICKS AND PANS

3 Media Conversion Apps That Will Make You a True Believer

One of the lingering concerns potential Linux users have is the worry of leaving behind Windows software they have relied on for playing audio and video files. That used to be a valid concern. But it isn't something to worry about any more. Three relatively new Linux apps make it possible to convert...

The very same corporations that are making small fortunes with Linux servers give short shrift to Linux Desktop, I argued in a recent article, setting off a spirited discussion. Many of you responded with counterarguments, siding -- surprisingly -- with businesses. Perhaps not surprisingly, I contin...

LINUX PICKS AND PANS

Caught on Video: 2 Tools for Linux Screen-Session Recording

Do you ever marvel at those step-by-step how-to product demos of software apps that end-users post on places like YouTube? It is often easy to spot these demo videos shot with cellphone cams or PC eye cams placed over the user's shoulder. But two cool Linux apps give you a the ability to record dire...

LINUX PICKS AND PANS

The Many Ways of Capturing the Moment With Linux

Capturing a screen image is a basic computing task -- so basic, in fact, that almost every computer keyboard has a dedicated key to grab a picture of what the monitor is displaying in the instant the key is pressed. Three Linux apps have proven very useful to me. I use Shutter, Gnome Screenshot and ...

Belgian open source application vendor OpenERP has set up its first overseas business office in San Jose, Calif. Traditionally, the company has worked with reseller partners in the United States and 54 other countries worldwide. After four years, though, OpenERP has begun an aggressive expansion. It...

LINUX PICKS AND PANS

3 Apps That Keep Linux Squeaky Clean

Have you cleaned up your Linux installation lately? On its face, that question might wrongly mark me as a Linux newbie, much like a Linux newcomer asking about antivirus and antimalware software. But I am far from being a newbie to Linux. That said, three program packages designed to clean out your ...

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