Open Source & Free

We use a large variety of Open Source (free!) software in the lab and continually look for new titles to suit our needs and the needs of our students. Below you'll find links to some of the favorites here.

Google Docs: Word Processing, Spreadsheets and Presentations online. Built in collabroation (sharing) and publishign features too. Google announced on March 31st 2008 that they will incorporate 'offline' features too.

- Photoshop Express! Online Photoshop.

- Jott: Call a service and Jott transcribes your message (voice to text) to your email, others in your address book and even groups. Thanks to Brian Gawlik!

Google Apps: We've featured the evolution of this service (Gmail for Domains, Google for Domains and now Google Apps) here before. Amazing tools hoted by Google under your domain name... all free. Featured in 'Proposals' too.

- Sprout: "Sprout is a quick and easy way for beginner and pro users to create living content including, websites, banners, videos, music, photos, RSS feeds, calendars and more." Quite cool!

Categories: You'll get the idea.

- A centralized open source software listing for macs (not all, but many great titles here). Here's another that has more titles as well.

- SubEthaEdit: Edit live with peers and use it to create code. The new verison cost, the old verison is free!

- A free version of the most powerful animation software (Maya Personal Learning Edition) in the world.

- A free music theory tutorial - one of many - but a pretty decent one.
- Free online banner / title effect generator. Easy way to make signs in quick order. Options for buttons, patterns, fonts, etc. One of many, but this engine generates decent quality.

Office Suites: Over 62 million (and counting) have downloaded Open Office.

- Open Office: Word processor, spreadsheet, etc with much of the same functionality of Microsoft Office.
- Nearly free, but worth a serious look: Star Office by Sun Microsystems.

- ZOHO: Create documents, wikis, presentations... most everything online. Free. Thanks Galen! - Star Office vs Microsoft Office. A comprehensive review by eWeek

- Open Workbench Project Management Software ! A great alternative to Microsoft Project.

- Free web editor: NVU (Very similar to FrontPage).

- Free classic books online. More titles than you'd think. Also available in a format for PDAs (Palmreader).
- Sourceforge: Battled tested software on the open source market. No kidding.

- Online 'photoshop' style editing at Fauxto
- Gimp: 80% of the functionality of Photoshop at no charge (PC and Mac).
- Paint.Net: Another Photoshop clone with some great functionality (PC Only). NEW !

- Audacity: Free sound editing software.
- Remember KidPix ? Try this one: TuxPaint.
- iPodder

Google: Powerful Ideas. Powerful Tools. Free Stuff.

Google Docs: Word Processing, Spreadsheets and Presentations online. Built in collabroation (sharing) and publishign features too. Google announced on March 31st 2008 that they will incorporate 'offline' features too.

- Got code ? Search open source programming code through this Google engine. NEW !

- 3D Modeling for free: Sketchup.
Includes a 'Warehouse' of pre-existing models. Snaps with Google Earth.

- Here's a list of all the Google innovations.