Topic: Freely available and legal software.

[Mr_Tricorder]

I just recently found a very good open source media player called VideoLAN (or VLC) here http://www.videolan.org/.  It seems to work very well and doesn't have any pop-up ads like RealPlayer and doesn't screw with your computer like Windows Media Player and Quicktime do.

[KBF-Kurok]

blender has a new version out Havent messed with it yet but it looks like it does alot more now. http://www.blender.org/cms/Blender_2_40.598.0.html

[Nemesis]

Updated list reorganized by category so that similar programs are listed together.

Antivirus and Antispam
Antivirus software
Antivirus software #2
Lavasoft - antispyware
Mailwasher - anti-spam
Microsoft AntiSpyware (Beta) time limited.
Spybot - antispyware

Audio Tools:
Audacity - recording and editing sounds.
VirtualDub is a video capture/processing utility for Windows

File transfer programs:
Filezilla - FTP download program.  Allows stops and restarts
Getright - FTP download program.  Allows stops and restarts
Star Downloader Free

Games:
WinUAE - Amiga Emulator
Stella - Atari 2600 Emulator
The Battle for Wesnoth is a turn-based strategy game with a fantasy theme.
Freeciv - Game
GNU Chess - Chess Game
Sokoban YASC - Yet Another Sokoban Clone Game
Tux Racer - Game
VegaStrike - game

Graphics Tools:
Blender - 3d modeling
The Gimp Image editor
irfanview - image viewer
Picassa
QCad - 2D CAD system
Videolan

Miscellaneous:
Celestia - The free space simulation
World Wind - from NASA

Networking:
Samba - Networking software

Office Sofware:
AbiWord Word Processor
MySQL - database
The OpenCD - windows software collection
Openoffice. org Office Suite
PDFCreator Sets up as a printer and allows any program that can print create a PDF.
Scribus - Desktop Publishing

Operating Systems:
Edubuntu is a version of the Ubuntu (Linux) operating system suitable for classroom use.
Distrowatch - links to many Linux versions
FreeBSD - Popular Unix variant
FreeDOS MS-DOS compatible OS
GNU - OS and tools.
Knoppix - Version of Linux that runs off the CD/DVD
MenuetOS 64bit OS
NetBSD - Popular Unix variant
OpenBSD - Popular Unix variant
QNX - Realtime OS - membership required for download
Ubuntu - Version of Linux that runs off the CD/DVD

Programming tools and source code:
Free Pascal - programming language
Quake 1-3 Source Code - open sourced by ID Software
Microsoft .NET Framework SDK
Sharp Develop
Visual Studio 2005 Prerelease Software
XBasic - Programming Language

Utilities:
DAEMON Tools - a virtual cd/dvd-rom emulator
Dead-Disk-Doctor
Deepburner CD/DVD Burner software
DOSBox - Use DOS programs.
DVDShrink May or may not be legal in your area
FreeDOS Edlin the essential utility its not DOS if it doesn't have edlin.
GCPUID provided CPU info.
GnuPG - encryption software
Hard Disk and Partition Imaging and Backup Software
Memtest86 - A Stand-alone Memory Diagnostic
Notepad 2 Notepad replacement
Nullsoft Scriptable Install System
7-Zip Winzip replacement
SISoft benchmarking utility
The Ultimate Boot CD
The Ultimate Windows Boot CD You need an installed XP to make this one.
Ventrilo - Voice over IP (VoIP) group communications software.

Web Tools:
Abyss - web server
AOLServer -
Apache - web server
eAccelerator - PHP accelerator
Firefox web browser
NVU Web authoring
Opera Web Browser
PHP - web scripting language
Roxen Webserver
Sambar Serve
Seamonkey web browser suite Formerly Mozilla.
Simple Machines Forum software
Thunderbird E-Mail program
xitami - webserver
Zend Optimizer - PHP accelerator
Zonealarm firewall Please note it has recently been revealed that Zonealarm calls home.  Details are still being disclosed.  Use at your own risk.

Websites with collections of software
The 46 Best-ever Freeware Utilities
CleanSoftware - source of further software
O'Reilly lists of stable free software
Playboy mirrors
Pricelessware - source of further software
Snapfiles collection
Software driver collection

Contributors to the list:In Alphabetical order
Age, Bonk, Iconoclast::toasty0, Javora, KBF-Kurok, MrCue, Pestalence_XC, Redshift the Kook

Before including the link here I verified it as accurate as of this time.  Any link whose software is not freely available (at this time) I removed, limited time free trials are not included on this list.  Free for home or academic use programs I did include.  Any whose link was invalid and an update not easily found I also did not include. 

If there are any errors or ommisions not covered by my comments above feel free to either post a correction/update here or PM it to me and I will edit it in. 

[Brush Wolf]

I use Zonealarm myself and when you install or update it does ask if it can send non-personal information back to them. You do have the option of not doing this so I see no problem with that.

[Nemesis]

I use Zonealarm myself and when you install or update it does ask if it can send non-personal information back to them. You do have the option of not doing this so I see no problem with that.

Link to full article

Now, the handsomely-named Mr Cringely has revealed that a colleague of his at Infoworld noticed that Zone Alarm 6.0 was sneakily sending off data to four different servers. Cringely says that Zone Labs (acquired by Checkpoint in March of 2004) at first denied the activity for a couple of months before deciding the software had a "bug" even though, as he points out, "the instructions to contact the servers were set out in the program’s XML code."

The company says it will fix the "bug" soon. In the meantime you can work around it by adding:
# Block access to ZoneLabs Server
127.0.0.1 zonelabs.com
to your Windows host file.

The "bug" seems to be present in the retail version of Zone Alarm, so there’s no telling what the freebie gets up to. We called Checkpoint here in Israel to find out, but were referred to a US spokeszoner. Trouble is they’ll all be in bed there on this sunny

Looks like it does it regardless of your settings.

[Brush Wolf]

Interesting little article. The real question to me is it a bug/bad programing or is it something required by Israeli security? If it is the second do you find another firewall or accept it as part of the price for doing business with an Israeli company? There seem to be decisions to be made.

[Nemesis]

Interesting little article. The real question to me is it a bug/bad programing or is it something required by Israeli security? If it is the second do you find another firewall or accept it as part of the price for doing business with an Israeli company? There seem to be decisions to be made.

Hardware Firewall in my router.  Eventually I will be trying to put Linux on my laptop and then when using the laptops wireless ability I will use the Linux firewall.

[E_Look]

Gents, I just d/l'd and installed MS Antispyware.  I did not activate their "Security Agents" nor join their "Spyware Network", because I don't fully understand exactly all that they do yet.

Can any of you enlighten me?  Were those good choices or way too conservative?

[Bonk]

Good job on the updated list Nemesis!    (suggestion: you might want to edit the first post of the thread with it for new members and guests to save them going through the whole thread)

E_Look, I enable the security agents (a good feature - acts like an on-demand virus scanner) but do not particpate in SpyNet myself.

Another addition for the list: http://www.vmware.com/products/player/  <--- I thoroughly approve. 

(I stopped using ZoneAlarm about 5 years ago... don't much trust it anymore)

[Javora]

Another idea would be to start another thread and put the list there.  Once the new thread is created, lock the thread down so it is read only.  Then put in the body of the locked thread that suggestions for additions to the locked thread can be made here in this thread.

This would keep the list that you maintain clean while saving people the trouble of searching this whole thread.  Hope this helps.

[Nemesis]

Another idea would be to start another thread and put the list there.  Once the new thread is created, lock the thread down so it is read only.  Then put in the body of the locked thread that suggestions for additions to the locked thread can be made here in this thread.

This would keep the list that you maintain clean while saving people the trouble of searching this whole thread.  Hope this helps.

I think that this is a good idea.  Unless there are some strong objections made first (or an even better idea) I will set it up that way this weekend.

Thanks Javora.

[Midnight Tech]

Nemesis, I've got one for ya...Wisdomsoft's Screenhunter. It's available at http://www.wisdom-soft.com/products/screenhunter_free.htm. There are a couple of nonfree versions but the base version has served me quite well.

[Bonk]

Never could figure out the need for a screen capture program. "Ctrl-PrintScrn" has always worked fine for me. I'm always suspicious of something that is unnecessary. 

[Nemesis]

Javora's suggestion has now been implemented.  +1 for the idea.

[Bonk]

Just remembered GLtron, its a fun toy reminiscent of the old arcade game:

http://www.gltron.org/

[Mr_Tricorder]

Just remembered GLtron, its a fun toy reminiscent of the old arcade game:

http://www.gltron.org/

I've played this one on Linux before.  It's pretty good.

[Javora]

Javora's suggestion has now been implemented.  +1 for the idea.

Just glad I could help, the new thread looks great.  If I may though, I would keep this thread stickied as well.  If nothing else to make it easier for you to keep track of new entries so this thread doesn't get lost with all the other new threads and posts.

[The Postman]

http://www.cpuid.org/cpuz.php

CPUZ is a CPU, motherboard, ram identification and performance utility.  useful for stock and OC'ed systems

[The Postman]

http://www.bootdisk.com/

should be self explanatory

[Nemesis]

Just glad I could help, the new thread looks great.  If I may though, I would keep this thread stickied as well.  If nothing else to make it easier for you to keep track of new entries so this thread doesn't get lost with all the other new threads and posts.

I don't want to have too many stickies so I will try it this way first.  If it doesn't work out it can easily be found and restickied at a later date.