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Free, Cheap and Open Source (April 19, 2008)

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There are some great free or cheap resources on the Web that can save you money. I’ve collected a list of some of my top favorites. Some of these are freeware, some are shareware, some are cheap-ware and some are open source.

Open Source and Freeware Defined

Open source software means programs people have written that are available free for you to download and use. These programs come with the programming code (”source code”) and they are licensed so they can be modified by whomever wants to. People all over the world volunteer their time or get paid to write this software. Their reasons vary a lot– some people believe software should be free, some need software that doesn’t exist yet so they pool their resources with colleagues to write it together, and some companies have a business model where they give their software away free but charge money for technical support and consulting. A great example of open source software is the Firefox Web browser. In comparison, freeware usually requires that you or your customers have to look at ads, but this can be worth it if they are not too obtrusive. And cheap-ware, is well, cheap!

There are great new resources I find out about all the time, so keep checking back. Note that open source software ranges from easy to challenging to install, and the quality of their documentation varies a lot.  Here is my list of favorites today (updated 1/2009):

Top Free, Cheap and Open Source Websites and Programs

  1. Highrise (www.highrisehq.com) : Track notes, calls, conversations and tasks with your customers.  There’s a free and a subscription version with more features.
  2. Wordpress (www.wordpress.org) : A lightweight, easy-to-use program for building and managing your website.  It’s what’s called a Content Management System.  See my other article on content management systems for more details.
  3. Freshbooks (www.freshbooks.com) : Create, send, and manage client invoices online for free!
  4. Doodle (www.doodle.ch/main.html) : The easiest way I know to pick a good group meeting time, regardless of what calendar program people are using.
  5. PHPList (www.phplist.com) : An HTML e-mail list manager.  Allows you to send HTML emails to a list of your customers.  This is a bit tricky to set up and maintain, but it works well.
  6. IStockPhoto (www.istockphoto.com) : A great source of high quality stock photos for your website or promotional materials.  Not free, but low-cost.
  7. Buxfer (www.buxfer.com) : A super-easy-to-use personal finance program for tracking your budget and expenses.  Nice charts too.  The only one my significant other and I are able to use together effectively :)
  8. Last.FM (www.last.fm) : Pick a style of music you like, then listen to a custom-tailored Internet radio station with that kind of music on it, just for you!
  9. Open Office (www.openoffice.org) : Great free replacement for Microsoft Office. Many new computers come with Microsoft office. But why buy it if you don’t have to? I’ve got older test machines I don’t have Microsoft Office on and Open Office works great! If you’re on a Mac, try NeoOffice instead (http://www.neooffice.org/neojava/en/index.php).
  10. Google Docs, Calendar, GMail (www.google.com) : Web-based document editing, calendar planning, and mail. Many people have heard of Google’s free tools, but there are some powerful features you might not know about. GMail’s search is the best I’ve seen, and Google Docs will let you collaborate with multiple authors on a document, as well as keeping a history so you can go back to an earlier version of a document. You can read and write Microsoft Word format.
  11. SugarCRM (www.sugarcrm.com/crm) : Full-featured, professional grade Customer Relationship Management software. Keep track of all your customers.
  12. GnuCash (www.gnucash.org) : Comprehensive accounting program for small businesses and individuals.
  13. G.I.M.P (www.gimp.org) : Gnu Image Manipulation Program; a very powerful graphics editing program with many of the same features as Photoshop.
  14. Scribus (www.scribus.net) : Award-winning page layout software for newsletters and publications.
  15. Audacity (audacity.sourceforge.net) : Professional sound recording and editing.
  16. Freemind (http://freemind.sourceforge.net/wiki/index.php/Main_Page) : Mind-mapping tool for visualizing information as an easy-to-understand diagram— great for visualizing your website!

Where Else to Look

There are many more great open source or free software programs and websites available. Here are some good places to read reviews or see some other lists of open source software:

Heard of a great free or open source program or web site? I’d love to hear about it– let me know by clicking the link below.


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