Comments on: 21 Awesome (But Lesser-Known) Open-Source Applications for Windows

By: Brian Lacy

Brian Lacy — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 20:22:20 +0000

WinMerge!

This is a great list indeed; I’m familiar with about half of the apps mentioned. I need to put in a solid plug for WinMerge though. Finding that tool was like a revelation. I use it constantly, especially for web development purposes; i.e. comparing conflicted versions in our SVN repository, or comparing similar source files from different servers. It’s a very solid, user-friendly app, and you can find a plugin for comparing Word files.

By: kathy025

kathy025 — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 17:10:02 +0000

Thank you for this! You write the awesomest articles!

By: robb

robb — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 20:36:47 +0000

pdfcreator and notepad++ are superbly simple apps.
recommended !!

By: spoonfed

spoonfed — Sat, 20 Jun 2009 09:15:23 +0000

As for games be sure to check out Warzone 2100 at http://wz2100.net/ The old retail game from Pumpkin Studios was made open source and is regularly updated. It’s an epic scale C&C style game.

By: Bobo

Bobo — Sun, 17 May 2009 15:56:31 +0000

Quite like Notepad++, but (and especially for users who don’t need FTP integration or macro support) prefer Metapad. The executable is smaller than Window’s own Notepad with more robust text handling. Faster launching than Notepad++, too, though not quite as powerful.

As an alternative to VirtuaWin, try Dexpot. Supports hotkeys, multiple ui methods to access workspaces, and additional features like windowshading (ala pre-OSX Mac), minimize any window to the tray, and a feature similar to Mac OSX’s Expose for managing app windows.

By: Revrend Shonuf

Revrend Shonuf — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 16:11:47 +0000

Just came across the site, and nice list and comments. Being an old *NIX/cmdline geek, I wanted to through out GVIM/Cream as a nice editor. Its nice for us who came up using VI for a long time. And the in tab Diff functionality is a nice to have.

By: NDH

NDH — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 03:52:00 +0000

I would *strongly* recommend people look at VirtuaWin (mentioned above, with a link) or another virtual desktop program (make sure it has hotkeys for desktop switching). Unless you only run one program at a time, you will be glad you checked this out. Unix/Linux has had this for literally decades and recently Mac finally caught on, but for some reason this hasn’t made it’s way to Windows yet. Whenever I use Windows this is the very first thing I install.

By: Redrik

Redrik — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 09:47:15 +0000

Now I’m feeling very old. I’ve used all in the list except the games and several I still use frequently. It’s impossible to know about all of the huge number of freeware and open source programs and often I stumble across things with inadequate up front information to light up my interest.
I’ve found Gizmo’s Freeware (http://www.techsupportalert.com/) very useful and it’s well worth signing up to get emails about new stuff. Sometimes I Google what I want but the results are dodgy. A better option is to go to freeware sites to search but some are better than others.
A list like this one is interesting but we all have our opinions on everything so lists are not always as useful as this one. It’s a good effort because it agrees with my own decisions. Nuff sed!

By: Paul

Paul — Sun, 15 Mar 2009 00:08:56 +0000

Nice list and nice feedback. Actually, I was searching for Something_Like VirtuaWin, and found it thanks to the feedback here. And, I’m tempted to put together a more comprehensive list of open source software available for Windows, and publish it somewhere. @ The Peoples Cube – “free” and “open source” are not synonymous. Open source means you can use it as you wish. Free means in MOST CASES that you don’t have to pay to use it as a private individual, or there are strings attached somehow. (data miners, anyone?) Open source has no strings attached.

By: Herny

Herny — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 01:31:30 +0000

I would like to recommend Daphne as a task manager alternative. Has a lot of features and much more information about process and windows. Includes a virtual desktop feature.