The Freeware and Open Source Software Thread

[drone]

Sysinternals System Tools
Homepage
OS: Win
Open Source: Some
Description: The Sysinternals web site provides you with advanced utilities, technical information, and source code related to Windows NT/2000/XP/2K3 and Windows 9x, Windows Me internals that you won't find anywhere else.
Check the site out, there're 50+ tools for all purposes.
Courtesy of R'as al Ghul

Unfortunately, Microsoft has just bought Winternals and Sysinternals.
http://www.winternals.com/Faq.aspx
http://www.sysinternals.com/blog/200...microsoft.html

My advice to everyone would be to download as many of these tools as you can now, there is no telling how long they will remain online. Mark says the Sysinternals site will remain around "for a while". Better get while the getting is good though. I will probably be downloading everything I can get my hands on and burning a CD with all the utils. The only good that can come out of this is that Vista benefits from Mark and Bryce's experience...

[R'as al Ghul]

Bad news indeed.
I'll have to check and see if my suite is complete.
I do not intend to jump on the vista wagon on release day, instead i'll be running XP until vista is mandatory for any directx version that's mandatory for any Total War version.

[tibilicus]

Rootkit revealer, process explorer and flinemon. Priceless from Sysinternals .

[drone]

GParted
Homepage
Open Source: Yes
OS: runs under Linux, handles filesystems ext2/3, FAT16/32, hfs, jfs, NTFS, reiserfs, ufs, xfs
Description:

GParted is the Gnome Partition Editor application.

A hard disk is usually subdivided into one or more partitions. These partitions are normally not re-sizable (making one larger and the adjacent one smaller) The purpose of GParted is to allow the individual to take a hard disk and change the partition organization therein, while preserving the partition contents.

GParted is an industrial-strength package for creating, destroying, resizing, moving, checking and copying partitions, and the filesystems on them. This is useful for creating space for new operating systems, reorganizing disk usage, copying data residing on hard disks and mirroring one partition with another (disk imaging).

This tool can be downloaded as an ISO image and burned onto a bootable Linux CD for partition management. It's essentially a open source clone of Partition Magic, with a myriad of filesystems supported. Haven't tried it yet, so I'm not quite ready to sing it's praises, but I've got a shortage on my C: drive right now, and giving $70 to Symantec just to move over 5 GB from my D: drive does not sit very well with me. Anyone else use this tool yet?

[Lemur]

I just want to give a little shout-out to this thread. I hosed my Windows install, and thanks to the links on the first page, I was able to get all of my apps back in record time. God bless us all, and Tiny Tim, too!

[Alexander the Pretty Good]

GParted is add'd.

Thanks Lemur. Glad to hear you got your PC back up and running quick-like.

[Evil_Maniac From Mars]

Does anyone know how I can get my hands on the Creative MediaSource program?

[Zalmoxis]

Hey, how do you turn images into JPG images?

[KukriKhan]

Under System Utilities:

SequoiaView
Homepage
OS: Win
Open Source: Yes
Description: Ever wondered why your hard disk is full? Or what directory is taking up most of the space? When using conventional disk browsing tools, such as Windows Explorer, these questions may be hard to answer. With SequoiaView however, they can be answered almost immediately. SequoiaView uses a visualization technique called cushion treemaps to provide you with a single picture of the entire contents of your hard drive. You can use it to locate those large files that you haven't accessed in one year, or to quickly locate the largest picture files on your drive.

[Alexander the Pretty Good]

I'll get to updating this soonish. School is almost over...

[DukeofSerbia]

IsoBuster

Category: CD/DVD
Homepage: http://www.isobuster.com
OS: MS Win 9x/Me/NT/2000/XP/Vista
Open Source: ?
Description: If you have damaged CD or/and DVD this is program for you. IsoBuster is probably the best program for saving your data from damaged DVDs and CDs. It read almost every standard of writing and types of CDs and DVDs.

Windows Live Messenger

Category: Instant Messaging Clients
Homepage: http://get.live.com/messenger/overview
OS: MS Windows
Open Source: No
Description: New version of Windows’ integrated Windows Messenger. Live has new look (maybe too fancy) and many new options like off line sending of messages and much better handling with contacts. What really annoy is high level of advertise provided by MS.

[DukeofSerbia]

CPU-Z

Category: System Utilities
Homepage: http://www.cpuid.com/cpuz.php
OS: MS Windows
Open Source: No
Description: CPU-Z is a freeware that gathers information on some of the main devices of your system: CPU (Name and number, Core stepping and process, Package, Core voltage, Internal and external clocks, clock multiplier, Supported instructions sets, Cache information), Mainboard (Vendor, model and revision, BIOS model and date, Chipset (northbridge and southbridge) and sensor, Graphic interface), Memory (Frequency and timings, Module(s) specification using SPD (Serial Presence Detect) : vendor, serial number, timings table) and System (Windows and DirectX version). Must have program for identification.

Riva Tuner

Category: System Utilities
Homepage: http://www.guru3d.com/index.php?page=rivatuner&menu=8
OS: MS Windows 2000/XP/XP x64
Open Source: No
Description: Rivatuner is one of the (if not the) best Tweak Utilities available for NVIDIA GeForce and ATI Radeon based videocards. RivaTuner is a complete powerful tweaking environment, providing you everything you may need to tune NVIDIA GPU based display adapters. The widest driver-level Direct3D / OpenGL and system tuning options, flexible profiling system allowing to make custom settings on per-application basis, both driver-level and low-level hardware access modes, unique diagnostic and realtime hardware monitoring features and exclusive power user oriented tools like built-in registry editor and patch script engine make RivaTuner's feature set absolutely unmatched. RivaTuner supports all NVIDIA display adapters starting from Riva TNT family up to the latest GeForce 8 series and widest range of NVIDIA drivers starting from the oldest Detonator 2.08 up to the newest ForceWare drivers family.

[Alexander the Pretty Good]

Updated! Even though I hate to add a Windows product, DukeOfSerbia...

Fixed: a few of broken/inefficient links, some of the opening text
Added: the latest entries, as well as an entry counter - we're almost at 100!

[Xiahou]

Here's a simple, fun, free FPS game. It also has some really nice graphics for being open sourced.

Alien Arena
Homepage
OS:Windows, Linux, Mac(?)
Open Source:Yes!
Description:From the game's website:

Do you like fast paced deathmatch? How about rich, colorful, arcadelike atmospheres? How about...retro Sci Fi? Then you're going to love what Alien Arena 2007 has in store for you! This game combines some of the very best aspects of such games as Quake III and Unreal Tournament and wraps them up with a retro alien theme, while adding tons of original ideas to make the game quite unique.

Single player just involves you and bots in various deathmatches. But the game also supports online multiplay which adds deathball, CTF, and other team matches in addition to the deathmatch free-for-alls. Good, mindless fun.

If anyone has the interest/ability to run a server, this could be a fun one for orgahs.

[TosaInu]

http://www.blackviper.com/index.html

Helps to configure your XP install.

[sapi]

bblean
http://bb4win.sourceforge.net/bblean/
OS: Win, Unix (link to win version)
Open source: afaik
Description: Shell replacement. Lightweight and very customisable. Been using it for a few months and love it

[TosaInu]

Speedfan http://www.majorgeeks.com/download337.html

This is a freeware tool that allows to monitor several temperatures, but more importantly to reduce the speed of CPU, PSU and case fans. My standard CPU fan was running at ~2600 RPM and made a lot of noise. Reduced it to 75%-1800RPM (make sure that the temperature is still in the safe zone). It's running at the same idle temperature and makes much less noise, will run Prime95 to test load.

Edit: 50-52% load, temperature is fine, fanspeed increased to 2140 (temperature controlled).

[edyzmedieval]

Thank you Tosa. Much appreciated for that link.

[Xiahou]

Speedfan http://www.majorgeeks.com/download337.html

This is a freeware tool that allows to monitor several temperatures, but more importantly to reduce the speed of CPU, PSU and case fans. My standard CPU fan was running at ~2600 RPM and made a lot of noise. Reduced it to 75%-1800RPM (make sure that the temperature is still in the safe zone). It's running at the same idle temperature and makes much less noise, will run Prime95 to test load.

Edit: 50-52% load, temperature is fine, fanspeed increased to 2140 (temperature controlled).

I've been using SpeedFan forever. Not to alter fan speeds, but just to monitor system temps and hard drive SMART info. It's a great, multipurpose utility.

Here's a link to the actual program's website: Speedfan

I don't know if it's open source or not... probably not- but definitely free!

[Omanes Alexandrapolites]

N Ninja
Homepage
OS: Windows, Mac and Linux (requires Flash Player 7)
Open Source: No
Description: Action/puzzle game in which the player is a ninja whom is trapped in a world of evil and homicidal robots.
Courtesy of Bijo

[Bijo]

Hah! You added N! Great

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RootKitRevealer
OS: Windows NT4 and higher
Open Source: no
Description: RootkitRevealer is an advanced rootkit detection utility. It runs on Windows NT 4 and higher and its output lists Registry and file system API discrepancies that may indicate the presence of a user-mode or kernel-mode rootkit. RootkitRevealer successfully detects all persistent rootkits published at www.rootkit.com, including AFX, Vanquish and HackerDefender (note: RootkitRevealer is not intended to detect rootkits like Fu that don't attempt to hide their files or registry keys).

---

Is there any free software -- with many options and such if possible (such as triggering to open a port when needed and closing it when not needed) -- that allows one to simplify port-forwarding (in regard to programs that need it)?

(Reading through guides bloated with terminology and long texts and having to do so many things require too much time and effort and what makes it worse is when you can't find a guide for your specific router model. Arrrgh... if success doesn't arrive soon they won't have to try to kill me in the future because I will have already died trying to figure out port-forwarding without the proper resources. Can you say bullet? )

[Ciaran]

I don´t know whether this has already been mentioned:

Ashampoo Clipfinder
http://www2.ashampoo.com/webcache/ht...t_2_0055__.htm

A handy tool for searching for and downloading video clips from a range of sites.

[Bijo]

I came across a few file managers. I thought I'd share my findings with you.


FreeCommander
OS: Windows
Open Source: No
Description: FreeCommander is an easy-to-use alternative to the standard windows file manager. The program helps you with daily work in Windows. Here you can find all the necessary functions to manage your data stock. You can take FreeCommander anywhere - just copy the installation directory on a CD, USB-Stick or even a floppy disk - and you can even work with this program on a foreign computer.

xplorer² lite
OS: Windows
Open Source: No
Description: The lightweight version of xplorer² is not a crippled unusable salesman of the professional version. It shares the same browsing and management engine, and gives many rival professional file managers a run for their money — literally! It is a complete little file manager, albeit lacking a bit in bells and whistles.

[Xiahou]

I'm surprised this one isn't in here yet:
JkDefrag
OS: Windows
OpenSource?: Yes

Free (released under the GNU General Public License) disk defragment and optimize utility for Windows 2000/2003/XP/Vista/X64. Completely automatic and very easy to use, fast, low overhead, with several optimization strategies, and can handle floppies and USB disks/sticks. Included are a Windows version, a commandline version (for scheduling by the task scheduler or for use from administrator scripts), a screensaver version, a DLL library (for use from programming languages), and versions for Windows X64.

I just started using this less than a week ago, but so far, it completely pwns the built-in Windows defrag on many levels.

[Bijo]

Some more stuff.

AxCrypt
OS: Windows 95/98/ME/NT/2K/XP
Open Source: Yes
Description: AxCrypt is free and easy to use open source strong file encryption for Windows 95/98/ME/NT/2K/XP, integrated with Windows Explorer. Encrypt, compress, decrypt, wipe, view and edit with a few mouse clicks. Cryptographic primitives are AES-128 and SHA-1.

WinMerge
OS: Windows
Open Source: Yes
Description: WinMerge is an Open Source visual text file differencing and merging tool for Win32 platforms. It is highly useful for determing what has changed between project versions, and then merging changes between versions.

[Bijo]

What is a good freeware ISO editor?

[jgrtmp]

EASEUS Patition Manager 3.0 Home Edition
Homepage: http://www.partition-tool.com/
OS: Free Home Edition is WIN2k, WINXP32 & Vista32.
Open Source: No
Description: Best PartMan since Vista's on board manager. Functions without the need of CD/Floppy rebooting. Includes both Disk & Partition Copy Wizards. Pro verions open up to other OSs & Servers (have CD boot recovery) starting at $32-$400(dependant upon License level).

I've used the previous version & had found it had upgraded since my download. This is great - no need for a floppy for those who dont have one in the bay...
Thank IT for fixing my account to add this to the list...

[Xiahou]

Toribash: Violence Perfected
homepage: http://toribash.com/
OS: Windows, Linux, Mac
Open Source: No

I've been playing around with this game for the last few days and have found it pretty entertaining. It's best described as a turn-based fighting game.
Here's the game's official trailer.
And here are a few gameplay videos that show you what the pros (not me) can do.
Vid1
Vid2

Enjoy.

[Raz]

< deleted>

[Xiahou]

WinDirStat
Open Source: Yes

WinDirStat is a disk usage statistics viewer and cleanup tool for Microsoft Windows (all current variants).
WinDirStat reads the whole directory tree once and then presents it in three useful views:

* The directory list, which resembles the tree view of the Windows Explorer but is sorted by file/subtree size,
* The treemap, which shows the whole contents of the directory tree straight away,
* The extension list, which serves as a legend and shows statistics about the file types.

I got tired of poking around on my games drive trying to find out where all the space has gone- so I downloaded this. I fell in love instantly when it showed me several gigs worth of temporary patch files buried deep in a games install directory.

Here's a sample image of how it displays drive info:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

The individual blocks represent files- the size of the block indicates its relative size. Directories are color coded.