Over the past year, I’ve had the opportunity to use many different open source software packages for various projects with which I’ve been involved. I’ve tried many different content management systems, shopping carts, operating systems, development editors, multimedia players, and many more. I have a few favorites that I have come to rely on and will continue to use long into the future.
I am not necessarily ranking these in any order. In this list, I am considering both the software package itself, as well as the community support and development behind it.
1. Ubuntu
Ubuntu is a very popular Linux distribution. I’m currently dual-booting Ubuntu and Windows and find myself using Ubuntu about 95% of the time. It is incredibly user-friendly and full-featured for anything you’ll ever need to do.
2. WordPress
WordPress is a content management solution for creating and managing websites. This website, and most of my others, are running on top of WordPress. It has a fantastic community behind it and there are thousands of themes and plugins making it scalable for any size or purpose.
3. Each of the LAMPs
LAMP stands for Linux, Apache, MySQL, and PHP. These comprise the majority of most websites and webservers. I’ve already included Linux by listing Ubuntu above, but the others definitely deserve a mention as well. Apache is the software on the server that serves web pages, MySQL is the database program for running a dynamic/more complex website, and PHP is a scripting language which allows you to create those dynamic/complex websites.
4. Mozilla Firefox
Firefox is, what I consider, the best internet browser available. It’s much safer than using Internet Explorer. It’s also highly customizable with many extensions and themes. Mozilla has great products and Firefox is no exception. The development team continues to produce superior products and I’m always eager to see what they come up with next.
5. Open Office
Open Office is a full document-editing suite. It can handle text documents, spreadsheets, presentations, databases, and more. It is compatible with all of the current document file types and is a wonderful free alternative to Microsoft Office.
I do use Zen-Cart, an open-source shopping cart solution, but did not include it in this list for the following reasons. It’s almost too customizable. There are hundreds of settings in the program and it’s very hard to find your way around to change them. And even though it’s open-source, they don’t share their development code. There is a team of core developers who maintain the project while keeping the code private. There is limited development documentation and I find myself reading through past forum topics to try and figure stuff out.
Those are just some of my favorites. I do use many more, including Banshee music management, Gaim instant messenger, Beryl graphics program, the GIMP image editing, Xara Xtreme vector graphic design, and Bluefish development editor.
But of course we cannot forget the one with which I am most actively involved… AdLogger!
