A few weeks ago I shared the news that I had lost everything on my hard drive (making me the poster boy for those who don’t do backups like they should). I’m still a bit sick about all the pictures I’ve lost (although I have recovered all those I lost that I had posted here on the site), but my biggest concern, moving forward, was how to replace the programs I lost.

Fortunately, for nearly every program out there, an open source equivalent exists. Many, if not most, of them are very robust and every bit as usable as their commercial counterparts.

Web Page Design — Amaya

Amaya is an open source editor from W3Schools.com

Amaya is a Web editor, i.e. a tool used to create and update documents directly on the Web. Browsing features are seamlessly integrated with the editing and remote access features in a uniform environment. This follows the original vision of the Web as a space for collaboration and not just a one-way publishing medium.

Productivity Tools — Open Office

A complete suite of tools that compete well with the products that cost serious money. Here’s what you get:

• Writer — A very full featured Word Processor/Desktop Publisher.
• Calc — I’m a numbers geek. Can’t help it. Calc is a spreadsheet program that does everything I need it to do.
• Impress — This is a program for creating multimedia presentations. It’s not one I use a lot, but it’s nice to have it in the tool bag if I need it.
• Draw — It’s a drawing program. I need to use it a bit more before I can say anything about it.
• Base — A database program. Again, I haven’t given this a good test drive.

Suite!

Graphics — Gimp

An open source graphic manipulation tool. The learning curve is just a little bit steeper than I would like, but I’m learning. I’ve been using PaintShop Pro for years, and this is going to take a while to get used to, but I do like it so far.

On a side note, the www.gimp.org site appears to be down right now, but I’m sure it’s only temporary.

I’ve also tried Inkscape, but didn’t like it very well.

Well, that’s how things stand today. Do you use any open source programs? What are your thoughts? Any suggestions?