Computer Software That You Love

[John Rogers]

Computer posts generally, on here at least, are asking for help or fix a problem which may or may not help. Sooooo I decided to list the programs I have used over the years and since I have Been retired I have a lot of time on my hands so here are my fun applications and why. Note most of these want a registration and a yearly or life time fee but they are small. Since the GREAT companies like Software City who used to give out a fantastic pocket protector with colored markers for marking up looooong code dot matrix print outs.

For work, when I worked as a Senior Oracle DBA, I came to really love Oracle Database software. Sure it was complicated and took years to learn the systems I managed NEVER had a crash or virus or other problems.

For fun, here is what I use to download YouTube videos and make movies out of them.
- 4K Video Downloader: Great little package and get updated couple times a year.
- Bulk Rename Utility: Best little app that allows rename of a whole directory of 25 or so files and will also get rid of Asian characters in file names.
- Use Net Explorer (UE.exe): which I have used for over 20 years to access "Usenet" to get things not readily available elseware.
- AVS Video Editor and associated suite of utilities: Click and copy to make a long (2 to 3 hrs) video of any format you wish. I usually create a MP4 movie out of my downloads.
- WINRAR: Great archive and unpack utility.
- Norton Utilities: This stuff has been keeping my computer(s) safe since that guy was in the liquor ads in Playboy!

For my home router I have TWO, the At&T connected to the incoming wires and on top of that the latest ASUS router. That is the main one keeping is safe and it has utility that tracks any incoming weirdness. Hope this will help someone.
John

[john70t]

For defrag of platter drives: https://www.disktrix.com/ultimatedefrag6.html
Benchmark hardware: https://www.cpuid.com/softwares/cpu-z.html
Cleanup and maintenance: https://www.ccleaner.com/ (didn't renew my pro subscription because they tried to charge my card 3 months into a cycle)
Basic CAD: https://www.sketchup.com/
Media player: https://www.videolan.org/vlc/

[JackDidley]

Number one on my list has to be Linux Mint. It just works, it is free, I have never had a virus and no antivirus needed.Updates are optional. I can do a fresh install in a few minutes.
Torq, on my phone for scanning my OBD2 cars.

I dont use it anymore but Datamaster was super for datalogging my OBD1 Corvette. Same goes for Tunerpro RT for burning chips.

[John Rogers]

Whoa, great stuff guys, thank you. I started with a Ti-99-4A, a tape drive AND a 150 baud modem! Here is what I have now:

John

[id10t]

Originally Posted by JackDidley

Number one on my list has to be Linux Mint. It just works, it is free, I have never had a virus and no antivirus needed.Updates are optional. I can do a fresh install in a few minutes.

Linux in general.

Both free and Free (there is a difference - free beer vs. free speech, gratis vs. libre)

But I'll pick Mint's grandparent distro Debian. All Mint really has over pure Debian is a better default desktop look/feel/config. So I boot with a Mint disk, export the settings via dconf, install Debian, import settings.

I don't back up the OS stuff or installed applications, and my home directory lives on a RAID-5 volume so I'm covered for hardware failure.

Picking a single app as a favorite is impossible, but if I had to pick one then I'd say GCC would be it, since I can use it to build any other app out there from source.

[GH85Carrera]

For a favorite software program I use a lot: CutePDF. It will let you "print" any file to a PDF format file.

I use it all the time for things like printing an order receipt, but not a alalog version, just a digital file that I can keep or delete and no paper wasted. Often PDF files that I have to fill out are locked to print the file only, I print it to a PDF with Cute PDF, and just store it that way.

My first computer was a Vic-20 with a cassette drive for file storage. I knew 16K was not enough ram, so I had the extra memory card to get it up to 32K of RAM. It took forever to load or save a file. I jumped into the Commodore 64 world when the floppy drives were available. 300 baud modem and the world of Fido net.

[id10t]

Originally Posted by GH85Carrera

For a favorite software program I use a lot: CutePDF. It will let you "print" any file to a PDF format file.

I use it all the time for things like printing an order receipt, but not a alalog version, just a digital file that I can keep or delete and no paper wasted. Often PDF files that I have to fill out are locked to print the file only, I print it to a PDF with Cute PDF, and just store it that way.

My first computer was a Vic-20 with a cassette drive for file storage. I knew 16K was not enough ram, so I had the extra memory card to get it up to 32K of RAM. It took forever to load or save a file. I jumped into the Commodore 64 world when the floppy drives were available. 300 baud modem and the world of Fido net.

Chrome offers print to pdf as a built-in, and Windows in general does now too I think. Linux has always had the ability, could even set up a network based fake printer that generates PDF files and sends to email using Linux, Samba (windows file/print server) and some shell scripts. Little more creative scripting and glue code could get you a fax server for sending/receiving faxes.... I set one up for an insurance office, it handled about 80k faxes per year across four phone lines

[JackDidley]

I have tried a bunch usually on USB sticks first. Mint is the only one I can think of that has drivers for my wireless printer right out of the box. Others I tried I have to open the terminal and type in command lines that I find on the internet. Not a big thing but it is a thing ti deal with.

[masraum]

Originally Posted by John Rogers

For fun, here is what I use to download YouTube videos and make movies out of them.
- 4K Video Downloader: Great little package and get updated couple times a year.
- Bulk Rename Utility: Best little app that allows rename of a whole directory of 25 or so files and will also get rid of Asian characters in file names.
- Use Net Explorer (UE.exe): which I have used for over 20 years to access "Usenet" to get things not readily available elseware.
- AVS Video Editor and associated suite of utilities: Click and copy to make a long (2 to 3 hrs) video of any format you wish. I usually create a MP4 movie out of my downloads.
- WINRAR: Great archive and unpack utility.
- Norton Utilities: This stuff has been keeping my computer(s) safe since that guy was in the liquor ads in Playboy!

Wow! I haven't used Usenet in probably 20 years. I'll bet I haven't used WinRar in 12-15 years (it is good software, I just haven't needed it in that long. Maybe the fact that you use Usenet, where I remember RAR archiving being more popular is why you still used it.

WOW!!! Norton Utilities, I don't think I've used Norton since the late 80s, or maybe early 90s. Back then it was this sort of thing.

UnErase, recovers erased files
FileFix, repairs damaged files
DiskLook, complete floppy disk displays and maps
SecMod, easy changes to floppy disk sectors
FileHide, interactive hidden file control
BatHide, automatic hidden file control
TimeMark, displays date, time, elapsed time
ScrAtr, sets DOS to work in any colors
Reverse, work in black on white
Clear, clears the screen for clarity
FileSort, keeps floppy disk files by date or name
DiskOpt, speeds floppy disk access
Beep, causes the PC speaker to beep
Print, prints files
Defragmenter
etc....

My list, hmmm. VLC is good, but I only use it if nothing else will play a file.

Handbrake - ripping DVDs to files that will stream from my NAS
Makemkv - ripping BD to file that handbrake can then rip to a file that will stream from my NAS
Not something that most folks would need, but "Secure CRT" - SSH client, telnet client, console client.
Firefox - (I've been using firefox since it was Netscape. I took a break once for a short period when it sucked. I've tried a bunch of the others over the years including a bunch of obscure ones.)
On a Windows box "excalibur" or on a Mac "RPN Anywhere" or "Free 42" - they are all calculators that support RPN.
If you wanted to download Torrents on a MAC, then I might recommend "Transmission"
Wireshark - if you need to take or view packet captures
iTerm - If you're on a MAC this is a terminal app that's better than the built in.

[masraum]

Originally Posted by id10t

Linux in general.

Both free and Free (there is a difference - free beer vs. free speech, gratis vs. libre)

But I'll pick Mint's grandparent distro Debian. All Mint really has over pure Debian is a better default desktop look/feel/config. So I boot with a Mint disk, export the settings via dconf, install Debian, import settings.

I don't back up the OS stuff or installed applications, and my home directory lives on a RAID-5 volume so I'm covered for hardware failure.

Picking a single app as a favorite is impossible, but if I had to pick one then I'd say GCC would be it, since I can use it to build any other app out there from source.

*nix > Windows

[Alan A]

Homebrew.

[Por_sha911]

I love software that is not overly complex,works like it is supposed to, and doesn't crash.

[Bill Douglas]

Originally Posted by Por_sha911

I love software that is not overly complex,works like it is supposed to, and doesn't crash.

Me too. I use Microsoft Word 97 and Excel 97. It works very well and fast. Not a whole lot of things added that I don't want to use.

[LWJ]

GH85Carrera,

You said Vic20. Recollection says that was nicknamed “The Blinder” as the moniter was supposed to be defective and hurt ones eye! Throw back!

[GH85Carrera]

Originally Posted by LWJ

GH85Carrera,

You said Vic20. Recollection says that was nicknamed “The Blinder” as the moniter was supposed to be defective and hurt ones eye! Throw back!

I used my TV as a monitor for the Vic 20. For the C-64 I used the monitor for years.

[WolfeMacleod]

For audio stuff, Spectralayers. It's audio editing capabilities are incredible. Like Photoshop for sound.

[fireant911]

One program that I have used extensively is OpenSolver. For those that do linear optimization problems, this is an amazing tool. It works with Microsoft Excel and unlike the standard solver that comes with Excel (that is limited to only 200 decision variables), OpenSolver has NO constraints on the number of decision variables (the limiting factor is the amount of memory on your computer). I regularly run the program with 12K+ variables and 600+ constraints to find an optimal solution to very complex scheduling-type problems. OpenSolver was developed and is maintained by the department of Engineering Science in Auckland, New Zealand.