Grab a Shovel and Join Mike Saunders on a Dig for the Best Free Software Gems
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54 BEST LINUX APPS BEST LINUX APPS Grab a shovel and join Mike Saunders on a dig for the best free software gems. ebian GNU/Linux’s software repositories magazine. We also get many recommendations from contain a whopping 48,564 packages for you, our readers. So this issue we decided to collect Dx86-64 machines. Just think about that for a together the best applications in the FOSS world and moment: it’s a staggering figure. Not every package is share what makes them great! a single application, sure, but the total number of You may be familiar with a few of the big-name programs available for Linux numbers in the tens of programs, so we’ll look at what they have in the thousands. You have a giant wealth of software that’s pipeline for upcoming releases. But for most of the free to install, explore and modify – and all just a few next few pages we want to introduce you to software apt-get, yum or pacman commands away. you’ve never come across before, or perhaps heard of This is brilliant, but who has time to try all of these in passing, but never actually tried. We’ve all had the programs? How can you easily sort the wheat from experience of discovering an awesome new program the chaff when the range is so exhaustive? We at that we come to use on a daily basis, and wonder how Linux Voice spend a lot of time rummaging around we managed without it beforehand. So by the end of package repositories, source code mirrors, GitHub and this article, you’ll be ready to spruce up your Linux box other sites, finding sparkling new gems to cover in the up with a bunch of new FOSS goodies. Let’s go… 18 www.linuxvoice.com 54 BEST LINUX APPS POEDIT JED BLEACHBIT Ever fancied There’s more to Deleting a program doesn’t (eg previously opened files or viewed helping out with an open console text editors than necessarily remove all traces of it from URLs) or cached data – for others it source project, but don’t Emacs vs Vim, despite your hard drive. Many programs can does more complicated work. have the sufficient the endless flamewars leave behind logs, temporary files, For instance, in Firefox, Chrome hacking nous to edit the on the web. Jed offers a cached files, and other bits ’n’ bobs that and other apps, BleachBit can shrink source code? If you can glut of power-user you’d rather get rid of. Sometimes you configuration files without removing speak more than one features, especially for can find these by poking around inside vital data, to improve performance language, you can almost coders, including code /tmp and your home directory, but it can and save disk space. On many Linux certainly help the folding and extensibility be a lot of hassle to do a thorough job. distributions it can remove language program by providing 2via scripts. But! These BleachBit aims to free up disk space packs for languages that you don’t interface translations. features aren’t hidden and maintain your privacy by getting use, and fix broken symbolic links. It’s Poedit is a friendly behind various cryptic rid of this unwanted junk. It cleans up a fantastic toolbox for keeping your graphical app that helps key combos – everything after a wide range of programs, both system clean, tidy and secure –3 and you to create translations is provided via DOS open source and proprietary, and in its definitely one to recommend to those of for software that uses EDIT-style drop-down Windows incarnation it can purge the your friends and colleagues who are still 1the Gettext framework. menus. junk from a whopping 1,200 apps. For battling with Windows. www.poedit.net www.jedsoft.org/jed many programs it simply erases history http://bleachbit.sourceforge.net MUPEN64PLUS ARIA2 Fancy some The mother of all Goldeneye 007 or download tools, Aria2 Mario 64 fun? Of course supports: HTTP(S), FTP, you do! Emulation of the BitTorrent and Metalink; Nintendo 64 console is a downloads from multiple mixed bag on5 Linux, but sources for maximum Mupen64Plus is the best speed; and remote solution we’ve found. It control operation via has a range of plugins for JSON-RPC and XML- CPU and video RPC. You can use proxy emulation, so you can servers, set bandwidth6 pick and choose the best limits, and create custom JOSM that work for you. HTTP headers. Basically, We all rave about the benefits of tutorials before you really get stuck in to http://tinyurl.com/ it does it all. open source, but open data is becoming editing map data. dyzktf7 http://aria2.sf.net equally important. Take OpenStreetMap for https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/ instance: it’s rather like Wikipedia in that JOSM/Guide is a great place to get started, the data is generated by users rather than with step-by-step guides showing how to do EASYSTROKE companies. This data is freely licensed in a basic editing jobs and upload your changes, Gesture recognition tends to get the most similar fashion, so anyone can use, modify while http://learnosm.org/en/beginner/start-4 attention on tablet and mobile devices, but it can be and share it. If you like the goals behind josm lets you play around with a sample very handy on the desktop as well. With Easystroke, OpenStreetMap but the data for your area map. Don’t worry if you make a mistake with is incomplete or incorrect, what can you a real map and upload the data – it’s not you can create custom gestures and assign them to do? Well, JOSM is a graphical editor for the hard for administrators to roll back to the X11 keybindings or shell commands. OpenStreetMap data, and it’s written in Java previous version. So, you could right-click and swipe rightwards so it runs pretty much everywhere. OpenStreetMap embodies the principles anywhere on your desktop to open a new terminal JOSM isn’t designed to be the most of collaboration and sharing that we love in window, or add specific gestures to your favourite newbie-friendly tool in the world, so you’re Linux, FOSS and the GPL, so give it a go. expected to work your way through a few http://josm.openstreetmap.de applications (eg swipe upwards to go to the start of a document). It’s also possible to add modifier keys to gestures, so that they don’t interfere with your apps. SYLPHEED http://github.com/thjaeger/easystroke Mail clients are ten a penny in Sylpheed supports POP3, IMAP4 the free software world, but few are as and SMTP out of the box, and can be 8 slick as Sylpheed. It’s written in C with a extended with junk mail filtering and GTK front-end, and aims to provide GnuPG signing functionality. We’ve used most of the functionality that end users Sylpheed on and off over the years, expect, without chomping through your and found it to be a solid app, and a RAM banks. The three-pane7 interface lightning fast performer when it comes (folder list, message list and message to searching through large mailboxes. If contents) is familiar and clean, while you’re tired of the bloat and fiddliness of plenty of keybindings obviate the need your current mail client, give it a try, to keep faffing around with the mouse. http://sylpheed.sraoss.jp/en www.linuxvoice.com 19 54 BEST LINUX APPS WIRESHARK KDEVELOP Formerly known Many people think as Ethereal, Wireshark is that KDevelop is only arguably the best packet useful if you’re writing analyser available on any KDE apps in C++, but this platform. It lets you integrated development inspect the contents of environment is a lot more network packets as they capable than that. It flow through your supports many other network, whether it’s for languages including troubleshooting9 or you’re Python, PHP, Ruby and just curious to see how a JavaScript, along with certain program is various document communicating with the markup formats. outside world. It can be a KDevelop 4.7 has just complex tool though – been released – it’s the there’s even a 408-page last of the 4.x line, so it book available explaining will have longer support how to use it! than regular versions. www.wireshark.org www.kdevelop.org10 Midori’s default search engine is DuckDuckGo, which doesn’t track you. MIDORI Remember when Firefox split off supports tabbed browsing, session from the Mozilla project, with the goal of management, extensions, a “speed being a fast and lightweight browser? dial” view, smart bookmarks and much It’s still a good performer today, but more. Midori uses WebKit as its HTML many have questioned its purpose now rendering engine, so it’s well equipped that it seemingly rolls11 in everything to handle the latest HTML5 and CSS. including the kitchen sink. You might have come across Midori Midori could be regarded as the before, as it’s the default browser in new Firefox: it’s deliberately designed Raspbian and Elementary OS; we’d KDevelop is best known as a C++ and Qt IDE, but it’s to be speedy and conservative with also like to see it adopted in other usable with other languages too. RAM, while still offering core features mainstream distros. that users expect. For instance, it www.midori-browser.org TOX BIRDFONT DOSBOX While the Snowden is implemented as a We must admit: Fancy playing some old DOS classics? Shudder revelations have made library, and then end-user many of us consider programs are built on despite being übergeeks, at the thought of fiddling with CONFIG.SYS and alternative email services, top of that.