Free software

Free (And Legal!) Software Tools
by Jonathan Moeller
(from the Dollar Stretcher newsletter)

OpenOffice.org provides a
word processor, a spreadsheet program, a presentation program
(like PowerPoint), along with database and graphics
applications. OpenOffice.org can save files in pre-2007
Microsoft Office formats, making it easy to share documents
with Microsoft Office users. And as an added bonus,
OpenOffice.org's word processor can save documents as PDF
files, an ability Microsoft Word lacks. You can find it at
http://www.openoffice.org.

Developed by the Czech software
company Grisoft, AVG is consistently one of the most popular
free antivirus programs. Additionally, it requires far fewer system resources
than many competing antivirus programs. You can download it
from http://www.grisoft.com.

Originally developed as a senior project at the
University of Washington, Paint.net has since grown into a
simple, yet effective image editor. If your picture editing
needs are fairly straightforward, get Paint.net at
http://www.getpaint.net. If you need something more powerful,
you can try the famous GIMP (GNU Image Manipulation Program)
image editor. Like Paint.net, it originally began as a student
project at the University of California. While it lacks some
of Photoshop's more esoteric features, the GIMP is nonetheless
a powerful and complex image-manipulation tool. You can obtain
it from http://www.gimp.org.

Microsoft Windows itself carries a hefty price tag, but
nowadays you can even find free alternatives to it in the form
of the Linux operating system. The most popular distribution
(version) is Ubuntu Linux. Funded by South African billionaire
and former space tourist Mark Shuttleworth, Ubuntu has grown
so popular that computer manufacturer Dell has begun offering
Ubuntu pre-loaded on its systems. You can even try Ubuntu
before you install it on your computer; its "LiveCD" mode lets
you boot your computer from an Ubuntu CD, permitting you to
test it without altering your hard drive. You can download
Ubuntu from http://www.ubuntu.com.