Hi everyone! So I’ve recently switched to Linux and I’m having a lot of fun downloading software and replacing my old stuff with it. I’m wondering what you all use?
My switched softwares:
Obsidian -> Logseq - Obsidian is great and all but I think Logseq is also competent in its own way even without plugins. I am currently exploring templates to create my own daily journal/habit tracker like I did in Obsidian.
Word/Notepad -> LibreOffice - Seems to have a lot of options. Currently using the writer software for quick notes.
Canva -> Inkscape - I am aware that Canva is a website/android app, but I decided to switch from it to Inkscape by utilizing open source illustrations such as Undraw for graphics needs. I still need to look up tutorials on how to use it properly, though!
Clip Studio Paint -> Krita - I actually made this switch a month or two ago, but I’m really enjoying Krita a lot more than I ever did Clip Studio Paint. Less things to get distracted by, giving you more chances to learn how to utilize the essentials.
Things I’d like to explore in more detail:
- Thunderbird as a calendar/email/task software
- Whether or not I should stick with Calibre for book management
- Kdenlive as a video creating program. I haven’t created videos before, but it seems fun.
How about you? What do you enjoy?
Not a replacement per se, but I am just amazed by how much better some common FOSS apps feel in Linux compared to Windows. Apps like VLC, Calibre, FreeCAD, Libreoffice, hell even Firefox are so much smoother in a UNIX system, almost like THIS is their real home!
Been using Gimp for over a decade over Paint/Photoshop.
Kdenlive is pretty nice.
I’ve personally been using AlternativeTo for many years to find alternative software, especially when I first began using Linux.
Calibre is very powerful for book management, you should stick with it.
Calibre is IMO the premier book management program, FOSS or otherwise.
@Witch
A helpful browser extension tool is Privacy Redirect. It allows automatic link redirects from:Reddit -> Libreddit
Youtube -> Invidious
Google -> Startpage (or other)
Maps -> OpenStreetMap… and a few others.
It is very customizable for what instances or sites you need which is why I think it’s great.CMUS as a music player. Clean interface, lightning fast and plays anything. I use it daily.
This is a list of all the open source software I have come across and use frequently to semi frequently. There will likely be some overlap with stuff everyone has already posted.
Photography and Image manipulation
- Darktable → RAW photo processing
- GIMP→ Photoshop alternative
- Krita → Digital painting (have only used it a bit, but I hear it’s good)
- Inkscape → Vector Graphics
- Automatic1111 → Diffusion model AI toolkit (mostly Stable Diffusion but also has extensions for other diffusion based models like OpenAI’s Shap-E)
3D modeling and Printing
- Blender → 3D Modeling, sculpting, 2D animation, compositing all rolled together (simply one of the best examples of FOSS)
- Meshroom → Photogrammetry
- PrusaSlicer → 3D printing slicer based on Slic3r
Video editing and Processing
- Kdenlive → Genuinely good video editor
- FFMPEG → Command line media toolkit (very complex but also works on android through Termux)
- Instant NeRF → Neural Radiance Fields, think photoscan to a 3D representation (not meant to make 3D meshes unfortunately)
Misc
- Calibre → E-book management
- Serge → Self hosted Local LLM’s made a bit easier to deal with
- Firefox → Web browser
FOSS I’m excited for
- DragGAN → Manipulate images by intuitively dragging, more on this here and here (official code being released this month but there are already projects based on the paper with working examples)
- CoDi → “Composable Diffusion” Any2Any conversion Txt2Vid, Vid2Audio, Audio+Txt2Img, whatever
- Neuralangelo → Promises to be NeRF’s for 3D models (don’t know if it will be FOSS but I’m hopeful)
Linux, to replace Windows :p
Whenever I use Windows I can’t get over how utterly terrible the basic file explorer is. I swear that it was better back in the XP days. On linux I use Dolphin and have found it to be excellent. Tabs, Split screens, everything is so usable.
I’ve used Thunderbird since it was released almost 20 years ago. It has some annoying bugs around setting up accounts (get your password right or it clears the whole form), but you do it once and it works wonderfully.
- nnn as my file manager. Very tiny and fast
- MyPaint for taking notes
- FreeTube for Youtube
- gPodder for podcasts
- LaTeX for writing papers and creating presentations
- Zotero for managing my research papers
Calibre is great for book management. I use Thunderbird for my email/calendar since I’m on Linux and have never even though of changing. Works like a charm and it does everything I need it to.
Other software I use and recommend are:
- Web browser: Firefox
- Image and drawing: GIMP and Inkscapr
- Plain text editing and programming: Neovim
- PDF reader: Okular
- Media player: VLC
- Terminal: Alacritty (main terminal) and Yakuake (to have a terminal that I can easily access and then hide)
LibreOffice (and not OpenOffice) is a must.
I have tried really hard to make the switch to GIMP, but Photoshop is too engraved within me.
I will probably keep using Photopea instead.
My last experience with Win10 vs now:
(FOSS in bold)
- Edge -> LibreWolf,
Brave - Windows Mail & Calendar -> Thunderbird, Tutanota
- Windows Explorer -> Thunar, PCManFM
- Todoist/iCal -> fruux + Thunderbird
- NCH VideoPad -> Kdenlive
- iTunes, Spotify -> CDs, Audacious, DeaDBeeF, Bandcamp
- VLC -> mpv, Parole
- OneNote ->
ObsidianJoplin + Backblaze B2 - Firefox Lockwise -> Bitwarden
- WPS Office -> LibreOffice, ONLYOFFICE
- VSCode -> Micro
- Visual Studio -> Micro + GCC + Glade
- Finale -> MuseScore
- NT -> Linux (obviously)
- Windows 10 -> Debian, Arch Linux
And now, the online services:
- Ecosia -> LibreX
- YouTube -> CloudTube
- Twitter -> Mastodon
- Reddit -> Libreddit, Lemmy
- Dropbox, Google Drive -> MEGA, Filen, USB sticks
- Blogger -> Neocities, Flounder (gemini protocol)
Sorry for the long post. Here are some potatoes:
People should stay far away from Brave.
Brandon Eich’s controversial past and opinions:
https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-26868536
Anti-vaxxer and far-right conspiracies:
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/22/business/brave-brendan-eich-covid-19.html
https://twitter.com/BrendanEich/status/1337496169690230784
https://www.reddit.com/r/BATProject/comments/khmbvl/do_you_feel_that_brendan_should_step_back_from/
https://twitter.com/BrendanEich/status/1538253982845399040
Privacy related:
https://www.lifewire.com/brave-browser-falls-short-of-its-promises-of-privacy-5206799
Brave automatically redirected searches to affiliated versions which they profited from:
https://www.theverge.com/2020/6/8/21283769/brave-browser-affiliate-links-crypto-privacy-ceo-apology
Brave collected donations on content creators behalf without consent:
Brave leaked Tor/Onion service requests through DNS:
https://www.reddit.com/r/netsec/comments/lndfms/more_in_comments_brave_browser_leaks_your_tor/
Brave sent unsolicited marketing mail to users, though they claimed it was anonymous:
https://twitter.com/sebmck/status/1531740563900448769
Brave temporarily whitelisted certain Facebook and Twitter trackers without telling users:
It took me a few seconds to figure out what the heck just popped up on the side of my screen, haha! Thank you for the potatoes.
Out of curiosity do you find that neocities is easy to set up for a beginner? I’d like to get into blogging that I don’t have to worry about getting comments on. Something where I can just ramble on a bit about how things went that day, what I learned, and then post and never touch it unless I want to reread that day’s entry.
- Edge -> LibreWolf,
Check out KDE Connect / gsConnect for integration your phone to your computer. It can sync notifications, messages, share clipboard, media playback controls, use either device as mouse/keyboard for the other. Its really good on Android. For iOS the app is much newer and with limited features due to iOS limitations
If you’re on KDE, something as ‘basic’ as the file manager Dolphin feels decades ahead of the Windows File Explorer
Zim Desktop wiki is really good for creating a personal wiki. Think building a personal knowledge base or notebook with interlinked articles
I recommend https://alternativeto.net/ since you just type in the software name and it will show alternatives rated by popularity. You can filter by many things including “open source”.
Notepad->kate