Reliable Free Software - Frpcug.org

The FAQs 

(Frequently Asked Questions) 

Preliminary Notes 

Free Software Summary 

Libre Ofice Review 

VMWare Review 

Free Software Appendices 

Appendix 1 

Links to Free Genealogy Software Reviews 

Appendix 2 

More Free Utilities 

Appendix 3 

More Free Photographic Applications 

Appendix 4 

Links to Computer Security Software Comparisons, Tips and Glossaries

Category Name Description Download Location Comments 

Utility 

CCleaner 

Revo Uninstaller 

Auslogics 

Defragmenter 

Registry cleaner 

Program uninstaller 

Hard drive 

defragmenter 

http://www.filehippo. 

com/download_cclean 

er/ 

http://www.revounins 

taller.com/revo_uninst 

aller_free_download.h 

tml 

http://www.auslogics. 

com/en/software/diskdefrag/ 

Effective; may require 

multiple registry 

cleaner runs 

More effective than 

the Windows version. 

Do not restart the 

computer after builtin 

uninstaller finishes 

Much faster than the 

Windows version. 

Registry cleaner 

feature not tested. 

Security 

Malwarebytes Anti 

Malware 

Malwarebytes Anti 

Rootkit 

Malware removal 

Root-kit removal 


com/download_malw 

arebytes_anti_malwar 

e/ 

http://www.malwareb 

ytes.org/products/mb 

ar/ 

Does not run in the 

background; therefore 

does not conflict with 

other security 

software. Finds 

problems other 

programs do not. 

CAUTION: Beta 

version; requires 

periodic re-download to 

update it


Do Not Track + 

(Do Not Track Me) 

NoScript 

Privoxy 

AVG Free 

Extension for Firefox 

that prevents web 

tracking. 

NoScript is a Firefox 

extension that allows 

JavaScript, Java, Flash 

and other plugins to 

be executed only by 

trusted web sites of 

your choice (e.g. your 

online bank). 

Privoxy provides the 

capapbility for 

removing ads and 

other items from web 

pages you visit. 

Free version of the 

AVG Anti-Virus 

application 

https://www.abine.co 

m/dntdetail.php 

https://addons.mozilla 

.org/enus/firefox/addon/nosc 

ript/ 

http://sourceforge.net/ 

projects/ijbswa/files/ 

http://free.avg.com/us 

-en/free-antivirusdownload 

OR 


com/download_avg_a 

ntivirus_32/ 

Automatically blocks 

all tracking requests 

made by the websites 

you visit; also blocks 

pop up ads. 

However, see this 

Forbes article. 

Requires user 

intervention for some 

websites. 

Blocks ads and 

banners, manages 

cookies. Multiplatform 

Available for single 

computer use for 

home and non 

commercial use. Find 

the MAC version at 

http://avgformac.org/


Avira Free 

Avast Free 


Avira Anti-Virus 

application 


Avast Anti-Virus 

application 

http://www.avira.com 

/en/download/produc 

t/avira-free-antivirus 

OR 


com/download_antivi 

r/ 


com/download_avast 

_antivirus/ 

Free for noncommercial 

use. 

Downloadable 

manual; variety of 

scans. Auto update 

only. Find the MAC 

version at 

http://www.avira.com 

/en/download/produc 

t/avira-free-macsecurity 

Free for noncommercial 

& home 

use. Also available 

for the MAC 

Photography 

Irfanview 

Picasa 

Image and audio 

editor 

Image organizer; 

image viewer; limited 

image editor; photo 

sharing 

http://www.irfanview. 

com/main_download_ 

engl.htm 

OR 


com/download_irfanv 

iew/ 

Picasa download 

Fast editing; editing 

limited to entire 

image; many image 

and audio formats. 

Download the PlugIns 

also. 

Can email photo from 

Picasa with auto 

resize.


GIMP 

Very capable image 

editor (with Layers 

capapbility), format 

converter and more. 

http://www.gimp.org/ 

downloads/ 

Competitor to 

Photoshop (except for 

commercial printing 

features). Multiplatform. 

Backup 

Easus ToDo Backup 

Free backup & system 

disaster recovery 

software for home 

users. 

http://www.todobackup.com/products/ 

home/free-backupsoftware.htm 

PDF User Guide 

available from the 

download page (about 

1/3 of the way down 

on the left). 

Audio 

Audacity 

Audacity® is free, 

open source, crossplatform 

software for 

recording and editing 

sounds. 

http://audacity.source 

forge.net/ 

Excellent choice for 

converting LPs/tapes 

to digital files. Multiplatform. 

Office Suite 

Libre Office 

“Office suite” of 6 

applications 

http://www.libreoffice 

.org/download 

Microsoft Office 

comparable. Multiplatform.


Media Players 

VLC 

Winamp Free 

A multimedia player 

compatible with a 

wide variety of audio 

and video formats as 

well as DVDs, VCDs, 

and various streaming 

protocols 

Multimedia player 


com/download_vlc_32 

http://www.winamp.c 

om/ 

Many formats without 

additional software. 

Multi-platform. 

Bookmarks for online 

streams. CD ripping 

feature. Easy access 

to 10s of thousands of 

online streams. Multiplatform. 

Desktop Publishing 

Scribus 

Scribus is an Open 

Source program that 

provides professional 

page layout with a 

combination of pressready 

output and new 

approaches to page 

design. 

http://wiki.scribus.net 

/canvas/Download 

Multi-platform. Not 

for the casual user – 

significant “learning 

curve.”


Genealogy 

HOME PAGES 

Gramps 

http://grampsproject.org/ 

Legacy Standard 

http://www.legacyfam 

ilytree.com/ 

Family Tree Legends 

http://www.familytree 

legends.com/ 

MyHeritage Family 

Tree Builder 

http://www.myherita 

ge.com/ 

RootsMagic Essentials 

http://www.rootsmagi 

c.com/ 

GEDCOM 

A specification for 

exchanging 

genealogical data 

between different 

genealogy software 

applications. 

N/A - See 

http://www.eogen.co 

m/GEDCOM and 

http://en.wikipedia.or 

g/wiki/Gedcom#Versi 

ons 

Developed by The 

Church of Jesus Christ 

of Latter-day Saints 

(LDS Church) as an 

aid to genealogical 

research

LibreOffice 

Mike Loughlin

LibreOffice Overview 

LibreOffice - pedigree 

What do I use it for? 

LibreOffice v4.0 vs Microsoft Office Suite 2013

LibreOffice - pedigree 

►Originated as StarOffice by German Company, Stardivision, in 1986. 

►Stardivision bought by Sun Microsystems in 1999. 

►Sun formed an open source group, OpenOffice.org, to develop the 

open-source suite and called it StarOffice. 

►Oracle bought Sun Microsystems in 2010. OpenOffice.org was 

continued and the program suite was then called Oracle Open Office. 

Then the programmers split

LibreOffice – pedigree (cont.) 

►9 months after Oracle bought Sun Microsystems, the main body of 

programmers on the OpenOffice.org project left to form The Document 

Foundation because of dissatisfaction with Sun's and Oracle's 

management of the OpenOffice.org project. 

►The Document Foundation then published a fork of OpenOffice 

which they called LibreOffice. Development was continued. 

►In 2011, after losing mindshare to LibreOffice, Oracle discontinued 

development of Oracle Open Office and sold its code to Apache 

Software Foundation, with certain parts sold to IBM.

LibreOffice – pedigree (cont.) 

►At LibreOffice 4.0 introduction in 2013 -- The Document 

Foundation said that "LibreOffice 4.0 is the first release that reflects 

the objectives set by the community at the time of the 

announcement, in September 2010: a cleaner and leaner code base, 

an improved set of features, better interoperability, and a more 

diverse and inclusive ecosystem."

How I Use it 

Word processing using the Writer Program – 

replaces WORD 

Presentations using the Impress Program 

– replaces PowerPoint 

Spreadsheets using the Calc Program 

– replaces Excel

LibreOffice v4.0 vs Microsoft 

Office 2013 

7 Reasons to pick LibreOffice 

► Classic Menu Structure 

► Common Code and Interfaces 

► Greater design control 

► A regular, six-month design cycle 

► Better navigation 

► More extensive style and automation 

► Greater stability 

Its not just about free price and licensing

VMWare 

Bert Broekstra

VMWare Overview 

● 

Virtual Machine Notes 

● 

● 

Gives the user ability to run alternative OS on Linux or Windows 

environments 

– Windows on Linux, Linux on Windows, Windows on Windows, Chrome on 

Windows or Linux 

– Use for testing or running of specific programs or OS without having to reboot 

or install to a different OS 

– (http://www.vmware.com/products/player/faqs.html) 

Commonly used to execute programs that may only run on one 

particular OS 

– Ex:TaxAct program designed for Windows only 

– Ex: digiKam program designed for Linux

VMWare Player - 1 

● 

Personal experience 

● 

Installed VMWare Player v5.0 on a Linux laptop 

– (https://my.vmware.com/web/vmware/free#desktop_end_user_computing/vmware_player/5_0) 

– VMWare Player for Linux 32-bit installed 

● 

● 

64-bit versions available 

Started VMWare and installed Windows XP 

– First tried a full install (580 MB) w/o any problems 

– Then created a customized install (260 MB) w/o any problems 

● 

● 

used nLite to create custom XP (www.nliteos.com) 

Restarted VMWare 

– VMWare updated itself & installed video & print drivers for the XP environment

VMWare Player - 2 

● 

Started the XP virtual machine 

● 

Installed & configured 

– Firefox 

● 

● 

Downloaded with IE 

Installed my addons (NoScript, Xmarks, Forecastfox, etc) 

– Foxit PDF Reader (from memory stick) 

– TaxAct (from memory stick) 

● 

● 

All interfaces (video, printer & internet) worked without having to do any 

reconfigurations 

No issues with the installed applications 

– Each worked as expected 

● 

Removed the full XP (580 MB) virtual machine


Utility 

IOBit Advanced 

System Care 6 

Glary Utilities 

360 Amigo 

Iobit Uninstaller 

Iobit SmartDefrag2 

Multifunction 

registry, etc. cleaner 

Multifunction 


Multifunction 


Program uninstaller 

Powerful drive defragger 

& optimizer 

http://www.iobit.com/ 

advancedsystemcarep 

er.html 

www.glarysoft.com/gl 

ary-utilities/ 

CNET 


advanceduninstaller.h 

tml 


iobitsmartdefrag.php 

9 – 10 cleaners 

Multiple tools. 

Multiple tools 

An acceptable free 

uninstaller similar to 

others – is not as 

thorough has the 4- 

stage Revo uninstaller 

A very good free 

defragger, possibly as 

good or better than 

Defraggler. Will not 

run on a laptop unless 

power cord is plugged 

in.


FileHippo Update 

Checker 

Secunia PSI Update 

Checker 

Software updater 

Software updater 


com/updatechecker/ 

http://secunia.com/vul 

nerability_scanning/p 

ersonal/ 

Free software updates 

which can run in 

automatic or manual 

mode – do the same 

thing but display 

results in different 

formats. 

Free software updates 

which can run in 

automatic or manual 

mode – do the same 

thing but display 

results in different 

formats.


Photography 

Photoscape 

Digikam 

Photo viewer/editor 

for jpg images 

digiKam is a Digital 

Asset Management 

(DAM) application 

that includes many 

image editing 

functions. 

Autostitch Panorama creator Softpedia 

Hugin 

Panorama creator 

http://www.photoscap 

e.org/ps/main/downlo 

ad.php 

http://www.digikam.o 

rg 

http://hugin.sourcefor 

ge.net/download/ 

Common 

enhancements; simple 

user interface. 

Windows only. 

Multi-platform. 

Windows version 

unstable and not 

recommended. 

Developed at 

University of British 

Columbia. 

Automatically stitches 

together even 

unaligned or zoomed 

photographs 

seamlessly without 

user input. 

Uses the Autostitch 

algorithm


Enfuse 

Picturenaut 

LuminanceHDR 

RawTherapee 

An Open Source 

command-line 

application for 

creating HDR images. 

HDR application with 

multiple features 

Luminance HDR is an 

open source graphical 

user interface 

application that aims 

to provide a workflow 

for High Dynamic 

Range (HDR) 

imaging. 

RawTherapee is a 64- 

bit open source raw 

converter for 

Windows, MacOS and 

Linux, with extensive 

image editing 

capabilities. Image 

processing uses 

32 bit floating point 

calculations (v. 4) 

http://software.bergm 

ark.com/enfuseGUI/M 

ain.html 

http://www.hdrlabs.co 

m/picturenaut/ 

http://qtpfsgui.sourcef 

orge.net/?page_id=10 

http://www.rawthera 

pee.com 

Windows and MAC 

Windows only 

Nine different 

algorithms. 

Multi-platform 

Excellent editor with 

many features for the 

RAW format photos. 

Significant “learning 

curve.” Memory 

intensive.


UFRaw 

Darktable 

RAW image editor 

An open source 

photography 

workflow application 

and RAW developer 

http://ufraw.sourcefor 

ge.net/Install.html 

http://www.darktable. 

org/install/ 

Raw editor plug-in for 

GIMP (also standalone). 

Multiplatform 

A virtual lighttable 

and darkroom. Linux 

and MAC.

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