My Top Mostly Freeware/Open-source List Mainly for Windows

My Top Freeware/Open-source List Mainly for Windows

Alright I've compiled a list of some freeware and open-source programs that are mainly for Windows but some work on Mac and Linux also. Most of these I use or have used but I happen to like the first listing in each category.

Compression/Zip Tools:

7-Zip | www.7-zip.org | 7-Zip is an open source archiver with a hihj compression ratio, really makes Windows built in zip feature useless. It also does everything WinZip does minus the fancy interface and pricetag.
jZip | www.jzip.com | A free WinZip alternative based on 7-Zip so it works about the same, they also have an affiliate program so maybe there is a paid version.
PeaZip | http://sourceforge.net/projects/peazip/?source=dlp | PeaZip claims to open up to 150 different kinds of compressed files which is grate but I'm not testing that, and it has a portable version which requires no installation at all. It also has a random password generator amd secure delete. (best review: http://www.pcworld.com/article/2044863/review-peazip-5-decompresses-everything.html)
Hamster Free Zip Archiver |  | Aside from the fancy interface it works the same as the rest but if your looking for a more modern GUI then this is the one for you.
In fact a great review of 3 of these 4 can be found at PC World (http://www.pcworld.com/article/2049053/5-free-compression-tools-zip-your-files-just-dandy.html)

HTML Editors:

KompoZer | www.kompozer.net/ | Easy web authoring! WYSIWYG HTML and CSS editor derived from Nvu. Binary downloads for Windows, Mac, and several variants of Linux.
PageBreeze | www.pagebreeze.com/ | PageBreeze is an award-winning FREE HTML Editor which has both visual (WYSIWYG) and HTML tag modes.
NVU | www.nvu.com/ | Build web pages and manage a website with no technical expertise or knowledge of HTML. ... Nvu and KompoZer are free, open source editors.
Notepad++ | notepad-plus-plus.org/ | Notepad++: a free source code editor which supports several programming languages running under the MS Windows environment including HTML.

Graphic Design:

Gimp | www.gimp.org | If you likePhotoshop but don't have the money to shell out then this is a great option.
Inkscape | www.inkscape.org | Inkscape is a professional vector graphics editor for Windows, Mac OS X and Linux. It's free and open source.
Jeta Logo Designer | www.jeta.com/logos/ | It's simple, fast and powerful software for logo design, icons, business web graphics. There are free and business edtions where include more logo options and shapes but the free edtion will work well for most people.

Video Design & Editing:

Avidemux (Windows/Mac/Linux) | Avidemux IconAvidemux is the Instagram of video editing software it is quick, has a small file size, will do just about everything most basic users could want, even if it does look a bit dated.
Lightworks (Windows) | Lightworks is the editing software that has been used to edit some Hollywood movies like 28 Days Later, Pulp Fiction, Mission Impossible and others. It's UI is morden and easy to follow, it does have a bit of a learning curve but most software does to a point. Only drawback is it's Windows only.
Windows Movie Maker (Windows) | Very easy to use video editing softwere that is great for small or even some midsize videos. I've edited some Fraps videos that are around 4gigs each with no issues.

Video Game Making:

Engine 001 | 2D, RPG, Create your game on virtually any platform. Whether it be on desktop or mobile devices, 001 can port your game for users to enjoy on multiple types of platforms, whether it be an iPhone, Android or PC device. Software is subscription based but its not much. $10 a month is what it costs but once you create a few games just cancel and renew when you want to go at it again... Helpful tips before you start would be to move all of your resources into like graphics, story scripts, etc.
Unity3D | Powerful enough that it can create games that rival the quality of some major titles. Out of the box, Unity3D supports the following platforms: Windows, Mac, Linux, Android, iOS, PS3, Xbox360, Wii U, and the web.
Construct 2 | Construct 2 is a flexible HTML5 game creation engine designed for rapid development of 2D games.
Game Maker Studio | With Game Maker Studio, you can create games using either drag-and-drop or Game Maker Studio’s built-in scripting language, GML. When you’re done, Game Maker Studio can produce an app that’s compatible with iOS or Android, an executable compatible with Windows, or HTML5 for putting your game on the web.

Automation Tools:

Automation Workshop Free Edition | Automation Workshop Free Edition is a free Windows automation application that automates repetitive computer tasks, from the simplest to the most complex.
AutoHotKey | Fast scriptable desktop automation with hotkeys Creating your own apps and macros has never been easier.
Winutomation | While not free you can get a good feel for it with the free trial. WinAutomation is the most advanced Windows Automation app, featuring a Macro Recorder and a Web Recorder. With WinAutomation you can teach your computer to perform your repetitive tasks automatically

Programming:

Python | Python is a programming language that lets you work quickly
and integrate systems more effectively.
Just Basic  | Just BASIC is a programming language for the Windows operating system.  It is completely free and it is suitable for creating all kinds of applications for business, industry, education and entertainment.
PICAXE Programming Editor  | PICAXE Programming Editor 6 is the completely free software application for developing and simulating PICAXE BASIC language programs under Windows (see AXEpad for Linux and Mac).

Red Beans and Rice

I make red beans and rice quite often, I always try different ingredients each time sometimes a little Slap Your Mamma to give it a little kick, how ever this time I added in some cimmion and not only did it smell good it tasted good.

I'm sure that the after effects won't smell all that great. Please feel free to comment and let me know how you make your!

Avoid Loans from RISE

Rise is nothing but a big scam, sure your payment may get reduced from time to time but your balance goes up. For a $2000 loan that I have been paying on for over two years twice a month my balance is now $2176 my last payment of $177.96 only applied $10 to the balance the rest was interest.

This company is a bunch of crooks, they're operating just like the only other loan company that I had a hard time paying off Cash Call.

I still have 20 more payments to make which works out to be over $3000 which means that $2000 will cost me over $7000 to pay off.

I don't with ill will on anyone but I really want these crooked trash to be found guilty of some criminal charges and have to do some prison time.. 60 years should do.

Why! Because they are not helping people, they are hurting them in the long run. They lie on their commercial and website.

I only wanted a loan of $1000 but they would not give me less than $2000, they tried to stick me with a $5000 loan thank God I did not take it not only would the payment be over $550 a month but in the end it would have cost me around $13,000.

Do what you want but I suggest if you need money go to a bank or local loan company and don't borrow more than you need or can afford to pay back.

On top of this they are trying to offer me another loan that would pay off the current loan and give me $247 on top of what I would owe. Now to me even with a lower interest rate I would end up owing more than I owe now.

Wow I just paid them $1000 and still owe them over $1000 it's a scam for sure. Unlike most other loans that go down as you make payments this one does not.

If I wait until the end of the month to make another payment I will owe them over $100 more dollars just in interest.

Emulators and Roms

I love playing games of today but there is something about the old classics of the past that I love but like most thing it is hard to acquire a working system to play the loads of games that are collecting dust in my house and shed. But I do have a couple extra computers that are great for playing classic games using emulators and roms or disk images.

Granted it is not lawful to just download game after game unless you own the game already then you are allowed to download a copy, but who am I to say what games you own and what games you don't own. Anyway here's three sites where you can find easy to acquire emulators and roms without too many hoops to jump through.

1. http://romhustler.net/ | very easy to use site I like them the most. Files appear to be clean but with anything you download a virus scan is always a good idea.
2.  http://www.emuparadise.me/ | a little bit more than just emulators and roms like game music, scans of comics and game magazines.
3. http://coolrom.com/ | not as cool as they used to be but still quite good, seems to lack any Nintendo roms now, they used to carry them. They download process takes a few clicks but not bad.

There are plenty of other sites but these are the ones that I happen to like the most... I hope that this very short post will help someone who stumbles across it.

Microsoft Surface 2

I got a Microsoft Surface 2 about a week ago and just have not enjoyed it the way I thought I should having paid over $500 for it. It all started with the very common no battery detected which after quite a few plugging and unplugging changed to plugged in not charging for a little bit.

I have never had this problem with an Android device or Apple I should have gotten the Samsung Tablet like I got for my wife. I thought being Windows that some programs would run or you could get most of the same apps and games that they have on Android.

Said to say you can't do any of the above thing because...

• You can only install items gotten through the Windows Store.
• What programs and games that are in the Windows Store charge you where they are free on other platforms.
• It runs on the ARM chipset and will not run standard Windows programs.

I understand that this was done for security reasons, but really I think its Microsoft's way of controlling how we use our tablets. After all whats the point of having a tablet that only runs Microsoft Office, Internet Explorer, damn near forces you to use the Metro Start Menu even if you prefer the desktop.

Before I put any apps or anything on my tablet I ran Windows Update which has ran 3 times sense then and now I am down to 10 gigs out of the 32 gigs that it was supposed to have. I mean really if I am running a stripped down version of Windows 8 the updates should be smaller and fewer. As far as security goes that's why I buy Antivirus and Anti-spyware software and to top it off its Wifi only so it's not like I have Internet access all the time.

I really think Microsoft should place a warning on the box with all the things that you want be able to do. I even tried the jailbreak for the Surface 2 but it did not work for me. I was hopping it would allow me to at-least run the portable apps from my 64 gig thumb-drive.

But it's not all bad once you get used to just the basics, after all Microsoft Office alone is a great office suite and does everything I could want, I can work on my blogs and websites post on social networks, edit pictures, and even work on learning programming, watch videos, and almost the same things I could be doing with an Android tablet.

I find it funny that I hardly have anything installed on my tablet and I'm down to 10 gigs when my wife has over 20 gigs free and has a ton of games and apps on her tablet she has an office app that can create, open, and edit Microsoft Office files and its free, graphics programs that are free, lots of games that are free that cost up to $3.99 in the Windows Store.

It would be so much better and more productive for me if I could get a working jailbreak and could use my portable apps even if I could not install any 3rd party apps. Also I have a 32 gig micro-sd card but not really using it, I wish I could use it as a catch all for Windows make it so that all my updates and system files are on it which would free up a good bit of space.

I have a 64 gig drive that I was planning on using was hopping that I could get the apps from the Windows store to Install onto the sd card but did not have any luck yet. There has to be some tweaks that will allow me to set where I want apps to be installed.

However if I can't find some way to make this tablet more suited for my needs I guess I will have to do a factory reset and sell it on ebay, and go out and get an Android tablet. For those people who are thinking about getting a Microsoft Surface 2 32 gig I suggest you rethink it unless your alright with very limited space, sheer lack of good apps and games, not that I play a lot of games I mainly play World of Warcraft and knew when I got the tablet that there was no chance of getting WoW running on the tablet due to the ram mainly.

Anyway if all you need is a few apps and a good office suite then I say go for it, it is a good feeling tablet that preforms nicely for everything that I have tried, not sure about the Surface Pro don't really want to drop that kind of money on a tablet unless someone wants to just toss large sums of cash my way lol... like that's going to happen.

Well looking at this it appears that the Surface Pro 2 should run desktop apps because it has an Intel processor but does not say for sure on the sales page... take a look...

http://www.microsoft.com/surface/en-us/products/surface-pro-2

Storage Shelves

I plan on building some storage shelves for my shed Monday. I will have to go to the hardware store and buy 10 2x4s for the frame.

I have a few already and the plywood, plus all the screws that I need. Of course I will have to clear the area that I will be using.

I will post some pictures of my shabby work when I finish it.

Done with the first set of shelves but can't take a picture yet still loading them down with crap. I did get lucky because I did not have much of a plan and a couple of the new 2x4s were bowed a bit.

I was going for a 24" spread so that I could get two shelves out of a sheet of plywood. But letting my son help me by holding everything up while I screwed the braces in place, I turn my back and he had let it slide 3 inches.

Yeah 27" shelves by 8' long. Which I could have fixed before I built the rest of the frame. But like a dummy I did not double check to see if my son let the frame move.

However it worked out fairly well, I only had 1 and a half sheets of plywood. Which worked out in the end just barely but hey I'll know better next time. 

To start with I will go to a lumber yard where I can pick my own boards. I'll also make a mark on the floor and wall there I want everything so nothing gets out of place.

I forget to get pictures before returning to work, oh well I guess I will snap a couple when I get back home.

Made It Home Again

I finely made it home after being gone for six weeks. I got off the boat Thursday October the 9th over in Freeport Texas.

All in all it was a nice trip just kind of windy at times. I went from one boat for three weeks to another for a week and then another for two weeks.

The only thing that is a pain in the butt is that I did not have but about $50 cash which went quite fast because I got a burger, fries and a drink at the airport in Houston so that was $20 gone, then another drink and a pack of gum so another $5 gone leaving me with $25 cash.

This really did not matter because I checked my credit card and debit card the day before I got off the boat and I had $220 on one and $235 on the other or so I thought.

Well it appears that there were some changes that I did not make show up on my credit card so that money was going, found that out when I went to get gas for my truck.

But I still had my debit card with $235 on it so I topped off my truck with $50 in gas and hit the road. I stopped at another gas station after being stuck in traffic for close to two hours.

I got me another drink, a powerball ticket and a mega millions ticket which I paid cash for so that was another $5 gone. I get to Mississippi and my wife wanted me to drop by Walmart and pick up a movie and a couple of household items OK no biggie.

Well I get to Walmart in Saraland Alabama and I get the items and her movie, I also get Godzilla for me. I get to the check out and everything turned out to be $63 and some change.

Knowing that I still had over $100 on my debit card I swipe it, denied. WTF!!! I do it 3 more times so I remove my Godzilla movie and used my $20 cash which knocked it down to $26 and some change.

So I swipe my card again and I am denied again then I got an email alert so I called the number and as I was going thru the automatized bullshit I get three text alerts and a call started to come in just as I finish the call I was on.

It was the same thing an automated faurd system. At this point I was more than a little pissed off and embarrassed because I was holding up the line and I hardly ever need to put anything back.

Anyway it turns out that I did have the money and after a few minutes I paid for the items minus my movie and left. Today I have to check to see that I did not get over charged and to see what happened to my credit card.

Because if it has been hacked or something then I need to stop the $400 payment and attempt to recover my money and get a new card.

AT&T Connection Issues In Bay City Texas

Southwestern Bell payphone with new AT&T signage (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I've been in the Bay City Texas area for about a week now and my mobile hotspots have been driving me crazy they for fine some of the time and at other I get disconnected every five minutes, its enough to make me go more then a little crazy. I use the mobile hotspot on my Galaxy Note 3 with AT&T which is 4g the service says I have 4 bars most of them time but when I go to do something it drops to 1 bar.

Verizon High Speed Internet (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Verizon is not any better I only have 3g coverage here so I'm paying all this money and not getting anything out of it. I really need to find some internet that just works everywhere I travel, at least the main areas I go. It would make life a lot simpler.

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Making a few days

I'm planning on riding a few weeks trying to get closer to the 90 days that I need to upgrade my license to master of towing inland which will go great with my master of towing western rivers.

Also building up some extra days and money never hurts. I've been off quite a lot over the last few months for my mother before she passed away, then the company left me off about two weeks after I requested to return. Then my uncle passed away after I returned to work for only two weeks.

So yeah I have to get I'm a mind set to ride over so I can achieve the goals that I have set for myself.u

A Little Rainbow

We were sitting pushed into the mudbank here across from Devil's Elbow when I look out of the window and this is what I saw...