this is the best site for good free programs:
http://www.techsupportalert.com/
whatever you can think of, there is a free program for it, many times of excellent quality, and if so it will be reviewed by techsupport alert.
best freeware site
Moderator: Site Mods
Yes, I have been using it for years.
Also see a beautiful site: http://alternativeto.net/
Here you see all alternatives for any program you know.
Anyone can add a program, which has to be validated by other users.
The site also ranks them by "likes" given by viewers.
Filtering is very user-friendly: the only criteria is, whether you need to pay for it. So "Free" and "open source" are clubbed together.
(Other download sites make it meaningless: There is no point in filtering by specific licenses, such as GPL, LGPL, GPLv2, Mozilla, freeware, etc.).
Also see a beautiful site: http://alternativeto.net/
Here you see all alternatives for any program you know.
Anyone can add a program, which has to be validated by other users.
The site also ranks them by "likes" given by viewers.
Filtering is very user-friendly: the only criteria is, whether you need to pay for it. So "Free" and "open source" are clubbed together.
(Other download sites make it meaningless: There is no point in filtering by specific licenses, such as GPL, LGPL, GPLv2, Mozilla, freeware, etc.).
After 20 years of people typing "What is the best... Sex Toy/SheMale Model/Fizzy Drink" into Google, hasn't the notion of what is "Best" become so subjective as to be meaningless by now? For example, in the kingdom of the blind they may have a vote to decide who has the best hairstyle - does this mean the winner actually has the best hairstyle? Of course not - unless everyone voting is first required to do all the Helen Keller touchy-feely stuff on all the contestants heads, which would be hygienically impractical.
So, in order for these sites of be of any use, we have take the word of the anonymous masses at face value. In general experience, this is tantamount to those nature films showing Monkeys masturbating on the rocks: Great for the monkeys - not so great for the viewer (unless you're into that kind of thing). But instead of monkeys, we have have the self-styled "experts" reviewing everything in sight - you see them everywhere these days, they "review" films on IMDB, they "review" books on Amazon, they review pretty much everything ever created in the history of the world - and yet - there's always a faintly putrid smell which accompanies their "open and honest opinions".
In this part of the world, there's a great slang term which may be blanketly applied to these sorts of "experts" - they're referred to as "Tossers" (in reference to the male act of masturbation). These are the kind of people who like to "rate" things in their music and video collections by associating star-icons with the files. As we all know, there are basic tenets which we adhere to when judging what makes an individual an adult or not (and thus fit to be taken seriously). Unfortunately, absolutely none of those basic tenets may be applied when reading something on the internet. For example, just because someone can string a few words together and spell them properly does not mean they may be classified as "literate" - dolphins can be trained to string interpretive symbols together in what we are told is a form of rudimentary communication, but that doesn't mean I'm going to trust one as a marriage counsellor or a personal assistant or even a fork-lift driver.
I'm a great advocate of the freedoms the internet provides - indeed, all the things which will forever prevent it from being anything more than an adolescent's wet dream - the anonymity, the tokenising of adult parley, the quick-reference illusion of proper depth which massive amounts of free information always suggests. These elements are conducive to creating a wonderful playground, but just like in real-life, the actual inhabitants of that playground are Neanderthals and barbarians who are merely imitating adult behaviour as long as it serves their purpose - the minute anything doesn't go their way they rant and rave and strike out at their fellow playmates.
What's even more insidious is that we've taken to saying "Yeah, we know all that, but look at this thing over here - it's got the ring of truth to it." And the subdivision into Walled Gardens begins. People group and gravitate into cliques and clubs, teams and armies, believing they actually have a shared basis upon which to form cogent, reasoned, and lucid arguments. Some will even go so far as to surmise that if you eliminated anonymity it would magically make everyone more aware of what personal responsibility really means, and bring about some kind of self-evident premise for civilised growth and progress. "We can make it work," they intone solemnly, "this really is the next stage of human development." The only thing worse than a garden-variety tosser is a well-meaning "educated" tosser who has no idea he's falling to his doom because he's been so diligent in surrounding himself with people who superficially agree with him (even if they pretend to be "opposites attracting"), that he's surrendered all sense of perspective for the imaginary safety of feeling loved.
Many a married man has wondered about how this self-same snooker came about in his own life.
In any event, the growth of these type of sites (and the reinforcing beliefs of their pseudo-veracity) can in no way ever bring about a consensus (neither democratic or demogogic) as to what any more than a single deluded individual could ever conceive of as being "the best" <something> software. Even if 250 monkeys "vote" for the same thing, that is not a basis for anything other than an increase of marketing traffic relating to a specific web address. The actual "product" they describe becomes irrelevant after awhile, because they don't really care if you (the user looking for the "best <x,y,z>") actually find what you want, or what you have told you need - they have already gotten what they want from you: Clicks. Doesn't matter if you click on a not-for-profit banner-ad, or seemingly harmless "supported by" message, or even if you just sat there reading the page for more than 2.3 minutes before clicking away, you've already contributed all they want from you. If you decide you like being used this way, they gracefully encourage you to "share" your wisdom or opinion or whatever it is internet-automaton-monkeys provide - all so that others may "benefit" from your "experience".
Is it just me, or is everything that seems this nice and helpful and superficially reasonable not made automatically suspicious just by dint of popular existence? I don't care if product <x> can make your teeth whiter, your waistline thinner, or take the sting out of long lonely winter nights - when Cole Porter wrote the phrase "A trip to the moon on gossamer wings" he wasn't just being poetic, he was evincing the enchantment people feel when imagining that their contributions to a lost cause have not been in vain.
What he did not do was to click "Like", or "Digg", or "+", or any of a hundred other filament icons of emptiness that so sway "humble opinions" these days. His was the real thing. Would that there was more of it in this world of participatory pretenders.
So, in order for these sites of be of any use, we have take the word of the anonymous masses at face value. In general experience, this is tantamount to those nature films showing Monkeys masturbating on the rocks: Great for the monkeys - not so great for the viewer (unless you're into that kind of thing). But instead of monkeys, we have have the self-styled "experts" reviewing everything in sight - you see them everywhere these days, they "review" films on IMDB, they "review" books on Amazon, they review pretty much everything ever created in the history of the world - and yet - there's always a faintly putrid smell which accompanies their "open and honest opinions".
In this part of the world, there's a great slang term which may be blanketly applied to these sorts of "experts" - they're referred to as "Tossers" (in reference to the male act of masturbation). These are the kind of people who like to "rate" things in their music and video collections by associating star-icons with the files. As we all know, there are basic tenets which we adhere to when judging what makes an individual an adult or not (and thus fit to be taken seriously). Unfortunately, absolutely none of those basic tenets may be applied when reading something on the internet. For example, just because someone can string a few words together and spell them properly does not mean they may be classified as "literate" - dolphins can be trained to string interpretive symbols together in what we are told is a form of rudimentary communication, but that doesn't mean I'm going to trust one as a marriage counsellor or a personal assistant or even a fork-lift driver.
I'm a great advocate of the freedoms the internet provides - indeed, all the things which will forever prevent it from being anything more than an adolescent's wet dream - the anonymity, the tokenising of adult parley, the quick-reference illusion of proper depth which massive amounts of free information always suggests. These elements are conducive to creating a wonderful playground, but just like in real-life, the actual inhabitants of that playground are Neanderthals and barbarians who are merely imitating adult behaviour as long as it serves their purpose - the minute anything doesn't go their way they rant and rave and strike out at their fellow playmates.
What's even more insidious is that we've taken to saying "Yeah, we know all that, but look at this thing over here - it's got the ring of truth to it." And the subdivision into Walled Gardens begins. People group and gravitate into cliques and clubs, teams and armies, believing they actually have a shared basis upon which to form cogent, reasoned, and lucid arguments. Some will even go so far as to surmise that if you eliminated anonymity it would magically make everyone more aware of what personal responsibility really means, and bring about some kind of self-evident premise for civilised growth and progress. "We can make it work," they intone solemnly, "this really is the next stage of human development." The only thing worse than a garden-variety tosser is a well-meaning "educated" tosser who has no idea he's falling to his doom because he's been so diligent in surrounding himself with people who superficially agree with him (even if they pretend to be "opposites attracting"), that he's surrendered all sense of perspective for the imaginary safety of feeling loved.
Many a married man has wondered about how this self-same snooker came about in his own life.
In any event, the growth of these type of sites (and the reinforcing beliefs of their pseudo-veracity) can in no way ever bring about a consensus (neither democratic or demogogic) as to what any more than a single deluded individual could ever conceive of as being "the best" <something> software. Even if 250 monkeys "vote" for the same thing, that is not a basis for anything other than an increase of marketing traffic relating to a specific web address. The actual "product" they describe becomes irrelevant after awhile, because they don't really care if you (the user looking for the "best <x,y,z>") actually find what you want, or what you have told you need - they have already gotten what they want from you: Clicks. Doesn't matter if you click on a not-for-profit banner-ad, or seemingly harmless "supported by" message, or even if you just sat there reading the page for more than 2.3 minutes before clicking away, you've already contributed all they want from you. If you decide you like being used this way, they gracefully encourage you to "share" your wisdom or opinion or whatever it is internet-automaton-monkeys provide - all so that others may "benefit" from your "experience".
Is it just me, or is everything that seems this nice and helpful and superficially reasonable not made automatically suspicious just by dint of popular existence? I don't care if product <x> can make your teeth whiter, your waistline thinner, or take the sting out of long lonely winter nights - when Cole Porter wrote the phrase "A trip to the moon on gossamer wings" he wasn't just being poetic, he was evincing the enchantment people feel when imagining that their contributions to a lost cause have not been in vain.
What he did not do was to click "Like", or "Digg", or "+", or any of a hundred other filament icons of emptiness that so sway "humble opinions" these days. His was the real thing. Would that there was more of it in this world of participatory pretenders.
Probably no coincidence that I spent many many many hours in university writing extended papers on Schopenhauer - I guess some of it rubbed off then, huh? :D Cynicism is (as it always was) the New Cool. 8)nikos wrote:...you sound like Schopenhauer. As all things in life trust comes with repeated tests and evaluation
Murphy's Law states that if a test is evaluated 100 times, and you then decide it's just dandy, it'll fail on the 101st test, making the evaluation worth about as much as the €uro. Just because 100 monkeys agree a slightly-mushy banana is a good thing, I'd go for the greener variety every time.
My basic philosophy states that anything "lots of people like" must be (by default) a bad thing [except pizza]. I have never run across anything that contravenes that rule.
Show me 1200 cows that voted McDonald's to be their favourite corporation, and I'll show you a poll based on wholly faked results - same thing applies to the internet's answers to "What is the best...?" queries. The ironic thing is, even if "real" people actually voted, the results are still faked, considering the basic nature of the medium.
Thus, objective evaluation is effectively impossible, so you end up having to install every piece of software to do your own evaluation anyway - if I listened to the masses, I'd probably still be suffering under the yoke of Adobe Reader. :roll:You were in an University? What did you to there - clean the windows? ("€uro", Eurouro then?)
Personally, I don't give much on "the best ..." sites. While techsupportalert is amazing when it comes to pure quantity, "best" is subjective. A simple example: A lot of people consider Linux "the best" operating system (* kernel, to be adequately precise), I still prefer Windows and FreeBSD over it. I presume the Wikipedia is a more trustworthy source for information like that, it has less quantity but it completely ignores personal opinions about the listed applications.
Personally, I don't give much on "the best ..." sites. While techsupportalert is amazing when it comes to pure quantity, "best" is subjective. A simple example: A lot of people consider Linux "the best" operating system (* kernel, to be adequately precise), I still prefer Windows and FreeBSD over it. I presume the Wikipedia is a more trustworthy source for information like that, it has less quantity but it completely ignores personal opinions about the listed applications.
Tux. ; tuxproject.de
registered xplorer² pro user since Oct 2009, ultimated in Mar 2012
registered xplorer² pro user since Oct 2009, ultimated in Mar 2012
Well... one more great freeware page is... well, my blog: www.zoniweb.com 
There are not so many different programs, cause I like to have only one (or couple, at most) good program - other good alternatives are bellow text ("similar freeware programs").
Serbian only. Google translate: http://goo.gl/bLgES
@ nikos: yes, www.techsupportalert.com is soooo fine page
There are not so many different programs, cause I like to have only one (or couple, at most) good program - other good alternatives are bellow text ("similar freeware programs").
Serbian only. Google translate: http://goo.gl/bLgES
@ nikos: yes, www.techsupportalert.com is soooo fine page
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RightPaddock
- Gold Member
- Posts: 428
- Joined: 2011 Jan 23, 18:58
- Location: Sydney AU
Bling free, flagging of Adware enabled downloads, forewarned forearmed ===>>> http://www.freeware-guide.com/
10 places to get old versions ===>>> http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/10-website ... -software/
The MAKEUSEOF site has lots of useful material
rp
10 places to get old versions ===>>> http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/10-website ... -software/
The MAKEUSEOF site has lots of useful material
rp
Windows 10 Pro (64 bit) version 1809 - Xplorer2 version: Pro 2.5.0.4 [Unicode] x64 2014-06-21