Sengork's General Tool Set

Finally an update to the list. A number of additions and modifications since the last update. No links or particular explanations to them this time, just google 'em.

These are the tools I use on daily basis & have installed on pretty much all PCs I encounter. And they're also responsible for my, at times excessive, Windows usage.

(In no particular order or category)

• Total Commander Ultima Prime distribution - my recent favourite, very handy. Not a tool but a set of very handy and integrated tools, no bloat - only functionality
• PuTTY - I think I've opened this app more times than any other
• gVIM - essential
• Cygwin - Because I often need to find/grep/awk/sed/bash on Windows
• NetTransport - Old habits die hard
• uTorrent - This is how software should be...
• WinRipper - I like extracting music out of apps
• GkrellM - Not just because it looks fancy
• CPU-z
• Opera - Best web browser out there
• AVG Free
• BartPE - Who said only Linux had boot CDs?
• nLite - Automate, slipstream & customise - because Windows will need to be reinstalled lots of times
• WinAMP - Thanks to Lycos' foolishness I'm not using Sonique anymore
• VLC - Because there's too many codecs to keep track of and it doesn't matter how classy the app looks when you use it for watching videos in 'full screen'!
• Power Toys for XP
• PeerGuardian
• The GIMP
• WinRAR
• OneWorld Time
• PowerOff
• Xming
• VMware Server - Best and most useful application concept that's come out in absolute ages
• GameArena - The Arena - Used less and less thanks to Steam
• WordWeb
• Unlocker
• SuperScan
• Nmap - Not just because it's been spotted in The Matrix
• Y'z dock
• TCPview
• Process Explorer
• Resource Hacker
• WinSCP
• VNC - I was always surprised how such an excellent idea for software's so little known of
• FreeNX - Faster than VNC/X11 for interactive usage, not mature yet though
• Knoppix Live DVDs
• Slackware (my favourite Linux distribution)
• Daemon Tools - Because mounting a simple ISO should not be a 'big hassle'
• DVD Shrink - There's a reason why it's author now works for Nero
• QuickPar
• Network Stumbler
• ffdshow
• WinHTTrack
• ZoneAlarm - Granted I've not bothered to check out Comodo yet
• PortableApps
• PDFCreator
• Toucan

Version: 1.5

Slackware user friendliness

$ man wtf

This will be a spoiler to reboot

$ uptime

6:38pm up 2587 day(s), 10:22, 5 users, load average: 0.05, 0.02, 0.02

*nix

My long held comparison views on the commercial non-Intel Midrange UNIX OSes out there based on my own experiences & expectations, being as generalistic as possible:

AIX >> ( Linux/*BSD > Solaris > HP-UX )

Now the amount of each I've seen out there which has been or is being deployed:

Solaris >> ( Linux/*BSD > AIX > HP-UX )

(Where > is greater than and >> is much greater than).

Naturally combine Veritas software with any one of the above greatly puts the OS it self out of the bigger picture within Midrange. HP-UX seems to be going out of the door for a while now.

On the other hand SANs and Virtualisation seem to be in the spotlight these days more so that any OS out there. OS has largey become something that simply makes all the hardware work together to run the App/DB. 

Now if I could only run AIX on something that's not a pSeries... Can run Solaris within VMware quite well, but AIX, no such luck even with AIX 6 Open Beta & PearPC...

Ubuntu on main PC

I've finally rolled up my sleeves and put Linux on main desktop PC, which has been for long a Windows XP box. Looked around a few Linux & BSD distributions and finalised the choice to Ubuntu. Finally a Linux distribution which is 'usable'. This OS is quite a joy to use with XGL and Beryl in action. Ubuntu is not only well integrated and automated, it's also based upon Debian's proven and mature packaging system. All the packages are specifically made for and 'supported' under Ubuntu, making software installations & dependency handling a breeze. Simply install and use.

By saying 'supported' I'm referring to the software begin specifically packaged for Ubuntu, this implies any software you install will work and be 'integrated' with it's surrounding environment. This practically eliminates post installation configurations & maintenance. (An example for the sceptics: install Enlightenment, and you'll have no need to go back handle dependencies and reconfigure your login manager to include it as a login session window manager option). In addition you will be notified about any software updates as new supported versions roll out.

Main struggle with Linux on main desktop PC has been non-integration, non-automation and things simply "breaking"/not working for whatever valid or invalid reason. This is quite history with Ubuntu (even Dell realises it).

Ubuntu Desk by ~eking on deviantART

Random notes:

• NTFS write support works well via NTFS-3G (although still chews up CPU).
• USB storage's detected, mounted and recognised automatically (iPod is different to USB Key).
• Plenty of Gkrellm plugins pre-packages (# apt-cache search gkrellm)
• RTCW:ET @ 1680x1050 32Bpp works just fine (if not better than in XP, # xmodmap -e "clear control", ~-Alt-Enter to "minimise" ingame)
• Internode usage meter for GNOME's neat, so is wmium
• Radio an TV Tuner card working by default

Slackware still remains steady on the server end for me.

Sengor's General Tool Set

Looking at how much time I spend looking for useful software utilities, here is an essential list, all of them are freely available on the internet:

(In no particular order or category)

• AVG Free
• Great free antivirus software, thanks Jones
• Sonique
• Formerly my favourite audio player, development of it these days is next to none
• GX::Transcoder
• Convert those audio files to and from multiple formats
• EAC - Exact Audio Copy
• Accurate and quality focused free CD -> MP3 ripper
• PowerToys for Win XP
• Tweak UI & Enhanced Alt+Tab & ClearType Tuner & Image Resizer & Virtual Desktop Manager are the most useful ones
• SciTE
• Syntax aware Code/Text editor with ability to expand/collapse code sections, very useful for large code viewing
• Dev C++
• C/C++ IDE for Windows platform
• WinAMP
• Still with classic skin, still the best media player out there ;)
• PeerGuardian
• Block/Filter out internet traffic from preselected IP address ranges, thanks Jones
• The GIMP
• Free photo editor/creator like Photoshop. Wind32 and Linux
• WinRAR
• best file archiver out there, light and fast, opens many formats
• 3D Mark
• Test out that Gfx Card, yes I know it's now called Futuremark - Hey I'm old fashioned!
• BurnAtOnce
• Burn those ISO images
• OneWorld Time
• What time is it in --insert place-- ?
• PowerOff
• Turn that PC off when you want and how you want, thanks Jones for the tip
• GameArena COGS
• Keep track of all of those local gaming servers for all of your games, GA account required
• WordWeb
• Uhh Ohh what does this and that fancy word mean? Free disctionary, I wish they had more internet jargon in there
• Windows Uptime
• How long did your Windows PC manage to stay up for so far?
• RefreshForce
• Fix all of those games/[resolutions] that run in low refresh rates
• SuperScan & Nmap
• See what TCP/IP ports are open on a remote computer
• Y'z Dock
• Mac OS Like docking bar for Windows, attractive eye candy, no official page since development ceased
• TCPview
• kindof like netstat but in GUI and real time
• Process Explorer
• See ALL processes that Windows is running, Task Manager hides some
• Riva Tuner
• Tweaker for nVidia based video cards
• Resource Hacker
• See what those Win32 binaries contain, Pictures, cursors, resources, classes...
• WinSCP
• The best SCP/SFTP client out there
• TightVNC
• Cross platform remote graphcal computer access, great for slow links, session resuming and situations where you don't have admin access to the remote box
• FreeNX
• I blogged about this a while ago. Similar to VNC but faster
• PuTTY
• SSH/Tenet/RAW client, for all of the remote access needs
• Cygwin
• unix shell for windows along with all of the usefull GNU tools, best way to get X11 working under Windows
• gVim
• advanced text editor, only for the brave!
• Real Alternative
• aka Media Player Classic with Plugins
• VLC Media Player
• ... and also preview/stream those corrupt/incomplete videos
• Net Transport
• download manager, even downloads streams into a file, thanks Jones
• uTorrent
• Light and small BitTorrent client with all the features you might need
• WinRipper
• Extract various multimedia segments from any file. Useful for extracting content from game files
• GkrellM
• System statistics monitoring panel, one of my long time favourites. Comes both in Unix and Win32 ports
• CPU-z
• Detailed info on CPU, M/B and RAM for PCs, can produce great summaries of a PC config.
• BartPE
• Make a bootable Windows XP based CD. There's lots of plugins for it available out there. Great for troubleshooting Windows issues (viruses, disks, spyware...)
• Knoppix
• Best live Linux CD/DVD out there. Useful feature is booting Memtest86 for troubleshooting memory related problems.
• Slackware
• Not a single tool, but a great selection of useful tools atop of a great build of Linux ketrnels (Yes that does constitute an OS).

That's enough for now, I'll probably update this list at a later stage...

Version: 1.4

FreeNX

Just discovered FreeNX (and here) and it became an instant favourite of mine. NX comes in various distributions and is VNC like. However what surprised me is the speed at which graphical logins are forwarded to the client with so little network overhead. Now I can finally run a virtual desktop from my Slackware machine and view it within any windows box on the LAN with much faster speeds than VNC or X11 forwarding. Further more the applications feel like being ran locally rathen than remotely, even copy-pasting works to/from windows desktop to Linux desktop with no extra effort. Finally feels like I'm back on the Linux machine locally. :) Winamp and Eterm side by side on the same monitor. Time to redesign my Linux desktop...! More info over at freenx.berlios.de & www.nomachine.com Grab the Slackware package over from linuxpackages.net