Linux Applications Replacing Windows

By Ole Wolf on September 15, 2007 6:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)
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My change from Windows to Linux wasn't based on ideological feelings against Microsoft or for Linux: It was a simple question of my getting tired of having to reinstall Windows every half a year because Windows had slown to a crawl. In addition, I've seen what I need to know about Vista by now, and wouldn't dream of upgrading the hardware all of the computers in our home to run an expensive operating system.

At the same time Linux is maturing. My current suite of applications that replace my usual Windows suite of applications include the following applications, most of which are free in my Kubuntu 7.04 installation (that is, Ubuntu with KDE as desktop):

Mail, calendar, contacts, notes	kontact (kmail, kalendar, knote, kaddressbook)
DVD and CD burning	k3b. Nero for Linux is also excellent, but costs money
DVD ripping and copying	dvd::rip and k9copy
Audio CD ripping and ID3 editing	grip and kid3
DVD and movie playback	kaffeine, xine, mplayer
Music player	amarok
Bitmap and vector graphics	GIMP and InkScape. Bibble is a very powerful digital photo editor, but costs money.
Word Processing	OpenOffice and KWord
Spreadsheets	OpenOffice and KSpread
Presentation	OpenOffice and KPresenter
Home Budget	KMyMoney
RSS Reader	akregator
ICQ, MSN Messenger, and IRC	kopete
Skype	Skype
FTP	Filezilla and gFtp
WWW Browsing	Firefox and Opera
Backup	crontab and rdiff-backup (I'm using scripts for this, because unfortunately "keep" crashes on my installation; most users seem to have no problems, however.
Vista's "Wow" Experience	Compiz-Fusion