Windows Applications

This list contains programs and tools most anyone could use, more or less. Programming related applications and more are listed on the Programming Resources page.

Internet Stuff

• Firefox – a great browser (OSX too)
• Chrome – another great browser (OSX too)
• Filezilla – free ftp/sftp client/server suite
• Thunderbird – great, free, email client (OSX too)
• Adobe Flash Player – now you can see the youtube videos and all of those annoying animated ads in your browser (OSX too)
• Adblock Plus – block those annoying animated ads (OSX too)

Anti virus/malware, etc

• Microsoft Security Essentials – a great, free, high quality anti-malware suite
• AVG Free – free antivirus suite, tries to trick you into upgrading to a paid version from time to time
• avast! – like AVG, without the annoying upsells
• AdAware – free (or non-free) anti-malware suite.
• SpyBot Search & Destory – another free anti-malware suite

Documents, Spreadsheets, and so on

• Open Office – free office alternative for word/excel/etc (OSX too)
• Adobe Reader – read/edit PDF files (OSX too)
• Foxit Reader – alternative to Adobe Reader
• PDFCreator – print directly to a PDF file
• notepad++ – an amazing, free, and powerful text editor
• TextPad – another high quality editor, non-free
• jedit – a cross platform editor (OSX too)

Communications

• Google Talk – IM/Voice/Video (OSX too)
• Skype – Same as Google Talk, better in some respects, worse in others. (OSX too)
• mIRC – IRC client
• Pidgin – multi service client (google talk, yahoo, aim, etc)
• Trillian – like pidgin

File Tools

• 7zip – make zip files, unpack all types of other archive formats
• WinDirStat – figure out where all that hard drive space went.
• SDelete – securely delete your personal files off that hard drive before you donate it to someone else.
• Unlocker – free up that file windows won’t let you delete.

Remote Control Tools

• Mobile Mouse Pro – control your mouse over wifi from your phone/ipod touch/etc. great for home theater setups w/ a computer connected to the tv.
• TightVNC – a free VNC (desktop sharing/controlling) client / server package. (OSX too)
• PuTTY – an amazing ssh client.

Sound & Music Authoring

• Audacity – a free sound editor (OSX too)
• Fruity Loops (aka FL Studio) – music production
• sonar – another music production DAW.
• Sony Acid – loops based music production
• Sony Sound Forge – like Audacity, but pro quality

Video & DVD Authoring

• Acoustica CD/DVD Labeler
• Ulead DVD Workshop – create dvd menu systems
• VirtualDub – capture / convert video in a variety of formats
• Adobe Premiere Elements – affordable high quality video editing

Image and Photo Authoring

• Paint Shop Pro – affordable alternative to photoshop
• Photoshop Elements – an affordable version of photoshop
• FastStone image viewer – amazing, free, powerful image management software
• Picasa – an easier-to-use / not-as-powerful (not as nerdy) image managaement software suite
• Acdsee Photo Manager – affordable image management software, slightly better than FastStone’s stuff
• paint.net – free photoshop alternative
• gimp – another free photoshop alternative (OSX too)
• inkscape – free illustrator alternative (vector graphics) (OSX too)
• gifsicle – make animated gifs
• jhead – read EXIF headers from jpegs
• png2ico – create .ico files from .png files
• centarsia – photo collage maker that makes those posters where tiny pictures make up a larger picture

CD/DVD/BDR burning/ripping/etc

• ImgBurn – superior, free, cd/dvd/blu-ray burning
• nero – the second, non-free, choice for media burning, a bit more user-friendly than imgburn but bloat-tastic these days.
• handbrake – rip your dvd movies for playback on your computer or iphone or ps3 or whatever (OSX too)
• DVD Shrink – copy your dvd (menus and all) to disc, works better than handbrake for tv show type dvds.
• Daemon Tools – mount .iso and other types of cd/dvd data images as drives on your computer
• Exact Audio Copy – a great tool for ripping a cd with some scratches on it.
• CDex – rip your cd audio to mp3, auto looks up track names

Media Players & Media Streaming

• VLC Media Player – plays almost anything, well. (OSX too)
• iTunes – music & video management system (OSX too)
• Winamp – another great media player, like VLC.
• tversity – stream your music and video files to your XBOX or PS3 or other UPnP player
• XBMC – another option (OSX too)
• PS3 Media Server – the best media streamer option there is, transcodes video for the client on the fly, supports more than just PS3 clients (OSX too)

Misc

• Launchy – launch apps and more with the keyboard
• Cygwin – unix commands / programs on windows
• cwrsync – rsync for windows with much better performance than the version that comes with cygwin
• tunnelier – ssh tunnels w/ automatic reconnection
• Microsoft Virtual PC – Run windows or another OS in a program.. a Virtual Machine, if you will.
• utorrent – a great bit torrent client
• Active WebCam – webcam watching software that can save video or frames of a video stream
• MAME – arcade game emulator
• Microsoft’s SysInternals suite – all kinds of great utilities
• Eduke32 – duke nukem 3d updated with internet play and hi res textures

Windows Tips & Tricks

Random Stuff

• double and triple clicking on words in a text editor will select the whole word/area
• in windows vista/7 you can drag/drop the displays in the display management control panel to configure which display is on the left/right

Keyboard Shortcuts

• windows key tricks
• windows key + e = windows explorer
• windows key + r = run window
• windows key + d = show desktop / minimize all, do it again to go back to where you were
• windows key + i = internet explorer window
• windows key + l = lock computer
• windows key + arrow keys = move window around (half screen left, for example) on win7/vista
• browser hotkeys (for firefox and chrome, at least)
• ctrl + t = open new tab
• ctrl + shift + t = open last closed tab
• ctrl + w = close current tab
• windows explorer hotkeys
• shift + right click = more menu items, such as “open command prompt here” (in win 7, at least)
• shift + delete = delete file without putting it in the recycle bin
• other windows hotkeys
• ctrl + c = copy selected item
• ctrl + v = paste
• ctrl + x = cut selected item
• ctrl + z = undo
• ctrl + y = redo
• print screen = take a screenshot of the screen (can paste it in ms paint or other image programs)
• alt + print screen = take a screenshot of the current program window
• alt + f4 = close program
• ctrl + p = print (most of the time)
• f3 or ctrl + f = find (most of the time)
• ctrl + o = open (most of the time)
• ctrl + s = save (most of the time)
• alt + tab = cycle through open windows

You can quickly open many of the built-in windows programs using the windows key + r trick:

• sol = solitaire
• calc = calculator
• cmd = dos command prompt
• mspaint = paint
• notepad = notepad
• wordpad = wordpad