Favorite Programs and Services

The list is organized in alphabetical order, if not specified otherwise.

I) Programs

i.1) Audio / Music

i.2) Image / Video

i.3) Communication / News

i.4) Personal planning

i.5) Knowledge Management / Document preparation

i.6) General

II) Online Services

ii.1) Email Providers

ii.2) Search Engines

ii.3) Web Browsers

ii.4) Content curation

ii.5) Content sharing

ii.6) Cloud storage

ii.7) Games

ii.8) Others

I) Programs

i.1) Audio / Music

FFmpeg - tools for transcoding, streaming and playing of multimedia files.

FLAC - lossless audio coding format.

Moc - console audio player.

Pulsemixer - mixer for PulseAudio.

Ogg Vorbis - lossy audio coding format.

Opus - lossy audio coding format (preference: 128-160 VBR).

Quod Libet - audio player, tag editor and library organizer.

i.2) Image / Video

GIMP - image editor.

Kdenlive - video editor.

Krita - painting program.

Mpv - video player.

OBS - video recording and streaming.

Sxiv - image viewer.

Webp - image format (replacement for JPEG, PNG, GIF).

i.3) Communication / News

Gajim - XMPP client.

Icedove - mail client.

Mutt Wizard - email client.

Newsboat - rss/atom feed reader.

Rate.sx - cryptocurrencies exchange rates.

Wttr.in - weather check.

i.4) Personal planning

Calcurse - text-based calendar and todo manager.

GNU Pem - personal expense manager.

Keepass XC - password manager.

Ledger - double-entry accounting system.

Pass - password manager.

Taskwarrior - to-do manager.

Taskwiki (vim plugin)- integration of taskwarrior with vimwiki.

Tty-clock - clock.

i.5) Knowledge Management / Document preparation

BibTeX - lists of references (works well with LaTeX).

Groff - document preparation system.

LaTeX - document preparation system.

Libreoffice - office productivity suite.

Logseq - knowledge base.

Mdp - markdown presentation tool.

Neovim - text editor.

NovelWritter - text editor for writing novels and larger projects.

SC-im - spreadsheet program.

Vimwiki (vim plugin)- note taking.

Wordgrinder - word processor.

Xapers - personal document indexing system, geared towards academic journal articles.

Zathura - document viewer.

Zimwiki - note taking (alternative to vimwiki).

Zotero - research assistant.

i.6) General

Asciiquarium - screensaver.

Bc - GNU bc arbitrary precision calculator language.

Cht.sh - cheat sheets repositories.

Cmatrix - screensaver.

Filezilla - FTP solution.

Libqrencode - QR encoder.

Ranger - file manager.

Rofi - window switcher, application launcher and dmenu replacement.

Zbar - QR code reader.

II) Online Services

ii.1) E-mail Providers

Displayed in order of preference. I have used all of those (many more actually), and all here offer a good service overall.

Posteo - open-source, secure, eco-friendly, cheap.

Countermail - a bit more expensive alternative, more oriented towards security.

Snopyta - free open-source service, but more limited email functionality.

Tutanota - free open-source service.

Automario - free open-source service.

ii.2) Search Engines

Brave search - can be used independently of Brave browser.

DuckDuckGo - most known out of the list.

Little Isle - stock SearX with a Wiby template.

Metager - based on principles of free knowledge, open-source, anti censorship, and renewable energy.

Mojeek - privacy-centered.

SearX - privacy-centered (many instances to choose from).

Yacy - built on principles of peer-to-peer networks.

Wiby - search engine for classic, retro, and lightweight websites, and based on a subject of interest.

ii.3) Web Browsers

Librewolf - fork of Firefox, focused on privacy, security and freedom.

Links2 - text and graphic web browser with a pull-down menu system.

Netsurf - lightweight and portable (more restricting than the others, for privacy reasons).

Qutebrowser - uses Vim-style key bindings and a minimal GUI.

W3m - text-based web browser and terminal pager.

Webbrowser - Pale Moon fork.

Freenet - peer-to-peer web platform (clearnet alternative).

Tor - great for privacy (clearnet alternative).

ii.4) Content curation

Coursera - some free online courses from various schools (proprietary).

Dead Sea Scrolls - digital library.

edX - some free online courses from various schools (proprietary).

Encyclopedia Britannica - alternative to wikipedia (proprietary).

Librivox - free public domain audiobooks.

Petrolette.space - rss reader on your browser.

Project Gutenberg - library of public domain ebooks.

Standard Ebooks - public domain ebooks that are carefully formatted.

Research Rabbit - tool to discover research papers (proprietary).

DeepL - translation tool (proprietary alternative to google translate).

Lingva Translate - a FOSS front-end for Google Translate.

Libre Translate - translation tool.

SimplyTranslate - translation tool.

ii.5) Content sharing

Ambient Mixer - listen and mix royalty-free ambient sound.

Codeberg - software development platform.

DaFont - collection of fonts.

Font Squirrel - collection of fonts.

Freepd - royalty-free music.

Freetube - private youtube client for desktop.

Hedgedoc - platform to write and share markdown.

Incompetech - royalty-free music.

Inventaire - book inventory and sharing.

Invidious instances - front end for youtube.

Jitsi Meet - video calls and conferencing.

KissccO - library of free-usable images.

Mastodon - social networking.

Neocites - web hosting service.

PDP - public domain pictures.

Peertube - decentralized video platform.

Pickup Image - library of free-usable images.

Pixelfed - photo sharing platform.

p2p.chat - peer-to-peer video conferencing application.

Unsplash - library of free-usable images.

ii.6) Cloud storage

Cryptee - encrypted service to store notes, documents and photos.

Filen - encrypted cloud storage.

Nextcloud - cloud storage.

OwnDrive (Nexcloud host).

The Good Cloud (Nexcloud host).

Wolkli (Nexcloud host).

ii.7) Games

I'm not a gamer, but I'm adding these in case you want some break from work.

Freesweep - minesweeper (cli app).

Lichess - online chess.

Nsnake - snake game (cli app).

Petris - tetris (cli app).

Shapez.io - puzzel games.

Veloren - multiplayer RPG.

You can also find more games here:

Games on the Linux console.

Inconsolation.

Unix ASCII games.

ii.8) Others

Museopen - free music recordings, sheet music, apps, and educational materials.

Nomie - private life tracker.

Flow - habit tracker.

OpenStreetMap - online map.

Overleaf - online LaTeX editor.

Liberapay - donations platform.

LibreSpeed - speedtest (no flash, java, or websocket).

Mullvad - VPN.

Snopyta - various privacy focused online services.

uMap - create maps with OpenStreetMap layers.