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Freeware for Windows -- Where Did It Go?
Talahamut asks: "The other day, I was planning on recording a radio show by running my stereo's output into my PC. Oooh, that sucks - WinXP's Sound Recorder limits you to 60 sec. recordings. Oh well, I'll just go online and grab a little WAV recorder. 30 minutes later, I'm frustrated because all I find is crippleware (time-limited, of course...) that records every format under the sun from any sound stream imaginable. What happened to the small home-brewed Windows utilities that used to be so easy to find online years ago? All the freeware sites I checked had nothing but commercial crippleware. Is there no place to find simple programs like that anymore?"
A vast majority of the stuff that was once released as freeware is now open source. There are a number of reasons behind this; the ubiquity of the internet and its usefulness in collaboration, the increased availability of high quality development tools and the fact that if you're not making money off some code, you might as well release the source.
With that in mind, Audacity, while being a bit more full featured than a simple sound recorder, will take care of what you need.
my sig's at the bottom of the page.
is that I can d/l a program for *Nix that is free (both beer and speech) and find that the exact same prog is shareware or commerical for Win32. VCDEasy and WinAirSnort come to mind.
It doesn't kill me to pay for software, but I remember the CD's of free games and tools that anyone running DOS could use.
Vertical
72 CD D7 52 D0 7E D8 47 44 91 D5 84 D1 59 F1 A9-This is my 128bit integer. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
I'll never forget the mess AOL's icq client and Kazaa's browser stuff made of my PC. For most utilities, sourceforge tends to have it. Better still, software from sourceforge doesn't install a ton of spyware, hijack your web browser or do any of the crap that freeware/shareware people are forced to do to pay for hosting.
This is one area where open source works. To see the benefit, compare DC++ or eMule with their proprietary equivalents. Better quality because no annoying attempt to install stuff other than what is needed.
Spyware has killed the freeware/shareware world. The degree to which Miranda and eMule are better than their 'free as in beer' equivalents still amazes me.
1000s Warcraft Gold while you sleep
After a bit more thinking, maybe the demand for freeware has dropped due to fear of viruses and an increase in technophobic users. The latter is inevitable and isn't meant in a bad way. The former is a problem that is solved by source code liberation - when software has assistants or gaurdians rather than owners.
/var/lib/apt/lists/*
When I need software? in kinda this order:
$ grep keyword
(that's for Debian, but I'm sure there are similar package lists with descriptions on the other distros)
If that doesn't work, I try the free software directory, and then freshmeat.
Please help publicise swpat.org - the software patents wiki
Maybe he just needs to "try searching". I know assholes post on boards saying "where do I find XYZ?" instead of checking Google first, but it's really come to a pretty sad state when they get an "Ask Slashdot" instead of searching Google!
Grab.
Bwahahahaha! Good one. Here's another. Maybe they will find it more stable and open. Maybe MS programmers will start participating with the community and answering questions on the developers newsgroups. :-)
:-)
But one the serious side, all too many Windows developers get sucked into this idea that they are going to get rich off "shareware." It's just not fun. The developers who are just in it for fun are going to move to a truely open platform where they can share in the work of others in an evironment that fosters those ideals instead of the ideals of greed.
So anyway, I don't think it's Windows programmers transitioning to Linux, it's just that most Windows programmers are greedy.
Oh yeah, give this post a half
ms bought them all out or hired the developper/s
if you can't beat'em, buy'em!
This is a test!
GnuWin is a nice burnable collection of free software for Windows.
I personally always include a "GPL" when I search for Windows software; helps filter out the cripppleware.
Joe Average is not going to change his entire operating system to record a radio broadcast... get real.
...and that's all there is to it.
As a reminder of how to develop under MFC a couple of days ago I wrote a toy program for monitoring machines.
Kinda like Nagios does (formerly netsaint) but in a single application instead of a webbased system.
I sent a copy to a colleague who appreciated it, and one of his first comments was sell it for 29$!
I am a Debian guy, I write free software for Linux/Unix and I could do for Windows - but to be honest I have no qualms about charging for Windows.
Why? None of the software I've produced has been by any means essential, its just handy stuff for the sysadmin type who has to look after a lot of Windows desktops.
If people use it fine, if they sent me money fine, if not I really don't mind.
Under Linux or Unix I'd honestly not consider it. I might get paid to update some software, or write something specifically for you (that happens every few months, usually for peanuts; but sometimes for suprisingly large amounts of cast) - but I'll not write something random then expect people to pay for it. It's a completely different market and mindset.
People under Windows may hate it, but they have been conditioned to expect to pay for software which is any good. Winamp is even going back to a premium paid product, after previously being shareware then going free!
Download.com and similar sites used to be good sources of freeware, but since they started charging to list your software, the freeware is gone; at best, the authors will want to recoup their listing fee.
To ensure perfect aim, shoot first and call whatever you hit the target
The folks who wrote DOS and Windows freeware in the 80's and 90's have just gotten tired of it. It was fun, but the community of techie early adopters has been inundated with everybody and his mother-in-law, and it's just not the same anymore. If they're still doing it, they've decided to make a job of it: hence crippleware requiring payment. Some have moved on to Linux and such, but the rest are just middle-aged parents who don't have time or enthusiasm for it anymore.
Meanwhile, the new generation of techie types (who could have been early adopters of PCs, but now it's too late for that) have either gone directly into open-source, or they've grown up in that "mature market" of Windows, where it seems that most of the neat toys and applets they'd want are already bundled with the OS, and the bubbling stewpot of innovation has cooled to a simmer.
Another related factor is that the nature of the computer you take out of the box has changed dramatically over that timeframe. If you bought a computer 25 years ago, it was expected that you would do some programming with it. Turn on that Apple II or C64 or that IBM PC without an OS installed, and you're in a BASIC interpretter. The more recent computer purchaser is never really given that nudge.
http://alternatives.rzero.com/
Along the same lines is the expense of developing on the Windows Platform. If you use actual legal copies of Microsoft's development tools, the cost is somewhat significant. This makes the bar to being able to afford to develop freeware a little higher.
Also, more and more companies are making it difficult to develop freeware if you are a corporate developer. Many companies now claim that they own everything that you do even on your own time, or at least have very strict rules about using company assests (their development tools) to do personal work.
These combined together have hurt "free" software on windows. The financial side keeps young programmers from developing "free" software, as they desparately need to recover their costs. The business side keeps many professional programmers from contributing as they don't want to fight the corporate battles to defend what they are doing. I know several folks in both categories. Most of the young folks are moving to Linux where the tools are much less expensive and the professional guys are finding things to do besides computer work on their own time.
I have no sig, does anyone have one to spare?
Actually, the _worst_ software is often the most expensive: Vertical applications that cost thousands or tens of thousands of dollars per seat. You are paying for very specialized functionality, and are often dedicating an employee or employees to using the software. Companies that do these kinds of packages have little or no incentive to make them usable because they often have little or no competition. If you're the only one who makes this specialized software, your customers are locked in, so you keep them just slightly less than ticked off enough to stop doing business with you.
Either that your Rational or Real, or in many cases, Microsoft and you simply hate your customers.
You are in a maze of twisty little passages, all alike.
The availability of a free-as-in-beer compiler for Windows doesn't have as much of an impact on Windows programmers as you might think. In the free-software world, the good coders tend to work on the Linux kernel and such things. In the Windows world, the good coders tend to want money for their work. Which means that the people left to develop freeware (i.e. free-as-in-beer, not-usually-free-as-in-speech software) are...
The not-so-good coders. The coders who would just look at you funny if you suggested that they use a command-line tool.
Sure, there are exceptions, like the excellent IrfanView and of course the wonderful (and also free-as-in-speech!) utility CDEX, and of course many "cross-platform" projects like Audacity and The GIMP (many of which originated in the Linux/Unix world anyhow)... buuuut... the majority of the freeware coders in the Windows world tend to be those who couldn't easily make a living off of their code.
You have to remember that the CULTURE in the Windows world is not like that of the Linux world...
While we're on the topic of comparative culture (drifting rapidly off-topic here, but...), please note that in Windows-land, money is a much stronger motivator. Additionally, in Windows-land, conformity is a lot more prevalent. You still see Unix coders who prefer some obscure clone of EMACS or vi, or an even more obscure editor no one's heard of, or one they wrote themselves. Windows people tend to write their papers in MS Word, and only MS Word... because that's what everyone else uses. It is a more conformist culture (this isn't a judgment, it's simply a fact!)
I am, at this very moment, editing a letter using GNU nano and a CGI I scripted in Perl to format it nicely for printing and/or PDFing. I'm not using MS Office, or even OpenOffice. And there are gajillions of people using "weird" or otherwise obscure solutions like that throughout the Unix world. In Windows-land, a weird approach like that would just get you funny looks. Like I said-- differences in culture...
Honey, I shrunk the Cygwin
There's plenty of open source out there.
The problem with looking for freeware on freeware/shareware sites is that those sites are desperate for some sort of revenue, so they prefer to host shareware and demos that they can earn revenue from through affiliate links. Having worked for such a site, I ought to know.
Most of the best freeware is open source nowadays. Whenever it's not it's usually to promote a commercial product. CDEX is one of the best cd rippers, sound recorders, and sound converters all in one.
In many cases, I don't think the incompatibilities were deliberate. The great thing about standards is that there are so many to choose from... Microsoft had to choose something, and it's not their fault that most people picked a different standard.
To take the sockets API as an example, the UNIX world had BSD sockets, while the Windows world had Winsock. Microsoft didn't invent Winsock -- it was put together by people who wanted TCP/IP on Windows back when Microsoft didn't provide this. When Microsoft added TCP/IP into Windows, they had a choice: They could use the "standard" BSD sockets, and break all the code people were already running on Windows, or they could build their version of the API people were already using.
In the case of threads, it's easy to ask why Microsoft doesn't use POSIX threads... except that the POSIX threads standard didn't exist until three years after Windows NT was first released. Oops.
As for graphics: If compatibility would mean supporting X windows, breaking compatibility is a Good Thing.
Tarsnap: Online backups for the truly paranoid
I think the amount of windows freeware is almost as abundant as there was in 1999/2000; it's just that bandwidth is no longer handed out like candy on Halloween in America.
That forces places like download.com to charge for their listings; and programmers then need to recoup their increased costs.
Plus, employees have less time to work on their programs; since they can't do it @ work anymore
(legal issues; having less leisure time there, etc.)
This is why it is often better to go to a site which serves as a portal to links to your subject of interest, rather than a general search engine.
Mac has the same problem that Windows has when it comes to freeware. The problem is more pronounced on Windows, simply because it's so widely used and developed for. It's kind of like shopping for music. Sure there's a lot of crap out there, but there are gems to be found amongst the dirt.
Yes, god forbid that anyone might try to come up with a better API.
;)
Surely something like that would never happen in the Linux world... oh, wait. It does happen. Everyone and their grandma has to come up with their own widgets (QT, GTK, Motif, Mozilla's own crap, etc), their very own font rendering library, their very own sound daemon, their very own graphics library (e.g., I'm sure SDL or SVGALib don't exactly align 1-to-1 with OpenGL either), etc.
So I hope you'll have some understanding if I find this kind of double standards funny. If it's in Linux it's cool to reinvent your own API for everything, but if it's Microsoft, it's a heinous crime to do the exact same thing. Right. Can I have some of those funny cigarettes too?
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
well, a guarenteed download/sale brings in "eyeballs", keeping their advertising rates high. if they can say to the advertisers "look how many people saw our site for ...", they can keep the advertising money flowing to more than cover costs for hosting the popular product.
the little-guys downloads aren't common enough to warrent raising advertising costs for their specific pages to cover the expense of hosting.
"But remember, most lynch mobs aren't this nice." (H.Simpson)
-- Joe