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SourceForge's Hottest Five Apps

Posted by kdawson on from the top-of-the-heap dept.

davidmwilliams points us to his story up on IT Wire about the top five most active open source projects on SourceForge. (Sourceforge.net and Slashdot are both owned by SourceForge Inc.) He writes, "It explains what they do and why they're useful. Most of these will be new to most people but all are definitely bursting with potential."

92 of 141 comments (clear)

  1. Well this is stupid by The+Real+Toad+King · · Score: 5, Insightful

    All they did was take the most active projects this week and commented on them.

    What was the point in this?

    1. Re:Well this is stupid by niceone · · Score: 1

      That's what I thought too. Its kind of like doing a music chart by looking at who's spending the most time in the studio (or maybe who's smashing up the most hotel rooms?).

      --
      ccalam - acoustic versions of new songs.
    2. Re:Well this is stupid by crivens · · Score: 2, Informative

      Site traffic obviously....

    3. Re:Well this is stupid by bluelip · · Score: 3, Informative

      Before trashing the article, read it. The very azureus you complain wasn't mentioned, was the #1 hottest project.

      RTFA, DA.

      --

      Yep, I never spell check.
      More incorrect spellings can be found he
    4. Re:Well this is stupid by palewook · · Score: 1

      notta clue. 6 of the top 10 downloads on this SourceForge list are p2p. hardly news nor surprising

    5. Re:Well this is stupid by donarb · · Score: 1

      What was the point in this?

      No Paris Hilton news this week...

    6. Re:Well this is stupid by ak3ldama · · Score: 2

      Or looking at the top 10 tracks at last.fm! haha. Ooh, apparently Oasis has a new song called Wonderwall, I should do a review on it!

      --
      "but money is the God of Algiers & Mahomet their prophet." - Rich. O'Bryen June 8th 1786
    7. Re:Well this is stupid by devilspgd · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Its kind of like doing a music chart by looking at who's spending the most time in the studio (or maybe who's smashing up the most hotel rooms?). Would that be better or worse then basing it on who is paying radio stations the most this week?
      --
      Give a man a fish, he'll eat for a day, but teach a man to phish...
    8. Re:Well this is stupid by flyingfsck · · Score: 1

      So the projects with the most bugs are at the top and the stable ones that just work and don't need updates are at the bottom - duh...

      --
      Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
    9. Re:Well this is stupid by bvankuik · · Score: 1

      Turn off your negativity filter man. It's a perfectly good way to make the sf.net top 10 list more readable. I knew the list existed but didn't take the time to look up each separate project its purpose.

  2. Stellarium by ajs · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Stellarium is right up there with Celestia for outstanding astro simulations. I use the two together when planning a night of stargazing or meteor watching in the mountains, and highly recommend them to anyone. Both have somewhat odd UIs to get used to, but it's one of the rare cases where the app itself is so uniquely useful that the UI is a secondary concern.

    1. Re:Stellarium by ajs · · Score: 4, Informative

      I was really disapointed to find out that they are planning to migrate to a Qt-based interface instead of their current one or instead of using a more open toolkit such as GTK+. There's nothing "more open" about GTK+. Qt was a commercial toolkit with a semi-proprietary license many years ago, but has long been under the GPL.

      This means that I will probably have to stop using it (or maintain a fork) because Qt is banned in my company. Banning the use of apps which utilize a certain toolkit (unless there's some financial or security impact from using that toolkit) is absurd. Find a new company.
    2. Re:Stellarium by overlordmead · · Score: 1

      Seriously though.... no scripted screen caps? That would have saved me hours of work for my Astronomy class this semester.

      --
      Think Gnole-ish, not prole-ish
  3. SourceForge Too Big And Now Not Supported by curmudgeon99 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    SourceForge is too big now. If you start a project and have a support request--good luck getting it answered. Having fought with their CVS implementation for a few weeks, I abandoned sourceforge for GoogleCode. Much easier.

    1. Re:SourceForge Too Big And Now Not Supported by Otter · · Score: 5, Funny
      As an example, search for "calendar". 2 of the first 3 returned have no code, and no website.

      Yes, we refer to those as "Outlook killers".

      Stellarium, by the way, is a superb piece of software and it's good to see it get attention even via a route as clueless as this article.

      --
      What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
    2. Re:SourceForge Too Big And Now Not Supported by _xeno_ · · Score: 5, Informative

      The problem is you can't cancel projects. I know I've got a few projects on SourceForge that I never intend to do anything with. One of them even has some code.

      In any case, I've long since lost both the password for that SourceForge account and no longer have access to the email address I used to create it, so those projects will remain forever, clogging up SourceForge despite the fact that they're long dead.

      I don't think SourceForge should just delete dead projects, but it would be nice if they'd move them into a "SourceForge Archive" or something after a project fails to see any activity or downloads for, say, a year. Leave them accessible, but stop returning them in searches unless a "search archives" option is set.

      --
      You are in a maze of twisty little relative jumps, all alike.
    3. Re:SourceForge Too Big And Now Not Supported by jiriki · · Score: 2, Informative

      Well there is: "Development Status : 7 - Inactive".
      This is probably exactly what you are searching for.

      (Won't help you with your login though...)

    4. Re:SourceForge Too Big And Now Not Supported by anomalous+cohort · · Score: 4, Informative

      Having fought with their CVS implementation for a few weeks

      I recently started a project over at sourceforge and I think that what they provide is really great. They give you all kinds of features like forums, news, trackers, and web site statistics via RSS. They will host a web site to promote your project. That hosting includes the ability to run a web application written in perl and access to your own database on a MySql server. With that much capability, I implemented the project web site using the source code of the project itself.

      You also get ssh, sftp, and cvs (via ssh) access. I haven't run into any problems with updating the content. There is a web interface for downloading code but you have to use cvs for uploading. I don't know what problem the original poster was running into but I found no difficulties with it.

    5. Re:SourceForge Too Big And Now Not Supported by curmudgeon99 · · Score: 1

      Okay, I'll elaborate. Granted, SF gives you a lot of bells. But, although I got my SF site to store my key, I could not get a connection. I sent in a support request to SF and they replied RTFM. Well, I followed up with that manual, and it led to three more. That's all fine but it just did not work for me. GoogleCode--on the other hand--was just plain easy to use. If it worked for you--great--but it didn't work for me. I've used SSH and CVS for years but this was hosed up. In any case, I'm happy at GoogleCode and would not think of returning to SF.

    6. Re:SourceForge Too Big And Now Not Supported by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

      Actually, last February, SourceForge implemented a policy to reduce the number of dead projects. It works something like this. When a project has no activity at all for (something like) 6 months, a notice is sent to the developer(s). I think they have something like 30 days to respond to keep the project active. Beyond that it is removed from the actual database but can be reinstated upon request for a certain period of time. Beyond that time the project is permanently deleted. (Note: I'm pretty sure I saw actual numbers like these stated somewhere in a bulletin or article or something, but I can't find it. Here is something pulled from SF: )
      2006-07

      Major Changes and Enhancements:

              * The SourceForge.net Engineering team added a site feature, allowing projects to reference an externally hosted Subversion repository from the Subversion link on the project summary page. The end-goal is to provide a similar setting for the other site tools allowing the single landing page to point to all major project resources, hosted at SourceForge.net or not.
              * The SourceForge.net Engineering team added a tool to allow a user to remove their user account without the need to request removal from Support. This new tool can be accessed from your SourceForge.net Account page.
              * The SourceForge.net Engineering team added a private flag to Tracker. This allows projects or users to flag their tracker items as private, keeping the data between the submitter and the project's Tracker Editors.
              * The SourceForge.net Service Operations Group upgraded ViewVC for both Subversion and CVS services to the latest version, 1.0.1. This upgrade, along with a few functional changes, should greatly improve the availability of ViewVC for the Subversion service.
              * The SourceForge.net Service Operations Group finished an initial run of the Project Autopurge System, removing all projects in a deleted status, and inactive projects that released no source and whose administrators didn't opt-out of the process. This should increase the pool of names available for projects and reduce the number of inactive projects on SourceForge.net.

    7. Re:SourceForge Too Big And Now Not Supported by anomalous+cohort · · Score: 1

      I guess that it doesn't really matter since you moved on but just in case anyone else is running into this, did you set the CVS_RSH environment variable to ssh? Also, there is no need to store your key at SF.

      I'm using a RHAT 9 machine when I connect. That might also make a difference.

    8. Re:SourceForge Too Big And Now Not Supported by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

      If the project has no other members and no code, or nothing other than the initial CVS check-in, they will delete a project if asked. I've done it.

      Of course if you can't log in to do so, then their reasons for not deleting the project are pretty obvious. At any rate, SourceForget's searching and browsing completely sucks, and their activity measurement metric isn't very good either. You get what you pay for I guess.

    9. Re:SourceForge Too Big And Now Not Supported by Sterling2p · · Score: 1

      I have a small project on sourceforge as well and I had a lot of problems learning the CVS system. The program Tourtoise CVS helped me a lot!

    10. Re:SourceForge Too Big And Now Not Supported by BlackFingolfin · · Score: 3, Informative

      Sorry, but your spreading incorrect information here:

      First of, it *is* possible to cancel projects. In the admin section, there is a whole section dedicated specifically to "Project Removal". In addition, you can takeover existing orphaned projects, there is a support document explaining how.

      Secondly: If you lost your password or do not have access to your old email address anymore: They have a whole support document dealing just with that topic, too: .

      Finally, projects which never made any code releases and have no other "real" data etc. are automtaically purged after some time. In addition they even undertook a big effort 1-2 years ago to mark and "delete" empty projects (with lots of fail safes, asking all project members whether the project is really dead etc. etc.) -- it still produced a cry of outrage over here on slashdot... The usual double standards seem to apply here :-/

    11. Re:SourceForge Too Big And Now Not Supported by curmudgeon99 · · Score: 1

      Wrong you are. SF expects you to upload your SSH key. Please refer to this link. The only way SF allow you to access their site as a developer is by setting your public key with SF and then trying to connect using PuTTY. Pain in the ass. I could never get a connection and when I asked for some support, they basically ignored my request. They have that right--granted--as I'm not paying for any services. But I also have the right to take my project elsewhere--as I chose.

    12. Re:SourceForge Too Big And Now Not Supported by anomalous+cohort · · Score: 1

      I guess you are now going to explain to me how I can easily check in my changes without uploading that key? Since you are the one who can never get the connection and since I am the one who has no problems, maybe you're the one who is wrong. As they say, the proof is in the pudding.

      The advantage of using shared SSH keys is that you don't have to type in your password with each CVS command. It is not a requirement, however.

    13. Re:SourceForge Too Big And Now Not Supported by curmudgeon99 · · Score: 1

      Obviously, if I didn't get in, something was wrong. But the way I read it--to have developer access to your CVS tree, you must upload that key. They did not offer me any alternative. I tried for weeks to get through that. In the meantime, I heard about GoogleCode and then I was very easily able to upload my source using SVN. Did you check out the image I linked to? That is the actual page where they show the key I was finally able to upload. But it did not work. In short, I was only offered to use the SSH-governed upload.

  4. In case you forgot: by Joe+Snipe · · Score: 2, Insightful

    SourceForge.net and Slashdot are both owned by OSTG.

    Also, this is neither news (let alone for nerds) or stuff that matters.

    --
    Sometimes, life itself is sarcasm...
    1. Re:In case you forgot: by SirTalon42 · · Score: 1

      Actually its no longer the OSTG. Apparently they renamed themselves yet again and they're now SourceForge Inc.

    2. Re:In case you forgot: by dintech · · Score: 3, Funny

      News from CEOs, stuff that flatters.

    3. Re:In case you forgot: by Just+Some+Guy · · Score: 1

      SourceForge.net and Slashdot are both owned by OSTG.

      Alternatively, you could RTFSummary which said the same thing (but more accurately). You know, in case you forgot.

      --
      Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
  5. Re:Its spam by eebra82 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Your problem is that you waste too much time bothering and then commenting. Yes, this news is sort of questionable but so is some news at CNN, CNet and other networks too.

    The trick is to waste as little time as possible per news item you do not find interesting. No one gives a shit if you stop visiting Slashdot. I know I will, because I really enjoy the service as it is.

    Perfection is an illusion.

    --
    Full Tilt
  6. Re:OSS P2P by dintech · · Score: 2, Insightful

    One word: Bandwidth.

  7. Go Azureus! by mattgreen · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Let me tell you, I've always wanted a Java P2P client. My biggest irk with uTorrent is it doesn't take up enough resources. Honestly, I can't believe the developers of uTorrent had the nerve to not put an entire plug-in architecture into it. They're totally missing the boat here.

    Besides, everyone KNOWS that the more design patterns you use, the better your program is!

    1. Re:Go Azureus! by twistedsymphony · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Despite your snaky cynicism (which is probably what got your the flamebait mod) I tend to agree with you sentiment. I ditched Azures months ago for uTorrent due mostly to it's unnecessary bloat. Are there even any worth while plug-ins for it?

      For the type of app that generally runs consistently in the background bloat is the last thing you want, similarly a pretty interface isn't all that necessary based on the amount of time most users will actually spend looking at it.

      --
      Collector's Edition
    2. Re:Go Azureus! by Kalewa · · Score: 4, Funny

      Tell me about it. I switched to uTorrent awhile ago and now all of my RAM is just...sitting around. It's not even doing anything. I mean come on, where's the bloated interface and memory leaks I'd become so accustomed to? Hell, I don't even have to change processor priority on uTorrent when I want to play a game. I want a program I have to maintain.

    3. Re:Go Azureus! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      Let me tell you, I've always wanted a C++ P2P client. My biggest urk with Azureus is that it's just not fast enough. Some people may like to open their P2P client and let it just sit in the background, but I like to open and close it all day long, so that startup time is very important to me. I also like looking at my system resources and marveling and how much RAM I'm not using, so it's very important that my P2P client uses 500 kB of RAM rather than 4 MB when it's minimized. Why, that's almost enough space for Firefox to open another tab. They're totally missing the boat here.

      Besides, everyone KNOWS that the less your client is capable of doing, the better it is. Nobody really needs a web-based interface for remotely managing torrents or an SSL-capable tracker!

    4. Re:Go Azureus! by BobNET · · Score: 1

      Since the summary says that it only run on Windows, I'm sure the virus writers are at your door to fulfill your request.

      Thanks to WINE, uTorrent is running on my Linux box at this very moment. And it's still using fewer resources than Azureus would...

    5. Re:Go Azureus! by Silentknyght · · Score: 2, Interesting

      I thought the benefit was that Azureus was blatantly open source, where you could (potentially) see the code and ensure that it wasn't doing anything shady. I've heard uTorrent slandered because it is not open and that the (new?) owner of uTorrent has some dubious associations with anti-P2P associations.

    6. Re:Go Azureus! by twistedsymphony · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Funny you should mention the Open source aspect. I'm all for open source (I even make donations to several projects) but on more than one occasion I received tips from various sources to "not upgrade to the latest Azureus because of..." it seems that regularly people would slip trojans, viruses, spyware and other nasties into the official releases. It was enough make me turn off the auto-update feature and wait for the "all clear". Though I never really looked into any of those claims, it certainly made by decision to switch clients easier when I was looking for something less bloated.

      As for dubious intentions of uTorrent's developers, you're mention is the first I've heard of it.

      --
      Collector's Edition
    7. Re:Go Azureus! by kwark · · Score: 1

      "The most memory I've ever seen Azureus use was about 40 MB"

      I want a piece of that VM. ps:
        PID USER PR NI VIRT RES SHR S %CPU %MEM TIME+ P COMMAND
      2690 kwark 15 0 1282m 847m 7872 S 1 10.5 207:09.38 3 java

      And slowly growing. The fun stuff is that the JVM it is running in thinks it is using only about 400Mb (limited to 512Mb), monitoring about 67 torrents.

      It will keep growing until the machine thrashes itself to death, but still the JVM is completly ignorant of it's own memory usage. My guess would be that there is a memleak in the native SWT stuff that the JVM simply knows nothing about. Over the years the leak seems to be slowing down, but after upgrading from 512Mb to 8Gb RAM who cares :)

      But I still prefer azureur over rtorrent anyday due to all plugins available and the lack of DHT.

    8. Re:Go Azureus! by Nasarius · · Score: 1

      The most memory I've ever seen Azureus use was about 40 MB, and that was with over a dozen torrents running at once.
      Wow, over a dozen! That's amazing! Try seeding a couple hundred torrents (mostly idle, obviously) with Azureus, then get back to me. It brings my E6600 with 2 gigs of RAM to its knees, on Linux or Windows.
      --
      LOAD "SIG",8,1
    9. Re:Go Azureus! by Zantetsuken · · Score: 1
      Ermm... uTorrent supports all of that... Straight from Wikipedia - the official site probably lists even more features...

      Of the list below, particularly note "Azureus must first upgrade to enhanced messaging protocol" - meaning that Azureus would in-fact be the client lacking usable features...

      Not to mention that some people may not have the greatest machine and think they shouldn't have to make major hardware upgrades to a machine to run something AND still have to deal with programs being buggy. For example, somebody might have an old P2 or P3 sitting in their closet as a NAS, which they like to occaisionally remote SSH or VNC into and add torrents from work - if you don't have the memory to spare, how can you run Azureus at all?

      Features present in Torrent include:
      • * Unicode support for Windows 95/98/ME, avoiding use of the Microsoft Layer for Unicode which is several times larger than Torrent.
      • * UPnP support for all versions of Windows, without needing Windows XP's UPnP framework.
      • * Protocol encryption (PE),
      • * Peer exchange (PEX) with other Torrent clients,
        • o libtorrent and clients based on it (MooPolice, etc.) have full Torrent PEX support.
        • o KTorrent has full Torrent PEX support as of 2.1 RC1.
        • o Azureus must first upgrade to enhanced messaging protocol[2].
      • * RSS ("broadcatching").
      • * "Trackerless" BitTorrent support using DHT, compatible with the original BitTorrent client and BitComet.
      • * User configurable intelligent disk caching system.
      • * Full proxy server support.
      • * HTTPS tracker support.
      • * Configurable bandwidth scheduler.
      • * Customizable search bar and icons.
      • * Localized for 38 languages[3].
      • * Initial seeding of torrents.
      • * Customizable user interface design[4]
      • * Configuration settings and temporary files are stored in a single directory, allowing portable use.
      • * WebUI
      • * Embedded Tracker - a simple tracker designed for seeding torrents, lacking a web interface or list of hosted torrents. It is not designed for secure or large-scale application.[5]
      • * Most of the features in Torrent work under Linux and Macintosh OSX under the Wine compatibility layer or the latest version of the proprietary software Cedega.
      Reading your post gives me the impression that you just found Ubuntu less than a month ago, and are still telling your friends "It's *just* like Winblows but better - and you get the purty Compiz too!"
    10. Re:Go Azureus! by Res3000 · · Score: 1

      The new owner of uTorrent is BitTorrent, Inc.

      So uTorrent is now owned by Bram Cohen, the one who wrote the protocol.

    11. Re:Go Azureus! by Silentknyght · · Score: 1

      So uTorrent is now owned by Bram Cohen, the one who wrote the protocol. And since it does not appear to be open source, and since Brahm Cohen has aided the MPAA in the past, http://www.slyck.com/news.php?story=1006 , that leaves me to be extra cautious / paranoid. Use your own judgment, of course.
    12. Re:Go Azureus! by Builder · · Score: 1

      Yeah, but... Azureus has one awesome thing going for it. I can have it running on my server at home, and using a widget on my mac, I can kick off a new torrent. So I have all the happiness of my mac, but my machine at home is doing the downloading, and next time I'm in the world, I can pick the stuff up.

      If I didn't have that, my link would be REALLY busy one week in 4, and totally idle the rest of the time.

      I'm also prepared to live with Azureus because it offers me a feature neither ktorrent nor utorrent offered last time I looked - the ability to open multiple torrent files at once instead of having to open each one individually.

  8. Re:OSS P2P by orra · · Score: 2, Insightful

    When there are new releases of a Linux distro, lots of people want to try it out. Despite having lots of mirrors, projects can crumble.

    BitTorrent helps.

  9. Re:OSS P2P by pebs · · Score: 2, Informative

    Wonder what percentage of the software downloaded via OSS P2P is actually Open Source itself?

    I guess you wouldn't necessarily need to download software via P2P if it was actually free to begin with.

    Granted, it is a smaller percentage, but in the case of Bittorrent it is being used more and more for legitimate software downloads. Bittorrent is really just another file transfer protocol that happens to be P2P. I download a lot of larger open source apps via P2P when I can because its generally faster, especially for new releases. Podcasts, especially video podcasts, are especially good to use Bittorrent for. Since it is subscription based, you have huge swarms trying to download the podcast at once, so Bittorrent is especially effective in that case.

    --
    #!/
  10. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  11. Not for end user. by jshriverWVU · · Score: 2, Funny
    I've only heard of 3 of these, and only used 2. The rest seem more geared toward businsess and not the end user.

    Would be nice to see a top 10 user geared list.

    1. Re:Not for end user. by kalirion · · Score: 1

      What do you mean "Not for end user"? Every project that's meant to be used is geared towards an end user. If a business uses it, the business is an end user. If the developers use it, they are the end users.

    2. Re:Not for end user. by jshriverWVU · · Score: 1

      End user being average joe sixpack sitting at home typing an email. Perhaps there's a better term for that.

    3. Re:Not for end user. by th3space · · Score: 1

      End user being average joe sixpack sitting at home typing an email. Perhaps there's a better term for that.
      Hmmmm...Joe Sixpack, perhaps? ;)
      --
      "How like you to drag your keyboard to a gun fight." - Aaron Bedard (BANE)
    4. Re:Not for end user. by rduke15 · · Score: 1

      So you feel the article should have been about 4 email clients and a beer opener?

  12. Re:OSS P2P by LWATCDR · · Score: 3, Informative

    "I guess you wouldn't necessarily need to download software via P2P if it was actually free to begin with."
    Actually yes you do. Things like Linux ISOs are BIG. And not every distribution has the luxury of deep pockets for band width.
    Even distros like Fedora offer torrents of the ISOs the save bandwidth and to speed up downloads.
    I have only used bit torrent to download Linux ISOs.

    --
    See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
  13. Re:OSS P2P by jshriverWVU · · Score: 1

    Little confused over your question, but the #1 item on the list was Azureus which is a open source P2P application.

  14. Re:Four letters they missed by Oscar_Wilde · · Score: 1

    Four letters they missed...
     
    They didn't miss anything. The list only includes the five most active projects from last week.

  15. nothing new by asabjorn · · Score: 3, Informative

    For me Datamations list was much more interesting since they spend time digging up new and upcoming projects I did not know about like kdenlive (kind of like the Diva video editor, but not a dead project). http://itmanagement.earthweb.com/osrc/article.php/ 3678071

  16. Gotta have Azureus! by shadowrat · · Score: 3, Funny

    "Azureus is the #1 application on SourceForge today. It needs little introduction and is both known and used throughout the world. "

    Well, that's all the information i need to know! Where do i sign up?

  17. Re:OSS P2P by Mockylock · · Score: 1

    I see. I have noticed there were actually more and more places using torrents. I guess I've never messed with torrents much because of usenet.

    --
    "Please, shut up. Just when I think you can't say anything more stupid, you speak again." -Archie Bunker.
  18. Zenoss Core by dave562 · · Score: 1

    Is anybody using this in a production environment? I've been trying to get HP OpenView implimented and it is one big fat PITA. All I really need to do at this point is monitor server disk/partition usage. It would also be nice to inventory the network but that is a secondary objective. Any suggestions for an easy to use tool. Will Zenoss do it?

    1. Re:Zenoss Core by GombuMstr · · Score: 1

      you will want to try zabbix. very slick, easy and works very well. www.zabbix.com

    2. Re:Zenoss Core by dino2gnt · · Score: 1

      Offtopic: I've played around with Zenoss, and I can tell you that it isn't a good enough NMS to replace http://www.opennms.org/ OpenNMS, and doesn't graph well enough to replace http://www.cacti.net/ Cacti.

      --
      Future events such as these may affect you in the future!
  19. Most useful from SF by tkdtaylor · · Score: 3, Informative

    The one program I always download from SF is filezilla (client) and recently I set up the server version to replace the broken default IIS FTP server.
    Both client and server are working great, highly recommended free open source FTP client and server.

    1. Re:Most useful from SF by TClevenger · · Score: 2, Informative
      Yup. My big three (that I put on any Windows machine I own) are:

      1. FileZilla. Great FTP and SFTP client.

      2. TUGZip. Excellent WinZip replacement.

      3. PDFCreator. Makes PDFs out of the output of any program with a "Print..." option.

    2. Re:Most useful from SF by J0nne · · Score: 3, Informative

      TugZip isn't open source, even though it's an excellent app, especially since it opens pretty much any archive type.

    3. Re:Most useful from SF by TClevenger · · Score: 1

      Sorry; you're correct. It's freeware, so I just assumed it was OS.

  20. Did iTWire's CSS fail to load anyone else? by Short+Circuit · · Score: 1

    Their CSS failed to load for me. If nothing else, it's a nice demonstration on how CSS can fail gracefully...

    --
    tasks(723) drafts(105) languages(484) examples(29106)
    1. Re:Did iTWire's CSS fail to load anyone else? by Zantetsuken · · Score: 1

      Yup, mine too - I'm not sure if its because of NoScript or not, though I kinda doubt it, as I've had for example the HP site do this without NoScript installed (hell, this was before I even found noscript)...

    2. Re:Did iTWire's CSS fail to load anyone else? by Short+Circuit · · Score: 1

      I wasn't running NoScript on that box, so that wasn't the issue.

      --
      tasks(723) drafts(105) languages(484) examples(29106)
  21. Re:OSS P2P by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Check http://www.legaltorrents.com/ - legal files distributed via Bittorrent.

    But since you mentioned software, check http://www.planeshift.it/ - an open source game distributed via Bittorrent.

  22. I'd rather see a wish list of projects by goombah99 · · Score: 1
    Here's one I'm wishing someone would do:

    A C++ binding for YAML

    What's on your wish list?

    --
    Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
    1. Re:I'd rather see a wish list of projects by poopdeville · · Score: 1

      A JIT compiled Ruby VM. Should be possible if you use LLVM. Hop to it, goombah.

      --
      After all, I am strangely colored.
  23. Don't worry by spun · · Score: 3, Funny

    It'll all be okay. You just need to find a dark, quiet room where you can chill out until the walls stop melting.

    --
    - None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
    1. Re:Don't worry by deanoaz · · Score: 5, Funny

      The bad thing is, I'm only 97 percent sure that was written by some kind of randomizing post creating software. There are enough really weird people around that I have to consider the possibility that all of that made sense to somebody.

      --
      If 'the people' in Amendment 2 are 'the state' then Amendments 1, 2, 4, 9, and 10 benefit the state, not you.
    2. Re:Don't worry by Jesterboy · · Score: 1

      Sadly, I used to attend a college course with a guy who talked EXACTLY like this, so I guess it must have made sense to him. He essentially ruined the class's forum by dumping huge amounts of posts like this on it.

      The best part was when the teacher stepped in, and asked him to stop his "mental masturbation".

  24. Re:Four letters they missed by jellomizer · · Score: 1

    So those where 5 projects that there was an update with, and 2 people downloaded. Right

    --
    If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
  25. It's free hosting. What do you expect? by Animats · · Score: 1

    That's because the SourceForge CEO liked to give talks boasting about how many projects they hosted.

    Most of the dead projects ought to be moved to something like "SourceForge archive", where they remain as a historical record and are searchable, but can no longer be updated and are just static pages.

    1. Re:It's free hosting. What do you expect? by idontgno · · Score: 1

      Hmmm. Maybe our little town could have avoided annexation by the big city next door if we could have counted the inhabitants of the local graveyards in our population.

      C'mon, SF, get it together. Dead is DEAD. A project with no activity and no ability to contact the principals needs to AT LEAST get "archived".

      Geesh. That's why I never search SF itself for anything; I take pointers from external sources like recent mail-list traffic. That way you know the project mentioned isn't merely dust and a bad smell.

      --
      Welcome to the Panopticon. Used to be a prison, now it's your home.
  26. Google Earth uses Ajax? by kalirion · · Score: 1

    From the article's explanation of Ajax:

    Google Earth is a web app. What makes it so snappy is Ajax.

    I've never actually used Google Earth, but I was under the impression that it does NOT run inside a web browser. So why would it use javascript? Maybe they meant to use Google Maps as an example?

  27. Well Said by kentyman · · Score: 1

    Mod parent up.

    --
    You know where you are? You're in the $PATH, baby. You're gonna get executed!
  28. TUGZip vs 7-ZIP by gr8dude · · Score: 1

    Is there a comparison between TUGZip and 7-ZIP? (also see 7-zip.org)

    --
    The saddest poem
    1. Re:TUGZip vs 7-ZIP by J0nne · · Score: 1

      TUGzip has a nicer interface (supports drag & drop for one, while 7-zip doesn't, last time i checked). And tugzip can also compress/decompress .7z files, so you can still use 7-zip's superior compression in a nice interface.

  29. No way. by thePowerOfGrayskull · · Score: 2, Funny

    This can't be a real web site. Where are the ugly colors, the Flash, the heavy graphics, for the gods' sakes, WHERE ARE THE ADS?!

    1. Re:No way. by thePowerOfGrayskull · · Score: 1

      Oh, there it is! Phew. I stand with my faith in the basic universal ugliness of sites fully restored.

    2. Re:No way. by h3 · · Score: 1

      http://www.itwire.com.au/content/view/13085/53/

  30. Re:The end of the article says 10... by triso · · Score: 1

    Hmm... the end of the article says "top 10 open-source projects".

    Someone forget a link to the first or did the author mess up? Perhaps the author is counting in base 5 because his other hand is busy...or perhaps the first five were done yesterday.

  31. As a user... by obeythefist · · Score: 1

    I really like sourceforge.

    I know that when I'm searching, googling if you will, for an app to do something, if a sourceforge link comes up, the software I get from there will be open source, and (maybe I am making a big jump here) virus and spyware free as a result.

    Am I lazy because I can't be stuffed researching too much about the apps I need? Maybe. But sourceforge is double plus good if you ask me.

    --
    I am government man, come from the government. The government has sent me. -- G.I.R.
  32. zk unimpressive by Chris+Pimlott · · Score: 1

    Never heard of zk before, but their demos are very uninspiring.

    Now this is an impressive ajax framework demo.

  33. Re:Its spam by sisinka · · Score: 1

    No one gives a shit if you stop visiting Slashdot. I quite get your point in this case, but still - this bugger off if you don't like it approach should be used VERY seldom. (If at all..?).
    --
    My parser is a grammar nazi.
  34. SLOWforge by insanechemist · · Score: 1

    is what they ought to call it. Takes forever to load no matter where I'm browsing from.

    --
    I thought it was a good idea
  35. Be Happy! by spun · · Score: 1

    Dying in your sleep is easy. I've died when I'm awake. DMT, my friend. More than once. Gone beyond, completely beyond. And I still can't make sense of you. But, you intrigue me to no end. S'why I responded. I thought, hey, with a mind like that, our little Jimekai has either done A LOT of hallucinogens, is a high functioning schizophrenic, is WAY more intelligent than me, or some combination. Whichever it is, fascinating. Utterly, utterly fascinating. But maybe I'm just weird that way. I'd rather have a completely unintelligible conversation with an interesting weirdo than a predictable conversation with a boring straight.

    --
    - None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton