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Pyroom Text Editor Does Minimalism the Right Way May 23, 2012 
Whether you are writing code or creating editorial content, a noisy computing environment often can silence your productivity. The Pyroom Text Editor gives you a quiet environment where computing noise cannot distract you from your creativity. Computing noise -- that is, computing distractions from the task at hand -- comes from all the media outlets your computer provides.
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A Tale of Two Suites: Do We Still Need OpenOffice.org? May 17, 2012 
Would a rose by any other name still smell as sweet? Or would it, perhaps, end up sweeter?
That, essentially, is the question at the heart of the forking process, which in turn is at the heart of a key situation today. Namely: Now that we have LibreOffice, do we still need OpenOffice as well? In the wake of Apache OpenOffice's new update, that's been the question du jour down at the Linux blogosphere's Punchy Penguin Cafe.
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Whatever You Want, Miro Finds It, Gets It, Plays It May 16, 2012 
The Internet is a hub for acquiring music, video and a just about any
other form of content. Miro is one of the most capable player apps that
I have seen for all of this media. Keeping up with the various forms
of content the Web has to offer can be a daunting task.
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The Rise of Open Source May 16, 2012 
SugarCon, the SugarCRM user meeting held in San Francisco a couple of weeks ago, did some important things for Sugar. It was a coming out party of sorts for a company with a distinct business model and strategy, namely open source. It was also validation of that strategy and, for many, a new realization of what open source means.
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LMMS Is a Fearsome Music-Making Machine May 02, 2012 
Music lovers have numerous strong choices for organizing and playing
their collections of songs on the Linux desktop. But music creators have
far fewer professional-strength options among Linux applications. With
Linux MultiMedia Studio, or LMMS, though, one option may be all you
really need. LMMS does it all and does it all well.
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SugarCRM 6.5 Adds Just a Touch of Sweetener April 27, 2012 
SugarCRM has just debuted a controlled release of version 6.5 of its flagship open source CRM offering. In many ways, the release is an iterative change -- it does not represent the same major shift in functionality and user interface as version 6 did, when it was launched in 2010.
In one key way, however, the new version is significantly different: The user interface is much more oriented to search technology.
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Advanced Easy Editor Goes Bare Bones, Then Breaks Out the Sandpaper April 25, 2012 
Sometimes too much of a good thing in free software can create bad impressions. For instance, some of the free stuff so easily available in Linux distro package managers is so archaic that newcomers to the OS might understandably shriek in horror. Don't get me wrong. I absolutely am a big fan of FOSS applications.
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Xournal Makes Short Work Out of Longhand April 18, 2012 
Regardless of how good they are, some Linux applications have very little appeal to all but users with specialized needs. That is not the case with Xournal. Even if you do not use a tablet for inputing notes, this app still lets you create with style. If you are looking for a very handy note-taking application, check out Xournal.
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qOrganizer Squares Away Everything but Its Own Interface April 11, 2012 
One of my biggest problems in managing appointments, to-do tasks, notes and reminders is that I work on a variety of desktop and laptop computers in multiple locations. To bridge the access gaps, I rely on a tablet computer and a smartphone tapped into cloud storage.
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Recoll Looks High, Looks Low, Finds Your File With Ease April 04, 2012 
Not all search tools are the same. Just like users have a variety of Linux distros that appeal to a wide range of needs, search apps do different tasks for different users. One of the best search tools I have found is a clever app called "Recoll."
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Fork Skewers Photoshop Skin GimpShop March 28, 2012 
I thought I had found image-manipulating Nirvana with GimpShop. But the wide world of open source software and the Linux community failed me this week. My quest for a better GIMP tool to give me a Photoshop-like Windows experience turned into a fool's folly. Actually, my faith in the Linux OS is still intact.
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TEA: A Smooth Text Editor That Hits the Sweet Spot March 21, 2012 
The TEA Text Editor is a very handy writing tool that delivers a much different user interface. For most computer users cranking out words or program code for digital consumption, text editors are often preferable to feature-bloated word processors. TEA pours on features yet keeps from getting too steamy.
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Mirage Image Viewer: Seeing Is Believing March 14, 2012 
Mirage is a fast and simple GTK+ image viewer for the GNOME desktop. Its lightweight structure includes just enough editing power to make it an ideal choice for everyday use. Image viewers come in all sizes and shapes. They can be packed full of editing features and can come with little or no photo management tools.
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Linux Loses Flash Player - but Does Anyone Care? March 01, 2012 
Adobe has been a fickle friend to Linux in recent times. The latest affront? Coming soon, there will be no more standalone Flash Player for Linux. Instead, Linux users who want Flash will have to do it through Chrome -- unless, of course, they happen to choose from among numerous alternative players out there. Is it the worst of times -- or the best of times? Or does it just not matter?
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Clementine's No Peach, but It Is a Pretty Sweet Music Player February 29, 2012 
The Clementine Music Player is an up and coming application that could replace your default music app. It is a close cousin to Amarok with just enough of its own personality to make it stand apart from the crowd. On any computing platform today, users have ample choices of music players.
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WordGrinder: Good, Old-Fashioned Text Editing Power February 22, 2012 
If you spend endless hours at a keyboard crunching words, avoiding distractions is essential. Sometimes, the worst offender in causing distractions comes from all the bells and whistles in the word processor itself. That is where WordGrinder comes to the rescue. In today's Linux world of GUI-filled desktops, using a text editor that runs within a terminal window may seem like a big step backward.
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gThumb Nimbly Shuffles Through Images and Video February 15, 2012 
gThumb is one of the best image viewer and browser applications available for the GNOME Desktop. I particularly like its adeptness in handling both still photography and videos. That is an unusual pairing for an image viewer on any platform. You are not likely to find this combination, or at least one that works so seamlessly, in other image viewers.
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Radio Tray: Tiny Web Radio Player Is Handy but Picks Up Some Static February 08, 2012 
If you spend a lot of time at your keyboard, no doubt you dabble a lot in listening to Internet radio. Radio Tray is a relatively new Linux app that can make tuning in to your favorite radio stations a new experience. Radio Tray is a streaming player for online radio that sits on the Linux desktop panel. Think of this app as a shortcut that hides the browser interface.
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