The more interesting question: Open Source Software

[Corny]

Do you use Open Source Software? And to what extent? Or do you still stick to proprietary software only - and for what reasons?
Please keep in mind that free software is not automatically Open Source Software

 

[MidnightPrism]

Just switched from Ubuntu to MAC Snow Leopard. One of the first things I downloaded was OpenOffice

 

[star-warrior]

I also have OpenOffice, but don't use it unless I have a .doc file that needs opening...

 

[mike_n_herrin]

i use open office and a number of free apps for my flash drive. i use knoppix and PCLinuxOS to recover data and do some minor repairs of winodws based machines. i mostly use windows still at work and at home for games.

 

[andysayshi]

I use Plex Media Centre software on a Mac Mini connected to my loungeroom plasma TV. It's a Mac-specific modification of XBMC.

 

[T-Rexx]

I use almost nothing but free, open source software.

That is primarily a financial decision, not a moral one. Open source software is very often given away free. I like free.

I have no moral objection to proprietary software and would use proprietary software if some proprietary program were the only practical solution to whatever I was trying to accomplish. But I have always been able to find legally free, open source solutions to everything I need.

No, the free stuff is not always the most elegant solution or the easiest to use. But it has always been good enough for me to get by. It has always been a reasonable alternative to the expensive, proprietary offerings. And again, it has always been free. And I like free.

I do have a slight moral objection to stealing software. Yes, Microsoft rapes people and realizes outrageous profits on software that is frequently of mediocre quality. They use their monopoly position to force smaller but cheaper and better quality alternatives off the market. Microsoft does everything it can to ensure that consumers have no choice but to be raped by them. You could argue that Microsoft deserves to have its software pirated. But I would only do that if I had no choice - if I absolutely had to use a proprietary program and simply had no way to acquire that program legally.

But, again, I cannot ever recall that happening. My needs are pretty simple, so I have always managed to find reasonable, open source solutions that are legally free. I like being legal. And I like being free.

 

[HornyHenry]

If it didnt come with the computer when I bought it it's either freeware or open source. (I'm only an average user so I often dont know for sure but most of what I loaded-in is freeware).

 

[Michiko]

I use... Chrome, VLC media player, and Audacity, all on Windows 7 at home, and OpenOffice.org *shivers* at college.

I'd very much like to use more free and open source software, but I've just found out that the free alternatives to the proprietary software I use just aren't as powerful or don't do what I need them to do. After five years of using five different Linux distributions, I gave up on it. I realized that I had to dual-boot Windows at all times and do most of my productivity tasks on Windows; I was using Linux just as an Internet OS most of the time. So I removed it and stayed on the Microsoft side of things.

Sadly, I think that Linux --I'm referring to what Debian folks call "GNU/Linux"-- will never become a major desktop operating system due to lack of coordination between its developers toward a common goal; there are too many different views of how a Linux system should be, and in the end there are many components which do the same in different ways, making standardization impossible, and in turn making it much more difficult for developers to target Linux. This, combined with the relatively poor quality of Linux-native FOSS alternatives to well-known commercial applications, confines desktop Linux to its current niche market among enthusiasts.

On the topic of FOSS applications, as I said before, I've found that the most advanced FOSS alternatives to the proprietary, Windows/OS X-only applications I commonly use, are just not up to my expectations. While MS Excel isn't perfect, doing any serious work with OpenOffice.org Calc is a nightmare; GIMP still lacks common features Adobe Photoshop implemented over ten years ago; a comparison between Inkscape and Adobe Illustrator sounds like one between MS Paint and Photoshop; Scribus is more comparable to the ages-old PageMaker feature-wise than to its proprietary competitor Adobe InDesign; and so on.

 

[treanir]

I'm on Windows 7, but go for open source software whenever I can. OpenOffice and VLC are the main examples of this, but there are a few more.

 

[D-Base]

Firefox, paint.net, Open office. To name a few. I'm on Windows 7.