Content Creator Tools on a Shoestring Budget
Earning money from home requires means of production. At the software level, I have tried dozens of production applications. Especially the free ones. Disappointment was the product of most of those tests.
Still, over the years some good free apps I did find.
Before recommending what to use, I will recommend what not to use.
I recommend not to waste time with the following:
LibreOffice
Polaris
Apache OpenOffice
AbiWord
UltraSearch
Scrivener
Jarte
These, to name just a few. In my experience, they are clunky,un-optimized software.
This article may seem biased towards towards Windows, offline applications. I have experience with developer operating systems like Linux. Still, my technical expertise is average. Due to this, any PC operating system other than Windows is out of the question for me.
This article favors offline applications because of privacy concerns. I simply don’t trust online applications. It’s better to keep some content, like personal, sensitive information, local.
Everything is much easier and simplified with professional, paid applications, yes. However, nothing compares to the satisfaction of achieving quality products with free applications. Knowing that one did it without lowering oneself to infringement.
Production Applications
Fund Manager
- MoneyManagerEX: basic digital ledger.
Data Organizer
TreeDB Notes: used to take notes, and organize information in tree format. Saves all the items in a proprietary database file.
StickyNotes: to take notes that can be attached to the desktop.
Design of Diagrams
draw.io: diagram design, web-based
Evolus Pencil: for Windows, not as good as draw.io, but more privacy
Organizer / Calendar
- Borg 1.8.2: the best designed, occupies a considerable memory space
- Task Coach: Good, but it takes up a lot of memory space
- ToDo List: it is the one that occupies less RAM of the three, and also the one with more features
Office
Kingsoft / WPS has a complete free suite. Each MS Office program has an equivalent.
The three I use:
- Kingsoft Presentation: creator of presentations
- Kingsoft Spreadsheet: spreadsheet
- Kingsoft Writer: word processor
Updated name of Kingsoft programs: WPS Office. But the (still available) versions called Kingsoft Office are equally good.
Another line that tries to be an alternative to MS Office is Softmaker FreeOffice.
- FreeOffice Planmaker: spreadsheet
- FreeOffice Texmaker: word processor.
- FreeOffice Presentation: slide creator
Wanting to leverage Google’s G Suite, but at the same time to keep my usage of G Suite, to a minimum, I could reduce those services to just 4.
Others may trust Google more than me, and use it as their go-to software to produce, and manage things. Goooglevangelists may even go as far as paying for the whole package. To have enhanced access to this assortment of almost twenty applications.
The only four applications belonging to G Suite that I use:
- Gmail
- Google Docs: store, edit and share documents
- Google Sheets: spreadsheet
- Google Slides: creator of presentations
Creation of Usable Databases
Free programs for Windows that supplant databases like MS Access are hard to find. The only one that turned out to be of any use for me was LibreOffice Base Portable. Yet, when importing a database created with MS Office 2003’s Access, the results were rather bad.
Professional Writing, Reading, Typesetting, Publishing
- Calibre: manages all types of documents. It serves as a catalog for a virtual library. Convert all types of document formats: PDF, EPUB, MOBI and the rest
- BlueGriffon EPUB Edition: create electronic books. More intuitive than Sigil, but the final manuscript may have formatting errors
- Sigil: create electronic books. It is not very intuitive for the user. Great for the finishing editing tasks. Like adding the cover and back cover to an e-book
- VersePerfect: poetry writing. It greatly facilitates the process of writing a poem
- YWriter: to write books. Organize the manuscript with chapters and other features
- Trelby: script writing. Has arbitrary design errors, such as the inability to cut and paste normally
- CeltX: script writing. Better than Trelby, but lacks useful features
- PDF95: The best virtual printer to print a .DOC / .DOCX / .RTF / .HTML to PDF
- Sumatra: the lightest PDF reader I ever used
- FoxitReader: good pdf reader, but the most recent versions are heavy
- Scribus: I wouldn’t recommend it. It’s stuck in the past and not a real alternative to InDesign, Acrobat, or Distiller.
Get them here: Calibre BlueGriffon EPUB Edition Sigil VersePerfect YWriter Trelby CeltX PDF95 Sumatra FoxitReader Scribus
Graphic Design and Photography
- Raw Therapy: minimalist post-processing application.
- Pixlr: online alternative to Adobe Photoshop.
- LunaPic: online picture editor. It has a lot of features that make it something more - than simply a Photoshop clone,
- Inkscape: vector design (alternative to Adobe Illustrator)
- FastStone Photo Resizer: resize photos
- ImageTasks: make different operations with photos, even change size. Superior to FastStone, since it allows batch processing with several photos at once.
- XnView: the best free photo viewer I used. Superior to ACDC, which was the norm years ago.
- XnConvert: I did not use it to convert photos. XnView and ImageTasks were always enough for me.
- SpringPublisher: creator of business cards, logos and other small designs. Okay for small projects, like a business card or postcard. The free version’s maximum export resolution is 180dpi. Watermarks the document if one attempts to create a bigger format
- BusinessCardLand: creator of cards on the web
- Picasa 3: discontinued image and photo manager by Google
Get them here: Raw Therapy Pixlr LunaPic Inkscape FastStone Photo Resizer ImageTasks XnView XnConvert SpringPubli sher BusinessCardLand Picasa 3
Web-page design
- Kompozer: free alternative to Adobe Dreamweaver, but extremely limited
- Google Web Designer: better than Kompozer, web-based
Pre-made Databases
- DiscLib: create catalogs of CDs and DVDs with search-able trees of the discs’s contents
- Erik's Movie Manager: no-nonsense movie catalogs
- DreamJournal: a niche application, but useful if one needs to record dreams for any reason. The one called DreamJournal.exe is a single file but seems to be unavailable on the web. I found Lightened Dream instead
Pseudo-Applications (Tools)
Screen Capture
- MWSnap 3.0: excellent for getting screenshots of almost everything
MWSnap 3.0
File manager
- FreeCommander XE: Orthodox file manager similar to Total Commander.
FreeCommander XE
Time Management
- Xnote Stopwatch: the best free stopwatch for Windows. It allows to edit the time manually.
Search of Local Files
- Locate 32: an idea stolen from the classic Macintosh finder. Creates a database, and finds any file on the disk.
- Everything: similar to Locate 32, but the database updates automatically.
Extro
Like I said in the title, all these applications are freeware or shareware, no strings attached. Still, it’s always good to reciprocate to the developers if your use of their applications was valuable.
I leave you now, with something for the developers of the applications and tools in this list, and for you, for reading this article:
Copy Content © Martin Wensley 2018
Photo/Image credits:
Opensource Obscure
rawpixel.com