First off, I don’t use a Mac so I don’t really know what the uninstall process is, however a utility I came across which looks like something our Mac readers might like is AppTrap.

Moving an application to the trash is simple and easy. Shouldn’t true uninstallation on the Mac be the same way?

With AppTrap, when you move an application to the trash, you’re automatically asked if you want to move the associated preference files as well. Now that’s uninstallation, the Mac way.

From the description, this seems like a pretty useful program as I imagine having to separately remove preference files would be rather annoying (if that type of thing bothers you). The program automatically detects any associated system files left over after you remove a program and lets you decide what to do. Simple enough.

AppTrap is free/open source and it may be a nice utility to have.

For those of you who are either hardcore traders or if you just like to dabble in the stock market, keeping up with the current price of both your portfolio as well as your watch list is essential to decision making. If you are looking for a tool which may help, give the open source project JStock a look.

JStock is a free stock market software for 23 countries. It provides Real-Time stock info, Intraday stock price snapshot, Stock indicator editor, Stock indicator scanner, Portfolio management and Market chit chat features. Free SMS/email alert supported[.]

JStock boasts a pretty impressive feature list. I can see the alerts (email/text/tray) being especially useful. Additionally, it is built on Java, so it runs on any OS.

While the most popular/well know open source bit torrent client is probably Vuze (formerly Azureus), I have written in the past about how the program’s “take over your system” style approach is not for me. So if you are looking for an alternate open source bit torrent client, then check out G3 Torrent.

G3 Torrent boasts a rather lengthy feature list and if you take a look at the screenshots, you will see it looks very similar to the way Azureus (2.x) looks. The only thing I can really see as a potential problem is the program has not been updated for over 4 years.

Overall, a bit torrent client is just a means to an end. A program doesn’t need to have constant updates as longs as it works well.

If you find yourself performing a certain task over and over (and over) again, setting up a macro to do this for you is the way to go. It may take a little bit of time up front, but it easily pays for itself. A tool which can make the process of setting up a macro easy is the open source utility AutoHotKey.

With it, you can:

• Automate almost anything by sending keystrokes and mouse clicks. You can write a mouse or keyboard macro by hand or use the macro recorder.
• Create hotkeys for keyboard, joystick, and mouse. Virtually any key, button, or combination can become a hotkey.
• Monitor your system. For example, close unwanted windows the moment they appear.
• Perform scripted actions in response to system shutdown or logoff.
• Tons more.

AutoHotKey is a fairly popular utility so you can find scripts others have created by searching around. Basically you are limited by only what you can think of.

I have posted about several tools to create PDF files, so today here is a tool to help you manipulate them. PDF Split and Merge is an open source program which does exactly as its name says:

• split your pdf documents (into chapters, single pages, etc.).
• merge many pdf documents or subsections of them.
• extract sections of your document into a single pdf document.
• mix alternate pages taken from two pdf documents in straight or reverse order into a single document.
• rotate pages of the selected pdf documents.
• visually reorder pages of a selected pdf document.
• visually compose a document dragging pages from selected pdf documents.

The program comes in both a basic and enhanced version. This tool in combination with a PDF creator for the most part should accommodate virtually all of your PDF needs.

Many people do not like Adobe PDF Reader because it is extreme overkill for the simple task of reading PDF’s. As a result, said people use an ‘alternate’ PDF viewer (such as Foxit Reader), however if you are looking for the ultimate lightweight PDF reader then you need to check out the open source program Sumatra PDF.

To quote their website:

Why another PDF reader?

Sumatra has a minimalistic design. Simplicity has a higher priority than a lot of features.

It’s small and starts up very fast.

It’s designed for portable use: it’s just one file with no external dependencies so you can run it from external USB drive.

For the minimalist, the benefits are obvious. The only problem you may have is reading PDF’s which have ‘newer’ encodings or were geared specifically towards Adobe Reader (which unfortunately is an assumption some people make).

If you are currently using Sumatra PDF, what are your findings on compatibility?

The vast majority of times when I post tips to software, the respective product is free. However, just because it is ‘free’ doesn’t mean it has no restrictions as there are different models of free software. The primary ones are freeware, shareware and open source.

It is a good idea to know the difference between these release models. For a good plain English explanation, check out this article. To quote on a brief overview of the differences:

• Freeware is usually a very small program, released by a student or enthusiast.
• Shareware is usually a mid-sized utility or application, written by a professional developer or small software company. The developer or publisher does not have the resources to market it, so they release it as shareware with a “try-before-you-buy” business model.
• Open source spans the gamut, but the largest “free” software out there are all open source–Linux, FreeBSD, PostgreSQL, Apache. Before the advent of VCs in the “free software industry,” collaborative development around a shared code base was the only way a large free application could be built.

A week ago, I ran a post about an article comparing 3 popular media players and several commenters pointed out VLC was their choice and were surprised it was left off the list. Well, the popular open source media player users will be happy to know VLC 1.0.0 is now available.

This major release introduces many new features, new formats and new codecs to the VLC multimedia framework and fixes a very high number of bugs that were present in the 0.9.x or 0.8.6 versions.

While I typically do not upgrade immediately after a major release (I prefer to let early adopters find the bugs), going from seemingly perma-beta to a stable release is significant. This appears to be a must get version for VLC users.

Enjoy and please post your thoughts on this new version if you take the plunge.

One of the more popular tools among people who run their own web sites is Google Analytics. Rightfully so as it is able to track just about anything you want. The only problem with Google Analytics is that you don’t own your own stats. Google keeps all the data on their servers and you access it through their portal. If you are looking to self host these tracking stats, check out Piwik.

Piwik is a PHP MySQL software program that you download and install on your own webserver. At the end of the five minute installation process you will be given a JavaScript tag. Simply copy and paste this tag on websites you wish to track.

As you can see, installation on a web site is as simple as Google Analytics and all the stats are stored in a database you control. Additionally, you can expand Piwik with many available plugins.

If you run your own sites and like to study your stats, this is at least worth looking into.

You have probably seen several tips in the past relating to the excellent Notepad replacement Notepad++, however today I am going to write about another open source text editor which is geared towards editing source code: Scintilla.

As well as features found in standard text editing components, Scintilla includes features especially useful when editing and debugging source code. These include support for syntax styling, error indicators, code completion and call tips. The selection margin can contain markers like those used in debuggers to indicate breakpoints and the current line. Styling choices are more open than with many editors, allowing the use of proportional fonts, bold and italics, multiple foreground and background colours and multiple fonts.

Scintilla runs on Windows, Linux and Mac so everyone can run it. As with most developer tools, it all comes down to personal preference as the features are usually pretty standard across the board. The more choices you have, the better right?

You have probably seen many articles and tips on this site about downloading videos from YouTube, however if you want to download from other sites a tool you need to check out is xVideoServiceThief.

This open source tool allows you to download from (at the time of writing) 55 popular websites which use embedded videos. Additionally, xVideoServiceThief boasts the following features:

• Convert the downloaded videos to Mpeg, DivX, etc.
• Simultaneous downloads!: Download more than one video at same time
• Automatic Updates! keep the xVideoServiceThief updated automatically (to add/update support for new sites)

If you like to keep videos on your hard drive, this tool is ideal because you don’t have to worry about going into your browser cache and renaming files, etc, etc. It is straightforward and completely free.

If you like the look and feel of iTunes, but don’t like it’s ‘take over your system’ style approach, an alternate you might want to take a look at is the open source aTunes.

aTunes is a full-featured audio player and manager, developed in Java programming language, so it can be executed on different platforms: Windows, Linux and Unix-like systems, …
Currently plays mp3, ogg, wma, wav, flac, mp4 and radio streaming, allowing users to easily edit tags, organize music and rip Audio CDs.

For the most part, aTunes handles all the player functions you would expect but has a strikingly similar look to iTunes. As stated, aTunes works on any OS so if you are looking for a music player, give it a try.

One of the more popular open source applications out there is GIMP (GNU Image Manipulation Program) which is a powerful photo editing application. While you may here it referred to as a Photoshop replacement, if you actually compare the functionality you will see GIMP doesn’t completely measure up (but you sure can’t beat the price).

However, if you are accustomed to using Photoshop, there are some changes and plugins you can apply to make GIMP look like Photoshop. While the changes here will not completely convert GIMP into a “free version of Photoshop”, it does provide similar aesthetics and functionality.

Again, you can’t beat the price so give it a try.

If you do a lot of ‘tech related’ communication or computer walk-throughs, a good screen capture utility is a must have. While there are lots out there (I know I have written about several in the past), another tool to add to the list is the open source Lightscreen.

For the most part, this utility has everything you would expect such as hotkey activation and configurable output formats. It does not offer an ‘after the fact’ editor which is found in most commercial packages, but if you can easily open the resulting screen shot file in your favorite graphics editor if you need to mark it up.

When you are examining your disk space usage to find the files/folders which are sucking up all the space, using a graphical/mapping disk usage utility can be very helpful for quickly locating the culprits. A nice open source utility for this, if you do not already have a tool you prefer, is KDirStat (Linux users) and WinDirStat (Windows users).

If you are not sure what a mapping disk usage utility does, just take a look at the screenshots on the applicable tool. Basically it gives you a graphical representation of the space used by files and folders by drawing proportionally sized boxes. Big boxes use a lot of space and small boxes do not use much. If you click on a box, you can jump to the respective file or folder.

This type of tool can be very useful when you are trying to clean up disk space.