This is my computer. There are many like it, but this one is mine. My computer is my best friend. It is my life. I must master it as I must master my life. My computer, without me, is useless. Without my computer, I am useless… And while there isn’t a true computer users creed; I wouldn’t mind having something such as this exist.
Moving forward I wanted to share with you some of software tools I install on all the computers I use to work, and play. Best of all they are all available for free.
- 7zip – One of the best tools for zipping and unzipping files. 7-Zip is open source software and can be used on any computer, including a computer in a commercial organization
- Putty – For system administrators, network admins alike this software is a must have. Featuring support for telnet and SSH.
- Notepad ++ – Notepad alternative that has great support for several programming languages.
- Wireshark – What else can I say; its a network protocol analyzer used for network troubleshooting, analysis, software and communications protocol development
- WinMTR – Traceroute and ping in a single network diagnostic tool. Useful when providing details to support teams
- Nmap – Free Security Scanner For Network Exploration & Hacking
- Iperf – A network testing tool that can create TCP and UDP data streams and measure the throughput of a network that is carrying them
- BackupProggie – A simple Windows copy/backup program with easy to use GUI. Supports long file names (above 256 chars). With many options to get the job done.
- HDGraph – Wonderful tool to draw multi-level pie charts of disk space on your disk volumes.
- Testdisk – Free and open source data recovery utility. It is primarily designed to help recover lost data storage partitions. Also one of the best free data recovery tools out
- SysinternalsSuite – Windows troubleshooting utilities – Everyting from disk, memory, cpu and more. This suite has many tools; If you want to look under the hood of Windows this is a must have.
- Tor – Sometimes Its all about enabling online anonymity; you never know when you want to rant.
- TrueCrypt – disk encryption software for Windows used for on-the-fly encryption (OTFE).
- Tftpd32 – Simple to setup and use TFTP Server, with DHCP abilities under its belt. Useful when pulling down switch and router configurations or when your just need to setup a small network for imaging systems.
- VLC – A cross-platform multimedia player and framework, which can also stream audio and video in a number of formats. Very useful for playing media without the need of a specific type of player
These are the just some of what I install. I hope you find my list useful.