Open source software – it’s truly the way forward. It’s a whole new movement where programmers from all over the world combine their skills and create free software for the world. You have hundreds of contributors all helping make software better and easily accessable to all.

Here’s a list of my personal favourites:

Open Office
http://www.openoffice.org
Full suite of  office products including Word Processing, Spreadsheets, Database, Presentation (Powerpoint-esque), all compatible with Microsoft Office and around £500 cheaper (or free if you prefer to call it that!)

Firefox
http://www.mozilla.com
Excellent web browser, better than Internet Explorer 7, probably better than any other with the exception of Opera. First to use tabbed browser windows.

Thunderbird
http://www.mozilla.com
Free email client from the makers of Firefox. I’ve used it for a couple of years now and love it!

Opera
http://www.opera.com
My personal favourite web browser. Download it for free and try it - go on, turn to the dark side.

The Gimp
http://www.gimp.org/
The rather unfortunately titled “Gimp” package (GNU Image Manipulation Program) is a little difficult to get used to but is an incredibly powerful image manipulation tool. Not quite up there with Photoshop, but actually not that far off!

Ubuntu
http://www.ubuntu.com/
For those who really want to go the whole hog and be Microsoft (or Apple) free! This open source operating system is a replacement for Windows and Mac OS. I’ve had this installed on a laptop and it’s great. It’s a Linux operating system, it’s quick, stable and very easy to use. Combine this with Open Office, throw in one of the many web browsers and free email clients mentioned and you have a free operating system running free software that is updated every few weeks by the open source community.

Try some of them out, you won’t be disappointed!