Juergen's Focus on Linux Blog

Are you playing an instrument? Have you thought about composing music yourself, but found it too tedious to write down the scores and edit them? There are several highly advanced free ... Read More

There haven't been really good options available for project managers looking for inexpensive alternatives for Microsoft Project. OpenProj promises to change that. OpenProj is not only inexpensive, but it is free, ... Read More

Battle for Wesnoth has become one of the most successfull Open Source games with more than a million downloads. The game involves following an ongoing story by fighting against enemies and ... Read More

The graphics software Inkscape is an advanced tool for creating professional looking graphics. It uses the Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) file format and supports paths, shapes, text, markers, gradients, grouping and more. ... Read More

Here are some of the advantages of Linux that are often cited when comparing Linux with other operating systems: (1) Low cost; (2) Stability; (3) Performance; (4) Network friendliness and security; (5) Flexibility; (6) Compatibility; (7) Choice; (8) ... Read More

If you thought there is no useful digital video editor for Linux think again. Kino is shaping up to be a great free and open-source alternative to programs like Windows ... Read More

With KAlarm you can schedule an alarm message not only by setting a particular time, but alternatively by specifying the amount of time between now and when the alarm is ... Read More

Ardour is an advanced audio software package for recording, editing and mixing audio signals. For example, if you have two or more sound recordings that you would like to combine ... Read More

The PDF format is a popular file type for documents that require well defined layout. Unfortunately there are not many options available to Linux users for manipulating PDF documents. One such option, ... Read More

The Firefox extension FoxTorrent allows you to stream torrent files while they are downloading, that is, you can watch video and listen to audio as the files are transferred ... Read More

If you are looking for alternatives to costly accounting software or personal finance managers you may want to check out open source software packages like GnuCash, KMyMoney, and Grisbi. GnuCash, ... Read More

Celestia is a free software package that graphically simulates celestial objects ranging from the earth and our solar system to distant constellations and galaxies. Simulating motions, light and shadow in ... Read More

The objective of the LiMo consortium is to design a Linux-based mobile phone platform that will provide an open and unified system for software developers. Current LiMo members include Motorola, NEC, ... Read More

Mindquarry is a web-based software tool designed to enable efficient collaboration. Its objective is to provide a collaboration tool that is so simple to use that it would be adopted ... Read More

A company called DeviceVM has developed a technology that makes PCs functional almost immediately after you turn them on. The Linux desktop environment Splashtop can be embedded in motherboards and enable ... Read More

The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) has been expanding through mergers with other trading companies such as Archipelago and Euronext in 2006 and 2007. This has created the challenge of ... Read More

The Linux distribution Fedora version 9 is now available for download. Highlights of this release include: GNOME Desktop 2.22 with improved file system and world clock applet KDE Desktop 4.0.3 with ... Read More

While most tasks can be conveniently accomplished using the graphical user interfaces of the Linux desktop, experienced users often find it more efficient to go back to the "command line". ... Read More

Instead of a traditional rotating disk hard drive, this device uses a solid state drive, which makes it more robust, since hard disk drives tend be the most fragile component ... Read More

Krita is a comprehensive graphics program for Linux, that is fundamentally different than the better known graphics package GIMP. The differences start with the layout of the various user interface components. ... Read More

Bluefish is a well designed editor and software development environment with a rich graphical user interface (GUI). It is well suited for development of web pages but also works well ... Read More

If you want to find out which programs are using most of your computer's CPU time or most of its memory, simply type in "top" in a terminal window. ... Read More

The Super Gamer VectorLinux-based distribution comes as a live DVD loaded with tons of native Linux games. It includes demos of some proprietary games, and native Windows games can be ... Read More

The developers of OpenOffice have released version 3.0 of this productivity suite. This is not a production release but intended to make the software available for testing by the general ... Read More

Puppy Linux is a distro with a number of interesting design requirements. For example it is designed so small that it can be loaded completely into RAM and run from ... Read More

Orbit is an addictive Open Source game that is based on a Newtonian physics simulation system. It takes some practice initially to figure out how to maneuver your spaceship when ... Read More

This latest Slackware version includes desktop environments Xfce 4.4.2 and KDE 3.5.9. Support for the Hardware Abstraction Layer (HAL) has been added as well. This enables users to connect USB ... Read More

The powerful Unix/Linux command awk allows you to manipulate files that are structured as columns of data and strings. Once you understand the basics of awk you will find that ... Read More

DFO is a photo management tool that allows you to do more of your photo organization work on your local computer. It is more responsive and you get your edits ... Read More

Company wide software projects, such as setting up enterprise resource planning (ERP) or customer relationship management (CRM) systems, tend to be extraordinarily expensive compared to the functionality they offer. Besides ... Read More