What open source programs do you recommend for Windows? (Windows exclusive or not)

I am and all my life have been a Linux user, I have nothing against Windows or MacOS, I just like Linux, and lately I have been experimenting with Windows in a virtual machine and I don’t really know much open source software there apart from the one that is cross-platform like Firefox or Joplin.

At the moment I know:

Flow Launcher: It’s a typical rofi style launcher, although I’m not a TWM user I like to just press super and type the first letters of the program I’m looking for to open it.

Lively Wallpaper: A program to have animated wallpapers, in the style of Wallpaper Engine.

Edit: I want to clarify that I read all the comments, I only respond to some because many times I have nothing to contribute to many of them because I don’t know what to comment. Thanks to all of you for providing your lists of programs, I will be sure to try as many as I can because they are great, at least I know what to install if I use Windows one day!

Redo11,

Alternative to lively, screen play

murtaza64,

I’ve been enjoying wezterm as a terminal emulator replacement for windows terminal. It offers nerdy fine grained customizability and an emoji/nerd font character picker. For most purposes WT seems to be fine though.

gornius,

although I’m not a TWM user I like to just press super and type the first letters of the program I’m looking for to open it.

It will never stop to amaze me how many people don’t know it’s a feature in every major DE and every Windows starting from Vista.

Even on Windows 10/11, just tap windows key and start typing without clicking anywhere.

My list of FOSS I use everywhere (these work in Win and Linux):

  • Open Tablet Driver - if you’ve got the drawing tablet it probably supports it. You can customize everything and has even built-in plugin manager.
  • Krita - GIMP alternative with non-destructive editing capabilities.
  • yt-dlp - download videos from almost any video sharing service, even TikTok, Instagram etc.
  • neovim - for quick file edits
  • vscode/vscodium with vim plugin - my IDE for everything
  • ffmpeg - forget handbrake - you can do even basic video editing here. Join two videos together? Done. Add audio to video? Done. Crop part of the video without reencoding it? Done. Loop a video to 10 hours without reencoding it? Done in matters of seconds.
  • kdenlive - an actual video editor that is 100% FOSS, doesn’t suck and works on Windows and Linux.
  • imagemagick - ffmpeg for images
Obi,
@Obi@sopuli.xyz avatar

It recently stopped working for me (windows key search) and it’s super debilitating once you got used to it.

ErwinLottemann,

why not use neovim as your ide instead?

gornius,

I used to, but I need to get my job done, not play with configuring it for hours just to achieve what VSCode does out of the box. Plus settings sync is great.

iloverocks,

Lite xl is also a nice IDE and very lite

hackris,

Adding to all the awesome software already mentioned here, WinCompose! You can have a compose key, for typing accented characters wothout changin your keyboard layout, for example.

learnbyexample, (edited )
@learnbyexample@programming.dev avatar

Check out github.com/auctors/free-lunch (list of free Windows software)

See also www.nirsoft.net (freeware, not open source)

lunicoDee,

See also www.nirsoft.net (freeware, not open source)

I’d say free(as in beer)ware

Send_me_nude_girls,
@Send_me_nude_girls@feddit.de avatar

VLC player, 7zip, translucent bar, greenshot, irfanview,

Never_Sm1le,
@Never_Sm1le@lemdro.id avatar

I advocate for ImageGlass, a very good image viewer and editor. Mpc or vlc for videos.

TheFonz,

I’ll check it out. How does it compare to Irfan viewer?

staticblanket,

BalenaEtcher or Rufus for writing ISOs to usb.

folak,

Or ventoy ? More useful, and so much faster than rufus.

520,

dd works very well if it's a Linux ISO and you're using the USB solely as a livecd.

It can also byte-clone discs and partitions, including ripping CDs and DVDs.

folak,

Don’t know about dd, but I’ll give an eye. www.ventoy.net/en/index.html Ventoy has a ton of features.

captain_aggravated,
@captain_aggravated@sh.itjust.works avatar

dd is a fairly ancient/standard file copy utility, if you dd an ISO file to a drive, it images that drive.

Ventoy is basically a clever use of GRUB, which allows booting multiple ISOs from the same USB stick.

GreenMario,
  1. GIMP (Image editor)
  2. putty (Secure shell/terminal emulator)
  3. WinSCP (Secure FTP client)
  4. QBittorrent (guess.)
  5. 7zip (All in one compressed archive manager)
  6. Firefox
  7. Notepad++ (text editor with syntax highlights)
  8. Handbrake (Video transcoder)
  9. VLC (all in one video player)

These are my top must have installed. There are others but they’re situational

Let’s not forget the various console emulators that are open source as well. All the good ones are.

hogofwar,

I use Kitty instead of Putty recently, though I don’t know if the difference is worth it.

jjakc,
@jjakc@lemthony.com avatar

I just use Powershell, much easier imo

grandel,

That’s a good list!

I use the same, except I use LibreWolf (privacy focused fork of FF) and VS Code instead of Firefox and Notepad++

cityboundforest,
@cityboundforest@beehaw.org avatar

Vs code

I would actually recommend VSCodium; it’s the same product but without the Microsoft telemetry.

HaggierRapscallier,

Does it lose any MS connected features? Other than surveillance.

GreenMario,

Yeah VS Code definitely if ya doing programming. I’m just editing config/ini files once in a while so N++ is just right for me.

vim_b,

PowerToys: productivity utilities like window pinning, window management, accented character typing assistant, color picker, text extractor, etc.

thehellrocc,

Seconding this. It has every feature you know Windows needs but it still doesn’t have (likely because of the need for testing or being aimed at power users).

AnonStoleMyPants,

You forgot the best thing. Window management, aka Fanzy Zones. You can set areas to your monitor and snap windows to those instead of just left / right side of monitor. Completely customizable.

SteveDinn,
@SteveDinn@lemmy.ca avatar

puTTY, my favourite terminal program for windows.

meiko60,
@meiko60@lemmy.sdf.org avatar

winget

anguo,

AltSnap github.com/RamonUnch/AltSnap

Xirup,
@Xirup@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

Oof, just actually installed AltDrag, I can’t live without being able to grab my windows with the super key from anywhere (although in this case the alt).

Thanks for letting me know that there is a fork still maintained.

anguo,

You can also change it to use the super key, (which I did too).

Crozekiel,

Wild, you are like from the alternate universe where Linux is dominant and nerds play around in windows. Are things better where you are from? :P

transientpunk,
@transientpunk@sh.itjust.works avatar

Being around the Steam Deck forums when it initially launched felt otherworldly. A super popular device launched with Linux as a first class citizen, and Windows users were desperate for drivers that improved unstable usability. It was surreal.

zikk_transport2,

Lmao I remember. I’ve been there too! 🔥

Xirup,
@Xirup@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

Of course! In this universe everybody uses linux phones and they are actually usable (and repairable)!

csm10495,
@csm10495@sh.itjust.works avatar

Well Android is Linux based… so maybe this is a similar universe.

sonalder,

This isn’t a FOSS apps list but a Free (as free beer) software list for Windows with a bunch of cool FOSS apps alternativeto.net/list/29653/my-windows-setup/

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