A list of the best software for Mac, Windows, Ubuntu Linux, Android, Software Development, and web browser extensions. Whenever I do a fresh install of a new operating system, I'll go through this list and choose what to install. Unless otherwise noted, all software are free.
This is a nice fun project for beginners to make a contribution to a project. I will add an issue for something, if followed correctly, I will accept. Just follow the directions in the issue, which if you are familiar with markdown, should be able to complete easily.
Any other pull requests submissions made is up to my discretion if I accept or not.
I use Mac most of the time now, so this list is rather extensive.
- Dropbox - Service that keeps your files safe, synced, and easy to share.
- Drobo - Get the software, after the hardware.
- Google Backup & Sync - Google's cloud service tied to your Gmail.
- OneDrive - Microsoft's cloud service.
- Brave - My current favorite web browser.
- Chrome - Google web browser.
- Firefox - My second favorite browser.
- Transmission - Torrent downloader.
- Tweetdeck - Twitter client with columns.
- Adobe Acrobat Reader - PDF reader and editor.
- AirDroid - A suitable replacement for Android File Transfer (ATF).
- Android File Transfer - Transfer files via USB to your Android device.
- balenaEtcher - Flash OS images to SD cards and USB drives, safely and easily.
- Calibre - One stop solution to e-book needs.
- EasyRes - A fast screen resolution switcher for Mac OS X with live animated previews.
- Filezilla - SFTP client.
- Karabiner - A powerful keyboard customizer. I remap my Caps lock key to the escape key.
- GPG Suite - Secure way to encrypt communication.
- OSX Fuse - The easiest and fastest way to create file systems for OS X.
- Prey Project - Track and find your stolen devices.
- SensibleSideButtons - Actually functional side navigation buttons on your third-party mice in macOS.
- Service Station - Service Station is a macOS app for customizing your right-click menu in Finder.
- SuperDuper - Clone hard drives.
- Teamviewer - Remotely control another computer.
- Trim Enabler - Enables TRIM on 3rd party SSDs.
- Tunnel Bear - VPN software.
- Unarchiver - Decompress zip/rar files.
- World Community Grid - Grid computing.
- Handbrake - Edit/convert videos.
- Livestreamer - Command-line utility that extracts streams from various services and pipes them into a video player of choice.
- Plex Media Server - Media server for your home videos/photos.
- Serenity - Relaxing ambient sounds. A better paid version is Noizio.
- SoundNode - Soundcloud desktop app.
- Spotify - Music player.
- Spotifree - Mute ads in Spotify.
- Tagger - Batch update your ID3 tags in your music collection (mp3s).
- VLC Media Player - The best video/media player for any OS.
- Blender - Open Source 3D Modeling
- Gimp - Edit pictures, a Photoshop-like program that's free.
- Giphy - Capture and create GIFs.
- Google Photos - Google's photo storage.
- Krita - Digital Painting.
- SketchUp - 3D Drawing tool.
- Alfred App - Type what you need or what you want to do.
- F.lux - Automatically adjust your computer screen to match lighting.
- Glances - System monitoring tool that runs in terminal.
- Skitch - Edit your screenshot images.
- Slack - Collaboration software for teams.
- Trello - Collaborative boards, lists, and cards.
- 1Password - Password Manager and Secure Wallet.
- Adobe Creative Cloud - Photoshop + Lightroom CC. Well worth the $10/month subscription.
- Bartender 3 - Organize your menu bar apps.
- Better Touch Tool - Custom map your keys.
- Bitwarden - Password manager.
- DaisyDisk - Visual breakdown of your disk space.
- Divvy Window Manager - Window management for tiling your windows.
- ForkLift 3 - Best Finder replacement.
- iStat Menus - System monitor for CPU, memory, HDD, battery, etc.
- iStat Mini - Mini version of iStat Menus.
- Magnet - Window arrangement app.
- Mailplane - The best way to use Gmail on your Mac.
- Noizio - App that creates ambient sounds of coffee shop, rain, ocean, etc.
- Parallels - Run other OSes as virtual machines.
- Paw (HTTP & REST Client) - Helps you build HTTP requests, inspect the server's response and even generate client code.
- Zooom/2 - Resize your windows without having to click on corners (No longer available).
I don't use Windows OS much anymore, so this list will be shorter, as many of the software available for Mac is also available on Windows.
- 7 Zip - Decompress zip/rar files.
- PDF-XChange Viewer - Open PDFs.
- PowerToys - Power user's productivity utilties.
- Paint .Net - Edit pictures/images.
- Sysinternals - Advanced system utilities.
- T-Clock Redux - Custom date/time format in taskbar.
- TaskbarX - Custom positioning of taskbar icons.
These are some of my favorite web-browser extensions that I use in Google Chrome and/or Firefox.
- 1Password - Password Manager and Secure Wallet.
- Buffer App - For managing your social media posts.
- ByPass Paywalls - Bypass website paywalls.
- Https Everywhere - Secure your web browsing by forcing https.
- Keepa - Amazon price tracker.
- LastPass - Securely store/generate passwords.
- Privacy Badger - Blocks spying ads and invisible trackers.
- PushBullet - Push messages to your devices.
- Tampermonkey - Userscript manager.
- TCPIP Utils - The ultimate online investigation tool!
- uBlock Origin (Firefox & Chrome) - Block unwanted ads in your browser.
This list includes development tools for both Mac and Windows. Also see my dotfiles.
- Android Studio - Android SDK and official IDE.
- Atom.io - Text editor that is community driven.
- DiffMerge - Compare your files/directories.
- Eclipse - Java IDE.
- JetBrains IntelliJ - Java IDE.
- JetBrains Resharper - .Net add-on with tons of functionality.
- JetBrains RubyMine - Ruby/Rails IDE.
- Notepad++ - Text editor with more features on Windows.
- Sublime Text - Text editor.
- Visual Studio 2012 color theme editor
- Visual Studio Code - Quickly becoming my default code editor over Atom.io.
- Visual Studio Mac
- DBeaver - Universal SQL Client
- Microsoft SQL Server 2014 Express - Microsoft's SQL IDE.
- mySQL WorkBench - SQL IDE for mySQL.
- pgAdmin - SQL IDE for Postgres.
- Postgres.app - Start/stop Postgres db.
- SSMS Tools Pack - SQL Server Management Studio Tools.
- Fishshell - A smart and user-friendly command line shell for macOS, Linux, and the rest of the family.
- Heroku Toolbelt - Deploy your apps to Heroku.
- Homebrew - Mac package manager.
- iTerm2 - Terminal alternative.
- iTerm2 Color Schemes - Make your iTerm look pretty.
- Oh my fish - A fish shell framework.
- PuTTY - SSH client terminal.
- rbenv - Manage your rubies.
- git - Better to install via Homebrew
- Github for Mac - Github for Desktop.
- SourceTree - My main git GUI.
- BitBucket - Host public/private git repos here.
- CodeAnywhere - Web based dev IDE.
- Dreamspark - Microsoft's program for students.
- Github - Host public/private repos here.
- GitLab
- Netlify - Deploy projects here for hosting.
- Scott Hanselman's 2014 Ultimate Developer Power Users Tool List for Windows
- Visual Studio color schemes
- Visual Studio wallpapers
My current favorite flavor of Linux is Xubuntu, but I also like Ubuntu Mate.
- How to create a bootable USB stick on OS X
- How to create a bootable USB stick on Windows
- Etcher - Flash OS images to SD cards & USB drives, safely and easily.
I format my external hard drives to exFAT so I can read/write to them from any operating system (OSX, Win, Linux).
sudo apt-get install exfat-utils exfat-fuse
sudo apt-get install boinc-client boinc-manager
sudo apt-get install gparted
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:git-core/ppa
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install git
sudo apt-get install openssh-server
Also see: SSH/OpenSSH/Configuring
I use Android as my primary mobile OS on all my devices.
- Lineage OS - Cyanogenmod is no more.
- Factory Images for Pixel and Nexus Devices
- Google Opinion Rewards
- IMDB
- OpenSignal - 3G/4G WiFi Map
- Pokemon GO
- Speedtest
- Wi-fi Analyzer
- wp clock
- Comic Con
- Foursquare
- Google Maps
- Lyft
- Meetup
- Park Chicago
- Parking Panda
- Southwest
- Swarm
- Uber
- Waze
- Yelp
- iCHAIT/awesome-macOS - A software list I've contributed to.
- privacytools.io - Recommended reading for security.
React
Typescript
Django
Laravel
Facebook
Microsoft
Google
Alibaba
D3
Tencent