Open Source Windows - Free Windows software, all open-source, all Windows XP and Vista

Open Source Windows - Free Windows software, all open-source, all Windows XP and Vista

Free and open-source software is good for you and for the world. This is the best Windows software that we know of.
No adware, no spyware, just good software.

Web Browsing

Mozilla Firefox

The premier free, open-source browser. Tabs, pop-up blocking, themes, and extensions. Considered by many to be the world's best browser.
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Video Player, BitTorrent, Podcasting

Miro

Beautiful interface. Plays any video type (much more than windows media player). Subscribe to video RSS, download, and watch all in one. Torrent support. Search and download from YouTube and others.
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IM - Instant Messaging

Pidgin

Connect to multiple IM accounts simultaneously in a single app, including: AOL IM, MSN, and Jabber.
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Video Converter- MP4, iPhone, Android

Miro Video Converter

Convert any type of video to mp4 or theora. Convert any video for use with iPhone, iPod, Android, etc. Very clean, easy to use interface.
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Download helpers

SkipScreen

A Firefox extension that skips unnecessary clicks and wait times on Rapidshare, Megaupload, Mediafire, zShare, and more.
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E-mail

Mozilla Thunderbird

Powerful spam filtering, solid interface, and all the features you need.
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RSS

RSSOwl

Solid cross-platform RSS client.
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Peer-to-Peer Filesharing

Cabos

A simple, easy to use filesharing program. Gnutella network.
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Gnucleus

A very good Gnutella search and download filesharing program.
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Video Playback

Miro

Beautiful interface. Plays any video type (much more than windows media player). Subscribe to video RSS, download, and watch all in one. Torrent support. Search and download from YouTube and others.
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VLC

Plays more video files than most players: Quicktime, AVI, DIVX, OGG, and more. Pretty good interface.
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MPlayer

Similar to VLC-- plays loads of video formats.
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Media Player Classic

Compact, but powerful media player. Plays anything under the sun. No install necessary.
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Word Processing / Office Suites

OpenOffice.org

Big, full featured suite of tools for word processing and spreadsheets. Compatible with and a free replacement for Microsoft Word documents. Also supports OpenDocument Format.
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AbiWord

A word processor. Leaner and quicker than OpenOffice. Compatible with Microsoft Word documents and OpenDocument Format.
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Podcasting

Juice

Solid podcasting client.
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DVD Ripping

Handbrake

DVD to MPEG-4 ripper/converter.
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Sound Recording

Audacity

Simple sound recording tool.
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Graphics / Photo Editing

GIMP

Photo editing application that rivals Photoshop in features.
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Paint.NET

Graphics editor with a very nice interface.
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Inkscape

Vector graphics application.
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FTP / SFTP

Filezilla

Excellent FTP program.
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IRC

X-Chat 2

IRC client.
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Archiving

PeaZip

Fantastic archiving utility to extract and pack archives of an extensive amount of formats. PeaZip also features password protecting archives, keyfile support, system integration, a lovely interface, and much more.
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About this Site
Open Source Windows is a simple list of the best free and open source software for Windows. We aren't trying to be a comprehensive listing of every open-source Windows application, instead we want to showcase the best, most important, and easiest to use. This page should be a handy reference and a useful tool for getting more people to start using free and open-source software. If you think we're missing any great apps, please let us know.

Note to software creators: first of all, thanks so much for making free, open-source software-- we love you.

Second, please try to make your download pages easy to use. It's usually very easy to improve-- just add a big 'Download Now' link towards the top of the page, without too much clutter around it (use mozilla.org or adiumx.com for inspiration).

Here's some more unsolicited advice for getting more people to download your software:

a. if you have a nice icon, show it off prominently.

b. put a download link and a screenshot on your front page.

c. if you use mirrors, use a script to pick a random mirror and just give people one link that says 'download now'

d. if there's any way you can avoid sending people to the sourceforge download mirror page, you should (we know it's not your fault, but it baffles lots of folks).

e. if you really want to make things easy for people, and you have a cross-platform app, detect what OS they are on and give them the correct link.

f. test your page on a novice! See if they can understand what the software does and how to get it.

Questions? Comments? Suggestions? Email us at hi@opensourcewindows.org