Some of you are wondering how to use Windows successfully while knowing about the advantages of a Linux workstation. To clarify a bit I created a plain, curated list. You are welcome to comment and recommend useful (free or open source) tools.
First I’d like to have an apt-like application installer. This is where chocolatey Scoop steps in.
Install it following the instructions on the site. Add extra sources using command
scoop install git
scoop bucket add extras
scoop bucket add nerd-fonts
Now as scoop is working, here a list of helpful tools:
- cmder-full – Helpful console emulators / ConEmu distribution
- openvpn – vpn client
- bleachbit – open source CCleaner alternative
- greenshot – my all-time favorite screenshot tool
- screentogif – convert screenrecords to gif (gifcam is good aswell)
- telegram – multi device chat (sorry for being fanboi, but who is afraid of facebook aswell?)
- chromium – yes, chrome browser is much better
- firefox – yes
- brave – chromium based anti-google browser with built-in adblocker
- tor-browser – Don’t think badly of me. Not required when using brave as browser
- vscode – Visual Studio Code editor, Microsoft best open source project
- 7zip – famous archiver (yes, I am aware of security concerns. free alternative?)
- jdownloader – download manager
- inkscape – compose and modify vector graphics
- gimp – open source photoshop equivalent
- blender – 3d modeling (love animation movies?)
- rocketchat-client – client for open source slack chat alternative
- cura – slicer application for 3d printing
- mpc-hc-fork – wonderful windows 2k media player clone
- vlc – vlc media player
- mp3tag – mp3 file id3 tag editor (works for FLAC and other formats)
- arduino – arduino ide for tinkering (recommend multiple portable copies instead – why?)
- libreoffice-fresh – open office derivate
- etcher – write images to portable storage
- dnsjumper – use fast dns
- audacity – audio file editor
- obs-studio – open broadcast studio software for streaming and recording
- keepass – password safe (works with wine and android possible aswell)
- keepass-plugin-keeagent – keepass ssh agent bridge
- keepass-plugin-keetraytotp – keepass mfa helper bridge
- handbrake – convert video files
- processhacker – extended task manager
- calibre – open ebook manager
- musicbee – another free musicplayer with advanced features
- windirstat – stats about disk usage
- winmerge – file diff gui tool
- sysinternals – useful system helper tools (bought or developed by Microsoft / Process Explorer / Autoruns)
- ffmpeg – useful for screentogif
- openssl – useful for openvpn
More scoop to love: https://github.com/tapanchandra/awesome-scoop
Further interesting buckets:
Tools for reverse engineering software – https://github.com/TheCjw/scoop-retools
Emulators – https://github.com/hermanjustnu/scoop-emulators
Besides this, there are useful tools not available with scoop:
- AllDup – Find duplicate files and apply operations on it
- QuickTextPaste – Shortcuts manager
- HostsFileEditor – manage /etc/hosts on Windows
- ec_menu – custom Windows context menus (https://www.sordum.org/ helper tools)
- MonitorProfileSwitcher – multiple displays? quickly switch setup (turn off, group)
- Duplicati – backup application with several storage options
Just one more thing. Updating all installed packages works with:
scoop update '*'