Digital Journal — Microsoft Windows is celebrating its 20th birthday this year, and everyone knows a lot changes with age. Your vision starts to fade, you become forgetful and you spend most of your time and money preventing ports from failing. Digital Journal‘s MIKE GHENU offers advice on how to inject your PC with young blood so your computer can age gracefully.
So you hate Microsoft’s products. You find them bloated, unfriendly and loaded with frivolous features. But don’t despair if you’re stuck with a PC because there are some alternatives to common Microsoft products out there — many being open-source software efforts. Open-source software is free and any money you choose to donate will help keep hapless computer programmers where they belong: at home, coding. Here are some programs you might want to consider to de-Microsoft your PC:
Outfox the Explorer
Microsoft’s Internet Explorer browser is still years behind the tabbed-browsing revolution. Instead of cluttering your taskbar with browser buttons, tabbed browsers open multiple pages within one program window, stacking them as little tabs beneath the URL bar for quick switching. The most credible browsing alternative, Firefox, incorporates this. Firefox has seen its market share rise almost 10 per cent over the past few years. Internet Explorer, however, still holds 85 per cent of the market. So-called IE shells — mini-programs that work on top of IE’s software engine, such as Maxthon — also use tabbed browsing and allow you to fiddle with the interface. IE does have a tabbed-browsing feature, but to enable it you have to install a new toolbar (downloadable from Microsoft’s website). Yes, something else to clutter up your browser window.
Smash Windows
Sadly, this is an area where Microsoft’s dominance is still firmly entrenched. Microsoft-bashers recommend a flavour of Linux called Fedora. However, Linux is still too mired in the realm of eyeglass tape and pocket protectors to appeal to the common computer user. But here’s something that might wind Microsoft up: In September, MIT researchers unveiled a surprisingly powerful $100 hand-crank laptop to distribute to disadvantaged kids. Their corporate sponsors: Chip-maker AMD, News Corp., Google and Red Hat, makers of Linux.
Ditch the Paperclip
MS Office and its annoying troupe of office assistants plague nearly 95 per cent of computers running office suites. They are also some of Microsoft’s surest money-spinners — the source of a quarter of its revenues. OpenOffice.org 2.0, however, an oddly named open-source suite from Sun Microsystems, is a reliable alternative. Its programs effectively duplicate all of MS Office’s applications. Sun claims its application has been downloaded more than 50 million times. And earlier this autumn, Sun agreed to bundle and market some of its wares jointly with Google — including OpenOffice.org and the Google toolbar.
Kill the Messenger
When MSN Messenger came into its own in 2000, it blew the reigning ICQ out of the water. But lately, Microsoft has made a hash of this program, loading it with annoying bells and whistles that only kids (or ad execs) could love. Animated emoticons, display pictures, friendly “nudges” to keep the conversation moving — it’s child’s play. In August, Google Talk entered the instant messaging arena. With a clean, minimalist look, Google Talk incorporates VoIP while maintaining an emoticon-free interface. But so far it has few early adopters. Where are you guys?
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There is much, much more waiting for you in this expanded issue of Digital Journal magazine, so pick up your copy today!
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