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Great apps, tools, software... What do you use?

pähkinäkauppias

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These I'm researching at the moment, not used yet:
- Odoo: open source ERP + CRM
- Mautic: open source marketing automation
- Calendso: open source Calendly alternative
- MojoAuth: free passwordless login provider
- Stacky: micro websites

These I have used and can recommend:
- Kdenlive: open source video editor
- OBS: open source broadcasting software
- Inkscape: open source vector graphics drawing software
- Krita: open source digital painting tool
- GIMP: open source image manipulation software
- Slack: communication
- Signal: secure communication
- Vivaldi: better browser with builtin adblock and vertical tabs
- Visual Studio Code: maybe the most used IDE today
- KeepassXC: cross-platform password manager
- Zim: desktop wiki
- Postman: API development and testing tool
- GitKraken: Git GUI
- DBeaver: free database tool
- Darktable: open source virtual lighttable and darkroom
- Geany: lightweight IDE
- GnuCash: open source accounting software
- Adobe Scan: actually working mobile document scanner

Web apps:
- Favicon Generator: create favicons for all platforms at once
- Splitwise: expense splitting
- Trello: simple todo/kanban
- Figma: design tool
- Seobility: SEO, I've only used the free version and don't have much experience in this area
 
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Patrick Besong

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EmailScraper (available on Mac App Store). You can drag folders and files to the interface (or select them via the buttons) and it will extract all the email addresses from them so you can put together custom email lists. It will scan plain text, CSV (Excel files), and Word docs. It can do websites too if you enter the web address into the form. It will remove any duplicate email addresses when it's done searching and allow you to fine tune the list by either keeping or deleting certain domains (like maybe just keeping .edu domains to target educational customers). It has a search feature too. You can export the email addresses as either plain text or CSV files that you can import into your email service. A Windows version is planned too, as well as support for PDF searches. Link: EmailScraper on Mac App Store
 

MJ DeMarco

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Bump.
 

Andy Black

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I like Basecamp for managing projects.

Recently signed up to podpage.com to create a website for our LetsChatSales podcast. It’s great! We upload episodes to Anchor.fm (which is free) and they get distributed to other podcast platforms and automatically to the website. Magic.

+1 for Camtasia. I use it to edit and annotate some of my course videos.

I did buy Doodly for creating hand drawn videos but haven’t put enough time into it.

I like Telegram for messaging and small group messaging. The little circular videos we can send are pretty cool looking.

New Zenler is pretty good as an all-in-one email and courses platform.

Circle.io could be good for community when they sort out a fee niggles. In the meantime I might use Discord.
 
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Nick Kadutskyi

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My stack:
  1. ClickUp
    • Project and task management
    • CRM
    • Customer Feedback and communication
  2. Loom
    • Quick videos for SOPs, F.A.Q.s etc
  3. Zoom
    • For communication and recording calls
  4. Calendly
    • Makes it much easier to set an appointment
  5. Telegram, Slack
    • Communication
  6. Fastmail, Postbox
    • Fastmail because I avoid Gmail
    • Postbox is a great desktop email client
  7. Adobe Suite, Sketch
    • For prototyping, ux design, ui design and sometimes presentations
  8. JetBrains PhpStorm, DataGrip and Intellij IDEA
    • I think these are the best tools for programming
  9. Nova for Mac
    • This is supplemental tool for programming but it's only for Mac
  10. Paw
    • API testing
  11. MAMP
    • Local servers
  12. Tresorit, Dropbox
    • Tresorit is very secure since it's zero-knowledge meaning no one can read your data without your password
      • I store everything there personal and business stuff.
    • Dropbox only for certain clients that won't get rid of it
  13. n8n
    • It's great self-hosted tool for integrations. Replaces Zapier and Integromat.
    • I use it for connecting ClickUp with zoom, Asana and Google Sheets. I run it in Google Cloud and at this point it costs me just $3.5/month.
  14. Obsidian
    • For knowledge organization
    • I use it according to Zettelkasten principles
  15. Cold Turkey blocker
    • A great way to block any app or website on your computer. And it's really hard to delete the app so you won't be able to easily get access to what you blocked.
    • Supports scheduling and different kinds of blocks
 

SaharaSnow

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My list at the moment:
  • Camtasia (creating videos)
  • Microsoft 365 (productivity & collaboration tools)
  • PowerPoint (creating simple icons, banners & diagrams -> then save as image)
  • Unsplash (royalty-free images)
  • Azure Compute & DevLabs (VMs for testing)
  • Azure Bot services (Q&A Maker)
  • AWS Polly / Azure Speech Services (Text-to-voice -> use neural voice)
  • Wix (quick websites)
  • TalentLMS (SaaS LMS for online course creation & hosting)
 
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Jlaugh

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The greatest app (IMO, of course) on my phone happens to be something that's not work-related at all. It's Strava: the first thing I do after reaching home from my run is sync my Garmin watch to my Strava mobile app. Then, after my post-run routine and breakfast, I log in to the site and evaluate my run. It really sets the tone for the rest of my day.

It also helps that I can follow some elite athletes: Amelia Boone and Jo Fukuda are quite active on the app, and observing how elites train has also been useful beyond running.
 

RichieZA

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XMind: This is the best mind mapping software that I have come across. I use for it organizing ideas, building content maps for SEO articles, creating to-do lists, and more. To me, it makes thinking on a computer significantly easier. The free trial never runs out (but they do have ways and means to convert you to the paid version.)
 

SarahK

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Omni: It's a virtual phone system that has been a lifesaver after my small business begin picking up and my team and I started struggling with the sheer volume of calls and messages. I've been using it for its virtual receptionist feature and also to customise my call menus.
 
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ijack

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I have a ton of stuff on my phone from weather, Kindle, Bible/prayer book apps, the apps for free download of ebooks via my library. NYT (I have a digital subscription), FB, FB Messenger. I don’t do Twitter or Instagram at all. Digital dive logs apps, dive planning, too. BBC Radio. Local news station.
 

Ozankey

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I have a ton of stuff on my phone from weather, Kindle, Bible/prayer book apps, the apps for free download of ebooks via my library. NYT (I have a digital subscription), FB, FB Messenger. I don’t do Twitter or Instagram at all. Digital dive logs apps, dive planning, too. BBC Radio. Local news station.
Just wanted to add useful utilities: Google Assistant and Find My Device by Google. I sometimes also une VPN and WiFi Analyzer.
 

Rauschmi

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Notepad++
Much better notepad tool than the windows default. Also great for software code viewing when you view many different software programming language files. (C++, C, Python, Ruby, Shell, Bash, TCL, etc...)

PathCopyCopy
This is amazing if you share server directory locations often. I have many mapped server locations on my PC. So when I need to share a file location, I can easily select the full file path that I can send to others.

AutoHotKey
I use this when I need to create a quick and dirty macro like script. This software is a programming language. So you will have to learn how to use it. But it is pretty fun to play with and use in a pinch when you don't quite understand how to make your computer do what you want, repeatedly. Like click a button every 20 seconds. Or automatically click the "skip ad" button on youtube.

TinkerCad
Great, simple, online CAD tool. VERY SIMPLE and basic. But it can get the job done. I enjoy creating simple mockups of things I am working on. You can import STL files and export your designs as STL files as well. (STL files are used in 3D printing) This also has an Arduino emulator that you can use to build circuits or run code and see the results.


MIT OpenCourseWare
Not actually software. But a great site to get access to come free classes.
MIT OpenCourseWare (OCW) is a web-based publication of virtually all MIT course content. OCW is open and available to the world and is a permanent MIT activity.
 
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Leo Hartas

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App and complex web app development. GDevelop. It's an open source game making program but I'm using it to create a complicated user interface that's non-game related. It uses simplified programming which is a job to get your head round but allows incredible flexibility.

Clip Studio for all raster graphics and drawing. Does animation too.

Affinity Publisher. I use this as my 'hub' for almost everything.

Wordpress with Elegant Themes Divi Theme for web sites.

Libre Office

Duck Duck Go and Brave Browser Actually find Duck Duck a better search engine than Google these days.

Generally I've always used low cost or free open source alternatives to big name software like Adobe or Microsoft. Saves a lot of cash and the communities and support are always very helpful.
 

basedzoomer

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1. mpv
media player.

2. yt-dlp
downloads youtube videos, channels, playlists. Can download videos from other sites as well.

3. PeerTube
decentralized video sharing. Self-hosted.

4. XMPP
decentralized, end to end encrypted chat service. Self-hosted.

5. BuyVM/Frantech
Unmetered bandwidth VPS at affordable rates (as of February 2022).

6. rsync
for making backups to hard-drive. and syncing local files to a server & vice versa.

7. transmission-cli
torrenting.

8. gpg
for encrypting sensitive files to be stored on a hard-drive.

9. Jitsi (can be self-hosted)
Private Video Conferencing.
 
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Daniel.

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Surprised this hasn't been mentioned, it's awesome!

TextExpander
- TextExpander is a productivity app that uses keyboard shortcuts to automatically insert longer blocks of frequently used text called snippets. For repetitive tasks that require entering the same information over and over again, it is an invaluable tool that can save a surprising amount of time.

View: https://vimeo.com/631124772
 
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Zoobs

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This is a fire thread. So many useful apps. Saving for future use.

If you use a Mac definitely check out:

Flycut it's a clipboard manager, super useful.
BettersnapTool for managing your windows and creating 'snap' areas

Password management:
Bitwarden - it's free, open source, can be self hosted or cloud based. Brilliant
 

MJ DeMarco

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Libby app ... gets you library ebooks for free, and without driving to the Library.
 

Artiom O

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I cannot really call it a software, but TempMail is probably the best online free tool I have ever used. It provides
temporary, secure, anonymous, free, disposable FAKE email addresses.

It ends up being useful when I want to test the services on a website, or when I am forced to register somewhere.
Instead of filling the inbox with spam, I keep it all clean. If I really like the service, then I could switch to my real email.

It's a great solution for a real problem!
 
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Itizn

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Lusha provides pretty accurate contact info for high profile people I need to call.
Only used it with Linkedin but evidently they also work on other sites.
 

Niptuck MD

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a good website to download most books imaginable is this

also for mac users, i cannot recommend Calibre enough. Reads all types of files and stable.
 

andyhaus44

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Because I do not always carry a pen and notepad on me all the time, I utilize the Day One app on my Apple Watch for ideas that come up throughout the day. Was at mass this morning and had a few ideas come up. Used my index finger to jot my ideas on the email app on my watch, my wife and kids didn’t even notice
 
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Gabbe18

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For me, Canva has a been a godsend.

I have to agree. I didn't use Canva until very recently and it has helped me A LOT in creating images and visuals for my clients' websites and my own blog posts!

And that is probably only one way to use canva. I am sure there are lot's of other ways Canva will be useful for my and my clients' work.
 

Andy Black

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I have to agree. I didn't use Canva until very recently and it has helped me A LOT in creating images and visuals for my clients' websites and my own blog posts!

And that is probably only one way to use canva. I am sure there are lot's of other ways Canva will be useful for my and my clients' work.
You can also create videos with Canva. I've not tried it yet, but it looks good from some of the tutorials I've seen.
 

Gabbe18

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You can also create videos with Canva. I've not tried it yet, but it looks good from some of the tutorials I've seen.
I didn't know that. Creating videos is not something I have done a lot of yet. Mainly because I feel like I can't do everything by myself. However, I could convert my blog posts into videos and the copy would be a great start for a video script.

Have you heard of Lumen5? It's a video creation platform that uses AI and I think you can use it to convert blog posts and text to video.

That fact that you mentioned that you can create videos with Canva reminded me of that software.
 
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Andy Black

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I didn't know that. Creating videos is not something I have done a lot of yet. Mainly because I feel like I can't do everything by myself. However, I could convert my blog posts into videos and the copy would be a great start for a video script.

Have you heard of Lumen5? It's a video creation platform that uses AI and I think you can use it to convert blog posts and text to video.

That fact that you mentioned that you can create videos with Canva reminded me of that software.
Yes, I think I had a play with Lumen5. It didn't quite produce videos I wanted for what I'm doing at the moment, but it might be handy for other projects.

There's a lot of video editing tools out there. I like Descript.com and Camtasia. CapCut looks good and is free (and from the same company that created TikTok).
 

Gabbe18

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Yes, I think I had a play with Lumen5. It didn't quite produce videos I wanted for what I'm doing at the moment, but it might be handy for other projects.

There's a lot of video editing tools out there. I like Descript.com and Camtasia. CapCut looks good and is free (and from the same company that created TikTok).
It's insane how many great products and services are out there to make the journey of entrepreneurship a little bit easier and smoother!
 

Andy Black

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Esquire

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Once again ... another gem of a recommendation from @Andy Black.

Andy introduced me to Descript not that long ago ... and I was seriously amazed at what the software could do with artificial intelligence on the audio side ... but as it turns out ... what they were doing up to now was just the tip of the iceberg.

I just joined Descript's beta test group for a new video editor called "Storyboards" ... OMG ... mind ... blown.

I think Camtasia just lost my business for good. Storyboards is insanely good. And off the charts user-friendly.

Should go live to the general public sometime next month.

Thanks Andy!
 
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