VirtualBox – free virtualizer for x86 hardware.

VirtualBox is a general-purpose full virtualizer for x86 hardware. Targeted at server, desktop and embedded use, it is now the only professional-quality virtualization solution that is also Open Source Software.

Some of the features of VirtualBox are:

• Modularity. VirtualBox has an extremely modular design with well-defined internal programming interfaces and a client/server design. This makes it easy to control it from several interfaces at once: for example, you can start a virtual machine in a typical virtual machine GUI and then control that machine from the command line, or possibly remotely. VirtualBox also comes with a full Software Development Kit: even though it is Open Source Software, you don’t have to hack the source to write a new interface for VirtualBox.

• Virtual machine descriptions in XML. The configuration settings of virtual machines are stored entirely in XML and are independent of the local machines. Virtual machine definitions can therefore easily be ported to other computers.

• Guest Additions for Windows and Linux. VirtualBox has special software that can be installed inside Windows and Linux virtual machines to improve performance and make integration much more seamless. Among the features provided by these Guest Additions are mouse pointer integration and arbitrary screen solutions (e.g. by resizing the guest window).

• Shared folders. Like many other virtualization solutions, for easy data exchange between hosts and guests, VirtualBox allows for declaring certain host directories as “shared folders”, which can then be accessed from within virtual machines.

A number of extra features are available with the full VirtualBox release only (see the “Editions” page for details):

• Virtual USB Controllers. VirtualBox implements a virtual USB controller and allows you to connect arbitrary USB devices to your virtual machines without having to install device specific drivers on the host.

• Remote Desktop Protocol. Unlike any other virtualization software, VirtualBox fully supports the standard Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP). A virtual machine can act as an RDP server, allowing you to “run” the virtual machine remotely on some thin client that merely displays the RDP data.

• USB over RDP. With this unique feature, a virtual machine that acts as an RDP server can still access arbitrary USB devices that are connected on the RDP client. This way, a powerful server machine can virtualize a lot of thin clients that merely need to display RDP data and have USB devices plugged in.

GIMP – The GNU Image Manipulation Program

GIMP is an acronym for GNU Image Manipulation Program. It is a freely distributed program for such tasks as photo retouching, image composition and image authoring.

It has many capabilities. It can be used as a simple paint program, an expert quality photo retouching program, an online batch processing system, a mass production image renderer, an image format converter, etc.

GIMP is expandable and extensible. It is designed to be augmented with plug-ins and extensions to do just about anything. The advanced scripting interface allows everything from the simplest task to the most complex image manipulation procedures to be easily scripted.

Get GIMP here.

WinMerge – Open Source differencing and merging tool for Windows

About WinMerge

WinMerge is an Open Source differencing and merging tool for Windows. WinMerge can compare both folders and files, presenting differences in a visual text format that is easy to understand and handle.

WinMerge is highly useful for determining what has changed between project versions, and then merging changes between versions. WinMerge can be used as an external differencing/merging tool or as a standalone application.

Features

In addition, WinMerge has many helpful supporting features that make comparing, synchronising, and merging as easy and useful as possible:

• General
  • Supports Microsoft Windows 98/2000/XP/2003/Vista/2008
  • Handles Windows, Unix and Mac text file formats
  • Unicode support
  • Tabbed interface
• File Compare
  • Visual differencing and merging of text files
  • Flexible editor with syntax highlighting, line numbers and word-wrap
  • Highlights differences inside lines
  • Difference pane shows current difference in two vertical panes
  • Location pane shows map of files compared
  • Moved lines detection
• Folder Compare
  • Regular Expression based file filters allow excluding and including items
  • Fast compare using file sizes and dates
  • Compares one folder or includes all subfolders
• Version Control
  • Creates patch files
  • Resolve conflict files
  • Rudimentary Visual SourceSafe and Rational ClearCase integration
• Other
  • Shell Integration (supports 64-bit Windows versions)
  • Archive file support using 7-Zip
  • Plugin support
  • Localizable interface
  • Online manual and installed HTML Help manual