Chris Were's recommended apps and websites

A list of useful apps, games and web services. Items listed here are free and open source unless specified otherwise.

• Apps
• Games
• Web apps
• Online resources
• How-tos and fixes
• Mastodon and fediverse tools
• Gemini tools

Apps

Apps listed in this section are done so with Linux users in mind. Some may be available for other platforms but not all.

• Audacity - audio editor: looks ugly but has lots of features and isn't too difficult to use.
• Delta Chat - an email client for desktop and mobile which displays emails like instant messages, available as an appimage.
• Firefox - my day-to-day browser of choice.
• GIMP - my photo and image editor of choice.
• Inkscape - design and edit vector graphics (e.g. SVG and PDF files).
• Kdenlive - video editor: reasonably advanced and full-featured, available as an appimage.
• KeePassXC - one of the best password managers around, available as an appimage and as a snap.
• Krita - a really full featured photo and image editor, available as an appimage.
• LibreOffice - office utils, available as a snap, flatpak or appimage.
• LibreWolf - respin of FireFox with some tweaks. Available as an appimage.
• OBS (Open Broadcaster Software) - screen recorder and livestreaming software.
• OpenShot - video editor: fine for basic video editing, available as an appimage.
• SimpleScreenRecorder - screen recorder: not as full-featured as OBS but a useful recorder nevertheless.
• Scribus - desktop publisher - available as an appimage.
• RSS Guard - simple RSS reader available as an appimage.

Games

• Battle for Wesnoth - a turn based fantasy stretegy game.
• Chromium BSU - fast paced, arcade-style, top-scrolling space shooter.
• Freedoom - free and open source FPS game based on the Doom engine.
• Minetest - free, open source voxel game engine and game, fun to build stuff in. Available as a snap.
• OpenArena - community-produced deathmatch FPS based on GPL idTech3 technology.
• OpenMW - open source engine for The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind. Original game files required.
• OpenTTD - Transport Tycoon Deluxe as imagined by FOSS.
• Red Eclipse - a fun Arena shooter, available as an appimage.
• Widelands - a Settlers-esq strategy open source strategy game.
• Xonotic - free and fast arena shooter.

Web apps

Open source web apps

• dpaste - free and open source alternative to Pastebin that works without JavaScript.
• Diagrams.net - a simple drawing and chart making program, available as an appimage.
• Hastebin - free and open source alternative to Pastebin.
• HTMLhouse - quick and easy webpage creation tool for people who like to code in HTML.
• Framapic - free and open source image hosting service.
• LibreSpeed - free and open source speedtest; no Flash, no Java, no websocket.
• LibreTranslate - free and open source translation tool.
• Jitsi Meet - video chat and conferencing.
• MultiTwitch - view multiple Twitch streams side-by-side, great for watching multiplayer streams.
• Neocities - build simple websites with HTML (like this one).
• OpenStreetMap - FOSS's answer to Google Maps.
• Piskel - pixel art image editor.
• PrivateBin - open source Pastebin alternative with privacy enhancements.
• RSS Bridge - takes social media pages and builds a RSS for them - project page.
• Twitch stream RSS generator - generates a RSS feed for your Twitch channel.

Open source front ends

For this section I've linked to instance lists. This is to help further decentralise and share the load. Please considder donating to your favourite instances.

• Bibliogram - front end for Instagram.
• Invidious - front end for YouTube.
• Libreddit (instance list) - an open source, freedom respecting front end to Reddit.
• Lingva Translate - project page - a FOSS front-end for Google Translate.
• Nitter - front end for Twitter.
• SearX - highly customisable, privacy respecting search engine front-end.

Closed source web apps

• Blogtrottr - delivers updates from RSS feeds to your email inbox.
• MailForSpam - receive email at a temporary address. Use it when signing up to certain websites to avoid spam.
• Temp Mail - receive email at a temporary address. Use it when signing up to certain websites to avoid spam.
• TweetDelete.net - lets you automatically delete Twitter posts that are older than a specified age.

Online resources

• Ambient Mixer - generate background audio to create your perfect environment using creative commons samples.
• DaFont - large collection of fonts, searchable by licence.
• Font Squirrel - large collection of fonts, searchable by licence.
• FreePD - large library of public domain music.
• Incompetech - large library of creative commons music.
• KissCC0 - a library of public domain images.
• Libreddit - an open source, freedom respecting front end to Reddit.
• PickUp Image - library of public domain images.
• Public Domain Pictures - library of public domain images.

How-tos and fixes

• How to strip JPEG metadata in Ubuntu - a useful, brief guide to removing metadata from photos.
• An increasingly less-brief introduction to Mastodon - a useful guide to Mastodon and the Fediverse.

Mastodon and fediverse tools

• Brutaldon - minimalist web interface for Mastodon, designed mostly for text only/command line browsers.
• Convert an RSS feed to ActivityPub - RSS to ActivityPub service.
• Halcyon - webclient for Mastodon and Pleroma which looks like Twitter.
• Fediplan - schedule messages with Mastodon or Pleroma.
• The Federation - Fediverse information and statistics.
• Fediverse.network - Fediverse statistics.
• Fediverse.party - Fediverse guide.
• Forget - service that automatically deletes your old posts.
• #mastoart - the #mastoart gallery (potentially some NSFW content).
• Mastodon Network Overview - lots of interesting data about the Fediverse.
• Mastodon Bridge - find your Twitter friends on Mastodon.
• Mastodon instances - directory of Mastodon instances.
• Mastodon Twitter Crossposter - automatically posts your Mastodon toots to Twitter and vice versa.
• Mastodon scheduler - schedule sending Mastodon toots.
• Mastofeed - embed your timeline into your website.
• Masto.Host - create a Mastodon instance with this hosting service.
• Mastoview - view the timeline of any instance.
• Mastoview.glitch.me - peek into any public Mastodon timeline.
• MOA - automatically posts your Mastodon toots to Twitter and vice versa.
• Trending tags - trending tags in the Fediverse.
• Pinafore - alternative UI for Mastodon where you can use your existing Mastodon account.
• Sepia Search - a search engine for PeerTube videos.
• Tootle - GTK based Mastodon desktop client.
• Trunk - find people in the Fediverse to follow based on your interests.
• Whalebird Desktop - electron based Mastodon client.

Gemini tools

• Moss.us gemini proxy - this allows people to view gemini capsules (sites) within their usual web browser.
• Vulpes.one gemini proxy - this allows people to view gemini capsules (sites) within their usual web browser.