5 Best Free Alternatives To Microsoft Visio

visio-man-drawingMicrosoft Visio is a professional diagramming software from Microsoft which makes it very easy to explore and visualize complex information and processes quickly. As an IT professional, I find it very easy and satisfying to visualize process flows, network architecture and program workflows. Microsoft Visio is not only limited to the IT field but can also be used with other fields like business, engineering and construction (maps and roads). One downside of Microsoft Visio that is common in almost all Microsoft products is that it is not affordable by a home user. The home user does not need to have very complex diagramming needs so we research and bring the most feature rich and free alternatives to Microsoft Visio.
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5 Best Free Alternatives To Microsoft Project

project-alternative-mainMicrosoft Project is a project management software which makes it a breeze to organize the whole project timeline including the work schedules, budgets and human work hours. Microsoft Project has become the best project management software which every IT professional and manager loves to work with. Microsoft Project is suitable for everyone from a person with very basic project management needs to a very large team with very complex collaboration and management needs. This is where simpler tools with only essential features come in. We share some of the most competent, simpler and free alternatives to Microsoft Project. There are two types of alternatives that I have used, web based and desktop based. Let’s get started with the list.
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TimeSlotTracker: A Useful Cross Platforms Compatible Time Tracker

timeslottracker-logoIf you are a freelancer who charges by the hour, you will know important it is to track the amount of time you have spent on each project. While there are several good time tracker software for Windows and Mac, there are only a few for Linux, and most of them are too basic and simple. While researching for a good time tracker software for Linux, I come across TimeSlotTracker, which is cross-platform compatible and comes with the plenty of features that are lacking in other software.
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5 Free Alternatives To Microsoft OneNote

OneNoteMicrosoft OneNote, as its name implies, is a note taking application from Microsoft. It is very different from other apps like Notepad or Wordpad, which take a linear approach to making a document. While Microsoft OneNote is completely different. It can gather all types of digital information including text, pictures, videos, web clips etc. And it is not necessary to arrange this information in a linear form. You can drag and drop anything anywhere on the canvas.
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How to Understand Terms and Conditions Without Reading Them

Terms-LogoNo one wants to spend the time to read lengthy Terms and Conditions. From a poll last week. 58% of you said that you will skip Terms and Conditions page when you are signing up for a service or install a new software and only 15% will read the T&C all the time or frequently. I can tell you from the time I spent in a previous career as a typesetter for a business forms printer that not many people do. The multiple typos I would find on existing printed Terms and Conditions told me that it was a necessary evil. It was important to include it, but not many people were going to take the time to read it.
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Best Alternatives To Microsoft PowerPoint (Online And Offline)

Microsoft PowerPoint start screenMicrosoft PowerPoint is certainly the best and the most used presentation software used on earth today. Presentation can be a great resource to share ideas, collaborate or showcase your work to the respective audience or gathering. I have been making presentations throughout my life, starting from school time where we had to present our work and prepare a presentation for it. At that time, Microsoft PowerPoint was the only solution we had and we never looked into any alternatives. However, the world has changed and we always look for software which can do our work cost and time effectively. I have a collected some of the presentation software that can be very useful for various purposes. The software are categorized into online and offline. The online software need no installation. They will open in a browser and you can easily make presentations using them. The offline software will be installed on your computer and will work even without Internet.
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Free Slideshow Maker Software To Organize Photos In Slideshows

slideshow-maker-mainNowadays the digital photos have become very easy to capture and save. With the advent of larger hard drives with cheaper prices, the space constraint is almost gone forever. Now comes the challenge of organizing these photos because with the passage of time, the collection of digital photos becomes so huge that it becomes very difficult to find a particular photo. I have recently written about 5 free feature rich photo editing software that can make the task of editing photos to your desired effect very easily and conveniently. A wonderful regular reader, Colin Boswell, has asked for suggesting some free software for making slideshows of photos particularly for the DVDs. While most of the slideshow making software are not free, I have a collection of few free software for making slideshows of digital photos.
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Is Noow better than VLC?

noow-introThere are a lot of applications you can use to play your video. Many people use Windows Media Player because that is what your Windows machine came with. There are other options like QuickTime/iTunes and the wildly popular VLC.

Noow is a pretty new competitor to the media playback game. Its claim is that it can play back HD video with amazing quality. Lets see how it stacks up against VLC.
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How to Stream Media to Your Xbox 360 or PS3

PlayStation 3Video game consoles, particularly the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, are increasingly becoming more than just gaming devices. They have become complete entertainment systems. You can now watch Netflix, Hulu, YouTube, and other streaming video content. You can purchase and listen to music, and with the new Xbox 360 dashboard update coming this fall, you can even watch exclusive live content from cable providers.

One media streaming dilemma that still faces some Xbox 360 and PS3 users is the ability to stream content from another device, such as a desktop or laptop computer. If you have home movies, pictures or photos, a collection of MP3s, or other content that you have downloaded to your computer, it is a pain to have to copy that content to your game console. For Windows users, they can connect their Xbox 360 to their Windows computers without much difficulty. For the rest of us, there are third-party tools. One in particular that I have been using lately is PS3 Media Server.
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How to Design Your Own House With Sweet Home 3D

sweethome3d-mainI am sure you don’t move house everyday, but when you do, one of the headache is to decide the layout of your new house. I have recently renovated my house and while everything is in a mess, I have to come up with the layout design of the house. I don’t have the luxury of moving my furniture around and do a trial and error. What I did is to make use of a software call Sweet Home 3D to design my house digitally.
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