What paid software is absolutely worth the money?
For me, that would be Secure CRT. I have yet to find a terminal emulator that matches its feature set. If you regularly manage hundreds of machines using various connection protocols (serial and ssh mostly in my case) It's worth the $$$, and so far there hasn't been any subscription nonsense. I liked using it at work so much I forked over the dough to have it at home.
None of the free alternatives do everything I need.
I'll also mention a few iOS apps. One is Sun Surveyor. It's an AR app that shows you the position of the sun, moon, and galactic center at any given time. The other would have to be Radarscope. It's a weather radar app, but it's a really good weather radar app.
EDIT:
This one's debatable, but I use it all the time. Plasticity is 3D modelling software that attempts to bridge the gap between practical CAD programs and software meant for 3D artists like Blender. It's not cheap considering Blender is free, but it's buy once use forever, and at (I think) $150 it's within reach of an individual hobbyist who knows what they want and is willing to pay for it.
In the world of music production Reaper is an insanely good deal with a fantastically refreshing licensing system.
I haven’t used Reaper in a while, but you can technically use it for free with full features by perpetually using it in trial version mode right?
Yes!
The developer is pretty insistent on saying that Reaper is NOT free but also that stupid licensing schemes for other DAWs like the horrid iLok and others only punish people who actually buy the software, which is self-defeating since the pirates are unaffected by the ways in which the tool is made worse for people who actually bought the tool legally.
I bought it simply because of how incredibly refreshing this was, free open source DAWs have gotten better since I did but there used to be barely any accessible, lowcost ones that were fully featured enough to be useful. Now there are open source options like Muse and LMMS but the thing about Reaper is it isn't a budget/hobbyist DAW, in many ways it is an industry leading software so even with good FOSS DAWs out there Reaper is still well worth it.
In specific, a lot of people use Reaper for live performance of software instruments as Reaper is an efficient beast at running complex chains of software effects efficiently.. and yet a lot of people also use Reaper for mixing and production because it has such high quality audio processing capabilities. Reaper is a behemoth.
Reaper can do more than 99.9999% of people are capable of using it for.
This would have been mine. I generally only donate rather than buy software, but reaper is an exception.
Same with Renoise, though I haven't bought it yet myself. Pretty cheap by Western standards, especially compared to the big DAWs, but excellent for its particular workflow, i.e. a tracker. It's actively developed too.
Bitwarden. It's free and open source, but you can pay for a subscription
if you don't want to self host for synchronisation between devices. It's very cheap and no doubt worth it.Also Aseprite, for pixel art and custom format exports.
Edit: looks like both these programs are just straight up fully featured and freely available now.
For real, I had been using Bitwarden for a couple of years for free and it never once had to show an ad to ask me to buy it's subscription. I just realized that it was giving me tons of value, and that prompted me to buy the (fairly priced) subscription. That's a gold standard imo.
I saw a banner in the extension telling me the premium version existed once, but it wasn't very intrusive
what kind of synchronization between devices are you referring to? I’ve never had a subscription and have used multiple vaults on numerous different devices
Basically storing an encrypted backup of your secure content so that a password you add to bitwarden on desktop can be accessed via your phone, accessible via a login.
ok, that’s basic cloud sync, which is a core free feature of Bitwarden, not a premium feature. you don’t need to purchase a subscription for that, it’s literally the fundamental purpose of any modern password manager and is completely free in Bitwarden
Yeah it does look like cloud sync is free now. I was a pretty early adopter of bitwarden so I believe originally you had to pay for cloud sync support, but I may be wrong.
Still, I'll continue to support them because they're the only password manager I've used that has some semblance of mutual respect.
Libresprite is the open source alternative and it's nearly identical.
Sync between devices doesnt require a subscription?
I use it on my desktop, laptop and phone, no issue
Never paid a dime
Aseprite is free if you compile it yourself, isn't it?
It used to be gpl licensed
Right, but it's still free (even for commercial use) under the current license so long as you compile it from source yourself and don't share the binary. The author just has some weird thoughts about the GPL.
Hmm odd. So there isn't really much of a difference between using libre sprite and aseprite.
Kagi. Search that actually works, with no ads. Worth every penny.
Another happy Kagi user here, and I also hate sounding like a shill but I’m really so glad I use their product. Not having to parse through ads and AI slop when I’m busy and looking for info is so helpful when I’m trying to work.
how is it better than ddg? genuinely asking
DDG still does top ranking of advertisers even though they aren't directly targeted to you. Kagi puts the most relevant information to your search regardless to what it is you search. You're also able to uprank and downrank different sites you want to see more or less of in your searches. For example if you're someone who looks up a lot of medical terms for work or something you can completely block sites like WebMD from taking over the results making it harder to find more relevant information to it. Not my exact use case but have been a Kagi user for probably 8 months now and it's 100% worth it for the rankings as well as Kagi Translate since it has a proofread feature that replaces Grammarly for me as a dyslexic that has to write a lot of emails.
thanks very much for this info. i can see the appeal of personal ranking. appreciate the details.
I like ecosia
They have ads but.. they donate their profits to help the coimate
They even have a breakdown of their economy on their site
I don’t know, I never personally used DDG much pardon (I should have, can’t recall why I didn’t).
Why do I always see so many down votes when Kagi is mentioned?
I think it might be one or both of:
In both cases, meh. I’m answering the OP question with my opinion, and hopefully somebody finds it useful.
Some people don't like the Dev also.
Also that Kagi is working alongside AI instead of resisting it. I'm not thrilled about that part either, but it's not a complete deal breaker for me since I can just choose not to use it.
IMO, LLMs are a tool which are sometimes useful; I like appending a question mark to a query to get a quick answer. But I agree that the AI work should be kept to a minimum. At least they are using models which are far more sustainable and lightweight.
Thanks so much! I wouldn't have known about it had people not talked about it. It's only been a much or two since switching to kagi and I've been happy with it.
I didn't downvote, but probably because they're a young USA-based search engine that requires login to use - which is usually a huge red flag for privacy, and their privacy of user searches is claimed but has never been verified by any kind of audit - another significant red flag.
Why trust another for-profit Palo-Alto search company with your search data, assist their (potential) tracking by logging in, and pay for it in the process?
Wouldn't using their Privacy Pass solve this?
So, wait.. pay for search, which we need you logged in for and 'we swear is private bro, honest - but oh hey, if you want a search that's definitely actually private and we promise it (harder)', pay them more for a Professional/Ultimate/Team plan to unlock Privacy Pass access .. that is uhh, a fresh red flag.
Further, you can't access Privacy Pass (PP) searches via their standard search engine page.. you can only access it by installing and using their closed source browser, or their closed source Android app, or their closed source browser extension.. So again its just 'trust me bro' but you're paying them more, and each of the technologies they require you use to access the Privacy Pass can theoretically track all of your data in far more detail than a search engine alone? Mate, from my perspective it's privacy red flags all the way down.
I mean I get it, how do you have a premium search engine that your users pay for to avoid ads, while also identifying that they've paid, while guaranteeing their anonymity/privacy? That's a tricky thing to solve, but the way they've opted to solve is arguably even more suspicious. Open source client code (at least) to validate the server service could not be using the PP tokens to link to a specific user would be a right way.
Kagi is definitely worth it.
I'll be a lifer for Kagi. I still twitch my way to Google sometimes from a lifetime of habit and every time, it's like a little check-in, and I think, "oh, god, it can't have gotten this much worse since last time, can it?"
TeraCopy if you move lots of data around.
However, even with a pro license, I still got an ad notification in my task area recently pushing their other software. Fucking hate advertisements that go out of their way to interrupt you.
The rest of that sentence literally defines the procedure of advertising.
Well yeah, just emphasizing I already paid for your software.
I should. But I bought it multiple years ago and I didn't care that much. But I will definitely think twice next time I need some software to not use them.
I've never seen ads and I use the usual free TeraCopy at home. Are there supposed to be ads? (I don't have a pihole or anything that'd be blocking the ads at the network level)
No, I could have just kept using free. But I was using it a lot and felt like I should pay for it, otherwise free software may not be available in the future. I think it was like $20.
Fair and reasonable. I don't use it often and have nearly finished moving entirely to Linux, otherwise I may have done the same (its Windows-only).
Immich https://immich.app/
Absolutely amazing and it's technically free, but please donate if you can, they fucking deserve it.
Being able to host your own photos and have ai to help identify faces WITHOUT internet or giving your private photos to the tech giants is worth every penny.
I love Immich, but I'm afraid to donate because they're part of FUTO which looks sketchy and I know there was some drama about them.
mullvad vpn
Jetbrains Intellij IDEA Ultimate. 100% worth the price.
Well yeah it's still the best IDE for the JVM around, but I'm really not happy how their focus shifted towards AI and other useless features like themes that waste more space and take control elements away by default. Enshittification is happening, and it makes me think about cancelling my personal subscription.
As a former Eclipse user I can vouch for this as well.
IntelliJ basically killed Eclipse as a major IDE and the reaction from most of its users was "good job". It's funny how such a widely hated IDE was dominant for so long.
(Though to be fair, Eclipse helped kill itself with its UI changes)
Haha no
Why should I pay a thousand bucks a year for it? I mean have you heard of emacs and neovim?
Perhaps purchasing as a company. For me as a person the everything pack is under $300/year. And repeat subscriptions get a discount, so I'll pay even less for it next year.
Their subscription model is nice. You will always own the last version you got with your subscription. You just won't get new versions until you resub.
In general, I agree. However it's pretty much better than all of the free offerings and better than many of the more expensive ones.
There aren't any can't live without features. There are several very nice to have on so.
Subscriptions is even worse :(
Thousands? I pay like $160/year.
For Ultimate?
I was just slightly off, $179.
Your next year will be even cheaper :)
"Why should I pay hundreds of dollars for a powered motor when I have this push mower?"
Drop your scripts for getting similar refactoring support to emacs and neovim
https://github.com/ThePrimeagen/refactoring.nvim
It costs too much and has a subscription, that's not my taste.
You mentioned VS Code, have you seen VSCodium?
I paid for a copy of the Torque app on android. It lets you use bluetooth OBD2 adapters to connect to your car's ECU for reading live engine data and trouble codes. The pro paid version unlocks a lot more customization for data logging screens, allows you to save live data logs to your phone, and enables a wider range of readable codes... Makes a huge difference diagnosing weird engine issues in cars 1996 and newer.
I paid for a license of obd jscan for my vehicle since it is specific to Dodge/Jeep it can do everything, including activation of features and access to all data in the vehicle. I had to buy a more expensive vlink adapter, but it was only $20 or so. It has saved me tons of money so far. I was able to program keys, activate remote start (had to install a hood switch), and have been able to diagnose several issues with things like tpms and abs.
+1 for Torque, pay once and it does exactly what it's supposed to do and doesn't bother you with anything else.
Used the free version, don't know why I updated to paid, WORTH IT ($5). I'll never not have a BT adapter ($4) on my car computer and Torque on hand. Worth it just to read check engine lights.
Wife's car occasionally throws, and sometimes clears, a minor emissions error, kills the cruise control. The passenger can reset it rolling down the interstate and we're back in business.
DaVinci Resolve.
The software is free but not FOSS and on Linux paying for the h.264 support is nice.
Keen live is a good alternative but it feels like an advanced form of movie maker to me and lacks polish. If you learn it KDEN Live can be powerful.
I came to say Davinci Resolve. I got it for $300 with the "Speed Editor" keyboard and a lifetime license. Worth every penny.
BeyondCompare. I've used it for all my Windows text comparison needs for decades. It also handles comparing spreadsheets and directory structures.
I'm sure BeyondCompare is much more powerful, but have a look at WinMerge if you don't know it yet. I keep being impressed by it for being free and OSS.
Thank you for the pointer. I'll try it out and see if I can recommend it to my colleagues. (I'm the library techie, so if a coworker has a problem, I'm the one they'll ask for help. So, I should at least play around with it a bit first.)
yeah, i know that all too well...
cool, let me know how it goes!
I've tried so many other open source or free software for diffing and Beyond Compare is still the best, if only I could convince my company to pay for a license for it
https://kaleidoscope.app/ on macOS is a super nice tool for diffs as well.
Balatro on me iPhone
Reaper.
Yes. This. 100%.
Even if it wasn’t the most reasonable to license, it’d still be the most flexible and “hackable”.
$60 for a lifetime
Yup. A price that respects their user base. On that basis alone I have had (and will continue to have) no issue paying for another license if needed.
When I switched to Linux I just bought a new copy instead of figuring out how to transfer the license I had for my Windows PC because the Reaper team just straight up deserves the money.
Moonreader Pro. It's an ebook readers for Android. The Pro/paid version has any feature you could ask for:
Any feature, I wish an ebook reader would have - moon reader delivered (but finding these features is not intuitive).
Honestly I’ve use it, it’s good but uses far my resources that it should.
KOreader is the FOSS alternative and while its interface sucks. Its reader is excellent.
Interesting, I'll take a look at it. It seems to tick all the same boxes as moonreader, but also works on Linux and Mac.
I was curious if KOreader worked on iPhones (AFAIK, it does not), but a FOSS alternative did, readest. I'll probably take a look at that too.
The only area KOreader fails in is the lack of widgets. Coolest (or not depending on how you see it) is the Chinese ereaders use it as their devices reading engine and make their own launcher to throw you into KOreader.
FBReader has a free version but it's so good I bought the Pro just to send them some $$.
I bought the pro version of this app years ago, but after jailbreaking my Kindle and installing the open source KOreader on it, I've moved to the KOreader app on Android and Readest app on Ios as it comes with built in reading position sync and it can directly connect to my Calibre OPDS server to download the books
MakeMKV
This. I don't if there even exists a FOSS solution which is as reliable as MakeMKV
Personally I just put the libdvdcss2, libaacs and libbdplus dll in Handbrake's install folder to directly encode my personal Blu-Ray and DVD to MKV straight from the disc.
This sounds interesting. I tried this like a year ago, but could not get it working. Maybe I should give it a try.
But it's free.
There's a blu-ray decoder extended license.
The Beta (which is unlimited) is free.
If you hadn't, I would've added it.
It’s FOSS software but I use it so much I donate to support it. FreeCAD. Yeah its interface isn’t the best. But compared to Fusion for my workflow it’s so much bettwr
And only getting better with every iteration.
donate the money to somebody who runs a fediverse server. running servers costs money every month, and that can't be eliminated either because hardware can't be optimized out of existence.
I only use the fediverse for social media, and even I wouldn't necessarily recommend this. If you're a wealthy individual and understand the cost, sure; go for it! But as far as an "investment", or recouping costs spent, giant corporations spin up servers and start services to entice users, knowing they'll eventually earn that money back in data collection and ads. The fediverse **will not** put up with that, so know what you're getting yourself into...
Kagi search. It made cutting Google out of my life easy. I’d rather not pay for search but none of the free alternatives really worked like I needed. I tried out Kagi on a whim and haven’t looked back.
I just wish I could disable the Google search box on my Google Pixel home page and replace it with a Kagi search bar (that opens in my default browser though; not like Qwant does, that forces you to use their own browser).
now i just went to try it out, and I will, but the AI and pricing tiers screams "business and profit first" to me
And Google doesn't?
They both value their customers. But in the case of Google, that's not you.
mine was voicemeeter. so much nicer manipulating audio on windows with voicemeeter and never looking at windows settings again.
wish it worked with Linux tbh, but I'm making due
I love Voicemeeter so much, it's definitely one of the tools keeping me on Windows.
Gimp.
::: spoiler Tap for spoiler P.S. This is a joke and I am very proud of it. :::
Your joke made me laugh, and I'm proud of you for making it.
Linux, KDE, Firefox, etc... we are ALL supposed to "pay" somehow for it, whatever our means and however we can.
When we consider free and open source software NOT paid software, we are sabotaging the very things we love.
Hard disagree. Please tell me where Linus said he expects normal users to "pay" (or whatver you meant with the quotes.) The thing that makes these revolutionary is that they are free in a world where everyone is always trying to get something from you.
There is literally no expectation of money or commits or anything. Don't shame people for using FOSS the way FOSS was intended. If you are well off and want to support them do it! Authors will appreciate it, but dont try to turn FOSS into yet another guilt trip.
just adding: foss is what is supposed to happen in a world where the increased productivity through automation benefits everyone vs the 'bottom line'. foss has always been my tiny island of space communism :)
can you please expand a bit? What does that mean? Never heard this before.
i am referring to societal model of star fleet in the fictional lore of star trek tng
Why are you deforming my words? You are free to have your own opinion and you are welcomed to disagree but when are arguing against something I did NOT say then you are not trying to have an honest conversation.
Anyway, on the spirit of discussing anyway (despite the risk of talking past each other) what do you imagine would happen if nobody, including Linus, would contribute (not necessarily financially) to FOSS? If nobody at all build FOSS or supports FOSS, there is no FOSS, as simple as that.
I think you are missing the point
Well my point, which might be different from OP but I still is important and thus why I brought it in the discussion is :
and thus ideally we would pay (again, however one can) AND have FLOSS anyway. I don't see why we would have to settle for proprietary software.
I do not use MacOS anymore but when I did I have bought Pixelmator, it's really good. Atleast when I have used it, the company behind it was bought by Apple since then.
Wish there would be something similar for Linux :( Gimp is like the opposite of intuitive.
Why not use PhotoGIMP, which is a Photoshop UX on GIMP? https://github.com/Diolinux/PhotoGIMP
It’s just not as nice.
An actually good alternative to Adobe software is the excellent Affinity suite.
Affinity is good, but the issue is that Affinity is proprietary. That's my problem with it.
Also like Transmit and DaisyDisk, even though you have less fancy FOSS alternatives for that, which work just as well.
Affinity is apparently considering porting their suite to linux, so hopefully that'll happen.
edit: source: https://techcentral.co.za/affinity-for-linux-canvas-next-big-move-could-reshape-the-desktop-software-market/274861/
That would close a major gap on the Linux desktop for me.
I would say for myself;
Personally: Synergy (a formerly OSS software KVM). GlassWire.
Professionally: IntelliJ. Datadog.
Check out input leap, its a free open fork of Synergy
Photoshop used to be worth the money. The move to subscription based comes at a time when alternatives are starting to catch up though, so that time (of being worth it) may be coming to an end.
There's no reason to pay for Photoshop now if you're just starting. Affinity is free (as in beer) and full-featured.
And now that it is free they moved their support from a forum, which was easily searchable for questions and answers, to discord! Such an improvement! /s
I paid for affinity 1, and I use it, mostly because I do not have ps cs5 for my Mac, if I did I would still be using that.
It is a decent program, but there are so many off choices they have made, and hills they are willing to die on. Like to crop in designer you have to use the select tool, copy, then open a new document from clipboard.
Then there is stuff you cannot do in designer, so you have to do it in photos, copy it and paste it into designer.
Total Commander on Windows. It can be used for free with the nag dialog, but I paid for it since I was using it every day.
Automate on Android: it's an automation tool with its own programming ‘language’ like Tasker, except visual. Tasker has some weird and cumbersome idioms, while Automate is mostly regular programming mapped onto its visual blocks. Plus it doesn't require buying more apps for additional functionality like Tasker. Alas, it can't do custom dialogs or onscreen buttons, so I might still need Tasker for that.
Unified Remote on Android: nice remote control for the desktop machine, with the ability to add custom controls programmed in Lua (iirc).
Magic Dosbox on Android: it allows adding custom onscreen controls tailored to each game.
Functional Ear Trainer and Perfect Ear on Android: nice training for hearing notes and rhythm, though I can't say they did much for my lazy ass.
Sunvox on Android: a music tracker with modular synths. Seems to be the only full-blown tracker on Android. Alas, doesn't seem to be very good with samples, the workflow is a bit cumbersome, but I need to properly try that yet. The app has been around for ages, I've seen it twenty years ago for Palm and Windows CE. There are also desktop versions, which are free iirc. (Also, the author can't currently receive payments from Google Play since he's in Russia. It's better to write to him and arrange payment via bitcoin or such, afaik he's happy to provide the full app that way.)
On Mac, there are many open-source utils for tweaking the interface, but paid Bartender and Hazeover are better than alternatives. One hides extra menu icons, the other dims background windows.
Alfred on Mac, a launcher: you call it up with a hotkey, and type a few letters to run an app or, crucially, a custom action. It's unmatched by alternatives, especially on Windows and Linux. Typing a couple letters into Alfred is often quicker than cmd-tabbing to an app. And it's way better for frequent actions than mousing around.
I'm also planning to buy Renoise, the cross-platform music tracker. It does about everything the big DAWs do, but with the keyboard-centric workflow. Pretty cheap too.
I also use Total Commander for Android. It's the only file manager on Android that makes sense to me.
Yeah, the Android app is great, and is free. The open-source Ghost Commander is lacking in polish in comparison.
The only thing I'm missing from TC on Android is filtering the list with keyboard entry instead of jumping to the file that begins with those letters. The former is much better, as shown by Double Commander.
Just a teensy iOS/macos extension, but Vinegar is awesome for watching YouTube.
I would have said the Affinity suite of stuff, but they recently sold out to Canva, and fuuuuuuuck them.
Agreed on Affinity. At least my old licenses still work. But yeah, fuck them.
I know many would not agree, but for me it's 1Password. I use it dozens of times a day - not just for passwords, but also for credit cards, social security numbers, notes, and maybe the most useful, SSH keys. My whole family is covered for $5/month, a laughably low sum.
I paid for Ardour, but it is also free.
Symphonium, a music app for android (maybe also iOS, dunno). I've tried so many other apps for both local and remote music, none of them come even close - I particularly like the pre-caching and rolling cache features, as there are some places I go regularly where connection is spotty, and they allow me to stream pretty much uninterrupted from my subsonic server.
nzb360 that I got a perpetual license for at 10eur. It's so easy and convenient to torrent stuff for my Jellyfin.
Niagara launcher is free but I paid for the perpetual license. It's a third party launcher that I really like.
I'm also a Jetbrains fan depending on the language, they have so much support for everything just out of the box and are on Linux.
Also games, but I guess people don't want to hear those here. Factorio was definitely worth.
+1 for the Niagara Launcher. Cleanest launcher I've found during 4 years of Android usage.
nzb360 is fantastic, I would've paid for it but was one the lucky ones to win it in the subreddit raffle
Games. Nothing else. Functional software should be open source.
Why are games the exception? Just curious why FOSS is required for non-entertainment but if you're being entertained it's OK for a studio to get profit?
If I'm reliant on software in order to do something (backups, accounting, etc.) I don't want that software working to be up to the whims of some company.
Games I'm fine with because they're art and the creators should be able to earn money from them.
Then remember to only buy indie or well unionised studio because the artists certainly don't earn much money from big studio games.
Because games are works of art. They generally don’t work like other software. Most software is designed to meet some requirements and either does so or works toward doing so over its lifetime. A game seeks to tell a story or provide an experience that may improve over time, but in many cases is a static end product.
Of course that isn’t all cases these days because there are a lot of subscription based models and game seasons, etc. But you still expect a game to be a thing for a limited time, or at least its development.
There is clearly a ton of exception to this, but I tend to think of game producers as workshops filled with artists and such. More like making a movie than maintaining a building.
Just seems like a weirdly arbritray distinction to who should or shouldn't be able to profit from their work. Like just because the maker of say Fusion Studio (video composting software) aren't making something to illicit an emotional response from you they shouldn't be able to charge for what they do?
In no other sphere would this distinction exist, imagine if all non-fiction books were free but you still had to pay for novels? Or because a bus is a utilitarian vehicle it's manufacturer shouldn't be allowed to be paid for it but because a Farrari exists for the pleasure of driving it, they can charge you to buy one.
edit: I do see the point about the fixed vs open ended though
I want to be explicit. I’m not at all saying people “shouldn’t be able to profit from their work”. No way; all labor should be rewarded. I’m just saying I can see why works of art are somewhat different than tools. You use fiction versus non-fiction books as an example, but I’m actually putting those in the same box as games and movies.
I generally prefer FOSS for practical and ethical reasons, but I have no problem with paid software or people being paid to write free software. I think most software can be done better by an interested community. Free software is just better in many cases. Sometimes that is true with games too though. Enemy Territory, for example.
Yeah this whole comment chain is nonsense and I'm honestly flabbergasted that there's so many up votes on such a terrible take.
Art is open for interpretation. I consider the apps Flowx and FairEmail works of art.
Distinction without a meaning.
Art and games defined as as art can be free (freedom or beer).
Open source != Free
If someone develops software they have a right to earn money on it.
You are confusing source available with open source
The only software I would buy again instantly is Tasker (Android).
I have it too but don't use it. What do u use it for?
Some of my most used:
Any chance you'd be willing to share some of those configurations? Especially the wireguard one. For some reason I have the hardest time getting something working to connect to wire guard using tasker when I leave home.
The others I'd love to see and learn from also if you'd be willing to share. Thanks!
I had trouble getting Wireguard to connect when using Tasker on another phone. Turning on a tunnel in a task only worked intermittently. If you're experiencing the same thing the work around is adding a step to start WG and then connecting the tunnel, but if I remember correctly I had to include a step to return to the previous app so I wouldn't end up with the WG UI left on the screen.
I do have one task shared on taskernet.com that may be of use. Go to https://taskernet.com/?public and deselect the "Basics" tag at the top, then search for "wireguard". Look for Wireguard Autoconnect. It's designed to connect a WG tunnel, then run an app and maintain the tunnel as long as the app is still on the screen. It drops the tunnel if you switch to another app or the launcher. Someone else has uploaded one that connects WG when not on your home SSID, but doing that requires location to be left on all the time, something which I avoid.
Would have no problem sharing my other configs but they've become too complex to do that easily. Everything's interconnected and nested with tasks setting and clearing multiple variables and then calling other tasks based on events and those variables. I'm no expert but am glad to help if you have questions and am on Lemmy often. DM me.
I've been using tasker for 16 years now and am always surprised that it hasn't started to suck or had a lot of functions blocked over the years
Any interesting uses you'd care to share?
The list is literally endless, and more often than not specific to what you specifically need. Here are some things I have setup:
I have also used it previously for job specific tasks. Like I had a button on my home screen that would open a menu with a list of options, and then I would select one of the options. It just saved that selected text and the current time into a file so I could reference what time I did something.
If you have any sort of smart home, the options just keep growing.
I do have a smart home and spend way too much time playing around with it, but haven't done much with Tasker yet. The only thing I use it for right now BT presence detection to trigger a task enabling wifi and disabling location.
Interesting and useful info, thanks for sharing.
If you use Android I highly recommend Niagara launcher. It's different in the best ways and very polished. I tried it for a while and happily paid for the lifetime license.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=bitpit.launcher
Just saw Clicks launched a new phone with Niagara launcher as the default. Physical keyboard, expandable storage and a headphone jack too.
+1 for Niagara. I don't care about how many different ways I can lay out my apps and widgets, I just want an app drawer and and a few favorites.
do games count? If yes, Terraria
i have over 375 hours on 2 games(Terraria and TModLoader) for the 5 USD i paid to get the game
On the game front I have to recommend Creeper World 3. I have over 50 days, yes days, of playing. It was absolutely worth the trivial cost and quite enjoyable.
I would've said Minecraft, but M$ unilaterally removed my account even though I bought it when Mojang still advertised it as keep forever.
They had a pretty long migration period, sorry you missed it. I got bamboozled into buying Bedrock in addition to Java. They had a promotion to give it for free but I migrated after that. Soon after I bought it they combined the two into one purchase so if anyone had either they now have both.
i didnt say minecraft because its so easy to pirate you can do it accidentally
its also owned by microsoft
PDF-xchange
Who knew a PDF editor would become so useful.
I'm pretty sure the free version has more features than adobe reader.
And if you don't want to pay, you can demo all of the paid features. Saving the file will put a watermark on every page, but if you print-to-pdf before you save, no watermark. Great if you just need to merge a few files or do some quick stuff once in a while.
Wip3out 2097
Bitwig. Excellent DAW that has a native linux build. I tried to like Ardour and many of the other open source alternatives, but they all felt cumbersome and not very mature.
I'm looking forward to learn Bitwig since it looks reslly cool. Do you have any way to learn using it and music production in general you found useful?
My experience with ProTools and Cakewalk 20ish years ago came in handy. Other than that, there are some really nice youtube tutorials available.
One thing worth mentioning is their excellent customer support. I signed up for the trial period, but then life happened, and I contacted them an explained my case and they were more than willing to reset my trial period so I could have a proper go.
After buying it I had a support request and they were both helpful and quick to help me resolve the issue.
Mullvad VPN.
That's a service, not software.
Isn't it both?
The software is just a slightly-customized OpenVPN/Wireguard client. Both of which are open source.
Yeah you can even just download a configuration file from most VPN services so you don't need their custom client.
Mullvad is dropping OpenVPN support on january 15h btw. https://mullvad.net/en/blog/final-reminder-for-openvpn-removal
Well, shit. Guess I'll be switching back to wireguard. I found openvpn to be much more stable.
You pay for the service. The app is free, but I don't really find it useful for a phone; the service works seamlessly with openvpn or wireguard on any proper server.
For writers working on bigger projects : scrivener
Divemate, better than keeping logs in different apps if you change computers. Android only, sorry. If you chew the fruit you gotta find something else.
Plex Media Sever used to be great and well worth the lifetime pass. With the recent UI changes I would drop kick it if I could. Sadly the other options just don't work right with large libraries.
Torque pro is nice especially if you have a turbo charged vehicle. Free is fine if you just need to check codes.
I feel like there are a lot of people who hate on Plex here, but for me it’s really been super solid so I always try to advocate for it. JF wasn’t for me. Buy once/use forever, great capable interface, great apps (downloads work perfectly now), and I never need to fiddle with it. I replace a Synology package every few weeks when they release a new version and it just keeps ticking.
I paid $89 for it on sale, and I’d definitely groan if I had to pay $250 for it today, but I’d still pay it. I’m just glad they’re paying hardworking folks to make the software I’ve used EVERY DAY for years. It’s the buy-once-cry-once model we wished every other software vendor would go back to.
I agree it's super stake and works well. The new UI for TV's is a fail.
There is a school of design thought that says you should be able to navigate to what you need in 3 clicks or less. Old school windows xp is an example, most everything needed was start, mouse over programs and click to access it. It you used it frequently it was start, click on the program. The longest was start, control panel, and then the app you needed.
Plex's new UI has me hitting the back button so many times it's faster to exit and come back in when before it was a simple scroll left and move around. To get to movies I have to move up then click multiple times and move down to browse instead of just moving let and clicking movies. As soon as anything else is able to support my library and allow me to use an old school plex interface like what the web browser still does Plex is dead to me. They have already stated the new UI is the future and they are going to eventually move to a more roku type model to profit from streaming. If they would keep the old UI available for people who prefer it I would stick around. They also split the android app so you his need 3 different apps if you have video, audio, and picture libraries.
I feel you on the UI changes, I’ve definitely noticed the extra clicks, and there is also a bit of a weird pattern when navigating between the main content area and the top bar where the selector wants to go to the left navigation pane.
I still feel fortunate every time I open up Plex that it exists, and I’m sure that their devs hear enough criticism on the internet that I try to leave something positive for them to find. So until the day that Plex operates anything close to the miserable experience that is a Roku in 2026, I’ll keep using it. I maintain perfect metadata and file naming for just that day.
For art on a Mac Sketch and Pixelmator are awesome and have fully replace the Adobe products I used to pirate to rely on.
FL Studio, a DAW (Digital Audio Workstation). There are different tiers which you can upgrade from any time. You get free updates forever.
Pdf Xchange is one I use a lot. Wish they'd make a Linux version instead of just saying to use Wine. I'd buy it again if they'd released it on Linux to get some of the newer features (correct scans, monochrome recoloring, delete all children, dark page mode).
BuzzKill for Android.
PocketCasts used to be, before they went subscription.
PocketCasts is subscription? I don't think I've seen anything indicating that to me and I know I'm not paying a subscription for it.
If you bought it before it went freemium, you're grandfathered in.
Oh word? Nice.... I guess I paid at one point to remove ads
Love Buzzkill 👍
God damn Matt Mullenweg. I have mixed feelings. I like the services that he keeps buying but I don’t like all the things he’s doing to them.
Guessing he has a sizable legal fee to make up for nuking Word Press credibility.
Anyway PocketCast now has a subscription and I hate it.
Procreate on iPad. Cheap and the best art studio you can ever buy
Sketchbook is free and does the same thing. What does procreate do, that sketchbook can't?
Not sure, but sketchbook comes from Autodesk and they are notorious for changing the rules and terms and conditions.
Just personal beef, but I refuse to touch their software after the shenanigans they pulled with Fusion.
RadarScope for Android and iOS. It's a professional grade weather radar app for the US (and Canada?) and is worth every
pennynickel.There are games I pay for, but only on Nintendo consoles. Aside from that, it's strictly write it myself or go without.
I definitely should donate to more FOSS projects, though.
Everyone around me is saying that DaVinci Resolve is great. It cost not an insignificant summ, so whether it actually worth it I will have to report later
Have you tried the free version? Unless you're running a large scale production studio, the free version should cover you.
Even the iPad version is amazing for quick stuff. No ads, no watermark, and no render limits and all the other junk that the other "free" apps are filled with.
They make their money on expensive hardware.
I am using free version for the last 4 years at least to edit a YouTube show and a podcast. I don't do anything really fancy, just basic editing, a bit of colour correction, a lot of audio cleanup.
Everyone is saying that starting version 20 they have some cool plugins that save a ton of time
Plugins can be nice. I haven't used resolve regularly in a while, so I don't keep up with the news. I looked up the price and it's $300, thought it was a lot more. That's pretty reasonable to save up for. Although, I didn't see if the price is per version or forever, that makes a difference.
Forever apparently
Radio Silence
This is an outbound application firewall for MacOS that allows you to block applications from phoning home. It blocks outgoing traffic rather than incoming traffic, which can be toggled within the firewall settings. It has a time-limited trial period, but I did the one-time-purchase for 9 $ and it served me well since I bought it in - I think it was in 2021 - originally to keep a not-so-legally-obtained Photoshop Suite from connecting to their servers. The app is not intrusive, no annoying pop ups or the like. The app launches automatically at system start up. Occaional updates (bug fixes or to match with the latest OS version) are included with the licence.
Today I use it to block a pirated version of SketchUp (the only remaining software I have installed that has been pirated) from calling home, als well as Affinity 2 (and, probably in the future) the now free Affinity 3 (since it was aquired by Canva).
I consider this app worth its money.
Have you ever used Little Snitch? It’s another great MacOS app that has an outbound firewall. It’s been updated to include a DNS ad-blocker too.
I’ve been very happy with it for many years, but I’m always open to trying out alternatives. Thanks for sharing!
I did once. It was back in the days when all of my software was pirated - even Little Snitch (where you had to add Little Snitch itself to its blocking rules, to prevent it from phoning home). As far as I can remember, it was too expensive to buy - at least for a permanently broke student at that time. Later I discovered Radio Silence. I wrote that I had RS from 2021 onward, but I think I already had it in 2018. Not 100% sure.
Propellerhead’s Reason.
It’s some of the best audio engineering software that exists and as I understand, impossible to pirate.
As a day one user since release in 2000 (and before that Rebirth and Recycle)...
It can be pirated, lately eats resources, crashes a lot, overpriced plugins, audio crackling no matter what buffer settings after updates and to this day doesn't have any ootb support for MIDI routing. After 20 years, and 400+ projects later I ditched that software. It became unreliable, used to be rock solid.
Propellerhead got aquired by an investment company, and Ernst left...became Reason Studios and then went downhill slowly. Last version I bought was Reason 12 upgrade and got more and more disappointed, stopped using it almost 2 years ago after another crash losing ideas.
Now on Studio One, also paid.
I am on Reason 3.0. Zero issues ever.
Didn't have any issues with that either (from memory.) Lightweight and solid. Until version 8 Reason was pretty good.
I only use Reason sometimes as a plugin now into Studio One. It does have some unique features I still like to use, but as a main sequencer I would not recommend any version later than 8, which you can't buy.
My advice for beginners to start with Reaper and it comes very cheap and full featured compared to most major DAW's.
I am from the Steinberg era back in the 80s with a C64/Amiga, 90s with Cubase on Atari and PC…that is why I switched to Studio One. Suits me best, and the Artist 5 version came free with the Presonus controller (that I did not need) for an extra 20€ on the normal software price.
They have some really shitty practices: https://youtu.be/YAx3yCNomkg
Same happened to me with Recycle, Reason Studio's stopped online activation. I still have the official, useless CD-Rom. So I have the 2.1 version that I did not pay for.
I've never found any paid software to be better at what it does than a FOSS version if one exists, and almost everything one can do with a computer has a FOSS version to do it with these days.
If I really can't find something I want that does what I need the way I need it done... I make it myself.
If you're talking functionality, I'll introduce you to some:
Amost all paid audio production software is leagues better than the free alternatives. And beyond that, many VSTs don't work under Linux.
The sad truth is that most Adobe products still beat their free alternatives in features. Those alternatives are definitely good enough for 95% of people but they aren't better
Autodesk software. AutoCAD has some competition (for basic things) but there's nothing for Revit. Actually a TON of construction/infrastructure software doesn't have a better alternatives, not just Autodesk
Those were my 3 sticking points (I switched anyway)
AutoCAD was top of my list.
I fucking hate AutoCAD (I use it professionally) but there's nothing better and I really doubt a free alternative can top it. AutoLISP alone makes it unbeatable
Every single major commercial 3D CAD suite is still better than FreeCAD. FreeCAD is not the unusable beast it used to be, in fact it’s very much better, but it has technical debt and structural limitations that just keep it worse.
And this infuriates me because the market for those suites is so oppressively terrible.
Like, hell, I don't even need the full suite of simulation and modeling tools that they come with. Just give me a rock-solid parametric CAD engine, a decent rendering suite tacked on to it, and I'd really love it if anyone in this market could start investigating Linux compatibility! Hell, I'd even pay for that - just not the awful licensing regimes the current offerings operate under.
I bought Alibre Design, as it was a less oppressive situation license-wise, but these days I find I’m using it less than I might simply because I prefer staying in Linux for literally anything else. It was a bit pricy, but at least it was a perpetual license. I am hearing that while they don’t intend to support Linux, they’re moving away from some of the libraries that have prevented Proton from working.
The rest are varying degrees of oppressive lock-in and feature erosion. PTC/OnShape in particular has a huge “Fuck-You” attitude towards anybody who wants to consider throwing a design up on Etsy or selling a few trinkets without paying out the ass for a professional-grade subscription, and being the only fully mature web-based tool, it’s the only one that works properly in Linux.
+1 for Alibre.
With v29 (release probably in march) they are changing the UI framework, the last thing preventing it on any other OSs. In the latest live stream on YouTube they hinted that they would look into a Linux port if there is enough interest. 3 of 4 hosts in the stream gave a thumbs up for Linux, so there is hope.
Edit: Link to the stream https://youtu.be/uDheVp1OH4Y?t=5184
Compared to other CAD its cheap as hell. Especially if you don't need the all features, you can get Atom3D for less than 300€. For everyone interested: wait for promotions, the price is heavily discounted a few times per year.
I would kill for Rhino 3D on Linux…
However, these days I usually prefer OpenSCAD to Grasshopper for parametric.
Almost all video game genres are overwhelmingly dominated by closed-source, commercial software. FOSS generally isn't competitive there.
I'd give FOSS the upper hand in traditional roguelikes and playing card solitaire implementations, maybe. Maybe chess AIs. Purely-text interactive fiction of the stuff that one might find on The Interactive Fiction Archive isn't mostly FOSS, but is frequently non-commercial.
That's a pretty small portion of what game stuff is out there.
But, yeah, for most non-game stuff, I'd agree; I'd rather use the FOSS options.
Datadog beats the pants off Prometheus, Grafana, and friends.
DAWs. LMMS is only really functional as introductory software, to see if you like the workflow before you graduate to a paid DAW IMO. Maybe when Audacity introduces the requisite features to be considered a DAW it'll be better, but that's at least a decade down the line.
package disabler pro. I have a samsung phone and disables the bloat. It has to be side loaded.
Try Canta and Shizuku. It's a pair that work together and allow you to remove anything.
Why don't you use LineageOS or something?
This phone wont run it.
What a shame
Best file explorer i have used on android. And still using today !
Solid explorer file manger : https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=pl.solidexplorer2
You can access to your own server using any protocol you want !
I’ll give a +1 to RadarScope; it’s by far the most useful radar app I’ve used. The only thing I’ve seen surpass it are desktop software, most of which is also paid like GRLevelX or products more oriented towards professional meteorologists (and most meteorologists I know from a past career in TV still seem to use RadarScope on their phones when they don’t have access to their more powerful software at work).
I really like RadarOmega, and it also has a decent desktop app (even on Linux!). Although obviously GRLevelX is much more advanced.
I changed to RadarOmega after Radarscope stopped working on my GrapheneOS phone.
I watch archived news coverage of tornadoes on YT and I've seen it used live. Pretty sure it has some broadcasting-specific features especially when streamed to an Apple TV.
Vegas Pro - it's pretty easy and user-friendly
it doesn't know the galactic center but otherwise check Trail Sense on f-droid. the astronomy tool has a 3d mode that shows where the sun and the moon is. oh it says there will be visible meteor showers in a few hours!
https://f-droid.org/packages/com.kylecorry.trail_sense
Sony Vegas.
I don't normally do the whole trolling thing, but I gotta say I was tempted to write "Windows" with no explanation just to see how poorly it would go.
windows are good for letting the fresh air in but it's no software so you missed the point here
Excluding mobile apps that I've paid to make ad-free, there's only two that I'm subscribed to so I guess they're worth the money.
Other is Protonmail and other I wont tell.
The computer's BIOS.
PocketTube. Makes YouTube much nicer and organized.
MultiView on androidTV
Anki ios app. Developer doesn’t charge for desktop or web app. Well worth the $25 to support.
Mindomo apparently. I did in days, what wasted years...
Scrivener is pretty damn good if you're into writing.
For novels, screenwriting or things like DnD it's got a corkboard with scene cards you can drag and drop around to make the story flow better.
It also has character management with little cheat sheets for notes. You can track character persona/relationships nicely.
$60, lifetime purchase with free upgrades and you can install on all your computers in your household
I pay for mobaxterm.
Anything that you like can be worth a cost. I prefer FOSS wherever possible, but really don’t mind paying for good stuff. One example is wooshy. This piece of software lets you use the keyboard in macOS for nearly everything, and it is the best use of the accessibility api’s I’ve ever seen. There are similar things but this software is unparalleled in my view.
Currently paying for a task app called Planndu, it's awesome
Fight club 5e. If you play enough D&D it becomes quickly worth it. It’s also proven useful in helping our new players get their characters setup more quickly.
It is very slow to be updated. Has he said if there is a plan to update to current rules? Last update was 2+ years ago. I loved the app, I purchased it, but as of now it is useless.
I haven’t seen him say anything about it, but I also don’t really watch his updates. I mostly watch for compendium updates from the Archivist. So far the 2024 stuff has imported fine, I’m using it in one of my campaigns, now. I’ve only had issues in the app with edge cases like changing an attack roll modifier for a specific special weapon, or something else niche.
Thanks, i guess it had been so long since i imported the files i completely forgot about that step of the process.
I think there was this paid C++ LSP that I gave a try to when looking into UE that one I liked. 1password, it's just great and the yearly cost is negible. FilePilot if you still have to use windows like I do.
HueForge, with the FlatForge plugin.
I know it's niche even amond 3D printing enthusiasts, but the results are stellar and always a conversation starter. I've even got the TD1s for Christmas, so I'm looking to up the quality even more.
Don't get me wrong, the software is a horrible unintuitive mess a of a UI with steep learning curve, but there are no alternatives.
Software for things that are tedious or time-consuming to code.
I'm hoping that Zed Editor will become worth the money some day. It's currently a bit lagging compared to Cursor, unfortunately.
At least make it funny, dude...
ChatGPT
Microsoft
Twitter
Adobe
Spotify
Few ones i could think of
Nice ragebait
don't forget google drive, and facebook without ads
/s
Amazon, Disney Plus, Netflix, Door Dash Premium, and if it counts of course Clash of Clans & Coinmaster.