More Free Productivity Tools

Thanks to open source communities and Google, free downloads and tools have become more useful to businesses than ever before.

An easy way to sum up the evolution of productivity software –

Old school of thought: I want more bang for my buck, which software should I buy?

New school of thought: Now, that I can spend less on software by using alternate solutions, I want the most return for my bandwidth and less time spent learning a new tool. What tools should I download?

This new approach is based on a number of free useful downloads and tools that push the edges of web-based and open source technologies. Microsoft Office products and the typical office-based solutions still have a safe-haven in today’s business climate, but this haven is being challenged at an ever increasing rate by ever improving open-source and free tools.

A couple months ago we introduced you to a couple free and helpful tools and now here are a few more of our favorites:

PDF Creation
doPDF Free PDF Converter – this downloadable tool allows users to save any document as a PDF

Screen Sharing
TeamViewer – a great tool that allows users to share a desktop environment without many security hassles and easy to understand accessibility. One clause, it is only free for non- enterprise use, so it’s great for non-profits and individuals in need of sharing.

File Transfer Protocol (FTP) Connection
Filezilla – is a free download that allows for easy access to FTP a variety of server content on the web. This tool is useful for managing server content as long as you have the credentials for access. Also, it is great for sending over large files such as photos and videos. If you work with us on a site build or intense project, it is more than likely we will FTP files to you and ask you to post files to FTP as well.

Anti-Virus
Avast Free Antivirus or AVG Anti-Virus Free Edition – both are free for download and used by literally hundreds of millions of people around the world. They work best when paired with full antivirus suites, but can prove to be useful alone. Once again, these are not to be hosted at enterprise level, but free for single computer download and usage.

Document Collaboration
Google Docs – this is available for use if you have a Google account. Multiple users can work on the same document at the same time. This is a great resource for hashing out research, project plans and timeline drafts with groups.

As with all free software and tools for use online, Media Genesis and the companies providing these services provide a “use at your own risk” clause. Please make sure that if you are to download or use these programs, you get them from the licensed provider for safety purposes. We recommend you do your homework using the respective websites and search engines to gain a full understanding of these tools and their uses.