User:BlankVerse/Software

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Web browsers
Don't use Microsoft's Internet Explorer web browser!!!

Instead, use one of the following programs: [[|frame|right|Opera homepage ]]
 * Opera internet web browser
 * I've used the Opera web browser since version 2, when the entire program still fit on a single 3.5" floppy disc. At that time I had it running on a relative's 286-based computer with only 12 MB of RAM. MSIE wouldn't run on that computer at all, and Netscape Navigator barely ran. It is a very good, fast browser that allows considerable customization. However the default settings can be quite confusing for the beginning Opera user and that the documentation for most of the more advanced features leaves much to be desired.


 * Mozilla Application Suite
 * This is a slightly newer version of the same software as the most current version of Netscape Navigator, but without any of the AOL bloatware added, such as AOL Instant Messenger and ICQ, and without any requirement to register with AOL's ScreenName service (which to me seems to have some of the same inherent problems as Microsoft's much maligned Passport service). For people deciding to replace MSIE, or for non-technical computer users, this may be the best choice.

[[|right|thumb|225px|Get Firefox Spread Firefox ]]
 * Mozilla Firefox
 * This is a rewritten web browser from the Mozilla folks. It is a very simple but fast web browser in the download version. On the other hand, it can be given many new capabilities by using downloadable extensions. For example, anyone doing any editing of Wikipedia articles should probably be using the SpellBound spell-check extension which has both American English and British English word lists available. I also use the Adblock, Googlebar, Add Bookmark Here, Plain Text Links, BugMeNot, and QuickNote extensions. This is the internet web browser that I currently use the most.

Spyware detection
I've tried several Spyware detection programs, but the best are still:
 * Ad-aware
 * Spybot - Search & Destroy

Other programs

 * Irfanview graphic file viewer
 * ZoneAlarm firewall program
 * NoteTab text editor (the program that I am using for all of my offline Wikipedia editing)
 * Personal Ancestral File (PAF) genealogy software from http://familysearch.com
 * WordWeb thesaurus & dictionary