How Do You Find the Right Tool for the Right Job ? 63
Arthur B. asks: "Whenever I try to find a software product, I find myself browsing SourceForge, but it's really hard to find something, when I only know the features I want and not the name of the project. It's hard, once I find a software, to gather information about it's reliability (is it a huge collaborative OSS project, an IT giant driven project or an end of term student project). The same is true about package trees in Linux distros. I'd like to ask the crowd: Where do you pick your software (be it commercial or not)? How do you compare different products? How do you know what a software does exactly before using it? Does a website provide this kind of help? Please let me know your tips and tricks."
Great Question. (Score:2, Informative)
Freshmeat (Score:5, Informative)
Stay informed and up-to-date all the time and not only if you've been delegated to a project.
Several useful steps. (Score:3, Informative)
Look up the terms on Google and see if there is an overarching concept involved.
Look for Wikipedia entries for those terms and the overarching concept. See if any of them have links to Wikipedia pages on software.
Do the same thing with sourceforge.
Do a google search for the software you find. That may lead you to pages that say how good the program is as well as other programs that do similar things.
I do this a lot (Score:4, Informative)
I run a freeware review site [nedwolf.com] [blatant plug] , and I basically scour delicious.org/popular and software, digg.com / software , freshmeat, FileForum Beta News and a few others. I download 'em, try em, and see what's what. It's a little easier for me because I'm limited to freeware, but these are good places to start.
Download.com (Score:3, Informative)
Their editors' rating is fairly reliable, if not, the users' comments usually set them straight.
apt-cache search <whatever> (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Google (Score:3, Informative)
Google Groups [google.com] is your friend.
You will find (with some effort) information about problems, products, programs, procedures, etc.
You can waste lots of time searching the web.
That is due to bullshit websites that have lots of keywords but no information.
MS likes to support those sites that frustrate Linux newbies.
Re:I do this a lot (Score:3, Informative)
I only did a quick run through of your site, but am I correct that it is a Windows-only software site? I will certainly pass your URL around because I work with some people who seem to feel that software isn't any good or reliable unless they paid someone money for it.
Tigris.org (Score:3, Informative)