Taf's favorites (12)

GIMP (GNU Image Manipulation Program) is a powerful photo and image editor for composition and authoring. It can be used as a simple paint program, a high quality photo retouching program, an online batch processing system, a mass production image renderer, an image format converter and much more.

The program is cross-platform with versions available for Mac and Linux. GIMP Portable is the PortableApps version of the program.

Notes:

1. If you're willing to risk trying a 2012 add-on, mimic Photoshop adjusts GIMP's layout to a switched on Photoshop-like single-window mode.
2. Alternatively, another portable package (though outdated from 2021) is X-Gimp.

Mozilla Thunderbird is a skinnable, feature-rich email, calendar, task and instant messaging client with support for plugins and many protocols. It comes with advanced search tools, message filtering, Bayesian spam detector, built-in spell checker, mailbox compression and many more. Program features can be extended with add-ons, including a specialized version of email encryption tool GPG.

Email protocols include SMTP, POP3, IMAP (including uploads, albeit a date issue), NNTP and RSS and chat support for IRC, Twitter, XMPP, Google Talk, and Matrix. Also supports OAuth for use with accounts that require it instead of a password.

Mozilla Thunderbird, Portable Edition is a special build licensed by Mozilla. Alternatively, X-Thunderbird is also available. For XP/Vista, version 52.9.1 is available here.

Inkscape is a vector graphics editor and open alternative to commercial apps like Illustrator, Freehand, CorelDraw, or Xara X. Useful for branding, icons, web design, publishing and even illustrated maps, it supports features like shapes, paths, text, markers, clones, alpha blending, transforms, gradients, patterns and grouping. Uses the open W3C standard Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) file format, as well as exporting to other vector-based and standard image types like PNG. Imports formats such as JPEG, PNG and TIFF.

Inkscape Portable is a portable wrapper distributed by the publisher using the PortableApps.com format. Alternatively, X-Inkscape is another wrapper that writes settings to the application folder.

Those on Windows XP and Vista should use 0.92.3 as that is the last supported version for those operating systems.

FreeVimager is a fast media viewer and image editor with full screen and multi-monitor support. Includes various image modification tools (lossless rotate and crop, resize, brightness, contrast, sharpen) and analysis tools. Includes batch processing and CD/DVD slideshow creation, as well as a random setting. Touch screen gesture support for zoom in/out and for next/previous picture.

Includes EXIF date / time adjustment, view image location in Google Maps and can view/edit JPEG, BMP, GIF, TIFF, PNG, PCX, EMF, HEIC, WEBP, AVIF, and JXR as well as save to PDF.

Also includes basic screenshot and scanning tools.

ChordEase makes it easier to play music with complicated chords. No matter what the chords are, you can play as if they were all in the key of C. You don't need to play sharps or flats, because ChordEase automatically adds them for you. Although ChordEase is primarily intended for jazz, it could be useful for any type of music that modulates frequently. ChordEase alters your notes in real time in order to make them harmonically correct, while preserving their rhythm and dynamics. By delegating rapid music theory calculations to ChordEase, you gain freedom to concentrate on other aspects of musical performance, such as feel and aesthetics.

The program is a translator that takes MIDI notes as input, and produces MIDI notes as output. The input notes are translated to the current chord scale, so that the output notes fit the chord progression of a song. Supports various mapping functions which determine how the translating is done, can handle multiple translations at once for multiple performers to play through a single instance using any number of MIDI instruments. Parameters can be remotely controlled via MIDI for additional effects and can also record its own output as MIDI data.

VisualMusic lets you play 128 musical instruments on your PC including flute, bagpipes and even whistle. You can even record, edit, and save what you are playing. If you not expert with the keyboard, the program provides you an easy scripting language to create music just by entering what key in which instrument you want to play for how much time.

X-VisualMusic is the portable version in win-PenPack format.

LenMus (Phonascus) is a program for learning music, allowing you to focus on specific skills and exercises covering both theory and aural training. The different activities can be customized to meet your needs, and the program provides interactive feedback until mastery of each concept is achieved. It also includes an score editor.

X-LenMus is the portable version in win-PenPack format.

Maxima is a system for the manipulation of symbolic and numerical expressions, including differentiation, integration, Taylor series, Laplace transforms, ordinary differential equations, systems of linear equations, polynomials, and sets, lists, vectors, matrices, and tensors. Maxima yields high precision numeric results by using exact fractions, arbitrary precision integers, and variable precision floating point numbers. Maxima can plot functions and data in two and three dimensions.

Cross platform with clients available for Linux, OS X, and Android (thanks Midas).

X-Maxima is a portablized version of the program. Alternatively, an unstable Maxima portable package is available from PortableApps.com.

WaveShop is a fast and lightweight audio editor, which despite its name supports lots of different audio file formats, including MP3, FLAC, OGG/Vorbis, and AAC/MP4. The program is bit-perfect, meaning uncompressed audio samples aren't altered unless they need to be; editing a portion of an audio file only affects that portion and the rest of the file remains untouched. Cut and pasted audio blocks won't modify their contents. This is especially useful for patching a finished master without corrupting its dither. Other features include unlimited undo, peak and RMS analysis, normalizing, fading, audio generation, and more.

Note that the author recommends running the 64-bit version (if you have 64-bit Windows) as it can load bigger files without running out of memory.

Alternatively, WaveShop Portable automatically switches between 32 & 64-bit and portablizes paths. X-WaveShop is also available.