People routinely ask about my favorite software so, I’ve decided to gather all my top picks in one place to make every one’s life a little easier.

All of the software listed here is free for personal use, meaning:

1. Any of this software can be installed and used at absolutely no charge, forever. There is no nagging, spyware, or anything else nasty.
2. Because it’s totally free, sometimes there is very little support. You either figure out how to use it, or just get rid of it.

So, without further ado, here is the list categorized by type of application:
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Security conscious techies now have some additional evidence to illustrate the inherent risks posed from surfing the Internet unprotected.

According to this article at ARSTechnica, one in twenty-five search results across major search engines result in sites affiliated with spyware, viruses, excessive pop-up advertisements, and junk e-mail.

The study found that not only can regular links found by search engines be dangerous, the sponsored links that appear in prominent positions in the results pages can also be harmful. In fact, in the May study, sponsored links were more than twice as likely to be linked to malware than non-sponsored links (8.5 vs. 3.1 percent).

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There is a new breed of online service providers all trying to gain position as the office document system of choice. Big players like Google and Microsoft have already announced their intentions, and small upstarts such as ThinkFree and Zoho have also thrown their hat in the ring.

I previously posted my review of Zoho.com so I won’t duplicate that work here. However, here is some information regarding other online services.
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Ok, if you’re ready to see some of the coolest Web projects going on right now take a trip to the Google Labs.

This is the testing ground for Google projects and there are some really cool ones in the works, many of which you can already test out and play around with.
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Did you know that in addition to Google’s totally automated and unfiltered search site at http://google.com, they also have a human edited site at http://directory.google.com/?

In many ways, this search engine is preferable to the normal search because the sites have been pre-filtered by humans. Give it a spin!

In case you haven’t noticed, searching through the US Government’s Web sites is like trying to find a needle in a haystack. Luckily for us, Google has arranged for a nifty U.S. Government Search.

So if you want to know once and for all: who killed John F. Kennedy (or at least the official version), where the aliens landed at Roswell, or what the deal is with Bonnie and Clyde… well, now you know where to get it.

Here is the latest white paper from Google explaining the technology behind how their search engine functions.

Here is an excerpt:

“The common gray pigeon can easily distinguish among items displaying only the minutest differences, an ability that enables it to select relevant web sites from among thousands of similar pages.”

A truly fascinating read.
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This is AWESOME! Mark Caswell-Daniels has developed a little flight sim game which uses Google Maps to allow you to fly all over the place. You can climb, dive, turn and even crash! You also have the option of shooting things on the ground.

Now, what would be GREAT would be if he could turn this into a multiplayer game so that if you see someone else you could have a dogfight online in real time.

By the way, I also started another Web site called GoogleGames.org to catalog all the Google related games out there. Check it out when you get a chance.
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Is there a particular topic that you’d always like to receive notification of if it hits the news wires? Well, Google has the service for you!

Just go to Google Alerts and enter the search terms, frequency and your e-mail address. After you click on the verification e-mail you’ll begin receiving notifications. So plug in your name, or Pamela Anderson, or Brangelina, or whatever turns you on!
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Google has a cool little item in the Google Labs which allows you to compare the frequency of different search terms. For example, if you want to see which term is more frequently searched for between Sex and Drugs, you can.

Or, if you want to find out who is more popular, Pamela Anderson or George Bush, you can do that too.

Also of note, the results tell you where in the world those terms are most searched for.
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Google has added some fascinating footage of the moon to commemorate the anniversary of our Apollo moon landings.

This is interesting from a historical perspective, but even more fascinating is the incredible detail of the moon surface that can be seen when you zoom all the way in. I guess this definitively answers all questions regarding what the moon surface is made of.
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I guess there is a reason for everything, though I can’t say that I am so desperate for organization that I’d actually use Google Notebook. Still, for those of you out there that would like to be able to organize and have universal access to notes on well… anything, Google has just the service for you.

I suppose this could make research projects much easier. And one really great thing about this service is that there is a little download which you can install to allow you to add things to your Notebook without having to leave the page you are actually denoting.