What is your favorite open source software?

Gonna go with Firefox as both my most-used piece of open-source software, and the software I see as most important to its ecosystem. If Firefox fails then we've just got Chromium-based browsers and, I guess, Safari.
- This a million times over!

I love and use Bitwarden daily.
- There something I don't understand. How does one use Bitwarden daily? It generates, remembers and autofill passwords, right? I rarely enter a password anywhere. What am I missing? Please educate me.
  
  There are certain sites which terminate your sessions after a while. For example, banking sites or most government portals. In such situations, the auto fill function is very handy.
  
  Like the other commenter said, I use it for sites that tend to sign me out after a few hours. I also use it for work things that sign out every session.
  
  I auto wipe cookies all on every browser close so that gets more use.
  
  Way way late to this, but I'll also say: Firefox and other privacy-focused browsers have an option to delete all of your browsing history and cookies when you close the browser, which also logs you out of anything you were using. It's a good practice if you're being mindful of how much tracking data you are letting be collected from you.
- I knew about Bitwarden, but I thought how could a cloud based thing be truly open source, but they actually do have their backend on GitHub 🤯
- I also love bitwarden daily ;)
- I also love bitwarden daily ;)

Firefox and its derivatives. They're the last free bastion preventing a Chromium monopoly on the browser market, which is hugely important - especially these days with Google's push for Mv3.

Signal, Thunderbird and Bitwarden
- Signal, Firefox and Eclipse.
  Too bad Signal are dropping support for Windows 7 ;(
  
  Kind of odd to use Signal (a privacy and security focused messenger) on Windows 7 (an EOL and thus highly unsecure operating system).
- I didn't know thunderbird was open source!
  
  Yup, it's the nephew, so to speak, of Firefox!
- that's cool that others also love open source. these three right here are 🔥

Ill throw in some obscure ones I use daily.
StemRoller. It's an AI-powered toolthat takes an mp3 and separates each instrument into its own file. Im a musician, and having access to stems like this is a game changer.
Carla is a tool for hosting VST plugins without the need for a full DAW. I primarily use Amp Simulators, and this has become a mandatory tool on any computer I use. It's also maintained by the creator of KXStudio.
- omg, stemroller sounds amazing!
- Stemroller sounds insane.
- Just downloaded and tried StemRoller. Definitely impressed, I'd say it works marginally better than any of the "free" (aka trial version, need to pay for full features) stem separators I've tried online, so very happy to find this!
- Those I’ll need to check especially the vst host. Nice :)
- These two links might single handedly change my life. Many thanks!!
- Both of these sound interesting, though I can't really think of a use for running vsts without a DAW. For a moment I thought it would be nice to play synth without opening a daw, but if I decide to record something I played I have to set it all up again.
  
  I use Ampsims nearly exclusively. When I'm practising or just noodling I don't have any intention to record. Carla has a much smaller footprint than a standard DAW, and therefore less energy usage.
  Keep in mind I'm a string instrument player primarily. I don't play with synths or anything like that.
- How does StemRoller compare to Serato?
  
  I haven't tried it so I can't speak to the features/results you get, but I do know Serato is closed-source. I always go with FOSS if I can.

Firefox. It is the only thing keeping Google from total internet domination

Blender by a huge mile. Yes, there’s tons of other software like Linux, of course, but Blender is such a powerful, well managed, economically viable and healthy (community) project that it should be shown as an example of how Open Source should be.
My biggest hurdle with other projects is the fanboys, because many times they’re quite toxic, insulting everybody who doesn’t adore the project and don’t accept constructive criticism.
- By a huuuge mile indeed. Blender devs are great at listening and communicating with the community.
  The standardization of hotkeys and features across the software is fantastic. The UI is snappy and filled to the brim with intuitive QoL features I wish were standard for my OS.
  I have irreconcilable grievances with a lot of open source software, VLC, VSCode, etc, and find development slow and heading non optimal for others like Sharex and Firefox... but Blender, that's green on all fronts.
- Blender is the model open source project :P

uBlock Origin, it's not even close!

GNU+Linux
- Firefox, Thunder, LibreOffice, Kdenlive, Audacity on GNU+Linux .... (I'm no pro which is why I'm on Ubuntu but even still, I haven't paid for software in years)

Linux.
- How could it be anything else?
  
  How about GNU/Linux?

Firefox and Bitwarden

LibreOffice is equal to any office software out there, and has been much more stable than OpenOffice, and works without an internet connection unlike Google Docs.

I'd go with either Firefox or Thunderbird. Both are immensely useful pieces of software that I use on a daily basis, and have evolved (mostly) nicely over time.
Not to give Mozilla too much credit, Nextcloud is also pretty slick!
- Wait for real? I feel like that's their only marketing point sometimes 😂

uBlock Origin - the chaddest AdBlock of them all!

Proxmox, opnsense, fdroid, and many more on r/selfhosted (now on lemmy also) .
sunshine, moonlight ( play my games anywhere in the world, games run on my pc at home)
Firefox (the best browser against google monopoly), thunderbird (best mail client)
LineageOS, microG, Mozilla Location services, Magisk, aurora store (let me use Android without any of google tracking)
Bitwarden, Proton mail/vpn, Nextcloud (finally no gmail tracking)
Jellyfin, kodi (lets me create my own Netflix)
GNU/Linux, GNOME, KDE and host of other Linux projects. No more windows tracking. Also if you want to really know how the OS works, you should start tinkering with Linux. I expanded my knowledge base by just using Linux as daily driver.
The list just goes on and on. I am so grateful for all the open source devs that put their time in developing these tools.
For those wanting to go further, checkout https://github.com/awesome-selfhosted/awesome-selfhosted

It's Lemmy you fools. It's always been Lemmy.

Not by importance. Obviously that would be the Linux kernel, GCC and GNU coreutils, and the Firefox web browser, among some other foundational things (code to run my desktop GUI, for example).
So, I'll say my favorite is PCSX2. Ever since they got rid of the ancient plugin architecture this emulator has been getting sooooooo much better, and it was already great! I would add other top tier emulators like Dolphin, DuckStation, SNES9X, SameBoy, and so on. I just love emulators :)

Not one per se, but I love when a piece of open source software absolutely destroys it's competition. I'm not talking Firefox vs. Chrome or Unity vs. Godot debate (both are better, don't @ me), I'm talking when it's not even close, the open alternative is just industry standard.
VLC, Calibre, OBS and Blender come to mind.
- any video player really - though what's doing the hard work behind the scenes is ffmpeg, which is foss as well
  
  Ffmpeg needs more love
- I've used Calibre for so long, it's just a great piece of software
- Has Blender become industry standard yet? Last time I looked (a couple of years ago?) the big commercial ones, at least Maya and Houdini, were still the industry standard. Not to take anything away from Blender though. It's an amazing piece of software, gaining ground quickly, and would be my choice for doing 3D. However, I'm not in industry, and I had read back then from industry folks that Blender was still lacking in some areas. Some of it may have just been inertia on the part of large organizations that used the commercial software though.
  
  I'd say it is still more in the 'Firefox v. Chrome' ground, used to a degree where it is aknowledged, but still not the most used by a good chunk. It keeps gaining ground tho, so the future looks bright :D
- ytdlp and mpv also comes to mind. Pretty much all terminal emulators are FOSS too.
- How about the fact that a large majority of the internet and cloud services run on Linux powered systems

If i had to go with just one the linux

Home Assistant, a powerful home automation platform.
- HA is still more of a lifestyle choice than just software.
  Someday I'll get around to putting those bulbs back on the Homekit controller instead of trying to run them through OTBR.
  The exhaust fan turning on when the litterbox detects a cat is pretty cool though.
  
  It does take up a lot of time, but I’ve found it really rewarding.
  Was there more functionality through HomeKit Controller?
  I’ve thought about running the air purifier when the cats use the tray, but haven’t done it yet. What do you use to detect the cats?
- Can you do voice activation with this? I am using google home it works pretty well, but I'd like to move to a more custom setup. But I need voice activation. It's so nice just talking.
  
  You can actually still use google Home if you want to - it integrates well with Google Home and Alexa but is currently massively expanding their own voice assistant option.
  Home Assistant is more a "background" integrator - it links up all you different smart home options, makes them thereby smarter and adds external data (e.g. weather, traffic,etc.) whenever you want. And of course enables you to easily add your own visualisation and your own automations.
  It is on one side incredibly easy to "start". And on the other side incredibly powerful.
  
  Philpo explained it well.
  I’m currently using Home Assistant as my integration platform to talk to everything, and as an automation engine to make things happen.
  Home Assistant can then expose your devices to other platforms like Apple HomeKit and Google Home.
  For controlling things manually, I mostly use the Apple Home app, and Siri and Google Assistant for voice control.
  This year the Home Assistant developers are focusing heavily on building out native and local voice control. There will be an announcement in a week on their progress. It looks like they will be announcing the ability to use wake works to activate voice commands (like Google/Siri/Alexa but all done without compromising your privacy).

Newpipe, tor, keepass xc , syncthing and KDE connect

Blender, don't even use it that much but I love it

My favorites based on usage:
7Zip. It's clean and has a lot of convenient features.
Bitwarden. I have too many accounts these days. It's a life saver and it's on all my devices!
Rufus Formatting tool. This rules. It's great for just formatting or creating a bootable USB. Not to mention it's portable so I can bring it with me to work.
- Genuine question because I've used winrar forever. Why 7zip over winrar?
  
  Do people really still use WinRar? I thought that was a relic of the old internet.
  
  WinRAR is simply obsoleted by 7zip. Or does everything WinRAR does and more. In my case, I particularly use their context menu shortcut for checking sha256 file hash
  
  They can all serve the same purpose. The advantages of 7zip are the following:
  It is totally free (as both in free beer and free speach)
  The 7z compression format is superior to rar because it can compress either more or faster (not both though)
  The rar format is proprietary. You are free to decompress but not to compress. In a business setting, you could theoretically get in trouble if you don't have a license. In some countries, e.g. USA, even outside a business setting. But if you have been using winrar forever, I can't see you changing your ways anytime soon! :)
  
  You don't have to pay for the license /s

I use a lot of Open Source software at home but Home Assistant is by far the most used, although mostly it's doing its automations in the background without me having to think about it.
- Home Assistant is not only extremely useful, extremely good, but I've loved contributing to it: it's so cool being able to develop a new integration and control your actual devices with it!

Git itself.
Which allowed this monstosity I contributed heavily to, to leave a hellscape of svn patches: https://github.com/LandSandBoat/server
So git earns the "favorite" designation hands down.

Blender. Probably one of the best pieces of software I've used ever.

So many to choose from...Linux, Syncthing, Vim, Firefox and Thunderbird/K-9 Mail, Keepass and derivatives, GrapheneOS, Inkscape, VLC/mpv, yt-dlp...there are just too many daily drivers to name them all.

vim, neovim and a bunch of plugins. It's such a great productivity booster, I am using it daily for SW development.

I'm convinced anyone who doesn't say emacs is simply just more productive than me
- Maybe on the short term but damn, that M-x butterflies is a time saver.
- Notepad++ is the first tolerable for me text editor since msedit.com and notepad.exe
  It has won the fruitless text editor war for me, at last !

Right now it's Proton. The work that has been done to makengaming possible on Linux is astounding!

Firefox I think is actually the best browser totally independent of technological ethics issues. Started using it because I was on 2GB RAM at the time and Chrome was much more RAM-intensive (apparently this is reversed now,) and I've never looked back.

I think I'll go with GIMP: it's such a well made tool and for 99% of use cases is a valid alternative to professional photo editing suites

SQLite. Probably the most widely used open-source library in the world. Pretty much every computer, phone, tablet, and a lot of embedded systems, all use it.

7-zip, Firefox, VLC player

We definitely need Blender in the mix as well!
Also Signal, Bitwarden and Firefox.

NVDA. Without it I literally couldn't use my computer every day, or do my job.

7zip is such an easy pick, its almost the default option lol

Haven't seen Inkscape here yet. I use it for almost every image editing thing I regularly do like cropping, stitching together, adding text and of course creating graphics from scratch.
- That and Gimp together are excellent.
  
  Definitely GIMP .... for any kind of simple quick photoshopping once you get accustomed to GIMP, it just works for about 80 percent of everything you want to do with an image ... yes there is a bit of a learning curve but its the image editor I use the most often

qBittorrent came to my rescue after uTorrent went commercial.

Freecad is pretty powerful, and fully functional now that they figured out their topological naming problem.
- How does it compare to OpenSCad?
  
  Openscad is all text based. Freecad is more like conventional cad software like fusion 360. Honestly I don't even know how people can use Openscad lol.
- God. I hatelove FreeCAD so much. As someone coming from the Autodesk/Fusion360 world it is so incredibly clunky and unrounded.
  And on the other side so incredibly powerful and flexible.
  Argh. Argh.
  I really have to figure it out better.
  
  It's hard for me to bitch when it's free. I am very grateful for their efforts. That being said the learning curve is steep. But I'd assume not as steep a openscad.
- They finally did it?? I was using the thunder-something fork for a while because of that, but I always prefer sticking with the base project if I can.
  
  It's largely mitigated in the newest version. I also used that branch. I don't know if maybe they folded that branch in to the main or what.

GNU & Linux (Debian)
TeX & LaTeX (TeX Live)
Firefox
Edit (forgot):
qBitTorrent
Signal

In terms of overall usage, gotta go GIMP.

BitWarden and Homebridge.

Most used for me is Firefox (in fact I'm so used to it, it didn't even come to mind until I saw so many replies mentioning it!).
The favorite is probably git.
For the recently discovered stuff that would probably be the Astro frontend framework (and Svelte).
Also what a wonderful thread to discover stuff. Thank you all! ::: spoiler spoiler Also my first ever comment on Lemmy. 😎 :::

in terms of time I spend in it:
linux
firefox
vi
- Throw in Git and that's me.

FFmpeg

Are we only counting FOSS or would Doom count? If Doom counts, my pick is Doom. Having access to Doom's source code is where I learned a huge majority of my programming knowledge making mods for it.

Tachiyomi.
- I love that app when I have a phone. I broke my phone tho so now I've been using Komikku
- I love how polished it feels.
- Great app that I practically use every day.
  
  I have tried using a couple of the forks, but always end up returning to the original.

I like a bunch of OSS projects but Firefox is way up there above the rest.

Since major projects like Firefox keep getting mentioned, I’ll throw a shout out to Ant Renamer.
It’s simple, it’s FOSS, and it just works. I often - ahem - acquire a number of files from various sources that are labeled like “Mission.Impossible.7.Complete.zHD.2022.xReloadedx”, and an application like Ant Renamer can batch rename files into whatever you need.
For example, if I need to backup or copy a set of game saves in a folder that all need to have the same prefix like N007 from N002, I would have to manually change 10K files from one prefix to the other. Ant Renamer can do everything in a batch that runs quicker than the blink of an eye.
So, Ant Renamer for the win!
- On that note there's a teeny tiny bash script called vimv, which enables you to rename a list of files in vim!
  It's absolutely glorious, but don't switch lines around or delete them, it's really simple, comes with the full power of vim and doesn't protect you from yourself ;)

Libre Office

Gnome 44, (probably gonna get roasted by Gentoo users) Nano, Librewolf, Free tube, NixOS, Gnu utils, Krita, kdenlive, Gimp Nuclear, Shredder, Gnome disks, Qemu/KVM
Edit- and test disk, it saved my ass this week. I accidentally wrote a new partion table over my hdd that had all my family photos. Used testdisk let it run on my laptop for 22hours recovered all photos and files. Shout out to the Devs for make great FOSS software