This is all software that I use. I know what it’s like when you are looking for the right tool for the job, and you can’t really tell what is best. I think that a personal recommendaion is always a positive sign, so these are my recommendations.

Just to be clear – I have no association with any of the software or companies listed here, and I gain nothing from people using them.

Book Collector
I have quite a large collection of books, and I always struggled with finding the right database software to record and manage my collection (if you think that this is simply making up a problem that shouldn’t exist – you may be right – I just like having a list of my books ) I tried a few different options, but never quite found the right one. Then I found Book Collector – and it was perfect. It is aimed solely at managing a book collection, and the interface is very easy to work. One of the main benefits is the ability to enter an ISBN, and the software will query online databases such as Amazon and the Library of Congress to get the details of the book – of course, you can also search by author and/or title. This was one of the first pieces of Shareware that I ever paid for, and I don’t regret it for second.

PuTTY
PuTTY is the daddy of terminal software. Of course, telnet and ssh are something of a dying art these days, but if you do use a terminal interface for anything, then you can do no better than PuTTY. Rock solid performance, tons of options, an intuitive interface, and a slick feel to it, and it’s Freeware! – this is how software should be done. Great for SSH tunelling and X forwarding as well.

Launchy
This is one of those pieces of software that you can’t imagine how you managed without for all that time. A great way to launch programs, documents and bookmarks from a command line-like interface. This is great for those of us that don’t use a mouse very much. As recommended by Lifehacker

WinURL
From the same author as PuTTY, WinURL is great for those times when you can’t just click on a URL and have it open in your browser. WinURL sits in the background, and when activated with Win-W it opens any URL in the clipboard in your browser. So all you need o do is copy the URL from whatever application you are in, and hit Win-W – ta daa. Very useful whe combined with PuTTY, which automatically copies selected text to the clipboard.

EditPlus
A great text editor that does everything you could need, and more. Some highlights are context highlighting, Regex search and replace, and browser preview…I just love it.

TiddlyWiki
Described as ‘a reusable non-linear personal web notebook’, TiddlyWiki is a single-file wiki that makes it really easy to keep notes, link posts, and do all sorts of groovy stuff. Plenty of little add-ons and plugins available, and you can even use it for blogging or many, many other things. Well worth a look.

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