How to securely select software for individual users

For China's PC users, most of the computer installation is free software, how to install and select software for those non-it technology category "small white" is still more difficult things, today is mainly about how individual users choose computer software common sense.

I personally feel that for most ordinary computer users, the general direction of personal software selection is: Foreign business software > foreign open source software > domestic open source software > domestic commercial software. For specific reasons I'll do some explanations below.

Foreign business software and foreign open source software

Many professional users may feel that a lot of foreign business software is not necessarily stronger than open source software, and many personalized features for open source software will be more appropriate. Admittedly, the contribution of the open source community to software is very large, but the more professional customization function for ordinary individual users, the threshold is higher, while commercial software for the public, usually have better ease of use, business software companies have relatively strong development capabilities, So the business software of Windows can be in the PC domain ahead of the open source Linux system.

However, most of the commercial software is charged, for individual users, the cost is not small, and open source software products are mostly in the form of source code for free download, no need to pay the cost of use, so many people are advocating open source software. However, with the advent of the free Internet model, many commercial software is now also beginning to free, such as Google's series of software, although the software may collect some of the user's personal privacy or other materials, but for Chinese users there is nothing to worry about, the United States government to Chinese users have no jurisdiction, Even if the user violates the laws of the United States (such as piracy, etc.), the likelihood of American "transnational" arrests is negligible, but if you use domestic software (such as QQ or Baidu), the case of "cross-province" arrests may be endless.

Homemade software and free software

For domestic software, commercial software does not have to brush rogue, and domestic open source software is very small selectivity, domestic because of the existence of pressure problems, open source developers are mostly solicited, less dedication, struggling of open source software is very few, and commercial companies to launch a variety of free software will often become the mainstream of the market.

A typical case is the 360 security software defeated rising, rising earlier rely on the sale of anti-virus software once alive, and since 360 launched a completely free security software, the industry pattern was broken, and also changed the user's consumption habits and software usage habits, subversion of the entire industry.

and the free business model brings the market effect is feeding frenzy, the competition is brutal, big companies rely on capital strength to spell out small companies, small software is not closed or be acquired, leading to the majority of common software products concentrated in the hands of some industry giants.

Homemade free software = Rogue software?

Most commonly used domestic software is free, these software research and development costs are high, only through advertising, value-added or other means to make money, users free to use the cost is not low, these free software can not be sold through sales, can only think of some other means, such as collecting the user's privacy information, pop windows, ads, etc. Sometimes play bullying, domestic environment so, for most "small white" users, also do not know these conditions.

Most of the domestic business company's software collects and monitors the behavior of domestic netizens, and the beauty of its name "Data mining" or "Big Data", the user's personal information is basically "bare Ben" state, "Trans-provincial" success rate is extremely high. And if the use of foreign software, and have a certain safety knowledge, it will be difficult to be "cross-province."

Therefore, for the user, try not to use the software of domestic commercial companies. But for some users, the security of personal privacy does not matter, also do not use foreign software, then for domestic rogue software, how should choose?

How to choose Rogue software?

If you have to choose to use domestic software, can be based on some principles: the software is not the company's mainstream profit, but the competition launched by competitors, usually this kind of "industry second" software products, in order to the needs of word of mouth, there will not be too many rogue behavior, there will not be any ads, However, developers of such software may be in short supply, and software may not be updated for a long time. For example, Tencent's main profit project is QQ, so its launch of the competition products "QQ Whirlwind" and "QQ video" rogue behavior is relatively small, although the function is limited but the update is slow, but also is a barely usable software.

Common software recommendations

In general, through some of the above-mentioned rules, I recommend some of the most common software options suggested below:

Browser: Chrome,firefox;

Input method: Google Input method, bing Input method or small Langhao input method;

Email: gmail or Hotmail, mail client: Mozilla Thunderbird;

Password management: Lastpass, 1Password or KeePass;

Cloud Sync Network disk: Dropbox or OneDrive;

Compression tool: 7-zip;

Image processing: GIMP;

Image view: Picasa;

Code Editor: notepad++;

Ftp:filezilla;

Download: eMule;

Anti-virus software: Small red umbrella, AVG, Avast, Comodo;

Instant messaging software: Google Hangouts or Skype, try not to use QQ, if you use QQ, do not discuss the above privacy or sensitive topics.