Author: Laura

Audacity

Posted on | by Laura

Audacity is a free and open-source digital audio editor and recording application software, available for Windows, macOS, Linux, and other Unix-like operating systems.   Audacity won the SourceForge 2007 and 2009 Community Choice Awards for Best Project for Multimedia. Audacity is licensed under GPLv2 or any later version.

The interface is translated into many languages. You can use Audacity to:,•Record live audio., •Record computer playback on any Windows Vista or later machine., •Convert tapes and records into digital recordings or CDs., •Edit WAV, AIFF, FLAC, MP2, MP3, or Ogg Vorbis sound files., •Cut, copy, splice, or mix sounds together. •Change the speed or pitch of a recording.

In addition to recording audio from multiple sources, Audacity can be used for post-processing all types of audio by adding effects such as normalization, trimming, and fading in and out. Audacity has also been used to record and mix entire albums, such as by Tune-Yards. It is also currently used in the UK OCR National Level 2 ICT course for the sound creation unit.

Audacity’s features include:

  • Recording and playing back sounds
    • Scrubbing (Version 2.1.1 and later)
    • Timer Record enables the user to schedule when a recording begins and ends to make an unattended recording.
    • MIDI playback is available (from version 2.2.0 onwards)
    • Punch and Roll recording – for editing on the fly (from version 2.3.0 onwards)
  • Editing
    • via cut, copy, and paste, with unlimited levels of undo
    • Features of modern multitrack audio software including navigation controls, zoom, and single track edit, project pane and XY project navigation, non-destructive and destructive effect processing, audio file manipulation (cut, copy, paste)
    • Amplitude envelope editing
    • Precise adjustments to the audio speed (tempo) while maintaining pitch in order to synchronize it with video or run for a predetermined length of time
    • Conversion of cassette tapes or records into digital tracks by splitting the audio source into multiple tracks based on silences in the source material
  • Cross-platform operation — Audacity works on Windows, macOS, and other Unix-like systems (including Linux and BSD)
    • Audacity uses the wxWidgets software library to provide a similar graphical user interface on several different operating systems.
  • A large array of digital effects and plug-ins. Additional effects can be written with Nyquist, a Lisp dialect.
    • Built-in LADSPA, VST(32-bit), and Nyquist plug-in support.
    • Noise Reduction based on sampling the noise to be minimized.
    • Vocal Reduction and Isolation for the creation of karaoke tracks and isolated vocal tracks.
    • Adjusting audio pitch while maintaining speed and adjusting audio speed while maintaining pitch
    • LADSPA, VST (32-bit) and Audio Unit (macOS) effects now support real-time preview (from version 2.1.0 onwards). Note: Real-time preview does not yet support latency compensation.
    • Saving and loading of user preset for effect settings across sessions (from 2.1.0 onwards).
  • Multitrack mixing
  • Support for multi-channel modes with sampling rates up to 96 kHz with 32 bits per sample.
  • Audio spectrum analysis using the Fourier transform algorithm
  • Importing and exporting of WAV, AIFF, MP3 (via the LAME encoder, now integrated as part of Audacity), Ogg Vorbis, and all file formats supported by libsndfile library. Versions 1.3.2 and later supported Free Lossless Audio Codec (FLAC). Version 1.3.6 and later also supported additional formats such as WMA, AAC, AMR, and AC3 via the optional FFmpeg library.
  • Detection of dropout errors while recording with an overburdened CPU
  • From 2.3.2 onwards, the mod-script-pipe for driving Audacity from Python now comes with Audacity and it can be enabled via preferences.
  • A full downloadable manual. (or available online without downloading).
  • Four user-selectable themes enable the user to choose their preferred look and feel for the application (version 2.2.0 and later)
    • Four user-selectable colorways for waveform display in audio tracks (version 2.2.1 and later).

Audacity supports the LV2 open standard for plugins and can therefore load software like Calf Studio Gear.

Audacity’s 3.0 update, in March 2021, introduced a new project file format, .aup3, using SQLite database to store everything.

Limitations

Audacity supports only 32-bit or 64-bit VST audio effect plug-ins, depending on which architecture it was built for, but not both at the same time. It is built-in 32-bit for Windows and 64-bit for macOS.

It does not support instrument VST (VSTi) plugins.

Audacity lacks dynamic equalizer controls and real time effects while recording.

Audacity does not natively import or export WMA, AAC, AC3, or most other proprietary or restricted file formats; rather, an optional FFmpeg library is required.

AVG AntiVirus

Posted on | by Laura

Microsoft’s built-in Windows Defender protects Windows consumers from most malware, spyware, and viruses. There are a few free good virus protection programs available online. The free one I like to use is AVG. AVG AntiVirus FREE is super lightweight software that won’t affect your PC’s performance or speed.

AVG AntiVirus free version of the software is a single anti-malware package that lets you protect an UNLIMITED number of Windows and Mac computers, as well as Android phones/tablets, from one easy-to-use dashboard. It’s also Zen-enabled, which means you can now extend your protection to your entire family and all their devices.

AVG features most of the common functions available in modern antivirus and Internet security programs, including periodic scans, scans of sent and received emails (including adding footers to the emails indicating this), the ability to repair some virus-infected files, and a quarantine area (virus vault) in which infected files are held.

Calibre

Posted on | by Laura

Calibre is a free and open-source e-book library management application developed by users of e-books for users of e-books. Calibre converts files to PDF, ePub, and other file types that work well on e-readers. Calibre can be used to create epubs for kindle and so much more. Calibre (stylised calibre) is a cross-platform open-source suite of e-book software.  Calibre is a powerful and easy-to-use e-book manager. It’ll allow you to do nearly everything and it takes things a step beyond normal e-book software. It’s also completely free and open source and great for both casual users and computer experts.

  • Save time on managing your e-book collection
  • Use it everywhere and with anything
  • Comprehensive e-book viewer
  • Download news/magazines from the web
  • Share and backup your library easily
  • Edit the books in your collection
  • Satisfy every e-book need and get support

Calibre supports organizing existing e-books into virtual libraries, displaying, editing, creating and converting e-books, as well as syncing e-books with a variety of e-readers. Editing books is supported for EPUB and AZW3 formats. …

Scribus a Free Alternative to Indesign

Posted on | by Laura

Scribus is a free Open Source application that functions very much like Adobe Indesign. Both are used for Desktop Publishing (page layout design for newspapers, brochures, newsletters, posters, books, and pdf). Scribus can also create animated and interactive PDF presentations and forms.

Scribus is a page layout program that can be installed on Windows, Mac, and Linux operating systems.  When saving and editing a file in Indesign, you won’t lose data by the inherent “trimming” function. What this means is that if you resize an image to 1/10th of its size the application gets rid of some data because you’re not using it. This function processed multiple times is what allows some documents (pdfs) to take up less space.

Scribus doesn’t have this function, so your files may be large depending on the image qualities used. The workaround for this is to edit your images in GIMP or Photoshop before using them in Scribus.

Although Scribus and Indesign are similar- Indesign’s file format (.indd) is proprietary and can NOT be read/opened/imported by Scribus. It’s currently unclear if Indesign has taken steps to be able to open Scribus files (.sla)

There are conversion processes that can be found by googling, but you may lose your layer functions and in some cases the whole of the file because it converts ‘every page’ of the file into a separate file*. As of today (10/30/13) Scribus is on version 1.4.3, with 1.5 in beta promising IDML files (the other export option Indesign offers besides pdf).

Inkscape

Posted on | by Laura

Inkscape

Create banners for websites and blogs with Inkscape and so much more. Inkscape is a free vector graphics editor similar to  Adobe Illustrator a widely used vector graphics editing program. Inkscape is powerful enough to compete with Adobe Illustrator in terms of the functionality most users expect from a vector graphics program.

The best thing about Inkscape is its ease of use. If you do a lot of work rendering and drawing in vector, this program will save you much time, even if you are new to digital art programs the learning curve with Inkscape is much easier than that of any Adobe Creative Suite program.

The Inkscape window has a large central drawing area, with several toolbars around the edges. Many dialog boxes, such as the one for setting stroke and fill properties, will open along the right edge of the window. The layout is configurable. For example, toolbars can be hidden, and dialog boxes can be dragged out of the main window to become independent windows.

The default file type of Inkscape is a .svg  but, Inkscape can import many file types including:

  • .ai
  • .pdf
  • .dxf
  • .png
  • .jpg
  • .bmp

Inkscape can export several file types including:

  • .pdf
  • .dxf
  • .png
  • .jpg
  • .bmp

Gimp A Free Alternative to Adobe’s Photoshop

Posted on | by Laura

GIMP is a free image retouching and editing tool, very much like Adobe Photoshop. Tools include free‐form drawing, resizing, cropping, photo montages, converting between different image formats
(i.e. from .tiff to .jpg), and more specialized tasks. There are versions for Windows, OS X, and Linux.

It is an extremely capable piece of software with many capabilities. It can be used as a simple paint program, an expert quality photo retouching program, an online batch processing system, a mass production image renderer, an image format converter, and more.

Gimp is expandable and extensible. It is designed to be augmented with plug-ins and extensions to do just about anything. The advanced scripting interface allows everything to be easily scripted, from the simplest task to the most complex image manipulation procedures.

Features And Capabilities
This is only a brief list of Gimp features:

· Full suite of painting tools including brushes, a pencil, an airbrush, cloning, etc.

· Tile-based memory management so image size is limited only by available disk space

· Sub-pixel sampling for all paint tools for high-quality anti-aliasing

· Full Alpha channel support

· Layers and channels

· A procedural database for calling internal Gimp functions from external programs, such as Script-Fu

· Advanced scripting capabilities

· Multiple undo/redo (limited only by disk space)

· Transformation tools including rotate, scale, shear and flip

· File formats supported include GIF, JPEG, PNG, XPM, TIFF, TGA, MPEG, PS, PDF, PCX, BMP and many others

· Load, display, convert and save to many file formats

· Selection tools including rectangle, ellipse, free, fuzzy, bezier and intelligent

· Plug-ins that allow for the easy addition of new file formats and new effect filters

To learn more visit the website …

LibreOffice An Alternative to Microsoft Office

Posted on | by Laura

LibreOffice is a powerful and free office suite, used by millions of people around the world. Its clean interface and feature-rich tools help you unleash your creativity and enhance your productivity. LibreOffice is compatible with a wide range of document formats such as Microsoft® Word (.doc, .docx), Excel (.xls, .xlsx), PowerPoint (.ppt, .pptx), and Publisher. You can open your Microsoft document in LibreOffice.

But LibreOffice goes much further with its native support for a modern and open standard, the Open Document Format (ODF). With LibreOffice, you have maximum control over your data and content – and you can export your work in many different formats including PDF. LibreOffice includes several applications that make it the most versatile Free and Open Source office suite on the market:

Writer (word processing)

The writer has all the features you need from a modern, full-featured word processing and desktop publishing tool. It’s simple enough for a quick memo, but powerful enough to create complete books with contents, diagrams, indexes, and more. You’re free to concentrate on your message, while the Writer makes it look great.

Calc (spreadsheets)

Calc is the free spreadsheet program you’ve always needed. Newcomers find it intuitive and easy to learn, while professional data miners and number crunchers appreciate the comprehensive range of advanced functions. Built-in wizards guide you through choosing and using a comprehensive range of advanced features. Or you can download templates from the LibreOffice template repository, for ready-made spreadsheet solutions.

Impress (presentations)

In Impress, creating and editing slides is very versatile thanks to different editing and view modes: Normal (for general editing), Outline (for organizing and outlining your text content), Notes (for viewing and editing the notes attached to a slide), Handout (for producing paper-based material), and Slide Sorter (for a thumbnail sheet view that lets you quickly locate and order your slides).

Draw (vector graphics and flowcharts),

Draw lets you produce anything from a quick sketch to a complex plan, and gives you the means to communicate with graphics and diagrams. With a maximum page size of 300cm by 300cm, Draw is an excellent package for producing technical drawings, brochures, posters, and many other documents. Draw lets you manipulate graphical objects, group them, crop them, use objects in 3D, and much more.

Base (databases)

The base is a full-featured desktop database front end, designed to meet the needs of a broad array of users. Base caters to power users and enterprise requirements, providing native-support drivers for some of the most widely employed multi-user database engines: MySQL/MariaDB, Adabas D, MS Access, and PostgreSQL. In addition, the built-in support for JDBC- and ODBC-standard drivers allows you to connect to virtually any other existing database engine as well.

Math (formula editing)

Math is LibreOffice’s formula editor and can be invoked in your text documents, spreadsheets, presentations, and drawings, enabling you to insert perfectly formatted mathematical and scientific formulas. Your formulas can include a wide range of elements, from fractions, terms with exponents and indices, integrals, and mathematical functions, to inequalities, systems of equations, and matrices.

You can start Math either as a stand-alone application directly from the LibreOffice Start Center or directly from within other LibreOffice applications such as Writer, Calc, Impress and Draw.

Charts

LibreOffice includes the ability to create and embed charts. Their style, color, and size can be customized in a broad variety of ways – pie charts, square and round columns, trend graphs, dots, 2D and 3D charts, and so much more.

5. Entering Split Transactions In GnuCash

Posted on | by Laura

In this tutorial, I will be talking about how to enter a split transaction and the difference between a simple and a split transaction. In the previous tutorial, I entered a simple transaction. In Gnucash a transaction with only two splits is called a simple transaction., since it only involves the current account and a single chart of account. An example of two splits in the previous tutorial with the opening balance transaction of the 500.00, the two splits involved are the checking account and the equity: opening balance.

Every transaction in GnuCash has at least two splits, but a transaction can have more than two splits. A transaction that involves three or more accounts is called a split transaction. The need for 3 or more splits in a transaction occurs when you need to split either the “from” or the “to” account into multiple transaction accounts.

7. How to Create Invoices in GnuCash -Part 02

Posted on | by Laura

In Part 1of Creating Invoices in GnuCash, I talked about four things you need to have in place before you begin creating invoices:

  • The Sales Tax Table
  • Register Your Business in the system,
  • Set up your Accounting Period
  • Setup your Billing Terms.

And I walked you through the steps of setting up each feature. If you haven’t already reviewed Creating Invoices which is part 1 of this tutorial I would suggest you go back and review it now so that you will be able to follow along with this tutorial.

In this tutorial creating invoices Part 2, I will be focusing on accounts receivable as I mentioned in the first tutorial invoicing in accounting terms is a part of Accounts Receivables. Accounts Receivable is money that’s owed to you, such as your invoice to clients. Sales invoices serve as an official record of a sale for both the buyer and the seller.

CLICK ON THE BUTTON TO WATCH THE VIDEO – How to Create Invoices in Gnucash Part 2

GnuCash has an integrated accounts receivable system. It is within this account that the integrated A/R system will place transactions. You generally do not work directly with this account. You generally work with the four integrated GnuCash A/R application components,

  1. Customers”
    People or companies to whom you sell products or services on credit.
  2. Invoices”
    The physical invoice you send to a customer to request payment. The invoice contains an itemized list of things you sold.
  3. Customer Jobs
    Customer Jobs is (optional) Customer Jobs are a mechanism by which you can group multiple invoices to a particular customer.
  4. Process the Invoice Payment

In the video tutorial above, I go through each component in detail.