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Small Business Software and Tutorials - Most Free/Open Source
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Open source programs are developed by communities of code-familar people on a voluntary basis. Donations are welcome by most communities. Look for the donation link on their websites.
The programs below have been vetted by word-of-mouth recommendations, user and/or industry reviews and/or through usage.
Google Checkout
Google Checkout is a fast, convenient checkout process that allows customers to buy from you with any credit card with a single login. You'll only be charged 2% + $0.20 per transaction. There are no monthly, setup, or gateway service fees. Google Checkout accepts major credit and debit cards, including VISA, MasterCard, American Express, and Discover. Buyers enter their credit or debit card information when they first sign up for Google Checkout and can select their preferred payment type during checkout.
Pay with credit card without signing up for a PayPal Account
Step-by-step: pay with a credit card without signing up for a PayPal account. And how to sign up for a PayPal account while purchasing an item.
Mint
Mint connects nightly to the credit card providers, banks and credit unions you choose to keep your transactions and accounts automatically up-to-date. Mint auto-balances your checkout and auto-categorizes (if you use debit and credit cards) your transactions. Set it up once and you're done. 40,000 users signed up in the two weeks after the September 18, 2007 launch. They support 3,500 US banks and credit card companies. Does not include forced monthly reconcilations. Free.
Note: Quicken's latest version includes auto-categorization.
OpenOffice
50 million users. A multi-platform office productivity suite (similar to Microsoft Office). It includes the key desktop applications; word processor, spreadsheet, presentation manager, drawing program, and database, with a user interface and feature set similar to other office suites. Sophisticated and flexible, OpenOffice.org also works transparently with a variety of file formats, including those of Microsoft Office, and the vendor-neutral OpenDocument standard from OASIS(105 MB download). Open source.
PDFonline
Web-based program converts the following documents and image formats into PDF: Documents, MS Word (DOC | RTF), MS PowerPoint (PPT), MS Publisher (PUB), MS Excel (XLS), HTML (MHT), Text (TXT). Images: JPG , GIF, TIFF, BMP, PNG, EMF, WMF. Free. Max - 2 MG. Quick registration.
Editgrid
100,000 users (similar to Excel). Web-based EditGrid brings your spreadsheets online. You can collaborate with your team, share or publish spreadsheets, and even power them with external data. Spreadsheet - easy to use, installation-free spreadsheet application. Web - accessible anytime anyplace. Collaboration - parallel editing and shared workspaces for multi-user environment. Publish - spreadsheets readily publishable for websites and blogs. Open source.
Gimp
GIMP is a photo editing program. It is a freely distributed piece of software for such tasks as photo retouching, image composition and image authoring. 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, etc. Open source.
Picasa
Free from Google, Picasa locates and organizes all the pictures on your computer, Picasa's Basic Fixes are buttons that make it fast and easy to crop, remove red eye, fix the contrast and color, and enhance your digital pictures. Picasa's 12 new visual effects can improve your photos. Write captions that stay with the picture.
Shipping
IShip
Compare carriers.
UPSP postage calculator
UPS time and cost calculator
Go to Quick Links, listed underneath
Calculations and Firing Information for the Ceramic Artist:
Thanks to Pottery Blog - Emily Murphy
Celsius to Fahrenheit conversions
and vice versa
Celsius to Fahrenheit conversions
(grams to pounds, etc...)
glaze calculator
metric / imperial converter
from Clayzee
Volume calculator
how much does that pitcher hold?
Orton Cone Chart
pdf format
Firing Temperature Color Chart
pdf format
Software Designed Specifically for Artists' Needs
Thanks to ArtBizBlog
Artist's Butler: A Studio Manager
Document and maintain an inventory of each item produced or sold, maintain your resume to include your most recent exhibits, prepare slides and invitations, keep your mailing list up-to-date, prepare price lists and consignment sheets for customers and galleries, and maintain orderly correspondence. $20
Tessera
We develop databases based on our tried and tested Tesseraq platform, allowing galleries to manage mailing lists, inventory, invoices and paying artists all from the same program.
Flick!
Artists know they should keep track of their artworks. But who has the time? Flick! helps you document all of your creations and includes the ability to record a wide range of data, far beyond the basics of medium, dimensions and date. You can also keep details of clients, create mailing lists and produce an assortment of useful reports. $25
Art and Craft Business Organizer
modules are . . . Events, Customers, Income, Expenses, Products, Inventory, Materials, Bills of Materials, Contacts, Email Campaigns, Tasks, General Information, Preferences, Helps and Home. $50
Artworks
Artist software for cataloging, tracking and presentation, designed specifically for artists, galleries and collectors. Catalog art works of any type - paintings, sculptures, ceramics and the like. Maintain full contact details of your clients. Track where all your works are at the moment and, for exhibitions and loans, when they are due back. The details of each work include photographs. You can show prospects a full-screen slide show. It captures sales details including commissions and taxes. $89
Working Artist
Track artwork, editions, provenance, images, Manage patrons, patron activity and collectors, Track shows, consignments, projects and registries, Create multiple mailing lists and bio/resume, Create invoices, statements, payment plans, Create price lists and price grids, Create address, slide, show labels and HTML, Write form and custom letters or link from Word, Track calendar, show entry and reminder dates, Track vendor orders and supplies on hand, Run professional reports based on selected criteria. $99
ArtScope
Import photos and catalog your artwork, Import, create and manage mailing lists, Create professional invoices, Manage exhibitions, Print gallery labels, Print postcards and mailing labels, View sales and inventory reports, View phone lists, Send Email announcements, See purchase histories, See exhibition histories, Import and Export data. $125
GYST
Written expressly for visual artists, the software includes a database type structure where you can keep track of all the artwork you have made, where it is, price, sales, invoices for sales and more. It includes your mailing list, place for your artist statements, resume, labels, and proposal tracking. It also allows you to easily print out an artwork checklist for each exhibition, create budgets, to do lists. It will guide you through writing a grant or proposal with detailed instructions. $149
Guild/Cooperative and Non-Profit Software
Doodle
Take 50 people and try to get them to schedule a get-together or a meeting. [...] The trick [...] is to use Doodle, a free Web-based service that lets participants vote on the best time, date, location--whatever. Free.
TechSoup.org
TechSoup connects nonprofits and public libraries with donated and discounted technology products. Choose from over 240 products from companies such as Microsoft, Adobe, and Symantec.
Website Design
Kompozer
KompoZer is a complete web authoring system that combines web file management and easy-to-use WYSIWYG web page editing. KompoZer (similar to Dreamweaver) is designed to be easy to use, making it ideal for non-technical computer users who want to create an attractive, professional-looking web site without needing to know HTML or web coding. Open source. The Site Wizard (next) includes tutorials on using Kompozer.
PsPad
Create web pages working directly with code. As a web authoring editor, PSPad contains many unique tools that save your time. Open source. Free.
The Site Wizard
Articles and tutorials on website design, promotion, programming and revenue making. Clear and succinct for non-techies.
HTML and CCS
Cascade style sheets {css) are now expected code for website design:
W3Schools:
HTML Goodies
HTML Code Tutorial
Search Engine Optimzation(SEO) for Site Owners and Small Businesses
Search Engine Optimization
FileZilla
FileZilla Client is a fast and reliable cross-platform FTP, FTPS and SFTP client with lots of useful features and an intuitive interface. Open source. Free.
Web Tools
FeedBlitz
Automatically receive online news of importance to you in a single, easy-to-read email. Multiple feeds,one daily email. Each night (US East Coast) the free service checks on your feeds, figures out the changes, and sends you a single, easy-to- read email with all the information at your fingertips. If there are no changes, you won't get a message, so FeedBlitz won't clutter up your email system with worthless emails. Even with an online aggregator having a daily digest backup is useful, as your email software has search, sort and indexing capabilities that many aggregators simply don't.
RSSowl
Automatically Receive Online News Of Importance to You. Consolidated RSS feed reader.
Browzar
Search and surf the web without leaving traces on your computer. Browzar is based on the Internet Explorer engine, which means it is such a small file that it only takes seconds to download. We've made it disposable; so you have the choice of keeping Browzar on your PC, or downloading it each time you need to protect your privacy. You don't even need to install it: with Browzar you just click and go...
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