Free Programming Tools and Utilities
Editors, Debuggers, Help Authoring, Setup, Version Control, etc
Free Programming Tools / Resources
You can find tools, resources and utilities for a wide variety of programming tasks below.
If you don't see the category of tools you want listed in the index below, please check out the Miscellaneous Free Programming Tools page, a catch-all page for everything that does not have its own page. Note that compilers and interpreters, source code and libraries as well as documentation are listed separately on their own pages.
Help and Documentation
Text and Source Code Handling
- Free Programmers' Editors, ASCII Text Editors and IDEs
- Free Java IDE and Editors
- Free Online Editors and Integrated Development Environment (IDE)
- Free Text Search and Replace Utilities
- Free Text and Binary Comparison / Merging Utilities (Diff/Merge)
- Free Clipboard Extenders and Clipboard History Managers
- Free Source Code Beautifiers
- Free Version Control Software
- Free Interactive Regular Expression (Regex) Testers and Builders
- Free Static Code Analyzers (Static Source Code Analysis Tools/Lint)
- Free Programmer's Fonts
Debugging and Binary Code Management
- Free Debuggers and Bug Trackers
- Free Disassemblers, Binary and Hex Editors, Hex Viewers
- Free DOS Extenders (Protected Mode)
- Free Text and Binary Comparison / Merging Utilities (Diff/Merge)
- Free Executable Compressors - shrink your EXEs and Binaries
- Free Windows Resource Compilers, Resource Editors, Resource Hackers, Icon Editors
- Free File Patch Makers (for Delivering Small Updates)
Compiler Construction and Grammars
Miscellaneous
- Free 3D Software Box Image Makers
- Free Interactive Regular Expression (Regex) Testers and Builders
- Free File Patch Makers (for Delivering Small Updates)
- Free GUI Builders, Application Builders and Rapid Application Development (RAD) Software
- Free Make Utilities (Program Maintenance and Building Software)
- Free Setup / Installers / Uninstallers
- Free Autorun/Autoplay DVD and CD Menu Creation Software
- Free Command Line Shells
- Free Programmer's Fonts
- Free JavaScript Minifiers (Minimizers), Obfuscators and Compressors
- Free Java Resources and Tools
- Miscellaneous Free Programming Tools and Utilities
Engineering Software
Other Programming Resources
- Free Source Code and Programming Libraries - don't reinvent the wheel
- Free Compilers and Interpreters for Programming Languages
- Free Online Programming Documentation, Frequently Recommended Programming Books
- Free Emulators and Virtual Machines
Other Resources of Interest
- Free Security, Privacy, and Anonymity
- Free Utilities and Application Software
- Free Perl CGI Scripts
- Free PHP/Perl CGI Script Hosting
- Free PHP Scripts
- Free JavaScript, AJAX, DHTML and Web 2.0 Scripts
- Free Web Hosts, Budget Web Hosts
- More Free Webmaster Resources
- Free Tutorials and Articles for Webmasters
- Free POP3, IMAP, SMTP, Web Email
New Pages on thefreecountry.com
- Free Android Emulators
- Free Social Network / Media Software
- Free Static Code Analyzers (Static Source Code Analysis Tools/Lint)
- Free JavaScript Minifiers (Minimizers), Obfuscators and Compressors
- Free Image Pop-Up JavaScripts (Where Image Overlays Current Web Page)
- Free Royalty-Free Stock Photos
- Free Online Editors and Integrated Development Environment (IDE)
- Free PHP Compilers: compile PHP scripts to native code, .NET or Java bytecode
- Free Embedded Web Video Player Scripts/Code
- Free Image/Photo Slide Show JavaScript
- Free Autorun/Autoplay DVD and CD Menu Creation Software
- Free DVD Authoring and Creation Software
New Pages on thesitewizard.com
- How to Upload and Link to a PDF File with BlueGriffon
- How Do I Stop Others From Using My Domain Name After I Cancel It?
- How to Put Text Next to an Image and Centre ("Center") Both on a Web Page (HTML/CSS)
- How to Play Music or Audio on a Website with HTML (HTML5)
- How to Give the Cells of a Table the Same Width in HTML (HTML/CSS)
- How to Make Expression Web Use HTML5 By Default
- How to Hide Images on a Website When It is Viewed on a Mobile Phone
- How to Add a Video to Your Website in HTML (HTML5)
- How to Block the Author ID and Author Archive URLs in WordPress Blogs Using .htaccess
- What is the Best Font Size for a Web Page? And How to Change Font Sizes with CSS
- How to Create a Blog
- What's the Difference Between a Domain Name Registrar and a Web Host?
- How to Back Up a Website
- Can You Fix a Typo in a Domain Name After You Register It?
- How to Centre an Image with CSS
- How to Move Your Website to SSL (ie, Convert from HTTP to HTTPS)
- Does the Price of a Domain Depend on the Name Chosen? Why do Some Domains Cost So Much?
- How to Install and Configure Apache, PHP, Perl and MySQL on Windows the Easy Way (with XAMPP)
- How to Make a Mobile-Friendly Website: Responsive Design in CSS
- What's the Difference Between a Content Management System (CMS), a Blog, a Web Editor and an Online Site Builder?
- Should I Learn HTML or Just Use a WYSIWYG Web Editor? Pros and Cons of Using a Visual Web Editor vs Learning HTML
- How to Centre a DIV Block Using CSS
- What is MySQL? What is a Database? What is SQL?
- What is HTML, CSS, JavaScript, PHP and Perl? Do I Need to Learn Them to Create a Website?
New Pages on HowToHaven.com
- How to Record a Game Video
- How to Boot a CD or DVD in Windows 8.1
- How to Change BIOS Settings on a Computer with Windows 8.1 Installed
- How to Shut Down Windows 8 (Full Shutdown and Normal Hybrid Shutdown)
- How to Set Up a Standard User Account (or Limited Account) on Windows Vista and Windows 7 for Daily Use
- How to Back Up Your Hard Disk in Windows
- How to Securely Prepare Your Old Computer for Disposal
- How to Work Around the Missing Up Arrow Button in Vista's Windows Explorer
Popular Pages
- How to Create/Start Your Own Website: The Beginner's A-Z Guide
- Hard Disk Backup and Restore, Hard Disk Image and Cloning Utilities
- Free Antivirus Software
- Free DVD Authoring and Creation Software
- Free Data Recovery, File and Partition Recovery, Undelete and Unformat Software
- Expression Web Tutorial: How to Design a Website with Microsoft Expression Web
- Dreamweaver Tutorial: How to Design a Website with Dreamweaver CS6
- BlueGriffon Tutorial: How to Design a Website with BlueGriffon 3
- How to Design and Publish Your Website with KompoZer
What's New
Stay Updated (Free)- Keep track of what's new on thefreecountry.com with your news reader
by pointing it to
thefreecountry.com's news feed
.
Note: for historical reasons, this What's New column also includes information from
thesitewizard.com's news feed
and HowToHaven.com's news feed
.
- Another 2 programs have been added to the Free Compiler Construction Tools: Lexer and Parser Generators page. If you are thinking of creating your own compiler, interpreter, or even programming language, these programs allow you to generate parsers (syntax analyzers) that simplify your task.
- New page: How to Upload and Link to a PDF File with BlueGriffon. Find out how to publish and link to a PDF file on your website using the free BlueGriffon web editor.
- Do you fancy writing your own novel, or some other type of book? A specialized program for this task has been added to the Free Word Processors and Office Suites page. This was previously commercial software, but is now free. It has many features that make things easy for authors. It can even produce publication-ready output in a variety of formats, including those for platforms like Amazon's Kindle.
- Another interpreter for the BASIC programming language has been added to the Free BASIC Compilers and Interpreters page. If you are interested in writing computer programs in this language, there are now 24 free implementations for you to choose from.
- In response to a user request, the Free Navigation Menu Wizard has been updated to allow the navigation menu to collapse into a "hamburger menu" button on mobile phones and other small screen devices. (View the demo on a mobile phone or a narrow browser window if you don't know what a hamburger menu is.) Note: this feature is completely optional. If you are worried about the poor usability of a hamburger menu, and your site is already using a mobile-friendly design, you do not have to enable it.
- Another item has been added to the Free Game Engines page. This one is used in lots of commercial games, has tons of features, and supports Windows, PlayStation 4, Xbox One and Oculus Rift. (Note that if you want to create a mobile phone game, and are disappointed that this package does support it, you can find other engines listed on that page that provide such facilities.)
- Another open source graphics library has been added to the Free Graphics Libraries and Engines page. This one provides a portable API that your programs can use on Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, Android and iOS. Incidentally, if you are looking for a graphics library because you are developing a game, you may also be interested in the Free Game Engines and Programming Libraries page.
- Two new implementations of the Forth programming language have been added to the Free Forth Compilers and Development Systems page. They run on numerous systems, including Windows, Mac OS X and Linux. The source code for both are available, and one of them is, in fact, in the public domain.
- A new open source compression library has been added to the Free Compression and Archiving Libraries and Source Code page. If you are writing a computer program that needs to process archives, whether they be in the ZIP, RAR, tar, 7-Zip (and so on) format, and don't want to reinvent the wheel, check it out. The library supports Windows as well as POSIX-type systems like Linux, FreeBSD, etc. (And, if I'm not wrong, it is the library used by the "tar" utility shipped in Windows 10, starting with insider build 17063.)
- A distributed database that is meant to handle large volumes of data across a cluster of servers has been added to the Free / Open Source NoSQL (Non-SQL) Database Servers page. This one was recently released as open source by Apple.
- New page: How Do I Stop Others From Using My Domain Name After I Cancel It? I was asked by a visitor if there was something she could do to prevent a domain name from being bought by others after it expires. This article addresses that question.
- A new assembler has been added to the Free Assemblers page. This one supports a wide variety of CPUs, including (as you might expect) the x86, as well as ARM, PowerPC, M680x0, Z80, 6502, Jaguar RISC, ColdFire, Raspberry Pi, etc. For those who are not sure what "assemblers" are, they are software used by computer programmers to translate programs written in assembly language into machine code. (Loosely speaking, assembly language is a computer language, but unlike other computer languages, it is different on every CPU, so for example, the assembly language for the ARM processor is different from that for the Intel x86 processor.)
- New page: How to Put Text Next to an Image and Centre ("Center") Both on a Web Page (HTML/CSS). I was asked by a visitor how he could place text beside an image and treat both as a single unit on a web page, so as to centre ("center") it or otherwise position it.
- Another open source file manager has been added to the Free File Managers and Graphical Shells page. Such software are useful for those who don't like the default user interface provided by your system for doing things like copying files and directories, renaming, deleting, and so on.
- If you are interested in setting up your own electronic mailing list, a new open source script has been added to the Free PHP Mailing List Scripts page. It allows you to host the mailing list software directly on your own website instead of using a mailing list service.
- New page: How to Play Music or Audio on a Website with HTML (HTML5). If you are interested in playing music or audio on your website, this article shows you the HTML code to use. HTML5 allows you to add an audio player with very little effort.
- New page: Free Android Emulators. These free Android emulators let you run Android apps and games on your Windows, Mac OS X or Linux machine. They are useful if you want to play Android games on your computer or if you want to develop and test your own Android app or game.
- New page: How to Give the Cells of a Table the Same Width in HTML (HTML/CSS). In response to a query from a visitor, who found that each time she added content to the cells of a table, the browser changed the width of every column, this article deals with how you can give all the cells of a table an equal width.
- An open source video editor for Windows, Mac OS X and Linux has been added to the Free Video Editors page.
- Another RSS Editor has been added to the Free RSS News Feed Editors page. These programs let you create and maintain an RSS newsfeed for your website, and are useful if you create a website using a web editor instead of using a blog script or CMS software.
- New page: How to Make Expression Web Use HTML5 By Default. I was asked by a visitor how he could make Expression Web use HTML5 by default. This article addresses that question.
- Are you tired of having to build a separate package of your Linux application for every single Linux distribution in use? Would it not be so much more pleasant if Linux applications can be built the way Windows and Mac OS X programs are, where all you need to do is to build a single bundle instead of worrying about what shared library versions are available on which distribution? The latest addition to the Free Setup Utilities page lets you do just that.
- New page: How to Hide Images on a Website When It is Viewed on a Mobile Phone. I was asked by a visitor how to make an image disappear from a web page when it is displayed on a phone. This article answers that question.
- A new open source program has been added to the Free Secure Password Managers page. Such software are helpful if you use different passwords for different online services (as you should). All you need to do is to memorize and use a single master password, instead of a zillion, while the program keeps track of all your other passwords, and stores them in an encrypted format.
- Updated: How to Make / Create a Website. The article on how to create a website has been updated with information on the latest developments on the Internet, namely the worldwide move towards using SSL, and how it affects the webmaster.
- New page: How to Add a Video to Your Website in HTML (HTML5). If you are looking for a way to put a video on your web page without hosting it on a video sharing site like YouTube, this article shows you the HTML code to use. With HTML5, this is now a very simple process.
- Two new free software for Windows have been added to the Free Personal Firewalls page. If you are want to block unwanted outgoing traffic from your machine (eg, to prevent apps from phoning home without your permission), and are irritated that the default Windows firewall allows any program on your machine (running with sufficient privileges) to change the firewall rules at will, take a look at these.
- New page: How to Change the Background Colour of a Web Page in CSS (HTML/CSS). In answer to a query from a visitor, this article deals with how you can change the colour of the background of either an entire web page or some portion of it (such as a paragraph or a column) using Cascading Style Sheets (CSS).
- The newest addition to the Free Debuggers and Bug Trackers page is a debugger that can record a failure in a program, allowing you to replay that execution as many times as you need, attaching breakpoints and watchpoints as needed. You can even reverse execute the program, with the debugger stopping the execution when those breakpoints or watchpoints are hit.
- New page: How to Block the Author ID and Author Archive URLs in WordPress Blogs Using .htaccess. I was asked by a visitor how he could block queries for his author ID and archive pages on his WordPress blog using the Apache .htaccess file. He may have wanted to do this to prevent duplicate content and/or the unintended disclosure of his login name. This article answers that question, as well as provides additional things that need to be done if either or both those reasons were behind the query.
- Updated: The entire BlueGriffon Tutorial has been updated for the version 3 series of BlueGriffon. Those who are thinking of using it to create a website can find the complete series online.
- New page: Free Social Network / Media Software. Have you ever wanted to create your own social media or social network website (like Facebook, Twitter and so on)? The free and open source software listed on this page let you do just that without having to write your own program from scratch.
- What is the Best Font Size for a Web Page? And How to Change Font Sizes with CSS. I was asked by one visitor what the ideal font size for a web page is and another about how to change that size. This article answers both questions.
- If you are looking for a news feed reader (for RSS/Atom feeds and even podcasts), check out the latest addition to the Free Standalone News Feed Readers and News Aggregators page. It works on Windows, Mac OS X and Linux and is open source.
- Another free program has been added to the Free Drawing and Painting Software, Image and Photo Editors page. If you are looking for a photo editor, or even a drawing and painting program to make a logo for your website or blog, check this page out. There are really a lot of free (and even open source) programs around these days.
- New page: How to Create a Blog. This guide takes you through the steps of setting up your own blog. (Note that the article deals specifically with making a blog. If you want some other type of site, you should read How to Create a Website instead.)
- Updated: How to Secure Your WordPress Blog. For those of you who are thinking of starting a website and installing WordPress, my article on securing a WordPress blog has been updated for the current versions of WordPress.
- New page: Free Static Code Analyzers (Static Source Code Analysis Tools/Lint). These free static code analysis tools scan the source code of your C, C++, Fortran, JavaScript and Java programs looking for potential bugs and constructs that may cause problems in the future.
