I’ve made the choice to start to move away from traditional closed-source software as much as possible in my business. I’m working on adopting the software this year with the idea that in 2008 I will move to Linux.

With all the stuff I use, this is a pretty bold plan. I hope I can make that deadline for the complete switch before the end of 2008. In the meantime, I’m searching for (and finding) a number of fantastic programs. And, over the next few weeks and months, I plan to share my findings in the hope that it makes the transition easier for others.

This means my findings (for the most part) will be limited to those programs that offer both a Linux and a Windows version, unfortunately. As I have it figured, there’s no way I can learn a new operating system, address software/hardware conflict issues, learn new software packages and keep a business going. Thus, I’ll be limited to cross-OS offerings for now. I’m looking for the best reviewed of the options and will pass along my findings as well as my resources for the reviews and the download pages.

Whether you are changing for ethical, moral, technical or financial reasons, I hope my findings will help your own transition.

I’ll keep the header “Open Source Gems” for each find to make it easy to search and I’ll tag them all with “open source” as well.