Best PC Magazine 2009 Programs

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    PC Magazine has published an annual ranking of the best programs:

    This year has been a difficult one for the software industry as well. The economic crisis has affected developer activity; collecting material for this review, we were once again convinced of this. Nevertheless, there are noteworthy news. We give the most interesting and relevant programs of 2009.


    For simple users:



    DoubleGIS

    DoubleGIS, www.2gis.ru | Windows
    A reference and information system covering 22 cities of Russia and Ukraine. The package is implemented at a high technical level, there are versions for PCs and communicators (based on Windows Mobile). Data and shell are updated using a convenient specialized module. The navigation subsystem allows you to get directions, taking into account local transport.
    Comments: It is a pity that there is no Moscow and St. Petersburg yet. Really convenient and very useful program that lives on every desktop in these cities. Able to count routes on transport and by car (recently), and offers a choice. As a directory of phones - simply indispensable. So, everyone who drives on business trips is a must have. Important: this is absolutely free!

    “Gogul”

    “The New Generation”, http://gogul.tv | Windows, Web
    The world's first browser in Russian, designed for children and adolescents ... Today, the topic of protecting children from the Internet is of concern to many. Unable to protect the child from the negative of real life, parents try to at least protect the delicate "flowers of life" from him at least on the Internet. “Gogul” provides parents with the opportunity to inspect in detail the behavior of their offspring on the Internet, registering both the sites they visited and attempts to open forbidden pages. The project is controversial, but undoubtedly indicative.

    AKVIS Sketch

    AKVIS, www.akvis.com | Windows
    An original utility that allows you to turn digital photos into realistic drawings. A very useful development, which will be appreciated by everyone who dreamed of learning to draw, but did not work out in life. With AKVIS Sketch, photos can be transformed into sketches, as if made with a pencil or charcoal, as well as get the effect of drawing in watercolor.

    WinRAR

    RARLab, www.win-rar.ru | Windows
    Famous archiver. From year to year, this utility only gets better. In 2009, WinRAR, in particular, began to work in 64-bit versions of Windows, the compression speed was increased when creating RAR archives in systems with multi-core processors (especially noticeable in Vista and Windows 7).

    The bat!

    RITLabs, www.ritlabs.com | Windows
    The Bat! .. This email program is loved and hated with the same passion. Fans have no idea how to work with mail using another system, opponents wonder how you can work with the “mouse” by maliciously beating its name (Kill The Bat!). Be that as it may, this is one of the most famous Russian programs , and in 2009 it was significantly updated.
    Comments: About two years ago, Bat became uncomfortable, non-functional and in general. I have not tried the new version yet. Likely, in connection with the updates, I will try to return to the good old Mouse Mail :)

    " Cards Mail.Ru "

    Mail.ru, http://maps.mail.ru | Windows mobile
    Free navigation software. Today, "Cards Mail.Ru" is perhaps the best among the free ones. User-friendly interface, efficient routing algorithms, relatively high speed of map scrolling, traffic jams, good compatibility with communicators “zoo” ... It would not be an exaggeration to say that there is no point in spending money on users from the regions whose maps are offered by “Cards Mail.Ru” commercial software products related to GPS navigation.

    Comments: Maps are not always relevant. Traffic jams are always by. It’s true that there’s no point in buying a GPS card - there is both a mail ru and DoubleGIS (for the operation of which, for example, access to the Internet is not needed). All of the above applies specifically to the regions

    Mobile Macros

    ArtePlus, www.artelplus.com | Windows mobile
    A small program for Windows Mobile. Its main purpose is to record macro commands. The user can automate frequently performed operations, once recording the actions as a completed application script and subsequently launching it with one command.
    Imtec Battery Mark

    Imtec Software, www.imtec.org.ru | Windows
    Program for testing laptop battery. Unlike analogues (BatteryMark.Ru and Battery Eater), the Imtec Battery Mark not only shows how long the laptop is running on battery power at maximum load, but also gives an overall assessment of the power system.

    Autosputnik

    Navigation Systems, www.autosputnik.com | Windows mobile
    Car navigation is one of the few niches that are actively developing, despite economic difficulties. Navigation software developers are constantly improving their systems by adding more and more new features to them. In our opinion, this race is still won by the Autosatellite package.

    Comments: I don’t use it myself, but my colleague has it installed on the navigator in the car. Satisfied, works well.

    Google

    Docs Google, http://docs.google.com | Web
    "Google Docs" - perhaps the first SaaS-package, which has gained wide popularity. Millions of users became familiar with the SaaS concept thanks to him. Not so long ago, the Google Docs system was integrated with Google Translator, it introduced tools for creating macros ... We can say that Microsoft Office Live has a serious contender.

    Comments: Yes, yes, yes! An extremely useful service even for girls spending time on the Internet in forums. Maintain any general lists, exchange useful information, lay out patterns and other very necessary information. Available for everyone.

    Spb TV

    Spb Software House, www.spbsoftwarehouse.com | Windows mobile
    A package that provides owners of communicators the opportunity to watch online broadcasts. The system is simple and convenient in operation: just select a channel, touch its icon with a pen (or finger). As a result, a video player that receives a digital television stream is launched. The selection of programs is quite large; there are both free television channels (from business ones like RBC to music ones) and commercial ones. In the shell of the system, of course, there is also a heat transfer program for tomorrow or for the whole week.

    Movavi Media Octopus

    Movavi, www.movavi.ru | Windows
    A program for managing media collections on mobile devices. It solves the very painful problem of the compatibility of the formats of various systems when transferring video or DVD content to them. The utility is extremely easy to use, provides automatic recognition of the type of device (iPod, Sony Playstation, iRiver Lplayer, USB-players Samsung and Nokia, Archos and other players, flash drives, external hard drives) and the choice of optimal settings.

    Corporate:



    “1C: Enterprise 8.2”

    “1C”, www.1c.ru | Windows, Linux, Web
    The version number of the new generation “1C: Enterprise 8.2” system differs from the previous one by only one digit ... But in fact, version 8.2 is almost the most significant change in this product since the release of the “1C: Enterprise 8” platform. The new version implements a wide range of new features and mechanisms, including the ability to work in thin and Web client modes, a "managed application" mode, a fail-safe server cluster with dynamic load balancing.

    FastReport

    Fast Reports Server , www.fast-report.com | Windows
    Powerful and functional report generator. From a small utility, it has long turned into a full-scale system for developing and organizing corporate reporting. Modern versions of this package provide functions for outputting information to browsers, PDF, XML, graphic files, etc.
    IPI.Manager PRO

    IPI, www.ipi-manager.ru | Windows, Linux, Web
    The task management system is one of the most mature products of this type in the Russian market. This development has come a long way; many technological innovations and ideas have been embodied in the PRO version. It is worth noting the tools for combining tasks into composite projects (with the ability to comprehensively track the percentage of completion).
    Naumen "One Window"

    Naumen, www.naumen.ru| Windows
    The concept of "one window" in domestic government agencies is taking root with difficulty. And not only because too much in the measured life of officials changes the existence of a clear schedule of work, there are purely technical problems. It is impossible to automate only one stage of work; inevitably, a comprehensive solution is required - this is what the developers of this system offer.
    Parallels Desktop Switch to Mac Edition

    Parallels, www.parallels.com | Windows, Mac OS X
    Kit consisting of Parallels Desktop 4.0 for Mac and accessories. It is intended for a quick transition to the Mac OS X platform. Is it worth it to “make a switch” - a separate question, Mac OS X is also not a panacea and not free from problems, but this kit simplifies the transition anyway.

    Linter

    RELEX, www.linter.ru | Android
    One of the first major DBMSs adapted for the Android platform. Linter was originally created to work in conditions of limited computing resources with the ability to process data in real time. The Linter adaptation for this mobile OS opens up new possibilities for creating application software - after all, the first full-featured SQL server for Android mobile phones.

    ABViewer 7

    CadSoftTools, www.cadsofttools.ru | Windows
    A utility for quick viewing and even some editing of drawings in popular CAD formats. It solves the eternal problem of viewing drawings received from external sources, providing an extremely well-thought-out set of functions and capabilities (up to the “Break”, “Pair”, “Chamfer”, etc. commands). Compatible with DWG / DXF, AutoCAD DWF and DXF binaries.

    LEXPRO

    LEXPRO, www.lexpro.r u | Windows
    Legal reference system, characterized by a very affordable pricing policy and very good quality. Implemented hypertext analytical processing, intelligent search, rubricator and dictionary. A positive consequence of the crisis that erupted at the end of 2008 was a slight revival in the ranks of the background developers.

    "EVFRAT-Document Management"

    Cognitive Technologies, www.cognitive.ru | Windows
    The electronic document management system "EVFRAT-Document Management" and in itself is one of the best software products. But in 2009, an event occurred that puts her in a special place. The developers implemented the “Understanding Documents” subsystem - it provides a literal understanding of the meaning of documents. The system is capable of itself, without human intervention, to parse the contents of the document, recognizing the semantic parts, for example, company name, date or outgoing number.

    DocsVision

    DocsVision, www.docsvision.ru | Windows
    DocsVision document management system is one of the most popular in Russia. Thousands of enterprises and tens of thousands of jobs are automated on its basis. The system provides the possibility of implementing process management according to the standard ISO 9001: 2000 (GOST R ISO 9001: 2001), automation of document management and archive of documents, synchronization of business processes and document management in branches and offices, etc.

    SuperMag MiddleOffice

    “Service Plus”, www.servplus .ru | Windows
    SuperMag MiddleOffice is an industry-leading retail automation solution. This product allows you to solve all the problems of automation of work with the goods, does not require a fully-functional corporate IP in each store, allows you to "take" functions unusual for the store to the level of the management office (making purchasing decisions, pricing, etc.).

    Reg Organizer 5

    Chemtable Software, www.chemtable.com | Windows
    Windows has a weak point - and it is called the System Registry. This controversial place from the point of view of system architecture has been giving users a lot of trouble for many years. And there was a whole industry of developing optimizer programs. One of the best is Reg Organizer.

    ABBYY Business Card Reader 2.0

    ABBYY Software House,www.abbyy.ru | Symbian
    A program for quickly adding contact details from business cards to the phone book. This type of foreign software has long been known, but many foreign programs, unlike ABBYY Business Card Reader (BCR), are not able to recognize the Cyrillic alphabet. The utility is extremely simple in operation - just take a picture of a business card, after which the data from it will automatically go to the address book. For an OCR system operating in the most severe shortage of computing resources, the recognition results are quite acceptable.

    Information Security:



    Data Control

    InfoWatch, www.infowatch.ru | Windows
    There are quite a lot of information leakage prevention systems on the market today, but most of these developments are aimed at large corporate structures, while the SMB sector is falling out of sight of developers. InfoWatch Data Control is an example of the reverse approach. The system provides monitoring and filtering of data transmitted outside the company by e-mail, HTTP-channels or IM and prevents the attempts of unauthorized communication sessions.

    USB Safely Remove

    Crystal Rich, www.safelyremove.com | Windows
    Another program that fixes Windows flaws. Organization of USB device management in this OS, to put it mildly, is not very thought out. There are many problems - and USB Safely Remove solves them. The presence of this utility greatly simplifies the life of lovers of “portable” programs, saving them from system shamanism, if Windows for some reason has changed the drive letter assigned to the media when connected.
    DeviceLock

    Smartline, www.devicelock.com | Windows
    One of the oldest designs to prevent information leakage. In 2009, this software product celebrated a peculiar anniversary - 4 million installations in tens of thousands of organizations from the credit and financial sector, the energy sector, etc.

    Safe'n'Sec Enterprise Suite

    SN Safe & Software, www.safensoft.ru | Windows A
    security complex built on the basis of proactive technologies: behavioral analysis and VIPO (Valid Insider Permitted Operations, profiling of the information system and privilege differentiation during computer operation). Safe'n'Sec Enterprise Suite is the continuation of a series of personal products adapted for work in the network environment of large companies.

    Atlansys Bastion Pro

    “Conceptual Systems”, www.atlansys.ru | Windows
    Atlansys Bastion Pro is designed to protect sensitive information on your PC. Data is placed in encrypted container files or on disks, which when connected to the system are displayed as regular logical disks.

    Handy phoneguard

    Epocware, www.epocware.com | Symbian
    A small program that acts as a bodyguard for smartphones based on the Symbian Series 60. With various kinds of excesses, Handy Phoneguard automatically sends SMS to the owner of the smartphone with the number of the new SIM card that the attacker inserted into it.

    "CPI Jupiter Identity Manager"

    "CPI", www.ivk.ru | Windows Linux
    The IVK Jupiter platform is little known to the general public. This is a technological development designed to solve special problems, first of all - the organization of highly reliable and completely transparent network environments based on almost any channel. In 2009, it was replenished with the subsystem “CPI Jupiter Identity Manager”, a tool for managing the identification of officials when working in geographically distributed automated computing systems.

    Drive Backup 9.0 Free Edition

    Paragon Software, www.paragon.ru | Windows
    Infrequently, developers of system utilities delight users for free - and effective! - tools. We cannot but mention Drive Backup 9.0 Free Edition. This program provides all the basic features that you should expect from a backup program. Make backups in a timely manner!

    Networks:



    Remote Office Manager

    Aledensoft, www.aledensoft.ru | Windows
    PC remote control program. Despite the fact that Windows has a built-in subsystem for a similar purpose, many prefer third-party utilities. This system is a promising competitor to the current leader, the Radmin package.
    Printer Activity Monitor

    Red Line Software, www.redline-software.com | Windows
    The old slogan of the Soviet period today can be reformulated as follows: "the press must be economical." Programs such as Printer Activity Monitor can help you keep track of and control the loading of printing devices. Such tools provide the administrator with the ability to centrally monitor printing on all printers in the organization, stop attempts to use office printers for personal purposes, reducing printing costs.
    UserGate Proxy & Firewall

    Entensys Corporation, www.usergate.ru | Windows
    One of the most popular Russian systems for organizing Internet access and protecting the local network from external threats. In 2009, Entensys expanded its range of software products (releasing, in particular, UserGate Mail Server and UserGate Parental Control), but UserGate 5.2 Proxy & Firewall remains the flagship.

    Ideco ICS

    Aydeco, www.ideco-software.ru | Linux
    Internet gateway for small and medium businesses. The package implements the ability to limit the effect of Internet usage rules by time of day, session speed and interface numbers. For example, you can immediately ban the entire office from visiting entertainment sites during working hours - and allow after 18:00 (there are statistics that with this approach, employees are more willing to work overtime).

    Comments: All-in-One Product. From the unmarked - for the home network, you can use it for free, along with the mail server and gateway antivirus.

    Radmin

    Famatech, www.radmin.ru | Windows
    Radmin, year after year, withstands the onslaught of young and aggressive rivals. This utility has long been an indispensable tool for administrators in many companies and remains so to this day. The main innovation implemented in 2009 by the creators of the program is compatibility with Windows 7.

    Antivirus software:



    Internet Security Pro 2010

    TrendMicro, http://en.trendmicro.com | Windows
    Antivirus Solutions Trend Micro, in particular Internet Security Pro 2010, over the past year or two have gained a lot of supporters among both individual users and companies. Software products for SMB and the corporate market are famous for the ease of administration and reliability of protection; Internet Security Pro 2010 enjoys a reputation as one of the most developed anti-virus systems that covers almost all areas of cyber attacks.

    Norton 360 4.0

    Symantec, www.symantec.com | Windows
    Norton 360 - a unique system. This security package was designed for completely inexperienced users, and Symantec programmers brilliantly solved the problem. This antivirus can be installed on an elderly matron’s computer and not be afraid that she will panic call her grandchildren when each dialog box appears. At the same time, the system provides reliable protection; in the beta version of the Norton 360 4.0 package, the "cloud" technology of Symantec Quorum is implemented.

    McAfee SiteAdvisor

    McAfee, http://home.mcafee.com | Windows
    The browser plug-in for Internet Explorer and Firefox provides analysis and evaluation of sites that users visit while surfing. Almost all antiviruses have something similar today, but the McAfee implementation is perhaps the most successful. We can say that he was the first of the packages we tested, where the hand does not reach to disable this function immediately after installing the system.

    Kaspersky Internet Security 2010

    Kaspersky Lab, www.kaspersky.ru | Windows
    Kaspersky Lab has always been at the forefront of the anti-virus movement - and the release of Kaspersky Internet Security 2010 once again proved this. A lot of innovations, from a powerful system of proactive defense to the proprietary function "safe environment". The achievements of the company not so long ago appreciated by Russian President D. A. Medvedev. We, too, cannot fail to mention such a wonderful product.

    CureNet!

    Dr. Web, www.drweb-curenet.com | Windows
    With special feeling, we award the title of “best network anti-virus program” to Dr.Web CureNet! .. During the year, the editorial computers were saved several times by the free CureIt! Utility, which always occupied the place of the best of free anti-virus utilities, but it was difficult to use it on the network . Dr.Web CureNet! solves this problem by providing automatic treatment of workstations in the office network.

    Outpost Network Security

    Agnitum, www.agnitum.ru | Windows
    Network anti-virus complex addressed to companies from the SMB sector. The system provides protection of local networks from external attacks and internal sabotage (excessive traffic, virus infection, spamming or interception of data on internal channels), protects PCs in the organization’s network from viruses and other types of malware, regulates Internet access, etc.

    Sites:



    Sypex Dumper 2

    “BINOVATOR”, www.sypex.net | Web
    Many site administrators will agree that the author of this utility would like to erect a monument - so many times it saved and helped out. An extremely simple and convenient program that performs essentially one function - managing dumps (backups) of MySQL DBMS databases. But doing it is not just good, but excellent. In the second version of this wonderful package, a number of cosmetic flaws were fixed, work with language files was improved, and a number of subtleties associated with the latest versions of MySQL 5.1.20 were taken into account.

    1C-Bitrix: Corporate Portal

    1C-Bitrix, www.1c-bitrix.ru | Web, Windows, Linux
    We marked this system among the best Russian developments for business in the past year, and we celebrate this. The reason is simple: the developers of "1C-Bitrix" again made a small revolution by creating a module "Business Processes". The genius (a big word, but it is justified) of the Corporate Portal system as such is that it does not require forced implementation. It is enough to install it and launch users there - they themselves will form social ties in the corporate environment. This concept was called Enterprise 2.0, but the implementation was not perfect: the means of automation of typical business processes fell out of sight of developers until the fall of 2009. On October 27, 2009, after the release of the Business Processes module, the system was completed.

    Amiro.CMS 5.4

    Amiro, www.amiro.ru| Web, Windows, Linux
    A content management system featuring powerful and easy-to-use tools for creating e-commerce systems. According to the estimates of our colleagues from CMSMagazine.ru, this product is the first in the number of online stores built on its basis. The system is powerful, simple and efficient, able to work even in conditions of limited resources.

    Marketing:



    Semonitor

    Semonitor, www.semonitor.ru | Windows It’s
    not enough to create a website - you need to promote it. This simple truth is annually recognized by hundreds of enthusiasts; "website promotion" has long turned into a small industry. And the Semonitor program has become an indispensable tool for so many. This package allows you to manage all aspects of the life of the site on the Internet.

    Operating Systems:



    Linux XP Flash

    SafeLine, www.linux-xp.ru | Linux The
    Linux XP distribution kit is one of the most interesting Russian branches of Linux. The version of Linux XP Flash is a mobile version of this OS (distributed on a flash drive). The user gets the opportunity to download the OS on any workstation and work on a PC without a hard drive. Settings and operating information are stored on the same drive.

    Fifth Platform

    Alt Linux, www.altlinux.ru | Linux
    ALTLinux is one of the most interesting Russian Linux distributions. 2009 was marked by the creation of the “Fifth Platform” - a software package for the development and distribution of enterprise IT solutions based on Linux. One of the first application systems based on it was the Alt Linux 5.0 Ark package. It is addressed to small companies, allows you to quickly deploy a basic IT infrastructure.

    Source: PC Magazine website (there are no categories and comments in the source, the products run in a random order).

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