OStatic

One of the great things about open source platforms and applications is that skilled authors often put free books online as guides. We've written about excellent ones for Ubuntu, one for Linux hacks, and one for the GIMP graphics application. ? Recently, I came across a great, free online book on the super powerful open source 3D graphics and animation application Blender. The book is called Blender Basics, Second Edition, and while it has the slight shortcoming of showing examples from Blender version 2.4 (Blender is now on version 2.48) it's still an excellent, very thorough way to learn the application. If you're unfamiliar with Blender, it's so flexible that impressive, full-length animated movies have been created with it. Here's more on what's in the book.

Most users of proprietary software arm themselves with arrays of digital entertainment applications, ranging from iTunes to Windows Media Player to RealPlayer. That's due to big improvements in the bandwidth everyone gets, attention from content providers, and more. The good news is that for open sourcers, digital entertainment applications have matured -- big-time -- for Windows, Linux and the Mac. Even if you use proprietary applications such as iTunes for music, or Windows Media Player for videos, there are many open source applications that can complement and add to your libraries, collections and players. You'll find 10 good roundups of open source digital entertainment resources here, and more than 50 total free applications.?