Ask HN: What Open Source software is needed that does not exist yet?

7 points·kluck··5 comments

A robust CAD package to serve as an alternative to AutoCad for the uses for which people correctly purchase AutoCad. If you think there is one, you don't appreciate the technical capability of AutoCad.

Three things come to mind:

1. A robust video-editing suite (of the quality of something like Final Cut or Premiere)

2. A high-quality audio recording/mixing program (of the quality and breadth of Logic, ProTools or even Reason)

3. A photo-editing tool that keeps up with Illustrator and Photoshop (I love Inkscape and Gimp, but I feel as if they're a few years behind at this point)

I'd agree Inkscape/Gimp have fallen behind, though I use both frequently. However, on Windows neither is very satisfactory. Lately I have been using Krita for digital photo editing, not exactly its best strength, but still quite effective. Krita works under Windows too.

Photoshop cs2 and other set of the adobe tools from cs2 area are free. they are much lighter and quicker then gimp / inkscape. and i was heavy user of the 2 open source editors.

A simple to configure HDD/SSD caching system for use with non-fileserver computers.

I once tried a paid version called Gladinet, which worked as I had envisioned it being set up.

The closest FOSS options that come to mind are ZFS fileservers, & FlashCache on github. Neither can be dropped into a desktop easily.

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