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Unlock Your Business: The Ultimate Guide to Open-Source Systems for Your Server (Savings & Control!)

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Unlock Your Business: The Ultimate Guide to Open-Source Systems for Your Server (Savings & Control!)

In today’s digital world, running a business, managing social media, creating websites, organizing sales, and ensuring effective communication are impossible without specialized software. Often, companies resort to paid SaaS solutions, where monthly costs can start from $20 for each product and quickly accumulate into significant sums, especially for small and medium-sized businesses. Moreover, such services often come with substantial limitations on functionality, customization, and control over your own data.

But there’s a powerful alternative – open-source systems that you can install on your own server (VPS/VDS). Imagine: instead of dozens of subscriptions, you pay only about $10-20 per month for server rental and get the ability to deploy a whole suite of necessary tools on it! This not only radically reduces costs but also gives you complete control over your data, security, and allows for flexible customization of systems to the unique needs of your business.

Today, we’ll explore a comprehensive list of such open-source solutions, grouped by category, with a brief description and examples of their use.

📈 CRM / ERP / Invoicing: Manage Relationships and Resources

Customer Relationship Management (CRM) and Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems are the backbone of any successful business. They help automate sales, marketing, support, accounting, and much more.

  • Vtiger CRM (Open Source)
    • Description: Integrated CRM for automating sales, marketing, and customer support.
    • Need Covered: A comprehensive solution for sales, marketing, and customer service departments. Allows maintaining a customer base, tracking deals, and planning campaigns.
    • Example: A sales department uses Vtiger to record all customer inquiries, create deals, and monitor their execution.
  • SuiteCRM
    • Description: A powerful open-source CRM, an alternative to Salesforce, with extensive customization capabilities.
    • Need Covered: Deep customization of business processes, a 360-degree view of the customer.
    • Example: A medium-sized enterprise customizes SuiteCRM to its unique business processes, integrating it with other systems for a complete overview of interactions with each client.
  • EspoCRM
    • Description: A web-based CRM application with an intuitive interface and modular structure.
    • Need Covered: Modularity, flexibility in settings for companies with diverse communication needs.
    • Example: A service company uses EspoCRM to manage customer requests, maintain a history of interactions, and plan the work of service engineers.
  • Odoo (CRM & Sales Modules)
    • Description: A suite of open-source business applications, including powerful CRM and sales modules, with an emphasis on integration.
    • Need Covered: Tight integration of CRM with other Odoo business applications (accounting, inventory, projects).
    • Example: A company using Odoo for accounting and inventory adds the CRM module for seamless data transfer about customers and orders between departments.
  • ERPNext (CRM & Sales Modules)
    • Description: A 100% open-source ERP that includes CRM and sales, built on the Frappe Framework.
    • Need Covered: Integration with all aspects of ERP, an API-first approach for extensions, mobility.
    • Example: A manufacturing company uses ERPNext to manage the entire cycle: from ordering raw materials and production to sales and customer service through the built-in CRM.
  • Dolibarr ERP & CRM
    • Description: A modular web-based ERP/CRM system for managing various aspects of a business, popular among SMEs and freelancers.
    • Need Covered: Flexible management of finances, orders, products, projects, and customers.
    • Example: A freelance designer uses Dolibarr to manage clients, issue invoices, and track payments.
  • CiviCRM
    • Description: An open-source CRM designed specifically for non-profit organizations, civic associations, and advocacy groups.
    • Need Covered: Managing donors, events, memberships, volunteers, and campaigns.
    • Example: A charitable foundation uses CiviCRM to collect donations, organize events, and communicate with its supporters.
  • Invoice Ninja
    • Description: An open-source tool for invoicing, time tracking, expense tracking, and accepting online payments.
    • Need Covered: Automation of the invoicing process, payment management, and financial document management for freelancers and small businesses.
    • Example: An IT consultant issues detailed invoices to clients for hours worked and accepts payments through Invoice Ninja.
  • Crater
    • Description: An open-source web and mobile platform for expense tracking, creating invoices and estimates, with client portals.
    • Need Covered: Comprehensive financial management for small businesses and freelancers, including mobile access.
    • Example: A construction crew uses Crater to create estimates, issue invoices for completed work, and track material costs.
  • Siwapp
    • Description: A simple open-source online invoicing tool, focused on small businesses, generates PDF invoices and has a REST API.
    • Need Covered: Quick and easy creation of professional invoices.
    • Example: A small photo studio uses Siwapp for the operational generation of invoices to clients for photo sessions.

🌐 CMS / Websites / Blogs / Stores: Your Online Presence

Content Management Systems (CMS) and e-commerce platforms allow you to create and manage websites, blogs, and online stores of varying complexity.

  • WordPress (.org)
    • Description: The world’s most popular open-source CMS for creating websites and blogs. It features a vast ecosystem of themes and plugins.
    • Need Covered: Creating blogs, corporate websites, portfolios, small and medium-sized online stores (with the WooCommerce plugin).
    • Example: A marketing agency quickly deploys a landing page for a client’s new product on WordPress, using a ready-made theme and a plugin for a contact form.
  • Drupal
    • Description: A powerful modular CMS and Digital Experience Platform (DXP) for more complex web projects.
    • Need Covered: Creating large corporate websites, government portals, social networks, complex web applications requiring a high level of security and flexibility.
    • Example: A university creates an educational portal on Drupal with student accounts, schedules, forums, and a library of materials.
  • Joomla!
    • Description: Another well-known CMS with a user-friendly interface that supports the creation of medium to high complexity websites. It has a built-in user management system and thousands of extensions.
    • Need Covered: Creating business websites, online communities, portals, news sites.
    • Example: A non-profit organization creates an informational portal on Joomla with news, an event calendar, and membership registration.
  • Ghost
    • Description: A modern open-source platform for blogs and online publications, focused on creating quality content. It has a minimalist design, built-in support for paid subscriptions, and SEO optimization.
    • Need Covered: Running professional blogs, online magazines, sites with paid access to content.
    • Example: An independent author launches a paid newsletter on Ghost, offering exclusive content to subscribers.
  • Strapi
    • Description: An open-source Node.js based headless CMS for creating a flexible API for content. It allows for easy data modeling and management, providing content for any frontend (website, mobile app).
    • Need Covered: Modern web applications, mobile applications, multi-channel content delivery where frontend and backend are developed separately.
    • Example: Mobile app developers use Strapi as a backend to manage articles, news, and user profiles displayed in the app.
  • OpenCart
    • Description: An easy-to-use open-source platform for online stores, known for its simplicity and large marketplace of extensions.
    • Need Covered: Quick launch of a small or medium-sized online store with basic and expandable functionality.
    • Example: A souvenir shop creates an online storefront on OpenCart, adding products, setting up payment methods, and delivery options using available modules.
  • Magento Open Source (formerly Magento Community Edition)
    • Description: A powerful and scalable open-source e-commerce platform. Suitable for large online stores with complex catalogs and business logic.
    • Need Covered: Creating large, multifunctional online stores, B2B portals, supporting complex product configurations and integrations.
    • Example: A large retail chain uses Magento Open Source for its central online store, managing thousands of products, different pricing policies, and integration with its inventory system.
  • PrestaShop
    • Description: A popular European open-source engine for online stores, aimed at small and medium-sized businesses. Easy to set up, with many modules.
    • Need Covered: Launching online stores, especially in the fashion, design, and home goods segments.
    • Example: A clothing designer opens their online boutique on PrestaShop, using attractive themes and marketing tools.
  • Shopware (Community Edition)
    • Description: A modern open e-commerce platform with a modular architecture, focusing on flexibility and customer experience (CX). It has an API-first approach.
    • Need Covered: Creating innovative online stores, B2B and B2C solutions, headless commerce, projects focused on a strong brand and customer experience.
    • Example: A custom furniture manufacturer uses Shopware to create a visually appealing store with a product configurator and CRM integration.
  • WooCommerce (via WordPress)
    • Description: The most popular e-commerce plugin that transforms WordPress into a full-fledged online store.
    • Need Covered: Creating online stores of any size, especially if there is an existing WordPress site or if tight integration of content and commerce is needed.
    • Example: A blogger selling their books and courses adds store functionality to their WordPress blog using WooCommerce.
  • OpenMage (Magento 1 fork)
    • Description: A community-driven fork of Magento 1.x created to provide long-term support (LTS), security, and stability for stores remaining on this version.
    • Need Covered: Continued safe operation of existing online stores on Magento 1 that are not yet ready for migration.
    • Example: A store owner running Magento 1.9 migrates to OpenMage to receive security updates and maintain compatibility with PHP 7/8.

⚙️ Business Process Automation: Work Smarter, Not Harder

Automation tools allow you to connect different applications and services, creating chains of actions that are performed automatically, freeing up your time for more important tasks.

  • n8n
    • Description: A flexible open-source workflow automation platform based on nodes. It allows integrating over 500 services and APIs through a visual interface, as well as writing custom code.
    • Need Covered: Automating marketing tasks, data synchronization between systems, sales automation, IT/DevOps operations.
    • Example: When a new lead fills out a form on the website (e.g., WordPress), n8n automatically adds them to the CRM (SuiteCRM), sends a welcome email (via Mailu), and creates a task for the manager in the task tracker (Planka).
  • Huginn
    • Description: An open-source system of “agents”-automators that allows creating personalized scenarios for monitoring websites, collecting data, and performing actions (similar to IFTTT/Zapier on your own server).
    • Need Covered: Personal automation, monitoring changes on websites, information aggregation, receiving notifications based on triggers.
    • Example: A marketer sets up a Huginn agent that checks for new brand mentions on Reddit every hour and sends links to these mentions to a special channel in Rocket.Chat.
  • Activepieces
    • Description: An open-source no-code/low-code automation platform with a focus on AI integration. It has a visual builder and supports JavaScript for complex scenarios.
    • Need Covered: Quick automation of routine tasks, integration of AI services into daily workflows, creation of custom AI agents.
    • Example: A support department uses Activepieces to automatically analyze the sentiment of incoming customer emails using an AI model and route urgent or negative inquiries to a senior manager.
  • Apache Airflow
    • Description: A platform for programmatically creating, scheduling, and monitoring complex workflows, especially popular for ETL processes and data engineering.
    • Need Covered: Orchestration of complex, multi-stage tasks, batch data processing, MLOps, managing dependencies between tasks.
    • Example: An analytics company uses Airflow for daily data collection from various sources, its processing, transformation, and loading into a data warehouse for further analysis and report building in Metabase.
  • Node-RED
    • Description: An IBM low-code platform with a graphical interface for building automation flows, particularly strong in IoT and integrating hardware devices with web services.
    • Need Covered: Automating processes in the Internet of Things (IoT), connecting sensors, managing devices, creating visual data flows.
    • Example: A “smart office” system uses Node-RED to collect data from temperature and light sensors, automatically turn on the air conditioner, and send notifications if a door is left open.
  • Camunda Platform
    • Description: A Business Process Management (BPM) platform and BPMN engine with an open core. Allows modeling complex processes graphically (BPMN diagrams) and executing them on the server.
    • Need Covered: Automation and orchestration of complex corporate business processes requiring clear modeling (BPMN standard) and execution monitoring.
    • Example: A bank automates the loan application review process using Camunda: from client submission, through data verification, scoring, approvals, to the final decision – each step is controlled and documented by the system.

🤖 AI / LLM / Chatbots: Intelligent Assistants

Tools based on artificial intelligence and large language models (LLM) open new possibilities for automating communication, data analysis, and creating intelligent services.

  • Rasa
    • Description: A leading open-source framework for creating advanced chatbots and AI assistants with deep natural language understanding (NLU) and dialogue management.
    • Need Covered: Development of custom, context-aware chatbots for automating customer support, internal assistants, voice interfaces.
    • Example: An e-commerce company creates a Rasa-based chatbot that helps customers track orders, get product information, and resolve simple issues without operator involvement.
  • Botpress
    • Description: An open-source visual platform for creating and deploying chatbots and AI agents. Supports integration with OpenAI GPT and other LLMs, has many ready-made integrations.
    • Need Covered: Rapid development of chatbots for various channels (website, messengers) using a visual constructor and the ability to connect powerful LLMs.
    • Example: A marketing agency creates an interactive bot on a client’s website using Botpress, which collects visitor contact details and qualifies leads.
  • OpenAssistant (LAION project)
    • Description: A research project to create an open chat assistant similar to ChatGPT. Data and models collected within the project are public and can be used to create custom AI solutions.
    • Need Covered: Access to open datasets and models for training and deploying custom large language models and chat assistants.
    • Example: A research group uses OpenAssistant datasets to train a specialized LLM for the Ukrainian language.
  • AnythingLLM
    • Description: An all-in-one open-source AI platform for working with local and cloud LLMs. Allows uploading your own documents, creating chatbots based on them (RAG), supports multi-user mode and vector databases.
    • Need Covered: Creating private chatbots that work with internal company documents, analyzing large volumes of text, secure work with LLMs.
    • Example: A law firm uploads its internal documents and legislative base into AnythingLLM to create an AI assistant that helps lawyers quickly find necessary information and precedents.
  • Ollama
    • Description: A tool for easily running and managing large language models (Llama 3, Mistral, Gemma, etc.) locally on your own computer or server.
    • Need Covered: Experimenting with different LLMs, developing AI applications with local model execution, ensuring data privacy when working with AI.
    • Example: A developer uses Ollama to run the Llama 3 model on their laptop to create a prototype of a text-generating program without needing to connect to cloud APIs.
  • Hugging Face Transformers
    • Description: A popular open-source library providing thousands of pre-trained models for NLP, computer vision, audio, and multimodal tasks. Allows easy loading, use, and fine-tuning of models.
    • Need Covered: Quick access to state-of-the-art AI models for various tasks, creating custom solutions based on them.
    • Example: A startup uses a model from the Transformers library to analyze the sentiment of customer reviews about their product.
  • Haystack
    • Description: An open-source framework for creating Question Answering and semantic search systems based on your documents. Allows connecting LLMs and vector databases.
    • Need Covered: Building intelligent search systems that understand natural language queries and find precise answers in large document arrays.
    • Example: A company’s technical support deploys a Haystack-based system that allows engineers to ask questions about technical documentation and quickly receive relevant answers.

💬 Communication (Chat, Customer Support, Helpdesk)

Effective communication with customers and within the team is the key to success. Open-source offers many tools for this.

  • Chatwoot
    • Description: A modern open-source omnichannel customer support platform, an alternative to Intercom and Zendesk. It combines website chat, email, Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, and other channels into a single interface.
    • Need Covered: Centralized management of all customer communications, increasing support service efficiency, improving customer experience.
    • Example: An online store uses Chatwoot to respond to customer inquiries coming from web chat, email, and Facebook Messenger, all in one window.
  • Rocket.Chat
    • Description: A popular open-source platform for team chat and collaboration, an analogue of Slack. Supports channels, private messages, video calls, file sharing, and integrations.
    • Need Covered: Organization of internal team communication, project discussions, secure information exchange.
    • Example: An IT company deploys Rocket.Chat on its own server for developer communication, creating thematic channels for projects, and integrating with GitLab.
  • Mattermost
    • Description: Another open platform for corporate messaging and collaboration, with an emphasis on security and privacy. Similar to Slack in functionality, also supports threaded communication and integrations with DevOps tools.
    • Need Covered: Secure and controlled communication for technical teams, integration with development and operations workflows.
    • Example: A SecOps team uses Mattermost to coordinate actions during security incidents, share logs, and integrate with monitoring systems.
  • Zulip
    • Description: An open-source team chat with a unique feature of topic-based threaded conversations, which helps structure discussions.
    • Need Covered: Effective communication management in large or distributed teams where many discussions occur simultaneously.
    • Example: A research group uses Zulip to discuss various scientific projects, where each research topic has its own separate message thread.
  • Matrix / Element
    • Description: Matrix is an open, decentralized protocol for secure real-time messaging. Element is a popular client for Matrix that supports chats, voice and video calls, and end-to-end encryption.
    • Need Covered: Creating a maximally secure and private communication environment, federation with other servers, integration of different messengers.
    • Example: An organization working with confidential data deploys its own Matrix server (e.g., Synapse) and uses Element for internal communication with end-to-end encryption.
  • osTicket
    • Description: A simple and popular open-source system for managing support requests (helpdesk/ticketing). Allows customers to create requests via a web form or email.
    • Need Covered: Organization of support service work, accounting for customer inquiries, tracking the status of problem resolution.
    • Example: A small hosting provider uses osTicket to receive and process technical requests from its clients.
  • Zammad
    • Description: A powerful open-source helpdesk platform with a modern web interface. Converts incoming requests from various channels (email, chat, phone, social media) into tickets.
    • Need Covered: Comprehensive customer support management, automation of ticket distribution, knowledge base, reporting.
    • Example: The customer service department of an online store uses Zammad to aggregate all customer inquiries and efficiently distribute them among operators.
  • Live Helper Chat
    • Description: Open-source chat for “live” support on a website. Offers text chat, voice/video calls, co-Browse, and AI integrations.
    • Need Covered: Providing instant support to website visitors, increasing conversion, collecting real-time feedback.
    • Example: An online English school installs Live Helper Chat on its website so consultants can promptly answer questions from potential students.

🗂️ File Storage / Document Management: Organize Your Data

Secure storage, synchronization, and shared access to files and documents are critically important for any organization.

  • Nextcloud
    • Description: A leading open-source platform for creating your own cloud file storage and collaboration. Includes file synchronization, calendars, contacts, video conferencing (Nextcloud Talk), online document editing (via integration with Collabora Online or OnlyOffice).
    • Need Covered: Replacing commercial cloud storage (Dropbox, Google Drive), full data control, advanced collaboration capabilities.
    • Example: A design agency deploys Nextcloud on its server for storing project files, collaboratively editing layouts with clients, and conducting video calls to discuss edits.
  • ownCloud
    • Description: A popular open platform for file synchronization and sharing, the predecessor of Nextcloud, which continues to be developed.
    • Need Covered: Creating private cloud storage, secure file sharing, collaborative work on documents.
    • Example: An educational institution uses ownCloud to provide students and teachers with access to learning materials and file sharing.
  • Seafile
    • Description: A high-performance open-source system for file synchronization and collaboration, known for its reliability and speed, especially when working with large files. Supports encryption and versioning.
    • Need Covered: Efficient synchronization of large data volumes, creation of a secure corporate file storage.
    • Example: A video studio uses Seafile to store and quickly synchronize large video projects between editors.
  • Syncthing
    • Description: A decentralized tool for P2P (peer-to-peer) file synchronization between devices directly, without a central server. Data is encrypted during transmission.
    • Need Covered: Secure and private file synchronization between personal computers, mobile devices, or small groups without using cloud services.
    • Example: A freelancer sets up Syncthing for automatic synchronization of work files between their desktop computer and laptop.
  • Mayan EDMS
    • Description: An advanced open-source Electronic Document Management System (EDMS) focused on managing digital documents, their categorization, search, and workflow automation. Supports OCR.
    • Need Covered: Organization of a corporate electronic archive, automation of document approval processes, version control, full-text search.
    • Example: A company’s legal department uses Mayan EDMS to store contracts, automatically recognize their text, and set up workflows for their approval.
  • Alfresco Community Edition
    • Description: A powerful open-source enterprise content management (ECM) platform. Allows companies to organize a centralized repository for all types of content – files, images, records – with version control, access rights, search, and business processes around documents.
    • Need Covered: Managing large volumes of corporate content, automating document flow, ensuring compliance with standards.
    • Example: A large manufacturing company implements Alfresco to manage technical documentation, drawings, and quality standards, ensuring access for relevant employees and control over changes.
  • MinIO
    • Description: A high-performance, S3-compatible open-source object storage. Optimized for storing large volumes of unstructured data, such as backups, archives, data for AI/ML.
    • Need Covered: Creating your own private or hybrid cloud object storage, similar to Amazon S3, for large data.
    • Example: An IT company uses MinIO to store daily backups of its clients’ databases and virtual machines.

📅 Appointment Scheduling & Video Conferencing

Organizing meetings and conducting online conferences are integral parts of modern business.

  • Easy!Appointments
    • Description: A free open-source online appointment booking system. Allows clients to independently choose dates and times, and businesses to manage schedules. Integrates with Google Calendar.
    • Need Covered: Automation of service booking, calendar management for service companies, consultants, salons.
    • Example: A private doctor integrates Easy!Appointments on their website so patients can independently book appointments.
  • Cal.com (formerly Calendso)
    • Description: An open-source alternative to Calendly for scheduling meetings. Offers a personalized booking page, calendar synchronization, and video call integration.
    • Need Covered: Convenient planning of individual and group meetings, avoiding schedule conflicts.
    • Example: A sales team uses Cal.com so potential clients can easily book a time for a product demonstration.
  • Apache OpenMeetings
    • Description: Open-source software for web conferencing, including video and audio communication, screen sharing, a whiteboard, file sharing, and meeting recording.
    • Need Covered: Conducting online meetings, webinars, training sessions, providing real-time collaboration tools.
    • Example: A university uses Apache OpenMeetings to conduct remote lectures and seminars for students.
  • Jitsi Meet
    • Description: A popular and easy-to-use open-source video conferencing platform. Allows HD video calls directly in the browser, supports many participants, screen sharing, and chat.
    • Need Covered: Quick creation and joining of video conferences without registration or complex software installation.
    • Example: A small team conducts daily stand-ups and project discussions using their own Jitsi Meet server.
  • BigBlueButton
    • Description: A specialized open-source web conferencing platform designed for online education. Supports whiteboards, presentations, polls, breakout rooms, and session recording.
    • Need Covered: Conducting interactive online lessons, training sessions, virtual classrooms with advanced educational tools.
    • Example: A language school uses BigBlueButton to organize group online classes with material demonstration and collaborative work on a virtual whiteboard.

📋 Project & Task Management

Effective project and task management helps teams stay organized and achieve goals.

  • Planka
    • Description: A simple and elegant open-source Kanban board for project management, an alternative to Trello. Allows creating boards, lists, cards, adding members, and setting deadlines.
    • Need Covered: Workflow visualization, Kanban-style task management, team collaboration on projects.
    • Example: A marketing department uses Planka to track the stages of creating an advertising campaign: from idea to launch and result analysis.
  • OpenProject
    • Description: Powerful open-source project management software supporting classic (waterfall), agile (Scrum, Kanban), and hybrid methodologies.
    • Need Covered: Comprehensive project management throughout the entire lifecycle: planning, execution, control, reporting.
    • Example: A construction company uses OpenProject to plan construction stages, allocate resources, track budgets, and interact with contractors.
  • Redmine
    • Description: A flexible open-source web application for project management and issue tracking. Supports multiple projects, user roles, Gantt charts, calendars, forums, and wikis.
    • Need Covered: Software development project management, bug tracking, documentation, team collaboration.
    • Example: A software development team uses Redmine to register found bugs, assign responsible parties, track their fixes, and plan releases.
  • Taiga.io
    • Description: An open-source project management platform designed specifically for agile methodologies (Scrum, Kanban). It has an intuitive interface.
    • Need Covered: Effective project management for Agile teams, sprint planning, backlog and progress visualization.
    • Example: A Scrum team uses Taiga.io to maintain the product backlog, plan sprints, conduct daily stand-ups, and track task completion on a Kanban board.
  • Wekan
    • Description: Another simple and flexible open-source Kanban board that allows visualizing workflows and managing tasks.
    • Need Covered: Visual task management, teamwork, flexible board customization for different projects.
    • Example: A small design studio uses Wekan to organize work on client projects, tracking stages from brief to final approval.
  • Kanboard
    • Description: Minimalist open-source project management software using the Kanban methodology. Focuses on simplicity and visualization.
    • Need Covered: Simple and effective task management for small teams or personal use who prefer minimalism.
    • Example: A freelancer uses Kanboard to organize their current tasks and track their completion for different clients.

🔗 Social Networks / Post Scheduling / Link Shortening

Tools for managing social media presence and optimizing links.

  • Mastodon
    • Description: A popular decentralized social network (open-source microblogging platform), an alternative to Twitter. Allows users to run their own independent servers (instances) that can interact with each other in a federated network (Fediverse) via the ActivityPub protocol.
    • Need Covered: Creating your own community or social media presence with greater control over data and content, without algorithmic feeds and centralized censorship.
    • Example: A non-profit organization creates its own Mastodon instance for its members and supporters, where they can freely discuss current topics and share news.
  • PixelFed
    • Description: An open, decentralized platform for photo sharing, similar to Instagram, which also uses the ActivityPub protocol to interact with other Fediverse services.
    • Need Covered: Publishing photos in your own space with data control, creating photo communities.
    • Example: An enthusiast photographer hosts their work on their own PixelFed server, sharing it with subscribers and other users of the federated network.
  • Friendica
    • Description: A decentralized open-source social network aimed at connecting users from different platforms. Supports ActivityPub, Diaspora, and other protocols, allowing communication with users on Mastodon, Diaspora, etc.
    • Need Covered: Creating a universal social profile that can interact with various decentralized networks, with an emphasis on privacy.
    • Example: A user who wants to communicate with friends on Mastodon and Diaspora without creating separate accounts uses Friendica as a single hub.
  • Diaspora*
    • Description: One of the first decentralized open-source social networks, consisting of independent servers (“pods”). Focuses on privacy and user control over their data.
    • Need Covered: An alternative to commercial social networks for users who value privacy and decentralization.
    • Example: A group of activists creates a closed Diaspora* pod for secure information exchange and coordination of their actions.
  • HumHub
    • Description: A flexible open-source platform for creating private social networks, intranet portals, and online communities. It has a modular structure.
    • Need Covered: Creating a corporate social network, educational platform, or a closed interest-based club.
    • Example: A company deploys HumHub as an internal portal for employees, where they can exchange news, discuss projects, and find colleagues’ contacts.
  • Mixpost
    • Description: A self-hosted open-source platform for managing social media. Allows creating and scheduling posts on various social networks from a single interface.
    • Need Covered: Centralized content management for social networks, scheduling publications, analytics.
    • Example: An SMM agency uses Mixpost to plan content for its clients on Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn, having a unified publication calendar.
  • Shlink
    • Description: An open-source URL shortening service that can be hosted on your own server. Provides detailed click analytics, the ability to use custom domains, and custom short links.
    • Need Covered: Creating branded short links, tracking the effectiveness of marketing campaigns, analyzing link clicks.
    • Example: A media publication uses Shlink to create short links to its articles (e.g., media.xy/news123) and tracks the number of clicks from social networks.
  • YOURLS (Your Own URL Shortener)
    • Description: A set of PHP scripts for creating your own URL shortening service. Provides full data control, statistics, and plugin support.
    • Need Covered: A simple and flexible tool for creating custom short links on your own server.
    • Example: A blogger installs YOURLS on their hosting to generate short links to their blog posts for sharing on Twitter.
  • Polr
    • Description: A modern, minimalist open-source application for URL shortening. Allows branding links and controlling data.
    • Need Covered: A lightweight and aesthetic tool for URL shortening with self-hosting capabilities.
    • Example: A startup uses Polr to create short, memorable links to its products for promotional materials.
  • Kutt.it
    • Description: A modern open-source URL shortener that supports custom domains, password protection for links, and detailed statistics.
    • Need Covered: A multifunctional tool for URL shortening with advanced features.
    • Example: A marketing team uses Kutt.it to create password-protected short links to exclusive offers for specific audience segments.

🔍 Search Engines: Find Information Effectively

Internal site search or private Internet search can significantly improve convenience and productivity.

  • SearXNG
    • Description: An open-source metasearch engine that aggregates results from over 70 search services and databases without tracking or profiling users.
    • Need Covered: Private and anonymous Internet searching, bypassing filters and censorship of some search engines.
    • Example: A privacy-conscious user installs their own SearXNG instance and uses it for daily Internet searches, receiving results from various sources without transmitting their data to large corporations.
  • YaCy
    • Description: A decentralized peer-to-peer search engine. Each YaCy node independently indexes web pages and shares the index with other network participants.
    • Need Covered: Creating an alternative, distributed internet search, indexing a custom set of sites or an intranet.
    • Example: A community of enthusiasts builds an alternative internet search using YaCy; their servers jointly scan a defined list of sites (scientific publications, blogs) and each participant can search this shared database, knowing that results are not filtered by external algorithms.
  • MeiliSearch
    • Description: An ultra-fast, lightweight, and developer-friendly open-source search engine. Ideal for integrating “search-as-you-type” functionality on sites and in applications.
    • Need Covered: Providing instant and relevant full-text search on your own website, online store, or mobile application.
    • Example: An online clothing store integrates MeiliSearch so buyers can instantly find products by name, description, or attributes, receiving results as they type their query.
  • Typesense
    • Description: A modern open-source search engine focused on speed, ease of use, and relevance. Offers features like typo correction, faceted search, geo-search, and semantic search.
    • Need Covered: Providing advanced search on a site or in an application with high speed and accuracy, an alternative to Algolia or Elasticsearch.
    • Example: A news portal uses Typesense to organize search across its article archive, allowing users to quickly find publications by keywords, date, author, or category, even if the query contains typos.
  • OpenSearch
    • Description: A powerful, scalable open-source search and analytics engine, an Amazon fork of Elasticsearch and Kibana. Used for full-text search, log analytics, and monitoring.
    • Need Covered: Advanced search and analytics of large data volumes, data visualization through OpenSearch Dashboards.
    • Example: An IT company uses OpenSearch to collect and analyze logs from its servers and applications, allowing for prompt error detection and system performance analysis.
  • Apache Solr
    • Description: A high-performance open-source search server built on the Apache Lucene library. Supports full-text search, faceted search, geospatial search, and scaling.
    • Need Covered: Implementing powerful and flexible search for websites, corporate portals, and document management systems.
    • Example: A large library uses Apache Solr to index its book catalog, providing users with fast and accurate search by author, title, keywords, and other parameters.

📊 Analytics & BI: Understand Your Business Deeper

Collecting and analyzing data about website visitors or business metrics helps make informed decisions.

  • Matomo (formerly Piwik)
    • Description: A popular open-source web analytics platform, a full-fledged alternative to Google Analytics. Provides detailed reports on visitors, traffic sources, on-site behavior, while ensuring full data control and privacy compliance.
    • Need Covered: Collection and analysis of website traffic statistics, conversion tracking, analysis of marketing campaign effectiveness with full data control.
    • Example: A company installs Matomo on its server to analyze its corporate website traffic, understand which channels visitors come from, and which pages are most popular, without transferring this data to third parties.
  • Plausible Analytics
    • Description: A lightweight and easy-to-use open-source web analytics system that focuses on user privacy. It does not use cookies and fully complies with GDPR.
    • Need Covered: Collection of basic website traffic statistics without complex settings and with respect for visitor privacy.
    • Example: A personal blog owner installs Plausible Analytics to see the number of visitors and popular pages, without burdening the site with heavy scripts and without requiring cookie consent.
  • Umami
    • Description: A simple, fast, and easily self-hostable open-source web analytics tool that respects privacy.
    • Need Covered: Quickly obtaining basic website traffic metrics (views, unique visitors, traffic sources, popular pages) without complex setups.
    • Example: A small startup adds Umami to its landing page to track basic advertising campaign effectiveness metrics without delving into complex analytical tools.
  • Metabase
    • Description: An open-source Business Intelligence (BI) tool that allows easy connection to various databases and creation of interactive dashboards and reports without writing SQL code (or with it for advanced users).
    • Need Covered: Enabling business users to independently analyze data, ask questions to data, and visualize results.
    • Example: A company’s sales manager uses Metabase to daily view a dashboard with current sales figures by products and regions, independently filtering data by necessary criteria.
  • Apache Superset
    • Description: A modern data exploration and visualization platform from Apache Software Foundation. Supports a wide range of SQL data sources, has a powerful SQL editor, and a rich set of visualizations.
    • Need Covered: Advanced data analytics, creation of complex interactive dashboards for large data volumes, providing tools for data scientists and analysts.
    • Example: The analytics department of a large e-commerce company uses Apache Superset to create dashboards displaying user behavior on the site, marketing channel effectiveness, and real-time sales dynamics.
  • Grafana
    • Description: A leading open-source platform for metrics visualization, monitoring, and analytics. Often used with Prometheus, InfluxDB, and other time-series databases.
    • Need Covered: Creating dashboards for monitoring IT infrastructure, applications, real-time business metrics, and setting up alerts.
    • Example: A DevOps team uses Grafana to visualize server load metrics, database query counts, and application error rates coming from Prometheus, for prompt problem response.
  • Redash
    • Description: An open-source platform for collaborative data work that allows connecting to various data sources, writing SQL queries, visualizing results, and sharing dashboards.
    • Need Covered: Providing analysts and teams with a tool for quick data access, analysis, and result sharing.
    • Example: A marketing analyst uses Redash to execute an SQL query to the customer database, builds a graph of audience segmentation, and shares it with the team for planning the next campaign.

🎓 LMS / Educational Platforms: Create and Manage Learning

Learning Management Systems (LMS) allow creating, conducting, and managing online courses and educational programs.

  • Moodle
    • Description: The world’s most popular open-source Learning Management System (LMS). Offers wide functionality for creating online courses, assignments, tests, forums, and tracking student progress.
    • Need Covered: Organization of distance learning, corporate training, creation of online schools.
    • Example: A university uses Moodle as a central platform for posting educational materials, conducting online testing, and facilitating student-teacher interaction.
  • Open edX
    • Description: An open-source platform for Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs), initially created by Harvard and MIT. Allows launching your own online learning portal with interactive courses, video lectures, exercises, forums, and certificates.
    • Need Covered: Launching large-scale online educational projects, creating corporate universities.
    • Example: A large technology company deploys Open edX to train its employees on new technologies and products, providing access to courses from anywhere in the world.
  • Canvas LMS (Community Edition)
    • Description: A modern and intuitive Learning Management System (LMS) with an open core (Apache license). Known for its user-friendly interface, mobile apps, and wide integration capabilities.
    • Need Covered: Organization of the educational process in schools, colleges, and universities, corporate training.
    • Example: A school uses Canvas LMS for maintaining electronic grade books, posting homework assignments, conducting online tests, and facilitating communication between teachers, students, and parents.

💼 HR / Personnel Management: Optimize HR Processes

Human Resource Management (HRM) systems help automate employee records, leave management, time tracking, and other HR tasks.

  • OrangeHRM (Starter Edition)
    • Description: One of the most well-known open-source Human Resources Management systems. The free Starter edition includes basic functionality: employee personal data management, leave management, time sheets.
    • Need Covered: Automation of basic HR processes for small and medium-sized businesses.
    • Example: A small office uses OrangeHRM Starter to maintain an employee database, process leave requests, and generate time reports.
  • IceHRM
    • Description: A modern open-source HRM system suitable for small and medium-sized businesses. Covers employee records, attendance, leave, and an extended version includes payroll.
    • Need Covered: Centralized management of HR data, automation of routine HR tasks.
    • Example: An IT company with 50 employees deploys IceHRM for online leave approval, timesheet management, and tracking work hours for projects.
  • MintHCM
    • Description: A relatively new open-source Human Capital Management (HCM) system focusing on talent management throughout the employee lifecycle: from hiring to performance appraisal.
    • Need Covered: Comprehensive talent management, automation of recruitment, onboarding, training, and performance review processes.
    • Example: A rapidly growing company uses MintHCM to manage vacancies, track candidates, plan adaptation programs for newcomers, and conduct annual performance reviews.

🛡️ Security / Authorization / Backup

Ensuring data security, access management, and reliable backups are critically important aspects.

  • Vaultwarden (formerly Bitwarden_RS)
    • Description: A lightweight, fully Bitwarden API-compatible password server written in Rust. Allows self-hosting a password manager for personal or team use.
    • Need Covered: Secure storage and synchronization of passwords, access from various devices, ability to share passwords within a team, full control over the password vault.
    • Example: A marketing agency deploys Vaultwarden for its team to securely store and share access to client social media accounts and advertising dashboards.
  • Passbolt
    • Description: An open-source password manager designed specifically for teamwork. Uses GPG encryption and provides granular access control to passwords.
    • Need Covered: Secure storage and shared use of passwords and other secrets within a team or organization.
    • Example: A company’s IT department uses Passbolt to store administrative passwords for servers and network equipment, granting access only to authorized engineers.
  • Keycloak
    • Description: A powerful open-source Identity and Access Management (IAM) system from Red Hat. Supports Single Sign-On (SSO), OAuth 2.0, OpenID Connect, SAML, and integration with LDAP/Active Directory.
    • Need Covered: Centralized user authentication and authorization for various applications and services, enhancing security and login convenience.
    • Example: A large company implements Keycloak so employees can access all corporate web applications (CRM, email, internal portal) with a single login and password.
  • Apache Guacamole
    • Description: An open-source clientless remote desktop gateway. Allows access to desktops (RDP, VNC, SSH) via a web browser.
    • Need Covered: Secure and convenient remote access to computers and servers without needing to install client software.
    • Example: A system administrator uses Apache Guacamole to remotely connect to client servers for configuration and maintenance directly from a browser.
  • RustDesk
    • Description: Open-source remote desktop software, an alternative to TeamViewer or AnyDesk. Allows self-hosting a server for full control over connections.
    • Need Covered: Fast and secure remote access to computers for technical support, collaboration, or personal use.
    • Example: A technical support service uses its own RustDesk server to connect to users’ computers and resolve their issues.
  • BorgBackup
    • Description: An efficient open-source deduplicating backup tool. Supports compression and data encryption.
    • Need Covered: Creating reliable, encrypted, and space-efficient backups of files and systems.
    • Example: A company configures daily backups of important server data to remote storage using BorgBackup, significantly reducing the stored data volume due to deduplication.
  • Duplicati
    • Description: A free open-source backup client that creates encrypted, incremental, compressed backups and stores them on cloud storage or remote file servers.
    • Need Covered: Automatic data backup from workstations and servers to the cloud or local storage.
    • Example: A small office uses Duplicati for daily backup of employee work documents to a network drive (NAS).
  • Restic
    • Description: A fast, secure, and efficient open-source backup tool. Supports deduplication, encryption, and various storage backends.
    • Need Covered: Reliable backup of files and directories, especially for technically savvy users and system administrators.
    • Example: A developer uses Restic to create encrypted snapshots of their projects and store them on S3-compatible storage.
  • pfSense
    • Description: A powerful open-source firewall/router distribution based on FreeBSD. Provides a wide range of network management and security features.
    • Need Covered: Ensuring corporate or home network security, traffic management, VPN, intrusion detection.
    • Example: An office installs pfSense on a dedicated PC to create a reliable firewall, set up VPN access for remote employees, and monitor network traffic.
  • Wazuh
    • Description: An open-source security monitoring platform (SIEM and XDR) for threat detection, integrity analysis, and incident response.
    • Need Covered: Comprehensive infrastructure security monitoring, log collection and analysis, intrusion and vulnerability detection.
    • Example: A company’s information security department deploys Wazuh for centralized log collection from all servers and workstations, analyzing them for suspicious activity and receiving alerts about potential threats.
  • ClamAV
    • Description: An open-source antivirus engine designed for detecting Trojans, viruses, malware, and other threats.
    • Need Covered: Scanning files, email, and web traffic for viruses.
    • Example: A company’s mail server integrates with ClamAV to automatically scan all incoming and outgoing emails for malware.
  • OpenVAS (Greenbone Community Edition)
    • Description: A full-featured open-source vulnerability scanner that allows detecting security weaknesses in network services and systems.
    • Need Covered: Regular scanning of IT infrastructure for known vulnerabilities and receiving recommendations for their remediation.
    • Example: A system administrator runs weekly scans of the corporate network using OpenVAS to detect and promptly fix potential security holes.

🛠️ DevOps / CI/CD / Monitoring: Automate Development and Control

Tools for automating software development, testing, deployment processes, and system status monitoring.

  • Jenkins
    • Description: A leading open-source automation server used for building, testing, and deploying software (CI/CD). Has a vast number of plugins.
    • Need Covered: Automation of the entire software development lifecycle, from code compilation to production deployment.
    • Example: A development team configures Jenkins so that every code commit to the Git repository automatically triggers a project build, runs tests, and, if successful, deploys the new version to a staging server.
  • GitLab CE (Community Edition)
    • Description: A free version of the popular GitLab platform for hosting Git repositories, including built-in tools for CI/CD, project management, issue tracking, and more.
    • Need Covered: Creating your own private “GitHub” with full control over code, development processes, and deployment.
    • Example: An IT company deploys GitLab CE on its own server so developers can store code, conduct code reviews, automatically test, and deploy applications using built-in GitLab CI.
  • Gitea
    • Description: A lightweight and easy-to-install self-hosted Git service written in Go. Offers basic functionality for hosting repositories, task management, and basic CI/CD (Gitea Actions).
    • Need Covered: Quick deployment of your own Git server for small teams or personal projects.
    • Example: A small startup uses Gitea to store the code for its mobile applications and organize collaborative developer work.
  • Prometheus
    • Description: A powerful open-source monitoring system and time-series database. Collects metrics from various sources, allows flexible queries (PromQL), and configures alerts.
    • Need Covered: Collection and analysis of server, application, and database performance metrics; setting up alerts for critical events.
    • Example: A DevOps team uses Prometheus to collect metrics (CPU, memory, disk space, request count) from all its servers and sets up alerts in Grafana if any indicator exceeds normal limits.
  • Zabbix
    • Description: A mature and multifunctional open-source platform for monitoring IT infrastructure, including servers, network equipment, virtual machines, applications, and services.
    • Need Covered: Comprehensive monitoring of the entire IT infrastructure from a single center, automatic problem detection, flexible notifications.
    • Example: An internet provider uses Zabbix to monitor the status of its network equipment, servers, and communication channels, receiving instant notifications of any failures.
  • Netdata
    • Description: An open-source tool for real-time system and application monitoring with high resolution. Provides detailed interactive dashboards “out of the box.”
    • Need Covered: Instant system performance monitoring, bottleneck detection, real-time application behavior analysis.
    • Example: A system administrator installs Netdata on critical servers for continuous status tracking and quick response to any performance anomalies.
  • Ansible
    • Description: A simple and powerful open-source IT infrastructure automation tool. Allows managing configurations, deploying applications, and orchestrating complex tasks.
    • Need Covered: Automation of routine system administration tasks, ensuring server configuration consistency, rapid application deployment.
    • Example: A DevOps engineer writes an Ansible playbook that automatically configures a new web server: installs necessary software, copies website files, and starts services.

🎬 Multimedia (Video, Podcasts, Galleries)

Tools for creating, managing, and distributing multimedia content.

  • PeerTube
    • Description: A decentralized open-source video hosting platform, an alternative to YouTube. Uses P2P technology (WebTorrent) to reduce server load and supports federation via ActivityPub.
    • Need Covered: Creating your own video hosting, distributing video content without censorship and ads from large platforms, participating in a federated video network.
    • Example: An educational institution launches its own PeerTube server to host lectures and educational videos, accessible to students without ads and embeddable on the university website.
  • Jellyfin
    • Description: A self-hosted open-source media server (Emby fork) for organizing and streaming videos, TV shows, music, and photos.
    • Need Covered: Creating your own media library with access from various devices (TVs, smartphones, computers) on a local network or over the internet.
    • Example: A family uses Jellyfin to store their collection of movies and home videos on a NAS, watching them on a Smart TV through a convenient interface.
  • Castopod
    • Description: An open-source platform for podcast hosting. Allows publishing episodes, generating RSS feeds, having a custom podcast website, and analytics. Supports Podcasting 2.0.
    • Need Covered: Independent hosting and distribution of podcasts, full control over content and statistics.
    • Example: An independent podcaster installs Castopod on their server, publishes episodes that become available on all popular podcast platforms via RSS, and tracks listening statistics.
  • PhotoPrism
    • Description: A modern open-source photo management gallery with AI features. Automatically indexes images, recognizes objects, faces, places, and allows smart search.
    • Need Covered: Organizing large photo archives, automatic categorization, convenient photo search and viewing.
    • Example: A photographer uses PhotoPrism to manage thousands of their photos; the system automatically recognizes people and places in photos, allowing easy searching for specific images like “Maria’s wedding 2023.”
  • Piwigo
    • Description: Open-source software for creating online photo galleries. Offers flexible settings for albums, tags, access rights, and is extensible with plugins.
    • Need Covered: Creating online portfolios, private or public photo albums, managing large image collections.
    • Example: A travel club creates a photo gallery of trips on its website using Piwigo, where members can upload and share their photos.
  • Lychee
    • Description: An easy-to-use self-hosted photo manager with an elegant interface. Allows easy uploading, managing, and sharing of photos.
    • Need Covered: Creating beautiful and convenient online photo albums with password protection and privacy management.
    • Example: A designer uses Lychee to showcase their work to potential clients, creating password-protected galleries for each project.
  • MediaDrop (formerly MediaCore CE)
    • Description: An open-source platform for publishing and managing video and audio content, similar to YouTube but for self-hosting.
    • Need Covered: Creating your own video or audio portal, managing a media library, content broadcasting.
    • Example: A music band uses MediaDrop to host their music videos and audio recordings on their own website, providing fans with convenient access to their work.
  • Funkwhale
    • Description: A decentralized open-source social audio platform. Allows users to listen, share, and upload music and podcasts, supporting federation via ActivityPub.
    • Need Covered: Creating your own music streaming service, sharing audio content on a federated network.
    • Example: A radio station archives its broadcasts and podcasts on its own Funkwhale server, making them available for listening to its employees and, optionally, a wider audience.

📝 Forms & Surveys

Collecting data through online forms and conducting surveys is an important tool for business and research.

  • LimeSurvey
    • Description: A powerful open-source tool for creating online surveys, questionnaires, and data collection forms. Offers a wide range of question types, conditional logic, participant management, and results analysis.
    • Need Covered: Conducting marketing research, collecting customer feedback, scientific surveys, internal corporate questionnaires.
    • Example: A research agency uses LimeSurvey to create and distribute complex questionnaires for sociological research, collecting and analyzing respondent answers.
  • OhMyForm
    • Description: An open-source alternative to TypeForm, TellForm, or Google Forms for creating beautiful and interactive online forms.
    • Need Covered: Creating attractive forms for registration, contact collection, surveys, market research.
    • Example: A startup creates a stylish form for collecting applications for beta testing its new product using OhMyForm.
  • Formtools
    • Description: A flexible open-source PHP/MySQL framework for managing data collected through any web forms. Allows storing, viewing, exporting, and visualizing data.
    • Need Covered: Centralized management of data from various website forms, report creation, data export for further analysis.
    • Example: A company with multiple contact forms on its website uses Formtools to collect all received messages into a single database for further processing.

🌟 Other Useful Tools

  • Home Assistant
    • Description: An open-source home automation platform that prioritizes local control and privacy. Supports thousands of devices and services.
    • Need Covered: Automation of processes in a “smart home” or small office: lighting control, climate control, security, energy consumption monitoring.
    • Example: A small office owner uses Home Assistant to automatically turn on lights when motion is detected, control the air conditioner on a schedule, and receive notifications from security sensors.
  • Elestio
    • Description: This is not a standalone open-source product, but a platform for managed deployment of over 350+ open-source applications. Elestio simplifies the process of installing, configuring, updating, and backing up many of the systems mentioned in this article on cloud providers or your own servers.
    • Need Covered: Quick and easy deployment of various open-source solutions without deep system administration knowledge.
    • Example: A small company without its own IT department uses Elestio to quickly launch Nextcloud for file sharing, WordPress for its website, and Chatwoot for customer support, without spending time on manual server setup for each.

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Transitioning to open-source solutions, while extremely beneficial, can seem daunting for companies without deep technical expertise or sufficient resources for independent implementation. This is where “Best Choice” comes in.

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  4. Train your team: We conduct training for your employees so they can use the new tools as effectively as possible.
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