Software for Home Use

I used to attempt to maintain a list of software installed in TCM. This became amusingly out-of-date, and was rather unnecessary: it it's there, it's there, being a good start. Less obvious is the list of software which might be available for `home' use, so that is here, and probably incomplete too.

Of course free software (GIMP, gnuplot, LaTeX, gcc, etc.) one can download and use under their various forms of no-cost licences. However, the University also enjoys no-cost licences for home use for the following otherwise commerical products:

• Matlab: there is a no-cost licence available from UCS Sales and funded by the Schools of Physical Sciences and Biology. Further details here.
• Mathematica: which has its own page
• NAG: F95 compiler, F90 and F77 libraries, for MacOS and Linux (and probably Windows). Ask for further details.
• Virus Scan: Trellix's product for Windows and MacOS can be obtained via the UIS's anti-virus page. (Trellix was previously known as McAfee.)

(The precise definition of "home" may vary slightly between the above products. But if you install software, it is your responsibility to ensure that you obey any licence terms.)

Of course it may be possible to persuade TCM to purchase a personal copy of some non-free software for you. For much software, Academia provides discounted academic prices. (Academia replaces the previous UCS/UIS Software Sales Division, as Software Sales has been outsourced.)

Major free packages which may be worth investigating include:

• Aquamacs, Emacs for MacOS X.
• GIMP, a bitmap graphics editing program for Linux, MacOS and Windows.
• Libre Office, an office suite for Linux, MacOS and Windows which is mostly Microsoft Office compatible.
• Scribus, a DTP program for Linux, MacOS and Windows.
• Inkscape, an SVG and PDF editor.
• TeXShop (Mac only), TeXstudio (Linux, MacOS and Windows) and TeXworks (Linux, MacOS and Windows) are LaTeX frontends.

and, of course, the ubiquitous Firefox.

Compilers

Intel offers free versions of its current compilers under the oneAPI brand. C, C++, DPC++ and Fortran are all included, along with an optimised python distribution. Linux, MacOS and Windows are supported.

There are other compilers: the GNU Compiler Collection (GCC) is increasingly good and covers C, C++ and Fortran, the Portland Group has released a free Community Edition of its compiler suite (Linux, MacOS and Windows), and Oracle still has a free version of the old Sun Compiler Suite (Linux and Solaris only). LLVM is an emerging open-source alternative to GCC, but as of 2022 it still lacks Fortran support. It is fine for C/C++ under the name clang. Of these, the Oracle suite seems least actively developed.

The Bottom Line

Using "pirated" software on TCM's computers, or on your own computers in TCM in the course of your work, will get you into lots of trouble. Not only is it illegal, but it would be the University, not you personally, which is likely to get sued.