Hackintosh is Poor Man's Mac

The lovely hardware that Apple produce does nothing for you if it's too much for your Poor Man's Wallet.  If you want to run OS X on your non-apple hardware then allegedly it's possible but creating your own Hackintosh! 

Google is your friend for this one as you allegedly need to browse the numerous forum postings and website s which show you how it's done.  You also allegedly require install disks to tweak and a good amount of time.  Remember this is obviously dodgy, so we couldn't possibly condone it, though having seen a Hackintosh in the flesh we can report that it was a sweet Poor Man's Version.

Android Weather Channel is Poor Man's Iphone WeatherPro

Android Weather Channel has a great price, it's free!  WeatherPro on the Iphone is a little bit more and they do the same job so why would you buy WeatherPro?  Well, it's more down to the appearance... the graphics on the Android app are a little clunky and the interface a bit sluggish.  If you're the kind of guy who likes Apple over Dell then maybe WeatherPro is your choice, if you like the Poor Man's Version then Weather Channel on Android does the job for free!

CSVEd is the Poor Man's Excel (but for CSV files only)

CSV files become unreadable after about 10 columns, and sometimes you can't get Microsoft Excel on the computer where you need to check the data, and downloading the data to another environment may be forbidden. In this event, CSVEd is a very helpful, and free bit of kit.

Stylus Studio is a Poor Man's Xml Spy

Well I wouldn't consider it cheap, but Stylus Studio is still a bit less money than Xml Spy, the leading xml/xsl editor and xml manipulation suite.  I actually shelled out for Stylus Studio as I couldn't find a free xml editor up to the job of the xsd, xml and xlst editing I had to do for a project.  Even then I waited for the annual deal to arrive before spending my money... maybe the Poorest man can recommend a Poor Man's Version of Stylus Studio....?

php is Poor Man's Version of asp.net

So I'm asking for it now... however, php is a good poor man's version of the good but rather expensive asp.net.  Asp.net get's it's main benefit from being able to use c# as it's serverside code base.  C# has all the bells and whistles plus has the benefit of being Windows centric so good for hooking up to windows based databases and other data sources.  It is however pricey to host and develop if you use Windows server and Visual Studio.net.

Php has a slightly less modern scripting syntax but wins out in a couple of way compared to asp.net - price and hosting flexibility.  Php is free, the platforms it runs best on (e.g. all those Linux variants) is free.. and there are numerous free web apps using php as a base.  Poor Man's Heaven!

Mysql is a Poor Man's Sql Server

Microsoft Sql Server is an enterprise relational database system that is used in millions of companies around the world.  It's fast, robust and has half decent tools shipped with the main server edition.  Mysql is the Poor Man's choice as it is also fast, robust and has a good toolset available for free or for a reasonable fee (see Navicat).

We tend to use Sql Server when clients demand it and Mysql when we're paying for it... there are some very large websites using Mysql so it's scalable as well as cheap!

Kirkland Colombian Filter Coffee is Poor Man's Starbucks

Some large corporate sites include Starbucks coffee shops within them.  If you're down the other end of the scale we've found Kirkland 100% Colombian Filter Coffee to be a good alternative.

It works out at about $10 for 1.4kg and the coffee strength is actually better than Starbucks, even if 'milk from the fridge' doesn't quite have the same sup as Starbucks microfoam.

Thunderbird , Poor Man's Microsoft Outlook

Thunderbird is lightweight email client from Mozilla, almost as good as Outlook but is not as great.
Works nicely with Google email account (IMAP)
However if you are poor man like me you can consider this one. Works nicely on one PC with Outlook if you want to separate Company and Private email.

Firefox, Poor Man's Safari

Firefox is an excellent web browser... however Safari running on a Mac is a bit flasher, and costs a whole lot more (as you need to own a Mac).  You can get Safari on the Pc but it's not that brilliant, I'd recommend either Safari or IE (ahem).

Cameraphone and whiteboard is a Poor Man's digital whiteboard

In the absence of a digital whiteboard where you can download and print a complicated diagram we find a cameraphone plus a traditional whiteboard will do the job.  It's a little fuzzy but most ideas can be captured on a 2mb resolution phone.

Excel, Poor Mans Version of HP Quality Center

If you're an experienced software tester you've probably used the Poor Man's Version of HP Quality Center... Microsoft Excel. Obviously you'd want to use Quality Center as it's built for job, however, with budgets tight Excel will provide you the basics. If you're a longterm user of QC then try Excel to see how lucky you are your company can afford that HP license.

Any Android Phone is the Poor Mans Iphone

So I own an Iphone 3g and one of my fellow developers is the proud owner of an Android handset. It pretty much does what my Iphone does but somewhat slower, with a slightly worse touch screen, and it's not quite as attractive.
It's the epitome of a Poor Man's Version.

SourceGear Diffmerge is the Poor Man's Beyond Compare

As soon as I began to work with multiple streams and configuration files, a strong Windows diff tool for folder-level and file-level comparisons became essential. ‘Beyond Compare’ is a marvellous tool for this purpose but the free alternative is ‘SourceGear Diffmerge’ . Diffmerge is less attractive, less tweakable, and less easy to use, but nevertheless achieves much of the essential usefulness of Beyond Compare. Hurrah!

Stack Overflow is the Poor Man's Version of Experts Exchange

And not a bad option at all... I've been a member of both and am happy to use Stack Overflow now without the expense of ExpertsExchange.  You can post your technical questions and other techies will compete to answer your problem, for free!

Welcome to Poor Man's Version

There's always a way to save some money when developing software. Whether it's an open source version of a high ticket item or a cheaper paid version that will do almost as good a job. We'll be using this blog to create a list of Poor Man's Versions that we favour.


If you have some good options then please let us know too!