It can be overwhelming to jump into the endeavour of creating a starting a new business and without knowing if your ideas will work. A critical role is to manage your cash flow and make sure the money is spent wisely. Nowadays, thanks to the internet and the open-source community, there is a plethora of great tools for your business and it won’t cost you any money.
Email Service
First of all, you will need an email address. Create an account on Gmail – https://mail.google.com
This Google account will allow you to access many useful collaborative services such as:
- Calendar Service: Free Organise meetings & events – https://calendar.google.com
- Contact Service: Free Directory of your contacts – https://contacts.google.com
- Google Docs: Free alternative to Microsoft Word. Many users can work simultaneously on the same document. Versioning control. Large choice of templates and different look & feel. – https://docs.google.com
- Google Sheets: Free alternative to Microsoft Excel. Same as Google Docs, many users can work simultaneously on the same document. Versioning control. And more… – https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/
- Google Slides: Free alternative to Microsoft PowerPoint. Same as the other Google tools, many users can work simultaneously on the same document. Versioning control. And more… – https://docs.google.com/presentation
- Google Drive: Free 15 GB cloud storage space – https://drive.google.com
- And more…
Operating System
Install the free operating system on to your server to replace Windows or other Linux paid OS: Ubuntu Server
Remote Access
Install Chrome Remote Desktop which is a free remote control software, a good alternative to Teamviewer: How to install Chrome Remote Desktop on Ubuntu 18.04 – (pretty much same config for Ubuntu 16.04)
VPN
How to set up an OpenVPN Server on Ubuntu 16.04
Cloud Printing
Google Cloud Print on Ubuntu 16.04, in 10 minutes!
Dynamic Domain Name Service
How to set up Free DDNS Service on Ubuntu
Backup
How to install and configure ownCloud on Ubuntu 16.06
Usually, I couple ownCloud with a Dropbox account (not free) for redundancy.
ERP / E-commerce website
Install Odoo on an Amazon Lightsail server for $20 / month.
Open Source ERP – Odoo 11 – installation guide on Ubuntu 16.04