lmemsm | Entries tagged with public domain

Whether you celebrate 8 days of Hanukkah, 12 days of Christmas, 7 days of Kwanzaa or anything else, it's always nice to have presents. With supply chains backed up and health hazards of shopping in crowded locations, this year is a great time to consider homemade presents.

I know many believe you get what you pay for me and that homemade gifts are not worthwhile. However, consider the time, effort and manpower that went into making a homemade gift. If you had to monetize it by paying someone else to do the work for you, with today's rising inflation, it would certainly cost a pretty penny to hire someone to do the job. Often a homemade gift has more intrinsic value that the latest cool commercial gadget or game.

Here are some gift ideas for the season...

Coloring

Coloring has been found to be a useful stress reduction activity. Give yourself the gift of a homemade coloring book using public domain clip art. You can also give your finished artwork or handmade holiday cards to others as a present.

Public Domain snowflake clip art to get you started:
https://www.rawpixel.com/board/1308894/vintage-snowflakes-wilson-alwyn-bentley-i-high-quality-cc0-images

Some other places to find artwork to color:
https://openclipart.org/faq
https://www.pdclipart.org/
https://publicdomainvectors.org/
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page

You can also create your own designs to color with free programs like TuxPaint and mtPaint ( https://github.com/wjaguar/mtpaint_handbook ) and rgbPaint ( http://mtpaint.sourceforge.net/rgbpaint.html ).

Exercise

Give yourself the gift of exercise. Why wait until your New Year's resolution to go to the gym when you can start exercising now and feel better for it? Studies have shown Vitamin D from sunlight can help protect against diseases ( https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/09/210915095408.htm ). Awe walks can have positive health effects and improve your mood more than walking just for the exercise ( https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32955293/ ). Try an early morning walk outside and enjoy the beauty of nature or try doing a Tai Chi form, QiGong exercise set or some yoga out in the sunshine. See how you feel afterwards.

Books

A book can be a wonderful gift.
Here's one of my favorite science fiction books:
http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/18137
It even includes a furry protagonist. Hope others enjoy reading it as much as I did.

Here's a list of free books that could make nice presents:
https://lmemsm.dreamwidth.org/13112.html

Books don't have to be fictional to be fun. Check into the many wonderful public domain hobby related books such as recipe books available online. You can also create your own and share it with others.

Want to find more ideas for books to read? Check out the reviews at BookWyrm
( https://bookwyrm.social/ ) or share some of your own reviews. If the book you want to read is not in the public domain, check archive.org or online resources from your local library to see if they can help you access it.

Movies

Some movies and TV shows with well known characters are actually in the public domain. So if you're in the mood for a literally free movie, check some of these out.

Mysteries

https://archive.org/search.php?query=charlie+chan&and[]=mediatype%3A%22movies%22&and[]=year%3A%221973%22&and[]=year%3A%221966%22&and[]=year%3A%221949%22&and[]=year%3A%221948%22&and[]=year%3A%221945%22&and[]=year%3A%221943%22&and[]=year%3A%221942%22&and[]=year%3A%221941%22&and[]=year%3A%221940%22&and[]=year%3A%221939%22&and[]=year%3A%221938%22&and[]=year%3A%221937%22&and[]=year%3A%221936%22&and[]=year%3A%221934%22&and[]=year%3A%221931%22&and[]=year%3A%221917%22&and[]=subject%3A%22mystery%22&and[]=subject%3A%22Charlie%20Chan%22

Action and adventure

https://archive.org/search.php?query=superman&and[]=mediatype%3A%22movies%22&and[]=year%3A%221948%22&and[]=year%3A%221947%22&and[]=year%3A%221944%22&and[]=year%3A%221943%22&and[]=year%3A%221942%22&and[]=year%3A%221941%22&and[]=year%3A%221940%22&and[]=year%3A%221939%22&and[]=year%3A%221938%22&and[]=year%3A%221937%22&and[]=year%3A%221936%22&and[]=year%3A%221932%22&and[]=year%3A%221930%22&and[]=year%3A%221920%22&and[]=subject%3A%22superman%22

https://archive.org/details/TARZANOFTHEAPESPUBLICDOMAINVERSION
https://archive.org/details/silent-the-adventures-of-tarzan
https://archive.org/details/TheAdventuresOfTarzan1921USAedicinAmericana.3gp
https://archive.org/details/silent-the-son-of-tarzan

Science Fiction

https://archive.org/search.php?query=Flash%20Gordon%20Conquers%20the%20Universe%20taylor%20AND%20mediatype%3Amovies
https://archive.org/details/PurpleDeathFromOuterSpace

https://archive.org/details/planet_outlaws_ipod

You can find more movies and adventures by searching archive.org.
You can also look through the listings at this site:
https://www.openculture.com/freemoviesonline

Here's some information on a radio play based on a popular movie series which includes material from my favorite author:
https://www.openculture.com/2020/05/the-original-star-wars-trilogy-adapted-into-a-14-hour-radio-drama-by-npr-1981-1996.html

Stargazing

Stargazing gives you something to do with your time that's aesthetically pleasing and a good learning experience. You can find out about constellations, planets and moons.

To help you get started, here are some free programs for your PC and phone that can help guide your star search.
https://f-droid.org/en/packages/org.tengel.planisphere/
https://f-droid.org/en/packages/com.google.android.stardroid/
http://nightsky.sourceforge.net/
https://portableapps.com/de/apps/education/stellarium_portable
https://portableapps.com/apps/education/celestia_portable

Games

What good is a gift idea list without the mention of games? From Free, Libre and Open Source computer games for your electronic devices to Creative Commons and public domain books about how to play a wide variety of games, there are several great resources for finding and sharing free games.

Here's my list of educational games for computers and mobile devices:
https://lmemsm.dreamwidth.org/15912.html
Know of others? Please share them.

You can play games remotely via: https://www.freeboardgames.org/

Birding

Give to others by giving the birds a gift this year. You can create bird feeders from recycled materials. You can also start planning your gardens and include some bird, animal and environment friendly plants. The birds may even give you a gift in return with some beautiful bird songs.
You can watch birds anytime virtually:
https://www.allaboutbirds.org/cams/cornell-lab-feederwatch/
It's also fun to learn how to identify the different types of birds that visit your neighborhood. Check out some of the free bird identification resources online such as public domain birding books and the e-bird program.

Giving to Others

Sometimes the best gift is sharing your time and skills with others.

This year, how about volunteering to help a Free, Libre, Open Source software project? You don't have to be a programmer to help out. They also need beta testers, artists, translators, help writing documentation and guides and help with other tasks. How fun would it be to beta test some computer games and be helping FLOSS projects at the same time?

There are also several Creative Commons projects in need of resources such as artwork, creative writing, multimedia recordings and more. You can add your creative works to a site featuring Creative Commons material using a CC license. You can also volunteer to help out various CC projects and web sites.

You can also help projects like these by advocating for them. Get involved with events like Software Freedom Day to help spread the word about great FLOSS and CC resources. Use FLOSS sites such as Get Together ( https://gettogether.community/ ) and Mobilizon ( https://instances.joinmobilizon.org/instances ) to share events. Use FLOSS programs ( https://lmemsm.dreamwidth.org/14124.html ) to host them virtually.

If you have a web site or blog or develop sites, help by making them more accessible. Find out more from projects like https://anybrowser.org/ and sites that discuss web accessibility such as 508E guidelines and A11Y best practices.

Continuous learning helps with brain health and neuroplasticity. Learn something new and help the world by volunteering your scientific skills. There are several citizen science projects in need of volunteers.

You can find more volunteer related links here:
https://lmemsm.dreamwidth.org/18603.html

Wrapping Up

Those are some of my gift ideas for now. You can also check earlier posts for holiday ideas from previous years. If you have other free resources you recommend, I'd enjoy hearing about them. Give a gift this year by sharing your own ideas, creativity and resources with others.

I've been investigating diets and foods to help with health recently. There's a lot of information out there and all types of different diets for different conditions. I can't help wondering how many of these will turn out to be dated or fad diets in another 10 or 50 or 100 years. To gain a better perspective, it's interesting to compare some of the ideas about what were considered good recipes for health in the last century or two and see if there are commonalities or ideas that lasted. It's also interesting to see what has changed.

The one diet I've seen a lot of positive feedback on and that hasn't changed over time is the Mediterranean diet. It can help with multiple health conditions. The only problem is, it's hard to figure out just what an authentic Mediterranean diet is. For instance, tomato (which is often used as an ingredients in recipes we would think of as Mediterranean) was originally from the Americas. So, it wasn't used in a standard Mediterranean diet until after trade with the Americas was established.

One interesting dietary myth you find in some of today's popular diets is that milk is an acid. Milk has always been alkaline. You can use any pH test to confirm that. Per wikipedia, whether a food is determined alkaline or acidic on an alkaline diet was based on the remains of the ash of a food after combustion by a device ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alkaline_diet ). This is not the same as what happens in an actual stomach. Very few studies have actually gone in and checked what was going on in a real stomach. One such study did so almost a century ago. I've seen more than one scientific paper that has tried to determine if milk is acidic in the stomach. The results of the papers I've read have stated that milk is still alkaline. Here's one study on milk and acidity:
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/22081694/
On the other hand, yogurt and probiotic foods like kefir are acidic. What's interesting is that some people with acid reflux or gerd have found milk, yogurt and/or kefir to be helpful. Many people find products like yogurt and kefir easier to digest because some of the lactose is already broken down by the probiotics.

Several modern studies have found probiotics good for improving health. Modern diets contain significantly less sources of probiotics than earlier ones. There really aren't that many sources for probiotics these days. Some food sources are yogurt (which can include milk or be milk-free), yogurt cheese aka Greek yogurt, kefir, kefir cheese, kombucha, sauerkraut. There was mention of health benefits from probiotics over 100 years ago.

Some ingredients listed in older cookbooks may no longer be considered safe. Also, if you have a compromised immune system or other conditions, raw eggs are not recommended. You may use pasteurized eggs in their place.

Here are some public domain recipe books on what were considered healthy foods at the time they were written:

The New Cookery: A Book of Recipes, Most of which are in Use at the Battle Creek Sanitarium
https://books.google.com/books?id=351BAQAAIAAJ&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&hl=en
Investigates using nutrition to help with mental disorders. Includes recipes using yogurt.

A Handbook of Invalid Cooking
https://archive.org/details/handbookofinvali00bola

Invalid Cookery
https://archive.org/details/b20421618

Foods of the Foreign-Born in Relation to Health
https://d.lib.msu.edu/fa/30/datastream/OBJ/View/
It includes some recipes that may work for those on a Mediterranean diet along with other ideas.

Food and Cookery for the Sick and Convalescent
https://d.lib.msu.edu/fa/28/datastream/OBJ/View/

Common Sense in the Household: a Manual of Practical Housewifery
https://d.lib.msu.edu/fa/15/datastream/OBJ/View/
It includes a chapter on foods for the sick-room.

The Cook Not Mad, or, Rational Cookery; Being a Collection of Original and Selected Receipts...
https://d.lib.msu.edu/fa/55/datastream/OBJ/View/

The Ladies' New Book of Cookery
https://d.lib.msu.edu/fa/48/datastream/OBJ/View/

Practical Italian Recipes for American Kitchens
https://books.google.com/books?id=eZfUAAAAMAAJ&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

Italian Recipes for Reformers
https://books.google.com/books?id=-AIFAAAAYAAJ&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false

I'll add more resources as I find them. Feel free to suggest others on our new mailing list.

New Years are usually about resolutions, but the bad thing about resolutions is that many of us make them and don't follow through. Wouldn't it be better if the New Year was about things we could do rather than things we won't do and think we should?

I've seen all kinds of quotes as to how long it takes to make a new habit. They can range from a few weeks to a year. Some quotes say a month, others say 66 days. It would be a lot easier if we were looking forward to something we enjoy rather than trying to add a new chore to our lives. If we have to do chores, it helps to reward oneself afterwards with something enjoyable.

Many people think exercise is one of the things they should do more of in a New Year. Instead of vowing to do more exercise or start an exercise routine at a certain time each day, how about doing something fun? Find activities that you like that are also exercise, such as dancing to your favorite songs or taking a leisurely walk to view nature or working in a vegetable/herb garden. I'm hoping to learn a new Tai Chi routine, the 24 form for the New Year. You can add more exercise in to your day by parking your car further away and taking the stairs instead of the elevator. You can even do stretching exercises in your chair while at work to take a break so you don't get RSI or eye strain. When working, take breaks to get up and walk around or get a drink or look out the window every so often. There are programs to remind you if you forget.

List of ergonomic software for RSI, etc.:
https://lmemsm.dreamwidth.org/13704.html
Workplace exercises that can be done from a chair:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HqfGRx8k_zA

Sitting properly while working can make a big difference in how you feel during the day. Arms and legs should be at right angles if you're working on the computer. Feet should be flat on the floor or on a foot rest. Stretching can help a great deal with pain. There are a variety of stretching exercises for different parts of the body. Chi Kung, Tai Chi and Yoga can also help with a variety of stretching moves. Weights are important to help prevent problems like osteoporosis and to help build muscle strength and mass. Aerobic exercises are important too. As mentioned, walking and gardening can be good aerobic exercises. So can swimming and water aerobics and bike riding. If you can't do either of those easily at this time, you could look into stationary bike riding. Exercise can greatly lift mood, help improve sleep and appetite and regulate weight too.

Another interesting thing for the New Year is that January 1st is Public Domain Day. Check out some of the new songs that are now in the public domain (and you can dance or sing to):
https://web.law.duke.edu/cspd/publicdomainday/2021/
There are new books and movies too.
Online libraries and sites that promote the public domain are great places to help celebrate. Check previous entries for lists of public domain books and information on where to find them.

Some useful public domain links:
https://archive.org/
http://www.ibiblio.org/eldritch/
https://www.pdinfo.com/public-domain-music-list.php
https://www.pond5.com/free
http://www.publicdomainproject.org/
http://www.pdcomedy.com/

Here are some public domain books and pictures that look interesting:
https://www.rawpixel.com/board/1308894/vintage-snowflakes-wilson-alwyn-bentley-i-high-quality-cc0-images
https://archive.org/stream/kittenscatsbooko00grov/kittenscatsbooko00grov
https://archive.org/stream/littlefolksanim00freegoog

Here are more public domain books. These are recipe books.
https://archive.org/details/goldmedalflour00washrich
https://archive.org/details/bettycrockerscoo00croc
https://archive.org/details/daintydessertsfo00charrich
https://archive.org/stream/usnavycookbook00instgoog

Want to lend your talents by volunteering? The Public Domain Project is asking for help:
https://en.publicdomainproject.org/index.php/PD:Community_Portal:aide

Instead of making a list of resolutions for the New Year, what if you made a gratitude list? It's a good way to count your blessings and one form of meditation. How about making a list or writing activities you like on slips of paper. Then, when you need something fun to do, you can go through the list or pull one of the slips at random and add something fun to your life. Trying to find activities you enjoy that are healthy or useful can be a lot more fun than trying to go through a todo list of resolutions that seem like chores. So what are some of your favorite fun activities? Feel free to share some of them on our new mailing list that replaces the Yahoo Groups lists that have been phased out: https://groups.io/g/distasis

For some light in the darkness this year...

If you get depressed when it starts getting darker out, such as during the winter months, you may want to investigate Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD). Full spectrum white lighting is one method of combating the effects. Light can have a great effect on mood. Too much blue light (from computer screens, phone and TVs before bed) can make it harder to fall asleep at night and produce melatonin naturally. There are programs and apps like Red Shift screen adjustments to help combat that ( https://lmemsm.dreamwidth.org/13704.html ). Better yet, don't use electronics before bed. Switch to lower level lighting tinted more toward the red spectrum at night. Keeping your home dark at night can improve melatonin production. You can find white light alarms to help you wake up in the morning and simulate a sunrise.
More information on circadian rhythms and the sleep cycle:
https://www.sleep.org/what-happens-during-sleep/

As mentioned in my Thanksgiving post, viewing or, better yet, getting exercise by walking in green environments can have a calming effect and help improve mood. Walking can help with neurogenesis too. Here are some more botanical garden and nature videos that I've found interesting:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IofrAwQVZqM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U7rkUBkhgdE

Playing games and exercising your brain can be a good holiday pastime. It can help create new neural pathways and build new brain cells (neurogenesis). Educational games and games you can play with pen and paper are listed in previous posts.
https://lmemsm.dreamwidth.org/15912.html
https://lmemsm.dreamwidth.org/14863.html
Playing with a dreidel is another common game this time of year:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dreidel

The holidays don't seem like the holidays without a chance to do some singing. I'm particularly interested in public domain and Creative Commons songs. Looking for songs that light the darkness this year. I'm including some links to carols and songs that are commonly sung during this season. If you're lucky, you may find a virtual group online that you can sing some of them with.

Was impressed with some of the carols mentioned by the Stay At Home Choir in their Carols from Around the World program:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IcgqxLjk1n4&list=PL8ZG8YS4Uucek0tsRBNNwFgYooiH-w4X_&index=13
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C9f6zxo6X0s&list=PL8ZG8YS4Uucek0tsRBNNwFgYooiH-w4X_&index=14
More info on the Santa Lucia carol:
https://www.hymnsandcarolsofchristmas.com/Hymns_and_Carols/NonEnglish/santa_lucia.htm

Banu Hoshekh l’Garesh (We come to chase the dark away)
https://opensiddur.org/prayers/lunisolar/commemorative-days/hanukkah/banu-hoshekh-lgaresh-by-sara-levi-tanai/

Rock of Ages
http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/10384-ma-oz-zur

More public domain music sites:
https://ccel.org/
https://hymnary.org/
http://www.hymnsandcarolsofchristmas.com/

There are several holidays this time of year including Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, Yule, Santa Lucia Day, Diwali, Bodhi Day, Solstice, HumanLight, Life Day and many others. Many of them include light in the festivities. There are lighted Christmas trees, yule logs (the type you burn in the fireplace, not the type you eat), menorahs, kinaras, diyas.

My favorite crepe recipe and some background on Yule:
http://web.archive.org/web/20060618143205/http://users.internorth.com/~wiccan/seasons/yule.htm

Here's a recipe for Lucia cats:
https://web.archive.org/web/20200928081044/https://www.kroger.com/r/saint-lucia-cats-recipe/184374

Exercise can also keep you warm during the colder months. Breathing exercises can also help with mood and can improve health. Breath is connected to life and spirit and often, the word for breath is synonymous for spirit in many languages. Chi from Tai Chi also refers to life energy. Here are some interesting exercise programs.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PkdRLJKajII
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IEGlntjbyZI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdaCuigipoM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e4VIw41R-PU

Check out some of the Pure Edge breathing meditations and the Mind Jar meditation in the Rest section:
https://pureedgeinc.org/curriculum/pure-brains-breaks/video-library/

Here are some astronomy events to light up your night this December:
https://www.space.com/great-conjunction-jupiter-saturn-christmas-star-2020-nasa-tips
Plus, you can check out more astronomy resources at:
https://www.openspaceproject.com/

I haven't even scratched the surface on resources. Will be searching for more links for the holidays and rituals that light the darkness. Will add what I find here.

Boker Ohr to everyone.

With Thanksgiving coming up, I've been trying to brainstorm activities for Thanksgiving for those who may be feeling isolated this holiday season. Having much less luck finding activities for this holiday than I did with Halloween.

It would be nice if some group out there had a virtual Thanksgiving dinner and invited everyone who had no place to go or no family to be with for the holiday. I'm sure there are some organizations and some families that are sharing Thanksgiving virtually. However, I've yet to find a group that is doing so and inviting the general public.

It would be fairly easy to do a virtual Thanksgiving using Jitsi Meet ( https://meet.jit.si/ ). I recently used Jitsi to talk a friend through how to do some tasks on her computer. She couldn't get Zoom working. Google Meet asked for a login which she didn't have. With Jitsi Meet, I just made up a room and we were both able to get on and conference together. She could share her desktop, so I could see exactly what was going on with her computer and talk her through how to do things.

I've checked our local library, Get Together ( https://gettogether.community/ ), Eventbrite and Meetup for Thanksgiving related events. Our library is having a fun baking event that I look forward to attending online. I've seen a few meditation events online centered around giving thanks during the holiday. Vitas is running some special bereavement support events just for the holidays: https://vitas.com/events

I will definitely be doing some holiday baking. I'll be making pecan pie. To deal with nut allergies, I'm substituting ground sunflower and pumpkin seed for the nut butter part of the filling this year. There's a great cranberry sauce recipe for the Vitamix that also makes cranberry juice during the process. Side dishes will probably include a spinach bake and asparagus. Will enjoy seeing what recipe our local library will be sharing at their event.

Thanksgiving is a great time to celebrate the harvest. I have an herb garden and will be making some things with the herb leaves. I'm also going to check out some of the virtual Botanical Garden tours available online. Could be fun to find an online gardening class or gardening group to participate in. I've been checking youtube and https://web.archive.org/web/20201022011009/https://www.mounts.org/virtual-garden-tours/ for calming virtual garden tours. Studies have shown that viewing green environments or walking in them can have a calming effect. Here's a link to one such study: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6379348/

It's also a great time to view nature and bird watch. Wikipedia has some good information on identifying birds in your area:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_birds
Cornell has some bird watching resources and events as well:
https://www.birds.cornell.edu/

Any time is a good time for meditation. Here are a couple of meditations that might be fitting for the holidays. The first is to list what you're thankful for. Count your blessings. Gratitude meditations can lift your mood. Here's a link with some more information:
https://www.headspace.com/meditation/gratitude
Pure Edge discusses an Attitude of Gratitude activity called Taking in the Good. Think of someone or something in your life that you're grateful for and take some time to just appreciate it.
Pure Edge also does a very interesting breathing meditation that can be very helpful. It's called Starfish breathing ( https://pureedgeinc.org/curriculum/pure-brains-breaks/video-library/ ). You use your hand as a tactile centering tool during the exercise. It reminds me of the art activity for Thanksgiving where you draw the outline of your hand and then turn it into an illustration of a turkey.

The online library archive.org has several resources for Thanksgiving. Many are in the public domain.

If you have some other ideas for ways to celebrate and connect at holiday time, feel free to share them:
http://www.distasis.com/connect.htm

P.S.: So my Thanksgiving didn't turn out as planned and I wasn't able to do most of the things I'd planned to. As you can see from my next post, just trying to keep a roof over my head and find some place with my own kitchen so I don't starve. (I'm down to 88 pounds.) Missed many of the online events this week. Will probably be eating a turkey sandwich for dinner on Thanksgiving. This year, hope to be thankful for a mold free roof over my head (even if it's someone else's roof) and good quality (minimally processed) food that won't make me sick at a table.

Celebrating Halloween all alone? Here are some ideas and brainstorms.

First, I'd like to invite you take the Halloween Holiday Tour. It's only accessible in October.
You can find a link to it here:
http://www.distasis.com/write

If you'd like to create your own Halloween interactive adventures electronically, here are some
of the many Free, Libre and Open Source options out there:
https://playfic.com/
http://twinery.org/
https://www.alanif.se/
http://www.tads.org/index.htm
http://www.trizbort.com/

Some also allow you to create web pages without needing to be a web designer:
http://textadventures.co.uk/squiffy
http://textadventures.co.uk/quest/
http://inform7.com/

This lets you create your own mobile apps:
https://appinventor.mit.edu/

You can also practice programming and create a storyline with these tools:
https://scratch.mit.edu/
http://www.alice.org/get-alice/storytelling-alice/

If you create your own Halloween adventure and it's not too scary, feel free to let me know about it:
http://www.distasis.com/connect.htm
I'd love to hear about any Free, Libre, Open Source, Creative Commons or public domain resources for Halloween. Treat it as a scavenger or treasure hunt and try to find some of your own or help create some new ones and share them with everyone.

The Halloween Holiday Tour has several ideas for celebrating Halloween plus links to activities, so I don't want to repeat that here. What else can I cover? I have seen some interesting web sites that mention favorite music and movies to watch for Halloween, so I'll share some of mine at this time.

I like classical Halloween music such as Night on Bald Mountain. I'm in the process of transcribing it to ABC notation so I can create a midi file of it. I also like Loreena McKennit's music. Some of her songs are based on public domain music or lyrics. I took some of my favorite Halloween themed songs from various music I own and put together my own Halloween playlist. You can find free software to work with music and create your own music CDs as part of this list on Open Source software:
http://www.distasis.com/cpp/osrclist.htm

As far as Halloween TV shows and videos, some of my favorites suitable for all ages are:
Curious George: A Halloween Boo Fest
Charlie Chan: Meeting at Midnight
Wishbone: The Legend of Creepy Collars
Legion of Superheroes season 1 episode 4 Fear Factory
Voyagers! episode 4
Spooky House
Thunder and the House of Magic
Check your local libraries for them.
You can find the Charlie Chan video online at archive.org: https://archive.org/details/CharlieChanBlackMagicMeetingAtMidnight
If you run across others, suitable for any age, feel free to let me know. I may add them to the list.

I'll definitely be doing some baking this Halloween. What's Halloween without some treats to go with the tricks? Haven't decided what's on my menu yet, but there will definitely be some homemade baked goods. I also like magic tricks on Halloween. You can check out some public domain magic books for ideas: https://lmemsm.dreamwidth.org/13112.html

Here is a 1917 recipe book that includes some ideas for celebrating Hallowe'en:
https://books.google.com/books?id=TeEqAAAAYAAJ
Here is a 1911 magazine that gives some menu ideas including a recipe for soul cakes on page 28 of the October 26th issue:
https://books.google.com/books?id=Zi4xAQAAMAAJ

In previous years, one of our local parks held a wonderful annual Halloween event. Will miss it this year. They showcased some of their animals. Some of their holidays decorations were really clever. You can try these at home. They took tennis balls and decorated them with pumpkin faces. They even sprayed some orange. They cut out the back of old gallon milk containers and put tea lights in them. They used markers to decorate faces on them. They provided a nice glow toward evening.

Our Wellness Department at work mentioned virtual staycations and here was one of the links they shared:
https://www.travelandleisure.com/trip-ideas/disney-vacations/virtual-disney-park-rides-worldwide
The Mystic Manor video looked like a lot of fun and very appropriate for Halloween.

Halloween is when the walls between the worlds grow thin and spirits of the Underworld walk the earth. For some cultures, Halloween is a wonderful time to remember ancestors and family no longer with us. What ways do you remember family members at this time?

Haven't tried an escape room yet. However, I did read that one of the libraries shared a digital escape room that might be fun for Halloween:
https://ptlibrary.org/hogwarts-digital-escape-room/

Halloween Comic Fest celebrates comic books once a year. This year they're offering older comic books in electronic format in their Throwback Thursday articles:
https://www.halloweencomicfest.com/EventNews
You can also check if there are any comic book stores participating in Halloween Comic Fest virtually this year.

Have some of your own kid-friendly Halloween rituals to continue celebrating at home this year? Please share them and help brainstorm some positive and safe ways to enjoy the holiday.

I wrote about the concept of Public Domain Fan Fiction ( http://www.distasis.com/write/pdff.htm ) in 2005. I've been looking for outlets on and off ever since. I've been aware for a while now of a few forums for writing about superheroes who have lapsed into the public domain. A recent search on science fiction and Creative Commons multimedia brought up some options very similar to what I envisioned back in 2005.

Here are some writing communities that facilitate the creation of a shared universe:
http://www.scpwiki.com/faq
https://www.orionsarm.com/
https://paradisichronicles.wordpress.com/
https://www.thefifthworld.com/
https://witness.scifieconomicslab.net/

If these are out there, I'm sure there must be other groups and forums as well. Feel free to join the wstorm mailing list mentioned on the Public Domain Fan Fiction page and post about your favorite public domain or Creative Commons licensed shared universes.

It can be hard to come up with ideas for Mother's Day when you have limited resources or want to complete a simple do-it-yourself project. This list brainstorms some ideas.

If you have an herb garden, it makes a great resource for homemade gifts. If you don't have one, now may be a great time to start one. You don't have to be good with plants just to grow herbs. When you grow herbs and plants that are native to your area, they can be very hardy. Many can grow like weeds and some are weeds with some very useful properties. Work with herbs and ingredients you're already familiar with and find safe or take precautions trying something new especially if you have allergies.

To start it off, here's a nice virtual tour of the Hawaii Tropical Botanical Garden that you can watch as a family:
https://youtu.be/BtZ0dcUzGX8

If you have Epsom salt around the house and you can safely use it, how about a relaxing foot soak? If you have an herb garden, you can add in herbs such as sage and rosemary.
https://www.healthline.com/health/diy-foot-soak

If you're growing soapwort, you can make your own soapwort shampoo rinse. Add other herbs such as rosemary and sage for dark hair, chamomile for blond or horsetail which is a great source of silicon.
http://gardenspot-natalie.blogspot.com/2014/06/soapwort-and-shampoo-diy.html

Scents can strongly affect mood. Scented herbal gardens are used in therapy. You can make a scented potpourri by dehydrating ground rosemary and citrus peels like orange and/or lemon.
https://www.gardenguides.com/12446836-how-to-make-rosemary-potpourri.html

If you have leftover organic citrus peels, you can make candied peels with a sweetener like honey. Eat them plain or dip them in chocolate for a special treat.
https://perchancetocook.com/2016/06/27/paleo-candied-orange-peels-gf/

Flowers from the garden make a nice present. However, some flowers such as nasturtium, chive blossoms, borage flowers, pansies and violas can do double duty. They make a wonderful addition to a salad or can be used to decorate a dessert. Are you growing any edible flowers in your garden?
https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/edible-flowers

If your garden's not yet ready to harvest, how about communicating how you feel with song?

Music can be very relaxing and has some health benefits. If you're family has musical talent, you can sing and play favorite tunes together. If not, you can create your own music using your computer and ABC notation.
http://www.distasis.com/recipes/music.htm

There are several wonderful public domain tunes you can play or have your computer play. Here's one that's appropriate for Mother's Day:
http://webapp1.dlib.indiana.edu/inharmony/detail.do?action=detail&fullItemID=/lilly/devincent/LL-SDV-167052

What about downloading an ebook to a computer or mobile device as a present and giving the gift of something interesting to read?

Check out public domain poetry books.
https://books.google.com/books?id=7dUCAAAAYAAJ&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&ppis=_e&dq=kitten%27s+garden+of+verses&source=gbs_navlinks_s

See if there are any interesting public domain joke books. Laughter can be the best medicine. Can't find a joke book that appeals to you? Then write your own and give it as a present.

Need more ideas? Think about making some homemade crafts or DIY projects for Mother's Day.

How about creating a homemade recipe book with the recipes you've been using most lately? You can also check for recipes online and see if you come up with any new favorites. There are some interesting public domain recipes books for World War I that have recipes and tips on what to do during food shortages. Also check recipes books with tips on stocking your pantry to deal with prolonged power outages or other restricting situations.
https://lmemsm.dreamwidth.org/12966.html
http://www.distasis.com/recipes/booklist.htm

Have photos of the family? Put together a new photo album and enjoy looking at it together.

If you don't have flowers in your garden at the moment, how about creating some origami ones?
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Origami_flower.svg

You can create homemade cards on your computer or draw them by hand. When you make homemade cards, it's also a great time to practice or learn calligraphy.

One of my favorite projects is creating a game set. Use items around the house or collect cards, dice, etc. and put together your favorite games in a collection. You can also create new games with your family. There are public domain books that describe how to play popular games such as those that use cards or dice. Find out about older games like chess and checkers and there many variants, Chinese checkers, reversi and mancala. Create your own games or favorite variants. You can also play games on paper or create your own game set renditions for games like peg solitaire, tic tac toe, battleship, etc.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peg_solitaire
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulls_and_Cows
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battleship_(game)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/3D_tic-tac-toe
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dots_and_Boxes
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sprouts_(game)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hangman_(game)

Here's some further background on the origins of Mothers Day and some gift ideas:
https://www.almanac.com/content/when-is-mothers-day

Check out the online libraries with public domain books. Your local library may offer online books as well.
http://www.distasis.com/cpp/pbtc.htm#pb11

ACM is offering free access to their wonderful and comprehensive digital library until June 30, 2020. This is a great resource for all things programming and computer related:
https://dl.acm.org/

archive.org has set up the National Emergency Library for people to borrow books in electronic format on a wide variety of subjects:
https://archive.org/details/nationalemergencylibrary

If you're having trouble reading, you can listen to books with collections like Librivox and Free Classic Audio Books.
https://librivox.org/
https://freeclassicaudiobooks.com/

You can also listen to public domain radio plays. Check out archive.org or sites that specialize in pd radio plays.
http://www.oldradioworld.com/

Try out some public domain sheet music. Sing and play songs or try some Karaoke at home.
http://www.distasis.com/recipes/music.htm
http://www.distasis.com/recipes/pdmuse.htm

If you're watching TV, turn on the closed captioning so you get some reading practice as well.

There are some great Open Source educational computer games. dnb is a psychological research activity that helps improve memory. Tuxmath can help keep math skills sharp.
https://lmemsm.dreamwidth.org/8013.html

Try some online tours using Google Cardboard, Google Expeditions or other online resources. Many museums provide an online tour at their web sites.
https://www.commonsense.org/education/top-picks/virtual-field-trip-apps-and-websites

You can do bird watching from your own backyard or window. Identify some of the birds in your area and see how many you can find.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_birds
https://davesgarden.com/guides/birdfiles/

Try baking.
http://www.distasis.com/recipes/

Keep a journal. Some writing resources are listed at:
http://www.distasis.com/write/

Gardening can be done in a yard or on your porch. You can garden from pots if you don't have any ground. Vegetables can be added to your salad or meal. Herbs can add flavor or be medicinal. Some flowers are edible and can add cheer to a meal.
https://davesgarden.com/community/

Try out some hobbies. If you program or want to learn, several Open Source projects need volunteers. Look into ham radio.

Use your arts and crafts skills to recycle household items. You can also try out projects like origami.

Help out a charity. You can help feed people and learn and play games at the same time. Help out via the freerice.com site.
https://freerice.com/categories/english-vocabulary

Exercise:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HqfGRx8k_zA

E-mail Pen Pals.

Meditation is a great activity and it can help you calm down, feel better and cope with not enough sleep. There are many types of meditation from visual and guided to breathing to mantra to music and walking. Biofeedback equipment is useful for some if you're have trouble getting started or concentrating. If one form of meditation doesn't work for you, try another. There are so many techniques, you're sure to find some that suit you.

There are some wonderful public domain cookbooks freely available. You can find them at sites such as archive.org and Google Books.

Many of the World War I (and World War II) cookbooks had recipes and tips for dealing with shortages and substituting ingredients.

Here are some of the public domain cookbooks I've shared with the homeaide mailing list. For more information on the mailing list or recipes tips and tricks, see http://www.distasis.com/recipes

What's interesting about some of these cookbooks is that many of the titles are just as relevant today as when they were published. There are tried and true recipes, thrifty recipes and recipes for avoiding certain ingredients like wheat and meats.

You can use Open Source programs like
mupdf ( http://www.mupdf.com/ ),
sumatra ( http://blog.kowalczyk.info/software/sumatrapdf/ ) and/or
fbreader ( http://www.fbreader.org/ )
to read them.

A Thousand Ways to Please a Family with Bettina's Best Recipes
http://books.google.com/books?id=F-EqAAAAYAAJ&dq=recipes+holidays&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Two Hundred and Seventy-five War-time Recipes
http://books.google.com/books?id=EV0EAAAAYAAJ&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Tempting Dishes for Small Incomes...
http://books.google.com/books?id=f8rqTkakRhgC&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Wheatless and Meatless Menus and Recipes
http://books.google.com/books?id=Y3AEAAAAYAAJ&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Wheatless and Meatless Days
http://books.google.com/books?id=2v4YAAAAYAAJ&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Just for Two: A Collection of Recipes Designed for Two Persons
http://books.google.com/books?id=QfopAAAAYAAJ&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Recipes for Quantity Service
http://books.google.com/books?id=DmEvAAAAYAAJ&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Recipes for Using Canned Goods
http://books.google.com/books?id=i5JCAQAAIAAJ&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Tried and Approved Recipes
http://books.google.com/books?id=F3EEAAAAQAAJ&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Tested Maryland Recipes
http://books.google.com/books?id=GwkZAAAAYAAJ&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Handbook of Recipes as Used in the Course in Home Economics in Columbus Public Schools
http://books.google.com/books?id=a_opAAAAYAAJ&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Our New England Family Recipes
http://books.google.com/books?id=ogkZAAAAYAAJ&source=gbs_navlinks_s

High-class Cookery Recipes: As Taught in the School
http://books.google.com/books?id=qPIHAAAAQAAJ&dq=recipes+holidays&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Twentieth Century Club War Time Cook Book
https://books.google.com/books?id=Nl0EAAAAYAAJ&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&ppis=_e&dq=twentieth+century+club+war+time+cook+book&source=gbs_navlinks_s

The New Cookery: a book of recipes, most of which are in use at the Battle Creek Sanitarium
https://books.google.com/books?id=351BAQAAIAAJ&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&hl=en

Public Domain books from the Cookbook and Home Economics Collection at archive.org:
https://archive.org/details/cbk?and%5B%5D=public+domain

Below is a list of code that is in the public domain or available under CC0 or unlicense or 0BSD terms.

The MinGW win32 API headers and mingw runtime library were originally released to the public domain. Although the mingw.org project prefers to differentiate itself from mingw64, the developers have followed the mingw64 project's example and licensed later versions of the w32api and mingwrt. I contacted the mingw.org project to ask if they would consider dual licensing using their current license and CC0, but they refused. It was at that point that I left the MinGW project. Needing to distribute license information with every program I build with my C/C++ compilers did not seem like a worthwhile trade-off. The last public domain version of w32api is w32api-3.17-2-mingw32-src.tar.lzma. The last version of mingwrt with some public domain code is mingwrt-3.20-2-mingw32-src.tar.lzma.

I am currently maintaining a version of w32api based on the last public domain version available. I have added some patches that never made it in to either mingw or mingw64. While it's not fully up-to-date with all the changes in the latest versions of Windows, it does support enough compatibility to be able to build several Open Source libraries on Windows. I also intend to keep backward compatibility with older versions of Windows for as long as can. I hope to replace the mingwrt library with something far more portable that includes support for some POSIX and C11 features. I already have bits and pieces coded from scratch including C11 and POSIX threading libraries. One of the purposes of this list is to find public domain source that might be useful to add to a C runtime library.

If you have recommendations for public domain/Unlicense/CC0 C/C++ functions, libraries and programs that I have missed, please let me know. Also feel free to contact me about my work maintaining the public domain version of w32api or my project to replace the mingwrt. You can contact me via the CppDesign mailing list or e-mail me: http://www.distasis.com/connect.htm

Public domain C runtime libraries:
PDCLib
http://pdclib.e43.eu/
Original Public Domain C library
https://sourceforge.net/projects/pdclib/
https://sourceforge.net/projects/pdos/
Another fork of PDCLib
https://github.com/DevSolar/pdclib
libc11
https://github.com/dryc/libc11
Eltanin-OS simia
https://github.com/eltanin-os/simia

dlmalloc - Doug Lea's memory allocator
http://gee.cs.oswego.edu/

SQLite database - includes sprintf code
https://www.sqlite.org/index.html

LibTom projects - cryptography and math libraries
https://github.com/libtom

strftime
https://github.com/arnoldrobbins/strftime

tz
https://github.com/eggert/tz

whereami
https://github.com/gpakosz/whereami

minlib - regexp and other small libraries
https://github.com/ccxvii/minilibs

tiny-regex-c
https://github.com/kokke/tiny-regex-c

tiny-regex
https://github.com/matp/tiny-regex

getline
https://github.com/ChristopherWilks/megadepth/blob/master/getline.c

getline
https://github.com/arnavyc/getdelim

getline
https://github.com/digilus/getline

getline
https://github.com/ivanrad/getline

getopt
https://github.com/skeeto/getopt

parg
https://github.com/jibsen/parg

sdbm (ndbm clone), basic regex, glob, also links to prolog and yacc
http://www.cse.yorku.ca/~oz/

Base64 encode/decode:

base64
https://www.fourmilab.ch/webtools/base64/

Race64
https://github.com/skeeto/race64

Compression:

miniz - zlib compression
https://code.google.com/archive/p/miniz/

zip - portable zip library based on miniz
https://github.com/kuba--/zip

liblzw - Compression/decompression library for LZW files with API comparable to zlib and libbzip2. LZW is used by UNIX compress/decompress programs which work with files with a .Z extension. I use this library with BSD gzip.
https://github.com/vapier/liblzw

ncompress - LZW compression/decompression tools
https://github.com/vapier/ncompress

unzoo - zoo unarchiver
http://freshmeat.sourceforge.net/projects/unzoo/

stdarc - compressors/decompressors collection
https://github.com/r-lyeh/stdarc.c

mousetar
https://pkgs.org/download/mousetar

dxTarRead - non-compressing archive file reader
https://github.com/DeXP/dxTarRead

Cryptography:

NaCl - crypto library
https://nacl.cr.yp.to/

TweetNaCl - crypto library
http://tweetnacl.cr.yp.to/software.html

Monocypher - crypto library
https://monocypher.org/

Kripto
https://github.com/rofl0r/kripto

WjCryptLib
https://github.com/WaterJuice/WjCryptLib

Crypto++ - Individual files are public domain
https://www.cryptopp.com/

tiny-AES-c
https://github.com/kokke/tiny-AES-c

retter
https://github.com/MaciejCzyzewski/retter

blasha1
https://github.com/FRex/blasha1

Random Number Generators:

pseudo random number generator and other files
https://github.com/Marc-B-Reynolds/Stand-alone-junk/tree/master/src/SFH
http://marc-b-reynolds.github.io/shf/2016/04/19/prns.html

UTF-8:

utf8 string functions
https://github.com/sheredom/utf8.h

Console:

pd_readline
https://github.com/mooseman/pd_readline

INI reader
https://github.com/seb-jones/simple-ini-reader

terminfo parser
https://github.com/agauniyal/termdb

library for drawing colors on terminals
https://github.com/agauniyal/rang

snore
https://github.com/FRex/snore

GUIs:

Nuklear - immediate mode GUI
https://github.com/Immediate-Mode-UI/Nuklear
https://github.com/vurtun/nuklear

D-Flat - graphics libbrary published in Dr. Dobb's Journal
https://github.com/mooseman/D-Flat

Turbo Vision
http://tvision.sourceforge.net/

wtk - cross-platform immediate mode GUI library
https://github.com/origamicomet/wtk

Vogle - graphics library
https://github.com/mooseman/Vogle

Math libraries:

FGMP - public domain implementation of a subset of the GNU gmp library with the same API
https://github.com/dad98253/fgmp

C++ Big Integer Library
https://mattmccutchen.net/bigint/

tiny-bignum-c
https://github.com/kokke/tiny-bignum-c

triglib
https://github.com/richgel999/triglib

meow_fft
https://github.com/JodiTheTigger/meow_fft

FFT library
https://github.com/wareya/fft

Communications:

irc library
https://github.com/domsson/libtwirc

irc client
https://git.janouch.name/p/uirc3/

nanoircd IRC server
https://github.com/joric/nanoircd

youtube-dl
http://ytdl-org.github.io/youtube-dl/about.html

streams federated communications server
https://codeberg.org/streams/streams

Programs and utilities:

pdksh
https://directory.fsf.org/wiki/Pdksh

es - extensible shell
http://wryun.github.io/es-shell/

byacc - Berkeley Yacc
https://invisible-island.net/byacc/byacc.html

miniAWK
https://github.com/mooseman/miniAWK

pdcore - public domain core utilities
https://github.com/mooseman/pdcore

pdutils - public domain utilities
https://github.com/mooseman/pdutils

unidiff - unified diff conversion
https://github.com/AceHusky12/unidiff

make
https://github.com/mumu3w/MINIX1x_OLD/tree/master/minix1.3_tc2_tasm/commands/make

touch utility
http://roy.orz.hm/svn/filedetails.php?repname=rtoss&path=%2Ftouch%2Ftouch.c

md5sum utility plus other CC0 utilities at the site:
http://myc01.free.fr/md5sum/

ripgrep - recursively searches directories for a regex pattern
https://github.com/BurntSushi/ripgrep/

pstree
https://github.com/janmojzis/pstree

xd - hex dump tool
https://www.ttgurney.com/xd.c

sc - spreadsheet calculator
http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/Linux/apps/financial/spreadsheet/!INDEX.html

scientific calculator
https://github.com/MostafaMahmoudAbdelrahman/scientific-calculator

cron and crontab
https://github.com/somnisoft/cron

tinyssh - ssh server
https://github.com/janmojzis/tinyssh

curvevpn
https://github.com/janmojzis/curvevpn

smtp-client
https://github.com/somnisoft/smtp-client

POP3 + SMTP server
https://github.com/skeeto/minimail

Epoch - Linux init system
https://universe2.us/epoch.html

sunrise and sunset
https://github.com/troglobit/sun

perpetual calendar
https://github.com/randruc/PerpetualCalendar

Virtual Machine
https://github.com/wasmite/wasabi

Hedley - compiler compatibility project
https://nemequ.github.io/hedley/

subc - compiler for a subset of the C language
http://www.t3x.org/subc/

BDS C - 8080/Z80 C Compiler
https://www.bdsoft.com/resources/bdsc.html

microprofile - profiler
https://github.com/jonasmr/microprofile

mpkg - package manager
http://charon.persephoneslair.org/~andrea/software/mpkg/

Games:

nbsdgames
https://github.com/untakenstupidnick/nbsdgames

Connect Four
https://github.com/skeeto/connect4

tile-solver
https://github.com/skeeto/tile-solver

flappy bird
https://github.com/skeeto/flappy

anarch
https://gitlab.com/drummyfish/anarch

kiki
https://sourceforge.net/projects/kiki/

Diamond Trust
http://hcsoftware.hg.sourceforge.net/hgweb/hcsoftware/DiamondTrust/

Behacked - bejeweled clone
https://github.com/Pentachoron-Labs/Behacked

Personal assistant:

Oracle - siri/alexa/google-assistant like chatbot
https://github.com/TheShoutingParrot/Oracle

Various projects
https://github.com/mooseman
https://github.com/mooseman/mooseman_stuff

Small and single file libraries:

image, sound, sprintf, Truetype font and other code
https://github.com/nothings/stb

public domain single file libraries
https://github.com/mackron/dr_libs

cute headers
https://github.com/RandyGaul/cute_headers

foundation library
https://github.com/mjansson/foundation_lib

single file public domain libraries
https://github.com/gingerBill/gb

single file public domain libraries
https://github.com/haunticaachris/htc

single file public domain libraries
https://github.com/mattiasgustavsson/libs

single file libraries in the public domain
https://github.com/to-miz/tm

stb inspired libraries
https://github.com/AfroDave/kj

single header libraries
https://github.com/Cyphre117/header-libraries

single header library for CLI
https://github.com/ronen25/libcmdf

tiny bits and useful snippets
https://github.com/r-lyeh/tinybits

public domain single file libraries
https://github.com/kieselsteini/sts

CLM_LIBS - useful code and macros
https://github.com/CarlosLunaMota/CLM_LIBS

vlib - single file header libraries for C
https://github.com/vktec/vlib

ZPL - your (almost) C99 Powerkit
https://github.com/zpl-c/zpl

FYS
https://github.com/germinolegrand/fys

portable public domain code snippets
https://github.com/nemequ/portable-snippets

code snippets and header-only files
https://github.com/DanielGibson/Snippets/

json parser
https://github.com/sheredom/json.h

Database:

tinycdb
http://www.corpit.ru/mjt/tinycdb.html

Lexical analysis:

re2c
https://re2c.org/

Data structures:

avl tree
https://github.com/etherealvisage/avl

avl tree
https://github.com/ebiggers/avl_tree

nbds - Non-blocking data structures
https://code.google.com/archive/p/nbds/

sack
https://github.com/FRex/sack

Editor:

kakoune - code editor
https://github.com/mawww/kakoune

Audio:

libmodplug
https://github.com/Konstanty/libmodplug

miniaudio
https://github.com/dr-soft/miniaudio

tonic
https://github.com/TonicAudio/Tonic

mp3_id3_tags
https://github.com/Arcxm/mp3_id3_tags

rsynth - text-to-speech system
http://www.speech.cs.cmu.edu/comp.speech/Section5/Synth/rsynth.html

voclib - vocoder
https://github.com/blastbay/voclib

Graphics:

gif-h
https://github.com/charlietangora/gif-h

gifdec
https://github.com/lecram/gifdec

gifenc
https://github.com/lecram/gifenc

gif-load
https://github.com/hidefromkgb/gif_load

GIF Writer
https://www.jonolick.com/home/gif-writer

jpeg-compressor
https://github.com/richgel999/jpeg-compressor

TinyJPEG
https://github.com/serge-rgb/TinyJPEG/

picojpeg
https://github.com/richgel999/picojpeg

analyzepng
https://github.com/FRex/analyzepng

topng
https://github.com/FRex/topng

binarypic
https://github.com/FRex/binarypic

libplum
https://github.com/aaaaaa123456789/libplum

miniexr
https://github.com/aras-p/miniexr

MPEG video writer
https://www.jonolick.com/home/mpeg-video-writer

gameswf
http://tulrich.com/textweb.pl?path=geekstuff/gameswf.txt

PDFGen
https://github.com/AndreRenaud/PDFGen

libqrgen
https://github.com/aaaaaa123456789/libqrgen

public domain single file libraries for games
https://github.com/pennie-quinn/paq

Game engines:

AVA - game engine
https://github.com/r-lyeh/AVA

L - game engine
https://github.com/Lyatus/L

Phyxed 2D - 2D physics engine with fixed point math
https://github.com/Srekel/phyxed-2d

easytab - tablet library
https://github.com/ApoorvaJ/EasyTab

Graphics and math:

HandmadeMath - math library for games and graphics
https://github.com/HandmadeMath/Handmade-Math

small3dlib - fast, small, efficient, portable, public domain 3D software rasterizer
https://gitlab.com/drummyfish/small3dlib

raycastlib - fast, small, efficient, portable, public domain ray casting library
https://gitlab.com/drummyfish/raycastlib

pt_math - scalar math
https://github.com/pmttavara/pt_math

linmath.h - lean linear math library for graphics
https://github.com/datenwolf/linmath.h

single file C/C++ libraries - raytracer, etc.
https://github.com/rmitton/rjm

graphics code
http://fileadmin.cs.lth.se/cs/Personal/Tomas_Akenine-Moller/code/

Immediate2D Drawing Framework
https://github.com/npiegdon/immediate2d

TIGR - Tiny Graphics Library
https://github.com/xahon/tigr

Debug Draw - immediate mode drawing API
https://github.com/glampert/debug-draw

lightmapper
https://github.com/ands/lightmapper#lightmapper

seamoptimizer
https://github.com/ands/seamoptimizer

tinygizmo
https://github.com/ddiakopoulos/tinygizmo

image resampler
https://github.com/richgel999/imageresampler

vector and matrix library
https://github.com/jobtalle/ccVector

vector math library
https://github.com/sgorsten/linalg

sts - vertex cache optimization
https://github.com/Sigkill79/sts

cro lib - mipmap generator
https://github.com/thebeast33/cro_lib

GUI apps for OSX in C
https://github.com/hidefromkgb/mac_load

Lightweight TUI display manager for Linux and BSD
https://gitlab.com/TilCreator/ly

OS:

TempleOS is an original operating system written in a variant of C called HolyC
https://github.com/cia-foundation/TempleOS

Tforth is a very tiny toy OS written for the IBM PC in 8086 assembly language inspired by the FORTH programming language
https://www.ttgurney.com/tforth.asm

Programmers that use other languages tend to think C and C++ don't have a lot of library or module support to help develop applications. While these languages don't have a lot of built-in support for a wide variety of functionality and they don't have an official way to add packages, modules, libraries or other forms of additional code, they still have a wide selection of third party code and libraries you can use to help perform tasks faster.

I personally prefer that C has a minimal library and you don't have to memorize a lot of functionality to get it running. I also like the fact that C/C++ lets you choose options for yourself instead of forcing you to use them. For instance, someone may want to use garbage collection and not deal with memory management. If so, there are libraries out there that can do it for you. However, when I want to write something that runs fast, I'd prefer to do my own memory management. Also, most of those higher level languages that programmers are so enthusiastic about because they have libraries to make tasks easier are usually written in C/C++. Some of the high performance libraries these languages use or the functionality that needs to access operating system related functions (like file management) typically use C/C++ code underneath. For instance, higher level languages that support Internet access are probably using a C library such as curl behind the scenes.

Not having an official version of some functionality that's part of a standard library can make it hard to figure out how best to add that functionality to a project. While there are tons of libraries available for C, not having a language specific way to easily add them as packages can make it confusing as to what use. There is an interesting development in C/C++ programming that's attempting to fill the gap. Several developers are coming up with lightweight and, in some cases, single file or single header libraries with lenient licensing that can easily be added to a project. I'll mention some of those options. If there are others you find useful, please let me know about them so they can be added to the list.

There is a lightweight package manager for C/C++ called clib that makes it easier to find and incorporate lightweight libraries in your projects. It includes a list of available packages:
https://github.com/clibs/clib/wiki/Packages

CCAN is another collection of C snippets similar to the CPAN collection:
http://ccodearchive.net/list.html

Snippets has been around a long time. It has short snippets of code that give examples on how to do things in C/C++. It's a useful resource.
https://github.com/vonj/snippets.org

Libraries that use Unlicense, CC0, BSD 0 clause (or other similar licenses) or code that is in the public domain is very easy to incorporate into projects. You don't have to worry about whether you've given proper credit in your program or provided the proper license information along with your own application. The Unlicense site has a nice list of source code you can use by itself or incorporate in your own projects. Some of the code listed is written for C/C++. There are also some interesting C/C++ projects at github in the public-domain projects.
http://unlicense.org/
https://github.com/public-domain?tab=repositories

Projects from Plan 9 and suckless.org are known for their efficiency and minimalism. You can check out some of that code at:
http://git.suckless.org/

micro-bunzip code is available from:
http://www.landley.net/code/

What follows is a list of single file and lightweight libraries:
https://github.com/nothings/stb
https://github.com/nothings/single_file_libs
https://github.com/yui0/slibs
https://github.com/mackron/dr_libs
https://github.com/RandyGaul/cute_headers
https://github.com/mattiasgustavsson/libs
https://github.com/pennie-quinn/paq
https://github.com/gingerBill/gb
https://github.com/to-miz/tm
https://github.com/r-lyeh/tinybits
https://github.com/tylov/C99Containers
https://github.com/nemequ/portable-snippets
https://github.com/floooh/sokol
https://github.com/hidefromkgb/mac_load
https://github.com/lvandeve/lodepng
https://github.com/rgamble/libcsv
https://github.com/rgamble/csvutils
https://github.com/arnoldrobbins/strftime
https://github.com/curl/fcurl

Know of some others worth trying? Please tell me about them:
https://groups.yahoo.com/groups/CppDesign/

The last post mentioned other groups' projects with dictionaries and language resources. I thought I'd mention some of the projects I've been working on in this area.

I've been creating build scripts with the LM BLD project ( http://www.distasis.com/cpp/lmbld.htm ) so that I'll have automated, repeatable steps to build programs, libraries and other types of packages. Here are some of things I've been working on.

The Moby project is a very nice dictionary resource. Using their thesaurus, I was able to create a word list and a simple dictionary in stardict format. I use it with Open Source programs like scramble.

The Strongs concordance is in the public domain. I've created a translation dictionary in stardict format with it.

I happen to like the stardict dictionary format. There are several nice programs that can work with that format. I wanted something lightweight that would work well on older systems or let me create my own GUI interfaces. The closest thing I could find to what I wanted was sdcv. However, there were a few issues I had with it. The biggest is that it requires glib as a dependency and I didn't want to install GTK+ related dependencies on my systems. The second issue I ran into was that it couldn't handle some of the newer versions of the stardict format. Since the code is GNU GPL licensed, I started with it and made several modifications and customizations. The result is sdcv2 which can be linked to my own Unicode shared libraries in place of glib if desired and can work with dictionaries in more recent stardict formats. It may not make use of all the latest features in the newer formats, but it can at least access information from them.

I've seen other projects that use the sdcv library as a back-end and create their own GUI for a dictionary program. It makes sense if the program uses GTK+, but it seems awkward for Qt or other GUI programs to require GTK+ related dependencies. With sdcv2, there are no GTK+ related dependencies.

I would love to find a dictionary with a FLTK GUI, especially if it can handle stardict format. Since, I haven't been able to find one, I may try to write one at some point. I've also been thinking about creating a pdcurses front end. When I use sdcv (or sdcv2) from the command line, certain systems like Windows can't handle input or output of certain Unicode characters correctly. I've added support for SDL 2.x, SDL2_ttf and the ability to work with a range of Unicode characters within the UCS-2 character set to pdcurses. I think pdcurses would make an interesting front end for a program using the sdcv2 library. It would work on any system that supports SDL 1.x or 2.x, including more unusual operating systems like Syllable and Haiku. Would like to hear from others who may be interested in or are working on similar projects.

The dictzip program compresses dictionary files. It uses an extension to the gzip format with extra fields to include information about the compressed dictionary. Files compressed with this format often use the .dz extension. You can use dictzip with stardict files to save space. dictzip is primarily a POSIX compliant program, so it doesn't convert well to certain systems. I was able to find a Windows port that limited the program's functionality, but did enough to get the job of compression done. I've made some modifications to it and am using it as a cross-platform method of compressing stardict dictionary files.

Several utilities and conversion programs were created for stardict in the stardict-tools project. Similar to stardict and sdcv, glib is a dependency for stardict-tools. There are a few tools that use a GTK+ front-end as well. I personally only use the stardict-tools to convert tab delimited files and files in babylon format to stardict. So, I modified the command line tools that do those conversions to build without glib. I also created my own makefile just to build the tools I use.

I've searched and I've yet to find a rhyming dictionary in stardict format. So, I'm working on creating one. It's a slow process. I've taken a public domain rhyming dictionary as a starting point and I'm in the process of editing it and converting it to the format I need.

I've also been searching for an Open Source C/C++ grammer checker, but I've yet to find one that I like.

These are just some of the projects I'm working on. If you're interested in comparing notes on these topics or if you have recommendations of other dictionary and word related projects you like, feel free to contact me ( http://www.distasis.com/contact.htm ).

It's hard to find public domain, Open Source and Creative Commons licensed language resources in formats that are easy for programs to work with. There are growing resources of scanned public domain books. Among them, you can find all kinds of dictionaries and references. Some sites even use an OCR to translate scanned documents to text formats. However, the translated versions are usually full of typographical errors.

There are a few projects out there that use Free, Open Source or Creative Commons licensing and have a goal of creating dictionaries or other references in accessible and searchable digital format, but not a lot. It would be nice to see more projects of this sort. The results could be useful with word processors and editors (such as LibreOffice, Abiword, SciTE), electronic dictionaries (such as stardict) and games (such as anagramarama and scramble).

Here are some of the projects I've located:

XDXF, the XML dictionary interchange format, project had a collection of dictionaries and language translation word lists they were working with and converting to various formats.
https://sourceforge.net/projects/xdxf/files/
They also have tools for converting between XDXF and other formats:
https://github.com/soshial/xdxf_makedict

The Moby project is a wonderful public domain resource. It includes word lists, thesaurus and more.
http://icon.shef.ac.uk/Moby/

The Free Dictionaries Project also provides downloads. If you want to translate one language to another, this is a useful, free resource:
http://www.dicts.info/uddl.php

SCOWL (Spell Checker Oriented Word Lists) and Friends has useful word lists and resources for spell checker utilities:
http://wordlist.aspell.net/

YAWL (Yet Another Word List) is based on the updated Public Domain ENABLE (Enhanced North American Benchmark Lexicon).
You can also find Libre licensed word lists in FLOSS games such as anagramarama.
http://www.sourcefiles.org/Games/Puzzle/Other_Word_Games/

Public Domain Chinese Dictionaries. I'd love to see some of this translated to stardict format. stardict-tools has some simple command line tools translate other formats to stardict format.
https://mandarinportal.com/public-domain-chinese-dictionaries/

Here's a rhyming dictionary (source code and online example) that uses Moby project resources to find rhymes:
http://stevehanov.ca/blog/index.php?id=8

If you know of other projects or developments in this area, I'd love to hear about them ( http://www.distasis.com/connect.htm ).

I've listed some core utilities options besides GNU. I thought I'd share something about what utilities I personally prefer to use. My main requirement in a good set of core utilities is portability. This is rather hard to find. You would think that if a utility was efficient and lightweight, it would be easy to port. However, that's not necessarily so. Many utilities that are designed for efficiency take advantage of features of a particular operating system which makes them harder to port.

At first, I considered starting with sbase which had stated goals similar to what I was looking for, but it didn't have enough features to effectively replace the GNU core utilities when developing and building programs. While newer versions of sbase have added a lot of functionality, they've become much less portable.

My favorite source for inspiration is Minix. Earlier versions provided some interesting and fairly portable versions of a variety of utilites:
https://www.minix-vmd.org/cgi-bin/raw/source/std/1.7.5/src/commands/simple/
Some of the utilities don't have sufficient UTF-8 support or lack some newer functionality found in GNU utilities that makes them fail when attempting to build applications. However, they make a useful starting point.

In some cases, the OBase or BSD utilities do a better job than the older Minix ones and still do that job efficiently. I particularly like the version of patch found on BSD systems. It's an earlier variant of the Free Software Foundation's patch program. Unlike the FSF's version of patch which uses the GNU license, it uses a BSD style license.

For some utilities, I've consulted the POSIX standards ( http://pubs.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/9699919799/idx/utilities.html ) and rewritten them from scratch.

Rather than trying to port utilities such as the Free Software Foundations coreutils, I thought having a lightweight, efficient, highly portable option would be a useful alternative. Many of the FSF developers have little interest in portability making it hard to get later versions of their programs working on non-POSIX systems. I was surprised at how little interest most users have in developing portable alternatives to the core utilities that could be used to build software. Not only was their little interest, some people posted extremely negative comments when anyone suggested creating alternatives to the FSF software. I was also surprised by some of the negative reactions I read about wonderful projects like SBase.

I have a growing collection of public domain, BSD and MIT licensed alternatives to the GNU core utilities. For now, I just use them for my own projects. If you have an interest in portable utilities and tools, would like to see a viable portable alternative to the FSF's GNU coreutils or would like to further discuss related topics in a positive light, feel free to contact me. I'd enjoy talking with other developers and utility users on the topic.

You'll find some added information on my utilities and information on how to discuss the topic further at:
http://www.distasis.com/cpp/lmbld.htm