Numerical simulations of flows are required for numerous applications, and are usually carried out using shallow water equations. We describe the FullSWOF software which is based on up-to-date finite volume methods and well-balanced schemes to solve this kind of equations. It consists of a set of open source C++ codes, freely available to the community, easy to use, and open for further development. Several features make FullSWOF particularly suitable for applications in hydrology: small water heights and wet-dry transitions are robustly handled, rainfall and infiltration are incorporated, and data from grid-based digital topographies can be used directly. A detailed mathematical description is given here, and the capabilities of FullSWOF are illustrated based on analytic solutions and datasets of real cases. The codes, available in 1D and 2D versions, have been validated on a large set of benchmark cases, which are available together with the download information and documentation at http://www.univ-orleans.fr/mapmo/soft/FullSWOF/.