Technology Discussion

The Definitive Windows 7 Commands Guide

2010-11-18T01:28:00.000-08:00

This definitive, mammoth guide contains a complete list of Windows 7 commands you need to gain access to all Windows 7 features. These commands are divided into two different categories :Shell commands and Run commands. Thanks to them you will be only one click away from all Windows 7 tools, utility, folders and features. Dont you remember the path to gain access to that neat Windows 7? Do you wish to clean Internet Explorer cache without rummaging among tricky options? Here is the guide you have always been looking for!

Shell Commands

These commands are especially useful to users, power users and administrators who need to gain access or create shortcuts to difficult-to-reach Windows 7 utilities or locations (such as folder for example). There are two ways you can use these Shell Commands: To create a shortcuts or through Run…

How to Create a Shortcut using a Shell Command.

Right-click any empty space on your desktop.
Click New.
Click Shortcut.
Now, if you want to create a shortcut, you will need to add “explorer.exe” , whiteout quotes, right in front of each Shell command. Here is an example: explorer.exe shell:PicturesLibrary.
So, right after clicking the shortcut link a new window will appear. In the blank field, write: shell:(your Command).
Click Next.
Click OK.

At this point you should see a shortcut icon on your desktop pointing to the the Picture Library.
How to access folders using a Shell Command.

Press the Windows Key + R on your keyboard.
In the blank field, type Shell:(your command). This will let you access every folder in your Windows 7, including hidden folders.
Click OK.

List

shell:AddNewProgramsFolder
shell:Administrative Tools (hidden folder)
shell:AppData (hidden to users)
shell:AppUpdatesFolder (installed updates)
shell:Cache (hidden folder) (Temporary Internet Files)
shell:CD Burning (hidden folder)
shell:ChangeRemoveProgramsFolder
shell:Common Administrative Tools (hidden folder)
shell:Common AppData (hidden folder)
shell:Common Desktop
shell:Common Documents
shell:Common Programs (hidden folder)
shell:Common Start Menu (hidden folder)
shell:Common Startup (hidden folder)
shell:Common Templates (hidden folder)
shell:CommonDownloads
shell:CommonMusic
shell:CommonPictures
shell:CommonRingtones (hidden folder)
shell:CommonVideo
shell:ConflictFolder
shell:ConnectionsFolder
shell:Contacts
shell:ControlPanelFolder
shell:Cookies
shell:Cookies\Low (hidden folder)
shell:CredentialManager (hidden folder)
shell:CryptoKeys (hidden folder)
shell:CSCFolder
shell:Default Gadgets
shell:Desktop
shell:Device Metadata Store (hidden folder)
shell:DocumentsLibrary
shell:Downloads
shell:DpapiKeys (hidden folder)
shell:Favorites
shell:Fonts
shell:Gadgets (hidden folder)
shell:Games
shell:GameTasks (hidden folder)
shell:History (hidden folder)
shell:ImplicitAppShortcuts
shell:InternetFolder (Internet Explorer)
shell:Libraries
shell:Links
shell:Local AppData (hidden folder)
shell:LocalAppDataLow (hidden folder)
shell:LocalizedResourcesDir
shell:MAPIFolder
shell:MusicLibrary
shell:My Music
shell:My Pictures
shell:My Video
shell:MyComputerFolder
shell:NetHood (hidden folder)
shell:NetworkPlacesFolder
shell:OEM Links
shell:Original Images
shell:OtherUsersFolder
shell:Personal
shell:PhotoAlbums
shell:PicturesLibrary
shell:Playlists
shell:PrintersFolder
shell:PrintHood (hidden folder)
shell:Profile
shell:ProgramFiles
shell:ProgramFilesCommon
shell:ProgramFilesCommonX86
shell:ProgramFilesX86
shell:Programs
shell:Public
shell:PublicGameTasks (hidden folder)
shell:PublicSuggestedLocations
shell:Quick Launch (hidden folder)
shell:Recent (hidden folder)
shell:RecycleBinFolder
shell:ResourceDir
shell:Ringtones (hidden folder)
shell:SampleMusic
shell:SamplePictures
shell:SamplePlaylists
shell:SampleVideos
shell:SavedGames
shell:Searches
shell:SearchHomeFolder
shell:SendTo (hidden folder)
shell:Start Menu (hidden folder)
shell:Startup
shell:SyncCenterFolder
shell:SyncResultsFolder
shell:SyncSetupFolder
shell:System
shell:SystemCertificates (hidden folder)
shell:SystemX86
shell:Templates
shell:TreePropertiesFolder
shell:User Pinned
shell:UserProfiles
shell:UsersFilesFolder
shell:UsersLibrariesFolder
shell:VideosLibrary
shell:Windows

Run Commands

Run Commands are quite useful if you want to reach, use, open anything in your Windows 7. What follows are the easy steps to use these commands.

How to use Run Commands

Press the Windows Key + R on your keyboard.
Type the command in the blank field.
Click OK.

List

Add/Remove Programs = appwiz.cpl
Administrative Tools = control admintools
Authorization Manager= azman.msc
Calculator = calc
Certificate Manager = certmgr.msc
Character Map = charmap
Check Disk Utility = chkdsk
Command Prompt = cmd.exe
Component Services = dcomcnfg
Computer Management = compmgmt.msc
Control Panel = control
Date and Time Properties = timedate.cpl
Defragment User Interface = dfrgui
Device Manager = devmgmt.msc
Direct X Troubleshooter = dxdiag
Disk Cleanup Utility = cleanmgr
Disk Management = diskmgmt.msc
Disk Parmelonion Manager = diskpart
Display Properties = control desktop or, alternatively desk.cpl
Ditilizer Calibration Tool = tabcal
Downloads = Downloads
DPI Scaling = dpiscaling
Driver Package Installer = dpinst
Driver Verifier Utility = verifier or, alternatively reset
DVD Player = dvdplay
Encryption File System = rekeywiz
Event Viewer = eventvwr.msc
Fax Cover Sheet Editor = fxscover
File Signature Verification Tool = sigverif
Folders Properties = control folders
Fonts = control fonts
Free Cell Card Game = freecell
Group Policy Editor = gpedit.msc
Iexpress Wizard = iexpress
Internet Explorer = iexplore
Internet Properties = inetcpl.cpl
IP Configuration = ipconfig.exe
iSCSI Initiator = iscsicpl
Keyboard Properties = control keyboard
Libraries = explorer or, alternatively Windows key + E
Local Security Settings = secpol.msc
Local Users and Groups = lusrmgr.msc
Logs You Out Of Windows = logoff
Microsoft Paint = mspaint.exe
Microsoft Support Diagnostic Tool = msdt
Mobility Center (mobile) = mblctr or, alternatively Windows key + X
Mouse Properties = control mouse
Mouse Properties = main.cpl
Network Connections = control netconnections
Network Connections = ncpa.cpl
Notepad = notepad
ODBC Data Source Administrator = odbcad32
On Screen Keyboard = osk or, alternatively Windows key + U
Optional Features Manager = optionalfeatures
Performance Monitor = perfmon.msc
Phone and Modem Options = telephon.cpl
Power Configuration = powercfg.cpl
Printer Migration = PrintBrmUi
Printers and Faxes = control printers
Private Character Editor = eudcedit
Regional Settings = intl.cpl
Registry Editor = regedit.exe
Remote Assistance = msra
Remote Desktop = mstsc
Resultant Set of Policy = rsop.msc
Scheduled Tasks = control schedtasks
Security Center = wscui.cpl
Services = services.msc
Shared Folders/MMC = fsmgmt.msc
Shuts Down Windows = shutdown
Snipping Tool = snippingtool
Sound Recorder = soundrecorder
Sound Volume = sndvol
Sounds and Audio = mmsys.cpl
Spider Solitare Card Game = spider
SQL Client Configuration = cliconfg
Sticky Note = StikyNot
Stored User Names and Passwords = credwiz
System Configuration Editor = sysedit
System Configuration Utility = msconfig
System File Checker Utility = sfc
System Information = msinfo32
System Properties = sysdm.cpl or, alternatively Windows key + Pause
Task Manager = taskmgr
Trusted Platform Module = TpmInit
User Accounts = netplwiz or, alternatively control userpasswords2
Utility Manager = utilman
Windows Activation = slui
Windows Backup Utility = sdclt
Windows Fax and Scan = wfs
Windows Firewall = firewall.cpl
Windows Firewall with Advanced Security = wf.msc
Windows Image Acquisition = wiaacmgr
Windows Magnifier = magnify
Windows Management Infrastructure = wmimgmt.msc
Windows Media Player = wmplayer
Windows Share Creation Wizard = shrpubw
Windows Standalong Update Manager = wusa
Windows System Security Tool = syskey
Windows Update App Manager = wuapp
Wordpad = write

Different shortcuts

These shortcuts let you access specific features and tools in Windows 7. Simply, copy and paste them to the blank field Run.. window and that’s it!

Action Center = rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL wscui.cpl
Add Network Location = rundll32.exe shwebsvc.dll,AddNetPlaceRunDll
Add/Remove Programs = rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL appwiz.cpl
Add/Remove Programs = RunDll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL appwiz.cpl,,0
Add/Remove Windows Components = rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL appwiz.cpl,,2
Advanced Restore = sdclt.exe /restorewizardadmin
Aero (Transparency feature) Off = Rundll32.exe DwmApi #104
Aero (Transparency feature) On = Rundll32.exe DwmApi #102
Backup Location and Settings = sdclt.exe /configure
Content Advisor = RunDll32.exe msrating.dll,RatingSetupUI
Control Panel = RunDll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL
Date and Time = rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL timedate.cpl
Date and Time (Additional Clocks) = rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL timedate.cpl,,1
Date and Time (Properties) = RunDll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL timedate.cpl
Device Manager = RunDll32.exe devmgr.dll DeviceManager_Execute
Device Manager = rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL hdwwiz.cpl
Display Settings = RunDll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL access.cpl,,3
Folder Options = RunDll32.exe shell32.dll,Options_RunDLL 0
Folder Options (File Types) = RunDll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_Options 2
Folder Options (Search) = RunDll32.exe shell32.dll,Options_RunDLL 2
Folder Options (View) = RunDll32.exe shell32.dll,Options_RunDLL 7
Forgotten Password Wizard = RunDll32.exe keymgr.dll,PRShowSaveWizardExW
Hibernate = RunDll32.exe powrprof.dll,SetSuspendState
Indexing Options = control.exe srchadmin.dll
Keyboard Properties = RunDll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL main.cpl @1
Lock Screen = RunDll32.exe user32.dll,LockWorkStation
Manage Wireless Networks = explorer.exe shell:::{1fa9085f-25a2-489b-85d4-86326eedcd87}
Map Network Drive = RunDll32.exe shell32.dll,SHHelpShortcuts_RunDLL Connect
Mouse Properties = RunDll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL main.cpl @0
Network Connections = RunDll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL ncpa.cpl
Notification Cache = rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Options_RunDLL 5
Open Control Panel (All Items) = explorer.exe shell:::{21ec2020-3aea-1069-a2dd-08002b30309d}
Pen and Touch Tablet PC (Settings) = rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL tabletpc.cpl
Pen and Touch Tablet PC (Settings Flicks Tab) = rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL tabletpc.cpl,,1
Pen and Touch Tablet PC (Settings Handwriting Tab) = rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL tabletpc.cpl,,2
People Near Me = rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL collab.cpl
People Near Me (Sign Up Tab) = rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL collab.cpl,,1
Personalization = rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL desk.cpl,,2
Phone and Modem (Options) = rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL telephon.cpl
Phone and Modem (Options Modems Tab) = rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL telephon.cpl,,1
Phone and Modems (Options Advanced Tab) = rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL telephon.cpl,,2
Power Options = rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL powercfg.cpl
Power Options Modify Plan Settings = rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL powercfg.cpl,,1
Regional Settings = RunDll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL intl.cpl,,3
Restore Files = sdclt.exe /restorewizard
Screen Resolution = rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL desk.cpl
ScreenSaver = rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL desk.cpl,,1
Set Program Access and Computer Defaults = rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL appwiz.cpl,,3
Sound Control Playback Tab = rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLLmmsys.cpl
Sound Control Recording Tab = rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLLmmsys.cpl,,1
Sound Control Sounds Tab = rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLLmmsys.cpl,,2
Stored Usernames /Passwords = RunDll32.exe keymgr.dll,KRShowKeyMgr
System Properties = rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL sysdm.cpl
System Properties (Advanced Tab) = rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL sysdm.cpl,,3
System Properties (Hardware Tab) = rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL sysdm.cpl,,2
System Properties (Remote Tab) = rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL sysdm.cpl,,5
System Properties (System Protection Tab) = rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL sysdm.cpl,,4
System Properties (Advanced) RunDll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL sysdm.cpl,,4
System Properties (Automatic Updates) = RunDll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL sysdm.cpl,,5
Taskbar Properties = RunDll32.exe shell32.dll,Options_RunDLL 1
Unplug Eject Hardware = RunDll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL hotplug.dll
User Accounts = RunDll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL nusrmgr.cpl
Welcome Center = rundll32.exe oobefldr.dll,ShowWelcomeCenter
Windows (About) = RunDll32.exe SHELL32.DLL,ShellAboutW
Windows Firewall = RunDll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL firewall.cpl
Windows Firewall = rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL firewall.cpl
Windows Security Center = RunDll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL wscui.cpl
Wireless Network Setup = RunDll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL NetSetup.cpl,@0,WNSW
Wireless Networks pop-up = rundll32.exe van.dll,RunVAN

Internet Explorer Advanced Settings

Delete All (Deeper Cleaning Including Add-on Data Deletion) = RunDll32.exe InetCpl.cpl,ClearMyTracksByProcess 4351
Delete All = RunDll32.exe InetCpl.cpl,ClearMyTracksByProcess 255
Delete Cookies = RunDll32.exe InetCpl.cpl,ClearMyTracksByProcess 2
Delete Form Data = RunDll32.exe InetCpl.cpl,ClearMyTracksByProcess 16
Delete History = RunDll32.exe InetCpl.cpl,ClearMyTracksByProcess 1
Delete Passwords = RunDll32.exe InetCpl.cpl,ClearMyTracksByProcess 32
Delete Temporary Internet Files = RunDll32.exe InetCpl.cpl,ClearMyTracksByProcess 8

How The Browsers Work?

2010-11-08T23:48:00.000-08:00

Courtesy: Digital Inspiration

Author: Amit

Exploring Firefox Cache: A Bunch Of Really Cool Tips

2010-10-16T20:39:00.000-07:00

The browser cache temporarily stores images, scripts, and other parts of websites while you are browsing. This is normally a good thing because this enhances performance and load time.
The browser cache usually works behind the scene: you are unlikely to notice it even exists unless you feel like digging deeper.
But do you know that you can actually have quite a bit of fun viewing your browser cache? Do you know why and how you can clean it? Today’s tutorial is just about that: what you can do with your Firefox cache.

Viewing Your Firefox Cache

The cache statistics and directory location can be viewed in about:cache. Then:

about:cache?device=memory – Lists memory cache entries.
about:cache?device=disk – Lists disk cache entries.

It is really not easy to make sense of that interface but luckily we have an addon to make it easier.
CacheView is a GUI Front-end of “about:cache”. It allows searching and sorting memory and disk cache files. CacheView gives you a preview pane for any images, and makes it really easy to save MP3s and flash files from the sites you’ve visited.
After you have it installed, just go to Tools ->CacheView (or just use the shortcut Ctrl+Shift+C) and you will be presented with a nice table containing your cache files and a preview pane.
The table is sortable by column (key, size, MIME Type, storing device, Last Fetched date) and what’s more it has a search function which adds a lot of sense to your cache database:

You can also right-click on an entry and delete it. It won’t delete things if the page is still opened in one of your tabs.

CacheSearch is another useful cache addon for FireFox which can search through the full-text of cache records:

Clearing The Firefox Cache

There are a few reasons why you may want to clear the Firefox cache, including privacy concerns and technical problems. I usually do it when I have any issues with a website: problems on sign-up, incorrect interface loading, etc.

Clearing the Cache Manually

Official Guide:

Navigate: Tools -> Options -> Advanced panel -> Network tab
In the Offline Storage section, click Clear Now.

FireFox Addons:

If you find yourself clearing the cache too often, you can find this little addon helpful. It adds a button to your browser toolbar – with it you can clear the cache with one click of a mouse.

Note: After installation, you will need to manually install the button to where you want it to be. For that, right-click on the sidebar and select “Customize“.
Here’s an alternative addon that can be used for that: Cache Status which will both monitor your cache statistics for both memory and disk devices and allow to clear it any time:

Clear The Cache Automatically:

Navigate: Tools -> Options -> Privacy panel
In the drop-down select “Use custom settings for history. “
Select the check box for Clear history when Firefox closes and in the Settings next to this check box select Cache:

Courtesy: Make Use

Author: Ann Smarty

Avoid Getting an Unwanted Surprise on Twitter

2010-08-19T21:22:00.000-07:00

You have come across an application on Twitter that will find your level of smartness with a click. You connect it to your Twitter account (using OAuth) and then you suddenly realize that that app has published your score to Twitter as well using your own account.

Such Twitter apps may be rare but they do exist and may sometimes embarrass you.

For instance, a popular directory would automatically change your Twitter profile as soon as you added yourself to that directory. More recently, we saw another Twitter app that would automatically tweet on your behalf and it nearly went viral.

How to Avoid Surprises on Twitter

If you would like to prevent apps from fiddling with your Twitter stream without asking, the easiest solution would be to not use them at all. That’s however an extreme approach as you’ll then miss a whole lot of other apps that are both nice and useful.

The solution is however simple. When you add an app to your Twitter account, you’ll see an authorization page where you can either allow or deny the app access to your Twitter data.

Read the language carefully. If it read something like “the app would like to access and update your data on Twitter,” you are granting the app permission to post to your Twitter stream. Majority of the Twitter apps won’t misuse that privilege but some may.

Therefore, if you are trying out a new app on Twitter that you have never heard of before, it may be a good idea to authorize only the ones that require read-only access to your Twitter data as seen in the screenshot below

Source: Digital Inspiration
Author: Amit Agarwal

Funny 404 Error Pages

2010-07-18T04:58:00.000-07:00

File Not Found

WANTED

Dear Happy Internet Traveler

The page cannot be found

Page Fault Error

You have encountered an error

Couldn’t find the page you’re looking for

Press any key to continue

Courtesy: Smashing App
Author: AN Jay

How To Completely Restore Your Windows Computer To Factory Settings

2010-06-20T07:05:00.000-07:00

Most computers from PC vendors come with certain pre-configured factory settings which are important to the computer’s operation. This is particularly true of laptops, which usually have special function buttons, and touch screen computers, which require special drivers in order to function. Of course, a computer from a factory also has default Windows settings and does not feature any of your own customizations.
There may come a time in your computer ownership that you decide to basically hit the reset button.

This may be because your computer was struck by a virus, or it may be because you are selling your computer and you want to make sure your personal information can’t be retrieved by the person you are selling to.
Whatever your situation, this guide will help you completely restore your computer to absolutely pristine factory settings.

Step 1: Save Files & Folders

Depending on your version of Windows and the recovery system your computer’s vendor uses, some of your settings and files may be saved when you restore your computer to factory settings. However, it is best not to rely on this.

Treat your restoration to factory settings the same as you would a complete re-format of your hard drive. Assume all data will be lost and back up all crucial information to an external hard drive. Don’t bother backing up programs you can reinstall, but make sure to back up everything you don’t already have a copy of.
Also, make sure that you back up your browser information. The help website of the web browser you use should provide instructions on how to back up your browser. If you don’t do this you will lose all of your bookmarks and saved passwords.

Step 2: Start The Recovery Program

There are two common methods for returning your operating system to factory settings. One of these is to simply reinstall the operating system through the operating system’s own repair or reinstall process. With Windows this usually requires access to a Windows installation CD or the creation of a boot CD. If you have this available, you can refer to our guide on how to re-install Windows.
However, most computer vendors no longer ship out a copy of the Windows installation CD with their computers. Instead, the computer ships with a recovery partition or recovery disk. Each vendor uses their own particular type of solution, but the basics of them are the same. The most common names used by each company for their recovery solution can be found below. Note that manufacturers do change names from time to time – usually it will simply be something with the vendor’s brand name and the word “recovery” included after it.

Acer – Acer eRecovery
ASUS – ASUS Recovery Partition
Dell – Dell Factory Image Restore
Gateway – Gateway Recovery Management
HP – HP PC System Recovery
Sony – Sony Vaio Recovery Wizard

You can start the recovery program from within Windows. Alternatively – if perhaps your computer is having problems booting into Windows – you can usually access the recovery partition during your computer’s boot cycle. Pay attention to the display when your computer boots. There should be text indicating what button you need to press to start the recovery process. Typically, it will be a function key.

Step 3: Restoring To Factory Settings

Each vendor has their own recovery solution, so there is no way to provide a definitive guide to each and every vendor within the scope of this article. However, the general process of restoration almost always works like this.

First, you will start the restoration program in Windows. The program will ask if you’d really like to begin the restoration process and warn you that your data could be (or will be) destroyed during the process.
Once you confirm that you would like to start the recovery process you’ll reach some sort of progress screen. The computer may reboot to access this, or it may simply exit Windows and boot directly into the restoration program. At this point you’re set in your course – do not cancel the process. This can take half an hour to several hours depending on the speed of your computer.

Once the restoration to factory settings is complete the computer will reboot and begin the Windows setup process. You will have to set up your user account and your settings just as you did when you first purchased the computer.

Step 4: Finishing Restoration

Ideally, the factory restoration wizard will completely restore everything needed to make your computer fully functional. However, in some situations you may find that a few drivers were not installed. For example, you might find that the screen brightness buttons no longer work on your laptop.
If you run into this problem you’ll need to download the drivers for your computer, which can be found on the vendor’s support website. You can either enter the serial number of your computer to obtain the proper drivers or you can find your model of computer yourself.

Once you have downloaded the appropriate drivers and installed them your system will be returned to its original factory settings. It will work just as it did the day that you bought it.

Author: Matt Smith

Courtesy: MakeUse

How to Recover Deleted Files

2010-06-19T10:42:00.000-07:00

Ack! The computer ate my term paper! We've all been there at some point. You delete an important file, somehow it skips your Recycle Bin altogether, and for all practical purposes, it's disappeared into the ether. But before you hit the big red panic button, there's a very good chance that your file is still alive and kicking somewhere on your hard drive—you just need to know how to find it. With the right tools, finding and recovering that deleted file can be as simple as a few clicks of your mouse.

Part I: The Overview

Ok, so you've lost an important file. Don't panic. Take a breath, and let's see if we can find it. Before you go into full-on file recovery mode, make sure you double-check the folder you had saved it in and the Recycle Bin or Trash. Still nothing?

1. Stop What You're Doing

When your operating system deletes a file, all it really does is mark the space on your hard drive that your file occupies as free space. It's still there, but your computer is now perfectly happy to write new data on top of it—at which point the file recovery process becomes a lot more difficult. That means you should do as little computing as possible until you find the file you're looking for, since every time you save a new file—every time your computer writes information to your hard drive—your chances of recovering the file go down.

2. Find the Right File Recovery Program

Windows: You've a lot of really great freeware options for file recovery if you're running Windows. Notable apps include Undelete Plus (original post), PC Inspector File Recovery (original post), and Restoration (original post). Undelete Plus is the most user-friendly option of the bunch, with advanced filtering options that make it easy to find your needle of a file among the haystack of deleted garbage, but in my tests I found both Restoration and PC Inspector File Recovery to be more effective at recovering files. (Of course, your mileage may vary.) As an added bonus, the bare bones Restoration is portable, which makes it an excellent addition to your thumb drive.
UPDATE: Per several readers advice, you may also want to check out Recuva (original post), another freeware Windows file recovery tool.
Mac: If you're on a Mac and aren't afraid to lay down a few bucks in the name of data recovery, the $99 Data Rescue II is the go-to application for file recovery with a friendly graphical interface.
All Platforms: If you're not afraid to crack open a terminal window or command prompt, the free, cross-platform command-line tool PhotoRec (original post) is a crack shot at recovering photos (as the name implies) as well as virtually any other file type from your removable media or hard drives.

3. Recover Your Files

Once you've picked a tool, it's time to scan your hard drive for your lost file or files. This process varies depending on the app you're using, but it's basically the same for all of them: Just point the program at the hard drive or folder that was holding your missing file and start your scan. Once the scan is complete, you're going to see a big list of jumbled file names. Often most of these files are nothing more than system files that your operating system has created in the course of basic operation, and you won't need to worry about them. You're just looking for the file type and name that matches what you've lost.
Once you find what you're looking for, saving it is a matter of right-clicking the file and choosing where to save it.
Went through steps one through three and still aren't having any luck? It might be worth trying again with a different application, since there can be a lot of variation between apps. If you're still not having any luck, part two discusses a few other ways you can try addressing more specific problems when your data goes missing.

Part 2: More Specific Problems

Above you got a basic overview for recovering deleted files from your computer. Now we'll take a closer look at some more specific problems, methods of data recovery, and tools that may be of help in your quest for your elusive lost data.

Recover Files from a Wiped or Unbootable Hard Drive

So you didn't just accidentally delete a file or two and empty your Recycle Bin prematurely—instead you've got a whole hard drive worth of missing data. You can still use many of the applications mentioned above to recover files from these drives as long as you have or can get the hard drive into a bootable computer. For more details, check out how to recover files from a wiped hard drive with PhotoRec (original post) or how to recover data from a crashed hard drive with PC Inspector File Recovery (original post).
If you can't or don't know how to get your unbootable drive into another computer, a Linux live CD can be perfect for rescuing files. If the Linux route scares you off, give the popular BartPE (original post) a try.
Finally, if none of these options can even read your hard drive, you still might be able to get it working for just long enough with a few tricks of the data recovery trade, like putting the busted hard drive in the freezer.

Recover Lost Photos

If you need to resurrect photos from a damaged flash memory card from your digital camera, you'll be happy to know that most of the applications listed in part one above will do the trick—you just need plug in your camera or insert the card into your computer's card reader before running your data recovery application of choice. That said, you can find other applications, like Zero Assumption Digital Image Recovery (original post), that are focused specifically on image recovery that you may want to add to your data recovery toolbox.

Recover Lost Word Documents

If your lost dissertation was saved as a Word document, you've got a few more interesting options for getting to your lost or deleted documents—read more about them here and here.

Recover Data from Scratched or Corrupted CDs and DVDs

If your munged data is sitting on optical media like a CD or DVD, the recovery process can be slightly different. Freeware application CD Recovery Toolbox (original post) is made specifically to read the portions of a CD that are readable in an effort to rescue as much data as possible from a damaged disc. If that doesn't work, you may want to give a look at the 30-day trial of shareware application CDCheck, as recommended by a reader. Then again, if scratches are the issue, you may be able to get away with simply fixing your scratched CD or DVD yourself.

Backup your Gmail Inbox Online

2010-05-13T05:44:00.000-07:00

If you want to backup your emails from Gmail to the local computer, enable POP3 access in your Gmail settings and then use a desktop mail client to download a copy of all your messages from the Google cloud to the local disk. That’s easy!
Windows Live Mail, Outlook and Thunderbird are some nice email clients that can automatically and easily bring your entire archive of Gmail messages offline.
Why you should backup Gmail to the cloud?
If you are not a huge fan of desktop applications or if you think that setting up a Gmail backup plan involves way too much effort, you can consider creating a backup of your Gmail account in the cloud itself. Before we get into the details, here are three situations where an online backup of Gmail messages will come handy:
Reason #1 – If your main Gmail account gets hacked, you will still have access to all your previous emails.
Reason #2 – If you delete an important email from your Gmail Inbox by mistake, you can easily retrieve it from the online backup. Google Apps Premier has Postini to restore deleted emails, here you’re getting that facility for free.
Reason #3 – If the Gmail service goes down (yes, it happens), you will still be able to read your older emails. Gmail outage won’t affect work.

Backup your Gmail Messages Online

There are three services that can help you automatically backup your Gmail (and Google Apps) email accounts online and luckily, they won’t cost you anything.

The first and most obvious choice is Gmail. Create a new Gmail account and under Settings –> Accounts and Import –> Check mail using POP3 –> Add POP3 email account, enter the email address of your main Gmail account that you want to backup.
Within an hour or so, the online mail fetcher program will pull messages from your main Gmail account and will copy them to your new “backup” account. In my limited testing, I found that Gmail’s mail fetcher left all the messages that were either “read” or have been previously downloaded by another POP3 client so it’s not “true backup.”
That brings us to another alternative – copy your Gmail mailbox to Windows Live Hotmail. While you can add a Gmail account to Hotmail using POP3 (just like Gmail’s mail fetcher), there’s a much better and reliable option out there for copying emails from Gmail into Hotmail and it’s called TrueSwitch.

Setup a new Hotmail account and TrueSwitch, an awesome web-based email account migration service, will copy all your emails and attachments from Gmail to your new Hotmail address. If you have a relatively large Gmail Inbox, the backup process might take up to 24 hours but you’ll get an email as soon as the transfer is complete.
Like Gmail, Hotmail too offers “expanding” storage so it can possibly fit your large Google inbox as well. You can then add your Gmail address to Hotmail (click “Add an email account” in the sidebar) and this will ensure that new messages that land in your Gmail inbox in the future are also saved in Hotmail.
That said, both the services discussed above have one common drawback – they’ll always backup your entire Gmail mailbox and you cannot limit the backup process to a specific set of folders (or labels in Gmail). So if you have a fairly large mailbox and don’t want to backup each and every Gmail folder (or label), try Backupify.

Courtesy: Digital Inspiration

Author: Amit Agarwal

Download Youtube Videos as MP3

2010-05-07T21:19:00.000-07:00

Video2mp3

Services like Video2mp3 make downloading YouTube videos as MP3 files a simple 3 step process. It simply allows you to enter the URL, click “convert”, and finally download the MP3 from the provided link.

Grab the YouTube URL:

Head over to video2mp3, enter the YouTube URL there and click “convert“:

Wait a bit for the conversion and then just download the mp3 from the link. Could this service get any simpler? Yes, with a Firefox add-on that adds a link to YouTube video pages to directly convert the video.

Dirpy

Dirpy is not just yet another YouTube MP3 converter. This site has quite a few features that set it apart.
First of all, they have integrated a bookmarklet into the mix making getting a video into the studio as easy as clicking a bookmarklet while on the YouTube video page.

Other features include the ability to set the file name and the start and end time of the MP3.
Basically, take what VideotoMp3 does (an easy 3 step process) and add a few very cool features, and a fun-to-say name, and you have Dirpy.

Vid2MP3

This happens to be the site I stumbled upon when I was doing my presentation and it did the job in a good amount of time. The site looks a bit weird but, like I said, it worked out great.
As it turns out, this site offers the choice between standard and high quality. Using it is as easy as using Video2mp3 and only requires entering the URL:

And downloading the MP3:

And then you’ll actually have to click another link to download it (why?):

Two cool features that VidToMP3 offers are the ability to preview the MP3 in an online player before downloading and the ability to email a friend a link to download the MP3. You will have to excuse quite a few ads on this site but the results are good and timely.

Courtesy: Make Use

Author: Tim Lenahan

Delete Facebook Apps that Now Have Greater Access to Your Data

2010-04-27T07:26:00.000-07:00

At Facebook's f8 conference, CEO Mark Zuckerberg told developers that Facebook applications would no longer have to dump any data they've collected on you after 24 hours. If you've got apps installed that might have prying eyes, here's how to uninstall them.
Facebook seems to change up its interface, and its settings, every few months, so if you thought you knew the easy way to remove an application entirely before, you might want to take a quick refresher. Not all Facebook applications are out to mine your personal stats for nefarious gain, but if you've kept an app or two hanging around because you thought there wasn't much exposure, here's how ReadWriteWeb recommends you go about showing them the door:

Click on "Account" at the top-right of the screen.
Click "Application Settings"
Change the "Show" drop-down box to "Authorized." This will show all the applications you've ever given permission to.
In the resulting list, click the "X" button on the far right next to each app you want to remove to delete it.
On the pop-up box that appears, click "Remove" then click "Okay" on the next box confirming the app was deleted.

Courtesy: LifeHacker

Author: Kevin

Some Google Docs Features

2010-04-20T00:50:00.000-07:00

Google has managed to change the word processing game by giving us Google Docs. With Google Docs we can collaborate on such things as documents, spreadsheets and presentations. I’ve personally enjoyed the ability to share a spreadsheet with the secretary of the bus ministry in my church so we can both update the list of riders we visit and pick up. Google Docs makes stuff like that second nature.

Now Google is releasing new Google Docs features into the offering. There are some that are really worth checking out because they can make life easier and even expand the ways in which we use Google Docs. Follow me as I go through some of the new Google Docs features worth checking out. It just may be worth your while.

Upload Any File

We can now make use of Google Docs when we want to save, access and even share larger files that don’t even have anything to do with documents, spreadsheets or presentations.

Do you have a file you want access to someplace else but you don’t want to carry around a computer or disk? Upload it to your trusty Google Docs account and access it from anywhere!

In my testing I uploaded a few picture files (all under 1MB), an mp3 file (about 8MB) and a wav file (over 16MB) and I’ve had no problem uploading or accessing them.

Realize though that the 1GB of space you are given to keep Google Docs files in is the same space you are using for these other files. But hey, that’s enough for space you’re not paying for, right?

Bulk Upload

Google has awarded us with the ability to upload more than one file at a time. It works very similarly to normal file selection. You have several options. You can hold the Ctrl button and click on the individual files you want selected. You can hold the Shift button, click the first file and then click the last file to select all files in between. Then there is the option to click and drag, drawing a box selecting all files in the pathway of your mouse.

Google lets you upload all of the selected files in one batch. Very easy.

Shared Folders

Being able to share and collaborate on files is pretty cool, right? Well, once you begin sharing several files with the same people it may get a bit complicated. Now Google has rolled out the ability to share folders and collaborate on files in that folder. Cool idea Google. Who would have come up with an idea like that?

To implement the sharing of a folder, just right-click on a folder in your Google Docs account and you’ll see the share option. You have two methods of sharing the folder. You can invite people to collaborate by adding their email and sending them a message.

You can also set it so that anyone with a provided link can either view or edit it which you would then share with only the people you want to have access.

Email As An Attachment

While Google was rolling out sharing options, they chose also to allow for emailing files as attachments. Since you can now upload any type of file you want, it only makes sense that they allow you to send those files as email attachments if you need to. In fact, the feature gets even neater when you start sending Google Document files as email attachments and they are converted into usable offline file formats.

Sharing files via an email attachment is as easy as right clicking on the file to be shared, hovering over the “Share” option, and clicking “Email as attachment…“ If it is a Google Document, you are offered more choices as far as the file format goes.

Any way you look at it though, sharing files via email attachment can come in handy.

DOCX Import

In the past it was difficult to open and use a Word 2007 file if you didn’t have the right version of Microsoft Office. Since then many of the free word processing programs have become compatible. Now apparently Google Docs is compatible too. You can upload the files and convert them for editing from within Google Docs.

This can come in handy if someone ever felt the need to send me a document since I don’t use Microsoft’s suite nor do I intend to in the near future (call me a penny pincher).

Courtesy: Make Use

Author: Tim Lenahan

Tips - CSS Targetting IE8, IE7 and IE6

2010-03-29T00:46:00.001-07:00

IE8 and Below

The key to targeting Internet Explorer 8 and below, with a hack, is to append “\9″ to the end of your style. For example:

body {
 color: red; /* all browsers, of course */
 color : green\9; /* IE8 and below */
}

It’s important to note that it must be “\9″. Unfortunately you can’t replace this with something along the lines of “\IE”, like I attempted to do so. Even “\8″ won’t work; it must be “\9″.

IE7 and Below

We can use the * symbol to target IE7 and below, like so:

body {
 color: red; /* all browsers, of course */
 color : green\9; /* IE8 and below */
 *color : yellow; /* IE7 and below */
}

IE6

Lastly, we have the underscore hack, which most designers are familiar with by now. Rather than the * symbol, we use the underscore. This will target only Internet Explorer 6.

body {
 color: red; /* all browsers, of course */
 color : green\9; /* IE8 and below */
 *color : yellow; /* IE7 and below */
 _color : orange; /* IE6 */
}

Gmail Detects and Warns You If Someone Else Is Using Your Account

2010-03-28T20:30:00.000-07:00

Gmail users are getting one more weapon in the fight against phishers and malware. In a blog post, Google has announced that it is adding a new feature that alerts users when the service detects “suspicious account activity”. Namely, Gmail will now give users a warning if it detects that they’re accessing their accounts from two different geographic regions within a short amount of time (credit cards often do the same thing).
The feature takes advantage of the IP tracking that Google launched back in July 2008, which lets users see the last few IP addresses to access their account. This doesn’t provide amazing accuracy (in the US it only displays what state you’re in), but it should at least help users detect attacks from across the country or abroad.
Of course, there are plenty of reasons why multiple people might be accessing the same Gmail account, so Gmail doesn’t lock you out — it just shows you a warning and prompts you to change your password. Google’s post also notes that the service will be coming to Google Apps after it gets feedback from its education and business customers.
One other security protection Gmail recently rolled out is default SSL access.

Courtesy: Gmail Blog
via: Tech Crunch

How To Install Cool Windows 7 Theme Downloads For Windows XP

2010-03-26T04:32:00.000-07:00

Don’t be jealous of your friends with Windows 7. Don’t run out and buy a new operating system or computer just so you can have the look and feel of Windows 7.
Maybe you like the orb, the toolbar, tray icons or the quick launch buttons? Well guess what, you can have them on your XP computer FOR FREE!
There are a few different themes and visual styles that you can grab. We found the best one and we will show you what you get and how to install it. It is not as easy as you would think.
The theme itself is a user on DeviantArt. This user has many great themes but today we will be looking at his Windows 7 transformation pack for Windows XP.

You can grab the download the Windows 7 themes for Windows XP here. We will also grab the Super Bar files from this link.
I found the theme and instructions from TechBliss Online.

Inside the archive you will find four folders. We will really only be using the Visual Styles folder but there are some great wallpapers (I say some because only one tickled my fancy and my wife liked one) in the wallpapers folder. Don’t worry you can use any wallpaper you want. Next up we will have to download an application that allows us to use a third party theme. That application is called UXTheme Multipatcher and you can grab it from Softpedia.
To start we will need to run the EXE and hit the button marked Patch. Don’t be scared – you can always undo it by re-running this setup program again. Without UXTheme-Multipatcher you will not be able to use third party themes as we will be in the next few steps.

You need to confirm your operating system version and then you will need to restart. Once you have the UXTheme installed and you have the above archives downloaded and extracted, we can get started.
Go into the DeviantArt RAR file we downloaded first and find the directory called Visual Styles. Inside there you will find a directory called Windows Se7en. Copy that entire directory to c:\windows\resources\themes.
Once it is there go into the folder and double click on the theme’s file called Windows Se7en.msstyles. If you have extensions turned off it will say Windows Se7en but the icon will be the same as the one in the shot below:

That will bring up the Windows theme chooser (located in display properties). There you will click apply to apply the theme. Next you will run the ViGlance OneStep.exe file within the ViGlance zip file. This file adds some awesomeness to your task bar.

When you are complete you will have a Windows 7 like system! This ViGlance also installs a system tray icon that gives you options on what you want enabled or not. You can see the options below and they are all self explanatory.

You can use and apply any of the wallpapers that you extracted or choose your own. Here is what my desktop looked like when I was finished:

Courtesy: Make Use

Author: Karl L. Gechli

Difference Between Browsers - Just Humour

2010-03-15T23:35:00.001-07:00

via loldwell.com

How To Download All Facebook Photos With Your or Frens Tag

2010-03-10T21:23:00.000-08:00

One of the best features of Facebook are the photos albums, which allows you and all of your friends to upload an unlimited number of pictures to share with your personal networks.
You can also create Facebook “tag” photos, which means a person’s profile is linked to the specific picture they appear in. This gives you the very useful ability to quickly view pictures of specific people – all without ever having to dig through a photo album.

While it’s great having all of these pictures online, you aren’t guaranteed that they will always be available. You can easily lose access to these photos if Facebook removes an album, if the internet is unavailable, or if the friend who uploaded the photos decides to remove them. It is possible to save Facebook pictures individually, but that can be incredibly tedious if you have a large amount of photos you’d like to download.
In this guide, I’ll show you how to download all of the Facebook tag photos that you and your friends are in with a great application called PhotoGrabber.

Getting Started

To begin, simply head over to the PhotoGrabber homepage and download the application for your operating system. PhotoGrabber is available for both Mac (PhotoGrabber-OSX) and Windows (PhotoGrabber-Win), so make sure to download the right .zip file.

After you’ve downloaded the file, Windows users should extract its contents to a new folder on your computer and Mac users should unzip and drag PhotoGrabber.app into your Applications folder.

One very nice feature of PhotoGrabber is that it is a standalone executable file and requires no installation. Once you’ve extracted the files, all you need to do is run pg.exe (just make sure to keep it in the same folder as the rest of the extracted files).

Downloading Facebook Photos

Now that you’ve downloaded and extracted PhotoGrabber, double click the PhotoGrabber executable to get started. When you first open the program, you will be presented with a login screen. Click the large Login button to be taken to a Facebook authentication page.

Click Allow on the Facebook authentication page which will allow PhotoGrabber to have access to your content.

Now that you’ve authorized PhotoGrabber to work with your account, head back to the application. Click I want to download…

PhotoGrabber will now display a list of all of your friends, including yourself. To download all pictures tagged with your name, simply select Myself then click the large Begin Download button.

Before the download begins, you will need to select a directory where you would like to save the tagged photos. Click OK and the download process will start.

Facebook photos are fairly small and download quickly, but the duration of the download will vary based on how many pictures have been tagged. It took approximately 20 minutes for me to download 1,000+ photos, but your experience may vary based on the network connection.

When the photos are finished downloading you can browse to the folder where they were saved to view them!

You can repeat this exact same process to download any tagged pictures of your friends, just select their name instead of Myself at the download selection screen.
Using the PhotoGrabber application for Facebook is great for keeping a personal copy of photos from Facebook and is an excellent way to protect them for the future.

Courtesy: Make Use Of

Author: Evan Wondrasek

Download Your or Fren's Facebook Photo Albums

2010-03-09T05:13:00.000-08:00

There are a couple of reasons why you may want to download your Facebook Photo albums (or that of your friends) to the desktop:

For viewing pictures even while you are offline.
For sharing photo albums with family members who aren’t very active on social sites. Just download a local copy of your Facebook albums and send them as email attachments or burn a DVD.
You have decided to close your Facebook account and therefore need a quick mechanism to move all your existing Facebook albums to another photo sharing website (like Flickr).
For offline backup.

To download any of your Facebook photo albums with ease, all you need is Fotobounce – it’s a free Windows-only utility that would help you manage photos in your Facebook and Flickr accounts right from the desktop.
You can download old photos, upload new ones to the web or simply view your existing photo albums as a slideshow without downloading them locally.
Fotobounce also includes built-in face recognition (similar to what you have in Google’s Picasa Albums) so you can quickly tag photos on the desktop and these people tags will be preserved even when the photos are uploaded on to Facebook.

Using Fotobounce, you can also browse (and download) photo albums of all your Facebook friends from the desktop and the same utility may also be used for uploading photos from the desktop onto Facebook or Flickr gallery with a simple right click.
That’s again useful if you want to migrate photos from one account to another.

Courtesy: Digital Inspiration

Author: Amit Agarwal

How to Export Email Addresses of all your Facebook Friends

2010-03-09T04:51:00.000-08:00

Search the Facebook Apps directory for something like “export contacts” and you’ll come across quite a few applications that sound as if they can transfer your friends contact information out of Facebook.
There’s an app called “Export Friends” that will save you friends names, city, birthday and their current location in a CSV (text) file that you then import into Excel, Gmail or any other web email program.
Then there are social plug-ins that can sync photos and status updates of your Facebook friends with matching contacts in Outlook.
The problem is that none of these apps can download what you are looking – the phone numbers and email addresses of your Facebook friends. There are Greasemonkey scripts and other hacks that can pull this information from Facebook through “web scraping” but don’t ever take that route as Zuckerberg’s army might ban your account forever.
The trick, as you can see in the video, is actually quite simple.
Go to address.yahoo.com and click the Facebook icon. A login dialog should pop-up, just sign-in with your Facebook credentials and within seconds, you entire Facebook address book will be available inside your Yahoo Mail Account. Once the import is done, click this link to download a CSV file with the email addresses of all your Facebook contacts to your desktop.
You can then import the CSV file into Gmail Contacts, LinkedIn, your phone address book or any of the social sites where you want to connect with your existing Facebook circle.
Update: If Yahoo! is unable to import your Facebook Address book, open your Facebook page and choose “Application Settings” under Account. Next remove the “Yahoo! Contact Importer” application from your Facebook profile and try the steps mentioned in the video again.

Courtesy: Digital Inspiration

Author: Amit Agarwal

Create JAR file in Java & Eclipse

2010-03-08T05:21:00.000-08:00

Let us see how to create a JAR file using Java’s jar command as well as using Eclipse IDE. The JAR file format is based on the popular ZIP file format. Usually these file are used for archiving and distribution the files and implementing various libraries, components and plug-ins in java applications. Compiler and JVMs (Java Virtual Machine) can understand and implement these formats for java application.

JAR file using Java commands

Following are few commands that can be used to create/view/modify/execute a JAR file using Java command line utilities and JVM.

Create a JAR file

1jar cf JAR_FILE_NAME FILE_NAMES_OR_DIRECTORY_NAME
2e.g.
3jar cf MyApp1.jar  C:\JavaProject\MyApp

View contents of a JAR file

1jar tf JAR_FILE_NAME
2e.g.
3jar tf MyApp1.jar

View contents with detail of a JAR file

1jar tvf JAR_FILE_NAME
2e.g.
3jar tvf MyApp1.jar

Note that we have used v (verbose) option to see the detail of JAR.

Extract content of JAR file

1jar xf JAR_FILE_NAME
2e.g.
3jar xf MyApp1.jar

Extract specific file from JAR file

1jar xf JAR_FILE_NAME FILE_NAME(S)_FROM_JAR_FILE
2e.g.
3jar xf MyApp1.jar Test1.class

Update a JAR file

1jar uf JAR_FILE_NAME FILE_NAMES_FROM_JAR_FILE
2e.g.
3jar uf MyApp1.jar Test1.class

Executing a JAR file

1java -jar JAR_FILE_NAME
2e.g.
3java -jar MyApp.jar

Create an executable JAR file

In order to create an executable JAR, one of the classes that we include in our JAR must be a main class.
Create a text file called MANIFEST.MF using any text editor and copy following content in it.

`1`	`Manifest-Version: 1.0`

`2`	`Main-Class: MyMainClass`

Where MyMainClass is the name of the class that contents main method. Also note that you have to specify fully qualified class name here.
Use following command to create an executable JAR file.

`1`	`jar cvfm MyApp.jar MANIFEST.MF FILE_NAMES_OR_DIRECTORY_NAME`

JAR file using Eclipse IDE

Creating JAR file using Eclipse IDE is pretty much easy. Follow the simple steps.
Right click on your project, which you want to create a JAR file of. And select Export from the context menu.

Select JAR file from Java folder and click Next.

Provide the Destination path and click on Finish to create the JAR.

Courtesy: Viral Patel

Author: Viral Patel

Hide Closed Projects in Eclipse Project Explorer View

2010-02-20T20:47:00.000-08:00

Ever wanted to hide all those closed projects in eclipse? Well, here is a simple trick that you may not know already.
Imagine your Eclipse workspace is filled with many projects that you created in past just to test some small functionality. Now you are done with these projects and hence you have closed it. Eclipse by default show all the closed projects in Project Explorer. Hence your project explorer may look like following where only two projects are open and rest competing for your attention although they are closed!

Eclipse comes with a cool tiny feature that many of us not know. You may want to Hide all those closed projects from your workspace in Project Explorer tab. Simply follow following steps and do this is few seconds!
Step 1: Click on right corner of Project Explorer tab and open context menu. Select Filters option from menu.

Step 2: Check Closed Projects option from Filter and press Ok

Now check your project explorer tab, all the closed projects are gone! Doesn’t it looks more clean :)

We used Filters option to remove closed projects from Project Explorer tab. Filters provides more options to select and remove from displaying it from explorer view.

Courtesy: Viral Patel
Author: Viral Patel

How to Add Facebook Chat to Your IM Client

2010-02-18T07:00:00.000-08:00

Facebook may have partnered with AIM to bring chat to your desktop, but if you're not a fan of the official AIM client, there's now an easy way to get Facebook Chat in the IM client of your choice.
Over a year ago, Facebook announced that they planned to support Facebook Chat over XMPP/Jabber, the same protocol that Google Talk uses, so people could use Facebook Chat in their favorite IM client—and then it was never mentioned again. Yesterday, though, Facebook announced that in addition to the AIM partnership, the XMPP/Jabber implementation had finally come to fruition.
If you are using a multi-protocol IM client such as Pidign, Adium, or iChat, set-up is really easy—you just add a new Jabber or XMPP account, the username being your username@chat.facebook.com, with your password being the same as your Facebook password. If you still haven't gotten a Facebook username (the tag that appears after www.facebook.com/ for your profile page) you'll need to go to your Settings page to enable it.

Once you log in, all your Facebook friends should show up in your buddy list. If this is good enough for you, that's fine, but I found it really messed with my organization. Although Facebook lets you decide which friend lists do and do not show up in your IM client, it doesn't seem to realize that those not on a list are important too—so if you have friends that aren't on a friend list, they'll just show up in a list called "Buddies" on your IM client, and there's no way to take them off (short of hiding that list client-side). Since most of my AIM and Gtalk contacts were already on a list called "Buddies", I had to create a new list for them to get my organization back on track. You may or may not care—it's just a warning that that list will likely be where all your unlisted Facebook friends go (at least it was for me).
Apart from that, everything else should be handled pretty well client-side. Profile thumbs are grabbed, Away in your client corresponds to Idle on Facebook, and, if you were previously using the unofficial add-on for adding Facebook Chat to Adium or Pidgin, you should find that the official route is far less flaky as far as connection goes. The service is pretty new, so there are bound to be a few bugs or hidden workarounds.

What if…Apple only offered the 64GB/3G iPad and sold it for $499

2010-02-18T06:53:00.000-08:00

Even though the iPad is still more than a month away from shipping, iSuppli conducted a preliminary itemized parts breakdown. The results aren’t that surprising: Apple’s making a boatload on these things. iSuppli concluded that the $499 16GB/no 3G model only costs $229 to manufacturer with the $829 64GB/3G model costing only $117 more to make even though it carries a $329 premium. Nice, eh?

These numbers can be broken down even further showing Apple’s insane margins. The 3G module only costs $24.50, but Apple charges $129 more for the option. The NAND memory chips are really the only difference between all three options, but their real costs of $29 for 16GB, $59 for $32GB, and $119 for 64GB are nowhere near proportionate with the iPad’s prices. All this data shows that Apple’s abandoning its long-held K.I.S.S. strategy.

So what if Apple got back on the keeping it simple bandwagon, only offered the high-end 64GB with 3G iPad and still sold it for $499? After all, the company would still be making at least $153 on each iPad sold. Would that turn around the iPad’s outlook?

The vast majority that participated in our poll the other day said that the iPad needs a lower price, specifically $349 for the base model. That clearly shows people are not satisfied with what the iPad offers at its $499 price point when it only offers 16 GB of storage and without the 3G wireless option along with a host of other letdowns such as lack of USB, SD card inputs, and multitasking. Surely if the iPad were only offered in a 64GB/3G kit, at least more would be able to look past some of the other transgressions.

In fact this model structure of six different options for the same device is new for Apple as of late. Previously Apple was known for its no nonsense approach of just a high-end or low-end option. (MacBook or MacBook Pro, iMac or Mac Pro) Now consumers have to decide not only how much extra they want to spend for storage, but also if they want to spend $130 more for 3G access.

GPS units are known for this type of rubbish. There might be a dozen different models available, but each step up only adds one or two slight software or hardware change that’s a nominal cost difference, but seems to be enough justification for the gradual price increase up the model line. Only the iPhone and iPod touch share this type of pricing structure, but even though they share a lot of the same parts, their core functionalities are different, justifying the difference. That can’t be said about the iPad, where a unit without 3G will be severally limited compared to one with the option.

Maybe Apple doesn’t need one iPad option priced at $499, but rather only two with both offering 3G access, since it isn’t tied down with a wireless contract anyway. Offer the 32GB option for $399 and then the 64GB one for $549. Something needs to change as clearly consumers aren’t thrilled with the iPad’s current pricing, and now that the whole world can see that Apple is downright robbing buyers of the high-end model, that perception will not improve. Apple, get back to your roots and keep it simple, stupid.

Courtesy: Crunch Gear

Author: Matt Burns

Which Social Network Is Right For You?

2010-02-18T00:05:00.000-08:00

Between Twitter, Facebook, and Google's new social networking tool, Buzz, it's hard to turn a corner without running into another social network. But how do you know which networking tool fits you best? We're here—with big charts and all—to help.
Last week Google Buzz made us ask ourselves what we wanted out of social networking. To answer that question, we charted what we liked and disliked about setup, privacy, usability, and other aspects of Buzz, Twitter, and Facebook. Here's the result.
This chart doesn't cover everything about every network out there. MySpace is (seemingly) on the decline or, at best, re-purposing itself. LinkedIn is really a business contact pool, FourSquare a geo-location game, and other networks generally too niche to be compared in the same aspects and categories.
For the simple read, here's the full chart of our Buzz, Twitter, and Facebook comparison. We color-coded each answer to give a context of where it stood, in comparison to what we know is possible and what a smart user would like to see. Red means that you can't rely on this network for this feature. Yellow indicates that the network offers it or makes due, but could definitely be better. Green means something works, and can be considered a selling point.

There's a lot of text there already to parse through, but it's obviously segmented and specific to each function. Having dug into the settings of each network and debated it with my fellow editors, I'll try to offer up a concise take on how I'd explain each network to someone completely new to any of them. I hope it might spur some thought about which network you're using now, too, and why.

Facebook

Facebook's strongest feature, as it stands now, is that it's relatively easy to figure out who your "friends" are. You can pull them from your webmail address book, sure, but you have to check off those you want to be a friend with, and they have to reciprocate. After that, you start seeing their status updates, photos, and other activities on Facebook.com, right when you log in. Simple enough, right? Not exactly.
You can't, or at least shouldn't, create two separate Facebook accounts for personal friends and work contacts/co-workers/casual acquaintances, all of whom are likely to hit you up on Facebook sooner or later. So it's up to the user to create groups of friends and set what those different friends can see. Also, your Facebook identity is tied to certain "networks"—an employer, a school, a location—that you have to remember to set controls for, too. Dig around and you'll almost certainly find the very fine-grain controls you might need. But then, every few months, Facebook changes up their offerings, for better or worse, and it's up to the user to notice and re-learn how to decide what's private, to whom, and, in a much more worrisome way, what's being made public and search-able on the web.
Facebook does have a pretty great iPhone app, and offers a good amount of access to third-party clients like Brizzly and TweetDeck. But they're still limited in some ways meant to drive you to the web site, and their non-iPhone mobile apps and sites are tough to love.

Twitter

What's easy to like about Twitter is the simplicity. You get an account, you see a suggested list of famous users that you can feel free to ignore, and then you're asked to write 140 characters about something, anything. It will be made public, search-able, and able to be re-broadcast by other users, unless you've decided to lock your entire account and require your permission to view it. You can follow other people, block the occasional jerk from following you, reply to others' posts, message other users privately (if you both follow each other), and, over time, you'll learn about third-party apps and context tricks that make the service make more sense. I started using Twitter one day into my first SXSW, and I had it mostly figured within one or two over-eager days.
That simplicity, and reliance on third-party sites and apps for picture posting, link shortening, and the like can be confusing to newcomers that aren't into digging around, for sure. And the speed and volume of the main stream can be overwhelming and off-putting. But Twitter has grown slowly into a network that adapts to users' needs, whether by force or through user innovation. If you don't like how noisy and fast your main feed is, creating a list of high-priority friends and thinkers will do the trick. As you figure out what you like and don't like about Twitter, you'll be able to find third-party apps and interfaces that cater to those interests. We'd love to see expanded features here or there (for discovering who's following you, and perhaps hiding certain posts from all but a few close followers, for example), but Twitter is a pretty novel solution for those who like to share short updates with the web at large.

Buzz

Whatever we write about Buzz will be slightly inaccurate in a week's time, most likely. Buzz is brand new, and already it announced an apology and upcoming "fixes." From what we've seen, though, it seems like it wants to be the solution that FriendFeed never was to tracking your friends and contacts' multi-varied interests. Some friends change their IM status to say what's up, while others post on Flickr, Twitter, their own blog, and other places. Rather than making you head to each site, or make those friends become endless self-promoters, Buzz aims to connect you to everything your friends are doing from a place you're already familiar with—your Gmail and Google contacts.
And that, of course, is where the uproar started. Buzz showed up, suddenly, inside Gmail, and when asking users to sign up, assumed too much that they'd like to turn their email contacts into people they "follow," and maybe make that following status public. If Google could reassure Buzz users that what they did on the network was only among their followers they've individually approved, it would be more appealing. The service also needs a dedicated home, instead of being spread across mobile sites, Gmail, Google Maps, and elsewhere, and gain better controls for how much "buzz" flies at you. But it's promising, still, because it's not a public-type Twitter, or a walled-off Facebook, but something else entirely.

Courtesy: Life Hacker

Ollie the bluebird/Twitterrific

Why Web Developers Should Switch to Google Chrome

2010-02-17T00:04:00.000-08:00

Check out Chrome 4's great new features for developers, such as cross-platform support, awesome web inspector integration, and handy new extensions. It's becoming more and more difficult to deny Chrome the title as the new browser for web developers. If it's not quite there yet, it will be soon!

Howdy y'all. Brian Egan, web cowboy, here. I'm a designer & front end developer working for the University of Nevada, Las Vegas Libraries, where I get to build websites that house fascinating photographs of Mining Boomtowns, Howard Hughes, and more upcoming goodies! You can find me on Twitter or check out more of my work and writing at brianegan.com.

Introduction

With quick load times, a snappy JavaScript engine, solid WebKit foundation, and big-name backing, Google Chrome has been gaining a respectable market share, even surpassing Safari to become the 3rd most popular browser in December. For developers, however, Firefox has been the sweetheart of many due to its ability to run on any operating system and because of its rich offering of web development add-ons, such as Firebug and the Web Developer Toolbar. But it’s important to test JavaScript in all browsers, and having a robust set of tools in each (including Internet Explorer), is precisely what developers need to make the most of their code.
Lucky for us, the Google folks have been working hard to make Chrome cross-platform, integrate WebKit’s fantastic Web Inspector, and add extensions, making Chrome 4 an amazingly useful tool for web development. In this tutorial, I’ll demonstrate some of the features that make Chrome 4 a great addition to the web developer utility belt.

Downloading Chrome 4

As of January 25, Chrome 4 has been officially released as stable for Windows. Mac and Linux users, however, we have to be a bit more brave in order to experience all that Chrome 4 has to offer. Mac users need to download the "dev" version, and Linux users the "beta" version, and it's highly worth it! Check out the following links to get a copy of Chrome for your operating system that supports everything we'll discuss in this article:

Web Inspector (aka Developer Tools)

Now let's get into the nitty gritty! In Firefox, Firebug is a godsend for developers, providing a debugging console, HTML & CSS manipulation, JavaScript profiling, and a whole lot of other goodness. The WebKit folks took notice and over the last couple of years have been perfecting a set of tools called the Web Inspector, which offers a similar set of features to Firebug. Within Chrome 4, the Web Inspector is labeled “Developer Tools.”

Accessing the Web Inspector/Developer Tools

In addition to Chrome 4, the Web Inspector has been in action for a while from within previous versions of Chrome and Safari, although it’s a bit hidden. To access the Web Inspector in various browsers:

Safari 4

Select “Edit > Preferences” (Windows) or “Safari > Preferences” (Mac)
Select the “Advanced” tab
Check “Show Develop Menu in menu bar”
A new menu item, “Develop,” will appear
Select “Develop > Show Web Inspector”

Chrome 3 (Windows only)

Select the Wrench
Select Developer
Select JavaScript Console (the whole range of tools are hidden under this name)

Chrome 4

Windows / Linux: Select the Page Icon > Developer > Developer Tools
Mac: Select View > Developer > Developer Tools

JavaScript Console

If you haven’t worked with the Firebug or Web Inspector console, then you’re missing out on a great way to help debug JavaScript. The JavaScript console serves several important functions, such as capturing errors and presenting them in a useful format, testing short bits of JavaScript, and as a convenient place to log useful information like variable values and execution times. Practically speaking, I use this tool regularly to evaluate the performance of my programs and to ensure that certain variables are being calculated correctly.

Elements Panel

In addition to the JavaScript console, it’s always nice to have a tool that allows you to quickly view the HTML and style information of particular elements on the page. The Web Inspector Elements panel gives a tree-structure view of the Document Object Model (DOM), allowing you to drill down into the document to select an item of interest. You can also access the information of a certain object by right clicking on an item within the browser and selecting “Inspect Element.”
Finally, I should note that the Elements panel allows for much more than simple inspection. You can modify and add styles, edit html, and in the latest versions, view event listeners attached to a selected DOM element. These features can all come in very handy when you’re dealing with little quirks that you can’t quite figure out.

Resources

The last feature I’d like to highlight within the Web Inspector/Developer Tools is the “Resources” tab. If you’ve worked with Firebug’s “Net” tab, then you’ll notice several similarities. Essentially, the Resources tab gives a breakdown of all the information that is exchanged between your browser and the server, from the images to the JavaScript to the document itself. It also shows a ton of handy information, such as:

A graph of the time it takes to download each component
A graph showing the size of the various components
A way to sort the requests by type, e.g. Documents, Stylesheets, Images, etc.
Image previews with dimensions, file size, and MIME type displayed below
Request and Response Headers
XML HTTP Request (XHR) information

An elegant tool that allows for easy inspection of page speed, the Resources tab can aid you in identifying and squashing performance bottlenecks. Give it a try and see where your page is too fat, then slim down your chunky images and code to provide a better experience for your users!

Extensions

Now, while I’ve always been blown away by the speed of Safari 4 and Chrome as compared to Firefox, they’ve both lacked a critical feature: add-ons. In Chrome 4, that all changes with the addition of “extensions.” You can add functionality to Chrome by downloading and installing extensions or by using the standard tools of the trade: HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, to write your own. Extensions can be downloaded from the Chrome Extensions Repository, and should be fairly simple to install. Already, a number of very compelling extensions have been created which aid web development, from quick validation to resolution testing. Let’s take a look at a few.

Speed Tracer

A web developer can never really be obsessed enough with performance, and the more tools that identify sluggish performance the better. That’s just where Speed Tracer, a Chrome extension developed by Google, comes into play. Speed Tracer takes the “Resources” panel to the next level by providing a visualization of the time it takes to execute low-level tasks, such as rendering CSS or parsing HTML and JavaScript. I’d highly recommend taking a look at a video demonstration of Speed Tracer put together by the folks at Google to get a better idea of how it can help you improve the performance of your applications.

Pendule

Moving from Firefox to Chrome, one extension everyone is going to look for is a replacement of the fantastic Web Developer Toolbar. For those who don’t know, the Web Developer Toolbar deals with the tasks Firebug wasn’t meant to handle, such as quick validation of HTML and CSS, the ability to quickly disable JavaScript or images, and a tool for checking links. Those functions are all handled with style by Pendule, which offers much of the core functionality of the Web Developer Toolbar (not quite all), while offering a few goodies of it’s own, such as a color picker.

Resolution Test

Web Developers often need to ensure that their designs work at a variety of resolutions. Resolution Test allows developers to efficiently resize their browser window to a number of common resolutions for quick and easy testing. The latest version even allows you to open multiple windows at different resolutions with only a couple of clicks. Resolution Test is fantastic for making sure your target audience is seeing the page you want them to see.

Webpage ScreenShot

There are occasions when its necessary not only to grab a screenshot of the current visible portion of a website, but a screenshot of the whole page. For example, you may want to print a full page for peer critical review or to demonstrate in your portfolio. I formerly used a Desktop tool for this, but now Webpage ScreenShot does a nice job of capturing full-page screenshots in a few clicks.

Chrome Sniffer

Do you ever stumble upon a fantastic page and wonder, “what are they using to build this?” I do, and often find myself digging through the source code trying to figure out who the man behind the curtain is. While it is a useful training exercise, and a necessary one if you really want to know what’s going on, Chrome Sniffer can usually give you a snapshot of which JavaScript and PHP frameworks are in use for a particular page. For example, navigate to NetTuts and Chrome Sniffer informs us that it’s run on Wordpress using Google Analytics and jQuery.

Conclusion

The future of web development continues to look brighter and brighter! While only a few years ago we had a limited set of tools for debugging JavaScript, tinkering with CSS, and viewing HTML, today we have a variety of powerful options. Now that Google Chrome has become cross platform, fully integrated the WebKit Web Inspector, and added extensions, it is a versatile tool for helping developers improve their own pages. I encourage all of you to download a copy for yourself and give it a shot to see if it can help you improve your pages, then come on back here and share your favorite plugins and tools with the rest of us!

Courtesy: Net Tuts+

Author: Brian Egan

What Are Meta Search Engines & How Do They Work?

2010-02-14T19:30:00.000-08:00

Search engines are an integral part of the Internet. Could you imagine the Internet without Google? And I am not even talking about all the services that Google offers as a company. Just imagine the Internet without Google search and you will realize how important search engines are. The Internet has billions and billions of websites with loads of content but it’s the search engines that make them discoverable. So is there any difference between search engines and meta search engines? What exactly is a meta search engine?
Before I even attempt an explanation, let me tell you that search engine technology is one of the most well kept secrets of computer science. No company will give you complete details on how they index, search and sort the results. That being said, I shall try my best to convey as much as I know and as much that is possible within the constraints of an article.

What is a Meta Search Engine?

To understand what a meta search engine is, first you have to understand how a search engine works. The search engine visits billions of websites and creates a database or repository of sorts of the various sites. This is known as the index. Then whenever a user enters the search query, something magical happens (algorithms if you are a computer geek) and the pages that are deemed relevant to what you asked for are returned. Pretty simple, huh? If only you could improve those magical algorithms you could create the next Google (although Google is smart enough to hire you instead!).
So now back to how a meta search engine works. Meta search engines don’t have a repository or index of their own, they take advantage of indices created by other search engines. In fact they present this as their strong point. A typical meta search engine pulls off the results from a number of search engines, say Google and Bing, and then apply their own algorithms in some cases to re-order the results.

Are Meta Search Engines Better?

The obvious thought that comes to mind is that meta search engines get their results from multiple search engines and since two is better than one the results must also be better. The truth however is different, in fact let me put it this way – it is a matter of personal preference.
Let me explain with an example. First off, you need to keep one thing in mind that no search engine can index the entire Internet. Yes, not even Google. Now, suppose you are looking for something that is on website ‘Z’ and say you search for the term in your favorite search engine and you get no results. So now the only way a meta search engine is going to be able to respond with a result is if any other search engine has indexed website ‘Z’. If other search engines have indexed website ‘Z’ then of course a meta search engine is better than the one you are using. But then are you using a good search engine in the first place that doesn’t index website ‘Z’?
I say so because the index of search engines are more or less the same. It’s the algorithms they use to create and search the index and the algorithms they use to order the results that make one search engine better than the other. So if something is missing from a search engine altogether than perhaps you need to switch. But hey, if it works for you, it is the best for you. So if a meta search engine gives you what you need then it is better. Viewed logically, you shouldn’t expect huge differences in results except for ups and downs in the ranks.

Example Of Meta Search Engines

There are probably thousands of them out there, some of the prominent ones are: Dogpile, Vivisimo, Mamma and Metacrawler.

A Different Meta Search Engine

As is often the case, the definition I presented above is only one of the many definitions of meta search engines. Till now we know that a meta search engine is one that searches databases of other search engines to give you the search results. As it turns out a search engine that searches multiple sites but not the entire web is also known as a meta search engine (although the definition is not very popular). Google Custom Search Engines (CSE’s) are an excellent example of such search engines. What’s better you can create one of your own and see how things work. Here is how:
Visit Google CSE , hit the big “Create a Custom Search Engine”

Fill in the required details and then enter the sites you want to search.

Test it out and see how things work. You can even make money with AdSense for search.
What are your opinions on the issue? Are meta search engines better than normal search engines?

Courtesy: Make Use

Author: Varun Kashyap

Google vs Apple

2010-02-13T23:30:00.001-08:00

Courtesy: GigaOm

Is your Windows Computer slow? Fix it.

2010-02-12T21:12:00.000-08:00

Your computer running Windows isn’t running in the same speed that it used to run when you first used it. It’s slower, crappy, takes a while to start and tests your patience like anything. There are many reasons for this, let’s try fixing up a few things on your slow Windows PC:
Slow Start Up
There can be a variety of reasons to Windows loading slow during start up. Go to Run, type msconfig and hit enter. Under the ‘Start Up’ tab, uncheck the unwanted programs and press OK. Things should be a bit fine the next time Windows boots.
Another program worth mentioning here is StartUp Delayer which will help in setting after how much time programs should be loaded after Windows boots. For instance, you could set your instant messenger program to load 50 seconds after Windows starts up.
Slow Loading Start Menu
If the Start Menu items are loading slowly, you can open the Registry Editor by typing in the Run menu ‘regedit.exe’ and pressing Enter. Go to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop. Look for MenuShowDelay, and double click to edit the value. The lower the number specified, the faster the Start Menu will load.
Slow Right Click Context Menu
Probably the Windows Right Click menu on your computer is loading slow because too many programs added unwanted entries there. Just download this program called Mmm, install it and then modify your context menu to remove unwanted items to speed it up.
Slow Send To Menu

If the Send To menu loads slowly, you can type ’sendto’ in the Run Dialog, and remove unwanted items in the Explorer Window that appears. This should add some speed to it.
Slow Defragmentation
The Windows Defragmenter can’t get any slower. You need to have an alternative to the Windows Defragmenter, and Defraggler is just one of the best ones available in the market. It’s free, and works like a charm and can speed up defragmentation manifold.
Slow loading My Computer Window
If the My Computer Window loads slowly, in the Explorer Window, go to Tools >> Folder Options >> View and uncheck ‘Automatically search for network folders and printers”
Slow loading Add or Remove Programs Applet
This is one of the most annoying piece of programs present in Windows, it takes ages to load if you have a considerable number of programs installed on your computer. You can either use the all-in-one CCleaner for this purpose, or get MyUninstaller that comes as a speedy replacement for Add or Remove Programs.
Slow Ending of Unresponsive Programs
If you’ve clicked on ‘End Task’ if any program is running unresponsive, you might have noticed that the program is not terminated immediately. You can alter this by going to Run >> regedit.exe >> HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ and change this value to 1000.
Disable Animations and Appearance Overhauls to maximize performance
If you’re a serious performance junkie, you probably won’t bother about eyecandy. Go to System Properties in the Control Panel. Click ‘Advanced’, then ‘Performance’ and click ‘Adjust for best performance’. This might boost your PC’s performance up a bit.

Additional Tips:
- Always keep your computer clean. Remove Junk and Unnecessary registry entries. Use CCleaner for this purpose, one excellent tool that just does what it says.
- Don’t keep installing software. Install a program only if it really serves you a purpose.
- Keep as less programs as possible running on the System Tray. This essentially means reducing the number of programs that start during Windows start up.

Courtesy: Make Use

Author: Shankar Ganesh

uTorrent 2.0 for Windows sheds the beta tag, goes RTM!

2010-02-03T19:40:00.000-08:00

utorrent has been the world's most popular BitTorrent app for quite some time, and today its developers announced another big milestone: version 2.0 has dropped the beta tag.

While many uTorrent users haven't been shy about updating to beta or RC builds, the general public seems to prefer the reassurance of the RTM stamp. If you count yourself among that group, you'll be glad to know that you can now download the new stable release from the uTorrent website or a number of mirrors (like Filehippo).

Yes, the installer still offers the Ask.com toolbar -- so make sure you pay attention to the screens as you click through the install if you don't want the toolbar installed.

One thing a lot of users forget about uTorrent is that it's skinnable -- so why not download a new theme for your new 2.0 install while you're at it?

Courtesy: Download Squad

Author: Lee Mathews

Twitter Clients – Web Apps or Desktops Apps? Which is Better?

2010-02-03T05:53:00.000-08:00

Twitter is a beast, in my opinion, that needs to be tamed! If you are to follow any amount of people on Twitter and actually keep up with them, you’ll need to use some sort of Twitter client in order to organize the chatter and get anything out of it all.

In the past, I have written articles on several different web apps including Tweetfunnel and HootSuite. Notice that both of those are web apps, meaning that you don’t install them on your computer but run them directly from the Internet from your web browser. There is another whole category of Twitter clients that you install on your PC, including Tweetdeck, Twhirl and Seesmic.
Therein lies the debate! Which type of Twitter client do you prefer — the web app or the desktop app? Let’s take a look at some of the pros and cons of each and see where we land!

The web app Twitter client

There are many reasons someone may choose to use a web app as their Twitter client of choice.

Running another application takes up more system resources so a web-based app could help to conserve system resources.
It can be easier to not have to switch between another program and your browser windows.
No download is necessary and version control is taken care of for you.
Perhaps you will find more options in the web-based alternatives.

Using web-based applications in general have certain advantages such as having access on any Internet connected computer with a web browser, not worrying about installing and updating, and hard drive space is no longer an issue. It almost seems everything is moving toward the “cloud” doesn’t it?

Currently my web app of choice is still HootSuite because it’s easy to use, easy to track stats, and the Hootlet bookmarklet makes sharing links easy. However, there are some reasons why I find myself using a desktop app also.

The desktop app Twitter client

Desktop apps do have their benefits. One of most used Twitter clients is Tweetdeck and that is a desktop app. So, why do people still choose to use desktop apps in light of the benefits of web apps?

Refreshing some of the web-based clients can become cumbersome.
Many desktop clients make being notified of tweets quite simple.
It’s easy having the program running in the tray ready for access.
Sometimes issues can be resolved by the user by reopening or reinstalling a program whereas if the webapp goes down, you’re out of luck.

Aside from the typical power apps such as Seesmic and Tweetdeck, there are the browser plugins such as Echofon and Chromed Bird.

I prefer to use this type of app because I get notifications directly in my browser window.

Courtesy: Make Use
Author: Tim Lenahan

Browser Speed Tests: Firefox 3.6, Chrome 4, Opera 10.5, and Extensions

2010-02-02T21:29:00.000-08:00

Firefox 3.6 is out, Chrome's stable version got a big upgrade, and Opera 10.5 is inching toward release. It's a great time for us to break out the timer, process manager, and code tracker for some up-to-date browser speed tests.
This go-round, we did things just slightly different from our last batch of browser tests.

We're still timing the human experience of clicking to start a browser and waiting for it to reach a (locally saved) home page, both "cold" (right after boot-up) and "warm" (after running at least once already), and having it load nine tabs at once, using a millisecond, keyboard-activated timer app from Rob Keir. To test JavaScript speeds and, new to these tests, DOM and CSS querying, we're using Mozilla's Dromaeo online suite, which loads offline and implements both Apple's SunSpider and Google's V8 tests, along with others. To measure memory use, we're using Windows 7's process manager, except in the case of Chrome, which has its own system. The tests are, as ever, performed on my trusty ThinkPad T61p, running a 2.0 GHz Intel Centrino Duo processor and sporting 2 GB of RAM, and currently running Windows 7.

What's new this go-round is, as mentioned, the inclusion of Dromaeo's DOM/CSS tests, as the use of jQuery and other JavaScript-based code will be increasingly important as HTML5 starts changing the web game. We also ran a little side test involving extensions, as many readers (and, truth be told, editors here) have noted that Firefox runs tight on memory when it's brand new, but it's long-term extension use that seems to slow things down. So we loaded up Firefox 3.6, and both the "stable" and "development" versions of Chrome, with extensions found on both browsers:

Xmarks bookmark sync
AdBlock (known as AdBlock Plus on Firefox)
CoolIris photo viewer
Gmail-based mail checkers: Gmail checker for Firefox, Google Mail Checker for Chrome
LastPass password manager

Are these extensions exactly the same between Firefox and Chrome? Not really. Are they generally providing the same functionality? We hope so. Either way, we wanted to see what a fan of these five fairly popular extensions would experience, in terms of memory use, across all three browsers (for Windows) that have a robust extension platform.
On to the tests!
Update: Originally this post referred to Opera's 10.5 release as a beta, but it's actually still a pre-alpha release. We've updated the text; our apologies for the confusion.
Click any of the images below for a clearer and wider look at the results.

Boot-up and warm loading; Winner: Opera!

Opera 10.01 and 10.5 Pre-Alpha are so close together in cold and warm starts, you could write off the difference to the speed of your testing editor's finger on the timer button. Close behind is Chrome's stable and development versions, similarly close in standing. Firefox 3.6 was surprisingly just a tad slower than 3.5 in starting up, at least from first boot-up, and Safari remains a fairly slow starter.

Tab Loading; Winner: Chrome (Stable)!

We were more than a little surprised at this result, so we triple-checked that we'd cleaned out Chrome's cache, cookies, and browsing data to ensure it wasn't getting a head start on loading each browser's home page, plus Gizmodo, Lifehacker, Hulu, and the Google home page. But the numbers bore out the new Chrome release's prowess on the "Open all in bookmarks" function, which bodes well for its individual tab loading:

JavaScript; Winner: Opera 10.5 Pre-Alpha! (Somehow)

Browser developers have told us before that JavaScript engine coders can, intentionally or subconsciously, write their frameworks "to the test," giving them an artificial advantage when placed against the competition in certain tests. And pure runs per second is, as Mozilla's Mike Beltzner put it, like a horsepower rating on a car—it doesn't tell the whole story of its performance.
Still, to look at Opera 10.5 in the Dromaeo aggregate results, you'd think that either Opera has developers who have learned not to sleep, or that something funny is going on. Still, we have to call them the winner, with Chrome's development channel, stable release, and Safari 4 picking up the remaining winner's circle slots.

DOM/CSS; Winner: Chrome (Dev)!

Google's browser mostly walks away with this one. Safari puts in a strong showing, and Firefox pushes past Opera.

Memory use, no extensions; Winner: Firefox 3.6!

For all the emphasis Firefox put on its themes, security, and plugin management for the 3.6 release, they could have mentioned that it's even more efficient with memory, at least soon after start-up, than the already impressive 3.5 releases. Opera 10.01 and Safari 4 aren't far behind, Opera 10.5 shows a pretty hefty jump in tab holding, and if you're using Chrome with multiple tabs, you'd better have a pretty modern system.

Memory use with extensions; Winner: Firefox 3.6!

You know what we learned about Chrome in these tests? That there's a price to pay for its walled garden model of security. It seems like each extension is individually contained in a tab-like shell, meaning that if your extension crashes, it won't bring down your whole browser. Even if it does, your tab contents and writing are preserved. That said, to have those extensions loaded, with or without tabs open, makes a pretty big difference in memory use. Extensions make a difference in Firefox, too, but much more incrementally:

The scores

As we first implemented in our last tests, we took the numeric score placement of each browser in each category and ranked them from 7, as best in category, to 1, as worst. We totaled those numbers up, and present them here as a total out of 35. If a browser had a 35, it would be best in every category: startup, page loading, code handling, and memory use. We didn't include the extension memory test, because it's not a fair fight between all the browsers.
Scores (out of 35 possible)

Google Chrome 4.0.302.3 (dev): 25
Google Chrome 4.0.249.78 (stable): 24
Firefox 3.6: 20
Firefox 3.5.4: 21
Opera 10.5 Pre-Alpha: 25
Opera 10.01: 15
Safari 4.0.4: 19

What did we learn? If you're using Opera 10.01, you have almost no reason not to upgrade. If you're using Chrome, the Stable channel is pretty much a wash with the development version, barring any new features that make their way first to the dev channel (which, granted, some certainly will). Firefox 3.6 seems more of an upgrade in features than core components, and Safari, well, doesn't it have a really neat launch page?

Courtesy: LifeHacker

Author: Kevin Purdy

Extensions in VLC

2010-02-02T05:01:00.000-08:00

A general introduction to VLC Extensions.
Starting with version 1.1, users will be able to write their own plugins for VLC, codenamed Extensions. The difference with other VLC modules consists in the language used to write these Extensions: Lua, a simple a lightweight scripting language, embbeded inside VLC media player.

Why extensions?

The success of Firefox over the past few years can be explained quite easily when you have a look at its main features. The major differences between Firefox and IE reside in the Open Source model, and the possibility for community users to write their own plugins. Some of these plugins, like AdBlockPlus, really change the way you enjoy the Web. As a consequence, you can't use any other browser, as long as you need your favorite Firefox plugins.
The same idea can apply to media players. With the constant progress of web technologies, you get more and more access to a lot of free content from your home computer. Why not binding this content with the software you love and the medias you watch or listen to? In less abstract terms, what if you could get the subtitles of the movie you are watching in less that one click, read the lyrics of the current track, learn about the artist's biography and discography right inside VLC?
Well, the answer is that you actual can. Just try VLC Extensions now and you'll see you can forget about your browser when it comes to multimedia-related content.

Okay, but what are extensions exactly?

Extensions are scripts running inside VLC, that will popup windows and fetch information on the web for you. To use an extension, all you need is to activate it from the View menu (if you are a Windows or Linux user). Then, it should be all self-explanatory.
Examples of possible (or actual) extensions include:

Wikipedia: get information about the artist, the album or the movie from Wikipedia.
IMDb: read the plot summary, learn about the cast of a movie and get a direct link to the Internet Movie Database.
Last.fm: Read useful information fetched from the artist's page on Last.fm.
Lyrics: Automatically get the lyrics of the current song.
Subtitles: Find and insert subtitles on top of the video in two clicks.
Concerts: Learn about the next concerts of this artist.

Obviously, if you have other ideas, I'd be glad to know about them!
Screenshot 1 Screenshot 2

Where do I start?

At the moment of writing, VLC 1.1 is yet under heavy development. Thus, in order to try these Extensions, you'll have to install a nightly build of VLC from http://nightlies.videolan.org.
Once this is done, you can find extensions here on the page Extensions for VLC. Download the Lua scripts and copy them to your VLC scripts folder:

Linux: ~/.local/share/vlc/lua/extensions/
Windows: %APPDATA%\VLC\lua\extensions

Launch VLC or open the Plugins & Extensions dialog to reload the list of extensions. Take a cup of coffee and enjoy!

Can I write my own?

Yes you can, but more details and tutorials will come later in another article. If you really want to get started now, read the README files and the example scripts provided. Remember you'll have to wait for VLC 1.1 before seeing them in you favorite media player.

Courtesy: Yet another geek's blog
Author: Jean-Philippe

VLC Media Player To Get Extensions Starting With Version 1.1

2010-02-02T04:58:00.000-08:00

Starting with version 1.1, VideoLan Media Player (VLC) will get extensions support, and anyone will be able to write their own - like it is with Firefox extensions:

Jean-Philippe André, one of the VLC developers explains on it's blog:

The difference with other VLC modules consists in the language used to write these Extensions: Lua, a simple a lightweight scripting language, embbeded inside VLC media player.

I must say this is great news but a somewhat expected move since VLC has all the features a media player needs so it's time to give power to the users. Also, just like it is with Firefox extensions: if you would incorporate all the extensions in the default installation, VLC would be bloated, but if you allow users to use extensions, everyone will have the features he wants, without bloating this great app.

There are already some VLC extensions you can try (you will need VLC 1.1 but if you use Ubuntu, fear not: the latest VLC 1.1 from GIT is available in the Web Upd8 PPA, build as of today - read on for installation instructions):

IMDb: read the plot summary, learn about the cast of a movie and get a direct link to the Internet Movie Database.
Last.fm: Read useful information fetched from the artist's page on Last.fm.
Lyrics: Automatically get the lyrics of the current song.
Subtitles: Find and insert subtitles on top of the video in two clicks.

Here are a few screenshots with some of these extensions:

And two concept extensions (or they might already exist, but I couldn't find a link to download):

Wikipedia: get information about the artist, the album or the movie from Wikipedia.
Concerts: Learn about the next concerts of this artist.

Installing and using the VLC extensions

1. Install VLC 1.1

The first thing you need is to use the latest VLC 1.1.

Ubuntu Karmic and Lucid users can download it from Web Upd8 PPA (don't forget to also download the x264 package).

Alternatively, add the PPA (although I recommend just downloading the packages manually):

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:nilarimogard/webupd8

And then:

sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get dist-upgrade

Like I said when announcing the Web Upd8 PPA, use it at your own risk. Also note that VLC 1.1 is not stable, so expect to find a lot of bugs. It might or might not work. If you want to remove any changes made by this PPA and reinstall the packages in the Ubuntu repositories, see this (will do it automatically).

If the VLC in this PPA doesn't work, or just want to compile VLC 1.1 from GIT yourself, see How To Compile VLC and VLMC (From GIT) In Ubuntu

If you are not using Ubuntu, download VLC nightlies from here: http://nightlies.videolan.org/

2. Download the VLC extensions

Download the extensions from HERE.

3. Installing and using the VLC extensions

Copy each of the .lua files downloaded in step 2, to the following location:

Linux: ~/.local/share/vlc/lua/extensions/ (you can enter: sudo nautilus ~/.local/share/vlc/lua/extensions/ in a terminal to open Nautilus with root permissions to the location where you must copy the .lua files).

Windows: %APPDATA%\VLC\lua\extensions

Extensions are scripts running inside VLC, that will popup windows and fetch information on the web for you. To use an extension, all you need is to activate it from the View menu. Then, it should be all self-explanatory:

Courtesy: webupd8

The Truth About Browser Cookies

2010-02-02T04:54:00.000-08:00

Browser cookies are one of those technical bits of web browsing that almost everyone has some awareness of. They're also probably one of the most misunderstood aspects of browsing. Today we're here to clear up the confusion.

Photo by esti.
When it comes to browser cookies, most users have a lot of misconceptions about what they do. Here's a closer look at exactly what a browser cookie is, what it isn't, and what it's really used for.
Note: If you're serious about your online privacy, check ouour guide on how to really browse without leaving a trace, where we cover much more than just cookies.

What Are Cookies Anyway?

Cookies are nothing more than tiny bits of text stored on your PC by your web browser, containing information set by web sites such as your session token, user preferences, or anything else that the web site needs to keep track of you from one request to the next. Once the web site has asked your browser to set the cookie, the next time your browser opens a new request to the server—clicking a link to a page, adding an item to your cart, or even loading an image—your browser will send that cookie back to the web site that set the cookie.
Cookies exist because the underlying HTTP protocol is stateless—each request from your browser is completely separate from the next one, so the server needs a way to keep track of what request belongs to what visitor. By storing a small bit of information in a cookie, the web site can determine that your page view belongs to your user account.
There are two "categories" of cookies: either first-party or third-party cookies. (Although there's actually no technical difference between the two.) First-party cookies are those cookies that belong to sites you actually visited in your browser, while third-party cookies, also known as tracking cookies, are generated from a Javascript include on the page—generally from third-party advertising web sites.

Myth: Cookies Spy On You and Track Everything You Are Doing

As we've already learned, the contents of cookies are set by the web site that you visited, so unless you've given your information to a web site, there's no way that cookies are going to contain personal information unless you've given that information to the site already.
Most cookies are as simple as a session token, but sometimes they contain your login credentials, usually encrypted or hashed in some format—but since cookies are only sent back to the same site that originated them, even if cookies contained personal information, it is not going to be shared with every site you visit.

Myth: Cookies Are Viruses or Spyware and Create Spam and Popups

Cookies are nothing more than text files and could not be executed even if you track down the hidden folder they are usually located in, but a surprising amount of people believe that cookies contain viruses or spyware. The reason for this, other than misconceptions fueled by clueless TV writers, is probably because most anti-spyware applications catch tracking cookies when you do a scan. Why? Cookies can be used by advertising web sites to track the sites you visit (assuming the sites are using the same advertising network—see more below), so most anti-spyware applications help you remove them.
The other myth is that cookies are responsible for spam and create pop-up advertisements. While it's true that an advertiser can use cookies to track which pop-up ads you've seen, the cookies have nothing to do with the advertisement in the first place.

Fact: Spyware and Viruses Can Read Your Cookies, but So What?

Another common misconception is that cookies are bad because if you have a virus or spyware infection, they can read your cookies to find out more information about you. This concept is not only overly paranoid, but completely illogical to boot—if your PC is already infected with a virus, you've got a lot more to worry about than a virus "reading" your cookies, since it has complete control over your computer, and your information at that point. You're better off spending your energy learning about the best ways to keep your PC secure.

Fact: Cookies Are Required for Logging Into Most Sites

The vast majority of web sites require cookies to be enabled in order to create an account and keep yourself logged in, so if you disable cookies in your browser, a large portion of the web is going to be broken. There are some exceptions, of course—you'll probably notice that many shopping web sites embed the session token into the URL, but it's not something that most sites are going to implement. These cookies are considered first-party cookies, because they are set by the web site you purposely visited.

Fact: Cookies are Used by Advertisers to Track Sites You Visit

Because cookies are always sent back to the site that originated them, an advertiser's cookie will be sent back to them from every web site you visit that is also using that same advertiser. This allows the advertiser to track the sites you visit, and send targeted advertising based on the types of sites that you visit.
This does not mean that advertisers can read the cookies from the web site you are visiting—they can only read their own cookies, but because the advertising Javascript is embedded in the page, they will know the URL you are visiting. These cookies are considered third-party cookies, because they are not set by the actual page you are visiting, and they can generally be blocked without causing any serious problems.
If this type of tracking keeps you up at night, consider that an advertiser can already track the sites you visit based a combination of your IP address, browser version, location, and any number of other factors—so getting rid of the tracking cookies only eliminates a small piece of the puzzle when it comes to tracking your behavior online. There are also only a few advertisers big enough to really track you across the majority of web sites—and one has to assume Google already knows everything else you're doing online.

Fact: Deleting or Blocking Cookies Can Cause More Annoying Ads

If you've ever visited a web site that sometimes, but not always, prevents you from reading the article until you click through an interstitial advertisement that takes over the entire page—you might wonder what logic dictates who sees the ads and when.
Here's how it works: interstitial ads pay web sites very lucrative rates to allow them to take over the entire page, but since most web site owners know that they are annoying, they are usually rate-limited so they aren't seen too often by the same person. Once you've seen the ad a single time, the advertiser sets a cookie on your PC to make certain that you don't see the same annoying ad again for a while. If you are deleting your cookies on a regular basis, you're probably also seeing a lot more of these interstitial ads than everybody else. That is, of course, if you don't have an adblocker installed.

Fact: Disabling Cookies Doesn't Matter If You Have Flash Enabled

As we've already pointed out in our guide to browsing without leaving a trace, even if you are blocking cookies in your browser, advertisers are using Flash cookies to keep track of what you're browsing online. In fact, more than half of the most popular web sites are using Flash tracking cookies—and even using your browser in private mode won't (currently) stop them from tracking you this way.

Still Want to Block Cookies? Try Blocking Third Party Cookies Only

If you are still worried about cookies for privacy reasons, you can set up your browser to only accept first-party cookies, so you'll still be able to log in to all the web sites that you visit. For Firefox, just head into the Options panel, switch to the Privacy tab, and uncheck the Accept third-party cookies box. If that causes you any problems, you can keep the option checked, but change the "Keep until" setting to remove the cookies once you close Firefox. Other browsers have similar settings; just head into the options to find them.

Courtesy: LifeHacker

Which Fonts Should You Use for Saving Ink

2010-02-02T04:09:00.000-08:00

Though we are headed towards an era of paperless offices where all the information would be in strict digital format, the pace is quite slow. That ink-sucking printer is still an indispensable part of your home office because you are frequently required to print invoices, emails, web pages and other documents on paper.
Since ink is still the most expensive component in the print workflow, you can reduce printing costs of documents if you can figure out ways that will decrease the consumption of ink while printing. For instance, when printing a document in Microsoft Word, you can switch to “Draft output” and the toner will last much longer.

Use a Font with Holes
An interesting option to help you save ink is Ecofont. Ecofont is like the popular Arial font but it has these little holes punched in the letters. These holes aren’t really visible in the printed document (that uses standard font sizes like 11px) but will save money as no ink is required when printing these dots.
Ecofont is available for download on Windows, Mac, and Linux systems. It may not be a good idea to use Ecofont in client communication but you can definitely consider using this font for personal or internal use.
Printing Web Pages with Custom Fonts

If you are printing web pages, I highly recommend Readability – this is a bookmarklet that will not only remove images, ads and other clutter from web pages but will also replace the font that was originally used in the formatting of that page.
Readability can sometimes remove sections from web pages that you would like to see in the print version. If that’s also a problem for you, check out PrintWhatYouLike.com – this is also a printing bookmarklet but it gives you complete control over the page layout including the font family that is used for rendering that page.

Both the above bookmarklets require a live internet connection to work. If you are looking for an alternative that will work offline, check out Green Print – they have a free version for Windows though the Mac edition costs a few bucks. Another good option is Smart Web Print from HP but that’s only available on Windows.
Which is the Best Font for Printing Documents
Now consider the third scenario. You have a document – say some training material or presentation handouts – that you want to print without sacrificing readability.
Fonts like Arial, Times News Roman, Courier, Helvetica, etc. are generally available on every machine but which one among them is the most economic typeface when it comes to printing?

Matt Robinson recently conducted a fairly unique study to determine the ink usage of these different typefaces. They used ballpoint pens to hand draw the same text at the same size but using different fonts and here’s the result.
Garamond* followed by Courier turned out to be the most economic fonts of them all while Impact and Comic Sans consumed the maximum ink. This is definitely not a “scientific study” but you still get the idea.
[*] Most Harry Potter books are set in 12pt Adobe Garamond.
Courtesy: Digital Inspiration

Gmail - Email for every purpose

2010-02-02T03:57:00.000-08:00

Let’s say that your email address is ‘GeorgeBush@gmail.com’, basically everything sent to any of the following email addresses will be forwarded to your primary email.

GeorgeBush@gmail.com
G.eorgeBush@gmail.com
Ge.orgeBush@gmail.com
GeorgeBus.h@gmail.com

GeorgeBush@googlemail.com
G.eorgeBush@googlemail.com
Ge.orgeBush@googlemail.com
GeorgeBus.h@googlemail.com

And that’s not all, you can place as many dots as you want, it can be even something like ‘G.e.o.r.g.e.B.u.s.h@gmail.com’ and you’ll still get it on ‘GeorgeBush@gmail.com’
Additionally, I just also found out that you can embed random text to your email ID using ‘+’ sign. That is to say ‘GeorgeBush+anythingyouwant@gmail.com’ can be used as your email address, as well.
Ok I got it. Now what ?
1. One email for every purpose
Instead of using different email addresses for various purposes (work, school, friends, etc.) you can use different variations of your Gmail and filter incoming mails by ’sent to’ address. For instance, all incoming mail sent to ‘Name.Surname@gmail.com’ can be put to folder ‘work’, messages sent to ‘NameSurname@gmail.com’ can be put to ‘friends’, ‘N.ameSurname@gmail.com’ can be used for newsletters, and so on.
2. Track/Block spammers
When signing up for some website, say thatwebsite.com, you can add thatwebsite to your Gmail user ID (eg. GeorgeBush+thatwebsite@gmail.com). This way you can block your subscription whenever you want and even identify those websites that distribute your email address to spammers.

Courtesy: Make Use

Twitter Addons for Firefox Browser

2010-01-31T09:06:00.000-08:00

Twitter is the most powerful microblogging service and so is Firefox among browser category. Without jumping to other sites, twitter extensions listed below allow you to post tweets, pictures, follow or unfollow friends, filter spam tweets, and much more.
Below is the list of 33 twitter addons for firefox browser that enhance twitter functionality for twitter addicts.

Photo Credit [katsurada]

List of Twitter Tools for Firefox Browser

1) Power Twitter 1.38 – It is a powerful firefox addon that allows you to share pictures on twitter via TwitPic. You can also view the original link behind the short URL, which makes you identify the content. If anybody shares only short link URL with you, then Power Twitter firefox plugin automatically translate the link into page titles. Also allow @mentions of friends on profile pages, link shrinking, facebook status updates and more.

2) Yoono – It is all-in-one firefox addon for Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Friendfeed, MySpace, Flickr, AIM, MSN and GTalk that makes your online social life very simple. Yoono plugin one installed can be accessed on the sidebar of your firefox browser window allowing you to get all your friend updates, update your status and share links, images and video across Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, and more. With its ‘Discovery’ widget, you can discover new websites, products, and videos and then share them with your friends online.

3) TwitrPix Express- Allows you to upload and share photo or images from any web site on Twitter without leaving the site you are on. All you have to do is just right-click on the image you want to share and select “Share using TwitrPix.” Enter your Twitter credentials and click Share. A link to the image and your tweet (status message) will be posted on Twitter. A “view image” button will appear if you want to see the photo you just tweeted. TwitrPix Express also provides you with an option to tag images.

4) TwitterBar- Allows you to post to Twitter from Firefox’s address bar. Just type your tweet in the address bar and click the TwitterBar icon to send it to Twitter. The URL of any webpage can be sent directly just by clicking the TwitterBar icon in the address bar. If you want to know how many characters are left for the tweet, the simply hover your mouse over the TwitterBar icon.

5) Shareaholic – A favorite firefox plugin for social networking addicts. Shareaholic allows you to share links, e-mail, tweet, videos, blogs, and images with Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Gmail, WordPress, and more.

6) Echofon- Powerful firefox addon that notifies you of your friend tweets on Twitter and allow you to view updates in a timeline and post your own tweets. Echofon allow you to access multiple Twitter accounts, get unread count in Firefox status bar, handles all the standard Twitter tasks such as direct messages and mentions, Syncs unread tweets with your iPhone and combine sequence tweets easily.

7) monkeyfly – Once you finished installing MonkeyFly, go to your Twitter page and click on the red plus sign next to “Home.” You’ll be able to add the following columns to your Twitter page: Mentions of @You, direct messages to you, your favorites, your tweets, your lists, and if you click on your “Saved Searches” you’ll be able to monitor the latest from Twitter. Apart from this you have following functionalities available which otherwise is not available with native twitter service.

Profile – By hovering the cursor over a twitter’s profile photo, you can view the latest tweets and profile information.
Photo – Using your TwitPic account, you can easily tweet a photo to your followers. The photo will then be displayed as a shortened URL in your status field.
TinyText – Using MonkeyFly’s URL shortener, you will have more room (more than 140 character limit) to write tweet.

8) Search Cloudlet – Tag cloud allows you to find relevant content quickly by showing you all the keywords. The most important websites are shown with bigger font. Search Cloudlet inserts smart tag clouds into Twitter interface to help you search faster. Just click keywords on the cloud to narrow down your tweet search. Once you install Search Cloudlet, you can view tag clouds on your Twitter home-page, search page, profile page, favorites and even into public timeline. Context-sensitive clouds like Author Clouds, Recipient Clouds and Hashtag Clouds also gets added. The plugin also provide tag cloud for Google and Yahoo.

9) Friendbar – Displays stream of text and photo updates from Facebook and Twitter right on the firefox browser toolbar and allows you to post status updates and reply from the browser toolbar itself. Friendbar allows you to automatically create a tiny URL for current web page you are viewing, post updates, retweets, direct messages, and replies, right from the Friendbar toolbar. This firefox extension also provides number of options for facebook too.

10) Twitter Glossary – While tweeting, most of the times we use some common words (slang). With Twitter Glossary you can define those words and terms that you regularly use in tweets. Once you add such words to your personal glossary, your twitter followers will be able to view the definition of those words as floating ‘tooltip’ text over the word when you use it in a tweet. So, newer ‘followers’ will not have hard time to understand everything in every tweet.

11) Twitter Search – This twitter search plugin gives you quick access to the real-time Twitter search.

12) TwitGlee – Search Twitter and Google together. Get Real Time Twitter as well as General Google results in a single webpage.

13) Twitzer – Allows you to post tweets of more than the 140 character on Twitter. The short or tiny URLs can be expanded to actual links so that you are sure you are clicking on safe links. It also help you in identifying the content of the webpage.

14) TwitJobSearch – If you want to search jobs TwitJobSearch.com then the plugin can help you.

15) Twitthat – Allows you to post current page to twitter via twitthat.com

16) TwitterEyes – TwitterEyes keeps track of your character usage when posting a status update and makes replacements for you if you want to tweet more than 140 characters.

17) Tweetlol - This extension provides you with a full-featured Twitter client as a Firefox sidebar pane. You can send status updates, follow or unfollow friend, and everything which is possible in native twitter service.

18) Twitalyzer – This add-on inserts Twitalyzer influence scores collected at www.twitalyzer.com to the Twitter web site (www.twitter.com).

19) TwittyTunes – Allows you to submit the songs to twitter you are currently playing. TwittyTunes only requires FoxyTunes in order to submit currently playing music, but if you only want to submit websites and regular updates FoxyTunes is not required.

20) Twitbin – It keeps all of your Twitter conversations on browser sidebar. Twitbin allows you to send tweets, receive messages, status updates, share links, and more.

21) Kutano - It allows users to discover other twitterers who are interested in the same web pages you are viewing and help you to connect with them instantly, either through @ replies or through easy-to-follow group discussions that can also be found directly beside the web page. Kutano also displays preview of videos and images that your followers have tweeted about, your twitter timeline, @replies, direct messages and follow/un-follow notifications directly into your browser.

22) Tweecious – It can be used as twitter backup or to archive your tweets online. Tweecious find tweets with links and post them to your delicious account. This way you’ll never lose the links you posted on Twitter.
23) Clean Tweets – Sometime Tweets will land you up to malware or porn sites. In order to get rid of such tweets, use Clean Tweets firefox extension that eliminates spam and completely removes such spam tweets from your screen. It automatically deletes any tweets from accounts that are less than 24hrs old and anyone tweet that mentions 3 or more (or what you decide) trending topics in it will not show up.

24) TinyTweet – Allow you to quickly tweet by simply highlighting any text in a web page. Once you highlight any text you want to tweet, just hit the “tweet this” button to sent the tweet. The addon uses bit.ly service to shorten the URL.

25) TwitKit TwitKit is a Twitter sidebar for Firefox. TwitKit has a 6-section interface, using tabs to separate content. You can view the Twitter public timeline, your user timeline, a list of your friends and their latest tweets, a list of your followers and their latest tweets, @replies made to you, and stats about your account.

26) InstantTweets – This firefox extension lets you send tweets directly from your address bar by simply clicking the blue bird icon. The bird icon will display BLUE if someone is following you and RED if they are not. Just right click on any Image or site to tweet a link to it on Twitter. InstantTweets also shows you “Characters Remaining Countdown” and shorten the Long URLs automatically.

27) Twitter Line - Twitter lines shows your friend’s time line Twitter on your browser tool bar. The addon also allows you to update your status and add/remove favorites.

28) Read All Tweets – It displays only unread tweets in the order beginning from oldest. If you are atwitter addict and do not want to miss out a single tweet on Twitter time-line, then this extension is the best. It also show replies from users you don’t follow and notifies about new DMs.

29) Bccth.is - Use the Bccth.is button to easily tweet from any page you’re on. Your tweet will be automatically populated with the title and URL of the page you are currently viewing. Also select followers and send them a private message in addition to your tweet.

30) Twitter ToolBar – Allow you to tweet the same message more than once on Twitter, so it is easy to re-tweet your own content again and again. Menu offers links to important Twitter pages, replies to you, and its search page.

31) Twiference Sidebar - Twiference Sidebar searches Twitter every time page changed with the keys extracted from the url. It assembles the results then displays the number of detected pages in the status bar and the tweets in the sidebar.

32) CloudBerry TweetFox - CloudBerry Twitter plug-in for Firefox lets you post excerpts from the websites you visit with a click of the button and attach a short URL to the source page.

33) Twicsy - Realtime Twitter Picture Search Engine – Real time image search of Twitpic, yFrog, flickr photos and more

Courtesy: Binary Head

Firefox 3.6 tips and tweak

2010-01-29T03:25:00.000-08:00

Here are five quick tips to enhance your Firefox 3.6 experience.

1. Open links in the tab bar far right

In Firefox 3.6, links opened from a web page (middle-clicking on them or from the context menu) open to the right of the current page to keep related content closer by default. To restore the previous behavior, access the advanced preferences by visiting about:config, then look for preference browser.tabs.insertRelatedAfterCurrent and set it to false.

2. Enable tab previews

If you prefer to see tabs thumbnails when switching tabs with Ctrl + Tab, set browser.ctrlTab.previews to true via about:config.

3. Enable tab previews menu button

Convert the list all tabs button (far right in the tab bar), set browser.allTabs.previews to true via about:config.

4. Tab previews hotkey

To quickly access the all tabs preview panel (once enabled) and search press Shift + Ctrl + Tab.

5. Hide the menu bar

On Windows, you can now hide the menu bar to gain a few thousand pixels for the actual content. Right-click on the menu bar and uncheck Menu Bar. To show it temporarily, press the Alt key.

Courtesy: Mozilla Links
Author: Percy Cabello

JavaScript Array Remove an Element

2010-01-27T20:15:00.000-08:00

Following is an example of JavaScript where we will remove elements from an array with Index and Value. There are different methods in JavaScript that we can use to remove elements. We will use splice() method.

Remove Array element by Index

First we will see an example were we will remove array element by its index. For this we can define a generic function removeByIndex().

function removeByIndex(arr, index) {
arr.splice(index, 1);
}

In above code we used javascript splice() method to remove element at an index. splice() method takes two argument. First is the index at which you want to remove element and second is number of elements to be removed. In our case it is 1.

To test the above code lets define a simple array and remove one of the element.

test = new Array();
test[0] = 'Apple';
test[1] = 'Ball';
test[2] = 'Cat';
test[3] = 'Dog';
alert("Array before removing elements: "+test);
removeByIndex(test, 2);
alert("Array after removing elements: "+test);

Also you may want to define removeByIndex method with an array so that you call it directly. For example, in following example, we have define an array test and its method removeByIndex().

test = new Array();
//define removeByIndex method as part of the array
Array.prototype.removeByIndex = function(index) {
this.splice(index, 1);
}
test[0] = 'Apple';
test[1] = 'Ball';
test[2] = 'Cat';
test[3] = 'Dog';
alert("Array before removing elements: "+test);
test.removeByIndex(2);
alert("Array after removing elements: "+test);

Remove Array element by Value

You may want to remove array element by its value and not index. This can be easily done by iterating through it and comparing the values, if a match is found we can remove that element by splice() method.

function removeByValue(arr, val) {
for(var i=0; i

The above code can be written as part of array also:

test = new Array();
Array.prototype.removeByValue = function(val) {
for(var i=0; i

Enjoy…

Courtesy: Viral Patel
Author: Viral Patel

Top 5 Free Microsoft Products

2010-01-27T03:36:00.000-08:00

Microsoft’s Internet Explorer may be the worst browser on the planet, and any Mac lover or Linux geek can easily expound on the flaws in the Windows operating system.

However, it would be foolhardy to abandon our objectivity and criticize all Microsoft products. Not only does Microsoft make some great products, but several of them are available for you to use completely free.

Here are my picks for the Top 5 free Microsoft software products and why they are the best.

#1: Windows Live Writer

Any blogger not using Windows Live Writer (WLW) is wasting time and being unproductive. Looking for a better alternative? There is none.

WLW makes blogging a breeze on popular platforms like Wordpress, Blogger, Windows Live, LiveJournal and Typepad. True WYSIWYG editing shows you previews of how your post will look. Easily upload/embed photos/videos with borders, effects, alignment, and resizing. WLW also has an extensible framework of plugins, that let you customize and extend its functionality. Check out our previous coverage of WLW to get more out of this must-have tool for bloggers.

#2: Photosynth

Microsoft Photosynth is a jaw-dropping technology that automatically stitches together your photos to create an immersive 3D view. You can explore hundreds of thousands of synths on the site, or upload your own photos to create your own synth. You can then embed your synth on your website to share with everyone. This can even be used for multiple people uploading pictures of an event. For example, here is the photosynth of Obama’s presidential inauguration made with hundreds of photographs contributed by multiple people. Below is a snapshot of a popular synth of the Statue of Liberty.

From NASA to National Geographic, you can explore fascinating 3D views of places all over the world. Photosynth uses the Seadragon technology that we’ve covered previously on MakeUseOf.

Photosynth is also integrated with Bing Maps. Over 14,000 geo-tagged photosynths comprising 1.4 million photos uploaded by users like you and me can be explored via the Photosynth Bing Maps application – easily one of the best free Microsoft software products.

#3: World Wide Telescope

Microsoft WorldWide Telescope (WWT) brings terabytes of imagery from the best ground telescopes and the Hubble Space Telescope to your desktop. It seamlessly combines the data from these multiple sources into a rich immersive world that you can explore from your home. Use the native Windows client for all features, or the web client for a smaller subset. Guided tours from experts are a great way to introduce the stars and galaxies to youngsters. Exploration is possible not only in the visible light spectrum, but also in non-visible wavelengths such as x-ray and infrared.

The user interface and imagery use Photosynth technology and is said to be significantly better than Google Sky.

#4: Windows Live Skydrive

Windows Live Skydrive offers 25 GB of free space to anyone with a free Live ID for uploading, storing, and sharing files and photos. Most online storage services do not provide anything above 2 GB for free, and Skydrive’s 25 GB remains unparalleled. You can choose to keep files private, share them with contacts, or make them public. People are uploading 4 million photos to Skydrive every day. With Office 2010, you’ll be able to directly save a document on your PC to Skydrive.

Check out MakeUseOf’s coverage of Windows Live to get the most out of Skydrive.

#5: Bing

Bing is one of the best free Microsoft software products. While I still use Google almost exclusively myself, I have no hesitation in nominating Bing in this list of the best free Microsoft products. Why?

For starters, Bing is better than Google for certain kinds of queries. Natural language searches seem to be better in Bing. The categories and suggestions offered by Bing on the left are unique and not matched by Google. Check out these 10 Sites to Compare Google vs Bing Results Side by Side and judge for yourself.

But the real reason I love Bing is because it provides competition to Google. The past decade has seen Google become a monopoly in the search business. With Bing’s increasing popularity, Google is forced to innovate. Compare the rate of feature enhancements announced by Google before and after the arrival of Bing and you will agree that Bing makes Google better. That is certainly good for all of us and the web in general.

Courtesy: Make Use
Author: Mahendra Palsule

Firebug - Web Development Evolved

2010-01-25T22:31:00.000-08:00

Firebug integrates with Firefox to put a wealth of web development tools at your fingertips while you browse. You can edit, debug, and monitor CSS, HTML, and JavaScript live in any web page.

Just the way you like it

Firebug is always just a keystroke away, but it never gets in your way. You can open Firebug in a separate window, or as a bar at the bottom of your browser. Firebug also gives you fine-grained control over which websites you want to enable it for.

Learn more

Inspect and edit HTML

Firebug makes it simple to find HTML elements buried deep in the page. Once you've found what you're looking for, Firebug gives you a wealth of information, and lets you edit the HTML live.

Learn more

Tweak CSS to perfection

Firebug's CSS tabs tell you everything you need to know about the styles in your web pages, and if you don't like what it's telling you, you can make changes and see them take effect instantly.

Learn more

Visualize CSS metrics

When your CSS boxes aren't lining up correctly it can be difficult to understand why. Let Firebug be your eyes and it will measure and illustrate all the offsets, margins, borders, padding, and sizes for you.

Learn more

Monitor network activity

Your pages are taking a long time to load, but why? Did you go crazy and write too much JavaScript? Did you forget to compress your images? Are your ad partner's servers taking a siesta? Firebug breaks it all down for you file-by-file.

Learn more

Debug and profile JavaScript

Firebug includes a powerful JavaScript debugger that lets you pause execution at any time and have look at the state of the world. If your code is a little sluggish, use the JavaScript profiler to measure performance and find bottlenecks fast.

Learn more

Quickly find errors

When things go wrong, Firebug lets you know immediately and gives you detailed and useful information about errors in JavaScript, CSS, and XML.

Learn more

Explore the DOM

The Document Object Model is a great big hierarchy of objects and functions just waiting to be tickled by JavaScript. Firebug helps you find DOM objects quickly and then edit them on the fly.

Learn more

Execute JavaScript on the fly

The command line is one of the oldest tools in the programming toolbox. Firebug gives you a good ol' fashioned command line for JavaScript complete with very modern amenities.

Learn more

Logging for JavaScript

Having a fancy JavaScript debugger is great, but sometimes the fastest way to find bugs is just to dump as much information to the console as you can. Firebug gives you a set of powerful logging functions that help you get answers fast. Courtsy

Learn

Courtesy: FireBug

Five alternatives to Internet Explorer

2010-01-25T04:00:00.000-08:00

There are plenty of alternatives to Internet Explorer, but be warned -- no web browser is 100 per cent secure

Mozilla Firefox

Firefox 3.6 is the latest version of the increasingly popular web browser. Mozilla claims it's 20 per cent faster than its predecessor, and features a "plug-in updater" – a tool that detects out-of-date programs that run in your browser (such as Flash, which is used for displaying some animated web pages or watching online videos).

Flock

Flock is a "social web browser" – it acts as a portal for people who want to integrate their Facebook and Flickr accounts, blogs, YouTube page and favourite websites into a single window.

Chrome

Google's web browser handles media-rich websites with ease, and because it treats individual "tabs" – open web pages – as separate programs, meaning that if one tab crashes, the whole browsing session isn't affected. The "incognito window" means you visit sites without saving your browsing history.

Opera

Opera is used on the Nintendo Wii, and Opera Mini is also an incredibly popular browser for mobile phones. Opera has all the usual features (it pioneered tabbed browsing in 2000), and can restore browsing sessions at the click of a mouse.

Safari

The Apple equivalent of Internet Explorer has a similar look and feel to the iTunes music store. Along with tabbed browsing and a built-in RSS feed reader, it also has Top Sites, a window that shows your most frequently-visited web pages.

Courtesy: Telegraph
Author: Claudine Beaumont

How to Use Twitter During Office Hours

2010-01-25T02:13:00.000-08:00

Some organizations have this policy that social media sites like Twitter, Facebook, etc. are a waste of time and therefore ban their staff from using such sites during office hours.

Then you also have companies that have no such rules in place and allow unrestricted access to the web as long as the employees are able to deliver what’s expected.

A. When Twitter is Not Allowed in Office

If you are working for a company that falls in the first category (no social media please), its better that you install a Twitter mobile app on your cell phone and not use the office computer at all for tweeting. After all, your boss will get a web usage report at the month-end and he will easily figure out which sites have you been visiting secretly during office hours.

If you don’t have a data-plan on your phone and cannot resist that urge to tweet ever 10 minutes, you may use tools like Posterous or Nutshell that allow anyone to send and receive tweets through regular office email.

There’s another option that will come handy if the twitter.com website itself has been blocked by your office firewall. You can use Twitter indirectly through third-party sites like Brizzly or Dabr.

These sites offer a fresh interface to your Twitter account with all the regular features (retweets, @replies, etc.) but the more interesting part is that they will work even if Twitter domain is inaccessible from your office computer. You can track up to 5 accounts with Brizzly.

Your Twitter friends’ timeline feed is protected by a password but you may still subscribe to it with a simple hack involving FeedBurner.

You can then follow tweets from your friends using Outlook or any other newsreader. Alternatively, you can subscribe to the friend’s feed directly with FeedDemon provided that access to Twitter is open in your office.

If you are allowed to use IM clients in Office, you can add twitter@twitter.com as a buddy in Google Talk and send tweets through IM. TweetSwitch is another free service that lets you send and receive tweets through popular instant messaging clients including AIM, Windows Live Messenger, Yahoo! Messenger, Skype and GTalk.

B. Use Twitter Without Letting Anyone Know

Now let’s look at the second category – you are very much allowed to use Twitter at work but you still don’t want to give your boss an impression that you are a Twitter addict.

In that case, here’s what you can do to possibly hide your Twitter addiction from boss and colleagues.

You can probably find a gazillion desktop apps for Twitter but if you are looking for something that doesn’t scream to the world that its a Twitter client, try Quitter.

Quitter is a simple twitter client that runs through the command prompt or the DOS window. With Quitter, you can read and reply to tweets, follow /unfollow people or even manage your direct messages. All you need is a Windows computer and no one in the office will ever have a clue that you are engrossed in Twitter.

If you are a Microsoft Office user, Spreadtweet is another interesting option for you. This is a proper Twitter client but in the guise of a spreadsheet so your boss will think that you’re working on an Excel sheet while you are up there tweeting your heart out!

With SpreadTweet, you can send and receive updates, @replies and direct messages all inside an application that looks like a clone of Excel 2007.

The other great option for Microsoft Office users in TwInbox – you probably have Outlook open on your screen all the time and this free Outlook add-in will simply turn your Outlook into a powerful Twitter client.

You can handle tweets just the way you manage your Inbox and the add-in will even let you tweet email messages with a click. The service is integrated with TwitPic so you can tweet pictures by simply dragging them into Outlook.

There’s more – all standard Outlook features like search, mail archiving, categories, etc. will also become available to your Tweets. This screencast explains TwInbox in detail.

Courtesy: Digital Inspiration
Author: Amit Agrawal

How To Do Interesting Things With Twitter?

2010-01-25T01:33:00.000-08:00

Twitter Guide: Learn some interesting tips and tricks for Twitter.

Q: I am a blogger and want to cross-post articles from my blog into Twitter?

A: Go to FeedBlitz, type the address of the feed in the Subscribe box and choose Twitter from the subscription options. The other option is Twitter Feed but that requires you to have an OpenID.

Q: I know that TwitPic allows me to post pictures on Twitter but I want to use my existing Flick account with Twitter.

A: Go to TwitterGram and associate your Flickr name with your Twitter account. Now assign a special tag (say Twitter) and any picture that you post on Flickr with that Tag will automatically get posted in your Twitter account as well.

Q: I just ordered a laptop on eBay and the owner shipped it via UPS. I want to track this package on Twitter.

A: Follow TrackThis on Twitter and send this bot a Direct Message with your Airway Bill Number. You’ll be notified each time your package changes location. Works with FedEx, UPS, DHL and USPS.

Q. I want to add events in my Google Calendar using Twitter?

A: Go to Twittercal, add gCal as your virtual friend on Twitter and add events by simply sending direct messages to your new Twitter friend.

Q: I am a blogger. How can I add “tweet this” links to all my blog post?

A: See detailed instructions on how to add ‘Tweet This’ to Blogger or WordPress blogs. The permalinks are shortened automatically in the tweet.

Q: Oh! I just saw a spam profile on Twitter that is using my picture and tweets. I want to report impersonation on Twitter.

A: Send a message to Twitter spam watch team at @spam with the suspicious user name.

Q: My Twitter friend just sent me a tweet in French. I want to translate his message into English.

A: Follow twanslate and send a direct message with the text you want to get translated along with the language code of the target language (en for English, fr from French, etc.).

Q: I want to use Twitter as a Gmail Notifier.

A: Create a new Twitter account and set the status of updates as “Protected” so that the updates don’t appear in a public timeline. Now subscribe to your Gmail RSS feed using FeedBlitz and become mutual friends.

Q: I want to use Twitter as an alarm clock to remind me that I have to pick my daughter from school in 30 minutes.

A: Follow timer – send a direct message with the reminder time and it will ping you at that time. For instance “d timer 30 pick daughter”.

Q: I want to use Twitter for ego surfing.

A: Go to tweetbeep and set up alerts for certain keywords and web URLs. You’ll get an email notification as soon as someone mentions you or your brand or your blog posts in their tweets.

Q: While I like the default Twitter search engine, I want to know about other alternatives.

A: Try Tweet Scan and Monitter. Unlike Summize, you don’t have to refresh the Monitter page each time there’s a new result matching your search query. And it support multi-column search so may track multiple keywords on the same screen.

Q: I want to conduct a quick and simple poll on Twitter. Is it possible?

A: Go to StrawPoll and create a poll. Your Twitter contacts can participate in the poll by simply sending an @reply message.

Firefox 3.6 Released: With New CSS Gradient Feature

2010-01-24T21:01:00.000-08:00

Mozilla has finally released Firefox 3.6, the newest version of its popular browser after months of testing. New Firefox is 20% faster than Firefox 3.5, according to Mozilla. It uses Gecko 1.9.2 web-rendering, which improves its load times, startup speed and stability. Javascript execution is faster and smoother as well. There’s also autocomplete form functionality and full HTML5 support. New feature called Personas has been added in Firefox 3.6 which lets you customize your Firefox with a single click and without a restart.

My Favourite feature is the addition of new CSS Gradient API. You can define Gradient effect on any element by specifying simple CSS styles. Thus now you can have CSS Gradient Effect without Images!
Note: All the below examples are Images. In order to view the gradient effect one must use Firefox 3.6

Liner Gradient

To create a linear gradient, you’ll need to set a starting point and a direction (or angle) for the gradient and to define the color stops.

`1`	`-moz-linear-gradient( [ \|\| ,]? , [, ]* )`

Starting Point: The starting point works just like background position. You can set the horizontal and the vertical positions as a percentage, in pixels, or using left/center/right for horizontal, and top/center/bottom for vertical. Positions start from the top left corner. If you don’t specify the horizontal or the vertical position, it will default to center.
Example

linear_gradient_square {
 width: 100px;
 height: 100px;
 border: 1px solid #333;
 background: -moz-linear-gradient(top, blue, white);
}

One that starts left (horizontal) and center (vertical):

`1`	`background: -moz-linear-gradient(left,` `blue,` `white);`

Here’s a simple example with three color stops. Because no point is specified for the first and last colors, they will default to 0% and 100%.

`1`	`background: -moz-linear-gradient(top,` `blue,` `white` `80%, orange);`

Colors will be evenly spaced if no position is specified.

`1`	`background: -moz-linear-gradient(left,` `red, orange, yellow,` `green,` `blue);`

Radial Gradients

The syntax for radial gradients is very similar to that of linear gradients:

`1`	`-moz-radial-gradient([ \|\| ,]? [ \|\| ,]? , [, ]*);`

Color stops: Just like with linear gradients, you should define color stops along the gradient line. The following circles have the same color stops, but the gradient on the left defaults to evenly spaced colors, while the one on the right has a specific position for each color.

1background: -moz-radial-gradient(red, yellow, #1E90FF);
2background: -moz-radial-gradient(red 5%, yellow 25%, #1E90FF 50%);

1.radial_gradient_circle {
2    background: -moz-radial-gradient(bottom left, circle, red, yellow, #1E90FF);
3}
4 .radial_gradient_ellipse {
5    background: -moz-radial-gradient(bottom left, ellipse, red, yellow, #1E90FF);
6}

1background: -moz-radial-gradient(ellipse closest-side, red, yellow 10%, #1E90FF 50%, white);
2background: -moz-radial-gradient(ellipse farthest-corner, red, yellow 10%, #1E90FF 50%, white);

1.repeating_radial_gradient_example {
2    background: -moz-repeating-radial-gradient(black, black 5px, white 5px, white 10px);
3}
4 .repeating_linear_gradient_example {
5     background: -moz-repeating-linear-gradient(top left -45deg, red, red 5px, white 5px, white 10px);
6}

Courtesy: ViralPatel
Author: Viral Patel

Windows Live MSN Messenger - Cool Tips & Tricks

2010-01-21T01:17:00.000-08:00

Windows Live Messenger, formally known has MSN Messenger (provided by Microsoft), has to be one of my favourite messaging clients. I am on it almost 24/7 and there are a few nifty features that make the experience a whole lot better.

This will be a two part post with the first part covering cool Windows Live tips and tricks that you can do without installing any add-ons, and the second part explains how you can make your Windows Live Messenger experience much more fun.

1. Remove Those Annoying Ads

You may noticed at the very bottom of the Windows Live Messenger main window, they show ads to you. However, if they slightly annoy you from time to time, here is a trick on how to block them.

On your Windows computer, open up Internet Explorer. Click on Tools, then select Internet Options. Click on the Security tab, click on Restricted sites, then click on the Sites button.

Then simply add the URL http://rad.msn.com. This serves as the Microsoft ad server and once you restrict this site, Windows Live Messenger will go from this:

to this:

2. See Which Contacts Haven’t Added You To Their Contact List

One of the most searched for keywords on my website is “how do I find out who blocked or deleted me on MSN”. It is really simple to find the answer and you don’t have to install any software on your computer or spy on your friends.

In Windows Live Messenger just go to Tools –> Options, go to the Privacy section, and under Contact List, click on View. The list that is presented to you are all your contacts that have got you on their contact list. If a contact of yours is not on that list, they have either not added you or have deleted you because they don’t want to talk to you anymore – yes I know the feeling.

If going through that list will take a while, you can also download aMSN (which is a excellent portable MSN program for your USB drive). When you view your contacts, the contacts that do not have you on their list will have a red cross next to them.

Another good thing is that you can send unlimited nudges to your friends.

3. Remote Assistance

MakeUseOf has covered many remote assistant applications such as Crossloop, Instant HouseCall, LogMeIn, uVNC, and Foldershare, but did you know Windows Live Messenger is another one? Just simply start a chat, select activities and click request remote assistance.

Accept all the prompts, then the other person will be able to view your screen, and they can control your computer if you wish for them too.

If it doesn’t work, make sure “Allow Remote Assistance” is enabled by right clicking on My Computer, select properties, Remote, and tick the box.

4. Changing Your Display Name

Want to impress your friends and have a cool name and spell your name like Ĝмдїι.©ǾМ? Well, if you open up Microsoft Word for example, find some symbols that look like characters, or even change the font, you can then paste that text into your display name field on MSN. If you want, you can also draw images like these ones.

Courtesy: Make Use of
Author: Jack Cola

Default https access for Gmail

2010-01-19T03:44:00.000-08:00

Gmail has long offered a more secure connection option over Https, and two years ago let users set it themselves as a default. Now Google is making https the default setting for all Gmail accounts, unless you flip it back.

Given their recent security episode in China, and the ever-expanding realm of devices and portals users can get at Gmail from, it's probably a smart step forward to gently goad users into using a more secure connection standard. Google notes that, although using https creates a slight latency, they believe the trade-off is worth it.

If https presents a problem in your particular IT environment, you can still switch it off in your Settings. Here's Google's explanation:

"If you've previously set your own https preference from Gmail Settings, nothing will change for your account. If you trust the security of your network and don't want default https turned on for performance reasons, you can turn it off at any time by choosing "Don't always use https" from the Settings menu. Gmail will still always encrypt the login page to protect your password. Google Apps users whose admins have not already defaulted their entire domains to https will have the same option."

Google also notes that Offline Gmail users who weren't already using https as a default may see some issues, but they suggest a work-around.

Does a default https present problems for your own Gmail account? Happy to see the security struggle moving a step forward? Tell us your take in the comments.

Courtesy: Default https access for Gmail
Author: [Official Gmail Blog]

Your Passwords Aren't As Secure As You Think

2010-01-19T02:45:00.000-08:00

If you allow applications to save your passwords, anyone with physical access to your PC can decode them unless you're properly encrypting them—and chances are pretty good you're not. Let's walk through the right and wrong ways to store your passwords.

For the purpose of this article, we'll assume that the people you allow into your house are trustworthy enough not to hack your passwords, and your laptop has been stolen instead—but the tips here should apply to either scenario. Regardless of how you choose to save your passwords, you should make sure to use great passwords and even stronger answers for security questions.

Once You Click "Remember Password" It's All Over
Almost any application that requires you to login to something will also provide an option to save your password, and once you've done that, your password may as well be plain text. Behind the scenes, even if the application encrypts the account information, it's doing so with a static key that can be easily deciphered through some reverse engineering, and somebody not only can, but already has created a utility to recover those passwords.

It doesn't even matter all that much if you've got a tough Windows password; anybody with physical access to your PC can use an Ubuntu Live CD to copy all of your data onto an external drive without modifying anything, and crack your files on another machine whenever they please (assuming you don't have your entire hard drive encrypted). If they had a little more time, they could use Ophcrack to figure out your password, or they could just be mean and use the System Rescue CD to change your Windows password.

Once that person has access to your files, they can recover your passwords with free tools easily—you can recover passwords in a few clicks from Outlook, Instant Messenger, Wi-Fi, Internet Explorer, Firefox, Chrome, or any number of other applications. All it takes is a quick Google search to find even more cracking utilities.

Pidgin Stores Passwords in Plain Text
That's right, your favorite open-source, multi-protocol instant messenger client stores your passwords in plain text. If you don't believe me, just open up your %appdata%\.purple\accounts.xml file in your favorite text editor, and you'll see your passwords right there for anybody to read.

The decision to store the passwords in plain text is a deliberate one that's been thoughtfully considered, and while you might initially think it's a terribly insecure way to handle security, keep in mind that you can simply download any number of utilities like Nirsoft's MessenPass and recover the passwords from AIM, Windows Live Messenger, Trillian, Miranda, Google Talk, Digsby, etc. The Pidgin developers point out that their option is actually the preferred method for security:

Having our passwords in plaintext is more secure than obfuscating them precisely because, when a user is not misled by a false sense of security, he is likely to use the software in a more secure manner.

The best answer, of course, is to not allow your IM client to store your passwords at all—but if you must store them, you should at least use the built-in Windows encryption, if not a full-blown TrueCrypt setup. Either option would be better than the pseudo-protection most other applications provide.

Password Managers Are the Only Secure Storage
The only truly secure way to store your passwords is to use a password manager to securely track your passwords, combined with a a great master password to protect the rest of your saved passwords—if you use an easy password for your password manager, it would be easy to crack with a brute force attack. Don't lure yourself into a false sense of security by just using one—your password manager password should be at least 10 alpha-numeric characters if you really want to be secure.

You've got a number of great password managers to choose from, like reader favorite Keepass, a cross-platform tool which has many plugins that help you master your passwords and make using a password manager easier to deal with. And, of course, let's not forget that Firefox has a full password manager built right into the application.

Use a Firefox Master Password (With More Than 8 Characters)
If you want to use Firefox to save the passwords for all your web accounts, you should make sure to enable a Firefox Master Password by heading into Tools –> Options –> Security and checking the box for Use a master password.

Once you've done this, Firefox will store all of your passwords with nearly unbreakable AES encryption—providing you use a password with more than 8 alpha-numeric characters and at least one capitalized letter. If you used a weak and pathetic password like "secret", it could be broken in a matter of minutes with a brute force cracking tool, but a decent 8+ random character password will take at least 73 years for a brute force attack.

Each time you start Firefox and go to a site that requires a saved password, you'll be first prompted for your master password. By default, the master password authentication will be active for the entire session, but you can use the Master Password Timeout extension to lock your master password again after a certain interval, which is handy if you walk away from your desk without remembering to lock it with Win+L.

Use TrueCrypt to Encrypt Everything
Rather than deal with password managers or whether or not to save your passwords, you could simply create a separate, encrypted TrueCrypt drive, and use portable versions of your applications to keep everything totally secure. If you're even more paranoid, you can use TrueCrypt to encrypt the entire hard drive—you will be prompted for a password every time you boot, but you can relax knowing that anything you do will be encrypted, even if you use scripts with your passwords stored in plain text. If TrueCrypt isn't your thing, you can use the built-in encryption functionality in Windows—just keep in mind that if you change your password your data will be inaccessible, and your Windows password can be cracked, giving them full access to your files.
Are you already using a password manager or encryption to keep your passwords secure? Share your best password security tips in the comments.

Courtesy: Lifehacker
Author: lowell@lifehacker.com

Access Facebook and Twitter From Gmail

2009-12-01T01:27:00.000-08:00

iGoogle gadgets can be added to Gmail. Since that is not what they are originally made for, they can look a little weird or just not be of any use at all. But these two gadgets works!

The Twitter gadget is actually made for Gmail, and the great thing is that it goes "fullscreen", that is, instead of your email you see tweets! The same goes for Facebook, although it's originally made for
iGoogle. But it also goes fullscreen, you just have to click on "Expand" inside the gadget box.

To install them, just do the following:

1. Go to Settings –> Labs, find "Add any gadget by URL" and activate it.
2. Find a XML gadget for Gmail or iGoogle.
3. Go to Settings –> Gadgets, enter the gadget URL into the text box and click Add.

These are the gadget URLs:
Twitter - http://twittergadget.appspot.com/gadget-gmail.xml
Facebook - http://hosting.gmodules.com/ig/gadgets/file/104971404861070329537/facebook.xml

Cisco CCNA Questions & Answers

2008-01-29T22:19:00.000-08:00

Decision Support System

2007-12-22T23:21:00.000-08:00

Definition:

For Little, a DSS is a "model-based set of procedures for processing data and judgments to assist a manager in his decision-making." Moore and Chang define DSS as extendible systems capable of supporting ad hoc data analysis and decision modeling, oriented toward future planning, and used at irregular, unplanned intervals. For Sprague and Carlson, DSS are "interactive computer-based systems that help decision makers utilize data and models to solve unstructured problems."

Decision support systems are a class of computer-based information systems including knowledge based systems that support decision making activities. Decision support systems are man – machine system for decision making purposes. Man part is more open & probabilistic while the machine part is more closed and deterministic. DSS must be closed system with feedback, external to the system. It uses the feedback to adjust output. Feedback is not internal like an elevator. The user provides judgmental inputs to the DSS.

According to the mode of assistance, DSS can be categorized into five different models:

A model-driven DSS emphasizes access to and manipulation of a statistical, financial, optimization, or simulation model. Model-driven DSS use data and parameters provided by users to assist decision makers in analyzing a situation; they are not necessarily data intensive.
A communication-driven DSS supports more than one person working on a shared task; examples include integrated tools like Microsoft's NetMeeting or Groove.
A data-driven DSS or data-oriented DSS emphasizes access to and manipulation of a time series of internal company data and, sometimes, external data.
A document-driven DSS manages, retrieves and manipulates unstructured information in a variety of electronic formats.
A knowledge-driven DSS provides specialized problem solving expertise stored as facts, rules, procedures, or in similar structures; examples are Expert Systems.

Algorithms Developed For Implementing D.S.S.:

There are many algorithms such as Analytical Hierarchical Process (AHP), Analytical Network Process (ANP), The Simple Multi Attribute Rating Technique (SMART) and other AI and Expert system technique.
ANP is best used in the case when there is interdependence among the items and the alternatives. ANP does not require independence among elements, so it can be used as an effective tool in these cases. Thus, this dependency increases complexity in design and sometimes becomes overhead when there is no dependencies among the parameters. It is the more general form of AHP.AHP is the specific form of ANP used in multi-criteria decision analysis. Both the AHP and the ANP derive ratio scale priorities for elements and clusters of elements by making paired comparisons of elements on a common property or criterion.

Analytical Hierarchical Process:

The Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) is a structured technique for dealing with complex decisions. The AHP provides a comprehensive and rational framework for structuring a problem, for representing and quantifying its elements, for relating those elements to overall goals, and for evaluating alternative solutions.
In AHP, first the decision problem is decomposed into a hierarchy of more easily comprehended sub-problems, each of which can be analyzed easily.
Once the hierarchy is built, various elements are systematically evaluated comparing them to one another in pairs. In making the comparisons, judgments about the elements' relative meaning and importance can be provided. It is the essence of the AHP that human judgments, and not just the underlying information, can be used in performing the evaluations.
The AHP converts the judgments to numerical values that can be processed, evaluated and compared over the entire range of the problem. A numerical weight or priority is derived for each element of the hierarchy, allowing diverse and often incommensurable elements to be compared to one another in a rational and consistent way. This capability distinguishes the AHP from other decision making techniques.
Although AHP is used in wide range by lots of decision makers, we still can’t deny the fact that it has a flaw. Researchers have found that the flaws in AHP are significant and lead to various types of decision errors.
Some flaws of AHP are:

The Use of Arbitrary Scales (1,3,5,7,9 or their reciprocal (1,1/3,1/5,1/7,1/9))
Rank Reversal
Inducement of Nonexistent Order

References:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decision_support_system
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Analytic_Hierarchy_Process
http://mat.gsia.cmu.edu/mstc/multiple/node4.html

Spring

2007-11-06T08:19:00.000-08:00

What is Spring?
Spring is an open-source framework, created by Rod Johnson and described in his book Expert One-on-One: J2EE Design and Development.1 It was created to address the complexity of enterprise application development. Spring makes it possible to use plain-vanilla JavaBeans to achieve things that were previously only possible with EJBs. However, Spring’s usefulness isn’t limited to server-side development. Any Java application can benefit from Spring in terms of simplicity, testability, and loose coupling.
Put simply, Spring is a lightweight inversion of control and aspect-oriented container framework. Okay, that’s not so simple a description. But it does summarizewhat Spring does. To make more sense of Spring, let’s break this description down:

Lightweight—Spring is lightweight in terms of both size and overhead. The entire Spring framework can be distributed in a single JAR file that weighs in at just over 1 MB. And the processing overhead required by Spring is negligible. What’s more, Spring is nonintrusive: objects in a Spring-enabled application typically have no dependencies on Springspecific classes.
Inversion of control—Spring promotes loose coupling through a technique known as inversion of control (IoC). When IoC is applied, objects are passively given their dependencies instead of creating or looking for dependent objects for themselves. You can think of IoC as JNDI in reverse—instead of an object looking up dependencies from a container, the container gives the dependencies to the object at instantiation without waiting to be asked.
Aspect-oriented—Spring comes with rich support for aspect-oriented programming that enables cohesive development by separating application business logic from system services (such as auditing and transaction management). Application objects do what they’re supposed to do—perform business logic—and nothing more. They are not responsible for (or even aware of) other system concerns, such as logging or transactional support.
Container—Spring is a container in the sense that it contains and manages the life cycle and configuration of application objects. You can configure how your each of your beans should be created—either create one single instance of your bean or produce a new instance every time one is needed based on a configurable prototype—and how they should be associated with each other. Spring should not, however, be confused with traditionally heavyweight EJB containers, which are often large and cumbersome
to work with.
Framework—Spring makes it possible to configure and compose complex applications from simpler components. In Spring, application objects are composed declaratively, typically in an XML file. Spring also provides much infrastructure functionality (transaction management, persistence framework integration, etc.), leaving the development of application logic to you.

All of these attributes of Spring enable you to write code that is cleaner, more manageable, and easier to test. They also set the stage for a variety of subframeworks within the greater Spring framework.

Spring modules:
The Spring framework is made up of seven well-defined modules. When taken as a whole, these modules give you everything you need to develop enterprise-ready applications. But you do not have to base your application fully on the Spring framework. You are free to pick and choose the modules that suit your application and ignore the rest.
All of Spring’s modules are built on top of the core container. The container defines how beans are created, configured, and managed—more of the nuts-and-bolts of Spring. You will implicitly use these classes when you configure your application. But as a developer, you will most likely be interested in the other modules that leverage the services provided by the container. These
modules will provide the frameworks with which you will build your application’s services, such as AOP and persistence.

1. The core container
Spring’s core container provides the fundamental functionality of the Spring framework. In this module you’ll find Spring’s BeanFactory, the heart of any Spring-based application. A BeanFactory is an implementation of the factory pattern that applies IoC to separate your application’s configuration and dependency specifications from the actual application code.

2. Application context module
The core module’s BeanFactory makes Spring a container, but the context module is what makes it a framework. This module extends the concept of Bean- Factory, adding support for internationalization (I18N) messages, application lifecycle events, and validation.
In addition, this module supplies many enterprise services such as e-mail, JNDI access, EJB integration, remoting, and scheduling. Also included is support for integration with templating frameworks such as Velocity and FreeMarker.

3. Spring’s AOP module
Spring provides rich support for aspect-oriented programming in its AOP module. This module serves as the basis for developing your own aspects for your Spring-enabled application. To ensure interoperability between Spring and other AOP frameworks, much of Spring’s AOP support is based on the API defined by the AOP Alliance. The AOP Alliance is an open-source project whose goal is to promote adoption of AOP and interoperability among different AOP implementations by defining a common set of interfaces and components. You can find out more about the AOP Alliance by visiting their website at http://aopalliance.sourceforge.net.
The Spring AOP module also introduces metadata programming to Spring. Using Spring’s metadata support, you are able to add annotations to your source code that instruct Spring on where and how to apply aspects.

4. JDBC abstraction and the DAO module
Working with JDBC often results in a lot of boilerplate code that gets a connection, creates a statement, processes a result set, and then closes the connection. Spring’s JDBC and Data Access Objects (DAO) module abstracts away the boilerplate code so that you can keep your database code clean and simple, and prevents problems that result from a failure to close database resources. This module also builds a layer of meaningful exceptions on top of the error messages given by several database servers. No more trying to decipher cryptic and proprietary SQL
error messages!
In addition, this module uses Spring’s AOP module to provide transaction
management services for objects in a Spring application.

5. Object/relational mapping integration module
For those who prefer using an object/relational mapping (ORM) tool over straight JDBC, Spring provides the ORM module. Spring doesn’t attempt to implement its own ORM solution, but does provide hooks into several popular ORM frameworks, including Hibernate, JDO, and iBATIS SQL Maps. Spring’s transaction management supports each of these ORM frameworks as well as JDBC.

6. Spring’s web module
The web context module builds on the application context module, providing a context that is appropriate for web-based applications. In addition, this module contains support for several web-oriented tasks such as transparently handling multipart requests for file uploads and programmatic binding of request parameters to your business objects. It also cotains integration support with Jakarta Struts.

7. The Spring MVC framework
Spring comes with a full-featured Model/View/Controller (MVC) framework for building web applications. Although Spring can easily be integrated with other MVC frameworks, such as Struts, Spring’s MVC framework uses IoC to provide for a clean separation of controller logic from business objects. It also allows you to declaratively bind request parameters to your business objects, What’s more, Spring’s MVC framework can take advantage of any of Spring’s other services, such as I18N messaging and validation.

References:
Spring In Action - Craig Walls, Ryan Breidenbach - Manning

GlassFish

2007-11-05T04:34:00.000-08:00

Overview:
In June 2005, Sun launched the GlassFish project -- an action that opened to the Java community the development of an application server that will be compliant with Java Platform, Enterprise Edition (Java EE) 5. Since then a large and growing community of developers has actively participated in the project.

Community:
The GlassFish community currently includes over 1100 members participating in the GlassFish project, with the objective of developing an open source application server that implements Java EE 5. In addition, the community is working to develop various web services technologies apart from the application server development effort. The community includes independent contributors as well as contributors from various organizations and companies. Members of the GlassFish community don't necessarily have to take an active role in developing code for the application server. By simply using the application server, they can file and track bugs and exchange information with other community members.

Projects:
The GlassFish project is a structured environment for developing the open source application server. The establishment of the GlassFish project is part of a larger effort by Sun to release major portions of its code into open source for use and improvement by the community. The GlassFish project is one of a variety of community-based projects hosted on java.net.

An open source application server:
GlassFish community is building an open source application server within the GlassFish project. The open source application server is based on the source code for Sun Java System Application Server Platform Edition 9, donated by Sun Microsystems, and on source code for TopLink, a Java object-to-relational persistence architecture, donated by Oracle. The GlassFish community makes periodic builds of the open source application server available for download.

About GlassFish Project:
GlassFish puts a free, open source, commercial-grade implementation of Java EE 5 in the hands of the community -- and puts it there early. Think about what benefits this might have for you. If you develop enterprise Java applications, being a GlassFish community member gives you an early opportunity to develop those applications and test them for conformance to Java EE 5. Note that conformance to Java EE 5 cannot be assured until the Java EE 5 specifications are final.
If you maintain enterprise Java applications, you can get an early start in migrating to Java EE 5. You can also get an early look at some of the new features in Java EE 5, such as the new Java Persistence API, the enhanced mapping capabilities in Java Architecture for XML Binding (JAXB) 2.0, the simplified interface for web services development in the Java API for XML Web Services (JAX-WS ) 2.0, as well as the ease-of-development improvements in Enterprise JavaBeans 3.0 technology. You can try out some of the new features in applications that you deploy to the GlassFish application server.
Another significant way in which community members contribute is by exchanging information. Whether it's through postings on the GlassFish discussion forum, broadcasts to mailing lists, or blog entries, members of the community maintain a continuing dialog about many aspects of the project, such as personal insights about GlassFish features, project-development issues, and answers to technical questions. Additionally, The Aquarium, a group blog, collects news related to the GlassFish community from a variety of sources. These communication channels provide a free-flowing information pipeline between members of the GlassFish community, including Sun and Oracle engineers.
GlassFish also gives community members the opportunity to improve the application server code. Developers have told Sun that they want the ability to contribute fixes and new features to Sun's code. The GlassFish project gives community members the context to do just that. As a member, you can identify bugs in the GlassFish code, contribute fixes, and even add new features.

References:
http://java.sun.com/developer/technicalArticles/glassfish/GFBasics.html

Two Development Models

2007-11-05T04:04:00.001-08:00

Overview:

When Sun introduced JSP technology, it provided a development road map for working with it and defined two models for building JSP-based Web applications. The two models are known as Model 1 and Model 2 and they prescribe different approaches to designing JSP-based Web applications. Model 1, the simpler of the two, was the primary solution implemented when JSPs were first introduced. However, over time, Model 2 has been accepted as the best way for building JSP-based Web applications and, as you'll see, is the inspiration for MVC-based Web frameworks like Struts. Following is an overview of both architectures.

Model 1 Architecture Overview :

The Model 1 architecture is very simple. A request is made to a JSP or servlet and then that JSP or servlet handles all responsibilities for the request, including processing the request, validating data, handling the business logic, and generating a response. Although conceptually simple, this architecture is not conducive to large-scale application development because, inevitably, a great deal of functionality is duplicated in each JSP. Also, the Model 1 architecture unnecessarily ties together the business logic and presentation logic of the application. Combining business logic with presentation logic makes it hard to introduce a new "view" or access point in an application. For example, in addition to an HTML interface, you might want to include a Wireless Markup Language (WML) interface for wireless access. In this case, using Model 1 will unnecessarily require the duplication of the business logic with each instance of the presentation code.

Model 2 Architecture Overview:
Model 2, or as it is most commonly referred to today, Model-View-Controller (MVC), solves many of the inherent problems with the original Model 1 design by providing a clear separation of application responsibilities. In the MVC architecture, a central servlet, known as the Controller, receives all requests for the application. The Controller then processes the request and works with the Model to prepare any data needed by the View (which is usually a JSP) and forwards the data to a JSP. The JSP then uses the data prepared by the Controller to generate a response to the browser. In this architecture, the business and presentation logic are separated from each other. Having the separation of business and presentation code accommodates multiple interfaces to the application, be they Web, wireless, or GUI (Swing). Additionally, this separation provides excellent reuse of code.

Model View Controller (MVC) Architecture

2007-11-05T04:02:00.001-08:00

Overview:

Model-View-Controller architecture is all about dividing application components into three different categories Model, View and the Controller. Components of the MVC architecture have unique responsibility and each component is independent of the other component. Changes in one component will have no or less impact on other component.

Model Components:
In the MVC architecture, model components provide an interface to the data and/or services used by an application. This way, controller components don't unnecessarily embed code for manipulating an application's data. Instead, they communicate with the model components that perform the data access and manipulation. Thus, the model component provides the business logic. Model components come in many different forms and can be as simple as a basic Java bean or as intricate as Enterprise JavaBeans (EJBs) or Web services.

View Components:
View components are used in the MVC architecture to generate the response to the browser. Thus, a view component provides what the user sees. Oftentimes the view components are simple JSPs or HTML pages. However, you can just as easily use WML, a templating engine such as Velocity or FreeMarker, XML with XSLT, or another view technology altogether for this part of the architecture. This is one of the main design advantages of MVC. You can use any view technology that you'd like without impacting the Model (or business) layer of your application.

Controller Components:
At the core of the MVC architecture are the controller components. The Controller is typically a servlet that receives requests for the application and manages the flow of data between the Model layer and the View layer. Thus, it controls the way that the Model and View layers interact. The Controller often uses helper classes for delegating control over specific requests or processes.

Struts

2007-11-04T05:05:00.000-08:00

Overview:

Although the Model-View-Controller architecture is a powerful means of organizing code, developing such code can be a painstaking process. This is where Struts comes in. Struts is a Web application framework that streamlines the building of Web applications based on the MVC design principles. But what does that mean? Is Struts an MVC Web application that you just add on to or extend? Is Struts just some libraries? Actually, Struts is a little bit of both. Struts provides the foundation, or framework, for building an MVC-oriented application along with libraries and utilities for making MVC development faster and easier.
You could create a new Controller servlet every time you wanted to use the MVC design pattern in your Web application. Additionally, you'd need to create the management/flow logic for getting data to and from the Model and then routing requests to the View. You'd also need to define interfaces for interacting with your Model objects and all the utility code that goes along with using the MVC design pattern. However, instead of going through this process each time you create a new application, you can use Struts. Struts provides the basic structure and outline for building that application, freeing you to concentrate on building the business logic in the application and not the "plumbing."
To better understand the benefits of Struts, consider the following analogy. If you were to create a GUI application in Java, you wouldn't write a text field widget and a drop-down widget yourself. You would use Java's Swing API that already has standardized, fully functional code that provides these controls. Not only are the Swing controls ready-to-use, but they are also understood by all Java programmers. Struts provides the same type of advantages: Struts supplies a standard way of implementing an MVC application, the Struts code is tried and true, and the techniques required to use Struts are well known and documented.
In addition to providing the foundation for MVC applications, Struts provides rich extension points so that your application can be customized as you see fit. This extensibility has led to several third-party extensions being made available for Struts, such as libraries for handling application workflow, libraries for working with view technologies other than JSP, and so on.

The Evolution of Struts:

Struts was originally created by Craig R. McClanahan and then donated to the Jakarta project of the Apache Software Foundation (ASF) in May 2000. In June 2001, Struts 1.0 was released. Since then, many people have contributed both source code and documentation to the project and Struts has become the de facto standard for building Web applications in Java and has been embraced throughout the Java community. Struts 1.1 was released in June 2003 and included a substantial amount of new functionality, including the addition of Tiles, Validator, declarative exception handling, and much more. Later, in December 2004, Struts 1.2 was released with several minor updates to the framework. Struts 1.3, released in 2006, introduced the largest change to the framework since the 1.1 release: the move to a chain of responsibility (COR)-based request processing engine.
Today, Struts is continuing to evolve. There are now two distinct major versions of Struts: Struts 1 and Struts 2. Struts 1 is the mature, widely adopted, documented, and supported version of Struts. It is the version of Struts in use now. Struts 2 is a completely new version of Struts based on the merger of Struts and WebWork, another popular open source Java Web application framework. At the time of this writing, Struts 2 is under development and does not have a specific release date. Going forward, Struts 1 and Struts 2 will both be actively developed and maintained as separate subprojects of the Struts project.
Another event has punctuated Struts' evolution: its graduation to a top-level Apache project. Struts is no longer a subproject of the Jakarta Project. This is an important change because it affords Struts more autonomy and gives it the ability to have its own subprojects.

Java Server Faces

2007-11-04T02:37:00.000-08:00

Overview:
JavaServer Faces is a holistic solution to several longstanding problems facing software developers and the customers who consume the software. For the end user, JavaServer Faces holds the promise of an easier, more intuitive usage experience for Web-based applications. For software developers, JavaServer Faces provides a standard, object-oriented, easy-to-use application programming interface (API) that takes much of the pain out of bringing a great user experience to the world of Web applications. JavaServer Faces gives users the power, flexibility, and performance that have previously been addressed only in a piecemeal fashion. JavaServer Faces was developed by a community of Web application experts assembled by the Java Community Process. These experts are the people behind Jakarta Struts, Oracle Application Server, Sun Java Studio, IBM WebSphere Studio, ATG, and many other programs in the Web application development space. Their collective wisdom was brought to bear on the problem
of how to take the best patterns from the existing technologies that solve the same problems and combine them into a cohesive whole, as well as filling in the gaps not filled anywhere to date. JavaServer Faces combines the ubiquity of JSP and servlets, the simplicity of JavaBeans, the power of J2EE, and the common-sense chutzpah of frameworks like Jakarta Struts to bring you the best-of-breed way to develop the user interface for a Web application.

Introduction:
JavaServer Faces (JSF) is an exciting new technology that will change the way we build user interfaces for Java 2 Enterprise Edition applications. With the introduction of JSF, we can finally create user interfaces simply with a set of reusable components. And with a component-based framework, Web applications are finally on a more level playing field with client-based User Interface (UI) frameworks such as Swing. Web developers will be able to use and reuse components off the shelf in their applications so we will see tool support and components implemented for JSF.

Why JSF?

MVC for web applications
Clean separation of roles
Easy to use
Extensible Component and Rendering architecture
Support for client device independence
Standard
Huge vendor and industry support
Offers finer-grained separation of behavior
and presentation than JSP
UI-component and Web-tier concepts
without limiting a particular scripting
technology or markup language

Comparing JSF & Struts:

Struts (I am not saying you should not use Struts)
- No built-in UI component model
- No built-in event model for UI components
- No built-in state management for UI components
- No built-in support of multiple renderers (Struts is more or less tied up with HTML)
- Not a standard (despite its popularity)
Struts and JSF can be used together

References
JSF in Action - Kito D. Mann

Technology Discussion

The Definitive Windows 7 Commands Guide

How The Browsers Work?

Exploring Firefox Cache: A Bunch Of Really Cool Tips

Viewing Your Firefox Cache

Clearing The Firefox Cache

Clearing the Cache Manually

Official Guide:

FireFox Addons:

Clear The Cache Automatically:

Avoid Getting an Unwanted Surprise on Twitter

How to Avoid Surprises on Twitter

Funny 404 Error Pages

How To Completely Restore Your Windows Computer To Factory Settings

Step 1: Save Files & Folders

Step 2: Start The Recovery Program

Step 3: Restoring To Factory Settings

Step 4: Finishing Restoration

How to Recover Deleted Files

Part I: The Overview

1. Stop What You're Doing

2. Find the Right File Recovery Program

3. Recover Your Files

Part 2: More Specific Problems

Recover Files from a Wiped or Unbootable Hard Drive

Recover Lost Photos

Recover Lost Word Documents

Recover Data from Scratched or Corrupted CDs and DVDs

Backup your Gmail Inbox Online

Backup your Gmail Messages Online

Download Youtube Videos as MP3

Delete Facebook Apps that Now Have Greater Access to Your Data

Some Google Docs Features

Upload Any File

Bulk Upload

Shared Folders

Email As An Attachment

DOCX Import

Tips - CSS Targetting IE8, IE7 and IE6

IE8 and Below

IE7 and Below

IE6

Gmail Detects and Warns You If Someone Else Is Using Your Account

How To Install Cool Windows 7 Theme Downloads For Windows XP

Difference Between Browsers - Just Humour

How To Download All Facebook Photos With Your or Frens Tag

Getting Started

Downloading Facebook Photos

Download Your or Fren's Facebook Photo Albums

How to Export Email Addresses of all your Facebook Friends

Create JAR file in Java & Eclipse

JAR file using Java commands

Create a JAR file

View contents of a JAR file

View contents with detail of a JAR file

Extract content of JAR file

Extract specific file from JAR file

Update a JAR file

Executing a JAR file

Create an executable JAR file

JAR file using Eclipse IDE

Hide Closed Projects in Eclipse Project Explorer View

How to Add Facebook Chat to Your IM Client

What if…Apple only offered the 64GB/3G iPad and sold it for $499

Which Social Network Is Right For You?

Facebook

Twitter

Buzz

Why Web Developers Should Switch to Google Chrome

Introduction

Downloading Chrome 4

Web Inspector (aka Developer Tools)

Accessing the Web Inspector/Developer Tools

Safari 4

Chrome 3 (Windows only)

Chrome 4

JavaScript Console

Elements Panel

Resources

Further Reading