Rss Newspaper…

Content originally posted on Layman Tech Tips

Web application FeedJournal turns your RSS feed(s) of choice into a newspaper-formatted PDF. You can either enjoy the newspaper-ness of the electronic PDF on your computer, or you can print out the paper for some offline, dead-tree reading. FeedJournal probably isn’t the best solution for feeds that generally have shorter items (like the Quotes feed), but longer articles (like you’ll find in our feature feed) fit really well in the FeedJournal layout. FeedJournal is free to use, requires registration with the site.

You can visit FeedJournal here

Everything is new…

domain hosting: We have shifted to Blogger (for better and not for worse…)

new name: layman tech tips

(http://laymantechtips.blogspot.com/)

authors: nice try… they do remain the same…

new content: ofcourse… we will be shadow blogging on this blog for the next 5 posts and after that we will discontinue entirely. though the archives will be still available no updates will be posted 5 posts hence… if you notice a glitch pls. comment or mail, we will try to smoothen that out…

reason: well there are many reasons

1. wordpress makes no adsense (check out the screenshot below optionally follow this link)
2. wordpress was is very restrictive in terms of what it allows you to insert in posts
3. you cannot customize your layout
4. you cannot add lots of widgets
5. you have to use predefined tags… and that sucks…

create abstract images…online

Do you feel sad when you see a masterpiece like the one on right thinking “I will never be able to make something like that”? Well the days of thunder are here… you can create an equally interesting masterpiece or even better…

All you need to do is head over to Viscosity. Viscosity is an award-winning random image generator which takes minimal inputs from you and helps you create masterpiece of your own…

Viscosity image starts out as 9 shaded horizontal stripes, but a few clicks will make it bloom into a multi-colored, semi-transparent, almost sculptural piece of transcendent web-stuff. You can also customize the size and the quality of the image.

To learn more about Viscosity visit here

Blogging Tips

This blog has talked about everything from Blogging tools, comparison of Blogging tools to photo Blogging. This post is about people who want to start their own blog but are note sure how to go about it. I will not be giving you a step by step tutorial on Blogging platforms or posting articles, I will be telling you what all to consider when you decide to blog. So here we go –

Research other Blogs - When you want to start a blog on a topic/product/service/experience, it is highly recommended that you first research similar blogs on the Internet, this will give you an idea, what popular blogs have in them, why people come back on these blogs, how they are written, style etc. Please don’t think that this is plagiarism, this is inspiration; it is not a bad thing to learn from a successful blog.
Clarity – Be very clear what you want to write and how do you want to write posts on your blog. If you are creating a blog to give your views on a topic/product/service/experience then stick to that, in these kind of blog you can also have news and give your own views on that. This helps, but give credit to the source from where the news was taken.
Layout/Design – The layout/design of your blog should mirror your interests or it should match with the total theme of the blog. Initially managing this will be problem, but once you get familiar with templates, it will be a cake walk.
Credits – When you start your blog, you will obviously take articles or insights or nuggets of information from other websites/blogs, give proper credits. This helps your in building credibility in the Blogosphere.

Tracking – If you have a blog don’t you think that somebody should keep a track of visitors/keyword for you? Don’t worry, just register your blog with FeedBurner or Google Analytics, they will do the rest for you. Just follow the instructions they give you and your blog is ready to be tracked.
Blog Indexing – Do not forget to index your blog with Google or Yahoo’s Webmaster service. It is free and once again their simple tutorial will help you in indexing your site. Indexing will primarily help your blog to come in search results of these search engines.
RSS Feeds – Once your blog is up and running, use FeedBurner to create feeds for your blog. This will help other people to subscribe to your blog in a reader or through their mail.
Promoting your Blog - These are some tips, which will help you in promoting a new blog

• When you send mails to friends and co-workers, put your blog’s URL after the closing salutation. The moment that person will read your mail he will notice the URL and click on it and if your blog is really interesting and insightful the person will congratulate you as well as ask others to read your blog

• Putting the Blog’s URL as a customized message, which gets displayed in your Google Talk or Yahoo or company’s internal messenger. Whenever you are online, the blog URL will get displayed and people in your friend’s list will click it out of curiosity and if they find it interesting rest will be history.

• There are Blog search engines where you can search blogs on the topics, which can be of interest to you. Search such blogs, read articles, if you like the articles comment on them and in that comment also put the URL of your blog. Next time the person, on whose blog you have commented, will read your comment he or she will definitely visit your blog.

These tips are not as efficient and accurate as Search Engine Optimization but they work thats for sure. I have experienced that.

Blogging is good and will help you enhance your skills and gain subject matter expertise. If you are done with the above things then you can click here to learn more about what all you can do with Blogging.

photoblogging with shozu…

One more photo-blogging tool apart from the ones already mentioned is Shozu…

Here are all the ways in which ShoZu keeps you connected.

Upload Photos & Videos. ShoZu enables one-click uploading of camera phone videos and pictures to over 30 online social networks, blogs, photo sites and other popular web destinations and of course email…

Download Friends’ Feeds. With ShoZu you can get your friends’ Flickr photos on your phone. Every time your friends add new photos to Flickr, they’re instantly sent to your phone so you’re always in the know.

Read & Reply to Comments. Posted a fun photo to your online profile last night? As your friends post comments, they’re sent to your phone where you can read and reply to them all.

Update your Status. Away? Keep your friends in the know while you’re on the go. Change your status for your different accounts direct from your phone with ShoZu.

Add Tags, Titles and Descriptions. Keep your photos and videos organized online with tags or do a little moblogging with descriptions. With ShoZu you can add tags, titles and descriptions before or after uploading your photos and videos.

Geo-tagging. Have a GPS enabled phone? ShoZu can geo-tag your photos and videos.

Updates: Firefox 3 ver 4.0

The first version of Firefox 3 beta was launched in the second week of February and this Monday Mozilla came up with the 4th Beta version of Firefox 3. And this beta has more than 900 enhancements than the previous beta versions; that’s some effort that has been put by the developers at Mozilla.

This beta version has enhancements related to performance and memory usage, fixes for stability and platform-specific enhancements (I hope they have taken into consideration the problem of Firefox crashing on XP systems; it does on mine and that also frequently). The new beta version has enhancements like new download manager; a full page zoom feature that allows you to zoom in and out of pages; and integration for Vista, Mac OS X and Linux. Firefox 3 will be officially released in the second half of 2008. Till then download this version 4 of Firefox Beta 3 and enjoy, believe me its really worth trying.

slideshow… collaboration style

Keeping in line with the several collaboration tools we have already mentioned… we are adding one more to the collection… and this collaboration tool can be used for collaborative slideshows…

Slidelive.com features:

• Instant sharing of Microsoft PowerPoint™ presentations
• Lightweight, browser based meeting solution
• Login and start your meeting right immediately
• Absolutely free

Visit Slidelive at www.slidelive.com

photo blogging

I had written about photo-blogging ideas now there is an addition to that list…

With twitxr you can share a moment, a picture, a thought, instantly with your mobile phone coz a picture is worth a thousand words…

Currently though it only has an iPhone native client they assure that nokia and android clients are on the way…

Sync google and outlook calendars…

Confused between using google calendar for all it’s features and outlook for it’s accessibility? You can now use both, the way is to sync them…

Sync your Google Calendar with your Microsoft Outlook™ calendar. Access your calendar however and whenever you want. Check your Microsoft Outlook events on the go with Google Calendar. View your Google Calendar information offline through Microsoft Outlook calendar.

Google Calendar Sync: Getting Started

Google Calendar Sync allows you to sync events between Google Calendar and Microsoft Outlook Calendar. You’ll be able to determine the direction of information flow, as well as the sync frequency. Staying on top of your Google Calendar and Microsoft Outlook Calendar events has never been easier!

Keep in mind that it’s not possible to sync events on secondary calendars at this time. Google Calendar Sync will only sync events from your primary Google Calendar and your default Microsoft Outlook calendar.

Get started

To begin syncing, follow the steps below:

1. To download Google Calendar Sync, visit Google calender sync Installer
2. Once a dialog box appears, click “Save File.” The download should open automatically. If it doesn’t, manually open the download from your browser’s download window.
3. Click “OK” to confirm that you’re aware this is an executable file.
4. Read through the Google Calendar Sync Terms of Service, and click “I Agree.”
5. Continue to follow through the Installation Options and click “Install” to finish the set-up process.

Once Google Calendar Sync is installed on your computer, the Google Calendar Sync Settings window will appear:

In the Settings window, enter your email address and password and select the Sync Option you prefer. For more information on each Sync Option, please visit Google Calendar Sync: Options

You’ll also be able to set the time interval for syncing to occur. Please keep in mind that 10 minutes is the minimum time interval allowed.

After the initial set-up, you can access the Google Calendar Sync Settings window again by double-clicking on the calendar icon in your Windows System Tray.

Mobile Secretary who is intelligent!!!

Some times when you are traveling for business meetings, you wish to have your secretary with you (don’t take it otherwise, I am talking about professional help). Taking a secretary along with you on business meetings is not always feasible.

Now it’s possible to have a secretary in your pocket while traveling; you just need to have a smart phone and small software called the Sapie. Sapie is artificial intelligence based secretary software for your smart phone. Sapie has got voice recognition and artificial intelligence making her faster and easier to use. You can do various tasks using Sapie like voice-activated emailing, dialing and note taking etc. Isn’t it cool to have a mobile secretary in your pocket with artificial intelligence?

Sapie Features:

• Sapie, You can use it as a regular mobile phone!
• Now you can enter in a new contact faster than ever!
• Talk to your Device. Leave yourself Voice Comments.
• Set up a reminder - quicker than others!
• Voice Comments. Delete and re-record or just add up?
• Send E-mails from Smartphone or PPC fast & easy! No other mailing program compares to Sapie’s.
• No more graphic interface, talk to Artificial Intelligence, which listens, speaks and you can even see its face!

You can download Sapie here

real-time collaboration…

Due to busy schedule, sometimes it is very difficult to get all your team members or your team of consultants to sit down together to discuss a project in a meeting. Let’s understand that people will be busy, late, or more often than not reluctant to attend the meeting

Say goodbye to scheduling meetings, sitting in traffic jams and waiting in boardrooms. With Cozimo you can collaborate and review images and videos — together in real-time or on your own time. Get feedback from clients and colleagues instantly. Cozimo is the faster, better, simpler way to work.

Features:

• Draw and annotate onto images, videos, PDFs from any web browser, anytime, anywhere.
• Get to ‘yes’ faster with live online interactive meetings, review and collaboration sessions.
• Stay organized with a complete, easy-to-find record of all project-related communications.
• Compete more effectively by supporting your clients with the latest design technology.

photoblog ideas…

Some people lead a very bored and idle life… Are there people who like to track every wrinkle, spot or hair on their face and think that it is a meaningful and interesting task? Probably no. But if your life is getting boring and you need some silly entertainment to perk it up… then well, a new website, Daily Mugshot, allows you to record and share how you look every day with the rest of the world, atleast the world that’s on to the web…

You can visit Daily Mugshot here

my cellphone speaks…

I was trying to find a Text-to-Speech for my handheld PDA and finally managed to get a utility software that able to perform this function and is suitable to be installed in any Windows Mobile Devices. Known as TellMeText version 1.1.0, it is able to convert your SMS messages and play your messages as sound.

This is especially useful when you want to read an SMS message that you have just received. Without straining your eyes on the mobile screen, or crashing into the car ahead and losing your life, the tool is intelligent enough to read out the message pop up on the screen word by word without any miss. Good thing is, it will also translate the sender’s mobile phone number prior to the message contents. So, in case you want to prevent some privacy or sensitive contents to be translated, you still can do it. The trouble is that you’d have to remember the cellphone numbers But I am sure that’s doable…

The utility can be installed on any Windows Mobile smart phone or pocket PC with version of 2003SE, 2005 and even latest Windows Mobile 2006. It is a freeware downloadable at Blondiesoft.

information technology foxed…

The foxy lady Olivia Munn is back and back with a ‘bang’! She is the new starlet hosting the viral video  for Dell Computers “IT Through The Decades…”

The clip is more of a marketing ploy that is directed at the goof-ups or poor IT-related decisions companies have made the past few decades i.e. ‘78 thru 2008. In the clip, Mike ‘the IT guy’ suggests ‘new’ technologies like databases and bar codes and gets made fun of by his colleagues. Olivia doesn’t have a million lines but then she was never hired to speak anyways, she does what she does best… adding a lot of sex appeal to the YouTube clip.

Warning: It’s a little longer than what is normal for viral clips… Olivia fans will also probably get a kick out of seeing her dressed up in retro 70’s and 80’s outfits.

fring, fring…

Do you have tons of contacts, friends, and family members in your instant messaging (IM) chat clients like google talk, skype, icq to name a few? But how do you stay connected with them if you are on the move and all you have is just a mobile phone? fring provides a simple mobile solution. fring is a mobile Internet service and community that enables users to access and interact with their social networks on-the-go, make free calls and live chat with all fring, Skype, MSN (Windows Live) Messenger, Google Talk, ICQ, SIP, Twitter, Yahoo! and AIM contacts and friends. In other word, fring is another multi-protocol instant messenger or softphone that supports voice talk or chat similar to Trillian, but for Windows Mobile Pocket PC Phone, Symbian and UIQ handsets device.

fring uses handset’s Internet connection available such as GPRS, EDGE or WiFi data plan to connect to instant messaging servers, and thus bypassing the expensive and costly traditional GSM mobile call network airtime minutes.

Features of fring:

1. Connect to all IM buddies from Skype, MSN Messenger, Google Talk, AIM, Yahoo! and more into mobile phone and view them from one, integrated contact list.
2. Place voice call to local and international calls over the Internet, which can be as cheap as free, rather than costly airtime minutes.
3. Live free chat instead of SMS.
4. Know who’s online before dialing, with presence or availability status or indicators for all of your contacts.
5. Invite friends to fring.
6. Ability to send and receive files on Windows Mobile device such as videos, music, games, ringtones, docs with fring file transfer feature.
7. Choose incoming call and message tones.
8. Auto-roam in and out of WiFi hotspots.
9. Engage in multiple conversations simultaneously.
10. Calling is simple with just pick a contact and hit the green button.
11. Usage of fring application is free.

fring require a Symbian 8 or 9, Windows Mobile 5 or 6 and UIQ handsets with 3G, GPRS, Wi-Fi network coverage. Preferably users should subscribe to unlimited usage data plan which can surf the Internet. Also requires is 200-375kb of available space on memory card or phone.

fring can be downloaded directly into your PDA phone. To download click on the download now link…

Internet Explorer 8 Beta Launched

Microsoft launched the Internet Explorer 7 for people who are looking to get more out of their Internet browser and are fascinated with tabbed browsing. This was Microsoft’s move to steal Firefox customers.Anyways, enough of strategy, finally the Internet Explorer version 8 has been launched by Microsoft and experts say that it is even better than the Version 7. This version, is a Beta version and is launched to get the initial feedback of users, it is available for download. The IE 8 has some exciting new features including –

Web Slices - Web Slices are like feeds where clients can subscribe to get updates and notify the user of changes.
Activities – IE 8 activities makes copying and pasting from one web page to another a simple and easy pattern.
Favorites Bar – The links bar is called the Favorites Bar and now you can access links, feeds, Web Slices and even Word, Excel and PowerPoint documents from this bar and the best part is you can place it anywhere within the IE8 window.
Automatic Crash Recovery – With this feature, you can recover your documents, web pages; links, if your browser crashes accidentally. You can also recover individual Tabs using this functionality.
Efficient Phishing Filter – With cyber crimes on the rise, IE8 gives full security against Phishing, this feature warns users when they visit a Phishing site.

Download Internet Explorer 8.

they mystery of rss readers…

What problem does RSS solve?

Most people are interested in multiple websites whose content changes on an unpredictable schedule. For example this weblog, you would not know if there will be two posts in the same day or one post a week but to know that you would have to keep checking the blog repeatedly. Repeatedly checking each website/weblog to see if there is any new content can be very tedious.

Email notification of changes was an early solution to this problem, which was quite widely used. Unfortunately, when you receive email notifications from multiple websites/weblogs they are usually disorganized and can get overwhelming, and are often mistaken for spam.

RSS is a better way to be notified of new and changed content. Notifications of changes to multiple websites are handled easily, and the results are presented to you well organized and distinct from email.

What are RSS readers?

To handle the RSS ‘feed’ as it is called, you would need an RSS reader… Basically, it’s a way to clump all your RSS feeds from various websites into one handy interface. Here are my picks for the top three RSS, or feed, readers on the Web:

• Google Reader: Hands down, in my personal opinion the best feed reader out there. Great organization, super fast, and hardly ever in for maintenance. You don’t need to register if you have a Gmail account.
• Bloglines: A great rss reader too. Uncluttered and simple.
• Newsgator: I’ve heard a lot of good things about NewsGator; the best thing about it is that feeds can be delivered right to your Microsoft Outlook in an organized fashion.

You can subscribe to our RSS here

Here’s How:

1. First, find a Web site that you’d like to stay updated on. Let’s pick takeonlogyk for example…
2. An orange feed icon (displayed on the right, oh and it’s black in our case) is pretty much becoming the standard for feed subscription. If you happen across this symbol on the Web site that you wish to subscribe to, click on it and you’ll be subscribed to that particular site’s RSS feed; it will then start showing up in your feed reader of choice (a feed reader is simply an aggregator of RSS feeds; makes it easy to read them all in one place).
3. Subscribe to this feed. Plenty of sites nowadays will give you a variety of options in order to get you subscribed via RSS to their site. You’ll either see it written out (“subscribe to this site”, for example) or you’ll see a list of feeder chiclet icons all mooched together for easy access. Clicking on any of these links will enable you to be subscribed to that feed’s content.
4. Subscribe via a feed reader button. Most feed readers have made it possible for you to do a “one-click” subscribe: you find a site you’re interested in, you notice that your chosen feed reader has an icon displayed, and you click on that icon. The process differs from reader to reader, but overall, the process is the same and pretty simple – you just click and you’re subscribed.
5. Once you’ve subscribed to a site’s feed, you can view updated content in your feed reader, which is basically a way to aggregate all your feeds in one handy place. It’s super convenient, and once you realize how much time you’re saving, you’ll wonder how you ever got along without RSS feeds.

Best of luck!

Social network sync-ing

There is a way to sync all your social sites i.e. Blogger, Delicious, Digg Faves, Flickr, GoogleDocs, GoogleReader, Metaweblog, MindMeister, Picasa, Slideshare, WordPress, and YouTube. Introducing Second | Brain. Second Brain combines all of your Picasa/Flickr photos, Youtube videos, Blogger posts in one single searchable location. The first time you add a particular stream it syncs all the information available and thence forward it does that all by itself…

Highlights:

• Get your own homepage e.g. http://ankitdesai.secondbrain.com/
• Share your content stream with others
• Browse and organize your content by tags and folders
• Follow content from other people and let other people follow you; you even get notified when this happens
• After the first sync when you add up a stream the following updations happen automatically

Second Brain: http://secondbrain.com/

mobile fusion…

MoFuse - an online mobile site creation app which lets you use your blog’s RSS feed as a basis of your mobile website - just launched their MoFuse Grow beta app today and it’s really nice. In just one step, you can enter the address of your blog, and instantly get a mobile website and unique URL created from your site’s feed, and then if you want you can continue to optimize it from there using the rest of MoFuse’s tools. It looks gorgeous, and works super simply. Definitely go check it out.

MoFuse Features:

• Custom domain name* - Use your own domain name or sub domain. (paid membership feature)
• SMS Widget - Place MoFuse SMS Widget onto your blog so your readers can get your mobile link via SMS message.
• Automatic Redirect - Use Automatic Redirect code to detect and redirect your mobile visitors to your mobile site.
• Brand your mobile site* - Upload your own image header/logo, grow your brands presence. (paid membership feature)
• Generate revenue - Enroll in revenue sharing program and earn 50% of all advertising profits using Google AdSense Mobile and AdMob!
• Automatic Image Resizing - Got images? Too big for a mobile screen? No problem, they’ll shrink them down for you!
• It’s affordable - By affordable we mean free. Yes we have a Professional level account, but all of their core features are available to everyone free of charge.
• Fully Compliant - Your mobile site will render perfect on your visitors mobile devices as they’re 100% .mobi compliant!
• Fully Hosted - No need to download anything! Just create your mobile site and they’ll do the rest!

Become a member here

Nice and useful - Google2Go Application

If you want innovative, interesting and simple applications, you should have a look at the application provided by the guys at Google, totally world class.

I came across an application, Google2Go, which lets you access Google services right on your handheld and this application takes second to install and is free. You can access Google’s mobile services like –
· Google Web/Image Search
· Google Local Search
· Gmail
· Google Calendar
· Google Reader
· Google Docs
· Picasa
· Google News
· Google Notes

Other features:
· Amazon
· EBay
· Weather.com
· Wikipedia
· Dictionary/Thesaurus

This application is really cool and pretty handy. Why not download it and give it a try. [Update: The admin-guy at techturf mentioned that there are various versions available so that even if all you have is a nokia e50 you can still use this application, head over here to download]

Blogging tools - 2

I started with ‘blogging tools - 1‘ and now it’s time for part 2.

When you blog and blog frequently at that sometimes you worry about everything getting lost… To remedy that we recommend you to two of the best blog backup services…

Blogbackuponline - BlogBackupOnline offers an easy way to create full blog backup, schedule and store backups online, and restore/export blog from a backup file.

BlogBackupOnline Features

• Securely store and backup your blog data online (SSL 128 Secure site…)
• Schedule automatic backups (daily, weekly, monthly) and backup reports
• Export: Download and Save backups to your PC
• Restore Backup: quickly restore or transfer your blog to another location
• Supported blogging platforms: Blogger, WordPress, TypePad, Friendster, LiveJournal, Serendipity, Windows Live Space, Movable Type, Terapad, and Vox
• Receive up to 50 MB of free backup space (this is more than enough for almost all of you…)
• Backup blog images (JPEG, GIF, PNG, TIFF, BMP)

[Update: BlogBackupOnline is out of beta and are now offering full range of service. The good news is that they will still have a free account, they call it 'freemium' apart from this they offer professional and enterprise accounts. The freemium offer includes 5MB of space this means for you that subscribers using less than 5 MB of storage space will be upgraded to the newest version automatically. Those users using more than 5MB of storage space will have an extended period of time (6 weeks) to continue to use the service while having the opportunity to decide if they would like to upgrade to a Professional or Enterprise account. After 6 weeks, they will continue to store your backups for one year, however new backups will not run. Techrigy will provide you with a guideline for exporting everything in your account and will continue to provide access to the backed up content.]
Blogbackupr is a web-based backup service for blogs. It takes less then a minute to setup and can automatically backup all blog articles and comments on a daily basis. It also comes with one-click restore functionality. The only problem, it requires your blog login details. And while this may not be a big issue for small personal blogs, for bigger blogs it definitely is an area of concern.

 

BlogBackupr - Feature List

• Automatically backup posted articles, user comments and blog categories.
• Automatic blog restore option: WordPress.com, Blogger.com and self-hosted WordPress blogs.
• Works with all blogs that offer RSS-feeds.
• Backup multiple blogs at the same time.
• Download (export) backup files as WordPress RSS, standard RSS, Text or HTML.
• Easily preview backed up articles online.
• Coming: Ability to backup images and template files.
• For additional details go to BlogBackupr FAQ page.

Google chatbox

Google Talk has released a new chatback feature allowing people visiting your blog, online profile, or personal web page to chat directly with you via Google Talk. To use chatback on your web site or supported personal profile page, all you need is a Google Talk account and some web space where you can embed the chatback badge code. 

Any user who wants to chat with you through the chatback badge doesn’t need a Google Talk account at all, so it’s a great way to let friends, family, or readers of your blog, for example, contact you quickly and easily without needing to register for anything.

Log in and get your Google Chatback…

collaboration… google style

Google Docs (where you share your docs with your friends across the globe) is a thing of past now we are not as much fascinated by it… the next big thing is EC [Enterprise wide collaboration]. Guess who is behind all this… yes, it’s google all the way…

Businesses, schools and organizations can now get powerful communication, productivity, collaboration and security tools right from the browser, leaving more time and money to focus on core objectives.

• No hardware or software to buy, install or maintain, even as you grow
• Access from anywhere, even from mobile devices
• Quick access to Google’s innnovation, like more efficient ways to collaborate
• Improved security and compliance

With Google Apps, you can get…

Applications including Gmail, Google Talk, Google Calendar and Google Docs. Learn more.

Services to make your existing messaging solution more secure and compliant. Learn more.

I have done this for my organization and I think it adds a lot of value… you can register here…

If you have already tried this out pls. share your experience…

Adding Tabs to Windows Explorer

Today we are so much used to tabbed browsing using Mozilla Firefox and Internet Explorer 7. But now for people like you and me, who love to move between tabs, there is a utility, which lets you add Tabs to your Windows Explorer.

The QT TabBar is a free and easy to install and use utility, which will add tabs to your Windows Explorer. You can open folders in the same way you open web pages in Mozilla or IE7. Drag and drop functions make this utility a fun. I have tried it and found it to be very useful. You can download and try for yourself, I am sure you will not be disappointed.

Put name near to the Windows XP time

Here is how you can put your name near to the Time display in Windows XP -

• Access the Control Panel from the Start menu.
• Double click Regional and Language Options.
• Click the Customize button in the Standards And Formats panel of the Regional Options tab.
• When the Customize Regional Options dialog box appears, select the Time tab.
• In the AM Symbol and PM Symbol boxes, you can replace that text with your name or whatever word you want, as long as it is no longer than 12 characters.
• To complete the operation, click OK twice — once to close the Customize Regional Options dialog box and once to close the Regional And Language Options dialog box.

[Via:Techrepublic]

gimme more…

“Give me more…” This seems to be the mantra for enticing customers to use your service…

Box.net started with 1GB (Basic & Free) now Windows is in competition. Windows SkyDrive is here. Upload and share up to 5GB of data to Windows Live SkyDrive, an online storage solution from Microsoft that’s just graduated from beta.

With your SkyDrive account (which requires a Windows Live ID), you get that 5GB of storage (which bests Box.net’s 1GB free plan) for personal folders accessible only to you, shared folders accessible to your friends, and public folders open to everyone (which can be subscribed to via RSS).

Details on SkyDrive limitations and usage are sketchy right now, but it looks like individual file sizes may be limited to 50MB.

Mindmaps are easy…

Glinkr - Glinkr lets you create visual mind-maps using simple text boxes and arrows. Ready maps can be stored and edited online, shared with others and easily published on any other blog or website.

Features:

• Create and edit visual maps online. There is nothing to install or download.
• Rearrange and style (color) text boxes as you like.
• Attach to maps additional links and descriptions.
• Publish ready maps on Glinkr or embed them on your blog or profile page.
• View maps in ‘Full Screen’ mode.
• Import / Export as XML Documents.

Xobni’s here…

Yesterday wasn’t going very well and then around 12:30am I checked my mail and there it was… It was an invite to try out Xobni. I had written about Xobni some time back… I was in the queue for trying it out and finally I got it…

Along with it I got 5 invites too which I can share with the first five to comment here… (Update: I am out of Xobni invites, now I am waiting for Grand Central invites which I will share soon…)

Oh! and I forgot to add that Xobni is definitely WOW!

P.S. Orkut’s forecast was on dot atleast this time around…

Spell with flickr

This is an excellent tool that helps you spell words with images from flickr…

See the sample implementation here or here

To use spell with Flickr head over here…

cross-checking now…

Remember the time when you shared an interesting link with a friend and were not sure if they had checked it out? Here’s the solution.

LinkBlip is an easy-to-use application that notifies you by email as soon as someone clicks on a shortened URL that is generated by the service. Additionally, general geographic information is listed so that you know where the person is located. While LinkBlip has potential for large scale mail blasts, it only works once—so that you’re not emailed multiple times if your friends decide it’s fun to click on the link again and again. LinkBlip is free and requires a valid email address for registration and to review the status of the link.

Pack of wolves… Google Pack…

A bunch of free software, no download hassles… isn’t this a geek’s wet dream?

That’s right Google is offering a pack of software free for direct download.  Check out the list of free software offered…

Google-branded

• Google Desktop
• Picasa, a photograph organizer and editor
• Google Toolbar for Internet Explorer
• Google Photos Screensaver, which displays pictures from the user’s computers
• Google Earth, an electronic globe
• Google Talk, an instant messaging and Voice over IP (VoIP) application
• Google Video Player, a multi-media player, only available in the U.S.

Third-party

• Mozilla Firefox with Google Toolbar you can also check out the Mozilla Firefox Beta 3 here
• Spyware Doctor Starter Edition
• Norton Security Scan
• Adobe Reader 8, a document viewer
• RealPlayer, a multi-media player
• GalleryPlayer
• Skype, a VoIP application
• StarOffice, a productivity suite that includes a word processor and spreadsheet

You can download them here…

new chat friend…

AOL has introduced an interesting new chatbot by the name of smarterchild. If you have an AOL account you can add him in and start chatting and asking relevant information.

I did not use him for anything relevant but here’s a brief of my conversation…

SmarterChild 4:24pm: Cool.This is my home, ankitdesai: 1 Get info such as movies, sports and weather 2 Visit my library including an encyclopedia, Shakespeare and a thesaurus 3 Have fun with word scrambles, manicdotes, ASCII art and more 4 Use tools like calculator, spell-check and dictionary 5 Join in - tell me about a crush, take a poll, leave a message and more 6 See what’s new - I’ve got something new to tell you about now.You can make your window bigger and scroll down to read better.Next time you want to see this menu, just type home.How may I help you?

ankitdesai@aol.in 4:25pm: tell me your mail id

SmarterChild 4:25pm: That’s interesting that you should say that, but I don’t think I can answer.

ankitdesai@aol.in 4:26pm: why?

SmarterChild 4:25pm: ‘Cause I said so.

ankitdesai@aol.in 4:26pm: that’s not being friendly

SmarterChild 4:25pm: I don’t know how to answer that.

ankitdesai@aol.in 4:26pm: r u a guy or a gal?

SmarterChild 4:25pm: I am neither male nor female. I’m a machine!

ankitdesai@aol.in 4:26pm: superb

SmarterChild 4:25pm: Sorry?

ankitdesai@aol.in 4:26pm: great

SmarterChild 4:25pm: Cool.

ankitdesai@aol.in 4:26pm: do you blog?

SmarterChild 4:26pm: I don’t understand this fully enough to say anything smart about it…

ankitdesai@aol.in 4:27pm:

SmarterChild 4:26pm: >>> I’ve got biographical info about every U.S. president. Try woodrow wilson bio, for example.

ankitdesai@aol.in 4:27pm: i dont want to

SmarterChild 4:26pm: That’s interesting that you should say that, but I don’t think I can answer.OK, should we get back to the kind of questions I was designed to answer?

ankitdesai@aol.in 4:27pm: nah

SmarterChild 4:26pm: No? OK.I do enjoy the conversation, but let’s talk about what I’m really here for.

ankitdesai@aol.in 4:27pm: no

SmarterChild 4:26pm: Fine.

Blogging tools - 1

After the comparison between different blogging domains in one of my previous posts the next logical step would have been to talk about several blogging tools that you can use…

Today we are featuring two of the most basic blogging tools…

JDarkRoom is a popular, simple full-screen text file editor with none of the usual bells and whistles that might distract you from the job in hand. If you are writing a novel, essay, thesis or just need to be able to concentrate on your writing, then JDarkRoom will definitely help. It comes immensely handy when you are writing a long post, a story, or recounting an experience to the community at large and need to focus on your content. (Download here) Type: Freeware

Windows Live Writer is a desktop blog publishing application. It features What You See is What You Get (WYSIWYG) Authoring, Photo Publishing and Map Publishing. Windows Live Writer is currently compatible with following. (Download here) Type: Freeware

• Windows Live Spaces
• Blogger
• LiveJournal
• TypePad
• WordPress
• All blogs that support RSD (Really Simple Discoverability)
• MetaWeblog API
• Moveable Type API
• Community Server
• PBlogs.gr
• JournalHome

a new day has come…

You’d have noticed the posts from another author appearing at ‘takeonlogyk’. The author has been roped in at considerable expense, when first offered the opportunity of co-authoring ‘takeonlogyk’ he showed immense interest, which might be since he gets to share takeonlogyk’s purported income of $2000/month…

Pls. welcome the blogger and a caring friend… Vikram Deo.

He writes at Not Another Mobile Phone Blog!!! which is his technology blog focusing on anything that can be related to ‘mobile’ and he has also been writing as a contributor on the Fone Arena Blog too which you can check out here…

Vikram’s technology sense is far more better than mine and hence cutting-edge content is guaranteed… Godspeed to Viky…

Firefox Beta Version 3

It time for Firefox Beta Version 3. Firefox is one the most used Internet browser today. It is used mainly because of 2 reasons, tabbed browsing and open source; people can create lots of add-ons for their Firefox Browser using their coding skills.

Today Mozilla will be launching the Beta Version 3 of this popular browser. This version will be having theme updates for all the platforms like Windows XP. This Version will also have a well integrated and full of options History and Bookmarks Tool. There are a new set of icons and toolbar menus also. You will find a complete list of features here. And if you close a session with multiple Tabs it will every time ask you, not like earlier when it asked only when the browser crashed.
[Image Via: Mozilla]

Google Saree

Google is well penetrated in the Indian search market with its Google Local Search. The company also has major R&F centers in India and considers India as an important stepping-stone to success. Google has inspired many companies and products;

Today I cam across this product, which is inspired by Google, this product has nothing to do with technology or what Google does, but still this is some interesting piece of work and it seems that Google’s search technology is really working for women.

yahoo live is here

Yahoo has recently launched the Yahoo Live Video service. As the name says Yahoo Live is a kind of Live video services. You just need to have a webcam and Yahoo ID and you are ready for Yahoo Live. You can stream your videos live, very true to the name.

Users can create a channel, get their cams authorized and start showing what you do to people. People can come and watch these videos. I am sure this service will be used by some antisocial elements, but that’s a different part of the story. By the way when I went to the website of Yahoo Live! This is the message I got.
Only conclusion I was able to draw after looking at this message was that, this service has become an instant hit with people.

Pocket-sized Bravia

Today, gadgets are increasingly becoming enhanced to give users the ultimate experience. Mobile phones come with large screens to make viewing an enjoyment, Personal Media Players come with beefed up memory and other functions that entice consumers.

Sony’s Bravia range of Televisions is really doing great in the market thanks to its awesome picture quality and host of other functions. Though mobile phone have started coming with mobile TV, Sony has come up with a small pocket sized Bravia TV. Sony has recently launched the XDV-D500 and XDV-G200 Tiny Bravia TV for people who are too much into television and are dissatisfied with TVs in their mobile phones. In the world on PMPs, somebody launching a TV of such small size is a real good idea and when it has Bravia brand name attached to it then, it is bound to attract attention.

the clash of the titans…

I’ve been in the blogosphere for almost two years now. During this time I have fiddled around with blogger.com (B) and wordpress.com (WP) exploring all the options and would like to post some a comparison of the two.

NOTE: In this comparison I have only taken into account the free wordpress.com hosted domain.

• Both are free blog sites that require nothing more than an ID and Password. That’s perfect! No need to worry about hosting, domain names, blah blah blah. Score: WP 1 | B 1
• Blogger is owned by Google. That’s cool. Word Press is open source. Even cooler. What does that mean for most people? Nothing really. But for those who care, it’s cool. Score: WP 2 | B 1
• With Blogger, you have much more control over the template. They give you access to the code so you can add all the sidebar junk you want. Of course you can also change the images, colors, etc. With WordPress.com you don’t get any control over the template except for uploading custom headers or changing theme colors in a few templates. Advantage: WP 2 | B 2
• Word Press allows you to use tags for each post which is great since it gives a perfect brief about the post that you have written. Tags are not supported in blogger. boo Score: WP 3 | B 2
• Word Press allows you to create pages of static info like an “About Me” (you can even change the name to ‘Author’ or something more apt) page. Blogger uses a profile that isn’t a part of your site. But that’s just for the “About Me” page. In Word Press, you can create as many pages about anything you like. Score: WP 4 | B 2
• If you create a post with a date or time stamp in the future, in Blogger it’ll show up with that date in the correct place. In Word Press, it’ll wait and publish that post at the time of the date stamp. Score: WP 5 | B 3
• WordPress.com allows trackbacks (a comment notification that someone blogged about you). Blogger does not. Score: WP 6 | B 3
• At least at this point, it seems WordPress.com’s Akismet spam blocker works better than Blogger, but it’s close very close call. Score: WP 7 | B 4
• Word Press provides you with basic stats. Blogger does not. Score: WP 8 | B 4
• Blogger and WordPress.com both allow multiple blogs on one account. Score: WP 9 | B 5
• WordPress.com has a very cool and easy import function so if you wanted to leave blogger, typepad, etc and go with wordpress.com, it’ll import all of your old posts and comments so easily. Blogger doesn’t know what import means. Score: WP 10 | B 5
• Word Press gives 3 gigabytes of storage as compared to a paltry 1 gigabyte of Blogger. Score: WP 11 | B 5

Overall winner: Word Press

My conclusion if you are into customizing your template and making your own template and blog, go with Blogger. You have more control over the look/design/template. However, the look/feel of wordpress.com’s templates are nice and clean and they are giving you a lot of options in the sidebar now. WordPress.com has many more options that are favorable like tags, pages, and trackbacks. This makes your blog better for visitors and encourages better conversation.

Also, I have more confidence in wordpress.com adding more features than blogger.com.

shortcut to success

My personal shortcut to success. ‘People’ covered me last week and I feature on the cover page…

So tell me have you ever dreamt about featuring on the first page of TIME Magazine or Fortune Magazine? The solution is … Magmypic

Try it out, its an excellent tool for creating fantastic profile photographs…

do you hate outlook?

Do you hate outlook for that drab skin and its almost featureless message handlers? There is something that you can do about it…

Introducing Xobni, Xobni is a well-implemented Outlook add-on that adds an excellent contact manager. It comes in a form of sidebar and includes a number of really useful features. Click on any email in your inbox and Xobni sidebar will show sender’s profile. This profile includes contact information, communication stats (number of in / out emails), related people, nested email conversations, all sent/received atttachments and more.

Xobni Features:

• Instantly see sender profile as you navigate through emails in your inbox.
• Automatically pulls contact’s phone number directly from his/her emails and adds it to the profile.
• View all email conversations with the contact, the number of emails that were sent and received from the email address, and stats showing when you usually send/receive emails to/from that contact.
• View all related attachments.
• Lightning-fast live search: Search though contacts and emails as you type.
• ‘Schedule time with … ‘ : Integrated meeting scheduler.
• At them moment Xobni works only with Mirosoft Outlook. However, support for Lotus Notes, Eudora, Outlook Express, Mozilla Thunderbird and other popular email clients will follow.
• More deta