Hypercognition: July 2004

Speed up Adobe Reader

PDF SpeedUp for Adobe Reader 1.32

Speed up your Acrobat Reader to being lightning fast. [License: Freeware|

CSS Layout Techniques

If you are looking for help making the transition to CSS layout (that's Cascading Style Sheets), you've come to the right place. I am cataloging here as many useful cross-browser CSS layout techniques as I can find

Hardware firewall

AlphaShield is a hardware firewall that connects between your computer and high speed modem.Connecting to the Internet without AlphaShield is like leaving the front door of your home unlocked. Hackers and unwanted intruders can easily enter your system, steal your valuable information and even take control of your computer to engage in Internet attacks. Once active, AlphaShield™ monitors all Internet activity and effectively protects your system from all unauthorized intruders. AlphaShield™ is your simple, most powerful and cost-effective Internet privacy solution. Under $100 Learn More

IE Tweak

IEtweak 2 1.0.6 Change IE title bar, default search engine, download folders and more. Freeware via MajorGeeks

Email hub

This site is meant to provide information and resources for electronic mail, as well as pointing to other information and resources. I try to include materials suitable for the end user, hobbyist, webmaster, administrator, etc.

Open Source Web Design

Open Source Web Design is a community of designers and site owners sharing free web design templates as well as web design information. Helping to make the internet a prettier place!

Flash Decompiler

Price: 39.95
Download file size: 3645 K

Flash Decompiler is a new powerful solution by SoftInfinity (department of Eltima Software GmbH) for everybody dealing with Macromedia Flash technology. Flash Decompiler delivers the power to extract all resources from a SWF file. Now with an ease of one click you can store sounds, images, videos, shapes, frames, morphs, fonts, texts, buttons, sprites and ActionScripts from any SWF file directly to your hard drive. Intellectual item-by-item preview, user-friendly controls with fully-customizable interface make Flash Decompiler a truly collaborative environment for professional work. We offer you the best support of SWF format available today.

Optimize Windows XP

Windows XP's default configuration is far from optimized. This guide will help you improve your overall system performance. I avoid using or recommending "all-in-one" Windows XP Tweak programs since many blindly adjust settings that have no affect on performance and can cause future problems. This guide is designed to be performed top to bottom, in sequence since some steps are required to be performed before others. This guide is not designed to be used in combination with other Windows tweaking guides or other Windows tweaking software. It is also not designed to be used in parts.

IE BHO tool

Remove Toolbar Buddy is a freeware utility to delete unwanted toolbars and other Internet Explorer add-ons such as buttons, menus and browser helper objects. Remove Toolbar Buddy backups configuration data so you can roll back all changes at any time.

CD burner

DeepBurner Pro 1.1.1.129 Beta
Create data, bootable, and audio CDs as well as data DVDs and more. [License: Freeware Requires: Win All Size: 4.6 Mb]

Free pdf conversion

AcroPDF provides print-to-PDF functionality in almost any Windows application. The program is free, with no pop-up advertisements or registration pop-up window, or feature limitations. It installs as a virtual printer and is accessible from any program that offers a Print option. AcroPDF allows you to create PDF files from any printable document (.doc, .xls, .ppt, images, text, web pages etc.) Unlike other solutions, this PDF converter impressed people with its speed: Usually a 100-page Word document took half a minute. AcroPDF is industrial strength PDF creation software offering such features as high resolution, summary information, PDF security options, password protection, page stretching, compatibility settings, image compression, PDF file size reduction, and font embedding. AcroPDF also enables software developers to easily integrate this pdf writer into their own project, where an automatic output-to-PDF feature is sought after. Visit AcroPDF site to learn more, http://www.acropdf.com

cPanel Proxy

This script is made for people who use cPanel. Its purpose is to give access to cPanel (including webmail and WHM) at port 80 by acting like a proxy. (For people behind strict firewalls.) It can be installed by server owner, reseller or end-users. Update 2004-07-02: FAQ addedUpdate 2004-06-26: Moved homepage to new address: http://cpanelproxy.net. Update 2004-06-15: Auto installer created. Download cPanelProxy.zip

DJ software

http://www.mixmeister.com/mmexp5.htm $49.95

Two turntables and a microphone is what it takes to be a DJ, right? MixMeister Express throws out the turntables, chucks the microphone stand in the corner and puts intelligently orchestrated DJ mixes in the hands of the music enthusiast where they belong. There are two essentials to being a great DJ; channeling the mood of the room with a complimentary selection of tracks and the dark art of beat matching songs with conflicting tempos. Mix Meister won't prevent you from picking songs in the key of bleh, but it matches beats better than any human DJ. Overlay tracks for unique song mashes. Record mix tapes like a high-fidelity all-star. Catalog music and edit ID3 tags. Normalize volume across tracks to eliminate abruptly loud or soft moments. And best of all, great mixes are exportable to WAV, WMA, or a CD/DVD burner for the ultimate in mix tape creation. Of course, the playing tracks in reverse feature provides generations to come with the ability to find out 'Paul is dead.'

Streaming software
Price: $199.00
http://www.spacialaudio.com/products/sam2/
http://www.spacialaudio.com/counter.html?file=sam2f.exe
SAM2 - Professional Internet broadcast DJ software. SAM is a powerful & advanced broadcast automation solution that has been undergoing continuous development now for over 4 years, specifically to fully meet the "specialized" needs of online broadcasters. SAM2 currently features MP3, mp3PRO, Windows Media 9 and Ogg streaming support, dual player decks, advanced playlist rotation logic, drag&drop management, real-time listener statistics, voice over/Mic input, sound FX module, automated requests, required RIAA/DMCA Sound Performance Accounting/Reporting features, HTML web output, full 24-bit PCM output, multi server support including - Live365, Shoutcast, Icecast, Windows Media and much much more!

Remote Control

(Technology) Full Body Remote Control
NTT DoCoMo may have succeeded in coming up with a wacky interface that we actually want.

Their UbiButton controller is a watch-type device with a chip on the back in contact with your skin; tap your fingertips together lightly and it picks up the shock. By tapping out different patterns (it detects only the shock, not the strength) the idea is that you could turn lights on and off, control appliances and more.

JPG Cleaner

JPG Cleaner is simple but powerful utility for cleaning JPG files from anything that is not picture data. Commonly used programs such as Adobe Photoshop are writing additional information into JPG file that isn't needed for correctly displaying the picture. All this data is useul only when opening the file in program that created it. Other programs such as Internet Browsers are just skipping this data, so the data is downloaded ant then thrown away! Just use this program when publishing JPG files on the Internet and your JPG files become smaller (if they contain non-picture data) with NO QUALITY LOSS.

Recover hard drive

SysOpt Forums - How does a lab recover hard drive data: Doesnt matter how many times you format or overwrite, the data is recovered using a special very expensive hard drive that can move the heads a lot more accurately than a normal hard drive. The basics are - when the platter is magnetised the area magentised is wider than the head so there is some overlap - the recovery heads move directly into this free zone and read the peripheral digital data - magnetoresistive microscopy - its a fascinating topic but very dry.

Commercial recovery software list

here are some utilities for data recovery :
http://www.topdownloads.net/software/browse.php?category=124

This can repair damages patiions fat32 ntfs ...... :
http://www.pcwash.com/hard-drive-repair/hard-disk-drive-repair.html

Clean context menu

One of my biggest pet hates is programs which insist on becoming a part of my context menus. A context menu is the little menu which pops up when you right click on objects, files, folders or icons. For example, right click on a desktop icon and if you have Norton Antivirus installed it will have 'Scan with Norton Antivirus' as a choice. I'm sure there are a lot of virused icons out there, thanks for the option guys. [more at TechnoBabble]

Freeware recommendations

The Pricelessware List reflects the programs favored by participants in the alt.comp.freeware newsgroup ; it is not an exhaustive list of the best available Freeware. Most of the listings are well-known programs, but there are some hard-to-find goodies to be discovered. Although most categories will list only 1 or 2 selections, a few will list 3-4 programs.

Sourceforge Most Popular at Download.com or Tucows Toppicks]

Favorite Free Software Programs from Radified

Street Tech's year-end guide to some software that doesn't suck. The idea here was to create a guide to overlooked and more generally useful Free Software offerings than the usual high geekitude offerings. Two types of licenses are listed. "Free as in speech" means it is free to use as you want, copy, modify, redistribute, but it's not necessarily free of charge. "Free as in beer" means free of charge (Like: "Hey, everybody, FREE BEER!)

FDISK resources

Radified uses these files to partition drives with FDISK.
This only contains the version of FDISK used to partition hard drives larger than 64GB.
Don't use this floppy with NTFS partitions.

Doc's FDISK Guide -> [HERE] (65KB zipped PDF)
See here for the HTML version of Doc's FDISK guide

Delpart.exe -> [HERE] (123KB)
Use delpart to delete NTFS partitions that defy FDISK.
Copy it to your floppy & execute it from there.
Then reboot & use FDISK to create Windows partitions.
More info here about Deleting partitions.

See here for info on Partitioning a hard drive with FDISK.
See here for info about Partitioning Strategies.

Windows XP boot disks -> [HERE] From the Microsoft site.
You might also want to try Ultimate Boot Disk.
Check out bootdisk.com for more.

Ranish Partition Manager - Partitions hard drives & Boot manager [like Partition Magic].

Interval screen capture

I'm currently testing a little program I just wrote - it's a fun tool that takes a screenshot of you desktop at a given interval and uploads it to an FTP server. Sort of a desktop webcam, so to say. If everything works the way I want, I'll probably release it tomorrow - I assume al least Bloggers have a use for it, though it's actually a little silly... *g*

So, if an image shows up below, my tool seems to be working well so far.

Front panel ports

FRONTX - FRONT PANEL COMPUTER PORTS: "The 5.25' FRONTX Casing has 4 port holding bays, i.e. 1 large bay and 3 small bays. The FRONTX Port is simply an extension cable fitted onto a custom designed port holder, which can be slotted into the port holding bay. It's that simple!!

Image backup

Ohls-Place - Acronis True Image reviewed: "Conclusion: I have to give the folks at Aconris a big hand for turning out a product that is not only intuitive but so simple to use it can almost operate itself. Top this all off with the fact that True Image can handle all of your back up needs while you continue to operate inside Windows makes this the one piece of software that I will be using for every computer in this household. The current price for True Image at the Ancoris Software Store is $44.99 for the downloadable version and $49.99 for boxed set. Why risk all of your important files and records? Back them up and do it the easy way with this product, I know if you're like me, you'll find it one of your immediate favorites. "

copy one drive to another -- Maxtor.com - MaxBlast III -- a one-step, ATA/IDE hard drive installation utility. MaxBlast 3 makes hard drive installations and upgrades hassle-free for novices and professionals alike by automatically identifying, partitioning, and formatting any Maxtor ATA hard drive, making it data-ready in minutes.

Free office suite

OpenOffice.org: "Announcement: OpenOffice.org 1.1 can be downloaded now. It represents months of testing, improvement, innovation. There is no other office suite like it, either in terms of features or code. And it's free. Right now. "

A Yank-a-file

Copy It Anyway 2.4
Size: 325KB (Download now)
Info: A program for copying corrupted files which can't be copied the standard way because of some error on media the file is stored on.

Blogger applications

Blog Tools: "Weblogs Compendium"

blogger applications from Royby

Site Listings
:: w.bloggar ::
Antville
audblog : sounding out
bcJournal
Big Blog Tool - Welcome!
Blog-City.com:
Blog-City.com: free and easy Blogging
BLOGGER
Blogging Network > How to Get Started
bloghorn
BlogWeaver
CityDesk: Desktop Content Management
diary-x.com :: diary-x.com
Diaryland!! online diary - fun, free online diaries you can update through your browser!
Dynaweb
Eastgate Tinderbox: the tool for notes
Enetation - annotations for your site
Free-Conversant Home
Geeklog - The Ultimate Weblog System
Greymatter - The Opensource Weblog/Journal Software
Hiveware - Soapbox Weblog System
iMi free weblogs
invisiblog.com (beta) - anonymous weblog publishing
LiveJournal.com
movabletype.org
pitas.com
pMachine - Publish Your Universe!
Project Steve Guttenberg :: The Police Academy Of Blogging Programs
Radio UserLand
Scoop Collaborative Media for the Masses
Su Logu Official Page
ThingamaBlog
TypePad
WriterBytes
[ dawk / home ]
journalspace

Make time the name

SetNameToTime is a free program designed to rename digital camera jpg and tiff files.

A file renaming program you may think, that is hardly a new concept - so why use this one?

Almost all jpg and tiff files produced by modern digital cameras contain information like the date and time the picture was shot, if a flash was used, the shutter speed, the f-stop and a lot of other information. SetNameToTime can extract this information and use it to rename the file.

The first version of SetNameToTime would use the date and time only to produce a name like 2003-08-11--11-40-00.jpg (year-month-date--hour-minute-second.jpg). The idea was to give each file a unique name and one that would always produce the correct chronological order."

Free RAM disk site

Free RAMDisk for W2k / XP / Server 2003 / PE:

Why use a ramdisk?
A ramdisk is as fast as your ram
and not as slow as your hard drive.

A ramdisk can be used to store:

web content of web servers
temporary index files
tables of database servers
temporary files ( TEMP and TMP)
Cached Internet Files
the scratch disk for Photoshop
games and programs in general

A ramdisk reloads data 30-60 times faster

But, be warned!
All kinds of data that may be lost at shutdown.

Tiny OS

TinyOS: "The networked sensor regime is an exciting new design space that is emerging as a result of innovations in RF Communication technology and MEMS technology. TinyOS explores the software support that is required in that design space. TinyOS is a component-based runtime environment designed to provide support for deeply embedded systems which require concurrency intensive operations while constrained by minimal hardware resources. Check out a fraction of the hundreds of TinyOS projects including the PicoRadio -- a meso-scale low cost (< 50 cents) transceiver for ubiquitous wireless data acquisition that minimizes power/energy dissipation. "

Salmi Batch Tricks

Recommended by Fred Langa: Timo Salmi's Assorted Batch Tricks: "This file contains assorted batch tricks. The items are in no particular order. Many, but not all, have been used in the TSBAT*.ZIP collection of batches. Likewise, there are some useful further tricks, not documented here, to be found in the TSBAT batches. Many users have sent me useful suggestions and their own alternative or further solutions. My best thanks for the material."

TinyApps.Org

"Welcome to TinyApps.Org, a guide to very small software for your PC. Virtually all of the programs listed here are free of charge and for use under Windows."

Photo album software

JAlbum is written after numerous disappointments with existing album software. With JAlbum you have full control of the look of the generated album, not just color theme and basic layout, still making an album is just a matter of drag and drop + a button click if you prefer to use one of the many existing looks. JAlbum will process your images, make index pages and slide show pages and even upload the final album to the Internet for your friends to see. No extra software is needed to view the albums, -just your web browser.

JAlbum - web photo album software: "Drop a folder containing image and movie files onto JAlbum and press 'Make album'. JAlbum will create thumbnails of your images and display them in html index pages. You can also have JAlbum produce a slide show of your images for easy navigation one at a time. The output may contain scaled-down versions of the original images. Clicking on these images may bring up the original image (for printing etc). JAlbum does not touch or modify your original images in any way. It just adds some files and folders to the image folder you specify during web creation. JAlbum can also create a web of a hierarchy of image folders. JAlbum supports jpeg, gif and png image files and popular movie formats like .avi, .mpg and .wmv" Freeware

Gallery Wizard is a free template based program for creating thumbnail gallery pages. It accepts over a dozen different input formats, with the possibilty for creating galleries from several different folders at once.

It renders the gallery pages, thumbnails including various effects (like 3D Border), and can optionaly also create HTML pages for each image. By using easy to understand HTML template files with various variables, you can create thumbnail galleries that suit your existing site design.

XP Tweaks

PCStats.com: "101 Tips and Tweaks for Windows XP "

Registry Optimizer

Registry Optimization for Windows NT/2000/2003/XP Detailed information Free

Emergency Recovery Utility NT
Registry Backup and Restore for Windows NT/2000/2003/XP Detailed information Free

Trickle backup

Simultaneous backup of your critical data

BackTrakPro is a powerful tool designed for an automatic backup of your critical data to work with removable media like Zip, USB, JAZ, CD-RW and mapped network connections. You can easily create a profile by including as many folders and individual files as required.

Trickle Backup is the key feature of BackTrakPro; it monitors and identifies the modified files and executes backup process in the background during system idle state.

The files are compressed by default with the compression ratio of 1:3 to minimize the storage space used. BackTrakPro also protects your valuable data with password and encryption.

The scheduler makes it easy to define the backup plan and set the program to backup daily, weekly, monthly or yearly at a specific time. The retention option allows you to maintain the number of versions of the changed file(s) and helps you to keep the recent changed file based on the selected retention option. The backup and restore activities are stored in a log file. $35 -20% discount.

Software migration

StepUp is the fastest and most reliable way to migrate data, applications and settings from your old PC to your new PC! Your data, applications and settings are automatically migrated with a simple installation process.

More Info >>

$29.95

Selectutorial: CSS selectors

maxdesign.com.au: "Selectors are one of the most important aspects of CSS as they are used to 'select' elements on an HTML page so that they can be styled. Find out more about selectors including the structure of rules, the document tree, types of selectors and their uses. There is also a step-by-step tutorial showing how selectors are used in the process of building a 3-column layout."

Selectutorial: CSS selectors: Here's a fantastic CSS tutorial which includes a 22-step guide to go from this to this through nothing but CSS. They're even nice enough to show you the BrowserCam results. Very well done.

Backup FireFox

Free MozBackup is a utility for creating backups of Mozilla, Mozilla FireFox, Mozilla Thunderbird and Netscape profiles. It allows you to backup mail, favorites, contacts, etc. This program is freeware. " 731KB. http://backup.jasnapaka.com/

Send Files up to 1GB

This is impressive - a free service that allows you to send a file up to 1GB to another PC or person. Just type in the recipient's email address and upload the file. The recipient is then notified by email and can download the file anytime within 7 days before it is deleted from the server. "No passwords to share, no software to install, no accounts to create, and no full mailboxes. Start sending now!" http://s2.yousendit.com/ [via techsupportalert]

Image recovery tool

Zero Assumption Digital Image Recovery 1.2

A specialized digital camera data recovery tool. Freeware

ListGarden RSS Generator

ListGarden 1.0 released

I've
just posted the 1.0 version of my ListGarden™ RSS Generator Program.
The source code has been released under the GNU GPL license, and it is
available for Microsoft Windows, Mac OS X, generic Perl, and server-CGI
use. A new feature has been added since the beta release: In addition
to creating the XML RSS file, it can also produce an HTML file with the
same information as the XML. I discuss RSS feeds in general in this
weblog post, as well as the issue of private RSS feeds.

Speed up web pages

codeproject.com Speed up your Web page’s download times with 10 easy to follow tips. Obvious moves like using CSS instead of tables and using a / at the end of directory links. While these may seem overly simple at first glance, there are still 8 more tips in this article at the Code Project that are not quite so easily dismissed. [via Lockergnome Web]

How To write Efficient CSS

positioniseverything.net So you want to write CSS more efficiently but are unsure where to start. How about starting with this tutorial? You will be walking along the path of all that is good and kind when writing good CSS code. Common mistakes are pointed out and you will be shown how to avoid them. [via Lockergnome Web]

Let them sing it for you

Erik Bunger Type a phrase and hear it sung with sound bytes from a variety of bands. [via Milk and Cookies]

Free vector graphics

Clif Notes -- Expression 3 can do for vector based graphics what PSP does for raster based graphics. Vector graphics allows you to easily manipulate and resize images that you add or import with no loss of detail. Now here's the kicker. Microsoft bought the software and is offering it as freeware. It's a 57mb download of pure image editing power at no cost. Here are a few examples of the images people have created: Giraffe Lady Parrot Cover GoTo Microsoft's download site. Passport registration may be required.

Last Freeware Version

freeware reviews: "Last Freeware Version at 321download.com - There are many good software programs I've used in the past that I just won't review here because they've gone from being freeware to shareware or trial software. I stumbled across this site and it's a gem. They've aquired a small collection of popular software in it's last version as freeware. They might be a little out of date, but these programs are unencumbered by being crippled or time limited. If you want an up to date version of them, prepare to pay some money. List from the website: http://www.321download.com/LastFreeware/ "

WinFind 2.0

The new search engine — WinFind 2.0 — now shows you hyperlinks to the most relevant article from each of the 15 textbases it indexes. You can easily expand your search results to show additional, related links from any of the sources with a single click. The new index is powered by Atomz.com, an award-winning provider of customized search technologies. Most of the programming of WinFind was done by my research director, Vickie Stevens.

WinFind 1.0 sometimes displayed a results page on which several of the links pointed to articles on the same site. This was due to the difficulties of mechanically ranking the variously formatted contents of the 15 expert sites. WinFind 2.0 will never exhibit this quirk.

Try out the advanced (but easy-to-use) version of WinFind 2.0 at WindowsSecrets.com/WinFind. The simple-search version (with just an input box) sits atop the WindowsSecrets.com home page.

WiFi Antenna

tritium.co.uk: "The Tritium Flatenna is a parabolic reflector for Wireless computer networks. It can be used to increase gain of WiFi or WLAN adaptors that have an external antenna. The Flatenna is constructed from silvered board providing exceptional performance for minimal cost. Unlike conventional antenna solutions, the Flatenna does not incur additional cable and connector losses. The Flatenna is easy to assemble and install, it just slips over your existing antenna to achieve 2 - 3 times additional range."

Stop the Broadcast Flag

pvrblog.com: "After July 1, 2005, every PC HDTV card, computer PVR software, and home theater based HDTV recorder (like the HD DirecTiVo unit) will be aware of the Broadcast Flag and prevent you from moving recordings off your boxes. They'll be especially harsh on computer based stuff, since pretty much every computer is connected to the internet these days...."

Following ASP

Via MIT's Technology Review: "Gmail validates a claim that Sun has been making for nearly a decade—that it’s possible to replace a network of PCs running Windows with world-class computers offering computing services to low-cost and easily-managed desktop machines—perhaps machines so inexpensive that they don’t even have a hard disk. Sun called such computers “thin clients.” While they are popular at some companies, they haven’t made real inroads against the Windows desktop because the applications just haven’t worked as well. But Gmail does work just as well as a copy of Outlook Express running on the desktop. In some way, in fact, it works better. This is big news—bigger, in fact, then most people seem to realize.

Network Info

Network Info is a small tool which displays important data of all network adapters that are connected to the computer (e.g. modem, DSL, LAN). The handling of the program is easy and intuitive. Data that are displayed are for example the IP-address, MAC-address, subnet mask and the address of the DHCP-server. If you click the Tray-button on the caption, the program minimizes to the system tray. Now the tooltip of the icon in the system tray shows the IP- and gateway-address of the network adapter that was displayed at last (Go to Applications, then scroll down).....(free).....[via shellcity.net]

Windows XP Prefetch

channels.lockergnome.com: "Windows XP contains a directory known as Prefetch in which it stores files that are used to start Windows XP and applications faster. By prefetching, Windows XP can read ahead into the cache the data that is expected to be requested (remember its much faster to read data from the cache). So you can see overall how this prefetching can improve performance. But - yes, there is a but - over time some of the files within the Prefetch directory are no longer used. The result is that it can noticeably slow down your computer's boot time. So what can you do? Simple. Open the run command and type in Prefetch. This takes you to the Windows\Prefetch directory. Once you are there, delete all the files within the folder (or at least those files that are more then two - three weeks old). So of course I tried this on my system and only noticed a slight decrease in the amount of time it took my computer to boot. However, I was more than happy to delete the 120 files that were in the folder. A word of caution though, empty this directory too often can have negative results. Shoot for about once a month and you should be okay."

Hypercognition

Saturday, July 31, 2004