Have you ever wondered how much time you spend on your computer performing certain tasks, or how often you run some of your applications? If so then you might want to checkout the newly released Slife 2.0. This is the first release of Slife that is completely free for users, and once you have it setup you'll be able to see just how productive you actually are.
Firefox 3 (review) has been out for just barely over a week now and it has been downloaded over 19 million times according to Spread Firefox. Many of you requested that we assemble a tweaks guide just like we did with Firefox 2, and so that's exactly what we've got in store for you today.
Last week Windows users got the joy of carrying Firefox 3 in their pockets, and today Mac users can do the same thing! Earlier today Portable Firefox 3.0 for Mac OS X was released, and with it you can carry your browser around with you from one Mac to another.
Compiz Fusion on Linux has definitely received a lot of attention because of their innovative thinking, and the latest thing to come out of their lab is a plugin called Stackswitch. To put it simply it is an application switcher, but it comes packed with pizzazz.
Back in October 2007 openSUSE 10.3 hit the streets in style as it always does, and it came packed with the features that keep geeks on the bleeding-edge. In true Novell style openSUSE 11.0 is busting down the doors with over 200 new features including a redesigned installer, faster package management, KDE 4, GNOME 2.22, Compiz Fusion, and more!
It took an astonishing 15 years to complete, but Wine 1.0 has finally been released! Wine, for those of you that don't know, serves as a way to run some Windows applications in Linux without the need for an emulator. The team has done their best to recreate the Dynamic Link Libraries (DLL's) that are used in Windows, and it all had to be done without an ounce of code from Microsoft.
In the last week we've seen two major browsers, Firefox (review) and Opera, release huge milestones for their desktop software. Just five days after the release of Opera 9.5 they are reporting that there have been an astounding 4.7 million downloads of the browser, thereby averaging almost a million downloads per day.
It's been a year and a half since Mozilla shipped Firefox 3 Alpha 1, and what we saw initially wasn't very breathtaking. For this first milestone release Mozilla focused on backend improvements that would, in the long run, make the browser a better competitor in a world that is largely dominated by Internet Explorer.
I never thought Opera was going to make this possible, but I'm pleased to say that in the new Opera 9.5 you can actually customize how many Speed Dial entries are shown at any one given time! They are so incredibly useful that I've found myself needing more than the nine that comes standard in the browser.
So it was just announced that Firefox 3.0 will be coming on Tuesday, but lets not get ahead of ourselves... Opera 9.5 is here today! The Opera team has worked tirelessly to bring you the next generation browser that millions of people will find comfort in using, and what they have to show for their work is something they can really be proud of.
Windows XP/Vista only As a web designer one of the things that is difficult to do is test a site in multiple versions of Internet Explorer, especially if you're running Vista which doesn't really include an option to run prior versions of IE.
Mac only One of my favorite features in Google Calendar is the "Quick Add" feature that lets you use a more natural language for adding events to the calendar. Apple iCal users can get a similar feature thanks to the free QuickCal Widget.
I've read about how a lot of people have chosen to disable User Account Control (UAC) in Vista because of the headaches that can result from it. That's mostly because of applications that have not yet been programmed to run in a general user mode, and they are still accustomed to running as a privileged user just as they did in XP.
I swear that Napster is as close as it gets to a cat with 9-lives. In 1999 it started off as a file sharing service that exploded with popularity. People could share and download songs freely, but the service was doomed to failure since it used central servers to connect one user to another.
Windows; Mac; One thing that has always amazed me is the fact that none of the desktop feed readers currently available synchronize with Google Reader. Maybe I'm wrong and I just haven't searched hard enough, but we're getting a little closer with ReadAir.
Mac only Interestingly enough Microsoft has released Office 2008 Service Pack 1 today for Macs. What's interesting about that? Well, it is one of the fastest turnarounds for a Service Pack that I've ever seen. The suite of applications was just released back in January 2008, and here we are four months later with a Service Pack.
Mac only Yahoo has made an acquisition today that will probably catch some Mac users off guard. They bought the rights to a Safari add-on called Inquisitor, which is pictured to the right.
Windows only It seems as though Apple's Expose feature has really struck a chord with Windows users. There have been Expose clones for what seems like forever, but it wasn't until Switcher that I became really impressed with what a feature like Expose could offer to a Windows user. Unfortunately to use Switcher you have to be running Vista with Aero enabled.
Mac only Breakaway is a nifty little free application that makes your Mac computer stop playing music in iTunes anytime you unplug the headphones. Some of you might already be familiar with this feature because it's something that most iPods do.
We were getting quite a few tips over the last day regarding the new version of AVG free that was just released. As you might recall AVG 8.0 Pro was made available several months ago, and it is a pretty comprehensive security suite. It wasn't bad, but to me it seemed pretty bloated.
