CyberNet News » WrapUp

WrapUp: Office 2010 Beta Available, Legal Usage of Windows 7 OEM Copies, and More

Ryan — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 22:02:40 +0000

Welcome to the WrapUp by CyberNet. This is a collection of news stories, downloads, and tips that we have collected over the last few days, but never got around to writing about. Don’t forget to send in your own tips, or just leave a comment on this page if you think you’ve got something we should include.

–News–

Office 2010 Beta Available
Microsoft has posted the Office 2010 Beta for MSDN and TechNet subscribers, but not before it had already been leaked. It was already appearing on your favorite BitTorrent search engine last week, but now there is some legitimacy to the download.

It’s “Illegal” to Use OEM Copy of Windows 7 on Your Own PC
I know several tech-savvy people who have purchased OEM copies of Windows 7 because they build their own PC’s, but if you look at the fine print doing so means you don’t have a genuine copy of the operating system. Microsoft says that you have to resell the PC to a third-party in order for it to be deemed legit, which is rather disheartening.

Google Getting Ready to Launch Extensions Site for Chrome?
The eagle-eyed people over at Download Squad noticed something new in the latest Chrome build… a reference to what appears to be an upcoming extensions site. Maybe Google Chrome extensions will finally become a bit more official, and I’m sure the extra publicity that developers will get will spark an onslaught of new extensions.

1080p HD Coming to YouTube Next Week
Starting next week users will be able to watch videos in both 720p and 1080p HD formats. They have even said that they will begin re-encoding videos that have been previously uploaded at the higher resolution so that there’s no need for anyone to upload their videos again to get the better video quality.

–News in Brief–

Windows 7 RTM Activation Bypassed by Hackers
Pirates just don’t give up… two new methods of bypassing Windows 7 activation emerge: RemoveWAT and ChewWGA.

Apple Launches iTunes Preview
Apple now provides a web-based version of iTunes that will let you preview URL’s before redirecting you to the iTunes software.

Google Acquires Gizmo5
Google’s acquisition of Gizmo5 will be used to enhanced Google Voice, and will likely be used to tie features into Google Talk.

Demonoid Rewrites Code, Comeback is Imminent
According to TorrentFreak, Demonoid’s return will be coming soon after it was down for several weeks, but they had to rewrite code to account for the loss of data.

Google Offers More Storage for Less Money
You can grab twice as much storage at a quarter of the old price over at Google… 20GB is just $5 a year and 80GB is $20 a year. Not bad! Or you can spring for the 16TB at $4k a year.

Google Provides Free WiFi at Airports This Holiday Season
47 different airports will be offering free WiFi for travelers this holiday season, compliments of Google.

Firefox Tops Vulnerability List
Firefox accounted for 44% of all vulnerabilities in the first half of 2009 according to an application security vendor.

Celebrating Five Years of Firefox
Last week the open source browser celebrated it’s fifth birthday.

–Tips, Tutorials, and Reviews–

Windows ReadyBoost Monitor
Windows 7 and Vista both support using ReadyBoost as a simple way to turn a USB drive or memory card into additional memory for the computer to use. ReadyBoost monitor is handy because you’ll be able to keep an eye as to whether your system is actually making use of the additional memory, and if so how often it’s being hit.

Wally Wallpaper Changer
Wally is a free and open source wallpaper changer that works on Windows, Mac, and Linux computers. With it you can have it pull down images from online sources (such as Flickr), and flip through the different images on your desktop to help keep the scenery fresh.

PHPAnywhere: An Online PHP Editor
PHPAnywhere is a rather full-features PHP editor that is all handled online. It does your syntax highlighting, can edit files located on an FTP location, adjust permissions, and much more. You’ll always be able to work on your code no matter what PC you’re using. It’s a programmer’s dream!

–Tips in Brief–

How to Convert MKV Files to DVD
This free Windows app will let you convert a high-quality MKV video file to a format that can easily be burned to a DVD.

Download Torrents without BitTorrent
A website called httpTorrents is will let users download files directly without needing a BitTorrent client.

Extract Clips from DVDs
DVD Knife is a free program that can be used to extract portions of a DVD to a single file.

Linux Mint 8 RC1 Spices Up Your Desktop
Linux Mint 8 builds on the latest Ubuntu 9.10 platform, and bundles a lot of apps/features to make it even easier to use.

Automatically Backup Your WordPress Database
These instructions demonstrate how you can use a free WordPress plug-in to schedule database backups.

Comodo EasyVPN Created a Free VPN in a Few Clicks
You can set up your own VPN with this free software, but you can only do it at home (it’s not free for commercial use).

Show Week Numbers in Google Calendar
Google has a special calendar you can add to your Google Calendar account that will display week/day numbers on your calendar.

–Downloads–

FeedDemon 3.0.0.45 [Mirror]
Firefox 3.6 ^{Beta 2} [Mirror]
Google Chrome 4.0.245.0 ^Beta [Mirror]
Maxthon 2.5.10.2994 [Mirror]
Maxthon 3.0.5.7 ^Alpha [Mirror]
Opera 10.10.1874 ^Beta [Mirror]
PeaZip 2.8 ^Beta [Mirror]
ReNamer 5.50 [Mirror]
Safari 4.0.4 [Mirror]
VirtualBox 3.1.0.54685 ^{Beta 1} [Mirror]

Copyright © 2009 CyberNet | CyberNet Forum | Learn Firefox
WrapUp: Office 2010 Beta Available, Legal Usage of Windows 7 OEM Copies, and More

Related Posts:

Microsoft Office 2010 Icon Pack

Microsoft To Stop Offering The Office 2007 Downloads Soon

Microsoft To Stop Offering Windows Vista Beta 2 Tomorrow

OpenOffice.org Wants You To “Get Legal”

New Poll: Is Your Copy of Microsoft Office Legitimate?

WrapUp: MSN Redesign, Clean Install with Windows 7 Upgrade Media, and More

Ryan — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 16:10:55 +0000

–News–

Fresh Windows 7 Installs Vulnerable to 8/10 Viruses
Some people feel as though UAC is enough to protect them from the computer daemons known as viruses, but as it turns out you may not want to go down that path. SophosLabs did a test, and a majority of the viruses ran on the OS just fine even with UAC enabled. I think you know the moral of the story.

Google Dashboard: See What they Know About You
A new section in the Google “my accounts” page serves as a dashboard for all of your Google activity. It summarizes recent emails from your Gmail account, how many contacts you have, documents, pictures, and more. You’ll quickly realize just how much Google knows about you.

Long Overdue MSN Redesign Coming
It’s been quite awhile since MSN has seen a redesign, and it’s safe to say that the current design is showing its age. A new one is on the way though, and it is largely simplified from what you currently know as MSN. Actually, the first thing that will probably come to your mind is “why didn’t the background load” when you see all of the white space that was previously filled with an eye-gouging blue.

Reocities… Your Geocities Archive
Yahoo! decided to kill off Geocities for some weird reason. I don’t quite understand because Geocities truly is a part of the Internet’s history, and served as the first personal homepage for a good chunk of Internet stragglers in the early days of 56K modems. One man decided to take it upon himself to create an archive of as many sites as possible, and according to him over 800,000 accounts have been restored as of now.

Google Maps Navigation for Android
In a rather interesting move Google announced that they will be providing turn-by-turn directions for Android devices at no additional cost. They will even throw in features like voice guidance, 3D-views, and a lot of other features you’ve come to expect from traditional GPS applications. I’m keeping my fingers crossed that it will be available for the iPhone soon as well!

–News in Brief–

Windows 7 Sales Exceed Vista Sales by 234%
Reports are that based on sales numbers from the first few days that Windows 7 blew Vista sales out of the water.

Intel Allegedly Paid Dell $6 Billion to no use AMD Chips
A lawsuit filed against Dell claims that they received billions of dollars in payouts over a five-year period from Intel so that Dell would not use AMD processors in their machines.

New Digg Trends
Digg is experimenting with a new way to get hot topics promoted to the front page even faster.

More Info on the Microsoft Courier
This document explains how the swipes and gestures will work on the Microsoft Courier.

Apple Announces 100,000 App Milestone
With over 100K apps in their App Store I’d say this gives Apple a key advantage over a lot of their competition. Granted a lot of the apps suck, but there are also a lot of amazing ones.

130K French Government PC’s Switching to Thunderbird
In a big win for Mozilla… 130,000 government machines in France will start using Thunderbird as the designated email client.

Ubuntu 9.10 Released
It’s that time of the year again! That’s right, the bi-annual release of Ubuntu is upon us with a handful of new features.

Crapware Banished from PC’s in Microsoft Stores
It’s a pleasant surprise for people buying a PC at a Microsoft Store when they find out that it doesn’t come with all the bloatware you’d normally get if purchased directly from the manufacturer.

SeaMonkey 2.0 Released
The new version of Mozilla SeaMonkey has session restore, tabbed email, an updated internal platform, and much more.

Google Voice Works with Your Existing Number
You can take advantage of some Google Voice features without having to switch over your phone number.

–Tips, Tutorials, and Reviews–

Allmyapps Bulk-Installs Programs
We’ve seen other solutions that are similar to this, but Allmyapps as an amazing repository of over 100 apps that you can choose to have rolled up into a single installer. If you rebuild machines often (like me) a utility that can do this becomes a huge time saver.

Readability 2 Makes Webpages Printable
Ever come across a page that you want to print or maybe paste into an email, but can’t because the formatting doesn’t carry over very nice? This handy bookmarklet will try to format the page you’re on in an easy-to-read layout that also doubles as a great printable solution.

Add CPU and Memory Meters to Windows 7 Taskbar
I’ve been saying for awhile that we’re going to start seeing some really clever uses of the Windows 7 Taskbar, and I think this is one of them. With this app you can add two performance meters to your Taskbar: one for CPU usage and another for memory usage. They make use of the built-in progress bar that is displayed behind the icon so that you can always see where the usage is at with a single glance.

Performing a Clean Install with Windows 7 Upgrade Media
One of the headaches with purchasing upgrade media with Windows is trying to provide proof that you own a prior version of the OS. Sure, it’s no problem if you already have Windows installed on your machine, but what if you want to perform a clean install? Paul Thurrott walks you through the different scenarios and explains what will or will not work. He also provides information on how to hack the registry to make a clean install work when using upgrade media.

–Tips in Brief–

Backup Your Ubuntu Machine
This simple app will let you pick and choose which areas of your Ubuntu machine you would like backed up.

Windows 7 Taskbar Tweaker
This free program will let you customize how icons are grouped, what action is performed when you click on an icon, what happens when you right-click, and more.

Rotate Desktop Backgrounds in Windows 7
You may not know it, but Windows 7 has a built-in feature that actually lets you shuffle through desktop backgrounds.

Get Pinned Tabs in Firefox
Yet another Google Chrome feature has been migrated to Firefox through the use of extensions!

Songr: Search for and Download Songs
Grab some of your favorite songs for free with this Windows desktop application.

Texturize Your Taskbar
Change the Taskbar background in Windows 7 to be more than just a single color.

Sketch Out Accidents Online
The website accidentsketch.com gives you the tools you need to quickly draw out and explain how an accident occurred.

IE-Like New Tab Page for Firefox
Firefox users can get a new tab page that resembles that of what you’ll find in IE7/IE8. The one nice addition, however, is the ability to add your favorite sites.

–Downloads–

Copyright © 2009 CyberNet | CyberNet Forum | Learn Firefox
WrapUp: MSN Redesign, Clean Install with Windows 7 Upgrade Media, and More

Clean Install from XP to Vista…a Workaround is Needed?

Windows Media Player 11 Leaked To The Web

Paul Thurrott Upgrades His XP Machine To Vista RC1

Beta Testers Wanted for Next Windows Media Center

WrapUp: Microsoft Reveals How Windows 7 is “Version 7″, VistaSwitcher Improves Alt-Tab, and More

Ryan — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 09:13:43 +0000

–News–

Google Reader Starts Using “Magic”
The Google Reader team announced that there is a new way to sort your feeds: by magic. They use your reading habits and web history (if you’ve opted in for web history tracking) to determine what sort of stuff from your feeds you’ll like the most. You can also view popular items from feeds you’re not even subscribed to, which they hope will help you discover new sites you’ll like.

Microsoft Reveals How Windows 7 is “Version 7″
Microsoft has assembled a video that clarifies exactly how they consider Windows 7 to be the 7th version of Windows. The order? Windows 1, Windows 2, Windows 3, Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7. Who did they leave out from the consumer lineup? Poor ol’ Windows Me, that’s who. I think they’re trying to wipe it from their memory (no pun intended).

Microsoft Security Essentials Delivered to Over a Million Users
In the first week Microsoft received 1.5 million downloads of their Security Essentials antivirus software. According to them there were over 4 million virus detections in that first week on over a half million unique machines. That just goes to prove that their are plenty of people who still need antivirus software to keep them safe, and it’s a good thing Microsoft finally got around to offering a solution for free.

–News in Brief–

Windows 7 Compatibility Center Released
Microsoft has posted a site you can visit to see if your hardware or software is compatible with Windows 7.

Whitehouse.gov Now Powered by Drupal
In an interesting move the Whitehouse.gov site has decided to use the open source Drupal software as their content management engine.

Google Maps’ Appearance Takes New Direction
On Google Maps you can now see street names more clearly thanks to a visual refresh they’ve rolled out.

Windows 7 Launch Day Facts
Over 8 million people tested out pre-release versions of Windows 7 from over 113 different countries.

Flickr Adds People Tagging
Flickr is rolling out people-tagging capabilities that TechCrunch says is better than what Facebook currently has.

Video Walkthrough of Apple’s Newest Additions
Apple unveiled a new “magic” mouse, new iMac’s, and more. This is a video walkthrough of their new products.

Twitter Hits 5 Billion Tweets
Robin Sloan happened to be the lucky person to post the 5 billionth tweet on Twitter.

uTorrent Holds 60% of BitTorrent Marketshare
Vuze, formerly known as Azureus, continues to drop in popularity as uTorrent emerges as the king of the BitTorrent network.

IMDB Turns 19
IMDB, which began as a USENET group, turned 19 about a week ago! Congrats to a site that definitely deserves it.

–Tips, Tutorials, and Reviews–

Ninite Does Bulk Installs for Windows Apps
This amazing service lets you choose the applications you want to install on your machine, and it will then create a custom installer for you to download. When running through the setup process it will keep the questions to a minimum, and according to Lifehacker it’s able to install most apps without asking you a single question. The number of apps supported is pretty incredible, and I could see this becoming a must-have app for anyone that sets up new PC’s regularly.

Burn Windows 7 ISO or put it on a USB Drive
Wow! Microsoft has finally wisened up and provides a tool to create a bootable DVD or USB drive that you can then install Windows 7 from. I’m happy to see the USB drive support in there because using media like that is nice since it’s reusable… as opposed to a DVD that most people probably won’t use more than a handful of times.

VistaSwitcher Improves Alt-Tab on XP, Vista, and Windows 7
I’m always on the lookout for something to improve my productivity, and for that reason I’m always tinkering with different application switchers. As the How-to Geek points out this is one awesome app switcher… especially because of the eye candy it offers.

–Tips in Brief–

How to Set Up a WordPress Blog on Your PC
A guide that covers everything you’ll need to get WordPress up and running on your local machine.

Look Up the Location of Any IP Address
Curious where an IP address is coming from? Just enter it in here to have it retrieve an approximate geographical location.

How to Safely Uninstall Ubuntu from a Dual-Boot Machine
An outline of what you need to do in order to remove Ubuntu without screwing up the other OS’s on your computer.

PortableApps.com Now Does Google Chrome On-the-Go
PortableApps now has a portable version of Chrome… kinda. It will create a portable version from the small file you download. They can’t actually redistribute Chrome as a portable browser due to licensing.

Lifehacker’s Guide to Windows 7
A rundown of all Lifehacker’s best Windows 7 tips.

How to Create a Virtual Hard Drive in Windows 7
A perfectly outlined guide to creating a virtual hard drive in Windows 7 that will appear as though it’s a second drive on your machine.

Microsoft Releases Windows 7 Sponsored Themes
You can now grab themes for products/companies such as Ferrari or the video game Gears of War.

Adobe Browserlab Open for All
I thought this was already open for everyone, but according to DownloadSquad Adobe just opened the doors so that you can easily start testing your site in all the most popular browsers.

Flickr Schedulr Lets You Upload Pics When it’s Convenient
Schedule your photos to upload when you won’t be using your PC.

How to Build a WiFi Home Surveillance System
An awesome tutorial on what you’ll need to create a motion-sensitive surveillance system in your own home.

Performance Showdown: Windows 7 vs. Snow Leopard
Spoiler: I wouldn’t really say one OS comes out on top of the other. They both have things they’re good at.

–Downloads–

Copyright © 2009 CyberNet | CyberNet Forum | Learn Firefox
WrapUp: Microsoft Reveals How Windows 7 is “Version 7″, VistaSwitcher Improves Alt-Tab, and More

New Updates Increase Vista’s Performance

Microsoft Releasing Plans For Windows Defender Beta 2

Vista SP1 Download Coming Soon

Vista RC1 Scheduled For August 15

WrapUp: SearchTabs Enhances Your Google Results, Find Source Images for Desktop Wallpapers, and More

Ryan — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 10:19:52 +0000

–News–

Shared Folders Now on Google Docs
Google has added a feature to Google Docs that I’m sure collaborators will love. They now let you share an entire folder of documents with a group of people instead of having to specify permissions on a per-document basis. That means you can have a folder of docs for co-workers, another for family members, and so on. This just got a lot more useful for me!

Microsoft Ditches Works for Office 2010 Starter
Microsoft has decided to give the axe to MS Works, and replace it with Office 2010 Starter edition. This will included stripped-down ad-filled versions of both Word and Excel that will ship on many new PC’s… instead of the current 60-day trial solution that is getting included. I’m a bit torn as to whether this will be good or bad. In some ways I’m happy I won’t have to hear people say “why can’t I edit my documents in Office anymore?” I’m a bit concerned, however, as to what the quality of ads will be like, and what information Microsoft will be able to collect from users as a result of that.

Verizon Promises Android Phones with Google Voice Support
Verizon and Google made a joint announcement that they will be working together to serve up some Android-powered phones this year. They also said that they will be including support for Google Voice, which was obviously a jab at Apple/AT&T considering the lack of support for the service from those two companies. This should definitely shine some more light on the Android platform, which will hopefully give Google the push they need to continually innovate in the mobile area.

–News in Brief–

Walmart Offering $45 Unlimited Nationwide Cellphone Plan
The retail giant Walmart will begin offering a no-contract cellphone plan in the coming days that includes unlimited minutes, data, and messaging for a mere $45 per month.

Gmail Labs Introduces “Got the Wrong Bob?”
Google can analyze the recipients that you have selected in an email composition, and see if you’ve likely chosen the correct people based on past email habits.

YouTube Shows Video Info
By right-clicking on a YouTube video you can now get information like bitrate, frame rate, and other details.

Ten Teen Entrepreneurs to Watch
TechCrunch outlines 10 teens that you should keep an eye out for… because you’ll probably hear about them again in the future.

Google Sites Gets More Features
When using Google Sites you can add things like documents, spreadsheets, calendars, and more.

Google’s (Lack of) Acquisition Process
Google’s CEO Eric Schmidt admits that Larry and Sergey buy companies on a whim.

Quickly View Formatted PDF’s in your Google Search Results
Google now includes a “Quick View” option next to PDF search results to make reading PDF’s less painful.

MediaFire Pushes for a Firefox Extension to be Banned
MediaFire is urging Mozilla to remove a Firefox extension that is against their terms of service.

Meebo Hits 90 Million Users
Congrats to Meebo for inching even closer to the huge 100 million user milestone!

Pirate Bay Relocates to Nuclear Bunker
The Pirate Bay is protecting themselves from physical attacks by relocating to a nuclear warfare bunker.

–Tips, Tutorials, and Reviews–

SearchTabs Enhances Your Google Results
The SearchTabs Firefox extension is pretty cool because it leverages the data from Xmarks, which includes over one billion user bookmarks. SearchTabs looks at this data and displays stats next to the results letting you know how each one ranks in particular categories. This can definitely be helpful when trying to determine how reputable something is that you’re reading.

Create a Virtual Machine Image From Your Hard Drive
Interestingly enough the Microsoft-owned Sysinternals company has created a free application that lets you turn the OS on your hard drive into a virtual machine image. The image that is generated can then be used in one of numerous virtual machine applications, or when you’re in Windows 7/Vista you can actually mount and browse the contents of the image without actually needing to fire it up.

Create Dynamic Desktop Wallpapers
PhotoJoy is a free Windows app that lets you create dynamic wallpapers and screensavers from the photos you have stored on your computer. If you’re looking for a way to spice up your desktop this is an awesome way to do it. And, if you’re anything like me, you have plenty of photos on your computer for it to work with.

Find Source Images for Desktop Wallpapers
I’m sure it’s happened to you before where you’ve seen an image or screenshot of an image that you really want to use as your wallpaper, but you’re not sure where the original high-res version can be found. That’s where TinEye comes in. Just upload the image, and it will try to locate some higher quality versions of the same photo that will hopefully be good enough to grace your desktop.

–Tips in Brief–

Firefox 3.7 Starts Prepping for Windows 7
Firefox 3.7 is including Windows 7-specific features like jumplists and per-tab Taskbar thumbnails… it’s just disappointing that this final release won’t be available until next year.

DoubleTwist: Another Media Player
This is a decent media player that supports a wide range of devices, including Android-powered gadgets.

Where’s My Cell Phone Service Calls Your Phone
That’s right… you won’t have to ask one of your friends to call your phone the next time you can’t find it. Although that does require you to have it off of silent, and you have to be in the general vicinity if you want to hear it.

Join the Minimalist Google Homepage Prototype
Google is testing a truly minimalist homepage with not much more than a search box and a few buttons. Just run a quick script and you’ll be able to join in the fun.

Color Code Outlook for Easier Management
Make some of your emails stand out from the others by color coding them as they fly in.

Make a Portable Browser Your Default
If you prefer to use a browser that is self-contained (a.k.a. portable) on your machine this is what you need to do to make it the default one.

Windows Mobile 6.5 Review
Who would have thought… the reviews for Windows Mobile 6.5 aren’t looking too good. Gizmodo even goes as far as to say that the changes are barely noticeable.

Create Music Video Playlists with TubeRadio.fm
This website, which will remind you a lot of iTunes, lets you queue up a bunch of music videos that you want to watch.

–Downloads–

Copyright © 2009 CyberNet | CyberNet Forum | Learn Firefox
WrapUp: SearchTabs Enhances Your Google Results, Find Source Images for Desktop Wallpapers, and More

Get Your Widescreen Wallpapers For Your Computer

Show Your Love: Firefox 2 Wallpapers

Put the Photos in your Flickr Account to Good Use

Automatically Rotate Desktop Wallpapers

WrapUp: Mozilla Launches PluginCheck Demo, Microsoft Security Essentials Scores a 98.44%, and More

Ryan — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 14:10:34 +0000

–News–

Gmail Messages Get Enhanced Content
Google has started to “enhance” emails that you receive from senders who’s mailing list you’re already subscribed to… assuming they’ve already “partnered” with Google to provide the special content. One such example is Netflix. When you receive an email from Netflix their icon will show up on the subject line, and the body of the email will contain interactive pieces. If you want to disable this you can do so by clicking the down arrow in the upper-right corner of the email, and choosing the “Do not customize mail from [sender]” option.

Mozilla Launches PluginCheck Demo
The Mozilla development blog has posted saying that they are currently testing a page that will be displayed for users who are upgrading their browser. This specially crafted page will let users see whether all of their browser plugins are up-to-date, and what’s kinda cool is that as of right now it appears as though it works in other browsers as well. Give it a whirl yourself to see if you’re up-to-date on your plugins.

“What is Google Wave” 2-Minute Explanation Video
You can watch this quick two-minute video while you sit there sulking because you didn’t get into Google Wave. I’ve actually been sending this video to people who ask what Google Wave is all about, and I’d say it does a pretty good job of explaining its primary functionality without overdoing it.

Apple Buys Map Company
Apparently back in July Apple purchased a company called Placebase, and their team has now joined Apple. Placebase has their own maps and an extensive API that could give Apple just what they need to integrate a homegrown mapping solution into their products. Apple currently relies on Google for maps on the iPhone, iLife and other products. Not only that but Google recently started showing “sponsored” locations when users search for POI’s on the iPhone, which could be something Apple doesn’t look too fondly at.

–News in Brief–

Drew Carey’s Bid for @Drew Twitter Name
@drew, the popular Twitter screen name behind the “Blame Drew’s Cancer” phenomena, has now received a bid of $25,000 by none other than Drew Carey himself. Carey also said he’ll up the bid to $100,000 if @DrewFromTV receives 100,000 follows by the end of the auction (in about a month).

Measuring Happiness Through Facebook
One site is trying to measure the happiness level of people in the U.S. by gathering Facebook data. As it turns out people like holidays, and hate Mondays. Who knew?

Famous Locations Shows Where Movies and TV Shows were Filmed
Find out where your favorite shows and movies were filmed with this handy little site.

This Photo Destroyed a Camera Lens
The death of a camera lens may not always be a bad thing… in this case the result is a stunning photo.

Google Adds Search Refinements
When performing Google searches you can now refine your search results by the time period they were posted, the type of result, and more.

BumpTop Gets Multi-Touch
BumpTop has received a multi-touch makeover for Windows 7 users.

Twitter Launching Lists
Twitter is working on a “lists” feature that will let people group the individuals that they are following.

Google Docs Gets New Features in Time for School
Google has added student-focused features like text translations and equation editors to their online office suite.

Dell Releases Laptop that Wirelessly Charges
Never trip over a power cord again with Dell’s wirelessly charging laptop.

NewEgg Files for $175M IPO
The electronic ~~heaven~~ retail giant Newegg has filed to go public, and is expecting to raise $175 million.

Apple Surpasses 2 Billion App Store Downloads
Apple announced that its App Store has had over 2 billion downloads, and is currently the home to over 85,000 apps.

Opera Mini Tops 30 Million Users
Opera Mini continues growing steadily as it served up almost 14 billion pages in August 2009, and also had 32 million people use the mobile browser within that one-month span.

–Tips, Tutorials, and Reviews–

Microsoft Security Essentials Scores 98.44% on Detection Test
Last week Microsoft officially released their free antivirus software called Microsoft Security Essentials. I’ve been using the Beta version on a lot of my PC’s, and I have to say that I’m rather impressed with the app. It has a nice sleek interface, and early reports I’ve read indicate that it’s able to detect viruses on par with the other antivirus offerings… which is kinda important.

Reset or Customize Your Windows Services
I’ve always been the type of person that sits there tweaking Windows services until I know I’ve got everything disabled that I’ll never use. For example, on some of my Windows 7 or Vista PC’s I’ll turn off the Windows indexing service if I know I don’t need my files or anything else indexed for fast searching. Sometimes, however, I disable that one service that I didn’t think I needed, but all of a sudden makes my computer go haywire. This website can be used to reset your Windows services back to their defaults, which, in a time of frustration, is priceless. Yep, that’s right… it’s not even an app.

–Tips in Brief–

Pin Individual Folders to the Windows 7 Taskbar
It would have been nice if Microsoft made it easier to pin multiple folders to the Taskbar, but this hack might be able to get you by until they provide a real solution.

Enhance Your Photos with PhotoFiltre
Bring your photos to life using the free PhotoFilter image editing software.

Copy Path Saves File Location to Clipboard
With this lightweight add-on you’ll be able to store a file’s path on your clipboard so that it can easily be shared and carried across multiple applications/windows.

Custom Chromium Build Adds Roboform Support
The popular Roboform password manager is now available on Google Chrome… but only if you’re using a custom-built version of the browser provided by the Roboform team themselves.

Keep Track of New Email with Gmail Notifier
This app has an edge on Google’s official notifier because you can use it to check multiple Gmail accounts, and you’ll also get basic support for managing your mail.

Firefox 3.6 Gets Lightweight Theme Support
The next version of Firefox will include support for what’s called personas, which are lightweight themes that resemble what’s currently available on the Google Chrome browser.

Google Reader Greasemonkey Script
If you’re using Google Reader this Greasemonkey Script will let you customize several aspects of your feed-reading experience.

Search Websites from your Windows 7 Desktop
Thanks to search connectors you’re able to search your favorite websites right from your desktop in Windows 7.

–Downloads–

CCleaner 2.24.1010 [Mirror]
CDBurnerXP 4.2.6.1706 [Mirror]
Defraggler 1.14.159 [Mirror]
Digsby Build 67 ^Beta [Mirror]
Evernote 3.5.0.437 ^Beta [Mirror]
FileZilla 3.2.8 [Mirror]
Foxit Reader 3.1.1.0928 [Mirror]
Google Chrome 4.0.220.1 ^Beta [Mirror]
Google Toolbar for IE 6.3.911.1819 [Mirror]
Growl 2.0 ^{Beta 20} [Mirror]
JAlbum 8.5 [Mirror]
KMPlayer 2.9.4.1436 [Mirror]
Maxthon 2.5.9.2101 ^{Beta 2} [Mirror]
Miranda 0.8.8 [Mirror]
Paint.NET 3.5 ^{Beta 2} [Mirror]
Picasa 3.5.79.69 [Mirror]
PSPad 4.5.5.2370 ^Beta [Mirror]
Recuva 1.31.437 [Mirror]
Sandboxie 3.40 [Mirror]

Copyright © 2009 CyberNet | CyberNet Forum | Learn Firefox
WrapUp: Mozilla Launches PluginCheck Demo, Microsoft Security Essentials Scores a 98.44%, and More

Windows Live Essentials To Compete With Google Pack

Mozilla Firefox 1.5.0.5 Release Scheduled For Thursday

Firefox 1.5.0.3 Released With The Security Patch

Demo Of Microsoft’s Vista Voice Recognition Misfires

WrapUp: GIMP’s Single-Window Mode, New Phoenix BIOS Boots PC in Seconds, and More

Ryan — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 11:34:06 +0000

–News–

Another Browser Migrates to WebKit
The WebKit rendering engine is on a roll. Safari started the whole thing, and then Google Chrome thought it would be good to use, then just recently Maxthon followed up with support, and now Epiphany. Sure, Epiphany may not be the most popular browser since it’s Linux-only, but that’s besides the point. What this shows is a growing trend of browsers migrating over to WebKit, which could prove to be a positive thing for users. If WebKit is established as a common rendering engine we may start to see an increasing number of sites making sure they work well with it. We might finally be able to pick a browser based upon the features it offers instead of whether it can display sites properly.

Phoenix BIOS Boots PC in Seconds
Phoenix has developed a BIOS that can “POST” in a mere one second, which leads to an overall fast boot time. They used a Lenovo T400s with an SSD, and it was able to reach a useable Windows 7 desktop in just 10-seconds. It’s not quite as fast as resuming from standby, but this can make having to restart your PC much less painful. I look forward to seeing this available in the future.

Dropbox Hits 2 Million Users; 1 Million Active
I have to admit that Dropbox is one of my favorite services. The main reason I like it so much is the fact that they offer 2GB of online storage that can be used to keep all the files I upload in sync across all my machines regardless of the OS. I was actually surprised to see that they only have 1 million active users… they definitely deserve more than that.

–News in Brief–

Wii Price Cut Available on Amazon
Amazon is already showing the price cut on the Wii, bringing it down to $199. To top it off they are also throwing in a $25 Amazon gift card with it.

Microsoft’s New Prototype “Wall”
Want a glimpse of the future? Here’s a new video put out by Microsoft demonstrating yet again what our offices may look like tomorrow. And by tomorrow I mean 50 years from now.

Firefox 3.6 Provides Tools for Better Support
Mozilla is adding an about:support to their browser that will give the users details about their Firefox setup that can be provided when they are in search of support.

DirectX 10.1 vs. DirectX 11
The difference between these two versions of DirectX doesn’t appear to be that great, but it might be more significant at higher resolutions.

Hide Read Labels in Gmail
A new Labs feature in Gmail will let you show only those labels that have unread items.

Video Interview with Steve Ballmer
Steve Ballmer sits down with TechCrunch and talks about Yahoo, Zune, and more.

FeedDemon 3.0 Released
The final version of FeedDemon has made it out the door, and is complete with Google Reader synchronization.

Microsoft’s Tablet… the Courier?
Rumors are that Microsoft is working on on a new kind of tablet PC that could be pretty amazing if the “leaked” image ends up being real.

Google Taps into IE with Chrome Frame
A plugin for Internet Explorer 6, 7, and 8 offered by Google lets web pages render with Chrome.

Picasa 3.5 Gets Name Tags and More
The new version of Picasa can identify the people in your photos, and will also let you geotag them.

Push Gmail for the iPhone and Windows Mobile
Both iPhone and Windows Mobile users can receive push email notifications if they’re using Gmail thanks to the new Exchange/ActiveSync support.

Netflix Makes Out Like a Bandit with their $1 Million Competition
We’ve covered the Netflix $1 million competition before, and we may see other companies following their lead. It’s said that if you look at everyone involved in the competition that Netflix was getting “Ph.D.’s for a dollar an hour.”

–Tips, Tutorials, and Reviews–

Auto Shutdown Firefox and More
I’ve seen extensions to shutdown Firefox after your downloads are done, but this one is rather unique. How so? First off it can integrate with the popular DownThemAll extension. Second, you can specify command line operations you want executed before your computer shuts down. Now that’s impressive.

GIMP is Getting Single-Window Mode
If you follow me on Twitter you know how excited I was last week when it was announced that the next version of GIMP would include a single-window mode. That’s right. Should you choose to you’ll no longer have windows floating all over the place. Not only that but the new version will also have several other great improvements that actually make me excited for the next release.

XPize Polishes Up XP
If you’re still holding off on upgrading your copy of XP then maybe you should consider giving it some new life with XPize. It updates a lot of the icons so that they are much more modern, and comes bundled with some themes that can even skin your login screen. It’s a completely free way to make your PC feel a bit more up-to-date.

Evernote Beta for Windows Gets a Facelift
I use Evernote all the time to take notes when I’m on the go, at home, or at work. The great thing is that Evernote stays in sync no matter where I’m at, and now the refreshed Windows version has some of the features only the Mac version had. The most prominent example is probably the thumbnail previews that go along with the awesome three-pane view.

–Tips in Brief–

How to Try Out Microsoft Office Web Apps
If you’re impatient and want to try out Microsoft Office Web Apps these are the instructions you need to follow.

Top 10 Ways to Get More From a Cameraphone
Here’s a variety of different ways you can use your cameraphone to ensure that it’s put to good use.

Create Beautiful Drawings with Livebrush
Got some artistic talent? This free app will transform that talent into a digital form.

Force IE to Use Chrome Frame
If you really like Chrome Frame you can force IE to always use that to render websites. Or, you know, you could just use Chrome.

CNet Techtracker Checks for Software Updates
Yep, another app that will check for updates to the software you have installed on your computer.

Selectively Block Flash Animations in Chrome
This will block all Flash animation on websites until you explicitly approve them.

Tux Paint: Great Image App for Kids
This is a pretty cool app for kids because it makes it simple for kids to find the various tools they need to draw.

Digsby Gets New Twitter Features
My love for Digsby has diminished a bit, but the new Twitter functionality is pretty cool.

John’s Background Switcher Updated
The new version includes a bunch of features including Google, Yahoo, and Bing image search results.

3 Tools to Manage Virtual Drives
Get some virtual drives hooked up to your PC with these free programs.

–Downloads–

Copyright © 2009 CyberNet | CyberNet Forum | Learn Firefox
WrapUp: GIMP’s Single-Window Mode, New Phoenix BIOS Boots PC in Seconds, and More

Vista OEM BIOS Cracks Won’t Work in SP1

Helpful Tip: Windows Shift+Restart

Dell’s XPS 700 Will Offer Overclocking In The BIOS

Mars Phoenix Lander Photos

WrapUp: Opera Mini 5 Beta, Getting the Most out of Dropbox, and More

Ryan — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 10:26:53 +0000

–News–

Firefox Users are Upgrading Adobe Flash
When Firefox users upgrade their browser they are shown a page that informs them of whether they’re running the latest version of the Flash plugin. Mozilla has released some stats, and apparently over 10 million users clicked the “upgrade” link in a one-week period. That’s about 30% of the people who upgraded to the latest Firefox 3.5 release, which I’d say is a pretty successful number. Nice job Mozilla!

Microsoft Offers Windows 7 for $30 to Students
College and university students can grab a copy of Windows 7 Home Premium for a mere $30. This isn’t a surprising offer since Microsoft also runs “the Ultimate Steal” which provides a copy of Office 2007 at 90% off the retail price. Windows 7 Home Premium retails for $120, which isn’t exactly 90% off, but a good deal nonetheless.

Opera Mini 5 Beta Gets Speed Dial, Tabs, and More
The Beta release of Opera Mini 5 has some incredible new features including a password manager, Speed Dial for your favorite sites, and even tabs. What’s even better, however, is the fact that it’s also optimized for touchscreen devices, and browsing with it looks pretty darn nice. Videos are available for those of you who want to check it out, but don’t have a device you can install it on.

Zune 4.0 Optimized for Windows 7
The new Zune 4.0 software comes with a lot of nice enhancements, but Windows 7 users will also be able to enjoy a few little extras. That includes jump list support and media controls (play, forward, etc…) when viewing the Taskbar preview. Aside from these Windows 7 specific features there’s also a new Quickplay interface, a Smart DJ that will mix your songs, and a Mini Player Mode.

–News in Brief–

Google Chrome 3.0 Leaves Beta
A new stable release of Google Chrome is available, and brings a refreshed new tab page, theme support, and more.

Windows Live Writer Getting a Ribbon Interface?
Looks like there are some clues pointing to a ribbon-style interface in Windows Live Writer.

Hulu Working on a Subscription-Based Model
Some sources are saying that Hulu is working on a subscription-based version of their online television viewer, but no details are available. Does this mean we could pay to get commercial-free viewing, or maybe they’d even allow users from outside the U.S.?

Digsby Cleans Up Installer, a Little
Digsby is trying to make amends with some of their users by making it a bit more obvious what you’re getting into when installing their messenger software.

YouTube Adds Resume Support on Longer Videos
If you’re watching a YouTube video longer than 20 minutes, close the page, and then reopen it you should see that the video will pick up where you left off.

Initial Snow Leopard Sales Double that of Leopard
According to a research firm Apple has sold more than double the number of Snow Leopard copies as they did Leopard in 2007.

Google Wants Chrome at 10% Market Share in 2-years
In one year Google wants to have 5% of the browser market share, and in two years they want to have 10% market share.

Google Acquires reCAPTCHA
The acquisition of reCAPTCHA by Google was a smart one, because they can now use the technology to help with Optimal Character Recognition (OCR) for their books.

Bing Grabs Over 10% of the Search Market
Bing’s market share rose another 22% from July to August, which gives them 10% of the overall search market.

Google Fast Flip: A New Way to Read News
Last week Google showed off a new visual approach to keeping up on the lastest news.

Wii Price Cut Coming: $199
Several advertisements for retailers are showing a $50 price cut on the Wii that will be coming soon, and will bring it down to $199.

Intuit Acquires Mint for $170 Million
Intuit, the creators of Quicken, can now add Mint to their repertoire of online financial management tools.

Bing’s New Way to Search: Visually
Bing now lets users search for items, such as cars, visually. You must have Silverlight installed if you want to try it out.

–Tips, Tutorials, and Reviews–

Using Dropbox for more than File Syncing
I’ve got into using Dropbox for a lot more than just syncing files, and this guide covers some of the things I’m using it for. One of my favorites is being able to remotely kick off a torrent download so that it’s completed by the time I get home. The list also covers syncing your passwords, your Pidgin profile, and portable applications.

How to Rip Your Music
Gizmodo has put together a great guide for anyone looking to rip some CD’s on both Windows and Mac. Many audio players, such as iTunes, include this kind of functionality. Music fanatics, however, might not like the lack of control they have over how their music is ripped. This guide puts the control back in your hands.

Hide Your Tweeting While at Work
This article covers two different apps that will mask your tweeting habits while your at work: one that simulates the command prompt, and another that looks like a spreadsheet. My favorite is the spreadsheet app, called Spreadtweet, that can resemble iWork, Office 2003, or Office 2007. It will certainly make you do a double-take the first time you see it.

Backup Your Wireless Settings in Windows 7
Windows 7 includes a nice new feature that lets you save your wireless settings to an executable. These settings can then be restored simply by running the executable. How is this useful? Well, if you have a complicated security key this could make it easy for guests to connect to your network without walking them through a long set of instructions.

–Tips in Brief–

Automatically Adjust Screen Resolutions for Each PC User
This free app will let you set screen resolutions based upon which user is currently logged in to the machine.

Restore Zune 4.0’s “Missing” Features (users outside the U.S.)
Are you missing some of the cool new features in the Zune 4.0 software simply because you live outside the U.S.? This is your solution.

Windows 7 Jump List Support for Winamp
Winamp may not natively include Jump List support in Windows 7, but a plugin is available that can add the jumpy goodness to your Taskbar.

Hide Outlook to the System Tray
Trying to conserve some of your precious Taskbar space? Throw Outlook into your System Tray with this app.

Launch Apps from Your System Tray
This application launcher lets you store shortcuts to all of your favorite apps in one easy-access System Tray icon.

Add the Recycle Bin to the Windows 7 Taskbar
Want faster access to the Recycle Bin in Windows 7? This trick will let you have it right on the Taskbar.

Alternative Sites to CliffsNotes
Not the kind of person that likes reading books? Bookmark these 7 sites… they’ll come in handy.

–Downloads–

AIM 7.0.10.18 ^{Beta 6} [Mirror]
Avant Browser 11.7.38 [Mirror]
ChromePlus 1.2.4 [Mirror]
Digsby Build 65 ^Beta [Mirror]
FeedDemon 3.0.0.38 ^Pre-Release [Mirror]
Google Chrome 4.0.211.2 ^Beta [Mirror]
KeePass 2.0.9 [Mirror]
KMPlayer 2.9.4.1435 [Mirror]
MediaMonkey 3.1.2.1266 [Mirror]
Miranda 0.8.6 [Mirror]
PeaZip 2.7.0 [Mirror]
Sandboxie 3.39.17 ^Beta [Mirror]
SeaMonkey 2.0 ^{Beta 2} [Mirror]
Ubuntu 9.10 ^{Alpha 6} [Mirror]
uTorrent 1.8.4.16442 [Mirror]
uTorrent 2.0.0.16546 ^Beta [Mirror]
Windows Live Messenger 2009.14.0.8089 [Mirror]
Zune 4.0 [Mirror]

Copyright © 2009 CyberNet | CyberNet Forum | Learn Firefox
WrapUp: Opera Mini 5 Beta, Getting the Most out of Dropbox, and More

Sign-up to Test the New Opera Mini Beta

Promote Opera Mini With 3 Great Banners

Download Opera Mini For Your Cell Phone

Opera Mini Continues to Prosper Around the World

WrapUp: Windows 7 Relaxes CableCard Restrictions, Google Spreadsheets’ SQL-like Syntax, and More

Ryan — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 11:32:58 +0000

–News–

Windows 7 Relaxes CableCard Restrictions
Microsoft released information last week stating that Windows 7 would give all PC owners the ability to add CableCards to their machines. Prior to this you could only buy CableCards with select OEM PC’s. What does this mean? Basically with CableCards you’re able to record encrypted cable channels using Windows Media Center. This could prove to be some stiff competition for Tivo considering there are no monthly service fees associated with a Media Center PC.

Leaked iPod Touch with Camera Photos were Real
Last week Apple released new iPod Nano’s with video recording capabilities, but many people were left puzzled when the same functionality was left out of their high-end iPod Touch product line. The internals of the new iPod Touch show striking similarities to the photos that were leaked prior to Apple’s announcements, and provide some solid evidence that the iPod Touch was indeed supposed to have a camera.

Dropbox Adds More Functionality
Dropbox is an amazing way to keep files in sync between all your machines, but their web interface has always been a little lackluster. They’ve added some new functionality including keyboard shortcuts, interface and usability improvements, and true bulk operations that make their website a lot better.

Attach 100MB Files in Yahoo! Mail with Drop.io
Yahoo! only lets you attach files up to 20MB to your emails, but thanks to some third-party integration that limit is now five times larger. To use the service you’ll have to click the “Get Started” link on this page to enable the use of apps, and then you should see an option in your mail sidebar to “Attach Large Files.” It’s not as integrated as I’d like to see it, but it’s still nice being able to send 100MB attachments without leaving the Yahoo! Mail interface.

Google’s “Jump to” Option in Search Results
When performing certain searches on Google you may find a “jump to” option offered right before the description of the result. Clicking on this link will take you directly to the part of the page related to what you’re searching for. For this to work Google is looking for “internal bookmarks/links” on a page. That’s why you’ll often find that Wikipedia results will show up with this option since it uses internal links in their table of contents to jump to various parts of the page.

–News in Brief–

Opera to Unveil “the Next Generation in Mobile Browsing”
Opera has put together a teaser page for something they will be unveiling very soon.

Chrome Turns Extensions on in Dev Channel
Google Chrome users running the developer version of the browser should be pleased to hear that you can now install extensions by default, which means this feature should be getting closer to prime time.

Windows 7 RTM not Affected by Latest Flaw
A recently discovered vulnerability makes it possible for a hacker to remotely control a system, but only affects Windows Vista, Server 2008, and pre-release versions of Windows 7.

Android has 10,000+ Applications Available
The Google Android mobile OS now has over 10,000 applications available for download, and 65% of those apps are free.

Firefox 3.5.3 Introduces Flash Update Notifications
In an attempt to keep users safe, Mozilla will now display a notification for anyone running Firefox if they have an old version of the Flash plugin. In the future the browser will also look for updates to other common plugins.

Facebook Lite Keeps Things Simple
Facebook users in the U.S. and India can now take advantage of a simpler Facebook interface that feels a bit Twitter-like.

Hotmail Getting More Improvements
Hotmail is rolling out some changes including auto-saving of drafts, keyboard shortcuts that closely match what’s used in Gmail, mobile improvements, and more.

Opera Unite Hits Beta Stage
The first Beta of Opera Unite has finally been released, and it’s significantly more stable than previous versions according to Download Squad.

Hubble Takes more Amazing Photos after Repair Mission
These are the first photos sent back from the Hubble Space Telescope after undergoing a rather extensive repair and service mission.

Google Earth 5.1 Gets Faster
The newest Beta of Google Earth not only uses less memory than previous versions, but is also 25% faster at starting up.

–Tips, Tutorials, and Reviews–

Windows 7 Login Background Changer
Want to freshen up that background image you see when you login to Windows 7? This free and open source application will let you select an image you want to use when logging into your machine. What I really like about this WPF-based solution is that it doesn’t modify any system files on your machine.

iTunes 9 Introduces a “Watched” Folder
iTunes 9 has finally added a highly requested feature: a watched folder. This folder resides in your music library, and any music added to it will automatically be imported into your library. Unfortunately this directory cannot be changed, and I suspect that Apple added it for the new “Home Sharing” features that let you automatically add music from other libraries on your network. It’s still nice to have though.

How to Access Gmail when it’s Down
With the recent Gmail outages some people are trying more than ever to make sure that they’ll still be able to access their messages even when the service is down. Normally when Gmail’s web interface goes down the IMAP/POP3 is still functional, and that’s what most people turn to. This article provides a few other alternatives such as checking the mobile version, using the iGoogle gadget, and more.

Postbox Email App Leaves Beta, Charges $40
Over the last few months Postbox has definitely been one of the most talked about desktop email clients. It was available for free when it was in the Beta stage, but now it will run you $40 for a license. It is definitely a nice email client, but they are in a tough spot. There are a lot of free desktop email clients out there, and I’d venture to guess that a majority of the money spent on desktop email clients goes towards Outlook. And then there’s also the fact that the web interfaces for email services like Gmail are evolving at a rather rapid pace.

Google Spreadsheets Gets SQL-like Syntax
Anyone familiar with SQL might enjoy the new “QUERY” function that was recently added to Google Spreadsheets. This function uses Gviz syntax to imitate SQL syntax right there in your document. It’s still a bit limited at this point… “SELECT” statements are the primary use, but you can add “ORDER BY,” “GROUP BY,” “LIMIT,” and more within your query. Hopefully it will branch out to become even more powerful.

–Tips in Brief–

iTunes 9 has Jump List Support in Windows 7
iTunes 9 was released last week, and anyone using Windows 7 can already take advantage of the included Jump List support. If you hover over the icon you can pause, play, or skip music, and you can receive additional options by right-clicking on the icon.

Pause Incoming Emails
This Outlook 2007 add-on from Microsoft will let you pause incoming emails so that they are not shown until you are ready to read them. This keeps you from getting distracted while you’re trying to work, and can also keep things quiet while you’re giving a presentation.

Coral IE Tab for Firefox
This Firefox extension is based on the popular IE Tab add-on, but takes it one step further. It is able to save your cookies and also works with Adblock Plus, which are things the original extension can’t boast.

Google Voice Adds Email Forwarding/Replies to SMS
Google will now let you view and reply to any SMS messages received through Google Voice right from your Inbox.

Another Free Backup Utility
As we’ve said in the past… there’s never a shortage of free backup utilities. What makes this one a bit different is that you can use it to backup and restore an entire partition or drive.

–Downloads–

Avant Browser 11.7.37 [Mirror]
Avast Home 5.0.104 ^Beta [Mirror]
CDBurnerXP 4.2.5.1541 [Mirror]
FeedDemon 3.0.0.35 ^Pre-Release [Mirror]
Firefox 3.0.14 [Mirror]
Firefox 3.5.3 [Mirror]
Google Chrome 4.0.206.1 ^Beta [Mirror]
Google Desktop 5.9.909.8267 [Mirror]
Google Earth 5.1.3506 ^Beta [Mirror]
iTunes 9.0.0 [Mirror]
Maxthon 2.5.7.1143 ^Beta [Mirror]
Maxthon 3.0.2.2 ^Alpha [Mirror]
QuickTime 7.64.17.73 [Mirror]
Sandboxie 3.39.13 ^Beta [Mirror]
uTorrent 1.8.4.16381 [Mirror]
uTorrent 2.0.16407 ^Beta [Mirror]
VirtualBox 3.0.6.52128 [Mirror]

Google Spreadsheets Now Allows Public Editing

Google Spreadsheets Gets An Update

Google Spreadsheets To Get A Chart Creator Soon

Google Spreadsheets Get A Few Nice Updates

WrapUp: New Office 2010 Build Leaked, Ultimate Power User’s Guide, and More

Ryan — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 11:55:27 +0000

–News–

WordPress Blogs Get Attacked
Last week a good chunk of WordPress blogs were finding that they were getting attacked from hackers. Those who had not been keeping up with the latest WordPress updates were vulnerable to the attack, and as a result a hacker could create an administrator account on the affected site. If you’re running the latest 2.8.4 release, however, you have nothing to worry about.

New Gmail Themes
Google unveiled three new Gmail themes last week, which is the first round of theme updates since they announced the feature back in November 2008. I like all of the themes quite a bit, but the “High Score” one is my favorite. It tries to replicate the 8-bit Nintendo environment from back in the day, and the color scheme changes between a day and night mode. There’s also a fourth “theme” that will simply pick one of the existing themes randomly when you launch Gmail.

New Build of Office 2010 Beta 1 Leaks
Microsoft has been keeping quiet on Office 2010, but that doesn’t seem to prevent leaks of pre-release versions. A new Office 2010 Beta 1 (build 4417) has been leaked and is making its way around file sharing networks. So far people have found that this release has a new activation system, new icons for all the various applications, a better Back-Stage view, improved editing features (whatever that means), and an upload center for sharing files on the Internet.

WordPress to Deliver RSS News in Real-Time
WordPress announced yesterday that they turned on support for RSSCloud for all 7.5 million blogs that they are currently hosting. This service makes it possible for blogs to have their RSS feeds pushed to syndication services instead of the services having to poll for updates. The fact that WordPress is supporting this service is a good indication that it should do well, and more feed readers (such as Google Reader) will likely take advantage of this service for that very reason.

–News in Brief–

Some Windows 7 Ads Available for Viewing
There’s a few Windows 7 ads available that show off some of the OS’s special features… in a slightly obscure way. I found them weirdly entertaining.

iPhone Gets MMS on September 25th
AT&T has now committed to September 25th as the day that they will turn on MMS for all iPhone customers.

Firefox 4 Coming in Q3/Q4 of 2010
According to Mozilla’s official roadmap they are targeting Q3/Q4 2010 for the Firefox 4 release. Firefox 3.6 is scheduled for Q3/Q4 2009, and Firefox 3.7 is scheduled for Q1/Q2 2010.

Stealing 23 MacBooks, 14 iPhones, and 9 iPods in 31 Seconds
A group of thieves not only broke into a New Jersey Apple Store, but they also made out with armfuls (literally) of gadgets.

Google Calendar Gets Real-Time Sports Calendars
Sports nuts will be happy to hear that Google Calendar will not only keep you informed of upcoming sports events, but it will also update scores in real-time when the games are going on. Those push updates for your calendar have never been so important!

Free 90-Day Windows 7 Enterprise Trial
Microsoft has made a free 90-day trial of Windows 7 Enterprise available on their site, but be warned that there is no way to activate the copy after the trial period has expired (meaning you have to wipe your machine).

Chrome Will Be Default Browser on Sony Vaio Computers
Google likely had to spend quite a bit of money to get this deal, but it could significantly open up their market share to have their browser ship as the default on new computers. It’s estimated that Chrome currently has 30 million users.

USB 3.0 is Certification Begins
Device manufacturers can now have their gadgets certified as being USB 3.0 compliant, and therefore receive the SuperSpeed USB logo stamped on it. Maybe we’ll seen USB 3.0 devices soon? USB 3.0 speeds are clocked around 4.8Gbps, which is around 10x faster that USB 2.0.

Maxthon 3 is Using WebKit
In hopes of creating a better performing browser the developers of Maxthon are moving away from the Trident rendering engine (used in IE) and switching to WebKit (used in Safari and Chrome).

ISP’s Start Blocking Pirate Bay?
This might not be a good sign. Ireland’s largest ISP, Eircom, is now blocking access to The Pirate Bay. Will others follow along?

–Tips, Tutorials, and Reviews–

Use Brute Force to Recover Your Firefox Master Password
If you forget the master password you set in Firefox you could lose access to all of the credentials you’ve stored over a period of months, or possibly even years. All hope isn’t lost. There is a brute force tool that lets you specify what characters you believe are in your password, the length (or a range of how long you think it is), and it will try it’s hardest to crack open your database for you. It won’t hurt to say a few prayers, too.

Ultimate Guide for Developers and Power Users
I’m a big fan of Scott Hanselman because he’s pointed me in the direction of some awesome apps, and he has assembled a rather amazing guide geared towards developers and power users. In it he outlines a long list of tools, tips, and some awesome apps you’re sure to love. This is definitely a page that deserves a spot in your bookmarks.

Mah Tweets: WPF-based Twitter/Facebook Client
Personally I’m not a big fan of the Twitter clients that use Adobe Air because, well, it just feels like a bloated platform. In fact I don’t have Adobe Air installed on any of my machines anymore. There are a lot of them that use Adobe Air though, but Mah Tweets is different because it uses WPF (Windows Presentation Foundation) to bring a fluid experience to your Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, and other accounts. If you’re looking for an alternative to the Adobe Air Twitter clients this is definitely something you should checkout.

–Tips in Brief–

Building a Hackintosh with Snow Leopard
Lifehacker outlines all of the necessary steps for building your very own Hackintosh running the latest Snow Leopard OS.

Download Facebook and Flickr Albums
This app makes it easy to download photos stored on either Flickr or Facebook.

Detailed Look at Snow Leopard
I’ve never seen an OS review quite as in-depth as this one, but anyone interested in how parts of Snow Leopard work should definitely give this a read. It’s rather long, but being the geek that I am I got sucked in once I started reading it.

A Look at Chrome’s 1st Year of Existence
Lifehacker takes a detailed look back at how things have progressed for the Chrome browser over the last year.

Use Your Keypad to Resize and Arrange Windows
If you don’t use the numeric keypad on your keyboard maybe you should consider putting it work by using the keys to resize or arrange windows on your screen.

Minimalist Gmail Interface using Greasemonkey
Simplify your Gmail interface with this Greasemonkey script that cuts out a lot of things you probably don’t use anyway.

–Downloads–

Related Posts:

Microsoft Office 2010 Icon Pack

The Ultimate Freeware Guide

Microsoft Confirms That There Is An Office Ultimate 2007 Edition

MyFive: Reasons to Love Microsoft Office 2007

Microsoft Wisens Up to Windows 7 Cracks?

WrapUp: Free Software Foundation Trashes Windows 7, Tabs in Microsoft Office, and More

Ryan — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 12:03:10 +0000

–News–

Free Software Foundation Trashes Windows 7
The Free Software Foundation (FSF) is pushing hard to keep people from jumping on the Windows 7 bandwagon. They have gone as far as to create a site, windows7sins.org, that would pretty much make any Windows user feel like they are a cult follower. They say that Microsoft is doing things like “poisoning education, invading piracy, and abusing standards.” OMG! Grab your picket signs! To be honest I’m a bit disappointed in the foundation with their approach.

Google Enhances Traffic Reporting
Last week Google announced that in select cities they would be showing traffic on roads other than major highways. I’m in the Chicagoland area, and I can verify that the color-coded traffic lines show up on way more streets than they did before. What’s even better, however, is that this functionality also spills over onto mobile devices (like the iPhone) that use traffic reporting on Google Maps.

Nokia Unveils Netbook with 12-hour Battery Life
Nokia is entering the PC market with a netbook that boasts a whopping 12-hour battery life. It has a 10.1-inch display, and even includes an HDMI port for hooking it up to your TV. And, of course, it is equipped with a 3G Internet card. Pricing and availability of the netbook hasn’t been announced, but they say that more details will be revealed at Nokia World 09 on September 2nd.

Office 2010 to Require Activation for Volume Licenses
Microsoft has come forward saying that even volume licenses will require activation in Office 2010, which isn’t surprising. When Microsoft was developing Office 2007 they didn’t have time to sneak in the enhanced activation system like they did for Vista. This meant that piraters could bypass activation simply by acquiring a volume license serial number (many of which are floating around the Internet). This move will help combat piracy of Office 2010.

Mininova Ordered to Remove Illegal Torrents
Man, it’s been a rough time for the BitTorrent community lately. Mininova is now getting hit hard as a judge ruled for them to remove all illegal content in the next three months, otherwise they’ll have to pay a $7 million fine. Since the news of this broke Mininova has come forward saying that they may appeal the case. It will be interesting to see if they will be able to get around the judgement, or whether they’ll just relocate their servers.

–News in Brief–

Ubuntu Software Store Coming to a Computer Near You
Canonical is developing a software store that can be used to easily install applications on their Linux platform.

Wikipedia Turning to Experienced Editors for Approval Process
In the next few weeks Wikipedia will being requiring approval of content changes by experienced editors, but only on pages that are about living people.

Gmail Finally Gets a Contact Picker
Users have been asking for this for awhile, and Google finally delivered. Clicking the “to:” link will open a contact selector where you can choose which of your contacts will receive the email.

LogMeIn’s Free Service Gets Revamped
The remote access service LogMeIn is getting some handy features including a Flash-based client that works in nearly all browsers.

Google Docs Can Translate into 42 Different Languages
In Google Docs you’re now able to translate entire documents into 42 different languages.

Zoho Notebook Gets Search, Moving, and Export Capabilities
If you’re using Zoho Notebook you’ll now be able to enjoy several new features. I must say that search capabilities was desperately needed.

Google’s Special ASCII Art Search Page
Performing a search for “ASCII Art” on Google will cause their logo to be replaced with an ASCII Art representation. What’s cool is that the logo is truly composed of text… it’s not an image.

–Tips, Tutorials, and Reviews–

Snow Leopard Reviews Roll Out
Apple’s Snow Leopard OS came out last Friday, and the reviews are in. For the most part people view the $30 price tag as reasonable since most of the improvements are under-the-hood, but for some it’s seen as more of a service pack than a full OS release. There are some new features though that do make the OS more pleasant to use on a day-to-day basis.

11 Windows Apps that Tie into Gmail
Download Squad has compiled a list of 11 different Windows applications that tie nicely into Gmail. The list has apps that can backup files to your email account, share files with friends/family, dedicated apps that check for messages, and more. It’s definitely worth checking out if you’re a Gmail user.

Add Tabs to Microsoft Office
Wouldn’t you like to have tabs in Microsoft Office? I’m not talking about the tab-like interface on the Ribbon either. I’m talking about tabs for switching between open documents. This simple little app will add a thin bar underneath the Office 2007 Ribbon that can be used to switch between your different docs. There’s nothin’ better than decluttering the Taskbar.

Yahoo! Messenger 10 Beta Available
A new Beta of Yahoo! Messenger was released last week, and I must admit that they are going down the right path. The most prominent feature in the update has got to be the high-quality video calling, which is likely targeting Skype users. They also threw more sociability into this release… you can view the status updates (from Facebook, Twitter, or Last.fm) of your friends right in your contact list.

Speed Up Outlook
Outlook can be painfully slow at times for me, and I’m always looking for ways to milk every ounce of performance out of the app. It’s especially important when you spend a large chunk of your day sending out dozens of emails. This guide includes things that will hopefully speed up Outlook, and offers tips like compacting your PST, running the Inbox repair tool, and more.

–Tips in Brief–

Making Windows 7 Home Premium more like Professional
This covers some free apps you can use to add the features found in Windows 7 Professional that are not included in Home Premium.

LicenseCrawler Retrieves Serials from the Registry
Keeping track of your serial numbers can be a tedious process, but this little app tries to make it easier by scanning the registry looking for any product keys you’re using.

Putting a Windows Install DVD on a Flash Driving
This free app will take a Windows install DVD and move it to a Flash drive that you’re able to boot from.

TweetMyMac Released
A few weeks ago we covered a free app called TweetMyPC that let you control your PC using Twitter. That same app is now available for Mac users.

Upload Files Unlimited in Size for 24-hours
A free file sharing service called Save As has an interesting upload policy. You can upload files of any size, but they will only remain available for 24-hours.

Mozilla Weave Gets More Improvements
Mozilla released Weave 0.6 that not only boasts better performance, but also comes with a nice administration page for managing settings.

5 Great Defragmenters
Looking for a good file defragmenter for Windows? These are five great solutions.

ChromePlus Builds off of Google’s Browser
This browser is based on Google Chrome, and includes features like rendering a site with IE, mouse gestures, and more.

–Downloads–

7-Zip 9.07 ^Beta [Mirror]
AbiWord 2.7.10 ^Beta [Mirror]
BurnAware Free 2.3.9 [Mirror]
CCleaner 2.23.993 [Mirror]
FeedDemon 3.0.0.29 ^RC7 [Mirror]
FileZilla 3.2.7.1 [Mirror]
Foxit Reader 3.1.0824 [Mirror]
Gimp 2.7.0 ^Beta [Mirror]
Google Chrome 2.0.172.43 [Mirror]
Google Chrome 4.0.203.2 ^Beta [Mirror]
Maxthon 2.5.6.350 [Mirror]
MediaMonkey 3.1.1.1261 [Mirror]
Miranda 0.8.5 [Mirror]
Nero Free 9.4.12.3d [Mirror]
Opera 10.00.1750 ^RC2 [Mirror]
Paint.NET 3.50.3522.33900 ^Alpha [Mirror]
PeaZip 2.7 ^Beta [Mirror]
SetPoint 4.80 [Mirror]
TagScanner 5.1.551 [Mirror]
uTorrent 2.0.16222 ^Beta [Mirror]

OpenOffice.org Has Released An Update To 2.0.1

New Poll: Is Your Copy of Microsoft Office Legitimate?

Microsoft Offers 150 Programs For Free

Microsoft Lets Users Test Drive Office 2007 Online