Adobe Labs releases Flex 2.0 Beta

Adobe Labs releases Flex 2.0 Beta to the public to try to increase the developers base.

What is it?
"Flex 2.0 delivers an integrated set of tools and technology enabling developers to build and deploy scalable Rich Internet Applications. Flex provides a modern, standards-based language supporting common design patterns and includes a client runtime, programming model, development environment, and advanced data services."

One thing I have to say about it is "Cool Logo!". I watched a few of the demos they have on the Beta website and this looks very cool. I may download it and give it a try - just need something to do with it...

Internet Explorer 7: Beta 2 Preview

Internet Explorer 7 Beta 2 Preview is intended to enable developers, Web developers and IT pros to begin to test the new browser for compatibility with their applications and Web sites.

Link:
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/ie/ie7/default.mspx

Love it or hate it, you can't stop it - Tax Season

Tax Preparation Software reviewed by PCMag.

Software Reviewed:

• TaxAct
• TaxCut
• TurboTax - this is the one I use and also got the highest rating from PCMag

Read and decide for yourself.

Free downloads for WinXP users

Free Downloads for WinXP users provides more than 5,000 downloads from over 2,000 companies – all free.

If you find something good let me know about it...

Portable Cell Phone Jammer

The Portable Cell Jammer can jam everything for 70 seconds in an approx. 3m range. How much fun would this be to have.

Cool Tool: Why Reboot?

Why Reboot?: "Exodus WhyReboot is a small (60KB) Windows application that displays a list of pending file operations that will occur after rebooting your computer. This is useful in determining why an installer has notified you that a reboot is needed."

SysInternals gives some insight on how this application probably works.

New version of Winamp - Fixes critical security exploit

Winamp:
http://www.winamp.com/player/

GET THIS DOWNLOAD AND UPGRADE!

Critical security flaw found in Winamp

A critical security flaw has been found in Winamp:
"An "extremely critical" security vulnerability has been discovered in AOL's Winamp digital media player, relating to the way the software handles filenames that include a computer name. An exploit has already surfaced for the flaw, which affects version 5 of the software."

Link:
http://.../Critical_Security_Flaw_Found_in_Winamp/1138642647

New release of Winamp is rumored to be coming on Tuesday (I will post something here when its released). Update your systems when this comes out.

Fruits of 'Sparkle' Unveiled

Breaking four years of silence, Microsoft on Jan. 24 unveiled the first pieces of its "Flash killer," a series of tools for designers that are expected to compete head-to-head with the Macromedia Flash product acquired by Adobe Systems last year.

Link (article):
http://www.eweek.com/...

Link for Microsoft Expression Interactive Designer:
http://www.microsoft.com/.../interactive_designer/default.aspx

Toolbar upgrade for Google (IE)

Google Toolbar for IE has been upgraded with new features and enhancement.

Link:
http://toolbar.google.com

Also, if you want an Open Source solution then check out GoogleBar (Firefox only)

Optimizing NTFS Performance

NTFS performance is affected by many factors, such as cluster size, fragmentation level, and the use of programs such as antivirus software. In addition, NTFS features such as compression and Indexing Service can also affect performance. You can optimize the performance of NTFS volumes by using the following guidelines.

Link:
http://www.microsoft.com/.../prkc_fil_punq.asp

Evrsoft's 1st Page 2006 is NOT free

Evrsoft's 1st Page 2006 is NOT free. That ends the evaluation for me. Oh well, onto other things.

(should be noted that I am not against them selling it, its just they stated it would be free and released a final version (release candidate) stating it will be free, and now they pull the rug out)

AdSenseLog

AdSenseLog is a tool for checking and analyzing your Adsense ads data (Content, Search and Custom/URL channels).

Features

• Automatically check your Adsense statistics, setup your own interval.
• Alerts - pop up a window, play a sound, or send an e-mail.
• Extensive statistics: Clickthrough, EPC and CPM data, Daily, weekly or monthly views. See your best days, daily/weekly or monthly averages, and more.
• Supports Content, Search and Custom/URL Channel data.
• Supports Ad unit or Page unit impressions for aggregate data.
• Export your data to HTML, CSV and Bitmap files.
  

Ok. enough information from the devlopers site. Why do I like AdSenseLog? Well, its mainly the features around charting and graphing. Being able to see results in a chart format makes analyzing the information much, much easier. If for nothing else this is the reason to try AdSenseLog

A couple things that need to be fixed:
1) The screen that asks if I want to minimize to the system tray gets annoying. I always want to exit on closing and there should be a way to remember this
2) I'm colorblind and there needs to be a way to set custom colors on the charts / graphs
3) When resizing the application the tablulated data needs to resize to use the available space. Really no reason why I should have to scroll columns when the application is wide enough to accomodate it.

Give it a try as this is a great application and it will only get better.

Interesting read about a stolen laptop

Read On:
http://cgi.ebay.com.au/STOLEN-THEFT-Apple-Powerbook...

BIG update to MSN Spaces

BIG update to MSN Spaces:

What's New:

• Spaces Search
• Mobile Search
• Your own advertising
• Book lists
• Better blog navigation.
  
• Customized blog entry display.
  
• Integrated Help.
• Enhanced Profile
• Live Contacts Beta!.
• Better commenting
• Photos are no longer limited to 30MB
• MetaWeblog API
• Better URLs!
• Xbox Live integration.
  
• New themes
• Publish from 3 email addresses
• Privacy controls

Read more about each one of the above points.

StopBadware.org

StopBadware.org:
We've all seen it happen: you or someone you know has downloaded something from the internet that seemed harmless enough at the time. Next thing you know, the computer has slowed to a crawl. Pop-up advertising starts to appear out of nowhere. Private information gets sent to some company you've never heard of. And the worst part? Trying to uninstall the software might only make the problem worse.

Badware plagues millions of computer already, and it's eroding people's trust in the internet. Our mission is to fix that.

Netscape releases version 8.1

Whats New:

• Anti-Spyware Protection
• Dynamic Security Center
• Profile Manager
• Enhanced RSS support
• New Options panel
• Undo tab close
• Tabbed browsing enhancements
• UI enhancements
• Performance improvements

Features:
http://browser.netscape.com/ns8/support/relnotes.jsp

Download:
http://browser.netscape.com/ns8/download/default.jsp


No thanks, I'll stick with Firefox.

(to think I actually bought Netscape years and years ago when browsers were being sold)

My Firefox extension list - What I use

Adblock 0.5.3.042

BlogThis 0.3

ChromEdit 0.1.1.1

Flashblock 1.2.9

Google Pagerank Status 0.9.6

IE Tab 1.0.7

IE View 1.2.7

ListZilla 0.5.1

Resize Search Box 0.0.7

Sage 1.3.6

Tabbrowser Preferences 1.2.8.5

Web Developer 1.0.1

X-Ray 0.5

101 Dumbest Moments in Business

Link:
http://money.cnn.com/.../101dumbest/full_list/

How to send large files to someone, the right way

You really shouldn't be sending anyone large files through email (unless its a Gmail account or something similiar). Most users using an ISP mail account will have some limit on the size a single email can be - usually somewhere between 2Meg - 8Meg. What you should be doing is using a service like one of the one's listed below.

These online services will send the person an email stating a file is awaiting them for download. Now they can download it when they want, and if they want, without it being forced upon them.

You Send It: Files up to 1Gig
http://www.yousendit.com/

Send Over: Files up to 2Gig
http://www.sendover.com/

Mail Big File: File up to 1Gig
http://mailbigfile.com/

DropSend: Files up to 1Gig
http://www.dropsend.com/

Numa Numa

Numa Numa - what is it?

Find out for yourself...

Post comments. Like to see what others think and how many you actually watched.

And just in case you want to see the original that started it all.

Google Video Player

Google Video Player, did I miss something?

Features:

• Watch videos downloaded from Google Video
• Browse scenes within a video using thumbnails
• Skip to anywhere in the video, even if that portion hasn't downloaded yet
• Sit back and watch videos in full screen mode
• Resume video downloads automatically

Banned in the USA?

What?

Link:
http://video.google.com/...

What to expect from cell phones in 2006

What do you want to see in your next cell phone?

• Plays MP3's and videos
• Be able to read blogs and video blogs
• Listen to the radio (local free)

All-in-one devices is something that I on the fence about. In one hand its nice to have certain features in my cell phone, like listening to MP3's - less things I have to carry. On the other hand when you try and do everything you end up doing nothing right - What you end up is each device is lacking and nothing is exactly what you want.

For me the future is going to be a cell phone / pda / 802.11g enabled device. Thinking about it I would probably want to break the phone out...

Free CD burning application

Is CDBurnerXP Pro worth the download? You decide. (I use Nero 6.6 not that garbage update 7)

Main Features of CDBurnerXP Pro

• Writes all kind of mediums apart from double-layer DVD (follows in next version). Burning video-DVDs is limited.
• Burn audio-CDs with and without gaps between tracks
• Burn on the fly / Burn-proof
• Supports most IDE, USB, Firewire and SCSI drives
• Rip Audio-CDs to harddrive, obtain track-information (ID3-tags) from Internet
• Burn and create ISO-files
• Customizeable with many settings
• Data verification after burn, create bootable discs
• (will be) available in multiple languages
• 100% freeware - no adware or restrictions
• bin/nrg->ISO converter, simple cover printing and much more!
• Operating systems: Windows 98/ME/2000/XP/2003 Server.

Wanna know whats coming in Firefox 2.0?

Firefox 2.0 will include lots of new features and enhancements.

A few highlights adding to my original blog on the future of Firefox:

• New Bookmarks and history
• Tabs will be redesigned to work more like windows in the OS environment
• Some visual design changes
• Improved web search

Publish, share, review, and mark up 3D designs in Intelligent Documents

Adobe Acrobat 3D: "Publish, share, review, and mark up 3D designs in Intelligent Documents"

Adobe® Acrobat® 3D software enriches collaboration by enabling extended teams to use Adobe PDF documents to more securely and reliably communicate 3D design intent. Insert and publish 3D designs from major CAD applications in Adobe PDF documents that can easily be shared with suppliers, partners, and customers using free Adobe Reader® 7.0 software.

Google News, beta no more.

Google News is finally out of Beta.

Remote Shutdown Tool to Shut Down and Restart a Computer

"This article describes how to use the Remote Shutdown tool (Shutdown.exe) to shut down and restart a local or remote Windows 2000-based or Microsoft Windows NT 4.0-based computer. "

Link:
http://support.microsoft.com/...317371&sd=tech

IE Tab

IE Tab lets you view pages in Firefox that will only work properly with IE.

This is a great extension, and needed when viewing some of Microsoft's pages, for Firefox users.

Link:
https://addons.mozilla.org/...

Google Pack or Lifehacker Pack?

Which do you like better then Google Pack of software or the new Lifehacker Pack of software?

Search Spy from Dogpile - This is weird

Wanna see what others are search for? Then check out Search Spy from Dogpile. I am amazed at what people are searching for. If you are brave enough check out the unfiltered search results.

Link:
http://www.dogpile.com/info.dogpl/searchspy/

Microsoft Research Group Shot

Microsoft Research Group Shot:
"MSR Group Shot helps you create a perfect group photo out of a series of group photos. With Group Shot you can select your favorite parts in each shot of the series and Group Shot will automatically build a composite image."

Internet Explorer Beta 2 Preview High Resolution Screenshots

Some really high quality screenshots and gives a great insight into the next version of Internet Explorer.

I am moving closer to really liking the cleaner menu / toolbar area. Its clean, neat, and well organized looking. Seems to bring the important things into focus without losing some of the functionality you currently have.

Link:
http://www.activewin.com/screenshots/vista/ie75299/

Tracing An Email

Tracing An Email
"The purpose of this guide is to show the process involved in tracing an email. The first step required to tracing an email is finding out the headers of the email. What are headers? Email headers are lines added at the top of an email message that are used by servers as the email goes on route to get delivered. Generally email clients only show the standard To, From, and Subject headers, but there are more."

No peaches, no apples.

Why is bush so awesome?
http://www.rocketboom.com/.../2006/01/rb_06_jan_20.html

Colorize Black and White Photos

Recolored is a software application that helps you with the otherwise difficult and time consuming task of colorizing black and white photos. Based on the latest developments in computer assisted image colorization, Recolored makes it possible for anyone to achieve professional looking results.

PAD Database is a comprehensive resource for software PAD files

PAD Database is a brand new resource that will benefit both Shareware / Freeware authors and developers looking to start their own shareware website (great way to increase exposure of your applications and generate revenue from ads).

Authors: Add your applications (PAD format) to the database to increase your exposure as this database will be driving many shareware websites.

Looking to start a website: Simply download the PAD Kit and the PAD Database and you can have a website up very quickly.

Link:
http://paddatabase.com

Play Commodore 64 games online

c64s.com - play Commodore 64 games online (no download required)

Another site that brings back lots of memories. No revolution controller needed for these games :-).

Dont forget about Atari.

505493139 Posts

Forums Rankings ranks all types of forums so you can see who the leaders are.

1st place is Gaia Online with:

• 505493139 posts
• 3162998 members
• 6227324 posts last week

That is a ton of traffic.

Was the WMF vulnerability intentional?

Mark's Sysinternals Blog: Inside the WMF Backdoor
"Steve Gibson (of SpinRite fame) proposed a theory in his weekly Thursday-night podcast last week that if true, would be the biggest scandal to ever hit Microsoft - that the Windows Metafile (WMF) vulnerability that drew so much media attention last month is actually a backdoor programmed intentionally by Microsoft for unknown reasons."

Windows XP Service Pack 3: Not Until 2007

Windows XP Service Pack 3: Not Until 2007

Play MP3's from a USB drive in your car

VR3 allows you to play MP3's from your car through the lighter and your existing car stereo. The device transmitts the audio on an FM channel that gets picked up by the stereo...

I'm interested but wary.

Anyone have any experience with this and want to share their thoughts? (post a comment).

IE7 fixes SELECT issues

IEBlog : For the SELECT few...: Problem is if you are developing a website you can't be sure that the user will have IE7. Since IE6 will be around for many, many years the fix won't help much.

What they need to do is patch IE6 too.

The new controller is a revolution?

What do you think of the new controller Nintendo will be introducing sometime this year? Looks like alot of work if you ask me. Video games shouldn't take that much effort...

Link:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-7965767564319548070

Video: Microsoft Gives Us A Windows Vista Preview

Gear Live | CES 2006 Video: Microsoft Gives Us A Windows Vista Preview

Whats new in Windows Vista:

• Animation effects
• Legacy metadata for 2000 legacy games built-in to the OS
• The new PC performance rating replacing “system requirements”
• Vista desktop search
• Vista’s way of alerting you of potential system problems
• The new Windows Defender Antivirus and Antispyware program
• The three official Windows Vista SKUs
• The new Breadcrumb Bar