Open Office (productivity) http://download.openoffice.
Avg (antivirus) http://free.avg.com/download?
Spybot (antispyware) http://www.safer-networking.
aSquared Free (antispyware) http://download4.emsisoft.com/
CCleaner (optimizer) http://download.piriform.com/
Easy Cleaner (optimizer) http://personal.inet.fi/
Adobe Reader (pdf reader) http://www.adobe.com/products/
Auslogics Disk Defrag (optimizer) http://www.auslogics.com/en/
TypeFaster (typing tutor) http://sourceforge.net/
Gimp (image editor) http://downloads.sourceforge.
Firefox (browser) http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/
Google Earth (map) http://earth.google.com/
K-Lite Codec Pack (video and audio codec) http://www.free-codecs.com/
VLC Player (media player) http://www.videolan.org/
Audacity (audio editor) http://audacity.sourceforge.
Facebook's redesign and other annoyances...
Overall I enjoy the redesign which I have been using for a few months now. Facebook has been the place to be in the world of social networking, like myspace was a few years ago. Facebook has grown up since its days are a college networking site and I think we are in the mist of some growing pains.
I believe the goal of the new design is to make sharing information with your friends easier and to improve communication (ie Facebook chat). And the advent of applications (although most are not useful) was a major step in the "Web 2.0" direction... which other social networks have been clonning.
With all of these "improvements" bugs have shown up. Some of the ones that I have experienced include: Not beign about to post links, not being able to post my status, and don't get me started on the chat feature.
Facebook has a long way to go to squash these bugs to bring back an enjoyable experience again. Have any of you ran into any bugs you'd like to share?
What would be cool for Facebook to add?
This is just a quick sugguestion to make facebook a compeditor in microblogging. Add the ability to send your status updates to an RSS feeder... What do you think?
EDIT: Another bug or poor execution? I had Facebook set to import my blog into the 'Notes' section of the site. My settings for that are no longer present... tsk tsk Facebook... tsk tsk...
I feel your pain. Until recently I thought that it was impossible to open the new .docx file format with Office 2003 or OpenOffice 2... That was, until today... I have found a link to Microsoft's Office Compatibility Pack for Word, Excel, and PowerPoint 2007 File Formats. Here's the link which has further instructions: Click Me!
What if you don't have MS Office? What to do... what to do... The free open source office alternative, OpenOffice.org, has a beta release of OpenOffice.org 3... this comes with no guarantees since it is just the beta version but if you really need to view those Office 2007 files try it by downloading here: Click Me!
Mac Screen Saver for Windows?
In need of a new screen saver? Like how clean and crisp those Mac screen savers look? You're in luck! While searching on http://sourceforge.net/ I found a Windows version of the Furry screen saver originally made for the Mac by Calum Robinson. If you have a Windows 32bit system give it a try and download it here.
We are all familiar with sites like Youtube, that offers user uploaded content to be shared with the masses. As you probably know, Youtube has stopped a majority of videos that violate copyright laws... so where can people find legal streaming videos of the shows they love to watch?
Hulu (From NBC and News Corp): Ad-supported streaming television shows and movies, including some in high definition.
Fancast (From Comcast): Fancast delivers movie trailers, TV show schedules, celebrity biographies, photos, show episode guides, and more. Fancast is your source for entertainment-related news and information.
South Park Studios: For those of you looking for a South Park fix, South Park Studios is offering the entire series for online streaming.
Are you using Windows XP and you're tired of staring at that green Start Menu... I have a free alternative for you... Litestep.
Warning: Do not install Litestep if you don't know what you're doing. Only install if you are an advanced user. I will not be explaining how to install Litestep, but I will be going over the basics of what it is and provide links for more information.
In computing, a shell is a piece of software that provides an interface for users. - "Wikipedia"
Litestep uses a small core that loads configurable modules. This allows the users to have a either a full featured desktop with calendars and Winamp controls to a minimalistic Desktop with nothing on it. The major advantage of using Litestep is that you can make or download themes, so if you are a Linux fan that is forced to use Windows, you should that a look at this shell.
The main module you'll use the most is xPopup module. This replaces the green start menu and is used by right clicking anywhere on the desktop.
I've been using Litestep for a few months now and rather enjoy changing the theme of my desktop from time to time. Using forums, I have been able to learn how to modify themes that I have downloaded to look and function the way that I want it to, with a great degree of success.
Before downloading Litestep, please read the forums at http://www.litestep.net/. You'll need to signup to use this forum, but all it requires is an active email account. Also check out the official page at http://www.lsdev.org/.
Today I uploaded a new feature to my website, a scrolling RSS feeder that uses Javascript and Cascading Style Sheets. I decided to see how it rendered in 3 windows based browsers: Internet Explorer 7, Firefox 2.0.0.12, and Safari 3.0.4. I also wanted to see how the rest of the pages rendered. Here's how it went.
Internet Explorer: Overall the page renders correctly with minor annoyances. The "Accordion" main menu is not positioned correctly in IE, it is slightly higher than in both Firefox and Safari. The RSS feeder works, but the Cascading Style Sheets again aren't displayed correctly, omitting a one pixel border around it. Overall IE is my least favorite browser, hopefully when I review IE 8 later this year, it will move up the ranks.
Firefox: Already I have a bias and want this browser to do better than the others. It rendered everything correctly. Page loading was slightly slow, but Firefox 3 claims to fix that problem.
Safari: Rendered correctly, was fast, and the font smoothing looks incredible. I have to admit that I originally wanted nothing to do with Safari, but was impressed with its results.
Summary: Firefox is probably the best browser out there and seems to render everything I have encountered splendidly. Safari so far gets a thumbs up but there are security holes in the program, and since it doesn't have add-ons like Firefox, it is unlikely to convert me. IE promises to render like it's counterparts when version 8 is released to the public. Having a community of developers to mend fixes and discuss changes is a big advantage that Firefox has over its competitors. If you have the choice, give Firefox a try