Computer Tips, Wallpapers, Free Softwares

Picture Browser and Viewer: PIE (Picture Information Extractor)

2012-02-02T13:31:00.002-06:00

Picture information extractor, is a free piece of software which is a picture browser and viewer on your computer. This photo software can also be used to edit the file name of your photo and viewing the metadata of the picture.

Interface of this Picture Browser and Viewer

Picture information extractor has a very good interface. It is really easy to use and navigate. Tools like importing or find your photos are easy to find. In a screenshot below you can see the two ways to find your photos. The two areas in black are where you can find your pictures.

Once you have clicked a photo you will be able to see the metadata on that photo. In the screenshot below you will be able to see the metadata of an example photo.

Unfortunately you cannot change metadata with the free version of this software, to be able to change the metadata you would need to purchase the full version of the software.

Pictures

Picture information extractor provides the best experiences when you’re viewing photos. When you double-click a photo it will take you into full screen mode, this will allow you to see the picture in full. Once you are in the full screen mode and viewing your picture you will be able to see there is information about the picture in the top left of the screen. The data you get on your picture is the file name, a star rating, the date the picture was taken, the time the picture was taken, the shutter, the aperture, flash, ISO, the date and time of when the picture had been modified and the file size of the photo. I have provided a screenshot below that shows this.

There is also an option of how you view the photos inside of the software. You can choose to list the pictures, list the pictures by file details, have a metadata list of the pictures and you can view the pictures by the thumbnails of the pictures. In the screenshots below you will be able to see the different ways you can view the pictures.

The screenshot below is a list of the pictures.

The screenshot below is of the file details.

The screenshot below is of a metadata list.

The screenshot below is a view of the pictures thumbnails.

Uses

Picture information extractor is a brilliant piece of software for photographers or anyone who wants to easily be able to view their pictures or to rename their pictures. For photographers the paid version would be a lot better because then you would have the ability to be able to edit the metadata on the pictures.

You can also check out free photo organizers reviewed by us.

Video Tutorial: How to Download and Use Picasa

2012-02-02T13:31:00.001-06:00

Here are a few video tutorials that demostrate how to download, install, and use Picasa – the free photo management and photo editing software.

You can download Picasa here.

This video tutorial shows how to download and install Picasa:

This video tutorial shows how to use Picasa, and edit photos using Picasa.

6 Best Free Photo Organizers

2012-02-02T13:31:00.000-06:00

Here are 6 Best free photo organizers to organize digital photos. These photo organizer software help you organize photos into folders, tag them, and arrange as necessary.

Picasa

Picasa is the best free photo organizer that allows you to organize digital photos easily and automatically. Picasa is a full fledged photo management software that lets you organize photos, edit photos, and publsih photos to Picasa web albums. The application is a product of Google and makes photo sharing on the web very easy for you. Edit your digital photos in the Picasa application and share them with your loved ones easily online by sharing Picasa albums with them. You can also make use of the name tags in the photos using Picasa which will automatically organize your photos based on the people in them and you can name the tag.

The freeware photo organizer is easy to download and works as your photo organizer as it automatically finds all the photos on your PC, wherever they are, and will organize them in seconds. When you have installed the application in your PC, it will automatically organize your digital photos in your system and you can edit them as per your choice and simple make a web album of all your digital photos. Share this album with your friends and family and even with every one in web. When you add more photos to your PC, they automatically show up in Picasa. Picasa also comes with face recognition, that makes it extremely easy to organize photos by people.

Read more about Picasa, or download free here.

SunlitGreen Photo Manager

SunlitGreen Photo Manager is yet another free application that easily organize photos and manages your digital pictures. Organize your photos in the folders and albums and name them with tags and collections. You can create any number of albums and folders using this free photo organizer software and make your photos available for everyone.

This digital photo organizer makes navigation through the folders and collection easy and fun. As you click on the collections and albums, you will be able to navigate through the large thumbnails. This will help you to locate your photos easily and do your task faster. You can attach any relevant information to your photos. You can add your own tags, as well as delete/rename/ reorder these entries.

SunlitGreen free photo manager also includes powerful search engine in the freeware program, which will help you to search for your photographs easily. as you can tag the snaps, you can search them too with the help of tag names. If you remember, the tag names than just enter the keyword in the search bar of the app, and results are presented to you as you type into the search box.

Read more about SunlitGreen Photo Manager, or download free here.

JetPhoto Studio

JetPhoto Studio is also a resourceful desktop free photo organizer. Edit tags, descriptions, geo data for photos or sets of photos on your computer. Then you can post your organized pictures onto photo sharing website like Flickr with just one click. This photo organizer is feature rich and helps you to create beautiful flash and web galleries just in few clicks by using this digital photo management software.

This photo organizer software offers variety of tools to organize your photo albums and images. It lets you add notes and tags to your photos with keywords. These text-based comments are searchable within both albums on your desktop computer and the web albums published onto your website using JetPhoto Server. Also, organize your photo album with dates and time for fast access.

The application makes photo sharing very simple and fun as you can edit and share your web albums with anyone in the world and share your memories with your friends and family. Once the album is published on the web server, you can still modify the album easily using JetPhoto Studio. Also add professional digital effects to your photos and albums.

Read more about JetPhoto Studio, or download free here.

Zoner PhotoStudio

Zoner PhotoStudio is free photo sharing and editing suite hat lets you to manage, edit, and share your photos faster and more easily. Download your pictures and the free photo organizer will automatically organize your digital photos and sort them for you to view. You can quickly find pics in the folder and tag them for better description. Also, add geotag to show where you took your shots.

The free photo organizer also allows you to have simple touch ups and little editing in your digital photos if you want. It offers you simple yet useful editing tools, which will let you to fix your photos quickly. Remove red-eye, wrinkles, and cool effects in the snaps to make your album more impressive.

Share your album with your family by turning your pics into panoramas. Share your photos in Facebook, give them impressive 3D effects while sharing, or publish them on Flickr.

Read more about Zoner Photo Studio, or download free latest free version here.

Magix Photo manager

Magix Photo manager is complete set of tools and functionality that offers you all the functions from organizing to managing and archiving the photo albums and collections. You import video clips and files in the app and create beautiful impressive presentation using this handy application.

The free photo organizer has user-friendly interface that will guide you to the app and also will introduce you with features and functions helpful for you. The photo manager has viewer and optimizer that will let you to view your snaps in the screen resolution plus you can Rotate, optimize, crop, convert, copy and add titles to pictures within seconds. Flexible display and management modes sort your media according to logical criteria such as date, motif or rating and make it easier to find photos later.

Read more about Magix Photo Manager, or download free here.

Windows Live Photo Gallery

Windows Live Photo Gallery is free photo organizer with great features and do all the photo managing and organizing task for you. Import photos from your camera, organize them into albums, and edit them so they look their best. You can use powerful and easy-to-use editing tools that you can use to edit batch of photos simultaneously. Clean up photos, remove blemishes, fix red-eye, and more.

The freeware photo organizer has tools that will search all the snaps in your system and will sort them in one single interface. Use the feature for locating and organizing the photos and videos by the information your camera added description like the date a photo was taken or by information added by you like tags, captions, and other information.

You can upload photos and videos to your favorite social networking sites like Facebook or YouTube. Select the photos and videos you want to upload and share them with your friends and following.

Read more about Windows Live Photo Gallery and download free here.

Picasa - Manage and Edit Photos

2012-02-02T13:30:00.000-06:00

Picasa is a wonderful free software. Many people know Picasa as just free photo editing software. However, Picasa is much more than that.

Picasa is a full featured photo management software. What that means is that it centrally manages all your photos located on your hard drive.

When you install Picasa, it will scan your hard drive for all jpeg, gif, bmp and other image files. It automatically arranges all the photo files in nice albums based on dates of photos. So, you can easily look for photos just by looking into the albums – no need to scan entire hard drive for that.

Apart from that, when you add some new photos to your computer, Picasa detects those as well when it is started next time. So, you can be always assured that all your photos are being centrally managed. Picasa also provides the innovative name tag feature to tag people in photos. Really cool.

Apart from Photo management, Picasa also provides easy photo sharing tools to share photos in chat, email using Picasa’s in built mail client, and you can even order prints right from Picasa. You can also upload pictures to Picasa web albums, geotag them, and use them in your blog.

Apart from all these nice Photo Management features, Picasa is a powerful free photo editor. It provides all the photo editing options such as red eye fix, crop, resize, make collages, change contrast, add effects, create slideshows etc.

Even though many other free photo editing software also provide such features, Picasa makes it really easy to use them. The interface is very easy, intuitive, and totally functional. It also has a one-click photo fixing tool that fixes common problems in photos, such as red eye.

Picasa is available for Windows, Mac, and Linux.

Try Picasa. This is one of the best free photo management software, and free photo editor. This is another free software that we totally love.

Download Link: Download Picasa Free(latest version)

Video Tutorials: Here are some video tutorials about how to download, install, and use Picasa

Use VLC Media Player To Set Video as Desktop Background

2012-02-02T11:30:00.000-06:00

Here is a short step by step tutorial on “How to use VLC to set video as desktop background”. VLC media player has got an option which allows you to easily set any video as desktop background in a easy way. You don’t require any kind of professional skills or knowledge for doing this, just few clicks and there you are in front of your favorite video being played in desktop background. And I am sure that most of you would be using VLC, may be not as your favorite media player, but as a substitute to it. Follow this simple step by step tutorial and learn “How to use VLC to set video as desktop background”.

How To Use VLC To Set Video as Desktop Background :

Open VLC media player installed on your system, if you don’t have it on your system then you can download it.

Select “tools” option and then click “Preferences” option.

In the “Preferences” window, click “video” option on the left side.

Select “DirectX video output” from the output drop down menu.

Hit the “Save” button for saving the changes made and exit VLC media player.

Restart VLC media player, select and open any video in VLC media player.

Right click the video and place your mouse over the “video” option with a small arrow in the context menu.

Select “DirectX Wallpaper” from the options available.

That’s it, now minimize VLC media player and watch your favorite video as desktop background.

Click the loop button once so that the video repeats automatically when it finishes.

Enjoy your favorite videos on desktop as desktop background.

You would also like to check out a tutorial on “How to set video as desktop background using DreamScene.”

System Operating: Windows All (32b & 64b).
Download: Latest Installer or Portable version.
Home page: www.videolan.org

Window Repair (All In One)

2012-02-02T05:35:00.000-06:00

Have you every found yourself in a jam where you have cleaned a PC from one of those rogue malware infections (AKA: scareware) only to discover that the infection, and even the cleaning process itself, caused corruption to the Windows registry and files (that control Internet Explorer, Windows Update, Firewall, etc.). My most recent experience was exactly that. I cleaned the machine only to find that the Firewall had been corrupted.

If this has occurred to you and you ran out of options, visit Tweaking.com and download their Windows Repair (All In One). As a matter of fact if you are in the position of cleaning malware from PC’s on a frequent basis, I suggest you keep Windows Repair (All In One) in your tech toolbox.

Windows Repair is an all-in-one repair tool to help fix a large majority of known Windows problems including registry errors and file permissions as well as issues with Internet Explorer, Windows Update, Windows Firewall and more. Malware and installed programs can modify your default settings. With Tweaking.com – Windows Repair you can restore Windows original settings.

I do recommend that you have some knowledge of cleaning malware from a PC before using this program; AND, that you follow the 4-step process that is built into this program before you initiate the repair process (see video).

Tweaking.com – Windows Repair can do the following:

Reset Registry Permissions
Reset File Permissions
Register System Files
Repair WMI
Repair Windows Firewall
Repair Internet Explorer
Repair MDAC & MS Jet
Repair Hosts File
Remove Policies Set By Infections
Repair Icons
Repair Winsock & DNS Cache
Remove Temp Files
Repair Proxy Settings
Unhide Non System Files
Repair Windows Updates
Repair CD/DVD Missing/Not Working
and more…

Operating System: All windows (32b & 64b).
Free/paid: Free
Download: Latest version

Password Protect Your Notes with Secret Notes

2012-01-31T18:22:00.000-06:00

Secret Notes is a free software which lets you password protect your notes and keeps them secure. Every now and then you’re going to run into a situation where you don’t feel comfortable or secure writing down notes on a piece of paper and keeping them near your computer. Secret Notes can keep information that needs to be secure, secure.

Safe, Secure, and Small Installation Package

The installer for Secret Notes is quite small at just two Megabytes. Installed program takes up about twenty-eight Megabytes of memory. Unlike most purveyors of freeware, softorino, the maker of Secret Notes, distributes their code through a number of highly respected sites, such as tucows, Brothersoft, Cnet, and softonic, so you can be sure the download is free of malicious software.

Password Protect Secret Notes Does One Thing-And Does It Well

Secret Notes doesn’t have all sorts of bells and whistles. It does on thing, and it does that one thing quite well. It allows you to write notes to yourself, like passwords, or your kids’ Christmas lists, and keep them safe and secret from prying eyes, like your kids looking to find out what you plan on buying them for Christmas.

After you install the program, it’ll ask you for a password, twice. Choose the password and confirm it, type thing. Not too different from other programs with built-in security. But when I installed the program and setup my password, I closed the program, waited a few minutes, and then reopened the program. It asked for my password, twice. That was surprising, but it was the only time it happened. In order to gain access to the program, each time you launch it, you have to input the password. This keeps it secure. You can also lock the notes if you step away from your computer and leave the program running.

This is a handy little program. I think I’ll be keeping it to use as my password list, instead of writing them down next to my computer and putting the page into my wallet. You have full control over the color of what you type, but you have no choices as far as the font and size of that text. That’s about the worst thing I can say about Secret Notes[Download] .

5 free good notes softwares

2012-01-31T16:01:00.000-06:00

Here are 5 best free post it notes software that serve as digital post it notes for your computer.

Would you like to stay organized? Then sticky notes software are the best choice for you. Sticky notes software can help you keep all your information neatly organized in one place. Normal paper post it notes will look a lot messy and cluttered with dozens of yellow paper sticky notes stuck all over. So here I present you with five different free digital post it notes that will help you accomplish this task easily in digital world.

1. Stickies

Stickies is a simple to use free sticky notes software that will help you keep your information as a computerized version of notes. They come in yellow rectangular windows where you can put text and they are being stored as an ‘ini’ file.

Download and install Stickies and a yellow sticky pad gets added to your quick launch bar. Double click this whenever when you need to load a new digital sticky note or right click it for other configuration options.

The software provides a provision to set alarm options with your Stickies. Also you can change other tool settings such as color, skin etc according to your need. Some of the skins available with Stickies are shown in the picture below. You even have an option to lock your text so that you won’t accidentally delete your message.

One most important feature of this free stick notes is that they will not mess your system files and also they won’t take much of your disk space. Download free Sticky Notes[HERE].

2. MemoThis

MemoThis is a free post it notes software to organize your data. MemoThis helps you create digital sticky notes that you can post on any web page. It just sticks on to the page as a layer over it just as how real sticky notes work and you will find them remain intact there when you return to the page again. You can also move it around as and when you need.

Your digital sticky notes can be controlled by setting it as private or collaborated with others. In this way you manage to make your memos visible to only those you want to see them. Web log addicts would love this tool. Find the picture below that shows how an online page with a memo on it would look like.

This free sticky notes software is very easy to install and you could start working with it within seconds. Download latest version [HERE] Or reach and sign up to download MemoThis directly by following the link.

3. Crawler Notes

Yet another convenient quick and simple digital post it notes. Create your messages and stick them onto your desktop. You can hide or show digital post it with a single mouse click.

The toolbar that comes with Crawler Notes helps you change the default settings of your notes color, texture etc.

Though Crawler Notes lacks the extra features such as alarm system to set reminders, the simplicity of this free sticky software really makes up for this. Follow the link to reach Crawler Notes free sticky notes software.

4. Efficient Sticky Notes

Efficient Sticky Notes is another sticky notes freeware to help you organize your information. You can manage your desktop post it notes by group, or set priority over them, add attachments to it etc. with Efficient Sticky Notes.

Various background colors and gradient effects are possible with this post it notes software. Also you can set your note as ‘semi-transparent’ if you don’t want the desktop to be fully covered with your note.

Efficient Sticky Notes software efficiently saves your time and money! Reach Efficient Sticky Notes by following the link.

5. Evernote

Evernote is another wonderful free online sticky notes software which comes with a friendly user interface. Whether text note, snapshot, web clip or audio; Evernote software automatically categorize and index the information and prepares it for your instant retrieval.

Evernote application uses AI technologies for recognition, indexing and search purposes. The tool integrates with Internet Explorer and FireFox which allows you to add items directly from the browser.

Several note templates are supported by Evernote. You can also share your notes with your friends and colleagues. Reach Evernote free online sticky notes tool through the link provided.

Conclusion:

Even outside of these featured five options, there are lot many free online sticky notes available. Try out your free Sticky note tool and you will never have to forget important meetings or “to-do” again and that too in a secure way. Also do leave your comments!

Video tutorial - How to use QuickFox Notes

2012-01-31T14:19:00.000-06:00

Here is a small video tutorial that explains how to use QuickFox Notes. QuickFox Notes is a free plugin for firefox that lets you take notes from within Firefox. You can easily synchronize notes across multiple computers.

QuickFox Notes - A good Free Firefox Plugin to take Notes

2012-01-31T14:18:00.000-06:00

QuickFox Notes is a free Firefox plugin that adds notes taking capabilities to Firefox. QuickFox Notes lets you easily add some notes, and store them as your bookmarks. If you keep your bookmarks synchronized across multiple computers, your notes will also get synchronized automatically.

QuickFox Notes is a very basic and simple to use Firefox plugin. It installs as an icon in your Firefox. Whenever you want to jot down something, just click on that icon. It will open a new notes window for you, and you can quickly type (or paste) your note.

All your notes are saved in a folder that is integrated with Bookmarks of Firefox. This has one big advantage. If you use utilities like Xmarks or Mozilla Weave to keep your bookmarks synchronized across multiple computers, your notes will also get synchronized automatically, without a need to do anything additional on your part.

Here is a small video tutorial that explains how to use QuickFox Notes.

QuickFox Notes lets you add only text and links to your notes. You cannot add images, or any other media. This is alright, as QuickFox is geared to be a simple notes taking application.

Quickfox Notes provides you with a tabbed interface like Notepad++. You can also search through your notes quickly using the search function.

QuickFox Notes provides you some formatting features as well. You can adjust text size, and background color of notes.

QuickFox Notes is a simple to use and makes notes taking a very easy task in Firefox.

Stickies: Free Electronic Post-It Notes for your Computer

2012-01-31T14:03:00.000-06:00

I find myself putting Post-It sticky notes over my computer screen to remember important items. Today I found this free software that creates electronic stickies that will remain on my computer screen for as long as I want, and I can configure them in any manner. Cool

Stickies is a free software to put small notes on your computer. You can easily create a sticky for any item you need to remember, and place that anywhere on the screen. Sticky will remain there till as long as you want, if if you reboot the computer!

You can also attach sticky to a particular website or folder, and sticky will show up whenever that website or folder is displayed on the screen.

Stickies can also be used to set important reminders. You can associate a time with a sticky, and the sticky will come up at the scheduled time.

Here are some of the other cool features of Stickies:

Stickies appearance can be customised; fonts, colors, and size can be changed.

Stickies can be hidden for a certain period, until a specified date and time, or to wake every day, week or month, to act as reminders.

Stickies can be transferred from one machine to another.

Stickies can snap to each other and to the sides of the screen.

Stickies can have alarms set to ensure you notice them at a point you choose

Stickies can be transferred to and from your Palm or PDA.

International language and RTL text support

Stickies is small and simple, it writes to a single text file, and does not alter the registry

Stickies is a really good, and easy to use software and completetly free. Love it!

Download using links at the end to get latest version or go to home page.

Download Link: Download Stickies Free

View World Time Zones with Every Time Zone

2012-01-30T20:47:00.000-06:00

Every Time Zone is a free online world time zone website which allows you to view world time zones without any confusion. This online tool shows a Green scale which shows your current local time and other time zones across the world. The green scale can be dragged to either side for viewing your local time zone and time zones around the world. You will also see purple color bar which cannot be dragged and shows the current local time.

Every time zone lays down a simple and easy way to view world time zones, otherwise time zones are really very confusing. This online world time zone website is really very useful when you need to manage the painful job of fixing online meetings with several people in different time zones. With the help of this online world time zone tool, you can easily choose a time suitable for all the time zones, and further schedule online meetings according to that time which suits every one across different time zones.

Don’t forget to check out free world time zone clock.

Key Features Of Every Time Zone:

Easy to use because of its simple user interface.

Shows your current local time on the Green scale.

No download or installation required.

Shows other time zones on green scale.

Drag the green scale to view time in different time zones.

View World time zones without any confusion.

Also, check out free world clock software.

Every Time Zone is one of the coolest and straight forward online service which allows you to view world time zone without any confusion. Click here to try this out absolutely free.

Instant Time Zone: Free World Time Zone Clock

2012-01-30T18:53:00.000-06:00

Instant Time Zone is a free World Time Zone Clock that displays current date and time in different parts of the World. You need to select the location for which you want to check the time and it will automatically display. With this free World Time Zone Clock, Instant Time Zone, you can also see world time zone map or city world time list. The program consists of various languages such as English, French, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish, Swedish, Romanian, Poland, Japanese, Thai, Chinese, Arabic, Russian and many other languages.

In addition, you can use it as a Atomic Alarm Clock. You can set alarm for yourself for some important meeting, birthday or other important events.

How to Download this free World Time Zone Clock:

Go onto the website

Click on “Download” button

Double-Click on the downloaded setup in order to run

Click on run

The installer will automatically install the Instant Time Zone tool

You will soon be taken to the “Select Language” Window.

Yup…there you are. Start using World Clock. You can display multiple clocks at the same time. You can use a different color for every time zone. Also, many options can change like, display, add years to date for countries with different calendar. For example: Thailand +543 years.

If you want to open display time, date & comment or some other available options, you need to click on to restore down button. You can also select transparency, or small display. In addition, it also has an option to display calendar, on top of all other windows.

In short, Instant Time zone is a nice free World Time Zone Clock that keeps you abreast with current time and date of various world time zones. Go ahead and get it right away.

Download (Free): Click Here
Home Page: Click Here
Works With: Windows 95, 98, Me, 2000, XP, NT, Vista
Free / Paid: Free

PhotoPixar - Create Video Slideshow From Photos

2012-01-30T17:30:00.000-06:00

PhotoPixar is a utility software which allows you to create video slideshow from photos. This utility software has got a very simple and easy to understand user interface. Create video slideshow from photos in JPG, BMP and PNG formats. Moreover, you may add your photo files to this software individually or add entire photo folder to this software. Keep in your mind that this software is free for limited period only, and this limited period has not been specified.

If I say more about this software, you can add your favorite music to your video slideshow for making your photo album more attractive. Moreover, you may also choose among several templates, backgrounds and effects which you want to use in your photo album. Add caption to your photo album and Share your Photo album with your friends by uploading it on Facebook with “Upload” button. Here in this article you will find a small tutorial of “How to create video slideshow from photos”.

Key Features Of This Utility Software That Creates Video Slideshow From Photos :

Simple and easy to understand interface.

Easy to use.

Add your favorite music to video slideshow.

Choose between several templates, backgrounds and effects.

Create Video slideshow and save it to this software.

Upload your photo album to Facebook for sharing it with your friends.

Add captions to your video slideshow.

Windows utility software.

How To Create Video Slideshow From Photos:

Firstly, simply download the latest version [HERE] or go on to the homepage of this utility software.

Download and install this software.

Launch this software.

Import photos to this software from your PC by clicking on “Add photos” option with a plus sign.

After uploading photos to this software add templates, background and effects by clicking on “Add Templates” button.

Click “customize” option which appears on the right side of the screen for choosing effects and background.

Add captions by typing the caption in box, select the caption color and click “Add caption” button.

Once you are over with all this, click “Publish Album” button.

Click Save button for saving it to this software or click upload button for uploading it to your Facebook account.

That’s all you need to do for creating a video slideshow from photos.

Download (Free): Click Here
Home Page: Click Here
Works With: Windows 7, Vista or XP
License: Free for Limited Time

Care4Teen - Internet Censor Program for Parents

2012-01-28T16:01:00.000-06:00

Care4Teen is a free internet censor program for parents to monitor and protect kids online. Teens and children can get in quite a bit of trouble on the Internet if they aren’t monitored carefully. This doesn’t mean watching over their shoulders every second that they’re on the computer, though. The best option is an Internet censoring program, such as Care4Teen.

Fast Download, Easy Installation of this internet censor program

The Care4Teen download is quite small because most of the program resides on the Care4Teen servers. Installation and setup is quick and easy. Prior to downloading the program, you’ll be required to create an account with a username and password. This process is easy and straightforward.

Once the installation completes, you’ll be requested to reboot your computer, since the executable acts as a firewall. This means that as your computer communicates with internet servers, the software reviews the data being sent and received and blocks inappropriate content, based upon a database residing on the Care4Teen servers.

Multiple Program Options available with this internet censor program

You have two main options for how the program runs. These are restricted and unrestricted modes. In restricted mode, the program is supposed to block content that you would find objectionable. The problem here is, when I was checking the program out, I made a point of searching for content of a pornographic nature and the program did nothing to stop my doing so. Even worse, when I went to some of the pages that came up in my search, the program did nothing. To me, this means the program doesn’t work as advertised. In unrestricted mode, the program is supposed to allow the user to view whatever content they request. However, the program will take screenshots every so often and every few minutes will record a short video showing what the user is seeing. This feature worked properly as I was putting the software through its paces.

Server-Side Database Incomplete

As I stated above, I made a point of visiting a number of sites that most parents of adolescents and teens wouldn’t want their children visiting. But the program failed completely in blocking these sites. Both the meta data and the site name included the words porn and pornography. This means that either the client installed on my computer wasn’t communicating properly with the database on Care4Teen servers, the database wasn’t communicating, or the internet censor software wasn’t written right.

Home Page: Click Here
Download (Free): Click Here
Works With: Windows
Free / Paid: Free

5 Best Free Parental Control Softwares

2012-01-28T15:31:00.000-06:00

Internet is never a safe place when it can compromise the safety of your kids. But there are many free parental control software available to manage and monitor your kid’s online activity.

Here is definition of Parental Control Software from Wikipedia:

Parental controls provide parents with automated tools to help protect their children and set restrictions while using devices and services…

…controlling the content which the child views on a device connected to the Internet, or limiting the amount of time they can use their device.

Basically, a parental control software lets you manage what type of activities can your kid do online, which applications or websites your kids can work with, and even manage how much time your kid can work online.

A secondary feature of such free parental control software is to report to you what your kids do online, so that you can see that they have not managed to bypass the restrictions imposed by you.

Here are 5 Best free parental control softwre:

1) OnlineFamily.Norton

OnlineFamily.Norton is a freeware that effectively blocks bad sites, controls time on the computer, supervises chat and reports on all the actions taken online through the system.

OnlineFamily.Norton is a good parental control freeware that provides an option to set parental control over what content a child can access. The restriction can be customized to notify a strict No-Access to a simple email notification to the parent whenever the child accesses the site.

It reports on how long a particular site was used, what search query was used by the child to browse through the site etc. Different controls can be set based on the age of your child.

Rather than creating an adversary relationship with the child, this software can be used to encourage a good talk between the parent and the child. Find OnlineFamily.Norton here. Also check this video tutorial about how to use OnlineFamily.Norton.

2. Windows Live Family Safety

Windows Live Family Safety is a free parental control software which lets you control and monitor the activity of your kids. You can install Windows Live Family Safety Filter on every computer that your child use and it can limit the searches, or block and allow websites, or monitoring IM messenger or hotmail etc.

The software might already be installed in your system if you are using Windows 7. Otherwise download and install the tool. Have a Windows Live ID and setting up controls or filters are absolutely easy. Once installed, every time when you try to access a site, the proxy server will filter the traffic to that account. Windows Live Family Safety is a part of Windows Live suite, that also includes Windows Live Mail, Windows Live Writer, and Windows Live Movie Maker.

Windows Live Family Safety is a brilliant choice for those who want to monitor their child’s online access. Find Windows Live Family Safety tool by following the link.

3. KidZui

KidZui browser is another freeware that in my opinion provides best parental control features for young kids. Kidzui protects your kid from questionable or indecent websites. Once the parent creates his/her account, they can set the child’s account. Based on the age group that the child fit in, KidZui offers a wonderful multimedia experience for them.

KidZui is not filter driven. The contents that are available with KidZui are already approved by the admin based on a whitelist database.

Though I felt that KidZui can’t be given a high rating for older kids as it’s too restrictive for them, it’s a good choice for your younger ones. Reach out KidZui through the link.

4. K9 Web Protection

K9 Web Protection is yet another easy to use free internet filter tool. It blocks offensive contents, and those sites detected as potential malware threats.

Download and install K9 Web Protection. You need to have an activation key to install the software. Your password is the key for every action and you need to remember it even if you want to uninstall the K9 Web Protection tool.

You can also block unwanted image contents from popping up in the site your kids browse. Just the images will not be shown but they are free to browse. But its functionality is limited with web surfing, as chat monitoring does not come with this tool. Avail free K9 Web Protection services by following the link.

5. Parental Control Bar

Parental Control Bar is a free content filter that adds on to your browser. It’s very easy to install and work with. You just need to remember your password.

But the tool only works with the newer versions of IE. The picture below shows the control bar that a parent will have access to. There are pre-labeled contents that Parental Control Bar can block. You can add or modify contents of your own for better filtering.

Though this software can’t be promoted as a good option over the others, it is still good with young kids. Find out more about Parental Control Bar through this link.

Conclusion

Parenting in this age of internet is a challenging task. But these free parental control tools will help you stop watching over your kid’s shoulder! Monitoring cannot always be equated to spying as long as you draw a strict line between these two. Communicate with your child that you are monitoring and give them their freedom in a safe internet zone.

SUMo - Keep your PC programs up-to-date

2012-01-28T14:57:00.000-06:00

If you're like us, you like to keep on top of the latest software updates, OS updates, and so on. However, it gets a bit unruly having to open each piece of software you have on your PC and running the "check for updates" option for each one.

Recently released SUMo 2.17 (stands for Software Update Monitor) will save you the work. SUMo automatically scans your PC for installed programs and searches for updates.

Once downloaded and installed, however, it was simple as pie.

The first time you run SUMo, it will prompt you to scan your PC for installed programs. If you agree, SUMo will find all the installed programs and load them into the interface, where you can check for updates with one click.

If you don't want SUMo to locate all of your programs, you can manually select which programs to scan for updates by choosing the "add" button at the bottom of the page or by dragging and dropping the executable onto the SUMo interface.

If an update is available, choose the Get Update option, and SUMo loads a helpful web page with various download locations (yes, there are ads on the page as well; remember, if it don't make dollars, it don't make sense).
SUMo is free software, and Windows only.

Operating System: Windows all (32b & 64b)
License: Free
Download: CLICK HERE
Home page: www.kcsoftwares.com

Keep our PC up to date and alway fast

2012-01-28T14:25:00.000-06:00

Keeping a computer Up To Date is an all inclusive phrase and it could mean updating hardware. On a system that works well, there is no need to do that.

On the other hand, keeping Windows up to date is much simpler. Make sure Windows Update is set to notify you when updates are available, (in the Control Panel). You can also set WU to download and install updates automatically, or you can set it to just notify you so you choose when to allow the updates to install.

Maintenance is involved, and one aspect many don't think about is physical maintenance, such as removing dust bunnies from around the fans and vents inside the computer. Dust will build up and that can cause overheating.

Other maintenance, software based, includes keeping your anti-virus definitions up to date and ensuring a full scan is performed once a week. In addition, since anti-virus scanners don't find all malware, download and install a couple of malware scanners so you can perform 'manual' scans once a week or so, to keep the pests out.

We often recommend the free latest versions of Malwarebytes Anti-malware and SUPERAntiSpyware.

No need to update drivers on a good working machine, but one thing you very muchly, (sorry, a unique English word), should do, is BACKUP your personal files to some external media, and then make two more backups of the same files, 3 backups in total, all on different external media. That way, if your system does fail, you don't lose all those documents, photos, music and videos you might have.

Video tutorial how to use OnlineFamily.Norton

2012-01-28T14:00:00.000-06:00

Here is a small video tutorial that explains how to configure and use OnlineFamily.Norton. This is a free software from Norton to monitor and manage online activities of your kids. You can create separate settings for each kid.

Kidzui: Free Browser to Manage Online Activities of your Kids

2012-01-28T11:34:00.000-06:00

There are lot of parental controls available out there that help you manage the content that your kids can see online. However, most of them rely on some sort of content management from you as a parent. You need select the category of websites that your kids can see, and the websites that you kid can navigate to. This makes them pretty cumbersome to use.

A simple solution to that problem is Kidzui. It is a free browser that is specially made for kids of ages 13 and below. Kidzui itself maintains a list of websites, games, and videos that are safe for kids. These websites/games/videos have been approved by parents like you. So, when your kid browses the internet using Kidzui, you can be sure that he/she is visiting only the sites that are safe, and it takes the burden completely off from you regarding managing the content that your kids can see online. Kidzui has more than 2 million approved websites/games/videos, so your kids would not complain of not enough content to browse.

Kidzui is completely full featured, and addresses all the aspects of safe web browsing for kids:

Safe Search for Kids

Search is the area that is sometimes most difficult to manage. Even if your kids search for a completely appropriate term for kids, still it is sometimes possible that search engines list non-related, and inappropriate results. This can sometimes tempt your kids to navigate to those websites. To address this, Kidzui comes with a built-in search engine. When your kids type some search phrase, Kidzui shows the results that are from approved results only. This ensures that your kid can browse only safe content, and not fall in the trap of bad websites. The content that kids see on Kidzui is relevant and appropriate for their age and interest.

Kidzui has some other interesting features also for search:

When your kid starts typing, Kidzui auto completes search terms, and ranks them in order of popularity among kids.

With the suggested search results, Kidzui also displays a visual image that helps your kid identify what they are searching for.

Kidzui provides spelling suggestions to help your kids complete their search terms.

Related channels are displayed along with the search results. This helps kid in exploring further content related to their interest.

Safe Browsing for Kids

The strongest aspect of Kidzui is that it has a database of over 2 million websites/games/videos that your kids can browse. All this content is approved by parents and teachers, which ensures that the content is completely appropriate, and of interest for your kids. Apart from the fact that kids browse only safe content, Kidzui also helps them in learning because they are encourage to explore other content that kids like.

Kidzui provides lot of features to help your kids navigate through this content:

Kidzui provides channels for popular content. Your kids can save their channels when they navigate through content. The channels will display on their home page, and new content is added to channels daily.

Kidzui home page displays popular content that other kids around the world find interesting. Kidzui editors also post interesting websites and content on Kidzui home page to help your kids discover and explore new content.

Kids can add their favorite websites / games/ videos to their Favorites section, and easily access them anytime.

Kidzui maintains a very comprehensive history of the content that your kids browse. They can access this history anytime, and explore that content again.

Kids can even tag content as they browse, and express their opinion about content.

Kids can easily share the content with their friends.

Social Networking

Once parents start regulating online activities of their kids, one of the biggest complaint that they get is that kids are not able to participate in social networking websites, such as MySpace and Facebook. Kidzui manages that aspect too. Kidzui provides its own social networking community for kids. Each kid can create their page in that community called MyKidZui page. Kids can add their friends to that page. After that, they can see when their friends came online, and share the tagged content with them.

Here are some of the features that Kidzui online community provides:

Kids can add and block friends.

Kids can share content with friends. All such shared content appears in their Inbox.

Ping friends to say “Hi”

See friends come online and their interests.

Kidzui does not allows any written text / chat / email in this online community. This ensures that even if some wrong persons creates an online page in Kidzui, they won’t be able to email or chat with your kids.

Kidzui even sends you a weekly report of your kids activities online. I wish Kidzui had some better online account management, like Windows Live Family Safety has.

As would be obvious from above, Kidzui is really a very comprehensive way to ensure that your kids browse only safe content online. It not only ensures that the content that your kids see is safe, it also promotes their curiosity by showing them other content that kids like. This means safe growth of the knowledge of your kids.

Kidzui is completely free. Kidzui is natively available for Windows, and Mac. Kidzui is also available as a browser add-in for Firefox. This means Kidzui can be used in Linux as well, by installing it in your Firefox browser in Linux. Love it!

  Home Page:  Click Here 
  Download (Free):  Click Here 
  Works With: Windows, Mac, Linux
  Free / Paid: Free

Launch of Google’s Emergency Public Alert Service

2012-01-28T08:22:00.000-06:00

oday’s post is an important one that ultimately and literally could be a lifesaver. Google, in conjunction with their mapping technology, has launched [see here] a platform service called Google Public Alerts that is designed to help you find critical emergency information during a crisis. The intent of the platform is to disseminate emergency messages such as the location of crisis events (such as hurricanes and earthquakes) and what actions to take (such as evacuation notices).

The Google Public Alerts service uses alerts provided by our authoritative, trusted partners. What alert you see (if any) depends on what alerts are active at a given location, on their severity, and on what you search for and where. To see all alerts go to the Google Public Alerts homepage.

Google Public Alerts currently shows weather, public safety and earthquake alerts from US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the National Weather Service, and the US Geological Survey (USGS).

Keep in mind that Google Public Alerts is a new baby, with future improvements expected (beyond weather and earthquakes), and should only be used as a supplemental tool or resource in determining the extent and degree of an emergency event. To see more on this [CLICK HERE].

PasteCopy - A Free Powerful Clipboard manager

2012-01-28T04:42:00.000-06:00

I usually copy and paste multiple many text, links...And I often use a powerful Clipboard Manager, especially it's free - PasteCopy.Net. So, I want to introduce to you. Hope this app will helpful for you.

PasteCopy.NET enlarges the capacity of Windows Clipboard and lets you organize csv (Comma separated values), html, rtf (Rich Text Format), text, unicode text & images into customizable categories. The supported fomats can be previewed and copied to Windows Clipboard with a mouse-click, or by keyboard navigation. PasteCopy.NET is a portable* freeware tool, only 719 kB, and can run from a USB memory stick.

Key Features

Portable freeware tool, only (719 kB)

Multilingual support

Auto- Copy & Paste Windows Clipboard

Convert rtf to txt (-automatically)

Convert html to rtf or txt (-automatically)

(Auto-) resizable/hide preview

Mouse-hover/keystroke preview

Clipboard-content preview in SystemTray

Export and print function

Supported Operating Systems: Windows 98/ME/2000 SP3/2003/2008/XP SP2/Vista/Windows 7
Requirements .NET 2.0 or higher.
Download: Click Here
Download .NET 2.0

VIDEO:

CinemaDrape - Hide Everything Outside the Main Application

2012-01-27T07:34:00.000-06:00

With the advent of the widescreen LCD/LED monitor we have established a visual landscape where we can easily open more than one application on the screen and take in more information. Under most circumstances this is a wonderful thing; however, I know myself there are times I wish I could create a distraction free environment and hide everything on the screen except the main task (or application) I am focused on.

Well, my wish came true with CinemaDrape…

CinemaDrape helps you focus on your current task on the screen (such as a video in a web page, a photo or a document editor area) by instantly blanking or dimming the other less important areas in a web page or in the background windows.

CinemaDrape gives you the ability to turn off (or hide) the side elements by exposing a drape. For example, let’s say you want to watch a video and hide everything else on the screen. It is possible with CinemaDrape. The drape will cover everything but the video. To get the idea, watch the video:

Once you install CinemaDrape, there are two things to remember. By pressing Ctrl + F12 on your keyboard will startup CinemaDrape and by pressing Esc on your keyboard will close CinemaDrape. CinemaDrape requires no memory when the drape is not active and no extra tray icon!

Easy to start

CinemaDrape is easy to start: just move your mouse over the area you want to focus on and press Ctrl+F12 (or your own favorite custom keyboard combination). This works in any Web browser or in any other program you are using.

To focus an entire window (such as your current, active window), just move your mouse over the title bar at the top of the window and press Ctrl+F12.

To focus the previously selected area from the last time the CinemaDrape was used, use the Ctrl+Alt+F12 keyboard shortcut anywhere in Windows.

Easy to close

CinemaDrape is easy to close: just press Esc or select Quit from the context menu.

CinemaDrape is also very customizable in that you can resize the focus window, save the focus window as a favorite (to use later), and change the color of the surrounding drape.

Operating System: Windows 7/Vista/XP
(32 & 64 bit).

Free / Paid: Free

Download Here

Personal Encryption Tool Free: ToolWiz BSafe

2012-01-26T16:31:00.000-06:00

ToolWiz BSafe is a free personal encryption tool. This personal encryption tool helps you in protecting your private documents by encrypting them. It creates a virtual safe which works like a regular drive where you can store files. The files stored in this virtual safe are encrypted on the go and cannot be accessed without the right password. So you can be sure that all your files will be safe with this personal encryption tool.

Lets look at some features of this personal encryption tool:

It is completely free for home use.

It creates a virtual disk on your system.

The storage is however done in a specific folder in your computer.

You need to know the password to open the information which is stored in that virtual safe.

It is very lightweight and does not affect the performance of your computer.

You can create multiple numbers of safes on your computer.

You can define the size and volume of the safe that is the maximum amount of files that can be stored in the safe.

You can also change the password of the safe later on.

How to use this personal encryption tool:

You need to download the software by clicking on the download link provided on the website or Download here.

After downloading the software you need to install it and then launch it.

On launching you will see a screen where you can create a new safe or you can open an existing safe.

Once you create a safe you have to define a file which will contain the safe and also the volume of the safe.

Then if you want to open a safe you have to open the file containing the safe and also have to give the password for the safe.

ToolWiz BSafe is a useful personal encryption software and can store any private file you have securely. Go ahead and give it a try, its free!

Download Here

3D Text Maker: Create Free Online 3D Text Banners

2012-01-26T08:36:00.000-06:00

3D Text Maker is a free web application to convert a normal text into 3D text. This web application is an awesome online 3D text maker which gives a 3D effect to a normal text. The appreciating part of this 3D Text creator is that it works online. No need to download any software or program for converting a normal text into 3D text.

The application is very fast and provides multiple options to create a 3D text in an easy way. The text created by this online application looks very real. Now you don’t need MS PowerPoint to give a 3D effect to a text. Just do it online with this 3D Text Maker app.

3D Text Maker is a very advance application which provides multiple options which can be customized from within the app. The interface provided by the app is very easy to understand. Also, you don’t need any sign up before getting started with the app.

Just visit the website, Select the font type, select a color, set your dimensions, set the effect, speed, font size, depth, frames and the like, enter the desired text and create a 3D text online with 3D Text Maker app. After creating the 3D Text, you can save the text from within the app.

Some Key Features Of 3D Text Maker App:

You can convert a normal text into 3D text online with 3D Text Maker.

The interface provided by the app is very simple.

You can select multiple font type from within the app to give a 3D effect to text.

Adjust dimensions of the text by your choice.

You can give different effects, set speed, font size, depth, frames and the like.

Select from among multiple colors to convert your 3D text into your favorite color.

You can save the created 3D Text on your desktop directly from the app.

Just convert your normal text into 3D text with online 3D Text Maker. Click here to visit the website of 3D Text Maker. Be a good artist and experience the art of 3D texting with 3D Text Maker app. Make your text live by giving 3D effect to your normal text.

Computer Tips, Wallpapers, Free Softwares

Picture Browser and Viewer: PIE (Picture Information Extractor)

Interface of this Picture Browser and Viewer

Pictures

Uses

Video Tutorial: How to Download and Use Picasa

6 Best Free Photo Organizers

Picasa

SunlitGreen Photo Manager

JetPhoto Studio

Zoner PhotoStudio

Magix Photo manager

Windows Live Photo Gallery

Picasa - Manage and Edit Photos

Use VLC Media Player To Set Video as Desktop Background

How To Use VLC To Set Video as Desktop Background :

Window Repair (All In One)

Operating System: All windows (32b & 64b).Free/paid: FreeDownload: Latest version

Password Protect Your Notes with Secret Notes

Safe, Secure, and Small Installation Package

Password Protect Secret Notes Does One Thing-And Does It Well

5 free good notes softwares

1. Stickies

2. MemoThis

3. Crawler Notes

4. Efficient Sticky Notes

5. Evernote

Video tutorial - How to use QuickFox Notes

QuickFox Notes - A good Free Firefox Plugin to take Notes

Stickies: Free Electronic Post-It Notes for your Computer

Here are some of the other cool features of Stickies:

View World Time Zones with Every Time Zone

Key Features Of Every Time Zone:

Instant Time Zone: Free World Time Zone Clock

How to Download this free World Time Zone Clock:

PhotoPixar - Create Video Slideshow From Photos

Key Features Of This Utility Software That Creates Video Slideshow From Photos :

How To Create Video Slideshow From Photos:

Care4Teen - Internet Censor Program for Parents

Fast Download, Easy Installation of this internet censor program

Multiple Program Options available with this internet censor program

Server-Side Database Incomplete

5 Best Free Parental Control Softwares

1) OnlineFamily.Norton

2. Windows Live Family Safety

3. KidZui

4. K9 Web Protection

5. Parental Control Bar

SUMo - Keep your PC programs up-to-date

Keep our PC up to date and alway fast

Video tutorial how to use OnlineFamily.Norton

Kidzui: Free Browser to Manage Online Activities of your Kids

Safe Search for Kids

Safe Browsing for Kids

Social Networking

Launch of Google’s Emergency Public Alert Service

PasteCopy - A Free Powerful Clipboard manager

Key Features

CinemaDrape - Hide Everything Outside the Main Application

Easy to start

Easy to close

Download Here

Personal Encryption Tool Free: ToolWiz BSafe

Lets look at some features of this personal encryption tool:

How to use this personal encryption tool:

Download Here

3D Text Maker: Create Free Online 3D Text Banners

Some Key Features Of 3D Text Maker App:

Operating System: All windows (32b & 64b).
Free/paid: Free
Download: Latest version