Microsoft even understood this, and included a copy of their BASIC programming language interpreter on Windows versions up to 98. But, you can still start for free and it’s easier than you think!

1. Pick a language.

While we won’t start an argument over the best language, some ok suggestions are:

• Shell – on Windows this is Windows PowerShell. On Mac and Linux, this is Bash (the born-again shell). Programs in shell languages are known as ‘shell scripts.’
• Python – open source and free for every platform. It’s easy, fun, and used in some of the highest-level applications, like Blender 3D and bitTorrent clients.
• Javascript. It runs in your web browser. It’s everywhere on the web.
• Basic – still found in places like Microsoft Word, Excel, Powerpoint, Frontpage, and Visio. It’s easy to learn; that’s why they named it “Basic.”

2. Gather some documentation. One of the most famous is the “Dummies” series which I’m sure some of you have seen before. There is a “For Dummies” book for probably every programming language out there. Search Google for name-of-language plus ‘tutorial’. A common name for your first program in any language is “Hello World!” which prints output to the screen. Search for that to find beginner’s level programs.

3. Be a quiet, self-starting learner. If you go into a programmer’s chat room hangout and interrupt their discussion of high-level computer science stuff to ask something like “How do I print?” the only answer they’ll give you is what you were told in step #2. Beginner’s level manuals are very easy to follow. Have some confidence in yourself!

4. Take your time. The best pace for the beginner is a few pages of the book per day. Don’t jump around in the book – it’s written with the easiest concepts presented first, with later concepts building on previous ones. One step at a time.

5. Take a read through a forum or message board devoted to your language. Simply typing the name of your language plus ‘forum’ into Google should produce tons of links. Look though some of the questions people ask and the answers given – almost every question a beginner can have has been answered dozens of times.

6. Don’t give up! It’s like learning a real language, except this is a computing language. It’s OK to put it aside if you get too busy, but try to pick it up again later. The more you keep your hand in, the better you’ll memorize it.

7. Have fun and don’t get too serious. Remember that this is a hobby, so it’s supposed to be fun. Any silly little thing you want to do, go ahead and do it. Much of what you’ll start out doing will be command-line things like inputting data to get output. Don’t let that stop you from making your own tic-tac-toe game or just a program that prints random characters on the screen really fast like a screensaver. Everybody needs to start somewhere.

8. Now you can join forums and chats and ask questions. And be sure to answer as many as you ask! By the time you’re out of the intermediate levels, you’re likely to become a valuable member of the programming community. There are plenty of websites out there devoted to hobbyist programmers – you don’t have to be the next Bill Gates or Linus Torvalds to enjoy programming as a hobby.

Motivation & Functionality of the tool

Universal Translator, Google’s impracticable technology is aimed at converting spoken words into a different language. At present one can convert text in 52 languages using “Google Translate”. However, Universal Translator is a speech-to-speech automated translator that will translate speech in real-time. Universal Translator will be embedded in the Android phones.

The idea inspiring the development of this pioneering tool is to enable Android users to easily communicate with people speaking in other languages with their smartphones.

The working of Universal Translator is straightforward. The tool will “listen” to the speaker (sender) at one-end and wait for them to complete until it comprehends the full meaning of the words (or phrases). It will then send this interpreted data to Google’s servers for translation. The person on the other end (receiver) will be able to listen to a computerized voice translation of the phrases spoken by the speaker. The communication will proceed similarly, both ways.

Overview of the technology:

Universal Translator is essentially a combination of two existing technologies by Google.

1. Google Translate: Online universal translator service.
2. Voice recognition system: Technology to recognize human voice. This technology is embedded in the Nexus One phone by Google and is used to bring about users spoken commands.

As Universal Translator combines voice recognition with Google Translate, it is very important for voice reorganization to be on the ball. However voice recognition is still not very capable in current smartphones, causing users to repeat commands often. Combining these technologies will present problems for the engineers working on this project.

Another prime challenge the team of programmers will face is the problems associated to various accents used for the same language. We know that languages are spoken with different dialects across different locations. Recognizing and translating these accents in real-time will be challenging, and it’s one of the main kinks that need to be ironed out; but I think we all look forward to when such technology becomes reality. And I’m sure this one is going to get used a lot.

Search Commands is an Office 2007 add-in that enables you to quickly search for those commands. Let’s see how to add and use this feature in Office 2007.

One way to install Search Commands add-on is to join the Office Labs Analytics program when you install Office 2007. When you do this a new command called “Search Commands” is added to the Ribbon.

You can also choose to install the add-on later. For this, you first need to download Search Commands Add-on from OfficeLabs website and then install it on your computer.

After the installation is complete, you will see that a new tab with the name “Search Commands” added to your Office 2007 applications.

Now that the Search Command is added to the Office 2007 Ribbon, let’s see a few examples to work with it.

Example 1: Want to add lists in your Word 2007 document.

Type “list” in the “Search” box and all commands related to it will be displayed on the search bar.

Browse through and select the command you are looking for.

Example 2: Can Word 2007 really save documents as PDF file.

Yes, it can. Just type “save as pdf” in the Search box, and the command that will enable you to do it will be displayed for you.

Example 3: List the commands related to creating a master slide in PowerPoint 2007.

Type “master” and have all commands related to working with master slides displayed on the Ribbon.

Example 4: Don’t know how to go about working with slides in PowerPoint 2007.

Just type “slide” in the Search box on the Search Command tab and gain easy access to all 60 commands related to slides.

Example 5: Easily access commands related to using Formulas in Excel worksheets.

You can see that more 350 commands have been detected. You can use the “Previous and Next” buttons on the Search bar to scroll through all these commands and access the command that you want to use.

Search Commands is a nice Office 2007 add-on that significantly simplifies the task of using Office 2007 Ribbon. With this add-on in place, you don’t have to waste your time looking for commands anymore.

The Windows Calendar window will be displayed.

You can easily use this calendar to manage your appointments and other day-to-day activities. However, if you prefer to stick to your Google Calendar, you can easily integrate it to the Windows Calendar and access it right from your desktop.

Here’s how to do this.

• First open your Google Calendar and click the “Settings” link given at the top of the web page.

• On the Calendar Settings page, click the “Calendar” tab

• Select your calendar and then on the Calendar Details page that is displayed, scroll down to the “Private Address” section.

• Here, right-click on the “ICAL” link, and the select the “Copy Shortcut” option. This will copy the link to your clipboard.
• Next, go back to your Windows Calendar and click the “Subscribe” button located on the toolbar.

• Paste the URL you copied in the “Calendar to subscribe to:” box and click “Next”.

• Windows Calendar will take some time to subscribe to your Google calendar and after some time, the Calendar subscription settings dialog box will be displayed.
• Here, enter a friendly name for your Google Calendar and choose the interval at which you want the calendar to update. Also, choose whether or not you want to include reminders and tasks.
• After you are done, hit the “Finish” button.

That’s all there is to it. Once your Google Calendar is synced with your Windows Calendar, you will be able to view your Google entries in the Windows Calendar. In the screenshot given below, entries in blue are from the Google Calendar.

The Google entries displayed here are read-only and you cannot make any changes to them. If you don’t to wait for the calendar to update on its own, on the Share menu in Windows Calendar, click the “Sync All” command.

Doteasy is a semi free web host that has been in business since 2000, and I think that’s because of their business model, of which domain name registration seems to be a main part. Register any com/org/net domain with them for $7.95 and you get a whole year’s worth of free web hosting on their servers. I’ve heard of Doteasy all this while, and it’s true they’ve been running as a free web host for a decade. Well, semi free that is.

While this means that the specifications won’t be that large for the free option; it still sounds ok, with 1 GB bandwidth and 100 MB storage space. You can have 10 email accounts and host 10 add-on domain names too. Here is the coupon code: 1003BPM.

Of course, there are also the paid plans.

The paid plans come in two types, the Ultra plan, and the Unlimited plan. Price-wise, there is so little difference between them that I figure most people would prefer the Unlimited plan at $9.95 a month. The paid plans all come with PHP and MySQL support, while you also get a unique IP of your own.

Here’s the caveat though, the free plans don’t support MYSQL and PHP, which means if you want to run WordPress hosting, you need the paid plans. However, both the free and paid web hosting plans come with standard free web tools which include online photo gallery, webform application, website creator, blog application, and forum application. Also, all the plans come with Cpanel powered backend administration.

Google Buzz is another social media application released on February this year. The application built in the Gmail window allows users to follow their favorite contacts and share links, videos, photos etc. in a hassle free way, collaborate with friends, and keep updated. Being integrated with Gmail, the friends list is automatically created and you do not have to make one from scratch. However at the same time, Buzz is not intrusive for Gmail users. In this post, we will pinpoint some exciting features of Google Buzz.

Buzz can be visualized as an amalgam of social networks like Facebook, Twitter and Friend Feed. There is also Google Buzz for Mobile, on mobile devices like Android and Iphone.

Getting started with Buzz on your mobile phone is easy:

• Log onto http://www.google.com/mobile/buzz/
• Send Buzz to your phone from the Send to Phone button
• Once you successfully open the page, you are able to view Buzz (updates) from your friends, essentially the same way as on your computer.
• In order to enter your status, you must post a Buzz. You can also tag your location via Google Maps. You can also post comments on the status of your friends.

Google Buzz for mobile has some distinguished features that make sharing via mobile a convenient experience. Here are the core features, elaborated briefly.

• Tagging Locations:
  Google Buzz, like Google Latitude is a location-Aware social Network. Many features of Latitude are enhanced in Buzz. When posting a Buzz from your phone you can also tag your location. To tag location from your phone, select your suggestions or search your locations. The location you select will be displayed on your Buzz which makes sharing more interactive. This location-implementation is based on an AGPS system.
• Integration of Buzz with Google Maps:
  The ‘Buzz Layer’ on Google Maps for mobile enables you to find out the happenings in the vicinity of your current location. The numbers of Buzz messages coming from a location indicate how eventful it is.  With Buzz Layer in Google Maps you can mark these action-packed places that can possibly be a newly opened restaurant, any social meeting or art exhibition. Similarly, you can view the affairs of any location you are interested in.
• Views in Buzz:
  There are 2 major views for your Buzz messages – Following View: The Following View will show Buzz messages from the people you follow. It is similar to Google Buzz in your Gmail. Nearby View: The Nearby View will display public Buzz updates tagged in your near-by location. You can also select location for which you need to span the associated Buzz messages.
• Using Buzz with Google Phone Voice Shortcut:
  As all the text fields in the Google phone are voice enabled and capable of transcribing voice into text, posting buzz is more unproblematic with Google Phone. You can effortlessly touch “Post buzz” and speak the content you want to publish about yourself.
• Simple shortcut to post Buzz:
  To post your buzz message conveniently, the shortcut for the posting box is placed on the navigation bar.

Comparisons between Facebook, and Google Buzz are obvious. While many assume that Google is too late to venture in this field due to Facebook’s dominance, Google doesn’t seem to think so, and it could turn out that Buzz and Facebook can co-exist.

As Buzz comes with Gmail it becomes convenient to stay informed with emails. However, this can be bothersome in some cases, like for people who use Gmail for professional emails.

Another consequence is through Buzz you might find yourself following people or cooperates you have mailed years ago. People have complained that Buzz tends to expose their contact list. This incorporation of Gmail and Buzz is stirring confusion among some Gmail users.

There have been other complaints concerning security issues, due to which Buzz has been revised for at least three times. However despite trivial complaints Google Buzz for Mobile continues to gain Android and Iphone users as fans, being a location-based social-interacting communication pad. I recommend to try-out Buzz for an interesting experience!