The Tech Daily

China Removes 'Green Dam'

noreply@blogger.com (techy) — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 11:45:00 +0000

In a very unexpected move, the Chinese authorities have indefinitely postponed their order that all PCs sold in the country must come with software, called Green Dam Youth Escort, that blocks certain websites.

According to Reuters, Chinese artist and activist Ai Weiwei, who had previously organized a protest against the Green Dam initiative, has also called on the people of China to celebrate its demise. About 200 Beijing residents, dressed in t-shirts mocking Green Dam, have arrived at a trendy art zone cafe to party all day in celebration of this victory in a war against censorship.

The Chinese authorities were under a great deal of pressure from various trade groups, American, European and Japanese chambers of commerce, and the U.S. National Association of Manufacturers, which sent a letter of protest against the measure, claiming it “raises significant questions of security, privacy, system reliability, the free flow of information and user choice.”

The combination of a huge public outcry against Green Dam and the reluctance of PC sellers to comply probably wouldn’t have been enough to convince the Chinese government to give up on Green Dam, but the fact that this measure was obviously undertaken in haste, with Green Dam itself having some serious issues (it doesn’t, for example, support 64-bit operating systems), was probably the straw that broke the camel’s back. In a word, Green Dam was not only unpopular; it was nearly impossible to implement.

Unfortunately, however important, this victory is a minor one. The Green Dam initiative was only postponed by the The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology; it could be reinstated at a later date. Even more importantly, Chinese Internet users are still behind the iron veil of the Great Firewall of China, which blocks them from visiting certain websites, with the blockade often spreading to the most popular internet destinations. I hope that the Chinese authorities have really softened up when it comes to censorship, but I fear that this might only be a minor drawback in their quest for total control of the Chinese Internet.

Search Options now in Google Images

noreply@blogger.com (techy) — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 11:40:00 +0000

A few months ago when we announced the Search Options panel, we promised that you would soon see similar functionality across our other search properties. Today we are rolling out Search Options for Google Images.

This new feature offers quick access to existing tools, including search by color and image type. Color search will find images that are only in color or only in black and white, or even images that contain a specific color, such as red, pink, or green. Type search is a great way to narrow down your results if you are looking for a specific kind of image, such as a photo, clip art, line drawing or face.

We've also revamped our size search. In addition to choosing from commonly searched-for sizes, now you can search for an exact image size or any image larger than a certain size. You can find images of practically any size, including 70 megapixels or more.

The new layout makes it faster and easier to combine and toggle between options. It also makes it easier for us to add additional image search options in the future, so keep your eyes peeled. Just click "Show options..." in the blue bar on the search results page to try out any of these tools.

Source:Google Blog

Lock your Pen drive

noreply@blogger.com (techy) — Sat, 18 Jul 2009 06:13:00 +0000

Data protection is a function of both deletion and encryption:
Deleting data does not necessarily remove the information from your drive. Usually, when deleting files only the pointer to the file in the file allocation table is deleted, leaving the files actual data untouched. This enables hackers to undelete files using special utilities.

In order to encrypt your data, it has to be read, encrypted and then replaced by the new encrypted data. This means that your original file is deleted and replaced by an encrypted version of the same file. Therefore the deleted original can be retrieved as explained above. Encryption alone is not completely safe.

In order to protect your data, it must be encrypted, in addition to physically wiping any trace of your original un-encrypted files. This is exactly what Lockngo Professional does.

Features:
Military Grade 256bit AES Encryption (FIPS 140-2 Certified)
Lockngo encrypts your files in extra strong ecryption making sure your data can't be compromised.

No software installation required
Lockngo runs directly from your removable media - does not require installation on any PC.

Fast encryption
Ultra-fast encryption optimization to reduce lock/unlock time.

Hides your files
Data is not only encrypted, but also hidden so it is completely impossible to retrieve.

Rich file-system support
Lockngo Professional now supports NTFS (New), FAT32 and FAT file systems.

New! Instant Lock
Lockngo Professional now provides a new, even quicker workflow, enabling you to lock the drive in one simple click.

Command Line control, advaced administration
Lockngo Professional offers control and configuration of its features right from the command line, enabling access to functionality and settings not available to the common user. The command line enables system administrators to permanently modify the software's settings and make the lock operation faster (removing the need to enter password each time). Command line access also assists system administrators seeking to manage multiple portable drives in their organization.

Remembers your password
Lockngo Professional remembers your password which makes your next use even easier.

Download Lockngo

Mobile Manufacturers agree on standard phone charger

noreply@blogger.com (techy) — Sat, 11 Jul 2009 06:23:00 +0000

Some of the world's biggest mobile phone manufacturers have agreed to adopt a new universal standard of phone charger in an effort to be more environmentally friendly.

Until now, most mobile phones have used proprietary chargers that will only work on one kind of device, leading to cupboards full of unwanted chargers in homes across the country.

But now, according to a report in The Telegraph, ten companies, including Apple, LG, Nokia, Samsung and Sony Ericsson, have submitted a Memorandum of Understanding to the European Commission pledging to start making phones that can be charged using a single charger.

The manufacturers will adopt the Micro USB connector across all their devices from next year, meaning that dozens of different handsets can be charged using a single plug.

The European Commission has been putting pressure on mobile phone makers to reach an agreement on a universal charging standard in an effort to cut down on the thousands of tons of waste generated each year by the inclusion of unwanted chargers with every new handset.

The GSMA, the trade organisation that represents the mobile phone industry, said that the new universal chargers will consume half as much energy when on standby as today's charging cables.

Technology experts have welcomed the announcement.

Source: Yahoo News

Microsoft releases Silverlight 3

noreply@blogger.com (techy) — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 10:39:00 +0000

Microsoft has released the latest version of its Silverlight player.

The release of Silverlight 3 arrived late Thursday night. The company’s presentation technology for graphics and video on the web was supposed to be released to the public on Friday morning, July 10 — there’s even a lavish launch event scheduled at a San Francisco hotel — but Microsoft decided to push Silverlight out a day early.

Silverlight 3 is a small, free plug-in download from Microsoft. It’s cross-browser and cross-platform, so it runs on Windows, Mac (the newest versions are Intel only) and Linux computers. The open-source Linux version is called Moonlight, and it ships with Novell distributions. If you’re running Ubuntu or some other non-Novell distribution, you can download it and install it manually.

Silverlight is Microsoft’s plug-in based player for streaming video and audio content, handling rich internet apps and displaying animated user interfaces in the browser — Redmond’s answer to Adobe Flash and open-source technologies like those promised by HTML 5. When Silverlight first arrived in 2007, it didn’t run too well on non-Windows desktops. Worse, with very little content available on the web for Silverlight to play, there wasn’t much of a reason to bother with it.

But quite a bit has changed in two years. Most notably, the compelling content finally arrived. Microsoft streamed live video and highlight clips on NBC’s official Beijing Olympics website in the summer of 2008 using Silverlight. The company released version 2 in September of 2008, an upgrade which improved Silverlight’s performance on Macs and improved the video playback quality overall. Silverlight was used again to stream coverage of the 2008 Democratic National Convention and all of the NCAA March Madness basketball tournament games in 2009, serving to raise Silverlight’s profile — and it’s install base — even more.

By now, Silverlight is installed on around 30% of web-connected PCs and devices like Windows Mobile smartphones. It’s a far cry from Adobe Flash’s install base (which is over 90%) but it’s a significant gain in a short period of time nonetheless. Also, Microsoft claims there are over 300,000 developers actively building web sites, apps and animated user interfaces in Silverlight right now.

Silverlight’s video capabilities have always been impressive when compared to Flash, and the new version boasts some new features that should keep the competition with Flash hot. It uses a media broadcasting technology Microsoft calls Smooth Streaming, an adaptive technology for playing the same H.264 video stream at the highest bitrate the device and its bandwidth limitations will allow. So if you’ve got a fast computer with an HD monitor and a wide open pipe, you’ll see super high quality video at up to full 1080p HD. If you’ve got a dinky smartphone with mid-level data service, you’ll see a constrained version of the same video.

The new version of Silverlight also has better 3-D graphics support and the ability to offload graphics work to a GPU for a smoother, hardware-accelerated user experience.

On the rich internet apps front, Silverlight 3 includes the ability for developers to create apps that run outside of the browser on a PC desktop, or on a mobile phone — yet another place where Silverlight 3 is catching up to competing technologies like AIR, Adobe’s Flash-based runtime for running webapps outside of the browser.

Also due to be released Friday (but not showing up yet, as of this writing late Thursday night) is Expression Studio 3, Microsoft’s set of tools for building Silverlight apps, standards-based websites and vector graphics for the web. The current version, Expression Studio 2, costs $700, or $350 for an upgrade from previous versions.

As mentioned previously, the Silverlight browser plug-in is free.
Silverlight Update Aims for Greater Adoption Through Developers
Mozilla Brings Webapps to the Desktop, Challenges AIR, Silverlight
Microsoft Launches Silverlight With Full Linux Support

Source: Webmonkey

NVIDIA unveils Tegra

noreply@blogger.com (techy) — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 10:39:00 +0000

Amidst the hype about Intel's processor platform for MIDs called Moorestown, NVIDIA has unveiled an answer of its own, its Tegra Processor.

They unveiled 12 high definition capable MIDs powered by the Tegra chip which are capable of delivering a desktop like browsing experience complete with Flash. As can be expected of any NVIDIA product, it has powerful graphics support with animation acceleration, flash video support, and the capability to play back video at full 1080p.

Since it is targeted for portable devices, it is also optimized greatly for lower power usage and may give as much as 5 times the battery life that we can see in the netbooks of today. It is capable of 25 days of playing music on a single charge, and 10hrs of full HD 1080p video playback.

According to Michael Rayfield, general manager of mobile business at NVIDIA, “These new Tegra-based products combine excellent Internet and media capabilities, always-on operation, and wireless connectivity for the un-tethered Internet experience consumers have been craving.”

In order to have a desktop-like browsing experience, support for Adobe Flash is necessary. For this NVIDIA tied up with Adobe to optimize the Flash Player for Tegra, by enabling it to utilize the powerful GPU of Tegra based devices to make the online Flash video and animation experience as smooth as possible. The Tegra architecture utilizes multiple processors working in unison for giving the composite experience. A separate processor is used to processing HTML, and HD video.

With the capability to support 3G, WiFi and WiMAX it also welcome by wireless carriers. As stated by Antonio Domit, Executive Technology Advisor to America Movil, Grupo Carso, and Inbursa, “Devices based on NVIDIA Tegra will allow us to offer a mobile Internet device that delivers an amazing level of functionality at minimal cost or even free through subsidies, The combination of a Tegra-based MID and our high-speed national coverage will allow millions of people to access the Internet and have an unprecedented experience. I can imagine the story is the same for every country around the world.”

Tegra devices are expected to start coming out in the second half of this year.

Source: Digit

Google planning to introduce a Operating System

noreply@blogger.com (techy) — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 10:11:00 +0000

It's been an exciting nine months since we launched the Google Chrome browser. Already, over 30 million people use it regularly. We designed Google Chrome for people who live on the web — searching for information, checking email, catching up on the news, shopping or just staying in touch with friends. However, the operating systems that browsers run on were designed in an era where there was no web. So today, we're announcing a new project that's a natural extension of Google Chrome — the Google Chrome Operating System. It's our attempt to re-think what operating systems should be.

Google Chrome OS is an open source, lightweight operating system that will initially be targeted at netbooks. Later this year we will open-source its code, and netbooks running Google Chrome OS will be available for consumers in the second half of 2010. Because we're already talking to partners about the project, and we'll soon be working with the open source community, we wanted to share our vision now so everyone understands what we are trying to achieve.

Speed, simplicity and security are the key aspects of Google Chrome OS. We're designing the OS to be fast and lightweight, to start up and get you onto the web in a few seconds. The user interface is minimal to stay out of your way, and most of the user experience takes place on the web. And as we did for the Google Chrome browser, we are going back to the basics and completely redesigning the underlying security architecture of the OS so that users don't have to deal with viruses, malware and security updates. It should just work.

Google Chrome OS will run on both x86 as well as ARM chips and we are working with multiple OEMs to bring a number of netbooks to market next year. The software architecture is simple — Google Chrome running within a new windowing system on top of a Linux kernel. For application developers, the web is the platform. All web-based applications will automatically work and new applications can be written using your favorite web technologies. And of course, these apps will run not only on Google Chrome OS, but on any standards-based browser on Windows, Mac and Linux thereby giving developers the largest user base of any platform.

Google Chrome OS is a new project, separate from Android. Android was designed from the beginning to work across a variety of devices from phones to set-top boxes to netbooks. Google Chrome OS is being created for people who spend most of their time on the web, and is being designed to power computers ranging from small netbooks to full-size desktop systems. While there are areas where Google Chrome OS and Android overlap, we believe choice will drive innovation for the benefit of everyone, including Google.

We hear a lot from our users and their message is clear — computers need to get better. People want to get to their email instantly, without wasting time waiting for their computers to boot and browsers to start up. They want their computers to always run as fast as when they first bought them. They want their data to be accessible to them wherever they are and not have to worry about losing their computer or forgetting to back up files. Even more importantly, they don't want to spend hours configuring their computers to work with every new piece of hardware, or have to worry about constant software updates. And any time our users have a better computing experience, Google benefits as well by having happier users who are more likely to spend time on the Internet.

We have a lot of work to do, and we're definitely going to need a lot of help from the open source community to accomplish this vision. We're excited for what's to come and we hope you are too. Stay tuned for more updates in the fall and have a great summer.

Source: Google Blog

Kaspersky Lab and BitDefender websites hit by hackers

noreply@blogger.com (techy) — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 15:58:00 +0000

The websites of two major providers of security products have been hit by hackers.

The website of Russian IT security provider Kaspersky Lab was hit at the weekend by a Romanian ‘white-hat’ hacker.

A group calling itself ‘the Romanian Security Team’ claimed that the hackers achieved full access to the database supporting the websites – which includes customer data – by simply altering a parameter in the URLs. They could also perform SQL injections to remotely introduce harmful code into the database.

The group also claimed to have hit the Portuguese site of US anti-virus provider BitDefender, with the personal details of thousands of users viewed. The hackers said that they alerted the two companies of the security flaw and did not expose any of the data they found.

Kaspersky Lab said in a statement: “On Saturday February 7 2009, a vulnerability was detected on a subsection of the usa.kaspersky.com domain when a hacker attempted an attack on the site.

“The site was only vulnerable for a very brief period, and upon detection of the vulnerability we immediately took action to roll back the subsection of the site and the vulnerability was eliminated within 30 minutes of detection. The vulnerability wasn’t critical and no data was compromised from the site.”

Gunter Ollmann, chief security strategist at IBM’s Internet Security Systems, said: “I hope that Kaspersky administrators fix this vulnerability rather quickly as they no doubt have a large customer base, and it would appear that all those customers are now exposed

“On top of that, this type of critical flaw can probably be used to usurp legitimate purchases and renewals of their products - which could include the linking to malicious and backdoored versions of their software - thereby infecting those very same customers that were seeking protection from malware in the first place.”

How to Rip a DVD to an AVI or MPEG File

noreply@blogger.com (techy) — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 15:13:00 +0000

1. Download DVDx archive file to your computer (DVDx_2_10_setup.zip), open it and double-click on "DVDx Setup". Complete the installation of DVDx.

Ensure you have XviD (and/or DivX) drivers by installing AutoGK or downloading codecs separately.
Download the latest Avi Rip free from Avi Rip
Download the latest DivX free from divx.com

2. Now run the DVDx software. The program window will appear.

You should insert the DVD you wish to rip into the DVD drive. Alternatively, if your DVD is saved as files on your computer, you can rip from there.

On the DVDx window, there are three menus available, File, Settings, and Tools.
A file window opens, and you can browse to your DVD.
Alternatively, to open DVD files which have been previously saved to your hard drive, click "Open IFO" to select your hard disk files as source.
In the folder selection box, select the file VTS_01_0.IFO in the DVD target directory on the hard drive.

Your movie is now loaded as source.

The Input Settings dialog automatically opens.

3. If you have more than 1 movie on the DVD, select the file that shows up in the popup box and then choose which movie you wish to encode by selecting it from the pull down menu in the upper left corner. You will have to choose the root menu and file for each one on the DVD, if there is more than 1 movie on the DVD.

4. Notice that the Input Settings dialog will show, in the Program Chain Index section at top left, the length of the movie to be processed. Check a suitable audio track is shown in the Audio section.

Other settings can be left at default.
Note: If during conversion you get an error "DVD drive could not be locked", you should install ASPI drivers, and then select the "Use ASPI" option. Otherwise this will not be necessary.
Now click OK.

5. Navigate to the Output Settings dialog box (shown below) through the Settings menu. Here you can choose output options such as movie format (AVI or MPG), and set the screen size (resolution) and audio quality.

6. Change several settings in the Output Settings dialog box:

Choose an output format (AVI is suitable for playback in Media Player).
Now choose an audio compression method. Lame MP3 is capable of excellent sound at small filesize (AVI only). If Lame is not available, choose the MPEG video compression, or download Lame MP3 drivers .
Choose the XviD video codec in the dropdown menu. Click 'Enable Video', but leave 'Enable 2nd' unchecked. You can choose an alternative video codec (such as DivX or Mpeg4) if you prefer.
Across in section Export Settings, choose a screen size (resolution) for encoding.
- For widescreen monitors (size ratio 16:9) choose 720x576. Any multiple of 16 is acceptable.
- For normal monitors choose (size ratio 4:3) choose 720x544. Any multiple of 16 is acceptable.
Next to the Max Frame number, click the button named Whole. Make sure you press this button for each new DVD movie or DVD file that you choose.
Other settings can be left at default.

7. To rip full movies without splitting the last few minutes into another file, Set the maximum file size to infinite in the Output Settings and rip away.

Click the Apply button.

8. Finally, under the File menu, click the menu item called Destination.This button is also found next to the red Record button at the bottom right.

Browse to a suitable destination folder, and type a filename into the box. Click on Save, then OK.
You are now ready to convert a DVD to an AVI.

9. Click the red Record button at bottom right.
10. Wait for encoding to complete and then enjoy your movie.

Source:WikiHow

Find out if your email has been read

noreply@blogger.com (techy) — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 15:10:00 +0000

Now you can find out when your email has been read by the recipient! No more guessing: "Has he or she read my email yet?"

SpyPig is a simple email tracking system that sends you a notification email as soon as the recipient opens and reads your message.

It works with virtually all modern email programs: Outlook, Eudora, Yahoo Email, Gmail, Hotmail, AOL Email and many others.
Best of all, SpyPig is FREE! No spam, no virus, no adware, no spyware. You can use it as often as you like, and there's no catch. Just introduce the Pig to all your friends! The system is very easy to use. In just few minutes, you'll be able to use it like a real spy!

Use It with Classified Ads
SpyPig is especially useful when you respond to a classified ad such as that on Craigslist (for an employment, for example) and wonder if your email reaches its target.

Basic Requirement
Both you and the recipient must use an HTML email, not plain-text or rich-text email. Visit the Requirements & Limitations page to learn more about SpyPig.

For more details, visit SpyPig

USB Vaccine

noreply@blogger.com (techy) — Sat, 04 Jul 2009 06:10:00 +0000

Panda has released Panda USB Vaccine with NTFS Support. It is out of it's beta stage and a full version has been released (v.1.0.0.50).

Some of the most notable improvements are the following:

Support for vaccinating NTFS drives. This uses a completely different technique than the vaccination of FAT/FAT32 drives.

Executing USBVaccine.exe launches an installer which allows you to configure whether you want USBVaccine to start automatically with Windows.

Configuration option during setup to hide the tray icon.

Configuration option during setup to automatically vaccinate any new USB drives inserted into the PC.

Fixed bug on PC shutdown when USBVaccine was running in the background (Vista).

Other bug fixes reported by users on certain types of USB drives.

The download is available on CNET here.

Pirate Bay acquired for $7.7 Million

noreply@blogger.com (techy) — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 14:31:00 +0000

The Pirate Bay team which recently went to court and loss for copyright violations, has launched a brand-new site called VideoBay. Video Bay provides streaming content of TV shows, music videos and more.

The new video streaming site is definitely still in beta, perhaps even alpha, because the site comes with a warning that states, "Don't expect anything to work at all". The on-going development of the site will take up to several years according to Peter Sunde of Pirate Bay.

In other news, a Swedish based technology company that goes by Global Gaming Factory X said that it had reached an agreement with The Pirate Bay to acquire it for $7.7 million. After the acquisitions the new owners would bring a legitimate business model to the Pirate Bay.

How the new owners plan on turning something such as the Pirate Bay into a legitimate business is beyond me. Doing so, would probably make them loose many users - and recouping their costs nearly impossible. However, with them investing that kind of money in something they most definitely have a business plan on how to accomplish it all. It will just be interesting to see how it plays out.

"We would like to introduce models which entail that content providers and copyright owners get paid for content that is downloaded via the site" said Hans Pandeya, CEO of GGF.

Okay, so they apparently want to do paid content but what would the content be? If it's not "open for anything" like the way it is now days, it's going to be hard to retain users IMO. Most of the users will go elsewhere anyway and you gotta think that GGF knows this as well. When users go to a site expecting something free, it's going to be hard to make them start paying when they can go down the road to the next house and get it free there.

"The Pirate Bay is a site that is among the top 100 most visited Internet sites in the world. However, in order to live on, The Pirate Bay requires a new business model, which satisfies the requirements and needs of all parties, content providers, broadband operators, end users, and the judiciary. Content creators and providers need to control their content and get paid for it. File sharers' need faster downloads and better quality" continues Hans Pandeya.

I hope it plays out well for the new owners. If they could somehow purse enough owners of content to continue allowing their material on the Pirate Bay, it might just work. I think that is definitely an uphill battle though.

Soure:Tech Fragments

Fastest Browser yet

noreply@blogger.com (techy) — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 14:10:00 +0000

The folks at Mozilla have deemed the changes in this incarnation of the popular Firefox browser significant enough to skip the planned version 3.1 and instead bump up the release number to 3.5. And I agree—it's a big improvement. By its appearance, you'd be hard pressed to tell how Firefox 3.5 differs from 3.0, but it's what's inside that counts. The new version speeds up JavaScript performance and catches up with other recent browsers like Internet Explorer 8, Opera 10, and Safari 4 by adding a private browsing mode. And 3.5 builds on everything you everything that made the previous versions of Firefox great, like the myriad extensions and themes and the "awesome" address bar for quickly getting where you're going on the Web. The result? An impressive piece of software gets even better.

I like Firefox 3.5's new New Tab button, which takes a page from Internet Explorer and Opera's playbook with a plus sign that makes it more obvious how to add a new tab. You can also now grab a tab and drag it into a new window on the desktop—or drag a window back into the open browser. The page appears as a large thumbnail while you do this. Safari, Chrome 2, and Opera all can do this, but IE8 still can't. Firefox is the last holdout to offer only a blank white page on new tabs: All other modern browsers display history, recently closed tabs, and favorites. Finally, in an appealing new touch, when you open a new tab in Firefox 3.5, the existing ones slide to the left.

Firefox already had an "Open recently closed tabs" choice, but 3.5 can reopen recently closed windows, too, so even if you've closed a whole browser window you haven't lost its tabs.
Buzz up!on Yahoo!

Unlike most of the competition, Firefox displays no indication when you're in the new private browsing mode—IE shows an InPrivate graphic in the address bar, and Chrome displays a private eye icon. When you start Firefox's private browsing mode, your existing tabs disappear, but they return when you turn off the mode. I had to reconnect to Outlook Web Access after a private session, though I'd been logged in before. Nothing from my private session appeared in history or in the awesome bar, which is how it should be.

You can also have the browser forget any site in your history. A new twist in clearing private data is that it's no longer an all-or-nothing proposition: Firefox 3.5's Clear Recent History lets you tell the browser just to clear history, cache, cookies, logins, and so on for the past hour, two hours, four hours, or whole day, or for your entire history. This is more control than the old Clear Private Data offered.

One nitpick of mine is that the sidebar isn't as accessible as the ones in Internet Explorer and Opera, which offer button access. This handy panel can show history or bookmarks, but you can only get to it if you know the keyboard combination, by customizing your toolbars, or by choosing it from the View menu. In Opera, the sidebar performs a multitude of functions as well, such as downloads, notes, and widgets.

Source: PC Mag

Download Firefox 3.5 RC

An easy way to find out when your last reboot was

noreply@blogger.com (techy) — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 10:12:00 +0000

Have you wondered when your system had a reboot, and you are using Windows NT, 2000, XP, Vista or 7, there are a couple of ways to obtain this information.

Method 1: Windows NT/2000 and XP

Open command prompt

Go to Start ---> Run--->

Now type cmd.

When the command prompt has loaded, type “net stats srv” (or “net statistics server”).

Method 2: Windows XP and beyond

In command prompt, type “system info” which will also provide you with your PC’s uptime.

Method 3: Windows Vista and beyond

For those using Vista or Windows 7, right click the taskbar and choose “Task Manager” or “Start Task Manager”. Click “Performance” tab and on the bottom right of the window you can see your system uptime.

Zemanta to make your blog better

noreply@blogger.com (techy) — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 11:04:00 +0000

Zemanta is a browser plug-in for Firefox and IE, and is available as a bookmarklet for Chrome and Safari. (More details here, you can download your version of Zemanta here.)

Here's how it works: while you write your blog post in Blogger, Zemanta opens up a sidebar next to the Blogger post editor. After you've written a few sentences, Zemanta analyzes the words in your post and suggests images and video that are relevant to your post; with one click, it inserts them into your post. (The Zemanta screenshot from Flickr in this post was inserted with just that one click.)

In addition, Zemanta looks for words/phrases it's familiar with, and makes it easy to link those words to URLs it knows about. The phrases appear immediately below the post editor in Blogger, and by clicking on them you automatically create the links Zemanta recommends. No more highlighting text, clicking "Link", pasting the URL - just click the words you want linked, and Zemanta handles the creation of the link - to webpages, maps, videos or pictures.

Blogger Labels are easier to use with Zemanta, too: Zemanta automatically suggests labels for your based on the text of your post, and creates the labels for you if you like. Finally, "Latest Update" gives you a list of blog posts from other blogs writing about similar topics. It's a great way to discover sites talking about similar topics, and if you'd like to point your readers to those articles for further reading, clicking on them in the sidebar inserts them as "Related reading" links at the bottom of your post (see below).

Source: BloggerBuzz

Yahoo 360 Closes on July 13 2009

noreply@blogger.com (techy) — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 10:58:00 +0000

Yahoo! 360° is a personal communication portal operated by Yahoo!. It is similar to other social networking sites and while text on the site still describes it as being in beta testing, in fact development has ended and the site is no longer actively supported. Long after support ended, the promised replacement social network site has never materialized.

Users can create personal web sites, share photos from Yahoo! Photos, maintain blogs, lists of local reviews, supply profile information, and see which friends are currently online. 360° also, by default, features a 'friends updates' section, under which each friend's latest update is summarized (e.g. blog posts, updates lists, new photostream etc.).

In May 2009 Yahoo! announced that Yahoo! 360° service will be officially closed on July 13, 2009 as Yahoo! developers aimed to "focus their efforts on the new profile on Yahoo".[1] Users are given options to move their Yahoo! 360° information and blog to the new profile before this deadline.

Yahoo 360

Searches flood Google about the death of the Pop King

noreply@blogger.com (techy) — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 10:44:00 +0000

As word spread of Michael Jackson's death, millions and millions of people from all over the world began searching for information about the pop icon. The following chart shows the meteoric rise in related searches around 3:00pm PDT:

Search volume began to increase around 2:00pm, skyrocketed by 3:00pm, and stabilized by about 8:00pm. As you can see in Google Hot Trends, many of the fastest rising search queries from yesterday and today have been about Michael Jackson's passing (others pertained to the death of another cultural icon,Farrah Fawcett). People who weren't near a computer yesterday turned to their mobile phones to check on breaking news. We saw one of the largest mobile search spikes we've ever seen, with 5 of the top 20 searches about the Moonwalker.

The spike in searches related to Michael Jackson was so big that Google News initially mistook it for an automated attack. As a result, for about 25 minutes yesterday, when some people searched Google News they saw a "We're sorry" page before finding the articles they were looking for.

Michael Jackson led an amazing and controversial life in the public eye. Many of us have a "Michael Jackson story." Mine is that he actually taught me how to moonwalk — thanks to many an hour I spent in front of the television trying to mimic his performances. Regardless of your story or personal opinions about this astounding performer, global interest in the King of Pop is undeniable.

Source: Google Blog

Giveaway: Kaspersky Internet Security 2009 , 5 Licenses

noreply@blogger.com (techy) — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 13:58:00 +0000

As a measure to increase the popularity of my blog, I have decided to give away 5 licenses of Kaspersky Internet Security 2009.

Download Kaspersky Internet Security 2009 and follow the below guidelines.

All you have to do is :

1. Subscribe to my newsletter.
2. Subscribe to my Google SMS Channel.

3. Also join our Twitter channel
4. Post a comment in my blog for most of the posts posted between 26 June 2009 and 25 July 2009.
5. I'll select the lucky winners using a lot method.
6. And I'll send the license keys to the winners' email address

P.S : The version of the software 2009 may be changed to 2010 depending upon availability.

How to be a Good Blogger

noreply@blogger.com (techy) — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 13:21:00 +0000

After successfully running a blog for over a month, I have come up with some tips for the wannabe bloggers and the new ones out there. I am no authority on blogging and these tips are based on just my experience.

1. Try to post an article atleast 5 days a week.

2. To get an idea about what to post, visit other blogs which have the same niche as your blog.

3. Post comments in other blogs and also post a link to your blog on the bottom of the comment.

4. Use social bookmarking sites like Digg, Delicious, Technorati to make your blog popular.

5. Create a channel for your blog at Twitter and update it as you update your blog.

6. Do not post more than 2 posts per day. I dont know why, but it will seem heavy on the reader's eyes.

7. In case, you copy some information from another blog, give the owner of the information credit, by posting the source of the information at the end of the post.

8. Use traffic analysis services like Google Analytics, Statcounter, Sitemeter, Histats to monitor the traffic and sources of your blog. Most of these services give a reasonable amount of data about your blog's traffic for free

9. Do not subscribe to any sites that offer link exchanges on a category basis. This may have an effect on your blog in Google search.

10. In case you need to exchange links, contact the administrator of the blog you wish to exchange with and come up with a good reason why he/she should exchange links with you.

I am sure the above tips would help you. Use the comments options if you think any of the above tips are incorrect or if you have any more tips that will be useful.

Microsoft Security Essentials Reviewed

noreply@blogger.com (techy) — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 13:00:00 +0000

Microsoft Security Essentials released by Microsoft a few days ago has nothing special about it. It has the usual Scan options.

It has a real time protection which alerts you when viruses, spyware or other potentially unwanted software attempts to install itself or run on your computer.

However, it has good detection capabilites. When it detects a virus, it gives you the description about the virus without connecting to the internet, unlike Kaspersky Antivirus which connects to its Virus database to access the information about the virus.

It has an option for how to react with threats, Microsoft SpyNet.
Microsoft Spynet is the online community that helps you choose how to respond to potential threats. The community also helps stop the spread of new malicious software infections.

Microsoft Security Essentials just detects the threats very well, but for reliability, we have to see in the long run. Although it doesn't have any special features, it does a good job on its own.

Microsoft Security Essentials Beta released

noreply@blogger.com (techy) — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 14:10:00 +0000

Previous: Leaked: Microsoft Security Essentials

Microsoft officially released its antivirus product "Microsoft Security Essentials" beta version. It was previously named "Morro" after a beach in Brazil. The latest definitions for Microsoft Security Essentials are also available on the site.

Minimum system requirements for Microsoft Security Essentials Beta

* Operating System: Windows XP (Service Pack 2 or Service Pack 3); Windows Vista; Windows 7 (Beta or Release Candidate)
* For Windows XP, a Personal Computer with a:
o CPU with clock speed of 500 MHz or higher
o Memory: 256 MB RAM or higher
* For Windows Vista and Windows 7, a Personal Computer with a:
o CPU with clock speed of 1.0 GHz or higher
o Memory: 1 GB RAM or higher
* VGA (Display): 800 x 600 or higher
* Storage: 140 MB of available hard-disk space
* An Internet connection is required for installation and to download the latest virus and spyware definitions for Microsoft Microsoft Security Essentials.
* Internet Browser:
o Windows Internet Explorer 6.0 or later
o Mozilla Firefox 2.0 or later

For information visit
http://microsoft.com/security_Essentials

Download here

Protect your data from being stolen

noreply@blogger.com (techy) — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 13:40:00 +0000

Firewalls and antivirus software are no defense against acts of data theft and corruption from within your organization at local endpoints. You don't have to be an administrator to connect a small digital camera, MP3 player, or flash memory stick to the USB and begin uploading or downloading whatever you want. If you are a system administrator, you know you can't manage such device-level activity via Group Policy.

Using endpoint device security solution called DeviceLock®, network administrators can lock out unauthorized users from USB and FireWire devices, WiFi and Bluetooth adapters, CD-Rom and floppy drives, serial and parallel ports, PDAs and smartphones, local and network printers and many other plug-and-play devices. Once DeviceLock® is installed, administrators can control access to any device, depending on the time of day and day of the week.

For enterprises standardized on software and hardware-based encryption solutions like PGP® Whole Disk Encryption, TrueCrypt and Lexar® SAFE PSD S1100 USB drives, DeviceLock® allows administrators to centrally define and remotely control the encryption policies their employees must follow when using removable devices for storing and retrieving corporate data. For example, certain employees or their groups can be allowed to write to and read from only specifically encrypted USB flash drives, while other users of the corporate network can be permitted to "read only" from non-encrypted removable storage devices but not write to them.

The USB white list allows you to authorize only specific devices that will not be locked regardless of any other settings. The intention is to allow special devices (e.g. smart card readers) but lock all other devices. Media White List feature allows you to authorize access to specific DVD/CD-ROM disks, uniquely identified by data signature, even when DeviceLock® has otherwise blocked the DVD/CD-ROM drive. A convenience when DVD/CD-ROM disks are routinely used for the distribution of new software or instruction manuals, Media White Listing can also specify allowed users and groups, so that only authorized users are able to access the contents of the DVD or CD-ROM.

The DeviceLock®'s optional data shadowing capability significantly enhances the corporate IT auditor’s ability to ensure that sensitive information has not left the premises on removable media. It captures full copies of files that are copied to authorized removable devices, Windows Mobile and Palm OS-based PDAs and smartphones, burned to CD/DVD or even printed by authorized end users. Shadow copies are stored on a centralized component of an existing server and any existing ODBC-compliant SQL infrastructure of the customer’s choosing.

DeviceLock® Enterprise Server can monitor remote computers in real-time, checking DeviceLock® Service status (running or not), policy consistency and integrity. The detailed information is written to the Monitoring log. Also, it is possible to define a master policy that can be automatically applied across selected remote computers in the event that their current policies are suspected to be out-of-date or damaged.

DeviceLock® allows you to generate a report concerning the permissions that have been set. You can see which users are assigned for what device and what devices are on the USB white list on all the computers across your network.

DeviceLock® provides a level of precision control over device resources unavailable via Windows Group Policy - and it does so with an interface that is seamlessly integrated into the Windows Group Policy Editor. As such, it’s easier to implement and manage across a large number of workstations.

For more information, visit www.devicelock.com

Download

Send anonymous email

noreply@blogger.com (techy) — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 14:17:00 +0000

You can send emails to anyone without disclosing your identity. It may be helpful when you want to play a trick on your friends.

Disclaimer: This is for EDUCATIONAL purposes only.

Now let me explain the procedure.

1. Go to Youmail.ws
2. Just enter an email id or anything in the format

name@something.something

in the Sender

3. Enter the address you want to send to in the Sendto

4. Now, enter the subject and the body of the email and press Send E-mail.

You cannot send attachments using this website. You can only send text messages.

Have fun!!!

Youmail

Proxy software for Windows and Mac

noreply@blogger.com (techy) — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 13:49:00 +0000

Proxifier is a program that allows network applications that do not support working through proxy servers operate through a HTTP or SOCKS proxy server or a chain of proxy servers.

There are many network applications that do not support working through proxy servers and thus cannot be used behind a LAN or firewall(s). These can compromise corporate privacy and lead you to many other restrictions. Proxifier solves all of these problems and gives you the opportunity to work with your favorite software without any restrictions. Additionally, it lets you gain extra control over network security, create a proxy tunnel and add more power to network functionality. With Proxifier you can work with any Internet client (browsers, FTP, IRC, BitTorrent, messengers, telnet, SSH, video/audio, games...) through a network that is separated from Internet by a firewall (only one open port is required for a proxy tunnel to bypass firewall).

Proxifier will provide you with added privacy in all your Internet activities. An example is sending and receiving email through a proxy server or by chaining multiple proxy servers together. Proxifier supports all mail clients while allowing you to remain anonymous.

Proxifier Portable Edition

Portable Edition has most of Proxifier features while providing you with unique opportunities:

Portable Edition requires no installation and can be run from removable media such as USB stick, Floppy, etc...
You don't need Admin rights on a computer to run the program and bypass firewall.
You can use Portable Edition on a computer with guest access only (for example at Internet Cafe).
... and much more.

The software is a trial version for 31 days.

Proxifier allows you to:

Run any network applications through proxy server; no special configuration is required for the software.
Access the Internet from restricted local area network through a proxy server gateway.
Bypass firewall restrictions (connect to restricted ports).
Use three types of proxy servers: SOCKS v4, SOCKS v5, and HTTP.
"Tunnel" the entire system (force all network connections in the system work through a proxy server).
Resolve DNS names through a proxy server.
Use flexible Proxification Rules.
Secure privacy by hiding your IP address.
Work through a chain of proxy servers using different protocols.
Use NTLM authentication on HTTP proxy
View information on current connections (addresses, rate, data transfer, connection time, etc.) in real-time.
View information on bandwidth usage as a colored diagram in real-time.
Maintain log files.
Log incoming and outgoing traffic.
Get detailed reports on network errors.
… and much more.

Proxifier Portable Edition:

Has most of Proxifier Standard Edition features.
Doesn't require installation on a local machine.
Can be run from removable media such as USB stick, Floppy, etc…
Can be run from Guest and Restricted user accounts.
Keeps all settings in the file, doesn't use system registry.

Download - Windows

Download-MacOSX

Download-Portable Edition

How to Backup Internet Explorer and Firefox Bookmarks, Settings, and History

noreply@blogger.com (techy) — Sun, 21 Jun 2009 12:57:00 +0000

MozBackup is a simple utility for creating backups of Mozilla Firefox, Mozilla Thunderbird, Mozilla Sunbird, Flock, SeaMonkey, Mozilla Suite, Spicebird, Songbird and Netscape profiles. It allows you to backup and restore bookmarks, mail, contacts, history, extensions, cache etc. It is an easy way to backup the above browsers.

MozBackup is compatible with:

Firefox 1.0 - 3.1
Thunderbird 1.0 - 3.0 Beta 2
Sunbird 0.3 - 0.9
Flock 1.0 - 2.0
SeaMonkey 1.0a - 2.0 Alpha 3
Mozilla Suite 1.7 - 1.7.x
Spicebird 0.4 - 0.8
Songbird 1.0
Netscape 7.x, 9.x

This program is a freeware and works on Windows 98/ME/NT/2000/XP/2003/Vista.

Download