Windows Applications that make my world easy

 

Today I wanted to talk about some programs which can make a lot of difference in your everyday experience with your PC.

Launchy is the first one that comes  to my mind.Ever struggled finding a program's shortcut ,you try to look at desktop and your Quick launch and then you go through the whole list of them at start menu which is again painful if you have lot of programs like me.With Launchy you just need to type the name of program and it comes just like program search in vista. But I like Launchy better because it is very clean.

If  you have used torrents than you would have come across utorrent , if not you must try it . It really is makes  the downloading of  torrents really manageable and easy.

If one want to access your PC from office or anywhere else you need to try LogMeIn or Live Mesh . Both these product are good in their way Live Mesh is a Microsoft  offering to connect your Desktops ,Mobiles and other devices (in future) .It gives a desktop on the web which you can use to synchronize files and folders. I have been using LogMeIn for  a month now and I find its remote control feature which is another name of remote desktop really fast and useful in order to monitor things . There are other stuffs in offering in Pro subscription but I use it for RDP only so I am quite content.

I have lot of browsers viz IE, Firefox,Opera ,Flock,Safari, Chrome installed on my PC.  Although my main browser has been Firefox as would be evident from my previous post. I use IE mainly for sites which open in IE in best manner.(I know I can use IE tab add-on in firefox.)

I have lot of media players on my computer too . I use VLC or Crystal mainly for all the video content. I use Real Player, itunes ,Mediamonkey for songs,audio etc. I like the tool minilyrics which I have installed recently to show the lyrics of the song in different manners.

If one is really picky about the items order in taskbar or saving space on taskbar by sending items to system tray , xNeatLite is a good tool for  that .

I have installed Windows Live package which consists of Writer to publish blog to a lot blog provider which is handy . It has Windows Live Photo Gallery  which is useful for viewing ,uploading , editing pictures. Although I have Picasa to take care of  it as I use Picasa Web Albums . The panorama creation utility in Photo Gallery is  useful. It also has Windows Live Mail  which one can use for one stop to access  a lot of email accounts from gmail,hotmail,yahoomail,aol, etc .

I also use Windows Desktop Search although I have tried Google Desktop Search and Coopernic search too. All of them work good for me.

I like the calender and clock widget of Yahoo! widgets . One can also use Google gadget for the same too.

As a download manager FlashGet has served purpose for me since long time. I earlier had Star downloader and IDM but I have liked FlashGet most .

Feel free to comment what apps you use to make your life easy.

(Mac vs PC ) vs Linux

Novell Linux making fun of Mac vs. PC ads

One More

In case you have missed the Mac Vs PC ads here is a compilation

My Firefox Add-ons

I have been thinking about writing a blog about the FireFox add-on that I like and I am currently using.

I have been using Download Statusbar for some time now and I really like the way it comes as toolbar in browser itself and not as some other dialog.

Other add-on that I really like is Fast Dial it is same as opera's speed dial but with more customizability.I like setting grid size according to me instead of custom 9 and it does not load the page as in speed dial but just the icon.

One really cool visualization add-on is Piclens.It makes browsing picture really cool on site on which it is enabled like Google and Yahoo image search ,deviant art etc. Other add-on from same group is Cooliris Previews which gives a small preview of the link. I do not use it as I did not find it useful.

WebMynd is next good visualization tool if you have a lot of hard disk to spare as it takes a snapshot of every page you visit and stores it so one can browse through once history in pictorial manner. Its a good add-on to try but it consumed too much hard disk so I had to disable it.

Adblock Plus is a good extension to get rid of some annoying ads.

Firebug and Tamper Data are great development tools for Firefox . Firebug lets one inspect the elements on web page and lot more. Tamper Data allows to capture get and post requests sent and modify them.


User Agent Switcher is another good tool to have although I have not used it a lot.I use it mainly to fool Megaupload that I have Alexa toolbar installed.

Recently I looked for the popular add-ons which I did not I have and I found following add-on which I am currently using and are really good.

I like Foxytunes to control my playlist from Firefox itself without switching windows.
The All-in-one sidebar is good tool to access bookmarks,downloads,add-ons etc.

Feedly is a really intuitive way to read one's RSS.It makes going through all the feeds really easy and fun.The recommendation feature from friends you follow is good too. It has been integrated with Google reader in a seamless manner.
Digg extension adds digg features into browser as evident from name. I do not use it a lot though.

Another tool Stealther seemed like replacement for IE8's inprivate mode but I have not been able to figure out how to use it.
McAfee SiteAdvisor is another tool which I have installed at office and thinking about installing at home too.

So that sums up all the add-ons that I use on my Firefox 3 currently to make browsing more productive and easy.

Write up for the yearbook which did not get published

I recently found my write up for the yearbook which did not get published.

Here it is :-

IITG will always hold a place close to my heart. These four years have been really great and filled with moments which I treasure. I am fortunate to have so many wonderful friends - Foolhardy Tushar, Persevering Shashi, Fearfully audacious Jain & Ramjane, Unruffled Jbo, Lazy bum Kumar, Foul mouthed Tau, Laidback Chahar and many more, with whom days passed by in a steady joyful manner.

Most of my time was spent watching soaps, movies or playing comp games, other times involved playing on the terrace, playing cards or sitting around chatting idly. Avoiding course work used to be top on the priority list.

Last few weeks have involved Cricket world cup which have agitated some friends of mine as India is out. But I am rooting for South Africa so my world cup is still on. I am hoping Aussies do not win.

I wish good luck to everyone. Good bye IITG.

Lonavala Trip

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