Tooling you Computer: The Assorted Softwares Post

On the second and long overdue edition of tools, I will be talking about useful PC softwares and plug-ins I found all over the internet that you can use freely. The most important thing that I can say about the following softwares is that you can trust them, it will not mess with your internal windows OS, it doesn’t even clog your memory, and they will only appear if you need to.

You should have the essential softwares like a decent antivirus like Avast and a splendid browser like a Firefox already so you won’t be seeing some of these softwares here. I will also recommend other software that you may or not heard before that may in some way helpful to your profession.

I am not a certified information technology expert but with the following software plus common sense, will give you a better working computer, even if it is a slow one.

Winpatrol
http://www.winpatrol.com/download.html
Whenever you install new software, there is always a possibility that something you don’t like install itself, usually packaged with the software you install in the first place. This bullcrap is universally known as Spywares and Malwares. Some software, without your knowledge, immediately places himself as part of your Start Up which greatly affects the overall performance of your computer. With Winpatrol, you can now disabled unnecessary Start Up stuff without messing their registry.

Winpatrol also monitors and notifies you if dangerous software that you don’t know running around your OS attempts to install to your main system. You can block and removes these threats with an ease. There are more beneficial features that you can use with it but most of time I only use this to remove those annoying and unneeded software. There is a plus version of it but it involves money spending again, it’s up to you to consider buying the upgraded version.

You may ask what is a spyware. According to one of my time eating website, Wikipedia, a Spyware is computer software that installs itself surreptitiously on a personal computer to intercept or take partial control over the user’s interaction with the computer, without the user’s informed consent.

While the term spyware suggests software that secretly monitors the user’s behavior, the functions of spyware extend well beyond simple monitoring. Spyware programs can collect various types of personal information, such as Internet surfing habit, but can also interfere with user control of the computer in other ways, such as installing other software, redirecting Web browser activity, accessing websites blindly that will cause more harmful viruses, or diverting advertising revenue to a third-party. Spyware can even change computer settings, resulting in slow connection speeds, different home pages, and loss of Internet or other programs.

Spybot Search and Destroy
http://www.safer-networking.org/en/spybotsd/index.html
Spywares, malware and other crap that shouldn’t be invented in the first place and the author of these said crapwares should die by drowning in a pool full of diarrhea powered crap. To make sure that kind of threat will not bother you, just install this excellent anti-spyware software and let it search and destroy those spyware. Before scanning your system again, always update the software because almost everyday, a bastard creates another sneaky spyware. Be sure to shield yourself with this handy software.

Super
http://www.erightsoft.com/SUPER.html
Super Video Converter, is the best video converter ever. There are a lot of shareware around that can convert your video file to another format. But most of the time, they will always cripple your video, by placing a logo watermark on your outputted video, and the only way to remove the watermark, is well, pay them, and you don’t want to do that. Those good guys from eRightSoft did a Lord’s work and provided us with this very reliable software than can convert almost all formats, even the .FLV format of video streaming sites like Youtube.

The process is easy, just drag the video to Super, choose the output format, and customize the main output (size, codec, etc.), and just wait. The conversion speed depends on the original size of your video and the speed of your computer so don’t expect fast results. After finishing the video conversion, you may view got your new freshly converted video, and you may burn it in a DVD or VCD, or if you are a rich bastard, a Blu-Ray burner. Why do I love Super? It’s free.

BitTorrent and the UTorrent
http://www.utorrent.com/
Having problems downloading your BitTorrent files using the original Bittorrent software? Is it too slow for you even if you detect a huge chunk of seeds from that file? Why am I talking technical? what is a torrent? Again, let’s ask google and Wikipedia.

BitTorrent is a peer-to-peer file sharing protocol used to distribute large amounts of data. The first distributor of the complete file or collection acts as the first seed. Each peer that downloads the data also uploads it to other peers. Relative to standard internet hosting, this provides a significant reduction in the original distributor’s hardware and bandwidth resource costs. It also provides redundancy against system problems and reduces dependence on the original distributor.

It’s like copying their file, no matter how big the size is, from their computer to your computer. It’s like the Napster and Frostwire peer-to-peer clients, but better. How do you use the Bittorrent, just do the following:

1. You should know first on what file do you want to have, is it an old movie? An old album you lost ages ago? A comic story arc you never read but you can’t find a printed copy somewhere? If you finally decided on what file you want to download, lets head to the web.
2. There are a lot of good torrent sites around the net. I recommend the controversial the Pirate Bay because it is one of the reliable torrent sharing sites and doesn’t have annoying ads. Just search the file, and download the torrent.
3. Now, to activate the torrent, you need a good BitTorrent client. I recommend UTorrent client because the download speed is quicker and easy to understand interface.
4. Download and install UTorrent and run your downloaded Torrent there.
5. Wait for the file to complete and enjoy.
6. Just a little tip, always check the number of seeds of the file, the more seed the torrent file has, the download will be faster.

Expectedly, torrent sharing is illegal because of copyright issues and having the file free of charge, so use it with caution.

OPEN OFFICE
http://www.openoffice.org/
The greatest alternative for that slow, horrible and hard drive eating Microsoft Office. It offers everything that any version of MS Office can do, but in a faster, lighter package and importantly, it is free. Open Office can edit existing files made in MS Office and you can open annoying formats without any other softwares to download., like that dreaded .DOCX wherein older MS Word versions cannot open.

Stay tune for more free and useful software goodies from this series.

Adding fire to Firefox: my recommended Firefox add-ons

I use Firefox primarily as my browser. It is safer and more reliable than the Internet Explorer, and I can’t remember the last time I used that browser. I sometimes use Google Chrome for its speed but Firefox takes the cake because of its countless and helpful add-ons. It may slow the browser sometimes but I highly recommend the following Firefox add-ons.

Adblock Plus: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1865
This add-on can easily remove all the unnecessary and space hogging  ads in many popular sites. Random ads sometime slows the loading of a page, this add-on simply gets rid of the ad on the fly. It may not work in other lesser known websites though but you can block them manually.

Linkification: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/190
You no longer copy and paste a static html address, this add-on automatically converts to a more convenient clickable link. This is useful in message boards that does not support HTML scripting.

Text to Image: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/618

It is like linkification, but instead of a link, the text URL of an image will turn into the actual image itself. It is again useful in message boards that does not support HTML scripting. Remember , this add-on may mess up other   due to conflicting HTML image URL mess fest. You can easily disable this with a click if a problem occur in  a different site.

FoxTab: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/8879
It’s like the Safari or Google Chrome multi-tab screen, in Firefox format. This is useful if you have a habit of opening a lot of tabs. This add-on will make a navigation to countless tabs easier.

NoScript: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/722
Probably the best security add-on for paranoid people. It shields you from malicious web attacks and clickjacking that can put your computer at risk of being hacked, played around or even steal your personal data.

DownThemAll!: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/201
A faster download manager, its like the old Download Accelerator we all loved during the heydays of Dial-up internet, but this is faster… way faster, its like your download speed ate a bunch of Popeye’s spinach. It can download huge files in less than an hour, it is still depends on your internet speed, it just enhances the speed by three times.

VideoDownloadHelper: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/3006
Effective tool if you want to grab a video from an online streaming sites like Youtube. If you know what to do, you can retrieve the FLV address of the video using VideoDownloadHelper and use the DownThemAll to download the video file, faster.

Use these useful add-ons for more smooth flowing internet experience especially if you are an active message board participant or an online streaming video addict. There are a lot of other add-ons scattered throughout the internet but I think the following were the the most important ones. Go to Firefox add-ons to get more add-ons at https://addons.mozilla.org.