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- Cool Websites and Tools [July 11]
- Pay Your Friends To Do Things For You With Paypal’s Do Stuff For Money
- Geeky Fun: Latest Hilarious Picks
- Ogame – A Free Online Strategy Game of Space War
- 3 Great Websites For Beginners to Learn How to Hit a Golf Ball
- 3 Tips for Quick and Free Translation Between Languages
- Ask & Answer The Web’s Questions With Aardvark + Free Invites!
| Cool Websites and Tools [July 11] Posted: 11 Jul 2009 04:00 PM PDT
(1) Computer Power Supply Calculator - This tool is a power supply calculator provided by Newegg, which lets you calculate the amount of watts your computer will maximally consume based on the configuration details of the components (CPU, Motherboards, Memory etc). Comes in handy if you plan to assemble your own computer from separate components. Read more: Computer Power Supply Calculator (2) Facebomb – Image editing site which focuses on spicing up the picture you would be using on your various social network profiles by applying variety of effects. You may pimp up your profile image by adding custom text and all kinds of symbols, pictures based on themes like love, toys, animals, angels and many more. Read more: Facebomb: Pimp Up Your Profile Picture (3) Mon.itor.us – Online site monitoring and tracking service which not only warns you when your website is down but also provides statistics of your website's uptime, downtime, visitor traffic and more. It provides a lot of information about your site and web server that helps you maintain a high uptime. Read more: Mon.itor.us: Extensive Online Site Monitor & Analytics Tool (4) Task.fm – Innovative reminder application which lets you set up reminders using natural language commands. Create a free account, log in and simply enter your reminder text into the reminder box. It could be anything like "Write an article tomorrow at 3 pm". Just make sure you include a date and time as part of your reminder. Task.fm will automatically extract the event date and time and remind you promptly on that day. Read more: Task .fm: Set Up Natural Language Reminders (5) TwitChuck – This application lets you to run a quick check on any Twitter user and find out if he/she is a potential spammer. It looks at the activity, followers and postings of that user and gives you a detailed feedback explaining why you should or not follow him or her. Read more: TwitChuck: Identify Twitter Spammers
These are just half of the websites that we discovered in the last couple of days. If you want us to send you daily round-ups of all cool websites we come across, leave your email here. Or follow us via RSS feed. Did you like the post? Please do share your thoughts in the comments section! New on MakeUseOf ? Get cheat sheets and cool PDF guides @ www.makeuseof.com/makeuseof-downloads/ Related posts
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| Pay Your Friends To Do Things For You With Paypal’s Do Stuff For Money Posted: 11 Jul 2009 02:00 PM PDT
For example let's say I wanted my co-worker to work the late shift and I wanted to work the early shift everyday for a year. I know it sounds ridiculous but, to me it would be worth almost anything! So if I want it I would have to make it worth it for him. Surely, I would get laughed at if I asked him to do it out of the kindness of his heart – now if I put $1000 behind my offer I think he would HAVE to take it – feel me? So it is a pretty simple service that anyone can use. With or without a Paypal account. Let’s take a look at it.
Now as you can see below, they are taking a play on money and letting you fill in the following fields:
After filling it out the form at the bottom of the note, you will see the note's fields actually populate. It will look like this when you are done:
Then you hit “Send Offer” to actually send the request to your recipient. Remember that your offer may be posted to the site’s home page as an example of a “Past Offer” if PayPal sees it fit. So maybe, you shouldn't use your significant other’s real full name when requesting sexual acts After hitting “Send Offer” you will see this form:
Send the request either by email or Facebook. You will see this message when you have completed the steps:
The email will look like this:
Pretty neat eh? Got some crazy ideas about what you are going to do with this service? If so, leave them in the comments! Related posts
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| Geeky Fun: Latest Hilarious Picks Posted: 11 Jul 2009 01:00 PM PDT
Check out the top picks from MakeUseOf Geeky Fun during the last week.
If you would like to keep up with all latest Geeky Fun additions, please subscribe to the Geeky Fun feed here. You can also subscribe and get the latest additions via email. Did you like the post? Please do share your thoughts in the comments section! New on MakeUseOf ? Get cheat sheets and cool PDF guides @ www.makeuseof.com/makeuseof-downloads/ Related posts
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| Ogame – A Free Online Strategy Game of Space War Posted: 11 Jul 2009 12:00 PM PDT
Ogame – A Space War Like No OtherWhen I first started playing the free online strategy game known as Ogame, I figured I’d play for about a couple of weeks and call it good. I was on vacation from work and looking for something to pass the time with a few of my online friends. We each signed up for a free account in Universe 36, claimed our first planet, and started our slow climb up the ranks.
The opening login screen itself really captured my interest unlike any other online game I’ve ever played. While the fact that I’ve always been a sci-fi fan might explain my fascination with the graphics, the animated front page filled with fascinating and subtly moving images of space sparked my imagination. It reminded me of a game I was once hooked on as a young kid in high school called Sentinel Worlds by Electronic Arts. That sense of adventure and excitement from those long ago late-nights of game playing came rushing back to me, and I knew that Ogame already had me hooked. Navigating Through OgameWhile there’s a lot of detail, complex game play and a lot of strategy involved in this game, overall navigating through the various control screens is a piece of cake once you get used to it. From the main screen, you have an overview of all of the planets that you’ve colonized.
Yes, there’s also an interplayer messaging system that can get pretty busy at times, especially when you’re trying to coordinate an attack of several battleship fleets between you and your buddies against another team (or “alliance”). Clicking on any one of your planets takes you to a “planetary control” menu, where you can build additional structures to further colonize your planet (and add functionality). You can access these building options by clicking on the “buildings” link on the left menu.
Or you can assign fleet production tasks to a particular planet – like building a fleet of fighters, cargo ships, or whatever else you feel you need added to your existing “fleet.” You can access your ship building area by clicking “Shipyard” in the left menu.
Just keep in mind that in many corners of this space world – the size of your fleet defines you. In Ogame, size matters. Of course, the clever players understand that all brawn and no brains just makes for an easy target, so ultimately you’ll turn to your “Research” area in order to build up your capabilities and your strength in battle.
As you build up your various technologies (all “building” activities are time-based), you’ll achieve more powerful “hits” against your opponents in battle, when spying on their planets, or the various other activities where you’re trying to gain additional resources. The Game Play and ActionThe “coolness” factor of Ogame comes down to the action. You could literally spend weeks just building technologies, fleet ships and buildings – but what good is it if there’s no action? The action in this game comes from “raiding” other player’s planets for their resources. And the addictive part of the game comes from the need for revenge when someone “crashes” your planet, wipes out your fleet, and takes all of your resources. That happens only once or twice, and you’ll discover that you’ve taken a sworn oathe of revenge, and you are officially an Ogame addict.
When you click on “Galaxy” in the left menu, you’ll see a screen like that above, where you’ll be spending most of your time, sifting through from one “system” to the next. What are you searching for? Ultimately you’re hunting for vulnerable planets – those with a code letter “i” or “I” signifying that the player has been idle for a long time. You send over your “probes” to check out whether there’s a fleet, defenses or resources on the planet – and when you see an undefended planet with lots of resources, you send in your fleet to sweep up the goods and add them to your stash. Sounds easy enough doesn’t it? That is, until one of their buddies “ninja’s” you, landing a fleet twice as large as yours on the planet just before your fleet gets there, wiping out your attack. Or someone much higher than you sends over a “deathstar” to wipe out anything you’ve got on your planet. If you’ve a savvy and clever player, you’ll quickly team up with a good alliance of gamers and after many, many months of building up your planets, your fleet, and waging war against other alliances and other worlds, you just might become the king of Ogame… at least in your particular Universe. Once you’re done there, you’ve got dozens of other Universes that are also available for conquering. Have you ever played Ogame, or any similar free online strategy games? Share your experiences in the comments section below. Related posts
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| 3 Great Websites For Beginners to Learn How to Hit a Golf Ball Posted: 11 Jul 2009 10:00 AM PDT
Some people say that golf isn’t a real “sport” because it doesn’t involve large, muscular and sweaty men running into each other. Let me just say one thing: golf is both mentally and physically demanding. I have played golf for many years now, and if I hit a 200 yard shot that lands in the woods, I will have to walk 200 yards to reach my golf ball, which by now is probably being gnawed on by some squirrel. For these 200 yards, I will also have to think about how much I regret snapping my wrist while hitting my shot, effectively ruining my score. Even so, playing golf is a very calming experience – it may be a chance for you to reorganize your thoughts in your mind on the quiet golf course, or you may just want to smack something as hard as you can (the driver makes a very satisfying noise when you hit the ball correctly). Now that everyone is so eager to learn about golf, including some of the basic principles as simple as how to hit a golf ball, here are 3 sites that will definitely help you pick up the game. Golf.comSimple site, simple interface, loads of information. One would naturally think that a website with such a demanded URL should have all of the info about golf. Since the main purpose of this article is to inform the masses about where to find tips on how to learn golf, let’s get straight down to business. Golf.com has a section called “Lesson Finder”:
Once here, you can click on a variety of different topics to choose from, including “basics”:
Inside, there is a plentiful selection of videos and articles to learn about how to swing a golf club, get the shot you want, and learn more about the game. These videos and articles are all certified and submitted by GOLF Magazine’s Top 100 golf teachers. Learnaboutgolf.comAnother great site that offers plenty of tips on how to improve your golf game. At the top of the site, there is a navigation bar. Click “Golf Lessons” to get to this screen:
There are more than 50 of these articles, but you get the point. Each is a simple article about 1 page in length that provides tips and tricks on how to improve your golfing game. You can also click on the “Video Golf Lessons” link next to the image in the above screenshot, and it will bring you to a new page with a bunch of short video lessons by some guy named Bobby Eldridge:
Here’s an example of one of his videos in Youtube: Golf.about.comBelieve it or not, About.com has a very detailed and rich database of beginner golf guides. There are 4 tabs at the top – click on the one labeled “Instruction,” and you will be brought to this page:
There really isn’t anything else to elaborate on. Any link you click is chock-full of information and tips. There’s also a golf video section, although the number of instructional videos are comparatively smaller than the other sites:
There are a lot of information floating around the internet on how to play golf or techniques on how to hit a golf ball, but these 3 websites are very concise, organized, and easy to follow; all house some form of video lessons paired with articles and tips. This helps the golfer gain a better understanding about what is trying to be conveyed, both conceptually and visually. The bottom line is that golf is a hands-on sport – you cannot just read about it and learn to play. So grab a set of clubs, any clubs, and get on the green and practice! P.S. If you are a left-handed golfer, it may be extremely hard to find instructions on how to play left-handed golf. The most consolidated database of videos I have found is located at eHow’s Left Handed Golf Tips: Video Series. Note that a lot of left-handed golfers still play with the same stance and swing as right-handed ones, save for the fact that they grip the clubs and swing a bit differently. This is probably because learning left-handed golf doesn’t really give you an advantage in the sport like it sometimes does (tennis for instance), and it’s really hard to find reverse clubs and an instructor who can teach you to learn opposites. Even so, there are golfers who play left-handed golf exceptionally well at the higher levels (most notably Phil Mickelson), so if you really feel that you want to play left-handed golf, then by all means, go for it. Utilize symmetries in establishing foundations around your golf game, and the above sites should be able to provide great tips that you can use as well (just flip everything)! If you haven’t left the house in days and your computer is your sanctuary, then check out Simon’s article on PangYa, an online golf game. Would you really consider golf a sport? Did you find the resources helpful? Do you have any pro tips for beginner golfers? Shoot away in the comments! Did you like the post? Please do share your thoughts in the comments section! New on MakeUseOf ? Get cheat sheets and cool PDF guides @ www.makeuseof.com/makeuseof-downloads/ Related posts
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| 3 Tips for Quick and Free Translation Between Languages Posted: 11 Jul 2009 08:00 AM PDT
Most free translation tools available for such translations are scarce, not quite accurate and generally have a price tag attached to them. There are some great, free options nevertheless. Karl reviewed Polyglot 3000 and found it quite awesome. Maria found 4 great online translation tools. I’m here to show you 3 more free translation tools that you can use to get the job done easily. Google TranslateGoogle Translate dominates them all. It’s free, it supports auto-detection and it many different languages. Earlier, we had to use different workarounds to get Google to translate the documents or copy and paste the text into the tiny Google Translate Box, however Google just made it a hell of a lot easier to translate your documents into other languages. All you have to do is browse here, upload the document to you want to translate, choose the languages (or let it detect automatically) and hit translate. Boom, you have the results, right there in the language you understand.
There are certain caveats: Microsoft OfficeIf you have Microsoft Office then you can use the built-in translate option to do the translations for you. While this cannot be termed as free, if you already have Microsoft Office you don’t need to pay anything else. Office 2007 users can find the option to translate under the Review Tab. Hitting translate displays the translated text. Office 2003 users can also translate the text via the Tools > Research > Translate option.
OpenOffice Free Translation ToolOn the other hand, if you happen to use OpenOffice, you should install the excellent Writer’s tools extension. Apart from translation, the extension also offers a truckload of other features. Note that Writer’s tools uses Google Translate to give you the desired results.
Which one is the best? I prefer visiting Google Translate. A lot of other tools use Google anyway, plus displaying the result as HTML is better than having them displayed as plain text (because there is still some sanity from the formatting point of view).
But that’s me. It boils down to personal preference in the end, because all of them share the same drawbacks – accuracy and loss of formatting are the two main culprits! If you are using Office or OpenOffice you might not want to leave the interface, or else if you don’t mind the digression, you can always visit Google Translate. Do you know of some better free Translation tools? Sound off in the comments and let us know! Did you like the post? Please do share your thoughts in the comments section! New on MakeUseOf ? Get cheat sheets and cool PDF guides @ www.makeuseof.com/makeuseof-downloads/ Related posts
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| Ask & Answer The Web’s Questions With Aardvark + Free Invites! Posted: 11 Jul 2009 06:00 AM PDT
It’s called Aardvark, and is a brand-new application that just came out of the SXSW conference this year. The site was in private beta for a while, then was invite-only. Recently, it’s become publicly available and is now open for questions. It’s available to anyone who logs in through Facebook Connect (if you have a Facebook account already, you’re all set. If not, Facebook accounts are free to everyone!). The Facebook implications of Aardvark are pretty impressive, but even logging in with Facebook is a great tool. If you haven’t had the privilege of owning a Facebook account, read on — we have exclusive invites and we’re giving them out to MakeUseOf readers! Signing up for Aardvark is simple, as is getting it running – just add some information about where you are, the IM client and username of your choice (as long as it’s Google Talk, AIM, or Live Messenger – for now), and the types of questions you’d like to answer for other people. You can also use the service by email, but I’m going to focus on IM because it’s so much cooler.
From the other side (the answerer), Aardvark is even more ingenious. When you sign up, you choose how often you want Aardvark to ask you questions; I chose “a couple of times a day.” When that time comes up, Aardvark sends you an IM saying “So-and-so has a question about ‘Some Topic You Can Answer.’” You can respond one of a few ways – “Sure” to see and answer the question, “face” to pass it on to a Facebook friend who might be able to answer, or “pass” to just make the question go away. If you pass, you can then mute a given topic to not get any more questions based on that topic. The cool thing about Aardvark is that the questions are limitless. For instance, I’m listed as able to answer questions about New York City, where I live. I periodically get a question like, “Where should I go for dinner near Union Square?”, and I’m able to offer a recommendation. The questions I get rarely require factual answers, and that’s one of the fun things about Aardvark – it’s a great way to find out what other people are into that I might like as well. One of Aardvark’s sample questions is, “Where’s the best place to buy running shoes in San Francisco?” It’s this kind of question, one that Google wouldn’t know but an actual local person might, that gives Aardvark awesome potential. Instead of services like ChaCha, which essentially just replaces a Google search when you can’t do one yourself, Aardvark goes beyond the capabilities, and sets you up with an expert in their field – even if that field is running shoes in San Francisco.
As you use Aardvark more, you get a sense of people who are able to answer certain questions for you – maybe you have a friend in Utah who you trust to answer such questions. You create these connections, and Aardvark uses them to narrow down your respondents even more, to try and get you the best possible answer. From the get-go though, Aardvark’s always done a good job of finding me the right person to answer my question. Once you set it up, it’s incredibly simple to use. It’s unobtrusive, and lives right in your IM window; nothing to install or download, or remember to run. There was a lot of buzz around Aardvark as SXSW got underway, and a few minutes using the app makes it easy to see why. As a MakeUseOf reader, you can now sign up to Aardark without using your Facebook account. Just hit this link and sign up! It’s now open for questions, but there are only 300 invites so grab one quickly! Is there anything else like this out there? Can Twitter do this better? What do you think? Did you like the post? Please do share your thoughts in the comments section! New on MakeUseOf ? Get cheat sheets and cool PDF guides @ www.makeuseof.com/makeuseof-downloads/ Related posts
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