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- PulpTunes – Share Your iTunes Library Online With Ease
- The Ultimate Guide To Your Windows Mobile Phone [PDF]
- Plagiarism Checkers: 5 Free Websites To Catch The Copycats
- How To Set Your Browser Homepage In 5 Browsers
- Use Microsoft Outlook Rules To Do Your Bidding (Outlook)
- 5 Online Resources For English Language (ESL) Teachers
| PulpTunes – Share Your iTunes Library Online With Ease Posted: 21 Jul 2009 03:01 PM PDT
The application is installed on your computer and then it acts as a server and allows for your computer to be connected to. You can then access your iTunes library through your browser and stream any song that you have or share your iTunes library with others. Since it acts as a server you will need to keep the computer turned on that you wish to access. If it is turned off then the application is not running and therefore you won’t be able to access your library. If you want to be able to access your iTunes library all the time but not leave your computer on, then the best solution would be to purchase a cheap computer that you can leave on all the time.
Installation and Setup
To download pulpTunes simply go to the pulpTunes website and click the Download Now button to being downloading the application. The file that will be downloaded is a zip file so expand it then open up the application named pulpTunes in the folder that is created. The first time you start up the application a window similar to the one pictured below will be displayed. This is telling you how to access the library within your browser and to open port 15000 on your firewall so that you can access your library from outside your network. If you do not know your IP address then this will also be shown so take a note of it.
When you click OK if you go to http://localhost:15000 you will see all of your songs and playlists.Your iTunes server has now been setup locally – you’ve now shared your iTunes library, and anyone on your network should be able to access it if they know the port number. If you do not want everyone to be able to access it then you can setup an admin username and password by clicking on the icon in the tray and then selecting User Management.
When the window opens up check Enable User Management and then enter the username and password that you would like then hit save. If you return to http://localhost:15000 you will now notice in the upper right corner that there is a hyperlink called Log in.
When you click the hyperlink you will be asked for the username and password that you have just entered into the User Management window. If you successfully log in you will now notice a hyperlink in the upper right corner called User Management.
If you do not want anonymous users to have access to any of your library then uncheck the Has access box. If you want anonymous users to only access certain playlists or songs then you can do this by clicking All Playlists and selecting the playlists and songs that you want to allow an anonymous user to listen to. To add a user that you do not want to be an Admin you must first create a group. I created a group called Users and I will allow them to rate songs so I check the Can rate songs box. To create a user, click on the Accounts tab and then press Add User. I named my user user1, the group Users and other required information. When I click save it is now possible to log in as user1 and listen to my library. Advanced SettingsBy default when the page loads, the first song automatically plays so to stop this, click on the pulpTunes icon in the tray and press Advanced Settings. If you uncheck Start playing songs, hit OK, then restart pulpTunes then the first song will no longer automatically play when the page has loaded. The Advanced Settings window also allows you to change the port number that is used to access the library, so for example if port 15000 is used by something else on your router you can change it to a port that is unused. If your iTunes XML library file is located somewhere else than the default location you can also change this here. If you want to see who is accessing the pulpTunes server and what songs they are listening to, you can enable logging to keep track of this. Click OK and restart the pulpTunes server and the changes will be applied. Please let us know what you think of sharing your iTunes library with pulpTunes by posting a comment below. If you know of a similar application feel free to discuss this below with other readers. Did you like the post? Please do share your thoughts in the comments section! New on Twitter ? Now you can follow MakeUseOf on Twitter too. Related posts
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| The Ultimate Guide To Your Windows Mobile Phone [PDF] Posted: 21 Jul 2009 02:18 PM PDT
With that in mind, one of our long-time staff writers started working on a PDF manual covering everything a Windows Mobile user could ever need. We’re proud to present this 50-paged monster to you — The MakeUseOf Windows Mobile Guide, written by Karl Gechlik, from askTheAdmin.com.
This guide starts at the very basics of Windows Mobile, and quietly builds up its pace to a more advanced level. Whether you want to (re)discover the most basic features and applications of your device, extend it with new applications and tools, or even flash a custom ROM, the Windows Mobile Guide comes to the rescue. Download the Windows Mobile Guide now, and read it on your computer today, or even on your phone! This free PDF is brought to you by MakeUseOf, no strings attached. 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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| Plagiarism Checkers: 5 Free Websites To Catch The Copycats Posted: 21 Jul 2009 01:01 PM PDT
That was from 'Copycats', a song by the Cranberries. Just swap the radio for the web and we could have an anthem for our times where content is free and content lifting is freedom. Copying is tame, plagiarism is the more serious (and demeaning) word and with the laws against copyright infringement in place, plagiarism as intentional fraud carries a mean look. Content plagiarism on the web spreads as fast as the web itself. With blogging, which is usually written words, an original thought becomes the archetype . Duplicate content is the bane of webmasters and even bloggers. A webmaster can easily but unsuspectingly publish duplicate content on the fly (though a guy who knows his job won't!). A blogger can see his work being scraped on another site. The bane – a lower page rank by search engines like Google which hates duplicate content. Many tools exist which help us in sidestepping prickly copyright issues. The professional ones are of course potent, spiffy and dollar loving. The free ones may not be too much on looks but without a pinch they are adequate for the blogger world. Here at MakeUseOf, we have previously covered quite a few content tracking web services. Here are five more for the armory.
Plagiarism Checker
A free online service which searches for originality (or lack of it) using a few phrases taken from different parts of the document. The phrases need not be contained within search operators like quotation marks as the plagiarism checker does it on its own through its code. Content checking is optional with either Google or Yahoo. The two search engines though are word limited in the use of phrases – Google allows 32 and Yahoo's word limit is 50. Plagiarism Checker thus limits the phrase within the word count. The word limitation restricts the scope of the content check. The matches open up in another webpage. In a previous post we had looked at how Google Alerts could be used to keep track of your content. This service provides a button to the Google Alerts page for setting it up. A webpage can also be submitted for a plagiarism check through a URL. Article Checker
A very similar plagiarism detection tool which checks for duplicate content using either Google or Yahoo. Both the search engines can be used to compare results. Input of content is through a text area box or by giving the URL of a webpage. The checker functions by taking blocks of text and running it through the search engines. A Google Alert can be set up for the positive matches with a click. Plagiarism Detect
This is a full-featured web service with a free and a paid option. The free option requires a signup and gives us an upload of Doc or Text files (or paste contents in a text area) and basic duplicate checking. The site makes a disclaimer that it does not store the uploaded content. Despite the basic checking service, the results are neatly displayed for us to sift through. Quote Finder
This is a very simple content checking aid from Google Blogoscoped; a site which unofficially covers Google related news. The plagiarism checker is a simple text area for pasting the relevant text. The results are highlighted in yellow with the number of sources obtained from the web search. Clicking on the highlighted phrases takes us to the Google search results page. It is simple, uncomplicated and relies on the power of Google search. DOC CopThis free web service offers the option of a File Check and a Web Check. Using File Check we can scan and compare a maximum of eight Microsoft Word or AdobePDF files of up to 100,000 words each against one another. We can specify the average string length (i.e. the number of words) that must be compared. The report can be optionally obtained in HTML or Doc format through email.
Web Check is where we can put a webpage, a Doc file or a PDF file through a duplicity check on the internet. Web Check is limited to a maximum of 550 words. Again, the word length can be specified using the string length dropdown.
The web tool requires registration and access is through a guest ID. A real time status indicator shows the current status of the submission. According to the site, it takes about an hour to generate and send the report using email. With the help of these free web tools, detecting duplicate content is not too tough a task. For a content writer, these useful tools serve another purpose – to determine where his ghost written articles have ended up… or even where they have been re-used with due citation and credit. But mostly, it helps each writer check his work against the web to avoid unintentional duplication. We have featured quite a few other tools here at Makeuseof.com – Copyscape : See Who is Stealing your Blog Content The use of this rooster of article plagiarism checking apps should be enough to make us all tread on the side of caution and keep our creative spirits intact. If you write (or publish)…do you check? Let us know. Image: swanksalot Did you like the post? Please do share your thoughts in the comments section! New on Twitter ? Now you can follow MakeUseOf on Twitter too. Related posts
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| How To Set Your Browser Homepage In 5 Browsers Posted: 21 Jul 2009 11:01 AM PDT
Apart from using your favorite website (wink, wink), we’ve seen a bunch of services here on MakeUseOf in the past, allowing you to make a personal, dynamic homepage, greeting you with image slideshows, recent RSS updates, and so on. Although it seems obvious for most computer users, finding out how to set your browser home page is not evident for everyone. Today, we’ll show you how to change your home page in 5 different browsers. Firefox and Firefox-based BrowsersFirefox is not just the acclaimed geek-browser anymore. These days, it’s the most used browser in the internet market. As such, that is where we’ll start. Note that any menu-names might have to be translated to your own language, but any changes should be obvious. How to Set Browser Home Page |
| Use Microsoft Outlook Rules To Do Your Bidding (Outlook) Posted: 21 Jul 2009 09:01 AM PDT
Today I am going to show how I use Outlook rules to restart my computer or to shut down my system if need be. In all actuality I have created many rules over the years and would like to show them to you – who knows maybe they will be as helpful to you as they are to me.
Here you can see the rules window. You can get there by hitting Tools – Rules and Alerts.
If you already have any rules created they will be here. A rule is simply a law on your computer that states when a message arrives with a specific subject, comes from a specific account or any of the other rules, a specific action will be taken. People use these to setup auto-forwards or automated responses. I use these to take actions on my computer. My first rule shuts down my system and the second one restarts the system. After you start creating the rule hit the Start from a blank rule radio box. This gives us the most flexibility.
Next select Check messages when they arrive. This will scan only incoming messages for your rules. Obviously if you want to be slick you can have things happen when other people send messages on your machine. You can really achieve automation with these rules!
To be on the safe side – ie: not have someone else send me a keyword and have my Outlook jump through hoops for them as well – we want to make sure that the rules are only processed if they come from my account that I have specified for this.
Next up I hit the specific keywords link and I specify my keyword(s). In this case I used the key word – SecretKeyWord. This is case sensitive and the email’s subject would have to have SecretKeyWord in the subject just like that. Then that will trigger our Action which you will see shortly.
Our action is going to run a batch file so we choose start an application. You will need to create a batch file for each action. For example to shutdown the computer your batch file (a text file saved with the .bat extension) would have this line and only this line in it: shutdown –s –t 00 and to create the same rule that restarts the computer just use this command: shutdown –s –t 00
When an email arrives with SecretKeyWord in the subject the batch file will be launched and the machine will be restarted – blamo just like that! You can create any batch file or even start an application on your machine with parameters. The possibilities are endless! Let us know how you use rules in the comments! Did you like the post? Please do share your thoughts in the comments section! New on Twitter ? Now you can follow MakeUseOf on Twitter too. Related posts
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| 5 Online Resources For English Language (ESL) Teachers Posted: 21 Jul 2009 07:01 AM PDT
But from 2004-2007, I had up to 15 German students a week who would pay me for the pleasure of putting them through their lingustic paces – “the Polish started to polish their boots…..at the bank she looked at the interest on her loan with interest….after eating dessert, the army deserted in the desert…”. At the end, I would wonder why the students staggered off looking for the nearest bar. English language teaching is very hard and one of the hardest parts about it is preparing lesson materials. Robin Williams made it look easy in the movie “Good Morning Vietnam” with his quick fire wit and dialogue – but that’s just in movie-land. In real life, it is much more difficult. If you are teaching classes of up to 30 people (which I did for a short while), then you have to constantly find lesson materials that will motivate them and hold their interest for the 45 minutes you have to teach them (it’s even more difficult if you’re teaching children). This means spending up to 2 hours a day, each day, solely on preparing your lessons for the next day. No wonder a lot of teachers burn out fast.
Here’s some of the places where I got my material from : Breaking News English
Breaking News English attempts to fill that niche by providing 1000+ news reports and questions for discussion. As you can see on the left, the recent lesson plans have ranged from “Israel & Hamas reject Amnesty report” to something more low-brow “Manchester United agree to sell Ronaldo”. So there’s something for everyone there. You can download each lesson plan in doc, PDF and mp3 format. ESL Cafe
This is quite a popular site which has been around for quite a long time. It has a bit of an Asian angle to it (they have dedicated job boards and forums for Korea and China) but the stuff that Dave Sperling includes on the site can be used anywhere. You can find links to lesson plans, links for students and teacher forums. You can even apply for a new job if you hate the one you’ve got. One Stop English
This is good news because for quite a while, I relied mostly on Inside Out to give me ideas. The site is part of the MacMillan dictionary people so the lessons sometime refer to the MacMillan definition of words but regardless, you can still use these lesson plans with other dictionaries (I’m an Oxford dictionary man myself). The subjects of the lessons can be a bit dry sometimes (the recent one is on litter). So sometimes you strike out here and you have to go looking elsewhere. But on the whole, they have some really good stuff here.
The site also has some excellent grammar lessons which I used constantly. So these are the ones that I used. If you teach English to foreigners, what sites do YOU use? Please recommend them to us in the comments. Image Credit : Trey Menefee Did you like the post? Please do share your thoughts in the comments section! New on Twitter ? Now you can follow MakeUseOf on Twitter too. Related posts
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If you have a Windows Mobile phone, you will know that stuff can occasionally get pretty difficult. These devices, which are basically mini-computers, have endless possibilities — and thus endless possible difficulties as well.
"A lack of originality
Although a lot of browsers come with great homepages (I’m thinking Firefox Start, but especially Opera’s Speed Dial), there are plenty of reasons for changing yours.
I have been using Outlook as my email client for many many moons now. It is not just because I am required to for my job – I really like it and I have got it to the point where it is a help to my work and not a hindrance.
Once upon a time (before coming to work at MakeUseOf), I was an English language teacher here in Germany. I still do it to a certain extent but I am not sure if one student a month really counts anymore.
If you are stuck for what to teach someone, the day’s current affairs is always a good place to go to. Everyone has an opinion about what’s in the news, whether it’s the war in Iraq, the financial crisis or Michael Jackson’s death.
One of my really favourite sites. You can download LOTS of lesson plans here, made by other teachers. They tend to steer you towards the paid “staff room” but you can ignore all that and stick to the free stuff instead. Things like 
I’ve just discovered that this website has had a big makeover since I was last there a couple of years ago. But it still seems to be hosting the free lesson plans.
This site (which has also had a recent makeover) has some really good conversational lesson ideas. This was the first site that my predecessor at a local language school recommended to me before she left and I can see why. With the | You are subscribed to email updates from MakeUseOf.com To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now. | Email delivery powered by Google |
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