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- Cool Websites and Tools [November 10]
- Four Fabulous Gmail Labs Extensions You Should Try Out
- Gizmoz – A 3D Talking Character Maker That Uses Your Photo
- Mandriva Linux 2010 – Perhaps The Best Linux Release All Year
- How to Compile Photos & Videos to Make a DVD With iDVD [Mac]
- 2 Safe Ways To Share Your Presentation Slides Online
| Cool Websites and Tools [November 10] Posted: 10 Nov 2009 05:01 PM PST
(1) CompareMyDocs – New web application that allows users to compare and merge text documents online. You can upload different versions of the same text document and see what has been changed. It automatically color codes changes it finds between the different revisions of a document and provides user with an easy way to approve, reject, or set aside a change. Read more: CompareMyDocs – Compare And Merge Documents Online
(2) X3Studios – Website that lets you quickly and easily generate artsy wallpapers, save them onto your computer and share with others online. You can also check out public library of wallpapers created by others. Read more: X3Studios: Create Cool Artsy Wallpapers (3) Lists Widget – Official Lists Widget from Twitter that lets anyone to display tweets for any public Twitter list on their blog, social networking profile etc. It can be customized in appearance and easily embedded on any website, blog or personal web page. Read more: Lists Widget – Get A Widget For Twitter List (4) CoTweet – Suite of tools within one app which helps small businesses to manage their Twitter communication easily and effectively. The main feature is letting various people use the same Twitter account. Hence corporate Twitter accounts can be managed easily. You could add up to six different Twitter accounts to the tool and invite people to tweet on your behalf. Read more: CoTweet – Twitter Management Tools For Business (5) GazoPa – Unique similar image search tool that gives a variety of options when it comes to finding images based on similarity. You can upload an image, just draw a rough sketch, supply an image URL or conduct a similar image search using keywords. You could filter search results by color, layout, size, shape and on the basis of its age on the web. Read more: GazoPa – Search Images By Similarity
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 Twitter ? Now you can follow MakeUseOf on Twitter too. Related posts
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| Four Fabulous Gmail Labs Extensions You Should Try Out Posted: 10 Nov 2009 02:01 PM PST
From Gmail it is possible to chat with friends, organize and share calendars, edit word documents, and far more. The addition of Gmail Labs created an excellent way for Google to provide users access to extra functionality still in the development process. It gives users like myself the ability to personalize Gmail in such a way that it becomes more than an email client. It is important to note that the list of add-ons for Gmail Labs is always changing – things can be added and removed without notice. I personally have been using Gmail Labs since it came out in 2008, and have never seen one of the features disappear, but Google reserves the right to do so if they decide. With that said, what aspects of Gmail Labs are worth noting to the average user? When scanning a growing list of 50 or so Gmail extensions, what might most users find essential? I've taken some time to consider these questions and want to suggest four Gmail Labs extensions that I think you'll love. Note: To enable Gmail Labs, navigate to Settings > Labs within your Gmail. Simply select a feature from the list of labs by clicking enable and then save changes at the bottom of the page. If Labs ever malfunctions and prevents your mail from loading, use this link to disable Labs.
Navbar Drag and Drop
Sounds relatively simple, right? This Gmail extension lets the user decide where those widget-looking boxes (like "chat" and "invite a friend") on their sidebar in Gmail will go. To re-order a "widget" grab it by the bar at the top, and simply drag it somewhere else. Face it, if you've just added a bunch of new Gmail Labs extensions you're going to want some of them in different locations than where the all-knowing Gmail Labs placed them. It's a fact of life. Embrace that desire with this useful extension. Google Search
When clicked on, results will open in a new window so that your email session is not disrupted. This may actually be the perfect extension for those of us that read emails which cause us to impulsively Google Search things. Give this one a try—you won't regret it. Text Messaging in Chat (US phones only)
Basically, this Gmail extension lets you text message other US cell phone users from your Gmail account in a chat-based style. To send a text message to a user, hover over their name in the Chat box, and under Video & More click Send SMS. From there it's just a matter of inputting their number (which Gmail will remember for later use) and sending them a message. I've found a use for this on more than one occasion recently – it's organized, handy, and free! Gmail Beta icon
If your Gmail inbox is anything like mine you’ve got features from Labs enabled, gadgets popping up all over the sidebar, and that strange feeling that something still isn’t right. Sometimes its helpful to have a reminder that if you’ve reached that point with your add-ons, your inbox is (whether you’d like to think so or not) mostly in a Beta state. That’s why Darren over at Google has created a Lab that changes the familiar Gmail logo back to the old one that many of us hardcore beta testers know and love. As Gmail continues to evolve into more than just email for its users, Google continues to look for the public response to the changes they make. That's why it is important to leave feedback – what do you want to see in the future of Gmail? 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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| Gizmoz – A 3D Talking Character Maker That Uses Your Photo Posted: 10 Nov 2009 12:01 PM PST
Well, that's what Gizmoz is. A Web 2.0 3d character maker that lets us create, customize and animate lifelike 3D talking characters and share it on sites like YouTube and Facebook. Yes, your very own talking, blabbering avatar. The animated online clones are a new 'breed' of character-based visual icons. Digital characters that will take over from humdrum photos and dumb avatars. What Gizmoz does is provide a free web service that makes it dead easy to create dead ringers for our online selves. These are embeddable Flash objects with the look of a 3D caricature. It's a huge lot of fun when you make these characters lip-synch with your own lines on social networking sites or just send it across like a 3D postcard. There are three ways you can use the Gizmoz 3d character maker to make your own virtual showcase. But first, go through the simple registration and log-in.
Publish 3D Clips
Large repertory of templates to put your face on and publish them or embed them as Flash objects. The templates give you a gallery of choices to make slideshows, 3D greeting cards, animated mini-clips, vacation postcards, commentary clips for any video where you are the speaking critic, 3D avatars, and a new beta product where you get to swap faces with a celebrity. Print Customized Products
You might not be asked to star in the next Indiana Jones film but you can put your face under his hat with a face swap. That's the general idea in this section (which is basically the beta face swap option from the earlier section) leading up to the stage where you get to print it on mugs and tees. But the printing isn't free though it may sound cool. If you don't want to part with your pennies, share the finished file on your social networks or simply download it to your computer. Create Cool Profile Pics
We are back to free with this part of the Gizmoz service. Create your own character using provided faces or your own snapped with a webcam or uploaded. You can customize your character by changing the hair, giving it some makeup, accessorizing it or just morphing it into something bizarre. The finished character is yours to download, print or share on social networks like Facebook. Enter the Gizmoz Studio
The process behind all three options takes you into the Gizmoz Studio interface where you mashup your face on the templates provided, add bells 'n whistles like graphics, media clips and voice bits to make the animations talk. Gizmoz gives you many tools to do the job. What's needed is only the face. Making the character talk is also easy using your own recorded voice or taking the help of the site's text to speech engine. The steps to follow for each process are clearly outlined.
The Gizmoz site is designed around one concept – that it should be easy to make your own animated 3D avatars and share it across the web. Making animated reincarnations of your own self is fun, what's better is finding out the ways to entertain your friends through it. I will leave you here now and go make one Clint styled avatar for myself. Always wanted to spout the lines – “Go ahead, make my day!” Will Gizmoz make yours? Discover it 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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| Mandriva Linux 2010 – Perhaps The Best Linux Release All Year Posted: 10 Nov 2009 10:01 AM PST
Although many changes have occurred to the company over the years, and ultimately they’ve lost their crown, Mandriva Linux remains a solid choice in an alternative operating system. IntroductionMandriva is primarily a KDE distro, although they do give GNOME and others almost equal development time. This release features KDE 4.3.2 and GNOME 2.28.1 as well as several lighter choices. Linux 2.6.31.5, Xorg X Server 1.6.5, and GCC 4.4.1 form the foundation underneath. Traditionally, the outstanding features of Mandriva are its installer and system control panel – which are rivaled by few, but this release hopes to offer some amenities to appeal to users of newer trends in technology such as semantic desktop and netbook support.
The Mandriva Linux installer sets the standard in user-friendly Linux installers. They were the first to use a pretty framebuffered graphical interface but perhaps the most useful element was the partitioner. To this day it remains the easiest to use due to the manner of the visual representation of your hard disk layout. Many others have used Mandriva’s installer for inspiration in their designs, but Mandriva’s reigns supreme.
The Mandriva Control Center again was ground breaking at it the time of its unveiling and again, it has few equals to this day. From within the control center a user can perform the whole range of Linux configuration. From hardware to software to kernel to boot to users, it can be found in this handy compact system tool. The Mandriva Software Management system is capable and easy to use as well. It will install software from a aptly stocked software repository, apply package and system updates, as well as removing unwanted software. Packages are categorized by function and can be sorted by their install status, package classification, or by search results. Information such as release data, changelog, and included files can be reviewed for each package. Checking the tick box and clicking apply is all that’s required to install a package or set of packages. The software manager also includes a System Tray applet to check for updates and inform the user of any available. When available the applet icon will will alert the user and upon clicking a window will open listing the updates giving the user the choice of applying them or not. At first boot the user will be asked to configure a remote update and software source, which entails just a few mouse clicks.
Mandriva Linux is available in three basic formats: an installable live CD, a free install DVD, and an all-inclusive commercial PowerPack edition. The installable live CD comes in your choice of KDE or GNOME, your choice of languages, and ships with some convenient proprietary code such as Wi-Fi drivers, 3D graphic drivers, Flash, and some browser plugins. This is the recommended version for most users. Advanced users may wish to use the free install DVD because it provides more desktop environments, several kernels, support for various hardware architectures, and developmental tools; but lacks proprietary drivers, codecs, and Flash. The commercial version has all sorts of extra goodies and is available at Mandriva Store. All Mandriva Linux formats come with a nice set of applications. Web browsers, email clients, office programs, multimedia players, chat and messaging clients, photo and image management and manipulation apps, games, and utilities are found in the menu. The online software repositories contain thousands more waiting to be installed. Mandriva is one of the largest and most complete Linux distributions available. 2010 ImprovementsFor those familiar with Mandriva this release brings some great improvements. The best two so far have been the increased stability and performance. Mandriva may have had a reputation for being a bit crashy in the past, but it appears those days are gone. In the several days since a fresh install only one application crash has occurred here, and this application is known to be unstable across distributions. This new-found stability comes with even better speed as well. Not only does Mandriva boot quicker, but desktop performance has improved noticeably. Applications open and function faster, including the two heavyweights OpenOffice.org and Firefox. There is virtually no graphic artifacting and redraws are immediate. In addition, the 2010 graphics are just beautiful. Some new features include a Live Upgrade for current users which allows them to update to 2010 without doing a fresh install. The installer now features a handy graphical initial partition layout screen before starting the actual partitioner, and the partitioner now has a file browser that lets you look at your current partitions’ data before making any decisions. Most of Mandriva’s original tools have seen lots of improvements in usability and efficiency and Ext4 is now the default filesystem. New guest user allows you to let others use your computer without risking your data. ConclusionThis really is a banner release for Mandriva. It’s been a long time since I could recommend it too much, but it’s moved way up my list with 2010. For new users the complete experience with Mandriva One live CD will convince you better than my words and for loyal users, well, you already know. It might be too soon to say, but it feels like this release will go down as Mandriva’s best ever – and perhaps it just might be the best Linux release of the year. 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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| How to Compile Photos & Videos to Make a DVD With iDVD [Mac] Posted: 10 Nov 2009 08:01 AM PST
Speaking of optical disks, CD and DVD are the most commonly used media by common people nowadays to store their multimedia digital memories. Being a media that supports interactive menus, it’s a bit surprising that most people use DVD only to store the raw data – just a direct copy of the files from the hard drive. Maybe they just don’t know how to make a DVD, or they think that creating DVD interactive menus is not for everybody, “those complicated things are too advanced for my simple brain” they might say. Getting started with iDVDBut compiling pictures and videos to make your own interactive DVD shouldn’t be a daunting task. Apple provides its users with a tool to make a DVD easily. The name is iDVD. I was opening iPhoto to organize my photos and videos taken from my cameras when I saw that there’s iDVD sitting there nearby waiting. Curious, I opened it and found out that the DVD creation process is as simple as using other iLife apps like iWeb and Garageband. When you open iDVD, you’ll get the familiar menu with several start options. As our purpose today is to quickly and easily create an interactive DVD with our personal photos and videos, the suggested choice is “Magic iDVD“.
Then you can browse the media folder to find items that you want to include in the DVD. The materials could be music, pictures and movies. Adding them to the project is just a matter of dragging and dropping.
Hit preview to see what the end result will look like. A preview window will appear, complete with the remote control-like playback interface.
If your project contains a big size of data collection, it might exceed the maximum capacity of the disc and iDVD will give you a pop-up notification.
You could delete some files to reduce the size, or you could try to modify the encoder setting. To do that, open “Project Info” from the “Project” menu (or use Command + Shift + I),
And choose the lower quality setting from the “Encoding” drop down menu.
Click “Start Project” to enter the next stage. Giving the final touchThere are other things that you can adjust from the menu interface. Click the “Menu Info” buttom at the bottom left of the window.
The menu info window will appear. Here you can adjust the loop duration, audio volume, buttons and drop zone. You could also change the background music simply by dragging and dropping any audio file from the hard drive to the audio box.
You’ll see the general folders of the DVD such as Movies, Pictures and Music. The folder and sub folder names could be edited easily by double clicking on it.
While editing the names, a text object setting dialog will appear. You could choose the font type and size here.
The last step is producing the DVD. From the File menu choose “Burn DVD” or hit “Command + R“. You could also save the DVD as an image to store in the hard drive (Shift + Command +R).
Another way to start the DVD burning process is by clicking the “Burn” button at the lower bar of the window next to the “Play” button. The process will stall unless you have a blank DVD ready in the drive.
And all that’s left to do is wait. The time will depend on how big your files are and how strong your Mac is. You could do something else while iDVD handle the necessary steps one by one.
There are a lot of iDVD features still uncovered by this short introduction, but I think it should be enough to start your own DVD project. Have you tried compiling personal movies and pictures into an interactive DVD? Do you know other free alternatives to iDVD? Please share using the comments below. Related posts
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| 2 Safe Ways To Share Your Presentation Slides Online Posted: 10 Nov 2009 06:01 AM PST
Now, sharing presentation slides is a very controversial topic for many different reasons. After all, you will provide all the work you’ve put into developing your presentation for free. But what exactly is it that you’re giving away? Your ideas? Your skill? Your time? Presentations are a work of art. When you share them in an edible format, you are losing control over what you have created. If you don’t want to see your hard work watered down by edits, you should not share your original files. However, you can offer two alternatives. Either share only the figures and images you used in your slides. Or make your presentation slides available in a format that does not allow simple editing. In other words, if someone wants to edit your ideas in a way you don’t approve of, they have to start from scratch and can only draw inspiration from your template. Here are 2 ways and several tools to safely share your presentations online.
1. Share Presentation Slides as PDFYou can export your PowerPoint or Word presentations to PDF. The disadvantage of this method is that you will lose all animations. If that is not an issue, try the following tools. KoolWIREThe easiest and most universal way is to use an online tool such as KoolWIRE. Using it is dead simple. Browse for the file on your computer, choose the output format, i.e. PDF, enter your eMail address, hit start and wait for the download link to be delivered to your inbox. When I tried it, it took less than a minute and in less than 5 minutes I had my PDF.
File SavrNow you will want to share the file. Let’s say you don’t have a website or server of your own. Also, you probably don’t want to eMail a huge file every time someone asks for it. Fortunately, the web has a simple solution in store. There are many free online tools that let you share your files through the web and you don’t even have to sign up for the service. File Savr is just one of many. You can upload files of up to 10GB, more than enough for a PDF file. Simply select the file you wish to upload. Once uploading has completed, File Savr will display the download page for the file. Save the URL and share it with people interested in your presentation. A CAPTCHA test must be passed before the file can actually be download.
I have previously reviewed 5 Easy Websites to Share Files Online Without Signing Up. PDF HammerIf someone would like to use parts of your work, they could prepare a PDF presentation and, using a PDF editor, merge individual presentation slides from different sources.
Along with KoolWIRE it was reviewed in Aibek’s post about Simplest PDF Apps Ever: Merge PDFs, PDF to DOC, Convert to PDF. 2. Share as Web PresentationYou can upload and share your presentation through an online service. While this preserves the original design of your slides, including animations, single slides can not be extracted and re-used in another medium. If this is what you desire, go ahead and give SlideBoom a try. SlideBoomYou can use SlideBoom as a guest. However, presentations will only remain online for 7 days. To use SlideBoom to its full potential, you should register. There is a free version, which allows you to upload up to 100 presentations. It supports animations, add-ins, audio, video, groups, graphical annotations and blog or website embedding.
SlideBoom creates a summary page for your presentation, which includes the actual presentation, your notes, a transcript, and optional sharing options. Members can vote on you presentations and download them if the owner has unlocked this option. Below is a demonstration of an embedded presentation. If you would like to improve your presentation skills, check out my post on 10 Powerpoint Tips for Preparing a Professional Presentation. Do you feel comfortable with sharing your presentation slides? Image credits: duchessa 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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If you were to ask someone what makes Gmail different from other free email providers, what would they tell you? I suspect some would suggest that they use Gmail because it is constantly evolving and improving – becoming more than just email for many people.
“Allows you to reorder the items in your navbar using drag and drop."
"Displays Google search results inside your mail window, letting you quickly find things and use them when you’re writing an email."
This is another feature that most people tend to overlook. Once enabled, this extension appears as a small, unobtrusive Google Search box in the Gmail sidebar on the left. Searches in that box return results in a nice chatbox-style area at the bottom of the window.
"Allows you to send and receive text messages (SMS) in Chat."
"Soothes the soul by putting the familiar beta sticker back on the Gmail logo"
The character that welcomed me on the homepage of Gizmoz hardly looked handsome. It was more of a cartoon Hulk in his pre-teens. Is that how I will turn out when I put my face through the Gizmoz web app? I wouldn't mind the muscles, though the face preferably should be my own.
You can’t turn back time. That’s why memories are our precious treasures. Throughout history, humans have tried many methods to preserve precious fragments of the past; from passing on tales, carving symbols, building monuments, drawing paintings, printing photos, up to the latest method of saving digital files to hard drives and optical disks.
When you’re in the formidable position to give public presentations, you may be approached by people with a request to share your presentation slides. Seriously, that is an honor. Apparently they enjoyed your talk, recognized your skill, and appreciated your efforts.
One free online tool to edit PDFs is 
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