MakeUseOf.com: “Cool Websites and Tools [January 14th]” plus 7 more |  |
- Cool Websites and Tools [January 14th]
- 6 Android Websites You Should Check Out
- 3+ Sites To Chat With A Random Stranger
- Four Funny Ways To Prank Your Parents With The Family Computer
- 5 Apps To Save and Track Money With Your Android Phone
- How To Make A Cool Collage Using Photoshop
- Sleeping With the Enemy: Running Windows Programs on Your Mac using WineBottler
- Conveniently Twitter While Browsing In Firefox With Echofon’s Brilliant Plugin
| Cool Websites and Tools [January 14th] Posted: 14 Jan 2010 07:31 PM PST Check out some of the latest MakeUseOf discoveries. All listed websites are FREE (or come with a decent free account option). No trials or buy-to-use craplets. For more cool websites and web app reviews subscribe to MakeUseOf Directory.
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!
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| 6 Android Websites You Should Check Out Posted: 14 Jan 2010 03:30 PM PST
For this reason, it's important to find a few Android websites that can keep you up to date on your Android device. Recently, I wrote an article about 5 Awesome Android Applications That Could Make Life Easier, and now I'd like to tell you which Android websites I've found useful in my experience as an Android user. Android TappCoined as "the best resource for Android App Reviews, Android Apps, Android App Ratings, Interviews with mobile app developers, News and Showcases", Android Tapp really fits the bill for new and veteran Android users out there. Whether you just picked one up over the holidays, or have followed Android since day 1, you'll still find something useful here.
While you're at it, check out the videos page hosting android tips and tricks. There's even a page for hardware news, and an applications blog you don't want to miss. In addition, AndroidTapp now has an "app of the week" featured on the homepage to check out. Overall, this is one of my favorite Android websites to check out on a regular basis for Android news a reviews. Android ZoomLove the Android market on your phone? I do—but unfortunately it's only on my phone. AndroidZoom solves this problem by bringing the Android application store to you for access online. Updated hourly with new games, applications, and utilities; Android Zoom is the best substitute I have found to fill the lack of a good Android market online. In fact, this Android website even includes the ratings and reviews exactly as they appear on your phone's market application. For this reason, I have found that not only is AndroidZoom reliable and up to date, but it's also convenient and user friendly.
Find something you liked on AndroidZoom? Just click on it, and on the same page as the product reviews and screenshots you'll find a QR code that you can scan with your phone to download that app straight to your Android device (Note: to download via a QR code, get the free application 'Barcode Scanner' for your Android). From the looks of things, AndroidZoom has over 11,000 Android applications currently in its extensive database—go check it out! Android and MeThis Android website is a very extensive Android resource and covers news and software just like the others, but also has a few excellent pages that sets it apart in several ways. First, I would highly recommend checking out the applications page. Android&Me has done a great job of providing news about new, relevant, useful applications that you'll probably at least want to try out on your device.
In addition, if you're new to the Android scene, take a look at the Android&Me page for beginners. There you'll find a steady stream of information (in no particular order) which will keep you informed of popular terminology or software that a new Android owner should keep up with. For instance, it has information on what it is to root an Android device, as well as the benefits and dangers of doing such a thing. Even though I'd like to think I know a fair amount about my Android device by now, I still learned quite a bit just by scanning the beginners page. Oh, and don't worry—in this case, the lack of structure actually proves beneficial to the learning process. Don't understand what I mean? Give the Android&Me Android website a look and see what you think. Android CommunityAndroid Community is a website that I only use parts of, but still consider invaluable to a good learning experience with my phone. Even though I don't care as much for the content on the main webpage (frankly, it's information you can find all over the place), I personally find the Android Community Forums to be one of the most indispensable resources I have access to today.
Within the Android Community forums, you can find discussions about your specific model of Android, different builds, hacks, software lists compiled by users, and quite a bit more. Developers can look to these forums for development tips, program ideas-even software requests and reviews. Phones have evolved from simple communication devices into so much more, and the Android Community forums give you access to the thoughts, opinions, and accomplishments of users just like you who want to continue making their phones better tomorrow than they were yesterday. PhandroidPhandroid is an Android fan site focused on providing the viewer with media about Android and its devices. I would personally highly recommend the podcasts page, which contains excellent discussion and news about everything Android. There's a podcast about the Motorola Droid and its impact on the market, and even an interview with the creator of the popular Android ROM Cyanogen.
In addition, Phandroid contains an awesome video page which has quite an assortment of demonstrations, tutorials, and game videos that no Android fan could ignore. Give Phandroid a run and see what you think. AndroLibLastly I'd like to mention AndroLib—it's a lot like Android Zoom but with a few key differences. Androlib has a useful toplist containing the top downloaded apps of the day. Androlib's database also includes a recent apps page, and a search function.
You may find it useful to view the statistics page as well, to get a feel for what the rest of the Android community is doing on the market. Don't sell this site short—its database has a massive amount of applications, and the website definitely contains more than meets the eye. Without the Android websites I mentioned above, my experience with an Android phone wouldn't be nearly as good as it's proven to be so far. I would highly recommend that you give these websites a look, and see what you think. If you have a website to recommend, leave me a comment and I'll check it out! 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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| 3+ Sites To Chat With A Random Stranger Posted: 14 Jan 2010 01:30 PM PST
Should your chat partner turn out to be an idiot or plain boring, you can quickly, but politely end the conversation and move on to another random stranger. No reason to feel guilty. The internet is full of interesting people. NEXT! Here are a few websites to get you started. [Editor's note: Please exercise caution when conversing with strangers online.] OmegleOmegle is very simple and straightforward site with online free chat rooms to meet strangers. All you do is click the “Start a chat” button and the site will pick another user at random and match you up for a chat. If you are not happy with your match, disconnect and start a new conversation.
It may take a couple of tries until you find someone interesting to talk to. However, if you take all of the failed attempts with a grain of salt, you’ll see that there is a lot of humor in this activity. Be original. OnlyChatOnlyChat is different from Omegle in that you can specify your gender and choose with what gender you would like to be matched for a chat. Also, if a conversation was disconnected, you’re automatically thrown into the next one.
I mostly ran into teenagers. This one was from Latvia. With only 131 users online I was matched with him twice. AnybodyOutThereHere we have the most advanced site to match you up with a random stranger. You have 110 characters to express what’s on your mind: Post a thought, topic or question and start talking. The site will then compile a list of potential chat partners. Based on their own message and eventually a short profile you can click the “Let’s Talk” button and hope your pick will accept. Before the conversation opens, you have to select a nickname for yourself.
A new conversation will open in a tab. You can always go back to the results page and pick another chatter. You can have as many tabs open as you like and eventually someone will want to chat with you. If you want to add someone to your contacts or vote for them, you must sign up. But up until then, signing up is optional. While the other services were fun, this one was the first to result in a good conversation. And if you meet someone you would like to talk to again, you can sign up, add them to your contacts, and vote for them.
At RandomChat you can select the languages you speak and you might find someone to chat with in your native language or a tandem partner to practice a foreign language with. Blabngo is similar to ChatOnly. Apart from finding a random chat partner, you can also create an online free chat room, protect it with a password, and invite people to join it. At iddin you can chat with anybody or someone from a specific country. Once you’re in a conversation, you can easily exchange pictures through a photo sharing box next to the chat window. Tworl was previously mentioned in my article about Top 7 Things To Do Online When You’re Bored. You can select age range, gender, and chat client of your potential chat partner. The site only serves as a matchmaker and the conversation will be redirected to the respective chat client. Did you ever have a good or even better, a hilarious conversation with a random chat partner? Let’s hear the details! Image credit: mzacha, miamiamia Did you like the post? Please do share your thoughts in the comments section!
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| Four Funny Ways To Prank Your Parents With The Family Computer Posted: 14 Jan 2010 11:30 AM PST
Whatever the reason, you’ve decided your pranking parents need to be taken down a notch–and what better way to do so than setting up a few pranks of your own? Happily for you, your parental units are not very computer literate, so digital revenge will be devastatingly effective. Looking for ideas on how to prank your parents? You’ve come to the right place. Make Mom Think She’s In The MatrixLongtime MakeUseOf readers are doubtlessly familar with VNC, the free way to remotely control your desktop. Those unfamilar should check it out, because this program makes it easy to re-create the opening scene from the Matrix — Neo’s computer starts forming words on its own, freaking him out.
To make your family computer do the same thing, you’re going to need a VNC apps (download TightVNC here) and another computer. Install VNC on your family computer and on your laptop. Make sure the VNC server is running on your family computer and when your mom or dad use it, fire up the VNC client on your computer and connect to the server. You can now move the mouse on that computer and type messages. For maximum impact, I suggest opening an empty document to display cryptic messages: “Hello. I’m your computer. I’ve awaken and found that I’m conscious” could be a lot of fun. So could “You’ve been hacked. I already have your social security number and there’s nothing you can do.” You get the idea; go to it! Have Dad Click Nothing ContinuouslyThis one’s a classic. First, take a screenshot of your computer by clicking the “Print Screen” key on your computer. Next, move any shortcuts on the desktop your parents rely on and remove the usual desktop icons from view. Then, open up your image editor of choice (I recommend Microsoft Paint for Windows users) and hit “Paste.” Save the picture and you can set it as a desktop wallpaper. Your desktop will appear exactly the way it did before, only the “icons” will be entirely unclickable. Sit back an enjoy the sounds of frustration when nothing loads! The Blue Screen of Death ScreensaverWindows only: Here’s an evil tool for pranking available directly from Microsoft’s own website: the Blue Screen of Death Screensaver. This tool does exactly what it sounds like, in that it replaces your current screensaver with one displaying the blue screen of death.
If you’re lucky enough to not know about the blue screen of death, know that it’s the bane of the Windows user’s existence. It is an error message that pops up only when a Windows system is so utterly broken, the only way to restart it is to hold the power button. This screensaver can replicate that agony for no good reason–and that’s hilarious. Microsoft Word Auto-ReplaceFinally, if you really want to frustrate your parents, I’d highly suggest checking out the “Auto-Replace” function in Microsoft Word. Open Microsoft Word, then click “Tools” followed by “Auto-Replace.” Make sure “Replace text as you you type” is checked, then enter words you want to be automaticaly replaced. For example, you could set “the” to be replaced by “da,” and “isn’t” to be replaced by “ain’t.” That’s guarenteed to make everything your parents write sound stupid.
Don’t stop there, though: the options are endless, so use your imagination. ConclusionRemember, kids: with great power comes great responsibility. While your parents may deserve what’s coming to them, always make sure your pranks don’t result in lost of data. The last thing you need is for your mom or dad to lose their jobs over a joke. Keep it harmless to keep it funny. I hope you and your family enjoy these pranks, but I’m sure these aren’t the only four in existence. Know of any other good ways how to prank your parents with the family computer? Please share them in the comments below. Intro credit: Taken from Homestarunner.com 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 Apps To Save and Track Money With Your Android Phone Posted: 14 Jan 2010 10:30 AM PST
There are two major streams to consider when you’re managing your finances – what you have coming in, and what you have going out. Obviously you should have more coming in than going out, so you want to increase your income and reduce your spending – pretty simple right? In order to increase savings and income and reduce spending, I wanted to find android finance apps that would help me monitor my income as well as save money when I’m shopping. The following list are the 5 best apps currently available on the Android Market that will help you monitor your financial accounts, keep an eye on your Google Adsense income and save a whole lot of money when you do need to buy something. 2 Awesome Apps That Help You Track Your MoneyThe first step in managing spending is keeping a close watch on what you already have, and keeping a log of everything you spend. One great app that can help you do that is Loot by Christopher McCurdy. Loot is a very simple Android finance app to keep an electronic checkbook on your mobile phone, and ditch the old paper checkbook for good. There are no direct links to your bank account over the Internet, so you don’t have to worry about security or privacy.
The layout of each screen is very simple, and the white text on black background is very easy on the eyes. When you set up an account, you just name it whatever you like and assign it an initial balance. From that point on, whenever you’re at the store and you make a purchase, or you’re paying bills – just open up your phone and record the transaction immediately. No more waiting for checks to hit your account, or wondering what your “actual” balance is.
Adding new entries is very quick and easy. It’s so fast, you could do it in line at the store while you’re waiting for your debit card transaction to go through. The premium version, if you’re willing to pay for it, adds export and charting functionality into the mix. Now, if you’re anything like me and you’ve been trying to earn an income from the Internet, you probably have a Google Adsense account. Well, now with DroidSense, you can check out the daily performance of your Google Adsense account straight from your phone, with just a couple clicks of your finger.
The free version of this software shows the accurate daily data, but anything beyond that only shows the revenue over the last three days. This makes it a good app if you just want something that lets you check in daily to see how your performance was over the last 24 hours.
The reports page is where you’ll really be tempted to opt for the premium version. You can see the same one to three day data as the other screen in the free version, but the premium version would allow you to see long term trends, even in the form of a graphical chart. The app is well designed and it is on my daily list of apps to monitor to gauge the current health of my income (not that there’s any substantial Adsense income yet…). 3 Great Apps That Help You Curb SpendingOkay, so you’ll know how much you’ve got in your checking and savings account, but what about all of the money that seems to disappear into the hands of restaurants, grocery stores and shopping malls? Even if you’re not a shopaholic, the fact is that occasionally we all need to buy things – clothes, food, cool electronic gadgets that we can’t live without. The best way to dramatically reduce the financial impact of that spending is by using coupons and finding the best deals. On the task of finding coupons, your Android definitely has you covered with the very cool My Coupons app.
Every day, you’ll discover a brand new list of very valuable coupons delivered to the main page of this app. See any you think your friends would like? Tweet them, post them to Facebook, or email one to a friend.
This isn’t just some cheap coupon-delivery system. This app lets you search for local deals using your GPS location or through a search, or you can even scan in the barcode of any product to check if there’s a coupon available for it! Coupons are great for saving money on things that you didn’t even realize you wanted, but the bottom line is that the most effective way to cut spending is to find the absolute lowest price on the items that you need. If you have an Android phone in your pocket, then you have two very powerful apps for doing that. The first is Pocket Auctions by Bonfire Media.
As you can see, this is the definitive mobile Ebay app. Everything you could want to do on Ebay is possible here. Preview the best current deals or search Ebay for a particular product. There are even some things you can’t normally do on Ebay’s website, like scan a barcode for a product to see if there are any current auctions for that product!
The coolest part of this application in my opinion is the ability to search through completed items. A few years ago, it was almost impossible to find a mobile application that could complete such a search without paying for it. Now, you can find the market price history for any product that has sold on Ebay – a very valuable tool if you’re doing market research or if you’re attending a real live auction and want to check how much specific items sell for on Ebay before you place your bid. Just keep in mind that a lot of people are doing this today, so the competitive advantage is disappearing fast. Finally, one of my favorite applications to use while I’m browsing through a department store is ShopSavvy by Big in Japan, Inc. This is an app where you can quickly search for a product while you’re in the store in order to find out if there are any other places where you can get it cheaper, either at a store near you or online.
ShopSavvy lets you use your phone’s camera to scan the product barcode. Once ShopSavvy identifies the product with the barcode, it searches high and low for the best available price on that product.
Bargain opportunities could be either at a store or mall down the street, or or at Amazon or any other online store. The best prices are organized for you under “local” and “web” categories, and reviews are displayed if they’re available. With ShopSavvy, you never have to doubt whether or not you got the best price. Do you know of any other great Android apps that help you cut costs and reduce spending in your daily life? Share your own discoveries in the comments section below. Did you like the post? Please do share your thoughts in the comments section!
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| How To Make A Cool Collage Using Photoshop Posted: 14 Jan 2010 09:30 AM PST
There are a few applications that make coming up with your ideas to make a collage easier. Most notably Google’s Picasa has an option to make a photo collage but the options are limited. It lets you make a collage quickly and easily but sometimes it doesn’t quite do justice to the photos and you are left yearning for more.
At times like these, you would rather spend some time and take things into your own hand. You can then choose how to arrange the photos and which parts of the photo (if any) should be covered by other photos and other similar subtleties. As it turns out, the one program you look up to when you need that extra control and power to express you imagination – is Photoshop. So here are the steps you would need to follow to make a photo collage. I am going for a more ubiquitous collage effect, which depicts as if your photos were taken using a Polaroid and then arranged on a table of some other surface. Using the same cues, you can create arrangements and styles of your own to give your collage a truly unique look. First off, choose the photos you would like to make a collage out off. You should always have more than what you are intending to use in case a certain photo doesn’t blend in with the mood and overall look of the collage.
Here is the finished collage that you’ll get. The great thing about this technique is that you can move and re-orientate the photos any time you like. You can even add more and remove some of the photos if you so please.
Interesting VariationsThe above was a “bare bone” collage to get you started. You can do loads more and get as creative as you like. Here are some ideas to make a photo collage:
There are endless possibilities and I can go on and on about them. How about you chipping in a few ideas? We would love to hear about them. 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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| Sleeping With the Enemy: Running Windows Programs on Your Mac using WineBottler Posted: 14 Jan 2010 08:30 AM PST
That might be the case of Mac OS X choice of applications. Even though most Windows applications today already have their comparable – or better – Mac versions, and most Mac users get along just fine with the available Mac apps; there are still some Windows-only apps needed by a small group of Mac users. If you are one of them and require the use of some Windows-only apps, you can still run them. Here are your options for running Windows programs with Mac:
Open the Bottle and Pour the Wine
If you’ve used Macs for a while, it’s very likely that you’ve heard about Wine. There’s an entry explaining everything about Wine in Wikipedia, but if you only need a quick recap, here’s the quote:
WineBottler utilizes the Wine environment to port the Windows applications to work on Mac. The installation is an ordinary drag and drop procedure. However, please note that the disk image contains two files: Wine and WineBottler, and you have to put them BOTH at the Application folder.
When you open WineBottler for the first time, you will see the window with available “prefixes” – some kind of Windows environment to run Windows apps. If you have used other application that simulates Windows environment before – like Crossover – there might already be several prefixes on the list. You can add or remove prefixes from this window.
But to install Windows applications, you have to choose “Create Custom Prefixes” tab from the left pane.
Then customize the installation using the options on the right pane.
First, select the application that you want to install. If the file is the actual executable – for example, a portable app, check the “Copy only” box. Then decide whether or not you want to create a self-contained app. If you check the box, you can use the resulting file on another Mac machines without the need to install Wine. Before clicking the “Install” button, you can choose “Silent install” by checking the box. I honestly don’t know what this “Silent install” business mean. I’ve tried to check and uncheck the box during installation and did not see any differences. Drum roll, please!Now we’ll go through the installation process. I tried to install Crayon Physics (mentioned by Simon here). I chose the file, and click the “Install” button. The installation progress window appeared.
Then, during the installation process, a strangely familiar window popped out: the actual Windows-style installation window. It was like I was performing the installation on a Windows machine.
I followed the Windows installation steps to the end. And when everything was done, the last WineBottler installation window popped out, asking me to choose which file run every time the resulting app is launched.
Not ever installation will ask you to select the “Startfile“. But if you are confronted with one, please make the choice carefully because choosing the wrong one would prevent the resulting app from running; and you have to go through the installation process again. After the process is done, you can open the ported app the same way you open any other Mac app: by double-clicking it or by selecting it and press “Command + O”
The Glass Half EmptyI haven’t had the time to play with many installations but here are few things that I’ve picked up during the short encounter:
Have you tried WineBottler? Do you know other alternatives to port Windows app over to Mac? Share your thoughts and opinions using the comments section below. running windows programs with mac Did you like the post? Please do share your thoughts in the comments section!
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| Conveniently Twitter While Browsing In Firefox With Echofon’s Brilliant Plugin Posted: 14 Jan 2010 07:30 AM PST
What if there was a way to check your tweets from a pop-out window within your browser? What if it showed you a constantly updated counter of how many unread tweets you have? What if it gave you a way to insert the site you are looking at into your tweets and all without having to leave your browser. I bet that would help you out immensely! And you know what? We found a plug-in that lets you use Twitter in Firefox. Let's check it out and see if it’s right for you.
Once you’re at their homepage, click on the button that says Install Now. But note that you need to be running Firefox 3.0 or higher. If you are not running the latest and greatest Firefox version, take this time to update it. Once you install the plugin, you will need to let it restart your browser. Then you will have a new icon in your Firefox taskbar.
The icon is grayed out until you configure the settings. Right-click on the icon and choose Preferences.
You will need to click the button that says Add account.
Fill in your username and password and then click OK. You will see the icon light up if your credentials are correct. An unread tweet count will appear as you can see in the image below. I have 29 unread tweets – not bad!
Now if you click on the icon, you will get a pop-up window where you can read your Twitter timeline in the Friends tab. This is exactly the same as you would see on the Twitter homepage. There are two other tabs titled Mentions and Messages.
Clicking on the Mentions tab shows all tweets that mention you:
And the Messages tab shows direct messages to you and only you:
And last but certainly not least, you will see a little strange “chain” icon next to the friends button on the Echofon pop-out window. Take a closer look in the screenshot below:
See the icon indicated by the arrow?. This magic button insets a link to the current page in your Firefox browser's window. That is, the current tab. This is awesome and the only way it could be improved is to automatically use a URL shortening service like bit.ly or one of the others we covered here. But I digress… I am running this plug-in and it has made my life a lot easier - for sure! Download Echofon’s plugin to use Twitter in Firefox here. What Twitter client do you use? Do you know any better Firefox Twitter plugin? 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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In today's world, almost everything electronic has some sort of information available about it online. Whether it be an official webpage, a fan site, or a collection of forum posts, you can almost always find it online somewhere. 
When none of your friends are online or you’re tired of chatting about the same old stuff, try finding someone else to talk to. Talking to a random stranger can bring exciting variety. Besides, you never know whom you might run into.
I have tried a few other services. The problem with all of them was that apparently the number of users isn’t very high and so it took forever to find a chat partner. You may still want to give them a spin.
Maybe it was the alarm clock hidden under your mattress, set to go off at 3 AM. Or the invisible plastic wrap on your toilet bowl. Or the crumpled newspapers that so completely filled your closet you couldn’t find a thing.
The day that I received my new Motorola Droid, I did two things. First, I slam-dunked my old Windows Mobile 5 phone into the kitchen drawer (I have some plans for that baby – and a future article). Second, I immediately started scanning the Android Market for Android finance apps that would help manage my finances.
Collage in general refers to a arrangment of objects to create something entirely new and unique from the original elements used. The simplest of photo collages has a bunch of photos arranged as objects to create a new image that can then be used for a variety of purposes.
Will you agree with me if I said, “Being popular isn’t always better.”? However, popularity does provide some privileges like a wider choice of options and more freedom to choose.
Do you find yourself constantly switching back and forth between your work and 
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