MakeUseOf.com: “Share The Interesting Conversations You Have Via Text Message With Bnter” plus 12 more |  |
- Share The Interesting Conversations You Have Via Text Message With Bnter
- Latest Hilarious Picks [MakeUseOf Geeky Fun]
- Cool Websites and Tools [November 30th]
- The 10 Toughest Tech Questions [MakeUseOf Answers]
- 2 Dead Simple Ways To Start Your Own Email Newsletter
- 4 Tips To Help You Fix The Windows Blue Screen Error
- How To Properly Close Your Facebook Account
- Hot Tech Deals [Nov 30th]
- 8 Online Programming Contests That You Can Challenge Yourself To Win
- How To Create An Interactive Quiz Using Powerpoint Masters
- 4 Great Places To Find Free Beautiful Photo Desktop Wallpapers
- 5 Cool Ways To Customize Your Windows 7 System
- The 3 Best Sites For Reliable Anti-Virus Software Reviews
| Share The Interesting Conversations You Have Via Text Message With Bnter Posted: 01 Dec 2010 07:31 AM PST
Bnter, pronounced ‘banter’, changes all that. Bnter lets you look through your text conversations, pick the most interesting parts, and publish them on a personal profile page for all your friends to see. It’s simple, free, and provides an amusing platform for you and your friends to interact with one another. In this article, I’ll show you how Bnter works, highlighting some of the website’s most appealing features. Who’s Behind Bnter?Bnter was created by Lauren Leto and Patrick Moberg. Lauren is also one of the co-founders of Texts From Last Night, which is similar in concept to Bnter. The difference is that Texts From Last Night lets you anonymously share single messages that are then picked and displayed publicly for everyone’s amusement. While it’s a pretty entertaining idea, Bnter (directory app) is more focused on sharing conversations and learning about the lives of your friends and others you meet on the site. It helps build community, which I think makes it an attractive platform for your text messages. How Does It Work?
To start using Bnter, the first thing you’ll want to do is head over to their homepage and sign up. Then, you can fill out some information you would like to be displayed on your profile page and locate your friends via Facebook and Twitter.
Once you’re all set, you can really start using Bnter. Click on Post A Conversation and you’ll be taken to a page where you can enter the information from your conversation. You can select who the conversation took place with, enter the back and forth “banter”, and write in tags to describe the conversation for easy searching later on. When you’re done, you can choose to post it to your Facebook, Twitter, or Tumblr account. What Else Can You Do?Bnter limits how long your conversation thread can be to highlight the most meaningful parts. The tagging feature allows you to categorize your conversations and clicking on tags lets you search the feed to find similar conversations.
Your friends will be able to follow you and comment on the text conversations you share. If a text is between yourself and another user, you can attribute them. Also, check your mentions to see conversations attributed to yourself.
Finally, you have the ability to repost posts that interest you. You can edit the tags to add your own voice, which is similar to how reposting works on Tumblr. ConclusionNow that you know how it works, you can invite your friends to come join in the fun and share their best conversations with you. All those great text messages you sent and received now have a place to live and entertain others, instead of being lost forever inside your phone. What do you think of Bnter? Do you have epic SMS conversations with your friends that you would like to share? NEW: Download MakeUseOf iPhone App. FREE!
    
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| Latest Hilarious Picks [MakeUseOf Geeky Fun] Posted: 01 Dec 2010 05:04 AM PST
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.
Do you like MakeUseOf articles? Don’t forget to share our articles with others! It’s really important to us.
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| Cool Websites and Tools [November 30th] Posted: 30 Nov 2010 07:31 PM PST
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. Follow MakeUseOf on Twitter. Includes cool extras.
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| The 10 Toughest Tech Questions [MakeUseOf Answers] Posted: 30 Nov 2010 06:31 PM PST
Not only do we need your help when resolving our toughest questions, sometimes we also ask for your input, so that we can improve MakeUseOf and provide a better service. If you would like to drop some feedback regarding our PDF Guides, head on over to the following questions and chip in: Which free PDF Guide would you like to see published on MakeUseOf? And while we work on your requests, you have the chance to win cash or an Amazon voucher in our Best Answer of the Week contest. All comments qualify automatically. Maybe you have the answer to one of these questions:
MakeUseOf Answers can help you to lose weight! Or at least you won’t think of food when distracted by Latest Questions, Most Popular Questions, or Unanswered Questions. For regular updates subscribe to the Answers RSS Feed. Need help? Ask A Question at MakeUseOf Answers. Follow MakeUseOf on Twitter. Includes cool extras.
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| 2 Dead Simple Ways To Start Your Own Email Newsletter Posted: 30 Nov 2010 05:31 PM PST
In this article, I’ll show you two extremely simple services that let you create your own newsletter and set the price you’d like to charge people to subscribe to it. Whether you want others to access what you know for free or not, you can get it done easily. Do you know enough about something that people would want to pay for that information? Why Would I Want An Email Newsletter?As I alluded to, a newsletter is a way for you to show off your expertise. If you’re an expert in sports, start a sports newsletter. If you’re funny, start a comedy newsletter. It’s another opportunity for you to display your knowledge in a given area. If you write a blog, a newsletter can complement your content. Tell your community to sign up for your newsletter for “added bonuses” or “best tips”. If you aren’t already creating content, a simple email newsletter can be a great place to start. Letter.ly
Letter.ly is the first service I would like to talk about. It’s a service that allows you to create a very basic newsletter and is very easy to use. The first thing you do is go to the Letter.ly homepage and click sign up. Once you do that, you’ll be prompted for information (name, email, password) to create your account.
On the next page, just fill out some information about your newsletter, such as its name, the URL you would like to associate with it, and the cost you would like to charge users to subscribe. Click Done!, and the signup process is complete. Don’t worry if you aren’t quite sure what type of newsletter you want to create, the information you submit can always be changed later.
[Note]: With Letter.ly, the minimum you can charge for your newsletter is $0.10. If you want to give away subscriptions to friends/supporters, you can enter their email addresses into your dashboard and they will get free copies. After you have everything straightened around, start sharing your newsletter link with people and creating content. Payments are made through Amazon and you can publish letters as often as you want. You will even be given a secret email address that you can send content to in order to create a letter. Other features include the ability for subscribers to reply to your letters to privately comment back to you, set up auto-publishing to your Facebook and Twitter accounts, and ability to unsubscribe whoever you choose. TinyLetterTinyLetter offers the same concept, but is different in its approach.
To get started, head over to the homepage, enter your desired username, and click Continue. Then, like Letter.ly, you’ll be prompted for information about your account credentials and newsletter settings.
Here’s where the two services differ a bit. With TinyLetter, you can be a bit more creative with your newsletter. Click on the Design and settings link on your dashboard and you’ll be taken to a page where you can make customizations. You can select a background image, choose where the subscription box goes, pick an email address background, and enter a YouTube embed code.
You can see your list of subscribers and old email newsletters at any time. [Note]: By default, newsletters you create with TinyLetter will be free to subscribe to. If you would like to create a paid newsletter, you can do so by signing up here. ConclusionAs you can see, both of these services are really very similar. Letter.ly seems to be more stripped down and business-oriented, which keeps it simple for you in its minimalistic style, while TinyLetter has more of a fun factor that could be better suited for the creative at heart. It’s really personal preference when deciding which one to use. Now that you know how it works, you can begin serving up content to the public. If you’re into the whole newsletter idea, check out some of the other services we’ve covered. Will you be starting your own email newsletter? What will yours be about? Image Credit: sita ram Got Questions? Ask Them Now FREE on MakeUseOf Answers!
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| 4 Tips To Help You Fix The Windows Blue Screen Error Posted: 30 Nov 2010 03:31 PM PST
Well, I’m here to walk you through a few steps you can take to troubleshoot your computer whenever you experience this blue screen error. Sometimes, the problem isn’t quite as serious or complicated as people think. It could be as simple as the fact that some hardware you installed created a conflict. Maybe a virus messed up the registry. Or maybe a driver file is corrupt. I’m going to show you how you can check for the most common issues that cause this error. Boot In Safe ModeThe first thing to do when you get the blue screen is to power down the computer. When you boot it back up, press the F8 key before the Windows screen appears. This will boot the computer into the Advanced Options screen where you can choose advanced boot options. Press the down arrow until “Safe Mode with Networking” is enabled and press enter. If you believe that you’re dealing with a virus that instantly connects to the Internet when you boot your computer, then go with just “Safe Mode” instead.
Keep a close eye on the screen after you press enter. The screen will scroll through each driver as it loads each one individually into memory. Many times, you’ll see the screen pause for a very long time at one of the .sys files before the boot fails and returns an error. Make note of the last file it was trying to load before it failed. Do a Google search (on another computer obviously) to determine what driver is failing and try reinstalling that driver.
If there are no driver problems, then determine whether there are any hardware conflicts by going into the Control Panel, clicking on System, and then Device Manager. Go through each device category and scan all of the devices for the telltale yellow accent icon that indicates there’s a device conflict. If you do see that icon, open up the driver and you’ll see a message box that reveals where the conflict is taking place. If you can’t find any device conflicts, move on to the next step – scanning your entire system.
Run Spyware, Adware, Virus & Registry ScansWhile you’re in safe mode, perform all of your spyware, adware and virus scans. This is the best time to run these apps because any viruses that try to disable them in normal mode will likely be disabled at this point. I love Malwarebytes, which Jimmy reviewed here at MUO before. Also run your virus scan software. If you don’t have one, you really should get one. Check out Justin’s list of the top 10 free anti-virus software apps available. Install one and do a full scan.
Another very useful scan to run is to check for any odd Registry entries or problems. A great open source app that can check your registry for any known problems is the Little Registry Cleaner which comes highly recommended by most users.
If you’ve tried everything up to this point and can’t seem to find any problems, don’t despair. We’ve got a couple more tricks up our sleeve. Things To Try As A Last ResortGo ahead and reboot your computer and press the F8 key again. This time, instead of booting into safe mode, select “Last Known Good Configuration“. This will revert to booting Windows using the last configuration where a successful boot took place. Many times this will resolve the issue without any further troubleshooting.
If that doesn’t work, reboot again into F8 mode and try selecting “Enable Boot Logging“. This boots Windows and logs every little detail of the boot-up into a file called “ntbtlog.txt” in the root directory, usually c:/Windows.
Open up the text file and scan through it to see exactly what’s loading and when it’s loading. It’s quite possible that something obvious will jump right out at you. If you identify anything loading that you didn’t want to load, try uninstalling and see if it fixes the problem.
Last but not least, you always have the option to do a system restore. Just go to the Control Panel, System and Security, Backup and Restore, and select “Recover System Settings for your Computer“.
Choose a valid restore point from the list and follow the instructions. Usually doing a system restore back to a date where your computer was running fine will resolve the blue screen error. Finally, if even a restore doesn’t seem to resolve the issue, you could be looking at a bad hard disk. If that’s the case, follow Guy’s instructions to do a Check Disk. The solution may be to buy a new hard drive. Have you ever had the blue screen of death? Were you able to figure your way out of it? Share your own experiences in the comments section below. Image credit: stevenafc Hey Facebookers, make sure to check out MakeUseOf page on Facebook. Over 24,000 fans already!
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| How To Properly Close Your Facebook Account Posted: 30 Nov 2010 01:31 PM PST
There are a number of really good reasons a person may have to close their Facebook account. Maybe you have privacy concerns or maybe you just don’t like to think about who Facebook has given your information to. Whatever your reason for wanting to delete your account, you need to make sure you do it right – and there’s more than just one trick to it. Back Up Your DataBefore you close your Facebook account, think about backing up your entire Facebook history. You never know what you might need in the future. Trial DeactivationIf you’re not sure about deleting your Facebook account, you can deactivate your account instead (Accounts > Settings > Deactivate Account).
Deactivation leaves everything intact: friends, photos, information, etc. In fact, while deactivated, your friends can still invite you to events and you can still receive notifications. In essence, all deactivating does is hide your profile page for a while. Deactivating is not deleting your Facebook account. If You Are Ultra-ParanoidYour reasons for deleting your account will determine how fastidious you want to be about the deletion process. If you’re really paranoid, begin by deleting all your data on Facebook bit by bit. This means you need to delete your account information, interests, photos, updates, messages, applications, notes, links, friend links, groups, fan pages… EVERYTHING.
There is one very good reason for doing this: When Facebook deletes your account, the photos aren’t really deleted. They’re de-linked from your account. Which means they’re still there, but no-one can match them up to you. Deleting photos might do exactly the same thing, but you can still try. If You’re An AdminFacebook has ways to determine who takes charge of groups or fan pages after the creator deletes an account. However, you might like to make that decision for yourself. Head to your Group/Page and add a few more admins you trust. Prepare For Deletion: Ensure You Won’t Log In For Two WeeksTo properly delete your account, you will need to make sure you don’t log in to Facebook for two weeks after the request is made. If you do, Facebook will take it as a sign that you don’t really want to delete your account and they will cancel your deletion request. So you’ll need to make sure there’s no way you can log in accidentally. Make sure you:
Schedule Your Account DeletionHead to this page to ask for your account to be deleted. Look under “How do I permanently delete my account?” and scroll down past the advice to deactivate until you see the “Submit your request here” link. Then you’ll see the “Delete My Account” and you can follow your nose from there to properly close your account.
Wait Two WeeksYour request for deleting your account is scheduled for two weeks later, in case you change your mind. The account goes into a deactivated state for the two weeks. In that time, all you have to do to cancel your request is to log into Facebook. Read More On Facebook PrivacyFacebook privacy has been a pretty big issue in the past few years. Mostly because it practically doesn’t exist. Facebook executives are pushing users towards being open with their updates and information, while simultaneously making privacy settings difficult to navigate. This has resulted in many privacy slip ups by users who didn’t really understand their settings. If you’re unsure about Facebook and think you might benefit from knowing more about Facebook privacy, take a read of the Facebook Privacy Guide (also available in French).
Here’s a few articles you might like:
If you’ve considered deleting your Facebook account, let us know the reasons in the comments. How easy or hard was it to close your Facebook account? Image Credit: Shutterstock Hey Facebookers, make sure to check out MakeUseOf page on Facebook. Over 24,000 fans already!
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| Posted: 30 Nov 2010 12:15 PM PST
For more fresh hot deals, visit our Hot Tech Deals page, which is constantly updated. Keep reading to find out today’s Hot Tech Deals.
Image credit: Modified from Svengraph’s icon set Hey Facebookers, make sure to check out MakeUseOf page on Facebook. Over 24,000 fans already!
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| 8 Online Programming Contests That You Can Challenge Yourself To Win Posted: 30 Nov 2010 11:31 AM PST
Today, many companies take advantage of the drawing power of contests to draw out the power of the crowd. We have taken a look at photo contests and design contests before. Then there is Google with its lineup of contests you should keep an eye on. One of the contests Google hosts is CodeJam; its annual programming competition. Google is of course not alone when it comes to calling up the brightest minds. Other biggies like Microsoft with its Imagine Cup and IBM are second to none. IBM for instance also sponsors the ACM International Collegiate Programming Contest.
Top Coder
TopCoder is the world’s largest competitive software development community spread over 200 countries and 272,348 members. The site hosts online programming contests in the Java, C++, and C# languages. Fortnightly online algorithm competitions and weekly competitions on design and development are platforms for coding skills. The algorithm based contests are usually the shortest (2 hrs) while marathon matches can go on for couple of weeks. The codes from design and development contests are usually picked up by companies for a profit. TopCoder.com sometimes serves as a hiring platform for developers. Codechef
Codechef is a noncommercial programming community that's Indian in origin but global in scope with nearly 25,000 members. The programming community hosts contests, trainings and events for its worldwide membership. Codechef is well organized with local chapters in colleges, meetups, an active forum, blog, Facebook Group and a Twitter stream. You can practice your problem solving skills on the site and then take part in the monthly face-offs. Calling All Innovators
Nokia's worldwide contest covers eco-friendly applications, entertainment, productivity, and life improvement. You have to design apps for Nokia that address these categories. The solution can be hardware, software, or services that relates to mobility using a mobile device. The contest is open to all mobile and web application developers worldwide. This year's contest is over, so you might have to wait till next year to walk away with the five figure cash prize. Apps for Development
The World Bank attempts to foster social innovation by asking the developer community to develop software applications related to one or more of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). You can submit any kind of software application, web apps, a mobile device, console, SMS, or any common software platform. The only condition is that the proposed application use one or more datasets from the World Bank Data Catalog available at data.worldbank.org. You can still participate before January 10, 2011. Another city specific example is the NYC BigApps 2.0 Competition which is for New York City. Facebook Engineering Puzzles
The engineering puzzles are placed on the Careers page on Facebook, so it could be an entry ticket to a job at Facebook. But you have to solve them and get them right first, because as this old blog entry explains competition to get into Facebook is pretty intense. The Facebook Puzzle Master Page also holds frequent contests that can help you get noticed. HTML5Contest
HTML5 is the new kid on the block. The site has been put together by a gaming website that seeks to promote itself and HTML5 mobile games with the help of monthly contests. Bring your game development skills to the table and walk away with up to $7,700 a month in prize money. Bitwise
This is an annual online programming contest that's held by The Department of Computer Science and Engineering, IIT Kharagpur (India); one of the top most engineering colleges in the world. The competition tests your C and C++ skills. The last edition had 4,900 teams from a total of 1,473 universities and institutes of 66 countries. Registration is free and open to all. The top prize is 40,000 INR (about $1,000). The registrations for the 2011 edition are expected to start soon. Al Zimmermann’s Programming Contests
If you are a 'demented computer programmer' then the annual (or biyearly) online programming contest should be for you. You can enter the latest round too where you need to arrange a deck of cards in a specific way. What's noteworthy is that you have to just submit the result and not the program. So, you can work at the solution with any tool available to you. Prizes are monetarily insignificant but attractively offbeat like sculpted math models or bronzed mini-sculptures. Programming contests are a great way to know exactly where you stand in the developer community. Do you take part in any programming challenge that's held online (or offline)? These aren't the only ones after all. Drop us a comment. Image: Shutterstock Follow MakeUseOf on Twitter. Includes cool extras.
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| How To Create An Interactive Quiz Using Powerpoint Masters Posted: 30 Nov 2010 10:31 AM PST
Microsoft Powerpoint is an immensely powerful suite, and can be used for much more than straightforward presentations. It can be used to create website mockups, and even interactive learning tools. We’ll explore one example of this last category below; interactive quizzes. De facto applications that employ a functional, if simple, interface. MastersA slide master is the DNA that is used to create new slides. A slide stamp, so to speak, which determines how newly created slides will look. By default, the slide master is pretty boring, but we can change this to pretty much anything we want. We can even create multiple master slides with sub-layouts and change between them on the fly while we’re creating our presentation.
To open the Slide Master menu, go to View and select Slide Master. This changes the Powerpoint mode, so you’ll have to switch this back to normal before you’re able to actually create the presentation. A Slide Master menu will be added to the top ribbon which you can use to add new master profiles and layouts. These will appear in the sidebar, as shown in the screenshot below. Slide Masters will appear independently and branch off into different layouts. LayeringSo how exactly are we planning to use the Slide Masters in our little quiz? We can use them to design different, recurring levels of the application, e.g. a main menu and different quiz categories.
Important! To make sure our quizzers won’t be able to advance by simply clicking elsewhere on the slide, you’ll have to disable the ‘Advance Slide on Mouse Click‘ option for every single Slide Master. Button ActionsButtons, much like in real applications and websites, allow us to navigate between different slides more freely than in the default linear matter. We can jump to and fro different slides, and even create clickable categories in our Slide Master. InterlinkingIt’s rather easy to link to a different slide. Select a piece of text or a shape with your right mouse, and click Hyperlink.
By default, this option allows you to link to a webpage. Select ‘Place in This Document’ in the left sidebar. This will allow for inter-presentation linking.
Hyperlinks allow you to create relative (e.g. next, previous slide) and absolute hyperlinks (i.e. pointing to a specific slide). We’ll be using both. Creating The QuizWe’re using the above two tools to create an interactive quiz. First, create as many actual slides as you have categories. These don’t need to contain much, except maybe a text element for easy reference. Masters & CategoriesWe’ll lay out the foundation, second. Select the first layout and design it to incorporate the major elements of your interface. These need to be consistent over the entire Powerpoint. I added the quiz title and links to every category. Point the category buttons to those slides you created before using a hyperlink.
If you want a custom design for each quiz category, copy and paste the layout as many times as you have categories. You can now adjust each layout as you see fit; the buttons will remain in working order. I created a colored text-box, matching the colors of my category buttons. Renaming them, also possible via right-click, will improve the overview. Landing Pages & Sub-pagesGo back to normal mode, and put a new slide at the very start of your presentation. This will be your main landing page, which you can use to give advance information, point to the different categories, or initiate the quiz. Adjust it as you deem appropriate.
You can change the layout of the existing category pages by using right-mouse -> Layout and selecting one of the designs you made earlier on.
Subsequent slides can be added using the right layout by selecting them from the dropdown box below the New Slide button.
We’ve now got almost everything set to create our quiz. Simply add one additional slide to the end of your document. This will be the slide people get to see when they select the wrong answer. Make it universal, so do not relate to any one question. Add a button below that the user can click to return to the question(e.g. Try Again, or Go Back), but instead of creating a hyperlink, select Insert -> Action -> Hyperlink to: -> Last Slide Viewed. A Quizzical QuestionnaireMake sure the questions appear per category and in running order. This allows us to use relative links. Now, to add a question, create a page using the right categoric lay-out. Add as many additional media as you deem appropriate and as many possible questions as you feel like. All but one of these answers need to point to your wrong answer-slide with a hyperlink. The correct answer links to the next slide in sequence. Do you know any other great uses for Powerpoint? Let us know in the comments! Got Questions? Ask Them Now FREE on MakeUseOf Answers!
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| 4 Great Places To Find Free Beautiful Photo Desktop Wallpapers Posted: 30 Nov 2010 08:31 AM PST
During my personal quest for beautiful photos to adorn my desktop background, I came across these four great places. Even though one or two of them should be pretty obvious to some of our readers, I’m sure the list could be useful to many others. Let The Hunt BeginIf you are willing to pay a little bit more attention to your surroundings, beauty is all around us. I guess we should learn how to see our world from a photographer’s eyes. They have the knack to see beautiful images within everyday scenes that we tend to ignore. Here are some places to see those beauties. 1. National GeographicPhotographers are also the kind of people who are willing to go the extra mile to capture something that we will never see in our everyday life: the view of the earth from outer space, the hunting rituals of nocturnal mammals, or the social life of poisonous insects. Nothing can better showcase how far nature photography can go than the images taken by National Geographic photographers.
Other than their official wallpapers page, there’s also the yearly international photography contest (like this 2009 event) with extraordinary photos submitted by “ordinary” photographers from all over the world.
Windows users can simplify the downloading process with the help of an application called NatGeo Wallpaper Downloader which will allow you to download 5,000+ wallpapers in one go.
2. NASAIf National Geographic guys claim the earth’s surface as their territory, then everything above and beyond the earth would be the playground of the NASA people. Not many people know that you can also download beautiful space-related wallpapers from the NASA site.
Just visit their “Image of the day” page for those “trekkish” shots. These interplanetary experts are also kind enough to provide you with several image sizes to download so you can find the one that fits your desktop.
3. WikipediaThis is also another unusual place to acquire your desktop wallpapers. Other than lots of text-based information, Wikipedia also has one section dedicated to desktop backgrounds.
Other than photographs, you can also find images taken from sketches, drawings, and paintings.
4. Flickr & Wallpapr (& Other Photo Sites)Let’s not forget one of the products of Web 2.0: Flickr (and other photo sites). Logically, they are also good places for you to drop by on your quest to find wallpapers. One problem though, you should always pay attention to the license. Always try to find images with a Creative Commons license that you can download, use and modify freely. Image size is also another point that you should consider because not all images uploaded to Flickr are formatted to fit your desktop.
Fortunately, you can use the help of Wallpapr to find Flickr images which are already customized to be wallpaper-friendly. All you have to do is write down the search string and Wallpapr will fetch images from the “Wallpapers” group on Flickr. They also have an iPhone version that you can use.
Other SourcesAll of the sources above should keep you busy for a very long while. But if you are still hungry for more, you can use your friendly neighborhood search engines, especially the ones that have been customized to find images like Google Image Search. Be creative in using the search string. You might want to start with “Desktop+Wallpaper+Your_Keyword_Here“.
You can use the search engines to find discussions on the net about finding desktop wallpapers, such as this Ask MetaFilter topic. We also have lots of articles related to desktop wallpapers, such as: Kick-Ass Wallpapers, Best Sites to Download Very High Resolution Wallpapers and part two, Take Flickr Straight to your Desktop with Interactive Wallpaper Updates, The 8 Best Sites For Funny Computer Desktop Wallpapers, etc. Be sure to check them out. As always, if you have your own personal favorites, please share them using the comments below. Image credit: National Geographic – Photo Contest 2009, NASA – Image of the day, Wikipedia – Desktop backgrounds, Flickr – DigitalFreak Hey Facebookers, make sure to check out MakeUseOf page on Facebook. Over 24,000 fans already!
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| 5 Cool Ways To Customize Your Windows 7 System Posted: 30 Nov 2010 07:31 AM PST
Windows 7 provides plenty of internal options to change the look and feel of your computer. It’s easy to give the operating system a unique style and at the same time enhance your experience as a user. For most of the coolest ways to customize Windows 7, you don’t even have to mess with hacks or additional software. Let me show you how you can dress up your installation of Windows 7 and make using your computer a visual and functional joy. 1. Change The Welcome ScreenThere are two basic things you can change that will affect the welcome screen. First of all, you can change your profile picture. Secondly, you can apply a hack or software to change the background image. To change your profile picture, go to > Start and type > User Accounts into the bar that says > Search programs and files, then open the respective entry under > Control Panel. Next, select > Change your picture. You can now choose a default image or click > Browse for more pictures… at the bottom of the list to access your own files. Once you have selected an image click the > Change Picture button and you’re done.
To change the logon screen manually, check out the procedure described in this article - How To Change Windows 7 Logon Screen Using a tool rather than the manual steps doesn’t make you less geeky. Rather it will save you time and give you access to further logon page customization options, for example changing buttons or Windows branding. Simon has reviewed three programs here - The Best Ways To Customize The Welcome Screen In Windows 7.
2. Add Desktop GadgetsGadgets are tiny tools that sit on your desktop. They add functionality and quickly let you complete tasks without launching a large program. Some of my three favorite Windows 7 gadgets are:
To browse, discover, and install gadgets, visit the Windows Live Gadget Gallery. To launch existing gadgets, go to > Start and type > Desktop Gadgets into the bar that says > Search programs and files, then open the respective entry under > Control Panel. Also have a look at The 7 Best Windows 7 Gadgets and the Top 7 Coolest Windows 7 Desktop Gadgets You Have To Use. 3. Change The Windows ThemeChanging the theme will have the greatest impact on your system in terms of look and feel. And you’ll be surprised how easy it is. > Right-click desktop and select > Personalize. You can now select a default theme, get more themes online, or create your own.
For some suggestions and detailed instructions on how to create your own custom theme, open this article: Top 5 Windows 7 Themes You Might Want To Try. 4. Create A Custom Desktop SlideshowTo add some variety to your desktop or showcase your own photos, you can create a custom desktop slideshow that will regularly change your wallpaper. > Right-click desktop, select > Personalize, and click on > Desktop Background. To create a slideshow, you need to select any entry from the > Picture location drop-down menu other than the default ‘Solid Colors’. Now > Browse for the folder that holds your pictures, > Select the ones you like, choose a > Picture position and time interval to > Change picture. Finally click the > Save changes button and enjoy.
Like the > Desktop Background you can also customize > Window Color and > Sounds and so create your own custom theme. Don’t forget to > Save theme! 5. Add Toolbars To Taskbar & Enable Quick Launch BarA toolbar located in your taskbar can provide instant access to often used programs, for example iTunes. Simply > right click Taskbar, expand > Toolbars, and check the ones you would like to see. For those mourning the Windows XP Quick Launch bar, don’t despair. There is a hack to bring it back. Follow the same steps outlined above and select > New toolbar…, enter the following path > %userprofile%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Quick Launch and click > Select Folder. The Quick Launch bar will appear, but it needs more customization. > Right-click Quick Launch and uncheck > Show title and > Show Text to make it more compact. You can also uncheck > Lock the taskbar and then > drag and drop Quick Launch into place.
Even more cool ways to customize your Windows 7 experience using easy hacks and some cool tricks can be found in the following article series: What is your favorite feature of Windows 7? Did you go the extra mile to create a unique style and user experience? Please share your tips in the comments. NEW: Download MakeUseOf iPhone App. FREE!
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| The 3 Best Sites For Reliable Anti-Virus Software Reviews Posted: 30 Nov 2010 07:00 AM PST
Anti-virus software is particularly troublesome. It’s easy to have a look at the features and make comments about the interface, but the actual business of testing the protective capabilities of anti-virus software is tough because there are millions of viruses in existence and thousands of new ones hitting the web every month. Therefore, antivirus software reviews require that the software be tested against a wide range of viruses – and that’s something only a handful of websites do. AV-Comparatives
Although most PC users don’t realize it, the field of anti-virus protection has an academic side populated by researchers and ex-hackers who rigorously analyze computer hardware and software on the search for security flaws that need to be addressed. This research often results in some useful information for the average computer user, and the AV-Comparatives website is perhaps the best example. An Austrian non-profit organization, AV-Comparatives exists solely to provide unbiased and comprehensive information about the effectiveness of anti-virus software. They subject the software to a variety of attacks including traditional viruses, trojans, scripting attacks and more. They also pay attention to details such as the rate of false positives and the number of viruses a program manages to quarantine but fails to remove. While the site’s most unique content are the in-depth comparatives, the site also offers a number of single-product reviews. The reviews are a bit technical, but they’ll guide you through the anti-virus software being reviewed step-by-step, giving you a grasp of how the program functions. PC Mag.com
The website of the long-running PC Magazine has always been a nice site for anti-virus reviews. Indeed, it is perhaps better at reviewing anti-virus software than anyone else – I’ve always felt the hardware reviews were a bit soft, but the anti-virus reviews don’t pull any punches. The editors aren’t shy about giving a poor anti-virus program a two-star rating (out of five). Even AV-Comparatives is much kinder about this, as the lowest rating they’re willing to dish out is “Tested”. The reviews take a look at anti-virus protection based on how well the software defends against a number of viruses, rootkits and other threats. The number of threats introduced and the exact threats used are not known, but the data is still useful for identifying strengths and weaknesses of different anti-virus software. Performance analysis of software is my favorite reason to read these reviews, however. PC Magazine reviews routinely comment on how long different programs took to complete scans. The reviews are also great sources for general information about the interface and installation of different anti-virus software. CNET
I don’t think there is any other review website on the web that is as consistently excellent as CNET. This site reviews everything from HDTVs to digital cameras to anti-virus software, and the reviews are always of high quality, informative and rigorous. CNET’s reviews throw a lot of information at the reader, including very useful information about performance. For example, most CNET reviews provide information about the impact an anti-virus program has on the test computer’s boot time. This sort of information is fairly unique, and it is a helpful measure of “real-world” anti-virus performance. When it comes to anti-virus protection, CNET actually leans heavily on the already mentioned AV-Comparatives tests. That’s fine – it’s doubtful that any individual review site could ever be as detailed as AV-Comparatives. CNET also makes mention of testing data from other sources, some of which are not available to the public (at least not without money exchanging hands). CNET’s video reviews remain a highlight – they compact most of the information you need to know about a product into a tight three to four minute long video. ConclusionThese three websites with antivirus software reviews should provide you with everything you need to know about anti-virus software before you buy. Although each site may disagree somewhat about certain programs, there does seem to be some overall consistency between their recommendations, which indicates they’re on the right track. If you have a favorite anti-virus review site that isn’t mentioned here, let us know. Do you like MakeUseOf articles? Don’t forget to share our articles with others! It’s really important to us.
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