Archive for Free

Lisa | July 19, 2012
No comments

Firefox Extension: Rainbow Color Tools

If you are new to Web development you might not know that there are a number of Firefox extensions that can make your life a whole lot easier. One is Rainbow Color Tools. I love this extension! It is easy to use and keeps me from having to hunt through CSS or other files in an attempt to find the information about the color of something I like. Once installed the extension is readily available in Firefox.

Rainbow Color Tools

The tool has four choices each with different features. First, the Analyzer gives you the website’s color scheme from the site’s images and CSS files. For instance, this is what I get for the Lister Hill site.

Rainbow Color Tools

All you do is hover over the color block for which you are interested to see the information about that color. The extension also allows you to copy or save the information (when you save the information it becomes part of your Library see below).

The HSV color picker has to do with Hue, Saturation, and Value. This can really help you get the right tone and depth of color. I don’t often need this feature but it is excellent for getting your color a shade or two lighter or darker for fancy mouse-overs and such.

Rainbow Color Tools

I use Inspector most. If I see a color I like all have to do is select Inspector and hover over the color. Then when I click the mouse button that HEX code for that color is saved and I can paste it wherever I need it to be.

Rainbow Color Tools
When you save colors they are placed in the Library with all the information you need to keep track of your colors.

Rainbow Color Tools

This is such a small little program but it has saved me so much time and even if you aren’t a Web developer there are all sorts of Firefox extensions that may make your life just a little easier. If you want to find out go to https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/.

If you are a Web developer you may also want to check out the Firebug and Web Developer extensions. If you are already using a Firefox extension let us know which ones!

Category: Free, Graphics, Productivity |
Pat Higginbottom | July 13, 2012
No comments

Is your password stuck to your monitor?

Or taped under your keyboard?  Or are they all saved in your browser?  I just finished a novel where a couple of teenagers wanted to log in to someone’s computer so they just put A then B then C into the user ID box until they hit the right letter and it autofilled.  So easy.  But we all have so many online accounts and they all need user IDs and passwords.  I tried for a while using a base password and then adding something specific to the site.  For example, Bradford (my dog’s name–I don’t really use that as a password…) then yah for yahoo so “Bradfordyah” but those with rules that insist you use number or symbols didn’t always fit.  I have also found that I sometimes need to share the password for something like Hulu and I don’t necessarily want to give my secret away.  So I need a new solution.  So what’s a person to do?

In researching something like this I often start with Lifehacker.  They tend to address issues like these often and provide lots of information and links.  Here are some great posts to get you started:

Today is Change your Password Day: Celebrate by Upgrading your Password System

No Time Like the Present to Choose Strong Passwords

Using Common Phrases Makes your Passphrase Password Useless:  Here’s how to Pick a Better Phrase

Geek to Live: Choose (and Remember) Great Passwords

Thinking about a Password manager?  The top three options it seems are:

This Lifehacker post is a bit old but talks about these 3 and a couple of others.  I’ve looked at all of these and bit and while I’ll admit to not actually using any of them (yet), I’m most impressed with LastPass which seems to be the Lifehacker favorite.  It can track all your web passwords, generate secure passwords, and provides a way to easily and safely share a password.  It is free and works across all browsers and devices.  The number of services who’ve had security leaks and breaches lately (Yahoo, LastFM, LinkedIN) makes feel I should really give this a try.

If you want to try LastPass, Lifehacker has a beginners guide and and intermediate guide to help.

Are any of you using one of these tools?  I’d love to hear about your experience.  In the meantime, don’t use one of these.

 

 

Category: Free, Productivity |
Pat Higginbottom | July 2, 2012
No comments

Dolphin Web Browser

I LOVE this browser.  Dolphin is a free mobile web browser available for iOS and Android.  Lifehacker calls it the best browser for Android and I totally agree even if you don’t get the new beta version.

It is fast, very fast, and easy to use though some call the interface cluttered.  If you do think it is too cluttered, try Dolphin Mini, a stripped down version also freely available.

You can import bookmarks or add as you go for those sites you visit often.  As an added bonus you can add up to 10 things to Speed Dial, see them when you open a new tab and select one with a single touch.  If that isn’t fun enough, set up gestures for your favorite sites or take advantage of the preloaded gestures.

In addition to the regular display you can also use the Webzine option to display sites.  It really is an elegant way to browse a site.

There are tons of other add-ons as well, ranging from strictly fun, such as colored themes, to very useful such as the ones for Evernote or Read Later.

Of all the cool features, Dolphin Sonar is my favorite.  For Android, you can install as a shortcut or shake your phone while Dolphin is open to activate it.  Then just ask for what you want the browser to search.  It worked very well for me and my voice, my husband not as much, but I was delighted with it.

So, while I’ve switched to Dolphin exclusively on my Driod, I don’t’ find myself choosing it as often on the iPad.  It works fine and has many of the same cool features (not Sonar it seems) but isn’t as big an improvement over Safari.  Webzine option is great on the iPad though since it is so much easier to read than on a phone.

I would highly recommend  you give Dolphin a try!

Category: Free, Mobile |
Lee | June 3, 2012
No comments

Spam-free searching? Try blekko

Are you interested in experimenting with a different search engine to add to your searching toolkit? blekko www.blekko.com  offers a different, intriguing approach.

blekko professes a bias towards quality sites so does not include sites such as content farms, reducing spam. blekko believes in human curation and uses “slashtags” as a one method to identify quality sites, as shown in the video below. blekko also promises to be open and transparent, making freely available to its users “all of the data that provide the underpinning of search results. This includes web data, ranking information and the curation efforts of users.”

Read the blekko Bill of Rights

For an example, adding the health slashtag created by blekko limits your search results to the 162 websites curated by “experts.” Unfortunately, I was unable to locate a list of content experts or an editorial board.  Also, although blekko provides complete SEO information, it is unclear what goes into the algorithm for relevancy ranking.

To create slashtags, or to mark results as spam, create an optional personal account. Or you can choose to log in using your facebook account. Learn more. You can also share your slashtags with your students, colleagues or friends.  blekko help will answer most questions about searching blekko, creating and sharing slashtags, removing spam and more.

The image below shows a blekko result list with the option to mark a site as spam displayed.

 

Free stuff from blekko:  Check out the free stuff blekko offers here.  Included is an an embeddable search bar, a browser tool bar, free t-shirts, trading cards and stickers and more.

 

Category: Free, Fun, Mobile, Productivity, Social Media | Tags: ,
Pat Higginbottom | April 25, 2012
No comments

Evernote Trunk

What’s in the Trunk  you ask?  Well it is easier to describe what is NOT in the Trunk.  The Evernote Trunk is a list of useful apps and products associated with Evernote.  Some are created by those friendly folks at Evernote but most are not.  You can browse web apps or mobile apps and even look at hardware you can link to Evernote.  I  have talked about Evernote in a previous post so in this post I want to talk about those apps created by Evernote.

Food

Evernote Food allows to you record your meals with your camera and automatically uploads it to a Food folder–or you can specify the folder you want to use.  You can track your meals and snacks easily this way.  other data points include location, any tags you want to add and a generic notes field where you can include helpful information like, “my salad was good but Jane’s pasta looked divine, get that next time!”

Skitch

Evernote Skitch is a tool to allow you to annotate and draw on photos or screenshots.  You can upload images, take with your camera or clip from the screen or web.  (To get a screen shot on your iPad hold down power and home buttons at the same time.) You can write, draw, crop and share your images.  Very easy and fun to use.

 

Peek 

Evernote Peek is a surprisingly fun tool to help you study.  You can download content, I got Spanish 101, and use the smart cover for your iPad to test your skill.  You lift the first flap for the clue then open to see if you are right.  It assumes you got it right (sadly that was not always true) so if you missed you mark the question as incorrect.  You can create your own quizzes by taking notes in Evernote.  The note title becomes the clue and the note body becomes the answer.

 

Hello 

Evernote Hello is a tool for managing your contacts.  You add photos and data to keep track of them.  I must admit I haven’t used this one yet.  I already have more contact than I really need.

 

Clearly

Evernote Clearly is a web app that  you can use to eliminate page distractions.  I loaded it for Firefox and found myself using it a lot to trim the fluff out of a page.  It created a nice text style for printing.

Most of these really have been useful.  Which apps do you connect to Evernote?

Category: Free, Fun, Mobile, Productivity |
Cara | April 10, 2012
One comment

New CDC iPad App

Last week, The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released its first ever app designed specifically for the iPad.  The app, available for free from the iPad App Store, features nine major sections or tabs: Health Articles, Vital Signs, PCD Journal, Public Health Matters, MMWR, Newsroom, CDC Podcasts, Social Media and Image Library.

Health Articles features articles written on timely topics.  Today’s headlines include information on food safety at fairs and festivals and safe gardening techniques.  Right now, you can access ten articles from this tab which are also available on the CDC website.

Vital Signs is a monthly feature that offers data on public health issues.  The March issue covers health care-associated infections (HAIs).  Each issue covers the problem, who is at risk and what can be done and by whom, ranging from the federal government to a health care provider to an individual patient.

Preventing Chronic Disease (PCD) Journal is a peer-reviewed journal addressing the link between public policy, research and and public health. It doesn’t appear that you can access the entire archives of the journal through the app, but you can access the most recent articles.

Public Health Matters is a blog written by CDC employees who share their experiences on a variety of public health topics.   Currently, you’ll find blog articles on running, disaster movies, and floods in Thailand.

MMWR- In this tab you can access the latest articles published in the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.  The CDC provides access to previous issues on its website.

Newsroom- As the title of this tab implies, this is a running list of articles and/or press releases on the results of CDC research, reports and telebriefings.

CDC Podcasts – You can also access CDC podcasts on a variety of health topics.  Current offerings include sexual assault awareness month, the CDC nutrition report, and adult immunization.

Social Media – This tab hooks you up to the CDC’s various Facebook pages and twitter feeds.  You can point your Spanish speaking colleagues or patients to the CDC en Español Facebook page.

Image Library –The CDC has provided a limited number of images available through the iPad app.  You can see images of people doing yoga, gardening, a cutaneous pigmented lesion and more.  I don’t recommend the cutaneous pigmented lesion unless you’re just into that sort of thing.

Category: Free, Mobile, Research, Social Media | Tags:
Fitts | March 25, 2012
No comments

HeyTell (Instant Voice Messenger)

Have you ever wished that you could utilize a PTT service free of charge or without having to go purchase a Boost Mobile pre-paid phone? Well now you can with a cross-platform voice messenger known as “HeyTell” that allows you to instantly talk with friends and family. HeyTell is an “Instant Voice Messaging” system that allows users to connect in a manner similar to a push-to-talk radio handset. It supports different privacy levels as well as a friends list and geolocation. One of the best things about it is that it is supported across not only IOS (which seems to be the norm) but also Android, BlackBerry and Windows. Once you download the app no account needed, you’d just enter in your name on the set-up screen. Afterwards just start the app, choose a contact, and push the button to start talking! In order to choose a contact you may send them an invitation link by either sending a text message to a saved contact in your phone or by email address. Either way they will get an invite and link to HeyTell which they can begin using almost immediately. They will simply enter their desired “name” on the set-up screen. It’s simple as that. Once you created your friends list you may begin talking with them by selecting or highlighting their name and pressing the “hold and speak” button down. When finished with your brief message just remove your finger from the button and HeyTell does the rest.

You have the ability to choose from three different privacy levels to control how users can contact you without an invite:

✓ Low Privacy: Anyone who knows your contact information can connect with you without an invite.

✓ Medium Privacy: Anyone who knows your contact information and is friends with one of your HeyTell friends can connect with you. Otherwise, they must invite you to connect.

✓ High Privacy: No one can connect with you until you accept their invitation.

HeyTell offers a variety of options in the setup other than the ones mentioned above such as what (if any) email address and/or # to make it easier for friends to find you. In addition you have control over whether you want to receive notifications when app is not running, whether messages expire automatically after 300 days and whether you decide to (if you choose to do so) share your location with selected contacts while you talk.

So in conclusion I would say that if you’ve ever hoped for a way to send voice messages to your friends without making a phone call, your wish has been granted. The application available through not only IOS and Android but also Black Berry and my personal favorite Windows called “Hey Tell” allows you to record a quick voice message and instantly send it to friends as they would typically do for a text message. Similar to a walkie talkie, this app is perfect for users (like me) who may want to send a quick message to a friend or co-worker without having to carry on a long drawn out conversation.

Category: Free, Fun, Mobile, Social Media, Uncategorized, Windows |
Pat Higginbottom | February 28, 2012
No comments

Evernote

We have mentioned Evernote in a couple of posts now and I’m really beginning to take advantage of it so it seemed time for a post of it’s own. Evernote’s tag line is:

but I think the reason we use it is because we can’t remember anything.  Evernote is a tool that allows you to capture text, images, audio, video, pretty much anything to view later from any one of your many devices.  I have a single account and can use Evernote on my laptop, my iPad and on my Android phone.  Captured items become notes and can be stored in notebooks categorized any way you like.  Data is auto-saved and synced.  All of this by the way is free though there is a Premium Account available that gives you more upload capacity, greater sharing and offline access.

Getting stuff into Evernote is a breeze.  There are multiple ways to add including:

I have successfully used all these options and especially like the clip from the web.  I downloaded the Chrome extension and use it frequently.  Clipping from the iPad is easy too once it is set up.  This blog post explains how.  After some trial and error I got it to work from my PC.

So what do you use Evernote for you ask?  Here are some ideas:

  • Take meeting notes
  • Collect information for a project
  • Create a checklist of goals, to-dos, tasks
  • Collect travel info
  • Compile recipes
  • Collect household information
  • Keep track of your dog’s vet info (or your kids)

In short, use Evernote to “remember everything” and to collate it in one place.  I’ve used many of these ideas and find the recipe collection to be the most useful.  I’ve also created and shared a household to-do list with my husband and clipped out lots of useful sites to help me write this post.  For example:

Finding things once you put them in Evernote is easy even if you haven’t made good use of tags.  Just type in the search box and choose a filter if you need to be more specific.  It even searches the text in images.

In my next post I’ll talk about what’s in the Evernote Trunk.

 

Category: Free, Productivity |
Fitts | February 10, 2012
2 comments

getHired

Let me preface this blog by saying “NO I’M NOT LOOKING FOR A JOB”! However if you are presently or perhaps in the near future may or even keeping abreast (as I do) of what’s out there then getHired is a quick and useful way to job search right from your Windows Mobile Phone. Once you’ve installed this free app from the windows phone marketplace,(although it possibly may be available on other platforms). All you have to do is enter what and where you are looking for and getHired will provide job listings from 6 different job search engines (SimplyHired, Indeed, CareerJet, JuJu, LinkUp and CareerBuilder) across more than 60 countries all in one consolidated view.

Generally speaking getHired is an electronic classifieds for your phone.

If you so choose in the apps settings, you don’t even have enter your city and Country as your location is automatically populated by enabling your location service.

Your most recent searches are tabluated and displayed for quick review and access as well as displaying a count of new jobs posted from the time you last used the app.

Found a job that you are interested in? Review the summary and you can send an email, text or as mentioned above, save it to your favorites list.

Finally feel free to customize search options as necessary. You can add or delete any of the 6 default job search engines as needed. As far as location you even have the option of sticking with the United States or broadening your search as well as by certain mile radius. You can also control how many recent searches it keeps.

Overall a very useful tool to have on the go. With the job market being what people can use all of the helpful tips, tools and apps they can get.

Category: Free, Fun, Mobile, Productivity, Windows |
Cara | January 20, 2012
No comments

5 Chrome Extensions To Love or Hate

As Pat pointed out in her post, Google Chrome bills itself as the fastest web browser out there.  Indeed, it’s fast, simple and open to customization.  There have to be a gazillion Chrome extensions available to enhance your web browsing experience, some better than others.  I couldn’t begin to compile a “best of” list, but I will share my thoughts on a few that I’ve tried.

Evernote Web Clipper – As an Evernote junkie, I find this extension handy.  Simply click the Evernote icon in the toolbar (all extensions have icons in the toolbar) and the page you’re visiting will be clipped to Evernote. I find this really helpful for information you might want to save and access repeatedly  (e.g. recipes) on a variety of devices or machines.

Page Snooze – I thought this sounded like a good idea, but it turned out not to be really useful for me in practice.  Page Snooze considers itself as an answer to “tab overload” and allows you to basically press the snooze button so you can read the page later.  However, it has preset time frames and doesn’t work across devices.  If I see something I want to read later but not necessarily keep, I prefer a service like Instapaper that can be used from any web-enabled device when I want it.

Send To Google Docs – This extensional allows you to upload a pdf version of the current page to your Google docs.  I confess I don’t use Google Docs often, but I can see how this would be great for someone who does. Plus, it is an easy way to turn a web page into a pdf file!

Checker Plus For Gmail –  This extension allows you to scan and delete email without having to open a Gmail tab.   It also provides desktop notification for incoming gmail messages.  This could be either super handy or super annoying, depending on the nature of your gmail account.  I get a lot of junk, so don’t feel the need to be notified of each new message. If you use gmail for work or other important correspondence, it could be quite useful.

AdBlock – AdBlock bills itself as the most popular Chrome extension evah!!!!111!! with over 3 million users.  Woo hoo!  Honestly, I think I am immune to ads at this point, but it seems to work well.  If ads bother you, check it out. You can customize it to allow certain types of ads, such as google text ads. They also have beta that allows blocking of ads in flash animation and videos. Sometimes it makes the pages look funny.

Awesome Screenshot: Capture and Annotate – This program allows you to capture and mark up any website without launching a separate application.

See:

Pretty nifty.  You will still need that separate program (I use Jing) if you want to capture anything NOT on the web though.

You can find all these extensions and more at the Chrome Web Store.  Have you tried any of the above extensions?  What did you think?  Have a favorite extension you’d like to share with us?  Drop a comment below.

Category: Free, Fun, Productivity |
« Older Entries   Recent Entries »