I’ve known about this browser extension for a while, but I am writing about it now after using it recently and finding it to be an invaluable tool.

I recently needed to download some 450 or so entries into Excel from a browser-based workflow and ticketing system that we use at work . There is no “export” function and I simply intended to copy and paste the rows of text into my spreadsheet. The only problem was that there were 40 listings per each displayed page in the browser, and that number was not customizible. I would have had to manually browse through a dozen or so pages and copy and paste a whole bunch of times in order to complete what I thought should have been a fairly straightforward process. This is when I remembered the PageZipper bookmarklet on my browsers; a single click loaded all listings pages instantly into the same browser page, and a single copy/paste transferred all the data into my spreadsheet all at once.

Here are more notes on this program:

• It works well: in articles or listings that employ “next” links to move to the next page, including most search-style results.
• It does not work well: in articles or pages that do not use “next” links or use a custom navigation scheme such as javascript (it does not work well with this site).
• Headers and footers: from all pages are loaded into your consolidated page. This means that if you want to grab the information on the page and are concerned about esthetics you will have to go in later on and clean up your web clipping manually.
• Be careful how you use: using PageZipper on search results that may span dozens or hundreds of pages means that your browser will be downloading and appending pages forever, and you will have to abort.
• How to install: for Firefox you simply install a plugin. For IE you will need to place a Javascript bookmarklet on your favorites toolbar (or in your favorites folder). Instructions on how to do this are on the PageZipper site.

Wish list (or how this program can be even better)

• The option to specify a specific number of “next” links to load. For example, if I am looking at a set of results that span 100 pages I might want to, say, consolidate and clip the first 5 pages only. It would be great if I could specify this, although I realize that it may be tough to embed too much interactive functionality into a javascript bookmarklet.

The verdict: a brilliant and original idea. This little service will be extremely valuable to anyone who does a lot of research on the internet (and/or a lot of clipping of web content). It will also be very valuable to anyone who might work with browser-based reporting systems where they might want to grab/clip or quickly copy information that spans many pages wholesale into the clipboard.

Compatibility: Requires Internet Explorer or Firefox browser.

Go to the PageZipper page to get the latest version.

If you’ve ever read or heard about ordinary people being sued for downloading files from torrent or other p2p networks, and worried about your own downloading activities, this program is for you. Typically, agencies that are out to detect people’s downloading activity will actually take part in providing the file for download, then attempt to find out as much information about the computers that connect to them as possible.

How it works:

What PeerBlock does is it taps into publicly available lists that classify IP addresses in order to simply avoid "bad" IP addresses. It utilizes the collective wisdom of communities and sites that classify IP addresses (go here for more on where these lists come from). It works much in the same way as a virus killer program in that it is constantly updating the lists of known "bad" IP addresses, even as more of these come into existence.

What kind of protection to expect:

In keeping with the virus killer analogy above, PeerBlock will not necessarily protect you from the latest unknown threat or bad IP, but it will greatly decrease your chances of being detected. Moreover (and this is where the viruskiller analogy ends), PeerBlock will make you harder to detect compared to others on the network; the PeerBlock documentation cites the so-called "bear principle: "when running away from an angry bear you don’t need to be faster than that bear … you only need to be faster than the guy next to you". The Peerblock site also states that "the only way to be safe with P2P downloading is to not share copyrighted content!".

Ease of Use:

What I really like about PeerBlock is that it is very easy to use; all you need to do is run it and specify what kinds of "lists" you would like to be protected from (P2P, Spyware, Advertising, or Education/Universities) and that’s it. It now runs in the background, preventing your computer from connecting to known bad sources, not just for torrent or p2p networks but for (optionally) for general web usage as well. It will also periodically auto-update the lists that it needs to do its job.

Program options:

You can enable or disable PeerBlock at will. You can also set up your own lists if you are so inclined as well as use PeerBlock to block custom IP ranges that you set up (such as the IP range of entire countries). You can allow or disallow IP filtering for HTTP access as well (i.e. regular browsing).

PeerBlock vs. PeerGuardian:

PeerBlock is based on the code from PeerGuardian (v. PG2 RC1 Test3). I would recommend using PeerBlock because it (a) is under development; (b) does not suffer from the kind of bugs that PeerGuardian had, (c) most importantly, runs on XP, Vista, and Windows 7 without hitch. You cannot run both simultaneously.

The verdict:

Convenient, easy to use, and might just save your bacon. Download it and be safe.

Version Tested: 1.0 r181

Compatibility: Windows XP, Vista, Windows 7.

Go to the program home page to download the latest version (approx 800K).

Are you interested in stocks? Do you invest or want to invest? Whatever your need, if you’ve ever wanted to put a stock ticker on your desktop this is the program that will do it. Here are more notes on this app:

• Data source: stock prices and news headlines are downloaded from Yahoo Finance.
• Info provided: stock price and difference from last price in dollars and percentages, color coded.
• Interactivity: hover over your stock price and a balloon tooltip with the latest related headlines from Yahoo Finance will be displayed.
• Regular RSS feeds: can be defined in the settings. You can then right click on any of the scrolling lines and select an RSS feed to view it. You can also randomize regular RSS feeds or randomize RSS feeds and stocks (see image to the right).
• Number of lines/tickers: you can have up to six bands scrolling simultaneously.
• Placement: top or bottom (which can be defined in the setup)
• Customizable: you can customize text and background colors, opacity, and scrolling speed.

Wish list (or how this program can be even better)

• The ability to switch interactivity on and off. I noticed that I would inadvertently trigger tooltips during my normal computer activity without intending it. It would be great if, for example, the stock ticker optionally responded to shift+clicking rather than just clicking, to avoid unintended triggering.
• The ability to remove Fox news and CNN RSS feeds, which are predefined.

The verdict: a nice little app for sure. I like (a) that it can display regular RSS feeds as well as stock, (b) that the scrolling is nice and smooth, and (c) its general look and feel, which is quite nice (see the screenshots). But Free Stock Ticker can be even better (see wish list above).

Note that there are a number of free programs that deliver the same function, such as another app with the exact same name (Free Stock Ticker) and TickerTape. If you want to try another program that is just an RSS news ticker and dont care for stocks check out Easy Desk Ticker which I mentioned previously in my posting entitled "Nine Ways to Check RSS feeds".

Version Tested: 1.2.2

Compatibility: WinAll. Requires MS .NET Framework 3.5. Download it here.

Go to the program home page to download the latest version (approx 319K).

Firefox extension "InvisibleHand" is an on-the-fly comparison shopping tool designed to instantly retrieve and display the best prices from a wide variety of online vendors for the items that you are looking at as you surf. See our Freewaregenius review here. Some of the added features in this new version are as follows:

• Google search integration: InvisibleHand can now grab deals from within a Google search. The cheapest offers for an item are presented discretely above the search results.
• Support for German retailers.
• Notifications are refreshed, presented more discretely.

If you have any feedback, comments, questions or suggestions they would love to hear them!

You likely have a reason for having multiple browsers installed on your PC (assuming that you do!). I use IE7 at work, for example, because most of the people who browse our work sites use that browser and I prefer to have their same browsing experience. But I also have Firefox installed because of the many interesting extensions and plugins that it has, etc.

Whatever your reasons for having multiple browsers, BrowserMaster is a small app that becomes, in effect, your default browser, and once it detects a request to open an internet link it briefly flashes browser icons on screen and allows you to quickly select the browser that you want to use. More notes below:

• Applies to links clicked outside a browser: for example shortcuts on your desktop, in a notes program, in an email notifier app, in an Office or PDF document or an email client, etc. Links clicked inside a browser behave as normal.
• Links: works for HTTP:\\ or HTTPS:\\ links.
• Default wait time: it gives you 2 seconds to choose your browser before going with the default. This can be changed in the settings file, but has to be done manually using a text editor. The settings file is in “C:\Documents and Settings\yourusername\Application Data\BrowserMaster\BrowserMaster.xml”; find the “delayin seconds” tag and change the value from 2 to something else.
• Other settings: from the settings file mentioned above, you could also enable/disable specific browsers. Find and change (Enabled=”true”) to (Enabled=”false”) for each listed browser.

Wish list (or how to make this program even better)

• Force a choice: I wish that BrowserMaster could be set to force the user to make a choice rather than the few seconds that this version waits for a decision.
• Set a default browser: it does not seem possible to set a default browser choice. It will default to whatever browser is open, but if no browser is open it defaulted to something and I couldn’t figure out how it made its decision (or whether that can be changed).
• Present a choice when opening local links: for pages that were stored on my hard drive, it didn’t give a choice, which I thought was strange.
• GUI interface: to quickly change the settings. Would be great.

The verdict: an original, clever little app that has a lot of potential. As it is it can be very useful, but they can really push this one and make it a lot better in my opinion. Check it out for yourself.

[Via: Umair from Crispytech tipped me off about this one; check out his BrowserMaster writeup here]

Version Tested: 1.1.0 Beta (note: I STRONGLY recommend installing this one over 1.0)

Compatibility: WinAll

Go to the program page to download the latest version (approx 376K).

Although there is probably no one left in the universe that hasn’t figured out how to find and download music on the internet, Songr is a nice program to have for the following reasons (consider this the PROS section):

1. It has a nice, compact interface.
2. The fact that it searches multiple sources, acting as a meta-search engine for audio search engines such as Skreemr and others.
3. It can identify songs based on lyrics. Perfect for those times when you have a section of a song echoing over and over in your head that you don’t have the name of and/or don’t know the artist.
4. It can download songs from YouTube as MP3 audio or as FLV or MPG video. (For this, click on the little blue floppy disk icon next to “search by lyrics”).

The CONS section:

• Reliability: many entries in the list of results turned out to be broken links when I tried to download them. And while eventually I invariably found entries in the list that worked, it would be great if Songr could check for and remove broken links from the list.

The verdict: a nice program; straightforward and does the job, but with room for improvement in terms of reliability. Regardless, Kudos to the developers for this nice little program.

Version Tested: 1.2

Compatibility: Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7. Requires Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5.

Go to the program home page to download the latest version (approx 0.45 megs).

Why you need this app: although many sites have RSS feeds or email subscription options that can notify you when there’s new content, many sites do not and may require constant follow up in order to keep up with changes. And even if a site supports RSS some types of content may not be supported, such as comments or discussions on forums and the like.

I’ve been looking at desktop-based apps that monitor websites for changes when I found this site. Changedetection.com will monitor a list of websites you specify for changes and send you email notifications whenever it detects them. More notes below:

• Highlighting changes: once it detects a change, Changedetection.com will render a version of the web page that displays new text on the page highlighted in a yellow marker style. Text that is no longer on the page is also displayed in a strike-through style.
• Changes it detects: text changes anywhere at all (including in the sidebar). Images, videos, or other elements such as HTML tags are not detected.
• History: what is truly amazing is that once you create an account, a history of the website(s) you are tracking is kept and can be accessed for later reference (see the screenshot to the right above).
• Schedule: Changedetection.com will check a website for changes once per day.

The verdict: this is a truly great service. I prefer this to local apps that track site changes because the monitoring and detection is performed remotely on their servers, so you do not have to worry about your PC being online, and your computer’s resources are not being used at all times.

I’m also blown away by the fact that changes are tracked and saved, such that you could access older versions of the sites you are interested in.

Compatibility: Browser based. You will need to provide an email address where your notifications will be sent.

Go to the changedetection.com page.

[Editor’s note: this review was contributed by blogger Ishan of ILoveFreeSoftware.com].

When Twitter was launched, I was really skeptical about how far it would go. 140 characters seemed like a joke. However, Twitter has proved me and tons of others wrong. Part of its strength is attributable to Twitter’s openly accessible API, whcih anyone can use that for free to build their own custom software (and which developers, unlike iPhone applications, do not need to get approval from Twitter). This API is why many people have come with up some really innovative applications around Twitter, and TweetMyPC is one of them.

To start, you need to install TweetMyPC on the PC that you need to control remotely. I find it useful to install this on my home PC, so that I can get stuff from it while I am in office or on vacation. After that, you need to associate the program with a Twitter account that TweetMyPC will monitor for your tweets. It is recommended that you create a separate Twitter account for TweetMyPC rather than use your primary Twitter account. Also, you should disable public access of your new Twitter account, so that no one else can do some fishy activity on your PC by sending tweets to your new account. To disable public access of your Twitter account, go to Twitter then Settings. In the "Account" tab, you will see an option at bottom that says "Protect my tweets". Once you check this option no one can follow your tweets. Also, do not follow anyone with this new account, otherwise their tweets will start coming in your timeline, and can confuse TweetMyPC.

Another step you need to take is associate a Gmail account with TweetMyPC. This email account will be used to get files from your PC (as I will explain later). You can choose an existing Gmail account, but you will need to provide your Gmail password as well, so I would recommend creating a new Gmail account for this. Once you are done with the setup, TweetMyPC will monitor your assigned Twitter account in one minute intervals to see to see if there are tweets that it needs to act on. Once you send a command to TweetMyPC it will act on that tweet and send you a tweet in response.

Here are some of the main things that TweetMyPC can do for you:

• Shutdown/Restart your PC: just tweet "Shutdown", and TweetMyPC will shutdown your system. Similarly, "Logoff", "Reboot", "Lock", "Hibernate", "Standby" will do the respective tasks as their names suggest.
• Get Screenshot of your system: if you are wondering what might be happening on your system in your absence, you can just tweet "Screenshot". TweetMyPC will grab a screenshot of your PC, and post it on Twitpic. It will then tweet you link to that screenshot.
• Download a file to your system: let’s say you want to start downloading some big file on your system so that the download is completed by the time you reach home. To do that, just tweet "download URL". TweetMyPC will start downloading the file from the URL that you mentioned. Note, however, that you need to use a URL shortened by Bit.ly
• Get a file from your PC: Let’s say you want to get a file from your computer. Just tweet "get" followed by file path. TweetMyPC will send you the file from the specified path at the Gmail address that you specified above. If you do not know the exact path of the file, you can tweet "getfilelist" followed by drive. TweetMyPC will send you list of files and folders in that drive. You can use that to find exact path of file you are looking for, and then use "get" command to get that file.

TweetMyPC has some other interesting commands as well and also an option to define your own command. All this makes TweetMyPC a really versatile tool that is very intelligent and still one of the simplest applications to use. Shoban, the developer of this software, has done some great out of the box thinking to come up with the idea for this innovative freeware, and then to implement it so beautifully. Love it!

Version Tested: 2.0

Compatibility: Windows, Mac. Windows version requires Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5 or higher.

Go to the program home page to download the latest version (approx 931K).

[Editor’s note: this posting was contributed by Freewaregenius reader Elioz Hefer; to whom I offer my extreme thanks and gratitude].

After a period of using MS Internet Explorer, my computer’s response time has become slower and I have encountered repeated problems of being thrown out from IE8 (especially). I have come to the conclusion that a clutter of addons has caused it, and resetting to default regrettably hasn’t been much help.

I therefore turned to the portable version of Mozilla firefox, with the thought that I would prefer to preserve my PC hygiene as much as possible. I have learned in time that my most valuable asset is the speed and quick response time of a computer, and therefore I try to avoid fixed installations. I also found that virtualizations such as Altiris SVS help but do not completely block remains of programs, and the same goes for programs that monitor or record program installations such as Magical Uninstall.

Firefox Portable Edition is the popular Mozilla Firefox web browser bundled with the PortableApps.com Launcher as a portable app, so you can take your bookmarks, extensions and saved passwords with you. Mozilla Firefox Portable Edition can be copied to a thumb drive so that you can use it whereever you go.

One problem though is that Firefox Portable Edition does not register itself with the system, and
thus cannot be set as the default browser using the GUI. Whenever turning to a new Url (within Portable Firefox or from library links I have previously saved, my PC would continuously opens IE8. Which is why I started looking for a way to set the portable version of Firefox to the default browser without installing the regular non portable version and the least degree of integration with my system.

The solution came in the form of very elegant program called DefaultBrowser written by Ramesh of “Ramesh’s site“, a resource dedicated to troubleshooting windows XP. This small utility can set the default browser according to user preference. What’s more, it is reversible and doesn’t install itself on the system that I could notice. Download it here.

Here is how to set Firefox Portable as the default browser for your user profile in Windows XP.

1. Download DefaultBrowser and unzip to the folder of your choice
2. Run the executable and select Firefox Portable from the list of browsers (see screenshot above) then click Apply.
3. In the Browse dialog box, select the location where the executable FirefoxPortable.exe is located.
4. That’s it. Very quickly and like magic Firefox Portable is now set as the default browser for your user account.

Notes:

1. If your desired browser is not on the list: in this case click browse button in the “for other browsers” section and point to the desired browser executable.
2. DefaultBrowser doesn’t change the IE shortcut in the “Quick Launch” menu which will still open Internet Explorer. Therefore you must manually put a shortcut of the Portable Firefox executable in the quick launch folder. To do that click the quick launch area and then choose Open folder, you can then drag create shortcuts in there or remove the ones you don’t want (I wouldn’t delete the explorer Icon from that folder in case you wish to reverse things).
3. Reversing this process: is done is done very easily by opening the small DefaultBrowser utility and choosing the reset button.
4. Important: If you’re using Mozilla Firefox Portable Edition from a USB disk: whenever the drive-letter for the USB disk changes, you’ll need to re-register FirefoxPortable.exe using the DefaultBrowser utility. For instance, the drive-letter for your USB disk may change when adding additional hardware in your system.

That’s it, enjoy!

Version Tested: 1.8

Compatibility: Windows XP.

Go to the DefaultBrowser page to download the latest version (approx 31K).

I am interested in the larger question of the different ways we request and consume information, and often think about the many different ways that RSS feeds are delivered and read, which is how this post was borne.

1- Using a web-based reader [Google Reader]: probably the most successful of the many free web-based RSS aggregators, Google Reader is the one I use to handle the many dozens of RSS feeds I subscribe to. The advantage of using a web based reader is, of course, the ability to access your RSS feeds from anywhere (say from a computer terminal at your local library), or even from a mobile device such as an iPhone.

Google Reader offers the ability to organize feeds in categories and tags and supports multimedia feeds such as podcasts. But what I like about Google reader is that it will maintain a history of RSS subscriptions that is preserved long after the original feed has moved on (i.e. you can see the backlog/history of an RSS feed previous to the latest 20 stories that a feed will typically display at any one time). Another unique feature is the option to “star” an RSS entry and have Google Reader broadcast your starred items within your very own RSS feed, which is a great way to filter out just the stuff you are interested in (and share your ’starred items’ RSS feed with others or on a widget on your site if you like). Instructions on how create a “starred items” feed in Google reader here. Also note that Google Reader also provides the ability the follow other users that use it and/or to share news items amongst users.

Alternative: Bloglines is another web-based aggregator option that is excellent.

2- Using a desktop aggregator [RSSOwl]: I’ve used many local freeware RSS clients, but the open source and multiplatform RSSOwl is my favorite (available for Windows/Linux/Mac). One feature I particularly like is its sophisticated, multi-criteria searches which you can actually save for later use. For example you could search for the terms “freeware PDF” and specify which feeds you want it to search in (say, only in 4 feeds) as well as where you want it to search (say, in just the headline, or the entire text). Finally you can save the search so it becomes an item in the sidebar alongside all the other feeds, and gets updated with new search results as new feeds are downloaded.

RSSOwl also supports tagging (which it terms adding “labels”) and will let you organize your RSS views using many different criteria (by date, by author, by category, by topic, by state, by “stickiness”, by label, by rating, or by feed). It also supports the so-called “river of news” viewing style where it will aggregate stories bases on date irrespective of the feeds they belong to. The other thing I like about RSSOwl is that it supports ATOM newsfeeds, which some clients strangely miss). It also can display RSS updates as they come in in the system tray area.

Two things I would love to see are (a) better support for Podcasts and multimedia feeds, and (b) an interface that is a little more user friendly; still, RSS Owl is definitely my favorite local RSS client.

3- Using a desktop widget [Klipfolio]: at one time it seemed that everyone was clamoring to put widgets on your desktop, from Google desktop to Yahoo widgets to Microsoft desktop search (and not forgetting Vista’s internal widgets). But my favorite freeware widget engine by far is Klipfolio, which manages to combine an excellent user experience with low resource utilization on your PC (and offers a wide range of powerful widgets to boot). Klipfolio is a winner when it comes to the coolness factor alone. And aside from RSS feeds, its also a great way to put Facebook, stocks, weather, and other information on your desktop (assuming you want all those things to lay claims on your attention bandwidth at all times ).

Klipfolio can dock to the side of your screen or be displayed as a floating window. You can click on an RSS item to view it in the browser or hover over it to view the story, in-place, as a hovering tooltip (see screenshot).

4- As tabs on the edge of your desktop [Stick]: Stick is a nifty freeware app that allows you to place all sorts of information (such as notes, folders, and RSS feeds) within tabs on the side of your screen (see screenshot). It will also optionally display real-time notifications of incoming feeds in the system tray area.

What’s different about tabs, of course, is that unlike say desktop widgets they are less obtrusive and in-your-face, yet instantly and immediately accessible through a simple click. They can, in other words, be used to both organize information and de-clutter your desktop as well as make that information available at your fingertips simultaneously.

5- Inside a dockable area on your desktop [SideSlide]: similar in concept to “Stick” above, SideSlide delivers a sort of virtual desktop that you can dock and undock in the top of your screen, and where you can place many different things including notes, shortcuts, “virtual” containers that point to actual folders, and RSS feeds.

SideSlide’s dockable interface presents another interesting option for making information instantly available within a couple of clicks yet being able to keep it out of your way when you don’t want it. The interface takes a little bit of getting used to and is a little clunky, and the RSS function provides options such as searching and tagging, among others.

6- As post-it sticky notes [Note Mania] : I was considering a review of a freeware sticky notes program a few weeks ago called Note Mania. I didn’t end up writing one (although I probably should have, as it is a really good one), but what struck me as being really unique and original was the option to display RSS feeds as sticky notes on your desktop (see screenshot).

Just imagine: you log into your PC and the RSS feeds you subscribe to are displayed as sticky notes on your desktop. You can then delete the stories you are not interested in and either click on the ones you want to read or simply keep them as desktop sticky notes to remind you to read them later on.

7- Embedded into your wallpaper [Chaos Wallpaper]: this program will embed RSS feed stories into your active desktop. Feed items can be clickable as well as scrollable through the on-screen slider on the right, and will update/refresh your feeds periodically. If you know a bit of HTML you can tweak the CSS stylesheets in order to modify the way that feeds are displayed on the desktop.

Note that aside from this functionality Chaos Wallpaper also functions as a very competent wallpaper changer.

8- As scrolling stock-tickers across your screen [EasyDeskTicker]: EasyDeskTicker displays your RSS feeds as horizontally scrolling news-tickers reminiscent of the scrolling stock and/or news tickers that are displayed on TV and even in some public venues. It allows you to add any number of news-ticker streams, to place them anywhere on screen, and to customize their behavior and speed, their color scheme as well as the size of the fonts, etc.

I would say that this is one of the most versatile and powerful stock-ticker type RSS feed readers out there, and is visually very smooth and problem-free. Note, however, that this program is free for private use only (vs. commercial). Also note that the way it works is each horizontal ticker you add has its own options dialog, which at first I didn’t realize and caused me some confusion.

9- As email in your Inbox [FeedMyInbox]: if you prefer to receive email notifications rather than subscribe to RSS feeds, FeedmyInbox is a free web service that can receive RSS feeds for you and automatically email them to an address you specify. Please note, however, that many sites (such as this one) offer the option to subscribe to both RSS feeds or to email notifications, so in theory for many sites you will not need the FeedMyInbox service. However, if a site does not offer email notifications, or if you like its RSS feed better than the emails that it offers (and I know that for example that for Freewaregenius the emails are very abbreviated) then FeedMyInbox may be for you.

If you know of other interesting ways to access RSS feeds using free software or services please share in the comments section.

If you use Outlook, like I do at work, you may frequently want to keep it running in the background in order to get email and other notifications as-they-occur. Fine and dandy, except if it has to be running all the time, you may want Outlook to at least be out of the way, neatly tucked away as an icon in the system tray rather than cluttering up the taskbar. Strangely, however, Outlook by default does not have a minimize to tray option, which is where HideOutlook comes to the rescue. More notes on this one below:

• Minimizes Outlook to system tray: interestingly, there will be two icons in the system tray, the minimized Outlook icon, and the HideOutlook icon (which also looks like an Outlook icon).
• Launch common tasks: right click on the HideOutlook icon to launch common tasks such as new emails, notes, appointments, tasks, etc.
• Memory consumption: about 10 megs, which is quite small but seems like it could have been less.
• Optionally starts with Windows
• Also available for Outlook Express (see links below)

The verdict: HideOutlook provides a function which should have been included in Outlook, and once you start minimizing Outlook to the system tray you will not want to go back. Note that another way to minimize Outlook (or any app) to the system tray is by using Trayconizer, but HideOutlook is certainly easier to set up and provides extra functionality (it is also more straightforward in terms of recommending to other people).

Version Tested: 1.0.18

Compatibility: Windows 98/ME/2000/XP; probably Vista as well (please confirm if you have Vista). I tested with Outlook 2007.

Go to the program page to download the latest version (approx 105K). Go here for HideOE for Outlook Express.

There’s no escaping it: file hosting services like Rapidshare and Megaupload have become a permanent feature of the internet landscape. If you use the internet you will very likely be downloading files from them, and this program can make the process much simpler, easier and faster for you. If you download a lot of files from these services then this program is an absolute must-have. (Note that it will also download videos from many video sharing sites as well).

Here are SEVEN EIGHT really cool things about this program:

1. Completely Automates downloading: Jdownloader works by managing hosting services compulsory “wait times” and circumvents CAPTCHAs (for more than 60 sites) by optical character recognition, without user intervention. This means that downloading, say, 4 files from Rapidshare can be done completely in the background, without requiring you to visit the download pages, wait for time counters to count down, enter Captchas, and spend 10 or 15 minutes doing this four times during the day.
2. Re-connects to defeat compulsory wait times: which is to say it tries to change your IP address such that the file hosting service treats you as a new user every time, and does not force a wait time between downloads. This function is dependent on the kind of connection and router setup you have, and I personally did not test it. If you are curious a list of reconnection scripts (and more info) can be found on this page (scroll down).
3. Supports a wide range of hosting services (and video sharing sites): in fact, way more than you every knew existed (“hundreds” by version 4). If you encounter something that is not a famous service like a Rapidshare or a Megaupload my guess is that Jdownloader will probably support it. A number of video sharing sites are also supported; to download, simply copy the URL of the video and look to see if Jdownloader has captured it. Note that although I could not find a list of supported services; if you go to settings tab / modules / Anticaptcha you will see a list of services which I assume also doubles as the supported sites list.
4. Captures multiple links on a webpage: want to download several links listed on a webpage? Simply highlight and copy all of them into the clipboard, and Jdownloader will recognize and add them to its list. (Contrast this with pasting links into a text file and downloading manually one-by-one).
5. The user interface: completely revamped in the new (0.7) version of this program, the “new” user interface is intuitive and straightforward and a very welcome change from previous versions, which was at times unnecessarily complicated.
6. Firefox integration: through the Flashgot Firefox extension. Jdownloader will provide the option to install this extension during its own installation process.
7. Scheduling downloads: a rather nifty option whereby you can tell the program to, say, start downloading at 2 am in the morning or something like that, when you know no one in your household is using internet bandwidth (as an example).
8. Open architecture: you can add or remove functionality by downloading and installing plugins. Examples include the auto unRAR-ing of downloaded files, “watching” of folders, and other cool stuff.

Notes on installation/uninstallation: unzip and run the .exe to install. Run the same .exe again to launch the app. The installer offers to install a browser plugin called Kikin (some sort of search engine aggregator), but AFTER it installs it tells you its still in closed beta and won’t let you use it. My advice is do not allow Kikin installation (click ’cancel’ when the Kikin screen appears during install). To uninstall Jdownloader, simply delete the Jdownloader folder (see here).

The verdict: a truly impressive piece of software. I would highly recommend this for anyone who does anything more than the very occasional downloading from file hosting services. This program can really save you a lot of time (and energy) and at what it does it is most likely the best in its class.

Version Tested: 7.504

Compatibility: Windows, Mac, Linux. Requires Java Runtime Environment.

Go to the program page to download the latest version (approx 19.3 megs).

There’s a big debate that’s started after the latest economic crash over why or whether the previously dominant "Efficient Market Theory" in economics has failed and been discredited. It is now thought that one of the main premises that underlie this theory, that of "perfect information" in the marketplace over time is an unrealistic assumption that simply is never the case. And though it will not save the Efficient Market Theory, Invisible Hand will definitely make your online shopping activity more intelligent by giving you instant access to the best prices that may be available with other vendors for the items that you are shopping for. Here are more notes:

• How it works: Invisible Hand works in the background while you surf. If it detects that you are looking at any of the sites that are among the network of shopping sites that it monitors, it will immediately scan the other sites on its network, fetch other available prices, and display these as clickable links in a toolbar on your page.
• Sites that are monitored: seem to over-represent books and electronics stores (including Amazon, Borders, Buy.com, Best Buy, NewEgg, as well as many others). For a bigger list look here. There is somewhat of a bias for US and UK outfits.
• Accuracy: in my experience testing of this software it was able to find accurate and useful information and lower prices on many items that I would typically shop for. Note, however, that in many cases shipping charges can be misleading, resulting in inaccurate recommendations (as an example, recommending something on site A that may cost 9$ with a $3.99 shipping charge over the same item on site B priced at $10 with free shipping).
• Performance: the question here is how responsive Invisible Hand is and how quickly it can query and retrieve information (as well as how bandwidth intensive it is). Unfortunately I cannot really answer this question; all I can say from a purely subjective perspective is that at times it seems to take longer than I expected for the data to be obtained, even with my hi-speed broadband connection.
• The user interface: there isn’t one. Look for the Invisible Hand icon (which is a downward pointing arrow, see image to the right) for some information on what’s going on. A grey icon means Invisible Hand could not find information; a green one means that it does have information, and you can click on it to invoke this info in the toolbar. There is an obvious need for a third color that says: I haven’t even started looking into this item, but will do so ASAP, and a fourth that says: this site isn’t supported, sorry.
• Privacy: promises not to collect any information aside from the items you are browsing for.
• No guarantees: it is quite possible that you are able to find a better deal on your own than what Invisible Hand recommends (although I would say it is unlikely).
• Bugs: I’ve had the experience where Invisible Hand refuses to make recommendations on an item (I should say, states that it has no recommendations to make), even when it had provided information a few hours earlier. Restarting Firefox magically brought the info back.

The verdict: a great software for online shopping that can potentially save you money from the moment you install it. If I could wish for something (aside from the remarks in the "User Interface" section above), it would be the ability to switch this one off by default until such a time as I am ready to press a button and ask it to quickly check for other or better prices for whatever I am looking at at that particular moment. It seems that for it to constantly querying and checking prices all the time and on every page I visit would in most (but not all) cases be a waste of bandwidth.

Having said the above I will say that I am impressed with Invisible Hand, am certain it will come in handy, and will definitely keep it permanently installed in Firefox. The FAQ page suggests that an Internet Explorer version may be in the works.

Version Tested: 1.5

Compatibility: Firefox 2.0-3.5

Go to the Invisible Hand home page to download the latest version (approx 41.3K).

Printee is a free Internet Explorer extension designed to remove elements of a webpage to create a perfectly printable page without ads or extra information (e.g sidebars, unrelated images, other stories on the page) that you might not want to waste ink and paper printing. Provides a single-click wizard when pressing CTRL+G that can provide a printer-ready page on-demand, instantly eliminating extraneous page elements.

Imagine the situation: you just found a nice article online that you want to print (or save to a mobile device to read later while on-the-go). And while a lot of sites offer a “printable version of this article” option, many others, such as Freewaregenius for example, do not. In this case (and if you are using Internet Explorer) you can use Printee to quickly strip the page of all text and images that you do not want. You can do this manually or press CTRL+G for an automated cleanup, and then print the page or save or clip it for later use. You will also have much more control over what to include and exclude than a “printable version” could ever provide.

Here are more notes on this software:

• How it works: once installed, you can add the “Printee” icon to your IE toolbar (see below for how to do that). Once you are ready to start editing a page for printing you can do one of 3 things (a) right click and drag the mouse over the page elements to start selecting; (b) double click CTRL, then left click on page elements to start selecting them, or (c) click on the Printee button in the IE toolbar, the left click elements to select. Once you have something (anything) selected simply right click and you will get a useful little context menu that can help you refine your selection.
• One click wizard: pressing CTRL+G is instant magic that will produce a printable version of your page instantly. Try it.
• More on how to use: if selecting manually, remember that you don’t have to select the elements you want all at once. Start off by selecting those elements inside your text that you don’t want and remove those first. If your text is a dark font on a dark background make sure to use the “remove background” function.
• Styles: you can quickly flip through several interesting pre-defined styles (sort of like “skins” for your printout).
• Fonts and margins: are easily editable. Change font or font size for your entire document or sections of it. Manipulating the desired margins (width) of your document is also a breeze.
• Other functions: you can print or email the edited page (using your system’s default email client)

Wish list (or how this software can be even better)

• Allow exiting out of Printee selection mode by pressing Esc. Currently, if you want to abort selecting you need to display the Printee toolbar and click on the “x” in the right corner [update: implemented in v.1.5.3.1].
• The ability to disable right click+drag, as I found that the selection mode is frequently accidentally launched when right clicking stuff on the page.  [update: implemented in v.1.5.3.1].
• A Firefox version. For those of us (like me) who use both browsers.

The verdict: the real strength of this software and what makes it much better than, say, web-based services that do the same thing (such as PrintWhatYouLike) is the automated CTRL+G instant-printable-page function.

If you use IE and find yourself printing a lot of web content for whatever reason you will find this an invaluable addition to your browser (I am planning a Top-10 IE extensions post and I think this one will make it to the list). My only criticism is that the manual element selection process could have been more user friendly as it is it takes a little bit of getting used to.

Version Tested: 1.5.2

Compatibility: Windows 2000, 2003, XP, Vista. Requires Internet Explorer 6, 7, or 8.

Go to the program page to download the latest version (approx 0.43 megs).

If you’ve seen the previous incarnation of this program you’ll be happy to know that this new version is a complete departure from its predecessor, completely re-written in JAVA. It avoids or circumvents all of the problems/issues that afflicted the previous incarnation including false positives reported by some anti-malware programs, restrictions on some (adult) sites, memory issues, and issues with registry entries and drivers that the program installed and left on the system (in truth, by the time the last version of Tubemaster plus was released all of these were actually already remedied, but I wanted to make sure to mention that these issues were a thing of the past).

Improvements also include a better looking user interface (the built-in browser of the predecessor is done away with). In fact the only feature of TM+ that I liked that TM++ does not have is portability. Here are more notes on this program:

• How it works: once you launch TM++ (it will reside in the system tray), use your browser to navigate to the video or audio that you want to download. TM++ will display a notification and start downloading your media as soon as it starts playing in the browser. You will need to keep the browser window open for the duration of the download in order for TM++ to download your media properly.
• Media conversion: on-the-fly. Includes a couple dozen conversion presets, my favorite of which is the quick MP3 extraction.
• Audio/video search: the search functions are very impressive. For video search, you can specify which site you want to search from a rather expansive list of sites.
• Virus/malware free: a clean bill of health from Virustotal.

The verdict: I’ve seen the development trajectory of this program and I think that developer deserves a lot of credit for taking this software in the right direction and creating what is undoubtedly an excellent product. But what makes this product noteworthy compared to others in its category is its ability to download from almost any site, including ant-leech encrypted media. It can be independently launched when needed and does not install itself as an extension in your browser.

Although TM++ is no longer portable (like TM+ was), this is understandable given that it relies on a number of other apps/technologies (including JAVA, which it will install if absent). Overall I highly recommend this.

Version tested: 1.0 beta

Compatibility: WinAll. Requries JAVA. Will soon be available on Linux and Mac.

Go to the program page to download the latest version (approx 180K).

Imagine that you’re at work pulling reports from the database or working on spreadsheets, but that you also just absolutely need to follow developments in the Wimbeldon match that is going on at the same time, or a landmark speech by President Obama (that would be me in the latter case). Typically what I would do is use my headphones, minimize the browser or media player, and follow the audio alone. Except now multitaskers and bored workers everywhere can rejoice: with Double Vision you can do your work while having your video showing semi-transparently under your spreadsheet or whatever application you’re using.

studies have shown that worker’s productivity increases by 15% while they use Double Vision (yes I’m just making this up). The irony is that I was actually introduced to this software by a coworker (thanks DAK!). More notes below:

• Plays video from the internet: i.e. anything that you would use the browser to view; does not play local video files.
• Transparency: you can control the level of transparency you want through a slider.
• How to use: browse to or type in the URL of the website you want and navigate to your video. In some cases (e.g. for YouTube) Double Vision seems to automatically zoom onto the video and hide all other page contents; if not, resize Double Vision around the video such that only the video is showing. Finally press the “Go Double Vision” button on the top left, which will sort of “burn” the Double Vision semitransparent player onto your screen so it shows through all other windows.
• Hotkeys: Ctrl+Alt will bring the player back into focus, while Ctrl+Esc will exit the semitransparent state and allow you to use the controls. You can set it to mute the sound as well, although curiously it doesn’t automatically un-mute when you resume playing the video (for that you’ll have to go to your volume control dialog).
• Auto skins: an option where Double Vision automatically changes its skin to match that of the video service being used (for example Netflix, Hulu, and Youtube).

Wish list (or how this program can be even better)

• A redesign of the user interface: currently it looks somewhat … unprofessional; they could do a lot better.
• The ability to customize the hotkeys used.
• Hulu support: while both the website and the player purport Hulu support, I was not able to get Hulu videos playing on this (got page missing/404 errors). And yes I am in the US and can get it to play on other browsers.

The verdict: I would say this is a very innovative and interesting software that does exactly what it purports to do and does it quite well. I would be happier if they made it look better (as per my wish list above), but other than that I would recommend it to overworked people everywhere!

Compatibility: Windows XP, Vista. Requires an internet connection

Go to the program page to download the latest version (approx 2.15 megs).

[Editor’s note: this review was written by Freewaregenius contributor Jason H. Check out his tech blog: 404techsupport.com].

You setup your accounts inside of Postbox just like you would Thunderbird, except Postbox has a number of preset accounts to make it even easier for you to connect to popular mail clients like Gmail, Windows Live Hotmail, or Yahoo! Mail. Postbox can import settings and configurations from other clients just like Thunderbird and including Thunderbird. Migrating my settings and local folders to Postbox from TB was very simple and very quick.

One thing Postbox brings with it is the To-Do list. You can just create a new entry for the To-Do list and it will put it at the top of your e-mail stack. Just put in a Subject and body and it will get added to the task list. If you look at your e-mail in another client, these to-do list entries simply look like standard e-mails. This is a fast replacement for those of us who e-mail ourselves notes and reminders.

Thunderbird has the next feature already, but Postbox really brings it to the forefront. This makes it more useful, more visible, and really more likely to be used. You can assign Topics to e-mails and you can create your own topics along with the default ones like Important, Work, and Personal. This tagging helps keep things organized and also aligns things with the To-Do list mentality of many e-mail clients.

Postbox uses tabs near the top of the client window to show different categories and inboxes. One very cool use of the tabs is the way Postbox can make the content of your e-mail available to you in different ways. For an example, look at the screenshot below. There are multiple tabs for images, attachments, and links, as well as two tabs for different folders. Under the images tab, all the images in your e-mails for the account selected will be displayed. (This would be more impressive if I had more than one image…) The same is true for the attachments and links tabs; all attachments will be listed plainly under its own tab, and all links from your e-mails will be listed with a little bit of accompanying context under the Links tab. This can be very helpful in getting to the meat of your e-mails and looking through archived (historically sorted) messages.

The compose window for Postbox really has a lot to be exploited for the e-mail power user as well. The compose window brings with it a small version of the attachments, links, and images tabs seen above, as well as a few other cool features. Integrated into the sidebar for the Postbox compose window includes: Google Maps, Yelp search, Thesaurus, and an easy signature selection.

Postbox also has a great search feature, the ability to archive messages at the press of a button (puts a message in a folder under your inbox called Archive), conversation views, contact panes, and quick links to help you find related messages to the one you’re looking at in the Reading pane.

Postbox is based off of Mozilla’s code and has a lot of the great features you’re already used to with Thunderbird. With similar accounts setup, Postbox had a little bit bigger footprint (40MB) compared to Thunderbird (27MB) as a running process. Your mileage may differ depending on your accounts, messages, and e-mail habits. The beta has been perfectly stable in my experience. Check it out now and provide some feedback to the developers to create the ultimate e-mail client.

Version tested: 1.0 beta12

Compatibility: Windows XP or Vista. Mac OS X (Tiger 10.4 and Leopard 10.5)

Go to the Postbox homepage for more info and to download the latestoar version (approx 7.73 megs).

Every once in a while I get emails asking me about the "Lightbox" style image viewing I have on this site from people who want to implement something similar on theirs (for the record I use a Wordpress plugin called Shutter Reloaded for this). Generally speaking it is a fairly nice effect, and so the question becomes: wouldn’t it be terrific if there were a Firefox plugin that delivers this function to any image site(s) that you may be browsing? Greased Lightbox is that plugin. Some notes on this as follows:

• How to use: install then browse over to an image site such as Flickr or perform a Google image search. Click on an image then browse the images with the arrow keys. Press "+" to zoom in, "-" to zoom out, "0" for full size, and "x","Esc", or mouse-click on the image to exit.
• Requires the Greasemonkey extension (see "compatibility below").

The verdict: a very nice effect indeed. Not as fancy and ambitious as, say, something like CoolIris (formerly PicLens) and it’s 3D wall of images, but depending on what you like this may be a good thing.

Version Tested: 0.18

Compatibility: works with Firefox with Greasemonkey extension or Safari with GreaseKit or Opera 8+

Go to the program page to download the latest version (approx 72K).

This program is most suited for users of Outlook who organize their email across a large number of folders, and who may be wishing for a quick and easy way to find and their folders. It does NOT provide an email search function though; if you want that look consider Xobni or Lookout.

This app was conceived when the author, who initially wrote it for himself, was facing the daunting task of organizing email across 500 folders and wanted a quick and easy way to find/access the correct folder.As an added bonus it provides two additional functions: the ability to bookmark folders as favorites, and the ability to right click on a folder and check for duplicate emails.

Here are more notes on this program:

• How it works: HOFS is launched separately from Outlook and appears as a sperate window. Letters typed in the search box will immediately display relevant folders. The user can then either drag and drop emails to the folder, or can select emails in Outlook and then right click select “Move Selected email to this folder”, or otherwise click CTRL+V.
• On-demand deduping: simply right click on any folder and select “Remove Duplicate Email”. HOFS checks for dupes by comparing the Message-ID header of emails to other messages received within 48 hours of each other.
• Ongoing duplicate email monitoring: an interesting feature whereby HOFS will monitor your selected folders for duplicate emails on a continuous basis (select a folder then check “Monitor folder for duplicate email” from the menu). I am assuming that HOFS has to be running for this function to work.
• Favorite folders: right click on a folder and select “add to favorites” to add the favorites list, displayed in the bottom page of the HOFS interface.

Wish list:

• Automatic launch with Outlook: an option for that would be excellent.
• Minimize to tray fix: on close HOFS minimizes to tray rather than shuts down. All well and good, except there does not seem to be a way to maximize it again, and clicking on the program shortcut merely displays a message that HOFS is already running.

The verdict: a simple yet highly useful program that can potentially significantly enhance your Outlook user experience. This program is ideally suited for Outlook users who work with a lot of folders; if this does not apply to you, you honestly might want to consider using folders more extensively, as HOFS really makes it easy to work with them.

But to many people the Outlook dedupe function may be even more valuable than the folder lookup. I was not able to evaluate the kind of job that it does with this, as apparently I do not have any duplicate emails , but would appreciate to learn about your experiences with it in the comments section.

Last word: if you use Outlook, download and install.

Version Tested: 0.2

Compatibility: Windows XP, Maybe Vista (unsure about Vista 64) and Microsoft Outlook 2003 or 2007 (author unsure about compatibility with previous versions). Also requires Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0

Go to the program page to download the latest version (approx 3.43 megs).

With this extension allows you to do is instantly remove traces of a site that you’re browsing, without having to remember to do it later on and without affecting the cookies and history of other browsing activity.

Some practical uses are:

• Instant, 1-click privacy (and security: without having to remember to clear your cookies and/or history later on, and without removing all traces of all of your other activity that you might want to preserve.
• Site development: developers, webmaster, and testers will love this tool, especially when a site that they are testing or working with places cookies locally that they need to always remove in order to make/test changes.

More information on this one below:

• What it removes: Close’n Forget remove cookies by default but can also be enabled to remove any reference to the current site from the browser’s history (from the settings). You can set it to remove the current domain from the browser’s history (e.g. sitename.com or sitename.com/bla.html; as well as subdomains (e.g. subdomain.sitename.com). Alternately, you can set it to forget all pages viewed in the tab/window you are closing. The image to the right shows the settings screen.
• How to use: you can either use the Close’n Forget option in the context menu, or place the Close’n Forget button on the title bar and simply click on that to exit a tab or window (instead of the button on the tab or window itself).
• Installation: after installing normally, you can place the Close’n Forget button on the title bar if you want. To do this, right click on the main toolbar, select customize, and click on the Close’n Forget button to add it.

The verdict: a brilliant and original concept that is yet so simple! This one is definitely one of my top 10 must-have Firefox plugins (yes there will be a top-10 Firefox plugin posting in the coming weeks; feel free to give suggestions).

Version Tested: 0.6.4

Compatibility: requires Firefox 2.x or 3.x.

Go to the plugin page to download the latest version (approx 20K).