Description: RBTray is a free, lightweight app that provides minimize-to-tray functionality for any open window by right clicking the bottom right corner of the window’s "minimize" button. Alternately you can minimize to tray by right clicking anywhere on the title bar and using a context menu that also provides "always on top", and Window resizing functions.

First off let me note that the version of this program that I am reviewing here is a modified version of the open source program with the same name that I downloaded from this site. More notes on this program below:

• What it does: minimize-to-tray on demand, from the title bar.
• How it works: does not install any buttons on the title bar; rather, it can minimize to tray by right-clicking the lower right corner of the minimize button (see screenshot above) or through a context menu that appears on right-clicking anywhere on the title bar (see image to the right).
• Memory use: is very small. Memory use seems to vary across a range, 500K to approx 2 megs.
• No install: simply unzip and run. To have the program start with Windows you will need to add a shortcut to the startup folder manually.
• Other functions: "always on top", and a rather puzzling "my size" function which on my machine resizes any window to 1584×948, apparently without giving you the option to customize that size.
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Description: QwikTulz is a free Explorer extension that can add a number of interesting functions to Windows’ right-click context menu, including save directory to ISO image, convert folder to drive, open with custom text editor, view/save/check MD5 Hash, convert across BAT/COM/EXE files, copy path, open DOS prompt, and others. It also offers standalone or command line options for some of these , such as the ISO creation, MD5 Hash functions, and EXE/COM/EXE conversions.

I’m always in the market for cool and interesting functions to add to the right-click context menu. If you are like me you might want to check out QwikTulz, a context menu enhancement that offers an interesting range of context menu functions, from the standard “copy path to clipboard” and “DOS prompt here” to the rather unusual (and to me more interesting) “Save Directory to ISO image file” and “Convert Directory into new drive”, with a smattering of other functions in between. Here are more notes on these:

• Mix and match functions: you can pick only those functions that you like and want to use; simply check/uncheck as appropriate (see image to the right).
• Dos prompt here/Windows Explorer here/New Folder Here/Copy Path to Clipboard: self explanatory, I think.
• Convert Directory into new drive: this will create a virtual hard drive volume in “My Computer” that contains the files from the directory that was used to create it. You can both read and write to this new drive, and can specify the drive letter on creation; however it does NOT survive a reboot. If you are interested in creating “permanent” drive shortcuts from folders check out Visual Subst.
• Save directory to ISO: very useful if you need to convert folders to ISO images frequently, on the spot. I personally use Imgburn to do this when I need it but this function gets a nod for being one of the most original I have seen in a context menu for some time. Note: you can also run the standalone utility QwikISO - installed with QuikTulz - that provides this function as well (see image to the right).
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Description: Garden of Colored Lights is a free, fast-paced vertically scrolling shoot em up. It offers excellent production qualities in the form of a quirky soundtrack and sound effects and colorful vector graphics, and employs an interesting innovation in gameplay where players can choose the weapons with-which to outfit their ship.

I’ve been wanting to post another interesting vertical scrolling shoot em up, and “Garden of Colored Lights” not only satisfies the “furious, frantic blaster” requirement but adds an interesting game innovation where it offers you the option to select your preferred combination of weapons. And although this may at first not seem too revolutionary, in practical terms you will find that your choice of weapons can in fact result in completely difference experiences of the game, depending on what combination of weapons you choose. More notes on this game:

• Weapon types: your ship can be equipped with 3 different weapons and there are 9 different weapons to choose from. Weapons belong to three different categories: “Slow Weapons” are powerful but take a while to recharge, so they cannot be used continuously; “Fast Weapons” are continuous and effective against small enemies, but require many multiple successive hits to destroy larger enemies; “Special Weapons” do cool things like hit enemies beside you or behind you.
• Weapons selection: in general it may be a good idea to have a “balanced” setup whereby you have one of each type of weapon that you like (Slow/Fast/Special). The game provides a handful of preset “types” to choose from that have that sort of balance. However if you really like a certain kind of weapon that, say, takes a while to recharge you can equip your ship with up to three instances of that weapon, such that you can use one while the others charge up (note: this is probably not the best idea in practice, but makes for some very interesting gameplay). Also, I might add, using multiple instances of the same weapon apparently causes the damage each one of them inflicts to be split between the two.
• Weapons management: three bars on the top left show you how much time before your each one of your weapons recharges. Generally speaking destroying enemies causes your weapons to recharge proportional to how much damage each of them did to the enemy. Sounds complicated? It gets even more so: killing bosses or their escorts apparently does not recharge your weapons, and the total amount of damage that you can do is split across your weapon that are firing at any one time, i.e. you always have a fixed amount of damage you can mete out at once, although when you’ve done enough damage with any single weapon it levels up and becomes even more potent.
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Description: ToyCon is a free drag and drop image to icon converter that converts JPG, PNG, GIF, BMP and TGA images to ICO as well as ICO to PNG. It supports the creation of a full range of icon size formats within the ICO file including the new Vista .ICO format which supports 256×256 resolution icons in PNG compression.

A quick image to icon converter that offers drag and drop simplicity alongside a versatile set of format choices for your resulting ICO file. Here are more notes on this program:

• Portable: just unzip and run, no installation needed.
• Drag and drop: the interface couldn’t be simpler (or more pleasant to work with). You can drag a single image or multiple image files at once onto the ToyCon dialog hovering on your desktop (see screenshot).
• ICO file formats: right click on “choose formats” to access a format selection dialog. This is where you determine if your ICO file will contain any or all of Vista, 32bit, 8bit or 4bit color information as well as the icon sizes that you would like included in your ICO file for each (16×16, 24×24, 32×32, 48×48, 64×64, 72×72, 96×96, 128×128 and 256×256). The format chooser is very versatile and powerful and comes with 3 pre-built presets (XP, Vista, and “Dock”) with the ability to specify a custom configuration. (Although it doesn’t allow you to save it independently as a preset).
• Convert ICO to PNG: is possible, up to an image size of 256×256.
• Batch conversion: see “drag and drop” above.
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Description: “Everything” is a free, lightning fast file and folder name search program that offers right-click context menu integration. It works with NTFS filesystem hard drives only because it does not scan your hard drive but rather uses the Master File Table of the NTFS volume to build its database.

If your hard drive(s) is NTFS formatted and if you are looking for a super-fast program for searching file and folder names that beats the pants off of Windows’ default search function, this program may be it. It may be, in fact, the fastest desktop search program (for files and folder names) that I have ever seen.

I will admit that before I encountered this program I thought that desktop search programs were of two types: the kind that scans your hard drive on demand on the one hand, and “indexing” search programs on the other that scan your hard drive, store the result in a database, and then use various methods to keep that database updated with subsequent changes. And although “Everything” is in fact similar to the aforementioned “indexing” desktop search programs (it does indeed build an index), there is a difference in that it doesn’t do this by actual, time consuming scanning of the hard drive.

The way “Everything” works is by accessing the NTFS USN Change Journal maintained by the NTFS drivers, which logs all changes made on the NTFS drive. It uses the raw Master File Table for building its database, which is very fast (1,000,000 files will take about 1 minute), but it only works with NTFS drives. More info on this program:

• Updating the database: aside from the initial indexing (which is superfast) you do not need to worry about this. You never need to reindex manually, and the program does not need to be running in memory at all times. All files are monitored, including system files.
• Search results: right click “Search Everything ..” on a folder or drive and you get a “flattened” list of results that include all files and folders inside recursively (hence the name “Everything”). You can then type into the search box to filter the result or click on a column header to sort them.
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Description: Automen is a free GUI for Mencoder that can perform video conversions across multiple formats and encoders. It supports XviD (for AVI encoding), FLV, X264 (MP4 for Ipod/PSP/PS3), WMV, MPEG4, MPEG2, and Huffyuv and is designed to be simple and straightforward for quick video conversion.

I will not mince words: this little program has unexpectedly come out of nowhere to become one of my favorite video conversion program hands down. The primary reason for this is in it’s user interface: the design is simple and makes sense, yet delivers a high degree of control and advanced functionality. Here are the top 8 reasons why this program rocks:

1. Set output width, not output resolution: you can tell Automen, for example, that you want your output video to be 640 pixels in width and it will determine what the height should be based on the input video aspect ratio. This is a good thing, as one thing I do NOT understand in most video converters is their insistence on the user defining the full, fixed output video resolution (e.g. 630×480), which is totally needless and in many situations results in converted movies with aspect ratios that are out of whack. You will not have to worry about wrong aspect ratios with Automen.
2. Encode by desired file size, not bitrate: how many people know what bitrate is? Not many, yet many video conversion programs insist on asking the user for their desired video bitrate. Instead these programs can do what Automen does and ask the user for the desired video size in megs, something which everyone can understand (the larger the video the more bitrate it can give you and the higher the quality). If you must adjust the bitrate manually, however, you can do so in the “advanced settings” tab.
3. Supports multithreaded processing: i.e. will take advantage of multiple core CPUs for faster conversion (check the box in the lower left corner of the ’basic settings’ tab to turn this on).
4. Offers multiple encoding quality settings: aside from setting the output size, which will greatly influence the output quality, you can select from a number of encoding presets (e.g. single pass or two pass, slow or fast, etc). In this case the tradeoff is between quality on the one hand and how quickly you want the conversion to be completed on the other.
5. Process only video, only audio, or both: simply check the appropriate box in the “advanced settings” tab. You can extract (demux) audio tracks from video files by checking the audio tab and unchecking the video tab.
6. Split output videos into multiple files: simply set the size in megs for each desired chunk to split into.
7. Normalize audio: for your audio track, whether as part of a video or when demuxing. Check the appropriate box in the “advanced settings” tab for this.
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Description: DVDnextCOPY iTurns Manager is a free program that can convert iTunes DRMS protected tracks to normal unprotected MP3s. It installs a virtual CD-writer driver and takes advantage of the option to burn tracks to CD in iTunes in order to capture and re-encode protected audio files to normal MP3s.

I’ve always had an interest in the various software that can remove DRM protection from MP3s, and with iTunes becoming the biggest music retailer in the US I am sure that a lot of people out there would love to find a solution for stripping DRMS protection from their purchases. If this applies to you I present the very strangely named yet rather brilliant “DVDnextCOPY iTurns Manager” (and yes it actually is iTurns, not iTunes, no typo there!). I tested this program on DRMS protected MP3s downloaded from the iTunes store and it worked brilliantly. Here’s more info on this program:

• How it works: it takes advantage of the option in iTunes to burn DRMS protected audio files to CD. It will install a virtual CD-writer driver on your machine that you burn to instead of your actual CD writer, and subsequently captures the data then re-encodes it as a normal MP3 (without the need for an actual physical medium).
• Tags/metadata: are fully preserved in the resulting MP3, including album art.
• Requirements: iTunes has to be installed, and it has to cooperate; (i.e. it has to play the DRMS protected songs). You cannot simply remove the DRMS protection of a track that, say, is copied from a friend’s computer as your iTunes will not play those to begin with.
• Re-encoding: be aware that your music will be re-encoded rather simply being stripped of the DRMS (output file format supported is MP3 only in the free version). The good news is that all information is digitally transferred rather than re-recorded, as the case would be in a straight recording program like Mp3MyMp3. If you like to get as close a copy of the original as possible you can make the re-encoding settings as close to the original audio file as possible.
• Legality: according to the developer’s site, this program is actually perfectly legal and does not violate copyright law. This is because DVDnextCOPY iTurns Manager does not actually alter or strip the DRMS protected files from their protection, but rather uses them to encode new files. The tracks also need to be legally yours in the first place as confirmed by the fact that your iTunes will actually play them.
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As you may have noticed, my site has been going offline frequently these days. Apparently this is because for some reason it is consuming too much of the shared hosting server’s CPU power.

This is not due, say, to a sudden increase in traffic (my traffic has more or less been pretty stable over some time now), no’r does it seem to be caused by any newly implemented changes in the site code itself (as far as I know there aren’t any). I am thus somewhat at a loss as to how to proceed in terms of getting this problem fixed. The people at my hosting company, Webuilders, have actually been rather patient and flexible in terms of communicating with me and managing this issue, but I still don’t know what to do…

I’ll figure out some sort of solution sooner or later I’m sure; I just wanted to let everybody know that this situation will hopefully be dealt with soon and in the meantime I apologize for the inconvenience.

Description: The Underside is a free action adventure platform game. It offers a low-res retro-graphics look, an explorable world, and fast-paced story-driven gameplay interspersed with humorous and whimsical commentary.

I downloaded and started playing this and quickly realized that it is so much fun that I had to post it (it also has a certain dry sense or humor that also adds to the game experience). This game is similar to the classic free platformer "Cave Story" in its look and feel as well as basic concepts and gameplay

This game by and large aims to be "plot driven", which is why I have to mention the storyline, which goes something like this: in the beginning "the Universal King" made a flat world that was initially good but then became bad so he wasn’t happy with it, "flipped it over" and started another world which became known as the "overside" (conversely, the world below became known as the "underside"). This arrangement worked out fine for a while but then that world in turn became "bad" and the Universal King, apparently running out of ideas, decided to wipe out the whole thing. Before doing so, however, he decided that if a single person proved to him that they can be good, he might forgo his destructive impulse. That person would be your character, destined to travel into the underworld and perform some good deed whose nature I am somewhat unclear on. Here are more notes on this game:

• Game dynamics: you start off being able to run and jump but soon find weapons and other useful objects that add to your abilities (e.g. extend your maximum health points, give you a bouncier jump, etc). Other collectibles are various food items to replenish health and coins that remain after killing baddies that you can collect for points.
• Graphics and sound: the game offers original "chunky" retro graphics and an original console-style soundtrack, both of which work really well to add to the game experience.
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Description: Snapact is a free, stylish image viewing and management software that offers a good range of image manipulation and management functions, including tag and metadata editing, a drop basket, and the creation of virtual albums which can be uploaded and shared using the free online Snapact photo sharing service.

If you’ve been reading this blog for a while then you know that I am always on the lookout for “stylish” image viewing software (e.g. Twins Visions, Pictomio). What’s different about Snapact is that while these programs previously sited tend on average to be resource hungry or have high 3D requirements, Snapact does not (uses around 23 megs in memory when running). On the other hand what Snapact manages to do is to retain a pleasing “coolness factor” while offering a lot of nice features both for image manipulation and image management (but especially the latter).

What also needs to be said about Snapact is that it is very much a desktop front-end to the free Snapact image sharing service; which is to say that it is designed for seamless integration with your online Snapact account. Having said that, I also have to note that you can use this program as a local viewer and image management program without signing up or using the online component. I had been using this program as a local image viewer for a week, in fact, before I decided to review it and only then did I sign up for a Snapact online account for the purposes of writing about it. More notes on this program as follows:

• Carousel-style browsing: similar to the famous iTunes carousel, this is not only fashionable these days but rather cool, and the implementation here is a very good one (fast, efficient). When viewing an image all of the other images in the same folder are displayed as thumbnails in the bottom part of the screen and will enlarge in turn as you mouse over them. Or you can simply use the left/right arrow keys to browse back and forth, as you would with any image viewer.
• Image editing functions: rotate, crop, blur, sharpen, brighten/contrast, redeye, adjust tint/color, and negative and black and white image filters.
• Image managent functions: edit or add tags to your images, edit other metadata (including rating, title, description, etc), view metadata (simply hover over any image thumbnail), add to album (an album is a kind of virtual folder or category), synchronize album(s) to your Snapact online account (this is optional), add to mini-basket (a handy work area where you can drag images or other files you would like to work with).
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