Instantbird: Mozilla based Pidgin.

It seems like nowadays, XUL based freeware is spreading to every type of program, and instant messaging is no exception. Instantbird is a multi-protocol IM client that uses Pidgin's libpurple to deliver the messages, and Mozilla's XUL library to display the interface. In other words: Pidgin turned Firefox.


Protocols.
Of course, what would a multi-protocol client be without protocols?

• AIM
• Facebook
  
• Gadu-Gadu
• Google Talk
• GroupWise
• ICQ
• IRC
• MSN/WindowsLive
• MyspaceIM
• Netsoul
• QQ
• Simple
• XMPP
• Yahoo

 Addons.
 One of the nice things about Instantbird being built off XUL is that -like Firefox and Thunderbird- you have a plethora of addons you can get to further customize it to your liking. You can add Emoticons, Message Styles, Protocols, Themes, and more, just like Firefox, there's pretty much everything your heart could desire. Unfortunately, because Instantbird is so young, there are barely any addons, like in the case of Protocols, only one (and it's in development). So the addons are definitely a good feature, but they need some time to grow.

 Baby Steps.
To be honest, Instantbird kind of has a ways to go. You are unable to set the sound scheme (other than diving into a JAR file and manually replacing the WAV files), you can set a custom "Away" message, but you cannot have things like "Do Not Disturb" or Invisibility, and downloading Instantbird from the website presents only a ZIP file, which would be great if Instantbird was portable, but it's not. Things like a custom sound scheme (possibly even as an addon), custom Away messages (which Pidgin has mastered), or an Installer or Portable version of Instantbird are just several examples of the next steps that Instantbird needs to take. Don't get me wrong, that doesn't mean it's not a wonderful app. I downloaded it and it sits right along Pidgin and Miranda in my start menu. I can start it up, and have all of the basic functionality that I need from any of the other multi-protocol clients.

The good, and the future.
The things that I do admire about Instantbird is that it is open source and cross platform. In a way, Instantbird is much like Songbird: it's a non-Mozilla app built off XUL that has practically unlimited potential. The wonderful thing about Songbird is that with most media players, you think "Gee, I wish it had [this feature] or [that feature]," but Songbird fills that with the customization from addons. And that's what Instantbird could do. Imagine an Instant Messaging client with all the power of Pidgin, enhanced with hundreds of addons! An addon for webcam chat, an addon for browser integration, an addon for buddy pounces....the possibilities are endless! The only thing standing in Instantbird's path to being a truly magnificent piece of freeware (available on all three primary operating systems) is time. I personally can't wait to see what Instantbird will bring to the table when it's more mature. It's already a good client now. In a few years, it could be amazing.

Visit Instantbird website for download

Data Crow: Media cataloger that's simply caw-esome

Almost everyone owns media. Books, DVDs, CDs, Software, it's all around us. Sometimes it can get a bit messy of what you have or don't have, and you might be looking for a way to organize it, and Data Crow can do just that.

Data Crow is a multi-featured media cataloger, designed to make it extremely easy to keep track of you various types of media. Right off the bat, it handles CDs, Movies, Books and even Software. It's pretty straightforward and easy to use, but also has the ability to be extremely customizable to an experienced user.

 Almost every single area of Data Crow is extremely well organized. It has everything divided up into "Modules" that can be enabled and disabled, so you can choose your own list of items you want to keep track of (example, "CDs", "Movies", "Books", etc). Under each module, there is also sub-Modules, like "Actors" or "Directors" for the "Movies" module, or "Artist" for the "CDs" module. Furthermore, under a module, you have a list of the items, like for example, I have "Extreme Days....I-Robot....Monty Python....." under my Movies, but you can also choose different ways to sort, like by "Actors", "Year", "Director", or just even by "Title".

The thing that (A) most impressed me, and (B) drew me to Data Crow is the ability to import an item. There's a TON of information for media items. Instead of entering in a DVD's title, director, actors, front cover, play length and other stuff that you might want, you can also just import all that data with a few clicks. The "Item Wizard" lets you search various online databases for the item that you have right in front of you. You can use the ISBN for things like books, and the UPC (barcode) for CDs, Movies, Software, etc. It's extremely accurate (from when I've used it). It uses well known sites like Amazon, Barnes and Noble, IMDB, SourceForge.net and gets almost every field available (depending on what site you choose). If the websites miss something or get it wrong, you can always manually edit a field.

The only other features I can think of to mention are Report and Filter. Data Crow can generate amazing reports in either PDF or HTML of an entire Module (ie, CDs, Movies). Very nice, if you need a detailed list of every CD/Book/DVD you own. It also has Filtering, which will bring up only the Movies/CDs/Books that match your filter, whether it be Actor, Author, Director, Title, etc.

The only thing that I was disappointed in was the ability to create your own module. Sounds great, right? Yeah, I thought the same thing too. I wanted to make a module dedicated to Steam games, but I found the process extremely difficult, and in the end, it just did not work out at all like I hoped. That being said, please don't let that taint your vision of Data Crow. I actually did create a good module, it just sorted the fields alphabetically, which put "Title" halfway down the list other than on top.

Otherwise, it really is a wonderful program. It's written in JAVA, meaning that it is cross platform. To be honest, Data Crow is the first program that's written in Java that I actually enjoy profusely. Other programs do their job well, but they still have that Java-y feel to them, and they're often slow. Not Data Crow. It can actually be skinned to where it hardly feels like Java, and it's extremely fast.
On top of that, Data Crow is portable, and open source. What more could you ask?

Visit Data Crow website for Download

Listmas: Just in time for next Christmas!

This last Christmas, I was searching for a freeware to create an extremely easy Christmas List, but I couldn't find any*. So I decided to write one. Listmas is a one-of-a-kind Christmas/year-round gift-planning freeware.

First off, let me say that Listmas saves everything to a file as you are typing it, so you'll never lose any data. That means that when you fire up Listmas for the first time, it will ask you to either create a new list, or open an old one. If you've never use Listmas before, you click "New". Listmas v1.0.2009 saves lists in a new format, LMF (stans for ListMas File). Anyway, once you pick a new file, you see Listmas! Yay! You'll see a bunch of fields at the bottom of the window with text like "Item", "Person", or "Store" above them, but don't type in them just yet.

In order to add a new item, right click in the Listview (the empty space) and click "New". You should see a new row added to the listview that's completely blank, except for 5 grey stars. Now you can hop on those edit fields. Make sure you have that new entry in the listview selected, and then you can start editing the fields below. As you type, you'll see that whatever you're changing is being updated in the listview row as well.
Here's the fields that are available:

• Item: name of the item
• Price: price of the item
• Person: recipient of the gift
• Priority: how important it is that you get this gift
  
• Store: where you bought it from
• URL: the web address to that item, if you're buying online. Can be launched by the button to the right
  
• Note: any other information you want to remember

One of the nice things about listmas is that nothing is required. Instead of forcing you to enter an Item name or a Price, you can leave whatever fields blank that you want.

Once you get a gift, you can mark it "Got" by either checking its "Got it!" box when you have it selected in the listview, or you can right click on a row and click "Got it". A "got" gift will turn to a different color, making it very easy to see what you have and what you don't have.

That's about it! Pretty simple, eh?

There are a few more features that I made sure to throw in which are all available in "Preferences" under Options.

• Currency: if you want, you can actually have Listmas keep track of those dollar signs (or whatever currency symbol you use). In version 1.0.2009, Listmas has dollars, cents, pounds, and yen. Or if you want to keep track of it yourself, you can choose "N/A".
• Grid: if it helps you stay more organize, you can add a grid to the list.
• Done color: by default, "got" items are yellow, but you can change that to a variety of colors, or even white, if you don't want the color to change.
• Open last used file: Listmas is designed to work that you open list files either from the simple "New/Open" dialog, or by passing them as an argument. But if you want, you can just make it remember the last list that you had open, and it will open that one.
• Show columns: the thing that I really wanted to add was customization. What if someone wants to create a list for just one person, so they don't need the "Person" column? Or what if someone doesn't shop online, so "URL" is irrelevant? Well, Listmas lets you hide whatever columns you want. This doesn't mean that the field will be hidden, just the column. That means that if you hide "Note", in the list, the "Note" column will be gone, but there will still be the "Note" space below the list. The reason for this is that I thought maybe the list could just be an "at a glance" view, and then if someone wanted to view all of the information, they click on the entry in the list and see the rest below.

It really is simple, but it's also very nice. It's not perfect, but from what I can see, it's the only list program out there. It's open source written in Autohotkey, portable (mostly, but I'll fix it all the way in the future), and it's very tiny, at only 250kb in size.

I still have a few ideas, if Listmas gets enough people to try it out and tell me they liked it. Here's a few plans that I am.....well, planning.

• "Shipping" column (for online buyers. I always like knowing how much I'm spending on shipping vs the price of the item.)
• "Date" column (for the year-round aspect of Listmas. Maybe even a reminder, like for birthdays.)
• Remembering & restoring column placement and width. (That would actually be pretty tricky, but I'd like to get there some day.)
• Generating an HTML report (I've already toyed with this, and it actually is not so hard. Just exporting everything to a very nice, presentable page that the user could print if they're going shopping, that also contains data like "Total amount spent". The problem is, the reports look....bleh. I'm really bad at HTML, so it looks very ugly. Plus, I'm having trouble coming up with enough data for an interesting report. I'd need some help on this one.)

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS:
-CodeByter: *The one list program I did find was by a site called CodeByter, and I drew alot of inspiration from it to make Listmas (like the colored rows, thought I actually didn't think I could pull that off.) It was a wonderful list program, but it had a few things that I wanted changed, so that's why I wrote Listmas. Otherwise, I owe alot to him. His website is down, for some reason, which makes me terribly sad.
-UselessDreamer: For helping to point me in the right direction for putting images in a listview....and for the stars....sorry for stealing!
-Titan: For his amazing anchor script, which is like the oxygen for my programs. My windows would never be resizable without you, Titan.
-tkoi: For his Image Button Script. My GUIs are pretty thanks to you, tkoi.
-evl: For his amazing Listview color script. Didn't believe it possible (in AHK) until you proved me wrong.
-PhilHo: For his astounding listview-column-swap script, allowing me to add the stars, and take Listmas to the next level in the future.

Visit FreewareWire Software Downloads page for Listmas v1.0.2009

Quitter: Who says quitters never prosper?

Quitter is a "quiet little Twitter client".  It's extremely interesting, because you can read tweets, send tweets, and pretty much have the entire functionality of Twitter.....right in your command line. Yes, it's a command line program.


READ:
-Read all: Read an aggregate of  tweets from every user that you're following.
-Read groups: Read tweets only from users in a certain group. (Read on to find what a group is.)
-Read from user: You can scroll through the users you are subscribed to and pick one to read their tweets.
-Read mentioned: Read tweets where you are mentioned, ie, @Freewarewire.

DIRECT MESSAGES:
-Read: Yesh.
-Send: You can also send a direct message to any user (even one you're not following). Just be sure you type the username correctly.


ACTIONS:
-Post a tweet: Self explanatory. Type in a tweet, and it will get posted to your profile.
-Reply: You can also reply to a tweet, or reply to a direct message.
-Retweet: You also have the ability to retweet someone else's tweet, but it's a little more difficult, since you just scroll through the tweets using the arrow keys
-Open link: If a tweet contains a link, you can choose to open it your web browser. But again, it requires the arrow keys, so it can be a bit difficult to find the tweet you're looking for.


Quite a bit of functionality, for such a "quiet" program. Plus, there's even more.

Color changing.
Unfortunately, you can't change the background color (within Quitter. However, I believe Quitter follows the Windows command line protocol, so you can make a batch file, but that gets a little complicated.) But you can change the text color, and the highlight color. What's highlighting? Glad you asked...

Filtering/Highlighting.
On top of being a "normal" Twitter client, Quitter also lets you sort incoming messages. Filtering allows you to block certain messages, and Highlighting highlights certain messages. You can use the following three types for either:
-hashtags (ex: #hashtag)
-usernames (ex: @username)
-word (ex: "shareware")
If you filter any of the above, they will not be shown in Twitter. If you Highlight them, they will be changed to the "Highlight color", making them stand out.

Grouping.
On top of everything else, you can also divide who you follow into groups. The reasoning? Because you can also get tweets from one specific group.

Number of tweets.
You can also change how many tweets are displayed on the screen. The default is 20 (which currently fills my screen from top to bottom) but the max is 200 (which would be massive!)

URL shortening service.
Quitter also lets you set what service you want to use when you post a tweet.

Over-post in red.
Twitter limits it to 140 characters per tweet, and Quitter knows that. When posting a tweet, anything beyond 140 characters will be in red text. You can still tweet it, but the red will get cut off.

Download updates.
Not only can Quitter check for updates every time it starts, it can also download the update straight to the Quitter folder. It won't install it for you, but all you have to do is open the ZIP file and extract the new version of Quitter over the old one.

Really, it's great little app, even for someone who doesn't use Twitter that much (ie, me). There are a few things you should know about it though.
1. Can't read own tweets (in version 1.2).
I'm not vain, I just wish this was an option. It really would be nice. Especially if you think you misspelled something or whatnot.
2. No need to Enter.
If you've ever used command line files, you know that you type something, then press "Enter", and it submits the data to the program. In Quitter, it submits the data as soon as you press a key, meaning you don't have to press "Enter" after. It's actually very nice because it lets you browse the menus much faster, but it does take some getting used to.
3. Needs .NET framework (2.0).
Yes, it does need the Microsoft .NET framework, so that makes me consider it not portable. Don't get me wrong, it can be put on a flash drive and taken anywhere, it just might not work on all computers.

One more thing that I need to add about  Quitter is that it's development has been abandoned, meaning the author has decided to move on to other programs. That doesn't mean that Quitter is not awesome or will not work, it just means that it's going to stay where it is.

If you don't mind the command line, it's a wonderful little app. It's only ~300kb in size, but it does require a hefty amount of RAM for what it does (15MB on my current machine). It is open source, and is promised to stay that way. If you like simplicity with functionality, Quitter is for you.

Visit Quitter (Disintegrator Software) website for download

PDFCreator: Printing without the printer

Sometimes you want to print something, but you don't want to use the paper. That's why there are programs called virtual printers which allows you to print whatever you want, only saving it to a file instead of actually putting ink onto paper. PDFCreator is one such program, and (as you can tell by the name) it excels in the creation of PDFs.

If you've never heard of a program like PDFCreator before, you might find it a tad odd, but trust me, virtual printer software is DEFINITELY something you want to have on your computer. Why? Well, for starters, if you've ever wanted to save something without having to use paper (say, a receipt while online shopping), you can just print it to a PDF instead. Also, PDFCreator is great if you want to "convert" anything that can be printed into the PDF format.

When you go to print something, all you have to do is select "PDF Creator" from the list instead of your hardware printer. Then, after whatever program is printing is done, it will hand the file over to PDFCreator, and you'll be prompted for a filename. Name it, click save, and you're done. It's that easy. It also has a ton of options like the ability to integrate into the shell, or make it auto-save with the date and time as a filename.

One surprising thing about PDFCreator is that it is not limited only to PDF files. Although that is the default, it can also "print" to PNG, JPG, BMP, PSD, TIFF, and several more. Another surprising thing is that PDFCreator does not just take a "snapshot" of the thing being printed. If you use a PDF reader, you probably know that on some PDFs, you have the ability to search for text, because the text is actually in the PDF. When PDFCreator prints a file, it doesn't just "flatten" it to a picture, it includes the text. So if you print a word document, you can then search through the text in the PDF you've printed. I don't use PDFs that much, but I thought that was pretty nifty.

Virtual Printers are one type of software I can't live without. The uses are endless. You can use it for anything from just creating a PDF of a letter to your cousin to taking a section of a multipage PDF by "printing" that section with PDFCreator. The only downsides are (1) it's like installing hardware so there are drivers, (2) it's not portable, since it's like installing a real printer, and (3) it's not a lite install. PDFCreator takes at least 21mb, probably a bit more including drivers. But if you can spare the space, it's totally worth it. Plus, it's even open source.

Visit PDFCreator (pdfforge) website for download

Songbird: Sing a song of freedom!

iTunes is one of the most used and well known music players, currently, but that doesn't mean that there's not free, open-sourced alternatives that are just as good, if not better. Songbird is one of those alternatives.

Usually, I don't like to "compare" freeware right off the bat, but the reason is because Songbird (at least in my mind) is a open source, better iTunes. It has alot of the same look and feel, but with better features.

First off, Songbird runs on XUL, the same thing that runs all Mozilla products (Firefox, Thunderbird, InstantBird, Miro, Spicebird, and of course, Mozilla), meaning that it really has the feel of a Mozilla product to it. Secondly, this means that it is completely cross platform, even though it is not as supported on Mac or Linux or Solaris as it is on Windows.

Addons.

So what makes Songbird so great? Good question! It really is the "Firefox of media players" in that it is extremely customizable. Just like Firefox and Thunderbird, it has addons that can be installed to further increase just how you want your media player to be. This can range from a different media view (like cover flow) to an alarm clock to displaying the Wikipedia article of the artist right there in your library. Granted, the addons are definitely not as vast as Firefox's, but they are growing every day.

Browser.

Another extremely noticeable difference from other media players is that it has its own web browser built in. That's right, it has a little Firefox(ish) browser, with addons and everything. The reasoning is that you can use that browser for searching for music, which I find very refreshing. But please, don't think this will replace your everyday browser, because it does not have all the features of a full fledged web browser, and it's not intended to.

Features.

So it has a web browser, and plugins. What else? Well, it also has the ability to add different stores, to search for concerts, and to play online streaming radio from within Songbird. It has features like an Equalizer built in, and different media views, expanding it beyond the three of iTunes. It also has "feathers" (skins) that REALLY allow you to customize how it looks. Besides the obvious "iTunes" skins (which are in abundance), you can get a practically whatever look or feel you want. The feathers do tend to run darker, but you can usually find one to fit your wants.

Ambition.

The main thing that I love about Songbird is the ambition. It has a very clear roadmap, and has stuck to it thus far (except for version 1.3, which is apparently put on hold...) The developers know that features are lacking, and are working on them.

For example, CD ripping is a new feature in 1.4 Beta. (Many believe that it should have been in 1.0, but that's a different discussion.) Currently, it only allows you to rip into OGG, FLAC, or WMA. Now Linux people might be rejoicing (even though you can only rip on Windows...), but most people I know don't use FLAC or OGG, and if you use WMA, you should be burned at the stake. (Just Kidding!) My point is, they're currently missing the very obvious MP3 option that most users desire.

Confusion.

All of that being said about ambition, I do have to admit that I'm slightly concerned about Songbird's future in terms of features. Indeed, their roadmap does look promising, but it worries me that people want it to be more than a music player. I read a comment on the Songbird blog that said "Please make songbird able to view PDF files". My point is, because it kind of "overdoes it" with the internet browser (in my opinion), people seem to want too much from Songbird. It seems like the developers are going in the right direction, but let's hope they stay the course.

iPod.

I want to talk very briefly about iPod support. You might say "Jon! I don't have an iPod! You're totally blocking out 1 of the 5 people that actually read this blog!" Well, tough.

I want to start off by saying that Songbird does have iPod support, though it might be a little touchy at times. Really, Songbird does have most of the features when it comes to iPods. There are a few that I've found that I want to change before I switch over.

1. Rip CDs to compatible format

It's great that Songbird can rip CDs, but if it's not MP3 or AAC, that doesn't help. MP3 will definitely come in the future, but it is a necessity, in my opinion.

2. "Remember position" and "Skip when shuffling"

Unfortunately, Songbird does not have support for these yet. Hopefully, it can be something as simple as an Addon, but it needs to be there for me. Why? Well, I need "Remember position" for movies or long things like maybe audiobooks or church sermons, and I need "Skip when shuffling" for things like comedy or church sermons. Again, not a necessity, per se, but it really should be there, and I don't understand what the difficulty would be in adding it.

3. Separate sections for video/audio

Right now, Songbird does not have good support for video. In the next release (1.4?) The developers do promise a ton of stuff for video support, but that is a MUST for me. "The Dark Knight" should not come on on shuffle.

4. Good podcast support for iPod

I likes me some Ask A Ninja, and I'm not going to give that up when I change media players. Again, this is a definite plan, but I'm just stating it as something that you should be aware of.

5. Smart Playlists for iPod

Songbird does have the ability to create playlists and sync those to your iPod. It also has the ability to create "Smart" playlists, but those are unsyncable.

6. Album art

Songbird does have the ability to have album art on your computer, but cannot transfer that to your iPod. To me, this is an extra feature, and really doesn't effect how I use my iPod, but some people may find it more of an issue.

So that's my little rant on iPod support. Songbird is an amazing media player, but it doesn't make sense to use Songbird to manage my media, then use iTunes to sync my iPod (especially since I'm a "play count nazi"...) So until Songbird steps its game up (which it already is), I'm stuck with iTunes.

But I personally believe that Songbird has the most potential for being an iTunes replacement. People might say "Are you saying Songbird is better than other media players?" No, I'm just saying that when it comes to transitioning from iTunes to another media player, Songbird might be the smoothest, whereas foobar2000 or MediaMonkey might be a little harder just because it feels different.

Problems.

I've had trouble sufficiently using Songbird for an extended time just because I use iTunes, but I have noticed that Songbird tends to be a bit buggy. Do note that the developers are trying hard to remove the bugs, but just don't expect it to be perfect. I've noticed that it crashes sometimes, more than I would like. The main problem I have is that it is rather resource hungry. True, iTunes is slow as a dead raccoon, but Songbird can't really offer much more sometimes. But the developers are working to fix it, as I've said, since I've seen remarkable improvements just in a few short version jumps.

Conclusion.

Overall, Songbird is a wonderful media player. It does good dealing with a large amount of music, and very well could bring iTunes to its knees. However, it still has a ways to go. It might be a bit lacking compared to other media players, but it will get there eventually, and it's already on its way. If Songbird has enough features to make you happy, then switch over and rejoice. But if it's still lacking a few things, then wait, and watch. Bright things are ahead for Songbird.

PS - I know that's not the "official" Songbird icon, but I refuse to use the "goldfish" application icon. Long live B&W!

Visit Songbird website for download

GIMP: Move over, Photoshop

To those of us who are not rich enough to afford Photoshop, or corrupt enough to torrent it, there is GIMP. GIMP is one of the best freeware of all time. It is so amazingly huge that it's almost impossible to explain the advantages in one blog post. But I'll try.

Please know that (1) I am not a graphics designer, and (2) I've never actually tried photoshop for a serious project. That being said, there are many people who are skilled in graphics design and photo manipulation that could write a far better review that I'm about to give, and I agree with them 100%. However, I'm still going to attempt to voice my opinion from the viewpoint of someone who just wants a freeware that can manipulate photos, not one that can compete with a $$$$$$$$$ commercial product.

So on with the show! The first thing you notice about the GIMP is that it requires GTK, which means that it has that "Linux type look" on Windows (and Linux as well). Some people aren't used to that, and it might scare them away, but it is very nice if you can deal with a little GNOME-ish appearance.

Next, the GIMP can handle a ton of different filetypes. It has its own, XCF, but it can also handle pretty much any image file you can image, from Photoshop files down to a gzip archive. It has tons of different tools, many mimicking Photoshop, and you can download things like fonts, brushes, and other little gadgets to further personalize your editing skills. It has a ton of filters which are being updated with each release, and it supports layers (obviously).

There are a few things wrong with the GIMP though. First is the startup time. It takes about a minute to start on my EEE PC, even more if you have a ton of fonts and brushes and such. Also, it's actually fairly buggy, and has crashed on me several times in the middle of work. That's not to say that it crashes every time, just several times. And any computer person knows, a program crashing before you've been able to save is never a happy thing.

The last thing I have to criticize GIMP for is the lack of user friendability. (Is that a word? Well, it is now.) Out of all of the freeware programs I've come across, the GIMP scared me the most when I first opened it. I mean, before GIMP, I used MS Paint, and jumping between those two is like going straight from crawling to running a marathon. It doesn't make it any easier that the "Help" file is not included in the download. However, there is plenty of support available on the GIMP Talk forums, and even books about GIMP (which are far more interesting than you'd think, in my experience).

Right now, it might seem like GIMP is a mediocre program since I've spent about half the time talking about it's flaws. But that's not the case. GIMP is an amazing program, but it's extremely complex. It's not as easy as just saying "Well, it has a nice blur filter," because GIMP really doesn't have one use. Heck, it doesn't have an intended use, really. GIMP is the most unbounded freeware utility you will find this side of Linux. The possibilities are endless.

Not only is GIMP 95% of everything you want in a (freeware) image editor, it's also cross platform, portable, and open source.

This is probably the worst review I've done (which is saying something), but I figured that if I put out a crappy review, someone smarter than me would offer to write their own and let me post it (giving them credit, of course). The way I see different users using GIMP is like this: if you don't know that much about GIMP, then this review might help turn you on to a great utility that you can begin to learn how to use. If you do know a ton about GIMP and think this review is oversimplified, then you're smarter than me, what are you doing here expecting profound image editing advice? I am no guru.

PS - If I get so much as one comment saying how much better Photoshop is than GIMP, my head is going to explode. Look at the title of this blog. This is "FreewareWire," not "$700CommercialSoftwareWire".

Visit GIMP website for download

Raindrop: Drop what you're doing and relax.

The sound of a raindrop is very soothing. So it makes sense that a freeware named "Raindrop" would be soothing as well. Raindrop creates "natural ambient sounds" for relaxation, sleep, and meditation. It does this by providing several two interesting features:

Background sound: Raindrop comes with several WAV files such as an air conditioner, a summer night, and wind noise. You can set up to three of them, and adjust each of their volume's indepdently of each other. It also has some sounds that are more for meditiation, like chanting and a "voice lullaby." Let me just say that, for things such as "Electric fan", they are very realistic, and don't sound at all like it is just a looping file.

Binaural beats: I am not an expert, but here's my explanation. If your ear here's two tones that are very close to each other in frequency (with 30 hertz), sometimes, it can make a mistake when it sends the information to your brain, giving you the impression that there is a "beat." That is a binaural beat. Binaural beats are known for being very relaxing when using low frequencies.

So anyway, Raindrop allows you to set two different tone frequencies (for example, 160hz and 165hz, and it will play the two tones out of the Left and Right speakers, creating a binaural beat, which can soothe and relax you.

The nice thing about Raindrop is that it's extremely customizable. You can have several ambient sounds going, but also some binaural beats as well. Not only that, you can set the individual volume for all three ambient sounds and all three binaural beats. You can also "automize" Raindrop by adding a "starting silence", a fade in/out time, and a "Stop after ___ seconds" with the option of shutting down after it stops.

Overall, Raindrop is an adorable little program. It's nice for someone who wants background noise, without the background noise-causer (like a fan), or for someone who just wants to relax. It's written in Borland Delphi, with the source being freely available, and it is portable to boot. The program is very tiny, at only 400kb, but the WAV files do add on to that, to about 20mb total. However, if you wanted it just as a binaural beats generator, or just wanted one WAV and trashed the rest, you could shrink it down to 1mb. It uses around 1-2mb of RAM when being run, which means that it is very good at creating background ambience in the background of your PC.

Visit Raindrop (mayakron's deep) website for download

GhostZilla: A Happy Haunting

GhostZilla is a web browser based on (if you can't tell by the name) Mozilla. GhostZilla is different, though, in that it is designed to be an extremely secretive web browser. GhostZilla is actually so good at what it does, it will probably redefine your view of "secretive."

Before talking about why GhostZilla is so secretive, let's first talk about it as a web browser. GhostZilla is actually quite dated, originally created as shareware in 2002, then gone freeware (woohoo!), then open source (woo-hoohoo!), then shut down (aww...). It does, however, have many features that are still around as must-haves; tabbed browsing, for example. Even though the tab bar is extremely small, there is indeed tabbed browsing support in GhostZilla, as well as bookmarks, history, password memory, form memory, customizable homepage, and proxy configuration (essentially everything that was in Mozilla 1.0.1). So if asked the question "Is GhostZilla a full-fledged web browser?", I would say "Yes".

I would like to quickly say that though GhostZilla is a "full-fledged" browser, it does take some getting used to. First, the menu bar ("File", "Edit", "Options", etc) is extremely skinny so that it does not draw the eye's attention. Likewise, the tab bar is MUCH thinner than any browser I've seen, and does not show a site's favicon by the title. Just thought I'd throw that in there.

Now for the secretive side. Rather than having it's own window, GhostZilla actually fits inside other windows, almost in a "parasitic" manner. The whole logic behind that is that if you open a window of a program that is easily recognizable, (like say, Mozilla Thunderbird), you can open GhostZilla inside the that program, giving the impression that you are not surfing the web, but doing something else (like checking your mail). Of course, GhostZilla is also secretive because it hides itself completely, even from the taskbar. When you want to use it again, touch the left side of the screen, then the right side, then the left again (a left-right-left motion). This will bring GhostZilla up inside whatever window is active. To hide GhostZilla, just move your mouse outside of GhostZilla's window, and it will become hidden again.

So that's how GhostZilla hides. But what about when you're using it? How is it really that secretive? Levels. There are 6 "Hiding Levels" that can be chosen from in GhostZilla. Here they are (almost directly copied from the GhostZilla manual):
Level 1: Looks regular, like a normal web browser.
Level 2: Web pages are shown in black and white. Big pictures are hidden, except for on mouseover.
Level 3: Same as Level 2, except big pictures are black and white.
Level 4: Same as Level 2, except pages are gray and white.
Level 5: Same as Level 4, except big pictures are black and white.
Level 6: Page is gray, pictures are gray and pale (and only shown on mouseover).

As you can see, each greater level adds something more to make the page less noticeable to the eye. The biggest eye catcher is -of course- pictures, which GhostZilla takes care of by auto-hiding them. If you use Level 6, the page is so gray, one could scarcely believe that you are checking Facebook, rather than doing your taxes (or some other boring activity). Or if you want to just use a browser that hides uber quick, use Level 1.

GhostZilla even handles ads. Pop-ups are not even allowed to exist, and on-page ads are handled by the "big picture" rules with the Levels.


So right about now, you're probably interested in this spy-browser. But then you think, "What about after GhostZilla is gone? What about footprints that lead back to me?" I mentioned history, bookmarks, etc, but does that mean that those are all left on the disk when you leave? Well, as for things like the cache (temporary internet files), they are "[stored] in Windows temporary directory", and GhostZilla "removes them all on exit". So it's kinda up to you; do you trust having files on the host computer, even temporarily? If so, then don't worry. If not, then perhaps a more paranoid browser is more your style.

But what about the "profile"? Bookmarks, history, and all that jazz? Well, GhostZilla lets you store all of that info in an encrypted archive. Because it is protected and not GhostZilla specific, no one looking at it will be able to tell that it's for GhostZilla. Of course, when GhostZilla came out, GhostZilla was meant to be run on a CD, and it was amazing that "you can choose to store the archive on a floppy!" Nowadays, you can have both GhostZilla and the profile on a USB drive. But anyway, it IS possible to save your bookmarks, preferences, and all that profile stuff, and it IS possible to use it next time. When you first start GhostZilla, it will ask if you want to load a profile, in which case you can if you have one.


Now let me take a brief moment, Freewarenites, to give a few precations. (A) GhostZilla is not untrackable. Schools and businesses and such log every web site access that is made, no matter the browser. This means that if you're planning on visiting inappropriate websites (whatever "inappropriate" means for your circumstances) and want to use GhostZilla to get away with it, you're going to be sorely disappointed when you get detention/fired/thrown in jail. And the most important part is DON'T COME CRYING TO ME IF YOU USE GHOSTZILLA AND GET YOURSELF IN TROUBLE. Fair warning. (B) GhostZilla may not be "legal". GhostZilla is no longer actively supported, and its home website is down and out. I do know that GhostZilla came under scrutiny from Mozilla (because it was trying to sell GhostZilla for $20...when it was based on open-source software...made by Mozilla). However, it came back online after it removed some of the proprietary stuff. However, it then again went offline in 2007, and has not been seen since. I don't know why it's gone. It might be a legality issue (though I doubt it). But just know that if Mozilla is still upset about GhostZilla being distributed, well, then I'm screwed. But you might wanna watch your back too.


GhostZilla is really a "full-fledged" web browser. It weighs about 26MB (which is a little lighter compared to Firefox or Chrome), and uses a good ~50MB of RAM, maybe more, depending on what you're doing. The best part of GhostZilla is that it is portable, because it makes it ten times more useful to be discreet on a computer that does not have GhostZilla installed. It's one of the most interesting web browsers you'll ever come across, and -even though I've never personally tried Mozilla (*gasp*)- I do love the feeling of having a Mozilla Coporation product under my fingers.

(As I mentioned, GhostZilla's homesite is gone. However, A+ Freeware is freakin' amazing enough to not only allow me to discover GhostZilla, but also to host the last known version, v1.0.1)
Visit GhostZilla (host site A+ Freeware) website for download

Hedgewars: Hogs at war!

Hedgewars is a "Worms-like game" that substitutes little pink Hedgehogs for worms. If you've never heard of the Worms video game series, it is a turn-by-turn strategy game, in which you control a team of worms that tries to blow up the other team by using deadly weapons. It may sound odd, but it is freakin fun, and freakin addicting. And Hedgewars is too.

Hedgewars is very comparable to the Worms games, in that almost every feature available for Worms is in Hedgewars. You can customize what weapons are available, make teams, make rules, make maps, and (I believe) make voices. The background music is pretty amazing in that it's actually fairly catchy, and makes blowing things up more fun. You can save games and replay them later (I'm 95% sure). Those are just a few of the notable features that make it comparable to a commercial game like Worms. The difference between Worms and Hedgewars is that Worms is a commercial game, and Hedgewars is not only free, but also open source and cross platform to boot.

In terms of in-game features, Hedgewars does not fail to impress. Available in at least v0.9.11, the "Shoppa" setting is actually built in (even though you can create your own, if you want). The weapons, hedgehogs, and characters all look good, and the physics of the game are very accurate (and always improving with each new release.) There are health bars, dropping crates and health packs, animated backgrounds, wind changes (and a wind meter). There's also even an availability to play LAN games, either locally or on the internet.

There are a few things that could stand to improve. The first is hedgehog animation. Maybe it's just because worms are so much more wiggly, but the Hedgehogs seem to stay in the same position all the time. For example, when being knocked over a distance, when flying via rope, etc, the Hedgehogs often keep the same "standing" position. Not a terrible flaw, but it would help players get into the game more. And a victory dance wouldn't hurt either.

The second is sounds. I did mention both the music and voices being great, and that is true, but Hedgewars lacks voices for several weapons, such as the rope (which is really sad...I miss the Worms twange), the baseball bat, and more.

Also, Training mode is in development (with v0.9.11), meaning there is one playable level, but it would be nice to get that up and running (since it's been down since at least v0.9.7, which was actually quite a while ago.


It may seem like I'm nitpicking, or that I don't like Hedgewars, but that is not true; it really is a good game. In terms of the physics and playability, Hedgewars is amazing; it's just that the presentation (graphics, sound) needs a little fine tuning. It has some very nice features that Worms does not have, like being able to customize the appearance of your hedgehogs (like adding a wig, a hat, etc). It has innovative new weapons, some that are comparable to Worms weapons (like the "Hellish grenade" instead of the "Holy hand grenade") and some that are completely original (like a walking exploding cake). Granted, there are not as many weapons as the Worms series (like no skunk, sheep, minigun, homing pigeon, dragon ball, flame thrower, salvation army, petrol bomb, etc.) but the weapons that it does have are fantastic, and hopefully new weapons are a part of Hedgewars' future. And that future looks like a very bright one.

Visit Hedgewars website for download

TweetMyPC: Yo dawg, I heard you like tweets.

In a world where Twitter is around every corner, how can you not expect for programs to pop up and use it? TweetMyPC is a program that allows you to use Twitter to control your PC. The most practical use, obviously, is being able to control you computer from anywhere in the world, right from your phone. Of course "control" is limited in use, but it is surprising what TweetMyPC can actually do, for just relying on a few words.

After you download TMPC, you log in with your twitter account (or create a new one, if you don't want to junk up your old one with commands), and then you're set. You can also set your Gmail account for certain commands, some of them are listed below. There are built-in commands for TMPC, most of which are incredibly useful. I'm not going to copy+paste them all over here, so if you want to know all of the commands, check out the Codegeeks website.

-shutdown/standby/lock - Shutdown, standby, or lockyour computer from anywhere. Useful if you remember that you left it on.
-screenshot - Tweet this, and TMPC will screenshot your PC and upload it to TwitPic.
-getprocesslist - This will make TMPC e-mail (via Gmail) a list of all running processes on your PC.
-download - Download anything. Just specify a URL after the word 'download', and TMPC will download the file to whatever directory you have set.
-getfile/getfilelist - Probably the most intriguing; "getfile" will automatically upload the file you specified as an attachment and e-mail it to yourself. If you don't know the full path, using "getfilelist" will help you get there.

As you can see, TMPC has some crazy commands, getting right down to process management, all without ever seeing your computer screen. After you Tweet one of the commands, TMPC will respond on Twitter with whatever action was run, like "TMPC -> Setting Workstation to Standby Mode". Even with just the built in commands, TMPC is an amazing program. But you can also have custom commands, making TMPC launch any program you want when it senses a certain one-word command.

As for the physical aspects of the program, TweetMyPC is only around 1mb in size, and runs fairly hefty at 17MB in RAM. It is not portable, however, because it requires Microsoft's .NET framework 3.5 to run. It is open source, however, so any who want to look at how it works can.

It's a strange program in the sense that everything that is done is available online for everyone to see, but it is ingenius nonetheless.

Visit TweetMyPC (CodePlex) website for download

Regshot: Like shooting keys in a barrel.

Regshot is a registry utility to compare "before" and "after" snapshots of your registry. In case you want to know what registry changes before doing a system update installing a program, take a "shot" of your registry. Then, after making your change, take a second shot, then compare.

Regshot is actually a very simple program, but nonetheless ingenious and incredibly useful. It is the best way to tell if a program is truly portable or not, and that is just one of it's many applications. But beyond comparing, it can also save the log to TXT files, for later use or later comparing. It defaults to the Temp directory, but you can also change the output folder to defaultly save in whatever folder you want.

But Regshot is not limited to just registry. You can also choose folders for Regshot to watch, and if any file is changed between shots (added/deleted/modified), it will appear in the report.

Speaking of which, the report is practically the main feature. You can either choose a simple TXT or an HTML file, which will list in a table all of the changes including their old and new values, additions, and deletions.

Perhaps the best part about Regshot is the lightness and swiftness about it. Even though some might think that it would take time to scan the entire registry and take a snapshot, but Regshot does it in a matter of seconds, and is packed in at only a required size of 75kb. It does, however, use quite the amount of RAM to snapshot; while idling, it sits aroun 300kb, but while shooting, it can peak at 60mb. It's also portable, however, meaning that you can take it anywhere, and open source to boot.

Regshot is an excellent hands-on tool for administrating your registry. It may not clean like other apps, but it lets you see crucial details that other registry cleaners mostly miss.

Visit Regshot website for Download

VirtuaWin: Virtually Awesome

VirtuaWin is a virtual desktop manager that lets you have multiple "desktops", helping to organize your life. For example, you can have one desktop for work and one for play, and instead of having a ton of windows open in one desktop, you can divide them up into two. It also helps you keep focused.

I'm not going to lie, other OSes (Linux, notably) have a strong emphasis on virtual desktops, so much so that they are often built in. But Windows users may not be familiar with the idea, and may therefore be less likely to try it. But I would suggest giving virtual desktops a try, even if they sound odd or perplexing, because they just might very well change how you use a computer.

The first nice thing about VirtuaWin is the layout of the desktops. By that, I mean, you can set it up to be "3 wide, 1 deep", or "2 deep, 4 wide", meaning you will have a "grid" of virtual desktops. I myself prefer to have just a line that I can switch between, left-right style, but if you so desire to have a 3x3 grid of nine desktops, that usabilty is there for you. You can also name your desktops, so you can distinguish what windows go to what (like my earlier example, "Work" and "Play" could be your desktop names).

You can also configure how to handle when windows pop up (like switching to the desktop where the window is, or bringing the window to the desktop you're on), and configure what options you want to be accessible in your tray menu. Speaking of options...

Options! On top of having different windows on different desktops, you can also use nice tray options like "Switch to" a specific window, "Move here" to move a window to the current desktop, and "Always show" which makes a window follow you wherever you go.

VirtuaWin also has the very, very nice tool of hotkeys, meaning that you can navigate through your grid of desktops just by pressing a key. You can set them to be almost whatever you want, and the actions you can use for the hotkey are vast.

VirtuaWin also allows you to use your mouse, like dragging the window to the right of the screen will move it to the next desktop on the grid. And of course there are too many options for me to list for this as well.

If VirtuaWin wasn't amazing enough, you can also download modules, which allow many different enhancements (like having a panoramic wallpaper spread across your virtual desktops, for example.)

VirtuaWin has a lot of options for such a small program. It's only around 200kb in size, runs around 6mb, and is completely portable, in case you wan't to take virtual desktops on the go. It's also open source, if anyone wants to take a peek at how it works.

The only slightly bad thing about VirtuaWin is that it is so configurable, it might scare those who are not used to virtual desktops. It might not be the best choice for someone who has never used a virtual desktop program before, but if you have and you want customibility, then VirtuaWin is for you.

Visit VirtuaWin website for download

Dropper: Drop 'n' go

Dropper is a little program that I wrote that shows a little box. When you drop files onto this box, it will open those files with whatever program you have specified. It's a type of "drop box", if you will.

I would like to first and foremost thank Brother Gabriel-Marie, who e-mailed me with suggestions for PEM, one of them being a "drop box" program for use with PEM. So without him, there would be no Dropper.

So the nice thing about Dropper is how customizable it is. You can set the program, of course, but you can also set the icon to whatever you want: PNG, JPG, ICO, even an EXE icon (like the icon of the program you're using. You can also resize it to almost any size you want (although I did put a cap on the smallest being 25x25, just so you don't lose it.) You can also set the transparency, anything from completely solid, to being barely visible. The background (that is, the color behind the icon) is also customizable, even though at the moment, you have the choice of white, black, and the default windows color. Lastly, there's the option of making it Always On Top (which I recommend), and the option of Enabling/Disabling it, meaning you can't drop files onto it.

That's about it. It runs at the Autohotkey usual 3.7mb of RAM, it's only 300kb in size. It's not quite portable, as it needs a few more tweaks to be able to make paths relative, but it's getting there. It's fairly beta, at the moment, and there's many things that I want it to have, but not yet. So here's a FAQ to answer some questions you might have:

Is Dropper portable? No (even though I already discussed it). While Dropper does not require any files outside of itself, the paths you choose are not relative yet, so it won't work across different drives (yet).

Why is my image fuzzy sometimes? There are two reasons I've come across this so far. The first is if you've resized Dropper to be very small, chosen a new image, then resized. If that's the case, just restart Dropper, and it should display a full sized icon/picture. The second case is with EXEs. For some reason, Autohotkey (the language it was written in) is not very good with using icons from EXEs, and it won't use the correct size. I'm working to correct this.

Can I use a transparent background? I thought of this feature and wanted to include it (there's even the menu option), but I ran into many roadblocks along the way. So no, you can't, and until I find away to do away with all the side effects and obstacles you'll never be able to.

Can I use a moving GIF? Again, nice feature to have, but no. This is again due to limitations of Autohotkey. You can choose a moving GIF, but it will only show the first frame. GIFs may not be displayed correctly, period.

Why do some windows underneath Dropper distort when I resize it? Are you teh haxxor? Strange bug I encountered. Just minimize-restore the window. :P

As you can see, there's missing features and some bugs, but it actually functions very well. You can drop multiple files onto it, and it will handle them no problem. Also, feel free to download the source, modify it, and make your own Dropper. Just please, give credit where credit is due.

Check out Dropper Screenshots here

Visit FreewareWire Software Downloads page for Dropper v1.0

Mojolauncher: Get ready for launch!

The other day, I was using MojoPac -which is in and of itself a very handy application- and I decided to drop a shortcut to the MojoPac starter onto my Rocketdock. It worked fine, until later that day, when I clicked the shortcut, and it couldn't find the file. My MojoPac had moved disk letters from "E:\" to "F:\". I realized that it was really pointless to create a shortcut for an application that was meant for an external drive, because it might be in a different place. So I decided to make a Mojo Launcher.

Mojolauncher is a very, very simple program that I wrote specifically to help with Mojopac. When run, it will monitor the root directory of every available disk for MojoPac's Start.exe (such as C:\Start.exe, D:\Start.exe, etc). If it finds a MojoPac starter on a disk, it will add the disk letter and the disk label to a list. You can then select from that list and launch whatever Mojopac you've selected. In addition, if Mojolauncher detects that MojoPac is running, it will wait until MojoPac closes until refreshing the list.

That's about it. It's a very, very simple program, and it's designed to be that way. The interface is very minimalistic, with barely any text, and no menus.

MegaLauncher/INI File:

To be honest, I don't feel like making Mojolauncher a full fledged program with customibility and everything....but I left the option open. Although I designed Mojolauncher specifically for MojoPac, I made it able to accept different programs. If you select a different program, Mojolauncher will become MegaLauncher (both are ML, if that helps you remember). It performs exactly the same way, only it will look for a custom EXE, with a custom description. In order to to this, look at the sample INI file a ways down. But first, read on about....

Custom Folders! Again, I really don't feel like making a GUI for a program that is so simple, but the functionality is nice. Add the folderpath to the INI file, and Mojolauncher/MegaLauncher will search that folder.

SAMPLE INI FILE: MOJOLAUNCHER.INI

[Folders]

also1=C:\Path\to\Program

also2=%ThisDrive%\FreewareWire\is\awesome.exe

[OtherApp]

OtherApp=StartupSaver.exe

OtherAppDesc=StartupSaver

If you can't tell by looking, also# are the custom folders, OtherApp is the alternate program's filename, and OtherAppDesc is the alternate program's description. Make sure you type both correctly, because MegaLauncher will not be able to tell if you typed an error, especially in the description. If you type either OtherApp or OtherAppDesc wrong in the INI file, MegaLauncher will simply never find what you told it to look for.

You may be wondering about the "%ThisDrive%". Well, that is there because Mojolauncher is entirely portable. Instead of the drive letter and colon, substitute in "%ThisDrive%" without the quotes for Mojolauncher/MegaLauncher use the drive letter that it is currently on.

It's not the best program, I know, but it was pretty fun to write, and I actually do use it myself. It's a standalone app, 370kb, and consumes around 4mb of RAM. I will always upload the source, including all the original icons, and edited icons (that is, if RingCube doesn't sue me. Please don't sue me.) Oh, I almost forgot to grovel. RingCube, if you're reading this, I made Mojolauncher because I love MojoPac. I don't intend, or even want, to make any money off Mojolauncher; I release it only for the purpose of better MojoPac. Please don't sue me. Pretty please.

..............

Visit FreewareWire Software Downloads page for MojoLauncher v1.0

Get MojPac here

I would like to also quickly give props to people who profoundly influenced the developement of this program, even if they are anonymous, or don't know I used their work.

• In terms of icons, I used icons from all-free-download.com, so thankyou whoever made those. (I did alter the colors, but that was really easy...much easier than making icons.)
• In terms of code, I used the Graphic Button "ILButton" script by tkoi, which I really must mention, because it made it crazy easy to use graphic buttons.
• I also used wOxxOm's code for retrieving file descriptions, to verify that the Start.exe is MojoPac's, which was so advanced, I couldn't pick out the code for just the description.
• Ladiko's AHK compiler, which made it very easy to include multiple icons in ML, and easily add version information.

Billy Mays Caps Lock: HERE'S HOW TO ORDER!

Let me start off this post by saying that I am not in any way mocking Billy Mays. His passing was indeed unfortunate, and, although I never actually bought any of the products he advertised, I can most definitely say that his were my favorite commercials. While I will not get all sappy and fill this post with "RIP"s and "We'll miss you"s, I will say that commercials will never be the same without him.

Caps lock is such a strange key, do we ever really use it? Besides the obnoxious kids online that seem to forget it's on, when do we need to type in all caps for an extended period of time? Well, now you can turn Capslock into something fun! With Billy Mays Caps Lock, everytime you press Capslock, Billy will spout out one of his most famous sayings.

In addition, a little Billy Mays head will rest in your tray, and you can still use Capslock if you hold any key before pressing it (ie, Shift+Capslock, Alt+Capslock, F+Capslock, etc.)

That's about it. It's a very funny little app, sure to bring you some joy. It's very small, portable, actually hosted at PortableApps, and open source. It, and all of the sounds that come with it, are only around 1mb combined, so it's also very tiny. The source is also very easy to read (only 56 lines of code), written in Autohotkey, so if you maybe want to find more soundclips, just crack open the AHK file, add it on, then drop the WAV file in the same directory as the others.

Visit Billy Mays Caps Lock website for download

Lightscreen: Praise the Lord, I saw the light!

Lightscreen is a screen capture utility that helps capture and manage your screenshots. It is very comparable to FSCapture, although Lightscreen might have a few less features. For example it has 3 different methods of capture: Screen, Window, and Area (a rectangle). It also has shortkeys that are customizable (and toggle....able) for all three of the above, and for opening the program window and opening the directory.

Speaking of which, Lightscreen's main feature (since it is on the front tab, and defaultly checked on) is that it can auto-save screenshots to a file. You can choose the folder, then set the filename prefix to be anything you want, then set a suffix being either a timestamp or just a number, so that each screencap will be organized and automatically named. Or you can even swap the two, making the custom name last and the date/number first. But anyway, you can then choose either JPG, BMP, or PNG, and the delay (the amount of time before the screencap is taken.

In addition to hotkeys and auto-file saving, Lightscreen also has a ton of other options, such as an optional taskbar icon, the option to hide the Lightscreen window when screen-capping, the option to show a magnification around the mouse when using the "Area" option, the option of either a sound notification or a traytip balloon when a screencap is taken, and even a screenshot quality adjuster. It also has "Advanced" settings like showing a "Save as" dialog for every screencap, including the cursor in screencaps, and the option to "Grab" only one monitor. Oh, did I mention it has multi-monitor support?

Overall, it's a nice little screen capture program. Like I said, it is very comparable to FSCapture, even though FSCapture is lighter, smaller, and more feature filled. Lightscreen is about 5mb in size and runs at 20mb RAM for me at the moment (though I am using portable). Oh, it's also portable, hosted over at PortableApps. It is also open source, if you view the files available on SourceForge. (It being hosted there anyway should tell you that it's open source.)

Visit Lightscreen website for download

UNetbootin: Easiest bootable USB ever.

UNetbootin stands for "Universal Netboot Installer," and essentially allows you to easily create a bootable USB with many Linux distributions. For those who've never tried, creating a bootable USB can actually be quite the hassle, so UNetbootin makes it much, much easier.

If you want to absolutely go hands free on a bootable USB, you can select from several common linux distributions, such as Ubuntu, Damn Small Linux, Puppy Linux, FreeBSD, Fedora, Gentoo, MEPIS, Mandriva, Slax, Frugalware, and many more. When you select one, you can then select the version (such as "8.10 live" or "8.04 install" for Ubuntu), or just pick to go with the Latest version, in which case, UNetbootin will check and download the latest released version. After you choose your distro, version, and select the USB drive, UNetbootin will automatically download the specified ISO, and make it into a bootable USB, meaning that you can walk away from your computer, then come back a few hours later (maybe less, if you chose a distro like Damn Small Linux) and have a fully functioning bootable USB device, no hassle.

Or if you already have your ISO and want to burn it, there's an option for that as well. Just show UNetbootin where your ISO is, select your USB drive, then hit "OK", and it creates a bootable USB from the ISO of your choice. It really is just that easy.

OR if you REALLY know what you're doing, you have the option of selecting the Kernel and the Initrd, and specifying Options.

Lastly comes the drive selection. UNetbootin is defaultly set to only display USB drives, but you can (if you dare) let it "Show all drives", but remember that if you accidentally choose your C:\ drive (or whatever drive your Windows is installed), you could screw up your Master Boot Record, and unless you know how to fix that.....well, just don't do it.


UNetbootin is a very, very handy program for those who want a bootable USB drive without any hassle. The very nicest part about UNetbootin is that you don't have to format your USB drive. That means that you can have your apps on the USB, then UNetbootin a Linux distro, and all your apps will be completely uneffected. All it does is just copy the needed Linux files from the ISO, set up a Syslinux boot menu, and edit the MBR on the USB drive. So if you don't like your Linux distribution, just delete the files. (Of course, your MBR would still stay changed, and I'm not smart enough to tell you what to do about that...) Probably the best part about it is that it is portable, and it is fairly small (around 3.5mb).

It's a very, very handy program if you don't have an available CD drive, or if you just prefer USB. There's also specialized versions of UNetbootin such as Auto Super Grub Disk, EasyPeasy, EeePCLinuxOS, xPUD, and FUSBi. EasyPeasy and EeePCLinuxOS are built specifically for the purpose of installing Linux to Netbooks, which makes UNetbootin a Netbook's best friend. (At first, I thought it was actually short for "Universal Netbook Installer" :P)

*My apologies to all smart Linux-people, if I misused a phrase here or there, or got something completely wrong. Feel free to correct me.

Visit UNetbootin website for download

WinRoll: They see me rolling...

WinRoll is a very function filled utility to manage windows in a very easy way. It is probably my favorite (what I like to call) window management tool I've yet to come across. It runs in your tray silently until you call upon one of its functions:

-Always on top/Send to buttom: You can make any window always on top by just middle clicking (or Shift+Right clicking) it's close button. Likewise, if you right click the close button, it will send that window to the back.

-Transparency: Change the transparency of windows but just Middle Clicking (or Shift+Right Clicking) on the title bar. But unlike programs like Glass2k, you can only choose a universal transparency percentage, not a different transparency for every window.

-Rrrrrroll!: I'm fairely sure that this is unique to WinRoll, but you can make windows "roll up" into their title bar. At first, you might be thinking, "Ok, when would I need that?", but imagine having 20+ windows open. Instead of having to keep going back to the taskbar to minimize/unminimize, you can just roll, go to the next window, roll, go to the next, etc. Not to mention the fact that it quickly hides a window that has been placed Always on top without having to minimize it.

-Minimize to tray: A very nice feature. Middle Click/Shift+Right Click a minimize button and you can have it minimize to the tray. But one of the VERY nice features that other Min2Tray programs might not have is the ability to minimize either (a) as it's own icon, or (b) in the WinRoll menu. The menu means that you can right click the WinRoll icon, and it will show a list of all the minimized windows. Really nice feature, if your tray is already cluttered, but you want to minimize something there.

-Apply to all: A very handy feature is that all three features I mentioned above can be applied to all open windows at once. Just press Alt+[Whatever mouse button applies to that function]. You can even use this for regular tasks, like closing or minimizing.

-On/Off: If you ever want to stop using WinRoll, you don't have to quit. Just double click the tray icon (or uncheck the "Enable" option in the tray menu) and WinRoll will essentially "Turn Off" meaning that it will unminimize all windows in the tray, turn off all transparencies, and turn off all always-on-tops. Then you can just turn it back on and start using it again. Keep in mind, though, that when WinRoll is turned back on, it will not restore all previous transparencies, always-on-tops, etc. It just makes sense: what if you kept WinRoll off for hours and the same programs weren't still open?

-Fast and LITE: WinRoll was written in assembly language, which makes it very fast, and very light. All that is needed is a DLL and the program itself, which combine to form only 24kb! In addition, it runs at 300kb of RAM. If that's not lite, I don't know what is.

The only -let me stress, only- flaw I find with WinRoll is that it does not work with all windows, like iTunes, for example. Because iTunes doesn't have a "title bar", it's unaffected. That's what makes programs that use hotkeys like AlwaysOnTopMaker nice.

Other than that, it's amazing. It's open source, which is very good, and it is portable.

Visit WinRoll website for download

Media Player Classic: They don't make media players like the used to.

While it may look like a Microsoft product, Media Player Classic is not. Though it's designed to look like the old version of Windows Media Player, it is actually open source, and holds alot more than WMP.

The best part of MPC is that it can play nearly every media file (both Video and Audio) right off the bat, and it doesn't even need to be installed. So let's talk about that for a minute.

MPC is fairly small, and standalone. It weighs only around 6mb, which may not be the smallest player, but considering how many built-in codecs it has, I'd say it's very worth it. It is also portable, meaning that you can take it anywhere, to a computer with no codecs, and still be able to play many files.

In terms of functionality, MPC has everything that I currently need to play in terms of audio and video.

-DVD player: Yes, it does have a DVD player. It may not be very flashy in terms of interface, but it is fully functional.

-Favorites: You can mark a file as a favorite so it can be easily accessed, and you can even make it remember the position of the object, so if you quit a movie, you can pick up right where you left off.

-Subtitles: To be honest, I've never used it. I don't even know how. But it's there, and that's what matters.

-"Open Device": Though I haven't used it much, it is a pretty nifty idea. For example, I can open my webcam, and view myself, typing this post.

-Keyboard shortcuts: Maybe not the most original idea, but almost everything has a keyboard shortcut, making it easy to go fullscreen, pause, view information, etc.

To be honest, that's all I can think of, at the moment. There's alot more customization, like you can open things in the same window or a different window for each file, you can change the icon for the main screen when no media is playing, and you can even specify an action to be performed after a media has finished playing (like shutting down or standbying.)

MPC is that it is the smallest, fully functional media player I've seen. When it comes to media player classic, I just want a program to play all my files. I'm not concerned with how it looks, just as long as it works. MPC opens files very, very fast, and I'm happy with that.

But if you guys think that my review was pathetic, let me know. I'm not very knowledgable on codecs and whatnot, so if something just works, I usually don't question it.

Visit Media Player Classic site for download