It can be a full time job keeping all your social media channels synchronised and up to date. If you’re a frequent blogger you’ll no doubt be frustrated by the time it takes to cross post from one channel to another.  We’ve just come across this great new tool which is still at the early stages of development but looks very promising indeed.

If only there was a way of setting up some Workflow so a post to one site is automatically published to another. Wouldn’t it be great if this was centralised also so you don’t need to remember all those forwarding rules you’ve set up?   This great tool called IFTTT, which stands for If This Then That (stupid name and we hate it also) provides a really simply way of configuring workflow between many social media channels so if you post to one channel,  the content automatically appears on the other.  In addition,  you can also setup IFTTT to forward you an email if an RSS feed is updated, or cross post photos from Flickr to Facebook.  It’s very embryonic right now,  but already a very powerful class of tool I’m sure we’ll see springing up across the Interweb soon.

IFTTT works using the programming concept of “If Something Happens,  Then Do Something Else”.  It’s a bit geeky but you’ll get the idea.  It works by creating Tasks which are small bits of logic that are run when a specific event occurs. For example, If I post a photo to Flickr,  then also send it to Tumblr.  If I update Twitter,  then also update Facebook.

Start by selecting the Trigger Channel which is the event channel or source which initiates the event   You’ll see below a wide range of channels provided already.  For example, you can set a trigger to fire if a file appears on DropBox or an email arrives in your inbox,  or you create an Instagram photo.

Once you’ve selected the Channel,  you need to pick the event that Channel should trigger.  For example, if you select the Flickr channel then you’ll have the following triggers available.  Clearly, if you select a different media channel,  there will be a different selection of triggers to chose on IFTTTT.

At this point you’ve configured WHEN you want the task to fire,  but not what you want to do when that event fires.   In the next step,  you simply select the Action Channel to set which media channel you want to update.  There is an ever growing selection available including send a message to BufferApp, update Tumblr, send an email, and send a posting to Instapaper. 

Having selected the action channel, then select the actual task you want to perform from the list of actions.  For example, you can have IFTTT download a file to DropBox,  but the actions vary hugely depending on the target channel you select.

That’s it!  Your workflow is now configured, and you’ll save precious seconds cross-posting to Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr and the like.   Let me know what you think.

There are certain Windows 7 games that can be played using the touch screen feature of your laptop or tablet. You can find that the Internet is a rich source of Windows 7 touch screen games as well as regular games. This article has discovered four downloadable Windows 7 games that are easy, fun, yet challenging to play.

BallDroppings

BallDroppings is a small game program (1MB) that can be played in Windows 7, Mac and mobile phones. In this game, balls continuously drop from the top left side of the screen. You manage these balls by drawing lines by touching the screen. Once a ball hits a line, it will grow in size. As it bounces away from a line, it will gradually return to its normal size. Music becomes more melodious the wider the distance is between the lines and when the number of balls gets to around 8-10. You can challenge yourself or compete with friends by trying to get as many balls as possible within a prescribed period of time.

Raindrop Melody Maker

Raindrop Melody Maker is a Lullatone program that allows you to create soothing music by combining simple tones and melodies. To create tones and music you just touch the raindrops. Each raindrop touch produces a specific tone. There are two other buttons at the bottom of the game page. The green one keeps track of the time while the red one stops the tune loops so that they you can start the game over.

Chat Noir

In Chat Noir, your goal is to trap a cat and prevent it from leaving the board. In this game, the board (where the cat is also at) is composed of green circles. Every time you touch a circle its color will darken and the cat will not be able to move to it. The cat is entitled to move to an untouched green circle every time you touch a spot. You have to create a ring of dark circles in order to contain the cat.

Windosill

Windosill is a game that is made by Vectorpark. In this game, you play the role of a car that has to go through a series of rooms. Your goal here is to get a small cube in each room so that you can enter another room and progress in the game. Getting the cubes is the tricky part since you have to accurately identify what particular action is needed to secure a cube in a room.

[Image from CloudComputingWorld]

Cloud applications are the wave of the future. Cloud technology opens doors to possibilities that would be hard to accomplish in typical desktop environments. You can do amazing things even if you are using an entry level PC with cloud. Below are examples of up and coming cloud apps that have tremendous potential.

Jaycut

One of the better cloud applications that you can use to produce great looking videos or movies with is Jaycut. After an initial 60 day free trial period you can continue to use the application by enrolling in any one of Jaycut’s subscription plans (quite pricey starting at $225/month). What’s good about Jaycut is it is powered by massive servers, rendering the possibility of your PC crashing to almost nil. What this implies is that you can go about with your editing work without interruption. With Jaycut, you can create awesome videos by adding effects or audio tracks to them. After editing, you can choose to upload your work directly to online video sites such as YouTube or you can opt to have Jaycut send it directly to your PC.

Photoshop.com

Photoshop.com is a flash-powered photo editor that lets you modify images online. Its basic plan is free while its Plus version sells for $49.99. With Photoshop you can choose to edit image files from your desktop or even from email and social media site accounts such as Gmail and Facebook. There are different things that you can do with photos in Photoshop.com. This program has capabilities that would allow you to alter or change the color of photos. You can also convert pictures to 3-D images. In addition, you can add music to photos, albums or slideshows. Once you are done editing, you can upload files to your desktop, email or Facebook account.

Picnik.com

Picnik.com is another example of Web software that you can use to edit photos. Basic sign-up is free though you can choose to get an upgraded version for a fee ($2.08/month for the most basic package). Photos for editing can be downloaded from your desktop or online accounts such as Flicker. You can do many things with Picnik. You can enhance colors, add text, change frames, remove red-eyes, and include images in photos. It is very easy to use and command tabs are big enough for quick recognition.

 Gliffy

One of the cloud apps that you can use to create diagrams and flowcharts is Gliffy. Gliffy is great for making floor plans, presentations, UML,  web sites, organization charts, and reports, among others. Selecting shapes is easy. All you need to do is to click and drag the shape that you like from a list. Connecting shapes is a breeze as well and there are many types of lines that you can choose from. The Basic Gliffy plan is free while the Premium plan can be had for a fee ($5/month for the most basic).

Tab Pinning

A feature of IE 9 that will benefit Windows 7 enabled computers is tab pinning wherein tabs can be pinned into the taskbar for convenience. Web sites are assigned an icon just like any program or application. What’s more, if a particular site supports the browser, you can use IE 9’s Jump List feature to directly open a particular section or page in the site.

Native Hardware Acceleration

IE 9 is also much faster than any of its predecessors. This is because the web browser does not only utilize the underlying graphics power but also makes use of a revamped JavaScript engine. The difference in speed can be most felt where it is most important which is when loading sites. IE9 can definitely give other well known high speed web browsers such as Firefox and Chrome a run for their money.

Tab (Process) Isolation

Tab isolation is one feature that comes with the IE 9. With tab isolation — which is also a standard in Chrome but not in Firefox — you need not worry about your entire browsing session stopping when one process is not responding. In addition, IE can also restore the non-responding site once it has resolved the problems affecting it, saving you precious time.

A proper download manager

With IE 9, you can see your recent downloads through its download manager. This neat tool can also let you pause downloads for resumption at a later date. You would also be appraised by the download manager if a particular file has malware.

Track Protection

Track protection list is a privacy tool in IE9 that will prevent website companies from tracking your browsing habits or tendencies. Some online sites use content — which may at the first glance look harmless — to track your browsing behaviour. With track protection, you can select which sites can follow you online. This feature works on every page of a site, which gives you ample protection from highly sophisticated tracking systems.

SmartScreen Filter

Another security feature that you can get from IE 9 is its SmartScreen Filter, which blocks and repels malicious sites.

Amazon has just entered the streaming music business with the launch of Cloud Player.  Amazon Cloud Player is a music player that lets anyone upload their music to Amazon’s servers and play them via the web or Android. 

Cloud Player comes in two types, an app for the web and an Android app counterpart. No app for the iPhone as yet.  Both players allow users to upload their music, create playlists and organize their music. And because it’s a cloud-based platform, users can access their music and settings from any compatible computer or Android device.  At the moment,  you can only purchase music directly for Amazon Cloud Player from the American Amazon.com site.  UK site isn’t supported so far. .

Users are given 5 GB of free storage, but can get 20 GB if they purchase an album through Amazon. It’s $1 per GB after that. The new Amazon Cloud Player service adds a new “Save to Amazon Cloud Drive” button for saving MP3s to the cloud, as well as an option to upload music from a hard drive to a user’s Cloud Drive.

The short screen-cam below gives a quick demonstration of Amazon Cloud Player.

Step 1. Add music to Cloud Drive

Purchase a song or album from the Amazon MP3 Store and click the Save to Amazon Cloud Drive button when your purchase is complete. Your purchase will be saved for free.

Step 2. Play your music in Cloud Player for Web

Click the Launch Amazon Cloud Player button to start listening to your purchase. Add more music from your library by clicking the Upload to Cloud Drive button from the Cloud Player screen.  Use Cloud Player to browse and search your library, create playlists, and download to your computer.

Step 3. Enjoy your music on the go with Cloud Player for Android

Install the Amazon MP3 for Android app to use Cloud Player on your Android device. Shop the full Amazon MP3 store, save your purchases to Cloud Drive, stream your Cloud Player library, and download to your device right from your Android phone or tablet.

Will Amazon Cloud Player succeed?

Is Amazon Cloud Player direct competition to subscription based services such as Spotify?  Most definitely.  But I’ll tell you the reason Amazon Cloud Player will fail.  The success of Spotify and other cloud based subscription services is because people don’t want to own music any more.  Why spend $8 on a Album you’ll only listen to for a month?  Most Web 2.0 people are perfectly happy “renting” their music when they want it.  I’m surprised that Amazon haven’t gone in this direction. Only time will tell.

[via Mashable]

Go to dabbleboard.com and click on Get Started.  The free version doesn’t require any signup so it’s quick to get started. The whiteboard session can be shared with any number of people by providing the unique URL of the whiteboard.   In freehand mode, the pointer simply paints whatever you doodle.   Switching off freehand causes dabbleboard to interpret a drawing and turn it into a tidy shape representing the doodle.

Dabbleboard also allows the upload of images which can be used as a background to sketch over. It also supports uploading of MS Word,  MS PowerPoint and PDF documents making it possible to quickly mark up the documents.  There is also a built in chat window supporting video and voice chat.  The audio and video chat works beautifully and makes the whiteboard session much more personal and interactive.

Saving the image is simple and the free version supports download to PNG format, or the image can be saved online.

Choosing a home page for a browser is a very personal affair.  For a Touch Screen it needs to have large buttons and load quickly.   For a Touch Screen browser we’ve grown to love the 200Linx homepage.

200Linx provides a delicious menu of 200 supersized links to the most popular sites making it ideal for a Touch Screen browser. It loads quickly and gives access to common great sites at the Touch of a finger.  Browse from a Touch Screen homepage specially designed for the US, UK, Canada, Mexico, Spain, Germany, France, Russia, Australia and Brazil. 

I was strangely interested in what’s popular in India,  but let down by a dysfunctional link. 

Visit 200linx.com

Windows and Mac. Even password-protected and encrypted public wifi connections aren’t as secure as you think.  There remains the potential for a 12 year old prodigy to steal your passwords and credit card details.  Also,  with ISPs being forced by government agencies to publish details of your surfing habits, you may want to think about securing all your browsing and downloading habits.  With this simple secure VPN solution from Hotspot Shield, you can be sure your browsing and socialising is secure from prying eyes, your ISP, and even your employer.

Use the comments below to say about your use of public hotspots.

Hotspot Shield is completely free and protects your entire web surfing session; securing both your home internet connection and public internet hotspots. It can be used to secure both wired and wireless networks.  Hotspot Shield protects your identity by ensuring all web transactions (shopping, filling out forms, downloads) are secured through HTTPS. Hotspot Shield also ensures your identity is invisible to third party websites and ISP’s

Hotspot Shield creates a virtual private network (VPN) between your laptop or iPhone and their Internet gateway. This tunnel prevents snoopers, hackers or ISP’s, from viewing your web browsing activities, instant messages, downloads, credit card information or anything else you send over the network.

Simply download the small application from Hotspot Shield, and wait for it to install.   Once completed, a small icon will appear in your system tray indicating if you’re connected or not.

Click Connect/On and a browser will open up, and start to establish a secure connection. Hotspot Shield uses a secure VPN (Virtual Private Network) tunnel to encrypt all your internet traffic from anyone (including your ISP) who may be listening for it.

Once connected with Hotspot Shield, you’ll be able to see further details of the connection including your secure IP address.  This new IP addresses means no one will be able to see your real IP address, determine your identity or hijack your session.  Given the importance of online security, I wouldn’t leave home without Hotspot shield.

Hotspot Shield runs on:

• Windows 7
• Windows XP
• Windows 2000
• Windows Vista
• Mac OS X (10.4 Tiger)
• Mac OS X (10.5 Leopard)
• Mac OS X (10.6 Snow Leopard)

Visit Hotspot Shield

Use the comments below to say about your use of public hotspots.

In this post I’ve rounded up the very best sites on the internet to download free apps giving you access to over a 1000 free applications.  These download sites for free software contain really good lists of tried and tested applications.  The download sites below have links to the very best free applications, utilities, system tools and online apps. If you can’t download the free app you need from these lists, it probably doesn’t exist.

The Best Free Software of 2010

Legendary PCMag already boasts the very best software of 2010 to download.  Covering a whole ranges of free downloads  including media management, search, video, graphics and just about every category you can think of.   All free applications are organised into 30 different categories.

Best Free Online Applications and Services

A huge page and collection of the very best free online applications and services.  Since they’re all online you don’t need to download anything to your machine.  Neatly organised into 11 categories covering home, office, image viewing, disk tools, internet, email, programming, security and many more.

99 of the best Windows freeware programs you may not know of

The title says it all here.   99 of the greatest free Windows downloads which you may have overlooked.  It isn’t categorised,  but well worth looking down the page for some golden free software.  This list focuses on the little-league of software developers who usually don’t get the headlines.

TopFreeware.net

This is an extensive and well categorised list of free downloads. It’s got virtually every category you can think of including screen capture tools, education, multimedia, security, games, backup and loads more.

The 70 coolest free applications in existence

This is Stephen York’s list of the coolest free downloads around for those people who are more fortunate to spend less time on the internet. Applications are neatly organised into 12 categories including video playback, web development, operating systems, remote access and many more.

I want a Freeware Utility to … 450+ common problems solved.

This self-claimed list of  “Extremely useful free utilities that do specific jobs really well and save time and money.” does what it says on the tin.  This no-frills web page contains over 450 direct links to some great downloads,  all neatly categorised and easy to find.  Download categories include notepad replacements, files and folders freeware, graphics, imaging, internet tools, keyboard utils, recovery solutions and many many more.

Lifehacker Pack 2009: Essential Free Windows Downloads

This is lifehacker’s bundling all the best free downloads for new computer owners, re-installers, would-be geeks, or anyone who wants to save time installing the best stuff out there. It’s all a bit common, but useful all the same.

The Best Applications.com

The Best Free Applications for Windows and Mac. Sporting a user interface which would’t be out of place at a Las Vegas casino,  this web site gives access to dozens of free applications to download.  Hover over each of the Icons to find the name of the free software, or change to List View to give you a scrolling list of free apps to download.

Free Fun Files

FreeFunFiles has a good selection of free software to download for Windows.   It has a good choice of hobby tools, children games, video games and  pda software. The is also quite a bit of paid for software too download also.

We’ll use the OneNote Guide as an example to demonstrate how easy it is to share any notebook online.  We’re also going to make use of the Microsoft Office Online Web Apps and SkyDrive.  You’ll first need to create yourself a Windows Live SkyDrive and Office Web Apps user ID.  If you already have a .NET Passport / Windows Live account then you have everything you need.

Share Your OneNote notebook.

Open up your notebook in OneNote 2010 and select File > Share.  This will take you to the screen below.

Looking at the section  “3. Web Location” above, if you already have a SkyDrive account you simply need to Click Sign In. Otherwise follow the Sign-Up process to create an account.  After you Click Sign-In you’ll be asked to enter your Windows Live ID credentials.

Once you’re authenticated, OneNote will display the list of folders for your account so choose the location to share your notebook. It’s best to choose “Documents”.

Select the folder your want for the share and then click Share Notebook. Wait a few moments and depending on the size of the notebook you’ll be shown the following dialog.   Click Yes to email a link and your favourite email client will open with a pre-prepared couple of links.

One of those links will enable you to open the notebook in OneNote and the other using a Web Browser.

Edit your OneNote notebook using a browser

Simply copy and past the http URL into a web browser and enter your login credentials when asked.  Your OneNote document will open using Microsoft Office Web Apps.    This will allow you full control over your OneNote notebook on the web. Any changes you make will automatically be synced with your “local” copy of the notebook.  I found that some larger OneNote notebooks took several minutes to synchronise with the web when they are first shared, so don’t be surprised of not all the content appears straight away.  Patience.

Down the left hand side of the browser window you have access to all your sections and pages.  You may find that some pages display the yellow warning banner at the top saying “This page contains items that cannot be displayed in OneNote Web App”.   This usually occurs if you’ve used the Draw functions in OneNote to create lines and shapes which aren’t part of an image.

Now, if you make a change to the OneNote notebook using the browser,  wait a few moments and the change should be automatically updated in your local version as if by magic. We found that you have to click onto another tab or page before the syncing in triggered.   Once you make any change,  the green synchronisation icon next to the notepad name will begin to spin. Once the synchronisation has completed, a small green tick appears next to the icon. This also works if you make a change in the OneNote client application.

Finally,  you might want to create yourself a desktop icon with a link to the OneNote Web Application. To do this,  copy the HTTP URL from the email you prepared earlier and then follow the instructions here.

The DNS server is responsible for turning the human-oriented domain names (e.g. bbc.co.uk) into computer-oriented numbers (e.g. 212.58.224.138).  Normally the DNS server you use is decided by your internet service provider, but often there is a much quicker one you can use.

With this neat project on Google Code,  you can easy perform some benchmarking to determine if there is a quick DNS server out there in cyberspace. Simply download the tool, and set it to run for 5-10 minutes by clicking Start Benchmark.

You’ll eventually be shown a set of charts and graphs for how your current DNS server compares to others. 

The tool suggests which DNS server is quicker for you and what the improvement will be.  This is a bit misleading.  The percentage increase is how much faster the DNS server will be,  and not an overall improvement in download speed, sadly.  It will make a small difference though.  Once you’ve got the recommended DNS settings (see top right of the image above), you then need to plug them into your Network settings. To do this on a Windows 7 PC, you need to go to Control Panel and select Network and Sharing Centre.  Then select Change Adapter Settings.

Right click on the active network connection, and select Properties to give you all the adapter settings.

Select the Internet Protocol 4 (TCP/IPv4) connection and then click Properties.

At the bottom of this dialogue, type in the recommended Preferred and Alterative DNS settings. Click OK and close down all the dialogue boxes to get back to Control Panel.  Enjoy a faster DNS server. 

Download [via Google code]

Let me know about your experiences with this.
How well has it worked for you?

Home Sheep Home

Fun, silly and very additive game to guide the sheep safely across the chasm. Use the cursor keys to control the sheep, to get them to the other side. Or send them to their death. There are 15 levels in total getting progressively harder.  I love the sheep sound effects and fact that a fat-sheep has more strength than a small sheep!

Pax-Xon

A thoroughly additive combination of the Classic Snake game, with Pac-man tendencies. Move the pac-man around to box-off areas of the screen to isolate the ghosts.  Finish the level when you’ve boxed-off over 80% of the play area.

I Love Traffic

Play the role of a traffic cop by directing the traffic through complex junctions by controlling the traffic lights.   Send all the cars through at the same time and the inevitable happens.   Click the traffic light to toggle it to red or green. Leave the lights on red too long, and the traffic soon builds up.  The aim of the game is to get a number of cars through the junction in just 30-60 seconds.

AdverPutt

AdverPutt in a combination of executive toy and mini-golf course. Use the mouse to direct the ball and click the button to make the put.  The further the mouse pointer is away from the ball, the more power you’ll hit it with.

Record Tripping

Daft Record Tripping requires a mouse with a scroll wheel to give you a feeling that you’re scratching a record. Scroll forward to speed up, and backwards to “scratch-back”.  The bizarre selection of music to scratch is a posh lady reading Alice in Wonderland to a backing track of some break-beat ambient trance.  Use the scrolling features to solve the puzzles. Bizarre, but great fun!  It can take a while to download depending on your broadband connection. But worth the wait.

Reflections

28 levels of puzzle fun where you have to use the mirrors and prisms to reflect the laser light to the destination without setting off the bombs. Test your intellect and knowledge of physics.

Toon Crisis

Silly cartoon based game from KillerViral.  You control a pointing finger for your gun. Saunter through some real-life streets and shoot the cartoon characters. It does take a bit of getting used to, but go for the head shots to make it easier. Use space to let loose a duck to distract them!

Juggler

Use the mouse to catch the balls and bounce them back into the sky.   As long as you keep one ball in the air, the others will come back in if you drop them. Complete with online score board.  Will you be top of the charts?

Kaleidoscope

Classic kaleidoscope fun.  Pick from the selection of shapes, and drag them onto the display to create some beautiful and hypnotic animated patterns.

Bobulous

Use your mouse to guide Captain Bobulous. Direct him to eat the enemies as they pop up.  Crash into a an enemy that’s bigger than you, and you’ll loose a life. When you have enough energy, a vortex appears that you have to jump into to allow you to eat the bigger enemies.

These are my favourite flash games. 
Do you have a favourite?