Steve's Ravin' Reviews
~~Steve Mills
Fearless leader asked that we try to try to produce articles for
the holiday season. I just couldn't come up with much in the software
arena. I am only reviewing free programs this month (either Freeware or
Adware), so it should help the budget and we have reviewed a couple of
terrific programs to use with the new digital camera.
Author Accolade - To the guys at Foo Dog Software for going WAY
above and beyond in solving a problem. Their Shooting Star Software is
my absolute favorite for auction management. I feel sorry for them
having to contend with eBay, which I think is a company with even less
customer interest than Billy's.
Your suggestions are welcome and encouraged.
Take Care…..Steve
steve@inil.com
JPEG Resizer
Version: 1.0
Author: Virtualzone
Web Site: http://www.virtualzone.de
Freeware
Rating: 4 Geezers
This is just the thing to prepare all of those Christmas pictures for
emailing. JPEG Resizer is a powerful tool for resizing lots of JPEGs with
just a few clicks. It lets you define a list of Images you want to resize,
choose one of three different resizing methods (Smart Resizing, Resizing by
calculating the size of one side, User-Defined Resizing), and set various
file output properties.
If you shot photos with a digital camera at a resolution that is too high
for presenting your photos on the internet, you need to resize them. JPEG
Resizer makes this job quite easy as you don't need to resize each single
image for itself.
UnzipThemAll
Version: 1.0.2
Author: Herve Thouzand
Web Site: http://www.herve-thouzard.com
Freeware
Rating: 5 Geezers
This program falls in the fire hose category - something you don't need very
often, but it's REALLY handy when you do.
If you ever had to unzip a bunch of compressed zip files and struggled with
a graphical interface or tried to interpret arcane command line programs
then you will appreciate UnzipThemAll.
√ Select all your archive files and in one
click, the program will decompress them in the current folder or in a
selected folder or in a new folder who's name is equal to archive's name or
in a folder who's name is made with a counter
√ The program does not require any installed
archive program such as Winzip or Winrar. It is fully independent
√ The program can sit in the Windows's tray so
that you can call it on demand
√ You can use the program to change files
attributes
√ The program can also copy files names to the
clipboard and create folders with names
√ If you have password protected archives, you
can type the password to extract files
√ You can save 20 favorites folders
√ You can set a startup directory or restore the
last working directory
√ The program can hide itself while
decompressing files, it can, too, beep at the end of the operation and/or
display a message when the process is finished
√ Possibility to see an history of all the
decompressions the program made during the session
√ You can call the program from the Windows
Explorer
√ The program is available in French and in
English
√ Print font overview
cam2pc
Version: 3.0
Author: Nabocorp
Web Site: http://www.nabocorp.com
Freeware
Rating: 6 Geezers
This is one of my most used programs. I pull the memory card from my camera,
put it in the reader and let cam2pc do its stuff. cam2pc is a complete
solution to ease your everyday work with your digital camera and your
pictures. Its primary feature is to automate the transfer of pictures from
the camera to the PC. By being able to automatically detect your camera,
create the destination directory and transfer your images, the whole process
is now done in a single click! For this particular feature, cam2pc is
compatible with the following cameras:
√ Digital cameras (and card readers) that appear
as removable devices in Windows and are assigned a drive letter
√ Digital cameras based on the Sierra Imaging
chipset (that includes Nikon Coolpix and many more)
√ Canon digital cameras
Once your images are transferred, cam2pc includes a fully featured image
browser and viewer. You can quickly review your images, losslessly rotate
them, rename them, resize them and, of course, view them in full-screen. There
are an incredible amount of options you can see on the web site. If you have
a digital camera, you need this software.
IEBooster
Version: 1.6
Author: Paessler Software Solutions
Web Site: http://www.paessler.com
Freeware
Rating: 5 Geezers
I find myself using this more and more. I do some SEO work and it's an easy
way to look at the server response and examine the source. Always available
with a right click while in Internet Explorer. IE Booster is a freeware
collection of tools that extend the context menu of the web browser MS
Internet Explorer (version 5 and up) for Windows.
The only drawback I've seen is that it refuses to play nice with NetCaptor,
my tabbed browser of choice.
This is added to your context menu:
Late addition - I managed to attract some
more spyware crap on my computer and it was really causing problems. This
one is called Xupiter. I regularly run AdAware, which we previously
reviewed. A quick search of the newsgroups seemed to confirm that AdAware
was not cleaning this particular vermin. Anyway, I used
Spybot Search and Destroy at
http://security.kolla.de and it did the job. Considerably more
complicated than AdAware, but it sure looks powerful. Just a quick initial
review for the adventurous to try.
Final Thought:
A man is
flying in a hot air balloon and realizes he is lost. He reduces height
and spots a man down below. He lowers the balloon further and shouts:
"Excuse me, can you tell me where I am?"
The man below says: "Yes you're in a hot air balloon, hovering 30 feet
above this field."
"You must work in Information Technology." says the balloonist.
"I do." replies the man. "How did you know?"
"Well", says the balloonist, "everything you have told me is technically
correct, but it's no use to anyone."
The man below says, "You must work in business as a manager."
"I do", replies the balloonist, "but how did you know?"
"Well", says the man, "you don't know where you are or where you are
going but you expect me to be able to help. You're in the same position
you were before we met but now it's my fault."
Steve
Mills has been reviewing software in different capacities for many years.
He
has recently left his job with a search engine consulting firm and is
looking for a new adventure.
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