Whereas we all have used Winzip and Winrar those beautiful utilities little do we know or care that they are not free. They are trialware and to use them beyond the time limit is illegal. So what do you do? What utility exists which can replace these products for free and yet provide the same productivity…The reply is 7-Zip

7-Zip is a freeware application which can be downloaded from www.7-zip.org .

If you like me care for GNU based products then 7-zip is under a LGPL license. Go to their site to find out more about 7-zip. Here are some of the features which might interest you:

• It compresses to both the zip format and the 7z format which is 30-70% better than the standard zip format.
• It allows you the same flexibility to split and merge files (as do Winrar and Winzip) but with better compression
• Allows you to password protect Archives.
• Create self extracting archive files to be sent out which means the end users dont need 7-zip or any other software for that matter to decompress your compressed files
• Create tar and gz archives for Linux and Unix

With all the above features and more, it compares up very well with the trialware programs Winzip and Winrar at no cost. Below is a price comparision with Winzip and Winrar:

WinZip (http://www.winzip.com)
Price: $29 (Evaluation Version Available)
OS Supported: 98/ME/NT/2000/XP/ Vista

WinRAR (http://www.rarlabs.com)
Price: $27 (Evaluation Version Available)
OS Supported: 98/ME/NT/2000/XP/ Vista

7-Zip (http://www.7-zip.org)
Price: Free
OS Supported: 98/ME/NT/2000/XP/ Vista

With so many good features does it have something missing you ask me? Well the below mentioned things are the only ones I came across:

• Cannot repair damaged archives
• Cannot create a rar file (do we really need these)

So what are you waiting for? Why use software like Winrar and Winzip illegally even after their trial period is expired. Not only is it unethical and illegal it also nags you a lot to buy it. Why go through all this when you have a free alternative (which is going to remain free) which can do this and so much more. Jump to the 7-zip community.

Microsoft Live Writer features an easy to use word-like editor which can be downloaded from http://get.live.com/writer/overview.

It allows connection to major blogging sites like WordPress, Blogger, Livejournal. Its quite easy and intuitive for a first time user and asks for the URL of the website along with the username and the password. Once you provide it that you are good to go.

It allows you options to save local drafts of your blog, post draft to your weblog, post draft to edit online (quite a handy feature) and of course to publish the whole weblog online. In addition you can of course preview while you are typing in how the real thing is going to look.

MLW – Microsoft Live Writer allows you to insert links, pictures, videos and tags like you were using a Word like editor as I have shown below.

All in all I think Microsoft has come up with a really good software to allow you to blog offline and if you are like me create articles before hand and publish it later. I would however like a scheduler feature here to post my blog online automatically. However it is a freeware and being that it just shines in what its supposed to do and it gets 5 stars from me.

Similarly many people today use Online banking. With a host of phishing scams out there many are cheated out of their hard earned money. Phishing scams are so sophisticated sometimes that it’s difficult to discern the scam site from the original. Other phishing scams including hacking email account passwords, identity thefts and so on.

If you have encountered such problem and are looking for a solution or want to take preemptive action then the software I review today McAfee SiteAdvisor is just what you need.

McAfee SiteAdvisor is a free software plugin which is available for both the Internet Explorer and Mozilla’s Firefox web browser as an addon. You can download it from http://www.siteadvisor.com/.

McAfee SiteAdvisor ensures that when you are on a website it lets you know how safe it is. Green means the site is safe, Yellow indicates proceed with caution and Red means the site is dangerous. After installation McAfee SiteAdvisor button can be found as shown below. Here by looking at the color you can determine how safe the website really is?

Alternately when you search online using google for example, it places an icon next to the weblink with the same color scheme indicating how safe the website is. A question mark can also be found sometimes which indicates the site has not been reviewed. Most of the times though you find icons next to your results.

It checks for all possible malware on the website and alerts you well in advance so that you are safe from online attacks as well as phishing attacks.

For all you techies and importantly non techies have you ever wondered what’s inside your computer? Sure enough if it is a desktop you might crank it open someday.But if you are a laptop user like me (who loves his laptop ) or a desktop user who would rather not open the system up just for the heck of it, this is where SIW comes in. It displays everything from the Processor to the RAM installed to BIOS, Windows Version, Serial numbers and much more.

Download Link: SIW is a freeware utility available from www.gtopala.com

The best part about SIW in my opinion is it is a standalone executable. That means you don’t need to install it to run it (note there is an installable version too). That for me just means less registry clutter and one less program to be tracked for uninstalling.

I installed SIW after downloading it from the website above (a quick download) and gave it a run and here is what I found the most interesting (there are a ton of things SIW displays for which I have couple of screenshots attached).

Interesting stuff it points out:

Hardware:

This includes everything from System manufacturer to the PC system type (mobile notebook) to the amount of RAM supported.

Then there are the other usual culprits like the motherboard (serial number), CPU (make, speed, even the technology 0.065µ in my case), the system clock, instructions supported, the RAM installed, Video, printers, battery information and much more. Honestly if you don’t understand it, its ok, be glad with SIW you are one of the few who even know what CPU technology they are using or what is the designed voltage of their battery .

Software:

This includes everything ranging from the OS- the version, the serial number, the product key, to the updates installed on your machine, the applications you have installed, the audio and video codecs you have installed to hold your breath even passwords. Yes you heard it right Passwords!!!

This program can help in password recovery. When I tested this it gave me 3 passwords that had been used on my laptop. This can help you remove private data like passwords so that it is not vulnerable to other attacks by showcasing such information to you.

Other than this I had information on installed databases, scheduled tasks and much much (believe me) more.

Network:

This includes utilities to scan your network, network information, open ports (really useful for admins) as well as ability to search the network.

Conclusion:

So the next time you are wondering if your PC is working too slow and you want to know whether you need a CPU upgrade or RAM upgrade use its internal CPU and Memory usage chart (which also shows CPU temperature) and with information that SIW provides from above, make a calculated decision on what you need changed. You can sure save a lot of bucks.

Other features include shutting down your computer, network traffic stats and Eureka (password tracking again)as well as exporting all data to HTML or CSV(comma seperated values) or text.

So what are you waiting for? Give it a try. Know more about the internals of your system so that the techie who comes to repair your system can’t fool you easily.

Your comments are most welcome.

I face many problems with IE7 (not talking about bugs), the two below hurting the browsing experience the most:

Flash based Ads: How many of you are tired/ annoyed/ down right mad, when you come across flash based ads, ads which can range from a mild distraction to downright loud sounds being played like those crazy emoticons talking or one of those things where you are congratulated for winning a free Apple Ipod?

No Crash Recovery in IE7: You are in the middle of doing some work on the office webmail, you have your other email account open, you just happen to read the latest score and are so thrilled that India might win the one day match against Australia and a couple of other sites (as is the norm with tabbed browsing) and suddenly the good ol’ Internet Explorer crashes (oh I donno from the thousands of reasons) and you loose all your work.

The problem here is you could easily switch to Firefox but some sites like Outlook Webmail and those with Sopcast links serving cricket or your favorite movie online work or best work only with IE so you have to use it. Read on to find out how to resolve this..

The product I feature today is IE7 Pro. This nifty product is a freeware. No its not a software from Microsoft but is a trusted add-on recommended by many sites. (a quick google search should allay your fears)The download link is http://www.ie7pro.com/

Features:

» Crash Recovery:

It allows you to recover from crashes. When you get into a crash, the next time you load it up, it allows you to go to the sites you were working on.

» Block Flash based ads:

In addition it allows you to block flash based ads. It has a list of database sites which it uses to blocks these ads from. Try this and browsing multiple tabs on rediff. It is a lot of fun when you don’t have ads to bother you.

» Integrated Download Manager:

Also, they have added a download manager which manages your downloads. In addition, they have a feature which allows you to save videos from sites like youtube.

» Fixing Display Resolutions:

IE7 pro allows you to fix display resolutions (its a bit different from resizing as these match the resolution levels you get with desktops). This is very useful working with webapps running on systems meant for people who desire the 800×600 resolution. Most apps are running towards the 1280×1080 and when running on a 800×600 desktop resolution, the results can be quite nasty. Thankfully IE7 pro fixes this. (Believe me this is a big life saver if you are in tech support with the wide array of users who like 800×600).

» Additional Features:

Other great features include useful tools like Super Drag Drop, Proxy Switcher, Mouse Gestures, Tab History Browser,Inline Search,Spell Check,Auto fill Form, Opening Search results in new tab, User Agent Switcher, Webpage Capturer, Greasemonkey alike user script etc .

So go ahead what are you waiting for? If the adblock and crash recovery features just whetted your appetite, there is tons of stuff you can do with other features like Super drag drop and Proxy Switcher (I can imagine the possibilities here) and other built in features.

So download the product from http://www.ie7pro.com/ and let me know how it changed the way you enjoyed your Cricket match online on Sopcast or working with Crash recovery. Make IE7 standard into IE7 pro. Oh yeah Brickbats are welcome too .

This is Pranav. Recently we got an assignment in our class to start a blog. Something which would be both fun and challenging to do.
I started one on Telecommunications networks but it seems to be too technical for many not to mention too narrow in scope.

The next best thing I know about is Software and technology. Have been bitten by this bug ever since I first browsed the Internet back in 1998(yeah that late!!).

This blog is about utility apps. These are everyday applications/ software that I have come across and which I found really useful(and cool) and which I find might be quite useful to many.

How many times has it happened that you had more than one thing to copy and paste but couldnt do so or you were one of the unfortunate ones who were on IE(because it is mandatory at several places due to legacy web apps for example) and had multiple tabs open and suddenly IE crashed for you to loose all your web links and having to open them again referencing them from the history.

Sounds familiar? If that’s the case keep visiting to find a list of applications which will help you increase your productivity. Most of the times I will be reviewing free software only. The only time I review shareware is when it has no free alternative.

So come use these utility apps…