Monthly Archives: September 2011

5 Google Tricks Which You Might Not Know

Most people use Google but almost everyone has heard of it. Although it is the most popular search engine, there are a lot of pretty nifty things that you can do with it other than a basic search. Here are a few of the more useful ‘tricks’ that the average user might not know.

Find the definition of a word
A lot of people either go to Wikipedia.org or Thesaurus.com to find the definition of a word they’re not familiar with. However, lots of people don’t know that you can discover what a word means simply by typing it in the Google search box. For example, if you want to find out what ‘extravagant’ means, all you need to do is type it in the Google search box – there’s no need to go searching out other dictionary websites.

Find places in your area
You can find restaurants, shops and other points of interest in your area simply by typing in the place you want to visit. If you wanted to find the addresses and information of Italian restaurants in your area, simply type ‘Italian restaurants’ in the Google search box. There is no need to type ‘Italian restaurants’ followed by your area, because it will automatically show only the ones which are located in the area you live in.

Find websites that are linking to your website
If you have a website and you want to see exactly how popular it is, you can discover the webpages and websites that are linking to it by typing ‘link:’ followed by the URL of your website. This will show you where your traffic is coming from, who likes your webpage/website and you may also discover information that will be useful for you to use yourself.

Search a Website That Doesn’t Have a Search Function
Although most websites nowadays have a built in search function, many don’t. If you would like to search a site that doesn’t have one, simply type “site:www.site.com search query”.

Convert Currency, Units, and Perform Math Functions
If you want to convert currency simply write it out as a math function. For example, “4 dollars = ?pounds” will convert this for you according to the latest conversion rates. For units, “5 inches = ?centimeters” will convert from inches to centimeters. As a calculator, simply enter in your equation: “5*3.12=”

Top 5 Internet Explorer Add-Ons Everyone Should Have

Browsers have seen a reassuring amount of improvements over the past four years. Ever since Firefox became popular and Chrome emerged as the fastest browser it seems that all of the companies in the browser game want to increase their own market share. Among the improved browsers is Microsoft’s Internet Explorer which is not the same clunky and depressing browser of the past but a fairly quick one with great add-ons. If you happen to be an IE8 user, here are some add-ons which we think are ‘must have’.

IE7Pro– Visit Website
Although the name of this add-on says ‘IE7’, this add-on works for version 8 as well. This is your basic all in one pack and provides such services as pop-up blocking, spell-checking, text highlighting, tabbed browsing management, crash recovery, and much more.

LastPass– Visit Website
This add-on is incredible for anyone who uses lots of passwords and doesn’t mind trusting those passwords to a (reliable) company’s encryption techniques. You set a master password and then tell LastPass to remember all of the logins that you use and you can instantly sign into your favorite websites without the annoying sign-in procedure.

Yoono – Visit Website
This is really cool. It’s a browser-based multi-protocol messaging client. Log in to Facebook, Twitter, AIM, MSN, GTalk, Skype, and more from your browser so you don’t have to deal with multiple annoying programs on your computer.

Web of Trust– Visit Website
This simply checks the URLs on a search against a database of known insecure websites. Surf the internet with no worries with this add-on.

Define With Wikipedia – Visit Website
If you are like me and are constantly looking to Wikipedia to learn extra things about what you read then you will love this add-on. This is nothing too fancy, just a quick Wikipedia search tool based on your highlighted text.

Although those are my top five, there are many other great tools out there to help your browsing experience. Head over to Microsoft’s add-on website and check them out.

Top 5 Free PC Programs Everyone Should Have

There are thousands of free programs available on the internet that claim to be able to change your life. However, if someone reset my computer right now, here are the first 5 pieces of free software I would install.

1. AVG Antivirus
Anti-virus software is extremely important for any PC or laptop. When you buy a new PC or laptop, you shouldn’t even access the internet before making sure that you have some good anti-virus software installed on your computer. You can buy anti-virus software such as PC Internet Security and Norton, but if you can’t afford it or can’t be bothered to buy any, you should definitely check out AVG Antivirus. It is free and does the job – what more can I say?

2. OpenOffice Suite
When office suites are mentioned, Microsoft Office is usually the first one that pops into people’s minds. However, there are many others that are available, and some of them are free. Microsoft Office can be very expensive to buy and sometimes doesn’t seem worth all the money. If you haven’t got an office suite and don’t want to pay to get one, you can download OpenOffice for free. It includes all of the tools and will integrate seamlessly with Microsoft’s suite.

3. Dropbox
A lot of people choose external hard drives, CDs, memory sticks and other devices to backup their files. However, if you ever lost them or they were destroyed in a house fire or other accident, you would lose everything. Online backup solutions are the best thing to use, but you might want to use other methods as well. Dropbox is a great and free service that will automatically sync files with their servers. Although the free version doesn’t allow for large backups, the software is essential for anyone who actively uses multiple computers.

4. VLC Media Player
How annoying is it when you download a video and you can’t find the right program or codec to run it? VLC Media Player is literally the most amazing piece of media software I have ever used. It plays, quite literally, everything that I have ever thrown at it and will even work for DVDs.

5. Pidgin Messaging Client
Almost everyone uses some sort of messaging client. Whether it is AIM, MSN, gTalk, Facebook Chat, Yahoo!, or others, in this day and age is it inexcusable to not be contactable online. Most people use more than one which is why Pidgin is a great option. Login to multiple accounts at once and remain in the loop without running a large number of programs.

5 Chrome Add-Ons Which Every Webmaster Must Have

Every webmaster has a plethora of tools that get them through the day. While there are thousands of different ones, here are some essential tools that we feel every webmaster should have installed.

1. LastPass Chrome Add-On
A webmaster will typically need to remember passwords to literally hundreds of different websites. They can either keep them all the same, attempt to remember lots of different passwords, or use LastPass. In this add-on, you make one master password and let the extension manage your logins for you. What’s best is that you can install it on your desktop, laptop, and any other device which you use and it will sync.

2. Twitter Bird Chrome Add-on
A lot of webmasters use Twitter to promote their webpages, so it’s helpful if you can easily access your Twitter updates and notifications. The Twitter Bird Chrome Addon will add a Twitter drop down menu to your web browser, so you can click on it to check the latest from Twitter! As well as reading what everybody else has been writing, you can easily post updates and links yourself.

3. SEO Site Tools Chrome Add-On
This is essentially an all-in-one chrome extension that helps webmasters with their SEO endeavors. My favorite part of it is the nofollow highlighter which will tell you if a website is adding the ‘nofollow’ tag to their links, essentially making the value of a backlink close to zero.

4. Facebook Chrome Add-on
Facebook is the favorite social networking site of many people, and lots of webmasters find it useful for promoting their websites and pages. With millions of people logging in and out of Facebook every day, it’s a great way to get more people clicking on your links. Like the Twitter Bird Chrome Addon, it will add a drop down menu to the top of the web browser. You can post each webpage as you publish or update it, and then check to see if anyone’s impressed with your work!

5. Google Toolbar Add-On
This is the official toolbar from Google. It integrates seamlessly, provides valuable information like PageRank, Alexa ranking, translation, and lots more. The Google Toolbar is certainly an essential for any webmaster that targets Google for traffic.