Computer Chit Chat

Archive for the ‘Download’ Category

Fellow blogger Skeet recently wrote about hidden objects games. I was familiar with the concept because my oldest son has a book full of pages with hidden objects. But I’d never played one on the computer and gone against time. After reading her post I was curious, so I found one that looked good. I downloaded Big City Adventure - San Francisco and immediately began my one hour free trial. I liked it a lot. At one point shortly after my youngest had gone to bed there were three of us (me, hubby and oldest son) huddled bear the monitor looking for things. I’m including a screenshot. If you like this type of game or are looking for a new type of game to try, check this one out. It’ll keep you busy. If you already play this type of game and enjoy it, please recommend some others to me.

• New hidden object game - Mystery Case Files Ravenhearst
• Free games
• You can win a wii if you live in a Charter area

This blog does follow. Are you wondering what following means? It has to do with - you guess it - links. Comment spam is a nasty problem that bloggers deal with. No follow means that a link in a comment shouldn’t be trusted, so it isn’t counted as a backlink. Now I write my blogs using Wordpress, which by default is no follow. I have the akismet plugin activated and I have all comments on moderation. So I am sure link spam is not getting through. I installed the do follow plug in, because I feel anyone that took the time to read something on my blog and comment about it deserves a vote for their link. The do follow plugin removes the no follow attribute from comments. It can be found at semiologic.com/software/wp-fixes/dofollow/ and it’s free for the taking.

• Want to better manage your Wordpress comments?
• Blog comment policies
• My blog comment policy

I am continuing to go through the helpful add-ons I’m using for the Firefox browser. The one I am writing about today does a lot. By that, I mean it really does A LOT. When installed, this add-on (located at https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/addon/321) displays the Google PageRank and Alexa rank, highlights keywords and no follow links, includes a link report, displays meta tags, has a built in keyword density analyser, displays whois information and shows back links. All of this information sits in a non-descript spot in a place of your choosing. I have mine set to display in the browser status bar. This add-on can tell you a lot about the site you’re on with very little effort by accomplishing numerous tasks while you’re on the site, so it can save you some time and effort. It’s good.

• ReminderFox
• How to install Firefox
• Nice Firefox add-on for handling links

There have been several times that I came across a website that was not in English. Now I took French, German and Latin in high school and college but that was a long time ago and I’ve forgotten far more than I remember. Today I got an offer to trade links. It was a PR5 link being offered, so I decided to check out the site. It was all in French. I hit the internet and found myself a Firefox add-on that will perform translation based on Google translation services. The add-on is found at https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/addon/918 and is called gTranslate. I downloaded it and restarted Firefox. I highlighted all of the text on the page offering me the link, right clicked, chose page info and translate page into English. Bam, the whole page appeared in English. Very cool tool indeed. It translates from English to German, German to English, English to Spanish, Spanish to English, English to French, French to English, English to Italian, Italian to English, English to Portuguese, Portuguese to English, English to Japanese, Japanese to English, English to Korean, Korean to English, English to Chinese (Simplified), Chinese (Simplified) to English, German to French and French to German

• How to install Firefox
• Nice Firefox add-on for handling links
• How to update Firefox automatically.

I am on the internet a lot. There have been more than a few times where I saw a group of links I was interested in and it took me forever to get them all open. With Firefox this is no longer an issue. I am using a Firefox add-on called Linky. It can be found at addons.mozilla.org/firefox/addon/425 and it is free. After downloading it you need to close and reopen Firefox and it will be working. All you do is highlight the group of links you’re interested in and right click. On the right click there will be an option for Linky letting you choose if you want to open the links in tabs or windows. It’s very cool.

• How to install Firefox
• SearchStatus Firefox add-on tells you more than rank
• Firefox time tracking plugin

Did you ever want to use a certain color that you saw on your monitor but couldn’t figure out the color code? It’s happened to me more than a few times. What can you do about it? Get Pixel Pick. Pixel Pick is a simple free program that will tell you the color code of whatever is under your mouse. It will translate the color into seceral different formats including RGB, CMYK and HEX. It’s so simple it doesn’t even require installation. It minimizes to the system tray and is ready to use. Just click once and point your mouse over the color you want and you’ll see the code appear. It’s very neat and quite helpful. Pixel Pick can downloaded for free at http://www.design-lib.com/the_pixel-pick.php

• Color picker Firefox addon
• How to install Firefox
• Save and Restore back up software deal for under $1

This tutorial presumes you have never installed Wordpress before on your own domain. This tutorial is written for those whose hosting includes cpanel.
This is not the only way to install Wordpress but it is how an easy way to do it and it’s how I’ve done it every time.
First decide if you want to run the whole site on Wordpress, or just the blog.
Go to http://wordpress.org/download/ and click on download .zip.
Download the zipped file to your computer. Unzip the package.
Now, log into cpanel and create a MySql database and user and add the user you’ve created to the database you’ve created. Click here if you need a tutorial on how to do this. Make a note of the name of the database and user name, you’ll need them in a while.
Now upload the wordpress files to your hosting account. You can upload them with an ftp client like Filezilla or you can upload them in cpanel. If you decided to run the whole site on Wordpress, then upload all of the contents (just the contents, not the folder) of the unzipped Wordpress file you downloaded right into the root directory of your site. If you decided to use Wordpress only for a blog, then rename the folder whatever (for example blog) and upload that folder to the root directory.
Now, in cpanel, go into the filemanager.
Find wp-config-sample.php and rename it wp-config.php
Click on wp-config.php and click edit. Another window will open.
Where the code says DB_NAME change that to your database name.
Where the code says DB_USER change that your database user name.
Where the code says DB_PASSWORD change that to the password you created.
Save wp_config.php and close that window.
Run the installer by accessing wp-admin/install.php in your browser.
If you installed in the root directory, access http://example.com/wp-admin/install.php
If you installed into a folder in the root directory, access http://example.com/blog/wp-admin/install.php
You’ll need to supply your blog name and your email address, and if you want your blog to be visible to search engines. You’ll be given a password, make sure you keep it.
You should be all set. Let me know how you did.

• How to create a database in Cpanel 11
• How to install a Wordpress plugin
• How to place a contact form in Wordpress

In the past few weeks besides switching from Outlook to Thunderbird I also switched from Internet Explorer to Firefox. Surfing the web has gone a lot more smoothly since then. Firefox is an open source internet browser. It’s free. It will run on Windows, Mac and Linux. It behaves differently than Explorer in a couple of ways. Installation is pretty straightforward.
Go to http://www.mozilla.com/firefox/ and click download.
Next click save to download and save the installer.
Click continue and follow the instructions and you’re done.
If you had heavily customized your Internet Explorer toolbars then you may want to go to the Add-ons page (very top of the Firefox link above) and look through the extensions and plugins. Why go through this you ask? Firefox users can pick what they have in their browser, rather than having what everyone else has whether they need it or not.
If you try it, let me know how it goes.

• Nice Firefox add-on for handling links
• How to update Firefox automatically.
• SearchStatus Firefox add-on tells you more than rank

Since installing Thunderbird and not using Outlook and Outlook Express a couple of weeks ago, my computer has behaved a lot better.
Thunderbird is an open source email client and it runs on Windows and Mac.
If you’re interested in switching to Thunderbird, for whatever reason, here’s the instructions on how to get it going.
Go to http://www.mozilla.com/thunderbird/ and download Thunderbird.
Close your other applications.
Install the download.
Go to the Tools menu and choose import.
Choose settings, and choose the program you’ve been using, click next. You should see a confirmation message. You’ve just brought over any email accounts you had configured.
Go back into Tools, choose import, choose Mail, choose the program you’ve been using and click next. You should see a confirmation message telling you how many mails were imported. You’ve just brought over all of the email you had saved in that program.
Lastly, go back into Tools, choose Import, Choose Address Books, choose the program you’ve been using and click next. You should see a confirmation message that your address book was successfully imported. You’ve just brought all of your contacts and addresses over.
That’s it!

• Do you keep a calendar on your computer?
• Anyone at Mozilla listening?
• How to change nameservers for Godaddy domains

How do you unzip zipped files? Like many people you might use Winzip. Wizip is shareware, meaning if you’re going to use it you’re supposed to send in some money. Mind you winzip still works if you don’t pay, it just takes a long time to open (basically it counts to 150). I used to use it all the time and came across something that works just as well and is freeware, meaning no payment requested or suggested or needed. The software I’m referring to is Coffeecup Free Zip Wizard. If you don’t really want to pay winzip and don’t want to wait to open your zipped files, this software is exactly what you’re looking for.

• Looking for a free alternative to Office?
• The cost of software
• How to install Wordpress using cpanel 11 on your own domain