6/28/09

New Digsby release is here!

Hello everyone,
While ago we have been talking about cool program Digsby.

The new Digsby is here! This release includes some major improvements including:

* Performance: We've optimized performance from the ground up, reducing overall CPU usage by about 50%
* Buddy List Search: Press Ctrl+F to easily search your buddy list or the web
* Emoticons: Added four new emoticon packs to choose from
* File Transfers: Improved the reliability of AIM, ICQ, and MSN file transfers
* Conversations: Added an option for new IM windows to start hidden and blink the tray icon instead of popping up a window
* New Infobox: The infobox now uses the same user interface control as the IM window (WebKit), making it much faster and more versatile
* Twitter: Added Retweet support
* MySpace: Added support for setting status on MySpace
* Google Talk: Added support for the Invisible status on Gtalk
* And More: Over 100 other bug fixes and enhancements!

We invite you to take the new Digsby for a test drive.

Download Now: http://www.digsby.com

6/26/09

Blogger Templates

Many bloggers that use the Blogger platform don't expand on trying to make their blog look the best that it can be, they just stick to the default templates that Blogger provides. What most people don't know is that they can download, then upload their own template onto their blog. To upload a template, go to layout> edit HTML, then you have the option to upload a template, that is where you upload the templates. Today, I will show you different sites to find amazing Blogger templates....







1. Blogger  Styles

   Blogger Styles is probably one of the most under-rated Blogger Template Sites out there. It is not a popular site for these templates, but it is definitely one of the best sites that I have ever seen for Blogger Templates. With a wide selection of original, and professional templates, they are one of the best sites out there. 



    2.    BTemplates
 BTemplates is probably the most popular website for Blogger Templates out there. With a large selection of Blogger templates, there is probably one there for everybody. Though BTemplates, is not my favorite Blogger Templates site, the recent templates that look amazing, have brought BTemplates to number two.



 3. Our Blogger Templates
Our Blogger Templates is another un-popular, under rated website for Blogger templates. They don't have the best templates, but there are some templates that are amzing, and look very professional, which is probably the only reason that it is number three.
 







 4. Blogger Templates
Blogger Templates is another un-popular Blogger templates website. They have number 4, because many of their templates are great for small buisnesses and the templates can fit many different types of companies. The only reason that it didn't make it any higher is because these templates aren't perfect for normal, personal blogs.






 5. eblog templates
Eblog Templates is one of the more popular websites for blogger templates. There are good templates, but not top notch. The other downside is that they require you to make an account to download the templates instead of a come in, go out sort of feel. It might take 15 minutes to make an account and download a template here, when it might only take you 2 minutes on the other websites.
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About The Author: Andrew
 Andrew at Tech Plus loves to share thoughts and ideas about blogging and design. He is a web designer and works with HTML 24/7. You can find him at http://techplustips.com/




 

6/19/09

Beat Stress with online games

This post is published by Salman of Blogging Tips

Every year on the Internet something new happens. A lot of discussion takes places about pluses and minuses. For last few years, online games are becoming a rage on the Internet. As expected, anything that becomes successful invites criticism. But the benefits may far outweigh the dangers. How about online games?

Online Games - why people play? Why do we do anything- because we love doing it? By natural instinct every animal seeks pleasure and runs away from pain. None of us likes the idea of getting admitted to a hospital, because that may be painful. All of us enjoy meeting friends because that is pleasant. It is true with games. Why no body is asking about the reason of popularity of games? The answer is very simple. Games make us feel good.

Addiction - anything that gives joy can be addictive. Some of us are addicted to adventures. They keep trying new adventure again and again. Some of us are addicted to love. Some of us are addicted to meeting friends. Some of us are addicted to collecting costly cards and so on. Everybody is somehow addicted to do what he/she loves doing. The need is to check that the addiction does not hurt.

Beat Stress With Online Games - play selected online games whenever you get bored. Play for a certain time and then stop. As soon as you feel relaxed, it is time to move on to your work. Controlled game playing cab be a fantastic stress buster. Try it.

Article Source: http://www.a1-articledirectory.com






6/18/09

How to play music education games?

This is a guest post by Mohd Salman Baig of Blogging Tips

Do you want some easy to follow instructions to some musical games to play along with children?

The benefits of learning through playing games are enormous. Games help to inspire,motivate and learn much quicker and with much more fun.

In order to become sucessful at music, most people think that you need to sit at the piano every time you practice for a half an hour each day. This is a myth and is simply not true.

If you want your children to be great at music and therefore able to receive the full benefits of music at a young age, then it is important to mix up music practice at home and make it just as fun as any other fun activity you do at home.

Here are three examples of traditional well known games and instructions, you could play in your next home practice session with your children to help make practice more inspiring, varied and fun!

Musical Go Fish

Materials To make: 1) You will need to make 8 cards of the same size with different musical symbols or notation on each.

Using your printer, make two copies of the cards sheets you have just prepared. This will make 16 cards altogether to use in the game.

Objective: The rules are based on the classic version of "Go Fish".

Make a pair by matching cards which are the same. Pairs are placed in front of each player until there are none remaining in their hand. The first player to match all of their own cards and place them in front of them is the winner!

Preparation: Deal five cards to each player (can use more or less if desired to make game shorter or longer). Extra cards go in the middle face down on a pile.

Directions: Player 1 asks player 2 of their choice if they have one of their cards. Player 2 either passes over the card or if they don't have it says "GO FISH!". If the result is "GO Fish!" then player 1 picks up a card from middle pile. Every player has a turn until someone matches all cards in their hand and "Goes Out".

Musical Snakes and Ladders

Object: To get to the top before anyone else.

Preparation: 1)Make musical dice for the level you require.

2) Find a traditional snakes and ladders game board, or make up your own based on the traditional version. Place the game board in the middle of the playing area.

Each player needs a counter or button.

Directions: All counters are to be placed at the start. Each player in turn rolls dice, add the number of beats together and moves accordingly.

You can play the game with more than one dice if you would prefer the game to move faster.

There will be ladders to climb and snakes to fall down in the process of playing the game. This is a fun game of luck and skill!

Musical Snap

Preparation: 1)You will need to make a deck of 48 cards. Make 12 cards using musical pitches and / or notation and photocopy the four times.

Object: Two matching cards in a row wins the snap.The player with the most cards wins!

How To Play: Divide the playing cards up equally between players have two cards face up to start off two piles in the middle. Each player takes in turn to place their card on top of one of the two piles in the middle, until the two piles match. When a match is spotted, the first player to put their hand over the entire pile and call out snap, wins the card deck. The player with the most cards in the end wins!


Article Source: http://www.a1-articledirectory.com



6/16/09

Some Important interview concepts

This post is posted by Salman of Best Tips Blogging
Here are some common but important concepts which you could be asked to explain.

a) OOP: Object Oriented Programming is a programming model that relies on representing real world objects in your code. Using analogies with reality then makes it easier for you to design your program. There's obviously a lot more to this, so make sure you read up before wantonly dropping it into an interview. In general, praise it, for it is good.

b) SDLC: The Software Development Life Cycle is a bunch of procedures and documents that take a software project from a neat idea to a saleable product. There's the analysis, planning, design, coding, testing and finally the maintenence of the product. A sufficiently vague statement would be,"I think current SDLc models are long overdue for a revamp."

c) Garbage collector: A feature of Java an the .Net frameworks, the garbage collector is a process that cleans the system's memory of objects and variables that programs aren't using. So if you're asked how you're going to go about cleaning the memory in, say, C#, it's a trick question-you dont really need to-the garbage collector does it.

d) Classifieds: A novel concept, and what you'll need if you really try to bluff your way through a technical interview :D


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6/15/09

Handy VLC media player options

This is the guest post posted by Salman of Best Tips 4 Blogging.

VLC Media Player is probably the best video/music player available today. Here are some the cool options that can try out.

a) Often Used Shortcuts

VLC's shortcuts are very easy to understand and even if for some reason you are not comfortable with them, VLC allows you to customize them too. You will find them under 'Settings-->Preferances-->Interface-->Hotkeys' settings. Some of most commonly used shorcuts are listed below:

F Fullscreen view
Spacebar Play/Pause
S Stop
Ctrl+Q Quit
+/- Play clip Faster/Slower
N/P Next/Previous clip
Shift+Left/Shift+Right Jump very short
Alt+Left/Alt+Right Jump short
Ctrl+Left/Ctrl+Right Jump long
Ctrl+Up/Ctrl+Down Increase/Decrease volume
M Mute
Ctrl+M Show DVD menu

b) Video Settings

If you want to tweak the way your videos look or sound in VLC, use the Extended GUI(Ctrl+G) to view a various settings you can change - hue saturation, brightness as well as an equalizer for auido settings.

c) Mouse controlled VLC

You can use mouse gestures in VLC as well. Follow the steps given below:

* Enable the mouse gestures interface by selecting 'Settings-->Add interface-->Mouse gestures'.
Once you've done this, use the following gestures to control VLC.

Right:Play the next item in the playlist.
Up/Right:Go fullscreen.
Down/Right:Quit.

If you would like the mouse gestures interface to be enabled everytime you start VLC, go to 'Settings-->Preferences-->Interfaces-->Control Interfaces' and check 'Mouse gestures control interface'.

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6/14/09

5 Windows tricks you didn't know

No matter how much we research, there's so much to Windows that we haven't yet discovered. Here are the top 5 tricks that you'll love to try out.

a) Folder Pictures

When there are a number of pictures in a folder, they tend to show up in numbers in the thumbnail view. Wouldn't it be great if we could display just a single photo as the Folder picture? Well, good news is on your way. We can do this by following the steps given below:

* Select the picture which you want to show up as your folder picture.
* Simply rename this picture to folder.jpg (You can also rename it to folder.gif).

b) Speed Up Your PC with a Pen drive

If you have a 1GB pen drive (2GB is recommended), then you can increase your system performance by moving your system Pagefile onto the pendrive. The trick behind this is that accessing flash memory is faster than the hard disk. You will need to do one thing after you move the system Pagefile onto the drive.

* Right click 'My Computer'.
* Select 'Properties'.
* Go to 'Hardware' tab an select your Pendrive.
* Click 'Properties'.
* Under 'Policies' tad, select 'Optimize for performance'.

That's it. You're done.

c) No Requirement of the Windows CD

Tired of looking for your Windows CD every time you encounter a problem? Well, you can escape that situation by following the given steps :

* Copy the entire CD onto your hard disk.
* Click 'Start-->Run' and type 'gpedit.msc'.
* Navigate to 'Computer Configuration-->Administrative Templates-->System'.
* Look at the right hand side to see 'Specify Windows installation file location'.
* Double click it and select 'Enable' and enter the path to your Windows XP setup file (setup.exe).

d) Disalbe Windows Key Shortcuts

If you want the users of your system to stop using the windows key shortcut, follow the steps given below:

* Click 'Start-->Run' and type 'gpedit.msc'.
* Navigate to 'User Configuration-->Administrative Templates-->Windows Components-->Windows Explorer.
* Enable the 'Turn off Windows + X hot keys' setting.

e) Disable some Control Panel Applets

If you want to remove some applets from the Control Panel so that other users of your system cant access them, follow these steps:

* Click 'Start-->Run' and type 'gpedit.msc'.
* Navigate to 'User Configuration-->Administrative Templates-->Control Panel'.
* On the right hand side, you'll see 'Show Only specified Control Panel applets'.
* Bear in mind that you'll have to know the exact names of the Control Panel applets to disable them. (For example, Add/Remove Programs is known as appwiz.cpl).