{mosimage}While setting up the new PC at Cuddalore, I was choosing these applications to make life easier for my PC illiterate parents. Then I thought, why not share these (hopefully) useful applications with you so that some of you people can also integrate with your daily usage for better PC handling. These are not complicated or high volume / resources consuming programmes, but simple yet powerful... something like Swiss Knives...

{mosimage}I was a strong believer of Internet explorer and so much fascinated while upgrading it from v5.0 to v5.5 and to v6.0. Even though I was aware of Netscape, Opera, Safari and other browsers, nothing excited me like MSIE. It was in Abu Dhabi and thanks to failure of opening the Yahoo! mail I got in touch with Firefox Mozilla. For 2-3 days, whenever I tried to access my Yahoo! Mail in MSIE, I was getting this error "999 Error. Please try after sometime". On a casual visit to Vicky's worktable, I found him accessing Yahoo! Mail. He said try with Mozilla Firefox and the moment I did it, I was hooked to Mozilla Firefox. Initially I found its "Plain Jane" appearance lacking glamour, but I fall for its speed and multitabbed browsing.

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YouTube.Com is one site that has an extensive collection of videos and documentries. Previously they used to offer downloads of the album, but after the popularity soared high, that facility was stopped. In countries like UAE, US and others, it is fine to see videos online through broadband connection, but right now in India there is a slab for bandwidth transfer. Eg. In home user plan that costs Rs. 500/- per month, the maximum volume permitted is 1 GB / month, which means after 1 GB for every 1 MB, you have to pay Rs. 1.20/-. If your monthly transfer is 1.25 GB, you have to shell out extra money for that 250 MB which is Rs. 300/-. Coming back to video issue, seeing a video once will you cost 9 - 12 MB. If you see the same video again and again, just multiply that by no. of times you see. If download is possible, you transfer to your HDD once and can see 'n' number of times without worrying about online costs. This is a small tutorial on how to download videos from not only YouTube, but also from other video sites like Google, iFilm, PutFile etc..

{mosimage}This once again derives inspiration from Vaithiyanathan's "Laws of Workplace" - "A machinery can't be mastered until it is harnessed to the maximum extent". We are regularly using many useful softwares but we don't know much about them. These few tips are for most of the novice users, who can find it useful in day to day usage. This time the topics are about securing your files with Winzip, Minimising the Windows at a click, Printer friendly mail pages and Line breaks in Excel.

{mosimage}Last time we had seen one way of protecting the files by encrypting them. Even though it was useful, the problem of encrypting and decrypting everytime to access it was bit cumbersome. How good it will be if there is a programme to lock the folder just the way we do our briefcase and purses? I searched the internet and stumbled upon lots of programmes but most of them were paid ones. After a long search for completely free programme I landed on the "Lock Folder". My first experiences of installing it was a nightmare and after a HDD format (for some other reasons) I tried again this time it was working fine.

Most of us are sharing a computer with many people. Sometimes we have many files that we don't want to share with others or even let others know about it. What will be the first option that'll come to our mind? Hiding the file. But if you choose "Show hidden and system files" in "Folders Option" your files will be visible to whomever using the computer. Else store it in secondary storage devices like floppy or CD or USB drive and carry with you. You can't depend on secondary storage devices as they can fail at any time.

You can try encrypting your file, hide its type and even file names or extensions. I am suggesting you a software that was distributed with "Computers Today" few years back. It is called "Cryptalite" and decrypting one is called "Decrypta Lite" conceived and distributed by Odyssey softwares, Chennai. Don't know whether it is available for downloads now or even developed further, but the version I have / suggest is really useful and more than enough for us.

They say necessity is the mother of all inventions and learning experiences, I too am no different from that. Sometimes we learn good things and sometimes we learn the bad things also. OK! OK! before I turn preachy let me say that what all this article is about. It is about creating smaller sized videos for internet sharing and more than one movie in a single 700 MB CD.

The intresting story behind this new learning experience is driven by my passion for this Nagarjuna & Tabu starrer Telugu movie - "Ninne Pelladtha". It was released when I was on my first year of Engg and I saw it with my Andhra friends only to fell in love with that movie instantly. I have been searching for the VCD of that movie for a very long time in Chennai & Coimbatore, but I accidentaly found it here in a video library. While taking a copy there was this problem that second VCD couldn't be copied because of larger size than a conventional CD. So I had to find out ways to compress it and to my amazement I found that there are more than one format available for having smaller video size with almost similiar resolution and clarity.

{mosimage}These are the terms that every net savvy person is familiar with and this small tutorial is for those who are unaware of these facilities. Every time you want to send some important documents like resume or attachments that are in demand like video clippings, you have this problem of uploading it every time. In case in you're out of town when somebody calls and asks for those important files urgently, you'll need them to be in secondary storage like floppy or CD at that moment, involving additional problem of carrying them always. I don't rely on CD or floppy as they can let you down anytime.

For about three months I worried that whether my digicam had got damaged, if so where should I get it repaired and the cost associated with the service. It is surely going to cost lot of bucks and at the end you are not sure of the parts if changed.The problem started with the day I bought a new compact flash card. Even though Fujifilm offers a slot for CompactFlash card, it supports the XD Card as premium medium.