If you haven’t heard of Google’s social activities sharing and recommendation service Schemer, we don’t blame you. It hasn’t received as much press as it deserves (ironically, we missed out on covering it as well). Better late than never though, and what better time to check this gem out in detail upon the launch of its iPhone app. While the Android app has been around for a while, Google has just released the iPhone app for Schemer a few minutes ago, and we’re here to take it on a spin for you. Read on for our full review.
READ MORE
By Haroon Q. Raja on May 17, 2012
The themes in Windows 7 and Windows 8 usually contains a number of images in each theme. Other elements remain the same, but the image changes to a new one after a specified amount of time. This time interval can be changed by opening Personalization settings and selecting the Desktop Background option. The time interval can be set from 10 seconds to one day depending on the user’s preference. If you are fond of using a large collection of wallpapers, you can set a lower time interval. However, having a large collection means that sometimes, an image may appear on your background that might not be according to your mood at the time and you might want to change it. By default, the desktop context menu of Windows 7 and Windows 8 contains an option called Switch To next Desktop Background, which – as the name suggests – allows you to switch to the next desktop background available in the image list. In this post, we will show you how to switch to the next desktop background using a keyboard shortcut rather than accessing the right click context menu of Windows desktop. Read on to find out how.
READ MORE
If you’re new to Mac or have just recently discovered that your Mac runs smoother if you use third-party apps as opposed to the default ones, you might be exploring how to set an app as the default one for its relevant file types. Unfortunately, this isn’t very easy to do. Many rightly go to the Open with… options of a file and set defaults there but either that doesn’t always work, or the changes are reverted for no apparent reason. What you need is a more permanent way to change default apps. In what follows, we will tell you how you can set an app as the default for one or several formats.
READ MORE
By Fatima on May 16, 2012
With more and more people gaining access to the widespread world of the internet, and with more effective means of communication and sharing being introduced via various online services, you stand a realistic chance of going viral among the global audience with your thoughts, creative skills or anything (however idiotic) that sets you apart from the rest. In this regard, die-hard music enthusiasts, who fail to impress the masses with their rather bland voices, have the option to resort to auto-tuning software or web services, which convert even the dullest of vocals into a musical masterpiece. When talking of similar applications for mobile platforms, not many have been able to entice a greater user-base than popular iOS app Songify. Songify transforms plain audio recordings into auto-tuned musical tracks with different beats in no more than a few taps. You don’t even need to sing to have the result sound like a song. All you have to do is speak into the mic and the app will do the songifying for you. Songify also has its own little social network that worldwide users can access to share their ‘musical masterpieces’ with others. Good news is, it is no longer exclusive to the iOS App Store, as an official Android variant has just hit the market.
READ MORE
By A. Rehman on May 16, 2012
Shortcut managers, application launchers and context menu editors all have one thing in common: they all simplify and enhance your Windows experience. In earlier posts, we have covered a lot of applications that allow you to easily access different programs and menus through hotkeys, right click context menus, or the system tray. Today, we have another application launcher and hotkey macro utility called FlashTray Pro, which allows you to instantly launch applications, files, folders, URLs and system options from the system tray menu. Moreover, the application has a collection of small utilities, including a Color Picker, Character Map, Screen Magnifier, Calendar Studio and Windows Sizer. The shortcuts can be accessed from both the system tray as well as through user-defined hotkeys.
READ MORE
Getting photos out of your iPhone is a fairly easy task. You don’t even need to launch iTunes to access your images. Nevertheless, you still have to use a cable, which is why there are still plenty of apps that make this task even easier. Air Projector is an iOS app that serves a similar purpose, but not just for extracting images. Using Air Projector, it is possible to display photos and PDF documents on any desktop computer without even transferring the data to it first. The app streams your media and documents to a web browser of your choice. The app doesn’t even need a desktop client as everything is done over Wi-Fi and HTTP.
READ MORE
While it might just be a matter of aesthetics, thumbnails are simply an amazing way of browsing through files without even opening them. Windows displays thumbnail previews for video files, but for some file formats, this option isn’t natively supported. If you consider this a problem, worry no more, as Media Preview has a solution for you. This small tool supports a large number of formats and lets you force thumbnail previews over video file extensions of your choice. The supported formats library includes 3GP, 3G2, AVI, AMV, DIVX, FLV, F4V, MKV, WEBM, MPG, MPEG, M1V, M2V, OGM, OGV, MP4, M4V, MPV4, TS, TP, MTS, MOV, RM, VOB, EVO & WMV. Instead of extracting the first few frames of the preview, the application seeks out relevant frames, which is quite helpful in instances where you have placed different episodes of the same TV show in a single folder.
READ MORE
TabsPreview is a Chrome extension that gives you a gorgeous 3D preview of all your opened tabs, with multiple search capabilities and customization options. It provides an instant thumbnail preview of all the opened tabs within the new tab screen or a new window. This can be quite handy for people who work with several tabs and often find it difficult to sift through them. Whenever you click the extension’s button in the toolbar, TabsPreview refreshes the thumbnails, so that you can always view the latest previews for all your open tabs. In addition to that, the extension offers you different preview modes, such as Stack, Grid, Glow etc. Both the scroll wheel or arrows displayed at the bottom of the page can be used to navigate between the previews, and you can also look through opened tabs by entering keywords in the search bar.
READ MORE
By Zainab on May 16, 2012
With each passing day, the pace of life is increasing all over the world for most of us. Compared to our ancestors, we are required to perform a lot more in much less time. With so many things to do in a day, one sometimes forgets about the all the tasks one has to perform. Nowadays, it is almost a must to have a good task reminder to help you remember and manage yourself efficiently. We have covered some very good task managers for both Windows and Mobile platforms, such as Conqu (reviewed here) and Concenturio (reviewed here). Today, we have another task manager called TimeTask that combines the features of a task manager, music player, shutdown timer and timed application launcher. More on TimeTask after the jump.
READ MORE
Even though Google has finally started taking an active interest in indoor maps, this particular genre of navigation is still in its infancy. There aren’t any major apps that can help you when you are lost within some huge building, given the fact that your GPS will be nearly useless on most such occasions. Add the lack of internet connectivity to this scenario, and your smartphone is left utterly redundant as a navigational device. Fortunately, if you have a Windows Phone 7, there is now a really easy solution to said problem. Meet FastMall, an amazing Mango app that will let you find your way inside any major shopping mall, and that too without GPS or internet connectivity! Doesn’t that sound too good to be true? Wait till you hear the rest of it.
READ MORE
Want to find out what people think about websites that you often visit? Plus Comments lets you view what others are saying about a particular website on Google+. With it, you can also see which Google+ users have shared content that you often browse. As you surf the web, an icon will appear in the URL bar linking you to discussions between Google+ users about that particular page. The extension collects and organizes social media content from Google+ and displays it in a compact pop-up. When you click an item, you will be redirected to the associated share on Google+. You can then read comments on the shares and add your own thoughts to the thread.
READ MORE
By Zainab on May 16, 2012
TweetsBetween is a web application for Twitter that allows you to see the most recent conversation between two Twitter users. Although TweetBetween is a great tool, remember that you can’t track conversations of users who have private Twitter accounts. Also, note that the app only retrieves the most recent messages, so you will only be able to see conversations as long as the users have exchanged messages in the last week. With it, you can keep up with the latest gossip between your favorite people, celebrities or stars. More after the break.
READ MORE
By Zainab on May 16, 2012
Last month we reviewed X-Screamer Radio, a portable version of Screamer Radio application, which allows music fans to record and listen to thousands of online radio stations. ClickGaGa is yet another such solution for Windows OS that enables its users to not only listen to various radio stations but also instantaneously grab their favorite tunes from the radio with an integrated sound record function. The application saves the audio output in MP3 format and suffice to say, the sound quality is on par with other popular radio clients with built-in recording option. What gives it the upper hand however, is its ability to record an audio track from the start, as according to the developers, it remembers the beginning of the track and automatically starts from there, for instance, even if you’ve missed a song. Along with this, there is also an included sound trimming tool to edit or trim the recorded broadcasts. More details after the jump.
READ MORE
Not stylish but certainly usable to a good degree; these words just about sum up FreeVimager. FreeVimager is a 3-in-1 application that can display, edit and convert images, videos and audio files. It’s basically a viewer and editor geared towards camera related applications. It supports BMP, JPG, PNG, GIF (both still and animated), TIFF, PCX and EMF image extensions; for audio it supports AIF, WAV, MP3, WMA, AU, MID and CDA file extensions, and AVI files for video as well as ZIP files for archiving.
READ MORE
By Zeeshan on May 16, 2012
Using the internet can be distracting sometimes. While doing offline work, you open the browser for one link, and the next thing you know, an hour has been wasted on YouTube videos. If you are writing a paper or trying to finish up a project for work, going to the internet for just one minute can cause you to lose concentration and waste a lot of time. Constant updates and feed alerts from social networking websites such as Facebook and Twitter can add to the distraction, and make you miss the deadline for finishing your work. In such a case, some kind of external stimulus is required to remind us to stop wasting time on the internet and get back to work. Today, we have a utility for Windows that provides you with just that. InternetOff is an application that allows you to turn internet access on for a limited interval of time, after which it is automatically disabled. Read on to find out more about InternetOff.
READ MORE
