Filed under: Internet, Productivity, Freeware, Browsers
New machine installs: the story so far
Way back in January I wrote about my corporate-sanctioned machine, complete with a few pieces of bloatware (sorry kids!). I appreciate the awesome suggestions, although since I need this thing for work purposes, I'm opting to go light and lean whenever possible to begin with. Yes, I realize Microsoft Office is the antithesis of "light and lean" but the suite is required to stay on the machine. For everything else, I want a small footprint.Case in point: I needed a screenshot app. I chose MWSnap because it was small and unobtrusive, and didn't require an installation. It isn't perfect, but it does the job and I remember using it years ago. Unfortunately, my next series of application downloads wouldn't be so lean.
Note that a collection of applications says a lot about the primary user and what they will be doing day-to-day. A few months ago I ran a Twitter straw poll for TUAW and found a large portion of followers were web designers and developers, judging from the software they were using at that time. My use case is simple: I'm using this machine to test software for DownloadSquad, learn some programming, and take basic screenshots and possibly screen video. So far, I'm almost where I want to be with the base set of applications. To see what I've installed so far, keep reading.
Up first: Netbeans
Oh wait, you cant just install Netbeans, I have to install the JDK as well. This one took a while, but now I've got a flexible, comfortable IDE for dev work (which I'll get into later this year as we reboot our Dev Chair series).
Next: let the browsing commence!
No webhead would be complete without downloading a few extra browsers, right? So far I've installed Firefox, Opera, Chrome and Safari 4 beta (but not QuickTime or iTunes). I will definitely be adding to this list later. Of course, I had to install Flash as well...
Fun research: Windows 7
I downloaded the ISO and a copy of VirtualPC from Microsoft. Before I realized I could simply capture the ISO, however, I went ahead and downloaded ImgBurn. We'll see if I ever use it.
Data sharing
To easily share research between my machines, I installed Evernote and Dropbox clients. Evernote was added to Firefox as well -- the first add-on to this installation of FF on my PC.
Miscellaneous
I installed IrfanView because it can handle almost everything I need to do with images, but I may also install GIMP later. Plus, I installed the NBC Video application, but it was later removed entirely.
Next up: Communications
Clearly my excursion is incomplete. So far I've merely set the stage. I have yet to fire up Office, so I'm thinking about setting up an email client and seeing if it'll handle my staggering number of accounts and daily correspondences. Any suggestions, leave them in the comments.
There's still IM, RSS and a notes/everything box for research. My heart is set on Pidgin for IM, but RSS is a wide open field, really. I find myself using a variety of readers for a variety of purposes (friends' blogs vs. work blogs, for example). The note application is also wide-open, as there are just as many cloud-based options as there are desktop-based ones. Evernote is great for capturing, but I need something like a wiki (but just for me) to collect research.
In a few weeks I'll report on what I've decided upon, but keep the suggestions coming! Eventually I'll get around to entertaining myself, and VLC will make a comfortable nest in some random sector on my drive.
With Halloween fast approaching, it's a great time to get in some practice defending your territory against zombies. In Graveyard Shift, you take aim at zombies and other creepy-crawlies, blasting them into splatters of cartoony green guts. It's a casual first-person shooter, and it's very easy to get the hang of - use the mouse to aim, click to fire. Graveyard Shift has at least 15 levels, and it might even have some secret stages I haven't unlocked yet.
They key to getting good at Graveyard Shift is learning to use ...
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Sirotnikov said 6:44PM on 3-05-2009
RSS readers are clearly google reader for the web and feed demon for a client. nothing comes close.
regarding research applications there are several options:
if you want a better evernote, with editing possibilities, then look no further than your microsoft office's OneNote 2007.
It is incredibly powerful in capturing and quickly editing information, especially with the ability to categorize in different tabs and sections, and label it to find later in search.
If it is important to capture and categorize sources then an add-on for firefox like Zotero could do the job. But you said it is less what you want.
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Tim said 6:56PM on 3-05-2009
Netbeans? Ew. There's much better IDE's out there that use less HDD space, and system resources, like Jcreator. Also, if you want to really run light, use notepad++ to write your programs, and you can always compile/run your programs through the command prompt.
As for RSS, every major browser has a built in feed reader. Or you could use Google reader.
For IM, some light clients are Pidgin, Trillian, and a little bit heavier is Digsby.
Also, installing all those browsers is a waste, unless you are a web developer. For making it light on resources, you could do much better.
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Victor Agreda Jr said 8:43PM on 3-05-2009
Those IDE's are good suggestions, I'll look into them.
I installed the browsers not because I'm a web developer, but I am interested in seeing the rendering differences between the browsers.
psycros said 9:42PM on 3-05-2009
Pidgin is OK, but Digsby is the best multi-service IM that I've used so far. Granted, I haven't used it in a couple months but unless they've really screwed up since then, I would highly recommend it. I tried Miranda as well, but its about worthless.
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MICR Toner said 10:04PM on 3-05-2009
Nice setup, so far. I also tried and dumped the NBC viewer software...I don't think it's worth the extra HD quality as it takes a long time to load and uses P2P and I just don't like to share! =P
Andy - http://www.tonerall.com
Discount MICR toner cartridges
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whiskey said 2:40AM on 3-06-2009
RSS and mail checking (more so now that hotmail has opened pop3 for their accounts) can easily be solved with Klipfolio. A definitive plus? You can set alerts for strings you setup.
Pidgin is best for multiple IM plus fB and tweeter.
VLC is a must!
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polobunny said 2:52AM on 3-06-2009
You might be interested giving a look at Sun xVM VirtualBox (I'm not a fan of Sun software usually), a terribly nice x86 virtualization package that packs a punch.
Packs a punch is not even the right term. I have been using VMWare Workstation software for as far as I remember (years, probably around 6 by now) and the switch was almost instant.
At 35MB for the setup files, one would believe it's lacking functions when compared to VMWare Workstation 300ish MB. Not at all. There's all the good stuff, even experimental 3D acceleration via OpenGL. Why was VMWare better than Microsoft VirtualPC? VirtualPC is slow, incredibly slow. You are extremely limited in terms of options too. That said, VMware Workstation isn't free. There's always VMWare Player, or VMWare Server, but those aren't nearly as complete.
Sun xVM VirtualBox is free too, just like VirtualPC.
Overall, a long post from me I agree, but I can't state how much I was impressed by this software.
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Victor Agreda Jr said 9:36AM on 3-06-2009
Ah, thanks for the tip on xVM! I did notice that VPC was terribly slow. I'll see if xVM will speed up my virtualized Win7.
worried said 7:41AM on 3-06-2009
take a look at portable apps, usually available mainly for amateur user needs, they will cover the likes of RSS and IM try www.portableapps.com, just install the apps without the suite in a folder of your choosing, no other resources permantly taken up.
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Fred said 8:35AM on 3-06-2009
+1 For Digsby. Handles IM, Email and social networking. Rather surprising, actually, that it doesn't do RSS. IT's mentioned a lot on their forums, and the devs seem supportive, but they are few and far between right now...
If you have a google account, check out igoogle. It's a personalized homepage that is very customizable. Right now, I have a window for my mailbox, a google reader window etc...
Also, since you have google gears within chrome, many of the google apps work offline, like email, reader, calendar etc...
And of course, if you are recording your screen actions (picture or video), FRAPS is key...
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idodialog said 9:19AM on 3-06-2009
Really you must not use MWSnap. I was rid of it in about 1970. Just use Alt->Prt Scrn if your such a trog.
Otherwise there are still free versions of Faststone capture to be had and while your at it, get rid of that other dinosaur IrfanView and try the way underrated and Free FastStone Image viewer which has excellent editing capabilities.
SnagIt is very hard to beat and has great editing capabilities built in (you gotta pay) - but Techsmith who make SnagIt also offer a great free capture tool called Jing. Anything would be better than MWSnap but those three are really excellent.
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Halo2Master said 9:21AM on 3-06-2009
Google Reader is the obvious RSS solution. There is really no reason to have a desktop client.
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Mark said 10:06AM on 3-06-2009
You could use Gmail to pick up your mail from all of your other mail accounts. Microsoft recently added pop3 access to hotmail accounts, so in my case I've got Gmail picking up my mail from my ISP e-mail, and my Hotmail e-mail.
You could also go web only for RSS, I use protopage.com you can add RSS feeds, Podcasts feeds(you can listen to the podcasts directly on the page), you can even add widgets, and have multiple tabbed pages, to better organize things.
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Grey said 10:07AM on 3-06-2009
IrfanView has the ability to do window snapshots. Make a shortcut to i_view32.exe (with all the usual quotes if in "Program Files") on your desktop, or startbar, edit it, and add /capture=1 /convert="D:\Pics\Captures\capture_$U(%Y%m%d_%H%M%S).jpg" to the end of the target. Now add a shortcut key to the shortcut (CTRL+ALT+Z cos they're close together ;-). now you get timestamped captures of the window, or if you're over the desktop, everything, as a jpeg. Without pasting the BMP file from printscreen
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Nic said 10:50AM on 3-06-2009
Screenshots:
http://lightscreen.sourceforge.net/
The master of OS screen shot apps. (Has a portable)
Gimp is good and has portable as well.
I personally like infraRecorder a lot more than imgBurn now. (OS and Portable)
Why so many browsers, I'd opt for just FF (has an IE add-in) and Chrome. I think firefox used to have a web developer plug-in as well. Is it really necessary to test your page in that many browsers?
VLC has a portable, and so does Pidgin.
I'd recommend Google Reader personally because I am always on different computers and I don't need to be wasting memory on that because I have a browser open most times anyway.
If your on Windows email client's generally are bad (Thunderbird is the best OS) except for Outlook and an Evloution port (but it's really slow - this is the Gnome email client).
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Michael K Pate said 3:14PM on 3-06-2009
Nothing against Irfanview or Gimp, but personally I install Paint.Net http://www.downloadsquad.com/tag/paint.net/ on every Windows machine I am going to be using on a regular basis.
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mxxcon said 12:46AM on 3-07-2009
For IM i really recommend you check out Miranda IM. Default install looks pretty bland, but you can totally customize it. If you don't want the hassle of manually customizing it, there are 100s of pre-packaged/pre-configured packs that look absolutely awesome.
For notes/snippets/research, check out TreeDBNotes Pro. Really powerful software.
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ryzza007 said 9:22PM on 3-11-2009
Are you STILL building this laptop? - man that is slow :)
'Testing software' doesn't sound like the best way to keep your PC lean - maybe you should find yourself a good disk defragger app
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fianno said 12:58PM on 5-14-2009
For screenshots i use greenshot It also has crosshairs so you can select the part of the screen you want.
If you keeping your PC lena, then a defragger would seem the clear choice. Smartderag is free and great. Although if money isnt a problem PerfectDisk 10 is the best Ive used. And Ive used alot :P
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