convert posts

Filed under: Office, Web services, Google

Set your Google Docs free with the new Convert, Zip and Download feature

by Jay Hathaway Oct 28th 2009

One of the first moves from Google's Data Liberation Front is the option to take your documents out of Google Docs with a new Convert, Zip and Download feature. You'll find the new feature under "export" in the More Actions menu. You can download multiple docs at once - wouldn't be music of a data liberation feature otherwise, right? - and that includes text documents, presentations and spreadsheets in the same batch. Downloads are limited to 500MB at a time, which shouldn't be a problem for the typical Docs user.

The Data Liberation Front is an engineering group within Google, pushing to make it easier for users to get their data out of any Google service quickly and for free. Google Docs exporting is just the first: in fact, they've got a whole list of Google services and the best ways to move your data into and out of them. Currently, about 2/3 of Google services meet the Front's standards for data exporting, so they still have plenty more work to do.

Tags: convert, data liberation, DataLiberation, export, google, google docs, GoogleDocs

Filed under: Fun, Utilities, Video

Off the Clock: RealPlayer SP downloads and converts web videos (even SFW ones!)

by Lee Mathews Sep 20th 2009

Believe me, I'm as shocked as anyone to be writing this post, but RealPlayer SP ships with a substantially reduced amount of suck compared to previous versions. Yes, the new version sucks so much less that I'm actually ok with using it to download and convert web video.

There are still glimpses of the past, of course. The installer does offer a toolbar (at least it's Google and not Ass...er, Ask). It also offers the pro version and a 14 day trial of something, but I can't tell you specifically what it was. Instead of reading, I quickly located the "leave me the hell alone" button and closed the screen.

Tags: convert, converter, downloader, ipod, off-the-clock, realplayer, video, video-conversion, youtube

Filed under: Security, Text, Web services

Convert text into unsearchable images with TxtNinja

by Jay Hathaway Aug 31st 2009

If you want a bit of text to be human-readable, but not read or indexed by bots, TxtNinja has got you covered. It converts your text to a GIF, with customizable size, font and color. Potential uses include concealing your email address from spammers, sending sensitive information over IM, and getting around text filters on forums.

The downside of TxtNinja is that the choices of fonts and colors are very limited, and they aren't common web fonts, either. Your TxtNinja GIF, unlike a real ninja, is unlikely to blend in with its surroundings. This isn't a particularly big deal, though, and you can use it to your advantage if you happen to want your text to stand out.

Tags: convert, email, image, text, txtninja

Filed under: Utilities, Video, Windows

SilverX converts Flash video to Silverlight

by Jay Hathaway Aug 14th 2009

SilverX is a Windows app that converts Flash (.SWF) videos to Microsoft's Silverlight format. It recognizes all the vectors, images, text and animations from the original Flash file, so you can extract all of those elements and edit them in a Silverlight app later. If you want to manipulate the individual elements, you can edit them like any other Silverlight solution, and even apply XAML. If you just want to play the movie back in your browser using Silverlight, you can do that too.

There's not a lot of fiddling necessary to use SilverX. Just pick a SWF file and an output directory, and everything happens under the hood. You can either output the file as a standalone app or a Silverlight solution. To work with solutions, you'll need Microsoft's Expression Blend 3 or Visual Studio 2008 SP1.

[via AddictiveTips]

Tags: convert, flash, silverlight, silverx, swf, vector, video, xaml

Filed under: Utilities, Video, Macintosh

Videomonkey video converter for Mac picks up where VisualHub left off

by Jay Hathaway Mar 30th 2009

With the discontinuation of VisualHub, one of the most popular video conversion apps for OS X, someone had to release an app to fill the void. That app might be VideoMonkey, which builds on VisualHub's source code and concept to convert videos to and from a number of popular formats. VideoMonkey actually improves on VisualHub in some ways, especially because it's a native Cocoa app, where VisualHub was built around AppleScript.

VideoMonkey uses the FFMpeg encoder for most of its work, but it also has the ability to combine with other tools and automatically figure out how to convert even some weird filetypes. For example, if you edit a WMV with Quicktime Pro and save it, VideoMonkey understands how to separate the audio and video and recombine them in a new format of your choice. This all goes on behind the scenes: for the user, it's a 1-click process. If you loved VisualHub, and you're looking for a replacement, VideoMonkey is all that and more.

Tags: convert, converter, ffmpeg, video, videomonkey

Filed under: Utilities, Windows, Freeware

FormatFactory Kicks Media Conversion Ass and Takes Names

by Lee Mathews Jul 5th 2008

Fine, it doesn't really takes names, but you won't care after you download and install this do-all media converter. FormatFactory's simple interface and broad file type support make it an excellent weapon of choice for media file junkies.

What could be better than a program that will convert audio, video, and image files from and to just about any format you can think of? How about one that does it all batch-style with minimal clicking? FormatFactory doesn't care what files you want to swap in what order, just feed it your sources and watch it go to work. Unlike a lot of similar apps, this one doesn't limit you to only video or audio, or even to one file at a time.

Tags: conversion, convert, dvd ripper, dvd ripping, DvdRipper, DvdRipping, file conver, FileConver, graphics, media

Filed under: Internet, Video, Windows

Convert YouTube videos to Windows Media with one click

by Brad Linder Jan 4th 2007

Sure, there are plenty of ways to grab a video from YouTube, save it as an flv file, and convert it the file format of your choice. But Zunemytube's got to be the simplest method I've seen so far.

All you have to do is install the plugin for Internet Explorer and a little Zune icon will pop up in your toolbar. Then you surf YouTube, Google Video or MSN Soapbox and find videos you want to save. Once you've found a video, all you have to do is click the "Zune It" button in your toolbar and the program will automatically download and convert the video into a Zune-compatible windows media video file. The program creates individual folders for Google, YouTube, and Soapbox videos in your "My Videos" folder.

I have to say, the video quality leaves something to be desired when converting YouTube videos. This is probably because you're taking a highly compressed video and converting it to another compressed video format. I had a bit more luck with Google Videos.

The program only works with Internet Explorer, and I was only able to test it with IE7. Anyone try it with earlier versions?

[Via jkOnTheRun]

Tags: convert, download squad, DownloadSquad, flv, google video, GoogleVideo, soapbox, wmv, youtube, zune, zunieplugin

Filed under: Utilities, Web services, Freeware

Zamzar: Free online file conversion

by Jordan Running Nov 2nd 2006

Awhile back I linked to Media-Convert, a web service that will convert files while you wait. I was duly impressed by Media-Convert, and I'm even more impressed by Zamzar, a very similar free service with a Web 2.0 touch. It can convert between five image formats, 14 document formats, 11 audio formats, and nine video formats, and unlike Media-Convert you can convert many files at once, up to 100MB (though you can only do one kind of conversion at once). After you've selected a file or files to convert, Zamzar will tell you which formats are available to convert to. Then you supply your e-mail address and click "convert" and Zamzar will e-mail you a link to the converted file. Not only was I impressed with Zamzar's ease of use, I was very impressed by its speed. After clicking on "Convert," I received the e-mail instantaneously. Also, the conversion is pretty faithful--though converting a complex Excel file to HTML didn't result in a perfect facimile, it didn't look bad at all. Zamzar is definitely a tool I'll be keeping on hand for when I need to do a quick conversion.

Tags: convert, web 2.0, Web2.0, web20, zamzar

Filed under: Audio, Utilities, Macintosh, Apple, Freeware

FairGame: Un-DRM your iTunes music with iMovie

by Jordan Running Oct 31st 2006

We've known for awhile that functionality built into iMovie could strip the DRM from music purchased from the iTunes Music Store, but the process wasn't exactly point-and-click. Now, thanks to the wonder of AppleScript, that process has been streamlined, and you're only a few clicks away from listening to your whole music collection on your non-Apple device. FairGame is a free Mac app from Seidai Software that will convert the songs you select in iTunes to an open format. It's not lightning-quick--about 40 seconds for every minute of music--but it's free and gets the job done.

[Via Boing Boing]

Tags: apple, convert, drm, fairgame, free, freeware, imovie, itunes, os x, OsX

Filed under: Utilities, Productivity, Web services, Freeware

Media-Convert: Web-based converter for most everything

by Jordan Running Oct 5th 2006

Media-Convert is a fairly impressive web service that will convert a file from one file format to another. That sounds pretty benign, but what's impressive is how many formats it supports. There's a good chance Media-Convert supports almost every document on you computer, including dozens of audio and video formats, a ton of common and obscure image formats, documents from Microsoft Office, OpenOffice.org, and others, compressed archives, and more. One particularly neat trick it can do is convert PDF documents to Adobe Flash (SWF) movies. It can also capture web pages as images, convert Microsoft Access databases to Excel spreadsheets, and, in case you're into this sort of thing, convert text documents to morse code. Of course, it's not lightning-fast. You have to upload your file or enter the URL of a file and then wait awhile while it's converted, but far as convenience and price (free!) goes it can scarcely be beat.

[Via Lifehacker]

Tags: convert, format, free, mediaconvert

Filed under: Design, Photo, Utilities, Blogging, Productivity

FastStone image tools

by Ryan Carter Sep 12th 2006

From the quick and dirty tools category, FastStone image tools work well and don't ask many questions. There is the Image Viewer (which is a browser, image editor, and converter), Capture (a screen capture utility that captures almost everything on screen, even flash), MaxView (a image viewer), and Photo Resizer (a batch converter, renamer, resizer). I use both the Capture application and sometimes resizer when I have a lot of pictures all at once that I want to convert or rename. They aren't by any means Adobe quality picture tools, but they work fine, and the are cheap too. You can't get much cheaper than free.

Tags: batch, browser, convert, faststone, image, photo, picture, resizer

Filed under: Video, Macintosh, Shareware

TubeSock: Save and convert YouTube videos for iPod playback

by Jordan Running Aug 30th 2006

TubeSock is a great-looking app for OS X that lets you save videos from YouTube and easily convert them for viewing on your iPod, FrontRow, or anywhere else. Freeware purists can skip over this one--it costs $15 if you want to be able to convert more than the 30 seconds of video allowed by the trial version--but the rest of you, read on: TubeSock integrates with Safari and Firefox, providing a "Show in TubeSock" button. When you're looking at a YouTube page you can press the button, which will open TubeSock with a preview of the video. Then there's a handy "Convert" button that will not only put the video in your desired format (H.264 by default, of course), but it will also send it to your device program of choice--your iPod, iTunes, or FrontRow. Very slick.

So, can anybody point me to a Windows equivalent?

Tags: convert, frontrow, ipod, itunes, osx, tubesock, video, youtube

Filed under: Office, Productivity, Web services, Freeware

Convert docs to PDF online, free

by Jordan Running Aug 21st 2006

Need to create a PDF file? Don't want to bother downloading/buying/installing software to make PDFs, or stuck at a library or internet kiosk where you can't? Enter PDF Online. It's a free service that will convert (almost) any document you upload into a PDF file. It supports lots of file formats, including most Office documents (e.g. Word/DOC, Excel/XLS, PowerPoint/PPT), plus HTML and plain text files, and the most common image formats including JPEG, GIF, TIFF, BMP, and PNG. All you have to do is upload your document with the PDF Online web form and enter your email address, and the PDF will be emailed to you. I tried it with an Excel file and I received the PDF in less than 30 seconds. The PDF looked good and even my Excel charts were displayed correctly. If you're feeling advanced you can also tweak a few options, like font embedding, security and watermarks, and image resolution and compression.

Tags: acrobat, adobe, convert, converter, document, free, office, pdf, pdfonline

Filed under: Video

How to get YouTube videos on your iPod or PSP

by Jordan Running Feb 15th 2006

Unlike Google Video, YouTube doesn't have an option to download videos for playback on your iPod or PSP. What's to be done? Happily, Lifehacker has a short how-to on downloading those videos and converting them to an iPod/PSP-friendly format. It takes a bit of fiddling in the form of a Greasmonkey script or bookmarklet to download the Flash video file and a third-party conversion tool to make it work with your portable device, but the process is pretty straightforward.

Tags: convert, ipod, lifehacker, psp, video, youtube

Filed under: Video, Windows, Open Source

HandBrake DVD ripping app ported to Windows

by Jordan Running Feb 2nd 2006

Popular open source DVD ripping app HandBrake has been available for Mac and Linux for some time now, and has finally been ported to Windows. HandBrake is a slick all-in-one ripping app that will encode your ripped video in MPEG-4 or H.264 (MP4, AVI, or OGM) and has a great built-in calculator that takes the fuss out of choosing a bitrate, which is especially great if your video's destination is an iPod or PSP. Hit the HandBrake forums to get the Windows release.

So what's the deal with the logo? The FAQ says "don't ask."

Tags: convert, dvd, encode, handbrake, rip, ripping, video, windows

Graveyard Shift - zombie-busting Time Waster

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 ...

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