Skip to Content

Submit your nominations for the Luxist Awards' Best in Decor
AOL Tech

visual posts

Filed under: Photo, Web services

Spectives: an image-only way to track your favorite sites

Spectives is a new way of following sites visually, by filtering new images as they're posted. You can subscribe to one site, or create a themed collection. When the sites update, your collection will update. Clicking on any image takes you to the source page, so you can read the post that goes along with it. It's a simple idea, and the execution is well-done in terms of both usability and visual appeal.

You don't have to sign up for an account to search or browse collections, but it does have advantages. You can make your own collections and add favorites to your Spectives homepage as tabs for easy access. Although Spectives seems like an alternative to RSS, you can also get RSS feeds of your collections if you prefer to take in your visual content that way. The only minor issue I have with Spectives is that it frames sites when you click through an image to see the original post. I don't think anyone likes toolbars, so an option to open in a new tab instead would be outstanding.

UPDATE: Spectives does actually have an "open in new tab" option, if you're logged in. You can find it in your settings.

Filed under: Mozilla, Open Source, Beta, Browsers

Deja vu all over again: tab previews are back in Firefox 3.6

Now that Firefox 3.5 has made it into the mainstream, Mozilla is plugging away at browser.next. In last night's addition to the 3.6 nightly builds, some old-but-new tab features have finally made an appearance in Mozilla's browser.

Originally slated for 3.0, then bumped to 3.5, then bumped again, tab previews are back in Firefox 3.6. To activate the feature, you'll need to jump into your about:config and search for browser.ctrlTab.previews. Double click the entry to set its value to true, and the result is what you see above.

Your last six tabs are displayed in a floating window, with a button below that allows viewing of all open tabs (screenshot after the break).

Read more →

Filed under: Internet, Web services, Search

Spezify combines several media types into an impressive visual search tool


Spezify is a kind of freeform search tool that incorporates websites, videos, images, microblog posts and more into a grid of results. It's not going to beat Google at finding some specific thing you're looking for, but it's impressive if you're looking to get an overview of a topic, especially if you're a visual person. Instead of showing text results, like Google, Spezify is more like a multimedia wall that you can scroll across vertically or horizontally to take in information at a glance.

Spezify also provides a list of related words at the top of the results screen, which can help you explore a topic further. Videos in the results are all embedded, and can be played without leaving the site, and a lot of the text results feature slightly longer previews than Google results do. All in all, I don't think Spezify is meant to replace any of the major search engines, but you might consider using it when you want a visual summary of a given topic.

Filed under: Fun, Internet, Video

Reflow visualizations are crazy



What's this "reflow" stuff mentioned in the title? We're glad you asked because you should probably fully understand know what we're referring to before you watch the vid. Reflow deals with the process by which a browser lays stuff out on a web page -- well, that's a simple way of putting it.

Anyway, the video above is the reflow process of Wikipedia slowed and "visualized". We're unsure how the author of the video captured or simulated the action, but what we do know is it's an interesting way to spend a few seconds. Check out a Google Japan reflow after the jump.

[via DougT]

Read more →

Filed under: Fun, Time-Wasters

Boot up, turn on, drop out with Trippy Apps


Looking for ways to make your PC into some sort of psychedelic trip toy? Trippy Apps is a site dedicated to cataloging the best in visual and auditory effect programs available for your all encompassing entertainment device.

Trippy Apps list 34 applications you can use to blow your inebriated mind. Mind you, we don't recommend ingesting illegal substances but, if you're bored, visually unsatisfied and easily mesmerized, Trippy Apps could kill a solid half hour of your time.

Filed under: Design, Developer, Fun, Internet, Web services

Browsing Amazon in a few creative ways

BROWSING AMAZON CREATIVELYFlipping through the categories in Amazon can get a little boring after a while, especially if you're just checking in to see if something catches your attention. So why not browse it in a creative way?

Josh Catone has outlined five different ways that users can check out goods on Amazon. From Flash visualization tools to relationship explorers, this small list covers them. They might not be for you, and they may not be the most effective at hunting for the products you want, but they sure do serve up the information in a creative way.
  • LivePlasma uses flash to visualize Amazon's store and links music, artists, bands, movies, directors and actors and gathers information creating a display of related products.
  • Flowser also uses Flash to visualize Amazon's store and provides the top three results for each category searched in.
  • BrowseGoods lets users move and zoom in on Amazon's product galleries. Its very selective right now with only contains cookware, shoes, sporting goods, toys and watches at the moment. Clicking on an item expands it in an info box.
  • TuneGlue, a relationship explorer, mashes data from Amazon and Last.fm, displaying different relationships between musical artists.
  • Coverpop uses covers of goods displayed in a collage format, mousing over expands the covers for a closer look, and link out to Amazons page.
All of these sources are just a different way to get a different view of what Amazon has in stock. We have to assume that all of these visualization tools get their revenue from Amazon's affiliate program. Nonetheless, it gets the information to you in a more creative way with the use of API's and mashup techniques, if you're in to that.

Filed under: Developer, Internet, Windows, Microsoft

Microsoft .net dev tools CTP released

Microsoft OrcasThe project codenamed "Orcas" is now available for download. The developer tools release is Microsoft's September customer technology preview (CTP) for the .net framework 3.0. You must have the .net framework and September CTP software development kit (SDK), not to mention a non-express version of Visual Studio 2005 already installed to run the tools in this release. At under 4MB (not quite a whale), the development tools include XAML intellisense support, project templates for Windows Presentation Foundation and Windows Communcation Foundation. The dev tools also features the Visual Designer (codename: Cider) for Windows Presentation Foundation, but is sadly not supported by the express editions of Visual Studio 2005. If you understood anything I just said, and it interests you you will be happy to know that it is now ready to be downloaded and I suppose anything else you want to do to it.

Featured Time Waster

The World's Hardest Game 2.0 - Time Waster

So, just how good at time waster games are you? Think you've got the stuff? Well, The World's Hardest Game 2.0 doesn't think you do. Yes, amazingly, it's possible to have a sequel to a game called "The World's Hardest Game". It doesn't seem logically possible, since if the first one was actually the world's hardest, how could another one come along and share the moniker? It made me doubt the name in the first place. That is, until I tried the game. The mechanics of the game are very simple. You are a small red square, ...

View more Time Wasters

Featured Galleries

Defective by Design, London: Protest Pictures
Microsoft Security Essentials
Chromium Pre-Alpha on CrunchBang Linux
Safari 4 Beta
10 Firefox themes that don't suck
IE8 RC1
Download Squad at the Crunchies After-Party
Download Squad at the Crunchies
WordPress 2.7
Cooking Mama: Mama Kills Animals
Windows 7 Hands On
Comodo Internet Security
Android First-look: Amazon.com MP3 Store
Android First-look: Twitroid
Google Reader Android
Android Hands-On
Twine 1.0
Photoshop Express Beta
Mozilla Birthday Cake
Palm stuff
Adobe Lightroom 1.1

 


Follow us on Twitter!

Flickr Pool

www.flickr.com

More Tech Coverage

AOL Radio

Joystiq

TUAW

Daily Finance

Autoblog

Urlesque

Engadget

WoW

Switched.com

FanHouse