Software Essentials

electron

Administrator
Staff member
Post names and links to the author's website of the coolest tools (in your opinion) here.

Wizmo http://www.grc.com/wizmo/wizmo.htm : This tool lets you control tons of uncommon functions on your computer, using command line parameters, such as: StandBy, Hibernate, Logoff, Exit, Reboot, Shutdown, Control CDROM door, Control screensaver, Control soundcard audio levels, and more!
 
Electron, that's a nice little program. I particuallrly like it monitor and volume control abilities... Much easier than scripting or using girder to do it!

I'll have to give it a try tonight. I recall seeing a lot of folks at the HS forum trying to develop multiple scripts and programs that do just what wizmo does - in a single program.

Have you posted this over there?
 
If you post it there, you're gonna have to call it a plug-in, and charge for it for it to have ANY credibility.... ;)
 
lol Skibum

I did post it there several times, but I guess most people don't realize how powerful this is. It's definitely very useful!
 
Atomic Clock

http://www.worldtimeserver.com/atomic-clock/

This is freeware and is used to keep the time on your PC Syncronized with the World Atomic Clock. This is very useful when you have a TV Video Capture car such as the ATI all in wonder and you want to setup your pc to record at a certain show at the precise time of day. Most broadcasting station use a GPS Syncronizer which is also in sync with the world atomic clock. Basically they have a RackMounted TrueTime Sync which is no more than a GPS Receiver.

With this you will never cut off the beginning or the end of your shows again. This is not the only program of its kind but is the one i use since its free
 
Spell Checker
http://www.iespell.com

This came from the HomeSeer forums but just in case some of our members don't visit the forum i have decided to post it here.

It add a "Spell Check" option to your right mouse click. This is a great way to save you from the embarrassment of spelling words wrong while posting on the boards. It says it only works in IE. This would help better the search results of the forums if posters would take the extra 20 seconds to check their post before they click the submit button.

Simply highlight all the text and right click on the text. Then click Spell Check in the pop up menu. The rest is self explanatory.

Let me know if you guys find one for mozilla
 
hmmm actually i did run it on that post but i must have hit the wrong button or it must not have worked i will try it on this post.

Look mah i can speel?
Look mom i can spell?

It works i must have hit the wrong button.
 
That Wizmo is very cool. I showed to a couple of collegues and perpetuated my geek status among them. I've got to say that the 'damit' variation of shutdown is very effective.

In terms of my own favorites, it's hard to choose just one, so I'd have to say that Mozilla's newer products are my collective pick. I am really liking Firefox 1.0 and Thunderbird 1.0. Both offer a very convenient quick search, highly intuitive interface, and excellent performance. Thunderbird provides saved search folders (they rerun previous searches that have been saved) and Firefox offers (can't live without it) tabbed browsing. I use them both at home and at work. Camino (as well as Firefox) is an excellent alternative for Mac OS X users, though I can't really knock Safari too much (out of the box, it offers spell checking in web forms using the common system dictionary).

http://www.mozilla.org
 
I know it's not fashionable these days to recommend products that rely on internet Explorer, but I have tried many other browsers and keep finding my way back to Avant, which is a tabbed browser based on the IE dll's. It just has features I have come to expect that I haven't found in other browsers, like mouse gestures, menu bar buttons for blocking on/off of flash animations/images/pop-ups, ad blockers, URL filtering, XML feeds, URL shortcuts, zoomable screen, grouping mutliple URLs and opening all of them at once, crash recovery, etc. I especially like how it allows opening new tabbed windows (leaving the other alone) when you type a URL in the address bar or click on a Favorites link. www.avantbrowser.com

I've pulled down Firefox and am looking at it (again), and maybe if I can get it configured properly, that will be a decent replacement.

Is anyone interested in network and security tools? I have a bunch of links I can post...
 
AVIcodec
If (like me) you are part of a circle of friends who send you funny clips by email on a regular basis, you may find you can't play some. It can be difficult to find out which codec you need. Install AVIcodec and it adds a mouse right click function, to detail codecs needed for AV files. It also lists all Video and Audio codecs you have installed.

http://avicodec.duby.info/
 
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