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Today is Technology Tuesday!!

Have you heard of Google Desktop? Google Desktop indexes the files on your PC so you can use the power of Google Search on your PC.

Here are some of the items you’ll be able to do full text searches on after installing Google Desktop and letting it index your PC:

• email
• files
• music
• photos
• chats
• Gmail
• web pages that you’ve viewed
• more…

It provides an extremely nice, advanced search, easy to learn and easy to use:

Google Desktop also comes with Google Gadgets, Sidebar, and Deskbar:

Here are some Google Gadgets. You can add as many as you like through the Add Gadgets Interface:

Google Deskbar:

Google’s Add Gadgets Interface

Google Sidebar:

And finally one of the best features you have to use if you’re an Outlook user, Google Search Outlook Integration:

Out of all these features I prefer Google Desktop Search and Outlook Integration. After playing around with the Gadgets, Sidebar and Deskbar I find them annoying and in the way. But, that’s just me.

The Google Desktop Search alone is a must have. You can turn it off (unload) when you’re not using it. When you know you’re going to be away from your computer for an extended period of time, fire it up and let it index automagically in the background. Cool Beans!!

Download Google Desktop here.

written by Bill Stevens

Today is Technology Tuesday.

The FREE software for today is Sizer from Programs by Brian Apps.

Sizer allows you to size any window to a predefined size. If you work with multiple size screens you can change the window size of a web browser or a resizable program instantly to see what it would look like.

This is very handy for web designers as they can switch between window sizes to see what their web pages will look like in different size browsers.

Computer support folks can provide better help by resizing a program on their PC as they help remote users over the phone. Let’s say a remote user is working in Microsoft Word and their window size is 800×600 and the support person is running Microsoft Word in 1280×1024, the support person can resize their own Microsoft Word to 800×600 to “see” what the remote user sees.

Sizer parks itself in the system tray as two-crossed double-sided arrows icon. By right-clicking on the crossed arrows you get the configuration options for Sizer as well as some standard defined window sizes.

You can also right-click on the resize corner of a window to resize the window as show below.

And yet another quick way to resize a window is by right-clicking on the maximize button of a window as show below.

The configuration screen (show below) allows you to add and order sizes as they would appear when they pop-up during use.

The “Move to” functionality allows you to position a window when you resize it.

The program ran fine on Windows Vista even though the author says that Sizer is not supported on Vista.

written by Bill Stevens

Today is Technology Tuesday. I’ll review various software and provide other computer tips and tricks that help folks understand their computers “more better”. Let me know if you have any computer questions that are challenging you.

FastStone Capture is a screen capture utility that allows you to grab “screen shots” of your computer. Why would you want to do that?

Well, for documentation purposes, “A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words.” If you ever have to create documentation where you wished you could provide a screen shot of something on your computer then this software will do that.

Let’s say your creating some “How To..” or other type of training documentation and you need to provide various screen shots to help someone understand what you’re trying to get across. Screen shots help tremendously.

What I really like about FastStone Capture is its small footprint. The screen below shows what you see when it is running on your computer. A small screen indeed. Which also means that it starts fast.

FastStone Capture has a great drawing feature that you can use right after you’ve taken a screen shot. This allows you to point out various parts of the screen shot and it’s very easy to use.

You can download FastStone Capture here to try. If it’s something you’ll use and want to purchase, it’s going for $19.95.

In contrast, there is the Cadillac of screen capturing tools, TechSmith’s SnagIt. For $39.95 this does just about everything you need a screen capturing tool to do.

I own both of these programs. I use FastStone most of the time because of it’s size (on screen, very small) and speed loading, read quickly.

When I have to get down and do some in depth screen capturing and manipulating then I use SnagIt. A bit bigger on the screen, slower loading, and more configuration options but something everyone would benefit from having in their toolkit.

written by Bill Stevens