Tag: Online Tools

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Reviews

Get the future page rank of your URL

Every time we search for something on Google Search, Page Ranks are supposed to be at the center of how Google ends up calculating which search results is best suited and reliable. Most webmaster spend days wondering when the next announcement of Google Page Rank would be made.

I came across this Page Rank Predictor which tries to predict the page rank of any website.

The web application takes it for granted that Google does not reveal the exact Page Rank of a website and shows a Page Rank which is lower than the actual one so it can factor in a website losing credibility in the short term.

About Page Rank Predictor

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  • As I mentioned before this Predictor app tries to show the correct Page Rank compared to the one announced by Google.
  • This basically means a Page Rank is lower or equal to the number given by the Predictor and hence you can expect that if there is a big different between your current and predicted Page Rank then it might be changing the next time Google announces Page Rank updates.
  • This PR Predictor can be taken seriously with more data being checked over a period of time to see if it really can predict the correct Page Rank for the future.

I guess if Page Rank Predictor can be taken seriously then Devils’ Workshop could boast of a great PR in the near future but that I guess only time and hard work can ensure. 😛

Do try out Page Rank Predictor and let me know your views and opinions on it through your comments.

(via Netchunks )

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News

Google shows how often governments request them to censor

I am sure many of you know about Twitter and Facebook being banned in Pakistan and if I take you back much further in the past there have been instances of China asking Google to censor the internet. Everytime there is offensive material a government does not always block the access to it but ask the website owners to remove content.

Google often gets many requests from governments for either data to be shared or removal requests. Google with its usual ‘rebellious’ yet ‘mature’ attitude has published statistics of government requests from around the world.

  • The stats are quite interesting. Brazil tops both lists of ‘Data requests’ and ‘Removal Requests’
  • India comes 4th with 1166 data requests over the last part of 2009. India comes 3rd in with 142 requests of removal of data.
  • What is interesting that countries like Germany, UK and US are also the top five of both lists.

There might be a temptation to look at this data and see think that the countries with the highest number of requests have highest amount of restrictions to net freedom.

One interesting name missing from this list is China. The reason is China considers requests for censorship as state secrets and hence its illegal to show the numbers for Google.

So what do you think about internet censorship? I am personally against it but would love to read your views through your comments.

Link: Government Requests to Google

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News

Everyone with a Google account is on a Wave

Google Wave the product from Google with a glorious introduction but an insipid product was almost truly on the back burner and most of us following Google felt that now Google Wave would just be this product which will have some of its features drop in other Google services like Google Docs and Gmail. But Google Wave is still in no mood to wave us a good bye and Google has re-launched Google Wave by making it available to everyone with a Google account.

Many people argue that there is nothing useful about Google Wave and that is true for a majority of its users who felt that they could blog, embed videos and more importantly have awesome apps to do all kinds of things.

Wave was more or less a glorified collaborative service which has found some takers but mostly people have tended to do away with it as a useless product.

Bright Side of Google Wave re-launch?

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  • The bright side is Google is also allowing everyone with an Google Apps account to get access to Google Wave. Considering they were packaging Wave as a collaboration tool for groups and teams, Wave should have been first made available to Google Apps users to play around with.
  • I assume with this  wiGoogle Wavell have a lot more extensions to make people really interested in adopting it as a tool to use.

Here is a video Google put out about Wave and it does seem to be trying hard to repackage Wave as a product.

So will Google finally get it right with Wave this time around or will they fail with the same product twice? Do let me know your views through your comments.

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News

Google Doodle Presents Pacman

I wonder how many of you know Pacman. In my school days it used to be one of most addictive game and it is still the same. I have Pacman installed in my iPhone and I play it all the time. For all those who wants to go back to childhood, head over to Google homepage and start playing Pacman.

Pacman is today’s Google Doodle and you will also notice the game says Google in it’s style :

Notice the GOOGLE written in the form of Maze. Do let us know who think they are still addicted to Pacman?

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Reviews

Edit Images Online Using Fixpicture

Fixpicture is a utility tool that edits your images without installing any software in your system. This is one of the most user friendly tool that is really easy to edit your pictures.

It is the free online image tool that is used to resize, convert the pictures or images even the digital photos into various formats like jpg, png, gif, nef, tiff, etc. It supports more than 400 formats. You can apply rotation, and some effects like greyscale, sepia, blur etc.

I think this is going to be the best alternative for many photo editing tools like Snagit, Photoshop etc. I feel this is the best alternative for these kinds of photo editing software and also there is no need to install this into your system.

As you can see from the above picture, here are the few things that you need to do while editing the images with Fixpicture.

  1. Open fixpicture.org, then you can select one of the 2 options displayed over there which are Flash version or Html version (if you use high speed Internet go for Flash version)
  2. You can resize the image to certain size of 760px, 600px, 350px, 100px and image size of 75% smaller, 50% smaller, 25% smaller and also a custom field is given to enter your prescribed value.
  3. Rotation is your next option, you can rotate your picture or image to 90 degrees Clockwise, 90 degrees Anti-Clockwise, Flip is vertical, Flip is horizontal and finally none which keeps your image as it is.
  4. You can also give effects to your image with features like automatic contrast, Grey-scale, sharpen, sepia.
  5. Select your prescribed format and then select the quality of image as good, better, best which gives you the required quality of images.

This way you can have a versatile editing options for images from a website interface like Picnik from Google instead of a a image editing software.

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News

Use Google translate to get correct pronunciations

Google Translation tools are probably the best ones around on the internet. I often use the Google translate tools to view websites in foreign languages. This is not always as the content translation is not always completely accurate. I have a passing interest in learning German and tried to look up ways to learn translated text. Google with its translation tools was obviously a favorite.

But if you visit Google Translate landing page you can also hear the correct pronunciation of the text which is translated.

About Google Translate

Google recently announced that they are adding a lot more languages to this voice translation which were not used. Hindi, French, German, Madarin, Macedonian and many other languages are included.

This tool is a boon for people who travel and can just type in something in English and get to know the translation along with also how to pronounce that statement. If you are very familiar with a particular language you can also submit a better pronunciation to Google to make it better. 😉

Many times when you learn a new language you might be unsure of how a word exactly sounds. A small sound misplaced can mean something completely different than what you might have wanted to convey. This is why Google Translate can be quite handy to nail the pronunciation correctly.

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Reviews

Merge two images into one with online tool

Sometimes we quickly want to merge two images and if we are using a computer which is not our own or if we are using one at an internet cafe then you might be left stumped because our favorite image editing software wont be on it. In this case how does one merge two images into one. Toolwerk Image Merger works like a charm as it can merge two image files uploaded irrespective of their file formats.

About Toolwerk Image Merger

  • One of the key benefits of such a Image merger service is adding watermark to images is now very easy. Make sure the first image you upload is the main one and the second one is the one you want to add as a watermark.
  • Also there is no need to register with the website as you can merge two images and directly save it on your hard disk. It stores the newly created image for about 30 minutes.
  • This image merging functionality is not as complex as lets say in Photoshop or even Picassa which does offer a lot more functionality but as I said this is more useful as a watermarking service than actually mixing two images into one.

I think this website will be useful for quickly merging two images without needing to sit and ponder over them too much. It is surely not as versatile as other online image editors like Picnik but then there is also the advantage of not having to register to use it.

Do let me know of any other similar services or websites through your comments.

Link: Toolwerk Image Merger

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Tips

Import Documents Easily from Google Docs

Google Docs is an excellent online service which allows you to manage and access your documents anywhere. Google Docs does not only allow you to manage web documents but also spreadsheets and presentations. But there may be a time when you want to import all the documents and save them on your computer for further work or as a backup.

Continue reading “Import Documents Easily from Google Docs”
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Reviews

4 Free websites to scan files for virus

Many times we do not have a Anti-Virus installed on our computer. Some times such Anti-Virus applications give false alarms about a certain file or script. Sometimes we suspect that there is nothing wrong with a particular file and that the Anti-Virus software is raising a false alarm.

Most times in such cases it is better to scan your computer for viruses, trojans and malware scripts. Online websites which scan for viruses are great mainly because there is no need to keep updating the anti-virus database as its done by the website offering this service. 😉

Below are 4 websites which will allow you to scan files your computer for trouble and that too for free.

#1. NoVirusThanks


  • This website allowed me to scan a particular file for a virus by scanning it with 24 Anti-virus programs which includes AVG, TrendMicro, Panda, Kaspersky, Vipre scanned form the website directly.
  • The only limitation is that the file size of NoVirusThanks is 20 MB.

#2. VirusChief

  • Pretty much like NoVirusThanks I could simply upload any file from my computer and scan it online with VirusChief portal.
  • It uses multiple anti-virus scanners for scanning a file like AVG, AntiVir, Avast, Bit Defender and others.
  • VirusChief also requires no registering to scan a file and it a free service.

#3. Dr.Web File Scanner

  • No registration required for using Dr.Web file scanner for viruses.
  • It is very useful for scanning a file for Mac or Linux users who are sending certain types of files to Windows users which might be defined as malware or suspicious.

#4. ActiveScan from Panda

  • ActiveScan 2.0 is powered by Panda Cloud Anti Virus. It allows you to scan your computer for viruses, trojans and malwares.
  • It can also carry out a quick scan of essential files on your computer.
  • It scans for more than 2.7 million viruses and trojans.
  • Active Scan can also be integrated on a website with a API being available for developers.

These 4 websites should be able to look up and diagnose a corrupt file on your computer. But it is not really a replacement or alternative for anti-virus applications installed locally on the system. Read up 3 free anti virus programs for Windows for getting options of having a Antivirus software locally.

These websites can more or less be used for diagnostic purposes but not for defending yourself from having infected files.

If you know any more alternatives do share with us through your comments.

Categories
Reviews

Compare the speed at which You Tube videos are streamed by your ISP

You Tube is a service which was wholly reliant on hi-speed internet connectivity. You Tube started about five years ago when most western countries had broadband easily available. Now hi-speed internet access is readily available around the globe and that has seen You Tube grow exponentially.

But what about your ISP? How fast do videos stream on your browser thanks to your ISP. I sure would like to compare the speed and see where I stand regarding other Internet Service Providers around.

You Tube has a tool called My Speed which actually allows you to check and compare speed of You Tube videos streaming on your connection.

About You Tube Video Speed History

  • When I used it on my computer it showed Video Speed comparison in the last month. Here my ISP is way below what is average speed for Pune (city where I reside), India and Global speed.
  • It is useful to note that most time click on a Video and wait till it gets completely stream. While doing so I surf around and check websites. This be slowing down the video streaming speed and I might not get an accurate picture.
  • I was out of town for a few days in the time it checked for speed variation and my ISP had changed along with City so this might have also had its effect.

So try out You Tube Video Speed History for yourself and compare the speed at with You Tube is streamed over your Internet connection. This is not a speed test for the internet but only for You Tube. You might also want to read up how India compare to the world when it comes to broadband internet.