Interesting Mozilla project to make the Web even more transparent

Nowadays, sales through the Internet are a common thing for most of the people, this transactions have significantly increased these kind of purchases, bringing as a consequence improvement regarding computer security standards to protect users data they provide in each transaction. Although there have been notable progress and this area, many people still have doubts when purchasing on the net, fearing that their data can be stolen, sold or used for any other purpose.

To vanish these fears, the star designer user interface of Mozilla, Aza Raski (creator of the tabs environment in Firefox browsers) has come up with a set of icons that acts as a privacy code, indicating the user the use that web sites does with their data. This coding is composed by thirteen icons that will indicate in Firefox browser whether the information provided will be used for other purposes, this will be sold or offered to private companies or even delivered to some kind of government with any court order.

The idea of Raskin and its Mozilla Firefox team is that these icons are shown clearly on the sites and, besides, linked with their terms of use. Another goal Firefox people have is to display this visual identification system on the browser automatically so that they can be read by computers. That is to say, that Firefox browsers display these icons through its interface, and always having by default the lowest privacy terms.

Although the project is still in its first stages, Mozilla has not been clear about when it will be launched in Firefox browser. If this project goes further by Mozilla people, will help the web to be clear and simple to users, this is so demand today due to the repercussions of the Wikileaks case.

Mozilla Rainbow: Record audio and video directly from the browser!

Some time ago, Mozilla’s creators publish the releasing of a new application for Mozilla Firefox browser, released under the name Rainbow.

This new application allows Mozilla Firefox to record audio and video directly from the browser, and after the file creation, to upload the new content on any site user wants. However, the extension of the file created is OGG, but in the near future WebM format is expected to be supported. Rainbow is currently available for the latest Nightly Builds of Mac OS, but they are working so this application has versions for Mozilla Firefox browser and Windows and Linux platforms.

Finally, it is worth mention that Mozilla Firefox developer leaves Rainbow´s open source at this stage of the project with the aim that advance users can review or modify it so it has an optimum performance when installing the application on Mozilla Firefox.

KeyGen ensures safer passwords

Safety has become an important issue for most Internet users. Thanks to the options provided by the Net nowadays, we can buy products, transfer money from bank accounts, or send and receive important information online. Something that must be taken into account is passwords. KeyGen is an application for creating strong, hacker-proof passwords so that we can be better protected.

This application is very easy-to-use. When we run KeyGen we’ll find a small window with options on the top. In the field “Key length” we must enter the number of characters we want the password to have.

Next, we must check the options that allow or disable upper and lower case letters as well as numbers, also located in the options on the top of the screen.

Once we have set these parameters, we can get a highly safe password by pressing “Generate”. In this way, thanks to KeyGen we can stop worrying about Internet safety, which is surely one of its most controversial issues.

Download torrents on your PC

Among the most popular methods for downloading files from the Internet, we also have .torrents. The Bit Torrent protocol works when a file provider initially makes his/her file available to the network. This is called a seed and allows others, named peers, to connect and download the file. Some Bit Torrent clients have their own search engine to look for movies, CDs, games, applications and more, and some others do not, which means you´ll to have to look for them in torrent portals. There are lots of clients to choose from, making it very difficult for the average user to tell a difference among them, since some of them look exactly the same thus creating confusion among users. Here we take a look at some of the more popular ones. We introduce you to µTorrent, Azureus, BitComet and BitTorrent.

µTorrent

This is, without a doubt, one of the best BitTorrent clients that we came across on the web. High download speeds and low system resource consumption are combined in µTorrent, meaning that downloads finish as fast as possible without causing your PC to grind to a halt.

One of the more interesting features of this program is its ability to download individual files within a .torrent, along with its support for RSS channels, avoiding the need to search for download addresses.

The only downside to this program is the user interface. Although the various features of µTorrent are clearly shown, it has a pretty primitive appearance. The only con we find in µTorrent is the lack of a search box for torrents, therefore we have to have torrents on our own and it can be difficult to learn how to search if we are new to this type of clients.

Azureus

Azureus is an alternative with two important things to bear in mind. Firstly, it’s written in Java – which we’ll talk about below – and secondly, it’s clear designed to make the most of P2P systems to view videos, in particular film trailers.

Now, the fact that it has been developed to run on the modern Java platform is both good and bad. On the upside, this program has an extremely attractive interface, along with a wide variety of features and options. The only problem is that if you don’t have Java installed on your machine, the program won’t work.

When it comes to downloading, Azureus presents the user with a very handy set of features and useful statistical information: you can set the download and upload speeds, get varied information about each file and each .torrent file in use, and see the average number of peers available for each torrent.

BitComet

BitComet is a pretty “regular” BitTorrent client. It uses few system resources, achieves good speeds, supports multiple downloads, and has an effective, solid interface. It all adds up to a package which is not very different to what is offered by other programs of this type.

However, one really interesting thing about BitComet is its ability to make use of DHTs (Distributed Hash Tables), allowing it to find seeds without the need to connect to a tracker service and thus happily bypassing the protection measures put in place by private trackers which only allow access to registered users. The only downside is that some of these sites have started to simply block all BitComet users.

BitTorrent

This application started out as an open-source client, and this was always its biggest strength. However, it went proprietary with the release of version 6, when it started to base itself on µTorrent.

This really shows, since now it’s more or less a faithful copy of that other program, discussed above. The only difference is the inclusion of a “Get Stuff” menu, which provides access to various parts of the official BitTorrent web site – one for movies, others for TV, Music and Games – from which you can search for seeds.

As you can see, the variety of features on offer is pretty big, with the differences between the various programs being fairly well defined. You must bear in mind that some torrent clients are banned from some trackers, so in case your torrent file doesn’t seem to start –making sure there are seeds first- try another one.

Since µTorrent features a user-friendly interface, is lightweight and pretty straightforward, it´s the best torrent client for low and high-end systems. It may not present as many features as other clients, but it´s size together with its minimalistic interface definitely makes µTorrent a winner when it comes to downloading torrents.

IP Telephony: your computer ready to talk through the phone

Internet is changing the way of communicating and day after day, new possibilities come out in order to communicate with other people, shorting the distances, breaking down the barriers.
Its innovating technology now enables us not only chatting with our friends but also having voice conversation with great quality. Our voice is now in the cyberspace!
This is possible thanks to the IP telephony that enable our voice to travel through the internet and be heard reaching any place of the world.

There are many the applications we can find to do so, but we only mention here the most popular software. Between them, they stand out. VoipBuster, Gizmo Project, Wengophone, WinFonie Mobile, Skype.

VoipBuster

VoipBuster is a program that uses the latest technology to bring free and high-quality voice communications to people all over the world. When you use the free VoipBuster software, you can call regular phones in various popular destinations for free or call at an incredible low rate to any other phone on the planet. You can also call all your online friends (pc-to-pc calls) as long as you like, for free.

This application offer us the possibility of creating contact list to communicate with our contacts easily and fast, also allow us to create many user profiles so that the program can be used by different users. In addition to this, we can also check the time and frequent use of the software through the history option and check the calls we make and the messages we send. The main disadvantage is that free calls only last for a minute and many users have claimed that they had problems during the call when they were suddenly disconnected.

Gizmo Project

Gizmo Project is a free program that uses advanced VoIP technology to allow you to talk with your friends around the world. Gizmo Project uses your internet connection (broadband or dial-up) to make calls to other computers. With the click of a mouse, you are connected to friends, family, and colleagues anywhere on earth. It´s just that simple. You talk clearly. For as long as you want, for free.

It also offers some interesting features such as voice mail; call record, call register, text messages. In addition to this, it supports video conferences and we can add images. We can check the broadband we are using when communicating and allow us to create user groups. It main disadvantage is the sound quality and problems when establishing connection.

Wengophone

This software allows you to make free phone calls to other Wengophone users.
You can buy credit to make phone calls to landlines or cell phones, with lower fees than the charged in regular calls. The program can be used as an Instant Messenger (like MSN Messenger, Yahoo! Messenger or Skype) and you can communicate with other users that share the same SIP (protocol) as Gizmo and Google Talk.

It has the capability to allow video conferences using webcams, microphone and speakers. You can chat by typing into the program´s window and use emoticons. You can use Wengophone to chat with users of another Instant Messengers, set up your account to add contacts, create different profiles, change the audio and video quality and customized the interface as you want.

Its main disadvantages are: establishing the communication is not always easy and their quality might not be the best since the call can suddenly be disconnected.

WinFonie Mobile

This tool can be very useful since it allow us to transfer our contacts information from PC to the mobile phone. WinFonie Mobile extracts information from multiple data base such as Excel, Outlook, Lotus, etc. It is a very practical tool since enable you to manage landline numbers, mobile numbers, e-mail address, etc.

Between is options it stands out the possibility of previewing the elements before starting the transference. The only disadvantage this tool has is that this application only works with Nokia and Sony Ericsson phone of the K series.

Skype

Skype is the most well known and use on the planet not only to communicate between users but also between phones from different countries. This application brings you high-quality voice communications even better than the regular ones. Some of their features are: contact lists, history log, videoconference, a search engine that allow you to find people to chat or talk in any language you want, the possibility of setting up different status such as online, not available, invisible, studying, at home, etc. Features a user-friendly interface that helps us communicating with just one click.

Something that is worth mention is that is has being proved that this amazing tool does not contain spyware, do not add publicities or ads and does not interfere with the Internet connection or firewalls. Another point in favor is that it uses PayPal enable you to send money from the software. Features a free voice service, send calls to your mobile when you are not available and you can be called to your personal Internet number at local rates. Its main disadvantage is the amount of users it has that makes the system collapse from time to time.

After talking about the different options we have, we can say that the application that offers more options is easier to use, have greater amount of user and the most complete one is Skype. Despite the other software´s offer interesting features, this particular application is the best option when calling or communicating with any part of the world through our computer.

Mozilla applications: open-source power and functionality

The Mozilla Foundation is a non-profit organization dedicated to the creation of open-source software, meaning that their projects available are for distribution and modification. We will detail the most popular Mozilla applications: Firefox, Thunderbird, Songbird, FileZilla and Seamonkey.

Firefox

Firefox is the most popular application from Mozilla. For years now, it has been considered one of the most complete, simple and safe web browser to surf the internet. Firefox features multiple options such as integration with other applications, numerous plug-ins and add-ons to download from their website and automatic updates.

Firefox touts faster rendering, vastly reduced use of system resources, clever new data-mining tools for your bookmarks and browser history, and more security features than any other browser.

Firefox´s interface features a tab system so you don´t need to open multiple browser sessions. Unlike many open-source applications –such as Internet explored based web browsers- Firefox is completely accessible for inexperienced users.

Thunderbird

Thunderbird is Mozilla´s e-mail client and maybe the closest competitor to Microsoft Windows Outlook Express. It features a simple an intuitive interface, plus it´s fully integrated with Firefox.

Though it doesn´t not present as many options as other clients, it does feature deliver some interesting characteristics such as support for themes, powerful e-mail filters and plug-in installation.

Thunderbird it’s a complete email solution, with support for POP, IMAP, and Gmail email accounts (and .Mac on OS X), contacts, as well as RSS and USENET newsgroups. It works just fine with multiple accounts of all kinds, features a logical and well-laid out interface, and can be customized in an almost bewildering number of ways.

Since Eudora was Mozilla´s foundation former name Thunderbird´s interface – almost identical to Eudora Mail- is another remarkable aspect of this e-mail client.

Songbird

Songbird is an open-source audio player with a similar interface to the popular iTunes and presenting most of it features. Among them we can mention the multimedia library storage engine enabling users to create music collections to choose from; an interactive web browser with music portals to download songs, podcast and radio broadcast support; synchronization with mobiles devices such as iPods and more.

Songbird features a Simple and Sleek UI interface , which to some extent resembles interface of Apple iTunes. Like Mozilla Firefox you can open multiple tabs in Songbird, simultaneously browse Internet and manage music inside Songbird using tabs and add different addons/plugins by using add on manager similar to one in Mozilla Firefox.

Songbird is a small simple program compatible with most popular music format (MP3, AAC, OGG, WMA and FLAC) add-ons and plug-ins. Currently, Songbird´s next release is still in development, therefore we may find some shortcomings such as consuming a great deal for system resources.

Filezilla

FileZilla is a complete FTP client solution enabling users to remotely access others PCs. FileZilla´s interface features drag-and-drop allowing you to transfer file with a simple mouse click.

You can also store FTP servers addresses, manage several accounts simultaneously, as well as filtering filenames and creating lists of regular sites.

Among FileZilla´s advanced features, we can mention the option to allow incoming connection through proxies and firewalls, and resuming FTP sessions as well. Though FileZilla is considered one of the best FTP clients out there, the interface could be improved by adding a bit of color.

Seamonkey

Mozilla Seamonkey is an internet application suite made of: a web browser including an e-mail client, an address book, a website editor and a IRC chat client. Seamonkey´s web browser is based on Firefox and has most of its features, apart from including other Mozilla application.

Likewise, it features an HTML editor, a java console, pop-ups and cookies manager and a site translator among others. Seamonkey’s Navigator has standard browser features such as tabbed browsing, pop-up blocking, and cookie controls.

Although Seamonkey sounds like an interesting proposition, it is an application suit suitable for those making their first steps into the internet.

Except for the web browser, the rest of Seamonkey´s application offer basic features only, so users familiarized with the internet will find them less than convenient.

Mozilla products stand for quality, functionality and innovation. It´s no coincidence that the number of users turning their eyes to these amazing, open-source- applications grows by the minute.

With this set of applications we just reviewed, you´ll be able to perform a countless number of activities. With Firefox, web browsing just got better and Thunderbird is an amazing e-mail client with more features than any other e-mail client out there. Download files via FTP with FileZilla, play all your music with Songbird and use Seamonkey if you´re making your first steps into the internet. Start using Mozilla applications now, they will not disappoint you.

Package of software to take full advantage of Internet

They are not doubts that Internet has changed the human history. Thanks to this incredible tool we can reach any place of the world with just a few clicks.
To do so, we need to know two things: the possibilities it offers, and having the necessary software to take advantage of it. In this article we will talk about a series of simple tools so you can carry out the main actions: surfing the web (Firefox), chatting (Windows Live Messenger), downloading files (eMule), administering e- mail accounts (Eudora) and something extra, watching TV (PPMate).

Mozilla Firefox

This is the lightest, compact and functional browser that exists. Browsers are the basic Internet tool since thanks of them; we can access the network, make downloads, surf the Web, etc.

Its main features are tabbed browsing, search engine, a great amount of plug in and complements available to improve its functionality, the security that offers when surfing the net, and more. It also offers a built-in search bar added to the menu bar that protects us against the annoying publicities since it has pop-ups.
Despite this software is pretty new, due to its great features has become the most popular.

eMule

eMule is the most used P2P software around the world. It gives us the opportunity of downloading all type of content, books, software, music, movies, etc. The file transference is made from user to user, reason why the more users, the greater the transference speed will be.

With eMule we will be able to find any type of content without mattering how old or wired it is. In addition to this, it stands out by downloading “heavy” files; these are, for example, complete discography and it also has a chat to ensure the communications between users.

eMule gives priority to those users that share greater amount of contents, avoiding those who do not contribute at all. Another disadvantage to mention is that is slow to download.

Windows Live Messenger

Windows Live Messenger is the most used instant mail client. With it, you will be able to chat with all your contacts in real time, exchange files, have voice conversations, video conferences, etc.
In addition to this, it allows sharing folders with other contacts, free call PC to PC, send messages to offline contacts and more.

Thanks to all the possibilities it offers, this tool has become one of the most popular, used not only by young people but also companies. Its main disadvantage is probably it only offer one chat room, preventing you of meeting new people.

Eudora

Eudora is one of the most used and traditional e-mail clients, since it offer two great features to their users: functionality and simplicity.

This software offers all the tools we expect to find: multiple support for E-mail accounts, powerful filters that ensure security when receiving mails, customized text presentation, “drag and drop” system to make all the tasks easy and processes automation to improve our work. This software also stands out by the possibility of including plug-in to improve it uses and benefits.

Its main disadvantage is related to the constant appearance of annoying publicities and ads during their use; nevertheless, this is irrelevant due to its good performance.

Ppmate

One of the brilliant Internet´s innovations is this type of software that allows watching TV by the P2P streaming technology. This original software offers the possibility of watching more than 200 channels that are also automatically renew and organized by categories to make the search easy.

Being P2P TV, the greater the numbers of users are enjoying the same channel, the better the video quality and the downloading speed will be. PPMate stands out for being available in English, since most of these kind of software are only available in Chinese.

Its main disadvantage is related to the few channels it offers and the slowness to tune them, something that we forget about due to the good transmission quality we obtain.

To sump up, the actions we can make with Internet are many and varied. The supply of programs offered grows day by day but only a few offers high standard of quality and simplicity. When analyzing these variants, we can say that the software here developed are the best in its category.

One the Opera´s main feature is its customization. Each user can set it up to suit their needs. For instance, you can set a specific number of websites to add as homepage as well as choosing among several search engines. Let´s see how to add browser windows and search engines to Opera in a few steps.

One of its most interesting and original features of Opera is to set several websites as homepage. One of them is Speed Dial, a websites’ graphic menu that enables users to customize it either by adding or removing websites to the links grid.

Opera allows users to increase the number of websites in their Speed Dial homepage, since Opera uses by default a 3×3 grid for the SpeeD Dial.

Follow these instructions to add more websites to the grid:

1)    To modify the main grid, we must modify a configuration file called speeddial.ini. The latter´s path changes according to the version of the Opera and the operative system you´re using. Use Windows search function to find it.

2)    Next, close Opera and open the file speeddial.ini con  with any text file -such as notepad or WordPad- and add the following lines:

3)    Save the file and open Opera again, you´ll notice the change at once.

By doing this, we can modify the number of rows and columns just by modifying the numeric values set in the lines “Rows” and “Columns” in speeddial.ini.

Add search engines to Opera

Every web browser includes a default search engine. In this way, the user doesn’t´ have to enter the search engine website (ex. www.Google.com). Opera includes some of the most popular search engines, but you can still add others. Follow these instructions to add search engines.

1)    Once you choose the search engine, right click inside the search box and choose the option “Create Search”.

2)    Next, complete “name” and “keyword” text fields.

3)    Now, click on a tab and then right click on it and choose the “customize” option.

4)    Another window will now open. Choose the “Buttons” tab and once inside choose the “Search” option. The search engine you added will be listed there.

5)    With the left mouse click drag the search engine outside the window and place it anywhere you where. Once you´ve followed these steps, you´ll have additional search engines on your list.

Opera is an application that can be fully customized, giving the user the possibility to adjust its options and features to the utmost. If you properly followed the above-mentioned steps, you won´t have any issues increasing websites to the grid or adding more search engines.

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Apple managed to revolutionize the multimedia world by releasing iTunes, a whole new multimedia concept for iPods that combines audio and video playback as well as Radio, TV and podcast broadcasting while purchasing music online. In this report, we’ll analyze this popular player’s potentials.

iTunes

The revolution we are talking about is not unconnected to iPod’s appearance in the market. This Apple mobile device massiveness ended up in the positioning of iTunes as its ideal and essential complement. Nowadays, most iPod users organize their music with iTunes.

The program´s interface differs from other players since it was made for using the iTunes Store, the online shop for purchasing applications, music and videos.

This is –among others- the reason why iTunes is a program that doesn´t require a great deal of computing knowledge, since most of its features are introduced by using a Wizard.

Moreover, files managed by iTunes are automatically sorted in playlists and libraries (depending on file types), inside which the user can easily add, sort and eliminate multimedia files. One thing to bear in mind though, is that iTunes may duplicate files, therefore we have to pay attention to the indications shown during this process.

As previously mentioned, iTunes features a complete audio, video, radio, TV and podcast player, as well as compatibility with most popular formats such as .mov, .avi, .swf, .mp3, .aac, .wma, and more.

Also, it has an equalizer with a wide range of music presets and 10 audio channels to configure manually. Moreover, it includes a large amount of radio and podcast signals for you to listen to radio online, and the possibility of adding streaming TV channels.

iTunes Store has a tab of its own where users can create an account so they can immediately start purchasing and downloading applications, programs and videos from its varied and colorful catalog.

Without any doubt, the greatest issue is the amount of system memory it consumes due to its visual complexity since it´s an interface developed for MacOSX and adapted to Microsoft Windows. We can notice this when launching the program, performing a search or even while playing files.

To sum up, iTunes is a player that emphasizes its original way to manage multimedia files, as well as purchasing online while playing videos or music, listening to radio stations or synchronizing your iPod.

Who has never tried to download files from the internet? This is one of the most common operations nowadays and it can be greatly improved with a program that is up to the task. DAP is one of the most popular download manager out there. It´s an amazing application that will simplify this task, managing your downloads while boosting their speed considerably.

Download Accelerator Plus (DAP)

One of the most important uses of the Internet is the downloading of files, ranging from applications and films to games, music, and much more. DAP is a program that promises to improve the whole download process, with its chief attraction being a notable reduction in the time it takes to actually get the file onto your PC and ready to be used.

The secret to this program’s considerable speed improvements is the way it splits each file into multiple parts. DAP makes use of a number of servers and mirrors that hold the particular file you’re downloading in order to download multiple segments simultaneously. This process notably speeds up the download process.

The program has a simple installation, in which you are shown the different options that you can choose to install and which is very accessible for practically all users.

As for its use, DAP is a piece of cake. It has a menu bar in which all the downloaded content is organized: games, films, videos, and another in which all of the files are displayed in a list. Upon entering each of these parts of the menu, DAPdisplays a list of all the elements that you can download, arranged according to the number of downloads of each one, from the highest to the lowest.

The program has another menu bar for those programs that you have chosen to download onto your PC, using which you can monitor the files you are downloading and thus check that they have successfully finished downloading.

All files downloaded using DAP will be sent to a folder called “My Completed Downloads”, added to the desktop at the time of installation. You can open any downloaded file from there.

One of the weak points of the program is that a lot of the interface, including the part describing the files to download, one of the menus, and the lists, always appear in English, even if you’ve set the program to use a different language. Another downside is the excessive amount of advertising that is displayed, which can quickly become irritating. Lastly, it’s worth mentioning that DAP is set by default to only allow 4 simultaneous downloads, a feature which, unless you’re aware of it, can be a pain.

Despite these faults, the download speeds offered by this program, along with the ability to resume interrupted downloads, and in particular the tool for downloading only virus-free content, make this an option which is well worth checking out.

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