Viewing and managing multiple accounts – that sounds good

I run multiple email accounts covering my personal needs, accounts for ProReviewer email, work email, a spam trap account for when I have to register but am unsure if the email details will be sold on, a hotmail account for Windows Live id, Google Gmail accounts  and others. These become difficult, or at least a lot of work, to check and manage. Just being able to view all emails from a single application without having to login to multiple accounts and websites is a real bonus.

I wrote a post about a utility call PopMan a while back (PopMan 1.3 – Portable Email Management on Your Desktop and on the Move) I used this for a while but found that not being able to view HTML emails was too restrictive as so much email now is based on HTML. My search for a portable freeware email reader led me to find PopPeeper which I have used at home, at work and on the move for more than a year. The ability to be able to read all my emails and delete those I don’t want to keep from a single, fast acting utility is brilliant and a huge timesaver. The fact that it is portable so that I can transfer a single setup to all my computers and have it on a USB stick I can use on other PC’s is a great timesaver and means that I always see the same interface, the same colour codings, etc.

What’s is PopPeeper?

The PopPeeper website has a good description which I have repeated below. However PopPeeper is far more than just an email notifier. It allows you to:

Setup multiple accounts of all different types (Web/POP/IMAP/Gmail/Hotmail/Yahoo?etc)

• Be notified when emails arrive
• Read emails in plain text or HTML
• View emails from all or individual accounts
• Delete emails*
• Send emails
• Keep an email address book
• View linked WebPages in PopPeeper message window or default web browser
• Allows attachments to be opened

*Some web based emails such as Google’s Gmail do not “play nicely” and emails cannot be deleted from the account using PopPeeper- however as Gmail has a large storage capacity this will not pose a major problem for the average user

Description from the PopPeeper website

• POP Peeper is an email notifier that runs in your Windows task bar and alerts you when you have new email on your POP3, IMAP (with IDLE support), Hotmail\MSN\LiveMail, Yahoo, GMail, MyWay, Excite, iWon, Lycos.com, RediffMail, Juno and NetZero accounts.
• IMAP supports allows you to access AOL, AIM, Netscape and other services. Send mail directly from POP Peeper and use the address book to email your frequently used contacts.
• POP Peeper allows you to view messages using HTML or you can choose to safely view all messages in rich or plain text.
• Several options are available that will decrease or eliminate the risks of reading your email (viruses, javascript, webbugs, etc).
• POP Peeper can be run from a portable device and can be password protected.
• Many notification options are available to indicate when new mail has arrived, such as sound alerts (configurable for each account), flashing scroll lock, skinnable popup notifier, customized screensaver and more.

More on Why You Would Want It?

What Does It Do – The Essentials?

Summary:

• Handles multiple email accounts of different types
• Handles all major email protocols (POP, IMAP, etc.)
• Allows emails from multiple accounts to be viewed
• Allows emails to be sent from multiple accounts
• Delete emails from some accounts

Pros: What’s Good?

Features & Benefits

• Freeware

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Popularity: 1% [?]

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What’s is Borderline?

Borderline is a tiny utility program that simply moves any windows outside the screen area of your computer monitor (or monitors in a dual + monitor setup) completely within the screen area.

Why Would You Want It?

Sometimes Windows move off the screen area of your monitor. This may be for many reasons such as changing resolution of the monitor or changing from a multi-monitor setup to a single monitor. Whatever the cause it can be extremely frustrating and even worse, if the Window does not show in the Windows Taskbar area. This post on Recover Hidden & Off-screen Windows with this Simple Tip and Freeware Program ForceWindowVisible will give you more information with:

• A way of moving windows on screen using “Windows Standard Move Function” (slow and requires the window to be shown in the Taskbar)
• A small portable utility called ForceWindowsVisible

The advantage of Borderline over ForceWindowsVisible is that it is simple and quick. Also ForceWindowsVisible can cause problems if you hide or unhide windows that are not meant to be seen or not meant to be hidden by mistake (or maybe just “experimenting” )

When Borderline is run it moves al windows within the borders of the monitor screen(s) and then closes. This means you have to run it each time but has the advantage that it does not run in the background using memory and CPU.

What Does It Do – The Essentials?

Summary:

• Moves all open Windows completely on screen of the monitor (or monitors in a multi-monitor setup
• Borderline closes down after running

Pros: What’s Good?

Features & Benefits

• Freeware

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Popularity: 1% [?]

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What’s This About?

MultiRes by Entech has been around for quite a while. It allows the screen display settings to be quickly and easily changed from the system tray or from the command line. The settings provided in the system tray are for supported values* for the screen and graphics adapter however non-standard or not supported values can be set from the command line which means batch files can be written to quickly change between different settings.

* The “supported” values are presumably obtained from the combination of the graphics card and monitor settings held by the system. If appears if the system only has a default monitor that some display settings may not actually be supported by the monitor.

Why Would You Want It?

There are lots of reasons why you may want to change the screen resolution and other graphics related settings for different applications such as  changing from office types applications to graphics, video, games, etc.

Another possible reason is to fit fixed sized windows onto a small display. I recently purchased a Samsung NC10 Netbook (great piece of kit which I would recommend to anyone wanting a small ultraportable solution). A small problem I experienced quite early on was that the display resolution of 1024 X 600 pixels. This meant that some of the standard software I use has fixed size “Option” screens which are deeper than 600 pixels so that some options and buttons were off the bottom of the display. I needed a solution that would allow me to quickly change the display settings to a non-standard size so that I could manage these types of windows before switching back to the standard (native) resolution. While MultiRes won’t display non-standard (supported) resolutions it would allow changing to them using the command line.

What Does It Do – The Essentials?

Summary:

• Changes Display resolutions
• Supports multi-monitor setups
• Changes other display settings e.g contrast, colour settings
• Comprehensive command line values

Pros: What’s Good?

Features & Benefits

• Freeware

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Popularity: 63% [?]

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What’s This About?

MMM Free is a utility that runs in the background that automatically alters the Explorer context menu to a configuration that you can choose. MMM Free is a cut down version of a shareware product but it does a very good job of moving items that you use infrequently to a “Rarely Used” Submenu. It is a good alternative to using ShellExView which was reviewed earlier. Control Your Context Menu Items with ShellExView

Why Would You Want It?

When ShellExView was reviewed I said:

MS Windows provides many shell extensions as part of the OS. Also lots of programs add their own commands to the Explore context menu, Internet Explorer, etc. when they are installed to help with using the program. This makes the right click context menu in the system applications very useful for carrying out all sorts of operations and commands, however they can become cluttered with commands you never need or use. This can make it difficult to find what you want.

MMM Free allows you to still have all the context menu items available but in a sub menu to the single line “Rarely Used” in the context menu rather than switching them off permanently (or until you enable them again using the ShellExView program). So MMM Free gives you the option of always having all the context menu items but in a more user friendly and manageable arrangement.

What Does It Do – The Essentials?

Summary:

• Wakes up your computer from Standby or Hibernation
•  

Pros: What’s Good?

Features & Benefits

• Freeware

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Popularity: 28% [?]

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What’s This About?

CMenuExtender is a small utility that will allow you to create your own Windows Explorer context menu. (That’s the menu that appears when you right click on a file or folder in Windows Explorer).

Why Would You Want It?

The Windows Explorer right click context menu can be very useful for carrying out all sorts of operations and commands. Many programs add their own commands to the context menu when they are installed to help with the program. Have you ever wanted to be able to copy or move a file to a specified directory as the following screenshot shows:

Here you can see items added by the Teracopy, WinRar, WinZip and Unlocker programs, all of which help in using the program>

With CMenuExtender you can create your own specific commands to do a wide variety of things, such as running specific programs to open particular files, moving or copying files to specific directories, running a DOS command, get information on the file and many other thins including user specified items.

What Does It Do – The Essentials?

Summary:

• Creates User Defined Contwext Menus in Windows Explorer
• Allows the menus and items to be edited
• Allows the menus and items to be moved
• Comes with a number of predefined commands

Pros: What’s Good?

Features & Benefits

• Freeware

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Popularity: 17% [?]

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What’s This About?

Copernic Desktop Search has been my desktop search utility of choice for sometime. The main reasons for this were

1. Searching Network Shares
2. Reasonably stable
3. OK Interface

and in that order!

There are obviously other desktop search products out there and I have tried most of them. I quite like Google but I don’t like the browser interface. X1 has a great interface with lots of options for refining searches and setting personal searches but won’t index network shares in the free version. MS Windows product was not as good as other solutions but I will certainly be looking at the new version 4 in the next few days. Anyway up till now I have been using Copernic on my home network to index 3 desktop PCs, 2 Laptops, my Windows Home Server drives and my NAS boxes.

Yesterday I was greeted by the following message box while suing Copernic Desktop Search 2.3:

A major new version "update” (note they don’t use the word upgrade) is always interesting with the promise of new features and options.

In fact the message box states:

We recommend that you update the current version to benefit from the latest features and improvements.

I duly updated by letting the automatic download and install process run.

What Did I Find?

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Popularity: 39% [?]

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What’s This About?

Edison is a program that allows you to change and save the standard windows power options in a simple interface for two different times “Work” and “Other”. It also has a simple scheduling option to switch between the two on a once per day basis.

Why Would You Want It?

You can easily change the standard Windows Power Options Properties by selecting Power Options in Control Panel as the last post  Windows Power Schemes – Set and Forget to Reduce Your Electricity Bill:

As you can see from the post under the Windows Power Options Properties – Power Schemes tab you can change all the options which are more than in Edison, you can also save as many different power schemes as you want. The advantage of Edison lies in the ability to automatically schedule two different power schemes to suit your pattern of use.

What Does It Do – The Essentials?

Summary:

• Quick and Simple Setting of 2 Power schemes
• Schedule Switching between the schemes once per day
• Helps save power for desktop PCs

Pros: What’s Good?

Features & Benefits

• Freeware
• See estimated savings

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Popularity: 19% [?]

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What’s This About?

WakeupOnStandBy  is a small program that will automatically wake up your computer from Standby or Hibernation mode at a predetermined schedule of time and days of the week, then run programs, open web pages, etc. before closing down your computer again if you want. It also has the ability to run multiple schedules allowing you to effectively shutdown and start your computer when you want.

Why Would You Want It?

Many computers are run 24/7 as a matter of convenience rather than necessity. Just to be able to get on the computer instantly without waiting for what might be quite a long boot period and get to your emails or instantly access web pages is a convenience. This is trade doff against the cost of running the PC and the consequential use of “scarce” resources, carbon footprint, global warming and a general disregard for he environment and future availability of resources for our children and grandchildren.

I am as bad as anyone and worse than many. I run several computers and some of them run 24/7 because I need them to be doing scheduled actions while  am not actively using them. These include indexing, backups, fetching email, etc. so the information is ready and available when I need. The fact is that these computers could be shutdown for several hours a day when I am at work or asleep without any real inconvenience. In fact unless your running a server of some sort or downloading over P2P networks you really don’t need any computer running all the time.

The recent severe increases in oil and gas prices has been a bit of a wake up call and started to make me look at ways of reducing my energy consumption so I can get the bills down. I am ashamed to admit it is the impact on my pocket and not my impact on the environment that has spurred me into action

So I am across WakeupOnStandBy in a search for a freeware program that would allow me to schedule the time my computer was running to suit my daily./weekly programme. As you will see it is not a perfect solution and could do with a bit of work to make it easier to use but it will certainly do the job needed with a little bit of perseverance.

However, if you want to save yourself some money or feel you should do your bit to preserve our planet it is worth a bit of effort to set up the necessary schedules

What Does It Do – The Essentials?

Summary:

• Wakes up your computer from Standby or Hibernation
• Puts the computer into Standby or Hibernation Mode
• Allows for scheduling based on time, days, and weeks
• Runs programs on Startup or Shutdown/Hibernate
• Saves power for desktop PCs
• Saves battery life for laptop PCs

Pros: What’s Good?

Features & Benefits

• Freeware

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Popularity: 24% [?]

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What’s This About?

CrossHairs is a very small program/utility that will display a vertical and horizontal line on the monitor at the mouse cursor position. It can be set to be static at the original position or to follow the mouse position.

Why Would You Want It?

CrossHair has 5 obvious functions:

1. As an aid to lining up graphics and text for page layouts
2. As an aid to estimating values on graphs and charts
3. To pinpoint the mouse cursor position on "busy" screens or difficult backgrounds
4. As an aid to people with impaired vision
5. To help young children spot the mouse position

I have found it very useful for all of the first 3 items over the past couple of years, particular 1 & 2. I am also sure it will be a great help to people with impaired vision or for children.

What Does It Do – The Essentials?

Summary:

• Shows vertical and horizontal lines activated by Hotkeys
• Lines can be static
• Lines can follow the mouse position

Pros: What’s Good?

Features & Benefits

• Freeware

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Popularity: 21% [?]

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What Is It?

A wonderful calculator with basic math functions plus extended financial, unit conversion, algebra and scientific functions. Combined with the ability to add your own requirements this is a truly versatile utility.

Why Would You Want It?

Ms Windows calculator provides basic functionality, Farsight Free fills many of the missing gaps you need. While some of the functions of Farsight may be beyond the your  needs in the extensive options there is something here for everybody and it deserves to be part of your essential toolbox. Don’t let the fact  that some of the functions and options are beyond your usual needs put you off that this utility is worthy of your attention.

What Does It Do – The Essentials?

Summary:

• Maths Functions
• Algebra and Trig Functions
• Financial Calculations
• Statistical Functions
• Logical Expressions
• Reverse Polish Notation

Pros: What’s Good?

Features & Benefits

• Freeware
• Simple to Use as a basic calculator

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Popularity: 22% [?]

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