So, please be aware that any comments left since the beginning of September and any further comments left until I sought things out may be lost.

Apologies to any one who has been inconvenienced.

The good news is that there will soon be some new posts mostly based on running Freeware (portable and otherwise) under the Windows 7 operating system which I have been experiementing with over the last couple of months

Barry

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

So I couldn’t think of a really good title that describes the recent “technical” problems that have resulted in no new ProReviewer posts for the last couple of weeks

Soon after I finished the post on ClipGuru a couple of weeks ago, as I was about to start on the next post, in fact at just after 5pm Saturday 8th November, we had a local power cut. No idea what caused it but after a few seconds the switchgear somewhere on the main grid automatically tried to reconnect the power twice in succession. No big deal you think, happens 2 or 3 times a year.

bigfoto.com

When the power was eventually restored a little later I found that my server PC wouldn’t start up, my Windows Home Server was dead and my main XP desktop, which I use for all my work and blogging, had some data corruption (or so I thought).

What Next?

Well I started off with the dead machines checking al the usual things like fuses on the mains and then working into opening up the machines and checking connections, boards and memory properly seated, etc. To cut a long story short over I pinned it down to the power supplies having failed by taking an old power supply from another machine and trying it on the dead ones. This all sounds fairly straight forward but lack of time and pressure of other things at home and work meant this took until the middle of the week to sort out.

In the mean time my main working desktop and started to behave ever more strangely. Crashing, freezing and the graphics display working intermittently. I thought it was the graphics card as I could connect remotely and al seemed to be working normally. A new graphics card and power supplies were ordered. However, the main desktop just got worse and worse. In the end I decided it could only be the motherboard.

What Now?

Well I sorted out the server PC and WHS machine power supplies and they are all working properly. I have a motherboard/processor/memory bundle coming tomorrow (the old mobo/cpu/memory were over 3 years old, therefore well out of date, so I decided to replace the lot).

I have used part of the available time to transfer data and install programs to my Vista machine, which I am using now to write this post. It also means I have been able to move the computers around in the study so it will now be possible to switch between my main desktop with XP and the Vista PC which should help with posts including more Vista programs.

So I hope to resume normal service over the next week to 10 days with 3 to 4 posts a week

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

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?

When Copernic 3 restarted I immediately noticed 2 things:

1. My Saved Searches were no longer there
2. The Preview Pane was showing
   (I normally don’t have it displayed)

OK, I though lets check this out and reset the options.

My Searches

So I clicked on “My Searches” in the menu bar to be greeted by a popup window with the following banner at the top:

Strike 1

This post will follow the usual format of presenting  information as screenshots backed up by further written details.

(click on any picture to enlarge where necessary)

Next I tried to reset the Preview Pane to off:

Again I was told this feature was only available in non-freeware versions:

Strike 2

So What Features Are Free?

So at this point I clicked on the Compare link in the popup window. This took me to the Copernic site and a handy table showing what was available in the freeware and paid versions:

Well as you can see there are a lot of free features in the free version and many of those missing are probably of less interest to many users not in a corporate environment. However for my use the following are essential:

1. Index Network Drives
2. Save Searches
3. Search Outlook Appointments

The ability to turn off the preview pane to speed up searches while not absolutely essential fell into the “highly desirable” category.

What Next?

Looking at the search results all my previous network share results were still there so I had a look at the files options dialog to find the previously defined network shares were still there>

Well that looked like a bit of a bonus so I tried adding a new network share:

Strike 3 and Out

Sorry Copernic, this was essential for me and I am not paying $49.95 when there are other free products that will do the job, so unfortunately Copernic Desktop Search 3 you are out

ProReviewer Conclusions

I am always disappointed, frustrated and sometimes a little angry when free products are crippled or become a paid offering. That said commercial organizations have to make decisions on the financial viability and alternative income streams that they get through free products. The difficulty that I see in all of this is that there are often good alternatives and sometimes you find the free alternatives are better than the paid for product. When that happens not only have you lost a customer but you have shown your competitors are better and for free.

As I said in the opening I will be looking at Windows Search 4 and will revisit some of the other free search software programs in the next few days. The worse case scenario is reinstalling Copernic 2 for the time being.

What Other Posts are Relevant?

Why You Want to Use Portable Freeware Applications

TaskSwitchXP – So Much More Than a Task Changer

Cuil Search Engine Maybe Not So "Cool" Yet

DonationCoder Freeware Utilities

What are the Tags?

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

If you keep up to date with Tech news you will know there has been a lot written about the impending release of the “Google Browser” Google Chrome over the last couple of days. Well now the Beta version (another Google everlasting beta? ) has been released to the world and ProReviewer has grabbed a copy to see what it does.

Why Would You Want It?

Google have done some clever pre-release marketing and in particular a comic strip talking about what \Google Chrome offers. It clearly takes on may of the great aspects of other browsers such as Firefox, Opera and Safari as well as making sure it has MS Internet Explorer * well in its sights. The particular aspects that appeal to me are the “sandboxing” of individual tabs (well it seems to be websites) so that if they crash or a script won’t complete it doesn’t crash or freeze the browser. A Task Manager for the browser to display information about the individual tabs and allow their termination. Other aspects related to search and history within the address bar or “Omnibar” reflect what the “opposition” is currently providing.

I have very gone through being slightly disappointed to indifferent to quite excited about Google Chrome over the last hour as I have experimented with its capabilities.I still realize that I am, at present, a “Dyed in the Wool” fan of Firefox 3 Portable and it will take a lot of development and add-ons (will there be any? ) to make me consider Google Chrome as my browser of choice. However, if their is a portable version with the current functionality I would certainly add it to my Portable Apps toolbox.

Screenshot Tour

Rather than follow the normal ProReviewer review template this post will take the form of a (similar) series of screenshots with notes.

Click on any screenshot to enlarge if necessary

Installation

Standard installer progress window

Installer Welcome and Customization:

About

More About What it Does in Detail:

Go to Page 2 for more details and screenshots

(This is where all the detail is so don’t miss it)

Go to Page 3 for ProReviewer Summary

(see Page Navigation below)

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

The long awaited development of a portable version of the cross platform music (media) player has now reached the stage of a “Development Test Release”

The Songbird website http://www.getsongbird.com/ describes Songbird as:

The Open Music Player

Songbird is an open-source customizable music player that’s under active development.

We’re working on creating a non-proprietary, cross platform, extensible tool that will help enable new ways to playback, manage, and discover music. There are lots of ways to contribute your time to the project. We’d love your help!

There are several features we’re proud of, but we’ll be the first to admit that others need ironing out, are experimental, or are just plain missing. There’s still a lot to do.

Visit the Songbird site for more details on all the functions, options and Add-ons available for the player.

PortableApps.com has now released the test development release with only the following note:

Release Notes:

Development Test 1 (2008-08-28): Initial release

Enjoy.

There are a few comments appended to the post at PortableApps.com but little feedback as yet against this very recent release date of 28 August 2008.

I f you want to give it a try the download link is available at PortableApps.com Songbird Portable 0.7 Development Test 1 the download is 19.3MB and the ”installed” size is 56.2MB.

I haven’t tried it as yet but I have been waiting quite some time for this portable version to see what it will do. I am sure any feedback will be very welcome at PortableApps

What Other Posts are Relevant?

Why You Want to Use Portable Freeware Applications

Freecom ToughDrive 2.5" – Strong and Reliable Pocket Sized Storage

Use a Laptop as a Cheap & Silent Media Center or Extender

TIP – Format a USB Flash Drive for Speed or File Size – What’s Best and How to Overcome Some Problems

A Better Way to Run Windows and Linux Together

What are the Tags?

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Today I receive a notification box for Google Calendar Sync on my main PC so I duly said yes to the update offer and it installed flawlessly.

I have previously posted Google Calendar Sync Test – Very Good But Not Perfect which gave a review of version 0.9.2.8 which gives details of some of the problems I found. (See the post for details )

A quick visit to the Google Calendar FAQ site didn’t reveal any details of what has been changed but a visit to the Google Calendar Forum resulted in finding a post that listed current issues:

Google Calendar Guide – Known Issues with Google Calendar Sync

Just to re-iterate, the team is aware of the many reports from people
having a variety of issues with Google Calendar Sync. It’s not
feasible for me to respond to individual threads but I’ve seen some
requests for a bit of insight into which specific issues the team is
hard at work resolving:

- Some users experience Outlook crashing when syncing.
- Events end up in Outlook’s “Deleted items” folder.
- User receives error message “Please connect to the internet”
although properly connected to internet.
- Message “Google Calendar Sync supports Microsoft Outlook 2003 and
2007 only” displays even when supported Outlook version is being used.
- User sees “Error syncing your calendar” message and no events are
transferred.

Other issues that have come up:

- Error message “You have outdated time zone information.” – Please
see info in FAQ section of Help Group.
- Certain events not transferring from Outlook to Google Calendar. -
This can occur if the email address used for Outlook isn’t the same as
your Google Account email address.
- Duplicate events appear after syncing. – We’ve seen this issue arise
when third-party sync apps are being used simultaneously with Google
Calendar Sync.

Don’t worry if your concern isn’t addressed by this list…we’re aware
of other reports too.

Thanks for your continued patience.

A quick check revealed that there were no obvious changes to options and that the update must therefore be dealing with one or more of the issues listed.

I ran a test on my home Outlook and the main problem I have with some appointments not being synchronised has not been resolved.

Other Useful Links

Google Calendar Sync: Getting Started

Known Issues page

Google Calendar Help Group

What Other Posts are Relevant?

Google Calendar Sync Test – Very Good But Not Perfect

GTD – Getting Things Done

News – Google Calendar Sync Released – Sync with Outlook & More

What are the Tags?

Technorati Tags: Freeware, Getting Things Done, Google, GTD, Impartial Review, Independent Review, Outlook, Pro Reviewer, ProReviewer, Utilities, Web Applications, Windows, Windows XP, Firefox

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Apologies to my regular readers who visited the site in the last couple of days, particularly those of you expecting the report on my testing of Google Calendar Sync. Those of you who visited may have noticed some problems with the page layout and missing icons or pictures. What turned out to be a relatively small file in one of the server directories caused me huge problems.

The Problem

I could not access the blog through the Admin interface which is used to manage the blog in all sorts of ways. Posting, managing comments, setting options, adding and removing plugins which provide additional functions, etc. So although readers were seeing minor problems their were major ones behind the scenes. As I though it was a plugin that I had recently added that streamlined the use of the admin interface I started there but had to work through the server file interface rather than the blog admin interface. Anyway, having moved files to temporary folders, deleted files, checked file permissions and done all sorts of other things one of my Google searches turned up an obscure solution. Which pointed me in the right direction. To cut a long story short there was an .htaccess file in the plugins directory with 4 lines in it that was the cause of the problem. I renamed this and hey-presto I had access to the admin panel again .

All then I had to do then was put back together everything as it was before, one step at a time and checking each step in case on of the plugins was creating the rogue file. This took a very long time

In retrospect I should have resorted to installing the last site backup but hey you live and learn .

The Happy Event

My first grandson was born yesterday (I already have two granddaughters). They light up my life.

Other Relevant Posts

GTD – Getting Things Done

News – Google Calendar Sync Released – Sync with Outlook & More

10 Ways to Save & Protect Your Data – Even files You Just Saved or Text You Just Typed

Technorati Tags: Freeware, Getting Things Done, Google, GTD, Impartial Review, Independent Review, Outlook, Pro Reviewer, ProReviewer, Utilities, Windows, Windows XP, Backup

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

There are many possibilities for running Windows and Linux on the same PC, andLinux provides an exciting new alternative which seems to give the best of both worlds!

There must be many people like me who want to run Linux, see what it’s all about, is it a real viable alternative to Windows for me and how good are the applications. What has put me off is the degree of effort required to set it up and try it when I have to use Windows for my day job, I have 20 years of experience and knowledge so I am comfortable with Windows, I know its strengths and weaknesses, I know what I can do and not do, I know what applications work for me and what they do (and don’t). This is a massive investment of time and memory, the thought of trying to do it all again while exciting, I love the new and unexplored, the thrill of new knowledge, it is all rather overwhelming. There is also the risk of it all going horribly wrong somewhere (Windows manages this quite well on its own at times!). Even with a good backup strategy and recent backups, which you would be very foolish not to employ under any situation, let alone an installation and environment like this. There is a lot of time and effort in checking that everything is there when restoring backups so best avoided if possible.

Up until recently the alternatives to using Linux and Windows at the same time have been:

• Have two separate PC’s one for each system. This has the advantage of completely separating the OS’s and avoiding potential disasters with one system effecting the other or your data..
• You can install both on a single PC and have a dual boot system. This is a rather inelegant and time consuming solution as you have to shut down one system and then boot the other. Also the dangers of corruption of data or one OS by the other greatly increases .
• You can install Virtualization software such as VMWare or VirtualBox and then install Linux in inside. A better solution but the communication between the virtual system and the native PC hardware/system can create issues in being able to create the same experience as a system installed directly to the PC.
• You can use WINE to run Windows applications in a Linux environment. (But I approach this from the view of a Windows user wanting to run Linux)

Now there is a better solution

Quoting from the andLinux.org website:

Introduction

andLinux is a complete Ubuntu Linux system running seamlessly in Windows 2000 based systems (2000, XP, 2003, Vista; 32-bit versions only). This project was started for Dynamism for the GP2X community, but its userbase far exceeds its original design. andLinux is free and will remain so, but donations are greatly needed.

andLinux uses CoLinux as its core which is confusing for many people. CoLinux is a port of the Linux kernel to Windows. Although this technology is a bit like running Linux in a virtual machine, CoLinux differs itself by being more of a merger of Windows and the Linux kernel and not an emulated PC, making it more efficient. Xming is used as X server and PulseAudio as sound server.

andLinux is not just for development and runs almost all Linux applications without modification.

Visit the andLinux website for more information, including screenshots, FAQ, Downloads and an installation guide. There is also a Forum which appears top be quite active.

There are two versions of andLinux Beta 1 rc6 (02/12/2008) currently available:

• Minimal – XFCE version – 143 MB
• Full – KDE version – 665 MB

The following information is also from andLinux:

Requirements

• OS: Windows 2000 / XP / 2003 / Vista (currently only the 32-bit versions are supported)
• Memory: at least 128 MB (192 MB or more is recommended)
  Note that you should have enough memory left for Windows (at least 128 MB for Windows 2000 / XP / 2003; at least 512 MB for Windows Vista)!
• Hard disk space: 2.5 GB (XFCE version) / 4.5 GB (KDE version)
  Note that you need an NTFS file system (which is default since Windows 2000) because you can’t create files larger than 2 GB on FAT(32) file systems!
• A good internet connection (to be able to install further applications via apt-get / Synaptic)
• Some basic Linux skills to proceed once andLinux is installed

What you will get

You will get:

• a fully functional Linux system, however without the usual desktop (you’ve already got one from Windows)
• a second panel (e.g. at the top of your Windows desktop) or a second start menu (in the system tray next to the clock), from which you can start Linux applications
• Linux applications and Windows applications can be used simultaneously and you can cut and paste text between them
• apt / Synaptic to install further applications

You will NOT get:

• another desktop
• the bench of applications that usually ship with Linux distributions (you have to fetch whatever you want)
• a printer driver
• trouble with further drivers

Security warning: It is recommended to use andLinux only on single-user-PCs or in a trustworthy environment because the communication with the X-Server and the launcher is not secured, i.e., every user who can login to Windows can access andLinux.

andLinux has me excited about giving it a try so that I have an easy way to dip in and out of the Linux experience quickly and easily. I will be posting a review of how this goes in the near future.

Another useful resource is this post on Lifehacker Seamlessly Run Linux…… . This gives a brief background to Linux and then lots of information and screenshots on installing andLinux..

Technorati Tags: Freeware, Linux, News, Operating System, Windows, Windows XP, Virualization, VMWare, VirualBox

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

SkyDrive Team blog:

February 21

Welcome to the bigger, better, faster SkyDrive!

We know it’s been mighty quiet on the SkyDrive blog, but we’ve been hard at work on a new version that we’re proud to announce today!

You’ve made two things clear since our first release: You want more space; and you want SkyDrive where you are. Today we’re giving you both. You now have five times the space you had before — that’s 5GB of free online storage for your favorite documents, pictures, and other files.

SkyDrive is also available now in 38 countries/regions. In addition to Great Britain, India, and the U.S., we’re live in Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Bolivia, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Denmark, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Finland, France, Guatemala, Honduras, Italy, Japan, Mexico, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Norway, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Puerto Rico, Portugal, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, and Turkey.

This is a part of Microsoft’s Windows Live initiative and appears to be a good way of storing and/or exchanging up to 5GB of your precious files online.

Personal experience using other free systems shows that the speed of transfer and limits on free storage capacity combine to make this only part of a strategy for backup or file exchange. The benefits are:

• Ability to access files from anywhere you can get an Internet connection
• Exchange files with others (friends, family, colleagues, etc.)
• Backup of important files away from the location of the originals (safeguard against fire or theft)

I shall be testing this out shortly and providing a review on what I find.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites