class="align-right" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/featured-arduino.jpg" alt="arduino circuit board" />Last time I left you href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/started-arduino-starter-kit-installing-drivers-setting-board-port">having set up your Arduino to work with Mac or Windows, and having uploaded a simple test app that blinked the on-board LED. Today I’m going to explain the code you uploaded, the structure of Arduino software, and a little more about the electronic bits on the board itself.

This article is part of an introduction to the Arduino series. The other articles in the series so far are:

• title="What Is Arduino & What Can You Do With It? [Technology Explained]" href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/arduino-technology-explained/">What is Arduino and what can you do with it?
• title="What’s Included In An Arduino Starter Kit? [MakeUseOf Explains]" href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/whats-included-arduino-starter-kit-makeuseof-explains/">What is an Arduino starter kit and what does it contain?
• href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/8-cool-components-arduino-projects/">More cool components to buy with your starter kit
• href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/started-arduino-starter-kit-installing-drivers-setting-board-port/">Getting Started With Your Arduino Starter Kit – Installing Drivers & Setting Up The Board & Port

The Hardware

Let’s take a closer look at what the Arduino Uno has in terms of bits on the circuit board.

Here’s an enlarged diagram to refer to:

class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/ArduinoUnoFront1.jpg" alt="arduino circuit board" width="580" height="440" />

• Along the top, there are 14 digital Input/Output pins (numbered 0-13). These are the most versatile pins on your Arduino and can function as either input or output, and will form the core of your projects. Digital means that the signal these pins can write or read will be on or off.

• 6 of those digital pins, which are marked by the tilde sign ~ are capable of doing what it is called href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pulse-width_modulation">Pulse Width Modulation. I’m not an electrical engineer so I won’t embarrass myself by explaining the science behind this, but to you and I it means we can provide a range of output levels – for instance, dimming an LED or driving a motor at varying speeds.

• Pin 13 is special in that it has a built-in LED. This is for convenience and testing purposes only really. You can use that on-board LED, as you did in the Blink example app, by simply outputting to pin 13 – or it can be used as a standard I/O pin.

• On the bottom right are 6 analog input pins. These will read the value of analog sensors such a light-meter or variable resistors.

• On the bottom left next to the analog input pins are power pins. The only ones you really need to worry about are the ground pins (GND), 3.3v, and 5v power lines.

• Finally, the only switch found on the Arduino is a reset switch. This will restart whatever program it has in its memory.

• The Arduino has a set amount of memory, and if your program goes too large, the compiler will give you an error.

The Structure Of An Arduino Program

Every Arduino program is made up of at least two functions (if you don’t know what a function is, be sure to read my title="The Absolute Basics Of Programming For Beginners (Pt. 2)" href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/absolute-basics-programming-beginners-part-2/">basic programming tutorial, part 2 – function and control statements, and title="The Basics Of Computer Programming 101 – Variables And DataTypes" href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/basics-of-computer-programming-variables-datatypes/">part 1 where we discussed variables before continuing).

The first is the setup function. This is run initially – once only – and is used to tell the Arduino what is connected and where, as well as initialising any variables you might need in your program.

Second is the loop. This is the core of every Arduino program. When the Arduino is running, after the setup function has completed, the loop will run through all the code, then do the whole thing again – until either either the power is lost or the reset switch is pressed. The length of time it takes to complete one full loop depends upon the code contained. You may write some code that says “wait 6 hours”, in which case the loop isn’t going to be repeating very often.

Here’s a quick state diagram to illustrate:

class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/arduino-state-diagram.png" alt="arduino circuit board" width="544" height="362" />

Examining The Blink Program

Take a look back at the Blink program code and identify the setup and loop functions.

Here’s the setup: />

void setup() { /> // initialize the digital pin as an output. /> // Pin 13 has an LED connected on most Arduino boards: /> pinMode(13, OUTPUT); /> }

The lines that begin with // are simply comments to explain the code to a human reader, and they don’t get uploaded to the Arduino. So in fact, there’s only one line of setup code in this particular Arduino app. That line is saying “Set pin 13 to output mode”. 13, remember, is the built-in LED.

Then there is the loop: />

void loop() { /> digitalWrite(13, HIGH); // set the LED on /> delay(1000); // wait for a second /> digitalWrite(13, LOW); // set the LED off /> delay(1000); // wait for a second /> }

The comments at the end of each line of code explain their function quite well. HIGH and LOW refer to the ON and OFF state of a digital output – in our case the LED. You could actually write ON or OFF in the code too, both are synonymous (as is 0 and 1 also). Delay tells the Arduino to wait for a bit, in this case 1000 milliseconds (or 1 second).

Finally, a note about the programming language used here. Notice that both setup and loop functions have the word void before them. This is a special word for nothing, because the function returns nothing when it is called – it simply runs the code contained within. For now, let’s leave it at that by saying that the function’s block of code is enclosed by curly braces { }, and that each line of code must end with a ; semi-colon.

Try altering the basic program somehow by changing the precise delay values to something larger or smaller. See how small you can get it down to before the flashing is no longer noticeable. Work out which value to change to get it to stay on for longer, or to stay off for longer. Try adding some more digitalWrite and delay statements into the loop function to create a more complex flashing pattern like the href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SOS">morse code for SOS. If you have a buzzer, try connecting it to pins 13 and GND too (hint: the red wire goes to 13, black to ground).

That’s all for today. Next time we’ll add in some more LEDs and write our own application from scratch. As ever, comments and shares much appreciated. I can’t imagine you’d have any problems with the code referred to today, but if you’ve tried adjusting the code slightly and are running into errors or unexpected behaviour, feel free to post it in the comments and we’ll see if we can work through it together.

View full post on MakeUseOf

class="align-right" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/featured-arduino.jpg" alt="arduino circuit board" />Last time I left you href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/started-arduino-starter-kit-installing-drivers-setting-board-port">having set up your Arduino to work with Mac or Windows, and having uploaded a simple test app that blinked the on-board LED. Today I’m going to explain the code you uploaded, the structure of Arduino software, and a little more about the electronic bits on the board itself.

This article is part of an introduction to the Arduino series. The other articles in the series so far are:

• title="What Is Arduino & What Can You Do With It? [Technology Explained]" href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/arduino-technology-explained/">What is Arduino and what can you do with it?
• title="What’s Included In An Arduino Starter Kit? [MakeUseOf Explains]" href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/whats-included-arduino-starter-kit-makeuseof-explains/">What is an Arduino starter kit and what does it contain?
• href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/8-cool-components-arduino-projects/">More cool components to buy with your starter kit
• href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/started-arduino-starter-kit-installing-drivers-setting-board-port/">Getting Started With Your Arduino Starter Kit – Installing Drivers & Setting Up The Board & Port

The Hardware

Let’s take a closer look at what the Arduino Uno has in terms of bits on the circuit board.

Here’s an enlarged diagram to refer to:

class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/ArduinoUnoFront1.jpg" alt="arduino circuit board" width="580" height="440" />

• Along the top, there are 14 digital Input/Output pins (numbered 0-13). These are the most versatile pins on your Arduino and can function as either input or output, and will form the core of your projects. Digital means that the signal these pins can write or read will be on or off.

• 6 of those digital pins, which are marked by the tilde sign ~ are capable of doing what it is called href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pulse-width_modulation">Pulse Width Modulation. I’m not an electrical engineer so I won’t embarrass myself by explaining the science behind this, but to you and I it means we can provide a range of output levels – for instance, dimming an LED or driving a motor at varying speeds.

• Pin 13 is special in that it has a built-in LED. This is for convenience and testing purposes only really. You can use that on-board LED, as you did in the Blink example app, by simply outputting to pin 13 – or it can be used as a standard I/O pin.

• On the bottom right are 6 analog input pins. These will read the value of analog sensors such a light-meter or variable resistors.

• On the bottom left next to the analog input pins are power pins. The only ones you really need to worry about are the ground pins (GND), 3.3v, and 5v power lines.

• Finally, the only switch found on the Arduino is a reset switch. This will restart whatever program it has in its memory.

• The Arduino has a set amount of memory, and if your program goes too large, the compiler will give you an error.

The Structure Of An Arduino Program

Every Arduino program is made up of at least two functions (if you don’t know what a function is, be sure to read my title="The Absolute Basics Of Programming For Beginners (Pt. 2)" href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/absolute-basics-programming-beginners-part-2/">basic programming tutorial, part 2 – function and control statements, and title="The Basics Of Computer Programming 101 – Variables And DataTypes" href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/basics-of-computer-programming-variables-datatypes/">part 1 where we discussed variables before continuing).

The first is the setup function. This is run initially – once only – and is used to tell the Arduino what is connected and where, as well as initialising any variables you might need in your program.

Second is the loop. This is the core of every Arduino program. When the Arduino is running, after the setup function has completed, the loop will run through all the code, then do the whole thing again – until either either the power is lost or the reset switch is pressed. The length of time it takes to complete one full loop depends upon the code contained. You may write some code that says “wait 6 hours”, in which case the loop isn’t going to be repeating very often.

Here’s a quick state diagram to illustrate:

class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/arduino-state-diagram.png" alt="arduino circuit board" width="544" height="362" />

Examining The Blink Program

Take a look back at the Blink program code and identify the setup and loop functions.

Here’s the setup: />

void setup() { /> // initialize the digital pin as an output. /> // Pin 13 has an LED connected on most Arduino boards: /> pinMode(13, OUTPUT); /> }

The lines that begin with // are simply comments to explain the code to a human reader, and they don’t get uploaded to the Arduino. So in fact, there’s only one line of setup code in this particular Arduino app. That line is saying “Set pin 13 to output mode”. 13, remember, is the built-in LED.

Then there is the loop: />

void loop() { /> digitalWrite(13, HIGH); // set the LED on /> delay(1000); // wait for a second /> digitalWrite(13, LOW); // set the LED off /> delay(1000); // wait for a second /> }

The comments at the end of each line of code explain their function quite well. HIGH and LOW refer to the ON and OFF state of a digital output – in our case the LED. You could actually write ON or OFF in the code too, both are synonymous (as is 0 and 1 also). Delay tells the Arduino to wait for a bit, in this case 1000 milliseconds (or 1 second).

Finally, a note about the programming language used here. Notice that both setup and loop functions have the word void before them. This is a special word for nothing, because the function returns nothing when it is called – it simply runs the code contained within. For now, let’s leave it at that by saying that the function’s block of code is enclosed by curly braces { }, and that each line of code must end with a ; semi-colon.

Try altering the basic program somehow by changing the precise delay values to something larger or smaller. See how small you can get it down to before the flashing is no longer noticeable. Work out which value to change to get it to stay on for longer, or to stay off for longer. Try adding some more digitalWrite and delay statements into the loop function to create a more complex flashing pattern like the href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SOS">morse code for SOS. If you have a buzzer, try connecting it to pins 13 and GND too (hint: the red wire goes to 13, black to ground).

That’s all for today. Next time we’ll add in some more LEDs and write our own application from scratch. As ever, comments and shares much appreciated. I can’t imagine you’d have any problems with the code referred to today, but if you’ve tried adjusting the code slightly and are running into errors or unexpected behaviour, feel free to post it in the comments and we’ll see if we can work through it together.

View full post on MakeUseOf

class="align-right" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/spotifylogo.jpg" alt="" />For everyone who has been waiting patiently to get into Spotify but couldn’t get an invite, fear not because the wait is finally over. Spotify is now available for anyone to join without an invite, if you live in the US, UK, Finland, France, Norway, Netherlands, Spain and Sweden. Simply head over to href="http://www.spotify.com">Spotify, register for a free account and you will be ready to go.

Spotify offers three plans, one is free, one costs $5 a month and the last costs $10 a month. The free plan allows users to stream music with ads. The $5 plan removes ads and time limits from the site. The $10 plan removes everything, and allows users to download the music from the service and play it on a personal device without being connected to the Internet.

According to MacWorld, in Europe where Spotify has some 50 million subscribers, only 1 million of those opt for the paid portion of the service. Clearly the free option is the most popular, and now that Spotify is available to all in the USA I don’t see those figures changing. The $10 price point is right on par with similar music streaming services, so I would expect them to be competitive with them.

class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/spoty.png" alt="" width="502" height="410" />

If you are interested in checking out Spotify, href="http://www.spotify.com">go sign up and let us know in the comments how you like it.

Source: href="http://www.macworld.com/article/162465/2011/09/spotify_music_service_opens_to_all.html#lsrc.rss_main" rel="nofollow">MacWorld

View full post on MakeUseOf

class="align-right" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/dashexpander.png" alt="text expansion mac" />Text expansion programs have been around for quite a while now, and are probably most used by advanced computer users and writers. Programs like TextExpander, TypeIt4Me, and Typinator (which is what I use) are huge time savers when it comes to typing frequently used words, phrases, or letters. But I still come across people who have never heard of these programs, or who don’t quite understand their value.

If you are a Mac user and have never used a text expansion application before, a new program aptly called href="http://kapeli.com/dashexpander/">DashExpander can help you type much faster and work more efficiently. DashExpander does not have the advanced professional features of the programs listed above, but it is useful if you don’t already have such a program installed on your Mac or if you only have a limited need for one.

How It Works

All text expansion Mac programs work similarly in that they automatically replace an abbreviation that you type with an assigned snippet, such as a word, phrase or entire paragraph. So when I want to type my name, for example, I type the abbreviations “bkc”, and Typinator replaces that abbreviation with my full name. DashExpander works the same way with a few unique features of its own.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" style="border: 0pt none;" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/mzl.vtmcegmt.800x500-75.jpg" alt="text expansion mac" width="580" height="362" border="0" />

DashExpander has four main parts – a window for an abbreviation, another window for the corresponding text expansion, a quick search window, and a sliding panel for your assigned tags. DashExpander provides a fairly useful tutorial for getting started with the program, but let’s go through a few samples step-by-step.

If you haven’t already done so, download DashExpander from the Mac Store and install it on your Mac, which must be running OS X Lion. To quickly see the program in action, launch TextEdit, or a similar application and type the abbreviation, “hhello“. DashExpander will replace what you just typed with the words, “Hi there!”. While this is not the best example of what DashExpander can do, it does show how typing one abbreviation saves you the trouble of typing two separate words.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" style="border: 0pt none;" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/screenshot1142.png" alt="text expansion mac" width="396" height="212" border="0" />

If you start each of your e-mails with the same greeting, such as “how are you?“, then you could create a text expansion–assigning your greeting with say a three letter abbreviation like “hwy.” This is a safe abbreviation because no words in English language begins with these three letters.

Adding Expansions

Open DashExpander from your menu bar, or by typing the keyword shortcut Option+Space bar. If DashExpander’s expansion editor opens with an existing snippet, simply ignore it and click on the “Add New Snippet” at the bottom of the editor.

To make the process easier, I suggest you first type the word(s) that you want to be expanded  in the larger box of DashExpander. Your expansion can be as short or as long as you would like.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" style="border: 0pt none;" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/screenshot1151.png" alt="text expansion mac" width="580" height="399" border="0" />

Now assign your snippet an abbreviation, which should be a group of letters or words that you can remember for that expansion. Try to make the abbreviation represent the expansion as closely as possible. So if the expansion is a template thank you letter, then the abbreviation might be “tthankyou” or “tty“.

After your expansion and abbreviation are set up, you can use the tagging feature to organize and categorize your snippets.

Advanced Expansions

DashExpander includes a unique feature for adding text to an expansion before it is pasted into a document. For this type of snippet, you set up an expansion as described above, but in places where you want to add unique text, you type a placeholder, surrounding it with four underscores, as shown in the sample below.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" style="border: 0pt none;" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/muoscreenshot89.png" alt="text expansion mac" width="580" height="393" border="0" />

When you type your assigned abbreviation, DashExpander will present a text editing window in which you can add the custom words or names to your snippet before it’s pasted.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" style="border: 0pt none;" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/screenshot1148.png" alt="text expansion applications" width="491" height="174" border="0" />

You can navigate from one placeholder to the next by pressing the Return or Tab key.

DashExpander’s snippet management features are limited when compared to more advanced programs, so you will definitely want to tag each of your snippets. To open and close the Tags panel, click on the tiny cloud icon on the left side of DashExpander. Try to use tags that will group together similar snippets.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" style="border: 0pt none;" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/muoscreenshot861.png" alt="text expansion applications" width="390" height="325" border="0" />

Dropbox Sync

Another great feature of DashExpander is Dropbox synchronization. This means that if you want to use DashExpander on two or more different Macs, you can synchronize your snippets between them using your Dropbox account.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" style="border: 0pt none;" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/screenshot1144.png" alt="text expansion mac" width="496" height="162" border="0" />

To use your Dropbox account, click on the gear button on the right side of DashExpander. In the pop-up window you can change the location of the DashExpander file to a Dropbox folder. You will of course use the same Dropbox folder for each Mac.

There are several features missing from DashExpander, such as the ability to only activate an expansion only after the spacebar is pressed, or to make some expansions only work in specified applications.

Despite its limitations, DashExpander is a great text expansion mac program for learning how to use text expansion in your workflow. If you like the program, please consider rating the app in the Mac App Store where it can be downloaded for free. And let us know what you think of it.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" style="border: 0pt none;" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/2011-09-12_1537.png" alt="text expansion mac" width="517" height="184" border="0" />

In a follow-up article, I will share some other different ways you might use DashExpander or a similar program. If you’re a Linux user, check out this MUO href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/goodbye-repetitive-typing-linux-autokey/">article about the text expansion program, Autokey.

View full post on MakeUseOf

class="align-right" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/MagicBossKey04.png" alt="magic boss key" />Computers are great tools that we use day in and day out for work and play. Often it’s hard to keep the two separate. So we end up checking Facebook at work, sneak in a little work email at home, and research the perfect birthday gift while the prospective recipient is watching TV right next to us. So what do you do when you suddenly find someone’s attention shifting to you, while you’re working on something you don’t want them to see? You need a quick way to hide the confidential material in an unsuspicious way! href="http://www.magictweak.com/freeutil/magicboss/magicboss.php?ref=mgboss_install">Magic Boss Key is your solution.

The tool can come in handy in a number of situations. You may use it to conceal extracurricular tasks at school, hide classified documents when a nosy colleague comes in to disturb, or keep generally keep your browsing habits private.

While you can use the [WINDOWS] + [D] keyboard shortcut to minimize everything and reveal only the desktop, Magic Boss Key actually hides only selected items. With the click of a single hot key, your choice of open windows disappears, for example running applications, browser windows, or open folders. At the same time, you can also hide desktop icons, the taskbar, and mute the sound.

class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/MagicBossKey03.png" border="0" alt="magic boss key" />

The setup is straightforward. When you launch Magic Boss Key, you will see a list of currently open windows. Simply check all the ones you want to be hidden when you click the hot key and you are essentially done. The trick is to leave some harmless windows unchecked and hence open, so that your desktop will not be suspiciously blank in case of an emergency.

class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/MagicBossKey01.png" border="0" alt="boss key" />

Remember to minimize the Magic Boss Key window, and then continue with your secret mission. Magic Boss Key automatically minimizes to the tray. Selecting the program window itself to be hidden doesn’t do too much or the behavior is buggy at best. The program remains visible in the tray, so it is recommended that you edit your system tray to hide this item.

Since some windows, although hidden, might still sit in the system tray, for example Magic Boss Key itself, or are pinned to the taskbar, you might want to hide the taskbar altogether. Click the > Options button and personalize the settings. Within the options window you can also pick your favorite hot key. You can choose between the [F12] button or the [Windows] button + left / right mouse button. Clicking the hot key again, will restore the hidden windows.

class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/MagicBossKey02.png" border="0" alt="magic boss key" />

While you’re on your secret mission, you may open more windows that you will want to hide. To get a fresh list of open windows in Magic Boss Key, click the > Refresh button. Note that your previous selection will be lost, so you essentially start over.

Taken together, Magic Boss Key is an easy to use tool with a simple interface and plain options. It could be a little better if hiding the tray icon of the program itself would work and if it was possible to launch the program with some windows preset to be hidden, for example specific applications like the browser or an instant messenger. Overall, however, it simply works.

If Magic Boss Key sounds interesting, but is not quite what you are looking for, check out the following articles:

• title="How To Quickly Hide Your Web Surfing From The Boss!" href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/how-to-quickly-hide-your-web-surfing-from-the-boss/">How To Quickly Hide Your Web Surfing From The Boss!
• title="8 Tools That Will Make You a Procrastination Ninja at Work" href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/8-tools-procrastination-ninja-work/">8 Tools That Will Make You a Procrastination Ninja at Work

How do you conceal your secret computer missions from spying eyes?

Image credits: title="Spying Office Worker" rel="nofollow" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/cat.mhtml?lang=en&search_source=search_form&version=llv1&anyorall=all&safesearch=1&searchterm=hide+monitor&search_group=&orient=&search_cat=&searchtermx=&photographer_name=&people_gender=&people_age=&people_ethnicity=&people_number=&commercial_ok=&color=&show_color_wheel=1#id=60607915&src=b449c9dad2d0c17708bef5d2c57342ec-1-4">PashOK />
/>Need Assistance? Ask questions to MakeUseOf staff and thousands of other readers on href="http://www.makeuseof.dev/answers/" target="_blank" >MakeUseOf Answers!

/>

 

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style="border: 0px none;margin-left:20px;float:right;" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/pinta-icon.png" alt="free image editing software"/> href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tags/gimp/">GIMP lovers may disagree, but the world’s needed a GTK photo editor with an easy-to-understand interface for a while. Featuring layers, various effects and good old fashioned editing functions, Pinta is the photo editor missing on Linux systems, as well as Windows and OS X. Think Paint.net, but cross-platform.

But even if you don’t use Linux, you just might find Pinta to be your new favorite free image editor. It’s fast, functional and gets the job done. If you’ve used Paint.net, or even Photoshop before, you’ll probably not have any trouble finding anything. But if you haven’t, consider Pinta a fantastic introduction to what photo editing software can do that’s not too cofusing to use.

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Toolkit

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" style="border: 0pt none;" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/pinta-basic.jpg" alt="free image editing software" />

Fire up Pinta for the first time and the interface will largely look familar. It’s not that different, at first glace, from Microsoft Paint: toolkit on the left, layers and history on the right, image in the center.

The toolkit should be familar to you, even if the only photo editing tool you’ve ever used is Microsoft Paint. If not, don’t worry: hovering over a given tool will cause a helpful popup to appear:

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" style="border: 0pt none;" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/pinta-tooltip.png" />

The menu is also worth browsing; you’ll find many useful things there. Rotating the image, viewing options, and various effects all await you.

You can also adjust the curves and colors, which is very useful should you need to correct a photo in this regard:

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" style="border: 0pt none;" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/pinta-curves.png" alt="image editing programs"/>

I could go on, but it’s best to just fire up the program and explore yourself. I highly recommend playing with the various effects to get an idea of what’s possible. Whether you want to make your photo look like an oil painting or just remove red eye from a family portrait, there’s lots to explore there.

Layers

If you’ve ever really gotten into photo editing, you know that layers are essential. Whether you’re trying to add elements to photos or simply stylize, the concept of layers become crucial very quickly. Pinta supports this, putting it above the simplest image editing software.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" style="border: 0pt none;" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/pinta-layers.png" alt="image editing programs"/>

Even with this seeming complexity, however, Pinta is a piece of software the average computer user should have no trouble at all using. Even the way layers is done is very easy to understand and use, if you experiment with it.

History

Another indispensable tool for image editing is your history. This allows you to see all the changes you’ve made while editing your image, and to roll them back at will.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" style="border: 0pt none;" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/pinta-history.png" alt="free image editing software"/>

This is self-explanatory, but very important if you like to experiment a great deal with your images. Note, however, that the current release of Pinta stores you entire history in the RAM, meaning this program will take up a lot of memory very quickly.

Installing Pinta

Want to get started? Head over the href="http://pinta-project.com/">Pinta’s official web site. You’ll find installation files for Ubuntu, Mac and Windows, which is the best way to get started.

The currrent incarnation of Pinta is only the beginning, so if you’re not quite happy with what you see here be sure to check back again in a couple of months. Dynamic projects like this can be a lot of fun to watch, and really represent the power of open source at its best!

Oh, and if you’re a Linux user not quite dedicated to the idea of installation, I highly recommend you download the program over at href="http://portablelinuxapps.org/">PortableLinuxApps.org. It’s the href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/portable-linux-apps-work-linux-distro/">place to find Linux downloads the work on every distro, and it couldn’t be easier to use.

So, what do you think of Pinta? Please share in the comments below. Also feel free to represent other free image editing programs, because I and our readers always love to learn about new software! />
/>Got Questions? Ask Them Now FREE on href="http://www.makeuseof.com/answers/">MakeUseOf Answers! />
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class="align-left" style="border: 0px none; margin-left: 20px; margin-top: 5px; float: right;" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/intro4.png" alt="" width="300" height="83" />Note-taking applications, such as class="vt-p" href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/5-alternatives-synchronize-multiplatform-quick-notes/">Evernote, Simplenote, etc. abound, each with pros and cons, but most work tailored to a specific need. Want to add stickies to your documents? There’s class="vt-p" href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/attach-notes-document-gumnotes/">GumNotes. Want to access your notes anywhere but don’t want them on your hard/flash drives? class="vt-p" href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/3-cool-ways-sticky-notes-online/">Here class="vt-p" href="http://www.makeuseof.com/dir/wrttn-fast-note-taking/">are class="vt-p" href="http://www.makeuseof.com/dir/shrib-quickly-notes-save-online-securely/">some class="vt-p" href="http://www.makeuseof.com/dir/walnote-keeping-notes-online/">web-based class="vt-p" href="http://www.makeuseof.com/dir/jotstore-notes-online-share-easily-securely/">sticky class="vt-p" href="http://www.makeuseof.com/dir/lessmemories-simple-note-taking/">notes applications (my personal favorite is class="vt-p" href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/super-simple-sticky-notes-from-jjot/">Jjot) or you can even try class="vt-p" href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/make-your-own-sticky-notes-with-notepad-windows/">making your own with Notepad.

class="vt-p" href="http://pnotes.sourceforge.net/">PNotes, short for either Pinned Notes or Portable Notes, is a feature-packed sticky notes program, but not just any. It’s a worthy addition to your collection of portable applications as it includes ways to protect your notes, reminder alerts, support for drag and drop of pictures, it’s been translated to class="vt-p" href="http://pnotes.sourceforge.net/index.php?page=3">many languages, etc. Here are some of the more interesting features of PNotes.

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Password-Protect & Encrypt Your Notes

Once you grab the latest version of PNotes, 7.0.107, class="vt-p" href="http://pnotes.sourceforge.net/index.php?page=5">here, you’ll see a lot of options on system tray icon right-click.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/110.png" alt="" width="214" height="570" />

This is perhaps one of the big features that held my attention at first: You can set a password to protect your notes in the Control Panel for PNotes.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/1a.png" alt="" width="499" height="316" />

Once you set it, you’ll be give the option to store your notes as encrypted files, and even hide the program icon from the system tray when it’s locked. Thus, this is probably THE notes program you should have on your flash drive so if your jump drive gets stolen, your precious tidbits of information will be locked away.

Create Notes With Rich-Text Formatting & Add Pictures

You have most options you’d want in rich-text formatting, including ability to insert bullets, change fonts, and even highlight text. What’s also neat is that you can create a new note from the text contents of your clipboard while retaining clickable links.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/2.0.png" alt="" width="580" height="558" />

The feature reminded me of class="vt-p" href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/how-to-sync-notes-with-cintanotes-and-dropbox/">CintaNotes and class="vt-p" href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/quotepad-quick-notes-set-reminders-windows/">QuotePad, applications which allow you to customize a hotkey to create a new note instantly from highlighted text, but of course, PNotes can do it also with just two or three more clicks, and it looks like it bundles a lot more features, like hierarchy of notes, grouping and ability to include images.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/2.2.png" alt="" width="372" height="348" />

While it says in the class="vt-p" href="http://pnotes.sourceforge.net/help/index.html">Help section for the program that you can insert images by copying and pasting them, I couldn’t quite get the copy-paste of images to work (only text was copied).

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/2.11.png" alt="" width="483" height="316" />

Luckily, drag- and dropping pictures worked really well. You can also right-click on each note, then selecting Insert > Insert picture to paste an image from your hard drive. PNotes also has an extensive collection of smilies, which could be useful for the Diary notes. You can set transparency, font, color and size (unless you use a custom skin) defaults for all or individual notes.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/2.3.png" alt="" width="580" height="445" />

Honestly, there are so many customization options that you can spend more time exploring those than actually creating notes. I’d just start writing notes and then customizing things as I go because the defaults might work just fine.

Set Reminders For Any Items

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/34.png" alt="" width="375" height="491" />

You can set reminders or due dates for notes at very specific schedules. You can choose to remind yourself at repeated intervals as well, and whether PNotes should track the overdue items or not.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/3a.png" alt="" width="297" height="404" />

You can also toggle high priority status for individual notes, and sort notes by high priority, completed items, schedule, last saved times, and tags (which you need to define first in PNote’s Control Panel).

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/3b.png" alt="" width="580" height="218" />

Diary Mode

If I can encrypt my notes and/or password-protect them, I’d definitely want to use this program for my journal entries. It’s highly convenient that PNotes also bundles a Diary mode or category, where each entry’s title is automatically populated with the date.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/4.jpg" alt="" width="575" height="472" />

So if you’re wary of publishing your thoughts on Facebook, Twitter or even dedicated journal applications (like class="vt-p" href="http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/keep-a-personal-online-diary-with-penzu/">Penzu) that are still hosted on third-party servers, PNotes can be a good alternative as you can password-protect your note database and encrypt your notes.

Overall, this program has an unbelievable set of features. You can even set hotkeys for hiding and showing your desired group of notes. As someone who relies on keyboard shortcuts a lot, I would like the program even more if it had more keyboard shortcuts than the universal ones for copying, pasting, saving, printing, etc. but I shouldn’t ask too much as this powerful program is being offered for free, and it’s open-source so the developer probably isn’t making much money.

Do you use an offline note application or prefer web-based services, like Evernote? Share your experiences in the comments below! />
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class="align-left" style="border: 0px none; margin-left: 20px; margin-top: 5px; float: right;" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/tinkertoollogo.png" border="0" alt="tinkertoollogo.png" width="230" height="212" />Sometimes Apple, with all its advanced wizardry, overlooks the little things in its operating system that make some of us Mac users scratch our heads and say, “what the heck are they thinking?!”  But rest assured, third party developers come along with awesome applications that help the rest of us tinker around with the system just enough to remain on the safe side of not crashing into a dead end wall.

class="vt-p" href="http://www.bresink.com/osx/TinkerTool.html">Tinkertool is one such application that Mac power users have used for years to make little tweaks to Mac OS X.

id="more-54479"> /> In the words of the developers, Tinkertool

is an application that gives you access to additional preferences settings Apple has built into the Mac OS X. This allows you to activate hidden features in the operating system and in some of the applications delivered with the system.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/tinkertool.png" alt="" width="580" height="406" />

On the Tinkertool‘s class="vt-p" href="http://www.bresink.com/osx/0TinkerTool/details.html">Details page, the developer provides over a hundred system features and settings that Tinkertool can modify, but their documentation for what Tinkertool can do doesn’t illustrate well what many of those changes look like, especially for new and intermediate Mac users. So the purpose of this article is show you some of the changes that might appeal to general users of Tinkertool.

iTunes 10 Tweaks

Let’s start off with the most obvious tweaks you might want Tinkertool to make. In the recent release of iTunes 10, Apple did a makeover of the media player’s interface that some users, including myself, are not too happy about.

Point in case, Apple got rid of the title bar of iTunes and put the close/minimize/expand buttons into a vertical position.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/itunes10before.png" border="0" alt="itunes10before.png" width="479" height="67" />

If you want to bring back the design interface like it was in iTunes 9, all you need to do is check the “Use standard window with title bar and horizontal buttons” box in Tinkertool, log out and log back into your user account, and presto the buttons and title are back where they used to be.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/itunesafter.png" border="0" alt="itunesafter.png" width="546" height="66" />

Among the five other settings, another little iTunes Tinkertool tweak that some users might like is being able to add half-star ratings.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/ituneshalfstars.png" border="0" alt="ituneshalfstars.png" width="330" height="196" />

Finder Tweaks

In the area of Finder tweaks, Tinkertool allows you to show hidden system files, which is something only useful if you know what to do with those files. So otherwise, best leave them alone.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/hiddenfiles.png" border="0" alt="hiddenfiles.png" width="238" height="291" />

But there are some settings that you might find useful, such as the ability to have Quick Look show the insides of folders.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/quicklookstransparent.png" border="0" alt="quicklookstransparent.png" width="600" height="342" />

Also, if you want to remove some of the menu items in Finder, Tinkertool enables you to do that.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/restrictedfinder.png" border="0" alt="restrictedfinder.png" width="561" height="123" />

You can also add “Quit” to the Finder menu, useful for when the Finder is acting ugly and you need to shut it down for a minute.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/quitfinderafter.png" border="0" alt="quitfinderafter.png" width="197" height="269" />

It’s also pretty nice to add scroll arrows at both ends of Finder windows, or you can choose to just put them at the start or the end.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/scrollbar.png" border="0" alt="scrollbar.png" width="118" height="491" />

Dock Tweaks

The only tweak in this area that appealed to me is the ability to add a recent items stack to my dock.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/recentitems.png" border="0" alt="recentitems.png" width="222" height="370" />

Other features include the ability to use spring-loaded tiles, and to disable three-dimensional glass effect, replacing it with a black background – as in the screenshot below. Not very attractive, but it’s an option if you’re trying to do a fancy makeover of your desktop or something.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/disablethreedimensional.png" border="0" alt="disablethreedimensional.png" width="352" height="73" />

QuickTime Tweaks

If you’re in the habit of using QuickTime Player for editing video, Tinkertool enables you to add an Option key setting for editing audio as well video.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/quicktimeaudio.png" border="0" alt="quicktimeaudio.png" width="420" height="74" />

You can also make changes to the QuickTime interface, getting rid of the title bar, and disabling the navigation controls even when the cursor re-enters the window.

Safari Tweaks

One of the best Tinkertool tweaks for Safari is the ability to disable the warning you get when closing a window that includes an unsubmitted form. For me it’s just one less click that I have to make, thanks to Tinkertool.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/Screen-shot-2010-09-21-at-8.55.51-AM.png" border="0" alt="Screen shot 2010-09-21 at 8.55.51 AM.png" width="436" height="163" />

Undos & Resetting

I have only highlighted about a third of the tweaks that Tinkertool can make. If you‘re using the program for the first time, you might feel a little apprehensive about making changes. But based on my tests, any changes you apply can be undone by either relaunching the application or logging out and back in, to apply changes. The instructions for applying and undoing settings are clearly present at the bottom of Tinkertool‘s window.

There’s also a Reset button that puts everything back to default settings.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/reseteverything.png" border="0" alt="reseteverything.png" width="600" height="147" />

In its fourth version, Tinkertool seems to be a pretty stable tool that allows you to do some cool little makeovers in Mac OS X without monkeying around too deeply in hidden territory. In other words, it’s a safe program that you might try just to see what it can do.

If you’re an experienced user of Tinkertool, let us know how you have used the program. What tweaks do you find most useful? />
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class="align-left" style="border: 0px none; margin-left: 20px; margin-top: 5px; float: right;" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/texeditlogo1.png" border="0" alt="word processing software" width="190" height="186" />Though Microsoft Word and Apple’s Page ’09 are both feature-rich word processing software, they may be more than what most Mac users need, especially when Apple‘s TextEdit program comes installed for free in every version of Mac OS X. TextEdit opens twice as fast as Word and Pages, and it provides basic tools for most writing projects.

Here are some suggestions for getting the most out of TextEdit, which of course can be found in the Applications folder of your Mac.

id="more-52640">

Preferences: New Document

Let’s start with TextEdit‘s Preferences. Among other things, you can set the default font and font size settings in Preferences. I believe the default setting is Helvetica 12.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/newdocument.png" border="0" alt="word processing software" width="425" height="580" />

As you can see, there are also other Preference settings you can make, including options for checking grammar and spelling and applying smart quotes and dashes as you type. You can also have your author and copyright information automatically appended to each document by adding that information in Preferences.

Where it says Rich text and Plain text, it‘s best to leave the Rich text option checked so that you can use basic formatting styles, such as bold, italics and underlining.

Preferences: Open & Save Settings

In the Open and Save Settings, you have options for Autosaving and various HTML settings.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/opensave.png" border="0" alt="free word processing programs" width="442" height="486" />

HTML Editor

You can paste HTML code into a TextEdit document, edit it, and save it as a webpage document (File>Save As>Web Page). When you use TextEdit as a HTML editor, you will want to format text in Plain text.

Formatting Styles

TextEdit includes many of the basic and advance text formatting styles found in Word and Pages. One feature that you might overlook in TextEdit is that you can save individual formatting styles to be used in future documents.

So for instance, say you want to quickly apply a particular color to selected text; you can do so by first selecting some text, style="color: #fa2a3c;"> style="color: #291d18;">opening up color picker (Format>Font>Show Colors) and selecting the color you want to use.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/savefavortestyle.png" border="0" alt="free word processing programs" width="450" height="225" />

While you still have your formatted text selected, go to Format>Font>Styles… and in the drop-down menu, select Add To Favorites. Give a title for your saved style.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/titleforstyle.png" border="0" alt="free word processing programs" width="251" height="144" />

Now when you want to apply that style again, you click on the Styles button in the toolbar of your TextEdit document. If the toolbar is not present in the document, go to Format>Make Rich Text.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/sytles.png" border="0" alt="free word processing software" width="219" height="347" />

Also, don’t forget that you can manually copy and paste styles from one piece of selected text to another. After your style is copied, go to Edit>Paste and Match Style, or use the keyboard shortcuts, Option+Command+C (copy style) and Option+Command+V (paste style).

TextEdit Toolbar

Notice also in the toolbar of a TextEdit document that you have some formatting options. They include the standard word processing features for aligning texts and paragraphs, and spacing between lines.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/formatlists.png" border="0" alt="free word processing software" width="212" height="257" />

Pages and Word have a robust table creation feature, but if you don’t feel like hauling out one of those hefty applications, you can create a basic table in TextEdit. Granted, there are limitations but the feature includes the tabbing and basic formatting options found in the larger word processing programs.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/tablesettings-1.png" border="0" alt="free word processing software" width="222" height="308" />

To create a table, go to Format>Table… and set the numbers for rows and columns in the Table palette. You can also apply text alignments, and the thickness and color of cell borders and backgrounds.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/tables.png" border="0" alt="tables.png" width="569" height="420" />

Other Goodies

TextEdit includes a few other powerful features that you want to keep in mind. For instance, under Edit>Transformation, you can select text and change its case or capitalize the first letter of each word of that selected text.

If you’re struggling to figure out the spelling of a word, you can put your insertion point at the end of a partially entered word and press Option+Esc, which will deliver up a set of words that might contain the one you’re looking for.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/wordcompletion.png" border="0" alt="word processing software" width="202" height="361" />

TextEdit doesn’t have the revision tracking, comments, and footnote features of Word and Pages, nor does it have their robust desktop layout design tools (although images can be added to TextEdit documents), but it is still a handy word processing software app that you will find on any Mac computer.

Let us know if and how you use TextEdit. Are there features you use that I did not touch on this article? Let us know about them. />
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Searching for the Best Registry Fix Program isn’t such a difficult task, or at least it doesn’t have to be that time consuming. Think of it – you can quickly research for anything on the World wide web: reading reports, accessing forums & blogs, or even installing the majority of these programs and identify which ones truly worth both your time and money. The following review will show you how you can quite fast research for the best windows reg. repair tool.

Finding the top windows reg. cleaning tool(s) is a critical task, imagine, this solution is about to edit your Window’s reg. system, this part of your Win is very complex, vulnerable, and critical, you don’t want an unprofessional system to deal with that.

As you already know there different windows reg. cleaners on the web, looking for the Best Registry Fix Program can take some time and even become quite difficult; however, you can at minimal effort transform this research fast and productive if you carefully follow these guidelines.

In the first step you should conduct a quick research on the web and locate the quality 3-5 win-registry cure tools, filter those that don’t offer a free trial, take the opportunity and install those who do offer free download and identify which programs are intuitive and easy to use, a good registry application should be intuitive and easy to operate by novice users, now, conduct a quick scan with each program and take a look at the results, don’t compare each program by the total number of problems that it has found, but by their level, identify which product truly discovered critical and important errors rather than just small negligible ones.

While researching for the Best Registry Fix Program check the the provider provides instant 24/7 help, make sure they offer automatic tool updates, and check product provides time-set scans, by the end of the day we are all busy people and we want to make sure that our Computer is being taken care of 24 hours a day. Keep this in mind, registry maintenance application isn’t just another tool installed on your Pc; this is a highly important tool that can easily help you prevent severe pc functionality problems, so take it seriously before you install such tool on your Pc.

Who doesn’t experience that situation?, you have a new Personal computer, it functions fine for a couple of months and after a while you start getting these problems, you start getting these unexplained and irritating error messages, slow internet problems and maybe even program functionality problems. Luckily, well designed XP Home Registry Fix Software can quickly repair most of these problems. By reading this review you’ll know how you can easily get rid of most of these errors and problems.

Do you know what win registry is? Well, Windows reg. is a Windows inner database which stores various information and configurations about your computer’s software and hardware installations. This info is being used by your PC’s Windows operating system. After a while that you’ve been using your pc, a wide range software and hardware installations and other files that are being used can harm your registry, causing your pc to start popping up alerts and error messages, reducing your PC’s speed and even affecting your Internet connection speed.

By now you probably already understand how crucial it is to preserve your Win registry settings undamaged. It’ll save you time and frustration in the future. How can this be done? If you know how to access and maintain your win-registry, then that can be easily done manually, it is no big deal, but when you have dozens and even hundreds of hardware & software configurations on your Personal computer you may find this task quite frustrating since it would require much of your effort. Most pc users don’t even know where to start or what to do, so it is recommended to either let a professional ‘cure’ and maintain your windows reg. (Can be quite expensive…) or try a professional win-registry repair application.

Very quickly – XP Home Registry Fix Software is a software solution which is designed to easily scan, detect and ‘cure’/eliminate unwanted settings from your Pc’s registry. By doing so it easily enables you to eliminate many unwanted system errors, activex problems, dll errors, Computer & application shutdown errors and many other irritating Pc problems that many of us probably experience almost daily.

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style="border: 0px none;margin-left:20px;float:right;" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/inventedpascal.jpg" alt="who invented pascal program"/>The href="hhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pascal_(programming_language)">Pascal programming language, which was based on the ALGOL computer language, was developed in the late 1960’s and was named after Blaise Pascal — a French mathematician, responsible for a series of discoveries and who also invented the first calculator (called Pascaline) in 1645.

Considering that Pascal died in 1662 and that the Pascal language was invented almost 300 years later, he can’t possibly have created the language. Then who invented the Pascal programming language?

id="more-49862"> /> Pascal was developed by Niklaus Wirth, who was born on February 15, 1934 in Winterthur, Switzerland to Walter, a geography professor, and Hedwig (Keller) Wirth. Niklaus developed the Algol-W which was implemented on one of the first IBM 360 (which was as large as a room) and used it as a base for the development of the Pascal language a few years later.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" style="border: 0pt none;" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/ibm_360.jpg" alt="who invented pascal program"/>

“Whereas Europeans generally pronounce my name the right way (‘Nick-louse Veert’), Americans invariably mangle it into ‘Nickel’s Worth.’ This is to say that Europeans call me by name, but Americans call me by value.” /> ~ Niklaus Wirth

Pascal was created by Wirth as a language that could be used for teaching fundamental concepts that would work reliably and efficiently on the computers available in the 1970’s. Pascal ended up being used for computer games, embedded systems and research projects, and was also used for the development of the href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Lisa">Lisa, one of the early Apple (Macintosh) computers and one of its derivatives, Object Pascal, is still used today, in applications such as Skype.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" style="border: 0pt none;" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/AppleLisa4_3.jpg" alt="who wrote the pascal programming language"/>

Niklaus Wirth is the author of highly recognized books, such as “Algorithms + Data Structures = Programs” (1976) and has received ten honorary doctorates and was awarded the href="http://www.ieee.org/about/awards/index.html"> IEEE Emmanuel Piore Prize and the href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turing_Award">Turing Prize in 1984 among many others, but Wirth’s main contribution has always been the concept of creating productive software designed in an organized fashion and free of unnecessary clutter.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" style="border: 0pt none;" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/award.jpg" alt="who wrote the pascal programming language"/>

In his article named “ href="http://cr.yp.to/bib/1995/wirth.pdf">A Plea for Lean Software” [PDF] which was written by Wirth in 1995, he explains some of the issues with software development and why it’s important to create clean, organized code by quoting two “laws” that he believes reflect the business:

• Software expands to fill the available memory. (Parkinson)
• Software is getting slower more rapidly than hardware becomes faster. (Reiser)

Interesting ideas, considering the number of lines of code of some of the most used software today, seems to be growing larger even as the hardware grows smaller each day.  For example:

• Basic had 4,000 lines of code in 1975, now it has over 2 million.
• The first version of Word had 27,000 lines of code. The current version of Office has over 30 million.
• Mac OS X is made of about 90 million lines of code.
• Windows 95 was made of 15 million lines of code, Windows 7 is made of over 50 million lines of code.
• A single game application for the iPhone, such as the “Unreal” game app has over 2 million lines of code.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" style="border: 0pt none;" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/unreal.jpg" alt="who invented pascal program"/>

He has stated that the only reason software has become large is because software vendors add features customers think they want, but never use. He was also a proponent of the idea that software should be completely understood by at least one person, and that having teams developing programs without any of them fully understanding its entirety caused a lot of unnecessary complexity and useless code.

style="text-align: center;"> class="aligncenter" style="border: 0pt none;" src="http://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/2010-07-21_1650.jpg" alt="who wrote the pascal programming language"/>

His development of Pascal was a testament to those beliefs. Pascal is still considered one of the most mathematical of computer languages. Its core is designed around focus on essentials, object oriented programming and keeping a simple core that is lightweight and easily understood.

Did you know about Pascal? />
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Life without music is such a drag, but internet has solved this issue for good. Where there people have to search hard for their favorite song, now there are people who use internet to conduct a simple search to get what they want. But, when you talk about free mp3 downloads, you have to face some issues again.

The reason is that there are many sites offering free mp3 music downloads, but not all these sites offer high quality music, which is the reason why you can find people having all sorts of issues when downloading a free music file. The simple solution to this particular problem is a program that searches internet on your behalf. With the help of this program you can always find your favorite music along with getting some information about what others are downloading these days.

However, you should take few things into consideration before you download one such program to find totally free mp3 music downloads. All these things help you make a better decision when selecting a free program for free mp3 music downloads.

•    Finding a program to find mp3 files is not hard, but finding the best program is the real catch. And, things get even tougher when you have to find a free program. Here, you should always make sure the program is completely free. There are some sites offering such programs that apparently looks free but comes with big cost. The cost in this case will be to be compromise your privacy. It means there are some programs that come with malware or spyware and makes living difficult for you.

•    When selecting a program for music downloads, you should compare two or more for their downloading speed. There is nothing more excruciating than downloading a song at slow speed. Though your internet connection has a lot to do with speed, you should still be paying attention to this particular feature of a program.

•    When getting a program for totally free mp3 downloads, you should pay attention to its overall features. Make sure a program offers moods, playlists, discographies and artist biographies. With the availability of all these features, it will become easier for you to access different types of info while listening to your favorite mp3 music.

•    Although it is true that these programs allow you to find totally free mp3 music downloads, you should still make sure you can use a program to buy songs. The ability to buy songs is not available in all these kinds of programs, so it is a good indicator that you’re going to download a good program for music downloads.

These are few of the most important considerations for those who are interested in using a program for free mp3 music downloads. Just make sure you find a right site and download the best program, as it is important to reap full benefits of one such program.

I believe many computer users have been annoyed by Anti Virus Online. It can not only modify Registry; insert Explorer.exe; but also infect all the EXE, SCR files on your computer. Actually, Anti Virus Online is released by Troj.StartPage.e. If you want to get rid of this Anti Virus Online completely, you need to read this review and get the most effective way to fix Anti Virus Online!

What is Anti Virus Online and why your PC is infected with Anti Virus Online?

What is Anti Virus Online? It is a type of Trojans that can affect Internet Explorer and release infective virus on your computer. This Anti Virus Online can not only modify settings on Internet Explorer, but also connect to certain websites automatically. Moreover, Anti Virus Online can alter Host files on your system and then disable your PC from visiting any other sites. At the same time, Anti Virus Online will release Anti Virus Online, so as to infect all the EXE and SRC files on your system. Once you start up your PC, virus will launch automatically and spread instantly! Due to the unknown mechanism, it can hide itself completely, which let the security tool hard to detect and remove it!

How to remove Anti Virus Online easily and completely?

For you convenience, you can read the following tips and use them to remove Anti Virus Online instantly! Before you take the following actions, please back up your important data first.

Go to Start—Run—input regedit. You will see the Registry Editor. Find this item from Registry Editor.

HKEY_CURRENT_USRE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer

When you find Anti Virus Online delete the item that starts with P.

Open My Computer and C disk. Firstly, please back up important files. Then eliminate all the Temp files/folders on your computer.
Reboot your PC and then launch your security tool to detect and remove virus threats from your system. After running the Full scan, virus will be removed completely!

Get the best tool for removing Anti Virus Online

Still wondering how to get rid of Anti Virus Online completely? Want to enhance you PC performance easily? You can click here to get the Best Security Tool for fix Anti Virus Online problem and make your PC run like a new one again!

Registry is a vital part of the Windows operating system. It is used by the operating system to store all the information about the hardware and software configuration of the PC and the system settings. It is also used to store the details of the network setting and user accounts. These are vital data that are frequently accessed by the operating system to smoothly run the PC. These information are accessed by the operating system while staring up the system as well as during the runtime.

How the registry errors corrupt the registry?

To be more precise the registry is used to store the values that are required to initialize the component. Every time a new hardware is added or removed, software is installed or uninstalled, changes are made to system settings, these values in the registry gets modified. Every time a change is made to the PC through the control panel, a new entry is generated in the registry, while the older one remains at the registry. Then there are embedded keys that are generated by the malware programs, traces of faulty installations, empty spaces left by the unintalltion processes – all these make the registry clogged up. As a result the operating system starts taking too much time to access the required information and eventually the PC gets slower. In fact when the registry errors are not repaired with a registry fix program, the PC becomes vulnerable to frequent failures.

How the registry cleaner can actually help?

A registry leaner is the most effective way to clean the registry. There are so many free registry cleaners available over the internet and you can download any of the registry fix program and install it. The registry cleaner will automatically scan the registry to detect the registry problems and ix them without your intervention. Moreover, with an advanced registry-fix program you can actually schedule the scanning process that will further make you free from manually starting the scanning process. You can even keep a back up of the registry for restoring that in case there is any problem after you have cleaned the registry.

Windows XP is one of the most well established operating systems in the World, with millions of people still using it every day 10 years after it was released. Unfortunately, the “registry” of this system is continually becoming damaged, causing Windows XP to run slower and with errors. The problems caused by the registry are wide-spread and well documented… and to fix them, you need to be able to use a ‘registry cleaner’ to scan through your PC and repair any of the damaged or corrupt settings that could be causing problems. However, which registry cleaner is the best?

If you’ve been looking at registry tools for long, you’ll know that there are a lot of them available. However, only a fraction of the available tools will work well on XP, because this system is so dated that a lot of the files and settings it has are unrecognizable to many of the newer registry tools. If you’re going to use a registry cleaner on XP, you need to be able to use the program that’s going to fix the most errors on this system in the most effective & reliable way. There are only a few tools which are still able to do this and they are generally produced by large software companies.

Finding the best registry program for XP is all about locating the tool that’s going to fix the most errors on your system without deleting / removing any of the “healthy” parts of it. All registry cleaners are designed to do a similar job – which is to clean through the registry database of your PC and fix the errors that cause it to run slowly. The registry database is where Windows stores all the settings it needs to run, and is what your computer uses to help it recall everything from your network settings to your stored passwords. Unfortunately, many registry cleaners will end up deleting a lot of the settings that XP has inside because they are not able to recognize these older settings on your PC.

The best XP registry repair utility is the program that is able to boost the speed of your PC and stop errors in the mos effective way. The best registry application for XP is “Frontline Registry Cleaner”, which is extremely effective and reliable. This tool is becoming very popular thanks to its compatibility with the likes of Windows 7, Vista and XP.