The Ultimate Blogging Resource
Archive: March 2009
Amazing but true , Notepad knew about 9/11/2001 ! The flight number which hit the World Trade Centre in New York was Q33N ! And Probably this was the code for the hit. I belive you will be shocked to watch this….
Do it yourself :
1. Open Notepad
2. Type : Q33 N
3. Now, go to Format menu
4. Choose Font.
5. Now, change the size to ’72’
6. Now, change the font to ‘Wingdings’
7. See what is displayed !
Shocked??
For those Firefox advocates including me myself, I relish the thought of knowing another simple trick about the ever powerful Firefox itself that will enhance my web experience. A little unknown feature available in your latest version of Firefox 3 is that is allows you to set more than on homepage. What i mean is that you can now open several instances of Firefox homepage when you first execute and run the popular web browser.
Select and follow the following directions on how to set and run more than one homepage in Firefox.
Tools -> Options -> Main (Home Page)
After which, simply separate each desired homepage with “|”. For example assuming you would like to make Facebook and Google to start up together when your launch Firefox, it should reflect as follows:
Well so what do you think of this simple trick that you’ve just learnt? Not too tough huh?
Friends Many of people thought to make a CD Protected(Non-writable nor copied)
Here Are Some OF the Software Used to Make a CD Protected :
Do you feel handicapped with the limitations of screen shots? Switch to screencasts and create a movie of your computer screen.
Everyone knows how to take a simple snapshot of the computer screen. Whether you use the [Print Scrn] keyboard shortcut and paste the image in your computer’s default paint application, or use a more sophisticated application to automate it, the purpose of capturing an image of your computer screen is the same. It is much easier to convey to other people want you want done.
If a picture is worth a thousand words, then a video should be worth at least ten thousand. We use screenshots a lot in this magazine to effectively communicate how a certain task is to be performed. And, of course, CHIP readers, being the whiz kids that they are, are probably used to being inundated with calls from friends and family for help to sort out their latest computer problems. Wouldn’t things be a whole lot easier for both parties if there was a way to communicate the solution in an easy to understand manner? This is where screencasts come in.
Screencasts are analogous to screenshots. As a screenshot refers to an image of the computer screen, a screencast is a digital recording or a movie of what one sees on the monitor. The best thing about screencasts is that along with video capture of the screen, one can also include audio in them. This audio might be your voice as you describe the actions taking place, or something entirely different—for instance, background music. While narration will require a microphone to record your voice, music from a file on your computer can be used just as easily as playing it with a standard media player.
This workshop will deal with how to successfully capture a screencast. For this purpose, we shall use the free product ‘CamStudio’, available on the CHIP DVD or the official website (http://camstudio.org). While there are many shareware applications available on the market, this great piece of screen recording software is released under the GPL license and is open source. Apart from digitally recording the screen and adding audio, CamStudio has the additional capability of inserting high quality screen captions with no jagged edges. Customization of cursors, for instance, using a unique cursor style that you wish to be displayed instead of the default white and black one, is also possible. A special video annotation feature can be used to capture yourself on the screen—a sort of ‘picture-in-picture’ effect.
The region of the screen can also be specified—the full screen or only a certain portion of it. Changing the quality settings of the movie recorded is easy—smaller videos sizes are better for emailing while high quality ones are appreciated when distributed on optical discs or presented in front of an audience. CamStudio comes with its own Lossless Codec compression format, as well as other video codes. There are two file formats that the application can record the movie in—AVI and SWF. This comes in really handy when you want to embed the Flash video on your blog or website.
Step 1: Installation
Install the application CamStudio and its associated video codec from the CHIP DVD or download the installation file from the official website (http://camstudio.org). This should place a shortcut to the application on your desktop, so double-click the icon to run it. CamStudio has a bare-bones feels to it, and its main toolbar reflects that. It only has six main buttons which include the record and playback controls, a shortcut to the annotations window and toggle for the view—’Normal’, ‘Compact’, and ‘Buttons’, and file formats—AVI and SWF. 
Step 2: Screen area
We are going to make a movie that will capture all the actions taken on the computer screen. The first thing to do is to set the area of the monitor that needs to be recorded. In the CamStudio window, select ‘Region | Fixed Region…’. In the proceeding dialog box titled ‘Fixed Region’, check the option ‘Drag Corners to Pan’. Next, press the ‘Select’ button and drag the crosshair cursor from the top-left of the screen to the bottom-right, excluding the taskbar. This way, the screencast will exclude the taskbar area and not give away to the viewer any other programs or hidden applications you may have running in the background.
Step 3: Cursor Options
CamStudio comes with a bevy of in-built cursor options. The normal cursor is a little bland, so we shall choose to record a differently styled one for the movie. Select ‘Options | Cursor Options’. In the window titled ‘Cursor Options’ check the radio button option ‘Use Custom Cursor’ and choose one from the list, for instance ‘PENCIL2’. If you have created a cursor that you want to use, select the option ‘Use Cursor From File’ and press the ‘Browse’ button. Next, browse to the folder location where the CUR (Cursor file) or ICO (Icon file ) file resides, select it and press ‘Open’. The cursor highlight option is available for those users that wish to highlight the cursor in a certain shape, color or size. Finally, exit the ‘Cursor Options’ window by pressing ‘OK’.
Step 4: Codec Configuration
To configure the codec that is used when the recording is made, go to ‘Options | Video Options’. The default compressor used is ‘Microsoft Video 1’ and while the video output using this compressor plays well in Windows Media Player, the same can’t be said for others, for instance, VLC player. So, we shall choose a more common compressor, for instance, ‘ffdshow Codec’. However, if you are sure that the end party has Windows Media Player, then just stick with the default option. The ‘CamStudio Lossless Codec v1.0’ is another option, and is available on the CHIP DVD. Make sure that the ‘Auto-Adjust’ option is checked and save your changes by pressing ‘OK’.
Step 5: Audio In
Since the movie needs to be accompanied by an audio narration, it is time to plug in your microphone to the ‘Mic in’ jack. Next, in the CamStudio window, select ‘Options | Record audio from microphone’. This tells the application to use the sound signal from the ‘Mic in’ jack as the audio source. To tweak the audio recording settings, go to ‘Options | Audio Option | Audio Options for Microphone’. Press the ‘Volume’ button to adjust the sound settings and press ‘OK’ to save your changes while exiting.
Now you are ready to press the record button and start recording. The sky’s the limit when it comes to taking digital recordings of your screen.
Here’s another useful tip for those bloggers, who are continuously trying to transform their free BlogSpot blogs into a pro-blog.
Through this hack, within 10 minutes you can start showing the images of commentators/comment-authors in your blog.
See the image below; how it will look after tweaking the HTML default code
To do so, first of all log in to Blogger
Now go to Layout, then click on Edit HTML tab.
Now Download the present template as a back up
Then click on “Expand widget templates“
Now search (CTRL+F) this
</head>
Immediately BEFORE IT, paste this:
<!–COMMENT-AUTHOR-PICTURE-STARTS–><script src=’http://dsai.588.googlepages.com/blogger_comment_author_photos.js’ type=’text/javascript’/>
<script type=’text/javascript’>
//<![CDATA[
addLoadEventundefinedfunctionundefined){showCommentPhotosundefined’commentphoto’,’comment-author’, 1);});
//]]>
</script><!–COMMENT-AUTHOR-PICTURE-STOPS–>
NOW see this code below:
<dl id=’comments-block’>
<b:loop values=’data:post.comments’ var=’comment’>
<dt class=’comment-author’ expr:id='”comment-” + data:comment.id’><div class=’commentphoto’ style=’float:right;’/><a expr:name='”comment-” + data:comment.id’/>
<b:if cond=’data:comment.authorUrl’><a expr:href=’data:comment.authorUrl’ rel=’nofollow’><data:comment.author/></a>
<b:else/>
<data:comment.author/>
</b:if>
<data:commentPostedByMsg/>
</dt>
<dd class=’comment-body’>
<b:if cond=’data:comment.isDeleted’>
<span class=’deleted-comment’><data:comment.body/></span>
<b:else/>
<p><data:comment.body/></p>
</b:if>
</dd>
<dd class=’comment-footer’>
<span class=’comment-timestamp’>
<a expr:href='”#comment-” + data:comment.id’ title=’comment permalink’>
<data:comment.timestamp/>
</a>
<b:include data=’comment’ name=’commentDeleteIcon’/>
</span>
</dd><div style=’clear:both;’/></b:loop></dl>
In the code above YOU HAVE TO INSERT code lines shown in BLUE and BOLDED
And the red ones, are those which you can use as markers, BEFORE whom you have to paste the blue code lines.
You can change the position of pictures or images from Right to Light, by changing it in the first blue line in the code above…
Now whenever, people use their gmail or openid account to comment, then their pictures will be displayed alongside the comments !<>
As many visitors ask how to embed html text in a way that it is displayed as it is in the published post and also their visitors can copy the content, so here’s a way to do that quite easily:The main problem that bloggers face is that, typing/pasting the html code in either Edit html or Compose sections during posting a blog entry is that, after publishing they dont find the code, rather the code lines are simply missing from their original place.The reason for this to occur is that if you try to type the HTML as it is (example <br/>), the web browser will interpret that as an instruction to display what follows in a new line (line break) but not display the HTML.What you can do is:
change the “<” symbol with 
, and also the symbol “>” with 
, but as to do all this manually is quite difficult, so you can use this website tool for simply converting the html code into embeddable text:
This helps prevent potentially harmful or disruptive HTML tags from being posted to your
form.
NOTE: After copying and pasting the converted text please remember to change these code snippets from the the overall code : and (starting and ending code letters) with these <blockquote> and </blockquote>
The Art of Making BootSkins
BootSkins are certainly the skinning fashion of the moment. These are replacements for the screen that is displayed when Windows is loading.
Previously, replacing these screens had been a somewhat risky affair involving hacking your Windows application to pieces, but now BootSkin (www.bootskin.com) allows you to replace the screen without risking damage to your Windows installation under Windows 2000 and Windows XP.
The software allows you to apply one of the default skins or one downloaded from WinCustomize (http://www.wincustomize.com/skins.asp?library=32), but how do you create one of your own?
Well, it’s actually really easy. All that are required are 2 images and one configuration file. The first thing to do is to design how you want your skin to look when it’s completed.
This is my image as I want it to look. It’s just a tweak of the standard look. What you need to bear in mind currently is that BootSkin only works with 16 color images. There are plans to change this in the future to allow more colors but we must work with what’s available at the moment so keep your image simple.
The two images are the background and the progress bar. The background incorporates everything you see above apart from the blue progress bar in the top right. The box surrounding the progress bar is an optional part of the background image.
A lot of image programs claim to produce 4-bit (16 color) bitmaps but often the format is not quite right without knowing your image editing software well. What is fortunate here is that another Stardock program can help.
SkinStudio (www.stardock.com/products/SkinStudio) is mainly a tool for creating WindowBlinds and other skins but it has a useful tool built in that can help. If you select Tools … Bootskin … Prepare Image from the menu you will launch a little utility specifically for this purpose.
If you “browse” for your image you can load it into the utility.
You should then check the “Dither” option and experiment with the different Resampling and Dithering types to find the closest 16 color representation of your original image. You can then press “Save” and save your background image.
You can then move on to prepare the progress bar. The best way to do this is to start with an existing image to tweak. Basically however, in the BootSkin, you will eventually specify how much space the progress bar will take up and then this progress bar you create will be animated as Windows loads to fill this space.
Here we are using a simple image, which also uses the same 16 color palette as the background.
OK, so on to creating the actual BootSkin.
Under the directory where you installed BootSkin there is a Skins directory. Within this directory there will be a series of folders for each BootSkin installed. To add your skin, create a subdirectory with the name of your skin. I’m creating a directory called StardockEdition. Within that folder I’m going to place my two image files and a copy of an existing bootskin.ini file from one of the other folders.
We’re almost there now. We’ve done the hard work in creating the images. Now, we just need to change the .ini file to tell BootSkin how to use these images. Lets take a look at that file now.
[BootSkin]
Type=0
Name = “XXXXXXXXXXXX”
Author = “XXXXXXXXXXXX”
Description = “XXXXXXXXXXXX”
ProgressBar=XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX.bmp
ProgressBarX = XXX
ProgressBarY = XXX
ProgressBarWidth = XXX
Screen=XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX.bmp
Note that I’ve replaced context with a series of XXXXXs. These are the areas you need to change.
Name
Here, simply enter the name of the BootSkin you have created within quotation marks.
e.g.
Name = “Windows Stardock Edition”
Author
Here, enter your own name so you can get the credit owed for your wonderful skin within quotation marks.
e.g.
Author = “_Martin_”
Description
Enter some information about the skin you have created, again within quotation marks.
e.g.
Description = “A simple twist on the standard login to give credit to Stardock’s wonderful software”
Progress Bar
Here, you need to enter the name of the bitmap file you are using for your progress bar.
e.g.
ProgressBar=StardockEditionProgress.bmp
ProgressBarX
You need to work our where you are placing the progress bar on the screen. This represents the absolute left edge of the bar. You can use your source image to work out the location.
e.g.
ProgressBarX = 508
ProgressBarY
This is the vertical coordinate of the top left of the progress bar on the screen.
e.g.
ProgressBarY = 12
ProgressBarWidth
This is how wide you want the progress bar to be. As Windows loads, the Progress bar image that you specified will be moved across this area. Once it has moved across the width of the progress bar you have specified here the progress bar will start again from the left edge of the progress bar.
e.g.
ProgressBarWidth = 118
Screen
Here, you need to enter the name of the bitmap file you are using for your background.
e.g.
Screen=StardockEditionBack.bmp
OK, so here’s the final version of the bootskin.ini file:
[BootSkin]
Type=0
Name = “Windows Stardock Edition”
Author = “_Martin_”
Description = “A simple twist on the standard login to give credit to Stardock’s wonderful software”
ProgressBar=StardockEditionProgress.bmp
ProgressBarX = 508
ProgressBarY = 12
ProgressBarWidth = 118
Screen=StardockEditionBack.bmp
Now that you have edited the file, save it.
If you load BootSkin now, you can see you skin in the list.
Click the Apply button and your skin will be shown the next time that Windows restarts.
The final thing you can do is to share your BootSkin with others. To do this, select your skin, and select File … Export Selected Skin to File. Then, select a name for your file and a location to save it to. You will then have a .bootskin file that you can share with other BootSkin users.
Note That For This Tutorial You Required SkinStudio 4 !
Download Software From Here :
Table Of Content
1.Skinstudio 4
2.Bootscreen 10.3
3.Logonstudio-(Extra)
If you have followed my posts previously, you will know that I am a fanatic in optimizing my site for the best performance. One of the thing that I do is to optimize and reduce the images to the smallest possible size without losing the visual quality.
If you are wondering why reducing the size of your images can help in the site’s performance, basically the bigger the size of your images, the slower it takes for the server to load, and the higher probability that your server will crash when you experience a traffic spike (like reach Digg front page). In addition, if you are hosting your images on a third party site, like Amazon S3, having a smaller image also mean lesser cost as the charge is based on the bandwidth and storage space used.
Smush.it is a service developed by the Yahoo Exceptional Performance team, aimed to improve the performance of your site. What SmushIt does is to strip all the metadata from the images and compress them using an optimization algorithm that will not only reduce the size, but also preserve the visual quality. When I first used it, I were surprised to see a 30% reduction in the size of the image that I have optimized in Photoshop. Most of the time that I use Smushit, it is able to shave 10-50%, occasionally 80% off the image size.
There are several ways that you can utilize Smush it.
If you have some images in your computer that you want to optimize, you can easily upload your images to Smushit via the onsite uploader. There is no limit to the number of images that you can upload, but do bear in mind that the more you upload, the slower it is.
Instead of uploading, you can also point Smushit to a Web URL (for example, your site) and get it to analyze and optimize all the images in that URL.
This is by far, my favorite way of using Smushit. If you are using Firefox browser, you can install the Smushit Firefox extension and have quick access to it anytime, anywhere. When you are on a web page (perhaps when you are previewing your post article in your site) and you want to optimize the images on that page, simply click on the SmushIt icon on the Status bar and it will analyze and optimize all the images on that page.
Alternative to the Firefox extension is the bookmarklet that you can place on your Bookmark bar.
Once SmushIt has optimized your images, it will show a report of how many bytes it has shaved off the original images and provide you a link to the zipped files of all the compressed images.
Another thing, if you are using WordPress, there is also a Smushit plugin that you can use. Once you have activated the plugin, all the images that you upload to your site will automatically run through SmushIt behind the scene. There is nothing extra that you need to do. Alternatively, you can go to your Media Library in WordPress and process your existing images with SmushIt.