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Get Global Text Expansion & Autocorrect In Windows With WordExpander

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The AutoCorrect feature in Word is probably the most used overlooked part of MS Office, with many people taking it for granted. The time it saves by automatically correcting those typos that we make in a hurry is priceless, and the absence of such a great feature across other apps or Windows' own text editors is lamentable. I wish almost all text editors included such a feature out of the box. The good news is, software like WordExpander can bring this functionality to almost every app you can think of, and that too without costing you a dime. The application appears to have been developed with Medical Transcription in mind, but can work perfectly for general purpose word expansion and auto-correct as well. No matter if it's a note-taking utility or a more powerful text editor, WordExpander supports almost every app out there. Read More

UrlMonitor Is A Tiny, Portable Website & Page Content Monitoring Tool

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If you have used applications like Growl Site Monitor, Monitey or StatusCake, you must be aware of how handy they can be to monitor a website's activity or downtime. These apps are designed to automatically notify you if the specified URL returns an unusual response or hits a 404. UrlMonitor is a similar Windows app with a clean design and minimal interface. It’s quite simple to use and allows you to monitor any kind of website for content changes such as missing links, file unavailability or deleted content, and alerts you by flashing its system tray icon, as well as displaying a 404 error in its response log. It quietly sits in the system tray without disrupting your workflow. Read More

Quickly Switch, Backup & Restore Windows WiFi Network Profiles, IP & DNS Settings

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When reinstalling Windows or upgrading to a new PC, we usually have to set up everything from scratch. We reinstall apps, re-download important files, and reconfigure several settings here and there. This includes credentials for wireless network profiles and configuring your network settings, such as the static IP and DNS that you want to use. If you’re a network administrator who is required to configure network profiles on multiple PCs and on a regular basis, such a task could take a bulk of your day's time. Network Profiles Utility can really save the day in such situations. Designed as a portable application, Network Profiles Utility can easily import and export wireless connection profiles as well as IP and DNS settings among multiple Windows machines. Read More

Easily Share Images & Screenshots To Imgur Via Drag & Drop With MyImgur

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Imgur needs no introduction when it comes to sharing photos and pictures over the web. If you have ever used Reddit, you'd probably be as much familiar with this acclaimed service as you like viewing those cat pictures over at Reddit. MyImgur is a Windows application that lets you upload images or screenshots to Imgur right from your desktop. You don’t need to fire up your favorite browser, open Imgur’s website and then upload the images. MyImgur consolidates all these steps into one. You simply drag and drop your image over the application window and it will swiftly move to Imgur server. The application also lets you sign in to your Imgur account in order to upload images straight to your profile. Read More

Add Global Hotkeys Support To Windows Media Player With WMP Keys

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Microsoft has been struggling for a while now, to get more people to use its Windows Media Player application. The application isn't used by many people anymore due to lack of features that are usually found in other third-party apps like KMPlayer and VLC, both of which handle audio as well as video files much better than Microsoft's offering. Yet, many casual users still rely on WMP because it comes with Windows and requires no further installation. Those of you who use it as their default app to play media files would be aware that it doesn't support global hotkeys by default. Global hotkeys aid in quickly navigating the app via keyboard shortcuts without having to bring up the player's window and use the mouse; for instance, you wouldn't have to bring the app into focus in order to change a song or turn down the volume, with the appropriate hotkeys. WMP Keys is a Windows Media Player plugin that enables this feature. It  doesn't boasts a truckload of options, but it still gets the job done and does it fairly well. Read More

PC Hunter Consolidates Every Bit Of System Information Under One Hood

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System information tools come in all shapes and size, and we've covered plenty of them in the past such as SIW, i-Nex, Speccy and countless others. If you’re a power user who wants to view detailed PC information for various purposes, try PC Hunter. It’s a portable program that puts a whole lot of useful system related information at your disposal. The application is designed to aid advanced users in detecting and removing malwares from their system, as well as access deep-level information related to the registry, hardware and software components, kernel modules, network, startup programs and much more. Read More

Nokia Music Comes To Windows 8 & RT; Impresses On Every Front [Review]

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Nokia’s foray into the world of music started quite a while back, when the company used to sell its XpressMusic line of mobile phones that focused on music playback. Even though the series had its moments when it shined, it was quickly overshadowed with the demise of Symbian phones. Fortunately, the concept still lived on as Nokia Music and translated over to Windows Phone back in September as a music streaming service and online store. So far, this offering by the Finnish phone maker has been enjoying its success on mobile platforms only, but that changes today, as Nokia has released the Nokia Music app for Windows 8 / RT. From what we have seen so far, it seems to be an awesome addition to the Windows Store. Read More

[Giveaway] Mention: Google Alerts Alternative With Desktop, Mobile Apps & Analytics

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A few days ago we covered Talkwalker Alerts - a free web alerts service that does pretty much what Google Alerts does, by letting you add as many web-based alerts as you like and monitor them via an RSS feed. It’s a good service and a reliable one should Google decide to axe its offering. Mention is a similar service that's more suited for users who use alerts extensively to monitor specific topics being discussed online. The service has both free and premium accounts available, with the free accounts limited to a total of three alerts and 50,000 mentions per month. Mention has apps for Mac, Windows, iOS, and Android that allow you to monitor these alerts as they come. The service does not send email alerts, and your inbox therefore remains clean from the clutter. Mention has its own ‘inbox’ that you can read the alerts in. Alerts can be narrowed down to include or exclude a certain phrase/word, originate from specific source(s), and be in a language of your choice. Mention allows you to view stats for your alerts and download them in report form as a PDF file. Read More

Convert MS Word Documents To Audio Files With AudioDocs

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With the pace at which technology in advancing, it wouldn't be more than a decade or two before we will have robots educating our children and telling them bedtime stories. Although we still have to wait for a while for that, we do have various text-to-speech software available today that can turn our literature into audiobooks, and a little Windows app called AudioDocs performs flawlessly well in this regard. This open-source program available at SourceForge is designed to convert documents in DOC/DOCX format into WAV audio files. It can prove to be quite useful if you want to convert stories, novels, essays, reports etc. into playable audio files. Details after the jump. Read More

Quickly Open Windows Command Prompt As Administrator In Current Path

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You may have noticed that when executing the Command Prompt Utility – usually shortened to cmd – from Start Screen or Start Menu, it opens up in your user folder when run it as normal, and in the System32 folder when launched as Administrator. This can be fairly annoying if you simply want to open another CMD window in your current path, the reason being you then have to enter a few 'cd' commands to navigate to your desired directory. ELE from WinAero is a fantastic application that can save you from this hassle. This lightweight portable application lets you launch a new elevated Command Prompt window i.e. with Administrator privileges right in your current selected folder path. Lets find out how it works. Read More

Zoolz Offers Incremental Cloud Data Backup With 100GB Of Free Storage

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There’s no shortage of cross platform file syncing services out there. Each has something special about it; some offer more storage, while others sell themselves on distinguising features or a great interface. Suffice to say, we’re swimming in file syncing services. Zoolz is different; it’s file storage and backup in the cloud. The app uses a desktop client to backup files to your cloud drive. Unlike file syncing services that will allow you to access backed up files at a moment’s notice, Zoolz backs them up for safekeeping and asks for a few hours (or maybe days) to retrieve it.  The desktop app takes regular backups of select folders or drives. You can restore files from a backup, but you will have to first download them, which takes time. Read More

Record Your PC’s Screeen In GIF Format Using GifCam For Windows

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Previously, we have covered some really awesome screencast programs for Windows such as Screenbird, Rylstim Screen Recorder, Acala Screen Recorder and Screencast-O-Matic, each offering its own unique features and functionality. However, most of these screencast tools allow saving output files in video formats like WMV, MP4, MPEG etc. If you’re on the hunt for a Windows app that can save screencasts as GIF files, try GifCam. The application makes it easy for anyone to capture on-screen activity directly to GIF  format instead of having to record the video in another format first and then converting it into GIF via third-party converters. What’s more, it’s a portable application, which allows using it on the move and saves you from any installation hassle. Read More

ModernNote Is A Multi-Format Modern UI Text Editor For Windows 8 & RT

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Windows 8 comes with tons of useful features and apps, and while Microsoft's latest OS includes Modern UI versions of many of them including Windows Media Player, Internet Explorer and Calculator among others, Notepad has unfortunately been neglected in this regard, and still looks like its antecedents. Even though most of you might not be seeking a metro version of Notepad, those with Windows RT devices must be missing it to jot down their notes without entering the desktop mode. ModernNote is a Windows Store app that - as the name suggests - aims to get rid of this nuisance by providing users with a feature-rich text editor with a touch-friendly Modern UI. Read More

Easily Create Time-Lapse Videos From Images In A Folder

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Time lapse photography purportedly dates back to as early as the 19th century – a period when the camera equipment itself was quite expensive. The technique helps users playback a group of photos of the same subject taken at different times during a day, hour week or even month, as a single video sequence. When you playback these photos at an adequately high frequency (usually 24 frames per second or higher), it creates an effect of fast-forwarding time at the same spot, thus creating a time lapse. A quick peek at Wikipedia reveals that the technique has been in use for a while now and has been employed in various subjects of research such as plants growth, evolution of construction sites, celestial motion and so on. Today, I stumbled upon a unique Windows application called Motion Timer Lapser and couldn't wait to give it a try. The open-source application is designed to let you customize and create various time lapse sequences out of a group of similar photos. Read More

AltaPixShare Is A Photo Resizer, Styler & Sharing App For Windows With A Great UI

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They say sharing is caring. Sharing photos with your folks is probably the best way to rekindle old and good memories. Due to the advancements in technologies such the high availability of home and mobile broadband internet access, along with various image sharing websites and services, the process of sharing photos with others has become much more easier than it was a few years ago. Though at places where you don't have access to high speed internet, for instance a trip to the countryside, it can be a bit hard to instantly share your high resolution photos, especially if they are fairly large in size. The best way would be to resize the images to a smaller size before you send them to others. If you require to instantly do that, AltaPixShare has an answer. This lightweight Windows app streamlines and unifies the processes of photo resizing and sharing, and even lets you apply a few filters to them in the process. Read More

Fotor & Its Suite Of Photo Styling Options Now Available For PC & Mac

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Fotor is a very well known name among iOS photo capturing and editing apps, and the developers have just released Windows & Mac versions of the app, and that too with a price tag of free. Like Fotor for iOS and Andriod and Fotor for Windows 8, Fotor offers lots of features on Mac as well, including the same effects as its iOS variant, a sophisticated crop feature, and an excellent tilt-shift effect. In addition, it has the usual rotate and color adjustment options that you can find in most photo editing apps, which are usually paid. The tilt-shift effect allows you to add both a radial and linear tilt-shift effect, and its intensity can be adjusted in terms of focal point. You can crop an image to a size that's customizable down to the pixel, straighten an image, add borders i.e. frames to it, and of course, apply color filters. The app can also read EXIF data for your images. Read More

Enjoy Powerful, One-Click PC Maintenance With Synei System Utilities

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One click system maintenance programs is not a new concept. Previously, we've reviewed applications like Glary Utilities, SlimCleaner and Puran Utilities that are designed to help users getting rid of unnecessary files that otherwise tend to be the cause of slack PC performance. Synei System Utilities is a similar Windows utilities suite that houses a host of different system maintenance tools like disk cleaner, startup manager, disk defragmenter, data backup, registry cleaner, system tune-up and a few more. The application is designed to speed up your computer’s performance by removing unwanted junk from the memory and primary storage. Read More

Quickly Set Any Solid Color As Desktop Background With LoneColor

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Being a blogger and someone who tests software as his primary job, screenshots are quite vital to my work. Along with adding a visual aspect to my reviews, they also help users easily understand the things I try to demonstrate. Therefore, something that has so much importance needs to be done with carefully chosen backgrounds and optimum quality. Speaking of backgrounds, a solid background color often aids in presenting things more clearly, but constantly moving back and forth between plain colored backgrounds and other wallpapers can itself be a waste of time. Recently I stumbled upon a great software labeled LoneColor and it happened to be quite a time saver in my work. The application allows changing the background to any solid color like yellow, pink, green, black etc. with a mere click. Lets find out how it works. Read More

Batch-Convert PDFs To RTF & Extract Their Elements With PDF Shaper

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PDF is one of the most convenient and secure ways of distributing documents that will always render and print with the same formatting of your choice, and others won't be able to easily modify them. Given such advantages along with the ability to password-protect PDF files, the format is widely used when it comes to sending confidential or important documents via emails attachments, file sharing sites, and through other file transfer mediums. However, at times we do encounter situations when we require to convert a file in to another format such as TXT, DOCX or RTF for the sake of making changes or extracting certain objects from the file. We have covered plenty of PDF converters in the past like 7-PDF Website Converter, PDF24, PDF To Word Converter, Doxillion Document Converter, just to name a few. If you’re looking for a PDF converter that can specifically convert files to RTF, PDF Shaper has the answer. Not only is it capable of converting a full PDF file or selected pages from it, but can also convert a batch of files in one go. Read More

Secure Folders With Bluetooth, Remove Duplicates & Rarely Used Files With PC Manager

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Is your PC running out of memory? Time to get rid of some duplicate files that you've been pilling up for a while. Applications that get rid of duplicate files like Auslogics Duplicate File Finder, DeDupler, BitFinder and DoubleKiller are sure to be handy, but recently I came across PC Manager and found that it does a lot more than simply trashing clones. PC Manager is a Java-based application that not only lets you find and remove duplicate files, but also offers tools like rarely used files remover, files securer via Bluetooth, and password generator. Read More