TechBits

PicMonkey

 Regular oatmeal with blueberries.
Had-too-much-coffee-before-my oatmeal with blueberries.
You'll find effects, tools, and more with the ever-so-awesome PicMonkey - a free online photo editing and effects site from some of the former Picnik developers. For a chuckle, have a peek at their "About" page. Need a review before you swing on over to play*? Try this one at the Photo Software Blog.

* When you swing on over to play, be sure you've got some time. I found myself investigating the various tools and trying out all the effects and quickly lost an hour. Neat effects, and pretty easy to use!

Send large files the easy way.

I was looking for a way to transfer a large file over the internet without having to sign up for any services. Sometimes email clients limit the size of the files you can send or receive, so what can you do if you want to send a large file to someone.  I found Wetransfer, a site that lets you transfer a file up to 2GBs for free. It’s fast and easy to use. Select the file you want to transfer to someone. In my case it was a video clip I created that I didn’t want to share with the world, just one other person. Enter in their email address and your email address. Type a message (optional) and click transfer. Within a few minutes the email addresses you entered will receive a message with a link to the file to download, the link will be active for two weeks. You will also receive an email notification when the receipent downloads the file.

Dropbox, Skydrive and Google Drive: a Quick Comparison

I've been a big fan of Dropbox for years but recently there have been some new and/or improved competitors to the Dropbox drive service:  Google Drive and Microsoft's SkyDrive.  Here's a quick comparison of all three products:

Dropbox

• Drive size
  • Initial drive size is 2GB, with an additional 500MB for every referral up to 18GB
• Cost
  • 2-18GB - Free
  • 50GB - $9.99/month, $99.99/year
  • 100GB - $19.99/month, $199/year
• Platforms:
  • PC: Windows XP and Windows 7
  • Linux
  • Mac
  • iPhone/iPad apps
  • Android for tablets and Smart Phones
  • Blackberry
• Extras
  • Retrievable file history for 30 days:  deleted files remain on the Dropbox server for easy recovery
  • Detailed logs of file changes (additions, deletions, changes)
  • Selective syncing of individual files
  • Add-on support, including e-mail to Dropbox, auto transfer to other cloud-based drives, and web hosting

 

Google Drive

• Drive Size
  • Initial size of 5GB; no incentive program
• Cost
  • 5GB  - Free
  • 25GB - $2.50/month, $30 / year
  • 100GB - $5/month, $60/yeay
• Platforms
  • PC: Windows XP and Windows 7 (no real standalone client used)
  • Mac
  • Android Tablets (possibly Smartphones as well)
• Extras
  • 10GB upload limit  with web-based interface (2GB for competing products)
  • Editing of more types of documents possible (AUTO CAD, Photoshop formats)
  • Integration with Google Apps/Docs tools (collaboration, etc.)

Sky Drive

• Drive Size
  • Initial drive size is 7GB; however new users can get 25GB for a limited time
• Cost
  • 7/25GB - Free
  • Additional 20GB - $10/year
  • Additional 50GB - $25/year
  • Additional 100GB - $50/year
• Platforms
  • PC: Windows 7 only (no XP support)
  • Mac
  • iPhone/iPad apps
  • Windows Phone
• Extras
  • Several apps are available that integrate SkyDrive with MS OneNote, Outlook, and files from a smart phone.
  • MS Office documents can be edited within SkyDrive without any loss of formatting

Guest Post - easy clickin'

Guest Post by Jean Anderson
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What are these you ask? The technical term is “clicker.” What, you don’t believe me? Okay, I give in. The real name of this gadget varies from “wireless presenter” to “presentation remote” to “wireless laser presentation remote.” If you do a quick Google search for “powerpoint remote control” you’ll find many different remotes.

They all do the same basic thing - they allow a presenter to venture away from their laptop. The remote connects wirelessly to the USB piece of the device that’s plugged into the laptop. This allows the presenter to use a couple of buttons on the remote to advance their slides, dim the screen, and use a laser pointer (if it’s included on the device).

Remotes such as the ones in the picture can be found at most any office supply store or online and range in price from $10 to $50.

Thanks to Amanda S. at Middleton for the topic suggestion!

Print Multiple Firefox Tabs as a Single PDF Document

When I find useful documentation online, I like to print the web page as a PDF so that I will always have a copy available.  Sometimes I'll find useful documentation from several sources online.  Instead of printing each webpage separately, I'd rather print all the sources as a single PDF.  I find it easier to manage.  The Print Pages to PDF Firefox add-on allows you to print multiple open tabs in Firefox to a single PDF document. 

After you have installed the add-on, you will notice Print Pages to PDF appears in your Firefox Tools menu.  This is where you can change defaults like margin size, headers and footers and it's where you'll click to actually print the PDF files.  I think the add-on is definitely worth a try as it beats copying pages to a Word document then printing to PDF.

Edit photos with MS Office Picture Manager

Did you know that you may have photo editing software hidden away on your PC? I'm not talking about Microsoft Paint. I mean Microsoft Office Picture Manager!

Where can you find it? MS Office Picture Manager has been bundled with the Microsoft Office suite since Office 2003. On most* PCs with MS Office, you can find it by going to Start > Microsoft Office > Microsoft Office Tools > Microsoft Office Picture Manager.

You can also start using it by clicking on your image in Windows Explorer and then selecting File > Open With > Microsoft Office Picture Manager, like so:

What is it used for? Basic changes and corrections to photos, like:

• Brightness and contrast
• Color
• Crop
• Rotate and flip
• Red-eye removal
• Resize

Why would you choose MS Office Picture Manager instead of MS Paint? MS Paint doesn't have options specifically for correcting photos (like red-eye removal), and on Windows XP its crop/resize capabilities don't make it easy to get photos sized to pixel-precise dimensions. MS Office Picture Manager does better with these tasks.

Where can you get help using MS Office Picture Manager? Support for MS Office Picture Manager.

When will you know you need a higher-powered tool for editing images?

• You want more control over colors and corrections.
• You want to combine your photos with text, color, and other images and edit each component as a separate "layer."
• You want to be able to save your work and come back later to edit the "layers" of photo, text, color, and other images.

* On SCLS-supported patron PCs that have MS Office, MS Office Picture Manager is not in the Start menu and you will need to use the "Open With" technique to start using it.

Space Cases

One of the things I like about the beginning of the year is the Consumer Electronics Show (CES).  A lot of the tech coverage for that week is either of the show itself or other items introduced by companies not at the show.  I enjoy seeing all of the gadgets and new technology, even for the things that won’t be available for some time yet.  (And, to be honest, the inadvertent amusement of the demos that go wrong.)

This year one of the items that caught my attention wasn’t actually a gadget per se.  It was a case for a gadget.  Normally cases are, well, kind of boring.  Sure, they might be pretty along with providing some protection but that’s about it for most of them.  Not so for this case.  To show how effective the case was, they put an iPad in their case and had it fall from the edge of space.  While I doubt any of us really have to worry about quite such a drop for our gadgets, I do admit it did make it one of the more memorable demonstrations I’ve ever seen. 

Wonder how well it'd hold up versus patrons...

 

 

My Magic Wand

 I wanted to let you know about a cool gadget I have. I was looking for a portable document scanner for my wife to use when she and her father go on long genealogy trips. I wanted one that would be easy to use and still have a good quality scan. I came across the VuPoint Magic Wand, and after reading some pretty good reviews I decided to purchase it. It exceeded my expectations in scan quality and I found it very easy to use. It’s kind of like holding a Toblerone chocolate bar, as far as the size. I purchased an 8GB MicroSD card to use with it since it doesn’t come with one.  The card can store hundreds of images before having to transfer them to a PC. It includes the USB cable to transfer the images to a PC. All total it costs around $100.00 and some change. It’s great if you’re on the road and can’t put the images on your PC right away.

Another thing I like about this Magic Wand is that it (in my opinion) does a better job of scanning a page in a book than a regular flat bed scanner because the spine of the book prevents you from getting the page completely flat on the scanning surface. With the Magic Wand you don’t have that problem; however, I found it does have some issues with paperback books, especially the smaller ones.

My wife was scanning fabric with it so she could get a better look at the patterns it was making. I thought that was weird…so I tried it. Here are some sample materials I’ve done with the Magic Wand.

YouTube Video Editor gets better

I recently updated my cell phone and found that the built-in camera takes some great video!

This is a lot of fun, but like many home movies, my videos could use a little editing.  There are many products out there that offer video editing, but I'm not really interested in learning the ins and outs a full-featured product like Premier.  Luckily, the YouTube Video Editor (http://www.youtube.com/editor) keeps offering new features, making simple video production very easy.

Video clips can be easily uploaded to your YouTube account from a smart phone or from videos located on your PC.  Once there, clips can be cropped:

and arranged in any order.  Then,fun transitions can be added between each clip:

After your video is combined, you can add Text throughout:

Finally, YouTube provides numerous audio tracks to really sweeten your production!

Best of all, it's free to use and can be accessed from any computer with an internet connection; no software install needed!

Brain Dump

Have you ever tried to quantify what it is that you know about some specialized topic? How about what you and other people as a group collectively know about that topic? It's not always easy.

When I'm writing documentation for complex systems, I want to be sure I get everything in my head out into the reference document. To help make sure I've considered all of the important components and all of the things that need to be said about those components, I like to brain dump using tools designed for "concept mapping".

As shown here, a concept map is represented as a bunch of noun phrases like "the brain" or "knowledge", drawn as ellipses or bubbles. The noun bubbles then have links drawn between them, labeled with phrases that express the nature of the relationship.

This doesn't appeal to everyone, but I find it helpful for grouping and sorting things out, especially for complex systems. When I'm done with a mapping, I find that putting that knowledge into regular prose form just flows quite naturally. Even better, it tends to result in cramming the most useful information into the fewest words. That's powerful stuff.

If all I have to work with is web access, I'll turn to a cloud application at http://bubbl.us/. It has the basic features needed, and I like the way they've done keyboard shortcuts to speed work flow. However, it has some behaviors I don't quite like just because it's too different from my favorite mapping tool.

If I can, I'll use a PC that has my faithful old CmapTools on it. CmapTools is a program available from the impressively titled Institute for Human and Machine Cognition (yes, this is exactly where SkyNet really will be born). You need to register to download CmapTools but it's free. If the idea of dumping your brain content sounds useful and/or fun (it's both), you can learn more at http://cmap.ihmc.us/.