There are a number of really solid desktop diagramming applications. For many people, though, that software is overkill. The applications contain more features than you’ll ever use. On top of that, if you move between operating systems a lot, you’ll run into compatibility problems. And what happens if you’re away from your computer and need to whip up a diagram in a hurry?

You turn to the web, of course! Like just about everything else, there’s a web-based app for diagramming. Well, more than one. Let’s take a look at four of the best ones.

1. Gliffy

Let’s start off with what’s arguably the most powerful and flexible diagramming tool on the web: Gliffy. You can use Gliffy’s templates (and there are quite a few of them) or start off with a blank canvas on which you can build your own diagrams.

So what kinds of diagrams can you create with Gliffy’s templates? Website and software user interfaces, Venn diagrams, organizational charts, flowcharts, network diagrams, UML diagrams, floor plans, and even business processes. There’s pretty much something in there for everyone. On top of that, there are multiple templates for each type of diagram.

The interface is drag and drop, which makes placing objects in your diagrams easy. On top of that, Gliffy comes with a number of very comprehensive object libraries. If you want to use your diagrams in a document or on a web page, you can export them in multiple formats like PNG, JPEG, or SVG.

You get five diagrams for free. After that, you have to pay for a plan.

2. Lovely Charts

If you’re looking for a comprehensive online diagramming solution, you could do worse than Lovely Charts. As the app’s name implies, you can create some very nice looking flowcharts. But you can also build some impressive diagrams.

Like what? How about network diagrams, site maps, wireframes, and even people diagrams. All the work is done in a very spare user interface, one that keeps all the main tools that you need at your fingertips. Or, at least, at your mouse pointer.

Adding elements to a diagram is easy. Just drag and drop it from a library of shapes. If you want to change a shape, right click it and choose an option from the menu that opens. Doing that is definitely faster than deleting and starting over.

Once you’re finished, you can save your diagram as a PNG or JPEG image. Admittedly, Lovely Chart’s export options aren’t as flexible as those of Gliffy but they’re usable.

3. Flowchart.com

While you might think Flowchart.com is limited (if only based on its name), it isn’t. In fact, Flowchart.com is very flexible. It’s also free, which is a bonus!

How flexible? You’re not limited to flowcharts. You can also create mindmaps, family trees and albums, and even network diagrams. Much of that flexibility comes from the extensive clip art and symbol libraries that comes with the application. Just select what you want and drag it into the work area. From there, you can add other basic shapes, text, and lines.

Another key feature of Flowchart.com is its collection of templates. You can use them to create several different engineering diagrams, flowcharts (obviously!), mind maps, organizational charts, and project management diagrams.

One unique feature of this application is its ability to record all of the actions and additions that you are performing on a diagram. You can literally walk someone through a thought or planning process.

4. LucidChart

If there are two words that describe LucidChart, those words are simple and flexible. It’s written in HTML5, so you should be able to use LucidChart with any modern web browser.

Just like any good desktop (or web-based) application, LucidChart allows you to drag and drop elements of a diagram and even images that you upload on the application’s canvas. You can literally begin creating diagrams within seconds. On top of that, once you register – there are free and paid accounts – you get access to a large number of shapes and fonts. And with some paid accounts you can also upload and save your work as a Visio diagram and you even get revision tracking.

The web offers some powerful, flexible, and easy-to-use diagramming applications. They pack most, if not all, of the features that you need and they’re available no matter where you are or what operating system that you use.

Do you have a favorite web-based diagramming tool? If so, share your picks by leaving a comment.

Photo credit: Daniel Göhler (Own work) GFDL, CC-BY-SA-3.0 or CC-BY-SA-2.0-de, via Wikimedia Commons

The post 4 Awesome Web-Based Apps for All of Your Diagramming Needs appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

One of the more interesting and useful third-party applications for Dropbox is DropPages. It turns Dropbox into a simple web server, letting you publish static web pages quickly and easily. You don’t even have to buy a domain or pay for hosting.

Here’s a look at how to get up and running with DropPages.

What You’ll Need

Obviously, you’ll need a Dropbox account. It’s free, and you get plenty of storage. Especially if you only use your Dropbox account for serving your web pages.

You’ll also need some files called themes. These provide the framework for your web site, and you can download them here. There are only three themes available, but they’re not bad looking.

That said, you can fine tune or create your own theme. How? Well, the themes are formatted with Markdown, a lightweight markup language that’s similar to Textile (which was covered by Make Tech Easier). Once you learn a bit of Markdown, you can customize your theme.

Once you have all of that, you’re ready to go.

Getting Set Up

Log into Dropbox and create a new folder. Click the New Folder button, and then type a name for the folder in the space that appears.

The name of the folder must contain .droppages.com – for example, scottnesbitt.droppages.com. This will be the URL to your web site. When you’re done, click the Create button.

From there, click the Share a Folder button in Dropbox. In the window that opens, click I’d like to share an existing folder and then click the Next button.

Click the folder that you created earlier, and then click the Next button.

In the next window, type server1@droppages.com in the Invite collaborators to this folder field. Doing this shares the file with the DropPages server and turns Dropbox (or, at least, that shared folder) into a basic but workable web server. When you’re done, click the Share folder button.

The request needs to be manually approved by Dave McDermid, the developer of DropPages. That approval can take anywhere from a few hours to a couple of days.

Finally, remember that theme file you downloaded earlier? Extract it into your DropPages folder. Once your share request has been approved, your site will look something like this when you (or someone else) goes to the URL:

Final Thoughts

DropPages isn’t high-octane Web publishing. But it’s not meant to be that. If you want to quickly put up a Web page or site, even just for a short while, the combination of DropPages and Dropbox is a great solution. Especially if your needs are simple and you don’t want to fool around with buying a domain, dealing with hosting, and coding web pages.

The post Publishing Web Pages with Dropbox and DropPages appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

If you use OpenOffice.org or LibreOffice, then you can save a lot of time by letting a command line utility called JODConverter do the work for you. Don’t let the fact that it’s a command line tool scare you. JODConverter is easy to use and fast. It’s also very effective.

Let’s take a look at how to use it.

Getting Started

Before you go and grab a copy of JODConverter, you’ll need OpenOffice.org or LibreOffice and the Java Runtime Environment for your operating system installed on your computer. Because it’s written in Java, JODConverter runs on Linux, Mac OS, and Windows.

Once you’ve made sure all of that is installed, download a copy of JODConverter. There are two version available: 2.x and 3.0. The main difference between the two version is that version 3.0 supports both LibreOffice and OpenOffice.org. It also seems, from my unscientific observations, to be a bit faster than version 2.x.

Extract the contents of the archive you downloaded to somewhere on your hard drive. For example, if you’re using Linux and downloaded version 3.0 of JODConverter, you can extract the archive to the directory /opt. JODConverter will be installed in /opt/jodconverter-core-3.0-beta-4.

Supported Conversions

JODConverter is very flexible. It can convert between the following formats:

• Word (.doc) to or from Word OpenDocument Text (.odt)
• Excel (.xls) to or from OpenDocument Spreadsheet (.ods)
• PowerPoint (.ppt) to or from OpenDocument Presentation (.odp)

The utility can also handle conversions from RTF and WordPerfect, older OpenOffice.org files, and can even convert all supported formats to PDF.

Doing a Basic Conversion

Now that everything is installed, you’re ready to go. The first thing you need to do is start OpenOffice.org in the background. To do that, open a terminal window and then type the following command:

soffice -headless -accept="socket,host=127.0.0.1,port=8100;urp;" &

Stay in the terminal window and change to the directory containing the files that you want to convert. Then, run the following command:

java -jar [path to JODConverter]/lib/[.jar file] source_file output_file

The path and the name of the .jar file will be different depending on the version of JODConverter that you’re using. If, for example, you’re using version 3.0, here’s a sample path:

java -jar opt/jodconverter-core-3.0-beta-4/lib/jodconverter-core-3.0-beta-4.jar source_file output_file

Let’s say you have a Word file named Secure_Email_Report.doc that you want to convert to OpenDocument format. Just run the following command:

java -jar [path to JODConverter]/lib/[.jar file] Secure_Email_Report.doc Secure_Email_Report.odt

Doing Batch Conversions

Using JODConverter to convert a single file is a waste. You can just as easily do the deed in OpenOffice.org or LibreOffice. But converting large numbers of files is where JODConverter shines. And that’s easy to do.

How? Just run this command:

java -jar [path to JODConverter]/lib/[.jar file] *.input_type -o output_type

In the command above, input_type is the extension of the files that you want to convert and output_type is the extension of the target format. For example:

java -jar [path to JODConverter]/lib/[.jar file] *.doc -o pdf

This converts all Word files (*.doc) in a directory to PDF files. All you need to do is substitute the extensions of the files types that you want to convert from and to.

Scripting the Conversion

Typing that long string at the command line can be a chore. And if you only use JODConverter infrequently, it’s easy to forget the path and name of the .jar file that you need to include in the command.

To get around that problem, you can write a script or a batch file. If you’re running Linux, for example, here’s a good tutorial on shell scripting.

But you don’t even need to do that. If you have Python (a popular scripting language and interpreter) installed on your computer, you can download and use a script named DocumentConverter.py.

To use the script, just type:

python DocumentConverter.py input_file output_file

The script doesn’t seem to work with batch conversion, though.

Final Thoughts

If you’re looking for a fast and efficient way to convert multiple documents to another format, then JODConverter is definitely worth a look. It’s fast, it’s efficient, and it’s flexible. On top of that, it’s fairly easy to use. Even if you only convert documents once in a blue moon, JODConverter is a good addition to your toolkit.

Photo credit: 7rains

The post How to Batch Convert Documents at the Command Line appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

Whether you believe that QR codes are here to stay or that they’re a fad, QR codes can be useful. Creating one is fairly easy. You don’t need any special software on your desktop, and you definitely don’t need to worry about fiddling with graphics.

There are a number of websites that will let you create your own QR codes. They have the same general features and functions, and save QR codes to your computer as a PNG file. Some generators, though, are better than others.

Let’s take a look at four of the best ones.

1. ZXing Project QR Code Generator

While it won’t win any prizes for looks, the ZXing Project QR Code Generator is easy to use and is very flexible. How simple and flexible?

Just choose the type of content that you want the QR code to contain. It can be any of the following:

• A calendar event
• Your contact information
• A geographic location
• An email address
• A phone number
• A short message to be sent by SMS
• A block of text
• A URL
• Login information for a wireless network

Then, you just type information in the fields on page and click the Generate button to create your QR code.

2. QRStuff

If you want even more flexibility, then you’ll want to check out QRStuff. It’s one of the most fully-feature QR code generators available, yet remains easy to use.

You get the same content options as you do with the ZXing Project generator, along with a few other options. These include PayPal Buy Now Link, links to various social media services, a link to content in the Apple iTunes Store, and a link to a video on YouTube. You can also use QRStuff’s built-in URL shortener – the shortened URLs begin with http://qrs.ly.

What really sets QRStuff apart, though, is the ability to change the color of your QR codes. Don’t like the standard black and white? Then change it to a shade of green, a nice red, or even bold blue.

3. GOQR

If you’re a back-to-basics kind of person, then GOQR might be what you’re looking for. It’s basic, but has a few options that set it apart from other QR code generators.

How basic? You can only create QR codes that contain text, a URL, a telephone number, and SMS message, or contact information. Nothing special, but not bad.

But, as I mentioned a couple of paragraphs ago, GOQR has a some very useful features. The first is the ability to change the size of your QR codes. Most generators create QR codes in three sizes: large (350 px by 350 px), medium (230 px by 230 px), and small (120 px by 120 px). With GOQR, you can use a slider to change the size of your QR code in five pixel increments. You can go as small as 60 px by 60 px or as large as 1000 px by 1000 px.

If you click the Options button, you can also change the foreground and background color of your QR code and add a margin around it.

4. Maestro

Maestro makes creating a QR code both simple and graphical. While it doesn’t offer a lot of options for the type of content to include in a QR code, it’s probably one of the easiest to use (and visually pleasing) QR code generator on the web.

You can use Maestro to create QR codes that contain:

• Phone numbers
• SMS messages
• URLs
• Map information
• Contact information
• Text
• Calendar events
• Links to content in the Android Market, BlackBerry App World, and the iTunes App Store

Maestro takes things a step further. You can add headings to your QR codes – sort marketing messages, for example. Maestro also generates an HTML image tag that you can embed in a website or blog (assuming you don’t want to download an image). On top of that, you can change the color of the QR code.

Creating your own QR code is quick and easy. While the four QR code generators we’ve just looked at are among the best ones out there, you can find more by doing a search with your favorite search engine.

Do you have a favorite QR code generator? Then share it by leaving a comment.

The post 4 Awesome Online Resources for Creating QR Codes appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

But what happens if you need to make some changes to a site or design and are away from that desktop or laptop? And what do you do when you’re using a tablet or a device like a Chromebook? Since you’re developing for the web, there’s no reason why you can’t turn to the web for help.

It’s worth checking out one of the number of web-based code editors out there. They range from simple editors to full-blown integrated development environments (IDEs).

Let’s take a look at four online editors for Web developers.

1. Codey

Codey is a very simple but very effective editor. It enables you to connect to your web servers and create and edit files on those servers.

After you sign up and log in, you’re asked for the FTP login information for your web server.

If you maintain multiple sites, you can add more than one server.

Codey’s editing interface is quite simple. In the navigation pane on the left, you can create a new file or select the file that you want to edit from a list. You’ll notice that there isn’t a toolbar that gives you one-click access tags or elements. You need to do all of your coding by hand.

2. ShiftEdit

ShiftEdit is a flexible IDE for web development. You can also use it for writing in plain text or Textile.

You can get files into ShiftEdit in a number of ways:

• Creating new files
• Uploading files from your hard drive
• Importing a DreamWeaver site file
• Connecting to a web server via SFTP
• Opening files that are stored in Dropbox

As with Codey, you need to code by hand using ShiftEdit. Well, not always. ShiftEdit also has a Design View that acts as a WYSIWYG editor. It actually gives a good representation of what a web page will look like.

ShiftEdit has two versions: a free version, and a premier edition that will gives you more features, and which will set you back $5 (USD) per month.

3. JustEdit

Lying somewhere between Codey and ShiftEdit is JustEdit. Using JustEdit, you can write Javascript, HTML5 code, and CSS and view the changes as you type.

The editing interface is very basic. You need to code by hand, but there are three tabs – one each for Javascript, HTML, and CSS. The preview pane on the right shows how all three look together.

One useful feature of JustEdit is the Smart Phone view. As the name suggests, it gives you a peek at how your page or site will look when viewed with a smartphone.

JustEdit also has another interesting feature: the ability to fork a project. You can take your code, make a copy of it, and then use that as the basis for another project. You can also fork code that others have shared and make a derivative work or just learn from what others have done.

4. CodeRun

If you do any C#, Javascript, or PHP development, then you might want to give CodeRun a close look.

CodeRun resembles a desktop IDE in both its looks and functions. Your work is built around the metaphor of the project. CodeRun builds the skeleton of the project, and has a project management pane that lets you add and remove files from a project, copy and upload files, and view files in a web browser window.

You can run your code, build it, and even download an entire project to your hard drive as a .zip file.

CodeRun keeps you honest by checking your errors in two ways. First, there is a real-time error list at the bottom of the application window. And there’s a built-in debugger. The debugger can be slow but it does a pretty good job.

Final Thoughts

Being away from your computer and your tools doesn’t mean that you can’t work on your web development projects. By turning to the web itself, and using the powerful and flexible tools that are available, you don’t have to miss a beat. You can work, and get things done, no matter where you are.

Photo credit: ppdigital

The post 4 Great Online Editors For Web Developers appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

Enter BlueGriffon. Built on top of Gecko (the rendering engine used by Firefox), BlueGriffon enables you to create web pages using HTML5, CSS3, and other widely-used web standards.

Let’s take a look at how to build web pages with BlueGriffon.

Installing BlueGriffon

Head on over to the BlueGriffon download page. You can either grab an installer or an archive containing the program’s files.

If you downloaded the installer, pop open a terminal window and navigate to the directory in which you downloaded the archive. Then, run the following commands:

chmod +x BlueGriffon-x.x.x-Linux-[arch]-Install sudo ./BlueGriffon-x.x.x-Linux-[arch]-Install

Where x.x.x is the version of BlueGriffon (the current version is 1.1.1) and [arch] is the architecture of your distribution (x86 for 32-bit systems or x86_64 for 64-bit systems). Follow the prompts. The installer copies the program’s files into the folder /usr/local/BlueGriffon.

If you downloaded the archive, just extract it to a directory in your path. Then, either manually add a launcher for the application to your system menu or add the path to the directory /usr/local/BlueGriffon to your system path.

Getting Started

When you’re ready to go, either double click the icon that the installer places on your desktop or run the command bluegriffon.

Select File -> New to create a new web page. You’re literally presented with a blank canvas, sort of like a new word processor document.

As with a word processor, you can literally start typing to create your document. Using the buttons and menus on the toolbar, you can also apply formatting to your page. Like what? Here’s a sampling:

• Heading and paragraph styles
• Font attributes like bold and italics
• Alignment of the text
• Indents
• Lists

You can also insert links, tables, images, video, audio, and forms with a click of a button or by selecting an option from the Insert menu.

That’s all pretty much standard for any good HTML editor. What sets BlueGriffon apart is its support for HTML5. HTML5 includes a number of new elements that, among other things, make it easier to add audio, video, menus, and distinct sections to a web page.

You can insert HTML5 elements by selecting Insert -> HTML 5 Element and then selecting the element from the list.

You have two options for adding formatting using Cascading Style Sheets. If you have a style sheet file, you can link it to your web page by selecting Insert -> Stylesheets. Click the + button.

Click Linked to the document and then click the icon beside the Href field. Navigate to the directory containing the stylesheet file that you want to add to your web page. Once you’ve added the stylesheet file, it appears in the Insert or edit stylesheets window.

When you’re done, you can wind up with a very nicely-formatted web page.

Any time you want to view or edit the HTML code of the page, click source at the bottom of the BlueGriffon window.

Adding Diagrams

Obviously, the easiest way to do that is to create the diagram in another program, save it as a web-friendly graphic file, and then insert a link to the image in BlueGriffon.

But if you just need a simple diagram, you can use BlueGriffon’s built-in SVG editor. On your web page, click where you want to place the diagram. Then, launch the editor by clicking the SVG Edit button on the toolbar.

The diagrams you can create are fairly basic, but you can build some decent flowcharts and the like. When you close the editor, BlueGriffon places the diagram on your web page.

Final Thoughts

BlueGriffon does a very good job of helping you build single web pages. There’s no site management feature, but its support for HTML5 is second to none. And you can expand on BlueGriffon’s capabilities with add-ons. You have to buy the add-ons, but if that supports the development of the application then they’re worth it.

Photo credit: svilen001

The post Create and Edit Web Pages on the Linux Desktop with BlueGriffon appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

One popular and effective way of beating a problem or releasing your creativity is mindmapping. While you can go old school and use pen and paper, there is quite a bit of mindmapping software out there for the desktop and on the web.

There are a number of really solid mindmapping tools for the Linux desktop. Let’s take a closer look at three of them.

1. FreeMind

FreeMind is probably the best-known Open Source mindmapping tool out there. And it’s definitely the most powerful.

Even though it is powerful, FreeMind is fairly easy to use. Every function you need is available from a right-click menu. You can add branches to (called nodes) to your mindmap, insert images, apply formatting, and even incorporate hyperlinks.

What really gives FreeMind a lot of flexibility are its plugins. One of the most useful is the plugin to export a mindmap to PDF or SVG. Even if you don’t want to use those plugins, though, you can export a mindmap to a number of other formats including XHTML, a Java applet, Flash, JPEG or PNG, or even an OpenOffice.org Writer document or a page for Twiki (a popular wiki engine).

2. VYM

VYM is short for View Your Mind and is quite a bit easier to use than FreeMind. A big part of that comes from its very clean, almost stripped-down interface.

As with FreeMind, all of the functions you need – adding nodes, inserting links and images, and changing line styles – are available with a right click.

One noticeable way in which VYM differs from FreeMind is how colorful many of the elements of a mindmap are by default. With FreeMind, you need to manually set colors for nodes and connectors. In VYM, they’re automatically colored. You can, however, change the colors if you need to.

VYM’s export function isn’t as flexible as that of FreeMind, but it does do a pretty good job depending on the format you choose. Those formats include OpenOffice.org Impress documents, XHTML, several image formats, LaTeX, and XML. Your best options are XHTML and the image formats.

Labyrinth

If you use the GNOME desktop manager and are looking for a simple mindmapping tool then you should give Labyrinth a look. While it lacks many of the bells and whistles in FreeMind and VYM, Labyrinth gets the job done.

While it’s easy to use, Labyrinth takes a bit of getting used to. Especially if you’ve used other mindmapping software. Forget about right-click menus. You add nodes by clicking somewhere in the editing area and then typing the label for the node. If you want to add a child, you need to click on the parent node first and then click in the editing area to create the new node. It’s a bit confusing at first, but once you get the hang of it editing in Labyrinth is fairly easy.

The mindmaps that you create with Labyrinth are like the application: very simple. You can add images to your mindmaps and export them in the following formats: PNG, JPEG, SVG, and PDF.

One feature that you’ll like about Labyrinth is map manager. When you launch Labyrinth, you get a window listing all of your existing mindmaps. No need to go hunting through a file explorer to try to find the one that you want.

Summing Up

Mindmapping is a great way to unleash your creativity and to clear any mental log jams. The right tool, when properly used, can help. And it can make the process of creating and using mindmaps even more enjoyable.

Photo credit: dumbledad

The post Three Great Mindmapping Tools for the Linux Desktop appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

No matter what you do, knowing some HTML (Hypertext Markup Language, the language used to format web pages) can’t hurt. It’s easy to learn and with HTML, you can write and format your documents in any text editor on any operating system.

But you know what? HTML is often overkill for most people. Why? They might not use it very often, and will need to pore over a tutorial whenever they need a refresher. A simpler and more efficient way of formatting documents for the web is to use Textile.

Taking a Closer Look

Textile is a lightweight markup language (also called a humane text format). All that means is instead of using formatting tags surrounded by angle brackets:

Textile uses keyboard symbols to format your documents. For example, surrounding a word or a phrase with asterisks:

*This is some sample text*

Makes that text bold. You can add other formatting – like headings, lists, tables, and a lot more – to your documents too. How? Let’s take a look at how to create headings.

And that’s easy. Like HTML, Textile supports six levels of headings – 1 is the largest, and 6 is the smallest. To format the largest heading, you’d write this in your document:

h1. My Heading

Make sure that there’s a space between the period and the text that will be the heading.

To create a numbered list, but a hash symbol (#) in front of each item:

# Item 1
# Item 2
# Item 3

For a bulleted list, replace the hash symbol with an asterisk.

Tables can be a bit trickier. You create cells using vertical dashes (|), like this:

|Name|Rank|Serial Number| |Scarlet|Captain|12345| |Nimitz|Admiral|02771|

One great feature of Textile is its support for Cascading Style Sheets (CSS – a way to add custom formatting to a web page). Say, for example, you have a paragraph style called article. You can add that a heading or paragraph in a Textile document like this:

 h2(article). A Formatted Heading

Here’s what a document formatted with Textile looks like:

There’s a lot more to Textile. And it’s a lot easier to learn than HTML. If you’re looking for a good reference, you can find one here.

Converting to HTML

So you have all these documents formatted with Textile and want to publish them to the web. How do you do that? The easiest way is to use the online processor. Just copy the contents of your document into a text field, and then click the Text to HTML button.

If you’re a command line junkie, check out Xilize. It enables you to convert documents formatted with Textile even when you’re offline.

Do You Need to Convert?

Well, that depends. If you’re building and maintaining web pages by hand, then Yes! You’ll have to do the conversion. But if you’re using a blogging platform or content management system, then you have another option.

WordPress, Movable Type, Joomla! and Drupal all have Textile plugins. With the plugins installed, you don’t need to convert your content to HTML. Just copy and paste it into the text editor in your blog or content management system and publish from there. You get the best of both worlds: a simple way to format your documents and a powerful way to making them available to the world.

Final Thoughts

Textile is a fast, simple, and efficient way to format content for the web. It’s easy to learn and, because it’s plain text, you can create and edit documents on any operating system and in any text editor.

It’s not for everyone, though. You might not want to tackle Textile’s admittedly shallow learning curve or have to deal with the conversion step. But if that doesn’t bother you, give Textile a try. It can seamlessly fit into your writing and web publishing workflow. And it can save you time and effort when you want to put content on the web.

Photo credit: svilen001

The post Getting to Know Textile appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

Like what? Well, your data is in someone else’s hands. And what happens if a service you’re using closes up shop, denies you access to your data, or is just unreachable? Then you have a problem.

The solution: create your own cloud. Believe it or not, doing that isn’t all that difficult. You don’t need a degree in computer science or training in networking. All you need is the right hardware and software.

Let’s take a look at four options for creating a personal cloud.

1. TonidoPlug

Imagine having a server that literally fits in the palm of your hand and which you can just plug into a handy socket. That’s the idea behind TonidoPlug. When configured, the TonidoPlug sits on your network and you access it using a unique URL.

But what does it do? TonidoPlug is a file and application server that runs Ubuntu. TonidoPlug comes installed with a number of media streaming, file sharing, and productivity applications. There’s also a blogging application, a bit torrent client and a file browser.

There are also a bunch of free mobile applications so you aren’t chained to a desktop or laptop computer.

2. ownCloud

If you have a web server (or space on one) and are willing to embrace your inner geek, then give ownCloud a look. It’s an Open Source project that lets you access your files anywhere, sort of like Dropbox. While ownCloud’s main capability right now is storing files, you can take advantage of that capability to sync items like bookmarks across different devices and machines.

You can access your files through ownCloud’s web interface or using WebDAV. If you need to, you can also connect to the server on which ownCloud is installed via SFTP or SSH.

Setting up ownCloud isn’t easy. It’s not very well documented, and you’ll have to search around for information on setting up the database that ownCloud uses. As well, there is no desktop or mobile client for ownCloud. Clients for the desktop and Android devices are being developed, though.

3. iTwin

iTwin takes a slightly different approach to creating a personal cloud. Instead of relying on servers, you plug a USB flash drive into your computer and then drag and drop the files that you want to share or sync on to the flash drive.

Then, you detach half of the drive and plug that half into another computer. From there, you drag and drop the files on to that computer. Using an Internet connection, the files are securely transferred and synchronized between your two computers.

The USB drive doesn’t store your files. It just creates a secure connection between your computers. Well, at least as far as the files that you’re sharing go. And you can remotely disable iTwin if you lose one or both halves of the USB drive.

The drawback? iTwin only works with computers running Windows.

4. Opera Unite

When is a web browser not a web browser? When it’s Opera. While you don’t hear much about Opera these days, it has one killer feature: Opera Unite.

Opera Unite turns the web browser into an application server. You can share files, access applications, and collaborate with with people. And those other people don’t need to be using Opera. They can access the files and applications that you’re serving with Opera Unite using any web browser.

The applications range from the interesting to the useful. They include media streaming and file sharing tools, productivity apps, and communication tools.

To use Opera Unite, you need an account with My Opera (Opera’s online community). You’ll get a unique URL for your Opera Unite server, and as long as your computer is connected to the Internet and Opera Unite is running you can access the server anywhere.

Creating your own cloud isn’t too difficult. And it can be a lot more secure than commercial cloud offerings. If nothing else, creating your own cloud gives you some peace of mind and keeps your data in your hands.

Photo credit: Lunaaldent

The post 4 Options to Create a Safe Personal Cloud appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

The problem with passwords is that they can be hard to remember. Or, at least, it’s hard to keep track of which password you use with which site or service. There are a number of excellent password management applications for desktop and mobile. But you’re not always at your own computer and your mobile device might not be handy.

Why not turn to the web? There are a number of services that let you securely manage and access your passwords, no matter where you are.

Let’s take a look at Passpack, a secure and easy to use online password manager.

Setting Up Your Account

While Passpack has paid accounts, you can also sign up for a free one. The free one lasts forever but is limited to 100 passwords.

When you sign up, you’re asked to create a user name and a password. Both are a minimum of six characters and are case sensitive.

That doesn’t seem too secure, does it? Even if you enter a long password, there’s always some doubt about its security.

But when you click Sign up Now, you still have one more thing to do. And that’s create a packing key. The packing key is a sentence (one which is easy for you to remember) that encrypts and decrypts your passwords in Passpack.

When you click Done, you’re ready to go.

Adding Your Passwords

Let’s say you’ve logged into your Passpack account. After entering your user name, password, and packing key you’re taken to a page containing information about your account and news about the service. Click the Passwords tab at the top of the page.

Click the Add New button to add a password to Passpack.

All you need to enter are a name for the site or service, your user ID, and the password for that site or service. Optionally, you can add a link and the email address that you signed up with. You can also add a note about the site. That could be anything from what you use it for to challenge questions and answers that might come up when you try to log into the site.

Notice that there’s a gauge below the Password field that shows the strength of your password. A longer, more complex one will be stronger.

Once you’ve entered all the information, click OK.

Getting To Your Passwords When You Need Them

OK, you’re somewhere and need can’t remember your login information for a particular website. What do you do?

Log into Passpack and then click the Passwords tab at the top of the screen. From there, find the name of the site or service that you want to log into. Passpack lists them alphabetically, and only displays 12 per page. You can click the previous page and next page links at the bottom of each password list to move through your collection.

In the list, just click the name of the site or service for which you want to get your login information.

Notice that your password is hidden. That’s to protect you from shoulder surfing. Click show to display your password.

Pros and Cons

Passpack isn’t for everyone. You need to have an Internet connection in order to use it. And although Passpack is secure, it’s only as secure as you make it. You need to create a strong password and packing key.

On the other hand, Passpack is quite secure. You can read about how the service secures passwords here. On top of that, Passpack times out after five minutes of inactivity. You’ll have to enter your packing key to get back in.

Passpack also has a desktop application and there’s a mobile version of the site. The desktop application isn’t anything special. You’re better off going through the web interface.

If you’re not afraid to put your passwords on the web, then Passpack is a good choice. It’s secure and easy to use, and your passwords are at your fingertips no matter where you are.

Photo credit: Mihut84

The post Manage Your Passwords Online with Passpack appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

With some, that can be fairly easy. With many others, it can be difficult, if not impossible. But you should be able to get your information – no matter what the information is – out of any online service easily and in a format that other services or software can read. After all, it’s your data!

Thanks to the work of the Data Liberation Front project, Google has been making the process of getting your data out of its various products easier. The result is Google Takeout. While not complete and not perfect, Google Takeout looks like it’s a step in the right direction.

Let’s take a look at how to use Google Takeout and see where it falls flat.

Using Takeout

Obviously, you won’t be using Google Takeout unless you have a Google account. Just go to the Google Takeout site and log in.

Takeout only supports the following services at the moment:

• +1 (web content that you’ve rated)
• Buzz (short updates and conversations)
• Picasa Web Albums
• Google Profiles
• Google+

With Google+, you can back up your circles (your groups of friends), your contacts, and your stream (any posts you’ve made to Google+).

On the main screen, click Create Archive. Takeout collects your data into a zip file and downloads it.

By default, Takeout creates an archive of everything. You might not want to do that too often. If you have a lot of data, especially a lot of photos in Picasa Web Albums, the zip file that Takeout creates can be large – several hundred megabytes.

Instead, click Choose services. You can select the data that you want to download, and Takeout will give you an estimate of the size of the archive.

Once you’ve selected the services, click Create Archive. Takeout collects your data into a zip file and downloads it.

The Backups Themselves

What you get in the archives the Takeout creates depends on the product. Takeout uses different file formats to backup your data.

Like what? Picasa Web Albums backups are, obviously, image files. Buzz, +1, and Google+ streams are HTML files. Your contacts are vCard files. And your Google Profile data is a JSON file.

While you might not be able to easily read some of those formats, other software and web services should be able to. It’s just a matter of importing the files.

What About My Other Data?

Takeout only lets you back up a small set of your data in Google’s services. But what about your other data? Well, there are some options for that. They’re not centralized, and force you to do a bit more work, but those options can be effective.

You can back up Google Docs using the information in this MakeTechEasier post. The Data Liberation Front website offers suggestions for other Google products.

If you’re willing to part with some money, then you might want to give Backupify a look. It can backup your Gmail, Google Docs, Google Sites, Google Calendar, and Google Contacts. Mac users can take advantage of CloudPull to backup their data from Google Docs,
Google Reader, Google Calendar, and Google Contacts.

Google’s products and services aren’t a black hole for your data. With Google Takeout, it’s gotten a lot easier to get your data out.

Google Takeout

The post Backup Your Online Data With Google Takeout appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

While Google, Bing, and Yahoo! are arguably the leaders in search, there are literally dozens of search engines out there. Many of those engines track your search history and, based on that history, put you in what’s been called a “search filter bubble”.

Enter DuckDuckGo. It’s not your average search engine. Not only does it maintain your privacy, it also has a number of nifty features that make the search engine more useful.

Let’s take a closer look at DuckDuckGo.

Using It

If you want to do a search, just head over to DuckDuckGo. Its front page looks a bit like Google, doesn’t it? Very minimal, very uncluttered, and very easy to understand.

Just type what you want to find — for example, MakeTechEasier — in the search box. Then, press Enter.

OK, nothing you haven’t seen before. But take a look to the right of the results. Notice the list of Search ideas? They apply additional criteria to your search. Click one of the search ideas, say +Tutorials and you get a more focused version of your search.

For the techie (or techie wannabe), there are also tech-related utilities that do more complex calculations, offer useful computing tools — like a whois search and a password generator – and links to cheatsheets.

More Than A Search Engine

But DuckDuckGo does more than search. It has a number of nifty utilities that you might find handy. Click Goodies on the main page. On the Goodies page, you can:

• Do mathematical calculations
• Perform conversions
• Find a list of DuckDuckGo keyboard shortcuts
• Get weather information

And a lot more.

You can also change a large number of settings. Click Settings on the main page. There are settings for how DuckDuckGo handles results, for tightening your privacy options, and for changing the look and feel of the front page.

The settings are easy to change. Select an option from one of the many drop-down lists on the Settings page, and then click the Click here to save and go back link at the bottom of the page.

!Bang

No, MakeTechEasier isn’t trying to shoot you. Using DuckDuckGo’s !Bang feature, you can essentially combine two steps into one: go to a particular site and automatically search for a keyword.

How does it work? Say you want to search Barnes & Noble for a book on WordPress. Just type !bn wordpress in the search box and press Enter. You automagically jump to the Barnes & Noble site and results matching your query appear.

There are !Bangs for over 100 sites. You can find a list of those sites here. The great thing about using a !Bang is that it saves you time. Depending on the site, though, the results may or may not be what you’re after.

If you don’t care about your search results being highly personalized, then you should definitely give DuckDuckGo a close look. You still get great results but with less spam and you don’t have to worry about being trapped in a search filter bubble. On top of that, DuckDuckGo’s other features and functions make it even more useful.

Photo credit: DarkSide

The post DuckDuckGo: A Search Engine With A Twist appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

For many people, an old fashioned spreadsheet is perfect for their needs. The rest of us need a little something more. Not with the features, of say, ,KyMyMoney or GNUCash but something that isn’t as confusing or convoluted as a spreadsheet can be.

Presented for your approval: wxBanker, a software that makes it easy to manage your finances. It might not have every bell or whistle, but it does have most of the bells and whistles that you actually need.

Getting wxBanker

Just head on over to the download page for wxBanker. You can download either a Debian installer or an archive containing the source code. If you’re running a Debian-based Linux distro then just double-click on the installer.

If you’re installing using the source code, you’ll need the following software and libraries installed on your computer first:

• Python
• wxPython
• python-dateutil

Chances are you already have all of that installed. If not, then you can install them using your distribution’s package manager.

Extract the archive containing the source code to a directory on your computer. Open a terminal, change to the directory, and run the following commands:

python setup.py build
sudo python setup.py install

If you’re using Ubuntu, wxBanker is in the official Ubuntu software repositories. You can use Ubuntu Software Center (select Applications > Ubuntu Software Center) or Synaptic Package Manager (select System > Administration > Synaptic Package Manager) to install it. If you want the latest version of the software, you can also add the wxBanker PPA to your system.

Getting to Work

Obviously, you’ll want to set up accounts. To do that, click the plus icon in the top-left corner of the wxBanker window. Type a name for the account and then press Enter.

Next, you need to enter transactions. There are two ways you can do this: importing comma-separated values (CSV) files or by manually entering the transactions.

To do an import, you’ll need to download a CSV file from your online banking system. Then, select File > Import from CSV.

In the CSV Import window, find the file that you downloaded from your online banking system. Then, in the bottom left of the window, select the account in wxBanker into which you want to import your transactions. Finally, click Import. Note that wxBanker won’t always import a CSV file.

If you’re starting with a clean slate, then manually entering your transactions is the way to go. To do that, click on the name of an account in the upper-left corner of the wxBanker window. Then, in the bottom right portion of the window select a date, enter a description of the transaction, and the amount. Then, press Enter.

What happens if the transaction is a debit or a bill? Easy, just put a minus sign in front of the amount. For example, -37.25.

Recurring Transactions

Sometimes (well, more of than that) we have fixed amounts put into or taken out of our accounts. wxBanker can handle those. When entering a transaction, click the Recurring checkbox.

Select how often the transaction repeats – daily, weekly, monthly, or yearly – and when (if ever) it ends. If the transaction repeats weekly, choose the day of the week. Then, press Enter.

The Downside

wxBanker’s simplicity comes at a price. You can’t directly link it to your bank accounts. And wxBanker doesn’t read files from applications like Quicken that were saved in the OFX format. However, you can export CSV files (which can also be read by spreadsheets), and you can connect wxBanker with Mint.com (just select Settings > Integrate with Mint.com).

That said, you shouldn’t expect wxBanker to integrate with your bank accounts. As the software’s developer states:

[T]he point of wxBanker is to keep your own separate balances to compare with your online banks and other accounts.

While wxBanker is simple, it does just enough. It’s a quick and easy way to track your financial transactions.

Photo credit: Avolore

The post Manage Your Finances (Simply) in Linux with wxBanker appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

The content on Tumblr consists of tumblelogs, which are somewhere between full-blown blogs and microblogs like Twitter. And a tumblelog is simple to set up and use, which adds to the popularity of Tumblr.

If you’re a Linux user and want to start using Tumblr, you’re not stuck with heading over to the site. There are a couple of Tumblr clients for the Linux desktop. Let’s take a look at how to post to Tumblr using Grumblr.

Getting Started

Let’s assume that you already have a Tumblr account. The next step is to download and install Grumblr. The application runs in any desktop manager that uses GTK. So, if you use a Linux distro that runs GNOME, XFCE, LXDE, or even a newer version of KDE, you should be able to run Grumblr.

Grumblr is written in the Ruby programming language, so you’ll need Ruby installed on your system along with a number of Ruby packages. You can find a list of those packages, along with installation instructions for Gentoo Linux and Ubuntu, at Grumblr website.

If you’re feeling a bit uber-geeky, then you can download and compile the source code for Grumblr.

From there, launch Grumblr. In Ubuntu, for example, press ALT+F2 to open the Run Application dialog box. Then, type grumblr in the dialog box and click Run.

On first start up, you’ll be asked to enter the email address and password for your Tumblr account. Once you do that, you’re ready to go.

Blogging with Grumblr

The difference between Tumblr and other blogging site is the way in which you post various types of content. And Grumblr reflects that. You can post text (like a traditional blog post), links, conversations, quotes, photos, audio, and video. For everything except text, you have something resembling a template with fields for the information for that kind of post.

Here’s an example of the fields used to post a link in Grumblr:

And Grumblr reflect this. On the left side of the Grumblr window, click a tab to select the kind of content you want to post. Then, type the post in the main part of the editor.

You’ll notice that unlike other blogging clients, like ScribeFire, there isn’t a formatting toolbar. You can add formatting using Markdown. Click the Markdown button in the bottom right of the Grumblr window and then add the Markdown formatting (which consists of symbols on your keyboard).

When you’re ready to publish your post, click Send. And if you’ve set your blog up to post to your Twitter account, click the Twitter button in the bottom left of the Grumblr window.

Like Tumblr itself, Grumblr is easy to use. It’s a simple but effective way to do short-form blogging from your Linux desktop.

The post Posting to Tumblr From The Linux Desktop With Grumblr appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

As long as you have some wifi available and the right app, you can turn your Android device into a mini web server, which lets you share files between your device and your computer. Let’s take a look at how to do just that with an app called Dooblou Wifi File Explorer.

Getting Going

You can download and install Dooblou Wifi File Explorer from the Android Market. There are two version: free, and Pro which costs just under $2 (USD). Using the free version, you can’t download, copy, or delete files. This article will look at the Pro version.

Once you’ve installed the app, turn on wifi on your Android device. You can do this using the widget on a home screen. If you’re using a wifi hotspot that you’ve visited before, then your device will automatically connect to it. If not, then manually connect to the hotspot by tapping Settings -> Wireless & Networks -> Wi-Fi Setting and then tapping the name of the hotspot to which you want to connect.

Next, start up Wifi File Explorer on your device.

When the application starts, you’ll be given a URL – for example http://192.68.24.179:8000. Just type that into the address bar of your Web browser to connect to Wifi File Explorer.

If you’re a bit paranoid, you can add a password that you (or anyone else) can use when you connect to Wifi File Explorer’s URL. To do that, tap the menu key on your device and then tap Settings. Then, tap Require Password and tap Password. Type the password in the text box that opens and then tap OK.

Now, you’re ready to go.

Using Wifi File Explorer

Type the URL for Wifi File Explorer in your browser’s address bar. If you set a password, you’ll be asked to enter it. Then, you’re at the main screen for Wifi File Explorer.

The screen is structured like a conventional file manager. Let’s take a look at some of the things you can do with Wifi File Explorer

Obviously, a listing of directories isn’t all that useful. You’ll want to dig into those directories to get to your files. To do that, just click on a link to the left to open a directory.

One the most common task you’ll perform is to upload files to your device. To upload a file, scroll to the bottom of the page. Then, click the Choose File button.

In the window that opens, find the file that you want to upload and then click Open. Back in your browser, click the Upload Files button.

You can’t upload multiple files. Well, you can but first you have to archive them into a zip file. Then, upload the zip file. Once that file is uploaded, unzip it and delete the archive. It’s a bit of work.

To download a file, click the Download link to the right of the name of the file. If you want to download several files at once, click to select the checkbox to the far right of the names of the files that you want to download. Then, click the Download Selected button.

Deleting a file is just as easy. You can either click the Delete link to the right of the name of the file, or select several files and then click the Delete Selected button.

If you have music on your device, you can stream it to a computer. Just go to the directory containing the music, and then click the Streaming Media Playlist button. This downloads a file with the extension .m3u. You can open this file in any media player, and it will play all the tracks on your device.

Shutting It Down

Once you’re finished, shutting down Wifi File Explorer is easy. Just turn off the wifi connection using the widget on your device’s home screen. Once the connection is broken, Wifi File Explorer shuts down.

Just remember to wait until any uploads or downloads are finished before you turn off your wifi connection.

Final Thoughts

Not having to connect an Android device to a computer with a USB cable is liberating. And with the widespread availability of wifi, using an app like Dooblou Wifi File Explorer makes sense. It just makes your digital life that much easier.

Photo credit: svilen001

The post How To Share Files with Your Android Device, Without Wires appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

Maybe you’re a budding author who wants to self publish. Or maybe you’re a software developer who wants to distribute documentation in a slightly different way. You could be a blogger who wants to collect a bunch of their best posts into an ebook.

There are several ways to do that. You could fire up your favorite word processor, start typing, and then create a PDF file. Or you could go straight to a format that just about every electronic device can handle. The easiest way to do that is to write an publish using Sigil

Sigil is an Open Source WYSIWYG ebook editor that produces ebooks in the popular epub format. You can read books in epub format using just about any dedicated ebook reader, on most smartphones and tablets, and even on desktop or laptop computers.

Let’s take a look at how to use Sigil to write and publish an ebook.

Installing the Software

Sigil can run on Linux, Mac OS, and Windows. You can download installers for each operating system from Sigil project’s website. If you’re in the mood to embrace your inner geek, you can also download the source code.

Once you’ve downloaded the installer, just run it. Sigil installs on your computer, and adds an icon to your Start or application menu. For example, you can launch Sigil under Ubuntu by selecting Applications -> Sigil -> Sigil.

Time to Get Writing

Sigil is WYSIWYG, which means working in it is a lot like working in a word processor. To get going, just start typing.

The main difference between Sigil and a word processor is that you don’t get all that much formatting. You can add:

• Headings
• Bold, italics, underline, and strikethrough
• Bullets and numbers
• Images

You can also justify and indent text. All of that is literally a click away on the toolbar. To apply formatting, just highlight the text and click one of the buttons on the toolbar.

Chances are that you’ll have more than just a bit of text. And chances are that you’ll want to break that text up into chapters. To do that, click to the left of the heading that you want to make a chapter title and the select Insert -> Chapter Break.

You’ll notice that something interesting happens in the left portion of the Sigil window. The new chapter is added to the Book Browser.

The Book Browser lists the chapters in your ebook. Out of the box, the chapters are named Section000x.xhtml, where x is a number starting at 1. You can change the name of the chapters by right clicking on them, selecting Rename from the menu that appears, and then typing a new name for the chapter.

You can also click and drag chapters in the Book Browser to rearrange them.

Once you’re finished, save the book. You can open the epub file whenever you want to edit it.

What If I Already Have Content?

A book in epub format is essentially a collection of XHTML files. So if you have content that’s already written in HTML or XHTML format, you can copy and paste that content into Sigil. To do that, open the HTML file in a text editor and copy it. Then, in Sigil, select View -> Code View.

Paste your HTML code into editing window then select View -> Book View to return to WYSIWYG mode. You’ll probably have to add chapter breaks, which was explained a few paragraphs ago.

Viewing Your ebook

Once you’ve got a draft completed, you’ll probably want to see what the product looks like. Obviously, the best way to do that is to view the epub on as many ebook readers (and other devices) as you can. Unfortunately, that’s not always possible. The next best thing to do is use the Calibre ebook management software.

After downloading and installing Calibre, use it to open your epub file. Then, click View on the Calibre toolbar. In the viewer window that opens, you can navigate through your ebook, change the size of the fonts, and see any formatting problems.

Conclusion

If you need a quick and easy way to write and publish an ebook, then you should give Sigil a look. It can actually do a bit more than what was described in this article, and once you get the hang of the software you’ll be able to create some very nice looking ebooks.

Photo credit: super

The post How to Easily Write and Publish eBooks With Sigil appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

In fact, ripping DVDs can be quite easy. If you’re a Linux user, you have a number of excellent options. And you can turn to the command line or go GUI. Going GUI can be a bit easier, especially if you only rip DVD once in a blue moon. With a GUI application, you don’t have to worry about remembering (or forgetting) lengthy command strings.

Presented for your consideration OGMRip. It’s an easy-to-use and efficient GUI application for ripping DVDs. Let’s take a look at how to use it.

Getting Up and Running

You can install OGMRip from sources, or you can download installation packages. Links to both the source files and the installers are available on the software’s download page.

OGMRip also requires a set of libraries and executables. You can find a list here. Chances are you have many (if not all of them) installed on your system. If you’re using a Debian-based Linux distro then your package manager will install the additional libraries and software.

Once you’ve installed OGMRip, look for it in your menu. In Ubuntu, for example, you can find it under Applications -> Sound & Video -> DVD Encoder OGMRip.

And if you’re a die-hard command line warrior, there’s also a command line client called shRip. You can download it here.

Let’s Get Ripping

To start off, just pop a DVD into your computer’s optical drive. Then fire up OGMRip.

Click the Load button, and in the Open DVD Disk window click Load.

It only takes about a second to load a DVD. Once the DVD is loaded, you can go ahead and rip it or select the chapters that you want to rip. That’s useful when, say, you’re ripping a DVD of a TV series and only want to extract certain episodes. To do that, click the checkbox beside the name of the chapter.

Then, click the Extract button. The Options window pops up. You can either click Extract to start the process, or select an output target from the Profile list. The default is Ogg Video, which should be good enough for most purposes. Remember, though, certain formats will take longer to rip than others.

After you click Extract, OGMRip rips your DVD in several steps. First, it extracts the video and audio. This can take 30 minutes or more, depending on the length of the DVD.

Next, OGMRip does a test to see by how much it can compress the video. You can turn off this test by clicking a checkbox in the Options window when you start the ripping process.

Finally, OGMRip encodes the video and saves it to your hard drive. Again, depending on the length of the DVD and the profile that you selected, this can take quite a long time.

Is That All It Can Do?

For those who need more features, OGMRip has them. You can also:

• Add subtitles from a file to your video
• Add audio from an external file
• Crop and scale the video

If you need more information, check the manual.

Extending OGMRip

The out-of-the-box settings for OGMRip are fine for most of your needs. But if you need to, you can easily extend the application using plugins and profiles. Let’s talk about those for a moment.

The plugins for OGMRip enable you to output video to several other formats. Those include AC3, Dirac, and MPEG-1 and MPEG-2. The plugins are distributed as source code, so you’ll need to download and compile the sources if you want to use the plugins.

Profiles, on the other hand, help OGMRip target video for various devices. Have an XBox 360 or an iPhone or an Archos device? Well, by installing a profile you can. To install a profile, download the one you want to use. It’s file with the extension .xml. Then select Edit -> Profiles in OGMRip. In the Edit Profiles window, click Import. Find the file that you downloaded, and then click Open.

Ripping DVDs doesn’t have to be difficult. OGMRip does a good job of making the process as easy and painless as possible.

Photo credit: wax115

The post Ripping DVDs in Linux with OGMRip appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

Installing JShot

JShot is written in Java. Before you install JShot, make sure that you have the Java runtime installed on your computer. Most operating systems come with it already installed, but it doesn’t hurt to check.

Once you’ve determined that you have the Java runtime installed, download the installer. There are two version: an executable for Windows and a .jar file for Linux and Mac OS X. If you’re using Windows, double click on the executable to launch the installer. If you downloaded the .jar file, crack open a terminal window, navigate to the directory into which you downloaded the file, and then run the following command:

java -jar jshotinstall.jar

Then follow the instructions on the installation screens.

Taking Screen Captures

If you’re doing a number of screen captures, it’s most convenient to launch the tray applet. Do that by selecting JShotTray from the Application or Start menu – for example, in Ubuntu select Applications > JShot > JShotTray.

Your capture options are limited: either a portion of a screen or window, or the full screen. Double click on the JShot tray icon to capture a section of the screen. Your mouse cursor will change to a plus sign (+) and you just click and drag to select the region. If you want to grab the entire screen, right click on the JShot tray icon and then select Capture > Full screen.

From there, you can save the screen capture (more on this soon), or edit it. To do the latter, click Edit with JShot. While I prefer to edit my images in The GIMP, the editor built into JShot doesn’t do too bad a job. With it, you can add shapes and lines to a screen capture, erase portions of the image, add text, and highlight text. Quick and dirty, but useful.

Saving Your Captures

If you want to be old fashioned, you can save your screen captures to your hard drive. Just click Save to file, give the file a name, and select the directory into which you want to save it.

But where’s the fun in that? Plus, you might not on you main computer, or might need to share the screen capture with someone else. JShot offers you a few ways to do that. You can upload a file to your Web site via FTP. If you have an account, you can also save your screen captures to any of the following services:

• Dropbox
• min.us
• ImageShack
• Picasa

Just click the Share button in the JShot window to select the service that you want to use.

Final Thoughts

While not the most fully-featured screen capture program out there, JShot does a better-than-average job. It’s easy to use, has solid features, and runs on several operating systems. If you use more than two OSes, then this is a plus – you get a consistent experience, no matter which operating system you use.

Photo credit: LeWy2005

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Another entry in the installer sweepstakes is Eve Installer. Unlike other installers for Ubuntu, Eve Installer is fairly simple and fairly barebones. It’s billed as a download manager that lets you install the main programs needed for the proper functioning of our Linux system.

Eve Installer won’t appeal to many hardcore users, but anyone else should find it useful.

Let’s take a look at how to use Eve Installer.

Downloading and installing Eve Installer

Head over to the developer’s website. It’s actually more of a blog than a website, so you’ll need to search for Eve Installer. The latest version (as of this writing) is 0.9.3.51. You can download English and Spanish packages for 32-bit and 64-bit computers, and a 32-bit installer for Linux Mint.

After downloading the file, open Nautilus and find the file eve-installer-0.9.3.51-[architecture]–[language].deb, for example eve-installer-0.9.3.51-amd64-EN.deb. Double click on the file to launch the Ubuntu Software Center (or GDebi package installer). Then, click Install Package.

Once the software has been installed, you can launch it by selecting System > Administration > EveInstaller.

Installing Software

Using Eve Installer, you can add any of the following:

• Software repositories (for example, the repository for the Medibuntu distribution)
• Basic applications and essentials for your Ubunutu distribution (for example, Flash Player or Dropbox)
• System tools
• Graphics applications
• Office software
• Audio and video applications
• Internet tools (like Web browsers and chat clients)
• Themes
• Games

The software that’s available is limited, but chances are you can find something new, interesting, and useful.

So, how do you go about installing software using Eve Installer? Say that you want to install Minitube, a desktop client for viewing YouTube videos. In Eve Installer, go to Multimedia. Then click the checkbox beside the entry in the list for Minitube.

When you’re ready to go, click Apply. A terminal window opens, showing the the progress of the installation.

When the installation is complete, you’ll need to click OK on the message that appears. Note, though, that Eve Installer doesn’t always add a shortcut for the program to your Applications menu.

Removing Software

OK, let’s say that you installed an application but it’s not really what you’re looking for. How do you get rid of it? Just find the application in Eve Installer. Click the checkbox next to the name of the application to deselect it. Then, click Apply.

Sometimes, Eve Installer will display a message stating that it can’t find the package that you want to remove from your system. To get rid of it, you might have manually delete the files from your computer — I’ve found that using apt-get at the command line and running Synaptic Package Manager don’t always do the job.

Final Thoughts

Overall, Eve Installer is easy to use and can install quite a bit of useful and interesting software on your computer. The amount of software is limited, and probably won’t be enough to appeal to a long-time Ubuntu user. But if you’re new to Ubuntu and don’t want to wade through the choices in Synaptic Package Manager or Ubuntu Software Center, then you should give Eve Installer a try.

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That’s all well and good if you’re chained to a desktop PC or laptop. But what happens if you frequently go mobile? Well, if you have an Android-powered phone and a Dropbox account, then you can turn to Todo.txt Touch.

Getting It and Getting Going

On your phone, go to the Android Market app and search for todo.txt touch. Then, tap the one search result. You’ll have to buy Todo.txt Touch; there’s no trial version. The app will set you back $2.00.

Once it’s installed, launch Todo.txt Touch.

The first thing you’ll need to do is link the app to your Dropbox account. When prompted, enter your Dropbox login information.

The app automatically saves your task list in a folder called todo in Dropbox. If you want to change the folder, tap the Menu button on your phone, and then tap Settings. On the Settings screen, tap File location and then type the name of another folder.

What If You Already Use Todo.txt on the Desktop?

That’s not a problem. First, make sure that you’re syncing the folder on Dropbox that Todo.txt Touch writes to with your computer. That should happen automatically. Then, move the file todo.txt into that Dropbox folder. You’ll also have to edit the file todo.cfg on your computer to point to the Dropbox folder. You can find instructions explaining how to do that here.

When you sync your task list with Todo.txt Touch, you’ll always be up to date.

Adding and Managing Tasks

Tap the Add button on the top right of the Todo.txt Touch screen. In the window that pops up, enter what you have to do and then tap Add.

Todo.txt uses a number of concepts from Getting Things Done (a popular method for personal organization). One of those concepts is contexts. A context is a thing, place, or person that you need to complete a task. All contexts have an @ sign in front of them For example, @Work denotes a task that you need to do in relation to your work. To include a context when adding a task, type @Context followed by the task.

You can also assign priorities to your tasks. To do that, tap a task on the main screen, and then tap Prioritize. On the Select priority screen, tap one of the priorities — ranging from A (most important) to E (least important).

If you need to modify or delete a task, just tap it. On the screen that opens, do one of the following:

• Tap Update to open the editing screen. From there, modify the task and then tap the Update button.
• Tap Delete. When prompted, tap the Delete button to get rid of the task.

Finishing Up

You have all of those tasks in your list. Obviously, you’re going to work your way through them. What do you do when you’re done? Tap the task that you’ve finished, and then tap Complete on the screen that opens. The task is crossed out in your list.

Once you’ve done marked a task as complete, remember to synchronize it in Dropbox. To do that, tap the Synchronize button on the top right of the Todo.txt Touch screen. On the screen that opens, tap Upload.

If you use Todo.txt and an Android phone, then Todo.txt Touch is a great way to make your task list even more portable. You get all the features you’re used to in Todo.txt but in a nice and easy-to-use graphical package.

Photo credit: Purple Slog

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