Computer and Web Articles

I hear the terms “upload” and “download” misused much, much too often. The difference between the two is simple, and I’d like to share it with you today in hopes that you’ll be able to avoid sounding silly in the future.

When you download a file, you’re pulling it from the Internet/from a website DOWN onto your computer. You can download almost anything - documents, music, photos - as long as you’re grabbing it from somewhere else and putting it onto your computer, you’re downloading.

Conversely, if you have something on your computer and you’re putting it UP onto the web, you’re uploading. You upload a file from your computer to a site where it didn’t exist before.

So, as an example, when I put photos from my computer onto my online Flickr photo album (at www.flickr.com), I’m uploading them to the web. If I’m browsing Flickr and I come across a shot of a friend that I really like, I can download it from the web onto my computer.

Remember how the fellows on Mission: Impossible (oh, and Inspector Gadget too) used to receive those cool messages at the beginning of each episode that self-destructed right after they finished reading them? Well, great news. Now you can create your very own self-destructing messages.

KickNotes allows anyone to send and receive self-destructing e-mails via the Internet - and the service is completely free. Message senders determine either how many times their message can be read or how much time can elapse after a message has been read before it self-destructs. Then, if someone tries to click on or access a KickNotes message that’s deleted itself, he or she is simply told that the message no longer exists. Once the message is gone, it’s GONE.

So go ahead and send your own self-destructing message over at www.kicknotes.com. And don’t forget to bookmark the site; you never know when a service like this could come in handy.

Ooh la la! Fun, easy and useful, Preezo is a little online tool that allows you to create great web presentations for school, business or pleasure.

The presentations you create can be accessed from any computer with an internet connection, so you don’t have to worry about bringing a disk or memory stick to your class or speech.

Even better, you can forget about having to e-mail huge PowerPoint presentations; Preezo presentations are far easier to share. Additionally, Preezo’s user interface will feel familiar and comfortable to anyone who’s ever used PowerPoint, so don’t worry about having to learn the ins and outs of a new program.

If you ever use PowerPoint, give Preezo a shot. You might never go back. Take a look here: www.preezo.com.

Find out where you fall on the spectrum of world wealth. Enter your annual income into the box on the homepage (make sure you first change the English pound sign to the American dollar sign, of course!) and click the “Show me the money” button. My guess is that you’ll be surprised to find just how financially wealthy you truly are in comparison to the rest of the world.

This site was developed by a London design agency named Poke for two primary purposes: to challenge people’s perceptions of their personal wealth while raising money for a good cause in the meantime.

Globalrichlist.com links directly to a site where you can donate to a humanitarian organization working with people in 70 of the world’s poorest countries. By no means are you required to donate money upon visiting the site, but if you do happen to take a peek and appreciate what you see, pass along the information to a friend or two, eh?

Go on.

Visit www.globalrichlist.com to gain a sense of just how rich you are.

• http://lab.mathieu-badimon.com - An absolutely beautiful showcase of interactive Flash work that’s quite fun to explore.
• http://tinyurl.com/37vphr - Do you use Yahoo to search the web? If so, you’ll definitely want to check out this page and make use of the great search shortcuts offered.
• http://www.drawspace.com - Learn to draw, become a better drawer, take drawing lessons, pick up drawing tips, practice drawing animals, discover the best drawing supplies to buy, etc. If you love to draw, DrawSpace.com was created just for you.

The easiest method of inserting today’s date in an Excel cell is to simply hold down the Ctrl key and … press the semicolon key. That’s it. It works, I promise! Try it out.

There’s a great shortcut for entering the current time as well - hold down the Ctrl and Shift keys, and then press the colon key. Ta-da!

Remember that hitting the Alt + Enter key combination while typing inside a cell forces a line break.

The next time you want to select ALL your Excel sheets at once, click on the tab of the first one, hold down the Shift key, then click on the tab of the last one.

You can always sort your data by columns by selecting Sort from the Data menu, then Options. Select that Sort left to right option button, then click OK - and in the Sort by option dialog box, just select the row number by which the columns should be sorted. Click OK one more time and you’re good to go.

Firefox’s PageAddict extension can help you take control of your online addictions! (Well, at the very least it’ll show you how bad they are …)

Install PageAddict and use the web as you usually do. Return to the PageAddict site at any time to see a summary displaying the amount of time you’ve spent/wasted on each site. Categorize sites to help you better understand where your time is going, and rest assured that your information is always kept private - it’s never shared or sold to anyone).

So if you think you’re ready to see just how many hours you’re spending each week playing Web Sudoku, watching videos over at Break.com, or reading news stories (and yes, I know you’re just reading the celebrity news stories, you can’t hide that from me), then you’re ready to use PageAddict. Install it now; it’s free to download from www.PageAddict.com. Go on - reclaim some of those wasted hours!

Earlier this week, upon clicking a link on the Lifehacker blog, I found myself looking at the CNN Money website, watching a short 2:47 video clip on a technology that I’d never heard of: inkless printing.

Printing photos taken from your phone is about to get a LOT easier, folks! Imagine clicking a button to send a photo from your cameraphone to your iPod-size inkless printer, which will print your full-color photo in 30 seconds.

Now imagine having that inkless printer actually embedded in your cameraphone or laptop (integrated printers coming soon!). Now, consider that the inkless photos printed with this new technology are essentially water resistant, smudge resistant, and quite hard to tear. Even cooler.

These inkless printers should be out on the market by the end of 2007, with increased distribution and production beginning early 2008. Take a look: http://tinyurl.com/2fw6yu.

1. BookMooch (www.bookmooch.com) - yet another book trading site where you give books away and receive books you want. I like the illustration on the homepage.
2. GameCheats (www.gamecheats.eu) - Are you an online gamer, by chance? Been to gamecheats.eu yet? Probably not, I’m guessing, because you’re probably one of those players who’s so good you never need any hints. Right?
3. “25 Tips to Improve Your Skype Experience” Article (http://tinyurl.com/3yzkty) - Learn how to: Forward your Skype calls, record your Skype calls, use Skype to provide online customer support from your website, bring Skype to your TV, create a lip-sync-ing avatar to hide behind (for those bad hair days, you know), let Skype disguise your voice … and more, of course … because I obviously didn’t list 25 tips right there.