Hasta La Gadget!

This article was written on January 16, 2008 by CyberNet.

Web Browser Wednesday

One of the most valuable pieces of data your browser can hold are your bookmarks. For some people it’s not only important to access your bookmarks no matter where you’re at, but also from whatever browser you are using. That’s why today we are taking a look at some different ways you’ll be able to sync bookmarks between the different browsers.

Something I spent a lot of time doing was hunting around for a solution that would work in several different browsers, instead of just Firefox and Internet Explorer. Unfortunately there wasn’t a lot I could find because some browsers, like Opera, don’t make it easy for third-party bookmarking services to be integrated.

Luckily Opera 9.5 (currently in the Beta stage) will include bookmark synchronization with Opera’s own servers. What I would like to see is Opera open up their bookmarking service and create an API that other developers could use. That way their service could become the one-stop shop for remote & cross-browser bookmark synchronization. But until that happens here are some alternative solutions:

–FavoriteSync & PlainOldFavorites–

PlainOldFavorites is a Firefox extension that gives users direct access to the Internet Explorer Favorites. With it you can access, add, and organize your favorites from within Firefox. Once installed this will add a new menu option that will be adjacent to your existing Firefox Bookmarks menu, and the two bookmarking systems are always kept separate from each other.

You can make the system even more powerful if you combine it with the free FavoriteSync utility. This will synchronize your Internet Explorer Favorites with a remote server so that the bookmarks can be accessed from any computer.

–Del.icio.us–

Del.icio.us is one of the most popular online bookmarking services, and they offer a variety of tools that integrate with it. There is an add-on for Internet Explorer, a Firefox extension, and bookmarklets that should work in the other browsers.

I’ve tried out Del.icio.us before, but for some reason it never really struck me as all that great. It’s nice that your bookmarks are accessible from any browser via their website, but I just don’t feel like I have the control over my bookmarks that I would like to have. I guess you could say that I’m more of a folder guy rather than a tagger.

–Diigo–

Diigo is really more than just a bookmarking service. In addition to letting you save and organize bookmarks, you can also clip text and images from websites. Just like Del.icio.us they have an add-on for Internet Explorer, extension for Firefox, and bookmarklets designed for the other major browsers.

Don’t shrug off the bookmarklet as a weaker version of the add-ons. Diigo’s bookmarklet is surprisingly powerful, and you’ll find almost all of the features contained within the add-ons. If you’re using a browser other than Internet Explorer or Firefox Diigo would be a perfect fit for you.

–Zinkmo–

We’ve previously written about Zinkmo and explained about how it works, so we won’t go too much in depth here. It’s an all-in-one solution for people who want to synchronize their bookmarks between Firefox and Internet Explorer…remotely! They’ll store your bookmarks on a remote server, which makes this an ideal solution for people who use one browser at home, and a different one at work.

–Google Bookmarks–

Google Bookmarks is integrated into the Google Toolbar for both Internet Explorer and Firefox, but Firefox users also have the GMarks extension for even more control. Google’s bookmarking system is similar to Del.icio.us in that it uses a labeling/tagging system for organizing the bookmarks. The tools used to display the bookmarks will transform these tags into a folder-like system.

If you’re using a browser other than Internet Explorer or Firefox just drag this bookmarklet into your bookmarks:

Google Bookmark

That bookmarklet will let you bookmark the site currently being viewed in the browser. Unfortunately the only way to view and manage your existing bookmarks is to visit the official Google Bookmarks homepage.

Copyright © 2011 CyberNet | CyberNet Forum | Learn Firefox

Related Posts:

Google Ditches Browser Sync Extension for Firefox 3Your Week in Review with Sunday’s SummaryCyberNotes: Synchronize Bookmarks Between Firefox and IEFoxmarks Introduces Sync ProfilesSync Bookmarks in Internet Explorer with IE7Pro

To say Motorola’s had a stellar show would be a massive understatement. Betwixt the Motorola Atrix 4G, the Xoom, Droid Bionic and to a lesser extent the Cliq 2, they’ve been reborn and are the star of the show. Of course, in order to peddle your wares at CES you need a booth — the more garish the better, typically — and Moto’s is massive and bedecked and badazzled in light with more flair than you’d need to work in a place like Chotchke’s. So, we wandered about, took in the sights, the sounds, and grabbed some pics and a short vid of what we saw.

Continue reading Motorola’s CES 2011 booth tour

Motorola’s CES 2011 booth tour originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 09 Jan 2011 08:01:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |   | Email this | Comments

This article was written on December 03, 2007 by CyberNet.

Do you have some computers in your home or at work that don’t get used as much as they should? After all, we can only use one computer at a time, and many users have one computer that they have handpicked to answer to their every need.

You might be surprised to find out that you can actually make use of several computers without sacrificing the ease-of-use that you get by keeping everything self contained on one computer. An application by Stardock called Multiplicity will let you share a single mouse and keyboard between several different computers after you complete the brief setup process. Multiplicity will even configure the Windows firewall automatically so that it’s one less thing you have to do.

Click to Enlarge

To use Multiplicity all you have to do is move your mouse from one computer/monitor to another. It will feel like you are using a single computer because of how seamless the transition is, but in reality each monitor is connected to its own computer. There are a lot of reasons that I can think of where this would be useful, such as…

• If you have a laptop and desktop at home. You’ll be able to make use of both computers (maybe just use your laptop for instant messengers and web browsing while you play a game on your desktop).
• If you have multiple desktops at work. You can use each computer for something different, which is really great for processor-intensive applications such as photo and video editing.

What would a utility like this be without being able to share clipboards between the computers? With Multiplicity you can actually copy and paste text or images from one computer, and then go and paste them onto another computer. If you purchase Multiplicity Pro you’ll even be able to copy and paste files and folders from one computer to another!

Multiplicity will let you customize some important aspects of the application, such as hotkeys that can be used to switch between the various machines. If you wish you can also set it up so that the displays not currently in focus will slightly darken, thereby making it easier for you to see which screen your mouse is currently on. Pretty cool, huh?

Click to Enlarge

–The Giveaway–

We have 1 license of Multiplicity Pro (valued at $49.95) to giveaway today! All you have to do is drop a comment below providing both your name and email address in the appropriate fields. We obviously need your email address for contacting you in the event that you should win. Believe it or not we’ve actually had winners in previous giveaways get randomly selected, but since they didn’t provide an email address we had to pick someone else.

Just as with all of our giveaways we will be using a random number generator to determine the winners. For this round here is how we’re going to give out the license:

• 1 winner will be picked from all of the comments submitted.

Entries for the giveaway will be accepted up until December 4th at 5:00PM Central Time.

Copyright © 2011 CyberNet | CyberNet Forum | Learn Firefox

Related Posts:

Less Than Two Hours to Enter CyberNet’s Giveaways!CyberNet’s $6,948 Giveaway RoundupAnd the Winners are…Only One Day Left To Enter The iPod Nano Giveaway!And the Tweak Vista Winners are…

This article was written on November 15, 2006 by CyberNet.

Web Browser Wednesday

Memory leaks seem to follow Firefox with every release but have you ever stopped to think that some of those leaks may be the cause of an extension(s) that you have installed? Many of you probably have thought about that but you haven’t taken the time to disable them one-by-one to find the culprits.

I don’t blame you because it takes some time to do that. First you have to record your memory usage after about an hour of using the browser. Then you have to disable one of the extensions and spend about another hour of browsing to see what your memory usage climbs back upto.

I take the time to do it every now and then but I typically have less than 7 extensions installed and I have found most of them to be leak-free. However, with the release of Firefox 2 I decided to give two extensions another shot after not using them for months: Tab Mix Plus and IE Tab.

I had forgotten how great Tab Mix Plus was and quickly became addicted to it all over again. After a few hours of installing the extension I noticed Firefox starting to run slow so I pulled up my memory usage and it was at 120MB! That isn’t as bad as some of you might experience but that is 40MB over my normal amount. It was hard but I determined that I would rather eliminate this memory leak so I ditched Tab Mix Plus, once again.

Next up was IE Tab. I didn’t install this simultaneously with Tab Mix Plus because I never install more than one “trial” extension at a time. After I have it installed long enough I’ll move the extension from the “trial” category to the “I think it’s a keeper” category. IE Tab was a little better than Tab Mix Plus but after around an hour of typical usage the memory meter was reading a little over 100MB which means IE Tab contributed around 20MB to the memory leaks. Needless to say I don’t use the extension that much so I decided to drop this one as well.

These memory leaks get pretty frustrating but I feel bad for the Mozilla team because so many people criticize their browser for being loaded with the leaks, when in fact the leak is often caused by an extension that the user has installed. Months ago I put together a list of extensions that are known to have leaks and IE Tab was on that list, but ironically enough Tab Mix Plus was one of the solutions to another problematic extension. I’m not sure what caused Tab Mix Plus to start leaking memory but after removing it from Firefox my memory usage returned to the 80-90MB for typical use.

Then there is always this about:config tweak that doesn’t remove the memory leaks but will free Firefox from using your physical memory as soon as you minimize the browser. Opera has this feature enabled by default and I think it is a good idea to use it in Firefox as well.

What’s the best way to start fresh and minimize the amount of memory that Firefox uses? The solution that everyone is saying works 100% is restarting Firefox, although that is just a temporary solution as well. The problem is that no one ever wants to restart Firefox because they don’t want to lose their open tabs or windows. No problem! Firefox 2 has a built-in session restore feature that can be utilized to cure that situation. Just install the Restarter extension (yes, another extension ) and it will add an option in the File menu to restart Firefox. It will automatically remember all of the tabs that you have open and even all of the windows. This is definitely a must-have extension for everyone using Firefox 2 and especially those people who are plagued with memory leaks!

Copyright © 2011 CyberNet | CyberNet Forum | Learn Firefox

Related Posts:

Firefox 3 Memory Leaks Status UpdateCyberNotes: Your Week In Review With Sunday’s SummaryCyberNotes: Firefox 2.0 Memory LeaksMozilla Fixes 2300 Bugs In Firefox 2.0 So FarFirefox Analyzed: 611 Defects and 71 Vulnerabilities Found

NetTalk hasn’t exactly made it easy for the world to believe in all of its claims, but things are just getting loco at this point. The NetTalk TV has been introduced here at CES, touted as a companion device to the Duo that provides ultra-low cost digital TV service. Reportedly, the bantam box offers HDMI / S-Video / composite outputs, Ethernet and WiFi, and it’ll enable consumers to receive only the standard- and high-definition content that they want. According to the company, this allows individuals to detach themselves from the high-priced cable packages that force you to pay for 50 channels (when you only need three), but here’s the kicker: there are no details whatsoever provided in the press release after the break. Not even a price. We’re told to expect shipments in Q3 of this year, followed by undoubted disappointment as you begin to understand that it won’t be NetTalk to finally convert the à la carte dream into reality.

Continue reading NetTalk TV to deliver à la carte HD television programming?

NetTalk TV to deliver à la carte HD television programming? originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 09 Jan 2011 00:45:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |   | Email this | Comments