Hasta La Gadget!

This article was written on April 10, 2008 by CyberNet.

It’s always amusing to read why people think one operating system is better than the other.  Of course we are all titled to our own opinions, but people can really get defensive when it comes to their operating system of choice even if they have no knowledge of, or have never used the other operating system. In our opinion at least, at the end of the day, there are reasons why Vista is great and reasons why OS X is great. By asking someone who used both on a regular basis, they could probably tell you about the strengths and weaknesses of each operating system. Do they both have their problems? Of course! Do they both have some great features about them? Why of course! If they didn’t, people wouldn’t use them.

Given this, you’ll understand why we found it amusing when Computer World recently wrote an article titled “Five Reasons why Vista Beats Mac OS X.” When TUAW (The Unofficial Apple Weblog) wrote their reasons why OS X was better to respond to what Computer World (CW) wrote, the situation got even more interesting. Here’s a quick look at what Computer World wrote and then how TUAW responded.

1. CW: Vista runs more software
   TUAW: “Is software ever really about quantity over quality?”
2. CW: Vista is safer
   TUAW: “The BSD base of OS X has certainly proved itself over the years and to say otherwise is just a staggering example of either stupidity or arrogance”
3. CW: It’s the money, stupid. “If like most of the world, you’ve got to work for a living, then you’ll find that a Vista machine is far less expensive than a Mac.”
   TUAW: “For many consumers, they want something that will last more than a year. For a one-year purchase, a $600 PC is fine — but if you want to keep something around for a while, the price point is going to be almost exactly the same Windows or Mac.”
4. CW: The Mac is closed; Vista is open
   TUAW: “If you are building your own computer, you aren’t looking for official support anyway — voiding the warranty is part of the fun. You can tweak out your iMac or you MacBook in amazing ways. Overclocking is so 2003 anyway.”
5. CW: Two words — Steve Jobs
   TUAW: Two words — Steve Ballmer

All of these arguments seem a little silly, don’t they? People use what they use for a reason, right? In the end, it comes down to personal choice. Any thoughts?

Copyright © 2010 CyberNet | CyberNet Forum | Learn Firefox

Related Posts:

Get A Tour Of Windows VistaMake Sure To Activate Windows Vista Beta 2Vista Transformation Pack 5.5 ReleasedVista And Suse 10.1 Go Head-To-HeadMicrosoft Officially Announces Vista Pricing

This article was written on May 21, 2008 by CyberNet.

Web Browser Wednesday

Are you one of those people who like to conserve every square inch of screen space when it’s possible? If so we have a treat for you today! We’re going to demonstrate how you can become the ultimate Firefox minimalist with the help of some extensions and themes. If you implement everything that we have listed below you’ll wonder where half of your browser has gone. You might also go cross-eyed… don’t say we didn’t warn you.

–Themes–

The first major step that a minimalist Firefox user takes is often in changing their theme. By choosing a more compact theme you can eliminate nearly any and all spacing found throughout Firefox, and the end result can save a lot of area in your browser.

The screenshot to the right shows the Classic Compact Firefox theme laid overtop of the classic theme. The double-ended arrows indicate how much space you save by simply applying this theme. There are a few other themes (like miniFox) that are similar, but Classic Compact is really the one that has won the hearts of minimalists around the globe.

–Toolbars & Menus–

There is a lot of “fat” that lies within the toolbars and menus in Firefox. The themes aim to take some pounds off the toolbars, but there are some extensions that can take the minimalist design to a whole new level:

• Searchbar Autosizer [Homepage]
  Keep the browser’s search box small when it’s not being used. This will let you have a really small search box that expands as you type. That means your Address Bar gets even more room!
• Faviconize Tab [Homepage]
  You’ll be able to double-click on a tab and have it collapsed down to only it’s icon. Now you won’t feel like such a pig when you have 40 different tabs open.
  
• Personal Menu [Homepage]
  How often do you really use those menus (File, Edit, etc…) anyway? If it’s not very often you can stuff them into a single icon by using this extension. All of the menus will still be accessible, but they will just take an extra click to get to them.
• Smart Bookmarks Bar [Homepage]
  If you’re not ready to give up your Bookmarks Bar then maybe this extension will help keep things a little more tidy. By default it will only show the icons for the sites located on the Bookmarks Bar, and then when you hover over them it will expand to show the name as well.
  

–Status Bar–

I wouldn’t say that the Status Bar is the hugest space consumer, but hey, we’re trying to scrounge up every pixel that’s possible. Right? So we’ve got a few specialized styles and one extension that can clean up your Status Bar a little bit.

• Mouseover for Clutter [Homepage] Requires Stylish
  This will hide the excessive number of icons that you probably have in the Firefox Status Bar, but they will reappear each time you hover over the bar. That way you’re not really losing any functionality, unless of course one of those icons also serves as some sort of notifier (such as a new mail notifier).
• Autohide Status Bar [Homepage] Requires Stylish
  Get the Status Bar completely out of the way with this style. Once installed it will create an area that is just one pixel in height, and when you hover over that it will show the Status Bar.
• autoHideStatusbar [Homepage]
  This is an extension that’s similar to how the previous style operates, except that it goes one step further. With this extension you can set it so that when you hover over hyperlinks it will show the Status Bar, which means you can still see where the links point to. The Status Bar can also be shown when the page is loading so that you can monitor the progress.
  Note: This extension is currently experimental, and you’ll need to login to your Mozilla account before downloading it.

–Overview–

I think you have a pretty good set of tools to work with so that you can be well on your way to becoming a Firefox minimalist. I’m sure many of you have trimmed down your Firefox in one way or another, and I would love to hear how you’ve managed to conserve space in Firefox! Shoot us a comment below with your thoughts.

Copyright © 2010 CyberNet | CyberNet Forum | Learn Firefox

Related Posts:

Your Week in Review with Sunday’s SummaryCyberNotes: Top 10 Wikipedia Themes for Stylish UsersTweak Firefox’s Performance Using FireTuneCyberNotes: Your Week In Review With Sunday’s SummaryCyberNotes: Your Week in Review with Sunday’s Summary

Even the most loyal Android user is bound to kvetch about the stock keyboard at some point or another, and while Swype has definitely grabbed the hearts of a good many Froyo users, Swiftkey remains our third-party keyboard of choice. After escaping beta just a few months ago, TouchType has just outed an ‘HD’ build that’s designed to cope with many of the higher-resolution displays being used on today’s gargantuan Android phones. Moreover, we’re guessing that this was done to look a bit better on devices like the Galaxy Tab, and there’s no denying that the new design elements are a real step forward. Aside from the makeover, the app is also gaining five new languages (Brazilian Portuguese, Czech, Danish, Norwegian and Polish), improved language prediction quality and a new US layout that nixes accented characters. For those who’ve yet to try it, the latest version can be tested for a full 31 days, after which you’ll be coerced into ponying up $3.99 for the real-deal. Hit the source links below (or the QR code shown here) to give it a go.

Continue reading Swiftkey Android keyboard goes HD, adds new tongues and improved language prediction

Swiftkey Android keyboard goes HD, adds new tongues and improved language prediction originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 15 Dec 2010 00:59:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |  Swiftkey (1), (2)  | Email this | Comments

This article was written on June 26, 2006 by CyberNet.

If you don’t want to download and install the free Microsoft Office 2007 Beta 2 then you can take it for a test drive online. Microsoft has setup a complete simulation environment that lets you completely test each of their Office 2007 products:

• Microsoft Office Access 2007
• Microsoft Office Excel 2007
• Microsoft Office InfoPath 2007
• Microsoft Office OneNote 2007
• Microsoft Office Outlook 2007
• Microsoft Office Outlook 2007 with Business Contact Manager
• Microsoft Office Outlook Web Access
• Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2007
• Microsoft Office Project Professional 2007
• Microsoft Office Publisher 2007
• Microsoft Office SharePoint Designer 2007
• Microsoft Office Visio 2007
• Microsoft Office Word 2007
• Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services
• Microsoft Office Project Server 2007 (should be available soon)
• Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007

The testing environment is currently very busy and you will probably have to wait in line if you want to give it a shot. There was no wait time when I accessed it the first time but when I went back it was a 17 minute delay. I am sure that the service will continue to get busy as more and more people find out about this, so go and “stand” in line now if you want to try it! Oh yeah, it requires Internet Explorer (surprise surprise) since it has to install an ActiveX plug-in.

Thanks Jason!

Copyright © 2010 CyberNet | CyberNet Forum | Learn Firefox

Related Posts:

OpenOffice.org: Take A Test Drive – Keep The Car!Windows Vista Business Test Drive Not ImpressiveMicrosoft Office 2007 Gets A Small FaceliftMicrosoft To Begin Charging For Office Beta 2Microsoft Confirms No ‘Kill Switch’ In Office 2007

This article was written on December 23, 2006 by CyberNet.

Setting up your own Web server can be a pain when trying to install PHP, MySQL, Apache, and phpMyAdmin. There are several different applications available that try to make doing this easy by installing all of the above for you, and my favorite has always been EasyPHP. I’ve tried others but EasyPHP is just so, well, easy.

The only thing that I never liked about it is that they don’t update it very frequently. It has been nearly 2 years since the last version was released and within that time there have been significant updates to all of the included programs. Luckily they have been working on a new version and we should see it available soon, but if you can’t wait any longer to get your Windows server setup in a matter of minutes (with the latest software) then they have posted a Beta version.

Here are the version numbers of each application that is included:

• Apache 2.2.3
• PHP 5.2.0
• MySQL 5.0.27
• phpMyAdmin 2.9.1.1
• SQLiteManager 1.2.0

If you’re still a little skeptical about how easy it is to install this just checkout their installation guide. Note: Most of the website is in French so you may have to use their translation buttons at the top in order to have the page translated into your language.

So now you don’t have any excuse why you can’t post your holiday pictures on a nice website for your family to see.

Copyright © 2010 CyberNet | CyberNet Forum | Learn Firefox

Related Posts:

Download Internet Explorer 7 Beta 3Avast! Antivirus for Windows Home Server (WHS)VMware Converter 3 Beta Makes Your OS Into Virtual MachineInternet Explorer 7 Beta 2 Released By MicrosoftWindows Server Longhorn Beta 3 Screenshot Gallery