Trouble he will find you, no matter where you go, oh oh
No matter if you're fast, no matter if you're slow, oh oh
The eye of the storm or the cry in the morn, oh oh
You're fine for a while but you start to lose control...
He's there in the dark
He's there in my heart
He waits in the wings
He's gotta play a part
Trouble is a friend yeah trouble is a friend of mine
Ah ooh...
Trouble is a friend but trouble is a foe, oh oh
And no matter what I feed him he always seems to grow, oh oh
He sees what I see and he knows what I know, oh oh
So don't forget as you ease on down the road...
He's there in the dark
He's there in my heart
He waits in the wings
He's gotta play a part
Trouble is a friend yeah trouble is a friend of mine
oh oh
So don't be alarmed if he takes you by the arm
I won't let him win but I'm a sucker for his charm
Trouble is a friend yeah trouble is a friend of mine
ah ooh
How I hate the way he makes me feel
And how I try to make him leave,
I try, oh oh I try.....
Saturday, October 24, 2009
Thursday, October 22, 2009
Pain Is Unavoidable, Suffering Is Optional
If you’ve never, ever been hurt in your entire life, raise your hand. And leave this blog ASAP, because the following article is not for you. It’s for all the people who got hurt at some point in their lives. And who suffered because of that.
Suffering and pain are tied together in our minds. One is giving birth to the other. They’re like a single, osmotic being. Every time we get hurt, we suffer. And every time we suffer we create more hurt. It’s difficult to even talk about pain and suffering in a detached way, this is how deep they are buried in our subconscious mind. The mere act of reading about pain and suffering is making your brain reconnect with those feelings in this very moment.
Do you remember how you felt last time you experienced pain? What were the exact feelings? Frustration? Sorrow? Despair? Defeat? What were the words you used to describe it? Suffering? Affliction? Trauma? Grief?
Pain is one of the most avoided situations in our life. We run away from pain. We’re trying to escape the pain. To mask it, to hide from it, to cover it in superfluous, temporary indulgences. We can’t stand it. Because we don’t want to suffer.
Why Do We Suffer?
Pain is external. It’s created by things out of our control. We’ve just been hit by something. The same way we get hit by happiness, sometimes. Only this time it hurts.
Suffering is internal. It gets triggered by our own feelings and perceptions of the pain. We’re interpreting the pain in a certain way. Most of the time by resisting it.
Pain is generated by loss. Loss of confidence, loss of affection, loss of hope. Every time you get disappointed, you’re losing a dream. And it hurts. We lose things we were attached to and the main body reacts: I want that part of me back. And we get this signal under the form of pain.
Suffering, on the other part, is the attachment for what we lose. The higher the attachment, the stronger the signal we receive. Pain becomes bigger and bigger.
But, believe it or not, losing parts of ourselves is natural. This is how we grow. By losing parts of ourselves. We lose our childish body and become adults. We lose our ignorance and become knowledgeable. We lose our inhibitions and become free. Every time we lose something, we’re forced to put something in its place. We create something new. We become something new.
Our loss is the trigger for evolution. We replace the tears with something we crafted. This is how we become a new being. Most of the time a better one. Because now we know what it takes to re-create that part of our Universe.
They say you grow stronger through pain than through happiness. And that’s true. You grow faster when you have all that work to do. When you lose all your dreams and hopes, you have to get to work. Fill in the gaps. Make sure life doesn’t flow away through all those holes. Be there. Do things.
I’m not making the apology of pain as the ultimate evolutionary tool. I’m human just like you and I get hurt just like you. What I do try is to lower the suffering. Because suffering is not necessary. Pain, as hurtful as it gets, might be. But suffering is an internal artifact, a self-generated response which I have control over. I may not control pain, but I can control my own reaction to it.
By giving free way to suffering I accept to lose my energy. My whole power is hijacked by suffering. Instead of using it for creating something new on that crack, I crave for what was there before. I use my focus in a desperate attempt to freeze the Universe in the very second before the loss occurred. Like this would be possible…
I Am What I Do
Every time I get hurt, I try to see which part of me is detached. What am I losing? Is the affection of somebody? Is my confidence in somebody? Is something I took for granted but it proved to be as changeable as the whole Universe? Every loss I experience creates some pain. I know I cannot avoid it. But I also know I can create something new in that hurtful cavity of myself.
That pain is the signal I have work to do. If there’s somebody affection I lost, I start to love myself more. If there’s confidence in somebody I lost, I start to trust myself more often. If there’s something I took for granted, like when I’m disappointed by somebody, I start to make and keep new promises. All those tears are signs of unfinished work with myself.
It’s not about the other guys. The outside process of getting hurt is in fact a reflection of what’s going on inside. Blaming external conditions for my pain is just another form of suffering. The real process takes place inside.
Deep down, every pain is a pointer for something we avoided to do for a long time. We’re designed in such a way that we naturally experience growth, and most of the time we grow organically. But sometimes we get so attached that we cannot break up and grow further other than through violent actions. This is when pain occur. When we don’t want to grow anymore. At that point, a violent event blows away that part of our main body which is not necessary anymore. Forcing us to start covering it with something new, and, most important, better.
Most of my pain came in my relationships. I made bad choices. Several times. I got hurt and I’m still getting hurt. It’s nobody else’s fault. In fact, it’s nobody’s fault. It’s just a pointer that I have a lot of work to do in this area. And that work is about myself. It’s about trusting and opening. About accepting rejection, if that’s the case, and creating understanding. It’s about making peace with my own failures and my partner’s failures. About acceptance and freedom.
Desperately trying to tune out the pain by temporary indulgences won’t solve my relationships problem. The cavity will still be there until I start building something new over it.
And I’m building something new over it. I’m not making huge progress, but I’m sticking with it. Every single day.
Source: www.dragosroua.com/33-ways-to-get-and-keep-yourself-motivated
Suffering and pain are tied together in our minds. One is giving birth to the other. They’re like a single, osmotic being. Every time we get hurt, we suffer. And every time we suffer we create more hurt. It’s difficult to even talk about pain and suffering in a detached way, this is how deep they are buried in our subconscious mind. The mere act of reading about pain and suffering is making your brain reconnect with those feelings in this very moment.
Do you remember how you felt last time you experienced pain? What were the exact feelings? Frustration? Sorrow? Despair? Defeat? What were the words you used to describe it? Suffering? Affliction? Trauma? Grief?
Pain is one of the most avoided situations in our life. We run away from pain. We’re trying to escape the pain. To mask it, to hide from it, to cover it in superfluous, temporary indulgences. We can’t stand it. Because we don’t want to suffer.
Why Do We Suffer?
Pain is external. It’s created by things out of our control. We’ve just been hit by something. The same way we get hit by happiness, sometimes. Only this time it hurts.
Suffering is internal. It gets triggered by our own feelings and perceptions of the pain. We’re interpreting the pain in a certain way. Most of the time by resisting it.
Pain is generated by loss. Loss of confidence, loss of affection, loss of hope. Every time you get disappointed, you’re losing a dream. And it hurts. We lose things we were attached to and the main body reacts: I want that part of me back. And we get this signal under the form of pain.
Suffering, on the other part, is the attachment for what we lose. The higher the attachment, the stronger the signal we receive. Pain becomes bigger and bigger.
But, believe it or not, losing parts of ourselves is natural. This is how we grow. By losing parts of ourselves. We lose our childish body and become adults. We lose our ignorance and become knowledgeable. We lose our inhibitions and become free. Every time we lose something, we’re forced to put something in its place. We create something new. We become something new.
Our loss is the trigger for evolution. We replace the tears with something we crafted. This is how we become a new being. Most of the time a better one. Because now we know what it takes to re-create that part of our Universe.
They say you grow stronger through pain than through happiness. And that’s true. You grow faster when you have all that work to do. When you lose all your dreams and hopes, you have to get to work. Fill in the gaps. Make sure life doesn’t flow away through all those holes. Be there. Do things.
I’m not making the apology of pain as the ultimate evolutionary tool. I’m human just like you and I get hurt just like you. What I do try is to lower the suffering. Because suffering is not necessary. Pain, as hurtful as it gets, might be. But suffering is an internal artifact, a self-generated response which I have control over. I may not control pain, but I can control my own reaction to it.
By giving free way to suffering I accept to lose my energy. My whole power is hijacked by suffering. Instead of using it for creating something new on that crack, I crave for what was there before. I use my focus in a desperate attempt to freeze the Universe in the very second before the loss occurred. Like this would be possible…
I Am What I Do
Every time I get hurt, I try to see which part of me is detached. What am I losing? Is the affection of somebody? Is my confidence in somebody? Is something I took for granted but it proved to be as changeable as the whole Universe? Every loss I experience creates some pain. I know I cannot avoid it. But I also know I can create something new in that hurtful cavity of myself.
That pain is the signal I have work to do. If there’s somebody affection I lost, I start to love myself more. If there’s confidence in somebody I lost, I start to trust myself more often. If there’s something I took for granted, like when I’m disappointed by somebody, I start to make and keep new promises. All those tears are signs of unfinished work with myself.
It’s not about the other guys. The outside process of getting hurt is in fact a reflection of what’s going on inside. Blaming external conditions for my pain is just another form of suffering. The real process takes place inside.
Deep down, every pain is a pointer for something we avoided to do for a long time. We’re designed in such a way that we naturally experience growth, and most of the time we grow organically. But sometimes we get so attached that we cannot break up and grow further other than through violent actions. This is when pain occur. When we don’t want to grow anymore. At that point, a violent event blows away that part of our main body which is not necessary anymore. Forcing us to start covering it with something new, and, most important, better.
Most of my pain came in my relationships. I made bad choices. Several times. I got hurt and I’m still getting hurt. It’s nobody else’s fault. In fact, it’s nobody’s fault. It’s just a pointer that I have a lot of work to do in this area. And that work is about myself. It’s about trusting and opening. About accepting rejection, if that’s the case, and creating understanding. It’s about making peace with my own failures and my partner’s failures. About acceptance and freedom.
Desperately trying to tune out the pain by temporary indulgences won’t solve my relationships problem. The cavity will still be there until I start building something new over it.
And I’m building something new over it. I’m not making huge progress, but I’m sticking with it. Every single day.
Source: www.dragosroua.com/33-ways-to-get-and-keep-yourself-motivated
Monday, October 19, 2009
difficult time
The real questions are the ones that obtrude upon your consciousness whether you like it or not, the ones that make your mind start vibrating like a jackhammer, the ones that you "come to terms with" only to discover that they are still there. The real questions refuse to be placated. They barge into your life at the times when it seems most important for them to stay away. They are the questions asked most frequently and answered most inadequately, the ones that reveal their true natures slowly, reluctantly, most often against your will.
i cry but tears did not come out. i cry but no one see me crying.
i cry but tears did not come out. i cry but no one see me crying.
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
Social Justice and Social Responsibility
"My passionate sense of social justice and social responsibility has always contrasted oddly with my pronounced lack of need for direct contact with other human beings and human communities. I am truly a 'lone traveler' and have never belonged to my country, my home, my friends, or even my immediate family, with my whole heart; in the face of all these ties, I have never lost a sense of distance and a need for solitude..."
The world as I see.
Einstien
The world as I see.
Einstien
We as Mortals
How strange is the lot of us mortals! Each of us is here for a brief sojourn; for what purpose he knows not, though he sometimes thinks he senses it. But without deeper reflection one knows from daily life that one exists for other people -- first of all for those upon whose smiles and well-being our own happiness is wholly dependent, and then for the many, unknown to us, to whose destinies we are bound by the ties of sympathy. A hundred times every day I remind myself that my inner and outer life are based on the labors of other men, living and dead, and that I must exert myself in order to give in the same measure as I have received and am still receiving...
The World as I See. Einstien
The World as I See. Einstien
Thursday, October 08, 2009
Family
Family is the first social unit for developing the qualities of the heart. A true family grows and moves through life together, inseparable in the heart. Whether a biological family or an extended family of people attracted to each other based on heart resonance and mutual support, the word "family" implies warmth, a place where the core feelings of the heart are nurtured. Family values represent the core values and guidelines that parents and family members hold in high regard for the well-being of the family. Sincere family feelings are core heart feelings. They are the basis for true family values. While we have differences, we remain "family" by virtue of our heart connection. Family provides necessary security and support, and acts as a buffer against external problems. A family made up of secure people generates a magnetic power that can get things done. They are the hope for real security in a stressful world.
50 websites you'll wonder how you lived without
Essential sites to add to your bookmarks today
When it comes to the Internet, we're creatures of habit – Google for search, Hotmail for email, Twitter to stay in touch and maybe the BBC's website for news.
This means that we use only a handful of favourite sites, leaving the rest of the Internet unvisited. Let's put that right. By the time you've finished reading, we promise that your list of bookmarked sites will have ballooned and you'll be getting more from your surfing.
Software and tools
1. ThinkFree Office is a powerful suite of productivity apps that includes a robust word processor, spreadsheet and presentation tool. The suite has subtle touches such as an inline spell-checker, and you can work offline if the Internet goes down. There's also support for 11 languages and helpful PDF export capability. Most importantly, you can share documents with other users and work on files collaboratively. The suite is free if you can live with 1GB of storage, or upgrade for a nominal fee to a premium account.
2. Zoho is a highly useful web portal for being productive on the go. More than just a word processor and task manager, Zoho has a multitude of small web apps for taking notes, storing contact information and project management. There's even a web conferencing tool. APIs are available for the web services in Zoho's word processor and spreadsheet, too. There's also a slideshow creator so that you can make calls from another website – for example, an accounting site could read tables from a Zoho spreadsheet. The site is one of the first to support VB macros and the document mark-up language LaTeX.
3. It's time to ditch Microsoft Excel. EditGrid is powerful enough for basic number crunching without the extensive pivot table and worksheet functions. Its main strength, unsurprisingly, comes in how you can format cells, with image includes, JavaScript calls and a data exchange between spreadsheets and even between the spreadsheets hosted by other users. There's a plugin that reads Excel data, templates, mash-up features for integrating data from websites like Yahoo! Finance and plenty of text formatting options. Registration is quick and there are three pricing plans: one free account, a premium account for just a few dollars per month and a multi-user company plan. Unfortunately, it does not work in Internet Explorer 6.
4. Web project management has taken a beating these last few years, especially since tools like www.basecamphq.com stress simplicity over actual features. Clarizen is easy to use and runs fast on a 3Mbps connection on a 64-bit 3GHz Vista PC, but it also has deeper features. For example, you can update your task list by sending an email to the project inbox. (You can also request a daily task list by sending an email.)
5. The original idea for SlideShare came when co-founder Jonathan Boutelle was at a conference and saw how attendees were easily sharing large videos and photo collections online, but had to physically pass around USB keys to distribute sales presentations. He created SlideShare as a way to host and store PowerPoint files. It has became incredibly popular.
6. It may not have the flare and design of Microsoft Visio, but the online flow-charting program known as Gliffy certainly has an expansive set of features. There are icons for networking, office design and organisation charts to help you put some order around any idea. Line connectors automatically snap into place, or avoid certain shapes when you move them around the screen – a powerful programming trick, especially since the site does not use any plug-ins or require you to download any software.
7. Part online presence for slideshows and part client-side tool that helps you create presentations and post them online, sliderocket.com has one major benefit: it's lightning fast. In tests with several different PCs at different connection speeds (including one at a public hotspot), we found that we could create a detailed sales presentation with several high-res graphics in no time The site uses Adobe Flex and the AIR client. 'Presentation analytics' (now there's a buzzword) tells you who saw your presentation and even how long they looked at each of your slides.
8. Scribd is not quite a word processor, although it looks like one at first. Instead, it's actually a content creation tool that you could use to publish your own technical papers, schoolwork, or even a novel online. It's also one of the only document management tools we have found that is free and publicly available (Scribd also offers a closed service).
Storage and files
9. Our favourite online storage portal, box.net has the most fascinating social networking features. Other users can tag and comment on your files (if you give them permission). You can use APIs to link the storage (a basic account is free, premium services cost about £4-£10 per month) to popular web services like www.zoho.com and www.picnik.com. If you do go with the premium account, you get 5 or 15GBs and the ability to see version history on files. Alas, there does not appear to be a desktop folder as with Dropbox.
10. It's easier to understand Pando by what it's not: you can't sync files, store them online or make back-ups. Instead, it's the best site we' found for sending large fi les by email. Instead of using attachments, you just send your recipient a Pando link. Max file size is 1GB, and there's a video sharing version for consumers and corporate users – all free.
11. Although it's not what we really want (a full Microsoft Word client on the web), Workspace is as close as Microsoft is willing to get at this point. It's a 'store and share' site that is worth your time because you can archive thousands of Word docs for free and make them fully searchable online – for you or for any user you give permission to access the archive.
12. Instead of just storing your files online or syncing them between computers, MozyHome is both a web portal to view your archived files and a client-side back-up app. Its main feature is the ability to monitor important folders and archive them to the web so that you can restore them at any time, regardless of whether you are even using the same computer. MozyHome is the free version that comes with 2GB of online storage, while Mozy Unlimited costs $5 per month and Mozy Pro is a network back-up utility with several pricing plans.
13. Most photo sharing sites use some combination of web forms, HTML and JavaScript to help you organise your photos online. Zoto uses JavaScript, along with a client-side photo uploader that
14. It might be easy to dismiss EyeOS as an attention grabbing alternative OS that runs in a browser. After all, it could be argued Firefox is a kind of operating system that runs JavaScript apps. EyeOS makes easy work of common tasks like file associations and one-click access to your favourite apps. The OS includes 60 popular apps, including word processing and audio players – you can get more at www.eyeos-apps.org. Still in its infant state, EyeOS reveals a tantalising glimpse of what Windows could look like if it ran in a browser.
15. The concept of a 'social database' might seem like a contradiction – but Blist pulls it off. You can enter vast quantities of data – the entire fantasy football roster for all your friends, for example – and then share the data between Blist users. Templates are geared for those who want to weed out duplicate data.
16. The holy grail of file syncing is the ability to drop files into a folder and have that same folder show up on every other computer you own and work exactly like a network drive – except that it's online. Dropbox (still in beta) solves this issue. Just add a folder to your desktop and copy files. You can also share complete folders so that anyone with access to the folder sees and is able to use the shared, synced files.
17. Carbonite is a unique online back-up utility that sits in your system tray and watches important folders, such as those containing 'dev' files or Word documents, automatically archiving them to a secure website as you work. There is no limit to the storage space available, although the program will only upload a couple of gigabytes per day. Strangely, after install, the clientside app reboots Windows Explorer.
Graphics
18. There are no extra frills offered by dafont.com – the main draw is that the site houses over 7,000 fonts, all freely available to download for Mac or Windows. Linux users will have to convert the fonts. You can grab every single font in one eMule or BitTorrent file; just go to www.dafont.com/faq.php#howmany and look for the 'zip' file links.
19. Part Flickr replacement and part entry-level photo editor, Photoshop Express proves that Adobe is on a clear path toward online apps. It's fairly basic: you can apply a handful of filters for lighting and exposure, rotate and re-size images, embed photos into a web page and share your shots with other users – even those on Flickr. The site shows huge potential: with 2GB of free storage, imagine being able to apply complex editing tasks to a series of photos where 'the cloud' does all the processing for you.
20. There's a plethora of general purpose how-to sites on the web, including the fantastic www.wonderhowto.com, but Luxa is for the technical-minded Photoshop user. You may already know how to perform a Gaussian blur, but Luxa teaches you how to make neon glow effects, complex layering, text design within Photoshop and many other skills.
21. Don't avoid Bluestring just because it's owned by AOL: the site is an example of how the web can be a powerful ally in digital media collection. You can upload music, photos, and videos. The handy status bar lets you do a massive bulk upload and switch to a different tab, then check back to see how much data has been uploaded.
22. Ecommerce sites have changed dramatically over the years. Imagekind is a unique site that lets you preview museum art and photos on various picture frames and even different canvas materials before making the purchase. Prints generally cost about £15 each. You can also sell your own prints.
23. Web users are always in a hurry, which is what makes Flauntr so attractive. You can click one option to see multiple views of how a filter will change your photo. Using the 'PicasR' filter, you can pick a work of art from Picasso and apply that technique to your image. The site isn't exceptionally fast, but the drag-and-drop interface and one-click effects are worth exploration.
24. If registering with Simplebucket could be easier, we'd be surprised. To upload photos (2MB max per image), you don't even need an account. You just type in your email, select photos and upload. You can then view those photos associated with your email account by clicking on a secure link the site sends you. Simplebucket is free, although you can buy more 'upload credits' for a few dollars – you get five free per day. If you want a password, you can always upload a photo and then click 'Settings' to create an account.
25. 1001freefonts actually has about 7,000 fonts to pick from, each with a useful preview. You can also perform a 'custom preview' to see how the font looks with the text you intend using. There's also a download option to buy 7,000 fonts all at once, which costs about a tenner.
26. InterfaceLIFT is a vast collection of icons, images, wallpapers and random clipart, which can help you add some flair to a web app or an interface. You can also just download desktop wallpapers — it's an amazingly good collection and all the artwork is free to use.
27. Similar to Photoshop Express, Picnik goes much further with an extensive array of photo-editing effects, histograms, fine pixel alterations and colour correction. You can upload photos from your PC, a webcam and any website.
Research and e-learning
28. Not all sites have to use a flashy interface. Martindale's reference desk is essentially a collection of links to really useful information. There's a huge wealth of reference material on disparate topics such as banjo lessons, world clocks, time and expense calculators, eye tests for computer users, a science database, currency convertors and just about anything you can think of. As the web moves closer to a 'single use' model where one site performs only a simple function, Martindale's throws the book at you – virtually.
29. Ever wonder how to embed a picture to a cell in Microsoft Excel? At eHow, you can find the answer in just a few clicks. They have categories for electronics, careers, health and many others. The site is almost all text, so you can find the answers you need quickly.
30. Mashery is a hosted service for your web API – it allows you to create links between, say, Yahoo! maps and Flickr photos, or plot the location of public parks with disc golf data you pull from a volunteer site. It supports usage tracking, asset management, encryption – everything you need to link data form one host to another.
31. Amazon uses the term 'artificial artificial intelligence' (sic) to define what the Mechanical Turk site is all about. It's actually a site where you can sign up to perform very repetitive tasks, such as typing text transcripts for videos. You pay just a few cents per completed Human Intelligence Task. These are generally things that a computer is not very good at. It's a very illuminating example of where AI is faltering.
32. Agreeing on basic business principals often requires written contracts and lawyers. You can skip that chaos by using Mumboe, a site that hosts online applications for business agreements. The free account is quite limited: you can only host up to 10 agreements and only three users can apply. Pricing for premium accounts runs to about £12 to £24 per month for unlimited users, secure and searchable contracts and version control. Registration is a little clunky: you have to agree to the terms twice and the confirmation email took a while to send.
33. Not quite a web aggregator, yet more than a simple search engine, PageOnce lets you add secure sites to one page – you can see your bank balance, airline ticket info, Netflix rentals and a host of other data. Registration was pretty easy: no codes to type in, just a confirmation link sent through email.
Mobile workers
34. The problem with most video chat software is that everyone you chat with needs to have downloaded the client. TokBox works online for two-way chats and multi-point video conferences with no software to download, and the registration is Web 2.0-streamlined to get you talking straightaway.
35. Other online conversion sites show you a laundry list of other options besides currency, for example weight, measurement and even language. Xe focuses entirely on currency, which means that it's easier to navigate and conversion options are all on the main screen.
36. While many online flight search sites are US-only, Skyscanner lets you choose any country as your origin, supports many different languages and presents an uncluttered, mostly ad-free interface for finding the lowest rates on international flights.
37. A web whiteboarding tool, Twiddla lets you visit any site and then host a meeting online where you can chat about the site, host an audio chat and mark it up with shapes and notes to participants. It's very useful for web developers and designers who want to visit a site in production to talk about the look and feel of it. It's also just a good meet-up site for mobile users who need to exchange ideas, and best of all, it's free.
38. Mobile users can watch TV any time they want with Joost - and the service has recently switched to an online viewer instead of requiring that you download a client. With 28,000 shows online, Joost has a leg up on other more 'premium' sites such as Hulu, although don't expect a high bit-rate or HD quality for any of the online streams.
39. Vello is unique. It lets you arrange a phone conference by calling a Vello number that re-distributes the conference call number to anyone that you want. There's no registrationor sign-up for attendees, and the site even offers a seven-day free trial to check it out.
40. Instant messaging aggregators are handy because they put all of your accounts into one page so you can chat with your associates and friends without installing any software. Orgoo is helpful if you tend to visit Internet cafes or use a borrowed laptop from work, or just want one-click access to IM. Still in private beta, it also offers a new video chat service that uses your webcam and is now open for unregistered use.
41. Like an open-source version of Microsoft Exchange, Zimbra is a mail client for business use where you host all of the mail online for every user. You can share all of your personal folders, assign specific tasks to certain people, instant message, integrate IMAP and POP mail as well as use an iPhone client to access the mail repository, and arrange meetings with your team.
42. Note-taking apps are usually small utilities that you download and use on your desktop. Evernote is a webbased version that collects all of your fragmented data into one searchable portal. You can scan documents, send an email to your account and upload photos, videos or just about anything you can think of to your own secure site. Then, when you need to find that one website or phone number, or that hilarious photo from the last business outing, you can fi d it on the free notes database online.
Miscellaneous
43. Keepm is a business card manager for the web. Adding a contact is very quick: you type the name, then add the phone numbers and address for that person. You can also import data from Outlook or using a the vCard file format and you can export your contacts database for use in other programs as a vCard or CSV file.
44. It's about time someone created an aggregator for video content. OVGuide doesn't actually host any videos, but it helps you find where they are located on the web. It's agnostic about the legalities of full-length feature films, merely pointing you to known locations.
45. Weeding out the undesirables and trolls on Internet forums is a Herculean task. Daniweb is a different kind of IRC chat: only IT professionals can join and the chats tend to be highly technical rather than just mindless chatter.
46. Google searches are a million miles wide and a centimetre thick. Stumpedia only returns the results that other users think are valuable. We searched for virtualisation on both search engines. On Google, we saw millions of links, most of them poorly worded definitions and myopic marketing sites. On Stumpedia there are just three links, including a site entry that does the server technology justice – it's worth a click.
47. The brilliant thing about trip planning site TripIt is that it knows where you are. If you plan a business trip to London, you can load all of your contacts from email clients and then track who will be in the area at the same time as you.
48. Intense – that's the initial reaction we had when using TunesBag (still in private beta – you have to request an invitation). Legal because the site is hosted in Austria, you can upload all of your music files to the site and then listen to the songs from any computer – or share the music with anyone you want. Use it while it's still alive!
49. If you use an RSS reader then it's worth checking out Toluu. The site is an 'aggregator of the aggregators'; you can import multiple RSS feeds from various sources and read them all in one spot before sharing the feeds with other users. Sharing is key: it means that you see what people who have subscribed to the same feeds as you are reading.
50. SoSauce is a catch-all for journaling to yourself (reminders, thoughts for the day), finding travel deals, social networking with other users and sharing photos. We love the area where you can play games like extreme sledding and hyper pong against other SoSauce members. [via tech radar]
When it comes to the Internet, we're creatures of habit – Google for search, Hotmail for email, Twitter to stay in touch and maybe the BBC's website for news.
This means that we use only a handful of favourite sites, leaving the rest of the Internet unvisited. Let's put that right. By the time you've finished reading, we promise that your list of bookmarked sites will have ballooned and you'll be getting more from your surfing.
Software and tools
1. ThinkFree Office is a powerful suite of productivity apps that includes a robust word processor, spreadsheet and presentation tool. The suite has subtle touches such as an inline spell-checker, and you can work offline if the Internet goes down. There's also support for 11 languages and helpful PDF export capability. Most importantly, you can share documents with other users and work on files collaboratively. The suite is free if you can live with 1GB of storage, or upgrade for a nominal fee to a premium account.
2. Zoho is a highly useful web portal for being productive on the go. More than just a word processor and task manager, Zoho has a multitude of small web apps for taking notes, storing contact information and project management. There's even a web conferencing tool. APIs are available for the web services in Zoho's word processor and spreadsheet, too. There's also a slideshow creator so that you can make calls from another website – for example, an accounting site could read tables from a Zoho spreadsheet. The site is one of the first to support VB macros and the document mark-up language LaTeX.
3. It's time to ditch Microsoft Excel. EditGrid is powerful enough for basic number crunching without the extensive pivot table and worksheet functions. Its main strength, unsurprisingly, comes in how you can format cells, with image includes, JavaScript calls and a data exchange between spreadsheets and even between the spreadsheets hosted by other users. There's a plugin that reads Excel data, templates, mash-up features for integrating data from websites like Yahoo! Finance and plenty of text formatting options. Registration is quick and there are three pricing plans: one free account, a premium account for just a few dollars per month and a multi-user company plan. Unfortunately, it does not work in Internet Explorer 6.
4. Web project management has taken a beating these last few years, especially since tools like www.basecamphq.com stress simplicity over actual features. Clarizen is easy to use and runs fast on a 3Mbps connection on a 64-bit 3GHz Vista PC, but it also has deeper features. For example, you can update your task list by sending an email to the project inbox. (You can also request a daily task list by sending an email.)
5. The original idea for SlideShare came when co-founder Jonathan Boutelle was at a conference and saw how attendees were easily sharing large videos and photo collections online, but had to physically pass around USB keys to distribute sales presentations. He created SlideShare as a way to host and store PowerPoint files. It has became incredibly popular.
6. It may not have the flare and design of Microsoft Visio, but the online flow-charting program known as Gliffy certainly has an expansive set of features. There are icons for networking, office design and organisation charts to help you put some order around any idea. Line connectors automatically snap into place, or avoid certain shapes when you move them around the screen – a powerful programming trick, especially since the site does not use any plug-ins or require you to download any software.
7. Part online presence for slideshows and part client-side tool that helps you create presentations and post them online, sliderocket.com has one major benefit: it's lightning fast. In tests with several different PCs at different connection speeds (including one at a public hotspot), we found that we could create a detailed sales presentation with several high-res graphics in no time The site uses Adobe Flex and the AIR client. 'Presentation analytics' (now there's a buzzword) tells you who saw your presentation and even how long they looked at each of your slides.
8. Scribd is not quite a word processor, although it looks like one at first. Instead, it's actually a content creation tool that you could use to publish your own technical papers, schoolwork, or even a novel online. It's also one of the only document management tools we have found that is free and publicly available (Scribd also offers a closed service).
Storage and files
9. Our favourite online storage portal, box.net has the most fascinating social networking features. Other users can tag and comment on your files (if you give them permission). You can use APIs to link the storage (a basic account is free, premium services cost about £4-£10 per month) to popular web services like www.zoho.com and www.picnik.com. If you do go with the premium account, you get 5 or 15GBs and the ability to see version history on files. Alas, there does not appear to be a desktop folder as with Dropbox.
10. It's easier to understand Pando by what it's not: you can't sync files, store them online or make back-ups. Instead, it's the best site we' found for sending large fi les by email. Instead of using attachments, you just send your recipient a Pando link. Max file size is 1GB, and there's a video sharing version for consumers and corporate users – all free.
11. Although it's not what we really want (a full Microsoft Word client on the web), Workspace is as close as Microsoft is willing to get at this point. It's a 'store and share' site that is worth your time because you can archive thousands of Word docs for free and make them fully searchable online – for you or for any user you give permission to access the archive.
12. Instead of just storing your files online or syncing them between computers, MozyHome is both a web portal to view your archived files and a client-side back-up app. Its main feature is the ability to monitor important folders and archive them to the web so that you can restore them at any time, regardless of whether you are even using the same computer. MozyHome is the free version that comes with 2GB of online storage, while Mozy Unlimited costs $5 per month and Mozy Pro is a network back-up utility with several pricing plans.
13. Most photo sharing sites use some combination of web forms, HTML and JavaScript to help you organise your photos online. Zoto uses JavaScript, along with a client-side photo uploader that
14. It might be easy to dismiss EyeOS as an attention grabbing alternative OS that runs in a browser. After all, it could be argued Firefox is a kind of operating system that runs JavaScript apps. EyeOS makes easy work of common tasks like file associations and one-click access to your favourite apps. The OS includes 60 popular apps, including word processing and audio players – you can get more at www.eyeos-apps.org. Still in its infant state, EyeOS reveals a tantalising glimpse of what Windows could look like if it ran in a browser.
15. The concept of a 'social database' might seem like a contradiction – but Blist pulls it off. You can enter vast quantities of data – the entire fantasy football roster for all your friends, for example – and then share the data between Blist users. Templates are geared for those who want to weed out duplicate data.
16. The holy grail of file syncing is the ability to drop files into a folder and have that same folder show up on every other computer you own and work exactly like a network drive – except that it's online. Dropbox (still in beta) solves this issue. Just add a folder to your desktop and copy files. You can also share complete folders so that anyone with access to the folder sees and is able to use the shared, synced files.
17. Carbonite is a unique online back-up utility that sits in your system tray and watches important folders, such as those containing 'dev' files or Word documents, automatically archiving them to a secure website as you work. There is no limit to the storage space available, although the program will only upload a couple of gigabytes per day. Strangely, after install, the clientside app reboots Windows Explorer.
Graphics
18. There are no extra frills offered by dafont.com – the main draw is that the site houses over 7,000 fonts, all freely available to download for Mac or Windows. Linux users will have to convert the fonts. You can grab every single font in one eMule or BitTorrent file; just go to www.dafont.com/faq.php#howmany and look for the 'zip' file links.
19. Part Flickr replacement and part entry-level photo editor, Photoshop Express proves that Adobe is on a clear path toward online apps. It's fairly basic: you can apply a handful of filters for lighting and exposure, rotate and re-size images, embed photos into a web page and share your shots with other users – even those on Flickr. The site shows huge potential: with 2GB of free storage, imagine being able to apply complex editing tasks to a series of photos where 'the cloud' does all the processing for you.
20. There's a plethora of general purpose how-to sites on the web, including the fantastic www.wonderhowto.com, but Luxa is for the technical-minded Photoshop user. You may already know how to perform a Gaussian blur, but Luxa teaches you how to make neon glow effects, complex layering, text design within Photoshop and many other skills.
21. Don't avoid Bluestring just because it's owned by AOL: the site is an example of how the web can be a powerful ally in digital media collection. You can upload music, photos, and videos. The handy status bar lets you do a massive bulk upload and switch to a different tab, then check back to see how much data has been uploaded.
22. Ecommerce sites have changed dramatically over the years. Imagekind is a unique site that lets you preview museum art and photos on various picture frames and even different canvas materials before making the purchase. Prints generally cost about £15 each. You can also sell your own prints.
23. Web users are always in a hurry, which is what makes Flauntr so attractive. You can click one option to see multiple views of how a filter will change your photo. Using the 'PicasR' filter, you can pick a work of art from Picasso and apply that technique to your image. The site isn't exceptionally fast, but the drag-and-drop interface and one-click effects are worth exploration.
24. If registering with Simplebucket could be easier, we'd be surprised. To upload photos (2MB max per image), you don't even need an account. You just type in your email, select photos and upload. You can then view those photos associated with your email account by clicking on a secure link the site sends you. Simplebucket is free, although you can buy more 'upload credits' for a few dollars – you get five free per day. If you want a password, you can always upload a photo and then click 'Settings' to create an account.
25. 1001freefonts actually has about 7,000 fonts to pick from, each with a useful preview. You can also perform a 'custom preview' to see how the font looks with the text you intend using. There's also a download option to buy 7,000 fonts all at once, which costs about a tenner.
26. InterfaceLIFT is a vast collection of icons, images, wallpapers and random clipart, which can help you add some flair to a web app or an interface. You can also just download desktop wallpapers — it's an amazingly good collection and all the artwork is free to use.
27. Similar to Photoshop Express, Picnik goes much further with an extensive array of photo-editing effects, histograms, fine pixel alterations and colour correction. You can upload photos from your PC, a webcam and any website.
Research and e-learning
28. Not all sites have to use a flashy interface. Martindale's reference desk is essentially a collection of links to really useful information. There's a huge wealth of reference material on disparate topics such as banjo lessons, world clocks, time and expense calculators, eye tests for computer users, a science database, currency convertors and just about anything you can think of. As the web moves closer to a 'single use' model where one site performs only a simple function, Martindale's throws the book at you – virtually.
29. Ever wonder how to embed a picture to a cell in Microsoft Excel? At eHow, you can find the answer in just a few clicks. They have categories for electronics, careers, health and many others. The site is almost all text, so you can find the answers you need quickly.
30. Mashery is a hosted service for your web API – it allows you to create links between, say, Yahoo! maps and Flickr photos, or plot the location of public parks with disc golf data you pull from a volunteer site. It supports usage tracking, asset management, encryption – everything you need to link data form one host to another.
31. Amazon uses the term 'artificial artificial intelligence' (sic) to define what the Mechanical Turk site is all about. It's actually a site where you can sign up to perform very repetitive tasks, such as typing text transcripts for videos. You pay just a few cents per completed Human Intelligence Task. These are generally things that a computer is not very good at. It's a very illuminating example of where AI is faltering.
32. Agreeing on basic business principals often requires written contracts and lawyers. You can skip that chaos by using Mumboe, a site that hosts online applications for business agreements. The free account is quite limited: you can only host up to 10 agreements and only three users can apply. Pricing for premium accounts runs to about £12 to £24 per month for unlimited users, secure and searchable contracts and version control. Registration is a little clunky: you have to agree to the terms twice and the confirmation email took a while to send.
33. Not quite a web aggregator, yet more than a simple search engine, PageOnce lets you add secure sites to one page – you can see your bank balance, airline ticket info, Netflix rentals and a host of other data. Registration was pretty easy: no codes to type in, just a confirmation link sent through email.
Mobile workers
34. The problem with most video chat software is that everyone you chat with needs to have downloaded the client. TokBox works online for two-way chats and multi-point video conferences with no software to download, and the registration is Web 2.0-streamlined to get you talking straightaway.
35. Other online conversion sites show you a laundry list of other options besides currency, for example weight, measurement and even language. Xe focuses entirely on currency, which means that it's easier to navigate and conversion options are all on the main screen.
36. While many online flight search sites are US-only, Skyscanner lets you choose any country as your origin, supports many different languages and presents an uncluttered, mostly ad-free interface for finding the lowest rates on international flights.
37. A web whiteboarding tool, Twiddla lets you visit any site and then host a meeting online where you can chat about the site, host an audio chat and mark it up with shapes and notes to participants. It's very useful for web developers and designers who want to visit a site in production to talk about the look and feel of it. It's also just a good meet-up site for mobile users who need to exchange ideas, and best of all, it's free.
38. Mobile users can watch TV any time they want with Joost - and the service has recently switched to an online viewer instead of requiring that you download a client. With 28,000 shows online, Joost has a leg up on other more 'premium' sites such as Hulu, although don't expect a high bit-rate or HD quality for any of the online streams.
39. Vello is unique. It lets you arrange a phone conference by calling a Vello number that re-distributes the conference call number to anyone that you want. There's no registrationor sign-up for attendees, and the site even offers a seven-day free trial to check it out.
40. Instant messaging aggregators are handy because they put all of your accounts into one page so you can chat with your associates and friends without installing any software. Orgoo is helpful if you tend to visit Internet cafes or use a borrowed laptop from work, or just want one-click access to IM. Still in private beta, it also offers a new video chat service that uses your webcam and is now open for unregistered use.
41. Like an open-source version of Microsoft Exchange, Zimbra is a mail client for business use where you host all of the mail online for every user. You can share all of your personal folders, assign specific tasks to certain people, instant message, integrate IMAP and POP mail as well as use an iPhone client to access the mail repository, and arrange meetings with your team.
42. Note-taking apps are usually small utilities that you download and use on your desktop. Evernote is a webbased version that collects all of your fragmented data into one searchable portal. You can scan documents, send an email to your account and upload photos, videos or just about anything you can think of to your own secure site. Then, when you need to find that one website or phone number, or that hilarious photo from the last business outing, you can fi d it on the free notes database online.
Miscellaneous
43. Keepm is a business card manager for the web. Adding a contact is very quick: you type the name, then add the phone numbers and address for that person. You can also import data from Outlook or using a the vCard file format and you can export your contacts database for use in other programs as a vCard or CSV file.
44. It's about time someone created an aggregator for video content. OVGuide doesn't actually host any videos, but it helps you find where they are located on the web. It's agnostic about the legalities of full-length feature films, merely pointing you to known locations.
45. Weeding out the undesirables and trolls on Internet forums is a Herculean task. Daniweb is a different kind of IRC chat: only IT professionals can join and the chats tend to be highly technical rather than just mindless chatter.
46. Google searches are a million miles wide and a centimetre thick. Stumpedia only returns the results that other users think are valuable. We searched for virtualisation on both search engines. On Google, we saw millions of links, most of them poorly worded definitions and myopic marketing sites. On Stumpedia there are just three links, including a site entry that does the server technology justice – it's worth a click.
47. The brilliant thing about trip planning site TripIt is that it knows where you are. If you plan a business trip to London, you can load all of your contacts from email clients and then track who will be in the area at the same time as you.
48. Intense – that's the initial reaction we had when using TunesBag (still in private beta – you have to request an invitation). Legal because the site is hosted in Austria, you can upload all of your music files to the site and then listen to the songs from any computer – or share the music with anyone you want. Use it while it's still alive!
49. If you use an RSS reader then it's worth checking out Toluu. The site is an 'aggregator of the aggregators'; you can import multiple RSS feeds from various sources and read them all in one spot before sharing the feeds with other users. Sharing is key: it means that you see what people who have subscribed to the same feeds as you are reading.
50. SoSauce is a catch-all for journaling to yourself (reminders, thoughts for the day), finding travel deals, social networking with other users and sharing photos. We love the area where you can play games like extreme sledding and hyper pong against other SoSauce members. [via tech radar]
Amazing 3 year old boy memorized the whole Holy Quran
May Allah showers His special blessings on this young kid and protect him from all kinds of EVIL.
Wednesday, October 07, 2009
The Time
The pressures on people today demand learning how to time shift. When faced with obviously conflicting priorities that "cannot possibly be accomplished in the time frame," what alternative is there other than mind-numbing stress? The first thing is to assume there is a solution that can be achieved once you get internally coherent enough to perceive it. Internal coherence is the priority and can lead to surprising time-saving convenience.
Thursday, October 01, 2009
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