Activity for May 16

Review - Sumatra PDF
1.5.1 (Apr 29, 2011)

This is a great PDF viewer alternative especially for older XP-era machines. Occasional rendering problems can sometimes occur on certain complex PDF documents with tons of images (rare); But mostly the compatibility is VERY VERY good, and getting closer to perfect with every release.

A little known but very capable viewer (as mentioned here on Betanews from another member) is STDU viewer:

http://fileforum.betanew...TDU-Viewer/1241899538/1
Review - AMD Catalyst Drivers for Windows
11.4 (Apr 29, 2011)

Working fine for me on Windows7 32bit/AMD E-350 Fusion cpu/gpu based laptop. IIRC, you also need .NET 3.5 or higher for the driver to install.

Those of you wanting a more corporate or "bare-bones" driver; After you choose the proper video card on the website, click the second tab "individual downloads" and choose (driver only).

To access 3D settings with this bare-bones driver, you can use "ATI tray tools". YMMV of course:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ATI_Tray_Tools
Review - Kaspersky Rescue Disk
10.0.23.29 (Sep 30, 2010)

USB version here:

http://devbuilds.kaspers...RescueDisk10/Rescue2usb/

Standard CD ISO here:

http://devbuilds.kaspers.../devbuilds/RescueDisk10/
Review - Screamer Radio
0.4.4 (20100924) Beta (Sep 27, 2010)

As a basic streaming and recording program it works well, just a couple things:

a.) when you first start the player, make sure to go top menu>recording>begin recording and make sure it is checked OFF.
For some reason it was already enabled when I downloaded the portable version. YMMV of course.

b.) As was mentioned before, the gui could use updating, maybe add vista/win7 taskbar controls (as windows media player classic already does) or basic skinning support.

c.) Regarding radio presets, there are times when stations fail to load "gives up" (as the radio station may have changed iURL or network ports), so you need to manually edit or add stations occasionally. For example under the "salsa" genre, there are 10 listed, but only one "sky FM" actually works. YMMV of course.
Review - Pidgin for Windows
2.7.3 (Aug 11, 2010)

What can I say? I love pidgin! Some nifty plugins already included.

[Must have plugin for pidgin]

http://www.cypherpunks.ca/otr/

"Off-the-Record (OTR) Messaging allows you to have private conversations over instant messaging by providing:

Encryption
No one else can read your instant messages.
Authentication
You are assured the correspondent is who you think it is.
Deniability
The messages you send do not have digital signatures that are checkable by a third party. Anyone can forge messages after a conversation to make them look like they came from you. However, during a conversation, your correspondent is assured the messages he sees are authentic and unmodified.
Perfect forward secrecy
If you lose control of your private keys, no previous conversation is compromised."
Comment - Windows Phone ramps up enterprise appeal with 7.5 'Mango' update
2.7.3 (May 16, 2011 - 1:41 PM)

Here is a list of features from a link I found earlier:

http://www.geekwire.com/...e-stuffed-full-features

-Bing Audio: Shazam-style audio track recognition
-Multitasking for third-party apps deeper integration with live tiles
-Internet Explorer 9, support for HTML 5
-Bing Vision: Integrated scanning for barcodes, tags, text, etc.
-Voice recognition for drafting text messages
-Email folders pinnable to the start screen for quick access
-Facebook Chat and Windows Live Messenger integration
-New conversation view for email exchanges
-Ability to search email servers for archived messages
-New Lync app for Windows Phone (IM and presence), a likely first step toward Skype integration
-Support for complex passwords (alphanumeric)
-Information rights management support for protected emails and documents
-Ability to access hidden corporate WiFi networks
-Native podcast search and download in the Windows Phone Marketplace
-Integrated turn-by-turn directions
-The ability to send SMS text messages to preset groups of contacts
-Integration of Office 365 and SkyDrive in the Office hub
-Overhaul of the Games hub, with an auto-sync feature
Comment - iPad Wi-Fi complaints echo those of Nexus One, iPod Touch
2.7.3 (Apr 7, 2010 - 10:27 AM)

Just reading the article, it might be helpful to tweak some of the settings on the wireless router/access point itself (YMMV of course).

Some settings as recommended by Linksys support (will work on other routers):

"Fragmentation Threshold" to 2304.
"RTS Threshold" to 2304.
"Beacon Interval" to 50.
Comment - Firefox 3.6 RTM officially released, includes personalization
2.7.3 (Jan 21, 2010 - 3:58 PM)

Running fine over here, previous add-ons/greasemonkey scripts are also working.

@Paul Skinner "it means hunting around for buttons that are bound to be obscured."

From Firefox FAQ:
=============
What's the difference between a Firefox theme and Personas for Firefox?
"Themes change the appearance of Firefox. A Persona is a special type of theme that changes the look of your browser without changing the navigation buttons, toolbars, and menus."

It's more of a background overlay. However some personas do unfocus the idle text menus.

@jafo818-"Right clicking on a link and selecting "Open Link in New Tab" is broken. It opens a new tab with the link, but does not load the page. "

Right click "open in new tab" is loading fine for me. Close Firefox, check your processes list to make sure no phantom "firefox.exe" are running. Or you can "Reset" your Firefox settings back to factory defaults:

http://www.browserland.c...without-uninstalling-it/
Comment - Should you dump Internet Explorer, NOW?
2.7.3 (Jan 18, 2010 - 11:15 AM)

side note:

For you techies, some interesting articles, "how to run firefox in protected mode"

http://superuser.com/que...-at-low-integrity-level

How to run an application with lower user rights user using "drop my rights"

http://cybercoyote.org/security/drop.shtml

As always YMMV, and again dropping IE entirely is not a realistic option for many companies. There are certain websites that will only work/view properly using IE only.
Comment - Should you dump Internet Explorer, NOW?
2.7.3 (Jan 17, 2010 - 8:51 PM)

You can get a sort of sandbox for firefox (and IE6?) using sandboxie and running firefox/ie6 from inside of that.

http://www.sandboxie.com...WebBrowserSettings1.png

YMMV