applications

Finding parking in NYC requires loads of patience and savvy particularity because parking signs are notoriously difficult to decipher.  The people at PrimoSpot.com have created a site rich with tools to help you land a spot that meets your location, time, and price needs.  Their map clues the user into street parking signs, meter availability, parking garages, street-side images,  places to avoid, premium spots and more.  You can use their site to strategize your parking plan or utilize their smartphone app in the moment as you approach your destination.

This is an indispensable tool for drivers in the NY Metropolis.  Anyone whose experienced the nightmare of having their car towed, which happens all too fast in this city, knows to be extra extra cautious about parking.  PrimoSpot takes some of the pressure off.

continue

I’ve recommended a couple of really useful bookmarklets (they add one-click functionality to a browser) before and here are a few more I feel are truly worth knowing about that I’ve discovered thus far.   With so much available at our finger tips and internet “bling” vying for our attention, here are some convenient tools to capture the moment all the while making said capture easily available for future reference:

Read It Later

This bookmarklet enables you to compile articles and other content or pages for, you guessed it,  reading later.  You can use it on your computer or phone.  What’s great is the compilation can be accessed when you are offline, so commuters on planes, trains or subways can get caught up on reading without internet connection.  Get it or discover more of it’s functionality here.

continue

How great is it to be in New York City, or the surrounding densely populated areas, and use Google Maps on your mobile to determine where you are in relation to a sought-after destination?   If you aren’t using it yet, here’s where to get it.

With that said, there are more unique ways to utilize Google Maps than just searching for locations, directions, and satellite views. Boost your use in these ways:

• Lifehacker’s fantastic tip list in Top 10 Things You Didn’t Know Google Maps Could Do.
• Business exposure – find out how to list your business on Google Maps
• Recession creativity inspired a newfangled kind of  resume listing.

Happy mapping.

continue

If you have grown accustom to downloading free books in PDF format, or if you have other kinds of documents that you would like to read on your iPad or e-book, Calibre is an application that will serve you well. Calibre is a free e-book library management application that converts PDFs to ePub format (among others), the format used by iPad’s iBooks. In fact, Calibre can do a whole lot more for your e-book collection; from library management, to syncing, to conversion and more. Calibre works on Windows, OSX and Linux, download and find out more here.

And, for a detailed how-to on converting PDFs to ePub, complete with screenshots, check out this post by Simple Help.

continue

Sooner or later disaster strikes, it is inevitable. If you work on computers, at some point you will lose data. The best way to get around this is to have backups. I’m a bit more paranoid about certain things ( like my pictures) that I can not replace. Those aforementioned things are backed up in 3 places, and one of the places also has redundancy built in. Recovery of data off of drives in not cheap, we are talking $1000 just to start. The prices can easily double.

So how do I get started backing up my stuff? Here are 3 programs that I recommend.

Bonkey
JaBackup
NasBackup

continue

There’s been a lot of talk about Windows 7 since it’s launch, most everything has been positive (which certainly wasn’t the case after Windows Vista launched).  In this tough economic client people are asking themselves, “Why should I upgrade and what benefits will I see if you do?”  I’ve been running Windows 7 since August with their Release Candidate and installed the full version as soon as Technet offered it and I’ve found many improvements over previous versions.

(Be warned, this is a long post.  I wanted to get as much information in as possible.  The short story is if you’re getting a new computer definitely get it with Windows 7, if your computer is less than 2 or 3 years old I would recommend the upgrade).

continue

iPhone Explorer is a free application that enables you to copy files to and from your iPhone or iPod Touch.  You can transfer photos, music and other media to right your computer.  You can also use it as a flash drive transporting files or using it as a storage device.

Here is what the makers say:

Printing anything from a browser – articles, receipts, directions, etc – can be frustrating because what you want gets printed along with  banner ads, page titles, and single lines of footer text, i.e. lots of paper and ink waste.  Now, without a lot of trouble, you can select exactly what you want to print using a Bookmarklet called PrintWhatYouLike.   You have the option to select different parts of a page to print, creating tidy and specific print results.

Bookmarklets are great because there is nothing to install, download or configure.  Simply drag the application into your Bookmark Toolbar.   When you are on the page you want to print, click on the Bookmarklet.  A user menu appears in the left column of your browser providing selection options.

continue

Microsoft put out a series of patches today for all versions of Internet Explorer from 5 to 8 for every operating system from Windows 2000 to Windows 7 to address a huge security vulnerability .

The vulnerability was used in the cyber attacks against Google, yahoo and others over the last couple weeks. If you’re running any versions of Internet Explorer please install any updates from Windows Update that are pending on your system or grab the update manually from Microsoft’s site.

Microsoft Security Bulletin MS10-002 – Critical

Adobe Reader is notorious for eating up computer resources.  If you are looking for a free, light and quick PDF reader try Foxit.  We have been using it for a while now and prefer it to Adobe Reader or CutePDF.  Here is what their website has to say about why it works so well:

• Incredibly small: The download size of Foxit Reader is just a fraction of Acrobat Reader 20 M size.
• Breezing-fast: When you run Foxit Reader, it launches instantly without any delay. You are not forced to view an annoying splash window displaying company logo, author names, etc.
• Annotation tool: Have you ever wished to annotate (or comment on) a PDF document when you are reading it? Foxit Reader allows you to draw graphics, highlight text, type text and make notes on a PDF document and then print out or save the annotated document.
• Text converter: You may convert the whole PDF document into a simple text file.
• High security and privacy: Foxit Reader highly respects the security and privacy of users and will never connect to the Internet without users’ permission. While other PDF readers often silently connect to the Internet in the background. Foxit PDF Reader does not contain any spyware.

You can try it for free here.  Let us know what you think.

continue