This is the most useful program I've found for ages and it's extremely simple: rndNoter - it sits in the tray and with a single click (or keystroke, customisable) a small notepad pops up in the corner for you to jot something down. Press escape and it disappears again with the text automatically saved.
Great thing is that it's absolutely instantaneous - the only thing I've found that can do this. I use it twenty times a day to jot down odd thoughts I would otherwise lose, later transferring them to my journal proper. Highly recommended.
Download (it's freeware): http://rndware.info/content/rndNoter
I see the rndNoter developer has found my review and has put it on the homepage: http://rndware.info/products/rndnoter.html.
He's welcome to it. I still use the program 20 times a day - at least. Absolutely essential and irreplaceable. Thanks Simon!
Some other freeware programs I use daily:
Rightmark CPU Clock - shows CPU temperature in tray - very handy because my laptop tends to overheat
Windows Live Writer - seems to be the best blogging tool
Everything - for file searching
WordWeb - dictionary
KMPlayer - still my preferred video player
ZoneAlarm 9 - no longer slows things down
I still use a lot of t same stuff as three years ago, though now I've switched to Windows 7 and Firefox.
Paid programs I can't live without:
Quick Macros - for automating tasks
Clipmate - this saves everything you have ever copied to the clipboard - I do Ctrl+C out of habit every few minutes - best way I've found not to lose stuff while writing.
Babylon dictionary - very impressive
Movie Collector - old version 5.6 can lift info from IMDb which is essential for non-mainstream films - newer versions can't.
NEO Email Organizer - sorts all emails by correspondent.
Atlantis - word processor that can handle large files (1,000+ pages) very nimbly. Microsoft Word can't do this without going into meltdown.
Anyone found anything new and wonderful?
So you keep a journal. I have been dipping into Andre Gide's and not finding them too interesting but the translator may have censored them. He did some censoring himself before sending them to the printer. Also Thomas Mann's journals have been published and he wanted that delayed for 20 years after his death to spare his wife but I believe she outlasted him by more than that. He was quite frank in what I have seen on the web in relation to his sexuality tho' I don't believe he ever actually engaged in physical practice from what little I have read.
VDownloader is good for nabbing Youtube vids
The Windows snipping tool is indispensible
Jarte is a simple word processor that suits my simple needs
VLC media player is indispensable. Will play Region 2 and has easy screenshot capability + you can add subs easily.
So you keep a journal.
Not really a journal so much as a collection of pensées which I'm thinking of collating under the title 'Miserable Maxims' and pitching as a airport bookshop bestseller for those who are fed up with everything.
Gide's journal - you mean Fruits of the Earth? - was an interesting attempt to provide a narrative to journal material, if a little heavy on the adolescent lyricism. But I admire the old writers who used to get it down on paper - that's impossible for me now. I don't think I can even hold a pen any more. I have to get things down in a jumble and then spend even longer rearranging it all and the rearranging takes all the art out of it. When it comes to writing, not being a genius is a bit of a handicap.
Some more useful freeware:
Zoner Photo Studio - almost as good a photo cataloguer as ACDSee and maybe even the very best tool for tagging photos with metadata (which I've started doing now) - quite amazing that it's freeware.
Wizmouse - handy gizmo that allows you to use the mousewheel to scroll a window that is not the active window.
So you keep a journal.
Not really a journal so much as a collection of pensées which I'm thinking of collating under the title 'Miserable Maxims' and pitching as a airport bookshop bestseller for those who are fed up with everything.
Gide's journal - you mean Fruits of the Earth? - was an interesting attempt to provide a narrative to journal material, if a little heavy on the adolescent lyricism. But I admire the old writers who used to get it down on paper - that's impossible for me now. I don't think I can even hold a pen any more. I have to get things down in a jumble and then spend even longer rearranging it all and the rearranging takes all the art out of it. When it comes to writing, not being a genius is a bit of a handicap.
Not recognizing pensées checking led me to Pascal and #2 the misery of man without god which now seems counter intuitive as the people who are making everyone else miserable are the true believers of any stripe and especially the Christians here in the US but still belief means that life on earth is but a passing discomfort which makes the daily shit more bearable. Being truly modern as Rimbaud declared means having to live with "the way of the world" which never changes and seems to get worse if that's possible.
New freeware video player which I'm liking a lot:
http://mirillis.com/en/products/splash.html
This is the only player I've found that will play back AVCHD from my camcorder smoothly and properly deinterlaced, so I've been waiting for this for about a year.
The pro version has some interesting picture enhancement features.
EDIT: yes, I'm aware of the irony of this after what I've just said about The Turin Horse. I hang my head.
I tend to just go with whatever's on whatever computer I'm using. I have a tough enough time getting that to work properly without downloading anything new. :roll:
I have what my nephew put on my machine plus the standard Microsoft Media Player. CyberLink PowerDVD 8 and VLC media player are the ones my nephew put there. I prefer the CyberLink, but for some stuff, the VLC works better. Actually, I think there is another player on this machine...forget where it is tho...think it is some kind of generic freeware thing.
Can't imagine anything better than the VLC. Free, makes screen shots, easy control of sound tracks and probably a lot more that I don't know anything about. Oh, it will play any region you throw at it. Which reminds me Amazon UK all of a sudden has refused to sell me PAL DVDs. So I buy from Amazon De or Amazon Fr. The one from France got here pronto but I have a 4 pak of Ruiz coming from Portugal and they quoted a MONTH delivery. Bummer.
