Tag: Software (Page 1 of 2)

Wiki on a Stick

April 11, 2010 /

I have my notes in regular textfiles, a file per topic, which is easy to maintain. The downside is that it gets blurry where to put a note and it’s not always easy to quickly find what I’m looking for. What I want is something small and simple (no server, no database) yet powerful enough for my notetaking.

This weekend I came across Wiki on a Stick. The name refers to the fact that you can easily carry some wikis on a USB stick. It’s easy, everything is in one single file, and small and so far I like it a lot.

I’m starting with two wikis, one personal and one business, but might add some more later.

ClockSmith Lite, a nice clock with chime

December 26, 2009 /

In my search for a nice and simple software clock with chime I found ClockSmith Lite. It’s available for Windows and Mac. The chime is really nice and can be set to play quarterly, every half hour, hourly, or it can be turned off.

I have set the chime for every half hour in order to use it with The Pomodoro Technique. At the chime I take a five minute break, then work for 25 minutes until the next chime.

The tolling of the hour has an on/off switch. I use that tolling as a reminder of the 18 Minute Plan That Keeps You Focused.

The creators of ClockSmith Lite are Dharma Gaia, I like their description of the name:

Our name reflects humanity’s responsibility to care for the earth and her inhabitants. It is derived from word Dharma; a Sanskrit term encompassing universal law, harmony, and personal duty; and Gaia, the ancient Greek name for the Goddess of the Earth.

EditPad Pro Text Editor

October 17, 2009 /

I have been using EditPad Lite for a longer time because of its ability to handle multiple files with a tabbed interface. EditPad Lite is quite powerful yet lacked some features that I wanted.

I write my blog posts in HTML-format and wanted a better text editor for that. Since I am pleased with the Lite-version as a basic text editor I decided to try EditPad Pro.

EditPad Pro’s Clip Collection is terrific for my needs. In the Clip Collection you can save plain text but also before&after which is perfect for HTML-tags. Select a text, click on the proper clip and the text is surrounded with the HTML-tags. That’s a lot easier than the copy-paste I did in the Lite-version.

Read more:
WriteMonkey text editor
Q10 text editor

WriteMonkey text editor

July 15, 2009 /

Through Another Fantastic Full Screen Text Editor I found WriteMonkey. It says:

Zenware for full screen distraction free creative writing. No whistles and bells, just empty screen, you and your words. WriteMonkey is light, fast, and perfectly handy for those who enjoy the simplicity of a typewriter but live in modern times.

I downloaded WriteMonkey and test it. It’s a great software with many features. I like the easy toggle between full screen (for no distractions) and small window to access other stuff. My only complaint so far is the progress or status bar that has very little information.

Read more:
WriteMonkey Text Editor where it says that WriteMonkey is the new king of full-screen distraction free text editing.

Q10 text editor

April 6, 2009 /

Maki, @doshdosh, tweeted about Q10 text editor. It’s freeware and Q10 says it is “a simple but powerful text editor designed and built with writers in mind”.

There are several interesting features but what hooked me is this:

Perfectly portable. A single self-contained executable file. That’s all. Easy to use with a pendrive, so you can carry your writing environment with you everywhere.

Update April 11,2009.
I have installed and tested Q10. It is a bit odd (to me) to have a totally blank screen without any visible distractions. I like the typewriter sound when writing, getting an audio feedback is actually great.

Q10 is a plain but powerful text editor. No formating can be done, all you can do is write which is the sole purpose of this software. Q10 creates txt-files, import them into your word processor of choice and do the formatting there.

You can have an information bar that shows current number of words, pages, lines, paragraphs and characters. Quite useful in order to see your writing progress.

In summary – I like Q10 and will use it when I need to focus on my writing.

Read more:
Q10: My New Favorite Text Editor
Q10: Text editor with a difference

Firefox and add-ons

February 27, 2009 /

Update November 29, 2017 Firefox has changed a lot since 2009 making my list of addons obsolete. For more current information, please visit Replace Dead Firefox Add-Ons With These WebExtensions.

I use Firefox as my standard web browser. Firefox is great as is but there are many add-ons that adds useful features. Here are the add-ons that I use.

All-in-One Sidebar lets you switch between bookmarks, add-ons andmore in the sidebar panel.

Cookie Monster is a great add-on that provides proactive cookie management on a site or domain level basis. Via the status bar, it provides easy access to enhanced cookie functionality.

Copy as HTML Link is great when blogging, it copies the selected text as a link, into the clipboard..

Download Statusbar lets you view and manage downloads from a statusbar, without an annoying download window.

Flashblock is terrific, it blocks Flash animations unless you either whitelist the site or click on the animation. An excellent add-on that makes sites load faster since Flash is blocked.

OpenBook improves Firefox Add Bookmark dialog.

Open Image In New Tab adds more functionality to the right click menu.

Options Menu gives easier access to options for add-ons by adding them to Firefox Tools menu.

PDF Download gives you the option to view the PDF-file in your PDF-viewer or to download the file.

QuickRestart is handy when you need to restart Firefox after enabling or disabling an extension.

Screengrab captures what you can see in the window, the entire page, just a selection or a particular frame as images – either to a file, or to the clipboard.

I also use the StumbleUpon toolbar.

Tab Mix Plus adds more features to Firefox tabs.

Greasemonkey gives you the option to run scripts. I run a package called Better Gmail 2 Firefox Extension for New Gmail which adds nice features to GMail.

I have tried NoScript (blocks scripts) and Adblock Plus (blocks ads and banners) but did not like them.

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