13-most essential open source apps that you probably like to say thank you

Today, we are going to say big Thank You to everyone who supports us, appreciate us, love us and always be there for us when we need them. So, how can we forget those that makes our online life easier and did the tremendous work for us. They delivered us those applications/software that help us to get the routine work done for our daily use. There are many that we can not count and list exactly but we are trying to make a list of 13 Most Essential Open Source Apps That You Probably Like To Say Thank You. And Yes! Happy Thanksgiving…

You are welcome to share if you want to say Thank You to more Open-Source Applications that made your life easier. Do you want to be the first one to know the latest happenings at SmashingApps.com just subscribe to our rss feed.

Downloadable Web-Based Applications

WordPress As An Open Source Fastest Growing And Damanding Blogging System

WordPress is a state-of-the-art publishing platform with a focus on aesthetics, web standards, and usability. WordPress is both free and priceless at the same time.

phpBB™ As The Most Widely Used Open Source Forum Solution

With a large and highly customisable set of key features coupled with a standards compliant interface, phpBB™ will grow with, and complement your website. With millions of installations worldwide, it is no wonder phpBB™ is one of the most popular ways to create and support a community.

Drupal As An Powerful And Open Source Content Management Platform

Drupal is a free software package that allows an individual or a community of users to easily publish, manage and organize a wide variety of content on a website. Tens of thousands of people and organizations are using Drupal to power scores of different web sites from personal weblogs to large community-driven websites.

Mindquarry DO As A Free And Open Source Application  for Team Collaboration

Mindquarry DO is an Open Source collaborative software platform for file sharing, task management, team collaboration and Wiki editing that is available for Windows, Linux and Mac OS X. Mindquarry runs as a web application with an optional desktop client for Windows, Linux and Mac OS that allows for desktop synchronization and offline work. As a result, you are able to connect with team members and share information from wherever you are, effectively improving team-work and increasing productivity within your team.

PrestaShop™ As An Open Source Professional e-Commerce Shopping Cart Software

The PrestaShop e-Commerce Solution was built to take advantage of essential Web 2.0 innovations such as dynamic AJAX-powered features and next-generation ergonomy. PrestaShop guides users through your product catalog intelligently and effortlessly, turning intrigued visitors into paying customers.

jobberBase As The Simple, Free And Open Source Job Board Software

jobberBase is a great open source job board software for anyone. You can get online your job posting website with jobberBase. It’s easy to install and configure to start your job board.

ModSecurity As An Open Source Web Application Firewall

ModSecurity is a web application firewall that can work either embedded or as a reverse proxy. It provides protection from a range of attacks against web applications and allows for HTTP traffic monitoring, logging and real-time analysis. It is also an open source project that aims to make the web application firewall technology available to everyone.

Downloadable Desktop Applications

OpenOffice As The Free and Open Office Productivity Suite

OpenOffice is the leading open-source office software suite for word processing, spreadsheets, presentations, graphics, databases and more. It is available in many languages and works on all common computers. It stores all your data in an international open standard format and can also read and write files from other common office software packages. It can be downloaded and used completely free of charge for any purpose.

Mozilla Firefox As An Open Source Faster, Safer And Smarter Web Browser

Mozilla Firefox is a fast and powerful web browser designed to run on both Linux and Windows. There are far fewer issues with spyware, adware, and pop ups making it far more secure than Internet Explorer.

Amaya

Alternative:Â Adobe Dreamweaver

Firefox 3 sets the pace with dozens of new features, including the smart location bar, one-click bookmarking and blindingly fast performance. Avoid online scams, unsafe transactions and forgeries with simple site identity. View Web pages faster, using less of your computer’s memory.

ClamWin As An Open Source Antivirus program for Microsoft Platform

ClamWin Free Antivirus comes with an easy installer and open source code. You may download and use it absolutely free of charge. It has High detection rates for viruses and spyware, Scanning Scheduler, Automatic downloads of regularly updated Virus Database etc

Gimp As An Image Manipulation Program

GIMP is an acronym for GNU Image Manipulation Program. It is a freely distributed program for such tasks as photo retouching, image composition and image authoring.

Ubuntu As A Community Developed, Linux-Based Operating System

Ubuntu is a community developed, Linux-based operating system that is perfect for laptops, desktops and servers. It contains all the applications you need - a web browser, presentation, document and spreadsheet software, instant messaging and much more.

Wine As An Open Source Virtual PC 

Wine is an Open Source implementation of the Windows API on top of X, OpenGL, and Unix. Think of Wine as a compatibility layer for running Windows programs. Wine does not require Microsoft Windows, as it is a completely free alternative implementation of the Windows API consisting of 100% non-Microsoft code, however Wine can optionally use native Windows DLLs if they are available.

This Article grab from  http://www.smashingapps.com

thank you to smashingapps.com

wubi installer in Deep

Still making excuses not to install Linux? Not willing to partition your drive? Well, the solution has arrived: Wubi.

It's Easy...

The first thing you need to do is download Wubi. It's an impressively small 957kb. You will need 256 mb memory, 5 Gb hard disk space, and a machine running Windows 98, 2000, XP, or Vista.

1. Set the Install Drive: The drive to which Ubuntu will be installed (note: one of Wubi's main features is that you do not have to make a Ubuntu partition so simply select the disk that Windows is installed on)
2. Set the Installation Size: The size of the Virtual Drive that Ubuntu will use (how much space you'll have for Ubuntu files). Note that the absolute minimum is 4gb.
3. Set the Desktop Environment: This allows you to set the GUI that Ubuntu will use. It defaults to Gnome (my personal favorite), also available is Kubuntu (a KDE environment) and Xubuntu (a Xfce environment). If you don't know which one you want use Ubuntu (Gnome) or Xubuntu (Xfce) if you have an older or lower spec computer. You can also install whatever version of Ubuntu you want, including 32-bit (expect a second tutorial shortly).
4. Set the Language: This is pretty self-explanatory. It should be noted that you can change this post-install.
5. Set the Username
6. Set the Password: Check out this article on creating strong passwords.
7. Click Install

Accessibility Options

There is a second page of settings you can go through: Accessibility Settings.

1. From the main install page click Accessibility
2. Choose a Visibility Aid: Note that you can only choose one.
   1. High Contrast: This changes the color scheme of Ubuntu to a higher contrast one as an aid to visibility.
   2. Magnifier: This allows users to use an on screen magnifier. They can move this magnifier over the screen and it will magnify the section under it.
   3. Screen Reader: This allows text and other output to be read out to a user using text-to-speech technology
   4. Braille Terminal: This allows Ubuntu to use a Braille Terminal (aka Refreshable Braille Display)
3. Choose a Mobility Aid: Note that you can only choose one
   1. Keyboard Modifiers: The most commonly used keyboard modifier is sticky keys. This allows the ctrl, alt and windows keys to be stay pressed after only one press by the user. This is useful if the user is only able to press one key at a time.
   2. On-Screen Keyboard: This allows the user to input text via an onscreen keyboard, by clicking keys.
4. Click Next
5. Click Install

Wubi will now download the version of Ubuntu that you selected under Desktop Environment and install it. When you start your computer a boot option will come up allowing you to choose between Ubuntu and your other OS.

Uninstallation

So you've tried Ubuntu, and decided it isn't for you. How can you uninstall it? It's easy. Arguably Wubi's best (and hopefully least used) feature is that it allows Ubuntu to be uninstalled like any other program. Just open Add or Remove Programs (under XP) or Programs and Features (under Vista), select Ubuntu and click modify or uninstall.

Wubi it's that easy.

install ubuntu with WUBI

Many novice users fear the technical process that has do be done before or during the installation of a Linux distribution

Wubi is an officially (sometime not)supported Ubuntu installer for Windows users that can bring you to the Linux world with a single click. Wubi allows you to install and uninstall Ubuntu as any other Windows application, in a simple and safe way. Are you curious about Linux and Ubuntu? Trying them out has never been easier!

Wubi is Simple

No need to burn a CD. Just run the installer, enter a password for the new account, and click "Install", go grab a coffee, and when you are back, Ubuntu will be ready for you.

Wubi is Discrete

Wubi keeps most of the files in one folder, and if you do not like it, you can simply uninstall it as any other application.

Wubi is Free

Wubi and Ubuntu cost absolutely nothing (free as in beer), but yet provide a state of the art, fully functional, operating system that does not require any activation and does not impose any restriction on its use (free as in freedom).

Requirements

{1}256 MB memory

{2}5 GB harddisk space

{3}Windows 98, 2000, XP, Vista

Ready to install

Run Wubi, insert a password for the new account, and click "install". The installation process from this point is fully automatic. The installation files (700MB) will be downloaded and checked, after which you will be asked to reboot. Do so and select Ubuntu at the boot screen. The installation will continue for another 10-15 minutes and the machine will reboot again. This is it. Now you can select Ubuntu at the boot screen and start using it.

Easy to uninstall

You uninstall it as any other applications. In Windows go to the control panel and select "Add or Remove Programs", then select Wubi/Ubuntu and uninstall it. You can also use the uninstaller that you find in the installation folder.

What wubi installer do?

You keep Windows as it is, Wubi only adds an extra option to boot into Ubuntu. Wubi does not require you to modify the partitions of your PC, or to use a different boot loader, and does not install special drivers. It works just like any other application. Wubi is free of spyware and malware, and being open source, anyone can verify that.

Is like wubi install is virtual Environment

No. This is a real installation, the only difference is that Ubuntu is installed within a file as opposed to being installed within its own partition. Thus we spare you the trouble of creating a free partition for Ubuntu. And we spare you the trouble to have of having to burn a CD-Rom.

Download here

Google Search Tips

Basic Examples

This Search Finds Pages Containing...

(1) biking Italy - the words biking and Italy

(2) recycle steel OR iron -  information on recycling steel or recycling iron

(3) "I have a dream" - the exact phrase I have a dream

(4) salsa –dance - the word salsa but NOT the word dance

(5) Louis +I France - information about Louis the First (I), weeding out other kings of France

(6) castle ~glossary - glossaries about castles, as well as dictonaries, lists of terms, terminology, etc.

(7)  fortune-telling - all forms of the term, whether spelled as a single word, a phrase, or hyphenated

(8) define:imbroglio - definitions of the word imbroglio from the Web

 

Calculator

Operators Meaning Type Into Search Box (& Results)

(1)  + – * /  basic arithmetic       12 + 34 - 56 * 7 / 8

(2)  % of   percentage of                45% of 39

(3) ^ or **  raise to a power   2^5 or 2**5

(4) old units in new units  convert units

               300 Euros in USD130lbs    in kg, or 31 in hex

 

Restrict Search

(1) city1 city2       Book flights.          

sfo bos  (Book flights from San Francisco (SFO)  to Boston (BOS).

(2) site:           Search only one website or domain. Halloween site:www.census.gov
(Search for information on Halloween gathered by the US Census Bureau.)

(3) [#]..[#]       Search within a range of numbers.
Dave Barry pirate 2002..2006
(Search for Dave Barry articles mentioning pirates written in these years.)

(4) filetype:   (or ext:)     Find documents of the specified type.
Form 1098-T IRS filetype:pdf
(Find the US tax form 1098-T in PDF format.)

(5)  link:   Find linked pages, i.e., show pages that point to the URL.
link:warriorlibrarian.com
(Find pages that link to Warrior Librarian's website.)

 

Specialized Information Queries

(1) book  (or books)   Search full-text of books.
book Ender's Game
(Show book-related information. Note: No colon needed after book.)

(2) define, what is, what are  Show a definition for a word or phrase.
define monopsony, what is podcast
(Show a definition for the words monopsony and podcast. Note: No colon after define, what is, or what are.)

(3) define:  Provide definitions for words, phrases, and acronyms from the Web.
define:kerning
(Find definitions for kerning from the Web.)

(4) phonebook:   Show all phonebook listings.
phonebook: Disney CA
(Search for Disney's phone numbers in California - CA.)

(5) rphonebook:   Show residential phonebook listings.
rphonebook: bill jones NY
(Search for the phone number of every Bill Jones in New York State - NY.)

(6) movie:  Find reviews and showtimes.
movie: traffic
(Search for information about this movie, including reviews, showtimes, etc.)

(7) stocks:  Given ticker symbols, show stock information
stocks: goog
(Find Google's current stock price.)

(8) weather  Given a location (US zip code or city), show the weather
weather Seattle WA, weather 81612
(Show the current weather and forecast. Note: No colon after weather.)

 

Alternative Query Types

(1) cache:  Display Google's cached version of a web page.
cache:www.irs.gov
(Show Google's cached version of the US Internal Revenue Service home page.)

(2) info: (or id:)  Find info about a page.
info:www.theonion.com
(Find information about The Onion website.)

(3) related:  List web pages that are similar or related to the URL.
related:www.healthfinder.gov
(Find websites related to the Healthfinder website.)

 

Restrict Search to Sites where Query Words Appear

(1) allinanchor:
All query words must appear in anchor text of links to the page.
allinanchor:useful parenting sites
(Search for pages that are called useful parenting sites by others.)

(2) inanchor:  Terms must appear in anchor text of links to the page.
restaurants Portland inanchor:kid-friendly
(Search for pages on Portland restaurants for which links to the page say they are "kid friendly.")

(3) allintext:  All query words must appear in the text of the page.
allintext:ingredients cilantro chicken lime
(Search for recipes with these three ingredients.)

(4) intext: The terms must appear in the text of the page.
Dan Shugar intext:Powerlight
(Find pages mentioning Dan Shugar where his company, Powerlight, is included in the text of the page, i.e., less likely to be from the corporate website.)

(5) allintitle: All query words must appear in the title of the page.
allintitle: Google Advanced Operators
(Search for pages with titles containing "Google," "Advanced,", and "Operators".)

(6) intitle: The terms must appear in the title of the page.
movies comedy intitle:top ten
(Search for pages with the words movie and comedy that include top ten in the title of the page.)

(7) allinurl:  All query words must appear in the URL.
allinurl:pez faq
(Search for pages containing the words pez & faq in the URL.)

(8) inurl:  The terms must appear in the URL of the page.
pharmaceutical inurl:investor
(Search for pages in which the URL contains the word investor.)

 

Restrict Search to Google Groups

(1) author:  Find Groups messages from the specified author.
flying author:Hamish author:Reid
(Search for Hamish Reid's articles on flying.)

(2) group:  Find Groups messages from the specified newsgroup.
ivan doig group:rec.arts.books
(Search for postings about Ivan Doig in the group rec.arts.books.)

(3) insubject:  Find Groups messages containing crazy quilts in the subject.
insubject:"crazy quilts"
(Find articles containing crazy quilts in the subject line.)

 

Restrict Search to Google News

(1) location:
Find News articles from sources located in the specified location.
queen location:uk
(Find British news articles on the Queen.)

(2) source: Find News articles from specified sources.
peace source:ha_aretz
(Show articles on peace from the Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz.)

 

Restrict Search to Froogle

(1) store:
Find Froogle products from the specified store.
jeans store:gap
(Find Gap jeans.) 

 

Thanks  www.GoogleGuide.com

Create Your Own Torrent

Torrents are great, they are the best way to share large files with your friends, or even with people you don’t know at all. But surprisingly enough, not many people create torrents when they need to share something. I have “a lot of” friends who know how to download torrents, but when they need to send me their latest 200MB vacation picture collection, they ask me to “get on msn”.

It’s not that I have anything against msn (although the file transfer sucks), but why don’t just use BitTorrent? Especially if you want to send something to more than one person, or if you want to share high quality HDTV files, because then you can share the bandwidth.

So how do you do this? Well it’s very simple. Open your favorite BitTorrent client and do the magic trick:

file > create torrent

That’s all? Well almost. All you need to do now is put in the tracker info and tick some boxes. This can differ somewhat from client to client but it all comes down to the same thing.

1. File > Create new Torrent (or CTRL + N)
2. Select the files and or directories

3. Trackers: This is probably the hard part for most people. But it’s pretty easy, just put in one of the popular public trackers. You can use one or more trackers, but in general one is enough.

Here are some good trackers you can use:

http://open.tracker.thepiratebay.org/announce
http://www.torrent-downloads.to:2710/announce
http://denis.stalker.h3q.com:6969/announce
udp://denis.stalker.h3q.com:6969/announce
http://www.sumotracker.com/announce

Put one of these in the tracker box

4. Do NOT tick the private torrent box (unless you’re using a private tracker)

5. Save the torrent and send it to your friends

1. File > Create Torrent (or CTRL + M)

2. Select the files and or directories

3. Select “enable public DHT network” from the dropdown box
This way you can be your own tracker if the public tracker goes down.

4. Tracker server and DHT node list
Again, This is probably the hard part for most people. But it’s pretty easy, just put in one of the popular public trackers. You can use one or more trackers, but in general one is enough.

Here are some of the most popular trackers at the moment:

http://open.tracker.thepiratebay.org/announce
http://www.torrent-downloads.to:2710/announce
http://denis.stalker.h3q.com:6969/announce
udp://denis.stalker.h3q.com:6969/announce
http://www.sumotracker.com/announce

Put one of these in the tracker box

5. Save the torrent and send it to your friends

1. File > New Torrent (or CTRL + N)

2. Tick “use an external tracker”.
And again, This is probably the hard part for most people. But it’s pretty easy, just put in one of the popular public trackers.

Here are some of the most popular trackers at the moment:

http://tracker.prq.to/announce
http://inferno.demonoid.com:3389/announce
http://tracker.bt-chat.com/announce
http://tracker.zerotracker.com:2710/announce

Put one of these in the tracker box

3. Select single file or dicectory, click NEXT and point to the file or directory you want to share, and click NEXT

4. Do NOT tick “private torrent”

5. Do tick “allow decentralized tracking”

6. Save the torrent and send it to your friends

Happy sharing. Note that you don’t need to upload the torrent to a website or a tracker. This means you control who gets the file and who doesn’t, and it won’t be visible to others!.

OpenID

What is an OpenID

OpenID is an URL

OpenID eliminates the need for multiple usernames across different websites, simplifying your online experience.

It means OpenID is an open, decentralized standard for user authentication and access control, allowing users to log onto many services with the same digital identity. It is a Single sign-on (SSO) method of access control. As such, it replaces the common login process that uses a login-name and a password, by allowing a user to log in once and gain access to the resources of multiple software systems.

You get to choose the OpenID Provider that best meets your needs and most importantly that you trust. At the same time, your OpenID can stay with you, no matter which Provider you move to. And best of all, the OpenID technology is not proprietary and is completely free.

How can I use this

OpenID is still in the adoption phase and is becoming more and more popular, as large organizations like AOL, Microsoft, Sun, Novell, etc. begin to accept and provide OpenIDs. Today it is estimated that there are over 160-million OpenID enabled URIs with nearly ten-thousand sites supporting OpenID logins.

More sites:

Here are some places you can visit to see where you can use your OpenID to log in today:

• myOpenID Site Directory
• The OpenID Directory

You can use your OpenID on any one of a growing number of sites (nearly ten-thousand) which support OpenID. If one of your favorite sites doesn’t support OpenID yet, ask them when they will!

Where can I get that

If you don’t have an OpenID yet, here are a few which are generally recommended by various members of the community. In the end you should choose a Provider from a company which you trust. We realize this list isn’t perfect and plan to evolve it into a more useful tool. If you’re curious about the technology behind various providers, you can look at a guide comparing provider feature sets.

Providers

• 
  ClaimID
  claimID is the free, easy way to manage your online identity with OpenID.
• 
  myOpenID
  Secure, free, hosted OpenID server by JanRain.
• 
  VeriSign’s Personal Identity Provider
  Free OpenID Provider with support for multi-factor authentication.

• 
  myID.net
  Free OpenID Provider with support for groups and Korean language.
• 
  myVidoop
  Free OpenID Provider that eliminates passwords with security features, customization, and browser integration.

check more providers here

For a list of more OpenID Providers, you may with to check the OpenID Directory. We don’t make any guarantees about the providers listed nor do we maintain this list.

OpenID authentication is used and provided by several large websites. Organizations like AOL, BBC, Google,IBM, Microsoft,MySpace, Orange, PayPal, VeriSign, and Yahoo! act as providers

AOL

openid.aol.com/screenname

Blogger

blogname.blogspot.com

Flickr

www.flickr.com/photos/username

LiveDoor

profile.livedoor.com/username

LiveJournal

username.livejournal.com

Orange (France Telecom)

http://openid.orange.fr/

SmugMug

username.smugmug.com

Technorati

technorati.com/people/technorati/username

Vox

member.vox.com

Yahoo

http://openid.yahoo.com

WordPress.com

username.wordpress.com

For developers

OpenID is an open, decentralized, free framework for user-centric digital identity. OpenID takes advantage of already existing internet technology (URI, HTTP, SSL, Diffie-Hellman) and realizes that people are already creating identities for themselves whether it be at their blog, photostream, profile page, etc. With OpenID you can easily transform one of these existing URIs into an account which can be used at sites which support OpenID logins.

More Details check this

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Shortcuts For IE7

General shortcuts   Turn Full Screen Mode on or off F11 Cycle through the Address Bar, Refresh button, Search Box, and items on a web page TAB Find a word or phrase on a page CTRL+F Open the current webpage in a new window CTRL+N Print the page CTRL+P Select all items on the page CTRL+A Zoom in CTRL+PLUS Zoom out CTRL+MINUS Zoom to 100% CTRL+0

Navigation Shortcuts Go to home page ALT+HOME Go backward ALT+LEFT Go forward ALT+RIGHT Refresh page F5 Refresh page and the cache CTRL+F5 Stop downloading page ESC

Favorite center Shortcuts Open Favorites CTRL+I Open Favorites in pinned mode CTRL+SHIFT+I Organize Favorites CTRL+B Add current page to Favorites CTRL+D Open Feeds CTRL+J Open Feeds in pinned mode CTRL+SHIFT+J Open History CTRL+H Open History in pinned mode CTRL+SHIFT+H

 

Tab shortcuts Open link in new background tab Middle mouse button or CTRL+left mouse button Open link in new foreground tab CTRL+SHIFT+left mouse button or CTRL+SHIFT+middle mouse button Close tab (closes window if only one tab is open) Middle mouse button on the tab or CTRL+W Open Quick Tab view CTRL+Q Open new tab CTRL+T View list of open tabs CTRL+SHIFT+Q Switch to next tab CTRL+TAB Switch to previous tab CTRL+SHIFT+TAB

Address Bar Shortcuts select the Address Bar ALT+D Add "http://www." to the beginning and ".com" to the end of text in Address Bar CTRL+ENTER Add "http://www." to the beginning and the website address suffix you have specified to the end of text in the Address Bar* CTRL+SHIFT+ENTER Open the website address that is typed in the Address Bar in new tab ALT+ENTER View list of previously typed addresses F4 Instant Search Box Select the Instant Search Box CTRL+E View list of search providers CTRL+DOWN Open search results in new tab ALT+ENTER

To do this	Do this
Disable all add-ons	Windows logo key + R > iexplore.exe –extoff
Turn on AutoComplete so that website addresses will be automatically filled in for you if you begin to type them again	Tools > Internet Options > Advanced > Use inline AutoComplete
Change how tabs work in Internet Explorer	Tools > Internet Options > on the General tab, under Tabs, click Settings
Display the Menu Bar at the top of the screen	To display temporarily: press the ALT key To display permanently: Tools > Menu Bar
Delete cookies, passwords, form data, history, and temporary Internet files	Tools > Delete Browsing History
Find and install add-ons	Tools > Manage Add-ons > Find More Add-ons
Print part of page	Select part of the page you want to print, press CTRL+P, click Selection, and then click Print
Change website address suffix*	Tools > Internet Options > Languages

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