Programs and Sites

NOTE

You can obtain these programs at their home site, where I link you here. You can also obtain these programs from general download sites that I list on my Download page.
Now there are some shareware programs I like that don't nag you, or nag gently, like WinZip , but for now I'll just tell you about the real freeware.

Revo Uninstaller

I highly recommend Revo Uninstaller though as a great uninstaller. No need to run it before you install. It searches your registry and hard drive for all the files that are associated with the program you want to uninstall. After it runs the program's uninstall, then it does it's search, and shows you what needs to be cleaned up. You can have it do all, or pick what you want. The first version I tried was very slow in showing you what programs exist, so you can pick what you want to uninstall. A later version is fast. It's not perfect in finding everything all the time, as I do find some obvious entries left in the registry.

Key Launch      
This is the program I use to find the programs I have in my startup menu. It launches with the Ctrl-Space combination and is clsed with the Escape key. Enter some of the letters of the program name and a list pos up to choose from, as well as where the file is located.

iColorFolder

iColorFolder lets you set your folders to different colors, to help identify them. After installation, it is found in the context menu, so just right click on a folder.

Sandboxie      

Sandboxie is a security tool. It lets you run programs locked withing a sandbox. To the program, it looks like it is using your registry, setting up the start menu, etc. But it is all done within a separate area - the sandbox. Then you can just delete everything it does just by telling Sandboxie to delete it. You can run the installer and then the program, all within the sandbox.
I use it to test new programs that I am not sure I will need. This way, if I don't like it, then I can cleanly delete it from my system. If I do like it, then I just reinstall it again, normally.

Gorilla Design Studio

I'm no longer using this, since I have broadband now, and the time for downloading ads doesn't matter. But, if you have dial-up, you still might want to consider this. If you do, then also consider the Host Toggle program. It will let you toggle between using the hosts file and not using it.
There are several programs to block ads from being read in by your browser. This page describes a method to do it without any additional programs. The concept is to use a 'Hosts' file which would be stored in your C:\Windows directory. Keep in the Hosts file a list of sites where ads come from, and your browser will be directed to omit the sites that are in the Hosts file because it does not reach them. You can add or delete sites as you wish, using Notepad or another plain text editor.
Depending on your browser, you might have a problem that your browser either stops because it cannot access the ad (Netscape) or your browser displays an error that it cannot access the ad. In the latter case, you just click the button on the error window, and it continues. If you have these problems, then get eDexter. You will find it here as well plus much more information on the Hosts file. eDexter will satisfy the desires of your browser.
You can try it just to see if it works for you. It's a simple method. If you wish to get rid of it, just delete or rename the Hosts file. Be sure to review the Hosts file before using it, in case there are sites there you actually want to visit. You can just delete those entries from the file.

Strip Mail

Are you annoyed by the '>' that appears in the first column of e-mails you receive, when you want to save it, or forward it. I am. Strip Mail is a simple program that will quickly and easily strip the '>' characters from the start of each line. It uses the clipboard, so you can strip the characters from anything, and save it anywhere. Clear instructions included.

ClipX      

There are quite a few clipboard programs for free. I looked at a few, but none got me to use it, until ClipX. It sits in the system tray and catches everything you copy. It holds the last 25 copies. I usually don't use it, but if I want to paste something from a few copies back, or I have multiple things to copy, it sure comes in handy. It uses a special key combination, that you can specify, to bring up the list for copying. Select one by it's number (if a single digit), or move cursor down list to entry you want. Hit enter key, and it is copied to where your cursor is.

Now, if you want something a bit fancier, try Ditto, but I'm sticking with ClipX, and ClipX uses a lot less memory.

HoverSnap      

There are also quite a few screen capture programs for free. I settled on Hover Snap. It also will sit in the system tray. You can either capture an active window or a custom rectangular area. You set up what type of file you want to capture it to: jpeg, gif, bitmap. or png. You specify where you want the results stored, and the filename to use. Then, when you want to capture something, use the appropriate key combination, choose the area if a custom area, and the file is saved.

Metapad

Would you like Notepad to be better? Metapad is a very small program that you can use to replace Notepad. It is much superior, with many more bells and whistles.
The way to do this is to copy Notepad.exe to another directory to save it. Then delete Notepad.exe within the \Windows directory. Rename metapad.exe to Notepad.exe and move it to the \Windows directory.
This will leave all files that are opened with Notepad to open with Metapad. Actually, it is trickier in XP or Vista. It will say Metapad in the title bar at the top of the window when you open a file using Notepad.
If you simply rename Notepad.exe, it seems that Windows will change all files that are opened with Notepad, to open with the new name. You don't want to just copy over Notepad, because you should save the original. This is why I described the above method to use Metapad.

Core FTP

There are many FTP programs out there. For awhile I actually just used the Windows FTP commands, which is like using DOS. But I then looked for a good simple program, and found FTP Surfer to fit the bill. Quick and easy to setup and use. I had tried one other popular one, but did not like it. But now I use Core FTP . I like their side-by-side windows of your online folder and the folder on your PC, easily identified as to which. You don't have to remember what is an upload and what is a download (as in FTP Surfer). You can drag and drop files from one to the other. Or send them by just clicking an arrow. If you need secure transfers, Core FTP apparently has that too. On the other hand, there is one disappointment. It can upload to the website multiple files, but it only download to my PC one at a time. But that can be a folder and all its subfolders.

FastFolder by BB

FastFolder is the way I access the main folders I go to all the time, like Windows, my download folder, Program Files, the folder I save the files I downloads in, etc. It sits in the System Tray and with a click it bring up links to a dozen folders that I've selected. It makes life a little easier.
The download is near the bottom of the page.

FileMap by BB

FileMap is a quick and easy way to be able to check on what files have been added or removed from your main system folders: \Windows, \Windows\System, and the root directory. It quickly does a comparison between any 2 points in time that you've had it take a snapshot. Syslog, which I mentioned above can show you the changed files between 2 adjacent snapshots, but FileMap will show you between any 2 snapshots.
The download is near the bottom of the page.
If you like BB software, you can see these and more at Bernie-Built.

YouTube Stuff

I've provided a description on another one of my pages, where I discuss YouTube.com, about the tools I use to download videos, play them, and convert the sound to MP3 format.

TaxAct

I'd agree that other tax programs are better, but TaxAct works, is easy, helpful, much smaller than the others, and free. Also, system requirements are much less than TurboTax and TaxCut. The main thing some people might miss is downloading their data from an investment firm or financial program. But it might take as much to accomplish that as to enter it yourself. If you switch from another software program, you can't get the data from the previous year, just from TaxAct. But then TurboTax won't take from another program either. If you decide to pay for the state tax software, the process is simple and quick, with a small download.

Clocx

Would you like a nice analog clock on your desktop? You know, one with hands on it. What's nice about this small program, is not just the clock, but it also has an alarm and a calendar. All the basic time related functions you need. Plus you can get different skins.

Print What You Like

This is not a download, but a tool to use in your browser. It lets you select a web page and print just the parts of the page you desire. You can cut out parts of the page or just select the part to keep. Then print what is left. There are a couple of ways to do this, and the one I am using is the bookmarklet method. The bookmarks toolbar runs near the top of your browser. In Firefox, right click on Tools and a list of toolbars is shown. Verify that your bookmark toolbar is checked.

CCleaner

CCleaner is a pretty popular cleaner and rightly deserved. It gives you many options for many programs as to what files to be cleaned up.

As an alternative, I've been using BleachBit. BleachBit is faster than CCleaner and it does almost everything I have CCleaner do. And it does have a portable version.

BullZip

There are a number of programs that convert spew a print to a PDF file. I've tried a few, and BullZip is the one I preferred. There were some cases that other print to PDF programs I tried failed to capture everything but BullZip succeeded. There are also cases that the browser just fails to print it properly, and the print to PDF program won't do any better. These programs are set up as an alternative printer, so you access it when you choose which printer to use.

Weather Gopher

Talking about having tools on your desktop, how about the weather. I've gone with this program as it simply shows me the current temperature. If I want the forecast, just right click the temperature and choose forecast. It brings up the NOAA forecast for my area in the default browser. If you cannot get it from the above link try Weather Gopher

Alarm Simple

Need an alarm to let you know when it is a specific time? Maybe you want to run a program at a specific tme of day. Alarm Simple is a small program that sits in your system tray. You can set up as many alarms as you'll need. The alarms can be for specific dates or days of the week. You can set each alarm to trigger a message on your desktop, play a wave file, or run a program.
There are a lot of alarm programs here, Alarm Simple is the last one on the page.

RamPage

When I had Windows 95 RamPage came in handy to free up memory when the OS was lax on doing it. With XP, I don't need it anymore, but I like to use it just to see how much memory is available. It sits quietly in the system tray displaying available memory. I have plenty of memory, but some programs still can have leaks or grab more and more memory as time passes. An occasional glance is all that is needed to see if I should look into a large use of memory.

Bit Meter      

I like to see a little sign of my internet activity on the system tray. Something showing when I'm transmitting and receiving. This was provided by the dialer when I had dial-up. I was happy to see ZoneAlarm showed it when I went to broadband. But I dropped ZoneAlarm and went to Comodo Firewall. So I went looking for for another program to do it. Seemed like BitMeter was the only one. In addition (when you place cursor on the icon, it will show the current download and upload speeds and amount of data that has been transferred since it started (startup). Just what I was looking for.

That was then, this is now: I don't use this anymore because I went back to the free ZoneAlarm. I had left ZoneAlarm because I wanted more information. Comodo, I found, has problems always identifying the source of requests properly. Because of this, it will put up an alert because the combination is not in its database yet. I have also found it difficult to tell it to always allow DNS requests. Since I have DSL and it uses PPPOE, the system requests a renewal of its IP address every day. Every few days Comodo would prevent this request without an alert and I'd have to reboot the system to get online.

Registry Monitor

Registry Monitor , known as RegMon creates a log of all activity to your registry. It's a great way to find out what's going on. Of course, you don't know what a program does with the information it retrieves, but you'll be amazed at the amount of activity.

File Monitor

File Monitor , is another interesting monitor program. It lets you know what programs are accessing what files and when. It can be rather surprising. You can filter out programs, so that they don't fill your log once you see a program doing constant file accesses.

Snooper

Snooper is another cool tool that monitors activity. This activity is the starting and ending of programs. You can thus see what's been happening on your system. When you double click it to start, it runs without any sign that it is running. It won't stop until you reboot, and not even then if you have it start up at boot time. What I do to stop it in order to read its log is Ctrl-Alt-Del and kill the task. Snooper is written by Karen Kenworthy formerly of Windows Magazine, which closed.

Countdown

Countdown is another tool that Karen Kenworthy wrote. This one is a simple calendar scheduler. Nothing fancy, which is what I like. Since it is simple, I am more likely to use it than some over-bloated calendar program. I use it regularly to keep track of when I have to pay bills and various events coming up.

IE Cookies View

Normally, I let cookies do their job. But there are some that I delete because they are at best used by advertisers. You can read more about this here. To delete them I've used the browser's own resources for Opera and Firefox. Fir Internet Explorer I've used IE Cookies View. It is just for Internet Explorer and has a simple interface.

I've come across Cookie Monster and Cookienator.
Both of these programs do several browsers together. CookieMonster shows 2 columns: it lists all the cookies to be deleted on the left side, and all the cookies you want to save on the right. I started by moving all to the right, and then moving back to the left the ones I wanted to remove. It then lets me save the list on the right, and then I delete the cookies on the left. Subsequently, new cookies are shown on the left, and my saved list is on the right. Then I go down the left list and move the new ones I want to keep to the right list and save it again.
Cookienator shows you a list of cookies that it feels should be deleted. You can remove cookies from that list before deleting. I use it after using Cookie Monster to see if I moved any to my right column I did want to delete. Some of the cookies Cookienator has in its list I want to keep.

AutoSizer      

I don't normally use Internet Explorer but I did finally get my wife to start using a browser, and I showed her Internet Explorer. That way she'll see the internet the way most people do. What I found was that IE does not open maximized, and that is one of those poor things from Microsoft. Programs are supposed to re-open in the window size in which they were closed, but not IE. I've tried all the different methods recommended to do this, and none work. I read at MS that if you use tabs, it won't work. Hey, MS, Firefox and Opera use tabs, and it works. Now, it is easy enough to hit the maximize button after opening it, but should be unnecessary.
So, I decided to use the IE New Window Maximizer, and let it startup with Windows. Unfortunately it is slow to maximize IE and often it does not do it. Then I switched to AutoSizer. Works like a charm, IE opens maximized immediately. Actually AutoSizer can be used with other programs also, but so far I found that unnecessary.

Asterisk key

Asterisk Key displays the password that is hidden under asterisks. Rather than having to hover over the asterisks to reveal the password, as some programs do, Asterisk Key displays the hidden passwords in all open windows.

CSVed

Some programs provide you the means to export their data into a CSV (Comma Separated Value) format. CSVed will display the CSV files. The first time you try to open a CSV file, you have to specify that you want CSVed to be the program to open those files. It doesn't do that for you.

Dependency Walker

Dependency Walker is a free Microsoft utility that scans any 32-bit or 64-bit Windows module (exe, dll, ocx, sys, etc.) and builds a hierarchical tree diagram of all dependent modules. For each module found, it lists all the functions that are exported by that module, and which of those functions are actually being called by other modules. Another view displays the minimum set of required files, along with detailed information about each file including a full path to the file, base address, version numbers, machine type, debug information, and more.
There are many programs that provide this type of information, but this is one of the few I know of that provides the dependencies, and the only one in which the programs do not have to be running.

CS Diff

Here is a program to compare files. For simple file compares I usually use my editor. But it does not compare all the files in a folder and its subfolders, with another folder and its subfolders. CS Diff does. I don't need to use it at home, but it sure helps at work. It presents the results of a file compare as the base file marked up with additions and deletions.
My only complaint is that you can't just backup to the compare results, you have to open a new window, and close the old one.

Program Lock and Protect

If you need to block programs from others being able to run them, this is a good utility to use. It is only in Beta test now, but works fine for me. Program Lock and Protect allows you to make programs unusable. You control the locking or unlocking of the programs under a password. It does not take a password to run a program, it takes a password to run Program Lock and Protect . You start by using the password mentioned when you first run Program Lock and Protect , then you change the password to one you like.

Tiny Spell

Tiny Spell is a great little spell checker. It's probably the smallest and one of the best, least obtrusive spell checkers. It works everywhere, in any program. It sits in your system tray and informs you of typing errors, anywhere you type, by providing a beep. If you prefer it to provide choices you can open its small spelling window, and when it beeps, click the window. This brings up a list of choices, click the one you want and it replaces what you typed. One problem I had in the past, and thus didn't use it, was that it ate up my system resources in Windows 95. But it is fine in other Windows versions.

Everything      

Everything is a search engine for your PC. It does create an index to speed up searches, but it does not have to keep running to maintain the index. And it takes no time to do it. I have over 90,000 files and it took a second or two to index, and after that searches are immediate. This is fantastic. The down side is that it does not search for text within files.

EZ Back-It-Up      

I purchased a USB flash drive that I want to use for 'daily' backups. Therefore I want a simple program to backup some special files. This one fits the bill. It provides a file directory to use to drag and drop files to be backed up. They are not compressed. Then I define them as a job and to what drive the files will be copied. I can then backup the files manually or on a schedule. The files are saved in the same directory structure.

Later, I got myself an external disk drive to be able to do a full backup. I decided against a full image, and wanted a program that would update the files that changed and add new files. I did not want incremental changes. As a 'full backup' I would choose all directories except \windows, \i386, and maybe a few others. I might include some of \windows. I looked at several of the free backup programs, and EZ Back-It-Up, again, was the only program that fit my wishes. I set up two backups with it, one for daily, backing up a few folders and files, and the other that does most of my folders to do twice a week. I skipped those folders that held the cache for my browsers. The "full" backup only takes 7 minutes.

Macrium Reflect

Reflect does image copies. I had gotten a portable external USB backup drive and added image backups to my repertoire. It's much larger than my internal drive so I can store multiple images. Reflect compacts the drive data and stores it all into one file. It used to take multiple files with my old drive. It depends on the drive technology as to the max size of a file. With Reflect, you can open the backup image with an explorer type view and retrieve whatever files you want, if you deleted something by mistake or corrupted some files. This backup I do weekly, and keep 8 weeks of backups. some special files. This one fits the bill. It provides a file directory to use to drag and drop files to be backed up. They are not compressed. Then I define them as a job and to what drive the files will be copied. I can then backup the files manually or on a schedule. The files are saved in the same directory structure.

Later, I got myself an external disk drive to be able to do a full backup. I decided against a full image, and wanted a program that would update the files that changed and add new files. I did not want incremental changes. As a 'full backup' I would choose all directories except \windows, \i386, and maybe a few others. I might include some of \windows. I looked at several of the free backup programs, and EZ Back-It-Up, again, was the only program that fit my wishes. I set up two backups with it, one for daily, backing up a few folders and files, and the other that does most of my folders to do twice a week. I skipped those folders that held the cache for my browsers.

BK Color Coder

If you are building a website, here is a nice tool to help you decide on the colors to use for background, links, and text. Too many sites don't check these combinations, such that links cannot be read in their background because of similarity of color. This tool will solve these problems easily.

Xenu's Link Sleuth

Another nice tool if you are building a website is one that will detect broken links. I found this one to be better than any online broken link detector I tried. The link verification is done on "normal" links, images, frames, plug-ins, backgrounds, local image maps, style sheets, scripts and java applets.
You enter your top level URL and it will report on all pages under it. The broken links can be sorted by links or by page (my preference). A reported broken link might mean that the site is now under a new URL, or it had closed up shop, or the site just might be down temporarily. Try to find the site by a search engine.
It will also tell you all links that have been redirected. Some of these you might want to update, while others might be fine with the link you use. You'll be able to tell.
Note: Be sure to include 'http://' at the start of the URL, and end it with '/'.

See HTML Help below, under online tools.

DTaskManager      

DTaskManager , is a replacement for the Microsoft Task Manager. It provides more information, like the pathname of the process, what time the process started, and a more accurate CPU time.

Calendar Magic

All the other tools I have mentioned are helping you technically. This program is a different animal. Obviously, it's about the calendar. It handles years from 1582 on the Gregorian calendar to 9999. But also wide ranges on just about any calendar you want: Julian, Hebrew, Chinese, Islamic, Hindu, and more. There are holidays on all these calendars, equivalent dates, reminders you can enter, and so much more. Since you can enter your location, so it can adjust the calendar for you, it also has distances between places, and not just big cities. It's a prize.

Smart Close

It is recommended that you close all the programs that you can when you install a new program. It helps protect against conflicts that will make the installation fail. I normally don't do this, but I certainly close any programs that are not always open. If you want to go further and close all that you can, you may have to restart the system afterwards, to be able to start those programs again. Smart Close goes a step further than similar programs. The programs that it closed, it can re-open.
But, be warned, you probably will have to work at this. You'll have to add programs to the list that are not closed, by experimentation, until you get a working set that can be re-opened. It gives you a list of the programs that are opened, and you just switch those programs into the list that it will not close. Of course, it saves that list for future use.

Firefox

I've been an Opera user, and still am. It is even by default browser. But, I've been using Firefox now for most of my internet use. This is because of the sites that don't adhere to proper standards or, at least, don't allow for Opera. So, I have a few Firefox add-ons that I've decided to use.
I like the look of the Colorful Tabs.
One of the things in Opera that is missing in Firefox is Duplicate Tabs. It's not as good as Opera, because you still cannot duplicate the complete tab, just it's current page; that is, no going back to previous pages.
Another Opera nicety I mimic is with Extended Statusbar to show speed, percentage, time, and loaded size of pages as they are loading.
FEBE is a little backup of important data in Firefox.
Flagfox shows what country the website is from, and Shazou lets you know if it says the server is in one country but is really another.
Even Firefox sometimes needs to say it is IE. You do that easily with IE Tabs.
To help reduce spoofing I use which highlights the domain in your URL so you can easily see the real site URL.
Opera also came up with the Speed Dial and so this add-on gives it to you in Firefox.
Netcraft is also for protecting you from bad websites, in that it give a risk rating for a website.
Download information is enhanced with Download Statusbar.

That's a lot of add-ons. I'm tired just seeing how many there are. I wonder how Firefox feels. Maybe that's why it is slow in starting.

Online Tools

HTML Help

This site is an excellent tool to analyze your site's HTML and links. Under tools, I've used the HTML Validator and the LinkValet. Both are quite good tools, and fast. As with Xenu, some links might still be valid even though the tool can't find it.

Tech Support Best Freeware Utilities

Above you have many of the free tools I like. At this site find what the folks at Tech Support Alert like. Pretty good list. I use many of them myself.