CCleaner for Mac OS X

As a windows user, I love CCleaner. It cleans out all the privacy data from firefox, windows, ie, and more. Now there is CCleaner for Mac's. I have tested it on my Mac laptop which is running OSX Leopard and unfortunately, it really doesn't do that much as it does on Windows. Seeing as OSX does most of the stuff automatically that CCleaner does on windows, it makes it pointless. Later on today I upgraded to OSX Lion and gave it a try on Mac's latest OS release and it did not work. As this is only a beta, expectations should not be set too high, and at this early stage, the options available in the application are a little limited.

http://www.piriform.com/mac/ccleaner

How to get the old facebook chat back.

Many of you have asked me how to get old facebook chat. Yes I know new facebook chat sidebar is very annoying. So the steps are pretty simple to accomplish this.

Attention: This will only work for chrome users.

1. Go to the wrench icon
2. Go to tools -extensions
3. Scroll down and go to "get more extensions"
4. Type "Facebook Chat Sidebar Disabler" in the search box
5. And install the first extension

Or you can go click here. Refresh the fb page and you get your chat back. Six hundred Million+ use facebook, and a large majority dislike the new chat. Looks like Google Chrome just stole the browser rating.

KeePass Password Safe

Excellent sharable password-protected password vault that can generate passwords based on your preferences. Great that it offers drag/drop user/password entry and automatically clears the clipboard when appropriate. I've used KeePass for somewhat over a year now, and find it nearly indispensable. Its Auto-Type features in particular are second to no other program I've tried, and its security and ease of use are up there with the best of them.I cannot recommend using a password manager strongly enough, and I highly recommend KeePass in particular. In my opinion, it's the best password manager in the world. This application is a must have.

[Click here to visit KeePass website]

Norman Malware Cleaner

Recently, I was testing out Norman Malware Cleaner ("NMC"), and within a short time, and I've come to a conclusion. In my opinion ("NMC") rates a -10, on a scale of 1 to 10. Why? While testing it (quick scan), without permission it altered several of my registry entries, without asking permission, and this is when allowed it to run only about 20 seconds or so.

After further investigation, I determined:

1. It by default, the program says to clean things. This is wrong! The default should be to ask of something is to be removed. If the individual user wants it to be removed automatically, the program should make the user go into a configuration area, and change it, or at the minimum, ask permission to make the change(s). This is poor programming.

2. The program changed my windows firewall settings. I have windows firewall turned off, because I use COMODO Firewall. This program should not have turned windows firewall on, and COMODO Firewall off.

3. The program modified and entry to have COMODO Firewall start automatically.
The entries in #1 were easily changed back, but shouldn't have been changed in the first place, without permission. As for #2 and #3, that could have caused me great difficulty. Since I have a pristine copy of windows (because I use Norton ghost), I restored by computer using ghost, and then restored my files. Total time, about 2 hours, most of which was restoring the files I previously zipped.

With 10 years in IT I know that Norman should have, as said above, made the user to change configuration items, or AT THE MINIMUM, requested permission to make the changes. This software is a piece of garbage in my book, because of the above.

Software to make your life better (F.lux)

It basically adjusts your monitor's colors to match daytime or night time. Your computer monitor puts out a blue light comparable to the sun all day long. When you're using your computer at night, this stops you from feeling sleepy. I've used it for a couple of days now and it really works. Normally by this time, I would be wide awake. Right now I'm awake to do some homework, but feeling sleepy as hell even though I took an hour nap today. It puts less strain on your eyes.

The program makes your monitor look "sepia" is the best way I would describe it. If the transition is too fast for you, you can change it so that it transitions at a slower rate.

I won't ever go back to the regular settings at night unless I'm doing some color-sensitive work or want to stay awake. try it for yourself for a couple of days and thank me later.

How to keep your password safe and secure with Keepass

Are you using the same password for all of your different blogs, email accounts, and social networks?  Would you like to have a more secure password but find it too hard to remember lots of different, complex passwords?

This short video will demonstrate how to use Keepass Password Safe to safely store all of your different passwords without having to remember them all.  All you need to remember is the master password to the password safe.

[Click here to watch KeePass video]