SFV Ninja, Simple File Verification Software

Many download portals and websites display file checksums on their download pages. The idea behind this is to give users the chance to calculate the checksum of the downloaded file to compare it with the checksum on the website. If the values are identical, then the file has not been tampered with (unless a hacker managed to alter the checksum on the page as well).

SFV Ninja is a portable software for Windows that can be used to calculate and display checksums of files that are accessible on the system. When you first start the program you have options to load individual files or files of a folder into the application. Users who have already worked with the program before can alternatively load a single checksum file or make the application crawl a folder for multiple checksum files to re-verify the data.

You can verify all files right away with a click on the Verify all files button. You may alternatively switch from the default CRC32 mode to MD5 or Sha-1 mode if those are preferred.

It may take some time to verify all files. The program managed to test 10 to 20 files per second on my test system. Each checksum is then displayed next to the program’s name and size in the interface. The information can be saved in sfv files which can be loaded again into the software to verify that the files have not been modified in the meantime.

Information that get saved include the file name and path, size and the checksum that has been calculated. When you load the sfv file into the application, you can re-verify all files again and compare the old and new checksum of each file with each other.

This can be handy to make sure that files in a specific directory have not been modified in the meantime, or to get a list of modified files in a directory. You can for instance use it to verify all files on a USB key, in a development directory or a shared network drive.

SFV Ninja is a portable software that is compatible with all recent 32-bit and 64-bit editions of the Microsoft Windows operating system. Yo can download the latest version from the developer’s website.

Mozilla Thunderbird 7 Email Client Released

Thunderbird has joined the rapid release process just like Firefox did. The two programs are now being developed and updated in sync, which means that you will see updates for both programs pop up at around the same time.

With the release of Firefox 7 came also the release of Thunderbird 7. The email program made a big jump from version 3 all the way to version 7, even skipping a version to sync with the Firefox browser.

Existing Thunderbird users should get update notifications right in the email client. They can then update from within without having to download the client from the official website. Users who have not received the notification of the update yet can check for it manually by going to Help > About Thunderbird.

The release notes list several changes and feature enhancements.

• Thunderbird is based on the new Mozilla Gecko 7 engine
• Several user interface fixes and improvements
• Several fixes to attachment handling
• Ability to print a summary of selected email messages
• Platform improvements to Address Book
• Fixed several security issues
• Numerous platform fixes that improve speed, performance and stability

Nothing major as you can, mostly under the hood improvements or changes that the majority of users might not even recognize.

The Welcome to Thunderbird page after updating or installing the new version lists additional features. I’m not sure if they all made their way into this version or if they have been available before. Thunderbird 7 starts up faster and is more responsive according to that feature listing. A new troubleshooting information page is listed there as well. It looks exactly like the page of the Firefox web browser.

New users can download the latest Thunderbird version from the official Mozilla Thunderbird project homepage. It is available there for all supported operating systems and languages.

Are you using Thunderbird? Let me know what you think of the latest update.

Why Everyone Should Own an E-Reader

E-readers. Millions of people own one, and millions are thinking about purchasing one. This article will not provide you with any insightful information on which one to choose, but merely provide you with reasons why you need to make the investment. If you're thinking about making the investment here are some reasons why you need to consider the purchase of one of the many e-readers that are available today.

Availability

Have you ever driven to a bookstore only to find that they don't have the book you want? Or they sold out an hour before you arrived? With an e-reader you will never have that problem. If it's available for purchase you'll have your own copy in seconds. With the recent closing of Borders stores some are required to travel more than twenty miles to browse or buy a book. The e-readers allow for you to browse from the comfort of your own home and even save gas! What if your in need of large print books? An e-reader allows for the font to be set at your own preference, so you'll never need to worry if a large print book will be available.

Cost

The average cost of an e-reader ranges between $100.00-$500.00 bucks. There are quite a few different options available for purchase and you'll need to go through each to see which one is best for you. The kindle, nook, and iPad's are always great options (although there are more.) Also, the books that you'll purchase will be significantly cheaper than what you'll find in stores. For example, I bought a copy of The Help at a store for around $15.00. A copy on your e-reader? Around $10.00 bucks. Not only will you be saving gas money, but you'll save on each book that you download.

Magazines and Newspapers

E-readers are not only convenient for books, but you can also purchase magazines and newspapers. Subscriptions to magazines are cheaper on e-readers. I personally have a subscription to the Rolling Stone and it's 2.99 a month. If a newspaper like the New York Times isn't available in your area, you can have your own copy every morning. The cost of most newspapers are also considerably less.

Extras

Lets say you're trying to remember the book your friend told you about a month ago. All you can remember is one word from the title. Search using the one word you remember and look! You find the book in seconds. Or lets say you are reading a novel with words you are not familiar with--most e-readers provide the option to touch the word and immediately you'll have a definition. You'll also have the ability (on most e-readers) to connect to the internet and browse freely. Possibly the best benefit about some e-readers is that it allows you to share the books you've purchased with others. This option will save you even more money! The e-readers are small and portable, which will be much easier to take with you when you're on the go. Looking for a little more? No fear, you'll find plenty of other applications (or apps) such as games, calculators, Pandora, and countless others.

Even if you've purchased an e-reader you can still purchase books the old fashioned way

Personally, I prefer a real book. There's something personal about my own copy that an e-reader cannot replace. I actually received a nook as a Christmas present last year. I didn't know what to do with it, but I quickly realized that it comes in handy when I'm in need of a great read. Unfortunately, there are no bookstores in my area and my e-reader has provided me with an outlet to further my reading. My e-reader has not replaced my hard copy books and never will, but with hardly any other choice it has definitely saved me gas, and provided me with a way to keep on reading when I thought all hope was lost.

Use FireForm to fill out forms automatically

I was looking for a Firefox extension that would fill out certain forms automatically which would help me a lot because I’m filling out a lot of forms to test out new sites and register for products. The guys at downloadsquad found a nice Firefox extension called FireForm which does exactly what I was looking for.

Fireform is able to fill out most forms automatically when you right-click the icon of the extension in the status bar and select fill in this page – left-clicking the icon has the same effect. You will have to create a profile before you can start using the automatic fill option. The profile is independent from existing Firefox profiles and will be used only for the FireForm extension.

You can supply information like names, contact information (email, phone), address and misc information like birthday. Once the profile is created you can use FireForm or create more profiles for other users that use this computer.

There might be the time when you come upon a website that uses a field that is not covered by the default selection that you edited in your FireForm profile. It would then be time to add a custom field to FireForm by using the Display Fields option of it.

Now hover over the field that you want to add and FireForm should display information about that field, the most important is the name that the developers have chosen for it. Remember that name and go to tools > fireform > advanced profiles management and add a description that you can choose freely, a value that should be automatically entered and the trigger that was displayed when you hovered over the form.

Sites tend to use different names for the same subject and you will have to edit those settings often in the beginning. You can add additional triggers to a form by separating them with “;”.

Types of Wi-Fi Encryption You Can Use

There are many types of Wi-Fi encryption you can use on modern Internet routers. So which one should you use? Many people don’t even use encryption, and those that do just pick an encryption type at random without knowing what they do. Most encryption types are better than nothing at all, but some are more suitable than others.

For a long time, WEP was considered to be an extremely good method of encrypting wireless connections. The acronym simply means Wired Equivalent Privacy. Originally it was only available in 64-bit configuration, but soon after 128-bit and even 256-bit encryption became available. Entering a 64-bit WEP Wi-Fi key was as simple as choosing a ten character hexadecimal number. Each character represented 4 bits, making 40 bits in total, and then 24 bits were added to complete the 64-bit key. WEP however, was proved to have many flaws mainly involving the short key size, which were relatively easy to crack. WEP also does not provide for security against altered packets – a process where packets of information is intercepted by an intruder and then altered before sending them back, making it look like the intruder is valid user.

These days, WPA (Wi-Fi Protected Access) and WPA2 have completely taken over from the old WEP encryption methods. You’ll probably still find WEP available on most routers, but it’s being phased out and someday it probably won’t be available at all. The main advantage WPA has over WEP is that it employs a powerful new feature called TKIP, or rather Temporal Key Integrity Protocol. TKIP is 128-bit, but instead of the key being static, it generates a new key for every packet of information that is sent, meaning it is a lot more secure. WPA also integrates a method of message integrity checks, used to defeat network attackers intercepting and altering data packets. WPA2 goes even further and replaces TKIP with CCMP. CCMP is an AES based encryption method that is much stronger even than TKIP.

In the home, you’ll probably want to use an encryption method called WPA-Personal. This is sometimes also called WPA-PSK. PSK stands for Pre-Shared Key, and is designed for home users and small offices where a server is not required for authenticating messages. It works by having each wireless device such as a laptop or smart phone authenticating directly with the wireless access point using the same key. Offices and large buildings may employ WPA-Enterprise. You can’t generally use this without a complicated authentication server set-up, but it does provide additional security.

Both WPA-SPK and WPA-Enterprise are available in WPA2, meaning even home users can now benefit from AES encryption over their Wi-Fi connections. All of these methods can transmit data at maximum speed, and you won’t notice any speed differences between each type of encryption. Therefore the recommendation is to use the best encryption you can. This means going for WPA2-PSK where you can in a home environment. There are new and more exotic types of Wi-Fi encryption becoming available, but for now even advanced users will find WPA2 more than adequate for most security applications.

If you are using wireless connections, you may want to check your router to make sure that it does not use encryption that can easily be cracked by users with the right toolset.

Google Plus For Everyone, No Longer Invite Only

It took Google some time to open their social network service Google Plus to the public. Up until now it was only possible to join the service after receiving an invite, or by accessing the site when Google removed the invite-limitation temporarily.

Google today over at the official Google Blog announced that Google+ is now available for everyone which means that anyone can sign up for Google+ without invitation. This step marks the transition from field trial of beta.

Users who want to sign up can head over to the official website at google.com/+ or http://plus.google.com/ to sign up for the service.

Google notes on the sign up page that Google+ is in Beta, which means that users may run into technical issues and other problems on the site during that time.

The very same blog post announced a slew of new and improved features. This includes hangouts on the phone. Users who connect to Google Plus via their phone can now join Hangouts just like desktop users can.

Hangouts are currently only supported on Android 2.3 and higher devices with front facing cameras. Google notes that iOS support will come soon.

Hangouts on Air is another new feature which allows Google Plus users to record a session. This session can then be watched by anyone. Hangouts got additional extras, including screensharing, a sketchpad, Google Docs support and an option to create named hangouts.

Google last week launched the Google+ Api that allows developers to create services and features around the social networking site. Today, Google is releasing an api specifically for Hangouts. Developers find more information about the available Apis over at the Google+ Platform blog.

More interesting to the majority of Google+ users is the improved Search in Google+. The search is now finding relevant people and posts, and “popular content from the web”.

You can read the full announcement over at the official Google Blog.

Use Windows 7 Backup to Schedule Automatic File Backups

Backing up your work is essential. Many of us keep important documents on our computers that include work files, pictures of the kids, insurance documents, even bank statements. Many of these files are lost forever if your hard drive fails and you have no backup. You may think that hard drives these days are better than they used to be, and never fail – a computer expert will tell you that all hard drives fail eventually. It’s not a matter of if, but when, the data storage on your computer will fail. On top of that, your computer is always at threat from viruses and malicious software, or from theft. Therefore it’s a wise precaution to have a backup, so that your precious files are in more than one location at any time.

There’s a lot of software out there that can be used to backup files to an external hard drive, or even to the cloud. But did you know that Windows 7 actually has some pretty sophisticated backup software built in? It can be used to make a single backup, or to regularly backup your files to keep your archive up to date.

You can backup to either a portable hard drive, to USB flash drives or to CDs or DVDs. The most popular method is to backup to a portable hard drive, as these are very cheap and can be easily connected and carried around. Portable drives are also very useful if you want to keep an off-site backup of your data.

You can find the options to backup your computer’s files from the control panel. Simply click on “start”, and then “control panel” and then find the option to backup your computer under the heading of “system and security”. You’ll be taken to a screen where you can set up a new backup or restore files if you already have an archive. You’ll need to be a computer administrator to do this, as you’ll see by the shield icon next to the link called “set up backup”. Clicking on this will start a wizard where you can set the parameters of your backup job.

You’ll need to select the device you want to use to hold your backups. Plug in a portable hard drive of suitable size to hold all the files you want to archive. The wizard will tell you the size of your drive, and the amount of free space you have on it.

On the next screen you can choose whether to manually select the files you want to backup, or let Windows 7 decide for you. If you have specific files and folders you want to backup, then do it manually but in most cases the automatic selection will work best. Click on next, and now you can see a summary of your selections. You also have the option here to set up a schedule for backups. A weekly backup is usually good enough, but if you are a heavy computer user then maybe select a daily backup.

You should now save your settings by clicking on the button to end the wizard. Congratulations, you’ve set up a backup job on your computer. All you need to do now is wait until the time you selected on your schedule, or you can click on the button “back up now” to start immediately.

4 Reasons to Help You Figure Out The Unexpected Computer Shutdowns

During the daily using of computer, there are always something unexpected. When you are playing a fantastic computer game or watching a fierce and live ballgame, your computer may suddenly close down automatically. Such situation will always make us feel so annoyed. But when it happened frequently, you should notice that there are must be something wrong with you computer. So today, let's find out the reason and solve such bothersome problems.

1. Virus is the first thing you should blame.

Once you find that there are frequent unexpected shutdowns occurred, you should have your computer checked and find out whether it is invaded by computer virus. We know that virus was produced after the computer was invented. Since the Internet become widely used in nowadays, this also provide a better opportunity for virus to spread. One notorious of the virus is Shockwave which caused great damage to computers all over the world at that time and would close down your computer and restart it automatically.

In this case, we can seek help from the latest anti-virus software. After the whole check of your computer, such software will find out whether you computer is infected or not under most circumstances. Also some hackers will invade other's computer maliciously and place Trojan program in the computer in order to control every activity of it. And it is very easy for these hackers to make your computer shut down. On this occasion some of the Trojan cannot be clear away, so you'd better reinstall the operating system.

2. The accumulated junk files will cause automatic shutdown too.

We all know the junk files are everywhere in the computer. The old installing files, registry, and error reports documents are all junk files. Once you do not clean such files timely, they will accumulate and take up lots of the limited system resource, which will slow down the system and lead to unexpected shutdown.

In order avoid the automatic computer shutdown, you need to empty the recycle bin regularly and install some pc cleaner to clean up all kinds of junk files. Personally, I think the Advanced Systemcare Pro will be a good choice. Besides the function of system optimization, it also can sweep the useless information and delete it.

3. If there is something wrong with the CPU, then shutdown happens.

You can start your computer and enter the desktop normally even when some function circuits and the second level cache of CPU are damaged. While if you want to execute some special function, such as playing game or drawing a graph, the shutdown will occur immediately.

So if your shutdown is caused by such reason, first you can try to shield the second level cache or session level cache in CMOS. The next step is checking the system to find out whether it can operate normally. If not, you'd better replace the CPU with a new one.

4. Unsteady voltage also will cause the computer to close down.

Generally speaking, the power supply voltage range of a home computer is from 170 to 240 volt. If there is something wrong with the power supply, let's say the voltage of electric supply is under 170 volt, the computer will restart or close down automatically. Therefore, we can purchase an uninterrupted power supply or a wide switch power supply from 130 to 260 volt to ensure the steady operation in regions that supply instable power frequently.

Knowing the detailed reasons can helps us to solve the bothersome problem effectively. And I hope what I write will be useful.

Hi, I hope what I have shared in my articles can help you. I love to write about love, relationship, sexual health, skin care and everything that I'm interested in. For more information about Systemcare Software, check IObit.com and it's very helpful.

Password Protect Firefox Bookmarks

Firefox bookmarks are accessible for all users of a computer system if one user account is used instead of individual user accounts. This can be a issue if you want to protect data from being seen or accessed by other users. But even if there are multiple user accounts, chance is that some may have access to your Firefox profile folder. A system administrator for instance would have that access.

Firefox bookmarks cannot be protected from prying eyes by default. Users with access can see the link titles and destinations of all bookmarks. Sometimes you may want to password protect and obscure links so that they cannot be opened or identified by third parties.

The Firefox add-on Link Password offers those options. The add-on adds two new options to the right-click bookmark’s context menu. This works both in the Bookmark’s Manager but also if bookmarks are displayed via a button in the Firefox user interface.

Encrypt this link password protects the link, with an option to randomize the link text as well to obscure the bookmark further and avoid identification of the link destination this way. When Encrypt this link is selected, a new window is displayed where a password needs to be entered. The Rename links box is optional.

The link will be replaced by a linkpassword url, the link title by a random page title. In this case, the link title was replaced by “Canada – Yahoo! Search Results”.

It can happen that a very strange looking link title will be selected. One of the links for instance was renamed to “Evighetens Filosofi – Visdomsord som passa dig… – Soker “Blue”, Sida 1″. It may make sense to select a custom link title manually instead, especially if you come up with a system that tells you – and no one else – where the link leads to.

When you open a password protected bookmark, you are asked to enter the password to decrypt the link and open the website.

This may be a bit inconvenient for bookmarks that you open a lot in Firefox, as you need to enter the password every time you open it in the browser. An option to enter the password once and store it for the browser session would be handy. I’d also like to see an option to protect all bookmarks with a single password automatically that you could enter to make all links available. This would make the extension more comfortable to work with.

Firefox users can install the Link Password extension directly from the official Mozilla Add-on repository.

Advanced Data Backup Considerations

In a home environment, many people neglect to backup their files and systems, and are then devastated when their computer fails taking all their precious files they’ve been collecting with it. Some people do backups, only to realise too late that the backups haven’t been working properly so when they’re needed they either contain data that is out of date, or in some cases, no data at all. If you’re really unlucky, you may find that the hard drive you’ve been using to backup your files onto is also damaged, or so neglected it doesn’t work. So how can you safeguard your files to make absolutely sure you are covered?

One solution is to have more than one backup disk. The more disks you have, the better protected you’ll be. With portable disk drives so cheap and easily available, it’s possible to have one backup disk for every day of the week. Label them up with that days Monday through to Sunday, and do a full backup onto each of them. After that, you can do an incremental backup each day, and you’ll effectively have seven backups of your hard-drive. So if one backup fails, you have six more to rely on. The chances of even two of your backups failing are remote, let alone seven. In fact, the odds of that happening are astronomical.

However, have you considered what would happen if your house were broken into or you suffer some kind of damage such as a fire? In these situations you could easily lose your computer and all your backups at the same time. In many cases, the data you own is much more valuable than the hardware, so you should make a plan to keep the data safe at all times. The best way to do this is to have a copy of your data offsite. If you work in an office, you could consider taking a backup disk to work with you. A simple rotation system would mean that you have a copy of your most recent data kept in your desk draw at work. You take a new disk with you one day, and bring home the old one. The chances of both your home and your office burning down or being broken into at the same time is just as remote as all your backups being damages. In addition, you’ll usually have a disk with you in transit, so at any one time you’ll actually have your data in three different places.

Other options include backing up your data to an online service. This can be just as costly as buying disks, and depending on the amount of data could take a very long time to upload and download, especially if you have movie files you want to protect.

You’ll also want to consider using encryption on your disks if you’re leaving personal data on your backups, especially in an unattended office overnight. There are many free programs such as Truecrypt that you can use to encrypt your data backups on the fly, to automatically protect your data.

ShareMeNot, Block Automatic Social Media Button Information Sharing

When you load a website on the Internet that has social media buttons embedded, you are automatically sharing information with those social media sites. And this happens even if you do not interact with those buttons at all. Facebook, Twitter or Google can use the data to track your movement on the Web. The absolute minimum that they get to know is the IP address, browser header (e.g. which browser is used, which operating system) and of course the visited web page. If you happen to be logged in, those information can be easily linked to the site’s account.

ShareMeNot is a new Firefox add-on that protects web users from those social media buttons. The add-on basically disables the button functionality until the user decides to interact with it. The extension does this without completely removing the buttons from the web pages.

The Facebook Like, Twitter tweet or Google+ buttons are still displayed along with information like the number of likes the site has received by other users.

ShareMeNot blocks communication with Facebook, Google+, Twitter, Stumbleupon, Digg and LinkedIn automatically on every web page the user visits after installing the add-on.

This is indicated by the add-on’s icon in the Firefox status bar which displays in red if elements are blocked from communicating with third party servers on the active web page.

Since the buttons are still displayed on the page, it is super easy to interact with them. A click on the button activates them. That’s actually all there is to it. It is alternatively possible to reload one or multiple buttons from the context menu of the add-on that is triggered with a click on the status bar.

You can furthermore disable the blocking of a specific service in the browser. This is done in the add-on’s preferences. The settings there contains a list of site exceptions where the trackers won’t be blocked on.

ShareMeNot is ideal for Firefox users who do not run add-ons like NoScript 24/7 on their browser. The solution itself is more elegant than previous solutions which simply removed the buttons and scripts from web pages, especially if those buttons are used from time to time by the user.

Firefox users can install ShareMeNot from the official Firefox add-on repository by clicking here.

Free File Wiper, Delete Files So That They Cannot Be Recovered

When you delete files or folders in Windows they are either moved to the trashcan of the system or deleted directly. Regardless of the selected action, files remains recoverable on the system for some time. To explain it in simple terms: When you delete a file, the reference is removed by the operating system but not the file contents which still exist on the hard drive. This means that anyone with the right tools can recover those files as long as they have not been overwritten (for instance by new installations or files).

Free File Wiper is one of those tools that make sure that deleted files or folders cannot be recovered anymore. The program overwrites the occupied disk space with random characters so that files and contents cannot be recovered anymore.

The program on start up displays a trashcan icon on the desktop. You can move around the icon freely. Files and folders that you want to delete securely on the system need to be dragged and dropped onto the icon. A prompt is then displayed that warns you that the data won’t be recoverable after the operation. If you proceed, the file contents get deleted and overwritten. You can disable the confirmation window in the program options to delete data automatically without confirmation prompt.

The program supports four different modes. A quick erase mode that overwrites the data once, and three additional modes that use different patterns and overwrite the date multiple times on the hard drive.

The file eraser integrates into the Send To menu of Windows Explorer as well by default. You can use it to send files directly to the program for safe deletion.

Free File Wiper is a handy program for Windows users who want to make sure that data that they delete cannot be recovered. Handy to carry around on a portable drive or tool DVD.

The program runs on 32-bit and 64-bit editions of Windows XP, Vista and windows 7. It requires the Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0. Downloads are provided at the developer website.

How To Cancel Drag And Drop Operations In Windows

Drag and drop operations can be very handy in Windows Explorer. You can use drag and drop to quickly copy or move files to another location, for instance to move files into a program window or another folder on the computer’s hard drive. Sometimes though you may start a drag and drop operation only to realize that you have selected some files or folders that you do not want to copy or move.

I know quite a few users who drop the selection into the same folder in this case to cancel the drag and drop operation. Since the files and folders exist in that folder, the operation is canceled and no files are added, moved or copied. When I’m saying moved or copied I mean that you can select the type of operation after you have started dragging files around but before you dropped them in a new location.

If you drop them while holding down the Shift key on the computer keyboard you move the files, while dropping them without additional key will copy the files.

But it is not always this easy. Especially not if you mistakenly drop the selection on a folder in the Windows Explorer location. If you do that, files and folders get moved or copied into that folder.

The correct way of canceling a drag and drop operation is to click the right mouse button once you have started to drag the files and folders around.

Windows will automatically cancel the operation so that everything is returned to its initial state. This only works for drag and drop operations in Windows Explorer, and not in third party applications like Firefox or Google Chrome.

Do you use drag and drop in Windows Explorer? If so, did you ever encounter a situation where you had to cancel the operation?

Avira 2012 Beta Versions Now Available

It is the time of the year again where security software developers are pushing out the regular yearly updates for their products. Avira has just started the official beta test for their new product line, which includes beta versions of Avira Free Antivirus, Avira Internet Security 2012 or Antivirus Premium 2012.

Windows users who are interested in participating in the beta to get their hands on the security software early, need to head over to the new Avira Beta Center where they need to register an account before they can do so.

Avira promises increased usability, reliability and stability in the new versions. This begins with the installation process which has now been streamlined so that for example Free Antivirus can be installed with just two clicks in express mode.

The programs will furthermore scan for potentially incompatible software like other security software automatically, giving the user the choice to remove the product or keep it installed regardless of the situation.

All program modules have been hardened to take into account new targeted malware attacks against security software. Avira notes that this includes the “ability to function without many registry keys, better protection against process termination and component deletion”.

A Fix Problem button has been added to the software to five users a one-click solution to issues that they encounter. That’s handy for inexperienced users in most cases as the software makes decisions for them.

Components have been updated in the 2012 releases. The firewall for instance is now able to filter IPv6 addresses on the adapter level, and mail and web protection are now able to work in IPv6 environments as well.

The Windows Hosts file will be protected in all Avira 2012 product versions against manipulation and tampering, a feature that was previously only available in Avira Internet Security.

Do the new features justify upgrading or installing the beta versions of the 2012 products? I personally would suggest to wait with the upgrade or installation in work environments, considering that beta products may still cause issues on a system.

Search For Copied Photos with Who Stole My Pictures for Firefox

There is a high chance that people will copy your photos or images that you post on the Internet. Some do that with attribution, others without. Sometimes you may want to know where your images have been posted on. A simple example is your profile photo on Facebook or your Google Profile. Maybe you want to know if another site copied that photo and used it without your permission. If that is the case, you may want to contact the site owner to stop this from happening.

So called reverse image search engines can be used to find copies of your images on the Internet. The most prominent ones are Tineye, Yandex and the recently updated Google Image Search engine.

While you could use those image search engines manually every time you want to find copies of a picture on the Internet, it is often faster and more comfortable to use a browser extension to do so.

The Who stole my pictures add-on for Firefox offers those capabilities. The extension adds a new entry to the browser’s right-click context menu when the mouse cursor hovers over images.

 You then have options to select one of the five support reverse image search engines separately (Baidu and Cydral are the remaining two), or perform a search on all five search engines directly.

If you select the latter option five browser tabs will open with the results of the five image search engines.

The options of the extension allow you to remove search engines from showing up in the context menu. This has also an effect on the multi-search option as removed image search engines are not included in that search anymore.

Who Stole My Pictures is a handy Firefox add-on for users who want to search for copies of images on the Internet. Firefox users can install the extension directly from the official Mozilla Firefox add-on repository.

Convert Img To Iso

The img file format is a common disk image format that is supported by the majority of CD and DVD burning and disk mounting programs. Sometimes though you might want to convert the img format to Iso, for instance if the program that you are using for a specific task is not supporting the img format at all.

While it might work to simply rename the img file extension to iso, it sometimes is not that simple to convert the file. The Img to Iso converter has been created for those cases.

  

The program interface is very minimalistic. There are barely any options available, not that one would expect a lot of options in a converter like this.

You select the source img file with a click on open. This opens the computer’s file browser where you can navigate to the folder containing the img disk file. Img to Iso supports both *.img and *.ima files. The files in the file browser are automatically filtered so that only those two formats are displayed.

A click on save in the Iso file line opens the very same file browser. This time though you need to specify a file name and location for the Iso file that the Img file is converted to.

A click on the Convert button starts the conversion process. This usually does not take long. The program does not alter or delete the Img file after the process. You may want to delete it manually after verifying that the Iso image works properly.

Windows users can download the free Img to Iso converter from the developer website. The program is compatible with 32-bit and 64-bit editions of Windows Vista and Windows 7. It uses Microsoft’s Virtual Hard Disk technology for its functionality, which means that the program needs to be started with elevated rights on the supported operating systems.

Fixing "BOOTMGR is missing" Error While Trying to Boot Windows 7 or Vista

If your Windows 7 or Vista computer has encountered the dreaded “BOOTMGR is missing” error, you aren’t alone. If the problem isn’t hardware related you can fix it with relative ease as long as you have a Windows DVD handy.

 

Boot off the Windows Vista DVD and then click Next at the first prompt:

You should see a link in the lower left-hand side for “Repair your computer”

The installation process will attempt to find your Vista installation directory. If there’s more than one in the list, select the correct one and then use the Next button again.

 

 Click the first link for “Startup Repair”

The installation process will repair the system, and then prompt for you to reboot.

Alternatively you could have chosen the Command Prompt option instead, and use the following command to fix the boot options only:

bootrec /fixboot 

At this point you should be able to reboot your computer, remove the DVD and everything should be working.