My Five Favorite Applications, by Kristin O, W3i Product Manager
In the spirit of the holidays, it seems a little free gift is in order. So, I am recommending my favorite free applications and why:
This is a nice and easy zip tool. Of course, anything that zips files up is indispensable. One that can do it without requiring a lot of thought, is even better. This is something that I use on a daily basis and frankly, could not live without.
A little piece of background, I have a main house that is about 200 miles away from my weekday apartment and the office. On top of that, I am in Minnesota. Being able to quickly check the weather, be alerted to any problems–whether snow in the winter or tornados in the summer–is crucial. I have come to recognize the little chirp as a lifeline of information, to the point that little bug can wake me up from several rooms away. Unless you live in a Utopian weather climate, this is a must have.
I recently discovered this application. How totally cool. Right now it only works on FireFox, but when you search, no more going back and forth, right clicking to open another window, all that stuff. KwiClick keeps my search results handy and when one page doesn’t quite cut it, the next option is right in front of me, a click away.
Wow!! Years ago I used another application that was quite expensive to capture what was going on with my screen. This has so many more features and is a free download. I found a few great uses for it. I have used it instead of trying to explain in email how to perform some tasks for my less technical friends, and I have used it when submitting technical tickets to websites where I can’t quite get my words to convey the problem that I am having. With its ability to capture sound from me or the computer, to capture just a section of the screen and to show or not show the mouse makes it a very useful tool.
Free Living 3D Fireplace Screensaver
It’s Christmas, and I feel a bit of nostalgia at Christmas time. Since I get a lot of hints that I might be a tad older than most of our readers, I won’t feel bad to say that, as a kid, we didn’t have a fireplace, DVDs weren’t invented (we didn’t even have beta players), no cable and the only satellite we knew about was SpaceLab. But on Christmas morning, at least one of those TV stations that came in over the antenna would run a film of a fireplace and play Christmas carols in the background. This was the backdrop for more Christmas mornings than I can remember. This just reminds me of the Yule Log broadcasts. Now I get the screensaver on, put a Christmas carol playlist on my Music Oasis and print out the lyrics from EZ Lyrics so friends and family can sing along with the carols.
So have a Merry Christmas, a Wonderful Hanukah, a Joyous Kwanzaa and a very Happy New Year!!
Kristin Oberhaus, Product Manager, W3i Holdings, LLC
Kristin has over 13 years of product management experience and is a certified usability analyst. She is an avid believer in pragmatic marketing.
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