Best Wishes And Happy New Year

The last day of the year has come. Looking back, I can say that it has been a very successful year for Ghacks.net. The site has seen its ups and downs throughout the year, but came out strong in the end. That’s pretty good considering that you cannot really predict what happens tomorrow (yes, that’s directed at Google mainly).

We have celebrated the six year anniversary of the site in October, and the fourth annual Christmas Giveaway in December. I’m happy that I can give something back, besides the content that is posted daily on Ghacks of course.

Looking forward I can only hope that Ghacks continues to growth in the same pace as it did the last years. I still think that this is incredible considering that the site does not have the backing of a big company that pays hundreds of thousands of Dollars for optimization, advertisement and content.

Being independent does have its advantages though, as we do not follow a corporate agenda or have to report to an executive who does not care about the site’s user base or reputation as much as we do. Can I manage to keep the site independent in the coming years? I honestly do not know. As much as I like writing and managing the site on my own, I feel pressure every day running it.

Enough with the babbling. On behalf of the Ghacks.net team I wish each and everyone of you a happy New Year and all the best for the year to come. I personally hope that I see you again here on the site in the new year, maybe even more than in the old. And if you could bring a friend or colleague along, that would be awesome.

This is the last post of the year, we’ll start posting again tomorrow on the first of January. Ghacks out.

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© Martin Brinkmann for gHacks Technology News | Latest Tech News, Software And Tutorials, 2011. | Permalink |
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Post tags: ghacks announcement, new-year

Epic Inventor, A free Terraria Inspired Game [Game Saturday]

I had lots of fun playing Terraria with a few friends of mine in cooperation. The game let you build, explore and conquer a hostile environment. Much of the game’s appeal came from the fact that you started with nothing but a small axe. Your first task was to gather enough resources to construct a workbench and house to protect yourself from the environment and night. At night, zombies and other creatures appeared that tried to hunt you down. Eventually you became stronger and started to explore deeper into the world.

Epic Inventor puts you in the same role. You start with a simple stick and some bread to recover hitpoints. Your first task is to gather enough resources to build a workbench and other goodies that aid you in the exploring.

Unlike in Terraria, you cannot interact with all world elements. The background trees cannot be choped down for instance. You need to find the smaller resources lying on the way. You move your character with WASD, collect resources and interact with the environment with E and jump with Space. A left-click uses the item in the active slot. This can be a weapon like the mighty stick you start with, or bread that regenerates health points when eaten.

New players will find the game to be rather difficulty in the beginning, as they have to start gathering resources, fight monsters that spaawn in endless waves and understand basic item creation mechanics to build better items. A good getting started video has been posted on YouTube.

A good tip for single player gamers is that you can configure your robot friend to automatically attack monsters. Please note though that your robot needs to be charged eventually which effectively removes the robot from the screen for a while.

The game, on the positive side of things ships with a functional multiplayer mode that you can play with your friends. Fans of Terraria or Minecraft will definitely like Epic Inventor for things that it has in common with the other games. The game is fully portable and only available for Windows at the time of writing.

Interested players can download Epic Inventor from the developer website.

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© Martin Brinkmann for gHacks Technology News | Latest Tech News, Software And Tutorials, 2011. | Permalink |
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Post tags: game saturday, Games

Diagnosing and Repairing Difficult Problems in Windows 7 Free Webcast

Windows 7 is Microsoft’s most stable and reliable version of their desktop operating system yet, but it’s still such a complex piece of software that when something does go wrong it can be extremely difficult to diagnose and repair the problem.

As the author of “Troubleshooting Windows 7 Inside Out” from Microsoft Press one of the most popular webcast requests I have received is for how you can diagnose and repair these complex and difficult problems, so on January 12th 2012 this is exactly what I’m going to do.

The webcast is completely free, live and starts at 10AM PT - San Francisco | 6pm – London | 1pm – New York | Fri, Jan 13th at 5am – Sydney | Fri, Jan 13th at 3am – Tokyo | Fri, Jan 13th at 2am – Beijing | 11:30pm – Mumbai

It can be difficult enough finding out what’s gone wrong with windows 7 or a program, but some problems can be a nightmare to diagnose. In this webcast, Mike Halsey, the author of Troubleshooting Windows 7 Inside Out talks you through how to diagnose really stubborn and hidden problems in Windows 7, and explains how you can go about fixing them.

In this webcast I’ll cover the tools and skills you’ll need to diagnose problems, and I’ll show you the extensive diagnostic tools that already exist inside Windows 7 to help you with the job.  In fact it’s possible to diagnose complex Windows 7 problems using nothing more than Windows 7 itself.

If you’re not able to make the webcast when it’s broadcast live, just register in advance and you’ll be given free access to watch it afterwards online through the O’Reilly website.  It will last for approximately 60 minutes and is part of a series of regular webcasts that, from February, will return to their regular first Thursday slot.

You can register for this free webcast here.

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© Mike Halsey MVP for gHacks Technology News | Latest Tech News, Software And Tutorials, 2011. | Permalink |
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Post tags: mike halsey, oreilly, troubleshooting, webcast, windows 7

Save and Load Firefox Sessions With Session Manager

The Firefox web browser saves session information automatically in intervals. The default interval is set to 15 seconds, with options to change it in the about:config configuration window (See: Change the Session Store Interval in Firefox).

Firefox does however save only one session, and while that should not be a problem for most users of the browser, it could be a issue for some. At its core, Session Manager offers better session management including options to save multiple sessions on user request or automatically. This alone can be very helpful for users who are experiencing occasional crashes or other issues that may prevent the saving of recently opened tabs.

Saving sessions can also be beneficial for users who use the browser for different purposes, say work and after-work. Instead of having to juggle around with multiple profiles, they could simply save and load sessions instead whenever they switch between different purposes.

Session Manager, the successor of Session Saver, is a Firefox add-on that can save and restore sessions either on user request or automatically. The Firefox add-on will automatically backup the session when the browser shuts down. This option, and many more, can be changed in the program settings.

Session Manager adds an entry to the browser’s Firefox menu that links to the most important extension options.

Backup Sessions list sessions that have been automatically saved by the extension, Session Manager options to save and load sessions, group them or open the extension settings to configure its behavior. You can load user saved sessions under Session Manager.

To save a session, simply select Session Manager > Save Session to do so. The extension displays a list of all windows and tabs that are currently open. You can save all windows and tabs, or only selected windows and tabs here.

It is furthermore possible to change the name to a descriptive one, and put the saved session into a specific group.

You can configure the extension’s behavior in the options. Here it is possible to define if and when sessions are saved automatically (on browser start, on shutdown), how sessions are restored (replace existing windows, bypass cache when restoring sessions, open as tabs in current window), and to configure keyboard shortcuts for fast access to program features.

The extension settings are extensive and leave little to be desired. Sessions are stored in the Firefox profile folder under sessions. They may take up considerable space, depending on the number of tabs and windows that are open at the time of saving.

Firefox users can download and install the Session Manager extension from the official Mozilla Firefox add-ons repository.

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© Martin Brinkmann for gHacks Technology News | Latest Tech News, Software And Tutorials, 2011. | Permalink |
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Post tags: firefox add-ons, session manager, sessions

Monitor A Process To Restart It Automatically On Exit

It may sometimes be necessary to run an application all the time when the computer is up and running. This can be a backup or security software, a synchronization program or another program that is performing important tasks whenever the computer is on.

Knas Restarter is a free portable process monitoring program for Windows that we have reviewed as part of our application monitor overview in 2009. The program has received an update after the initial review, the tested program version is 2.0.

The core functionality has remained the same: Select a single running process for monitoring and define actions that are executed automatically when the process stops running.

The program displays a list of all running processes on the system along with their path and name, process id and parameters if available. You can refresh the listing if the process has been started after you have started Knas Restarter.

Highlight the process that you want monitored in the process listing and click the select button afterwards. The process should now be listed under Process to Monitor in the program interface.

You can change the monitoring interval here from 60 seconds to another value, and select to save the log in another directory or not at all.

Four actions are available that can be combined. The restart of the process is the only selected action, available as well as options to kill the process again if it is unresponsive for a set amount of intervals, play a warning sound or execute an external script.

Optional restart parameters can be configured in the program window as well. You can configure startup parameters and a working directory here, select a startup state for the process window (normal, maximized or minimized), force the focus on the window or keep the restarter program window minimized during activity.

You can save the settings to have them available next time you start the program, or create a program shortcut that loads the monitoring program with all selected parameters.

A click on start begins the monitoring of the process in the selected interval.

Restarter is a useful tool for Windows users who want to make sure that a specific process is running all the time on their system. The program is compatible with 32-bit and 64-bit editions of the Microsoft Windows operating system. Downloads and documentation are available on the developer homepage.

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© Martin Brinkmann for gHacks Technology News | Latest Tech News, Software And Tutorials, 2011. | Permalink |
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What to Wear Suggests Clothes Based On Weather Conditions

Have you ever asked yourself what you should wear on a given day? Maybe you have that many clothes that it has become incredible hard to pick the right pieces, or you have forgotten that you have those warm boots lying around that you could wear in winter.

What to Wear is a simple application that aids you by suggesting what you could wear based on your own wardrobe. Configuration will take some time, as you need to add your wardrobe, or at least part of it, to the program before you can use it for suggestions.

New clothes are added in the wardrobe window. The program requires you to name the item, assign a body part and an image to it. Especially the image part could delay setup significantly as you may need to create photos of all your clothes. It is possible to skip that by using a generic picture for all items added to the wardrobe. The program groups clothes into torso, legs and feet categories.

Once you have added enough items to your wardrobe, you need to link those items to weather conditions in the conditions configuration window. Here you select torso, leg and feet pieces for specific weather conditions and styles like work, dressy or special.

You can then use the main program interface for what to wear suggestions for specific temperature and style requirements. The garments are displayed with their image in the program window with options to get another random suggestion or change items in one group only.

The biggest obstacle that users face is the adding of their wardrobe to the program database, and the linking of items to weather conditions. The program could use additional categories like head or accessories, and an automatic weather checker to suggest items to wear automatically and without user interaction.

Windows users can download the latest version of the program from Softpedia. The program is compatible with 32-bit and 64-bit editions of the Microsoft Windows operating system.

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© Martin Brinkmann for gHacks Technology News | Latest Tech News, Software And Tutorials, 2011. | Permalink |
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Post tags: clothing organizer, windows software

Microsoft .Net Framework Security Update Released

Microsoft has released an out-of-band security update for the Windows operating system that fixes a number of security vulnerabilities in the Microsoft .NET Framework. The vulnerability affects all 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Windows that receive security updates, and the following versions of the Microsoft .NET Framework: Microsoft .Net Framework 1.1, 2.0, 3.5 Service Pack 1 and 4.

At least one of the vulnerabilities has received the maximum severity rating of critical, the highest possible rating, on all affected operating systems and .Net versions. Microsoft notes that the most severe vulnerability could allow elevation of privileges “if an unauthenticated attacker sends a specially crafted web request to” a target site. Attackers who successfully exploit the issue can “take any action in the context of an existing account on the ASP.NET site, including executing arbitrary commands”.

Security updates are already listed on Windows Update. Windows users who have only installed the Microsoft .Net Framework 4.0 Client Profile may only see important in Windows Update instead of critical ones. That is because ASP.Net, the component that is affected by the critical vulnerability, is not included in this version of the framework.

Most Windows users have configured automatic updates. Users who do not use automatic updates or Windows Update may download the patches from the Microsoft Update Catalog site instead. Please note that you can only open the site in Internet Explorer and not in other browsers.

Microsoft’s Download Center is currently not listing the security updates. It is however likely that they will appear on the site in the next days.

A restart of the computer is not required after applying the patches. The patches will merely stop related services during patches before they are restarted.

Additional information about the security vulnerability are available on the Microsoft Security Bulletin page. This bulletin raises the count to 100 bulletins that have been released by the Redmond company in 2011.

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© Martin Brinkmann for gHacks Technology News | Latest Tech News, Software And Tutorials, 2011. | Permalink |
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