We reviewed the Adobe Reader alternative Sumatra back in the beginning of 2008 and came to the conclusion back then that Sumatra was a lightweight and fast replacement that was ideal for viewing PDF documents. Version 1.0 of Sumatra was released yesterday which actually was one of the two updates that the developer of the pdf reader has published this year. The main changes since our last review are better pdf reading compatibilities, bug fixes, other compatibility fixes and additional features that have been added by the developer or contributors. Contributors you may ask? Sumatra is Open Source and it is therefor possible for others to contribute to the program.
Adobe Releases Flash 10.1 and Air 2.0 Previews
Adobe today released two technology previews for Adobe Flash and Adobe Air. Adobe Flash 10.1 Pre-Release and Adobe Air 2.0 Beta are now both available for download at Adobe Labs. Both applications are available for all supported operating systems (Windows, Mac and Linux) although some of the new features introduced are limited to a specific operating system.
Flash 10.1 introduces several new key features including video hardware acceleration (only available in Flash for Windows), better mobility support including smartphone and other Internet-devices support and additional option for media delivery. Users interested in installing the new Flash Player version should note that it is not the final release but a community preview which is mainly aimed at developers.
Flickr Desktop App Destroy Flickr
Destroy Flickr is the second Adobe Air application that provides Flickr users with capabilities to manager Flickr from the computer desktop. It was one of the recommended applications in the comments of the Zflick Flickr photo viewer review. Destroy Flickr can only be used by Flickr users to manage their own uploaded photos. This limits the reach of the application quite a bit, the remaining functionality has been perfectly brought to the desktop on the other hand.
The user needs to authenticate the application at the first startup after entering the Flickr username or email address. The process is painless and should take less than a minute to complete. It does involve logging into Flickr with the default web browser to allow Destroy Flickr access to the user data.
Check Open Computer Connections With My Ports
Ports are what connects your computer to the outside world. This can either be in a network or the Internet. Open ports are required for many things like connecting to websites, downloading files, chatting or uploading photos to Flickr or Facebook. Most ports are only open when they are needed by an application. Problems can arise if ports are open all the time as these can be used by malicious users and automated scripts to attack the computer system.
It is therefor recommended to regularly check the open ports for computer security reasons. We reviewed CurrPorts (see: Who is connected to your PC right now) a while ago. It is a portable Nirsoft application that will display the open ports along with information needed to conclude if the open ports are needed or not.
Microsoft Office 2010 Beta Download
The beta of Microsoft’s upcoming Office suite Microsoft Office 2010 has been finished and already been made available to MSDN and Technet subscribers. This leaves the general public who is also highly interested in this new beta with second row seats for now although it is rumored that public Office 2010 beta downloads will be activated by Microsoft in this week.
One indicator that this is the case is the Microsoft Office 2010 Beta Download page which is already listing download buttons for the three Microsoft Office editions Office Home and Business 2010 beta, Office Professional 2010 beta and Office Professional Plus 2010 beta. The links are unfortunately not live yet leading to a “The Office 2010 beta will come soon” page instead.
Automatically Reload Websites With Auto F5
It happens sometimes that you are on a website waiting for something to happen, for example a download that should be available on that day or a registration form for a new web service. And then there are times where you want to reload a page because the contents change all the time. This can be pages that display random photos and images or forums with a large userbase. There are two options to deal with these situations. The first option is to use a program to monitor website changes. This program, once configured will periodically check the websites to see if they have changed in the meantime.
The second option is a script to automatically reload a website periodically. And one of these scripts is the Greasemonkey script Auto F5 which can automatically reload websites.
Microsoft Security Essentials Updater
Microsoft’s new and free security software Microsoft Security Essentials received some raving reviews since its first release as a beta version. The final version of the antivirus software program was released alongside Microsoft’s new operating system Windows 7. Microsoft Security Essentials is using Windows Update to update the virus definition files which can be problematic in situations where Windows Update is not activated by default which is for example the case in company networks where updates are tested before they are applied to computer systems. It can also be helpful if Windows Update is not working properly (either because of a computer virus or other form of attack or because of other reasons).
Nakodari over at Addictive Tips has created a small software program called MSE Update Utility which can be used to update Microsoft Security Essentials even if Windows Update is disabled.
