Why the New Opera is Perfect for Slow Connections

Opera 11.1 is available for download for Windows, Mac and Linux.

One of the best features of Opera is the built-in Turbo mode that lets you browse the web faster even on slow connections. The feature can also help you save money when you are on a metered Internet connection, like that hotel room, where you have to pay per byte.

Let me explain. When you request a web page - say time.com - your browser will connect directly to the time.com servers to download all the images, text, and other associated files. However, in the case of Opera Turbo, the same request is routed to Opera servers – the web page is downloaded on Opera servers first, it is then compressed and served to you.

The content and layout of the page doesn’t change after compression though the quality of images is often reduced. But since your browser now has to download lesser number of bytes for the same web page, it will load a lot faster on your computer.

  

Opera Turbo with Google's WebP

The Turbo mode has been part of Opera since version 10 but with the new 11.1 release, that’s due today, Opera servers are now using Google’s WebP image format, instead of JPEG, to compress images. As a result, the byte size of the compressed images is reduced even further without much degradation in the visual quality.

I ran a quick test comparing the size of these photographs as served through regular Opera, Opera Turbo (JPG) and new Opera Turbo with WebP based compression. See results:

The quality of compressed images is quite acceptable. In some cases the images compressed with WebP look better (or smoother) than the ones that have been compressed using JPEG.

And when every byte matters, the savings are obviously huge with Opera 11.1. The other innovative feature of Opera is Unite that turns your computer into a server with a click.

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Does your Flash Player Look Like a Green Screen?

You are trying to watch a video on YouTube but all you get is a green screen like the one in the above screenshot. The audio portion is playing just fine but the Adobe Flash Player is unable to render the video.

If you refresh the web page, the ‘green screen’ problem might vanish temporarily but it is very likely to stage a comeback in your next browsing session. And this problem is not specific to YouTube but any video website that uses the Adobe Flash Player.

The fix is however simple. While you are on a video page, right click anywhere inside the Flash Player and choose settings. Now click the first tab that says Display (look for the monitor icon) and uncheck “Enable Hardware Acceleration.”

Refresh the page (hit F5) and enjoy the videos. The performance of playback in Flash Player might take a slight hit after you disable hardware acceleration but that’s obviously better than watching a video that only has sound.

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How to Use Windows 7 Themes on XP or Vista

Microsoft paid close attention to personalization in Windows 7, and shipped it with a gorgeous collection of desktop backgrounds and themes. Windows 7 also makes it easy for users to create their own personalized themes and then share it with other Windows 7 users.

If you are still using an older version of Windows (like Windows XP or Vista), you don't have to feel left behind because, with some simple tricks, you can enjoy all or part of what these Windows 7 themes have to offer.

Use Windows 7 Themes with XP and Vista

First, launch the official Windows 7 themes directory and download some of the themes you like to your Windows XP or Vista desktop.

These files have a unique .themepack extension which is just another zip format containing all of the elements of a theme including the background images, Aero glass colors, sounds, cursors, icons, screen savers, etc.

To use these files on an older version of Windows, you first need to extract them as only Windows 7 can natively understand the themepack format. You can either change the file extension of the Windows 7 theme file from .themepack to .cab and then extract the files with a right-click, or install the free 7-Zip utility as 7-Zip can automatically hand the themepack file format.

Once extracted, your theme files will now be in a new folder that has the same name as your original themepack.

Aero Glass Border and Desktop Backgrounds

Now that you have all the required files, its time to activate the Windows 7 theme on your non-Windows 7 computer.

If your computer is running Windows Vista that supports Aero, simply double-click the .theme file that is present in the them folder you just extracted.  This will set your windows border glass to the color of the Windows 7 theme and your wallpaper to the default background of the theme. However, this background picture will disappear when you reboot your computer, so you need to set that as a permanent background.

Windows XP does not support Aero glass, but you can still use the background images from downloaded Windows 7 theme on your XP desktop. You can find the backgrounds inside the themepack folder itself or in a sub-folder named DesktopBackground. Pick any image, right click on it, and select “Set as Desktop Background.”

Windows 7 like Desktop Slideshows for XP and Vista

Most Windows 7 themes consist of multiple background images and Windows 7 will automatically change your desktop background at periodic intervals using one of the images from the themepack. Windows Vista and XP do not support desktop slideshows, but you can easily bring that feature use the excellent and free John’s Background Switcher program.

To create a desktop slideshow, click the add button and choose “A folder on your computer.” Now select the Windows 7 theme folder that contains all the background images. The program allows lot of tweaking but you can skip that because the default settings are very similar to what you need for simulating Windows 7 behavior on your XP or Vista computer.

However, John’s Background Switcher by default shows the name of the image in the top right hand corner of the picture.  To remove this, click the "More…" button that has a gear icon on it. Uncheck the box beside the 3rd entry which says "Show picture info on the top-right corner of the screen." Now click Ok, and then click Ok in the main window, and your desktop slideshow is all ready.

For RSS-enabled Windows 7 Themes

Some Windows 7 themes download images from the internet (via RSS feeds) when switching desktop backgrounds.

To know if the theme you are looking to port on your Vista or XP computer uses RSS or not, open the .theme file in a text editor like Notepad. Then search for the string “RssFeed” without the quotes. If you find that string, copy the link address of the RSS feed and, you can then use the “RSS photo feed” option in John’s Background Switcher program to create an RSS powered desktop slideshow on your XP or Vista machines.

Windows 7 Sounds, Cursor, Screensavers, etc.

Most Windows 7 themes only contain a glass color and desktop backgrounds.  However, some may contain screensavers, sounds, cursors, and icons as well. The good part is that you can use the elements on your Vista / XP theme as well.

Sounds - You can copy the sound files (.wav) to the default media folder (C:\Windows\Media), and if you have set the Windows 7 theme in Windows Vista as described above, it will automatically these sounds. Else, you will have to manually change your sounds from the Control Panel.

Icons - If the Windows 7 theme that you plan to use with XP or Vista contains a different set of desktop and system icons (.ico files), you may follow the directions below to apply them on your version of Windows:

A. For Windows Vista - Right-click on the desktop, select Personalize and choose “Change Desktop Icons.” Select the items you which to change, click “Change Icons,” and browse to the location of new icons that are part of the Windows 7 theme.

B. For Windows XP - Right-click on the desktop, select Properties and choose "Customize Desktop" under the Desktop tab. Select the items you wish to change, click “Change Icon,” and browse to the location of the icons from your theme.

To change icons of individual programs, simply right-click on the program shortcut on your desktop, select Properties, and click the button that says "Change Icon" in the Shortcut tab. Browse to the location of the icon extract from the Windows 7 theme and select the one you want to apply.

Screensavers - For using a Windows 7 screensaver inside XP or Vista, just copy the relevant screensaver files (.scr) into your Windows system folder usually located at C:\Windows\System32.  Now, change your system screensaver using the usual method. Please remember that not all Windows 7 screensavers will work correctly on previous versions of Windows.

Cursors - You can copy the Windows 7 cursor files (.cur or .ani) to C:\Windows\Cursors on XP or Vista, and then apply the new set using the mouse settings under Control Panel. Use the [Control Panel\Cursors] of the .theme file (see example) to understand the default cursor mappings.

 

Source : labnol.org

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How Software Download Sites Are Confusing Users

Columnist and radio host Dwight Silverman recently did a detailed analysis on how the various software download links, available on CNET’s popular download.com website, could be confusing their not so tech savvy users.

The reason is quite simple. Some of the banner ads running on Download.com have big red buttons that scream “Start Download” – such ads are confusing and the user may therefore end up installing a completely unrelated software. To CNET’s defense, they have little control over such ads as these are directly served by Google.

This story reminds me of another popular software downloads site - Softonic.com – that offers a very tricky download process (you’ll soon know why). 

What you see above is the download page for the trial version of a popular video game.

Like most users, you are likely to click that big blue link that says “Download” but it will actually download a Softonic software on your machine and not the game installer that you landed here for. The real download link is hidden somewhere below in a relatively small font.

Once you have downloaded Softonic’s own downloader, the first screen of the installer will contain the usual EULA that you need to accept to proceed with the game installation.

On Screen #2, shown below, Softonic recommends installing the Babylon Toolbar on your computer. This option is selected by default so if you pass this screen in a hurry, chances are that you’ll find another new toolbar in your browser.

And that brings us to Screen #3. This is the place where the software installer, you were looking for, will start downloading on your computer directly from the game vendor’s server.  

Since Softonic had an interest in putting that toolbar on your computer, they wrapped the installer in their own downloader thus forcing users to take extra steps for a process that could have been completed in one click.

There’s another interesting thing about this last screen that I should point out – it has a big Google AdSense ad that shows up while the software installer is downloading in the background. Maybe Softonic has a special deal with Google but as far as I know, Google forbids all publishers from showing ads in desktop apps (one exception is Google Earth).

Source : labnol.org

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How Twitter Can Improve Their Homepage?

What you see here is a screenshot of the Twitter home page (English version) that shows up when you are either not registered with Twitter or are not logged-in.

Just below the sign-up form, you can find a rotating list of some of the popular people who are part of the Twitter ecosystem. These mostly point to Twitter accounts of celebrities from the entertainment and media world, brands, authors, and everyone else who commands a popular following on Twitter. 

Twitter probably has this list in place to convince first-time users to sign-up for an account but there’s one little problem with their approach.

Katie Jacobs Stanton of Twitter, while speaking at the Guardian Active conference, shared that Twitter has more than 200 million accounts worldwide and that more than 70% of Twitter traffic comes from outside the US.

The last bit is important because although 70% of Twitter’s traffic is international, the list of suggested users on Twitter’s English homepage is almost 100% American. The suggestions change every time you refresh the page but the accounts that make this list are mostly of interest to American people.

Twitter does maintain some country-specific lists – see the India list for example - and they’ll probably see more conversions if the suggestions on the homepage could automatically change depending on the IP (country) of the visitor.

Source : labnol.org

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How to Add JavaScript in your WordPress Posts

While you can easily add JavaScript code to your WordPress site by modifying the theme files, there can be instances when you may want to insert JavaScript inside specific posts or pages and not the entire site. How do you do that?

If you are running the self-hosted version of WordPress (not WordPress.com), you can sometimes add JavaScript through the built-in editor itself. Just change the writing mode from Visual to HTML and copy-paste your JavaScript code into the text box.

Adding JavaScript to WordPress – An Alternative

However, if the above option doesn’t work with your JavaScript, here’s an even better option that makes use of custom fields and short-codes. I also prefer this method for inserting JavaScript and you can see it in action in my one my previous posts.

The idea is that instead of adding the JavaScript code directly inside your post, you create a new custom field and set the value of this custom field to the JavaScript code. Then insert a shortcode in your post content which will in turn fetch the value of that custom field.

There are quite a few WordPress plugins that let you display custom field values via shortcodes though I use the one by @gonahkar. So here’s the full workflow again:

#1. Add a new Custom Field (say js) and paste the JavaScript widget into the Value field.

#2. Switch to the HTML mode in your WordPress editor and insert [cf]CUSTOM_FIELD_NAME[/cf] in a new line. Save, publish and WordPress will substitute that shortcode with the actual JavaScript code. That’s it.

Source: labnol

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