Freeware Feature: GridMove

Purpose: Quickly and optimally arranging windows on your screen
Web site: http://jgpaiva.donationcoders.com/gridmove.html
Skill level required: Beginner to Intermediate

Although the efficiency benefits of using multiple monitors are becoming well-known, and although multiple-monitor configurations are more tenable than ever, you might be stuck with a single monitor for one reason or another. I've only recently been able to convince my employer that multiple monitors is a solid investment for power users in particular, but I know it will be years or decades before they let me purchase dual monitors for the majority of the staff.

So if you're stuck with a single monitor, how can you work efficiently? For that matter, perhaps you have dual monitors but still want to make the most of the space you have (after all, even two monitors isn't enough, right power users?). Well, you could resize your windows and arrange them perfectly to maximize the utilization of your screen space. That's time-consuming though, which kinda defeats the purpose of your efficiency attempts.

The solution is a simple program called GridMove. This program is difficult to explain, but this visual helps. GridMove "splits" your monitor into multiple rectangles. Drop a window onto one of these rectangles, and GridMove takes care of the resizing for you. Basically, GridMove lets you predefine a workspace layout, and then it takes away the work of the window resizing. You get the benefits of fastidious window management, without the time-consuming labor that is typically required. I now use this program daily at work, and it became particularly useful once a friend pointed out the keyboard shortcuts.

Here's a bonus for you: whether or not GridMove floats your boat, you may want to try GroupBar from Microsoft. GroupBar is in the same basic category as GridMove; it helps you manage your open windows so you can be more efficient.

Freeware Feature: MWSnap

Purpose: Taking screenshots / screen captures
Web site: http://www.mirekw.com/winfreeware/mwsnap.html
Skill level required: Beginner to Intermediate

Taking "pictures" of my desktop (screenshots or screen captures) is something my job often requires. It even comes in handy sometimes at home. You may already be familiar with two common methods of capturing a picture of your screen:

• The PrtScn (or Print Screen) button. This button captures an image of your screen to your clipboard. After hitting this button, open up a photo editing program--or any program where you need to paste a picture--and hit the Paste button. Keyboard users prefer the keyboard shortcut CTRL + V for pasting.
• ALT + PrtScn. This captures an image of only the active window on your screen. This is very helpful if you want to take a picture of a dialog box, for instance.

Sometimes you may require greater flexibility. Microsoft OneNote, which I won't take time to describe here, has a very cool screen capture feature. Right-click on its system tray icon, select "Create Screen Clipping," and you get to select exactly the portion of your screen that you copy to the clipboard. Very cool, very useful, and very simple. The problem is, I have OneNote only on my work PC, and buying a copy of that program simply for that feature would be overkill.

In my search for free software that simulated the screen clipping feature of OneNote, I found MWSnap. I tried some other software, and MWSnap was the one I liked the best. It has plenty of features to meet my needs, including a handy AutoSave option. If you're looking for a screen capture utility, give MWSnap a try.

Freeware Feature: PINs

PINs

Purpose: Store passwords in a secure database
Web site: http://www.mirekw.com/winfreeware/pins.html
Skill level required: Beginner

Deep down, you know that you shouldn't use the same password for so many of your accounts. You also know that you should use more complex passwords, rather than just incrementing a digit at the end of your pet's name every time your password expires. The problem is, how are you going to remember all those passwords?

The answer is PINs. Actually, the answer is: an encrypted password database. PINs just happens to be a fantastic and free one. With solid encryption and superb portability (no installation is required), PINs is my password database of choice for home and work.

A bonus is that PINs can generate passwords for you. So it can generate a password like P!+tZ-(9M, and you don't have to worry about remembering it. Or better yet, we can devise a password that's much more difficult to crack and is easier to remember. But you'll have to wait for another post to hear about that trick.

Freeware Feature: VideoLAN VLC Media Player

VideoLAN VLC Media Player

Purpose: Multi-format, cross-platform media player

Web site: http://www.videolan.org/vlc/

Skill Level Required: Intermediate

It can be surprisingly difficult to play DVDs on a computer.

If you've ever added a new DVD-ROM drive to a computer yourself, or if you've ever just had to completely reinstall Windows, you may have found that Windows Media Player doesn't want to play your DVDs. What happened, you ask? You probably lack the proper codec.

CODEC stands for "compression/decompression algorithm." In simple terms, the video on your DVD (and other digital videos) is compressed--packaged--before it's distributed. Your media player needs to have the know-how (packaged in a codec) for decompressing the file and making it usable on your computer. Microsoft chose to not include a standard DVD codec in Windows. Bummer. Hopefully you happen to have a DVD software program that has the necessary codec; you may just need to find and install it. But if you don't own such a program or can't find it, what can you do?

I can offer you at least one solution. One day when I was looking for a free solution to this problem, I stumbled upon VideoLAN's VLC Media Player. It's an open-source project, and it's still under development. I personally found the video to be a little jerky at times, but usable. I suspect this problem will be eliminated in time, if it hasn't been already.

I also found the software to be less intuitive than Windows Media Player, but that too is likely to be fixed in time. The point is, I now have a solution for any computer that tells me I don't have the proper codec for playing a DVD.

UPDATE: While researching codec licensing options for my company, I found that users of VLC Media Player are technically required to pay royalties to one or more patent-holders. You can read about it here. (And for the systems administrators out there, it's worth noting that a couple of the big players in the commercial DVD codec market say that we're not allowed to use our OEM licenses when we clone PCs, meaning that buying WinDVD, PowerDVD, etc. preinstalled on your PCs is useless unless if you use cloning. This leaves two viable options: 1) buy a site license for a DVD player or codec, 2) use Windows Vista Ultimate or similar OS, which does come packaged with a DVD codec. Microsoft recommends not using Ultimate in a business environment though.)

Freeware Feature: Weather Watcher

Weather Watcher
Purpose: Automatic weather updates
Web site: http://www.singerscreations.com/AboutWeatherWatcher.asp
Skill level required: Beginner

Want to scare an I.T. pro? Slowly and quietly approach him from behind, then suddenly yell, "Weatherbug!"

Weatherbug was--and maybe still is--a program that came with baggage. Consumers downloaded it rampantly, even installing it on corporate networks--where it doesn't really belong (for the most part, getting weather reports is not a work-related activity). I.T. pros quickly became annoyed with this program for two reasons: 1) it showed up in antispyware reports, 2) it showed up in network traffic reports. In other words, some security software was flagging it as spyware or adware, and the program was generating a lot of network traffic due to the frequent weather updates. When you're trying to run a clean network, those two things are vexing.

There has been much hubbub on the web about whether Weatherbug--in its current form--is indeed adware. I'm not going to try to settle the argument; I'm here to offer an alternative. (The alternative should probably still not be installed on a corporate network; I'm recommending it just because it's baggage-free.)

Weather Watcher is the program I stumbled upon one day, that is quite advanced for its price ($0). You can get the icon in your system tray, choose what it displays, launch the application, see maps, get multiple forecast formats, and more. There's just one caveat: there is an option to install some adware along with Weather Watcher. For that reason, McAfee's SiteAdvisor (which I've talked about before) gives it a bad rating. If you read SiteAdvisor's review though, you'll find that Weather Watcher users claim that SiteAdvisor's rating is unfair. It's very easy to install the ad-free version of Weather Watcher. No tricks here.

If you want weather updates on your desktop, try Weather Watcher before thinking about Weatherbug.

Freeware Feature: Avast! Antivirus

Avast! Antivirus
Purpose: Computer security (antivirus)
Web site: http://www.avast.com/
Skill level required: Intermediate

I don't love Avast! Antivirus, but I still recommend it. Here's why:

For one thing, I'm not a fan of Norton Antivirus. No, I'm not one of those people that hates all successful companies for no good reason (I am a fan of Microsoft and WalMart, for instance); I've just seen Norton products cause problems on my own computer and others' computers. This is 6+ years in the I.T. industry talking.

Secondly, I suspect that many people don't stay up-to-date on their antivirus software because it costs money to do so. Do you whip out your credit card every time your antivirus software asks you to do so?

Given those points, Avast! is a decent choice. It doesn't seem to cause as many problems as Norton, and there's no cost hurdle every 12 months. What I don't love about Avast! is its interface. I don't find it very intuitive. Perhaps you will though. If you're looking for a free antivirus program, this one is worth a try--and won't set you back a penny.

Freeware Feature: OpenOffice.org

OpenOffice.org (yes, the .org is part of the name)
Purpose: Office productivity (word processing, spreadsheets, etc.)
Web site: http://www.openoffice.org/
Skill level required: Beginner

Ok, I'm cheating. I'm highlighting a program I already alluded to once. But I'm continually surprised by how many people have not heard about OpenOffice.org.

Microsoft Office is very popular, but can also be very expensive. (Although on Tuesday, January 30, 2007, Microsoft is releasing the Home and Student Edition at a decent price for home consumers.) OpenOffice.org is one of the most competent free alternatives, and is definitely worth a look if a) you can't afford Microsoft Office, b) you like to have a variety of options when it comes to your software, or c) you just hate Microsoft.

OpenOffice.org includes:

• A word processor
• A spreadsheet program
• A presentation program
• A graphics/diagram program
• A database program
• An equation editor

Different components of the product are at different maturity levels. And OpenOffice is absolutely no match for Office 2007. It lacks the polish of Microsoft's venerable suite, but it has its place. If you are still using the basic "suite" that came with your computer, try OpenOffice.org.

Freeware Feature: Picasa

Picasa
Purpose: Editing and organizing photos
Web site: http://picasa.google.com/
Skill level required: Beginner

Picasa, Google's photo editing and organization program, is one of those "wow--this is free?!?" programs.

Forget installing the software that came with your camera, and forget about buying any other photo editing and organization program--at least until you've tried Picasa. Most people just need a way to import their pictures from their camera, perform some basic editing like cropping and redeye fixes, and find the pictures they want once the pictures are on the computer. Picasa handles these basic tasks admirably, and the occasional upgrades offer real, useful improvements. (So if you're running an old version, be sure to give the most current version a try.)

As with my other Freeware Feature posts, I'm not going to provide a full review, nor am I going to list all the great features. Google already has a product tour that can handle the latter. But I will tell you one of my favorite features. I love the new "experimental" feature that allows you to search your picture collection for certain colors. This is really quite amazing; I can find all my pictures that have the color red in them. This is great for people who like to be creative with photos (whether they're into graphic design or something less daunting), but it can be of use to anybody.

Oh, and I guess I have to mention the geotagging feature. Wouldn't it be neat if your camera had a GPS receiver built into it, and it could record global positioning coordinates in every picture you took? Then you could find all of your Colorado vacation pictures by looking at a digital map of Colorado that was linked to your picture program. Well, when you combine Picasa with Google Earth (which is scheduled for an upcoming Freeware Feature post), you can do just that--even if your camera doesn't have a built-in geotagging feature.

Freeware Feature: 7-Zip

7-Zip

Purpose: Zipping (compressing) or unzipping files

Web site: http://www.7-zip.org/

Skill level required: Beginner

Recent versions of Windows include a basic program for zipping and unzipping files. It's easy enough to use, but it may not meet all of your zipping/unzipping needs. (I occasionally run into people who have never used the Windows zip program before. If you're completely new to this, you may find this page useful, although Microsoft doesn't include screenshots.) If you find a compressed file that Windows XP can't handle, or if you want to do something slightly advanced like creating a self-extracting archive, you'll need to look elsewhere.

Some people mistakenly think that WinZip is freeware, but it's actually shareware. It's supposed to be registered if you use it beyond the stated trial period. So for me, at least, WinZip is out.

I stumbled upon 7-Zip one day on Sourceforge.net, a web site that hosts open source projects. It's completely free, and it has features that the basic Windows zip program lacks. It's not the only free zip program, but it's a well-respected one that is pretty much guaranteed to always be free.

Freeware Feature: PrimoPDF

Today I'm starting what I hope will be a 15-week series of Friday posts about free software programs that I find useful. Let me make this clear up front: I am not claiming that these are the 15 best freeware utilities in the world. I'm not even claiming that all of these are the best freeware options in their respective categories. They are just 15 programs I've found after years of hunting for software to meet various needs. I've tested all of them enough that I'm comfortable recommending them, and I still use most of them to varying degrees.

As I understand the license agreements, all of the freeware in this series is legal for personal, non-commercial use. Whatever your scenario, always read software licenses to ensure that you are in compliance.

PrimoPDF
Purpose: Creating PDF files from any application that can print
Web Site: http://www.primopdf.com/
Skill Level Required: Beginner

I've tried a few PDF creators, ranging from Adobe's professional ones to completely free ones. If you're looking for a free way to create PDFs, PrimoPDF is a great option. (I.T. departments can even appreciate the fact that unlike other PDF programs--such as PDFCreator on SourceForge.net--this one can run under limited user rights in Windows XP.)

As with many PDF creators, PrimoPDF installs a "printer" on your computer. When you print a file to that printer, the result is a PDF file rather than a physical, printed document.

A nice touch is that you can set some security on your PDF, including setting a password on the file, preventing printing, etc. (Note: You can never prevent a determined person from printing any document you give them--PDF or other. In a pinch, anybody could take a screenshot of any pages they want to print, and then print the screenshot. Don't heavily rely on this "security" feature.)

For details and screenshots, see http://www.primopdf.com/free-pdf-userguide.asp.