Tools, utilities, and drivers

How to take a remote screenshot in OS X

Taking a screenshot in OS X is a popular option for capturing activity on your computer, whether for communicating instructions to people or documenting events that are happening on your system. Usually screenshots are taken when sitting at the local system, but if needed you can also do so remotely by several different means.

The easiest way to take a remote screenshot is by using the Screen Sharing service in OS X. By enabling this in the Sharing system preferences and then connecting to the remote system to view its screen, you are provided a couple of ways to take … Read more

Manage your online time wisely with timeStats, a Chrome extension

The Internet is a pretty great resource for work or school, but it can also be an enormous distraction. timeStats is an extension for Google Chrome that allows you to see how you spend your online time. A few clicks will get you a chart distribution of your Internet activity; a couple more, and you can get even more detailed reports. The reports break down your daily/weekly/monthly activities with awesome pie charts and bar graphs showing what you did on which day. It can also show you other details such as the sites, domain zones, and time spent … Read more

Great local search apps for iOS

I was going through the app listings the other day and came across LocalScope, a unique local search tool that helps you find things near your current location. Obviously, many people already use Google Maps (no current version for iOS) for this purpose, and the Yelp-powered Apple Maps gets better every day, but after looking at LocalScope (reviewed below), I went on a search for other apps that tailor their results just for what is right around your area.

This week's collection of apps is all about searching for services around your location. The first gives you tons of listings and a surprising bonus feature for finding your destination. The second offers a slick radial interface and tons of categories to pick from. The third is LocalScope, and uses social data to find places, videos, and images from people around your location.… Read more

Apple releases bug-fix update for 2012 MacBooks

For those of you who own one of Apple's new MacBook Air or MacBook Pro systems that were released in June, Apple has made a software update available. The update is around 127MB in size and includes bug fixes and performance enhancements for the systems' graphics, and their ability to communicate with some USB devices.

While Apple didn't reveal the specific problems addressed by this update, recently a few owners of the new MacBooks have reported noticing flashing displays when waking the system, washed-out or high-contrast colors when using external displays, and odd graphical artifacts when using some … Read more

iStat for iOS now monitors Windows machines, too

Software utility maker Bjango has released a new $5 version of its iStat app for iOS that now lets people remotely monitor their Windows machines, not just Macs.

I've been a big fan of iStat Menus, a $16 utility that uses the OS X menu to show a variety of usage details such as CPU utilization, upload and download speeds, free storage space, and fan temperature.

iStat for iOS shows statistics such as free storage space, battery life, and network usage for iPhones, iPads, and iPod Touches. And if you have an agent called iStat Server installed on your … Read more

SwiftKey Flow lets you swipe on your Android keyboard

Looks like Android's top-selling keyboard app, SwiftKey, has a sibling in the works, in the form of a new program called SwiftKey Flow. Officially announced today, SwiftKey Flow takes a page out of competitor Swype's book, by letting its users input text via continuous gliding gestures.

What differentiates SwiftKey Flow, however, is the underlying natural-language technology that's been migrated over from the original SwiftKey keyboard app. This means that users of the new Flow will get not only the flexibility of choosing between a traditional tapping style and a Swype-like gliding style of typing, but also the … Read more

Get a $609 Mac software bundle for $29

Mac software tends to be on the pricey side (not unlike Macs themselves), and freebies are few and far between. That's why I'm seriously jazzed about this deal.

Ending in just two days, the MacHeist 4 Bundle gives you 17 Mac programs for $29. Combined value if purchased separately: $609. (It's true: I did the math.)

I'm not a Mac user myself, but I know good software when I see it. For starters, MacHeist 4 comes with popular writing tool Scrivener, even more popular drive optimizer DiskTools Pro, and even more popular still information-capture tool Evernote (specifically, 15 months of Evernote Premium).… Read more

3 must-have freeware apps for multiple desktops

Users who are tired of running back and forth between multiple computers might want to give today's collection of freeware a look. First, we have two KVM switch replacements: Qsynergy, a more intuitive version of the popular Synergy; and Mouse without Borders, a quick and easy solution from Microsoft's Garage for sharing your keyboard and mouse.

A third alternative is Win Switch, a tool to share programs on multiple computers and unchain you from your desk. All three options differ from remote desktop applications such as TeamViewer or Splashtop, since all of the computers operate on the same … Read more

XMBC lets you customize mouse functions

From everyday office work to Web browsing or even casual gaming, (X-Mouse Button Control) (XMBC, but not to be confused with the open-source media-center software XBMC) lets you control your computer mouse like a hardcore gamer. With customizable mapping features and numerous profiles setup, X-Mouse Button Control lets you do so much more than your standard pointing and clicking.

Most modern PC games let you customize the mapping of your keyboard and mouse buttons, but strangely, Windows provides very few options for tweaking your mouse functionality. The basic Mouse Control will only let you make minor adjustments to cursor sensitivity … Read more

Add tabs to Windows Explorer with QTTabBar

A little Internet Explorer shell named Netcaptor introduced tabbed browsing, and major players like Opera and Mozilla Firefox (and then Google Chrome) made the feature a default tool for surfing the Web. Even though Microsoft eventually added tabbed browsing to its own browser with Internet Explorer 7, the idea of tabs never really translated to Windows Explorer ... until QTTabBar.

QTTabBar is an extension that brings tab functionality to the Windows Explorer file browser. Began as a project by a Japanese developer known as Quizo, QTTabBar (which also goes by QT TabBar) added tabs to Window Explorer during the many years … Read more