add-in

An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, and that's especially true when it comes to spyware; wouldn't you rather protect your system than spend hours trying to rid it of malicious visitors? SpywareBlaster is a simple program that provides protection from ActiveX-based software and unwanted cookies for both Firefox and Internet Explorer users.

SpywareBlaster has a simple interface that will be easy for even novices to navigate. The main screen shows the protection status for Internet Explorer, restricted Web sites, and Firefox. By default, protection is disabled for each of these, but you can easily … Read more

NirSoft's MozillaHistoryView reads the history DAT file in Mozilla-based Web browsers such as Firefox as well as Netscape and displays your browsing history under a wide range of useful column headings. The built-in History feature in the latest version of Firefox also displays lots of useful information, it's true. But you must have Firefox open to use it. MozillaHistoryView is a standalone tool that reads history DAT files directly, whether your browser is open or not. You can save and export the data in various ways, too. The program also gives you greater flexibility in accessing multiple browser … Read more

Web Loanalyzer is a free loan calculator written in HTML and JavaScript. It quickly analyzes a loan's parameters and explains in plain English how long it will take to pay the loan off, how much interest will be paid, and so on. We took a look at Web Loanalyzer Q1.

We extracted Web Loanalyzer's zipped program file and clicked it, which opened the calculator in our Web browser. Web Loanalyzer is locally hosted, so you don't need an active Internet connection to use it. The program's interface is small, about the size of two banner ads … Read more

A macro is an automated series of computer actions that can save you a lot of time if you find yourself doing the same tasks over and over again. Unfortunately, macros aren't always easy to create, which means that a lot of people who could benefit from them never get the chance. iMacros for Internet Explorer changes this, making it easy even for novices to create and use macros.

This browser extension appears as a small icon on the IE toolbar, and clicking on it opens a sidebar to the left. Here there are tabs for playing, recording, and … Read more

Flash adds multimedia effects to Web sites, but not everyone wants that. Some people find Flash animations annoying or distracting, or they're concerned about privacy and security. And for some, it's all of the above. Developers have responded with a variety of tools designed to block all or some Flash animations from loading. We took a look at Flashblock, a free Flash blocker for Firefox and other Mozilla browsers as well as related browsers such as Netscape. It blocks Flash, Shockwave, and Authorware in both Macromedia and Adobe versions.

After we installed Flashblock and restarted Firefox, the first … Read more

One of the crowning features of Windows Home Server, which Microsoft announced it was cutting as part of the next major version of the OS, is set to return with the help of some third-party software makers.

Drive pooling, which lets users take multiple hard drives and turn them into one solid block of storage was made possible by a feature called Drive Extender. In November, Microsoft announced it would be removing the feature in the second major version of the Windows Home Server software, code-named Vail, citing higher-capacity commodity hard drives as making the feature obsolete.

Users cried fowl, … Read more

When you import data in Excel, you also import any blank spaces that come with it, which isn't a problem in day-to-day use. If you try to process the data, though, extra spaces can lead to problems, such as masking duplicate files from tools designed to find and remove them. Trim Spaces for Excel from Add-in Express is a free Excel add-in that can locate and remove leading and trailing spaces in cells in Excel documents.

We installed Trim Spaces in Excel 2010 and opened a spreadsheet. The Trim Spaces Help file opened automatically, while an AbleBits.com tab … Read more

HTTPWatch Basic Edition is a free browser plug-in that collects and displays information about Web sites. It's a trial edition of HTTPWatch Professional, with which it shares many features, albeit with limitations, mostly for Web sites with nonproprietary log files. The Basic version also displays a logo banner on printouts. Both work with Microsoft Internet Explorer as well as Mozilla Firefox. You can save the information HTTPWatch Basic Edition collects as a log file and view it with an included utility, HTTP Studio.

We downloaded and installed HTTPWatch Basic for Internet Explorer. During the process, we allowed the plug-in'… Read more

Every wireless-network user should know the perils of signing into a Web service over an unencrypted connection. Elinor Mills explains the perils of using open Wi-Fi networks in her InSecurity Complex blog.

The safest approach is to enter user IDs and passwords only when the page's address begins with "https://" and it has a lock icon at the top or bottom of the browser window. Otherwise a network snoop could monitor your actions without your knowledge. Note that the lock icon may have an exclamation mark even though the page address begins with "https:". This … Read more