This is a follow-up of the previous article on Paint.NET v2.5 Beta 4. Designed and developed at Washington State University with guidance from Microsoft, Paint.NET, a student project programmed in C# and GDI+, is a photo and image editing tool designed for computers running Microsoft Windows XP or Windows 2000.

Bringing powerful features to the desktop, such includes a myriad of special effects, plug-in extensibility, and layer manipulation, to enhance the image editing process. Digital photographers and artists can enhance their images with features and effects such as levels adjustment, cross-layer cloning, anti-aliased tools, motion blur, and red eye removal.

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I listen to a lot of music but I don’t subscribe to the “that artist is great and this one is junk” mentality. Granted there are certain genres that I tend to filter out but on the whole my tastes vary wildly.

The Pandora Project is a very cool music recommendation system that’s tailor made for people like me. They have managed to categorise a huge music library in terms of the characteristics of individual songs. Once you give them an example of a song you like they go off and play you more of the same type of thing.
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There is no reason why the next generation of MSN Messenger should not be considered cool. First of all, it is no longer called MSN Messenger, instead Microsoft has renamed it to be Windows Live Messenger, (in fact is MSN Messenger 8 beta), to integrate with the introduction of Windows Live, an online application fully equipped with several features, by Microsoft.

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Skype has been one of the leading voice conference software, downloaded by millions over the world. In addition, Google, introducing GoogleTalk, has recently rise up to challenge the other Internet Messaging (IM) clients, such as MSN Messenger, Yahoo Messenger and ICQ. Currently, MSN, Yahoo and ICQ offered video chats, but GoogleTalk and Skype are lacking in this area. Nonetheless, Santa Cruz Networks has developed Festoon, a form of plug-in to allow video and sharing in Skype and GoogleTalk.

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I am sure most of you would have watched Star Wars before. Imagine finding yourself landed on a foreign land, or looking through the most powerful tracking system over your screen, overlook an area over a piece of land. This is what NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) World Wind has in for you. With NASA World Wind, installed users can view the moon in 3D image, with Clementine data and full place names.

According to Patrick Hogan, World Wind project manager at NASA Ames, this was the first of its kind, exploring the moon in 3D interactive environment, created by World Wind.

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I’ve been using the free version of Pixmantec’s RAW conversion software for a while now and I’ve been eagerly awaiting the release of the permium edition that hit the shelves earlier this week.

If you use a digital SLR you need to try the RAW mode of your camera and see for yourself the quality difference it can make over using the normal JPEG setting. RAW files are the digital equivalent of film negatives - they contain all the original information captured by the sensor which can later be manipulated on the PC (”developed” in the old world) without any loss of quality. Once you’ve got a CF card full of RAW images you’ll need to convert them into some useable format like TIFF or JPEG and that’s where Rawshooter comes in.
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One of the most popular compression utility in Windows is here again. WinZip International LLC. has announced the released of its latest software, WinZip 10.0. The software maker has significantly improved the usability and functionality of their latest release.

According to the product information, an improved compression technology was introduced in WinZip 10.0 that allows users to create even smaller *.zip files, hence save storage space. In addition, sending *.zip attachments in emails will also be faster. WinZip 10.0 further introduces a new Explorer-style view, making it easier to manage multi-folder zip files. Some other features include the ability to create split (multi-volume) zip files during compression, automatic update checking, and support for Windows XP 2 Attachment Manager, a function that helps users protect their computers by warning them of potential malicious zip files prior opening.

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This is probably one of the best Windows-based software I have ever used for wireless network detection. With 802.11a/b/g standard becoming a widespread common protocol for network interconnections, office and household users have succumb to the fascinating wireless connectivity to the World Wide Web (WWW) by mere invisible electromagnetic waves, operating usually at 2.4GHz license-free (in some countries) frequency.

NetStumber 0.4.0 has proven to be quite a useful piece of tool, in terms of wireless network detection. It allows detection of various network type, i.e. Peer-to-Peer, and Access Points (AP). In addition, it offers real-time signal-to-noise (SNR) ratio of a particular network, refreshing at approximately 1Hz. Compared to Windows’ bundled Wireless Zero Configuration (WZC) tool, this is an absolutely useful, especially in regions where signal is particularly very poor. Should there be several networks operating at the same time, NetStumbler has managed to picked them up simultaneously. Currently, NetStumbler supports several wireless network cards, so likelihood that you picked any Wireless card, and try with NetStumbler, chances that it is likely to work.

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