Software

GNOME have just released a new version (2.12 ) of the their award winning desktop environment and development tools for Linux (and UNIX). It looks to have various fixes and improvements over previous versions. In the release notes they even say how they have improved the mines games, now the first click is guaranteed not to be mine, now how nice is that little attention to detail.

You can download it from the GNOME 2.12 page. If you fancy giving it a try but don’t want to vape you system or do a full install you can download a boot able CD image which will let you play with desktop with the minimum o fuss.

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VOIP (Voice Over IP (Internet Protocol)) is becoming the in thing at the moment due to the money it can save you with free international telephone calls. Skype is one of the leaders of this growing technology boasting 161,473,977 downloads of their software so far and increasing by the second.

The latest beta version released yesterday boosts:

• Our call quality is the best ever for talking, laughing and sharing stories.
• It’s now faster to get set up, and easier to add your contacts, so you can get more friends talking for free.
• You can forward calls on to mobiles, landlines and other Skype Names.
• Make calls instantly from Outlook email or Internet Explorer with our new toolbars.
• Personalise your Skype — play around with sounds, ringtones and pictures to show the world who you are.

You can download it for free from the official skype site

In the time it took to write this post another 5,000 copies have been downloaded (161,478,749) which is kind of crazy.

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I’m often amazed at the things Google release and I’m equally fascinated at services, tools and games that are dreamt up by people using the Google search engine and API.

Guess the Google is a really simple (as many of the best are) but addictive game. To play you have to work out (or guess) the keyword used to find 20 pictures on Google Images. This may sound easy but be warned it’s not and can be a serious time waster, it took me multiple goes befor I scored over 200. Check it out here

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A new version of the FairUse wizard is out. This tool does a pretty good job of backing up your DVDs to various AVI formats in it’s free guise. Paying for the more advanced version gets you more control over the finished product. It’s a lot simpler to use than many of the other offerings out there, although in the end they are all capable of producing similar output. There’s not much more to say really… download it and give it a try.

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This is cool. Google recently let us have the excellent and free Google Earth, which is great fun and also an educational tool for young and old alike. I often sit down with my daughter and fly around the world planning the next dream holiday.

NASA are probably as well known as Google but probably don’t have quite the same sort of marketing muscle but their World Wind application could well be better than Google Earth and best yet both of these programs are free
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Seems like Google are pretty busy these days sticking fingers in as many pies as possible. In the last couple of months they have released the excellent Google Earth, a big revision to their Desktop Search and now they are entering the IM (Instant Messanger) market with the all new Google Talk.
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