Yes, Foxit PDF reader is a free PDF reader created by other company.
Actually I would not recommend if you just want to try a different PDF READER. Foxit is maybe a little faster than Acrobat, but its displayed quality is worse. Also , there are lots of flickering when you resize the window.
Then why am I writing about this software? Because it has great advantages over Acrobat Reader. You can write texts , mark Highlight and Underline, and add notes to the PDF file. Some simple graphical diagram tools are also supported. But special watermark texts will also be written at the top right hand corner of the document when it is saved.
I heard that many small sized companies use Foxit Reader for this function and because it is free.
Well, these goodies do not come with the default Windows XP. They are created by the developers and they are free. That’s why there is no support from Microsoft for these products. By the way, according to the link, these will only work with Windows XP, not Vista.
There are several great useful utilities that can be downloaded and setup separately. I think some of them are very useful.
Here are the ones that I like
1. Tweak UI. As the name of the program explains, you can tweak many default properties of your Windows system. (Default user UI, Explorer Settings, Logon - Auto logon, Desktop Icons, Mouse Settings.) It is very useful.
2. Alt-Tab Replacement.
It is a wonderful replacement of traditional ALT-TAB Taskswitcher, indeed. Small preview image appears in the left side when you move onto the next application.The background color is depend on the Desktop Color defined in the Display option of the Control panel.
Download TaskswitchPowertoySetup.exe
Some more of the interests are
- ClearType Tuner : When installed, it will help to display the fonts in more distinct and clear way. It is a great help for the people who use labtop with small screens.
- Virtual Desktop Manager: When you have at least 10 or more applications running at the same time, you do feel that your screen is very small and tight and hoping for a larger monitor. But you can solve the limited desktop space by using the Virtual Desktop Manager. You can have several desktops and you can switch each desktop easily. Later in the upcoming blog entry, I will discuss more about the other Virtual Desktop applications that I have used. PowerToy’s Virtual Desktop Manager is nice, but not the best.
- Image Resizer: This is a very useful and simple utility to resize images that you can access it through the shortcut resize menu in the right mouse click popup menu.
So please go ahead and try for yourself!
Are you looking for a free PDF creator/generator? You don’t have to spend high prices to create a decent PDF document.
PrimoPDF (http://www.primopdf.com/) is a free to use PDF converter program. When installed, it works like a printer device that you can print documents from any Windows Application such as Microsoft Word and Firefox Web browser.
For example, if you would like to create a PDF document for a Yahoo Website, visit Yahoo.com in your favorite Web browser and click on the Print menu.
When you see the Print Popup windows , select ‘PrimoPDF’ from the Printer selection list. Then click on the ‘OK’ button to print.
Then a new PrimoPDF window shows such as below.
Now you can just define the new PDF file name to save as by clicking the “…” browse button. After selecting the filename, you can finish by click on the ‘OK’ button.
Here is the captured image of the PDF file opened with Adobe Reader 8. You can click on the image to view the enlarged image.
Another great thing about PrimoPDF is that it does not print any kind of Watermark in the generated PDF file unlike some freeware/shareware PDF softwares. So you get the exact document that you want to print.
Here is the actual PDF file , Yahoo!.pdf, created with the PrimoPDF.
There are several similar products when it comes to Desktop Widgets. There are
- Apple DashBoard
- Microsoft Vista Gadget
- Google Desktop Gadget
- Yahoo Widget
Here is the article from Yahoo Widget Blog The Ever-Changing Widget Landscape with the comparison and the explanation between the different version of Widgets or similar products.
I agree with the blog in regards of Apple DashBoard and Vista Gadget that they are heavily depended on the OS. I can’t even try Dashboard and Vista Gadget cause I don’t have the OS (Mac OSX or Vista). With the current Windows XP, I have two options Google Gadget and Yahoo Widget anyway. But since Goolge Gadget is much less dynamic and intuitive, so my only option is Yahoo.
There are about 4000 widgets in yahoo widget gallery. That is just too many and I already wasted quite amount time browsing and testing one by one.
I hope that there is some featured articles or guides to introduce only few outstanding widgets everyweek or so.
RocketDock ( http://www.punksoftware.com/rocketdock) is Windows Application Launcher similar to the Mac OS X’s launch bar.
I was longing for such App launcher for Windows and tried some yahoo widget previously but they were very disappointing. When I first found this free software and I was very excited and satisfied with its powerful features that I always wanted.
Actually there are several similar Dock App for Windows, but this is good enough for me not to try other Dock / Launcher softwares.
- You can add and remove icons by just drag and drop.
- You can change the icon image with the regular image files (jpeg, gif, png)
- Multi language support
- Full control setting of its behavior (Icon Enlargement, Menu hides…)
Take a look at this movie that they made for showcase of RocketDock.
http://one.revver.com/watch/160224/flv
You may need 3rd party ICON images to decorate your dock. Try Everaldo’s free Crystal Icon Series. They are great and comes in various sizes from 16X16 to 128X128. If the above site does not work, try CrystalXp.net. They host many icon image sets, and I believe that they are free for personal use. But I guess you need to contact the author for the commercial use.
Other similar Windows Docking products are ObjectDock and AquaDock.
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