I Love Free Software

Take Backup of Gmail, Microsoft Exchange, POP3 Mails with MailStore Home
Recover Deleted Files with Wise Data Recovery
Peer to Peer File Sharing Client: Torrent Monster
Free Facebook Photo Uploader For Windows: Upload2Facebook
Create Encrypted Folder with BoxCryptor
Search Google, YouTube, Bing by Speaking with Speechify
5 Free Chrome Extensions To Control YouTube Playback
Search Files and Folders in Windows with Wise JetSearch

Take Backup of Gmail, Microsoft Exchange, POP3 Mails with MailStore Home

Posted: 26 May 2012 05:00 PM PDT

MailStore Home is a free application that enables you to archive all your emails across different mailboxes at a centralised archive. The application creates a backup of all your important emails on either your computer or on a removable flash drive. With MailStore you can easily manage your emails and be able to search and retrieve them when you need them.

Features

MailStore incorporates a fast text-based search to sift through large volumes of emails in a few moments
Centralised email archive
Portable Application can be launched from removable drives like USB flash drives

How to use it

To archive an email, you need to create a profile. Click Archive Email to add an account. Click the Advanced button to add email accounts from Google, Kerio Connect, Microsoft Exchange and other IMAP and POP3 Mailboxes. You also have the option of choosing selected email clients on the E-mail clients section. You can create an email profile by adding an MBOX email file or other email files from a local directory.

For Gmail, choose Google Mail in the dropdown. Enter a valid email address and your password. Click Test to check whether you entered the correct details or are able to logon to the server. Next, configure archiving options and set a timeout and click Finish. A confirmation message appears to inform you if the address was successfully added. To archive emails, double-click on any of the listed addresses or click Run. A small interface takes you through the archiving process. If any security concerns are raised by the program, kindly confirm that the certificate you are using is indeed from Google.

For easier access you can create a desktop shortcut to execute the archiving progress more faster and easily by clicking Create shortcut on desktop button. You can edit the details of any email address by clicking Properties and following the prompts provided. The Commands button allows you to access editing features like cut, copy, paste, rename and delete. These commands can also be accessed via the default hotkeys except for the rename function that uses the F2 function key. Archived messages can be viewed by clicking My Archives Folder and navigating to the inbox directory. Archiving procedures can vary slightly for the different types of accounts.

To search for emails, click on Search email. Enter text in the search for text box, and select which items should be searched by checking their respective text boxes. In the general section, select a folder to be searched or use the default which searches all folders. You can narrow down your search by entering the recipient's name or names of persons it was copied to and date the mail was sent-chances are you won’t be remembering these so leave them blank. You can narrow down your search further by selecting whether the email you are searching for contained attachments, its size or its priority by checking the respective text boxes. Click Search to run the search and New Query to perform another search.

MailStore Home allows you to export emails to other programs. To export emails, click Export emails in the left menu. Before you can archive emails, you need to create an account using at least one of the options provided. Program settings can be accessed by clicking Administrative Tools. The section allows you to set a default directory for MailStore, free up unused space in MailStore's files and create a search index for faster searching.

Pros

Archive emails in a few easy steps
Fast and simple to use
No profile and archived mail limits
Support for a wide variety of mail providers

Cons

No auto archiving or archiving schedule feature

Conclusion

MailStore Home offers you a simple and efficient way to store your mail locally.

Take Backup of Gmail, Microsoft Exchange, POP3 Mails with MailStore Home was originally published at I Love Free Software

Recover Deleted Files with Wise Data Recovery

Posted: 26 May 2012 02:00 PM PDT

Wise Data Recovery, like the name of the program suggests it, is a file recovery software which is very small, light and very simple to use. This data recovery software is capable of recovering files not only from the Recycle Bin, you don’t even need data recovery to recover files from Recycle Bin, just use Restore, but when you delete the files from Recycle Bin, that’s where problems start, and that’s exactly where Win Data Recovery can help you out.

As it was said, program is very simple to use, and its interface follows this to the letter. There are no advanced options or hidden large menus with a lot of different options to configure, which makes Wise Data Recovery perfect for beginners. Enough sweet talk, let’s see how good it really is when it comes to recovery.

Recover deleted files with Wise Data Recovery

For the purpose of this test, we decided to empty out our Recycle bin and try to recover files that were deleted. There was a large number of files and folders there. On the image below you can see the names of some of the files and folders which were in Recycle Bin, which we deleted:

I’m showing you this, because I wanted you to know that files had “normal” names, it’s important, why exactly you’ll find out soon enough. In order for the program to present you with a list of files that can be recovered, you’re gonna have to scan your computer with it. After you do, you should see something similar to this:

To scan select the partition where the files were deleted in the top left corner and then click on Scan. Program will then list all the recoverable files that were found on the entire partition. Scanning lasted only a few seconds, but we have a small hard drive on this PC, larger partitions will probably last longer. To find deleted files and recover them faster, you should browse to the location where data was located last before it was deleted. Since we were deleting from the Recycle Bin, we will open up the Recycler folder on the left side of the screen, see image below:

What we see here on the picture are the contents of the Recycle Bin which we deleted just now. Notice that the file names are very weird and nothing like what they were when we last saw them in the Recycle Bin. Why this happened we don’t know, maybe the program wasn’t able to retrieve the names, we tried it several times, with the same result. Perhaps you will have more luck and have actual names, this is definitely a drawback of Wise Data Recovery, other data recovery software like Recuva recovers the original files names, so you might want to pick Recuva over Wise Data Recovery.

Conclusion

Don’t give up on Wise Data Recovery right away, first test it and see how it will work, because it is faster and a bit easier to use than Recuva. You might get original file names, but if you don’t you’re at least warned and now you know what to expect. Program offers file filtering based on file type, that way we have:

Images
Audio
Video
Documents
Compressed
Emails

So you can filter out files more easily. See how the program will behave and report us your findings.

Recover Deleted Files with Wise Data Recovery was originally published at I Love Free Software

Peer to Peer File Sharing Client: Torrent Monster

Posted: 26 May 2012 12:30 PM PDT

Torrent Monster is a free peer-to-peer file sharing client. In other words it is an application where users can share desired files. It enables the user to download music files, movie files, pictures, applications and documents easily. The number of registered users is huge and is increasing by the passing day. Therefore locating and downloading a desired file of any type becomes very simple and hassle-free. The resources of Torrent Monster is vast which increases the chance of finding a required file. What sets this peer-to-peer file sharing client apart is its uncomplicated interface and the download speed. This software allows the user to download a file at the maximum speed of his or her connection.

Features Of This File Sharing Application

The Torrent Monster can anticipate the speed of each of the torrent sources and give the quickest top priority. It uses optimization algorithms to provide the user with the best download speed.
The peer-to-peer file sharing client has a user-friendly and uncluttered interface. The user is provided with abundance of features and settings which ensures better searching and downloading processes.
This application allows the export and import of torrent files in XML ( Extensible Markup Language). It also includes a comprehensive tool to upload these files on the internet.
The file sharing client also keeps a record of the download statistics. It also provides with necessary information about the internet connection of the user.
The multi source download is much faster in Torrent Monster compared to other peer-to-peer file sharing clients.
The application has a convoluted library organizer which makes the usage of library much easier.
The download mesh provided by Torrent Monster aids the sources and the search outcomes automatically.
The magnetic links of the software allows the user to share files easily.
The software can calculate the speed of available hosts. It also allows the user to preview a file which he or she wants to download.
The active blasting is better compared to most other peer-to-peer file sharing clients.
The peer-to-peer file sharing client manages the connections to an optimal level.
It uses the total bandwidth to the maximum level by allowing dynamic uploading.
Torrent Monster runs on the largest decentralised file sharing network which is Gnutella file sharing network.

Interface And Working Of Torrent Monster

The Torrent Monster consists of a comprehensive and efficient interface. The menu bar consists of the following options: file, view, tools, window and help. The file option enables the user to open torrent files, to open and close new torrent and to manage the transfers. The view option helps the user to remove and reinstate the side bar and the tool bar. The tools button gives the user the following options: my tracker, my classic shares, console, statistics, transfers bar, all peers, client stats, IP filters and options.

The search box is right below the menu bar. The side bar shows the user the list of the downloading files and downloaded files. Then comes the Torrents Monster Radio which allows the user to listen to internet radio. The stations are classified under genres and locations which makes the entire process easier. Subscription option allow Torrent Monster to give the user live updates about newly downloaded contents.

When one enters the name of the file, Torrent Monster returns a list of sources. The user then has to simply select a source and download the file to the desired location.

Downloading And Installing The Software

Torrent Monster can be downloaded from the official website of GoForSharing. A number of other sites host the download link too. While the .exe file can take time to download the actual installation does not take much time.

Final Verdict

Torrent Monster is a powerful and well designed Gnutella client. If you are looking for a compact and solid peer-to-peer file sharing client then surely go for it.

Peer to Peer File Sharing Client: Torrent Monster was originally published at I Love Free Software

Free Facebook Photo Uploader For Windows: Upload2Facebook

Posted: 26 May 2012 11:00 AM PDT

One of the best aspects of Facebook is the ability to share your world in the form of pictures with your friends, which brings us to process of uploading photos to Facebook. Facebook has one of the easy ways of uploading a photo to your account, but still it is not the best way. The Upload2Facebook software is one that claims to be the best way to upload photos to Facebook. On initial looks, the best aspect of the Upload2Facebook free Facebook photo uploader software is that it is free, but one should look beyond the skin you recognise that it is much more.

Download and Installation of this Facebook photo uploader:

Like many of the free software, the Upload2Facebook free Facebook photo uploader software is very lightweight. As a result, downloading the software is extremely easy considering the size of just 4 MB, which will take only a matter of seconds on a decent Internet connection. The installation of the file does not require handling anything of high technical detail because it is simple and straightforward.

Key Features of this Facebook photo uploader:

Ability to upload multiple photos at the same time.
Ability to download multiple photos from your Facebook account.
Simple interface that lets you choose between a number of photos for either uploading or downloading.
Ability to comment on the photos from the software itself.
Ability to download the photos that you are tagged at the touch of a button.
Provides the ability to work even when there is no Internet connection.

One of the chief areas where the uploading system of Facebook falters is when your Internet connection fails just at the last moment. It means that the time you have spent uploading 99% of the files goes waste.

The Upload2Facebook free Facebook photo uploader software takes you around this problem by providing a system that will let you resume your uploads if in case the Internet connection falters at the last moment. Facebook has allowed the opportunity to select multiple files for uploading, but the Upload2Facebook free Facebook photo uploader software perfects the system because this allows the ability to select photos even when you are off-line.

Facebook clearly recognises that uploading is a part of your account, but the same does not apply to downloading. The Upload2Facebook free Facebook photo uploading software lets you download all the files or specific files from your account in one single go.

Some of the simple, yet thoughtful features of this software are the most interesting aspect. The Upload2Facebook free Facebook photo uploader software lets you comment on the photos and add descriptions in an instant. It also lets you download the photos that you are tagged in. Download the Upload2Facebook free Facebook photo uploader software now.

Free Facebook Photo Uploader For Windows: Upload2Facebook was originally published at I Love Free Software

Create Encrypted Folder with BoxCryptor

Posted: 26 May 2012 09:30 AM PDT

BoxCryptor is a free software that you can use to create an encrypted folder and password protect folder so that the files which are inside cannot be accessed or tampered by anyone but you, or other people who know the password that you placed on the folder.

Something like this can be very useful if you are sharing your computer with several different people and you have data which you don’t want anyone else seeing or using. This is also use to provide additional protection to data that you store in cloud folders using services like Dropbox, and Google Drive.

This is the default window of BoxCryptor and as you can see the interface is very easy to understand and there’s not a lot of options to confuse people. Everything that you need for having an encrypted folder is right there in the BoxCryptors main page. There’s also the option for opening up the Advanced mode at the upper right corner which offers more options for those willing to tinker with this encryption program.

How exactly is BoxCryptor encrypting a folder?

Short answer would be that BoxCryptor is very similar to recently reviewed TrueCrypt encryption software, only it has a lot less options than TrueCrypt. After installation program requires you to restart your PC, after doing that you will be greeted with the following screen:

Here you are given the option to either create a new encrypted folder or to open an existing encrypted folder. Creation of the encrypted folder is very easy, all the input that is required from the user is to designate a location where the encrypted folder will be saved, and to enter the password with which the folder will be protected. Simple to follow wizard takes care of all this, and there’s no need to explain it in a lot of detail. Once you’re finished, BoxCryptor will automatically mount your encrypted folder as a virtual partition, exactly the same thing that we saw TrueCrypt do:

Every time that the computer starts, a BoxCrypt window will pop out where you can enter your password and decrypt the folder in order for it to be available while you are using the computer. Those who do not know the password will not be able to peak inside the created virtual partition, or should I say folder.

Limitation of the free version and conclusions

BoxCrypt free is limited to 5GB of data stored inside the encrypted virtual hard drive that it creates. There are also two paid versions of this application which are offering unlimited space, and the more expensive option also offers the option for commercial usage of the software in companies.

Great thing about BoxCryptor is that there are versions not only for Windows, Mac and Linux, but also for Android and iOS, which means that you can use it on your smartphone. Technically speaking Linux doesn’t have BoxCryptor as a standalone application, to open up your encrypted BoxCrypor folder in Linux you’re gonna need to use a third party application EncFS which uses the same type of protection that BoxCryptor offers. The encryption that’s used is AES-256, which is what the government uses, definitely more than enough for home users, unless you’re a spy ;).

No related posts.

Create Encrypted Folder with BoxCryptor was originally published at I Love Free Software

Search Google, YouTube, Bing by Speaking with Speechify

Posted: 26 May 2012 08:00 AM PDT

Speechify is an extension for Google Chrome which allows audio input for search boxes. The audio support provided by the extension allows the user to say what they want to search for. This extension is compatible with the recently released Google Chrome Beta 11. With this free add on the user can input speech in a number of websites. Google Voice Search already allowed speech input but this add on allows the same thing for other sites too. The user will no longer be needed to type his or her query. Instead he can just say it out loud and results will be returned. The add on basically converts speech to text and then searches for the text as usual.

Features Of Speechify

This add on is compatible with Google Chrome Beta 11 only. With the other versions of Chrome the user will have to make do with Google Voice Search.
If you required version of Google Chrome you can easily add this free extension.
The add on uses HTML5 to convert speech to text allowing audio input to search boxes.
The extension is extremely light weight and has a size of 251 kilo byte only.
The Operating Systems with which Speechify is compatible with are: Windows NT, Windows 98, Windows Me, Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 2000 and Windows 7.
Speechify can be used in Google, Amazon, Hulu, YouTube, Bing and Twitter search boxes. The developers are trying to add Facebook and Unibar to the already long list of websites.
The latest version of Speechify, the Chrome add on is Speechify 1.3.
The efficient extension fixes bugs unlike the previous versions.
The earlier version did not include Twitter support. Speechify 1.3 allows the user to input the search topic as an audio input.
The new icon of Speechify 1.3 is found beside the search boxes for most of the websites.
The user can use this smart extension along with Google Instant for best results. This will enable him or her to search for queries without even hitting the enter button.
The conversion from speech to text does not happen locally. The audio snippet gets transferred to Google Cloud which does the conversion and returns the text. Then Google returns the results for the text.

Interface And Working Of The Extension

Once the user has installed the Speechify extension he or she will find a grey microphone icon to the left of most search bars. The grey colour indicates that the microphone is inactive. When one clicks on the icon it turns brown indicating that it is now active. The activation can take time if your server speed is low. Next it shows a message that says "Speak Now" and you have to speak out the input. You can cancel it if you want. You have to press enter if Google Instant is not activated for the results.

One should not expect absolute accuracy. In fact the accuracy of Speechify partially depends on the user’s mic and his or her ability to speak clearly. Still accuracy is one of Speechify’s major defects. The developers will surely look into this as this extension is still in the beta stage. It also does not work with Quora though the icon is present.

Downloading The Chrome Add On

The extension is obviously available in the Google Chrome Web store. Apart from that you will also find the download link on numerous websites across the internet. Installing the extension to your Chrome browser takes a few seconds only.

Final Verdict

Though the developers have not yet perfected the speech recognition part, Speechify is one exciting application. This extension will definitely be used and exploited by a lot of sites and Android applications in future.

Search Google, YouTube, Bing by Speaking with Speechify was originally published at I Love Free Software

5 Free Chrome Extensions To Control YouTube Playback

Posted: 26 May 2012 06:30 AM PDT

Here, are 5 free Chrome extensions to control YouTube Playback on Google Chrome browser. These extensions allow you to easily control YouTube from your Chrome browser. Some of the extensions let you customize the playback window, while others provide easier controls, and one of these adds intuitive keyboard shortcuts to control YouTube from keyboard.

If you are a big YouTube fan (like I am), then these extensions can help to tremendously improve YouTube viewing experience on YouTube.

Note: These extensions do not provide options to download videos. If that is what you are looking for, check out our previous list of Chrome extensions to download YouTube videos.

Magic Actions For YouTube:

Magic Actions For YouTube is a free Chrome extension to control YouTube in a nice way on Google Chrome browser. The extension allows you to watch YouTube videos in Cinema mode which is the part I liked the most. Cinema Mode turns the YouTube playback into cinema like watching videos. The extension is designed smart enough to switch the video playback to cinema mode automatically as soon as a video is played on YouTube. The mode provides a beautiful background with different color options. Also, the backlight in the extension brings the focus on the video, and makes it look great.

Another good part of this extension is its mouse wheel volume control. You can control volume of YouTube with mouse wheel.

Below are some more features of this YouTube extension for Chrome:

Change OSD type to line or text. (Volume control)
Choose OSD color from among multiple colors.
Enables Auto-HD feature automatically when a video is played.
Switch the video to full-screen mode even if you are watching video in cinema mode.
Enable Auto-replay.
Auto-hide player controls.
Hide page elements.
Enable day/night feature.
Enable quick share.

This is one of the most versatile YouTube extension for Chrome that I have come across. Most probably, your search for a nice extension might end here. If you are looking for more, read on (coming up: control Youtube with keyboard).

YouTube Player Keyboard Controls:

YouTube Player Keyboard Controls is a free Chrome extension to control YouTube with keyboard while you are playing videos on YouTube. This extension adds multiple keyboard shortcuts to control common YouTube functions via keyboard. You can play, pause, forward, rewind, control volume; all with keyboard. Just press the shortcut key on your keyboard and control the YouTube on your Google Chrome browser. All the shortcuts work on both flash player and HTML5 player.

Here, are the keyboard shortcuts to control YouTube playback on Chrome browser:

Spacebar – Play/pause.
Right/Left arrow key – Fast forward/rewind video (every skip by the extension is of 5 seconds)
Up and down arrow keys – Volume up and down. You can even increase or decrease the volume by pressing plus or minus keys in the number pad of the keyboard.
Asterisk key – Mute/Unmute.

Note 1: Unlike most of the other Chrome extensions, this extension does not adds any icon to your Google Chrome browser. So, don’t look for that. Just install the extension, and start using the above mentioned keyboard shortcuts for YouTube.

Note 2: During our testing of this extension, we found some of the features would not work fine if some other YouTube extension for Chrome is also installed. When we uninstalled those extensions, this one worked like a charm.

Video Controller:

Video Controller is a free Chrome extension that allows you to control Youtube playback from any Chrome tab. This extension adds an icon next to address bar. When you click on that icon, it shows a small window that has controls for Play, Pause, Volume control, previous, and next. So, without going to the tab where YouTube video is playing, you can control the playback using this extension. If you are playing multiple videos in different tabs for Chrome, then it shows separate controls for each of those videos, with controls nicely lined vertically.

Of course, real use of this extension is if you are playing YouTube videos in the background just for listening to some songs. So, without going to the player window, you can quickly control the YouTube playback. Personally, I prefer to use Muziic for that, instead of going to YouTube.

Well, back to our extension. The extension allows you to control the play/pause, volume up/down, pervious/next from YouTube playlist, and gives one click option to directly go to YouTube window that is playing your video.

YouTube Volume Controller:

YouTube Volume Controller is a free Chrome extension to control YouTube volume from any Chrome window or tab. With YouTube Volume Controller extension, you can easily control multiple videos you might be playing in multiple Chrome tabs. The controller comes with pause/play button, mute button, replay button, and restart button. The good part of this Chrome extension is its setting up of initial value. You can customize the initial volume of YouTube videos varying from 0-100. Also, you can pause or mute all the YouTube videos together.

YouTube 720P, Full Window:

YouTube 720P, Full Window is a free Chrome extension to play YouTube videos in full window mode. The extension is smart enough, that it plays the video automatically in all the available space in your browser. This makes it different than the full screen mode of YouTube, as that mode takes away the browser address bar, Windows status bar, etc. In case of this extension, the browser remains as it is, but the video takes all the space available inside the browser. Click on backspace button to stop the video playback and then select any other video to play. With this extension, you don't need to toggle the video playback to full-screen manually from YouTube video player. The extension plays 720P videos on YouTube.

So, now that you know about most of the good Chrome extensions for YouTube, check them out, and see which one works for you best. These will further enhance your YouTube experience.

And if you know of some other great extension, do mention in comments.

5 Free Chrome Extensions To Control YouTube Playback was originally published at I Love Free Software

Search Files and Folders in Windows with Wise JetSearch

Posted: 26 May 2012 05:00 AM PDT

Wise JetSearch allows you to find your files more easily, it’s a search tool that has a lot of interesting features, which can compliment the basic functions that you get with the default Windows search tool. Keeping track of files can be very difficult, especially now that computers have amazingly large disk space which can be used to store large amounts of files. Wise Jet Search can help you find files located anywhere on your computer, and it can do it in a few clicks.

Default window of Wise JetSearch doesn’t have much on it, you just have the basic search options at the top of the application window. What’s interesting about Wise JetSearch is that next to the default window which is shown above, there is also a small roll down search box which you can use for quick searches, without the need to open up the main application to type in the search term.

This small search field that Wise JetSearch adds is located on the right corner window of the desktop and it will hide as you hover with your mouse over it. Obviously results that you get are the same, regardless of where you’ve made your search. Let’s see what kind of results will Wise JetSearch offer, and if it’s as good or perhaps even better than its competition.

Searching files with Wise JetSearch

Well like it was said in the introduction there is no great mystery when it comes to how file search is done, you select the partition disk where you think file might be, then enter keywords of the files, and click on Search.

We only received one result but that’s because we were very precise about what we were looking for. The search function of Wise JetSearch is very fast and precise. We’ve conducted a search for a short term that we knew was present a lot throughout the system and Wise JetSearch found them all.

You can also check out VX Search tool for windows reviewed by us.

How to use the quick search in Wise JetSearch

Searching with the quick search can be accessed for example when you are not in the position to be in the applications main window but you need to search something quickly. In that case you can simply close the main app, and the Quick search tool will be left running in the upper right corner of the window. When you need to make a search just hover you mouse over the thin line that’s present on the edge of the screen, enter your search term there and click Search, for the results the main application window will appear.

The results for the work box returned a lot more results, which were mainly created by BoxCryptor app. For easier file access Wise JetSearch is offering you to simply right click on the results list and you have several different options to manipulate the found files directly from the program, without having the files opened in the file browser. All in all Wise JetSearch is a decent file search application, definitely give it a try if you need a simple and fast file search.

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Search Files and Folders in Windows with Wise JetSearch was originally published at I Love Free Software

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