From AppSnap’s web site:

It automatically figures out the latest version, downloads the installer and then installs the software in one seamless step.

An interesting point the web site brings up is Windows does not have a package manager offered by most Linux distributions to automatically notify you of updates, so I imagine this is the application’s overall goal.

AppSnap, at the time of this writing covers 361 free programs: from 7-Zip to ZuluPad (check out the Applications link).

WDS installs itself in the taskbar and will look something like this:

I have the indexing window purposely open in that screen shot because when you first install it it will take time to index everything. If you don’t have the indexing window open, you will know WDS is doing something by a fade-in/fade-out magnifying glass icon next to the clock (you can see it in the screenshot above).

The Big Question: Is this better than the standard built-in XP search?

Yes.

But it depends what you’re looking for.

My biggest gripe: E-Mail searching

I do like the fact you can search thru e-mails without having the client running. If you use Outlook, Outlook Express or Windows Live Mail, WDS is a nice little shortcut to search thru mail quickly.

The only drawback is that it doesn’t show the title of e-mails, just the cryptic-looking file names.

Like this:

Not cool.

There is a specific way you could use WDS where you can see the information that matters when e-mail searching. You have to use the "big" version (by clicking the magnifying glass icon), then click "E-Mail" then purposely select "Large icons" and then you can see e-mail content when searching for it.

Big pain in the rump if you asked me.

Searching everything else? Does just fine.

Aside from the e-mail searching b.s., this is a genuinely good utility for finding anything else in XP. It does find things faster than the standard search does.

Will this slow down your computer?

Only on older systems - especially during the indexing process. For example, I’d never put this on a computer with a Celeron processor in it or on any anything with under 1GB of RAM.

How to uninstall in case you don’t like it

Easy enough: It’s listed as Windows Search 4.0 in your Add/Remove via Control Panel.

Looks like this:

This app is not pretty but it sure is easy. In fact, it’s so easy that it sometimes confuses people. When you install it, all you have to do to create a ZIP or 7z file is just right-click a file, a selection of files or a folder, choose 7-Zip from the context menu and create your ZIP file. That’s all there is to it.

7-Zip will easily open files created by other archive programs such as WinZIP. It will also recognize archive types from Linux such as TAR and GZIP (very handy).

The only archive type others use that 7-Zip does not support (to the best of my knowledge) is RAR. WinRAR is available for that (but it’s not free).

Wavosaur is a small self contained application (doesn’t require any installation) which boasts some impressive features including VST plugins. Outside of music editing, “podcasts” seem to be one of the more practical applications for a wave editing program and this one looks like it can certainly fit the bill… for the attractive price of free.

Although I do not really see a need for a self-contained wave editing program as I can’t imagine people carrying around their sound files on the go, it is nice to know the program is lightweight and probably does not have many (if any) bloat issues.

Mac users never have a problem with QuickTime because it works superb with MacOS. However as many people are aware, Apple doesn’t exactly program things for Windows that “play nice”, so to speak. There are some that think Apple’s QuickTime is so bad they they call it the “New RealPlayer” (in reference to how Real’s RealPlayer software really sucked).

Is there an alternative? Absolutely. You can try out QuickTime Alternative. Compared to regular QuickTime, this loads fast and isn’t bulky at all.

Try it out. You may like it.

DoubleKiller’s web site provides a good description of how their scan works:

DoubleKiller searches single or multiple directories for duplicate files by comparing any combination of file name, size, modification date and content. Using user-defined masks like *.mp3 or *.dll you can limit the scan to files that interest you or protect important files from being scanned. Furthermore you can exclude files in a particular file size range or files with certain attributes, like hidden or system files.

This type of application is ideal if you have several locations where you save files (i.e. on your local drive and a network location) or for finding those ubiquitous file types which get saved everywhere (text, doc, xls, pdf, etc.).

DoubleKiller is a free application and does not require any installation on the client system in order to run. Because of this, keeping it on a flash drive might come in handy.

IE7Pro is a free add-on which adds loads of functionality. From their web site:

IE7Pro includes Tabbed Browsing Management, Spell Check, Inline Search, Super Drag Drop, Crash Recovery, Proxy Switcher, Mouse Gesture, Tab History Browser, Web Accelerator, User Agent Switcher, Webpage Capturer, AD Blocker, Flash Block, Greasemonkey like User Scripts platform, User Plug-ins, MiniDM, Google sponsored search,IE Faster and many more power packed features.

Those familiar with Firefox’s functionality will probably recognize that this add-on nearly levels the playing field with ’standard’ functionality. Without a doubt, this is a no-brainer download for IE7 users.

If you ever needed to record your screen so you can show someone else how to do something, CamStudio is for you, no question.  The files output by CamStudio can be posted to video sharing sites like YouTube easily so there’s no hassle involved.

And for those using Windows Vista, yes, CamStudio does work great with Vista.

How does CamStudio compared to Camtasia (paid application)?

I get asked this question often. The answer is that Camtasia is a much better application and is packed with stuff that makes it worth it’s price. However, being that CamStudio is free you really can’t complain about it.

RAM Idle runs in the background and, well, from the editor’s review:

The program icon sits in the desktop tray and displays the amount of memory your PC has available at any given time.If you know you’ll need a certain amount, you can specify that amount; otherwise, you can let the program run automatically to balance memory needs vs. memory available.

While I’m not exactly sure how this is accomplished, one key feature is the ability to assign memory to a specific application so you know it has the memory available it requires (for games perhaps).

Personally, these kind of things are not up my alley, but I would be interested to see how effective it is. If anyone uses this program, please post a comment.

The single coolest thing about Electric Sheep is that people are submitting new “sheep” all the time. What this means is that someone will upload a new 3D style pattern for the screen saver and your computer will locally cache a copy of it. And even if your computer isn’t connected to the internet it will still show the existing sheep. This keeps your screen saver anti-boring.

Contrary to the title, there are no actual images of sheep. It’s just the name of the software.

For those who ask how the sheep are downloaded, it’s done via bittorrent protocol.

Another perk: Electric Sheep not only works on Windows but also Redhat, Debian, Gentoo, FreeBSD and Mac OS X.

Give it a try.