Thread: Compprehensive and powerful Tools

EVEN FOR SOMEONE like me who gets to play with a lot of goodies in our test lab - gadgets, hardware, software - you name it, I am always excited when I have the opportunity to check out "free" apps. But more often than not, they tend to be unpolished, unstable, and tend to pack in less functionality, So when I chanced upon these three tools that are surprisingly packed to the brim with amazing features, I couldn't believe there was no need to empty my pockets to make full use of them.

Starting From Scratch

I instantly took a liking to this innovative tool for creating interactive stories, games, and animation, Yes, Scratch, developed by the Lifelong Kindergarten Group at the MIT Media Lab, can do all this and more, All you need is a little bit of creativity, It sports a very intuitive inter¬face which had me creating basic animations in no time, At image searching abilities but often they are not too intuitive.

Photology is an altogether different kind of photo organizer which provides different searching criteria not found in other photo organizers, Other than the normal filters like date, time, file name, etc, you can look for photos based on location (indoor or outdoor), contents (plants, faces, flowers, etc), different photo features(under/over exposed, vertical, in focus, black/white, etc), and color. the outset it was a bit confusing but a few moments of exploring was all I needed to get going - it is that easy. But if you just want to start up right away without much trouble, just going through the Getting Started and Reference Guide available on their website is all you will need to do (you can also find it in the Scratch folder in the DVD), There are also lots of resources for getting more out of it in their site support section.

The only caveat I found is that it doesn't allow you to save projects in formats other than its native format and it is basically meant for shar¬ing your creation with other Scratch users. This is easily done by clicking on the Share \Jutton where it will be uploaded (you need to sign up for an account). Find it free in the Fun@Home section.

An Image Organizer with Brains

Since I got a digital camera, I have been dumping photos into my PC like crazy and with every passing moment, it has become very hard to trace all the images stored inside my 320 GB hard disk. Agreed that some image viewers and organizers come with image searching abilities but often they are not too intuitive.



Photology is an altogether different kind of photo organizer which provides different searching crite¬ria not found in other photo organizers, Other than the normal filters like date, time, file name, etc, you can look for photos based on location (indoor or outdoor), contents (plants, faces, flowers, etc), different photo features (under/over exposed, ver¬tical, in focus, black/white, etc), and color.

It doesn't always give the perfect result by throwing up images not included in the search criteria but other than this little snag, it did its job pretty well. It also comes with basic organizing functionality, image editing tools, and a quick way to share your photos online (Flickr, Picasa, SmugMug, etc). Find it free in the Graphics and Photos section.

An All-in-One with a different Touch

I was not sure what this app was all about initially - it seemed like a tool with multiple-personality attributes. From its name (Capture. NET), I thought it might be an image capturing tool but after I ran it, my impression was that it was a desktop calendar. Turned out that it was both with lots of other useful tools included. It also acts as a screen ruler, image converter/editor, privacy eraser, font manager, file shredder, font manage, and lots more. Find a free version in the Utilities section.