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Sally was very interested in converting her physical DVD disks to electronic media files that she could play on her iTunes, iPod, iPhone or AppleTV. But, the problem was that there was no easy way to convert the huge DVD files and make them fit and play smoothly on her mobile and iTunes supported devices. Then Sally came across a really great, Open Source program called Handbrake. Little did she know this free software tool would be the answer to her problems.

Handbrake is an awesome utility that will not only compress DVD and other video sources into a single file, it will also create a final video file that is formatted and encoded properly for your Apple device. Sally looked at BestBuy and a few online retailers for a product that would compress and reformat her video library but came up empty handed.

She then looked at the Open Source software sources on the Internet and was very surprised to see the large number of utilities that claimed to do exactly what she wanted. After a few mis-starts with some spyware soaked programs, Sally read a recommendation for a good number of open source software programs, among them was VLC player, Xvid, and Handbrake. To her surprise, Handbrake installed easily and didn’t have any embedded spyware, gray ware or malware. She got the install done and was compressing her first DVD within 10 minutes. The program is so easy to use and has many automated features for even the novice end user that has attempted a video transfer. Sally was really impressed with the results as well. She could strip out the previews, menus and just start the movie exactly at the main title screen. Handbrake had so many flexible options that she started a huge conversion project for her favorite movies. Many people don’t know about programs like Handbrake because they assume for anything to be any good, they must pay a lot of money for it. In this case, the Open Source development efforts of people involved with Handbrake look out for the end-user and have produced a great and stable video compression product that helps get your media where you want it.

Anyone out there who has a less than stellar digital photo knows that there are many different tools and applications that can help users with photo editing and retouching or even photo manipulation. However most of these programs such as PhotoShop come with a very high price tag as well as large computing requirements. Most average users do not need all of the bells and whistles of programs such as PhotoShop and relatively few want to spend the money for this program.

Fortunately there is a program out there than can fulfill the needs of these users, and even those of higher-end users. GIMP, GNU Image Manipulation Program, is a perfect alternative, not only because it is free, but it also provides many high-end photo manipulation and retouching features. The product is perfect for bloggers looking to update their logo, add a digital file, or using the animation features to make short videos, once you the Xvid download.

It is offered free as part of the Open Source, GNU General Public License community. It has won awards, as well as accolades from its user base. In fact, many professional designers and artists have been known to use GIMP over PhotoShop and other such programs.

GIMP can be used in several different ways. It can be used as a paint program or as a photo retouching program. It also has the ability to be a batch photo processing system. It will also render photos on a mass production scale, as well as having the ability to convert photo formats.

GIMP is easily customizable to individual user needs and tastes. There are widgets, customized icons and custom tool sets. The program uses modules or docks that will allow a user to toggle back and forth between images and open panes. It also has a preview feature that allows the user to see changes being made before actually having the program make those changes.

GIMP is a great program for anyone — amateur or professional — looking for a great photo editing application.

Are you looking for a way to plan your life? Whether it be goals, plans or just general day-to-day activities. Have you considered trying mind mapping? No, mind mapping is not some brain scan that your doctor uses. Mind mapping is simply a way to visualize your creative planning phases. It involves not only creativity and thinking, but also problem solving.

Basically, you start with a single idea or theme and branch out from there, adding topics and sub-topics that are in someway related to that idea. It actually works very similarly to the way the brain does function, thus why it is called mind mapping.

And of course, this process can be made easier through the use of a software package. One such package available is called FreeMind, a free, Open Source program available under the GNU General Public license. It is available on several different platforms so it is available to many users.

This award-winning program will allow you to create and edit a graphical view of your concept or idea. It approaches the idea process in a non-linear, creative approach. It allows users to approach traditional brainstorming from different angles — a sort of “thinking outside the box” approach.

Some features that FreeMind provides include:

-Ability to save files to XML
-Folding branches
-Ability to place clouds around branches
-Nodes can have individual icons
-Hyper linking from nodes to web pages and files
-FreeMind for the web can utilize Flash or Java
-Document export to OpenDocument or PDF for easy sharing
-FreeMind documents can be exported to XHTML as well as HTML
-Graphical linking

So the next time you need to be creative in your planning of ideas and goals, try using FreeMind and you might just find yourself much more successful because you were “thinking out side the box!”

Do you own and run your own website? If so, you’ve probably involved yourself in the common habit of revisiting your own pages again and again, from anywhere you have access to the web. Additionally, like most webmasters, you’ve probably caught typos, glitches, broken segments of code, or other errors during these browsing sessions. If you want to make quick changes to resolve these site errors, you can likely do so before you even get back to your home computer — and all you’ll need is FTP access and a NotePad program.

The first thing you’ll need to do is access your website via FTP. This can be done through many desktop environments, including the “connect to server” option in Mac or the Microsoft Explorer interface in Windows, but you can also download free and lightweight FTP programs like FileZilla. Once you’re logged into your server, simply download the HTML file for the page that needs a fix.

Chances are the computer you’re on doesn’t have an advanced web editing program, but does have a standard NotePad program. HTML and CSS files can both be manipulated through NotePad. If you’re really looking to sort through the code effectively, you can even download open source software like NotePad++, which will let you see the code more readily.

Even without an expert-level set of experience in coding, you can browse through the HTML file in text editor, tracking down the text or code segment that needs a tweak. Once you’ve located the appropriate segment of the file, make the change and re-upload the HTML document via FTP. Confirm that you want to overwrite the file, then re-visit the page that had the error. Your fix should be visible, and you will be able to breathe a little easier knowing your site’s minor issue has been resolved.

While computers have taken on a great many uses in the 21st century, one of the primary functions remains browsing through multimedia. Online and offline, through audio and video, users obsess over their favorite bits of media. However, when it comes to “potential losses,” multimedia is one of the most at-risk categories when your computer crashes. Entire music and video libraries can be decimated in an instant regardless of how impressive your portable multimedia player is, so it’s important that you learn the basics of backing up these large files. Here are four of the best ways to do so.

-Use a web service.
There are various online storage sites that will allow you to keep data online. Not only does this allow you to have a backup for your files, but it means you can access the multimedia from any location where you can get on the net.

-Use external drives.
While the storage size of external drives has increased dramatically, the price has continued to decline. You can purchase an 8 gigabyte flash drive for just $15, giving you enough room to store up to 8000 minutes of audio or 800 minutes of video. Have more media than that? An external terabyte hard drive can be purchased for just $100.

-Use internal drives. A second hard-drive increases your system resilience in the case of a crash, and will help expand your storage dramatically. Internal hard drives, while a bit harder to install, are even cheaper than external drives.

-Use a web server.
If you’re willing to pay a small monthly fee, you can get essentially unlimited online storage space through a web server. While you’ll have to learn how to use FTPS, this is one of the most reliable backup methods.

By using one of these simple tactics, you can rest assured that, no matter what happens to the rest of your computer, your multimedia will be safe.