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Software
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Quicken: This is my financial tool for keeping track of my investments, charge cards, bank accounts, etc. This goes with TurboTax each year for tax season. |
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Microsoft Office: I use Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Publisher, and Outlook. Occasionally, I use Access to create a database file to support a web project which requires a database. |
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Microsoft FrontPage: My favorite web creation tool. Great product, lots of excellent features, easy to use. Note: I have just purchased a copy of Dreamweaver MX, and plan to learn how to use it. Looks like a very powerful program. |
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Adobe Photoshop: My favorite image editor! This is the absolute best there is in this category! |
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Adobe ImageReady: This application, which comes with Photoshop, allows the creation of web navigation bars, complete with javascript programming. |
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ACDSee: My favorite image viewer program from ACD Systems Ltd. The raw speed of this program makes it a wonderful tool for finding the right image on my 100+ PhotoCD's. |
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Visual Basic: This is truly a wonderful product! I use it to create applications for work and home, and of course VBScript for creating Active Server Pages for dynamic websites. |
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Visio Technical: This is a wonderful drawing program - I just barely know how to use. Even so, I do some pretty great drawings - such as web server layouts, room layouts (for home remodeling planning), organization charts, and more. |
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Panorama Factory: This program allows me to create a very large image from a series of images which overlap. The process is called "stitching." A sample of the power of this program can be viewed in the Photography section under Panoramas. This is available for only $35 at panoramafactory.com. |
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RipEditBurn: This audio processing program, from Blaze Audio, allows me to convert files to MP3, edit them, compress them to higher levels, etc. Very useful audio tool. |
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Fidelity Active Trader Pro: This is a very powerful trading tool I use every day. I can preload a batch of trades, and when the market condition is right, click a single button to execute all of the trades. Great real-time charts and streaming market data. |
Software Utilities
There are a few utilities which should be mentioned, due to their usefulness.
| Monaco EZcolor: I use this utility, and the associated hardware device to calibrate my monitor, printer, and scanner. I can now "see" what the printer will print before I print it, and adjust the color of the printout directly on-screen. Required for any serious digital photographer. |
Continued in right column...
Utilities list, continued...
| FTP Voyager: this is a shareware utility for doing FTP access. I use it in addition to FrontPage to manage my websites. Very nice graphical user interface, and quite powerful. Get it on the web. |
| QuickKeys: I used this on the Mac, and when I switched to the PC, I really missed it. Then they came out with the PC version! I have lots of special keyboard macros that do very common functions. Saves me lots of time! |
| FileBackPC: This is a great shareware backup program. I use one central program to back up everything on my net. I really like the "backup on change" feature - it does real-time backups while I work. Supports multiple levels of backup, archiving, etc. |
| Diskeeper: This program runs my disk defragmentation in the background. |
| IHateSpan: This utility allows me to bounce spam back to its source, as well as generate reports to spam sites. Controlling spam has become a major issue for most of us. |
Games
I used to spend a lot of time playing computer games. I remember the "good old days" of the Apple II, with Bandits, Gorgon, Alien Rain, etc. The newer games are certainly nicer looking on-screen, but frankly, they are no more playable - and sometimes less playable - then the original computer games!
Lately, I am too busy making websites and doing photography to play many games. My current favorites are:
| Age of Empires II: This is really an excellent strategy game. I have version 1.0, the expansion kit, as well as 2.0. I love a good 4-way game with friends against 4 computer players. |
| Civilization II: OK, by now you have guessed I like strategy games! This is a favorite! I have spent many hours playing just one game! I have Civ III, but have not had the time to learn how to use it... |
| Mahjongg games: Solitaire versions of the game abound. I have several shareware versions I enjoy. |
| Klondike: A simple solitaire card game. I have several shareware versions I enjoy. Spider is a variant that comes with XP, which I play when I use my laptop. |
| Jigsaw Puzzles: these are from shockwave.com, and are very nicely done. |
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