Does Your PC Have Worms?

Does Your PC Have Worms?

by: Joel Walsh

Worms aren't just for dogs anymore. Find out how to inoculate your computer against these nasty parasites. What Are Worms? Worms are descended from viruses and are even nastier. Just as ever stronger doses of pesticide breed ever more resilient locusts, better and better anti-spyware software bred ever more devious viruses. Finally, some virus designers stopped having their creations infect and take over files the way real viruses infect and take over cells. Instead, they created programs that could stand on their own and cause plenty of trouble without the help of any other software applications. Just worms are independent organisms that can infect a host directly, so do computer worms infect computers directly. What Do Worms Do? Worm designers are often even more sinister than virus designers, since worm designers are not just vandals. Worm designers often use their creations to achieve specific goals: • Backdoor creation. Worms often try to set up another kind of malware, a backdoor. A backdoor is a hidden opening in your network connection that lets the worm send data out and take data in. Practically speaking, the data it's sending out are often spam emails, and the data it takes in are instructions on spam emails to send. • Denial of service attack. Some worm designers really are vandals rather than profit-hungry con artists sending spam. But their vandalism can be more targeted. They use worms to send out numerous requests to remote computers, such as web servers, in order to overwhelm them and therefore shut them down. This is called a denial of service attack. • Spyware, Trojan, adware, and virus installation. Worms are often used simply to unleash other forms of malware on a computer that might otherwise block them. • Information theft and fraud.Worms can multitask in order to set up spyware that gathers sensitive information--often financial information--and then set up backdoors, Trojans, viruses, or dialers to disseminate the stolen data. How Do Worms End Up on a PC? Worms enter PCs just as viruses, spyware and other malware do: any way they can! Some favorite points of entry for worms: • Websites can actually download software to your computer without you realizing it. This software includes not only worms, but also spyware, adware, viruses, and other malware. These malware programs find their way into websites either by the deliberate design of the site owner or because hackers have installed the software on the website's server. • Peer-to-peer file-sharing networkscontain many nice-enough-looking files that are really worms. One of the sneakiest disguises is a filename that indicates the spyware is really a video of a beautiful actress. • Email, the favored route of viruses, can still be exploited by Spyware. But since new email programs usually block the automatic opening of file attachments, this is less of a problem than it used to be. • Any internet connection inevitably lets data flow both in and out, and so is vulnerable to attacks by worms. How Do You Get Rid of Worms? There's really only one good way to make sure your computer is rid of worms: scan it with multiple antivirus and anti-spyware programs using a full-system scan. Worms are tricky, so anything less than a full-system scan might let them escape. Worse, with new worms coming out all the time, some antivirus and anti-spyware packages may not even know about a new worm until after its wreaking havoc on your machine. That's why you should try using more than one antivirus program and more than one anti-spyware program to increase your odds of successfully detecting the malware. Don't have more than one anti-spyware and antivirus software? You'd better start downloading. After all, worms won't take excuses.

Does Google Hire "Mad Scientists?"

Does Google Hire "Mad Scientists?"

by: Jim Edwards

Online search giant, Google, often tests the waters for new services by rolling out a "beta" (first) version of an idea to gauge public reaction. By employing this strategy, it's easy to imagine a building full of creative, "mad scientist" types cooking up the latest and greatest online gizmos. In fact, you can take a peek at what's cooking at Google by logging on to There you'll find glimpses of the true "bleeding edge" technology Google thinks will shape the way we use information on the Internet in the very near future. ** Online Video Search ** Log on to http://video.google.com to see the next step in Google's quest to become the world's foremost repository of online and offline information. This first attempt at providing searchable data about video is currently restricted to recent television shows. Unlike the video search at rival Yahoo! ( http://video.yahoo.com ) which provides a searchable database of actual video clips available for viewing right online, Google's video search results take the browser to a page with still frame images and text transcripts of the show. Since it rates much easier to search text than video, this particular format of transcript combined with still frame should win out over the straight video clip method (at least for now). ** Help With Keyword Searches ** One problem everyone encounters periodically online involves wanting to find something, but not knowing exactly how to phrase the request to a search engine. You sort of know what you want, but aren't 100% sure how to phrase it, or the results you get from the phrases you use don't give you the results you want. Log on to http://labs.google.com and click the "Google Suggest" link (currently third link from the top on the left side of the page). This link takes you to a search page where, as you type in your keyword phrase, Google will make additional suggestions on related search terms you should consider. Other gizmos in the Google "lab" include: Google Maps. Google Desktop, and Google Scholar. ** Recent Graduates From The "Lab" ** Some recent graduates of the Google Lab include: "Web Alerts" - Log on to http://www.google.com/alerts to receive an email notification any time a new web page or news article enters the Google database containing a search phrase you specify. This provides an excellent means to quickly find new sites that mention anything from your favorite movie star to use of a trademarked product name you want to monitor. "Search By Location" - Log on to http://local.google.com to find local businesses and other interesting information based on geography. A search on "printing" in "norge, va" immediately brought up the Printwell printer I use, and a search for "mexican" in "lightfoot, va" turned up my favorite Mexican restaurant. Also, a search for "museum" in "williamsburg, va" turned up some very interesting places I didn't know existed, even though we live in a tourist town. I actually doubt that Google hires mad scientists, but by the looks of all the projects they have going, it's safe to say they hire extremely creative people who like to push the boundaries of technology.

Does Google Hire "Mad Scientists?"

Does Google Hire "Mad Scientists?"

by: Jim Edwards

Online search giant, Google, often tests the waters for new services by rolling out a "beta" (first) version of an idea to gauge public reaction. By employing this strategy, it's easy to imagine a building full of creative, "mad scientist" types cooking up the latest and greatest online gizmos. In fact, you can take a peek at what's cooking at Google by logging on to There you'll find glimpses of the true "bleeding edge" technology Google thinks will shape the way we use information on the Internet in the very near future. ** Online Video Search ** Log on to http://video.google.com to see the next step in Google's quest to become the world's foremost repository of online and offline information. This first attempt at providing searchable data about video is currently restricted to recent television shows. Unlike the video search at rival Yahoo! ( http://video.yahoo.com ) which provides a searchable database of actual video clips available for viewing right online, Google's video search results take the browser to a page with still frame images and text transcripts of the show. Since it rates much easier to search text than video, this particular format of transcript combined with still frame should win out over the straight video clip method (at least for now). ** Help With Keyword Searches ** One problem everyone encounters periodically online involves wanting to find something, but not knowing exactly how to phrase the request to a search engine. You sort of know what you want, but aren't 100% sure how to phrase it, or the results you get from the phrases you use don't give you the results you want. Log on to http://labs.google.com and click the "Google Suggest" link (currently third link from the top on the left side of the page). This link takes you to a search page where, as you type in your keyword phrase, Google will make additional suggestions on related search terms you should consider. Other gizmos in the Google "lab" include: Google Maps. Google Desktop, and Google Scholar. ** Recent Graduates From The "Lab" ** Some recent graduates of the Google Lab include: "Web Alerts" - Log on to http://www.google.com/alerts to receive an email notification any time a new web page or news article enters the Google database containing a search phrase you specify. This provides an excellent means to quickly find new sites that mention anything from your favorite movie star to use of a trademarked product name you want to monitor. "Search By Location" - Log on to http://local.google.com to find local businesses and other interesting information based on geography. A search on "printing" in "norge, va" immediately brought up the Printwell printer I use, and a search for "mexican" in "lightfoot, va" turned up my favorite Mexican restaurant. Also, a search for "museum" in "williamsburg, va" turned up some very interesting places I didn't know existed, even though we live in a tourist town. I actually doubt that Google hires mad scientists, but by the looks of all the projects they have going, it's safe to say they hire extremely creative people who like to push the boundaries of technology.

Digital SLR Camera versus a Compact Digital Camera

Digital SLR Camera versus a Compact Digital Camera

by: Virginia Wong

Digital Single Lens Reflex (SLR) cameras are excellent cameras that produce clearer, sharper and more colourful images than most point and shoot digital cameras available. With prices falling rapidly, they are now more affordable then ever. With the price gap between an entry model digital SLR camera and the most expensive compact digital camera narrowing; the question is… do I spend the extra money and get a Digital SLR camera? or save a few hundred dollars and purchase the best digital compact camera. Well, it really depends on your budget; however if you do spend the extra money, here's what you get: In addition to the price falls in the Digital SLR models, the performance on these cameras has increased year on year with the latest Digital SLR cameras being quicker and faster than ever before. They have improved to such an extent that power up or start-up time is near instantaneous with virtually no lag time. “Lag time is the time between you pressing the shutter release button and the camera actually taking the shot”. This delay can vary quite a bit between different camera models and it is one of the biggest drawbacks compared to a compact digital camera. The latest digital SLR cameras have virtually no lag times and react in the same way as conventional film cameras, even in burst mode. Compact digital cameras are catching up; however the difference is still significant. A lag time of ~0.5 seconds can result in you missing the heartbeat of the moment and hence that potential great picture. Digital SLR camera also has a larger sensor versus a smaller sensor in a compact digital camera. This equates to higher sensitivity and less noise and results in the camera taking clearer pictures in low light. (They also have better autofocus speed in low light as well). A measure of sensitivity in a digital camera is ISO and a typical ISO range for a Digital SLR camera varies from ISO 100 – 1600 with the latter being more sensitive. The ISO range for a compact digital camera varies from ISO 50 – 400. In summary, the higher the ISO rating, the greater the sensitivity and the better the photo can be taken in low light. The Digital SLR cameras have a much longer battery life due to the limited use of the LCD screen. Please note, that as the LCD screen is only used for viewing the image, the battery life of a digital SLR can allow up to 2000 shots per charge in some cameras compared to 500 for a good point and shoot digital camera. Digital SLR cameras also allow you to interchange lens such as adding a zoom or macro lens when required. On the negative side of a Digital SLR camera; they are usually larger and heavier than compact digital cameras, the image cannot be previewed on the LCD screen prior taking the picture. If you really require the image to be viewed on the LCD prior to taking the picture, there are third party manufacturers that produce LCD screens that attaches to the viewfinder and allow the scene to be view just like a compact digital camera. The other drawback is the inability to take videos and finally, lenses are expensive with the majority costing more than the camera itself. Although compact digital cameras cannot compete on features with a Digital SLR camera, they are great value, have the ability to take videos and are portable. If you have decided to purchase a Digital SLR camera I recommend you visit other websites which has Information on Digital Camera and compare the features. If you are still undecided, purchase both.

Digital Light Processing

Digital Light Processing

by: Mitchell Medford

In essence, DLP is a nanotechnology implementation of the old survival technique of using a mirror to signal for help -- its purpose is to shine a controlled series of light flashes on a target to send a message. The mirror in this case is part of an optical semiconductor called a digital micro mirror device, or DMD. The DMD chip contains not one but an entire array of up to 2.1 million microscopic mirrors, each just 16 micrometers square (less than one-fifth the size of a human hair) and 1 micrometer apart! The DMD (Digital Micromirror Device) chip was invented in 1987 by TI scientist Larry Hornbeck, who had been exploring the manipulation of reflected light since 1977. In 1992, TI started a project to explore the DMD's commercial viability. A year later, it named the new technology DLP and formed a separate group, now called the DLP (Digital Light Processing) Products division, to develop commercial display applications. The DMD chip is driven by a digital video or graphic signal in which each digital pixel corresponds to a single mirror on the DMD. Add a light source and a projection lens, and the mirrors can reflect a digital image onto a viewing screen or other surface. Each mirror is mounted on tiny hinges, so it can be tilted 12 degrees toward or away from the light source, creating a light or dark pixel on the projection surface. DLP (Digital Light Processing) technology utilizes a small digital micro mirror device (DMD) to tilt micro mirrors less than the size of a human hair in width toward or away from a white lamp inside the DLP television. This process creates a light or dark pixel on the face of the projection screen, depending on how much light is reflected by the mirror. Each mirror can turn on or off several thousands of times per second, so this technology can reproduce 1024 shades of gray. There are four main components in the system: the DMD chip, the color wheel, the light source, and the optics. Light from the lamp passes through a color wheel filter and into the DMD chip, which will switch its mirrors on or off in relation to the color reflecting off them, producing an image. DLP-based projection displays are well-suited to high-brightness and high-resolution applications: (a) the digital light switch is reflective and has a high fill factor, resulting in high optical efficiency at the pixel level and low pixelation effects in the projected image; (b) as the resolution and size of the DMD increase, the overall system optical efficiency grows because of higher lamp-coupling efficiency; (c) because the DMD operates with conventional CMOS voltage levels (~5volts), integrated row and column drivers are readily employed to minimize the complexity and cost impact of scaling to higher resolutions; (d) because the DMD is a reflective technology, the DMD chip can be effectively cooled through the chip substrate, thus facilitating the use of high-power projection lamps without thermal degradation of the DMD; and(e) finally, DLP-based systems are all-digital (digital video in, digital light out), so reproduction of the original video source material is accurate and the image quality is stable with time. A Note on Methodology: Size is the most relevant attribute to investigate when evaluating the picture quality of DLP televisions. Today, DLP displays can be purchased in sizes ranging from 43" to 65" on the diagonal. When compared with LCD large LCD TV cannot reproduce black levels remotely close those of a smaller LCD TV. Therefore, when comparing units of similar size, the DLP set will display richer black levels. Color saturation is the absence of gray in color. The less gray, the more saturated the color is said to be. The method with which color is rendered differs for each technology. The DLP television's color accuracy is heavily dependent on the color wheel filters for single chip designs. Since the color wheel has fixed color filters (red, green, and blue), color adjustment is limited on these single chip designs. Big Screen TVs are more popular than ever. The days of projection sets that took up half the living room with bulky cabinets, only viewable in total darkness, with everyone crowded around the center of the screen, and high prices are gone. Today's big screens TV's are brighter, slimmer, viewable from the same angles as their Tube counterparts, and with prices for entry-level sets around $1,500, they have become more affordable than ever.

Custom Gaming Laptops - Five Things You Must Consider When Building a Gaming Laptop

Custom Gaming Laptops - Five Things You Must Consider When Building a Gaming Laptop

by: Laura Alter

Gone are the days when you would have been laughed at if you walked into an all-night LAN party carrying your trusty laptop and expecting to hang with the giant computer towers standing at everyone’s feet. The gaming laptop computers of today sport huge, crisp LCD screens, cutting-edge video cards and full-size keyboards. Not only can these gaming laptop computers hang with the standard clunky computer tower, but they can also be ordered fully custom to meet the exact specifications of any gamer. Since there are so many customizable components in these laptops, a standard practice has been to create what some call a “system builder.” This is the page where you get to add and subtract components through drop-down menus in order to create the best gaming laptop computer for your needs and your budget. This type of page can be overwhelming to someone just starting the gaming laptop shopping process, but it is very manageable if you take it just one component at a time. The Gaming Laptop GPU This is the heart of a gaming laptop computer. The GPU (graphics processing unit) is a component that will make or break your gaming experience. If your GPU isn’t up to snuff, your games won’t play. Without getting into specific models since they change all the time, the key is that the graphics card not share resources with the computer. A gaming laptop video card must have its own memory on board. Generally speaking, standard off-the-shelf laptops will not have this feature. The two current makers of laptop video cards are nVIDIA and ATI. Without the Screen, You Don’t Have Much What good is a gaming laptop without a screen that can actually render your games? Now certainly, you can connect an external monitor, but if you can’t actually play on your gaming laptop without that external monitor, then your laptop isn’t all that mobile. While the technology and terminology for LCDs (liquid crystal displays) could take up an entire article in itself, there are a few key points to keep in mind when choosing from available LCD options for your new gaming laptop computer: native resolution, aspect ratio, rise and fall time, contrast, viewing angle, and size. Native Resolution. The native resolution is simply the setting at which your screen will render the clearest images. Since games are constantly in motion, slightly soft edges may not bother most gamers, but keep in mind that while this is your gaming laptop, you will likely also use it for other things like surfing the Internet. If the resolution isn’t comfortable, you aren’t going to enjoy using it. Aspect Ratio. As you probably know, a movie theater screen and a TV screen have different proportions. Likewise, there are widescreen format gaming laptops and there are laptops that have a standard aspect ratio –- like that of a TV. A widescreen format gaming laptop (a 16:10 ratio) has advantages and disadvantages. Many games today do not have a widescreen mode. This means that the game may stretch across the screen and become distorted or you may run it with black bars that fill in the sides. There are ways to get around this, but if you want an out of the box perfect experience, the widescreen format may not be for you. That said, a widescreen LCD does offer plenty of screen real estate for web surfing and other type of computer activities, and a game played in a wide format setting offers an expansive field of view. For this reason, there are some very loyal widescreen-loving gamers out there. Do your best to find a balance between current and future technology and what your computer habits are beyond gaming. Even with its limitations, the widescreen format is found on most of the best gaming laptop computers. Rise and Fall. The phrase ‘rise and fall time’ is used to describe how fast the LCD can respond to changes. In the past, LCDs have been plagued with the inability to render images as fast as computer games can spit them out. This presents a major problem for laptop gamers because if they can’t see the images properly, they can’t play the game properly. This lag can mean the difference between playing to win and barely playing. Fortunately, gaming laptop LCDs have come a long way and they are only getting better. While once it was impossible to game on a laptop screen, the gaming laptop LCDs of today offer 25 milliseconds or less rise and fall time while generally off-the-shelf laptops have 40 milliseconds or less rise and fall time. Contrast. If a gaming laptop LCD has poor contrast, that means that the black areas aren’t quite as black as they should be and the white areas aren’t quite as white. This is important to a laptop gamer because you have to see the game properly -– as it was intended to be seen -– in order to compete effectively. Look for a contrast ratio of 400:1 or higher in a custom gaming laptop computer. Viewing Angle. This is an often-overlooked LCD feature, but it must be considered if you are building a gaming laptop computer. Many high quality LCDs on the market are difficult to see clearly at any angle other than straight on and at the right height. This can be a big drawback to gaming on a LCD screen because a screen with poor viewing angles won’t allow others to watch the screen as you play and also hurts your view when doing something as simple as adjusting your seating, which can require you to then adjust to position of your laptop screen to see it properly again. But gaming on a laptop does not mean that you are doomed to have poor viewing angles. There are LCDs on the market that have amazing viewing angles –- up to 120 degrees. These screens not only allow gaming onlookers, but they also allow you to use that giant, crisp screen to do things like play movies and even make presentations. Size. In a gaming laptop computer, size is everything. Most gaming laptops are large, robust pieces of electronics. Having a machine of this stature means you also get to have a large screen. The best gaming laptop computer LCD screens out there are at least 15 inches. A crowd favorite is a 17 inch widescreen (even with the challenges that widescreens present). Largr 19 inch laptop screens are just starting to be talked about with consumers expecting to see 19 inch or even large models on the market in the near future. The best way to really get a feel for what laptop LCDs are all about is to take a trip to a local box store and play with the LCDs on the display laptops while keeping in mind what you have read here. While these laptops are not custom gaming laptops, you can see what the sizes really look like, what different resolutions look like, and what the viewing angles truly are so you can start to develop your own preferences. The RAM – What Type and How Much? The RAM (random access memory) found in laptops is called SODIMM (small outline dual inline memory module). The RAM is responsible for your processing power. If you are shopping for a custom gaming laptop, you will generally be offered DDR2 RAM with the choice of how much you want in your computer. Most high-end games being released today need 1GB of RAM for optimum, lag-free game play. Some people are going with 2GB to ensure that they can run multiple applications along with the game and not experience any slow down in response time. This is a large investment and you want to be able to use this gaming laptop for some time in the future. Most custom laptops are user upgradeable, but this should be left up to professionals. The CPU – Not Just Mobile Technology The CPUs (central processing units) found in many custom gaming laptops are identical to those found in desktops. These chips require a great deal of cooling power, which in turn can make your laptop louder than light weight, lower power ultra portables when the fans kick on and it can become somewhat warm to the touch. Don’t be alarmed by this -– it is normal. And with these desktop processors comes screaming power! Don’t waste your money on the latest CPU release that likely has an inflated price tag (and that price will likely come down before long). Stick with a current CPU speed that is offered by a reputable custom gaming laptop reseller, and you really can’t go wrong. The Gaming Laptop Hard Drive This is the final component to consider when building a gaming laptop. Laptop hard drives come in a variety of speeds and capacities ranging from 4200 to 7200 RPMs and 40 to over 100 GBs. For the most part, this is user preference. Whenever possible, go for a 7200 RPM hard drive, but if you need a capacity not offered in this speed, it’s okay to go for the 5400 RPM drive. Take a look at your current computer, and buy your capacity based on this. Also keep in mind that with many custom gaming laptop manufacturers, you have the ability to upgrade or add another hard drive at a later date. At the end of the day, gaming laptop computers are all about power. Don’t expect a twelve-pound notebook with a desktop processor, numerous fans, a giant heatsink, and independent video card to last on battery power all that long. But do make sure to enjoy the jawdrops that you’ll get as you walk into your regular LAN party location with your new, screaming-fast gaming laptop computer. Crack that puppy open, fire it up, and stand clear of the drool as you take on your favorite game with fellow gamers gathered around to take in the action. Gaming is not just for desktops anymore!

Create Your Own Webcomic

Create Your Own Webcomic

by: Daniel Punch

Syndicated comic authors have been complaining about newspaper size restrictions, content censoring and similar issues for a long time. Comic enthusiasts have been increasingly irritated by the treatment their entertainment medium receives as well. Then along came the Internet, providing unlimited and unrestricted distribution possibilities. Thus the webcomic was born. There are millions of webcomics out there, dealing with such vast topics as video games, college life, samurai, Lego men, identity and self esteem, depression, suicide, children and joy. People write them either for a living, for fun, as stress relief, for artistic expression, or often just for the hell of it. Then they stick their creations on the web and hope that just one more person will find and enjoy the fruits of their labour. There seem to be several hundred new comics created each and every day. These often dwindle and fade after only a few months. Occasionally, however, a comic rises above the rest and gains such popularity that the creator is able to forgo all other work and scrape a living solely off the proceeds generated by their websites. Some examples of such are Penny-Arcade, PvP, CtrlAltDel and Squidi.net. Many people, when introduced to the world of webcomics, think to themselves "Wouldn't it be cool to have my own comic?" and a few go beyond this and create their own. So how can a newcomer ensure that their comic continues beyond the first few weeks of enthusiasm? Now before I go into some useful tips it is probably worth noting that I am the proud owner of a failed webcomic. It went for a few months before hitting a few snags and then grinding into the ground. I have plans to return to creating the comics, but as of yet have not. So I'm not really drawing from a foundation of success, more of failure and an understanding of some of the main factors contributing to my failure. For starters, you're going to need to plan a little. It's unfortunate, unfair and certainly not fun, but it is necessary. Sit down and think about your comic. Come up with a location setting, some characters and maybe even a few plots to test them in. Run the characters through some adventures and see how they react and how you react to them. Your characters will grow and change throughout this process, and continue to do so throughout the life of your comic but you need to get a handle on their basic character traits. For some reason the majority of comics revolve around a group of people (usually guys) that are somewhat geeky and live together. Usually in a university dorm. I would imagine that this is because that's the general life of the majority of webcomic authors. The premise itself also makes an awful lot of sense for the basis of a comic. When designing my own webcomic the process went a little something like this: I designed the main characters, most of which were drawings that I had been playing with since high school. Then I needed a reason for them to constantly see each other and interact, so I got them living together. They needed character traits that I could relate to, so they become university-aged students that had at least a passing interest in the geeky side of life. I drew my first few strips and showed them to some friends, who liked them, so started looking into putting them online. The initial line up included two guys who lived together, a female love interest for one of the characters and a talking animal (in my case a frog, because I had this frog that I'd been drawing for years and had become quite attached to him). At this point I wasn't very experienced with webcomics, having only really read the syndicated newspaper comics that the syndicated press companies post online. So I started looking through some of the major comics, only to find that Sluggy Freelance had the talking animals, geeky guys that lived together and female love interest already covered. A bit more research revealed that the "university students living together" was covered in the large majority of comics. Furthermore, having a kind of wacky (and just a little stupid) character, and a more sensible and reserved one was practically a given. Then, to rub salt in the wound, I found that another comic had its main character design very similar to my own. So I got rid of the frog, removed the focus on gaming and university and otherwise left the comic as it was. Not entirely original. Anyway, the point is that you should probably try to be more original. Check through your concept and remove the whole university students living together with wacky talking inappropriately anthropomorphic sidekicks. You'll be better off in the long run and have a more original creation. Before you jump headfirst into publishing your comics online, you should build up a bit of a backlog of comics. Try to draw at least ten or so quality comics that you would be proud to have on your site. If you're going to have a story-based comic then it would be a good idea to plan your first story arc. It is really useful to maintain this backlog of comics whenever possible, so that you can fall behind in the creation of the comics but still have content to post online. Nothing turns away readers faster than failing to provide them with content when you say you will. If you eat into the backlog, try to draw a few extra strips so that it doesn't get diminished. As a helpful guide for your comics, decide roughly what format they will take (e.g. three or four panel gag strips etc.) and draw up the panels on your computer. You can then print these and draw the strips within the panels, ensuring that they stay neat and consistent. When the comics have been drawn, scan them into your computer and touch them up any way you like. It's generally the best practice to remove speech balloons and text and add these on computer, because it will usually be neater and easier to read. Remember to fit balloons around the speech, not the speech into the balloons. It's amazing how often this is forgotten. Some good fonts, free for non-commercial use, can be found at http://blambot.com. Don't get too stressed about your artwork, I found that most people don't mind slightly inconsistent and not overly fantastic artwork provided they enjoy the content of the comic. So now you're ready to get going with the online side of things. Start writing your web page so that you can just upload it when you're ready. Webcomic PHP management systems are relatively easy to find. I personally really like ComicPro that, unfortunately, seems to have vanished from the web. If you can hunt it down it's worth a look. Web hosting is quite easy to find as well, you won't need much space to begin with so you can use one of the many free providers out there (including http://keenspace.com that provides free hosting specifically for webcomics), use the web space provided by the majority of ISPs or purchase your own web hosting plan (you can get a quite cheap one because you won't be needing many features to begin with). When signing up for any hosting package, make sure you have permission to change the read/write attributes of your files because the PHP comic managers will need this (this is done on Linux servers using CHMOD from your FTP program; In Windows you can Right-Click a file, select Properties and change security permissions there; or you may need to use a proprietary control panel provided by the host). You're going to need to decide on an update schedule for your comic. It's probably best to start small and build up; maybe two or three updates a week. This way you have three to five weeks of comics in your backlog, which allows you to fall behind substantially before anyone notices. While we're on the topic of deciding schedules, it will help you if you actually try and schedule an hour or so into your day to write comics. If you just try to fit them into the free time that you're "bound to have just after you finish just this one last thing" then you'll often find yourself failing to get a strip drawn on time. Now that you have your comic online you can start promoting it. There are a huge number of comic directories out there that will help get you exposure. Get your friends excited about your comic and they in turn will get their friends excited. Read other people's comics and get involved in their forums. Find sites that accept guest artwork or comics and send some to them. The best promotion comes from getting people to read your comic and fire a link across their instant messenger program to another friend. My current list of "must read every day" comics came entirely from various people sending links to me. Don't expect instant success, look to sharing your vision with even just one new person every day. Well, I hope that helps to give you a few ideas about how to make your comic and keep it running. When your characters start to grow they'll almost create the stories and jokes themselves and the strip won't be anywhere near as hard to write as it was when you first started out. Just keep drawing the comics on a frequent basis so that you don't fall out of the rhythm of your created world and above all else have fun.

Create Your Own Digital Library

Create Your Own Digital Library

by: Jelaine Macaraeg

The moment you got your first digital camera, your view of the world has totally changed. You always seem to see something beautiful or artistic in your surroundings, worthy of being captured in pixels. You experiment quite a lot and keep on loading your pictures in your computer. Until one day, you thought of working on a project. You’re sure you have the kind of picture you need – you knew you have it somewhere in your hard disk… in one of those folders… You can’t run a search for it though because you pretty much use generic filenames like Flower1, Flower2, Flower 3 and so on. Uh-oh! Looks like it’s high time for you to organize your digital photos! Microsoft has something that can help you do that. It’s called the Microsoft Digital Image Suite 9, which actually consists of two imaging applications – MS Digital Image Library 9, which serves as your database of digital images and MS Digital Image Pro 9, which is a photo manipulation program. A lot of people may like it’s familiar Explorer-like interface – the left pane being the folder pane, while the right side of the window is the image browser, showing thumbnails of your images. The good thing about Digital Image Library 9 is that you wouldn’t have to transfer your photos from their current location. Instead, it scans your hard disk and locates folders it considers photo folders, afterwhich you may deselect folders that are not appropriate. The images may then be sorted according to date or keywords. From here, you may double-click on a photo to bring it up in a full-screen view and use the basic controls for zoom, fit to screen, rotate and print. You may also select multiple photos for slideshow, the speed of which range from 1 second to 1 minute. Oftentimes, pictures taken with a digital camera contains metadata. These are information about the photo, such as shutter speed and the date and time the photo was taken. Digital Image Library 9 allows you to add these metadata with captions and keywords to easily categorize and later on identify images. Another nifty feature of this application is that it even allows you to rate your photos! From the preview pane, simply click on how many stars, the highest being five, you wish to assign each photo. If you wish to do some retouches on an image, simply click the edit button and Digital Image Pro 9 launches and opens the selected image. This application has a lot of quick-fix features such as the Red Eye tool and the Smart Erase, which caters to novice retouchers and home users who don’t want anything complicated. Being the all-in-one application that it is, Microsoft Digital Image Suite 9 comes with tons of mats, frames and templates for creating professional photo projects such as scrapbooks, photo albums, calendars and postcards. You may also get Microsoft Photo Story, an add-on to the suite that lets you turn your photos into video. Simply choose which photos to include then add some narration if you have a microphone and add music and zooming effects.

Copying XBOX Games

Copying XBOX Games

by: Terry Dunn

There really is no shortcut to copying XBOX games. In fact, this is a mightily complicated process and has stumped some really techie people. This is evident with the prevalence of the question on copying XBOX games in Internet message boards and tech chat rooms. But why does one need to be going about there and copying XBOX games? Is this not legal? If you have an XBOX and you have purchased original games to play on it, chances are you must have ran through a huge chunk of your savings. Original games are very expensive and because CDs are not exactly immortal, you can eventually wear out a game especially if you use it every minute of the day. To give value to consumers, most countries allow original CD buyers to make back-up copies of their XBOX games in case their original got damaged or got lost provided that they are aware of the law against pirated software and that they actually own an original cd and are only copying XBOX games for their personal use only. While it is relatively easy to do the copying of XBOX games, the same cannot be said in actually using the XBOX games that you have copied. Most software contain an encryption that must be met when inserted in an XBOX. Copying an XBOX game, however, does not copy this encryption. This is a protection system that most XBOX consoles have as protection against flagrant copying of XBOX games. To be able to run XBOX games that you have copied, you need to modify your XBOX. This can be a daunting task especially to beginners who are afraid of destroying their XBOXes with their tinkering. According to most tech experts, there are a lot of ways to modifying your XBOX in order to accommodate the practice of copying of XBOX games. Some are quite complicated and only a tech expert could do while other ways can be expensive but easy. One is to buy and install a MOD-chip. This will allow your console to play XBOX games that you have copied as well as play imported games from other countries with perfect sound and video with no problem at all. While it may seem that all you have to do is purchase a MOD-Chip and then voila, you have another think coming. There are actually a lot of things that you should consider when buying a MOD-Chip. Most recommend the Divineo Modchips, which are purported to be really reliable. Some of the popular brands are the Xecuter 2 and 3, Xenium, SmartXX, X-bit, Alladin, Chameleon and Xchip. Another way in copying and using XBOX games is to change the BIOS of the XBOX so that it will no longer read the requirements of the digitally-signed software. This is basically reprogramming the whole BIOS. You might also consider purchasing a bigger hard drive and just save all your games inside the XBOX. This way, you already have copy of your favorite games inside and would no longer need to swap CDs. The third way is to do the game swapping technique, wherein you will first boot the original CD and then swap the copy once it has already booted up. This might be very complicated and will not actually serve your purpose in copying your XBOX games… that is to preserve your original CDs.

Copy any DVD movie with EZ DVD Copy™

Copy any DVD movie with EZ DVD Copy™

by: Johnathan Crews

Have you ever wanted to copy a DVD movie that you own? Now you can with EZ DVD Copy™. Our powerful, easy-to-use software will allow you to copy virtually any DVD, using a CD-R or DVD-R! EZ DVD Copy allows you to extract all of the features that are available on the original disc. Or you may leave off extras so you can fit your entire DVD movie on to just one blank disc. You don't have to split your DVD movie across two separate discs. Finish copying in less than an hour! All you will be using is either your CD-R or DVD-R burners and blank media to record! For less than the cost of few DVDs, you will have everything you need to copy your favorite collection in one easy to use software program! EZ DVD Copy is the fastest and easiest way to copy DVDs! Built-In CSS Decryption Ripper Watch copies on your DVD player or computer Fit your entire movie to a single disc Copy a movie in less than an hour! FREE ONE YEAR software updates. FREE Helpdesk Support. Available for instant download. Supports both NTSC and PAL DVDs. 30 Day Money Back Guarantee! Don't wait for theaters... Download all the movies you want on the Internet today! With our EZ Download Club, you could search and watch unlimited movies (even titles that are still in theaters). We even show you how to find video games. Want to download ANONYMOUSLY and have access to UNMONITORED archives of files? Our EZ Download Club is the answer. Below is a small list of the DVDs that are now available for download. Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines Matchstick Men House Of The Dead Secondhand Lions The Italian Job Pirates of the Carribean Thirteen American Splendor Uptown Girls Out of Time S.W.A.T. The Order The Medallion Freaky Friday Assassination Tango Bad Boys II Gigli How to Deal Seabiscuit Rugrats Go Wild The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen Anything Else Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of Black Pearl X2: X-Men United Bruce Almighty Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas The Santa Clause 2 Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle Terminator 3 Rise of the Machines American Wedding The Matrix Reloaded Discover how to backup any Xbox, PlayStation 2, PSX, Dreamcast and PC video games with our EZ Video Game Copy. No more scratches, cracks or buying games you used to own. Protect your gaming investment with our step-by-step guide to copying your games. Want to record your favorite TV programs and movies on to CDs that you can watch on your PC or DVD Player? With our comprehensive instructions, step by step guidance and screen shots - you can kiss your outdated analogue video good bye! With EZ VHS Copy, you will be able to convert all your old VHS movies to CD or DVD. Our software will help you to transfer your VHS tapes to digital format! No more clutter of tapes lying around. Never worry about your precious home movies becoming corrupt. Transfer your old vinyl records or cassettes to CD. You can turn that old musical format into digital and copy your LPs to CD-R or even DVD-R media. We’ll show you how to do it with our detailed instruction guide. All you need is your stereo equipment, PC and RCA cables. Start enjoying again the music you love, in your car or home with great sound quality. Preserve your collection of LPs and cassette tapes now, before they become too deteriorated. Tired of paying high prices for your favorite DVDS and video games? Now you can buy popular titles and new releases from our wholesale sources for as low as $3.00. All DVDs and video games are brand new and are made by the actual manufacturers. Our DVD Wholesalers List comes with e-mail contacts, websites, phone numbers and physical mailing addresses in the USA and the UK. This is not some useless and outdated directory you have seen on the Internet. This list has current sources and has been compiled in June of 2003.

Cool New Search Engine On The Block

Cool New Search Engine On The Block

by: Jim Edwards

If you log on to PayPerClickSearchEngines.com you'll find they list over 600 different pay-per-click search engines operating online. In fact, some online sources report that over 1,000 "search engines" of various size and popularity operate in the U.S. alone. With so much competition among sites to capture the search traffic that Google.com and Yahoo.com seem to dominate like 800 lb. Gorillas, why would one new search engine rate even a second glance? The answer: Amazon, the Web's mega bookstore, launched a new search engine with a very user-friendly interface and some of the fastest, most relevant searches online... along with a **twist** that will help EVERY person who wants to sell ebooks for profit, publish articles to get traffic, or create special reports that go viral. Here's the story... Amazon recently launched www.A9.com -- a search engine that creates more of a "portal" experience than the traditional search engine where you input your search terms, click a button, and pray something relevant to your search appears in the results. When you first log on to A9.com, it looks like a traditional search engine, but once you start searching, you'll find an organized and extremely helpful set of search tools right at your fingertips. A9.com organizes its search criteria by category on the right side of the page. Input a search term such as "mortgage loan" or "George Washington" and you'll start to see why I like this search engine so much. When you first input your search term, the website displays the "web" search results to show you various websites A9.com deems relevant to your search. Click the "books" button on the right and get a list of the most relevant books available on Amazon.com. Follow virtually any of those book links to the Amazon website and you can literally browse through the table of contents, first chapter, and even the index of most books. Click on the "Movies" button and get a list of any relevant movies with your search terms included. One of the helpful things you'll notice as you start searching different types of media is that you can show or hide various search results on the same page. So if you only want to search books and movies, you can hide the Web and reference results. Depending on the type of information you need to research, you can also use the "Reference" results to get dictionary, encyclopedia, and history information on the search terms you entered. Needless to say, when I did a search for "George Washington," this reference section overflowed with relevant links and information. However, I was surprised at just how much reference material was available for search terms like "mortgage," including information from Investopedia.com on alternative search terms to help me narrow my search for more relevant information. Probably the biggest reason I like A9.com so much is that it helps to wade through the ever rising tide of information that threatens to drown us all online. Depending on what you need to find, you can quickly get suggestions, reference material, physical books, and even information on available film and video without leaving the A9.com website. Now, here's specifically how A9.com can help anyone who wants to publish their own ebooks, articles, or special reports. #1 - Insert your main search term at A9.com and look at 2 things: total web results (higher number the better) and the books and movies tabs. If you see a lot of web results and tons of books and movies on the subject, you have a VERY good (and fast) indication that the topic you're considering is "hot" enough to warrant more investigation for creating your own ebook, special report, or other info-product. #2 - Follow the look links to specific listings on Amazon. Some of those books will allow you to go through the table of contents, first chapter, and index right there on your screen. Use this opportunity to: A. Make notes on the most important points on your topic (from the table of contents) and expand your list of potential points to cover. B. Get a feel for the general topic and the typical way authors are currently approaching it (first chapter). ** By the way, the table of contents and / or first chapter will usually give you at least one great idea for an article you could create (or pay someone to create) and use to generate traffic to your website. C. Look for additional keywords you could use for your pay-per-click campaigns as well as your headlines, bullets, and other classified ads (in the index). #3 - Use the "Reference" tab on A9.com to access the dictionary, thesaurus, and other tools to find MORE keywords you can use to advertise on pay-per-click search engines... specific "niche" keywords many of your competitors probably aren't using. Though nothing on A9.com is actually new, it does present a much faster and easier way to search the web, compare reults, gather marketing intelligence, and wade through available data to help you with your own ebooks, special reports, article writing, and other marketing activities.

Converting Your Wedding Videos To DVD

Converting Your Wedding Videos To DVD

by: Kirsten Hawkins

Technology marches ever onward and, as it does, it carries us right along with it. In the early 1980’s, as VCR’s dropped in price and appeared in more and more homes, there was a sudden mass appeal for people to have their old Super 8 home movies converted to video cassette. Video tapes last far longer than film and it just made sense to convert those old reels into a more watchable and compact format. People brought their movies of their baby’s first steps, birthday parties, and weddings and turned them into video tapes. Not long after that, video cameras became cost effective for people to buy and those old super 8 cameras and projectors went the way of the dodo. People began using video tape for everything and the wedding video was born. Technology has shifted yet again, folks. You may have noticed less and less video tapes at your local Blockbuster store. The medium is becoming extinct, replaced by DVD. Guess what? It’s time to convert yet again. DVD discs last far longer than video tape, offer higher quality picture and sound, and can run longer than video cassettes. By converting your wedding videos to DVD you can ensure that the memories you saved will last even longer. The process of converting your wedding video to DVD is not complicated, but to do it yourself you will need some special equipment. Obviously you’ll need a DVD recording device and a way for your VCR to connect to it. If you have a DVD burner on your computer, you’re halfway there. You will also need a way for your VCR to interface with your computer. Most computers do not come shipped with a way to do this. You’ll need to install a TV card on your computer that has inputs that match your VCR’s outputs. Most TV cards do have both RF and A/V inputs. Next you’ll need to record the wedding video onto the computer’s hard drive. You may need special software to do this if your TV card didn’t come with any bundled. Sony’s Vegas Video is a good one, but there are a number of different titles available. Keep in mind that the video will take up a lot of drive space. In order for the video to be placed on DVD it will have to be in an MPEG format. Your video recording software should be able to save it this way. Once that is done, it’s simply a matter of using your DVD burning software to transfer the video onto a DVD disc that you can then watch on any DVD player. The software will have instructions for doing this. Once the process (which can take some time, be warned) is complete, viola! Your wedding video is now on DVD and can be enjoyed forever. If you don’t have or can’t afford the equipment and software to follow the preceding steps, fear not. There are companies that can take away all of the hassle and transfer your wedding videos to DVD for you, for a price. Whichever method you choose will have the same end result and you’ll be enjoying your old wedding videos and other home movies on a new format that’s built to last.

Confessions of a Screensaver Thousandaire

Confessions of a Screensaver Thousandaire

by: Brent Whinfield

Click here for the Video version of this article: There is a little item which is treated with scorn by many marketing "gurus," yet which has proven to be popular with the "masses" year after year, after year. Why is there still a craze for screensavers? I mean, let's get real here. This is something we first became acquainted with waaay back in the day, when the Internet was commonly referred to as the World Wide Web. Screensaver is old school, right? Wrongo! The amazing thing is, despite the death knell being tolled by sages, screensavers continue to enjoy unprecedented popularity. Don't believe me? I dare you to type in the word "screensaver" into Google, and take a look at the bewildering number of websites that offer them. Go ahead, write to a few of those site owners and ask how popular those little programs are. They'll tell you that they're one of the most downloaded items on the 'net. Need further proof? Stroll through the screensaver section of cnet/download.com and observe the phenomenon up close and personal. The great thing about download.com is that at a glance you can determine what date the saver was first listed, how many downloads it has enjoyed, and very importantly, what users thing of it. Inside download.com you can quite easily see that many savers are free, while the majority sell for between $14.95. and $19.95. Speaking of CNET, according to their research, screensavers are the second most downloaded software application on the Internet. Yahoo reports the word "screensaver" has appeared in their "Top 100 Searches" list every week since 1995. The term "screensaver" is searched for an average of 34,357 times a day according to statistics provided by WordTracker. So, we've established that there is a genuine craze for these desktop ornaments. But do all these people make money with them? I mean, it seems more often than not, screensavers that are being offered at all the hundreds of download sites are...free. Didn't your mother tell you that there is no such thing as "free" in this world? You should listen to her. She is absolutely correct. Well then, how can people make money who are giving away screensavers for free? In order to answer your question, I'll unfortunately have to use a dirty word. It's a word that brings a shudder of revulsion to Internet users far and wide. That almost obscene word is, ugh... Spyware. That's right, spyware! Spyware is the number one reason today why many screensaver authors try to inveigle you into freely downloading their software. You see, these unethical marketers make deals to hide advertising and such into their programs. Unknowingly after you have downloaded that attractive looking screensaver, the spyware embeds itself into your computer system. Once there, they call home to the "mother ship" with explicit details on your surfing habits, your buying habits, plus other personal details. My advice...stay away from free screensavers. Now don't get me wrong - of course there are still a good number of saver authors who will not lower themselves to such unethical practices, but as a general rule, you should look at free offers with a jaundiced eye. Legitimate screensaver authors offer a free download of their screensavers either as shareware, or freeware which is limited in some way. In the software industry this is known as "cripple-ware." After getting a taste of the free limited version, hopefully you'll be willing to pay a reasonable sum for the "Pro" version which has lots more features. Sharware as you know, enables you to try out the screensaver for a specific length of time before it expires. This is try-before-you- buy marketing. In the Screensaver Thousandaire Video Course I teach my students how it is possible to create an excellent income by selling screensavers to specific markets...niche marketing, if you will. Since we have established that screensavers are popular, then it makes absolute sense that individuals with a particular passion would find attractive a screensaver which features their passion. In other words, we are often told by marketing gurus to first find a need and then fill it. First identify the niche market, and then sell to it. Let's use one of my screensaver projects as an example. I happen to be a vegetarian. This means that I'm one of those growing number of weirdos who refuses to eat anything with a face...or who ever had a mother :) So no meat, and no dairy for Uncle Brent. Well, the most natural thing in world is for me to not only try and connect with other vegetarians on the 'net, but also to try and find info which feeds (sorry about the pun), my passion. How do you think I'll react if someone offered me a screensaver of vegetarian recipes? Especially if those recipes feature beautiful color photos that show step-by-step how to prepare healthy meals, or better yet, teach me through a series of UPDATEABLE content? Don't you think I'll grab it if the price is reasonable? Of course I will! That by the way was how I created one of my screensaver products. See what I mean? Provide a product which directly appeals to a specific audience and you will immediately tap into immediate income. Updateable content? Yes Virginia, it is now possible for you to place fresh content onto your customers screensaver using a certain secret device. You'll do so without the customer even being aware of it. He'll wake up one morning to new images, music, and Flash videos in his saver. He'll love you for that. No more boring, stale screensavers! How many of those can you sell all day long? In conclusion, there is an awful lot of money in marketing screensavers. There does not seem to be any waning of the demand. I sell screensavers because there is a huge demand for them. I encourage you to first find a niche, and then create a saver based on the specific demands of that specific market.

Computers and Internet: Inspiring Us To Create

Computers and Internet: Inspiring Us To Create

by: Daniel Punch

The Internet is sometimes criticized (usually by parents who think their kids need to be outdoors more often) as leading people to be sitting in front of their computers all day growing bulbous, lethargic and (depending on who you talk to) stupid. I think that the opposite can often be true. My friends and I have recently been inspired to new creative ventures through the time spent online. I have long been a fan of movies, martial arts movies in particular. It has been said that they’re kind of like the modern musical with finely choreographed dances (although in this case the ‘dance’ is a fight) showing fantastic physical ability, timing, and grace. Recently I have found that there are many online groups of people dedicated to making their own martial arts films. Most of these guys are really talented and I’ve seen film fight scenes that are better than the majority of the American made ‘martial arts’ movies. Where the commercial films focus on special effects, from wirework (attaching wires to an actor in order to allow them to do extraordinary feats) to computer rendered effects (sometimes even using a computer animated actor in fights as seen in ‘The Matrix Reloaded’), these independent groups get out there and make impressive films through sheer physical exertion and amazing ability. It’s amazing what a bit (well, a lot really) of hard work can do for you. These independent action crews perform wall runs, flips, falls, tumbles, and flying kicks without the use of wires or special effects. There’s no insurance to worry about or studios to get sued so they try some pretty incredible and dangerous things. My favorite stunt crews are ‘The Stunt People’ who can be visited at , and Zero Gravity Stunts who have their homepage at. There are also Jabronie Pictures and VJ Films (some of whose videos can be found at thumbnails.php?album=1115) that are both worth a mention. These sites also provide many links to other similar websites, so your collection of independent short films can be built up to a fearsome size quite quickly. So, I’ll now get back to the original topic of this article, that being the Internet as a medium to inspire people to become active and creative. These films got me pretty excited. I’d never really thought about just trying to make my own short martial arts film. The world’s largest short film festival held in Australia called ‘Tropfest’ provided a group of friends and I with a valid excuse to behave silly in front of a video camera. I’m not going to lie; the film we produced was relatively low quality. One of the fights we filmed was, well, not bad! There was a decent amount of good mixed in with the not so good, and I have great memories of spraying false blood out of a hose that was wound around a friend’s chest all over my parent’s house when simulating a gunshot. We had no flips and very few tumbles (I myself having the gymnastic ability of a dead walrus) but the point is we got in there and had a great time with an entertaining outcome. We have plans to make more movies and a few other film festivals on the horizon that we may enter. Maybe one day our films will be good… The Internet has inspired us in other ways as well. In the past I ran a webcomic that unfortunately is now all but dead. However, it too was a lot of fun while it lasted. A friend of mine is currently setting up a web-based design company because he realized just how easy the Internet makes it to go into business for yourself, instead of working your way through university through a variety of often low paying and uninteresting casual job positions. I currently waste too much time playing other people’s games so my newest plan is to learn Flash and make my own online games. So, while I’m trying to inject some form of gymnastic ability into my gargantuan frame as I attempt to make short films with a decent story, acting, camerawork and so on, why don’t you find something that gets you excited and try it out for yourself? If someone like me can do it, then you can probably work it out with a just a little bit of effort. You may never be as good as the things that inspire you, but it’s a lot of fun trying to emulate them or create your own. Another positive point to mention is that when you get stuck the Internet is full of tutorials written by those in the know to get you through your difficult spots. Even I can try and learn from Tricks Tutorials . So, see the great possibilities in the Internet and go and have fun broadening your horizons!

Comprehensive Meaning Of Segmentation By Clustering

Comprehensive Meaning Of Segmentation By Clustering

by: Eng.Mohamed S. El Kayyali

Segmentation as a word, means to classify the objects that are exists in an image, it has many theories and methodologies, assume that we would like to recognize objects in an image, there are too many pixels to handle each individually, instead, we should like some form of compact, summary representation. Although, superficially these different methods may seem some how complicated for any reader, in this article I will demonstrate the meaning of clustering in segmentation. One natural view of segmentation is that we are attempting to determine which components of data set naturally belong together. This is a problem known as clustering. We can cluster in two ways: -Partitioning: here we have a large data set, and curve it up according to notion of the association between items inside the set. We would like to decompose it into pieces that are good according to our model. For example we can decompose an image into regions that have coherent color and texture. -Grouping: in this part we have distinct data items, and we would like to collect sets of data items that make sense together. The key here is to determine what representation is suitable for the problem at hand, we need to know by what criteria a segmentation method should decide which pixels belong together and which do not. Once we decide which cluster method suitable for our application, segmentation by clustering could be very useful for some applications that may use clustering, as well as summarizing video, or finding machine parts, finding people in mage, finding buildings in satellite images: these done by looking for collections of edge points that can be assembled in line segment and then assembling line into polygons. It is hard to see that there could be a comprehensive theory of segmentation, not least what is interesting and what is not depends on the application, there is no comprehensive theory of segmentation at time of writing. Since clustering is defined above, in addition clustering is a process whereby a data set is replaced by cluster, it is natural to think of segmentation as clustering, another meaning: pixels may belong together because they have the same color, the same texture, they are nearby, and so on. Some of clustering methods as well as: clustering by K-means, segmentation by graph theoretic clustering.

Clueless About What You Can Buy On Ebay?

Clueless About What You Can Buy On Ebay?

by: David Riewe

Being clueless on what items to buy on E-bay is a phase. In fact, it's the very first step to online shopping. With every new day, online shoppers conquer more E-bay buying techniques, and slowly lift off the novice's launch pad. From then on, online shoppers realize there's more they can buy on E-bay than meets the eye. Generally, E-bay is comprised of almost all the things a buyer would want and need under the sun. In fact, it seems that E-bay's selling almost everything. Because of its diversity in items being sold, E-bay categorized each item for easier search. Though, each listing varies from one country to another. Generally, online shoppers may choose to buy things under the category of antiques. These may include old-fashioned decors; house wares; vintage cars, clothing, and accessories; historic collector's item; and old postcards. Buyers may also deliberate on buying items classified under the automotive category. These may range from cars to accessories to almost insignificant extras like car stickers, car perfumes, and collectibles. Those who are looking for computer gadgets, electronic bolts, or printers may look at the Electronics and Computers category of E-bay. E-bay listings also have the basic necessities like clothes, shoes, and accessories. It also includes different kinds of jewelries like trinkets, charms, necklaces, bracelets, earrings, rings, watches, and ornaments. Those who are looking for stamps and other collectables like postcards, old papers, even different kinds of minerals, rocks, and fossils will find E-bay a very lucrative place to do online shopping. E-bay also caters to people who are into sports. Buyers can find different sorts of sports gadgets, sports get-ups, and tools. Those who are hobbyists may also find practical tools for their respective hobbies like gardening tools, cross-stitching paraphernalia, cooking and baking utensils, or scrapbooks. Best of all, E-bay offers a great line of entertainment appliances and high-tech gadgets like mobile phones, mp3 players, pc tablets, PDAs, memory cards, flash cards, video cameras, digital cameras, audio recorders, sensors, and camcorders. Aside from these common items that reflect fads and fashions in today's contemporary society, e-bay has also that special section that consists of "everything else." These are the things that do not fall under the basic categories. These are ephemera, costumes, children's themed gift sets, party packages, mobile sim card, and mobile load, even a Google account. With these things, buyers can be assured of a wide array of things and gadgets that would serve them best provided that it does not fall under E-bay's prohibited list.

Choosing the best computer model

Choosing the best computer model

by: Dr. Yuri Iserlis

Computer Families and Models Many computer manufacturers, especially such computer giants as IBM, Dell, Gateway, Sony, Apple, etc. issue families (series) of computers. Models of computers in each series have either the same principle of design, or same processor, or have been given diapason of performances. The series can include a base model, and several derivative models. Usually for each type of computer, manufacturers issue series that generally can be divided into 3-4 categories: budget-friendly (at low price), mid-range (at middle price), cutting-edge and ultimate performance (at high, and very high prices). IBM, Gateway, Dell and Apple issue computer families not only for Home and Home office, but also for Small, Mid size or Large Businesses. These families can also include the network optimized series. The needed features First of all, you have to make a preliminary analysis of your needs to pick a type of computer, and a zone where you might search this computer, for example, for Home or for Small Business. But it is not sufficient. To understand what kind of computer to buy, you additionally have to determine what computer performance you need: the type of processor, speed, size of memory, type of video and audio cards, type of case, and so on. You can select one from two ways: 1 - to formulate your needs in the process of searching, 2 - to compile a list a hardware requirement for the programs you might want to run (see: http://www.cleverace.com/Choosing_best_computer_model2.htm.) Preliminary selection: To select a computer family, you have to choose one, which the features match your wishes. Such families can be several. Next procedures are to find the best computer family and best model of computer belonging to this family. If you know the features you need, you can identify the name of the computer family. For this goal you have to use for example, a Table of Features comparison for base models of computer families. For example, according to this Table, if you know that you need a computer only for simple text editing and emailing, your choice is Budget-Friendly Series. On the other hand, if you need for realization of your tasks a computer from Cutting-Edge series , but it is not affordable, your choice can be like a computer from Mid-range series plus a customization (perhaps, when you can better afford it). To accelerate the search for the preliminary selection, you can find comparison information about the different types of computers with the help a comparison-shopping search engine. It allows you quickly to find the needed products sold by online stores, small businesses, and individuals in diapason of affordable prices. Search can be done by Brand, by Price, by Processor speed, etc. To find what you need, see: http://www.nextag.com/serv/cleverace/buyer/outpdir.jsp Generally, a preliminary selection can be executed on the basis of not only cost and main functions, but also on an evaluation of convenience of use, warranties, and so on. This kind of selection you can make for computer families of different manufacturers for example, for 3 or 4 families of computer giants. Some companies, such as Gateway, gives to a buyer an opportunity to compare preliminary selected models of computers with "compare" option. Final selection. To find the optimal model for yourself, you may make the final selection from the preliminary chosen models. It is much easier to compare 3-4 models, than more than 5 million variants that are available on the Computer Market at the beginning of your search. Custom built model If you can't find a computer with the needed performances among the available computers, you need to select a vendor and to order a custom built computer. Discount Keep in mind, you can find a cheaper computer for the same model on the Discount Market, because some online stores, especially the computer giants, suggest coupons; or discounts, such as $20 off, when you spend $150 or more; free shipping; free printer; and so on.

CD ripper software

CD ripper software

by: Mansi gupta

What it is CD ripper? CD ripper software opens up a whole new world of opportunities in how you listen to music. With CD ripper software, you can take audio CD tracks and place them into audio files on your computer. These audio tracks can be saved as WAV, MP3, OGG, or WMA audio files. The term “ripping” is used to describe this process. Newer, more advanced CD ripper software is also available that allows you to convert back and forth between these formats. In fact, some CD ripper software is now available that can record vinyl LP’s and cassettes to create WAV, MP3, OGG, or WMA audio files. Where to get it. A variety of CD ripper software is available online. Simply typing “CD ripper” into any search engine will bring up a wide variety of available CD ripper software. Most CD ripper software is extremely user friendly and offers a variety of options, but you should do some searching and comparing before deciding which CD ripper software is best for you. What to look for. Every type of CD ripper software had its own style and interface. Make sure the CD ripper software you choose is easy to use and to understand. It doesn’t matter how great the software is if you can’t utilize it to its fullest! When exploring CD ripper software options, be sure to also check out the software’s editing abilities. With most CD ripper software programs, you can select the output format for you music. This includes the bitrate, channels, and frequency. The best CD ripper software will create high quality files by digitally matching the audio bit for bit. Quality CD ripper software will also tag the encoded audio files with metadata. The metadata contains information about the artist, track number, song title, and album title. This will automatically be input into the WAV, MP3, OGG, or WMA audio file. Some CD ripper software programs will even search online for pictures of album covers and insert this as a thumbnail image next to the file. Another perk to some CD ripper software is the ability to delete the silence at the beginning or end of tracks. Yet other CD ripper software programs will allow you to edit the songs themselves, giving you full control of the sound provided by your WAV, MP3, OGG, or WMA audio file. For those traditionalists who still enjoy listening to their music from a CD, a CD ripper can be used to select your favorite songs to create a mixed CD. In fact, some CD rippers will allow you to rip audio tracks directly from a CD and burn them to a new CD, without ever having to save them as a new audio file. With thousands of people ripping CD’s every day, CD ripping is definitely the wave of the future, and the best choice for music lovers everywhere. Why keep your music stationary on older format CDROMS, when you can rip the music, put it into your favorite mp3 player, and listen on the go? We recommend Blaze Media Pro as the best, all-in-one audio and video software, including CD ripping and all the other features mentioned above.

Buying a Personal Computer

Buying a Personal Computer

by: Bonnie Archer

For so many people the computer world is a seeming unsolvable jungle filled with mysterious words. Here is a guide to help you understand the personal computer and to give you the information needed to make a shopping decision you can live with so you can enjoy your PC for years to come. Not long ago the average 'cheaper' personal computer cost was about $1500. - $2000. And this price did not necessarily include the power to edit videos, pictures, or play games. For that you would have had to spend more on upgrades. Now things such as video editing are standard on the newest personal computers. PC’s have become less expensive than ever before and they come with more capabilities than ever. The personal computer (PC) you purchase will depend upon what it will be used for. So will you surf the Internet and email, working in spreadsheets, playing video games? Who is using the PC and what are there interests? More than likely you will have to accommodate a combination of these or maybe even all of them. Many personal computers (PC) today offer very similar capabilities so your main decision will be based upon which specialties your personal needs present. For instance if you are mainly interested in gaming than you will be sure to spend more for a good 3D graphics card. If you want to make music you will need a good sound card. If you work all day on your computer or use it for photo editing you will want to invest in a better monitor. Also, make sure your PC has enough memory to quickly work the tasks you have planed. For the best value for your dollar spend your money on the personal computer components that will best suit your needs.

Buying a laptop that you can use as a personal assistant

Buying a laptop that you can use as a personal assistant

by: Dakota Caudilla

Don’t be surprised but buying a laptop can be even harder than buying a desktop computer. In fact, buying a computer is very straightforward. Laptops, however, are very personal stuff because it’s something that you will carry around with you and sometimes act as more than just a computer for you to work on. They become a companion! That’s why finding and selecting the right laptop can be very tricky. Hard core computer gamers or people who will use their laptops for designing or video production may need more help than just reading about buying laptops. For conventional laptop users, here’s something for you to digest. The price for laptops varies drastically from brand to brand. Some laptops can cost $500 while some laptops can cost you $6,000. Some entry-level (meaning basic laptops) can be bought for between $600 and $900. If you grab a laptop off eBay or other rebate or dropshipping websites, you might get a mid-range laptop for far less than that. Even for basic laptop users, the description and specifications for the laptop is very, very important. If you’re not sure, check around and ask your friends for advice on how to buy a good laptop for the lowest price possible. You should be getting a laptop that comes with AT LEAST 512 megabytes of memory. The size of the memory ensures that your laptop can run multiple programs smoothly. As for hard drive, invest in as big a hard drive for your laptop as you can afford. Another thing that you may have to look out before you invest in the laptop is to find out how many USB ports that the laptop has. Most laptops come with at least 2 USB ports, the more the better. If you use a camera or thumb drive (disk key), this is where you insert the cable – the USB ports. You don’t want to have to remove the USB cable for your printer and mouse every time you try to save pictures from your camera to your laptop! Some laptops come with slots for camera memory cards, for instance, your compact flash cards. If you’re keen on getting a Windows based laptop, the security of your laptop should be at the top of your priority lists. Windows SP2 XP should be ideal because it comes with antispam, antispyware, antipopups and antivirus programs. Some laptop retailers may offer you cheap or free programs that you can install into the laptop as a second layer protection to your laptop. Other factors to take into account when shopping for laptops are the screen size, the life of the battery, the processor of the laptop, screen and keyboard, wi-fi networking, size and weight of the laptop. Dakota Caudilla, journalist, and website builder Dakota Caudilla lives in Texas. He is the owner and co-editor of on which you will find a longer, more detailed version of this article.