HOUSECALL information technology

The internet is full of free software and can be hard to find applications that are useful amongst all the rubble. Audacity is a genuine diamond in the rough, an exceptional audio recording and editing software.

The program is even used by Speech-Language Pathologists to record and analyze variations in accents and voice disorders. It also has a number of other features and possibilities for other lines of work, including:

Recording live audio.
Converting tapes and records into digital recordings or CDs.
Editing Ogg Vorbis, MP3, WAV, and AIFF sound files.
Cutting, copying, splicing or mixing sounds together.
Changing the speed or pitch of a recording.
Removing static, hiss, hum, or other constant background noises.
Quickly editing even large audio files.
And more!

Audacity is available for Windows, Mac OS, and Linux/Unix operating systems. To see if your computer will run Audacity, view the system requirements for Windows, Mac, and Linux.

Once you’ve determined that Audacity will run on your system, go to the download page to install Audacity. Be sure and click on your operating system to download the correct file. Follow the instructions provided for installing the program.

After you’ve installed Audacity, you can try recording a file. Open audacity and hit the record button (the red circle). You will need a microphone to record your own voice. To stop recording, you can press pause (the two blue rectangles) or stop (the yellow square) but note that they work differently. If you press pause and then press record again, you will start recording right where you left off. But if you press stop, Audacity will create a new sound layer, and once you press record again it will start from the beginning. For example if I recorded myself whistling a tune and then pressed stop, and pressed record again and sang the tune, when I played it I would hear myself singing and whistling the tune at the same time. When you record the second layer, you can hear what’s playing in the first layer when you record.

You can also use Audacity to edit audio files that were recorded by other means. Audacity can open most any type of audio file. M4P is a common file type that is an exception. If you want to open an M4P file you will need to convert it, which you can do in iTunes by following the instructions here.

Once you’re finished with your file you will need to save it. If you might want to continue working on it in the future, you should save it as an Audacity file to keep the layers in tact. To do this, go to the File menu and choose Save Project. If you want to distribute the file, by burning it to a CD, emailing it to a friend, or putting it on your webpage, you will need to export it as a common type of file. Otherwise people will only be able to listen to it if they have Audacity.

Here are the types of files that you can use to export your completed Audacity projects:

Ogg Vorbis – A free and un-patented audio compression format used for storing and playing digital music, similar to the MP3. For more information, see the vorbis website. To export to this type of file, go to the File menu and select Export as Ogg Vorbis.
MP3 – The standard for storing and playing digital music and other audio files. To export to an MP3 file you will first need to download and install the LAME MP3 encoder. Follow the instructions here. Be sure to download the correct version for your operating system. Once it is installed, export to MP3 in Audacity by going to the File menu and selecting Export as MP3.
WAV – An audio format that uses raw or uncompressed audio and is ideal for creating audio CDs. To export to this type of file in Audacity, go to the File menu and chose Export to WAV.

Want to do more with Audacity? The Audacity Wiki includes a page filled with tutorials for creating all sorts of projects with Audacity. Many off-site tutorials are included as well.

According to Technorati’s State of the Blogosphere 2009 report, around 900,000 blog posts are uploaded in a twenty-four hour period. If you’re an avid blog reader it can be tricky to stay up-to-date  without feeling overwhelmed. It’s easy to accidentally skip a blog and a critical piece of information. You also might find yourself continually refreshing the page on a favorite blog as you wait for a new update. Wouldn’t it be nice if you could read the new posts for all your favorite blogs in one place?

You can, and the answer is Real Simple Syndication (or RSS for short). RSS is just as easy as the name implies—it allows you to subscribe to your favorite blogs and read them all in one place. It’s like subscribing to your favorite magazines instead of waiting for them to show up on the newsstand.

Almost all blogs have an RSS feed, which is a version of the blog in special simplified format of just the important content like text, links, and images. Blog readers can subscribe to a blog by clicking on the link for the feed, which is usually labeled something like “Subscribe Here” or “RSS Feed.” The RSS logo is also often used, and looks like this:

Once you click the link you will be asked what RSS reader you want to use to subscribe. RSS readers are also known as news aggregators or simply aggregators. RSS readers gather all the posts of your favorite blogs that you subscribe to in one place. Each individual post is called a news item. There are many RSS readers available and some of the best ones are free:

Built-In Readers
Many applications you already use have built-in RSS readers including Microsoft Outlook and Internet Explorer, Apple Safari and Apple Mail, and Mozilla Firefox (through a feature called Live Bookmarks).

Note: Some built-in readers require you to copy the URL of the RSS feed. This is found at the top of your browser where you would type in the address of a webpage. Click on the RSS link for anything you want to subscribe to and then copy the URL.

FeedDemon
FeedDemon is a very popular full-featured feed reader for Windows. Some of the many things FeedDemon can do include tagging items with your own keywords, automatically downloading podcasts, and alerting you when a keyword you specified pops up in a new news item. It is a stand-alone application, which means you don’t have to use any other programs (such as a web browser) to use it. FeedDemon is considered very east to use with its intuitive user interface.

NetNewsWire
NetNewsWire is created by the same people as FeedDemon, a company called NewsGator. The feed reader is popular with many Mac OSX users for being a powerful yet easy to use stand-alone application. Features include multiple viewing options, the ability to save items as HTML, and the capacity for tracking information and automatically determining which feeds are most important to you.

Google Reader
Google Reader allows you to read your favorite blogs all together in your web browser on your computer or your smartphone. It uses the same login as the rest of your google account and links you with all of your gmail contacts so you can share news stories with your friend. If you use gmail the user interface will seem familiar. A popular feature of Google Reader marks new items as read as you scroll down the page. You can also quickly star items that are important to you.

Bloglines
Another popular feed reader that works in your browser is called Bloglines. Bloglines has some great features like notifications, which is an add-on for your browser that notifies you when a new item is added to your feed. It has a mobile version that looks great on smartphones and it provides stellar recommendations on new feeds that might be of interest to you.

When most people think of RSS feeds blogs come to mind but you can subscribe to other things online as well.

Google News Alerts
You can add Google News items to your RSS reader on any topic or search term. Simply go to news.google.com and type in a search term. You might search for “technology” or the name of your favorite politician. Then down at the bottom of the page you will see a link titled “RSS” with the orange RSS logo next to it. Click on the link to choose your RSS reader or copy the RSS link at the top.

Craigslist Searches
RSS is a great way to find a new apartment, job, or flat screen TV on Craigslist. Go to the city of your choice and enter your search terms. On the lower right-hand corner of the screen and find the orange box with the words “RSS.” Click it and just like subscribing to a blog.

As we inch closer to 2010, HouseCall remains committed to keeping our clients informed on ways to ever improve efficiently by utilizing the best technology on the market.  In this effort, we would like to share with you a few gems of technology that may make your workday more efficient in the New Year.

Flip Video Camcorder

This is not your father’s camcorder. The Flip is small, super-portable, and very easy to use. The Ultra HD model ($199.99) allows for up to 120 minutes of HD quality video. It’s perfect for on the fly captures of speeches and presentations, yet has high quality video that looks perfectly professional.

Uploading videos with the Flip is easy. The Flip plugs directly into your computer with USB and comes with software for easy video editing. The software also makes it simple to upload videos directly to YouTube.

Plantronics Wireless Headset

The Plantronics CS55 Wireless Headset ($255.00) is perfect for anyone who spends a great deal of time on the phone. Holding the receiver to your face is painful after a while and doing work one handed can be difficult. Wireless technology and battery life of up to 10 hours allows you to talk on the phone while roaming around up to 300 feet. You can even answer and end calls while you’re away from your desk.

If you’re interested in purchasing a Plantronics headset feel free to contact us.

Kindle

Having a Kindle from Amazon ($259.00) is like having an entire library (up to 1,500 books!) that weighs only 10.2 ounces. Not only can you read books on the Kindle, but you can also subscribe to newspapers like the Washington Post. The Kindle will even read text to you. Best of all, there’s no glare or backlight so it’s more like reading from a page than a computer screen.

Going Green: Consume less paper by reading important PDFs on your Kindle instead of printing them out.

LaCie iamaKey

Flash drives (also known as thumb drives or USB drives) quickly made floppy disks obsolete by allowing people to easily store and transport more data in a smaller item. The only downside to the small size is how easily it can get lost. The LaCie iamaKey (starting at $21.99 for 4GB) solves that problem by creating a flash drive that is key-shaped so you can attach it to your keyring. Now all you have to do is remember where you put your keys!

Acer Aspire One Netbook

Netbooks are perfect for computing anywhere. It’s small enough to take with you on a plane, on the metro, at work, and at home. The Acer Aspire One is our top choice with the solid hardware necessary for on the go use. With a 10.1” WSVGA CrystalBrite LED backlit LCD screen and a Intel Atom processor N270 you can do anything anywhere. Choose from one of four colors to match your style.

CardScan Executive

Where are all the business cards that you’ve collected over the years? If you’re like most people, they’re probably in a box on your desk taking up space and waiting for the day when you’ll have time to enter each contact into Outlook. If your job is like most jobs, you know that day will never come. CardScan Executive ($259.99) will scan your business cards, extract the important text, and with a click of the mouse transfer that information straight to Outlook. CardScan will process up to 15 cards a minute in color. No one can type that fast! CardScan is also available for Mac.

Adobe Premier Elements

Sometimes free video editing software such as Windows Movie Maker and iMovie isn’t quite enough. Adobe Premier Elements ($99.99) is a popular and affortable software for editing and perfecting videos. This software gives you the opportunity to create clean and professional videos easily: add titles, automatically remove bad footage, include transitions, create picture-in-picture effects, add animations, and more.

Apple Magic Mouse

Adding the scroll wheel to the top of a mouse was smart, but the Apple Magic Mouse ($69.00) is brilliant. It brings the multitouch experience from the iPhone to your mouse. Instead of manipulating the scroll wheel you just slide your fingers on top of the mouse to scroll in any direction. The rest of it works like a regular mouse–you just move it around with your hand and click.

Interested in getting a new Mac to go with the Apple Magic Mouse? Contact us and we’ll see what we can put together!

Sharing media has come along way since slide projectors that had to be setup and transported. Today media sharing is free and easy and can be done online. The most popular video sharing site is YouTube. You’ve probably watched funny videos of cats on this website before. Individuals, businesses and other organizations use YouTube to share information through videos. Flickr is the most popular photo-sharing site, and you don’t have to be a professional photographer to take advantage of the amazing service it offers.

There are a few reasons why using Flickr and YouTube to share media instead of merely adding it to your website is a good idea:

1. Uploading photos and movies is incredibly easy. YouTube accepts eight different common video formats including those used by iMovie and Windows Movie Maker. Flickr automatically resizes large photos into reasonable sizes and creates thumbnails.
2. Embedding movies from YouTube is a lot easier than manually adding them to your website. Once your video is uploaded to YouTube you just have to paste the code provided on your website. Flickr offers a few options for adding photos to your website, including badges that display your most recent photos.
3. Using Flickr and YouTube increases exposure to your photos and videos. People that don’t know about your website might find your video on YouTube or your photo on Flickr and visit your website from there. For instance, if someone were looking for videos of sailboats, they might go straight to YouTube and search for sailboats instead of going to a sailboat related website and searching for videos.

To sign up for a Flickr account, you will need a free Yahoo account. If you don’t have one already, sign up here. Once you have your yahoo account, click the “Create Your Account” button on Flickr’s website and follow the simple instructions. Once you’ve signed up you can start uploading photos right away. The Flickr Uploader is software for PC and Mac that makes adding photos incredibly easy. Take the Flickr tour for more information on the features Flickr offers.

YouTube requires a Google account to sign up. You can sign up for your free Google account here. With your Google account ready, click here to create a YouTube account. Once you’re done, uploading videos is easy and adding your videos on your webpage is simple, too. All you need to do is find the “embed” link in the information box to the left of the video. You can see the imbed link at the bottom of the screenshot here:

Just copy what’s in the box and paste it where you would like the video to appear on your website.

That’s all there is to it! YouTube and Flickr make uploading and sharing photos and videos easy and much more fun than a slide projector.

Anyone working in today’s environment will have opened many PDF files from email attachments or downloaded from the Internet. PDFs can be opened on any computer using Adobe’s free PDF reader software Adobe Acrobat Reader, which is most likely already on your computer. Reading a PDF is effortless, but what about you want to create one? You might want to create a PDF to distribute a document while making sure no one edits your work. Small file size is another reason to create a PDF. A PDF is usually smaller than the same document would be in Microsoft Word. The process for creating a PDF is different than you might expect, but it’s easy and there are a few different methods depending on what operating system and software you’re using.

You can create a PDF out of just about anything that is printable, including pages from the Internet. You can convert any file into PDF using familiar software such as Microsoft Word or Publisher, software from the Open Office suite, or Apple’s iWork software to name a few. You can create a PDF by printing to PDF. This may sound strange since printing usually involves creating hard copies of documents on the tray of a printer. It may help if you think about a PDF as a “digital hard copy.” If you created a document, spreadsheet, or presentation, The PDF is the final draft of your work. But, instead of distributing it the old fashioned way, you can distribute it electronically.

A handy example of printing to PDF is anytime you need to keep a record of something you see on the internet, like a page indicating your receipt for a recent purchase.  Instead of printing the receipt on paper, you can opt to print it as a PDF and keep a digital copy on your designated hard drive.  It is much easier to keep a digital folder of receipts than just a paper folder.

Adobe Acrobat Professional
Adobe Acrobat Professional (Acrobat Pro) allows you to not only create PDFs but also offers tools for doing more with your PDFs such creating PDF forms. The software is powerful, but expensive. If you have Acrobat Pro installed on your computer, you can easily print to PDF. When you are finished with the document you want to turn into a PDF, go to the File menu and then select Print, or you may “save as” a PDF. (If you are using Microsoft Office 2007, you will go to the Office menu instead.) You will see the usual screen with printer options, including selecting a printer from the drop-down menu. From the drop down menu select “Adobe PDF” and choose where you want to save your PDF. Then click Save. It will take a few seconds or longer to create the PDF depending on the size of your document. When the PDF is created, it will open in Acrobat Pro. If you choose to “save as” a PDF, you will be prompted for a PDF file name similar to printing in PDF.

CutePDF
Printing to PDF using CutePDF works the same way as using Acrobat Pro. CutePDF is a free application that can be downloaded from the Internet. (Note: Always check with your Systems Administrator before downloading software from the Internet.) If you are a HouseCall client, CutePDF should already be installed on your computer. When you’re ready, go to the File or Office menu and then select Print. The printer options screen will appear, including a drop-down menu of the printers installed on your PC. From the drop down menu, select “CutePDF Writer” and choose where you want to save your PDF. Then click Save. It will take a few seconds or longer to create the PDF depending on the size of your document. When the PDF is created, you will find it in the folder you selected.

Office 2007
With Microsoft Office 2007 installed on your computer you can create PDFs from your Office files using an extension that you can download and install here. Once the extension is installed, creating a PDF from your Office 2007 document is easy. Just go to the Office menu and go to Save As and select Save As PDF or XPS. Select the folder where you would like to save the PDF. Make sure the Save as Type is set to PDF. Click Publish. Your new PDF will automatically open in your default PDF viewer, most likely Adobe Acrobat Reader.

Mac OS X
If you use a Mac and have OS X 10.4 (Tiger) or later (this includes Leopard and Snow Leopard) you do not need any additional software to create PDFs. With the document you want to turn into a PDF open, simply go to the File menu and select Print. A window with options will appear. Click the button labeled PDF in the lower left hand corner. From the drop down menu click Save as PDF. Choose where you want to save your PDF and click save. You will find the PDF in the folder you selected.

Going Green: The more you accomplish your goals by just printing PDF, the less paper you will consume.

If you have any questions or if you are interested in any of the software mentioned feel free to contact your HouseCall Systems Administrator.