How to save images from Flickr:

1. Firstly open the image you want to save and go to Actions>>View all Sizes, to view the image in actual size.
2. Now select the largest size. That largest size is the actual size of that photo.
3. Now simply press Ctrl+S to save the page and save it to your desktop or any other desired location. You can also save the link by clicking on ‘File’ on the ‘Menu Bar’ and click ‘Save Link as’.
4. This will save that page (link) and a Folder with that which contains all the images on that page. Open this folder and you will find the desired image in that folder.

That’s it; you can find your image in this folder, copy and paste it to anywhere else. You can also save an image by viewing Page Source (by pressing Ctrl+U) of the same page that we saved earlier. View page source and find the link of that image there. Click on that link and save the image.

[Image taken from Flickr belongs to juliusfrumble. All rights reserved.]

-- This Post How to save a protected image from Flickr is Published on Devils Workshop .

Related: [Trick] Display Custom Dials on Your Chrome’s New Tab Page

Yesterday, I was playing with the user data of my Chrome profile, and suddenly I discovered something super interesting. With this hack, you can customize and control the sites that appear on new tab page.

Let’s begin..

• First of all, close Google Chrome, including background processes, as we’re tweaking Chrome itself.
• Go to C:\Users\home\AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default (in Windows 7), XP and Vista paths will be a bit similar, just search for “Google” folder.
• There you can see a file named ‘Top Sites’, that’s the file we need to tweak. This is actually a SQLite file, so you need a SQLite viewer in order to edit that file.
• Here we’ll use a simple Firefox addon – SQLite manager for the purpose. Download and install it.
• Now after installing it, launch your Firefox, hit Tools (in the menu bar) > SQLite manager.
• Now the addon will be opened in a new window, then, hit Database > Connect Database, and select the ‘Top Sites’ file which I showed you in the first.

• After you have connected the database, hit Thumbnails (under Tables), which is in the left side bar.

• And now there you’re!  You can have a glimpse of top sites in the right column, hit the URL_Rank tab for sites to be in order.

Editing and Adding new ‘Top Sites’

• To edit any site, right click on it > edit. There you can edit the site URL, rank, title and even thumbnail. Let’s have a close look at each part of it.

URL: This is obvious, to change the site, you need to change the URL.

Rank: Give it anything from 0 to infinity, more rank implies less probability of appearing on new tab page.

Title: Just add the meta title of the site.

Thumbnail: This is a bit painstaking, you need to get the thumbnail of the site you want to add. For this we’ll use Webshots, just enter the URL of the site and you can get the thumbnail of it. That’s not all, now you need to resize the thumbnail to 212 X 132 exactly, I used MS Paint for this. In SQLite manager, you can add thumbnail by clicking on clip icon next to Thumbnail option.

• After editing all these things, click Ok and the database will be updated accordingly.

I know, this may be a bit complex for some of you. If you weren’t able to follow this tutorial, we can help you, drop your doubts in the comments.

-- This Post [Hack] How To Control Which Sites Appear on Chrome’s New Tab is Published on Devils Workshop .

Timeline basically changes the way we see our Facebook wall. The changes are quite radical.

At the moment it is not available for all users and might be made available in a couple of weeks. Thankfully, for the curious minded there is a hack which allows Facebook to enable Timeline feature on your account.

• The method is simple. Timeline features are available for Facebook developers and all you have to do is register at Facebook as a developer. Here is a step by step guide on how to go about it.
• First visit Facebook’s Developer App on your account. Access it from this link. The user is prompted to allow Facebook Developer Apps to access your Facebook content.
• Now Click on Create new App as seen in image below.

• Now enter App Display Name and App Namespace. It can be any test name as we are not actually creating a new app.

• Now the point is to fill up details about Open Graph details for the App.
• As seen in the image below enter what your App will be used for and click on ‘Get Started’.

• Here you might be prompted to verify your account via a mobile phone number or credit card. I used registered my phone which got a verification code via a text message.
• Once done with the verification, you have convinced Facebook that you are a developer and Facebook Timeline is added on your profile as a developer preview.

You Facebook profile will now be enabled with the new Timeline feature. Do be careful as this is still a beta product and might have a few bugs. In case you want to opt-out of Timelines look up this guide.

Do drop in your comments.

Related: Do you ‘Like’ the new Facebook!

-- This Post How to Enable Facebook Timeline on your Account is Published on Devils Workshop .

This is not a small post, so to keep it organized I broke the post into 4 parts which you can access from the links below.

• Email
• Browsers
• Social
• Other

Email

This section contains tips regarding how to deal with E-mail spam, sharing your E-mail address securely and more.

Use A Disposable Email Address

I sign up for a lot of sites daily and some times I may not be ready to sign up using my default email address as I’m not interested to receive emails from the site. A disposable email address is a temporary Email address which auto destroys itself after a specific period of time.

There are many services which provide disposable email addresses, 10MinuteMail is one of them and works perfectly.

Link: 10MinuteMail

Share Your Email Address Securely

Sharing your Email address publicly is like inviting spammers and spam emails. Spammers run bots which collect Emails shared all over the web and they start sending the spam emails.

Scr.im is a nice service which will provide you a short personalized URL for you, then your friends need to break the captcha after which they can view your email address.

Link: Scr.im

Know who’s selling your Email address to spammers

If you have come across a site which looks spammy and if you’re curious to know if they intrude your privacy, this trick will be handy for you. This works only in Gmail.

In Gmail, Youremail@gmail.com, Your+email@gmail.com, You+remail.com etc are all the same, you can insert the ‘+’ anywhere in your email address. So, if you’re signing up for a site, enter your email address as Youremail+sitename@gmail.com and the next time you get ‘free offer/spam’ emails, just check if the mail is sent to Youremail+sitename@gmail.com, if that’s true then the site (for which you’ve signed up) has sold your email! Definitely!

Browsers

This part contains tips regarding how to update browser plug-ins, dealing with saved passwords and private browsing.

Keep your Browser plug-ins and add-ons up to date

Browser plug-ins especially Flash and Shockwave plug-ins (and even Java) are vulnerable, so you should keep them up to date. For this task you may use update checkers, which are plenty for Windows.

You can also do this manually. If you’re on Chrome, go to chrome://plugins/ and Chrome will alert you (with download links) if there are any outdated plug-ins.

Firefox users can simply head on to Plugins Check page and download the latest plugins.

Never save passwords in the browser itself

Modern browsers are not really modern in privacy, there are many vulnerabilities and it is suggested to not save passwords in the browser itself. Instead you can use a password manager like LastPass (saves passwords in the cloud) or Keepass (saves passwords locally). If you use more than one browser, then you can use them to sync your passwords too.

Links: Lastpass | Keepass

Switch to private browsing

Private browsing is a browsing mode which is present in all the modern browsers, during private mode no cookies,cache or form data will be stored. This doesn’t mean that your ISP cannot track you! It’s just that no traces will be left after you’ve done private browsing.

To switch to private browsing (or incognito mode) in Chrome, press Ctrl+Shift+N. In Firefox, click on menu and select Start Private Browsing.

Hide your IP address

This is not something new, but beginners can find it useful. An IP address can be used to track anyone’s geographical location, if you do some cyber crime, the police will contact your ISP and get your IP address and thus they can track you.

You can simply use a web proxy for hiding your IP address, Proxy.org has a list of working web proxies. If you’re looking for some advanced proxy management tool, then checkout Proxy Switchy (for Chrome) and FoxyProxy (for Firefox).

Links: Proxy.org | Proxy Switchy | FoxyProxy

Permanently delete files before ditching a hard drive

Even after you have deleted all the files in your hard drive, they can be retrieved using some file recovery tools such as Recuva.

CCleaner does this task efficiently, just head on to Tools > Drive Wipe, select a drive and hit Wipe. So next time you’re throwing your old hard drive away, make sure you overwrite it.

Link: CCleaner

UPDATE: As commentator Outspoken suggested DBAN (Darik’s Boot and Nuke) is the best drive wiper available till date. Unlike other wipers it boots via CD or USB and overwrites all the files/free space so that they can be unrecoverable. Just get the .iso file from the site, burn it to a disk and you can use it.

Link: DBAN

Social

Twitter and Google Plus privacy tips

Turn off search visibility in your Google+ account

While you can’t do this on Twitter, it’s possible on Google+. Head on to your profile and under editing mode, click on search visibility and untick it.

Make your Tweets exclusive

Twitter is public and if you want to convey a personal message, you can always use the Direct Message option. But if you’re on Twitter to hang out with your family friends then you can make your tweets exclusive.

In the settings, tick the box under Tweet Privacy and enter your password. From now, only people whom you’ve approved will be able see the tweets. Also note that, even though you’ve enabled Tweet Privacy, your previous tweets can be visible in some places.

Delete location history in Twitter

Twitter is public, so it’s better to switch the location tracker off. If you’ve tweeted with location tracker on, you can always remove the location information from the settings.

Just click on that link and your location history will be deleted within a few minutes (depends on how often you used it).

Leave Facebook, Try Google+ !

Google+ is a lot better than Facebook when it comes to privacy. There is no annoying application spam, you won’t get tagged in irrelevant photos nor you friend requests from people you don’t know. That’s all.

Other

Contains uncategorized tips like using like blocking ad networks from tracking you, removing your presence from the web and more.

Remove yourself from people and phone directories

There are many phone directories available like White Pages, People Finder etc which gather information that is publicly available on the web. If you care about privacy, you can remove yourself from those type of sites. All you have to do is read their privacy policy and get the link for opt-out process.

Remove EXIF data from your photos

If you share your personal photographs on social networks, then EXIF data can be your real privacy loophole. EXIF(Exchangeable image file format) data is the  information (geolocation, camera data and camera settings) stored in every digital image.

QuickFix is a nice tool which can remove EXIF data from digital images with a click. All you need to do is, drop the image in the program and click on QuickFix Metadata and you’re done. It won’t overwrite the original photo, instead it will create a new one.

Link: QuickFix

Use HTTPS whenever possible

HTTPS (Hyper text transfer protocol secured) is mainly used by banking sites as it provides better security while browsing. All the information that is transferred from your browser to the site’s server is encrypted, so a hacker need to break it to access the information which is quite tedious.

Turning on HTTPS in Facebook

By default, Facebook offers HTTP connection but you can enable HTTPS from the settings.

In Twitter

Just check “Always use HTTPS” in settings and you’re done.

In Gmail

Go to Mail settings, under General tab, select Always use HTTPS.

Using Firefox? Oh, you’re lucky. There’s a neat add-on called HTTPS Everywhere which automatically switches your connection to HTTPS (if the site offers it). Currently it supports a large list of over 1000 sites. Unfortunately, there’s no alternative for Chrome users, they need to manually enable HTTPS in the respective sites.

Link: HTTPS Everywhere

Stop Ad networks from tracking you

Ad agencies store cookies track you all over the web, they do this for ad personalization, i.e. the ads shown to you will be more relevant. But if you don’t like to get tracked, there’s a way to stop them.

If you’re using Chrome, you can install Keep My Opt-Outs (by Google) which will completely remove ad personalization and if you’re so curious to know the ad networks that are tracking you, get Ghostery. Firefox don’t need to install any add-on for this, as you can simply turn off ad personalization from the settings. Collusion is a handy tool for Firefox users to know who’s tracking.

Links: Keep My Opt-Outs and Ghostery (for Chrome) | Collusion (for Firefox)

Remove objectionable images from Google Streetview

Google Streetview which is intended to roll out in Bangalore has been banned in many countries like UK as it was taking pictures of some private places. If you’ve seen pictures of your house or any kind of objectionable element on Streetview, you can report it.

Click on “Report a problem” on the bottom of the map, then fill the form and submit it.

Never use your ISP’s search engine

ISPs generally offer their search engine as the default one, for example if you subscribe to Sify Broadband (Indian ISP), you get search.sify.com as the default search engine. It’s always better to change it to something reliable, preferably Google SSL.

That’s all. If you know some worth privacy tips, do share them.

-- This Post Your Complete Guide To Online Privacy And Anonymity is Published on Devils Workshop .

Many times we want to delete some of these passwords and but not all of them. For example banking websites or other websites which you do not visit anymore.

Managing Saved Passwords in Chrome

• Click on the wrench icon at top right corner of your browser. When you click on it a drop down menu option appears where you can find the ‘Options‘.
• Options are separated into 3 categories “Basic“,”Personal Stuff“, “Under the Bonnet“.
• Click on “Personal Stuff” from this menu. This option will allow you to customize some the personal aspects of the browser which includes syncing data, theme.
• Check your Password options here. Click on “Manage saved passwords…” button and now we can access all the passwords saved on Chrome.

Editor’s Note: This post was a Guest Post by Manendra. Would you like to write one for us? Do check this link.

-- This Post [Online Tip] Manage Saved Passwords in Google Chrome is Published on Devils Workshop .

Collusion

Collusion is an interactive way to know who’s tracking you, in real-time. It’s actually a Firefox add-on, once it’s installed, head on to their site(on Firefox) and start browsing as you would normally do. After a few seconds of browsing you will see an interactive image showing dots which correspond to sites.

Features of Collusion

• An interactive way to track your trackers in real-time.
• Each dot correspond to a website (which is tracking you).
• The red ones are confirmed trackers and the grey ones are not confirmed, but that doesn’t mean that they don’t track you.
• Hover your cursor over a dot to know more about it.

Unfortunately Collusion doesn’t have a feature to block the detected trackers, but Firefox has an inbuilt feature to block trackers, you can enable this feature from the options window (image below). Link: Collusion

Ghostery

As Collusion is Firefox-only, Chrome users can make use of Ghostery which is quite similar to Collusion but also gives an option to block trackers.

Features of Ghostery

• When you load a website after installing Ghostery, you get the trackers and respective info under it (as shown in the image).
• Click on More info to get extra information about the trackers, you can view what data each tracker collects from you.

• Block trackers, this one is an experimental feature. If you’re not satisfied with Ghostery’s performance in blocking trackers, you may try Keep My Opt Outs for Chrome.

Link: Ghostery Do you really care about privacy? We like to hear that in the comments.

-- This Post Disable Websites from Tracking You For Better Privacy is Published on Devils Workshop .

Just follow the step by step guide to use Friends to Gmail, a Facebook app that extracts your Facebooks contacts in .CSV format and then lets you save it on your computer and then tells you to import it on Google Contacts.

Moving Facebook Contacts to Gmail Contacts

• Go to friendstogmail website and click on “Connect with Facebook”

• Make sure you are logged on to your Facebook account and now authorize this app to use yor personal information.

•  Now wait for a few moments while the application processes your friends

• Copy the data now generated and save it in a text file with the extension “.csv”.

• Now point your web browser to http://www.google.com/contacts/ .Sign in with your desired Google Account and select Import.  Browse to the facebook.csv file and click on Import.

Now all your contacts have been uploaded into to your Google Account, which can be accessed via Gmail or Google+. You might also be in can also move all your Facebook albums to Google+ with a Chrome extension.

Do drop in your comments.

Link: FriendstoGmail

-- This Post Import Your Facebook Contacts to Google Plus is Published on Devils Workshop .

#1. Color Plus

Let’s start with the most basic tool. Most of the geeks/bloggers (including me) didn’t like the color of the Google bar and many wanted to customize it, there are many ways to do this. If you’re on Chrome then Color Plus might do the work for you. Using Firefox? No worries, there’s a userscript for that.

Links: Color Plus (Chrome-only) | Google bar color changer (Userscript-works on all browsers)

#2. Gplus.to

Shortens your Google+ profile URL, hopefully Google will introduce this feature in the coming days. Just choose a nick name, enter your profile ID and you’re done! Your shortened URL will be something like this – http://gplus.to/nickname

Link: Gplus.to (Web app)

Related: Create Easy to Remember Short URLs of your Google+ Profile

#3. Block Plus

(Image credit)

Some say that the best feature of Google+ is its integration with the Google bar, no doubt, it’s a wonderful feature but it may make a bit unproductive as it follows you everywhere (on all Google sites).

Block Plus removes the Google+ integration from the Google bar and you may continue doing your work than concentrating on Google+ notifications. Another Userscript, Google+ notifications blocker, does the same thing but eventually works on all browsers.

Link: Block Plus (Chrome-only) | Google+ Notifications blocker (Userscript- works on all browsers)

#4. Plusbar

This is a nice addition to Google+, Plusbar is a bookmarklet which converts Google+ into your entertainment dashboard. You can watch BBC News, Al Jazeera, Nasa TV and many other live streaming channels directly from Google plus.

Plusbar Demo

Link: Plusbar (Works on all browsers)

#5. Surplus

This is just the opposite to Block Plus, Surplus makes it easy to check your Google+ updates on non-Google sites. Apart from checking updates, you can also post links/normal text. You can also turn on desktop notifications and sounds in the options.

Link: Surplus (Chrome-only)

#6. PlusFeed

PlusFeed allows you to follow Google+ posts of anyone by subscribing to their feed. To get the feed address, replace Google_plus_ID in http://plusfeed.appspot.com/Google_plus_ID with your Google plus ID and subscribe to it using your RSS reader.

Link: PlusFeed (Web app)

#7. Like +1

Even though Google+ is liked by most of the beta testers, only a very few of them left Facebook and decided to choose Google plus as their primary networking tool. So, as with the arrival of Google+, the +1 button has got some meaning and many started +1’ing (along with liking) their favorite articles.

Like +1 combines +1 button and like button into a single button, so that you can save a few seconds. Your +1’s won’t appear instantly, it may take a minute to appear.

Link: Like +1 (Chrome-only)

#8. Extended Share

Share your Google+ posts on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn with a couple of clicks. Just click on Share on.. present beside the Share option and choose the site on which you want to share the post. 

Link: Extended Share (Chrome-only)

#9. Find People on Plus

Pretty self-explanatory, it’s a directory of all the people who signed up for Google+, it detects your area and shows user suggestions. Apart from acting as a people directory, it is also a showcase of Google+ statistics and top Google+ users which I found interesting.

Link: Find People on Plus (Web app)

Related: Find People on Google+ Directory

#10. Google+ Statistics

While Find People on Plus shows some mild statistics of every Google+  user, Google+ Statistics is better if you want to checkout graphs, following trends etc. You might know about Twitter Counter, the same guys have built Google+ Statistics.

You can also track your Google+ statistics by signing up using your Google account. It also provides a statistics widget which you can embed on your site.

Link: Google+ Statistics (Web app)

Bonus Tools

#11. Move Your Photos

This chrome extension will help you in exporting all your Facebook photos to your Picasa account. If you’re migrating to Google+ then this one will be handy, as you don’t need to manually export the photos.

You need to login to Facebook and grand permission to the app, as this app has become popular lately, it may take more time to migrate the photos.

Link: Move Your Photos (Chrome-only)

Related: Move Photos from Facebook Albums to Google+ using Chrome Extension

#12. GTools+

With GTools+ you can customize the interface of Google+ such as editing the Google bar components, changing the position of the chat box, pinning the Google bar to the top and much more. It can also be used for translation and to setup notifications for Google+, you can even customize the color of notifications.

Link: GTools+ (Chrome-only)

#13. Agent G+

There are many extensions and add-ons to post sync your Google+ posts with Twitter and Facebook, but this one is extension-free. You just need to authorize the app in Twitter and Facebook and post a Google+ update of the authorization string you get (share it with only + Agent G).

Once you have done that, you can sync your Google+ posts by simply sharing the posts with +Agent G.

Link: Agent G+ (Web app)

So, that is it. If you know some worthy Google+ tools, do share them through the comments.

-- This Post 10 Great Tools to Light up Google Plus Addicts is Published on Devils Workshop .

We also came across an online tool using which you can create easy to remember short URL of Google+ Profile. Let’s now take a look at some of the keyboard shortcuts and tips to use Google+.

Google+ Shortcuts (Works for Mac and Windows)

• Space: Scroll down
• Shift+Space: Scroll up
• J: Scroll down one post
• K: Scroll up one post
• Enter: Start comment

Google + Tips:

• To write in:
  • Bold: *Bold*
  • Italics: _Italics_
  • Strikethrough: -Strikethrough-

You can also use a combination of all three, i.e., *_Bold and Italics _*



In fact, these are also the common auto correct options that are available in MS Word.

• Tag people: Use + or @ before the name. You can even tag someone who is not in your circle- (just like twitter).
  
• Drag and drop to share your photos and videos – a feature similar to that in Gmail.
  
• Edit your post after publishing: The small arrow at the top right of the post is very useful. If after posting an update, you realize that there has been some mistake, you don’t have to delete it. Just click on the arrow, it’ll give you an option to edit your status. You can also edit your comments after posting.
  
• Disable reshare:This option is also available from the small arrow at the top right of the post. This is useful when you send a message to a selected group of people, and you don’t want someone from that group to share it with others.
• Disable Comment:Use this feature when a post is getting spammed with comments.
• Mute others’ post to remove it from your stream.
  

Do you know any other shortcuts or tips? Share it with us through your comments.

-- This Post [Cheat Sheet] Google+ Tips and Shortcuts for Windows and Mac Users is Published on Devils Workshop .

Many such issues are solved by using open source alternatives which are not as good as the paid ones. Hence when it comes to gaming, everyone prefers Windows as it supports a lot of games.

Also, another drawback is we do not find a lot of games that run on Linux.

Penguspy is a website that really good for looking up free Linux based games online.

Penguspy Features

• The site is very useful if you are predominantly a Linux user and feel the need to have Windows only for gaming needs.
• The games are classified into several categories like arcade, action, adventure, puzzle, FPS, RPG, sim, sport etc.
• You just want to select a category, select the game and you can see it’s trailer, ratings, some reviews and a link to download them.

If you are using Linux, try out Penguspy and do drop in your comments.

Link: Penguspy

-- This Post Search and Find Games for Linux Online is Published on Devils Workshop .