Freeware World

When it comes to photo editing and manipulation, Photoshop is undoubtedly the best software you can find for the job. Though it started back in 1987 as a basic graphic app developed by Thomas Knoll, the first version of Photoshop was officially launched at the beginning of 1990 – exactly twenty years ago.

I’m a big fan of this great program (as you can tell by the loads of posts I’ve written about it) so I thought it would be a nice idea to write this post as a celebration of Photoshop’s 20th birthday. I’m sure you’ll be shocked to see how different the first Photoshop looks from the one you have on your computer!

Like I said before, Photoshop started off in 1987 as a very basic graphic app for Mac called Display, created by Thomas Knoll, which could only display images in black and white.

Thomas’s brother, John, was working for Industrial Light and Magic and asked Thomas to work on a enhanced version of this program that could help him process digital images. The idea seemed to work, and in 1988 the two brothers decided to create a commercial photo editing tool based on Display, but using a new name: Photoshop.

Thomas wrote all the code, while John focused on plug-ins. They also managed to reach a deal with Adobe in September 1988, and early in 1990, the first version of Photoshop was launched.

Since then, two decades of changes and improvements have turned Photoshop into one of the greatest photo editing applications ever. Not only is it the standard tool for many professional designers and developers, but it has also become an essential tool for newspapers, magazines and online media.

The dominance of Photoshop in today’s world of graphic design has also caused controversy about the abuse of photo manipulation. From the US Air Force pilot about to be eaten by a shark to President Sarkozy’s vanishing love handles, we’ve all seen many popular examples of photoshopped images.

But the best examples of the power of Photoshop often come from anonymous users, like the community behind Worth1000. Once you start browsing this site, you never know when to stop. Some of these creations are just so good that it’s hard to believe they’re not real.

Oddly enough, the same happens with Photoshop Disasters, though this time you won’t be browsing amazing Photoshop compositions like the ones in Worth1000; on the contrary, it’s a collection of hilarious Photoshop outrages that have inexplicably made their way to printed media all over the world.

Happy birthday, Photoshop!

(Photoshop splash screens, interface snapshots and examples taken from Hongkiat.com, Blogvecindad.com, Oddee.com and Photopreneur.com)

A year ago I was still pretty skeptical about touchscreens. I felt that total reliance on a touchscreens was a mistake, and that devices needed some physical controls, like d-pads, keyboards or keypads.

Having decided to get an iPhone regardless of these fears, and watching the development of apps over the last year, I have changed my mind. While I still can’t touch-text under tables like I used to, I can now tap out emails pretty quickly using the virtual keyboard. I think a physical keyboard is more natural to use, but I have been surprised how quickly I’ve got comfortable to life without one. The gains from touchscreens certainly outweigh the losses: Navigating around a device with a touchscreen is easier and faster - browsing is fantastic. A smartphone without a touchscreen would be a nightmare!

I own a Nintendo DS and a PSP, and never thought the iPhone could compete in game quality. There are areas where that’s still true - driving games on the iPhone are only ever surprisingly good considering they’re on an iPhone. They don’t stand up to systems with more controls - the accelerometer is too imprecise and sensitive (see Real Racing). But when games are developed especially for the touchscreen, they can be fantastic. Space Invaders Infinity Gene is perfect, while Beneath a Steel Sky and Broken Sword show that touchscreens are the best system for point and click adventures.

All in all, touchscreens are a great way to interact with computers - there is plenty of space for them in my life, although that doesn’t mean my joypads and laptop keyboards will be going anywhere soon. Is it a bad idea to say that on the eve of another Apple launch?

The twelfth annual Independent Games Festival has released the winners of the Student Showcase category. Don’t think that “student” equals amateurish or poor quality - there are some amazing games in the list, and some will no doubt go on to be commercial titles like DigiPen’s Narbacular Drop, which turned into the wonderful Portal.

The best thing about the list? Of the ten finalists, only two are unavailable, but the other eight are free to play!

There are cool puzzle games (Continuity, Puzzle Bloom and and Puddle), strange 3D experiences (Devil’s Tuning Fork and Dreamside Maroon), art games (Spectre and Ulitsa Dimitrova), and the adrenaline rush that is DigiPen’s Igneous. All are great reasons to be excited about game development, mixing experimentation with great playability.

Dive in and get playing!

Windows 7 features a nice collection of themes with which you can easily change the look and feel of your operating system. You can find them under the Personalize menu, right-clicking anywhere on the desktop. Depending on your area, you’ll get different sets of location specific themes - in my case, I have a Spain set with nice wallpapers displaying the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, the windmills in La Mancha and the coves of Majorca.

But these are not the only regional themes you can use in Windows 7. There are other additional themes you can easily find in the system. Click the Start button and enter C:\Windows\Globalization\MCT in the Search field.

Windows Explorer will open up a window with more themes. In my case, I get an extra Mexican set, but depending on your region you may get themes from Australia, the UK or Canada, to name a few.

You can choose to use just the new wallpaper…

 …or install the complete new theme by double clicking the correspondent file.

The new themes will appear under My Themes, inside the Personalization window. Here’s how my new Mexican theme looks like.

Remember you can download themes for Windows 7 from the Microsoft official website and from several other websites as well, as we already explained a while ago.

It’s that time of year again when we whip our crystal ball out of the drawer and take a look at what software is in store for the coming year. We were proved right with all our software predictions for 2009, so I’m trusting the ball to work its magic once again. Here we go with a guide to what to expect from the coming year:

1. Chromium OS

This was an easy one, because Google has already released the source code for its shiny new operating system. The OS is being touted as the perfect solution for netbooks, because it’s entirely based around the web and thus doesn’t require cavernous hard disk space. We were initially underwhelmed by Chromium when we gave it a run-out a couple of months back, but the OS is sure to look a lot different come the end of the year, and Google’s reputation alone should be enough to convince hoards of people to make the switch to browser-based computing.

2. Internet Explorer 9

For the last few years poor old IE has been kicked, battered and stamped on by web users like a cute puppy who got old. Microsoft began work on Internet Explorer 9 a few weeks ago and unveiled some details of the browser at its Professional Developers Conference in Los Angeles in November. When finally released, hopefully towards the end of the year, IE9 will be equipped with new hardware-accelerated text and graphics to make web sites look better. The new version’s Direct2D browsing technology is designed to significantly speed up web applications, which is necessary if Microsoft continues to push the wonders of cloud computing. Internet Explorer 9 could see Firefox turncoats flocking back to their roots. Alternatively, and more likely, no one will notice much difference in the browser and its release will pass with no great fanfare.

3. Adobe Creative Suite 5

Rumor has it that the new versions of Photoshop, Flash et. al should be with us around April. It’ll be a new era for the design suite because the Mac version has been completely rebuilt in Cocoa, and will no longer run on PowerPC chips. Judging by the sneaky peeks we’ve seen here and from what was announced at Adobe MAX 2009, designers will be whimpering with delight when CS5 finally becomes available. New goodies you can expect from the suite include ‘wet look’ 3D Photoshop paint brushes, native iPhone game compiling in Flash, and a ‘Smart Paste’ tool for Dreamweaver that makes it easier to integrate vector graphics and Illustrator-created content into your web sites.

4. New Apple OS

I’m already bored of the new Apple Tablet and it hasn’t even been launched (or even confirmed!) yet. Rumors are rife already about what OS/UI this ‘alleged’ device will run. Some say it will run the full OS X, others are adamant that it will us the iPhone OS. My money is on a new variant of OS X that lies somewhere between the two, which will include loads of smart gestures and will be shackled tightly to iTunes.

5. Firefox 4/Firefox Mobile

Two massive releases from Mozilla that are penned for release this year. Firefox 4 for Windows and Mac should arrive around October, and early tidbits of information and flashes of screenshots suggest it’ll be worth the wait. According to Stephen Horlander, product visual designer at Mozilla, the new interface will be radically stripped down to bring it in line with its leaner rivals, Chrome and Safari. Take a look at the screenshots on Stephen’s site if you want an idea of how it will look. Finally, this year will also see the arrival of Firefox Mobile. It’s already available for the Nokia N900 but expect releases for Android, Symbian, and Windows Mobile, too.

6. Windows Azure

The new Azure platform is Microsoft’s attempt to drive people up into the cloud. The environment is designed to help businesses develop their own cloud applications and services, implementing them alongside their existing services. I’ll be honest here and say I really don’t understand what Azure actually does and I was none the wiser after watching Microsoft’s incredibly vague overview video outlining the benefits of the platform on the Azure home page.

7. Google Goggles

Expect Google to ramp up its production of mobile software this year. Besides knocking out new updates of its Android  platform and making stacks of money from its Nexus One phone, Google will continue to experiment with new interfaces for mobile devices. It’s highly effective Voice Search tool has been followed up by the development of an augmented reality app called Google Goggles. Essentionally, it allows you to point your phone at something and Google will tell you what it is, which is pretty cool. Thankfully, Google has said Goggles will block searching on people’s faces, which is a relieve for anyone who values their privacy.

8. Location-based services

A more general prediction is that 2010 will be the year when location-based services finally come into their own. Uptake of location-aware smartphone devices will increase exponentially and thus more of us will be trackable via satellite. This means we expect to see shops flashing ads to your mobile as you walk past them, automatic check-ins as you walk into an airport, and everyone on Facebook knowing exactly where you are at any given time.

Windows: The better your password practice, the harder it is to remember them! Get those passwords under control with Sticky Password, a password manager with brains and brawn. Its excellent security options are perfectly packaged in a seriously well-thought out program.

Mac: iPhoto offers fairly basic photo editing options but to really impress with your images, you can’t do much better than Adobe Photoshop Elements. Adobe Photoshop Elements integrates seamlessly with Adobe Bridge CS4 software and provides instant organization of your images.

iPhone: If Forest Gump had an iPhone, then World Cup Table Tennis would surely be the first game he would download. This excellent iPhone ping pong simulation sees you take on the World in a knockout tournament, or compete for points in Arcade mode. The graphics and ball physics in World Cup Table Tennis are the best you’ll find in any iPhone ping pong game

Windows: If you want to get started in professional video editing, Sony Vegas is an excellent choice. This powerful video editor includes more than 300 special effects, supports VST plug-ins, works with all popular formats and imports data from various devices, including HD video. It takes a while to learn how to use it, but it’s really worth the effort!

Mac: Special effects can help you breath new life into your images, and with ImageLobe is easier than ever! Simply drag any image into the program’s interface, select the effect among the more than 40 included in the program and drag it out again to save your changes. A simple, effective way to give that special touch to your images.

Mobile: Even if you’re not a hardcore gamer, you’ve surely played Space Invaders at some point. Now you can enjoy an excellent version of the original Space Invaders from 1978 on your phone. Graphics and sound are quite primitive - as they’re supposed to be - but the best about this game is its insanely addictive gameplay!

Going back to the past is sometimes the only way to understand the present - and even the future. Now that we’re about to enter 2010, blogs and newspapers are starting to publish their own analysis of this first decade of the 21st century. But what about software? Can we trace it back to its origins and see what it looked like five, ten or twenty years ago? In the case of Windows, the answer is yes. We’ve been able to find images from all the versions of Windows released up to now, from 1.01 to Seven.

Windows 1.01 (1985)

You might not have been born yet when Windows 1.0 was released. Don’t complain about it though. With such a tacky combination of colors, this first version of Windows wasn’t really something worth viewing.

Windows 2.03 (1987)

It took Microsoft two long years to release the second version of Windows. Windows 2 was supposed to improve the first version, but the color combination didn’t get any better. The most outstanding feature, however, was the Control Panel, with an overbloated menu of three options.

Windows 3.0 (1990)

In 1990 Windows started to look like a real operating system - or at least like the one we know today, with its windows, menus and icons. We already had NotePad, Calculator and Paint (known as Paintbrush at that time) and all the apps were stored in the so called Program Manager.

Windows 3.1 (1992)

The interface in Windows 3.1 didn’t change that much from the previous version, except for better program icons. This was the first version of Windows I ever used. By the way, did you notice that the Sound Recorder hasn’t changed at all in 15 years?

Windows 95 (1995)

This looks way more familiar, doesn’t it? The dull-to-death gray background was replaced by the classic Windows blueish green, or greenish blue - not really an improvement. Program Manager is now gone, and can now be placed anywhere on the screen. This is the first version of Windows to feature the Start menu and the taskbar, and the minimize, maximize and close buttons on each Window change to the well-known underscore, square and x symbols.

Windows NT 4.0 (1996)

Windows NT didn’t bring any significant changes to the interface, nor did it replace the background with even more boring colors. In fact, it looks exactly the same as Windows 95.

Windows 98 (1998)

The most important change in Windows 98 regarding the previous version is the Quick Launch bar, which enables you to run programs without having to browse the Start menu or look for them on the desktop. Talking about the Start Menu, this feature was improved as well with support for right click and the ability to move items around.

Windows 2000 (2000)

The interface in Windows 2000 doesn’t feature any outstanding improvements, though the background color chanhes from greenish blue to a more navy blue. Much better!

Windows Me (2000)

Windows Millenium is that one operating system that everyone tries to leave behind - even those who created it. To be honest, it didn’t have any important new features, but it did include some really annoying characteristics we’d better not mention here.

Windows XP (2001)

Windows XP was released, and there was light. Squared windows and apps were replaced by rounded corners, available in three flavors: blue, silver and olive. It was a complete interface overhaul and though it felt a bit cheesy, it was way better than the gray style of previous versions.

Windows Server 2003 (2003)

Sysadmins and network managers are serious people, and maybe that’s why Windows Server replaces rounded corners with squared Windows again - despite having been released after Windows XP. Its appearance is very similar to Windows 2000, but with better icons.

Windows Vista (2006)

In 2006 Microsoft thought that we would probably be tired of the blue taskbar, and released a new Windows version with a black taskbar and a rounded Start button. Other important features in Windows Vista were transparency effects, a collection of mostly useless gadgets and the ability to manage apps and windows in a 3D environment.

Windows 7 (2009)

The most important change in Windows 7 interface is the taskbar, where program shortcuts are mixed up with running apps, besides having real time previews and jump lists. The rest remains more or less the same, except for the new AeroShake and AeroPeek functions.

[Via: OnSoftware Spain]

Just two more days until Christmas and that’s two more days in which to check out great software before you get  interrupted by the festivities. Have a look behind the window to find one of Niamh’s top apps of the year.

xxx is a great application that allows you to create stick figure animations that range from the simple to impressive - with a little time and patience. Working on the normal basics of stick figure animation, create individual frames of action and then view them in sequence, producing the animation. Move over Disney, xxx has come to town! - Niamh

Windows: If, like the Softonic editors, you’re also hooked to Twitter, you’ll love Saezuri. This AIR-based desktop client will make your Twitter experience much better! Includes all the tools you would expect (view and send tweets, support for multiple accounts, built-in URL shortener, photo uploader…) all wrapped up in a nicely designed interface.

iPhone: Google Earth for iPhone, successfully brings the best free mapping tool on the planet to the Apple device. The application uses the same satellite and aerial photography found in the desktop version, only this time you navigate the globe simply by swishing your fingers across the screen. This latest update of the app is now 10Mb so WiFi is no longer required to download it.

Mac: Macs have always excelled at Desktop Publishing although applications like Quark are neither simple nor cheap. However Swift Publisher makes it easy enough for anyone to produce professional looking flyers, newsletters, brochures, letterheads and more. There are more than 1,000 images, 90 designs and 100 templates to help get you going too, so you don’t have to start from scratch.