Naveen’s Blog

I am already using Andrew Spencer’s YouTube video downloader script to run my own YouTube video downloading site. Now this article shows you the way to download streaming video from LiveLeak in an FLV format.

What is LiveLeak?
Liveleak, based in the UK, is a website that lets users post and share videos, similar to sites like YouTube, but it allows some sexual content and emphasizes reality-based footage such as war scenes from various parts of the world, grisly accidents, executions, and crimes. – Wikipedia

Why I went to LiveLeak?
I was searching for educational autopsy videos in Google and I got link to a video shared on LiveLeak. I searched for the term “Autopsy” in LiveLeak and surprised to see number of videos, which aren’t available in any of video-sharing sites. Hey….don’t see the videos if you have a weak heart .

So….let’s start the hacking. We need Firefox (I forgot IE and permanently deleted it from my XP ), Greasemonkey Firefox extension, and LiveLeak Greasemonkey user script.

What is this Greasemonkey?
Greasemonkey is a Firefox extension that allows you to customize the way web pages look and function. It’s a tiny extension that does wonders. Just head over to userscripts.org to see what Greasemonkey can do.

First, install the Greasemonkey extension for Firefox from here: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/748

Official homepage of Greasemonkey: http://www.greasespot.net/

Restart the browser and you will see a monkey icon on the status bar of the Firefox.

Then, go the LiveLeak Greasemonkey user script page here: http://userscripts.org/scripts/show/6442 On the right side, you will see the link “Install this script.” Click that and it will popup a screen like this:

Click the “Install” button, and you are done. Now, you are ready to download the videos from LiveLeak. Go to any video page and you will see a download link like this.

Right click on it and select the option “Save Link As” to save the video to your desktop. You can use Wimpy standalone tiny FLV player or VLC Player to play the FLV video.

Today morning, when I saw at the status bar of the Firefox for Adsense statistics, I surprised to see a big amount floating on the status bar. I never got that much. Immediately, I have opened the account to see the statistics and felt sad to see that Adsense Notifier is showing the “Clicks” count as “Earnings.” I felt that Google has updated the script and looked at AN’s homepage, Mincus Code. Allen of Mincus Code posted that he will be updating the script tonight or tomorrow. I setup the extension to show the statistics every one hour and it has become a habit for me to look at the status bar every hour or so.

I am eagerly waiting for the updated version of Adsense Notifier. If you are also fan of Adsense Notifier, start refreshing the AN’s home page to see if it is updated

Update: December 2, 2007: Updated version (0.9.5) has come that is working fine. Download it here: http://code.mincus.com/3/adsense-notifier/

TechSmith’s Camtasia is a complete professional solution for recording, editing and sharing high-quality screen videos. It is easy-to-use, affordable, and is the quickest and most effective way for you to communicate. Easily record your screen to create compelling training videos, screencasts, and presentations without ever leaving your desk.

Click here to go to the promo page on TechSmith’s website. Enter your correct email address to receive the serial key of Camtasia Studio 3.1.3. You can upgrade it to the latest version that is 5.0 at a concessional rate of for just 88 £ (New version is 176 £).

I think this promo will be for a short period, so hurry up and download it before it is closed.

Camtasia Studio 3.1 Features:

• Capture everything you see on your screen.
• Edit and enhance the videos - pinpoint cursor movements with special visual effects, perform sophisticated moves such as highlighting, zooming, and panning, and even record what you draw on the screen.
• Share in the industry-standard AVI and streaming media formats.
• Side-by-side display that allows users to determine the dimensions of the camera and screen video windows to provide emphasis and focus the viewer’s attention.
• Flash 8 support with direct publishing to FLV that ensures bullet-proof delivery of any content for any audience via the ubiquitous Flash player.
• Section 508-compliant open captioning that makes content more accessible and more memorable. Users can add their own text captioning, import speaker notes from PowerPoint, or paste in text from any document.
• Interactivity and quizzing enhancements that allow instructors to embed questions into their multimedia content and to receive feedback via email without requiring a Learning Management System (LMS).
• QuickTime 7 and H.264 support in Camtasia Studio that delivers the industry’s highest quality video with spectacular compression for customers who want to publish their content in the QuickTime format.
• Third-party Project Streamer hosting so individuals can easily share their content online with others by simply emailing or posting a link to a website. The option to upload a video from within Camtasia Studio is now available and users can choose which of their videos they want to make available for public viewing.

My friend called me asking a solution for the above question. He runs a small medical transcription company. When transcriptionists are busy with searching medical terminology, there is a chance for accidentally going to the sites with adult content. He also wants to restrict the net use for the night shift people. He don’t want to spend money buying the content filtering software and it must be easy to setup because they don’t have system administrators to do that. Everything related to systems is taken care of by themselves.

So, I have started searching the net and found these easy steps to stop the adult content showing up in browsers. It is basically about changing the DNS servers in your system.

What is DNS?
DNS (Domain Name System) is a process that translates easy to remember addresses (like www.scrubit.com) to a numerical IP address used by computers (67.138.54.99) Everyone uses DNS. Most DNS is provided to the user by your internet service provider, or a recursive DNS service like ScrubIT. More info you can read on Wikipedia here.

Here I explain about two services OpenDNS and ScrubIt.

OpenDNS: It offers more free services than ScrubIt and more it is faster than ScrubIt. But, adult content filtering is not turned on by default. You have to create a free account on OpenDNS to turn it on. It will give you access to a number of interesting features like Adult Site Blocking, Phishing Site Blocking, Phishing Site Blocking, Stats and Logs, Typo Corrections, etc. Change your DNS servers to 208.67.222.222 & 208.67.220.220, create a free account on OpenDNS, add your IP address, and turn the adult site blocking on. Now you are free from adult sites.

Note that this works only with static IPs as your free account is linked to the IP to gain the control. Lot of broadband accounts comes with static IP and if your internet provider does not support static IP, you can download the Dynamic DNS client to update your IP address automatically. More information is here: http://www.opendns.com/support/dynamic_ip/

Below are some screenshots. It is totally free, so give it a try to learn more about OpenDNS.

Continue reading »

Yesterday, I have come across this fast and free WhoIs checking software, IDwhois. Before findings this, I was using another free client, which checks only few TLDs like .com, .net, .org, and .info. I use this software to check domain availability across different extensions.

It is too fast and checks nealry 130 gTLDs and ccTLDs. It has checked 500 domains in less than a minute. You can prepare the domains list in text format and upload it when you are ready, and also you can save the results into XML format too.

IDwhois Features :
- More than 130 TLDs to lookup
- Stand alone whois client
- Integrated Parser
- Export results on .HTML, .CSV or .XML for fast reporting
- Import domain name list from a .TXT file
- XML Configuration files to add or modify TLD settings / interfaced
- Multi thread WHOIS lookup
- WHOIS Request timer to avoid registrars/NICs time out
- multi-IP bridge lookup environment (avoid NIC black list)
- Rearrange the information in your whois results
- Tree view result
- Free online support by mail
- Proxy environment

Download it here.

What does “Who Is” mean?
WHOIS is a TCP-based query/response protocol which is widely used for querying a database in order to determine the owner of a domain name, an IP address, or an autonomous system number on the Internet. WHOIS lookups were traditionally made using a command line interface, but a number of simplified web-based tools now exist for looking up domain ownership details from different databases. Web-based WHOIS clients still rely on the WHOIS protocol to connect to a WHOIS server and do lookups, and command-line WHOIS clients are still quite widely used by system administrators. - Wikipedia

I got the free serial from a promotion campaign run by TechSmith for SnagIt screen capturing and image editing software few months ago and I really liked it. It stops working after one year and I have started looking for an alternative free software for it. Today, I am able to find a free alternative for it. Photoscape is a free photo editing software with amazing features like batch editing of multiple photos, screen capturing, color picker, merging multiple photos to single one, GIF animation, adding text and images to photos, and normal photo editing software features like auto contrast, black & white, cropping and resizing. It has features like SnagIt and I think it is a free alternative to SnagIt, a $39.95 commercial product. I like Photoscape’s video help.

See more screenshots of the software here: http://www.photoscape.org/ps/main/screenshot.php

Go to Photoscape and download it.

.in domain promo is running now and many of the registrars have come with an unbelievable discount. Actual one year registration price for a .in domain is approximately Rs. 800/$20. During this promo period, .in domain is available between Rs. 200/$5 to Rs.140/$3.5 depending on the registrar.

You can get .in domain for Rs. 199/$5 at Rediff. If you are from India, you can register the domain by paying through Credit Card, Cheque, DD, or via Internet Banking facility of ICICI, HDFC, Federal, and Axis. If you select the option “Cheque Payment,” they will send their agent to collect it at your home.

Sify is also selling .in domains at the same price, but it accepts only Credit Card, Debit Card, and DD.

Mitsu, an accredited .in domain registrar, has gone further in discount and is selling .in domains at Rs.140/$3.5. It has mentioned on the homepage that the promo price is valid till 30th December.

If you are running a small organization, office, or shop; purchase a domain and apply for Google Apps to get free email and IM hosting for your domain along with number of other features.

So, go ahead and get your .in domain now! Please note that from the second year, you have to pay the normal registration fee.

Ever wanted to have your Linux look like Vista? Everybody likes the aero glass effects of Vista. Now, you can get the same effect in Linux too. Get Vixta! Vixta is a Fedora-based Linux distribution with a custom KDE-based interface, which looks and feels like Vista. Look at the screen shots and sure you will love it.

Vixta Homepage: http://www.vixta.org/
Download Here: On SourceForge (708 MB ISO)