Links |
| The
Hunger Site |
Donate Clicks. Help Feed the Hungry, provide Mammograms, improve Children's Lives and Healthcare, preserve
Rainforests, assist Animal Shelters. Takes only a few minutes and no $ out of your pocket. |
Help Cure
Cancer &
Smallpox |
Grid.org, a not-for-profit segment of United Devices, Inc., is donating personnel and computer resources to assist basic research projects, described in the main link on the left, which are searching for promising leukemia- and smallpox-fighting drug molecules. If you have a Windows computer, you can join the search. For further information and tips and hints on getting started, please read my UD Tips. If your computer falls below the minimum requirements or does not run Windows, this site tracks many medical research and other projects seeking your donation of idle computer time. You may find some which match up with your interests and computer. |
Environmental
News Network |
Global environmental news. Updated daily. |
| BioGems |
"Saving Endangered Wild Places." BioGems is a News and Take Action arm of the Natural Resources Defense Council. If you are opposed to the G.W.Bush administration breaking environmantal laws and dismantaling environmental regulations, this is an excellent place to voice your opinion to your Congresspersons and urge them to uphold the laws they made and vote Against the administration's anti-environmental bills and riders. |
| LCV.org |
The "League of Conservation Voters" site is a good place to find the voting records of your Congresspersons on conservation issues as well as another place from which to send your viewpoint to them. The anti-conservation turn of our government and congress is not a party line thing. The majority of both Republican and Democratic elected representatives have sold their souls and turned their backs on the American public who are heavily in favor of clean air and water and protecting the environment. |
Barbecue'n On
The Internet |
For everyone from rank beginner with first gas grill to cook-off competitor with monster pit/smoker wagon. Lessons, recipes, equipment, newsletter. |
| NOVA |
One of my favorite PBS programs. This site contains supplementary material for the TV programs. A few older programs, four so far, are available online in streaming QuickTime and RealVideo formats; they are sans commercials, closed captioned, and broken into eight 5 - 10 minute segments. Both formats play in a browser window. The RealVideo has better sound but its picture is only ½ the size of the QuickTime one. |
| X Prize |
Keep up with the Civilian Space Race. Who's going to be the first to fly three people on two round trips into space in a reusable craft and win the "X Trophy" and $10 million? |
| Hull Number |
Find your old Navy (sea, air, land), Coast Guard, and ship-board Marine buddies, and enter yourself into the database so they can find you. It's all free. |
Museum of
Paleontology |
University of California, Berkeley. Learn how to get around in this gigantic online museum by clicking the "Navigation" button at the bottom of the window. |
BookCrossing
|
Just read a good book? If you loved it, then set it free. When you release a book back into the wild, or spot a freed book, please fill out a release/spot report at BookCrossing.com. |
| KidsClick! |
KidsClick! is a search portal designed by librarians with links to (mostly) non-commercial Web pages suitable for the K-7 crowd. If you could locate something in the children's card catalog of a large library, you can probably locate it here. Home schooling your kids? You'll probably want to bookmark this site. For the philosophy behind the link selections, read About KidsClick. |
Gibson
Research |
If the name Steve Gibson doesn't mean anything to you, it will after you visit this site. Start by running Shields Up!. If it reports "stealth" for all tests, then you're probably running at least a half way decent firewall (Windows XP's built-in firewall is not a decent one according to oodles of reports, even though it may pass these tests; Windows XP SP2 will contained an improved firewall.) If anything showed less than "stealth", then see ZoneAlarm in the Favorite Programs section below. Windows XP users who haven't installed either Service Pack 1 or the "Flaw in Windows XP Help and Support Center" patch should read XPdite. Okay. Now dig around the site. There's a lot of very interesting, and educational, information here. |
SpaceWeather
Phone |
Get a phone call from NASA's SpaceWeather.com when something is about to happen, or is happening now, over your head; Aurora, Meteor shower, Space Station crossing, etc. This is not a free service, but if you're always sleeping through some of the best aurora displays of the year.... |
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NASA General Interest News. You don't need to be a rocket scientist to read these stories. These headlines self-update whenever you visit this page (if you are using a JavaScript enabled browser.) If the headlines do not appear, click here for the latest story. |
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Click to Subscribe | |
Well, a lot of them anyway. LangaList is one of my favorite newsletters. Fred has been in the middle of the personal computing scene for a long time (anyone remember Popular Computing magazine?) and knows whereof he speaks. Read current and past issues here. |
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Online Virus Scanner & Cleaner for Windows 95 through XP, with Internet Explorer 5.0 or newer. Clicking the animation on the left will start the process. Before you do, download any waiting mail and close your mail program, close all other open programs and browser windows, and... "deactivate" your antivirus program! The first time you run ActiveScan, an ActiveX Control and Panda's scan engine and current signature file will be downloaded - about 10 minutes over a 28K modem. Subsequent executions generally need to download only a new signature file. If you aren't ready to get a second opinion on your virus-free status right now, right-click this page and choose "Create Shortcut" to this page on your Desktop. |
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A Few of my Favorite Free Windows Programs |
| TClockEx |
Vastly improved SysTray Clock with pop-up calendar. |
| Dimension 4 |
Synchronize your computer's clock to a guaranteed accurate time server. Can be configured to load at Windows startup, sync your clock the first time you access the Internet, then self-exit to free up its memory space and "resources." |
| Trillian |
Five Instant Messengers in one. Keeps getting better. A similar product is the 4-in-1 Easy Message. |
| ZoneAlarm |
This free Personal Firewall is all you need for a home desktop or portable computer (there are also two commercial versions.) A firewall is mandatory for folks with "always on" Internet connections, and contrary to popular opinion, dial-up users need a firewall too. Hackers are again trying to get into any old computer they can to plant Zombies which don't care about the type of Internet connection. |
| Ad-Aware |
Ad-Aware will identify ad/spy-ware programs on your computer and can remove most of the ones you don't want. NOTE!!! Ad-Aware 6.0 is the current version. It is a completely new program, not an update or revision. If you have an older version, before installing Ad-Aware 6 you must fully uninstall the old version (use Programs Add/Remove) and the companion "RefUpdate" program. After removal make sure the C:\Program Files\LavaSoft directories are gone; if present, right-click them and choose Delete, then empty your Recycle bin. Reboot your computer. Before installing Version 6, you must prepare your computer properly. Shut down all running programs except Explorer, SysTray, and firewall - you may have to use Ctrl-Alt-Delete (or better yet, EndItAll - see below) to shut down some of them. |
| EndItAll |
EndItAll 2.0 displays most of the programs running on your computer. With one click you can shut down all the "probably safe to close" programs. It is easy to modify the program list to set the "safe/unsafe" (unlock/lock) status of each program. No longer free, but, to me, worth paying for. |
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