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The best way to suggest a new category is to create a software stub for that category.
A stub is a blank review. The advantage of creating a stub is that it get the software category onto our website and this encourages our users to offer suggestions or even take over the editing of that category by writing a full review.
It is remarkable how many suggestions some stubs get via the Comments section at the end of the stub.
All these suggestions make the writing of a full review much easier. Indeed a smart way of creating a new software category that you intend to edit yourself is to first create a stub, let the comments come in over a month or so and then write the review using these comments.
How to create a stub for a new software category
1. The easiest way to create a stub is to copy an existing stub. So your first step is to go to this page which list software categories currently without editors and select an article that has the words "Stub only" in the title.
2. Edit the stub you have selected. Open another browser tab at techsupportalert.com and select "Create content from the left sidebar.
3. Select "Article" from the create content page
4. In the Title box enter the software category. Start with "Best Free ..." and follow it with your new category, for example "Best Free Color Picker." Capitalize all words of four letters or more as this will be your page heading.
At the end of the title add the words (Stub only) to clearly indicate to site visitirs that the page is only a stub not a full review. Your title should now read something like:
Best Free Color Picker (Stub only)
5. In the "Article type" select one of more broad classes of software that best fit you new category. Start off by selecting the parent category "PC freeware" then select the sub-category (or sub-categories) from the list by holding down the Ctrl key while you select. Select only from the following classes:
-PC Freeware
-- Cleanup & Tuning
-- Desktop & GUI
-- Disk & File Utilities
-- Education
-- Games and Diversions
-- Home & Office
-- Image View and Edit
-- Internet, Email and Messaging
-- Multimedia (CD, DVD, Video, Audio)
-- Security / Privacy / Encryption
-- Networking & File Transfer
-- Programming & Engineering
-- Security
-- System and Performance Info
-- System Utilties
6. Now we need to copy the Article Text field from the existing stub to the new stub.
Switch to the browser tab containing the existing stub opened in the online editor. Click in the Article Text box and press Ctrl A followed bt Ctrl C to select and copy the comments.
Switch to the browser tab containing the new stub and click in the Article Text box and press Ctrl V to paste the copied text from the old stub to the stub.
7. Scroll down to the heading "URL path settings" and click on the little arrow to the left of the heading to expand the options.
Now uncheck the box that says "Automatic alias."
In the box below enter the title of your review in lower case and with a "-" between words instead of spaces. Please also add ".htm" to the end.
So if your review is titled "Best Free Color Picker" enter "best-free-color-picker.htm"
8. Scroll to the bottom of the page and click "Submit" to save your work.
You have now created and saved your new stub.
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Why not : best image/file online hosting solution : image hosting, send it, etc ?
Best free online TV channel
Best free online news aggregator
Best free personal finance
Best free collaboration suite
Best Free Website Changes Monitor ???
I'd like to see the Best Tech Websites category expanded into a more general Best Online/Web Services category to include file hosting , photo hosting, etc.
I'm rebuilding a PC from scratch with XP Pro, with the idea of being able to continually reload it the system from CD. ButI've only got very old XP disc. Not too good at building CD for loading. Need to learn too much in too short a time. It would be great to have a list of some of the best/latest XP complete/packaged builds available for download and simple install, to which I could just apply my licence key!
Kind of like ordering the banquet meal at the restaurant instead of bothering with picking all the bits I want from the menu.My guess would be the same for Vista, different versions etc
Calculators:
I really like ecalc. It has a dashboard thing for Macs, a widget for iGoogle, and a calculator for Vista sidebar.
Windows version:
http://www.ecalc.com/blog/free-windows-calculator-download/
other info:
http://www.ecalc.com/blog
The calculator from Windows 7 (Vista only) is pretty nice:
http://www.box.net/shared/y7tdnm9y2a#Windows7-calculator
Microsoft has Calculator Plus,but it comes with some restrictions,Genuine Windows validation is required. It supports Windows XP, Windows 2003 and Windows Vista or later version.
Personally I don't like the round buttons.
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=32B0D059-B53A-4...
Tiny URL for Calculator Plus:
http://tinyurl.com/c9t7u
Best Free Quick Launch replacements, like Free Launch Bar:
http://www.freelaunchbar.com/
One I forgot about:
Best free duplicate images (pictures) programs
Also needed: best free VPN and/or anti-censorship services.
Examples:
Hotspot Shield
Vtunnel
UltraSurf
tony, here's a few titles to start your Games section with ;-)
TMNations (excellent racing game)
http://www.trackmanianations.com/indexUk.php
TMNations Forever (follow-up of the excellent racing game)
http://www.trackmania.com/en/index.php?lang=en&rub=downloads_info&id=17
S.W.I.N.E. (hillarious tank battles between rabbits and pigs)
http://www.gamershell.com/download_11942.shtml
WarRock (online Battlefield Earth-like game -- basic game play is free)
http://WarRock.net
How to create a portable app tutorial would be interesting (and popular, I think).
How about software to avoid using
That could be solved just by adding an excluded list to articles.
I recently posted a hot find of a free language learning site and there seems to be a good response and a few other free sites suggested by posters. So I am thinking maybe a Best Free Sites to Learn a Language (or a better name).
http://www.techsupportalert.com/content/learn-lanuage-free.htm
A best P2P program (non-bittorrent) or best Gnutella or Best e-Donkey. These are pretty popular.
http://www.slyck.com/story1774_BitTorrent_and_eDonkey2000_Represent_near...
Also, I posted an article 50 places for free books online (could probably use a better name) and that might be a good category. I guess best to see what kind of response on that.
http://www.techsupportalert.com/content/50-places-free-books-online.htm
Also saw a post on process killer that had good info for possible category
http://www.techsupportalert.com/content/kills-processes.htm
Best Free Partition Manager
I agree completely. I'm surprised there isn't one reviewed here.
Done. See here:
http://www.techsupportalert.com/content/best-free-partition-manager.htm
I suggest "Best Internet Explorer Shell" because programs such as Avant and Maxthon really are not browsers themselves, but just front-ends for IE. They extend the functionality of IE, but still use the IE engine.
My suggestions are we need categories for:
Games
3D Graphics
Colour calibration - if I can I will try one day to achieve this, but it won't be this year. So if someone wishes to have ago be my guest.
Mail notifiers (I use Poptray)
Image converters
Image resizers
Image import from camera software
Exif software
Image convertors
desktop icon management
Just a few here I am sure that others will now begin to add to this.
Tony
I guess this is "Tutorials / How-tos" stuff but one problem i've been facing lately is the huge amount of crapware that cames pre-installed in OEM machines (99% of recent laptops ?). Removing that garbage is much more difficult than running PC Decrapifier, for instance HP is using a hidden and locked partition for recovery purposes, that has no flexibility at all. If you move it, stops working. If improperly removed, say deleting its partition, you can get MBR damaged. See here:
http://www.mydigitallife.info/2008/02/29/hp-partiton-overlaps-system-rec...
I have an HP too and yeah the same thing happens: HP stores a 10GB backup partition on my hard drive. It has absolutely no purpose. Why not use the backup DVD if something goes wrong? Why waste valuable hard drive space? You can remove it though easily. But I don't remember how.
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