In January of this year my dear husband bought me an adorable little computer, a netbook. It’s even pink! I have loved it since I got it, and now lots of my friends and family are getting them too. It took me a while to figure out how to get the best use of it, so I thought I’d help by sharing my favorite free programs and how I use them on my netbook.
1. Evernote
When I was first setting up my new netbook, one of the biggest challenges I had was accessing my important information from my main computer on my little one. I searched and searched and came across Evernote. This program allows you set up multiple “notebooks” that can sync between a free online account and onto as many computers as you need. Each notebook can contain as many “notes” as you’d like.
I’ve created notebooks for all my random thoughts like, Girl Scouts, church, recipes, inspirational ideas, craft ideas, Bible study, writing, etc. The best part is that all the notes can be searched. This works great for recipes. I use my netbook as my main recipe book now. The notes can also be tagged. That means I can tag all my main dishes, desserts, favorite party dishes, etc. with these keywords to help me find them quick when I need them.
Another great bonus for this software is that it is meant to save any information you find online in notes easily too. When you find something interesting when you are searching for info online like recipes or craft ideas, you just select your text and pictures. Then select the Evernote icon in the task tray to quickly access a link to copy your selection right into a note.
This has been a great program for organizing my brain! I love that I can access that brain online or on either of my computers. Super handy!
2. Windows Live Photo Gallery
Windows Live has a family of software that provides great tools for free. They are great on regular computers and netbooks. Our family favorite for organizing photos is the Windows Live Photo Gallery.
This program has a powerful photo fixing tool set. The red eye fix is like no other. You can brighten your photos, straighten them, etc.
The way that this program imports photos from your camera is very useful. It will automatically divide them up into separate folders based on dates.
It also prompts you to name the folders before you import them. I put my photos in folders named for the month with number and name (for example, “02 February”). The number with the leading zero keeps them displayed in order. For each date I label the folders for each set of photos with the date followed by a brief description of what we were doing in those photos (for example, “06 My Birthday” or “24 Christmas Eve”. This makes it really easy to find my photos later. The fact that this program prompts for the folder names on import makes it so you don’t put it off and never get to it.
Every now and then you need to got through your photos and tag them, maybe while you are deleting pictures that are no good. Once photos are tagged with names of people, locations, events, it is really easy to search for specific photos later. Searching for “Kelby” will give me all the pictures of my oldest daughter. I love being able to search for “Kelby Anika Tegan” to get only pictures that have all three girls in them.
The program is easy to install and free. Once installed, you only need to point it to the location of your photos so it can import them into the program’s database. It does not move the pictures. Go to Windows Live Downloads to find this program. You do need to set up a Windows Live account if you don’t already have one.
3. Windows Live Mail
One of the biggest headaches I had when I got my netbook was how to access my Outlook calendar and contacts on it. The netbook came with Outlook Express, but it wouldn’t allow me to access my regular Outlook data from my main computer. I didn’t want to have two separate copies of the information because I knew I’d update on one and not the other and end up with bad information. So, at first I did without that information on the netbook.
Even though I live with my computer geek husband and he knew all about it, I didn’t find out about Windows Live Mail until he had a Windows 7 Release party ten months later. Windows Live Mail can completely replace Outlook Express and includes calendars and contact information. You can also use it to access multiple Google, hotmail, or other emails with imap functionality.
Now, in order to get my information to sync between my computers I had to go through a little set up, but it is so worth it! You must download a little application called Outlook Connector. This little program allows you to sync your Outlook 2003 or 2007 data with your online Windows Live account. This then allows you to log online on any computer and access your calendars and contacts.
The real beauty of Windows Live Mail on the netbook at this point is that it will also sync with those online calendar and contacts. This keeps all your contacts and calendars synced in all three places. If you make a change on one computer it changes on them all!
I love being able to access phone numbers and addresses of friends and family when I am out and about with my netbook. I can also add appointments to my calendar on the go too.
4. Skype
If your netbook has a built in camera, you’ll want to have a good video call application. Didn’t you dream as a kid of the day that you could have a video phone?!
We generally use Windows Live Messenger for instant messaging, but for video calls, Skype seems to have better quality video. Last year we even had my parents “over” by video call on Christmas morning using Skype.
This application is more fun the more people that you know that are on it. You add your friends to your contact list. It is important to set your privacy settings very tight or you’ll end up with unsolicited messages asking to be your “friend” and sometimes those friends are really friendly if you catch my drift.
If you place a call it will ring on the other person’s computer as long as that person has the application running. It can be active in the task tray without having an open window.
Skype can also be used to do instant messaging with your friends. It is an all around great communication product. If you desire, you can even pay for a service that will allow you to call real phones from your computer or add voice mail so people can leave you a message if you are not able to answer your computer.
5. Feedreader
If you find yourself interested in blogs, whether news or your personal family and friends, you are going to want to find a feed reading program for your computer.
A feed reader will aggregate all the blogs that you want to check. I read a few crafty,writing, personal, and spiritual blogs, so that is a lot to go chasing around the web. Instead, I simply subscribe to these blogs inside my feed reader program. When I open that program, it shows me all the posts that have been uploaded since I last checked. My reading material comes to me, I don’t go to it. I even found my tent trailer on Craigslist by subscribing to the “camping trailers for sale” feed.
My aggregator of choice is Feedreader right now. It is a free download that runs on my computer. It brings me all my favorite blogs and when I subscribe to a podcast, it will allow me to download the audio onto my computer so I can put it on my MP3 player.
Internet Explorer actually has a built in feed reader, so you can start by using that instead. When the little square symbol on the top right of the screen is solid orange, it means that site is providing a feed that you can subscribe to. 
When you click that orange symbol, it will take you to a page that represents the feed. If you click “subscribe to feed” there, it will enter your feed into Internet Explorer where you can read it by clicking on the “Favorites” button and then choosing the “Feeds” tab. Or you can copy the address from the address line and paste it into any feed reading program.
I used to use Google Reader to do the same thing. The beauty of using an online service to aggregate your feeds is that you can log on to get to them from any computer that is online.
The reason I like Feedreader the best is because it is easy to access the audio parts of Podcasts. If you are only reading text, anything will work. It doesn’t really matter how you do it, just do it so you can keep up-to-date on all the latest from your favorite writers. In fact, start with subscribing to my blog by adding this line to your feed reader: http://perpetuallywright.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default.
Other Favorites
I have several other free favorites that will be helpful on any computer. If you like to do any desktop publishing and use a lot of fonts, a must have program is The Font Thing. I found it a little tricky to install, but it is worth it. It indexes all your fonts and shows you a little sample in each font style. You can type in your phrase and see exactly what it would look like in each font.
If you use the same password for everything because you forget them too easily otherwise, you need to get Password Corral. My husband got me on this because he said you really need to have a different password for everything to be safe. Password Corral is just a little program that can store an encrypted list of all your passwords. Only trick is that you must remember the password to open Password Corral!
I can’t sign off without telling any blog writers out there that they need to use Windows Live Writer for blogging. I’m using it right now. I love it because I can compose a blog post on my netbook even if I am not able to get online. I can add all the photos, check spelling, and make it look pretty, then save it to publish anytime. You can even write a bunch of different posts to save for publishing later. It has a great tool set for making blog writing easier. I just noticed there is even a new version I need to download and try.
I hope that some of these applications will help you find solutions for your netbook or any other computer. Hopefully some of my hard learned lessons will save you time and brain power!
