NowITWorks.net

Hello everyone!

Thanks to our readers for cutting our team some slack last week as we were busy for the holidays - hence no posts.

But the good news is that we are in full swing, preparing for 2009. Considering the growth and progress we have made this year, there is a positive attitude about what we can accomplish in the coming year.

In the meantime, albeit a little late, here are some things that we are thankful for at Now IT Works.

• The many people who make our lives interesting and wonderful; from co-workers to customers to family to vendors - we appreciate them all;

• While health and well-being should be appreciated more than just once a year, now is as good a time as any to be thankful that we are all well and working to make Now IT Works even greater;

• Seeing holiday decorations - with Thanksgiving falling later this year, we’re preparing to have our hearts ironically-warmed with icicle lights and snowman, a whole week earlier…

Whatever it is that you are thankful for, make sure to take a few minutes for yourself and enjoy any activity that brings you joy as we kick off December and the countdown to the holidays.

While the upcoming holidays will make some people want to gather up the kids and settle in with some popcorn and a movie - here’s a list of a few movies that probably won’t make the cut…

1. Die Hard
2. Santa Claus Conquers the Martians
3. Gremlins
4. The Hebrew Hammer

For the full listing, click here.

Source: Wired magazine - 10 Unconventional Winter Holiday Movies

Have a wonderful weekend - start your holiday movie watching tonight “Christmas with the Kranks” is on FX!

Do you know the difference between a computer worm, virus and trojan horse?

Click here to read an in-depth and educational article from www.webopedia.com

• Jerry Yang steps down from his post at Yahoo, after the failed acquisition by Microsoft and declining stock value (New York Times)

• For those who have nothing going on this Tuesday afternoon, the Top 10 Amazing Animal Videos - I’m a sucker for a baby hamster eating broccoli (Wired)

• The president elect will have to hand over his Blackberry before taking office, or risk having all of his personal communications available for public consumption (Tech News World)

• Lastly, for the eternal optimist - 198 Windows Vista Tips& Tricks (PC Mag)

When your browser windows opens, the first page displayed is called the “Home Page”. Most folks will set this to their email provider’s web portal, their favorite news site, or often leave it as the particular browser’s default page, i.e. MSN.

Arguably, one of the best features of modern browsers is the use of tabbed browsing, or opening multiple pages in the same browser window, which can be switched using a series of tabs at the top of the window. I’m sure most of you are aware of this feature, which can save a lot of time and desktop real estate. Read the remainder of this entry »

The list of the Top 10 Gadgets for Christmas 2008 have been released - click here to see the full listing.

However, on a sad note - CNN has released their predictions for the biggest technology flops for this holiday season. That’s the spirit, CNN!

Have a great weekend!

GMail Backup is a free utility you can use to archive your GMail account to your local computer using GMail IMAP support. You can even use it to restore your GMail messages in the event of loss.

The software is available cross-platform, so Windows users can take advantage of it as well as MacOS and Linux users. Unfortunately, only the Windows version uses a graphical user interface (GUI), whereas the MacOS and Linux versions are command line only.

The program saves the messages in Microsoft’s .EML format, which can allow you to browse them offline. You can even upload the archive to another GMail account, making it simple to move your mail from one account to another.

Link: Gmail Backup

• This story is horrible and comical, don’t feel too guilty while laughing at this guy - especially since some people think he has a case (Wired)

• James Bond will always be cooler than you but at least you know you could actually use some of those gadgets from the films (MSNBC)

• Mozilla’s new mobile browser - can it compete with the big boys? (Technology Review)

$$ Check out this article from PC World about how to save money, save electricity and be more environmentally sound, just by being conscious of the technology around your home or office.

When Office 2007 came out in late 2006, Word users were often surprised to see that their files created in the software were by default saved in the new .DOCX file format, which was unreadable by previous versions of Office. This caused many headaches in the corporate and end-user world, even though the default setting itself can be changed easily.

Google has now made it easy to view these files, even if you don’t have Office 2007. Simply email the offending .DOCX file to your Gmail account, open the message, and select View As HTML next to the attachment. You’ll be able to see the contents of the file, and do what you will with the text and whatnot.

Link: View Office Open XML files as HTML