Kevin Smith Software Review
At the Kevin Smith Show, we constantly give new software a trial run. This brief review is
offered to anyone who may be interested.
This is an excellent software for creating RSS feeds for mp3 files. There are only a couple of others designed specifically for making RSS feeds for multiple mp3 files. I've tried just about all of them. The biggest problem you normally run into is that most of them do not automate much of anything, and do not like multiple mp3's. They are designed to creat RSS feeds for one to ten (usually) podcasts.
FeedForAll allows you to build an RSS feed with as many mp3 files as you want. It is very well designed, containing a wizard to help you get your RSS feed set up, and a wizard to help you list each mp3 (Item Wizard). The Item Wizard provides some automation to make wure your feed meets iTunes standards.
It comes in Windows and Mac versions with a license fee under $40.00.
This software attempts to do the same task as FeedForAll. It does allow you to make an RSS feed containing many mp3 files. It is not anywhere near as intuitive as FeedForAll and is a bit clunky in its operation. It seemed to be a bit unstable and was, for our purposes, unsuitable. However, I think it could be used for a smaller volume of podcast entries without much of a problem.
License Fee is $19
FastSender is a script software (install it on your server) that provides complete--and I do mean complete--newsletter management. It handles subscriptions and unsubscriptions. It has built in templates (if you want to use them), a built-in WYSIWYG page editor, or allows you to send a text version. It allows you to set up how many e-mails to send per hour, and this was particularly important after we changed our hosting company. Our hosting company allows only 500 e-mails per hour to be sent. This is not a problem for small newsletters, but for one with thousands of subscribers it could be a deal killer. With FastSender, I have set it to send just less than 500 per hour. Once I am ready to send the newsletter, I simply click "SEND" and it starts e-mailing them at the predetermined rate per hour. You just set it and forget it. Once it starts sending, you simply minimize the window and let it work in the background.
Installation is pretty much automated. Purely simple, sleek, and does what it promises to do.
License Fee is $88.
SibSoft CommuniMail is a mailing list manager and newsletter script, targeted to be used for small and medium business and personal sites. It is a program that handles the subscriptions of a mailing list and also sends out newsletters - emails that are received by everyone who is subscribed to the mailing list.
This is very much the same type of software as FastSender. We used it until moving over to BlueHost where there is a limit of 500 e-mails per hour. Communimail does not allow you to set the sending rate per hour and was, therefore, obsoleted by our move to BlueHost. Excellent software in every other respect.
License Fee is $29.95
OpenOffice Suite 4.5
Outstanding alternative to MS Office®. It is mostly compatible with MS Office® but not entirely. Nevertheless, you will find this office suite a delight to use. One of the great features, from my point of view, is that you can create a document in the word processer, and then export it directly to PDF. You also have spreadsheet, database, and presentation programs that will do about everything you need to do.
Lincense Fee: FREE
WebCamMax 4.2
WebCamMax is software that allows you to control as many webcams as you can plug into your computer. It allows you to switch from one camera to the other with the ease of a click. There are built in special effects, and you can create your own as well. You can set up play lists and stream whatever files you want to stream (.wmv or .mpg). This is the software I use to control what you see on the KSS-TV video feed. One feature it does not have that I wish it had is the ability to crossfade from one camera to the other. When I click on a camera, there is an instant switch to the new camera. Crossfading would be a nice touch. This is good software, but support is in the tank. It takes days and days to get a response to a support ticket.
License Fee: Ranges from $19.95 for 6 months to $49.95 for lifetime.
GeoVid Flash to Video Encoder 3
One of the big benefits to producing video in flash is the quality of the file captured. One of the big problems, however, is that you cannot convert flash to video easily. Many programs claim they can convert flash to video, but they all have the same error. They cannot sync the audio with the video. So, you get a finished product that looks like an old Japanese movie. The mouth moves and then the audio follows. GeoVid fixes this problem nicely. It is somewhat tempermental. Though I use it every day, I have not yet figured out what causes it to throw a fit. Sometimes, it works precisely as it should. Sometimes, it just won't work at all. When it does work, nothing else beats it that I have found.
License Fee is $49.95
RealDraw 5
I have PhotoShop and I use RealDraw. Compared to PhotoShop, this is simplicity itself. Yes, PhotoShop will do things you cannot do with RealDraw. But then, I don't want, or need, to do those things.
License Fee is (30 day free trial) $55
The name says it all. You can load just about any video into this software and convert it to just about any other format. There is a free version that really works well. Try it out, and if you find it works as you need it to, you can upgrade to the full version. Though I paid for GeoVid (listed above), I use this software more than GeoVid because it works better. The only problem I've run into is converting from .FLV to .WMV. But, I can convert to .MPG, .MP4, .AVI and a host of other formats with no problem at all. Plus, it is at least 20 times faster than GeoVid.
License Fee is FREE
ZaraRadio is automation software for radio stations. I use the free version because that is all that was available when I started using it. They now have a commercial version, but their free version does absolutely everything I need. With ZaraRadio, you can build playlists, set up timed events, program sweepers and run them as events, and just about anything else you need to do if you are an independent broadcaster.
License is FREE
SAM Broadcaster does everything ZaraRadio does, and 40 miles more. That's the problem. The program is huge. It has so many options, you can never weed through them and get down to just what you really need to do. Well, you can. But it takes a very long time and the learning curve is like the Matterhorn. Lots of people use it. I scrapped it in favor of ZaraRadio the first day I saw ZaraRadio.
License Fee is $299
This is an FTP client that is sophisticated and sleek. I've tried a bunch of FTP clients, and this one is absolutely the fastest and most functional I have found.
License is FREE
Opera 4
Opera is an internet browser. It is a lightening fast replacement for Internet Explorer based on Mozilla. You may find that pages not displaying right in FireFox will display properly in Opera. I use it and I like it. Having said that, I must say that I use IE at least 99% of the time.
License is FREE
VLC Media Player is great. Instead of having a media player for mpg, and another for wmv, and another for mov, and another for flv files, why not just use one player that will play them all? That's what VLC does. It will play any media files you have. I use it exclusively. They offer a version for any OS.
License is FREE
This is the one and only driver updater worth spending money on. I have 4 of them that I have paid for, and this is absolutely the ONLY one that delivered the goods. I use eMachines because they are cheap. But they come loaded with Vista and Vista needs (in my humble opinion) an exorcist. Staying loyal to St. Gates, eMachines' support site does not provide drivers for XP on any system they have loaded with Vista. I absolutely will not run VIsta. So, when I converted the machines over to XP, I needed drivers for all the devices. Some of those drivers are very obscure and almost impossible to find. DriverAgent scans your computer hardware and compiles a list of all the drivers you need for your computer. Beside each item on the list is a link for downloading and installing the necessary driver. In my experience, it has never missed.
License Fee $44.95