As you all know, HTC bought Beats by Dre in 2011and now includes technology both software and material to enhance the sound quality of its smartphones. For its part, Dolby favored agreements with several manufacturers, the Dolby digital plus is present in Nokia N8, Kindle fire HD amazon and Grand ZTE Memo device. This kind of partnership allows Beats or Dolby to control the sound source directly and manage all user experience. But for other device owners like Samsung, LG, and Sony you can modify the sound quality of the phone with help of applications.

Enhance Music Quality using Android Apps

Poweramp

Poweramp is my favorite android app that increases the sound quality of your android. It really improves the music quality with a dedicated music player. Actually the app costs you $4, but the trail version of the Poweramp allows you to use the full featured poweramp for 15 days. You can try the trail version and if you love, you can purchase it. It has advanced audio control, great sound quality and accepts all music file formats.

You can select equalizer to configure your music taste or select from one of the presets. You can select player skin or theme to blend with your smartphone color.

Equalizer

Equalizer app improves the sound quality of your android tablet or phone. You can apply equalizer presets based on music genre. It has additional audio effects such as bass booster, virtualizer and reverb presets. It has got 5 Band-level Equalizer Controller and integrates with the stock android music player. Also works with streaming music like Pandora, spotify etc. The app is free to use.

Music Volume EQ

Music Volume EQ works like a charm. For people who use primary device as Android should install this music app to listen some high quality music. It has 5 band equalizer, bass boost effect, 9 presets, stereo led VU meter and home screen widget.

PlayerPro Music player

It is one of the top music player apps in the android market. You get to browse, play music, watch video, download artist pictures, genre, manually change ID3 tags, album folder, change theme skins of the player, download and save lyrics, has equalizer with customizable presets, stereo widening effect, reverb effect, bass boost effect, volume control. It’s All in One music player that you need for Android device.

Doubletwist with Magic Radio

Doubletwist player with Magic radio is an infinite music playlist with love. You can select songs, create playlist based on the moods. Around 15+million tracks on the cloud from which you can play a song. You can sync music (even from iTunes playlists) to your phone from your Mac/PC over usb or Wi-Fi or Airsync.

5 Great Android Apps to Get Better Music Sound Quality is a post from: Madras Geek

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As said earlier, SWF files are flash files that can be used on websites and for multimedia related stuff. For better SEO reasons, webmasters avoid using SWF flash files on the web; instead GIF image formats get more visibility in the point of SEO. So if you want to convert SWF files to GIF format to use it on websites, here are 4 great software that can convert your SWF flash files into GIF format.

Below is the list of 4 great software that can convert SWF to GIF. There are lots of similar ones on the web, how did I choose the 4 best SWF to GIF converters? I made sure they provide top features and options to convert easily. Also the output result should be excellent without any loss of visual quality. It shouldn’t skip frames when converting flash files into GIF.

SWF to GIF

SWF to GIF Animator is free software that allows you to convert SWF files to GIF. You can change the output GIF size, color depth, frame rate, etc. This software can work with all SWF files even the complex structured ones, with repeats and with a single frame. It is 100% freeware.

E.M Magic SWF2AVI

From the name you can guess it’s a SWF to AVI software but has the feature to convert SWF to various image file formats. It is simple to use and can convert SWF to AVI and various other video file formats such as 3GP, MP4, iPhone, Xbox, PS3, Zune, DVD, Blu-ray etc. It doesn’t skip frames while conversion and also has option to convert Flash to PNG, TGA, TIFF image with alpha transparent channel. On selecting the output option, choose SWF to Gif (animation) option. It has both free and paid version. Download and try out the free version.

Eltima SWF to Animated GIF

This one is all in one converter that has SWF and FLV toolbox offering multiple types of conversion including SWF to GIF format. It is also possible to convert SWF to JPG, PNG or any other image file format. Similar to above software, you need to setup the output option to Animated GIF and get the output result without losing image quality. It has both free and paid version, download and try out the free version first. If you’re not satisfied with the output quality, try the first mentioned software which is 100% free with all premium functions.

789Soft SWF to GIF Converter

SWF to GIF converter from 789Soft can support both Windows and Mac OSX platform. It can convert your SWF files to GIF format in a professional way. You can import the SWF file and convert into a GIF animation format. Later you can export GIF and extract picture list to extract separate picture. It also adds conversion of JPG, BMP, PNG files. It supports batch conversion and you can customize lot of parameters. It has got live preview, so that you can preview the output GIF file and adjust the output settings.

If you want to convert JPG files into GIF, try GIF Online Maker tool. You can ever try another alternative GIF generator tool which we reviewed sometime back.

I remember sharing an interesting post with you all last year. 5 Great tools to convert images into text.

4 Best SWF to GIF Converters for Mac and Windows is a post from: Madras Geek

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Cloud storage helps in many practical uses to store and share data online. You may use it for backup, sharing files with your friends. But actually cloud storage services can be used for many other activities. I just use my Dropbox cloud storage service creatively for 3 cases.

Send Pocket Items to Dropbox and Save as PDF

If you’re using Pocket app to save articles to read it later, with the help of IFTTT (If this then that) you can send all your pocket articles to Dropbox and save them as PDF file for later read. Pocket is one of the best inventions for me. It allows you to save any article for later read. You can simply use its web browser extension or mobile app to instantly send web links to read it later. All your articles are stored in pocket account that can be read later.

With the help of IFTTT recipe you can now send all your pocket articles to Dropbox as PDF file. If you’re hearing about IFTTT for the first time, you should read our articles on IFTTT.

Here are few recipes from IFTTT that can send all your Pocket links to Dropbox as PDF files. With the help of Dropbox, you can retrieve the PDF from anywhere and read it.

If you’re not using Dropbox, here are few more IFTTT recipes for doing the similar task with Box, Google drive and Ever note.

I use this IFTTT recipe many times whenever I find articles which are more than 2500 words and too lengthy to read. I just push it to pocket. Later it sends it to Dropbox as PDF file.

Writebox – Dropbox text editor

Open notepad, write something and save it. It will save the notepad file in your local hard disk. Similar concept, open Writebox app on your web browser, write something and save it automatically to your Dropbox folder.

Writebox is a simple text editor for Dropbox that helps you to concentrate on distraction free writing and sharing your writing text on your computers and devices. You can open Writebox and hit F11 on your browser to get full screen for distraction free writing. You can even load text data from Dropbox folder.

You need to authorize your Dropbox account with Writebox, so that you can sync all the text data files from your Dropbox account. Your text is automatically saved on your local with every key type. You can use Ctrl+S for shortcut to sync with Dropbox.

Get Email Attachments to Dropbox

This is something similar to send attachments directly to Google drive concept. Authorize your Dropbox account with Send to Dropbox. You will get your unique email address – For example: abc@sendtodropbox.com. So any email attachment send to that unique address will be backed up to Dropbox attachment folder.

If you’re using Gmail as your primary email address, then you can setup email forwarding in your Gmail Options. Under the address settings, you can add email forwarding. Verify the email address and there you go!

If you’ve some more creative ways to use Dropbox, do let us know through comments!

3 Creative Ways to Use Dropbox Cloud Storage Service is a post from: Madras Geek

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Out of 1000+ unique devices, we took top 10 devices that have seen highest sales in which 8 devices are manufactured by Samsung and rest 2 are from Sony Xperia. So this shows clearly that Samsung is leading the android segment of Phones and tablets in India.  Samsung Galaxy S2 and S3 are the top sellers in almost every country.

So what are some best android smartphones and tablets in India under price range Rs.20,000 ? As I said, Samsung had been a clear winner on Android in India. Other competitors includes Micromax, Sony, HTC and LG. So if you’re planning to get a decent android tablet or phone, you can consider the products from these 5 companies – Samsung, Sony, HTC, LG and Micromax.

Top Android phones and tablets less than Rs 20000

Before moving into android phones for less than 20K, you should know what are the top models or hot selling phones based on Android and other platforms. Currently, there are few android phones that are worth the money.

Samsung Galaxy S3, Micromax Canvas 2, HTC Desire V, Galaxy S2, Samsung Galaxy S Duos, Samsung Galaxy Note 2, Galaxy Ace Duos, in tablets section – Galaxy Tab 2 and few others. All the information are subjected only to Indian market.

Best Selling Android Phones less than Rs 20000

Samsung Galaxy Grand Duos

Samsung Galaxy grand duos (dual SIM) was launched recently with Android 4.1 OS Jelly bean. It has 5 inch touchscreen, 8 megapixel camera, Full HD recording, 1.2Ghz dual core processor (broadcomm processor and not exynos processor which is being used in Galaxy S2) and expandable up to 64 GB. Decent looks similar to Note 2, but little smaller and 1GB RAM which is decent for most popular games on android. Call voice quality and speaker output is very good. Battery 2100Mh is used and not the 3100Mh which is being used in Note 2.

Micromax Canvas HD

Micromax Canvas HD comes with 5 inch screen, Android 4.1.2 Jelly bean, dual SIM, 1.2 Ghz Quad core processor with 1GB RAM.  Almost all HD games run smoothly, light weight, IPS screen display, full HD 1080p videos, battery life above expectation, internal memory is low just 4GB you can expand up to 32GB externally. 8 Megapixel rear camera and 2 megapixel front facing camera.

HTC One V

HTC One V comes with Android 4.0 (ICS) and has 5 Megapixel camera, 3.7 inch touchscreen, 1 GHz processor and expandable memory. It has beats audio enhancement. Great build, good battery life, what I loved the most is extremely efficient camera with a dedicated image chip for better photos even in low light. Unfortunately no secondary camera.

Sony Xperia J

Sony Xperia J has 4 inch display screen with Android 4.0 ICS, 5 megapixel camera, 0.3 mp front facing camera, 1 GHz Cortex A5 processor and has scratch resistant and sony bravia engine. Regarding battery, decent backup and uses 1700mAh. It uses just 512 MB RAM, video recording is not HD video.

LG Optimus L7 and L9

LG optimus L7 and L9 both comes under 20000 INR. LG Optimus L7 has 4.3 inch touchscreen with android 4.1 jelly bean OS , 8 mega pixel camera, dual SIM, 1GHz dual core processor. LG Optimus L9 comes with Android 4.0.4 ICS, 4.7 inch touch screen, 5 mp camera, 1GHz ARM Cortex-A9 Dual Core processor with 1 GB RAM. Excellent battery life, comes with 2150mAh battery, light weight, thin and has all the essentials covered up.

Xolo X1000

If you’re looking something apart from usual manufacturers like Sony, htc, Samsung, consider Xolo X1000. It comes with Android 4.1 jelly bean, 8 megapixel camera, dual SIM, 1.2 mp front facing camera, 5 inch touchscreen, 1 GHz dual core processor.

If you’re looking for Android phones more than Rs 20000 – here are my suggestions

Galaxy S2, Galaxy S3, HTC One X, Galaxy Note 2, Sony Xperia Z.

Best Selling Android Tablets less than Rs 20000

Samsung Galaxy Tab 2

Micromax Funbook Pro

Lenova A2107 tablet

If you’re not specific about android OS, you can consider iPad Mini which is 21,900 INR in India. I suggest you to go with iPad mini for tablet experience.

Best Android Phones & Tablets under Rs.20000 in India is a post from: Madras Geek

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Alternative to Temple run for Android

If you like temple run for android and would like to get others with the same style of play, here we bring you the 5 free games of same style that you will surely have fun as much or more than playing temple run.

Subway surfers

I have been playing these two games madly on my Nexus 7. One is temple run and another one is subway surfers. You need to catch as many coins to unlock new players, get power magnets and more. Love the way the scenery changes with the world tour. I started with New York, Rome, now surfing at Sydney.

Crazy Grandpa

Crazy grandpa is addicting with nice game controls. Grandpa shows us a fun trying to walk the streets at full speed on a skateboard, dodging cars and collecting to advance, instead of coins, all parts that get in the way.

Crazy Fist II

Crazy Fist II is similar to temple run. You need to speed run to escape from amazing monster chasing with some excellent dark mythology style of graphics. It has exciting combat combo, leaderboard system and simple operation.

Temple hunter

Treasure hunter in the mysterious ancient Egyptian pyramids to look for lost treasure. You got 2 maps, 2 modes: mission and endless, you can shop to buy points, lives etc.

Chasing Yello

Yello – the gold fish in the local wild creek. Help Yello to escape by navigating the fish through a rough adventure in the dangerous river filled with rocks, burning logs etc. On the way you can collect stars, powerups, magnets and awesome cartoon animations.

Do you think any other to fit the best alternative to Temple run? Have you tried out the new temple run 2? Looking forward to hear your thoughts via comments.

5 Best Temple Run Alternatives for Android is a post from: Madras Geek

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If the reason they are shutting it down is because it is not profitable enough then they should give it a chance to pay for itself. Why not test out charging for Google reader since there are apparently a lot of ardent fans lamenting its demise. Brain Shih former Google reader product manager answers why is Google killing Google reader, you can read his answer on quora.

5 Best Alternatives to RSS Feed Reader

When I was looking out for an alternative to Google reader, closest to my interest comes Newsblur and The Old Reader. Newsblur is charging 1$ per month for unlimited feeds, the free version can hold up to 60 feeds only. Feedly, Flipboard, Reeder, Pulse, Google currents, Zite and there are lot of magazine style RSS feed reader apps, but none comes close to minimalist Google reader. Also most of them require mobile or tablet device to read feeds. If you take iPhone, iPad – here are few apps to read RSS feeds on iPhone, iPad.

Some of my friends suggested a pro tip – not to migrate your feeds till June 20^th. Because most of the RSS feed readers like Feedly, The Old reader, Newsblur are changing its pricing and plans. Also after the news of Google reader’s death, other RSS feed readers are enjoying huge traffic. Many people have started to export all their feeds from Google reader to other RSS readers.

How to Export Google Reader RSS Feeds?

Open your Google reader, navigate to settings and under export/import tab, you can download your RSS feeds xml file. Once you’re done, you can import that xml file to any other RSS feed readers. All your feeds will be migrated easily without any hassle.

Best Google Reader Alternative

When I looked out for the best alternative to Google reader with similar minimalist interface, easy sharing options, I found The Old Reader to be closest match. I just tried out the Old Reader for few days and here are my thoughts.

1. The Old Reader is a clone of Google Reader.
2. You can import your XML file that saves all your feeds and folders exactly from Google reader.
3. Sharing options as same as Google reader, people can follow your shared items.
4. You can share and save articles. Twitter, Facebook, G+ to share articles and Pocket app to save articles for later read.
5. The display modes are similar to Google reader. You can view in expanded mode with excerpts / full view of articles or just the title alone in the list view mode.
6. I love keyboard shortcuts. J,k for previous/next post, o – open post in new window, s for share a post, and other keyboard shortcuts as in Google reader.
7. Integration with Pocket app is awesome. It allows us to save an article for read it later. The keyboard shortcut, F allows us to save an article to Pocket. With one click, you can send to pocket app.
8. The Old Reader has browser extensions for Google chrome and Safari that shows us the notifications for unread new items.
9. Similar to Google reader, you can double click to rename a folder, drag and drop items into a folder etc.
10. Try out The Old Reader and leave your thoughts as comments, will add the best comment as 10^th point along with your name and website URL. (dofollow backlink)

10 Reasons Why I Choose the Old Reader as Google Reader Alternative is a post from: Madras Geek

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Before we get into the creative ideas for offline marketing, there are two major branches – Buzz marketing and Grassroots marketing. Buzz marketing is spreading the message organically through people (word of mouth). Facebook is one of the best examples for buzz marketing. They didn’t intend for it to be buzz marketing campaign, but that’s exactly how it turned into. People signed up first and started to spread the word, the more people joined themselves curiously.

creative beach advertising by Sprite – especially during the summer season.

Grassroots marketing is very simple. Go out where your customers are and make relationships. In this form of marketing, you can use traditional methods like flyers where the people whom you’ve appointed went out into the field and talked with people about your company.

• Traditional offline marketing techniques includes Yellow pages, classified ads, Radio/TV commercials, Flyers, Telemarketing, Banners, billboards, etc.
• Networking is a great way for small business owners to market their product offline. Your local meetups, trade shows, seminars are good for networking. You probably won’t close sales on the spot but making contacts is good for business.
• Conduct a tech event, mini seminars, so you can showcase all your products and services. It is inexpensive to rent a hall and conduct a mini seminar.
• When you ship your product, you can insert in a letter for another product in the package. It doesn’t cost you and you might make a sale. If it is your first product or service, tie up with similar business owners to get help from them.
• Recorded voice message is a good way to grab more customers. You simply upload all your customers phone numbers and record the message you want to leave, technology does the rest.
• If you place your business ad in unusual places like the side of your van/car. You can print out small stickers and stick them on your car rear glass, sides etc.

Clever Advertising & Marketing Campaigns – Dental Implants

• You can also spend little money on promotional products and give it to your employees and customers. For example: A small local software development company at my area spends on promotional products like T-shirts, stress balls, bags, hats where the company logos and names are printed on it. You can even print your company name on daily use products like Pen, Water bottles, Mouse pads, etc. If you want to get started, visit Quality Logo Products.
• Creative business cards are one of the best creative offline marketing technique. People remember you because of your creative business card. I remember some businesses even have an edible chocolate card or stick of gum attached.
• When you stay in hotels, leave your business card, business coupon in your room, lobbies and other places that people gather.
• Another form of creative offline marketing is, getting a booth at local events to promote your company. A lot of churches and religious groups hold festivals, so make sure you contact them about getting a booth space at one of their events.

10 Creative Offline Marketing Ideas for Small Business is a post from: Madras Geek

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The internet addiction statistics report says those age groups 18-24 are the most addicted internet users followed by 25-30 year age group. When they asked people do you normally stay longer than intended, 75% answered yes to it. Facebook addiction is increasingly becoming a real problem. Apart from Facebook addiction, gaming addiction is another category.

Some of the shocking reports include A 17 years old teenager shot his parents after the confiscated his Halo3 video game. Another 20 year old guy died from blood clot caused by playing his Xbox for 12 hours straight. A guy in Taiwan died in an internet café after playing Diablo 3 non-stop for over 40 hours.

Side effects of internet addiction on children

The consequence of internet addiction includes loss of sense of time, withdrawal when computer is inaccessible, social isolation and fatigue, tolerance, including the need for better computer equipment. This may lead to job loss, failure to succeed in academics, incurrence of debt and for adults breakdown of marriage.

Before we talk about side effects, this information was shocking. By age 2, more than 90% of American children have an online history, by age 5, more than 50% regularly use a computer or tablet. By middle school, kids spend more time with gadgets than parents or teachers.

What are the major side effects of internet addiction on children?

Shorter attention span – on average, people’s attention span have dropped over last ten years. 10 years ago, it was 12 minutes and today it is 5 minutes.

Lack of in-depth reading makes one a jack of all trades, master of none.

Cognitive overload – browsing from one page to another may lead to important information being glossed over.

Multi-tasking – learning isn’t as effective/efficient when multitasking.

Treatment for internet addiction on children

How to counter these internet addiction side effects? You can limit internet use; parents should enforce some sort of limit. You can use parental controls on android tablets, smartphones they use. By this you can limit the amount of time they spend on their devices. You can have a complete control of their device from your computer.

3 Search engines for kids & Best Android apps for kids.

Apart from internet, encourage your kids other interests. Expose your children to non-internet activities, get them out of the house, and encourage them to meet real people, take them places.

Help them develop emotional intelligence, engage in meaningful conversations and encourage them to express their feelings. Take an active role in their internet usage. Monitor them using parental control softwares, encourage the use of educational apps and games.

How to Cure Internet Addiction Disorder on Children is a post from: Madras Geek

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You very well know about your family size and their lifestyle, so it is easy for you to design a floor plan that suits your lifestyle. You know what you want and by designing the floor plan by yourself can avoid lot of unwanted stuff, provide more space, design access to important areas and more.

Autodesk Homestyler

Autodesk homestyler is a free online tool that provides access to home design software developed by Autodesk. You can create interior design plans and remodeling with a simple drag and drop products. All your designs are displayed in a 3D view. It is completely free and web based. You don’t have to install any software in your PC.

You can check out their gallery of house designs to get an idea of how to design master bedroom, indoor and outdoor living, modular kitchen etc.

Floor Planner

Floor planner is an online home floor plan builder to create floor plans and then view them in 3D perspective. This is free online tool for one project, more than one can opt for an annual economic plan. You can sign up with another email ID to create new floor plans for free. With floor planner, you can create stunning 3D floor plans and embed it on your construction website.

Placepad

Placepad is a minimal floor plan generator. Unlike the above two with high graphics, placepad allows anyone to create an interactive floor plan with photos, notes. You can create a basic floor plan, no furniture, no textures, no 3D. It just adds enough contexts and a simple floor design.

Roomle

Roomle is one of the best online floor planning and sketching tool to create unlimited floor plans for free. You can draw the floor plans quickly, add windows, doors just by dragging and dropping, add walls, etc. Finally you can display it in 3D.

Flash Floor plan

Flash floor plan is desktop software with a drag and drop facilities to create room layouts, furniture are loaded into palette that can be drag and dropped onto a floor plan. It has both free and paid versions. Free version is open source software and has all the major features of flash floor plan. Give it a try!

5 Best Programs to Design House Floor Plans is a post from: Madras Geek

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Backup your phone using Titanium backup pro.

Backup it to the cloud, so you can sync the data back in your new android phone.

Backup call logs, text messages, contacts, SMS, music playlists, photos, videos, settings, browser bookmarks.

For contacts, I recommend Google contacts. Sync it! If you’ve less contacts, then you can copy it to your SIM.

For music, photos and videos which are usually consume large space, backup to your PC and not in the cloud.

You can use Software data cable; you don’t need USB cable at all. Transfer files using Wi-Fi.

Shut down your phone; remove memory cards and SIM card.

Switch on once again and go to your settings and do a factory reset.

Erase all your personal data. Maybe a factory reset.

For android 2.3 – settings > privacy > factory data reset

For android 4.0 and above – settings > backup and reset > personal data > factory reset.

Phone will format itself and restart.

On the hardware side, remove batteries, backside panel and clean the phone with a soft cloth.

Collect all the USB cables, chargers that come with the phone and place it in the original box (if you still have it).

Once done, you can sell your used android phones.

Some of the websites to help you to get started:

1. eBay
2. Craiglist
3. Swappa
4. Flipswap
5. Cash for Smartphones
6. Buy My Tronics
7. Olx.in (For Indian users)
8. Quickr (Indian users)
9. Sulekha (Indian users)
10. Instead of selling it, donate to someone who doesn’t own a smartphone :D

What Things Should I do before I sell my Android Phone? is a post from: Madras Geek

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Once you’re done with finding out who unfollowed you recently, your next step should be to find out who is not following you. Sometimes you follow people without expecting in return that they will follow you. Now you need to find those who’re not following you. Tools to help you find who is not following you on twitter. Ask them politely to follow you.

If you’re on Facebook and want to find out who unfriended you on Facebook, here is the tutorial.

Find out who removed you on Google plus circles. Also learn the reasons why people unfollow you on twitter.

How to find out who recently unfollowed me on twitter

All the apps which are mentioned below needs your twitter account to authorize so that they can scan and send timely updates on who unfollowed you.

Unfollowers.me

Sign in with your twitter account

Find out which twitter follower has unfollowed you

Get notifications by email, tweet or DM

Also find who is not following you back.

Unfollow.fr

It’s a French site. It finds no-follow back and inactive followings.

You can receive the name of your unfollowers by mail or DM.

Just unfollow

Just unfollow is a popular twitter management tool.

It can find out who unfollowed me on twitter.

It can unfollow non-followers and inactive users.

You can also follow back those who follow you.

Previously we had reviewed Just unfollow here 1 and here 2.

Who.Unfollowed.me

Email or DM’s you when someone unfollowed you on twitter.

It checks for people who’re not following you back.

No automatic tweets without your permission.

No non-sense tool.

Managing a twitter account is not as simple as that. If you don’t want to follow someone, but you want to read their tweets, you can add them to twitter lists which are easy to manage. Follow only people who interact with humans. You can use twitter lists to add bots and other official twitter accounts of brands and products.

5 Apps to See Who Unfollowed me on Twitter is a post from: Madras Geek

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Recently I wrote about how hackers insert malicious code inside WP Premium themes that you try to pirate. Always, a premium WP theme is better than a free theme. Developers and designers put lot of efforts to produce a premium WP theme, go buy it instead of pirating it. If you’re planning to use free themes, download it from official WP repository.

Even free WP themes can have malicious codes inside theme files. Better read this guide on how to scan and check for malicious code, malware in WP theme files.

Handpicked Clean Responsive WP Minimal Themes

Minimalist design doesn’t mean black and white or themes with more white space. The WP theme should be clean, easy user interface with proper navigation, headers, footers, fonts used, color schemes etc. If a site uses contrasting colors and fonts hurting the eyes, irregular layout that spoils the content area are some of the features of bad designed WP themes. A theme becomes minimal when you set the typography, spacing and color schemes perfectly.

Twenty Twelve

The official 2012 theme from WordPress is the standard for all other WP themes. One of the best minimal responsive WP themes I have used. Every wp user must have known about 2012 WP theme. I’m expecting 2013 theme for WordPress soon.

Responsive WP theme from themeid

Responsive WP theme from themeid is one of the most popular WP themes downloaded. Lot of customization options where you can upload logo, social networking icons, webmaster tools etc. It is also cross browser compatible.

Origin

Origin WP theme is from alienwp theme portal. It looks simple, elegant and has a responsive layout. Responsive layout means your website layout is adjustable for better viewing on desktop, tablets and mobile devices. You don’t have to add a mobile theme separately.

Oxygen

Oxygen is a professional magazine theme that can be used for blogging. It has a content slider which can be used to display featured posts. Lot of widgets, theme settings, custom background etc.

Minimal Photography theme

WordPress theme for photographers. I see lot of amateur photographers starting their own Facebook page to display their photography works. I suggest them to build their fan base on websites. Anytime you can lose Facebook. Don’t build your business on a third party site. So for a professional photography website, here is the minimal WP theme.

Truly Minimal

As the name suggest, it is truly minimal. You have options to customize typography, custom page templates, theme widgets, etc.

Colorway

Colorway impressed me at first look. Beautiful theme.

Catchbox

Another minimal WordPress theme from catch themes.

Respo WP theme

Respo is one of my favorite minimal WP themes. I previously planned to use Respo for this blog. Later I went with Genesis framework.

Clean Retina

With greyish background, clean retina is simply awesome.

Hatch WP theme (for photography)

Another WP photography theme for budding photographers to showcase their work. Completely responsive which adapts automatically to your tablets and mobile devices. It can be customized to 9 home page layouts, featured slider etc.

Stumblr (tumblr style WP theme)

Tumblr style wordpress theme. There are lots of tumblr look like WP themes, but this one stands out in minimal design.

Simple market

Simple market is a html5 responsive WP theme.

Shadows WP theme

Another choice of mine was Shadows WP theme when I wanted to change theme for this blog.

Delicate WP theme

Delicate is a responsive and highly customizable lightweight theme.

Photo Free Gallery WP theme

Minimal WP Business theme

Zenhabits WP Theme

If you’re a big fan of Zenhabits blog, then here is the theme used in Zenhabits blog.

Imbalance (WP photography theme)

Manifest WP Theme

All these themes impressed me on first look. They are all handpicked WP minimal themes from madrasgeek.com blog. Enjoy!

20 Handpicked Free Minimalist WordPress Themes is a post from: Madras Geek

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Convert 2D to 3D Video – How they do that

Now you can easily convert any 2D movie into a 3D one from the comforts of home and for an affordable cost. If this sounds enticing, here are three of the most convenient yet highly effective 2D to 3D converters on the web.

Movavi Video Converter 3D

Movavi has over a decade of experience in developing video editing and processing software. This experience alone has attracted a large fraction of its four million users to download the Movavi Video Converter 3D. However, there are also numerous features which make this software a good choice for converting your 2D movies to 3D, such as:

Support for a Wide Range of Video and Audio Formats as Well as Devices – You can easily convert different video and audio formats, such as HD video and WAV files respectively. The converter also supports many devices including Amazon Kindle, Android phones and Dell computers.

Ripping Unencrypted DVDs Before Converting Them – The software allows high quality lossless transference from DVD before converting them. However, the DVD should be unencrypted since the software won’t work with copyrighted DVDs.

Multiple 3D Video Modes – You can choose the 3D mode you want, starting from Stereo to Anaglyph, depending on your monitor and glasses.

Adjustable 3D Video Parameters – You can determine the 3D depth, shift and perspective you want your 2 videos to receive. The Movavi converter will show you the results of your settings instantly through its preview feature.

The Movavi Video Converter 3D is offered for a once-in-a-lifetime cost, but you can take advantage of its free trial to try it out and see if it’s the software for you.

DVDFab 2D to 3D Converter

DVDFab 2D to 3D Converter is the first full-featured software worldwide to transform conventional 2D DVDs, Blu-ray CDs and videos into different formats such as AVI, Flash and MP4. Though you may need to complement this software with the DVDAB DVD Ripper, Blu-ray Ripper and Video Converter, there are a few features you may want to avail, including:

Support for Multiple Devices – In addition to your computer, you can watch your converted 3D movies on your computer or 3D TV as well as glasses-free 3D phones like HTC EVO 3D and LG Optimus 3D P920.

Full Customization – In addition to choosing from two 3D formats (Side by Side and Top and Bottom), you can also decide which frame size to choose as well as divide the output into two files or save it as Anaglyph output.

Manageable Hardware and Software Requirements – You won’t need to get another PC to run the DVDFab 2D to 3D converter. The basic requirements are Windows 8/7/Vista/XP, 512 MB Ram, Pentium II 500 MHz processor, 100 GB free space, a DVD or Blu-ray drive, and an internet connection.

With the DVDFab 2D to 3D Converter, you can easily recreate your favorite 2D titles in 3D for an affordable price.

IQmango Free 3D Video Converter

If you’d rather go for a free 3D video converter, IQmango software is a good choice. The IQmango 3D Video Converter is an easy to use application that allows you to customize your output before enjoying it with Anaglyph Red Cyan glasses or NVIDIA 3D glasses. Some of the features which make it worth downloading:

Free Preview Feature – In most 3D video converters, the preview feature comes with a price tag attached. However, this isn’t the case with IQmango’s software since this capability is automatically installed for free.

Seven 3D Techniques – You can choose from seven 3D modes – 3 Anaglyph, 2 Side by Side, and 2 Top and Bottom. So, depending on your preferences, you can choose how much 3D you want your 2D movies to feature.

Support for Portable Devices – You can easily convert different formats, such as Flash and HD, and play them on your portable devices. This allows you to watch your favorite titles as you go.

High Speed and Output Quality – Despite being an open source program, the IQmango converter allows users to convert their movies very quickly and enjoy great output.

Considering that you get the basic features of 3D converters and then some, you may be amazed at the fact that you don’t need to invest a single penny to enjoy the works of IQmango 3D Video Converter.

There are more options available for you on the internet, but these three recommendations will provide you with the most value and the best movie experience you seek. So, take your pick quickly to enjoy the magic of 3D right away.

Converting 2D Movies to 3D – Boost Your Cinematic Experience On Your Own from Home is a post from: Madras Geek

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If you want to send numbers from your contact book to voicemail, you have the option in the settings of each contact. For unknown numbers, you can do it with help of Google voice.

How to Send Anonymous Callers to Voicemail in Google Voice?

With the help of Google voice, you can send any unknown, anonymous number directly to voicemail. This [how to] setup is completely for unknown numbers that are NOT in the address book.

1. Open Google voice and go to contacts, put all your contacts under one or more groups.
2. In Google voice, open settings > groups and customize each group. Make sure to specify that they ring all your phones.
3. Under settings > phones, uncheck all the phones. Now everybody who calls you who is in one of the groups will trigger the phones to ring, while anyone who is not will go straight to voicemail.
4. Make sure, thereafter every time you add a contact, should be placed in one of those groups.

Under settings > groups and circles, you have two groups. They’re all contacts and Anonymous callers. So these callers who don’t have a caller ID, appear as unknown or restricted can be sent directly to voicemail.

The above method can also be used for Unknown numbers. Not only anonymous numbers can be sending to voicemail, if you don’t have a number in your address book and it is not anonymous number, you can send to voicemail. If a call falls into a category that has no enabled forwarding phones, it goes straight to voicemail. So uncheck all the phones in the Settings > Phones tab, then specify them all for “All Contacts” and you will get what you want.

If you want all calls to be send to voicemail, follow this guide Do Not Disturb on Google voice.

Android apps to Forward Unknown Callers to Voicemail

I found 3 apps that come closer to solve our issue.

Extreme call blocker (Stealth)

It can block calls, sms, and mms with complete privacy. It has 4 way supports to block a call. You can send to voicemail, no screen flash even if number in your contact list. If you don’t want the caller to leave you a voice mail, you can answer and hung up. No voicemail and no miss call notification.  You can mute the ring only. Caller will hear the normal ring and then voice call, you hear nothing.

You can simply black list the numbers, even block unknown or private, restricted numbers. You can even block all numbers that aren’t in the contact book.

Another special feature, you can use wildcard match to block an area code. Option to send auto text message reply to blocked calls and messages.

aFirewall Call Blocker

This one is a free app. It can block incoming calls from your contact list and even block unknown, restricted, anonymous calls. In the app, under unknown and private in blacklist category you can find the option to activate.

Call control blocker (Community powered)

This app is community powered call blocking, which means crowd sourcing the spam callers. So once the number is reported by the community, it blacklists it. When you install the app, all the numbers reported goes into blacklist. So it stops telemarketers, and other spam calls before they bother you.

Even has a personal block list. You can even block phone numbers by area code wise.

Android Apps to Forward Unknown Callers to Voicemail is a post from: Madras Geek

The post Android Apps to Forward Unknown Callers to Voicemail appeared first on Madras Geek.

WordPress self-hosted is open source software; there can be lot of loop holes. But the security team at WordPress is fixing those issues on regular intervals. If you analyze the major reason for all these “my blog is hacked, help me please” kind of issue is mainly because people don’t use the legal softwares, tools on the WordPress website. If you try to download WordPress themes illegally and use it, there are lots of chances that the WP theme which is uploaded by a random stranger on the internet can have malicious code and malware present inside the core WP theme files.

How to clean a nulled WP theme

I am not encouraging you to use Premium themes illegally by downloading it. (You should read the last paragraph about pirating WP themes). But, if you wanted to use, make sure your nulled WP theme is clean without any malicious code or malware present inside the core WP theme files. How to check/scan for malicious code inside WP theme files?

What kind of malicious code is there inside WP theme files? The person who is uploading can insert any kind of adult keyword linking back to his website, or upload set of codes to exploit your theme later when you upload it to your website, etc.

They can inject codes which are difficult to find. The codes aren’t like regular ones, they might be encrypted, and calling just the class name using PHP code and the original code might be present on some other WP theme file. So, here we are going to learn where the malicious codes always hide? Tools to check it out after installation and how to clean theme before you install the WordPress theme.

My method:

I usually test out any WP theme on my local host. So download the WP theme on your desktop and unzip it. Use wingrep or fgrep (depend if I am on Win or Linux box) to find: “mail(” and “eval(” strings. Checks this calls if exist and remove it.

Also I would suggest you to manually open all the files under WP Theme and scan line by line for any malicious codes calling any function or class outside WordPress. If you find any codes encrypted, you can use this online tool to decrypt PHP codes.

Manual method is always the best one. Now you can install it on your local host and check the files once again. Make sure they work properly and all the functions on the theme work perfectly.

WordPress Security Scanner

Sucuri security online tool scans your WordPress website for free. It scans your website for malware issues, malicious JavaScripts, malicious iFrames codes that are injected, suspicious redirection, spam, whether your website is blacklisted or not. Just enter your website URL and it will display all the information.

Scan WordPress for Malware

If you’re worried about malicious scripting on your websites, Unmask Parasites online tool exploits security vulnerabilities and hidden illicit content. Similar to Sucuri security tool, you need to enter your website address and it shows the external references such as JavaScripts, iFrame codes to the website whether they’re safe or not.

You can perform additional test like if you want to reveal hidden spam links inside your website. As I said before, random strangers who upload WP themes on the internet might hide some of their website links with adult, drug keywords.

With the help of this tool, you can find whether your website is infected with these keywords stuffed inside.

Plugins to Check WordPress Infected with Malware

I will put down a list of WordPress plugins that can help you to clean nulled WP theme or any hacked theme.

Exploit Scanner

This plugin doesn’t prevent any hackers to enter your website. But it can find out the scripts and modified content that are left by the hackers. Some of the methods used to insert scripts are hide the code or spam links using CSS, hide text. So these kinds of things can be found out using this plugin.

Some hackers go a step further and bind the text or codes in your database. Spam links are sometimes added to blog posts and comments. They’re hidden by CSS so visitors don’t see them, but search engines do. This plugin searches for content that are changed in WP files and DB records.

Download the plugin

WordPress Antivirus

WP Antivirus plugin will scan for any malicious injections in your theme files. Not once, but automatically every day. Sometimes, you might have a perfect theme without any malicious code, but hackers try to inject code via a loop hole in your plugins directory. So this plugin daily scans all WP theme files and database tables. WP Antivirus

Theme Authenticity Checker (TAC)

This is what exactly we need. TAC stands for Theme Authenticity Checker. It searches the source files of every installed theme for signs of malicious code. If such code is found, it displays the path to the theme file, the line number, and a small snippet of the suspect code.

So I hope all these links will help you to enjoy malware free WP themes.

Note: If you’re using a free WP theme, don’t be happy. These days, hackers and strangers on the internet insert malicious codes in the free WP themes and upload it to the web. So what I suggest is, if you’re downloading a free WP theme, download it from the official WP theme repository. If you’re planning to get Premium WP theme, buy it legally from sites like themeforest, elegant themes, Woothemes etc. They’re the best in the market. Don’t PIRATE!

It takes just 10 seconds to pirate a WP theme, but do you know how many hours it takes to design a theme, code, debug and release its first version? So, Don’t PIRATE!

Scan and Clean WordPress Theme for Malicious Codes is a post from: Madras Geek

The post Scan and Clean WordPress Theme for Malicious Codes appeared first on Madras Geek.