Demo Girl

I generally use TweetDeck as my Twitter client, but I’ve also tried out a few others, including the Flock browser. There are a lot of offerings out there and one that is new to me is TwitHive.

The thing I like about TwitHive is that there is nothing to install.  TwitHive uses OAuth so you don’t have to provide a 3rd party with your twitter credentials.

Once you are logged in you can set up multiple channels for different twitter accounts or just to get updates from certain people.  You can do twitter searches and TwitHive also includes a URL shortener when you are adding your own posts.  I didn’t see a feature to add photos and there didn’t seem to be any way to be notified of new updates — like a sound or popup.  But if you are away from your own computer or you don’t like the idea of installing a Twitter client, then TwitHive does seem to get the basic job done.

To see TwitHive in action, click on the screencast below (best viewed in HD in Full Screen):

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I’m fairly new here at DemoGirl.com.  I have been working for our company for almost 15 years handling various tasks from tech support to billing issues.  I don’t get out much to surf the net and test out the latest and greatest tools and applications because I’m busy with my regular duties here at Centercloud.  One of the most difficult tasks for me is finding tools or applications that might prove useful to DemoGirl.com readers.  I’d love feedback on what sorts of things you would like to see covered.

Today I decided to cover four Web sites that I like.  Some may be old news to you — if so, I hope you’ll leave a comment and share some of the sites that you can’t do without.

Without further ado, here’s a list of the Web sites I deemed screencast-worthy:

ShortGPS.com
Create short links of addresses to share on twitter or other media

Virl.com
Shortens URLs and creates short links for news and photos to share with others

GeekChart
Create a pie chart showing your social media habits

TadaList
Free, easy to use list maker.  Easy to share with others.

To see these sites in action, check out the screencast below (best viewed in HD in full screen):

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The next time my tax accountant complains that his 14 MB email to me bounced because of size limits, I’m going to point him in the direction of FileTwt.  FileTwt is a very simple Web site that lets you quickly share large files via Twitter.

If you are going to share the file publicly, you don’t even have to sign up for an account — just enter your Twitter login, locate the file you want to upload and send out the tweet.  Your followers will then see a link which they can follow over to RapidShare to grab the file.  I didn’t like all of the links I had to click through to get to the file, but the FileTwt blog says they are working to host the files themselves so you can eliminate the RapidShare step.  When that happens, I’ll happily use the service.

You do have to sign up for an account if you want to send the files to one specific Twitter user.  But the cool thing is that FileTwt creates a friend list for you when you create the account.  This makes sending direct messages easy.

If you want to see FileTwt in action, click on the screencast below (best viewed in HD in full screen):

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Thanks to a tip on Mashable, I downloaded Flock 2.5.  To be honest, I had never heard of Flock –  now I’m like, where have I been?   This browser gives easy access to your social media, but now I’m not sure if it’s going to cause me to spend more time playing when I should be working.

I like the sidebar which gives you quick access to updates on Facebook, Twitter, and MySpace.  The other cool thing is the Facebook chat link that stays open even if you aren’t on the Facebook page.  You can easily drag videos and pictures to share in a chat.  Also worth mentioning is the “blog this” feature  — just right mouse click on media you want to blog about and a blog editor opens up for you to add your post and quickly publish to your blog.

Yeah.. Flock has me hooked.

If you want to see Flock 2.5 in action, check out the screencast below (best viewed in HD in full screen):

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P.S.  Please ignore my dog scratching in the background toward the end.  My voice wasn’t up to redoing the narration.

I am not a fan of Evite.  The problem is, almost everyone I know continues to use it even though there are so many other services out there that deserve a chance.  Here’s one.  Here’s another.  Oh, and yes, another.  Today I’m going to show you another great service that deserves some attention – Paperless Post allows you to create online invitations that resemble actual stationary.  The invites are highly customizable and your friends don’t need to sign up for anything in order to respond.

When your friends get the invite delivered to their inbox, they’ll be able to click on a clean, white envelope and the invite will pop out for them to read.  They can RSVP and, depending on the settings you used when creating your invite, they’ll be able to see who else is coming, who isn’t, and who hasn’t responded.

As the creator, you’ll be able to see who has opened the invite and not bothered to respond yet – just like Evite!

To learn more about Paperless Post and to see it in action, watch the screencast below (best if viewed in HD in full screen):

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Robo.to allows you to create a virtual business card, complete with your own video avatar.  It gives you a place to share your flickr photos, your location, and your other online identities, as well as updates to Twitter and Facebook.

After you sign up for an account (which is currently invite only) you’ll be able to pick a username which will act as part of your Robo.to domain.  You can see mine here.  You can then record a couple seconds of video that visitors will see upon arrival to your site.  You can record multiple videos but the last one you record will be the first one that appears.

You can point out your location on a Google map, add your latest flickr photos, and choose to push updates you create on Robo.to through to Twitter and/or Facebook.

I had fun yesterday and today testing out Robo.to – but it is definitely invite only for a reason.  My flickr photos won’t show up.   When I update to Twitter only the text goes through so no one would have any idea what I was talking about since there’s no link to my Robo.to page or video.  There are also some much needed features missing like the ability to delete a video, control which video appears first when someone visits your Robo.to page, and some sort of privacy setting if I don’t want just anyone to be able to see my page.  If these features exist, I could not find them.

If you want to see Justin’s Robo.to page, click here.  It’s cleverly done, and should give you an idea about what type of video you can create to act as your “calling card”.

To see Robo.to in action, click on the screencast below (best viewed in HD in full screen):

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If you use Firefox and are a fan of Tabs (check and check!) then you may want to give Desktop a look.  Desktop is an experimental Firefox Add-on that allows you to create a custom page loaded with shortcuts to your favorite websites.  Every time you open a new tab, you’ll see a set of thumbnails which allow you to access the sites you like to frequent.

Besides just thumbnails, you can also add search widgets and folders.  You can also customize the background of your tab page as I did in the image above.

Desktop is experimental so check back often to see if new features have been added and to see which version of Firefox it is compatible with.

To see Desktop in action, watch the screencast below (best viewed in HD in full screen):

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I can’t let my daughter read this post or she will want to take over the one computer we have in the house.  Oh, wait… she can’t read, and she doesn’t need to be able to read to use the kid-friendly KIDO’Z browser.

The KIDO’Z browser lets younger children safely navigate through a nice collection of kid-appropriate Web sites, videos and games.  The install is quick and you just need to give a few details about your child.  There is a parent control area where you can control the content your child will view, as well as set time limits.

Using the browser was pretty easy for my preschooler, and I’m sure that when my older child gets home he’ll quickly locate the section that includes science videos.  There seemed to be plenty of content available — enough for the amount of time I let my kids use the computer.

If you’d like to see KIDO’Z in action, click on the screencast below (best viewed in HD in full screen):

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Thanks to TechCrunch for pointing me in the direction of a useful site called Food.com.  Food.com gathers up recipes from all over the Internet and allows you to quickly do a recipe search and save recipes from many different places.

The site seems to strongly encourage you to add the Food.com toolbar, which I did.  It makes searching quick because you don’t have to start out at the Food.com Web site, and you can easily add recipes from just about any site you are on.  If you find a recipe on a site that Food.com doesn’t capture, you can still add a link to that recipe in your recipe box.  Very cool.

You can also quickly upload your own recipes so that others may benefit from your culinary expertise.

If you’d like to see a screencast of Food.com, click on the link below (best viewed in HD in Full Screen):

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