Mind Mapping with Bubbl.us

A mind map of Reviews & Guides

Bubbl.us is a popular web based mind mapping application offering both free as well as paid plans.

You can use this very easy to use application to create clean and coherent mind maps such as the one shown along side (click image to enlarge).

Getting Started with Bubbl.us
The best thing about creating mind maps with Bubbl.us is the speed and simplicity with which you can go about it. Signing up is super easy with the only requirements being a username, e-mail and password. And you don't even need to confirm your ID!

Creating a Mind Map with Bubbl.us
You start with a tab. From this tab you can create any number of child tabs and from each child yet more child tabs to create a tree. You can also create more independent tabs and connect them through arrows. You can choose the color as well as the text size. You may also include links in the bubbles (tabs). A simple drag  facility helps you to align the bubbles any which way you wish. You may also add labels to the lines joining the bubbles.

Exporting and Sharing Your Mind Map
Once your mind map is ready Bubbl.us allows you to export it either as an HTML embed code or a simple link to your mind map. You can also download the mind map as a .jpg file as I have done in the mind map above. Or else you can simply save the mind map in your bubbl.us account.

Bubbl.us Account Options
Free account holders can save up to 3 mind maps but can create an unlimited number of mind maps.  Premium accounts are priced at $6 per month or $59 a year.

Ubersuggest : Free Keyword Suggestion Tool

Admittedly, to draw Google's attention towards your blog first and foremost you need plenty of  decent and niche content but to really go anywhere with your blog it is of utmost necessity that you pay due attention to SEO and optimize your content for at least the most popular search engines like Google Yahoo and Bing. 

One of the easiest way to get noticed is by choosing the proper keywords for your post. Alternately, after you decide upon the broad general topic you can do some quick keyword research and phrase your article accordingly.

Another reason why you should definitely do some keyword research before writing your article is because the CPC rates for Google Adsense (along with most other ad servers) depend heavily on the keywords associated with your content and since on an average less than 3% of the visitors to your blog actually click on a contextual 

But effective keyword research is quite a difficult and laborious process to master and it is more than likely that unless you are a hardcore pro blogger you will neither find the time nor the enthusiasm for extensive keyword research. In that case it is best to take the help of a simple keyword suggestion tool. While there are plenty of paid options it is perhaps best with a free alternative such as Ubersuggest

Ubersuggest Screen Shot. Redbox--language Bluebox--search vertical Grey Ellipse--search term

It is a very simple keyword suggestion tool where you simply need to type in a query and then select a language as well as a search field (such as images, news, recipe or web) and it will generate a list of relevant  and related keywords. You can choose as many of the suggested keywords as you want and Ubersuggest will create a list of the keywords which you can easily copy and paste in the "tags" field of your post. It's that simple and of course free!

However, its simplicity unavoidably leads to lack of features. Most notably Ubersuggest gives no hint as to the competition for each keyword as well as its CPC value. Another thing you must remember is that many blogging platforms (including Blogger) requires you to separate keywords by commas. Ubersuggest's listbuilder doesnot do that. So you must remember to enter the commas manually.

Overall Ubersuggest is a simple and fast way for newbie bloggers generate a handful of relevant keywords without having to wrack your brains. Nothing more nothing less.

Free and Easy Folder Encryption Software

Just thought I'd tell you about a free, easy and portable folder encryption software that I have been using for quite a few years now and am pretty satisfied with. It is called 1 Second  Folder Encryption and it really does not take much more than just a single second. And the best part is it is absolutely free!

It simply encrypts any folder on your system so that they cannot be viewed unless they are decrypted by the user. It is as simple  as downloading and installing the set up files and spending a couple of minutes getting familiar with the minimal and intuitive user interface.

Being a freeware however, it does have plenty of limitations:

1. It only allows a single user, that is, there is only one master password to encrypt or decrypt all the folders on your system.
2. The encrypted folders are neither hidden nor shredded, they are simply "locked" so that if someone tries to open he will simply get a system error message
3. The interface though intuitive could have been made somewhat more efficient and user friendly.
4. Last and most importantly the distributor refuses to take any responsibility in case of failure.

Overall, 1 Second Folder Encryption is ideally suited for those photos and videos and documents you'd rather other members of your family or friends not see, but trusting it with anything more sensitive may not be such a good idea.  

MathType : Software Review

MathType is a specialized software which enables typing out of complex mathematical formulae and expressions which cannot easily written on popular text editors like MS Words or even MS Excel.

Some Useful Features of MathType
The most remarkable feature of MathType is its intuitive and user friendly yet immensely powerful simplistic user interface. There are several modes such as derivatives, matrices, statistics, algebra etc with each mode having a series of one-click expression entry options for commonly used expressions. 

There are also a series of tabs for easily entering all sorts of symbols and commonly used Greek letters. In this regard it may be worth noting that though MS Word definitely boasts of a much more exhaustive set of foreign characters and symbols (though many of them find NO use in writing mathematical expressions), it is far easier to find and properly use them on MathType.

Mathtype Toolbar

Another impressive feature of MathType is the highly efficient way in which they have dealt with superscripts and subscripts and even sub-subscripts. This feature is far superior than any other word editor I have used either online or otherwise. In fact, in many ways the ability of MathType to seamlessly handle scripts of different sizes and at different realtive positions simultaneously is the corner stone of its success.

The matrix/vectors of any dimension can also be suitably represented with MathType.

Expressions involving summation and various types of integration (surface,volume,line etc) can also be easily written using MathType.

A few experimental equations to showcase Mathtype's ability  to handle complex mathematical equations

Disadvantages of MathType 
Though MathType is a highly efficient software and fits its product description perfectly, yet its nearly $100 price tag is quite exorbitant.

Also, personally I felt its integration with MS Words could have been considerably better as it is quite a hassle to rectify the typos once you have pasted to Words. Further, alignment of the MathType symbols with the Words documents is also not always perfect.

Last but definitely not the least not all online publishing platforms support Math Type, and I am talking major sites such as Hubpages, and to the best of my knowledge even Blogger!

Free Flash Games at Stick Sports : Review

Of all the hundreds if not thousands of free online gaming websites Sticksports.com is probably my favorite. As of present it offers the following five games and several variations/dervatives.

In order of preference (preference is of course subjective) they are:

1. Stick Tennis

This is my absolute favorite online game. It has probably got the best graphics of all the games in the Stickfranchise and as far as the game play is concerned it is in league with any of those EA sports games that you spent good money to buy. With all five grand slam scenarios (Wimbledon, US Open, Oz Open and Roland Garros) along with separate graphics (grass, clay or synthetic) for each of them and accurate players’ skill levels (Federer moves faster than Rodick but Rodick’s surf is faster than Roger’s) ensures that Stick Tennis stays head and shoulders above the competition, at least for the time being.

Further the game is sufficiently challenging so that you have to work for your wins and that makes Stick Tennis an even better game.

2.Stick Cricket

Up next is Stick Cricket–the very first game in the Sticksports family. With a descent game play and tolerable graphics this is also a damn good freebie. Like Stick Tennis this is also a very fast game and usually each match lasts no more than 10 minutes. However, if you’re very busy and can’t possibly spare 10 mins. there’s no need to despair–try the T2 mode, it hardly takes a couple of mins  to complete a T2 match.

3.Stick Football

Sorry football lovers but this game is know where near as good as the two mentioned above. For one thing the graphic is absolutely pathetic (I can’t remember the last time I played a game where the characters glidedinstead of walked)

On top of that this game is so easy that you get tired of scoring goals even before the first half is over! A real disappointed!

4.Stick Baseball

The gameplay is very similar to Stick Cricket but can't really say much more as baseball is really not my sport


5.Stick Racing
The latest addition to the Stick Sports family is Stick Racing. However, this game is also very disapointing and rather boring with stupid graphics and a pathetic gameplay.

How to Choose a Free Website Hosting Service

For first timers and casual webmasters (like myself) free services are particularly appealing even if they are restricted and lacking in features. These days there are hundreds of companies who offer free web hosting but most them of them have some sort of a catch in order to force you into opting for one of their paid plans to gain greater freedom on the net.

The following is a beginners guide to web hosting mentioning a list of features that are available for free and are particularly helpful to webmasters.

1. MySQL and PHP support.

MySQL and PHP are very important and you can run a very limited number of applications without them. For example even a basic WordPress blog requires a MySQL database and PHP support. Apart from this a lot of popular applications such as Movable Type require Perl for proper functioning.

2. FTP Access

FTP access is very important to maintain a website because every time you need to upload something you will be needing it. Even if you have browser upload facilities it is not always very reliable, specially when dealing with relatively large files, in which case FTP is the best and easiest method to achieve your end.

3. Bandwidth

Bandwidth is basically a measure of the maximum amount of traffic that your website can receive within a given frame of time (usually one month). Assuming that you are hoping to get at least a few visitors to your website apart from yourself and family you should look for a web host which provides bandwidth in excess of 200MB/month at least. For a very realistic estimate a text-based website which has received around 200 page views will expend 90MB bandwidth.

If you are considering photo blogs or Vblogs (video blogs) you should only consider web hosts providing over 500MB data transfer per month.

4. Advertisement

A lot of free web hosts monetize their service by forcibly  placing banner or pop-up ads on your website. Some include a footer text like “Click here for free web hosting”. If it is a purely personal blog these advertisements hardly pose a problem. But otherwise it somehow seems to undermine the credibility and authority of your website, not to mention become tiresome to your readers.

5. Diskspace

Depending up on the nature of your site this may be either your most important or your least important concern. For most purposes a disk space of above 500MB should be quite sufficient and a lot of web hosting companies provide more than that. However, if you are planning on creating your portfolio and get your high resolution photos or HD videos online you might be a touch hard put to find a free host with sufficient amount of disk space. (the maximum I’ve ever heard of is 50 GB and that’s a bit rare).

6. PHP cURL and fsockopen enabled are two other important features for a web host but these are very rare in case free web host provider. I’m not sure exactly what purpose these two features serve, but I can guarantee you one thing: If you are looking to use any auto blogging   applications chances are they won’t work without cURL and fsockopen enabled.

This is basically all you need to know in order to find yourself a descent web host. In case you get stuck, never mind, I’m planning to do another article discussing my experiences with some of the larger web hosting companies that provide free hosting.

Zurker : Own a Social Networking Site for Free !!!

Have you heard of Zurker yet? It is a new Social Networking sites which claims to be more fun than Facebook and is making no bones about the fact that toppling Facebook as the number social networking site is their main ambition--and that should tell you something about what its creators think about the potential for Zurker. However, it has one major difference from Facebook, Myspace and just about any other social networking sites--it is owned by its members and you get paid for Zurker's success.


How does the payment structure at Zurker work?
Zurker assigns its member vShares for every new successful referral. And I am very happy to say that Vshare isn't another one of those abstract revenue sharing rating points. Instead Vshare is simply a virtual share and will become a real share once Zurker get 1 million members. The value of one Vshare is one-millionth of the evaluation of Zurker. So here's the catch: only the people who refer the first 1 million people will be awarded Vshares. So it is best to join Zurker as soon as possible to maximize your chances of referring new members.


This is actually a great earning opportunity considering that Social Networking sites are some of the greatest money makers in the cyber world and even if Zurker falls way short of Facebook's $50 billion evaluation and is evaluated at just $50million (and that is quite a conservative estimnate considering Myspace fetched close to $600million and Bebo $800million), each vShare (which you are getting for free) will still earn you $50! Now that's not to shabby.


Other features of Zurker
Apart from this radical new development, Zurker has all the features you would expect in a social networking site. However, for obvious reasons Zuker doesn't allow multiple accounts  and they are also planning to go open source sometime in the future. Another point to note about Zurker is that it has already introduced country specific TLDs (like in Blogger) and this shows that they are more than willing to adapt to the present scenario, which has now become almost a prerequisite for success on the internet.


The future of Zurker is still quite uncertain, but it has been building up members at an impressive rate and is already of PR4 site with an Alexa rank of around 58000. So I will definitely reccomend you to check out Zurker specially as it is completely free and easy to use. 


Note:At present Zurker is in beta testing and you cannot sign up without an invitation. So ince you don't have one feel free to use mine (or click on any of the links to Zurker in the article above):
http://www.zurker.in/i-123003-ajdsilrbdk