Updates coming to Bing Search

Remember that the aim of searching for information on the web is to actually find the information you want. It's all well and good to see a huge list of links on the screen but that doesn't help much. That's why Bing search is more aptly described as a decision search engine to help you find, for example, the best deal for a plane ticket from Melbourne to Sydney (www.bing.com/travel) or to browse the latest video offerings (www.bing.com/videos/browse)

To see how Bing helps your decision making, imagine you're looking to purchase a new digital camera. You want to compare prices, brands and features. So start at bing.com by typing in digital camera. Now look at the left-hand pane on the screen for a breakdown of headings that help you focus on a particular aspect, for example, price. If you're not happy with the Australian version of Bing (since it's still in trial mode), go to the top right of the screen, click Australia, and from the subsequent page, choose United States - English. Now you have more options on the left-hand side of the screen to narrow down your search and find the information you want.

By the time you read this, other features should be available including nutrition and fitness information and calculations using the Wolfram|Alpha computational engine. For example, you'll be able to ask Bing to calculate your body mass index. As well maths enthusiasts will be able to ask Bing to plot a mathematical curve or ask for the properties of a dodecahedron.

Bing Maps updates

There have been imagery updates to Bing Maps in the last couple of months, the first focusing on a certain city which will be holding a major Olympic event in the near future. The November update concentrated on Eastern Europe so you can do some exploring.

The UK has its own version of Bing Maps which was just updated the other day and you can now instantly obtain a map of the London Tube lines and stations with one click. Try out Bing Maps UK at www.bing.com/maps/?mkt=en-uk.

Bing Maps has also a more flexible driving directions feature. Once you've got the driving directions, by dragging the route line you can make changes to your journey (give a few days for the Australian version to be updated).

Installing Windows 7

Windows 7 certainly has plenty of features that make it compelling as upgrade from Windows Vista. However one stumbling block many people run into when upgrading an operating system is that they haven't been backing up their important documents, photos and videos.

Many people purchased Windows Live OneCare and that purchase prompted the importance of a backup plan. Windows has its own built-in back up feature but we tend to forget about backing up until it's too late, or almost too late.

Do yourself a favour and go out and purchase an external hard drive onto which you can backup your data both as insurance against your hard drive failing or when the day comes to upgrade your version of Windows. Prices for external hard drives are cheap and a hundred dollars or so now gives your more relief than you'll ever know.

Apollo 12 re-enactment

As he did with the Apollo 11 re-enactment in July, webDotWiz is posting the major events that took place forty years ago on the Apollo 12 mission to the moon.

webDotWiz uses his Twitter account (www.twitter.com/webdotwiz) to post these major events. He's linked his Facebook account (www.facebook.com/webdotwiz) to his Twitter account so tweets automatically are added to his Facebook wall.

As well, webDotWiz has used the Windows Live web activities feature to bring in his Twitter and Facebook entries so those people on webDotWiz's Windows Live network are automatically informed of what posts he's made on their Live What's New page and they can follow the Apollo 12 mission without any extra effort.

A reminder that you can now add your YouTube account to your Windows Live activities so you can easily let your friends and family know when you've added a movie online that you created in Windows Live Movie Maker.

Quicklinks

Bing's new features

• Behind Bing, new features: www.discoverbing.com/behindbing/
• Bing for mobile now live at m.bing.com: www.bing.com/community/blogs/search/
• Bing Maps Imagery Release, October 2009 (including Vancouver): www.liveside.net
• Bing Maps Imagery Release, November 2009: www.bing.com/community/blogs/maps/
• Bing Maps is Looking Good: www.bing.com/community/blogs/search/
• Bing Maps London Tube map view: blogs.msdn.com/stevecla01/
• Bing Maps UK: www.bing.com/maps/?mkt=en-uk
• Bing Reference: www.bing.com/reference
• Bing Videos: www.bing.com/videos/browse
• Bing’s Next Chapter Begins: www.bing.com/community/blogs/search/
• Bringing the Best of Web Video to You at Bing Videos: www.bing.com/community/blogs/search/
• How Many Calories in a Burger? What’s 2^2^2^2^2? Bing and Wolfram|Alpha Have the Answers: www.bing.com/community/blogs/search/
• New features and updates to Bing Reference: www.liveside.net/bingblog/

Windows 7

• Get more from Windows 7 – top things to do after you upgrade: windowslivewire.spaces.live.com
• Live OneCare Backup Restore Tool Available: social.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/onecarebackupandrestore/
• Windows 7 Forums: social.answers.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/category/windows7
• Windows 7 Forums - Install, upgrade and activate: social.answers.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/w7install/

For all the sites listed with this week’s webDotWiz Online column see www.webdotwiz.com/sites-191109.htm

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Posted using the 2009 version of Windows Live Writer.

webDotWiz Online at www.webdotwiz.com

webDotWiz on Facebook at www.facebook.com/webdotwiz

Getting started

Yes, webDotWiz can hear you loudly protesting that your brain is already stressed enough as you learn to cope with all the ways you can use your photos such as create movies, keep up with all the options now available in Live Hotmail, track people on your Live network with What's new on your network, easily upload photos from Live Photo Gallery to your new Facebook site - and so the list goes on.

Well, you'll be pleased to know that often by straining the brain with some different types of problems that the brain copes better. So this week we'll take a look at learning some computer programming with Small Basic.

Get started by going to smallbasic.com to download and install Small Basic (the download is only a few megabytes). The download button is over on the right-hand side of the web page. You'll notice there's a Getting Started document (Word 2007 or PDF format) so download this as well. It's got some theory but more importantly there are plenty of small sample programs that you can run so you can see how things work.

Start Small Basic (you'll find it under your All Programs on the Windows Start menu). There are the usual New, Open, Save, Save As and Copy/Paste menu items. As well there's an Import button and a Run button to run your programs. The Import button is interesting because it enables you to download programs that others have written so you can learn from what others have done (that's one of the secrets of learning to write computer programs).

Small Basic doesn't have many keywords - only fifteen in fact - unlike full-blown programming environments such as Visual Basic with hundreds. Once you start typing in the programming area,  Small Basic will help you out by popping up suggestions as to what it thinks you're trying to say. For example, start typing webdotwiz (not one of Small Basic's keywords). Now try typing TextWindow - Small Basic knows something about this text because it's one of its keywords and will popup some information about it.

Hello world

All real programmers write their first program to say Hello world. Starting out with Small Basic is no different - well, it keeps the tradition alive. All you need do is type TextWindow.WriteLine("hello") and press the Run button (or press the F5 button on your keyboard).

Your program runs and prints Hello world in a very basic text window (check the task bar if you can't see this window).

You can jazz up things a bit by changing the colour of the text so look in the Introducing Small Basic document for the list of colours you can use and the extra line of code you'll need to type in.

Add some colour

Go to about page 24 of the Introducing Small Basic document to type in some code to get Small Basic to use a graphics window. Now you can draw lines, circles and rectanges using different colours and start to see more possibilities (see page 25 and following pages in Introducing Small Basic).

Learn from others

The Import button enables you to download programs that others have written. You may want to just play Asteroids or Gorilla but you'll also be able to glance at the code to see how the program works. If you're a coder from way back, it won't take you long to pick up Small Basic's way of programming and you might even trying porting some of your old games over to Small Basic (as lots of others have done).

To use Import you'll need a code for each program. You'll find each program's code in the Small Basic forum threads Post your sample code and Post your sample code part II (go online to today's sites listing page for direct links).

For example you want to play Tetris - click on Import and enter TETRIS as the code. The program code downloads into Small Basic. Before running, it would be a good idea to save the program so you can open and play again at a later time.

Note that some programs need images and sounds to be downloaded from the web; if they're causing humbugs with your Windows firewall, leave them till later. You can pre-check any program, though, by entering its code on the Small Basic program listing page.

Have fun straining the brain

There's little point in getting the brain to try out a new challenge if it's not enjoyable so look for program listings on the Small Basic forums that use graphics and output some interesting designs. Want more challenges with Small Basic? Try out the Project Euler problems!

Quicklinks

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Posted using the 2009 version of Windows Live Writer.

webDotWiz Online at www.webdotwiz.com

webDotWiz on Facebook at www.facebook.com/webdotwiz

This week we'll look at how easy it is to create a movie from a collection of photos and play it on your TV's DVD player.

Vista Home Premium

If your computer is running Vista Home Premium, you have all the tools you need to create a movie and burn a DVD which you can then play on your TV set using a DVD player that is built-in to your TV or is hooked up to it. The software we'll use consists of Windows Live Movie Maker Beta (update: currently a trial version and a full version is expected towards the end of 2009) and Windows DVD Maker.

For those running Windows XP, you can download Photo Story for Windows (it's a free download from the link at the end of this post) and use it to create your movie. To burn the DVD so it runs on a TV DVD player, you'll need to purchase extra software.

Before moving on, a word or several about different versions of Windows Vista.

Windows Vista versions

<begin rant>

Regardless of Microsoft's marketing policies, Windows Vista is sold in different versions, each with or without features, for specific sections of the market. So, for example, Windows Vista Business is aimed at business users on a company network where features such as Windows Media Center, Windows Media Player, Movie Maker and DVD Maker are not required. Vista Home is aimed at desktop and laptop computers which don't have the power to run multimedia applications very well so they don't include Media Player, for example.

Most of us at home (and sometimes at work) will need to have Windows Vista Home Premium so we can work with photos and movies without requiring any extra software.

If you're looking at the purchase of a new desktop PC or laptop, the first task is to check that you'll be getting Vista Home Premium. If not, go somewhere else.

One reason that there are so many laptops being offered at discount prices is that they're not installed with Windows Vista Home Premium. If you still want to purchase one of these products then only do so if you're prepared to pay the extra money to purchase a legitimate copy of Microsoft Windows Home Premium and install it over the top of whatever is on the machine you plan to purchase.

For heaven's sake don't purchase a computer that has Windows XP installed. The life cycle of free support for Windows XP concluded on April 14 2009. In other words Windows XP is ten years old and Microsoft won't be supplying any more free updates. As well, applications won't be developed for XP since programmers can't get free support from Microsoft if they run into problems.

If you're looking at purchasing a new computer or laptop, take advantage of the expertise at Rushworth Community House and come along to ask any questions you have.

</end rant>

From Live Photo Gallery to Live Movie Maker

The first step is to load your photos from Live Photo Gallery into Live Movie Maker and all that's needed in this step is to open both program, choose your photos and drag and drop them into Live Movie Maker.

At the time of writing, webDotWiz can assure you that you can use as many as 680 (update: 780 works but 1000 seems to be the limit) photos in Live Movie Maker. However, if you're going to create a movie from that many photos, it's best to drag and drop your photos in groups because you'll want to order them - and that's a simple job in Live Movie Maker - just drag your photos around until you've got them as you want.

Hint: when dragging and dropping from one Windows program to another, place the “From” window (the source) on the left of your computer screen and the “To” window (the destination) on the right. Position the windows by dragging the window with your mouse placed on the window’s title bar (at the top of the window).

In the screenshot on the right, just enough of the Live Photo Gallery window is visible so you can drag on one of the photos that have been selected. The Live Movie Maker window has been placed so enough can be seen so as to drop the photos.

Live Movie Maker

  You can add text over a photo so use this feature to include some information to your viewers as you see fit. It's a good way to split up your photos into sections on a specific topic. Click the Edit tab to insert text, change font, font size and style.

Transitions are available on the Visual Effects tab. Don't overdo them and perhaps only apply a transition to a photo that begins a new section in your movie.

Music can be added, too. Use tracks you've got available in Windows Media Player. Just note that you can't publish one of your movies online to MSN Video Soapbox if it contains copyrighted material (update 16-Aug-2009: MSN Video Soapbox is shutting down at the end of August; YouTube is an option but videos are limited to 10 minute running time).

Once you've got your photos in the order you want and added some transitions and music, it's time to create your DVD.

In Live Movie Maker, click on the Home tab and choose the Output button.  Now select the first option, Windows Media DVD Quality. You'll be prompted for a name for your movie and once you've entered this information, Live Move Maker begins creating the movie. Depending on how many photos you're using, this step can take a reasonable amount of time so be patient.

Windows DVD Maker

Start Windows DVD Maker from the Windows Start button/All programs and click Add to bring in your movie or movies that you want to burn onto a DVD.

Note at the bottom left of the screen that you're informed how many minutes out of the 150 minutes available on the DVD you've used. In other words, you can add several movies to DVD Maker and have them all burnt onto the DVD but keep an eye on how much time is remaining. After you've added all the movies you want to burn, you can re-order them by dragging and dropping so everything is organised as you want.

Click the Next button at the bottom right of DVD Maker's screen to choose a menu style from those on the right-hand side of the screen, change the menu text or customise the menu. The latter enables you to use external videos as a foreground and background to your menu.

Use the menu text button so you can enter your own disc title for your DVD movie (it's set as the day of creation) and change the font and font size to your needs. As well you can change the text that's on the Play, Next and Notes links on your DVD's menu. The notes box enables you to enter a description of the contents of the DVD. Once you've made your change, remember to click on Change Text at the bottom of the screen.

Once you've got your menu style and menu organised, it's time to Burn your movie to a DVD. Click Burn at the bottom of the screen and you'll be prompted to insert a blank DVD (a DVD-R is recommended) and the burn process begins.

Be aware that burning a DVD is a complicated and slow process so once the burn starts, either carry on with other work on your computer or have a very long cuppa.

After burning, you can try your DVD on your TV's DVD player. At time of writing, various webDotWizards have found that movies they've burned onto DVDs have all worked on their TV DVD player so you should find the same if you burn onto blank DVD-R discs.

Quicklinks

• Anticipation Builds for Windows Live Movie Maker: movies.blainesville.com
• Microsoft Windows Movie Maker tips, tutorials, forums and more...: www.windowsmoviemakers.net/Forums/
• MovieMakers for Windows Movie Maker Enthusiasts: www.windowsmoviemakers.net
• Paint.NET Homepage: www.getpaint.net
• Photo Story 3 for Windows: www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/digitalphotography/photostory/
• Use Vista DVD Maker to save the day: blogs.technet.com/doxley/
• Windows Live Australia: www.windowslive.com.au
• Windows Live Photo Gallery - Extras, Photosynth: www.windowslive.com/Connect/
• Windows Live Photo Sharing: www.freeyourphotos.ca

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webDotWiz on Facebook www.facebook.com/webdotwiz

This week we'll look at the easy way to share your Windows Live activities with your friends on other social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter. As well, for those of you with Facebook and/or Twitter accounts, for example, you'll find out the easy way to let your Live network friends receive updates from these and similar services.

Remember we're looking at ways to share by using the least amount of effort!

Using your Windows Live home page

The Live home page (home.live.com) gives you all the news from people in your live network - what they've been writing about on their Live Spaces website and new photos they've added to their Live photos site (photos.live.com), with the proviso of the owner's permission settings.

The April update to Windows Live expands on giving family and friends in your Live network more news about what you've been doing on your other social networking sites. You may have a Facebook or Twitter account to which you post or you've got some of your photos on Flickr. With the latest Live update, you can now use the Live web activities page to add the latest from these other sites so your Live network.

To enable your Live network of family and friends to receive your updates from, say, Facebook, go to the top right of your Live home page and click on Add web activities. Alternatively, if you happen to be on your Live profile page, scroll down until you find Web activities on the left-hand side and click on Add (note you can always change your mind by using the Manage link).

There are about thirty web activities from around the world to choose from and add to your profile so you can share with others. Once you've chosen Facebook - to continue our example - you'll be taken to a page where you sign in to Facebook with your usual Facebook sign-in email address and password. That's it - now your posts to Facebook will also appear on the Live Home pages of your Live network of family and friends.

View Full Album

Note: webDotWiz has already added web activities for Facebook and Twitter so that’s why they don’t appear on his Web Activities page. To show you how simple the process is, webDotWiz added the web activity for his photos on Flickr.

IE 8 accelerators for Twitter and Facebook

Being a Windows Live devotee, you mightn't want to spend lots of time updating your Facebook and Twitter accounts with lots of posts but at the same time want to tell people on Facebook on Twitter that you've updated your Live Space or Live Photos gallery.

That's as simple as could be using Internet Explorer 8's accelerators.

Bring up your Live Space site, choose one of your entries so it loads by itself, highlight the title and immediately you'll see a small blue icon popup - this is IE8's accelerator icon. Click this icon to bring up a whole range of accelerators, that is, quick and easy ways to pass information to another site.

At the bottom of the popup menu is the All Accelerators option. Click this to bring up more accelerators. Look in the list for Facebook or Twitter. If they're not there, click Find more accelerators to take you to the IE Addons gallery page from where you can add the Facebook, Twitter and other accelerators to your list.

After installing the Facebook and Twitter accelerators, all you need do to post your latest Live Space entry or a new Live photo album is highlight the title of your entry or photo gallery, click the accelerator icon, click Share on Facebook or Send to Twitter and go through your usual sign-in steps for these services.

You don't have to do anything else - your Facebook and Twitter services will be passed your latest Live Space blog entry or your new Live Photos album and your friends on these services will see what you've been doing on Windows Live.

Getting the latest news in slices

Go to Final Siren at www.finalsiren.com (this site gives all the latest AFL scores, the ladder and lots more), hover your mouse over the results table and you'll see a green border with a green icon in the top left - this is an Internet Explorer 8 web slice in action. As well, a green icon will appear on IE 8's toolbar.

So you can automatically get the latest footy results from Final Siren, all you need do is click the green web slice icon and then click Add to favorites bar. Now, whenever the Final Siren updates the scores, the AFL Results tab will turn bold - click it and a small window opens with the latest updated scores. Now you can carry on with other jobs whether it be browsing other sites, checking your friends' photo albums or writing up a new Live Spaces entry.

There are a whole range of handy web slices you can use with Internet Explorer 8 including news on the spread of the swine flu virus. Visit the IE Addons web slices page for a full list.

Live Writer Twitter notifiy plugin

For those who have a Twitter account, the Writer Twitter notify plugin is a simple way to add each of your Live Spaces entries to your Twitter feed for your followers to know when you have published a new entry. You can download the Twitter notifier from the Live Gallery.

If you have webDotWiz on your Live network, you'll see this in action when you notice two entries from webDotWiz - one from Windows Live itself because he's published a new entry on his Live Space, the other from Twitter because he's added the Twitter web activity to his Live profile.

Further, because webDotWiz was lazy, he linked his Twitter account to his Facebook account some time ago so his tweets would automatically appear on his Facebook page. Since he's now using the Facebook Live web activity, you'll see the same post appear from his Facebook account in your What's new with your network. Phew...

Internet Explorer 8 tips

Internet Explorer 8 became available to Windows XP and Windows Vista users a little while ago and will be part of the Windows automatic update service in the coming months. Apart from better security, there are a number of features to enable us to more easily get and read the information we want from the Internet.

Tabbed browsing is the in-thing and it enables us to open several web pages in Internet Explorer at once and then easily switch to each tab to browse each page in turn. A simple example is looking at the list of results from a web search. The old method of browsing search results is to click a link on the search page that then opens the site, skim the page for information, not find it, and then click the back button to return to our search list and try to remember where we're up to in the list of search results.

Instead in IE 8 a more efficient method is to right-click a link in the search results and then click Open in a new tab on the popup menu (or hold down the CTRL key and click the link). As you look down the page of search results, repeat this step to open each site in a new tab. When you've finished moving down the search result list and opened sites that will possibly give you the required information, click each tab to open each site in its own window. Note that all the tabs are coloured as a group.

Accelerators are a new feature in Internet Explorer 8 that, for one thing, save copying a link, opening a new browser window and pasting the link to load the page. Instead highlight some text, for example, an address, right click the selected text and up pops the blue accelerator icon. Click this to bring up the options. In the example of locating an address, choose the Map with Live Search option which will bring up a map in a small window over the page you're currently on.

Other Accelerators include searching for information on some text you select, and translating selected text. At the bottom of the popup menu you have access to more accelerators which you can add to the list on your computer (e.g. Sharing on Facebook or Send to Twitter).

Doing a search on some selected text automatically opens a search page of results on a new tab so you're saved the hassle of having to copy and paste the text into a new browser window.

Live Photos tricks

Because Live Photos is a part of online Windows Internet Services, that is, because the service is offered as a web page, new functionality can be offered as users request it without us having to download and install a new program.

Last week Live Photos was updated so that we can put photos in our photo albums in order by date, time, name or arrange them manually. You'll see that a Sort link now appears at the top of a photo album you're viewing. The default choice is to sort by Date but click the down arrow to see more choices - at the bottom of the list is Arrange photos.

When you click Arrange photos your album will re-load and you're informed at the top of the page that you can now simply drag and drop the photos into the order you want. When you've re-arranged the photos, remember to click the Save button or you can Cancel the operation.

One of the handiest features of Live Photos is that you can simply Send a link (now on the More menu) rather than spending lots of time emailing photos as attachments to family and friends. By uploading your photos to your Live Photos albums you're accomplishing two jobs at once - backing up your photos and making life easier for yourself.

If family and friends are in your Windows Live network, they'll see when they visit their Live What's new page or their Live Home page that you've uploaded new photos so you won't even have to phone or email them. They can then choose the Download with Photo Gallery option on the More menu to download the photos they want and have them organised on their computer using Live Photo Gallery.

Quicklinks

• Easy Way to Alert Family & Friends About Your New Photos: on10.net/blogs/sarahintampa/
• Footy + IE 8 makes a tasty web slice: blogs.msdn.com/frankarr/
• Internet Explorer 8 Download: www.microsoft.com/ie8/
• Internet Explorer 8 Features: www.microsoft.com/windows/internet-explorer/
• IE 8 Security SmartScreen Filter: blogs.msdn.com/ie/
• Live SkyDrive adds new features (April 14 2009): skydriveteam.spaces.live.com
• New - drag photos where you want them: windowslivewire.spaces.live.com
• Subscribing to Content with Web Slices: msdn.microsoft.com
• What’s New in Internet Explorer 8: technet.microsoft.com/en-us/magazine/
• Who Needs IE 8 Accelerators?: blogs.msdn.com/mikeormond/

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Posted using the 2009 version of Windows Live Writer.

Eta Carinae

You may have been one of those who participated in one of the spectacular autumn nights at the Rushworth Observatory recently and your curiosity has been prodded to follow up on more sky viewing. Alternatively you have always wondered how you can explore the sky but don't own or know anybody with a telescope.

The Microsoft WorldWide Telescope program is just what you need!

You can either download WWT from www.worldwidetelescope.org so as to run it on your computer or use the online version at www.worldwidetelescope.org/webclient (Mac users rejoice). WWT uses imagery from all the major astronomical sources such as the Hubble Space Telescope and earth-based observatories. There are some differences between the WWT desktop program and the web-based one, such as the latter not being able to include some highlights such as the 3D solar tour.

Getting started

After download and install, when you start WWT for the first time you may be overwhelmed by all the possible options. So let's keep things simple for the minute.

The menu across the top of the screen consists of Explore, Guided Tours, Search, Community, Telescope, View and Settings. At the bottom left under the Field of View is where you can choose what you want to Look At (e.g, WWT is initially set to view the sky but you can change it to the Solar System, for example. Alongside is Imagery (which is initially set to Digitized sky survey Optical) and there are plenty of options from which you to choose as you extend your explorations. To find more information about the different types of imagery available in WWT, see the How To page at the WWT website.

To see what WWT is capable of it's best to choose Guided Tours from the top menu. There's a Learning WWT choice but you may want something more exciting and there's plenty to choose from, such as touring nebulas, galaxies, planets, black holes, star clusters and supernova. These tours have been created by professional astronomers and are often accompanied by a voiceover.

Exploring

A click on the Explore button brings up a large list of different collections including collections you create, the solar system, planets and moons, constellations and astrophotography. Unlike a physical telescope located at, say, Melbourne, WWT enables us to view constellations whether they be in our southern celestial view or the northern sky. You can check this out by choosing Andromeda from the list of Constellations and checking the  celestial sphere at the bottom right of the WWT screen. Choose Centaurus, for example, to see the difference (Centaurus is on the second page of the eight page of constellation collections as shown on the right-hand side of the WWT screen).

Having chosen the Centaurus collection, you'll notice that the bottom pane fills with objects that are related to your current field of view. By hovering over each image, WWT will show you where that object is located in the sky. For example, hover over Scattered light from the Boomerang nebula to locate it in the field of view. Another object to locate is supernova SN1006.

Getting help

You'll find WWT's help section by clicking the bottom half of the Explore button. When starting out, perhaps just confine yourself to a couple of topics such as Getting Started and Exploring with WWT. Whenever you come across some new jargon (common astronomical terms like azimuth and right ascension), then consult the glossary in WWT help.

Panning and zooming

Staying with the Centaurus collection, you can pan around and zoom in and out of the field of view. To pan, hold won the left mouse button and drag the view. To zoom, use your mouse wheel or use the Page Up/Page Down keys or the plus (+) and minus (-) keys.

Note that as you zoom in, the list of objects that are viewable changes in the bottom pane.

Change your location

Under the View menu you can set the location from where you're viewing the sky through your WorldWide Telescope. By default, WWT is set to a Microsoft building in Redmond, Seattle, Washington State, i.e. you're viewing from the northern hemisphere. Click the the Setup button and choose Melbourne AU from the list of world cities but bear in mind you can always change this setting if you want to be somewhere else in the world. See what happens when you tick the View from this location box - you'll have a horizon. Perhaps you may want to leave this unticked.

Change the viewing time

Also under the View menu is Observing time. This setting enables you to do a Dr. Who and speed back or forward in time and gives you the means to observe planetary motion. For other things to do, see WWT's help.

The Finder Scope

Go back to Explore - Constellations - Centaurus. Now right click in the Field of View and up pops the Finder Scope. You can drag it around and, as you do so, you'll be informed of any object in its view. Close to the centre in the Field of View you should be able to find galaxy NGC 4835. The Finder Scope gives you the options of doing some research on this object or you can show the actual object. Note that the Alt and Az (altitude and azimuth) numbers are constantly changing. After all, you're viewing the sky through a telescope and the earth is slowly rotating so you're changing position relative to the celestial sphere.

Take a screenshot

You can take a screenshot of your current view that you can save as a JPG file and then use later in a Word document, for example. You might be looking for an object that depicts the awesomeness of the universe and WWT provides you with plenty of choice. Click the bottom of the View menu button and choose Copy current view image. Note that this option doesn't work very well when observing planets in a closeup view because they're moving across the sky and you might get a double image when you paste into your graphics program. An alternative is to use the screen clip function in Microsoft OneNote.

Homework

Read through the spectacular autumn nights at the Rushworth Observatory article and find the objects in WorldWide Telescope that people saw live in the telescope at the Rushworth Observatory. For example, choose WWT's search menu, type in 47 Tucanae and the Field of View will locate this object. Right click to bring up the Finder Scope for more information.

Another object to find is the Orion nebula and there's plenty of exploration to do here including imagery of Orion from Hubble.

Take a tour of the solar system in 3D by choosing Solar System under Look At (bottom left of WWT window) and then 3D Solar System View should pop up under Imagery (alongside Look At).

Looking for more information?

There are numerous astronomy sites but to get started and be able to easily follow what's being discussed webDotWiz advises the Cosmic Log and Space sections at www.msnbc.msn.com. The Month in Pictures feature is a handy way to view images and come across new objects you can then find in WWT. As well there's some reference material about the formation of stars, nebulas, constellations and supernovas.

2009 is the International Year of Astronomy so look up the site at www.astronomy2009.org.au for special events and sitings.

Panoramas

Ok, it's time to tear yourself away from tagging your photos in Windows Live Photo Gallery and do a couple of quick photo shoots for fun purposes.

So grab your camera, walk out to the front gate and snap several shots - five or six will do -, each one overlapping the other by about fifty percent or so. Now walk across the road, looking back at your house. Snap some more shots, each one overlapping the other, again by about fifty percent. Instead of snapping your photos from left to right, this time take the photos from right to left. All you need to do is hold your camera at the same height as best you can for each photo (unless you've got a tripod).

While you're outside, is there a tall tree, building or tower nearby? Snap some more overlapping photos. It doesn't matter whether you start at the bottom or at the top.

Now you can return inside and straightaway load your photos onto your computer using Live Photo Gallery.  Choose the first group, tag them with the descriptive tag Panorama, go to Make on Photo Gallery's main menu, choose Create panoramic photo, wait a little while, give a name to your panorama when asked, and click Save. Done. You can marvel at your creation for just a minute or two before creating the other panoramas from the shots you took. If things haven't worked out as you expected, run outside again and re-take your shots, this time making sure you overlap your photos.

To tidy up your panoramas by removing the areas of black at the top and bottom (unless you've used a tripod), in Live Photo Gallery choose Fix from the top menu, and then Crop from the menu on the right-hand pane. Adjust the crop area until it's what you want, click Return to gallery at the top left to save your cropped panorama and you're done. Double-click the panorama to open it full-screen and use the mouse wheel to zoom in and out to see the detail you've captured and pan around with the left-button down.

Now choose your panoramas (put a tick on the top left of each panorama) in Live Photo Gallery, click Publish on the top menu, give your new album at name such as Marvellous Panoramas and upload them. Later on you can make sure your friends download them by going to your Live Photos page (photos.live.com) and sending them a link to your online album.

One last job is to use a free program called Deep Zoom Composer to process your panorama and upload it to the free website at Photozoom so others can zoom in and out and pan around your photo. We'll talk about Deep Zoom another time.

Photosynth - may the Synth be with you

Photosynth takes a group of photos (which have been shot so there's overlap between one photo and the next) and creates a three-dimensional view of an object or scene, small or large. Perhaps the best example is the synth  of the inauguration of the U.S. President on January 20 2009 which was created from thousands of photos people took and submitted. You'll find plenty of other synths at photosynth.net that will give you ideas of what's possible.

You can synth large or small objects and scenarios and you can easily do your first synth. There are a couple of examples in this week's list of sites (for example the synth of the Murchison meteorite).

If you want to choose a largish object, walk around your car and take plenty of overlapping shots. Some photos could be at a distance while others can be a closeup of a feature of your car. You should end with about thirty photos.

Another project is to create a synth of the interior of a room. Take overlapping photos from the centre of the room and then from each corner of the room. To finish off, take close-up photos of each wall (as you would when doing a panorama). Depending on the room size, you'll end up with about sixty or more photos.

Alternatively you could create a synth of a small object such as a ceramic sculpture or a flower vase. In this case you need at least twenty-four photos each taken at fifteen degrees around the object. The simple way to get shots every fifteen degrees is to use a lazy susan on which you've placed a mark at fifteen degrees around the edge. A tripod also helps and you can then take another twenty-four photos from a slightly raised height to add more detail to your finished creation.

Once you've shot your photos, import them into Live Photo Gallery, tag them (at least one tag should be Synth or Photosynth), select the group of photos you want to synth, choose Extras from Photo Gallery's top menu then click Create a Photosynth to begin the process. For your first synth, you may need to install the photosynth add-on.

You'll be asked to sign with your Windows Live ID. For your first project, Photosynth will create your free online storage space and you'll need to make a nickname for yourself.

Photosynth then brings up a pane into which you need to enter your synth's title (if you don't, the Synth button at the bottom will remain greyed out). As well enter some tags and a description so others who are exploring the Photosynth site can find your finished creation.

You'll have to wait a reasonably time for Photosynth to upload your files and at the same time put them together into a 3D view. A progress bar will keep you up to date as to how things are going. Keep an eye on how synthy your project is - you should achieve 100% synthing a small object on a lazy susan using a tripod for your camera.

Finally you can geo-tag your synth by clicking on the world map icon on your synth's web page. Let's get plenty of synths from the local area showing up on the map.

Some quicklinks to help you with your panoramas and photosynths – and to have fun with your photos

• Check out AutoCollage: blogs.msdn.com/pix/
• Download Windows Live Essentials 2009: download.live.com
• Georgina at Camelback: starskihutch.spaces.live.com
• How to Geotag Your Synths: blogs.msdn.com/photosynth/
• Maurs at the Lodge: maursgreg.spaces.live.com
• Murchison Meteorite Photosynth: jbmurch.spaces.live.com
• Penny Royal Panorama: billshorsetroughs.spaces.live.com
• Photosynth Homepage: photosynth.net
• Photosynth Map Explore Geotagged Synths: photosynth.net/geoexplore.aspx
• Photosynth Photography Guide - Tips and Tricks: blogs.msdn.com/photosynth/
• Playing with Photo Gallery panoramas: windowslivewire.spaces.live.com
• Tell me more about Windows Live Movie Maker beta: windowslivewire.spaces.live.com
• The Art of Photography: kevplew.spaces.live.com
• Thelma and Reg: theregrushy.spaces.live.com
• U.S. President Inauguration photosynthed: www.msnbc.msn.com/id/28661923
• Windows Live Photo Gallery Features: download.live.com/photogallery

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Posted using the latest 2009 version of Windows Live Writer.

Windows Live Photo Gallery is a free program and one of the free Windows Live Essentials programs which you can download from download.live.com. Live Photo Gallery makes it easy for you to:

• copy your photos and movies from your camera to your computer
• edit your photos, for example, adjust colour, rotate and crop
• backup your photos and movies using your 25,000 megabytes of free online space
• share your photos with family and friends
• organise your photos with descriptive and people tags
• view photos taken by your family and friends

Copying photos from your camera

When you plug your camera into your computer, Windows Vista and Windows XP will automatically load any drivers that connect your camera to your computer. In other words, you can forget about installing any software that came on a CD with your camera.

After plugging in your camera, look at the bottom of the screen for an orange notification that reads Autorun; click this to bring up a list of choices to use to copy your photos to your camera. Choose the one that says Import photos and videos using Live Photo Gallery.

On the next dialogue box, choose Review. This option will result in Live Photo Gallery looking at what photos you already have on your computer and compare those with the photos on your camera. Live Photo Gallery will then show you only the photos you haven't yet copied from your camera to your computer. This feature may seem superfluous when you first start storing photos on your computer but with camera memory cards being so cheap and able to store hundreds of photos, the capability to easily see the most recent photos that need copying saves lots and lots of time.

The next part of the copying process involves using the slider at the bottom right of the dialogue to adjust the time span so your photos are grouped by date and time. So, for example, if you've taken a large group of photos on just one day, then adjust the slider so your photos are grouped every few hours. On the other hand, if your photos are spread over a week or two, adjust the slider according to days.

You need to enter a name (click in the Enter name box) which turns out to be a folder name into which your photos will be copied. Don't worry if you miss this step - Live Photo Gallery will create a folder according to the day's date, e.g. 2009-02-26, and if you have several groups of photos, folders will be named 2009-02-26 001, 2009-02-26 002, and so on. But folder names aren't important because you're going to add tags to your photos so they're organised and you can easily find them when the need arises.

Tagging photos to organise and find them

Depending on how your grouping works out from the step above, you should be able to add a descriptive tag or two before the final step to import your photos. If not, we'll do it after importing. So click Import to copy your photos from the camera to your computer.

After the photos are imported, Live Photo Gallery opens to show your photos in the folder you named (or the first folder if you grouped your photos into several sections or folders). Now it's time to add tags.

There are two types of tags: descriptive and people, the latter using face recognition. You can select a single photo or a group of photos to apply a general tag such as Holidays and then add further tags that best describe one photo or a group of photos.

The purpose of tags is so you can view photos with a single click on a tag name from the tag list in Live Photo Gallery. Staying with our Holidays photos, over time you'll be able to view all your holiday photos and then focus in on that holiday you took at Byron Bay or Margaret River. You took some photos on the beach (another tag) at sunrise (another tag). Your holiday photos from Margaret River include some magnificent sunsets (another tag).

Now that you have tagged your holiday photos, later when looking for a photo of a sunset, simply click the Sunset tag to view them.

Remember, too, that colours are important so add tags to your photos so you can later view all your photos that feature a colour. For example, you have photos of red roses - that's two tags to use.

Saving and sharing your photos all in one step

Using a Windows Live ID (a Hotmail account in an earlier age) you're able to store and share your photos online. You have 25,000 megabytes (25Gb) of free storage - that's enough space for about 8,000 photos.

Live Photo Gallery gives you access to your online storage through the Publish menu item. So after tagging your photos, it's time to upload them.

Choose a group of photos that will make an album about a particular theme such as Sunsets at Byron Bay 2009 and click Publish then Online album to begin the upload step. Note that you have a choice about who you share you photos with - everybody, those on your Live network, or just you.

It's up to you to choose the most appropriate. After you upload your photos to an album, you can let other people know where to view your photos and they can download the ones they want.

People in your Live network will be automatically notified that you've uploaded a new album so you don't need to do anything else except wait for the accolades that your photos deserve.

Some things to do

• Take lots of photos in different conditions, e.g., close ups, landscapes, indoors and into the sun, so learn the capabilities of your camera (remember, one day you'll be asked to take photos for a special birthday, wedding or family event so be prepared)
• Live Photo Gallery can stitch photos together to create panoramas so try this feature (just overlap your photos by about half) under the Make menu item
• Live Photo Gallery can combine your photos to create a 3D view that uses Photosynth (see some samples by the webDotWizards in today's list of sites)
• When changing batteries, some cameras lose the date and time setting so check your camera
• Learn about depth of field and test how well your camera performs

Quick links

Windows Live enables you to keep up to date with what your family, relatives and friends are doing if they're on your contacts list in Live Messenger or Live People.

For example, if family or friends publish some new photos from their recent trip overseas into an album on their Live Photos page (and they set the appropriate permission on this album) then you'll see a notification on your Live Home page in the form of thumbnails of some of the photos. So, rather than waiting for an email or having to visit their website to find out when the new photos are viewable, you're notified almost immediately on your Live Home page.

Live Essentials and Live Internet Services

Before going on, a reminder that Windows Live consists of two parts: Windows Live Essentials and Windows Live Internet Services. Live Essentials is made up of several free programs you download and install on your computer: Live Mail, Live Messenger, Live Movie Maker (for Vista only), Live Photo Gallery, Live Toolbar and Live Family Safety. So, for example, if you want to edit some of your photos, you go to the Windows start button to open the start menu, find Windows Live Photo Gallery in the list of programs and click it's name to load it.

The other part of Windows Live is called Live Internet Services because these services are online and you access them as web pages in your browser such as Internet Explorer. Each Live Internet Service page has a common menu across the top of the page so you can easily flip between pages: Home, Profile, People, Mail, Photos and More (to get to your other online services such as your Live Space and your online storage at Live Skydrive).

The reason for this common menu on each Live Internet Service page is to make it convenient for you to get to whatever service you want to use whenever you need to do something. For example, you're reading and sending some emails and wonder if one of your friends has put some of their photos online - just click on the Home link and you can check. Then you can return to your Live Hotmail inbox by clicking on Mail.

One advantage with the online services part of Windows Live is that updates and new features can be introduced without us having to do anything, that is nothing to download and install. So keep an eye out for some new features to appear in your Live Hotmail and Live People where you'll receive news on what your friends are doing and even be able to use Messenger to chat online.

One of the webDotWizards described Windows Live as a system and that's a good way to think of things. Windows Live is not a complicated system and it's organised in such a way that you can easily move between different parts depending on what you want to get done.

Permissions and your profile page

You need to take some time out to check what permissions you have set - you do this from your Live Profile page and when you go to this page there's a large reminder at the top of the page to manage your permissions.

The permissions you set on your profile page for different pieces of information about yourself result in what people in your network can read about you. For example, if you only want people in your network to see your first name but not your surname then it's possible to do this.

Remember that what you see on your profile page is not what the rest of us can view. The only way to check out how this works is to come into the Rushworth Community House where you can see your profile permissions in action on other computers.

A reminder, too, that you're able to set permissions on the photo albums you create on your Live Photos page. If you don't want everybody to view an album then set the permission accordingly. You're able to only allow one or two people to view an album so there are plenty of options.

Homework

Come into Rushworth Community House on day, walk up to a computer and without doing anything else, start up Internet Explorer and go to http://profile.live.com. What happens?

Quick links for more information:

• Changing the way you share your photos: blogs.msdn.com/pix/
• Did you know – Insert photo album options in Live Writer (and what they look like): webdotwiz.spaces.live.com
• Did you know – Insert picture options in Live Writer (and what they look like): webdotwiz.spaces.live.com
• Do you know how to get to your Live Space?: webdotwiz.spaces.live.com
• Do you know how to get to your friends' Live Spaces?: webdotwiz.spaces.live.com
• Download Windows Live Essentials 2009: download.live.com
• Have you seen the latest Hotmail changes?: windowslivewire.spaces.live.com
• Hotmail update starts rolling out for all users, POP3 coming to the U.S.: www.liveside.net
• Managing your contacts with Windows Live People: windowslivewire.spaces.live.com
• What's new with your network in Hotmail (Screenshot): skydrive.live.com
• Whoa, cool new features in Hotmail: mailcall.spaces.live.com

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Follow webDotWiz on Twitter.

Posted using Windows Live Writer 2009.

In his last column in December, webDotWiz walked you through the latest release of the Windows Live online services. The main online services are made up of Live Hotmail for online webmail, Live Calendar, Live Photos for online storage and sharing of photo albums, Live Skydrive to store online documents and pictures (25,000 metabytes of free online space), Live Spaces for your own website and Office Live Workspace to store and share Office documents. You can check out more information about these services at webDotWiz Online.

Then in the middle of Decemeber the other part of Windows Live, Windows Live Essentials, was updated and this release became the final released version a couple of weeks ago.

The Windows Live Essentials consist of free programs you download and install: Live Messenger, Live Mail, Live Photo Gallery, Live Movie Maker, Live Toolbar and Live Family Safety. You can easily tell if you've got the latest versions - you won't see the word "beta" in the title of these programs on your Windows start menu. As well, if you're getting a message when you sign in to Live Messenger that there is a newer version to download, then you're still running the old version and should update to get all the new features now available.

Live Messenger

The 2009 version of Live Messenger now enables you to sign in on more than one computer at a time thus simplifying your messaging habits. Another handy feature is that you can IM one of your contacts regardless of whether they're online - they'll get your IM as soon as they sign in at their end. To extend this feature, it's worth considering having a Windows Live ID for home and another for work. Then you can IM reminders to yourself between home and work.

Sharing photos is now much easier whether you want to just show a few of your latest to a family member or friend. Simply drag a photo from Live Photo Gallery onto the conversation window.

Live Photo Gallery

Use Live Photo Gallery to organise your photos and scans by adding both people and descriptive tags, use the edit tools to remove redeye, sharpen or crop your photos, and easily upload and share your photos to your online Live Photos storage area or other online photos service providers.

Live Photo Gallery makes it easy to take photos off your camera by comparing what you've already taken off your camera with what you've stored on your hard drive. This option also works for CDs, DVDs and memory sticks.

As well Live Photo Gallery now works with Live Skydrive so that when a friend invites you to download some of their photos you can use the same technique as you do with your camera by choosing which photos you want to download.

Live Mail

Live Mail replaces the out-of-date Outlook Express email program by allowing any number of email accounts to be accessed as well as providing more modern security for protection from spamming and phishing. The program is easy to setup with your email accounts and will automatically give you updates of your contacts' Live Spaces.

Live Writer

Use Live Writer to add entries to your Live Spaces website or to other blog services. Whilst the Live Spaces Add entry function has been updated by being able to add pictures so they show in full size, Live Writer has more options. As well as inserting photos, you can also insert a photo album, a map or a video.

Live Toolbar

The 2009 version of the Live Toolbar works quite differently from lots of current toolbars by opening a small pane for each service on the toolbar instead of just linking to a particular web page. One handy feature is to easily add sites to your Shared Favorites folder (stored in your Live Skydrive area) so you can access any of these sites regardless of which computer you're using.

Live Family Safety

This Live Safety program enables you to set up permissions for the younger members of your family so they can more safely access the Internet.

Hints and tips

There are plenty of links in this week's list of sites to help you out with making the most of the Windows Live Essentials programs. To get started, browse the webDotWiz Online Windows Live Essentials page which has links to separate pages for each Live Essentials program. As well, take the time to browse the webDotWizards web sites to see how Live Writer is used.

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Posted using the 2009 version of Windows Live Writer.

Worldwide Telescope

The free WorldWide Telescope application has been updated – it’s titled the Equinox version. You can download it from its homepage at www.worldwidetelescope.org.

The most spectacular new feature is being able to view the solar system in 3D. Go down to the bottom of the WWT screen and choose Solar System from the Look At dropdown list. Then click on the drop down list under Imagery to choose 3D Solar System View. Hold down your mouse left-button to pan around the sky and use the scroll wheel to zoom in and out or press Page Up/Page Down.

As well WWT has expanded the range of imagery available including photography from noted astrophotographers such as Jack Newton.

After you’ve installed WWT, you may want to change the viewing location to a city near you (the default setting is one of Microsoft’s research buildings in Redmond, Seattle, Washington State). Go to View on the main menu at the top of the screen and choose a viewing location that suits from the list of cities around the world. If you know your location’s latitude and longitude, you can manually enter the values. Since you can set your viewing location anywhere in the world, you’re able to view both the northern and hemisphere skies, something not possible with a physical telescope set up a particular location.

You’ll find yourself spending lots of time simply exploring the various collections that are part of WWT (they’re under the Explore option from the main menu). As well, there are plenty of guided tours where all you need do is sit back and enjoy. These tours range from the Apollo missions through to touring galaxies and supernovas.

Finally under Explore, look for the panoramas which include scenes from Mars and the Apollo moon missions. Also WWT integrates with Microsoft Office so, for example, you can copy and paste a WWT image into Word (click the little arrow under View on the main menu to get to the Copy Current View Image).

Live Photo Gallery – black and white photos

You may have already noticed that under the Fix menu in the trial (beta) version of Live Photo Gallery that you convert photos to black and white. Doing so can add impact, drama and attitude to selected photos.

To try this feature, copy and paste one of your photos (remember you need to be in a folder to do this – you can’t copy and paste if you’re viewing photos under one of your descriptive tags). To copy, right-click on the selected photo and choose Copy. In a blank spot in the folder window, right click and Paste – Live Photo Gallery will keep the same name of the photo file but append Copy to it.

Try the yellow filter on landscapes to create a subtle contrast between the sky and clouds and the green foliage. The orange filter will create stronger effects on sky and foliage. For even more contrast, try the red filter which is also very effective for still-life photos.

Live Hotmail update

It seems most people have now received the latest update to Hotmail as it spreads worldwide onto all the Hotmail servers.

For those using a small screen monitor, you should firstly maximise the browser window (use the right-most button at the top right of your browser window). As well you may have to use Options to lay out your reading pane in a different way to what you had previously – you’ll have to experiment to get the best result.

Live Maps – new imagery

The imagery for Melbourne and Geelong has been updated on Live Maps and it’s all bird’s eye imagery. For example, Southern Cross station and the Eureka Tower are worth looking at. In bird’s eye, remember you can rotate around to view the imagery from the north, south, east or west – handy when you want to see your seat at the MCG or Kardinia Park.

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Posted using the Wave 3 version of Windows Live Writer.

The Wave 3 version of all the programs and services that make up the Windows Live suite (Live Calendar, Live Family Care, Live Hotmail, Live Mail, Live Messenger, Live Movie Maker, Live Photo Gallery, Live Toolbar, Live Writer) can be downloaded from http://download.live.com. Although these programs are still in trial (that’s why you’ll see “beta” in their title), webDotWiz has installed them on his own computer and those at the Rushworth Community House without any problem.

In this column we’ll take a brief look at some of the new features in just two of the Live suite: Live Messenger and Live Photo Gallery. There’s plenty to talk about but one of the snazziest little things in Live Messenger is when you hover your mouse over the top right corner to see the texture peel away so you can set your own scene. Choose from those provided or browse to use one of your own photos.

The Wave 3 Messenger becomes a better central point to get to your email (note the small envelope on the right-hand side) either via Live Mail or directly to your Hotmail.

Favorites is set up so you can add specific people to this group of friends. As well you can create groups of people whom you chat with (a group can consist of as many as fifteen of your Messenger contact friends).

At the bottom of the Messenger windows is the What’s new section. This part of the window scrolls through what your friends have added to their Live Spaces so you’ll be up-to-date whenever they add new photos or make a new entry. Click the dividing line to expand the size of this section or click What’s new to take to your Live Spaces home page.

Hover your mouse over one of your contacts to bring up a menu so you can post an instant message to begin chatting or share some photos or send an email.

Turning to Live Photo Gallery, there are some special features that have been added. You’re now able to tag people in your photos with their name for easy reference, straighten any photos (often this is done automatically as soon as you choose the Fix menu), view and download photos of your friends on Live Messenger, and create a Photosynth directly.

Now there are two types of tags – people and descriptive, the latter being the former Tags feature. When you first start Live Photo Gallery after installing the Wave 3 version you’ll note that it spends some time updating your photo library (look down in the bottom left corner) to look through your photos to apply its face recognition technology. Once this task is finished, opening any photo of family or friends will bring up a list of unidentified people.

Over at the top right of the Live Photo Gallery windows you’ll see under People tags that you can identify this person.

Hovering over the Identify link enables you to enter a name for this person and if you’re logged in to your Windows Live ID you’ll have access to your Messenger friends list to make the job easier.

The Straighten photo function under the Fix menu repairs any photos taken when you weren’t holding the camera level. As well when you’ve scanned 35mm slides and the negative has slipped inside its cardboard holder the scanned result can be repaired.

Here’s a scanned slide that needs a little straightening:

After choosing Straighten photo under the Fix menu, a grid is placed over your photo to help make the job easier if you’re not happy with Live Photo Gallery’s automatic straightening.

Live Photo Gallery has plenty of excellent features to help you organise your photos and edit them for your viewing pleasure. The program is simple to use but at the same time is powerful – and it’s free! If you’d like to take the creation of panoramic photos further than Live Photo Gallery offers, you can download Microsoft Image Composite Editor which gives you more output options for your large panoramic creations.

Overall the Wave 3 version of the Windows Live suite is now at a stage where we can start to experience the benefit of how these services tie in together (webDotWiz hasn’t mentioned, for example, how Live Calendar now synchronises with the calendar in Live Mail or Outlook).

Here are some sites to get you started:

• How good is a Beta - Will you run it at home?: robdolin.spaces.live.com/Blog/
• Live Photo Gallery Cheat Sheet (summary of new features): blogs.msdn.com/pix/
• New Version of Pro Photo Tools released: blogs.msdn.com/prophoto/
• New Windows Live Wave 3 Trial Versions: www.liveside.net
• Response to Some Feedback on "What's New" in Windows Live Messenger: www.25hoursaday.com/weblog/
• Wave 3 Windows Live Messenger 9 Beta – What’s New? A Comparison With 8.5: www.liveside.net
• Windows Live Download Page: download.live.com
• Windows Live Mail Beta Available Today: morethanmail.spaces.live.com
• Windows Live Messenger Beta Released: messengersays.spaces.live.com
• Windows Live Movie Maker Beta: www.liveside.net
• Windows Live Photo Gallery and Movie Maker Betas Released: blogs.msdn.com/pix/
• Windows Live Photo Gallery and Movie Maker Plugins Page: blogs.msdn.com/pix/
• Windows Live Photo Gallery Beta – New Features: www.liveside.net
• Windows Live Writer Beta New Features: windowslivewriter.spaces.live.com

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May the Synth be with you.

Posted using the Wave 3 version of Windows Live Writer.

There’s no doubt that the digital camera has brought photography to so many more people compared to the old days when we had to struggle with the old film camera. One amazing feature of the digital camera is that the worry of wasting a costly film because of some malfunction (by the camera or the photographer, or both) is no longer there.

Then along comes a free program such as Windows Live Photo Gallery which enables us to take a series of photos and stitch them together to create a panorama. Now these panoramas turn out to be much wider or higher than our computer screen but we can pan around in Photo Gallery to view them in all their glory. But what about showing off our creative work to family and friends? Invite them over for a viewing? Not likely when many can still recall those boring slide nights!

Alright, then, we can show our panoramas on our own web site such as Windows Live Spaces. But wait a minute, panoramas can be far wider (or higher) than a computer screen. For example, if you stitch together half a dozen photos, each about 2000 pixels wide, you’ve got a photo that is about 10,000 pixels wide (allowing for overlap) – computer monitors aren’t that wide!

Here’s a panorama taken from the shores of Waranga Basin – it’s 11,200 pixels wide and reduced to about 600 pixels wide to fit on this web page:

So along comes a free program with plenty of free online space where you can compose and upload your panoramas so your family and friends can pan and zoom your creations. We talked about Deep Zoom Composer a few weeks ago so go back to that article if you want a quick refresh of what’s possible. To view the panorama above after being processed in Deep Zoom Composer, click this link.

Exciting as creating a panorama is, there’s something missing, namely being able to view more of the panorama above and below what’s currently in view. That is, stitching is linear – your creation is either a horizontal or vertical view.

So a completely different way of viewing our photos has just been introduced – it’s called Microsoft Photosynth which takes a collection of photos and creates a 3D view which can be zoomed and panned. As well, using your Windows Live ID, you’re given 20 gigabytes of free online space in which to store your synths so we can all view your creation. webDotWiz''s first attempt is the Rushworth Community House Multipurpose room - this synth is made up of about sixty photos. Use the Explore link on Photosythn.net to view plenty of other synths that range across all sorts of topics.

The Photosynth site has plenty of tips about how to get the best results, that is, how to get a high synth score for your collection. There's a video to watch or you can download a how-to document.

You don't need any special equipment although a tripod for your camera is a good aid. All you need do is take a series of photos that have about a fifty percent overlap. For example, synthing a room entails snapping shots from the centre of the room, followed by taking more shots along each wall and then from the four corners. Then go to the Create page at Photosynth.net, download and install the add-in (only required the first time) and your photos will be synthed into a 3D view and uploaded (this latter step requires a broadband connection obviously).

To get some ideas, view those synths that are already online at Photosynth.net, in particular those that have a high synth rating.

Rushworth Community House Multipurpose Room synthed

Whether you're viewing the art works at a famous art gallery, touring one of the world's well-known landmarks, enjoying some wedding photos or looking inside somebody's garden shed, Photosynth has brought a new way to view our photo collections.

Here are some sites to get you stared:

• Photosynth and wedding photography: blogs.msdn.com/photosynth/
• Rick's Potting Shed (Synthed): photosynth.net
• Rushworth Community House Multipurpose Room Synthed: photosynth.net
• Synthing tips - How to synth a room: blogs.msdn.com/photosynth/
• Synthing to sell - using Photosynth to help sell a house: blogs.msdn.com/photosynth/

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May the Synth be with you.

Posted using the Tech Preview of Windows Live Writer.

We're not going to get away from advertising on the web so it's something we have to live with. There are the good points, though - many valuable web services are free because the service recovers its costs through advertising.

However over the past few months many sites, large and small, have been displaying Flash-based ads (those one that appear as anmiations or movies) which, after a click, redirect visitors to a site that promotes scareware, fraudware or, at the worst, installs viruses.

In other words, for example, you're on one of your favourite sites and click an advertisement from Widget Airlines. Rather than ending up on Widget's ticket booking page, you're confronted with a dialogue box that tells you your computer is infected with 53 pieces of malware or you're asked - if you're lucky - if you want to install a computer performance-enhancing program. In the worst case scenario, malware automatically installs without your knowledge or permission.

More often than not the site owner has an agreement with an advertising company and doesn't realise until informed by people such as Sandi Hardmeier of Spyware Sucks that some of the ads on its site redirect visitors to sites carrying malicious content.

Now, please don't click on every Flash-based ad on various sites to test the above - you could easily end up with an inoperable computer system. Instead read up on Sandi's posts - you'll see plenty of example screenshots.

Until Adobe patch the Flash player so that we, the users, have more control, Flash remains the Typhoid Mary of the Internet, to use Sandi's description.

Footnote: be careful of any new Flash-based online games. Sorry to spoil the fun.

The first column, Make a good start to 2008,  is now online (as well being online here). There is the usual list of sites for you to browse.

Since the last column, advances in new technology and new Internet services have come along at the usual pace, i.e., it's hard to keep up with what's the latest. For example, how about a snazzy little digital camera memory card, the Eye-fi,  that has a Wifi connection so you can upload your photos to your Live Space directly from your camera?

On the other hand, the criminals have been busy trying - and succeeding - to rip off money from unsuspecting Internet users. For this reason, the first job for 2008 is to check that you have an antivirus program running, and most importantly, it's up to date. Download and install the free AVG antivirus program from Grisoft - it's updated almost every day, scans your computer each day and will protect you.

Your second protection, if you have a Windows XP computer, is to install Windows Defender, another free program, to protect against spyware and malware. There's no excuse for not protecting your computers against viruses and spyware.

Users of XP and Vista computers should have accounts set up for each user. Certainly on Windows XP, only one person - The Boss in Charge of The Computer - should be allowed to be an administrative users - all other users should be confined to limited accounts. This measure is to avoid the installation of malware or spyware by a careless click. Use Windows XP help and support to see how to set up accounts.

Once you know your computer is protected against the nasties, you can begin to enjoy the Internet and get on with learning some new skills. However you still need to be careful. A computer is not - repeat, not - just another home appliance. Because a computer is storing important data, somebody in the household has to take responsibility for the integrity of that data, that is, make sure music, financial records, documents, photos and videos are stored safely and securely.

One area the webDotWizards are making headway is in organising and editing their photos by using Windows Live Photo Gallery, one of the free programs in the Windows Live Suite (others being Live Messenger, Live Writer, Live Toolbar). Then using Photo Story for Windows it's possible to make your own movies to show off all your photos to family and friends online through Soapbox.

This post is also on webDotWiz Online, the first column for 2008, along with webDotWiz's selection of sites for your browsing interest.

The webDotWiz Online column for 12-Jul-2007 is now ready for you to browse through. This week's column gives you some tips and tricks on using Microsoft Photo Story to create movies from your photos.

Here's the link: www.webdotwiz.com/index-120707.htm or go to www.webdotwiz.com and follow the link from there. As always, there's a long list of sites for you to browse and see what may be of interest.

webDotWiz's online column for 28-Jun-2007 (published in Rushworth's Waranga News fortnightly volunteer newspaper) is now available.

Topics this fortnight are The Knowledge Economy and some news about Windows services except Windows Live Folders and Windows Live Photo Gallery which were announced after the column was written.

Among the sites mentioned in this week's column are:

• 25 Web Sites to Watch (Popfly is one of them): www.pcworld.com
• Everything you've always wanted to know about WiMAX: www.theage.com.au/news/business/
• Gimundo - Good News Served Daily: www.gimundo.com
• High cost of country WiMAX: australianit.news.com.au
• Live Earth Concerts 07/07/07: greengeneration.ninemsn.com.au/live-earth/
• The need for speed for grains farmer: www.news.com.au/heraldsun/

You'll find all sites on this week's sites page.

The latest webDotWiz column (for 14-Jun-2007) is now online.

The staff (well, ahem, you-know-who) hasn't put this week's site links into their respective pages but you can browse through them all on the Recent Sites Added page.

Here are a few selected sites that are in this week's list:

Full the complete list, see here.

There have been lots of updates and news about various Windows Live services in the past couple of days and webDotWiz has posted about most of them.

Here's a summary of what he's been talking about over the past one or two days:

• New version of Windows Live Writer
• Screenshots of Windows Live Mail, Windows Live Writer and Windows Live Messenger 8.5 (beta)
• Windows Live Mail now available
• Windows Live Messenger 8.5 trial version not yet ready for Australia
• Soapbox on MSN Video now open for everybody
• A Popfly gadget on Waranga Basin
• Microsoft Surface

After publishing this entry, webDotWiz is off to upload the latest update to his webDotWiz Online Column, namely for 31-May-2007. Written earlier in the week, this fortnight's column is now out-of-date in the light of the releases of Windows Live Mail, Windows Live Writer and Windows Live Messenger 8.5... oh, well.

However, webDotWiz's 31-May column talks about Microsoft Popfly more generally so it's worth a read - as always, there's a long list of sites for you to peruse and check out.