How's it going guys? ThioJoe here
And today, I'm going to go over some really cool free programs that I think you guys will find useful
And hopefully you haven't heard of too many of these
I'm sure some of them you have
Now these are also for Windows but they may also be available for Mac
Sorry Mac users, I'm a Windows user
So let's jump right in, hopefully you find these pretty cool.
The first program is called "HashTab"
It's a very simple program, but also very useful
Now to understand what it does is
--Have you ever gone to a website and you go to download a file or something
and it says: "Check the hash before running the file"
Basically what a hash is
Is when you use a certain algorithm
to run on the file, and it generates a string
of numbers and letters
And every time you use that algorithm on that file
It will create the exact same string of numbers
So that means if you download a file
And you check the hash--string
Against what they put, you know it is the exact same file that they are saying you should be downloading
That can be important for two reasons
First of all to make sure the file is not corrupted
And second of all, to make sure no one malicious went and uploaded the wrong file and it's got a virus or something like that.
It's a way of making sure you're downloading exactly what you think
So what this program does is makes it really easy to check hashes
I know for me I would always see the hash thing and not even know how to check it--it'd be too much of a pain
But what this program does is when you install it
Now every time you right-click a file and go to "Properties"
There is a new tab
That shows you all sorts of different hashes
that a website might be using
you can actually select
which hashes you want to show up
It also has a "comparison box" so you can just paste the string right in there and it will tell you whether it's correct or not.
So, the next time you go to download a file and it has a hash listed
It's very easy to say: "Yep, yep, this is exactly what I'm looking for" and you're good to go
The next program is good for people like me who have a tough time staying on task
It's called "RescueTime"--this is actually a pretty popular program
You guys may have already heard of it
Basically it lets you keep track of what websites you're going on
what programs you're using
And which of these are distracting and which are productive
So you can keep tabs on how much time you're wasting
Or how productive you're being
It's also nice because it can notify you when you're spending to much time on this or that
And you can keep track of where you're wasting most of your time
And address it
For this one there are two versions
The free and the paid version
The free version basically lets you track all of your data and stuff like that
Where the paid version actually allows you to block websites that you've determined are distracting
So it gives you a little more control
That's just something to be aware of
The next program is called "Sandboxie"
And it's a very useful security program
For when you have to deal with suspicious files or anything like that
Like the name suggests, it lets you run files in an isolated "sandbox"
Which basically means it can't access the rest of the system
So say you download a file from a suspicious source
And you aren't really sure if it's a virus or not
Then you can run it in a sandbox
And even if it is a virus, it won't be able to access any other files on the computer
Because it's contained in that sandbox
It's pretty similar if you're familiar with "Virtual Machines" except a little more convenient
You basically have to right-click the file and click "Run Sandboxed"
And you're good to go
It's definitely nice to have for when you come across a suspicious file
And you don't want to rely on your antivirus, which [those] aren't always perfect
Though, keep in mind, if you are going to use this, it's best used for individual files
If you go to install a program with it
I guess it would work, but then that whole program would be isolated
So you would really be able to run it except in the sandbox
It wouldn't be very useful
It mostly used for individual files, or groups of files that you aren't sure of being a virus or something like that
Now, another program related to that topic--which I didn't even include in the Top 5--this is like a bonus--is called "VirusTotal Uploader"
If you haven't heard of VirusTotal before, you definitely want to pay attention
This is a great website--I think, actually, Google bought it
If I'm not mistaken
It's basically a website where you can upload a file, and it automatically scans that
With about 50 different antiviruses
And I use that website for basically any file I download that I'm kinda suspicious of
And also, use it of course, with Sandboxie
Now, what the VirusTotal Uploader program does
is, instead of having to go to the website, and click "upload" and that sort of thing
you just right-click on any file through a context menu after you install it
And you can upload it right from your computer
instantly, basically
And it check the file with all sorts of different antiviruses
And most of the time, if someone has already uploaded that same exact file
Then you don't have to wait for it to scan, it will just tell you the results
It does that by first taking a hash of the file--remember, we just talked about those?
And if it's the same exact hash, they know: "Oh, we already scanned this file, here's the hash, here are the results"
Then, after it's uploaded you just look down the list and see if any flagged it as a virus
Now, you do want to use common sense, sometimes you might see one or two flagged it as a virus from some random antivirus software you've never heard of
So, it might be a false positive, just keep that in mind and use common sense if pretty much everything says it's fine
but one says it's a virus
Still be cautious
But also know that it might be a false positive
Alright, moving on, program number four is "Plex"
This is an awesome program I love to use
It's great for people who have a lot of videos, movies, TV shows on their computer
What the software will do is import all of your video files into a library and it will scan them and automatically catagorize them
by show, movie, it will automatically gather descriptions, classify it and name the episodes
And make it very organized
But more importantly, after you do that, it lets you stream all of those files
From your computer to any device and watch it on your TV
I think basically all the game consoles these days
have a Plex app that you can at least download if it's not natively supported
I know Xbox One S does
I actually have an LG TV that has a Plex app that you can download right from their store, it's a native app.
And it's really cool, I can stream all of my stuff
Right from my computer without having to download any of stuff onto my TV at all
So if all of your devices do have a Plex app, then it all just ties together
really easily
It does a take a little bit of work to set up , you sometimes might have to rename some files manually
If they're not organized
Into folders and stuff like that, like you might have to put a TV show
in different folders by season manually
But, once you have it all set up, and you have your organization scheme ready to go and you know how it all works
It will import it basically instantly
Very easy to use
Now, finally is a program I use basically every day that is "Notepad++"
Which is basically in infinitely better replacement of Windows Notepad
And this is something I--for example--use when I go write up video outlines and that sort of thing
And it might look simple, but it has some very good features
Much better than the typical bare bones Notepad
For example, it lets you do programming
So, it'll be like an IDE, where it will, actually, highlight syntax, and that sort of thing
And tell you if there's incorrect syntax, if you import some code
it will highlight it all nice, [and] make it very easy to read
But, of course, it's also got a lot of other nifty features
For example being able to search several different files at once for specific text
You can say: "Find all of the files in this folder that mention: whatever"
And you can also have multiple tabs
open for different text documents
which you can't do with Notepad
It also maintains unsaved documents
If you close it, so if you're typing up a bunch of stuff, you didn't save it, and you go to close it,
and you open it back up, it will all still be there
Plus, it's got the ability to install plugins
So if there's a feature it doesn't have regularly, there's probably a plugin you can install to get it
So this program is great for when you just want a simple text editor
Where MS [Microsoft] Word would be overkill
but you still want some pretty good features.
And, that's it, those are five really cool programs that I think you guys will enjoy
Hopefully you didn't hear of all of them already, and you found at least one or two that where new to you
So you guys can let me know down in the comments section what you thought
If you've got some other cool programs you want to recommend, let us know down there
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