As I write these lines, a car-sized robot powered by 32 cubes of plutonium is roaming the surface of Mars, taking photos using no less than 17 cameras, vaporizing stuff with infrared laser beams, drilling into rocks, and generally having a good time. NASA's Curiosity rover is one of the space agency's most ambitious, important, and exciting scientific missions.
When Tim Berners-Lee invented the first Web browser in 1990, it was just an application made to read HTML pages passively. Fast-forward to today, and the modern Web browser has become a powerful platform in itself—almost a miniature operating system, capable of running complex JavaScript code and interacting with Flash plug-ins.
The Angry Birds franchise needs little introduction. What started as a simple physics-based game became a cultural phenomenon, replete with Angry Birds dolls, keychains, and other merchandise. Rovio has updated Angry Birds before, with the release of Angry Birds Seasons and Angry Birds Rio (a tie-in for the movie), but while those updates introduced new levels and graphics, they kept the same basic gameplay and physics. With Angry Birds Space, Rovio is trying something truly new, creating a game that feels fresh, and even addictive.
People often think of software as either commercial (including shareware), or free (including open-source offerings). But somewhere in between lies another large category of software: donationware. The creators of such programs give the software away for free, in the hope that appreciative users will donate to support the application or a cause the developer wishes to promote. In this article I cover lesser-known gems.
An online store is a complex thing; developing one from scratch can take months of hard work. Yet in the final analysis, most stores are very much alike. Shopify ($29 plus percentage per month and up, 30-day free trial) lets you create your own store with a minimum of fuss and hassle, and with lots of customizable options.
Screen real estate seems to be getting less expensive by the day. I recently bought a pair of 24-inch LCD monitors for a very affordable price, whereas a few years ago I could only dream of having such a setup. On the other end of the spectrum, more and more people are toting tiny netbooks with 10-inch displays. But no matter the size of your Windows desktop, you can get more out of it with the help of free and low-cost tools.
