PDFVue is a new tool for both viewing and annotating PDF files. Similar to services like PDFMeNot and PDFHammer, PDFVue can open up PDF files right in your browser, forgoing the need to use desktop software. Better yet, if you've got the service's new browser extension installed, it can be set to automatically open up any PDF link you come across while browsing. This is not the fastest process since it first has to download and render the file, but if you've ever experienced hang-ups with Adobe's Acrobat Reader it's a nice step up.
So why use this service other than for speed? One good reason is the annotation tools. It includes all the usual goodies that let you fill in forms and highlight text. It also lets you upload images to stick into the PDF, making it a lightweight desktop publishing tool, since when you're done you can save it as a separate PDF file.
One thing users may not enjoy about PDFVue is that it doesn't take advantage of your screen real estate very well. Documents are kept to the very middle of the page and cannot be expanded to take up the whole screen. If you're on a desktop computer with a nice big screen, this isn't a problem. But when using it on a laptop, I found myself having to zoom into a level that required quite a bit of scrolling to navigate around the document. This can be somewhat remedied by minimizing the tools window on the right side of the page.
Related: Preview PDFs in your browser without downloading them
PDFVue's PDF editor and viewer is full of tools to that let you mark up PDFs.
(Credit: CNET Networks)Ajax DocumentViewer has released a browser helper tool that allows users to view any document in the app's quick preview option. Whenever users find a PDF or Microsoft file type in their browser, they can highlight the link and view it in the Ajax DocumentViewer without downloading it. The free tool is available now and doesn't require any registration.
Acquia, a company that provides open-source software for the Drupal content management system, announced the public beta release of its search tool Wednesday. Those who want to use it can download it from Acquia's site and install it as a module on any Drupal 6 site. According to the company, the search will provide navigation, content recommendations, and configurable results weighting. It's built on a redundant hosted service infrastructure, requiring no servers to deploy or manage. The public beta is free and available now with an Acquia Network subscription.
In other Acquia news, the company also announced that its board has appointed Tom Erickson as chief executive officer. Erickson is a founding board director and has served as chairman of the company since October. Prior to his work with Acquia, he was the CEO of Systinet, a company that was acquired in 2006 for its online service technology. Jay Batson, the former CEO of Acquia, will continue in an executive management role at the company.
Zynga, a social-gaming company that develops mobile apps, announced Wednesday that it has launched Scramble Live for the iPhone and iPod Touch. The company, which also provides the same game for Facebook, will allow iPhone users to play with Facebook users and other players who have the app installed on their devices. Scramble Live is available now for $4.99.
Conveneer, a mobile platform developer, announced Wednesday that it has raised $4.5 million in a round of funding that was led by Industrifonden. According to the company's executives, they plan to put the capital to use on a new mobile platform, which aims at making data on mobile phones accessible on the Web.
TiltViewer turns your photos into a visually engaging experience.
(Credit: CNET Networks)Got a photo gallery you want to spice up? Check out TiltViewer. Like CoolIris' PicLens, it takes your photos and places them on a dynamic 3D wall that can be zoomed around with your mouse. Clicking any thumbnail will scale it up as big as your browser window is, and you can flip any shot to view the metadata--complete with customizable links that go towards that photo's sale page, or to download links.
The big difference between the PicLens and TiltViewer is that the latter doesn't require the viewer to have any sort of browser plug-in installed to see your shots, although setting it up on your page requires installing a small bit of code and linking it up with files you have hosted elsewhere.
To demonstrate the technology, there's a test page with the entire "explore" section of Flickr set up here. The tool is completely free, although leaves a small watermark on all your shots. A slightly more configurable pro version that's watermark-free runs at $45. Airtight Interactive, the makers of TiltViewer, also make a handful of other neat, or otherwise visually engaging Flash tools. You can check out the entire gallery of them here.
[via DownloadSquad]
Remember ListPic, the service that used to scrape Craigslist for photos in listings and present them in a wonderfully simple visual browser? Well it's still around, albeit with listings from Oodle instead of Craigslist proper. If you're still jonesing for that visual Craigslist experience, there's a Firefox extension aptly named Craigslist image preview that you're going to enjoy. It will automatically pull up photo thumbnails from each posting and put them into the search results so you can eyeball each item before spending the extra click to see the photos.
This works for everything, not just real estate or items for sale, which actually makes exploring some of Craigslist's darkest depths quite a bit of fun. As Simon over at DownloadSquad notes, a similar tool like this is actually a part of Craigslist already, but only for the bikes listings. We've been expecting Craigslist to roll out its own enhanced visual viewer since the cryptic comment by creator Craig Newark about a visual viewer during the ListPic takedown last June. Until then you'll have to settle for this.
[Via DownloadSquad]
Instead of just links, the image viewer extension automatically adds tiny thumbnails to search results, making it more visually engaging.
(Credit: CNET Networks)
Gone are the days of needing software to open up e-mail attachments. Between Gmail and a handful of online office tools, the reliance on Microsoft Office isn't nearly as much of a stranglehold as it was in the 90s. This morning Zoho is expanding its format-free nature with a new tool called Viewer that will open up 15 different types of common file formats from Microsoft, Open Office, Open Document, and others such as PDFs, CSVs, and HTML files. There's also a form to submit file types you want supported in future updates.
Once uploaded, files show up in a simple viewer that loads quickly. Along the top is a list of options to share the file with others (via a URL), embed it on a blog or Web site, print, export, or--the killer app--edit. Clicking the edit button will shoot the document over to one of Zoho's comparable applications. For instance, if you attempt to edit an Microsoft Word document, it will open up in Zoho Writer. Likewise, if you open up a spreadsheet file, it will open up in Zoho Sheet. I didn't manage to get this functionality to work with PowerPoint documents, but you can still import these files manually into Zoho's presentation application as a workaround.
Zoho Viewer lets you upload files one at a time or in bulk. The only snag is a 5MB limit per file, so if you've got a big PDF floating around, you're out of luck.
Zoho Viewer's functionality is a lot like Scribd, which has been doing quite well. The main thing Scribd has that Zoho's viewer doesn't is a sense of community. The feeling of discovery and exploration is lost without some sort of hub for other people's shared documents. As it stands, this is a great tool for people who don't want to install software to view some of the more "off-brand" file types.
I've embedded below an example of the Zoho Viewer in action, with a PDF of the manual for the iPhone Bluetooth headset.
Idio is an online music magazine that launched late last year. Idio looks and feels like a paper magazine, with turning pages and some pretty slick-looking layouts. What's neat is that Idio isn't just made up of text and photos, there are also music and video clips embedded right into the pages. Users get content fed to them by an algorithm that selects articles or clips (it thinks) you might be interested in based on your favorite bands. Content comes from all over, either from blogs or music news feeds.
To drill down into your musical tastes a little further, you can go into each genre and pick out which styles you like. Each subgenre is given a tag, and you can click on it to change how much impact it has on your feeds. Idio will then sort through the content to tailor it to your new choices.
Idio has built in some social democracy functionality to the interface. You can dig deeper into an article, either by giving it a thumbs up or down (as with StumbleUpon) or by using a simple slider with a heart to show how much relevance it has to your musical tastes. You can also comment on a story, although you're likely to get a richer commenting experience by visiting the blog or the site where the story originated.
Idio is very pretty, but I found it recycled some of the same content after using it for a few days. I can't recommend it for breaking music news and long, in-depth content, because you're not going to get it. What's more interesting is the platform and design, which reminds me of the HyperComics viewer I looked at in January. It's a fun throwback to the visceral feel of reading a magazine, which admittedly feels a little awkward in a Web browser but is still full of possibilities for rich media viewing, given the right content.
The layout of an Idio magazine is two pages at a time. To flip to the next page, either click on the page icons at the bottom of the screen, or click on the corner of a page you're looking at.
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