AUDACITY
If your job needs audio editing and you are looking for the right tool that will not only suffice your needs but also suit your pocket, then your search ends right here, right now! Today I will discuss about Audacity, the digital audio editor. Well, if you are still not sure about if it fits your bill then let me tell you that it is free. Yes you have read it right it is free as it is an open source program.
This cross platform digital audio editor is available for Windows, Linux, MAC OS X and BSD. It has a clean interface that keeps the toolbar and work space uncluttered and makes it easy to use. It supports 32 bit floating point audio and has excellent features and built-in effects including noise removal, bass boost. It can import and export all file formats that are supported by libsndfile library like WAV, AIFF, MP3 etc. Though for MP3 files you need to download the LAME encoder. Audio files can be easily edited by its Cut, Copy, Paste functionality. Another interesting feature is that you can perform unlimited “Undo” operations while editing an audio file. Audacity also allows you to change an audio’s pitch without changing it’s speed. Likewise it’s ‘tempo’ functionality allows you to make adjustments to the speed of an audio track while keeping the pitch same and in turn helps you to synchronize the audio with the video. It has multi track mixing features with a large array of digital effects and plug-ins. With audacity you can also convert cassette tapes or records to digital tracks as it has the ability to automatically split one wav track or other supported type tracks into multiple tracks. Its latest release includes features that support direct sound device for Windows.
Content Management System
The current explosion in eCommerce has highlighted the advantages of and excellent Content Management System (CMS) like Sitecore.
For businesses that consider their website and their customers who contact them online to be an integral part of their business, using a content management system is only logical. It will allow those businesses to provide a seamless, high quality online experience that open source or low-end solutions simply can't provide.
For many of our customers, their website is a strategic part of their business. The added security and performance features of a CMS allow these businesses to focus the website and the usability features that make the customer experience truly superior.
By giving developers and content providers a simple to use and intuitive system, a CMS allows the marketing department or the sales department to create website content and design elements of the site. These professionals understand the customers and their needs better than developers or IT departments. With a CMS, the control goes to the people with the ideas, not only to the people with the programming expertise
Small Businesses and the Economic Crisis
The current economic crisis can be a frightening time for any business, but is particularly stressful for small businesses. There is a great deal of uncertainty and many questions – can we attract any new customers? Is anyone going to be able to afford my product? Will our business survive?
Just remember that every other business and individual is also feeling the pinch. They want to find the right items to fill their needs without wasting money or time on irrelevant or non-vital products or services.
GNU IMAGE MANIPULATION PROGRAM (GIMP )
At a time when the global economy is going through a recession, using an open source program can be like a “bridge over troubled waters” over licensed software. This effectively will bring down the expenses of you or your company. I won’t say that each every software we use has an equally effective open source program but yes, it is true in case of Adobe Photoshop. The GNU Image Manipulation Program or more popularly known as the GIMP can be the open source alternative to Adobe Photoshop.
Sitecore Keeps Ahead of Web Trends
One of the many reasons we choose to partner with Sitecore for our content management system is that they keep ahead of business trends, and are ready for the future.
Sitecore recently identified the three key web content management trends for 2009 – do any of these sound like goals for your company this year? If so, let us help you implement them using the seamless integration tools Sitecore provides.
The first trend is the growth of ecommerce elements. Companies want to integrate more and more ecommerce tools into their websites. One of the most popular tools for businesses to implement is InSite Commerce, a program that integrates ecommerce solutions. It allows a business to manage multiple websites and allows a great deal of flexibility for customers.
The other top ecommerce solution used by businesses is Microsoft Commerce Server, which offers intuitive tools for integrating ecommerce solutions including an out of the box shopping solution.
Piwik as your web analytics software!
I know, you would probably argue with me on Google Analytics being the best of them all, but what’s the harm in knowing about this new web analytics tool on the block? Piwik, as its website claims, is an open source alternative to Google Analytics.
Piwik is a PHP-MySql based program. In order to get started, you have to first download this software from their website and get it installed on your own web server. It just takes as less as 5 minutes to set things up and get going. At the end of the set up process, the software generates a javascript code. You just need to copy and paste this code onto the web pages that you would want to track. There is also a plugin that would automate this process for you! Simple?
Okay, you would still probably argue that Google analytics is the most popular amongst all and that Piwik is just no big deal. However, let me mention here that alternative open source web analytics solutions have their own advantages:
Required Sitecore Improvements
Here are a few things Sitecore can improve on:
Sitecore Admin needs to load faster
Need an easier way to assign renderings to place holders
Need an easier way to Assign roles & users to folders and content items
Right now it is a pain to get it setup on Windows 2008 with SQL Server 2008, it would be ...
