Free Download A Day

In this world nothing is certain but death and taxes.
— Benjamin Franklin

While taxes are a certainty, there's nothing that says you have to suffer while you're preparing them. "Adjusted gross" this, and "Line 27" that could lead you to lose your mind.

There are many different automated solutions out there to help you do your taxes, but many of them are still pretty complicated, and most of them require that you pay for the privilege of using them. TaxAct is a totally free solution that allows you to prepare, print, and e-file your Federal taxes. Whether you prepare your taxes online, or download the software (or order the free CD-ROM, shipping charge added) and run the tool locally, you are in control. Using a simple interview technique, this tool walks you step-by-step through preparing your Federal tax return. E-file helps you get your refund sooner. Accuracy is not a problem, either: they guarantee that your return will be 100% accurate, or they will pay the penalty for you.

State tax computation is also available, for an added fee. Available paid versions of the Federal return give you telephone support.

TaxAct is available as an online service, and should support most modern browsers for Linux, Mac, or Windows. The download is compatible with 32-bit Windows systems, from Win95 up through Vista.

Download TaxAct

Device drivers are those little bits of magical computer code that allow your system to talk to all the devices attached to it. Scanners, printers, input devices, video: if your computer can talk to them—or listen to them—there are device drivers facilitating that communication.

As systems get more complex and more and more goodies are attached, the opportunities for conflicts between different drivers, or the chances of a driver getting clobbered, increase dramatically.

With Driver Detective installed, you'll be sure that you have the latest versions of all those critical device drivers that keep your system from becoming just an expensive doorstop. Manufacturers are constantly updating their drivers, so you want to keep on top of the latest and greatest.

Driver Detective runs under Windows 2000 and later iterations of the Windows operating system. It requires version 2 of the .NET framework, and a web browser (IE, Firefox, and Opera are currently supported). While downloading this tool and running the scan are free, note that it appears that using Driver Detective to actually update your system may require registration and payment of a fee. Of course there's nothing that says you can't take the information you glean from the scan and go find those updates yourself.

Download Driver Detective

PDF Hammer is an online tool that lets you manipulate Portable Document Format (PDF) files. Rather than having to go out and buy an expensive copy of Adobe Acrobat, you can make basic modifications to your PDF docs at no cost.

Without having to create any kind of account, you simply upload the documents you're going to work with. You can reorder the pages in your PDF file, or delete individual pages, or even append one file to another. This means you can pick and choose the pages you want and put them into the order you want, and then download the resulting merged file. They promise that with coming revisions you'll eventually be able to add watermarks to pages, and more.

While you can't create a new PDF from scratch, you can take existing documents and tweak them to make them behave the way you want to.

PDF Hammer is a free online tool. It should be compatible with systems running most modern web browsers.

Download PDF Hammer

There are bunches of screensavers out there. But are any of them as cool as that Flash move you've got? What if you just built your own?

InstantStorm is a free tool that lets you take any Flash file (or other image) and make a fully-functioning screensaver out of it. Whether you just want to have the coolest screensaver in the office, share a group photo with family and friends, or even turn it into a marketing tool with a company logo or sales info included, InstantStorm can help you realize your screensaver dreams.

The New Project Wizard makes it easy for beginners to create high-quality screensavers right from the get-go. There's plenty of options to let the experienced user take it as far as they want, also.

InstantStorm is a free download for both personal and commercial use. It's compatible with all 32-bit Windows platforms.

Download InstantStorm

There's all kinds of stuff we need to keep secure. Logins, passwords, credit card info, the list goes on and on. Here's a tool that will keep things as secure as possible.

CiphSafe is an app that lets you easily save login and password pairs, or any other information that you want to keep really, really secure. You create a document that holds all your secret stuff, give it a password, and you're done. Keep all your stuff in one document, or create multiple docs, one for home, another for work, etc. There's room in each entry for a pretty good sized note, so you don't have to worry about coming back later to find some cryptic message whose meaning is now lost to you.

CiphSafe uses a 320-bit key, so it is just about as secure as you can get. This, or course, means that you should never, ever forget your passphrase, because you're not going to get into your document without it.

CiphSafe is a Mac tool. The current release requires OS X 10.4+, but there is a down-rev version still available for users running 10.2.

Download CiphSafe

The Attack Tool Kit is a framework for checking your Windows box for system vulnerabilities. By "attacking" your system yourself, you can see what the "bad guys" might see, and take appropriate countermeasures before your machine is hijacked or your data is misappropriated.

All you need to do to run a scan is to specify the host name or IP of the system you want to check, select the specific test or tests you want to run, enter any appropriate options for that test, run the check, and then analyze the results. Individual tests are specified via "plug-ins" that users can select, or even create on their own.

If an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, then Attack Tool Kit may be the heaviest thing you do today.

Attack Tool Kit is licensed under the GPL and is available as a free download for Windows users.

Download Attack Tool Kit

Does anybody really know what time it is? With Time and Date, there is no excuse for not knowing.

There's not a lot about times and dates that you can't learn from Time and Date. You can get the current time for just about anywhere in the world, or you can build a calendar for just about any location. Who knew that Australia Day was on a Saturday this year?

With a wealth of other tools, including calculators for sun and moon events (rise, set, phase), time zones, dates, and even a customizable countdown clock, you'll always be right on time.

Date and Time is a free online service that should be available to anyone with an Internet connection and a current-generation web browser.

Download Time and Date

Are you responsible for the care and feeding of a large website or an online application? Given the speed with which everything on the Web changes, it can be a constant headache to plan, implement, and then test changes and updates to your site. We've found a tool that may help you to at least get through the testing phase easier.

Watir (pronounced like water) is a Ruby library that helps to build test suites for your online applications. Watir (Web App Testing in Ruby) is designed to interact with browsers the same ways that human users do: click on buttons, fill-in forms, follow links, and all the other types of interactions that you need to use to really test the stability and performance of your complex online apps.

Not a keystroke recorder, Watir allows you to really get in there and test the logic and results from working through your complex site or complicated online app. You're programming in Ruby here, so it's going to be helpful if you have experience in the language, or at least a couple of good references to work with.

Watir is available for Windows and Internet Explorer. There are also ports for Firefox (on Windows, Mac, Linux) and Safari running under OS X.

Download Watir

Where does all the time go? You know you've been busy, but how much time did you spend on this project or with that client? If you're billing hourly, it's vital that you keep track of who and what is getting your attention. Even if not, you need to stay on top of things to make sure you're being as productive as you can be.

PC Fare Meter is kind of like a taxi meter, but without the stinky upholstery. It keeps track of where you spend your time by watching your activities on your machine. Typing away on a Word doc? It knows how long you've been there. Working on a spreadsheet? Same deal. Basically, as long as you tap your keyboard or move your mouse every 30 seconds, or at some other customized interval, it'll keep logging where you're focusing your attention. By grabbing both the application name and the window name, you can be working on multiple projects at once, while keeping separate totals for the time spent—great for when you're jumping back and forth between projects.

PC Fare Meter is a Windows app and requires NT/Win2k. It also requires version 2 of the .NET framework.

Download PC Fare Meter