Google Analytics Reporting Suite

For web site owners, measuring traffic and visitor stats are crucial tasks to managing the site and improving performance. With the Google Analytics AIR application, those who use Google's free analytics software can now view those stats without needing to log in using a web browser. This robust application allows for multiple profiles from different Analytics accounts. Within the app, all the visitors, traffic, and content reports are available, just as they are online. A tabbed interface allows you to easily switch between the various reports. Within each area, you can drilldown into the data to view things like goal values and data segmentation. The app provides animated, interactive graphs, making viewing the data just as useful, if not more so, than when you view it online. You can also quickly swich between the interactive reports to viewing them in a PDF format instead. These reports can then be saved or printed, just like any online PDF. Alternately, reports can be exported to PDF, Excel, or XML formats. Download it here.

Twhirl - A Twitter Client

Twhirl is a desktop client for the Twitter microblogging service. Most of the features available on the Twitter website are accessible through twhirl, too. Plus, a lot of usability enhancements have been added.

It goes without saying that one of the most popular AIR applications is the Twitter client, Twhirl. Although it never got a write-up by any top blogs, it seems that everyone discovered this app on their own anyway. One of the best things about Twhirl is that it can be used to connect to multiple Twitter accounts. This is very useful for those that keep a Twitter account for personal use and a separate one for a business or service that they run. The Twhirl app demonstrates how AIR apps bring the web to the desktop, as it can dock in the system tray, just like a real desktop application does. You can search Twitter users, view their timelines, and choose to follow or unfollow them as you like. You can also search the public timeline in a feature that is powered by another web service, terraminds. Twhirl automatically fetches your friends' status updates, direct messages, and replies, while color-coding different types of messages. You'll receive both visual and audible notifications of tweets, with new messages displaying in a preview pop-up. Within Twhirl, you can easily post links via the URL-shortening feature provided by snurl.com. The app is skinnable and comes with multiple color schemes built-in that you can choose from. Overall, Twhirl is one of the best Twitter clients, and one of the best AIR apps, too. Download it here.

RichFLV - Apollo FLV Editing Tool

RichFLV is an AIR app that lets you edit Flash Video (FLV) files. The app reads FLV metadata - while importing the video, the app outputs the number and types of tags found for video, sound, keyframe (Keyframe Tags), and data (DataTags). With RichFLV, you can read, edit, modify, or delete cuepoints and cut FLV files. You can also use the app as a conversion tool, and convert the FLV files to SWF (Shockwave Flash) format. The sound in the FLV can be converted to an MP3, as well. Although serving a niche audience, this popular app has already been downloaded 654 times from the AIR Marketplace. Download it here.

Google to Sell Display Ads in Web Videos

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Web search leader Google Inc. plans to start selling ads to appear in Web videos after it agreed a partnership with YuMe, an online video advertising network.

YuMe, a Redwood City, Calif.-based start-up, said on Thursday, it will serve InVideo overlay adverts as part of Google's AdSense for video beta advertising program.

Google has traditionally used AdSense for text-only advertising but said the video program extends its offer to targeted, contextually relevant video graphical ads and text overlays.

Google has been working on ways of developing advertising revenue for online video since it bought YouTube, the video-sharing site, in November 2006.

As Internet access speeds become faster around the world more television and Hollywood-produced video content is moving to the Web on sites like Hulu.com, owned by News Corp and NBC Universal, and Fancast.com, owned by Comcast Corp.

YuMe said Google is one of the third-party feeds accepted by YuMe's Adaptive Campaign Engine, which helps Web publishers in its network match each video ad impression with the best money-making ad placement in realtime.

Watch DVD in your ipod or iphone

HandBrake is an open-source, GPL-licensed, multiplatform, multithreaded DVD to MPEG-4 converter, availabel for MacOS X, Linux and Windows.

So you just bought an iPod touch or iPhone and want to stock it with movies from your DVD library. There are countless commercial utilities that promise to rip DVDs, but I recommend trying HandBrake. This open-source (read: free) utility for Windows (download), Mac (download), and Linux converts your DVDs for viewing on iPods, iPhones, Sony PSPs, and other portable media players. It's by no means new, but I just had to share my newfound appreciation for it.

Note that because most commercial DVDs are copy-protected, HandBrake can't work its magic without a decryption utility running in the background. Rumor has it that DVD43, also free (but Windows-only), works really, really well.

Your Personal Internet Assistant - PageOnce

PageOnce takes the information appropriate to each account and displays it in a Netvibes/PageFlakes-like layout. Use it to view how many cell minutes you have left, the balance of your credit card/bank account (use with caution..), updates to your social network, and much more. Link to try out the closed beta is in the story.

Despite the fact that PageOnce needs to build relationships with many of the account providers in order to retrieve information from them (not everyone has an API like Facebook after all), the company has done a good job digesting information for at-a-glance presentations from a fairly wide range of providers. The “fetch once” technology behind the site, however, only pulls information from elsewhere; it doesn’t push information back, so you can’t actually make changes to your bank account while on PageOnce; you’ll need to follow links to the bank’s website itself.

Test out by yourself..

Making it picture perfect

The photo book industry is still pretty new in the Malaysian market, and my research only turned up three companies which offer the service – Photobook (http://www.photobook.com.my/), Pixart (http://www.pixart.com.my/) and Ecaztudios (http://www.ecazstudios.com/).
These companies offer varying levels of service and size of books so you should take a look at our guide and decide which one is right for you.
Once you've decided on the one you want, you need to go to the company's website and download their free proprietary software to help you create the book.
The one exception is Ecazstudios, which does not have any software for you to download – instead the site requires that you use a program like iPhoto (if you're using a Mac) or Adobe InDesign to do the layout.
Once the layout is done, you just send in the file (either online or via snail mail) and make a payment for the book, and voila about a week later you get your book!
However, which photo book company is best? Well, it all depends on what you want.
Here's a quick look at the three companies we looked at.

Photobook.com.my
As far as variety goes, photobook.com.my has the most choices when it comes to book sizes – the company offers the small 5R (20 x 15cm) size, a 21 x 21cm book, A4 landscape, A4 portrait, 30 x 30cm large photo book and the impressive A3 (40 x 30cm) book for serious photo enthusiasts.
The company's Templatexpert Photostudio software is also the most advanced of the pre-packaged proprietary applications we've tried, allowing you to move pictures around, resize them and even spread a single picture out across two pages (if the resolution is high enough).
There are also a number of pre-made and downloadable templates to choose from and the software even allows you to add different types of borders to your photos.

he only hiccup we found was that by default, your images will be cropped to fit into the frames in the template.
However, this is easily remedied by going into the Options then the Settings screen and unchecking the "Cut pictures to size of image box automatic."
Once the layout is done, you can then click on the "Order" button to pay for the book and upload it to the manufacturer.

Pixart.com.my
Pixart.com.my has the distinction of being one of the first companies (if not the first) to offer photo books in Malaysia at pretty reasonable prices too.
Pixart offers only two sizes of photo books – either a Pocket Photo Book (6 x 8in) or an A4-size Coffee Table Photo Book.
The one advantage of the larger Coffee Table Photo Book is that it has a little cut-out on the front which shows the photo you have on your first page.
The books come in 10 or 12 sheets, which work out to 20 or 24 pages when printed on both sides.
Pixart offers two types of prints – either the more regular offset printing similar to magazine-type printing, or the slightly more expensive "photo imaging" prints which are supposed to be the same print quality as photos produced from photo labs.

Ecazstudios.com.my
You've probably seen examples of photo books from ecazstudios.com.my at some Apple stores in the Klang Valley and with good reason – this photo book company is probably the most hands-off when it comes to making your photo book.
For one thing, Ecazstudios requires you to be familiar with applications like Apple's iPhoto application or Adobe's InDesign.
Furthermore, the company currently does not accept uploading of your photo book, and you will instead have to rely on plain old snail mail.
Ecazstudios also offers two sizes of photo books – 6 x 8in version as well as the A4-size but the company is more flexible when it comes to creating your photo book you can opt to create a more unique photo book in whatever size and options that you want.