ABBYY Software’s PDF Transformer Pro Version 2. As a purchaser of ABBYY’s original PDF Transformer, I was impressed by the software’s ability to convert PDF files to Word, Excel, HTML or Text formats quickly and accurately.

The company’s latest release, Version 2.0, now offers a couple of highly desirable new features, which have been much desired by users like myself for sometime now. Version 2.0 now offers the ability to create searchable PDF files. PDFs can be created from within a Word document; the ABBYY software adds a toolbar to word, and with one touch on the “Create PDF” button. In addition, PDFs can be created from within most other windows applications, by using the “Print File” function. This latest version of the PDF Transformer software also improves on its already impressive capabilities in converting PDFs to Word, Excel, or other format types. In general, PDFs containing primarily text are converted to Word quite accurately, with accurate preservation of the text formatting, and PDF documents columns of numbers are generally preserved well. The program runs into greater difficulty in transforming mixed text / number documents into the Excel format, particularly in preserving the format of the original document. However, quite often users are trying to convert financial documents, e.g., quarterly reports or budget documents, into a format, e.g., Excel, simply for the purpose of extracting the number data for use in analysis, while avoiding the need for typing in the data by hand, and format retention in this situation is not the primary concern. And, overall, the software does an excellent job of converting to Excel formats. Other new functionally in PDF Transformer 2.0 includes the ability to convert standard, scanned PDFs to searchable PDFs, which very useful for users looking for particular words / phrases in the document, but not desiring to convert to Word, with potential effects on appearance or formatting that it might entail. Always an outstanding value, with the additional functionality included in Version 2.0, PDF Transformer is now an exceptional buy, and a “must have” for most office and home computer users’ desktops!

Working in architecture, graphic design and photography, I use a lot of graphic packages, and unfortunately most are very very expensive. So it’s a real pleasure to have found the Corel Draw X3 Suite, a very reasonably priced product for the things it does, for a series of reasons.

First of all, it does the same things more popular industry-standard software do, but better. And it comes as a complete suite including two main programs and many additional utilities. Corel Draw is a truly vectorial software, which means you can do a lot of editing and still obtain high quality final graphics, without losing quality in transformations. Corel Photo Paint is a powerful retouching tool. A large number of filters are included, meaning that you will be able to open and save to all common graphic formats – and a lot of uncommon formats too. Let’s add that this piece of software works well even on reasonably basic computers, without requiring dedicated graphic workstations. And it’s easy enough to use for beginners and powerful enough for more advanced users.

Turbo Notes+ is a very simple tool that allows you to save and send notes much like the yellow sticky notes that have become a cultural icon.

Turbo Notes+ allows you to create a note then either save to your desktop for future reference or to send to a colleague within an interoffice network. The software notes the users/senders name at the top as to identify the source and the ability to send notes back and is very useful. Other customizable features such as changing the fonts, background and text colors, and sizes of the notes are useful but can leave room for getting carried away. Turbo Notes+ is a very practical utility and works well is most any environment.

Like many others I have always thought it would be fun to make a computer game. Up until now, I never have. That all changed when I stumbled upon a program called ‘game maker’ (http://www.gamemaker.nl/).

Within a few hours after downloading the program I was playing my first computer game – and yes, I made it all by myself! Immediately I realized that I could make my own shareware game (using game maker of course) and sell it on the internet. So I did! (See for yourself – check it out at http://www.brilliantowl.com/MathFlashCards.html) Two months later, having sold 9 copies of my game, I made $60! I admit, I could use a little polishing on my game making skills – but its not a bad start. Game Maker is a decent piece of software. Written by a university professor who actually teaches the art of game making brings some assurance that it was built right. The registration fee was only $20 (when I purchased it) – well worth the money. Game Maker isn’t all that hard to use either. My 10 year old has even played with it. Check it out for yourself!

Meebo is a website that allows AIM, MSN Messenger, Yahoo! Messenger, ICQ, GoogleTalk, or Jabber users to use their services to chat.

The user does not have to load any software on their machine, and the service can be accessed from anywhere on the internet. Recently, Meebo added the ability to create Meebo accounts, which allow advanced functionality like automatic sign-in to multiple accounts and chat log tracking.

After working with Photoshop for years, I found an old version of Corel Painter packed as a “freebie” with something I bought. I have long forgotten the “something”. However, I was so amazed by what Corel could do, even that old small version, that I bit the bullet and purchased the latest 9.5 version of Painter.

As an artist, I was able to create satisfying work immediately, but it took only minutes to feel comfortable with this fast moving program. Comparing it to Photoshop, it is quite intuitive to work with, makes sense, operates pretty much the same, in terms of sizing your work and color gradients. Both can utilize the Pantone Color System. There are many similarities, but Photoshop does not have a true artists’ mixing palette, nor a way to save favored color sets for future use. I can paint and do paint every day with Painter. Not an option for me with Photoshop as it is simply too painstaking. You can download a 30 day trial at Corel