Category: Useful Applications & Tips

Hexlock: A free All-in-One App locker for Android by liquidum

It seems that the prevalence of technology has held on to the entire world of mankind. Undoubtedly it is creditable for the globalisation where the majority of people count on modern technology. For instance, the mobile phone has become the necessity of not an only amateur to renowned businessman but also the habitual need of all the people who use mobile gadgets to store valuable assets like bank info, private messages, videos, photos etc. Indeed, the misuse of our private information can afflict our career and personal life following this, we ought to adopt safety majors to inflict unwanted trouble and certainly there are lots of app lockers available on the play store as well as lock option given by the android. While sometimes we may have to hand over our device to someone by unlocking it thereby we must pick and choose the an : appropriate app to secure our sensitive catalogue. Here I’m referring to HEXLOCK a free app locker which has unique features that dramatically protects your privacy by setting a pin. Pattern or fingerprint.

Of course, Hexlock is a 100% free app locker that secures app with a password to prevent unauthorised access. Users can create up to six unique profiles to cover every situation each with a different colour and logo. These at Work, Home, Cafe, Party, Parental, and School and activate them automatically when connected to a known Wi-Fi. Additionally, you can customise your profile name as suitable to you as well as their colour combination and icon and you may set different apps to be locked under that profile. It also comprises a new feature called Media Vault that lets users protect their photos and videos in a locked private file.

Obviously, it may be annoying to keep a password on your phone every time when you unlock it. However, Hexlock manages to ease this problem by setting up fascinating features of locking individual app. In fact, we all have different scenarios in our life where we want certain apps to be accessible or not accessible for instance when you have to give your phone to kids or young relatives you won’t have to worry about important folders being deleted or buying games without your knowledge and cherry on top the app cannot be uninstalled by other if someone steals your phone. Fairly, it falls in with the protection of social network, for example, you can lend your device to anyone without being worried that they will check your facebook, WhatsApp etc.

Admittedly, another remarkable speciality of this app locker includes Self-active hallmark which automatically activates when connected to the selected network. Besides, the profile automatically deactivates when using a different browser or while switching off to wifi network from mobile data and vice versa. On the other hand, the persistent notification to unlock not only every app but also while reading something for a longer time may really be irritating to some people.

Overall, Hexlock stands out impressive due to its peculiar features of individual app locking system which are certainly applicable for all android users to keep up their privacy. Indeed, it is a surplus of beautiful design, customizable profiles with the possibility of locking app by pin, pattern or fingerprint.

Download Hexlock for Android

July 2, 2016
RocketVPN: A free Android & iOS exclusive VPN app by liquidum

VPN and other internet anonymity tools have become a norm after witnessing the activists and social benefactors, highlighting the government/private organisations responsible for breaching the user privacy. Edward Snowden and Wikileaks Top Secret documents made it clear that privacy is just a hoax as it was brought to the spotlight that our own government is monitoring online user activity and phone calls. Using VPN or similar tools to encrypt our important data while accessing the internet on the public network has become a necessity. Well, this article is not about how we ended up like this, but to discuss one such anonymity tool called RocketVPN.

See Also: Access any blocked website with Free Google Chrome extensions

Rocket VPN is a free app (in-app purchase required for unlimited data) for Android that encrypts your data, unblocks geographically restricted content and keeps you anonymous for a safer, better browsing experience. RocketVPN is particularly designed to encrypt Android and iOS smartphone’s network, which is a good thing and a tradeoff for some. It is nice to have an app specially designed for major smartphone platform as it will integrate with it flawlessly, however, for power users who prefer “One plan for all” would be disappointed.

RocketVPN is an application developed by renowned developer liquidum, dedicated to designing, developing and marketing innovative utility apps for the mobile market, including The Cleaner, Rocket VPN, Hemlock and Battery Time for Android and Presto! and Fast for iOS. Liquidum’s apps are distributed through the Google Play Store and Apple App Store and have been downloaded over 30 million times.

See Also: Hidester Proxy Site offers best Fast, Free & Premium Proxy list Service

RocketVPN like any other VPN is capable of securing the network from intruders and data snooping while lifting the restriction imposed by the ISP (Internet Service Provider) or websites. The popularity of the app can be determined by the fact that it has already been downloaded up to 5 Million times on Google Play Store.

The two main features of a VPN that make it a powerful tool of privacy: Firstly, Your data is encrypted, meaning that you can browse the Internet over unsecured Wi-Fi networks (like at Starbucks) without worrying, or you can rest assured that your ISP isn’t spying on your Web activities.

Secondly, you can bypass geo-restrictions. Americans can access the UK-only BBC iPlayer, Indians can access US-only services like Netflix, and so on. Not only can your location not be tracked, but the contents of your data can’t be either. This will really help you browse the Web anonymously.

During our test, we noticed some drop in overall speed but it is evitable for any VPN network depending on the location of the server you choose.

The minimalistic material UI and interactive environment do the trick while still holding some pleasant animations. However, it does not offer unlimited free data usage. You’ll have to buy the subscription starting at $2.99/month or $29.99/year if you are expecting to exceed 500MB monthly data limit.

Download RocketVPN for Android

Download RocketVPN for iOS

June 24, 2016
How to batch rename multiple files or folders to add suffix/prefix

Ever tried to batch rename multiple files or folders on your computer? Well, editing just a few of them won’t necessarily flip your anger switch, but when there are hundreds or thousands of files to be renamed, it got to be a little inconvenient.

Recently, while working with my new Free image hosting website, I ran into some problems. Apparently, I decided to use Amazon S3 as my underlying storage solution to scale the platform in order to serve the anticipated surge in service demand. To achieve this, I had to rename more than 9,000 files, which includes the full-size image, thumbnail and resized pictures. This particular migration required me to add a ‘suffix’ to each and every image before uploading them to Amazon S3. I was certain that I could edit all of these files manually, one-by-one. However, after going through the first few hundred images in 30 minutes it became clear to me that it is not going to be an easy task. So, I started calculating and concluded that to rename all those 9,000 images, it would require 40 hours of continuous editing. Can you believe that?

TL;DR: I needed something to edit and add suffix to more than 9,000 files.

Hunt for the solution

I have a separate droplet (VPS instance) for my image hosting website, which gives me the flexibility to provide better service to the users as it often gets too crowded at times. First, I thought I would do it on my server itself using the command line, as my main VPS server provided by digitalocean runs latest Ubuntu distro. Linux is a very powerful Operating system, and one can achieve anything, given it falls right into its programming capabilities. However, doing so would totally kill the motive of writing this article. If publishing this article means helping many others who are struggling to find the solution to the same problem, then why give up?

First, I tried to find out if Windows Operating system natively supports this feature. I am well aware that you can rename multiple files at once with desired suffix and incremental numbering by simply selecting all the files to be renamed and pressing F2 key on the keyboard, but it is nowhere near what we actually want to achieve here. That leaves us with the tedious command prompt or the new WindowsShell to execute some command based instructions. However, I won’t touch this segment in this article as it will be a little overkill for this simple task.

That brings me to the next phase of ‘solution hunt’ – The search for a dedicated third party software/application. A simple google query leads me to multiple websites which claimed to provide the solution. However, when tested individually, I concluded there are two simple yet powerful tools which are capable of achieving just what we want. The best thing is that they’re all free.

The Solution: Batch Rename Multiple Files or Folders

The solution I found is still an overkill for what we wanted to achieve, but they’re a complete solution to anything that requires batch renaming of files on windows. In fact, they’re so powerful that even an old school command line junky would say goodbye to all those nifty codes.

Bulk Rename Utility

Bulk Rename Utility immediately became one of my favorite tools as it helped me rename all my 9,000 files with the click of a button.

All I had to do it select the folder where my files were located, put the keyword I wanted to add to all the files in the “Suffix” box.

There is a huge list of options that make it one of the most powerful file renaming tool atm. You can rename multiple files quickly in any manner you want, rename photos (even the exif meta data), rename mp3 files, change file creation and modification time stamps and so on.

Download BulkRenameUtility

Advanced Renamer

Advanced Renamer is a free program for renaming multiple files and folders at once. By configuring renaming methods the names can be manipulated in various ways. You can setup advanced batch job using this powerful tool in minutes. There are 14 different methods that enable you to change the names, attributes, and timestamps of files in one go.

Advanced Renamer is pretty much same as the tool mentioned above, but I personally felt it was little less newbie friendly. However, there is nothing it can’t achieve that you can do on BulkRenameUtility.

Download Advanced Renamer

April 10, 2016
Transform your old PC into an Android Smartphone with Remix OS

If you’re looking for a way to drag your old vintage PC to 2016 then you’re in luck. Remember Jide’s Remix OS that was announced at CES this year? Well, the developer’s at Jide has just launched the 32-bit version of Remix OS, an addition to the 64-bit OS released earlier. Usually, the older systems have very low CPU power and Ram, restricting them to run any heavy applications or latest OS, including any version of Linux distros. The 32-bit Remix OS has been purposely built to breathe new life into these aging systems.

The fully features multi-window Android OS has every basic feature one would need to perform productive work, or even play some high-end games. Everything works perfectly well with a very neat and beautiful design, resembling the latest Windows 10 OS. The start button is located at the left corner of the taskbar which is situated at the bottom of the screen. Overall, the Remix OS gives a very clean experience while adding some very powerful features to Android OS.

The good thing about Jide’s approach is that the OS can be integrated into the system while still supporting all the Core Android features. That means access to the Google Play Store is inevitable, but with apps that can be resized, moved around, and flipped from one to another, in the same way, you might in Windows or Mac OS X.

Installation is a breeze. You simply need to download the setup file, run the program to write the OS to USB, making it easily bootable from BIOS. From there you can install it on your computer, just like you’d install any other OS.

Once installed you can treat your computer as a fully functional Android smartphone with amazing features that Remix OS has baked on top of the Android core.

February 1, 2016
Access any blocked website with Free Google Chrome extensions

Netizens have a handful of options to protect their Privacy over the internet, and security experts also recommend practicing the standard protocols to prevent identity theft and security breach. Many of us are ready to implement these security layers to our system, but the main issue is that they are not always free or affordable.

A secure router like ‘bitdefender box‘ can provide highly secured communication line to all the wireless devices that are connected to it, but currently it is only available in US and costs $199. There are premium VPN services that can provide similar protection over multiple devices, such as hideipVPN, CactusVPN, VPN4ALL, VyprVPN etc. Then there are DNS services like Unotelly, which are capable of lifting the restriction from geo-blocked websites. We also covered the basics of wireless security earlier, which gives you a good idea how to protect yourself from the interception of wireless traffic.

All of these options are highly recommended and secure way to access the internet, but if you’re like me who just wants to access the geo-blocked websites while keeping the identity private, these “Free” Google Chrome extensions will get you going.

The recent melodramatic event in India, where the government took a major decision to block more than 800 porn websites in the country sparked outrage. Free porn websites, including Pornhub.com, xvideos.com, playboy.com and xxx.com are blocked by ISPs in India and many other countries. These restriction imposed by the Indian government was ordered to be lifted, ruling out the previous decision, but ISPs choose not to unblock these websites to this date.

One should always keep a handy note of these free Chrome VPN tools to bypass the restriction on content accessibility.

Here are some Free Google Chrome VPN extensions to unblock almost any website:

ZenMate

This is probably the best free VPN service, that provides unlimited usage without any logical limitations. Of course you are limited to the number of server locations you can use, which includes US, Romania, Germany and HongKong. We tested Zenmate to unblock some website which are currently being blocked by my ISP, and it perfectly lifted restrictions. We were actually amazed because we could stream videos and other heavy contents over this secure network, like there was nothing in between, throttling the speed.

When we tested Zenmate for DNS leak, it returned the owner as “Hurricane Electric,” which apparently is a global internet service provider. So we can vouch that it does pretty good work at hiding your information unless zenmate or Hurricane is keeping your activity records.

Zenmate is available for cross-platforms, which includes Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Opera, Android, and iOS. If you like their free chrome extension, you can even try premium plans which can protect all your devices over the network.

[Download]

Unlimited Free VPN – Betternet

The only reason we are not listing this service at the top, it is a comparitively new company. The service is open source, and completely free. It is the only free VPN service we know that doesn’t sell you ads or offers alternate premium plans to bump up the speed or data usage. It is FREE 100%, with the only drawback being available 1 US server location which cannot be changed.

We love how they disclose their monthly earning from the apps they recommend under the partnership with third party networks. Betternet is available for all the platforms – Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome, Windows, Android, and iOS.

[Download]

CyberGhost

CyberGhost is a reputed VPN company, which proved to be a good tool to unblock banned websites by their free Google Chrome extension. It is a company recognized by many reputed tech blogs — wired, TechCrunch, the guardian and chip to name a few. It is a big name and very trusted.

We liked the simple UI, and limited options to play with. It offers 3 server locations – United States, Germany and Netherlands which cannot be extended by a premium service unless you happen to vouch for a paid VPN account that protects entire network on your computer.

There is a dedicated free Android app, but it didn’t perform quite well during our test. Maybe it was some glitch at their end during that session.

[Download]

We also tested ultrasurf, Gom VPN, dotVPN, Unlimited Free VPN – Hola and TunnelBear — they were offering either limited bandwidth and required registration or leaked DNS information and forced advertisements, which isn’t good if you wanted to hide your online identity.

These tools are highly effective and we tested them for DNS and information leaks, but keep in mind that they are not as secure as a reputed premium VPN services and are not recommended for those who are seeking top-notch security.

Most of these services might be keeping activity logs. The owners of the services above have the ability to associate your personal IP address with the names of all the sites you connect to and store this data indefinitely, which can identify you if authorized personnel to contact them for investigation of your involvement in a suspicious activity. This does not mean that they do log or store it indefinitely but they may and you need to trust whatever their policy says.

January 25, 2016
Top 10 Apps you must download on your smartphone in 2016

The smartphone market is continuously growing, introducing more and better apps. 2015 was a great year for new ideas and interesting applications. With the development of smartphones, we saw a huge rise in the quality of apps too. Here are the top 10 Apps, developed in 2015 that you must download in 2016 on your new smartphone. These applications are platform independent, i.e. you can download them on any smartphone regardless of the Operating System it is powered by.

Quora

Quora is available for all smartphones and is an app that gives perfect answers to your questions. All you have to do is ask a question and let the professions answer it. It has 4.5 stars on Google Play and has been widely loved by the users. The app is only of 2.9M and is compatible with all latest smartphones.

SHAREit

SHAREit is currently the fastest sharing app available. It allows the user to share all kinds of file, including, pictures, text, audio or video at very fast speed. It is 200 times faster than Bluetooth and supports all operating systems. You can share files from android, iPhone, iPad, Windows, Windows Phone and Mac. One the best feature that this app offers is that it is network independent; you can share files through the app even if you are offline.

Pocket

The pocket is a simple, beautifully designed app that allows you to enjoy the best stories available on the Web, based on your interests. It provides unlimited space, allowing the user to save and share countless stories, videos, and pictures.

Truecaller

Truecaller is the smartest communication app available. It is compatible with all devices and allows the user to go beyond the phonebook. With the app installed, the user can identify an unknown call and know who it is from. It can also block unwanted calls and texts. The app is full of other interesting features that can be purchased.

MX Player

MX player is a great app for enjoying videos and watching movies. It supports almost all formats of videos and is equipped with hardware acceleration, multicore coding, zooming gestures, subtitles and has a kids lock.

Mobile Security & Antivirus by Avast

Out of all security apps, Avast’s app is the most comprehensive, easy to use and effective apps in the market while still being free. Compatible with all devices, the app keeps the device safe from Malware threats. With is amazing anti-theft features, you don’t have to worry about your personal data getting in the wrong hands.

Hitman: Sniper

Hitman: Sniper is the best smartphone action game of 2015. It is packed with details and interesting features. It has over 150 missions and the user can challenge their friends and play against the leader board.

Camera360

Camera360 is one of the best camera apps available. It offers over 200 filters, NFC photo sharing and allows fixing the pictures after they’re taken. The adjustments allowed are powerful and easy to do. It is suitable for both professional and new photographers.

Google Drive

Backing up your data and making it available on all your devices is really important these days. Google Drive is the best cloud storage app available to date. The app is easy to use and gives out free GBs of space, allowing the user to store more data.

Modern Combat 5: Blackout

This amazing action game has set high bars for all other shooting apps. It has an interactive gameplay, allowing the user to customize the controls and even the play style. Enjoy the realistic graphics and get lost in the addictive game style.

January 10, 2016