Most of us used to taking screenshots have rooted their phones to enable taking screenshots. But many still would like to have an option to take screenshots without rooting their phones.

There have been apps which have worked on non rooted phones but depending on the phones, they work on some and don’t work on some non-rooted phones. Here is an app which has been around for a while which works on all non-rooted phones : ‘No Root Screenshot It’

Obviously, as the name suggest the app allows you to take, edit, and share screen captures from your Android device without rooting it first. But you would need a desktop utility which is provided by the developer ( Windows and Mac supported) You would need to pair up with the desktop utility and once connected, you are good to take screenshots.

Negative: If you restart your phone, you would have to reconnect to the desktop app.

You can set timers for screenshots to allow menus to be captured, shake the phone to get captures, annotate or crop screenshots and share the shot to web, email and other apps.

Price: $4.99

Some of the other screenshots apps which may or may not require your phone to be rooted depending on your phone model : Screenshot it, Shake to screenshot(Galaxy series only), Screenshot UX, X-Shoot

When you access a website through Opera, it first downloads the page on its server, compresses it there and then redirects it to your phone. Thus your browser downloads lesser amount of kb for the same page. Opera has been claiming that using Opera reduces the page size by 80%, thus directly reducing your data charges. Though, there was no verification offered for the same.

But with the newly updated Opera browser, you can have exact idea how much data you have downloaded during your browsing session and how much you have saved using Opera as your browser. It also keeps track of total data usage, enabling you to translate your usual monthly internet activities into a data usage figure. Thus, allowing you to choose an optimal plan or reduce usage.

To view the data usage using Opera : Launch Opera and click ‘data usage’ under ‘help’ section.

Opera can, obviously. track only the data passing through your Opera browser. There are other apps which may be used to track the entire data usage, including data used by apps : eg : 3gwatchdog, netcounter, TrafficInfo, Onavo and more.

A review of best data tracking apps soon.

The German computer magazine COM is currently running a giveaway of Avast Internet Security. The offer is in German but is accessible to anyone and the license works with the English version as well.

Enter the first name, last name and your email address on the promotion page (link at the end of the page) to receive the license in you email address.

In your email click the link which ends with license-com-so-gehts.zip.

This is a zip file and you will use this to register your Internet Security suite. The license expires in 9 months. That is you will be able to use this till April 2012.

Promotional Page Link

Download the English Avast Internet Security

1. Set up your work email

Android has a built-in email app which is although a bare minimum but still serves the purpose. You can also install better email apps on your android. Setting up an email account of a email provider like google, yahoo etc. is quite simple and I believe you must have done it by now. But you can also add your work email account to the email app to regularly get updates of your work email.

You’ll have to get few technical details from your IT department in your office and then you can easily setup your work email account. You can alter settings to change the notification and message checking. It is very useful as most of the office email servers do not offer a version which is mobile friendly.

2. Make sure ‘Data Roaming’ is off

If you do not want to incur heavy charges for using data transmission while on roaming, adjust this option to be off. It can amount to huge charges if you are on an international trip. To adjust this setting :

-Tap on menu while on your home screen

-Choose Settings , then tap ‘Wireless and Networks’. Go to ‘Mobile Networks’

- See if data roaming is disabled. If not, disable it by taping the option.

3. Voicemail

Voicemail is also a feature which is missed by many android users. You can allow Google to handle your voicemail

Go to google.com/voice and register for the free service by Google 9but only for the voicemail feature)

You can now have computer generated transcripts of your voicemails delivered to your phone. You can also download mp3 version of your voicemails and explore all other options to integrate your voice mail with your android phone.

4. Install Dropbox

You might be using dropbox on your computer. Now, use it on your phone. Dropbox is a great service which provides you with 2 Gb of space on the cloud. Now you can install dropbox on your phone and now you can easily access the files from your computer. Just upload files from your computer to dropbox and using dropbox on your phone access them easily.

Go to Market app.

Search for dropbox and install it.

5. Add contacts to your home screen

You can easily add contacts to your home screen, so that with 1 tap you can call, sms, view facebook profile and do other task with your preferred contact.

- Press and hold your your finger on an empty spot on any of your home screens.

- Choose ‘Shortcuts’ from the pop up menu.

- Select ‘Contact’ and scroll to find you preferred contact.

Now you can get in tough with your contact with just 1 tap.

6. Install a better music player

Although android native music app is decent but there are wonderful apps in the market which you ought to try out. Some of them are : Tunewiki, doubletwist, etc.

You can search for the app in the market and install it. You’ll definitely prefer the new app over the native app. Another option could be to try out services like grooveshark, spotify etc. which stream music over the internet. (but these are paid apps)

7. Create a link for Directions Home

- Press and hold on a spot on your home screen.

- Choose ‘Shortcuts’.  Pick ‘Directions and Navigation’.

- Enter your home address in ‘destination field’.

- Name the shortcut as ‘Home’ or any other name you deem suitable

Now if you are lost and need directions back home, it is just 1 tap away.

For further exciting apps and tips and tricks for android , check out our android dedicated site androidhub

There are some known modes of sharing links from browser to your android device but if you have any other smart phone, this is the perfect option for you. It supports all major OS as well as supports all major browsers.

1. Phone Set Up

- Go to site to phone from your laptop and click setup with your phone.

- The site will generate a unique link and ask you to visit the link using your phone browser.

- Follow the instructions on the page which are adjusted as per you smartphone OS.

- After completing the setup, click on Complete Setup.

2. Browser Setup

There are two ways of sending links to your phone. Either you can go to site to phone website and use Quick Send and send the links to your phone. You don’t have to install an addon or create an account in this case.

Second method involves installing a plugin(IE 8/9 and chrome) or a bookmarklet(rest of browsers).

- Click on setup browser.

-Follow the instructions.

3. Sending the link to your phone

-After  completing the setup, whenever you are on a site the link of which you want on your phone. just right  click and select the option ‘Send Page to Phone’ or click on the icon in menu bar.

- Go to your phone’s app launcher and open the bookmark you created earlier.

- This will launch the webpage, the link of which  you just sent to your phone

You can also view the history of the sent links.

For some this might not be an interesting tool, but for some who are plagued by this issue this might be a welcome cure.

Opera 11 has been released and comes with a much awaited feature of extensions which has been one key missing feature that is the ability to use extensions. With the release 11 it has now taken the war to the doorsteps of Mozilla, Google and Microsoft.

Following are some of the new release features:

Tab stacking
Dragging one tab over another allows you to create groups of tabs. Now you can keep dozens of webpages open, organized and under control.

Safer address field
The address field has been improved and now hides the complexity of long web addresses. It also provides more security information to help you stay safe when browsing; just click the badge for the website to see security information about the site you are visiting.

Visual mouse gestures
Perform many common browser actions with a quick flick of your mouse. Holding down the right mouse button on a webpage now shows a visual guide that indicates how to perform the available gestures.

Using drippler.com

1. After registrations, click the tab ‘My Gadgets‘ on top left of your page.

2. Click on the button indicating ‘Click here to stay updated‘.

3. Choose the gadgets you want to be updated. You’ll now be informed of any update released for your gadget.

You can also connect to facebook to be regularly notified of the updates for your gadget. Just click on the connect to Faceook button for linking to your facebook account. You’ll receive weekly about your gadgets.

It has upt o date and detailed information on the the gadgets it displays. One of the disadvantages of the site is that it does not have comprehensive list of gadgets. Thus it might be a case that some of your gadgets may not have been listed on the site. Also another feature which is not likable is that in spite of your gadget having a new software update or not, the site sends a weekly email notifying you about news about your gadget.

Webroot Spy Sweeper is a leading solution provider against the latest spyware threats. Now you can get the Webroot Spy Sweeper free license for 6 months. All you have to do is download the package from their facebook page.

Webroot Spy Sweeper Facebook page

It causes immense pain when an important file which has lot of important stuff is corrupted or damaged. Unless you have backed up the file you might have lost everything, or not? Here are are some ways which can help you recover your corrupt excel file.

1. Run Repair

The first method to try recovering your file is to use the repair option of excel.  Go to :

File->Open-> Click on the excel file.

In the open dropdown menu choose open and repair

It opens a dialogue box giving you option of repair or extract data. The first option will recover as much data as possible and second option will copy formula and values.

You can try repair first and then extract if the first option doesn’t yield results.

2. Save File to Different Format

If you can open the excel file, you can try saving it n different format and then try to open it in excel and then save it as excel workbook.

Select SaveAs option and choose any other format such as SYLK from the Save as type menu.

Now go to open and open the file you just saved as SYLK. Now again when file open choose the SaveAs option and save the file as excel workbook.

You can also use html format to save the file.

3. Open in Word

You can try opening the file in Microsoft Word. But for this you have to be sure to have Microsoft Excel converter installed. It can be downloaded from Microsoft Website. But with option, you will lost chart sheets, dialog sheets, macro sheets, and you will lose all cell formulas. However, you should be able to view the data.

4. Alter Calculation Option

If you are unable to open the file at all, you can try setting the recalculation option in excel to manual. Go to :

Tools->Options->Calculation->Manual

For Excel 2007 or higher versions, the steps are different. Click on office button on top left and choose excel options. Click on Formulas, then click on manual under calculation options section.

Now try to open the corrupted excel file.

5. Link to Corrupted File

In excel one can link a excel workbook to a a worksheet. you can try this to recover the corrupted excel file.

Open a new file in excel but be careful to open the file in the same folder as your corrupted file.

In cell A1, Type =<Filename>!A1

(For eg. =Sales.xls!A1)

If it works, then the data(of cell A1) of the corrupted file should appear in cell A1. Then you can drag for the rest of the worksheet to obtain other values.

Hopefully these techniques should help you recover your excel file. If you know of any other ways to recover the files, do feel free to post them here.