QA Graphic
May 11, 2019

Inkatlas

Create cool looking maps with Inkatlas

Google Maps are great, but it isn't helpful if you want to draw and showcase areas around a location. That's what makes inkatlas so great. You can draw and print out maps.

Description from Website

Whether you need a quick map for your next bike trip or a tailored cartographic solution for your publishing business, Inkatlas is the simple way to create paper maps. You don't need to become a GIS expert. Leave it to us!

Ink Atlas
https://inkatlas.com/create/

Sample Map

Sample Map created with InkAtlas

New Hampshire

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May 4, 2019

Markdown Table Generator

Make tables for any markdown editor

Markdown formating is becoming really popular. Cool apps like Notion is making is easy to copy/paste data. Markdown is also very popular in the Wiki community.

One of the challenges of Markdown is making tables. Thankfully sites like Table Generator makes it easy to create table. Simply define the number of rows and columns - and presto you have a working Markdown template to fill in.

Description from Website

As the official Markdown documentation states, Markdown does not provide any special syntax for tables. Instead it uses HTML <table> syntax. But there exist Markdown syntax extensions which provide additional syntax for creating simple tables.

Markdown Table Generator
https://www.tablesgenerator.com/markdown_tables

Sample Output

Sample seven-day table.

|   |   |   |   |   |   |   |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|   |   |   |   |   |   |   |
|   |   |   |   |   |   |   |
|   |   |   |   |   |   |   |
|   |   |   |   |   |   |   |

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April 27, 2019

Xicon

Easily Create ICO icons for websites

Creating .ico can be complex, but Xicon makes it easy. You can easily create icons from any size image. There are some tools that help remove the background and add additional touch-ups

Website Description

X-Icon Editor is an HTML5 application (based on Canvas) that allows you to create high-resolution icons that let your sites shine with IE9 and above. With X-Icon Editor you can quickly get your site ready with a large icon which will be available for pinned sites and the new tab page. Create your own site icon today!

The X-Icon Editor helps you build a high-resolution icon that can include up to 4 sizes: 16x16, 24x24, 32x32 and 64x64 pixels.

xicon Editor
http://www.xiconeditor.com/

Five Things I learned about Xicon Editor

  • The site launched on October 28, 2010 by Microsoft.
  • You can import any size image to convert to an ico icon.
  • Using the paint bucket you can easily remove the background.
  • The final image isn't compressed, and the site offers some suggestions to help compress the image.
  • The preview is a good way to preview the icon as a bookmark, Window's dock icon, and in the tool bar.

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April 20, 2019

Ranking of Weather around the World

Find out the extreme temps from the past 20 years

Ever had one of those days where it felt like it was the hottest place on Earth? Or perhaps it's freezing outside and your thinking it must be the cold place on the planet?

Well now you can check it out from ogimet.com. You can see the Hottest Temps, Coldest Temp, Rainest and Windest place on earth. Not just right now, but anytime in the last 20 years!

You can find out what the extreme Temps at the time someone was born in the past 20 years.

Description from Website

This page query uses both WMO and ICAO station indices, and allows efficient searches based on site, partial name string, country etc

These pages should be used for information purposes. The authors are not responsible for any error, delay or defect in the data or its interpretation. The products of this site should not be used in any critical mission

This website does not store any personal information of its users except the corregimiento of use of cookies. However, use Google Adsense services. You can visit this page of Google to know what use is given to the information collected by third-party ads

Ranking Temps
http://www.ogimet.com/ranking.phtml.en

This is a free service, and there is a time limit on how many history searches can be performed. (I believe it's one query for every 1 minute.)

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April 13, 2019

LCD Generator

Quickly create cool looking LCD screens

Using an LCD generator to display text is one way to make your message stand out. What's nice about avtanski.net solution is that there are so many ways to quickly generate a custom LCD screen. Simply drag/drop the graphic to Slack so that everyone knows.

The LCD Generator is a unique way to display your phone number on your website or business card.

Website Description

This is a generator for LCD/LED display screenshots. Supported display types: 5x8 character matrix, 7-segment, 14-segment, and 16-segment displays. Select the display type, type the message to be displayed, pick a color scheme, display dimensions, cursor position, and image size, then press Preview to see the image, or Download to save it locally.

L C D Generator
http://avtanski.net/projects/lcd/

Examples

For This I Went To

Release Is Red

White House Press Number

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April 6, 2019

Facebook Design — Devices

Facebook has great mockup templates for any design purposes.

There are a lot of services/solutions to creating mock-up and a quick Google search for "iPhone Mockups" produce about 50,800,000 results. Yikes! How can one find good quality Mockups to use in Photoshop, Sketch or Affinity Photo?

Facebook!

Facebook? Yes, that Facebook. They have a developer area where you can download all sorts of device design ideas which you can download and use as mockups.

Website description

Facebook supports a diverse audience around the world and an equally diverse set of devices. To emphasize that in our design mocks, we redrew a range of devices to show the global diversity of the people using our products. Each device comes with a bitmap of the device (with and without shadows) and the original Sketch file for that device.

We???ve incorporated many of these devices into Origami and worked with the Framer Team to add them to Framer as well.

While Facebook has redrawn and shares these assets for the benefit of the design community, Facebook does not own any of the underlying product or user interface designs. Please do not repackage and redistribute these as your own.

Facebook Devices
https://facebook.design/devices

Sample Design

Using the iPhone XS Max, and Dell XPS design I created the sample layout in Affinity Designer:

Fun Facebook Design

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March 30, 2019

Text to ASCII Art

Create cool ASCII art from your text

Ascii Art is a popular way to highlight text. In the 80s and 90s it was popular to show Ascii art in popular chat rooms at Delphi Internet or Compuserv. Nowadays, Ascii art is used for terminal login headlines.

Patorjk's Text to ASCII Art tool is a great way to create all sorts of Ascii art.

Website Description

I originally couldn't think of a name for the app, and I thought ASCII Art of pizza is called "Pizza ASCII Art", so what this app generates should be called "Text ASCII Art". However, the name was a little awkward, and I noticed some people were calling it "Text to ASCII Art Generator" (I guess they assumed I forgot a word). When I saw this I realized that was a better name. While coding up version 2.0, I decided to rename the app to add in the "to" and to capitalize on the "ASCII" part.

Ascii Art Haunted Mansion
http://patorjk.com/software/taag

Five things I Learned

There are 174 fonts in four categories: 53 Feature FIGlet Fonts, 10 ANSI FIGlet Fonts, 75 Regular FIGlet Fonts and 36 AOL Macro Fonts.

The "Test All" is a good way to look at your text in all the fonts!

You can't cut/paste the output into Slack. The best way to display in Slack is to use a screenshot

If you use like the Text to Ascii Art tool, there is a Chrome Extension. Now you can easily create Ascii Art whenever you need it.

There is an Ascii Art Web Ring where you can find other sites that offer Ascii arts.

Sample Output

  ___ _ __ _   _  __ _ _ __    ___ ___  _ __ ___  
 / __| '__| | | |/ _` | '_   / __/ _ | '_ ` _  
| (__| |  | |_| | (_| | | | || (_| (_) | | | | | |
 ___|_|   __, |__,_|_| |_(_)______/|_| |_| |_|
           |___/                                             

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March 23, 2019

Iconizer

Easy way to find and create icons.

Icons are useful in folders and applications. Finding good icons can be a tough task using Google or Bing.

Thankfully someone created a service that not only makes finding icons easy but also creating an icon from images. Iconizer is a great resource for finding and creating icons.

Simple Website Description

This is not just a search.
It's an icon GENERATOR

Iconizer
https://icons8.com/iconizer/

Things I learned about the Iconizer

There are a lot of great icons in the database. They are great to add to Slack.

There are great Facebook, Bing and Hard Drive icons.

This is a good resource if your using Notion.so As you can find useful page icons.

I had a problem creating an icon from an upload. When I uploaded a small PNG file, the image would never show up in the editor.

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March 16, 2019

WhereFor

Get some great travel ideas.

Everyone needs a vacation from the daily routine. Certainly, Disney World or Hawaii would be great places to go. But what if you didn't have enough money to go there - but you still want to get away for a quick vacation.

You could always ask your Facebook friends on where to go. You would get all sorts of interesting places.

WhereFor has a better way. Simply set your budget and your departing City and WhereFor will tell you all the places you can afford to go to.

Website Description

Explore our map to discover all the cities you can go on your budget. Youll be surprised how far you can go.

For each city, we show you the cheapest flight and highest-rated hotel in your budget. Or, choose your own.

We guarantee the lowest prices, never add fees, and have a 24-hour refund policy. So book your flight and hotel, together or separately, with confidence.

Where For
https://play.wherefor.com/

The service is still in Beta. The Google Maps still says "For development purposes only" and the Facebook sign-in shows this message: "App Not Setup: This app is still in development mode, and you don't have access to it. Switch to a registered test user or ask an app admin for permissions."

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March 9, 2019

Destroy the Web Game

Have fun destroying websites with kickass software

Sometimes you need to have a break from all the craziness at work. Spending all day searching information on stackoverflow.com can be boring.

Why not spice it up the website with a game? That's what kickassapp.com is for. Simply drag the link to your bookmark bar and then when your tired of a site, simply click on the link and play the game.

Website Information

Kick Ass started as a hobby project by a young developer named Erik Rothoff Andersson. The first iteration of Kick-Ass came about when he wanted to destroy his ex-girlfriend's blog. He put up Kick-Ass on Reddit, showing off his programming ninja skills and shortly after it exploded on the internet.
The internet was abuzz with Kick Ass-fever. Many ad agencies modified Kick-Ass to promote brands like M&M, the movie Thor, Axe and many more. Erik was later invited to Denmark to receive the Danish Internet Award for his excellence, also free beer.

Destroy The Web
https://kickassapp.com/

Fun Times

You can create your own ships on Kick Ass website. Simply go to the Designer Page and create your ship.

Website owners can support Kick-Ass by removing ads from the game. It's a way to make a website a bit more entertaining for a certain segment of the internet market. (Subscription is $99 a year)

I recall another app that offered a similar functionality but Website developers were able to add a shield to prevent the site from being destroyed. (I am searching for that site - if you know leave a comment below!)

As of today, the default ship has been played 4,841,459 times. (That's a lot of free time.)

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About

I will highlight a fun Internet site every Saturday. The basic premise is to highlight sites that I regularly visit for a variety of reasons. All site recommendations are mine and are unsponsored. By highlighting these websites, I hope to provide value to those who may not know of the sites or who might be interested in visiting the sites. I also want to share the sites that I find valuable in the hopes that others will find them just as beneficial.

Check out all the blog posts.

Schedule

ThursdayGluten Free
FridayMacintosh
SaturdayInternet Tools
SundayOpen Topic
MondayMedia Monday
TuesdayQA
WednesdayNew England