How to block people on LinkedIn

Virtually all of the social networks you care to mention feature the ability to block users you would rather were not in contact with you. This is an option you will find in Facebook, Twitter and on numerous other sites, and it is a great way to avoid someone you have fallen out with, or anyone you would prefer was no able to see what you’re getting up to. It is a little late to the party, but the professional social network LinkedIn has finally added this very option.

Head over to your profile at the LinkedIn website and navigate to the account of another user that you would like to block. This could be someone you have noticed has been browsing through your account, someone you have received unwanted messages from, or just someone you would like to block before you ever hear from them.

On the profile page for the person you want to block, click the down arrow to the right of the blue button next to their profile image. From the drop down menu that appears, click the Block or report button.

Select the Block option and click Continue followed by Agree.

Just as with the likes of Facebook, if you block someone no notification will be sent out. It does mean that neither you nor the person you have blocked will be able to access each other’s accounts, and any previous contact there has been between you will disappear.

Should you ever change your mind about someone, you may decide that you want to unblock them again. Visit your own profile page, hover your mouse over your picture to the upper right of the page and then click the Privacy & Settings link.

In the Privacy Controls section, click Manage who you’re blocking and you can unblock people you are happy to get in touch with again.

Enjoy being in control of your account!

How to recover from a browser hijack in Chrome

It’s the kind of thing you imagine only happens to other people, but then all of a sudden it happens to you; your browser has been hijacked! It is worryingly easy to fall victim to malicious software that makes unwanted changes to your computer, but if you find that your Chrome settings have changes without your consent, there is a quick and easy way to get things back to the way they hold be.

In fact, you should find that Chrome detects when settings have been changed, and if suspicious activity has been detected, your browser should offer to restore your previous settings â€" a backup has been automatically created for you! Just click Reset and everything should be back to normal in a flash.

But Chrome may not pick up on changes that have been made. If you notice that things are not the way they should be and you want to revert to earlier settings, this can be achieved very simply. Click the Chrome menu button and then click Settings. Click the Show advanced settings link at the bottom of the page and then scroll right down to the bottom. Click the button labelled Reset browser settings and things will be taken care of for you.

Resetting browser data will disable any extensions that you have installed, so you will need to re-enable those you want to continue using. Click the Extensions link to the left of the settings screen and make sure that the Enabled box is checked next to each extension you are interested in.

Chrome and Firefox extension lets you block and skip YouTube ads

It’s no real surprise the YouTube displays ads. It’s owner, Google, despite being called a search company, is really an advertising-based business. And, the tremendous amount of bandwidth required to run the service is an overwhelming cost. However, if you just can’t stomach those ads, then there are some workarounds.

One of the simplest is a browser plugin with the unceremonious name of “ScrewAds Plus”. It is available for both Firefox and Chrome users â€" sorry Internet Explorer folks.

Once you have installed it (we are using Chrome for this demonstration) you’ll be alerted that the extension is now active. The icon will appear in your menu bar.

The Chrome version doesn’t have any options, though the developer has included a few in the Firefox version. This isn’t a drawback, as there really isn’t anything additional you need.

The one problem is there doesn’t see to be anyway to block the pre-roll ads, though YouTube frequently lets you skip them after 5 seconds, so it’s not a major issue.

While it doesn’t quite solve all of the advertising woes, it’s a good start. Check it out if you use either Firefox or Chrome.

Forecast.io brings detailed weather from around the world

Watching the weather is one constant, not matter where in the world you travel. At times it can be a concern because of actual safety issues â€" think hurricanes, tornados and blizzards. Many of us monitor it via  a mobile device, but there is a great web app that also makes this possible, and it perhaps gives the most detailed information of any service around.

Forecast.io is the website in question here. By simply visiting it, the service detects your location (presumably based on IP address) and immediately begins presenting information.

At the top of the page you’ll pre presented with a globe that depicts your hemisphere, showing a radar image of all the current weather patterns, color-coded based on if it is snow or rain. To the right of this you’ll see the current conditions in your area. You can swap the globe for a regional or local view of the map, if you choose.

Clicking the Plus button to the right of current conditions presents a bit of additional information, including wind speed, humidity and barometric pressure.

Scrolling further down, you find a forecast for your area, which even contains an animated image for each day â€" you can watch the snowflakes drift down.

Again, you can click on the Plus sign. In this case, it will show you an hour-by-hour breakdown of what to expect, including precipitation and temperature.

The service not only allows you to check the weather in your area, but others around the world. So if you’re planning a trip then you can get an idea of what to expect. You can also easily toggle between Celsius and Fahrenheit. There’s a lot of detail here, and users around the world should check it out.

Check the Chrome Dashboard for all Sync statistics

This past week Mozilla announced accounts for Firefox, something long overdue, as Google’s Chrome web browser has had this capability for sometime now. Customers can log in using a Google account and then choose what to sync across computers. This includes bookmarks, login and password data, browsing history and more.

This means that when you log into a Chrome session on another computer, you can get all of this automatically, and it populates rather quickly. Users can pick and choose what is and is not synced, but there is also a dashboard that provides an overview of just how much data your sharing among your computers. Here’s how to access this information.

Start by heading to the settings menu by clicking the three-bar icon at the top right of the browser, then scroll down and hit the settings option. Under “Sign In”, which is the top section, you will find a link to “Google Dashboard”.

This will open a new tab that displays all of the exact data involved in your syncing â€" the number of apps, extensions, bookmarks, settings, themes and more. It will also alert you to the time and date of your most recent sync, and provide a link to Google’s privacy policy.

This is good data to have and likely something you’ll want to check periodically just make sure everything is going smoothly and that nothing appears unusual.

Manage files on a Chromebook with Zip Extractor

Judging by sales figures, a fair number of people may have received a Chromebook over this past holiday season, and others likely already owned one. The devices have remained a top-selling product, especially according to figures published by Amazon.

Chrome OS is designed to handle a lot scenarios, but an area it doesn’t excel in is ZIP files. Given the commonness of these on the internet, that’s a drawback of the operating system. However, it is fortunately one that can be overcome.

Chrome OS can handle the file, supporting the ability to open them, but there is no option to actually extract one â€" something we all would like to do. ZIP Extractor aims to fix this shortcoming with an app available through the Chrome Web Store. Just install it, free of charge, and it is easy enough to use.

The app works with Google Drive, which it utilizes to extract files to. Once installed, you will need to visit the website to authorize the service to work on your behalf.

When a ZIP file is clicked, it will launch the web page â€" this isn’t actually an app. Therein lies the one big drawback, as ZIP Extractor will not work offline. It also requires you to grant access to your Google Drive account, which could be looked at as a security concern. However, the app was developed by a Google employee, so you should feel fairly safe in this case.

Enable Gmail desktop notifications

Gmail is far from being the only free email service on the market, with hot competition from Outlook.com and Yahoo, to name only two. However, it seems to hold some favor with the tech crowd, and the company offers lots of perks in the way of add-ons, many of which appear through the Labs program.

One addition is the ability to get notifications about new messages right on your desktop. This isn’t the default behavior, but something you will need to enable on your own. Here’s how to do it.

Head to Gmail and click on the “Settings” option â€" the gear at the top right of the main Gmail page. There are a number of options under this, so you’ll actually have to select “Settings”.

This opens to the “General” tab, which is fine in this case, as it’s where you’ll want to be for this. Scroll down to find the section labeled “Desktop Notifications”.

There are a couple of options to choose from here. By default it is set to off, but you can enable either all mail or just important messages to pop up a notification. You can also change Chat settings here. Those are enabled by default, but you can turn that off. Once your choices are made, scroll to the bottom and click “Save Changes”.

That’s all there is to it. Now you can get a better idea about when a new email arrives, handy when you are waiting for something important.

Avoid Sites Loading From Cache Using Cache Killer For Chrome

Chrome is a very flexible browser, you can use the apps and extensions to improve its functionality. The new update for Chrome, introduced many features and improved security in Chrome, but the real strength is the extensions. It has the capacity to completely change the usage of browser for people who work in different fields. Previously, I wrote about a chrome extension to save links and organize bookmarks in Chrome. Today I’ve come with another useful extension called “Cache Killer” for Chrome. It automatically clears cache from the website before loading in your browser. Here’s how it works.

You can download Cache Killer from the Chrome web store using the link at the end of this post. Once you complete the installation, you can see the Cache killer icon near to your URL bar. After installation, the app will silently work in the background. When you open a website, it will clear the existing cache from your browser. Browser Cache clearing is a very important process in many situations. Sometimes the website won’t load or update because of the browser cache. This app will clear all those things without any manual effort.

Cache memory also reflects on the performance of your browser. Too much of cache memory will lower the speed of your browser. This app will help you to clear cache automatically to improve the performance. Using the Cache Killer icon, you can also manually clear the cache of a website. By default, it will be red, if you didn’t clear the cache manually. Once you click that, it will turn green when it clears all the cache data for that particular website.

For people who work online all the day, this app will be very helpful to load fresh data all the time. Also, it reduces your work by doing the cache clearing process automatically. Try this new extension in your browser and share your experience with us in the comments. Thanks for reading, do share this post with your friends.

Download Cache Killer for Chrome

How To Convert A Webpage To Print-Friendly PDF In Chrome

Looking for an easy way to convert any webpage to print-friendly PDF file while saving your ink and paper? your search ends here, take a look at Print Friendly & PDF for Chrome. It’s an amazing Google chrome extension that gives you the ability to removes ads, navigation and junk before your print anything.

The main aim of Print Friendly & Chrome is to provide a clutter-free reading experience. Here’s how it works. After installing the extension, you’ll see a green icon on top right side of your browser. To create a PDF of a webpage, visit it and click the green extension. A window will popup with your page, you’ll notice that it doesn’t have much clutter in the first place. After that, you can click on anything like an image, advertisement or text that you don’t want and it’ll delete it.

Here’s what the page looks after 5 seconds, all good to go to print.

You can also change the text size from 70% to 100% with a click, email or remove images automatically. If you want to create a PDF of that page, just click PDF on top left of the window and choose the size, A4 or letter. That’s it.

Download Print Friendly & PDF here

Chrome has a problem with malicious extensions, here’s a fix

Just a couple of days ago BlogsDNA showed you an easy method for checking the extensions you have installed in Chrome. This came on the heals of a revelation that some extensions were utilizing adware to profit from free add-ons. Google has started to remove the offending extensions from its Chrome Web Store, but the company has gone one step further.

Steps have been released, allowing you to completely reset the browser in the event you have fallen victim to any of these extensions. “Settings hijacking remains our number one user complaint“, the company states. So here are the steps to reset things if you find yourself in need.

First, Chrome will be prompting Windows users whose settings appear to have been changed, asking if they’d like to restore their browser settings back to factory default.

However, if you are affected and don’t receive this message, then head to the Settings section and scroll down to the bottom. Tap the “Advanced”  section and then continue further down to locate the “Reset Browser Settings” section, which has only one, rather obvious, option.

Once this is done, you’ll need to head back into Settings and click “Tools” and then “Extensions” to begin re-enabling the ones you still wish to use. That’s all there is to it. Perhaps in the future Google will come up with a more user-friendly way of handling this.

Tab Killer is an Alternative Tool For Default Bookmarks Option in Chrome

Though we have many apps for web and mobile devices to save links and read later, the default “Bookmarks option” also helps you maintain important links for quick access. Without any applications, you can use the bookmarks option to organize all your favorite links and save multiple tabs in your browser. Today I’ve come with a new Chrome extension called “Tab Killer”, which is an excellent alternative to the default bookmarks option in Chrome. It lets you easily save, manage and delete links from a separate pop out window with the help of shortcuts. Here’s how it works.

You can download Tab Killer from Chrome web store using the link below. Once you install the extension, you can see the Tab Killer icon near to your URL bar. First time, when you click that, you will see only an empty window with a title “Bookmarks”. To start with the extension, you need to know two important shortcuts. First one “Alt+A”, to save any link from your browser. Next one “Alt+Z”, to open the Tab killer bookmarks window. With the help of these two shortcuts, you can save and manage all your favorite links instantly.

By default, all your existing bookmarks will be synced to the extension. You can access them under “Bookmarks” option in the pop out window. As soon as you save a link when you open the pop out window, you can see a “Pin Shaped icon” at the end of all the links. It is like a “Check box” for the app. On the left side you can see an “Options icon” moving all over wherever you move the cursor. These pinned and unpinned links can be removed using that options icon.

Using that Options button you can clear all the bookmarked links in the extension. Also, it lets you add the saved links to default bookmark options in the browser. For all these operations, the pin at the end of every link can be used to select or deselect the links. If you come across an interesting link when you browse, you can use the Tab Killer shortcuts to quickly save those links for later reference. If you are a kind of person, who keep the links in separate tabs for reading later, this extension will help you kill those tabs and gives you a clutter free interface.

You can watch the video tutorial above to understand more about the application. Try this in your browser and share your experience with us in the comments. Thanks for reading, do share this post with your friends.

Download Tab Killer For Chrome