How to download videos and music from YouTube

 I’ve noticed recently that many people, even those that aren’t particularly inclined towards tech, have been asking me how to download videos from YouTube. So I thought it might be a good idea to offer some of my favourite ways to do just that.  

  

Obviously, YouTube being the biggest and most popular video sharing website there is, there are a fair few of ways of getting YouTube videos on to your hard drive or portable devices. Some are browser add ons, some are third party websites and some are desktop applications. Recently, more and more musical content has been appearing on the site as well, so I’ve offered my favourite way of getting music from YouTube to your MP3 player or iPod.

Click to continue reading..

 

Add-on: Video DownloadHelper

 

The quickest option for videos is the extremely popular Firefox extension Video DownloadHelper. This add on places a little icon next to your address bar, which becomes animated whenever there is downloadable content available on the web page. You click it, and the video starts downloading. This does not only work on YouTube, you can use it  to download videos on many other websites such as Dailymotion and Megavideo, as well us download all the images on the page. Essentially, all it does is find a link to the downloadable file and then give it to Firefox to download normally, but it does that very well and very consistently. The Add on usually downloads in the FLV (flash video) format so you will need a converter or a media player which can play flash video such as VLC. 

This add on only works on Firefox, but if all you want to do is get videos from YouTube you can use YouTube Downloader for Google Chrome.

Website/ Music: Bender Converter

 

I may be cheating here by combining the best ways of downloading music and the best website for downloading videos but I think Bender Converter really is both. It’s well designed and offers many options while being easy to use. First you need to find the video you want to download on YouTube and copy it’s URL (address), and then paste it on to Bender Converter. This is where it comes in to it’s own, as you can then choose the format of the video you download. This means you don’t have to download a video and then find a means of converting the video to play on your portable device. On this site, all the converting is done on an external server, which means it is fast, and you have one less step to deal with. There are many formats available and the website helpfully tells you which formats play on which devices.

The format choice is also important when it comes to downloading music. If you want to download music using the other options, you would have to first download the video and then rip out the audio using another program or just copy the video to your device. However, on Bender Converter, you can choose to convert the video to pure MP3 before downloading, meaning you get a music file which can easily be synced to any MP3 player or iPod. You also get a faster download as the mp3 file will be considerably smaller than any of the video formats.

Other notable websites which offer a similar service include Keepvid and ClipNabber.

Desktop: Real Player

 

I wouldn’t recommend straying far from the browser for your downloading needs, but if you absolutely have to, the best desktop option is Real Player. The latest versions of the enduring media player come with an easy way of downloading web videos. Whenever flash video is playing a rectangle pops up which says ‘Download this video’. Click that, and the video downloads to your Real Player library, from where you can view it or convert it to play on various devices. Real Player is also a great way of organising your entire media collection.

If you are comfortable with a little less hand feeding, you can use the already mentioned VLC media player to download content from YouTube in the format of your choice by ‘Opening a Network Stream’ with the URL if the YouTube Video and then choosing to ‘Save as’ in the desired format.

That concludes my best ways of downloading content from YouTube and other video sharing websites. These methods are for personal use only and should not be used as part of any activity which may be deemed illegal or inappropriate. I hope that sounded serious enough. 

If you have trouble with anything mentioned in this post or anything else on this blog, feel free to contact us using the Contact or Feedback/Help pages. 

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Christmas Freebie - $49 advanced media converter for free

Merry Christmas everyone! I don't mean to sound like I'm gaining something from promoting this, but this is a genuine and great giveaway. The software is called iMedia converter, it can convert videos to many popular formats, and has helpful presets for a large number of devices. So it's really easy to get a video you downloaded from the internet to play on your mobile device. But as well as converting, it is also able to rip DVDs and convert them to commonly used formats. Unlike some DVD ripping software, it is also very fast. More importantly, it is able to bypass many protection methods found on DVDs. If you have a large DVD collection and want to get those movies on to your phone or computer, this is a simple and fast way of doing it. The interface is also well designed and intuitive to use, there are advanced settings if you want them, but the basic setup helps you get what you want quickly and easily. Read on to find out how to get it free for Windows.

This software is usually $49, but from the 23rd to the 27th of December they're giving it away for FREE. But as far as I can see, you will need a Facebook account. But as half a billion people do, I don't think that will be much of a problem. Here's how you get it: 

1. Go to the iSkysoft website, and hit the free download link

   2. While the setup file is downloading, go back to the website and click "Get KeyCode" 

3. You will be taken to a Facebook page where you have to "Like" it before you can register. Once have clicked Like, you need to fill in your name and email address. The code to register the product will be sent to your email address. 

4. Now you need to run the setup file which you downloaded. Once you have installed it, run the program. You will get a dialog in which you should fill in the email address you filled in on the facebook page, and the registration code which you received in the email. Then just hit 'Register'. That's it, enjoy! Have a happy Christmas.

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Peel an Onion to Procrastinate

We began the website with a heavy dose of productivity and wonderful ways to get things done. I feel I ought to balance this by writing about something that is purely designed for procrastination and wasting time.



There are of course countless ways on the Internet to waste your valuable, or maybe not so valuable time. But I only discovered this site recently and I've already spent hours on it. It's called The Onion, I don't want to ruin for it for anyone but you would have to be pretty dense not to notice it is a fake news website.  This site is quite well known in the USA, not so much in the UK, but it does focus on US 'news'.


All the headlines, such as “North Korean World Cup team takes two weeks to figure out rules of version of soccer that rest of world plays”, and the stories themselves, are hilarious and well crafted. As well as having great content the site is well designed, and if you just look at it without reading anything it would be very hard to distinguish it from an actual news source. But that it certainly is not.

You are not going to learn much, but you'll enjoy it.
Link : http://www.theonion.com

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Getting Things Done – Notes

If anyone has been here before and were expecting posts – sorry for not posting for such a long time. But knowing the likelihood of you (the person currently reading this) having been to this site before is very small indeed, I will proceed without any guilt.


We have already covered Tasks and Calendars in this trio of posts about productivity, now the final category: Notes. I will cover two of the best note taking services out there, both with unique features. I can say from personal experience that both of these services will really help you keep organised. I will look at: Microsoft Office OneNote and Evernote.
 

 

Microsoft Office OneNote 2010

OneNote is a rather undervalued member of Microsoft’s Office family, but I think it really has a lot to offer. It’s cleverly designed with notebooks, under which are sections which in turn consist of individual pages, giving the feel of using an actual notebook as well as easy ways of organising your content. It is very liberating as you are able to write anywhere, and all your text automatically gets a text box around it, enabling you to move it around.

As well as text, you can also create notes in the form of videos and sound recordings. The ability to draw is particularly useful if you have a tablet or touchscreen enabled PC as OneNote is able to recognise and convert handwriting to digital text. It is also able to recognise and process text within images. I find this particularly useful because I scan all of my hand outs or important documents in to OneNote, where I can convert the document to digital text or search through the text. 

OneNote 2010 has the ability to sync to the web. If you have a Windows Live account, you can synchronise selected notebooks to Microsoft’s free 25gb of storage in the cloud, SkyDrive. You will then be able to view and edit your notes from anywhere through your browser (not all browsers are compatible). Although the online editor, which can also be used with Word, PowerPoint and Excel files, is not nearly as feature filled as the paid desktop version, it is still more than enough for occasional use. The online syncing also enables sharing with others, and puts OneNote in contention with the other web based services I will cover.
Unfortunately, OneNote only has a mobile application for Windows devices. The lack of the ability to take notes on the move with popular smartphone devices is a key weakness.

Microsoft Office OneNote 2010 has a formidable feature set and the familiarity and ease of use of Microsoft Office. However, it is let down by the steep price.

Price: $79.99

URL: http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/onenote/

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Evernote

Evernote is currently seen as the biggest competitor to OneNote. It has nowhere near the same bulk of features, however, it’s cross platform capabilities and price (which is free), make it a very popular choice.

Evernote lets you take text, drawing, voice or video notes. These notes are organised by notebooks and tags. There are desktop applications for Windows and OSX as well as mobile applications for iOS, Android, Palm, Blackberry and Windows Mobile. All of these devices sync the notes to the web, therefore you can access all your notes from any one of these devices. You can also access all the notes through the web app, meaning you can view your notes from anywhere you have an internet connection. This is a key strength of Evernote.
Evernote, like OneNote, is able to recognise text within images, but it cannot convert them to digital text, only make them searchable. From what I have seen, Evernote is much better at recognising handwriting within images, but the lack of the ability to convert it makes this feature less useful. Evernote can also take screenshots and save them as notes (as can OneNote).

Evernote’s free accounts have a 40mb per month upload limit, and a limit on the type of files you can attach to each note. Premium account holders can add any type of file to the note, making it possible to use Evernote as an online storage solution, and they have a monthly upload limit of 500mb. Premium accounts are $5/month or $45/year.

If all you want is to make text or image based notes which are synced to all of your devices for free, Evernote is perfect. But if your looking for more advanced features, and don’t mind paying, OneNote may be a better choice.

Price: Free / Premium: $5/month or $45/year

URL: http://www.evernote.com

Rating:

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Getting Things Done - Tasks

Second post on productivity, all about task management services this time. Out of all three types of productivity services we are covering tasks seem to be the most pointless. Why should I write down my task? Moreover, why should I put it online? Surely we are all capable of remembering? Well, sometimes we don’t remember everything but writing your tasks down does a lot more than that. They are mainly motivational; I can say from personal experience that recording your to-do items physically help you get a lot more done. Recording them online, opens up a whole host of features and ways to get even more done! In this post I will be covering three services: Google Tasks,  Remember the Milk and Toodledo.

Google Tasks
 

Google tasks is not a separate service from Google, it is tightly built in to Gmail and Google Calendar, in this way it is very useful as a way to amplify your existing Google life. However, it is very minimalist and not exactly feature heavy. You can add a task with a due date, re arrange it, and tick it off once you’re done. That is about it. Its real strength is the integration with Mail and Calendar. For example, you can add an email to your tasks by simply ticking it and hitting ‘Add to Tasks’. In Calendar tasks with due dates show up in your Calendar on those dates so you can view them alongside your other events.

Tasks does offer a separate mobile version which is very easy to use, but there are no native apps offered by Google themselves, not even for Android.

Google tasks may just be the simple and reliable kind of thing you are looking for, however, it’s not good enough for me.

Price: Free

URL: http://www.gmail.com/tasks

Rating:

Remember the Milk

 

Remember the Milk, despite the curious name, is arguably one of the most well known and widely used task applications on the web, and for good reason. It provides a clean interface, behind which can be found a powerful toolkit of features. Tasks can be sorted in to lists and according to priority, given due dates and times, have a URL or location added to them or given repeats. For me the best feature is the “Smart Add”. From wherever you add the task, whether it be from the website, your mobile device etc., if you were to type “Take rubbish out tomorrow at 8am” RTM will understand “tomorrow at 8am” is the due time and set it to that. Therefore all your reminders and sorting according to due date will be done without you having to fill out a separate box. This is a great time saver and you can also add things like priority and repeats through the syntax using symbols such as @ and !.

RTM also has very handy ways of reminding you about your tasks. It can email you, SMS you (if you are on one of the supported networks), or even alert you through your instant messaging client. The most innovative reminder method I think is through Twitter. Once you have connected your accounts, RTM will send a direct message to you when a task is due, or every day with a summary of the day’s tasks. You can also add tasks by sending direct messages to @rtm with the previously mentioned syntax. If you have your mobile set up with twitter for SMS, you can get text reminders through Twitter but also add tasks from your phone by adding ‘dm rtm’ before your post. It also integrates with many other services, including Gmail as a Firefox and Chrome extension.

Remember the Milk has free apps for iOS devices and  Android and syncing for Blackberry and Windows Mobile but they all require a paid Pro account to use. There is a web app for iPhones (also requires pro account), as well as a normal mobile website for all internet enabled phones and devices.
RTM is a feature packed and very useful web application, especially if you are willing to pay. If you are looking for simplicity, it may not be for you.

Price: Free / Pro: $25/yr

URL: http://www.rmilk.com

Rating:

Toodledo

 

Toodledo is the most feature heavy website we are covering on this website. It offers everything Remember the Milk does (yes this is way of getting  out of listing all the features again), and more. One of the most significant features which Remember the Milk does not offer is subtasks, which Toodledo does. It is also a more complete service with notes, goals and file uploads. Much like Remember the Milk, Toodledo offers an iOS app, available for free accounts, but the app itself is not free. It also supports SMS reminders, Email reminders, Twitter support etc.

There is only one thing that makes choosing Toodledo over RTM a bit tricky. As you can see from the screenshot the interface is nowhere near as slick as Remember the Milk. The colours are painful and the layout is not very easy on the eye. However, if you look for substance over style, Toodledo is the one to go for.

Price: Free / Pro: $14.95/yr/ Plus:$29.95/yr

URL: http://www.toodledo.com

Rating:

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Getting Things Done - Calendars

This is our first ever post and its the fist in a series of three about a sector of the web which is steadily gaining ground, productivity. We will be showcasing the best the web has to offer in three areas of productivity: calendars, tasks and notes. Today we’re covering calendars; tasks and notes are coming up soon!

 

Calendars

Calendars, whether online, on your desktop or just hanging from your wall provide a great way to keep track of what your doing. They’re very effective in organising your commitments and schedule. Moving your calendar online, rather than keep it localised, brings a whole range of benefits, such as easy collaboration or family management. Let’s have a look at two services: Cozi and Google Calendar

Cozi 

Cozi is an extremely family orientated service, and feature packed to help family life run smoother. It has got a shared calendar, as well as shopping lists, to do lists, a family journal  and a photo collage screensaver maker. They offer a native iPhone app, which is very handy, however it is not free like the rest of the service, nor is it available in the UK. The website itself supports newer Blackberries and Windows Mobile. Other mobiles can receive reminders via SMS or email. As one reminder goes to all members, you can alert everyone to a piece of news via just one message, without the need for a mobile phone.

As it is meant to be used by all the family, the interface is very simple and easy to use. It is very useful for a busy family looking for a way to keep themselves organised, but not very good for someone hoping to streamline their working life or studies. However it is a well rounded, well thought out service, and it’s free so it’s worth a try.

Price: Free

URL: http://www.cozi.com

Rating:

 

Google Calendar

Google Calendar has long been a part of Google’s arsenal of web apps, and has become the most widely used web based calendar around. Through the Google Apps programme, many businesses and schools are relying on it as their primary method of time management and collaboration.

There are many reasons for its success, including the strong integration with other popular Google services such as Gmail, Tasks and Docs, its simplicity and ease of use , and enough features to compete with many paid services. Even though it is not as family orientated as Cozi, it is still very easy to share a calendar or invite many people to an event.

The ability to import and export calendars through multiple formats such as iCal and XML means that it works well with many other calendar programmes such as, Apple iCal, Mozilla Thunderbird or Microsoft Outlook (Outlook requires Calendar Sync to synchronise events). You can also add calendars from other public sources, for example, I have a UK holidays calendar, and during the Football World Cup I added a calendar which displayed the times of upcoming matches, but also the scores and scorers of previous matches. The site also supports adding custom ‘gadgets’ to centralise your web work.

Google Calendar, like most Google products, also works extremely well on mobile devices, especially if you have an Android or even iOS device. Although there is no native app on the iPhone like there is for Android, you can sync your existing calendar application to Google calendar beautifully through the Microsoft Exchange Protocol, or just use the web app, which is optimised for smartphones. Like Cozi, you can also send reminders of events to multiple mobile phones or email addresses.

Overall, Google Calendar is a feature filled and advanced but easy to use calendar, which can help just about anyone get organised.

Price: Free

URL: http://www.google.com/calendar

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Obviously there are many other calendar services, not to mention many multi-function applications which integrate calendars. Hopefully some of these will be covered in the next two posts but if you think I’ve missed out a crucial one leave a comment with your suggestion.

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Brave New Site

Our Logo. Like it?

Welcome to WebMaze, a brand new website/blog, providing tips, tutorials and tech news to all wishing to navigate the maze that is the internet. The site will be regularly updated with matters concerning the web and ways you can make your web life more productive or enjoyable. Speaking of productivity, look out for our first post on the very matter coming soon. Get ready to enter the Maze!

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