EMDB is a powerful database that makes it easy to keep track of your movie collection.

How easy? To add a movie you simply enter its title, click the Search IMDB button, and EMDB will track down matching movies for you. Choose the right one and it automatically finds and fills in details like the cover art, cast, genre, director, duration and a whole lot more.

You can then customise the entry with a rating, or more specific information about your copy. Like, is it a VHS tape, DVD, Blu-ray disc, something else? Is it a PAL, SECAM or NTSC copy? Which region is it? And the list goes on.

Or, if you're in a hurry, you can just click OK and add this particular movie to your collection. Which is very nicely displayed, with your movie cover art images laid out on a virtual shelf (although you can also opt for a more ordinary text-based list, if you like).

Once you've finished then the database can have several possible applications. You're able to use it to track movies you've loaned to others, for instance. Or to create Wish Lists of movies you like, but just haven't got around to buying yet.

And if you've a particularly impressive collection, then the Export option will allow you to save its details on HTML pages, ready for uploading to a website and sharing with the world.

What's new in 3.14?

- IMDb import: Fixed importing of plot outline.
- Database: Added Auro-3D 9.1, 10.1 and 11.1 Audio stream formats.
- Translations: Updated the Arabic, Simplified Chinese and Dutch translations.

EMDB is a powerful database that makes it easy to keep track of your movie collection.

How easy? To add a movie you simply enter its title, click the Search IMDB button, and EMDB will track down matching movies for you. Choose the right one and it automatically finds and fills in details like the cover art, cast, genre, director, duration and a whole lot more.

You can then customise the entry with a rating, or more specific information about your copy. Like, is it a VHS tape, DVD, Blu-ray disc, something else? Is it a PAL, SECAM or NTSC copy? Which region is it? And the list goes on.

Or, if you're in a hurry, you can just click OK and add this particular movie to your collection. Which is very nicely displayed, with your movie cover art images laid out on a virtual shelf (although you can also opt for a more ordinary text-based list, if you like).

Once you've finished then the database can have several possible applications. You're able to use it to track movies you've loaned to others, for instance. Or to create Wish Lists of movies you like, but just haven't got around to buying yet.

And if you've a particularly impressive collection, then the Export option will allow you to save its details on HTML pages, ready for uploading to a website and sharing with the world.

What's new in 3.14?

- IMDb import: Fixed importing of plot outline.
- Database: Added Auro-3D 9.1, 10.1 and 11.1 Audio stream formats.
- Translations: Updated the Arabic, Simplified Chinese and Dutch translations.

You’ve got all that media – photos, videos, recorded TV, music and more – scattered across your network, and now there’s a load of online media to tap into as well. How can you possibly keep on top of it all while making it possible to access your media while away from home on your portable device?

Plex is one possible solution. It allows you to share the media content – photos, music, video and recorded TV – from selected folders on the host computer as well as any network shares, but that’s not all. Plex also lets you tap into online content too, allowing your clients to access internet-hosted media like YouTube, NetFlix and more through the same interface. These are served via the use of special Plex PMS Plug-ins, some of which are included with the main download, while others are available for separate download and install.

Plex comes in two parts: this is the Media Server, which you need to install on the PC or Mac that’s hosting all the media content you wish to share. Note, previous Mac builds combined both media server and client in a single application – this is no longer the case from 0.9.5 onwards.

Setup is relatively simple, but easier on the Mac than Windows – visit the wiki for full instructions (click the 'Laika' link). Your library can be organised according to four types of content: TV shows, movies, pictures and music. Select which folders – network shares as well as folders – to make accessible, and they’ll be made available to your clients, complete with metadata that helps identify the content being played, including artist bios for music and movie descriptions for video.

Then all you need to do is install the client software and your library will be available for streaming on that Mac, PC or portable device. Get the Plex Media Center client for Windows and Mac, or Plex for Android and iOS mobile devices.

Both at home and in the office, we all have a great deal of information that needs organising. From contacts to appointments, EssentialPIM is a powerful personal information manager that makes it easy to keep on top of an ever-growing amount of information. The ability to store all of your email, addresses, lists and notes in one place makes the program a one stop shop for your organisational needs.

There are three versions of EssentialPIM available. The free version includes all of the basic features of the program while upgrading to Pro edition adds a number of useful extra including advanced encryption and multi-user access. Other Pro features include the ability to create desktop sticky notes, synchronisation with Palm and Windows Mobile devices as well as Outlook and Google Calendar, and an advanced backup facility.

The network version of the program has been designed with small to medium sized businesses in mind and makes it easy to share information between workers. Proving a network is already in place, nothing extra is needed to take advantage of the powerful features of EssentialPIM Pro Network which makes it easy to co-ordinate a group of workers.

For version 7.64 changes (see the full changelog for more):

- Improved synchronization of tasks with Toodledo
- Much faster import of huge iCal files
- Better EPIM handling on systems with multiple monitors
- Improvements related to synchronization with EPIM Cloud and to synchronization of Android EPIM with WinEPIM (running on Chinese Windows) 
- Fixed lots of problems in Mail module
- Other minor bug fixes

FireAlpaca is a powerful paint application, crammed with interesting functions and features.

At a minimum, you can launch the program, choose a brush and start drawing. Preset brushes include Pen, Pencil, AirBrush, Watercolor, Leaf, Flower, Star, Eraser, Blur, Smudge and more.

Selecting any brush displays a preview and - sometimes - assorted settings you can tweak. Choose "Star", say, and you're able to adjust particle size, rotation, hue jitter, colour jitter, randomisation factors and more.

FireAlpaca isn't an image editor, but it gives you plenty of related tools for working on your picture: rotate, flip, resize, canvas size, filters, selections, and layer support to keep everything organised.

There are unusual perspective tools, including concentration lines, multiple perspective views, and the ability to snap to 3D objects, like a cube, by using 3D perspective.

The program has a number of features aimed at comic book artists, including some built-in panel layouts and templates.

There are plenty of other bonus features to explore, and FireAlpaca is surprisingly configurable. For example, an "Environment Setting" dialog has tweaks for zoom operations, coordinate systems, pen pressure detection, antialiasing, right-button operations, tablet usage, and more.

What's new in 2.1.1 (see changelog for more)?

- Bug fixed.

ImBatch is an interesting batch processing tool which can convert, resize, rotate and carry out other operations on lots of images in a single operation.

Adding images is as easy as dragging and dropping them onto the program, and ImBatch supports plenty of file formats: BMP, DIB, RLE, TIF, TIFF, FAX, G3N, G3F, XIF, GIF, JPG, JPEG, JPE, JIF, PCX, PNG, TGA, TARGA, VDA, ICB, VST, PIX, PXM, PPM, PGM, PBM, WBMP, JP2, J2K, JPC, J2C, DCX, DAT, PSD, WDP and HDP.

Clicking "Add Task" then allows you to choose exactly what you'd like to do with these files. The options available are "Save As" (convert format), "Resize", "Rotate", "Soft Shadow", "Flip", "Round Corners", "Convert Colours", "Convert to Gray", "Set Tag", "Remove Tags" and "Shift Time" (the final 3 all relate to EXIF tags).

As you combine these tasks, so a Live Preview window shows you what they'll do to your target image.

There's even a task command to upload your processed images to Facebook, so you won't have the hassle of doing this manually.

Version 5.9.1 (see full changelog):

- 'Optimize For Web' task: added "Preserve Structure" option.
- 'Time Shift' task: fixed task work.
- Fixed preserving of the original date/time of files, if the corresponding option is selected in the settings, but 'Save as' task was not added.
- Fixed preserving of the original date/time of files, if the corresponding option is selected in the settings, when saving in the EXIF/IPTC Editor.