Tag: app-subdomain-redirection:stylish

Everyone on Tumblr knows just how many different themes there are to choose from. You can customize your account on the popular microblogging website with virtually hundreds of different options. Apart from a few select days where Tumblr made site-wide color alterations to recognize special events however, user dashboards have always been a relatively uninteresting (and somewhat ironic) shade of Facebook blue.

No more however, at least for Firefox and Chrome users. Now, thanks to the helpful add-on Stylish, you can customize your dashboard as you see fit.

There are lots of different dashboard designs to choose from. My personal favorite place to look is UserStyles, a site dedicated to assisting web surfers in styling the web any way they choose, and making it their own unique browsing experience. As you may have guessed, the site has a page dedicated specifically to designs for Tumblr dashboards.

Installation is a snap. All you need to do is have the required browser and install the corresponding Stylish add-on. Just browse the available design options on UserStyles after that and click the “install” button on the upper left of the screen when you find one you like. In a few seconds, your dashboard will be transformed.

A word to the wise, however: Stylish only currently works with Firefox and Chrome browsers. Also be aware that, while incredibly cool looking, some of the darker designs make it impossible to see text input if you actually have something to post or reblog. If you’re on Tumblr primarily for browsing though, you should be fine. The uninstall process is also very simple if you decide later you’d rather revert back to Tumblr’s default dashboard colors.

Now that your dashboard’s been all prettied up, you should also consider backing up your Tumblr posts. For a site that’s notorious for its “We’ll be back shortly” downtime messages, you can never be too safe!

If you love using a certain application or program but wish you could just tweak the interface in a few minor (and even some major) ways, then usually there’s not much you can do beyond the options presented in the program preferences. However, while tinkering with the look of Google Reader the other day, I came across a superb Firefox plugin called Stylish which basically rearranges the CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) of hundreds of web-app interfaces to your liking. As the developers say, “Stylish is to CSS what Greasemonkey is to JavaScript.” Stylish is not dangerous because doesn’t make any fundamental changes to a program’s structure – it merely changes the cosmetics of the program by tinkering with the CSS.

Once you’ve installed the Stylish plugin into Firefox, you’ve opened the world to a whole range of user created interfaces and application interface tweaks on the Stylish directory that would simply be impossible to do otherwise (unless it’s an open source app and you’ve got some coding knowledge).

Don’t like the look of your sidebar in Google Reader? Then simply download one of the many “styles” that users have created for that particular application and the look is instantly altered. When you download a style, there is an option to preview how it will make your application look although this didn’t work for me. However, installing and removing styles is so quick and easy that you don’t really need this option – style changes are instantaneous.

The only drawback of stylish is the way that some users label and annotate their different styles. Some of them don’t really explain (or show a screenshot) of how the application will look when you’ve altered it which means the only way to find out is to download it. I was actually looking for a way to extend the subscription sidebar in Google Reader so that I could see all my subscriptions without having to scroll down but despite trying several styles, drew a blank. Currently popular styles include a dark grey interface for YouTube, an improved Add Bookmark dialogue and an alternative look for Gmail.

However, the sheer number and range of applications and programs you can change with Stylish is truly impressive – chances are, if you want to change the look of an app or program, you can with Stylish.

Taking a screenshot is not just a question of having the right window opened in front of you and then pressing the Prntscrn key. They say a picture is worth a thousand words, so you should choose the screen capturing tool you’re going to use very carefully.

If you’d like to have professional-looking screenshots, RumShot is probably your best choice. It’s a free snapshot tool with which not only can you take snapshots from your screen in a variety of ways, but also add some original effects to them. Rumshot is very easy to use: simply overlay its transparent interface window over the area you want to capture and press the Take Screenshot button. The only drawback is that you can’t resize the capturing window, but the funny part comes right after taking the snapshot. Time for some effects!

As default, Rumshot features only one simple frame, but if you download this pack from the developer’s pack and copy all the included files into the My Documents\Rumshot Themes folder, you’ll get an impressive 67 different frames and borders you can apply right to your captured image. Some of them follow more traditional design styles but there are others that can make your screenshots look like a 3D monitor, a mobile phone, a photo collage, a Sony PSP, a filmstrip or an ancient scroll.

So next time you need to produce a bunch of stylish snapshots, give Rumshot a go. You won’t be disappointed.

Kitty Spangles Solitaire is a suite of 40 different variations of solitaire, among which you”ll find Klondike, Freecell or Spider. The game is set in a stylish, shiny interface which you can customize with one of the multitude of themes made available. All games can be played with up to 7 other players and all user statistics will be saved every time you play.