January 3, 2008
Free Website Offer Real Solutions

By Dave Maxwell

2008 is going to be a very good year for website material. More and more people are finding almost everything they need online. The list of website grows each year by leaps and bounds. It is always useful to find sites that provide free, valuable services that can make life easier and save you time.

Microsoft Office is the leader in office suites. Businesses worldwide use it for documents, spreadsheets, and presentations. Students use it, beginning even in elementary school. Today’s modern household probably uses it in one form or another.

However, as popular as it is, Microsoft Office is not used by everyone, which can make it inconvenient to work on files from home. And you may not be able to edit files sent to you from another person. Be concerned no longer. Thinkfreeonline.com has you covered. This internet service can be used on any computer to edit MS Office documents. It can be used to create new Word, Excel and PowerPoint compatible documents.

Many PDF files are ubiquitous. Organizations use them because they can be read on any computer. The formatting doesn’t change. But working with PDF is not easy without a PDF editor which can prove to be expensive. However, you can go online and visit pdffiller.com. Although you won’t be able to change the text in the file, it will let you fill out PDF forms. It’s a user-friendly system, just click and start typing. You can even reposition your text to line everything up. Printing is also easy, just click the button.

Need to send a big computer file via email? This has not been a good idea in the past. Many internet service providers will reject them. If you have videos or large photos you want to send, you need another solution. It’s called YouSendit.com. You can send up to 100 megabytes – equal to two encyclopedia volumes – to your email destination. The person on the other end will get an email with a download link to the file. If you frequently send larger files, the company provides a pay service for such needs.

Want to get photographs from your cell phone? Try Photobucket.com. When you sign up, it’s free so don’t worry, you get one gigabyte of storage. That’s equal to 10 yards of books on a library shelf, for photos and videos. You can also upload photos directly from your cell phone.

And finally, for having fun on the computer with maps, Microsoft’s Maps.Live.com kicks things up a notch. Using its Virtual Earth 3D feature, you can explore cities in three dimensions. You’ll see buildings and attractions close up from all angles. Most major U.S. cities are included and Microsoft is working to add more.