Picasa
Google's image viewer automatically indexes every image on your computer at launch; finds "the pictures you forgot you had" (and wish you had deleted); then lets you move them all around until you are happy with them. The interface is luxurious and very convenient for rapid browsing. It lets you rename pictures from within the program or caption them while they are being displayed. If you also have Google Earth, the Geotagging feature lets you place a thumbnail of the image directly on to a Google aerial photo/map, clickable to the original.
Picasa is as much an organizational tool as it is an image viewer. Among its most useful features is Timeline which lets you scroll through your pictures in chronological order. Picasa is available in many languages, including Thai, Tagalog (spoken in the Philippines by about 22 million people), and Turkish.
Comment
Picasa is a typical Google product: highly professional, very clever, but a bit aggressive -- especially with its tendency to ferret out material without asking. However, it is free, so it could scarcely be better value, and it has some great features (like RAW support) that are lacking in certain commercial browsing software. Note: it is not an online application and requires Windows.
Tech info
- OS: Windows 2000 onward
- Price level: FREE
Google is attempting to "organise the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful." It has made significant progress in this endeavor, with the world's largest search engine, Google Maps, and Scholar.
From the same vendor:
- Blogger
- Google Chrome
- Google Earth
- Picasa Web Albums
- SketchUp
- Talk
- YouTube
©trl