Truveo: an IE8 Add On Accelerator

An Internet Explorer add on, Truveo, the AOL video search engine, relaunched a couple of months ago. Frankly, its awesome. If you haven't seen it yet, take a look at Truveo, then come back here. It doesn't host videos. It searches all over the web for videos related to your search term. Places you haven't even heard of that are putting up videos. These are displayed as channels on the left side of the page. It goes and finds them for you.

The Truveo add on for Internet Explorer 8 comes as an Accelerator with a preview. Once you have added it either by the tools menu or going straight to the IE8 add on gallery here you will be able to use it as any other Accelerator.
Highlight text and click on the accelerator icon that pops up. Choose "Browse videos with Truveo" and a preview will appear. You can wait on the preview or click again to open another tab in your IE8 browser for the Trueveo results.

I went looking for videos by the emerging band Lightning Dust. You can see the steps and results on this post. You can use Truveo to find vids for any topic, TV shows that are released on the web, how to vids, enviromental or even music videos. Have fun. Your comments and questions are welcome.

Best Free Music and Lyrics Accelerator Add On for Internet Explorer 8

This IE8 accelerator, FoxyTunes, is one of the best free music and lyrics search accelerators for Internet Explorer 8. Besides allowing you to control your music player from the toolbar it provides a plethora of information about any artist or song you are listening to. The "i" button (See #1) on the FoxyTunes toolbar produces an always on top box that allows access to the juiced up search and explore accelerators for this free music add on.



Click the down arrow (See #2)on the Explore tab for more selective options. Notice it calls this FoxyTunes Planet. It delivers. Clicking on that tab or artist option will open a new tab in Internet Explorer 8. This will start like you expect with a picture and bio of the artist or band then it opens up areas for Rhapsody, videos on Yahoo and Youtube, list of top tracks and albums, photos on Flicker... and it goes on. This Internet Explorer 8 accelerator goes out across the planet and brings back a ton of interesting and useful sites about the music you listen to.

Using FoxyTunes to find free music lyrics is easy. A box for lyrics appears on the right side if you use planet option. Another way to find free music lyrics with this IE 8 accelerator is to use the search function (See #3 below).



So, what if you don't have your new favorite song. There is a little Tab on the left side of the window to open up Rhapsody. It provides 25 free plays.



To give you a better idea of what this free music and lyrics accelerator for IE8 looks like I have provided a few screen shots of FoxyTunes Planet. I was listening to "Yesterday" - 30 Seconds to Mars. First view: Band logo, music on Rhapsody, lyrics for "Yesterday."



Second view: Band bio, Videos on Yahoo!, music on Last.fm and photos at Flickr.



Third view: Top albums, Yahoo! search results, YouTube videos and albums at Amazon.



If you listen to music on your PC and want more info such as band bios and free music lyrics this is a great add on for you.

IE8 Accelerators

How to use Internet Explorer 8 Accelerators

Windows IE8 Accelerators allow you to rapidly acquire information from other sources without leaving the page you are on. Highlight the text and a little blue icon with an arrow appears above and to the left. In the first image I highlighted the term “System Restore” from my last blog entry. Click on it and a list of Accelerator options opens up (Image 2) . You can start a blog entry, do a search, write email or have the term translated. Click on desired function and it will open in a tab next to the one you are using.


More Accelerators
Need something else? There are Accelerators for Stocks, Music, Click on All Accelerators. Another list of options pops up with more options. Still don’t see your favorite app? Click “Find More Accelerators.” This will take you to the Internet Explorer 8 Add-ons Gallery. I added about four more Accelerators while doing this blog entry. There are about 100 and I imagine more are being added every day, but, apparently there are only so many slots you can use. Four in the first menu. Twelve or so in the second menu. So you may have to pick and choose. Some Accelerators use Web Slices, allowing you to see a pied=ce of the page it is pointing to.






How to Remove Unwanted Accelerators
Removing unwanted Accelerators is easy. Highlight a phrase. Click the blue arrow Accelerator icon. Click All Accelerators. At the bottom of the next menu choose Manage Accelerators.
An alternative way to get to the Manage Accelerators function is to click on Tools. Look for Manage Add-ons about four items down from the top of the menu. This will open the Manage Add-ons application. On the left side you will see Accelerators. Clicking on that puts you on the Manage Accelerators page.

To remove an Accelerator select it. The remove button will appear at the bottom of the page. Click it. Now you have room to add another Accelerator. :)

Changing a Category

Looking at my Accelerators I see there is one in an odd category. The MSN Stock Charter has been dropped in the Define Category. To change that select it. At the bottom of the page you will see the properties appear. To the right of Category is Define (Or whatever the mislabel is for your Accelerator). Select the link “change” next to that.

A small window will pop up allowing you to redefine the category. I changed it to Stocks for this Accelerator.



Well, now you know just about everything you need to about Windows IE8 Accelerators. So crank up your new Internet Explorer 8 browser and have fun with your Accelerators.

Questions and comments about IE8 are welcome.

How to Uninstall IE8 Vista or XP

Are you trying to figure out how to uninstall IE8? So you tried the new Internet Explorer 8 browser from Microsoft and its not up to your expectations. Perhaps your computer is crashing,freezing up or moving at the pace of a snail charging up a hill. Maybe IE8 starts then blinks off. Too many new fangled add-ons? Whatever the reason, you can get rid of it.

How to Uninstall IE8 Vista

Your first problem may be finding the program so that you can uninstall it. Many of us are still not use to the ways things are arranged in Vista. If you are using the classic view in your control panel you will need to switch back to the Vista View. The following steps will take you through the process.

Go to Start in the lower left hand corner of your screen.

Select your Control Panel. If you are using Classic View change to Vista view by clicking on Control Panel Home in the top left corner of your window.

Click Programs. Do not click “Uninstall programs” here. Internet Explorer 8 is classified as an update.

Under Programs and Features click View installed updates.


Look for Windows Internet Explorer 8, select and click on Uninstall at the top of the page or you can right click on Windows Internet Explorer 8 and select Uninstall that way.
From there just follow the directions as they pop up on your screen.

How to uninstall IE8 XP

If you need to uninstall Windows Internet Explorer 8 from XP These steps will see you through the process.

Click the Start Button in the lower left corner of your Desktop.

Select your Control Panel.
Then choose Add or Remove Programs.
From the list of programs pick Windows Internet Explorer 8
Click the Remove button.

When you are finished you will need to restart your computer.

Giving Internet Explorer 8 Another Chance
If you decide to give IE8 another try make sure you do your backups and set a System Restore Point. You may also have fewer problems if you reset your internet options in IE7 to their defaults before you download IE8. You can do this by clicking on Tools on the menu bar, selecting Internet Options, then the Advanced Tab. On that page click Restore advanced settings and Reset under Reset Internet Explorer settings. Click Apply and OK. Close all windows and restart your computer before downloading IE8. This clears any wrong settings in IE7 which when imported during the installation may cause havoc in the IE8 environment.

Share your experience or suggestions on how to uninstall IE8 Vista or XP in the comments.

Download IE8

My experience with the Download of IE8 went well except for a small glitch which was easy to overcome. Before we get into that let's cover some basics

System Requirements. Generally, Windows Vista or Windows XP with Service Pack 2 and 512 MB of memory.

Precautions. Do backups and set a system restore point. You can do this by going to the start button in the lower left corner of your desktop. Click all programs. Select Accessories. Select System Tools. Select System Restore. Follow the directions.

According to the release notes for Internet Explorer 8 there have been a few problems brought on by incorrect settings in IE 7. If these settings are wrong Internet Explorer 8 will blink and close when you try to start it. So, if you have changed your Internet settings in IE 7 you may want to reset them before you install Internet Explorer 8. Otherwise you may have to uninstall IE 8, reset your settings in IE 7 and reinstall IE 8.

Download IE8: My Experience. For the most part my experience downloading Internet Explorer 8 went smoothly. I went to the homepage at Microsoft, clicked the big button on the page and waited.

A moment later a new window appeared. “Thank you for choosing Internet Explorer 8,” and a few steps to follow. Wait a minute. The window showed in Step 1 did not appear on my laptop.

Download IE8: Minor Glitch. There was a small problem with my download of Internet Explorer 8. The little window which offers the option to save or run did not open on my computer. My mind was just beginning to form some very nasty thoughts concerning Microsoft when I noticed the sentence above the illustration. "If your download does not start automatically click here."



"Oh," I thought, "they knew me and my computer were coming."

A little fearfully I moved my mouse to the "click here." At this point I was beginning to have reservations about upgrading. Internet Explorer and I have never become friends. Do I really want to put this on my Toshiba? My backups are done and the restore point has been set. After a moment of thought I decided to continue the transfer to this new browser.

A new window opened: Internet Explorer and Worldwide sites. In this window I was asked to select to select my country (United States) and to designate the operating system I was using. I knew I was using Vista but was it the 64 bit or regular. I opened my control panel and clicked on System. The information there told me I have a 32 bit operating system. I selected "Windows Vista" from the list and continued with the upgrade.

Download IE8: Time. The download went smoothly from here taking only about five minutes for my connection. I live in a rural area and use a satellite dish to find my way to the Internet. The speed for me was faster than it would be for someone with dialup and slower for me than it would be for someone with DSL or cable. I remember seeing on the Microsoft site that the time for those with a 56k modem would be about thirty minutes. I imagine for those with cable it would be near instantaneous.

The installation took a few more minutes. The Download IE8 installation was done before I could make a cup of coffee. There was a supplemental license concerning the new features Search Suggestions and Accelerator previews. More on these in a future post.

In case you don't have it yet here is the link for the free download of IE8 at Microsoft.

Share your experience with Download IE8 in the comments.

IE8: Internet Explorer 8 for Beginers

Welcome to IE8, Internet Explorer 8 for Beginners. This site provides tips and techniques for beginning users of Internet Explorer 8. If you don't already have the new IE8 you can get the free download from Microsoft.

Free IE8, Internet Explorer 8 Download