surfing

BitTorrent Surf is a new Chrome add-on (download) that turns the browser into a torrent client. While that's not an innovation on its own, this is the first time the company has built a complete torrent-manager for the browser.

In development for the past six months, according to the BitTorrent blog announcing the add-on, Surf lets you find torrents on the Web and download them.

Still in rough alpha, Surf goes beyond that. It allows for automatic torrent detection when you navigate to a site, and you can save favorite sites to "create your own combined engine," … Read more

A few days after the Windows 8 operating system went on sale and started generating significant revenue, Microsoft was slapped with a lawsuit by a company no one had ever heard of. The suit targets the core design feature of the new Windows 8 user interface -- the Live Tiles that surface dynamically updated information, such as tweets, photos, notifications and weather data, on the home screen of Windows 8 devices.

Read: Microsoft sued over Live Tiles

SurfCast's bare-bones Web site is short on corporate details, such as who is actually running the show. … Read more

Safari has been Apple's Web browser for many years, and the company keeps making improvements to it at regular intervals. Originally designed to be a Web browser with the Mac OS look and feel, Safari has been part of the Apple family a long time. Apple support isn't the only reason to use it, though; it has other strengths.

With the latest releases, you can do many tasks that used to require multiple apps or a lot of keystrokes. For example, you can send a tweet or post content to Facebook from within Safari. If you visit a … Read more

Tor stands for The Onion Router. Imagine each layer of an onion is a server. That's essentially how Tor lets you surf the Web safely and anonymously, and with no creepy Web ads that have obviously been tracking you. The trouble with Tor is the trouble with onions: they can be overwhelming. ThankSoft's Mask Surf Pro makes it easy to use the Tor network yet offers advanced features like the capability to choose which host country to emulate. Developers can use it to test how their tools or Web pages perform in specific regions or under certain browser … Read more

Web Search Pro from Captain Caveman offers an innovative way of doing Internet searches. The free Firefox extension allows the user to determine beforehand how the search is to be conducted. In essence, it is like instructing the browser where to look. For example, typing a particular topic and telling it to look in Wikipedia will bring you to a specific Wiki page on the topic.

Sadly, there is no Help file to aid the new user. This would have been helpful in explaining the Drag & Drop Zone functionality of the application, which is probably its best feature. It … Read more

Those Angry Birds are still angry even though they can now hang out on the beach with 15 new levels.

Flying in today to iPhone and iPad users, version 2.2 of the original Angry Birds nestles in with a whole new set of challenges.

A new section dubbed Surf and Turf offers 15 levels where you can slingshot the angry birds at the piggies just trying to get a tan at the beach. As usually, the levels start off easy but get more difficult as you move along.

But don't worry, if you bump into trouble getting through … Read more

Axis, Yahoo's new standalone Web browser for iOS (and extension for desktop versions of Google Chrome, Firefox, and Safari), embodies some really neat ideas about surfing the Web, especially on the touch screen. The app keeps the bloat to a minimum, and offers tools that make searching and browsing a snap. Unfortunately, like every third-party browser, Axis suffers from Apple's restrictions in that it can't be set as the default browser.

Axis has a helpful tutorial overlay when you get started, but it doesn't take long to explore the cool and unique features of this Web … Read more

Popular Web sites are the bane of any would-be productive day's existence and, fortunately, there are ways to help. 

If willpower isn't your thing, there are lots of programs out there that can block access to Web sites. The problem with a lot of these programs is that you have to manually disable the block--if your conviction really falters your can still unblock it before your work gets done.

FocalFilter is a program for Windows operating systems that can block a user-generated list of Web sites for a specified period of time. The lock on these sites … Read more

Microsoft has acquired video search engine VideoSurf, several reports claim.

According to Israel-based news outlet Globes, Microsoft has acquired VideoSurf for "tens of millions of dollars." In a follow-up report, TechCrunch Europe cited an anonymous source who claimed Microsoft acquired the company for $70 million.

Neither Microsoft nor VideoSurf immediately responded to CNET's request for confirmation of the deal.

If Microsoft did, in fact, acquire VideoSurf, the company will likely be used to improve Bing. VideoSurf allows users to search for video content around the Web from a host of sources, including Hulu, Dailymotion, Comedy Central, and … Read more