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How To Kill Time Productively On Your Phone Blogger Tony Hirst spent a few minutes mixing the RSS and KML feeds from Google’s Calendar and Maps functions and, with the help of Yahoo Pipes, came up with a fantastic mashup: Mapped Google Calendar events. That means, for example, opening your customised map to see that you’ve got grocery shopping and a post office stop in one part of town, so you might want to seek out an ATM near there to avoid excess driving. The mashup requires a little Pipes work, and also a public GCal feed, but once you’ve got it working, you can then add your GCal items to “My Maps” or even embed them on your own start page. In short, people like our reader Mike might have a great solution for getting directions and coordinate timing for their schedules. Displaying Google Calendar Events on a Map [OUseful Info via Google Operating System]
Windows/Mac/Linux: With pictures, videos, and high-resolution fonts, slideshows can make up some pretty big files—fine if you’ve got a large enough thumb drive or CD-R, but what if you have to email? Sun Presentation Manager, a free extension for OpenOffice, shrinks down files by compressing graphics, deleting hidden slides, and creating static versions of linked objects. It works similar to the PowerPoint-based PPTminimizer, but without the fee and exclusive Office platform—you can use the extension on either OpenOffice files or imported PowerPoint projects. Sun Presentation Manager is a free download, and requires OpenOffice 2.3 or StarOffice 8 or later. Sun Presentation Minimizer [via Linux.com]
Windows/Mac/Linux: Vidalia, a free, open-source, cross-platform application, makes setting up and configuring Web proxy tool Tor a snap, allowing you to surf the internet anonymously with a turn on/turn off utility. VIdalia sets up your system and helps you connect to, and monitor, Tor relays around the world, even letting you see the route your browsing is taking at the moment. You can also monitor bandwidth usage and set up your own Tor relay if you want to contribute, but Vidalia’s main appeal is the bundling of software and configuration tools that make Tor easy enough for anyone to use. Vidalia is a free download for Windows, Mac, and Linux systems. Vidalia [via Hackosis]
Free (during beta) project management web app LiquidPlanner is, at a glance, yet another competitor for Microsoft Project, but the time- and task-tracking tool takes a slightly different approach to goals and deadlines. Using what its creators dub “probabilistic” scheduling, LiquidPlanner asks its users to enter a range of dates for task completion, based on best-case and worst-case situations, and it then judges the likelihood of that and other tasks being completed by a given date. Most of the standard Project-like tools are there as well, along with some collaboration tools like a group discussion wiki and easy document sharing. I haven’t found a tool to import Project files, however, so open source solutions like OpenProj and GanttProject might be better solutions for those already set up MS-style. LiquidPlanner is free to use during its public beta and requires a sign-up for all users. LiquidPlanner [via eHub]
Windows/Mac/Linux (Firefox): WebMynd, a free add-on for Firefox, makes it easy to browse through web pages you’ve visited or specifically “webmarked,” whether they’re static or dynamically generated. Although you can tell WebMynd not to monitor certain pages and turn its history noting on and off, the add-on generally works as a background service, taking snapshots of the pages you visit. Hit the WebMynd button and you can see thumbnails of those pages. Click on the thumbnails and you get fully browse-able snapshots, with links, images and other data preserved. For hunting down links and images on pages that change pretty frequently, or just getting a more easily-navigated history, WebMynd serves a purpose. WebMynd is free to download, works wherever Firefox does, and lets you browse a week’s history at no cost; $US10 and $US20 subscriptions get you six months or a year’s worth of snapshots. WebMynd [via Download Squad]
The PicLens browser extension, which creates fullscreen photo slideshows from Flickr pages, Google, or Yahoo image searches and many more locations, has made itself available for Safari, Firefox, and Internet Explorer. Nifty. [via]
Windows only: My Lockbox isn’t a full-featured encryption solution like TrueCrypt, but it is an easy and free way to hide a folder from all but the most technically savvy (and extremely prying) eyes. Install the program, choose a folder you want to hide (or let it create a “My Lockbox” in your My Documents folder) and then run the program to unlock and add files to it. Shutting down the program or even booting into safe mode won’t reveal your folder, unlike many other “hiding” utilities, and even looking at folder sizes won’t reveal your data. Somebody with a recovery disk and knowledge that you’re hiding something might breach your data, but for most people’s needs, My Lockbox gets the (secret) job done. My Lockbox is a free download for Windows 2000 and later. My Lockbox [via Freeware Genius]
One year ago on Lifehacker, you learned how to burn any video file to a playable DVD.
US-centric: MSNBC highlights how to invoke Rule 240 to get a new flight fast any time your flight is cancelled for anything other than weather. I invoked Rule 240—which states that in the event of any flight delay or cancellation caused by anything other than weather, the airline would fly me on the next available flight—not their next available flight, which might not leave for another 24 hours. And guess what happened? A lot of United passengers made it to Boston that day&mdash on American.
A relic of pre-deregulation airlines, the article says that most newer airlines won’t honor rule 240, but apparently most of the older airlines still respect this rule as a matter of company policy. If you know anything more about rule 240—maybe you’ve invoked it yourself?—let’s hear about it in the comments. For more details, check out Consumerist’s rather extensive guide to Rule 240. Photo by dougww. Stranded at the airport? Don’t forget Rule 240 [MSNBC]
Rollup keyboards can be a fantastic, portable solution to travel with your laptop. They’re often cheapy novelty products or they’re expensive. But the Hack a Day blog turned up an example of a DIY roll up keyboad which was made from a normal keyboard. Considering you can pick up a decent keyboard for around $20 this could be a good solution if you’re confident in your ability to take a apart a keyboard using a screwdriver – and gluing keys on the transparent membrane you find inside.
Make your own Roll-Up Keyboard [Instructables via Hack a Day]
