Tuesday, February 5, 2008
ID3
11:30PM Tamar Weinberg | One year ago on Lifehacker, alum Rick Broida taught you how to whip up your MP3 library by fixing the ID3 tags. More »
Better YouTube Firefox Extension Updated with New Features
8:00PM Gina Trapani | Firefox only: Just uploaded a new release of the Better YouTube Firefox extension, a compilation of user scripts that enhance YouTube. The update fixes bugs due to a site redesign, and adds features like an alternate video player that does not autoplay (but does auto-load video in the background while it’s paused) and a handy link to download the video you’re watching. Current users can get the update through Firefox’s Add-ons dialog; everyone else, hit the link to download. Better YouTube Firefox Extension More »
Manage Your Tracking Numbers with Track My Shipments
3:00PM Adam Pash | US-centric: Web site TrackMyShipments automatically tracks packages from any delivery company by examining the shipping email and adding any shipments to your tracking queue. It works like this: You sign up for TrackMyShipments, then forward any shipping confirmation email (you know, those “Your order has shipped” emails) to track@trackmyshipments.com. The webapp identifies your email address and automatically detects the tracking number and company from your email, and starts tracking the package. Their site displays the status of the package and its current location on a map, and you can use it to set up email or SMS alerts for deliveries. With TrackMyShipments, keeping track of all your various packages is as simple as forwarding an email. TrackMyShipments More »
Migrate All Your Old Gmail to a New Gmail Address
2:00PM Adam Pash | The email address you chose when signing up for Gmail seemed completely hilarious when you first signed up, but after a year of sending resumes to employers from strangelove45@gmail.com, you may be reconsidering your choice. Luckily with Gmail’s easy-to-use Mail Fetcher feature and POP3 access, you can easily import all of your old emails to your new, respectable Gmail address with a few very simple steps. Here’s how it works: More »Turn a Greasemonkey script into a Firefox extension
12:04PM Sarah Stokely | Mark at the MakeUseOf blog points out that it’s become all the rage to convert Greasemonkey user scripts into Firefox extensions – giving our own Gina Trapani’s Better Gmail as an example.The benefit of this is that even non-programmers can take a Greasemonkey script and turn it into a Firefox extension – a format more likely to be used by non-programmers.Mark runs you through how to use a User Script Compiler to turn a script into an XPI file (Firefox extension) – no coding required:
“First, you need to get the actual Greasemonkey script. Go to your Firefox profile in your Windows Explorer and find the “gm_scripts” sub-folder.
This folder contains all the Greasemonkey scripts that you have
installed on your Firefox browser and should all be in javascript file
format (.js)…
Now right-click on the desired script, choose “rename” and turn the
file from javascript to a text file (.txt). Open the text file and you
have your code. Then go to the User Script Compiler and enter the required information in the fields provided.”
Once you’ve filled out that screen and hit compile, you’re done – just drag it onto your Firefox browser to start the installation. As Mark points out, you can find new user scripts from sites like Userscripts.org.
How to turn Greasemonkey Scripts into Firefox Extensions [Makeuseof.com] More » 
Find Lost Music in Your iTunes Library
12:00PM Adam Pash | In response to last week’s Best of 2007 Smart Playlist, the Podophile weblog suggests another useful iTunes Smart Playlsit: the Lost Music playlist. If you’re a compulsive music collector like me, or suffer from an advanced case of M.A.D.D. (music attention deficit disorder) there are probably a lot of tracks in iTunes that you never got around to listening to. [...] Just set up a smart playlist of all music added in 2007 with a play count of 0. If you religiously listen to every new song at least once, you may need adjust the play count to 1, just to flesh out your playlist a bit. Not only is the Lost Music Smart Playlist is a great way to keep up with those undiscovered gems in your iTunes library, but you could also use a similar playlist (maybe throw a skip count rule into the mix) to prune your iTunes library of music you haven’t lost but you just don’t listen to. Find Your “Lost” Music From 2007 [Podophile] More »Childproof your kitchen – by inviting the kids in
11:50AM Sarah Stokely | Here’s a great hack for dealing with little kids in the kitchen. Rather than banning them from the kitchen and turning down their offers to help, this mum decided it would be quicker, safer and more productive to bring the kids into the kitchen, show them how to do things safely and let them help. And it worked.
“It turned out to be far easier to teach the 5-year-old how to use sharp
things safely (and with supervision) than to let her try on her own…
or to turn the kitchen into a complete hands-off zone.”
The hack came from Grant at 43 Folders, who said it freed up enough of his wife’s time that she now has a blog for cooking with kids, called Junior Kitchen. That is just neat. :)
It’s not bug, it’s kung fu [43 Folders] More » AOL
11:45AM Sarah Stokely | The Oz reports today that Time Warner is setting up a new AOL portal in Australia. “The company is expected to launch an advertiser supported free portal
offering additional web services such as email in direct competition
with established portals such as Ninemsn and Yahoo7.” This will be AOL’s third crack at setting up a portal here. Would a zombie joke be in poor taste? More » Bloggies
11:08AM Sarah Stokely | Skellie and Problogger Darren Rowse are among the Aussie nominees in the 2008 Bloggie awards. Lifehacker has previously featured a number of tips from Darren’s Digital Photography School blog, as well as Skellie’s recently launched Anywired blog, which provides tips for the mobile freelancer. Good luck guys. :) More » 
