The Digital Photography School blog has an instructive tutorial on using layers for those just getting their feet wet inside Photoshop, or other high-end image editors like the open-source GIMP. Those jumping in will learn how to make transparent layers, use masked layers to roll back effects, and duplicate layers for sharpening and other effects. Hit the link for a quick schooling, including links to related lessons, or offer up your own tutorials and advice in the comments. Understanding Layers in Photoshop [Digital Photography School]
Too many large email attachments weighing down Outlook’s PST file and your hard drive, but you don’t want to throw out the message with the attachment? Weblog Digital Inspiration details how to separate attachments from email messages in Outlook without deleting the message. It’s a simple process, and when you’re done the file is no longer attached to the message; you can keep or delete it as you see fit. It’s not difficult, but the little two-step process could save you hard drive space and keep Outlook’s PST file lighter and snappier—especially if you back it up regularly. Remove Email Attachments In Outlook Without Deleting the Message [Digital Inspiration]
Google’s free web site creation tool, creatively named Google Sites, is now open to users who have a non-Google Apps account. The What You See Is What You Get (WYSIWYG) web page editor lets folks who don’t know a lick of HTML put together a good looking web site quickly and easily. You can also allow only certain people to view the site, edit its pages, and you can even hook up Google Analytics to get your web site traffic charts going. Your Google Sites URL will be something like http://sites.google.com/site/yournamehere/ and you get 100MB of file storage space for free, as well as page templates for common uses, like announcements, lists, and a “file cabinet.” Hit the play button above for a closer look. Like most of the big G’s stuff, for the low price of free, this is an impressive offering. Google Sites now open to everyone [Official Google Blog]
Wikihow runs down how to make a digital image look like a sketch in Photoshop. Looks like a good photo transformation before you upload it to the Rasterbator.
Most Firefox 3 testers agree that the preview release of the new browser promises faster and all-around better surfing—but one of the most noticeable interface changes, the big Back button, has gotten mixed reviews. If you’re not a fan of Firefox 3′s large back button, you don’t have to wrangle with CSS or themes to adjust its size. Simply right-click on Firefox’s toolbar, and choose Customise. In the dialogue box, select “Use small icons”—and voila! Your back button will be the same size as reload. Thanks, zaxour!
US Only: Crime-mapping mashup SpotCrime pulls data from city police records and news sources and plots it in an easy-to-snoop fashion. Choose a city, a time frame, and the types of offences you want to see, and you can mouse over the pinned icons to see thumbnail descriptions, or click an item for a full read. The site claims that humans are working in the background to make sense of the data, and that incidents show up anywhere from 3-24 hours after they’re reported. A good tool for checking out a potential neighbourhood for moving or exploring, or just keeping up on what’s going down across town.
SpotCrime [via TechCrunch]Windows only: Freeware application FreeSnap maximises your active window one edge at a time through a handful of simple keyboard shortcuts. If you’re obsessed with making the most of your screen real estate, don’t want to maximise windows to take up the entire screen in all directions, and manually resizing windows to the edge of your screen is too much of a hassle, FreeSnap is a perfect solution. Windows-Left/Right/Up/Down will expand your window to the corresponding side of your monitor, while other shortcuts resize windows to specific dimensions or move windows to pre-defined positions on your screen. FreeSnap is freeware, Windows only. FreeSnap [Blue Onion Software via FreewareGenius]
Windows only: Donationware application Desktop Teleporter automatically moves files and folders from your desktop to user-defined folders to keep your desktop clean and neat. Desktop Teleporter is serious about keeping your desktop clean, moving any file that you don’t add to the exclude list. If you want more advanced options and support beyond the desktop, check out Lifehacker’s very own Belvedere. If all you want is a clean desktop and don’t need more advanced options, Desktop Teleporter looks like a winner. Desktop Teleporter [Donation Coders via Techie Buzz]
Windows/Mac/Linux (OpenOffice): The Sun Wiki Publisher, a free extension for the OpenOffice.org office suite, lets you edit and contribute to any MediaWiki-based page on the web, assuming it accepts anonymous editing or you have credentials. The real benefit lies in being able to use OpenOffice’s styling tools—bolding, lists, tables, and the like—instead of having to remember the MediaWiki markup style. Creating a new page is relatively simple, but editing an existing page requires, at least with this version, copying and pasting an article in Writer, then sending it to the wiki for updating. For those rocking their own wiki web pages (or thumb drives), this extension might make a nice go-between. The Sun Wiki Publisher is a free download, works wherever OpenOffice.org does.
Sun Wiki Publisher [via Linux.com]Free markup sharing site A.nnotate offers a simple tool for letting co-workers or friends comment and review a document or web page without installing specialty software or hosting a web conference. Upload a Word document, PDF, or other file, or just pass A.nnotate a web page address, and you can start highlighting text or choosing areas to leave notes, either in the margins or as floating boxes. Once a page is started, the creator can email links to as many people as they want to comment. A free account at the site gives one person about 25 pages per month to offer for markup with unlimited annotators, but advanced offerings are available starting at $10 per month. A.nnotate [via Web Worker Daily]
