Windows only: Music application TuneUp scans your iTunes library to fill in and clean up your music’s metadata, including album art. After you install it, just point it at songs in your library you want to clean up; TuneUp fingerprints and analyzes them and then provides a diagnostic overview of your missing or incorrect metadata. You can then verify and clean up all your metadata with the stroke of a button. In theory it’s very similar to previously mentioned MusicBrainz, but it’s an altogether fresh take with a few more features.
iPhone/iPod touch only: The iPhone has sported a .com keyboard shortcut for making quick work of URLs in Mobile Safari since it was released, but reader George points us to an expansion to this keyboard shortcut that can save tons of time for entering email addresses and non-.com URLs. First, in Mobile Safari, just hold down the .com button for a second to see other domain options (namely .net, .edu, and .org). Second, when the keyboard has the @ symbol but no .com key, you can hold the ‘.’ (period) key to get the same domain shortcuts—something that comes in especially handy when you’re manually entering email addresses or filling in login credentials in new apps. I’m not sure if this keyboard shortcut is an iPhone 2.0 feature or something that was added when hold-for-accents was added for international language support, but it’s definitely one to know. Thanks George!
All things Google weblog Google Operating System details how to take full advantage of Gmail Superstars, a souped-up version of Gmail’s standard yellow star available in previously mentioned Gmail Labs. When enabled, Gmail Superstars allows you to set the star to one of 12 different icons for more robust labelling via the previously single-function star icon. The really cool part? Gmail Superstars are incorporated into Gmail’s advanced search, so you can use queries like:
Mac OS X only: Free utility Dock Spaces creates and swaps between up to five customizable Docks in Leopard. Contrary to what the name might imply, Dock Spaces does not swap out your Dock every time you change Spaces. Instead, it swaps Dock content through your menu bar on demand, perfect for creating different task-specific Docks. Dock Spaces is donationware, Mac OS X only. Dock Spaces [via Cool OSX Apps]
Jotting a simple list is a great way to brainstorm, but when you want to visualise, organise, and untangle a deep set of ideas, you want a mind map. Web-based mind mapping tool MindMeister offers a simple interface to create mind maps collaboratively or on the go. We’ve mentioned a few mind mapping apps in the past, and showed you how to mind map meetings as an alternative to linear note-taking. But if you haven’t tried mind mapping yet, MindMeister is a great place to start. Let’s dive into MindMeister to give mind mapping a go without downloading a thing.
Mac OS X Leopard only: One of the built-in Mac utilities that got the most feature additions in Leopard—albeit pretty quietly—is Preview, the PDF and image viewer. We’ve already covered how you can do more with Preview in Leopard, but Mac OS X Hints points out another good one: image annotation. Add arrows and notes, or circle and outline areas of an image in Preview using the Annotation menu. (In Preview’s View menu choose Customise Toolbar, then drag the Annotate menu onto the toolbar.) Then, when you’re editing a non-PDF image in Preview, just select your annotation, and click and drag on the image itself. Handy, and no third-party software required. Annotate non-PDF images in 10.5′s Preview [Mac OS X Hints]
Google Notebook already offers quick-clipping tools for Firefox and Internet Explorer users (although the IE7 version requires adding the Google Toolbar), but the recent addition of a “Note This” bookmarklet closes the gap for anyone on Safari or another non-standard browser, or those who like their browsers lean and clean. Select text on a page and hit the bookmarklet to take a quick note, or hit it with nothing selected to create a link to the page. Opera users (insert sigh here) can only view notebooks, unfortunately, so this won’t help them add notes. Other than that, Notebook fans will want to make room on their toolbar for it. Google Notebook bookmarklet [via Google Operating System]
Search engine Scour aggregates results from Yahoo, Google, and MSN on one page, displays reviews and feedback from other Scour members about those results, and rewards you with points that you can trade in for a Visa gift card. Register for a free account at Scour, and use it each time you search the web. Accumulate enough Scour points and you can get a $25 Visa gift card. Every member is awarded one point for every search, two for a vote and three for a comment with a maximum of 4 points a search. Once you aggregate at least 6,500 points you can cash them out for a $25 Visa gift card… it’s more than you currently make from searching, right?
Since Scour uses results from Google, Yahoo, and MSN anyway, you’re getting the same results you’d get if you were using those engines—but racking up points while you do. A Scour browser toolbar’s available for for download as well. Scour [via Webware]
