Although being a student isn’t a requirement for using Microsoft’s note-taking application OneNote, the software’s robust data capture and collaboration components lend themselves well to an academic environment. OneNote can replace multiple physical notebooks, binders, and collections of paper notes with a single streamlined, search indexed, tabbed and subdivided master notebook. Whether you’re a student taking notes in class or an employee taking notes in company meetings, check out just how useful OneNote can be.
Just published a bug fix update to the Better GReader Firefox extension; if you’re using the excellent Minimalistic skin, you’ll want this upgrade, which fixes the “white page” bug. (Thanks to Scott Cowan for the speedy fix after Google’s changes.) Download the latest version of Better GReader here.
Windows only: Free application SpeedRead is designed to improve your reading speed and retention by quickly flashing a few words at a time on your screen in quick succession. You can adjust features like playback speed and number of words to display at a time, and SpeedRead keeps track of your stats as you read. At first you may want to stick to one word at a time, but with practice SpeedRead could really boost your speed-reading skills. The app comes with a directory full of stories in plain text to help you practice, but you can point it to any text file on your computer. If you’re on a public computer but still want to practice, check out previously mentioned Zap Reader or Spreeder. SpeedRead is freeware, Windows only. SpeedRead [via Download Squad]
Software and webapps rock at being calendars: You can update them from any computer or your phone, they don’t have to triple-check when Easter is, and they never get coffee stains on them. But your online or desktop calendar can do a lot more than just hold dates and tell you about them. Free programs and tweaks can integrate appointments into your email app, embed a whole-month view into your wallpaper, schedule birthdays without a single phone call, and improve your faulty memory for everything. Take a look at 10 free and customisable hacks you can apply to your own appointment-keeping system. Photo by Joe Lanman.
Many people don’t realise that rather than installing dozens of applications, you can control nearly any aspect of your computer with simple shortcuts that don’t take up any resources. You can even take this approach a step further and assign shortcut keys using the built-in Windows hotkey functionality, or access them from the keyboard using your favourite application launcher. Let’s take a look at a number of simple shortcuts to control some frequently used tasks.
Windows only: Free search app Agent Ransack is a tool worth checking out if you’ve got a file you just can’t find with Windows’ built-in search or other index-based apps, but you know a few details about it. That’s because Agent Ransack, the “lite” version of File Locator Pro, helps you build regular expression searches for seriously complex filtering. In other words, if you know a file starts with “T” but the next letter isn’t a vowel, and the file somehow ends with “-klf,” you can have Agent Ransack do that exact search, in specific folders, and sort the results by all the standard criteria. The tools requires installation, but doesn’t do active indexing, so it doesn’t cost any performance hits while still running remarkably small and light. Agent Ransack is a free download for Windows systems only. Agent Ransack [via Download Squad]
