Monday, November 3, 2008
Organise
Ken Rename Helps You Rename On The Go
11:30PM Lifehacker US Edition | Windows only: Ken Rename is a portable file renaming utility. The interface is straight forward with support for simple and complex renaming tasks. Ken Rename supports wildcards, macros, numbered file lists, string replacement and removal, and has an undo function to save you from a renaming mishap. Weighing in at under half a MB, Ken Rename is a handy addition to your flash drive toolkit. For a similar program with the welcome addition of a preview function, try WildRename. For a Mac friendly, but non-portable, alternative check out File List. Ken Rename is freeware, Windows only. Ken Rename [via The Portable Freeware Collection] More »
Work
4:00PM Angus Kidman | Microsoft’s Live Mesh file sync technology, previously available only via Windows PCs, has now been extended to Windows Mobile, allowing you to access files via your phone (and potentially leave the PC itself at home), and to Mac OS X, useful if you work across both Windows and Max platforms. Unfortunately the Mobile option is US and UK only for now (just as Mesh itself was in early previews), but it should become available in Australia within the next few months. If you’ve sampled the Mac version, tell us how it tastes in the comments.
Live Mesh goes Beta, adds preview for Mac client and Mobile client
More »
Live Mesh Hits Windows Mobile And Macs
4:00PM Angus Kidman | Microsoft’s Live Mesh file sync technology, previously available only via Windows PCs, has now been extended to Windows Mobile, allowing you to access files via your phone (and potentially leave the PC itself at home), and to Mac OS X, useful if you work across both Windows and Max platforms. Unfortunately the Mobile option is US and UK only for now (just as Mesh itself was in early previews), but it should become available in Australia within the next few months. If you’ve sampled the Mac version, tell us how it tastes in the comments.
Live Mesh goes Beta, adds preview for Mac client and Mobile client
More »
Organise
1:45PM Angus Kidman | Australians travelling to the US for business or pleasure have long been able to use the visa waiver program to enter the country without requiring a visa, but from next January you’ll need to fill out a form online in advance rather than completing documentation in flight. What do the new rules mean and how can you make sure you don’t get caught out? More »
Sort Yourself For New US Visa Waiver Requirements
1:45PM Angus Kidman | Australians travelling to the US for business or pleasure have long been able to use the visa waiver program to enter the country without requiring a visa, but from next January you’ll need to fill out a form online in advance rather than completing documentation in flight. What do the new rules mean and how can you make sure you don’t get caught out? More »
Organise
11:29AM Angus Kidman | The declining Australian dollar might be bad news if you’re planning a US trip, but it turns out to be good news if you want to buy an iPod. Australia now ranks as the cheapest place on the globe to purchase a basic iPod, according to CommSec’s quarterly iPod index, reports Susannah Moran at AustralianIT. That’s a dramatic change from the previous quarter, when Australia ranked 14th for buying the then-entry-level model. iPods are generally hard to acquire at a discount (save for Apple’s own occasional sales), so any opportunity to save money is helpful.
CommSec to unveil ‘iPod index’
[AustralianIT]
More »
Falling Dollar Makes Australia iPod Discount Heaven
11:29AM Angus Kidman | The declining Australian dollar might be bad news if you’re planning a US trip, but it turns out to be good news if you want to buy an iPod. Australia now ranks as the cheapest place on the globe to purchase a basic iPod, according to CommSec’s quarterly iPod index, reports Susannah Moran at AustralianIT. That’s a dramatic change from the previous quarter, when Australia ranked 14th for buying the then-entry-level model. iPods are generally hard to acquire at a discount (save for Apple’s own occasional sales), so any opportunity to save money is helpful.
CommSec to unveil ‘iPod index’
[AustralianIT]
More »
Organise
10:00AM Angus Kidman |
Back in September, we pointed out that a new system to make it easier to switch banks (by speeding up the transfer of automatic payments) was in development. That scheme goes live this week, so if you’re looking for a better deal from your bank, the process should be a bit less painful. As Karen Dearne confirms at AustralianIT, the process still isn’t automated — you need to transfer a printed list of payments from your old to your new bank — but at least it’s a start. Full details of the scheme can be found on the Australia Payments Clearing Association site (PDF link). To find yourself a better bank deal, check out recently mentioned Mozo.
Switching banks easier from Nov 1 [AustralianIT]
More »
New Bank Switching Program Begins
10:00AM Angus Kidman |
Back in September, we pointed out that a new system to make it easier to switch banks (by speeding up the transfer of automatic payments) was in development. That scheme goes live this week, so if you’re looking for a better deal from your bank, the process should be a bit less painful. As Karen Dearne confirms at AustralianIT, the process still isn’t automated — you need to transfer a printed list of payments from your old to your new bank — but at least it’s a start. Full details of the scheme can be found on the Australia Payments Clearing Association site (PDF link). To find yourself a better bank deal, check out recently mentioned Mozo.
Switching banks easier from Nov 1 [AustralianIT]
More »
Design
PhotoFunia Pastes Your Face All Over The Place
9:00AM Lifehacker US Edition | Put some Photoshop wizardy at your fingertips with photo manipulation site PhotoFunia. Take a clean headshot of yourself or the soon-to-be-victim of your prank and upload it to PhotoFunia. There are currently sixty nine photos that faces can be pasted into ranging from the Andy Warhol-esque art gallery scene featured in the image above to magazine covers, currency, famous photos, and more. The process is fast and requires no interaction from the user other than selecting the template to be used and uploading the picture. With a simple head shot most of the templates worked just fine, with a few having odd sizing issues (i.e. my noggin looked way too big for the scale of the picture.) Once PhotoFunia generates the picture it can be saved at full size, saved in a smaller forum-friendly avatar size, or saved to ImageShack. PhotoFunia is a free web-based image manipulator. PhotoFunia [via MakeUseOf] More »
Organise
8:30AM Angus Kidman | Kick off your Lifehacker Monday by making sure you didn’t miss any of the biggest posts from last week:
The International Business Traveller’s Gadget Packing Checklist“Last week’s Road Worrier column on less than obvious business travel essentials stirred up plenty of comments from readers, many of them relating to the specific items needed when a work trip takes you overseas.”
Battle Of The Thumb Drive Linux Systems“These days, it only takes an increasingly-cheap USB thumb drive and a program like UNetbootin to create a portable Linux desktop you can run on any computer that can boot from a USB port.”
MewSeek SoulSeek Client Now On iPhone 2.0 (Jailbroken iPhone/iPod touch)“Now called MewSeek, the Soulseek client lets you download music from the P2P network directly to your device.”
Switchwise Helps Pick Cheapest Electricity Provider“If you’re trying to trim the family budget in lean times, the electricity bill is a good place to start. More sensible use of appliances is always a good approach, but with competition now at least a partial reality, it also pays to work out if you could get a better deal on your existing service.”
Can Windows 7 Recover from Vista?“Our gadget-obsessed siblings at Gizmodo got a chance to walk through Windows 7 at the Professional Developers Conference, highlighting a heaping serving of nice new features.”
System Explorer All-In-One PC Monitor And Manager (Windows)“When you want to manage your PC’s processes, startup items, network connections, windows, tasks, open files, and installed software, you can do that all using the free all-in-one monitoring tools System Explorer.”
Be Ruthless But Share When It Comes To Airport Power“I’m writing this post from Nice Airport, where I’m having an unexpected stopover because my scheduled flight got delayed so the windscreen could be replaced.”
SysMetrix Puts System Data In A Configurable Clock (Windows)“SysMetrix gives you a desktop widget you can skin, configure, and tweak to show you the time, your system info, email updates, and other information in a seemingly endless number of configurations.”
Gmail Drive Config Mounts Multiple Gmail Accounts As Disks (Windows)“Mount more than one Gmail account as a remote disk drive with free utility Gmail Drive Config.”
Ubuntu 8.10 Released, Includes Bootable USB Maker“This release doesn’t bring much huge or startlingly new to Ubuntu, but does smooth out some rough edges and improves the Wi-Fi, 3G, and portability experience.”
Vistumbler Detects Wi-Fi Hotspots, Maps Them (Windows Vista)“Free, open-source application Vistumbler scans wireless networks within range of your Wi-Fi antenna, tracks signal strength over time, and handles pretty much everything else that other apps of this kind do.”
More »
Last Week’s Best Posts
8:30AM Angus Kidman | Kick off your Lifehacker Monday by making sure you didn’t miss any of the biggest posts from last week:
The International Business Traveller’s Gadget Packing Checklist“Last week’s Road Worrier column on less than obvious business travel essentials stirred up plenty of comments from readers, many of them relating to the specific items needed when a work trip takes you overseas.”
Battle Of The Thumb Drive Linux Systems“These days, it only takes an increasingly-cheap USB thumb drive and a program like UNetbootin to create a portable Linux desktop you can run on any computer that can boot from a USB port.”
MewSeek SoulSeek Client Now On iPhone 2.0 (Jailbroken iPhone/iPod touch)“Now called MewSeek, the Soulseek client lets you download music from the P2P network directly to your device.”
Switchwise Helps Pick Cheapest Electricity Provider“If you’re trying to trim the family budget in lean times, the electricity bill is a good place to start. More sensible use of appliances is always a good approach, but with competition now at least a partial reality, it also pays to work out if you could get a better deal on your existing service.”
Can Windows 7 Recover from Vista?“Our gadget-obsessed siblings at Gizmodo got a chance to walk through Windows 7 at the Professional Developers Conference, highlighting a heaping serving of nice new features.”
System Explorer All-In-One PC Monitor And Manager (Windows)“When you want to manage your PC’s processes, startup items, network connections, windows, tasks, open files, and installed software, you can do that all using the free all-in-one monitoring tools System Explorer.”
Be Ruthless But Share When It Comes To Airport Power“I’m writing this post from Nice Airport, where I’m having an unexpected stopover because my scheduled flight got delayed so the windscreen could be replaced.”
SysMetrix Puts System Data In A Configurable Clock (Windows)“SysMetrix gives you a desktop widget you can skin, configure, and tweak to show you the time, your system info, email updates, and other information in a seemingly endless number of configurations.”
Gmail Drive Config Mounts Multiple Gmail Accounts As Disks (Windows)“Mount more than one Gmail account as a remote disk drive with free utility Gmail Drive Config.”
Ubuntu 8.10 Released, Includes Bootable USB Maker“This release doesn’t bring much huge or startlingly new to Ubuntu, but does smooth out some rough edges and improves the Wi-Fi, 3G, and portability experience.”
Vistumbler Detects Wi-Fi Hotspots, Maps Them (Windows Vista)“Free, open-source application Vistumbler scans wireless networks within range of your Wi-Fi antenna, tracks signal strength over time, and handles pretty much everything else that other apps of this kind do.”
More »
Work
CSS Toolbox Is a Killer Text Editor For Web Designers
8:30AM Adam Pash | Windows only: Free application CSS Toolbox streamlines working with cascading stylesheets (CSS) through auto-completion, syntax highlighting, and several more advanced features that make it stand out from a regular text editor. For those of you who don’t know, CSS files are the building blocks that style the web. CSS Toolbox offers advanced features for building out your stylesheets, including a CSS beautifier, validator, and even compressor. This one isn’t of much use to non-developers, but if you are a designer (or you have any inkling of learning about web design), this app looks like a real winner. On the other hand, if a solid text editor is all you want, check out our Hive Five Best Text Editors. CSS Toolbox is a free download, Windows only. CSS Toolbox [via CNET] More »
Fix
Simple Ways To Be Prepared For House Guests
8:00AM Lifehacker US Edition | Keep the space you use for guests in a prepared state and you’ll be ready to host at the drop of a hat. At the Simple Productivity Blog, they have a five point checklist to being prepared for impromptu hosting with minimal stress. The very first item on the list is something I know I’ve been guilty of: More »
