Windows only: Porta’Menu is a tiny (175k!) application launcher for your portable drives. It is extremely spartan, but effective. Add your applications, it remember the relative path and from there on you only have to launch the application launcher when you insert your flash drive instead of digging through the application directories. The interface is very reminiscent of earlier lower resolution versions of windows, and if you read the readme.txt you’ll find out why. The author found that an ancient program he’d written to launch applications back in the days before start menus worked perfectly as a relative-path application manager for portable drives. Porta’menu is freeware, Windows only. Porta’Menu [via Freeware Home]
A simple URL edit can open attached Office docs from Gmail in a sleek viewer, rather than the sometimes funky HTML option. The Google Operating System blog points out that Google’s viewer—powered by Google Docs, but not requiring a sign-up at that service or a cluttered dashboard for existing users—works with Word, Excel, and PowerPoint files just as easily as the PDF files Gmail already tells you it can handle. Simply replace the segment view=att with view=gvatt in the URL after you hit “View as HTML,” and you’ll launch a scalable, zoom-able, easier-to-manage viewer for your attachment. Google Viewer for Gmail Attachments [Google Operating System]
Most anyone using Ubuntu Linux has to install Adobe Flash, Java, DVD playback, and other plug-ins to actually enjoy it. Super Ubuntu packs all that essential in from the get-go. It’s basically just a re-compiled version of the official Ubuntu distribution, but with a whole bunch of features included that save you the time of grabbing them yourself. File-sharing apps, multimedia codecs, Windows compatibility tools (including WINE and support for PortableApps installations), and lots updates that haven’t hit the official repositories are included, but you’ll still get official security and application updates through Ubuntu. The creators seem pretty intent on keeping Super Ubuntu up to date, and offer a constantly-seeded ISO torrent and live USB creation tools for anyone looking to try it out. Super Ubuntu is a free download for most any computer running on x86-based processors. It appears to be a 32-bit-only affair at this point. Super Ubuntu [via DownloadTube]
Windows only: A small background app can give XP and Vista users part of the functionality of “Aero Peek,” a smart way of previewing windows and showing the desktop in Windows 7. Unfortunately, that part is just the desktop showing aspect, available from a tray icon installed by the Aero Peek app—though it likely won’t be long before we see the windows previews, whether from this developer or elsewhere. In the meantime, it’s an intriguingly different way for users of desktop gadgets, or those who have to head back to their desktop often for files, to minimise their active windows. Unlike hitting the Windows Key+D combo, restoring your windows from Aero Peek always keeps whatever windows you had active in the front, and shows what windows you have open in shaded outlines.
Not for everyone, especially those inclined toward keyboard shortcuts, but an intriguing attempt at getting yet another one of Windows 7′s features into your Windows desktop. Aero Peek is a free download for Windows systems only. AeroPeek [via gHacks]
Conventional wisdom holds that in times of economic distress, it should be easier than ever to get discounted airfares. However, while there are some good deals to be had, the fundamental strategies for getting cheap flights remain the same as ever. More »
The Advertising Standards Bureau has released its list of the most-complained about ads of 2008, covering TV, print and billboards. To be frank, I haven’t seen most of them (which reflects my media consumption habits, I guess), but it’s interesting to note that even the most-complained about ad — the Kotex ‘beaver’ campaign — only attracted 185 complaints, and wasn’t ultimately banned. Motorola’s Razr ad held up the tech flag at #10.
Advertising Standards Bureau [DOC format]A posting on the Google Android Porting group details how to install Android on an Eee PC, or similarly architected netbook. This is code-compiling stuff that is not for the faint of heart, but it’s an interesting indication of how Google’s mobile phone OS could also spread to other devices. Howto build Android full source for X86 Architecture like EeePC(ASUS) [via Google Operating System]
VortexBox is an open-source CD ripping and media server solution. Based on Fedora 10, VortexBox is capable of streaming in multiple formats allowing you to hear your music on your other computers, iTunes, media centres, slim devices like squeezeboxes and other media devices. Installation is straight forward, download the ISO file, burn it to a disc, pop the disc in the unused computer you want to turn into a jukebox and you’re on your way. Once the installation is complete you can access the box remotely with the build in web server. Ripping is completely automated, just pop in the disk you want it to rip and it rips, tags, and gets the cover art. VortexBox is an open-source Linux-based media server. VortexBox [via Freeware Home]
Windows only: WindowsPager is a free and light-weight application for managing virtual desktops. The application is just over 300k and uses around 5MB of system memory. Windows Pager requires no installation or administrative rights to run. After running the executable a small bank of four screens—see the screenshot at left— is placed on the Windows taskbar. Clicking on one of the four panes in takes you to one of the four virtual desktops. On a multiple monitor setup, WindowsPager treats all of the monitors as one enormous desktop and cycling through the virtual desktops will fresh all of the multiple monitors accordingly. WindowsPager was quick to respond to changes and bring up the new windows for each virtual desktop. WindowsPager is a free portable-application, Windows only. WindowsPapger [via Freeware Genius]
A detailed post on Microsoft’s Engineering Windows 7 blog explains what HomeGroup — the new networking interface for Windows 7 which aims to make it easier to share printers, storage and media without hassle in a home environment — hopes to achieve. Given my experience with networking in Windows 7 to date, I’m a little sceptical of HomeGroup’s promises, but it’s a worthwhile read if you’re a Windows household sharing multiple machines. At Home with HomeGroup in Windows 7 [Engineering Windows 7]
