Monday, February 23, 2009 - Page 2
Organise

Last Week’s Best Posts

Lifehacker AU

Kick off your Lifehacker Monday by making sure you didn’t miss any of the biggest posts from last week:

Twitter Promises Two-Way SMS For Australia“While Australian users of Twitter can send updates via SMS if they’re prepared to pay for a text to the UK, there’s currently no option for receiving updates the same way.” Properly Erase Your Physical MediaA whopping 40% of the used hard drives on eBay contain easily recoverable personal data. Use the following guide to ensure your personal data never makes it out into the wild. Computer Repair Kit Packs Dozens of Tools In One Portable Package (Windows)Portable system-fixing bundle Computer Repair Utility Kit puts 57 recovery tools into a single package. That gives you easy access to important system utilities without the fuss of building your own toolkit. DVDs Toswap Lets You Trade Those Unwanted Movies“Finished with that DVD movie you got cheaply in the pre-Christmas sales and don’t know what to do with it? A free DVD swap site might be just the ticket.” Top 10 Outlook BoostersOutlook is such a fixture of office and computer life, its potential as a central life-organising inbox is easily taken for granted. Empower your Outlook with these add-ons, link-ups and data management techniques. Make Windows XP Look Like Windows 7 (No Hacking Required) (Windows)The system theme pack installer from NiwradSoft gives your crayola-inspired Windows XP desktop an impressive Windows 7-ish look-without wasting time hacking system files yourself. Stop The iPhone’s AutoCorrect Feature Ruining Your SMS Messages“I am a bilingual Aussie and often have to type SMS in another language which is really annoying with the autocorrect feature trying to sub in English words all the time.” Create Skittles-Flavored VodkaCertain combinations of things are practically fated to be together: peanut butter and jelly, nachos and cheese, Skittles and vodka. Skittles and vodka? ManicTime Tracks Your Work Day (Windows)ManicTime is a detailed time-tracking application for keeping tabs on where your workday goes. Get a handle on how you spend your time with tags, graphs, and reports. Process Manager For Windows Updates, Adds Transparency And System Tray Minimising (Windows)Free task managing application Process Manager for Windows adds options to the global context menu for all applications-adding quick access to control running tasks. Shape Collage Is A Seriously Fun Photo Collage Application (Windows/Mac/Linux)Desktop application Shape Collage creates customised photo collages with advanced options that will have you creating fun posters in seconds. Todo.txt CLI Manages Your Tasks From The Command Line (Windows/Mac/Linux)Dozens of fancy point-and-click task managers promise to organise your to-do list, but so often power users find that nothing outdoes that trusty old classic: the todo.txt file. iPodME Converts Your Video To iPod Friendly Format (Windows)If you’re looking for a fire-and-forget video converter to help stock your iPod, iPodME is a dead simple and lightweight tool for bulk converting your video files.

Fix

Create Your Own Minimalist Storage With Hungarian Shelves

If you’re looking for sturdy wall-hugging shelving that doesn’t require fancy custom braces or brackets, check out the industrious design of these Hungarian shelves.What makes them “Hungarian”? Instructables user Juliofo ran across the design while visiting a friend in Budapest and was told they’d had been designed by a local professor—but if you know another name for this innovative style, by all means, share it in the comments.The design itself is simple but sturdy: one set of boards attached vertically against the studs of the walls, another set of boards serves as the shelves. The two segments are held together by series of mortise joints, shimmed with wooden wedges. Save for screwing the vertical support pieces into the wall studs, the entire affair is held together without any screws or glue—and this is all explained in a bit more detail at the Instructables post. While the example Juliofo uses for his tutorial is rather plain, another Instructables user mtemple was inspired by his design and created a more polished version, complete with detailing on the vertical supports as seen in the photos above right. If you have your own elegant DIY wall storage solution, we’ve love to hear about it in the comments below.

How to Make and Install Hungarian Shelves [Instructables]

Work

Five Best Live CDs

Live CDs (and DVDs) are versatile tools, allowing you to boot into an operating system without installing anything to your hard drives. Let’s take a closer look at the five most popular live CDs. Photo by bulinna.