Kick off your Lifehacker Monday by making sure you didn’t miss any of the biggest posts from last week:
- Laptopfriendlycafes.com Helps You Get Wi-Fi, Power, Coffee
“Laptopfriendlycafes.jpg Corporate coffee chains often strike Wi-Fi deals with a particular provider, but if you want genuinely free Wi-Fi, you’re going to need to stick to independent cafés.”
- Custom Wire Management For Multi-Monitor Bliss
Brian Connolly was tired of cramped desks and messy wiring, so he built his own desk and wire management system to have the spacious and tidy spread he desired.
- DeskHedron Adds 3D Virtual Desktop Eye-Candy To Windows (Windows)
Free application DeskHedron brings multiple virtual desktops to Windows, complete with an impressive spinning 3D animation that switches between your desktops.
- Strip Word’s Interface Back For More Effective Writing
“Microsoft’s Word blog outlines techniques for getting rid of on-screen junk by minimising the ribbon, switch to Web layout and disabling other elements of the Windows interface.”
- Gmail Dark Theme Makes Gmail Easy On The Eyes
Lifehacker reader haute negro took advantage of Gmail’s new user-defined custom themes to create an attractive, easy-on-the-eyes Gmail Dark theme.
- DisplayFusion 3.0 Manages Everything Across Multi-Monitor Setups (Windows)
If you’re looking to manage windows and wallpapers on multiple monitors, it’s tough to go wrong with the reasonably priced, and recently updated, DisplayFusion.
- Are Tech Support Departments Getting Worse?
“The recession gets blamed for everything these days, so I’m wondering if it’s also an excuse for new slackness in tech support departments.”
- Prevent Firefox From Hogging Memory When Minimised
In our latest browser speed tests, I half-heartedly complained that Firefox eats up memory over long periods of use. Our lovely, helpful commenters pointed out that there is, indeed, a tweak to help with that.
- PolarClock Tracks The Time With Concentric Circles (Windows/Mac)
PolarClock is a novel screen saver that displays the passage of time in a series of shrinking concentric circles.
- Google Has A Semi-Secret Stand-Alone Task Manager
Google Blogoscoped found a strangely unguarded task manager lurking on Google’s servers, similar to Gmail’s task widget but with a more keyboard-friendly, single-focus design.
- IKEA Planner Visualises Your Dream Rooms in 3D
Windows only: IKEA has released its own 3D room design tool to help you plan the modernist, clean-lined kitchen, bedroom, or workspace of your dreams.
- Foxmarks Becomes Xmarks, Adds Search And Suggestion Features (Windows/Mac/Linux)
One of our favourite Firefox extensions dropped two letters and added a few neat features. Xmarks, Foxmarks’ successor, is Firefox only right now, but plans to soon be your go-anywhere hive brain for bookmarks.
- Vista SP2 Release Candidate Now Available (Windows Vista)
Everything but the last few bug fixes on Service Pack 2 for Windows Vista is now available for your upgrading pleasure. Grab it if you want better search, Bluetooth, Blu-Ray, and all the system fixes.
- Better Gmail 2 Gets Unread Message Favicon (And Cleaned Up) (Greasemonkey)
Minutes ago I posted an update to the Better Gmail 2 Firefox extension, adding a new feature and cleaning out the redundant items that are available in Gmail Labs.
- Procrastination Killer Times Your Short-Burst Work Dashes (Windows)
Software developer Elie really digs Merlin Mann’s (10+2)*5 dash, which breaks hours into 10-minute bursts of plugging away at one thing with two-minute breaks. Elie’s Procrastination Killer app helps you time and controls those dashes.
