Mozilla developers post a screenshot of what Firefox 3.0's unified bookmarks, history and downloads manager—named Places—may look like. Being just a mockup, the final product probably won't turn out exactly like this, but it's a neat preview of features in the works. Highlights include tags, search and page previews right inside the Places Organizer. After the jump get the full screenshot and a glimpse into the minds of the makers of our favourite browser. (Warning: huge image ahead.)

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Keep your identity from getting stolen online with eight effective methods to avoid phishing scams.

Windows only: Freeware app GNU ls brings the common ls terminal command for *nix to the Windows command prompt. Though subtle, this very lightweight download will bring you the nuances of the *nix terminal to Windows. If you're a heavy command line user or a heavy batch scripter, you'll appreciate the customisability GNU ls affords. GNU ls is a great companion for *nix heads stuck on Windows systems.

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Can the right foods improve your mood? The Ririan Project claims that they can. In a recent weblog post, they list 11 foods that can improve your attitude and boost your emotions. For example, blueberries are packed with vitamin C, which can alleviate stress, and Brazil nuts contain selenium, which can prevent depression. See also these 10 foods that boost your health.

Antique furniture lover mkjarval writes in:

Any time you have doors or drawers that stick—whether from old age, paint or humidity etc—just rub an old (hopefully white or light coloured) candle over any of the spots that create friction. My mother got this tip from an old family friend who worked as a carpenter and it has helped make a few unusable pieces of furniture work like new again.

While we're talking about household fixes, see also how to silence squeaky floorboards with talcum powder. Thanks, mkjarval!

Car guy Rob Gruhl gives some great, practical advice on how to find, finance and negotiate buying a new car. Hit the play button on this (fast) five-minute clip before you purchase your next set of wheels. Thanks, Brady!

Reader Korian pointed us to a useful piece in The Australian which talks about the current state of play for broadband users in Australia, looking at the practise of 'shaping' download speeds as well as giving some "sound, no nonsense Aus-centric advice for broadband users".

It contains ten tips for maximising your broadband value, including:

• PICK an ISP who suits your usage habits. If you're a dedicated online gamer, pick an ISP that offers free gaming traffic. Conversely, if you're permanently swapping files via BitTorrent, don't choose an ISP that automatically shapes P2P traffic.

• PAY your bill the cheapest way possible. Many ISPs charge a service fee for monthly billing or payment by credit card; direct debit is often the cheapest option.

• CHECK for upload rules. Most ISPs don't count uploads as part of your overall traffic, but some (including Telstra and, in some cases, Optus) do. Avoid these plans, especially if you regularly send large files yourself.

• MAKE sure your ISP supports rapid transfer. Rapid transfer allows you to easily switch to another ISP with minimal disruption if a better plan comes along.

• KEEP your security software up-to-date. If your machine becomes part of an infected "botnet", your internet usage can skyrocket.

MIS-shaping future of broadband [The Australian]

Thanks, Korian!

The Pixar love-in continues here at Lifehacker AU with our second giveaway - tickets to see the Pixar: 20 years of animation exhibition at ACMI (the Australian Centre for the Moving Image) in Melbourne.
The exhibition, made up of artwork and digital media borrowed from the Pixar Animation Studios archives, originated at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, and makes its only Australian appearance at ACMI.
The exhibition features over 500 sketches, paintings, sculptures and storyboards revealing how Pixar's characters and worlds are brought to life. In addition to these one-of-a-kind works by artists and sculptors, the exhibition includes spectacular immersive environments and interactive experiences developed by Pixar to extend the magic of their films. ACMI has more information on the exhibition here.
We have five double passes to giveway to the exhibition, which runs until Sunday, 14 October. So if you live in Melbourne (or you'll be visiting Melbourne between now and then, and promise you'll go to the exhibition while you're in town!), then submit your best tip to be in a chance to win a double pass!
We'll be giving the free passes to readers who submit the top five tips on anything to do with digital video, photo or animation. Could be a tip on editing, could be a tip on taking good photos - it's up to you how high or low tech you go.
To enter, leave your best tips here in the comments section. If you have multiple tips, leave multiple comments - go mad!
Entries close at 7.59am AEST next Friday - the 21st of September. See here for the official terms and conditions.

And thanks to our friends at ACMI for donating the prizes! :)

Logmein is a free application which allows you to connect and remotely control your PC. It's not new, but I'm a new fan having used it while I was away at a conference this week. Happily, it works with Vista, as I was using a Vista laptop at the conference to connect to my Vista box at home.
One thing I learned - the remote access does depend on the remote PC being powered on. It sounds like a no-brainer, but I was on autopilot before I left home and put my PC into hibernate mode. I had to make a phone call home to get it turned on, which wouldn't be possible if you live on your own! So if you intend to use Logmein on the road, make sure you leave your PC turned on!
My one gripe was that if the PC you're trying to access remotely needs to be powered up, there seems to be a delay of a few minutes before that PC shows up as "online" to you at the remote location. Admittedly, I was attempting to access it from a fairly crappy hotel conference room media centre with Vista machines on an unreliable wireless network, so any of those factors may have contributed to slowing down the remote connection!
We wrote up the use of Logmein as a way to provide remote tech support here.

• Wrap Text as You Type in Excel with Alt-Enter
• Search and Replace Word Formatting
• Compare Two Word Documents for Differences
• Disable Annoying MS Word Features
• View Two Areas of Your Spreadsheet at Once
• Go Back to Where You Left Off in a Word Document
• Reference Excel Cell Ranges by Label
• Change Case in MS Office Apps from the Keyboard
• Automatically Insert Sample Text into a Document

Here's a tip which I was embarrassingly unaware of - if you've upgraded to ADSL2+, without upgrading your line filter - you may be losing out on the speed boost you should be getting!
ADSL2+ filters are compliant with the ADSL2+ standard, AS/ACIFS041 (2005). If you're interested in finding out the difference between the older ADSL standard and this one, there's an interesting Whirlpool post on the subject here.
Netcomm's channel manager Rochelle White tells us that using an old ADSL filter can strip out 2/3 of your ADSL2+ speed, as well as causing static on the line or even causing your internet to disconnect when the phone rings. She warns that many ISPs are still shipping old filters, even when selling ADSL2+ networking equipment.
Netcomm ISP partner Exetel is now shipping Netcomm ADSL2+ equipment with Netcomm's Netcomm EM1550B ADSL2 line filter. And, as of 3 weeks ago, you can also buy Netcomm's EM1550 ADSL2+ Splitter-Filter off the shelf through Harvey Norman and Officeworks for $27.
It's not just Netcomm who are in on the act though. Netgear's Andrew Trickett advised us that they're shipping ADSL2+ filters with all ADSL2+ product, and if you buy Netgear through an Optus ADSL2+ package, you'll get *two* filters.
I don't recall *ever* getting a new line filter in the box with a modem or router (maybe because I buy retail rather than through an ISP) - I've been using the same old one for years. I just googled my current filter and it's marked as "obsolete" on the vendor's website - and when I doubled checked, it turns out it is an ADSL filter, not ADSL2+. oops. :) I'll be upgrading that today!

Thanks for the tip, Rochelle!

Earlier today we told you about how to defer emails to avoid embarrassment.
It reminded me of a tip I've been meaning to post about avoiding premature sending of emails - and this one doesn't require any additional software. It just needs you to use the "Save as Draft" function in Thunderbird.
I've started using "Save as Draft" for a few reasons.

• *I know I'm going to be writing the in stages, or wanting to edit or add things before it's finished and ready to go. Saving the draft allows me to save my work in case my email client or computer crashes, or I later mistakenly close my email client without saving the email I'm working on.


• *When viewing your list of draft emails in the Draft folder in Thunderbird, the "Send" button is dropped off the toolbar so you can't send the email accidentally just by having it selected in the list - you need to hit "Edit draft" in order to open up the email and keep working.


• *The other good thing about the Draft function is that when you hit "Save" you have a choice between "Save as draft" or "Save as template". Go the template option if you're crafting an email which you're likely to be able to reuse. It will be saved in a new "Template" folder below the "Drafts" folder in your email folders.

Note - I'm sure that Outlook 2007 has similar functionality but I haven't yet installed it as I'm wedded to Thunderbird. Feel free to leave comments about similar functions for other email clients.

Ever hit the Send button on an email and realise a few seconds later that rather than complaining to your coworker about your boss's impossible dictates and ugly ties, you hit Reply All and complained to your entire company, boss included? If you're using Outlook, the How-To Geek weblog details how to use Outlook rules to defer the delivery of emails so that you have time to fix those "Oh no!" moments without really interrupting your workflow. We've covered this idea before, but the How-To Geek compellingly emphasises why you might want to defer emails. (Now if only Gmail would integrate a similar feature.) If you're looking to remember your attachments, check out the Outlook Attachment Reminder.

Many of the search operators you use in Google's search box work in the new Google Reader search, and the Google Operating System weblog rounds them up along with a few other Reader search tips. For example:

2. Exact matches: put quotation marks around your search terms to get the results that include an exact phrase.

3. Wildcard: use an asterisk to replace some words in your query. This only works for exact matches. Include an asterisk for each word you want to replace.

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I just got back from an IT journalist conference (Media Connect's Influence event) where I got to meet Tech Crunch's WA-based blogger Duncan Riley. He told me about the Australian Blogging Conference which is being held on Friday, September 28 at QUT in Brisbane.
Information on the conference is available here.

Thanks, Duncan!

Linux users: Install iPodLinux on your iPod without losing any of your existing content with a script introduced by Mike's Ubuntu Blog. The script automatically partitions your iPod's hard drive and installs a boot partitioner with just three terminal commands.

wget http://de.dataghost.com/ipl/dg-installer/dg-linux-installer-20070311.tar.bz2
tar -jxf dg-linux-installer-20070311.tar.bz2
sudo ./installer.sh

I installed iPodLinux on my iPod, and besides an occasional freeze up (and a decent drain on the battery), iPodLinux has been running very well. After installing iPodLinux you'll still be able to sync your iPod just as you normally would in addition to doing other fun things, like playing games. If you're not running Linux, you can still install iPodLinux on your iPod from your Windows or Mac PC.

Find and download high quality album artwork for your music library with web application iTunes Album Art Grabber. How high quality? you ask. We're talking up to 1425x1425 pixels—so huge. The site is still working out some kinks, but—provided the bugs are taken care of—anyone who's spent time agonising over a music library complete with full album artwork will find the high resolutions and simple, pop-up free web site an excellent resource for adding super high quality artwork to their digital music. Share where you grab high quality album art for your tunes in the comments.

Improve your Photoshop productivity with these 30 "undocumented" (i.e., not found in the menus) shortcuts.

Windows/Mac/Linux (All platforms): Formerly Windows-only free, open source FTP client FileZilla upgrades to version 3.0, adding cross-platform support and a few small feature updates, most notably an improved transfer management window. If FileZilla has been your FTP client of choice on Windows but you've been forced to find an alternative on other platforms, now you can get the free, no-nonsense FTP client for Linux and Mac as well (the Mac version of FileZilla has been delayed, but should be up soon). Former FileZilla users can import old FileZilla settings to your new FileZilla installation by selecting Edit -> Import and navigating to the FileZilla.xml file in your old FileZilla directory.

AU - we reported this on September 3. :)

If you still aren't regularly backing up your hard drive, maybe it's time you consider the substantial emotional and monetary expense of losing your data.

Popular web-based instant messaging service Meebo now supports file transfer, meaning you can share files with your contacts over Meebo IM on the web—whether your contacts are using Meebo or not. You'll need to have registered with Meebo (a free and painless process) in order to send files from their web interface, but anyone can receive files. Unreliable IM file transfer has always plagued me, so I'm happy to report that my transfer tests with Meebo went swimmingly.

You can keep your home spotless in 19 short minutes a day by following CNN Living's room-by-room roadmap to cleanliness. For example:

Bathroom, 2 minutes daily • Wipe out the sink (30 seconds). Wipe the toilet seat and rim (15 seconds). • Swoosh the toilet bowl with a brush (15 seconds). • Wipe the mirror and faucet (15 seconds). • Squeegee the shower door (30 seconds). • Spray the entire shower and the curtain liner with shower mist after every use (15 seconds).

In short, four and a half minutes in the kitchen, two minutes in the bathroom, six and a half minutes in your bedroom, and six minutes in the living room are all you need to keep your home looking great. Maybe I'm a pig, but the same routine spread out over every two or three days should still yield a pretty nice looking home.

If you've purchased a new Windows computer in the past few years that's running Windows Media Center Edition or Vista Home Premium or Ultimate and you aren't taking advantage of its baked-in DVR Media Center software, it's time we change that. Why? Because after installing a $70 capture card in your computer and a bit of freeware third-party software, you've got all the tools you need to record television shows on your PC's built-in Media Center, extend that Media Center to your Xbox 360, schedule recordings and stream TV over the internet.

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Productivity blogger Leo Babauta is paring down all the stuff in his life to the barest essentials, and calling the new system "haiku productivity." English majors out there know that haiku is 3-line poetry which contains an exact, short number of syllables per line. Babauta applied haiku-style limits to his own life and distilled his goals, email processing sessions, feeds, Most Important Tasks and other tasks and information to specific amounts. While most of these numbers feel arbitrary, the concept of limitation and focus to encourage productivity is solid. What can you haiku in your productivity system? (Don't say number of Lifehacker posts read per day. That would hurt our feelings.)

Windows only: The Instant Boss timer application sets up a number of work dashes with breaks. Especially useful for practicing Merlin's 10+2*5 procrastination hack, you commit to working a certain amount of minutes, then you get a break, then the Instant Boss tells you to "Get back to work!" I'm revising the Lifehacker book in 60-minute dashes using my trusty kitchen timer, but I may switch over to Instant Boss (especially on the road). Instant Boss is a free download (donations encouraged) for Windows only. Thanks, Jayvant!

You already know that backing up your data online is one of the best ways to secure it in case of theft or disaster. But where do you store your stuff online? There are lots of cheap and free-but-limited online backup and storage solutions out there. Tell us which one you use.

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"The way to 'solve' the problem of procrastination is to let delight pull you instead of making a to-do list push you." —Paul Graham [via]

Clever web developer Rafael describes how he used the Live HTTP Headers Firefox extension to download the MP3 behind a Flash player:

What the liveHTTPHeaders extension does is show you the browser's http requests. I use it a lot in web development work to make sure that Flash is requesting data correctly. This tip will always be handy when you come across a site that obscures media through flash.

Rafael used Live HTTP Headers to grab the MP3 from a Flash player playing the theme from Californication, but in theory this will work for other players (a cursory test on YouTube and MySpace didn't turn out much, though).