Security guru Bruce Schneier, who'll be keynoting at Linux.conf.au in Melbourne later this month, has penned an opinion piece for Wired on why he leaves his home Wi-Fi network unlocked. Under the heading "Steal this Wi-Fi" he says he considers sharing access to his internet is basic politeness: "Providing internet access to guests is kind of like providing heat and electricity, or a hot cup of tea." We love the sentiment Bruce, but in Australia at least we have download caps and excess use charges to consider too.

PC gamers will appreciate Can You Run it, an online tool which checks your system spec against a list of popular and new release games to see if your computer can play them.
Note that it does require you to download an Active X or Java plugin to work. The test runs quickly and shows you the results in an easy to read format - spelling out both what componentry you have and what the minimum requirement is for the game you've asked about. It also shows you the optimal or "Recommended" specs for the game - my system got the all clear for the minimum requirements for playing Bioshock, but when I clicked into the "Recommended" specs it warned me my video RAM wasn't up to snuff - Bioshock recommends 512MB of RAM, and I have a measly 256MB. Oh the shame.
I also liked the fact that  the results page also prompts you to the vendor's download page if you need to update your driver.

Windows Vista only: Free, open source Vista application and Media Center plugin Lifextender removes commercials from Windows Media Center-recorded TV shows, cutting the average 30 minute show down to around 22 minutes. Lifextender scans the directory your Media Center records to, analyzes, and re-cuts the videos one at a time, then replaces the original file with the new, commercial-free one. Not only will it save you time, it'll also save you hard drive space. If you're using Vista's Media Center to record TV, this is a must-have (it even works with extenders like your Xbox 360). If you aren't using your Vista PC as a media center, maybe it's time you turn it into the media center powerhouse it's meant to be.

Not sure how we missed this last month, but a new release of Gmail's Mobile App that works with Google Apps (For Your Domain) accounts is now available for your Java-enabled mobile phone. Just browse to m.google.com/a on your mobile phone and download "Mail by Google." The icon is a blue envelope (instead of the regular Gmail Mobile red icon) and it's labeled "Mail by Google." You log in using your name@yourdomain.com address. You can have both Gmail Mobile and Mail by Google installed on the same phone, and it works on Symbian and other Java-enabled handsets like my Nokia 6682. Check out our screenshot tour of the Gmail Mobile 1.5 app to get a taste of Gmail Mobile 1.5. The Mail by Google mobile app is a free download direct to your handset.

Windows tip: Weblog gHacks details how to customize your system tray to selectively show and hide system tray apps

Right-click the start menu button and select Properties. Uncheck Hide Inactive Icons to display all icons. You could alternatively click on customize and select items that you always want to see.

Windows/Mac/Linux: After all that trouble of writing up a step by step tutorial on how to install the software that powers Wikipedia on your home computer, and someone goes ahead and builds a simple click-click-click installer. The BitNami project offers executable installers for lots of open source webapps, from MediaWiki (of Wikipedia) to Drupal to WordPress. Download the installer for the app you want on your computer, and in a few clicks you'll have it up and running—no configuration file editing or installing MySQL, PHPmyadmin, and Apache separately required. Sweet. All BitNami installers are free, and most seem to be offered for Windows, Mac and Linux. Thanks, RIDRU!

As the temperature shoots up to 40 degrees and above, most of us are melting in our shoes and dreaming of escaping to the Antarctic for a few days. If you can afford to do that, go for it.
But if you're like most of us and stuck in the office through the summer, here's a guide to beating the heat and keeping your cool. Read on for Lifehacker's tips to choosing summer-friendly clothing and shoes, how to survive commuting hell, and how to stay cool in the office.

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If you're on the lookout for a new domain name, here's a trap to look out for. When checking domain availability via a registrar, ensure you're using a site you trust. Most domain registrars have a tool on their website which lets you search for available domain names (for example, Network Solutions WHOIS Search).

 But you may want to careful when you use WHOIS services - and here's why. Some domain registrars have been known to immediately register a site (for a period of a few days) when you query a .com domain for availability through their website - thus preventing you from registering it via any other registrar.

While operators doing this may claim they are doing it to stop someone else grabbing the domain while you're completing the shopping cart process, it's effectively a lockin, and it looks like it's against ICANN's registrar agreement too.

ICANN's registrar agreement says:

    3.7.4 Registrar shall not activate any Registered Name unless and
    until it is satisfied that it has received a reasonable assurance
    of payment of its registration fee. For this purpose, a charge to
    a credit card, general commercial terms extended to creditworthy
    customers, or other mechanism providing a similar level of assurance
    of payment shall be sufficient, provided that the obligation to pay
    becomes final and non-revocable by the Registered Name Holder upon
    activation of the registration.

The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People author Steven R. Covey advises readers how to to strike a balance between work and life:

Today the average college student or corporate worker considers themselves a "multitasker". It's not unusual to meet people in their 20s who are working, going to school, starting their own company, married, raising kids and enjoying hobbies. They end up with a huge list of things that fracture their attention. This isn't wrong in any way-for the most part it's admirable-but there is an old saying: to a hammer, everything looks like a nail.

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Here's a tip which could help spice up a birthday cake for your geeky child or loved one - a kitchen hack for making edible googly eyes. The creators -at the aptly named Evil Mad Scientist Labratories blog - use empty gelatine capsules (like the ones used for vitamins and other pills), hundreds and thousands or cake decorating balls for the 'pupils'. The pupils are captured in the gel cap, which is gently pushed into a light coloured backing (soft biscuit or a malteser cut in half) to provide the base and the 'whites of the eyes'.
How could a birthday cake *NOT* be improved by this hack? I love it.

One Hundred Percent EDIBLE Googly Eyes [Evil Mad Scientist Labratories via MAKE]

Windows only: Freeware Microsoft Outlook plug-in Xobni (that's inbox backwards) adds a handful of killer features to its new Outlook sidebar. Among those features: Email analytics, extraordinarily useful contact cards, fast search, threaded (Gmail-like) conversations, and more. The video above gives an excellent overview, so give it a look. Seeing as Xobni has successfully made Outlook appear exciting (which is no easy feat), this freeware, Windows-only plug-in looks like a winner. Currently Xobni is in a closed beta, but the first 50 readers to head to the download page and enter the code "lifehacker" can download. Once you're in, you should be able to invite friends, so if you use the code, keep an eye on the comments and help out a fellow Outlook user. Outlook lovers, let's hear how it works for you in the comments.

Build out a paper flowchart on your gigantic whiteboard with Removable Magic Tape. The tape pulls off easily, leaves behind no messy residue, and can be pulled up and moved around. Weblog Cool Tools suggests using it for testing layouts for books, and it would also be perfect for testing out your scrapbook layouts. Removable Magic Tape will set you back $3 at Amazon.

Tech help site Of Zen and Computing describes how to use Microsoft Office to do Optical Character Recognition (OCR)—that is, recognize text inside digital images (like scanned documents). The Microsoft Document Imaging application comes with Microsoft Office (who knew?) and can grok text from TIFF images. Haven't tried this one myself, but after wrestling with various OCR apps several years ago, my expectations are low. What's your favorite OCR application or method? Tell us about it in the comments.

Windows and Mac OS X only: If you've ever considered using a desktop-based newsreader rather than online options like Google Reader, chances are you've run into Newsgator's FeedDemon (Windows) or NetNewsWire (Mac). Today Newsgator has announced that both offerings are free, meaning that you can now get the speed, desktop integration, smart lists, and syncing capabilities of these awesome newsreaders for the wonderful price of naught. I made the move to NetNewsWire from Google Reader a couple of months back, and frankly, I'm not sure I could go back to web-based RSS. And now that both FeedDemon and NetNewsWire have hit the freeware world, I don't think I'll ever have to. They've also freed up NewsGator Go! (for Windows Mobile) and NewsGator Inbox (for MS Outlook). Awesome.

Even in this golden age of Big Internet Companies Acquiring Everything In Sight, there are still a few independent, small webapps out there that don't get the attention they should for their useful functionality. Every once in awhile we get sick of constantly writing about the big name webapps everyone knows about, so today we're turning the spotlight away from the obvious greats and taking a look at online tools that may have flown under your radar. Here's our top 10 pick of of underhyped webapps that should get more attention than they do.

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Mac OS X only: Desktop Facebook application PhotoBook browses your own and your friends' Facebook photo albums in an interface similar to iPhoto. Install PhotoBook and log into your Facebook account to easily navigate users and albums in what's decidedly a more user-friendly interface than Facebook on the web. PhotoBook comes with easy "add to iPhoto" feature (great for sucking friends' and family members' albums into your own collection), search as you type, full-screen slideshows, and keyboard shortcuts that make flipping through Facebook photos a lot faster and easier. PhotoBook 1.1 is a free download for Mac only.

The Lifehacker team will be at a few events and conferences in the next couple of months:

• On January 30th, Gina will be talking about Better Gmail at Web Directions North in Vancouver. (session description)
  
• On March 3rd, Gina will be talking personal productivity at O'Reilly's Emerging Technology conference in San Diego, California. (session description)
  
• From March 7th to 11th, Gina, Adam, and Tamar will be at South by Southwest Interactive in Austin, TX, hitting up panels, signing books, and attending the Bloggie Awards. Gina will be speaking on a panel moderated by Annalee Newitz of io9 (more details to come on that.)

Setting up a meeting agenda is easy—at least compared to the task of finding a time that all the participants can and will make. TimeBridge, a free meeting scheduling web app, sends out emails to every attendee you enter in and asks them which of the five time slots you've picked out work for them. If they all reply, TimeBridge figures out which time works best, confirms it and emails you back. If nothing works or you've got the inevitable one or two stragglers, you'll also find out. It's not an entirely new idea, but the instant sync with Google Calendar or Outlook (through a plug-in) certainly takes away one more step from the often tedious process. For more tips on shepherding your important discussions, hear how our readers answered a call for help.

One of the first things that stood out about my new iPod Touch's browser interface was the lack of a copy/paste function—and it really stuck out when sending email or filling out forms. Quasi Clipboard, a bookmarklet for the iPhone and iPod Touch, isn't a copy/paste fix, but it's a decent half-way fix. Hit the "Set" button and type in some text (that you're hopefully looking at in-browser), and you can recall that text into any text box later with the "Get" button. For hard-to-remember items like account numbers and URLs, it's definitely better than jumping back and forth between pages. Quasi Touch requires syncing your iPhone/iPod Touch with Safari (Mac) or Internet Explorer (Windows) to install.

Windows only: There are many, many tools to convert Microsoft Word files into PDF documents, including those built into the latest office suites, but what about the other way around? Free PDF to Word Doc Converter is a small program that solves a big headache for some office and document workers. Load up a PDF, choose how you want to export the file—including images, shapes and text layout functions—and hit the convert button. My own tests found, like others, that some pretty big Word files can come out, especially if you've got images and graphs embedded, but for your standard text-only document, the free tool gets most of the text and layout right. Free PDF to Word Converter is a free download for all versions of Windows.

Win/Mac/Linux (Firefox): Firefox's drop-down search toolbar can be a serious time saver—unless you have so many engines installed that you stall while looking for the right one. Organize Search Engines, a free Firefox add-on, gives you the same abilities to group search engines into folders and insert separators as Firefox's built-in bookmark organizer. By grouping your lesser-used search sites into folders, you make it easier for your eye to find the more helpful ones and, as the How-To Geek points out, optimise other extensions like Context Search. Organize Search Engines is a free download and works wherever Firefox does.

Linux only: Free open source backup utility FlyBack exists to offer part of the features in Mac OS X Leopard's vaunted Time Machine—at least the part involving set-it-and-forget-it, time-stamped backups. Install and load FlyBack, tell it where your external drive is and which folders you want to back up and when, and the program sets up your Linux system's cron scheduler to do it. The program is still in its infancy, but has come a long way since a buggy version I gave up on in early November, and I prefer the pared-down interface edges to more advanced apps like TimeVault. FlyBack is a free download for Linux systems and may require installing a few Python libraries to get running (detailed at the project page)