One of the nice things about the open source movement is it gives us choices. The Wine project has been around for years and lets users run supported Windows applications under Linux. I got an interesting update of where Wine is at from a talk at Linux.conf.au today.

If the Gimp isn't enough for you, you may be interested to know that you can now use Wine to run Photoshop on Linux. The Code Weavers project, maintained by Dan Kegel, supports CS2 and CS3.

This tip came from a talk by Leslie Hawthorn, Google's head of open source programs. Google sponsorship helped fund the development, and there's more in the pipeline. They are also working on getting the speech recognition software Dragon Naturally Speaking working under Linux as well.

Leslie said Dan Kegel had also been working on getting iTunes to work under Linux as well. "He purchased Kraftwerk's Autobahn on iTunes!"

Wine's been lower profile in recent years, it was good to get an update on its progress. I used to recommend it to gamers who didn't want a Windows PC just for games. Have you used Wine? If so I'd be interested to hear what you thought of it.

Linus Torvalds is one of the most influential hackers in modern computing, having created the Linux kernel as an open source alternative to the Unix operating system.  He’s since spent nearly 20 years  maintaining the kernel in a leadership role (as well as continuing to have an active coding role) through the Linux Foundation.

Linus is a regular attendee at Linux.conf.au (last year he was spotted tooling around the conference on a home brew Segway – possibly the geekiest moment in history). He’s back again for LCA this year, and we were thrilled to score an interview with him yesterday.

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BitTorrent is the go-to resource for downloading everything from music and movies to software and operating systems, but as its popularity continues to grow, so do the number of tools available for making the most of it. Some are must-haves, while others are a waste of time. Climb aboard for a look at 10 of the best BitTorrent utilities, tools, and resources for finding and managing your BitTorrent downloads quickly and efficiently.

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The Dumb Little Man weblog's got his eye on your PC posture, and frankly, it's not all it could be. Not only can good posture improve your overall well-being, but from a productivity perspective, it can also help you stay fresh so you can work harder for a longer period of time without feeling the fatigue more common to your old hunched-over habits. To aid in the improvement of your PC posture, the post offers six stretches to get you sitting up straighter and taller at your computer. While you're at it, maybe it's time you fixed your overall workspace into a more healthy, usable setup.

• How do I stop eating when I'm not hungry?
• Can anyone recommend a rowing machine for a small area?
• How can I take my after-work hobby full-time?
• Why are transfers to my external firewire drive so slow?
• What's the best way to play my MP3 player in my car that doesn't use a tape adapter or FM transmitter?

This video tutorial steps through how to build a very simple and cheap vertical camera stabiliser intended to reduce camera shake when you're shooting in conditions where a tripod just won't do (or, you know, you don't have a tripod). The stabiliser should work particularly well for shorter distance shots, but you'll notice more shaking the more zooming you do. In those cases, the tripod is still your best friend, but for a workable and cheap DIY, this is a great DIY tool.

That jar of paprika might have lasted you through college, but is it still fresh? The Unclutterer organisation blog rounds up helpful links to freshness checkers that decode the numbers and letters that replace actual dates on some containers. Here's the list of spice-maker links:

• Durkee
• McCormick
• Spice Islands (registration required)

Even better, one commenter points us to The Epicentre's "Spice Advice" page, which provides storage tips and general guidelines on what you can keep and what can be tossed. Get rid of a few dead-taste spices and your cupboards might just become a little more navigable.

One year ago, Lifehacker released its About this Site Firefox Addon, which provides valuable data about the websites you're visiting.

Blogger Tony Hirst spent a few minutes mixing the RSS and KML feeds from Google's Calendar and Maps functions and, with the help of Yahoo Pipes, came up with a fantastic mashup: Mapped Google Calendar events. That means, for example, opening your customised map to see that you've got grocery shopping and a post office stop in one part of town, so you might want to seek out an ATM near there to avoid excess driving. The mashup requires a little Pipes work, and also a public GCal feed, but once you've got it working, you can then add your GCal items to "My Maps" or even embed them on your own start page. In short, people like our reader Mike might have a great solution for getting directions and coordinate timing for their schedules.

Windows/Mac/Linux: With pictures, videos, and high-resolution fonts, slideshows can make up some pretty big files—fine if you've got a large enough thumb drive or CD-R, but what if you have to email? Sun Presentation Manager, a free extension for OpenOffice, shrinks down files by compressing graphics, deleting hidden slides, and creating static versions of linked objects. It works similar to the PowerPoint-based PPTminimizer, but without the fee and exclusive Office platform—you can use the extension on either OpenOffice files or imported PowerPoint projects. Sun Presentation Manager is a free download, and requires OpenOffice 2.3 or StarOffice 8 or later.

Windows/Mac/Linux: Vidalia, a free, open-source, cross-platform application, makes setting up and configuring Web proxy tool Tor a snap, allowing you to surf the internet anonymously with a turn on/turn off utility. VIdalia sets up your system and helps you connect to, and monitor, Tor relays around the world, even letting you see the route your browsing is taking at the moment. You can also monitor bandwidth usage and set up your own Tor relay if you want to contribute, but Vidalia's main appeal is the bundling of software and configuration tools that make Tor easy enough for anyone to use. Vidalia is a free download for Windows, Mac, and Linux systems.

Free (during beta) project management web app LiquidPlanner is, at a glance, yet another competitor for Microsoft Project, but the time- and task-tracking tool takes a slightly different approach to goals and deadlines. Using what its creators dub "probabilistic" scheduling, LiquidPlanner asks its users to enter a range of dates for task completion, based on best-case and worst-case situations, and it then judges the likelihood of that and other tasks being completed by a given date. Most of the standard Project-like tools are there as well, along with some collaboration tools like a group discussion wiki and easy document sharing. I haven't found a tool to import Project files, however, so open source solutions like OpenProj and GanttProject might be better solutions for those already set up MS-style. LiquidPlanner is free to use during its public beta and requires a sign-up for all users.

Windows/Mac/Linux (Firefox): WebMynd, a free add-on for Firefox, makes it easy to browse through web pages you've visited or specifically "webmarked," whether they're static or dynamically generated. Although you can tell WebMynd not to monitor certain pages and turn its history noting on and off, the add-on generally works as a background service, taking snapshots of the pages you visit. Hit the WebMynd button and you can see thumbnails of those pages. Click on the thumbnails and you get fully browse-able snapshots, with links, images and other data preserved. For hunting down links and images on pages that change pretty frequently, or just getting a more easily-navigated history, WebMynd serves a purpose. WebMynd is free to download, works wherever Firefox does, and lets you browse a week's history at no cost; $US10 and $US20 subscriptions get you six months or a year's worth of snapshots.

Windows only: My Lockbox isn't a full-featured encryption solution like TrueCrypt, but it is an easy and free way to hide a folder from all but the most technically savvy (and extremely prying) eyes. Install the program, choose a folder you want to hide (or let it create a "My Lockbox" in your My Documents folder) and then run the program to unlock and add files to it. Shutting down the program or even booting into safe mode won't reveal your folder, unlike many other "hiding" utilities, and even looking at folder sizes won't reveal your data. Somebody with a recovery disk and knowledge that you're hiding something might breach your data, but for most people's needs, My Lockbox gets the (secret) job done. My Lockbox is a free download for Windows 2000 and later.

US-centric: MSNBC highlights how to invoke Rule 240 to get a new flight fast any time your flight is cancelled for anything other than weather.

I invoked Rule 240—which states that in the event of any flight delay or cancellation caused by anything other than weather, the airline would fly me on the next available flight—not their next available flight, which might not leave for another 24 hours. And guess what happened? A lot of United passengers made it to Boston that day&mdash on American.

A relic of pre-deregulation airlines, the article says that most newer airlines won't honor rule 240, but apparently most of the older airlines still respect this rule as a matter of company policy. If you know anything more about rule 240—maybe you've invoked it yourself?—let's hear about it in the comments. For more details, check out Consumerist's rather extensive guide to Rule 240. Photo by dougww.