Add a little eye candy to your most frequently used folders on your Mac by assigning a background image to the window. To do so, from the View menu, choose "As Icons." Then again from the View menu, choose "Show View Options." Under Background, choose Picture, and select the image you want to set as the background. This setting is folder-specific, so you can theme multiple folders separately.

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Windows only: Freeware application Hotspot Shield secures your public web browsing by connecting you to the internet through the Hotspot Shield virtual private network. What more people seem to use Hotspot Shield for is to access US-only websites from outside the US. We post a lot of content on Lifehacker, and sometimes we get guff for not identifying US-only services. Hotspot Shield has been the go-to service for tons of Lifehacker readers dying to try a site who've hit the US-only wall. Hotspot Shield is ad-supported and installs a toolbar (lame, I know), Windows only. Got another tried and true method for accessing region-specific sites? Let's hear about it in the comments.

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TGIF, people! Before you head out to happy hour, get a load of this week's most popular posts:

Making wireless broadband work on the Eee PC
"Optus, 3 and Vodafone might claim to only support Windows and Macs with their wireless broadband systems, but in fact you can use any of them on a Linux Eee PC without special driver software. Here's the step-by-step guide to getting it set up for Australian 3G networks."

3 key: no cables, me like
"3's latest mobile broadband offering, the prosaically named Broadband Internet Key, is pretty much a standard 3G modem but adds one really useful feature: no cable."

Do More with Your Webcam with Free Tools
"The webcam that came packaged with your computer system can do a whole lot more than just let you video chat. With the right tools, you can turn your webcam into a watchful surveillance tool, a face recognition-enabled computer login utility, a time-lapse movie-maker, and more."

Five Best Start Pages
"Whether you use it to keep up to date on the latest news or as a launching point for the rest of your browsing, you want to find a solid start page to fit your surfing habits."

Protect Your Stolen Mobile Phone
"You've synced your email, address book, and calendar to your fancy smartphone, which has internet access, photos, and videos on it, too—but how do you keep a thief from ringing up your bill, or worse, stealing your identity using your phone?"

Dual Boot or Run Windows in a Virtual Machine?
"I know I can either dual boot Windows with Boot Camp, or run Windows on my Mac with virtualisation software like VMware Fusion or Parallels Desktop. Which is better?"

Enable Google Contact Sync Without an iPhone or iPod Touch
"If you don't have an iPhone or iPod touch, unlocking Google contact sync isn't worth paying hundreds of dollars for the device. A simple system tweak can turn it on for you."

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Windows only: Copy MP3s and other files to and from a jailbroken iPhone or iPod touch with iPhoneBrowser, a free Windows file-browsing utility. iPhoneBrowser is a pretty no-frills file browser, as you can see in the screen above, but it's less hassle then the FTP method included in our iPhone/iPod copying guide earlier today. The apps' "Goto Location" menu can direct you to the folders containing photos, program icons, third-party apps, and more, if it works, but you can add your own favourite spots as well. iPhoneBrowser hemmed and hawed about my ZiPhone-broken> iPod touch, but transferinng my MP3s to the desktop was still pretty easy. iPhoneBrowser is a free download for Windows systems only. Thanks, Miguel and halfshafter!

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Incorporating a new habit into your routine can be difficult, especially if it's not an everyday activity, so personal development blogger Steve Pavlina offers several tips for maintaining that new habit. For example:

Suppose you want to exercise 5 days a week, and you really want to keep those off days. Instead of doing your regular exercise, you could schedule an an alternative activity for the same time. Instead of doing your usual workout, you could use your off days to go for a walk, read, meditate, write in your journal, etc.

Pavlina also suggests making appointments out of your habits to ensure that it's got a serious placeholder in your daily schedule. Got your own method of making a new habit work? Let's hear it in the comments.

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Windows only: Freeware application Start Killer hides the Start menu button, freeing up extra space on your Windows taskbar. You can still access the Start menu by hitting the Windows key, but Start Killer frees up a good chunk of taskbar real estate. You can optionally disable the Start menu altogether if you wanted to deny users access to it. Start Killer only does one thing, but there's nothing we like better than a simple tool that does exactly what it says. No Vista option as yet.

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Wired's How-To Wiki dives into home automation, offering advice for beginning "smart house" hackers looking to take their homes to the future. The article focuses on the X10 standard for automation, covering the devices and software you can use to save energy and look cool by automating devices in your home. We've highlighted a few fun ways you can put a little X10 automation to good use, like the remote controlled deadbolt, but Wired's post covers the nuts and bolts of getting started. If you've traveled the home automation road, share your experience in the comments.

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Do-it-yourselfer Kipkay doesn't have a backlit keyboard, so he repurposed the pointless Scroll Lock LED on an old school keyboard to light up all the keys instead. The end result does indeed make typing in the dark possible, but it doesn't look anywhere near as cool as a commercial backlit keyboard. In fact, in the stark light of day you will probably be embarrassed about the keyboard's light antennae, which you turn on by hitting the Scroll Lock key. Still, this is a nifty mod if only for the innovative concept. Hit the jump to watch how he did it.

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All platforms running Thunderbird: Thunderbird extension Zindus syncs your Google contacts with Thunderbird's address book. Just install the extension, give it your Gmail username and password (it supports both @gmail and Google Apps domains), and hit the Sync Now button to synchronise names, email addresses, phone numbers, IM handles, and more. Zindus does its best to handle any conflicts and walk you through resolutions, but you can also sync the contacts to a separate list if you just want to give it a try. The free, cross-platform Zindus is a fantastic solution for Thunderbird users jealous of Address Book's recent Google Contact Sync update.

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Mozilla product manager Alex Polvi's state of Firefox 3-compatible add-ons report points out that while top extensions like Gmail Manager, Forecast Fox, and Foxmarks are now Firefox 3-ready, testers are still waiting on a few biggies, like Greasemonkey, Tab Mix Plus, FoxyTunes, and Google Browser Sync. Tell us the extension that has you waiting on Firefox 3 in the comments.

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Development on the Xbox Media Centre Mac port continues apace, with the new beta 3 which dropped today. Grab the update to get more fixes and additions from the Linux version, and see how XBMC turns your Mac into a better media center.

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Got some downtime at the office but don't feel comfortable pulling out a paperback to get some reading in on-the-job? Web site Read at Work serves up public domain works in PowerPoint-looking chunks. The site boasts a convincing Flash application that runs in fullscreen and looks exactly like a Windows XP installation. (You have to try it to truly appreciate it.) Granted, reading an entire book in this fashion is far from ideal, but if you're desperate, it's a fun—albeit weird—way to get your fix.

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There as many applications and methods for copying music from an iPod to your computer as there are iPod models themselves, which makes finding a sure-fire, free solution a matter of tedious trial and error. To save you the work, today we're rounding up the best tools and techniques for getting music off any model iPod onto nearly any computer—for free. Whether you're a Windows user looking to yank tunes from an iPhone, a Mac fan backing up an iPod classic, or a Linux enthusiast trying to get into your new nano, we've got you covered. Follow along for a detailed look at the best ways to transfer songs from your iPod to your computer, no matter what hardware or operating system you're rocking.

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Webapp MyFolia organizes and tracks your garden's progress using all the current "Web 2.0" tools out there—tags, a wiki, Google maps, and social networking. Sign up for an account at MyFolia to:

• Track your gardening progress - list your current plants with planting dates, track your seed stashes and note down your wish list plants.
• Share your garden with others and check out what other gardeners are growing near you.
• See who else is growing the same things you are - see their photos, read their journal entries and even leave them a comment or two!
• Join a gardening group (or start your own!) about any gardening topic under the sun.

Even if you're not a gardener yourself, you can check out other people's flowers and vegetables by just surfing the tags at MyFolia. Do you keep a gardening journal? How do you do it? Tell us about your Getting Gardening Done system in the comments.

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Miss anything good this month on Lifehacker? Have a recap:

• Turn Your Point-and-Shoot into a Super-Camera
  "If you're using a consumer grade point-and-shoot Canon digital camera, you've got hardware in hand that can support advanced features way beyond what shipped in the box."
• Get Vista's Best Features in XP
  "Despite the fact that most of you prefer XP to Vista and would rather Microsoft extended XP's shelf-life, several new and improved features available in Vista would be great to have in XP."
• Top 10 Things You Forgot Your Mac Can Do
  "Macs may be more expensive, and Mac users more elitist (ahem), but blind Apple loyalty aside, there are a number of neat features bundled into your Mac that make it super useful and fun."
• Top 10 Firefox 3 Features
  "The newest version of our favourite open source web browser, Mozilla Firefox 3, offers dozens of new features and fixes, but only a handful will make the most dramatic difference in your everyday browsing."
• Best Text Editors
  "From managing our to-do lists and writing code to jotting ideas and keeping a grocery list, nothing beats a solid plain text editor."
• Learn to Play an Instrument Online
  "Chances are at one point or another, you've either purchased an instrument or considered doing so with the intention of learning to play it; most of us, however, never get around the learning part."
• Best Online File Sharing Services
  "Whether you're trying to share megabytes worth of music with a friend or send an important document to a coworker, nothing outshines a fast, easy-to-use file-sharing service."
• Slipstream Service Pack 3 into Your Windows XP Installation CD
  "Next time you wipe your PC's hard drive clean and reinstall Windows with that old installation disc, you don't want to connect your fresh, unpatched and vulnerable system to the internet only to download 176 new updates from Microsoft."
• XBMC Turns Your Mac into the Ultimate Media Center
  "You don't have to mod your classic Xbox to run the best free media centre application around anymore: Dedicated developers have ported the Xbox Media Centre (XBMC) software to the Mac, and its killer features will convince you to abandon Front Row forever."

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Free eBay search tool Auction Bloopers does the exhaustive work of finding slight misspellings and typos in and around every word you type in, throwing them all into the online auction giant and returning with search results that include pretty much every possible result you might not find otherwise. We've previously highlighted a similar search tool, but Auction Bloopers notably uses extra, missing, and mis-ordered characters for model and serial numbers, making it a handy tool for gadget hunting.

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Gmail's newer, less-refresh-required version 2, unveiled back in the fall of 2007, hasn't been readily accessible to users of Opera's browser. Tech blog CyberNet notes, however, that by using Opera's 9.5 beta version, and using this no-browser-check-required link as your access point, you'll get full access to all the AJAX-y goodness. If you don't see changes right away, hit the "Newer Version" link in the upper-right corner.

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