Here's a clever way to fold an 8.5x11 sheet of paper into a small book. The way it's folded, all of the book's 8 outward-facing pages are from the same side of the sheet of paper. This allows you to easily construct a handy little daily planner by printing a single sheet of paper. When you're done folding, the first and third leaf will have a little pouch that you can shove a business card or two inside.

The PocketMod website has a flash application that lets you quickly build a layout for your planner. You can drag calendars, todo-lists, grids, conversion tables, and even RSS feed articles to the page and print it directly from your browser.

I love it. It's the iPhone for the mobile Luddite.

You're probably thinking: this pocketmod thing is awesome and all, but what about maps? Well, PocketMod does maps too. Or rather, a cool Web2.0 mapping service does PocketMods.

At mapufacture.com, you can create and manage custom maps and import data layers from news sources, geo blogging services, and Google My Maps. In addition to all the normal embedding and sharing tools that you'd expect, they also have a PocketMod export, allowing you to convert your map into a handy format that you can put in your back pocket.

You can't make phone calls on your PocketMod and it doesn't hold any songs you can't sing or whistle yourself. On the other hand, it's crazy slim, 3rd party application writing is a cinch, the data plan is affordable, and you won't believe the battery life.

PocketMod
Mapufacture - create custom multilayer maps (with pocketmod output support)

FreePOPs is an open source, plugin-based POP proxy that you can run on your local machine. It was originally designed to allow you to use a normal POP email client to read your mail on a multitude of webmail systems. You point your mail client at the FreePOPs server, and it connects and screen-scrapes your webmail account so that you can read your email in the comfort of your favorite mail reader.

The great thing about FreePOPs is its filter plugin architecture. There are a number of different plugins to support the specific requirements of most of the popular web-based email systems. There's even an RSS plugin that will pull an RSS feed and make it look like a normal POP mailbox. Thankfully, you don't need to configure anything on the server. Instead, you connect to the FreePOPs server using a particular username and password format to activate the appropriate plugin.

Here's how to set up an RSS-to-POP mailbox using FreePOPs and the standard OS X Mail.app email client.

Every morning Robert Scoble starts his day by sifting through 622 RSS feeds. In this interview, he describes the tools and tricks that enable him to accomplish the immense task of personally aggregating the live web. Here are a few spoiler tips:

• Use Google Reader (keyboard commands make browsing faster)
• Use "all items view" to see the full river of news in chronological order
• Filter out potentials in the first pass. Take a top level filter for topic, information density, author, and quality of post. Only articles that make the cut are looked at in more detail.
• Superhuman abilities help

How Scoble Reads 622 RSS Feeds Each Morning - Link

Click To Play

A couple months ago, I mentioned the new (Mac-only) Skitch screen-capture and annotation app from Plasq. At the time, I wasn't able to register for their mailing list (the captcha issue is fixed now, so do head over to sign up), but I just got a sneak peak at the private beta, and it's everything I'd hoped it would be. Check out the screencast for a quick walkthrough and my initial impressions. In brief, I can think of many productive uses for it, but the time I waste playing with it will likely negate all of them.- Link to video download.

1. Work hard on a discrete, small task for 10 minutes.
2. Take a 2 minute break.
3. Repeat the first two steps 5 times

The key to this hack is to reward yourself with a break regardless of whether the task was completed or not. You are rewarding progress made, not work completed, and this makes even the most daunting tasks seem more manageable (especially when the hardest part is getting started).

I think what's probably going on here is that you are structuring for yourself a positive reinforcement conditioning system. By keeping the increments short, it's much easier to form the association between the work stimulus and the break reward. Compare this to the 2 week cycle on the typical pay check reward, or the 30 day invoice roundabout if you're a freelancer, or even no reward for those thankless around the house tasks that always need to be done... Procrastinators just need something more immediate and obvious as encouraging reinforcement.

What do you think about this? Have a productivity hack that works better for you? Chat about it in the comments!

43 Folders' Procrastination hack: "(10+2)*5" -Link.

Documents are placed through an OCR process, so the text is selectable and searchable (though I'd probably rather have my documents converted to plain text or html). For whiteboards, you don't even need to take the shot head on. The software will take cues from the whiteboard's edge to transform the image into proper alignment.

Save a trip to the fax machine, and never write "Do Not Erase" again -Link.

Over at the SmileOnMyMac Blog, Gordon Meyer (author of Smart Home Hacks) offers a great tip for speeding up tedious blogging tasks with TextExpander (Mac only):

Here's a great tip for bloggers and the like. I use TextExpander to create a handy macro for creating Amazon Affiliate links. It's much easier than using Amazon's web interface.

Related:

• Merlin Mann's TextExpander video tutorial for MacBreak

Matt Cutts shares three solid Gmail productivity tips to help keep your inbox under control, including keeping mailing lists out of there (using filters), prioritizing messages (using Greasemonkey and persistent searches), and excluding messages from certain accounts (using filters and labels).

Click To Play

Over at O'Reilly's Mac DevCenter, Erica Sadun points out a little-known (at least to me) feature in the current version of iChat:

By control-clicking (right-clicking) a buddy's name, a contextual menu pops up offering the option to invite that person to a one-way video chat. This means that they can watch your video but will not send video back to you in return.

For example, crafts like knitting are notoriously hard to teach without visual cues, and even the most detailed books often suffer from their lack of moving pictures. When I learned to knit, I used books as a crutch, but actually learning required sitting next to my mother-in-law to see how it was done. Even now, when I hit a roadblock with a new technique, I need to wait till the next time we're together. But if we had a feature like this, we likely wouldn't have to wait. I could just "look over her shoulder" as she described what she was doing.

The most obvious benefit of one-way video is that it doesn't require the recipient to have a video camera on their end, but as Erica notes, for instructional content as with streaming movies, one-way video has another notable advantage over two-way video conferencing:

you don't have to watch the other person watching your video. You don't have to see them adjusting their hair, performing nasal maintenance, or any of the other unconscious things people do when they get involved in watching TV as opposed to engaging actively in a social situation.

Writing wonks and anal editors rejoice! Gina Trapani just released her Ly Detector as a Greasemonkey script!

If you're at all familiar with Strunk and White, you know that excessive use of adverbs - words that end in -ly - isn't a sign of strong writing. All of us writers struggle with sentence-weakening generally's and relatively's at times, but now there's a Greasemonkey script that highlights adverbial transgressions on the web automatically. (Whoops!)

Once it's installed, The Ly Detector Greasemonkey script takes a yellow highlighter to adverbs, like obviously and previously to help web writers stay on their non-adverbial toes. The Ly Detector's great for bloggers who are trying to improve their skills with the quill - or just those who want to make fun of them. After the jump, the script download, and some more details of how this works.

Related:

• Greasemonkey Hacks [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/03/pass_the_ly_detector.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558" />Read More</a>] [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/03/pass_the_ly_detector.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558#comments" />Comments</a>] http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/03/pass_the_ly_detector.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/03/pass_the_ly_detector.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 Life Thu, 01 Mar 2007 04:49:10 -0800 Over at Parent Hacks, Asha Dornfest points to Listpic, a "visual Craigslist browser" that lets you search your city's Craigslist listings by keyword or category and display the results as image thumbnails. Price and location are included with the...

  Over at Parent Hacks, Asha Dornfest points to Listpic, a "visual Craigslist browser" that lets you search your city's Craigslist listings by keyword or category and display the results as image thumbnails. Price and location are included with the photo, mousing over reveals some details on the item, and clicking the image opens a pop-up of the detailed listing. This view helps weed out the listings with generic promotional photos, getting right to items that appear to be real, and becomes a big help for those of us who have a "no photo, no interest" policy for online bargain hunting.

  ]]> [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/03/browse_craigslist_photos_with.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558" />Read More</a>] [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/03/browse_craigslist_photos_with.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558#comments" />Comments</a>] http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/03/browse_craigslist_photos_with.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/03/browse_craigslist_photos_with.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 Shopping Thu, 01 Mar 2007 03:52:52 -0800 When my access to O'Reilly's email server went out today, I still managed to send a message to tech support from my O'Reilly email address. Since I'd already added my other address to Gmail, here's all I needed to...

  When my access to O'Reilly's email server went out today, I still managed to send a message to tech support from my O'Reilly email address. Since I'd already added my other address to Gmail, here's all I needed to do:

  1. Log in to your Gmail account at mail.google.com.
     
  2. Click Compose.
     
  3. Use the drop-down menu in the From field to select the address you'd like to use to send the message.
     
  4. Compose and send!
  Sure, it's more of a tip than a hack, since it's built into Gmail, but it sure saved me in a pinch today, so I thought it qualified for a Hackszine mention.

  
  Related:
  

  • Google Hacks, 3E
  ]]> [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/send_company_email_from_gmail.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558" />Read More</a>] [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/send_company_email_from_gmail.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558#comments" />Comments</a>] http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/send_company_email_from_gmail.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/send_company_email_from_gmail.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 Gmail Mon, 26 Feb 2007 07:05:46 -0800 Have you ever gotten to work early due to light traffic and wished you'd slept in a bit later? Or maybe you've left on time, but arrived late because of a traffic jam? Greg McCarroll is working on the...
  Have you ever gotten to work early due to light traffic and wished you'd slept in a bit later? Or maybe you've left on time, but arrived late because of a traffic jam? Greg McCarroll is working on the second iteration of a wired alarm clock that adjusts your wake-up time depending on traffic conditions.

  Greg writes,
  

  The original idea was simply to take the data I could access via the live departure boards feature of our railway network's website, which contained information about train departure times and all too often delays and apply it to the wake-up time of an "alarm clock".

  Ever since, I've been wondering how I could apply my alarm clock hack to my daily drive and when I recently discovered the TFL Traffic Alerts Service I knew how to reawaken the project. Basically I intend to build a journey time predictor based on the following data,
  

  • The amount, proximity and severity of traffic alerts to my daily route.
  • Wheter or not it's a school holiday or not.
  • The day of the week (I have a pet theory that people start earlier on a Monday and slowly get later towards the friday).

  A screen scraping agent, LEGO snooze button interface, airport express wake-up tunes, getting to sleep in, and never being late to work again. I love it.

  Links:
  

  • Intelligent alarm clock v1
  • Version 2 - in progress
  ]]> [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/intelligent_snooze_button_agen.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558" />Read More</a>] [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/intelligent_snooze_button_agen.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558#comments" />Comments</a>] http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/intelligent_snooze_button_agen.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/intelligent_snooze_button_agen.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 Life Sat, 24 Feb 2007 00:10:06 -0800 Here's a great way to rid your desk of device clutter. Take everything but the monitor, keyboard, and mouse and zip-tie it all to the underside. - Link....
  Here's a great way to rid your desk of device clutter. Take everything but the monitor, keyboard, and mouse and zip-tie it all to the underside. - Link.
  ]]> [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/unclutter_your_desk.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558" />Read More</a>] [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/unclutter_your_desk.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558#comments" />Comments</a>] http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/unclutter_your_desk.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/unclutter_your_desk.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 Productivity Fri, 23 Feb 2007 00:11:54 -0800 IMified and Stikkit seem to have heard my request. You can now post to Stikkit via IM....

  IMified and Stikkit seem to have heard my request. You can now post to Stikkit via IM.

  ]]> [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/imify_to_stikkit.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558" />Read More</a>] [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/imify_to_stikkit.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558#comments" />Comments</a>] http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/imify_to_stikkit.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/imify_to_stikkit.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 Productivity Fri, 09 Feb 2007 17:00:09 -0800 We at Hackszine are all about collaboration, and lately our geographically distributed team has been working on web-based and decidedly non-MS Office ways of doing so. We've been paying particular attention to the Google suite made up of Google...

  We at Hackszine are all about collaboration, and lately our geographically distributed team has been working on web-based and decidedly non-MS Office ways of doing so. We've been paying particular attention to the Google suite made up of Google Docs & Spreadsheets, Gmail, and Google Calendar (and rumored to soon include a PowerPoint alternative), which have generally worked well but have caused some significant hitches as well. Once we all get together on the same document, things have moved smoothly, but it usually takes many failed invitations, foiled uploads, and redirects before we get there.

  Ever since Google acquired Writely, the "Email to Google Docs" feature has consistently failed for me when sent from my work email address, requiring me to upload everything from the web interface instead of copying Google Docs with a message that I send to our group with a Word attachment, which would really speed things up for us. So, just getting a document started has been a tedious hassle. But the hassle hasn't ended once the document is online.

  This week, Dale Dougherty sent this Google Docs/Calendar request to our group, which I've decided to share with our competent Hackszine readers, since I've been unable to find a workable solution myself:

  I've been trying to share a Google Doc with the two Brians. When I use their O'Reilly email, they don't get the message. So I have to use their Gmail addresses. Should I be able to invite anyone with an email address to view or edit a Google doc? Bre sent me an invitation to his calendar using my O'Reilly address and it didn't work--it complained that it couldn't link his calendar to mine. My Google account is set up with my Gmail address. Can someone explain this set of problems--using a non-Gmail email address and your Gmail address interchangeably?

  

  Dale's message highlights a problem we've encountered with all of Google's services--namely, that when you're invited to join a document at one email address (that is, when the message actually makes it through spam filters), but the rest of your life is attached to another, you're out of luck. Since I maintain a Google Calendar (shared with others and including others' calendars) associated with my Gmail account, I'm not going to maintain an entirely separate calendar (is that even possible, or wouldn't that still require another Google account?) for collaborations with people who use my @oreilly.com address as their primary means of contact, and there doesn't appear to be any way to merge online identities within the Google system.

  Tim O'Reilly puts a finer point on this issue:

  The only hack I've been able to figure out is to get people to send me the invitation to both accounts. (I forward all my *****@oreilly.com mail to Gmail, but not the other way around, as that would create a loop, yet I use *****@gmail.com for calendar et al. The alternative would be to make *****@gmail.com my primary email address and forward to *****@oreilly.com.) Seems to me that this is a hidden (maybe even unconscious) power play by Google. There's a race on to get your sticky identity from one site to become your default identity.

  This is a good point. Is Google attempting to keep their system closed, locking us into a single online identity associated with their services? If that's the case, it wouldn't be that much better for collaboration than being locked into the MS Office suite, the unfortunate de facto standard for most professional collaboration right now.

  So, does anyone have any solutions to this tangled nest of questions? Any specific hacks to help out the Hacks team? In addition to these specific concerns, we'd also love to see any general hacks that help get you use other tools to get things done that would normally require MS Office. This is a hot space on our radar (especially with the launch of Google Apps for Your Domain), both behind the scenes and in terms of what we'd like to cover.

  ]]> [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/call_for_hacks_help_the_hacks.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558" />Read More</a>] [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/call_for_hacks_help_the_hacks.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558#comments" />Comments</a>] http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/call_for_hacks_help_the_hacks.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/call_for_hacks_help_the_hacks.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 Google Fri, 09 Feb 2007 07:57:19 -0800 Contrary to what you might think, based on the focus of most of the posts on this site, we don't necessarily believe there's always a technological solution to every problem. In fact, for many areas in life, I've often...

  Contrary to what you might think, based on the focus of most of the posts on this site, we don't necessarily believe there's always a technological solution to every problem. In fact, for many areas in life, I've often found the right life hack for my particular need may be discovered at perhaps the opposite end of the spectrum: philosophy.

  In particular, the Ancients really knew how to live well and started hacking great ways to deal with the effects of technology from the moment Prometheus gave us fire. For example, I don't make it to the theater as much as I'd like anymore, but whenever I do, I take a page from Epictetus:
  

  When you are going about any action, remind yourself what nature the action is. If you are going to bathe, picture to yourself the things which usually happen in the bath: some people splash the water, some push, some use abusive language, and others steal. Thus you will more safely go about this action if you say to yourself, "I will now go bathe, and keep my own mind in a state conformable to nature." And in the same manner with regard to every other action. For thus, if any hindrance arises in bathing, you will have it ready to say, "It was not only to bathe that I desired, but to keep my mind in a state conformable to nature; and I will not keep it if I am bothered at things that happen."

  Okay, so we don't have public baths anymore, but this technique works well in movie theaters, lines at amusement parks, restaurants, or pretty much anywhere you intend to enjoy yourself around other people. Seriously, I consider this passage with many deep breaths at almost every movie I attend. It works.
  ]]> [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/everyday_stoicism_or_how_i_lea.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558" />Read More</a>] [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/everyday_stoicism_or_how_i_lea.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558#comments" />Comments</a>] http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/everyday_stoicism_or_how_i_lea.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/everyday_stoicism_or_how_i_lea.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 Life Fri, 09 Feb 2007 05:48:49 -0800 Inspired by our post about personalizing your Flickr replies, the ever-resourceful and reader-focused Gina Trapani just whipped up her own code to add similar functionality to Lifehacker comments. Her Lifehacker Reply with Commenter Name Greasemonkey script adds a "[reply...

  Inspired by our post about personalizing your Flickr replies, the ever-resourceful and reader-focused Gina Trapani just whipped up her own code to add similar functionality to Lifehacker comments. Her Lifehacker Reply with Commenter Name Greasemonkey script adds a "[reply by name]" link to each comment on Lifehacker.com and inserts the commenter's name (prepended with an @ in v 0.2) into your response when you click that link.

  Taking it one step further (thanks to the GNU Public License assigned to Gina's original code), Lifehacker reader Ali Karbassi modified the script to include links to the actual comment boxes you're replying to.

  Nice work all around. It adds a nice personal touch to the comments thread, and it's great to see community improvements to the site's innovation. I know it makes my reader experience more enjoyable, both functionally and emotionally.

  Links to Lifehacker Greasemonkey Scripts:

  • Lifehacker post about the script
  • Gina's Lifehacker Reply with Commenter Name
  • Ali Karbassi's modified script
  ]]> [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/reply_with_commenter_name_at_l.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558" />Read More</a>] [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/reply_with_commenter_name_at_l.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558#comments" />Comments</a>] http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/reply_with_commenter_name_at_l.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/reply_with_commenter_name_at_l.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 Life Thu, 08 Feb 2007 05:52:07 -0800 Thanks to Lifehacker for tipping us off to IMified:an instant messenger buddy that works accross all major IM networks and offers access to a growing number of web applications, as well as productivity tools like notes, reminders, and todo's....

  Thanks to Lifehacker for tipping us off to IMified:

  an instant messenger buddy that works accross all major IM networks and offers access to a growing number of web applications, as well as productivity tools like notes, reminders, and todo's. Imified helps you get things done faster.

  To get started, just send a message in AIM/iChat/Yahoo! Messenger to the IMified buddy (imified@imified.com for MSN or imified@gmail.com on Google Talk/Jabber). Following a few prompts will soon allow you to IM your favorite web apps, including Google Calendar, Backpack, Remember the Milk, Blogger, and more (here's hoping Stikkit is next).

  
  I can confirm that it works seamlessly and easily with WordPress (though I couldn't get it to work with Blogger). Setup was easy and I composed and posted this test message in just a minute or so entirely through iChat:

  

  ]]> [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/imify_your_web_apps.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558" />Read More</a>] [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/imify_your_web_apps.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558#comments" />Comments</a>] http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/imify_your_web_apps.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/imify_your_web_apps.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 Blogging Tue, 06 Feb 2007 12:38:02 -0800 There's a classic horror story that keeps me from sleeping at night sometimes. I've heard it told a few different ways. I've even told the story myself more than once, but Phil's version that he posted yesterday morning was...
  There's a classic horror story that keeps me from sleeping at night sometimes. I've heard it told a few different ways. I've even told the story myself more than once, but Phil's version that he posted yesterday morning was one of the most frightening:

  A couple weeks ago a flood hit my apartment/office area and soaked the desktop system, monitors, equipment *and* back up drive (along with a ton of other stuff) - luckily I have a daily back up on a Powerbook. But, of course the Powerbook decided to completely stop working while at our ETSY event before that could be backed up too. Zapping the PRAM revealed the hard drive failed, so the usual steps of Disk Util, TechTool and then finally drive removal and DiskWarrior were attempted - for the most part the drive seems completely dead - there might be a chance to recover some data under linux, or from a data recovery shop, but it's not looking good.

  According his latest update, the backup drives dried out okay and appear to be working fine, so I guess that means he's managed to survive the perfect storm, but it got me thinking - how many of us ever keep a regular, daily backup in the first place? I've suffered several near-misses in the past, and I'm still guilty of not keeping good backups.

  Never Again
  So, February isn't too late for a new year's resolution. Don't go another day without your important files backed up. Let's sit down for 15 minutes, right now, and set up an automated backup system for ourselves. All you need is an external hard disk or a remote server with sufficient storage for a couple copies of your data. Based on Phil's story, you might want to situate your backup system on an elevated surface and not beneath any water pipes.

  We're not focusing on a perfect backup solution here, with off-site, fire proof, vault storage. Don't let the nay-sayers stop you with the long list of things that can go wrong with a simple back-up solution, or explanations of how to do it the "right way". In 15 minutes you are going to be significantly more protected from data loss, and this will give you the time you need to relax and find a good price on your fire proof vault.

  ]]> [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/automate_your_backups.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558" />Read More</a>] [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/automate_your_backups.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558#comments" />Comments</a>] http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/automate_your_backups.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/automate_your_backups.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 Data Mon, 05 Feb 2007 01:14:41 -0800 Apropos of my previous post today, in which I mentioned that Stikkit would "likely be the source of great productivity hacks in the future," I'm happy to report that the future begins in earnest now. Just in from Stikkit...

  Apropos of my previous post today, in which I mentioned that Stikkit would "likely be the source of great productivity hacks in the future," I'm happy to report that the future begins in earnest now. Just in from Stikkit HQ, Rael tips us off to the brand-new Stikkit API:

  As much as we believe in how Stikkit "thinks" about your data, only you know how to best organize your notes so they work for you. The Stikkit API lets you "get at" your Stikkit data so you can shape it, direct it, and mash it up with other applications.

  Remember, you heard it here first. Now, get hacking and report back with the ways you're extending, tweaking, or enhancing Stikkit to suit your personal organizational needs.

  
  Related:

  • Life Hacking News: Mann to Stikkit
  • Merlin Joins Stikkit Advisory Board
  • Search for Stikkits on Your Mac
  • Stikkit Tricks
  ]]> [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/stikkit_open_for_hacking.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558" />Read More</a>] [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/stikkit_open_for_hacking.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558#comments" />Comments</a>] http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/stikkit_open_for_hacking.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/stikkit_open_for_hacking.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 Productivity Thu, 01 Feb 2007 18:37:40 -0800 In life hacking news, I just learned that Merlin Mann (life hacking pioneer and one-person productivity guru behind 43 Folders) is now an adviser for Values of n (founded by former Hacks series editor Rael Dornfest), the company behind...

  In life hacking news, I just learned that Merlin Mann (life hacking pioneer and one-person productivity guru behind 43 Folders) is now an adviser for Values of n (founded by former Hacks series editor Rael Dornfest), the company behind the impressive new Stikkit productivity app. I'm looking forward to seeing some great results from this collaboration between two of my favorite life hackers. If you haven't tried out Stikkit yet, do so now. It's a great life hack in itself, which is just getting better and better as it develops, but will also likely be the source of great productivity hacks in the future (note: some power users are already hacking it).

  As a bit of an aside, there's a hack to be found in the links from the Values of n announcement too, a hack in which I have some personal involvement in the telling. Though Merlin was kind enough to leave my name out of his 43 Folders podcast on "the perfect apostrophe," I am, in fact, the "very nice man whose life [he] temporarily ruined." While he overstates the damage done by just a tad, his depiction of me as "a character out a 30s screwball comedy" is uncanny:

  
  powered by ODEO

  
  The link to Merlin's hilarious podcast isn't simply gratuitous or intended to feed my own vanity. If you listen carefully, you'll find a valuable life hack in there, a perhaps more nuanced and intereresting way to "not sweat the small stuff" or, more accurately, to recognize the right stuff to sweat and just get it done. Beyond my obvious involvement as a character in his story, it resonated with me on a number of other levels as well, which I explained in a bit more detail a while back on my personal blog (note: this link, unlike the previous links, is indeed intentionally gratuitous).

  ]]> [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/life_hacking_news_mann_to_stik.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558" />Read More</a>] [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/life_hacking_news_mann_to_stik.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558#comments" />Comments</a>] http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/life_hacking_news_mann_to_stik.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/02/life_hacking_news_mann_to_stik.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 Life Thu, 01 Feb 2007 06:36:24 -0800 Without getting into the ethics of employers blocking access to certain sites on company machines (and without comment on the ethics of subverting those filters), if you need to access your personal Gmail account from an office that restricts...

  Without getting into the ethics of employers blocking access to certain sites on company machines (and without comment on the ethics of subverting those filters), if you need to access your personal Gmail account from an office that restricts access, engtech has a number of solutions for getting around the firewall. Check out the linked post for details, but here's a quick rundown of your options (the last of which I hope is entirely tongue-in-cheek, which might save it from being offensive):

  1. Use different web addresses.
  2. Configure your mail program to access Gmail (through POP).
  3. Access Gmail through Google Desktop.
  4. Use a web server with Gmail Lite installed.
  5. Bribe the IT guys at your work.

  If nothing else, this hack would help on days when the company email fails and you still need to reach someone urgently on professional business.

  
  Related:
  

  • Google Hacks, 3E
    
  • Use Google to View MySpace or Any Restricted Site
  ]]> [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/01/access_gmail_behind_a_firewall.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558" />Read More</a>] [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/01/access_gmail_behind_a_firewall.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558#comments" />Comments</a>] http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/01/access_gmail_behind_a_firewall.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/01/access_gmail_behind_a_firewall.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 Gmail Thu, 25 Jan 2007 06:50:48 -0800 Posted before the holidays, Sean Alexander's article on how-to snipe a PS3 or Wii online (or, originally, an Xbox 360) should still be valuable for gamers who have yet to get their hands on the out-of-stock console of their...

  Posted before the holidays, Sean Alexander's article on how-to snipe a PS3 or Wii online (or, originally, an Xbox 360) should still be valuable for gamers who have yet to get their hands on the out-of-stock console of their choice:

  Here's a fool-proof way to get notified when PS3/Wii/etc are available for online ordering--no online auctions required. I've tested it personally--and received my premium system in time for Christmas.

  His method relies on configuring URLyWarning to notify you of status changes with retailer-tracking sites specific to the console you're still drooling over.
  ]]> [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/01/shopping_sniper_score_a_ps3_or.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558" />Read More</a>] [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/01/shopping_sniper_score_a_ps3_or.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558#comments" />Comments</a>] http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/01/shopping_sniper_score_a_ps3_or.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/01/shopping_sniper_score_a_ps3_or.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 Shopping Thu, 25 Jan 2007 05:08:23 -0800 Anyone who's a part of a mailing list has been party to email threads that just went on way too long. If you use Gmail, did you know you can mute the conversation to keep all future additions out...

  Anyone who's a part of a mailing list has been party to email threads that just went on way too long. If you use Gmail, did you know you can mute the conversation to keep all future additions out of your inbox:

  By using the 'm' shortcut key, new messages added to the conversation bypass your inbox so that the conversation stays archived. If your address appears in the to or cc field, though, the conversation will pop back into your inbox ready for your attention.

  The muted messages you never see remain marked as unread and you can still find them with standard Gmail search syntax. There's even a special search syntax that returns muted messages only:

  is:muted

  If you later discover that some interesting talk has been going on behind your back, unmuting the conversation is as easy as selecting the conversation and choosing "Move to inbox" from the "More actions..." menu.

  Now, what I really want to see is a way to mute conversations where my address is just on the cc line, for those many times when I'm copied on a message that never should have gone to me in the first place, or when friends or colleagues hijack a relevant message with off-topic chatter. Anyone have a hack for that?

  (Via Mark Pilgrim)

  Related:
  

  • Google Hacks, 3E
    
  • Greasemonkey Hacks
  ]]> [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/01/automatically_ignore_entire_co.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558" />Read More</a>] [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/01/automatically_ignore_entire_co.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558#comments" />Comments</a>] http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/01/automatically_ignore_entire_co.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/01/automatically_ignore_entire_co.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 Gmail Wed, 24 Jan 2007 08:37:18 -0800 In the Hacks Instructables pool, tracydanger provides a great life hack for downsizing your wallet:I got sick and tired of having a dozen little "bonus" cards to carry around, so I made this simple fix. Basically, I just scanned...

  In the Hacks Instructables pool, tracydanger provides a great life hack for downsizing your wallet:

  I got sick and tired of having a dozen little "bonus" cards to carry around, so I made this simple fix. Basically, I just scanned in all my barcodes, fit them nicely into a row in photoshop and then printed them out onto a card.

  Check out the Instructable for detailed instructions and troubleshooting tips.
  
  UPDATE: jeff_1868 comments:
  

  Someone has come up with an online service. Simply, go to http://www.justoneclubcard.com/ and enter in the barcode numbers for 8 of your club cards. The service generates a card, front & back, with the barcodes for those 8 cards. It's free and you can create as many as you would like. If you cannot find a store listed, just e-mail him photocopies of your card & he will add it to the service.

  ]]> [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/01/skeleton_barcode_card.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558" />Read More</a>] [<a href="http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/01/skeleton_barcode_card.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558#comments" />Comments</a>] http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/01/skeleton_barcode_card.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 http://www.hackszine.com/blog/archive/2007/01/skeleton_barcode_card.html?CMP=OTC-7G2N43923558 Productivity Tue, 23 Jan 2007 06:15:18 -0800