Sunday, August 30, 2009

Hive Five - Defrag Utilities 2009

 clipped from lifehacker.com

Your computer's a busy beaver, rapidly accessing and utilizing files all in the name of bringing you what you want, when you want it. Sometimes it needs a little help tidying up, and that's where these five disk defragmenters come in.


For those of you unfamiliar with the problem of file fragmentation, a quick—and quite simplified—primer is in order. Files are stored on a hard drive in blocks of data. The larger the file, the larger the number of blocks it is composed of. As your operating system accesses files, moves files around, and so on data blocks are not always arranged in the most effective manner. Imagine it like a messy office where as you opened file folders from your file cabinet you frequently placed documents from inside all over the room. You have a great memory, and you can find all the pages from each folder again if you need to, but you waste a lot of time just moving around looking for them.

In a perfect system the blocks of data that compose a file would be in the immediate vicinity of the file header, and your operating system would waste no time at all looking for the other pieces of the file. As it stands, however, on a badly fragmented disk the data can be scattered in pieces across the entire platter of the hard disk. The following defragmentation applications are specialized tools which will help you optimize your hard drive. Continuing with the analogy of the file cabinet, a defragmenter is the helpful assistant that comes in and alphabetizes all your documents in the appropriate folders and file drawers for you.


If you're in the mood to dig into the more arcane aspects of the topic, definitely check out the Wikipedia entries on file system fragmentation and defragmentation. Now onto the top five nominees:

Auslogics Disk Defrag (Windows, Free)

Auslogics Disk Defrag is a simple disk defragmentation program. You can defragment multiple disks or select individual files or folders for defragmentation. Auslogics allows you to set the priority of the application and can tell your computer to shut itself down when the defragmentation process is complete—a handy feature when you want it to scan and defragment while you're sleeping but don't want to leave your computer idling all night. Auslogics Disk Defrag is a free and portable application.

MyDefrag (Formerly JKDefrag) (Windows, Free)

MyDefrag is an effective tool for defragmenting your disks. You can run it in default mode and get not only a defragmented disk but also optimized file placement; or you can tinker with it via scripting and further increase your disk optimization for your specific needs. Even without its script support, MyDefrag does an excellent job defragmenting files and moving them to the optimum place on your hard disk. Files that are frequently accessed together are grouped together in zones for increased performance. MyDefrag will even scan the space allocated to the master file table and will move files from that space back to more appropriate places (sometimes when pressed for space Windows will dump files there, effectively orphaning them from the rest of the system).

Perfect Disk (Windows, $29.99)

PerfectDisk is one of only two commercial entries in this week's Hive Five. One of PerfectDisk's biggest claims to fame is what they call "Space Restoration Technology". On top of optimizing your disks during actual defragmention, PerfectDisk monitors disk writing to ensure that future files are written in the most efficient way possible in order to cut down on potential defragmentation. PerfectDisk will also analyze your data usage and create optimization patterns suited for your style of file use and work. It can be scheduled or set to run when the computer is idle for continuous defragmentation.

Defraggler (Windows, Free)

Defraggler, from the same company that produces popular applications CCleaner and Recuva, is a portable defragmentation tool. It can scan multiple disks, individual disks, folders, or individual files for some quick, specific defragging. When Defraggler scans a disk, it shows you all the fragmented files and lets you either select sets to be defragmented or batch defragment all of them.

Diskeeper (Windows, $29.99)

Like Perfect Disk, Diskeeper is packed with features not usually found in free defragmentation solutions. In addition to the basic defragmentation tools, Diskeeper can, for example, perform a quick defragmentation of system files on boot to keep your operating system running as efficiently as possible. Diskeeper, like Perfect Disk, has a system for continuously defragmenting files and optimizing new files for disk storage while you work. When you defragment multiple hard drives, Diskeeper selects different algorithms based on the disk—for example, it optimizes your operating system disk differently from a media storage disk.


Now that you've had a chance to look over the most popular defragmentation applications, it's time to cast a vote for your favorite:

Which Disk Defragmenter is Best?






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Saturday, August 29, 2009

Top Travel Tips

 clipped from lifehacker.com

Being able to work just about anywhere is a mixed blessing. If you're tired of dying batteries, lost receipts, absent files, and laptop theft paranoia, pick up on our top 10 tactics for a better life on the road.


10. Keep track of everything

Your car's parked in section H14 of the airport. Dinner with the clients has been changed to 8 p.m. Your daughter would really love that bag you saw in that little shop downtown, and you must not forget to grab your raincoat from the hotel closet, like you always do. A tool that follows you everywhere, like the brain-expanding Evernote, the very iPhone-friendly reQall, or politely nagging/reminding to-do systems like Remember the Milk or Todoist might be perfect for your needs. Then again, you might be like so many Lifehacker readers and find that, for your task management and remember-it-or-else purposes, pen and paper is the ultimate portable tool.

9. Find your saving grace: free Wi-Fi

$12 per day airport Wi-Fi is like a $60 steak entree at a restaurant with leather seating—it only exists because expense accounts also exist. For those of us footing our own bill, there's usually a free alternative to the billing demands of coffee shops and air travel waypoints. Gina did us all a favor by rounding up the definitive guide to locating free Wi-Fi, covering the bases from free-as-in-beer offerings to hoping somebody doesn't mind you're tip-toe-ing past their very weak encryption. It's definitely worth the print-out or, more practically, a "Save Page As."

8. Tether your phone for emergency email & directions

From experience, we can tell you that even a great 3G cellphone connection feels a little slow when sent through a laptop browser. That said, Wi-Fi is sometimes an absolute no-go, and you'll need to find out exactly how to get around that parade to the conference center or dash out a long enough email that cellphone-keypad typing isn't feasible. Before your trip, or with some time in your hotel, you can enable tethering on an iPhone or your Palm Pre, or tether an Android, Windows Mobile, BlackBerry, (jailbroken) iPhone, or even (older) Palm OS phone with PdaNet. Android owners can also root their phones for the easiest Wi-Fi tethering we've ever seen.

7. Protect your laptop

First things first: If your laptop and all its data access aren't tucked behind great but memorable passwords, they need to be. Beyond that, tools like Laptop Alarm for Windows can help prevent your system from being nabbed while it's running (hello coffee shop snatchers), while LaptopLock is the best post-theft data protector and thief finder we know of for Windows systems. Mac users have the similarly clever iAlertU to use the MacBook's webcam that works as a car alarm for your laptop, snapping a picture of the thief and sounding an alarm when a potential thief tries grabbing your armed laptop, then emails the pic to you so you can hopefully identify the culprit. (Original post)

6. Get set up with smart SMS services

For at least a year, I carried an iPod touch around with my "dumb" cellphone, using the iPod's Wi-Fi and apps when I could, but using text message services whenever I really needed to pull up information or send myself something important. What I learned was that a host of services can work almost entirely through SMS, but they don't all promote that fact very well. Google Calendar can send you today's or tomorrow's agenda, Amazon can price items for you, Twitter can set a timer and text you back (assuming you have direct messages sent to your phone), and many other services offer similar functionality. Even if they claim it's an email service, you can send an SMS to that email address to follow through—all great reasons to claim your constant texting is really just practice for faster productivity. (Original post)

5. Get better life from batteries

First of all, get yourself a spare battery for rechargeable devices like your laptop or other gadgets. Use your spare batteries fully when you're going to use them, then recharge them to around 50-percent full and keep them someplace cool, like wrapped in a paper towel inside the fridge, to increase their shelf life. Keep your cell phone out of your pocket if you want to extend its battery life (the extra heat decreases its battery life). Every so often, charge your battery all the way full, then run it completely down to recalibrate its sense of how much it can hold. Don't run your battery somewhere it will get very hot, and turn off Wi-Fi and fancy graphics effects when you're really just editing a Word document. Those are just a few of the take-away battery tips we've collected and dissected over years of use and discussion, but they're a pretty good beginner's course in squeezing every last bit of rare travel power from your devices. (Original post)

4. Carry an Altoids-sized "survival" kit

We're fans of Altoids tins, as they're durable, compact, inexpensive, and they come with a tasty treat. They can also fit easily in your pocket or go-bag and are perfect for carrying essential medical and mending gear, which will make you the hero of anyone who nicks themselves, or even needs to know which way is North in a strange city. If you're less of a survivalist and more of a maker, you could check out the "maker's tin," for a big dose of DIY ingenuity in a tiny metal container. Make sure to pack it in a way that lets you keep it in your laptop/to-go bag at all times, so you'll always be the guy who's surprisingly prepared on every trip.

3. Manage your travel expenses

If the back of your wallet or bottom of your purse isn't quite cutting it as a receipt management system, try out a system like Xpenser, which lets you call a free number and simply ramble out something like "dinner 58 with Albertson Associates;" alternately, you can quickly add your expense via their web site or SMS. You'll later see a $58 dinner cost neatly tagged to the right date and client. Your accountant, your tax preparer, and your former shoebox stronghold will appreciate your small efforts. If you'd rather mail copies or take digital photos or scans of your receipts post-facto, Shoeboxed has you covered. (Original post)

2. Float between online and offline files

Until I'd talked to four different people last week who didn't know that Zoho, Google's Docs, Calendar, Reader, and Gmail services, Remember the Milk tasks, and many other services could be managed offline with Google Gears, I'd though it was an old-hat piece of advice. Consider this a friendly reminder, then, that the five minutes it takes to install Gears, click the "Offline" or green check mark icon on the Gears-supporting web site, and synchronize your online life is entirely worth it. And if you haven't grabbed a free account from Dropbox, SugarSync, or another cross-platform, web-accessible synchronization service, that, too, will be a lifesaver on some rainy day when you're much too rushed to prepare all your files before you head to the airport.

1. Properly pack your laptop/go bag

We can't tell you exactly what you'll need for every trip, but we can suggest the cables, containers, notepads, spare batteries, portable Wi-Fi routers, and many other items that have saved our editors' and readers' travel-weary butts on many occasions. A week-long, ever-so-slightly-navel-gaze-y series on what our editors pack in their laptop bags culminated in a multi-bag roundup. Further back, our endlessly creative and forward-thinking readers offered their own views at their daily and long-distance travel bags in three photo-stuffed installments. Peruse, poke fun, but more than anything, take them as examples of how you can make life on the road a bit more comfortable and predictable.


That's how we roll, at least when we're heading out farther than the coffee shop or coworking spot. Tell us, and your fellow weary wanderers, your most essential, trip-saving tips and tactics in the comments.
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Thursday, August 27, 2009

10 Sites to Discover the Best Web Apps

 clipped from www.inspiredm.com

10 Awesome Websites That Help You Discover the Best Web Apps


If you're watching the blogosphere close enough, you can observe a new trend coming along pretty quick – the application blog, whether is focused on iPhone apps, Mac apps, Air apps, web apps, or all of them. Today we're gonna talk about the best web apps blogs, with daily tools that will save you lots of time or – on the contrary – gonna lose the whole day playing with. Please feel free to suggest others in the comments.

Useful Tools

useful

A web magazine for people who love web tools and apps. There are new and exciting applications being developed all the time. We sift through the abundance of technologies available to you, and help you find the most useful tools


Feed My App

feedmyapp

Feedmyapp is a Web 2.0 Directory with the best and latest web 2.0 sites, daily updated. We classify web apps by tagging them and creating a brief description for each one listed

Web Appers

webapper

WebAppers is a blog dedicated to share top quality open source resources for web developer and web designer daily. As a web designer, you'll find some of the best free icons, stock photos, brushes, fonts  and design inspirations

Creative Applications

creative

CreativeApplications.Net [CAN] was launched in October 2008 by Filip Visnjic, architect, lecturer, new media technologist, entrepreneur and most recently a blogger. Ever since his first Apple Mac in 1994 he discovered passion for software

Web App Storm

webappstorm

If you are familiar with our sister site, Mac.AppStorm, you can guess what the purpose of this site is. We aim to bring you news, reviews, and resources for all things web related

The Museum of Modern Betas

momb

The MoMB is a site dedicated to listing webbased applications on a beta trip.  This site is in early alpha, I still need to figure a few things out.  You always can drop me a note at saurierduval-at-gmail-dot-com

Ziipa

ziipa

Our goal to showcase the best Web 2.0 websites, start-ups and applications.  Building a great search engine that delivers great content in a visual way and is simple to use

Launchly

launchly

We are focused on one thing — delivering the latest in new website launches to people that are interested in and passionate about them so their owners can get the feedback they need to succeed

Lovely Pages

lovely

Lovely pages is a web applications & services directory focused on a minimalist style. Please consider contributing adding your favourite web applications and reviews

Webware

webware

Say No to boxed software! The future of applications is online delivery and access. Software is passé. Webware is the new way to get things done

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Prep Your Mac for Snow Leopard

 clipped from lifehacker.com


An operating system update like this Friday's release of Mac OS X Snow Leopard is a perfect time to clean up your computer and start fresh. Let's prepare your Mac for this weekend's 10.6 upgrade.


Before You Upgrade, Part 1: Clean Up Your Mac

You don't want to take those applications you haven't launched in months, giant log files, superfluous startup items, and even old documents you don't need anymore into Snow Leopard, so the first thing you want to do is give your Mac the virtual hose-down. Audit your data, applications, and login items; run some maintenance, and give the old hard drive a checkup with Disk Utility. Here are detailed instructions on how to clean up and revive your bloated, sluggish Mac.

Before You Upgrade, Part 2: Back Up Your Data

Before you crack open that pretty Snow Leopard box, get yourself an external FireWire drive and run a full backup of all the important files on your Mac. If you've got Leopard now you should already be running Time Machine, so make sure you've got a fresh new backup completed. If you're still on Tiger, here are a gaggle of free Mac backup utilities for you to use. (But seriously, if you don't already: get a FireWire drive. Back up your Mac. Now.)

Before You Upgrade, Part 3 (The Extra-Paranoid Track): Make a Bootable Backup of Your Mac

Maybe you go through the entire Snow Leopard upgrade process only to realize that your one, essential, company VPN application isn't yet compatible. Maybe you accidentally lose files or apps in the upgrade process, or you just decide you hate Snow Leopard and want to go back to Leopard stat. One great way to ensure you can go right back to your working Mac's state before an upgrade is to mirror the current state of your Mac on a bootable external hard drive. Even if you've got a Time Machine backup, grab another external drive and clone your Mac's internal hard drive. With a bootable clone on hand, if anything goes wrong or you just want to boot back up into your old Mac's environment (settings, apps, data, and all), you can do so by holding down the T key Option key, restarting your Mac, and choosing the clone as your bootup disk.

The Upgrade Path to Snow Leopard

To install Snow Leopard on your Intel-based Mac, Apple recommends you go from Leopard using the $29 Snow Leopard upgrade disc, or go from Tiger using the $169 Mac Box Set. Here's Apple's full set of system requirements.

The important thing to know is that you can only install the $29 upgrade on top of an existing Leopard installation. That is, you can't start with a formatted Mac hard drive and install Snow Leopard only, which is kind of a bummer for geeks who like to do totally fresh, from-scratch installations.

Correction and update: We have confirmed that the preview of Snow Leopard DOES offer a standalone installer that works on a freshly-formatted hard drive without an existing Leopard installation or DVD. While we can't absolutely say before Friday whether or not the final release will work this way, it's very possible it will. (Read: The full version of the new Mac OS X may be just $29.) My apologies for the mistake! Thanks to commenters RudolphDer and dark42 for asking!

Choose one of two methods for the upgrade.

Upgrade Method 1. Install Snow Leopard Directly on Top of Your Existing Leopard Setup (Easy)

If you're already running a relatively clean installation of Leopard, and you want to make this update as easy, fast, and painless as possible, you're just going to pop your Snow Leopard DVD into your Mac's drive and go. I did this using the Dev Preview of Snow Leopard on a well-used and cluttered Mac, and things went just fine. This is the upgrade path Apple wants you to take and suits most folks—with a good backup, you've nothing to fear. The only possible disadvantage to this approach is that some old logs and system files you don't need might stick around.

Upgrade Method 2. Wipe Your Mac Clean and Start from Scratch (Advanced)

Serious nerds who want their Snow Leopard installation absolutely pristine (and come from the Windows school of wipe-and-reinstall) can go all-out and format their Mac's hard drive, reinstall Leopard, upgrade to Snow Leopard,, install Snow Leopard and then restore their data from backup and reinstall all their essential apps.

The one advantage to this approach is that you can take the opportunity to repartition your Mac's hard drive in the process (though if it's Boot Camp you want, you can set that up any time, not just when wiping your drive). You'll also know for sure your Mac is completely cruft-free. The disadvantage to this approach is that it's tedious and time-consuming. The Snow Leopard installation can take 45 minutes to an hour, then you've got to restore your Time Machine backup (depending on how much data we're talking, this can also take up to an hour) and then you've got to reinstall your applications.


If you do decide to go this route on Snow Leopard upgrade day, here are a few notes:

  • Only start once you have your Leopard DVD and Snow Leopard DVD in hand, and your data backed up.
  • Inventory your Mac's application list. Command-line lovers can do a simple ls /Applications/ >> appsiuse.txt to get a textual listing of everything in the Applications folder. Otherwise you can just eye your Applications folder and note down its contents. Also check your System Preferences panes for any panels you've installed there.
  • After you've inventoried your applications and backed up your data, insert your Leopard DVD and click on "Install Mac OS X."
  • Insert your Snow Leopard DVD and click on "Install Mac OS X." When you reach the Snow Leopard Installer's "Welcome" screen, from the Utilities menu, choose "Disk Utility..." From there you can (say a little prayer) and format or repartition your Mac's internal hard drive. Once that's done, continue with the installation as usual.

You get a few opportunities to restore your Time Machine backup during the Snow Leopard installation. Even if you pass each time, once Snow Leopard is completely installed, you can get your data out of Time Machine by running the Migration Assistant (located in /Applications/Utilities/).

One important thing to know about restoring a Time Machine backup: you can't be logged in as the same user name that you're restoring. That is, if I'm logged in as gina, and my backed-up Time Machine user is also gina, the Migration Assistant either makes you rename the restored user or log in as another (admin) user to do the restore. The Migration Assistant also lets you decide what you restore: which data (in predetermined folders/categories, like Music, Pictures, Documents, etc), all of your Applications (or none), settings, and other files. Here's what that looks like:


How are you planning to upgrade to Snow Leopard? Are you doing any special Mac prep beforehand? Tell us about it in the comments.

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Wednesday, August 26, 2009

13 Sites for the Best Answers on the Web


 clipped from thenextweb.com

By Srikanth AD on 25th August 2009

13 Best Sites to Get Your Questions Answered!The Internet is a huge resource of knowledge and information where you can find virtually anything. But, very often there are situations where you aren't able to find the answers to your questions.  Your question may require local knowledge or particular expertise.


Fortunately there are sites out there that can not only  be used to find peoples thoughts and opinions about a particular topic but will also will help in finding experts in various fields. Herein find some best sites where you can ask questions and get answers from real people online.


Answerbag

You can find answers to various questions from different categories on Answerbag You may ask questions on any topic but will need to register to do so. You can also browse through questions in selected categories of your choice and read all the questions and answers posted by other people.

13 Best Sites to Get Your Questions Answered!


Yahoo! Answers

Probably the most popular community Q&A powered site with millions of users and thousands of questions asked and answered every day. All the questions are categorized in such a way that you can easily search for a related question in a category or place you question in a relevant category. Answers are rated by visitors and the best rated answer will be displayed as the best answer for a question.

13 Best Sites to Get Your Questions Answered!

You need to register with the site in order to ask or answer the questions. To make the users participate actively, it has a points system. When you ask a question you'll spend points and when you answer the questions you'll earn them. Based on the points earned, the user level will be defined.


Blurt it

This is another site where you can ask questions and answer them without  registration. You can also browse through questions in various categories and browse through the Q&A's posted by other people.

13 Best Sites to Get Your Questions Answered!

You can explore answers across various topics and categories and get opinions from various people across the world on a selected knowledge area.


Anybody Out There

Screen shot 2009-08-25 at 20.16.21

AnybodyOutThere is an interesting concept and platform that provides instant and relevant responses to your thoughts and questions by connecting you to people the people who should be able to help.

AnybodyOutThere lets you post the general topic of your question then goes to work finding the best person to answer your question based on how they've helped others before.


WikiAnswers

Wiki answers have a huge database of questions and answers and they are arranged in about 5,372 categories for easy reference. On the homepage you can post questions and also see new questions and new answers for the questions asked.

13 Best Sites to Get Your Questions Answered!

You can also answer to questions asked by other people and most of the answers are moderated and  the best and relevant answers will be displayed. Reference library will help you get the reference you needed on a select topic.

You can browse through un-answered questions to answer them or browse through the answered questions and add your answer to a question. If you are registered with the site, you will get email notifications whenever your question is answered.


Askville

This website is powered by Amazon. The most interesting part of the site is, when you ask a question all the related questions will be displayed for you to easily find the answer instantly. If the question you have asked is unique then, you can post your question on the site to get it answered by  people. from across the world. When your question gets answered, you will get an email notification so that you can easily go through the answers.

13 Best Sites to Get Your Questions Answered!

To encourage user participation, it will issue gold points unlike yahoo. You can earn gold points when you have asked or answered a question. You can  comment on answers and also give a compliment to questions and answers.


Ask Me Help Desk

You need to register with this site and create an account for free in order to ask and answer questions.  When your question gets answered by others you will get an email notification about the answer. The key feature of this site is that, you can also get paid for providing answers to questions.

13 Best Sites to Get Your Questions Answered!

You can also become expert on this site by answering more questions so that you can build reputation. It also allows you to communicate with other members privately to exchange knowledge with others.


Answer Bank

On this site you can get answers to questions related to a wide variety of topics including music, law, sesonal, jobs, family etc.,

13 Best Sites to Get Your Questions Answered!

A lot of questions on the AnswerBank are topical, relating to what is going on in the news or in the world of entertainment and sport. You can ask as many questions as your imagination can provide.


AskDeb

You can ask questions about any topic on this site and get answers, opinions  and advice from  experts and real people.

13 Best Sites to Get Your Questions Answered!

You can ask questions related to daily and professional life.  This is also a blogging site where in you can find articles about various topics and information about many things.


Able2Know

In this site you can ask a question and also start a discussion on a topic  to  get answers and opinions from various people.

13 Best Sites to Get Your Questions Answered!

You can also provide answers to un-answered questions and exchange knowledge with others. Help others to get answers and in turn you will get help from others on your questions.


Mahalo Answers

13 Best Sites to Get Your Questions Answered!

This is one another up and coming community powered question . Most of  the data present on the site is submitted by users. It will also check for quality of answers and users can also vote for their favorites.  The most voted answer will be picked as the best answer for the question.


Answerly

13 Best Sites to Get Your Questions Answered!

Answerly lets you search across a scope of Q&A sites using a custom Google search.


AardVark

13 Best Sites to Get Your Questions Answered!

Aardvark uses an entirely new method to get answers to your questions.   Described as Yahoo Answers meets Twitter, Aardvark primarily uses email and IM to send and receive answers to questions.

The site uses your network of friends and their friends as  a resource, and when  a question is posted, it will look for the most appropriate person among them to answer it.


Twitter

13 Best Sites to Get Your Questions Answered!

Twitter in its own right, is another very good platform to get answers and opinions from people. Similar to Aardvark in some respects, but where it does fall short is that you're limited by the number of people who follow you. Thanks to the retweet however, there's always a good chance someone will be kind enough to share it with their followers. There are a number of services that use the Twitter API to create their own Q&A service, examples include:  IKnowTweet, ToAnswer, TwitQA, .


Friendfeed

Screen shot 2009-08-25 at 19.39.09Recently acquired Friendfeed is another fantastic way to find answers to your questions. Thanks to a feature called "groups" which lets users create groups for discussion around a particular topics, you'll find if your question is about a particular subject area – there's bound to be someone who can help.

To find a group, use the search tools on the site. You have to join the respective group to post your question and you can get answers from people. in real time.

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