Frengly Translates Text, Auto-Detects Source Language [Translation]
Online language translation app Frengly autodetects the source language of text and quickly translates it into your language of choice. Just paste any piece of text into Frengly, hit translate, and let Frengly take care of the rest. Frengly actually plugs into the Google Translate API to both detect the language and to translate the text, so you may wonder: Why use Frengly? Ultimately it's about speed and ease of use. Google Translate requires you to choose the auto-detect option every time you head to the page, which means you lose a step in what should be a feature that shaves a step off translation. Likewise, it's easier to select your destination language once from one of the many buttons rather than dig through the drop-down menu. So while Frengly isn't all that innovative on its own, you can think of it as a nicer front-end to Google Translate.
Pownce to Close Doors on December 15th [Closures]
On the heels of Sandy's closure announcement, another small startup announces its shutdown and acquisition: previously mentioned file-sharing service Pownce has been acquired by blogging software makers Six Apart, and the service is shutting down on December 15th. Pownce users can export their messages and import them into a blogging service like WordPress, TypePad, or Vox; no word on how and if Six Apart will integrate Pownce technology into their services. [via]
Ask MetaFilter Roundup [Hive Mind]
- What's a good webcam setup for my technophobic relative?
- How can I change white web pages to a darker color?
- What's a good call forwarding service?
- Any great ideas for reducing my computer clutter?
- What's the best way to stream HD media from a PC?
Chrome Extensions On the Way, Adblock Imminent [Google Chrome]
Google has published official documentation detailing their plans to bring extensions to their beta web browser Chrome. When we asked you a few months back whether Chrome with extensions would convince you to switch, 28% said yes, while a whopping 22% of you said that as long as an Adblock extension never reached Chrome, you wouldn't use it. A previous announcement should have already satisfied the first group, but if you were in the Adblock crowd, you'll be happy to know that one of the highlighted uses for Google Chrome extensions is content filtering, including "Adblock, Flashblock, Privacy control, and Parental control." Sounds like Google's moving in the right direction if they want to snag more early adopters. Now we just need to see more progress for the Mac and Linux crowd.
Show Us Your Handmade DIY Holiday Projects [Call For Submissions]
When you find yourself glancing worriedly from your bank account balance back to the calendar this holiday season, it's time to ditch the catalogs and commercials, roll up your sleeves and get to doing it yourself. Everyone's cutting down on expenditures this year, but that doesn't mean you can't give thoughtful and creative gifts to your family and friends. Lifehacker readers are the craftiest and cleverist DIYers on the interwebs, so we want to see your handmade creations and DIY gift ideas. Submit photos of your holiday projects-in-progress, or maybe ones you've completed in past years, and we'll feature some of the best ones here throughout December. Break out your knitting needles, soldering guns, duct tape, and common household objects, and show us your best holiday stuff. What are you working on this year? Tell us about it in the comments and submit photos to our DIY Holiday Flickr group. Photo by Margarida Sardo.
Joost Streams TV, Movies to Your iPhone [Featured IPhone Download]
iPhone/iPod touch only: Television and movie streaming service Joost officially finds its way to the iPhone and iPod touch. Joost started out as a desktop application, was quickly overshadowed by online offerings like Hulu, then recently moved to the web in an attempt to keep up with the competition. With its new iPhone/iPod touch application, Joost is back in the drivers seat, beating the likes of Hulu to Apple's popular mobile devices. Joost still doesn't offer as much popular content as Hulu, but its 46,000 videos—which include 400 TV series, 1,200 movies and short films, and 18,000 music videos—are a pretty good start.
The player can be buggy at times, but overall it's an impressive offering. Joost is a free download from the iTunes App Store.
Notify Me When It's Up Emails You When a Web Site Returns [Email Notification]
Web site Notify Me When It's Up performs a very simple but worthwhile task: It sends you an email when a downed site you want to visit returns to the internet. Similar to previously mentioned Down For Everyone or Just Me—which helps you figure out if a site you're having trouble reaching is really down or its, well, just you—Notify Me When It's Up takes the next logical step by monitoring a downed site and letting you know when it returns. Might be useful next time your favorite weblog is unreachable or a link you really want to check out crashes under the weight of its popularity.
"Cyber Monday" Deals Roundup [Shopping]
Thank goodness our brother site Gizmodo did all the work of digging up the best online shopping deals today, "Cyber Monday"—and saved us the trouble. Go getchyer Monday-after-Black-Friday discounts on.
Checkvist Simplifies Outlines [Outliner]
The problem with many online to-do list managers is that they don't support sub-lists for tasks that involve several steps—but outliner webapp Checkvist does just that, and with a clean interface that supports tons of keyboard shortcuts. Sign up for a free account at Checkvist to make your first list (hit Enter to add a task). Each list node can have a note attached to it, and any number of sub-nodes (Shift+Enter to enter one). Reorder your list items (Ctrl+arrow) and mark an item complete by selecting it and hitting the Spacebar. Export your lists from Checkvist to plain text, HTML, or OPML formats, and invite others to collaborate on the list with you. Here's what the Checkvist intro list (with some additions) looks like.
After playing with Checkvist for just a short while, what struck me is just how damn fun and easy it is to do a brain dump in list format without ever taking your hands off the keyboard. If you're a regular list maker and keyboard shortcut lover, make sure you take a look.
Get VMware Fusion for Half Price Today Only [Deals]
Virtual machine application VMware Fusion—popular for running Windows and other operating systems on Macs—is for sale at 50% off the regular price today only—down to $40 from the regular $80. Sounds like a good time to grab a copy of Fusion, one of our top 10 new and improved apps of last year, if you've been in need of a little virtualization.
FCC Pushing for Free Internet Plan [Free Wi-Fi]
The Wall Street Journal reports that outgoing FCC Chairman Kevin Martin wants to offer free Wi-Fi to all—porn-free Wi-Fi, to be more specific. The no-smut specification is a little troubling, since drawing a straight line through the massive gray area of propriety isn't a simple task, but the FCC has also proposed a version of the plan that would allow adults to opt out of the filtering. Sound like a winner to you? Photo by superfem.
Know the Facts of the Three-Day Cooling-Off Period [Saving Money]
The Get Rich Slowly blog details the ins and outs of the cooling-off period, a three-business-day window the (U.S.) Federal Trade Commission enforces to cancel purchases of $25 or more. There's a good deal of fine print, as J.D. explains:
- If you make a purchase entirely by mail or telephone, the rule does not apply.
- When you initiate the sale at the seller's permanent business location, the rule does not apply, even if the deal is closed in your home.
- Despite popular misconception, there is no cooling-off rule for automobile purchases. Make sure you want that car before you buy it.
Helpful stuff to keep in mind, especially as gift-buying mentality starts to take over. If you're looking to cut off impulsive purchases at the root, try some of our readers' advice on avoiding buying just-released gear. Photo by Flyinace2000.
Exact Factor Alerts You When Your Search Rank Improves [Web Reputation]
Free alert service Exactfactor tracks search engine results by key words, and can email anyone interested in how any web site is doing in the battle for the top Google, Yahoo, or Live.com spot. After signing up for an account, you enter one or two web sites and key words to track them by. You'll see an instant report on the site's ranking on each search site, and can hit "Get alerts" to be e-mailed when that site improves, declines, or hits the front page of the search results. If you're looking for ways to juice your standing in the world of web search (or bury something unfortunate), check Tamar's guide to managing your online reputation.
Windows Automation Macro Recorder Free Today Only [Featured Windows Download]
Windows only: The Giveaway of the Day web site is featuring a small, simple, but effective macro recording tool for free until 3 a.m. EST on Dec. 2. Windows Automation Macro Recorder (WAMR), normally $30, has a nicely clean interface that focuses on two main buttons, Record and Execute, and it records specifically timed mouse and keyboard movements and actions by default. You can choose what WAMR does and doesn't notice in the options, rename your created macros, and schedule them inside the application for running whenever you'd like. For those without the programming chops or interest for AutoHotKey, or seeking a simple automation tool, WAMR could easily fit the bill. WAMR is for Windows systems only; the Giveaway method requires downloading, installing, and activating this software before the expiration date (17 hours from now in this case). If you only need to automate your web actions, try the iMacros Firefox extension.
Use Mouse Gestures to Open New Pages With Easy DragToGo [Featured Firefox Addon]
Firefox only: Easy DragToGo is a Firefox extension which enables interaction with highlighted text and images via mouse gestures. Text actions are determined by whether or not the highlighted text is a URL or not, and by the variables you assign in the preferences menu. An example setup, and my current one, is that all non-URL text when highlighted and dragged becomes a Google search. Drag up to search in a new foreground tab, drag down to search in a new background tab. You assign gestures to opening new URLs, searching text, and saving images. The amount of movement required to trigger the assigned action in Easy DragToGo is minuscule, which makes for some wonderfully lazy mousing. If you're intrigued by the idea of using mouse gestures to browse, check out how to Navigate Firefox with Mouse Gestures. Easy DragToGo is free and works wherever Firefox does.
Windows 7 Won't Require Graphics Hardware for Effects [Windows 7]
UK magazine Custom PC reports that Windows 7 will feature WARP, which lets any computer with an 800MHz processor run Aero-style desktop transparency and, with a certain performance hit, the Direct3D requirements for video games. Microsoft seems to have learned something from the "Vista Capable/Ready" labeling fiasco, so expect less confusion on what can "run" the OS due out in mid-2009. [via]
Ubuntu 8.10 and Fedora 10 Eerily Close on Speed [Linux]
The team at the Phoronix site benchmark tested the newly-released Fedora 10 Linux distribution against Ubuntu 8.10 on 32 and 64-bit machines, and found the results nearly identical. Interesting find, and nice to know it's really the features and interface that sets most Linux distros apart these days.
More Ways to Hide Google SearchWiki Features [Google]
We've already pointed out a Greasemonkey script that hides Google's new SearchWiki ranking buttons, but there are viable work-arounds for those not using Firefox or its page-styling Greasemonkey extension. The Google Operating System blog points out four other methods. Most clever and convenient among them is heading to your Experimental Feature settings and enabling any other experiment, like keyboard shortcuts, which disables SearchWiki buttons and notes until you clear out your browser's cookies. Also recommended: Signing out from your Google account and a URL-ending trick, detailed at Google Operating System's post.
Gladinet Mounts Web Storage Apps as Virtual Drives [Featured Windows Download]
Windows only: Free utility Gladinet Cloud Desktop removes the web interfaces from Google Docs, Picasa Web Albums, Windows Live SkyDrive and Amazon S3 Storage, mounting them instead as folders you can add, remove, or open documents from. Gladinet hides most of the back-end technology that pulls it off, asking you only for a username and password. Once mounted, it's easy to, say, open a Google Docs file in your local copy of Microsoft Word, or directly add pictures to folders in your Picasa or SkyDrive accounts. Read on for a look at how Gladinet works, along with a 10-minute video that explains more of its features.
After grabbing the beta download, installing and launching Gladinet Cloud Desktop, you'll see a fairly simple "start page," which either opens Windows Explorer directly to your virtual webapp drives ("Explore My Gladinet Drive") or mounts a new one ("Mount Disk Storage or Web Storage As Virtual Directory").
Choose to mount a new drive, and you'll be asked to choose a service, provide login details and give it a name.
Once you mount a web service for the first time, you won't need to type in usernames and passwords again, as your credentials are stored in a "Safe Card," which you can manage and delete in a separate dialog. It might take a minute or more for Gladinet to make the connection and mount your virtual drive, and the app doesn't make it clear that it's gone through successfully.
If everything does go through, however, you can head to your "Computer" section, or hit the "Explore" choice on the Gladinet start page, and see your pictures, documents, and other files listed under a new shared drive, labeled "Z:" and named "resources." Opening a word document might fail at first—it did for me with Word 2007—but the files are otherwise there for you to move and manage. Some services, like Picasa, are finicky about what you can put where, but Gladinet shows an explanatory progress dialog that details what went wrong.
Uploading a picture to the Picasa drive, for example, doesn't fly, unless you create a new folder and leave it there—which makes sense, because Picasa Web Albums is organized by, well, albums. But creating a new "Just a Test" folder and dropping a screenshot there worked, as evidenced by the Picasa Web Albums screenshot to the left. SkyDrive and Google Docs worked similarly; I don't, unfortunately, have an S3 account to check out, but I'd presume it has fewer restrictions than any of the others, being a storage-based app.
Gladinet keeps itself in your system tray while running, and closing it un-mounts your "resources" drive with all your app connections. From its right-click system tray menu, you can add and delete app-drives and Safe Card credentials, and create logins that allow you to run Google Calendar, Gmail, the ThinkFree suite and other webapps in stand-alone windows—nothing you can't do with Prism or Google Gears, though.
All in all, Gladinet seems like a pretty handy utility for someone who trades a lot of files between their cloud and desktop spaces. I'd assume Gladinet intends to expand its coverage of webapps, though they could limit this free version to the four listed here and keep others for its "Standard" version, which adds remote desktop and file-grabbing tools.
For those looking for a more in-depth tour around Gladinet, the makers have released this 10-minute introductory tour video:
What do you think of Gladinet's spin on web-as-desktop? Share your take in the comments.
November 2008's Most Popular Posts [[this Is Good]]
Before December 1st is officially upon us, make sure you didn't miss any of November's greatest hits:
- How to Burn Any Video File to a Playable Video DVD
"With your BitTorrent addiction in full swing, you've filled hard drives with media but can't seem to figure out how to burn any of the videos you downloaded to a DVD." - Customize Your Own Killer "Enigma" Desktop
"Windows desktop tweaker extraordinaire and Lifehacker reader Kaelri—who brought us the gorgeous Lightning at Sunset desktop and then showed us how to do it ourselves—is back, this time with a fresh new desktop he calls 'Enigma.'" - Is Your Printer Wasting Your Ink and Money?
"Everyone's been there: You just bought an expensive ink cartridge for your printer, you use it for a while, and then suddenly—much sooner than seems reasonable—your printer tells you that you're either low on or out of ink." - The Complete Guide to Speeding Up Your PC's Startup
"You just hit the power button your PC, and now you've got enough time to brew a fresh pot of coffee for the entire office—because that's how long it takes for your computer to go from 'on' to 'ready to work.'" - Top 10 Things to Look Forward to in Windows 7
"While the next iteration of the ubiquitous Microsoft desktop operating system, Windows 7, isn't a dramatic overhaul of its predecessor Windows Vista, it does fix several sore spots and add a few welcome features." - Get Windows 7's Best Features Right Now
"If you're tired of hearing about Windows 7's upcoming features while you sit and stare at your aging XP or Vista desktop, take solace in a few free apps and themes that can give you a taste right now." - Free Software We're Most Thankful For
"Dear free software developers: Before we American nerds sit down to our turkey and mashed potatoes today, know that your creations are at the top of the list of things we're most thankful for." - Five Best Desktop Customization Tools
"It's crazy to think that an operating system can fit every user's needs out of the box, even if we are just talking about looks." - Five Best Remote Desktop Tools
"Whether you want quick access to your home computer from anywhere in the world or you're the go-to IT person for your friends and family, remote desktop applications are a godsend." - Top 10 Online Freebies and Deals
"Unless you're a financial Jedi Knight or economic Sith Lord, you probably don't have a ton of control over our turbulent economy. What you can reign over is your spending and saving—and when you know where they are, you can take advantage of deep discounts and general freebies across the web."
Create an Ultra Thin Wallet From a USPS Tyvek Mailing Pouch [DIY]
If you're a fan of the ultra thin All-Ett but you're on a budget, all you need to do is score a free USPS Tyvek mailing pouch and grab a pair of scissors. Over at the DIY site Instructables there is a tutorial on turning those extremely durable Tyvek pouches into equally as durable wallets. The end result is definitely more attractive than you'd assume a folded up mailing pouch would be. Additionally if you're a fan of the Hipster PDA it makes a perfect cover for your stack of 3x5 cards. If you have trouble finding a USPS mailing pouch, any Tyvek mailing pouch will do although it may require slight modification to the folds in the tutorial. For other wallet related goodness check out our wallet hacks roundup.
Ask the Commenters Roundup [Hive Mind]
- Where can I find a fast-booting web browser only flavor of Linux?
- What music helps you focus and get things done?
- What advice would you give a high school student interested in a tech industry career?
- What are some must have applications for a college student running Vista-64?
- Is it possible to decrypt a TrueCrypt volume through Cygwin?
Cubic Explorer Saves Your File Management Sessions [Windows Featured Download]
Windows only: Cubic Explorer is a robust Windows Explorer replacement. Among the features power users have come to expect from Explorer alternatives you'll find tabbed windows, bookmarking, bread crumb navigation, file previews, detailed file searching and quick search via extension filtering. One area of oversight is the lack of dual pane browsing, but the tab interface is snappy enough that the lack of panes can be forgiven. The feature which really shines is the ability to save sessions. If you use Cubic Explorer on multiple machines you can save your preferences for each unique setup: work, home, laptops, etc. Cubic Explore is packaged both in an installer and in a zip file for portable use. For other Explorer alternatives, check out the five best alternative file managers. Cubic Explorer is freeware, Windows only.
DIY Wrapping Paper Saves Money and Personalizes Your Gifts [DIY]
Unless you had the foresight to stockpile wrapping paper after Christmas last year, you're looking at buying a lot of over priced paper this holiday season. At the business blog Strategize they came up with a cheap solution for wrapping tons of gifts without breaking the bank.
[We used the] basic brown shipping paper that you can purchase in any office supply or paper store. We wound up buying a pretty large roll of it in a 50 weight, but the entire roll was less than $50. The logo is applied with a self-inking rubber stamp that cost us around $25 and was produced in 24 hours by OfficeMax.
$75 for wrapping gifts might seem steep, but they wrapped around 150 gifts with those basic supplies putting their cost per gift wrapped at around fifty cents. They used their company logo as the adornment on the spartan paper, but you can easily substitute your own variety of craft store stamps or markers to the same effect. In an effort to recycle even more this year, I saved the enormous roll of art paper my toddler has been working her way through to be used as colorful wrapping paper. Should I run out, I'll set her to work with more crayons and restock. While you have gift wrapping on the brain, set up a gift wrapping station to speed up your holiday preparations. For other wrapping ideas check out how to Make Your Own Gift Wrap and how to Turn Catalogs Into Gift Wrap. Have you own creative way of wrapping gifts? Share in the comments below.
DVD Identifier Gives You a Detailed Look at Your Discs [Featured Windows Download]
Windows only: Selecting blank media would seem to be a straight forward affair. You discover a certain brand works great for your purposes so you plan to buy more in the future. Simple! The label wrapped around the spindle of DVDs you just purchased doesn't tell the whole story however. While there are dozens and dozens of DVD brands, there are only a few actual manufacturers. If you're looking for that perfect burn and want to take another step towards becoming a blank-media connoisseur, DVD Identifier will help you dig beneath the labels and find more detailed information about your media. No need to waste burn time if you know the discs are low quality or won't be accepted by a finicky console or DVD player. For an interesting, albeit slightly dated, look at media quality and the varied labels of disc media check out the guide to high quality recordable DVDs. DVD Identifier is freeware, Windows only, and works on CD, DVD, HD DVD, and BLU-RAY media.
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