Friday 5

The F5 list: Best apps, tools & tricks

This week's section is devoted entirely to rounding up the best cool Web apps, free downloads, useful sites and sweet programs, all with an eye toward providing you with ways to improve your life -- in both cyberspace and meatspace.

Of course there's always more stuff than you get fit into a newspaper page, even when you leave out every third word like "cool" and "nifty." So here's a more complete list of cool, nifty stuff, broken down by categories. And of course, this being the Web, everything is linked.

I began this list on April 10 over at my personal blog, so this list includes some suggestions from readers there. Now: What would you add? What would you replace?

THE BIGGIES (regardless of category)

1. Firefox: Without a doubt the best browser I've ever used.
2. Twitter: Simple, but so many uses.
3. Google Reader: Best RSS reader I've used. Share with friends. Post to site. Supports tags.
4. G-mail: I should use it for everything, just haven't made the switch yet.
5. Stumble: I don't randomly surf anymore, because Stumble is better.
6. Vimeo: A video-sharing/hosting site with a decent FLV codec and lots of free bandwidth.
7. Facebook: Even if you're not sure about social sites, this one is useful.
8. Portable Apps: With OpenOffice portable suite, this is an amazing set of tools.
9. OpenOffice: Why buy MS Office?

SOCIAL & COMMUNICATION

1. Twitter: I was slow to pick this up, and it's hard to explain to people why it's valuable. Now I get it.
2. Facebook: MySpace could have been Facebook, if it wasn't the worst software platform imaginable run by one of the world's most evil media companies. Facebook has had its ethical lapses and false moves, but it's still a great way to organize group activities on the fly. It's what teenagers use instead of email.
3. LinkedIn: Stodgy but useful.
4. Ning: Build your own social networks on the fly. Used to create Wired Journalists.
5. Digg: Spread the news.
6. Friendfeed: All your stuff (well, pretty much all of it) in one place.
7. gTalk: A handy IM client.
8. Gmail: If I can ever get my act together and switch over the Gmail, my digital life should get better. Unfortunately, my email life is in disarray and has been for a year, and so I've been slow to utilize my SECOND Gmail account.
9. Thunderbird: A great Mozilla replacement for MS Outloo... a Microsoft product so evil I can't speak it's cursed name.
10. Skype: I used this for doing overseas interviews and it was great, but I haven't used it since.
11. Snitter: "Snook's Twitter" runs on AIR and provides a cool, free, standalone Twitter interface.
12. Tweetpeek: This thing is just great. You can build a page that displays Tweets by all the people you follow. Also has a much more useful embedded widget.

BLOGGING & PUBLISHING

1. Blogger: The gateway drug.
2. Vox: An interesting service, but I haven't done much with it... though I'm thinking about it again.
3. Typepad: Their top-of-the-line account costs about $13 a month. BTW, here's a link to the open-source version of the software, provided by Matthew.
4. Wordpress: Recent update bugginess aside, this is the stuff to use if you're hosting.
5. Tag Cloud: Get a visualization from any set of occurrences. 
6. Flickr: The ubiquitous photo sharing site.
7. Statcounter: Free site stats, just works, very detailed.
8. Utterz: A handy way of getting audio posts onto your site. The Utterz people see their product more as an audio social site. I see it as a very smart way to get reports online from a "dumb" phone.
9. Vizu: Set up your own polls and display them on your site.

BROWSING

1. Stumbleupon: I don't have the time to explore Stumble the way I'd like. But there are moments when it's almost magical: You push the Stumble button and something great and unexpected appears on your screen.
2. Flock: This specialized version of Firefox is built for people who use lots of social media services . I'd tried it before and didn't "get it," but new-media whiz Don D. Lewis of Mount Pleasant gave me a demo and made me a convert. Here's Don: "What I like about it is the ability to have your Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, Gmail and other automated feeds available as a sidebar. Using Flock allows me to browse the web while not missing real-time updates from the above social media sites...Flock does not have all the "plug-ins" that are available under Firefox, but I'm not a big extensions user anyway. Because the underlying code is essentially Firefox, I've not seen the need to upgrade to the latest Firefox release....Flock has traditionally been more stable than Firefox, but I've not tried the new Firefox 3.0 version. Like the say, "your mileage may vary".
3. Del.icio.us: The long-time champion folksonomy tagging service.
4. ZigTag: I love this tagging service. It's still being developed, but it's a great bridge between taxonomies and folksonomies.
5. Download Status Bar: A must-have Firefox add-on.
6. Sage RSS: Sometimes you down need Google Reader. A lightweight RSS reader as a Firefox add-on.
7. Fireshot screen capture: Excellent Firefox add-on.
8. Foxmarks: Firefox add-on I run on three computers.
9. Bugmenot: Beat news-site logins.
10. AVG Free: I love this virus protection utility. I upgraded to the pro version more out of loyalty than necessity.

TRAVEL

1. Google Maps: Great resource for all sorts of travel-related tasks.
2. Google Earth: This was cool when it first came out, but it's gotten better as users around the world add more information. Restaurants? Wi-fi hubs? If you're in a new city with a laptop and you've got Google Earth, you're oriented.
3. Seatguru: Some online travel services let you pick your seat. But what good is that if you don't know what the best seats are? If you know the airline and the type of plane, Seatguru tells you where the best seats are located in that model with that airline's seating configuration. Then book-away.

PRODUCTIVITY

1. PortableApps: If you use multiple computers, or occasionally log-in on someone else's machine, you need this suite of programs. The portable Firefox is reason enough to get this on your Flash drive.
2. OpenOffice: The ultimate cross-platform productivity suite. And it's free.
3. Ta-da Lists: I make to-do lists almost every day. This lets me share those lists with other people who just wish I'd shut up and have a beer or something.
4. Gethuman: User-submitted procedures for getting to a human being on various companies' robotic phone directories.

BUY & SELL

1. Craigslist: Most people know about the classified ads function of Craigslist. My favorite part is the "Missed Connections" section. Sometimes stupid, often banal, these messages to the cosmos are sometimes wistful and poetic and yearning and sublime. But I digress.
2. Zillow: How much is your house worth? Interesting question. How much is your NEIGHBOR'S house worth? More interesting.
3. Swapagift: In theory, this is a site where you can swap a gift certificate from a place you DON'T want to shop for a certificate to a place where you DO. But it's a GREAT place to buy discounted cards when you know you're headed to a particular store. Right now I can get $200 of Cabela's merchandise for $180. Good deal if I'm buying outdoor gear.
4. CafePress: This is the online insta-business store most online store people use. And it's good and it works.
5. Zazzle: This is the online insta-business store really artistic people use. And it's good and it works. Take your pick.
6. Shopzilla: Compare prices for things before you buy.

VIDEO & AUDIO & IMAGE

1. Media Converter: You wanna get something out of a  bad file format and into into something you can use? Use this. Free, but ad-supported.
2. Magic's Video Downloader (FF add-on): Doesn't work on all sites, but works on some big ones you visit frequently (YouTube, baby). When it recognizes media it can grab, the browser icon lights up. Click it and the file downloads. Great when you want to mashup a viral YouTube vid.
3. iTunes: The DRM is super-evil, but it's a great piece of software, particularly if you like podcasts/vodcasts.
4. SoundTaxi: I tend to buy cheap MP3 players, so I need a way to get my iTunes MP4 music into a playable format. SoundTaxi does this for cheap (price has gone up $5 to $20).
5. Current.com: It's the video-sharing site and community with a direct link to TV, which makes it an interesting place.
6. YouTube: Yes, the codec is crappy. Yes, it's a big mess. But it's the public square of the modern age.
7. Blip: They're trying to be a portal to Web video that's part of a series. The specificity of the mission makes it cool. You don't upload to Blip. You audition for Blip.
8. Vimeo: I like Vimeo a lot. It's my primary video hosting site.
9. Pandora: Lastfm.com is supposed to be good, too, but I really dig the "Music Genome Project" guts of Pandora.
10. MusicBrainz: Other people swear by this as a download that will sniff out the metadata for your messed up and disorganized digital music library. I haven't been able to successfully test it yet. There are multiple products you can try.
11. FoxyTunes: This is a Firefox add-on that lets you play audio CDs from your browser. Duh.
12. Internet Archive: There's so much stuff here, but this is where I go to get ironic stock video footage and nab audio I can use in my edits. It's (almost all) public domain or CC licensed stuff. Be sure to check out the AV Geeks collection.
13. The GIMP: This is the standard image processor for people who don't want to pay for Photoshop. It's free, open-source tech, and it's basically a no-cost killer for cheap image processors. Comes with a portable version, and I keep mine on a Flash drive.
14. Photoshop Express (BETA): Adobe now has an online version of its industry-standard image processor. You wanna bet this thing gives the start-ups that currently occupy the online-imaging space nothing but trouble?
15. Gickr.com: I love clever animated GIF files. Give Gickr up to 10 images and it turns them into an animated file for you to download and use.
16. Flickr (listed under blogging, too).

SEARCH

1. Google: The Daddy.
2. Google SMS: A did a Friday piece a while back on cool things you can do with your phone. Everybody ought to have these functions programmed into their cellphone. It's not perfect (I never could get it to deliver the Tar Heel's win in the Sweet 16 while I was off-grid), but this set of functions essentially extends Search to your "dumb" phone. For Free.
3. Wikipedia: It's not controversial because it's not perfect (it isn't). It's controversial because it's so simple and so revolutionary.
4. Zabasearch: This is a pretty good look-up for hard-to-find people. Many of the results lead to pay services.
5. NNDB: Think digital Who's-Who.

FUN & MISC.

1. I Want To: The ultimate "find an app to do it" page. Ugly as hell, but the place to go if you need a currency calculator, or list of disposable e-mail providers, etc.
2. Church Sign Generator: The original and best. Write your own church sign message and post it as a Jpeg.
3. CNet: It's a site, not an app, but it's so useful when you're buying tech that it might as well be its own category. Which is why Techcrunch can kiss my ass.
4. Bombay TV: You get to write three subtitles for a Bollywood film clip, so it's very fun. I'd like it better if I could figure out how to embed  it.
5. Free graphing paper generator: I use this every week. Why buy a pad of graphing paper when you just need a couple sheets? Plus you can make the graphing area precisely the size you want.
6. Second Life. I know this could go under other categories, and there are other Virtual Worlds to consider. But I'm putting it here kinda like YouTube is under video. It's the biggest, baddest VW on the block. Membership is free, so you can explore before you decide to plop down some cash for Linden Dollars.

USER-RECOMMENDED STUFF
Here's a list of recommendations from Charleston blogger Matthew Williams:

* Gimp
* Pidgin
* Avast
* Abiword
* NetNewsWire
*Magnatune

Websites:
* Reddit
* MetaFilter

Firefox:
* It's All Text
* Scribe Fire
* Adblock+

Blogging
* MTOS

Got something you wanna recommend? Leave us a comment and tell us about it.

 

This week's section is devoted entirely to rounding up the best cool Web apps, free downloads, useful sites and sweet programs, all with an eye toward providing you with ways to improve your life -- in both cyberspace and meatspace.

Of course there's always more stuff than you get fit into a newspaper page, even when you leave out every third word like "cool" and "nifty." So here's a more complete list of cool, nifty stuff, broken down by categories. And of course, this being the Web, everything is linked.

I began this list on April 10 over at my personal blog, so this list includes some suggestions from readers there. Now: What would you add? What would you replace?

THE BIGGIES (regardless of category)

1. Firefox: Without a doubt the best browser I've ever used.
2. Twitter: Simple, but so many uses.
3. Google Reader: Best RSS reader I've used. Share with friends. Post to site. Supports tags.
4. G-mail: I should use it for everything, just haven't made the switch yet.
5. Stumble: I don't randomly surf anymore, because Stumble is better.
6. Vimeo: A video-sharing/hosting site with a decent FLV codec and lots of free bandwidth.
7. Facebook: Even if you're not sure about social sites, this one is useful.
8. Portable Apps: With OpenOffice portable suite, this is an amazing set of tools.
9. OpenOffice: Why buy MS Office?

SOCIAL & COMMUNICATION

1. Twitter: I was slow to pick this up, and it's hard to explain to people why it's valuable. Now I get it.
2. Facebook: MySpace could have been Facebook, if it wasn't the worst software platform imaginable run by one of the world's most evil media companies. Facebook has had its ethical lapses and false moves, but it's still a great way to organize group activities on the fly. It's what teenagers use instead of email.
3. LinkedIn: Stodgy but useful.
4. Ning: Build your own social networks on the fly. Used to create Wired Journalists.
5. Digg: Spread the news.
6. Friendfeed: All your stuff (well, pretty much all of it) in one place.
7. gTalk: A handy IM client.
8. Gmail: If I can ever get my act together and switch over the Gmail, my digital life should get better. Unfortunately, my email life is in disarray and has been for a year, and so I've been slow to utilize my SECOND Gmail account.
9. Thunderbird: A great Mozilla replacement for MS Outloo... a Microsoft product so evil I can't speak it's cursed name.
10. Skype: I used this for doing overseas interviews and it was great, but I haven't used it since.
11. Snitter: "Snook's Twitter" runs on AIR and provides a cool, free, standalone Twitter interface.
12. Tweetpeek: This thing is just great. You can build a page that displays Tweets by all the people you follow. Also has a much more useful embedded widget.

BLOGGING & PUBLISHING

1. Blogger: The gateway drug.
2. Vox: An interesting service, but I haven't done much with it... though I'm thinking about it again.
3. Typepad: Their top-of-the-line account costs about $13 a month. BTW, here's a link to the open-source version of the software, provided by Matthew.
4. Wordpress: Recent update bugginess aside, this is the stuff to use if you're hosting.
5. Tag Cloud: Get a visualization from any set of occurrences. 
6. Flickr: The ubiquitous photo sharing site.
7. Statcounter: Free site stats, just works, very detailed.
8. Utterz: A handy way of getting audio posts onto your site. The Utterz people see their product more as an audio social site. I see it as a very smart way to get reports online from a "dumb" phone.
9. Vizu: Set up your own polls and display them on your site.

BROWSING

1. Stumbleupon: I don't have the time to explore Stumble the way I'd like. But there are moments when it's almost magical: You push the Stumble button and something great and unexpected appears on your screen.
2. Flock: This specialized version of Firefox is built for people who use lots of social media services . I'd tried it before and didn't "get it," but new-media whiz Don D. Lewis of Mount Pleasant gave me a demo and made me a convert. Here's Don: "What I like about it is the ability to have your Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, Gmail and other automated feeds available as a sidebar. Using Flock allows me to browse the web while not missing real-time updates from the above social media sites...Flock does not have all the "plug-ins" that are available under Firefox, but I'm not a big extensions user anyway. Because the underlying code is essentially Firefox, I've not seen the need to upgrade to the latest Firefox release....Flock has traditionally been more stable than Firefox, but I've not tried the new Firefox 3.0 version. Like the say, "your mileage may vary".
3. Del.icio.us: The long-time champion folksonomy tagging service.
4. ZigTag: I love this tagging service. It's still being developed, but it's a great bridge between taxonomies and folksonomies.
5. Download Status Bar: A must-have Firefox add-on.
6. Sage RSS: Sometimes you down need Google Reader. A lightweight RSS reader as a Firefox add-on.
7. Fireshot screen capture: Excellent Firefox add-on.
8. Foxmarks: Firefox add-on I run on three computers.
9. Bugmenot: Beat news-site logins.
10. AVG Free: I love this virus protection utility. I upgraded to the pro version more out of loyalty than necessity.

TRAVEL

1. Google Maps: Great resource for all sorts of travel-related tasks.
2. Google Earth: This was cool when it first came out, but it's gotten better as users around the world add more information. Restaurants? Wi-fi hubs? If you're in a new city with a laptop and you've got Google Earth, you're oriented.
3. Seatguru: Some online travel services let you pick your seat. But what good is that if you don't know what the best seats are? If you know the airline and the type of plane, Seatguru tells you where the best seats are located in that model with that airline's seating configuration. Then book-away.

PRODUCTIVITY

1. PortableApps: If you use multiple computers, or occasionally log-in on someone else's machine, you need this suite of programs. The portable Firefox is reason enough to get this on your Flash drive.
2. OpenOffice: The ultimate cross-platform productivity suite. And it's free.
3. Ta-da Lists: I make to-do lists almost every day. This lets me share those lists with other people who just wish I'd shut up and have a beer or something.
4. Gethuman: User-submitted procedures for getting to a human being on various companies' robotic phone directories.

BUY & SELL

1. Craigslist: Most people know about the classified ads function of Craigslist. My favorite part is the "Missed Connections" section. Sometimes stupid, often banal, these messages to the cosmos are sometimes wistful and poetic and yearning and sublime. But I digress.
2. Zillow: How much is your house worth? Interesting question. How much is your NEIGHBOR'S house worth? More interesting.
3. Swapagift: In theory, this is a site where you can swap a gift certificate from a place you DON'T want to shop for a certificate to a place where you DO. But it's a GREAT place to buy discounted cards when you know you're headed to a particular store. Right now I can get $200 of Cabela's merchandise for $180. Good deal if I'm buying outdoor gear.
4. CafePress: This is the online insta-business store most online store people use. And it's good and it works.
5. Zazzle: This is the online insta-business store really artistic people use. And it's good and it works. Take your pick.
6. Shopzilla: Compare prices for things before you buy.

VIDEO & AUDIO & IMAGE

1. Media Converter: You wanna get something out of a  bad file format and into into something you can use? Use this. Free, but ad-supported.
2. Magic's Video Downloader (FF add-on): Doesn't work on all sites, but works on some big ones you visit frequently (YouTube, baby). When it recognizes media it can grab, the browser icon lights up. Click it and the file downloads. Great when you want to mashup a viral YouTube vid.
3. iTunes: The DRM is super-evil, but it's a great piece of software, particularly if you like podcasts/vodcasts.
4. SoundTaxi: I tend to buy cheap MP3 players, so I need a way to get my iTunes MP4 music into a playable format. SoundTaxi does this for cheap (price has gone up $5 to $20).
5. Current.com: It's the video-sharing site and community with a direct link to TV, which makes it an interesting place.
6. YouTube: Yes, the codec is crappy. Yes, it's a big mess. But it's the public square of the modern age.
7. Blip: They're trying to be a portal to Web video that's part of a series. The specificity of the mission makes it cool. You don't upload to Blip. You audition for Blip.
8. Vimeo: I like Vimeo a lot. It's my primary video hosting site.
9. Pandora: Lastfm.com is supposed to be good, too, but I really dig the "Music Genome Project" guts of Pandora.
10. MusicBrainz: Other people swear by this as a download that will sniff out the metadata for your messed up and disorganized digital music library. I haven't been able to successfully test it yet. There are multiple products you can try.
11. FoxyTunes: This is a Firefox add-on that lets you play audio CDs from your browser. Duh.
12. Internet Archive: There's so much stuff here, but this is where I go to get ironic stock video footage and nab audio I can use in my edits. It's (almost all) public domain or CC licensed stuff. Be sure to check out the AV Geeks collection.
13. The GIMP: This is the standard image processor for people who don't want to pay for Photoshop. It's free, open-source tech, and it's basically a no-cost killer for cheap image processors. Comes with a portable version, and I keep mine on a Flash drive.
14. Photoshop Express (BETA): Adobe now has an online version of its industry-standard image processor. You wanna bet this thing gives the start-ups that currently occupy the online-imaging space nothing but trouble?
15. Gickr.com: I love clever animated GIF files. Give Gickr up to 10 images and it turns them into an animated file for you to download and use.
16. Flickr (listed under blogging, too).

SEARCH

1. Google: The Daddy.
2. Google SMS: A did a Friday piece a while back on cool things you can do with your phone. Everybody ought to have these functions programmed into their cellphone. It's not perfect (I never could get it to deliver the Tar Heel's win in the Sweet 16 while I was off-grid), but this set of functions essentially extends Search to your "dumb" phone. For Free.
3. Wikipedia: It's not controversial because it's not perfect (it isn't). It's controversial because it's so simple and so revolutionary.
4. Zabasearch: This is a pretty good look-up for hard-to-find people. Many of the results lead to pay services.
5. NNDB: Think digital Who's-Who.

FUN & MISC.

1. I Want To: The ultimate "find an app to do it" page. Ugly as hell, but the place to go if you need a currency calculator, or list of disposable e-mail providers, etc.
2. Church Sign Generator: The original and best. Write your own church sign message and post it as a Jpeg.
3. CNet: It's a site, not an app, but it's so useful when you're buying tech that it might as well be its own category. Which is why Techcrunch can kiss my ass.
4. Bombay TV: You get to write three subtitles for a Bollywood film clip, so it's very fun. I'd like it better if I could figure out how to embed  it.
5. Free graphing paper generator: I use this every week. Why buy a pad of graphing paper when you just need a couple sheets? Plus you can make the graphing area precisely the size you want.
6. Second Life. I know this could go under other categories, and there are other Virtual Worlds to consider. But I'm putting it here kinda like YouTube is under video. It's the biggest, baddest VW on the block. Membership is free, so you can explore before you decide to plop down some cash for Linden Dollars.

USER-RECOMMENDED STUFF
Here's a list of recommendations from Charleston blogger Matthew Williams:

* Gimp
* Pidgin
* Avast
* Abiword
* NetNewsWire
*Magnatune

Websites:
* Reddit
* MetaFilter

Firefox:
* It's All Text
* Scribe Fire
* Adblock+

Blogging
* MTOS

Got something you wanna recommend? Leave us a comment and tell us about it.

Prank your co-worker's keyboard

Looking for a quickie April Fool's prank... or just sly, remorseless revenge for one?

Try this: Turn your victim's computer keyboard into utter gibberish.

We tested this one at Friday 5 Labs last week, and it actually works. Try it on your own computer before you set out to prank your computer-using friends. It's annoying, for sure, and if your victim is compu-phobic in the slightest it's likely to cause a major meltdown. But it's also easily reversed, and will cause no permanent harm.

Follow along after the jump...

More cool stuff to do with your phone

Picking five cool things to do with your phone was a fun project (I'll post the link here after it's published on Friday), but there were multiple cool things that didn't make the cut.

Put an audio clip on your blog: If I go out and buy a new data contract for my obsolete Nokia, I'd be able to e-mail posts and photos to this blog and have them show up like magic. Personally, I think all reporters should have that capability now, since you never know when you'll bump into spot news. But I digress.

But let's say you're wandering around and you spot something you want to add to your site right away. My answer: Utterz, a free service that lets you record audio posts for your site. Utterz is also a community for people who want to -- in essence -- trade voice mails.

While I find that prospect less than enticing, the Utterz interface is relatively simple and the pieces that connect it to standard blogging platforms seem to work fine. I've got the number saved on my phone, and if I'm riding around and I notice something (a church sign, the Ron Paul blimp, etc.), I'll just get off the bike and make the call. Bingo: A quick audio post.

Also nice to know: When my first attempts at using the service didn't work because of my own mistake, someone from Utterz noticed, then left a comment for me to help me through the problem. Didn't even have to ask for help.

Tell people what you're doing via Twitter: I did a Twitter piece for F5 some weeks ago, and Tweeting has gone on to become part of my daily life (follow me at http://twitter.com/xarker).

There isn't much time in my life for sitting around doing nothing, but every now and then I have to go to the DMV, or wait for something. And that's when this feature comes in handy.

I can use SMS to send a Tweet, and I often do. It's not as fast as Tweeting via keyboard, though, so I tend to reserve it for out-of-pocket times.

If I'm REALLY geeking out, I can record an Utterz message and have that appear in my Twitter stream, but I haven't figured out why I'd want to do that. I may do it anyway. Just because.

New features that could convince you to upgrade: Sometimes you wonder whether gadgety features are worth anything. But as the Web matures and phone OS become more sophisticated, there are reasons to consider bumping yourself up to a more fully featured phone.

For instance, as nice as it is to know that I can text my location to Google and find my way out of a jam, I'd be a lot better off if I could receive a map. And your camera phone doesn't really become a useful appliance until you can post photos to the Web from anywhere.

Why worry about sending and receiving video on your phone? Because of Qikcasting.

I hate to think of myself as being nothing but a shill for Robert Scoble, but the people who make higher-end cell phones really need to pay this guy some money. He's singlehandedly raised Qik's profile with his live-streaming of tech events, and in doing so he's made me re-think my cheapskate attitude toward my phone.

What else could I be doing?

DIY: Grab & download a YouTube video

F5 free YouTube video conversion tutorial from Dan Conover on Vimeo.

Putting Twitter to work for you

Twitter get-started tutorial from Dan Conover on Vimeo.

Thinking about setting up Twitter for the first time? Follow along with me as a I walk you through setting up your account, finding friends to "follow" and making your first Tweets.

5 Firefox add-ons

Have you tried the free Firefox Web browser yet?

If you haven’t (and you should), consider these five great tools you can add to your Firefox surfing experience — all in less than five minutes:

1. FoxyTunes: Adds a row of music-player controls at the bottom of your browser window, allowing you to pick, play and pause your music without leaving your browser.

2. Stumbleupon: Tell this add-on just a bit about your interests and start “stumbling” around the Web. You’ll join thousands of people with similar interests in a cooperative quest for cool new stuff.

3. Download Status Bar: Don’t you hate it when you download something and then you can’t find where the computer stashed it? This simple tool brings sanity back to downloading.

4. Foxmarks Bookmarks Synchronizer: Set this up for every computer you use and it will keep all your bookmarks identical on each machine.

5. gTalk Sidebar: Add Google’s popular Instant Messaging tool to your browser sidebar.

And the best part? There are literally hundreds of free add-ons for your Firefox browser, so you can customize it to fit your needs.

A good trick: Cat, Hat, thing, do...

From our friends over at Boing Boing comes this sweet little idea: Write a poem, or a story, or whatever, using only the words that appear in the Dr. Seuss classic “The Cat in the Hat.” Ready, set... GO!

But what are those words? And how many are there (articles cited either/or/and 223 or 236 words). And though I did (eventually) find an online list, I needed something better.

My solution? Type every word of the book into a spreadsheet, run a couple of filters and functions on the prose and ... voila! I got an alphabetized, numbered list of every word Dr. Seuss used to write his easy-reader. And yes, I eventually came up with 236.

You can find that list on Charleston.net, or as a numbered list right here, or as a single-page, printable PDF. And if you do bother to try this little challenge, please send me the results  (if snail-mail suits your results better, try: Dan Conover, The Post and Courier, 134 Columbus St., Charleston, SC, 29403).

Make your posts pop with simple HTML

Have you ever noticed how some people’s comments on blogs and forums just look better than others?

That’s because they’re using invisible HTML tags to dress up their thoughts. Learn these five simple tags (using the shifted characters above the comma and period keys on your computer) and bask in the glow of  your new cyber-geekiness.

Italic <em>: Makes plain text italic (the “em” stands for “emphasize”). Close it out by adding  a </em> tag at the end of the passage you want italicized. Example: “Very <em>cool!</em>” looks like this: Very cool!

Bold <strong>: Same thing as the italics tag. Close it out with a </strong> tag.

Hyperlink <a href=”http://www.example.com”>: Copy the full web address for your link and paste it between the quotation marks. Define the text you want to make clickable by adding a </a> tag at the end of it.

Inset quote <blockquote>: Decrease the margins for longer quotations  with a <blockquote> tag. Close out the quoted material with </blockquote>.

Send e-mail <a href=”mailto:you@abc.com”> : Treat this one like a hyperlink, closing it out with a </a> tag. The difference? People who click on the link will get a blank e-mail form with the address you specify in the “Send to” field. The address goes after the colon and don’t add any spaces.

Boost your personal Google rank

More Americans than ever — including prospective employers, clients and business associates — now use search engines to run background checks on people they’ve never met. Which means it may be time to push the information you want people to find to the top of the “Your Name” search results page.

Like so:

1. BuyYourName.com: So your name is Moultrie Ravenel Pinckney and your friends call you Moot. The URL www.mootpinckney.com is still available, lucky boy. As for you, Mrs. Jane Smith, well ... thanks anyway.
2. Write your autobiography: It’s your life. Describe it. But think resume here, not expose.
3. Link to it: Google treats links as recommendations, so you need as many as you can get to boost your page rank. One good solution: If you comment on other sites and blogs, add your new URL to your log-in identity, and then comment away.
4. Try networking: There are all more professional and personal networking sites and services than we can mention here. Sharing your Web URL on these sites will boost your search profile, even if it does nothing else.
5. Change your name: So your parents named you Barry Bonds, or maybe Paris Hilton. Sorry. Maybe it’s time to start calling yourself “Ace Bonds” or “Zoey Hilton.” It’s all about branding, and if yours is already taken, you’ll just have to get creative.

Five geek things to perk up your life

Surf better
Firefox
The Firefox browser from Mozilla is the browser of choice for only about 16 percent of Web-surfing Americans, but it’s the preferred tool among the technorati. If you’re frustrated with your Internet Explorer browser, download the latest version of Firefox and see what the buzz is all about. Life-improving coolnesses: More than 1,000 free plug-in tools; manage your own privacy settings and browsing history; search shortcuts; built-it pop-up blocker. Cost: Free. Address: www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox.

Own your music
SoundTaxi
So you bought a bunch of songs from Apple’s popular iTunes music store and now you want to take them with you to the gym on an off-brand digital music player. Hello, frustration. Apples sells music on iTunes with a built-in copyright protection code that only iPods can read. You could spend hours hacking the problem with techno-geek freeware, or you can spend $15 and download Soundtaxi. Life-improving coolnesses: Cue up you iTunes music library, press the “convert” button and wake up in the morning to a truly flexible digital music library. Cost: $14.90 for an easy download. Address: www.soundtaxi.info.

Get your family organized
Google Calendar
Problem: A busy family with busy lives. Solution: A single calendar that everyone can access from anywhere, at any time. Google’s calendar is easy and intuitive. Life-improving coolnesses: Invite your family, friends and associates to compile group calendars with you. Then combine your multiple calendars into one personal view. Cost: Free along with the rest of your Google account. Address: www.google.com, then click the Sign-in button on the upper-right-hand corner.

Protect your computer
AVG Anti-virus 7.5 Free Edition
Most new computers ship with built-in virus protection (that you still have to pay for as subscriptions), but some of these packaged security programs can be pricey -- and almost as annoying as the bugs they’re trying to defeat. AVG’s freeware version is a lightweight, proven system that comes with regular automatic updates, so it spots new viruses just like the big-name systems do. Life-improving coolnesses: Who cares? You just want virus protection that works. Cost: Free, with the option to upgrade to the professional version for $29.95 a year. Address: www.free.grisoft.com.

Record your own audio
Audacity
There are all sorts of reasons to add a good audio recording and editing program to your toolbox, but a lot of what’s available is overly technical and wildly expensive. Audacity is popular with podcasters and techies, but it’s also a great download for people who are just starting to experiment with audio. Life-improving coolnesses: Record bedtime stories for your grandkids. Archive oral histories from your older family members. Send playable greetings to loved ones overseas. Cost: Open-source freeware, but donations are accepted. Address: http://audacity.sourceforge.net/