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| Best Instant Messenger? [Hive Five Call For Contenders]
July 23, 2009 at 8:00 pm
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|  Instant messaging is a staple of the modern communication toolkit. Once you were locked into using the client provided by the service you preferred, but these days a variety of excellent cross-platform, cross-protocol tools are available for the job.
Photo by kwanz. We visited the topic of instant messaging once before in our Hive Five series, but so much has changed in the interim that we're returning to get more feedback from the well-versed Lifehacker readership. Since then, Trillian came back on the scene, and Digsby has—rightfully so—taken some flak for including so much crapware in their installation (even though there is a way around it), among other shake ups in the instant messaging arena. This week we want to hear about your favorite instant messaging client and what features won you over. Cross-platform support? Integration with your favorite video-chat service? The best looking emoticons in town? Slim memory footprint? Hive Five nominations take place in the comments, where you post your favorite tool for the job. We get hundreds of comments, so to make your nomination clear, please include it at the top of your comment like so: VOTE: Instant Messaging Client. Please don't include your vote in a reply to another commenter. Instead, make your vote and reply separate comments. If you don't follow this format, we may not count your vote. To prevent tampering with the results, votes from first-time commenters may not be counted. After you've made your nomination, let us know what makes it stand out from the competition. About the Hive Five: The Hive Five feature series asks readers to answer the most frequently asked question we get: "Which tool is the best?" Once a week we'll put out a call for contenders looking for the best solution to a certain problem, then YOU tell us your favorite tools to get the job done. Every weekend, we'll report back with the top five recommendations and give you a chance to vote on which is best. For an example, check out last week's Hive Five Best GPS Devices.
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| Google Latitude Comes to the iPhone [Google Maps]
July 23, 2009 at 7:40 pm
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|  The good news: Google Latitude—the Maps feature that finds your nearby friends on a map—is now available on the iPhone. The bad news: It's only available as a web application, so it doesn't currently work with the Google Maps app.
To try it out, just point your iPhone's browser to http://google.com/latitude and allow Safari to use your current location. Latitude will use your iPhone's GPS to locate you and add your location to Latitude's database. Assuming you've got friends using Latitude, when you tap on the See Map button, you'll see yourself and friends on a Google Map in Safari. While it's very cool that iPhone users can join in the fun on Latitude, it is a bummer that it's not an integrated native application—either inside Google Maps proper or its own standalone app. (The same way that it's unfortunate that there's no native version of Gmail Mobile for the iPhone, despite the fact that Gmail Mobile in Safari is pretty solid.) Still, it works very well on the location front, and while I'm having a bit of a time adding friends successfully, it shows promise.
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| Remains of the Day: Windows 7 RTM on BitTorrent? [For What It's Worth]
July 23, 2009 at 7:00 pm
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|  Google celebrates Comic-Con with some new iGoogle comic themes, you may want to wait a bit on those Windows 7 RTM torrents, and everybody wants to see Internet Explorer 6 die.
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| Miro 2.5 Gets New Audio Podcast Section, Improved Launch Speeds [Downloads]
July 23, 2009 at 6:00 pm
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|  Windows/Mac/Linux: Miro, the open-source media player that's sort of like a TiVo for internet video, has hit its 2.5 release, boasting 2 to 4 times faster launching speeds, a new audio podcast section, and more.
In addition to the faster launching speeds and new audio podcast section, the Miro blog lists some other major changes added in this latest release, including a button to download from YouTube when you're browsing the site from inside Miro, a new library interface with video, audio, and other sections, and new keyboard shortcuts for almost all available functions—which could work wonders if you wanted to program your remote to work with Miro. The Miro interface was also nicely cleaned up. For the full list of changes, check out the Miro 2.5 release notes. Miro is a free download for Windows, Mac, and Linux.
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| BBC's Quick Fix Dishes Essential Phrases in Foreign Languages [Education]
July 23, 2009 at 5:00 pm
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|  If you want to brush up on a few important phrases before heading abroad on holiday (you know, because you're all about good travel etiquette), the BBC's Quick Fix site is a crash course in useful phrases in foreign languages.
The site covers 36 languages, from Albanian to Ukranian, and includes printable phrase-sheets and audio snippets of the phrases (like you see in the screenshot of the player above) to help you get the pronunciations right. It's certainly no replacement for learning the language (the parent site, BBC Languages, can help a bit more with that), but if you just want to get a few important phrases down so you can better navigate the natives, it seems like a nice resource.
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| Avoid Over-Saving for Retirement [Personal Finance]
July 23, 2009 at 4:30 pm
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|  It may seem like a pretty luxurious problem to have in the midst of a recession, but personal finance weblog The Simple Dollar details why saving too much money for retirement can be problematic.
Photo by chispita_666. For one, excessive retirement income also means excessive taxes on your withdrawals. But the big reason, according to the author, is that: [E]xcessive retirement savings takes away from your other life goals. Dropping that 401(k) contribution back to 10% gives you another 5% of your salary - $2,300 pre-tax - to save for other life goals without diminishing the quality of your retirement. Instead, start socking that money away for other goals: a big fat emergency fund, a home down payment, a small business you dream of starting, a vacation, or whatever it is that really makes your life worth living. Like we said, it seems like a pretty nice problem to have during bad economic times, but striking the right balance with your money is important no matter what you're making. Of course, what you save for retirement depends greatly on your retirement goals, so check out how to figure out how much you need to retire before you decide you're saving too much.
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| Disable Automatic Web Page Refreshing [Firefox Tips]
July 23, 2009 at 4:00 pm
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|  Firefox only (Win/Mac/Linux): Have you ever noticed how some web sites automatically reload the page every minute or two? It's frustrating, unnecessary, and thankfully can be easily disabled in Firefox.
While there could be some valid reasons for reloading the page, most of the time it's just a way to artificially increase pageviews—at the cost of your bandwidth and CPU cycles. To disable the automatic refresh, you can type about:config into the location bar, and then filter by the following setting:
accessibility.blockautorefresh
Once you've found it, simply double-click on the key to change the value to false true, and web pages won't be able to reload the page. If you have the setting enabled but you'd like to make a single page refresh automatically, you can use the previously mentioned ReloadEvery extension. Thanks, Wilhelm!
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| Take 18 Minutes to Keep Your Days on Track [Organization]
July 23, 2009 at 3:30 pm
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|  According to the Harvard Business blog, you can organize an eight-hour work day and keep it on track by creating a ritual that'll only take a total of 18 minutes each day.
Photo by koyochi Harvard Business blog's Peter Bregman outlines three steps on how to avoid those days when you can barely remember what you intended to accomplish by the time you reach for your keyboard: STEP 1 (5 Minutes) Set Plan for Day.
STEP 2 (1 minute every hour) Refocus..
STEP 3 (5 Minutes) Review. Basically, you'll start the day off right by grabbing a sheet of paper and writing down the goals which you can realistically accomplish that day. The important part is to immediately assign time slots to those tasks by order of importance and difficulty because these designated times make you more likely to accomplish your goals and give you a way of tracking your progress once every hour. At the end of the work day, you'll take a few minutes to review not just the last hour, but the entire day. Did you stay on track? What can you do differently tomorrow to retain or improve your productivity? Check out the full details on this time management ritual on the Harvard Business blog and tell us about how you organize your days and prevent slumps in productivity. Do you have a ritual or do you fly by the seat of your pants and hope for the best? Share your workday time management successes (or failures) in the comments.
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| The Dual Desk Office [Featured Workspace]
July 23, 2009 at 3:00 pm
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|  It's a recurrent theme among featured workspaces, but only because it's true: if you want something just perfect you have to build it yourself. Today's featured workspace features a complete office remodel including custom desk and door.
Lifehacker reader John Sorenson did quite a remodel job on a small upstairs room in his home. The space feels much bigger than it is and John has tons of room to spread out with a custom built-in desk. From his notes:
This is the product of a remodel job I did in my home, replaced window, installed a new Maple floor, baseboards and rim, put in a reeded glass door and custom built in the desk. I couldn't find a desk that served my purposes so I just built one into the space. I custom ordered the legs and the rest was taken care of with a few trips to Home Depot. I really wanted the separation between "work" space and "creative" space... And with all this audio equipment, I didn't want to overcrowd myself when I was paying bills, working from home, or anything like that. It's really a good "his & her's" setup, but I took both sides for myself. The ceiling is only 4' high on either side, but the paint scheme and the configuration makes good use of the limiting height. I took this into consideration that I had to keep the middle area open to access the desks. We're huge fans of the reeded glass door, not only does it let in light from the hallway but it adds a lot of character—and an old-time detective agency vibe!—to the room. Check out the photos below to see the glass door and the rest of the office from different angles.   
  
If you have a workspace of your own to show off, throw the pictures on your Flickr account and add it to the Lifehacker Workspace Show and Tell Pool. Include some details about your setup and why it works for you, and you just might see it featured on the front page of Lifehacker.
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| Spice Up Your Push-up Routine with "The Hindu" and "Dive Bomber" [Fitness]
July 23, 2009 at 2:30 pm
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| We've already explained why the push-up belongs in your fitness routine, but if you've grown weary of the standard method, weblog Art of Manliness rounds up "the ultimate push-up guide" with 35 variations on the classic, including "The Hindu". Concerning "The Hindu" push-up, Art of Manliness says the technique has been used for centuries and "consists of a dynamic full body movement that will build strength and flexibility in your chest, shoulders, back, hips, and triceps." Watch the above video to see the method in action. Two things to keep in mind when applying this technique: - Make sure to get a good stretch in your back.
- The first time you perform a Hindu Push-up you might find yourself falling on your face during the initial descent.
If you're looking to give your muscles even more of a workout, try "The Dive Bomber" push-up, which is performed exactly like The Hindu, except upon returning to the starting position, "you follow the same swooping motion you make on the descent in reverse". A third variation is "The Tiger," which combines The Hindu and Dive Bomber. The Tiger focuses on your triceps and, if positioned properly, should look like an upside down V. Browse the full post for the entire list of push-up variations—complete with videos—and if you're looking for a push-up plan, check out previously mentioned One Hundred Push-Ups for details on how to go from 0 to 100 push-ups in a matter of six weeks. Still prefer doing crunches over push-ups? Here's why you should switch gears and ditch the crunches now.
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| Unofficial Chrome Extension Manager Enables or Disables Add-ons [Downloads]
July 23, 2009 at 2:00 pm
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|  Windows only: Until Google graces us with a real extension manager, an enterprising user put together an impressive batch file that can handle enabling, disabling, or even uninstalling Google Chrome extensions.
Once you've downloaded the batch file, you can simply double-click to open it up in a command prompt window, where you'll be presented with a menu that allows you to enable, disable, or uninstall extensions, or even run Chrome with extensions enabled. It's definitely not the ideal way to deal with add-ons, but it's a great, workable solution until Google puts a real extension manager together—and you have to admire those kind of batch scripting skills. Hit the link for the download, and remember to right-click the batch file download link and Save As, giving the file a *.bat extension.
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| Turn Gmail Into Your Ultimate GTD Inbox [GTD]
July 23, 2009 at 1:30 pm
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|  If you love Gmail and you happen to be a disciple of the Getting Things Done philosophy, reader Chris Zimmerman details how he employs a couple of Gmail Labs features to transform Gmail into an impressive GTD inbox.
Ed. note: Everything below comes courtesy of Chris, who details how he uses previously mentioned Gmail Labs features like Gmail Superstars. and Multiple Inboxes to get things done. Gmail Setup Using Superstars & Multiple Inboxes: - Enable both "multiple inboxes" and "Superstars" in Google Labs
- Then in general settings, set your stars up like this:
These are used to represent, in order from left to right: - Red Bang - Needs Immediate Action/Scheduling, search query: has:red-bang (or l:^ss_cr)
- Yellow Bang - Needs Action/Non-Immediate, search query: has:yellow-bang (or l:^ss_cy)
- Red Star - Scheduled on Calendar, search query: has:red-star (or l:^ss_sr)
- Orange Arrows - Delegated, search query: has:orange-guillemet (or l:^ss_co)
- Purple Question - Needs Further Follow-Up or Research, search query: has:purple-question (or l:^ss_cp)
- Purple Star - Some Day/Long Term, search query: has:purple-star (or l:^ss_sp)
- Green Check - Completed, search query: has:green-check (or l:^ss_cg)
- Green Star - Archive, search query: has:green-star (or l:^ss_sg)
- Blue Info - Archive as General Reference Item, search query: has:blue-info (or l:^ss_cb)
- Then I set the settings of my multiple mailboxes up like this:
- The idea is, nothing should sit with a "red bang" for very long. For me at least, if it isn't scheduled, it probably won't happen, so I want stuff on the calendar as soon as possible.
- Once your Inbox is set up it looks great and automatically sorts things into the proper piles like so:
- I then also use labels to define Contexts, Projects, and Resources - Prefixed with a C/ or a P/ or R/ respectively:
Context Examples: - C/Appointment
- C/Community
- C/Computer
- C/Consciousness
- C/Errands
- C/Exercise
- C/Home
- C/Offline
- C/Phone
- C/Private
- C/Travel
Project Examples: - P/Company Site
- P/Source New Building
- P/Board Outing
- P/Spring Vacation
Resource Examples: - R/Jones, Steve, Attorney
- R/Zoning Board
- R/Thomas, Joe
- Toggling the stars quickly puts things in the right action pile for fast processing. Tagging them with context and project labels, I know what I could be working on and how to move projects ahead.
- I also save common searches in my toolbar using this Gmail bookmarklet generator. Using the same search queries from above, you generate bookmarklets you can drag right to the toolbar. As an example, say I want to quickly see all mail that's been delegated (the orange arrows); I go to the site, and enter l:^ss_co as my query, like so:
"Title" is the word that will appear in the button, so I keep it simple and stick to what I am looking for.
After I hit "generate", here's what I got: 
Then I just dragged it to my toolbar. I took it a step further, and put my common searches in and created a folder for all of them, like so: 
Clicking on any of the bookmarklets takes me directly to whichever search I need. Thanks for the great writeup, Chris! Got a similar implementation of your own? Let's hear it in the comments.
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| Gadget and Gear Deals of the Day [Dealhacker]
July 23, 2009 at 1:00 pm
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|  Discounted peripherals, monitors, large screen TVs, and free vodka are but a few of the deals you'll find in today's roundup.
Computer Gear! Not Computer Gear! Free Stuff! Thanks Slickdeals, Fatwallet, TechDealDigger, TechBargains, CheapStinkyBargains, and GamerHotline!
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| Quickly Upload Photos and Video to Facebook via Email [Photo Sharing]
July 23, 2009 at 12:30 pm
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|  Facebook is easily one of the most popular places to share photos and videos with friends and family. Now the folks at Facebook have streamlined the process, allowing you to upload media directly to your account via a personalized email address.
It works like this: Just log in and head to the Facebook Mobile page, then look for the custom email address under the Upload Photos via Email section. Copy the address, add it to your contacts, and next time you want to upload something to Facebook, just compose and email to your custom address and attach the files in question. Similarly, if someone sends you photos you want to upload to Facebook, you can simply forward the email and attachments to your custom Facebook address. If the notion sounds familiar, it's probably because Flickr has offered its own upload by email option (that we mentioned in our advanced Flickr user guide) for quite some time now—as have many other sites. As relative photo purists, we cringe to think that some people rely exclusively on Facebook to host their photos, since it generally compresses the hell out of them, but even still, it's a useful feature.
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| Bookmarks Archiver Automatically Cleans Old Bookmarks [Downloads]
July 23, 2009 at 12:00 pm
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|  Firefox only (Win/Mac/Linux): Firefox extension Bookmarks Archiver cleans out those old bookmarks that you never use, but still have cluttering up your bookmarks menu.
Once you've installed the experimental Firefox extension, you should take a trip into the add-on's options panel to set the number of days to check, and whether you want the bookmark archiving to prompt you or not. Once you've configured the settings to your liking, whenever you restart Firefox you'll be prompted (or not) to archive or delete the bookmarks. Since the extension relies on the history feature to determine the last time you've visited a bookmark, you'll need to have visited the bookmark at least once to trigger an archive, but it's an interesting add-on definitely worth a look.
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| Break Away from Guidebooks for Cheaper Vacationing [Travel]
July 23, 2009 at 11:00 am
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|  Guidebooks are a staple item for many travelers. While there is nothing wrong with using a guidebook to get a feel for the environment you'll be vacationing in, it's a sure way to pay high prices and fight crowds.
Photo by mode. Over at the frugality blog Wise Bread, they've put together a handy guide to budget travel. One quick way to cut down on the cost and the time spent waiting at crowded destinations is to ditch the guidebook: Consult a good, locally researched guidebook like those in the Lonely Planet series for basic background and logistical info before you travel, but don't use it to plan your every move, like where you'll stay, eat and hang out. By the time a guidebook recommends something, it's usually overrun with tourists (and overpriced). What can you do if you aren't using the guidebook? You can follow another bit of advice they offer by obeying the "Three L's Rule" to Look for Lines of Locals and keep your eyes and ears focused on finding the places the non-tourists go to enjoy the local culture. For more money-saving travel tips, check out the full article. If you have your own tips for getting more out of your travel while keeping the costs down, share the wealth in the comments below.
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| WhatsOpen Hunts Down Files that Won't Let You Eject a Volume [Downloads]
July 23, 2009 at 10:35 am
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|  Mac OS X only: Ever try ejecting a thumb drive or other volume on your Mac but discover "disk is in use and could not be ejected"? WhatsOpen hunts down the culprits so you can get on with your life.
Just download WhatsOpen and fire it up, choose the Volume you're trying to eject from the Volume drop-down, then click on the List Files button. WhatsOpen will scan that volume and detect and list any open files on said volume. Armed with that knowledge, you should be able to close whatever file or application is causing the problem and eject the disk. If you're still not having any luck, you can simply click the Force Eject button and be done with it. Windows users looking for a similar solution should take a look at previously mentioned File & Folder Unlocker. WhatsOpen is freeware, Mac OS X only; donations are accepted.
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| How to Master Text Highlighting with Your Mouse [Mouse Tips]
July 23, 2009 at 10:00 am
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|  Depending upon the font size of a document and your hand-eye coordination, it can be difficult to position the mouse cursor exactly where you want it when selecting text. Here's how to quickly select text blocks with minimal fuss.
Photo by quinn.anya. You may have been using some of these text-selection tricks ever since you fired up a computer with a mouse, but chances are you'll find something below that you didn't know before. Select By Words Instead of Characters Instead of simply clicking and dragging your mouse, double-click the first or last word you want to highlight and hold down the mouse button on the second click; then just drag the mouse as usual when selecting text and voilà—you're selecting whole words rather than individual characters. I've tested this method with Firefox, Internet Explorer, Microsoft Word, Wordpad, and Notepad—but it's probably an OS default, since it works in virtually any program I can think of. You can get Word to do the same thing by default—without double-clicking—via the Edit tab in the Options dialog, but it's an all or nothing affair. The option is checked by default; turning it off gives you greater flexibility for text selection once you know this trick. Select Whole Paragraphs or Documents Most applications will also select an entire paragraph with a triple-click. Similar to the above method, if you triple-click before dragging the mouse, only whole paragraphs will be highlighted. This can be a quick way to select an entire document by triple-clicking the first paragraph and dragging down to the last. More Selection Options Using Word While the above tips work most anywhere, Word seemingly has no end of different ways to select text. Here are just some found by experimenting with different key combinations while clicking and/or dragging with the mouse: - Shift+click: Select from the current caret position to the mouse cursor location
- Alt+double-click: Select from the beginning of a word to the mouse cursor location
- Alt+click-and-drag: Select a rectangular block of text
- Ctrl+click: Select an entire sentence; once one sentence has been selected this way, Shift+click or Ctrl+click-and-drag can be used to expand the selection to multiple contiguous sentences
If you've got your own text selection tricks, share them in the comments.
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| Web Video Downloader Grabs Video and Flash Games [Downloads]
July 23, 2009 at 9:30 am
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|  Firefox ony: We've all come across a video or flash game we'd like to save for posterity or at least for future goofing off. Web Video Downloader makes it easy to snag video and games off the web.
Web Video Downloader adds a small icon to your menu bar, as seen in the screenshot, which becomes animated when there is available content on the page you are on. With the extension you can download FLV, SWG, WMV, AVI, MOV, RM, and RMVB, among others. All the downloads are handled by a download manager, a basic two column affair that shows which files are pending and which are downloaded. Once you've downloaded the source file you move or rename it from within the download manager. If you have a favored tool for grabbing video from the web, Firefox-based or otherwise, let's hear about it in the comments. Web Video Downloader requires Firefox and is available for Windows and Mac.
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| Keep Meetings on Track By Standing [Meetings]
July 23, 2009 at 9:00 am
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|  Office meetings can drag on for far too long. Our own Gina Trapani has come up with some "extreme" ways to keep them short and on track.
Photo by improveit. Gina writes that one way to avoid unproductive meetings is to keep everyone standing. It goes without saying that if you're seated and comfortable, you're more likely to allow a meeting to linger on than if your feet start to hurt because you've been upright. Blogger John Trosko instituted "stand-up" meetings at his company and found the method to be both more efficient and faster. Instead of sitting at a traditional conference table, we took the chairs out of the room and ran meetings while standing on our feet. Well, the length of the meetings DRASTICALLY dropped, because people didn't want to stand for long. Meetings went from 30-60 minutes to roughly 1/2 of that while still delivering meaty content. Check out the full post for other ways to keep a meeting moving, then chime in with your own make-meetings-better methods in the comments.
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| Increase Productivity by Shelving Infrequently Used Items [Productivity]
July 23, 2009 at 8:30 am
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|  When your desktop starts to groan under the weight of the junk on it, it's time to evaluate how frequently you actually use the things strewn across it. Photo by Johan Larsson.
While some people end up with a desk that is just messy and littered with empty soda cans and food wrappers, most of us tend to end up more with work related clutter on our desks. Things get taken out and not put away and maybe they were never put away to begin with. We miscalculate how long we might need something and so it stays on our desk for weeks without being used on the off chance that we'll need to use it again so why would we bother with the hassle of storing it somewhere else? Over at the Harvard Business Review, our own Gina Trapani shares some tips for maximizing your workplace productivity including the importance of only putting things of immediate utility on your desk:
Split your workspace tools and current paperwork into two categories: what should be within arm's reach and what shouldn't. Right now, as you sit at your desk, consider every single item that you can reach out and touch. Is there anything you use less than a few times a week? Get it out of your way. (Hint: If it's dusty, it doesn't need to be there.) Is there anything you use often that's not right nearby? Relocate it to the space right in front of you. For example, if you rarely use the hole punch, store it in the office supplies drawer. If you're always jotting things down, a fresh notepad and uncapped pen should be next to your mouse pad. How you store the infrequently used items will be dependent on your office situation and the volume of storage you have available for the purposes of clearing off your desk. The following is the path items take in my home office, based on frequently of use: - Daily Use: On the actual desktop.
- Weekly Use: In organizer drawers under my charging station, to the side of my desk.
- Monthly Use: In a storage closet at the back of my office.
- Quarterly Use: Everything used this infrequently is stored on shelving in the basement.
You may not have a home office to spread out in or the liberty to shove things in the boiler room at your work. Even in an office tight on extra storage space however, something as small as a plastic tote tucked deep under a desk or on top of a shelf can provide just enough extra storage to hold those infrequently used artifacts and keep your desk clear for productive work. If you have experience squeezing extra space out of an office to keep your desktop a clear landing strip for new work, let's hear about it in the comments.
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| Card.ly Creates Attractive Online Business Cards in a Jiffy [Address Book]
July 23, 2009 at 7:00 am
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|  Web site Card.ly allows you to collect all of your contact information—online and off—into one simple, linkable "business card" you can share with anyone.
The site's pretty simple. You just sign up, fill in whatever information you want to pull into a centralized "business card", and you're ready to go. When you're finished, you'll get a personalized link that looks something like http://card.ly/lifehacker. You can simply share that link with anyone you want to stay updated with you, or, if you really like it, Card.ly provides various embeddable options for placing your vCard on your web site, in your email, or anywhere you want to include it. Even though this is the sort of thing that it seems most people use the likes of Facebook for these days, Card.ly is a fun and simple idea executed well.
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