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10 Amazing Hacks that Harness the Awesome Power of USB

Alex Castle — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 18:30:00 -0600

After our USB 3.0 coverage last week, we figured it would be a good time to turn our attention back to USB 2.0 (aka High Speed), and one of the classic nerd hobbies: USB hacking. Because of its highly-accessible wiring, USB can be easily modified for all sorts of purposes, even by neophyte hardware hackers. In the past, we've shown you how to perform some simple hacks, but now we want to highlight some of our favorite hacks created by members of the DIY community.

Some are of questionable utility, some of them are downright dangerous, but all of them are good, old-fashioned fun. Read on for our collection of 10 amazing USB hacks!

Solar powered USB charger

Sure, you've seen handheld USB chargers before, built into altoids tins or otherwise, but have you seen a USB charger that's solar powered? We didn't think so.

With this hack you can be sure that you'll always be able to slowly charge your gadgets. As long as you're using your gadgets outside. And it's sunny.

USB air conditioner

This USB hack takes the traditional USB casefan mod, and takes it to new extremes by turning it into a full fledged air conditioning unit for your room. The hack involves installing a casefan into the top of a coffee tin, punching holes in the bottom, and suspending a pile of ice in the middle. The casefan (modified to run on USB power, of course) then sucks air in through the holes in the bottom and through the ice, cooling it in the process. The cold air is then expelled from the top of the can, cooling down your room.

USB minifridge

Miniature USB refrigerators have for years been a staple of office "white elephant" parties, and other occasions to give your friends bad presents. There's no better way to gradually chill a single can of Fresca and possibly overload your power supply at the same time.

Now, thanks to Ross V, you can build your own USB refrigerator, out of nothing more than a peltier refrigeration device, a box and a USB cable.

NERF USB stick destroyer

Alright, so this particular project doesn't actually involve creating something that uses USB, persay. We're still including it because 1) It does involve USB, at least tangentially, 2) It IS a hack, and 3) It's totally awesome.

What exactly does the NERF USB stick destroyer do, besides the obvious? It's a NERF gun-mounted electronics scrambler, which disables RFID tags and ruins USB sticks in a flurry of laser-gun sounds and flashing lights. But don't take our word for it--check out the video.

USB to Cat5 connector

This hack relies on the simple fact that when it comes right down to it, there's not that big of a difference between USB and Cat5 (ethernet) cable. They're all just bundles of wires. This hack shows how you can rewire a 8-wire Cat5 cable to act as an extension cable for 4-wire USB signals. USB doesn't function well over very long distances, but you'd still be hard-pressed to find a cheaper way to make custom-length USB extensions.

Run USB Through Telephone Lines

In the same spirit as the USB-Cat5 hack, this video shows you how to wire a USB-to-telephone line adapter, allowing you to use the wiring that's already in your walls as USB extension. Is this a good idea? Probably not, since the wiring in your walls might well be much longer than the actual distance from one room to another, and if your phone rings your gadgets could get fried. Nonetheless, it's a neat trick to impress your nerdy friends.

Make a USB reading light

Maybe the oldest USB hack in the book, this article from Make magazine shows you how to make a USB reading light out of an LED and some wire. There are dozens of takes on the same hack floating around on the internet, from lava lamps to mood lights, but it's an excellent starting place for any aspiring USB hacker, and more useful than most USB hacks.

Turn your USB wi-fi dongle into a satellite dish

If you've ever tried to take an older laptop or a desktop on the internet over a wireless network, you've probably dealt with a USB wireless dongle. This hack shows a simple way to boost your wireless reception by creating a sort of satellite dish out of a pasta strainer. Another, similar hack shows the same feat accomplished with a folding metal colander.

Turn a case fan into a personal cooler

Another classic, the USB casefan cooler mod turns an old PC casefan into a simple USB-powered desk fan. We could tell you all about how to make one out of an old USB cable, a case fan, and a coat hanger, but we'd rather just link to our full writeup.

USB Laser Air Purifier

As a special treat for making it all the way through this list, we've saved the best USB hack for last. Behold! The USB Laser Air Purifier.

Pay no mind to the dubious air-purification effects of cheap laser pointers. Disregard the fact that without any fan blades, the air being "purified" will mostly just sit inside the seemingly-unnecessary 2-liter soda bottle. No, simply sit back and bask in the spinning, blinding light of the USB Laser Air Purifier.

Did we miss your favorite USB hack? Hit the comments and let us know!

Twitter Wants to Undermine Chinese and Iranian Censors

Bart Salisbury — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 15:26:02 -0600

Twitter looks to be taking a new approach to Internet censorship. Rather than thump its chest and make big talk, like Google has done recently with China, Twitter is looking into technologies that will allow it to circumvent the censoring of Tweets. If they build a fence, Twitter seems to be saying, we won’t make them take it down, but rather will find a way around it.

Twitter co-founder Evan Williams didn’t mince words: “The most productive way to fight that is not by trying to engage China and other governments whose very being is against what we are about.” Williams is optimistic that “there are technological ways around these barriers.”

Twitter’s being closed-lipped about the actual details, for obvious reasons. Williams only suggested that Twitter’s general efforts were “interesting hacks.” No mention was made as to when and how Twitter would start its censorship counterattack.

Image Credit: Travis Isaac/Flickr

20 Essential Gmail Tips You Probably Don't Use (but Should!)

Paul Lilly — Thu, 24 Dec 2009 11:00:00 -0600

Remember when webmail used to be synonymous with AOL? Boy has the Internet grown up since then, and lucky for us, a little company called Google came along and changed not just how we surf the web, but also how we communicate with each other. We're of course referring to Gmail, Google's nearly six-year-old webmail service that only recently shed its beta tag.

For most of you, we're probably preaching to the choir and you already own at least one Gmail account, if not several. And with good reason, too. Google's now-infamous email service offers oodles of storage space (over 7GB and counting), excellent spam detection, built-in chat, awesome search capabilities, a ton of customization options, and a whole lot more. But even with all that it offers out of the box, are you making the most out your Gmail account?

That's where we come in. We show you everything you need to know to wield Gmail like a pro. Need to access Gmail offline? How about automating canned responses for quick-fire emails? Want to set up Gmail on your own domain? We'll walk you through all of these, plus a whole lot more essential tweaks and tips that most people are just too lazy to use.

Learn to Use Keyboard Shortcuts

You've heard the expression that you need to learn to crawl before you can walk, and when it comes to Gmail, you'll be ahead of the game if you learn how to use keyboard shortcuts before diving into more advanced options. To enable keyboard shortcuts, click on Settings and mark the 'Keyboard shortcuts on' radial button.

Now that you have this feature turned on, here's a sampling of what you can do with it:

c: Compose a new message. Hold Shift +c to compose a message in a new window
Tab+Enter: Send a message
k: Move cursor to a more recent conversation
j: Move cursor to the next oldest conversation
n: Move cursor to the next message
o or Enter: Opens your conversation
x: Selects the current conversation
e: Archives selected conversation
!: Marks current conversation as spam
r: Reply
a: Reply to all
g then i: Go to the Inbox
g then a: Go to "All mail"
g then k: Opens Tasks and switches the focus to it

There's a lot more shortcuts to learn, all of which you can reference here.

One shortcut that's not on the list, however, is a keyboard combo that opens up a simple version of Snake. But you'll first need to enable this one under Gmail Labs. Click on Settings>Labs. Scroll down until you see Old Snakey and mark the Enable radio button. Press the Saved Settings button all the way at the bottom, and then just mash the & key (Shift+7) to fire up this classic time waster!

Import Your Contacts from Outlook (and other Mail Apps)

Kudos to you if you can remember the email address for everyone in your Address Book. That gets pretty difficult when you start dealing with dozens of contacts, let alone hundreds or even thousands, and who wants to sit around and retype all that info? The good news is, in most cases you won't have to when making the switch to Gmail.

Like many email clients and services, Gmail supports the Comma Separated Values (CSV) file format. This makes it easy to transfer your Outlook contacts over to Gmail. In Outlook, click on File>Import and Export. Choose 'Export to a file' and press Next. Choose 'Comma Separated Values (Windows),' which should be the second entry down, as depicted above.

By default, Outlook seems to assume you want to export your mail and automatically scrolls down to your Inbox. But what we're after are all the email addresses, so scroll up and highlight Contacts, and then click on Next.

Choose a location for the file you're about to save and give it a name, like OutlookContacts. Click Next>Finish and wait a few seconds while Outlook composes the file.

Now that you have your CSV file, sign in to Gmail and click on Contacts. You should see three links at the top of the Contacts window: Import, Export, and Print. Click on Import>Browse and select your CSV file. Note that before mashing the Import button, you can choose to import your contacts to an existing group or create a new one by clicking the related checkbox. Once you're ready, press Import.

Use this same method for any service or client which allows you to export your contacts to a CSV file. If you have a Yahoo email account, for example, click on the Contacts tab and select Export from the Tools pull-down menu. Press the Export Now button next to Yahoo! CSV, type in the CAPTCHA code, and Yahoo will automatically begin exporting your addresses. Then it's just a matter of importing the file into Gmail as outlined above.

Sign Out Remotely (and Discover Who's Been Using Your Account)

It doesn't matter whether we're sitting at the library or fixing Uncle Pete's PC. If we're sitting in front of a computer, we're probably going to check our Gmail to see if we have any urgent messages. That's fine, but what if you forget to sign out? The next person that uses the PC will able to jump into your account and read all of your conversations. Even worse, that person could send out emails on your behalf and create all kinds of chaos. And all because you forgot to sign out.

Don't sweat it, Google has your back. Scroll down below your inbox and take note of the Details URL. Right next to it, Google tells you when the last account activity took place, and from which IP it originated from.

When you click on the Details link, a new window pops up with more detailed information about any recent activity that occurred on your account, including the IP address, date and time, and even the access type (browser, mobile, POP3, SMTP, and so forth).

In addition to your armchair investigation, this is also where you're able to sign out of your account remotely. Just click on the 'Sign out all other sessions' buttons and it will be like you never forgot to log off at all!

Chat Up Your AIM Buddies through Gmail

Gmail isn't going to replace your multiprotocol instant messaging client (Digsby, Pidgin, etc) anytime soon, but it does come in handy being able to load up your AIM contacts for a quick conversation here and there. Imagine receiving an urgent email from a contact who also has an AIM account. Rather than email back and forth, just fire up a chat and find out what's going on.

To do so, scroll down to chat, click on your name, and select Sign into AIM. If this is your first time signing in, Gmail will take a short moment to import your buddy list, which will be displayed right in the browser window.Then just click on a name like you normally would and start chatting.

There aren't a ton of options to play with, but Google does afford you some control over how you choose to chat. In terms of the UI, you can pop the chat window in and out of the Gmail browser window. But even more useful is the ability to chat off the record. Anything you type will saved to both your and the recipient's chat log, but if you'd rather that not be the case, click on 'Video & More' and select 'go off the record.' From now on, any messages you send will not be saved on either side.

Mute or Ignore Conversations the Polite Way

Ever get caught up in a lame group conversation that you want no part of? You basically have two options when this happens. First, you can send off an insulting email letting the other participants know you have no interest in their topic of conversations and to remove you from the current discussion. The problem in doing that is you're bound to piss someone off and it will all be for naught. Why? Because some bonehead will inevitably reply to an older email from which your name hasn't yet been removed, putting you right back in the thick of things.

The other solution is to simply put up with it and delete the emails as they come in. If you're thinking there's got to be a better way, you're absolutely correct. One of the coolest features in Gmail is the ability to mute or flat-out ignore a conversation. Here's how you do it.

First you need to turn on keyboard shortcuts as we outlined earlier (Settings, Keyboard shortcuts on, Save). Once this is enabled, simply press the 'm' key to mute a conversation. By doing so, new messages added the conversation skip your inbox and stay archived. That is, unless you're the direct recipient, in which case it will still show up in your inbox so you don't have to stress over missing any urgent emails.

The downside to this is your muted messages can quickly become lost, making them difficult to track down if you ever need to reference one of them. However, there's an easy way to sort through them all. In the search field, type is:muted.

What you won't find is an unmute button, but that's okay, you don't need one. To unmute a conversation, open it up and click on Move to Inbox.

Configure Outlook to Access Gmail

We're not going to debate which is the better email protocol, IMAP or POP3. We don't need to, because Gmail supports them both, as does Outlook. So rather than spark a flame war over which one is better (*cough* IMAP *cough*), we'll show you how to configure each one.

Configure Gmail in Outlook with POP3

Before you do anything, sign in to your Gmail account and click on Forwarding and POP/IMAP. There are a few different options for enabling POP3, and we recommend checking the second one, 'Enable POP for mail that arrives from now on.' If you want Outlook to also download mail that you've already received and read, click the other radio button. Press Save Changes.

In the same section, decide and choose whether you want Gmail to keep a copy of messaged accessed via POP3 on Google's servers, archive them, or delete them.

Now fire up Outlook and navigate to Tools>Account Settings and be sure the Email tab is selected. Click on New, select the first radio button (Microsoft Exchange, POP3, IMAP, or HTTP), and press Next. Fill in the account setup form, including your Gmail email address and password. Once you're finished, click on Next and see if Outlook is able to automatically configure your account. If not, you'll need to go back and mark the 'Manually configure server settings or additional server types' checkbox.

Click Next and select the Internet E-mail radio button. In the next window, fill out the fields as follows:

Your Name: Your name, or a really witty alias
Email Address: Your Gmail email address
Account Type: POP3
Incoming Mail Server: pop.gmail.com
Outgoing mail server (SMTP): smtp.gmail.com
User name: Your Gmail username
Password: Your Gmail password
Require logon using Secure Password Authentication (SPA): Checked

Now click on the More Settings button and select the Advanced tab. Fill out the following:

Incoming Server (POP3): 995
This server requires an encrypted connection (SSL): Checked
Outgoing server (SMTP): 587
Use the folling type of encrypted connection: TLS

Configure Gmail in Outlook with POP3

Sign into Gmail, click on Forwarding and POP/IMAP, and mark the Enable IMAP radio button. Press Save Changes.

Load up Outlook and create a new account using the same steps above, only this time don't even attempt to let Google auto detect the settings. Mark the 'Manually configure server settings or additional server types' check box, click Next, and fill out the fields as follows:

Your Name" Your Name
Email Address: Your Gmail email address
Account Type: IMAP
Incoming mail server: imap.gmail.com
Outgoing mail server (SMTP): smtp.gmail.com
User name: Your Gmail user name
Password: Your Gmail password
Require logon using Secure Password Authentication (SPA): Unchecked

Now click on the More Settings button and select the Advanced tab. Fill out the following:

Incoming Server (POP3): 993
Use the following type of encrypted connection: SSL
Outgoing server (SMTP): 25
Use the folling type of encrypted connection: TLS

Back up and Use Gmail Offline

The reason it always seems like your Internet connection goes out at the worst possible time is because when you stop and think about it, there's really no good time to be without Internet access. Whether we're trying to play an online multiplayer game or collaborate on a cloud project, losing an internet connection sucks. That doesn't mean you can't still be productive, however, because Google has made it possible to use your Gmail account offline. Here's what you need to do.

Log into your Gmail account, click on the Settings link in the top-right corner (right next to your email account), and then click on the Offline link. You'll see a bunch of options for configuring Offline access, but the one you have to check for this to work is the 'Enable Offline Mail for this computer' radio button.

Configure the other options however you like and then press Save Changes. You should now see a pop-up window with a short description outlining what Offline access is. Read it and then press the Install button. This will open up yet another window directing you to install Gears. You need this app in order to access Gmail offline, so go ahead and click through the installer. Be sure to save your work because you'll need to restart your browser once Gears is finished installing.

After installing, you should be greeted with a pair of pop-up windows. One of them will ask permission for Offline Mail to use Gears (mark the checkbox and click Allow), and the other will ask if you want any shortcuts installed (select as desired).

At this point, the synchronization process will kick in. Depending on how much email you've acquired through the years, this could take a long while, even on a fast connection. Once it's finished, however, you'll be able to access all your mail offline just by clicking on any of the shortcuts you created in the previous step. And don't worry about remembering to sync in the future; Gmail will do this all on its own whenever you log in.

Gmail Backup

If you'd rather not use an email client like Outlook or Thunderbird, and don't want to install Google Gears for offline access, you can still maintain a backup of your Gmail account. Here's how.

Download and install Gmail Backup from here. Run the program, input your username and password, and choose a directory to save your mail. When you're finished, click the Backup button and Gmail Backup will do the rest. Should you ever need to view these messages offline, you can do so in Outlook and other clients that support the .eml file format. But what's even cooler is that you can restore your local emails back into Gmail just by clicking on the Restore button.

Integrate Gmail into Google Apps

Google does a lot more than just email, and that can mean wielding different accounts, tabs, or browser windows. If you're heavy into Google Apps, that can quickly become a drag, so here are a few ways you can integrate Gmail with other Google services.

We'll start off by mentioning iGoogle, which serves as your hub for most things Google, or your gHub (we made that up). With iGoogle set as your home page, you'll have quck access to a variety of services, including Gmail, Google Docs, Google Calendar, and a bunch of optional Gadgets, which you can access here.

Google Calendar

to integrate Google Calendar with your Gmail account, log into Gmail, click on Settings, and select the Labs tab. Scroll down and enable the Google Calendar gadget, and then click Save.

Google Docs Previews

Google Labs also has a gadget for previewing Google Docs. You'll find this entry just below the Calendar gadget. Once enabled, you'll be able to see previews of documents, spreadsheets, and presentations right in your email whenever someone sends you a link to a Google Doc.

Google Voice Player

There's no need to navigate back and forth from Gmail to Google Voice in order to play back your voicemails. Enable 'Google Voice player in mail' under the Labs stab and you'll be able to play back your voice messages from your email notification.

Set up Automated Canned Responses for Quick Fire Emails

We admit it, we're hypocrites, but hear us out. Sure, we despise as much as the next person receiving an automated response to a customer support inquiry, so why in the world would we advocate setting up Google's so-called Canned Responses? Put simply, we can be much more efficient and less burnt out by composing pre-set replies to common questions we receive all the time.

To take advantage of this feature, head back into the Labs tab (under Settings), enable Canned Responses, and mash the Save button. Now let's say you placed a For Sale ad on Craigslist or your local Classifieds and the item sold, but you continue to receive inquiries. It can get pretty old typing out the same response over and over, and it's bad etiquette to just ignore the email. After all, you may be shunning a future buyer for other items you may list for sale.

This is where Canned Responses come in. Type in your response. In our example, we wrote, "The 2008 Pontiac GTO I listed on Craigslist is sold. Thank you for your interest." It's short, polite, and to the point, and it's also generic enough to be used no matter what the question is regarding the car that was recently sold. To save this message as a Canned Response, click on the Canned Respond link in the upper right corner, select Save, and give it a name.

The next time an email comes in asking about the car, we can simply click on the Canned Response link and insert our pre-composed reply.

To take it a step further, we can automate the process of sending Canned Responses by using Filters. To do this, click on the Create a Filter link next to the search box. In this example, we want to filter emails that contain the words 'Craigslist,' 'Pontiac,' or 'GTO.' We'll write these down in the 'Has the words' field with each word separated by the search operator 'OR' (in all caps). When you're finished, click Next.

In the next step, mark the 'Send canned response' checkbox and select the appropriate one from the pull-down menu. You can also choose to mark the email as read, delete, archive it, and a few other options. When you have it configured the way you want, mash the Create Filter button and let Gmail handle the rest!

Send and Receive Blocked Files

Thank virus writers and malicious malware miscreants for the restrictions most ISPs and email services place on potentially dangerous file types. That includes Google, which blocks you from sending or receiving executables, as well as some other file formats, even if they're sent in a one of these compressed file types: .zip, .tar, .tgz, .taz. .z, and .gz.

The easiest workaround is to amend the file extension to fool Gmail into allowing the file, and then let the recipient know they'll need to rename the file. For example, let's say you coded a simple app and wanted to share it with your mentor. Open up the directory where the file is located and press the Alt key to bring up the menu bar. Click on Tools>Folder Options, select the View tab, and uncheck 'Hide extensions for known file types.' Hit OK.

Now you can edit your file's extension. Right- click the blocked file and select Rename. Add .REMOVE to the end of the file, so for example CustomApp.exe would become CustomApp.exe.REMOVE. A pop-up window will appear letting you know that if you change the extension, the file might become unusable. Click Yes, as once the recipient changes it back. it will be fully usable again. Now you're free to send your file!

Protip: If you have a lot of blocked file attachments to send, compress them into a single .zip file and then change the .zip extension in the same manner above.

If you're not comfortable thwarting Gmail's virus scanner, you still have other options. One of our favorites is YouSendIt. Once you register, this free service will allow you to send any file type up to 100MB in size (By contrast, Gmail limits messages to 25MB). If you need more than that, there are also several subscription plans available starting at $10/month.

To use the service, just log in, attach your file, and fire away. Once the file is uploaded to YouSendIt's servers, the recipient will receive an email with a download link that's good for 7 days. Groovy!

Import Mail From Thunderbird into Gmail

So you're ready to ditch your email client, but aren't so keen on giving up all of your saved mail? No problem! Thanks to a nifty program called Gmail Loader, it's pretty easy to import your old mail into your Gmail account. Here's how.

First, download and extract Gmail Loader from here. Fire up the program and click the Find button. You'll need to navigate to the Local Folder, which is buried in your Thunderbird Profile folder. To locate the Profile folder, follow Mozilla's instructions here.

What we're looking for is the Inbox file, which on our Windows 7 testbed is located here:

C:\Users\Paul\AppData\Roaming\Thunderbird\Profiles\zlkd62ok.default\Mail\Local Folders

Once you've located the Inbox file, enter in your Gmail address where indicated. The rest of the settings you can leave alone, and all that's left to do at this point is hit 'Send to Gmail.'

Troubleshooting

If you receive errors when attempting to import your mail, you'll need to change the SMTP Server field and input your ISP's info. Check the 'Requires Authentication' box and input your username and password.

Host Your Domain's Email at Gmail

If you own a website, chances are you also want to use your personalized email address (you@yourdomain.com, for example). At the same time, Gmail's feature set typically trounces all over most other email services, including the one that comes prepackaged with your domain. One solution is to simply forward your email to a Gmail account, but that isn't exactly elegant. Nor is it necessary, because Google allows you to host your domain email at Gmail, giving you the best of both worlds.

To get started, you need to sign up with Google Apps Standard Edition (it's free) by following this link. Click the 'Administrator: I own or control this domain' radio button and type in your domain name in the specified field.

When you're finished setting up your account, you'll be required to verify that you own the website you just registered. You can do this in one of two ways - either by uploading an HTML file to your website, or changing the domain's CNAME records with your domain host. It doesn't matter which one you choose, though if you choose to go the CNAME route, Google provides specific instructions for several popular hosts here (scroll down and expand 'Specific instructions for popular domain hosts).

Once you've verified your site, you'll need to configure your domain's MX (Mail Exchange) records. How you get there will depend on which host you're using, and so will the records you need to input. Find your host here and follow the instructions exactly as Google lays them out, or if you don't see your host listed, follow these general MX record instructions:

Sign in to your hosting account and navigate to the MX record maintenance page
Delete all existing MX entries
Enter the MX records depicted above

It might take a little while for all the changes to take effect, but when they do, you'll be able to log into your email account by navigating to http://mail.google.com/a/YOURWEBSITEHERE.COM/#inbox, where YOURWEBSITE.COM is the name of your domain.

After you log in, spend some time familiarizing yourself with the Dashboard and the different settings available. For example, you can create up to 50 email accounts, set up groups, enable contact sharing, and more.

Track Which Sites are Sharing Your Email Address

Interested in learning which sites are sharing your email address? There's an easy way reveal which sites and services aren't living up their privacy promises. All you have to do is append your email address with +xxx, replacing xxx with whatever you want. For example, if your Gmail address is JohnDoe@gmail.com, you could use the email address JohnDoe+BestBuy@gmail.com when registering at Best Buy. Emails sent to JohnDoe +BestBuy@gmail.com will still show up in your regular inbox, and if you start receiving all kinds of unsolicited junk mail at that addy, you'll know the culprit.

Discovering who's sharing your email isn't the only thing this trick is good for. Pre-labeled emails also come in handy for sorting your messages and using a unified account in place of several email addys. If you wanted to keep your work messages separate from your day-to- day email, just append the word 'work' to your email addy. To use our above example, you would use JohnDoe+Work@gmail.com when communicating with co-workers. Take it a step further by creating labels and setting up filters to automatically sort your work, personal, and any other types of email addresses you set up.

Sorting with Labels and Filters

Few email services come close to offering the same flexibility and management options as Gmail, and it's mostly due to Google's implementation of labels and filters. In short, labels act like folders, while filters act like, well, filters.

If you're using Gmail, you've probably already created a few labels. Here are some good ways to utilize them:

Create an 'Ideas' label and setup a filter to auto-archive any emails sent to JohnDoe+Ideas@gmail.com to the corresponding label. This will prevent you from cluttering up your inbox every time you email yourself a fantastic idea you want to be sure not to forget.
Create a label called 'Needs Response' and attached it to any emails that you've sent out and, once you hear back from, will require another response. This way you can quickly and easily view which emails are still in need of a followup and not have to worry you'll forget about them.
Gmail organizes labels in alphabetical order, but this may not always be the way you want them. Take control by adding a number or letter prefix in front of your labels. For example, if you want your 'Work' label to appear at the top, rename it to '1 Work' or 'a Work.'
Color code your labels to better manage your email. Just click on the box next to the label and select a color. To make better use of this one, combine certain labels with filters so that incoming emails from work appear in one color, while emails from immediate family members appear in another.
Still sporting a small monitor? Use the Labs feature 'Remove Labels from Subjects' so that emails in your inbox will have their labels hidden, leaving more room for the subject line.

Use Gmail as a Hard Drive

Every Gmail account comes with more online storage than you're ever likely to use (7GB and growing), or at least that's the case if all you're doing is using it for email. Rather than let it go to waste, why not use it as an online storage or backup for your local files? Here's how.

Download and install Gmail Drive from here. Gmail Drive is a Windows shell extension that creates a virtual file system based around your Gmail account. Once installed, Gmail Drive will appear as a regular hard drive under My Computer. Double-click the drive and enter in your Gmail username and password, and then just drag and drop files to upload them to your Gmail account. Of course, you'll need an Internet connection for this to work, since this is a cloud-based storage solution

When you log into your account, the uploaded files will appear as emails with file attachments.

Troubleshooting: Gmail Drive works best in 32-bit Windows. You can try your luck at getting it to work in a 64-bit version of Windows, but it likely will not work.

Our Top 5 Must-Have Labs Add- Ons

Gmail owes much of its flexibility to Gmail Labs. These add-ons are essentially beta services that, for one reason or another, haven't been implemented yet as a permanent feature. But don't let the experimental status fool you - there are a lot of good Labs features that both run stable and improve the overall Gmail experience. Here's a list of our favorite five, in addition to the ones we've already covered previously in this writeup (like Canned Responses).

Navbar Drag and Drop

Allows you to reorganize and reorder the items in your navbar simply by dragging and dropping. Very handy.

Forgotten Attachment Detector

Uh oh, did you just fire off an email without the promised attachment you said was included? That won't happen with this Labs featured enabled. Should you mention an attachment but forget to include it, a pop-up will appear giving you an instant do-over.

Mark as Read Button

Buttons or pull-down menus? If you frequently perform a particular action, the button wins out every time. And if you find yourself marking emails as read on a consistent basis, this just might become your favorite add-on.

Text Messaging (SMS) in Chat and SMS in Chat Gadget

Use these two Labs features together (the latter requires the former) to send and receive SMS messages in chat, which is a lot easier to do when you're sitting at a PC with a full-sized keyboard than it is to dig out your smartphone and mash your thumbs.

Undo Send

Probably the best Labs feature ever, Undo Send gives you a moment to reflect on that angry email you just sent your boss, and should a cooler head prevail, unsend the message and maybe even save your job!

Have a favorite Labs feature that didn't make the list? Be sure to post it in the comments section below!

5 Essential Gmail Downloads

Gmail Notifier

It's tough to imagine using Gmail without Gmail Notifier. This little utility sits unobtrusively in the systray and lets you know when there's a new message in your inbox. It also serves as a gateway to your inbox - just right-click and select View Inbox.

Free, toolbar.google.com/toolbar/gmail-helper/

Fuser

The hardest part about being a social butterfly in cyberspace is managing all those different accounts. It's easy to waste an entire morning just catching up on current events through Gmail, MySpace, LinkedIn, Friendster, and Twitter. That's where Fuser comes in, which is a catch-all front-end that combines all those accounts (including multiple accounts through the same service) into a single, manageable inbox.

Free, www.fuser.com

Gmail S/MIME

Send and receive signed and encrypted messages in Gmail with this Firefox add-on. Once installed, you'll notice a padlock icon when composing an email. Give it a click to lock and encrypt your email, and rest easy knowing your top secret message will stay that way.

Free, https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/592

Email This!

We like any tool or service that makes our lives easier and streamlines common tasks, and one such utility that fits the bill is the Email This! Firefox add-on. Once installed, Email This! will appear in your right-click context menu making easy work out of emailing the title, link, and any highlighted text through your Gmail account.

Free, https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/3102

Gmail Manager

This Firefox add-on is like a supercharged version of Gmail Notifier. Probably the best feature is the ability to add multiple accounts, but you can also configure how often Gmail Manager checks for new messages, display new mail snippets from the inbox, play a sound when new mail arrives, hide your email alias, and more.

Free, https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1320

8 Practical Uses for Your Old Laptop

John Brandon — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 16:00:00 -0600

This holiday, you pull the wraps off a brand new laptop and open the lid to your shiny new mobile companion. The first thought you might have is to consider which apps you should install first and what's the fastest way to load the up the hard disk with music and movies. Of course, you inevitably have to think about your old laptop, and what price you can sell it for on Craigslist. But before you dump an old laptop or retire it to the den of forgotten gadgets, here are eight practical ideas on how you can extend its life.

1. Run a Home Server for File-Sharing

One sensible use for a last year’s netbook is to turn it into a network-attached storage server. This allows you to store files on the hard drive, assign user groups, and access the drive over your home network. Most of the popular NAS applications -- such as Openfiler and Nexenta -- provide a few options for how you install the NAS software. You can load it up as a distro that actually takes over the laptop or as a client that runs in Linux or Windows. These open-source tools are similar to Microsoft Home Server and many offer a Web-based console to control the NAS from a remote computer, so once you set up the NAS on your netbook, you can leave it to sit idly next to your router and never have to even open the lid.

You’re getting the most out of the processor, RAM, and internal storage while using a new laptop for other purposes. Another advantage to using a netbook is that, because of the architecture of the Atom processor, the disk speed access is more than adequate for a NAS. Additionally, power consumption is a trickle on the Atom compared to a full-blown desktop processor, so you are getting good performance and low power use. The caveat is that netbooks and notebooks aren’t designed to run 24/7 like a dedicated server, so you run the risk of your netbook running out of steam and burning out.

FreeNAS might not have the most extensive feature-set; it is by no means a replacement for Windows Server in a business setting. But it does provide the basics you need for a file server and supports many of the latest protocols including iSCSI, a common standard for business users, and FTP for setting up a remote session for file transfers. The best way to get started is to download the ISO file available at www.freenas.org. Use the Windows 7 built-in ISO burner or IMGBurn -- just double-click the file, insert a blank CD, and burn the disk image. We used a Lenovo S12 netbook for this. You'll need an external CD drive for any netbook; we used a Plextor PX-610U drive. (You can also use an IMG file and write the file to a USB key but when we tried this it did not work with the Lenovo S12.) On the netbook, load the CD and press the boot options key when you first turn on the computer -- with the S12, the key is F12. Select the USB drive and follow the options to install FreeNAS. Here, you can choose to add FreeNAS to a partition as an embedded install or you can just use the entire disk (which uses FreeBSD for the OS).

Burn the FreeNAS ISO file to a blank CD, boot your laptop, and install the server.

We used the embedded install for our project. Once installed, you will see a simple menu where you can assign an interface and set the IP address. Once you know the IP address, you can move over to a remote computer -- connected through the same router -- and type in that IP address to access a Web setup for the NAS. (You may need to assign that port on your router.) Use the login "admin" and password "freenas" to access the NAS initially and change as needed. We won't walk through all of the steps required to turn your laptop into a NAS -- follow this guide for more details.

Your NAS is now ready for access form any computer, and you can make drives as needed, use the assigned disk space for file storage, set up an iTunes streaming server, configure media sharing for video game consoles, set up BitTorrent, add an FTP server, and configure additional disks such as external hard drives or even multiple USB keys in free USB slots.

FreeNAS is simple to set up and install, and once it's working, you can remote-connect over the Web.

2. Install an Experimental OS

An experimental OS allows you to venture beyond the comfort of Windows. You should consider turning an old netbook into a simple yet fast-booting e-mail and Web machine. Or, you could use your old netbook to see what Google is up to with their new Chrome OS. The word "experimental" has a few implications, and one of them is that you never know how something will work, and even if you do have the right hardware you may find that the OS crashes so often it is not worth the effort. One key here is to plan a good portion of time for troubleshooting and an easy way to get the old laptop back to a useable computer. That said, there is great satisfaction is actually getting one of these new OSes up and running.

Two of the best Linux distributions to consider are Moblin (www.moblin.org) and Jolicloud (www.jolicloud.com). Both offer good guidance for not only finding the latest builds and burning it to a USB flash drive or CD-R, but also good documentation for installing extra software and tweaking the OS for your own tastes. Jolicloud in particular offers a new paradigm for installing software (it work more like an iPhone where you see a bunch of apps and just click one install button) and syncs well with the cloud. Moblin is meant to liven up older netbooks that don’t run Windows fast enough.

Both Moblin and Jolicloud have been out for a while and are not nearly as experimental as Google Android or Google Chrome OS. We tested the Android OS on an Aspire One D250-1613 that can run in a dual-boot mode which supports both Android and Windows XP. (To switch between them, you run an Android program from Windows or click a large arrow from Android to retreat back to Windows XP.) Google says Android is meant for any device, but on a netbook the OS has a decided look and feel of a smartphone. You can pan the desktop left and right to see additional desktop space -- which is a space saving measure on the small screen but not as practical on a netbook.

Android OS is experimental -- it works more like a smartphone interface than a desktop OS. Just be sure to right-click to access menu options, such as compose a new e-mail message.

If you’re a bit more daring and have the right hardware, you can try using Chrome OS on your old netbook. Most of the information about how to compile the OS and whether it will work on your netbook is at http://www.chromium.org/chromium-os, and you will need a bit of programming experience to get it working. Fortunately, you can easily find pre-compiled IMG files that you can load onto a USB key to boot up the OS.

We prefer the build that Dell put out for the Dell Mini 10v, available at http://linux.dell.com/files/cto. This build is super-simple to use. Just download the single IMG file then use Win32DiskImager (available here) to load the IMG file and write it to a spare IMG file. Note that this IMG file requires an 8GB key or larger or you will get an error when you try to write the file.

Insert the USB key in the Dell Mini, power up, and immediately press F12 to access the boot disk menu Select the USB Storage option and press Enter. You will see the Chrome OS log in screen. Type “dell” for both the username and password and login. Press CTRL-ALT-T to access the terminal mode. Then, type:

   % sudo /etc/mount_rw.sh
   % sudo insmod /lib/modules/2.6.30-chromeos-intel-menlow/kernel/net/wireless/lib80211.ko
   % sudo insmod /lib/modules/2.6.30-chromeos-intel-menlow/kernel/drivers/net/wireless/wl.ko
   % sudo depmod -a
   % exit

This loads the Wi-Fi driver. Reboot the Mini by holding down the power button for a few seconds and then wait a second and press and hold again to boot up (using the USB key again) and login. You will have to wait a while for the built-in Wi-Fi to load, but eventually you can go to the upper right corner and select the second drop-down menu from the right and select your Wi-Fi network. Of course you can also just connect an Ethernet cable but that sort of defeats the purpose of having a fast-loading netbook!

Download the Dell Chrome IMG file, burn to a USB key, and boot your Dell Mini into Chrome OS

3. Stream Transcoded Video to Video Game Consoles

Another really smart use of an old laptop is to use it as a media streaming server, especially one that is dedicated to a specific video game console such as the Sony PlayStation 3 or Xbox 360. TVersity (www.tversity.com) is one good piece of streaming software but the best option for PS3 (and Xbox 360 owners) is PS3 Media Server (http://ps3mediaserver.blogspot.com/), mostly because of how well it works for streaming high-def video.

Note that you will likely need an Intel Core 2 Duo processor-powered machine to support 1080p streaming, but can get by with a slightly lesser laptop for 720p video files. Even then, one reason that using an older laptop works so well for streaming videos, photos, music, and anything else you can throw at the console is that you really need a dedicated machine to transcode unsupported file types. (If you already have a home server or a NAS, you might still consider using an old laptop for a console streaming box because an atom-based server will also chug a bit when you stream high-def files.)

Make sure you open the ports for media sharing -- on a D-Link router, it is under the Port Forwarding tab.

There are just a few steps required to get the PS3 Media Server up and running. Download the latest build install it in Windows. There isn't too much to configure, but you will likely need to open port 5001 for the IP address of the console (not the laptop). This allows the console to find the media server. Next, make sure you enable media streaming. On the laptop, go to the Network and Sharing Center and go to Change advanced sharing settings and enable media streaming. To play WMA video files on the console you will need to go to System Settings and enable WMA. While there, check to make sure the Media Server option is enabled. The PS3 Media Server from your laptop will show up as an option under the video, music, and photo sections of the PS3 XMB interface.

PS3 Media Server shows you all activity on the server, including current connections. If you have trouble getting the PS3 IP address to work, try using the force IP setting.

4. Turn Your Laptop into a Virtual Guitar Amp

Here's one of the most fun uses for an old laptop: turning it into a guitar-ripping audio workstation! Now, one word of caution at this point -- audio recording does require a fast PC with loads of RAM; using an older laptop that might not have the fastest processor will still work for basic MIDI programming, connecting an audio interface and controlling a virtual amp, or for basic track recording in a sequencer, but for full multi-track audio recording we recommend a high-end rig with a fast hard drive.

Line 6 makes a great UBS audio interface that comes with virtual amp software.

To turn a laptop into an amp, you need three main components: a way to connect the guitar or other instruments, speakers that provide enough power for your axe, and virtual amp software. We prefer the Line6 POD Studio UX1 audio interface (http://line6.com/podstudioux1/ ) because it is simple to use, works well with Windows, and is just heavy enough to sit flat on your desk when you connect up your Fender. The POD also comes with a free program called POD Farm for emulating common amps, such as the Marshall JCM-800. For speakers, you will want to use something better than the small desktop speakers that came with your PC. We used a set of Alesis M1 Active MKII speakers. Make sure the speakers use quarter-inch cables to connect up to the audio interface. If your speakers use thin 3.5mm speaker cables or even a USB connection, be careful because your guitar can overpower them.

Riffworks T4 is the free version of the Sonoma Wire Works virtual amp software.

Next, for virtual amp software, the best program we've found is Sonoma Wire Works RiffWorks T4 Free (www.sonomawireworks.com/T4). This app works similar to POD Farm but offers recording features and the ability to feed audio loops and recordings to other programs. For MIDI recording and track recording, the best app to use is Reaper (www.reaper.fm) which is available as a free trial. For Linux users, you can use Ardour (www.ardour.org) which is an open source tool.

Reaper is an outstanding digital audio workstation tool that works well for MIDI and audio recording.

We used an Acer 5738PG-6306 laptop for setting up the audio station. The basic setup requires that you connect the UX1 to your laptop using a USB cable. Next, run quarter-inch cables out to the speakers. Connect your guitar, a microphone, or a MIDI keyboard to the quarter-inch input on the front of the UX1. Run POD Farm or Riffworks and set up the virtual amp software by choosing an amp and setting effects. There are large buttons on the top of the UX1 for controlling volume levels. Once you have it all set up, you can use Riffworks to record audio and make MP3s and crank out some guitar riffs.

One quick way to turn an old laptop into an audio workstation is to install the Ubuntu Studio (www.ubuntostudio.org), which has many of the latest audio tools, plug-ins, and libraries for create MIDI and recorded audio tracks.

5. Create a Music and Movie Ripping Station

One of the best uses for an old laptop is to turn it into a music-ripping station. This a great secondary purpose for a laptop because you barely need to look at the screen (you just insert the disc and walk away), you can set options so the rips go directly to a network drive, and you can position this station in an area where you often have music CDS, such as the living room.

Our preferred CD ripping tool is EAC, and you can read our guide about using it here.

For ripping DVD movies, Handbrake (www.handbrake.fr) is probably the best tool for ripping DVDs and it is free to use. Read our Handbrake guide here.

6. Join a Distributed Computing Project

Distributed computing projects like Folding@Home have been around a while, but they still need more volunteers. Dedicating your old laptop (and at least a portion of your Internet connection) to one of these projects is a charitable act, because the software typically runs only when you are not using the laptop for other purposes.

Folding@Home, for example, sits in the system tray and waits for idle periods (you can configure the amount of priority), based on Windows system processes. Folding@Home works best on dual-core processors but will work on just about old laptop -- you can even find downloads for Linux and Mac.

Find a project that you can get behind and join their cause!

You can see real-time information about which work unit is active and when it started.

7. Organize Your Photos

The digital camera craze is still in full force, especially with the under-age set using Photobucket.com and Facebook to share their snapshots with each other. With an old laptop, you can set up a photo workstation for processing all of those images. Many laptops -- even those from a few years back – have built-in card readers, or you can find a cheap external one. As a photo organizer, the laptop becomes an easy way to pop in a camera card, offload photos, import them automatically into a photo organization tool, and then either saver them to a network drive or upload them to an online location if needed. This communal photo station makes it easy for everyone in your home to free up space on their camera cards and get back to taking more photos.

Pictomio is a world-class image organization and tagging tool that competes with Adobe Lightroom.

Pictomio (www.pictomio.com) is a great free image organizer with features that mirror what you would find in commercial programs like Adobe Lightroom. You can organize images, edit EXIF data (which shows what camera was used and shot settings), add geotag data for where the photo was taken, upload images directly to Flickr, Facebook, and other sites, and generally just get a good handle on which photos you have in your collection.

One way to use the tool in a group setting at home is to create a folder for each user and then dump files off a flash card to that folder. Pictomio can also tag images automatically so you can make photos more searchable. The tool lets you create slideshows and photo albums, but is a bit limited in terms of adding effects to images. For that, we recommend the free Paint.net app (www.getpaint.com), which is as close as anyone in the open source community has come to a Photoshop clone with support for layers, red-eye removal, and distortion effects.

Once you have this photo workstation up and running, it will help you organize not just the image but your photo workflow.

8. Set up Home Surveillance with Motion Sensing

Using an old laptop for home surveillance makes sense, especially if you are dedicated the PC to the task. You can position the laptop at a doorway or even outside (in warm weather) to see if anyone has come to the door or tried to break into your house. Many laptops have a built-in webcam, and with home surveillance tools you can receive an e-mail automatically if there is a disturbance.

Once Yawcam senses motion, it can save webcam pictures to a network drive.

One of the best tools for home surveillance is Yawcam (www.yawcam.com), a free program that works with most external webcams from companies like Logitech and Microsoft, and also the internal webcam on laptops. We tested it on a Sony VAIO NW notebook and Yawcam recognized the webcam immediately. There are large buttons for enabling the camera functions, including motion sensing. When the app senses motion, it will send a photo from the webcam to you as an e-mail. Yawcam can also dump a webcam image out to a file server or an FTP site for easy access.

Another great option for home surveillance is to use a third-part Wi-Fi camera and feed the video footage to a spare laptop. For example, you can use the D-Link Pan and Tilt Wireless N Network Camera (DCS-5230) and install it at your front door. Then, you can load the included D-ViewCam software on your laptop. When FedEx brings you a pack, you can instantly see what it is -- you can even install up to 32 of the DCS-5230 cameras around your home and see the video thumbnails on one screen.

Yawcam senses motion and can alert you by sending an e-mail with an attached picture.

Got any other great uses for old laptops? Share your projects in the comments section below!

15 Hacks Every Dropbox User Should Know

Alex Castle and Norman Chan — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 11:00:00 -0600

When you get right down to it, Dropbox is a pretty simple app. It syncs folders—that’s it. But what makes Dropbox amazing is the sheer number of different ways you can use that functionality, by itself or in conjunction with other programs, to improve your computing experience. We like Dropbox so much that we’ve written about it several times before, and we still haven’t gotten to every cool thing you can do with the program.

That’s why, in this article, we’re going to share with you a whopping 15 things that we think everyone should know about Dropbox, from how to get extra storage for free to how to use Dropbox to control your Bittorrent client.

Run Dropbox as a Windows Service

If you use Dropbox on a server, like a Windows Home Server machine, it’s preferable to run Dropbox as a Windows service, so it starts up before a user logs in. Though Dropbox doesn’t officially support running as a service, you can hack this feature with Microsoft’s Srvany utility.

First, download both instsrv.exe and srvany.exe from the Windows Server 2003 Resource Kit. Copy both files to your Dropbox application directory (ie. C:\program files\Dropbox) on your server, after you’ve already installed Dropbox. This may have to be done with a Remote Desktop connection.

Open up a command prompt as an Administrator, and execute the following commands (quotes included):

“C:\Program Files\Dropbox\instsrv.exe” Dropbox “C:\Program Files\Dropbox\srvany.exe”

reg ADD HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Dropbox\Parameters /v Application /d “C:\Program Files\Dropbox\Dropbox.exe”

reg ADD HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Dropbox\Parameters /v AppDirectory /d “C:\Program Files\Dropbox”

Next, cut and paste all files from C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Local Settings\DropBox to C:\Documents and Settings\Default User\Application Data\Dropbox

Finally, type net start Dropbox in the Command Prompt.

This works on any Desktop machine as well. You’ll also have to remove the Dropbox application shortcut from the Startup folder in your Start Menu.

For more information on the Srvany utility, head here.

Use Symbolic Links to Unlock Dropbox’s Potential

The biggest problem with using Dropbox to sync programs is that it only works for apps that allow you to change where configuration files and databases are stored—a minority of all software. Lots of popular applications like web browsers, email clients, and even Steam are pretty finicky over where they store their data—they give you little or no control over what locations they use. With symbolic links, a feature in Windows Vista and 7, you can take that control back into your own hands.

Mklink is a command line command short for “make link.” It’s used to create symbolic or hard links, which allow you to connect files and folder. It’s sort of like creating shortcuts, except that they’re handled at the operating system level, so they work with any program. You can, for instance, use mklink to fool Steam into thinking that a game on a different hard drive is actually in your Steam games folder. You can link files on a single computer, or across a local network. You cannot, however, link files across the internet.

To find out all about Mklink, and how to use it, check out our Mklink How-To.

The beauty of using Dropbox with symbolic links is that the principle drawback of each goes away. Dropbox can now sync any two programs, because with Mklink you can change the location of the programs data, whether it wants you to or not, and Mklink is no longer confined to your local network, as Dropbox can bridge the game to computers out in the wider internet.

Here's an example of how you can use this combo to cloud-ify your Firefox profile:

1. Find the directory containing your Firefox profile. A default installation places this folder in %APPDATA%\Mozilla\Firefox
2. Copy that Firefox directory into your Dropbox folder.
3. Delete the original Firefox folder.
4. Use Mklink to create a hardlink between the new and original Firefox folders, If your Dropbox folder is in C:/ you can use the following command:

mklink /J %APPDATA%\Mozilla\Firefox C:/dropbox/Firefox

Now any computer that you complete these steps on (and that has access to your dropbox account) will share the same Firefox profile. The same basic steps will work for almost any app.

Add files to Dropbox with E-mail

It’s the fifth-most requested feature in Dropbox—the ability to email a file to yourself that will automatically sync to your Dropbox account. Unfortunately, there’s no easy way to do this right now. But if you’re willing mash up a few applications and services, you can make this feature work.

First, you’ll need to create a new Gmail account. This address will be what you use to temporarily store files to sync to your Dropbox. We recommend creating a new account that’s easy to remember, and not using your personal or main Gmail account.

Next, download GMail Drive, a shell namespace extension that links to a Gmail account and syncs attachments and emails onto a newly created system drive. GMail Drive creates a virtual filesystem based on email sent to your Gmail account (with GMAILFS: in the subject line), and lets you browse them as if you they were stored on your hard drive.

Finally, using the mklink command, create a symbolic link between the folders in your GMail Drive and a newly created folder in your Dropbox. This means that any time you email an attachment to your dummy Gmail account with GMAILFS: in the subject line, the files will automatically be moved to your Dropbox. This only works if you have GMail Drive and Dropbox running on an active computer or server.

Sync Your IM Chatlogs

A lot of people use instant messaging to keep in touch with their coworkers during the day. We certainly do here at the Maximum PC office, but we’re sure the same can be said for many less-technically-forward offices as well. Because of that it sometimes comes up that while you’re at home you want to remember something from a conversation you had while you were at work, but you can’t, because your IM logs are stored on your work computer.

That doesn’t have to be the case, though. If you use Pidgin, a free, open source multi-protocol IM client, you can tell it to save its logs in a folder in your Dropbox. As long as Pidgin is set up that way on all of your computers, they will all share access to the same logs.

Actually setting it up so that Pidgin saves your logs somewhere other than the default location is a little trickier than you might imagine, though. You’ll need to change the PURPLEHOME environment variable on your system, which defines where Pidgin will save its configuration files and logs. To do this, open the control panel and select System. Then select the Advanced tab, and click on Environment Variables. Now, click New under the System Variables box. In the Variable Name field, enter PURPLEHOME and in the Variable Value field, enter the location of your Dropbox folder. Now Pidgin will use a folder inside your Dropbox called .purple to save its data.

If you’re ok working from a fresh install of Pidgin, that's all you’ll need to do. If you have existing settings and logs that you want to keep using, just copy the .purple folder from its default directory (Application Data) to your Dropbox directory.

Host Your Music Collection in the Cloud

Tired of having to juggle your music collection between your desktop and laptop computer? Want to be able to access your music from anywhere, on any computer, but don’t want to (or don’t have the cash to) set up a streaming media server? Consider setting up a $9.99/month Pro50 account to host your favorite music.

With your MP3 files and iTunes library.xml file backed up to Dropbox, you can keep multiple computers running perfectly in-sync music collections. Add music on one computer, and it’ll be available on each other computer as well. Just be sure not to make changes on more than one computer at a time.

To tell each instance of iTunes to use the library file located in your Dropbox, just hold shift while launching the program. A dialog box will come up prompting you to choose a new library file.

If you’re using a friends computer, or another computer that you don’t want to keep your whole collection on at once, you can use the Dropbox web interface to download just the files you want to listen to at one time. Just visit dropbox.com, navigate through your collection, put a checkmark next to the files you want to listen to (or next to a folder, if you want to download a whole album at once) and then select Download from the More actions tab.

Keep Firefox Settings Synched Across Multiple Computers

For people who regularly use more than one computer, it can be a pain to switch back and forth between two browsers. Sure, applications and extensions like Xmarks can keep your bookmarks in sync for you, but what about your extensions and your history. Fortunately, you can use Dropbox to keep two Firefox installations totally in sync.

"But wait!" I hear you saying "you can't choose where Firefox saves its data!" Thats true, but there are ways to work around this. You can us Mklink, as discussed earlier, but there’s also an easier solution specific to Firefox: use Firefox Portable.

Firefox Portable is an app that's meant to run from anywhere, such as from a portable USB thumbdrive. In order to do this, a portable app has to be entirely self-contained, not storing any data anywhere else on your system. That means that if you get Portable Firefox and install it into your Dropbox, you'll have a full-featured browser that syncs and backs up all your data in the cloud.

Incidentally, this trick also works well for any portable app that you might want to have available at a moment’s notice.

Store All Your Passwords with Keypass

Everyone knows that good password security requires that you use passwords that are A) long, B) complicated, and C) different for every website and service you use. Of course, these three requirements also make it a total pain to memorize all the passwords you need, meaning that most people don’t follow the rules, either using one password across many services (a security risk) or writing their passwords down near the computer (also a security risk).

That’s where KeePass comes in. KeePass is a free, open source password safe. It allows you to generate a unique, totally random password for every site or service you use, while only requiring you to remember a single master passphrase. Whenever you attempt to log into a service, KeePass asks for your master passphrase, then automatically enters the appropriate password from your safe.

That’s all well and good, but what do you do if you frequently use two different computers (say, a desktop and a laptop)? You could use a USB drive to keep your KeePass password archive with you at all times, but that’s one more little bit of hardware you have to keep track of. Instead, use DropBox to keep an up-to-date copy of your password file on both computers, at all times. Just tell KeePass to save your password archive somewhere in your DropBox synced folder.

Worried about security? Fuhgeddaboutit. KeePass saves your password in an archive encrypted with nigh-unbreakable AES 256-bit encryption. That means that as long as you pick a strong, long password, getting a hold of your KeePass file won’t do a hacker a bit of good.

Know the Pricing Options, Cheapskate

We know you like getting your internet services for free. Dropbox doesn’t disappoint, as the majority of its users utilize the free 2GB account. But what if 2GB of synced cloud storage isn’t enough for you? Dropbox offers two Premium account options.

The first is the Pro 50 account, which boosts your storage capacity to 50GB (it adds 48GB so that your cap is 50GB), which costs $10/month, or $99 a year. For $20 a month, or $199 a year, you can upgrade your account to 100GB of total storage. Pro accounts also get 9 votes (as opposed to 6 for Free users) in the Votebox system, which lets users pick which features to add in the next iteration of Dropbox.

Compared to other services, the pricing is competitive. Our only wish is that Dropbox would offer more storage size options. Sugarsync, a Dropbox competitor, has premium account tiers at 30GB ($5/month) and 250GB ($25/month).

Also note that once you’ve upgraded to a Pro Dropbox account, Dropbox will still give you the option to downgrade back to your original Free account, even though this isn’t explicitly stated in the terms of use. Dropbox also reserves the right to delete your account if you don’t use it for 90 days.

Get 5.25GB of Total Free Space

You can more than double your Free account capacity by using Dropbox’s referral system. Simply find your referral link on the Dropbox website and get a friend to create an account using that link. For each new account you refer, you get 250MB of extra space, up to 3GB. That means all you have to do get refer 12 people to max out on this referral bonus.

In addition, Dropbox gives you another 250MB bonus for becoming a Dropbox “Guru.” Just head to the Getting Started section of the website, and complete five of the six steps listed. These are pretty simple requirements, which include taking the Dropbox tour, installing the desktop app, and sharing a folder with friends. This is the quickest and easiest way to get extra free storage without using any referrals.

Pro accounts can earn up to 6GB of referral space, and downgraded pro accounts still retain any bonus space earned from referrals.

Use Dropbox to manage BitTorrent

How often have you found yourself sitting at work, only to find out that a file you’re interested (a demo for a game you’re excited about, for instance) has just become available online. Sure, you could sit there patiently, and wait until you get home to download it; but why bother waiting when you could have it ready for you as soon as you get there. Most of the big BitTorrent clients have some sort of web-based control, but those can be tricky to set up, and require that you have a static IP (or set up a DynDNS account). Using DropBox, it’s much easier.

Here’s what you’ll need to do: First, make sure you have a BitTorrent client capable of automatically loading .torrent files from a folder. All the big ones are capable of this, including uTorrent, Vuze, and the standard BitTorrent client. Next, set it up to monitor your DropBox, or a folder in your DropBox (My Documents/My Dropbox/Torrents for instance) and automatically open any .torrent file added to that folder.

Now, if you see a file you want to grab, just download the .torrent file to your Dropbox/Torrents folder, and your home PC will start the download as soon as DropBox syncs. It’s as simple as that.

Of course, this method requires that you leave you computer on all day long, a decidedly environmentally-unfriendly practice that we don't recommend. But If you're anticipating the need to download something (a beta test for a new MMO, maybe?) we won't fault you for making a one-day exception.

Use Portable Dropbox to keep your data mobile

Making Dropbox into a portable app (that is, an app that can be installed on a USB thumb drive) might at first seem redundant—isn’t Dropbox meant to replace thumb drives, after all? But if you stop to think about it, there are ways in which Dropbox and USB drives can be used together. For instance, consider the following situation:

You’ve got to give a PowerPoint presentation, and you’ll be using somebody else’s laptop, which is connected to a projector. You could copy the .ppt file over to a USB key, but why bother? All your project files are already sitting on a USB key connected to your computer, running portable Dropbox. You snag the key and head out the door. On the way, your boss calls and tells you that there’s a big mistake in the presentation, but you don’t sweat it: your boss saves a correct version, and when you get to the presentation you run Dropbox and the file updates in a flash.

So how do you actually run portable Dropbox? It’s pretty easy, just follow these steps:

1.   Download Portable Dropbox. The Dropbox forums page for the project is here, although as of 12/7/09, the latest version seems to be broken, and you’ll need to grab the fixed version here.
2.   Unzip the file you downloaded, and drop the contents (the DropBox folder) onto your thumbdrive.
3.   Run the DropboxPortable executable, and follow the instructions in the installer.

Host a website on Dropbox

Now here’s an unusual use for Dropbox. Did you know that you can actually host a website, using Dropbox’s “Public” folder? It’s easy, you just drop in html files and images into your public folder, the way you would normally upload those files onto an FTP server.

Interlinking works fine, as does client-side scripting. Obviously, any server side stuff won’t work, but this is a great way to quickly host a smaller page. You can simply build the site as you like, viewing it locally, and when you’re satisfied, it’s already on the web!

We haven’t heard any specific information about bandwidth caps on Dropbox’s public share, but it’s safe to say that that it’s probably not meant to be used for mass data transfer. In other words, If you want to host something bigger than a personal site or blog, you’re still better off with traditional hosting.

Utilize the Web Interface

Dropbox is primarily a desktop app, but its website is very useful for accessing your files. The web interface offers the same functionality as the desktop client, letting you browse, download, and upload files to your account. This is handy when you need file access on the go, but here are three other reasons to use the web interface:

Track Recent Activity – The recent events tab gives you a timeline of account activity, even including the movement of files between folders so you can keep track of everything. Uploaded images show up as thumbnails, too.

Share Folders – You have to use the website to grant and accept folder shares for collaborating with other Dropbox users (which is different for sharing individual files in the Public folder). Shared folders take up space on the accounts of all collaborators.

Undo Delete Files – The best feature of the Web interface is the ability to view and retrieve previously deleted files in your Dropbox. On free accounts, deleted files can be recovered up to 30 days after they were deleted, though that limit is removed for Pro users.

Use Your My Documents folder as your Dropbox folder

In Windows Vista and 7, you can easily store your My Documents folder in Dropbox. This puts all your document files in the cloud, which can also then be synced with your other computers’ My Documents folders. Just right-click My Documents, go to the Location tab, and click the Move button to relocate My Documents to a new directory. Navigate to your Dropbox directory, and click OK.

Use Dropbox Mobile App for Photo Blogging

The iPhone Dropbox app is currently the only mobile Dropbox client, but it’s pretty powerful. Not only does it let you browse and view images, read documents, and even play music found in your Dropbox, but you can even use it to take and store cameraphone pics directly to the cloud. We found this feature most useful when paired with services and programs that can monitor desktop folders to automatically upload images to blogs and image-hosting sites, like Flickr.

Google Voice "Lite" Gives You All the Great Features Without a New Number

Bart Salisbury — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 16:47:50 -0500

No matter how innovative the big boys are, the minions lurking about in the ‘tubes’ keep on beating them to the punch on new, innovative features. In this case the big boy is Google Voice, which offers you a phone number along with a bag stuffed with nifty features like voicemail, voicemail transcription, custom greetings, free text-messaging, blocking unwanted callers, and call screening. The only drawback is you have to use Google Voice’s assigned number, which is a problem for us who have our identity intimately tied to an existing mobile number.

The hackers on the net didn’t let this slow them down, however, and a workaround came about pretty quickly. Keep your existing mobile number, just forward your unanswered calls to your Google Voice number. The process is pretty simple, in fact. You can find it explained in posts at TechnologyCrowd and Lifehacker.

Well hack no more. Google Voice has taken the hint and now offers a ‘lite’ version with this feature. According to The Official Google Blog if you sign up with your existing number you’ll get access Google Voice’s voicemail features. If you already have a Google Voice account the process of forwarding your voicemail from your mobile numbers has been simplified.

Image Credit: Google

Custom Firmware Rocks! How to Hack Gadgets with New Software

Alex Castle, Norman Chan, and Dave Murphy — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 10:30:00 -0500

While we're big fans of the proven awesomeness of open-source software, we don't automatically download every free application that's labeled as an open-source project. What make more sense is the use of open-source as the tool that effects some kind of massive or otherwise unreachable change in a common device. Case in point is open-source firmware, named not for any philosophical belief behind its creation, but because few would want to heft the banner for these changes themselves. After all, creativity comes from a wide range of sources and inputs--as does software testers. You sure wouldn't want to be the one person working on third-party iPhone firmware, bricking device after device in a quest to add additional functionality that Apple didn't first design.

But that kind of unintended funcitonality is the sole benefit to open-source firmware. Throw those aspirations of community membership and open-source allegiance out the window: You want to increase the power of your device akin to a Sim tinkering his or her hardware to gain mechanical skill points. There's no shame in that. In fact, you can accomplish much by adopting third-party firmware in place of standard manufacturer packages. For example, building increased sound codecs into your MP3 player of choice, or adding on-screen level meters to your digital SLR. You can even turn your router into a bridge, perfect for extending the range of your neighbor's wireless signal so you can thieve his connection from additional locations in your apartment. You can also brick your device.

We jest, but only partially. For the danger of running third-party firmware--safe as many of the packages can seem to be--is that you could render your device of choice unusable. It happens to "real" firmware upgrades; it can happen to "unofficial" firmware upgrades as well, only I venture that you'll probably find more problems in the latter scenario than with a manufacturer's tried-and-tested update. But still, the benefits can often outweigh the risks, especially if you're looking to extend your legacy devices with additional features. An entire ocean of open-source firmware fixes awaits your perusal -- we take a look at some outstanding examples of open-source firmware, and teach you how to install them on your own gadgets!

MP3 Players

For most people, an MP3 player serves a pretty narrow purpose: it plays music, maybe a video here or there if you’ve got a newer model, and might have a handful of applications. All in all, though, MP3 players are rarely treated as anything more than tiny, portable jukeboxes, which is a shame, because as gadgets they’ve got the potential for so much more. That’s why, in this article, we show you how to install custom Rockbox firmware and breathe new life into your trusty old MP3 player.

Sony's PSP

For as long as Sony’s PlayStation Portable has been on the market, it’s been a juicy target for hackers. With burly hardware (for a handheld) and a gorgeous screen, it just begs to play homebrew, and lots of PSP owners have cracked their devices to do just that. Unfortunately, Sony has had other plans for their handheld, and has released dozens of firmware updates and several hardware revisions to make it harder to hack the PSPs handheld.

As such, there’s no one hack that works on all PSP, and in fact some PSPs are completely unhackable. There is, however, one fairly easy method that works on most consoles, which is what we illustrate in this article.

BIOS

OpenBIOS and Coreboot are two examples of the open source world's answer to proprietary BIOS firmware. Flashing your motherboard with either of these can be an anxiety-inducing process, but you should be able to tap into faster loading speeds if you're successful. Everyone wants a speedy, netbook-style BIOS loadup, right?

Routers

Third-party router software has been around for a while, but we can’t help but keep recommending it to users who want to add undocumented features to their home network. Our favorite router firmware package is still Tomato, which we favor for its compatibility with a wide range of router brands and models, user-friendly interface, and powerful feature set. We show you how to upgrade your router’s firmware to the newest version of Tomato and then configure the Quality of Service settings to manage your network traffic.

E-readers

Yes, you can even get open-source firmware for your electronic reader. The pickings aren't vast, but firmware like OpenInkPot can update your device with new settings and better performance, as well as give you access to additional software reader options, eliminate the necessity of DRM for your device, and even add Wi-Fi capabilities to a network-incompatible E-reader.

Point and Shoot Digital Cameras

We love point-and-shoot pocket cameras for their small size and ease of use, but we lament their relatively paltry feature sets when compared to more expensive DSLR models. The good news, for owners of the popular Canon PowerShot cameras, is that your consumer-grade gadget can be upgraded with custom software to endow it with professional features like RAW image recording and live histogram feedback. CHDK (Canon Hack Development Kit) is an easy-to-install software package created by a savvy group of programmers to supercharge the Canon PowerShot. We show you how to safely install and configure this free firmware add-on with no risk to your camera.

SLRs

The Canon 5D Mark II camera is pretty impressive in its own right, given the kind of video that this full-frame, digital SLR can shoot. But don't let it be said that accomplishment ever got in the way of open-source innovation. That's where the open-source firmware package Magic Lantern comes into play. Amongst the features it adds to this jam-packed camera include on-screen audio meters (ideal for the amateur filmmaker), manual gain control, zebra stripes, and crop marks for different aspect ratios.

Digital Media Players

Western Digital's WDTV is kind of like a magic media streaming box. You plug any USB storage device (Flash key, portable hard drive, etc) into its two USB ports and it'll play any movie, picture, or audio file that it finds, outputting your media to your big screen TV via HDMI. Western Digital has done a great job updating its own official firmware to boost compatibility with almost every media format you can think of (yes, including MKV packages with subtitles), but the open-source offering takes the WDTV's functionality even further. B-Rad's WDLXTV firmware adds support for USB optical drives, USB hubs, limited ethernet connectivity, custom GUIs, and an application package that turns the WDTV into a mini-server!

Anything Else?

This is just a brief introduction to the world of open-source firmware. Hopefully it's gotten you stewing about all the different electronic devices you can hack in the comfort of your own dwelling. But just in case you need a little more inspiration, is anyone else out there running open-source firmware that deserves mentioning? Leave a comment to help flush out the list for your fellow readers!

How-To: Hack Your Canon PowerShot Digital Camera

Norman Chan — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 00:00:37 -0500

Find the Right Software

Download the version of CHDK software that’s appropriate for your Canon PowerShot. CHDK only works with a camera using Canon’s Digic II or newer image sensor—any PowerShot made after 2005 should work. To find the right download, you’ll have to first find your existing firmware version number. Using Notepad or any other text-editing tool, create and save an empty file named ver.req. You’ll have to disable the “Hide extensions for known file types” setting under Windows Explorer’s Folder Options in order to change the file extension to .req.

Using a USB card reader, drop this file into the root directory of your SD card (not while the card is in the camera). Put the card back in your camera, turn on the camera under playback mode, and press the “set” and “disp.” buttons together. If done properly, the camera should display the firmware version number, i.e., Firmware Ver GM1.00C.

Next, head over to the CHDK download site and find your camera model and firmware version. Download the corresponding Zip file under the column labeled Complete.

Load CHDK

With your SD card back in a card reader and connected to your PC, extract the entire contents of the software package into the root directory of the card. Now you’re ready to run the CHDK software. Put the card back in your camera again and turn on your camera under playback mode (the lens should be retracted). Hit the Menu button, and scroll down to the bottom of the first menu tab. You should see an option for “firm update.” Select this and choose Yes when prompted. This is an entirely safe process since CHDK installs additional software instead of replacing the existing firmware in your camera.

CHDK should automatically load in a few seconds and display its logo. You can now switch the camera to capture mode to begin using the new features. Keep in mind that since your core firmware hasn’t actually been modified, CHDK will be disabled every time you turn off your camera, and you’ll have to manually enable it with every boot. We’ll go over how to make CHDK automatically boot later.

Configure the New Features

The first thing you’ll notice with CHDK enabled is that the onscreen display (OSD) shows new information, including the remaining battery life as a percentage, focus distance in meters, and a digital clock.

To enter the special CHDK menu, you need to enter Alt mode by pressing the Shortcut button on your camera (this button is later configurable). When in Alt mode, you’ll see an <ALT> indicator at the bottom of the OSD. Pressing the Menu button will bring up the CHDK menu, where you can enable a live histogram, zebra stripes (to indicate overexposure), and turn on RAW recording mode. The available feature set depends on your PowerShot model, so check the official CHDK wiki for more information.

Boot CHDK at Startup

If you don’t want to manually load CHDK every time you use your camera, you can set it to auto-load, as long as your SD card is smaller than 2GB and not formatted for FAT32 (most aren’t by default). From the same Zip file you downloaded earlier, copy the PS.fir and DISKBOOT.bin files to the root directory of your SD card. Enter the CHDK menu using Alt mode and navigate to Miscellaneous Stuff. Select “Make Card Bootable” and hit the set button. Take out the SD card and slide its physical locking mechanism into the “lock” position. The next time you turn on the camera, CHDK should automatically start up as well.