Dipity
Windows only (running Google Desktop): If you want access to your Gmail on your desktop (literally) without running a full-blown email client, now you can download the Gmail Google Desktop gadget....
If you'll be without your personal assistant when webapp Sandy closes its doors next Monday, you may not have to wait long for a replacement: A group of developers are working to build a free, open...
Software developer Gustavo Duarte explains exactly what your computer does while you wait, in a thorough, technical answer to the question "Why the hell is my computer taking so long to do somethi...
Windows only: Free text replacement application PhraseExpress updates to version 6.0, sporting a handful of new time-saving features and stability improvements. If you're unfamiliar with text repla...
Firefox with Greasmonkey (and other browsers): The Helvetireader theme for Google Reader strips away the bells and whistles and offers a minimal interface redesign for keyboard shortcut users. Ins...
Online language translation app Frengly autodetects the source language of text and quickly translates it into your language of choice. Just paste any piece of text into Frengly, hit translate, and...
Windows only: The Giveaway of the Day web site is featuring a small, simple, but effective macro recording tool for free until 3 a.m. EST on Dec. 2. Windows Automation Macro Recorder (WAMR), normal...
Firefox only: Easy DragToGo is a Firefox extension which enables interaction with highlighted text and images via mouse gestures. Text actions are determined by whether or not the highlighted text...
UK magazine Custom PC reports that Windows 7 will feature WARP, which lets any computer with an 800MHz processor run Aero-style desktop transparency and, with a certain performance hit, the Direct3...
The team at the Phoronix site benchmark tested the newly-released Fedora 10 Linux distribution against Ubuntu 8.10 on 32 and 64-bit machines, and found the results nearly>. Interesting find, and ni...
We've already pointed out a Greasemonkey script that hides Google's new SearchWiki ranking buttons, but there are viable work-arounds for those not using Firefox or its page-styling Greasemonkey ex...
Windows only: Free utility Gladinet Cloud Desktop removes the web interfaces from Google Docs, Picasa Web Albums, Windows Live SkyDrive and Amazon S3 Storage, mounting them instead as folders you ...
TiddlyDu2 is a TiddlyWiki derivative tweaked to serve as a personal information manager. TiddlyDu2 has categories for sorting current tasks, long term projects, life goals, and a context based syst...
The internet has made it easier than ever to share media and data with friends, family, and co-workers, but that doesn't mean burning your own CDs and DVDs is a thing of the past. Blank optical dis...
Windows only: Take a few minutes to familiarize yourself with the 747-dashboard of an interface that graces Bulk Rename Utility and you'll be rewarded with an enormously powerful tool. You can rena...
Caledos Manages Your Massive Wallpaper Collection (Windows)"If you like varied wallpaper but find yourself frittering away time digging through your archives picking new ones out, let Caledos Autom...
Adobe Air: Sure you can export your RSS feeds from Google Reader and import the feed file into desktop RSS reader for offline browsing. Scoop takes offline browsing a step further by allowing you ...
Whether you'd like to increase your mental health or just relax after a stressful holiday visit, there aren't many games more than chess. Over at tips and tricks blog MakeUseOf, they have rounded ...
Bath bombs, for the unfamiliar, are chalky feeling balls about the size of a small orange that you throw into a bath tub. They don't explode but they do react with the water fizzing and spinning, f...
Windows only: If you're not particularly fond of the official Windows Update system provided through Internet Explorer, whether your reason being a distaste for the Windows Genuine Advantage softwa...
We've all been there. You look at a list of names for a meeting or at a new business card and you have absolutely no there was a last name with that many vowels. HowToSayThatName.com is a web site ...
Hand-Me-Downs is a web-based service reminiscent of Craiglist where parents can list used items for babies and children. Users are given the option to sell, give away, or donate their things. If yo...
Almost two years later, our weekly listicle, the Lifehacker Top 10, still proves to be one of the most popular posts that publishes here. Since our top 10-making bot is off this weekend, take a gan...
Need to spend less time on blogs during the holidays? Don't unsubscribe from all our daily posts—switch to our trimmed-down top stories feed to skip the extras and get right to the good stuff. Don'...
Many people are taking the transition from analog to digital television as a pretty good excuse to upgrade their televisions. Shockingly, despite paying a premium for a high definition set and all ...
PicClick is a web-based shopping search engine that scours eBay and Amazon and returns results in thumbnail format. Instead of scrolling through long and rather linear pages of search results you c...
Dear free software developers: Before we American nerds sit down to our turkey and mashed potatoes today, know that your creations are at the top of the list of things we're most thankful for. Wh...
Mac OS X only: If you've been waiting patiently for the popular BitTorrent application, uTorrent, to find its way to your Mac, your wait is finally over: uTorrent for the Mac is officially availabl...
Once you've woken from your first triptophan-induced nap and the initial bloat has worn off, you're going to be ready for another Thanksgiving binge—and another, and another. Rather than trek the s...
Firefox only (Windows/Mac/Linux): Experimental Firefox extension TooManyTabs organizes extra browser tabs in Firefox, allowing you to store over 50 extra tabs in a special row for quick access at a...
Web site Sling streams popular television shows and movies through a web-based Flash player. Sling is brought to you by the company behind the Slingbox, a living room gadget capable of streaming li...
Fedora has just released version 10 of the popular Linux distribution. It's only been six months since Fedora 9 hit servers, but the new release boasts all sorts of new features and improvements, i...
Macworld runs down the cheapest iPhone dictionary applications; sadly, the one free option doesn't get the best review (though it's unsurprisingly the most popular). What's your favorite iPhone dic...
Web site Tarpipe streamlines your updates to various social web sites, creating simple or complex workflows to update several buckets in one fell swoop. Let's say you want to do something simple li...
A big part of staying productive is keeping track of time, how much and on what you spend it—so why not make glancing at the clock as fun as possible? The Pin Clock is a nifty digital clock that p...
Previously mentioned personal productivity web sites I Want Sandy and Stikkit are shutting their doors on Monday, December 8th, and judging by the volume of emails we've received from disappointed ...
If you've read recent speculation that a Gmail vulnerability may be lurking in the depths of your email account, Google wants to assure you that Gmail is secure as ever. According to the post on th...
The crafty bloggers at the Geeky Gadgets web site don't want to pay an extra $30 for an iPhone 3G dock, so they fashioned one out of cardboard—and are now offering the cut-out template as a free d...
You don't have to run a manual search every day from now until December 23rd to find the best price on an item you're hot to purchase but only for so much—web service ZingSale will monitor item pr...
How do I transition out of a heavily academic/theoretical mode, and into a creative one? What small (snack-sized), quiet (non-crunchy), neat (non-crumb making) and relatively healthy foods can I ke...
Need to chat with a group of people all running different chat clients and you don't have time to coordinate everyone switching to a multi-service chat client like Digsby? Stinto is a free web-bas...
Now's the time to start getting ready for this coming Black Friday—the day after Thanksgiving, which promises crack-of-dawn store openings and crazy discounts. Over at the Unclutterer blog, Matt sh...
What better day than the one before a long weekend to dress up your desktop with a new wallpaper image. The Web Designer Depot site rounds up 40 wallpapers loaded with color for your perusal and d...
On the heels of his fast-and-easy sweet potato dish, minimalist chef Mark Bittman demonstrates how to save yourself three hours on Thanksgiving day by roasting your turkey in 45 minutes. The trick...
If you're tired of hearing about Windows 7's upcoming features while you sit and stare at your aging XP or Vista desktop, take solace in a few free apps and themes that can give you a taste right ...
There was a time when—if you wanted to burn a CD or DVD—you had to pony up cash for shareware apps from companies like Nero or Roxio to get many options and good results. Today you've got an ample ...
There was a time when—if you wanted to burn a CD or DVD—you had to pony up cash for shareware apps from companies like Nero or Roxio to get many options and good results. Today you've got an ample ...
Google just updated the Google Maps interface with revamped controls that match Google Earth's and put the yellow Street View guy ("Peg Man") front and center. Hit the play button above to see a G...
Windows/Mac/Linux: TextFlow is an Adobe AIR-based word processor with a new and innovative take on document collaboration. Rather than offer real-time updates when multiple users are working on a d...
The Belkin Mini Surge Protector is a perfect stocking stuffer for the mobile worker in your life. The small gadget turns one three-prong outlet into three surge-protected outlets. As an added bonus...
Web service DialMyCalls sends mass telephone messages to a user-defined group. If you've ever been part of a phone tree that, for example, spreads word that your softball game has been called off, ...
Free application launcher and dock application RocketDock took home the gold star from this weekend's Hive Five Best Desktop Customization Tools, followed in second place by Samurize (which lost by...
Melt Mail is a free email forwarding service that creates a temporary email address that forwards all incoming mail to your real email address. To use it, just enter the email address you want mess...
Firefox with Greasemonkey: If you've consolidated multiple email addresses in Gmail, chances are you've accidentally sent email using the wrong From address at one point or another. If this is a pe...
Windows only: Free application Newzie is a feature-rich desktop newsreader designed to keep you up to date with the latest web content, whether that content is coming from a traditional RSS feed or...
Reader projectvirus creates a smart, dynamic desktop HUD that prominently displays a desktop-sized flip clock. That big old clock is pretty cool by itself, but projectvirus went one step further by...
Mac OS X only: Preference pane Visage lets you customize your Mac's desktop, login panel, and alerts. Set a custom login panel background image and logo with Visage, or enable a "desktop effect" t...
Everyone's done it: you've got a raging stomachache and you're feeling kind of fatigued, so you search online for the cause of your malady and conclude that you've got cancer. A new study from Micr...
All platforms: A new version of the most popular media converter for Lifehacker readers, Handbrake, adds several useful features like universal input (it's not just for DVDs any more), better vide...
TiVo owners, you've got a new bookmark to add to your mobile phone while you're on the road this Thanksgiving: The new TiVo Mobile web site lets you program your DVR remotely. (You could always do...
Released a few weeks ago only to the developer version of Chrome, Google has now pushed out a full-on bookmark manager in the latest beta going out to users (version 0.4.154.25). Make sure you're ...
YouTube has adjusted the video clip player's size from a 4:3 aspect ratio to 16:9 (generally used for HD TV). As a result, many clips will have black bars on either side to fill in the new space. ...
Firefox only: If you frequently deal with bookmarks that have limited future utility, the Tark (Temporary Bookmarks) extension can set an expiration date on them. For instance, if you bookmark auct...
Editor: Say hey again to Keir Thomas, author of the new book Ubuntu Kung Fu, who stopped by to share some more of the best material from the book, in a follow-up to his post, Some Productive Ubunt...
Windows only: Small utility Minime clears your taskbar by minimizing windows to its single icon in the system tray. With Minime running, hit Ctrl+Shift+Z to send a window to the system tray instea...
Neuroscientist William Fishbein says that deep, "slow-wave" sleep can help us commit information to memory, learn new skills, and extrapolate information. Science news site Physorg reports that Fi...
Windows only: Foxit Reader—the PDF viewer that introduced most of us to the good life sans Adobe's bloated Acrobat Reader—has just updated to version 3.0. Among the handful of new and improved feat...
Web site keyboardr is an as-you-type search mashup of Google (including blog and image search), Wikipedia, and YouTube with blazing speed. Once you see a result you like, just use your arrow keys t...
Ok people, it's time to get thankful—for all the free software you've downloaded, installed, or used online to your benefit this year. We've posted literally thousands of free downloads and webapp...
Napsounds is a repository of relaxing audio files designed for power napping. Every day a unique 20 minute track is generated in the electronic, and nature sounds category. You can listen directly ...
Music-lover dmosiondz put the currently-playing Winamp track front and center on his/her Windows desktop using one of the most popular desktop customization tools, Samurize. This good-looking "Now...
If you're finding Google's new SearchWiki ranking buttons are more annoying than useful, you can hide them using this Greasemonkey user script (a definite candidate for a Better Google extension)....
Rather than dismissing a web page or other digital document as TLDR ("too long; didn't read"), run it through the GreatSummary webapp, which summarizes online content in a few sentences. Enter a U...
If you're at work today here in the U.S., things are probably pretty quiet: your bosses and coworkers took vacation days to piggyback on the holiday, meetings are canceled, clients are out of the o...
Minimalist chef (and my man crush) Mark Bittman says this Thanksgiving's the time try something better than "that canned sweet potato with marshmallows thing," and offers a yummy can-free alternat...
Over the past 14 years, I have studied productivity, the learning process, and time management. Just six years ago, I returned to university to earn a degree in psychology to understand the applic...
If you're in a pinch for a last-minute gift this holiday season, chocolate covered strawberries are a ridiculous simple and well received gesture. At the DIY blog Instructables there is a step by s...
Antique photographs have a certain warmth to them imparted by the development process that can't be replicated by simply dumping the color data from a photograph. At wiikiHow there is a tutorial o...
It's crazy to think that an operating system can fit every user's needs out of the box, even if we are just talking about looks. Luckily, if you're not keen on the cookie-cutter appearance of your ...
Windows only: If you like varied wallpaper but find yourself frittering away time digging through your archives picking new ones out, let Caledos Automatic Wallpaper Changer take care of the manage...
StreamDesk Brings Web Streams to the Desktop (Windows and Mac)"StreamDesk brings a hand-picked selection of live video streams from sites like Ustream.tv, Justin.tv and Stickam directly to your des...
Sure you could probably pick up a pleather case for nearly any electronic device you own, courtesy of eBay and healthy international trade routes, but it would lack the charm of a hand crafted leat...
