computers/useful software


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It's like CDDB on crack, with richer metadata and the ability to tag your disorganized MP3 collection…

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A google search for "quicksilver clone for windows" turned up the so-far very impressive AppRocket. Give it a try and let me know what you think.

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Handy mono program for stitching together digital panorama images.

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WebNote is an online note-taking program. It lets you create a tableau, where you can create and edit notes in various colors. You can interactively drag and resize notes, make whatever edits you want, and then save the tableau.

What makes WebNote amazing is that it's web-based. Try it here. The coolest upshot is that you can use WebNote as a collaborative workspace like a Wiki, but giving users more powerful visual hints in the form of colored notes arranged in space.

Still, while I think the idea and code is neat, I'm not sure this is that valuable as a standalone application. I think these notes are most useful as annontative elements on an existing, larger piece of content. In particular, I think it would be a useful piece of interface in a writing workshop. Readers could position notes around a document in order to share questions and suggestions.

Another cool idea would be a collaborative whiteboard space. Here it would be most interesting to combine the annotated tableau with some sort of periodically updating interface. Maybe the notes slide down over time, and fade into a regular blog. But when something is important, you can make a big note and put it right on top. Perhaps a few people can share this and use it as an efficient way to share bits of more and less transient information during the workday. Or you could use it for your own note list. If something important is about to slide off screen, just drag it back to the top of your attention!

It doesn't do most of this stuff yet, but luckily, WebNote is open source too. An inspiring piece of interface work.

[via Napsterization]

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LAMPPIX allows you to burn your web projects (i.e. PHP presentations or Perl scripts) onto a CD-ROM and give them away to others. They will only have to insert the CD and reboot — if you configured LAMPPIX right (and this is really easy!) they can view your project

If we ever want to market frassle for intranets, this is the way to do it. Download a 200MB CD image, burn, boot, and you've got your very own frassle to play with. As they say in car sales, the feel of the wheel will seal the deal.

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While reading a somewhat interesting post about how the Google Desktop Search works, I saw a very curt comment:

Why not replace Google Desktop with Intellij Omea

Why not? Well, Google Desktop search was from Google, and Omea was… not a word. What is this strange beast?

Omea is an extremely powerful yet simple to use Integrated Information Environment. With Omea, you can access, organize, and quickly search all your digital resources, including e-mails, syndicated Web feeds, instant messaging conversations, newsgroup articles, favorite web sites, personal contacts, and even locally stored files (.doc, .pdf, .txt, etc.), all in one easy to use composite interface that's well organized and efficient to navigate.

Sounds nice, but I've heard this all before. So I download it, and it impresses the hell out of me. As in, it's my new email client and RSS aggregator. It's fast. It's got a complex but usable interface. It synchronizes instantaneously with Outlook.

Let me be blunt: this software raises the bar for frassle. Try it! They also have a simpler RSS Reader and bookmark manager that anyone using an aggregator should try. Windows only.

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A cool collaboration tool that puts a translucent picture of your collaborator on your screen. When they move, the image gets more opaque.

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Easily generates multi-column layouts that are compatible with lots of browsers. Neato.

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Funny, I was almost ready to sit down and write a module to do exactly this.

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