Achieve Inbox Zero (Kinda/Sorta) With Boomerang

Beta, Microsoft, Software, Web

Achieve Inbox Zero (Kinda/Sorta) With Boomerang

1 Comment 22 February 2011

Boomerang, which debuted almost a year ago today (2/28/2010), originally started out as an add-in for Microsoft Outlook that allowed you to temporarily hide a message and then “boomerang” that message back at a later date. (The add-in offers a great number of options in that regard: return it in a day, two days, two weeks, two months, a custom time and so on and so forth.)

When the message comes back, you have the option to keep the message unread and even flag it for follow-up. That way, when the message comes back as the original receipt date, you’ll be sure not to miss it.

Continue Reading






Design, Web

ToodleDo is Great But Looks Terrible. Make It Look Better with Stylish.

No Comments 01 February 2011

In the world of online task management, ToodleDo offers most of what Remember the Milk does but also includes, among many other features, the ability to have sub-tasks. RTM, regrettably, does not.

As many of you are already aware, sub-tasks can be a lifesaver when it comes to project management.

Unfortunately, ToodleDo – in this author’s humble opinion – has a terrible interface. The colors just plain don’t work together well and navigation is the complete opposite of intuitive – especially for a site that’s supposed to help you with GTD.

Continue Reading

SimplyFile 3.0: if possible, it’s even better than before.

Microsoft, Software

SimplyFile 3.0: if possible, it’s even better than before.

No Comments 28 July 2010

Anyone who knows us knows that we’re big fans of TechHit products… insanely powerful and time-saving utilities (mostly for Microsoft Outlook) like TwInbox and FBLook, QuickJump, and, our personal favorite, SimplyFile.

If you missed our review of SimplyFile from way back when, the following is a snippet from that article as well as a brief overview of the software itself:

SimplyFile is designed to help you, well, simply file messages that are in your Outlook inbox into the appropriate folder. By using “an advanced algorithm to learn and adapt to your filing habits,” SimplyFile gives you a recommended folder destination as soon as you select a message in your inbox. By clicking on the SimplyFile button, the message immediately goes to that destination; thus saving you from dragging/scrolling through your folder structure and dropping it into the necessary folder once you’ve found it.

In addition to the all-powerful SimplyFile button mentioned above, the software also adds some much-needed Gmail-esque keyboard shortcuts for message management and for navigating complex folder structures – shortcuts that literally save me hours every single week. (Yeah, that’s no dramatization – it will literally save you hours of time every week if you’re an Outlook power user.)

Like I mentioned before, there’s a 30-day trial of SimplyFile available for download. If you download it, I’d be genuinely surprised if you didn’t purchase it.

The new release not only adds support for Outlook 2010 but also options to quickly file away all messages within a particular thread as well as messages from a particular sender – both great ways to achieve inbox:zero. Additional new features include batch filing and some interesting usage statistics.

SimplyFile runs $49 but, again, if you’re a serious Outlook user, it’s well worth it.

SquareSpace vs. WordPress.com

Open Source, Web, WordPress

SquareSpace vs. WordPress.com

No Comments 13 June 2010

If you’re looking to setup your own blog, you’ve undoubtedly come across the following two options in your searches: WordPress.com and Google’s Blogger service.

I’ll start by saying that Google’s Blogger service doesn’t have anything on WordPress so, as it stands now, there’s not a chance I’d recommend it to anyone that cares about the functionality and/or aesthetic appeal of their blog.

That said, one service that you might not have come across is SquareSpace and it’s truly one of the few online services that can stand head-to-head with the ever-powerful, always-”open” WordPress. So what’s the biggest difference between the two?

Continue Reading

Zaplee: the $5-a-month phone system for your business

Feature, VOIP

Zaplee: the $5-a-month phone system for your business

2 Comments 25 January 2010

When it comes to setting up your small business, there are a great number of things to worry about. Among them? Implementing a phone system for use by a small, handful of employees or by vast quantities of call center drones… or any combination of employees in between.

There are a great number of sophisticated VOIP solutions out there. You can go the Microsoft route and implement a “unified communications” suite like Microsoft Office Communications Server. Similarly, you can go with a richly-complex Windows Server-based solution like ShoreTel. If you’re a true rogue, you can alternatively go the open-source route and opt for a Linux-based phone system like Asterisk.

Of course, there’s always an online solution that’ll save you from investing in either hardware or software. (For the most part, at least.) Enter Zaplee. Zaplee integrates with your existing Skype account(s) to provide you with an easy way to manage departments, extensions, greetings, forwarding, complex routing, etc.

Getting everything setup, at least according to the site, is a pretty straight-forward, 4 or 5-step process: download the software, setup the extensions, setup departments, record greetings and then, well, go live. Check out the Zaplee feature tour to get an overview of how the system looks and works.

As a side note, there are two flavors of Zaplee: the $5-a-month (for unlimited users) solution that you can manage from your desktop, alongside the Skype software. The other option, Zaplee On-Demand, at $10-a-month (also for unlimited users) is entirely Web-based.

Overall, it’s a pretty impressive, quick and easy way to get a phone system setup in your office. Sure, you might very well outgrow it eventually and you might decide that you’re better off with one of the aforementioned paths I mentioned above (OCS/ShoreTel/Asterisk) but, then again, Zaplee might just do everything you need… and at a ridiculously-low price.

What say you? What voice system have you decided upon/deployed for your office?

Sync your beloved Firefox add-ons with Siphon

Feature, Mozilla, Web

Sync your beloved Firefox add-ons with Siphon

2 Comments 24 January 2010

Way back when, we had mentioned that Mozilla’s plans for “Weave,” their platform for syncing browsing information between different desktop/mobile clients, included support for synchronizing Firefox extensions or, as they’re known now, “add-ons.”

Well, it turns out that add-on synchronization isn’t isn’t here yet and keeps getting bumped from the official Weave roadmap. So, our plans for a completely synchronized Firefox experience among our PCs were somewhat dashed… until now.

Continue Reading

Web

Pre-emptively save your hard work with Lazarus

1 Comment 11 January 2010

Alright, it’s happened to me no less than one trillion times now and I’m sure it’s happened to you: you fill out a contact form or a form for tech support only to lose every carefully-chosen word in some fluke accident like a browser crash or the accidental closing of a tab.

If it has happened, save yourself some trouble in the future by installing the Lazarus add-on for your browser. (Lazarus for Mozilla Firefox | Lazarus for Google Chrome – sorry IE users)

Continue Reading

Drive yourself insane with Snarl Notifier

Feature, Open Source, Software, Uncategorized

Drive yourself insane with Snarl Notifier

No Comments 10 January 2010

If you’re a regular Windows user, you’re used to system notifications popping up in the lower right-hand corner of the screen. “Your battery is low,” “This version of Windows may not be legitimate,” “Your anti-virus solution may be out-of-date,” “You are now [illegally] connected to [your neighbor's] wireless network” and, of course, “You have new Windows Updates available.”

As if these weren’t enough, the open-source/freeware product Snarl exists solely to double your notification pleasure.

While providing you with some of the same notifications you already receive (battery is low, audio is muted, etc.), Snarl also enables even more notifications for those that either have OCD or just need to always be “in-the-know.”  Examples include notifications for: hourly time updates, timer countdowns, more-specific power/battery notifications and more. Plus, like any truly-great application, Snarl supports extendability. For those that like the concept of this application, this is where it really gets interesting. Developers (or even you) can even write their own Snarl applications so that you can be visually notified for every event imaginable.

Want to be notified of a recent Tweet? New emails (even Exchange emails)? New Google Wave messages? New weather alerts? Snarl has you covered.

Plus, if you’re a true nerd, you’ll certainly appreciate how much granular control over what you’re notified about and how exactly you’re notified.

G’head and check it out: http://www.fullphat.net.

[Source: downloadsquad.com]

Software

QuickLaunch Replacements for Windows 7

1 Comment 09 January 2010

One of the (few) complaints I continually hear about Windows 7 is the lack of the Quick Launch toolbar for the taskbar. Sure, the icon-friendly new taskbar makes it easier to store multiple shortcuts but you still can’t store that many.

Enter 7Stacks and Jumplist Launcher. Both apps enable you to add shortcuts to folders/applications anywhere on your system… shortcuts that will be accessible via a right-click on the app icon in your taskbar. It’s something that I wish was built into Win7 natively but a 3rd-party app will do just nicely.

[Source: FreewareGenius.com]

3 Great and Portable CD/DVD Burning Apps

Feature, In-Depth, Software

3 Great and Portable CD/DVD Burning Apps

4 Comments 16 October 2009

We’re all about portable apps here at Fans of Tech. Why? Well, the more crap that gets installed into different directories on your system (and in the registry), the slower your computer’s gonna be. That’s a fact. With portable apps, you just download the program and just, well, run it. That’s it. It’s a beautiful thing, really.

That said, we typically opt for installer-free apps that we can just drop in a single directory to be synced on all of our machines. (I personally currently use SugarSync now.)

A standalone app to burn CDs or DVDs is just one example of what I’m talking about. No clunky installs of Nero (which I think weighs in at about 400mb now) or Sonic or anything similar… just double-click the portable app’s EXE and start burnin’. There are more than a few portable burning suites that we’ve encountered in the past but the following titles are some of the more solid entries.

2009-10-16_daBurnerFirst up is daBurner. Sure, it’s the youngest of the bunch but you shouldn’t let that fool ya… as it does exactly what you need it to do: burn stuff. Here’s the official description: “No advanced burning options and complicated configuration. No integrated backup-mediacenter-slideshow-virtual drive stuff. It’s just a stupid burner. For smart people.” This one is aces in my book if not only for that beautiful description but also for the fact that the software is genuinely insanely-easy to use… unlike many burning apps.

2009-10-16_InfraRecorder[4]Next up is Infrarecorder. It’s definitely more feature-packed than DaBurner and offers up dual-layer DVD recording, CD/DVD-RW erasing, ISO & BIN/CUE burning, disc copying, audio track burning and more. Infrarecorder’s been around for a while so there’s definitely something to be gained from its experience.

image

Finally, we come to DeepBurner. This one isn’t as feature-packed as Infrarecorder but it’s got a pretty polished interface and it provides you with the basic functionality you need: burn audio discs, data discs, ISOs and bootable discs. The premium version of DeepBurner adds a few more options but there’s no portable version available for it.

There are some more (potentially more powerful) standalone burning apps listed on PortableFreeware.com but some of these require a little bit of manipulation to make them “portable.”

If, however, you do prefer the old-school method of running apps like these, i.e., by installing them, you’ll want to check out CDBurnerXP: a great, lightweight burning suite from the makers of Ketarin. In addition, the latest release of IMGBurn added a plethora of new features (no, seriously, go look at the changelog for ImgBurn 2.5) and it could potentially take my title for best free burning app available… period. It is, without a doubt, definitely worth the measly $2 donation that the author is kindly asking for on the app’s homepage. Do it. Be a hero. Donate that $2.

Did we miss any? (I can guarantee we did.) Let us know what your favorite portable burning app is in the comments below.

@fansoftech

Tips?

Got any ideas for software or web apps you'd like us to highlight? Let us know... drop us a tip: fansoftech [at] gmail.com.

Advertising

If you're interested in putting a banner on fansoftech.com, let us know. The rates are incredibly cheap (we're not interested in gouging people) so give us a shout: fansoftech [at] gmail.com.

© 2009 Fans of Tech. Powered by Wordpress.

a part of the   neighborhood.