Geek News and Musings

Build an Under-the-Cabinet Kitchen PC from an Old Laptop [DIY]

Inspired by our guide to giving an old laptop new life with cheap or free projects, Lifehacker reader Brian turned his aging Dell laptop into an incredible under-the-cabinet kitchen PC.

Brian uses his saucy setup to pipe music to his kitchen via Pandora, view his Google Calendar, and get a look at the news. He needed a lightweight operating system that would support Flash, and ultimately settled on the much-beloved Puppy Linux. A little tinkering, two coat-hangers (which he used for mounting the laptop), and some elbow grease later, Brian’s put together a very cool kitchen computer.

Despite having put together a great setup already, Brian has a few more ideas for spicing up his setup in the future:

• Integrate software keyboard for occasional logins
• Cron-like item scheduling for time based events, ( ie, show weather in morning, news at night )
• Limited command support for auto-shutdown of the appliance
• A RSS feed integrator showing semi-random news items stock ticker style.

If Brian’s flavor of laptop repurposing isn’t quite your cup o’ tea, try turning your laptop into a wall-mounted computer or one of our other favorite laptop projects.

GetPersonas.com Adds Instant-Preview Themes to Firefox [Themes]

Firefox only (Windows/Mac/Linux): Firefox launched its Personas theming extension nearly a year ago, but now there’s a big, search-able repository that instantly applies those themes for previewing. Check out what GetPersonas.com offers and how it works.

As we previously noted, skinning Firefox for a new look doesn’t exactly add much productivity to your browsing day, but if you’re going to seek out that complete desktop theme feel, GetPersonas makes it seriously simple. As in, mouse over a theme to have it instantly drawn onto your Firefox window, or click it once to have it applied to your browser chrome.

You’ll need to install the Personas extension from GetPersonas to get started window-shopping and installing themes. Once you do, you’ll get a bemused little fox face in the lower-left corner of your browser. The menu that pops up from clicking the Personas fox automatically updates with the newest and most popular themes, but also remembers the last few themes you grabbed from GetPersonas. As for the site itself, it’s arranged and ordered a lot like Mozilla’s other add-on offerings:

The Mozilla team’s also offered up their own screencast detailing how GetPersonas works:

If nothing else, this easy-peasy Firefox theming should make for some interesting future entries into our Lifehacker Desktop Show and Tell Group. And we’re certainly hoping so, since many of the most popular themes don’t exactly make bookmark toolbar links easy to read.

Share you favorite Personas theme links, or totally expected criticism of how much time this could waste, in the comments.

Hive Five: Five Best Mind Mapping Applications [Hive Five]

Mind mapping is a great way to add structure to brainstorming sessions and visualize your ideas. Check out the applications your fellow readers use to do their best brainstorming.

Earlier this week we asked you to share which mind mapping application helped you brainstorm most effectively. The votes are in and we’re back to share the results and arm you with the tools to make your next think tank meeting that much more productive.

MindMeister (Web Application, Free)

MindMeister is by far the most simplistic mind mapping tool in the top five, but its simplicity is definitely an asset. Once you’re logged into the service, you can create a fully functional mind map using little more than the directional arrows and the Insert key to add new nodes to your map. Additional customizations like font size and node colors are available for when you want to go beyond the basics. In the upper right corner is a navigation window, handy for when your mind maps become larger than the display space. Exporting is also a strong point for MindMeister; you can export your files to a text outline, PDF, JPG, PNG, or GIF. MindMeister’s history function lets you view past versions of your mind map and revert to them if you desire. You can share your maps for public collaboration or hand-select collaborators. Upgrading from the free account to the premium account gives you some handy additional features like map searching, offline editing, and the ability to export your maps to popular software like FreeMind and MindManager.

MindJet MindManager (Windows/Mac, $399)

MindJet MindManager isn't cheap by any means, but you get more than your share of value and sophistication for the hundreds you spend on the program. The interface and feature set of MindManager are very polished, and the primary menus are set up like the Microsoft Office Ribbon. After the initial installation, MindManager walks you through the creation of a sample mind map—helpful both to familiarize you with the interface but also to show you features you may have overlooked. MindManager is definitely oriented towards corporate environments, including extensive integration with the Office suite and support for linking your mind maps directly into common database formats like MySQL and Access. Finding information in large mind maps is easy thanks to topic sorting, filtering, and text search tools. Mind maps can be exported in a variety of formats, but most notably in interactive PDF files and embeddable Flash animations. MindManager is available as a 30 day trial.

XMind (Windows/Mac/Linux, Free)

XMind is the kind of free application that makes you forget you’re not paying for the privilege of using it. The interface is simple and intuitive to use. You can quickly move through your entire mind map with only a handful of keystrokes or jump over to the outline view for even quicker navigation. In addition to a basic mind map you can also create fishbone, organizational, tree, and logic charts. You can export charts as HTML, images, or text, and XMind comes a free account on XMind.net which allows you to share your charts online and embed them into blogs and web sites. There is a professional version of XMind which expands on the functionality of the base application and allows you to create online charts and collaborate with others. XMind Pro is $49 per year, but most people will find the free version more than robust enough for their mind mapping needs. Portable versions available for all three supported platforms.

FreeMind (Java, Free)

One of FreeMind's strongest selling points is a Java-based implementation. Whether you use it on Ubuntu or Windows, the features and user interface remain consistent. FreeMind is keyboard friendly with the core functionality well covered by keyboard shortcuts—I made the sample mind map pictured here without ever touching the mouse. The visual elements of your mind maps are highly customizable, including custom icons for flagging nodes on the map, color coding, grouping, and more. Mind maps created with FreeMind can be exported as HTML, PDF, and PNG files, among others.The support wiki for FreeMind is extensive and goes well beyond simply explaining how the application functions, covering things like how to add your own keyboard shortcuts and how to make the application portable.

iMindMap (Windows/Mac/Linux, $99-295)

iMindMap can claim two distinctions among the top five tools. First, it's the biggest download—weighing in at 135MB. Second it's the only application on the list developed by Tony Buzan—who lays claim to being the inventor of the mind map. iMindMap takes a different approach to mapping than the other applications in the list. Rather than create new nodes off the main idea by adding boxes, nodes are created by clicking in the center or the main idea and drawing away from it with the mouse. Each new idea is a branch off the center. Strangely, many of basic feature available in free mind-mapping software are only found in the more expensive versions of iMindMap, like the ability to expand and collapse branches. Mind maps created in iMindMap can be exported as PDF, JPG, PNG and text outline; a 7 day trial is available.

---

A small aside: Although we didn’t include it because the topic of this Hive Five was mind mapping software, it bears noting that nearly 20% of the votes went to analog methods like pencil and paper and using a whiteboard. For all your geeky ways, many of you have much love for good old fashioned analog brainstorming.

Now that you’ve seen the contenders for the crown of Master of the Mind Map, it’s time to log your vote for your favorite:

Which Mind Mapping Software Is Best?
( polls)

Agree with the spread? Can’t believe your favorite mind mapping tool didn’t make the top five? Sound off with your opinions in the comments below.

Help Loic Le Meur (Seesmic) and John Furrier (Silicon Angle) find new hosting

Top 10 Tools for a Free Online Education [Lifehacker Top 10]

It’s easy to forget these days that the internet started out as a place for academics and researchers to trade data and knowledge. Recapture the web’s brain-expanding potential with these free resources for educating yourself online.

Photo by Sailor Coruscant.

10. Teach yourself programming

Coding, whether on the web or on the desktop, is one of those skills you’ll almost never regret having. Coincidentally, the web is full of people willing to teach, and show off, programming skills. Whether you’re looking to knock out a modest Firefox extension or tackle your first programming language, there's no requirement to run out and buy the thickest book you can find at Barnes & Noble. Google Code University, for instance, hosts a whole CSE program’s worth of straight-up coding lessons in its bowels. We’ve pointed out a lot of other programming resources found around the web, so you should be able to get started in almost any project. As for the random, unexpected, seemingly inscrutable bugs, well … welcome to the fold.

9. Get a Personal MBA

“MBA programs don’t have a monopoly on advanced business knowledge: you can teach yourself everything you need to know to succeed in life and at work.” The Personal MBA site occasionally updates its list of dozens of helpful business books, designed to teach both the nuts-and-bolts money stuff and the kind of thinking one needs to get ahead in sales, marketing, or wherever your interests lie. A business school can offer networking, mentoring, and other perks, but nobody can teach you enthusiasm and business savvy—except yourself.

8. Learn to actually use Ubuntu

Too often, newcomers to Ubuntu, the seriously popular Linux distribution, find that their questions about any problem great or small is answered with a curt “Search the forums,” or “Just Google it.” From experience, that’s like telling someone there’s maple sap somewhere in that forest, so here’s a nail and get moving. With a brand-new installation sitting on your computer, few resources are as straight-forward and comprehensive as the Ubuntu Guide, which is packed with common stuff like installing VLC and getting VLC playback, but spans across topics including Samba and remote printing configuration. Author Keir Thomas also offered Lifehacker readers a little preview of his Ubuntu Kung Fu in two excerpts that tweak one’s system into a faster, more efficient data flinger.

7. Get started on a new language

Nobody’s pretending you can talk like a local without some immersion experience. But there’s a lot of resources on the web for honing an already-sharpened second language, or at least picking up some of the vocab and nuances. Learn10 gives you 10 vocabulary builders delivered every day by email, through iGoogle, through an iPhone page, or most any other way you’d like. One Minute Languages podcasts its lessons and lets newcomers stream from the archives. And Mango Languages has about 100 lessons, shown to you in PowerPoint style with interstitial quizzes, to move you through any language without cracking a book. Not that books are bad, of course, but this is stuff you can crack out during a coffee break.

6. Trade your skills, find an instructor

As Ramit Sethi put it in our interview, many people don’t realize the value of the skills they do have, whether it’s something as simple as higher-level English or software lessons for those in need. A site like TeachMate capitalizes on the inherent disparities in our interests, letting someone willing to teach a bit of, for example, Russian language get cooking lessons in return. If a site like TeachMate doesn’t quite reach you, try Craigslist, which, especially in a recession, is brimming with people looking to trade skills instead of cash.

5. Academic Earth and YouTube EDU

We have to guess that having a giant, searchable database of free academic lectures was just too good an idea for two different web firms to pass up. Academic Earth has been described as a Hulu-like aggregator for lots of major universities’ content, and offers the slicker and more navigable front-end for them, as well as allowing embedding and sharing with no restrictions. YouTube EDU might have a broader reach, and the player and format might be a bit more familiar to most. Both sites offer both individual lectures and full course series, and are definitely worth checking out.

4. Teach yourself all kinds of photography

Sites like Photojojo and Digital Photography School are oft-linked resources around Lifehacker, and for good reason. They let the uber-technical shooters run wild in forums and discussion groups, but focus the majority of their front-page posts on things that beginning DSLR shooters and moderate consumer-cam photographers can grasp and mix into their daily camera work. Of course, we’ve compiled and sought out our own digital photography advice at Lifehacker, including photographer Scott Feldstein’s guide to mastering your DSLR camera (Part 1 and Part 2), and our compilation of David Pogue’s best photography tricks, plus ours. Then there’s the simple pleasures of posting on Flickr, seeking out Photo by Marcin Wichary.

3. Get an unofficial liberal arts major

Whole-mind learning doesn't end the day you declare a major and start sending out resumes. A huge number of universities offer up some of their most unique and fascinating resources for free online, posting up databases, image galleries, and all kinds of stuff you wish you had time to dig through during your undergrad years. Learn everything you ever wanted to about Picasso at Texas A & M's Picasso Project. Indulge your inner geo-geek with super hi-res images from Hirise at the University of Arizona. Tour the world’s spaces in 3D with The World Wide Panorama at UC Berkeley. Wendy Boswell discovered those resources and way more in her discovery of the .edu underground, and you can find a lot more down there, too.

2. Learn an instrument

If being dropped off at the music store/mall/piano teacher’s house wasn’t a memorable part of your childhood, you might dig the digital age’s equivalents a lot more. Guitar players, in particular, have a lot of places to turn for video, audio, and graphical teaching tools. Adam rounded a lot of them up in his guide to learning to play an instrument online. If you want to build a foundation for learning any instrument, though, Ricci Adams’ Musictheory.net has Flash-based tutorials that offer a gentle tour through keys, time signatures, modalities, and the other ins and outs of notes and chords.

1. Learn from actual college courses online

A huge number of colleges, universities, and other degree-granting universities are going all open-source these days—giving away the actual guts of their courses, while retaining their revenue stream by awarding degrees only to those who pay. In this day and age, though, programming, marketing, design, and other self-taught skills are pretty valuable, however you came by them. Whether you're looking to break into a field or just augment your skill set, dig into our guide to getting a free college education online, which we then updated a bit with Education Portal’s list of ten universities with the best free online courses. Just think about it—at home, with your coffee and comfortable chair, you're far more awake than the average co-ed who totally should have hit the hay a bit earlier last night.

Where do you turn when you have to teach yourself something? What skills or topics would you like to see more coverage of on Lifehacker, or just anywhere on the web? Help us plan a curriculum in the comments.

This Week’s Top Downloads [Download Roundup]

• Top 10 Tiny & Awesome Windows Utilities (Windows)
  It’s the little things that make a Windows system great-like utilities that use less than 10MB of memory to make your life easier. Here are 10 apps that pack a lot of greatness into very little space.
• Killer Typography Tools and Free Font Downloads
  Whether you’re putting together a resume, flyer, or web page, everyone needs to find and compare fonts some time. Here are some tools that can help you find the perfect font.
• Magnifique Customizes Your OS X Theme (Mac)
  Not keen on Leopard’s default theme, or just prefer to ditch the status quo for something more your style? Free application Mangifique quickly and easily swaps custom themes in OS X.
• Better Gmail for Google Chrome (Windows)
  Better Gmail for Google Chrome is a compilation of user scripts designed to enhance your Gmail experience-and to make it easy, we’ve tested and bundled them together in one easy download.
• Synergy-Plus Controls Multiple Systems from a Single Keyboard & Mouse (Windows)
  We took a strong liking to controlling multiple computers with a single keyboard and mouse nearly two years ago, and the concept’s still cool, but the software hasn’t updated. Synergy-Plus keeps the multi-control party going.
• Boxee Adds Pandora, PBS, New API (and Fixes Hulu) (WIndows/Mac/Linux)
  Open-source media center Boxee debuted a new Alpha release tonight, adding support for Pandora music streaming, PBS video feeds, and changes that open it up to more multimedia goodness (oh, and fix Hulu streaming, too).
• Outlook 2007 Update Boosts Performance and Responsiveness (Windows)
  Microsoft is offering a “cumulative update” for Outlook 2007 users running SP1 that its developers promise will improve hard disk usage, startup and shutdown times, and help those with smaller, cached mailbox storage.
• Display Your Desktop Icons in List View (Windows)
  DesktopListView is an really tiny application that activates a list view of small icons on your destop, giving you more room for an intriguing desktop or custom-sized windows.
• Vuze Converts BitTorrent Downloads to Device-Friendly Formats (Windows/Mac/Linux)
  Vuze-one of the most popular BitTorrent clients around-has just added a killer feature that allows you to easily transcode any download so its playable on your iPhone, iPod, Apple TV, PS3, and Xbox 360.
• Close’n Forget Removes Browser Tracks of the Site You’re On (Firefox)
  Close’n Forget, one of the runners-up for Mozilla’s Best Firefox 3 Extensions, has updated to, well, actually work more often, erasing any site’s cookie/history/AwesomeBar evidence from Firefox with one button click.

Help Loic Le Meur (Seesmic) and John Furrier (Silicon Angle) find new hosting

This Week’s Most Popular Posts [Highlights]

Time for a look back at all the productivity goodies you loved this week on Lifehacker.

If you missed too many posts over the course of the week, your Lifehacker eyes may be bigger than your productivity stomach. Consider giving our top stories feed a try, or get really specific with your own customized feed. Here are this week’s best posts:

• Top 10 Tiny & Awesome Windows Utilities
  It’s the little things that make a Windows system great-like utilities that use less than 10MB of memory to make your life easier. Here are 10 apps that pack a lot of greatness into very little space.
• Five Best Web Browsers
  It’s probably the most important and debated piece of software on the modern computer. See how your fellow readers get around the net, and vote for your favorite web browser, in this week’s Hive Five.
• Turn an Old Laptop into a Wall-Mounted Computer
  Why settle for a digital picture frame when, in the same wall space, you could mount an entirely functional computer/slideshow player/TV tuner? Lifehacker reader Justin took an old Sony Vaio laptop he wasn’t using and turned it into a wall-mounted computer.
• First Look at Ubuntu 9.04 “Jaunty Jackalope” Beta
  The name’s ridiculous, but “Jaunty Jackalope,” the next release of the popular Linux distribution Ubuntu, is seriously focused on the user experience.
• Ramit Sethi on Getting Rich and Automating Your Money
  Ramit Sethi, author of I Will Teach You To Be Rich and the same-named blog, answered a few questions recently about managing and automating money.
• Academic Earth Aggregates Lectures from MIT, Harvard, Yale, and Others
  Web site Academic Earth is like Hulu for academic lectures, pulling free lectures from Berkeley, Harvard, MIT, Princeton, Stanford, and Yale into one attractive, easy to navigate site.
• Killer Typography Tools and Free Font Downloads
  Whether you’re putting together a resume, flyer, or web page, everyone needs to find and compare fonts some time. Here are some tools that can help you find the perfect font.
• Switch to a Two-Week Grocery Cycle to Waste Less Food
  The Green Cheapskate Blog cites studies showing that the American grocery shopper wastes 25 percent of their purchased food-if not more. Switch to an every-other-week shopping regimen, and you might start throwing less money away.
• 101 Recession-Busting Free Sites and Downloads
  PC World just published my (Adam’s) big old compendium of great free web sites and downloads. They’re calling it 101 Great Free Sites and Downloads You’ve Probably Never Heard Of, but you’re Lifehacker readers, so you’ve seen most of them at some time or another here.
• Create Edible Gummy Shot Glasses
  Trying to figure out what to serve your skittles-infused vodka in? Why, a flavored gummy shot glass, of course. ShesParticular at tinkering haven Instructables uploaded a ridiculously simple tutorial on making your own gummy shot glasses.
• Make Your Home Dust-Proof
  Cut down on the time you spend dusting and make the air in your home healthier with a few simple tips.

Synergy-Plus Controls Multiple Systems from a Single Keyboard & Mouse [Downloads]

Windows only: We took a strong liking to controlling multiple computers with a single keyboard and mouse nearly two years ago, and the concept’s still cool, but the software hasn’t updated. Synergy-Plus keeps the multi-control party going.

As you can see in the screen above, Synergy-Plus offers much the same kind of multi-computer control as the Synergy2 download, but has been adding regular bug fixes and feature tweaks, whereas the original hasn’t seen an update since early 2006. Our setup guide should get anyone who wants to run separate systems on multiple monitors up and running, but the Synergy-Plus fork team has provided its setup guide for those looking for a comprehensive run-down. Synergy-Plus is a free download for Windows systems only; for the Mac and Linux computers you might be controlling, try SynergyKM (Mac OS X) and the platform-independent original on Linux (unless our readers have any more up-to-date suggestions for *nux systems?). Thanks, Tom!

Synergy-Plus Controls Multiple Systems from a Single Keyboard & Mouse [Downloads]

Windows only: We took a strong liking to controlling multiple computers with a single keyboard and mouse nearly two years ago, and the concept’s still cool, but the software hasn’t updated. Synergy-Plus keeps the multi-control party going.

As you can see in the screen above, Synergy-Plus offers much the same kind of multi-computer control as the Synergy2 download, but has been adding regular bug fixes and feature tweaks, whereas the original hasn’t seen an update since early 2006. Our setup guide should get anyone who wants to run separate systems on multiple monitors up and running, but the Synergy-Plus fork team has provided its setup guide for those looking for a comprehensive run-down. Synergy-Plus is a free download for Windows systems only; for the Mac and Linux computers you might be controlling, try SynergyKM (Mac OS X) and the platform-independent original on Linux (unless our readers have any more up-to-date suggestions for *nux systems?). Thanks, Tom!

« Previous entries