Tag: tools

#3SkillsYEG, Edmonton Tool Library, LRT operators like pilots

Here’s the latest entry in my Edmonton Etcetera series, in which I share some thoughts on a few topical items in one post. Less than I’d write in a full post on each, but more than I’d include in Edmonton Notes. Have feedback? Let me know!

3SkillsYEG – what three things will you learn?

Today the Edmonton Public Library launched a new City of Learners campaign called #3SkillsYEG:

“#3SkillsYEG invites Edmontonians to create their own version of Robinson’s adventure by learning, teaching and sharing three new things with each other in 2016. By declaring to learn a skill related to “Personal Growth & Well-Being” in February; “Creativity & Expression” in March; and “Making Our City Better” in April, and sharing it on social media, participants will be entered to win an iPad, $200 towards Metro Continuing Education and tickets to the Telus World of Science.”

You can learn more about #3SkillsYEG here. Participating is simple – just pick three skills you want to learn and commit to learning one each month. You don’t have to follow the monthly themes, but that’s potentially a good way to stay on track. There’s going to be events related to each one too. You can enter the contest by declaring the skills you’re going to learn here.

Making a Better Burger
Me learning to make a better burger at Farmfair back in November

I really like this initiative, so I agreed to be a Learning Champion. What that means is that I’ll be participating and sharing my progress and encouraging others to do so as well. My list of “things to learn” is far longer than I’m able to tackle, but I will pick three for #3SkillsYEG and will be writing about each one in the coming months.

Edmonton Tool Library

Here’s a great idea that’s long overdue that two Edmontonians are finally doing something about. Leslie Bush and Robyn Webb are starting the Edmonton Tool Library, which will let you borrow tools just like you can currently borrow books and other items from the public library. There are tool lending libraries all around the world, including in many Canadian cities. Here’s the news from CBC Edmonton:

“The plan is to open the new tool library downtown, where many residents don’t have the room to store many tools. The group doesn’t yet have a firm opening date in mind, but is hoping to be up and running later this year. Edmontonians who sign up for an annual membership will be able to borrow tools for limited periods of time.”

For now they have a Facebook page and an idea. Sometimes that’s good enough to get something going. If you want more information or to find out how to get involved, sign up for their mailing list here.

Vancouver Tool Library Est. 2011
Vancouver’s Tool Library launched in 2011, photo by Richard Eriksson

This idea has come up dozens of times in recent years, especially after Make Something Edmonton launched, but to my knowledge no one has actually tried to make it happen. There are some related initiatives that have been very successful in Edmonton, like ENTS which does provide access to a variety of tools including drills, saws, and more for use in their space. But to be able to borrow a power tool for use in your home, that’s pretty interesting.

The other obvious initiative that comes to mind is EPL’s Makerspace. Like ENTS, there are some tools there you can use on-site, including a couple of 3D printers. There’s no tool library though, at least not yet. With the revitalization of the Stanley Milner library downtown gearing up there’s a related effort called “Makerspace 2020” to determine how the Makerspace should evolve. I know for a fact that tools have come up in consultations on that project, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see EPL itself offer something in the near future.

The LRT driver who sounds like a pilot

If you’ve been a passenger on the LRT recently, you might have heard Jon Morgan. He’s an LRT operator who entertains passengers by giving them updates on connections, the weather, nearby attractions, and more. I heard him recently and was amused, and judging by the smiles, it seems my fellow passengers were too. Here’s what he told Global Edmonton:

“I love our city and I like to learn as much as I can about our city, relay it across to the people. I just like to brighten people’s days as much as possible.”

I’d say he’s doing a good job of that!

If this all seems oddly familiar, that’s because it is. Back in 2010, essentially the same story was written about Tim Mireault. And then again in 2012. Good stories are worth repeating, I guess!

Get your digital house in order for 2015

Maybe you make new year’s resolutions, maybe you don’t. Either way, a new year always brings the feeling of starting fresh! That thing you’ve been putting off? Now’s the time to wipe the slate clean and tackle it. With that in mind, here are some tech-related things you might consider starting 2015 with.

Backup your stuff

It’s always a good idea to backup your stuff regularly, and now’s as good a time as any to set this up if you’ve been putting it off. Any backup strategy is better than no backup strategy, but ideally you’d have multiple copies of important data, stored locally and in a remote location. Have some really important stuff? Put it on a USB drive and stick it in a safe deposit box. For most data though, a combination of a local drive and the cloud is probably the way to go.

Backblaze 2.0 (fisheye)
Photo by ChrisDag

I have been using Backblaze for a couple of years now. For $5 per month or $50 per year, you get worry-free, unlimited backup. You simply install the software on your computer (Windows or Mac) and Backblaze will send everything up to the cloud automatically. You don’t need to worry about choosing specific folders to backup, and everything is encrypted. If you ever need to restore something, there are three options: you can download a zip file for free, you can pay $99 to get up to 128 GB sent on a USB flash drive, or you can pay $189 to get up to 4 TB sent on a hard drive. If you’ve ever lost something important, I think you’ll agree that Backblaze is totally worth the price.

Store stuff in the cloud

Related to the backup task, now’s a great time to take advantage of cloud storage. If you save stuff to the cloud regularly, I think you can worry about backing it up a little less. Saving data to the cloud is like backing it up immediately! You’ve probably been exposed to Dropbox and that’s a fine service but I’m a big fan of OneDrive.

OneDrive

With Dropbox you only get 2 GB of storage for free, but with OneDrive you get 15 GB and it’s really easy to earn more (and as an Office 365 subscriber I get unlimited storage). OneDrive supports Windows, Mac, Android, iOS, and Xbox. I use it for everything, especially OneNote as I wrote about last year. I can’t recommend it enough!

Another service to keep in mind is Mover. They’re a local company, and their service can help to migrate your data from one cloud storage provider to another. That might be useful if you plan on testing a few out. You could also use Mover’s backup service for $4 per month. Another great addition to your toolkit!

Get organized

Are you a to-do-list person? Maybe you like sticky notes? Spreadsheets? There are countless ways to organize your tasks and ideas, and I have tried my share of them. But over the past year, I’ve found that Trello works best for me.

Trello

Trello is the right combination of simplicity and power. You can create boards, which contain lists, which contain cards. You can then move cards from list to list. A typical setup will have “To Do”, “Doing”, and “Done” lists. And let me tell you, moving a card into that “Done” list is super satisfying! Trello works across devices and platforms, has a great responsive website, and is free!

A local service that you might use in a similar fashion is Stormboard, which provides a shared, real-time sticky note whiteboard. It’s a great tool, focused mainly on collaborating with others (which Trello can do too). Check out the tour to see all that Stormboard can do.

If more traditional task lists are your thing, then I’d recommend Remember the Milk. The service has been around for 9 years already, which feels like an eternity in the web space, but it’s still here because it is excellent. It too works across devices and services, and has a pretty advanced set of features.

Improve your security

Security was a big topic last year and will continue to be in the headlines this year. It can seem incredibly daunting to try to protect yourself in the post-Snowden world, but here are two really important things you can do.

First, stop using the same password for everything. In the security world people often talk about “attack surface”, and a different password for every website you use really decreases your attack surface. Because if one service is hacked and you use the same password everywhere, then all of your other accounts would be vulnerable too!

If you only use one or two websites, it’s easy to remember a different password for each. But more than likely you use dozens of services. That’s where a tool called a password manager comes in. I use LastPass because it works across devices and uses strong encryption to keep my data safe (I have used Passpack in the past too). When I sign up for a new website or app, I add it to LastPass and use a strong password that it generates for me automatically. If I had to remember every password, I’d be much less likely to use a strong password (random combination of characters), so that’s another benefit of using a service like LastPass (I take it a step further and generate random answers to the very insecure password recovery questions too).

So, what happens if LastPass gets hacked? Good question. Certainly their approach to encryption is one level of protection, but two-factor authentication is another. And that’s my second security tip – enable two-factor authentication wherever possible!

2FA

Two-factor authentication (2FA) makes your accounts more secure by requiring additional information when logging in. Typically this is a code sent to you via text message or generated in a specific app, the idea being that even if someone had your password, they’d also need your phone to login. It takes a few extra seconds when logging into a website or app, but it’s worth it. There’s an excellent list of websites that support 2FA here. For services that support software-based 2FA rather than text messages, you’ll need an app like Google Authenticator on Android or iOS, or Authenticator on Windows Phone.

Maybe you don’t want to enable 2FA on every site, but you should enable it on your email account at minimum (and get a new one if yours doesn’t support 2FA). So much of our identity and security online is tied to our email accounts, so it’s a critical area to focus on. Apple, Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo all support 2FA. I also use it on key social media accounts on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn. Of course I use it on financial services like PayPal wherever possible too.

Backup your data, start using cloud storage, use an online tool to get organized, and take some simple steps to improve your security. All the best in 2015!

OneNote + OneDrive = Awesome

Without good tools to keep me organized, I’d be totally scatterbrained and lost. Well, good tools and an understanding partner who helps me keep on top of things! I have tried a bunch of different tools over the years, but two in particular have become absolutely critical: OneNote and OneDrive. This isn’t a sponsored post, I just want to share two tools that have really made a difference for me. Maybe they’ll have a positive impact on your life too!

OneNote

OneNote has developed into an amazing tool since it was launched over ten years ago. I originally used it locally on my computer to keep track of typed notes. I also had a Tablet PC, so I would use it for handwriting too. OneNote supports more advanced features also, like audio or video notes, photo notes, smart tags, document scanning, screen clippings, and much more.

Here’s an overview of the new OneNote:

I use OneNote many times a day, across most of my devices. I track my computer activity with RescueTime, so I know with certainty that OneNote is consistently in the top five applications by usage. It works on my desktop, my laptop, my Surface, and my phone. I run Windows everywhere, but even if your devices are a bit more varied, OneNote can work for you. There are apps for Android, iPad, and iPhone too. There’s even a web app.

At the moment I have two high level notebooks – one for personal stuff and one for work stuff. When I’m doing research for a blog post, I store everything in OneNote. I’ll even write some of my drafts there. I keep recipes, lists, and ideas in my personal notebook. My work notebook is filled mainly with meeting notes, often captured in ink using my Surface Pro, but I also use it for UI reviews, to keep track of technologies I’m exploring, and a variety of other things.

One of the greatest things about OneNote is the search. The ability to organize notes into sections is handy, and if you use tags you can quickly find any note that has a specific tag. But most of the time I just search. The best part is that OneNote will even search my handwritten notes, without any conversion to text. It’s surprisingly accurate, and it’s this feature that I typically demo to people when I’m showing them OneNote on my Surface. Support for this was added years ago and it still never fails to amaze.

OneDrive

OneDrive is the new name for SkyDrive, which first launched in 2007. It’s kind of like DropBox in that it is a place in the cloud to store your files. You get 7 GB of storage space for free, and it’s pretty easy and expensive to boost that amount.

Here’s an overview of the new OneDrive:

Again, OneDrive works across all of my devices, and again, there are apps for Windows, Mac, Android, iPad, and iPhone. There’s even an Xbox app, which comes in handy when you want to show some photos (which are stored automatically on OneDrive as I take them with my phone).

I put all kinds of stuff in my OneDrive (I’ve got over 47 GB of storage total, 20 GB of which comes from my Office 365 subscription). Everything I scan using my Doxie goes into OneDrive. Documents, presentations, audio recordings, graphics, mind maps, blog post drafts in MarkDown, – you name it, I store it in OneDrive.

Using OneDrive I don’t worry as much about backups (though I still use Backblaze and a few other approaches to do regular backups). Using OneDrive means I rarely have use for USB sticks, because my files are always in sync, across all my devices. OneDrive has completely changed the way I think about file storage, for the better.

The one and only feature I desperately want for OneDrive is co-owned folders, to bring DropBox-like folder sharing to the platform (you can share and collaborate on documents now, but I want to have an entire folder that is kept in sync across multiple OneDrive accounts). The good news is that the co-owner feature is apparently coming very soon.

OneNote & OneDrive are better together

The magic happens when you store your OneNote notebooks on OneDrive. All of the new Microsoft Office apps support logging in with a Microsoft Account, so it makes it super easy to do. I think this approach is probably the default for the phone and tablet apps too.

With OneNote on OneDrive, it doesn’t matter what device I’m using, because my notebooks are kept up-to-date with changes. The sync is completely automatic and fast. So fast actually, that it fits into a 6 second Vine:

I rely on this each and every day, so I’m glad I have never run into a sync problem. I can take some notes at home, walk over to the office, and pick up right where I left off on a completely different computer. I regularly take notes on my phone when I’m at an event, and when I get back to a computer to start blogging about it, I don’t need to worry about where my notes are. They’re always there, ready for me.

These two tools have made a big difference in my life. If you want to give OneDrive a spin, use this referral link and we’ll both get an extra 0.5 GB of storage space for free. If you want to try OneNote, you can download it for free here.

How do I network effectively? Good tools help!

I’m really looking forward to being one of the three panelists at tomorrow’s Capital Ideas Edmonton event tackling the question, “How do I network effectively?” I guess you could say I have had some success with networking and I definitely have some ideas and thoughts on the subject to share!

How do you approach someone in a crowd without seeming pushy? How can you best connect with someone you meet at an event? Should you send a follow up after first connecting? You have been sharing your networking advice, and now we’re asking three Edmonton entrepreneurs to share their experiences.

We’ll get into those questions and many more during lunch tomorrow, and my sense is that we’ll quickly coalesce around the notion that you simply can’t beat face-to-face interaction. We’ll probably touch on technology, but I don’t think it’ll be the focus. For that reason, I thought it might be interesting to share some of the tools I use to help me network effectively.

Business Cards

I look forward to a time when everyone carries around a device equipped with NFC technology so that we can just tap devices and have contact information shared instantly. We’re not there yet however, so most of us rely on business cards to pass our details to someone else. I tried to do away with business cards for a while, thinking that anyone could Google me really quickly. That experiment didn’t last long though – I learned that people like having something tangible. I’m still using the business cards I designed back in 2009 (with some minor adjustments) and I find they work well. I only have my website and email addresses on the front of the card, which reflects my preference for online communication instead of the phone. On the back of the card is a tag cloud with organizations and words that hopefully jog someone’s memory about where or how they met me. Plus, I think it looks cool! The challenge of course is that I always think of things to add to the tag cloud before I run out of cards. Notably absent at the moment? What the Truck?!.

Website

I have resisted the temptation to make my blog the “front page” of my website specifically so that I have a more static place to put contact information, a brief bio, and a photo. I think this useful for people who want to find out more after looking at a business card or my Twitter profile or some other page that lists my URL. I treat my website as a hub for all of my online activities (you’ll find links to most of my social media profiles). One new service that does this for you is about.me and if you don’t already have a website, I would recommend taking a look at it. Here’s my page.

Online Calendar

You can very often find me at Credo Coffee or one of the other coffee spots downtown because I love meeting with people face-to-face. I will sometimes initiate but very often I get messages from others who want to meet with me to discuss something. I found that keeping track of all the emails and going back-and-forth on availability was time consuming and error prone, so I started looking for tools to help. I settled on Doodle a few months ago, which I had already started using to organize group meetings with others.

Doodle has a great feature called MeetMe which gives you a page that others can use to book time with you (Tungle.me is another option). This requires syncing your calendar with Doodle, but it supports all of the popular options such as Google Calendar, Outlook, iCal, etc. You can see my Doodle page here. Scheduling meetings is now really easy – I just point people to my Doodle page and they can suggest a time that works for them! I have scheduled more than three dozen meetings this way, and I now wonder how I ever got by without it. The basic service is free, but there’s a paid option if you want to customize your page.

Email & CRM

I have been a very happy Exchange/Outlook user for years, and last year I made the transition to Office 365 which is Microsoft’s hosted service. Whether you choose Exchange, Gmail, or some other service doesn’t matter too much, as long as you have access to it from anywhere. I don’t currently use a separate CRM tool, though I have given it some thought (not sure it is worth the effort). What I do right now is store contact details and simple notes about people in my Exchange address book, and I store longer form meeting notes (if necessary) using OneNote. I used Evernote for a while, but I’ve chosen the Microsoft ecosystem, and OneNote simply works better with Outlook, Skydrive, my Windows Phone, etc.

Social Networking

Have a favorite service? Chances are I am “mastermaq” there. I have profiles at most places, though my main networks are Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn. These services are great for keeping in touch with people, but they are also a great way to augment my address book. My Windows Phone automatically links contacts from my address book and social networking services together so that I have one master contact list. I can’t tell you how many times I haven’t had a phone number or email address in my Exchange address book but have found it via someone’s social networking profile. Very handy! And the best part is that you don’t really have to keep your address book up-to-date – your contacts do it for you.

Reminders

I use a combination of services to make sure that I don’t forget to follow-up on something or with someone, and I have to admit that I still miss things from time to time (I have a terrible memory). First, I make extensive use of flags in my email. If I can’t deal with something right away, I’ll flag it so that I can review it later. Second, I make use of lists and flags inside of OneNote. Sometimes it’s just easier to have a page with a list of stuff that I know to check. Third, I generally set reminders on events in my calendar. Fourth, and probably most important, I use Remember the Milk. There are dozens and dozens of task list or reminder services out there, but RTM does everything I need it and more. It is frequently updated and improved, it works on pretty much every device, it integrates with a ton of other services, and it’s fast and easy-to-use. Best of all, unless you need some of the advanced features, it is free!

Sync & Backup

I guess underlying all of the tools I have talked about above is that everything is synced to my various computers and devices automatically, as well was backed up. I use both Dropbox and Skydrive very extensively. While these are not “networking” tools, they are important to make sure that all the effort you put into writing things down isn’t all of a sudden lost one day!

Other

Although recent devices and software have improved the situation greatly, I think QR codes are still more of a gimmick than a useful tool. My preference would be to use a short URL that is relatively easy to type or write down instead of a QR code.

And finally yes, I will absolutely Google you before we meet!

I hope you find some of these tools useful for your own networking activities. More importantly, I’d love to hear about the tools you use that I haven’t even discovered yet! Let me know in the comments below.

I love Readability!

readabilityIf you spend any amount of time reading things on the web, you should be using Readability. Yes, I think it’s that simple! I really started using it after Anil Dash blogged about it back in November, and it has made an incredible difference for me. Here’s what it does:

“Readability turns any web page into a clean view for reading now or later on your computer, smartphone, or tablet.”

Simple enough, right? Simple, but powerful. After adding a simple bookmarklet to my browser, I am just one click away from having any web page become instantly more readable. And by that I mean larger text, a consistent font, and no clutter. Or I can save an article for later, or I can even send an article to my Kindle to read on that device instead.

Here’s an example of the difference it makes. The square on the left is the original article, and the square on the right is the Readability page that I get after clicking the bookmarklet (if you’re not logged in, you’ll have to click “Readability view” at the top of that page to see what I am talking about).

The comparison is better when you look at the actual pages, but do you see the difference? The Readability view is just text, no clutter. I could turn off images too, so even the featured image wouldn’t show up.

Here’s another example. Compare this Edmonton Journal article about Stephen Carter and Linda Sloan’s tweet debacle with this Readability view of the article. Which would you rather look at? On my laptop, with a resolution of 1600×900, the actual text of the article is below the fold on the Journal. With Readability, I can start reading right away, with nothing to distract me.

You can control the way it all looks too in the settings. You can pick a different color scheme, a different font size, you can hide images, etc.

In case you’re wondering about lost revenue because the ads aren’t being displayed, Readability has a solution for that too:

“Readability features an innovative way to support writers. Become a Readability Subscriber and 70% of your monthly contribution will go toward supporting great writing. Subscribing is entirely optional.”

“Here’s how it works: Every time you use Readability to read an article, a portion of your monthly contribution is earmarked for that publisher or writer.”

It’s a neat concept.

I love Readability. It makes the experience of reading things online much better. I’m also a fan of the Kindle functionality. Santa gave me a Kindle for Christmas, and with Readability I have been able to quickly and easily get content on it to read on a screen built for reading! I love reading the stuff at Longreads and Longform, but I spend enough time in front of a computer screen as it is, so being able to send those articles to my Kindle is huge.

If you read stuff online, check out Readability. You can see my reading list on Readability here.

Pingdom Website Monitoring

pingdom logo Pingdom is a service that monitors your websites and/or servers and can let you know when something goes wrong. Despite your best efforts, something will go wrong, so it’s important to know right away when it does so that you can take action. That’s exactly what Pingdom helps you do.

I should have written this a long time ago – I’m a very happy Pingdom customer! I’ve used dozens of different monitoring tools and services over the years, and without a doubt, Pingdom is my favorite. I first got an account in August 2007, when I took advantage of a free offer for Mashable readers (if I remember correctly). I didn’t use it right away, but when I did, I was impressed. So much so that I bought Pingdom Basic account ($9.95/mo or $119.40/year).

The two Pingdom terms you need to know are checks and notifications. A check is basically a website, mail server, or DNS server (there are HTTP/HTTPS, Ping, TCP, UDP, DNS, and POP3/IMAP/SMTP checks). A notification is an email address or cell phone number (for SMS). Pingdom Basic gives you 5 checks, unlimited email notifications, and 20 SMS notifications. Additionally, you get included uptime reports.

The best thing about Pingdom is that it’s fast and reliable. I receive notifications generally within about a minute of something going down. That’s much faster than anything else I’ve tried. I feel confident relying on Pingdom to let me know if something is wrong with my servers.

Another thing I love about Pingdom is their blog, called Royal Pingdom. They occasionally post about Pingdom-related things, but more often than not they post about the industry in general. They obviously put some time and effort into it though, because their posts are original, in-depth, and very interesting. For instance, earlier this week they posted about 12 great iPhone applications for sysadmins and webmasters. It’s the kind of thing that keeps me subscribed.

If you’re looking for a website monitoring solution, I’d strongly recommend Pingdom.

How do you keep track of things?

post it notesI’m a bit of a scatterbrain at times, I’ll admit that. I generally need to write something down if I want to have any hope of remembering it later. If an event is not in my calendar, I’ll almost certainly miss it. I also find that I’m terrible at keeping track of paper, so I try to avoid post-it notes whenever possible. Here are some of the tools I currently use to help me keep track of things (tasks, ideas, events, etc):

As you can see, it’s not a small list. You might think that there’d be quite a bit of overlap between these, but there isn’t really. For instance, I use RTM for tasks, things I actually need to do something about. In contrast, I mainly use OneNote for brainstorming.

For the most part, this toolset helps me keep track of things. It’s not the most efficient system in the world though, and I wonder if there’s something better? For a creative person such as myself, who loves to read and has a million thoughts and ideas a day, what tools exist to help keep track of it all? It’s like I need something to help annotate my life.

Maybe a new tool isn’t the solution. I don’t regularly review the items in each of the tools above, which might be something I should start doing.

Putting the Caps Lock button to good use with Enso 2.0 Launcher Prototype

enso launcher

All keyboards have a CAPS Lock button, but how often do you actually use it? If you’re like me, you probably press it accidentally more than you press it on purpose. What if you could put that button to good use? Wouldn’t that be great?

Unless you’ve just installed a fresh copy of Windows XP, chances are your Start Menu is a ridiculously large list. As you install applications over time, it becomes more and more difficult to find the one you want! What if there was an easier, faster way to launch applications? Wouldn’t that be great?

Humanized’s Enso 2.0 Launcher Prototype solves both of these problems at once.

I’ve been using a launch utility called Launchy for quite a while now, but the latest version has been nothing but trouble for me. It uses far too much memory and CPU, and most of the useful plugins from the old version don’t work in 2.0. So I went looking for something better (to be clear, this is far less of an issue on Vista thanks to the search functionality of the Start Menu).

Eventually I came across Enso. I noticed that there was a new “prototype” version out, and decided to download that instead of the stable release. I’m glad I did! Enso 2.0 Launcher Prototype runs in the background, and is summoned simply by holding down the CAPS lock button.

It’s important to note “holding down the CAPS lock button”. One of the unique things about Enso is that it is quasimodal – as soon as you let go of the CAPS lock button, it disappears. The way most applications work is with a hotkey, they are modal – press the button and the window appears until you get rid of it. You can read more about that here. It might seem awkward at first, but it actually makes a ton of sense and is pretty easy to get used to.

enso 2

I guess Enso 2.0 is actually quasimodal and modal…that is, you hold CAPS to open Enso, and type the “open” command to get the modal box shown above.

Enso does more than just launch applications, websites, files and directories. It has some other handy commands such as “uppercase” which will convert whatever text is selected into uppercase letters. It can also do things like calculate “2+2”. More than a launcher, Enso is a command system.

My only complaints thus far are that Enso seems to launch after everything else does on system startup, and occasionally it crashes. It’s definitely solid enough for day-to-day use though.

If you’re looking for an excellent launch utility, give Enso 2.0 a shot, and put your CAPS lock button to good use! (for the record, you can configure it to use a different key)

Notepad2: My favorite text editor!

notepad If there’s one thing you can count on having when you sit down at a Windows machine, it’s Notepad. The trusty little text editor even comes with the massively stripped-down Server Core edition of Windows Server 2008! Sometimes though, don’t you wish Notepad did just a little bit more? I used to, until I found the absolutely wonderful Notepad2.

Notepad2 looks a lot like Notepad, but it manages to include a ton of useful features while still remaining small and extremely quick. Here’s what it looks like on my Vista machine (sized down to fit):

notepad2

Notepad2 includes the following main features:

  • Syntax highlighting for lots of different programming languages and file formats (C# shown above)
  • Bracket matching
  • Encoding and newline conversion
  • Regular-expression search and replace

There are lots of really useful smaller features too, such as the zoom buttons on the toolbar, bookmarks, and favorites. I also really like the fact that there’s a “Read Only” item on the File menu that toggles the read only status of the file – super handy.

read only

There’s more information on Notepad2 at Wikipedia.

The download is less than 250 KB and there’s nothing to install. You can also download the source if you like. If English isn’t your language, there are 14 translated versions available.

If you do decide to download Notepad2, my advice would be to stick it in your C:WindowsSystem32 folder. That way, you can just type “notepad2” in the Run command or on any command line, and it’ll open. You should also add Notepad2 to your explorer context menu, so that when you right-click on a file, there’s an item to open it in Notepad2:

notepad2 open

To do that, download this zip file, extract it, right-click on the .reg file, and choose Merge. If you put Notepad2 somewhere other than the folder I mentioned above, edit the contents of the .reg file first.

Trust me, after you get used to using Notepad2, you’ll miss it dearly when you have to use a machine that only has Notepad. I stick Notepad2 (and the .reg file) on every USB key I have, so that I’ve always got it with me – that’s how much I love it!

Download Notepad2 from flo’s freeware

I Love TripIt (And You Will Too!)

Late last year I came across TripIt, a free Web 2.0 travel organization service. TripIt helps you automatically build an itinerary, access it from multiple locations and devices, share it with others, and more. It also automatically includes maps and weather forecasts, among other information.

I’ve used TripIt four times now. The first was my trip to New York over Christmas. I managed to convince Sharon to join, and we built our entire itinerary using TripIt. I also used it for my trip to Yellowknife, for Northern Voice 2008, and for my recent weekend trip to Calgary. TripIt is dead simple to use, and once you get used to using it you sort of get addicted!

The way it works is you book your flights, hotels, car rentals, and restaurant reservations as you would normally. Then, forward your confirmation emails to plans@tripit.com. TripIt will automatically recognize the information, and insert it into your new itinerary. The only time this hasn’t worked for me was when we made our reservation at Bar Americain in New York (which supports OpenTable). I have to think that was a temporary glitch, because it has been flawless ever since (including our OpenTable reservation at Blink in Calgary). Megan booked the flights to Vancouver for Northern Voice, so I didn’t have a confirmation email to forward. I entered the information manually, and TripIt even made that easier – it knew the departure and arrival times and other information based only on the airline and flight number. Pretty cool.

tripit

That’s why I love TripIt – it’s just so deliciously simple! Forward the confirmation email and you’re done.

Sure you can add extra information and custom items to the itinerary, but TripIt does the heavy lifting and that’s what is most important. You can print your itinerary of course, and the formatting that TripIt provides is really clean and simple. If you forget to do that however, no worries – TripIt can send you your itinerary via email! You can send the command “get trip” to plans@tripit.com, and it’ll respond with your information. Or you can send something more specific, such as “get flight”. It’s really quite neat! You can learn more about the TripIt To Me feature here.

Some other handy features that TripIt includes:

  • The ability to share your trips with others. They can be either viewers or collaborators, meaning they can add items to the itinerary.
  • A travel guide for your destination. TripIt will load information from Wikipedia, Flickr, Eventful, and more.
  • See Who’s Close is a new feature that shows you when your connections (friends) are going to be near you at any given time.
  • iCal support, meaning you can load your itinerary up in Outlook, Google Calendar, and more.

As much as I love TripIt, it’s not perfect. Here are the top three features I’d like to see them add:

  1. Twitter and SMS support! Most other apps that I use on a regular basis (such as Remember The Milk) have this. Email is great, but Twitter and text messaging are better.
  2. Facebook widget. What I’d really like is for TripIt to do what dopplr does – show upcoming trips, and post an item to my news feed when traveling. If TripIt had this feature, I probably wouldn’t use dopplr anymore.
  3. Library of locations. When we went to NY, we added items like “Greenwich Village” and “Statue of Liberty” ourselves. It would have been really awesome if TripIt could have recognized those locations and automatically included relevant information (such as directions from/to our previous/next locations, pricing information, etc). This feature would make TripIt absolutely incredible!

If you’re just planning a quick road trip to see family or friends, TripIt may not be that useful for you. For all other kinds of trips however, I think you’ll find TripIt to be absolutely indispensable. I can honestly say I won’t travel without it anymore!