Nov 20, 2009 8:04pm GMT
Bookmarks can come in handy when working with long and complex documents, but the way this feature works in OpenOffice.org is not particularly intuitive. The bookmarks you add to the document are not visible, and you have to use the Navigator to view the bookmarks and jump to a bookmarked place in the document. The VisibleBookmarks extension offers a simple solution to the problem. Once instal... more »
Roll Out Your Own Dropbox AlternativeNov 19, 2009 5:46pm GMT
Dropbox is without doubt an extremely useful service, but it has two major drawbacks: it uses proprietary software and -- as with any cloud-based service -- you leave your data at the mercy of a third party. So why not roll out your own solution that replaces Dropbox and runs on your own server? If you like the idea, then the Fak3r blog provides step-by-step instructions on how to set up your... more »
Scribble Notes with SimpleTextNov 18, 2009 5:58pm GMT
Here is a genuinely useful Web-based application -- SimpleText. It is, indeed, a rather simple online note-taking application that is positively light on features. It doesn't offer any fancy text formatting tools, and you won't find any advanced sharing capabilities in it either. So what's so "genuinely useful" about it, then? Again, it's simplicity. I find it particularly useful for... more »
Manage Photos with ShotwellNov 16, 2009 8:43pm GMT
When it comes to organizing and tweaking photos, digiKam and F-Spot rule the roost. But if you don't need all the bells and whistles of a full-blown photo management tool, then you might want to try Shotwell. If you are running the latest version of Ubuntu, installing Showtell is rather straightforward. Launch the Synaptic package manager, c... more »
Extension Watch: Keep Tabs on Documents with History MasterNov 13, 2009 5:16pm GMT
While the Recent Documents command under the File menu gives you quick access to the previously opened documents, this feature has a few serious limitations. For example, you can't change the number of documents it keeps and there is no way to delete entries you don't need. The History Master extension aims to solve these problems and adds a few other creature comforts that make it easier to k... more »
Batch Renaming Photos with Command-Line ToolsNov 07, 2009 4:44pm GMT
Using date and time stamps as file names makes it significantly easier to manage your photos, and tools like Rapid Photo Downloader can automatically rename photos on the fly when downloading them from the camera. But what if you already have hundreds or even thousands of photos? In this case, you can rename them using a few simple command-line tools. The first one is the exiv2 package which c... more »
Creating Ebooks with SigilNov 05, 2009 7:56pm GMT
There are plenty of places on the Web where you can find ebooks in the EPUB format, but what if you need to create an ebook yourself? Sigil can help you with that. This nifty application allows you to create ebooks using the graphical interface without getting your hands dirty with coding. Despite being a relatively new application, Sigil already sports all the essential features that simplify... more »
