When you use a site like Gmail, you have to decide: Do I want to use the service’s website, or do I want to use it through an app, like Outlook? Here’s how to get the best of both worlds.

What I’m talking about is something called site-specific browsers, which are essentially dedicated apps derived from the browsers already installed on your system, designed to load up a single web app. Nothing else.

The thing is, limiting the app’s functionality to a single website means it can do native-like things, like have its own icon, serve up notifications in the OS X dock, and be launched from Spotlight or the Start Menu like a regular, native program.

It’s also a great way to run multiple instances of the same service—like two Gmail accounts—without one forcing the other to log out.

And hell, you use web apps like Facebook, Last.fm and Gmail just as much and just as hard as you do regular apps, so haven’t they earned their own icons? Their own windows, so they don’t get lost in a sea of tabs? Their own notifications? Their own places in your application menus?

Their own system processes, so a browser crash won’t knock them out, too? Their own lives? Yeah, sure they have. Here’s how to make it happen.

Mac OS X: Fluid

The best tool for creating site-specific apps in OS X is called Fluid. It’s a free framework for creating your own site-specific apps, based on WebKit, like Apple’s Safari or Google’s Chrome. So!

1. Download it Fluid here, and drag the app over to your Applications folder.

2. Since the site-specific browsers you’ll be creating will have their own icons, you’ll need to download those. If you don’t, Fluid will pull the site’s favorites icon to use as the system icon, which is fine, but can look a bit rough, especially if you run your OS X dock large, or use CoverFlow a lot. This Flickr group has hundreds of available icons, covering just about any site you can imagine. To use them, download the full-size .PNG from Flickr.

3. Create your app! When you open Fluid, You’ll be prompted with a window asking you for a URL, a site name (Which will be the app’s name, as far as your OS is concerned), a place to save the app (the Applications folder by default) and an option to either use the site’s favicon or a custom icon. Fill the fields out, and hit create.

4. Launch your app. The first time you start the app, you’ll be prompted to log into the service. After the initial login, though, Fluid will remember your details, so that when you start the app again, it’ll be all ready to go.

5. Customize! Ok, so you’ve got your web app—now it’s time to tweak. If you want to change the look of the site, or how certain parts of it function, Fluid supports client-side userscripts, which basically let you reformat the page, or add functionality to it, however you want. From within a Fluid app, click the Script icon in the Menu Bar, and click “Browse Userscripts.org” and see if you find anything you like. If you do, the script should be downloaded and copied to YourUserName/Library/Application Support/Fluid/SSB/YourApp’sName/Userscripts.

There are also a small number of Fluid plugins, which give Fluid greater native app-like powers. These are scattered around the internet, and a good central resource is hard to come by. This Google string tends to work pretty well for finding them, though.

In addition, Fluid itself has some application settings to play around with, most of which are self-explanatory. One that’s not, and that comes in handy a lot, is the “Allow Browsing to any URL” option under Settings > Advanced: This prevents new windows opened in Fluid from opening in your default browser instead, and cures most of the issues I’ve come across with using Fluid with less popular sites that may not have automatic presets built into Fluid.

Windows: Prism

Prism takes a slightly different approach to the creation of site-specific browsers, in that it’s an extension for Firefox, not its own app. The creation process, though, isn’t terribly different. Here’s the routine:

1. Download the Prism extension for Firefox here. (Note: some people have issues with Prism freezing during the setup process, or find core functions, like minimizing to the system tray, missing in this version. In that case, download the last version of Prism right here—it should fix everything, without sacrificing any major features.)
2. Navigate to the webpage you want to convert into an app, let it load, and select “Convert Website to Application” from the Tools menu in Firefox. You’ll be prompted with these options. Fill them out as you please:

If you’d like to use a custom icon, as opposed to the website’s favorite’s icon, you should download a full-res .PNG file from this Flickr group. These are icons created with Fluid (above) in mind, so some may have an OS X-like aesthetic, but they will work, and in the context of Windows 7, they usually look pretty great.

And that’s it! Prism isn’t as immediately customizable as Fluid for OS X, but it gets the job done.

Alternative: Prism supports something called “Bundles”, which automatically apply settings and application icons for popular websites with a single click. Here are a few to try.

Alternative II: Chrome for Windows offers similar functionality to Prism, albeit in a rather basic, stripped-down form. If your only goal is to isolate web apps in their own windows, though, this’ll work fine, and takes just a few seconds:

The New York Times has a long, juicy look at what’s been going on behind the scenes with the ever-escalating conflict between Google and Apple. The cause for all the enmity, according to insiders? Ego.

When Apple filed suit against HTC earlier this month, it was clear that Google and Apple’s romance had turned sour. But the Times’ article, which draws on “interviews with two dozen industry watchers, Silicon Valley investors and current and former employees at both companies,” offers a sense of just how personal this battle is and always has been. The writers begin by summarizing:

At the heart of their dispute is a sense of betrayal: Mr. Jobs believes that Google violated the alliance between the companies by producing cellphones that physically, technologically and spiritually resembled the iPhone. In short, he feels that his former friends at Google picked his pocket.

The article starts with the good old days, when the two companies were cooperative and when the individuals that ran them were close. Even before the mutually-beneficial industry chuminess between Steve Jobs and Eric Schmidt, Jobs had a personal relationship with those heading Google.

In the company’s early days, the article explains, Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin “considered Mr. Jobs a mentor,” and they did the things that mentors and mentees do:

[Sergey] Brin was also known to take long walks with Mr. Jobs near his house in Palo Alto, and in the nearby foothills of the Santa Cruz Mountains. According to colleagues, they discussed the future of technology and planned some joint ventures that never came to fruition – like a collaborative effort to develop a version of Apple’s Safari browser for Windows.

Google’s development of Android, however, was the thin end of the wedge, and even in its early stages was a source of tension. The article recounts one Android-related meeting between Jobs and Google that sounds mighty uncomfortable:

At one particularly heated meeting in 2008 on Google’s campus, Mr. Jobs angrily told Google executives that if they deployed a version of multitouch – the popular iPhone feature that allows users to control their devices with flicks of their fingers – he would sue. Two people briefed on the meeting described it as “fierce” and “heated.”

Eventually, we on the outside caught wind of the conflict. As early as January 2008, Jobs was slighting Android, and a year after that we heard that Apple had stopped multitouch on Android altogether. We watched things get publicly uncomfortable when Apple rejected Google Voice from the app store. And soon we saw their acquisitions become undeniably competitive, Apple allegedly feeling that Google “stole” AdMob from them and preemptively gobbling up Lala in return. On the AdMob acquisition, the article reveals that Apple had a 45-day window in which it could have purchased the company for $600 million, but they stalled and Google swept in to outbid them. After this move, a source says, “Mr. Jobs speculated that AdMob might have violated its legal obligations, with help from Google.”

At the time, the AdMob saga suggested that the stakes were being raised in the face-off, and Apple’s recent patent infringement suit against HTC was just further confirmation that the bad blood was turning into a blood bath.

In January we heard that Apple was in talks with Microsoft to replace Google with Bing as the default search engine on iPhones and iPads, and the Times article ends by mentioning that “One Apple employee says that Qi Lu, the president of Microsoft’s online services division, was recently seen visiting Apple’s campus in Cupertino to discuss such a deal.”

The Apple-Google war is waged by massive, relentless corporations, but it is fueled by the bruised egos of a few men. Given a better picture of how personal the conflict has been all along, it’s hard to imagine the giants reconciling anytime soon. [NY Times]

At least in the parts of the internet I frequent, pet pictures have been enjoying an unusual popularity as of late. FujiFilm’s Finepix Z700 has technology that snaps a photo when your furry friend smiles. Talk about capturing the zeitgeist.

This 12MP point-and-shoot is the first to include FujiFilm’s pet detection software, but early adopters beware: apparently there are still some kinks to be worked out.

At a camera show in Japan this week, the Z700 excelled at shooting stuffed animals but was a bit less successful when live animals were thrown in front of the lens. It also has trouble tracking animals if they’re moving around.

But if your pet is sitting perfectly still, and is of a type mentioned on FujiFilm’s extensive list of breeds that work best with the technology, the Finepix Z700 might help you get that perfect shot.

The camera will be available later this month for $280. [FujiFilm via PC World]

Just over a year ago, Dell pushed out its latest and greatest 24-incher, the energy-sipping G2410. Today, the Round Rock powerhouse has introduced that very unit’s successor (complete with a height adjustable stand), the G2410H.

Still sized at 24-inches, this 1080p LCD monitor sports a variety of eco-modes, 5 millisecond response time, 160-degree (horizontal) / 170-degree (vertical) viewing angles, a native 1,920 x 1,080 resolution, ambient light sensor, 250 nits of brightness, a 1,000:1 contrast ratio and DVI / VGA inputs.

We’ve had one in-house for around a week now, and for $339, it’s not a bad replacement to that 21-inch CRT that’s still weighing heavily on your desk. It’s not as sharp and brilliant as the (admittedly more expensive) UltraSharp U2711, but it was certainly clear enough for the average home user. It’s shipping now if you just can’t resist.

Push-up bars for the Wii Balance Board? Now that sounds like a fantastic idea — just the thing broad-shouldered individuals need to play Wii Fit without backstrain.

Too bad this particular set of bars isn’t worth the plastic it’s printed from. The latest and greatest from the minds in the chintzy plastic peripheral industry, the $25 CTA Digital Wii Push Up Bar is held in place by only your weight and a few foam strips without reinforcement of any kind, meaning it could detach itself with any significant exertion.

The only good that comes out of all this is an embarrassing video demonstration after the break, which features a pair of smiling humans pretending to have fun with the contraption. QVC, eat your heart out.

Target hits the mark every time! Find everything cheap but chic in one amazing superstore. Fashion from Mizrahi, home goods, hot electronic gadgets, sports equipment, toys galore and more.

Spend your $500 however you want, whenever you want, on anything you want!

Is it an Android tablet? An e-reader? Just a sweet gadget with two screens? Truth is the Entourage Edge is a little bit of everything, and that’s exactly why we’ve been so intrigued with the “dualbook” since we fondled it at CES.

Finally ready to make its shipping debut, the $499 dual screen device is aimed at students, but really it’s for anyone interested in a combination 9.7-inch E Ink reading / note-taking experience and a 10.1-inch Android web tablet. It’s sounded very cool to us for quite a while, but there’s always a difference between hype and reality.

Does the Edge live up to its promise or attempt to do too much? The only place to find out is after the break in our full review.

Look and feel

Here’s the thing about the inch-thick Edge – it’s large. The size of a netbook large. It’s not only thicker than most e-readers – three times thicker than the Kindle DX — but it’s heavier too. Holding up the three-pound device while lying on a couch was more of an upper body work out than we’d care for, but we do assume most students will stand it up or lay it flat on a desk. And like the Motorola Backflip, the Edge has taken some yoga classes: it can do the reverse clamshell and flip its screens so that they lie back to back.

We’d be lying if we said we thought the Edge was attractive. When closed the glossy white and boxy design continually made us think that it belonged in a sterile hospital room, and its silverish gray trim doesn’t really do much for us either. Entourage does plan to offer a variety of colors, but it’s still quite vanilla looking. The other thing that makes the Edge look like a laptop is the number of ports that surround it: two USB, a micro-USB, mic and headphone jacks, and SIM and SD card slots. A stylus is tucked into the side, and a curious three megapixel camera lives above the LCD screen. We looked through Android menus for about 20 minutes before we realized there’s no way to use it — a future software update will apparently enable camera functionality.

E-reader experience

Like the Kindle DX, the Edge’s 1200 x 825-pixel, 9.7-inch E-Ink screen is spacious and fits more text on the page than the average six-inch reader. As usual, there’s a fairly long refresh when turning pages and zooming in on text, but we really found the overall reading experience to be pleasant. It’s easy to page through a book using the physical forward and back buttons, though it would have been nice if finger swipes on the touch-enabled E Ink display did the same.

Speaking of the touch, it’s pretty nice: you can underline/highlight text and jot down notes in the margin or in a separate journal page with the included stylus, and you also can save a marked up page or journal document as a PDF and then easily transfer it to the LCD screen and email it to a friend. Pretty impressive, but because the screen is E Ink based the writing experience is laggy; there’s about a second delay until the text shows up. Those worried about missing a word can always launch the Android audio recorder which uses the Edge’s dual microphones. They picked up a bit of background noise when we recorded a meeting, but we could clearly make out the conversation.

As an e-reader the Edge is actually solid until it comes to buying books. Though you can download books over the air from the Entourage Edge store, the selection is lacking compared to Amazon and Barnes & Noble’s e-book stores, not to mention quite expensive. Entourage says there are over 225,000 trade books, 65 current New York Times best sellers as well and over 1,500 newspapers in its store — we found some titles by our favorite authors including Nick Hornby and Jodi Picolt, but when searching for others like John Grisham we came up empty handed.

The company is really banking on people using the device to download free ePub books and PDFs from Google Books. You can actually do this right from the Android browser on the LCD screen; once you download a book the Edge automatically puts it in your library and will open it on the E Ink display. You can also sideload content either using the SD slot or by transferring files to the 4GB of onboard memory directly from your desktop.

Android tablet experience

It’s when you start using the 10.1-inch Android tablet on the right side that the Edge shows signs of weakness. While the standard Android 1.6 apps are present and Entourage has also thrown in Docs to Go, the Edge doesn’t support the Android Marketplace. Yes, this means no downloading your favorite Android apps, and yes, it sucks. We felt lost without our go-to internet radio and Twitter apps. As a consolation, we’re also told that the company is planning on launching its own Android app store for the device soon.

The rest of the Android experience is also quite mediocre. To its credit the company has added a nice shortcut bar to the home screen with icons to the library, bookstore, browser and e-mail, but the resistive touchscreen gets in the way of smoothly navigating menus and browsing the web. While we got the hang of having to press harder on the screen and on the virtual keyboard, we seemed to select the wrong links and letters more often than not. There’s a trackball on the right to make up for it, but it just felt counterintuitive to switch between the screen and the ball. In the end, the tablet is best used for light web browsing, checking email and listening to some music — the speakers between the screens are actually fairly loud. Oh and while the company promises Flash Lite support, we couldn’t get YouTube videos to play in the browser, and the YouTube app isn’t preloaded.

Performance and battery life

As for performance, we don’t necessarily think the Edge is slow — it’s just not fast. It certainly isn’t as fast as an Atom netbook or the Snapdragon-powered Nexus One, but the Marvell Armada PXA168 processor was fine for keeping open a few browser tabs and playing some music in the background. However, it was sluggish when having to backtrack through menus. WiFi browsing speed was decent; it took 4 seconds to load Engadget.com. There’s a SIM slot on the top of the device, but like so much else on the Edge, it hasn’t been enabled yet.

Battery life is really dependent on what you’re doing. With WiFi and both screens turned on the Edge only lasted four hours. That’s pretty awful for an ARM-based tablet like this, but if you turn off the LCD screen in settings – we wish there was a physical switch for this – it should get over 16 hours of standby. (That’s still less than the Kindle’s three days.) Oddly, when we closed the device it didn’t go to sleep, but this will apparently be fixed in the first firmware update. Still, you’ll have to charge the Edge quite frequently — too bad the charger is larger and less portable than most laptop AC adapters.

Wrap-up

Yes, the Edge is a combination e-reader and a Android tablet — it just doesn’t quite work well as either. For $499 there are just too many issues with it, including its chunky body, skimpy e-book selection, frustrating touchscreen, poor battery life and lack of Android apps. While promised software updates may yet fix enough issues and enable enough features to perhaps make it a decent textbook replacement for some students, we just can’t say that its worth the cash right now. And so our wait continues.