Toodledo is a simple and easy to use online task manager which aims to help you become more organized, stay motivated and more productive. While there are many to-do list applications around, Toodledo stands out among the rest because of it has plenty of ‘killer‘ features. Read on for the review.

1st killer feature: Providing you an organized way to manage your to-do list

There are plenty of ways you can manage your to-do list in Toodledo. You can organize them into different folders, add subtasks for each task, insert tag for easy retrieval, group them into context for relevancy, starred it to show urgency and many other ways that suit your needs and preferences.

2nd killer feature: Highly accessible

While it is a web-based application, Toodledo has make it easy for you to access and update your to-do list in your daily life. You can choose to update your tasks via twitter, by talking to Jott, insert an entry to your Google calendar, as a gadget in Netvibes/Pageflakes, as a widget from your Mac dashboard, as a Firefox extension, from the ToDo app on your iPhone/iPod Touch or even subscribe to your own task list RSS feed.

3rd killer feature: Goal setting and progress tracking

We all know that any goals can be achieved by simply completing a list of tasks. The only problem is how we can keep ourselves motivated to complete the required tasks. Toodledo allows you to define your goals (short-term, long-term, lifelong) and create a list of task required to achieve that goals. It helps you to stay motivated, and at the same time allows you to track your progress and how close you are to achieving your goals.

4th killer feature: To do list booklet

You can easily print your to-do list as a foldable booklet that you can put in your pocket. Each booklet contains your hotlist, your top 110 most important tasks, and a section for written notes. Assembly of the booklet is as simple as one cut with a scissors and a few folds.

Now, if you feel that the above features are not enough and you wanted more, Toodledo has released their API so that you can easily create your own app and integrate it with Toodledo. Several useful features such as the Firefox extension make by third party developers using the API.

There are three accounts that you can sign up with Toodledo: free, pro and pro plus. The pro account costs $14.95 while the pro plus costs $29.95 per year. For the price you pay, you can enjoy extra features such as 1GB of storage space, goal progress tracking, booklet customization and many more.

Toodledo

There are thousand of great applications for the Mac OSX, and many of them come with a price. For someone who are used to using open-source software, or just don’t feel like paying the money for every single app, here is a list of the top 10 free applications that you (seriously) cannot live without. Rest assure that they are not any worst than the paid apps, some of them are even better.

1. AppTrap - AppTrap help you to eradicate all the unnecessary files when you uninstall an app. While Apple teaches you to simply drag and drop to the trash to uninstall the applications, it does not get rid of those library files that you created when installing the app. With AppTrap, you simply drag the application to the trash, and a window will pop up to ask if you want to delete the associated system files too. Simple as that.

2. AppFresh - While Apple built-in Software Update helps keep your software like iTunes and Mac OSX update, it doesn’t update your the third party apps that you have installed. What AppFresh does is to check your third party apps for new versions and let you download and install the latest update all in a single window. I have only started to use this app and I instantly fall in love with it. It not only save your money (it’s free), but also save your time in updating your application.

3.Adium - Having trouble juggling with various instant messaging accounts? With Adium, you can now have one software to ‘rule them all‘. Adium allows you to connect to any number of messaging accounts on any combination of supported messaging protocol and display all your contacts in a single window.There is no need for you to install various IM clients anymore.

4.VLC - VLC is a versatile media player that plays almost every media format that you throw to it. Yes, including Microsoft’s proprietary wmv format. Did I also mention that VLC is capable of encoding media content, streaming server and client, play movies with subtitles and timeshifting?

5. Handbrake - Handbrake is a DVD to MP4 converter that anyone can use with simple ‘click and run‘ interface. You don’t have to understand all the jargon such as frame rate, bit rate, sampling rate etc. Just pick the preset option and Handbrake will do the rest for you. (In case you don’t know, all version of iPod only supports MP4 (or H.264) video format. You need a converter to convert your DVD to iPod format)

6. Carbon Copy Cloner -  CCC does what Time machine don’t do; create a bootable clone. Time machine does incremental backup such that lose your file, but if your system crashes, you can’t boot from your Time capsule. What Carbon copy cloner (CCC) does is to create a bootable clone of your Mac disk to a backup drive. In the event that your Mac crashes, you can boot right off from the backup drive and restore all the setting.

7. Growl - Growl is a notification management app that is often overlooked by many. It integrates with many applications such as Adium, iTunes, Gmail notifier to send you notifications during events such as when your friend come online, the name of the current iTunes track, or when new mail arrives.

8. Main Menu - Main Menu optimizes, maintains and ensure that your Mac runs smoothly. You can rebuild your Spotlight library for faster searching, repairing permissions, cleaning caches to improve application performance, and even more advanced settings, such as enabling and disabling the Dashboard. MainMenu is full of powerful maintenance tools to keep your Mac running like new, within a slick, simple interface.

9. Neo Office - Can’t afford iWork or Microsoft Office? Neo Office is here to the rescue. NeoOffice is a port over from the popular Open Office suite. It contains the full set of office applications, including word processing, spreadsheet, presentation, drawing, and database programs.

10. Transmission - Transmission is a simple, lightweight, yet powerful bit-torrent client. While keeping its size small, there are plenty of features that make it on level with powerhouse - Azureus.

Did I say 10 apps? Sorry, I lied. Here is one more:

11. Caffeine - Caffeine is a tiny program that puts an icon in the right side of your menu bar. Click it to prevent your Mac from automatically going to sleep, dimming the screen or starting screen savers. Click it again to go back. Hold down the Command key while clicking to show the menu.

It can be very frustrating to buy a brand new keyboard with tons of function keys only to find out that your Linux OS does not support them. Although your keyboard package might come with a CD-ROM that contains the configuration software, it is most likely to be Windows-based and there is no way you can get it to load in Linux.

KeyTouch is the solution to this problem. It allows you to easily configure the extra function keys of your keyboard and define for every individual function key what to do when it is pressed.

While there are applications in both KDE and GNOME that allow you to bind actions to extra function keys, they require you to edit some configuration files. What KeyTouch has done is to simplify the process and makes it easy to use.

Installing KeyTouch

If you are using Ubuntu Hardy, KeyTouch is already included in the repository. Open up the terminal (Applications -> Accessories -> Terminal) and type

sudo apt-get install keytouch

Alternatively, go to System->Administration->Synaptic Package Manager and search for Keytouch. Check the box beside it and click Apply.

For other Linux distro, go to http://keytouch.sourceforge.net/dl-keytouch.php to download the installer package.

Configuring the Function keys

The first time you run KeyTouch, it will ask you to select the keyboard that you are using. Select your keyboard from the list and click the “OK” button. (If you can’t find your keyboard on the list, follow the instruction here)

After choosing the keyboard, KeyTouch will restart and load the main configuration window. The first tab you will see is the Key Setting. This is where you configure the action for each function key.

On the left, click on the key that you want to edit. On the right, select the action that you want it to perform. You can get it to perform its default setting (if there is any), open a program or to run a specific action from the plugin list.

The second tab is the Keyboard. This section shows the keyboard that you have selected previously. If you want to change the keyboard, you can just click ‘Change‘.

The third tab is the Preferences. This is where you can see all the available plugins and also some basic user setting. You will find that nothing happens when you click the ‘Download‘ button. This is because the path to the browser has not been set. Click the ‘Choose‘ button beside the Internet Browser field. Choose the default browser and click OK. Once you have done that, clicking the ‘Download‘ button will open up the browser and bring you to the KeyTouch plugin page.

What happens if I can’t find my keyboard in the list?

There are two solutions to this:

1) Go to http://keytouch.sourceforge.net/dl-keyboards.php and search for the keyboard file for your keyboard. Download the keyboard file to your desktop. In the KeyTouch keyboard selection window, click ‘Import‘ and select the keyboard file that you have downloaded.

2) If you can’t find the keyboard file in the KeyTouch website, you can create your own keyboard file using the KeyTouch Editor.

For Ubuntu, in your terminal, type

sudo apt-get install keytouch-editor

For other Linux distro, go to http://keytouch.sourceforge.net/dl-keytouch-editor.php to download the respective installer package.

Still in your terminal, type

sudo modprobe evdev
sudo keytouch-editor

A window will appear to show a list of all your input devices. Scroll down to look for your keyboard entry. Once you found it, highlight it and click OK.

A small dialog box will pop up to prompt you to press a function key. This allows the KeyTouch editor to detect whether the entry you selected is correct.

In the next window, you can enter the detail of your keyboard such as the Manufacturer and Model. On the bottom left pane, click ‘New‘ to add a function key. Once added, you will be able to define its action on the right pane.

When you are done with the editing, go to File->Save As and save the keyboard file on your desktop. Close the keytouch-editor.

Open your KeyTouch and import the keyboard file. You will be able to edit your keyboard function key now.

WattOS is a new lightweight Linux distribution that has low power requirement and can be used on computer with older hardware. It is in fact, a stripped down version of Ubuntu, with many of the heavy-duty applications such as OpenOffice removed, and/or replaced with a faster and smaller alternative.

According to the developer, there will be three desktop versions:

wattOS - The core desktop system using a fully featured Gnome desktop
mWattOS - A smaller desktop system using XFCE as the core interface.
µWattOS - An even smaller desktop utilizing a minimal desktop GUI or command line. Ideal for appliances, small systems, kiosks, or old computers.
Substation - A server edition

At the moment, only the full version of wattOS is available for download. Not much detail is known of the mWattOS, µWattOS and Substation yet.

Screenshot

WattOS is still in alpha stage and there are still plenty of work that need to be done. Meanwhile, you can download the source file at WattOS Download page.

For those shortcut key lovers out there, here is a long list of keyboard shortcuts for Ubuntu Hardy. Most of them should work in the previous version of Ubuntu as well. Enjoy the list.

General keyboard shortcuts

Ctrl + A = Select all
Ctrl + C = Copy the highlighted content to clipboard
Ctrl + V = Paste the clipboard content
Ctrl + N = New (Create a new document, not in terminal)
Ctrl + O = Open a document
Ctrl + S = Save the current document
Ctrl + P = Print the current document
Ctrl + W = Close the close document
Ctrl + Q = Quit the current application

Keyboard shortcuts for GNOME desktop

Ctrl + Alt + F1 = Switch to the first virtual terminal
Ctrl + Alt + F2(F3)(F4)(F5)(F6) = Select the different virtual terminals
Ctrl + Alt + F7 = Restore back to the current terminal session with X
Ctrl + Alt + Backspace = Restart GNOME
Alt + Tab = Switch between open programs
Ctrl + Alt + L = Lock the screen.
Alt + F1 = opens the Applications menu
Alt + F2 = opens the Run Application dialog box.
Alt + F3 = opens the Deskbar Applet
Alt + F4 = closes the current window.
Alt + F5 = unmaximizes the current window.
Alt + F7 = move the current window
Alt + F8 = resizes the current window.
Alt + F9 = minimizes the current window.
Alt + F10 =  maximizes the current window.
Alt + Space = opens the window menu.
Ctrl + Alt + + = Switch to next X resolution
Ctrl + Alt + - = Switch to previous X resolution
Ctrl + Alt + Left/Right = move to the next/previous workspace

Keyboard shortcuts for Terminal

Ctrl + A = Move cursor to beginning of line
Ctrl + E = Move cursor to end of line
Ctrl + C = kills the current process.
Ctrl + Z = sends the current process to the background.
Ctrl + D = logs you out.
Ctrl + R = finds the last command matching the entered letters.
Enter a letter, followed by Tab + Tab = lists the available commands beginning with those letters.
Ctrl + U = deletes the current line.
Ctrl + K = deletes the command from the cursor right.
Ctrl + W = deletes the word before the cursor.
Ctrl + L = clears the terminal output
Shift + Ctrl + C = copy the highlighted command to the clipboard.
Shift + Ctrl + V (or Shift + Insert) = pastes the contents of the clipboard.
Alt + F = moves forward one word.
Alt + B = moves backward one word.
Arrow Up/Down = browse command history
Shift + PageUp / PageDown = Scroll terminal output

Keyboard shortcuts for Compiz

Alt + Tab = switch between open windows
Win + Tab = switch between open windows with Shift Switcher or Ring Switcher effect
Win + E = Expo, show all workspace
Ctrl + Alt + Down = Film Effect
Ctrl + Alt + Left mouse button = Rotate Desktop Cube
Alt + Shift + Up = Scale Windows
Ctrl + Alt + D = Show Desktop
Win + Left mouse button = take screenshot on selected area
Win + Mousewheel = Zoom In/Out
Alt + Mousewheel = Transparent Window
Alt + F8 = Resize Window
Alt + F7 = Move Window
Win + P = Add Helper
F9 = show widget layer
Shift + F9 = show water effects
Win + Shift + Left mouse button = Fire Effects
Win + Shift + C = Clear Fire Effects
Win + Left mouse button = Annotate: Draw
Win + 1 = Start annotation
Win + 3 = End annotation
Win + S = selects windows for grouping
Win + T = Group Windows together
Win + U = Ungroup Windows
Win + Left/Right = Flip Windows

Keyboard shortcut for Nautilus

Shift + Ctrl + N = Create New Folder
Ctrl + T = Delete selected file(s) to trash
Alt + ENTER = Show File/Folder Properties
Ctrl + 1 = Toggle View As Icons
Ctrl + 2 = Toggle View As List
Shift + Right = Open Directory (Only in List View)
Shift + Left = Close Directory (Only in List View)
Ctrl + S = Select Pattern
F2 = Rename File
Ctrl + A = Select all files and folders
Ctrl + W = Close Window
Ctrl + Shift + W = Close All Nautilus Windows
Ctrl + R = Reload Nautilus Window
Alt + Up = Open parent directory
Alt + Left = Back
Alt + Right = Forward
Alt + Home = go to Home folder
Ctrl + L = go to location bar
F9 = Show sidepane
Ctrl + H = Show Hidden Files
Ctrl + + = Zoom In
Ctrl + - = Zoom Out
Ctrl + 0 = Normal Size

(For those who want to configure your own keyboard shortcuts, you can do it at System->Preferences->Keyboard Shortcuts.)

Which one is your favorite keyboard shortcuts? Is there anymore shortcut that I have left out? Let me know in the comment and I will add it in.

Screenshots

After installation, you can find a pane at the top-right hand corner of the screen. Click on it to display the overview of your 360 degree desktop. Drag the slider to navigate around the desktop.

Click to enlarge

You can download and change the panorama wallpaper.

Download widgets and insert them onto your desktop.

Performance

While Ross at simplehelp.net reported that the software caused sluggish performance in Windows Vista, it works fine on my Windows XP. There is a slight lag when dragging and moving the desktop for the first time, but the subsequent movement are rather smooth and instantaneous.

Meanwhile, this is only a beta release. Hopefully, more improvement and content will be added on in the future release.

[360Desktop]

Open up your Terminal (Applications->Accessories->Terminal).

Type the command

sudo apt-get autoremove icedtea-gcjwebplugin

to remove the icedtea-gcjwebplugin package from your system.

Restart your Firefox 3. The Java runtime should be working now.

(icedtea-gcjwebplugin is a little web browser plugin to execute Java applets. It is targeted for Mozilla and compatible browsers that support the NPAPI. It seems that this has some compatibility issue with Firefox 3.)

What seems to be a simple task in Linux turns out to be almost impossible in Mac. One of my favorite feature in Ubuntu is the ability to keep some of my application windows ‘always on top’ so that I can refer to them easily. When I switched to Mac, it turns out that this feature is not available at all. Considering how user-friendly Mac Leopard is, I am quite disappointed that this feature is not available by default. Luckily, Afloat from Infinite Labs manage to the tackle the problem.

Afloat is a donation-ware that allows you to set your application windows ‘always on top’ and keep afloat on top of all others. In addition, there are some sweet surprises, such as making your window transparent or turn the window into a translucent overlay so you can access to several windows in one glance. (It reminds me of the transparent feature in Linux Compiz)

The latest version of Afloat uses PlugSuit as its application manager. It is also compatible with SIMBL, an InputManager for managing application plugins.

Installing Afloat

Download Afloat here.

Double click to open the installer

Install the app

Now open your applications (such as Safari, iChat, iWork etc). Go to Window->Keep Afloat. Your current application window will now be always on top of other window.

Some screenshots:

Window in translucent mode

Afloat in overlay mode

iPhone/iPod Touch users will know that while it is easy to sync music from iTunes to your iPod, it certainly does not work the other way round. It may be a great security feature by Apple, but it has definitely caused lot of inconvenience to its users. Luckily, there are lots of easy way to get this done.

In Mac, users can use the free application Senuti to copy music from their iPod to the computer. At the moment, only the beta version Senuti 0.50.2b7 supports iPhone and iPod touch.

The configuration of Senuti is easy and works out of the box. After installing, Senuti will prompt you where to save your music files and whether to add it to iTunes library. Once that is done, plug in your iPhone/iPod Touch and it will automatically detect all the songs/videos/playlist in your device. Click Transfer and the all the selected entries will be transferred to the computer.

In Windows, users can use the Winamp’s iPod plugin to achieve the same effect.

In Linux, it is more troublesome to sync the iPhone/iPod Touch with the OS, nevertheless, it can still be done via this tutorial.

Reconstructor is an Ubuntu GNU/Linux CD Creator that allows you to modify an existing Ubuntu distribution and save as your own Linux distribution. It uses the Desktop(Live), Alternate(Install), or Server disc as a base, and then allows for user customization.

You can basically customize the entire environment, such as add/remove software, change the default look (splash, themes, fonts, wallpaper, etc.), add desktop links, etc.

What you need:
- An iso file of your favorite Ubuntu distribution (can be Desktop Live or Alternate CD)
- An existing working Ubuntu on your machine

Installing Reconstructor

Download Reconstructor deb file

Double click the downloaded deb file to install it in your system.

Using Reconstructor

Go to Applications -> System Tools -> Reconstructor. Enter your password and the Welcome screen will load up.

Click Next in the Welcome screen

Choose the type of installer you are using, Desktop (Live CD) or Alternate (Install CD). Click Next.

The next screen is to setup the working environment. If you are doing it for the first, check the following boxes:

• Create Remaster
• Create Root
• Create Initial Ramdisk

This will creates the cdrom directory, the root filesystem directory and the initial ramdisk (initrd) directory. If you are continuing from a previous session and want to keep the existing trees (which will keep all installed software and customizations), unselect the options.

Under the “Live CD ISO filename” field, select the path to where the Ubuntu ISO file is located.

Click Next. This will bring you to the customization screen.

Customization

1. Boot Screen

The first tab you see in the customization screen is the boot screen. This is where you splash screen for the Live CD and during bootup. For the Live CD splash screen, it have to be a 640×480 .pcx image in GIMP. Here is a tutorial on how to create the boot up usplash screen.

Unless you are using Ubuntu 6.06, ignore the generate button.

Gnome

The next tab is where you customize the look and feel of the desktop. You can configure the GNOME theme, login-screen, wallpaper, default font, borders, icons etc. A good place where you can find tons of beautiful theme is http://www.gnome-look.org.

Apt

This section allows you to select the Apt Repositories for your own distribution. Unless you know what you are doing, it is safe to check the 4 default Ubuntu repositories. You can also add your custom repositories in the text box below, one repository per line.

Optimization

Advanced customization for advanced users. Configure it if you know what you are doing. If you know nothing about it, just skip this section.

LiveCD

The LiveCD section is for customizing the live environment. If you are using applications that require remote access, it is best to set your username and password. Otherwise, for general distribution, leave all the fields blank.

Modules

This is the most important part of the whole process. You can decide which application/modules you want in your Ubuntu. When choosing your module, you can select it as a standard Execute which installs the application by default, or, a “run on boot” mode that will set the module to run on boot after the live user logs in.

There are plenty of modules where you can download from the reconstructor site. Once you have download the third party modules, click ‘Add‘ to include it in the module selection.

To include (or remove) any applications not found in the modules, you can enter the application name in the “sudo apt-get install” or “sudo apt-get remove” fields.

Click Apply to confirm any changes that you made. The program will configure and install the selected software and update the ISO size real time.

Once you are done with your customization, click Next. This will bring you to the Build screen where the program will create the Live CD for you.

Build the distribution

Before you start to build your distribution, make sure that all the boxes are checked. They are all necessary to create the root filesystem, compress it to a Live CD ISO. Enter the path to where you want the ISO file to store. Click Next.

Sit back and wait.

Once the build is finished, you will get a status message followed by the path to the .iso file. To burn the ISO file to disc, click “Burn ISO”