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We’ll have  plenty more reviews of online collaboration tools, exciting new gadgets, and much more soon, so keep checking back.

Entering a new task can be done as simply as typing it in the task list and hitting enter. Pretty straightforward. The unique feature is that the app also turns specific emails into tasks. From within an email message, there’s an “Add to Tasks” feature under the More Actions drop down along the top, making it easy to keep track of your tasks amid busy mornings of catching up on emails.

Brining tasks, emails, and chats within one window significantly increases what you can do with Gmail, and makes it a great productivity tool rather just another email client.
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Reviews of more productivity tools can be found on this blog.

For the sake of being obvious, we’ll assume that you don’t forget your laptop or cell phone.  Here are some of the less-obvious gadgets that can be considered traveling essentials:

1) IOGEAR Portable Media Player

With the ability to store 50 DVD movies on its 120 GB hard drive, the IOGEAR Portable Media Player is quite possibly your best friend on travels.  It is tiny compared to other PMPs and offers the unique ability to convert standard definition content at up to 720p HD resolution.  Even better, you won’t be stuck paying $9.99 per movie at the hotel.  This little gadget will hook into just about anything that can play movies.

2) Mobile Printers

Don’t assume that you won’t need one when you reach your destination (or when you’re on your way).  Trying to hook up to someone else’s printer requires drivers.  Transferring files to computers that already have printer hookups require the pain of the transfer.  Then, there is always the potential for a printer to not be available at all.  When considering mobile printers, size matters.  It’s probably better to take a more compact one and sacrifice a little speed.

3) Video Eyeware

You’re probably wondering why you will need video eyeware.  When traveling, there is one thing to always keep in mind — there is always someone looking over your shoulder.  This nifty little piece of technology, the EzVision Video Eyeware, gives you privacy and the ability to be completely unobtrusive to travelers around you.  Before you say “but you have to connect to your laptop to play”, please first check out…

4) Portable GPS Navigation

Trying to rely on maps and directions when driving in unfamiliar territory can be an unnecessary burden.  Many car rental companies charge a super-premium price to have a vehicle with navigation.  For those who travel often and rent often, a portable GPS navigation system is perfect for keeping in the right direction.  This portable GPS by Delphi has many features and an attractive price tag that allows you to input directions for places from your itinerary, saving time and energy during the trip that should be spent for on more important functions.

5) True Global Travel Plug Adaptor

Going international?  Power outlets across the seas are different from one to another.  Gadgets have different plugs.  Having the means to power up may sound simple, but without a tool like the Travel Plug Adaptor, you may end up being out of juice, out of luck, and out of time.

Regardless of where you travel or how often, making sure you keep the important gadgets with you can help to make or break a trip.  The best part of all of these — they can all fit in one nice, neat travel bag that can either fit itself into a suitcase or work as one of your carryon bags.

Business is all about being prepared.  These items will make preparation as easy as possible.

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Get more travel productivity tips right here.

Google Docs

Google Docs is one of the best online collaboration tools available. In fact, this blog post was originally written in Google Docs. Available to anyone with a Google Account, Google Docs lets users create documents in a wide variety of formats, including DOC, XLS, ODT, ODS, RTF, CSV, and PPT. In addition, docs from your computer can be uploaded to Google Docs which will allow users to share them with anyone that you may be collaborating with. Users can also choose who can access your docs, giving instant access to any number of other users. Additionally, any edits that you make are also visible to other users that share your document in real time. With Google Docs, users can store their documents without worrying about loosing unsaved work, and they can be accessed from anywhere. It also gives even the most unorganized person the ability to organize their documents.

Box.net

There’s plenty of file storage websites out there, and one that offers plenty of flexibility for is is Box.net. Box enables large documents, photos, spreadsheets, videos, or zip files to to stored securely on the Web. Files that are stored online can be accessed by anyone that you want to share access with; clients, colleagues, or friends. OpenBox Services also enable documents to be edited easily online, without having to upload again from your desktop. As with many other online collaboration tools, the biggest benefit is that files can be accessed from anywhere, whether you’re at work, at home, or on the road. Box simplifies file management, maximized productivity, and gives plenty of security and control over your files. To see what Box can do, try it out for free.

Central Desktop

We’ve covered Central Desktop before, and we’ve seen first hand how this tool can save time and boost producitivity. For anyone who needs to collaborate with clients or coworkers, Central Desktop provides an array of services all in one online collaboration tool. Central Desktop makes it easy to share clients, manag projects, and bounce around ideas in a wiki-enabled, secure workspace. All Web meetings and information shared via Central Desktop is available in real-time, turning documents and spreadsheets into a real life office on the Web. What’s unique about central desktop is that its accessible via email, rather than requiring users to login to Central Desktop to that users who stick with the email clients their most comfortable with. Check out their completely free trial and start collaborating.

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Find more online collaboration tools right here.

Digg has people scared

Whenever they talk during Digg Town Hall Meetings or interviews where the question is brought up, they exude a passion about their desire to not get gamed.  They tell stories of what seems like entire little countries logging on to spam their site with Diggs to worthless blogs.  They talk about measures and counter-measures to detect gaming that are too secretive to discuss openly.  They don’t want to get gamed.  They don’t want to get gamed.  They don’t want to get gamed.

Guys, we get the point.

The problem is this.  You’re Digg.  You’re going to get gamed.  Making it harder to get gamed isn’t the solution, it’s becoming part of the problem.  You see, unless you hire editors (and we assume that it would take dozens of editors on 24 hours a day to go through all of the stories) and foil your intentions of being socially driven, you’re going to get gamed.  It happens.  They key is in encouraging a community of users who work with established groundrules and police themselves.

It works elsewhere.  Reddit might get spammed, but they are quick to down-mod any spam that hits the front page.  Newsvine is tremendously quick to respond to spam or attempts at gaming.  Mixx and Propeller have their own issues, but nowhere near what you have at Digg.

Before anyone jumps in and says “But Digg is bigger”, remember that Digg IS bigger.  They have the resources to make this happen, to adjust the site in a way that is more community driven and harder to game.  The ways they are using now to stop gaming are futile.  Banning people who can easily switch IPs and hop back on only encourages them to find new ways to game the system.

Build your community.  Stop with the stupid tactics.

For more stories about Digg, check out some of these posts:

• Digg Trying to Be Too Smart to Make it Work?
• Banned on Digg
• A Newcomer’s Take on Digg
• What is Digg Planning?
• digg.com social media fail

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“Create online workspaces to share files and documents, manage task lists and engage in group discussions.”

While we normally would never review the sign-up process itself for a product, this one had certain unusual characteristics that warranted a mini-review of its own.  The complete review of Central Desktop will be posted in less than a month.

The first thing that one will notice when they sign up for the free trial of Central Desktop is their confidence.  Unlike so many applications that offer free trials, this one DOES NOT start charging your credit card if you don’t cancel before the trial ends.  They do request a credit card number, but it is simply to verify that people do not take advantage by registering multiple free trials.  The card is never charged unless the user specifically upgrades to a paid account.

If the trial runs its course with no action by the user, it simply cancels without charging the credit card.

The company itself has demonstrated stability by receiving $7 million in funding in April, 2008.  In this world where simplicity is the key to achieving funding, Central Desktop seems to excel initially.  During setup, there were templates already created organized by the plans for use.  For the purposes of our upcoming review, we selected all of the options.

From there, it gives the standard video introductory walk-thru that should be mandatory with anything tougher to use than Notepad.  While we suggest watching this video, it was important to see how easy it was to learn how to use Central Desktop without the tutorial, so we will play around for a couple of days before watching.

This technique will fit many users naturally - the ones who skip past the instructions and play it by ear until they get stuck a couple of days later and decide to watch the video.

Stay tuned for more on Central Desktop.  If you don’t want to wait, simply click here to take it for a test drive yourself.  No risk, of course.

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Read more application reviews on this blog.

Email by its nature should help us save time. Asking questions or collaborating with clients, colleagues, and friends via email allows you the freedom to multitask and doesn’t drain the time it takes to locate contacts in person or play phone tag with them. In addition to saving that time, email allows communications to be documented and saved for later reference.

Despite how wonderful email can be, it can also quickly become disorganized. Important emails can suddenly be lost, and before you know if spammers can take over. With just a few tips you can communicate more efficiently, help keep your inbox organized, and make your email correspondence stand out.

Respond to emails promptly, it will help clear your inbox and keep you organized. Leaving new emails in your inbox for a day or two drains time in the long run, especially if it comes down to crunch time and you need to respond to multiple emails at once. The best solution here is to try to respond to emails immediately after reading them. It’s also important to know when the most appropriate expected response time is for your professional email, as there is certain etiquette per industry that require differing response times.

Longer emails that require detailed responses may be addressed in separate emails. However it is important to at least address some portion promptly. Each subsequent email should also highlight or address the specific portion your response is referencing.

Schedule when you check your email. Having a regimented schedule will help keep that inbox organized. It will also help others gauge what kind of response time they should expect when emailing you. Whether its checking it constantly or every couple days, having a system in place will prevent your email from taking over!

Utilize third party tools. On the web you’ll find a wealth of applications and third-party plug-ins that can seriously save you time and help you email friends and colleagues more efficiently. One of places to find some of these tools and applications is the Microsoft Marketplace. The Microsoft Office Marketplace features numerous custom toolbar downloads that integrate time-saving tools seamlessly into MS Outlook.

Use labels & folders whenever possible! Different email systems use difference methods of labeling or categorizing. Gmail for example, allow you to applied labels of you choosing to difference emails, and allows you to label difference email addresses as well. Utilizing features such as these to keep work and personal emails separate will help to minimize confuse and clutter, and also enable you to quickly reference emails you need to find.

Organizing not only by category but also by urgency is also a great way to keep on top of important emails. One of the biggest email problems arises when the crucial emails slip through the cracks, as the less relevant or personal emails clutter your inbox. Separating emails by urgency helps to regulate which emails require a response and the timeline in which they should be responded to.

It doesn’t hurt to be selective in your response bin either. Going from trying to respond to everything to responding to hardly anything are two extremes you should avoid. This is why it’s important to make sure you use labels or filters as not everything necessarily deserves responses and you shouldn’t feel you need to. But for those important messages that do deserve your attention, make sure they are organized in such a way that you can give it the attention it deserves.

Save time by being succinct. Email at work does not need to include jokes, banter, or even elaborate essays. Work email should consist of asking for information, or supplying information, that’s it! By refraining from excess verbiage your emails remain more informative and authoritative, and it also will save you and your recipients serious time. Simply getting to the point in your emails will also prevent numerous back and forth messages.

Read it before you move it. Don’t label or move an email from your inbox unless you have actually read it. If you begin moving unread emails into folders it is more than likely they’ll stay that way. Keep all unread emails where they belong – in your inbox!

Utilize the subject line of every email. An effective subject line can help summarize the content of your email, enabling the recipient to immediately decipher the email as work related, personal, or spam! Making the email specific not only helps the recipient, but also helps you find it when you need to reference it weeks or months later.

Take advantage of free email accounts. Email accounts are not difficult to obtain. The most popular and most robust email accounts are free, and take only seconds to create! The ease if getting a free email account comes in handy for all of those newsletters and updates you may want to subscribe to. Rather than bog down your work account, or even your everyday personal email account, get a separate account to house all of those newsletters and bulletins that you can’t seem to resist, and it will give you less emails to sift through when you need to find something!

Label spam. When you receive spam, it’s not enough to simply delete it. Make sure you label it as spam or black list it when it sneaks into your inbox. By blocking spam you can prevent future emails from that sender from creeping into your inbox, thus reducing the amount of spam you get over time. It’s the best method for fighting off those annoying spammers. In addition, most email clients have spam filters build right in. If you want to have spam automatically filtered out of your inbox, make sure the spam filters are turned on. It isn’t a guarantee of blocking all spam, but it’s a good method of keeping most out of your way.

Leave your mark. Signature lines are a great way to let email recipients know who you are and we’re your from. Whether you’re new to the company or are corresponding with a potential new client, letting people know where you’re from, linking to your website(s), are even adding a provocative quote adds valuable information and makes your email more memorable.

Bonus: Use a collaborating software such as Central Desktop
.

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More online productivity tips on their way soon.

We pretty much all have an Apple iPod. It’s currently the best selling mp3 player on the market. Even with competitive offerings from Microsoft, SanDisk, and others, Apple’s iPod still remains the preferred choice among music lovers.

But there are plenty of other ways to use the iPod to aid productivity and organization beyond simply listening to your favorite tracks

Learn A Foreign Language

Learning a foreign language takes time and dedication. Work, relationships, and other commitments are sometimes a hindrance for many folks who would like to speak a different tongue. What many people don’t realize is that the iPod is perhaps the best tool to learn another language for the active professional. There are many language programs available in mp3 format and many of them are designed specifically for the iPod, making it ideal for learning while commuting and on the go.

iPod As A Navigation Tool

There are many sources online to find direction and subway maps for cities around the world. But rather than printing them out and wasting paper, how about bringing maps with you electronically? Many electronic subways maps can be downloaded straight to the iPod. Since they’re accessible on the device you already use everyday, it saves paper, time, and reduces clutter when you need to find your way in an unfamiliar place.

Make Exercise Less Of A Chore

Running or jogging can be made much easier by listening to your favorite tunes. Carrying an iPod while running can make the time fly by much faster and make the journey more enjoyable. There are tools that can even help plan and track your route.

Plan Your Day

The Apple iPod has a simple calendar feature that some users aren’t even aware of, but it’s a great way to organize meetings and events. At the end of each day, input your upcoming tasks and meetings into the calendar. Then, while listening to music on your way to work in the morning, glance through the calendar and see what you have lined-up.

Check Your Favorite Blogs And News

With the addition of WiFi, the latest iPod is a far greater tool for productivity than ever before. When commuting or when you simply need a coffee break, the iPod can help you stay current with news and all of your favorite blogs like COMMUTEER :-).

Stay Current With Your Favorite Authors

Some of us have longer commutes than others. Longer commutes often cause free time to vanish, making it harder to plan other activities in the evenings. With audible books in mp3 format, a long drive to work could be used to consume that new book that you’ve been eagerly waiting to read once you had more time.

Use The iPod As An External Hard Drive

Sometimes carrying too many electronics and accessories around can be a burden rather than helping efficiency. By combining several tools in one, you can reduce clutter and free up some valuable space in your pocket. A great way to do this is to get rid of the external hard drive hanging from your key chain and use your iPod to store all your data instead. iPods come with huge hard drives which can easily take on music, movies, photos, and then still have room left over for the PSDs your need to review or other documents you need for the upcoming meeting.

How About You?

Leave a comment about how you use your iPod or mp3 player to stay productive and organized.

Paper can get lost.

Paper can get damaged, i.e. the infamous coffee cup ring.

Paper notes must be transferred to digital for easy editing and backing up.

With lots of handwritten notes, there is the need to store and organize in ways that may be archaic to some.

For those of us in the digital world where the need for pen and paper comes up, there is the Mobile Digital Scribe by IOGEAR.  It offers the best of both worlds — write it with a pen and store/edit it with a computer.

In a review of digital pens, Wired points out the convenience of being able to write directly to computer using regular ink and regular paper.  With the new mobile version, you don’t have to be connected to a computer, offering the flexibility to write in one place and move it to a computer later.

If things continue, handwriting will make a comeback (as long as it can be backed up and edited digitally).  Handwritten notes can be more easily organized on-the-fly and allow the notes to include drawings, sketches, and diagrams.  As a society, we have grown so used to taking digital notes that we sometimes forget the simplicity of the pen.  With the Mobile Digital Scribe by IOGEAR, it is easy to take handwritten notes and still be able to quickly and conveniently convert them to digital.  Whether it’s for editing purposes or just to have a backup, this ability makes the old Bic an obsolete tool for today’s professional, especially the mobile ones.  Even students can receive a great benefit from digital pens as they are able to exchange notes more quickly across campus or to different campuses.

Handwriting is not dead.  In fact, we may be seeing the beginning of a resurgence.

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Read more Tech Advice Stories on this blog.

But another important introduction from Apple was the MobileMe platform. As a successor to .Mac, subscribers can now access an array of data and applications remotely via your Mac, PC, iPod Touch, or iPhone. A MobileMe application called iDisk also enables users to easily store files and share them easily online: ideal for the mobile freelancer!

MobileMe gives you access to email, calendars, and contacts from anywhere you are in the world, and keeps things updated automatically. In addition, MobileMe also features native compatibility with a variety of other Mac applications, including Mail, Address Book, iCal, and even Microsoft Outlook on PCs.

Plans for MobileMe begin at $99 for a year subscription with 20 GB of storage space. Families can get Mobile for $149 per year with 40 GB of storage space.

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Stay current on the latest productivity technology.