links for 2008-11-27
November 27th, 2008
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Deploy* is a free, open source, web application which allows user to quickly deploy a web project framework with valid XHTML and CSS in only a matter of seconds.
Archive
Archive for November, 2008
links for 2008-11-26
November 26th, 2008
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Sinatra is a really awesome minimalist web framework. It lets you build web applications with just a few lines of code. iUI is a collection of JavaScript, CSS, and images that lets you easily make your web sites look great on the iPhone. Using these two tools, it’s really easy to build simple iPhone apps.
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StateStats: Explore the popularity of search queries in U.S. states
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It started as a fork of the abandoned CocoaMySQL project, and has grown into a great looking Mac OS X database management app.
The Sequel Pro project is currently under active development and welcomes any contributions of time and coding.
links for 2008-11-25
November 25th, 2008
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About Product Planner
Product Planner was born out of the need to help people understand and create user flows for their web products. The idea is that by looking at examples of other successful web products, you can get a better idea of how to create your own.
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Twitpay was one of several projects in development at Startup Weekend, held November 7-9 in Atlanta, Georgia.
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it doesn't support transactions in the way that most people typically think about them. That means, enforcing uniqueness of one field across all documents is not safe. A classic example of this would be enforcing that a username is unique. You can check whether a username exists, and if not, create a new one. There is no guarantee
links for 2008-11-24
November 24th, 2008
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Start a usability test for your web project in two minutes. Submit questions about your site and receive up to ten responses from our reviewers. The cost is $7.
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Here's a free tool I wrote to help us watch our favorite shows without cable TV. It displays which shows can be watched or ordered online and links directly to the site or service which carries the shows.
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at No. 8 on the leader board; his program was 8.8 percent better than Cinematch. Bertoni said he thought he was within striking distance of victory. But his progress had slowed to a crawl. The more Bertoni improved upon Netflix, the harder it became to move his number forward. Why? Bertoni says it’s partly because of “Napoleon Dynamite,”
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RubyURL was created as a free service to make posting long URLs easier. If you use it for spamming or illegal purposes, your RubyURL will be disabled. This service is provided without warranty of any kind.
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daylight savings time caused a 1 percent overall increase in residential electricity use, though the effect varied from month to month.
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Some statistics illuminate the scale of Omniture’s infrastructure: it operates 15,000 servers for its 5,000 customers, and processes almost a trillion transactions per quarter — that’s a hundred times more than Salesforce.com’s proudly touted 10 billion.
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When “Iron Man,” starring Robert Downey Jr., became available on iTunes in late September, it sold more than $1 million in $2.99 downloads in its first seven days of release, analysts say. That’s almost pure profit, because the cost of delivery is so low, analysts note.
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mechanical turk users message board
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416 Requested Range Not Satisfied
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With a little code, plus the turkers, it has succeeded in basically automating the process. The company charges its customers from 42 cents a minute for podcast transcription to 75 cents a minute for other audio.
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Google won’t confirm this, but it’s fairly trivial to detect (see screen shot below). Why did they go with Akamai instead of partnering? One key factor may be that Mogulus, Ustream and Justin.tv haven’t streamed live events with much more than 100,000 simultaneous viewers (correction: one person associated with Justin.tv emails to say they’ve hit “well over 400,000″), so tonight’s concert would have been an experiment in scalability for them.
links for 2008-11-23
November 23rd, 2008
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It took six hours and two minutes to sort 1PB (10 trillion 100-byte records) on 4,000 computers. We're not aware of any other sorting experiment at this scale and are obviously very excited to be able to process so much data so quickly.
links for 2008-11-22
November 22nd, 2008
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We also really ought to find a way for small investors who know what they are doing to place a small bet on a company they really like. And companies like Boxee and Twitter could really benefit from that too.
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Last week, I started a new Turk experiment to answer two questions: what do these people look like, and how much does it cost for someone to reveal their face?
Answer #1. This is what Mechanical Turk looks like (click for full-size):
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I blogged about how Microsoft is extending support for jQuery. Over the last few weeks we've been working with the jQuery team to add great jQuery intellisense support within Visual Studio 2008 and Visual Web Developer 2008 Express (which is free). This is now available to download and use.
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Sometimes you want to follow someone on Twitter, but you don't want them to know you're following them. We present to you TweetStalk ‒ the simple way to stalk Twitter users without having to follow them.
links for 2008-11-21
November 21st, 2008
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jRails is a drop-in jQuery replacement for Prototype/script.aculo.us on Rails. Using jRails, you can get all of the same default Rails helpers for javascript functionality using the lighter jQuery library.
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Here are 7 of the best admin skins, note that because they are via ThemeForest, they are paid themes.
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Zapr lets you create URL links to any files or folders on your PC. You can then send these links to others (via email or IM or YOURNAME.zapr.com) and they can get the files or see the folders directly from your PC via any browser. They do not need to register or install software.
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We're going to dissect the most important features of social news sites, and showcase example code and libraries that can help you on your way to developing your own social media website.
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Microsoft will no longer play under the bright lights of Major League Baseball, which has decided to throw out the vendor's Silverlight browser add-on in favor of Adobe's Flash.
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Sun has upgraded MySQL Enterprise, its subscription-based service for the open-source MySQL database, adding access to a query analysis tool for tracking and fixing problematic code and performance issues.
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A simple, unobtrusive and customisable client-side method for easily embedding a Twitter feed into a web page.
links for 2008-11-20
November 20th, 2008
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If you have a numeric keypad on your notebook, don't you think it's very useful? NumberKey will turn iPhone / iPod touch into numeric keypad for your notebook. Not only at home or the office, also when you are out , you can use numeric keypad whenever you need.
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If you have an iPhone, you’ll probably want to check out SnapTell Explorer, a free application now available on the App Store. The premise is simple: take a photo of the cover of any CD, DVD, book, or video game, and the application will automatically identify the product and find ratings and pricing information online.
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Find out now by creating your own kluster—a new breed of group decision-making tool that helps you bubble-up new ideas, identify the best ones, and make better decisions.
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Ocarina, named after an ancient flute-like wind instrument, lets people play haunting, flute-like songs by blowing into the iPhone microphone and hitting the virtual buttons.
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As Martin over at Ghacks points out, you could accomplish a similar feat on Yahoo's Pipes service, although I found Feed Rinse to be dramatically easier to use.
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By unit testing with QUnit, I find I often need to trigger additional events or add additional code from within the plugin so the test can be meaningful.
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CloudFront, however, is amazingly well tuned. That 46ms time remained constant within 2ms every single time I loaded that file. In other words, CloudFront is so much faster and more consistent that there is simply no reason not to use it for all your S3 content hosting starting today.
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This review captures what's been driving me crazy over the last year… an unbelievable proliferation of anecdotes disguised as science, self-professed experts writing about things they actually know nothing about, and amusing stories disguised as metaphors for how the world works.
links for 2008-11-19
November 19th, 2008
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Looking for the best product? There are lots of choices, but only one can be the very best. Let our experts instantly show you the top picks for your needs. Bestcovery is the fastest, easiest way to find the best of everything.
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The HotChalk Learning Environment is a collaborative online resource for
K-12 teachers, students and parents. It provides an easy-to-use learning
management system (LMS) accessible by any Internet browser, a media-rich
library of teacher-contributed lesson plans and digital content,
including audio, video, textbook, and assessment content, a
collaborative education portal with articles and blogs, as well as
online professional development for teachers. -
Texas Governor, Rick Perry, ordered state agencies to stop transferring data to IBM to prevent data loss on a failing project. Texas also fined IBM $900,000 for failing to meet data backup requirements specified in the state’s $863M outsourcing contract.
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Hibernate comes with three different caching mechanisms – first level, second level and query cache. Truly understanding how the Hibernate caches work and interact with each other is important when you need to increase performance – just enabling caching in your entity with an annotation (or in classic .hbm.xml mapping file) is easy. But understanding what and how things happens behind the scenes is not. You might even end up with a less performing system if you do not know what you are doing.
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What's Wrong With IE6?
This is a development blog, so I shouldn't have to explain this to anyone here, but off top of my head (this is a small part of a very large list):1. Lack of support for current standards for HTML markup, CSS, etc
2. Support for non-standard features not compatible with other browsers
3. No PNG transparency support
4. Released in 2001, we've completely moved beyond everything about IE6. This is a browser that PC World rated one of the worst tech products of all time. -
10 Adobe AIR applications perfect for web designers. Graphics designers, interaction designers, and web developers might also find this collection useful.
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I’ll show you how to build a personal notes database with Adobe AIR.
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Test-driven development, or TDD, consists of the following loop:
1. Write a failing test case that encodes some behavior you need.
2. Write just enough code to pass the test case in the simplest possible way.
3. Refactor to improve the design of the code.
4. Repeat until you have all the behavior you need. -
This will add the Zoom Effect to any a tag classed with zoom, and will show content relating to the id referenced in the href of the a tag.
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I just got back from the Ajax Experience in Boston and I’ve had a lot of stuff on my mind.
First, I must first attest that hands down, jQuery was the most popular and well represented framework there. -
Will the Semantic Web fully arrive? Absolutely, not due to forces of digital determinism, but because of what MIT computer scientist Michael Dertouzos called “the ancient human in each of us.” (4) As ancient human beings, we want to develop tools that help us connect, develop relationships, and explore and understand the world around us, regardless of how technologically advanced we become. Those in the 1980s who told me e-mail would never catch on ignored the ancient human, as did those who told me just a few years ago that the world would come to see blogging as superfluous. The Semantic Web will happen. The ancient human will see to it.
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3. Hone things down
If a client wants a 50-page site and you can see a way of doing it in 10, tell them and convince them to do so. Smaller sites are typically more creative, and offer more clarity and focus. -
WSF/Ruby is a web services framework for Ruby. It can be used to write & consume web services in Ruby. Following example demonstrates a complete client code for accessing a web service located @ http://mooshup.com/services/hiranya/oxygentanknews & printing back the response.
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There are possibly millions of flash-based games out there. And, this short list is a way of sharing a few, but also putting the call out to GeekDad readers. What flash games do you play with your children?
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The Silverlight Toolkit is a collection of Silverlight controls, components and utilities made available outside the normal Silverlight release cycle. It adds new functionality quickly for designers and developers, and provides the community an efficient way to help shape product development by contributing ideas and bug reports. This first release includes full source code, unit tests, samples and documentation for 12 new controls covering charting, styling, layout, and user input.
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In this introduction, we look at what makes jQuery unique and why it helps you to write smaller code, faster. We also go hands-on (bring your laptops!) and write an animated Accordion Widget and an Ajax To-Do List from scratch.
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A number of customers have already launched Internet-facing Silverlight 2 RIA solutions (including Renault, Hard Rock and Toyota). For example, last month AOL launched their new AOL Mail RIA using Silverlight 2:
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That was a cute story, but now it's been just 5 months and today Peldi reports that he's just cleared $100,000 in sales of the four variations of his product.
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I am really excited to announce that Adobe has been working with the Growl team to add support to Growl for Adobe AIR and Flash applications. Among other things, this will enable Adobe AIR applications to leverage the Growl notification framework on Mac.
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JiggyApp provides a full API for developing an application – apparently separate from most of the typical APIs. Arguably, though, the code ends up being relatively usable.
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This is a simple step-by-step tutorial on how to serve your images and other media faster to end-users using the Amazon S3 + CloudFront Content Delivery Network:
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Supports Amazon S3 CloudFront distributions
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Adobe's Extensible Metadata Platform (XMP) is a labeling technology that allows you to embed data about a file, known as metadata, into the file itself. With XMP, desktop applications and back-end publishing systems gain a common method for capturing,
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Generate fresh URLs for your content using the domain name from step 3 and hand them out. By using our CNAME support you can even make the content appear as if it is coming from your own domain. You can associate up to 10 CNAMEs with each distribution.
links for 2008-11-18
November 18th, 2008
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1. An applicant lacking even basic job skills
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Codename "Cocomo" is a Platform as a Service that allows Flex developers to easily add real-time social capabilities into their RIA (rich Internet applications). Comprised of both Flex-based client components and a hosted services infrastructure, Cocomo allows you to build real-time, multi-user applications with Flex in less time than ever before. And because Acrobat.com hosts the service, issues like deployment, maintenance, and scalability are taken care of for you.
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During the conversion process I found it to be most helpful to load jQuery side by side with Prototype using jQuery’s no-conflict functionality. As I slowly combed through my JavaScript removing Prototype dependencies I would periodically remove Prototype to see if and where I missed any outliers. This also requires you to use the jQuery() syntax as opposed to the traditional $() syntax. In doing so this helps easily identify where Prototype code remains.
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I haven't had a chance to use the ShopSavvy application yet, but after watching the demo, which is embedded below, I'm ready to get a G1 today! This little program looks to do more on your phone than most full-fledged price comparison sites. Checking the price is as easy as scanning the product's barcode with the built-in camera.
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Following through on several of its promises, digital-pen maker Livescribe this week is announcing a Mac version of its desktop software, handwriting recognition software, as well as the ability for digital-pen owners to print special "dot paper" using their own printer.
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A while back, you may remember, I posted about ROXML, a ruby object to xml mapping library. I liked the idea but not the implementation. Soon after, I started playing around with what I have named HappyMapper, a ruby object to xml mapping library.
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Last week I published a collection of over 50 excellent navigational menus for your design inspiration. Because I found more examples than I used in that post, and because others seemed to share my appreciation for menu design, I’ve decided to put together a second collection.
links for 2008-11-17
November 17th, 2008
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The ‘personal learning environment’ (PLE) is a collection of concepts intended to express this idea. (Liber, 2006) The PLE is not an application, but rather, a description of the process of learning in situ from a variety of courses and according to one’s personal, context-situated, needs.
links for 2008-11-16
November 16th, 2008
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The following is the current Berkshire Hathaway's top holdings. We'll track the holdings that represent more than 1% of the Berkshire Hathaway's portfolio and added together represent about 90% of the portfolio.
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I helped to develop Bort, but I think that base apps are the way to roll. They save you about half a days worth of development and let you get straight into developing your application rather than fucking around doing the same monotonous stuff every time.
links for 2008-11-15
November 15th, 2008
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David must have forgotten that I have a full log of the chat where he admitted it, so let’s get into some nice clean truth for a change.
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eCollege is a leading provider of an integrated, standards-based eLearning solution to the post-secondary and K-12 education industries. eCollege builds and supports some of the most successful, fully online degree, certificate/diploma and professional development programs in the country.
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Integral is a lightweight application to help you test the integration between different applications. It was developed to ensure that the various (independently tested) applications that make up a web site are interacting correctly before they are rolled out to the live servers. Written with Thor. Available from Github.
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Authlogic has been updated to 1.1.0. Authlogic is a clean, simple, and unobtrusive ruby authentication solution.
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choose to have notifications delivered to Instant Messenger, SMS, Email, or Desktop Application.
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Jumpchart is a website planning application that allows you to plan the navigation of your website by creating, dragging and dropping pages into the plan. You can also add text and formatting to pages and then export your CSS files and site map when you’re finished.
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"Give it some time," he said, noting that before long, the tricky component to integrating online video and social networking will be reduced to figuring out which witticisms to type. "What would I possibly have to say via onscreen chat," he quipped. "'Pass the popcorn?'"
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TimeMachineEditor is a software for Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard that lets you change the default one-hour backup interval of Time Machine.
You can change the interval or decide to make daily, weekly and monthly backups. -
Keep in mind that this is an early preview, so I'm well aware that it needs a lot of TLC before I'll be happy making a 1.0 release, such as:
* A test suite :(
* A screencast of Gisting basics
* A homepage/website with examples and documentation
* Running Gisting in the clouds. -
So, in this post I am going to list down the kind of tests that can be run by NUnit or other similar testing tools.
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A free online Flash gaming portal designed just for kids. All games are reviewed for kid appropriateness so parents can let their kids surf the site without concern that they'll encounter an inappropriate game. The site is operated by KidZui.com; all games on the site (plus many more) are also available in KidZui's fun, kid-safe web browser.
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In online free-to-play games, companies aim to structure their costs so they can break even if as little as 5-10% of the users pay. Anything above that is profit. Which is why these numbers from MMPOW, a blog that covers the industry, are so impressive:
* Club Penguin: 25% monthly uniques pay, $5/mo per paying user
* Habbo: 10% monthly players pay, $10.30/mo per paying user
* Runescape: 16.6% monthly uniques pay, $5/mo per paying user
* Puzzle Pirates: 22% monthly players pay, $7.95/mo per paying user
links for 2008-11-13
November 13th, 2008
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Study Island is a leading provider of web-based state assessment preparation programs and standards based learning programs.
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This week, Trotzke is at the fifth Web 2.0 Summit, a high-profile conference that includes the likes of Tim O’Reilly, Dion Hinchliffe, Mark Zuckerberg and Jerry Yang.
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This is a list of handy MySQL commands that I use time and time again. At the bottom are statements, clauses, and functions you can use in MySQL.
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These are some of the ways I started to recently use and rediscover RSS.
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Ta-da Lists Widget is a free Dashboard widget for OS X that offers quick access to 37signals Ta-da Lists.
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Unlock your iPod with Senuti, a simple application that allows you to transfer songs from your iPod to your computer.
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Slife Teams is a new communications and analytics tool for your company. It makes it easy and automatic for your employees to share what they are working on, visualize how much time is collectively spent on projects and activities, and much more.
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BlueHarvest allows you to keep your disks and servers free of Mac "trails"
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Never fear! Your days of boring status updates are over! Simply type your name, indicate whether you are a boy or a girl, then hit Generate.
You will be served up a brand new, sparkly status all ready to be copied and pasted into Facebook, Twitter or whichever social networking site you like best.
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Download the source code for PearPC at http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/pearpc/pearpc-0.3.1.tar.gz. As of this writing, 0.3.1 is the most recent version.
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curl -u youremail:yourpassw -d status=”text” http://twitter.com/statuses/update.xml
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GroupTable allows you to manage all of your group projects, study groups and student organizations easily from one central location. At a glance you can see all the recent updates for each of your groups including new files uploads, topic posts, tasks, upcoming events & more.
