Friday TechTips

Good Friday afternoon library staff! Today’s Friday afternoon tech-tip is a service that is near and dear to my heart as I’ve been a long time user. It also came in very handy last night as my parents now have DSL service and I fully expect to be their tech support person. Fortunately, I installed the software I’m telling you about several months ago while they were using a standard dial-up connection.

LogMeIn - http://logmein.com

LogMeIn offers several tiers of service, but I find the free version meets ALL of my needs (look for LogMeIn Free in the “Products” section at the top of the page). LogMeIn allows you to remotely connect to any PC that you own from anywhere you have web access and have full desktop control. To get started, do the following:

Visit http://logmein.com and create an account. You will then need to “Add a Computer.” to your authorized list. Be sure to be using the computer you wish to access in the future, as a small client will be installed. In Windows, you will see it in the task tray. It’s very light weight and won’t bog your system down. You will also have to give the computer a name, so choose something that you will remember in the future (if you’re going to add multiple computers).

In the future, when you need to access the computer, go to the LogMeIn website, login to your account, and you will then see your “stable” of machines. Assuming the computer is on and connected to the internet, you will be able to login and have full remote control access.

I’ve used LogMeIn to email myself a document that I left on my home computer, upload files to Flickr, and yes, provide technical assistance. Let me know if you have questions or would like further details!

Enjoy your weekend!

It’s April 11, and time again for another Friday Afternoon TechTip! Today’s featured service is Jott, from http://jott.com. It’s a very easy way to put your mobile phone to work, helping you to remember things and stay more organized. Everyone on staff (even Tom!) probably has a cell phone. After creating an account, you can then dial in from your phone to leave yourself reminders, to-do items, and even email others. Jott will take your voice message and transcribe it to text and then send it back to you as an email message. It can also store the audio of your message allowing you to play it back later.

Here’s a quick list of all the things you can do with Jott and simple instructions:

http://jott.com/jott/how-to-jott.html

I’ve used Jott to send email, leave myself a reminder, and yes, even post an update to Twitter. Jott integrates with several web services (http://jott.com/jott/how-to-jott.html) which allows you to create an appointment on your Google Calendar, post a blog entry to Blogger, or even get a list of items you’re interested in purchasing from Amazon.

It’s free, so give it a test this weekend!

Good afternoon!  It’s time for another Friday Afternoon TechTip! This week I’m highlighting two free services that allow you to organize your to-do lists and projects.  Both are very flexible and easily integrated into other web services.

• Remember The Milk - http://www.rememberthemilk.com
• Toodledo - http://www.toodledo.com

Both focus on “reinventing the to-do list” in various ways.  Both offer to-do list builders, multiple categories, notes fields, and reminders via email, SMS, IM, and Twitter.  Both also synchronize with most mobile phones and PDAs as well as Google Calendar, etc.  You can also import your to-do list from Outlook, and let’s face it, the Tasks feature of Outlook is a little dated.  Both of these services bring Web 2.0 to life as ways to help you remain more productive and organized.  I’ve been using Toodledo for a while now and really like it.  It has a Firefox extension that gives me full access to my projects without having to go directly to the site. Since both are web-based, you can get your to-do list anywhere you have web access.  Toodledo will also print out a handy little booklet letting you keep a paper list of your projects in your pocket.

Take a look at both and let me know if you have questions or ideas about either.

Have a good weekend!

Last week I told you about Foldershare from Microsoft, an easy way to synchronize folders and files between computers. This week, I want to tell you about another fresh-out-of-beta service from Microsoft called Skydrive. In simple terms it’s a 5gb online storage locker, again offered to you at no cost. You can use it to store important files and share them with others if you choose. It’s quite fast and since it’s online, you don’t have to worry about losing your files as you would if you misplaced a USB storage device. Give it a try at:

http://skydrive.live.com

To register, you will need either a Windows Live login or Hotmail address. Ok, that will be all the free Microsoft promos for a while and we’ll look at something new next week!

I came across a new service last week that I’ve found to be very helpful in moving and backing-up files.  It’s called Foldershare and it was created by an independent company, but then purchased my Microsoft in 2005.  Microsoft has recently released it in beta status as part of their Windows Live service.  In essence it’s a mechanism to share or synchronize files and folders between multiple computers.  You could use it to back up documents between your work and home computer, between multiple work computers, etc.  To start using it do the following:

1. Go to http://foldershare.com and create an account (doesn’t have to be a Windows Live ID, I’m using my work email address).
2. You’ll need to then download the client (it’s available for both PC and Mac) to each computer you want to synchronize with. See the Manage Your Computers section for this.
3. You will then create a personal library (for backups) or a shared library to distribute files to friends and family.  You must then select a folder or specific file on your computer.  You also have to select the folder or location where the files will be received by the second computer.

Once installed, both computers will search for each other, and then start the synchronization process. Note that it doesn’t store your files online, it simply uses the web to copy the files back and forth.

Have a good weekend! - Andy