organ

Hazel is a flexible utility designed to help you tidy up files and folders--especially in your Downloads, Desktop, and Trash--and keep them organized with rules that you specify. You access Hazel through a System Preferences pane, where you can create Mail-style rules to execute a wide variety of actions. For example, Hazel's built-in sample rules include options for cleaning up your Downloads folder, such as automatically moving images and music into your Pictures and Music folders respectively. These sample rules only hint at Hazel's capabilities, though, and you can set the app to automatically import into iTunes and … Read more

It is frequently the case that Start menu enhancements turn out not to be enhancements at all, but ugly, clunky, annoying modifications that we can't wait to get rid of. Start Menu Organizer, however, is a thing of beauty. It's incredibly intuitive, does exactly what it says it will without a bunch of useless extra features, and performs a truly valuable service.

Take a look at your Start menu. Is the All Programs tab a clutter of random stuff with no rhyme or reason? Start Menu Organizer can help. The program's interface is simple and clean, requiring … Read more

Garage Organizer offers to help coordinate all of the various chores that make running a garage difficult. With simple options and great results, this program is sure to win a few fans.

Garage Organizer boasts its strengths immediately by showcasing a well-organized interface that never leaves you in the dark. Large command buttons clearly point the way toward several boxes for data that are easy to quickly fill. The program offers a Help file, but we are confident it will need to be consulted only for the program's more complicated tasks. This versatile management system operates primarily from a … Read more

EssentialPIM Pro is a powerful personal information manager that provides all the functionality of Outlook in an intuitive, attractive layout.

EssentialPIM Pro's interface is fairly self-explanatory and, like many similar programs, organizes its features in tabs along the side. The fonts and color scheme are pleasant and integrate well with newer versions of Windows. Each module of the program offers a degree of customization without going overboard, allowing users to tweak the program's appearance to suit their preferences. Users who have experience with any sort of calendar or personal organizer should find the program easy to use, but … Read more

dB Organizer Deluxe allows users to create and manage databases with ease. The program contains a lot of features but is easy enough to be used by database novices.

The program's interface isn't particularly attractive and is a bit cluttered at first glance, but it's not difficult to figure out how to get started. dB organizer splits the database into a Table of Contents section and a Details section, showing a list of database entries on one side and detailed information about each one on the other. Users can add or edit information in the Details section … Read more

Books is a free tool that can help you organize your book collection, acting as a sort of iTunes for physical books. This "virtual card catalog" lets you classify all the books you own using predefined fields (like title, author, publication date, etc.) or you can create your own. Books also lets you track and store summaries, cover images, personal reviews and ratings, notes on multiple copies of a single book, and more--and it even helps you track a book's lending history. "Smart Lists" (similar to iTunes' Smart Playlists) let you group books by any … Read more

I recently went on a nice, long vacation, and the first thing I did when I got back was to upload some of the best 200 or so photos I had taken.

As an experiment, I uploaded many of the same shots to two services--Flickr and Facebook. Both let users tag photos, so I wanted to see which ones would get tagged first, and not by me.

The winner? Facebook.

Just an hour or two after having uploaded to both services, all of my 88 shots on Facebook had been tagged. The most amazing part is that very few of them were tagged by me. Right after my upload, I tagged a handful of them, which in turn alerted those users to view the shots. From there, they (not me) went on to tag some more of my photos, continuing the cycle.

Flickr, on the other hand, was a different story. I uploaded close to 200 photos to the service. There were still the same shots of the same people, but there were also additional shots of landscapes or nature. Of those shots, only a handful were tagged, and only by one user--my colleague Stephen Shankland, whom I had pestered to look at my artistic capturing of sand castles. His tags weren't even of people; instead, he added descriptive keywords about the photos.

Now, to be fair, I have far more friends on Facebook than I do on Flickr--more than eight times the number to be exact. But in terms of photo usage, my Flickr activity far outweighs what I do on Facebook. I've only created 37 albums on Facebook which contain a total of 532 photos. On Flickr, I have 101 photo sets (Flickr's nickname for albums) which total 3,438 photos. More importantly, anyone on Flickr can see the photos I've uploaded, not just people I've put on a friends list.

In terms of use, the sites are quite different, too. Facebook may have gotten into the photo arena a little later than Flickr, but it's quickly outpaced it. The company says it's getting 900 million photos uploaded each month from its more than 200 million users, whereas Flickr's official numbers put that number somewhere around 90 million uploads from some 40 million registered users. Just keep in mind those 200 million Facebook users are probably not using the site specifically for photo hosting like they are on Flickr.

So why are Flickr users so hesitant to tag other people's photos? There are many reasons, but the biggest is that the two tagging systems are just plain… Read more

I'll admit. I'm a geek. I use my phone for a lot more than talking, texting, and updating Twitter.

With 8 GB of internal memory the Palm Pre is ready to handle my music and photos. Today I hooked the Pre to my laptop for the first time...

I love the camera on the Pre (more about it later) but the way the photos are organized bugs me a bit. All Photos and Photo Roll are nearly the same. And, there's no way to actually organize the photos from the phone. While this can be easily accomplished from your computer, pairing my devices via USB up isn't something I do every day of the week. I wish there was a way to assign photos to certain albums from within the phone. … Read more

This simple but well-designed program ensures that your meetings and attendees stay on task. It offers an easy-to-navigate user interface that will appeal to all user levels.

Effective Meetings opens with a professional, straightforward user interface. Menu and command buttons run across the top of the window for creating new meeting agendas. The features are organized by categories that break down the meeting process (General, Attendees, Preparation, Agenda, and Minutes) and each can be accessed by either clicking the appropriate command button at the top or by clicking the appropriate tab at the bottom of the window. We quickly walked … Read more