tool

Last night, I started a professional audio production program at the University of Washington Extension. There are about 40 students in the class. A half dozen or so are like me--in our 30s or older, with full-time careers outside the music industry, but with a longtime interest in recording and a lot of experience writing and playing music.

But most are full-time students, or between college and graduate school, and are expecting to make a career in the music industry. Some of these kids are frighteningly single-minded--there's an 18-year-old who's been messing around with recording software since he … Read more

Just about everyone gets around the Web using one search engine or another, with most using Google or Yahoo as their preferred search sites. We've come a long way from when sites would display information and we would obediently follow their recommendations on the Web (think AOL). Now we'll think of something (a vacation destination, a person, a product, etc.) and enter it into a search engine to find out more. There have always been search sites, but I really think the concept of the term "Google it" is what transformed our Internet use into what it is today. With most people using a search engine as their home page these days, it's no wonder Google and other search engines are doing so well now.

Several browsers capitalized on search-engine use by adding a search box to the browser's interface. I use the search box in Safari all the time, but today I found a little application that makes Safari's search box even more convenient.… Read more

According to a McKinsey & Company study of US economic activity, "Raising the productivity of employees whose jobs can't be automated is the next big performance challenge." The study argues that "as more companies come to specialize in core activities and outsource the rest, they have greater need for workers who can interact with co-workers, partners, and vendors," supported by highly personalized organizing and communication tools. 40 percent of labor activity, says McKinsey, comes not from making things or from traditional transactions but from what the consultancy calls the "Interaction Economy," which it … Read more

If you're a Flickr user, you might be unaware there's a whole world of tools that take advantage of Flickr's API to let you tweak and repurpose your shots. This morning I've been enjoying BigHugeLabs, a site that's home to about 40 tools that let you play with Flickr photos--yours and everyone else's. Several provide simple ways to add text, or a filter to your photo. Others dig deep into the heart of service to let you turn your photos into desk kitsch and conversation starters. I've picked five of my favorites.

Trading Card. … Read more

When you work in, on, or around the Web, you tend to collect tools. A site here, a toolbar there...you really can't help it. Here's a total must-have for your SEO toolbox...but don't tell the developers and designers.

The Web Developer extension from Chris Pederick is a hugely popular and useful tool for Web developers and designers everywhere. But this browser add-on is an equal-opportunity tool that should be in every SEO's toolbox as well for quick snapshot views and reviews of sites. It will require the use of one of the following browsers, … Read more

Best4c says it's the "best online diagram tool on earth." A pretty lofty claim, considering how many other chart utilities are out there that have similar feature sets (see Gliffy, mxGraph, Ajax13, Floor Planner, etc.) Best4c offers up a simple drag and drop editor, with a four-pane interface that mimics a other desktop drawing apps. You can pick from a fairly large selection of items to drag into your virtual space, including items for floor planning like desks, couches, and houseplants, all the way to flow chart tools to use as a virtual whiteboarding space. There's … Read more

Intel on Tuesday is scheduled to release the source code to a development tool for writing applications to run on multicore chips.

The company released Threading Building Blocks last August, a C++ template designed to simplify the job of writing applications that take advantage of processors with multiple cores, or processing units.

During the last year, Intel found that customers and potential customers wanted greater platform support and assurances that the toolset would be around for a long time, said James Reinders, the director of Intel's software development products.

To address these concerns, Intel has decided to release the tool … Read more

I spent part of this morning having a go with the new Facebook app from the folks at WordPress.com (a Webware 100 winner). Once installed and linked up with your Wordpress.com account, you can post to any of your blogs without leaving Facebook. You can also check traffic stats and add bookmarks to your blogroll. The actual blog authoring tool is very limited in this release. There's no way to add links or pictures to posts. You're also unable to manage some of the subtleties of authoring like bold and italicized fonts, indentations, and the handy … Read more

Answers, the creator of Answers.com, plans to purchase Lexico Publishing Group, the parent of Dictionary.com.

Through the deal, Answers will inherit a collection of Web properties that "generate approximately three times the total page views of Answers.com," according to an Answers statement.

In addition to Dictionary.com, Lexico also owns Thesaurus.com and Reference.com.

Lexico Web sites had a total of 11.5 million unique users in June, Answers Chairman and CEO Robert S. Rosenschein said in a Tuesday Webcast.

"The combined properties (of Answers and Lexico) would have reached a total of … Read more