Postica has to be one of the more single-serving Web apps I've seen in a long time. The service lets you create a slew of tiny sticky notes that can be maneuvered around the confines of your browser with ajaxian flair. They don't hover over pages you're looking at like Diigo or Fleck; instead it's all about your personal note space. Whatever notes you create are saved, and can be accessed from wherever. You can also share them with others, and they can send notes to your workspace, too.
Each note is confined to just 140 characters, the same length as an SMS text message or a note on Twitter. You can also add a single file to each note. I managed to get a few image files that were over 5MB in size, but it choked on the 50MB video file I tried. There's no documentation on what the size limit is, or if you'll run into any sort of cap on total storage so I'd stick to small files like PDFs, pictures, and office docs.
I'm still wary to recommend Postica over something like Shifd, a similar Web-based sticky note service that does a much better job integrating URLs, addresses, and letting you access and sync up your notes on both desktops and mobile phones. The one area where Postica has the leg up is file sharing, but you've got to be patient for each upload to make its way there.
Little post-its made easy, but that's about all you can do with Postica.
(Credit: CNET Networks)This afternoon I've been playing with a real fun annotation tool (at least fun compared with Microsoft Word). It's called A.nnotate, and it's one of the simplest tools I've come across, letting you add small (or very large) notes, corrections, or scribblings that float on top of the document like little widgets.
By default the notes are anchored to where they've been put on the document, but you can simply move them about, or sort them on a one-page listing that will organize them by time or who wrote them.
Power users will get the most use of the small notes. You can re-color them one of 21 shades and give each one tags, either from a preselected list or by making your own. This is one of the simpler ways to organize corrections, things to delete, and additions, so whoever gets the document back can sort out what needs to be done and very easily turn it into a workflow.
In addition to Word docs and PDF files, the service works with entire Web pages. You can plug in any old URL and it will take a snapshot of the page in a similar fashion to Iterasi (review). These same notes will show up on a source list you maintain. Clicking on any of them will take you right to where you left the note on the saved page, which will stay the same even if the source content changes.
The service is free to use--to an extent. Each document you open costs credits. You get 150 free each month, and the standard document costs 5 credits a page. If you want to work on docs with others, and work on several larger, multipage documents, there are premium plans that expand the amount of credits you have at up to 50,000 per month.
Other services in this space include Diigo (coverage), Evernote (coverage), Fleck (review), and TrailFire.
(Via Web Worker Daily via Lifehacker)
Leave notes on any bit of document, PDF, or Web page with A.nnotate. You can even add tags to each note and sort through them later.
(Credit: CNET Networks)
Although there are lots of freeware and pay-to-play note-taking programs, there hasn't been a note-killer, a single note-taker that makes you sit up and take notice. While scouring the Web for this elusive-but-essential tool, Notesake shines as a robust tool designed for the college lecture hall but useful for a myriad of purposes.
... Read more
Fleck is a free Web annotation tool for marking up blogs, Web sites, and social networking profiles with little sticky notes. The service launched late last year as a Firefox-only tool and has since added compatibility with Internet Explorer. Fleck, like other annotation tools, can be a dead-simple way to collaborate and leave visual feedback for others without the hassle of software or the complexity of more advanced business collaboration tools.
Managing annotations with Fleck is very simple. Just plug a URL from any Web site into Fleck.com and you're ready to go. You can create and move around small yellow bullets that double as full-sized sticky notes when you expand them. Everything is managed from a floating toolbar that resides on the bottom of your browser window. The toolbar gives you straightforward access to add and share annotations with others. You can send off your notes to someone via e-mail or publish them straight to your blog if you're a WordPress user and are willing to install the plug-in on the server that's running your blogging tool.
Annotations show up in two ways: either as a bullet or a full sticky note.
(Credit: CNET Networks)What's more interesting is the Firefox extension Fleck launched last month. Once installed, it shows any publicly available Fleck markups for the page you're currently visiting. It's reminiscent of the Smart Digg Button extension we wrote about last week, although a little less creepy. By default, all Flecks are turned on as public, although users can set them to be private by checking a small box.
Fleck is really simple to use, but doesn't offer some of the really rich sharing and markup options we've seen lately with Yoono [hands-on] and Grouptivity [hands-on]. I'd like to see Fleck add a drawing tool, and a way to make lines and boxes, too. There's also no way to make changes with others in real time. The closest thing to that is the versioning feature, which gives each user multiple workspaces.
It's still nice to use one of these tools without the need for registration or any sort of installation. The downloadable extensions that Fleck offers only makes it easier, and a little richer for exploration.
To see an example of a Webware post with Fleck annotations, click here. To mark up this post, click the 'annotate this page' link I've embedded below.
I reviewed ActiveWeave's sticky-note service, called Stickis, in November. I liked the concept but said the site had "user interface features to work through," and that it could "stand to lose some of its advanced features." The team at ActiveWeave apparently got the message, since the company's new product, BlogRovr, is just as interesting as Stickis but also a lot simpler. And, therefore, more useful. (By the way, there's a quote from my Stickis review on the BlogRovr home page. Unsurprisingly, it's not one of the above.)
BlogRovr is tracking these sites for me.
(Credit: CNET Networks)Here's the BlogRovr concept: There are blogs and sites you like with authors you want to hear from. When surfing the Web, if you find a site or story that one of your favorite sites has written about, you might want to read its commentary on the new content you've encountered.
For this, BlogRovr will be your watchdog. And it's easy to set up: Go to BlogRovr.com and indicate the sites you want to track. Then, when you're reading content that has also been written about by one of your favorite writers, a small slide-out window points you to those write-ups. Or, install the BlogRovr add-on (only available on Firefox, so far) to get a new toolbar button that enables quick adding of blogs or sites to your BlogRovr watch list.
Any site that has an RSS feed will work as a source for BlogRovr. The company says it will eventually write some special code for major sites like Digg, so it can expose more than just text (for Digg: probably a chiclet with the number of Diggs the site has).
A BlogRovr slide-out (on the right). These blogs link to the target site--Buxfer, in this case.
(Credit: CNET Networks)The social networking and back-and-forth user comments from ActiveWeave's Stickis product isn't in BlogRover, and you won't miss it. This is a simple service that does a very nice job of keeping you plugged into your favorite bloggers.
I had a problem with the BlogRovr toolbar button not showing up on one of my tweaked-to-death PCs, but it works fine on another. Overall, the concept, utility, and usability of this new service is extremely good. I plan to start using it immediately.
A Trailfire pop-up on an old Wired News story.
(Credit: CNET Networks)Users can now leave comments on annotations, making them nice jumping-off points for focused discussions. Also, each "trail" gets its own Web page as a "trailhead." That's so Google will pick up the trails and index them.
Anyone can read Trailfire notes and follow trails without a browser add-on. You need the the Trailfire software to create trails, though.
I like the Trailfire (and Stickis) concept, and this one is nicely executed. Web annotation is an interesting form of hypertext (CEO John O'Halloran even dropped the obligatory Memex reference when he demonstrated it for me). I'm not sure the world is ready for yet another way to navigate the Web, but for particular uses--leading people on tours of various Web sites, mostly--Trailfire looks very handy. Follow my brief Web sticky note trail for a real-world example.
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