Using Legos and a Lego motor to generate the current, you can make a hand-cranked USB charger. Great stocking stuffer for that nerd who misses his childhood. [via]
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Tod and his bots send some seasons greetings, he writes -
“The Roomba family was out caroling. They stopped by and sang a few songs. I caught a few on tape. I think they were a little tipsy on mulled 30W or something.
This was a demo of RoombaMidi2, a Mac OS X program to turn your Roomba into a MIDI instrument. Click the link to find out how and get the source code (and find out why they were so drunk).” - Link.
You’re here reading Lifehacker.com - quite possibly in a feed reader or using Firefox - so the hacks in Chapter 9 of Lifehacker the book won’t be very revelatory. To you. But this chapter’s for your brother-in-law who pulls you aside after dinner and asks you what the heck RSS is, anyway.
From the chapter intro:
Mastering the use of a web browser, finding what you need quickly, navigating engines and indices, determining a set of trusted sources, and judging the quality and authority of new sources are all skills anyone who uses the web to his advantage needs. In effect, on the web, you are your own personal research librarian.
After the jump, chapter 9’s list of hacks adorned with merry holiday hyperlinks.
Hack 68: Google Like a Pro (Web, Easy)
“Google’s single, one-line input box conceals a host of functionality that can narrow your results to exactly what you need. “
Related posts:
Hack 69: Subscribe to Web Sites with RSS (All platforms, Medium)
“Like a magazine subscription that automatically brings each new issue to your door, you can subscribe to web site feeds that push information to your door.”
Related posts:
Hack 70: Quick Search Dependable Engines (All platforms with Firefox, Medium)
“Another keyboard-driven method for searching the web is what Firefox calls Quick Searches–customizable, keyword-based searches from the Firefox address bar.”
Related posts:
Hack 71: Extend Your Web Browser (All platforms with Firefox, Medium)
“The best feature of popular open-source web browser Firefox is its openness: the browser was built so that anyone can write a feature-adding extension for it. “
Related posts:
Hack 72: Get Ten Must-Have Bookmarklets (All platforms, Easy)
“Bookmarklets can enhance web pages, add special functionality, and make your browsing experience a lot more efficient by offering one-click access to useful tools.”
Related post:
Hack 73: Get Your Data on a Map (Web, Easy)
“This hack points you to several of the best mashups that can help you adjust your commute home from work for traffic, decide where to live, help you find a nearby used car for sale, and figure out how far your jog across the bridge this morning really was.”
Related posts:
Hack 74: Set Multiple Sites as Your Homepage (All platforms with Firefox or Internet Explorer 7, Easy)
“You can set several web pages as your homepage in tabbed browsers (like Firefox and Internet Explorer 7) and also bookmark and open sets of tabs.”
Related post:
Hack 75: Access Unavailable Web Sites via Google (Web, Easy)
“Web sites go offline. They move, occasionally suffer from temporary unavailability or errors, or become slow to respond because of technical difficulties or a period of high user demand. In those cases, when you need the information right away, you need a mirror of that web site’s content.”
Related post:
Hack 76: Take Your Browser Configuration with You (Windows (Firefox), Medium)
“Now that you’ve tricked out your copy of Firefox with extensions, bookmarklets, sets of bookmarks, and Quick Searches, the last thing you want to do is have to set it all up again at another computer. If you get a new computer, or want to transport your settings at home to the office, a handy utility called MozBackup can help.”
Related post:
Hack 77: Find Out About a Web Site (Web, Medium)
“When you find information on the web at a site you’ve never seen before, it’s difficult to assess how trustworthy that source is. Although ultimately the decision is yours, there are several services that provide information about other web sites that can help you decide.”
Hack 78: Have a Say in What Google Says About You (Web, Medium)
“Someone out there’s trying to find information about you right now, whether it’s a potential employer, date, or a long lost friend. What happens when she Googles you?”
Related post:
Hack 79: Capture Web Clippings with Google Notebook (All platforms with Firefox or Internet Explorer, Medium)
“Collecting bookmarks just isn’t enough when you’re doing serious web research. Web pages disappear, or the information you need is just one paragraph halfway down the page, or you want to annotate a page with your own notes for later reference.”
Related post:
Hack 80: Clear your Web Browsing Tracks (All (with Firefox or Internet Explorer), Medium)
“Your web browser saves a lot of information about where you go and what you do online while you’re surfing the web.”
Nine chapter previews down, 1 to go! Stay tuned for the Lifehacker book preview wrap-up with the final chapter 10 tomorrow.
Jake writes in with his latest project -
“I used a 19th Century technique called electrolytic etching to create brass cover plates for a set of Moleskin notebooks that I plan to give as gifts these season.” - Link.
It’s a sphere drawing etcha-sketch-style drawing machine using PICaxe microcontrollers and old floppy drive steppers. Wow!
The Doodle Dome was a toy made by Tyco in the early 1990’s. It is basically an Etch-A-Sketch type deal, except that instead of a flat rectangle, it is (most of) a sphere. Like an Etch-a-Sketch, there are two knobs that move a little pointer around a drawing surface, and it scrapes some silver dust-like stuff off to draw a picture. Outside of the shape, the other notable difference is that there is a little lever that pulls the drawing point off of the surface, so the picture can have gaps in it, instead of being all connected by a line.
For no particular reason, this spring I rigged one up with motors and a computer interface, to see if I could get it to draw arbitrary pictures. I got the whole thing about 95% done back in April, then last week I finally finished it up and took some pictures. - Link (Thanks Jay)
Merry Christmas everyone! I stumbled on this neat wrapping idea last year, and my gift recipients really like it. It makes opening presents that much faster.
Materials needed:
- Ribbon (preferably thin, need not match the paper)
- Wrapping paper (preferably pretty)
- Present (preferably cubical or cylindrical)
- Tape, scissor, bows and the like
.
By: kqrpnb
Windows/Mac/Unix (Firefox): The Organize Status Bar Firefox extension lets you manage and organize the items on your status bar (where do they come up with these crazy names?).
If you’ve installed many extensions (and we know a lot of you have), you’ve probably also noticed that your chrome has gotten a little busy. While you can easily customize your toolbar(s), the status bar is a nother story - though it can get just as cluttered. With Organize Status Bar, you can reorder or remove items altogether from the status bar, giving you a lot more control over what goes on down there. Thanks Jatin!
To make a good solid perfume, all you need is beeswax, either almond oil, jojoba oil or vitamin E, and your preferred essential oils. Scents like sandalwood and ylang ylang are considered aphrodisiacs; the smell of peppermint helps suppress your appetite; and some flowery scents like chamomile are calming. Go here and here for more information on the effects […]
Has your expensive smoking habit prevented you from picking up a real DSLR flash? Well continue to tar up those lungs because that problem has been solved. Conveniently, an empty pack of cigarettes provides the perfect flash diffuser for the integrated flash lens of Canon DSLRs. Diffusing a flash prevents really washed-out images and make the lighting appear more natural. Hit the jump to see a before and after.
Cigarette Packet Flash Diffuser [instructables]
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