Web Worker Daily

I recently wrote “How to Carry Your Office on a Stick,” which showcased the best ways to install portable applications on a USB flash drive. But what if you’re the type of person that doesn’t like to carry a flash drive around or happens to lose or forget it? The solution then might be a desktop in the clouds. This idea of an online or virtual desktop that you can access from any computer has actually been around for years, but continues to evolve with time. Here are some of the best ways to host your desktop online today. Read the rest of this entry »

I’m very happy in my choice of Twitter clients at the moment. Tweetie is my weapon of choice for the Mac desktop, and it has served faithfully since its release. Doesn’t hurt that it’s free, either (though ad-supported). But I’m always glad to try out new contenders to the throne, and that’s why Twitt caught my eye today.

Twitt is a new, lightweight Mac Twitter client that has some interesting features I haven’t yet found elsewhere. Can it compete with perennial favorites Tweetie and TweetDeck, though? Using both those programs regularly has set my expectations fairly high, but Twitt definitely counts some surprising twists among its repertoire. Read the rest of this entry »

I love technology, but not when it comes to switching PCs — moving all the data and applications from one Windows machine to another is not always as easy as it could be.

I thought I’d share some tips gleaned from my latest move to a new desktop. My way isn’t necessary the best way, but it may give you some ideas when it comes time for you to make the switch. Here are the steps that I took.

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Facebook only just announced that it would be making its stream API public, and now it’s following up with the launch of a new Adobe AIR desktop app that takes advantage of those capabilities. Yes, it’s an AIR app, which makes it slightly icky right away, but native desktop clients will no doubt follow in short order.

AIR app or not, the real question is: Will this bring Facebook back into my daily professional life? Read the rest of this entry »

Today marks the highly anticipated release of Tweetie for the Mac by atebits, developer of the iPhone version of the same app. Tweetie has enjoyed tremendous success on the iPhone, and for my money is far and away the best mobile client for my web workflow. Which is why I was first in line to download the new Mac client it this a.m. and see if it might be an improvement over Nambu, my current desktop Twitter solution. Olly Farshi over at our sister site TheAppleBlog has a full review, but I wanted to look at it specifically with web work in mind.

Things started off well, since Tweetie offers a full-featured, ad-supported free version in addition to a $19.95 (currently on sale for $14.95) ad-free version. I can live with one ad per hour in my tweet stream in exchange for a great free program. Heck, half of the tweets of those I’m following are probably ads anyway. Read the rest of this entry »

I’m skittish when it comes to desktop indexing and search apps. Aside from the workstation computer at my last office-based job, I don’t generally keep any running on my computers, whether Windows or Mac-based machines. I just don’t find the need for anything more heavyweight and resource-sapping than what Spotlight or Explorer’s built-in search functions provide. So let’s just say that Exalead Desktop Search was already operating at a disadvantage when I set about giving it a look for the purposes of this blog post, but I was pleasantly surprised.

I was impressed when Exalead detected and offered to index my Thunderbird mailbox during the first run setup wizard. If there’s one thing I shy away from more than desktop indexing applications, it’s the various incarnations of Microsoft Outlook. Of course, Thunderbird’s latest beta allows you to index your accounts for use with Vista’s built-in search, so it’s not critical functionality. Still, better available than not. Read the rest of this entry »