Dr. Augustine Fou's Online Scrapbook

Saturday, April 03, 2010

#DD2010 - @JetBlue Reaching 1.6 Million Customers Daily, with NO Media Cost #ROI #SocialMedia - http://bit.ly/lvuG0

#DD2010 - @JetBlue Reaching 1.6 Million Customers Daily, with NO Media Cost #ROI #SocialMedia - http://bit.ly/lvuG0

#HowTo see Gmail for #iPad without an iPad right now (#Chrome, #Safari) - http://bit.ly/aNRcsI

How to Set Up a Mail Merge in Gmail for Personalized Mass Emails [Gmail Tip]

Source: http://lifehacker.com/5508283/how-to-set-up-a-mail-merge-in-gmail-for-personalized-mass-emails

How to Set Up a Mail Merge in Gmail for Personalized Mass Emails If you want to send out a personalized mass email, much like most companies' marketing emails, creating a mail merge is the easiest way. Unlike the antiquated mail merges of days past, you can do it in Gmail with half the headache.

A mail merge is when a template is merged with a database of information, such as a list of names or other unique details. It's useful for sending out personalized emails to multiple people quickly. Technology blog Digital Inspiration offers up a Gmail tip to get this done, using Gmail with Google Docs. First, create a contact group within Gmail that you want to send the email blast to. Using Google Docs, then create a copy of this spreadsheet in your account.

How to Set Up a Mail Merge in Gmail for Personalized Mass Emails

Go to the Mail Merge tab at the top, near Help. Click on "Import Gmail Contacts" and authorize Google Docs to access your Google Contacts. Go to the Mail Merge tab again, click the "Import Gmail Contacts" again and type the name of the Gmail group that you created earlier.

How to Set Up a Mail Merge in Gmail for Personalized Mass Emails

You can edit all the fields in green to your liking. After you're satisfied, go to the Mail Merge tab one more time, and hit "Start Mail Merge." Google Docs will now send out your email, and keep track of the status of each. Handy!

Create a Mail Merge with Gmail and Google Docs [Digital Inspiration]

Apple Buys a Little Chip Company That Makes Really Fast ARM Processors for iPhones and iPads [Unconfirmed]

Source: http://gizmodo.com/5508449/apple-buys-a-little-chip-company-that-makes-really-fast-arm-processors-for-iphones-and-ipads

Intrinsity is a chip design company that specializes in really fast, really power-efficient ARM processors, like the ones found in the iPhone, iPad and basically every other smartphone. Well, it looks like Apple just bought them. [EDN, MacRumors]

iPass? The best present and future alternatives to the Apple iPad

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2010/04/02/ipass-the-best-present-and-future-alternatives-to-the-apple-ipa/

When Steve Jobs introduced the iPad he was quick to shake his finger in the nose of the other devices out there attempting to fill the gap between cell phone and full-sized laptop, and in particular those market-dominating netbooks. In Apple's opinion, the iPad may be the gadget for surfing the web, watching movies, reading books and running apps, but it's surely not the only game in town. And if you aren't sold on the iPad, but happen to be someone who's looking to buy a secondary computing device to use while traveling or while simply lying on the couch, your choices at the moment come down to netbooks and... well, more netbooks. And that's not such a bad thing, especially if you need a feature Apple's tablet can't offer, like multitasking, a keyboard, or Flash support. So, before you get up on Saturday morning and run off to purchase that iPad, you may want to peruse the best current (as well as coming) alternatives we've rounded up after the break.

Continue reading iPass? The best present and future alternatives to the Apple iPad

iPass? The best present and future alternatives to the Apple iPad originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 02 Apr 2010 09:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Quake II GWT port proves HTML5 isn't just for video

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2010/04/02/quake-ii-gwt-port-proves-html5-isnt-just-for-video/

There's no question that HTML5 is good for more than just video, but if anything will put that misconception to rest, it's Quake II running in a browser. Apparently built by a trio of Google developers in their spare time, the Quake II GWT port uses a HTML5 canvas and WebGL for graphics acceleration (also seen demoed on the N900), which seem to get the job done remarkably well -- although it's still a long ways from running on certain non-Flash-equipped devices. Then again, this project was revealed on April 1st, but quite a few folks have already reported success in getting it up and running -- so, unless there's a global conspiracy to dash our hopes and dreams (always a possibility), it seems to be the real deal. Head on past the break to check it out in action.

Continue reading Quake II GWT port proves HTML5 isn't just for video

Quake II GWT port proves HTML5 isn't just for video originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 02 Apr 2010 18:07:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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iPad roundup: iDisplay extended desktop, plus Kindle and Time reader apps

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2010/04/02/ipad-roundup-idisplay-extended-desktop-plus-kindle-time-and-m/

Say what you will, the past couple of days have been littered with signs of a rapidly expanding set of functions that the iPad can perform. Latest on the block is the iDisplay desktop extender, which will turn any of your iPhone OS devices into a WiFi-connected second monitor, allowing you to finally unchain your Mac OS (Windows version forthcoming) desktop and take it on the move. Introductory price is $4.99 and you'll find an early hands-on experience at the TUAW link. Next up we have the Kindle for iPhone app contracting its name to just Kindle and making the expected jump to iPad compatibility with version 2.0, which comes with iBookstore-like page turning and, best of all, won't cost you a thing. We've also got word of Time Magazine pricing what's free on the iPhone at $4.99 per issue on the iPad, with the excuse being that you can "experience Time in a revolutionary new way." Good luck with that, we say.

Continue reading iPad roundup: iDisplay extended desktop, plus Kindle and Time reader apps

iPad roundup: iDisplay extended desktop, plus Kindle and Time reader apps originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 02 Apr 2010 19:31:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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TUAW, mocoNews.net | source

Shape Services, App Store (Kindle), Time | Email this | Comments

ASUS, EVGA, Gigabyte, Intel and MSI do battle for P55 motherboard throne

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2010/04/03/asus-evga-gigabyte-intel-and-msi-do-battle-for-p55-motherboar/

Look, we know you've got choices, and when it comes to motherboards, you've got options galore. If you've been eying a new Core i5 or Core i7 rig to replace that aging ~~Pentium 4~~ 486 system of yours, but aren't quite feeling the pre-fabricated thing, a whole slew of mobo makers have pushed through new boards to support Intel's P55 Express chipset. The gurus over at Hot Hardware -- gluttons for pain no like other, it seems -- rounded up mainboards from ASUS, EVGA, Gigabyte, Intel and MSI in order to see which ruled the roost, and more importantly, which was right for you. Options ranging from $140 to $340 were taken into account, and while the top-end EVGA P55 Classified obviously performed well under pressure, just about every single contender had a little something special to offer. There's no cut and dry "winner" when it comes to something like this, only detailed explanations as to which board suits what kind of buyer. Tired of paging through Froogle without actually knowing what you're looking for? Tap that source link and get some enlightenment.

ASUS, EVGA, Gigabyte, Intel and MSI do battle for P55 motherboard throne originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 03 Apr 2010 04:11:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Netflix coming to the iPhone and iPod touch

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2010/04/03/netflix-coming-to-the-iphone-and-ipod-touch/

This one needs very little explication indeed. Netflix has just officially confirmed that its currently iPad-only app will be trickling down to the smaller iPhone OS devices. It's all very teasing and noncommittal as far as the timeframe goes, but who's not excited about getting the "dessert" to the iPad's main course?

[Thanks, drmm3r41]

Netflix coming to the iPhone and iPod touch originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 03 Apr 2010 05:59:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Friday, April 02, 2010

How Can I Send an Email via Text Message? [Ask Lifehacker]

Source: http://lifehacker.com/5506326/how-can-i-send-an-email-via-text-message

How Can I Send an Email via Text Message? Dear Lifehacker,
I like to keep a to-do list by emailing myself, but I don't have a data plan for my phone. Is it possible to send an email to myself via SMS?

Signed,
SMS 4 Life

Photo by C y r i l l i c u s.

Hey there SMS,
It seems like there should be an easy answer to this question, ~~but unfortunately we're not aware of a single service designed explicitly for the purpose of sending email via SMS~~, and luckily, there is! (Thanks commenters!) We've listed the best option first, followed by a few helpful alternatives that might come in handy depending on your situation.

1) Just Enter Your Email Address as the SMS Recipient

Okay, so this method is actually dead simple, and from what our commenters are saying, it appears to work with most carriers:

Fire up SMS on your phone, but instead of entering in a number you want to text, enter an email address. Any email address. Compose your text like normal, hit Send, and your carrier will convert the message to an email. When it's delivered, it'll look something like you see in the screenshot below:

How Can I Send an Email via Text Message?

Simple, right? I was completely unaware that this was even an option before our readers pointed it out (Lifehacker readers are awesome), and it works like a charm. I've got three other methods for you to try out below, and since you're interested in using your text messages as a to-do list, I particularly like method #3 below, since it adds a to-do-specific subject to the email. But if the above method works for you, you can stop there.

2) Google Voice

If you're able to get your hands on a Google Voice invitation (we've got a dedicated thread here for handing out extras if you've got one and you're feeling kind), Voice has a very simple solution to your problem:

How Can I Send an Email via Text Message?

If you're logged into your Google account, just point your browser to the Voicemail and SMS settings page and tick the checkbox below Alert me when I have new voicemails and pick the address you'd like to email the message to. (See the screenshot above.) Once enabled, you can email anything to yourself via SMS by simply texting your Google Voice number from any phone. Your text message will end up in your inbox and look similar to the email you see below.

How Can I Send an Email via Text Message?

But Google Voice SMS-to-email forwarding may be overkill if you're only interested in sending email to yourself, since any text messages other people send to your Voice number will also end up in your inbox. That may be more inbox clutter than you're interested in. You could always set up filters, but that starts to get rather convoluted. Instead, consider the following solution:

3) Text yourself via email, then reply to that to email via SMS

Okay, this one may sound a little bit complicated, but overall it's actually really simple and effective. As you may or may not know, you can send text messages to most phones from your email account, provided you know the right email address for your carrier. For example, to send a text message to an AT&T phone via email, you'd simply append the 10-digit phone number to @txt.att.net (e.g., 5551234567@txt.att.net). We've highlighted this before, but as a quick reminder, some of the most popular carriers' email-to-SMS addresses are:

Alltel: phonenumber@message.alltel.com
AT&T: phonenumber@txt.att.net
T-Mobile: phonenumber@tmomail.net
Virgin Mobile: phonenumber@vmobl.com
Sprint: phonenumber@messaging.sprintpcs.com
Verizon: phonenumber@vtext.com
Nextel: phonenumber@messaging.nextel.com
US Cellular: phonenumber@mms.uscc.net

To use this method, compose a message in your email account to the proper email address for your phone and carrier (it should work with any email provider) with a subject like Mobile To-Do List, then send the message.

How Can I Send an Email via Text Message?

In a few seconds, you should get a text message from a strange number (for AT&T, the number is 1010100001 for the first email you send to your phone); the message will look something like the image below:

How Can I Send an Email via Text Message?

Once you've sent the initial text message via email, you can now reply to that number from your phone any time you want, and the reply will end up in your email inbox with the same subject you used in the original email.

How Can I Send an Email via Text Message?

As far as I can tell, this method works for quite some time, though I could imagine that it varies from carrier to carrier. If your replies stop going back to your email address, just send another text from your email to refresh the replies.

4) Twitter

If you use Twitter, you can set up your account to notify you of direct messages via email (point your browser to the notifications page and tick the checkbox next to Direct Text Emails).

How Can I Send an Email via Text Message?

Since Twitter is built specifically so you can update your account via SMS, just send a text message to 40404 with d yourusername Item you want to add to your to-do list in the message ('d' stands for direct, and you'd naturally replace yourusername with your actual username and add your to-do text after that.

How Can I Send an Email via Text Message?

In a few seconds, the message will end up in your inbox:

How Can I Send an Email via Text Message?

At the end of the day, the first method will probably best satisfy most people's SMS-to-email needs. While the latter three methods aren't necessarily perfect, any of these methods should work.

Love and email,
Lifehacker

P.S. Know of a better method for accomplishing the same task? Please, share it in the comments!

Alt+Tab Tuner Makes Windows 7's Task Switcher Thumbnails Larger and Much More [Downloads]

Source: http://lifehacker.com/5507473/alt%252Btab-tuner-makes-windows-7s-task-switcher-thumbnails-larger-and-much-more

Alt+Tab Tuner Makes Windows 7's Task Switcher Thumbnails Larger and Much More Windows 7 only: System tweaking utility Alt+Tab Tuner customizes everything about the Windows 7 Alt-Tab dialog, from setting the transparency to increasing the size of the thumbnails.

To customize the settings, all you have to do is unzip and launch the utility, drag the sliders to suit your preferences, and click the Apply button. You can even use the utility to switch back to the old XP-style Alt+Tab dialog if you were so inclined. Alt+Tab Tuner is a free download for Windows 7 only.

If you aren't happy with the built-in Alt+Tab system, and even tweaking it won't help, make sure to check out the awesome VistaSwitcher alternative, which even includes the Alt+` key combination to switch between specific application windows.

Alt-Tab Tuner [Softpedia via Download Squad]

Marketing success is when users remember you, remember to look for you, and remember to tell their friends about you - http://bit.ly/cFZy6q

University of Washington's Prefab tool promises to 'unlock the desktop'

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2010/04/01/university-of-washingtons-prefab-tool-promises-to-unlock-the-d/

The University of Washington may be overstating things a just a tad with a headline like "what if all software was open source," but the so-called "Prefab" software tool developed by some researchers at the university does indeed manage to pull of some fairly impressive tricks. The short of it is that the tool promises to you let you (or developers) modify any application without actually modifying it. To do that, the software constantly looks for easily identifiable elements of an application (dialog boxes, scroll bars, buttons, etc.) and then "alters their behavior" by effectively taking over your display, leaving the actual program running in the background and displaying the augmented version instead. According to the researchers, the possibilities from there on out are virtually endless, and include things like adding iTunes buttons to your Word toolbar and tweaking Photoshop to display previews for a whole range of effects at once. Head on past the break for a quick demo video, and look for more to be unveiled at the CHI 2010 conference in Atlanta next month.

[Thanks, Keith]

Continue reading University of Washington's Prefab tool promises to 'unlock the desktop'

University of Washington's Prefab tool promises to 'unlock the desktop' originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 01 Apr 2010 09:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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CBC |

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Olympus E-PL1 review

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2010/04/01/olympus-e-pl1-review/

It seems like such a simple thing now, but it took Olympus three revisions to finally get its "Pen" Micro Four Thirds series down below (or even close to) the magical $600 mark. Lucky for us, the E-PL1 doesn't skimp on functionality, and in fact expands on the capabilities of the E-P1 and E-P2 with an integrated pop-up flash. We already rounded up some reviews from the big boys, so check out those in-depth walkthroughs if you're looking to get nerdy, but if you'd still like to hear our thoughts on this new shooter, follow along in our mini-review after the break.

Gallery: Olympus E-PL1 review hands-on