contacts

Delivering anesthesia via contact lenses

Eye drops are so 1.0. Not only can they be messy and inconvenient to apply, they deliver medicine to treat dryness and other issues in imprecise volumes so quickly that they need to be reapplied every few hours.

And for those applying eye drops after laser eye surgery--when the eyes are especially tender--they can be a real pain.

Which is why researchers at the University of Florida are working to design contact lenses already helpful in protecting the eyes post-surgery that can extend the release time of anesthesia to help with this post-surgery pain.

The trick, chemist Anuj Chauhan … Read more

Find Web domain owners with WhoIs

WHOIS is a protocol that lets users query databases to find out the ownership information behind Web domains. WhoIs is a simple program that lets users perform this task, though we're not sure what the point of the program is when you can get the same information from any number of Web sites. If you do want a program dedicated to WHOIS queries, though, we suppose that WhoIs is a decent choice.

The program's interface is quite plain, and not entirely intuitive. A text box lets users enter the domain they want to search for, and we liked … Read more

iOS 5.0.1 triggers address book bug for certain users

Apple's iOS 5.0.1 seems to have created a glitch with the Contacts app for certain users, according to various sources and several posts on the Apple Support Forums.

Startup Foundry founder Paul Hontz reported late last week that after updating to 5.0.1, the iPhone was no longer able to associate address book contacts with other apps. Opening the Contacts app would display all the right names. But using the iMessage texting app or even making a phone call would fail to remember the name of a contact and just display the person's phone number.… Read more

Address Book distribution list editor disabled by iCloud

After creating a group of contacts in Address Book, you can send e-mails to its members by simply typing the name of the group in the address field of an e-mail message, and Mail will fill in a list of the e-mail addresses of its members.

When Mail does this, by default the primary e-mail address for the contacts in the group will be used, so if a member has multiple e-mail addresses then the first one listed will be used. However, this default behavior can be changed by using Address Book's distribution list editor (available in the Edit … Read more

Give your patients Excel-lent care with Free Excel Contact Appointment Scheduler

Med-e-Forms specializes in PDF-based document solutions for health care providers, but it also offers a range of free Excel workbooks, including Free Excel Contact Appointment Scheduler. This free spreadsheet template for Microsoft Excel automatically schedules appointments based on your contacts list and office hours. It keeps track of contact data, referrals, and the date, time, and length of appointments. It's optimized for physicians or health care providers in small, private practices, but lots of businesses can use it, too, and even customize it to their own needs.

Opening this workbook in Excel didn't exactly dazzle us--more like daze--but … Read more

How to improve Siri by using phonetic names

Siri is a by-the-book type of app; if a word is spelled a certain way, but is pronounced completely different, Siri doesn't care. Similar to how it handles punctuation, Siri will read or write using the exact information available to it.

Twitter Integration in iOS 5: A closer look

Among the many new features in iOS 5 for Apple's mobile devices, one seemingly small addition will make sharing your life in fewer than 140 characters much easier.

Integrated Twitter features are now an option in most of the main iOS apps, and on first use, you'll see just how easy it is to send tweets from your browser, photo app, YouTube, Contacts, or Maps. iOS 5 doesn't come standard with a complete Twitter experience that lets you browse tweets as well, but during your first setup you'll find a handy button for downloading Twitter's … Read more

Xobni introduces Smartr contact management for Gmail and Android

Xobni, maker of popular contact management tools for Outlook and BlackBerry, has today announced a new sub-brand along with two new products ready for public beta. Smartr Inbox for Gmail and Smartr Contacts for Android--both previously branded as Xobni products during their private beta stage--now bring Xobni's contact management powers to Google's e-mail platform.

Smartr Inbox for Gmail is a browser extension that adds a useful sidebar to your Gmail interface. With it, you can easily pull up any contact you've ever communicated with, along with details of your e-mail relationship, history, and even common contacts between … Read more

Sync Gmail and Outlook contacts automatically

A reader named Maribeth is migrating from Outlook to Gmail and asked about synchronizing her two accounts:

"I just read your blog about Outlook/Gmail [ Merge your Outlook and Gmail contacts]. I understand this is a fix to make them both the same, but do you know if there is a way to sync them continually? I still want to use Outlook on my desktop and also have IMAP movability on my Droidx2 phone and also on an iPad. Is it possible?"

In a July 2009 post I described how to "Sync contacts and calendars between Outlook, Gmail, and iPhone.&… Read more

One Google keyboard shortcut to remember

Keyboard shortcuts help us achieve greater efficiency by not having to lift our hands from the keyboard to use the mouse. The only problem is remembering them all. If you use Gmail, Google Calendar, or Google Reader, the single most important keyboard shortcut to remember is the question mark ("?").

In the Google services we mentioned above, hitting the "?" will bring up a grid of all the keyboard shortcuts that are available for that service. Clicking on the "Open in a new window" link will display the shortcuts in a new browser window so that … Read more