organization

Winstep Xtreme is a customizable Windows interface suite that combines enhanced functionality and attractive effects with a wide variety of widgets, utilities, task managers, and power tools, all designed to work together seamlessly. It bundles the NeXuS Ultimate dock system; WorkShelf, a versatile tabbed dock; NextStart, an enhanced system taskbar; Winstep Start Menu Organizer; FontBrowser; and more. Not to mention a wide variety of desktop widgets such as weather monitors, system meters, and time/date displays.

We opened Winstep Xtreme, and first to appear was NextStart, a skinnable, totally customizable taskbar replacement that basically lets you park anything you want … Read more

Editors' note: This article originally stated in error that ClearContext Professional was released this week. The content below has been updated to correct this mistake.

As evidenced by this article on NudgeMail, e-mail organization is of personal interest to me--and I know I'm not the only inbox control freak structured individual in existence. Certainly, ClearContext was counting on that when it developed ClearContext Professional, a plug-in for Microsoft Outlook.

The goal of ClearContext Professional is to help you stay in control of your inbox by providing organizational tools and rules for e-mails, tasks, appointments, and projects. Adding it to … Read more

Virtual desktop managers have been common third-party Windows accessories at least since the days of Windows 98, and they're even more common for Unix users, for whom they're essential productivity features. Virtual desktops add capabilities to the Windows desktop by creating copies of your desktop that you can customize for specific uses--work, e-mail, and gaming, for example--and rapidly switch between. It's almost like having separate computers, except with all your files and settings on each. Portable VirtuaWin is a free and totally portable version of VirtuaWin, a free virtual desktop manager. It's compact and runs from … Read more

For better or worse, we often find ourselves using our e-mail accounts to store information that we're likely to forget, such as Christmas gift ideas and passwords for infrequently used accounts. AllMyNotes Organizer Free Edition provides an alternative to such practices, letting you easily save and organize numerous notes to yourself.

The program's interface is well-designed and intuitive, and we liked that it walks you through the program setup with a wizard. This is where you can specify what you plan to use the program for; the options include Personal, Professional & Business, School, Family Records, and Passwords &… Read more

Australia's Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization tomorrow plans to unveil a breakthrough in wireless technology that will allow multiple users to upload content at the same time while maintaining a data transfer rate of 12 megabits per second (Mbps), all over their old analog TV aerial.

The technology, named Ngara, allows up to six users to occupy the equivalent spectrum space of one television channel (7 megahertz) and has a spectral efficiency of 20 bits per second per hertz. Ngara can handle up to three times that of similar technology and maintains a data rate more than 10 … Read more

Bare Bones Software's Yojimbo provides a fast, intuitive way to collect and store all kinds of information--from text and images to bookmarks, software serial numbers, passwords, and complete Web page archives that you can read offline. Yojimbo also lets you sync up with your iPad.

Yojimbo makes it extremely easy to add new bits of info: You can scan something directly using TWAIN plug-ins, you can drag and drop almost anything onto Yojimbo's Drop Dock (a tab that sits at the edge of the screen and holds all your "Collections"), or you can hit F8 to … Read more

Let's just say it's a good thing this breakthrough didn't come around when I was in my early twenties, or I may have been tempted to spend a little more time at my favorite neighborhood watering hole.

Scientists at the Institute for Regenerative Medicine at Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center say they've successfully used human liver cells to create miniature livers that function like their larger, more naturally derived counterparts.

Using a process called decellularization, the team rinsed real livers from an unspecified animal with detergent, stripping them of all their cells and leaving only … Read more

Junko is a free tool that lets you split PDF files into separate documents by page range or number or combine many PDFs into larger files. By splitting large PDFs into multiple smaller files, you can work on just the pages or sections you need, and they're easier for small apps to handle. Combining multiple PDFs is useful for creating manuals and other multipage documents. Junko is powered by PDFsharp, the open-source .NET library of PDF wares.

Junko's interface is very basic and opens with a blank main view, but it's Aero-compatible and has a customizable toolbar. … Read more

PersonalBrain is a full-featured mind-mapping program, designed to create a "digital home for your mind" that can help you visually organize almost any sort of process or project as a dynamic, interconnected system of Thoughts (called a Brain). PersonalBrain gives you a fairly intuitive interface for collecting, organizing, viewing, and navigating ideas, tasks, Web sites, related documents, and more.

Whether you're building a complex Web site or conducting academic research, this app can help you build searchable networks of information with tools for taking notes, creating shortcuts (pins), zooming out to get a higher-level view of your … Read more