The Week in Tech for November 18-24

Posted on November 24, 2007
Filed Under Technology Links | Leave a Comment

What are people using on Facebook? Here is a good analysis.

Google leaves $110 million dollars on the table every year because of the “I’m feeling lucky” button.

Smartpastor.com thinks that churches should move to OpenOffice.org.

Bookmark pages you want to read later with Readeroo.

Meebo: 10 Gotta Have Free Applications

Posted on November 14, 2007
Filed Under Communication, Free Applications | Leave a Comment

I am going to shoot square with you, I am not a real big fan of instant messaging. But many of the people I minister to are and as such I feel that I need to make an effort to be accessible in a means they prefer. So a couple of times a week I log onto Meebo and make myself available to instant message.

Meebo is a web page that allows you to chat on all the major networks (and a few minor ones) via small boxes on your web page.

So if this interests you, surf over to Meebo and create your account. Once logged in you can, assuming you have chatted with Gtalk, Yahoo Chat, MSN Messenger, or AIM you can start using those chat platforms on that site.

I have created chat names for all the major platforms and have chatted with folks in my church on all of them via meebo. I do this because I know some of my people are MSN folks, while others are loyal to AIM, and the tech tips are into gtalk. Being available on all of them is my own little way of being electronically incarnational to my church.

Now, there are pieces of software that do the same things but I believe that web-based is better as the more software you load on your computer the slower it is going to run.

At this point meebo does not offer some of the advanced features that chatting software offers today such as voice and video chat, but they are working on it and likely will soon.

So if chatting is something that is helpful to you in ministry, dump your software and go meebo.

10 “gotta have” free application series:

1. Firefox: November 8

2. Gmail with Pop Access: November 9

3. Web Clipping Software: November 12

4. Meebo: November 14

5. Skype: November 16

6. Open Office: November 19

7. RSS Readers: November 21

8. Mozy: November 23

9. Free System Tools: November 26

10. Jott: November 27

Google Notebook: 10 Gotta Have Free Applications

Posted on November 12, 2007
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When you signed up for gmail you did something you probably were not even aware of…you opened up a whole new set of possibilities for computing power including using a great Google application called the Google Notebook.

The Google Notebook is a powerful web clipping tool that allows you to save pictures, text, and links from web pages for later use.

Why would this be valuable?  Suppose you come across a web site that contains some quotes and information that would be great for your next sermon.  What are your choices?  Well, you could print it out and save it.  You could jot a note and try to find the site again later, or you could clip it in your google notebook.  Then you will have it for later in a notebook you can organize as you choose.

To use the Google Notebook, first download Firefox.  (Located in the far right coloum)  Then go and download the Google Notebook firefox extension here.   Just click on the download button and follow the instructions. There is a Google Notebook tool also available for the Internet Explorer, but honestly you do not want to go there.

You should now have a small box that reads “open notebook” in the lower right hand corner of your browser.

Assuming you are still signed into your Google account, now go find some text to test clip.  Just highlight text you want to save by pushing your left mouse button down and dragging it over text until you have the section you want.  Once you have dragged it over the section you want you can release the left mouse button.

Now, on your highlighted text, push your right mouse button and one of the options, towards the bottom, will say “note this (Google Notebook)”.  Push that part on the menu and just like that, your “clipped” section will show up in a box in the lower left hand corner.  This clip will contain the text you selected and will contain a link back to the site it came from.

You can now hit the X to close it or leave it open as you browse around.

The real power of the notebook comes as your create different notebooks.  So for every category of things you would want to clip you can make your own notebook.  (Examples, gift ideas for my family, current or future sermons, leadership ideas, inspirational quotes, great articles on TechSeminary.com, … the possibilties are endless.)

I would suggest creating your first notebook and start playing it it.  When you get comfortable you will see how easy it is to move items around to different notebooks, to search your notebooks, and even eventually share what you find in your notebook.

There are other notebook type products available and Web Worker Daily has a great run down of them all but for my use, the simplicity of the Google Notebook makes it my clipping software of choice.

See you soon for the next of my “10 Gotta Have Free Applications.”

10 “gotta have” free application series:

1. Firefox: November 8

2. Gmail with Pop Access: November 9

3. Web Clipping Software: November 12

4. Meebo: November 14

5. Skype: November 16

6. Open Office: November 19

7. RSS Readers: November 21

8. Mozy: November 23

9. Free System Tools: November 26

10. Jott: November 27

Gmail: 10 Gotta Have Free Applications

Posted on November 9, 2007
Filed Under Communication | 1 Comment

A few months back I convinced the children’s ministry director at our church to switch to gmail and after a few weeks she told me, “Gmail is changing my life.”

Of course she was saying that tongue and cheek, but she was serious in realizing that gmail is an amazing e-mail system that will improve how you communicate with e-mail.

Why is gmail so great?

1. It if fast…darn fast. It sends, receives, sorts, and searches (more on that later) Google fast.

2. The spam filters are second to none. Once a week it seemed that I would have a legitimate e-mail filtered from a member of my church. Now I just have everything come through and while gmail has filtered a couple of newsletters I wanted, not once a stand alone e-mail from a church member.

3. Lots of storage space so you never have to delete an e-mail. Since gmail archives both my incoming and outgoing mail, I never have to worry about losing an important e-mail. They keep adding storage. I get a lot of e-mail and after a year I am up to using 6% of my storage. Their constantly increasing capacity is out pacing my use.

4. The layout is quite intuitive. You will be up and running in minutes.

5. Searching. This is the best feature…put the power of Google to work finding your important e-mails. For example, if you once had an email sent to you with the cell phone number of Betty in your church but can not find it, just type “betty” and “cell” in the search box and you will have it in seconds. It is amazingly faster than the search in Outlook, Outlook Express, or any of the other web mail programs.

Now, you may be thinking that you hate the idea of telling people that you have a new e-mail address and don’t want to bother. I understand that and feel the same way…and I did not.  Nearly all e-mail addresses set up on their own domain (example: you@yourchurch.com) can forward to your new gmail account. Then when people send you an e-mail at you@yourchurch.com it will end up at you@gmail.com. You can then reply from your gmail account taking advantage of the all the features that gmail offers. If you don’t know how to do this, have your church’s resident geek help set it up for you.

When you sign up with gmail you have the option of using it with a traditional e-mail program (Outlook, Outlook express, etc) or via a web page interface. Most popular web mails (Hotmail, Yahoo, etc) allow you to only use it on a web page unless you choose to pay for the extra service…gmail does not charge for this or any other service. I recommend Thunderbird and will write more on that in a future date.

At a minimum you will want to go to gmail and set up an account because having a Google account will allow you to do other things in this list of “1o Gotta Have Free Applications”.

Also see:

10 “gotta have” free application series:

1. Firefox: November 8

2. Gmail with Pop Access: November 9

3. Web Clipping Software: November 12

4. Meebo: November 14

5. Skype: November 16

6. Open Office: November 19

7. RSS Readers: November 21

8. Mozy: November 23

9. Free System Tools: November 26

10. Jott: November 27

Firefox: 10 Gotta Have free applications

Posted on November 8, 2007
Filed Under Firefox, Free Applications | 1 Comment

Much of what we are going to do with technology starts with the best browser on the market today…Firefox.

Firefox is a free open source browser that leaves Internet Explorer quite a ways behind. This is because Firefox is..

1. Faster!

2. More secure!

3. Customizable to your needs with hundreds of free plugins.

Is it really worth it to go to a new browser! Yes! You have to experience it to believe it. I was a skeptic until I played around with it for a few days and realized how much faster it was. Then I started loading extensions and realized how much I had been missing.

You may be worried that you will lose all your bookmarks and the simple customization that Internet Explorer allows…fear not! Firefox will import it all painlessly for your effective web browsing.

If you don’t like it, you can always uninstall it. So be brave, take your web usage to a new level and download Firefox via the button to the right on your screen.

10 “gotta have” free application series:

1. Firefox: November 8

2. Gmail with Pop Access: November 9

3. Web Clipping Software: November 12

4. Meebo: November 14

5. Skype: November 16

6. Open Office: November 19

7. RSS Readers: November 21

8. Mozy: November 23

9. Free System Tools: November 26

10. Jott: November 27