The Great Geek Manual

Plenty of robots can fly — but none can fly like a real bird. That is, until Markus Fischer and his team at Festo built SmartBird, a large, lightweight robot, modeled on a seagull, that flies by flapping its wings. A soaring demo fresh from TEDGlobal 2011.
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A Jedi robot that can duel with humans — what could go wrong? Students at Stanford University have created a “JediBot” that can fight a duel against a human opponent. It uses a Microsoft Kinect sensor to track its opponent’s lightsaber, and then counterattacks whenever it makes contact.

The JediBot isn’t the fastest sparring partner you can find, delivering one swing every two to three seconds, but it does mean you don’t need to have any friends to practice your lightsaber skills.

I’m just waiting for someone to cross the JediBot’s sensor and software with a quadrocopter to create the lightsaber practice droid from Star Wars.

Utilities and Resources

• 35+ Desktop Utilities To Manage Your Code Snippets
• 4space – this utility transforms your computer into a HTTP file server with multiple password-protected directories. Very convenient for sharing regularly updated files.
• The Best Free Web Apps of 2011
• Ditch PayPal and Use These Other Services to Send People Money
• Vizualize.Me – allows you to visualize your resume in one click by turning your LinkedIn profile into an infographic. (In Beta)
• Zip2Fix – a portable utility for extracting the undamaged files from a ZIP file when some of the files inside the archive are damaged.

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Utilities and Resources

• Calibre – a good free program for managing books on devices (iPad or Kindle)
• Cantio – this web app allows users to stream YouTube in a Grooveshark interface.
• Codeita – a powerful, easy to use, cloud-based, web development environment. It’s a powerful code editor, an advanced svg image editor, and an out of this world project management and collaboration tool.
• loads.in – lets users see how fast your (or any) website loads in a real browser from over 50 locations worldwide. An absolute must for web developers.
• MP3 Skype Recorder – need to do an interview via Skype for your blog? Here’s the easy way to record it. The name pretty much says it all.
• MyCube Vault – a free utility that will back up your Facebook data, your Google Contacts, and your Picasa photos and albums at regular intervals that you select.

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In an attempt to expand its market share in South Korean, the European grocery chain Tesco has come up with a brilliant idea. Tesco has launched a virtual grocery store in the subway. While waiting to commute, customers can purchase food items by scanning QR codes with their smartphones at virtual shelves installed right in the subway station. A delivery service drops off the ordered items at the customer’s door by the time they get home.

Utilities and Resources

• Google Web Fonts – Offers hundreds of free, open-source fonts for your perusal.
• MachStudio Pro 2 – this expensive 3D visualization suite is now free.
• Quirky – is sort of like Threadless, but for inventions. Learn more.
• Qwiki – a colorful alternative to search engines. Qwiki tells the story of a topic, rather than just returning webpages.
• Search by image – similar to Google Goggles, you can drag an image to the search and find similar pictures and content. Doesn’t work well with faces. [Demo]
• Should I Change My Password – checks a list of e-mails connected to passwords released by hackers to the public (source list here) and tells you if your password has been compromised.
• sideCLOUDload – send files from a url directly to “the cloud” (currently Dropbox and Email) without downloading to your computer or mobile device.
• TuneSpan – a free app for Mac OS X 10.5 or higher that lets you store parts of your iTunes library on external storage to save disk space.

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Utilities and Resources

• Google Notebook – an excellent web application for all those who take notes to save bookmarks or for any other purpose. Log-in using your Gmail account.
• MP3 Cover Downloader – find and add cover images (album arts) to your mp3 files. No matter where you move your mp3 file, the saved cover will be there.
• WiFi HD FREE – turn your iPhone into a wireless, mobile external hard drive. It works over any WiFi connection.

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Utilities and Resources

• Androidify – an app that will let you take that little green Android avatar and turn it into yourself, your friends, your family or anyone.
• Asciiflow – an online utility for making ASCII art diagrams.
• gleeBox – browser add-on enables new, faster keyboard navigation options to Chrome, Safari, and Firefox web browsers.
• HideIt – allows you to minimize any application to your Windows system tray (rather than your taskbar) by right-clicking its minimize button.
• Lorem Pixum – a placeholder image generator for web and print designers for any size or topic. Speed up your workflow during the development process.
• Smipple – a social service for saving, storing, organizing, and sharing snippets of code with your friends and coworkers.

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