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Wednesday, December 8, 2010
Hide and Show Desktop Icons on OS X with an Automator Service [Video]
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Make Your Holiday Travel Easier with Packing Cubes [Stuff We Like]
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Benefit from an Interview Rejection by Debriefing Yourself [Interviews]
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Android Market Adds "Similar" Tab for Easier App Discovery [Updates]
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Tuesday, December 7, 2010
The Best Things to Buy in December [Buying Guide]
In a way, December is the month in which everything is nominally "on sale." But what's really discounted and worth buying, if you're not just buying gifts? These are the items that tend to be cheaper in this cold, cheery month.
Every month, we look back at our big post on the best times to buy anything and when, and pull out items each month for further inspectoin. We revamp the timeline for that month, and remind everyone of the latest items coming up cheap (or just cheaper than usual) this month.
Here's what's newly cheap in December; click for a larger view.
As always, these tips aren't intended to make you buy, buy, buy. But if you do happen to need something seen here, maybe now's the time to be looking for deals. On to the savings:
Shrubs, bushes, bulbs, etc.: Anything you can buy now and store at a halfway decent temperature until spring, you can likely get at a discount. Greenhouses and garden shops are starting to feel the post-season decline, and landscape goods that can make it indoors go pretty cheap this time of year.
Wedding dresses (and other wedding gear): It's the best of both discount worlds: hardly anybody's buying right now, but stores are anticipating a whole bunch of bridal shoppers after all those unbearably cute Christmas morning engagements. Because of the slow season and decent stock, you can drive the price around a bit, says SmartMoney.com.
Tools: Because, really, who wants to work on their shingles when it's snowing, as AOL Shopping points out? But if you know you're in need of decent tools for when things start to defrost, now's a good time to grab them.
Champagne: There's really only one time of year when everyone thinks about buying Champagne, and it's right before New Year's Eve. So the Champagne firms get cut-throat in trying to lure everybody to their brand, so go ahead and stock up, within reason, while the getting's good, according to SmartMoney.com.
HDTVs and home theater equipment: All the new shiny stuff arrives in spring, so it's getting near the time when you might be able to punch a few hundred dollars off last years models, as Kiplinger, via Consumer Reports, suggests. The deals actually get better in January, but now's not a bad time to start looking if you're grabbing a gift for someone you obviously like a whole lot.
Off-color cars: Meaning the kind that are purple, orange, or gold, not that they tell rude jokes. If you're okay with the colors that aren't as popular, now's a great time to hit the dealership, find a car that isn't silver, black, or red, then drive down the year-end price. That tip comes courtesty of a Forbes piece by Mark Di Vincenzo's, whose book Buy Ketchup in May has been previously featured and highly inspirational.
We're going to peek back at this and other installments in our "Best Things to Buy" series later this year, so we can update and improve our buying guide for 2011. If you know of something we missed this month, tell us why it's cheap in the comments, and we'll check it out. The author of this post can be contacted at tips@lifehacker.comBest Text Editor? [Hive Five Call For Contenders]
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Synapse Is a Super-Fast, Tightly Integrated Application Launcher for Linux [Downloads]
Linux: Free app Synapse goes beyond the simple application launcher to tightly integrate with your Linux system, quickly accessing any recent action you've performed so you can return to it or perform something similar in an instant.
GNOME-Do is still one of our favorite Linux launchers, but it hasn't updated in over a year. If you're looking for something a bit fresher (and without the ugly Mono dependencies), Synapse is a great replacement. It's similar to GNOME-Do and other application launchers in the sense that, with a quick keyboard shortcut, you can launch an application or take action on a certain file, depending on the plugins you have installed.
However, while the plugin list isn't quite as extensive as the more mature GNOME-Do, the Zeitgeist plugin allows for a lot of cool things. Zeitgeist (which comes pre-installed on Ubuntu) is a service that logs all your activity—files opened, websites visited, conversations held—and all these are quickly available through Synapse. You can look up recently used files (say, if you closed that document by accident or want to repeat the song you just heard) and even find other similar files. It's a slightly different approach to quick launching, and one that may have a slightly bigger learning curve but it has a ton of possibilities since Zeitgeist logs so much.
Apart from all that, you also have the usual plugins—Banshee, Rhythmbox, Dictionary, Log out/Shut Down/Suspend, and quick Terminal commands, to name a few. If you rely heavily on some of GNOME-Do's more custom plugins, you might have to wait a bit before Synapse fits into your workflow better, but if not, it's definitely worth checking out. Hit the link below to read more.
Send an email to Whitson Gordon, the author of this post, at whitson@lifehacker.com.
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