Quick tools to test your internet speed

Many of the ISPs (Internet Service Providers) continue to describe their services in terms of kilobits (kbps), rather than using kilobytes (KBps) or megabytes (MBps).

This makes it easy for potential customers to compare transfer rates against their existing dial-up modems.

A dial-up modem is capable of speeds close to 56 kbps, line noise, network traffic and other interference can cut data transfer speed significantly. Under the best circumstances, a 56 kbps modem will generally operate at about 53 kbps or 6 KB/sec. Below are some conversions that might help when looking at high-speed ISP.


Understanding kbps will no doubt become handy in determining the best value for your money when switching ISPs.

Also there are some new quick tools which could help to check your actual connection speed. Testing your connection will tell you if you are getting the speed promised by your Internet service provider.

1. SpeedTest.net : This is a free broadband speed analysis tool that allows anyone to test their Internet connection. During an online speed test the website will send your computer a file and then measure how long it takes to download. It performs three key measurements checks to determine the overall quality and performance of your Internet connection. Click here to open the html page.

2. Pingtest.net : Use Pingtest.net to determine the quality of your broadband Internet connection. Streaming media, voice, video communications, and online gaming require more than just raw speed. Test your connection now to get your Pingtest.net rating and share the result with others.

How to read complete articles from Wall Street Journal for Free

The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) is one of the best quality newspaper in the United State. It is also the largest circulation news paper. The online version of the Wall Street Journal is equally good with high quality contents, however its a paid subscription service. The subscription goes to $89 annually to access its premium contents.

In one of my previous article i had shared a trick to read complete articles of WSJ.com following a simple trick using the mobile2.wsj.com method. Here i am sharing one more trick that would enable all to read full articles from the Wall Street Journal.

This time Google comes to our rescue. The method is by using Google cache.

Eg. Below is a link to an article on Wall street journal. ("Google Seeks to Tap Power Markets")
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704854904574644721659940760.html
The complete article is not available for all, one has to subscribe to read the complete article directly.

However if you want to read the complete article all you have to do is copy the article link and google it.

ie., go to google.com and search for "http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704854904574644721659940760.html " you would get a result as below screen shot. On this result page click on the 'cache' link ( highlighted red) and wow you could read the complete article for free..

Try it for your self.. and enjoy reading

High Quality Desktop Wallpaper Collection

This new year, gift your desktop computer some new high quality wallpapers. Below i am presenting some of my favorite wallpapers which can be easily downloaded by clicking on the image.

So pick your favorite.









































If you would like to have some more wallpapers, e mail me and i would reply with more high quality desktop wallpapers.

If you are aware of some website, please share to all via comments below..
ll
Update:
Few readers have shared some links to me via email.. so you could try them also..
From desizntech
From designora

Download any online file with a single click

Be it RapidShare, Megaupload, Mediafire, zShare or any file hosting site which makes you to wait for seconds or even minutes before the download link apprears and then you click more links to finally download the file. This unfriendly method of download would soon be a thing of the past with skipscreen. By using this skipscreen addon one can bypass the download delays on the hosting sites.

Skipscreen is a free and handy Firefox plugin designed to auto-clicks through the ad-screens of the hosting site. Once you click on a download link, SkipScreen will do all the work until the file starts downloading. So if you a hardcore file downloader this is a must have addon.

Just to share Skipscreen has already crossed 1 million download and the download only seems increasing. Click the below link to try it for yourself. Download Skipscreen

Below is a video explaining Skipscreen features.

How to download flash files online without any addons

Many a times we come accross interesting flash files like any video files or any high quality flash game file from a game website, and we wish to download it to our system. Well there are softwares and browser addons which would let you download these files ( some whith limitation) but there is an alternate way to download flash online.

If you are using Mozilla Firefox, then folow the below method.
Go to the webpage where the flash files embeded
a. Click Tools - Page Info from the browser menu bar
b. Click the Media Tab on the Page Info Windows
c. The media tab has a complete list (with preview) of Images, CSS Files and Shockwave Flash files that were downloaded by the Firefox browser while loading the page.
d. Scroll down the list and locate the required swf file.
e. Click the "Save As" button to save the file on your system

If you are using Internet Explorer or Chrome, then folow the below method.
a. Click Tools - Internet Options
b. In the General Tab, click the Settings button available in the Temporary Internet Files group.
c. Click View Files to open your Temporary Internet Files folder. Depending upon your IE settings, the Temp. folder can contain tens of thousands of files.
d. Click View - Details. Now click View - Arrange Icons By - Internet Address. Depending upon the webpage, there could one or more Flash files (Shockwave Flash Object) under the Inernet Address.
e. Once you find the right flash file, right-click and choose Copy. Then paste the swf file in any other directory. ensure to keep the page and IE open to avoid purging of the cache file.

Thats it simple trick you could use without using any addons or software

How to Control laptops via internet using twitter

Yes, Remotely controlling your laptop via twitter twits is now very much possible. You basically have to install a small application on to your laptop (mac book) or your desktop and leave your system connected to the internet.

Now from you twitter account your could send various commands as twits on to your system which it would recognize the command and act upon. There are two application that i am sharing below.

1. TweetMyPC : Using with a user can then initiate the shutdown, restart of logoff the system by updating the status at Twitter. TweetMyPC is freeware, Windows only and requires .NET 3.5 or higher on your system. TweetMyPC checks for status updates every minute and runs most of the time in the Windows system tray.

2. TweetMyMac : This more for Mac users, using this tiny application you can remote control your macbook. Infact this has more additional command options, some interesting ones are listed below.

a. iSight - Snaps an image from your Mac's iSight camera. Your Mac will then reply with the picture posted on TwitPic.

b. open [App] / quit [App] - Opens/Quits the application. You do not need to specify the apps path, but you must enter it's full name, eg "open Address Book".

c. screensaver - The screensaver will be activated on your Mac.

All the above with other basic commands like shutdown, restart, sleep, etc..
You could download the TweetMyMac application from

How to undo a just send email on Gmail

Suppose you had something quite interesting to share with your friend. You go to your Gmail compose option and draft the content and select the recipient from your address book and hit send. And just then to your shock you remembered that instead of your friend you have emailed it to your boss... & Gmail doesn't have a recall option... oops!!.

Well to your rescue Gmail recently added a small handy feature that can save your day.. Activating this feature would hold your email for few seconds after you hit send and you get an undo option to stop the transmission of the email.

Some would find this feature good to have and some whould say why delay the send email even for a sec. Well i would say the feature is optional to the user and infact google should allow the user to have control to set the time for hold.

To activate turn on Undo Send in Gmail Labs under Settings, and you’ll see a new “Undo” link on every sent mail confirmation for few secs. Click “Undo,” and google would grab the message before it’s sent and take you right back to compose.

Tip to customise images size on Blogger

While blogging most of us would have uploaded images on to blogger post, within blogger.com there is an option (as shown below) to size a particular image. ie., small, medium or large.

However there is trick to size the images as per your requirement (customizing image size) while uploading any image on blogger.

This is how you do it.

1. Upload your image on to your blog post as usual and then open the 'edit html' option to find the URL of the image.
eg. https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwsA_9O_95oOkfDuSGYkbkgY1Z1HKRiQGymbBRvg11Od97qeehOwRU8ZM8cTc1_OuJuC4hYZIvIpd0_hTAn6anfaFWEHGpgzoJW7cx1M4ZbJOC8GT5rv2fpGKOR-FyPqF8jdvZFotpGPE/s200-h/todaysmanager.JPG

2. Refer the above highlighted part on the URL, this is nothing but the pixel size of the image.

3. If you change the size of this URL, the size of the image to changes.. the size could be eg. s200 or s400 or s800 etc...

So customize the URL address to customize the image size.. Thats it...
Some sample images provided below, have a look

https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwsA_9O_95oOkfDuSGYkbkgY1Z1HKRiQGymbBRvg11Od97qeehOwRU8ZM8cTc1_OuJuC4hYZIvIpd0_hTAn6anfaFWEHGpgzoJW7cx1M4ZbJOC8GT5rv2fpGKOR-FyPqF8jdvZFotpGPE/s200-h/todaysmanager.JPG

https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwsA_9O_95oOkfDuSGYkbkgY1Z1HKRiQGymbBRvg11Od97qeehOwRU8ZM8cTc1_OuJuC4hYZIvIpd0_hTAn6anfaFWEHGpgzoJW7cx1M4ZbJOC8GT5rv2fpGKOR-FyPqF8jdvZFotpGPE/s400-h/todaysmanager.JPG

https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwsA_9O_95oOkfDuSGYkbkgY1Z1HKRiQGymbBRvg11Od97qeehOwRU8ZM8cTc1_OuJuC4hYZIvIpd0_hTAn6anfaFWEHGpgzoJW7cx1M4ZbJOC8GT5rv2fpGKOR-FyPqF8jdvZFotpGPE/s800-h/todaysmanager.JPG

A better way to store, organize, search, and manage bookmarks of web pages

Social bookmarking is the way forward if you are looking for a better way to store, organize, search, and manage bookmarks of web pages.In a social bookmarking system, users save links to web pages that they want to remember and/or share. These bookmarks are usually public, and can be saved privately, shared only with specified people or groups, shared only inside certain networks, or another combination of public and private domains. The allowed people can usually view these bookmarks chronologically, by category or tags, or via a search engine.

All over the World is the trend that we trust each other more and more than Engines and experts. Userdriven reviews are getting increasing attention all over and now big companies are starting to realize that too. Tagging is the future and Social Bookmarking the tool!

Here is a short video explanation of the features and benefits of Social Bookmarking sites like Delicious.com... in simple english...

New simple ways to convert Video files online

Many a times you come across some online videos which you would like to download on your computer or your mobile phone. Mostly these are Flash/FLV format videos that you see on websites like YouTube, Daily Motion etc.. well i would like to share some quite simple methods to download these video files in your required format.

Here are some tools that would do the trick.

1.Movavi: I would say Movavi Online Video Converter is the easiest way to get your videos in the format you want. Steps to follow are simple.. go to the website, then either fetch it the URL of the video file (eg. This from YouTube. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8us3ZOPo3MU ) or alternatively browse/attach an existing file from your computer.

Then select the download format (this site has almost all formats) Then hit "Convert". Soon you would get a converted link to download the file... as simple as that. Try it to know its simplicity.
The Link

2.KickYouTube: Its the best way to download video files from the YouTube website. KickYouTube is a clone site of YouTube with a "kick" feature. This "kick" directly allows you to download videos in your required format, be it 3GP, AVI, MP4, etc... All YouTube files are available at Kickyoutube site.
The Link
Here is an video demo of the kick effect

Downloads: 25111 Views: 33975

Now read complete Wall Street Journal articles for free

The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) published by Dow Jones & Company is one of the largest-circulation newspaper in the United State. Its online edition covers U.S. and international business and financial news and issues.

It is also commonly known to be the largest paid-subscription news site on the Web, with 980,000 paid subscribers in mid-2007. As of May 2008, an annual subscription to the online edition of the Wall Street Journal cost $119 for those who do not have subscriptions to the print edition. Even today to read the complete articles on the WSJ the subscription goes to $89 annually.

However you can now read the complete articles of WSJ.com following a simple trick mentioned below.

Example: This article http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122185337285057803.html To read this complete you need to be a paid subscriber.

But before this article URL if you paste http://mobile2.wsj.com/device/article.php?mid=&CALL_URL= you can read the complete article. So the final URL would look like http://mobile2.wsj.com/device/article.php?mid=&CALL_URL=http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122185337285057803.html Try it to test it.

It really works, so why not share this trick to your friends, email this article to your friends..

How to hide private folders in XP

Surely you would have come across instances where you want to hide a file on your computer but not sure how this could be done. Here i am sharing a simple method that would help you hide folders on your PC. This would work on Windows 9x/Me/NT/2000/XP/2003 platforms.

Firstly collect all your contents in to a folder that you intend to hide. Then download this simple and small software called the "Free Hide Folder" from here (size 743 KB). Install the software and execute it. It would ask you for a password, this password is for access this software itself.

Once you have set the password, opend the software and "Add File" that you intend to hide.. Thats it.. To undide the folder follow he same procedure. This is a very simple method of hiding your private folders especially when you are sharing your computer with others.


If you are interested in protecting your personal information, Free Hide Folder is just what you are searching for. With Free Hide Folder you will protect your files avoiding them to be being modified, seen or erased by other users. Well there are also alternate methods of hiding folders like hiding the file inside an JPG image (email me if you would like to know about this trick)

Give the "Free Hide Folder" a try and tell me if you liked it... Heres' the link to download the software

Now access blocked websites via your email

Legendum Ltd recently released a free service that could send websites right into your inbox with the URL as subject title. The process itself is also very simple and easy.

To request a delivery of a web page, send an email to www@web2mail.com with the address of the web page you want to view as the subject of your email message.

For example an email with the subject "askwiki.blogspot.com" would request the AskWiki website. You should receive a reply within 5 minutes. You may also choose the delivery time and frequency - daily, weekly, or on a particular day of the month.

So if you only have access to your email and other websites are restricted in your office then this free tool can very much come handy. here is the link to try out the free service. By the way... there are few more methods to view restricted websites through your office firewall, email me for some tips.. also if you have some methods do post them in my comments below.

The much awaited iPhone unlook tool now available

The much awaited iPhone 2.0 Pwnage Tool is now available on the internet. If you are aware of the jailbreak process released on the internet early this year, then this tool could be very usefull.

This 20 MB zip file is released by the iPhone Dev Blog very recently. As per this "unofficial" official blog of the "iphone-dev team" this tool unlocks and jailbreaks older iPhones with 2.0 firmwares, it also jailbreaks iPhone 3G and iPod Touch with 2.0 firmwares.

Here are some download options:
Link 1
Link 2
Link 3

More download options here.

In case you use this application, share us your comments for fellow bloggers and iPhone users

Read premium magazines free online

All these while premium magazines were to be subscribed. Even magazines like Reader’s Digest, MIT Technology Review, PC Magazine, MacWorld, Lonely Planet have there online editions but one has to subscribe them as well. Well not any more.. a small tweak on your Mozilla Firefox browser setting does the trick and enables you to read all these magazines for free.

Surprisingly this is a very simple tweak which enable you read these magazines absolutely free. Follow the below few steps and you are in.

Step 1. In Firefox: enter “about:config” in the location bar
Step 2. Enter “useragent” in the filter and change the value for “general.useragent.extra.firefox” to “Mobile Safari 1.1.3″.
Step 3. Open zinio.com/iphone and here you can start reading your favorite magazines.

After reading, set it back to setting to “Firefox/2.0.0.14″ to get back to normal mode. By the way you could also read magazines like Playboy and Penthouse. Thanks caul for the tip via Labnol

Data recovery and tracking options for lost or stolen mobiles

Todays mobile phones are not just an equipment for voice communication its much much more beyond that. Its now a daily companion which knows all your friends contacts, important files, your photo album, movie collections, your mp3 player, FM station and the list continues. Its so much so valuable that one feels paralyzed if this companion is not with you for even a day.

Now what if one fine day your phone ever get lost or stolen? ofcourse its a financial impact,but as well as your valuable data is lost. hmm so rather to be sorry then you could take few precautions that would help you to 1. Recover your valuable data and 2. Help you track your mobile phone, when mobile phones are lost or stolen. Lets talk about the above two aspects.

1. Data recovery from a lost mobile phone: Precaution is better than cure, the saying that holds very valid here. Backing up your data is the best thing to do as soon as you get a new mobile. Since a lot of the new phones have a syncing option already in the phone it would be a good thing to just leave it on and simply let it update your PC with new information.

If necessary you can also back up your SMS. software like Oxygen Phone Manager. These applications allow you to back up all your data, and this doesn’t just include your contact base and schedule but even your current settings, images, videos etc. Basically it takes care of everything that’s on your phone and memory card. Here is the link.

2. Lost mobile tracking system: My first recommendation would be an anti theft mobile location-tracking system developed by Micro Lab. Its called the Micro LMTS (lost mobile tracking system). It will track the location of stolen or lost mobile sets in India. When someone tries to replace or change the SIM card of lost / stolen mobile, a email will automatically send out to the real owner of the mobile handset, and it will tell the exact location etc of the cell phone, thus by using this info the real owner could trap the culprit with the help of local police authorities etc. Here is the link.

Another option is PhoneBAK Mobilephone which again is an innovative lost & found anti-theft software program that sends the thief's contact number, location and other details to pre-defined phone numbers (e.g. spouse, colleague) when mobile phone device is lost or stolen. It sends out 02 customizable SMS Text message alerts (local & overseas) with information of IMEI, IMSI, location and the thief's contact number when the program detects that it is an unauthorized SIM card! This works quitely in the (background) of the mobile phone. One can place a order from here.

mGuard is another software for Sony Ericsson phones which provides protection and safety from theft or losing your device and helps to retrieve it back. Now the users can forget the fear of losing their device by protecting it using mGuard Software. As of now, mGuard is the world’s only Theft Recovery Software for Java phone. Download this from here.

Exclusive search tools for rapidshare files

Rapidshare has a huge database of music files, videos files, softwares, ebooks and all other kinds of stuff. One can only term Rapidshare as a goldmine of files. The main reason behind its popularity is that the contents on rapidshare are shared by the people for the people.

The site however has couple of downside too. a.) Rapidshare imposes a download and time limit on non premium users of their service. Downloading from Rapidshare is only possible with one connection at a time and Rapidshare limits the size of the files that you download to 30 megabytes every hour. However there are multiple methods to hack this restriction, refer my previous posts here, here and here. b.) A search option within Rapidshare is missing, so how does one search contents in Rapidshare.

Well here are few options that comes handy. Simple method to search in Rapidshare.

1. FILEZ : Gives a very basis search option to look for files within Rapidshare, its simple and precise. A seach plugin is also available.

2. Rapidshare-Search-Engine : Offers a web and database search for files hosted on Rapidshare. This site also provides additional functions like a
Rapidshare link checker for instance and offers keyword email updates.

3. Filecrop : This is more of a basic search. You can limit the file size of the files that are displayed in the search results. Users can also report broken links.

4. Rapid Library : This service also provides a tagging service. Each search result displays tags as well which means that you can explore additional files this way as well. Also recent tags are also displayed on the main page of the site.

Friends, do try these out and if you have more free tools or reference URLs please add them in your comments below.

How to access Hulu from outside USA

Major television networks and movie studios have been providing their content to legal websites via various revenue sharing models. This is one way of fighting online piracy online. Some shows and movies can be purchased or rented from services like Apple’s iTunes or Amazon’s Unbox. Where a user pays a fee to download video files.

Update : The Hotspot Shield no longer shows Hulu videos. There are more alternatives to watch TV channels online.. Click here to know these options

The other model, common on the Web sites of the TV networks, is free, ad-supported streaming directly within a Web browser. Well lets talk about the later one.

Hulu is an online video on demand service that offers hi quality video sharing. Hulu aims to be a legal, one-stop shop for streaming of TV shows and movies from numerous networks and studios. The service is a joint venture of NBC Universal and News Corp. The site is organized in a clean, elegant manner. You can browse shows alphabetically, by genre or by network, or you can use an excellent search system.

The service offers full-length episodes of NBC and FOX television programs, including shows from the Bravo, Fuel TV, FX, Sci Fi, Style, Sundance, and Oxygen channels. But there is a catch to view its contents. One can view if he access the site within USA. So if you are out of the States you can not view these hi quality videos. But well we have a simple tip that could allow to view Hulu outsite USA, you could call it the Hulu trick or the Hulu hack.

To view Hulu content you would require to use a program called Hotspot Shield. This tool creates a virtual private network (VPN) between your laptop/computer and your internet router/Internet connection. The software can be freely downloaded at AnchorFree website. Once you install the application, run it and while its running just go to hulu.com and the videos will work without a hitch.

What this application does is it restricts Hulu from recognizing that you are outside the US. Therefore, because Hulu doesn't know where you are from, it assumes the best and gives you full, unadulterated access to all content.

Try it out and let me know your views. Here are the links
AnchorFree to download Hotspot shield
Hulu Website

Update : The Hotspot Shield no longer shows Hulu videos. There are more alternatives to watch TV channels online.. Click here to know these options

Tips to convert RSS to HTML for your website easy and free

Most of us are aware of the benefits of subscribing to RSS feeds of various blogs and website. It keeps us posted on all the latest updates on the blog and by using RSS readers one need not visit original site... making life simpler. RSS readers like netvibes, google reader are some of the best and i use them very often. It took me some time to have a decent collection of blogs and website which post valuable and interesting articles.

As a blogger i always wanted to share these interesting articles to my readers, one option i had was to convert these RSS feed from those sites to HTML and then post it on my blog. This led me to do some research on some of the free tools available on the web.

So i managed to get some simple tools which can do the trick, using which i can convert RSS to HTML. These are my recommendation, try it out and post in your views/comments.

1. Wigitize: The best in the pack. This tool is very simple and very customizable. You copy the RSS feed URL here and then generate a code, which then can be pasted on your blog or website. I tried this with my blog's RSS feed and here is the generated code. By the way you are absolutely free to paste the below code on your blog.
<div class="feed_widget"><br /> <ul id="feed_widget_18634"></ul><br /> <script type="text/javascript" src="http://wigitize.com/javascripts/wigitize.js"></script><br /> <script type="text/javascript">wigitize_show_date = false;</script><br /> <script type="text/javascript" src="http://wigitize.com/feeds/18634.json"></script><br /></div>

2. Grazr: This site provide a simple widget which displays feed content on a webpage. This would be a good option in case looks and theme matter you the most. You can easily customise the design, dimension of the widget box using option available on the site. Below is the source code for AskWiki's RSS feed, go ahead paste this to your blog.
<div style="height:350px;width:300px;"><a href="http://grazr.com/read?view=o&theme=default&font=Verdana&fontsize=8pt&file=http://feeds.feedburner.com/askwiki" target="gz"><img src="http://grazr.com/images/grazrbadge.png" border="0" /></a><script defer="defer" type="text/javascript" src="http://grazr.com/gzloader.js?view=o&theme=default&font=Verdana&fontsize=8pt&file=http://feeds.feedburner.com/askwiki"></script></div>

3. Google Gadget: A highly customizable RSS reader to spice up your blog with color and functionality. With tons of options available for the user. This gadget is capable of showing inline pictures and HTML formatting. Recommended for advanced users only: there are lots of HTML/CSS type options. Here what i got for my blog, go ahead and use this code on your blog.
<script src="http://gmodules.com/ig/ifr?url=http://customrss.googlepages.com/customrss.xml&up_rssurl=http%3A%2F%2Ffeeds.feedburner.com%2Faskwiki&up_title=CustomRSS&up_titleurl=http%3A%2F%2Fcustomrss.googlepages.com&up_num_entries=8&up_linkaction=showdescription&up_background=FFFFFF&up_border=FFFFFF&up_round=1&up_fontfamily=Arial&up_fontsize=8pt&up_openfontsize=9pt&up_itempadding=3px&up_bullet=plus&up_custicon=&up_boxicon=0&up_opacity=20&up_itemlinkcolor=000000&up_itemlinkweight=Normal&up_itemlinkdecoration=None&up_vlinkcolor=C7CFA8&up_vlinkweight=Normal&up_vlinkdecoration=None&up_showdate=1&up_datecolor=9F9F9F&up_tcolor=1C57A9&up_thighlight=FFF19D&up_desclinkcolor=1B5790&up_color=000000&up_dback=FFFFFF&up_dborder=DFCE6F&up_desclinkweight=Bold&up_desclinkdecoration=None&synd=open&w=300&h=160&title=AskWiki&border=%23ffffff%7C3px%2C1px+solid+%23999999&output=js"></script>

Do try the above options and let me know your views

How to set invisible mode in Gmail Chat

Yahoo chat has it, AIM has it and most other common internet messenger softwares has it, i am referring to the invisible mode available on these application.

GTalk as of now does not have an invisible mode option, however in an recent update to Gmail they have added this feature to GMail chat. But it won’t work if you are logged in simultaneously with Google Talk. So now you can be offline but also chat with friends who are online, completely invisible.

Also setting up your invisible mode in Gmail chat is also very simple, refer the adjoining image here, use the invisible option now available under the 'set status here' option.

Google Talk does not allow users to decide when their status changes to 'idle' and back. The result is that others can easily know whether or not you're at your computer. however there are some free softwares that can assist you to take control of your GTalk status.

Try gAlwaysIdle, it adds two new options to Google Talk, allowing you to change your status to be 'always idle' or 'never idle'. When your status is set to 'always idle', you'll appear idle to your Google Talk buddies, even if you're sitting at your computer typing e-mails and sending IMs. The software is freely available here..