This is not really a topic for the software forum, but in my short time here I've seen this site has a lot of members who are very knowledgeable, so I'm sure I'll get some help.

I'm a software geek who's clueless about money  I can spend days and weeks on tweaking programs and searching for the perfect utility, but not so when it comes to money. Even though I make a decent living, my savings do not reflect this because they don't grow like they should. I lost a lot of my savings a few years ago in the stock market and since then have been very hesitant. Currently I've put most of it in online banks such as ING which give me higher APR but thats pretty much it.

What are some good resources you recommend? There are way too many blogs out there, I don't know where to start. I also need some software to track my money and spending - I was going to get either Money or Quicken, but there are also some free web based alternatives like Wesabe, Mint etc which look very compelling (apart from having to trust a website with my account passwords). I'd also appreciate links to some good forums for personal finance.

From a posting made by Raymond Chen on his blog (http://blogs.msdn.co...7/10/31/5788081.aspx), there's a group making magic wands that use accelerometers to detect certain motions or taps and can display messages in the air based on those motions:

http://www.rawbw.com/~acorn/wand/

The wand is a magical device for casting spells. Spells are cast by either waving the wand around or tapping the wand on a hard surface.

...

When a spell is successfully cast on the wand, the wand replies with a message. Messages are viewed by waving the wand quickly back and forth in front of you. Glowing gems display the message in red letters in midair.

Every year people participate in a wonderful project called NaNoWriMo, where they sign up and pledge to write a full novel in exactly one month.

The idea is to force yourself to write write write and not worry about editing or perfecting.  It's a fantastic exercise for everyone who has always wanted to do something like this.

What: Writing one 50,000-word novel from scratch in a month's time.

Who: You! We can't do this unless we have some other people trying it as well. Let's write laughably awful yet lengthy prose together.

Why: The reasons are endless! To actively participate in one of our era's most enchanting art forms! To write without having to obsess over quality. To be able to make obscure references to passages from our novels at parties. To be able to mock real novelists who dawdle on and on, taking far longer than 30 days to produce their work.

http://www.nanowrimo.org/

Looks nice.. similar to http://micropledge but focused more on open source.  Looks like they don't charge a fee for their service?

The Cofundos process itself is schematically depicted in the figure and works as follows:
Somebody misses an open-source software tool or library for a specific purpose, a feature in an open-source software or a plugin for an existing software. He describes the project to develop the software.
Requirements-Engineering: Other people help enhancing the description of the project by adding specific requirements and comments.
Bidding: Users who also like the project and need the resulting software, bid a certain amount of money, which they will donate to the project performer after its successful completion.
Offering: Specialists who are capable to perform the project and to develop the respective software offer to realise the project for a certain amount of money and within a certain timeframe.
Call for competitive offers: As soon as the sum of the bid amount exceeds the money requested by the first offer, a call for competitive offers is started and lasts for three week.
Accepting an offer: After the three weeks call period for alternative offers is elapsed, all bidders are requested to vote about which offer to choose. Bidders votes are weighted by the amount of their bid. The specialist with the majority of the votes is selected to carry out the project.
Voting about project success: After the specialist announces the completion of the project or the development timeframe as suggested by the specialist elapsed, the bidders vote about how the initially defined requirements (agreed on by the specialist) are met by the provided solution.
Donation to the specialist carrying out the project: If the majority of the bidders agree that the requirements are met, bidders are requested to make the respective donations.
If the majority of the bidders decide that the requirements are only partially met by the implementation, an extension will be granted to the specialist for improving his implementation.
If the majority of the bidders decide that the requirements are not met by the implementation, the project failed, no donations will be made and the project might be reopened for bidding.

http://www.cofundos.org/

I made a small AHK script I thought you might want to use: AltTab Fingertips. Many thanks to ak_ for creating "menu at cursor" idea with FileDraft, which inspired this. It's like alt-tab but quicker. A lot of code comes from my PutAside script.

-DC Member Justice

Press a configurable hotkey (F10 by default), and get a menu at the mouse with all the current windows on it. You can exclude processes using the tray menu.

For all the freeloaders out there, here is a interesting article linking 53 freeware apps, + windows.  The article is about rebuilding a machine, using just a windows and freeware.

good quick read of the main article
http://www.freewareg...l-freeware-programs/

there look to be some keepers in among some of the apps we already know
a few I will be giving a run, but already this looks great for the icon designers
http://www.freewareg.../03/becyicongrabber/