Thanks to an ever-increasing deluge of
digital information, many of us have computer desktops that look
like our physical ones. But instead of being crowded with Post-it
Notes, paper, folders, and magazines, our virtual workspaces are
cluttered with electronic documents, links to the Web, and software
applications.
Recently, a new set of tools have emerged to help us control our
digital lives, giving us a way to consolidate information into one
place -- even onto a single Web page. ( "Keep it to one page" isn't
just the mantra of resume writers anymore. )
The idea of a personal Internet portal is nothing new, of course.
Excite and Yahoo! have had "My Page" features for years. But these
new tools are taking the concept to the next level, with better
functionality, added flexibility, and greater ease of use. Some
tools let users assemble collections of Web pages, or parts of Web
pages, into a single browser window. Others are designed to capture
and organize the bits and bytes that we need on our hard drive, as
well as on the Web.
What can these tools actually do for you? How much time do you
need to spend up front to save time down the road? To find out, Fast
Company tested four of the Web's most popular organizational tools.
We rated each tool based on functionality ( How much can you do with
it? ) and ease of use ( How easy is it to get the tool up and
running? How hard is it to add new information later? ). Here's what
we learned.
QuickBrowse ( http://www.quickbrowse.com/
)
Functionality **
Ease of Use ****
Quickbrowse is just that -- a quicker way to browse the Web. The
tool was created by Marc Fest, 33, a Florida-based freelance
journalist who was searching for an easier way to surf the Web, so
that he could spend more of his free time doing what he loves:
surfing the waves. When he couldn't find a tool to help him browse
the 20 or so newspaper sites that he visited each day, he wrote
Quickbrowse. He told a few of his friends about the tool, and, like
every good idea on the Web, word of Quickbrowse spread quickly.
Quickbrowse isn't an especially robust tool, but what it lacks in
functionality it makes up for in ease of use. Getting started
couldn't be easier. Just register by entering your email address and
a password, and you can begin to enter the URLs that you want to
browse. Hit the "Quickbrowse" button, and the tool stitches together
the sites into one long, scrollable page. The pages look exactly how
they would appear if you visited them individually, and all of the
links work. When you click on a link, a separate browser window
opens for the new page.
Sound easy? Well, it gets better. Once you've created a master
page, you can save it to Quickbrowse's home page so you can access
your master page without retyping your list of URLs. You can also
create multiple master pages. We created a daily-news page as well
as a technology-news page. Each page pieced together information
from five different sites. Although there's no limit to the number
of sites that you can add to a Quickbrowse page, it's a good idea to
keep your page count to a reasonable number. The more sites that the
service has to piece together, the longer it will take for each
master page to load.
Could a service this easy get any easier? Absolutely. You can
have your Quickbrowse pages delivered to your email inbox. Select a
delivery time, choose a frequency ( daily, weekly, or monthly ), and
decide how you want to view the text ( as an email in HTML or as an
attachment ). You can even specify the date or the day of the week
that you'd prefer to have the message delivered.
The site is elegantly simple, but it's not perfect. When we used
Quickbrowse, the tool was identical to the one that was designed by
programming hobbyist Fest, for his personal use. The user interface
wasn't the slickest, and the site was a bit slow and clunky. The
tool also had a hard time handling sites such as the Wall Street
Journal's, which requires users to log on to gain access to its
contents. However, these problems will be addressed in the tool's
latest version. And if Quickbrowse can solve them, then we'll
definitely sign up -- quick!
OnePage ( http://www.onepage.com/
)
Functionality **
Ease of Use *
OnePage is similar to Quickbrowse, but instead of combining
entire Web pages, this tool lets you take your favorite parts of Web
pages and put them onto a single site. OnePage also lets you add
images, headlines, and tables. Unfortunately, the process for
building these metapages is cumbersome, and it doesn't always work.
For example, when we went to Fast Company's home page, the tool
didn't display all of the images on the site. When we chose one of
the images that it did display, named it, and added it to our
OnePage, it mistakenly added two copies.
You can also add content from OnePage's directory. The directory
is a list of already-collected bits and pieces of sites that have
been organized by category. But adding content from the catalog is
only slightly less daunting than adding it directly from the Web.
First, we had to select a broad category ( we chose their
"lifestyle" category ). This led us to a long list of choices, such
as "movies" and "hobbies." When we selected "movies," we got a
screen that included NetFlix, a DVD-rental company that we thought
would offer current movie listings. After choosing NetFlix, we ended
up with a box that listed the top-10 movie rentals, rather than the
current theater listings that we were hoping for. ( Note: The site
was in beta testing when we used it, so some of these problems may
be fixed soon. )
But if you have patience and tenacity, OnePage does provide some
nice features. For example, it lets you create and save multiple
pages and then email them to friends and colleagues. But unlike
Quickbrowse, OnePage's metapages can't be bookmarked. You have to
log onto the OnePage site to retrieve your pages. Similar to My
Yahoo!, OnePage is designed to be your browser's start page. But
we're not sure that we're ready to start there just yet.
Octopus.com ( http://www.octopus.com/
)
Functionality **1/2
Ease of Use **
Like OnePage, Octopus.com is designed to let users retrieve and
organize parts of Web sites, rather than entire pages. You can also
create multiple pages, save them for later retrieval, and share them
with friends via email. But unlike OnePage or Quickbrowse,
Octopus.com lets you grab parts of Web pages while you surf. This
feature is called the Octopus Backpack. To add this function, just
drop the "Octopus this!" button onto your browser tool bar. When you
find a piece of content that you'd like to clip, click on the
"Octopus this!" button, and another browser window featuring boxes
that outline each individual piece of content launches. You can add
pieces by hitting the "add" button, and you can clip sections,
links, forms, or pages.
Once you've finished collecting the content, you're ready to
build your page, or "view." Just visit the Octopus.com site, and
open your Octopus Backpack. You can then either add the Web clips to
an already-existing view or create an entirely new view by dragging
and dropping the clips from the Backpack into the "Octopus view"
area.
However, you don't always have to start from scratch. The tool
offers a Yahoo!-like directory of pages that have already been
created by other users and by Octopus's editors. For example, you
can select the "find movie showtimes" page. When you enter your zip
code, you'll get a list of theaters that are closest to you. Just
drag and drop your theater of interest into the new view, and you
will automatically get a list of the movies and show times at that
theater.
Enfish OneSpace, by Enfish Technology ( http://www.enfish.com/
)
Functionality ****
Ease of Use ****
All of the tools that we've reviewed so far focus on organizing
information on the Web. But what about all of the stuff on your hard
drive? Part online service, part software application, Enfish
Onespace automatically organizes your hard drive while incorporating
relevant Web content.
Just visit Enfish's home page, and download the application. The
software will take an inventory of everything that is on your hard
drive -- files, documents, email, to-do lists, appointments -- and
then create a directory. Depending on how much information you have
on your hard drive, this process can take two hours or longer ( but
you can tell the service to work while your machine is idle ).
The next time that you sign on to your computer, Enfish Onespace
will automatically launch ( although you can tell it not to ). On
the left side of the program window, a directory tree will appear
that includes several categories. The "people" section gives you a
lists all of the people in your contact-management program. All of
the companies in your contact list will also appear. The "my
computer" section lists the contents of your hard drive. The "my
mail" section lists all of your email accounts.
The right side of the program window shows all of your
appointments and tasks, the latest headlines, the weather, and your
email inbox. And everything works together. Click on the "people"
section, and you'll get a list of all of your contacts. Select a
name from the directory, and you'll get the person's contact
information. You also see any news, notes, people, appointments, and
tasks that pertain to this contact, as well as any other related
items, such as email and documents. You can also see contact
information and related data if you select a company from your list.
Enfish Onespace is more than just a great way to keep track of
all of your information. It is also an excellent way to make sense
of it. Enfish Onespace is by far the most robust and easy-to-use
tool of this sort that we've encountered. However, you'll have to
sacrifice some flexibility when it comes to obtaining content from
the Web. Enfish Onespace will only retrieve content that is related
to the contacts or to the companies on your contact list from the
content providers that the service has already partnered with.
Aside from that shortcoming, Enfish Onespace is one space that
you won't want to live without.
Gina Imperato ( gimperato@fastcompany.com
), a Fast Company associate editor, is based in San Francisco.
We
at Clickmarks have launched a... David Trollman
--
(most recently added
comment)
