Ricky Says

I showed you a while ago how to link your Facebook account with Twitter, so that whenever you posted something to Facebook it would automatically show up on Twitter.

However, I quickly discovered that many of my personal Facebook updates were "TMI" for my Twitter followers, and my business-related tweets were gobbly-gook to my Facebook friends. So I turned off the Facebook-Twitter integration.

Recently I discovered a better (and free) tool for handling Twitter and Facebook integration: TweetDeck

TweetDeck lets you create links to both your Twitter and Facebook accounts, and then lets you identify which service(s) your updates will be sent to. So you can post to just Twitter, or just Facebook, or you can update both Twitter and Facebook in one shot. That's the kind of control I was looking for!

Here's how you can set up Facebook and Twitter in TweetDeck:

1. Download and install a free copy of TweetDeck if you haven't done so already.

2. Click the Settings button in TweetDeck.

3. Select the Accounts tab and click "Add New Account".

4. Click the "Add Your Facebook Account" link and enter your Facebook account information.

You'll be asked to allow access to your Facebook account, and to allow TweetDeck to publish to your Facebook acount.

5. Type in your tweet like you normally would, and choose both Facebook and Twitter in the "From" section in TweetDeck.

For some reason the Snipping Tool in Windows Vista tends to frequently lock up, resulting in the familiar error message "The Snipping Tool is not working on your computer right now". In fact, it just happened to me so I thought I'd jot down the steps I took to fix the problem.

Microsoft's error messages are not always very helpful, and this is no exception. Restart your computer? Really?

It turns out you can quickly reset this handy screen capture utility without restarting your computer, just by killing the SnippingTool.exe process in your control panel.

Don't let that line of techno-speak scare you away either - it's actually super easy if you follow the steps below:

1. Open your Task Manager by giving your computer the 3-fingered salute (press Ctrl+Alt+Del keys at the same time). Select "Start Task Manager" from the list of options that are displayed.

2. Click the "Processes" tab in the popup dialog, and click on the SnippingTool.exe process.

3. Click the "End Process" button and confirm that you want to kill this service.

4. Start up the Snipping Tool again, which you can find in your Start -- All Programs -- Accessories menu.

A few clicks is all it takes to restart the Snipping Tool and get back to taking screen shots in Windows Vista.

One of the first things I did after purchasing my iPhone 3GS was to buy a screen protector. In fact, I had the sales tech install it for me in the Apple store to make sure there was no way a scratch could find it's way anywhere near my new device.

I've done that with all my gadgets - all the way back to my Blackberry Curve and even my old Motorola RAZR. Ever since I got that first scratch just from carrying my iPod Nano in my pocket, I've been very careful to protect my gadgets.

The screen protector was brittle though, and didn't stick very well around the edges, as you can see from the photo below. It also didn't protect the sides or the back (I already have a scratch on the silver side trim, and several scratches on the back side even though I've been extremely careful with it).

The second thing I did was bought a rubber case to protect the sides and back, but I never liked how bulky it was, and how it stuck to everything and didn't slide in and out of my pocket very well.

That all changed today when I discovered the Invisible Shield, which is a full body skin that's precision cut for the iPhone (and many other mobile devices).

The shield has a piece that covers the front and another that covers that back and wraps around the sides for full protection. It's contoured so it's able to wrap snuggly around the corners of the iPhone, and comes with a special spray that helps it adhere tightly and without peeling like my old skin (and without leaving residue if I need to remove it later).

I'm enroute to Dallas, TX right now and it's a wifi flight with American Airlines. I'm typing... I mean tapping this post on my iPhone 3GS, after paying the $7.95 per flight connection fee.

The Internet speed is plenty fast to download a music album from iTunes while updating 4 apps, browsing the web and checkng email, without any noticeable slow down.

GPS is a little confused though, and thinks I'm at the airport I'll be landing at in a few minutes - probably because that's where the signal is coming from:

SMS also doesn't work, so don't plan on texting on these flights, and you can't share a connection between a laptop and mobile device - you have to buy a separate connection for a laptop or mobile device (iPhone, Blackberry, etc).

I'd love to see wifi be free on flightd, but all things consideredl, I felt it was a great value and I was able to get a lot of work done (and play) instead of wasting a few hours in the air.

The Motorola 376g (KRAZR) camera phone from Tracfone comes equipped with Bluetooth support for hands-free headset devices, letting you keep your hands on the steering wheel while you make calls or answer incoming calls.

To use a hands-free device with a Tracfone Motorola W376g, you'll need to connect (pair) your headset with your phone. Once they're paired, then the headset can be used to automatically answer calls.

Setting up the bluetooth headset:

Make sure your headset is fully charged and the boom (the part that goes over your ear) is in the closed position. Shown below is the Motorola H350 bluetooth headset that connects nicely with the Motorola W376g phone and all other Motorola phones as well.

Press the connect button for about 3 seconds to put it in "Find Me" mode. The connect button is the same button you press to answer an incoming call, and is usually located on the front of the headset near the top.

Setting up the Motorola W376g:

Press the main menu button (round button between the up/down/left/right arrows) and then select Settings -- Bluetooth Link, which is on the second screen of the Settings option (ie. you'll have to scroll down a little to see it).

Select Audio Devices and then [Look for Device]

The Motorola 376g will find your bluetooth headset and auto-pair them together. This only needs to be done once, and then it will recognize the headset in the future automatically.

You'll only have about a 30 second time window to pair the phone with the headset, so make sure you time the steps above to happen at about the same time.