Herewith: news bits, remainders, and low-threshold links for your dining and dancing pleasure.

• ChronoSync | Handy Tips for Using ChronoSync | Econ Technologies - I've mentioned before that I'm a fan of ChronoSync for automatically backing up or syncing folders between two Macs. This is a bunch of handy tips and recipes for setting CS up to do your bidding.
• Rule the Web - My pal and frequent co-conspirator, Mark Frauenfelder, sent me a copy of his swell new book, Rule The Web, which is an up-to-date edition that answers the years-old question: "So, what cool stuff can I actually do with the internet?" While many of Mark's tips and links will be familiar to most of you, this would make a fantastic gift for friends and relatives who are new to intermediate web surfers. Recommended, as is Mark's companion site for the book. (And thanks for the very kind words about 43f, Mark)
• The Universal Traveler - Speaking of books, I keep meaning to write a followup to the post about Ze Frank and "morphological synthesis" since it led me to a couple good books on creativity. I'm particularly enjoying The Universal Traveler (whose title I mangled horribly on The Heather Gold Show last Friday). It's a lo-fi, somewhat hippie-looking tome, but don't let the clip art and Courier 12 fool you -- this thing is chock full of great ideas for approaching any kind of creative challenge. I love that the authors understand that different people and different problems will require a wide-ranging set of tools and approaches. Good stuff.
• YouTube - Microsoft Surface Parody - I'm sure you've seen it already, but I just can't get enough of this Microsoft Surface sendup, courtesy of Sarcastic Gamer. I'm a long time fan and advocate of the adjective big-ass, so this cracked me up.
• MacBreak Minute: Sogudi (1080p) - Episodes of MacBreak's tiny little brother, MacBreak Minute, have started going out. I did a quickie on Sogudi (featured on 43f twice previously) that you can download in either iPod size (yikes, tiny!) or 1080p (yikes, ginormous!). Related: please remind me to shave next time I do one of these.
• Tonight in SF: Merlin's OmniFocus Demo - Finally, a friendly reminder that I'll be at the Stockton St. Apple Store tonight at 7pm to demo OmniFocus and talk about how I use it. OmniGroup's CEO (and lead fantasy-gamer) Ken Case will be in evidence too, and we'll be happy to answer any questions you have. It's free, open to the public, and I hope I'll see you there.

I'm in NYC right now to do visit with folks at Tekserve. So.

Simple System Preference changes yield sexy results

tasks, to-dos and dates; blackberry <--> mac

Freedom Filer?

Free (or at least way cheaper) DEVONThink alternative?

Panic - Coda - One-Window Web Development for Mac OS X

In conjunction with the celebration of their 10th anniversary -- and cannily timed to be eligible for an Apple Design Award -- Panic has released their new "one-window web development" app, "Coda."

I've only been playing with it for an hour or two, so I don't have anything revelatory to add to everyone else's reactions. But, so far, I'm very impressed with the ease of use and lovely design. That said, hiding under the pretty is a lot of great stuff that should make prosumer web designers' lives easier, including built-in SSH shell, a straightforward CSS editor, and a very configurable multi-paned window approach. I also love the low-key code validation, Hamburger Helper "Clips," and what looks like a pretty nifty "Bonjour" sharing functionality.

The care that the Panic folks put into all of their apps and the humor and humanity that they express as a company makes me proud to use a Mac. They're doing God's work, and, whenever the opportunity arises, I'm all too happy to give them my money.

Related to "Thanks. No." and email filtering, I wonder how hard it would be for Mail.app, etc. to have a rule by which messages with more than n recipients in the "To:" line could be flagged for (depending on your preferences and courage) filtering, auto-archiving, or deletion. Maybe via AppleScript?

I've heard from several friends who filter all non-work email for which they aren't the exclusive "To:" recipient, but it would be handy to have some flexibility in what your own magic number is -- plus of course what you'd then do with emails that exceed your limit would be up to you.

But in an edge case, for example, if I get an email that went to [>=90 TO: recipients] and [<=25%] of the recipients were in my Address Book, the message would be flagged as "possible friend spam." (And, yes, I was once on a "Hey, this is funny" list that went to 96 people multiple times each day. Good times.)

So, any thoughts? Bonus points if it's a rule that's easy for non-geeks to recreate in GUI apps like Mail.app, Entourage, and Outlook, etc. Comments open for brainstorming.

(In related news, as I mentioned on MM.com, I'll soon be opening a thread on the Board to take suggestions on improving Thanks. No., so keep your powder dry on that one.)

Well I'm very happy to note that those 300 daily seconds of The Writer's Almanac are now available as a downloadable podcast. Good on Garrison, and good on APM. (I know Mr. K can be a little nutty with the copyright and trademarks, so I can only imagine this was a decision that came with a certain amount of deliberation.)