Top 10 Gmail Labs Add-ons to Increase Your Productivity

gmaillab-unpluggedFor quite a while, Google has been releasing add-on features for a good number of their web applications. Gmail, Calendar and Reader all have several user selectable features. Links to these experimental add-ons can be found on the Google Labs page. Not all of the add-ons are perfect, but they are kid tested and mother approved.

Here is a quote about the Labs add-ons from the top of the Gmail Labs page:

“Gmail Labs is a testing ground for experimental features that aren’t quite ready for primetime. They may change,break or disappear at any time.

If (when) a Labs feature breaks, and you’re having trouble loading your inbox, there’s an escape hatch. Use http://mail.google.com/mail/?labs=0.”

I apparently have nothing better to do with my time than add fancy features to my Gmail. I’ll go ahead and save you the time of figuring out which of the Gmail Labs add-ons you should head for and give you the top 10 to get you started.

Scribefire: A Full Featured Blog Editor For Firefox Users

scribefire-logoNot too long ago I started looking around for an easy way to post to some of the blogs I write for. The first thing that came to mind, since I was already using it to write, was to use the publish option in Google Docs to post. If you use the free hosting sites like Blogger, Wordpress.com or Livejournal to name a few, this will do the trick. This is also a viable option if  you post to a site using that uses the Blogger, Metaweblog or Moveable Type API. Where Google falls short is if you need to post to multiple sites.

I went on a hunt and found a couple different choices. To be honest, I tried the Firefox add-on Scribefire first; I never quite got to the second one. The reason I didn’t go any further is it did what I needed it to do and it did it well. Scribefire lets me post to multiple blogs, storing of notes and uploads images. I can work on multiple posts at the same time by opening different tabs. This smart little Firefox add-on auto saves my progress while I work and also when I close the editing window.

1