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Nail It Down

Yahoo Calendar If you don't object to an occasional ad appearing next to your appointment book, Yahoo's calendar is one of the best available online. Its Time Guides let you easily insert holidays, local weather reports, and events from Yahoo Groups into your calendar; and optional software syncs your calendar with Outlook, Outlook Express, and Palm PDAs.

Ta-Da List This straightforward to-do list manager lets you create lists, reorder items, and check them off when completed--from the comfort of your browser.

Palm Desktop Designed to sync with the company's PDAs, Palm Desktop is a remarkably well done calendar and address book application for Windows. Even if you don't own a PDA, you might like using this organizer anyway, to help keep your life in order. It's free for anyone, not just for Palm customers.

Yahoo Widgets Formerly known as Konfabulator, this application puts "widgets" on your desktop that provide information such as stock tickers, weather reports, and photos; alternatively, they can provide services, like running search engine queries or storing notes. Choose from thousands of widgets, or as many as your desktop can bear.

Del.icio.us Forget browser bookmarks--Del.icio.us can keep track of your favorite sites much more easily, and from any PC online. When you post an item to Del.icio.us, you add keywords; afterward, you can search for items that you or other users have tagged with these words, making this site a handy search tool, too.

EssentialPIM Free EssentialPIM combines a calendar, a contact manager, a to-do list, and a notes manager. Its EPIM Today view displays your day at a glance, and import and export tools enable you to share information with other organizers.

SyncNotes This is a sticky-note application that runs on your computer--and it features an online account that you can use to view and edit your notes from any Web or WAP browser.

FreeMind Psychologists say that an effective way to take notes is to put them in a "mind map"--a free-form tree structure that mimics the way your brain works. FreeMind does exactly that. It acts like an outliner--except that, instead of working with headings and subheadings, you create nodes and subnodes that branch from a central point. Each node can contain text, pictures, special icons, or colorful formatting. FreeMind is useful for taking notes in class, outlining books, or even planning a route to world domination.

Furl Like Del.icio.us, Furl lets you save your favorite Web pages in an online account that you can access from any computer. However, Furl lets you save the entire page--so even if the site becomes inaccessible later, you still have a copy.