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The last time you cleaned out your inbox, how many of those emails were auto-generated notifications from social networks and other websites? Unless you're particularly aggressive about turning off default notifications, it was probably more than a few. You've been meaning to get around to going through and changing all those settings, but - oh hey, hang on, there's another email.

Editing the notification settings on a few big Web services doesn't sound like a big deal, and in reality it's not. But in all the digital, real-time chaos of life online, it's easy to put off. You might zap one when you think of it, but what about the rest of them? Are you really going to sit there, hunt them all down and annihilate them?

When the iPad first launched two years ago, it was derided by some for its limitations. The first iteration didn't even have a camera on it, and it may never get a physical keyboard, so the notion of the device being used for content creation was laughable. Instead, the iPad was seen as a tool best used to lean back and consume content. For the most part, that's how things have played out. People use their iPads for reading, watching video, listening to music and gaming.

Despite that, the iPad is finding a place in business all over the world. About 67% of iPad-owning professionals use their tablets at work, even if the vast majority of the devices are not supplied by employers, according to a recent survey by IDG. Of those people, 93% use the device for work-related communication.

Technology may be enabling an increasingly mobile, untethered workforce, but many people still need productive, office-like environments in which to get things done. If working from home or a coffee shop just doesn't cut it, there's always the option of coworking.

Coworking, for those who aren't familiar, is the growing trend of freelancers and mobile workers coming together in a shared space that looks and feels much like a traditional office. It got started in San Francisco a few years back and there are now over 400 coworking spaces in the world.

For small and medium-sized businesses, there's no shortage of Web-based software out there designed to help them collaborate, market themselves and get things done. In fact, the selection can be a little overwhelming. This comparison chart on Wikipedia, for example, breaks down 132 project management software options for businesses. And that's just project management.

Recognizing that smaller operations seldom have the time or patience to sift through hundreds of options, serial entrepreneur Rachel Blankstein launched Comparz, a site that combines expert and user reviews for an variety of Web-based tools for SMBs.

It's not exactly breaking news that mobile technologies are changing the way we work and enabling employees to be productive regardless of their location. What's interesting is the pace at which they appear to be doing so.

71% of SMB's report that their employees use mobile technologies to work outside the office, according to a new survey published by Portfolio.com. On average, these mobile workers get about 50% of their work done outside the office thanks in large part to smart phones and tablets.

It seems as though the minute the iPad was announced, innumerable light bulbs went off as developers and entrepreneurs everywhere came to the same realization: "We could totally use this device as a digital whiteboard!" Indeed, a search for the word "whiteboard" in the App Store returns a whopping 170 iPad apps.

Although the device's 10-inch screen may not compare to a full-sized, physical whiteboard, it can be quite handy to use a virtual whiteboard with team members remotely, and the iPad's form factor suits itself quite well to exactly that.

ZohoCRM, the popular SaaS business suite, has extended its reach into the mobile world with two new apps for iPhones and Blackberries that are available today. You can watch the intro video here on their blog. The iPhone app integrates with other iPhone functions, such as getting directions to an address and sending emails to customers, as well as having your calls logged as activities inside the Zoho main CRM application.

For users of Apple's iOS mobile operating system, there was much to be excited about in yesterday's keynote unveiling iOS 5, the next version of the OS for iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch. Deeper Twitter integration, wireless syncing across devices, and the ability to untether your iOS devices from the desktop have rightly got users anticipating the next OS upgrade.

One feature that is sure to please productivity geeks is Reminders, a new native task management app for iOS that works across devices.

Remember the Milk, a popular task management Web and mobile app, recently launched their long-awaited offering for the iPad.

Although the desktop Web version of Remember the Milk works fine on the iPad, the interface doesn't quite take advantage of the tablet form factor. Their new native iOS app fixes that problem with a fancy layout reminiscent of Twitter's iPad app.

Zoho has brought its popular online productivity tools Zoho Docs to the iPad.

The app is designed to give you mobile access to your Zoho documents, including those created in Zoho Writer, Sheet, Show, and Docs (the word processing, spreadsheet, and presentation applications). You can also view shared documents via the app.