Project Management and Collaboration applications are one of the staples of the typical web worker. And while we’ve covered our share of alternatives, the ubiquitous Basecamp is the one that I seem to run into most often.

With a healthy userbase and a robust API, it’s no surprise that a number of useful add-ons have been created to make our Basecamp lives just that much easier. One such add-on I’ve been testing lately is Periscope by Ten Seven, Interactive.

Periscope is an iGoogle gadget that lets you quickly and easily log activity and time towards your Basecamp projects. It also provides a nice updating snapshot into the activity on your projects, even across multiple accounts. Activity is easily filtered by account or by project.

A hover lets you get a quick glimpse of the detail of each activity and a click takes you directly to the corresponding Basecamp page.

In this initial beta release you are limited to the aforementioned time tracking and logging. For now you’ll still need to visit your project pages to comment or add and complete to-do items. Increased interactivity for to-dos and milestones is on the roadmap for future enhancement though. In true 37signals fashion, Periscope is updated frequently with new functionality.

Periscope is iPhone friendly for easy access on the go, and it also works like a charm on your Windows desktop as a Google Desktop Gadget.

After a successful private beta, Ivan and the Persicope team are ready to open things up a bit. If you’re interested in participating head over to Periscope Gadget and register for access to the public beta which is going live a bit later today.

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For the first time anyone can create and submit a theme for iGoogle – so long as it “compelling, polished, tested design that conforms to the guidelines given in the program policy.” (Don’t mess with the Google logo).

To change your theme, click the Select Theme link and pick a theme from the new directory. Along with all the standard themes there are already a few new (at least to me) themes, such as this world map that changes during the course of the day.

If you’re daydreaming about millions of Googlers seeing your branded theme with your logo standing proudly next to the big G – not so fast. Logos, brand names and the like can be appear on a theme only in one place – a 50 by 100 pixel area in the top right corner of the footer. However, if you doing this for art sake, you can include your signature (no large than a 200 pixel square) – just not within 50 pixels of Google’s logo, search box or links. And as you’d expect, themes need to be G rated.

Google also provides a simple means to test your theme before submitting it to the theme directory.

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