Increasing Laptop Battery Service Life [duplicate]

This LifeHacker how to protect your battery for future use.

Below is an edited excerpt.

Your laptop probably uses a Lithium battery,the following applies to Lithium batteries.

Unlike nickel batteries that need to be fully drained before a recharge to optimize the battery life, Lithium batteries do not need to fully discharge it before recharging, and in fact, if you fully deplete a lithium battery and don't recharge for a while, it can become [incapable of holding a charge].

You'll also want to make sure that your battery is not always fully charged—Wikipedia points out that if your lithium battery is fully charged all the time, you will lose up to 20% of your capacity each year, no matter what you do. Make sure to discharge the battery sometimes, and if you spend most of your time plugged in at a desk, you would be better off running the battery down to half, and then simply removing the battery and storing it in a cool place.