An Interview With The Creator Of Linux 

I really interesting read I came across the other day is an interview with the primary driving force behind Linux, Linus Torvalds. If you
are at all interested in Linux or with how maintaining an entire
operating system from the highest level is done, this is well worth
the read.

There is no technical talk at all in the interview and you don’t have
to understand anything about the Linux OS to follow along. I just
thought this would be a worthwhile read to gain an appreciation
of all the moving parts which go into R&D of an operating system.

Enjoy.

Website Performance Analyzer For Firebug 

Have you ever wanted to know how your website measures in
speed with regards to caching and actual downloaded files? If
so then Yahoo has made available an excellent tool called YSlow 
which analyzes this information.

YSlow is actually an extension of the Firefox plugin, Firebug
(an extension of an extension). Among other functions, it allows
you to see how much data your pages will download with both
a full and empty browser cache as well as offering tips to increase
the performance of your site.

Overall, this is a fantastic tool for developers to help optimize
speed and efficiency on your websites. There is a good overview
of the tool on PHPied’s website, so give it a look if you are interested.

Always Display File Extensions 

Checking Your System’s Currently Available Memory 

You probably already know how much memory your system has physically installed in it, often times it is import to see how much is actually available
for you to use at any time.

Here is one way to check:

1. Open Start > Programs > Accessories > System Tools
   > System Information.
2. Select the System Summary link at the top of the tree on the left side.
3. Note the value for Total Physical Memory. This is the amount of
   RAM Windows has recognized as installed in your system.
4. Note the value for Available Physical Memory. This is the amount
   of unused RAM available to your computer right now.

If the Available Physical Memory value is low when no programs are open
(on XP or Vista, anything below 100 MB would be considered low), you
might want to look into getting additional memory for your system.

Using NoScript To Secure Firefox 

Firefox users are probably already aware of how the browser boasts itself as a more secure application than Internet Explorer, however you can make it even more secure by utilizing the NoScript plugin.

NoScript basically disables JavaScript, Java, Flash and other possible exploit laden vehicles for non-trusted sites. This ensures browser execution from unknown or unauthorized sites is not a concern on your machine. Additionally, you can easily set NoScript to allow execution on trusted sites so your
browsing experience is uninterrupted.

As their tag line states:

There’s a browser safer than Firefox…
…it is Firefox, with NoScript! This is a Great Tool!

Before You Get Rid Of A Computer 

Yesterday’s post about buying PCs and parts from thrift stores got me thinking a bit about what I would do if I were donating or selling an old computer. You want to make sure you have everything you need off of it, yet donate/sell something which is worthwhile.

I came up with a checklist of what I would do, so here it is:

1. Make sure the computer still is in function condition (powers on
   and boots properly).
2. Backup all data which I may need or want in the future.
3. Completely zero-write the drive.
4. Verify the zero-write was successful so there is no sensitive or
   personal information on it.
5. Remove any parts from the PC I need (i.e. extra RAM, DVD
   drive, etc.).
6. Include a power cord, keyboard and/or mouse with what I am
   donating/selling (as available).

Obviously, making sure there is no personal information on it is the most important step as you don’t want an unscrupulous person getting hold of it.

Overall, I think the above is a good starting point if you are looking to get rid of an old computer. Possible places to donate them would be schools, thrift stores or you could possibly sell it to a PC shop or at a yard sale. Or you could give it to me, I wipe the harddrives, and then put them back to factory specs, and then give them to a kid or church that does not have one.

Looking For Cheap Or Older Parts? 

If you ever find yourself need cheap or older parts, rather than scouring eBay for what you need try a local thrift store. Using eBay can, many times, be cost prohibitive because the shipping you pay is sometimes more than what the part is worth.

I’ve bought to many PCs from thrift stores for under $25 which included a functioning hard drives, PC 100/133 RAM, sound/video/network cards, floppy/CD drives, motherboards and CPUs (up to P3). Not to mention the case they come with. The only thing to be careful of is many times the unit is not functioning as a whole, but typically the majority of the parts work.

This route is perfect if you are looking to build or repair an old test machine as you can get a fully functional PC for virtually nothing.

Saving A File With An Alternate Extension 

Sometimes when you are creating or editing a file, you need to save it with an extension other than the application’s default. This is especially true when dealing with text files. One way you can do this is by selecting “Save As” and changing the type of file to “Any file” and typing in the name. A quicker way to do this, however is to put the desired file name in quotes.

For example, you can save a file “test file.132″ in Notepad, by simply opening Notepad, typing in some text and then going to Save As. In the  dialog, enter “test file.132″ (with the quotes) in the file name box and the file will be saved with the 132 extension.

This can be done regardless of what type of file you have selected to save it as in the save dialog box as the value in quotes overrides the selected file extension. A handy trick to know if you work with a lot of different text file types.

Scheduling When Services Run 

A handy trick you can do with Windows services is starting and stopping them based on a schedule you set. This way you can run background processes during a time where you will not be using the computer in order to maximize resources available to you.

For example, suppose I only wanted to run Folding @ Home during
non-business hours (5 PM - 8 AM), here is how I would do it:

1. Open your Services configuration: Start > Run > services.msc 
2. Set the service’s startup type to Manual.
3. Create a new text file called “Folding-Start.bat” with the line: 
   net start folding-service-name
4. Create another text file called “Folding-Stop.bat” with the line:
   net stop folding-service-name
5. Create a Windows Scheduled Task to run “Folding-Start.bat”
   at 5 PM every weekday.
6. Create another Scheduled Task to run “Folding-Stop.bat”
   at 8 AM every weekday.

This will ensure the service is not running during working hours,
so the resources will not be used. Of course this same process
and be applied to any other Windows Service you have on your system.

What To Do If You Spill Something On Your Laptop 

If you use a laptop regularly, inevitably you are probably going to end up spilling something on it. After you shout the obligatory obscenities and scramble to remove the source of the spill, be sure to follow these steps to try to save your laptop.

The article gives you a walk through of each of the steps you should do in order to prevent as much damage as possible. Of course it starts out by saying liquids and laptops should never be near each other. Practically speaking (for me at least), my coffee is always nearby…

Tips For Cleaning Your Components 

A good measure to take when doing system maintenance is occasionally cleaning your hardware components. Doing so removes dust and debris which can accumulate inside your system and degrade hardware performance.

While there are probably many more things you can do, I am just going to mention the simple and most obvious and ones:

• When cleaning the inside of your computer (motherboard, etc.)
  make sure your computer is off and you ground yourself before
  opening the case.
• Use only an air duster/canned air to remove dust from your
  components. I would recommend doing so outside so it doesn’t
  end up all over your house.
• Remember to blow out the insides of any intake or exhaust fans.
• When cleaning your monitor, make sure you do so with a clean
  rag and only use cleaning agents designed for electronics.
• Clean your keyboard.

Internet Web Protection Services 

I came across a pretty useful site today called Internet Web Protection Services. If you are well versed in standard security you should take for your computer systems, the articles probably will not be anything new  to you, however I did find the links they offer at the top of their site useful.

Along the top, they have a categorical breakdown of freely available security tools. Much to my delight, they don’t water down the list with every available program out there, they limit their list to only a select few. I have personally used several of the tools they link to and can attest to their effectiveness. My only complaint was they don’t link to the best Outlook anti-spam tool, Spambayes.

Anyhow, this is a good site to know about if you need to pass security information along to someone who might not be as educated, or if you are looking for some free tools.

Don’t Skimp On The Laptop Battery 

In follow up to my post about tips to save laptop power when running on a battery, I missed the most obvious, yet significant factor: the battery itself.

When you are buying a laptop, you should almost always opt for an
upgraded battery. If you think about it, you will probably have your
laptop for several years, so spending an extra $50 (or however much it costs) over the course of time is really not too significant. Considering you don’t know when you will need it and your battery cells can significantly improve the usage time when you are unplugged, the cost is well worth it.

I know when you order laptops from Dell, you have the option to
upgrade from a 6 cell to a 9 cell battery and I always go for it.
Just keep this in mind the next time you are purchasing a laptop.

Google Isn’t The Only Search Engine Out There 

One thing I think a lot of us are guilty of (myself included) is limiting our searches to a single search engine, for everyone I know, this is typically Google. For the most part, if you are searching for something general such as “race cars”, “how to use a chainsaw”, etc. this is fine, however if you are searching for something extremely specific you should not limit your searches to a single search engine.

I thought of this tip today as I was troubleshooting a specific
(and apparently rare) error message with one of my servers. Google’s results pulled up several hits, but not what I needed, I then searched MSN using the same search terms and found the answer.

So keep this in mind next time you are looking for something specific . Here is a quick list of some of the major search engines which you  should give a shot:

• Google
• MSN
• Yahoo
• Ask

Some Tips To Save Laptop Battery Power 

For those of who who utilize laptops quite a bit, you are probably
always aware of the amount of battery power left when you are
working “unplugged”. While this is the biggest advantage of a
laptop, it is also the biggest disadvantage as once your battery
power is gone, you can’t use your laptop until you are able to
plug it back in.

That said, here are 15 tips for saving laptop battery power. While
some of the tips may seem a bit unrealistic if you are constantly
switching between mobile and docked usage, they are still very
worthwhile tips. Give them a read and you should be able to
squeeze some extra usage out of your laptop battery.

Some Tips To Save Laptop Battery Power 

For those of who who utilize laptops quite a bit, you are probably
always aware of the amount of battery power left when you are
working “unplugged”. While this is the biggest advantage of a
laptop, it is also the biggest disadvantage as once your battery
power is gone, you can’t use your laptop until you are able to
plug it back in.

That said, here are 15 tips for saving laptop battery power.
While some of the tips may seem a bit unrealistic if you are
constantly switching between mobile and docked usage, they
are still very worthwhile tips. Give them a read and you should
be able to squeeze some extra usage out of your laptop battery.

Forcing Internet Explorer Compliance 

A big complaint web developers have is IE does not behave the
way a browser should when it comes to Internet standards. The
problem comes when implementing standards compliant markup
and CSS with both Firefox and IE rendering it differently.
Considering these two browsers are widely used, your page
needs to look the part in both of them.

Dean Edwards IE7 page is a collection of fixes to force IE to
act in a more “predicatable” way. By implementing the Javascript
or CSS fixes on this page, you can overcome a lot of the
frustrations of developing for IE.

Firebug Web Development Plugin For Firefox 

Web developers, no matter what your preferred browser is, will
want to take note of the Firefox plugin: Firebug. This truly is a
great tool for both design and debugging is it gives you visual
tools for adjusting alignments and, of course, markup debuggers.

I think their tag line gives you a good overall indication of exactly
what this tool does:

Firebug integrates with Firefox to put a wealth of web
development tools at your fingertips while you browse.
You can edit, debug, and monitor CSS, HTML, and
JavaScript live in any web page.

To elaborate on the “edit, debug, and monitor” features listed
above, Firebug allows you change these elements on the fly to
see how they will look once you incorporate the change into
your markup or Javascript. Any developer will agree this is a
great feature.

Monitor Your CPU Temperature 

An important piece of information to know, especially if you
overclock your hardware, is the temperature of your CPU.
If your CPU gets too hot, well bad things can happen.

If your motherboard or PC manufacturer do not already have
a utility available to do this, then check out Core Temp. This
free lightweight program monitors the temperature on CPU’s
and breaks them down by core when applicable. Core Temp
supports almost all of the recent CPU’s and is a great tool to
have.

You Only Need One Version Of Java 

I was going through my Add/Remove Programs listing this
morning and noticed 5 entries for the Java Runtime Environment
dating back to “Java 5 Release 7″. I thought this was very odd
as there was a subsequent entry for each release after this and
all were ~100MB in size.

So to see what was happening, I checked Java for updates and
sure enough a new one was out. I ran the web updater (which
usually notifies you in your System Tray) and completed the
update. Upon refreshing the Add/Remove Programs list,
another Java entry was added.

Of course the new version of Java does not require the previous,
so I uninstalled every version up to the most recent and tried a
Java app. It worked without any hitches.

So check your Add/Remove Programs and remove any old
entries of the Java Runtime to clear up some clutter on your
machine.

Common Excel Formulas 

If you have ever used Excel for more than making a shopping
list, then you know the incredible power it has through the use
of formulas. Once you have formulas in place, their “cascading”
effect makes playing with number very fast and useful.

Of course to make these formulas, sometimes you have scratch
your head, experiment and read through the help files or search
the Internet. If this sounds familiar then check out this Microsoft
page of common Excel formulas.

This page has a pretty sizable list of how to implement common
formulas in your Excel documents and can give you some ideas
on how to make your spreadsheets more efficient.

Memory Errors Do Not Necessarily Mean
Faulty Memory 

Twice within the past month, I’ve had laptops start to behave
erratically on their users.  The, otherwise stable, system would
crash at random times and sometimes even fail to boot up.
After the normal  troubleshooting steps I came to the conclusion
it was RAM that was the problem. After pulling out the
bad sticks, everything work great.

This got me thinking, since memory hardly ever goes bad,
that the memory may not have been the problem. So I took a
know working laptop and put both the “faulty” memory sticks
into it and the system fired right up and ran very well all day.
I then took the memory I pulled out the good system and put
it in the laptops which were having problems. The same
symptoms came back.

After running multiple iterations of Memtest86 on the various
machines, the only consistent result was there was a problem
with the slot on the motherboard which held the “faulty”
memory. Nothing was wrong with the memory at all. I sent
the laptops back to the manufacturer, as they were still under
warranty, and they replaced the motherboards and everything
is now running great.

The point of the story is, just because you get errors which
indicate bad memory, the error may not actually be with the
memory itself. Just be methodical with your troubleshooting
and you will be able to zero in on the exact problem.

More On Making Use Of Old Laptops

One of my recent posts discussed installing Puppy Linux on
an ancient laptop (P1-266/80MB RAM) I had. After a couple
of weeks of use, I have found myself using it exclusively for
remote connection to my much faster desktop machine, even
when I am only browsing the Internet.

The reason I do this is because the laptop’s extremely limited
power has trouble browsing modern websites as the CPU
runs at ~75% just to render the CSS. This is no fault of the
OS or the browser, just lack of horsepower by the machine.
So when I remote connect to my desktop machine using the
included Linux RDP client, I can browse with all the speed
of my desktop.

Of course, there are a couple of drawbacks being the color
spectrum is limited and a very slight (almost unnoticeable) bit
of lag. Still, the benefits of this far outweigh the negatives.

The point of this post being,  don’t pass up a cheap or free
old laptop because it can’t run your current OS of choice
well. You can set up your primary machine as a remote
connection server and use the laptop to connect from
anywhere in the World. This beats buying a new laptop
and having the hassle of transferring the files back and forth.

Breakout-Esque Game For Windows CE 

Those of you with Windows CE based portable devices
looking for a way to kill some time should check out
Microsoft’s Cubicle Chaos game. This breakout style
game is a small and lightweight program specifically
designed to work on your CE based device.

While it is a bit dated (2001) it takes advantage of
ActiveSync to install on your mobile device and is
completely free. Enjoy.

Run Dialog Behavior In Vista 

One of the more useful, and somewhat immediately
noticable, changes in Windows Vista is the much improved
behavior of the Run Dialog box.

Now, instead of being an actual dialog box, it is
embedded into the Start Menu. Even better, it makes
suggestions for programs and previously entered paths
which start with what you are typing as you type. The
Run Dialog up until now would only remember actual
programs or locations you had previously run.

To try the new behavior, simply click the Start Menu
and then in the text box immediately above the Vista
logo type “cal” and you will notice options being listed
at the top such as the calculator or the Windows Calendar.

This is a very handy feature of the OS and has become
a shortcut I use often.

Moving Files From An Earlier Windows
Install To Vista 

If you install Windows Vista by upgrading an existing
version of Windows, Vista does this by creating a copy
of your existing files and keeping them in an alternate location
on the new OS. Of course, you will want to move these files
to the new location for your active Windows installation, so
here are some Microsoft articles which may help:

• How to retrieve files from an earlier version of
  Windows in Windows Vista
• How to move Internet Explorer favorites from an
  earlier version of Windows to the Internet Explorer
  Favorites folder in Windows Vista
• How to remove the Windows.old folder that is
  generated when you perform a custom installation
  of Windows Vista

Overall, the upgrade is pretty painless, so hopefully these
articles can save you a bit of time.

Automatically Paste Text Into Outlook
Without The Formatting

One of the “it’s about time” features Outlook 2007 implements
is a setting where you can paste text from a external source
(such as a web page or Word document) directly into your
message where the pasted text format stays consistent with
the rest of your message text. In the past, you would have
to use Edit > Paste Special > Unformatted Text or the
Notepad trick, but no longer!

Here are the steps to make pasted text into your Outlook
messages conform with your existing text:

1. Compose a new message.
2. Click the Office bar in the upper left corner of
   the new message window.
3. Click the Editor Options button in the bottom right.
4. Select the Advanced menu.
5. In the “Cut, copy and paste” section, change the
   first 4 options to “Keep Text Only”.
6. Click Ok to apply your settings.

Now you can copy and paste from anywhere without being
constantly annoyed with having to make the font and size
consistent.

I say it again… it’s about time!

Download Windows Home Server
RC1 For Free 

Developers and users take note: Microsoft is currently
running a promotion for their new Home Server
operating system, which involves a $50,000 prize for
developing the coolest add-in. In order to make this
contest possible, Microsoft made Home Server RC1
 available for free download for a limited time.

Keep in mind, RC (release candidate) is not the final
version of the software, but is deemed stable enough
for a release to the public. So if you are a development
or PC enthusiast, be sure to check out this new OS
and enter the contest!

Microsoft Security Portal 

While on the topic of security and anti-spyware, I can across
a very informative page on Microsoft: The Microsoft Malware
Protection Center.

This site gives you a rundown of current and active threats
for Windows as well a dictionary on threat which lists it’s
severity level, description, effected file, etc. While you can
get this same information by Googling a treat name, the
Microsoft site is useful because it adds some additional
information all in one place, including:

• Top desktop / email threats.
• Top Malicious Software Removal Tool detections.
• Links to security blogs.
• Comprehensive threat encyclopedia.

This is a good bookmark to have in the event you are dealing
with trying to remove spyware.

Checking For Spyware Using Netstat 

By definition, in order for spyware to work, it has to have
access to an Internet connection in order to submit information
to a master program. Of course, this information is undesirable,
for obvious reasons.

While there are 1,001 different utilities which detect and remove
these programs, one effective tool is the Windows Netstat utility.
This video on PC Mech shows you how to use Netstat to detec
t any undesirable programs which your anti-spyware scanners
may have missed. This is really worth checking out.

Note: Vista users will need to launch Netstat using administrator
rights.

Remove The Windows Start Menu
Display Delay 

Did you know that, by default in Windows, there is a 400 ms
delay between the time you press the Start Menu button and
when the display process actually starts? You can easily
remove this delay by making a simple registry entry change:

1. Open Start > Run.
2. Enter: regedit
3. Click Ok. The Registry Editor will open.
4. Browse to: HKEY_CURRENT_USER >
   Control Panel > Desktop
5. Double click on the entry “Menu Show Delay”.
6. Change the value to 0 to remove the delay.
7. Close the Registry Editor.

Now there will not be an imposed time on load of the
Start Menu. This works for both XP and Vista, although
I am not sure about 2000 (probably so though).

CNet's 5 Worst Downloads 

Everyone loves a cool and useful, preferably free, utility,
but I’m going to take a different direction with this post.
As the subject line states, this video shows CNet’s 5
Worst Downloads for the Summer. I actually found this
quite amusing (especially number one… wow) so it is
good for a laugh.

I actually did check and these programs are real and
available for you to download, if you so choose.
So check out the video and enjoy a good laugh.

Disable The Vista Administrator Confirmations 

One security feature which Windows Vista implements is a
virtual “blanket” between a standard user account and an
administrator account. This leads to a more secure system
because administrator level tasks, such as modifying the
registry or installing new programs, cannot be done through
a normal user. As a result, Vista will prompt you whenever
you run any program which tries to perform this action.

This popup usually dims the screen and halts all activity until
you answer. While this is a good security measure, you might
want to disable it if it inhibits your usage. Here is how:

For Vista Business and Ultimate:

1. Open Control Panel (Classic View).
2. Open Administrative Tools.
3. Open Local Security Policy.
4. Select Local Policies > Security Options.
5. Locate the option for “User Account Control: Behavior
   of the elevation prompt for administrators in Admin
   Approval Mode”.
6. Change this value to: Elevate without prompting.

 For Vista Home versions:

1. Open Start > Run > regedit
2. Go to: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft
   \Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System
3. Change the value of ConsentPromptBehaviorAdmin to
   00000000
4. Close regedit.

After making these changes you should no longer receive the
prompt to open certain applications and utilities as the administrator.

Shortcut To Bypass Windows XP
Startup Programs 

If you are troubleshooting your Windows XP installation,
a prudent task is to boot up your machine without running
the configured startup programs. Doing this can disable
malicious programs from loading altogether.

Of course doing this could require quite a bit of effort if you
were to manually edit the msconfig entries. Instead, try a
shortcut mentioned in this Microsoft article, Troubleshooting
the Startup Process, which is to simply hold down the Shift key
while booting your machine. Doing this disables programs
set to load in the following locations:

• systemdrive\Documents and Settings\Username
  \Start Menu\Programs\Startup
• systemdrive\Documents and Settings\All Users
  \Start Menu\Programs\Startup
• windir\Profiles\Username\Start Menu\Programs
  \Startup
• windir\Profiles\All Users\Start Menu\Programs
  \Startup

In order for this to work, you have to continue to hold down
the Shift key until all the desktop program icons have appeared.

Additionally, this is a great way to make your computer boot faster
to Windows as it doesn’t load all the programs in the background.
You would, however, have to start these program manually if you
wanted to use them.

CSS Tips 

Linux For An Old Laptop 

Today’s tip is for those of you who may have an old laptop
which is practically worthless by today’s standards, but still
functional. I have such a machine (Pentium 266 MMX,
80 MB RAM, 4 GB HD) which still sports a “Designed for
Windows 95″ sticker.

While I could load Windows 98 on the machine, finding the
drivers for the devices and my ancient Orinoco wireless card
would be more trouble than I care to deal with, so instead I
looked for a lightweight Linux distribution. The one I found
was Puppy Linux.

I downloaded and burned the live CD and then proceeded to
use its graphical installer to put it on the hard drive. After about
10 minutes I had Puppy Linux totally installed on my hard drive.
After a reboot and 5 minutes more, I used the graphical network
configuration tool to configure my wireless card and now I’m set.
In fact I am writing this tip from inside my new Puppy Linux install.

I plan to just use this machine to either remote connect to my
other machine or just use the wireless internet from around the
house, so I really don’t need any horsepower.

So if you have an old laptop, or can get one, I would
recommend Puppy Linux be on your list of OS’s to try.

A Paintbrush Replacement 

I know I have been posting about Notepad replacements for
quite some time, so today I am going to post about another
Windows standard program replacement… this time Paintbrush.

Paint.NET is truly an awesome graphics program. It runs on the
.NET platform and offers many significant features over Paintbrush.
In fact, I think comparing it to Paintbrush would be an insult to Paint.NET. It does many of the most common graphics manipulations and supports the formats you would expect, but in a very intuitive and straight-forward way.

I, up until recently, used GIMP as my graphics program, but have
since uninstalled it in favor of the more user friendly and practical
Paint.NET. If you are looking for a free graphics program for
Windows, Paint.NET is a fantastic choice.

Desktop Sidebar 

If you have upgraded to Vista, one of the more noticeable immediate
changes is the addition of the desktop components which allows
you to view an analog clock, RSS feeds, weather, etc. While this
ships with Vista, Windows 2000 and XP users can get a similar
tool via the free Desktop Sidebar program.

This tool allows you add many of the same components
available in Vista plus more, including:

• Search
• Media Player / WinAmp Controls
• Performance Monitors
• Inbox
• Todo List

Rock XP 

Today I am posting about a truly handy utility for Windows XP
which allows you recovery lots of useful information from your
Windows XP installation. While there are many pieces of
software available which handle the changing of the
Windows product key, Rock XP does this, but it also does
tons more.

Taken straight from Rock XP’s website: ——

• Allow you to get all Microsoft Software Serials
• Allow you to change your XP key
• Allow you to save you XP activation
• Allow you to retrieve you internet connection parameters
  (like passwords)
• Allow you to retrieve MSN login and password
• Allow you to retrieve XP login and HASH password
• Allow you to display system password (LSA)
• Allow you to generate random password
• and others more features !!

—— I find the feature which allows you to get the product
key off any Microsoft software especially usefully as we
have ~10 machines at work here and keeping up with
which product key goes to which machine becomes
difficult the machines constantly change hands (arg!).

Anyhow, this free utility is very handy and worth having around.

Change Your My Documents Location 

By default, your My Documents folder is stored inside of your
local user profile folder. While this typically is fine you may
want to change the location of these documents. For example,
if you have a server, it makes sense to put your files on the
server so they can benefit from any backup processes
running on the server.

To change this, simply do the following:

1. Right click on My Documents from either your desktop
   or Start Menu icon.
2. Select Properties.
3. Go to the Location tab.
4. Click the Move button.
5. Navigate to the new location. This can be either a local
   drive, mapped drive or a UNC path.
6. Click Apply.
7. You can optionally have the Windows automatically
   copy over any existing file.

ASP.Net �How Do I� Video Center 

Aspiring or experienced web developers who utilize the
Microsoft Visual Studio/Express ASP.Net development
tools now have another learning tool at their disposal.
Microsoft has launched their new How Do I Video Center
for ASP.Net developers.

This site is targeted at beginners, but experienced developers
may be able to pick up a trick or two. These video range
from brief ~5 minutes to in depth ~30 minutes, so if you
are looking for a how to, this is an excellent resource.

Disable The Windows Indexing Service 

The Windows Indexing Service, if you are not familiar
with it, basically “pre-emptively” scans all files and
folders on your computer ahead of time, so when you
run a search the performance is faster. While this is a
good idea in theory, it really dampers performance
and can cause system issues.

Unless you search for files and folders on your
machines a lot, it is best to disable the Indexing Service.
Here is how:

1. Login to your computer as an administrator.
2. Right click on My Computer and select Manage.
3. Expand Services and Applications.
4. Click on Services.
5. Locate the Indexing Service entry.
6. Right click and select Properties.
7. Click the Stop button.
8. Change the startup type to Disabled.
9. Click Ok to apply your settings.

This will prevent the indexing service from sucking up
system resources and should help your overall performance.

StumbleUpon Plugin For Internet Explorer 

StumbleUpon seems to be a very popular site. While I
have never personally invested any time looking at
the site, I read about it nearly everywhere.

Most of the time when I hear about StumbleUpon, it is in
reference to the Firefox plugin, however by sheer
happenstance, I stumbled upon (ha) a StumbleUpon
plugin for Internet Explorer.

So if you like StumbleUpon and use Internet Explorer
as your preferred browser, this plugin is for you.

Standards Compliant �New Window�
Link 

Building A USB Lamp 

Something really interesting I ran across today is a video on
how to make a USB lamp. This is actually rather clever as
they make a lamp powered by a USB cable using only 2
CD’s, a paper cup, a paper lamp shade, 2 small wires,
and of course, a light bulb.

The video is pretty brief, but it shows you exactly how to
build it. For those of you who are into computer light kits,
have fun with this one as you can use your imagination to
come up with something really nifty.

Register Your Business With Google Local 

If you have a business of any size, you really consider registering
it with Google Local. In addition to the obvious benefit of being
listed in a Google Local search, you also have your registered address saved as a location in Google Maps. This way when a user types “your business name” into a Google Map search, your company’s address shows up. It looks very professional.

Registration is easy. Simply fill out the form linked to above and
then Google will send you a confirmation to your registered address. After following the instructions on the confirmation, you will be all set.

Customizing Office's My Places

Typically when you save office files, you probably place them in the My Documents folder (or on your desktop). However, if you are constantly saving to or opening from an alternate location, such as a network location you can configure this location to be available in your Microsoft Office (2000/XP/2003) favorites bar.

This article on LockerGnome explains the exact steps to adding a custom location, so check it out. From what I can tell, it does not work on Office 2007, so once I find the equivalent functionality for 2007, I will post it.

Skype Internet Phone

First off, the topic of an Internet phone is almost too much of a “loaded” tip, but I thought I would spread the benefits of it anyway in a brief, tip-like manner.

Many of you may current be using, or tried Skype in the past, but it goes without saying, this is a fantastic program. Basically what it allows you to do is have your computer act as a phone using only your PC microphone and speaker. This voice over IP (VOIP) model allows you to make phone calls, absolutely free to any other Skype user around the World. Once you have the program installed, you can then use it to chat with any of the over 170 million users for free. If you constantly make international calls, this is definitely worth consideration!

If you want more details on exactly how Skype works, be sure to check out Wikipedia’s page on Skype. This should help answer any questions you may have.

Creating An Image Trail

Do you remember when you beat Solitaire on Windows and all the cards bounce off the screen, leaving a “trail” behind them as they go, eventually filling up the screen? Well, Paintbrush offers the functionality to create this same leave behind trail effect with an image. Here is how you do it:

1. Open an image and select the portion to make a trail of.
2. Select the “transparent move” (the box where the green square’s background is the same as the background of the rest of the image).
3. Hold down the shift key and drag the image around the screen.

As you can see, a “leave behind” of the image is kept as you move it. The faster you move the mouse, the more of the image gets left behind.

Gmail Drive

If you have a Gmail account, odds are you have several gigabytes of storage available (which you, realistically, will probably never use). Take advantage of this freely available online space by using it to backup files to with Gmail Drive.

Gmail Drive is a free tool which creates another drive available in My Computer which you can use to store your files. Of course, you are limited to the rules of Gmail with the files storage which includes (currently) 20 MB max file size and ~60 character file name. Still, most of your files should easily satisfy these requirements.

Keep in mind though, this is not an official tool of Google, so it is limited by what can be done by the developer and there is no guarantee it will work in the future due to Gmail changes.

Another Notepad Replacement

While on the topic of Notepad, I figured it is only appropriate if I make yet another suggestion for a replacement program. In the past I have pointed to both EditPad and jEdit as a simple text editor and programmer’s editor, respectively. Today, I am referring to another popular program which does a good job at both.

Notepad++ is a great combination of both a simple text editor and a programmer’s editor. It offers many of the advanced features of jEdit, such as folding, syntax highlighting and auto-complete… all while loading reasonably fast. Additionally, Notepad++ has built in Windows right-click menu integration to make it easy to open files.

I’ve starting using this more and more as my primary editor over both EditPad and jEdit (still fantastic programs), so give it a shot.

Use Notepad To Create A Log File

If you use Notepad as one of your primary text editors, a trick you might not know about is configuring a text file in Notepad to log the date and time of changes. The previous link explains exactly how to do, and as you can see, it is very easy.

While I find this to be a neat function, I personally have several other text editors I use in conjunction with Notepad. Unfortunately this trick only works if you do your editing in Notepad.

Receive Faxes Via Email

If you ever have a need to send and receive faxes and do not want to make the investment in the hardware and perhaps a phone line, then doing faxing through email probably fits your situation. If you are looking for such as service then take a look at EFax.

They offer a free service which lets you receive up to 20 fax pages per month on your own unique fax number. If you have a small business, this is the perfect (and cost effective) way to allow your customers to communicate through faxing.

Unfortunately, the free service does not allow you to send faxes via email, as this requires one of their pay services. Still, if you want to receive faxes then EFax is worth a look.

PHP IDE In Visual Studio

In my organization I am constantly doing development work in Visual Studio and PHP. While VS is an excellent product for Windows development, it only supports the Microsoft development languages and not PHP.

Well, the other day, I stumbled across VS.Php which integrates the PHP language inside the fantastic VS IDE. While you do not get 100% of the VS features available when you are developing in PHP (it’s pretty close though), the real value is the single point of entry for both Windows and web development. If you are in the same boat as me, VS.Php is definitely worth a look.

If you do not have Visual Studio, you can download the standalone edition which is a PHP IDE in itself.

I usually do not post tips about non-free software, but for professional developers or ultra enthusiasts, this is really worth consideration.

More Tips For Upgrading To Windows Vista

Now that I am looking at having to upgrade all our companies machines to Windows Vista from Windows XP, I have really been looking for a way to make the transition as painless as possible. My biggest concern, of course, is maintaining data and preventing loss of any kind. Of course I am doing backups, but if the data can be kept intact, all the better.

While researching I came across some very good Microsoft articles which I thought could be helpful to others. These articles are very thorough and link to other applicable KB’s.

• How to perform a custom installation of Windows Vista on a computer that is running Windows XP
• How to retrieve files from an earlier version of Windows in Windows Vista

While the first is pretty self explanatory, the second one is very helpful as it explains what the upgrade process does with your My Documents, Favorites, etc.

These are very helpful indeed.

Creating A Calendar In Vista

If you are running Windows Vista and accustomed to using a wall or desk calendar to keep track of important dates, bump the traditional calendar in favor of the Windows Calendar. The Windows Calendar has everything you would expect from a calendar program such as recurring events, notifications, etc. Even better, you can subscribe to Internet calendars which use the ICS format.

To open the Windows Calendar:

1. Click the Start Button.
2. Type “calendar” in the Search box.
3. Select Windows Calendar when it appears at the top.

If you are interested in created a “shared” family calendar, this Microsoft article explains exactly how to do it with color coding and everything.

This program really is a great addition to Windows Vista.

PC �Watchdog�

We all know any PC running Windows requires anti-virus and anti-spyware programs to keep it protected. Of course sometimes malicious programs can still slip through the cracks either in the form of an Active X Control, accidental clicking yes instead of no, etc.

To help protect you from this or even get rid of anything you may already have, Winpatrol 2007 does the trick. The link provided takes you to PC World’s review of the program and gives you a brief breakdown of some of the features. For the security minded, this would be a good program to have.

A Complete Dual Booting Guide

If you are looking to try a new OS, but are a bit hesitant to wipe what you have and start fresh a dual boot is a great way to transition. This way you can try the new OS while still having your old OS operational to make the transition easier.

With that said, if you are unsure how to actually do this, take a look at this dual booting guide posted on APC. It shows you how to how to create a dual boot with any combination of Linux, XP and Vista. No matter what OS you are starting with or what OS you are transitioning to, this guide an help.

Automatic Webpage Refresher

If you want to make sure your browser is constantly getting the most recent content (i.e. refreshed regularly), you can either manually hit the refresh button every time you view the page, or try this Web Page Refresher program. Personally I like to have my baseball box scores updated constantly, so this simple program does the trick for me.

So if you want to make sure you are seeing the latest box scores, stock quotes, forum posts, etc. then give this utility a try.

Running Windows XP Inside Of Windows Vista

I’m going to preface this tip by saying the entire process is more involved than the scope of a daily tip, so I am only going to give very high level steps.

If you are hesitant to upgrade to Windows Vista because one of your programs is not supported, you can install and run Windows XP completely inside of Windows Vista. The magic is all in a fantastic free product, Microsoft Virtual PC 2007. This is not a dual boot, but a complete OS installation inside of Vista, itself. I use this setup every day at work in order to run Vista as my primary OS and can seamlessly open my XP installation at any time to run apps which do not work in Vista.

Here is a high level overview of what you would need to do in order to do this. It really isn’t hard… seriously.

1. Download and install Microsoft Virtual PC 2007.
2. Create a new virtual machine. You can either use the XP preset or customize it yourself.
3. Put your XP install disk inside your CD drive.
4. Start the XP virtual machine and as it boots up, the XP installation program will load.
5. Install XP as you would on any PC.
6. That’s it.

Once the installation is done, you will have a complete XP environment inside your Vista installation.

Note: I would recommend you have ~2 GB of memory before doing this. The reason is while you are running a virtual PC, both it and Vista will be using memory (because you are running 2 OS’s at once).

Running Programs With XP Compatibility In Vista

If you have upgraded to Windows Vista (or are thinking about it), you probably know some programs do not work correctly running natively in Vista. For these programs, you can configure them to run in Windows 2000/XP/2003 compatibility mode as a work around.

Here is how to do it:

1. Right click on a program shortcut and select Properties.
2. Go to the Compatibility tab.
3. Check the box “Run this program in compatibility mode for:”.
4. Select the OS in the drop down below. Usually Windows XP (Service Pack 2) is the best option.
5. You might also need to select “Run this program as an administrator” to allow appropriate file permissions. I would only recommend this if you experience problems while running in compatibility mode.

While this isn’t a 100% graceful solution. It is a viable “stop gap” for running programs which experience trouble inside of Windows Vista.

How To Backup The Windows Registry

Every time you see any article which asks you to make changes to the Windows Registry, it is preceded with the obligatory, “backup your registry first” statement. Unfortunately, most sites do not provide instructions or a link on how to backup your registry. So as a public service, I’m going to post links to Microsoft articles which explain how to do this.

How to backup your Windows XP or Windows Server 2003 Registry

How to backup your Windows 2000 Registry

How to backup your Windows 9x/ME Registry

Unfortunately, Microsoft doesn’t have a Windows Vista article yet, but I’m guessing the tool under Start > Programs > Accessories > System Tools > Backup Status and Configuration would do the trick.

Free PDF Writer For Windows Vista

This past weekend I had to upgrade my work PC to Windows Vista, so this is just a heads up that you will probably seeing quite a bit of Vista tips in the future.

One of the first things I found didn’t work after the upgrade, was PDFCreator (the free PDF writer I have used with Windows 2000 and XP). Of course, after some searching I did find a free alternative, CutePDF Writer. The installation was very easy as all you have to do is follow the steps they provide on their website (installation of 2 downloads) and the product works just as advertised.

I know CutePDF is a fairly popular product, so you might have heard of it… or even use it yourself. So if you are looking for a free PDF writer for Windows Vista, CutePDF is a quick and easy way to go.

Full List Of IE7 Keyboard Shortcuts

Building off last weeks post regarding the Ctrl + Enter URL shortcut in IE, I found a full list of Internet Explorer 7 Shortcut Keys on Microsoft’s site.

There are several shortcuts listed here that I really like (such as the open feeds in “pinned” mode Ctrl + Shift + J). So take a look as you are bound to find a shortcut you can make use of.

Create Your Own IE �About� Page Shortcut

You may be familiar with the blank page in IE referenced by going to the URL “about:blank”. When you type this address, the keyword “about” tells IE to look in the Windows Registry for the location of “blank”. So if you would like to add your own “about” page shortcut, do this:

1. Go to Start > Run > regedit. Click Ok.
2. Navigate to: HKEY_LOCALMACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\InternetExplorer\AboutURLs.
3. Select Edit > New > String Value.
4. Change the name to what you want your shortcut to be. Try “tips” for example.
5. Double click on the new entry name.
6. Enter a URL for the value. Try “http://www.pcdailytips.com“.
7. Now open IE and enter “about:” + your shortcut name. Try: “about:tips”.

Preserving Your SD And MMC Flash Memory Cards

Unlike the hard disk, flash memory has a limit, albeit a high one, on how many times it can be written to. Directly related, did you know every time you take a picture with your digital camera, several write operations are performed on you memory card?

While digital camera writes are normal operations, there are a few things you can do to keep the number of write operations performed on you flash cards down:

• Try to use flash memory cards only for storing data, but never modifying it. For example, if you edit pictures or music files, copy the file to your hard disk, do your changes and then write it back to your memory card.
• Delete the data on the flash card only if the storage medium is filled up and cannot store new data anymore. This ensures write operations are performed on different sectors and not the same sectors over and over again.

While it is not essential to follow the above tips (flash memory is pretty cheap), it is just something to keep in mind to help preserve the life of your memory card.

Tips For Increasing The Life Of CD's And DVD's

You probably know CD and DVD media, while overall is fairly durable, can easily be damaged. Here are just a few tips to help keep your CD’s and DVD’s in top shape:

1. Never touch the underside of a CD or a DVD. It’s a sensitive area. Fingerprints and smudges can affect the disk’s readability. Always use your thumb for support on the outer rim and insert your index finger in the hole to hold the disk.
2. When you are loading your CD’s/DVD’s from the top, don’t bend the disk too much while inserting it to the rotation motor. Push the disk gently on the motor from the area outside the center ring.
3. The best way to store your media is in jewel or DVD cases. CD sleeves or other pouches may damage the media due to constant friction.
4. Never expose your disks to direct sunlight. There could be data deterioration due to the heat and high intensity light of the sun.

If you do notice the first signs of deterioration, backup or make a copy of your media so you can be sure to avoid data loss.

Windows Vista vs. Windows XP SP2 Security

Whether you have installed Windows Vista or not, you probably already know there are differences between it and Windows XP (naturally). Many of these differences deal directly with security in an effort to make Vista more secure than XP SP2.

For todays tip, I want to point you to a good blog article on Microsoft Technet dealing with percieved differences vs. actual differences. Don’t let the source fool you, as this article is not biased. In fact the article merely references and highlights excerpts from 2 other articles written on the subject, one which points out flaws in Vista as compared to XP SP2 and the other which addresses what the first article points out.

If you are at all concerned or interested in Vista security, this really is worth your read.

Creating Signatures With Witty Quotes

If you tired of carrying the same quote below your signature in your emails, then this tip is for you.

Qliner Quotes is a free, fun utility which will make sure your “well” of quotes never runs dry. In addition to just a normal quote generator, you can also have random quotes inserted into your email or Windows Messanger. On top of this there are also additional plugins such as wallpaper and screensavers you can download.

If nothing else, Qliner is a fun way to pass some time.

We Sure Have Come A Long Way!

Online Password Strength Checker

We all know that using a weak password is a no-no. Your dog’s name, your birthday or the word “password” are all bad ideas as they lend a higher probability to being cracked. While using a strong password may not be feasible for every login you create, you should definitely use on important sites, such as your online banking login.

A very nifty web tool which Microsoft makes available is their Online Password Strength Checker. This tool is very simple, just type your password in the box and you can instantly see whether it is weak, medium or strong. Don’t worry, your passwords are not saved, everything seems to be accomplished through client side script.

Give your current passwords a try and make sure they are at the appropriate strength.

Free Registry Cleaner

It seems the Windows Registry has become a hot topic lately in the world of security and reliability. So much that there are many applications available which do nothing but try to detect errors in the Windows Registry.

If you are looking for a free tool, a utility which has received high praise is EasyCleaner. While I am always cautious (and skeptical) before doing anything with the registry, the EasyCleaner description on the website makes the program seem as though it is pretty straight forward and only looks at the obvious.

So if you want to try to clean up your registry, give it a try. Just remember there are always risks whenever you mess with your registry, so be careful and make sure you have a backup just in case!

Run Any Application As A Service

First off I want to say what I am covering in this tip is a bit on the advanced side, and requires some understanding of how services work in Windows.

An incredibly powerful tool made available by Microsoft is the aptly named “srvany.exe” utility. With this utility you can run any program as a Windows Service and get all the benefits services offer. This Microsoft KB article explains exactly how to use the tool and this article gives a good walk-through complete with screenshots.

In the past, I have used this tool on both Windows XP and Server 2003 to launch applications with a COM interface available to the network only when the application is running (MapPoint 2003 stands out). This way I can insure the program will start automatically and be available without having to manually open it after a reboot.

Computer Inventory Tool

If you are looking for tool to assist you with taking an inventory of both computer hardware and software on your network, then give a good look at OCS Inventory. This free, open source tool boasts many features, including: 

• Windows, Unix and Mac detection.
• Lightweight on system resources.
• Easily deployable through scripts. 
• Web based interface.
• Query’able and extendable through web services and an API.

If you have ever been faced with trying to do an audit on a large network, you know having a tool to simply the process is almost a requirement. For this reason, OSC Inventory deserves a fair look.

IE URL Typing Shortcut

Still on the same topic as yesterday, today I am going to cover a very handy IE keyboard shortcut dealing with typing URL’s. Simply put, by typing the primary domain into the address bar and press Ctrl + Enter, “http://” and “.com” are automatically added to the domain name.

For example, try this:

1. Open a new IE window.
2. In the address bar type: pcdailytips
3. Press Ctrl + Enter.
4. You are taken to: http://www.pcdailytips.com

While this isn’t a huge time-saver, it is a pretty nice thing to know.

Finding Alt Key Shortcuts

Many of you probably already know about the shortcut key Alt + F4 which closes the active application. Of course there are numerous other shortcut combinations you can figure out in your favorite applications by doing the following:

1. Open the application you want to find the key combinations for.
2. Press the Alt key. This will cause the top menu to underline a letter.
3. Press the letter corresponding to the underlined letter you want invoke.
4. If a submenu opens, there should be more options which are underlined. Pressing the underlined letter with either open additional submenus or run the corresponding command.

If it sounds confusing, just give it a try and you will see what I mean. Additionally, you can have the Alt shortcut key underlined by default by doing:

1. Go to the Control Panel.
2. Open Display.
3. Go the the Appearance tab.
4. Click Effects.
5. Uncheck the option for “Hide underlined […] until I press the Alt key.

Figuring out keyboard shortcuts to handle tasks which you have to run through several menu options can really help you save time.

Google Webmaster Central

Another set of Google tools you might want to take advantage of are located on the Google Webmaster Central site. This site features information, FAQ’s and blogs, straight from the Google team, on how to improve your site with respect to Google.

One tool to note is Google Sitemaps (located in the Webmaster tools section). Basically, with Google Sitemaps you can submit a specially formatted XML file to Google with contains information on all your site’s pages in order to make it easier for their crawler to find your pages. While there is documentation made available, if you have a large site, you might want to take advantage of the Sitemap Generator Tool in order to create a sitemap file for you.

While Google may not be the “be-all” of search engines, there is little dispute it is the most popular, so making your site tweaked in favor or Google isn’t a bad idea.

Webmasters: Utilize Google Analytics

If you have any sort of website you maintain, you probably know tracking visitor statistics is essential. While there are dozens of free and commercial services and products which track visitor trends, Google Analytics has to be up among the top. Best of all, the service is complete free to use and is ridiculously simple to implement.

Here are some of the features:

• Completely redesigned AJAX-ified interface.
• Track basic stats (unique visitors, time on site, keywords) as well as advanced stats (entrance/exit pages, browser settings, etc.).
• Create campaigns to monitor the effectiveness of your marketing.
• Tight integration with Ad-words program.
• Dashboards and charts for virtually all data.
• Track user sessions with site overlays.

If you are not already taking advantage of this fantastic product, so sign up now.

Using The Home/End/Page Up/Page Down Keys

Copy-Paste In The Windows Command Prompt

If utilize the Windows command prompt and are annoyed with the lack of typical copy-paste behavior, this tip is for you. Here is how to enable and perform copy-paste into the Windows command:

1. Open the command prompt window.
2. Right click on the title bar and select Properties.
3. Under Edit Options, check both QuickEdit Mode and Insert Mode.
4. Click Ok.
5. Select the option to Save for future windows.
6. Click Ok.
7. Close the command prompt windows and reopen it so the changes take effect.

Now you copy text from the command prompt to your clipboard by highlighting it and clicking on the right mouse button (the highlighting will disappear when you do this). To paste text into the command prompt, simply right click into the command prompt window and any text in your clipboard is pasted.

This shortcut is a huge time saver if you make regular use of the command prompt.

Another Anti-Spam Tool

Still on the topic of combating spam, another tool you might want to take a look at is Spamihilator. This program acts as a “go-between” from the mail server and your mail client. Essentially, it works this way:

1. All mail is delivered directly to your local installed copy of Spamihilator.
2. Spamihilator filters the messages (based on a Bayes learning algorithm).
3. Your email client retrieves the filtered message from Spamihilator.

This intermediate step prevents the spam from ever reaching your Inbox. Of course, you need to configure your email client to work with Spamihilator and there are extensive instructions available on the website.

While I have not personally used it, it looks like a good alternative for users not using Outlook (if you are using Outlook, use SpamBayes instead), so now Outlook Express/Thunderbird/etc. users have an evolving free spam prevention tool.

(The Best?) Spam Protection For Outlook

The Old Car Tape Adapter

You might remember, “way back when”, the old tape adapter which was used in a car with a portable CD player to play CD’s through the car’s stereo. Today, there are fancy add-ons you can purchase for your portable MP3 players which broadcast music through an FM channel which you can tune to on your car.

While these devices seem to work ok, they are a bit on the pricey side (~$20), in my opinion. So instead, if your car has a tape player, consider using the old tape adapter on your MP3 player. These can be had very cheap, as I got mine for $3, and work great. Simply plug in the adapter to the headphone jack and then pop it in your tape player.

Preparing To Upgrade XP To Vista

Check The Updated Date On Articles

Make Use Of Online HTML Editors

If you are into web development, you probably either use a WYSIWYG editor or simply type the code by hand. Both of these methods are great depending on your style, however if you ever need a way to quickly get a clip of HTML code (either to send as an example to someone, or you don’t want to dig through references), make use of an online HTML editor.

I would recommend the fantastic FCKeditor Demo for such a situation. All you do is enter your formatted text into the text area, click the Source button and the 100% valid XHTML source appears in front of you which you can easily copy and paste. Often times this may be a much faster alternative to either firing up your own editor or typing the code yourself.

Firefox Anti-Phishing Plugins

I just came across this great article today regarding anti-phishing plugins for Firefox. This is a pretty extensive list which provides a short description and download link for each.

There really isn’t much more to add, so take a look at the article and pick the one(s) you like.

Easy Way To Get Your Connection Strings

Developers, if you utilize multiple database servers and have a hard time remembering the exact connection string to make connections (OLEDB, ODBC, DSN, etc.), then take a look at ConnectionStrings.com.

This is a straight to the point site which has information only about the connection strings required for dozens of data sources. Everything from SQL Server to Exchange to MySQL and SQLite is covered in a very logical and quick to access style.

Definitely a bookmark worthy site for any developer.

Unplug Your USB Devices Carefully

Whenever you unplug a USB device from its connection, make sure you are careful in doing so. The best way to unplug a device is by pulling firmly straight out of the connector. Wiggling the USB connector or pulling from an angle can cause the plug to bend or can damage (and break) the internal connectors which make the device work.

This tip was prompted by having a friend bring a broken USB flash drive to me in order to see if I could do anything about it. Upon inspection, the small metal strip connectors were broken. When I asked them to show me how they remove the device, they both wiggled and pulled at an angle (quite violently).

Fasterfox Users: Be Courteous

If you are a Firefox user who makes use of the Fasterfox plugin, make sure you are not “abusing” the power of the plugin by increasing the load on web servers.

Basically, the way Fasterfox works is when you visit a page, the plugin scans the page for links and “pre-downloads” the content in the event you click on the link. Of course this works great for end users as there is virtually no load time on the link as the content has already been downloaded. However, this puts a great burden on the web server as your browser is downloading content you may never view.

You may not think it is a big deal as someone browsing the site, but this directly leads to increased costs on the web site owner. Bandwidth is expensive and you are utilizing the server’s resources (on the chance you may visit a link) which could be used on actual people viewing the site.

To make sure you are playing nice, change your preferences in the plugin to run in Courteous mode. This way, you can get the end user enhancements without placing an offen unnecessary load on the servers offering up content.

Resetting Your Internet Connection

If you use either DSL or a Cable Modem and find your Internet connection has unexpectedly gone down, before you dial up tech support, try “resetting” your Internet connection. Here is how:

1. Shut down your computer.
2. If you have a router, unplug it.
3. Unplug your DSL / Cable Modem.
4. Wait 30 seconds.
5. Plug your DSL / Cable Modem back in.
6. Wait 30 seconds.
7. If you have a router, plug it back in.
8. Turn on your computer.

For the most part, this will fix any connections where your Internet connection has all of a sudden gone down without you having reconfigured your environment. However, if your ISP is having issues at the time, this will not fix it (as it is up to them), but it is a good starting point for troubleshooting.

Ideas For Using Compressed Files

I thought of this tip while archiving some old files into “deep storage”. As you may know I have referred to 7-Zip many times in past tips, so once again I am going to go to the well.

Typically whenever I use compressed files, I use zip format with normal level compression, however today when truly archiving files I used 7z format with ultra level compression. Of course the higher the level of compression, the more time and system resources it uses to both compress and uncompress it. To me, this extra time is worth it because I don’t intent to use these archived files often, so the extra time is worth it to save space. On the other hand, if I were going to email a file to someone, I would use normal level zip compression as it is fast and gives a pretty good ratio.

If you want to get very detailed, you can use different compression formats for different files to maximize storage. Wikipedia has a very good breakdown of the compression ratios of formats versus files.

This is just something to consider as file compression is, basically, used all the time.

Cleaning Up Corrupted Installs

If you have ever had problems trying to uninstall a program through the Add/Remove Programs dialog, typically this is because required uninstall files have gone missing. Typically it doesn’t do any harm to have “dead” installs listed in the Add/Remove Programs list, but it can be annoying.

To remedy this problem, try using the Windows Installer CleanUp Utility. This program, among other things, removes files and registry entries which the problem program’s installer created. While it is not 100% guaranteed to work (as it depends on how “messy” the installation actually is), it is a good and easy starting point to get rid of the unwanted program.

Save $$ - Buy OEM or Upgrade Software

You might be considering upgrading your current Windows installation to Vista in the near future. If so, considering purchasing OEM or Upgrade versions of the new operating system instead of the full retail package. This can really help save you some money.

There are a few “footnotes” about this type of software in general, so in a nutshell:

• OEM can typically only be installed on one machine and the license is not transferable. You might have to purchase a small (i.e. under $5) peice of hardware from some vendors in order to purchase an OEM version.
• Upgrade versions require you to have a “qualifying” product already installed on your machine. For example, Windows XP must be on your machine to install the Vista upgrade version.

Either way, both versions are the same as their full counterparts, however the difference is in the price tag. Just something to consider…

SQL Injection Scanners

For you developers or webmasters out there, you are probably aware of vulnerabilities in some code which can lead to a SQL injection attack. While most commercial applications and major open source projects most likely have preventative measures, some dated or custom code may not.

This article from Security Hacks points you to 15 different scanners you can use to analyze your site to see if you are at risk. Considering this is the most common “hack” attempt and is very easy to do, it makes sense for you to test your code or website to make sure you are protected.

Scheduling A Power On

Rounding off the summer month tip’s followup regarding the scheduled shutdowns, today’s tip is going to discuss how you can schedule a power on of your computer so it will be ready for you in the morning.

While you can configure a task in your operating system to shut down your PC, you cannot configure a task to start it back up. This must be done through the BIOS. Virtually all modern PCs have a feature in the BIOS to turn the PC on at a scheduled time, so most likely this tip will apply to you.

1. Restart your computer.
2. Enter the BIOS screen (usually this is done by pressing either F2, F10, or Del when you first reboot your computer).
3. Navigate the BIOS menus and locate a feature along the lines of “Wake Alarm”, “Power On Schedule”, etc.
4. Set the schedule accordingly. Some BIOS functions offer advanced features such as the ability to only schedule on weekdays.
5. Save and apply your changes.
6. Reboot back to your OS.

By implementing all 3 of these tips, you have a true “set it and forget it” plan for helping save a little bit of energy and money on your electricity bills.

Scheduling A Shutdown

Reminder For The Summer Months

Now that the summer heat is starting to make itself known (of course, depending on where you live), it’s time to start cranking up the AC. Of course, during the summer you electricity bill is probably going to rise due to the AC usage which is where this tip comes in.

When your computer is on, it produces, and outputs heat into the room. It probably isn’t noticeable much if you leave doors open to the room or have it close to an AC vent, however it still produces heat nonetheless (even a “cool” CPU runs around ~85 F). This excess heat causes your AC to work harder to keep the room cool which, in turn, can lead to increased electric bills.

So during the summer months, consider turning your PC off when you are done with it for the day. Doing this prevents your computer, which sits unused the entire night, from outputting unneeded heat into your house all night. This may not sound like much but it could help save you a bit on electricity.

Easy Way to Save Images From the Web

Whether you are using IE, Firefox or Safari, I’m sure you know you can easily save images from the web by right-clicking on them and selecting “Save Image As”. Today’s tip is to show you an alternate way which makes it even easier.

Instead of right-clicking, try dragging the actual image on the browser to either your desktop or a folder where you want to save it. By doing this, the image is saved without having to invoke any dialogs where you have to specify a location. The only time this doesn’t work is if the image is a link in which case the link would be copied.

Mass Updating Text Files

Often times I do actually find myself needing to perform mass updates on a group of text files at once. For example on non-templated websites or collections of configuration files, you many need to perform replacing one value with another across an entire selection of files.

Today I just wanted to give you a quick example on how you can do this. I am utilizing the program, Editpad Lite to perform these changes:

1. Highlight / select all your files.
2. Right click on a selected file and go: Send To > EditPad.
3. All the files will open in EditPad with each file in a separate tab.
4. Select Edit > Find.
5. Type your old text into the find box and your new text into the replace box.
6. Check the box on the left side to have EditPad replace across all open documents.
7. Run the replace.
8. Select File > Save All, or click the toolbar icon and you have updated all your pages.

Whether you have 5 or 50 files open, they can all be updated in a matter of minutes.