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Startup Faster with Startup Delayer

Posted By: Sarah Perez | Apr 18th @ 10:03 AM

By now, most of you have heard about editing your startup options via msconfig, but that process involves checking or unchecking programs from running at startup altogether.

However, you might have quite a few programs that you do need to run, like your online backup or your anti-virus auto-updating program. Unfortunately, some of these programs can take a lot of time to start up when you first turn on your computer. This is where Startup Delayer can help.

Startup Delayer takes a different approach than msconfig. Like msconfig, you can use the program to enable and disable programs from running, but you can also use it to have programs run after startup at a designated time, by customizing the intervals at which they begin to run.

To do so, you just go into Startup Delayer's options and specify how many seconds after Windows has started up before running each program.

Startup Delayer is free and can be downloaded from here. (via Download Blog)
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Where's My "No To All?"

Posted By: Sarah Perez | Apr 18th @ 10:01 AM
Have you ever been copying a whole lot of files and gotten a prompt asking if you want to overwrite? You'll usually be presented with four options: Yes, No, Cancel, or Yes to All. But sometimes the answer is going to be "No to All," however, that option isn't available as a button. But a tip on DownloadSquad reminds us that you can answer "No to All" quite easily - just hold down "Shift" and click "No." This is one of those "how did I live without it?" kind of tips - if you already knew this, it's no big deal, but if you just found out, you're going to be thrilled, which is precisely why I had to share.
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Group Your Taskbar Windows with Reg Hack

Posted By: Sarah Perez | Apr 14th @ 10:55 AM

The Lifehacker blog offers up a great little registry hack for grouping similar items on your taskbar. You may have noticed that the taskbar only groups items when you have launched enough windows to fill the taskbar. However, if you want to group similar programs all the time, a simple registry hack does the trick. Go to:

HKEY_CURRRENT_USER \ Software \ Microsoft \ Windows \ CurrentVersion \ Explorer \ Advanced
Create a new DWORD (32-bit) value named TaskbarGroupSize at that location, setting the value to 2 or higher to set the number of programs to activate the grouping.
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Get Drop Shadows in Your Screen Capture

Posted By: Sarah Perez | Apr 9th @ 11:40 AM

The Digital Inspiration blog posts a great tip on how to capture Vista's Aero Glass drop shadow when you're doing a screen capture without having to buy any expensive software.

The trick is to put the window you want a screenshot of in front of notepad. Then do a print screen or Vista's Snipping Tool to take the picture and save the file. Next, open the file in any editing program like Windows Photo Gallery and crop out the parts you don't need.

Quick, painless, and best all of free! Nice tip!
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Passwordbird Helps You Make Passwords

Posted By: Sarah Perez | Apr 9th @ 11:35 AM
A new site called Passwordbird helps you come up with a password that's easy for you to remember, but hard for others to guess. To use the site, you first enter in a name that's special to you, then a special word, and then a special date, and the result is an automatically-generated password based on those entries. If you don't like the password, you only need to click once and the site will generate a new one for you. You can keeping clicking to cycle through several different choices until you find a password that suits you.
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Getting a List of Filenames in Vista is Easy!

Posted By: Sarah Perez | Mar 28th @ 9:30 AM
Remember what a challenge it was to generate a list of filenames of all the files in a folder on your PC? In XP, you had to go to the command prompt and type in something like DIR /B /ON *.* > filelist.txt. (That command sorts them in order). In Vista, it's so much easier. Now, all you have to do is select the files, right-click, and choose "Copy as Path." Paste the list anywhere. Of course, this does copy the entire path to the file, but Find-and-Replace can quickly take care of that. It's the little things like this that really make my day. (Thanks to AppScout for reminding me of this!)
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Top 5 things you didn't know you could do with your Vista Media Center PC

Posted By: Steven Kerr Lindsay | Mar 14th @ 11:27 AM

Here I present my top 5 things you can do using your Vista Media Center PC.

Enjoy! I hope you like this one guys!, Let me know what you think on the forums. Take it easy!


And if you like my video, make sure you rate me and digg it :)
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How To Search Your PSTs with Vista's Built-In Search

Posted By: Sarah Perez | Mar 8th @ 10:32 AM

Do you archive your email to PST files (maybe due to a corporate policy limiting your mailbox size)? If so, you know that even though it's archived, you will still need to access those old emails from time to time. If you don't want to keep all your archives open in your Outlook, there is another way...if you use Windows Vista. With Vista's built-in search option, you can specify that you want PSTs to be indexed (this is not turned on by default). It's pretty easy to set this up, just follow these steps:

  1. Go to the Control Panel
  2. Choose "Indexing Options"
  3. Click on the "Advanced" button
  4. Click on the "File Types" tab
  5. Check the checkbox next to "PST" to include it in the search
  6. Select the bullet next to the option "Index Properties and File Contents"
  7. Click OK and OK again on the message that appears.

You're done! Now you can use Vista's built-in search to find that email you need!

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Live Search työkalu tarjoaa nopean tavan omiin eri palveluiden hakuihin.

Posted By: Jukka Wallasvaara | Jan 3rd @ 7:39 AM

imageLive Search työkalupalkki tarjoaa näppärän tavan lisätä omia hakukohteita helposti käytettäväksi.

Olemassa olevia hakupalvelun tarjoajia voidaan helposti lisätä hakupalkkiin valitsemalla haluttu palvelun tarjoaja listasta. Lisäksi erittäin näppärä ominaisuus on luoda omia hakupalvelu, jolloin voidaan lisätä mikä tahansa url parametrejä tukeva hakupalvelu pikahaun piiriin.

Hakupalveluiden lisääminen on todella näppärää, kuten alla on kuvattu.

 

 

 

 

Live Search Tool

imageTyökalun alasvetovalikosta valitaan lisättävien tarjoajien haku(Find More Providers...),

josta saa helposti lisättyä valmiita palvelun tarjoajia hakupalkin hakukohteisiin.

Näppärää, eikö vain?

 

 

 

 

 

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Mielenkiintoisena ominaisuutena on kustomoitujen hakupalveluiden lisäys mahdollisuus, jossa voidaan parametrien avulla ottaa käyttöön mieleisen palvelun hakuominaisuudet - suoraan työkalusta käytettäviksi.

Jos esimerkiksi halutaan käyttää webistä löytyvää ilmaista sanakirjapalvelua, voidaan sen hakutoiminnallisuudet tuoda yhden painalluksen taakse.

Uuden palvelun lisäyksessä tulee syöttää sivuston haku url siten, että hakukentän arvoksi laitetaan TEST -teksti, jolloin tässä esimerkissä URL tekstiksi tulee: http://www.ilmainensanakirja.fi/trans?Q=TEST&Q2=&P=12

Lisäksi hakupalvelulle annetaan tietysti nimi.

Tämä url vastaa sanakirjasivuston osoitetta, joka tuottaa parametrinä annetun sanan käännöksen englannista suomeen.

Kun tiedot on syötetty, hyväksytään lisäys.

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image

 

 

Haettaessa valitaan vain haluttu palvelu, jota halutaan haussa käyttää ja se on siinä.

Palveluja voipi sitten olla niin työpaikat, keskusteluryhmät, autot, yms, mitä sitten tuleekin tarpeeseen.
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Photojojo - A Site for Photo Enthusiasts

Posted By: Sarah Perez | Nov 29th, 2007 @ 12:16 PM
OK, I'm not a huge fan of the goofy name, but this website/newsletter has a lot of cool stuff that makes it worth checking it. Photojojo is primarily a newsletter (and they house their newsletter archives on their website) where you can find tutorials, do-it-yourself projects, camera/camera accessory reviews, contests, and much more. Some recent posts on Photojojo include a customizable version of the Monopoly board game, where you can add your own photos; a how-to post on making a doggie cam; tips on de-pixelizing your photos using VectorMagic; and a handy how-to on removing extra people from your photos. Whether you're just getting into photography or already an enthusiast, you can learn a lot the Photojob site. There's even a store where they have cool photo-related tools and gifts and a forum where you can chat with other shutterbugs like yourself.
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How I Use Outlook - 7 Tips

Posted By: Sarah Perez | Nov 20th, 2007 @ 2:02 PM
There are so many things you can do with Outlook, but I have to admit, I've never fully explorered all its features. However, the more I "live" in my Outlook at work, the more I've become obsessed with finding new and useful ways to get things done as efficiently and quickly as I can. On that note, here are a few Outlook tips I've discovered that have been making my work life easier.

1. The ClearContext add-in - every since someone told me about this add-in, I've been using the heck out of it. Although I can only afford the free version, I've found it unbelievably useful for categorizing my mail. Since I had been using a folders system prior to the Outlook 2007 upgrade, I didn't feel much like redoing this system just to use Outlook 2007's color-coded categories. Instead, I use a mashup of ClearContext labels and Outlook cateogries. ClearContext lets me label my mail and these labels are linked to an Outlook category list. As I visually scan my email, Outlook's color-coded categories help me find what I'm looking for fast. When it's time to move an email from the Inbox to its category folder, I just hit the "File Msg" button on the ClearContext toolbar and the message archives itself to the appropriate folder. (Another option for filing is SpeedFiler, which I hear is good, too).

2. Natural Language - I've been using Outlook 2007 for many months now, but I just discovered this feature thanks to a tip I read online. The new version of Outlook lets you enter appointments on your calendar using natural language. Instead of using the drop-down box to pick a date, you can type in real expressions like "day after tomorrow," "one week from today," "two months from today," "three days from now," and much more. You can also use expressions like "today + 3 days" and Outlook will figure that out, too. Finally, you can type in the names of holidays and use them in expressions like "the day before Christmas."

3. Outlook Calendar on the desktop - this software lets you pin the Outlook calendar to your desktop. The calendar stays there all the time so you can always see what's upcoming. It's not just a view of your calendar either, it's the real Microsoft Outlook calendar, so you get all its functionality, like direct editing, drag and drop of files, etc. Awesome.

4. Search Folders & Favorites - how did I live before Search Folders? Search Folders let you create virtual folders based on certain criteria. For example, you could make a folder of email from your boss you categorized as "Important" or a folder of your emails that have attachments. Even better, add these Search Folders to your Favorite Folders list and hide your Mail Folders list so that all you see is your Favorites. You'll be surprised how rarely you'll need to view your "real" folders.

5. Fast Email Searches - If you use Outlook 2007 on Vista, you have Vista's killer search built into Outlook. However, at work, we're still on XP. No worries though...you can download Windows Desktop Search for Windows XP like I did and experience the glory of fast searches. With either Vista or Desktop Search, results are displayed as soon as you start typing in text. 

6. Form Emails - Using templates, you can save standardized emails so you don't have to type the same thing over and over again. I use forms for things like emailing a new user's login information to their supervisor or emailing someone a note letting them know their issue was input as a helpdesk ticket. Creating your own form is easy - just write the email, then go to File --> Save As, and choose "Outlook Template (*.oft)" from the drop-down box. The email is saved as a template. Next time you want to use that form, open it by going to Tool --> Forms --> Choose a Form. Change the drop-down box to "User Templates in File System" and then pick the template you created.

7. Minimize to Tray - I'm surprised how many people don't know how to minimize Outlook to run in the System Tray. This is an absolute necessity (it should be the default!). Right-click on the Outlook icon in the Notification Area (next to the clock). In the menu that displays, select "Hide When Minimized."
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Dual-Monitor Wallpaper

Posted By: Sarah Perez | Nov 6th, 2007 @ 5:09 AM
If you have dual monitors, or perhaps a notebook with an extra monitor attached, you may have noticed that you can't set the wallpaper on a per-screen basis. If your monitors are different sizes, this leaves you with one monitor where you wallpaper won't completely fill the screen. By using a dual monitor utility like DisplayFusion, you can set different wallpaper images for each desktop or you can stretch an image across your desktops. If you're going to be stretching images, some of the best photos you can use are panoramic photos (like those you made with Windows Live Photo Gallery beta - check out this how-to screencast.) You can also snag some dual screen wallpapers from this gallery. DisplayFusion is a free download. For more features, like the ability to extend the taskbar across multiple monitors, hotkeys, keyboard shortcuts, and unified screensavers, you may want to shell out the $40 for UltraMon instead. (via LifeHacker)
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Outlook 2007 Tip: Preview PDFs Automatically

Posted By: Sarah Perez | Jul 27th, 2007 @ 2:48 PM
Did you know that Outlook 2007 can be configured to allow you to preview PDF attachments automatically? With this handy tip from the Living-With-Outlook blog, you can easily set up your Outlook to allow PDF previewing right in the Outlook's Preview Pane. To get started, you first need to download the latest version of Adobe's Acrobat Reader (currently version 8.1). After it's installed, restart Outlook, and locate an email that has a PDF attached. You should now be able to preview the file just like you would any other previewable file - just click the PDF icon in the Reading Pane and your PDF will display to the right of your message list. Longer PDFs will be scrollable using the scroll bar or arrow keys. When you're finished previewing the attachment, one more click will easily return you to the email message.
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Natural language search in Vista

Posted By: JD Lewin | Jan 23rd, 2007 @ 1:09 PM
One of the most time-honored traditions for geeks is the setup process of a new machine, and with Vista only days away millions of people are readying themselves for this ceremony. Mike Torres has found one to add to our lists: the Natural Language Search option in Windows Vista.

This brilliant little option gives Vista the ability to understand more human search queries like, "Pictures of Sampy," or "email about nerf weapons from last week." For some reason this little gem is turned off by default, so be sure to get into your control panels and enable it.
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Viva Pinata Help/Cheats/Info Wiki

Posted By: Erik | Dec 1st, 2006 @ 2:50 PM
I don't know how many of you have played Viva Pinata yet, but my wife and I absolutely love it.  It may be kid oriented, but this kid hasn't played anything so entertaining since the first Halo game came out.  Gears of War is a great game, but even it can't keep me away from playing Viva Pinata!  It plays into my lack of self control so well.  Just one more thing I need to do and then I'm done.  Oh wait, a new Pinata is visiting.  What do I need to do to get it?  Oh, that's easy, let me do that quick.  On and on...hour after hour of building my garden!

To the point of this post.  If you ever get stuck or want to learn more about all the other cool stuff you can do with your plants, pinatas, workers, etc, check out the Pinata Island Wiki.  It has so much info.  It's a wiki, so you can of course add stuff that you find that isn't posted yet.
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