Windows XP

Stop users from running specific applications in Windows

January 20, 2010 18:52 pm by Jal

As a security measure, there are times when you need to stop access to certain programs to other users. In Windows, using the Local Group Policy Editor, you can specify which all programs you want to prevent from running. This is very useful if you are administering an Internet lab in school and colleges or running an Internet café. Here’s the work around:

1) Press + R to open the ‘Run’ dialog box. Type ‘gpedit.msc’ and click ‘OK’.

2) The Local Group Policy Editor window will open. In the left pane, navigate to ‘User Configuration’ > ‘Administrative Templates’ > ‘System’. Now in the right pane, double-click ‘Don’t run specified Windows applications’.

Local Group Policy Editor

3) In the window that appears, click the ‘Enabled’ radio-button and then click ‘Show…’ button under ‘Options’.

Don't run specified Windows applications window

4) In the ‘Show contents’ window, specify the executable file (.exe) of the programs you wish to prevent from being executed. Finally, click ‘OK’.

Show Contents window

You’re done! The programs specified here won’t run until you ‘Disable’ the setting in step 3) or you remove the program’s .exe from the ‘Show Contents’ window.

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Animated Startmenu for Windows

January 8, 2010 20:37 pm by Jal

deviantART is full of crazy people doing all the awesomeness don’t know since when. One such deviantART user, oO-MrHigh-Oo made a small utility called ‘Startmenu Animation’ that gives a nice 3D animation to the Startmenu in Windows XP, Vista and 7. Basically that’s all it does. But it deserves a post because the way it seamlessly integrates with the system without hogging much resources is what appealed to me. Here’s what the startmenu looks like after running ‘Startmenu Animation’.

Startmenu Animation runs on Windows XP, Vista and 7 so try it out now.

Download Startmenu Animation / 1.3 MB

Digg it or Tweet it to let your followers know about this utility.

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Fishbowl brings Facebook on your desktop

November 20, 2009 13:24 pm by Jal

Today’s technological scenario is all about integration and making every task simpler and every information easily accessible. Well, similar are the thoughts of UXLabs at Microsoft. They have created a very sleek Facebook client application that brings the complete Facebook experience right on your Windows desktop – Fishbowl.

Although in a ‘trial’ (beta) stage, Fishbowl offers some features that surely will excite Facebook power users. Apart from the seamless integration with Facebook, here are some of the plus points of Fishbowl:

» Fishbowl offers mini-mode which is more fun and less obtrusive.

» Smooth user interface and sleek navigation. It supports drag n’ drop pictures to publish them on Facebook. Furthermore, it can go full screen and play a slideshow of your albums.

Fishbowl - Photos

» You can update your status, view your friends’ albums, their updates, news-feeds and other notifications.

Fishbowl - status update

Fishbowl - navigation and notifications

» “Interest Level”, my favorite feature, helps you filter your stream anonymously in order to avoid boring updates from friends.

Fishbowl - interest level

» If you are a Windows 7 user, you can monitor your Facebook stream right from your taskbar using jumplists.

Fishbowl - Jumplists

If you want to give it a try then click the link below.

Download Fishbowl / 6.6mb

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100+ free games from Microsoft

November 13, 2009 5:28 am by Jal

Instead of exploring new things all the time, sometimes I dig into what I have already got and I always come up with something new. Very few of us might know that Microsoft also offers lots of free games to its users. ‘The Games’ section in Windows Vista and Windows 7 is often listed in the feature lists but rarely anyone plays the games offered. And if you have checked the link in the ‘Game providers’ subsection lately, then you will find that Microsoft now offers 100+ free games to its users. So if you think you’ve had enough of solitaire and minesweeper, I’d say you do the following:

Click Start > Games. In the ‘Game Providers’ subsection, click ‘More Games from Microsoft’.

Games by Microsoft

Alternatively, you can click here: Microsoft "Play Your Game"

And guess what, that’s it. Just click “Play Now” button to play your favorite games. You can also download trial versions of these games. Enjoy!

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Play Windows XP Solitaire in Windows 7

October 25, 2009 4:37 am by Jal

It’s October 2009 and Microsoft has already released Windows 7 a few days ago. People all over the world has embraced the new operating system but there are some who are still nostalgic about the operating system that ruled the world for 7+ years – Windows XP. Apart from all the good things that Windows XP had, it had those really beautiful games which you grew up playing them. Now we are on a highly advanced OS called Windows 7 which has the super stylized version of games that featured on Windows XP. But here is your chance to play the same old versions of Windows XP games on Windows 7 without much hassles.

The thing that makes this task easy is the simplicity with which these small applications (like games) were incorporated into Windows XP. In Windows XP, such applications need just an executable file and a dll file to run. Here I am going to show you how you can play the Windows XP version of Solitaire in Windows 7. You can use this method to play other Windows XP games.

Windows XP Solitaire in Windows 7:

You’ll need: Two PCs, one running Windows XP and other, Windows 7 and a USB flash drive.

Windows XP Solitaire in Windows 7

1) Plug in the USB flash drive in Windows XP machine and navigate to this folder:

C:\Windows\System32

2) Copy and paste the files ‘sol.exe’ and ‘cards.dll’ from the System32 folder to the USB flash drive and safely remove the flash drive.

3) Insert the flash drive in the Windows 7 machine and store both the files in a folder on the local hard disk.

4) Run ‘sol.exe’ and there you are! Enjoy the Windows XP version of Solitaire in Windows 7.

As I mentioned earlier, you can follow this method to play other Windows XP games but I leave that upon you. Enjoy!

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Copy multiple entries to clipboard using clipboard managers

September 29, 2009 15:15 pm by Jal

Last night I was working with my brother on his project and there was a lot of material needed to be copied from websites to Word. It was a tiresome process to copy and paste the required material, neglecting few lines in between, again copying and pasting few lines and so on. It was then that I tried to search for something that can ease this everyday process of copy-pasting. I found the clipboard managers. A lot of good ones.

A clipboard managers does the basic task of storing the information for the temporary period of time during the time you copy the content and paste it somewhere. Now the built in clipboard of Windows stores one entry at a time. This is where clipboard managers come in. They let you temporarily store multiple bytes of information, maintains a history, and lets you paste that content one by one. I used some of these clipboard managers but I’d favor ‘Ditto’ clipboard manager.

‘Ditto’ lets you save multiple items in the clipboard and lets you retrieve them one by one at a later time. Unlimited amounts of data can be stored in clipboard using ‘Ditto’. The most advanced feature of ‘Ditto’ is that, it lets you copy information from one computer and paste it to another.

‘Ditto’ offers lot more features like:

1) Keeping synchronization of clipboard data within multiple computers.

2) Ability to encrypt data when transmitted over the network

3) Foreign character support

and many more…

It may seem like a not so useful utility but let me tell you, you will realize its importance when you’ll truly need it. It is definitely a time saver.

Some other clipboard managers that I came across: Clipmagic (8/10), Clipboard Recorder (8/10), Sanvient (6/10) and ClipTorrent (6/10). Use them and make copy-pasting a breeze!

Don’t miss these awesome tips/tricks:

Draw a picture in Wordpad

Password protect your files using WinRAR

Google Image Search made easy

More…

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How to password protect your files using WinRAR

August 14, 2009 9:41 am by Jal

Compression of files using utilities like WinZip and WinRAR is very common technique and has been in use since long. But very few know that you can also password protect your important files using WinRAR to keep them from prying eyes. Here’s how you do it.

1) Open WinRAR and browse to the folder where your important files are located using the drop-down navigation method shown below and click ‘Add’ button on top. Alternatively, if you have integrated WinRAR in your context menu, you just need to select your files in Windows Explorer, right-click and select ‘Add to archive…’

2) A new window will appear. Click on the ‘Advanced’ tab and then click on ‘Set Password’ button. Enter desired password and for better security, check ‘Encrypt file names’ and click OK. Click OK again.

A new password protected and compressed file will be generated. When you try to open it, it will ask for the password. You can use this quick method for transferring sensitive files over the internet too.