America Online
HIDING THE E-MAIL RECIPIENT ADDRESS
Many e-mail programs let you hide the addresses of
recipients by using the BCC (Blind Carbon Copy)
feature.
To accomplish this using AOL's e-mail program, you
put the names in parentheses.
To hide a list of names, separate them with commas
and put the entire list in parentheses.
Microsoft Internet Explorer
THAT DAMN TICKING NOISE!
Here is how to fix that annoying default setting in
MS IE5 and IE6:
Go to the Sounds Control Panel, look for the 'Windows
Explorer' section, then the 'Start Navigation' sound.
Change the attached wave file from 'Start.wav' to
'(none)'.
This will rid you of the 'ticking' noise you hear
every time you click or follow a hyperlink!
EASILY SETTING THE HOME PAGE
You can instantly change the Internet Explorer home page by first surfing to the page you want to make your new default page.
Then just drag the page icon that appears in the address box and drop it on the Home icon on IE's toolbar (it looks like a little house). A box pops up asking you to confirm your choice. Click on Yes, and you have a new home page.
VERSION NUMBERS
Here's how to decode Microsoft's confusing version numbering scheme.
(Go to the Help menu, 'About Internet Explorer'):
IE 6.0 version number is 6.0.2900.2180... (Win XP w/ SP2)
IE 6.0 version number is 6.0.2600.0000 (Win XP)
IE 5.5 SP1 version number is 5.50.4522.1800
IE 5.5 version number is 5.50.4134.0600
IE 5.01 SP1 version number is 5.00.3105.0106
IE 5.01 version number is 5.0.2919.6307 (Win 98)
IE 4.01 SP2 version number is 4.72.3612.1713
HOW TO USE IE AS A FTP CLIENT
You can use IE5 (or later) as a FTP program to upload and download files.
Surf to a site where you have FTP priviledges by entering the FTP address in IE:
ftp://www.your_domain_name.com.
The first time you connect you will get a "FTP Folder Error" dialog box stating that Windows cannot access this folder. Click OK. Then go to the File menu and select the 'Login As...' option. Enter your User Name and Password and check the 'Save Password' box. Your FTP address will now look like: ftp://your_user_name@www.your_domain_name.com/.
After you connect, bookmark the site for easier return (IE will automatically use your saved user name and password).
Upload files by dragging and dropping icons from your PC to the IE browser window, or use COPY & PASTE.
Downloading files is less intuitive. Drag & drop and COPY & PASTE do not work. Select the files or folders you want in the browser window, then right-click on the item(s). Select 'Copy To Folder' from the menu that pops up. This will display a standard browsing dialog box from which you can select the target folder on your PC.
Microsoft Windows 9x
HOW TO DISABLE DLL CACHING
When a program loads a DLL into memory, the default
behaviour is for it to stay there until you reboot.
This can cause a problem if you have two different
programs using two different DLL files (or versions)
with the same name. This tip can also benefit low
memory systems or programming environments.
Run REGEDIT (backup the Registry first!) and navigate
to:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer
Create a new String Value in the right pane and name it:
"AlwaysUnloadDll" (sans quotes).
Give this new string a value of 1, close REGEDIT, and
reboot Windows. This will eliminate DLL caching -
programs won't re-launch as quickly as before, but
each will load its preferred DLL file.
USE TASK SCHEDULER TO REBOOT YOUR SYSTEM
Go Task Scheduler and select 'Add Scheduled Task'. When the Scheduled Task Wizard's program selection window appears, click on 'Browse...' and select this program:
C:\WINDOWS\rundll32.exe
Give the task a name ("Reboot Windows") and select the times to run, then continue to the Finish panel and select Advanced Properties. Paste the following line in the Run command window and then click Apply and OK:
C:\WINDOWS\rundll32.exe shell32.dll,SHExitWindowsEx 0x2
DISABLE THE SCREEN SAVER WHEN RUNNING DEFRAG
Are you tired of having to move your mouse every minute or so to prevent the screen saver from interrupting your defrag (because you forgot to temporarily disable it)?
Run REGEDIT (backup the Registry first!) and navigate to:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Applets
Create a new key:
"Defrag" (sans quotes).
Now, within this newly created key, create the key:
"Settings" (without quotes).
In the Settings key, create a string value and label it:
"DisableScreenSaver" (without quotes).
Next, edit the value "(Default)" and change it to:
"YES" (without quotes).
The next time DEFRAG is run, the screen saver will be temporarily disabled.
Microsoft Windows XP
HOW TO SWITCH TO THE WIN98 CLASSIC LOOK
The Windows XP default GUI interface can be a bit
confusing to long-time users of Windows 9x. Click the
link below to read our guideline on tweaking the
Windows XP look:
Switching Windows XP to the Classic Style
Microsoft Word
ROMAN NUMERALS MADE EASY
Open a new MS Word document, and hold down the CTRL
and ALT keys while pressing the L key.
The program will display sequential Roman Numerals
as long as you hold down the keys.
Modems
LINE SPEED TEST FOR 56K MODEMS
U.S. Robotics has a line test phone number setup in
the form of a Bulletin Board System. Simply dial
847-330-2780 from a terminal program such as HyperTerminal
included with Windows. Login using a username of line
and a password of test. A series of line diagnostics
will be performed, and then present you with the verdict
on whether you can adequately establish and maintain a
56K connection. More info at
http://www.usrobotics.com/products/line-test.asp