This is the first post in a new series of tips & tricks that I’m going to run henceforth on my blog. The series will deal with accessorising Windows XP and enjoying a Vista like experience. The series will be called XP’rience Vista.
Vista is still going to take some time before it hits the general consumer market and even after it does so, it’ll take a good while to convert the majority of users out there. Till then, why not enjoy tasty bits of Vista delivered right on to your XP desktop !!
Here’s you first XP >> Vista transformation toy - Visual Task Tips. Windows Vista has got a new function integrated into it’s shell to display a miniaturised screenshot of a running application when you hover your mouse on the application tabs in your taskbar. This comes in handy when you have multiple instances of an application open (say multiple browser windows) and want to figure out what’s running where.
Instead of sending you off on a wild goose chase, the thumbnail previews actually helps you pin-point the application you wish to switch to, thus causing a big boost in your productivity.
The software has a few known limitations though. Certain applications like MS Word, MS Visual Studio, Windows Media Player, Autodesk 3DS Max etc. render themselves in unusual ways to improve performance. The thumbnails for such software may turn up as black, incomplete or corrupted. On the same note, it’s unable to show the previews for minimised windows. However, if a previous cached copy exists that is displayed instead.
The handy piece of code comes in a surprisingly small bundle - an installer 90KB in size or a zip package which is only 69KB. My advise is the don’t use a Download Manager to grab this utility. Since it uses a PHP based redirection script for the download, you might end up downloading a file called download.php and not the software itself. Employ your browser-based download mechanism instead.
Get Visual Task Tips today…
This rocking PC Repair System was the results of a 32MB USB Drive Contest held by Daily Cup of Tech. The contestants were required to come up with ideas on the most innovative usage of a 32MB USB drive and this submission came out as one of the …
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How often have you come across a message like, “Error Deleting File or Folder” while trying to delete one? For me, it’s been a frequent occurence while trying to get rid of some spyware file that I spotted on my system and invariably on each occasion I’ve been …
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For the beginners who want to reap the benefits of the .htaccess file but are daunted by it’s cryptic syntax - here’s a cool tool for you to modify the file visually.
TLHouse Software brings you HTAccessible - a freeware with a nice and easy GUI that allows you to create custom .htaccess files based on criteria you specify using the …
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Usage of file / disk encryption has been long prevalent - but never like that of the present times. With the explosive growth of the internet and consequently ever-increasing risk of hacking, protection of one’s private / sensitive data has gained utmost importance. There are hundreds of methods of encryption which can be used for this purpose - all with …
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What is it?
NetMeter is a free, lightweight network bandwidth monitoring utility that sits in your system tray and continually keeps track of the amount of data flowing through your own system’s network connection. It’s highly customisable and shows neat graphs of your current download & upload speeds. The graph is toggled when you click on the system-tray icon.
You have the …
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Paint.NET has been in existence for quite a while and I’ve been following the development version by version since it’s inception. While at the beginning it served as an extremely good replacement for the standard MS Paint it’s evolved to be a really powerful tool that provides you with a good array of features of PhotoShop without paying a penny.
The …
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Avro Keyboard by OmicronLab is a really terrific Bengali typing software that performs on-the-fly phoenetic transliteration of typed text in English - which means that those who require to type in Bengali, but are unfamiliar / uncomfortable with the layout of the Bengali Keyboard can simply zip ahead and type the Bengali text as they’d spell it in English and …
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