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Save Passwords If you're tired of remembering and typing in passwords for various Web sites, you can let IE save your passwords automatically (without the annoying pop-up that asks whether you want to save each password). In IE 5 and IE 6, select Tools | Internet Options and go to the Content tab. Then click AutoComplete and uncheck Prompt me to save passwords. |
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Save search queries on your desktop
When you need to perform the search again, you can simply double-click the shortcut and--with no
additional criteria configuration--quickly launch the search operation by clicking the Search Now button. Follow these steps:
1. Go to Start | Search, configure your search criteria, and click the Search Now button. 2. Once the Search utility successfully completes the operation, go to File | Save Search. 3. By default, the Save Search dialog box opens to the My Documents folder, but you can easily navigate to the desktop. 4. Specify a name, and click Save.
The next time you want to perform this particular search operation, just double-click the Search shortcut on your desktop, and click the Search Now button. |
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Save the baseline system configuration When you want to learn more about a specific system, you can launch the System Information utility and find an abundance of configuration details. This information is helpful in
many situations, such as troubleshooting problems. However, if the source of the problem is a configuration error, you won't easily track down the problem in System Information unless you know specifically
what you're looking for. The chances of tracking down the problem increase when you have information to compare to the current System Information view. As such, it's a good idea to save a copy of the
system configuration information when the computer is working properly. This will serve as a good baseline configuration. You can then open multiple instances of System Information--with the current configuration
displayed in one window and the baseline configuration in another--to compare and locate the configuration problem. To save the baseline system configuration information from the System Information
utility, click File | Save. In the Save As dialog box, type an appropriate name in the File Name text box and leave the file type set to the standard System Information File format .nfo. You can view this file at any
time by going to File | Open and locating the desired .nfo file. |
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Save time with Doskey macros
Windows XP's command-line utilities are useful in many situations. However, the biggest drawback to using the command line is typing commands with long parameter lists. For example, suppose you're using
the Driverquery command to display a list of all the installed drivers on a remote system. Here's how your command line may look: Driverquery /s server1 /u maindom\hirpln /p p@ssw3d /fo list
If you make one little typo, you'll have to start all over. The next time you find yourself working from a command prompt, and you know that you'll be repeatedly issuing the same command, save time by
creating a Doskey macro using this syntax: Doskey shortcut=command string To shorten the command line given above, type the following:
Doskey DQ=Driverquery /s server1 /u maindom\hirpln /p p@ssw3d /fo list Now you can quickly and easily issue the entire command string by typing DQ. Simply overwrite the computer name, username, and
password for different systems. |
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Save time with keyboard shortcuts Windows XP is simple to use, but some tasks require several clicks of the mouse. Fortunately, there are several keyboard shortcuts that decrease the amount of time it takes to
complete certain tasks. These include:
Note: [WIN] is the Windows logo key. To view additional keyboard shortcuts, search Help And Support under the Start menu. There are even more shortcuts you can take. For
instance, you can run built-in utilities much faster through the Run dialog box than by clicking them. Simply type the following commands in the Run prompt:
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Schedule a system shutdown operation Windows XP allows you to automate the shutdown of your system. This is especially handy if you want to schedule your system to shut down after it backs up files from a personal
folder to a shared server folder after hours. To help you with this type of operation, XP comes with a command-line utility called Shutdown.exe, which you can configure to run at a specified time within the Scheduled
Tasks tool. Here's how:
1. Open Control Panel and double-click Scheduled Tasks. 2. Select Add Scheduled Task to launch the Scheduled Task Wizard. 3. Click Next.
4. Click the Browse button to access the Windows\System32 folder. 5. Select Shutdown.exe and click Open. 6. Follow the wizard through the next two screens to give the task a name and
choose a schedule. 7. Enter the name and password of your user account and click Next. 8. Select the Open Advanced Properties For This Task When I Click Finish check box, and then click
Finish. 9. In the Task tab of Advanced Properties, add the following parameters to the end of the command line in the Run text box: 10. Click OK.
11. Enter the name and password of your user account and click OK.
When the Shutdown utility runs, a small dialog box will display on the screen before the system powers down. Note:
On some older systems, the Shutdown.exe command shuts down Windows but doesn't power down the computer. Instead, it displays the message "It is now safe to turn off your computer." |
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Schedule Chkdsk for bootup with Chkntfs This allows you to obtain a more accurate reading on the condition of the disk without the extra
overhead of the running operating system. You can do this using the Chkntfs utility. Follow these steps:
1. Go to Start | Run. 2. To restore all Chkntfs default settings, enter Chkntfs /d. 3. If there are multiple hard drives in the system, enter Chkntfs /x <drive
letter>:. This excludes the drives you don't want to check. Make <drive letter> the letter(s) of the drive(s) you want to exclude. 4. Enter Chkntfs /t:0
to set the countdown to zero. 5. Type Chkntfs /c <drive letter>:, where <drive letter> is the letter of the drive you want to check. |
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Search Better and Faster with Indexing Windows XP can index your files when your computer is idle, enabling the search process to work more quickly and flexibly. In addition to the text in files, the index also
includes file properties, which means that you can search for things like author names or titles. If you don't use the search feature very often, you might want to turn the Indexing Service off, because the indexed
files take up space on your hard drive. But the more you depend on the search feature, the better off you'll be with the Indexing Service active. To check the current settings in Windows XP, choose Start | Search, and
then select Change preferences from the choices on the left. Look for the option With Indexing Service, which means the feature is currently off, or Without Indexing Service, which means the feature is currently on. (We
realize it sounds backwards.) To change the current setting, choose the option and click on Yes. You can access this dialog in Windows 2000 by Start | Search | Files/Folders | Search Options | Indexing Service. |
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Secure unattended workstations with the Windows Exit Screen Saver However, Microsoft offers a great solution to this potential problem with the Windows Exit Screen Saver
(Winexit.scr), which comes with both the Windows 2000 Server Resource Kit and the Windows Server 2003 Resource Kit. And it works with Windows XP. The Windows Exit Screen Saver automatically quits any
currently running programs and logs off the user of a workstation after a specified time period. You can find this tool on the resource kit CDs, or you can download the Windows Exit Screen Saver from Microsoft's Web
site, as part of the Installing and configuring this tool is easy. Follow these steps:
1. Right-click Winexit.scr, and select Install. 2. On the Screen Saver tab of the Display Properties dialog box, select Logoff Screen Saver, and click the Settings button.
3. Select the Force Application Termination check box to configure the tool to close all running programs. 4. In the Countdown For n Seconds text box, enter the number of seconds that you want the tool
to display the logoff warning message box before logging off the user. 5. In the Logoff Message text box, enter the message that you want to appear in the logoff warning message box.
6. Click OK.
After the specified period of inactivity, the Windows Exit Screen Saver will beep and display the logoff warning message. If the user takes no action before the countdown timer reaches zero, the system
will initiate the logoff procedure. You can stop the process before the countdown timer reaches zero by either moving the mouse or pressing any key on the keyboard. |
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Send broadcast messages the easy way
But hidden deep within the Windows XP operating system is the Send Console Message tool, which works just like the old WinPopup utility
in Windows 9x. Unfortunately, Microsoft hid it so well that most IT professionals don't know it exists. Here's how to uncover and use the Send Console Message tool. Follow these steps:
1. Go to Start | Control Panel, and double-click Administrative Tools. 2. Double-click Computer Management. 3. Go to Action | All Tasks | Send Console Message.
Windows will open the Send Console Message tool, but you need to add computer names to the Recipients list. Follow these steps:
1. Click the Add button. 2. In the Select Computer dialog box, click Advanced. 3. Click Find Now.
4. Select the computers, and click OK to exit both dialog boxes.
You can now type messages in the Message text box and click the Send button to broadcast messages to the users on your network. |
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Set Multimedia Folders to Display Useful Information Windows XP lets you set up folders that contain media files so that relevant details about the files within are shown. By default, when files are copied into a newly created
folder, Windows tries to guess what kind of files are in the folder—video, audio, data, or whatever—but if the folder isn't configured correctly, you can modify it. Open the folder in question and select View |
Customize This Folder from the folder's menu. From there you can choose a template to apply to the folder. If you want to choose details individually, such as track length, file size, or bit rate, select View | Choose
Details, and check all the columns you want to show. |
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Set Up Ownership on Hard Drives
If you use NTFS, you can designate who owns a hard drive. This is useful on systems that have multiple user accounts set up. You must be in the Administrators group to perform this task. Click Start, then go to the
Control Panel. Double-click Administrative Tools and then Computer Management. In the console tree, click Disk Management. Right-click on the drive for which you want to set up ownership, click Properties, then choose
the Security tab. Click Advanced, and then click on the Owner tab. Click on the new owner, then click OK. |
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Set your TCP/IP laptop settings
If you have a laptop that you use to connect to both home and office networks, you should investigate Windows XP's TCP/IP alternate configuration. This feature allows you to use your laptop on both networks without
having to manually reconfigure your TCP/IP settings. To use TCP/IP alternate configuration, one of the networks--most commonly the office network--must use DHCP-allocated TCP/IP addresses. The other network--most
commonly your home network--must use a static TCP/IP addressing scheme. Here's how to configure your laptop to use the alternate configuration feature:
1. Open Control Panel. 2. If you're using Category View, select Network And Internet Connections and double-click Network Connections. If you're using Classic View, simply double-click
Network Connections. 3. Right-click the Local Area Connection icon and select Properties. 4. Double-click Internet Protocol (TCP/IP). 5. On the General tab of the Internet
Protocol (TCP/IP) Properties dialog box, select both the Obtain An IP Address Automatically and the Obtain DNS Server Address Automatically radio buttons. These settings will allow your laptop to dynamically obtain
a TCP/IP address from the DHCP server on the office network. 6. Select the Alternate Configuration tab of the Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) Properties dialog box and click the User Configured radio
button. 7. Enter the static IP numbers that you use on your home network to connect to the Internet. 8. Click OK twice and close the Network Connections window.
You can now effortlessly move your laptop between both your office and home networks. |
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Shorten the Start Menu Delay If you have ever been annoyed by the built-in delay before a menu displays in Windows, you can eliminate it. To do this, open Regedit and navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\ControlPanel \Desktop\MenuShowDelay. The default value is 400 (milliseconds); lowering the value will speed up how quickly menus display. This change will take effect after you reboot. |
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Shut down your system with Tsshutdn.exe In a previous tip, we said the Shutdown.exe command shuts down Windows but doesn't power down the system on some older computers. Instead, it displays the message, "It is
now safe to turn off your computer." If this happens to you, use the command-line utility Tsshutdn.exe, which was originally designed for shutting down Windows 2000 systems running Terminal Server. Tsshutdn.exe
is included in Windows XP and can be run via the Scheduled Tasks tool to configure your system to shut itself down at a specified time. Here's how:
1. Open Control Panel and double-click Scheduled Tasks. 2. Select Add Scheduled Task to launch the Scheduled Task Wizard. 3. Click Next.
4. Choose the Browse button to access the Windows\System32 folder. 5. Select Tsshutdn.exe and click Open. 6. Follow the wizard through the next two screens to give the task a name and
choose a schedule. 7. Enter the name and password of your user account and click Next. 8. Select the Open Advanced Properties For This Task When I Click Finish check box, and then click
Finish. 9. In the Task tab of Advanced Properties, add the following parameters to the end of the command line in the Run text box: 10. Click OK. 11. Enter the name and password of your user account and click OK.
When the Tsshutdn utility runs, the command prompt window appears on the screen for a few seconds before the system powers down. |
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Simple XP File Sharing If you're
familiar with network file sharing, you may get a shock when you upgrade to Windows XP. The sharing dialog is completely different and doesn't allow nearly as much control. For example, it won't let you set up a folder
so that only you can access it remotely. You can't password-protect folders the way you can in Windows 9x versions, and you can't set networkwide, per-user permissions as you can in Win 2000. Microsoft calls this
feature simple file sharing, and Windows XP Home users are stuck with it. In Windows XP Professional, however, you can turn off the feature. To do this, choose Folder Options from the Tools menu in Windows Explorer.
Click the View tab. Scroll down to the box titled Use simple file sharing (Recommended) and uncheck it. Click OK. Now when you right-click a folder and choose Sharing and Security, the Sharing tab will be just like the
one in Windows 2000. |
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Simultaneously close all open windows Have you ever been on a troubleshooting expedition and needed to shut down all the running applications on a system before you could proceed? More than likely, you probably
accessed each window and manually shut down the application. If you've ever had to do this on a system that had multiple windows open at the same time, you know how time-consuming it is to manually shut down each
application's window. Wouldn't it be great if you could quickly shut down all running applications at the same time? Here's how to implement this trick:
1. While pressing the [Ctrl] key, successively click each of the task icons on the taskbar. 2. Right-click the last task icon, and choose Close Group.
When you select the Close Group command, Windows XP initiates a standard exit procedure for each open application. If any application has unsaved information in an open document, the application will
prompt you to save the document before it closes. |
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Snoop on snoopers Turnabout is
fair play. The built-in networking features in Windows XP make it easy for other users to connect to your PC to use shared files and printers. Unfortunately, those features also make it easy for snoopers, hackers, and
backdoor programs to compromise your system's security. Your first line of defense should be a combination of a secure firewall and a good antivirus program. But even with these security measures in place, Trojan
horse programs, e-mail viruses, and other nasty code can still get past your defenses. If you suspect that someone (or something) is accessing your PC over a network or the Internet, there's an easy way to tell. The
command line utility Netstat shows the status and address of every connection to your PC. Open a command line window and type Netstat –a to see a complete list of all the open connections to and from your PC. Don't
panic if you see lots of connections; most of them are supposed to be there. If you see a suspect item in the connections list, you can type Netstat -o to get the Windows process ID number for each connection. You can
then match up the process ID number with the list of running tasks from Task Manager to see which programs are using which connection. |
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Speed up My Network Places However, you can
override this configuration with a simple registry edit. Follow these steps:
1. Open the Registry Editor (Regedit.exe). 2. Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE/Software/Microsoft/Windows/ Current Version/Explorer/RemoteComputer/NameSpace. 3. Under the
NameSpace branch, locate the subkey named {D6277990-4C6A-11CF-8D87-00AA0060F5BF}. 4. To make a backup copy of this key, right-click the key, and select Export. 5. In the Export Registry
File dialog box, select a folder, and give the file a descriptive name. 6. Right-click the key, and select Delete. 7. Close the Registry Editor, and restart Windows XP for the change to
take effect.
Note: Editing the registry is risky, so be sure you have a verified backup before making any changes. |
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StickyKeys The Windows
StickyKeys feature lets you type Shift, Ctrl, Alt, and Windows keys as individual keystrokes. You can, for example, press Ctrl and then another key consecutively, rather than having to hold the Ctrl key down while
typing the other key. To make this feature available, go to the Control Panel and choose Accessibility Options, then the Keyboard tab, and add a check to the Use StickyKeys check box. You'll also want to explore the
available settings. In particular, note that by default, the feature turns off if you press two keys at once. You may want to check the Use Shortcut option, which lets you turn the feature back on by pressing Shift five
times. |
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Stop Blocking Attachments
Outlook Express 6 can be configured to block any attachments whose extensions are in Internet Explorer 6's list of unsafe file types. (We've even seen new systems that had attachments blocked by default.) If such an
attachment arrives, you'll get a message like "Outlook Express removed access to the following unsafe attachments in your mail:". Specifically, OE 6 blocks attachments having any of these extensions: .asp,
.bas, .bat, .chm, .cmd, .com, .exe, .hlp, .hta, .inf, .isp, .js, .jse, .lnk, .msi, .mst, .pcd, .pif, .reg, .scr, .url, .vbe, .vbs, .ws, and .wsh. You can't remove items from this list, as it's hard-coded in the file
Shdocvw.dll. Other file types that have the box Confirm open after download checked in Windows Explorer's Edit File Type dialog may also be blocked. To turn off this feature in Outlook Express, select Options from the
Tools menu, click on the Security tab, and uncheck the box that says Do not allow attachments to be saved or opened that could potentially be a virus. Once you click on OK, you should also be able to open attachments
that arrived while this feature was on. |
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System Restore from Command Prompt Here's another trick you can use to start system restore in XP. 1. boot to the XP Boot menu by tapping F8 when starting computer 2. select safemode - command prompt only
3. from the command prompt: cd \windows\system32\restore rstrui This will manually start the system restore feature, if it hasn't been corrupted/broken by other means (i.e. virus etc.) |
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