insight ■

■ tips and tricks

Power
Windows
Secrets to attaining peace of mind when
working with Windows—here’s everything you
need to know to run a lean, mean, killer
1
machine

contents
1 Windows 98
5 Windows 2000 Professional
7 Windows XP Professional

Tweak UI for Windows 98 and 2000,

Tweak UI for XP
Tips on becoming a Photoshop Guru
Find it on the Mindware CD

97 JANUARY 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
WINDOWS 98
This most widely used OS is more tolerant
than later versions and allows many power
Turn off Task Scheduler
First of all, turn off the Task
Scheduler, unless it really
is scheduling something
important. Most users have
no critical programs sched-
uled, especially after freshly
installing Windows. The
scheduling utility keeps run-
ning in the background,
unnecessarily hogging mem-
ory. To disable it, double-
click the Task Scheduler icon
in the system tray and click
Advanced > Stop Using Task
Scheduler. When you create a
scheduled task, the feature
will be enabled.
Nix the Active Desktop
For a healthy Windows, you
have to get rid of the Active
Desktop. Microsoft had
2 added this feature with
Internet Explorer 4 and later
into Windows when it
integrated the browser and
the operating system. It
allows you to display Web
content on the desktop
itself. The Active Desktop
hogs a ridiculous amount
of memory and often causes
the system to be unstable.
Simply right-click on an
empty area of the desktop
and disable View as Web
Page to turn this off. If
you set JPEG or GIF files
as your wallpaper, this
feature needs to be turned
on. It is better to convert
them to BMPs before setting
them as the wallpaper.
98
Enable DMA
Direct Memory Access
(DMA) is a technique that
hard disks and CD-ROM
drives can use to transfer
data directly to and from
memory, without passing
through the processor. DMA
reduces the load on the sys-
tem processor since data
transfers do not require
monitoring by the CPU.
With DMA, a write or read
operation can be executed in
two to four clock cycles.
Without DMA it will cost the
CPU a minimum of 16 clock
cycles per operation. Not
only do disk read/write oper-
ations gain a significant
boost in speed, but Windows
also works faster, since it can
load system files much faster
and also accesses the swap
file at higher speeds.
Older hard disks and CD-
ROM drives do not support
DMA, but almost all com-
puters today use DMA-com-
pliant devices. In case you
face a problem after enabling
DMA, reboot Windows to
Safe Mode and disable the
option. Also, DMA needs to
be enabled from the BIOS,
Enabling DMA significantly
improves speed
but again, on most comput-
ers, this is on by default.
DMA is supported only in
Windows 95 OSR 2 and later.
To enable DMA, open
Control Panel > System > Device
Manager. Expand the Disk
drives tree, select the hard
disk and click Properties.
Under the Settings tab,
check the DMA option.
Repeat this for all other
hard disks and the CD-ROM
or DVD-ROM drives.
File system properties
Changing the File System
settings can also provide bet-
ter performance. First,
change your computer’s role
to a Network Server, even if
it is not one. Open Control
Panel > System > Performance
and click File System. Under
the Hard Disk tab, change
the typical role of the com-
puter to Network server
instead of Desktop comput-
er. The setting controls the
size of various internal data
structures used by the 32-bit
file access driver (VFAT).
When you use the Desktop
computer setting, VFAT allo-
cates memory to record the
32 most recently accessed
folders and 677 most recent-
ly accessed files, consuming
approximately 10 KB of
memory. With the Mobile or
docking system setting,
VFAT allocates memory to
record 16 folders and 337
files, taking up around 5 KB
of memory. As a Network
server, VFAT allocates
around 40 KB of memory to
record 64 folders and 2,729
files. With the kind of
memory available on sys-
tems today, this slight over-
head hardly makes any
difference, especially consid-
ering the performance gain
it provides.
Optimise virtual
memory
The way virtual memory is
configured tremendously
affects Windows perform-
ance. This is true for all
versions of Windows,
including the now-obsolete
Windows 3.1. The swap file
is what Windows uses to
store temporary data when it
runs out of RAM. Thus, your
working is not limited by the
amount of RAM on your
machine. However, for a
program to be able to use
this data, it must be trans-
ferred back to the RAM. The
data that is not immediately
required is moved to a part
of the hard disk and recalled
when required. However,
since hard disks are nowhere
as fast as RAM, swapping
data back and forth drasti-
cally reduces speed. No mat-
ter how much RAM you
have, Windows will always
use the swap file for some
infrequently used parts of
the OS (read the next tip to see
how to avoid this).
By default, Windows
Optimise the Windows swap
file for better performance
JANUARY 2003

Defragmenting
Regularly defragmenting the
hard disk maintains optimum
performance for read/write
operations. Hard disks store
data in sectors and clusters,
the latter being the smallest
addressable unit. Clusters are
of a fixed size, depending on
the file system (FAT, FAT32,
NTFS, etc). A cluster can hold
only one file, but a file may
span over several clusters.
For FAT32 partitions, the
cluster size is 4 KB. Thus, any
file between 0 bytes to 4 KB
will occupy one cluster.
Should its size increase
beyond 4 KB, it will look for
the next free cluster to fill up.
With frequently changing
uses a variable swap file that is
created on bootup and where
the size is dynamically modi-
fied when required. Though
this works just fine, it is not
the most optimal. You can
never get the speed of RAM
from the hard disk, but you
can make it slightly faster.
The best way to configure the
swap file is to have a perma-
nent swap file, preferably on a
dedicated partition. This min-
imises the effect of disk frag-
mentation and increases seek
time. Another practice that a
few power users have adopt-
ed is to place the swap file on
the first partition and the
operating system on the fol-
lowing partition. Data closer
to the centre of the drive is
read slightly faster than data
at the periphery. This is espe-
cially useful for PCs with only
99
files such as documents,
spreadsheets, images, etc,
the fragments of the file may
not be on contiguous clus-
ters. Reading and writing to
such files spread all over the
partition is obviously slow.
Defragmenting brings pieces
of the file together, so that
they are accessed faster.
All versions of Windows
are bundled with defragment-
ing tools. In Windows 98, you
can run it from Start > Pro-
grams > Accessories > System
Tools > Disk Defragmenter. In
Windows 2000 and XP, right-
click My Computer and click
Manage. Look for Disk
Defragmenter under Storage.
64 or 128 MB of RAM where
data would frequently be
swapped to the hard disk and
can be easily done with BIOS-
es that allow booting from
the D drive.
To change the swap file
settings, open Control Panel >
System > Performance and click
Virtual Memory. Choose ‘Let
me specify my own virtual
memory settings’ and select
the drive for the swap file.
Note that no matter what
partition you boot from, it
will always appear as the C
drive from DOS and Win-
dows 98, and the first parti-
tion that is recognised as C by
the BIOS will be assigned a
higher drive letter. Set the
minimum and maximum
size for the swap file. Both
these numbers should be
identical to set a permanent
(non-variable) swap file. Ide-
ally, it should be two-and-a-
half times the amount of
RAM on your system, but if
you have a separate partition
for it, you may not want it to
be less than 512 MB—if it is
lower, it will have to be a
FAT16 partition, not FAT32.
Avoid the swap file
When Windows loads, it
moves certain parts of the
operating system to the swap
file anyway, regardless of
whether it has run out of
RAM or not. This is very good
for systems with less memo-
ry, since it leaves some free
RAM and applications will
start much faster. Otherwise,
when you start an applica-
tion and memory is required,
Windows will have to first
move all this data to the swap
file to free up RAM. This
functionality is usually not
required on systems with 256
MB or more RAM, especially
if they only run common
productivity tools such as
Office and Internet applica-
tions. You can prevent Win-
dows from using the swap file
until absolutely required by
adding the line below to the
[386Enh] section of the
\Windows\ system.ini file.
ConservativeSwapfile
Usage=1
You can edit this file in
Notepad. In case you face any
problems such as programs
crashing frequently, remove
this line and reboot.
Display settings
The display settings affect the
speed of Windows too. The
more animations and transi-
tions the OS has to show, the
higher is the processor and
RAM usage. Typically, turning
off all such features instanta-
neously shows the difference
in speed. Right-click an
empty area of the desktop
and click Properties. Under
the Effects tab, uncheck the
boxes for ‘Animate windows,
menus and lists’, ‘Smooth
Turn off unnecessary graphic
effects
edges of screen fonts’ and
‘Show window contents
while dragging’.
Temporary cleaner
3
Regularly removing files that
accumulate in the Temp fold-
er can also show better per-
formance—these files are
usually very small and
unnecessarily fill up the hard
disk. This also causes high
disk fragmentation and
pushes important data
towards the periphery of the
disk, where read/write opera-
tions are slower. Ideally, cre-
ate a batch file that empties
this folder and place it in the
Startup, so that it runs every
time you boot to Windows.
You could do this from the
autoexec.bat too, but this file
runs while still in DOS mode,
so disk access will be much
JANUARY 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
slower than when in Win-
dows. You should strip all file
attributes before running the
delete command, since hid-
den and system files will not
be deleted from the Com-
mand Prompt. Also, using the
deltree command instead of
del will ensure that even fold-
ers are deleted. Thus, your
batch file should contain the
following commands:
attrib -a -s -r -h c:\Windows\
Temp\*.* /s
Deltree/y C:\Windows\
Temp\*
Managing power
Power Management is a very
useful feature for notebooks,
but not as critical on a desk-
top PC. With default power
management settings, the
computer will automatically
reduce the spinning rate of
the hard disks and blank off
the monitor after a few min-
utes of idle time. In older sys-
4 tems, this sometimes causes
Windows to lock up. Depend-
ing on the settings, every
time you need to use the PC,
the hard disk will have to
spin up again before data can
be accessed on it. Turning
off power management
completely will not harm the
system in any way. At most,
Turn off power saving features
100
set only the monitor to be
turned off. Open Control Panel
> Power Management and
choose Always On under
Power schemes to disable all
power saving features.
Optionally, you can set only
the system standby and hard
disk settings to Never.
Disable Autorun
Autorun was an innovative
feature to automatically
launch programs from CD-
ROM and DVD drives. How-
ever, the way it works, it
affects system performance,
apart from being irritating at
times. While this feature is
on, Windows polls the drive
every 5 seconds to check if
some media has been insert-
ed. If it finds a new disc, it
will check it for the
autorun.inf file and execute
the commands within this.
This is quite an overhead,
especially when you need the
feature only sometimes. This
is true for all versions of Win-
dows. To turn it off, open
Control Panel > System > Device
Manager. Expand the
CDROM tree, select the drive
and click Properties. Under
the Settings tab, disable ‘Auto
insert notification’.
Boot faster
Before Windows loads, it
processes certain files to set
the correct environment and
load initial drivers and Win-
dows settings. The config.sys
typically loads drivers and
the autoexec.bat sets the
environment and runs pro-
grams before Windows loads.
If these files are loading any
unnecessary items, you
BIOS Tweaks
Changing certain BIOS settings
can reduce the amount of time
it takes to hand over control to
the operating system, thereby
reducing the time taken to
boot. Although there are sev-
eral different BIOSes with vary-
ing options, there are some
settings common to all. Look
around your BIOS to find these
options. Usually, to enter the
BIOS setup, you have to press
the [Delete] key while it is
loading.
Configure your hard drives
in the BIOS, instead of setting
it to automatically detect them
every time it boots. For most
should remove them. Both
files can be edited in
Notepad.
A third file, the msdos.
sys, sets several parameters
for Windows. It specifies the
Windows folder, the location
of the startup files, behaviour
of the boot menu, etc.
Changing a few parameters
can ensure faster booting of
the operating system. If any
parameters exist, you can
change its value, or simply
add a line with the parame-
ter. Before you can edit this
file, however, you must strip
its read-only and hidden
attributes. To do this, open a
Command Prompt window
and type this command:
attrib –h –r msdos.sys
When Windows is not
shut down properly, it auto-
matically runs Scandisk
when it boots again. You can
disable this by using
AutoScan=0. Setting its value
BIOSes, you can simply select
the Auto Detect Hard Disks
option. Disable Boot Up Flop-
py Seek. This option checks if
there is a floppy in the drive.
You also don’t need the Virus
Protection feature. Enabling
this from the BIOS often caus-
es problems with system
updates and also slows down
the booting time. Change the
boot order so that it loads the
operating system from the
hard drive first. You would
hardly ever boot from a floppy
or CD-ROM and when you
need to, you can switch to this
configuration in the BIOS.
to 1 will bring up a prompt
asking if you want to run
Scandisk and setting it to 2
will run Scandisk automati-
cally. BootDelay=x sets the
amount of time you have to
press [F8] to bring up the
boot menu. The default value
for this is 2 seconds. If Boot-
Menu is set to 1, it will
always bring up the boot
menu, BootMenuDelay sets the
number of seconds this
menu is displayed for, before
booting with the default
selection. When BootWarn is
set to 0, Windows will boot
to Safe Mode without warn-
ing, whenever it does not
start properly.
By now, you probably
have FAT32 on all drives, so
disk compression utilities
will not work. You should
disable the driver for this by
setting DblSpace and Drv-
Space to 0. Also, if you do not
have a SCSI controller, set
JANUARY 2003
DoubleBuffer to 0. You can
disable logging of the boot
process by setting the value
of DisableLog to 1. Setting
SystemReg to 0 will disable
scanning of the Registry at
startup, but it is better to
leave this on.
Defragmenting to
rearrange programs
Windows 98 has a pretty use-
ful feature to help load appli-
cations faster—over time, it
tracks your usage patterns
and logs the frequency with
which you use each applica-
tion. It can then rearrange
the files of the application on
your hard drive so that they
will load faster. After you
have used your computer for
a few weeks, run the Disk
Defragmenter and select the
drive you want to defrag-
ment (usually C). Click Set-
Defragment the hard disk to
rearrange programs
tings and check the box to
‘Rearrange program files so
my programs start faster’.
Plus, you also have the added
advantage of the disk getting
defragmented.
Windows logon
If you are not on a network
and Windows is not config-
ured for multiple users, or
network users are not
authenticated by an NT
domain, you should turn off
the Windows logon dialog
101
Log on to Windows
automatically
box. Open Control Panel > Net-
work to configure the net-
work properties. You don’t
require the Microsoft Family
Logon, so select it and click
Remove. Ensure that the Pri-
mary Network Logon is Win-
dows Logon and click OK. If
you don’t have any password
for the user, Windows will
automatically log on without
the prompt. If you did set a
password, you can locate and
delete the PWL file from the
Windows folder, restart Win-
dows and this time enter a
blank password.
Using Tweak UI
Tweak UI is a very powerful
software that lets you change
various system settings with-
out having to edit system files
or fiddle with the
Registry. It is free and can
be downloaded from www.
microsoft.com/ntworkstation/dow
nloads/PowerToys/Networking/N
TTweakUI.asp. Version 1.33 is a
consolidated version that will
work on Windows 9x as well
as NT systems—it will give
you different options on dif-
ferent OSes. After it is
installed, it will be available
from the Control Panel.
Using Tweak UI is pretty
straightforward, but here are
a few changes you must make
to get better performance.
Under the General tab,
disable Window animation,
Smooth scrolling, Menu ani-
mation, Combo box anima-
tion and List box animation.
On the Explorer tab, disable
‘Animated Click here to
begin’. Next, switch to the
IE4 tab and disable ‘Active
Desktop enabled’. On the
Boot tab, you can control
boot settings such as the
behaviour of the boot menu,
Scandisk, etc. Autorun for
CDs
can WINDOWS 2000 PROFESSIONAL
Windows 2000 lacks little in terms
of performance and stability, but can be
squeezed for even more juice
Get rid of services
Services are background appli-
cations that run on Windows.
They may be system-related
programs without which Win-
dows cannot run, or helper
applications, providing cer-
tain functionality to other
programs. For example, the
Security Accounts Manager
service stores security infor-
mation for user accounts to
be used by all applications
for authentication. Windows
2000 starts several services by
default, many of which you
may not require. You can
either permanently disable a
service, or set it to be manual-
Stop services you don’t require
Use Tweak UI to speed up
Windows 98
be disabled under the Para-
noia tab.
ly started. If you are unsure,
choose the Manual mode—
the service will be started only
when required, but will not
cause any errors. If perma-
nently disabled, dependent
programs will throw up errors
5
when they need the service.
Right-click My Computer
and click Manage. On the left
pane, expand Services and
Applications and click Ser-
vices. Sort the services in
descending order by the Sta-
tus column to bring the serv-
ices that are currently run-
ning on top. You can select
each service and double-click
it to read its description,
change the Startup type to
Manual or Disabled and to
stop it. As you go through the
list, you may realise that you
don’t require more than half
the services, such as Distrib-
uted File System, Task Sched-
uler, Remote Registry Service,
JANUARY 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
RunAs Service, etc. If you
don’t have any NTFS parti-
tions, Distributed Link Track-
ing will not help in any way.
Similarly, if you don’t have
any printers installed, you
can turn off Print Spooler.
Personalised menus
Windows 2000 introduced
personalised menus, tracking
usage of menu items across all
local users. Items that have
not been used recently are
hidden away, providing faster
access to frequently used
shortcuts. This is a very
resourceful addition to the
user interface, but comes at a
price. Every time you open a
menu, Windows checks up
which items are to be dis-
played and which ones are to
6 ance gain will be more appar-
Disable personalised menus in
Windows 2000
be hidden. This is quite
unnecessary and one can
actually feel the delay on slow
systems. Turn off personalised
menus from Start > Settings >
Taskbar & Start Menu.
Active Desktop
Though there haven’t been
any known issues with Active
Desktop on Windows 2000 as
against 98, it can slow down
102
Web content on the desktop
hogs resources
the OS. You should avoid
using GIFs and JPEG images as
your wallpaper. To disable
Web content on the desktop,
right-click on the desktop,
click Properties and switch to
the Web tab. Uncheck the box
to ‘Show Web content on my
Active Desktop’ and click OK.
Away with display
effects
Windows 2000 brought with
it a new set of display effects
for menus, lists and windows.
Turning these off will save up
some resources. The perform-
ent on low-end computers,
but you will definitely notice it
when minimising or maximis-
ing windows. Right-click on
the desktop, click Properties
and switch to the Effects tab.
Squeeze out even the last drop
of power by turning off display
effects
Disable ‘Use transition effects
for menus and tooltips’,
‘Smooth edges of screen fonts’
and ‘Show window contents
while dragging’.
Performance options
Built over the NT architec-
ture, Windows 2000 provides
performance options similar
to Windows NT 4. Open Con-
trol Panel > System > Advanced
and click Performance
Options. Here, you can set
Windows to optimise proces-
sor and memory usage for
Setting the swap file sizes and
the maximum registry size
applications or background
services. For desktop PCs, you
don’t need to change this set-
ting. If it were a server, you
would choose to optimise for
background services. You can
also change the virtual mem-
ory settings. You can have
one swap file per drive, each
with different sizes (Check
the tip Optimise virtual
memory in the Windows 98
section for more on swap
files). You will notice that
here you can also set the
maximum registry size.
You should not set this to a
very low value, or you will
start facing problems as you
install more programs. Setting
a small size does make a
difference though—Windows
loads the registry into memo-
ry, so the smaller the registry,
lesser is the memory used.
Maintaining temporary
files
By default, Windows 2000 sets
up different Temp folders for
each user along with the
\Winnt\Temp folder. Thus,
when clearing out temporary
files, you have to check this
folder, as well as the Temp
folder under each user’s
account profile, under \Docu-
ments and Settings\<User>
\Local Settings\Temp. This is
as unmanageable as it is irri-
tating. Fortunately, you can
change this behaviour. Open
Control Panel > System >
Advanced and click Environ-
ment Variables. You will see
two boxes for User variables
and System variables. Delete
the TEMP and TMP variables
for the user, or set their paths
Change environment variables
to %SystemRoot%\TEMP. You
will have to repeat this for
every local user.
Power boot
On the System Properties dia-
log, under the Advanced tab,
click Startup and Recovery to
change the boot options for
the NT Flex boot loader. If
you have only Windows 2000
installed, disable ‘Display a
JANUARY 2003
list of operating systems’. If
you dual boot with another
OS, reduce the amount of
time for which the boot
options are displayed. Thus,
when you switch on your PC,
you will not have to hang
around to press [Enter] to
load Windows.
Automatic Logon
If yours is a single-user PC, or
a particular user logs on to
Windows 2000 most often,
you can have the operating
system logon automatically
with that user’s credentials.
You should not use this if
security is a concern. If the
computer is part of a work-
group and not logging on to a
domain, open Control Panel >
Users and Passwords and
uncheck ‘Users must enter a
user name and password to
use this computer’. On the
Advanced tab, uncheck
‘Require users to press Ctrl-
Alt-Del before logging on’.
If Windows is set to log on
to a domain, you can enable
this functionality by editing
the registry. Start regedt32
from Start > Run and navigate
to HKEY_Local_ Machine\
Software\Microsoft\Win-
dowsNT\CurrentVersion\
Winlogon. Create the keys
DefaultDomainName, Defaul-
tUserName, and DefaultPass-
Log on automatically to
Windows 2000
103
word and enter the domain,
user name and password to
automatically log on to.
Using Tweak UI for
Windows 2000
Tweak UI for Windows 2000
is a very powerful tool to
modify system settings.
Though the installer is the
same one as for Windows 98,
the options available and its
behaviour are different in sev-
eral respects. On installing
Tweak UI, you can launch it
from the Control Panel.
On the General tab, turn
off Combo box animation,
Tweak UI for Windows 2000
Cursor shadow, List box ani-
mation, Menu animation,
Menu fading, Menu selection
fading, Smooth scrolling,
Tooltip animation, Tooltip
fade and Window animation.
Switch to the IE tab and
uncheck the box to ‘Allow
Active Desktop to be turned
on/off’. On the Paranoia tab
you can disable Autorun for
audio and data CDs.
Options on the Cmd tab
let you configure keys to auto-
matically complete file and
directory names at the Com-
mand Prompt. For example,
you can type in the first char-
acter of the file or directory
name and press Tab to have
Windows fill in the rest for
you. This is extremely useful
even if you work only occa-
sionally
WINDOWS XP PROFESSIONAL
XP is quite user-friendly with an impressive
interface, but is sluggish on low-end systems
Change the theme
The default Windows XP
theme looks very pretty, but
hogs a lot of system resources
for the eye-candy effects such
as bevelled objects and transi-
tions. If looks are not impor-
tant to you, switch over to the
classic Windows look. To do
this, right-click an empty area
Switch to the classic Windows
theme
of the desktop and click Prop-
erties. Under the Themes tab,
set Windows Classic as the
current theme and click OK.
Turn off display effects
Switching off transition and
animation effects can save a
lot of system resources. These
effects are not required to run
programs and cause an
unnecessary load on the
Disable all display effects on XP
with the Command Prompt.
On the Logon tab, you can set
an account to automatically
log on after booting Windows.
This is useful for single-user
PCs, or where security is not
critical.
processor and RAM. Right-
click on an empty area of the
desktop, click Properties and
switch to the Appearance tab.
Click Effects and clear all the
checkboxes.
Choose performance
Windows XP has some very
good features to maximise
performance. Unfortunately,
the default settings are no
good. You can choose to have
it optimise itself for faster
computing. To change these
settings, click Start, right-
click My Computer and click
7
Properties. Switch to the
Advanced tab and click the
Settings button under Perfor-
mance. By default, ‘Let Win-
dows choose what’s best for
my computer’ is selected.
Choose ‘Adjust for best per-
formance’ instead, and you
will almost immediately
notice a boost in speed. This
is because all graphic effects
are turned off. You can
XP lets you optimise the OS for
performance
JANUARY 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
optionally choose each type
of effect that should be
enabled from here, but if it’s
power you are looking for,
leave them all off. Note that
the behaviour and appear-
ance of a lot of Windows such
as the Control Panel, will
become quite different. If you
prefer the helpful wizard-like
interfaces, you may want to
sacrifice a bit on performance
and enable the option to ‘Use
common tasks in folders’.
Paging options
On the Performance Options
dialog (right-click My Com-
puter and click Properties >
Advanced > Settings), click on
the Advanced tab to access
even more performance fea-
tures. You can adjust the
processor and memory
options, but for desktop PCs
8 helpful for most users, so you
Changing swap file settings
in XP
you should leave the default
options (optimise for Pro-
grams). What you should
change are the virtual memo-
ry settings. You can have one
swap file per drive (Check the
tip ‘Optimise virtual memory’ in
the Windows 98 section for
more on swap files). Set the
104
optimum size and click OK.
Boot options
If you are not booting multi-
ple operating systems, you can
turn off the option perma-
nently, until it is required. If
there is another OS on your
system, say Windows 98, you
can reduce the amount of time
the option to choose which
OS to load is displayed. Right-
click My Computer, click Prop-
erties > Advanced and click the
Settings button under Startup
and Recovery. Here, you can
choose which operating sys-
tem to boot by default. You
can uncheck the boxes to
show the boot options, or
select the number of seconds
for which the choices are dis-
played. Five seconds is usually
more than enough.
You will notice recovery
settings in case of a system fail-
ure. Alerts and debugging
information will not be very
can turn these options off too.
Turn off services
Depending on your comput-
er’s configuration and options
chosen when installing Win-
dows XP, it will have certain
services enabled. Many of
these you may never require
and can safely switch off. You
can disable a service so that it
Reduce load on CPU and RAM
by turning off services
never runs, or set it to be
manually started.
Right-click My Computer
and click Manage to bring up
the Computer Management
console. On the left pane,
select Services under Services
and Applications to control all
installed services. The easiest
way to filter through the list is
to sort it by the Status column.
Services that are ‘Started’ are
the ones you need to look at.
(Read more on services in the tip
‘Get rid of services’ under Win-
dows 2000 Professional’.)
Quit indexing
The Indexing Service stores
information from documents
and organises it for faster
searches. This is not useful to
many users, especially if the
documents are well organised.
Not only does this service take
up system resources, it also
involves frequent read/write
operations to the hard disk,
which are particularly slow.
From the Computer Manage-
ment console (right-click My
Computer and click Manage),
select Indexing Service from
the left pane under Services
and Applications. You will see
the list of catalogues on the
right pane. If any of them are
started, you can stop them
from here, and even delete the
catalogue. Optionally, you can
expand the tree on the left
pane for each indexed item
and restrict the folders it scans.
Tweak UI for XP
Tweak UI is available for Win-
dows XP too. It gives you
access to quite a few system
settings that are otherwise not
readily available, and can help
Power up with Tweak UI for XP
gain that extra inch of power
from XP. You can download
this version from www.
microsoft.com/windowsxp/pro/
downloads/powertoys.asp.
Under General, you can
turn off display effects such as
fading and animations.
Under Explorer, uncheck the
boxes for ‘Allow Web content
to be added to the desktop’
and ‘Enable smooth scroll-
ing’. Expand the Explorer
tree, select Thumbnails and
move the Image Quality slid-
er to around the centre. Next,
expand the My Computer >
AutoPlay branch. Under Dri-
ves, you can disable AutoPlay
for all drives, thus reducing
this overhead. Under the
Types branch, you can choose
to disable AutoPlay for CD,
DVD and removable drives.
Under the Command
Prompt branch, you can con-
figure special keys to auto-
matically complete file and
directory names, as on a Unix
system. If you have a single-
user system, you can have XP
logon automatically from
Logon > Autologon. Under
Logon > Unread Mail, you can
disable the notification of
new e-mail messages for each
user. Not only is this more
secure, but it also reduces the
overhead of polling for new
messages for every user.
JANUARY 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks

Power Builder
Want to build that
dream machine? Here
are tips from power
users on how to build
a souped up system—
the fastest and most
stable, this side of the
Arabian Sea

9
contents
10 Intel-based systems
11 Athlon-based systems
12 Installing mother-
boards
13 Power supply
15 Cooling tips
15 Overclocking tips

Power tweaks for

Windows 98

Find it on the
Mindware CD

ILLUSTRATION: Mahesh Benkar

97 FEBRUARY 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
10 POWER TIPS FOR
INTEL-BASED SYSTEMS
The right installation will pave the way for
trouble-free operation and let you harness the
full potential of your PC. Keep in mind the
following tips while buying and installing an
Intel-based processor
1
Keeping your cool just a dab—too much thermal
Since processors are con- paste and it will ooze out. Also
tinuously stressing on make sure there are no air
faster speeds, cooling becomes bubbles.
an important issue—gift your
3
processor a rated heatsink and Power to run
cooling fan combination. Due to additional power
Most processors come with requirements, all Pentium
the heatsink and cooling fan 4 processors need the extra
in tow, but you may require a +12 V rail to run correctly.
better cooling solution, espe- Therefore, make sure the
cially in the case of the Pen- power supply for your new
tium 4 processors. processor has the necessary
four-pin +12 V connector that
2
How much thermal goes into the ATX12V connec-
paste? tor on your motherboard—
If your heatsink is cov- both your power supply and
ered by thermal tape, you motherboard should support
10 don't need to apply any ther-
mal paste. Otherwise, apply
this connector.
4
Go for quality
Don't skimp on the
motherboard—a high-
quality motherboard may
make you a few thousand
rupees poorer, but will guar-
antee far greater stability
and support for hardware,
chipset and BIOS. You’ll also
get more features such as
more overclocking options
and integrated peripherals.
5
BIOS updates
Make sure you buy a
motherboard that offers
regular BIOS and driver
The Pentium 4’s Thermal Heat updates on the company Web
Spreader protects and site. This spells great support
dissapates heat from its core for newer hardware and helps
98
iron out the bugs and flaws
that may crop up. Newer BIOS
updates can also mean signif-
icant performance boosts.
6
To HyperThread or
not?
Intel’s new 3.06 GHz
processor now incorporates a
technology called Hyper-
Threading, which enables the
processor to perform far better
when running multiple appli-
cations simultaneously. How-
ever, this comes at a price and
you should opt for it only if
you need the high perform-
ance for executing multiple
tasks. You will also need to
confirm if your motherboard
supports HyperThreading.
7
A question of memory
The current scenario
gives users the choice of
SDRAM, DDR and RDRAM
memory in a Pentium 4-
based system. DDR memory
offers high data transfer
bandwidth and is priced
lower than RDRAM. Howev-
er, RDRAM's higher data
transfer rate makes it ideally
suited to demanding applica-
tions such as gaming, CAD
modelling and graphics-
intensive, texture-heavy app-
lications. Also, RDRAM needs
to be installed in pairs, unlike
the DDR or SDRAM—this
needs to be kept in mind
while buying memory mod-
ules. These three types of
memories cannot be used on
the same system, therefore,
choose your camp with care
as you will not be able to
change your memory type
later without also changing
the motherboard.
8
Willamette or North-
wood
While the newer North-
wood Pentium 4 processors
built around the 0.13-micron
fabrication process are more
popular than their older 0.18-
micron Willamette counter-
parts, the latter is still available
in the market. The Willamette
processors draw more power
and therefore generate more
heat. Also, the Northwood
processors integrate twice the
amount of L2 cache (512 KB)
as compared to 256 KB inte-
grated by the Willamettes.
9
Special drivers
Intel supplies drivers for
the new 800-series
chipsets (including the 845,
845-DDR and 850 chipsets)
called the Intel Application
Accelerator driver—another
fancy name for the UDMA
drivers. These increase the
performance of your IDE
devices quite significantly.
They offer better boot times
and also surpass the 137 GB
limitation of the IDE drives in
the native Widows drivers.
10
Application sup-
port for special
instruction sets
Intel processors have special
instruction sets such as SSE2
that help deliver better per-
formance with certain types
of data. Ensure that you look
out for applications that sup-
port these special instruction
sets when using a P4 proces-
sor. In some cases, you might
need to install specific
patches that let these appli-
cations use the special
instruction sets.
FEBRUARY 2003
 THE RIGHT WAY TO INSTALL A PROCESSOR
STEP Preparing the
1 motherboard
Set your motherboard to run
at the correct core voltage,
bus frequency and clock
multiplier settings by con-
sulting the manual. In some
cases, you may need to do
this through the DIP switch-
es on the motherboard or
DIP switches to set the correct
bus frequency and clock multi-
plier settings
the Frequency/Voltage set-
tings in the BIOS.
STEP Preparing the
2 processor
Next, apply thermal paste on
your processor by using a
thin plastic visiting card—
a plastic card is best suited to
spreading the paste smooth-
ly all across the surface of the
processor core. You can also
extend this paste around the
10 POWER TIPS FOR
ATHLON-BASED SYSTEMS
Since you belong to the AMD camp, consider
the following steps to build a reliable and
high-performance system
1
Take care while
mounting the processor
AMD processors have a
very delicate processor core as
the silicon is exposed on top
of the chip. Therefore, great
99
Smoothly apply the thermal paste
to the processor core so that there
are no air bubbles
core, but smoothen out the
paste such that there are no
air bubbles. Also, the paste
should be in contact with
every portion of the proces-
sor core.
STEP Preparing the
3 heatsink
Next, locate the region on
the underside of the
heatsink where the proces-
sor is going to touch the
processor core. This is usual-
ly in the centre of the flat
area of the heatsink. Once
you have ascertained this
On the
heatsink,
apply thermal
paste on the
area that will
be in contact
with the
processor core
care needs to be taken to
ensure that the processor is
not damaged by rough and
incorrect installation of the
heatsink. Ensure that the
heatsink is installed flat
zone, wipe it clean of any
dust. Then evenly spread
some thermal paste, careful-
ly avoiding any air bubbles.
STEP Seat the processor
4 in the socket
Clamp the processor firmly
into the socket on the moth-
erboard and make sure that
it is correctly aligned with
the pins. Do so without
applying too much force on
the processor.
Firmly seat the processor in the
motherboard socket
STEP Install the heatsink
5 Place the heatsink on
the processor gently, but
firmly—take care not to
damage the core of the
processor. Make sure that
the heatsink is seated such
that it is in complete contact
with the processor core,
then fasten the clasps into
down—do not angle it or try
to slide it in, as this would
graze the top of the processor
or chip its sides and render it
useless.
2
Keep it cool
AMD processors are
extremely susceptible to
heat and it is critical that
they be kept cool. Therefore,
the CPU has to be plugged in
before powering on the sys-
Make sure the heatsink is firm-
ly latched onto processor socket
the retention hooks of the
processor socket to ensure
that it is in firm contact
with the processor.
STEP Connect the CPU
6 fan
Finally, connect the CPU fan
on the correct point on the
motherboard. Make sure
that the heatsink assembly
is firmly seated—there
should be no play in it.
There, you're now good
to go!
11
Connect the CPU fan to the
motherboard
tem, otherwise the CPU and
possibly the motherboard
would be damaged within
seconds of switching on the
system. Also see that the CPU
fan is correctly mounted on
the system using thermal
paste so that it maintains
good contact between the
heatsink and the processor
(refer to the box, ‘The Right
Way to Install a Processor’, for
more details on how to do this).
FEBRUARY 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
3 9
Stick to ratings
Always use a CPU
heatsink and fan combi-
nation that has been certified
by AMD. If you prefer to buy
a separate one, make sure it
is rated and can run with
your particular processor as
Athlon has stringent cooling
requirements.
4 6
Power considerations
If you plan to use the
faster Athlon processors
(2000+ and above) along
with power-hungry peripher-
als such as a CD-Writer, large
hard disks and a powerful
graphics card, use a high-
quality power supply with a
rating of at least 300 watts.
Most low-end power supplies
cannot deliver clean power to
systems built on these com-
ponents, resulting in an
unstable system.
5
Follow the instructions
12
AMD processors also
have specialised instruc-
tion sets like 3DNow! which
The AMD’s exposed core invites
damage
100
streamline the power of cer-
tain applications. To realise
the full potential of these
processors, make sure that
your applications integrate
support for the special
instructions. In some cases,
you might need to load spe-
cial patches to enable the
support.
A matter of memory
The AMD processors let
you choose between
SDRAM and DDR memory.
While SDRAM is the cheaper
of the two, DDR memory
offers higher bandwidth and
it is continually evolving in
terms of technology and
speed. SDRAM is a good cost-
effective option if you plan to
run memory-intensive appli-
cations. However, DDR's
inherent speed and falling
prices make it a good invest-
ment for the future.
7
Which processor?
AMD gives you three
choices in processors.
While the Duron range offers
reasonably good perform-
ance given its price, it makes
sense to choose the Athlons
as Duron processors are on
their way out. Here again,
you get to choose between
the older Palomino proces-
sors built around the 0.18-
micron process and the
newer Thoroughbred proces-
sors built around the 0.13-
micron process. While the
latter boasts higher clock
speeds, lower power con-
sumption and consequently
better performance, not all
motherboards support them.
Ensure that your motherboard
inherently supports these
processors before buying
them. Optionally, you could
download a BIOS update that
would enable the support, if
your motherboard allows it.
8
Don’t scrounge
A cheap motherboard
will run your processor,
but will also put the stability
and reliability of your system
at risk. Also, there are plenty
of features that a good-quali-
ty motherboard allows you in
the form of better hardware
support, cutting-edge fea-
tures and even support for
overclocking. A branded
motherboard will also feature
BIOS and driver updates on
its Web site.
10 TIPS ON INSTALLING
MOTHERBOARDS
The motherboard is the physical and
electronic foundation of your system.
Here are a few tips that will help smoothen
the installation process and enable it to be
installed in a stable manner
1
Get it set right
Before you install the
motherboard, consult
the accompanying manu-
al—you may have installed
motherboards numerous
times, but manufacturers
add last minute addendums
that describe special consid-
erations or last-minute
changes incorporated into
the board. Also, mark out all
the jumper settings in the
manual tables so that they
correspond to your proces-
sor, RAM and other system
Drive it in
Ensure that you down-
load and run your AMD
motherboard with the latest
chipset drivers for high per-
formance and to eliminate
possible bugs and compatibili-
ty issues. Visit the chipsetman-
ufacturer's Web site frequently
for newer driver updates.
10
BIOS updates
Make sure you buy a
motherboard that
offers regular BIOS and driver
updates on the company Web
site. This spells great support
for newer hardware and helps
iron out the bugs and flaws
that may crop up. Newer BIOS
updates can also mean signif-
icant performance boosts.
components. Tick the
appropriate jumper settings;
this makes it easier to
implement these settings
during installation.
2
Handle with caution
The motherboard has
very sensitive electronic
components that are suscep-
tible to damage by static
charge. Therefore, ensure
that you are properly
grounded (touch a metallic
object to get rid of static elec-
tricity) and that the mother-
FEBRUARY 2003
board is kept in its anti-static
packaging until the time of
installation.
3
Setting the jumpers
before installing it
Set the jumpers to their
correct positions before
installing the motherboard
into the system cabinet.
Doing this lessens your
chances of missing any criti-
cal settings and it is also
far easier to access certain
jumpers when the board is
outside the system.
4
Mount the processor
and RAM before
installing
It can be quite difficult to
mount the processor, espe-
cially the heatsink, after the
board is seated in the cabinet,
since the power and IDE
cables get in the way. There-
fore, mount the processor, the
heatsink and fan and the
RAM modules when the
motherboard is outside the
system. This also allows you
to visually verify if the
heatsink is properly seated on
the processor.
Remember to connect the
CPU fan to the correct point
on the motherboard.
5
Ensure a comfortable
fit
The power conditioning
capa-citors next to the proces-
sor socket can get in the way
of mounting the CPU
heatsink. Make sure that your
heatsink does not push
against these, as this could
damage or even dislodge
them from the motherboard.
Also, in the case of special
101
heatsinks, veri-
fy that it is not
large enough
to push against
other surface
mounted com-
ponents close
to the proces-
sor socket.
6
Anchor-
ing the
board
Make sure that
your mother-
board is com-
fortably seated
in the cabinet.
P r e f e r a b l y,
your cabinet
should have a
detachable Some boards, like this MSI KT4 Ultra, include a fan for its chipset—something to
backplate—this look out for
lets you mount
the motherboard using the viate any unnecessary build- and motherboard being per-
spacers and mounting screws up of stress by cards that manently damaged—and all
outside the system. Ensure might have been forced into this could happen within
that the motherboard has a slot. seconds of powering up the
anchor points near all the system, leaving you with
13
8
extremities of the board so Take care while absolutely no time to correct
that it will be firmly seated attaching the IDE your mistake!
and all its edges are adequate- cables
10
ly supported. The IDE cables are usually sit- Listen for diagnos-
uated near one edge of the tic beeps
7
Tighten later motherboard. Therefore, care Remember to con-
Most of the time, one needs to be taken that the nect the motherboard speak-
would tighten all the board is not bent when plug- er. Study the motherboard
screws of the motherboard ging in the ends of the cables. manual for deciphering the
upon placing it into the sys- This could cause breakages in sequence of the diagnostic
tem. A better option is to the delicate tracks on the beeps that are emitted when
lightly fasten all the mount- motherboard’s surface, ren- the motherboard is powered
ing screws so that there is dering it useless. up—a single short beep
still a bit of play in the means things are in order.
9
motherboard after it has Attach the CPU fan Otherwise, you need to diag-
been mounted. Tighten the This cannot be stressed nose what’s wrong with the
motherboard’s mounting enough—ensure that help of the beep sequence.
screws after the rest of the the CPU fan is plugged into Check if all fans are spin-
add-on cards have been the correct point on the ning, and that the cards and
placed in their respective PCI motherboard. Failing to do RAM modules are properly
or AGP slots. This helps alle- so could result in your CPU seated.
FEBRUARY 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
10 POWER SUPPLY
CONSIDERATIONS
With today's power-hungry processors and
system peripherals, a good power source is
critical for a smooth and reliable operation
1
Make sure you have
enough juice
Very often, the standard
power supplies that come
with the system casings have
a bare minimum power rat-
ing of 235 watts. While this
is suited to very basic sys-
tems, the power require-
ments in your super system
could soon supersede this
low-end power supply. It is
therefore wise to choose the
highest rating your budget
will allow—at least 300 watts,
or in the case of peripheral-
packed gaming rigs and
workstations, even 500 watts.
2
Trust the brand
14 There are numerous
brands of power supplies
on the market, many of
which use very low-quality
parts. Stay away from these
and spend a little more on a
reputable and reliable brand
such as Codegen or Antec.
3
Watch the weight
As a rough rule of thumb,
take two power supplies
of the same rating but differ-
ent brands and see which one
is heavier. Usually, a heavier
power supply implies that
higher quality components
such as heat sinks, capacitors
and transformers are used and
this translates into higher
quality. Lighter power sup-
plies usually comprise of
102
lower-quality components
fabricated of cheaper and
hence lighter materials. The
lighter weight may also mean
that some components, such
as the heatsink, are complete-
ly left out.
4
Special processor
compatibility
Depending upon your
processor, make sure that your
power supply can provide the
juice required to run the
processor. Look for any indi-
cation that the power supply
is rated for use on AMD or
Intel-based systems specifical-
ly. In the case of Pentium 4-
based systems, look out for
the presence of the ATX12V
four-pin connector that is
needed to power Pentium 4
processor-based computers.
5
Beware the bundles
Most power supplies
bundled with the system
casing are of low quality
since their cost has to be inte-
grated into the cost of the
system. Beware of these
power supplies and make
sure that their rating is high
enough for your particular
processor, peripherals and
internal system components.
If need be, opt to trade in the
integrated power supply with
another of a higher rating,
quality and brand, and offer
to pay the price difference.
Some SMPSes
feature two fans—one for
cooling the processor and the other for ventilation
6
Go in for the highest
Even though you might
not need the additional
power, it makes sense to
invest in a power supply that
is rated slightly higher than
for your application. Also, a
higher rating does not mean
that it necessarily draws more
power—it will only draw as
much power as is needed by
your particular mix of system
components.
7
How's the head count?
You may find out, much
to your dismay, that the
number of power supply
heads from your SMPS may
be lesser than the number
needed by your hard disk,
CD/DVD/CD-RW drive, etc.
This is another factor you
need to consider—your
power supply should have
enough power connectors,
so that you do not need
to invest in additional
Y-cables for powering all your
components.
8
SMPS cooler
In most systems, the
SMPS fan shoulders the
burden of cooling all the
compo-
nents. This
makes it important for the
fan to be powerful enough to
handle the airflow in the sys-
tem, without letting too
much heat to be developed
within the system.
9
Lower the noise
The SMPS fan tends to
make a lot of noise due
to the vibration. To prevent
this, the SMPS unit must be
firmly fastened to the casing,
with no play in it. A loose
attachment causes the power
supply to vibrate excessively
and can also cause compo-
nent stability problems in the
future.
10
Clean the fans
regularly
The SMPS fan is one
of the biggest components in
the system and sometimes
serves as the only duct for
directing the heated air out-
side the system. Hence, it is
very prone to dust and needs
to be cleaned regularly to pre-
vent dust build-up within the
SMPS and the fan. A blower
or brush does a competent
job of dislodging any dirt or
dust stuck on the fan blades.
FEBRUARY 2003
 10 TIPS FOR COOLING
Now that your system is up and running, it is
important that you keep it cool for greater
reliability. A cool system is also better
equipped to handle overclocking experiments
1
Case cooling fans
If your casing has provi-
sions for cooling fans,
invest in a couple of good
ones. A CPU fan concentrates
on only the processor and
additional system cooling
fans draw hot air from heat-
generating components such
as the CD-ROM, chipset and
graphics card, maintaining a
constant airflow within the
system cabinet.
2 5
Upgrade your proces-
sor cooling
While the bundled
heatsink and CPU fan do a
good job of cooling the CPU
during normal operations,
you will need a more robust
solution if your system is sit-
uated in an especially
warm environment
or while over-
A good heatsink and fan
combination is vital for cooling
your processor
103
clocking. In such cases,
choose a more powerful solu-
tion from brands such as
ThermalTake or CoolerMas-
ter. Also, see to it that the
CPU fan has an airflow of at
least 34 cfm (cubic feet per
minute) for reliable cooling
under strenuous thermal
conditions.
3
Of frequencies and
voltages
While installing your
motherboard and processor,
make sure that your voltage
and frequency settings are at
their correct values, unless
you mean to be overclocking
them. An incorrect setting
could run sections of your
system with higher voltage
5
and frequency ratings than
they are meant to, resulting
in higher heat levels. There-
fore, consult the mother-
board manual while setting
the voltages and frequencies.
4
Get a system dash-
board
Most systems have
applications that monitor the
sensor chip on your mother-
board to keep you informed
about the current tempera-
tures, frequencies and volt-
ages of its critical
components. This is especial-
ly useful while overclocking,
when you want to keep the
rated thermal levels under
safe limits.
Arrange your cables
Internal cables such as
your IDE, power and
sensor cables can cause a
mess within the system and
hamper the airflow. Make
sure that these cables are cor-
rectly ordered and tied
together to circulate the air
within the cabinet for more
efficient cooling.
6
Double-barrel cool-
ing
Opt for a casing that
has at least two blowholes
with provisions for cooling
fans. One fan should be
placed in the front and the
other in the rear of the sys-
tem for smooth circulation.
7
Additional cooling
If you are going to
carry out overclocking
experiments, make space for
additional cooling for your
processor, graphics card,
RAM and motherboard by
modifying your system cas-
ing and installing more fans.
8
Go with the brushless
Invest in a brushless
type of cooling fan as
these are far more efficient—
they ae silent and feature a
higher rpm as compared to
older fans.
9
Clean the fans regu-
larly
Case cooling fans are
susceptible to picking up dust
and dirt from the environ-
ment and need to be taken
care of. If they are too
clogged with dust, they could
slow down or even stop rotat-
ing completely, causing over-
heating or even failure of
components. Clean out these
fans with a brush or a blower
so as to dislodge any build-up
of dust on the fan blades. It is
wise to keep your system cov-
ered during the day when it
is not being used as this pre-
15
vents dust from settling on it.
10
Keep the system
away from dusty
environments to
prevent dirt clogging
Keep your system away from
dusty environments—this
includes open windows fac-
ing main roads or construc-
tion sites. While a sealed, air
conditioned room is best
suited to a computer, today’s
computers are hardy enough
to work well in a normal
room, but care needs to be
taken that they are not in
direct sunlight, causing
unnecessary build-up of
heat.
FEBRUARY 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
10 OVERCLOCKING TIPS
Now that your system is all set firmly,
you may feel the urge to push its performance
that extra mile. Here are a few things
you need to keep in mind before embarking
on any overclocking adventure
1
With a little help from
your motherboard
Firstly, consult the manu-
al to make sure that your
motherboard supports over-
clocking through jumper set-
tings or BIOS tweaks. Once you
are sure that you can change
the CPU’s core voltage, clock
multiplier or bus speed, only
then should you go about
pushing your system harder.
2
Tighter control of
voltage/frequencies
Opt for a motherboard
that offers fine control of
parameters such as the core
voltage, clock multiplier and
16
bus frequency. If these param-
eters can be incremented by
small units, your overclocking
experiments can be that much
more controlled and safer.
3
Processor permission
Most processors allow
overclocking only to a
certain extent. Others, by
virtue of their design, allow
overclocking to greater
degrees. A processor with a
lower amount of L2 cache, a
smaller fabrication process
and a lower bus speed support
can be overclocked to far
greater extents as it has more
room for expansion.
Most processors today
have their clock multipliers
locked and this prevents
104
them from being tweaked
through that component. In
such cases, the bus speed
needs to be used, but take care
so that the rest of the system
is not adversely affected.
4
You are on your own!
Keep in mind that your
warranties will not cover
any damage cause by tweak-
ing; so be very sure of the
extent to which you can push
your system safely. This is
especially applicable if you
want to modify any part of
your hardware to accommo-
date experiments.
5 9
Ramp up your cooling
The first by-product of a
tweaking experiment
will be the generation of heat
in your critical components.
Therefore, make sure that you
Some AMD processors require their L1 bridges to be shorted with a
graphite pencil before overclocking them
have adequate cooling for
components such as the
processor, RAM and mother-
board chipset. If necessary,
purchase a better heatsink or
cabinet cooling system.
6
Multiplier or bus
speed?
You can increase the
effective speed of your sys-
tem by either increasing the
clock multiplier or the bus
frequency. However, since
most processors are clock-
locked, you will have to take
the bus-frequency route.
However, in this case,
installing a system monitor-
ing software would be a good
idea to keep tabs on your
temperatures, voltages and
frequencies. See that limits
are not exceeded—tempera-
tures should not exceed
60º C and voltages should
not swing more than 5
per cent away from their
rated values. Throttle back
as soon as you feel that
your system is reaching its
limits and if it shows any
signs of instability.
7
Overclock in steps
Start out your overclock-
ing at the rated settings
and work your way up in
small increments—do not be
overzealous. Working in small
steps allows you to closely
monitor your system for signs
of instability, before pushing
it to the next level.
8
Tablulate your find-
ings and find out the
most stable setting
for your system
At each step of your over-
clocking adventure, tabulate
the present frequency, voltage
and thermal levels of your
processor and system. At each
stage, run a strenuous appli-
cation such as a looping game
benchmark and look for any
signs of instability. Your tabu-
lated results will pin down
the point at which your sys-
tem runs most stable.
Monitor the status of
your system
Throughout your over-
clocking efforts, monitor your
system temperatures and volt-
ages very closely. It is critical
that they remain within limits
for your system to run reliably.
Failing to do so will result in
shortening the life of your
processor or even failure.
10
Run an acid test
Once you’ve over-
clocked to satisfac-
tion, you need to run a
burn-in application for at
least 4 hours. This will ensure
that your overclocked com-
puter will run all your appli-
cations reliably, without lag
or failing.
FEBRUARY 2003
insight ■
■ tips and tricks

Freeware Tips on some powerful freeware tools

that you can use everywhere—at home, in
for all the office and while online. Fortified with

Occassions*
these tools and the secrets to getting the
most from them, you can thrive entirely
on freely available software!
*Also see ‘All the Software you’ll ever need’ on page 64
17

contents
18 Developer Tools
18 Home Tools
19 Office Tools

ILLUSTRATIONS: Mahesh Benkar

21 Internet Tools
More than 75 freeware! 22 Multimedia Tools
23 System Tools
Find it on the Mindware CD
24 Essential Tools

131 MARCH 2003

 insight ■
■ tips and tricks

DEVELOPER TOOLS
Bloodshed Dev-C++ 4
Smaller EXE files
You can ensure smaller file
sizes for your EXE files com-
plied from the C/C++ code.
Go to Options > Compiler
Options. Under the Linker Create custom setup files with
page, make sure the ‘Generate Optimise your EXE files this tool
debug information’ box is left
unchecked. Also, under Code Setup Creator Package Manager
Generation/Optimization, To create a setup package When you install additional
select Best Optimization. which will let others install Dev-C++ packages such as
your executables, click Tools extra libraries, you can man-
Setting Classpaths in JCreator v2.50 > Setup Creator or press [F11] age them using the Package
JCreator is a fast IDE for Java, offering you all the functionality to open the Setup Creator Manager utility. The Package
within commercial IDEs. With JCreator you don’t need to head menu. Fill in the details such Manager gives you detailed
off for the command prompt while working with Java—with a as the software title and information at a glance
powerful GUI-based interface, everything is a mouse-click away. organisation name; set other about the contents of the
When working with multiple libraries scattered across different options such as the back- package, including file list-
folders, adding all the paths to ground colour scheme. You ings, descriptions and ver-
the Autoexec file makes it can set the license details sion details. It also lets you
rather unwieldy. Also, you run and add the files you intend remove any packages. To
the risk of the program refer- to distribute along with their access the Package Manager
ring back to an older library, final location. Finally, click within the main window, go
which is located on the class- on Build to create the setup to Tools > Package Manager, or
path. In JCreator, you can set EXE file. press [Ctrl] + [F12].
18 Set the profiles and classpaths
up custom classpaths and pro-
files by clicking on Configure >
Options and selecting JDK Profiles from the list at the left side. HOME
Clicking on New lets you select the directory where the JDK is
located. Then, you can add additional paths and libraries by ClickTray Calendar
clicking on Add > Add Path... or Add > Add Archive... This lets Setting alarms
you define custom paths and libraries, unique to that profile. To set alarms, select
If you work across several versions of the JDK or would like to Alarms from the list on
create unique profiles of the JDK for different uses, click on the the right in the main
New button to add in another profile. Remember that the first window. Under the
profile listed will be the Data Input tab, enter
default. the time of the alarm
You can choose a specific and choose between dis-
profile or add a library class- playing an alarm mes-
path for a project without sage or starting or
opening the Options menu. closing a program. If
Click on Project > Project Set- you choose to display a
tings and select a JDK profile. message, you can enter the or name in the field. Flip
You can also set up the message in the message field. through the other tabs to set
required Libraries and JDK Tool Set project-specific profiles and If you choose to start or end even more detailed prefer-
options specific to that project. classpaths a program you will need to ences.
enter the program’s location Finally, from the list at the

132 MARCH 2003


Create your own Multimedia Card with FreeCard 2.0
FreeCard 2.0 will give you a
great multimedia card in a
jiffy. To create the card, first
start the FreeCard application.
You can add pictures by click-
ing on the Select Graphic or
Video button (the first button
to the left). You can add
Create colourful multimedia Bitmaps (BMP) or videos (AVI
files instantly format). If you choose a
Bitmap, then you can set the way the presentation opens, by
selecting it from the drop down list. To add music, click on the
Select Music button. You can use MIDI or WAVE files. You can
write a personalised message on the text field to the right.
Finally, preview the card by clicking on Run. You can now see
the card that you have created. To send the card, click Send.
You can choose to have it sent by e-mail or through Windows
Messaging or make a standalone EXE file.
create a new category by click-
ing on the Add New Category
button on the bottom left. You
can choose an existing catego-
ry by highlighting and check-
ing it. To add a task to the
category, enter the text into
the Text Enter Area window
Set your daily alarms here and click on Add Entry. Final-
ly, click on the OK button.
bottom of the Data Input tab, If you have finished your
select Insert Alarm (this is the To Do tasks, just click on
first button from the right). Done!
You should see the alarm
listed in the alarm text list Countdown Clock
on top. You can then min- If you are driven by time and
imise ClickTray Calendar would like to have a count-
back to the system tray, and down clock ticking away on
continue working. your desktop, select Count-
down Clock from the list at
To Do lists the right side in ClickTray
ClickTray Calendar will help Calendar. In the window that
you maintain a comprehen- comes up, you can set the
sive To Do list, which you countdown time under the
could sort separately by cate- Settings tab. Once the time is
gory. In the main window, set, click on the display tab
choose To Do List and set the and click on Start Clock. Your
categories and tasks. First, time starts now!
133
OFFICE
OpenOffice.org
Turning off AutoFormat
and AutoCorrect in Writer
Writer, the word processor
within the OpenOffice.org
suite, comes with automa-
tisms, namely the auto for-
mat and auto correct
facilities. While these may be
useful, they can also be irri-
tating especially when text is
being corrected or formatted go to Insert > Special Character.
wrongly. For example, with Choose Symbol from the Font
the default settings it will list and click on the symbol
capitalise the first letter of you want inserted.
every sentence, or every URL
is recognised and is coloured Locking text in Writer
to mark it out as a hyperlink. Writer also has the option
To turn off such auto format where you can lock in a sec-
and auto correct options, go tion of the text to prevent it
to Tools > AutoCorrect/AutoFor- from being edited or changed.
mat. Under the Options tab, Select the portion of text that
uncheck the specific options
that you don’t want. You can
choose not to have it auto
correct and auto format while
you modify the text or while
you enter the text on to the
19
page. To turn back the auto
correct and auto format
options, select the options
Lock up your text from here
that you want enabled.
you want protected, go to
Inserting special charac- Insert > Section and under the
ters in Writer entry for Write protection,
To insert special characters select the Protect option.
such as the ® or © or ™ sym- Finally, select Insert. The
bols within the document, selected text is now locked;
bring the cursor to the place you cannot overwrite the text.
where you want the character If you would like to safe-
or symbol inserted, and then guard the section with a
password, choose the With
Password option, provide a
password and click OK.
Freezing the panes in Calc
If you would like to see row or
Adding special characters column captions for a long
MARCH 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
spreadsheet as you work
through it, you can freeze the
fields that hold the caption. If
it is a single row or column
caption that has to be frozen,
click on the cell just below or
to the right of the row or col-
umn that will contain the cap-
tion. Select Windows > Freeze. If
you have either column cap-
tions or row captions, you can
create a cross freezing by click-
ing on the uppermost left side
cell that does not contain a
caption. For example, in a
sheet with single row and col-
umn captions, you should
choose the B2 cell.
If you have multiple row
and column captions to be
frozen, you can split the sheet
window. Click on the cell just
below or to the right of the
row or column where you
want to insert your caption,
and select Windows > Split. The
sheet window will be split.
Now you can scroll both parts
20 of the split window, display-
ing the caption as per your
requirements.
Cell protection in Calc
All the cells in Calc are pro-
tected by default. However,
you can turn off this feature.
To do so, select all the cells in
the spreadsheet. Go to Format
> Cells and select the Cell Pro-
tection tab. To turn off protec-
tion for all the cells, uncheck
the Protected option. Click on
OK to finish.
If you would like to enable
the option, just select the
Protected option.
To selectively enable the
protected option, select the
cells you want protected, go to
Format > Cells and select the
134
Protecting the data within your
cells
Protected option under the
Cell Protection tab. You will
need to turn on the protection
at the sheet level. Select Tools >
Protect Document > Document.
You can provide a password
here to ensure that those fields
cannot be edited.
###….?
You may see ### in a cell
where you have entered some
data value in Calc. This hap-
pens if the value is too large
to be displayed—Calc will clip
it and display ‘###’. To read
the value, you can resize that
particular cell. If the cell con-
tent is text, you can double-
click on the cell. This will
Unhashing the hashes
show a red triangle that indi-
cates that the field is over-
flowing.
Saving as text files
You can output the Calc
spreadsheet into an ASCII
delimited text file. Go to File >
Save As and select Text CSV as
the File type. Enable the Edit
filter settings box. Set the
delimiters that you need.
Finally, click on Save and the
text file is generated.
Saving Draw documents as
standard formats in Draw
Draw is the OpenOffice.org
application that lets you work
with the images in your doc-
uments. It saves the images in
the SXD format, which is a
document format. To save the
Draw document as a standard
graphics format, go to File >
Export and from the dialog
box that appears, choose the
graphics format you want the
files saved as; click Save.
Cropping images in
OpenOffice.org Draw
Once the image is inserted
into your drawing file, click
on the image to open the
image toolbar. Within the
Cropping the image in Draw
image toolbar, select Crop
(the right-most button). This
will open up the Crop menu.
You can add the exact meas-
urements of the canvas that
you want cropped. Finally,
click on OK.
Microsoft NetMeeting
3.01
Sharing it all
Microsoft NetMeeting also lets
you share entire programs,
which you can access as
though you were at the
remote computer. Go to Tools >
Sharing and select the pro-
grams you want shared. You
Share your programs from here
can enable total sharing by
selecting Allow Control under
Control. This will allow peo-
ple to access the remote appli-
cation and make changes to it.
Transferring files
To send a file to another com-
puter on NetMeeting, go to
Tools > File Transfer. This will
open the file transfer menu.
Go to File > Add Files and add
the file that you want sent.
Then click on the File > Send A
File to send the file to the
other computer or highlight
and right-click the file and
select Send A File. To send
multiple files at the same
time, first add all of them to
the menu, then go to File and
select Send All. This will send
all the files to the other
computer.
Whiteboarding
To create an area for all the
parties to interact, you can set
up a common whiteboard
through Tools > Whiteboard in
NetMeeting 3.01. This will
open the Whiteboard, which
can be viewed and used by all
the parties in the meeting.
MARCH 2003
 INTERNET
AI RoboForm
Adding your vital stats
With AI RoboForm you can
save a lot of your confidential
personal data. Click on AI
RoboForm in the system tray
and go to Edit Identities. Here
you can flip through the tabs
to enter details for the current
identity, such as name,
address, password, e-mail
address, credit card informa-
tion, bank account informa-
tion and so on. Since all this
data is encrypted and stored
locally on the disk, it is safe.
Use it for accessing pages that
require registrations and pass-
words, shopping sites and
even for logging into your
Hotmail account!
Protect Your Identity
Since you may tend to entrust
quite a lot of confidential and
personal data to AI Robo-
Form, it makes sense to pro-
tect your identities and
passcards. To do so, choose
Options from AI RoboForm
135
on the system tray and
then flip over to the User
Data on the Options
menu. Select Set Master
Password and enter a mas-
ter password. This will be
used to protect your iden-
tities and passcards.
Auto filling forms
To auto fill a form, click on
AI RoboForm in the system
tray; go to More on the
toolbar and choose
Options. Under the Form
Filling tab, select Auto Fill
Without Asking. It will fill
AI RoboForm’s AutoFill stands by
forms from a passcard if a pass-
card matches the current Web
page. If no passcards match the
current page, it will fill forms
from the Current Identity.
Opera 7
Google within Opera
If you are a heavy search
engine user, you will find this
very handy. To run a Google
search on say, SETI, just type
Set search keywords here
‘g SETI’ in the address bar and
you will immediately link up
to the search result page at
Google.com. To access other
search engine options, go to
File > Preferences and select
Search from the list. You
can choose from Google,
AllTheWeb, Lycos, Down-
load.com and other search
engines. For each there is a
keyword to be entered before
adding the search term.
Customise and disguise
If you would like to stop open-
ing (or start opening) pop-up
windows or access other
options on the fly, you can do
so by pressing [F12] while in
Opera and set options such as
accepting or refusing pop-up
windows or enabling/dis-
abling Java and cookies as well
as identifying your browser as
IE or Mozilla. You could access
all these options from the
Quick Preferences option from
the File menu.
Mouse Gestures
One really useful feature with-
in Opera is the Mouse Ges-
tures feature—it allows you to
do common tasks within the
browser without clicking but-
tons on the toolbar. For exam-
ple, to access the previous page
in the history, you need to
keep the right button pressed
as you move the mouse to the
left. To close a page, just hold
down the right mouse button
and move down, and then to
the right, tracing an ‘L’. There
are mouse gestures for nearly
all commonly done tasks
within Opera—you wouldn’t
really need to press the but-
tons on the toolbar!
Zoom and full screen views
To zoom in and out of a Web
page, don’t look around for
an option within the toolbar-
just press [+] to zoom into a
Web page and [-] to zoom out
of a Web page.
Full screen views in Opera
are accessed by pressing [F11],
but here is where the differ-
ence lies: within Opera you
get a totally ‘full’ screen view.
Unlike IE, there are no tool-
bars on top.
Remembering where you
went last
If you abruptly stopped your
last browsing session, Opera
remembers where you went
21
last. When you restart Opera,
you will be prompted to start
Crashed? Resume effortlessly
from where you stopped and
resume what you did last.
Netscape 7
Tabbed Browsing
With tabbed browsing being
MARCH 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
one of Netscape’s better fea-
tures, this is how you can
enable it in case it hasn’t
been enabled. Click on Edit >
Preferences to access the Pref-
erences window. Expand the
Navigator tree and select
Tabbed Browsing. Select the
options you want. You can
open a new tab by pressing
[Ctrl] + [T] and cycle through
all the opened tabs by press-
ing [Ctrl] + [PgUp] or [Ctrl] +
[PgDn].
Searching from Netscape
The default search engine
for searching from within
Netscape is Google, but you
can set another search engine.
Go to Edit > Preferences and
select Internet Search. You can
specify the search engine that
you want to work with from
within the drop down list.
Finally, click on OK to set the
preference. If you enter a term
on the Address bar that cannot
22 be resolved into a Web page,
Netscape will now automati-
MULTIMEDIA
136
Set in the search preferences
cally search for it in the default
search engine.
Enabling Quick Launch
If you have not configured
Netscape to load at startup,
then enabling the Quick
Launch option will give you
fast loading times. To enable
Quick Launch, click on
Edit > Preferences and select
Advanced from the list at the
left. In the Advanced menu,
under ‘Enable features that
increase performance’, select
Enable Quick Launch and
select OK. After a reboot, you
should see Netscape loading
faster.
VirtualDub
Compressing Video
If you have large MPEG files
and would like to see them
converted into smaller sizes,
you can choose to re-
encode them into the AVI
(Audio Video Interleave)
format. The best AVI codec
is the DivX codec series.
However, you would need
to have the DivX codec
installed in your computer.
You can also use the Indeo
codecs, which give good
results.
Open the file in Virtual-
Dub and go to Video > Com-
pression. The options listed will
be the ones for which the
codecs are present in your
machine. Choose the DivX
codec, which gives the ideal
balance between file size and
quality. Click on OK; this
brings you back to the main
screen. Click on File > Save as
AVI and save the output file.
The conversion then starts and
you can monitor the progress
of the encoding from the Vir-
tualDub Status indicator.
Encoding with the Indeo codecs
If you are using the Indeo
AVI codecs, then in the Video
> Compression screen, you will
need to specify the video
compression quality—choos-
ing a value between 80 to 90
per cent should give you
good file sizes with little loss
in quality. Lower settings will
affect the quality, but will
give you lower file sizes. You
will also need to enter the
value for a keyframe inter-
val—this will ensure quick
fast-forwards and rewinds
within the video file. A lower
value here is recommended.
Select a value of 85, which
will give you good results.
Filters
VirtualDub comes with some
very useful filters. You can use
these to resize or realign your
video files, crop or integrate
Using the filters in VirtualDub
special effects such as motion
blur or smoothing into the
video files. The filters are
accessed from Video > Filters.
For example, if you would like
to have still smaller file sizes,
you can resize the video. To
resize the video, open the
source file. Then click on Video
> Filters and then click on Add.
This will open a list of avail-
able filters. Choose 2:1 Reduc-
tion (High Quality) and click
OK. You can add more filters
to the list in the same way.
Then choose your compres-
sion settings and save as an
AVI file. You select the order
in which you want the effects
applied.
dBpower AMP Music
Converter
Right-click!
To start using dBpower AMP,
all you need is to have the plu-
gins for the format into which
you need to encode your
audio files. Once you have
MARCH 2003
them installed, you can start
right away. Within Explorer,
locate the file that you want
encoded. Then right-click and
choose Convert To. You
should see the listed options
for the audio formats support-
ed. Select the format of your
choice and click on it. This
will bring forth the Options
menu where you can set
parameters such as encoding
quality and type. When you
have entered the options,
click on Convert to start con-
verting the file.
Audacity
Removing noise
To remove excess noise or
hiss from the audio file, first
select a few seconds of hiss
(at the beginning or the end
of the clip) and then click on
Effects > Noise Removal. Click
on Get a Noise Profile. This
will generate a profile of the
frequencies you need
Cleaning up scratchy audio files
removed from the file. Final-
ly, select the audio section
from which you want the
unwanted sound artefacts
removed, go to Effects > Noise
removal, and select the
amount of audio you want
filtered. Experiment with
how much sound you want
removed—too little and the
artefacts remain, too much
and the audio portions may
be lost. Finally, click on
Remove Noise. That is it.
Audacity will start cleaning
the audio file.
PC Inspector File Recovery
This is an indispensable tool for those times when you delete a
file, only to realise that you need it back! Relax, you are forgiv-
en—you can use this excellent file recovery tool
First, start PC Inspector File Recovery. You can choose
between recovering lost files, finding lost data, and finding a
lost or inaccessible drive. Select Recover Deleted File. Then,
within Select Drive, click on the Logical Drive tab and choose
the drive on which your data was located, then click OK. Within
the Explorer-like interface, choose Deleted and locate the folder
where the file was located. The deleted file will be indicated in
green and alongside you would be able to view the status of
the deleted file. Right-click
on the file and choose to
Save To… to save it. You
would need to save it on
another drive (physical or
logical). Choose the loca-
tion and click OK.
Depending on the disk
and the deleted file, you
should have a working file
recovered. Recover those deleted files
and set the parameters for it. such as Yahoo! or MSN or
You can choose between mIRC. You can assign these
denying access, to allowing rights from Programs Control

SYSTEM TOOLS
ZoneAlarm
Program control
Clicking on Program Con-
trol lets you set security
levels for programs that
may access the Internet
from your computer. Click-
ing on the Main tab lets
you set broad-based rules;
set Medium here.
To set specific rules for
each program, open the
Program tab—here you will
find listed all the programs
that have tried to connect.
You can also add any pro-
grams here that you would
like to allow access to.
These could be your brows-
er, mail client, or any other
specialised programs. For
example, if you use file-shar-
ing programs over the Inter-
net, you can add the file name
here through the Add option,
outright access or settle on the
program asking for permis-
Set Program Control from here
sion every time it wants to
connect.
Server rights
ZoneAlarm may alert you
about granting server rights
to certain programs—this is
the case with chat and file
transfer software that allow
for real time conversations,
under the Programs tab
panel. ZoneAlarm continu-
23
ously monitors the activity of
the programs and hence pre-
vents unauthorised access.
Alerts
If you have chosen to view
alerts while installing Zone
Alarm, you will be alerted as
soon as a program tries to con-
nect to the Internet or net-
work. The alert will specify
which program is trying to
connect, and you can choose
to allow or disallow it. You can
ensure that programs that you
frequently use, such as your
browser or mail client, can be
allowed to establish such con-
nections. There may be other
programs that may try to

137 MARCH 2003

 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
Alerts warn you about inbound
and outbound connections
access the Internet—some
may be legitimate, but there
may also be some spyware
programs. Use your discre-
tion before allowing them to
connect. Clicking on the
More Info button at the
AlertAdvisor connects to
ZoneLabs online, and gives
more information regarding
the alert.
Full stop
If you would like to stop all
24 Internet connections, except
inbound and outbound, click
on the red Stop button—this
will stop all connections at
once. The Internet lock can be
configured from the Program
Control screen, in the Main
tab. This is obviously a drastic
measure—you would need to
use this in the event that you
are certain that a Trojan or
some major security loophole
exists within your computer.
Temporarily stepping
down security
You can step down the secu-
rity if your programs tend to
conflict with ZoneAlarm.
This may happen if you use
software such as VNC or
PCAnywhere that let you
138
control a remote computer.
But be sure to restore it later!
PGP Freeware
Creating your key pair
Encryption with PGP requires
that you generate a public and
a private key. The public key is
distributed to everyone so that
they can encrypt and send you
secure messages. The private
key is kept confidential and is
used to decrypt the messages.
After installation, PGP will
prompt you to create your key
pair. To create additional keys,
click on PGP on the system
tray and choose PGPKeys. To
create a new key pair, go to
Creating the key pair
Keys and select New Keys. This
will open the Key Generation
Wizard. Choose Expert if you
wamt to specify additional
parameters such as the key size
and key type. Clicking on Next
will prompt you for a
passphrase, and finally, you
can generate the key pair.
Distributing the public key
You should distribute your
public key so that people can
send you securely encrypted
messages. Simply right-click
on the key and choose Send To
> Domain Server to send your
key. To send your key by
e-mail, choose Send To > Mail
Recipient.
ESSENTIALS
Internet
Explorer 6
Image toolbar
The Image toolbar
pops up when you
hover your mouse
over certain Web
page images. It lets
you save/print/
e-mail pictures and
also opens up the
My Pictures folder. If
you find the toolbar to be a select (or deselect) the Enable
nuisance, you can disable it Automatic Image Resizing
by right-clicking on the tool- option.
bar and selecting Disable
Image Toolbar. Deleting cookies and
personal information
You can get rid of tiresome
cookies through Tools > Inter-
net Options. Under the Gener-
al tab, locate Temporary
Internet Files and click on
IE6’s Image Toolbar Delete Cookies.
If you use IE6’s AutoCom-
You can later restore the plete feature you may end up
Image Toolbar through Tools >
Internet Options > Advanced.
with IE hanging on to much
Scroll down to the Multimedia
section and select the Enable
Image Toolbar option. The
next time you launch IE, you
will get the Image Toolbar.
Enabling/disabling auto
resize
The Auto Resize function in
IE 6 resizes large images to fit
into the browser window so
you no longer need to scroll Clearing out personal data from
horizontally or vertically to the AutoComplete feature
view the file. This is enabled
with the default install, but of your confidential informa-
you can can enable/disable tion. To erase this informa-
the function from Tools > Inter- tion, go to Tools > Internet
net Options > Advanced. Within Options and click on the Con-
the list, scroll down to the tent tab. Click on Clear Forms
Multimedia section and and Clear Passwordst
MARCH 2003
insight ■
■ tips and tricks

Stay
Connected
If you have just put
together some
computers, cables and
adapters, and are
vying to venture into
the networked world,
you definitely need
some help. This month
we bring you easy
tricks to get your
network up and
running, and help you 25
make the most of
your time

contents
26 Windows Networking
32 Network Printers
31 Internet Explorer

ILLUSTRATIONS: Mahesh Benkar

99 APRIL 2003
 ■ tips and tricks

WINDOWS NETWORKING added to the chart. Use this to

Windows features some very useful tools to
troubleshoot your network. You can use them
to ensure that your network is up and running,
and detect problems, as well as find out
important network parameters
NetWatcher
NetWatcher is installed
with the full installation of
Windows 98. If it is not so
in your machine, go to
Control Panel > Add/Remove
Programs and click on the
Windows Setup tab to
install it. Click on ‘System
Tools’ and then ‘Details’,
and then scroll down to
select NetWatcher; you will
be prompted to insert the
Windows 98 CD.
26 Use NetWatcher to track what
resources are users accessing on
your machine
NetWatcher lets you see
who is using the shared
resources on your computer at
any given moment in time,
across the network. You can
use it to add shared folders, as
well as disconnect users from
your computer or just a specif-
ic file. Note that disconnecting
the users does not prevent
them from reconnecting to
your machine. For that, you
need to either hide or unshare
the specific resources.
System monitor
System Monitor is a standard
utility in Windows. If it is not
already installed, you can
install it from Control Panel >
Add/Remove Programs, here
navigate to Windows Setup >
System Tools > Details. Scroll
down and select System
Monitor.
Within System Monitor,
click on the Add button and
choose Microsoft Network
Server from the category field.
Choose the parameters that
you want to track. This will be
System Monitor graphs your
system performance
determine if your system is
slowing down on account of
shared resources. You may
need to disconnect a user or
unshare a resource to remedy
it.
Win IP Config
Win IP Config can be
accessed by going to Start >
Run and typing in winipcfg in
the open dialog box. Win IP
Config lets you view all your
current TCP/IP settings in a
single menu. By clicking on
More Info, additional infor-
mation regarding the net-
work can be viewed.
If the IP address was
dynamically allocated by a
DHCP (Dynamic Host Con-
figuration Protocol) server,
then you can use the Release
and Renew buttons to release
and renew the IP address.
The information displayed
on Win IP Config is described
below.
Adapter address
This is a hexadecimal address
that is unique to every
network adapter. It is hard
coded into the card by the
manufacturer, and consists of
six 8-bit numbers. However
remember that modems
(both internal and external)
do not have this address—
this is restricted to network
adapters while the number
for a modem or dial up
adapter is set to a meaningless
default number.
IP address
This is the current IP net-
working address. Depending
on whether DHCP is used,
See your complete TCP/IP
configuration on Win IP Config
this may be static, fixed or
dynamically allotted. The
static value would be entered
in the TCP/IP network con-
figuration menu.
Subnet Mask
This is used to mask a portion
of the IP address to determine
the subnet where the com-
puter is located, that is,
where the computer is locat-
ed within the internal net-
work. All computers running
TCP/IP must have the subnet
mask defined.
Default Gateway
This is the IP address of the
computer that provides the
connection to a remote net-
work. The gateway computer
is the computer that TCP/IP
will use to communicate and
route data destined for com-
puters on remote networks.
On clicking on it for more
information, the following
settings are displayed.
DHCP Server
This entry indicates the IP
address of the DHCP server.
The DHCP server, when
present, will dynamically

100 APRIL 2003

assign an IP address to the
machine upon connecting
to the network. Clicking on
the Release button will
release the IP address, and
the Renew button requests a
new IP address from the
DHCP server.
Primary and Secondary
WINS Server
These settings specify the IP
address of the Primary and
Secondary WINS Server, if
present. The WINS servers
translate the NetBIOS names
into the corresponding IP
addresses.
Lease Obtained and Leased
Expired
These values show when the
current IP address was
obtained and when it is due
to expire. You can use the
Release and Renew buttons to
release and renew your cur-
rent IP address. In any case,
the DHCP client automatical-
ly attempts to renew the lease
when 50 per cent of the lease
time has expired.
Ping
The Ping utility will let you
determine whether a specific
IP address is accessible. It
works by sending a data
packet to the specified
address and waiting for the
reply. Ping is a simple, yet
highly configurable tool.
Trace Route
You can troubleshoot your
Internet connection with the
Trace Route option. To use
Trace Route, type tracert in the
command line. Tracert traces
every hop (router on the Inter-
101
Use tracert to troubleshoot your
routing problems
net) that a packet takes to
reach its destination, giving
the path and the amount of
time taken between each hop.
On a LAN, this can be used to
diagnose problems in routing.
Use it on the Internet to
choose the nearest and fastest
download sites.
Netstat
Use Netstat to display proto-
col based statistics, as well as
all current inbound and out-
bound connections. Netstat
can be configured to display
Netstat shows you inbound and
outbound connections through
all the ports
all connections and listening
ports and Ethernet statistics,
as well as statistics on a pro-
tocol basis. This would
include statistics for TCP,
UDP, ICMP and IP. This is a
very useful command line
utility that lets you know
who is accessing the machine.
IP Config
IP Config is a very useful tool
that displays the entire TCP/IP
configuration in your
machine. The IP Config utility
displays all the information in
the Win IP Config utility, but
on the command line. To
obtain all the information, use
the ipconfig/all command.
Net
The Net utility in the com-
mand line contains a host of
other interlinked utilities. You
can choose to do basic net-
work configuration, diagnos-
tics, inspect print queues, as
well as connecting and dis-
connecting to the network
from the command line. Type
in net /? on the command line
to access more information
on the different commands
within the Net utility.
For command line utili-
ties, in order to be able to read
the text output one screen at
a time, type in the command
through the More paging
command—this would be of
the form net /? | more.
LAN protocol
The exchange of information
takes place through estab-
lished protocols. Windows 98
supports the following trans-
port protocols:
TCP/IP: TCP/IP is installed
by default in Windows 98. If
your computer is located on
an interconnected network
with diverse hardware and
operating systems, you would
need to use the TCP/IP proto-
col. TCP/IP is the standard
protocol for the Internet, and
also the de-facto standard for
LAN communications.
NWLink IPX/SPX Com-
patible Transport: This is the
standard network protocol
that is used to communicate
with NetWare networks. It
supports routing too.
IPX/SPX is needed only if
your computer is connected
to, or communicates with a
NetWare network.
NetBEUI: You need to
install this protocol only if
your network uses NetBEUI as
a transport protocol.
Generally, for a small net-
work, all you need to have
installed is the TCP/IP proto-
col suite that is installed by
default in Windows 98.
Driving for DOS
If you use DOS applications,
you may not be able to use
files and shared resources that
are located across the net-
work, since these programs
need a full path to the files,
starting with a drive letter.
Within Windows, you can
map folders that are shared
across the network, to free
drive letters to your computer.
Use Explorer to get to the
27
shared folder and then right-
click and choose ‘Map Net-
work Drive’. Select any free
drive letter in the configura-
tion screen. Now you can
Mapping frequently used
network shares
APRIL 2003
 ■ tips and tricks
access the shared folder as
though it were located on
your hard drive. If you intend
work within this shared fold-
er regularly, tick and enable
the ‘Reconnect at Logon’
option, to make the drive
mapping permanent.
Now these drives will be
fully accessible through DOS
or any older Windows pro-
grams.
Searching for a server
If you are working on a large
LAN, then getting into a
shared network resource or
folder would mean making
your way through the Net-
work Neighbourhood and the
various workgroups. The
entire list of computers across
the network could take quite a
while to build up; instead, go
to the address bar and type
\\computer_name to directly
connect with and browse the
remote computer. You can also
28 go to the Start > Run menu and
type \\computer_name to access
the computer. This is the Uni-
versal Naming Convention
(UNC) style network name.
File and Printer Sharing
To share resources across the
network, you will need to
enable the ‘File and Printer
sharing’ option. If you do not
intend to share any folders or
printers from your computer,
you can uninstall the same
for Microsoft Networks. To do
this, go to Start > Settings > Con-
trol Panel > Network and click
on the File Sharing. Uncheck
both the ‘Give access to files’
and ‘Give access to printer’.
You will have to restart your
computer for the changes to
102
Removing File and Printer
Sharing Services
take place.
Now no one will be able
to access any files on your
machine, since your comput-
er will not appear on the net-
work. You will, however, be
able to access files and folders
on other computers as long as
Client for Microsoft Networks
is installed.
Protecting your shares
To ensure safe sharing of your
network shares, you can
restrict access to your shared
resources. Right-click on the
folder or drive you want to
share, and select Sharing.
Here you can set the level of
access. You can mark a folder
as read-only, give it full access
and assign a password for
each. A quick way of hiding
your shared folders is to add
the ‘$’ sign as the last charac-
ter in the share name. This
way even though the folder
appears to be hidden from
public view, it can still be
accessed and viewed—so if
you really have to lock it
down and protect it, add in a
password too.
Messaging across the LAN
You can send a quick message
across the LAN using a stan-
dard tool within Windows.
WinPopUp is a standard and
easy-to-use messaging utility
within Windows. To use Win-
PopUp, go to Start > Run and
type in winpopup in the Open
field, and click OK. This will
open the WinPopUp window.
To send a message through
WinPopUp, click on Send—
Using the WinPopUP messaging
utility
this opens up the Send Mes-
sage window. Type message in
the Message text field, and the
name of receipient (the com-
puter’s name) and click on OK.
Incoming messages are also
displayed in the WinPopUp
window. Keep in mind that for
the recepient to be able to
receive your message, he or
she would also need to have
WinPopUp running.
Firewall
Windows XP comes with a
firewall known as the Internet
Connection Firewall or ICF.
ICF provides only inbound
protection—unlike a full-
fledged firewall, it only moni-
tors data coming into your
machine from the Internet. To
Configuring the ICF
turn on ICF, go to the Control
panel and select Network Con-
nections. Open this, and right-
click on the displayed
connection, and click on
Properties. Under the
Advanced tab, you can enable
ICF. While the default settings
may work fine, you may want
to tweak the settings. Click on
the Settings button to access
all the ICF features and set-
tings. You can fine tune the
network services under the
Services tab, set logging details
under Security Logging and
details about ICMP under the
ICMP (Internet Control Mes-
sage Protocol) tab.
ICF - Do you need it?
Keep in mind that ICF is for
use only with a direct con-
nection to the Internet, such
as a dial-up or cable modem
connection. This means that
computers connected to the
Internet through a LAN or
Internet Connection Sharing
(ICS) or a hardware router
don’t need an ICF. Moreover,
you may tend to have some
trouble with networking
with other computers on a
APRIL 2003

Disabling the ICF
LAN, as File and Printer Shar-
ing services are blocked. It
would make sense to disable
the ICF if you intend to use
File and Printer Sharing serv-
ices that would be essential
in a LAN environment. To
disable the ICF, go to the
Control Panel, and select the
Network Connections. Open
this and right-click on the
desired connection, click on
Properties and under the
Advanced tab, disable ICF.
Viewing the network
utilisation
You can view the current per-
centage of network utilisation
in the Windows XP task man-
ager. Open the Task Manager
by holding down [Ctrl] +
[Shift] + [Esc] and click on the
View the network utilisation
103
Networking tab. You will then
see the real-time graph of net-
work utilisation.
IPConfig in XP
Windows XP doesn’t feature
the GUI Win IP Config tool,
so to quickly locate all the
relevant TCP/IP configura-
tion details, you will need to
use the command line IP
Config tool, accessed by typ-
ing ipconfig.
Faster Windows sharing
When you try to view the
shared folders on a computer
running Windows 98 or ME
from a PC running Windows
2000, there may be a delay of
up to 30 seconds. This is
Open up shared folders within
Windows 98/ME faster
because Windows 2000 tries
to determine if any ‘Sched-
uled Tasks’ are enabled on the
other computer. You can fix
this delay by deleting a Reg-
istry entry on the Windows
2000 machine—but only after
backing up the Registry
before making any edits.
Go to Start > Run and
type REGEDIT to open the
Registry Editor. Navigate to
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Soft-
ware\Microsoft\Windows\Cur-
rentVersion\Explorer\RemoteCom
puter\NameSpace, and locate
the subkey that reads
{D6277990-4C6A-11CF-
8D87-00AA0060F5BF}.
First click on Export and
save the selected branch
as, say, restoreshare.reg in
a folder. Once you have
exported a copy of the key,
right-click on this subkey
and click on Delete. This
should fix the problem.
Network indicator
On a PC with a modem, you
can see the little flashing
computers in the System Tray
Turning on the network monitor
that shows you that there is
some data flowing. Now in
Windows 2000, you can see
the same flashing computers
style indicator for your local
network.
Right-click on My Net-
work Places, click on the
Local Area Connection. Click
on the Properties button. At
the bottom of the Properties
window, you will see the
Show Icon in taskbar when
connected option. Enable this
and you will see the indicator.
Routing your way
Windows 2000 has a very
powerful command line tool,
the Route command that can
be used to view, and even
change the computer’s rout-
Routing data in Windows 2000
ing table. This can affect the
path that the network traffic
takes to get from one place to
the other. Be careful while
editing the routing table
though—a little mistake here
could play havoc with your
network communications.
You can find out the differ-
ent options for usage by
typing route/? at the
command line.
Pathping
The pathping command line
utility in Windows 2000 gives
you the best of ping and trac-
ert, by sending out packets to
each router on the way to a
final destination over a period
29
Use pathping to determine any
weak links on the network
of time, and then computes
the results based on the pack-
ets returned from each hop.
Since pathping shows the
degree of packet loss at any
given router or link, you can
use it to determine which
routers or links might be caus-
ing network problems.
Type pathping /? at the
command prompt to get
additional information on
APRIL 2003
 syntax and options. nectors on each end. To get
the two computers physically
Net Send connected, just connect
You can use the net send either end of the cable into
command line utility to the slot on the network
send messages to another adapter of each computer.
computer, or choose to send
messages to everybody in Connecting three or more
computers
For networking three or more
computers, you would need
to have standard CAT5
Sending messages through cabling with standard con-
net send nectors, one network adapter
for every computer and a hub
the domain. Just typing in or a switch that acts as a
net send computer_name and central connection point for
typing in your message after networking the computers
that should do it! For more
syntax and options type in Hubs and Switches.
net send /? at the command If you are setting up a
prompt. SoHo network with not more
than four to six computers
Connecting two computers that you will use for relatively
For networking two comput- light network traffic, consider
ers, you need two network using a hub instead of a
adapters, and a crossover net- switch to network the com-
work cable of adequate puters.
30 length with the RJ-45 con-
NETWORK PRINTERS
Sharing a printer on the network saves a lot of
trouble, not to mention time and resources. We
bring you some tips on sharing and accessing a
Networked printer
Installing File and Print
Sharing Services
To access and print files
stored in your computer
through other comput-
ers on the network, you
will need to install File
and Print Sharing Services.
To do so in Windows 98, go
to Start > Settings > Control Panel
and click on Network. This
will open up the Network
104
Set up File and Print Sharing
services from the Control Panel
utility menu; click on File and
Print Sharing. Enable the
options and then click on OK.
Installing network printers
You can access a number of
shared printers across the net-
work. To do so, you need to
install the printer within Win-
dows—locate the computer
that is sharing the printer on
the network from Network
Installing the network printer
Neighbourhood. Right-click
on the shared printer and
choose Install—the Add Print-
er wizard will guide you dur-
ing the install. If you are
printing from within Win-
dows, tick No for the printing
from MS-DOS programs. The
wizard will offer to print a test
page to confirm that the print-
er is properly installed.
Setting a printer as a
default printer
You can install the network
printer as a default printer—
within Windows, both local
and network printers are
located under Printers in the
Control Panel. Simply right-
click on the printer and click
on Set as Default.
Mapping the printer
For some applications, you
may need to assign a print job
to a specific port number, such
as LPT1 or LPT2. This way,
within an application, you can
send the print jobs to the ports
instead of specifying the print-
Mapping the printer to a
specific port
er by name. To do so, first
locate the printer on the net-
work from the Network Neigh-
bourhood, right-click on it and
go to Capture Printer port.
Choose the appropriate port
number from the drop-down
list and assign a value such as
LPT2. This value needs to be
greater, if you already have a
printer attached locally to your
computer. Enable the Recon-
nect at logon option if you
want the mapping option to be
present every time you login.
Sharing a local printer
If you have a printer attached
to your computer and want
to share it across the network,
go to the Control Panel > Print-
APRIL 2003

Sharing your local printer across
the network
ers. Within the Printers folder,
right-click on the printer you
want to share and select Shar-
ing. Here, select Shared as
and type in the name of the
printer in the Share Name
field. To finish, click OK. The
printer will now be shared
across the network.
Restricting access
You can restrict access to the
INTERNET EXPLORER
Get networked on the Web
Speed up the Dial-Up Net-
work (DUN) initialisation
The Windows DUN tools are
relatively easy to set up and
can be tweaked to con-
nect faster to
your ISP. One of
the most irritat-
ing delays
occurs
after the
connection has
been estab-
lished, before
the DUN has sig-
nalled the successful
connect. This can be
105
printers to specific users by
typing in a password in the
Share Printer menu. This way
only those people with the
password will be able to use
the printer.
Queuing up
Before giving a print com-
mand, find out if there is
another print job that is
pending. You can do this by
going to Start > Settings > Print-
ers and selecting the printer.
Click on the selected print-
er—this will open up the
print queue window.
Once you have issued a
print command, you can
pause or cancel the same by
right-clicking on the printer
icon on the system tray.
Locate the job, and right-
click and select Cancel
Printing. This will terminate
the job.
speeded up in a couple of
steps:
Getting online faster with DUN
Click on the Dial-Up Net-
working folder in My Com-
puter. Right-click on the
connection that you want to
change, and go to Properties >
Server Type. While keeping
TCP/IP turned on, turn off
support for NetBEUI and
IPX/SPX. Note here that turn-
ing off support for IPX/SPX
will disable access to NetWare.
Another time saving trick
would be turning off the Log
on to network, which you
need only if you are dialling
into a Windows LAN. Finally
click OK to set the changes.
Backing up the ISP
settings
It pays to backup all the
information stored in your
DUN connection for easy
retrieval, in case you need to
reset all the values for future
installs, or while transferring
to another computer. All the
information that you need to
dial into your ISP—namely
the authentication details,
telephone number and IP
address information for all
DUN profiles—is stored in
the registry.
Go to Start > Run and type
The RemoteAccess key holds the
key to your Dial-Up settings
REGEDIT. Now, in the left
pane, navigate to the
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Remote
Access key. To backup this
branch of the Registry, go to
Registry > Export Registry File
command. Choose the select-
ed branch option and assign
a name, say INTERNET.REG.
To import this setting to
another computer, just copy
the key to the second PC, run
REGEDIT, and import this file
into the Registry.
Monitoring the modem
You can use your System
Monitor to monitor the qual-
ity of your dial-up connec-
31
tion. To do this, start System
Monitor from Start > Programs
> Accessories > System Tools. Go
to Edit > Add Item and click on
Dial-Up Networking Adapter >
CRC Errors. Finally click on
OK. If you encounter a lot of
CRC errors, then there may
be problems either with your
phone line or modem. If both
System Monitor can track your
Internet connection
APRIL 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
appear to be fine, try adding
Framing Errors and Timeout
Errors from Edit > Add Item >
Dial-Up Networking Adapter to
pinpoint the problems in
your connection.
Automatic re-dialling
If you often need to dial more
than once before you con-
nect through your ISP, you
can setup automatic re-
dialling. This can be done by
going to Start > Programs >
Accessories > Communications >
Dial-Up Networking > Connection
Name > Settings. Check Redial,
and select the number of
times that you want to re-dial
(between 2 and 100). To wrap
it up, click OK and close Dial-
Up Networking.
Honest modems
When you open up the
modem icon from the sys-
tem tray, it indicates the
speed at which the comput-
32 er and modem communi-
...Speed it up
New Windows
A single page may take its own
sweet time to load, so optimise
your time by opening links in
new windows. To open a Web
page hotlink in a new window,
hold down [Shift] as you click
on the hotlink; this is faster
than right-clicking and select-
ing ‘Open Link in New Win-
dow’. This is particularly useful
when you have a Web page
that has numerous links that
you want to open as you read
the Web page. Note that this
will not work with JavaScript
pages.
106
Getting your modem's truthful
speeds
cate. But this is not the true
data transfer speed—the
speed at which your modem
communicates with the
modem on the other side is
the true speed. To see this, go
to Start > Settings > Control
Panel > Modems > Properties >
Connection. Click on the
advanced button and in the
Extra settings, put ATW2L0.
You should now get the cor-
rect speed.
Faster Searching
To search in Internet Explor-
er 5 or greater, instead of
jumping to your favourite
search engine, press [Ctrl] +
[E]. The Search pane opens
into MSN search. Here,
choose your category, enter
the search term you’re look-
ing for, and click Search.
Smart Searching
If you are one of those who
trusts Google to get to a page
worth your while, then you
should get hold of the
Google search bar
Smart searching with search
toolbars
(toolbar.google.com). Most
popular search engines, such
as Google, Yahoo!, Ask Jeeves
and Toema, have free search
toolbars that are tightly
integrated into Internet
Explorer. These toolbars
make searching online
quicker and easier.
Speeding up
You can speed up navigation
within Explorer 5 or Explor-
er 6 by disabling page transi-
tions. To make this change,
in Explorer, go to Tools >
Internet Options. Under the
Advanced tab, disable the
option for ‘Enable Page
Transitions’ and click OK.
This will allow for faster
browsing.
Faster loading
If a text or graphics-heavy
page takes a long time to
download its graphics, hit-
ting F5 or clicking Refresh
can speed up the loading the
second time.
Automatic refreshing
IE cache keeps a record of the
Web pages you have visited;
this can be used to retrieve
Automatic refreshing: Enabling
and disabling it
those pages faster. To change
any cache settings, go to Tools
> Internet Options > General >
Settings. To automatically
check for updated versions of
visited pages, enable the
‘Automatically’ option under
‘Check for newer versions of
stored pages:’. This will give
you faster and updated ver-
sions of the Web pages you
frequently visit.
…Or disabling it
You may want to disable the
above feature, if the pages
you visit are not updated very
often. To do this, set the
option to Never. If you want
to open the latest version of
the page, click Refresh, or
press F5.
Cache Sizes
If you want to store versions
of the Web pages that you
visit, adjust the amount of
space in your cache. Go to
Tools > Internet Options and
select General. Move the slid-
er to select the amount of
hard disk space you would
like to devote to your cache.
Ideally, keep aside about 75
to 100 MB.
APRIL 2003
insight ■
■ tips and tricks

E-mail is a part
of everyday life,
whether you are a
entrepreneur or a
student. Here are a
few tools to make
your everyday e-mail
experience more
efficient

33

contents
18 Microsoft Outlook
ILLUSTRATIONS: Mahesh Benkar
21 Eudora
23 Evolution

99 MAY 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
MICROSOFT OUTLOOK
Outlook users can tweak and tune to get what
they want, using these tips and add-ins
Bypass read receipts
To skip read receipts you
need to know which e-mails
request them. To do this, you
need to change the look of
your Inbox. Select your
34 Inbox and click Field Choos-
er, in the combo box. Select
‘All Mail Fields’, and locate
the ‘Receipt Requested’ field.
Drag and drop this field to
the Inbox window. You will
see an additional column
with the values ‘Yes/Blank’.
Choose to bypass Read Receipts
in the Tracking Options
100
Here ‘yes’ means a read
receipt is requested.
To bypass, you have two
alternatives—the first is to
click ‘No’ when such an e-
mail opens. You can make
Outlook remember your
answer for all e-mails that
request read receipt.
Another alternative is to
go to Tools > Options > E-
mail Options > Tracking
Options, and select any of
the three responses—
Always, Never or Ask—that
need to occur when e-mails
with read receipt arrive.
Printing blank
calendars
Sometimes you urgently
need a blank calendar for
the week/month. Outlook
lets you do so. It is as simple
as creating a folder and
printing it. Just click on the
Calendar icon and select
New Folder. Key in a name
Print a blank calendar by
creating a new folder
for the folder and press OK.
Now select the newly creat-
ed folder and print it in the
desired print style.
Move fast
There are some shortcut keys
in Outlook, which are very
helpful while navigating.
Pressing [Ctrl] + [Shift] + [I]
moves you directly to the
Inbox folder and similarly
[Ctrl] + [Shift] + [O] moves
you to the Outbox folder.
Similarly, if you are
working with Calendars and
constantly need to switch
between the weekly and
monthly view, then you can
use the keys [Alt] + [-] and
[Alt] + [=] to do so.
Categorising e-mails
A lot of people do not write
subjects to their e-mails.
There are ways you can
insert the subject, making it
easier to categorise and
manage e-mails even after
receiving them. Just open
the e-mail, click on the sub-
ject line, modify the subject
and save it.
Abbreviated time
If you need to insert the
time anywhere in an e-mail,
Outlook has some simple
shortcuts. For example, to
type 5 pm, just type 5p,
while 6:45 am can be
entered as 645a.
Days at a glance
You can view 1 day, 5 days, 7
days or 31 days at a glance,
in the Outlook calender. It is
also possible to view 2 to 14
days at a glance—any 14
days irrespective of the
month or year.
While in the Calendar
You can choose to view any
selected date
view, press [Alt] + [0 to 9].
For example, if you press
[Alt] + [0], you get a view
that shows the next 10 days
from the current selected
day. Say you wish to plan all
Sundays of the month, click
the first Sunday, press [Ctrl]
and select all the Sundays of
the month.
Forward contact(s)
The simplest way to forward
contacts is to switch your
view to Phone list in Con-
tacts. Select the single or mul-
tiple entries that you wish to
forward, right-click and select
Forward Items. Now, type the
MAY 2003
e-mail address of the intended
person and press Send.
Manage PST file size
All the e-mails in Microsoft
Outlook are saved in a single
file with a PST extension. If
you have used Outlook for a
long time, the size of the .pst
file will be large. Keeping the
file down to a manageable size
is a problem. One way to
reduce the file size is to archive
the old items. The archived
items are then moved to
another PST file. But the
archive file size will also
increase over a period of time.
Another way is to create
many data files—one for per-
sonal mail, one for depart-
ment mail, one for company
mail, one for external client
mail, and so on. In this way
the mails will be split over
different files, resulting in
smaller single files.
To make a new data file go
to File > Data File Management.
Press Add to add a new data
file, then select the ‘Types of
storage’ as Personal Folder File
(*.pst), name the new PST file
and press OK. You can now
view the new folder. By
default, it contains a Deleted
Items folder. Now you need to
add sub-folders to store e-
mails in, and create new sort-
Control the PST file size with
Data Management
101
ing rules that will redirect your
incoming mails to this folder.
Add holidays
Marking the holidays on
your Outlook calender will
make it easier for you to plan
around them. Outlook does
have a way to add holidays,
but you will find no entry for
India. To personalise it to
Indian holidays, you need to
modify the Outlook.txt or
Outlook.hol file.
Locate the Outlook.txt or
Outlook.hol file and open
it using word pad. The file
contains a list of holidays—
You can add holidays using the
calender options
one per line, grouped by the
country name. Go to the
bottom of the file and add a
new group name—‘India’ in
square brackets, followed by
a number, denoting the
totalnumbe of entries.
Finally add the names and
dates of the holidays you
want to mark.
It should look something
like this:
[India] 3
Republic Day: 2003/01/26
Independence Day: 2003/8/15
Gandhi Jayanti: 2003/10/2
You can add as many hol-
idays as you want, as long as
you add the proper count
after the square brackets.
Now, go to Tools > Options >
Calendar Options > Add Holi-
days, search for the entry
‘India’, select it and press OK.
Add-ins
Outlook has add-ins to facil-
itate and automate many fre-
quent tasks. These are easily
downloadable from the
Internet. Here are some of
the more popular ones.
Manage attachments
Attachment add-ins help in
extracting attachments from
e-mails into a folder. Most
add-ins remove the attach-
ments but add a link to the
file in the e-mail. An exam-
ple of one such add-in is
TODI. The add-in and infor-
mation on how to install
and use it is available at
Automatically sort your
attachments in to specific folders
http://www.aufgang.org/koch
/homepage/software/todi.htm
. Auto print
The print add-ins are for
offices that constantly
require to print e-mails. Add-
ins in this category print
the e-mail as soon as it
arrives. One such add-in
can be bought at http://www.
sperrysoftware.com
Always inform BOSS
Some organisations pass
about a large amount of cor-
respondence in the form of
e-mails. In such cases, it is
mostly mandatory to mark a
copy to the project or
department head, so that
the progress of the project
can be tracked. Certain add-
ins put in a default e-mail
address, that is added to
every e-mail that is sent,
without the knowledge of
the sender. One such add-in,
called ‘Always BCC’, can be
bought at www.sperrysoft-
ware.com
Time stamp
Sometimes your e-mails take
hours to reach the recievers,
even over an Intranet. There
are add-ins that time stamp
the exact time and date of
when you sent an e-mail. This
helps to keep an exact record
35
of important e-mails. These
add-ins can be enabled or dis-
abled with a mouse click. You
can get one such add-in from
http://www.sperrysoftware.com/jc
TimeDateSignature.asp
Mass mail
Mass mailing has become the
new mantra of marketing
gurus, add-ins that enable
Mass mailing from Outlook
are available. The add-ins
vary in the features they pro-
vide—some just help you
send e-mails, while others
help you sort the responses as
well. PC iMail is available at
http://www.prosoftapps.com/
pcimail.htm. It can extract
MAY 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
addresses from your Outlook
address book. Depending on
your security settings, you
may get a pop up asking for
permission to carry out the
operation or stop it.
Auto zip attachments
This add-in helps to reduce
bandwidth requirements.
Whenever you attach a file
in a new e-mail, this add-in
converts your attachment
into a zip file reducing its
file size, in turn, reducing
the time taken to transfer
the e-mail. One of the add-
You can automatically Zip
outgoing e-mail attachments
36 ins in this category is bxAu-
toZip from www.baxbex.com.
Before any e-mail is sent,
bxAutozip compresses and
zips attached files.
Reminders via e-mail
Some might wonder about the
uses of e-mail reminders. They
can be sent to yourself, your
colleagues, subordinates, boss-
es, or even friends. Another
advantage is that the
reminders aren’t limited to
Outlook users, as they can be
sent even to non Outlook
users. This add-in is available
at www.sperrysoftware.com.
Access files from home
This is a unique add-in and
perhaps the most exciting.
102
You can use e-mail reminders to
organise your daily schedule
Once installed it lets you
access any file remotely from
your computer via e-mail.
You just write an e-mail spec-
ifying the path of the file and
you get a return e-mail with
the file as an attachment. It
takes care of the security issue
by allowing you to specify the
return address initially. Thus
whenever a request arrives
the file needed is sent to only
that e-mail addtess. Howev-
er, you should know the path
of the file in advance, as it
does not allow you to view
directory structures.
Auto redirect
Not all companies have a Web-
mail facility, they just provide
POP3 access from com puters,
within the organisation. You
won’t be allowed to access
your e-mail from outside the
company premises. In such a
situation, you need a tool that
redirects your e-mail to a
Web-based e-mail account,
which will allow you to access
them from anywhere outside
office. One such add-in is
AutoRedirect from IvaSoft
(http://victori. hypermart.net/
autoredirect.html). This add-in
creates a folder within the
Inbox, called Redirect: xyz@
something.com.
As soon as you restart
Outlook, it will ask you for
the e-mail address to which
you wish to redirect your e-
mails to. If you drop any e-
mail into this new folder it
will automatically be for-
warded to the e-mail address
you have set. Next, create
some rules in Outlook that
would drop a copy of all your
mail to the redirect folder
You can redirect company e-
mail to a Web mail account for
easy access away from work
created. You can now access
your e-mails through a Web-
mail service.
If the e-mails are not for-
warded, you might be using
Outlook in Internet Mail
Only (IMO) mode. In this
case you will need another
add-in called redirector2002
to support AutoRedirect. This
add-in is also available at the
IvaSoft Web site http://vic-
tori.hypermart.net/redirec-
tor.html. To check what mode
Outlook is running in, go to
Help > About Microsoft Out-
look, the second line or text
string will tell you which
mode your Outlook is con-
figured in.
Whenever an e-mail is
sent Outlook might pop
up a message box asking
for permission to forward
the e-mail. You can disable
this message box by adding
another add-in from IvaSoft
available at http://www.
express-soft.com/mailmate/
clickyes.html
Auto reply
Replying to each and every e-
mail in your mailbox can take
up a lot of time. Add-ins can
be used to send pre-formatted
responses, depending upon
the content of the e-mail
You can configure the add-in
to search for words such as
resume, bio-data, etc and
instruct it to send a precom-
piled e-mail to the sender.
The add-in is available at
http://www.nextword.com/
autoReplyprod.htm
SMS
Typing an SMS on your cell
phone can cause eye strain.
With this new plug-in you
can SMS in the form of an
e-mail, using a persons
mobile number as the e-mail
Use the auto reply to answer
your mails when on vacation
address. The plug-in is
available at http://www.
tamingthebeast.net/ringtones/
sms-plugin.htm. However, there
is a fee applicable.
MAY 2003

EUDORA
For all you Eudora fans out there, learn how to
enhance your e-mail experience
Insert recipients
quickly
If you send frequent e-mails to
certain addresses, then you
can make use of the ‘Recipient
List’ in Eudora for quick access
to their e-mail addresses. To
add a user to this list, go to
Tools > Address Book. Click on
the desired user and you will
see the entire details for the
selected user. In the Recipient
List checkbox, select Yes.
Once you have added the
desired users to the Recipient
List, sending e-mail to them
will be much easier. To do this,
right click in the To, Cc or Bcc
box, select ‘Insert Recipient’
and click on the desired user.
Remove bar while reply
Those who are irritated by the
bar that appears while reply-
ing, there is some good news.
There are shortcut keys to
remove those bars. Select the
lines from which you wish to
remove the bar and press [Ctrl]
+ [.]. If you need to add those
103
bars again, select the lines and
press [Ctrl] + [Shift] + [.].
Sponsored mode
problem
The free version of Eudora
available on the Internet is a
sponsored version. Hence,
sometimes you might get an
error message that says
Eudora could not download
ads. To tackle this problem, you
need to locate your Eudora
folder, and go to eudpriv > ads
folder. Delete all files within the
ads folder, and restart Eudora.
The problem will vanish.
Change mail arrival
sound
You can change the sound
played whenever a new mail
arrives by assigning a .wav file
within Tools > Options > Getting
Attention. Click the unnamed
button, locate the .wav file,
and click Open. Now, when-
ever you receive a mail, your
choice of sound will be played.
Backing up all
Backing up your Eudora e-
mails is as simple as copy-past-
You can customise the tune that
plays when an e-mail is recieved
ing. Find the Eudora folder—
it’s location in Windows 98 is
c:\windows\application
data\qualcomm\eudora— select
all the files with *.mbx, *.pce,
*.txt and *.fol extensions.
Copy the selected files to a
backup storage device. The
*.mbx, *.pce and *.fol files
relate to e-mails, while *.txt
files contain the address book.
Delete the entire e-mail
Eudora, by default, does not
delete attachments. To delete
both the attachments and the
e-mail, go to Tools > Options >
You can delete e-mails in their
entirety when exiting Eudora
Attachments. Select the ‘Delete
attachments when emptying
trash’ option. From now on
e-mails will be deleted in
their entirety.
Drafts
Instead of typing similar e-
mail body text for commonly
formatted e-mails, such as
responses to standard infor-
mation requests, You can save
general layouts of the e-mails
you most commonly send.
These are saved as ‘Stationery’
in Eudora, and are all ready to
be sent later with minor last
minute changes. To create
new ‘Stationery’, go to Tools >
Stationery, a blank window
will open up. Right click in
this window and select New.
In the composition window,
fill as many fields as you wish,
and save the stationery. Send-
ing the e-mail is as simple as
double clicking a Stationery
item and making last minute
changes, if any.
Mail list
Sometimes, people have more
than one e-mail address. You
can send an e-mail to all a
persons addresses easily by
creating a Mail list. To do this,
when you create a user entry
in the address book, you see a
box stating ‘This nickname
will expand to the following
addresses’, just enter as many
e-mail addresses as you want
and your list is ready.
Hot chillies
Whenever you are composing
an e-mail, Eudora determines
your mood by checking for
37
specific words in the message.
Depending on the words and
language used, it checks the
degree of offensive material.
Eudora gives a symbolic rep-
resentation to each e-mail—1
chilly, 2 chillies or 3 chillies—
to represent the type of lan-
guage. As the offensiveness of
Eudora can gauge your mood
when you type an e-mail
MAY 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
the language used increases,
so does the number of chill-
ies. To check or change the
settings, go to Tools > Options >
MoodWatch.
Work faster
The fastest way to send e-mail
is to press [Ctrl] + [E] to open
the send e-mail box.
View all headers
Generally e-mail clients don’t
show all the header fields. To
view all header fields, open
the e-mail and click the ‘BLAH
BLAH BLAH’ button.
Filter on nick
Eudora provides a different
way to filter e-mails. Instead of
the normal filter, using the
e-mail address, Eudora allows
you to filter using nicknames.
In this way even if the e-mail
address of the person changes,
the mail will still be consid-
ered recognisable. Though, if
38 both nick and mail Id change,
it would bypass the filter. To
setup a filter go to Tools > Filter
> New. Specify the condition,
and action, and you’re done.
Vacation reply
With the help of Filter and Sta-
tionery, you can configure
Eudora to reply to all e-mails
that arrive within a specified
period. The filter acts a
dummy controller—you can
draft a personalised reply and
whenever an e-mail arrives,
during this vacation period,
the personalised draft is sent
as a reply to the sender.
E-mail traffic report
One of the useful features of
Eudora is the graphical analy-
104
sis of the amount of e-mails
being handled. It shows a
graphical chart for e-mails
arrived, e-mails sent and
Eudora usage. It shows the
report for the current day and
the previous day. Similarly, it
also shows a weekly, monthly
and yearly report.
Add-ins
Eudora has add-ins to facili-
tate and automate many fre-
quent tasks. These are easily
downloadable from the
Internet. Here are some of
the more popular ones.
Mail alert
This add-in runs as a stand-
alone program, using Eudo-
ra’s e-mail settings to poll the
e-mail server at regular inter-
vals. If it detects new e-mail
This add-in alerts you as soon as
there is an e-mail on the server
at the server, then it pops up
a window indicating the
arrival. It also provides ways
to read, reply and delete the
e-mails directly from the
server. The MailAlert add-in
can be downloaded from
http://www.diamondridge.com/so
ftware/mailalert/index.htm.
Address book to HTML
You may want to publish your
address book on your Web site
for others to refer to. This add-
in helps to export Eudora’s
address book to HTML format.
It consists of an executable
program, which needs to
You can convert your address
book to HTML, in order to
upload to a Web page
know the folder location of
the address book. In Windows
98 the default folder is C:\Win-
dows\Application Data\qual-
comm\eudora. The add-in
needs ‘NNdbase.txt’, which
contains the entire address
book of Eudora. On clicking
the convert button an html
file is created in the same fold-
er by the name NNdbase.htm.
The add-in itself provides a
way to view the converted
file. This add-in is available at
http://www.mindspring.com/~aeg
reene/eudora/.
Convert your e-mails to HTML
and upload to Web pages
Mail to HTML
Similar to the address to
HTML, is the Mail to HTML.
Let’s say you subscribe to a
mailing list and have an inter-
esting e-mail in your inbox,
which you would like to share
with others. You can upload
this to a Web site, Intranet or
Internet based, with just a few
mouse clicks. The add-in effec-
tively converts the entire
mailbox into HTML pages. It
generally finds the source fold-
er, and you have to specify the
destination folder where the
HTML files will reside after
conversion. Apart from this
you can even convert the
mails into normal text files.
The plug-in is available at
http://users.erols.com/tgitlin/
Synchronise two PCs
If you have two computers,
both running Eudora, with
seperate address books. You
can use this plug-in to syn-
chronise the address book
between both machines. It has
an interface window where
you have to select the address
file, NNdbase.txt, from first
computer and then the
address file from second com-
puter. A destination file that
consists of a compiled address
book from both machines is
created. The plug-in is avail-
able at http://eudora.interweb.be/
addins.html
Backup
BackDora, an add-in from
ajsystems.com, helps to back-
up Eudora e-mails and the
address book. It combines
important files into a com-
pressed zip file. The add-in is
available as a free download at
http://eudora.interweb.be/addins.
html. The add-in works as a
You can backup your important
e-mails and your address book
standalone application, but
uses Eudora’s settings. When
you run BackDora for the first
time, you will be requested to
select the profile to backup.
MAY 2003
 EVOLUTION
Using Evolution just got simpler. Learn how to
use the add-ins and tips to your advantage
Setting up LDAP
Many companies provide
LDAP (Lightweight Directory
Access Protocol) servers for
tracking people’s contact
information. To configure an
LDAP server in Evolution go
to Tools > Settings, select the
‘Directory Servers’ tab and
click Add. You will see the
LDAP configuration assistant.
Click on Next and enter the
server name, for example
ldap.somecompany.com, and
select the login type. Click
Next, select the port number
to use—by default it is 389—
and enter the search options,
if any. Select a display name,
click Next and click on Finish.
You can use Evolution settings
to set up an LDAP server
105
vFolders
vFolders are virtual folders,
which can be used to receive
mail using specific search cri-
teria. This is quite similar to
filters except that vFolders do
not contain any e-mail—
what appears in the virtual
folders are just links to actual
e-mails contained in the
inbox. Deleting mails in
vFolders does not delete them
from the inbox.
To create a new virtual
folder, select Tools > Virtual
Folder Editor. Click Add and
specify the rule name, for
instance, Huge Mails. Select
the If criteria, for example,
file size, and the vFolder
sources, and click Ok.
Use vFolders in Evolution to sort
e-mails virtually
Emptying trash
It is tiresome to delete mails
from the inbox and then again
from the Trash. A better option
is to let Evolution delete the
You can Empty the trash folder on
exit to save time
trash, when you exit. To set this
option, click on Tools > Settings,
and select the Mail Preferences
tab. Under deleting mail, check
Empty trash folders on exit.
Importing contacts
from Outlook
Using Outlook, export all your
contacts to a .csv file. A perl
script csv2vcard.pl is provided
in Evolution to convert .csv
files to VCard (.vcf) files. Use
the command: csv2vcard. pl file-
name.csv filename.vcf and import
the .vcf file into Evolution
using File > Import. Select
‘Import a single file’ and click
Next, then select the file type
as Vcard and type in the file-
name. Click on the Import
button and select a folder, to
which the file will be import-
ed, and click Ok to finish.
Managing recent mail
If you get annoyed by the
huge e-mails lined up in your
mailbox and only want
recent mail, then Evolution
has the perfect solution for
you. You can set it to display
recent mails by going to
Search > Advanced. Type in a
rule name, such as daily mail
or recent mail, select Date
received under the If criteria.
Click on ‘Click here to select
a date’, and select Compare
against ‘A time relative to the
Letting only recent mail into the
mailbox
current time’. Adjust the
number of minutes, hours,
days, etc., according to your
preferences and click Ok.
Prevent image loading
In order to prevent images
from loading in Evolution, go
to Tools > Settings, click on the
Mail Preferences tab. Here,
select HTML Mail and click
39
You can prevent images from
loading in Evolution
on ‘Never load images off the
Net’, and click Apply/OK.
Creating a new e-mail
account
To create a new account, go to
Tools >Settings and select Mail
Accounts. Click Add, fill in
the details, and select the
server type—generally POP.
Give the name of the POP
server, such as pop.jasub-
MAY 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
hai.com, and your username.
Make sure that the Authenti-
cation type is Password, and
then click Next. Set the e-mail
checking and message storage
options as per your personal
preferences. Select the server
type (generally SMTP), type in
the host name and your user-
name. Click Next. Type the
name of the account (by
Configure new accounts easily
using the Account: Assistant
default it will be your e-mail
ID). Click Next and then
Finish to complete the
account creation.
40 Using colour
Quoted text can be highlight-
ed using various colours in
Evolution, unlike the tradi-
tional methods of indenting
quotations. Go to Tools >Set-
tings and click on Mail Prefer-
ences. In the General tab,
select ‘Highlight quotations
Highlight quoted text with your
choice of colours
106
with color’ and select the
preferred colour.
Enable spell checking
Go to Tools > Settings, select
Composer Preferences and
click on the Spell Checking
tab. In the option section,
select ‘Check spelling while I
type’. Adjust the colour of mis-
spelled words and click Ok.
Adding folders to
Summary
In Evolution, the Summary
page displays your most
important folders. By default
it displays the inbox of the
default account. But what
if one of your accounts is
equally important and
deserves a place in the
Summary? You can add
another folder by going to
Tools > Settings. Click on
‘Summary Preferences’ and
select the required folders.
Adding news feeds
The Summary page displays
news feeds from many Web
sites using RDF (Resource
Description Format). To add
news feeds, go to Tools > Set-
tings, click on Summary Pref-
erences and then the News
Feeds tab. Select from the
given list of Web sites, and
click on Add. To add a Web
site of your own choice, other
Subscribe to news feeds using
Evolution
You can add news feeds of your
choice in Evolution
than those provided in the
default list, click on the ‘Add
news feed’ button, give the
name and address of the Web
site and click on Ok. The Web
site will now appear in the list
of available news feeds.
Adding emoticons
To add emoticons or smileys
to messages, start composing
a message and place the cur-
sor at the required line. Then
select Insert > Smileys and insert
the emoticon you want. In
case the emoticons don’t
show, go to Tools > Settings,
Select the Automatically insert
smiley option to customise your
e-mails
click on Composer Preferences >
General, uncheck ‘Automati-
cally insert smiley images’
and click Ok.
Open folders in a new
window
Sometimes it is much better to
open many folders in multiple
windows so that you are not
restricted to doing one thing at
a time. To do this in Evolution,
just right click on the folder in
the folder bar and select Open
in a new window. If the folder
bar is not visible, select View >
Folder Bar from the menu.
Default forward style
Forwarding e-mail is one of
the most frequent e-mail
activities. Forwarding mail
can be done in a number of
ways—inline, quoted, or as
attachments. In Evolution,
you can specify a default
method. Go to Tools > Settings
and click on Composer Prefer-
Set the forwarding and reply
styles in Evolution settings
ences > General. In the Default
behavior section, select the
Forward Style as Attachment,
Inline or Quoted.
Composing HTML mail
Writing an e-mail in plain text
can be monotonous, which is
why users may prefer using
HTML. Evolution provides
facilities for formatting text in
a variety of ways using HTML.
To enable this, go to Tools > Set-
tings and click on Composer
Preferences. Select the General
tab and check ‘Format mes-
sages in HTML’.
MAY 2003
insight ■
■ tips and tricks

Leaving
xplorer
behind
We dissect two of the best Web browsers 41
that serve to tame the Internet experience:
Opera and Mozilla take up the Web
gauntlet and teach Internet Explorer a trick
or two. With features galore, we show you
how to get the best of the two
IMAGING: Atul Deshmukh

For Windows and Linux

Opera 7.10 with Java
Mozilla 1.3

For Windows
contents
42 Opera
Plug-ins for both browsers
45 Mozilla

237 JUNE 2003

 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
OPERA
Tabbed browsing, mouse gestures and a great
e-mail client Opera never looked better
ILLUSTRATIONS: Mahesh Benkar
Multiple sessions
You can start your browsing
experience with the same set
of Web sites every time by
saving those sites as a session.
This done, you can ask Opera
42 to start with your saved ses-
sion whenever you boot the
browser. For example, if you
visit a Web-based e-mail and
a few news sites, open them
and click on File > Sessions >
Save session. A session is saved
with a .win extension. You
can save this file anywhere,
but the default location is
You can recover your crashed
browsing sessions from here
238
advised. Note that you can
always recall these saved Web
site sessions even while
browsing some other sites;
File > Sessions > Insert Session will
take care of this.
Next, press [Alt] + [P] to
bring the Preferences dialog,
and head to File > Preferences >
Start, and Exit. Then click on
the ‘Show startup dialog’
check-box. This will show
the startup dialog box every
time you boot into Opera.
This box allows you to main-
tain multiple sessions and
eliminates the frustration
associated with a browser
crash—you can start brows-
ing at exactly the point
where the crash occurred—a
very useful feature.
The default path for the
saved sessions is:
Windows 2000/XP:
C:\Documents and Settings\
<login name>\Application
Data\Opera\Opera7\
profile\sessions\opera.win
Windows 95/98: C:\ Win-
dows\Application Data\Opera\
Opera7\sessions\opera.win
Tabbed browsing
Opera comes with a great
tabbed browsing feature. To
use this, first ensure that the
Page Bar is enabled; View >
Page Bar > Top should do this.
Call a new tab by either
pressing [Ctrl] + [N] or by dou-
ble-clicking on an empty
Page Bar area. You can also
open a tab in the back-
ground by right-clicking on
a link and select- thankfully, can
ing ‘Open in Press F11 for be tweaked into
background the full-screen a leaner inter-
page’—a better mode toggle; face. Right-click
feature as it lets [Shift] + [F11] is the on the Main
you browse the small-screen mode, Bar, click on
parent page while for handhelds and ‘Images only’,
the link opens other small-screen and then
without disturb- devices uncheck ‘Large
ing you. Note that images’. Right-
once a background tab fin- click on it again and choose
ishes loading a Web page, Left; then disable the Per-
the text of the tab will sonal Toolbar by right-click-
change colour to indicate ing on it and selecting ‘Off’.
this. Switch off the Hotlist by
You can browse between pressing [F4].
tabs using the [Ctrl] + [Tab] Go to View > Status Bar >
Bottom, View > Page Bar > Top,
View > Address Bar > Top, View
Navigation Bar > Auto. You can
drag-and-drop elements to
the toolbars. We will do so
for the Address Bar. Right-
click on it and choose ‘Cus-
tomize toolbars’. You will
Done rendering background tab find three tabs here, Large,
Small and Fields. The last tab
combination. You can also is where you will find search
use the mouse to do this:
Keep the right-mouse button
options—Zoom and Status
field. Let us add the Google
pressed and use the scroll search field to the Address
button to move up and Bar. Just click on it and drag
down the list of tabs. it to the bar. Note that it is a
Any active window, such drop-down field and an
as a tab, can be closed by especially useful search crite-
pressing [Ctrl] + [W]. You can rion is the ‘Find’ in page
close all open tabs by press- search, which highlights
ing [Ctrl] + [Shift] + [W]. To keywords within the Web
close all tabs but the one you
are browsing under, press
[Ctrl] + [Alt] + [W]. You can
also change the position of
the tabs by dragging and
dropping them wherever
you deem them to be fit.
Clothes that make the
browser You can drag and drop toolbars
The default user interface of to customise the Opera UI
Opera is a space-hog but
JUNE 2003
page as you type in the field.
Bound together
You can create copies of the
current page that you are
browsing. This enables you
to maintain a cloned copy of
the page for cross-referencing
or comparison. Right-click on
a page and select ‘Duplicate’
or press [Ctrl] + [Shift] + [N] to
do this.
Magic Wand
Logging into Web sites is a
much simpler task, thanks to
the Wand feature—a pass-
word and forms manager. Log
in to a site and let Opera save
your username and password.
When you next come to the
same site, the login boxes will
be bordered golden. Press
[Ctrl] + [Enter] at the login
screen and Opera will fill the
requisite personal informa-
tion and automatically login.
All Wand passwords can
be cleared from Delete private
data on the File menu. Your
usernames and passwords are
scrambled by the Wand before
they are saved to disk. Howev-
er, for added protection you
may set a master password in
Opera's Security preferences.
Press [Alt] + [P] and go to the
Security section of the Prefer-
ences dialog box. Click on ‘Set
password’ next to ‘Master
You can enable or disable the
Wand from here
239
password’ for added security. you back to a site in the
You can also change it when history. If you have jumped
Opera asks you for the pass- from Google.com to
word, and when it asks Thinkdigit.com, you can
whether the same should be rewind back to Google by
used for both the e-mail client pressing [Shift] + [Z]. Rewind
and the Wand. takes you back a Web site, so
unless you have followed
Download manager Opera supports searching more than one link at
Opera comes with a down- from the Address bar, find Thinkdigit.com, you can
load manager (Transfers) that the appropriate alphabets press [Shift] + [Z] to go instant-
can pause, resume and for engines here ly back to Google. Pressing
retransfer a corrupted down- [Z], on the other hand, would
load. You can specify a default the list of engines supported take you just one page back.
download directory. Press [Alt] and the associative alphabet. Note that [Shift] + [X] takes
+ [P] > Programs and Paths and Here, you can also change you forward in a similar vein.
the relevant pane can be the number of results dis-
played per page. Slideshow
To use the Address Bar for In a Web site that has a lot of
a Google search, press [F8] and images linked in a continu-
precede a query with a g, eg: ous manner (eg. a site that
g X-Men movie Web site displays family photos or
[Enter], will search for the ‘X- screenshots of games), you
Men…’ string in Google. can use the Slideshow feature
of Opera to enjoy the pic-
Choose a default path to Forward rewind tures better. The FastForward
download all files to When viewing a page with no button displays photo files
user forward history, Opera on the Web in a slideshow.
found on the right. You can will try to detect a possible
also choose external pro- forward link that you can
To see photos full-screen on a
black background, press [F11]
43
grams for viewing the source access. The Forward icon will to invoke Opera’s presenta-
code of a page, etc here. Press change into a FastForward tion tool OperaShow.
[Ctrl] + [Alt] + [T] to quickly call icon when this is possible.
the Transfer window. Certain Web sites, mostly Reload time
forums and search engines, Opera can reload a Web site
Search me have a single link at the bot- after a user-specified time.
Opera supports several tom that takes you to the Right-click on a Web page and
search engines. You can next page of posts. Try it with go to Reload every > Enable. Note
either type in a query into a search engine to go to the
the search field—[Shift] + Next page link, or when read-
[F8]—or you can use the ing a multi-page article. It can
Address Bar to do the same. detect link-next elements,
Every engine is associated and will perform checks to
with a single alpha- find one if not.
bet, thus Google Press [F12] for Press the
gets a ‘g’, Down- quick access to spacebar to
load.com gets a 'w', preferences, such follow the link
etc. Press [Alt] + [P] as pop-up block- to the next Opera can automatically reload
and go to the ing and disabling post, or page. a Web page after a set amount
Search option for GIF animations Rewind takes of time
JUNE 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
that you can also set a custom background window. Here are
time to reload at, say, every 2 some of the gestures support-
minutes and 30 seconds. The ed by Opera, to use them: Click
Custom dialog box also lets and hold right mouse button,
you reload only if the Web page move the mouse in the indi-
has expired (as determined by cated directions then release
the site programmer). the right mouse button.
Open new document
By proxy Move down
To set up a proxy server, press Reload
[Alt] + [P] > Network > Proxy Move up and down
Servers. Add the address and Restore or maximize
port number for the appropri- window
ate proxy server type here and Move up then right
make sure that the check box Minimise
is ticked. You can also disable Move down then left
proxy for certain addresses, Duplicate window
Move down then up
Close document
Move down then right,
or move right-left-right
Note it down
Opera lets you keep snippets
of text from Web sites as
notes. For example, a partic-
ularly interesting piece of
Enter information on your proxy news can be saved for pos-
44 server here terity as a note. To do this
select any amount of text off
such as within a LAN, and a Web page, right-click and
can point Opera to an auto- click on Copy to note ([Ctrl] +
matic proxy configuration [Shift] + [C]). Notes can then
URL, if your ISP requires such be accessed by pressing the
a setting. [F4] key, to invoke the Hotlist
under the Notes section. You
Mouse gestures can delete notes here and
Mouse gestures are a novel way create new ones as well. You
to navigate the Web using can also send a note via e-
Opera. For example, you can mail by right-clicking on it.
hold the right mouse button
and draw an 'L' into a Web The Hotlist
page to tell Opera The Hotlist panel is
to close it. Similarly, Double-click toggled by the [F4]
you can hold a on a blank key. It is a reposito-
right-clicked mouse page or press ry of useful stuff—
over a link and [Ctrl] + [Space] Bookmarks, Mail,
move the mouse to go to your Contacts, History
down, then up to home page and Transfers can
open the link in the be accessed from
240
Keyboard shortcuts
Here is how you can use the keyboard to navigate and use Opera
more efficiently:
Command Key combination
Find text [Ctrl] + [F]
Find next instance of text [F3]
Find previous instance of text [Shift] + [F3]
Display context (right-click) menu [Ctrl] + [M]
Preview page as if printed [P]
Close all pages and exit Opera [Ctrl] + [Q]
Enter a Web address [F2]
Paste and go [Ctrl] + [D]
Enter nickname for fast bookmark access [Shift] + [F2]
Go to parent directory [Ctrl] + [Backspace]
Go to next page in history (or Fast Forward) [X]
Go to previous page in history [Z]
File a page as new bookmark [Ctrl] + [T]
Save selected link as new bookmark [Ctrl] + [Shift] + [T]
Manage bookmarks [Ctrl] + [Alt] + [B]
Show transfers [Ctrl] + [Alt] + [T]
Set your preferences [Alt] + [P]
Set focus to address field [F8]
Set focus to search field [Shift] + [F8]
Check e-mail [Ctrl] + [K]
Write new e-mail [Ctrl] + [E]
Go to next e-mail [J]
Go to next unread e-mail [Shift] + [J]
Go to previous e-mail
Go to previous unread e-mail
[U]
[Shift] + [U]
Reply to e-mail [R]
Reply to all recipients of e-mail [Shift] + [R]
Recognize sender of e-mail as new contact [A]
View all e-mail associated with sender [E]
here. It also provides a quick
listing of all the windows
open (Windows), informa-
tion on the Web page that
you are browsing (Info), and a
listing of all the links off a
Web page (Links).
If that is not enough, you
can customise this panel by
adding games, news pages,
dictionaries, etc. To show a
Web page in the Hotlist,
bookmark the page by press-
You can play a game like Snake ing [Ctrl] + [T] and select to
here, right inside the Hotlist show it as a panel. You can
JUNE 2003
find more panels, specifically
designed for the slim, vertical
layout that the Hotlist offers,
at http://my. opera.com/cus-
tomize/panel/.
Bookmarks
To file a bookmark, press
[Ctrl] + [T], you can show the
page under the Hotlist or on
the Personal Bar here. You
can also give a bookmark a
Nickname. For example, by
giving Thinkdigit.com the
nickname of Home, you can
enter Home in the Address
bar and Opera will take you
to the Web site. Make sure
you do not assign a com-
mon URL such as Microsoft.
A bookmarked site gets
precedence over a URL. So
typing Microsoft will take
you to Thinkdigit.com in
this case.
Manage your bookmarks
by pressing [Ctrl] + [Alt] + [B].
Note that deleted ones are
stored in a Trash folder. You
can import bookmarks from
IE, Netscape, Mozilla, etc, over
here. You can also export your
current bookmarks for backup
or other purposes.
Assign a nickname to a Web site
to visit it via the nick in the
Address bar
241
Mail
It is possible to import e-
mails to Opera’s M2 e-mail
client, from earlier versions
of Opera, Outlook Express,
Eudora, Netscape Mail (only
version 6 and 7), or any
mailbox stored in the gener-
ic mbox format, including
older versions of Netscape.
Select File > Import > Mail to
import your e-mail. You can
import different accounts,
folders, settings and con-
tacts. When importing from
Opera 6, the folder structure
will be copied to My folder
and the imported e-mails
will be saved to the Received
folder.
Quick reply is useful for
chat-like conversations. You
can type a short text that will
be appended to the top of the
original quoted message.
When you are viewing a mail,
type your message in the text
box and click on the Quick
reply button. This will send
the reply to all the recipients
of the original e-mail.
Set up filters for My
folders and Spam by right-
clicking on a folder and
then Properties. Click on
Add filter, Boolean operators
are supported—you can
match your filters by com-
ponents such as Sender, To
header, or Entire mail. The
condition can be set to
‘Contains’, ‘Doesn’t con-
tain’, or ‘Matches regular
expression’. When you are
finished with each filter, set
the filters to ‘And’ if your
messages must satisfy all
the filter terms or ‘Or’ if
they only need to match
one of them.
MOZILLA
Claiming to be the fastest browser out there,
Mozilla has lots of tricks up its sleeve, such as
an IRC and an e-mail client
Image blocking
You can change the behav-
iour that Mozilla defaults to
for images. Image loading
can be turned off complete-
ly, image animations can be
forced to loop once or never,
You can change default
behaviour for images here
or you can specifically ask
Mozilla to only load images
that originate from the
server you are visiting—
effectively eliminating
advertisements and banners
that are hosted on other
servers. Go to Edit > Prefer-
ences > Privacy & Security >
Images to defines such intent.
Note that you can also block
images in Mail and News-
group messages
from here.
Popup
Windows
Those annoying
popup ads can be
turned off from Edit >
Preferences > Privacy
& Security > Popup
Windows. You can
also define Web sites as
exceptions for both,
allowing and suppressing
pop-up windows. Additional-
45
You can specify certain Web
sites, which Mozilla will allow
pop-up windows for.
ly, Mozilla can play a confir-
mation and can display an
icon in the status bar, upon
successful popup blocking.
Form manager
To better fill out forms on
Web sites, the Form Manger
can remember your personal
information. Go to Edit > Pref-
erences > Privacy & Security >
Forms and click on the ‘Save
data from…’ check box. Fur-
ther more, you can also pre-
fill personal details by
clicking on the 'Manage
JUNE 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks

right into the Sidebar.

Sidebar
The Sidebar can display
browsing History, your Book-
marks, and the search engines
A master password can be used amongst other things. These
to effectively lock your sensitive 'other things' can be down-
The Form Manager can store data loaded from http://dmoz.org/ Mozilla’s in-built IRC client can
your personal data to better fill Netscape/Sidebar/. There, you be accessed with [Ctrl] + [F3]
online forms also be tagged to a timelim- will find calendars, games,
it—useful if your PC is used news, and reference sites. To the channel.
Stored Form Data' button. by multiple users. add something to the Sidebar, Also available is a down-
Contact information, billing click on its name, and a con- load manager—Tools > Down-
details and shipping particu- Search firmation window will let you load Manager—which lets you
lars can all be separate sets Mozilla lets you perform a complete the process. The pause and resume your down-
of data, granting search on Google, amongst Sidebar can be toggled on and loads (double-click on a file to
greater flexibility. other popular off by pressing the [F9] key. do this) without the need for
After you have Type about:config engines. You
configured this, in the address bar to can type the
you can save a rel- get a comprehensive text that you
evant form's data listing of all the wish to search
from Edit > Save tweaks and under- for in the
Form Info and the the-hood operations Address Bar.
saved data can be that Mozilla will let This should
loaded by clicking you play with bring down a
on Edit > Fill in drop-menu
Form. You can from where Pause and resume downloads,

46 select which
auto-fill here.
fields to you can select the search
engine and press [Enter].
The contents of the Sidebar can
be customised to suit your need
using the Download Manager

To change the engine used, an external manager. Howev-

Password Manager go to Edit > Preferences > Naviga- er, it cannot split a file into
The Password Manager can tor > Internet Search; you can You can add, remove and multiples for faster downloads.
store your login information also choose to display search change the order of entries in
for password protected Web results in the sidebar. the sidebar by right-clicking Proxy server
sites, mail and news servers. If you choose the on the bar and selecting Cus- You can define your network's
You can turn on this option Advanced radio button of the tomize Sidebar. proxy server (if it has one)
from Edit > Preferences > Privacy Sidebar Search Tab Preference, under Edit > Preferences >
& Security > Passwords. You can you can type in text to search Miscellaneous tools Advanced > Proxies. If your net-
also encrypt this stored data. Mozilla comes bundled with work uses a script for proxy
Stored data such as passwords an IRC client, press [Ctrl] + [3] detection and switching, you
can have a master password to invoke it. You can choose can type the address of the
acting as a safety mechanism. from the default list of servers script file under the Automat-
This way Mozilla can confirm that are tagged within the ic proxy configuration URL
your identity before auto-fill- client or go to a personal radio text.
ing login information, and favourite by typing in the
such. You can ask the brows- address in the input line Tabbed browsing
er to ask you the master pass- below. To join a channel type Taking a page out of Opera,
word the first time it is You can change the search ‘/join xyz’ in the input line, Mozilla also allows opening
needed or every time. It can engine from here where ‘xyz’ is the name of new Web pages onto tabs.

242 JUNE 2003


Tabbed browsing in Mozilla is
not as appealing as it is in
Opera
You can play with how this
works under Edit > Preferences >
Navigator > Tabbed Browsing.
Click on ‘Load links in the
background’ to open links in
the background tab. You can
also define a middle-click on
a link or a [Ctrl] + [Enter] in the
address bar to open a tab by
default, instead of a new win-
dow. Tabs can be navigated by
using the [Ctrl] + [PgUp] and
[Ctrl] + [PgDown] keys. Tabs,
like any daughter window in
Mozilla, can be closed by
pressing [Ctrl] + [W].
Save sets of tabs as a group
bookmark by going to Book-
marks > File Bookmark
([Ctrl]+[Shift]+[B]) and check-
ing File as group. Now, when
you go to this bookmark, all
the tabs will open at once.
Multizilla is a Mozilla add-
on that adds better tabbed
functionality to the browser.
Get it at http://multizilla.
mozdev.org/. A stable version is
slated to be out by the time
you read this.
Bookmark keywords
Keywords are custom short-
cuts to bookmarks. To set a
keyword, go to Bookmarks >
Manage Bookmarks (or press
243
file—Exit Mozilla, Filtered
including Quick The Windows mail
Launch, go to version of Mozilla You can set up
your profile folder can notify you of filters for e-mail
(see the Who am new messages if messages. Start
I? box for further Mail or News is the e-mail
information), open. Go to Edit > client, go to
back up the Preferences > Mail Tools > Message
prefs.js file in case & Newsgroups > Filters > New and
of problems, and Notifications enter the appro-
Create (or edit) priate informa-
the file user.js. Add this tion. You can filter by Subject,
Assigning a keyword to a line to the file: user_pref(“net- Attachment, Sender, etc. Fil-
bookmark acts as a nickname work.protocol-handler.exter- tered messages can be moved
for the address field nal.mailto”, true). to another folder, labelled dif-
This will open the default
[Ctrl] + [B]) and select the system e-mail program when
bookmark you want to set a you click on an e-mail link in
keyword for. Click Properties Mozilla.
or press [Ctrl] + [I] and enter a
keyword for that bookmark. Exporting mail
You will now be able to go to Since Mozilla stores e-mail
that address by entering its files in the standard plain text
keyword in the Mozilla mbox format, almost all mail Here any message from
address bar. programs can use or import it. Programmers Heaven will be
Your e-mail files are inside moved to the PH folder
Browsing on speed your profile (see Who am I?),
Go to Edit > Preferences > in the Mail and (if you use ferently, deleted, etc.
Advanced > HTTP Networking IMAP) ImapMail folders. Each
and check Enable Pipelining. mail folder (Inbox, Sent, etc.)
Mozilla has automatic
junk mail detection; some-
47
Mozilla defaults this to ‘off’ as is stored as two files; one with thing that can be helped by
certain servers and proxies no extension (e.g. Sent), tagging spam messages as
have problems with pipelin- which is the mail file itself (in junk using the Junk Mail
ing, but when ‘on’, the mbox format), and one with a toolbar button. Tools > Junk
browser fetches everything .msf extension (e.g. Sent.msf), Mail Controls under the e-mail
on the page in a which is the client can be evoked to
single connec- Open Mail/News index to the change spam settings.
tion, rather than and go to Tools > mail file. Tell
one connection Import to import e- the other pro- Malicious e-mail
per item, boost- mail messages from gram to import JavaScript is switched off by
ing browsing per- other mail clients e-mail from the default for mail and news, so
formance. file with no an e-mail cannot run script
extension. code just by being opened.
A different mail If you want to transfer Mozilla Mail will not allow a
To make Mozilla use another an e-mail file to another virus or worm to execute
e-mail program, you can either Mozilla profile or another automatically. Attachments
install or re-install just the installation of Mozilla, simply can be viewed without a virus
browser using the Custom put the e-mail file into being able to execute. You
installation method. Or you the other installation’s would need to save an attach-
can customise the profile Mail folder. ment to your system and
JUNE 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks

run it to cause and create a Keyboard shortcuts

harm, if it is You can export new profile. Here is how you can use the keyboard to navigate and use
a virus. your bookmarks by Exit Mozilla Mozilla more efficiently:
pressing [Ctrl]+[B] to (also Quick
Profiles bring the Bookmark Launch). Command Key combination
Your profile is Manager, then click- 3. Go to the Close Window [Ctrl] + [W]
what Mozilla ing on Tools > profile folders Find [Ctrl] + [F]
identifies you Export. Import in a and copy all Find Again [F3]
with. It contains similar fashion files from the
Find Links As You Type ['] (apostrophe)
your bookmarks, old profile
Find Text As You Type [/]
mail, news files, account set- folder to the new profile
tings, stored passwords, folder, allowing existing Open search engine page [Ctrl] + [Shift] + [F]
address book, security certifi- files in the new profile’s Open Context Menu [Shift] + [F10]
cates and preferences. You folder to be replaced. Exit Mozilla [Ctrl] + [Q]
can set-up multiple identities 4. If you want to copy your Start Navigator [Ctrl] + [1]
if others share your comput- form data and passwords: Start Mail & Newsgroups [Ctrl] + [2]
er. Mozilla will boot with save some any form data
Start IRC Chat [Ctrl] + [3]
the Profile Manager if and passwords in your
Start Composer [Ctrl] + [4]
multiple profiles exist. Go to new profile. Find the two
Start > Programs > Mozilla > Pro- numbered files with *.w Start Address Book [Ctrl] + [5]
file Manager to add multiple and *.s extensions in your File a Bookmark [Ctrl] + [Shift] + [D]
profiles. new profile’s folder. Find Reload [Ctrl] + [R]
For Linux: Open a shell files with the same exten- Select all text in Location Bar [Ctrl] + [L]
prompt, cd to the Mozilla sions in your old profile Open Web Page Location [Ctrl] + [Shift] + [L]
program directory and enter folder, make copies of Caret Mode (toggle) [F7]
mozilla -profilemanager. them and rename them
Full Screen (toggle) [F11]
To find out where your so that the numbers
profile is stored, look in the match those of the files in Zoom text Smaller [Ctrl] + [-]
Zoom text Larger [Ctrl] + [+]
48 ‘Who am I?’ box. the new profile folder.
Copy them to the new New Navigator Tab [Ctrl] + [T]
Rescue me profile, replace files. Switch to next Tab [Ctrl] + [Page Down]
If your old profile has been 5. Restart the Profile Manag- Switch to Previous Tab [Ctrl] + [Page Up]
corrupted, follow these steps er and start as the new Sidebar (toggle) [F9]
to rescue your data: profile. The contents of
1. Note the name of the your old profile should
folder containing the old now have been successful- Add-Ons
profile. ly restored to the new VISIT HTTP://WWW.MOZDEV.ORG/
2. Start the Profile Manager profile. PROJECTS/ACTIVE.HTML

FOR MORE ADD-ONS

Who am I? MozBlog
Mozilla creates profiles for storing various settings, passwords, Blog with Mozilla while you
etc. This information is located at different places for different surf
OSes; note that some of these files or directories may be hidden: http://mozblog.mozdev.org/
Windows XP/2000: C:\Documents and Settings\[Windows Login Mouse Gesture Support
Name]\Application Data\Mozilla\Profiles\[Profile Name]\[random Navigate the Web using click-
string].slt\ and-drag mouse gestures
Windows 95/98: C:\Windows\Application Data\Mozilla\ http://optimoz.mozdev.org/
Profiles\[Profile Name]\[random string].slt\ gestures/
Linux: ~/.mozilla/[Profile Name]/[random string].slt/ Piemenus
A radical way to access the
Add Piemenu to Mozilla
Mozilla UI, piemenus reduce
mouse movements and are
thus easier and faster to get
used to
http://www.gamemakers.de/mozil
la/radialcontext/

244 JUNE 2003

insight ■
■ tips and tricks

Jumpin’
Jukeboxes
If the audiophile in you is looking for
ways on making the most of the
music (and videos) sitting on your 49
hard disk, here come some power
user tips on managing the best media
players in the world today.

GRAPHIC DESIGN : Atul Deshmukh

Winamp 2.91, Winamp3, Media Jukebox 8, Media Jukebox 8,

contents
MusicMatch Jukebox 8, Windows Media Player 9, iZotope Ozone 50 Winamp
for Winamp 2 and Winamp3, MuchFX2 for Winamp 2, 52 Media Jukebox 8
Bobware Stereo Delay for Winamp 2, iZotope Vinyl for Winamp 2, 53 MusicMatch Jukebox 8
Enhancer 0.17 for Winamp 2 55 Windows Media Player 9
Find them on the Mindware CD 56 Enhancing you music

117 JULY 2003

 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
WINAMP 2
This is the classic llama rocker—with its simple
exterior and plethora of features. This
skinnable player comes with video support as
well as tons of new features
ILLUSTRATIONS: Farzana Cooper
Meet the library
Winamp now comes with a
media library—the Winamp
Library. This looks pretty
similar to the Media Library
in Winamp3, but doesn’t
contain all the advanced fea-
tures. Open it by right-click-
50 ing on the Main window and
select Library. You can navi-
gate over the main sections,
called Views, from the left
side pane. To add your files,
click on Library and select
the directories containing all
your media files. Winamp
immediately separates the
audio files from the video
files, and puts each under
the correct Views.
You can also choose to
create custom Views with
The Winamp Library looks
118
specific rules for
each View.
If you flip across
the default audio
and video Views,
you will notice that
there is a lot you can
do in each View. For
example, under Audio,
you can view your collec-
tion by artiste or album.
There’s also a useful search
facility that lets you search for
files within the library, with
Search for files within the library
using the search facility
the results displayed in the
Result pane. You can narrow
down your search by entering
in multiple keywords. You can
choose to either enqueue the
results to the current playlist
or play it straight off the
library. Here’s another cool
tip; if you right-click on the
track in the Results pane, you
can choose to play all the
tracks by the same artist, or
play all the tracks in the
album, or add the files to a
playlist. Right-clicking on the
track in the Result pane will
let you access and change file
information, as well as
remove the file from the
library and the drive.
Playlist Editor
Winamp 2’s Playlist Editor
hasn’t really changed in its
new makeover. However, it
still remains the easiest to
work with. If you have just
Winamp 2's Playlist Editor is
easy to work with
loaded a huge playlist, and
want to search for one spe-
cific track, getting hold of
the search plugin for
Winamp 2 could do it. How-
ever, you can get a quick
search-and-select done by
pressing [F3]. This opens up
the ‘Jump to file’ window,
where you can enter the
search criteria.
Bookmarking
If you want to list your
Shortcuts
Task
Play, or Restart, or Unpause
Stop
Pause
Next Track
Previous Track
Winamp Preferences Menu
Winamp Library
Adding Bookmarks
Volume Increase/Decrease
Cycle focus around the windows
favourite tracks such that
they can be accessed in a
jiffy, you can bookmark
them with Winamp’s con-
venient bookmarking fea-
ture. To bookmark tracks,
right-click the selected tracks
in the Playlist Editor and
select Bookmark Item(s). You
can also use the [ALT] + [I]
combination for the same.
To access the bookmarks,
right-click on Winamp, go to
Bookmarks and pick up your
track from the list there.
Movies
Arguably, the coolest feature
in Winamp 2 is the addition
of video playback. Winamp
now supports a wide variety
of formats including MPEG,
WMV, AVI and DivX. To
playback all the DivX videos,
You can also watch movies
using Winamp 2
Shortcuts
[X]
[V]
[C]
[B]
[Z]
[Ctrl] + [P]
[Alt] + [L]
[Alt] + [I]
[ á] / [ â]
[Ctrl] + [Tab]
JULY 2003
you need to install the DivX
codec bundle separately.
Winamp’s video window
is tightly integrated into
Winamp itself. Just drop the
videos into the playlist and
click on them—your movies
will start playing!
Right-click anywhere on
Winamp, and navigate to
O p t i o n s > P r e f e r e n c e s . From
here, you can configure video
playback. If the video play-
WINAMP3
NullSoft’s Winamp3 is Winamp 2 on steroids.
It comes with support for a whole load
of audio and video formats
Main window
The Main window in
Winamp3 is the hub of all
the activity—you can con-
trol all playback settings
from here. Winamp3 also
Tweak all playback settings in
the Main window
has built-in support for
crossfading that you can
toggle from here.
Advanced Equaliser
settings
The default Equaliser inter-
Use the Advanced Equaliser
Settings to tweak crossfading
119
back quality appears to be
inferior, try turning off the
Allow video overlay option.
Plug-ins
With Winamp, you have
plugins for just about
everything-from general
plug-ins to input and
output, as well as DSP
and visualisation support.
You can find them at
www.winamp.com.
face doesn’t let you access
the crossfading and channel
balance functions. You can
enable this by clicking on
the third button from the
right, on the top-right hand
side of the window.
The Thinger
The most visible feature in
Winamp is the thingie
called the Thinger. It pro-
vides single-click access to
all the other components.
Use the Thinger to access
Use the Thinger to access the
Video Window
the Playlist editor, the Media
Library, and the Preferences
menu. You can also use it to
start the Video Window that
will let you load your
favourite video clips
and movies, as well as the
Advanced Visualisation Stu-
dio and the Winamp brows- The results of your search are
er. To toggle the Thinger, displayed in the Playlist
click on the Winamp sym- Selection window. If this fea-
bol on the bottom right side ture has been turned off, you
of the main window. can enable it by making the
Playlist Editor window active
Playlist Editor and pressing [F3].
The Playlist Editor has just
about all the features that Media Library
Winamp 2 has, and some The Media Library is a splen-
more. You can use the did Winamp3 addition, and
Playlist editor to drag and lets you catalogue your
drop in files from all over audio and video files. You
your collection, and then can enable this through the
use the extensive sorting Thinger or by right-clicking
and organising features to at the main window and
sort your music and videos. selecting Media Library.
For example, if you have Start by adding in all your
duplicate entries in the audio and video files. You
playlist, weed them out by can then use the Media
going to S e l > S e l e c t d u p l i c a t e s . Library to add the selected
This will highlight, and list songs to the Playlist Editor.
them in the Playlist Selec- It also features a handy
tion window at the right search option and the inter-
side. To remove them, click face has four windows that
on D e l > D e l e t e d u p l i c a t e d i t e m s you can use to sort the titles
or right-click in the Playlist in the list by artist, album,
editor and select ‘Remove genre, comment, genre and
duplicated entries’. year, and also use a combi-
nation of all of the options
51
Quick selection to filter out the results.
The Quick Selection box, lets
you search for files quickly Multiple Playlists
using specific search terms. You can open up multiple
Shortcuts
Task Shortcuts
Play, or Restart, or Unpause [X]
Stop [V]
Pause [C]
Next Track [B]
Previous Track [Z]
Winamp Preferences Menu [Ctrl] + [P]
Volume Increase/ Decrease [ á] / [ â]
Cycle focus around the windows [Ctrl] + [Tab]
Video in full screen mode [Alt] + [Enter]
Exit full screen mode [Esc]
JULY 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
the new window by clicking
on them.
Viewing video
Winamp3 now supports
MPEG, AVI and WMV for-
mats, as well as the ASF
streaming video format.
NullSoft also has its own
streaming video standard,
Catalogue audio and video files the NSV that is fully sup-
using the Media Library ported by Winamp3. If
you have the DivX codecs
Playlist Editor windows
by selecting P l a y l i s t > C r e a t e
p l a y l i s t i n n e w e d i t o r . In this
manner, you can edit your
playlists without making
changes to your existing
ones. Since the new playlist
opens up in a new window,
the old playlist continues
to play uninterrupted. The
new Playlist Editor window
features full drag and Winamp3 supports the ASF
drop support from the streaming video format as well
old window as well as
Explorer. When you are installed, then you will be
52 done, you can play files in able to see DivX videos.
MEDIA JUKEBOX 8
Compared to other shareware jukeboxes,
Media Jukebox comes with a rather plain
interface. But beneath its ordinary exterior lie
powerful organising and playback features
Setting options
It’s very easy to
configure your
Media Jukebox set-
tings. To access
the Settings and
Options win-
dow, go to S e t-
tings > Options .
Tweak all the
settings includ-
120
Shortcuts
Task
Play or Pause
Stop
Previous Track
Next Track
Media Jukebox Settings
Jump to Search
Jump to Playing Now
Jump to Media Library
Jump to Playlist
Toggle between mini-player
and Jukebox mode
ing the General, Playback
recording and Encoding set-
tings from there. Flip across
the options using the scroll-
able list at the left side. The
crossfading option here is
just ideal for smooth cross-
fading for a long party
playlist. You can configure
The Settings window
this from the Playback set-
tings in the Options window.
Another cool feature is that
you can set in all file associ-
ations straight from the File
Associations settings in the
Options window..
Making libraries
The Media Jukebox library
and organisation features are
second to none. To start with,
you can import all your
media files by going to File >
L i b r a r y > I m p o r t M e d i a . You can
choose the drives and folders
in which you want Media
Jukebox to search from here.
Shortcuts
[Ctrl] + [P]
[Ctrl] + [S]
[Ctrl] + [ L]
[Ctrl] + [N]
[Ctrl] + [O]
[Ctrl] + [F]
[Ctrl] + [2]
[Ctrl] + [3]
[Ctrl] + [4]
[Ctrl] + [E]
Adding your files to the Library
By clicking on Advanced, you
can configure additional
parameters such as the type
of media file, and also set
other advanced options.
Finally, click on Start Search
to start the search. Media
Jukebox will display the
results and let you add them
to the library.
Using the library
The library can be accessed
from the main window, by
clicking on Media Library in
the left pane. The organisa-
tion tree opens up and you
can browse the library by
album, artiste, genre, and so
on. Clicking on each of them
further opens up the tree, and
this lets you see individual
entries under each section.
You can add the files that you
want to play to the current
playlist by right-clicking on
the file and selecting Play.
JULY 2003
You can also rename, move, enter ‘a r t i s t = O f f s p r i n g ’ and will be prompted for a pass-
or delete the file, by accessing ‘~ t = 6 0 ’ in the search pane. word. In the party mode, the
the options when you right- Here ~t limits the playtime more advanced disk and file
click on the file. to ‘t’ minutes. Typing in features (such as deleting)
The library comes with a ‘d o o r s’ and ‘j i m m o r r i s o n ’ will are protected. You will need
powerful search feature too. create a smartlist that nar- to use the password to switch
To access the search feature, Making a Smartlist rows down the results to The back to the normal mode.
click on the Media Library in Doors and Jim Morrison. You
the main window. In the Once you have created the can create any number of Movies on the Jukebox
search text pane, you can playlist, you can fill it up with such smartlists based on Media Jukebox can also play
enter in the search string. your favourite songs. You can numerous criteria that you your favourite videos and
The really cool thing about drag and drop the media files can define. movies. With support for the
its search feature is that you from Explorer. To do so from DivX, QuickTime and Real
can search using just about Media Library, select the Party mode lockup formats, this is a versatile
any criteria, including the songs or the criteria that you Media Jukebox is perfect for video player. To play media
usual artist and album, and want to import. Right-click creating party playlists where files in the QuickTime and
year searches. For offbeat on it, head to S e n d T o > P l a y l i s t you would like to have your Real formats, you will need
searches, you can search by and select the playlist that guests browse the playlists to have the QuickTime and
comment, bit rate, the last you have created. You can and have non-destructive Real players installed sepa-
played songs, the playlists, even do this from the Playing access to the files. To access rately. To play DivX videos,
and also search giving the Now list. the party mode, go to View you will need to have the
file types option. Smartlists are better than and select Party Mode. You DivX codec bundle installed.
Playlists—you can embed
Playlists and Smartlists special rules within them
Create custom playlists by using select keywords. For MUSICMATCH JUKEBOX 8
right-clicking on Playlists on example, if you want to
the left pane of the main win- make a selection of songs by In the age of all-in-one complete players
dow, and select Add Playlist, one particular artiste for a and jukeboxes comes MusicMatch Jukebox.
or go to E d i t > A d d P l a y l i s t . time limit of sixty minutes, The all-new Version 8 of MusicMatch Jukebox 53
has slick, colourful skinnable interface,
Some common Smartlist keywords increased Super Tagging features,
Keyword Usage Example as well as unique visualization features
artist= ar="jim morrison"
album= al="morrison hotel"
name= name="blue sunday"
numberplays= numberplays=10
(returns all files played 10 times)
bitrate= bitrate=256
(returns all files with bitrate equal to 256 kbps)
~a ~a blue sunday
(get full album containing this song)
~s ~s 700
(limited to 700 MB size)
Recorder quality do so, go to O p t i o n s > S e t t i n g s
~t ~t 60
settings and click on the Recorder
(Time limited to 60 mins)
You can set in your own per- tab. You can set file encoding
~n ~n 25 sonal file quality preferences quality here, for all the sup-
(limited to 25 tracks) in MusicMatch Jukebox. To ported formats. MusicMatch

121 JULY 2003

 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
ly, select the screen resolu-
tion at which you want to
see the slideshow, and click
OK. You can preview it by
clicking on Start in the Select
Visualisation menu.
This is where Quality matters! Music library
The music library manage-
Jukebox lets you rip and ment in MusicMatch is very
encode MP3s at upto 320 good. You can add MP3s,
Kbps encoding quality. You MP3PROs, WAV and WMA
can also set additional set- audio files to My Library. You
tings, such as the location of can choose to have Music-
the encoded files, delayed Match scan all your local
recordings and changing the
Recording Source.
Slideshow features
You can use MusicMatch
slideshow to display your
personal photographs as
your music plays. To enable
this, go to View and select
V i s u a l i z a t i o n s > C h o o s e r . Under Adding tracks to the library
Select Visualization, choose
the ‘MUSICMATCH Slide- drives, as well as mapped
show Visualization’ and click networked drives for audio
54 on Configure. This will open files. To do so, go to O p t i o n s >
Music Library > Search and Add
T r a c k s from all Drives…, and
scan the whole drive, or
restrict the search to specific
folders. You can also add
by dropping a file into the
My Library window from the
Explorer.
Tweak visualisations here Looking up your tags
MusicMatch Jukebox has
the Slideshow menu and let enhanced tag support, which
you tweak the settings. First, means that you can now
select the picture folder, and embed more than just text
then choose the interval in into your digital music files.
seconds. The slideshow can While editing and adding
display pictures that transi- text and images to your
tion from one to the other, audio files, you can choose
with many transition to update them using the
effects—you can choose and Super Tagging process. This
apply them from here. Final- automates the process by
122
Shortcuts
Task
Play
Stop
Pause
Increase Volume
Go to Previous Track
Go to Next Track
Decrease Volume
Mute
Jukebox Settings
Open AutoDJ
Slideshow full screen
looking up the data on the
Internet. To use this service,
highlight the track in My
Library, or the Playlist, right-
click and select Edit Track
Tags. Within Edit Track Tags,
select Lookup Tags. Music-
Match will attempt to locate
the information on the
Internet, and return the
results in the Lookup Tags
Results window.
Sorting and searching
the library
You can sort the files listed
within My Library. To do
this, click on My Library in
the Music Center, and under
View By, choose a new way
to browse for tracks.
To locate any file within
the library, click on Find in
the Music Center, and enter
the name of the track you
want to locate. If multiple
entries are present, the first
instance is highlighted and
shown. You can narrow down
your search by being case-spe-
cific (uppercase or lowercase)
and also restrict searches to
the exact string specified.
Shortcuts
[Ctrl] + [P]
[Ctrl] + [S]
[Pause/Break]
[Alt] + [ á]
[Alt] + [ ß]
[Alt] + [ à]
[Alt] + [ â]
[Ctrl] + [M]
[Ctrl] + [Shift] + [S]
[Ctrl] + [D]
[F11]
Spinning with the
AutoDJ
The AutoDJ option lets you
create custom playlists auto-
matically from those tracks
in the library that have the
Tag info filled in. Click on
Setting up the AutoDJ
AutoDJ in the Music Center,
or select O p t i o n s > P l a y l i s t >
A u t o D J. After setting the
playtime in the window,
you can choose from an
exhaustive list of criteria,
that include selecting by
Artiste, Album, Genre,
Mood, and so on. You can
combine this across several
criteria. Click on Preview to
give you an idea of what
you will get and when done,
click on Get Tracks to add it
to the current playlist.
JULY 2003

The slick Burner Plus interface
Burning CDs
MusicMatch Jukebox Basic,
that is bundled in the free ver-
sion MusicMatch Jukebox,
allows you to make music
CDs. The Burner Plus, that is
bundled with the shareware
version, comes with plenty of
advanced features that makes
it almost as good as any stand-
alone CD writing software. To
create Audio CDs, first open a
saved playlist, or create one
that contains the tracks that
you want to burn; this will
WINDOWS MEDIA PLAYER 9
With support for encoding on
the acclaimed Windows Media Audio codecs,
this is one skinnable player
you need if you are an WMA fan!
Graphical equaliser:
Windows Media Player has a
10-band graphic equaliser
that you can access and tin-
123
open the Burner Plus window.
To add any more files, click on
the Add button. You can also
add tracks by dragging and
dropping using Windows
Explorer. Finally, when you
are ready to write the CD,
click on the Burn button.
SmartSplit
If you have lots of files to burn
and you aren't sure how many
CDs you will need, here is a
nifty utility within Music-
Match that will help you.
First, select all the files that
you want to write on the CD
and drag them into the Burn-
er Plus window. Then, click on
the SmartSplit button. All
your files will be divided into
the required number of discs.
Finally, click on Burn to get
started!
ker around with. You can
access it by going to V i e w >
Enhancements > Graphic
E q u a l i s e r.
SRS WOW Effects
Turn it on by going to V i e w
> E n h a n c e m e n t s and selecting
SRS WOW Effects. You can
optimise the output, specific
to your audio set up, by select-
ing the kind of speakers that
are attached to your comput-
er. To improve the bass out-
putted, move the TruBass
slider to the right. If you want
to widen and enhance the
computer’. Select the options
and click Search. This will
scan your hard drives for
media files and add them to
your Media Library. You can
also add tracks that are cur-
Tweaking the SRS WOW effects rently playing, or all the
tracks in the playlist by going
stereo effect, move the WOW
Effect slider to the right.
Media library
Before you create playlists,
you should add links to your
digital media files in the
Media Library. The easiest
way would be to add files into
the library by getting Win- Adding files into the library
dows Media Player to scan
your computer. To do so, go to F i l e > A d d t o M e d i a L i b r a r y
to F i l e > A d d t o M e d i a L i b r a r y and selecting ‘Add Currently
and choose ‘By Searching Playing Track’. Also, all the
Shortcuts
Here are some of the more commonly used shortcuts
for Windows Media Player 9.
Task Shortcuts
55
Access the Now Playing,
Media Guide, Copy from CD,
Media Library, Radio Tuner,
Copy to CD or Device,
Premium Services, and
Skin Chooser taskbar features [Alt]+ [V] +[G]
Making your videos run in
full-screen mode and restoring
them back again [Alt] + [Enter]
Playing the previous track [Ctrl] + [B]
Playing/Pausing the selected track [Ctrl] + [P]
Stopping the selected track [Ctrl] + [S]
Playing the next item [Ctrl] + [F]
Muting the volume [F8]
Turning down the volume [F9]
Turning down the volume [F10]
Opening the Search box
(in the Media Library) [Alt] + [S]
JULY 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks

music that you copy is auto-
matically added to the library,
as is all the media content
that you purchase and down-
load from the Internet.
Sorting the library
You can locate all the music
files that you have entered
into the Media Library by
going to Media Library and
expanding the All Music
tree in the left pane. To
search for any file within
the Library, click on the
search button. In the Search
For field, enter the search
term that you would like
to search. The results are
displayed in the details
pane.
Editing media
information
To edit information on any
media file, locate the file with-
in the Media Library. Then
media information.
Within Windows XP, you
can edit the tags with the
Advanced Tag Editor. Access
this by locating the file,
right-clicking and selecting
Advanced Tag Editor.
Using the Internet
Windows Media Player has
been fully integrated with
the Internet. You can locate
information about the
albums in your playlist by
right-clicking on the album
in the Media Library and
clicking on Find Album Info.
In this manner, you can
update or change informa-
tion regarding an album.
Make videos look
better
Windows Media Player sup-
ports a large number of pop-
ular video formats, including
the VCDs, DVDs and DivX
formats—you will need to
Most players today make up
for this by restoring the crys-
talline highs and the low
rumble of the bass, and also
restore some stereo separa-
tion by piping the sound
through DSP plug-ins.
In Winamp 2, to access
all the DSP plugins, right-
click anywhere in Winamp
and select O p t i o n s > P r e f e r -
e n c e s and scroll down the list
to Plugins. All DSP plug-ins
are located under DSP.
In Winamp3, DSP plug-
ins are loaded as you start
the player, and you can con-
figure the settings there.
In Media Jukebox, you
can access all the plug-ins by
going to S e t t i n g s > P l u g - i n
M a n a g e r and picking out the
plug-in from there, and
clicking on Configure.
MusicMatch Jukebox lets
you access and configure
plug-ins from V i e w > S o u n d
Enhancement.
more than one DSP plug-in
at one go. This can be used
to stack up all the DSP plug-
ins that you want by click-
ing on the ‘+’ (Add) button.
You can also configure them
through MuchFX2, by click-
ing on the CFG button.
Bobware Stereo Delay
This plug-in lets you config-
ure stereo delay, crossover
and delayed amplification for
your music, and restores
some of the stereo loss that
occurs on account of the MP3
compression technology.
iZotope Vinyl
While all the other plug-ins
here will enhance the way

56 install the DivX codec sepa-

rately. It also comes with
robust video playback
enhancement features.
Adjust the playback controls
by clicking on V i e w > E n h a n c e -
m e n t s and then Video Set-
tings. You can fine-tune the
Editing information hue, saturation, brightness
and contrast controls using
right-click in the details pane, the sliders. When you are
and select Edit to change the done, click on Close.
ENHANCING YOUR MUSIC
If your MP3s sound dull and lifeless,
then here is how you can enliven them
iZotope Ozone
Izotope Ozone is a DSP plug-
in for Winamp 2 and
Winamp3. It is one of the
most powerful plugins avail-
able. The Winamp3 version
lets you try out all the set-
tings for a trial period. You
can access all the presets, and
save your own custom ones
by clicking on Presets in the
main Ozone window. Ozone
lets you tweak the acoustic
characteristics of the room,
making your music sound
cleaner and better.
MuchFX2
Oops, I just unscrewed the
faceplate!
your music sounds, iZotope
will toss you back into
another age. Vinyl can make
your MP3s sound as though
you were playing music
from an age-old LP.
Enhancer 0.17
Enhancer is a tweaker's
dream, and lets you config-
ure your DSP settings to the
maximum in Winamp 2. You
can use Enhancer to optimise

O
wing to the lossy standard, some of the fine MuchFX2 is a Winamp 2 your base and treble settings,
compression tech- highs and lower thumping DSP plugin stacker that has and also set precise values for
nology of the MP3 bass are lost after encoding. been designed to let you add the dry signal volume.

124 JULY 2003

insight ■
■ tips and tricks

Imagine
Imaging... 57
We tell you how to make your
imaginations a reality. Master these tips
and tricks on the three major graphics
software. Create jazzy effects, and play
with images in a much faster and
efficient way.

contents
58 Paint Shop Pro 8
61 Adobe Illustrator
GRAHIC DESIGN: Atul Deshmukh
63 Adobe Photoshop

111 AUGUST 2003

 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
PAINT SHOP PRO 8
This image editing software from JASC
Software now has a more polished look than
ever before, and has lots of features which are
unique to it. Find out how you can achieve
special effects in few easy steps.
sented. If your text is
not visible, it is
because both,
the fill and out-
line colours,
are white.
Click any
colour on
the palette
to choose
the outline
colour and
right-click to
fill in the
colour. If the let-
ters overlap each
ILLUSTRATIONS: Farzana Cooper other, increase
the kerning—the space
Curved text between the letters. Nor-
58 To create curved text, first
you need a curve on which
mally, auto-kerning works
well. Click OK, and the
to place the text. With the curved text is seen.
Preset Shape Tool, draw a To make the circle invis-
circle on a new canvas. ible, locate the layer that
Switch to the Text tool. The contains your text and
cursor changes to the vector object. Click on the
Curved Text cursor when ‘+’ to expand the layer,
you move it over the image. right-click on the ellipse,
Click, and enter the desired and click properties.
text in the dialog box pre- Uncheck the Visible check-
box; click OK, and the circle
will disappear.
Custom moulded
button
Open a new image with a
white background and
immediately add a new
layer (layer 1). Select any
Use Paint Shop Pro to curve background colour, and
your text as desired white as the foreground
112
colour. Create a circle, using
the Preset Shape Tool with
the following specifications:
Type: Circle; Style: Stroked
& Filled; Line Width: 22;
with Antialias checked.
Add a new layer—Layer
2. Using the Webding font,
hold in the Shift key,
and type @ for the hammer
and spanner symbol that
we will be using in this
example. Type in a font size
of 100, and select ‘Create
as Selection’.
Back in your image, the
selection will appear as a
dotted line around the text.
Do not release the selection,
and your type will instantly
disappear. If the entire font
is on your screen you’re ok,
if part of it is off the screen,
you will need to try again.
Place the cursor in the mid-
dle of the window, and click
to go back into the text
editor. Click ok, and see if
the entire phone symbol is
on the window. Go to Selec-
tions > Modify > Expand on the
Menu Bar, and expand the
selection to 4.
Using the Flood Fill
tool, fill your selection with
the solid colour you used for
a background colour. Using
the Move tool, position the
hammer and spanner sym-
bol in the centre of the cir-
cle. If all has gone well, the
phone symbol should be
large enough to fill the
inside of the circle, barely
touching the edges. Unse-
lect any selections, and
merge all of the layers.
Once the layers are
merged, use the Magic
Wand to select the figure
You can create your buttons
and icons easily in few steps.
again, and fill it with a Sun-
burst Gradient fill. Adjust
the settings so that the
white part of the sunburst is
in the top left corner of the
preview square.
Go to Image > 3 D Effects >
Outer Bevel, and select the
following settings: bevel,
smoothness: 13; depth: 5;
ambience: 0; shininess: 0;
light white; angle: 315;
intensity: 38; elevation: 47.
Invert your selection.
Using the Flood Fill tool set
to solid, fill the interior
areas of your figure with the
solid colour, selected as the
background colour. Invert
the selection again, and add
a drop shadow with the fol-
lowing settings; Opacity:
100; Blur: 13; Horizontal: 0;
Vertical: 0.
Glowing text
Create a new file with a
black background, set to 16
million colours. For the
foreground colour, select
light purple—RGB (128,128,
255). Enter some text. Uns-
elect the text by going to
Selections > Select none. Go to
Glowing Text
JULY 2003
 Keyboard shortcuts for PSP 8
Menu Command
File > Import >
Screen Capture > Start
Edit > Paste >
Paste As New Layer
Edit > Paste >
Paste As New Selection
Edit > Paste >
Paste As New Vector Selection
Edit > Paste >
Paste As Transparent Selection
Image > Crop to Selection
Image > Flip
Image > Rotate > Free Rotate...
Adjust > Brightness and Contrast >
Brightness / Contrast...
Adjust > Brightness and
Contrast > Gamma Correction...
Adjust > Hue and Saturation >
Hue/Saturation/Lightness...
Selections > Float
Selections > Invert
Effects > Edge Effects > Dilate,
and repeat this thrice. This
will expand the text. Now
go to Adjust > Blur > Blur More.
Do this thrice to create the
glowing effect around the
text.
Now, select dark pur-
ple— RGB(0,0,64) as your
foreground colour. Enter the
same text again, and move
it so it superimposes the
blurred text. This is the
final image.
This effect looks best
with a lighter colour on the
outside, and a darker colour
on the inside.
113
Shortcut Description
[Shift] + [C] Start a capture
[Ctrl] + [L] Paste the clipboard contents into the
current document as a new layer
[Ctrl] + [E] Paste the clipboard data into the
current image as a new selection
[Ctrl] + [G] Paste vector data in clipboard, into the
current image, as a new vector selection
[Ctrl] + [Shift] + [E] Paste the clipboard contents into the
current image, using the background
colour as transparent
[Shift] + [R] Crop Tool: Used to eliminate, or crop
areas of an image.
[Ctrl] + [I] Flip image
[Ctrl] + [R]
Apply rotation to image
[Shift] + [B] Adjust brightness and contrast
[Shift] + [G] Apply gamma correction to the image
[Shift] + [H] Adjust the hue, saturation and/
or lightness
[Ctrl] + [F] Convert the current regular selection
into a floating selection
[Ctrl] + [Shift] + [I] Invert the current selection area
Golden text white as your foreground
Create a new image with colour, and give the text a
white as your background hot wax coating by selecting
colour, set to 16 million Effects > Artistic Effects > Hot
colours. Enter some text Wax Coating.
using in light grey—RGB Now, go to Adjust > Color
(192,192,192). Keep the text Balance > Red/Green/Blue, and
selected throughout the enter these percentage val-
entire tutorial. Now go to ues: Red: 100; Green: 50;
Selections > Modify > Feather. Blue: 0. Do this twice to get
Enter 3 in the ‘Number of a realistic gold colour.
pixels’ field, to expand the Finally, add a drop shad-
selected area. Now, select ow for a 3D effect. Go to
Effects > 3 D Effects > Drop
Shadow with the following
options; Color: black; Opac-
ity: 100; Blur: 10; Vertical
Offset: 4; Horizontal Offset:
Golden Text 4. This is the final image.
Neon Text
This method can also be
applied to shapes such as
hearts, found in the Webd-
ings font, for example.
Neon text
Create a new file with a
black background, set to 16
million colours. With white
as your foreground colour,
enter some text. Unselect
the text by going to Selections
> Select None. Go to Adjust >
Blur > Blur More. Now go to
Effects > Artistic Effects > Solar-
ize. Set the Threshold to
128, and click OK.
Now, click the Adjust >
Color Balance > Red/Green/
Blue, and enter these per-
centage values; Red: 100,
Green: 0, Blue: 100, for a
light purple colour. This is
the final image.
59
Water text
Create a new image with
a white background, set to
16 million colours. Enter
some black text, preferably
with a thick font such as
Arial Black. Keep the text
selected. Now, select the
Paint brush tool, and set it
to Size: 50; Opacity: 100;
Texture: Marble.
With white as your fore-
ground colour, click and
Water Text
AUGUST 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
drag the paint brush over
the text once. Unselect the
text by going to Selections >
Select None. Now go to Effects
> Edge Effects > Dilate. This
will increase the lighter
areas of your text.
Go to Adjust > Blur > Blur
more. Create a watery effect,
by going to Effects > Artistic
Effects > Hot wax coating. This
will create a liquid effect. To
add some colour, go to
Adjust > Colors > Red/Green/
Blue, and use Red: 0;
Green: 20; Blue: 100.
Note that all colours are
possible.
Burnt edges
Open an image, and select a
white background, set to 16
million colours. Use the
Magic Wand tool, and click
on the white area around
the image. Invert the selec-
tion by going to Selections >
Invert. This will allow you to
60 work only on the image,
and not the white border.
Use the Paint Brush tool
with white as your fore-
ground, and create an edge
as if has been burnt.
Click Selections > Select
None, and select the white
areas again, using the Magic
Wand tool. Invert the selec-
tion, and if you wish, feath-
Burnt Edges Effect
114
er the selection by 2 or 3
pixels. This will give you a
smoother edge. Use the Air
Brush tool with black as
your foreground colour.
Select a brush size of 10, and
opacity 50. Go around the
image close to the edges to
create a dark border. Use
opacity of 20 to create a
lighter border, further in
from the darker one. You
can also use dark brown to
give more realistic burnt
edge effect.
Flying text
Start with any colour back-
ground. Choose a font, and
some text. Press [Ctrl] + [C]
Flying text effect
to copy the text to clip-
board. Now, unselect your
text. Flatten the image by
clicking Layers > Merge >
Merge All (Flatten). Then, go
to Image > Rotate > Rotate
Clockwise 90. Next, go to
Effects > Distortion Effects >
Wind. Set the strength at
100, from the Right.
Then, go to Image >
Rotate > Rotate Anticlockwise
90, to bring the image back
to its original position. Now
paste the text you had
copied to the Clip Board.
Flatten the image once
again. Now, click the Selec-
tion tool from the tool bar,
and drag it across your wind
effect to cover the effect in
the selection rectangle.
Now go to Effects > Geo-
metric Effects > Perspective-ver-
tical. Set the Distortion to
100 and Color to the back-
ground colour you are
using. After that, unselect,
and you’r e done.
Creating styled lines
To create a styled line, press
the arrow or preview win-
dow for Styled Lines on the
Tool Options palette, then
press the Custom button at
the bottom on the Line
Style selection list.
Here, you can manipu-
late several line properties.
To set one of the caps, press
the arrow button near the
caps preview window, to get
the selection box. Choose
the cap you want by click-
ing it. You can then set the
cap size relative to the line
width, by pressing the cap’s
Size button and then setting
the Height and Width for
the cap. You add dashes and
gaps in the Style pane of
the Styled Line dialog box.
The first time you press Add,
you add a dash, which you
can size by setting a value
with the Length control, or
by dragging the pointed
With Paint Shop Pro 8, you can
create your own Styled Lines.
AUGUST 2003
thumb in the control box.
Press Add again, to add a
gap. You can keep adding
dashes and gaps.
To save your styled line,
press the ‘Save As New’ but-
ton. Once you save your
new line style, it’s available
with any drawing tool. You
can create styled lines for all
sorts of purposes, including
navigation buttons for a
Web site, or separator bars
for a Web site, or newsletter.
The Seamless Tiling
effect
Turn any selection into
a seamless pattern for appli-
cations such as painting,
adding text, or creating
The Seamless Tiling Effect in
PSP 8
backgrounds, with the
Seamless Tiling Effect under
the Effects > Image Effects
menu. This feature gives
you the option to create
tiles using three methods.
Try this effect. You are sure
to like it.
AUGUST 2003
 ADOBE ILLUSTRATOR
If you want a top of the line graphics program
that deals with both raster and vector
graphics, Adobe Illustrator 10 is the software
for you. Use these small time saving tips to get
the best out of this powerful tool.
at the palette’s bottom,
and say yes, when
asked if you want
to delete the
selected styles.
Follow the
same proce-
dure for brush-
es, swatches
and symbols
(symbols are in
AI 10 only). You
will now only
have items used in the
document in the palette.
Create custom styles Next, delete the objects
To create custom styles, set using the styles from the
up objects with the strokes page. New styles are stored
and fills you want to save as
styles. Drag each of them to
in the styles palette. Save
the file, give it a descriptive
the styles palette. Do not name, and close it. Remem-
delete them from the page ber, the file must be closed
yet. On the Styles palette, to load the styles.
click the options triangle, To use the styles, go to
Window > Style Libraries > Other
Library, and navigate to
where you saved the file.
Highlight it and click Open
to open it. The styles will be
in the styles palette, ready
for use.
Create your custom styles and Transferring vectors
use them later to ease your between Illustrator and
work and attain consistency Photoshop
Vectors are important as
and choose ‘Select all they are resolution inde-
unused’. pendent—so they can be
The unused styles are scaled up or down with no
selected. Click the trash can loss of detail—and they
115
print clean, and crisp. Vec-
tor shapes can be easily
modified; just a little tug on
a handle turns a line into a
curve. Vectors can be easily
rasterized into pixels; it
takes specialised programs
to convert pixels into vec-
tors. If vectors could be
transferred between differ-
ent programs, it would be a
very handy feature. Here is
how we can do it between
Photoshop and Illustrator.
From Photoshop to
Illustrator
Between Illustrator 9 and
Photoshop 6, you can drag
and drop paths, directly
from Photoshop into
Illustrator. Previously, you
could only export, or copy,
and paste. Just select the
Photoshop path, and drag
it to an open Illustrator
document.
Export paths from Pho-
toshop, by going to File >
Export > Paths to Illustrator.
You can choose a specific
path from the Paths palette,
a path from a shape layer, or
crop marks that define the
Photoshop file size. Note
that the path exported to
Illustrator, will have no fill,
or stroke. Select all, or
switch to the outline mode
to see your vectors.
From Illustrator to
Photoshop
You can also get vectors
from Illustrator into Photo-
shop. If you select the Illus-
trator objects, and then
copy and paste, a dialog box
appears that lets you control
whether you want the path
converted into pixels (on
their own layer), paths
(added to Photoshop’s Paths
palette), or shapes (as a new
shape layer).
Photoshop lets you con-
trol the conversion from
precious vectors to bland
pixels. If you choose pixels,
a transformation box
appears around the import-
ed art work. Use the bound-
ing box handles to scale,
rotate, or skew the art work
any which way you want. As
long as you don’t double-
click, or press [Enter],
you’ve still got resolution-
independent vectors.
Finally, if you want to
drag and drop from Illustra-
tor into Photoshop, you can
control the created object
type as follows. With no
key pressed, drag to create
a pixel layer. Hold [Ctrl] to
create a path. If a shape
layer is currently active, the
path will be added to that
shape layer. Hold [Shift]
and place the new object
in the centre of the Photo-
61
shop file.
Make your own gift
tags
You can create your own tags
that are business card sized
to put on gift boxes. By
default, the 0 on the ruler is
set to the left side horizon-
tally, and the bottom verti-
cally. Change it by clicking
on the crosshairs on the
rulers’ top, and dragging it to
the top left corner.
Unfortunately, you can’t
change the page margins in
Illustrator. They’re set to the
unprintable area of your
printer. You can move them
around on the page, but you
AUGUST 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
Create your own gift tags and
put them on gift boxes!
can’t change their size.
Hence, you’ll need to pull
out horizontal guides to
0.75, 4.25, and 7.75 inches.
Click on the ruler, and drag
with your mouse, to pull
out guides. You’ll also need
to drag vertical guides out to
0.5, 2.5, 4.5, 6.5, 8.5, and
10.5 inches.
62 Place the image you
want to use. Select File >
Place, and navigate to the
directory with your image
and double-click on the file
name. Select the image,
once you have it placed
properly. Once it’s selected,
the bounding box, and
small rectangles appear
around it. Then, choose
Object > Transform > Move.
Put in 0 for the horizon-
tal position, and -2 for the
vertical position. Negative
numbers move objects
down; positive numbers
move objects up. Press the
copy button—this places a
copy of the object you select-
ed, at the chosen position.
Choose Object > Transform >
116
Transform Again, or the key-
board shortcut [Ctrl] + [D],
three more times.
Select everything ([Ctrl] +
[A]). Then, choose Object >
Transform > Move again. This
time, enter 3.5 for the hori-
zontal position, and 0 for the
vertical position. Press copy,
and all the graphics will be
positioned as desired.
Print this, and you are
ready with your Gift Tags.
Changing the default
Illustrator file
If you want a brush, symbol,
swatch, or style to be avail-
able whenever you create a
new document in Illustra-
tor, you can edit the Illus-
trator Start up documents in
the Illustrator plug-ins fold-
er. For example, if you
installed Illustrator 10, the
start file for CMYK will be
called ‘Adobe Illustrator
Startup_CMYK.ai’ and will
be located in ‘C:\Program
Files\Adobe\Illustrator 10
\Plug-ins’. Just open the file
in Illustrator, add the
content you want available,
save, and close the docu-
ment. The next time you
create a new document
in Illustrator it will be there.
Remember that unless
you do a cleanup on every
final document you save, by
deleting unused brushes,
symbols, swatches, and
styles, everything you add
increases file sizes. Hence,
delete items you will never
use from the start up file.
Once again, this is not for
the casual user. It’s akin
to changing the Windows
registry.
Turn guides into vector
lines
Go to View > Guides > Lock
Guides, to unlock locked
guides. Then, go to View >
Guides > Release Guides, and
the guides will turn into
vector lines.
Changing tool pointer
You can change the point-
er’s appearance, from the
tool pointer to a cross hair,
for more precise control.
More artwork is visible,
when using a cross hair
pointer. This is convenient
for detailed drawing, and
editing. To change a draw-
ing tool pointer to a cross
hair, press [Caps Lock],
before you begin drawing
with the tool. To make this
change permanent, open
Edit > Preferences > General,
and check ‘Use Precise Cur-
sor’, and click OK.
Draw straight
When you draw, or move
objects, hold down the Shift
key, so as to move them
within a range of 45 degrees.
This angle can be changed
from Edit > Preferences > Gener-
al. Enter the new Constrain
Angle, and click OK.
you can personalise a lot of
things, through this Preferences
Dialog.
Scratch disk
For best performance, pro-
vide Illustrator with ample
swap space on the hard disk
where it can temporarily
store information such as
the image information,
undo information, etc. This
will ensure its smooth func-
tioning, especially if you
work with large, complex
graphics. Change the loca-
tion of the scratch disk, by
clicking on Edit > Preferences >
Plug-ins & Scratch Disk.
Easter egg
By default, in the lower left
hand corner of the drawing
area, Illustrator displays the
current tool being used.
Click on it to view other
items such as, the Date and
Time, the amount of Free
Memory, and the Number of
Undo’s. If you hold down
[Alt] while clicking on the
drop-down, you can choose
such items as number of
shopping days left till
Christmas, a pair of eyes
that follow your cursor, the
number of mouse clicks,
and the moon phase,
among other things!
Custom brushes
To use an object as a brush,
Alt Click and keep yourself
updated with some interesting
information.
AUGUST 2003
select the object, and click
on the new brush icon
in the brushes palette. In the
new brush dialog box, select
the kind of brush to create,
and click OK. Set the
properties for the brush
from the Brush Options dia-
log box, and click OK to cre-
ate the brush.
Artwork and preview
You can view some items in
Preview mode, and other
items in Artwork simultane-
ously. Place the objects on
separate layers. Double-click
the layers you wish to see in
Artwork mode, and disable
Preview from the layer
Options dialog box.
Text on path
You can apply text around
any object in Illustrator.
First, create the object
around which you want the
text to appear. Select the
Path Type tool. To do so,
hold down the mouse but-
ton on the Type tool, until
the options below it appear.
Create an insertion point
near the object’s edge, and
type the text.
Enter the new height or
width value in the transform
palette; hold down [Ctrl],
and hit Enter, or Return. The
other value will be entered
automatically. More trans-
form tricks here.
Use that Knife nicely
Using the Knife tool, can
have an uncertain outcome
if you don’t know the short-
cuts to making it work.
If you select the Knife Tool,
and begin cutting a shape,
117
Use Path Type tool to curve
your text the way you like.
it is very hard to try and
keep that cut straight. Press
[Alt], and then begin cut-
ting, because if you begin
cutting, and press [Alt] later,
the cut will be crooked. If
you have several layers with-
out any item selected, and
you begin cutting it with the
Knife Tool, the cut will
apply to all layers. If you
want to cut only one item,
make sure that it is the only
thing selected.
Moving objects
Here’s how to move one
item from one layer to the
next. Select the item you
want to move. The layer
with the selected item has a
little square in it. Hover over
the little square and you’ll
see a hand with a pointing
finger. Press the Alt key,
and drag that item to a
new layer.
Find the complementa-
ry color for a selected item
by holding down [Ctrl], and
clicking inside the bar,
when working in the colour
bar area (the area at the bot-
tom with all the colors).
This gives you the colour
immediately. It will not
change the actual art piece,
unless you actively select
the item.
PHOTOSHOP
Use everyone’s favourite image editing tool in a
smarter way with these smart tips.
Manipulating layers
Selecting layers
Press [Ctrl] and click on a
layer in the Layers palette to
automatically select every-
thing. This is the best way to
select small, complex objects
on a layer. To show only one
layer, and hide all the others,
press [Alt], and click on the
eye icon to the left of the
layer, in the layers palette.
Deleting layers
To delete a layer set, but not
the layers within the set, go
to the Layer palette drop-
down menu, and choose
Delete Layer Set. Click on Set
Only, when the dialog box
appears, and click OK.
Linked layers
Delete only the set, not the
layers that are contained in it.
If you want to
make the same
change to more
than one Type
layer at the same
time, just link
all of the
layers you
want from
the Layers
palette, then
hold [Shift],
and make your
changes to one
of the linked layers. All of the
linked layers will show the
same change.
To delete your active
layer, and the layers linked to
it, hold [Ctrl], and click on
the trash icon in your Layers
palette. You can quickly lock
all of your linked layers, by
choosing ‘Lock All Linked
Layers’ from the layer palette
63
drop down menu. You can
easily align your linked lay-
ers by selecting the Move
Tool and looking at the
Options bar. There’s a selec-
tion of buttons that will
align your layers to the left,
right, horizontally, vertically,
to the centre, and even
adjust the spacing.
Using masks
If you want your Layer mask
to have clean sharp edges,
add a Vector mask. To do this,
hold down [Alt], while click-
ing on the ‘Add a Mask’ but-
ton, at the bottom of the
Layers palette. Mask a layer, or
set of layers with Layer Masks
already attached, by adding
AUGUST 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
them to a layer set, and
adding a mask to that set. To
quickly and easily copy your
Layer Mask, just click on the
Layer you want the mask
copied to, then click directly
on the Layer Mask you want
copied, and drag it to the Lay-
ers Mask icon.
More Layer settings
If you want to move more
than one layer in your doc-
ument, just link the Layers
together. Do that, by click-
ing on the little empty box
next to the eye icon in the
Layers Palette.
Change your background
into a fully functional layer,
by double-clicking on it in
the Layers Palette.
If you want to save your
personal style as a Layer
Style, you can add a Layer
Style to its own layer by
going to Layer > Layer Styles >
Create Layers. It will appear on
its own Layer beneath the
64 original layer.
Change the opacity of the
layer you’re working on, by
pressing a number on your
keyboard. For example, typ-
ing 4 will set it to 40 per
cent, typing 5 sets it to 50
per cent, etc. If you want it
to be 52 per cent, just type in
5, and 2 quickly.
File handling
You can double-click any-
where on your open work-
space, to bring up the Open
dialog box.
When using the ‘Save for
Web’ dialog box, you can see
how your image will look on
different platforms by using
the arrow in the preview’s
upper right corner, and select-
118
ing which platform you want
to see. Don’t keep saving your
images as JPEG, because Pho-
toshop compresses the file
each time. Save it as a loss-less
format until you’re done with
the editing.
After working on a Photo-
shop document for a while,
you may have some unseen
data lying on the outside of
the image. To get rid of this,
and hence, shrink your file
size, press [Ctrl]+[A] to select,
and then, go to Image > Crop.
To shrink the size of your
Photoshop files further, go to
Preferences > File Handling, and
uncheck the box that says
‘Always Maximize Compati-
bility for Photoshop PSD
Files’.
To undo the save, just
press [Ctrl] + [Alt] + [Z] a cou-
ple of times, until you see
your layers coming back. To
close all of your currently
open images, press [Ctrl] +
[Shift] + [F4].
Manipulating images
Use the Clone Stamp tool, to
clone from one open image
to another quite easily. Just
hold down [Alt], and click on
the image you want to clone,
then go to the original image,
and start painting.
To quickly change the
size of your preview thumb-
nail in your palettes, just
right-click in an open area of
the palette, and a menu will
appear with your selections.
Gain lost detail of a
shrunken image, by going
under Filter > Sharpen >
Unsharp Mask. In the dialog
box that appears, try using a
Radius of 1.0 and a Thresh-
old of 4, then play around
with the amount until you
are satisfied with the result.
Crooked scans are common,
and annoying. Fix them eas-
ily by selecting the Measure
tool, and dragging it along
the top edge of your image.
Now, go to Image > Rotate
Canvas > Arbitrary. Press OK,
and Photoshop straightens
the image automatically.
Clone one image into another
Playing with colours
Text colour changes when
highlighted. To view the orig-
inal text colour, and yet keep
it selected, press [Ctrl]+[H], to
hide the selection.
To get a finger painting
effect, hold [Alt] while using
the Smudge tool. When
using a spot colour gradient
that fades to white, make
white a zero percent tint of
the spot colour. This ensures
that the entire gradient is
maintained in the separation.
CMYK colours
If you’re working in CMYK
mode, the colour picker is
still in RGB. To get around
this, press [Ctrl] + [Y], while
the colour picker is open.
This is the Shortcut for Proof
Colours found under the
View menu. Get the best
effect when sharpening flesh
tones in CMYK mode, by
applying the filter to the
image’s cyan channel.
Text effects
To numerically enter the
exact size for a type box, hold
the Alt key, and click on your
document using the Text
tool. A ‘Paragraph Text Size’
dialog box will pop up. To
quickly render your text layer,
just right-click on the layer’s
name in the layers palette,
and select Rasterize Layer. To
get your fancy quotation
marks back (the real ones, not
the block foot, or inch mark),
look under Preferences, and
choose General Preferences.
Here, you can choose to tog-
gle the quotes with the ‘Use
Smart Quotes’ selection.
Other useful tips
Gradient banding: To elimi-
nate gradient banding when
printing, go to Filter > Noise >
Add Noise. When the dialog
opens, enter 2 in the Amount
field, select the Gaussian
option in the Distribution
section, and check the Mono-
chromatic box. Now, just
click OK.
View at 100 per cent: No
matter what your current
zoom level is, to view your
image at 100 per cent, just
double-click on the Zoom
Tool icon.
Kerning and Tracking
Adjust: To set the Tracking
tighter, highlight the type,
and press [Alt] + [Left arrow].
To loosen, use [Alt] + [Right
arrow]. Adjust kerning, by
clicking the cursor between
the two layers, and using the
same shortcuts.
AUGUST 2003
insight ■
■ tips and tricks

GRAHIC DESIGN: Solomon Lewis

From cleaning
cartridges to new
ideas on how to
use your printer,
here’s all the
printer-related 65
information you
need for home or
office use

contents

Print
66 Toner and ink cartridges
66 Using the Right Paper
66 Maintenance

Away
67 Printing Images
68 Power Tips
69 Fun with your printer
70 Troubleshooting
70 Network Printing
71 Miscellanous Tips

133 SEPTEMBER 2003

 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
Toner and Ink
Cartridges
Cartridges are not only the
most important part of a
printer, they are also the
only part that is maintained
and handled by the user. We
tell you how to squeeze the
last drop out of your car-
tridges, and get crisp and
sharp prints that won’t bur-
den your pocket.
Laser Printers
Generally, over 50 per
cent of printing problems
related to laser printers are
resolved when the toner car-
tridge is cleaned. So, clean
your toner cartridge regularly.
Never touch the drum sur-
face while handling toner
cartridges since this could
lead to oil spots and scr-
taches which will be evident
on your printouts. Also, the
cartridge should be protect-
ed from sunlight so it’s
66 always stored it in its origi-
nal box.
At times, in certain HP
printers, the screw in the car-
tridge cover becomes loose
due to vibrations. This screw
needs to be checked and
tightened, if you see a hori-
zontal white line in the cen-
tre of a printed page.
Another common prob-
lem is the black dots that
appear on printouts. This is
usually because of a nick on
the drum, caused by a for-
eign object. If this has hap-
pened, there’s no way you
can get the cartridge
repaired—you’ll have to
replace it. So make sure you
are using dust-free paper.
Also, keep the printer clea—
134
clean the outer surface regu-
larly. Use a damp cloth to
clean the accumulated debris
and dust, whenever you are
changing a cartridge. Pay
special attention to the rub-
ber rollers—never use alco-
holic cleaners on these.
Inkjet Printers
If you are installing a
new cartridge in your inkjet
printer, keep it in the upright
position for a few moments
before fitting it in. This
ensures that the ink will be
at the nozzle when you are
ready to use the printer. Also,
store the cartridge in an
upright position, in an air-
tight, rigid plastic container.
Whenever you feel tha your
prints aren’t as crisp as they
should be, run the printer’s
head-cleaning utility. This is
necessary especially if you
are using your printer after a
long time.
Using the Right Paper
The regular paper that
you use for printing
ILUSTRATOR: Mahesh Benkar
does fine for day-to-
day print jobs. However,
at times, you may want to
print on special types of
paper. Different types of
paper are available for differ-
ent printing needs.
Photo Paper
This is similar to the paper
used by film developers, and
is designed to produce high-
quality images. They come
in both, matte and glossy
finish, and in standard
photo sizes such as 4 X 6
inches. Use photo paper for
studio quality photos.
Greeting cards
These papers are thicker, pre-
folded, and smaller than reg-
ular paper. They come with
matching envelopes. Printers
typically come with bundled
software, with several tem-
plates, for creating greeting
cards. Use this paper to cre-
ate personalised greeting
cards that have a profes-
sional look.
Glossy paper
Glossy paper has a shiny,
coated surface on one or
both sides. This produces
vibrant colours, but the prints
a r e
susceptible to fingerprints.
Use glossy paper for
brochures, flyers and report
covers.
Transparencies
These are clear plastic sheets,
and are used to create over-
head-projector presentations.
These can only be used with
inkjet printers, as transparen-
cies cannot tolerate the heat
generated by laser printers.
Craft papers
Craft papers come in a huge
variety. For example, iron-on
paper allows you to print and
image and transfer it to a
cloth. Banner papers, used to
create banners, also come in
this category. Other papers in
this category are Vellum,
parchment, printable fabric
sheets, shrink-wrap plastic
and so on.
Stickers and labels
Stickers and labels are avail-
able for mail, folders,
diskettes, CDs and whatever
else you can think of. You
can use fonts, images and
colours to customise them.
Re-stickables allow for a lot
of creative flexibility.
Remember to check your
printer manual for compati-
bility, before using specialty
papers. Otherwise, you may
experience paper jams and
such.
Maintenance
Clear paper jams
Carelessness while clearing
a paper jam could lead to
accumulation of toner
dust, which could be haz-
ardous to the health of
your printer. If the paper
jams before it reaches the
Fuser roller—the roller that
fuses the toner with the
paper—the toner will just lie
on the page, in the shape of
the image being printed.
Caution is necessary here, so
that the toner doesn’t fall
into the printer while you’re
pulling out the paper. If it
has not yet begun to come
out of the printer, pull the
paper towards the inside of
the printer. If the paper had
just begun to feed, and you
SEPTEMEBR 2003
pulled it back through the
Feed rollers—the rollers that
feed the paper in the print-
er—the toner on the paper
could fall onto the rollers.
This could cause following
copies to come out dirty.
Avoiding paper jams
The thumb-rule is not to
overload the printer. Too
many papers can lead to
pressure on the paper sepa-
ration tabs, and result in
double feeds. Special care is
needed to feed specialty
papers such as photo paper.
Since these are thicker, the
best thing to do is to feed
them manually, one by one.
Also, do not use transparen-
cies, or other media that can-
not tolerate high levels of
heat. Cleaning your printer,
especially the roller, plays an
important part in avoiding
jams. This is because dirty
rollers hamper the move-
ment of paper inside the
printer.
Static electricity
The laser printers that are
most affected by static elec-
tricity are those based on the
Corona Wire technology.
Static electricity increas-
es because of two things—
wind or movement, and dry
air. In winter, the problem is
compounded by low humid-
ity, and dry heat in offices
and homes. You may notice
random black streaks, or
blotches of toner on your
pages because of this. To
remedy this, the humidity
level in the room should be
at least 35 per cent. Further,
you can decrease the static
135
electricity around the printer
using a solution comprising
one tablespoon of liquid fab-
ric softener and about 300
ml of water—spray this on
the carpet around the print-
er. Do not spray it directly
onto the printer.
AB switches
Be careful when using man-
ual AB switches for
printer sharing.
In most
cases,
t h e
ven-
dor’s warranty becomes void
if you use them. A better
option would be to use elec-
tronic switches.
Ozone filters
One more component that
needs to be taken care of is
the ozone filter. A clogged
ozone filter can harm your
printer by increasing its tem-
perature, and by blocking
the airflow—thus slowing
down the fan. A fan that’s
slow causes harm to printer
components, and the ozone
produced oxidizes them.
Change the ozone filter once
in 6 months.
Corona wire
Some of the older laser print-
ers, such as the HP Laserjet II
and III, are based on corona
wire technology. Special care
is needed to clean them.
Most vertical streaking
caused by a dirty Corona
wire will be hazy or uneven,
and intermittent. The wire is
found in a metal furrow that
runs the width of the paper,
along the bottom. It may be
covered with angled wire.
The wire is very thin, like a
strand of hair, and care
should be taken not to
break it while clean-
ing. First, the fur-
row should be
cleaned with
a vacuum
cleaner, and
then with a
cotton swab
dampened
with water or
peroxide. After
all the toner is
removed from the
floor and walls of the trough,
gently brush the length of
the corona wire with a dry
cotton swab to remove any
dust or debris.
Many toner cartridges
have a charge wire inside
them. Removing dust from
this will prevent most verti-
cal streaking.
Inkjet Printers
Cleaning the head
The head cleaning utility,
that comes with almost all
printers, does not always do
an efficient job. Often, ink
deposits build up on the end
of the print head, causing
the cartridge to function sub-
optimally. It’s better to clean
the head manually, to ensure
proper functioning and
crisper prints. Clean the
head by wiping it gently
with a soft cotton cloth—
don’t use tissues since they
tend to stick onto the head.
Snap the cartridge in and out
a couple times, to get a good
connection after cleaning.
General Cleaning
If the printer is printing in
streaks, and is smearing,
there’s excess ink in the car-
riage area. Open the printer
and remove the cartridges.
Fold a letter-sized piece of
paper in half, and then in
half again the other way, so
that it is quartered. Insert
this paper into the regular
feed slot or space. Move the
paper to the left and to the
right, to remove excess ink
under the carriage. Once the
excess ink is removed, the
printer should resume print-
ing normally.
Apart from this, do call
your technician at least once
a year to get your printer
cleaned thoroughly. There
67
are parts that are impossible
to get at without disassem-
bling the machine. These
need to be attended to by a
professional.
Printing Images
There are a few general rules
that can be followed to print
high quality photographs.
The first rule is to use spe-
cially designed photo papers.
Several well-known brands
such as HP, Kodak and oth-
ers have their own brand of
photo papers. The second
rule is to use a photo car-
tridge. Your inkjet printer
will have to support this,
however. The third rule is to
SEPTEMEBR 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
choose the correct settings in
the ‘Print’ dialog box. For
this, click ‘Printer proper-
ties’, and set the print quali-
ty to the highest possible
value. Also choose ‘photo
paper,’ if you are using one,
as the paper type; use high
resolution.
Customising images
First off, the photo that you
want to print should have a
resolution of at least 300 dpi,
otherwise the prints won’t be
good enough. If you’re scan-
ning a photo to print, scan it
at 300 dpi. Use a format such
as TIFF that preserves the
colours and sharpness, if you
intend to print the image.
You should therefore also
save your digital camera
images in the TIFF format,
if there’s an option to do so.
Also, don’t enlarge the
image using an image-edit-
ing software. This is because
68 an image of 1280 x 960 pix-
els at 72 dpi, has the same
amount of details, as a 4 x 3-
inch image at 300 dpi. How-
ever, this also means that
you can safely use a 1280 x
960 pixel image to print a 4
by 3-inch photo.
You might notice that
the printed image doesn’t
look exactly like the one on
the screen—this is simply
because the images on the
screen are in the RGB (red,
green and blu) format, and
the printer uses CMYK inks
(cyan, magenta, yellow and
black). There are colours that
can be rendered in RGB, but
not in CMYK. To avoid this
problem, convert your image
to the CMYK mode, using
136
image editing software such
as Adobe Photoshop, or
PaintShop Pro.
Also use a photo editing
software to edit your image,
to correct the red eye, dust
and specks problems. You
can use sharpening filters to
improve photo edges.
Print settings and
paper
Next comes the printer. The
printer should be able to
print at
least
600
x 600 dpi. The higher the
dpi, the better will be the
quality of the printed
images. You also need to
keep your printer drivers
updated.
The next step now, is to
adjust the print settings. Set
the print-quality to maxi-
mum, and choose the right
paper setting, as it controls
the amount of ink that gets
onto the paper. It’s better to
use the same brand of paper
as your printer’s as a compa-
ny usually customises its
paper for its printers.
After printing, you need
to allow the printout to dry.
Normally, the drying time is
one hour. If the photo will be
in close contact with some-
thing else—for example, if
you’re going to frame it—it’s
better to let it dry for 24
hours. If you are printing
multiple copies, remove each
copy from the printer as
soon as it is printed.
Printing black and
white photos
The best way to print black
and white photos is to print
them using the colour car-
tridge. Yes, you read right!
The black cartridge is
designed to print black text,
and cannot produce shades
of grey as efficiently as a
colour cartridge can. Use an
image-editing software for
good quality results. Open
the photograph in your
favourite image editing
tool, and convert the
photo to greyscale.
Now, print the photo-
graph with ‘Automat-
ic’ colour settings, the
highest print quality and the
correct paper type. You’ll get
a fine photo.
Power Tips
Printing marked
selection
When printing selected text
say on a Web page, select the
text, and go to File > Print. If
you’re using Internet Explor-
er 5 or higher, choose to
print ‘Selection’ in the dialog
box that pops up. Most of
the newer browsers have the
Print Preview in the File
menu. This feature can be
very useful if you want to
print only selected pages.
Use the Print dialog box in
Internet Explorer to choose
what you want to print
Decide upon the pages that
you want to print in the
Print Preview dialog box,
and then click ‘Print…’. Now
in the Print dialog box, enter
the page numbers and click
OK. This procedure is
practically the same for
most browsers, including
Netscape.
Printing large
documents
Sometimes, you might want
to print a large document
that is laid out in many
pages—one being the index
page, and all the chapters
linked to it. Internet Explor-
er has an easy solution for
this problem. Just print the
index page, and in the Print
dialog box, tick the ‘Print all
linked documents’ option.
Printing with back-
ground
By default, the background
of the page—that may
include images—is not
printed. To print background
images and colours in Inter-
net Explorer, go to Tools >
‘Internet Options…’. Click on
the Advanced tab, and scroll
down to Printing. Here, tick
the box that says ‘Print back-
SEPTEMEBR 2003
ground color and images’,
and click OK. Now, you will
be able to print a Web page
with its background images
and colours.
If you use Netscape, go
to File > Page Setup. Under
‘Format & Options’, you will
see a check box labelled
‘Print Background (colors
& images)’. Tick this, and
click OK. Now go to File >
Print and click Print.
Fun with your printer
Creating monthly
calendars
Most word processing
applications come with
specific methods to create
calendars. In MS Word, you
can find it by going to Insert
> ‘Object…’, and then choos-
ing ‘Calendar Control.’ But
this might not provide the
level of customisation that
you want in order to mark
certain important occasions,
like your anniversary. An
easy solution is available at
http://www.timeanddate.com/ca
lendar/. This Web site has cal-
endars customised for many
countries, which you could
use as your template. Copy
the calendar pertaining to
the months you wish to
You can print the Outlook
calendar with all notes
and meetings reminders
137
print, into your word pro-
cessing or image-editing pro-
gram, customise it and
then print them.
Another
way is
to use specialised software
such as Calendar 200X,
which can be downloaded
from www.graffman.net. You
can also use Outlook to print
a calendar. Just switch to cal-
endar, and go to File >
‘Print…’. You will be present-
ed with a dialog box, asking
you to choose the printing
style. You can print weekly
or monthly views of your
calendar, with your appoint-
ments marked out.
Creating a person-
alised mouse-pad
You can create a personalised
mouse pad, using a 3mm
thick foam sheet, double-
sided adhesive sheets, inkjet
coated-satin finish fabric,
coated paper, glossy-finish
acrylic spray, and a pair of
scissors. First, choose a
design that you can print on
coated inkjet paper. If you
are satisfied with the results,
take a final printout on the
satin-finish fabric. Allow the
ink to dry completely. Then,
spray it with acrylic, and
leave it to dry again. Peel
away the covering from
one side of the adhe-
sive, and apply it to
the flipside of the
fabric. Cut out
the design,
a n d er’s LCD, choose the ones
remove the
other cov-
ering of
the adhe-
sive. Now,
paste it on
the foam
sheet. Cut out
the foam sheet
in the shape of
the design, and your mouse
pad is ready!
Card modelling
Card modelling is the art of
creating a scaled model with
card paper. This is somewhat
similar to Origami—the craft
of folding paper. You can use
your printer to print ready-
made kits, available on some
Web sites, or create them
yourself from scratch. Here
are a few Web sites that
will help you get started:
www.fiddlersgreen.net, www.
digitalnavy.com, www.paperpar-
adise.com and www.cardfaq.
org/faq. All you need in order
to create these paper models
is a computer, printer, scis-
sors, glue and good quality
printing paper.
Computerless printing
Thus far, you’ve needed a
computer to act as an inter-
face between your digital
camera and your printer.
Now, with newer cameras
and printers, you can print
photographs from digital
cameras without a PC! Some
of the latest printers provide
you with a special slot for the
memory card of your digital
camera. You can download
your pictures to the printer,
preview them on the print-
that you want printed, make
adjustments, and then print
them. HP has come up with
its Photosmart series of
cameras and printers, which
provide you with this
functionality.
Some printers do not
require a memory card to be
inserted; the camera is direct-
ly attached to the printer via
a cable. Canon’s Powershot
series is one such example.
You can customise photo-
graphs by using the camera
controls and the LCD, and
print directly to the printer.
Page setup
Most of the printing software
provide you with a ‘Page
69
Setup’ feature. This lets you
determine how your page is
going to print. The first
thing that you can set is mar-
gin. The margin is the dis-
tance of the printed material
from the edge of the paper.
If you were printing formal
documents, you would
prefer larger margins—espe-
cially the left margin. Other-
wise, you can opt for smaller
margins. Remember that you
cannot set the margins to be
zero—most applications are
smart enough to warn you if
you try to do so.
The next customisable
thing is the gutter. The gutter
identifies a blank space on
SEPTEMEBR 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
the paper that will be
trimmed off or bound into
the bind of a book. Set this
option only if you plan to
bind the pages. You can set it
to be on the top or on the
left of the page.
You can also choose the
Page Orientation. It can be
Landscape or Portrait. In
Landscape prints, the width
is more than the height. For
Portrait prints, the height
exceeds the width.
Troubleshooting
Inkjet Printers
If horizontal or vertical lines
appear on your printouts,
the first step would be to run
the print head cleaning util-
ity three or four times. In
most cases, this solves the
problem. Check the paper if
the printouts appear faint.
The paper should not be
damaged, old, or loaded
incorrectly. If you use spe-
70 ciality paper such as photo
paper, make sure you’re
printing on the correct side.
Also, check the printer’s
manual for information
regarding the compatibility
of the paper with the printer.
To unblock a cartridge’s
print head, place the print
head in a shallow bowl of
hot water for 20 to 30 min-
utes. This will soften the
dried ink so that it flows
through the print head. You
should see the ink bleed out.
Repeat if necessary. Next,
insert the cartridge into the
printer, and run the print
head cleaning utility. If soak-
ing the cartridge in water
hasn’t cleaned and dissolved
the dried ink, place the print
138
head part of the cartridge in
a shallow bowl containing a
mixture of very hot water
and bleach (or ammonia) in
equal amounts—just enough
to cover the print head, for
two or three minutes. This
should hydrate the dried ink,
causing it to flow through
the print head, and the ink
should bleed out. Repeat if
needed. Now, insert the car-
tridge into the printer, and
run the printer’s print head
cleaning utility.
Laser Printers
Streaks appear on
printouts when the
drum cleaning blades
make improper con-
tact with the drum
surface. These
blades are made of
rubber, and so
require replace-
ment. If the streaks look like
thin pencil lines, the drum
itself has scratches, and must
be replaced. Try cleaning the
drum with alcohol. Wipe
it gently with a soft tissue.
If this doesn’t work, you
have to change the drum.
Do check the Fuser unit,
where the toner is fused with
paper. Be careful, as this
may be very hot. You will
need to clean the upper heat
roller, which is usually black
in colour.
Sometimes, a brand new
cartridge may not work prop-
erly. A reason for this could be
that there is no pool of ink at
the exit port (the pre-cham-
ber) that the built-in print
head can suck from. Some of
the sponge-filled cartridges
can develop air pockets at the
bottom of the cartridge that
can block the flow of ink.
Wrap the cartridge in a towel
or cloth, and place it in a plas-
tic bag. Hold it in your hand,
with the head or exit ports
pointing down. Extend your
arm, and swing the cartridge
down towards the floor rap-
idly, as if you
would if you
were
t o
throw it. Repeat this a couple
of times. Then, remove the
cloth wrapping. There should
be a visible spot of ink from
each chamber. Repeat if there
isn’t. Now, place the cartridge
back in the printer.
Network Printing
Installing Network
Printers
In order to access a shared
printer on a network, you
need to install it first. You
can install any number of
printers on your machine.
You’ll need to first locate the
computer that has put the
printer up for sharing, using
Network Neighbourhood.
Right-click on the printer
icon within that computer
and click Install. Alternative-
ly, double-click the printer
icon—this will bring up the
Add Printer Wizard. Follow
the on-screen instructions to
install the network printer.
Sharing a local printer
If you want to share the
printer that’s connected to
your computer, go to Control
Panel > Printers. Right-click on
the printer icon, and click
Sharing. Here, select ‘Share
As,’ and type in the name of
the printer in the Share
Name field. Click OK.
Controlling net-
work printing
If your computer
has Windows 98 and
the print server is
running Windows NT
or 2000, you don't
have much control
over the printing
process. One solution to
this would be to install a
Remote Procedure Call Print
Provider (RPCPP). To install
RPCCP, insert your Windows
98 installation CD into your
CD-ROM drive, go to Start >
Settings > Control Panel and
double-click Network. From
the configuration tab, select
Add. In the ‘Select Network
Component Type’ dialog
box, choose Service and then
click Add. Then click Have
Disk. In the ‘Copy Manufac-
turer’s File From’ box, type in
‘E:\tools\reskit\netadmin\rpcpp
’ (where E is the drive letter
of your CD-ROM). Then
click OK. Click OK again
after the installation, and
reboot your machine.
After you’ve done this,
you’ll be able to choose the
remote printer to send your
SEPTEMEBR 2003
job to, as well as being able
to see the print queue. You
can also cancel any print
jobs by going to Start > Set-
tings > Printers.
Installing additional
drivers
If you’re sharing your print-
er, you’ll want users running
any version of Windows to
be able to use it. If you're
running Windows 2000 or
XP, it is advisable to install
additional drivers, so that
others don’t have to look for
drivers before using your
printer. To do this, go to Start
> Control Panel > Printers.
Right-click the printer icon
and choose Properties. In
the Sharing tab, click the
'Additional Drivers…' but-
ton. Follow the on-screen
instructions to install the
drivers. Now all users will be
able to install the drivers by
just double-clicking the
printer name.
Disabling printer
announcements
If you are sharing a printer
on a Windows 2000/NT
machine, it will announce
to the other print servers on
the network that it has a
printer available, every 10
minutes. These announce-
ments can cause excessive
network traffic. To disable
them, go to Start > Run and
type in ‘regedit’ to open up
the registry editor. Navigate
to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\
SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Con
trol\Print, and add a new
value with the name as
DisableServerThread, and
the type as ‘REG_DWORD’.
139
Enter a value of 1. This
disables the announce-
ments, but also means
that the printer will not be
visible when one is brows-
ing the network. It can
still be accessed by entering
the name in manually.
To turn the announcements
back on, change the value
in the registry back to 0.
Instead of disabling the
announcements altogether,
you can change the time
interval between announce-
ments. Simply add a new key
named ServerThreadTimeout
at the same location as
above. Enter the value for
this key in milliseconds. For
example, if you want to
extend the interval to one
hour, enter the value
‘3600000’.
Restricting printer
times
You can set a schedule for
when a printer will be avail-
able for use. In Windows
2000 and XP, go to Start >
Control Panel > Printers, right-
click on the printer, and
choose Properties. On the
Advanced tab, there are two
You can restrict the times when
a printer will handle jobs
choices near the top: ‘Always
available’ and ‘Available
From...’, where you can set
the time during which print
jobs can be printed. Users
can still submit jobs any
time they want, but the jobs
will not be printed except
during the times set for the
printer as available.
Command Line Control
You can use the Net Print
command to control what
print jobs are currently
running on a computer.
The syntax for the Net Print
command is NET PRINT
\\computername\sharename
[\\computername]job_id[/
HOLD|/RELEASE| /DELETE].
Here the vertical bars
mean ‘or’, job_id is the iden-
tification number of the job
and the optional fields are in
square brackets. If you type
in just the command with-
out any options, it will dis-
play the current print jobs. If
you don’t remember the
share name of the printer,
type in ‘NET VIEW \\computer-
name’ to list all the shared
resources.
Miscellaneous Tips
Printing shortcuts
You don’t have to launch
an application and then
go to File > Print in order to
print a file. Go to Start > Set-
tings > Printers. Select the
printer of your choice.
Right-click the selected
printer, and select ‘Create
Shortcut’. Windows will tell
you that it can’t create the
shortcut here, and will ask
you if you want it on your
desktop. Click Yes. Then,
whenever you want to print
in a hurry, just highlight
the file you want to print,
and drag it onto the printer
shortcut on your desktop.
You can also add a short-
cut to the Send To menu of
the Explorer for immediate
printing. To do this, open
C:\Windows\SendTo, and cre-
ate a shortcut there for
your printer. Next time you
want to print a file, simply
right-click the file in the
explorer window, and
choose your printer from
the Send To menu.
Economic printing
To save toner or ink, it’s a
good idea to keep your
default print settings to
Draft, or EconoMode—espe-
cially when you don’t always
need high quality prints. To
do this, go to Control Panel >
Printers, and choose the print-
er properties by right-click-
ing the printer icon. You can
later change the settings
71
temporarily through the
Print dialog of the applica-
tion that you are printing
from, as and when you need
high quality prints.
Further, save paper by
printing on both sides of the
page. If your printer doesn’t
support two-sided printing,
feed the paper manually, and
flip it over to print on the
other side. You can also use
software such as FinePrint
(www.fineprint.com) for dou-
ble-sided prints. Do remem-
ber to set the page margins
to the minimum value s
upported. This will allow
more matter to be printed on
fewer pages.
SEPTEMEBR 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
Two printers
Generally, black text print-
outs are taken in economy
mode, while images are
printed using the best quality
mode. This requires you to
change the printer options, to
suit the print job at hand.
Avoid this by installing
another copy of the printer,
but with a different name. Do
this by going to Control Panel >
Printers, and clicking Add New
Printer. Now, use different
default print settings for these
two printers. You can choose
either of them, to suit your
printing needs.
Speed printing
Windows normally spools
print jobs before sending
them to the printer. Spooling
involves writing the data to
be printed, to a temporary
file. This allows you to work
while the printing in
progress. However, this slows
72 down the printing process.
On most printers, you can
turn off the spooler by going
to Start > Settings > Printers.
Right-click on the printer
icon, select Properties, and
then click Details. Click
‘Spool Settings’ at the bot-
tom of the dialog box. Select
the ‘Print Directly to Printer’
option. This will tie up your
application until the printer
has all the data, but your
print job will be done faster.
This option is handy if your
print spooler crashes, and
you need to print before you
reboot your PC.
Print-related software
The standard print dialogue
box doesn’t provide all the
140
flexibility and customisa-
tion that you would like to
have. There are various soft-
ware that let you do them.
One such software is
FinePrint (www.fineprint.com).
FinePrint is a Windows
printer driver that provides
you with advanced printing
capabilities. It has some
very useful features, such as
the ability to add blank
pages, and delete pages.
The ‘Ink Saver’ provides
options to convert coloured
text to black, and to skip
graphics. You can print
multiple pages on a single
sheet of paper, add water-
marks, headers and footers,
and you can even insert
customised letterheads. It
also allows you to design
your printouts as an image,
and also to retain the
text format maintained in
the Web page that you’re
printing from.
Another useful software
is Directory Printer (www.gal-
cott.com). With this, you can
print the directory structure
of your hard drive. It can
print all the folder names and
file names. It can also export
the structure to a text file.
PaperlessPrinter (www.
rarefind.com) allows you to
convert printable documents
to HTML, JPEG and BMP for-
mats. You can use it to pub-
lish documents in HTML,
JPEG or BMP, preserving their
look and content—complete
with fonts and graphics. You
can distribute your HTML
documents by e-mail, or
store them on the Web, an
intranet, a file system, or
on a CD.
Stuck Print Jobs
Sometimes a print job gets
stuck in the print queue.
Viewing the queue shows
that the job is being deleted,
but it never is actually delet-
ed, and other jobs don’t
move forward. To resolve
this, you don’t have to
restart the print server, but
only the print spooler. To do
so, if you are using Windows
2000 or XP, open up the DOS
prompt, and type in the
command ‘net stop spooler’.
Wait until the service stops,
and then type in ‘net start
spooler’. You can also do this
by going to Start > Settings >
Control Panel > Administrative
Tools > Services, highlighting
the Spooler service, right-
clicking it and choosing
Restart. Now you should be
able to delete a stuck print
job, if it is not deleted auto-
matically.
Cleaning up old
printer files
By default, any print jobs
sent to a printer will be tem-
porarily spooled to a folder
on the hard drive. Usually,
these files are deleted when
the job has printed. Some-
times, these temporary files
don’t get deleted. If you’re
not expecting anything to be
printed, you may safely
delete any files in that folder.
The default folder location is
%systemroot%\system32\spool\
printers, where %systemroot% is
usually either ‘C:\windows’
or ‘C:\winnt.’
If you want to change the
location of this folder—
because you want to free up
space on your drive, or for
any other reason—go to Start
> Settings > Control Panel, and
click Printers. Now go to File
> Server Properties. Under the
Advanced tab, you’ll see a
field that says ‘Spool Folder.’
Here you can type in the
new location path of the
spool folder.
Printer pooling
If you are using Windows
2000 or XP, and using sever-
al identical printers, you
can create a pool of the
printers, that will enable
Windows to balance the
print jobs. To do this, con-
nect all the printers to your
Create a pool if you have
multiple, similar printers
machine on different ports.
Install the drivers for one
printer. Now go to Start > Set-
tings > Control Panel, and dou-
ble-click Printers. Right-click
the printer name and click
Properties. Under the Ports
tab, tick ‘Enable printer pool-
ing.’ Now tick all the ports to
which your printers are con-
nected. Click OK. Windows
will automatically handle
the allocation of print jobs
across the printers.
SEPTEMEBR 2003
insight ■
■ tips and tricks

Here are a whole

bunch of keyboard
shortcuts to rescue
yourself from those
tiresome ambles
with the mouse...

73
contents
74 Windows
75 Microsoft Office
78 Windows Media Player
78 Winamp
79 Graphics software
80 Internet

A Short Cut

IILUSTRATOR: Mahesh Benkar

away

117 OCTOBER 2003

 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
WINDOWS
If you want to...
Select a menu; select or clear a
check box by the letter under-
lined in the menu name
Select or deselect an active
item—after selecting a group
of items using [Ctrl]
Select the main toolbar,
beginning from the first item
(generally File). After the first
option is activated, navigate
74 through menu options using
the appropriate arrow keys.
Press [F10] or [Alt] to exit
Rename a selected item
Open the drop-down list box
in Windows Explorer
Bypass the AutoPlay feature
when you insert a CD-ROM;
to suppress the AutoExec
macro in MS Word
Delete items permanently,
without moving them to the
Recycle Bin
Make a selection from the last
selected item, to the current
item, in any extended
selection dialog box, combo
box, or list box
Display a shortcut menu
that shows a list of commands
118
Press
[Alt] + [Letter], where the
[Letter] is the underlined
letter in a menu command
[Ctrl] + [Spacebar]
[F10], or [Alt]
[F2]
[F4], Pressing [F4] again
moves the keyboard focus
back to the previously used
item
[Shift] (while inserting the
CD, or while opening Word)
[Shift] + [Delete]
[Shift] + [Spacebar]
[Shift] + [F10], or the
Application key (the key
If you want to...
relevant to a selected object—
same as right-clicking the
mouse
Close an active window
Minimize an active window
Restore an active window
Maximize an active window
Expand the view of everything
under the current selection,
when working in Windows
Explorer
Go one folder level up in My
Computer or Windows
Explorer
Display the properties of a
selected item, while working
in a window
Display the document menu
—the same as left-clicking
the top left of a window
Copy or cut a selected file to
a folder by dragging it there
SPECIAL SHORTCUTS
If you want to
Display Windows Help
Open the Start menu
Open the System Properties
dialog box
Open the Find Computer
dialog box
Open Windows Explorer
Open the Find All Files
dialog box
Minimize all open windows
Expand previously opened
windows, and go back to
the window you were
working in last
Display the Run dialog box
Select and cycle through
the taskbar buttons
Set focus on a notification
(only in Windows XP)
Press
next to the right-hand
Windows key)
[Alt] + [Spacebar] + [C] or
[Alt] + [F4]
[Alt] + [Spacebar] + [N]
[Alt] + [Spacebar] + [R]
[Alt] + [Spacebar] + [X]
[*] (on the numeric keypad)
[Backspace]
[Alt] + [Enter]
[Alt] + [-], or [Alt] + [Spacebar]
Hold [Ctrl] and drag on the
file will copy a file. Holding
[Shift] and dragging a file
will move it
Press
[Windows] + [F1]
[Windows], [Ctrl] + [Esc]
[Windows] + [Pause Break]
[Windows] + [Ctrl] + [F]
[Windows] + [E]
[Windows] + [F]
[Windows] + [M]
[Windows] + [Shift] + M
[Windows] + [R]
[Windows] + [Tab]
[Windows] + [B]
OCTOBER 2003

MICROSOFT OFFICE
Microsoft Word
If you want to...
Insert the copyright symbol (©)
Insert the euro symbol (¤)
Insert a comment
Switch to Normal view
Switch to Outline view
Switch to Page Layout view
Move the cursor to the top of
the window
Insert an ellipsis
Insert the trademark symbol
Go back to the cursor's
previous location
Return cursor to first cell in a
row, when working with a
table
Move to the first cell in a
column when working with
a table
Insert a Date field into
a document
Insert a Page Number field
into a document
Insert a Time field into
a document
Expand text below a
heading, while working
in a document outline
Move between a master
document and its associated
sub-documents
Increase the font size of
selected text by 1 point
119
If you want to... Press
Insert or delete one line [Ctrl] + [0]
space preceding a paragraph
Single-space the lines of
selected text within a [Ctrl] + [1]
document
Double-space the lines of
selected text within a [Ctrl] + [2]
document
Set the spacing between [Ctrl] + [5]
lines of selected text to 1.5
Centre align a paragraph [Ctrl] + [E]
where the cursor is located
Insert a page break at the cur- [Ctrl] + [Enter]
sor's position in a document
Apply subscript formatting
(with automatic spacing) to [Ctrl] + [=]
Press
selected text
[Alt] + [Ctrl] + [C] Indent a paragraph from the [Ctrl] + [M]
[Alt] + [Ctrl] + [E] left
[Alt] + [Ctrl] + [M] Move cursor's position to [Ctrl] + [Page Down]
[Alt] + [Ctrl] + [N] the top of the next page
[Alt] + [Ctrl] + [O] Move cursor's position to [Ctrl] + [Page Up]
[Alt] + [Ctrl] + [P] the top of the previous page
[Alt] + [Ctrl] + [Page Up] Remove current formatting [Ctrl] + [Q]
of selected paragraph
[Alt] + [Ctrl] + [.] Remove a command from a [Alt] + [Ctrl] + [-], and then
[Alt] + [Ctrl] + [T] menu select the menu item to
[Alt] + [Ctrl] + [Z]
Display Customize Keyboard
remove
[Alt] + [Ctrl] + [+], select a
75
dialog box and create a menu command and add,
[Alt] + [Home] shortcut key for a menu change, or remove the
command desired shortcut key from
within the dialog box
[Alt] + [Page Up] Add a toolbar button to a [Alt] + [Ctrl] + [=], select the
menu bar toolbar button—Word auto-
[Alt] + [Shift] + [D] matically adds the button to
the appropriate menu
[Alt] + [Shift] + [P] Increase the font size of [Ctrl] + [Shift] + [>]
selected characters
[Alt] + [Shift] + [T] Format selected letters as [Ctrl] + [Shift] + [A]
all capitals
Double-underline a [Ctrl] + [Shift] + [D]
[Alt] + [Shift] + [+] selection of text
Insert a column break at the [Ctrl] + [Shift] + [Enter]
cursor’s position
[Ctrl] + [\] Select the font field on the
main taskbar, to change the [Ctrl] + [Shift] + [F]
[Ctrl] + []] (]) font of the selected text
Reduce the selection size [Shift] + [F8]
OCTOBER 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks

If you want to... Press MS PowerPoint

Apply hidden text [Ctrl] + [Shift] + [H] If you want to... Press
formatting to a selection Advance to the next slide [N], Left-Click, [Spacebar], [!],
Format selected letters as [Ctrl] + [Shift] + [K] ["], [Enter], or [Page Down]
small capitals Return to the previous slide [P], [Backspace], [#], [$], or
Remove a paragraph indent [Ctrl] + [Shift] + [M] [Page Up]
from the left Go to a particular slide [Number] + [Enter]
Select the font size field on Blacken or un-blacken the [B], or [.]
the window toolbar to [Ctrl] + [Shift] + [P] screen
change the font size of Whiten or un-whiten the [W], or [,]
selected text screen
Underline selected text, but Show or hide the arrow [A], or [=]
not the spaces in between [Ctrl] + [Shift] + [W] pointer
the words Stop or restart automatic [S], or [+]
Activate the ruler while [F10] + [Ctrl] + [Shift] show
working in a document End, or exit slideshow [Esc], [Ctrl] + [Break], or [-]
Display a shortcut menu [F10] + [Shift] Erase drawing on screen [E]
Display Save As dialog box [F12] Go to hidden slide [H]
Change the cases of selected [F3] + [Shift] Rehearse-use new time [T]
letters Rehearse-use original time [O]
Activate Extend mode, EXT [F8], EXT appears at the Rehearse-advance on [M]
appears in the lower right bottom right-hand corner mouse-click
corner of the window; of the window. Pressing Change pointer to pen [Ctrl] + [P]
pressing [F8] repeatedly [F8] repeatedly expands Change pointer to arrow [Ctrl] + [A]
extends the selection to the the selection; press [Esc] Change pointer to eraser [Ctrl] + [E]
word, the line, the docu- to cancel Hide pointer and button [Ctrl] + [H]
ment; press [ESC] to cancel. Automatically show or hide [Ctrl] + [U]
76 arrow
All Slides dialog box [Ctrl] + [5]
View taskbar [Ctrl] + [H]
KEYBOARD CONTROL FOR DESKTOP
Show or hide ink mark-up [Ctrl] + [M]
Ever thought of browsing your desktop using only the
keyboard? Here's how you can do it:
% Press [Windows] + [D] to show the desktop MS Excel
% Press the [Windows], to bring up the Start menu
% Press [Esc] to make the Start menu disappear, but If you want to... Press
keep the taskbar active) Select a Help topic while [Alt] + [Number] (hitting [1]
% Press [Shift] + [Tab] once to toggle between the using Office Assistant selects the leftmost option,
taskbar and the desktop. Your desktop will now be [2] the next, and so on)
Move to the left between [Ctrl] + [Alt] + [#]
active, although you may not notice any visual indi-
nonadjacent selections
cation of it
Display the Style command; [Alt] + [']
% Press [Down Arrow] to see which desktop icon is works even in a spreadsheet
active, and continue to use the cursor keys to move Insert the AutoSum formula;
to the icon you want to use works within a cell, or [Alt] + [=]
% Press [Enter] to run the icon, or press [Shift] + [F10] to formula bar of a spreadsheet
Select the entire active [Ctrl] + [Spacebar]
see the context menu for that icon
column

120 OCTOBER 2003

 If you want to...
Select a folder or a file in the
Open and Save As dialog
boxes—use the arrow keys to
move through the listed fold-
ers and files
Scroll through a block of data
within a row or column, in
the direction of the arrow key
Move to the last cell in the
current row that isn't blank—
only works if you haven't
selected the Transition navi-
gation keys check box on the
Transition tab
Move to the last cell on the
worksheet
Insert a new worksheet into a
workbook
Open Office Assistant in order
to display context sensitive
Help, or to reveal formatting
of selected characters
Maximize or restore the
workbook window
Create a chart
Display Visual Basic Editor
Insert a new worksheet into a
workbook
Display Save As dialog box
(file menu)
Edit a cell comment
Paste a function into a
formula
Repeat the last action
Display the Go To tab on the
Find and Replace dialog box
Turn Extend mode on. This
allows you to select as much
of a worksheet or workbook
as you want
Increase the size of selected
area
Display the AutoFilter list for
the current column
Extend or reduce a selection
by one cell
If multiple cells are selected,
select only the active cell
121
Press If you want to... Press
With scroll lock on, extend
the selection to the cell in [Shift] + [End]
[Alt] + [0] the lower-right corner of the
window
Extend a selection to the end
of a field, when working in [Shift] + [End]
[End] + Arrow key Data form
Select from the insertion
point to the end of the text [Shift] + [End]
box entry
[End] + [Enter] Complete a cell entry and [Shift] + [Enter]
move up in a selection
Display a shortcut menu that
shows a list of commands [Shift] + [F10]
[End] + [Home] relevant to the selected object
Move to the previous pane [Shift] + [F6]
[F1] + [Alt] + [Shift] Move a selected field into the
Page area when working with [Alt] + [P]
the Pivot Table Wizard
[F1] + [Shift] Open Microsoft Outlook
Message Options dialog box [Alt + [P]
when sending an e-mail
[F10] + [Ctrl] Display next screen to the
right, while working in a [Alt] + [Page Down]
[F11] worksheet or workbook
[F11] + [Alt] Display previous screen to
[F11] + [Shift] the left, while working in a
worksheet or workbook
[Alt] + [Page Up]
77
[F12] Open the Address book while
working in the To: field, [Alt] + [.]
[F2] + [Shift] when sending an e-mail
[F3] + [Shift] Move a selected field into the
row area while working with- [Alt] + [R]
[F4] in the Pivot Table Wizard
[F5] Send the active spreadsheet [Alt] + [S]
as an e-mail
Select only visible cells in the [Alt] + [;]
[F8] to turn on, [Esc] to quit active window
Ungroup selected Pivot Table
items, while working with [Alt] + [Shift] + [#]
[F8] + [Shift] Pivot Table
Ungroup rows or columns in [Alt] + [Shift] + [#]
[Alt] + ["] an outlined spreadsheet
Group selected Pivot Table
[Shift] + Arrow Key items, while working within [Alt] + [Shift] + [!]
a Pivot Table
[Shift] + [Backspace] Group rows or columns while [Alt] + [Shift] + [!]
working within a worksheet
OCTOBER 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks

WINDOWS MEDIA PLAYER 9 WINAMP

If you want to... Press

Play an item [Enter], [Spacebar] Action Shortcut

Switch to full mode (on the [Ctrl] + [1]
anchor window menu) Miscellaneous Commands
Display the skin shortcut [Shift] + [F10] Always on top toggle (all but [Ctrl] + [A]
menu (in skin mode) playlist editor).
Shuffle the playback order Cycle through the Winamp [Ctrl] + [Tab]
of items in a playlist (in skin [Ctrl] + [H] windows
mode) Go to Preferences [Ctrl] + [P]
Repeat the playlist (in skin [Ctrl] + [T] Jump to time in current track [Ctrl] + [J]
78 mode)
Increase the volume [F10]
Open new Winamp window
Main window Shortcuts
[Ctrl] + [Alt] + [N]

Decrease the volume [F9] Toggle the Repeat option. [R]

Mute the volume [F8] Toggle the Shuffle option. [S]
Switch to full mode (in skin [Ctrl] + [1] Open the current file info box [Alt] + [3]
mode) Playback Controls
Access the Features Taskbar [Ctrl] + [Tab] Play or restart a track [X], [5] on the numeric keypad
Play or pause [Ctrl] + [P] Stop a track [V]
Stop playback [Ctrl] + [S] Stop a track with fade-out [Shift] + [V]
Play the previous item [Ctrl] + [B] Pause or restart a track [C]
Play the next item [Ctrl] + [F] Play the next track [B], [6] on the numeric keypad
Rewind (available only [Ctrl] + [Shift] + [B] Play the previous track [Z], [4] on the numeric keypad
when playing video files) Rewind 5 seconds [#], [7] on the numeric
Fast-forward (available only [Ctrl] + [Shift] + [F] keypad
when playing video files) Fast-Forward 5 seconds [!], [9] on the numeric
Display the menu bar in full [Ctrl] + [M] keypad
mode Open or play a file [L], [0] on the numeric keypad
Display video in full screen [Alt] + [Enter] Open or play a directory [Shift] + [L], [Insert]
Zoom to 50 per cent [Alt] + [1] Turn the volume up [$], [8] on the numeric
Zoom to 100 per cent [Alt] + [2] keypad
Zoom to 200 per cent [Alt] + [3] Turn the volume down ["], [2] on the numeric
Eject the CD or DVD [Ctrl] + [E] keypad

122 OCTOBER 2003

 GRAPHIC SOFTWARE
Paintshop Pro 8
If you want to...
Start a capture
Paste the clipboard contents
into the current document as
a new layer
Paste data from the clipboard
into the current image as a
new selection
Paste vector data from the
clipboard into the current
image as a new vector
selection
Paste data from the clipboard
into the current image using
no background colour
Use the Crop Tool to elimi-
nate or crop areas of an image.
Flip an image
Apply rotation to an image.
Adjust brightness and
contrast
Apply gamma correction to
the image
Adjust the hue, saturation
and lightness.
Convert the current regular
selection into a floating
selection
Invert the current selection
area
123
Photoshop 7
If you want to...
Viewing
Fit an image in the window
Get 100 per cent
magnification
Scroll left, right, up or down
10 units
Toggles layer mask on or off
Editing
Move type in image
Align left, centre, or right
Press
[Shift] + [C] Align top, centre, or bottom
[Ctrl] + [L]
Show or hide a selection on
[Ctrl] + [E] selected type
Toggle Small Caps on or off
[Ctrl] + [G]
Toggle Superscript on or off
Toggle Subscript on or off
Toggle paragraph hyphen-
ation on or off
Toggle single and every-line
[Ctrl] + [Shift] + [E] composer on or off
Decrease or increases type
[Shift] + [R] size of selected text by 2
points or pixels
[Ctrl] + [I]
[Ctrl] + [R] Path editing
[Shift] + [B] Select multiple anchor
points
[Shift] + [G]
Select the entire path
[Shift] + [H]
Switch from Path Selection
[Ctrl] + [F] tool, or Pen tools to Direct
Selection Tool
[Ctrl] + [Shift] + [I] Switch from Direct Selection
Tool to Convert Point Tool
Press
[Ctrl] + [0]
[Alt] + [Ctrl] + [0]
[Shift] + [Page Up] to go up,
[Shift] + [Page Down] to go
down, [Ctrl] + [Page Up] to go
left and [Ctrl] + [Page Down]
to go right.
[\]
[Ctrl] + drag type when Type
layer is selected
[Shift] + [Ctrl] + [L], [Shift] +
[Ctrl] + [C], or [Shift] + [Ctrl] +
[R] (while the type tool is
selected)
[Shift] + [Ctrl] + [L], [Shift] +
[Ctrl] + [C], or [Shift] + [Ctrl] +
[R] (while the Vertical type
tool is selected)
[Ctrl] + [H]
[Shift] + [Ctrl] + [H]
[Shift] + [Ctrl] + [+]
[Shift] + [Alt] + [Ctrl] + [+]
79
[Shift] + [Alt] + [Ctrl] + [H]
[Shift] + [Alt] + [Ctrl] + [T]
[Shift] + [Ctrl] + [<], or [Shift] +
[Ctrl] + [>], hold down [Alt] to
decrease or increase by a fac-
tor of 10
[Shift] + left-click, while the
Direct Selection tool is
selected
[Alt] + left-click, while the
Direct Selection tool is
selected.
[Ctrl]
[Alt] + [Ctrl]
OCTOBER 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks

INTERNET
Keyboard shortcuts are useful when
you need that little extra control over
your surfing ways. Indeed, they are of
great help when when filling Web forms,
moving to a different tab, completing
a Web address that’s been typed over
a million times, etc. Here are some
useful key combinations that give you
a tighter grip over your Web cruises

Command Internet Explorer Opera Netscape

Add Bookmark [Ctrl] + [D] [Ctrl] + [T] [Ctrl] + [D]

Back [Backspace], [Alt] + [#] [Backspace] or [Alt] + [#], [Backspace] or [Alt] + [#]
[Ctrl] + [#], [Z]
Access Bookmarks [Ctrl] + [I] [F4] [Ctrl] + [B]
Close Window [Ctrl] + [W] [Ctrl] + [W] [Ctrl] + [W]
Auto-complete .com Address [Ctrl] + [Enter] NA NA
Decrease Text Size NA [9] NA
Delete [Delete] [Delete] [Delete]
Find Again [F3] [F3] [F3]
Find on page [Ctrl] + [F] [Ctrl] + [F] [Ctrl] + [F]
80 Forward [Shift] + [Backspace] or [Alt] + [!] [Shift] + [Backspace] or [Alt] + [!]
or [Ctrl] + [!], [X]
[Alt] + [!]

Full Screen [F11] [F11] [F11]

Show entire forward history:
History [Ctrl] + [H] [Alt] + [X] Show entire [Ctrl] + [H]
backward history: [Alt] + [Z]
Home Page [Alt] + [Home] [Ctrl] + [Space] [Alt] + [Home]
Increase Text Size NA NA [Ctrl] + [+]
Move to Next Frame [F6] NA NA
Move to Previous Frame [Ctrl] + [Shift] + [Tab] NA NA
New Tab NA NA [Ctrl] + [T]
Next Tab NA NA [Ctrl] + [Page Down]
New Window [Ctrl] + [N] [Ctrl] + [N] [Ctrl] + [N]
Open File [Ctrl] + [O] [Ctrl] + [O] [Ctrl] + [O]
Open Address in New Tab NA NA NA
Page Source [Ctrl] + [F3] [Ctrl] + [F3] [Ctrl] + [U]
Previous Tab NA NA [Ctrl] + [Page Up]
Reload [F5], [Ctrl] + [R] [F5], [Ctrl] + [R] [Ctrl] + [R]
Reload (override cache) [Ctrl] + [F5] NA NA
Select Location Bar [Alt] + [D], [F6], [F4], [Ctrl] + [Tab] [Ctrl] + [H], [F8] [Ctrl] + [L]
Select Search Bar [CTRL] + [E] [Shift] + [F8] NA

124 OCTOBER 2003

insight ■
■ tips and tricks

ILLUSTRATOR: Mahesh Benkar If gaming’s your thing,

here comes a collection
of tips to get the
best gaming rig
ever. Right from
hardware and
software issues,
to tweaking and
extracting that 81
extra from your
graphics cards,
this is the place to
park your rig and
get to work

contents
Power Tweaks 82
83
84
Windows XP
Under the Hood
ATi Tweaking
85 nVidia Tweaking
86 Game Tweaks
87 PDA Tweaks

133 NOVEMBER 2003

 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
XP LOVIN’
Prevention is better
than cure
Make sure you back up all
your data before you attempt
to change anything—this
could save you a lot of time
and hair later. Create a Sys-
tem Restore Point by going to
Start > Programs > Accessories >
82 System Tools > System Restore,
click ‘Create a restore point’
and then click Next. Now,
name the restore point, and
the date and time will be
automatically added. Finally,
click Create. Also, remember
to backup your registry. Go to
Start > Run, type ‘regedit’ and
press [Enter]. Go to My Com-
puter > File > Export, and select
‘All’ in the ‘Export Range’
area at the bottom, choose a
directory and file name, and
click Save.
Boot-up time
Use the Welcome screen for
logging in, as it enables faster
boot ups. Disable Fast User
Switching, and if you have
only one user account on
134
your PC, leave your password
blank. Now you won’t be
asked for your password every
time you boot, thus reducing
your booting time.
If you have multiple
accounts on your computer,
go to Start > Run, type ‘control
userpasswords2’ and press
[Enter]. Clear the checkbox
that says ‘Users must enter a
username and password to
use this computer’. Now, go
to Advanced tab and click
Decrease the bootup time by disabling
password entry by users
Advanced. Click the Users
folder, and right-click the
‘HelpAssistant’ account.
Choose Properties, and make
sure the ‘User cannot change
password’, ‘Password never
expires’ and ‘Account is dis-
abled’ checkboxes are
checked. This is necessary for
security purposes.
Healthy hard drives
Go to Windows Explorer,
right-click your hard drive
and choose Properties. Clear
the checkbox that says
“Compress drive to save disk
space”. Also, clear ‘Allow
Indexing Service to index this
disk for fast file searching’—
this relates to the Indexing
Service, which indexes your
files to reduce the time need-
ed to search the hard drive for
a specific file. If you disable it,
normal performance becomes
better. In the subsequent dia-
log box choose ‘Apply
changes to [Drive letter]:\,
subfolders and files’ and click
OK. This will improve the per-
formance of your hard drive.
For optimum perform-
ance, it is necessary to
ensure that your hard
drives are error-free. For
this, scan your hard
drives and defragment
them regularly. Right-
click on your drive let-
ter in Windows
Explorer, go to Tools
and click ‘Run Now…’
or ‘Defragment Now’.
You can also use
Diskkeeper, which is
faster and more power-
ful, to Defragment
your drives.
To increase the per-
formance of the disk drives,
press [Windows] + [Pause / Break]
to bring up the System Prop-
erties dialog box. Click on
Hardware, and then Device
Manager. Now click the ‘+’
sign next to Disk drives to
expand it, and double-click
the disk name to bring up the
Properties box. Click on the
Policies tab, and select ‘Opti-
mize for Performance’, check
the ‘Enable Write Caching on
the disk’ checkbox and click
OK. Now under ‘IDE
ATA/ATAPI Controllers’, dou-
ble-click on ‘Primary IDE
Channel’, go to Advanced
Settings and check ‘DMA if
Available’. Do this for all the
IDE channels.
Looks or power?
Open the System Properties
by pressing [Windows] +
[Pause/Break], go to the
Advanced tab and click on
the Settings button under
Performance. Click ‘Adjust
for Best performance’—this
turns off all the bells and
whistles, sets the theme to
classic Windows and
improves performance
tremendously, especially in
low-end systems. Now, click
on the Advanced tab and
click Change in the Virtual
memory area. For optimum
performance of your comput-
er, it is necessary to set the vir-
tual memory size correctly,
depending upon the amount
of RAM installed. It’s better to
have a dedicated partition for
the paging file, rather than
using the system partition.
Make sure that Virtual Mem-
ory is around 1.5 times the
RAM, or higher if you use
NOVEMBER 2003

Set the same initial and maximum Virtual
Memory size for better performance
memory-intensive games and
applications. Make sure the
initial and maximum sizes
are the same—if Windows
has to increase the paging file
size, the performance gain is
lost. For more information on
Virtual Memory, visit http://
aumha.org/win5/a/xpvm.php.
Fine tuning
Go to Start > Run, type ‘mscon-
fig’ and press [Enter] to open
the System Configuration
Utility. In the Start Up tab,
uncheck programs that you
don’t want to load at start up.
If you’re not sure about an
entry, leave it unchanged.
Finally, click OK and restart
your PC. Now, go to Start >
Run, type ‘gpedit.msc’ and press
[Enter] to open Group Policy
Editor. This is applicable only
for Windows XP Professional.
Enable the following policies:
User Configuration > Adminis-
trative Templates > Windows
Components > Windows Explorer
> Remove CD Burning Features
User Configuration > Adminis-
135
trative Templates > Win-
dows Components > Win-
dows Explorer > Remove
Shared Documents from
My Computer
Computer Configura-
tion > Administrative Tem-
plates > System > Remove
boot / Shutdown / Logon /
Logoff messages
User Configuration >
Administrative Templates
> Start Menu and Taskbar
> Turn off user tracking
Computer Configura-
tion > Administrative Tem-
plates > System > Turn off
Autoplay
Computer Configura-
tion > Administrative Templates >
Windows Components > Internet
Explorer > Disable Showing the
Splash Screen
Computer Configuration >
Administrative Templates > Win-
dows Components > Windows
Messenger (Enable both items)
User configuration > Adminis-
trative Templates > Desktop >
Remove My Documents icon from
Desktop
Tuning the registry
Though editing the registry
can give you power, it can
damage your operating sys-
tem as well. Always backup
up your registry before edit-
ing it. Once you’ve taken a
backup, open the registry edi-
tor—go to Start > Run, type
‘regedit’ and press [Enter]. To
improve the shutdown and
restart process, navigate to
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control
Panel\Desktop, and edit the
following entries:
‘HungAppTimeout=4000’,
‘WaitToKillAppTimeout=4000’,
‘MenuShowDelay=20’ and
‘AutoEndTasks= 1’. Here, 1000
means 1 second.
Now, navigate to ‘HKEY_
LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\
CurrentControlSet\Control\
Session Manager\Memory Man-
agement\PrefetchParameters’
and change the value of
‘EnablePrefetcher’ to 5.
To remove the Outlook
Express splash screen, go
to ‘HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Identi-
ties\{Unique Identity}\Software\
Microsoft\Outlook Express\5.0’,
create a new DWORD value
named ‘NoSplash’ and set its
value to 1.
To disable Balloon tips,
go to ‘HKEY_CURRENT_USER\
Software\Microsoft\Windows\
C u r r e n t Ve r s i o n \ E x p l o r e r \
UNDER THE HOOD
BIOS tweaks
On POST, press [Delete]—or
[F2], depending on your
BIOS—to enter the BIOS
Setup utility. You can also use
utilities such as TweakBIOS
for this. Customise the fol-
lowing settings:
Disable ‘Boot Up Floppy
Seek’. Most newer systems
don’t require this.
Advanced’, and create a
DWORD value named
‘Enable BalloonTips’ and set it
to 0.
To turn off the ‘low disk
space’ notification, go to
‘HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\
SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\
Services\lanmanserver’ and cre-
ate a DWORD value named
‘DiskSpaceThreshold’ and set
its value to between 0 and 99.
This will denote the threshold
free space in percentage,
before the notification pops
up. This is especially helpful
when you have a partition
that is almost full, but don’t
want to delete anything from
it such as a swap partition
with a fixed swap file.
83
Set the Boot Sequence to
boot from the drive where
Windows is installed.
Disable ‘Video BIOS
Shadow’.
Enable Shadow System
BIOS—see if it increases per-
formance for your system,
otherwise disable it.
Disable ‘Video BIOS
Cacheable’—most new video
NOVEMBER 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
cards do not need this.
Enable ‘Video RAM
Cacheable’, only if you have
older cards, Disable it for
newer cards with more than
16 MB RAM.
Set ‘8 & 16 bit I/O Recov-
ery Time’ to 0 or N/A, if you
do not use ISA cards.
Enable ‘SDRAM Precharge
Control’ unless it causes
problems with your system.
Set the CAS Latency Time
to 2 for fastest performance.
This sets the time delay
before the SDRAM starts to
carry out a read command.
Set the RAS-to-CAS Delay
to 2T. This inserts a delay
between the RAS (Row
Address Strobe) and CAS (Col-
umn Address Strobe) signals.
Set the RAS Pre-charge
Time to 2T. This is used to set
the number of cycles for the
RAS to store its charge before
the memory refreshes.
Disable ‘Memory Hole’.
84 Disable ‘Passive Release’.
Disable ‘Delayed Trans-
action’.
Choose PCI or AGP for
‘Init Display First’, as per
your display card.
Set the KBC Input Clock
to 16 MHz. This set-
ting is related to the
Super I/O chip.
The AGP Aper-
ture size determines
how much of your
system RAM is
shared with your
graphics card, to
help it function
smoothly. Set it
according to the
amount of RAM on
your system: If you Change FSB first, before changing the
have 128 MB or CDP ratio
136
more, set it to 64 MB or 32
MB. If you have less than
128 MB of RAM, set this to
half or quarter the amount
of RAM you have—if you
have 96 MB, set this to 48
MB, or 24 MB, etc. Make sure
you allot at least 16 MB to
the graphics card.
Overclocking
Caution: Overclocking your
CPU will void your warran-
ty, and if done improperly,
will shorten the life of your
CPU, or even cause a
burnout. If you still want
to overclock, do so with
extreme caution—do not
push your CPU beyond a
reasonable limit. Done prop-
erly, it can yield significant
performance boosts.
If you have an Intel
motherboard, chances are
you cannot overclock your
CPU, as Intel desktop moth-
erboards are generally
locked. On the other hand,
the performance mother-
boards from Gigabyte and
MSI let you tweak a little.
Before overclocking your
CPU, you have to change the
FSB. Increase the default
value from the BIOS in small
increments, say from 133 to
135 or 140. Now, change the
CPU ratio setting marginal-
ly. As all Intel CPUs are
locked, this is only applica-
ble to Athlon CPUs. Remem-
ber not to change the
voltage settings, as it may
cause overheating.
Fan please
Ideally, ensure that there are
at least two fans within the
cabinet. A fan in the front
will suck fresh air into the
case, while a fan behind will
push out the warmer air. An
SMPS with two fans will
also help.
ATi TWEAKING
OpenGL settings
For optimal performance
with the OpenGL API, flip
across to the OpenGL tab.
Under Main Settings, enable
the Custom Settings option.
Under Custom settings,
move the slider for the Anti-
Aliasing settings to the
extreme left, which in this
case, is 2X. Select the Perfor-
Cables, cables
Cables from the SMPS are
quite often slack; wind up
the excess length; if possi-
ble, tie up the power cables
with string, anchoring them
to the top of the cabinet.
Bunch data cables
together using duct tape—
or split flexible PVC tubing,
and place the cables within
it. Not only does this keep
your cables tangle free, it
also keeps them from
collecting dust, as well
as keeping your cabinet
airy. Also, make sure that
there are no cables directly
above the CPU or graphics
card fans.
mance option here, and set
the Anisotropic Filtering slid-
er to the least possible value.
Similarly, set the Texture Pref-
erence, as well as the Mipmap
Detail Level, to High Perfor-
mance. You can choose to
leave the Application Prefer-
ence options for all the set-
tings disabled. Finally, turn
off the Vertical Sync option.
NOVEMBER 2003
 Direct3D settings
The Direct3D settings menu
is similar to that of the
OpenGL settings. In the
main settings, enable the
Custom Settings option.
Under Custom Settings,
reduce Anti-Aliasing and
Anisotropic Filtering to the
least possible values, and
Use the Direct3D settings menu to fine
tune your ATi graphics card
enable Performance instead
of Quality. Adjust the
Texture Preference and
MipMap Detail levels to
High Performance, and turn
off Vertical Sync.
Advanced ATi Tweaks
To access some of the hid-
den features of the ATi
Radeon cards, use Power-
Strip. It will let you compre-
hensively tweak all standard
and hidden features of your
Radeon card.
Performance counts
PowerStrip resides in the Sys-
tem Tray. To access all the
features, right-click on the
icon, and choose from the
137
available options. The per-
formance options are locat-
ed by going to Performance
profiles > Configure. From
here, you can tweak the per-
formance features of the
Radeon without entering the
Catalyst driver applet. Using
PowerStrip, you can also
tweak other settings, such as
the ideal Colour and
Display profiles.
Overclocking and
pushing it
To obtain the best out
of your card, you can
overclock your GPU
and graphics memory
speed; but remember,
doing so will void your
warranty. Moreover,
you may damage your
card irreparably.
You can overclock
your Radeon using
PowerStrip; the stan-
dard ATI Catalyst driver
interface will not let
you tweak the GPU and
memory speeds. This can be
done by moving the sliders
within the Clock controls sec-
tion of the Performance pro-
files applet. If they appear to
have been disabled, check
and see if the ‘Disable clock
controls’ option has been
selected, and if so, deselect it.
Overclocking will lead to a
performance boost, but do it
cautiously, in 5 MHz incre-
ments. Move both the Engine
Clock and the Memory Clock
speeds up by 5 MHz, and test
the system to ensure that it’s
stable. Once you feel that
you’ve got that additional
punch in performance, leave
the sliders in position.
Remember, too big an incre-
ment will damage your card
irreparably. You can choose
to save the setting as a per-
formance profile for future
nVidia TWEAKING
Performance
Under the Performance and
Quality Settings option in
the fold out menu, you can
tweak the card for best per-
formance. First, move the
Image Settings slider to High
Performance. After that,
move the Anti-Aliasing slid-
er to the left, to ‘Anti-Alias-
ing - Off’. Similarly turn the
Anisotropic Filtering to the
Off position. After this, de-
select the Texture Sharpen-
ing option.
Direct3D settings
Under the Performance and
Quality Settings option, you
can set the Performance and
Compatibility options for
the Direct3D API-based
applications. Select ‘Best Per-
formance for Mipmap Detail
Level’, and leave the PCI Tex-
use. Watch out for excessive
temperature increases; ensure
that your cooling unit is
working properly before
attempting this.
ture Memory Size at its
default level. You may need
to enable Fog table emula-
tion if you see a plain white
screen while playing a game.
85
OpenGL settings
This is located next to the
Direct3D setting; set the
‘Default Color Depth’ to 16
bpp for good performance;
remember that setting it
to 32 bpp will result in a
performance hit. Turn off
Vertical Sync and disable
Anisotropic Filtering.
Unlocking hidden
features
To unlock the more subtle
features within the Detonator
drivers, use tools such as
nVHardPage (http://www.
nvhardpage.com). Run the util-
ity. To get the hidden options,
NOVEMBER 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
under the Tweaks tab, enable
Activate Cool Bits, Activate
Hardware options, Activate
AGP Options and Activate
Display Orientations.
Depending on the nVidia
card you have, you should
see several new options acti-
vated within the Detonator
driver, including Clock Fre-
quencies, AGP Settings and
Hardware Options.
Hardware options
Hardware Options will let
you reset the AGP settings
on your machine. The moth-
erboard setting is automati-
cally detected and you can
manually set your AGP set-
ting to the highest value sup-
ported by your motherboard
and graphics card.
Overclocking your
nVidia
Overclocking your nVidia
card might give your gaming
86 a performance boost, but
again, this needs to be done
with caution. Keep in mind
that if you recklessly over-
clock, your graphics card
might go kaput.
By default, the overclock-
Overclock your nVidia card by
dragging a few sliders, but be careful
138
ing options are not exposed
within the nVidia driver, but
if you have enabled the Acti-
vate Cool Bits option
through nVHardPage, you
can run up the clock fre-
quencies of your GPU and
graphics memory.
To do so, click on the
Clock Frequencies option.
Enable the ‘Allow clock fre-
quency adjustments’ option.
You may need to reboot to
enable it. Once enabled, you
can change the Core Clock
Frequency, which controls
the frequency of the GPU.
The Memory Clock Frequen-
cy controls the speed of the
graphics memory on the
card. Ideally, increase the
frequencies by a factor of 2
to 5 MHz at a time and test
the settings. Raise the levels
of the GPU speed, as well as
the graphics memory, syn-
chronously. Remember,
don’t move the sliders by
ridiculous intervals—you
will damage the card. A little
overclocking, on the other
hand, may give you just that
little boost you crave for.
Also, watch out for excessive
heat—it might make sense to
get additional cooling
fans mounted within
the case.
TNT and TNT2
cards
If you have a TNT or TNT
2-level card, this will be
of interest to you. While
a lot of new games may
demand no less than a
GeForce class card, the
fact remains that with a
slight tweak, you could
still command the best
from your TNT card. You may
have a little trouble with the
very newest Detonator driv-
ers, since these have opti-
mizations for the latest cards,
and may tax TNT. Be on the
lookout for older, stable driv-
ers, such as those in the 20-
series family.
Setting the cards
Set the AGP aperture size to
GAME TWEAKS
Quake III
Advanced Tweaks
Simple tweaks can be set
straight from within the
game, and these commands
should be entered at the con-
sole. The console is accessed
by typing ‘~’ during the game.
To invoke the same settings
every time, you could create a
new document and enter all
the desired settings. Then
name it, say, custom.cfg. Dur-
ing game play, pull down the
console and type ‘/exec cus-
tom.cfg’ to load in your cus-
tom configuration file. You
can also enter the settings
into the q3config.cfg file, and
invoke it automatically at
half or quarter your system
RAM size. Now, open the
nVidia settings and make
these changes: Set Mipmap
Levels to ‘Best Performance’.
Enable ‘Enable Fog Table
Emulation’, under the Direct
3D Settings tab. If you have
a powerful CPU, choose
‘Default Color Depth’ as
‘Always use 32 bpp’, other-
wise choose 16 bpp.
runtime. Make sure you pre-
cede each command setting
with the word ‘seta’.
The Gun: This command
will allow you to toggle the
gun display; for the best per-
formance, turn off the gun
display. Use cg_drawGun 0 to
turn it off, and cg_drawGun 1
to turn it on.
Shelling hard: Though see-
ing the ejected shells pop-
ping out of your gun may
feel realistic, it takes its toll
on performance; to get the
best, disable it by using
cg_brassTime 0 and cg_
brassTime 500 to turn it on
Sixteen makes sense: While
you may be scoffing at run-
NOVEMBER 2003

Turn off eye candy in Quake III
to get higher frame rates
ning Quake III at 16-bit
colour, keep in mind that
swiching over to 32-bit ren-
dering, though it’s higher
quality, will definitely give
that frame rate drop. Opti-
mal settings would be r_col-
orbits 16 while going back to
32-bit would be r_colorbits 32.
Sky, no sky: While all the
dynamic sky effects and see-
through portals look great,
turning them off will yield
much better performance. To
set optimal performance use
r_fastsky 1. To go back to eye
candy, use r_fastsky 0
Pretty flashes: Weapons in
Quake III come with some
very realistic lighting and
flare effects, but at the cost of
performance. To turn it off,
use r_dynamicLight 0. Turn it
back on with r_dynamicLight 1
Curves cost more: Turning
off those pretty curves in
Quake III could do wonders
for performance. Do that by
setting r_nocurves 1. If you
want to get back to the
curves, use r_nocurves 0
UT2003
Advanced tweaks
UT2003’s main settings can
be accessed from the
UT2003.ini file located under
the System folder of the
139
install. While all the simpler
graphics tweaks can be set
from within the settings
menu, you can tweak this file
to give that extra perform-
ance boost. Open the
UT2003.ini file in any text
editor to try out these tweaks.
Before you start to edit the
file, be sure to back it up, in
case you want to restore
the original settings. Scroll
down the file and locate
all these settings under
[D3DDrv.D3DRender Device],
unless mentioned otherwise.
Pre-caching textures: Set
‘UsePrecaching=False’ to dis-
able loading of textures into
video memory while loading
the level, especially if you are
using a graphics card with
32 MB of video memory.
This should give you
smoother gameplay. On the
other hand, should you have
a card with 64 MB or more,
you can set this to True.
Trilinear texture filtering:
Setting ‘UseTrilinear=True’ will
enable trilinear texture filter-
ing, which will give you
enhanced quality but you
might suffer a performance
hit on older cards. To turn it
off, set it to False
Compressed lightmaps: If
this is enabled, your loading
times will increase, but you
should see increased in-game
performance. Enable it with
‘UseCompressedLightmaps= True’.
On the other hand, if you
happen to have a very high-
end graphics card, such as
one with 128 MB of video
RAM or more, you can disable
this to get more realistic,
uncompressed lightmaps.
Minimum frames: Again,
Anti-Aliasing, Anisotropic
Filtering turned off in UT2003
this one is recommended
only if you happen to have
TWEAKING PDAS
U
nlike mobile phones,
PDAs are like mini-
computers and can
be tweaked to yield better
performance. A PDA can be
tweaked in two ways—over-
clocking and using a tweak
utility. Everything is faster
when a PDA is overclocked;
unfortunately the battery
drains quicker too. The other
option is to use a tweaking
utility that raises the CPU
clock speed only when
required—such as when
playing a game—and lowers
the clock when using less
CPU intensive applications.
This provides you with a
device that is fast when you
jumping frame rates and
would like to stick to a
defined value. Locate ‘MinDe-
siredFrameRate= 35.000000’
under [WinDrv. WindowsClient].
As you can see, the default is
35 frames per second.
Increase this to a value that
you believe is sustainable for
your system. UT2003 will
compensate by reducing eye
candy through the game play,
and try to maintain the frame
rates around this number.
87
need it, and the battery lasts
longer too—unless you play
games all day!
Caution: before playing
with clock frequencies, make
sure you know what you’re
doing, or else you might
damage the CPU. Remember,
overclocking increases CPU
power and reduces battery
life, while underclocking
reduces CPU power and
increases battery life. Also, be
careful to make changes in
small increments, and check
the performance-to-stability
ratio. Last but not least,
always backup your data.
The utilities available
depend on what CPU and
NOVEMBER 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
You should turn off unwanted
services. This frees up system
resources, which the games
can utilise.
Creating a Hardware
Profile
Go to Start > Control Panel >
System. In the Hardware tab,
click the ‘Hardware Profiles’
button. You will see a profile
named ‘Profile 1(Current)’ in
the Available Hardware Profile
list. Click the Copy button to
copy this profile and name it
‘Gaming’, or any other con-
venient name. Don’t make any
further changes, and click OK
twice to close the windows.
Disabling Services
for Gaming
Go to Start > Run, type ‘servic-
es.msc’ and press [Enter].
Disable all the services men-
tioned below by right-clicking
and selecting Properties > Log
On > Disable.
88 operating system your PDA
runs. For example, in PDAs
with Intel XScale processors
and Palm OS, such as the
Sony CLIÉ and Palm Tung-
sten, there is a utility
called Lightspeed (http://
www.clievideo.com). If you
have a Pocket PC with an
XScale processor running
Windows CE, you can use
Pocket Hack Master. It allows
you to overclock your 400
MHz CPU to 500 MHz.
Pocket Hack Master has
Turbo and Run modes, which
tweak the memory and LCD
multipliers to run according-
ly. You can also set the
SDRAM latency, refresh-rate
or refresh-cycles. This pro-
140
At Your Service
! Routing and Remote Access
! Alerter
! Application Layer Gateway
Service
! Application Management
! Background Intelligent
Transfer Service
! ClipBook
! COM+ System Application
! Computer Browser
! Distributed Link Tracking
Client
! Distributed Transaction
Coordinator
! Error Reporting Service
! Fast User Switching
Compatibility Help and
Support
! IMAPI CD-Burning COM
Service
! Indexing Service
! Internet Connection
Firewall (ICF) / Internet
Connection Sharing (ICS)
! IPSEC Services
! Logical Disk Manager
gram also shows you running
processes, threads, loaded
DLLs, etc. One of the best fea-
tures is the ability to set Scale
Use Pocket Hack Master to overclock
your XScale-based Pocket PC
Administrative Service
! MS Software Shadow Copy
Provider
! Net Logon
! NetMeeting Remote
Desktop Sharing
! Network DDE
! Network DDE DSDM
! Network Location
Awareness (NLA)
! NT LM Security Support
Provider
! Performance Logs and
Alerts
! Portable Media Serial
Number
! Print Spooler
! Protected Storage
! QoS RSVP
! Routing and Remote Access
! Remote Desktop Help
Session Manager
! Remote Procedure Call
(RPC) Locator
! Remote Registry
! Removable Storage
triggers for the CPU load—
this basically increases the
CPU speed when a particular
load is reached. Download it
from http://download.com.
com/3000-217810193651.html.
Another utility for
XScale processors is XCPUS-
caler (http://www.immiersoft.
com). It allows you to
dynamically scale the
processor speed of Pocket
PCs and Windows Mobile
2003. It allows for a change
in speed of up to 50 per
cent. A very useful feature of
this application is Auto Scal-
ing—it increases or decreas-
es CPU power depending
on how CPU-intensive
the currently running
! Secondary Logon
! Security Accounts Manager
Server
! Smart Card
! Smart Card Helper
! SSDP Discovery Service
! System Restore Service
! TCP/IP NetBIOS Helper
! Task Scheduler
! Telnet
! Themes
! Uninterruptible Power
Supply
! Universal Plug and Play
Device Host
! Upload Manager
! Volume Shadow Copy
! Windows Image Acquisition
(WIA)
! Windows Installer
! Windows Management
Instrumentation Driver
Extensions
! Wireless Zero Configuration
! WMI Performance Adapter
! Windows Time
application is, thus increasing
battery life.
iPaq 1910 users can use
Clear Speed (http://revolution.
cx/speed/speed.htm). This gives
you the option of control-
ling the Pocket PC speeds
and backlight, based on how
much power is remaining in
the batteries. Basically, when
your battery is full, the CPU
runs at full power, and as
the batteries drain, the
speed reduces—this increas-
es battery life. iPaq users
can also download the JS
Overclock utility to squeeze
every ounce of speed
from their CPUs. Get it at
http://www.jimmysoftware.
com/Software/Overclock.
NOVEMBER 2003
insight ■
■ tips and tricks

Registry
Unplugged
Editing the registry is not black magic; it is just
another step towards taming Windows. Learn
89
the top registry tweaks to get complete control

contents
90 Customisation
92 Office
93 Performance
94 Annoyances
95 Ease the Task
IMAGING: Solomon Lewis 95 Covering Tracks

163 DECEMBER 2003

 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
T
he registry is the place
where Windows stores
all its settings. These
settings are used to control
hardware, installed applica-
tions, the user interface—
practically every setting in
the system. So to make any
changes to the default set-
tings, the registry has to be
edited. To open the registry
editor, go to Start > Run, type
‘regedit’ and press [Enter].
The registry editor contains
two vertical panes. The left
pane has a Windows explor-
er-like hierarchy structure.
Each item here is called key,
and a key can have sub-keys.
When you select a key, you’ll
find some items in the right
pane. These are the entries
corresponding to the selected
key. The keys are organised
containers for the entries; it is
the entries that store the set-
tings. The entries can store
different types of data: String,
90 Binary and DWORD values.
Back up...back up
The registry is critical for the
health of any Windows sys-
tem. Any damage to it will
cause the system to behave
erratically. It’s recommended
that you don’t make any
changes to the system reg-
istry without backing up the
current settings. To take a
backup of the registry, open
the registry editor and select
Registry > Export Registry File. In
the dialog box that appears,
select ‘All’ and enter a name
for the backup file. It’s also
possible to back up specific
registry keys. To do so, select
the key to be saved, and go
to Registry > Export Registry File,
check ‘Selected branch’ and
click OK.
Windows Me and XP
users can create system
restore points. This feature
lets you revert to a particular
state in case of a system
crash. To take a snapshot of
the current state of the sys-
tem, go to Start > Programs >
Accessories > System Tools > Sys-
164
tem Restore and select ‘Create
a restore point’. To revert to
this point later, you will have
to start System Restore and
select which point you want
to restore to.
Creating a new key
To create a new key, just
right-click the parent key
and select New > Key. To cre-
ate an entry, select the key in
the left pane, right-click over
in the right pane and select
CUSTOMISATION
ILUSTRATOR:
Creating icons
The icon of a bitmap file
can be set as the file image
itself. To effect this setting,
navigate to the key HKEY_
CLASSES_ROOT/Paint.Picture/
DefaultIcon and set the value
of ‘Default entry’ to ‘%1’.
Also navigate to the key
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT/.bmp and
set ‘Default entry’ to
‘PAINT.PICTURE’. The flip side
of this tweak is that folders
with a lot of bitmap files
might take longer to load. In
Use bitmap images as icons
the data type of the entry to
be created.
Restart
When a change is made to the
registry, the effect may or may
not be visible immediately. For
example, when changing the
title bar text of IE, you need to
restart it for the changes to
be reflected. For OS-related
tweaks you may need to log
off and log on again, or even
restart the machine.
Farzana Cooper
such cases, try increasing the
icon cache to make the fold-
ers load faster. The icon
cache can be increased
using the ‘MaxCachedIcons’
entry (type string) in the
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\
Software\Microsoft\Windows\
CurrentVersion\Explorer key.
Increase the value of this
entry to increase the icon
cache; use any value between
100 and 4,096.
Start Menu scrolling
When your Start menu
overflows, it isn’t pos-
sible to list all the
entries in a single col-
umn. Then, Windows
either creates a second
column or a scrolling
menu. You can control
this through the
registry. Navigate to
the HKEY_CURRENT_
DECEMBER 2003
USER\Software\Microsoft\
Windows\CurrentVersion\Explor
er\Advanced, and select the
entry called ‘StartMenu
ScrollPrograms’. If it’s not
present, create a new String
value called ‘StartMenuScroll-
Programs’. Specify the value
as ‘Yes’ if you want the Start
menu to scroll, and ‘No’ if
you need the Start menu as
multiple columns.
IE Title bar text
Internet Explorer installa-
tions distributed by compa-
nies other than Microsoft
might have their names in
the title bar. If you want
to change this, navigate to
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Soft-
ware\Microsoft\Internet Explor-
er\Main, and edit or create a
string value entry called
‘Window Title’. Double-click
the entry and enter any
Remove unwanted text from the IE title bar
string you want. Leave it
blank if you want to remove
the default string. You’ll
need to restart Internet
Explorer for the change to
take effect.
Size of desktop icons
Using the Control Panel dis-
play settings, icons in Win-
dows can be displayed in
only two different sizes.
Tweaking the registry allows
you to have any size for
icons. Go to HKEY_CUR-
RENT_USER\Control Panel\Desk-
top\WindowMetrics, and create
or modify the string value
‘Shell Icon Size’. Give the
value of your desired icon
size, in pixels.
Extracting the
product key
The Windows product key is
sometimes forgotten or mis-
165
placed after the Windows
installation. This serves as a
blockade during the
inevitable Windows reinstall.
In case of Windows 95, the
product key can be obtained
from the system properties
window (Windows key + [Pause\
Break]). For Windows 98, it’s
possible to extract the key
from the registry. Select the
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\
Software\Microsoft\Windows\
CurrentVersion key, and in the
right pane, the value of the
entry ProductKey will give
the product key of the cur-
rent Windows installation.
Logon message
To create a personalised
logon message in XP, go to
HKEY_ LOCAL_ MACHINE\ SOFT-
WARE\Microsoft\WindowsNT\
CurrentVersion\Winlogon. In
the right pane, double-click
the string
entry ‘Legal-
NoticeCap-
tion’, enter
the string ‘My
Windows XP
Machine’ and
click OK.
Next, double-
click the ‘LegalNotice Text’
string entry, and enter the
message to be displayed.
Screensaver grace
period
If you’ve set a screen saver
password in Windows 2000
or XP, and the screen saver
activates, there is a grace
period before which Win-
dows doesn’t prompt for a
password when you press a
key or move the mouse. For
security reasons, it is advised
that you remove this grace
period. Go to HKEY_LOCAL_
MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft
\ W i n d o w s N T \ C u r r e n t Ve r -
sion\Winlogon, create a string
entry named ‘ScreenSaver-
GracePeriod’ and give it a
value of ‘0’. If the key exists,
modify its value to ‘0’, or else
create a DWORD entry, with
the above details.
Display Administrator
in logon screen
Like the root user in Linux,
Windows XP has a default
user called ‘Administrator’.
This user is not displayed in
the logon screen where all the
users in the system are dis-
played. To view this account,
go to HKEY_ LOCAL_MACHINE
\Software\Microsoft\Windows-
NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon\
SpecialAccounts\UserList. If the
binary Administrator key
does not exist, create it.
Assign its value to ‘1’ to see
the Administrator, or ‘0’ to
hide it.
Change the welcome
screen
Windows XP displays three
different screens during
boot-up. The second screen
is the one that says
“Welcome”. To change this,
navigate to HKEY USERS\.
DEFAULT\Control Panel\Desk-
top. Under this key, you will
find an entry named ‘Wall-
paper’; double-click it and
enter the path of the image
file you want displayed.
The file can be a BMP
or JPEG image. If you want
to tile the image, set the
value of the ‘TileWallPaper’
entry to 1. If you want
to stretch the wallpaper, set
the value of the ‘WallPaper-
Style’ entry to 2.
Colour of encrypted
and compressed files
Windows XP displays
encrypted and compressed
files and folders in a differ-
ent colour. To change the
default colour, go to
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Soft-
ware\Microsoft\Windows\Cur-
rentVersion\Explorer. Under
this key, create a binary
entry named ‘AltEncryp-
tionColor’. Set its value as
the RGB ratio of the desired
colour for encrypted files;
the format is RR GG BB 00.
The last two digits are
always ‘00’. Similarly, to
change the colour of com-
pressed files and folders,
create or modify a binary
entry named ‘AltColor’.
Specify its value as men-
tioned above. For this
tweak to work, the ‘Show
encrypted and compressed
folders in color’ must be
enabled via the folder
options window.
Detailed information
in the device manager
When this tweak is applied,
the device manger in Win-
dows 2000 and XP will
show an extra tab called
‘Details’. Selecting this tab
will provide additional
information about the
device. Go to HKEY_LOCAL_
MACHINE\SYSTEM\Current-
ControlSet\Control\Session-
Manager\Environment. Here,
you’ll find a string entry
with the name ‘DEVM-
GR_SHOW_DETAILS’; if
there isn’t one, create it.
Assign this entry a value of
‘1’ if you want the system
91
to display the details tab; to
hide the tab, assign it a
value of ‘0’.
Prevent access to
specified drives
Use this tweak to prevent
access to drives to certain
users. Remember, once this
is applied, the prohibited
user can’t access the drive by
any means. Log into Win-
dows using the user account
that you want to restrict
access to, open the registry
editor and go to HKEY_CUR-
RENT_USER\Software\Micr
osoft\Windows\Cur-
rentVersion\Policies\Explor
er. Create a DWORD value
with the name ‘NoViewOn-
Drive’. Double click this
entry and in the dialog box
that appears, select the radio
button named ‘Decimal’. In
the value data field you need
to enter a number that
depends on the drive that
needs to be hidden. Use the
formula ‘2n-1’, where n is 1
for your A drive, 2 for B
DECEMBER 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
Get extra information about
system devices
drive, and so on until 26 for
drive Z. If you need to hide
more than one drive, add
the respective drive numbers
and enter it into the value
data field. For example, to
hide drive C you need to
enter 4 (23-1); to hide drives
92 D and E you need to enter
24 (24-1+25-1). To apply the
change to all users in the
system, follow the same
method, but use the key
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\
Software\Microsoft\Win-
dows\CurrentVersion\Policies\
Explorer instead. To remove
all restrictions, just delete
the entry.
Know your real writ-
ing speed in Nero
While writing a CD using
Nero 5.5, only the average
speed is displayed in
the burn status dialog box.
To force Nero to display
the actual writing speed,
navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_
USER\Software\ahead\
Nero-BurningRom\Recorder.
Under this, open the
DWORD entry ‘ShowSin-
gleRecorderSpeed’ (create
one if it doesn't exist).
Change the value of this
entry to ‘1’ to display the
actual writing speed, and ‘0’
to display the average
writing speed.
166
OFFICE
Minimise Outlook to
the system tray
Outlook 2003 can be min-
imised to the system tray,
but it’s possible with earlier
versions of Outlook as well.
Go to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\
Software\Microsoft\Office\10.0\
Outlook\Preferences and create
You can minimise Outlook XP to
the system tray
a DWORD entry named
‘MinToTray’. Give it a value
of ‘1’. Restart Outlook for the
change to take effect.
Give four digits for
year in Excel
Whenever a date is entered
in an Excel cell, the year field
is automatically truncated to
two digits. For example,
when the user enters the date
9-11-2000 in a cell, it is auto-
matically replaced with
9/11/00. This is bad when
spanning across a century,
such as records from 1999 to
2003. This tweak makes
Excel display dates with four
digits for the year field.
Locate HKEY_CURRENT_USER\
Software\Microsoft\Office\
[Version]\Excel\Options, where
[Version] indicates your
Office version (Office XP is
‘10.0’, 2000 is ‘9.0’, etc.).
Create or modify the
DWORD entry ‘EnableFour-
DigitYearDisplay’ and enter a
value of ‘1’.
Change the number of
undo levels in Excel
By default, Excel can perform
16 undo operations. You
can customise the num-
ber of undo levels, but
remember that increas-
ing the number of levels
results in more RAM
being allocated to Excel.
Go to HKEY_CURRENT_
USER\Software\Microsoft\Office
\ [ Ve r s i o n ] \ E x c e l \ O p t i o n s .
Under this key, create a
DWORD value with the
name ‘UndoHistory’. You
can turn off the undo feature
by giving a value of ‘0’, use
the maximum allowed level
‘100’, or provide an interme-
diate level of your choice.
Remember to select the deci-
mal radio button when
entering a value between 0
and 100.
Remove attachments
restrictions
When an incoming e-mail
has attachments such as
EXE, SCR, etc., Outlook XP
doesn’t download the attach-
ments, for security reasons.
The complete list of file
extensions which aren’t
downloaded in Outlook XP
and 2003 is: ADE, ADP, ASX,
BAS, BAT, CHM, CMD, COM,
DECEMBER 2003
CPL, CRT, EXE, HLP, HTA,
INF, INS, ISP, JS, JSE, LNK,
MDA, MDB, MDE, MDZ,
MSC, MSI, MSP, MST, PCD,
PIF, PRF, REG, SCF, SCR, SCT,
SHB, SHS, URL, VB, VBE,
VBS, WSC, WSF and WSH.
If you want Outlook to
download any of the above
mentioned file extensions,
go to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\
Software\Microsoft\Office\10.0
\Outlook\Security (11.0 for
Outlook 2003), and create or
modify the string entry
named ‘Level1Remove’. The
value of this entry is the file
extension that it will down-
load; so, add the file exten-
sions that you wish Outlook
to download, separated by a
semicolon—for example, to
force Outlook to download
EXE and BAT files, assign the
value ‘exe;bat’.
Add custom places to
the open/save dialog box
In the MS Office Open and
Save dialog box, there’s a
Performance
Disable Windows XP
support for Zip files
Windows XP comes with
in-built support for Zip files,
but this can be a curse in
disguise. While searching
for files, XP automatically
searches through Zip files,
resulting in a slow search.
To disable support for Zip
files, go to Start > Run, type
‘ regsvr32/u%windir%\sys-
tem32\zipfldr.dll’ and click
OK. If you want to enable it
167
bar on the right that con-
tains links to common loca-
tions such as My Computer,
My Documents, etc. Using
this tweak, you can add cus-
tom locations to this bar.
For example, if you often
save your work on a net-
work drive, you can add it
to the places bar. Navigate
to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\
Software\Microsoft\Office\
[ Ve r s i o n ] \ C o m m o n \ O p e n -
Find\Places\UserDefinedPlaces,
where ‘[Version]’ indicates
the current office version.
Create a sub-key with the
name ‘PlaceX’, where X is a
unique number. In other
words, name the first cus-
tom location ‘Place1’, the
second ‘Place2’, and so on.
Now select the newly creat-
ed sub-key and create two
string entries in it: ‘Name’
and ‘Path’. The value for
‘Name’, is whatever you
want to call that location,
and that for ‘Path’ is the
exact path to that folder.
later, go to Start > Run and
type ‘regsvr32 %windir%\
system32\zipfldr.dll’. Disabling
support for Zip files in XP
does not in any way affect
the functionality of third-
party tools such as WinZip,
WinRAR, etc.
Speed up access to
folders with AVI files
Windows XP sometimes
takes a really long time to
open folders with AVI files.
This is because XP tries to get
information about the files.
To disable this feature, open
the registry and go to
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\
CLSID\{87D62D94-71B3-4b9a-
9489-5FE6850DC73E}. Append
a [-] (a minus sign) in front
of the ‘{87D…’ key, so that it
becomes something like ‘-
{87D…’.
Prevent OS being
paged to disk
At times, when there’s a
dearth of RAM, the system
will move some portion of
the main memory to the
hard disk. Obviously, this
slows down the system, but
there’s nothing much that
can be done about it. In case
your system is blessed with
loads of RAM (256 MB or
more) and runs Windows
NT, 2000 or XP, you can use
this tweak to prevent the
kernel mode code from
being moved to the hard
disk. While this will improve
system performance, it may
affect programs that rely on
Windows swap space. So if
you notice any eccentric
behaviour after applying this
setting, revert to the previ-
ous setting. Go to
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYS-
TEM\CurrentControlSet\Con-
trol\Session Manager\Memory
Management. Look for a
DWORD entry called ‘Dis-
ablePagingExecutive’; set it
to ‘1’ to disable the kernel
being paged. if you face
problems, set it back to ‘0’.
Increase USB
polling interval
By default, Win-
dows checks for
connected USB
devices once every
millisecond. This
might prevent the
processor from
going into power
saving mode, which
is vital for laptops
to conserve battery
life. This tweak
allows you to increase the
USB polling interval. For
Windows 98 and Me, go to
HKEY_ LOCAL_MACHINE\Sys-
tem\CurrentControlSet\Services\
Class\Usb\0000; for Windows
2000 or XP, go to HKEY_
LOCAL_MACHINE\System\
CurrentControlSet\Control\Class
\{36FC9E60-C465-11CF-
8056444553540000}\0000.
Create a DWORD entry
called ‘IdleEnable’ and give
it a value of ‘1’. To revert to
the previous refresh rate,
give the entry a value of ‘0’.
Quicker access to
network folders
When you open a remote
location by entering the
computer name in the Run
dialog box or through Net-
work Neighbourhood, Win-
dows takes a long time to
open the location. Instead,
when the complete address
of the location is given such
as ‘\\computername\folder-
name’, it opens immediately.
93
Microsoft has confirmed that
this occurs when a Windows
2000 system tries to access a
Windows 98 system. The
system tries to read the
scheduled tasks of the
remote system—a fairly use-
less step. To solve the prob-
lem, open the registry and
delete the HKEY_LOCAL_
MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\
W i n d o w s \ C u r re n t Ve r s i o n \
Explorer\RemoteComputer\
NameSpace\{D6277990-4C6A-
11CF-8D8700AA0060F5BF} key.
DECEMBER 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
Turn off support for
UnPnP
Universal Plug and Play
(UPnP) devices can be con-
nected to any system over
the network instantly—like a
PnP device being connected
to a local system. Windows
XP supports this feature, but
Microsoft has acknowledged
a security flaw. Though there
is a patch, it is recommended
to turn off this feature—there
are so few UPnP devices
available anyway. Navigate
to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE \
System\CurrentControlSet\
Services\upnphost and double
click the DWORD entry
named ‘Start’. To disable sup-
port for this service, give it a
value of ‘4’; to enable it
again, give it a value of ‘3’. If
ANNOYANCES
94
Menu display delay
When a menu is opened,
Windows opens the menu
after a small delay. For exam-
ple, after clicking on Start, the
Programs menu takes ages to
expand. This is because the
‘Menushowdelay’ entry has
been given a large value.
Open the key HKEY_CURRENT_
USER\Control Panel\ Desktop
and modify or create a string
value named ‘MenuShow
Delay’. In this entry, give the
required delay in millisec-
onds; the accepted limit is 0
to 999.
168
you use any UnPnP devices
over your network, leave
it enabled.
Window refresh rate
All open windows are
refreshed at a predefined
interval; but when there’re
too many windows open,
and a paucity of memory,
they often appear blank—a
file copied to a folder may not
appear immediately on the
window. This tweak allows
you to set a faster refresh rate
for open windows. Go to
HKEY_LOCAL_ MACHINE\SYS-
TEM\CurrentControlSet\Con-
trol\Update. Create or modify
the DWORD key called
‘UpdateMode’. Assign it a
value of ‘0’ for a faster refresh
rate, and ‘1’ for default.
Disable low disk space
warning
Windows XP will
show a warning
message whenever
the drive is low on
disk space. For some
reason, whether we
have an 8 GB or 80
GB hard drive, it’s
never enough, and
this message just
gets irritating after a
while. To suppress it,
go to HKEY_CURRENT_
USER\Software\
Microsoft\Windows\
Stop the annoying low disk
space warning
CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer
and create or modify the
DWORD value called
‘NoLowDiskSpaceChecks’. A
value of ‘1’ will disable the
warning message, ‘0’ will
enable it.
Disable CD burning
Windows XP comes with in-
built support for CD writing.
Since this offers limited func-
tionality, power users might
not need it. To disable sup-
port for CD writing, go to
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\
Software\Microsoft\Windows\
CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer.
Create or modify the
DWORD entry called
‘NoCDBurning’. A value of
‘1’ disables CD burning and
‘0’ enables it.
Hide the links folder
Internet Explorer incessantly
creates the ‘Links’ folder
under the Favourites section,
even if the user deletes it.
You can get rid of it perma-
nently by going to HKEY_
C U R R E N T _ U S E R \ S o f t w a re \
Microsoft\InternetExplorer\
Toolbar. Set the value of the
‘LinksFolderName’ entry as a
blank string. Now, open IE
and delete the Links folder. It
will no longer be displayed
under Favourites.
DECEMBER 2003
 EASE THE TASK
Beep on printer errors
Use this setting to enable the
machine to beep every few
seconds when a print error
occurs. For local printers, go
to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\
System\CurrentControlSet\
Control\Print and create or
modify the DWORD entry
called ‘BeepEnabled’. A value
of ‘1’ enables beeps and ‘0’
disables them.
For network printers,
go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\
Software\ Microsoft\Windows
N T \ C u r re n t Ve r s i o n \ P r i n t \
Providers\LanManPrintSer-
vices\Servers and create or
modify the DWORD entry
called ‘BeepEnabled’. A value
of ‘1’ enables beeps and ‘0’
disables them.
Include Copy to and
Move to in the context
menu
When you right-click a file,
you get a menu called con-
text menu. This tweak shows
you how you can add two
useful entries to it, namely,
‘Copy To’ and ‘Move To’.
Therefore, copying and mov-
ing files can be done in
2 steps. To add the ‘Copy To’
option, go to HKEY_CLASS-
ES_ROOT\ Directory\shellex\
ContextMenuHandlers and cre-
ate a sub-key called ‘Copy
169
To’. Select the key you creat-
ed and in the right pane,
modify the value of the
‘Default’ entry to ‘{C2FBB630-
297111d1A18C00C04FD75D13}
’. Similarly, navigate to
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\*\
shellex\ContextMenuHandlers
and create a sub-key named
‘Copy To’ and give the same
default value as above. For
the ‘Move To’ option, dupli-
cate the above mentioned
steps, but rename the sub-
keys as ‘Move To’ and
the Default values as
‘{C2FBB631-2971-11d1-
A18C-00C04FD75D13}’.
Now when you right click on
any file or folder—except on
the Desktop—you will get
these two options.
Start button context
menu
Using this tweak, you can
open applications from the
context menu of the Start
button, i.e. by right-clicking
on the Start button. Open
the registry and select the
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\ Directo-
ry\Shell key. Create a new
sub-key named after the pro-
gram you want to associate it
with, say, Notepad. Now
select this key and create
another sub-key named
‘Command’ and set its
below: Search for ‘<search
terms>’. This will take you
directly to the results page in
Google. Open the registry and
navigate to HKEY_ CURRENT_
USER\Software\Microsoft\Inter-
netExplorer\Main; change the
value of ‘Use Search Asst’ to
‘no’; change the value of
‘Search Page’ to ‘http://www.
google.com’; change the value
Get the ‘Copy to’ in the context of ‘Search Bar’ to ‘http://
menu www.google. com/ie’.
Next, go to HKEY_
‘Default’ entry value as C U R R E N T _ U S E R \ S o f t w a re \
the path to the executable Microsoft\InternetExplorer\
for example, ‘C:Windows\ Search URL and change the
notepad.exe’. values of ‘Default’ to ‘http://
www.google.com/keyword/%s’
Make Google default and ‘provider’ to ‘gogl’. Then
search page go to the HKEY_LOCAL_
Google-holics ahoy! You can MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft
set IE to search using Google \Internet Explorer\Search key
as default. Enter the search and modify the ‘Search
terms in the address and select Assistant’ entry’svalue to
the option that appears ‘http://www.google.com/ie’.
COVERING TRACES 95
Selectively
remove cached
Run commands
Commands entered
in the Run dialog
box are automatical-
ly cached to be used
again later as Auto
Complete. You can
selectively remove
entries from the
cached list of
instructions. Go to
HKEY_CURRENT_
USER\Software\
DECEMBER 2003
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks

Microsoft\Windows\Current can selectively remove items that you don’t want files to
Version\Explorer\RunMRU, and from the Start menu. Go to be stored in the Recycle bin.
on the right pane, you will HKEY_CURRENT_USER\ Go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\
find entries, each one repre- Software\Microsoft\Windows\ Software\Microsoft\Windows\
senting a cached instruction. CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer, CurrentVersion\Explorer\BitBucket
Delete the unwanted entries, and add a DWORD entry and create a DWORD entry
or delete all if you want to for each item you want named ‘NukeOnDelete’. Give
clear the cache. to remove. this a value of ‘1’ to disable
Here’s a list of items: the Recycle bin and ‘0’ to
Remove Logoff from ‘NoRecentDocsMenu’ enable it.
Start Menu removes the Documents
In Windows 98, the start menu. Disable recent files list
menu will have a Log Off but- ‘NoFavoritesMenu’re- in Media Player 8
ton, but many users don’t use moves the Favourites menu. Windows Media Player 8
it, especially in stand alone ‘NoFind’ removes the maintains a list of files
systems. To remove this but- Find command from the accessed recently in the File
ton from the Start menu, Start menu. menu. Use this registry tweak
go to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\ ‘NoRun’ removes the Run to do away with that list.
Software\Microsoft\Windows\Cu command. Open the registry and navi-
rrentVersion\Policies\Explorer, ‘NoClose’ removes the gate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\
create a binary entry and Shutdown command (be care- S o f t w a re \ M i c ro s o f t \ M e d i a
enter its value as 01 00 00 00. ful as it prevents you from Player\Preferences. Here, double
shutting down Windows). click the ‘AddToMRU’ entry.
Removing typed URLs ‘NoSetTaskbar’ removes Give this a value of ‘00’ if you
from IE address bar the Taskbar command in the intend to disable the recent
Internet Explorer stores 25 Settings sub-folder on the Start files list. You can enable it by
URLs that were previously menu. Adding this entry will changing the value to ‘01’.
entered into the address bar. also prevent a user from mak-
96 Click on the drop down but- ing changes to the taskbar by
ton at the end of the address right-clicking on the taskbar
Clear Add/Remove Pro-
grams list
bar to view the cached URLs. and selecting Properties. Certain program entries do
To selectively remove URLs In Windows 2000 and remain in the Add/Remove
XP, adding programs list owing to an
‘NoSMHelp’ uninstallations that go hay-
will remove wire. This tweak enables you
the help to do away with those. Go to
item and HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\
‘NoCom- SOFTWARE\Microsoft\
Selectively remove cached URLs in IE monGroups’ W i n d o w s \ C u r r e n t Ve r s i o n \
will remove Uninstall. Under this key,
from this list go to HKEY_ all the entries located in you will find sub-keys for
CURRENT_USER\Software\Micros C:\Documents and Settings\All each program installed.
oft\Internet Explorer\TypedURLs. Users\Start Menu and its sub- Right-click and delete all
In the right pane, you will folders. the entries you want removed
find the list of URLs ordered After adding any entry, from the Add\ Remove pro-
with names url, url2, …url25. assign it a value of ‘1’ to grams list.
Delete the entries you wish to remove the item
remove. Rename the remain- from the Start Menu,
ing entries so that the order is or ‘0’ to bring it back.
maintained. For example, if
you delete two entries, Remove the
rename the others so that Recycle bin
they list as url1 to url23. If you’re tired of hav-
ing to delete things
Remove Start menu twice and the Recy-
items cle Bin seems redun-
Most users don’t use all the dant, you can
items in the Start menu. remove it. Using this
Entries such as Help and Log tweak, you can force
off are sometimes never used Windows to delete
at all. Using this tweak, you files directly—be sure

170 DECEMBER 2003

insight ■
■ tips and tricks

Photo Finish! Click those

cho-chweet moments,
scan that Swiss
landscape, and doll it
up...with aplomb!

contents
2 Digital Photography
4 Scanning
6 Processing

IMAGING: Mahesh Benkar

123 JANUARY 2004

 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
DIGITAL PHOTOGRAPHY
Use these tips to breeze through a photo shoot
using a digital camera!
Focusing
You might face this problem
if you use an auto-focus cam-
era—the camera captures the
distant background and blurs
the subject. This is because
2 cameras are usually designed
to have a central focus. The
solution is quite simple. Point
the camera at the subject and
position it in the centre of the
frame. Keep the shutter but-
ton pressed halfway down to
lock the focus on the subject
and re-position the camera so
the scene is framed to your
liking. Finally, press the shut-
ter button down completely
to take a snapshot.
The Rule of Thirds
One of the most popular rules
of photography, it applies to
both traditional, as well as
digital photography. Accord-
ing to this rule, if the frame
of the viewfinder were to be
divided into thirds, both hor-
124
izontally and vertically, then
the four intersections are the
best places to put your sub-
ject, instead of the centre of
the frame. This yields an
Follow the Rule of Thirds to click
appealing photos
appealing image.
In case of a landscape
shoot that needs an empha-
sis on the sky, get the horizon
on the lower horizontal grid.
Foreground and back-
ground
Zoom in and choose a large
aperture setting for sharper
foregrounds and blurred
backgrounds. This setting is
appropriate for portrait pho-
tos. Zooming out and choos-
ing a small aperture results in
an equal focus on the back-
ground and foreground.
Shooting fireworks
Snap up those beautiful fire-
works using a digital camera
with a shutter speed longer
than ½ a second. Ideally, opt
for a shutter speed between 2
to 10 seconds to capture all
the sparkle and razzmatazz.
You will also need a tripod to
avoid jerky, haphazard pho-
tos. Eliminate even the slight-
est possibility of vibration by
using a camera that comes
equipped with a remote shut-
ter release.
Set ISO to the lowest set-
ting to reduce noise—the tiny
dots across such snaps.
Enable long exposure noise
reduction, if the camera
comes with it.
Preview the shot on the
LCD screen, and accordingly
adjust the aperture so that it’s
just the right size to get bright
sharp photos. Keep spare bat-
teries with you.
Warm tones
Normally, the default white
balance setting for most digi-
tal cameras is set to ‘Auto’.
Though this is fine in most
cases, sunny landscapes and
portraits taken in bright light
could turn out dull. Hence,
change its setting to ‘Cloudy’
to get warmer reds and yel-
lows that make the picture
look better.
Polarising filter
Polarising filter is used for
outdoor shoots since it
reduces glare and reflection,
and results in more saturated
colours, especially in the case
of sky. Use your sunglasses in
case your camera doesn’t
have support for one. Place
the glasses as close to the
camera as possible, check the
LCD to see that its frame does
not obstruct the view and
shoot. For better results, use
it when the light source and
the subject are at right angles,
i.e., when the sun is exactly
over your head. Further, set
the white balance to ‘Cloudy’
for warmer photos.
Flash modes
Normally, digital cameras
have three flash modes—
Auto Flash, Fill Flash and Red
Eye Reduction.
Auto Flash mode is used
for general photography. In
this mode, the flash deter-
mines whether it needs to be
fired or not, based
on the amount
light present. This mode is
of
represented on the LCD by
a lightning icon with a
capital ‘A’.
In the case of Fill Flash,
the flash is always fired. This
is useful when the subject is
sitting in the shade with
bright sunlight around. If set
to Auto, the flash would not
have fired, resulting in dark
spots around the eyes. In the
Red-Eye Reduction mode, the
flash is fired several times
before the shutter actually
opens. Thus, the eye-pupils
are contracted and the red-
eye effect reduces. Use this
mode when there is very little
light and the photo depends
on the flash.
JANUARY 2004
Snapping water
A camera with a shutter speed
that’s slower than a second or
two can be used to shoot
flowing water and make it
look like a painting. Set your
camera on a tripod. Adjust
the aperture either to f-8, f-
11, or f-16 for better depth of
field. Now, set the shutter
speed to 2 seconds, and
shoot. Since you are using
long exposures, make sure
that the subject is positioned
in the shade. Use polarising
filters to enhance the effect.
Master the modes
Digital cameras have many
presets, called modes or
macros that let you click pho-
tos differently. Some of the
common modes are Auto,
Portrait, Landscape, Sports
and Night. Auto mode is the
general picture-taking mode.
When you use this mode, the
exposure, focus, and flash are
set automatically. When this
mode is active, there is usual-
ly a small camera icon on
your LCD to indicate it. Por-
trait mode, usually shown on
the LCD as a face, sharpens
the subject and leaves the
background out of focus.
Landscape mode is indi-
cated by mountains on the
LCD, and is suited for shoot-
ing subjects that are at a dis-
tance. Often, a slower shutter
speed is chosen and hence,
it’s better to use a tripod
while using this mode. The
Sports or Action mode pro-
vides a faster shutter speed
and is use to shoot fast mov-
ing objects. Night mode, as
the name suggests, is used to
shoot in poor light condi-
125
tions. Since this also means
longer exposures, use of a tri-
pod is recommended.
Taking silhouettes
Silhouettes make for appeal-
ing photographs. To shoot a
silhouette, first position your-
self with the sun somewhere
in front of you. Now, set the
exposure on the brighter part
of the scene. Use the expo-
sure lock button to secure the
exposure. Re-compose the
photo and shoot. If it doesn’t
have an exposure lock but-
ton, set the exposure com-
pensation to -2 or -3.
Slideshows and screen-
savers
To view your pictures as a
slide show in Windows XP,
open the images folder in
Windows Explorer and click
Use WIndows XP’s ‘My Pictures
Screen Saver’ option to view
your photos as a screensaver
on ‘View as slide show’ under
Picture Tasks in the Common
Tasks area. Alternatively,
right-click any image, select
Open With > Windows Picture
and Fax Viewer’. Once the
image is opened, press [F11]
to start the slide show. You
can also view this slide show
as a screensaver. Right-click
the desktop, select Properties
and choose ‘My Picture
Slideshow’ in the Screen
Saver tab. Click on Settings
to specify the folder and
other settings.
In case you use Windows
98, or intend to create a
screensaver file, use utilities
such as Irfanview (www.irfan-
view.com). In Irfanview, click
File > Slideshow, specify the
folder and other settings, and
click on ‘Save as .scr’. Save
this file in C:\Windows\System
in Windows 98, or C:\Win-
dows\System32, if you use
Windows XP.
Transferring pictures
There are two ways to transfer
images from a digital camera
to a computer. One is tether-
ing, wherein the camera is
directly connected to a PC
using the cable provided with
it. This can be slow and cum-
bersome and drains the cam-
era’s batteries, unless it has an
AC adapter. The other way is
to use a CardReader. Simply
insert the memory card of the
camera into the reader, and
connect the reader to the PC.
Most readers don’t require
separate drivers and support
all major card formats.
Download pictures auto-
matically
You can configure your digi-
cam in Windows XP to
download pictures automati-
cally when it’s plugged in.
However, the camera should
either have the Windows
Image Acquisition driver, or
support Picture Transfer Pro-
tocol (PTP). Right-click the
camera icon in My Comput-
er, and choose Properties. Go
to the Events tab, click ‘Save
all pictures to this folder’ and
specify the folder. Now,
whenever you connect your
camera, the pictures will be
automatically downloaded to
that folder.
Care and maintenance
Carry your camera and other
accessories such as memory
cards, batteries, cleaning kit
and tripod in a separate bag.
Keep your camera covered
with a plastic bag to protect
it from moisture. Also, place
some silica gel bags along
with it to absorb moisture.
Never use paper tissue or
napkins to clean lenses. They
contain scratchy wood prod-
ucts and may damage the
coating on the lense. Use a
camera-cleaning kit that
incudes special brushes and a
lens-cleaning solution. Keep
the bristles of the len-clean-
ing brush from coming in
3
contact with your hands as
body oil gets transferred onto
them. After cleaning with a
brush, put a drop of lens-
cleaning solution on a lens-
cleaning tissue, and clean the
lens in circular motions.
Avoid high temperatures
as these affect the camera.
When in bright sunny light,
keep the camera covered in
a white towel when not in
use. Keep the camera away
from strong magnetic fields,
as it may damage its memo-
ry card. Finally, remove the
batteries and store them in a
dry cool place if you do not
plan to use the camera for a
few weeks.
JANUARY 2004
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
SCANNING
A scan lets you get that lovely little picture
onto your desktop. Using these nifty tricks
while you are at it!
Buying a scanner
Before buying a scanner, you
4 need to keep your budget in
mind and evaluate the scan-
ner on the following points:
Resolution, measured in
dots per inch (dpi), deter-
mines the sharpness of the
scan. Typical flatbed scan-
ners offer a resolution rang-
ing from 600 to 2400 dpi.
The second factor is Dynam-
ic Range. Scanners that
reproduce white perfectly
have a minimal optical den-
sity or Dmin of 0.0. On the
other hand, scanners that
output a perfect black have a
maximum optical density or
Dmax of 4.0. These two val-
ues constitute the dynamic
range of the scanner. Typical
values for these are 2.5 and
3.5.
126
Use Descreen
filter when
scanning
printed
material
buy a model which come 128, 128) reference colour
with these accessories, as card from a photo lab, and
buying them separately is scan the image along with
expensive. it. Open it in Photoshop and
press [I] to activate the Eye-
Calibrating the scanner dropper tool. The Info
Calibrate your scanner every Palette shows the RGB val-
one or two months for opti- ues as you move the mouse
mum results. Calibration pointer over the colour card.
involves scanning a known If it matches with the actual
colour and adjusting the colour (RGB = 128, 128, 128
Another factor is the Bit output to match that colour. in this case), your image
Depth. This is concerned In case the scanner doesn’t colours are perfect. Other-
with the analog to digital
conversion of images, dur-
support calibration, get a
standard gray (RGB=128,
wise, change the colour bal-
ance and brightness of the
ing scanning. Typically,
scanners have 48-bit con- Calculating image size and PPI
versions, with 16-bit each Use this table to calculate the scan dpi, depending on the
for red, blue and green. The print resolution and printed size desired:
next feature that you should
consider is the speed of Printer Type Standard inkjet High-quality Photo-quality
scanning. Though there is printer inkjet printer inkjet printer
no standard method of Print Resolution 300 to 320 dpi 600 to 720 dpi 1,200 to 2,880 dpi
measuring the speed, you Scan Resoltion 150 ppi 150 to 240 ppi 240 to 360 ppi
can compare the time taken Printed Size Actual Pixel Dimensions (Average)
to scan the same image at 2 x 3-inch 300 x 450 400 x 600 600 x 900
the same settings by differ-
pixels pixels pixels
ent scanners.
4 x 6-inch 600 x 900 800 x 1,200 1,200 x 1,800
Finally, look for trans-
pixels pixels pixels
parency adapters for scan-
5 x 7-inch 750 x 1,050 1,000 x 1,400 1,500 x 2,100
ning slides and negatives,
Automated Document Feed- pixels pixels pixels
ers (ADF), etc. If you are 8 x 10-inch 1,200 x 1,500 1,600 x 2,000 2,400 x 3,000
looking for any of these fea- pixels pixels pixels
tures, make sure that you
JANUARY 2004

Use the Lineart mode in the scanner software
to scan line-arts
image until you get the pre-
cise reference colour. Final-
ly, crop out the scanned
reference colour card.
Scanning magazines
Scans of magazines or news-
papers often result in dotted
image patterns, commonly
referred to as moiré. Min-
imise this effect by scan-
ning the image at 300 dpi
with the scanner software’s
Descreen filter on, and then
re-sizing it to 33 per cent of
its size using photo-editing
software such as Photoshop.
Finally, apply the Unsharp
Mask filter.
Scanning line-art
Line-art is a clip art, drawing
or pencil sketch, consisting of
two colours. There are three
methods of scanning line-art.
The first is the Black and
White Mode, or 1-bit scan-
ning that just picks up the
black areas. This method
suits line-art that does not
have shades akin to that of
pencil sketches as it keeps the
127
image size to the smaller than the double the like lower1.tif, lower2.tif.
m i n i m u m . longest side of your scan- This is necessary because we
Remember to re- ners glass, you can follow will have to flip these lower
size and rotate at this method: images before creating the
the time of scan- Make a mark after every final image.
ning, to preserve eight inches on the longest Open all the images in
the final image side of the image from the Photoshop. Create layers for
quality. right to the left. Now, rotate each image by clicking Layer
The other the image by 180 degrees > New > Layer from Background.
method is the and mark it in the same Rotate the canvas by click-
grayscale mode, manner, on the opposite ing Image > Rotate Canvas >
or 8-bit scanning longest side. Here, we 180O for all the lower-half
that records assume that the image has a images. Create a new blank
shades of grey. landscape orientation, i.e., image, large enough to
This results in its width is greater than its accommodate all these
much larger height. Now, align the images. Put all the layers on
files, but it’s suit- upper-right corner of the this image and align them
able for line-art with shades. image with that of the scan- appropriately to get the final
The third method— ner glass. Choose the set- picture. You can also use
halftone—is a format that tings at which you want to Photoshop CS’s (Creative
prints black dots in a manner scan the whole image and Suite) Photomerge feature to
that simulates shades of grey. start the scan. Save this file automate the last step.
as Image1.tif. Move the
Scanning for fax image to the next mark and Saving scanned images
Scanning at 200 dpi in Line scan without altering the Save images scanned to be
Art mode, 100 per cent is settings. Save this file as used on the Web or be sent
most suitable when the image2.tif. Repeat the as e-mail attachments in the
image has to be faxed. The process till you have .JPEG format. . GIF is a better
easiest method would be to
print the image to the fax
scanned the entire image.
To scan the lower half of the
option for images such as
line arts that have less than
5
driver directly from your image, turn the painting by 256 colours since it results in
scanner program. Fax 180O and repeat the above smaller file sizes.
always uses the Line Art process. This time use a dif- If you plan to edit the
mode—even if you scan it ferent naming convention images later, save them in
in some other an uncompressed format.
mode, the fax O You may also save them in
Image 1 V Image 2
software con- E the TIF format as it allows
R
verts it into L compressing without caus-
A
Line Art. P ing loss of image quality. If
P
E
you are scanning images for
Scanning D archival, it’s always recom-
oversized mended that you save one
images copy in your image editor’s
If the image to native format. For example,
be scanned is if you use Photoshop, save
larger than a copy in the PSD format.
your scanner You might want to save the
glass, but its Scan images larger than the scanning area by second copy in high quality
longest side is dividing it into sections JPEG format.
JANUARY 2004
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
PROCESSING
Snapped and scanned, but satisfied you are
not? Here’s how you add that touch of class to
them!
Reducing red-eye effect
Eye pupils dilate in the dark,
thus reflecting the flash light
in the eye’s blood vessels.
This gives the person a ‘red
eye’. Hence, avoid photo-
graphing in the dark. If it’s
6 absolutely necessary, use a
camera with red-eye reduc-
tion feature.
Tell the subject do not
look directly into the lens. If
possible, use a removable
flash that is placed at some
distance from the camera.
You may also use photo man-
agement software such as
Photoshop album, Picasa,
ULead Photo Explorer, JASC
to remove red eye.
Cropping
Cropping is used to edit
unwanted portions of a pho-
tograph. Maintain the aspect
ratio for prints when crop-
ping using software. For
example, if you need a 5 x 7
print, you will need to crop
128
the image precisely to that
size. Open Photoshop and
press [Ctrl] + [R] to enable
rulers. Right-click on the
ruler, and select Inches to
change the ruler unit. Now,
drag the horizontal guideline
to 5 inches, and position the
vertical guideline at 7 inch-
es. Press [C] to switch to the
Crop tool, and drag a rectan-
gle of 5 by 7 inches. Move it
to a suitable position, and
double-click to crop; trying
unusual shapes may be a
good idea. For example,
heart for a couple’s photo.
Cropping comes handy
while correcting horizon
lines or straightening your
photos.
Automated features
Improve the quality of your
photographs by using the
automated functions in Pho-
toshop. Go to Image > Adjust-
ments > Auto Levels and then
apply Auto Contrast and
Auto Color. Finally, sharpen
them via Filter > Sharpen >
Sharpen.
Sharpening
You can sharpen any image
using Photoshop’s Unsharp
Mask filter (Filter > Sharpen >
‘Unsharp Mask…’). This com-
pensates for the blurring
caused by the low-pass filter
Use Photoshop’s Unsharp Mask
filter to sharpen your images
that is found in almost all
digital cameras to improve
image quality. Apply it before
the image is re-sized, or
resampled, but after other
corrections have been done.
Its ideal settings would be a
radius value of 0.3 to 0.5,
threshold value of 0 to 2 and
amount between 200 to 500
per cent.
For compensating the
blurring done by output
process, it should be sharp-
ened after resize/ resample.
Generally, finer the print,
the lower will be the radius.
For example, you will need
a radius of 1.0 to 1.5 for
photos that are printed on
premium inkjet photo
paper.
Wipe off dust and
scratches
Make use of dust and
scratch removal software to
get clean scans. One such
plug-in is Kodak’s Digital
ICE (www.asf.com). Apply the
noise filter to the photo in
Photoshop by going to Filter
> Noise > ‘Dust and Scratch-
es…’. Next, despeckle the
image by going to Filter >
Noise >Despeckle.
You may also use the
Clone Stamp Tool to clone a
cleaner area to the dusty one.
To use this Photoshop tool,
press [C] and click on an area
that resembles your target
area, while holding down
[Alt]. After defining the
source, release [Alt] and paint
in the normal way. Do
remember to zoom in and
keep the brush size smaller
for better results.
Creating panoramas
The latest version of Photo-
shop CS comes with Pho-
tomerge—a feature that
allows you to create panora-
mas in just a few clicks. The
best part is that you don’t
even need to fix your camera
on a tripod while taking
images, as Photoshop adjusts
the level automatically. Open
Photoshop CS and click on
File > Automate > Photomerge.
Click on Use Files and use
the browse button to locate
all the images that want to
use for creating the panora-
ma. Make sure that the
‘Attempt to Automatically
Arrange Source Images’
check box is checked, and
click OK. A dialog box with
JANUARY 2004

Create an impressive panorama in minutes using
Photomerge in Photoshop CS!
your images identified and
adjusted comes up. Click OK
to accept and use the Crop
tool to crop out unnecessary
portions.
Visit www.panoguide.com—
a Web site dedicated to cre-
ating panoramas, for more
tips and software.
Distortion correction
Distortion in photographs
could be Barrel distortion—a
lens effect that leaves photos
with a spherical distortion at
the centre, or it could be Pin-
cushion distortion, which
Pincushion
Distortion Distortion
results in images that are
pinched in the centre.
An easy solution to cor-
rect this would be to use the
Panorama Tools plug-in for
Photoshop that can be
downloaded from http://
home.no.net/dmaurer/~dersch/In
dex.htm. Open the ZIP
129
file, and
extract the
pano12.dll
file in the
folder where
Photoshop
is installed.
Now, extract
all the files
inside the
‘Photoshop
Plugin’ in
the ZIP file
to the Pho-
toshop Plug-Ins or Filters
directory. Restart Photoshop
and open the photo in need
of correction. First, go to Fil-
ter > Panorama Tools > Correct
to bring up the ‘Correct
Options’ dialog box. Select
Radial Shift, and click on
the option next to it to
bring up the ‘Set Polynomi-
al Coefficients for Radial
Correction’ dialog box. Set
‘a’ and ‘c’ to zero for all
colours, and choose a value
for ‘b’ and ‘d’ such that their
values add up to one. The
values for ‘b’ should be neg-
No Barrel
Distortion
ative to correct barrel dis-
tortion, and positive to
rectify pincushion distor-
tions. Start with 0.015 for ‘b’
and 0.085 for ‘d’ to correct
pincushion, and -0.015 and
+1.015 for barrel distortion.
Increase or decrease the val-
ues gradually until the
images are corrected proper-
ly. Refer to the Readme.html
file inside the ZIP file for
further details.
Warning!
There are two ways to rotate
images in Windows XP. You
can right-click on the
thumbnail view in Windows
Explorer and choose Rotate
Clockwise’ or ‘Rotate
Counter Clockwise’, or use
the rotate image button in
Windows Picture and Fax
Viewer. However, every time
an image is rotated, it’s
saved, which results in some
loss of quality. Thus, make it
a point to use specialised
photo-editing software that
save only the final image. If
you use Photoshop, it would
be best to keep saving the
image that is being worked
upon in the PSD format.
Save it in the JPEG format
only when you’re done with
all the editing. The use of the
rotate image function in
Windows XP should be the
last step of your editing
process.
Image resolution
Perhaps the most important
Adjust image resolution before printing
thing to keep in mind while
printing images is the reso-
lution. Ideally, a 4 x 6 inches
photo should be have a reso-
lution of at least 800 x 600.
For 5 x 7 prints, it should be
1024 x 768 and for 8 x 10
prints, it should be 1600 x
1200 pixels. Furthermore,
you need to have a dpi of
300 for sharper, clearer
prints. Use Photoshop to
change all these parameters.
Access them by going to
Image > Image Size.
Tinting black and white
photos
Using photo-editing applica-
tions, you can add colour to
black and white photos.
Open the image in Photo-
shop. Go to Image > Mode,
and ensure that the colour
mode is RGB or CMYK. Now,
press and hold down [Shift]
and use the Lasso tool to
select a certain area, say, the
skin of the photographed
person. That done, go to
7
Image > Adjustments > Varia-
tions and adjust the levels to
obtain the desired colour.
Now, select other elements
in the photograph and
adjust the colour variations
in the same
manner. Use the
Path tool for bet-
ter control over
selections.
Finally, create
a new layer with
‘soft light’ blend-
ing mode and 85
per cent opacity.
Now, use the
dodge and burn
tool to lighten
and darken the
JANUARY 2004
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
Use Adjust Variations dialog to
colorize Black and White
Photos.
specific areas to finalise the
image.
Print easy
The easiest way to print your
images is to use the Photo
Printing Wizard in Windows
XP. Open the image folder in
Windows Explorer, select the
images you need to print
while holding down [Ctrl]
and then click ‘Print the
selected pictures’ under Pic-
8 click ‘Publish
Print your images easily with Windows XP’s
Photo Printing Wizard
ture Tasks. Follow the
instructions to print your
images in Full Page, Contact
Sheet, 8 x 10, 5 x 7, 4 x 6, 3.5
x 5 or Wallet prints.
130
File naming
By default, images down-
loaded from a digital camera
are named as DSCN0001,
DSCN0002, … Use the batch
function in Windows XP to
rename them. Open the
image folder in Windows
Explorer, hold down [Ctrl],
select all the desired images
and press [F2]. Name them
appropriately and press
[Enter]. If you entered ‘birth-
day’, the last selected file will
be renamed ‘birthday’ and
the preceding files will be
renamed ‘birthday (1)’,
‘birthday (2)’, etc.
Photos on the Web
Windows XP’s Web Publish-
ing Wizard stores photo-
graphs online, as private or
public albums. Open the
folder that contains your
photographs, hold down
[Ctrl] and select the pictures
you want to share. Next,
the selected
items to the
Web’ under ‘File
and Folder
Tasks’ to start
the Wizard.
After you have
confirmed the
photos you
want uploaded,
specify its loca-
tion to the Ser-
vice Providers
in the next
screen. Here,
we choose MSN Groups—the
standard option. The wizard
then gives you the option of
keeping your files public or
private. Accordingly, you are
asked the name of the group
Use Windows XP’s Web Publishing Wizard to mid-tones and the
share your photos easily
and a few other details as
part of the registration
process. It then displays the
Web address of your group.
Finally, the Wizard uploads
the photos.
E-mailing
To e-mail photographs,
right-click the image in Win-
dows Explorer and choose
Send To > Mail Recipient. A dia-
log box in Windows XP pro-
vides you with three options
to re-size the image prior to
e-mailing it: 640 x 480 strict-
ly for computer viewing, 800
x 600 for 4 x 6 prints and
1024 x 768 for 5 x 7 prints.
Of course, you can always
send it as it is!
Histogram
Exposure is one important
factor that differentiates
good photos from shoddy
ones. A good photo has all its
elements illuminated prop-
erly. Use the histogram to
correct exposure. Though
many cameras show a his-
togram on their LCDs after
you take a picture, it’s better
to view the histogram in a
photo-editing tool and make
corrections there. Access the
histogram in Photo-
shop by going to
Image > Adjustments >
Levels.
The right side
of the histogram
shows the lightest
portion or ‘high-
lights’ of the
images, the middle
section shows the
left most side shows
the darker portions
or ‘shadows’. The vertical
axis shows the pixels in each
Use Histogram to correct the
exposure in your photographs
level. An underexposed
image has many pixels con-
centrated in the shadows.
Move the sliders to improve
the distribution of brightness
levels. Alternatively, use the
Auto button to let Photo-
shop make the adjustments.
Further, you can also adjust
histogram of channels, i.e
red, blue and green, if their
distribution appears improp-
er. For example, adjust the
histogram for the blue chan-
nel if the sky looks dull in
your photograph
JANUARY 2004
insight ■
■ tips and tricks

Tracking it Sturgeon’s Law states

that 90 per cent of
everything is useless.

Down
You know this is true
while searching for
information online.
TnT comes to your
rescue with fast and
relevant searches
that help you defy
Sturgeon’s Law
9

contents
10 General search engines
12 Metacrawlers
14 Metacrawler tools
15 Peer to peer searches
15 Database searches

Grokker2
Copernic Agent Basic
Mahesh Benkar

145 FEBRUARY 2004

 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
GENERAL SEARCH ENGINES
Google
Think search, and
chances are you’ll
think www. google.com.
Here’s how we make
the reliable horse work
better for you.
At Google’s home
page, if you click on
Want more than plain HTML? Look for
10 Advanced Search, you
can access advanced
specific document file types
options that narrow down
results to more specific links.
Language
You tend to get a lot of
non-English results whilst
searching. By restricting
your search to English sites
from the drop-down box,
you don’t waste time on
results you can’t understand
anyway.
Getting format specific
You can search specifically
for, say, PDFs or PPT files.
Choose the format of your
choice across the six listed
on the Advanced page, or
exclude the results that
146
Illustrations: Farzana Cooper
return formats that you
don’t want, by selecting the
format and clicking ‘Don’t’.
Here’s a word
If you usually look for spe-
cific words in a Web page,
fine-tune Google to do just
that. Use the Occurrences
option that lets you specify
where you want to see the
search terms, whether in the
text, URL, title, or anywhere
else in the page.
Domaining it
The Domain option lets you
limit searches to a particular
domain, or avoid bringing
up results from it. Fill in the
domain box with a Web site main page. If you want your
that you want to restrict browser to remember your
results to, and select Only, or preferences, you need to set
avoid picking up results it to accept cookies—Tools >
from, by selecting Don’t Internet Options > Privacy for IE.
from the drop-down box.
Language, please
Pageing specifically You can choose to restrict
The options under the Page- searches to only English
Specific Search heading allow pages, but remember Google
for quickly locating pages that also provides a reasonably
offer services, or have content accurate translation of pages
similar to that of a specified in five listed languages—Ger-
Web page. For instance, if you man, French, Spanish, Italian
enter ‘space.com’ (a site for and Portuguese. Also, you
astronomy enthusiasts), the may occasionally need results
similar pages listed include that are listed in another lan-
some from NASA as well as guage—say, if you’re research-
Sky and Telescope magazine, ing French poetry. If you only
and several other well-known need English results, set it
space-enthusiast sites. from the Advanced Search
page instead.
Preferences
If Google is your tool of Numbers and pages
trade, it makes sense to You can set the number of
tweak it to your quirks— returned results on a single
head to Preferences on the page, and the way in which
Google Keywords
Keyword/ Usage Action
symbol
[+] Chevrolet +Camaro Looks for documents containing
both ‘Chevrolet’ and ‘Camaro’
[-] Chevrolet -Camaro Results will contain ‘Chevrolet’
but not ‘Camaro’
[~] ~transducer Searches for the term ‘trans-
ducer’ as well as its synonyms
OR May OR June Results will have either ‘May’ or
‘June’, or both
Cache: cache:http://www. Returns Google's cached pages
yoursite.com/ of www.yoursite.com
define: define:virus Gives the definition of the
word ‘virus’
site: Apple site:www. Will restrict search to pages
food.com containing ‘apple’ only at
www.food.com
related: related:www. Will fetch results of sites similar
greatvacations.com to www.greatvacations.com
info: info:www. Will present information that
sweepstakes.com Google has on www.sweep-
stakes.com
For more search terms check out http://www.google.com/help/operators.html
FEBRUARY 2004
results are opened—under
‘Number of Results’, select a
number from 10 to 100 from
the drop down box. Obvi-
ously, the larger the number,
the more time it will take for
the results page to load. Tick
the Results Window check-
box to open search results in
a new browser window.
Content censoring
To ensure that search results
do not turn up explicit sexu-
al content, use the Safe-
Search option. This can be
set under SafeSearch Filter-
ing. Choose from three lev-
els—no filtering, moderate
filtering that only blocks
explicit images, and strict
filtering for explicit text
and images.
Make sure all your searches are safe for the family option is avail-
All across Google
Once set, your Google
preferences are main-
tained throughout all of
Google’s services, so
between general search-
es and Google Groups,
there are no differences
in settings.
AltaVista
AltaVista (www.altavista.
com) has powerful
search capabilities
under its plain and sim-
ple skin. It’s one of the
147
older engines around, but
still comes with a bounty of
features.
Truly fast searches
While AltaVista is fast,
nothing’s ever fast enough!
If you want even faster
results, switch over to the
text-only version at
http://www.altavista.com/
web/text. It’s plain and sim-
ple, with no graphical ele-
ments to spice up and slow
down the page.
Advanced search
Advanced Web searching is
accessible from the main
page. You can build up
queries using exact phrase
matches, as well as by the
presence or absence of key-
words across a
page. This is
possible from
the ‘Build a
query with…’
option.
If you’d
prefer Boolean
operators, the
The true strength of AltaVista is its
Advanced Search
able under ‘Search with…’. Advanced? Not quite
Use keywords such as ‘AND’, If you prefer the query-build-
‘OR’, ‘AND NOT’ and ing tool, check out the ‘More
‘NEAR’. ‘NEAR’ is used to Precision’ version of AltaVista
specify that two terms at http://www.altavista.com/
should be located close ?qbmode=. You don’t get all
together—within 10 the advanced features, but
words—as in ‘iit NEAR admis- you do have access to the
sions’ for a search on ‘IIT query-building options.
admissions’.
Wildcarding
Advance advanced AltaVista supports wildcard
Other Advanced Search characters; use [*] to get
options trim your searches. search results based on varia-
‘Date’ will limit the date and tions of words. This is how it
time-range of the Web pages works: there have to be at
you are looking for and ‘File- least three letters before the
type’ will let you specify the [*] sign. Remember, any letter
formats. You can also limit or letters can take the place of
searches to specific top-level the wildcard character, so a
domains or site domains. search for ‘Micro*’ can result
Site Collapse, if enabled, will in ‘Micro’, ‘Micron’,
display a maximum of two ‘Microsoft’, ‘Microscope’,
results per site. If disabled, it ‘Microscopic’, and so on.
will show you all results,
grouped by relevance. Preferences
Results from the same site Click on Settings on the
are indented beneath the main page to set your prefer-
first result. ences. You can choose to set
language settings (English or
11
AltaVista Keywords
Keyword/ Usage Action
Symbol
AND Custard AND Apple Looks for pages containing
both the words (any order,
anywhere in the page)
OR Custard OR Apple Looks for pages containing
both the words, if not at least
one
AND NOT Custard AND NOT Results served up contain
Apple ‘Custard’, but not ‘Apple’
[*] Col*r Looks for pages containing
both ‘Colour’ and ‘Color’
domain domain:edu Finds documents from the
.edu domain
image:boating Finds pages that feature an
Image
image called boating
Like like:ebay.com Finds sites that are similar in
content to eBay, the auction
site
See the complete list at http://www.altavista.com/help/adv_search/syntax
FEBRUARY 2004
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
Spanish), or access the
Family Filter page. For
Web searches, set the
options for displaying
Web page information,
the number of results to
be returned per page, as
well as browser language
troubleshooting, should
you have trouble with
junk text being displayed.
Filters Parlez-vous Français? Babelfish to
AltaVista takes explicit the rescue…
content very seriously; by
default, all family filtering
against sexually explicit con-
tent is turned on. You can
access it at http://www.altavista entire Web page. Enter the
.com/web/ffset. You can choose
the sort of filtering, whether
restricted to image video and
audio searches, for all or no
searches. To enforce this, you
can also protect the settings
with a password.
AltaVista other searches
12 You can also search for more
than just Web pages—think
images, MP3 audio, video and
news. Like the Yahoo! Directo-
ries, AltaVista too has a direc-
tory that you can use while
searching for information. The
Image Search has limited
options, in terms of size and
colour; however, it is very fast.
Cool tools
While not in the traditional
realm of search, these tools
will undoubtedly help you
while you work on academic
research.
Babelfish
AltaVista’s coolest tool has
got to be the Babel Fish Trans-
lation engine (http://babelfish.
148
altavista.com/babelfish/). It’s
reasonably accurate for gen-
eral use, and lightning fast—
be it a few lines of text, or an
text in the blank text block
(up to 150 words), or enter
the URL of the Web page you
want translated in the URL
box, to get it translated to the
language of your choice.
Converters
With AltaVista around, you
don’t have to dip into your
pocket calculator for any
quick mathematical conver-
sions. Use AltaVista’s quick
converter functions to help
you work between conver-
sions—for example, enter-
ing ‘convert 1 in’ at the
AltaVista search box will
give you all the metric and
imperial equivalents of 1
inch. So, you can convert
time by using ‘convert 45 sec’;
convert speed by typing
‘convert 1 mach’; do tempera-
ture conversions by entering
‘convert 40 F’; convert weight
using ‘convert 170 lb’; do area
conversions by enter ‘convert
25 acre’; and do cooking vol-
umes conversions by typing
‘convert 1 gal’.
METACRAWLERS
Mamma operators, to separate the
Claiming to be the mother wheat from the chaff.
of all search engines, Here’s how.
Mamma (www.mamma.com)
gives fast results for your Refining your search
queries. And it’s got some Mamma provides a pretty
pretty cool advanced fea- nifty service called ‘Refine
tures as well. Your Search’ that provides
links to further sub-topics
Search operators within a search. This feature
Search operators make life a provides more specific topic
little simpler when you’re searches. If you input a
searching through reams of
pages to locate elusive infor-
general query, such as ‘Linux
kernel programming’, the refine
mation. In Mamma, you search options will include
can use both mathematical ‘kernel programming’ as well
operators, as well as Boolean as ‘Linux device drivers’.
Mamma search keywords
Keyword/ Usage Action
Symbol
AND watch AND casio Looks for pages containing
both the words (any order,
anywhere in the page)
OR watch OR casio Looks for pages containing
either of the words, if there are
no results with both the words
Results served up contain
NOT watch NOT casio
‘watch’, but not ‘casio’
[+] watch +casio Looks for pages containing
‘watch’ and ‘casio’.
[-] watch -casio Results will contain ‘watch’ but
not ‘casio’
"" "casio watch" Results will have the exact
phrase ‘casio watch’ present,
and in this order.
FEBRUARY 2004

Even more refinements popping up,
thanks to good ol’ Mamma
Power search
Use the Power Search
option found on the main
page to fine-tune your
search. Here, under ‘Select
search sources’, you can
select the directories and
indexing engines to be used
by Windows. Under Pay-
Per-Click, you can safely
choose to ignore all the
options, since the results
displayed here may not be
relevant to your search. Set
adult content reduction, if
desired, and other options
such as highlighting search
terms. Also, set the other
options for speed, number
of results displayed (keep it
low for fast page loading),
descriptions, and whether
you want the results to
open in a new window.
Dogpile
Another of those massive
Web crawling search
engines, Dogpile (www.dog-
pile.com), gives you results
from across a wide variety
of search engines. Use Dog-
pile to search from Google,
Yahoo!, AltaVista, Ask
149
Jeeves, About, and other
search engines at a sin-
gle go.
Web search
Dogpile’s Web Search is
simple and easy to use.
You can pre-refine your
search by choosing
between Web searches,
images, audio, multime-
dia, new and shopping.
This will limit your
results to those cate-
gories.
Setting preferences
Setting the adult filter here
will ensure that all your
Dogpile searches are filtered.
Also, set the other options
such as language, automati-
cally correcting misspelled
terms—clicking on this will
auto-correct all spellings, a
feature you may not like
unless you make typos
often. You can also set the
way you want the results dis-
played. This can be arranged
either by relevance, or
grouped by search engine.
Ideally, choose relevance, as
this will remove obvious
duplicates in the results.
However, if you find too few
results, it makes sense to
view results by search
engine. You might also like
to have all results open in a
separate browser window;
this feature can be enabled
by checking ‘Open Search
Results Links in New
Window’.
Remember, you need to
let your browser accept
cookies so that you
can save these preferences
as default.
Use Dogpile to sniff out elusive Web pages
Advanced search
Dogpile’s advanced search is
accessed from the main page.
Start off by qualifying your
searches with key terms that
you want or don’t want listed
on the results—the Dogpile
advanced search option
makes a exact phrase search,
as well as a search using either
some or all of the listed key-
words. You can also use
Boolean search terms instead,
by using a combination of
‘AND’, ‘OR’ and ‘NOT’.
More search options
For more search power, you
might consider using the
domain search option under
Advanced Search. You could
start with restricting search-
es to, or excluding searches
from, top-level domains
such as .com or .edu, or get
more specific with specific
domains such as
Microsoft.com. The ‘Last
Page Update’ option will let
you obtain results that were
listed before an update on
the target date, or you could
choose to see results after an
update on a certain date.
Audio search
The audio search is a pretty
nifty tool. Input search key-
words, and you‘ll get links
to audio files that fit the
description, or the key-
words you entered. And no,
this isn’t a smart way to
start downloading warez;
copyrighted content is pret-
ty much non-existent.
Multimedia
The multimedia option is
13
for searching for video files.
The results you get are in
the formof links to sites
hosting video content in a
variety of formats.
News, shopping
Dogpile’s primary news
feeds are culled from ABC
News, and they aren’t
always the latest around,
but you can also get feeds
from the FAST search
engine, with quick, up-
to-the-minute results.
Shopping is also an option
with Dogpile, but it’s US-
centric, and will, at best,
give you an indication of
product prices.
FEBRUARY 2004
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
METACRAWLER TOOLS
Copernic Agent Basic
Copernic Agent Basic
(www.copernic.com) is a nic toolbar on Internet
metasearch tool that allows
you to query multiple
search engines with a single
request. At installation,
Copernic adds a toolbar to
IE and works with it
throughout.
14 Working smart
You can search from within
Copernic helps you perform a smart metasearch
150
the Copernic application
window, or from the Coper-
Explorer. The Copernic
application window search
takes place at the extreme
left, and results are dis-
played in the right-hand
bottom pane. All previous
searches are listed in the top
pane. Click on any of them
to open the search results in
the results pane.
Enabling search
engines
The quickest way to look at
all the enabled search
engines is by clicking on the
hot link above the Category
pane at the left. By default,
this reads ‘13 engines
enabled’. Click on this to
select the search engines
you want to work with.
Verifying results
Over a period of time, if you
are looking at saved results,
it makes sense to ensure
that all the results still exist.
Go to Results > Verify Links to
verify all the links in the
saved results.
Viewing results
Your search results are
only good if they’re under-
standable. So, if you have
a cluttered result pane,
click Result Layout to get
the results either more
detailed or made simpler.
With the advanced features in
Copernic
Professional,
you can
group results
u s i n g
numerous
criteria, but
for the Basic
version, the
common
display tool
is a good
place to
start. Grokker draws a map and delivers visual search
results that will make more sense
Grokker
Grokker (www.groxis.com) is a
30-day trial software that’s not
a metasearch tool in the tradi-
tional sense. It works with the
information that it draws
from search engines such as
Google, as well as shopping
sites such as Amazon, and rep-
resents the information in
visual maps, making the rele-
vance of the search results eas-
ier to understand.
Visual mapping
Grokker takes search terms
and draws maps; the size of
the resultant mapped spheres
corresponds to the relevance
of the document. When you
click a link, Grokker opens up
the pages in a browser pane
on the right.
Metasearch tools
You can use Grokker to run
searches by ranking, sources
and domains—commercial,
educational, non-profit or
other. The slider controls
are located at the bottom,
and let you tweak these
results. You can see the
effect on the map drawn.
Grokker is an excellent tool
to understand the relations
between search keywords
and analysing the informa-
tion obtained.
FEBRUARY 2004
 PEER TO PEER SEARCHES
KaZaA (using the
KaZaA Lite K++ client)
KaZaA Lite is a popular P2P
client software Whether it’s
music, movies, software or
even games, chances are
you’ll find it on the KaZaA
network. The best bit is that
you can choose to search
using Google, or choose
instead to perform a P2P
search. Take a look at how
to make advanced intelli-
gent searches in KaZaA.
Specialise, specialise
Searching KaZaA is fairly
easy. If you’ve chosen P2P
searches over Google
search, in the main search
sidebar on the left, choose
from searching for specific
binary files such as music,
video files, images, or doc-
uments. It makes sense to
do an ‘everything’ search
only if you can’t locate a
specific file.
Timing searches
By default, KaZaA Lite
searches for only two min-
151
utes. This can give a huge
number of results, or none
at all—depending on the
criteria, the rarity of the file
you’re searching for and
your connection speed. To
increase this time, click on
Auto Search More (top-left
side-bar). You can choose to
search for longer for more
results, or do continuous
search—as clients keep con-
necting to the network, you
should see more results.
Audio searching
Here’s the quickest way to
locate the right audio file in
KaZaA. First, select P2P
search and choose the
Audio option. Once done,
keep the default ‘All’ option
checked, and enter the
artist’s name and song. Sift
through the multitude of
results by clicking on ‘More
Search Options’. Now, you
can choose to refine the
search by the ‘quality’ and
‘integrity’ ratings to ensure
that you get the best down-
load from the lot.
Family filtering
To keep the ‘U’ rating on
your P2P searches, you can
set in search filter limits.
These can be accessed by
clicking on Search Filter on
the sidebar, or by going to
Options > Kazaa Lite K++
Options and flipping across
DATABASE SEARCHES
Articles and extracts
A good place to start searching
for articles online is www.find-
articles.com, now owned by
LookSmart. FindArticles stores
article listings across many
genres such as automobiles,
art, computers, computing
technology, etc., from as far
back as 1998.
Searching for articles
The ‘Advanced search’,
accessed from the main page,
is limited. However, the site
still features listings on many
arcane subjects with substan-
tial results. For a narrowed-
down list, search from the
magazine genre drop-down
list to the right.
You can also tweak the
search here with searches for
to the Filters tab. You can set
the filter here, and choose
from pre-configured modes
that filter adult content.
Optionally, all such filtering
can be password protected.
You can also choose to filter
suspicious file types, based
on file extensions.
exact phrases, or the presence
(or absence), of keywords.
15
Directory
As you search FindArticles,
you can see the directory from
which you’re receiving the
results. To narrow in on a
source, inspect the source
publications.
Papers online
One of the biggest reposito-
ries of papers online is
www.itpapers.com. With links
to over 25,000 whitepapers
on diverse topics, this site
can be invaluable as a central
listing for research papers.
Search here is, unfortunately,
limited to plain searches,
with little tweaking possible;
however the site main page
FEBRUARY 2004
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
Use Find articles to locate documents from as
far back as 1998
lists the groups into which
the papers have been dis-
tributed—whitepapers on
Linux, for instance, are
accessible under Platform/OS
> Linux/Open Source.
Going back in time
If you’re searching for a page
that existed and was updated
later, or was taken off
the Internet, there are
a couple of nifty tricks
for accessing it.
16 Google caching
Use Google’s caching
feature to access sites
that are unreachable,
or have
recently shut down.
Do this either by
searching for the site Go back in time to search for now-defunct
on Google and click- pages using the Wayback Machine
ing on the ‘Cached’
option, or by typing
‘ c a c h e : w w w. s o m e s i t e . most will be cached, depend-
com/somepage .html’.
Note that Google typical-
ly caches a recent copy of
the Web page as it crawls the
Internet, so looking for real-
ly old versions of a page may
not be possible with Google.
The WayBack Machine
This is how you get years
152
back in time, the
cyber way. The
W a y B a c k
Machine, located
at www. archive.org
(mirrored at http://
archive.bibalex. org),
is the super-repos-
itory for all that
was there, and
may not exist
anymore.
Advanced search
Click on Advanced Search
to launch the WayBack
Machine’s advanced search
page. You can specify the
URL of the page you want
retrieve and its time (month,
day and year). You can
retrieve pages dating from
1996, although there won’t
be every version of the page;
ing on popularity.
Other great features
The WayBack machine also
offers you options such as
comparing two versions of
Web pages. In case a Web page
has several similar cached ver-
sions, you can choose to see
all versions, or just one. You
can also choose to generate a
PDF of a Web page.
For more than the Web
There’s more than just text at
www.archive.org. As one of the
Internet’s premier indexing
and archiving organisations,
you can also access a large
amount of statistical data,
free historic videos, and free
high-quality audio that spans
the Internet age.
Usenet
There’s nothing like the
Usenet to access information
from peer groups and people
from across the world. At one
time, the biggest source for
archived posts, in the Usenet
community, used to be
www.dejanews.com. But after
Google took it over, all
archived Usenet posts are
located at Google Groups
(http://groups. google.com)
Advanced Groups Search
The Advanced Groups Search
accessible from the Groups
page will allow you to locate
messages by keywords, exact
phrase matches, as well as by
newsgroup posted to, subject,
author, message ID and lan-
guage. You can also check
posts by message dates—all
Perform a Usenet search from as far back as
1981 using Google Groups
the way back to 1981.
Advanced Group Search also
lets you set in SafeSearch fil-
ters to prevent adult content
from being displayed.
Directories
Directories are aggregated
collections of Web pages
and sources of information,
under common subject-
based groupings. Searches
using directories turn up
results of similar sites, from
where more detailed Web
site specific searches can
be done.
Yahoo directory
Located at http://dir.yahoo.com,
the Yahoo Directory features
a wide variety of subjects
from which you can search
for similar Web sites.
Advanced Search options
(from the Directory main
page), will let you search
using keyword and phrase
matches, as well as domain,
country and language
searches, which helps gener-
ate results based on narrow,
specific searches.
DMOZ
The Open Directory Project,
located at www.dmoz.org aims
to be the largest human edit-
ed directory of
the Web, with
over four million
Web sites
grouped across
5,00,000 cate-
gories. Advanced
searches let you
access limited
fine-tuning
options for a few
categories.
FEBRUARY 2004
insight ■
■ tips and tricks

To be a
Writer...
For those smitten by the writing bug, but facing
the writer’s block, we’ll make a writer of you 17
yet…

contents
18 Web toolkits
20 Blogging
21 Accessibility
23 Resources

Atul Deshmukh

115 MARCH 2004

 insight ■
■ tips and tricks

WEB TOOLKITS any problems that TidyHTML
cannot solve.
Your own Web site is one of the best ways to
display your art. These site creation tools will Quick and tidy
help you bring forth your creativity online… Use TidyHTML’s quick-fix fea-
tures (Tools > TidyHTML Quick
Tools) to apply source-format-
ting, upgrade to a style sheet,
or convert to XML or output
tags in uppercase.
Insert > Tables…, and key in the
formatting as desired.
Perls of wisdom
1st Page 2000 comes with
loads of features to jazz up
your Web pages. Go to Script-
ing > Full Featured Perl Scripts,
and choose from countdown
timers, credit card validators,
etc. Your server
should be running
a CGI service, in
case you wish to
use the script.

1st Page 2000
1st Page 2000 (www.evrsoft.
com) is a simple HTML editor
with loads of features to help
you create some dramatic
Web sites with little effort.
Working around
18 The coding workspace com-
prises tabbed windows. By
default, the Edit window is
displayed, followed by the
Preview and Reference panes.
Click on the Reference pane
to access a copy of several
HTML guides, including the
W3C HTML Reference.
Moding around
1st Page 2000 lets you access
various modes, depending on
your familiarity with the
software. You are in the Easy
or Normal mode, by default,
when you start off for the
first time. The page will
show you large icons and
simple controls, with all the
advanced features within the
respective menus. Once you
JavaScript
magic
Illustrations: Farzana Cooper Go to Scripting >
Instantz Scripts to
are familiar with the tools at access a list of
hand, you can go to Options Use TidyHTML's powerful features to clean JavaScripts, such
and switch to the Advanced up your HTML code
or Expert mode.
Insert
Quick work The Insert menu eases
To access simple spell-check- the task of adding
ing, press [F7] for all textual material onto the page.
content; use LiveSpell (Tools >
LiveSpell) to mark out incor-
Whether it’s adding an
anchor to another Web
rectly spelled text; use the the- page or another service,
saurus by pressing [Shift] + [F7]. an e-mail link, images,
tables or Java applets,
Tagging etc, you can do it all. The Instanz JavaScript wizard has lots
Find all assorted tag shortcuts For instance, should of easy-to-use JavaScripts
for start, end, bold, italics, etc., you want to add in a
under the Tag menu. Click to table to the page, click on as Audio Effects, Background
insert them into the HTML Effects, Buttons,
document. In the same menu, Calendars, Clocks,
are the common font faces, Menus, Passwords
font colours and font sizes. and so on; click on
any of them to get
Cleaning up further options.
TidyHTML, a nifty customis- Choose the kind
able tool that comes with 1st of effect you want
Page, helps you clean and to display, and
tidy up your HTML code of click Insert.
all its errors—go to Tools > Selecting Scripts >
TidyHTML Format and Fix. Use the Insert menu's numerous options to Commonly Used
Warnings are generated for insert lots of little HTML code with ease JavaScript Wizard

116 MARCH 2004

lets you access JavaScripts
for several common
applications such as drop-
down menus, document
fade effects, browser type
and so on.
Rollover Images
One really cool effect you
can add to your page is the
rollover image effect. While
in the Easy mode, click on
the palette icon on the tool-
bar, and select Insert
JavaScript for rollover images is now
very easily inserted into your code
Rollover Image. In the applet
that opens, specify the
anchor and the ALT text to
be inserted, and the image
name as well. Click OK when
you’re done.
FrontPage 2002
FrontPage 2002 is
Microsoft’s standard HTML-
editing and Web site cre-
ation tool that comes with
Office 2002.
117
Creating your sites
FrontPage 2002 comes with a
host of templates for all sorts
of Web sites. Setting up a sim-
ple personal Web site is just a
matter of minutes. Start
FrontPage, go to File > New
Page or Web, and select Per-
sonal Web from the right-
hand pane. Select Personal
Web again and click OK.
Thus, FrontPage creates a
directory structure, as well as
all the pages that you imme-
diately need for
your Web site.
You can
edit the page
content direct-
ly in the Nor-
mal pane. The
HTML pane
shows you all
the HTML content for
that page, while Preview
gives you a preview of the
page in Internet Explorer.
Finally, publish the page
by going to File > Publish
Web wizard. You may
upload the pages directly
to your Web site using the
File Transfer Protocol
(FTP). Note that you need a
Web server with the
Microsoft FrontPage 2000
Server Extensions turned
on, or else the pages will not
display accurately.
Creating database-
driven sites
FrontPage 2002 lets you build
nifty database-driven Web
sites that work with your
business even if you don’t
know how to work with data-
bases, HTML, or ASP. Here’s
how you can, for example,
capture e-mail addresses and
FrontPage 2002's menu-based interface sets
up database and front-end HTML in a jiffy
phone numbers in a data-
base. Go to File > New Page or
Web. In the right-hand pane,
select Database Interface Wiz-
ard and click OK. Choose
‘Create a new Access database
within your web’. Click Next,
and set a name for
the database con-
nection. Specify
the names and
types (whether
string, numbers,
etc.), of the data-
base fields in the
next screen. Click
on Next, and the
database is created. The Views menu lets you inspect and change
In the next screen, your whole site schema
specify the pages
you want created; by default
a submission page and a
results page are already
selected. Finally, click Next
and then Finish. Upload the
database and the pages to a
Web server that supports
Active Server Pages (ASP),
ActiveX Data Objects,
Microsoft FrontPage 2000
Server Extensions or Share-
Point team Services.
Creating all sorts
FrontPage also lets you create
Web sites that provide a cor-
porate façade, or Web-based
customer support.
Go to File > New
Page or Web, and
choose Web site
Templates from
the right-hand
pane. This opens
up the Templates
applet for you to
make a choice.
Views
You can employ
FrontPage to inspect your
Web pages too. Use the
Views panel on the left-
hand side of FrontPage to
see various parameters on
your Web site. For instance,
clicking on Page lets you see
19
the entire page in the work-
space; Folders shows the
folder structure; Reports
builds up a site summary
that details various Web site
parameters such as pictures,
unlinked and linked pages,
broken hyperlinks, etc. Nav-
igation shows you see a tree-
like layout of the entire Web
site, where you can add,
delete or link in more pages.
Hyperlinks shows you
hyperlinks or anchors for
each page in the folder list.
Finally, Tasks shows you any
listed tasks for the Web site.
MARCH 2004
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
Add in tasks from Edit > Tasks host them on Apache or
> Add Tasks… Use the Tasks Microsoft IIS Web servers. Go
view to track these. to Tools > Page Options. Flip
over to the Compatibility tab,
Page options and select the browsers that
Fine-tune compatibility you want to provide access to.
options for your HTML proj- Likewise, choose the appro-
ects so that they are accessed, priate version of the browser
either by several browsers, or a you’re targetting. Servers lets
specific one. You can even you choose between Apache
and IIS. For example,
select Microsoft IIS for
pages that are dynam-
ically generated with
ASP. Be sure to check
the ‘Microsoft Front-
Page Server Exten-
sions’ checkbox for
projects that need it.
You can also select the
appropriate settings
from the remaining,
such as ActiveX
controls, VBScript,
Set the custom page options from the JavaScript, ASP, the
Page Options applet CSS version, etc.
BLOGGING
20 Blogging is a neat way to get your work online,
as well as a channel to communicate with
other people of similar interests. Let’s look at
two popular Weblogs—Live Journal and Blogger
odyssey. It lets you set up a
simple blog with images. Reg-
istration is very
straightforward.
After logging in,
go to Journal
and choose
Update… This
opens the
Update page,
where you can key in your
thoughts, adventures, experi-
Live Journal ences, etc., into the text field.
Live Journal (www.livejournal. Additional options let you
com) is an excellent Web site put in access levels to make
to start your blogging posts public, private or acces-
118
change the look
and feel of your
Mood icons and
save the changes.
S2
Live Journal lets you interact with a vast The layout cus-
community of bloggers tomisation in the
S2 system lets you
sible only to friends. You change language and themes.
can also disallow comments. Choose to blog in English, six
You can define pictures you other languages, or opt for a
want to use, as well as click customised language. Finally,
the Pictures link to add new click Customize, under Indi-
pictures. Finally, click on vidual settings, to set colour,
Update Journal to load the font, presentation and text
entry onto the blog. options. Even more detailed
Customisation
Live Journal allows
for limited cus-
tomisation within
the page. Click
Manage > Customize.
Here, the settings
let you choose
between S1, the old
system and S2, the
new system. S2 lets you customise your blog’s layout, and
even has a style system language called S2
S1
S1 lets you customise your presentation styles are possi-
blog page layout using the ble with their style system
Page Layout Style that has a language, also known as S2.
number of listed styles. Lay-
out customisation is possible Adding friends
with recent events and views. You can add friends who will
Also, set colour theme be able to access specific sec-
options here. A cool feature is tions of your blog that are
Style Override that
lets you tweak spe-
cific things about
your page layout.
These are valid at
the beginning of a
document, and are
limited to <title>,
<base>, <style>,
<link>, and The Friends tool lets you read your friend’s
<meta>. Finally, posts, and lets them read all yours
MARCH 2004
not available to
the general public.
You can also view
their posts on
the Friends page.
Friends have to be
Live Journal users.
Go to Manage >
Friends to edit, add
and filter friends.
Finally, click on
Save Changes and
access the updated
Friends page there.
Blogger Set the FTP details to blog directly to your
Blogger (www.blog- personal Web space
ger.com) is another
popular blog spot. It has now your Web server. Choose to
tied up with Google. Posting
is simple—all you need to do
is click on your blog name.
Blogger immediately puts
you at the posting page,
where you can add new
posts by clicking on Create
New Post. Once done, click
on Publish Your Post.
Getting personal
If you have Web space, you
can create your blog page,
using Blogger’s editing and
publishing tools. You need to Publishing lets you set all
supply the FTP authentica-
tion details (username and
password), and create the
appropriate directory on
Blogger is one of the most popular blog spots
119
‘FTP it to your own server’
while setting up your blog,
and provide the necessary
details. Now you can add in
all posts at Blogger.com, and
view them on your Web site!
Settings, and more
Clicking on Settings lets you
access a lot of things about
the way your blog works.
Under Basic, you can
change titles and the
description of your blog.
your publishing details; For-
matting sets time, date, lan-
guage, etc.; Site Feed lets
you link RSS feeds to your
blog; E-mail lets you specify
other e-mail addresses to
route comments to, and
Members lets you add in
team members who can also
blog on the same page—
the best way to set up a
community blog.
ACCESSIBILITY
“The power of the Web is in its universality.
Access by everyone regardless of disability
is an essential aspect.”
S o said Tim Berners-Lee,
W3C Director and inventor
of the World Wide Web, and
this aspect can be put into
practice with a little effort.
Once you have put together
your Web site, use these tips to
ensure that your pages are
accessible to all.
Images
For those who do not use
graphical browsers, or cannot
access graphics in a browser, a
simple accessibility tip is to use
the ALT attribute and describe
the image.
Detailed description
With HTML 4.0, you can now
ConTemplating
You can change templates,
from Templates > Blog
Template and tweak the
HTML code a bit. Choose
New Template lets you
select from a list of existing
templates.
21
choose to put in full-picture
descriptions along with the
ALT text. Use the LONGDESC
attribute to add this descrip-
tion. It can also take the form
of a separate page referenced
by a d (descriptive) link.
Quick images
Use the width and height
attributes for every IMG tag to
specify the dimension of an
image. This speeds up image
loading, and the text around
the images starts to fill in rap-
idly. Here’s their syntax:
<IMG SRC=“coolcar.gif”
height=“200” width=“200”
ALT=“My concept car” LONGDE-
SC=“car_detail.html” ALIGN=left>
MARCH 2004
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks

Flashing Java fuss access to information. pages look organised and W3C’s check
For all your efforts to make a The same argument goes for neat, but they can be quite a The W3C Web site
classy Web site with using Java applets on your hassle for those using a (www.w3c.org) offers you free
Flash effects, it’s possible that Web site. It’s possible that browser that does not sup- HTML and Cascading Style
someone may be Net-surfers may not have the port them. Hence, keep a link Sheets (CSS) validation serv-
accessing it with a browser Java Runtime Environment to a version of your Web site ices. Access the free HTML
sans a Flash player. Hence, (JRE) installed. Downloading sans frames. This ensures validation service at http://val-
keep an alternative link that it from the Internet takes access to all, regardless of idator.w3.org/. It checks and
lets people bypass such quite a while. Hence, keep a frame compatibility. ensures that your HTML code
effects. It is unreasonable to non-Java version too, and dis- Here’s what you can do. follows the W3C’s Web Con-
expect people to download play a visible link to it. After ‘</FRAMESET>’, write tent Accessibility Guidelines
an extra plug-in just to view ‘<NOFRAMES></NOFRAMES>’, (WCAG). Either submit the
the information on your Web Frames and include the HTML code URL, or upload an HTML file
site, especially when they can Frames may make your Web that you would want to dis- for inspection. Access the
find the same play in a frame-disabled tweakable features for this
elsewhere. browser within these two tags. service by clicking on
Keep the ‘Extended Interface’ or
same in mind Testing ‘Extended File Upload Inter-
while opting Testing each page on all face’ on the home page. Alter-
for Flash the possible browsers makes natively, gain access to them
menus. While a lot of sense, as if your pages at http://validator.w3.org/
the eye-candy are not in
is pleasing, strict con-
with slow formance
Internet of the W3C
access, people standards,
would prefer Here’s a site with reasonable frames, which allow then your
to have a no- for easy navigation through the site complex
22 Standards of Access
p a g e s
appear dif-
The various accessibility standards ensure that the Internet and ferently in
the World Wide Web is accessible to all, irrespective of the surfer’s d i f f e r e n t W3C’s site offers a free validation check. Just enter
mode of access or disabilities. There are two well-known stan- b r o w s e r s . the URL to get the page validated
dards and guidelines of accessibility. The first is the World Wide Ensure that
Web Consortium (W3C) standard called the Web Content Acces- your HTML toolkit has sev- detailed.html for a submitted
sibility Guidelines (WCAG), under their Web Accessibility Initiative eral popular browsers, name- URL, or http://validator.w3.
(http://www.w3.org/WAI/). These guidelines have three levels of ly, Opera, Netscape and org/file-upload.html for an
specification that provide various priority levels. The other is the Mozilla. Also, consider test- uploaded file. W3C’s service
US Government’s Section 508 guidelines (www.section508.gov), ing the page with the Lynx depends on Document Type
which look at a relatively lesser level of accessibility guidelines, text browser. Definition (DTD) to validate
concentrating mostly on basic accessibility, the code. Lack of a proper
whilst leaving out many other pressing issues. Checking and validating DTD would lead to non-vali-
Both services offer free accessibility testing It doesn’t take too much dation of the page.
services and tools. effort to have your Web
Get this mascot Bobby is a free service that tests Web sites pages tested and validated. Validating the page CSS
to grace your for ease of use, adherence to standards and With little effort, you can use Visit the W3C CSS validation
Web site once accessibility by people with disabilities. Display freely available services and service (http://jigsaw.w3.org/ css-
you pass the their endearing mascot on your Web site once tools over the Internet that validator/), and choose to
Bobby test it’s Bobby-tested successfully. will validate your Web pages either validate by giving the
and Web sites. URL of the CSS, or uploading

120 MARCH 2004

it. You can also enter RESOURCES
the code of the CSS
If you are ready to host your Web site and
within the text scan
area. There is also a publish your work online, check out the
stand-alone tool following tips on free and paid hosting, and
available at the Web make it look absolutely professional
site for the same pur-
pose.

Bobby
Bobby (http://bobby.
watchfire.com/bobby/
html/en/index.jsp) is a
free service that vali- Use STEP to make more accessible
dates and tests your Web pages
Web site, and ensures
compliance with accessibility Web site, (www.section508.
guidelines. Bobby checks for gov), find a free tool called
W3C’s WCAG guidelines, as STEP508 (Simple Tool for

Domain-ing it Web site using space bought

Bobby offers check services for both, the W3C guidelines, as well as
the Section508 guidelines
well as the U.S. government’s
Section 508 guidelines. Enter
the URL of the page, and
choose to test it for Section
508 compliance, or for the
WCAG compliance. Use the
Customisation page (http://
bobby.watchfire.com/bobby/html/
en/advanced.jsp) to tweak
Bobby for better results.
Section 508
The US Government’s Sec-
tion 508 guidelines require
all data in electronic format
to be accessible to people
with disabilities. At their
Error Prioritisation) that
looks at the severity of acces-
sibility errors as well as the
effort to fix them.
Customizing Bobby
In the advanced features,
select checkboxes for full
text output, complete HTML
source for the lines, as well
as the Analyze HTTP error
pages option. Finally, for
pages that respond differently
to different browsers, Bobby
impersonates a Netscape, IE,
Opera, or Lynx browser, as
well as AOL and WebTV.
With domain names
available for as low as US$
9.95 (approx. Rs 448), it’s
easy to get yourself one
from Web sites such as
Network Solutions (www.net-
worksolutions .com). In fact,
you can also visit Web sites
such as GoDaddy (www.
godaddy. com) that has spe-
cial economical offers for
domain-name buyers. Once
you register your domain,
you can use free DNS servic-
es such as ZoneEdit (www.
zoneedit.com) that lets you
specify several sub-domains.
Finally, you need space on a
Web server. While most free
services give you decent
space, your Web site would
be listed under their
domain, and you will have
to suffer their ad banners on
your Web pages. Host your
from an ISP to use your
domain name.
GeoCities
With GeoCities (www.
23
geocities.com) now a part of
Yahoo!, signing up for an
account is as simple as using
the one existing with Yahoo!.
GeoCities gives you 15 MB of
space. Set up your Web site
using their free Web site cre-
ation tools such as the Yahoo!
PageWizards and the Yahoo!
PageBuilder.
The PageWizard is a sim-
ple five-minute page set-up
wizard that lets you select a
page from the available page
themes, and then customise
the text, images and links and
personal information. The
PageBuilder wizard is a little
more detailed in its cus-
tomization. You will need JRE

121 MARCH 2004

 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
com) is yet another
place where you
can access Web
space for free. The
basic account pro-
vides you 12 MB
space, with an
upper file-size
limit of 256 KB.
FreeServers also
gives out free
We b - h o s t i n g
space for any of
your domain
names. For that
though, the page
Set up your GeoCities site in a jiffy, and will have its ad
experiment with the available styles banners.
installed to access it though. Brinkster
Also, the PageBuilder takes a The basic free account at
while to open if you are Brinkster (www.brinkster.com)
using a dial-up connection. entitles you to a maximum
For more customised pages, of 30 MB space. Brinkster
you can create your
own page, then
upload the pages
and the associated
24 files into your
GeoCities account.
Upload files that
size up to 5 MB by
clicking on Easy
Upload in the
Advanced Toolbox
section of your Brinkster is free, has a clean interface, but
GeoCities account. limited features
Getting free space lets you run ASP pages that
Several Web sites offer interface with an online
free space to host your Web database; the FrontPage
site. Most of them have a Server Extensions though
decent amount of space. are available only for the
They also come with basic paid account. The file size
Web site building tools restriction here is 1 MB
and wizards to guide you (larger for databases). Use
through such services. their browser-based file
manager to upload files; FTP
FreeServers is restricted to the paid
FreeServers (www.freeservers. account.
122
150m Templates
Huge is definitely what you Web sites
call 150m.com’s (www.150m. Web site templates are a
com) offer of 100 MB free great way to start working
space—restricted to a maxi- with, since they come
mum of 1 MB for individual complete with images and
file sizes. 150m allows for FTP interlinked pages. Start
access to your space on their with MyFreeTemplates
site. It also lets you redirect (www.myfreetemplates.com)
your domain names to the that hosts a variety of tem-
pages that you have put up plates for personal as well as
here. Finally, 150m.com itself business Web sites.
has a simple Web site creation
tool and additional tweaks for Newsletters
your pages. Now that you have your
Web site up and running,
Space, more space it makes sense to let
For those of you who would the whole world know,
like still more space, check out and what better way than
O-F.com (www. o-f.com). The a newsletter? Get free
free basic free account gives newsletter templates at
you 100 MB of space, 150m. MyFreeTemplates (www.
com style. You are limited to a myfreetemplates.com), and
daily bandwidth of 40 MB. start working on despatch-
The user manager interface is ing them. Of course, e-mail
very similar to that of 150m. etiquette demands that you
com, so if you
have been look-
ing for lots of
space, try this
free web space
service as well.
Apart from a site
builder tool,
there’s a plus
point for using
this service—
their free FTP
services, just like
150m. com. This
way, when it
comes to
uploads, you are
not restricted to
some browser MyFreeTemplates gives you an easy way of
based file manag- making classy looking sites
er. Again, for all
the extras such as FrontPage give people the option of
Extensions, you would need receiving them, and not
to be a paid account user. spam mercilessly.
MARCH 2004
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks

Animating
Instincts
Atul Deshmukh

25
contents
26 Maya
Nifty tips compiled by
Suzzanne Rebello,
a Maya consultant,
who has lent her expertise
to many international
animation projects.

So you want to be a graphics
animator... You’re definitely
going to need these tips to
to make Maya and 3ds max
work for you...
29 3ds max
Here are 13 useful nuggets
by Sachin Puthran. He
handles art direction for
audio visuals, especially
in the area of film and
televison.

115 APRIL 2004

 insight ■
■ tips and tricks

MAYA
Get the most respected animation software to
create breathtaking animations for you
‘Use Default Button’ option,
set the Project as Current
and save your working
scenes. Transfer all file
textures to the
Source Image folder.
Before you render,
delete all unused
nodes. To do this, go to
File> Optimize Scene Size.
Farzana Cooper

Clean the Channel

General user tips
Manage your scenes
A project lets you group dif-
ferent files such as rendered
images, needed for a scene or
26 a group of related scenes. Go
to Create Project and click the
Group different files needed for a scene
into a Project
box
Select Object and then Transfer unused channels into the NonKeyable attributes
go to Window > General
Editor > Channel Control. To revert to selections time. Rig this LowPoly model,
Select channels that you Go to Create > Sets > Quick and keep checking the skin-
won’t use on your current Selection Sets and name the ning results, the Outputs on
object. Click on Move to selection. Next, go to Edit > the hiRes model, or the
transfer them to the Non Quick Select Set. This is handy Smooth Proxy. Keeping the
Keyable attributes. Also, look when you have to revert to LowPoly and HiPoly on two
out for Non Keyable attrib- selected vertices in a
utes such as Shear, Ghosting, complex mesh. Use
etc.—you can transfer them
to the Keyable attributes with
the Lasso tool or go to
Edit > Paint Selection Tool,
the Move button. to make Selections. Use the sel box to name the selection
You can split an
outliner in two to Modeling different layers is usually
efficiently manage a Making polygonal helpful, for files with large
number of objects. Models scenes, and also when you
Click on the grey To keep a check on your have to edit vertices—the
line at the bottom polygonal count, Go to Dis- fewer the better.
of the outliner and play > Heads Up Display > Poly
drag it upwards Count On to do so. Make a To make wires, tails for
to do so. polygon smooth proxy by polygonal meshes
going to Polygon > Smooth To create creatures, pipes, or
Lock the camera Proxy. For symmetrical char- get multiple appendages to
To the right in the acters or models, model only protrude quickly, use the
channel box, select one half, and when complete, extrude process. To do this,
the channels by mirror the other half. Do this select the edges or faces you
name, click on the by going to Polygon > Mirror want to extrude and the
one on top, drag it to Geometry. Here, choose the curve you want to extrude
the last, right-click respective axis and select Mir- along. Go to Edit Polygons >
and select Lock ror. You can also opt to Extrude Face or Edit Polygons >
Selected. ‘Merge the Vertices’ at this Extrude Edge. Here, turn on the

116 APRIL 2004

‘Use selected curve for extru-
sion’ option and click
Extrude. Press [Ctrl] + [A] to
access the Attribute Editor
and use its controls to edit the
extrusion.
Use the Twist option to
rotate the extruded polygons,
and ‘Taper/Taper Curve’ to
scale them along the curve. To
control the taper exactly,
open the Taper Curve section
and use the graph control to
set scaling along the length of
the curve.
Nurbs at render time
To get rid of jagged edges of
nurbs at render time, go to
Attribute Editor and drop-
down Tessellation. Check the
Display Tessellation box and
increase the ‘Curvature Toler-
ance’ by using the drop down
menu. You can Increase the U
and V divisions factor by typ-
ing in a higher value. This
increases the meshcount
when rendering, thereby out-
puting a smoother geometry.
Animation
Reordering inputs
The way the deformers or
input nodes are assigned
affect the object to a consid-
erable extent. To reorder
these, right-click on Object
and go to Inputs > All inputs,
click the middle mouse but-
ton on the input node and
place it below or above anoth-
er in the same stack.
Evaluate nodes
This feature is present in the
Modify menu. It’s great, espe-
cially when making a tiny
change in a completely rigged
character setup. Just put the
117
respective function on, make
your changes, and go back to
Evaluate All.
Smoothing weights
It’s a bit unnerving to keep
rotating the joints, or moving
the Inverse Kinematics (IK) to
check the influence of the
joints and their weights on
your skinned character.
Instead, simply animate
the joints at their extreme
positions. Set one key at bind
pose at frame 0 and another
at another pose, at, say, frame
50. Now, compare or adjust
the weights as you scrub
along the timeline.
Editing smooth skin bind
To change the weighting of
the CVs, other than by paint-
ing weights, go to Windows >
General Editors > Component Edi-
tor and under the Smooth
Skin tab, type in the values for
the selected vertices.
Ghosting
This is a direct translation of
the classical animation tech-
nique of flipping through a
handful of cell drawings to get
a feel for the timing of the
action you are working on.
You can control ghosting
on each object in your scene
with the ‘Ghost Selected’ and
‘Unghost Selected’ options
windows, or with the Ghost-
ing Information attributes. In
addition to ghosting individ-
ual objects, you can now
ghost entire skeletons or
object hierarchies.
The appearance of ghosts
in the scene view is also
improved for Maya 5. The
colour of ghosts before and
after the current frame or
keyframe lightens as their dis-
tance from it increases. This is
visible only when scene view
Shading is set to Wireframe.
Move along rotation axes
Use the Move tool to move
along the Rotation Axis
option to orient the move
manipulator to the local rota-
tion axes of the object.
Freeze joint orientation
Maya 5 lets you freeze the
local joint rotation axes to
match world space. To do so,
go to Modify > Freeze Transfor-
mation and turn on the Orient
option. If this option is turned
off, the local joint rotation
axes are not affected by Freeze
Transformation.
Parent constraints
With a parent constraint, you
can relate the position—trans-
lation and rotation—of one
object to another, so that the
objects behave as if they are a
part of a parent-child rela-
tionship that has multiple tar-
get parents.
An object’s movement can
also be constrained by the
average position of multiple
objects.
Maintain offset
Use ‘Maintain Offset’ to pre-
serve the original, relative
translation, rotation, and scal-
ing of a constrained object.
This option is present in all
constraint option menus
IK/FK blending lets you
apply keyframe animation to
joints, and also control them
with IK animation. In addi-
tion to blending IK and For-
ward Kinematics (FK) anima-
tion over multiple frames, a
blend can occur over a single
frame as well. This switches IK
to FK or FK to IK instantly.
Indirect skinning
Here’s how you can conform
the shape of the skeleton
through a lattice: Construct a
shape in the form of a snake—
draw a curve, create a circle,
and Extrude on Path. Draw a
skeleton of 10 or more joints
inside the model. Create an IK
handle that’s the length of the
skeleton. Select the skin and
create a lattice with ample
divisions. Select Skeleton and
‘Bind Skin to the Lattice’. This
lets you deform the hardest of
objects convincingly.
Rendering
Pelting
Reduce the effort and time
you spend on adjusting those
UVs when texturising charac-
ters or models: The technique
is called pelting. Take your
27
mesh, for example, the face,
duplicate it and flatten out all
the CVs onto a single plane,
almost as if you were to ham-
mer them. Apply a planar
map to it. Now, transfer the
UVs back to the original face
mesh and then open the UV
editor. Isn’t that something!
Paint FX
Flip Tube direction
Use this to switch the direc-
tion of the current brush
between Along Path (ideal for
canvas painting of plants) and
Along Normal (ideal for scene
painting of plants). This is
available as a hotkey.
A ‘Force Tube to be Along
APRIL 2004
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
Path’ checkbox is added to
the Canvas section of the
Paint Effects Globals. When
checked, this causes brushes
with tubes whose elevation-
Min is greater than 0.5 to be
drawn along the path rather
than along the normal in can-
vas mode. Thus, the plant
brushes draw in the expected
direction when painting in
the canvas.
Paint effects and polygons
You can convert Paint Effects
strokes to polygonal meshes,
including construction histo-
ry, using Modify > Convert >
Paint Effects To Polygons.
This allows you to: Ren-
der in any renderer, includ-
ing the Maya Software
renderer—mental ray for
Maya—the Hardware ren-
derer, and the Vector ren-
derer. Also to have Paint
Effects show in reflections,
refractions and through
28 transparent objects. Lastly,
you can use other polygon-
editing tools on them.
Turn on Quad Output, to
output to quadrilaterals. The
default is off, defaulting out-
put to triangles.
Lights
Intensity and colour curves
Use a custom brightness
decay rate to increase a spot-
light’s brightness, or a custom
colour decay rate to change its
colour with distance.
Intensity curves and
colour curves are graphical
representations of a light’s
brightness and colour with
distance. Use the graph editor
(Windows > Animation Editor), to
view them.
118
The vertical axis repre-
sents the intensity or colour
intensity value, and the hori-
zontal axis represents dis-
tance from the light source.
Intensity curves and colour
curves are similar to anima-
tion curves, except that the
horizontal axis of an anima-
tion curve represents time.
RampShader brightness
Use this Shader Type to create
cartoon-style shading with the
help of a ramp with stepped
values. The right side of the
ramp shows the colour output
where the brightness of the
diffused and translucent light-
ing is 1.0 or greater. The left
side displays the colour with
brightness set to zero.
3D Paint Tool
Edit existing textures
You can now edit both, the
size and the file format of
existing 3D Paint textures
using the Assign/Edit Textures
button in the File Textures
section of the 3D Paint Tool
settings. This button was pre-
Adjust the brightness of a spotlight to suit your animated needs
viously named Assign
Textures and used only
for assigning new tex-
tures; it had
no effect on existing
textures.
The displacement
attribute
Displacement is added
to the Attribute to Paint The Maya Vector to render in style!
drop-down list in the
File Textures section of the 3D
Paint Tool settings. It is now a These are used to render
paintable attribute.
Output
The Maya Vector renderer
Make good use of the Maya
Vector to stylise renderings.
It offers cartoon, tonal art, create them.
line art, hidden line, wire-
frame in various bitmap
image formats such as IFF,
TIFF, etc. It also offers in the ware Tab, drop down
following 2D vector formats:
Macromedia Flash (non-inter-
active) version 3, 4 or 5 (SWF), option to Enable Render
Adobe Illustrator version 8
(AI), Encapsulated PostScript
Level 2 (EPS), Scalable Vector
Graphics (SVG).
Render layers
huge scenes. Below the
Channel box, there are dis-
play layers. Click on the
drop down menu, and
change to Render. Add the
objects to the layers as you
Now, go to Windows >
Rendering Editor > Render Glob-
als. Here, in the Maya soft-
Render Layers/MultiPass
Control and turn on the
Layers. All objects are
assigned to the default lay-
ers. Also, look for trans-
parency throughout the
layers at render time.
Fcheck
Access Fcheck by going to
Start > All Programs > Maya >
Fcheck. This utility is provid-
ed by Maya to view images
and animation sequences.
Use it to view high-resolu-
tion image sequences. If your
RAM doesn’t support play-
back of larger images—
because the image sequence
is too large—you can shrink
it and reduce the image
by 50 per cent. Fcheck is
also used to re-number the
sequence or rename it.
APRIL 2004
 3ds max
3ds max is one of the most sophisticated 3D
software that makes your images come alive.
Here, we take you through nifty tips that take
your work to a new animated dimension
3
ds max is one of the
most popular 3D appli-
cations used in the
broadcast and film industry.
Its intuitive toolsets help you
create professional-quality
3D models, photo-realistic
still images, and film-quality
animation on your PC.
The new channel, Pogo,
has made excellent use of
animation to package itself.
We will use the Pogo logo as
an example to help under-
stand the plethora of features
that are hidden in 3dsmax.
Creating the element
The basic element of Pogo is
a square with its top-right
corner rounded.
Let’s create this shape:
Click on the Front viewport
to activate the viewport.
119
The basic form of the Pogo logo
Click the Create tab in the
command panel. Click the
Shapes button to display the
Splines shape type.
On the Object Type roll-
out, click rectangle. Click the
Keyboard Entry rollout to
open it. Here, select a numer-
ic field with the mouse and
enter a value of 50 in the
Length and Width field.
Leave the Corner Radius
value at 0 and click Create.
Observe the Front view-
port. You now have a square
of 50 units. Name this ele-
ment as Pogo_element in the
Name and Color field.
Create embedded
shapes
We need to embed a circle
inside the square, so that we
can modify the size of the cir-
cle in animation. While there
are many techniques to do so,
3ds max offers you a simple
method to create this effect.
Select circle to get that shape in
the animation
To embed a new shape,
select the ‘Pogo_element’
that you have created in the
Front viewport. Go to the
Create panel and uncheck
the ‘Select New Shape’
option in the rollout. Now,
click the Circle button. Open
the Keyboard Entry rollout.
Enter 10 as the Radius value
and click Create.
The new shape is a part of
View the shape from the Front
viewport
the ‘Pogo_element’. Move the
shape in the Top Viewport,
using the Select and Move
tool, and both move together.
Dynamic mouse undo
If you are moving the
‘Pogo_element’ from the
existing position to a new
position by left-clicking and
dragging the mouse, you can
cancel this action by keeping
the left-click pressed and
clicking the right button
once. This is a handy tool to
check certain functions with-
out committing your actions.
Animating the hole
First, convert the object into
a mesh. Select the object,
click on the modifier list and
select Edit Mesh. Alterna-
tively, press [E] after clicking
on the modifier list to jump
to the Edit Mesh modifier.
Expand the Editable
Spline modifier controls and
select the spline module.
Click on the circle in the
29
object and the selected
spline is displayed in red.
Click on the ‘Show end
result on/off’ toggle button
The magic icon to preview the
end result
APRIL 2004
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
for the mesh preview when
keyframing. You can see the
mesh in shade view in the
Perspective viewport.
Now go to Frame 1 on
the timeline and hit the
Auto Key button to activate
it. Go to frame 20 and use
the Select and Uniform Scale
tool to scale the circle. Simi-
larly, go to each successive
twentieth frame and
keyframe the circle using
various scaling values. The
best way is to scale up and
down during keyframing.
Remember to scale the circle
within the square.
Now your basic shape is
animated. Save this file as,
say, Pogoanim_ master.max
The rounded corner
Use the Fillet option to create
the rounded top-right edge.
To get a better view, click on
the ‘Zoom Extents All’ but-
ton. This fits the shape to the
30 best size in all viewports.
The magic button to fit views in
all the viewports
Here’s how you fillet the
edge: select the ‘Pogo_ele-
ment’ and click the Modify
tab in the Command panel.
Here, the selected object is
shown as an editable spline
object. Click on the ‘+’ to
open up the sub-object con-
trols. Click on the ‘Vertex
sub-object’ and then on the
top-right vertex of the
‘Pogo_element’ in the Front
120
The Fillet dialog box helps you
create those round edged corners
viewport. Now, enter ‘10’ in
the Fillet box and press
[Enter]. Your Pogo shape is
now ready. Save this file as
Pogo_master.max. For other
techniques, remember to
save it as a new file before
starting a new project.
Creating an array of
animated shapes
Use the array command to
create duplicates of the basic
shape. Remember to save as
this file as tech2.max. Select
the object, and go to the
Tools > Array command from
the top menu bar. We will
now duplicate 10 copies on
the X-axis. Note that the size
of our master object is 50
units. In the Move incre-
mental field, set a value of
50. Select type of object as
Make multiple duplicates in a jiffy
Copy. In the array dimen-
sions, select 1D with a count
of 5 and click OK. The shape
is repeated across the X-axis
with edge-to-edge accuracy.
Move the slider on the time-
line from 0 to 100 and you
will find that even the ani-
mation parameters are
copied with the object.
Randomising animation
Notice that all the circles are
animated in a similar way
on the timeline. We can
now bring in some variation
by selecting each object and
shifting the keyframe.
The Play/Pause toggle controls
playback
Select the second object in
the series and move each
keyframe marker that appears
on the timeline to a different
position. For example, move
the keyframe marker 1 to
frame 5, keyframe marker 20
to frame 35, and so on. This
done, check the playback by
selecting the perspective view
and clicking the Play Anima-
tion button next to the time-
line. Repeat this procedure for
all the objects. On playback,
the circles are animating at
different time intervals.
Save this file as
tech3.max.
Make an instanced
array
Select all the 5 animated
objects and go to the Tools -
array command again. Click
on ‘Reset All Parameters’.
Enter 50 as the value in the
incremental Y Move field.
Select instance as the type of
object. Enter 5 as the array
dimensions 1D and click OK.
Notice that this creates a
new set of objects on the Y-
axis. Go to the timeline and
The Perspective viewport shows
the model with instanced arrays
APRIL 2004
insight ■
■ tips and tricks
hit ‘Play animation’. All the
vertical objects have the
same animation. The base
object keyframes can now be
modified. Remember we had
used the Instance option
while creating an array. Let’s
see how to use this feature.
Select the 3rd object in the
bottom row. Observe that
the keyframes are the same
for the objects placed verti-
cally above it. Modify the
keyframe position of the
base object. All the
keyframes in the instanced
objects above it are updated
automatically. Group all the
objects using the group
command in the menu bar.
Save this file as tech4.max.
Using Instance while
copying, allows you to mod-
ify the parameters of the
master object. All instances
created from the master
object are updated automat-
ically. This is useful when
developing animation—say,
with a school of fish, where
you modify one fish to
update all instanced objects.
Camera animation
Create a free camera in the
Front viewport from the
camera command panel.
Move the camera along the
Y-axis so as to view the
grouped objects. Select Cam-
era view in Perspective view-
port or press [C] while there.
Your animation is displayed
as seen through the camera.
Move the camera till the
objects just fit to the extremes
of the view. This is your view
in Frame 1. Now, turn on
AutoKey and go to frame 25.
Move the camera in the
121
Quickly check your animations
in Preview mode
left view along the X-axis
closer to the object. Move it
along the same axis away
from the object in frame 50.
Use your own creative cam-
era compositions. Repeat the
same for frame 75. For frame
100, copy the keyframe from
frame 1 to frame 100 by click-
ing and dragging the frame 1
marker, while holding down
[Shift]. Your basic animation is
ready. You can preview your
animation by selecting the
Animation > Make Preview com-
mand from the menu bar.
Save the file as tech5.max
The Make Preview win-
dow has options that allow
you to set the size and param-
eters of your preview. Ensure
that you have chosen Cam-
era01 from the Render View-
port drop-down option. You
can also create multiple cam-
eras in the same scene and
animate them. You can name
these cameras for your con-
venience. Set the camera
name during preview in the
Render Viewport dropdown.
Adding dynamism to
camera animation
Regular keyframing gives
you a very standard looking
animation. You can add
spice to your animation by
using Track View > Curve editor.
Select the camera and
select the Track View > Curve edi-
tor from the Graph Editors
menu to open the curve-edi-
tor window. Select the Trans-
form Y position of the camera
in the left panel of the editor
window. A green curve
defines the movement of the
camera. It starts with an ease
in, takes a peak and then ends
with an ease out. This is the
Curves that can set things right
default attribute assigned to
animated objects in 3dsmax.
However, we can assign dif-
ferent controls to change the
nature of animation required.
You can modify the
nature of curve in the graph
editor to change the tempo of
the animation. Click on the
second node to display the
Adjust the curve to change the
pace of the animation
Bezier control handles. Drag
the left node vertically down
to change the nature of curve.
Preview the animation using
the camera viewport.
Similarly, select the fourth
node and select the Set Tan-
gent to Fast icon on the
curve-editor top panel. Pre-
view it to see the difference.
Save the file as tech6.max.
Handheld camera
effect
Assign controllers to the X or
Z-axis to make the camera
movements look wacky or
like the effect of a jerk when
using a handheld camera.
Assign a controller by
right-clicking on the X posi-
tion of camera01, transform
the position in the curve-edi-
tor, and select ‘Assign con-
troller’ to open the Assign
Float controller box. Select
‘Noise Float’ and click OK.
An irregular wave pattern
appears in the Noise Con-
31
Tweak the curve controls to get
that jerky look
troller property window.
Preview the animation.
Observe that your camera
has shifted to the left and
the movement is a bit jerky.
Adjust the Group01 object
APRIL 2004
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
by moving it to the left of
the X-axis in the front view-
port. Use the camera view-
port to move it till you are
satisfied with the framing.
You can also change the
property of the noise
strength by right-clicking on
the X position name and
selecting properties. Change
the values of Roughness and
Strength to get variations. A
small feature called Ramp in
and Ramp out allows you to
smoothen the start and end
movements. Preview your
animation at this stage and
save the file as tech7.max
Using Skylight
Now we can set up the basic
lights required for the ani-
mation. Choose an Omni
light from the lights pane.
Position this to the right of
the camera and in front of
the object group. Reduce the
multiplier intensity of the
32 light to 0.5 in the light
properties box.
To make your illumina-
tion convincing and softer,
use Skylights. Click on the
Skylight button in the Create
lights rollout. Create this
Let there be light
122
light anywhere in the scene
since the effect isn’t based on
its position. You need to acti-
vate the Advanced lighting
control to use the Skylight’s
lighting property. To do so, go
to Rendering > Advanced light-
ing, and select Light Tracer.
Next, create a spotlight
using the create Spot Target
The magical light meter
in the lights create panel.
Use the Top viewport to cre-
ate light from the left of the
camera, pointing towards
the group object. From the
Left viewport, move the tar-
get upwards, pointing to the
centre of the group.
Here’s a special feature
that lets you project an
The focus beam light
image onto this object.
Select the spotlight and
open Advanced Effects from
the Modify Light panel.
Click None to open the
Material/Map browser win-
dow. Select Bitmap and press
OK. Select a bitmap image
file from your image
resource and press OK.
Notice that the image
name is shown in the Pro-
jector Map box. Open the
spotlight parameters in the
Modify Lights panel.
Choose rectangle as the
option for the shape of the
spotlight. Use the Bitmap Fit
button to automatically
resize the rectangle of the The ultimate makeup toolkit
spotlight to the rectangular
proportion of the projected opened group and click on
image. Click on the Bitmap ‘Assign Material to Selection’.
Fit option and choose the Create 5 such colours in
projected image again. the Material editor and assign
You can also change the it to each object. Render a sin-
Hotspot/Beam and Falloff/ gle frame to see the result.
Field values to adjust the cov- You are now ready to ren-
erage area of the spotlight. der the entire animation.
Render the scene. You will Select the Camera viewport
see the projected image ren- and hit the Render Scene but-
dered onto the group object. ton on the toolbar. Select the
To make the animation inter- Active Time segment of 100
esting, animate the spot tar- frames. Select the custom file
get from the Front viewport size of 320 x 200 pixels. In
on the X-axis and Y-axis.
Save the file as tech8.max.
the Render Output section
select the Save File option
and enter the filename as
Texturing shapes for a render. Select MOV - Quick-
colourful final animation
The animation will look very
colourful and contemporary
if we can assign a different
colour for each square.
To apply colour maps, first
open the group object. select Ready to render
it and go to Group > Open from
the menu bar. Now, select time as the Save As type. Hit
each shape one by one and the render button and enjoy
apply different colours using your Pogo animation.
the Material editor. Remember to render in
Open the Material editor D1 PAL size, ie, 720 x 576 pix-
by pressing [M]. Select the first els for professional television-
sample sphere and change quality ouputs. Also,
the diffuse colour to blue. remember that the televison
Select the shape at the format requires 25 frames per
extreme-left and top of the second. Happy Animating!
APRIL 2004
insight ■
■ tips and tricks

Speed secrets
You don’t need the
latest hardware and
the best
33
configuration for
contents
boasting rights. Fine- 34 Hardware
tune your existing 35 Windows XP
system with these 39 Gaming
40 Forum
tweaks to race
ahead

ILLUSTRATIONS: Farzana Cooper

143 MAY 2004

 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
HARDWARE
Hardware is the first stop on the Tweak
Express. A few right and quick fixes, and your
system will surprise you
Quickly press [Delete] as
34 your computer starts up to
enter your PC’s BIOS. This
is where you set your
system for better perform-
ance—no matter what OS
you’re running.
Flashers
Before anything else, if your
BIOS version is over a year or
two old, chances are your
motherboard manufacturer
has released an updated ver-
sion that will significantly
increase performance and
stability. If the flashing
process is interrupted, your
motherboard will be rendered
useless: flashing is therefore
not for the faint hearted. Get
your system assembler to
update your BIOS.
144
Beyond clock
speeds
The first step to overclocking
your CPU is to increase the
Front Side Bus (FSB). Before
you start, ensure you have a
well-ventilated cabinet, with
at least three fans—one for
ventilation, one for the
Switched Mode Power
Supply (SMPS) and one for
the CPU. Increase the FSB in
the smallest of instalments—
from, say, 133 MHz to 135
MHz. Now change your CPU
ratio marginally, and keep
testing sytem stability and
performance. Of course, this
only applies to Athlon CPUs.
Intel locks theirs to pre-
vent overclocking accidents.
Don’t give in to the
temptation of trying to
change voltage settings—this
will significantly increase the
amount of heat produced.
Basic BIOS tweaks
Here are some generic BIOS
tips to increase performance.
The gains are limited, but
the tweaks aren’t as risky as
overclocking.
Firstly, set the First Boot
Device to your C: drive and
disable the Second, Third
and Other boot devices. On
the rare occasions when you
need to boot from a floppy
or CD, a deft move on
[Delete], and changing the
First Boot Device option to
Floppy or CD will remedy
the situation.
Change the ‘CAS Latency
Time’ from 3 to 2—this
reduces the amount of time
your RAM waits before it
starts a ‘read’ command.
Change the ‘RAS-to-CAS
Delay’ and the ‘RAS Pre-
charge Time’ to 2—this
reduces the delay between
signals and lets the memory
refresh faster.
Make sure that the
bootup virus checking
option is disabled to increase
boot times significantly.
Disable ‘Boot up Floppy
seek’ so that the BIOS won’t
waste time looking for a
floppy drive. Disable the
Video BIOS Shadow.
If you have a graphics
card with over 16 MB of
memory, disable ‘Video RAM
Cacheable’.
Set the initial display card
as either PCI or AGP, and not
‘Auto’, depending on the
configuration of your
graphics card.
Dirty hardware
Cleanliness is next to godli-
ness, even in technology.
Keep your cabinet clean and
in a well-ventilated area.
This is especially important
for surfaces such as those of
the CPU, GPU and power
supply that heat up. As long
as these are clean, the heat
won’t build up.
Use soft paint brushes to
clean fans to prevent them
from slowing down or
locking up, which can cause
hardware damage.
Cable chaos
Arrange and tie your cables
with rubber bands or cotton
threads to prevent entangle-
ment and improve ventila-
tion. Also, try and space
hard drives as far away from
each other as possible. Con-
sider adding a fan for your
hard drives if your cabinet is
too small.
Separate IDEs
please
A common assumption is
that if the hard disk and CD-
ROM drive are on the same
cable, data transfer will be
faster. This isn’t true, since
data transfer rates depend
on Integrated Device Elec-
tronics (IDE) controllers,
which run at the speed of
the slower device. Since the
optical drive is slower than
the hard disk, connecting
them to the same IDE port
slows down performance.
Also, transfer speeds
between drives on two dif-
ferent IDE channels is faster
than that between devices
on the same IDE channel.
MAY 2004
 WINDOWS XP From within the
…because your RAM doesn’t oblige XP’s bells System
Properties dialog
and whistles box, you can set
Windows XP to
give preference
to performance.
You can allocate
its resources to
give preference
to the programs
you run

File system first
When installing Windows
XP, make a clean install, as
opposed to updating from an
older version. This is because
formatting your hard drive to
use the NTFS file system is
better, since FAT32 is slower
and less stable. To change
your drive’s FAT32 file system
to NTFS, go to Start > Run and
type ‘command’. At the com-
mand prompt, type ‘convert X:
/FS:NTFS’ and press [Enter]—
here ‘X:’ is the drive you want
to convert.
Start with the boot
What you should look to
improve upon is bootup
time. You can save as much as
30 seconds by optimising
your boot options. If only
one person uses your com-
puter, leave the password
blank. Also disable Fast User
Switching by going to Start >
Run, and typing ‘control user-
passwords’ and pressing [Enter].
In the User Accounts ‘Performance’. The dialog press [Enter]. In the User
window, click on ‘Change the box called Performance Accounts dialog box that
way users log on or off’; make Options pops up. Under pops up, uncheck ‘Users
sure the ‘Use the Welcome Visual Effects, select ‘Adjust must enter a username and
screen’ option is ticked, and for best performance’ and password to use this com-
uncheck ‘Use Fast User click Apply. puter’. Since you are doing
Switching’. Click on Apply Again, in the Perfor- away with passwords alto-
Options
the window.
and close mance Options dialog box,
click on Advanced. Under
gether, disable the HelpAs-
sistant account. In the User
35
Processor
Prettier equals scheduling
slower and Memory
The first thing you notice in usage, make
XP is the look. Unfortu- sure the Pro-
nately, the crisp menus, the grams option
new fade-in and fade-out is selected in
effects and the breathtaking each case.
wallpapers drain your
system’s memory. For any PC Do
with less than 256 MB of away with
RAM and a CPU slower than passwords
1 GHz, turn off all the frills. To disable
The easiest way to do this logon pass-
is to press [Windows] + w o r d s
[Pause/Break] to launch the entirely, go to
System Properties dialog box. Start > Run,
Here, click on Advanced. type ‘control
You’ll see three ‘Settings’ but- userpass- If you have only one user on your computer, it
tons. Click the one related to words2’ and makes sense to disable password requirements

145 MAY 2004

 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
Setting the right folder options
will let you work faster in Explorer
check ‘Display file size infor-
mation in folder tips’ and
‘Display simple folder view
in Explorer’s Folder list’.
Under Offline Files, uncheck
‘Enable Offline Files’.
Defragmentation
One cause of system slow-
down is fragmented data.
38 When writing to your drive,
whatever space is available is
filled, so even small files
Defragment disk drives once a
month, for faster data access
148
can be distributed all over
the place.
Windows may also split
large files into many parts
and spread them over the
hard disk. This is fragmenta-
tion. To counter this, you
need to defrag your hard
disks once a month.
Go to Windows Explorer,
right-click on a drive, select
‘Properties’ and in Tools,
click ‘Defragment Now…’.
When Disk Defragmenter
opens up, click Defragment.
After the process is done,
check your hard disks for
errors. In the disk properties
box, click ‘Check Now…’
under ‘Error-checking’.
No compression
and indexing
Drive compression and
indexing is a feature of Win-
dows XP that helps you save
space and search your hard
disk better—provided the
drive is formatted in NTFS.
To begin with, if you have
slower 5,400-rpm drives, or
an older, slower computer, it’s
better that you leave these
features turned off. The eas-
iest way to check if this is
enabled, is to double-click My
Computer, right-click on an
NTFS drive and select Proper-
ties. At the bottom of the
dialog box that pops up,
you’ll see two check boxes
called ‘Compress drive to save
disk space’ and ‘Allow
Indexing Service to index this
disk for fast file searching’.
If you don’t search your
hard disk for files frequently,
you can safely uncheck the
‘Allow Indexing Service to
index this disk for fast file
searching’
option. Turning
off disk com-
pression, how-
ever, is a little
more compli-
cated. Not all
users have 40
GB and 80 GB
drives, and
some would
rather save
every MB of
disk space DMA access will let your drives communicate
that they can, faster with other components
gladly waiting
a few seconds longer for pro-
grams to load.
Another thing to
remember is that if disk com-
pression is already enabled,
and your drive is almost full,
turning it off can have
unpleasant consequences—
prepare to lose a little data.
We suggest you turn off disk
compression only if you
have large hard disks, with
space to spare.
If you change any settings,
click OK and then make sure
to check the ‘Apply changes
to <Drive>:\, subfolders and
files’. You can do the same for
all your NTFS drives.
Boost that drive
Go to System Properties
([Windows] + [Pause Break]) ,
and then to Hardware > Device
manager. Look for ‘Disk
Drives’ and double-click on
it. In ‘Properties’, check
‘Optimise for performance’
and ‘Enable Write Caching
on the disk’. Now, go to IDE
ATA/ATAPI Controllers, and
double-click ‘Primary IDE
Channel’. Under Advanced
Settings, make sure ‘DMA if
available’ is enabled.
Do the same for the Sec-
ondary IDE Channel. You’ll
need to restart for the
changes to take effect.
Unwanted fonts
and applications
Not only do extra fonts slow
down your system, they also
increase bootup times. Use
a font management tool
such as Typograph (http://
www.neuber.com/typograph/).
Refer to the Quickstart
article—‘Fonts Sans Confu-
sion’—in the January 2004
edition of Digit for tips to
use Typograph.
The same applies to
unwanted programs. Unin-
stall all that you don’t
need—too many applica-
tions slow the system down,
even if you have space to
spare. All installed programs
have associated keys and
values in the registry, and ref-
erences to them are all over
your hard disk. Try asking a
hard disk that’s sorting
through 2,000 fonts and
applications to hurry up!
MAY 2004
insight ■
■ tips and tricks
GAMING
Now for some help with your fps...
T
o make your PC play
faster, access the
graphics card settings
by right-clicking on the
desktop and going to Properties
> Settings > Advanced. You can
tweak all options from here.
OpenGL settings
For faster fps, and a more
enjoyable experience, turn off
eye-candy.
Make sure all the options
in your graphics card settings
are tuned for high perform-
ance. Set the minimum levels
for—or turn off—resource
hungry settings such as
Anisotropic Filtering, Anti-
Aliasing, Mipmap Detail and
Vertical Sync.
Direct3D settings
In your card’s Direct3D
settings, set all eye-candy to
a minimum, or just turn
the settings off. Here again,
turn off Anti-Aliasing,
Anisotropic Filtering, Mip-
map Details and Vertical
Sync. You may need to enable
Fog table emulation for
149
nVidia cards to avoid seeing a
blank screen.
A clean win
Keep your graphics card clean
and airy. All that gaming can
really test the hardware, and
if you’re not careful, be pre-
pared to see a BSOD, or worse
still, corrupted files after a
rather ‘hot’ reboot.
The area around the
graphics card should be open
and cables shouldn’t obstruct
the fan. If possible, install an
additional fan on top of your
cabinet. With typical mother-
board placements, this new
fan will blow air straight onto
the AGP graphics card.
Get by with a little
help
You can get power-user-type
control over your graphics
card drivers with third-party
tools. These will further
tweak your card settings for
best performance with
decent visual effects.
Radeon users can try out
PowerStrip (http://www.entech-
taiwan.net/util/ps.shtm), and
nVidia card owners, nVHard-
Page (www.nvhardpage.com).
For those still hanging on to
TNT and TNT2 cards, we
suggest you use older, stable
drivers, instead of the
latest Detonator drivers
(www.nvidia.com).
The Detonator drivers are
optimised for the latest breed
of graphic chipsets, and may
tax your older cards. Of
course, if you can’t find the
older drivers, stick to the new.
Overclocking
You can overclock your GPU
to get better graphics, but
there is a limit. Don’t expect
to get 9800 Pro performance
out of your TNT2. There’s a
very fine line between a faster
GPU, and a minor explosion,
so be wary. And do bear in
mind that overclocking is
considered tampering, which
voids your warranty. If you
have no clue what you’re
doing, skip these tips.
Using third-party utili-
ties mentioned earlier—
Using tools such as nVHardPage can
give you that performance boost you
require so badly
PowerStrip for Radeons and
nVHardPage for nVidia’s
cards—you can tweak your
GPU. Go to the clock fre-
quency controller in your
respective utility, and
increase the clock speed
and memory speed at not
more than 5 MHz at a time.
Keep testing for stability
and excessive heat emitted
by the card.
The performance increase
begins to go down as you
overclock more and more.
Use your judgement to get the
optimal setting where the
overclocking is moderate and
the performance gain is satis-
factory. As always, add a few
fans to your cabinet before
you do this.
LAN parties
Before connecting to a game
server, close all programs that
use the Internet to maximise
your connection speed and
minimise your ping times.
Don’t spare even IM applica-
39
tions. Also, exit as many pro-
grams and services as you can.
Don’t forget
the game
Apart from setting
the graphics card
options, you also
need to adjust each
game’s settings for
high performance.
This is usually found
in the game menu
under Options > Set-
tings > Graphics, or
something similar.
Set colour depths,
‘details’, and all
other such settings
to Low.
MAY 2004
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks

Some of the smartest users we meet on the forum are long term Digit subscribers. Wait, is
there a pattern here?

Posted: Mon Jan 26, 2004 9:30 pm Post subject:

Tweaking UR OS:
ice
1) Get XP antispy (freeware). Block all the worthless services. (It has a description for the services too)
Digitized!
2) Get System Mechanic... Run a registry check and a junk file remover check every week or so. Also, tweak the OS accord-
ing to your needs., eg, in the Optimization sub-menu, choose startup manager and remove stuff like kernel check and MS
Office. Btw, don’t delete the entries, just disable them, so that u can re-enable them later…In the Tweak Windows Set-
tings, you can change the options according to your needs. I’ve enabled Prefetching to monitor bootfile and application
launch
Joined: 28 Dec 2003 3) I use Tweak XP. It has a lot of cool options like cache optimization, hardware optimization—they are all depend-
Posts: 1635 ent on your RAM, hardware, etc. All you need to do is spend a good 30 minutes with the software.
Location: Mumbai
4) Cable nut (for Net speed) Yes the name says cable, but it also works with dial-ups, ADSL, etc Install it (freeware )
choose Start > Programs > Cable nut > Css > your connection speed > your OS. For XP, choose Windows 2000 as the OS.
5) Install Naviscope. It will tell you about your network usage—what goes on between your PC and the Net, block
adds, etc. Thus it speeds up the Net and has options of optimizing MTU/RWIN Settings in Windows 9x.
6) Install Hare, and change your kernel to 88-bit. If it isn’t stable, go back to 64-bit. BTW, never use Hare’s RAM opti-
mizer. It sucks! You can use Hare to change your GFX card options, Prefetching, etc.
7) If you want to decrease your boot up time, install Zoom. Enable boot file caching, and if you don’t change your
startup files regularly, enable Startup Snapshot, or whatever it’s called. It works! Also try BootVis, though I don’t guar-
40 antee it—it helped me, but didn’t help Dexter.
8) This is a big post. Do I get paid for this?
9) Yeah! Defragment! The most important thing is to defragment your drives regularly. Windows defragmenter is
slow, so try [Windows] + [R], type ‘cmd’ and press [Enter]. Now, type ‘diskeeper’ and press [Enter], choose the option
that best suits your needs and defragment. My comp defrags itself using this bat file every night at 3:
diskeeper c: -f
diskeeper d: -f
diskeeper e: -f
diskeeper e: -f
My C: is FAT32, so it takes ’bout 20-30 minutes. The rest are NTFS, and take less than a minute each.

Deep Posted: Mon Feb 23, 2004 10:01 am Post subject: Re: My XP freeze
Digitized
gauravsuneja wrote:
My XP freezes so that I can’t press even [Ctrl] + [Alt] + [Del]. I have to cold reboot when this happens,
especially while using Photoshop.My configuration is XP Pro, 128 MB RAM, nVidia 64 MB graphics Cre-
ative sound, 40 GB hard drive. Any answers?
Joined: 23 Jan 2004
Posts: 324
Location: Mumbai, LOL! How can you expect XP to run properly with 128 MB of RAM? Time to upgrade to 384 or 512 MB. Deep
India

Posted: Mon Feb 23, 2004 3:36 pm Post subject:

ice
Digitized! BTW Deep, my comp ran beautifully on 128 MB. All I did was:
1) Changed the visual options
2) Disabled the worthless services
3) Made my page file 512 MB, spanning two hard drives
4) Used a RAM optimiser
5) Used Hare
Joined: 28 Dec 2003
Posts: 1635
Location: Mumbai

150 MAY 2004

 insight ■
■ tips and tricks

It s a Free-Free
W orld
Tried the free software on the CD along with this issue? Now here are
some quick tips to give you the winning edge
41
Farzana Cooper

contents
42 Essentials
42 Multimedia
43 Internet
46 System
47 Office
48 Developer Tools

177 JUNE 2004

 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
ESSENTIALS
Adobe Acrobat Reader
Full 6.0
Adobe Acrobat Reader comes
in two flavours—the Basic and
the Full version. The difference
is that the Full version has
comprehensive help, support
for accessibility features, and
most importantly, the provi-
sion to search within Adobe
Catalog Index files. The Index
42 files provide access to a full-text
search system. This makes it
simpler and faster to search for
text within multiple PDF files,
through a single interface.
Acrobat allows you to search
within an index for quick search
178
The search interface sup-
ports search using simple,
compound or Boolean argu-
ments. Advanced search capa-
bilities, such as stemming and
proximity, help you refine the
search results.
To search via an index,
drag and drop the index file,
with the PDX extension, into
the application. The search
bar opens on the right hand
side. By default, the search
application will be in Basic
mode, but by using the link at
the bottom of the page, you
can enable Advanced
mode. Remember, you
need to use the Full version
of Adobe Acrobat Reader
6.0 to avail these options.
The results obtained can
be sorted in various ways.
Relevance sorting keeps the
most probable results on
the top. ‘Sort by filename’
is self-explanatory. The
Digit Archive filenames in
the second free CD with
this issue, have been cho-
sen such that, on being
sorted, they appear in
chronological order.
MULTIMEDIA
dBpower AMP Music
Converter
To start using dBpower AMP,
all you need are the plugins
for the formats into which
you need to encode your
audio files. Once you have
them installed, you can start
right away.
Within Explorer, locate the
file you want encoded, right-
click on it, and choose ‘Con-
vert To’. You should see the
listed options for the audio
formats supported. Select the
format of your choice and
click on it. This opens the
Options menu where you can
set parameters such as encod-
ing quality and type. When
you have entered the options,
click on Convert to start con-
verting the file.
Winamp 5.03
Global Hotkeys
Winamp 5.03 features global
hotkeys that allow you to con-
trol your player using the key-
board. The fun thing is that
the shortcuts work even if
Winamp is not in focus. Thus,
even if you’re working
in Word, you can pause,
play, stop, or increase or
decrease volume with
the following configurable
key combinations:
Action Shortcut
Play/Pause [Ctrl] + [Alt] + [Home]
Stop [Ctrl] + [Alt] + [End]
Next Track [Ctrl] + [Alt] +
[Page Down]
Previous Track [Ctrl] + [Alt] + [Page Up]
Increase Volume [Ctrl] + [Alt] + [Ç ]
Decrease Volume [Ctrl] + [Alt] + [È ]
Left Seek [Ctrl] + [Alt] + [Å ]
Right Seek: [Ctrl] + [Alt] + [Æ]
Welcome the Media
Library
Winamp boasts of a powerful
feature called the Media
Library. Open it by right-click-
ing on the main window and
selecting Library, or by press-
ing [Alt] + [L]. You can navigate
over the main sections, called
Views, from the left side pane.
To add your files, click on
JUNE 2004

The Media Library is a manageable bird’s
eye-view of all your music collection
Library, and select the directo-
ries containing your media
files. Winamp immediately
separates the audio from the
video files, and puts each
under the correct View.
If you flip across the
default Audio and Video
Views, you’ll notice there’s a
lot you can do in each View.
For example, under the Audio
View, you can view your col-
lection by artiste or by album.
There’s also a useful search
facility that lets you search
for files within the library,
with the results displayed in
the Results pane. You can nar-
row down your search by
entering multiple keywords.
You may choose to either
enqueue the results to the cur-
rent playlist, or play it straight
off the library.
If you right-click on the
track in the Results pane, you
can choose to play all tracks
by the same artiste, or play all
the tracks in the album, or add
the files to a playlist. Right-
clicking on the track in the
Results pane lets you access
and change file information,
and remove the file from the
library and the drive.
You can even create your
own custom views, such as
‘High Bitrate’ to automatically
filter only those audio
179
files which have a
bitrate of, or more
than, 192 Kbps.
The media library
can also keep track
of various playlists. It
also allows you to
keep track of media
folders—your music
sources. These can be
local or shared fold-
ers. They can be scanned
automatically for new media.
Tags are used to generate
searchable info in the library
for later reference.
The Playlist Editor
Winamp’s Playlist Editor has-
n’t really changed in this
makeover. It still remains the
easiest to work with. If
you’ve just loaded a huge
playlist, and want to search
for a specific track, a quick
search-and-select can be
done by pressing [F3].
Winamp is full of features
waiting to be utilised
This opens up the ‘Jump to
file’ window, where you can
enter the search criteria.
The filtered song can
be played immediately, or
enqueued to be played after
the current song.
Forget me not
If you want to list your
favourite tracks such that they
can be accessed in a jiffy, you
can bookmark them with
Winamp’s convenient book-
marking feature. To bookmark
tracks, right-click the selected
tracks in the Playlist Editor and
select ‘Bookmark Item(s)’. You
can also use the [Alt] + [I] com-
bination for this. To access the
bookmarks, right-click on
Winamp, go to Bookmarks
and pick up your track from
the list there.
Not just skin deep
The new Winamp boasts of
skin support which, apart
from looking really great,
has some new and impres-
sive features. To begin with,
INTERNET
Eudora
Insert recipients quickly
If you send frequent e-mails
to certain addresses, then use
the ‘Recipient List’ in Eudora
for quick access to their e-
mail addresses.
To add a user to this list,
go to Tools > Address Book.
Click on the desired user to
the ‘repeat’ button is now a
three-way toggle. It toggles
between ‘No repeat’, ‘repeat
playlist’ and the new ‘Repeat
Track’, which will keep
repeating the current track.
Also on offer is the Notifica-
tion feature, which, if the
player is minimised will pop
up details of new actions,
such as a track change, a
playback pause etc.
Additionally, you can
make Winamp transparent,
and as unobtrusive as you
want. Also, for those with
changing moods, Winamp
can now wear multitudes of
colours. Change the colour
to suit your mood.
43
see all his/her details. In the
Recipient List checkbox,
select Yes.
Once you have added
the desired users to the
Recipient List, sending e-
mail to them will be easier.
Just right-click in the To, Cc
or Bcc box, select ‘Insert
Recipient’ and click on the
desired user.
JUNE 2004
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
You’ve got tweet!
You can change the sound
played when a new mail
arrives, by assigning a wav
file within Tools > Options >
GettingAttention. Click the
unnamed button, locate the
.wav file, and click Open.
Now, whenever you receive
an e-mail, your sound of
choice will be played.
A backup a day keeps
the doctor away
Backing up your Eudora e-
mails is as simple as copying
and pasting. Find the Eudora
folder—in Windows 98, it’s
located at C:\Windows\app
licationdata\qualcomm\eudo-
ra—and select all the files
with the .mbx, .pce, .txt and
.fol extensions. Copy the
selected files to a backup
storage device. The .mbx,
.pce and .fol files relate to e-
mails, while *.txt files con-
tain the address book.
44 Drafts, or stationery
Instead of typing the same
body text for oft-formatted
e-mails, such as standard
responses to information
requests, you can save gener-
al layouts of such e-mails.
These are saved as Stationery
in Eudora, and can be read-
ied to be sent with minor,
last minute changes. To cre-
ate new Stationery, go to
Tools > Stationery. A blank
window will open up. Right
click in this window and
select New. In the composi-
tion window, fill in as many
fields as you wish, and save
the Stationery.
Sending the e-mail is now
as simple as double-clicking
180
a Stationery item and mak-
ing a few changes, if any.
Mail list
Some people have more than
one e-mail address. You can
send an e-mail to all of these
by creating a mail list. To do
this, when you create a user
entry in the address book,
you see a box that says ‘This
nickname will expand to the
following addresses’. Enter as
many e-mail addresses as
you want, and your list is
ready.
Work faster
The fastest way to send e-
mail is to press [Ctrl] + [E] to
open the send e-mail box.
Filter on nick
Eudora provides a different
way to filter e-mails. Instead
of the regular filter, using the
e-mail address, Eudora
allows you to filter using
nicknames. This way, even if
the e-mail address of the per-
son changes, the mail will
still be considered recognis-
able. Of course, if both the
nick and e-mail ID change, it
would bypass the filter.
To set up a filter, go to
Tools > Filter > New. Specify the
conditions, and the action to
be taken, and you’re done.
Vacation reply
With the help of Filters and
Stationery, configure Eudora
to reply to all e-mails that
arrive within a specified peri-
od. The filter acts a dummy
controller—you can draft a
personalised respnse, which
will be sent as a reply mail
during the vacation period.
Eudora add-ins
Eudora has add-ins to facili-
tate and automate many
frequent tasks. These are
easily downloadable from
the Internet. Here are some
of the more popular ones.
Mail alert
This add-in runs as a stand-
alone program, using Eudo-
ra’s e-mail settings, to poll
your e-mail server at regular
intervals. If it detects new
mail at the server, then it
pops up a window indicating
this. It also provides ways to
read, reply to and delete the
e-mails directly from the
server. The MailAlert add-in
can be downloaded from
http://www.diamondridge.com/s
oftware/mailalert/index.htm.
Address book to HTML
This add-in helps you export
Eudora’s address book to
HTML. This is handy, when
publishing your address
book on your Web site for
others to refer. It consists of
an executable program,
which needs to know
the folder location of the
address book.
In Windows 98, the
default folder is C:\Win-
dows\ApplicationData\qual-
comm\eudora. The add-in
needs ‘NNdbase.txt’, which
contains Eudora’s entire
address book. On clicking
the ‘Convert’ button an html
file is created in the same
folder, by the name NNd-
base.htm. The add-in itself
provides a way to view the
converted file. This add-in is
available at http://www.min
dspring.com/~aegreene/eudora/.
Mail to HTML
Similar to ‘address book to
HTML’ is ‘mail to HTML’.
Suppose you subscribe to a
mailing list, and get an inter-
esting e-mail which you
would like to share. You can
upload this to a Web site,
Intranet, or Internet based
with just a few mouse clicks.
The add-in effectively
converts the entire mailbox
into HTML pages. It general-
ly finds the source folder,
and you need to specify
the destination folder where
the HTML files will reside
after conversion.
Apart from this, you can
even convert mails into text
files. The plugin is available
at http://users.erols.com/tgitlin/
Synchronise two PCs
Use this plugin to synchro-
nise the address books of two
PCs running Eudora.
There’s an interface win-
dow where you have to
select NNdbase.txt—the
address file, from the first
computer, and then the
address file from the second
system. A destination file
that consists of a compiled
address book from both
machines is created. The plu-
gin is available at http://eudo-
ra.interweb.be/addins.html.
Opera 7.23
Down with the mouse!
Opera supports a whole lot
of keyboard shortcuts. We
list some of them here:
To go to a URL directly,
you can press [F2], and enter
the URL in the address bar
which pops up. If your
JUNE 2004
address bar is enabled, you
can press [F2] to take the key-
board focus to the address bar.
Additionally, you can load a
document from your hard
drive by pressing [Ctrl] + [O].
Document images can be
easily toggled simply by
pressing [G]. This is a three-
way switch, and will cycle
between ‘Show all images’,
‘Show loaded images’, and
‘Do not show images’. If you
come across a Web page with
bad formatting, making it
unreadable, you can press
[Ctrl] + [G]. Of course, you can
always use the classic [F5] or
[Ctrl] + [F5] combination for a
page refresh.
Once you are done with a
window, you can hit [Ctrl] +
[F4] to close the active
MDI window.
Zip zap zoom!
Opera boasts of true zoom
functionally, which allows
you to zoom not only text,
but even images and styles
proportionately. You can
exploit this feature using the
trusty old keyboard by repet-
itively pressing [0] and [9] for
a 10 per cent zoom out, or
zoom in respectively. [7] and
[8] can do.
If you’re lost, you can
always press [6] to revert to
100 per cent zoom.
Scroll that page
You don’t need a mouse to
use the scroll bar. You can hit
[Ctrl] + [F7] to toggle the scroll
bar on or off. The arrow keys
can be used to scroll up and
down. [Page Up] and [Page
Down] scroll page-wise. Like-
wise, [Home] scrolls the
181
document to the top, and
[End] takes you to the end of
the document.
Additionally, you can use
[Q] and [A] to navigate to the
previous and next text link
on the page respectively.
Once on a link, press the
Space Bar or [Enter] to open
the link in a new window.
Handy, eh?
If there’s a form on page,
despair not; you still don’t
need a mouse to enter the
form. Press [Tab], and Opera
will promptly take you to the
form fields. Don’t feel like
making a purchase at that
moment? Press [F9], and focus
will return to the Web page.
Looking around for a his-
tory of URLs visited? Press
[H], and you get the list at
your fingertips…literally.
Manage that document
Opera boasts of keyboard
shortcuts for just about
everything. It allows you
to manage your document
windows easily using key-
board shortcuts:
Action Shortcut
New document [Ctrl] + [N]
Duplicate window [Ctrl] + [Shift] + [N]
Reload all [Ctrl] + [F5]
Cascade windows [Shift] + [F5]
Tile horizontally [F6]
Tile vertically [Shift] + [F6]
Restore focus [F9]
Switch to next [Ctrl] + [Tab]
Switch to previous [Ctrl] + [Shift] + [Tab]
Minimise current [4]
Maximise current [5]
Close all [Ctrl] + [Shift] + [W]
Put across a point
Apart from being an excel-
lent browser, Opera doubles
up as a fabulous presenta-
tion tool.
Press [F11] to transform
Opera into presentation
mode. Scrollbars vanish, the
document opens in full
screen and menus hide. Cer-
Opera is capable of transforming a Web
page to a slide
tain parts of the document
may be hidden, and fonts
and formatting may change
to reflect presentation status.
The M2 factor
Another weapon in Opera’s
arsenal is the feature-packed
M2 client that fulfils all
your news or mail client
needs.
To configure a new
newsgroup account, go to
Mail > New Account. Choose
the type of account—in this
case, it will be a news
account. To subscribe to a
thread of the Microsoft
newsgroup domain, enter
msnews.microsoft.com as the
incoming server and your
SMTP as the outgoing serv-
er. The outgoing server will
be used to send your posts
to the news server via e-
mail. Use the following set-
tings to better refine your
account usage preferences
in your mail account:
Leave messages on
server (POP accounts
only): This will leave a copy
of the message on the server
even after you have down-
loaded and read it. Good if
you might need mail again
at another computer.
Mark messages
as read if already
downloaded: This
option will ask M2 to
mark a mail as read if
the mail has been
marked as read from
some other mail
client earlier, or from
some other location.
Download mes-
sage body when
checking: This
selects if M2 should down-
load only the message head-
er, or the complete message
body as well. Choosing to
download only message
headers can come in handy
so you can delete spam, or
an unsolicited, large mail
just by reading its header.
Keep local copy of mes-
45
sage body: This makes a
local copy of the mail for
later viewing.
Check for mail every #
minutes: This forces M2 to
check for new e-mail after a
specified duration.
Play sound when new
messages arrive: M2 can
optionally play back a sound
alert to indicate the arrival of
a new mail.
Queue messages (do
not send immediately):
Enabling this option causes
M2 to halt a message imme-
diately. Instead, it queues it
in the outbox. All messages
will be sent only when the
Send button is clicked.
JUNE 2004
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
SYSTEM
StopYell 2002
Mend your filenames
StopYell is a one-stop solution
for all filename renaming
jobs. You can make elemen-
tary or complex filename
changes, and StopYell will
46 do it all at the click of a but-
ton. This feature comes
in handy when there are mul-
tiple file sources, and you
have to follow various file
naming conventions.
Use the simple dialog box
to change your filenames to
Change your filenames from
HiCcUpS.jpg to Hiccups.jpg
182
lowercase or keep it all caps.
You can also choose to con-
vert a long filename to sen-
tence case, which converts
the first letter of the filename
to caps. If there are numbers
or special characters in the
filename, you can define if
you want the character
immediately after the special
character to be capitalised.
Similar changes can
be made on filename exten-
sions too.
StopYell, by default, keeps
the advanced filename
rename options disabled so
that no accidental filename
change happens. Click the
‘Enable Advanced Options’
option to enable advanced
features. This will allow
StopYell to generate new file-
Advanced options allow StopYell
to improve filenames by more
than just the case
names, not limited to chang-
ing of case.
If you have a number of
files downloaded from, say,
your digicam, and you need
to prefix all filenames with a
word, say, ‘goatrip_’, you can
turn on the Prefix option in
the Serial Filenames tab and
enter the word you need to
add before all your filenames.
Serial mender
So you downloaded a hun-
dred different photographs
from a hundred different
sites for your project, but the
mixed filenames are making
it hellish for you to keep
track of them?
Go to the Serial Filename
tab and enable the Auto-Ser-
ial Naming option. The
result will be filenames such
as ‘picnic_trip_1.jpg’, ‘pic-
nic_trip_2.jpg’, etc.
StopYell can suggest filenames
to use for serial filenames
A powerful feature wait-
ing to be exploited here
is ‘Auto Suggest’. Once
enabled, it analyses the tar-
get folder to automatically
suggest a prefix for a file-
name, which, most often,
makes sense.
The General Stuff
StopYell’s General tab is
chock-full of features you
can use. Often, Web sites
rename the filenames to
adhere to online Web
resource locator naming
standards, which are brows-
er friendly, but forget to
change the filename back to
its human-readable form.
This is when special charac-
ters in the filenames get
Replace bad characters such
as % from filenames quickly
and easily
replaced with codes. For
example, space becomes
%20, and so on.
Fixing this on 50 files can
be a headache without
StopYell. Go to the
Advanced Options and
switch to the Advanced tab.
Here, in the General tab,
check Enable Replace. By
default, underscores and
‘%20’ are converted to
spaces. Other configurations
are available as well.
The same tab will also
allow you remove all digits
from filenames, or remove
extra whitespace, at the click
of a button.
Eventually, filenames
JUNE 2004
insight ■
■ tips and tricks
such as ‘34_gOa%20
Trip.JPG’, get converted to
‘Goa Trip.jpg’. Did we hear
“Cool”?
Name your tracks
Not resting at its capabilities
to rename simple and com-
plex naming requirements,
StopYell manages to auto-
matically rename MP3s by
reading their ID3 tags.
Give it a folder full of
songs, and it will look in
Rename a file from good_
song.mp3 to
Californication.mp3
each song to get related
details such as Title, Artiste,
etc, and build up a logical
filename for each file, so you
know the song just by look-
ing at the filename.
StopYell changes the
naming convention depend-
ing on how much informa-
tion is found in the ID3 tag
of a given song. Default and
recommended naming con-
ventions are provided by
default, but can be changed
if needed. Info tags get
replaced by the actual infor-
mation. For example, a file
called ‘so young.mp3’, with
‘%a - %t(%m)’ selected
183
builds up the filename ‘The
Corrs - So Young (Talk On
Corners).mp3’.
ZoneAlarm
Program control
Clicking on Program Con-
trol lets you set security lev-
els for programs that may
access the Internet from
your computer.
Clicking on the Main tab
lets you set broad-based
rules; set Medium here. To
set specific rules for each
program, open the Program
tab—here you will find a list
of programs that have tried
to connect.
You can also add pro-
grams such as your browser,
e-mail client, or a specialised
application to which you
would like to grant access.
For example, if you use file-
sharing programs over the
Internet, you can add the
filename here through the
Add option, and set its
parameters. Choose between
denying access, to allowing
outright access, or settle on
the program asking for per-
mission every time it wants
to connect.
Server rights
ZoneAlarm may alert you
about granting server rights
to certain programs—this is
the case with chat and file
transfer software that allow
for real-time conversations,
such as Yahoo!, MSN or
mIRC. You can assign these
rights from Program Control
under the Programs tab.
ZoneAlarm monitors the
activity of the programs con-
tinuously and prevents unau-
thorised access.
Full stop
To stop all Internet activity,
click on the red Stop button.
You can configure the Inter-
net Lock from the Program
Control screen, in the Main
tab. This is obviously a drastic
measure—use this if you are
certain that a Trojan or some
OFFICE
OpenOffice.org
Turning off AutoFor-
mat and AutoCorrect in
Writer
Writer, the word processor
within the OpenOffice.org
suite, comes with automa-
tors, namely the auto-for-
mat and auto-correct
facilities. While these may
be useful, they can also be
irritating, especially when
text is being corrected or for-
matted wrongly. For exam-
ple, with the default
settings, it capitalises the
first letter of every sentence;
every URL is recognised and
other major security loophole
exists on your computer.
You can also configure
certain software to bypass
the Internet lock. This is
useful, if, for example, you
wish to leave for the day, but
need a download to com-
plete. In this case, you can
give, say, your download
manager rights to bypass the
Internet Lock.
47
is coloured to mark it out as
a hyperlink.
To turn off these, go to
Tools > AutoCorrect/AutoFormat.
Under the Options tab,
uncheck the options that
you don’t need. You can
choose not to have it auto-
correct and auto-format,
while you modify the text,
or while you enter the text
onto the page.
Inserting special char-
acters in Writer
To insert special characters
such as the ® or © symbols,
place the cursor in the
desired position, and then
go to Insert > Special Character.
JUNE 2004
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
Choose Symbol from the Font
list, and click on the symbol
you want inserted.
Locking text
Writer also has an option that
lets you lock in a section of
text to prevent it from being
edited or changed. Select the
portion of text that you want
protected, go to Insert > Section,
and under the entry for Write
protection, select the Protect
option. Finally, select Insert.
The selected text is now
locked; you cannot overwrite
the text.
If you like to safeguard the
DEVELOPER TOOLS
48
NSIS 2
Showing the doors
Any installation package is
incomplete if a corresponding
uninstall module is not bun-
dled. Uninstallation is as
essential a component as the
installation module. Hence, it
is necessary to add the correct
values in your NSIS script to
allow for a successful unin-
stall.
184
section with a password,
choose the ‘With Password’
option, provide a password
and click OK.
Freezing panes in Calc
To view row or column cap-
tions for a long spreadsheet as
you work through it, you can
freeze the fields that hold the
caption.
If a single row or column
caption needs to be frozen,
click on the cell just below or
to the right of the row or col-
umn that contains the cap-
tion. Go to Windows > Freeze. If
you have either column cap-
The information has to be
added to the following reg-
NSIS has many configurable options, such as which compression to
use for the final install package
tions or row captions, you
can create cross freezing by
clicking on the uppermost
left side cell that does not
contain a caption.
For example, in a sheet
with single row and column
captions, choose the B2 cell.
If you have multiple row and
column captions to be frozen,
you can split the sheet win-
dow. Click on the cell just
below or to the right of the
row or column where you
want to insert your caption,
and go to Windows > Split. The
sheet window splits. Now,
you can scroll both parts of
istry key: HKLM\Software\
Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVer-
sion\Uninstall
You need to add the fol-
lowing mandatory keys:
DisplayName (string): This
is where the name of your
applications goes.
UninstallString (string):
Path and filename of the
uninstaller. Always quote the
path to ensure that spaces do
not prevent Windows from
finding the uninstaller.
Optionally, add the fol-
lowing information to help
users get more data about
the split window, displaying
the caption as per your
requirements.
About those pesky
####s
If you see ### in a cell where
you have entered some data
value in Calc, it means that
the value is too large to be dis-
played, and that Calc has
clipped it to display ‘###’. To
read the value, resize that par-
ticular cell. If the cell content
is text, you can double-click
on the cell. This shows a red
triangle that indicates that
the field is overflowing.
your application:
ModifyPath (string): Path
and filename of the applica-
tion modify program
InstallSource (string): Loca-
tion from where the applica-
tion was installed
RegCompany (string): Com-
pany name of the application
HelpLink (string): The Web
site of the application
HelpTelephone (string): The
phone number for applica-
tion support
URLInfoAbout (string): A link
to the application home page
DisplayVersion (string): Dis-
played version of the applica-
tion
VersionMajor (dword): Major
version number of the applica-
tion
VersionMinor (dword): Minor
version of the application
NoRepair (dword): This is set
to 1 if the uninstaller has no
option to repair the installa-
tion
JUNE 2004
insight ■
■ tips and tricks

49

contents Take a look at how to have fun with some

50 Easter eggs professional software, and also become a
Take a look at some of the smart little fun things you
serious force with the most popular of games
can find hidden within some of the most commonly
used software

54 Game cheats
Tired of struggling with that game? We’ll show you
how to become a gaming god in no time—cheats
for 23 of the most popular games inside

119 JULY 2004

 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
EASTER EGGS entitled ‘Why did the
computer shut down unex-
pectedly?!’
Solitare Win Win
Force Solitare to win by a
hack. Here’s how: Open
sol.exe located in
C:\Windows\System32\ using
Resource Hacker. Expand
String Table > 64 > 1033 in the
left pane. Notice a line in the
right pane saying 1010,
“Force a win”. Use these
numbers to enable the Easter
Egg. Now expand Menu > 1 >
1033. Create a menu by
typing the following just
before the last closing brace:
POPUP “&Easter Egg”
E aster Eggs are undocu-
mented, hidden tidbits in
software, games, etc., that
32-bit Windows executables
and resource files.
Open the msgina.dll file,
{
MENUITEM "&Egg 1", 1008
MENUITEM "&Egg 2", 1009
users accidentally stumble located in the C:\Windows MENUITEM "&Egg 3", 1010
upon. These are fun to find, } mode.
and thousands have already Now, click the
been documented. Compile Script
Easter eggs started out as button. Next, go to
50 a rebellion by early program-
mers who did not get credit
File > Save and save it
in the original loca-
for their work. That’s why tion, i.e.,
some of them are as simple C:\Windows\System32
as a scrolling list of program- \sol.exe. Also, replace
mers. However, you also find sol.exe in the
some as advanced as a C:\Windows\System32
hidden car racing game in \dllcache folder.
Excel 2000. So read on to Now, a new menu
explore the amusing world Easter Egg appears
of Easter eggs. with Egg 1, Egg 2
Resource Hacker is a handy tool to find out and Egg 3 as
Windows XP what’s hidden inside Windows System files. options. Click Egg 3
Unexpected shutdown to force a win.
For this, you need a software
called Resource Hacker. Get \System32 directory, in WinRAR
it from our July 2004 Mind- Resource Hacker. In the left Falling Book
ware CD, or download it pane, expand Dialog > 2210 > Works on: WinRAR 3.20,
from http://www.users. 1033. A dialog box opens at 3.30
o n . n e t / ~ j o h n s o n / re s o u rc e - the bottom right hand of the WinRAR—the popular file
hacker/. Resource Hacker is a screen. Notice the line just compression utility—has a
free tool to view and modify below the drop-down list smart Easter Egg. Start
120
WinRAR and go to Help >
About. Next, click the book
icon and it starts to fall.
Further, if you press and hold
[Shift], and click the logo, you
see a small sail boat near the
letter ‘R’. You may have to
click a few times to see it ,
though.
Winamp
Full Screen Credits
Works on: Winamp 2.91
Start Winamp, go to
Winamp menu, click Null-
soft Winamp and switch to
the Credits tab to see an
animated screen. Now, hold
down [Ctrl] + [Alt] and right-
click twice on the animation.
This changes it to full-screen
mode and alters the anima-
tion a bit. Repeat the same
step to get back to normal
This full-screen
animation depends on the
active visualisation. Change
it to spectrum and then oscil-
loscope and repeat the
process to see the difference.
Full Screen Credits
Works On: Winamp 5
An animated logo comes up
as you go to Winamp menu >
Nullsoft Winamp and click the
Winamp tab. Press and hold
[Shift] and double-click on
this logo to change it to an
ASCII art.
Dancing Llamas
Works On: Winamp 5
This is one amusing egg in
Winamp 5. First play a song
with fast beats and heavy
bass. Now, switch to the
modern skin and resize the
main window. Increase its
width to make the Beat
APRIL 2004
 MS Excel
Excel has
several interest-
ing Easter eggs,
some of
which we
mentioned in
the article ‘Excel
Entertainment’
Find Easter eggs in Winamp to reveal two llamas in the Decem-
headbanging, and also to make it transparent ber 2003 issue
of Digit. Find
Analyzer visible to the left of that in the
the Spectrum Analyzer. Now, 36 issues archive CD of June
hold down [Shift] + [Ctrl] + 2004. Here, we repeat some
[Alt] and click the centre of ‘Excel’lent (Eggcellent?)
the Beat Analyzer. You’ll see Easter eggs.
two llamas striking their
heads on the ground in tune
with each beat.
Transparent Beats
Works On: Winamp 5,
Windows XP or 2000
Play a song that’s akin to the
one described above. Now,
ensure that the main window
has the focus (its title bar
should be brighter than that
of other windows) and type
It’s hard to believe that this is an Easter
egg hidden inside Excel 2000
‘NULLSOFT’. However, since
pressing [L] opens the File
Open dialog, you’ll have to Dev Hunter Game
press [Esc] after each [L]. Works On: Excel 2000,
Hence, you end up typing [N] requires DirectX
[U] [L] [Esc] [L] [Esc] [S] [O] [F] [T]. This Easter egg is compli-
This done, you see that the catedness re-defined. To
main window goes transpar- access it, create a new file in
ent at each beat and then Excel 2000 and go to File >
reverts to being opaque. Save as Web Page. Choose
This Easter egg consumes ‘Publish Sheet’ and ‘Add
a lot of system resources. If Interactivity’. Next, save
your system runs slow, type and open it using Internet
NULLSOFT again to turn it Explorer. You see the Excel
off, or just exit Winamp and file in the middle of the
restart it. page. Go to row 2000,
In Winamp 2.91, the title column WC and select this
bar shows a funny change row. Press [Tab] to highlight
when you do the same thing. the cell WC:2000. Then
Try this and see yourself. press and hold [Shift] + [Ctrl]
121
+ [Alt] and click the Office
logo in the upper-left
corner.
A car racing game Spy
Hunter should start. Use the
arrow keys to steer, [Space] to
fire, [O] to drop oil on the
road and [H] to turn on your
head lights.
Windows 98
Teapot
Works on: Windows 98,
Windows 95
Right-click on the desktop
and select Properties. Go
to the Screensaver tab
and choose the Pipes
screensaver. Click
Settings and select
Pipes as Multiple, Pipe
Style as Traditional,
Joint Type
as Mixed and Surface
Style as Solid. Click
OK and then click
the Preview button.
Watch the screen-
saver churn out
teapots instead
of joints!
Windows 98 team
Go to C:\Windows\ Applica-
tionData\Microsoft\WELCOME
and find the file Weldata.exe.
Right-click it and select
Create Shortcut. Now, right-
click the shortcut and
select Properties. In
the General tab, add
Y o u _ a r e _
a_real_rascal to the
Target text box, after
the path, and choose
Minimized in the
Run combo box.
Click OK, double-
click the shortcut
and enjoy! The hidden windows 98 credits
Windows 98 team
Version 2
Works on: Windows 98
There is another way to view
Windows 98 team credits.
Double-click the clock in the
system tray to bring up the
Date and Time Properties.
Click the Time Zone tab, hold
down [Ctrl] and click and hold
the mouse button on Cairo,
Egypt. With the mouse
button still pressed, drag the
pointer to Baton Rouge, LA.
Release the mouse button but
keep [Ctrl] pressed. Click on
Baton Rouge, LA again and
drag it to Redmond, WA. The
credits movie starts to play
once you release the mouse
button. You can also try
doing the same thing in
Regional Settings under
Control Panel.
Hearts Cheat
Works on: Windows 98
Interested in the cards of
other players while playing
Hearts? Try this. Go to Start
51
> Run, type ‘regedit’ and press
[Enter]. Navigate to the key
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Soft-
ware\Microsoft\Windows\Curre
ntVersion\Applets\Hearts.
Here, create a new string,
name it ZB, and enter 42 as
its value. Now, close the
APRIL 2004
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks
registry editor and start
Hearts. During the game,
press [Shift] + [Ctrl] + [Alt] +
[F12] to see what cards the
other players have.
MS Access
Magic Eight Ball
Works on: MS Access 97, MS
Access 2000
Create a blank database in
Access and then go to Macros
> New. Now, press the Space-
bar and click
Close. Save the
macro as Magic
Eight Ball.
Click and drag
it to the tool-
bar. The icon
should change
to the picture
of an eight ball.
Click it for
some advice!
This is one of the six games hidden in Flash MX
Access 97
Setup “Lizard” credits
52 Works on: MS Access 97
MS Access includes a Setup
wizard to create setup
programs used to distribute
databases. This Easter egg is
included in this Setup
wizard. Start this Setup
wizard from the Start menu,
select ‘Create a new set of
setup options…’, click Next
and then Add. Browse to the
folder C:\Program Files\
Microsoft Office\Office\, select
All Files in the ‘Files of
Type’ field and choose
mso97.dll.
The screen goes blank and
the credits appear. Notice
that the letters are made up
of tiny lizards. Also, look out
for the warning at the end
of them.
122
Macromedia
Flash
Gary’s Car Jump
Works on: Macromedia Flash
4 and 5
For this, go to Help >
About in Macromedia Flash.
Now, double-click the
Macromedia logo—the one
with two upward arrows
located at the right of the
about box. Click the Thanks
button and the logo
bounces up and down.
Click the Team button to
play a cool game—
Gary’s Car Jump.
Six Games
Works On: Macromedia Flash
MX
While Flash 4 and 5 have
one hidden game each,
Flash MX has six. To access
these, go to Help > About.
Now, click underneath the X
of the logo. Clicking the
correct spot may need a few
tries. Once you do so, your
screen turns dark blue and
offers you a choice of six
games—Gary’s Bike Jump,
Gold rush, Asteroids, Lunar
Lander, Breakthrough and
Flash Blox (Tetris).
Adobe Illustrator
Works On: Adobe Illustrator
10
Teri, one of the developers
of Adobe Illustrator 10, coded
this egg for his daughter. Open
any document in Illustrator,
open the Symbols palette and
set it to List view, so that you
see the symbol names.
Double-click a symbol to
rename. Type in “Teri’s daugh-
ter’s” and press [Enter]. Note
that this is case-sensitive.
Now, double-click it again and
rename it to something that
might logically be associated
with Teri’s daughter’s—for
example, name, eye colour, etc.
Now, when you press [Enter],
instead of renaming, it treats
this as a query and renames the
symbol to the answer, or a
random failure message.
For the next question, you
will have to rename it back to
Teri’s daughter’s first and then
rename it to the question.
After a certain number of fail-
ure messages, it starts giving
hints as to what to ask for—
You haven’t asked about her
favourite food yet.
Birthday Cake
Works on: Adobe Illustrator
8, 9 or 10
Create a new document in
Illustrator. Now, open the
Brush palette and click the
‘New Brush’ button. Select
‘Calligraphic’ and enter
angle 5, roundness 26 and
diameter 56. Now, when
you start drawing with this
brush, instead of the normal
brush strokes, it draws birth-
day cakes. To make different
cakes, set the sliders on the
right to ‘random’. Duckerboard in ImageReady CS
ImageReady
Ducks
Works on: ImageReady 7.0
and CS mageReady developers
seem to have a soft corner for
ducks. This is evident from
this Easter egg, which is actu-
ally composed of more than
one egg. First, press and hold
[Ctrl] and go to ImageReady
> About ImageReady. You see
a different About screen, with
its code name, for example,
Taconite in case of
ImageReady CS. That’s the first
egg. Wait a few seconds for the
second and the
credits will start scrolling.
Speed them up by pressing
[Alt]. At the bottom, you see
two big ducks with the line,
“Long live the Ducks!”
More ducks
Works on: ImageReady CS
For the really funny duck’s
egg, press [Ctrl] and go to
ImageReady > About
ImageReady. Now, if you press
and hold [Ctrl] again, the
mouse pointer changes to a
rubber stamp. Click anywhere
on the image and a duck
appears. You can stamp up to
ten ducks. To erase all ducks,
press [Ctrl] + [Shift] and click.
To ‘shoot’ ducks one by one,
press and hold [Alt] + [Shift],
aim and click.
APRIL 2004
 using [Ctrl] + [V].
Now switch to
the Channels
palette and click
the Red, Green
and Blue channels
one at a time.
Notice the eyes of
the cat move.
The credits screen with ducks in ImageReady Change the Hue
using [Ctrl] + [U]
Duckerboard and an interesting effect
Works on: ImageReady CS comes your way.
By default, the grid that you
see is similar to a chessboard. Begone
To change its look, open a Works on: Photoshop 7, CS
new file with a transparent To see this egg, open any file
background. Click anywhere or create a new one. Next,
inside the canvas window and press and hold [Alt], click the
type ‘duckerboard’. Your triangle at the top-right
chessboard like grid turns into corner of the Layer palette
a duckerboard. and then click Palette options.
You see a Merlin window
Photoshop appearing. If you can’t read
Credits the text on the title bar, right-
Works on: Photoshop 6, 7, CS click it and then click Move.
and ImageReady 7, CS Use the right-arrow to resize
This egg works on almost and then press [Enter]. Click
all versions of Photoshop and
ImageReady. Click [Ctrl] and
the Begone button to close it.
go to Help > About. In case of Outlook
older versions, you may have Ren Hoek
to press [Ctrl] + [Alt]. This It is named after the charac-
brings up a different screen, ter from the animation
with the code name of the series Ren & Stimpy Show.
software. The credit list starts Open Outlook 2000 and
scrolling after a while, and if type Ren Hoek in the ‘Find a
you press [Alt], the scrolling Contact’ textbox. Outlook
speeds up. Read the last lines will show a dialog box
of the credits carefully— saying that it cannot find
they’re really interesting. the contact. This egg may
not work if you do have a
Cat Eyes contact named Ren Hoek in
Works on: Photoshop 7 your address book. Now, go
Go to Help > About Photoshop, to Tools > Marco > Macros.
while holding down [Ctrl]. In the Macro Name box,
The Liquid Sky splash screen type OL2Rocks. Click the
appears. Now, press [Print Create button to open the
Screen], click File > New and About Microsoft Outlook
paste the clipboard contents dialog. Hold down [Shift] +
123
[Ctrl] + [Alt] and click OK. Create a blank page in
The Outlook 2000 team DreamWeaver. Then, go to
credits appear. Try to catch Insert > Layout Objects > Layer
the names as they fly to the and create a new layer. Now,
mailbox. open the Layers palette by
going to Window > Layers.
MS Word With the layer selected,
Word Credits double-click its name in the
Start MS Word 2000 and go Layers palette and rename it
to Help > Show
Office Assistant
to bring the
office assistant.
In the ‘What
would you like to
do?’ box, type in See the photographs of the developers in
Cast and click Macromedia Dreamweaver
Search. From the
results, click Microsoft Office to ‘ToastYourOwn’. Press
2000 User Assistance Staff. [Enter] and you see a dialog
Then, click the graphic on box saying, “So, I see you
the Word help screen. want to toast your own...”.
Click OK to be taken to
VB Credits www.dreamcentral.com/tyo/.
Works on: MS Word 97, Interesting!
Word 2000
Start Word and press [Alt] + A Game
[F11] to open Microsoft Visual Works in: Dreamweaver 4 or
Basic Editor. Right-click
anywhere on the toolbar and
later, requires FireWorks to be
installed
53
click Customize. Now, go to Start Dreamweaver and go
the Help Menu and right-click to Commands > Create Web Photo
‘About Microsoft Visual Basic’. Album. Enter the title of the
In the Name field, you see album as play a game. Click
&About Microsoft Visual OK and have fun!
Basic, which is editable.
Change it to Show VB Credits. Developers’ Pictures
Now close the Customize Works in: Dreamweaver 2.0
dialog box and then go to or later
Help > Show VB Credits. Turn Open a page that has images
on the speakers and enjoy in Dreamweaver. Now, select
these credits. You can use the the image, hold down [Ctrl],
arrow keys to adjust the speed. and double-click the image
These will be different for both thumbnail in the Properties
the versions of Word. palette. Keep on double-
clicking, while holding
Dreamweaver down the [Ctrl] key
Toast your own and you see photographs of
Works in: DreamWeaver 2.0 the developers and
or later their names.
APRIL 2004
 insight ■
■ tips and tricks

GAME CHEATS
Age of Empires 2 Airport Tycoon 2 Unlock online levels file in Windows Explorer.
To use these cheat codes, To use these cheats, press [~] To use these cheats, press [~] Most probably, it will be
press [Enter] while playing to get the console while play- to get the console while play- C:\Call of Duty\CoDSP.exe.
the game, type in the code ing. Enter these codes and ing. Thereafter, enter the Right-click the file, go to
and press [Enter] again. press [Enter] to activate. following commands and Send To > Desktop (Create
shortcut). Now go the desk-
ROCK ON 1,000 stone MassDrop Huge airport
top, right-click the created
LUMBERJACK 1,000 wood DoEarthquake Start earthquake
shortcut and click Properties.
ROBIN HOOD 1,000 gold DoTornado Start a tornado
In the target box, add the
CHEESE STEAK JIMMY’S 1,000 food INeedCash Get $100 million
following to the end of
MARCO Reveal map SetBudget <number> Replace <number> with the budget you want
the path: ‘+set thereisacow
POLO Remove shadow SetCash <number> Replace <number> with the cash you want
1337 +set developer 1
AEGIS Fast build HideGame Hide game
+setsv_cheats 1 +set
NATURAL WONDERS Control Nature ShowGame Show game
monkeytoy 0’
RESIGN You lose Airport Tycoon2’s cheat codes Now click OK and double
WIMPYWIMPYWIMPY Destroy yourself
I LOVE THE MONKEY
HEAD
Gives VDML America’s Army
To use these cheats, press [~]
TORPEDO# Kill opponent # to get the console while play-
BLACK DEATH Destroy all ing. Then enter these codes
enemies
and press [Enter] to activate.
I R WINNER You win
These will only work on
Age of Empires 2 Cheats servers with cheats activated.

behindview 1 3rd person view

54 Age of Mythology God God mode
To use these cheat codes,
Fly Flying
press [Enter] while playing
Ghost No clipping mode
the game, type in the code
and then press [Enter] again. America’s Army cheats press [Enter] to activate: click the shortcut to start the
‘mpcheat changeclass game. Then, press the [~]
THRILL OF VICTORY Win scenario <code>’. Substitute ‘<code>’ during the play and enter
SET ASCENDANT Show all animals with one of the codes following codes.
DIVINE INTERVENTION Enable used God power mentioned below
JUNK FOOD NIGHT Get 1,000 food God God mode
G M16A2 (w/ grenade launcher)
TROJAN HORSE FOR SALE Get 1,000 wood give all Weapons, items and amm
S M81 (sniper)
ATM OF EREBUS Get 1,000 gold notarget Enemies don’t target you
AK AK47
THRILL OF VICTORY Win scenario noclip No clipping mode
S24 M24 (sniper)
SET ASCENDANT Show all animals give ammo Max out ammo
F Fists
GOATUNHEIM Turn enemy to goats
GP AK47 (w/ grenade launcher)
WUV WOO Flying purple hippo Call of Duty Cheats
SVD Dragonov sniper rifle
ISIS HEAR MY PLEA Heroes from the campaign
America’s Army Cheats
RED TIDE Changes water to red Counter-Strike
LETS GO! NOW! (2 spaces between go and Faster gameplay
now) Call of Duty Condition Zero
To enable cheats on this To enable cheats, press [~]
Age of Mythology cheats game, locate the executable and enter ‘sv_cheats’. This

124 APRIL 2004

enables the cheat. Then pres winalottery Get money and license
Max Payne Motocross
openallroads Get all roads
[~] during the game play and
hardtruck- Get money and license
To enable the cheats, you need Madness 2
enter these cheats. isthebest to enable the console first. To
Various Cheats
advancedmap See hidden containers do so, start the game with the
God God mode on map view
‘-developer‘ parameter. Create a Type Big Heads at the main
Fly you will fly fillup Unlimited fuel
shortcut for the game and add menu and everyone’s head
notarget No one will target you minesoff Get rid of mines
this parameter at the end of becomes heads . If you fall
Noclip Go through [Backspace] Use it to repair a damaged
truck sans any cost the path in the target box. down, press [Tab] and you get
impulse You’ll receive a sniper rifle,
Start the game and press up immediately. To do a nose
101 an AK 47, 3 grenades and a Hard Truck 2 Cheats
desert eagle [F12] to bring the console wheelie stunt, take a small
and enter any of the fol- jump when the landing space
Counterstrike Condition Zero
Hidden and lowing cheats: is clear. Before you land, lean
Cheats Dangerous forward until the bike
To enable the cheats, type Here we’ve only given the becomes vertical. Now hold
DX-Ball 2 ‘unlockcheatmode’ at the cheat codes themselves, as the break button and see
During the game, type Campaign Select screen. A they’re self-explanatory: yourself doing the stunt.
‘eureka’. You will hear a tune clicking sound indicates that god c_addhealth
if it is typed correctly. Now, the code is entered correctly. GetAllWeapons GetInfiniteAmmo Need for Speed
press any of these keys: Use these specific cheats
during the game play:
GetBaseballbat GetBeretta
Underground
[Right] Advance to next board GetBerettaDual GetDualBeretta
Go to the Main > Statistics. Go
[Left] Return to previous board zombie After death return as GetDesertEagle GetSawedShotgun
zombie back again by pressing [Delete]
[Down] Advance to last board in set GetPumpShotgun GetJackhammer
bighead Big heads or [Backspace]. Now enter the
[Up] Return to first board in set GetIngram GetIngramDual
codes below:
<any key> Random power-up killthemall Kill enemies GetDualIngram GetMP5
[F6] Turn Music Off missiondone End current mission OK GetColtCommando GetMolotov gimmesomecircuits Unlock circuits
[F5] MIDI On/Off openalldoor Open all doors gimmesomesprints Unlock sprint
GetGrenade GetM79
allammo Get all weapons circuits
DX-Ball 2 cheats GetSniper GetHealth
noplayerhits High falls are the only gimmesomedrag Unlock drag

Grand Theft thing that hurts player GetPainkillers GetBulletTime.

circuits 55
goodhealth Resistant to gunfire
Auto Midtown
gimmeppablo Unlock Petey
Pablo
To use these cheats, first go to
the Character Select screen
Hidden and Dangerous cheats
Madness 2 gotcharobzombie Unlock Rob
To enter cheats, press [Y] dur-
and press [Delete], enter the The Hulk ing the game play and enter havyamystikal
Zombie
Unlock Mystikal
code and then press [Enter]. Enter cheats by going to
these cheats: needmylostprophets Unlock Lost
If [Delete] doesn’t work, use Options > Code. Activate them
showme cops Display all police Prophets
[Backspace] instead. by going to Options > Special units on the map allmylvloneparts All level 1 perform-
Features > Cheats.
6031769 Unlimited life big bus party All other vehicles are ance parts
GMMSKIN Be Invincible buses seemylvl2parts All level 2
itsgallus All levels all cities
No police presence FLSHWND Get regenerator tiny car All other vehicles are performance parts
stevesmates
ANGMNGT Rage Meter to Max compact cars driftdriftbaby All drift tracks
itcouldbeyou 999,999,999 points
All weapons, armour, GRNCHTR Unlimited continues jet planes All other vehicles are slidingwithstyle Drift physics
suckmyrocket
HLTHDSE Double HP airplanes
itstantrum and jail key Unlimited
lives BRNGITN Double HP for enemies Need for Speed Underground
warp eleven All other vehicles
MMMYHLP Half HP for enemies move much faster Cheats
Grand Theft Auto cheats FSTOFRY Killer punch All traffic vehicles
BRCESTN Solve puzzle
amizdA eoJ
drive around in No One Lives
Hard Truck 2 TRUBLVR Get all levels reverse Forever 2
Pause the game and type in Press [T], then enter one of the
the following cheats: The Hulk cheats Midtown Madness 2 cheats following codes:

125 APRIL 2004

 insight ■
■ tips and tricks

maphole Skip the current level through. You’re now out of lowing cheats to really go Hitman:
the practice area and can crazy on the road:
poltergeist Become invisible
Kfa skate on the road.
Contracts
Get weapons, ammo,
BRIBE Removes the police officer Find the file hitmancon-
armour and health
K’THUNK! Gives you a bat tracts.ini in the game’s fold-
Mods Get the silencer, scope
SPOON! Gives you nitrous oxide er. Open it with a text edi-
and camera zoom
Watch_me_xplode All Levels THWACK! Gives you a chain tor, and add this line to the
God Become invincible
MOON$HOT Get Moon Gravity PLUGH Disables cheat mode end of the file: ‘EnableCheats
FBIAGENT Matrix Mode YES,OCCIFER Kill cops 1’. Now during gameplay put
No one lives for ever 2 cheats
BELIKEERIC Perfect Rails in one of the following
Road Rash cheats
cheats:
Postal 2 FREEWHEELIE Perfect Manuals

Press [Shift] and [@] (or [~] on Tony Hawk’s Pros Skater 4 IOIER Bomb
some systems) to make the cheats IOIRULEZ Be Invincible
Game Console Window IOIHITLEIF Max out health
appear. Type in ‘SISSY’ to IOIGRV Gravity
IOILEPOW Lethal Charge
Alamode Puts you in God Mode Duke Nukem 3D IOINGUN Nail Gun Unlocked
IAmSoLame Gives you all weapons, maximum ammo, and makes To cheat your way through IOIPOWER Max Force Mode
you invincible Duke Nukem 3D, just type in IOIHITALI Boxing Mode
JewsForJesus Gives you lots of cash the following codes during IOISLO Slow Motion
SwimWithFishes Gives you all radar-related items the game play:
Hitman contracts cheats
IAmTheOne Gives you lots of catnip
BlockMyAss Gives you body armour dnunlock Unlocks doors

IAmTheLaw Gives you cop clothing dnhyper Steroids effect

Healthful Gives you full health and several (4) medkits dnskill# Set skill level

IFeelFree Ghost mode (toggled; enter code again to turn off) dncoords Shows your coordinates

LikeABirdy Fly mode (toggled; enter code again to turn off) dnitems Gives you power-ups
dndebug Displays debug info
Postal 2 cheats dninventory All power-ups
OTHER CHEATS
56 enable cheat mode, and then Unreal Tourn-
dnweapons All weapons and full ammo
dnmonsters Toggles the monsters off
enter the cheats:
ment 2004 dnlooksfunnyshade Make monsters pink

Serious Sam Single Player Cheats Press

dncashman
dnstuff
Throws money when you hit the use key
All weapons, keys and power-ups
Bring up the console using [~] in the game to bring
dncornholio God mode and unlimited jetpack
[~], then enter one of the fol- down the console, or press
Duke Nukem 3D cheats
lowing codes [Tab] for quick console.

please fly Flight mode God Toggles God Mode Game Trainers
please giveall All items Ghost Enables you to walk A game trainer is a third-party program that allows you to turn
please god Invincibility through walls on and off certain qualities that weren’t included in the game.
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Tony Hawk’s Pro Loaded Gives you all weapons
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ited lives to unlimited ammo, invulnerability, etc. The trainer
alters the original memory locations to allow you to cheat where
Skater 4 you wouldn’t be able to without it.
Leaving the practice area Unreal Tournament 2004 cheats Visit http://www.cheatplanet.com/pctrainers.html to download
While playing in the Practice trainers for various games.
mode, go to the fence at end Road Rash
of the ramp, lie down, allot To enable cheats, first type UPENDRA SINGHAI
and then just only slip ‘XYZZY’. Then use the fol- upendra_singhai@thinkdigit.com

126 APRIL 2004


MS Excel
Rows to Column or
Vice-versa
If you want to inter-
change the data in rows
to columns and vice-versa,
select the cells containing the
data and press [CTRL] + [C] to
copy them to the clipboard.
Now click the first cell where
you want to paste the data
and go to Edit > Paste Special.
In the dialog, enable the
checkmark Transpose and
click OK to paste.
Separating Last Name
and First
If you have a field that
contains entire names,
but what you need instead is
two fields containing the first
name and last name sepa-
rately, use the Convert Text to
Column Wizard.
To access this wizard,
select the data and then click
Data > Text to Column. In the
first screen of the three-step
wizard, you will be asked to
chose if your date type is
‘Delimited’, or ‘fixed width’.
Check the choice applicable
and click Next. In the next
screen, if your date type is
‘Delimited’ choose the appro-
Separating firstname and lastname
using the text to column wizard
priate delimiter or the char-
acter that separates the first
and last names, and then
click OK. In the final step,
select the destination box and
click the destination cell, and
finally, click Finish.
If you are feeling adven-
turous, you could try either
for the following two com-
mands:
1. =LEFT(A1,FIND(“,”,A1)-1)
assuming the name is in cell
A1 and the first name and last
name are separated by a
comma.
2. =MID(A1,FIND(“,”,A1)+
2,255) to extract last name.
Want a 1. Enter the data in one sheet, marks entered are within the
Special Character? copy and then paste into other specified range. To set valida-
The characters * or ‘ and sheets. tion rules for this example,
? have special meaning 2. Press and hold the [CTRL] select the cells and go to Data
in Excel. To locate them in key and click on the sheet > Validation. On the Settings
your Excel file, use the Find names near the status bar. tab, in the Allow list, choose
and Replace dialog under One you have selected the ‘decimal’. In the Data list,
‘Edit’. Prefix them with a ‘‘ ’ in sheets, enter data on the select ‘between’. In the
the ‘Find’ field and search. For sheet that is visible and it will Minimum and Maximum
example, if you want to find a be entered to all sheets. fields, enter 0 and 100 respec-
?, enter ‘? in the find dialog. Similarly, you can use the tively. On the Input message
[CTRL] key to select multiple tab, you can specify what mes-
Freeze the Title Row sheets and then do many sage to display at the time of
Use the Window > Freeze other things, like running entering data in those cells.
Panes menu item to lock the spell checker. This message comes similar to
the tool tips and is unobtru-
sive. On the Error Alert tab,
you can specify the message to
display a wrong value is
entered. Finally, click OK.
MS Word
Remove the Drawing
Canvas
In Word 2002 and later,
whenever you insert a
drawing object, a drawing
canvas is placed around it. It
was introduced to help you
arrange the drawings in the
document. If you prefer
working without it, you can
turn it off. One way is to drag
the drawing object out of the
canvas, selecting the canvas
and then deleting it using the
[DEL] key. There is a way to
Discover turn it off permanently, too.
Go to Tools > Options and
GENERAL TIPS switch to the General tab.
MS Excel 57 • MS Word 57 • MS PowerPoint 58 Here, clear the checkbox that
MS Outlook 59 • MS Access 61 says ‘Automatically create
READERS’ TIPS 60 drawing canvas when
inserting AutoShapes’.
30 MINUTES EXPERT
Customise your DivX movie CD 63 Change blank paragraphs
Arrest that Song! 64 at the end of the page
If a page ends with a
table, a drawing object
(such as a text box or text
specific columns and rows, so Using Validation Rules frame) or a continuous section
that they are visible all the You can limit the data break, it will be followed by a
time. Whenever you use this that can be entered in blank paragraph. This para-
command, the column on the graph may force your docu-
left of the selected cell, and the ment to jump onto another
row above the selected cell will page. To keep your document
freeze. For example, if you on one page, format the blank
cursor is at cell B2, the first row paragraph:
and first column will freeze.. To 1. Make the paragraph sym-
reverse, simply click Window > bols visible by pressing
Unfreeze Panes. [CTRL]+[SHIFT]+[8].
2. Select the paragraph
Working on Multiple symbol you want to change.
Sheets Creating rules for data entry 3. On the Format menu, click
If you want to enter cer- Font and then click the Font
tain data on more than cells. For example, you can tab.
one sheet, opt for one of the create a rule for entering stu- 4. Type 1 in the Size box, and
following ways: dents’ marks, so that the click OK.
AUGUST 2004 DIGIT 57
 Tips & Tricks
5. On the Format menu, click
Paragraph, and then click the
Indents and Spacing tab.
6. In the Spacing area, in the
Before and After boxes, type
the number 0.
7. In the Line Spacing box,
select Single.
8. Click OK.
Removing blank paragraphs at the
end of the page
Creating Styles
Using styles for format-
ting is recommended
over changing formatting
parameters like fonts, para-
Illustrations: Mahesh Benkar
graphs space for individual
chunks of text. This allows you
to format faster and also
brings consistency across the
document. To create a new
style, select the text that you
have formatted and want to
use as ‘style’. Go to Format >
Styles and Formatting. This
will open the Style and
58 DIGIT AUGUST 2004
Formatting task pane in
Word 2002 or later. Click
New Style in the task pane
and in the dialog that
comes up, enter the name
of the new style. Change
other options if you want
to, and click OK. You can
apply the style from the
Styles dropdown list on the
Formatting toolbar.
More text in less space
You can fit in more
text in lesser space in
several ways. Perhaps, the
most obvious one is to
reduce the font size.
However, don’t make it too
small that it becomes
unreadable. As a rule of
thumb, anything below 9
point is a no-no. however, you
can accomplish tighter text
also by reducing the line
spacing to single, making
indents paragraph spacing
zero. You can get to all these
using the Format > Paragraph
dialog.
Using a Table of Contents
A table of contents
comes in handy when
navigating within a docu-
ment—especially long docu-
ments. It creates and main-
tains internal hyperlinks
based on the formatting
styles used in the document.
Make sure you format the
document using the styles—
Heading 1, Heading 2, etc.
Now, move your cursor to the
Creating a table of contents
Bet you didn’t know
Justify text beautifully in
MS Word
When you apply Justify
formatting to a paragraph, Word
inserts spaces to adjust the
length of the line. Sometimes,
you may end up having too much
white space in between words. To
achieve alternative and more
presentable text justification, go
to Tools > Options and click the
Compatibility tab. In the
Recommended options for list,
click WordPerfect 6.x for
Windows. Then enable the
checkboxDo full justfication like
WordPerfect 6x for Windows
under the Options. Click OK to
close the dialog. This spacing
adds and removes spaces,
which normally results in
uniform spacing.
beginning of your document
by pressing [Ctrl] + [Home]. Go
to Insert > Reference > Index
and Tables. In the dialog box
that pops up, go to the Table
of Contents tab. Click on the
Options button, and make
sure all the heading levels
you have used in the docu-
ment are selected. Click OK to
come back to the Index and
Tables. Now choose the
number of levels you want to
appear in the TOC and click
OK to create the table of con-
tents. You will have to press
[Ctrl] and click the hyperlinks
to follow them. To go back to
the TOC, click on the ‘Go to
TOC’ button on the Outlining
toolbar.
If you are using Word
2002 or later, there is a sim-
pler way to navigate within a
large document. Simply click
View > Document Map and
the map of the document,
similar to Windows explorer,
will open on the left side of
document window. You can
then click the heading in the
document map to jump to
that section. It’s better to use
MS PowerPoint
than TOC in many cases.
Use Outline for entering
content quicker
Tackling both the
look and typing the
content for a presentation
at the same time can be a
bit overwhelming. Why not
try getting your thoughts
down first in the Outline
view and then build from
there? In the left panel of
the PowerPoint window,
click the Outline tab. Type
your thought and press
[ENTER]; that’s a new slide
title. You can continue cre-
ating slides and entering
slide titles by typing infor-
mation and pressing
[ENTER]. If you want to add con-
tent to a slide, press [TAB]
(instead of [ENTER]) and
PowerPoint records the text as
a bullet point. To add a bullet
within a bullet point, press
[TAB] again. You can create
several levels of bullets, but
usually one or two levels do
the trick.
Template for repeated
presentations
If you are creating the
same presentation
layout over and over again,
you can turn your presenta-
tion into a template that you
or others can use fast and
flawlessly. A template saves all
the settings you have
selected—background images,
colour scheme, font selec-
tions, and so on—and ensures
that the presentations you
create based on that template
all have the same elements in
common. This is great if you
have a uniform companywide
look that you want all
your departments to adhere
to. To turn a presentation into
a template:

On the File menu, click
Save As.
In the Save as type list,
click Design Template.
Name the file and click
Save.
Another extra that can
really help: add instruc-
tions about special for-
mats, font choices, or video
clips in the Notes area
(under each slide), if others
will be using your
template.
Creating a Photo Album
in PowerPoint 2002
You can use
PowerPoint 2002 and
later to create a photo-
album presentation. To
create this, go to Insert >
Picture > New Photo
Album. The Photo Album
dialog will open. Now click
the File/Disk button to add
any picture that’s stored on
your computer, or click the
Scanner/Camera to add pic-
tures from a scanner or
camera. Hold down [SHIFT]
to select multiple images.
Using this dialog, you can
choose the layout of the
album, convert pictures
into greyscale, adjust the
brightness and contrast or
rotate the image. When you
are done, click ‘Create’ to
create the presentation. If
you need to modify any of
these changes later, just go to
Format > Photo Album.
Creating a Photo Album presentation
Bet you didn’t know
Schedule ‘Response to
e-mail’ in MS Outlook
As much as you’d like to, you
can’t always respond instantly
to every e-mail message. If you
did, you’d never get any work
done. To make sure that you
don’t forget to answer
important messages, move
them to your calendar so you
can set aside a specific time to
respond, or add them to your
task list as a reminder.
To turn an e-mail message into
an item on your calendar or
task list:
1. Drag the message from
your Inbox onto the Calendar
icon or Tasks icon on the
Outlook Bar or onto your
Calendar or Tasks folder in the
Folder List. This will create a
new appointment item.
2. If you are moving the
item to the calendar, enter the
date and time you want to
reply and specify any
additional options you want.
(The body of the e-mail
message is automatically added
to the appointment.)
3. Click Save and Close to
add the appointment to your
Calendar or Task list.
4. You can drag items
between all Outlook folders,
including Inbox, Tasks,
Calendar, Contacts, and Notes.
For more options, right-click
before you drag.
Reducing the size of
presentations
When you add pictures
to presentations, the size
increases. To compress pic-
tures in PowerPoint, open the
presentation and click any
image. The images toolbar
should be visible now. If it
doesn’t appear, right-click on
any toolbar and choose
Pictures. On the picture
toolbar, click the Compress
Pictures button. If you can’t
locate the button, simply
hover your mouse over the
buttons and read the tool tips.
In the dialog box that
appears, choose ‘All pictures
in document’ in the ‘Apply to’
Compressing pictures in
presentations
field. Choose the appropriate
resolution, depending on
what the presentation is
intended for—if you don’t
plan to print the slides,
choose Web/Screen option.
Click OK and the images will
be compressed.
Converting slides to
images
You may want to convert
individual slides into
Some useful keyboard shortcuts
Keyboard shortcuts help you work faster with any application.
PowerPoint has shortcuts too. Here are some of them:
To
Start a presentation
Advance to the next slide
Return to the previous slide
Go to particular slide
Make the screen blank
Make the screen white
Show or Hide the arrow pointer
Erase drawings on a screen
Change pointer to pen
Change pointer to arrow
Change pointer to eraser
Hide pointer and button
To get help on keyboard shortcuts
Tips & Tricks
images, say, in order to e-mail
it to someone. All you have to
do is: open the presentation in
PowerPoint, scroll down to
that slide and click View >
Notes Page. Here you’ll see
that the slide occupies half of
the page as an image. Right-
click on this image and choose
‘Copy’. Now open any graphic
application such as MS Paint
or Photoshop, paste the copied
image there and save the file.
MS Outlook
Colour code your Calendar
Outlook provides ‘labels’
which allow you to
colour-code your appoint-
ments by choosing from var-
ious label types and colours.
So, with a quick glance you
get to see the types of appoint-
ments at hand.
Instead of the normal cal-
endar, your calendar can
look like the one in
labels.bmp.
To colour-code your cal-
endar, right-click an appoint-
ment, point to Label, and then
click the label you want. Or,
Press
[F5]
[N], Left-click, [Spacebar],
, , [Enter], or [Page Down]
[P], [Backspace], , , or
[Page Up]
Number followed by [Enter]
[B] or [.]
[W] or [,]
[A] or [=]
[E]
[Ctrl] + [P]
[Ctrl] + [A]
[Ctrl] + [E]
[Ctrl] + [H]
[Shift] + [?]
AUGUST 2004 DIGIT 59
 Tips & Tricks
Colour coding appointments
when you are scheduling an
appointment, click a colour in
the Label list.
Rules Rule
Outlook has a powerful
rules system to notify
when an important mail, such
as from your fiancé or your
boss, comes in. Additionally,
you can make Outlook auto-
matically move e-mail into
predefined folders such as
‘Mailing Lists’, ‘Family Mail’
and more. This will
help de-clutter your inbox
and make your e-mails more
manageable.
Illustration: Mahesh Benkar
To create a rule, click
Rules Wizard. You can either
customise on the Tools menu,
one of the sample rules in
Outlook, or build one from
the scratch. Most rules
operate on messages as they
arrive or are sent, but you can
create a rule and select it to
run on messages in your Inbox
60 DIGIT AUGUST 2004
Readers’ Tips
MS Excel
Close Workbooks Fast
Need to leave your desk suddenly but
have 10 worksheets open in Excel? Try
this—Click the File menu while keeping
the SHIFT key pressed on your key-
board. Excel will now reveal a ‘Close All’ menu
item, clicking which will close all open
worksheets, while prompting for a save where
applicable.
Naveenchandran
MS Word
Customising Your “Normal” Template
Does your work require sending large
number of letters on your letterhead?
What you can do is open the normal.dot
template file from a path like
“C:\Documents and Settings\Saurabh Kumar
\Application Data\Microsoft\ Templates”.
Any changes you make in this document will
appear in any new documents you make in Word.
You can use the header/foother fields to add
custom letter head graphics, page numbering,
date/time etc. and these will appear every time
you open a new document.
Shortcuts to Useful Word Features
Did you know that the status bar, that area at the
bottom of Word documents where the page
number appears, also provides shortcuts to a
number of very useful features? Here are a few
you may want to use:
To open the Find and Replace dialog box,
double-click any location indicator on the
status bar, such as the page number or section
number.
To turn the macro recorder on or off, double-
click REC.
To turn the Track Changes feature on or off,
double-click TRK.
To turn extend selection mode on or off, dou
ble-click EXT.
To turn overtype mode on or off, double-click
OVR.
To change the language format of selected
text, double-click Language.
(or other folders). In fact, one message in your Inbox. Open
of the easiest ways to create a the message, and on the
rule is by using an existing Actions menu click Create
To resolve errors in grammar or spelling, double-
click the Spelling and Grammar Status.
Smit
MS Outlook
Important Office data files
At the time of making your regular
backup, it is essential to know where the
important data files of MS Office are
kept. Here are the important ones:
.pab files are Microsoft Outlook address
book files.
.pst files are Microsoft Outlook mail,
contacts, tasks and calendar files book files.
.rwz files are the Microsoft Outlook rules wiz
ard files.
Locate the file by using the Windows find tool.
Click Start > Find > Files or Folders.
In the Named box type *.pab(or whatever you
are searching for from above) in the Look in box,
ensure it is looking on the drive that Microsoft Office
is located (generally the C: drive). Click Find Now
This should locate the file you are looking for,
if present. Ensure that you have completely closed
your copy of Microsoft Office. Once this file is
located copy the file to an alternate drive or
backup media.
Deep
MS Access
Automagically normalise tables
One of the most useful but unnoticed fea-
ture of Access is Analyze. It is divided into
three options.
Table Analyzer: This feature attempts
to analyze your table for repeated data, recommends
and splits the tables to generate BCNF normalised
table structure. The tool is good for a quick survey of
the tables or for newbies, as its suggestions are usu-
ally good and based on logic.
Performance Analyzer: It analyses and suggests
modification in the structure of the database to opti-
mize the performance of database. The wizard will
attempt to locate logical errors such as incorrect
data types and more.
Documentor: This one is used to create the
documentation of the database structure, which can
be useful and a real time saver for quick
report generation.
waaznt
Rule. The Rules Wizard will
include details about your
message, such as sender and

subject, already filled in.
All you need to do is choose
which criteria to use and
which action it should
trigger. And enter data in
steps till ‘Finish’.
Categorise to Track
Data
Categories help you
manage your data
from various sources, but is
a very under-utilised fea-
ture of Outlook. Each
Outlook item can be
assigned a category, either
from the Outlook’s default
set, or a custom one. Assign
your e-mail, meetings, jour-
nals entries, tasks etc. a cat-
egory, so that later, you can
easily retrieve all data
related to a particular cate-
gory, such as of your
clients’ names.
Categorising to organised data
To categorise an item,
right-click the item, and
then click Categories. This
will bring up your current
list of categories. Select a
category from the Available
categories list. To create
new categories, click Master
Category List.
To view all the items that
belong to that category, you
can customise your view to
group items by category. Or
use Advanced Find to search
Bet you didn’t know
Delete Duplicate Rows in
MS Excel
To delete duplicate rows, you
filter a list for unique rows,
delete the original list, and
then replace it with the filtered
list. The original list must have
column headers.
1. Select all the rows,
including the column headers,
in the list you want to filter.
2. On the Data menu, point
to Filter, and then click
Advanced Filter.
3. In the Advanced Filter
dialog box, click Filter the list,
in place.
4. Select the Unique records
only check box, and then click
OK. The filtered list is displayed
and the duplicate rows are
hidden.
5. On the Edit menu, click
Office Clipboard. The Clipboard
task pane is displayed.
6. Make sure the filtered list
is still selected, and then click
Copy. The filtered list is
highlighted with bounding
outlines and the selection
appears as an item at the top of
the Clipboard.
7. On the Data menu, point
to Filter, and then click Show
All. The original list is
re-displayed.
8. Press the [DELETE] key.
The original list is deleted.
9. In the Clipboard, click
on the filtered list item. The
filtered list appears in the
same location as the original
list.
Caution: Because you are
permanently deleting data, it’s
a good idea to copy the original
list to another worksheet or
workbook before using the
following procedure.
for all the Outlook items
related to a category.
In the Tools menu, click
Advanced Find, and then click
the More Choices tab.
Click Categories and use
the Available categories list
to select the categories you
would like to find. Click OK.
Then go to Find Now.
Search all Info Related
to a Contact
Few people ever ven-
ture past the first tab
in the Outlook Contacts
form. After all, if you are
storing information for
business contacts, just
about everything you need
is contained on the first
tab. Occasionally, you click
on the second tab to enter
a spouse’s or assistant’s
name. But have you ever
seen what the third tab,
the Activities tab, con-
tains?
The Activities tab
shows you all the Outlook
items related to that con-
tact: every e-mail, meeting,
journal entry, or task. It’s a
great way to review all
your communication with
someone or prepare for a
meeting with them. If
you’re overwhelmed by the
sheer volume of informa-
tion on this tab, you can
filter the information and
display only Contacts, E-
mail, Journal Entries,
Notes, or Upcoming Tasks
or Appointments.
Create a virtual
business card
Use Outlook to extend
the ritual of passing
out business cards. Add a
virtual business card
(vCard) to your e-mail signa-
ture, ensuring that your
business contact informa-
tion is included in each e-mail
message you send.
To include a vCard with your
e-mail signature:
1. On the Tools menu, click
Options, and then click the
Tips & Tricks
Mail Format tab.
2. Under Signature, click
Signatures, and then click New.
3. Select the options you
want, and then click Next.
4. Under vCard options,
select a vCard from the list or
click New vCard from Contact.
MS Access
Archiving Stale Records
If you have a large data-
base, with records you
do not query regularly,
shifting them to a new table
will improve the efficiency of
your table. We will hence
archive records from one table
to another. You archive
records (instead of deleting
them) when you want to
remove unnecessary records
from the original table to
reduce its size. To archive
records in an Access database
(.mdb), build simple queries
that move the records from
one table to another. A macro
can be used to automate the
multiple queries used to
accomplish this task.
To periodically archive
records from one table to
another:
1. Use the Copy and Paste
commands to make a copy of
the table you want to archive.
Copy only the structure, not
the data. For example, copy
the structure of the Products
table in the sample database
to a new table called
Products_Archive.
2. Create an append query
that contains all the fields in
the original table and
appends records to the
archive table. Set the criteria
to specify the subset of
records you want archived.
For example, create an
append query called
Products_Append that
appends only discontinued
AUGUST 2004 DIGIT 61
 Tips & Tricks
items to the Products_
Archive table by setting the
Criteria cell for the
Discontinued field to = -1.
3. After appending the
records to the archive
table, you will need to
remove them from the orig-
inal table. Create a delete
query with the same cri-
teria you specified in the
append query. If you create
an append query that
prompts for a parameter,
you should also create a
delete query that prompts
for the same parameter.
Make sure you enter the
same values each time you
are prompted when you
run the queries. For
example, create a delete
query called Products_
Delete using the same cri-
teria as the Products_
Append query.
4. Create a macro that
first runs the append
query and then runs the
delete query. For example,
create a macro called
Products_Archive_Records
that uses the OpenQuery
action to run the Products
_Append query and then
uses the OpenQuery action
to run the Products_Delete
query.
5. Run the archive
macro each time you want
to archive your records. For
example, run the
Products_Archive_
Records macro each time
you want to archive discon-
tinued products from the
Products table to the
Products_Archive table.
Lock for .ldb
Sometimes when a new
user tries to access a
shared database on the server,
a situation arises causing
Access to delete the .ldb file,
62 DIGIT AUGUST 2004
Bet you didn’t know
Add Stripe Patterns to a
Table in MS Word
One way to modify the built-in
table formats that come with
Microsoft Word is to apply
your own stripe patterns. You
can select the number of rows
or columns to include in a
stripe pattern and apply your
colour choices to the pattern.
When you modify a table
style, all tables with that style
in the active document will be
changed.
1. To add stripe patterns to
a table, select the table.
2. Open the Styles and
Formatting task pane from the
‘Format’ toolbar.
3. In the Styles and
Formatting task pane, click
the arrow on the ‘Table style’,
and then click ‘Modify’.
4. In the ‘Apply Formatting
to’ box, select a stripe pattern
by doing one or both of the
following: Add stripes to rows,
Click Odd row stripes or Even
Row stripes.
5. To select a colour for the
stripes, click the arrow next to
Shading Colour, and then
chose a colour.
6. By default, the stripe
patterns are applied to every
alternate row or column.
7. To change the number of
rows or columns in a stripe
pattern, click Format, and
then click Stripes.
8. Change the number of
rows in a stripe or the
number of rows in a row
band box.
but because of another user
also working on the file, the
.ldb files fail to get erased. This
is tried 15 times before Access
fails and gives up. This process
causes a performance hit.
To overcome this problem
you need to create a form on
the client side, which creates a
persistent connection with
the database by opening a
recordset. To do this:
1. Create an empty form.
2. In the code view,
declare a recordset variable
in the global declarations
section.
3. In the OnOpen event,
open a recordset against
any table.
4. In the OnClose event,
which will activate when
the MDB is closed, close the
recordset and set the vari-
able to nothing.
5. Ensure that you
always open this form
when opening the MDB.
Maintaining persistent
connections to linked tables
could improve performance
significantly because it pre-
vents Microsoft Jet from
constantly deleting, cre-
ating, and obtaining locking
information from the other
database’s locking informa-
tion file.
Open Database Objects
Faster
If a database has the
Name AutoCorrect
feature enabled, more
often than not, users will
experience a delay when
they try to open any of the
database objects. When
using a secured database
with Name AutoCorrect
enabled, the current user
must have design permis-
sions on the object to
enable Name AutoCorrect
to track, fix, and log the
binding errors when an
object is opened. If a user
does not have design permis-
sion on an object that Name
AutoCorrect is trying to
change, the changes occur
every time that the user
opens the object. This hap-
pens because the user does
not have permissions to ever
save the changes.
To fix this, open the Tools
menu, select Options, and
choose the General tab. Then,
clear the Track name
AutoCorrect check box.
Query based on User Input
Access allows you to
enter parametric
queries. Such queries can
accept inputs from the user,
while running to make the
query result conditional,
based on the user input. They
are useful because the query
itself does not need to be
modified by the query
designer. You can easily add
conditions to the query by
using the ‘Criteria’ box of the
Query Designer grid. Enter
some text to describe the
input enclosed square
brackets in the criteria box
query_pmt.bmp. Next time
you run the query, Access will
ask you for the input of the
field to complete the query on
the fly.
Defining the order of user inputs
You can make your query
more complex. Example, you
may set the Between…And…
operator by entering some-
thing like “Between [min age]
And [max age]” in the same
criteria box.
If you have parametric

Customise your DivX movie CD
Insert a CD and get DivX to autorun. Get a synposis of the movie. Browse online
film reviews. Play around with lots more by customising your DivX movie CD
R
ipping a DVD movie to
DivX has now become
passé. It’s time to elevate
yourself to the next level.
Customize your DivX movie CDs
so that once you insert a disk in
your drive, it not only auto-
runs, but also provides you with
a menu so that you can do more
things related to the movie like
reading a synopsis of the movie
or launching a
browser to go
directly to
online reviews.
And no, you do
not require pro-
gramming
knowledge for
accomplishing
this—just 30
minutes.
To create
this menu we
will be using a
The CD interface, with the buttons freeware tool
called Compact
Disc Autorun (CDA) available on
the web (www.utdallas.edu/~
jbs024000/software/cda.html)
and some other software
that will make the menu
look better, and display images
such as the DVD front and
back covers.
First, download the CDA
compressed archive,
and extract the exe-
cutable to the folder where
you have your movie. When
you run the program you
should see an interface as
shown.
Whew! That’s a lot of but-
tons. But don’t worry, once you
start, it’ll be a walk in the park.
Click on the first button
and you will get a lot of
options to configure
that button. Here’s how we did
it. We chose to keep the first
Each button can be customised to
perform a specific function
button as the ‘Play Movie’
button. Provide the path of the
movie and that’s it. You’re
done!
Customising comes
next. Play around with
the buttons as you like.
If you want to keep a codec
pack handy on the CD, copy
the codec installer in the same
folder as the executable and
create a button for it. If you
The final interface that appears
when you enter the CD in the drive
Tips & Tricks
have the images of the back
and front DVD covers create
buttons for them too. If you
have a small synopsis text file,
create a button for that.
Our menu resembled this
box below.
Now for the final
touches. With the
buttons created,
click on Settings > Sound &
other option. This will let
you configure the options
for the main window. If you
want to display any images,
click on the Settings > Image
properties option and pro-
vide the path to the image to be
displayed. Then click on
Settings > Test Settings. This
will give you a status report of
the work that you have done
and whether anything is
wrong. If everything is OK,
click on Settings > Save to cur-
rent directory. Then click on
Settings > Create INF and finally
click on Settings > Make
Settings read only.
Burn all the files that
you see to a CD. Make
sure that all the files,
including the movie and the
auto-run files are on the root of
the CD. If there are any folders,
make sure that you specify the
path correctly. Once you have
the movie on the CD, try it out
and let us know if your friends
are amazed to see what you
have just created!
Note: Find the software men-
tioned here and more similar
freeware on our DVD/CD.
AUGUST 2004 DIGIT 63
 Tips & Tricks
input on more than one of
the fields, then how do you
decide which input box
appears before which? In
that case, you can control it
by going to Tool > Query >
Parameters. Here, enter
the parameters with the
exact name. Be careful to
keep it in the order in
which you wish them to
appear.
Tip of the Month
Easy Access to
Frequently-accessed
Documents
The Work menu is a great
Word feature that few
people know about. You can
use the Work menu to keep
an easily accessible list of
your favourite Word files.
Here is how you can add
the Work menu to the
toolbar:
1. Go to Tools, click
Customize, and then click
the Commands tab.
2. In the Categories box,
click Built-in Menus.
3. Click ‘Work’ in the
Commands box and drag it
to the menu bar or
displayed toolbar.
4. With the Work menu in
place, you can add any
open Word document to
your list. Here are the
options:
5. To add the current
document to the Work
menu, on the Work menu,
click Add to Work Menu.
6. To open a document on
the Work menu, on the Work
menu, click the document
you want to open.
7. To remove a document
from the Work menu:
8. Press [CTRL]+[[ALT]+[[-].
Your cursor will look like a
large, bold underscore.
9. On the Work menu, click
the document you want
to remove.
64 DIGIT AUGUST 2004
Arrest that Song!
Record Internet radio
shows and your favourite
all-time hits—BOOMBox is
here for you
Y
ou finally got a ‘broadband’
Internet connection. Stream-
ing audio beckons (stream-
ing video needs
the Indian defin-
ition of broadband
to change)! You are
sitting at your
c o m p u t e r ,
listening to your
favourite Internet
radio channel, and
a song you just
love is aired.
“Nooo! Damn! How
Click on ‘Tune in’ to launch the do I record this?”
default media player you wonder. We
will show you how
you can record your favourite
Internet radio shows or just a few
all-time-favourite songs.
You need to have a SHOUTcast
compatible player installed,
which supports the .PLS file
extension. We will use a player
called BOOMBox Online Radio
Player—a small and intuitive
online radio player. However, its
best feature is the bundled
streaming audio recorder.
Configuring this tool is a
snap: Once you start the software,
Warning! you can choose to either see a list
of radio stations by category, or
A lot of the see a complete list that will give
content on you more options to choose from.
popular Internet Click on the Refresh Radio List
radio stations is button to get the latest list.
copyrighted. You will see a list of radio
Capturing this stations displayed. Click on one,
content is illegal! and you are shown a brief
Make sure you description, including the URL
only capture and the current song that is
audio that isn’t playing. Clicking on the Populate
copyrighted. Now Playing button will show you
all the songs playing on all the
radio stations in your list.
To listen to a station, click on
Tune In. This launches your
default media player, such as,
Winamp. The song doesn’t start
immediately, as it is buffered first
to enure smooth playback.
Once playback begins, you can
configure the recorder. Go to
Recorder > View Recorder, which
opens the Recorder window. Click
on Advanced to see all the
options. An option is the
Advanced Song Change Detection
feature cuts the songs
accordingly to different parts. For
extremely advanced audio
editing, you’ll need to find
different software.
Once the recording is done,
navigate to the folder with the
recorded songs. The software
ASCD (Advanced Song Change
Detection) records each track separately
on to your hard drive
saves the recordings as MP3s. So,
you won’t have to worry about
converting uncompressed
formats, such as WAV into MP3.
You can add radio stations to
your favorites list and one-click
recording. BOOMBox offers other
amazing features, for free. Here’s
to never having to do without
your favourite music ever again.

Internet Explorer
Retrieving Lost Password
For Content Advisor
Control the Web sites
that users surf using your
PC via Content Advisor in IE.
Specify a password. Forget the
password and you may not be
able to visit certain Web sites at
all. There is a work around
though. Go to Start > Run, and
type ‘regedit’ to bring up the
registry editor. Navigate to the
registry key HKEY_
L O C A L _ M AC H I N E \ S O F T -
WARE\Microsoft\Windows\
CurrentVersion\Policies\Rati
ngs. Delete the key entry in the
right pane and close the reg-
istry editor. Now, start Internet
Explorer, go to Tools > Internet
Options > Content > Content
Advisor and click ‘Disable
Ratings’. Do not enter any pass-
word when asked to do so and
click OK. That’s it! All Content
Advisor Settings eliminated.
Auto-disconnect
This feature was enabled
by default in IE4; not so
in the latest version. Enabling
it lets you specify the period of
inactivity after which the
Internet connection is discon-
nected. You can also configure
it to prompt you to ascertain
that IE should go offline, when
you close all its instances—a
useful feature for dial-up users.
Open Internet Explorer, go
to Tools > Internet Options ,
flip to the Connections tab,
click Settings and then click
Advanced. Select the check-
boxes that says ‘Disconnect If
Idle for [X] minutes’ and
‘Disconnect when connection
may no longer be needed’.
You can set Internet Explorer to
disconnect the dialup connection
automatically when you don’t
need it
Click OK thrice to save costs of ink while printing,
changes. Here’s how you do this: make a
plain text file with the line
FTP With Internet Explorer ‘IMG { display: none !impor-
Internet Explorer can tant;}’ in it and save it as
emulate an FTP client. imagesoff.css. Use Notepad to
Simply type in addresses in the do this. Now, in Tools >
following format: ftp://user- Internet Options, press the
n a m e : p a s s wo r d @ s e r ve r - ‘Accessibility’ button. Use the
name.com. If you are behind a ‘user style sheet’ option to
firewall, or cannot access FTP specify the .css file you just cre-
folders, try using the Passive ated. Once you press OK, all
mode. To enable this, go to your images will vanish, until
Tools > Internet Options, you go back to the Internet
switch to the Advanced tab and Options dialog and disable the
Secrets That Keep You Ahead In The Race
GENERAL TIPS
Internet Explorer 53 • Opera 54 • Firefox 57
Mozilla 58
READERS’ TIPS 57
30 MINUTES EXPERT
Securing Your Windows XP System With In-built
Tools 56 • Billing Time With BillingTracker 59
enable the ‘Use Passive FTP selected settings.
(for firewall and DSL modem
compatibility)’ checkbox Zoom In/Out Quickly
under Browsing Settings. To increase the font size
on a Web site using the
Scroll Through History scroll wheel of the mouse,
If your mouse has the scroll your mouse down, while
scroll wheel, then simply pressing the [Ctrl] button.
press the [Shift] button and Scroll up to reduce the font
scroll up or down to go for- size.
ward or backward in the
browser history. Get Alerts On Updates
Many IE users hardly
Disable Images, Graphics know how to use the
Disable all graphics and Offline Viewing feature of
images of a Web site to Internet Explorer. If you visit a
load the page faster or to save particular Web site regularly,
Make a Web site available offline on
the ‘Organize Favourites’ window
you can add it to your list of
favourites, and click on
‘Organize Favourites’. Now,
click on the ‘Make available
offline’ option and select
‘Properties’. You can even set
the rate at which IE checks
whether the page is updated. If
the page does get updated, IE
can alert you by displaying
a small red icon in the
favourite list, or even by
sending you an e-mail.
Home Sweet Home
Another feature that’s
seldom used, is the
homepage. If you start
browsing your Internet every
time by a specific Web site—an
e-mail site or or your home-
page, for example—you can set
the URL of this Web sites as
your browser’s homepage. This
will cause IE to start by visiting
that URL first. Set this by going
to Tools > Internet Options
and inserting the URL in the
‘Home page’ field.
Auto-flush Browser Cache
If you wish to clean up
your surfing trackswhen
you are done, but hate to
empty your IE cache manually,
then here is 1a better way out.
Go to Tools > Internet
Options and flip to the
Advanced panel. Scroll down
to Security and check ‘Empty
Temporary Internet Files
folder when browser is
closed’ and click OK, IE will
now automatically delete its
cache when you close the
browser window.
Keep History Trimmed
You can configure
Internet Explorer to

SEPTEMBER 2004 DIGIT 53

 Digital Tools l Tips & Tricks
Bet You Didn’t Know
Your Own Search Keywords
in Internet Explorer
Opera and Firefox let you use
keywords to search from the
address bar. You can implement
this in Internet Explorer too via
a registry tweak. If that frightens
you, use the Tweak UI utility,
which can be downloaded from
Microsoft’s Web site.
Visit the search engine site
you want to add a keyword for,
search for something, say a
phrase, and copy the URL. Next,
expand Internet Explorer in the
left pane of Tweak UI and then
click Search. In the right pane,
click Create and paste in the
URL. Now, replace the phrase
you searched for with %s, and
enter a keyword of your choice
in the Prefix box. For example, if
you want to add Google, your
search string will be something
like http://www.google.co.in/
search?q=%s and the keyword
may be g. Click OK twice to
change your settings. The next
time you want to google Digit,
just type in ‘g Digit’ in the
address bar.
automatically delete the his-
tory of visited Web sites. Go to
Tools > Internet Options. On
the first tab, under ‘History’,
set the number of days for
which the browser should
retain the history. If you enter
five, then all track of Web sites
Add your keywords for easy,
customised searches
54 DIGIT SEPTEMBER 2004
older than five days gets
purged automatically.
Opera
Multiple Sessions
You can start surfing
with the same set of
Web sites by saving them as a
session.
For example, if you like to
start out with a Web-based e-
mail site along with a couple
of news sites, open them and
click on File > Sessions > Save
session. Save the file with a
.win extension in the default
location.
You can recall these saved
sessions even while browsing
some other sites; File >
Sessions > Insert Session will
take care of this. Next, press
[Alt] + [P] to bring the
You can choose to start any saved
session or last auto-saved session
when you start Opera
Preferences dialog, head to
File > Preferences > Start and
Exit. Here, check ‘Show start-
up dialog’ to bring up the
startup dialog box every time
you open Opera.
This box allows you to
maintain multiple sessions
and eliminates the frustration
associated with a browser
crash—you can start browsing
at exactly the point where the
crash occurred, a very useful
feature. The default path for
the saved sessions is:
Windows 2000/XP: C:\
Documentsand Settings\
<login name>\Application
Data\Opera\Opera7\pro- make the interface cleaner
file\sessions\opera.win and more user-friendly, you
Windows 95/98: C:\ can perform the following
Windows\ApplicationData\O modifications: go to View >
pera\Opera7\sesions\ Status Bar > Bottom, View >
opera.win
Tabbed Browsing
To use Opera’s tabbed
browsing feature, enable
the Page bar by going to View
> Toolbars > Page bar. Call a
new tab either by pressing
[Ctrl] + [N] or double-clicking
on an empty Page Bar area.
Right-clicking a link and Opera is the most customisable
selecting ‘Open in back- browser around. You can easily
ground page’ opens a tab in change buttons and the position
the background—a better fea- of all the toolbars
ture, as it lets you browse the
parent page as the link opens Page Bar > Top, View >
without disturbing you. Note Address Bar > Top, View
that the text of the tab Navigation Bar > Auto. You
changes colour once it fin- can drag-and-drop elements
ishes loading a Web page. to the toolbars. We will do so
Browse between tabs by using for the Address Bar: right-
[Ctrl] + [Tab]. You can also use
the mouse to do this: With the
Illustrations: Farzana Cooper
mouse right-clicked, use the
scroll button to move up and
down the list of tabs. Use
[Ctrl]+[W] to close any active
tab. Close all open tabs using
[Ctrl] + [Shift] + [W]. To close all
tabs, but the one you are
browsing under, press [Ctrl] +
[Alt] + [W]. You can also change
the position of the tabs by
simply dragging and dropping
them wherever you deem click and choose ‘Customize
them to be fit. toolbars’. You will find three
tabs here: Large, Small and
Clothes Make the Browser Fields. The last tab is where
The default user inter- you will find search options—
face can be tweaked to the Zoom and Status fields.
be leaner and much less of a Let us add the Google search
resource-hogger. Right-click field to the Address Bar. Just
on the Main Bar, click on click on it and drag it to the
‘Images only’, and then bar. Note that it is a drop-
uncheck ‘Large images’. Right- down field. An especially
click again and choose Left, useful search criterion is
then disable the Personal ‘Find’ in the page search,
Toolbar by right-clicking on it which highlights keywords
and selecting ‘Off’. Switch off within the Web page as you
the Hotlist by pressing [F4]. To type in the field.
Magic Wand
Logging on to Web sites is
a much simpler task
thanks to the Wand feature-a
password and forms manager.
Log in to a site and let Opera
save your username and pass-
word. When you next come to
the same site, the login boxes
will be bordered golden. Press
[Ctrl] + [Enter] at the login
screen and Opera fills in the
requisite personal informa-
tion, and automatically log in.
All Wand passwords can be
cleared from ‘Delete private
data’ on the File menu. Your
usernames and passwords are
scrambled by the Wand before
they are saved to disk. However,
for added protection you may
set a master password in
Opera’s Security preferences.
Press [Alt] + [P] and go to the
Security section of the
Preferences dialog box. Click
on ‘Set password’ next to
‘Master password’ for added
security. You can also change it
when Opera asks you for the
password, and when it asks
whether the same should be
used for both the e-mail client
and the Wand.
Search Me
Opera supports several
search engines. You can
either type in a query into the
search field—[Shift] + [F8]—or
you can use the Address Bar to
do the same. Every engine is
associated with a single letter;
thus, Google gets a ‘g’,
Download. com gets a ‘w’, etc.
Press [Alt] + [P] and go to the
Search option for the list of
engines supported and the
associated letter. Here, you can
also change the number of
results displayed per page. To
use the Address Bar for a
Google search, press [F8] and
precede a query with a ‘g,’ for
example, ‘g X-Men movie Web
site’ [Enter], will search for the
‘X-Men…’ string in Google.
Forward/Rewind
When viewing a page
with no user forward his-
tory, Opera will try to detect a
possible forward link that you
can access. The Forward icon
will change into a FastForward
icon when this is possible.
Certain Web sites, mostly
forums and search engines,
have a single link at the
bottom that takes you to the
next page of posts. Try it with
a search engine to go to the
Next page link, or when
reading a multi-page article.
It can detect link-next ele-
ments, and will perform
checks to find one if not. Press
the spacebar to follow the link
to the next post, or page.
Rewind takes you back to a
site in the history. If you have
jumped from Google.com to
Thinkdigit.com, you can
rewind to Google by pressing
[Shift] + [Z]. Rewind takes you
back a Web site, so unless you
have followed more than one
link at Thinkdigit.com, you
can press [Shift] + [Z] to go
instantly back to Google.
Pressing [Z], on the other
hand, would take you just one
page back. Note that [Shift] +
[X] takes you forward in a sim-
ilar vein.
Slideshow
In a Web site that has a
lot of images linked in a
continuous manner (for
example, a site that displays
family photos or screenshots
of games), you can use the
Slideshow feature of Opera to
enjoy the pictures better. The
FastForward button displays
photo files on the Web in a
slideshow. To see photos full-
screen on a black background,
press [F11] to invoke Opera’s
presentation tool, OperaShow.
Reload Time
Opera can reload a Web
site after a user-specified
time. Right-click on a Web
page and go to Reload every >
Enable. Note that you can also
set a custom time, to reload at,
say, every two minutes and 30
seconds.
The Custom dialog box
also lets you reload only if the
Web page has expired (as
determined by the site pro-
grammer). Great for those
cricket score Web sites!
By Proxy
To set up a proxy server,
press [Alt] + [P] >
Network > Proxy Servers. Add
the address and port number
for the appropriate type of the
proxy server here, and just
make sure that the checkbox
is ticked. You can also disable
proxies for certain addresses,
such as within a LAN, and can
point Opera to an automatic
proxy configuration URL, in
case your ISP requires such a
setting.
Bet You Didn’t Know
Mouse Gestures in Opera
Mouse gestures are a novel way
to navigate the Web using
Opera. For instance, you can
hold the right mouse button
and draw an ‘L’ on a Web page
to indicate that you want it
closed. Similarly, right-click and
hold the mouse over a link and
move it down and then up to
open the link in the background
window. Here are some gestures
supported by Opera. Click and
hold the right mouse button,
move the mouse in the
directions indicated below and
then release the button:
Open new document: Move
down
Reload: Move up and down
Restore or maximise window:
Move up then right
Minimise: Move down then
left
Duplicate window: Move
down then up
Close document: Move down
then right, or move right-left-
right
Note it Down
Opera lets you keep snip-
pets of text from Web
sites as notes. For example, a
particularly interesting piece of
news can be saved for posterity
as a note. To do this, select any
amount of text off a Web page,
right-click and click on ‘Copy to
note’ ([Ctrl] + [Shift] + [C]). Notes
can then be accessed by
pressing the [F4] key, to invoke
the Hotlist under the Notes sec-
tion. You can delete notes here
SEPTEMBER 2004 DIGIT 55
 Securing Your Windows XP System with
In-built Tools
Just set up a new installation of Windows XP Professional? Here is what you
need to do to secure the PC using in-built tools in Windows XP
Deepak Dhingra 2. Click Automatic Updates, 2. Under Pick a task, click
and then select Keep my com- Create a new account.
Enable Firewall puter up to date. 3. On the ‘Name the new
Before you connect to the 3. Select an appropriate setting. account’ window, type a name
Internet or your LAN, enable You can specify a schedule as for the new account. Click Next.
the built-in fire- to when the updates will be 4. On the ‘Pick an account type’
wall—without downloaded and installed. page, click the type of account,
this, your PC and click Create Account.
may be infected Since Automatic Update only You need to assign a pass-
with Blaster or installs future updates, you will word to your administrator
Sasser within also need to go to the Microsoft account so that only you can
minutes of con- Web site for updates and install access it:
necting. To do the latest available updates. 1. Go to Start > Control Panel >
so: 1. Go to http://windowsup- User Accounts.
1. Go to Start > date.microsoft.com 2. Under ‘Pick an account to
Control Panel > 2. Click ‘Scan for Updates.’ change,’ select and click on the
Network and Windows Update scans your name of your account.
I n t e r n e t computer and displays a pre- 3. On the ‘What do you want to
Connections > selected list of critical change about your account’
Internet Connection Firewall N e t w o r k updates. page, click ‘Create a password.’
Connections. 3. Under ‘Pick updates to 4. In the ‘Type a new password’
2. Right click on the connection install,’ click ‘Critical box, enter a password, and
you want to protect and click Updates and Service Packs’. follow the steps that come up.
Also Remember Properties. A list of the updates that are 5. Click ‘Create Password.’
3. Click on the Advanced tab appropriate is generated. deepak_dhingra@thinkdigit.com,
Install an and then select ‘Protect my Critical updates are selected
antivirus software, computer and network by lim- for download by default.
such as the free AVG iting or preventing access to 4. Click ‘Review and install
or Avast anti-virus
this computer from the updates.’
solutions to protect
Internet.’ Click OK. 5. Select the updates and then
your computer from
viruses. Let the soft-
click Install Now.
ware get automatic
Install Security Updates
updates to its virus Security updates protect your Create Users
definitions to make computer from vulnerabilities The User Accounts features in
sure that you are and malicious code. Whenever Windows XP can also be used to
immune to the threats are detected, Microsoft protect your computer from
latest threats. promptly releases security unauthorised access. To avoid
Do not open patches for their OSes. misuse, you can create limited
unidentified e-mail Windows XP comes with an user accounts. If your PC is
attachments. automatic update feature that ‘hacked’ while you are logged in
Do not share downloads new patches auto- as a ‘limited’ user, the hacker
passwords and matically. To activate it: can only inflict limited damage.
credit card numbers 1. Go to Start > Control To set up a user account:
with anyone over Panel > Performance & 1. Go to Start > Control Panel > The settings for Automatic Updates
the Internet. Maintenance > System. User Accounts.

56 DIGIT SEPTEMBER 2004


Readers’ Tips
Firefox
Navigation Made Easy
Firefox lets you navigate browser his-
tory with ease using the scroll wheel.
Press [SShift] and roll the wheel back-
wards to visit the previous Web page,
or forward to go back to the next Web page.
Sreevirus
Opera Tricks
Some Commands For The Web Page
Here are some smart Opera tricks up my sleeve.
Double-click on a blank page to go to the predefined
homepage. Middle-click on a link to open it in a
background window. If the heavy Java system slows
the browser down, press [F12] and uncheck ‘Enable
Java’. Press the Spacebar twice to ‘FastForward’ to
the next page. Opera intelligently ‘looks’ at a page
and detects ‘Next’ hyperlinks. Use [Ctrl]+[Alt]+[V]
to validate Web pages. Press [G] to toggle between
preventing image to load or permitting them to load
afresh, or from the cache. And by the way, Opera
lets you reopen windows closed in the current ses-
sion by going to Window > Closed. Press
[Ctrl]+[Alt]+[Z] to reopen the Web page that was
closed last.
great_manish
News Feeds
About Opera and RSS
RSS feeds publish news to Opera, hence
you can get to know the latest without
actually browsing any news sites. Go to
Mail > News Feeds. A dialogue showing
a few news sites such as BBC, etc., comes up.
Check the ones already mentioned or add a Web
site of your choice, and Opera fetches news from
that site at the specified time interval.
No need to press the refresh thing at all. News
downloaded is elegantly indicated by a small
popup to the bottom left of the browser. News
sites such as Yahoo! (http://story.news.yahoo
.com/news?tmpl=s&u=/rss_index_tech/static)
and Reuters (http://reuters.com/newsrss.jhtml)
that provide free RSS feeds can be good places to
start with.
Deep
Quick reply is useful for chat-
like conversations. You can
type a short text that will be
appended to the top of the
original quoted message.
When you are viewing an
e-mail, type your message in
the text box, and click on the
‘Quick reply’ button. This will
send the reply to all the recipi-
ents of the original e-mail. Set
up filters for My folders and
Spam by right-clicking on a
folder and then Properties.
Click on Add filter: Boolean
operators are supported—you
can match your filters by cri-
teria such as Sender, To header,
or Entire mail. The condition
can be set to ‘Contains’,
‘Doesn’t contain’, or ‘Matches
regular expression’.
When you are finished
with each filter, set the filters
to ‘And’ if your messages must
satisfy all the filter terms, or
‘Or’ if they only need to match
one of them.

and create new ones as well.
You can also send a note via e-
mail by right-clicking on it.
Hotlist
The Hotlist panel is tog-
gled by the [F4] key. It is
a repository of useful stuff—
Bookmarks, Mail, Contacts,
History and Transfers can be
accessed from here. It also
provides a quick listing of all
the windows open (Windows),
information on the Web page
that you are browsing (Info),
and a listing of all the links
off a Web page (Links).
If that were not enough,
you can customise this panel
by adding games, news pages,
dictionaries, etc. To make a
Web page show up in the
Hotlist, bookmark the page by
pressing [Ctrl] + [T] and select
to show it as a panel. You can
find more panels, specifically
designed for the slim, vertical
layout that the Hotlist offers,
at http://my.opera.com/cus-
tomize/ panel/.
Bookmarks
To file a bookmark, press
[Ctrl] + [T]. You can show
the page under the Hotlist or
on the Personal Bar here. You
can also give a bookmark a
nickname. For example, by
giving Thinkdigit.com the
nickname ‘Home,’ you can
enter ‘Home’ in the Address
bar, and Opera will take you to
the Web site. Make sure you do
not assign a common URL such
as ‘Microsoft.’ A bookmarked
site gets precedence over a URL,
so typing in ‘Microsoft’ will
take you to Thinkdigit.com in
this case. Manage your book-
marks by pressing [Ctrl] + [Alt] +
[B]. Note that deleted ones are
stored in a Trash folder. You can
import bookmarks from IE,
Netscape, Mozilla, etc, over
here. You can also export your
current bookmarks for backup
or other purposes.
Mail
It is possible to import e-
mails to Opera’s M2 e-
mail client, from earlier ver-
sions of Opera as well as from
Outlook Express, Eudora,
Netscape Mail (only version 6
and 7), or any mailbox stored
in the generic mbox format,
including older versions of
Netscape. Select File > Import
> Mail to import your e-mail.
You can import different
accounts, folders, settings and
contacts.
When importing from
Opera 6, the folder structure
will be copied to ‘My folder,’
and the imported e-mails will
be saved to the Received folder.
Firefox
Backing Up
Use MozBackup (http://
backup.jasnapaka.com)
to back up your profile. This
freeware utility works with
Mozilla, Mozilla Firefox,
Mozilla Thunderbird and
Netscape. It allows you to
backup e-mails, favourites,
contacts, etc. Just run
MozBackup and choose what
you want to backup.
Bookmark Backups: the
name of this extension
Use Bookmark Backup to backup
Bookmarks and other settings in
Firefox

SEPTEMBER 2004 DIGIT 57

 Digital Tools l Tips & Tricks
Use MozBackup to backup
important settings automatically
explains its function. Firefox
uses it to copy the bookmarks
file to a desired location as you
close the browser. If the orig-
inal file gets corrupt or lost,
you can restore the latest
backup by copying into your
profile folder. Simply go to
Tools > Extensions, and click
Options to choose what you
want to back up. Apart from
bookmarks, you can specify
other files to back up too. Be
warned though: use this exten-
sion along with the regular
profile backup. Download
Bookmark Backups from
http://www.pikey.me.uk/mozil
la/?extension=bb.
Profile Games
All personal settings
such asfavourites list,
history, cookies, e-mail set-
tings, etc, constitute one pro-
file.
Firefox uses profiles to
manage multiple users. As a
rule, you have to delete the
installation directory when-
ever you install a newer ver-
sion of Firefox, but you can
Use Bookmark Backup to backup
Bookmarks and other settings of
Firefox
58 DIGIT SEPTEMBER 2004
safely retain the profiles
folder and restore it.
Knowing the location of
the profile can be useful
when you install a newer ver-
sion or reinstall the existing
version, when you are
migrating to another com-
puter, or just backing up set-
tings. This folder is located at
C:\Documents and Settings\
<Windowslogin/user
name>\Application Data\
Mozilla\FireFox\Profiles\<Pr
ofile name> in Windows XP
/2000 and at C:\Windows\
ApplicationData\Mozilla\Fire
fox\Profiles\<Profile name>.
Extensions
Akin to plugins, exten-
sions are software that
work with Firefox to give you
the desired functionality.
Download more than 200 such
extensions at http://
extensionroom.mozdev.org/m
ain.php/Firefox.
Tabbed Browsing
Tabs let you open many
Web pages simultane-
ously. It reduces clutter at the
Task bar and brings other
added benefits, such as ses-
sions, with it. Most popular
browsers such as Opera,
Netscape, Mozilla, and, obvi-
ously Firefox support tabbed
browsing.
You can also use extensions
to enhance tab functionality.
Some of them are:
Flowing Tabs: Wraps tabs
onto multiple rows
Session Saver: Remembers
open tabs and reopens them
the next time you use the
browser
Tab Killer: Disables tabbed
browsing
Tab Scroller: Lets you switch
between tabs using the scroll
wheel
Tab X: Adds a Close button
to every tab
Undoclosetab: Allows you to
reopen tabs closed recently
Tab browser Extensions or
‘TBE’ (http://white.sakura.
ne.jp/~piro/xul/_tabexten-
sions.html.en) is a heavy duty
extension that lets you reopen
up to 50 closed tabs, drag-and-
drop and thus rearrange tabs
and use the mouse to navigate.
It also bestows a Close button
and a progress bar on each tab,
and also bundles along the
auto-reload feature.
Customising
Configuration
Here’s how you configure
Firefox real quick. Simply
type ‘about:config’ in its
address bar and press [Enter] to
bring up a list of customisable
features. Changing a value for
a feature is as simple as double-
clicking it and entering the
appropriate value. Change
these values only if you are
sure of what you intend doing.
For example, to alter image
animation, find the line that
says image.animation_mode
and change it to once, none or
normal. ‘Once’ causes anima-
tions to play once, none stops
all animation and normal indi-
cates default animation.
Easy Search
Search using your
favourite search engine
via the search bar in Firefox.
Press [Ctrl]+[K], type the search
phrase and press [Enter] to
search using Google—the
default search engine. To add
more search engines, click the
arrow at the search bar and
choose ‘Add engines’. This
brings you to a Web site
offering search engine plugins.
An easier way to search is
by using keywords. For
example, type ‘google search-
phrase’ in the address bar to
search in Google. Other key-
words are: ‘goto’ to use
Bet You Didn’t Know
Importing IE Cookies into
Firefox
Open Internet Explorer, go to
File > Import / Export and
choose ‘Export Cookies’. Specify
a location and click OK. Now,
open this file and put a dot
before every line. For example,
‘yahoo.com TRUE/FALSE
1271725143’ becomes
‘.yahoo.com TRUE/FALSE
1271725143’. Now, move this file
into Firefox’s profiles folder.
Google’s ‘I’m Feeling Lucky’
search, ‘dict’ to search dic-
tionary.com, etc. You can
come up with your own key-
words too: Add the page (that
you intend creating a keyword
for) to bookmarks, point to
this entry, right-click and
choose Properties. Replace the
phrase you searched for on the
Web page with ‘%s’, type in a
value in the keyword field and
then click OK.
Load Firefox Faster
In Windows XP, right-
click the icon you choose
to start Firefox and choose
Properties. In the target box,
add ‘/Prefetch:1’ to the end of
the line so that it reads:
‘C:\Program Files\Mozilla
Firefox\Firefox.exe”
/Prefetch:1’. This gets Firefox to
load faster.
Mozilla
Form Manager
To better fill out forms on Web
sites, the Form Manger can
remember your personal infor-
mation. Go to Edit >
Preferences > Privacy &
Security > Forms and click on
the ‘Save data from…’
checkbox. Furthermore, you
can also pre-fill personal details
by clicking on the ‘Manage
Stored Form Data’ button.
 Tip Of The Month
Question: In Opera,
is there a way to
arrange my
downloads
automatically by
folders?
Answer: Yes, you can do so.
Among the many features
that Opera comes loaded
with is one that
automatically organises all
your downloads (transfers)
as separate folders, based
on the type of files
downloaded.
To have Opera
accomplish this feat, go to
Tools > Preferences and
select the ‘File types’
section of the Preferences
dialog box.
Here, locate the file
type that you intend
sending to a specific folder.
For example, to send your
downloaded MP3 songs to
your ‘c:\music’ folder,
search for the MIME type
called ‘Audio/mpeg’ with
file extensions of MP3, MP2,
and MPGA.
You can use the Search
box on the top to type in the
extension you need (for
this, you have to uncheck
‘Hide file types opened with
Opera’ ). Once located, click
Edit and in the dialog box
that opens.
Click on ‘Save to disk’
and ‘Do not ask for folder,
but save directly to’ and
then enter the target
folder—eg, ‘c:\music’—in the
text box that you see there.
Click OK and you are done!
Repeat the same steps
for extensions of all the
other files that you want to
store in different folders.
Billing Time with BillingTracker
Freelancers—manage your
clients, invoices, expenses,
work, and more
B
illingTracker Pro is is the
ideal time-management tool
for freelancers, whose
earnings depend on the time
spent on a project.
Setting it Up
The latest version of
BillingTracker Pro is on the
September Digit DVD/CD.
Freelancers work
for several clients at
the same time. Also,
there are several
projects to be
tackled for each
client. This is when
BillingTracker
comes in handy.
To enter client
details, go to
Manage > Manage
Entering Client Clients. Click the ‘Add new client’
details and then button at the bottom of the
Project details are
program window. Entering Client
the initial steps to
start using details and then Project details,
BillingTracker are the initial steps to start using
BillingTracker. You can add as
many clients you want by clicking
the ‘Add new client’ button.
Next, go to Manage > Manage
Projects and choose the name of
the client from the dropdown list.
Then click ‘Add a new project’ to
enter project details for the client
name that you selected.
Use the Timer function to keep
constant track of the time spent
on various projects: Go to Manage
> Timer. Here, you get to keep
track of two projects
simultaneously. Choose the first
client and project and click the
button ‘Set A’. Then select the
second client and project and
click ‘Set A’. Now, you can simply
use the Start button to start the
timer, the Pause button to pause it
and the ‘double arrow’ button to
switch between the projects.
Managing Expenses
All you have to is go to Manage >
Manage Expenses, and you get to
view all the expenses incurred. To
record a new expense, just click
on ‘Add a new expense’ button,
and enter the values.
Managing Work
Whenever you complete a
particular task, you can enter it to
keep track of the time taken. Go to
Manage > Manage Work to view the
list of all the work done.
It’s Billing Time
Here comes the most crucial part
of the software—creating invoices
and billing your clients. To
manage all your invoices, go to
Manage > Manage Invoice, and you
Keep track of the time spent on projects
using this tool
will get to see a list of all invoices
that you have created. You can
search for any particular invoice.
Got Payment?
BillingTracker Pro is designed to
manage all your transactions with
clients. To record payments
received, go to Manage > Manage
Payments, and click ‘Add a new
payment’. It will show you a list of
all outstanding invoices.
SEPTEMBER 2004 DIGIT 59
 Digital Tools l Tips & Tricks
Contact information, billing
details and shipping particu-
lars can all be separate sets of
data, granting greater flexi-
bility. After you configure it,
you can save a relevant form’s
data from Edit > Save Form
Info and the saved data can be
loaded by clicking on Edit > Fill
in Form. You can select which
fields to auto-fill here.
Bet You Didn’t Know
Changing the Words
‘Mozilla Firefox’ in the
Window Title
Navigate to the installation
folder. Typically, it’s
C:\Program Files\Mozilla
Firefox. Once there, copy a
folder called chrome to some
other location, so that you can
restore it later if something
goes wrong. Extract en-US.jar
(present in this folder), unzip
it, and go to locale\en-
US\global folder. Open the file
brand.dtd using Notepad.
Locate these lines:
<!ENTITY brandShortName
“Firefox”>
<!ENTITY brandFullName
“Mozilla Firefox”>
<!ENTITY version “0.8”>
<!ENTITY vendorShortName
“Mozilla Firefox”>
and change them to:
<!ENTITY brandShortName
“My Browser”>
<!ENTITY brandFullName “My
Browser”>
<!ENTITY version “1.0”>
<!ENTITY vendorShortName
“My Browser”>
Now zip the folder and start
Firefox to see the results. If you
plan to use the inbuilt zip
feature of Windows XP, rename
the extension of en-US.jar file
to .zip, unzip it, make the
changes, zip it and change its
extension back to .jar. In case
anything goes wrong, replace
this folder with its backup.
60 DIGIT SEPTEMBER 2004
Popup Windows
Annoying popups can be
turned off from Edit >
Preferences > Privacy &
Security > Popup Windows.
You can also define Web sites as
exceptions for both allowing
and suppressing pop-up win-
dows. Also, Mozilla displays a
confirmation dialog box, and
displays an icon in the status
bar upon popup blocking.
Managing Passwords
Password Manager stores
your login information
for password-protected Web
sites, mail and news servers.
Turn on this option from Edit >
Preferences > Privacy &
Security > Passwords. You can
also encrypt this stored data.
Stored data such as passwords
can have a master password
acting as a safety mechanism.
This way, Mozilla can confirm
your identity before auto-filling
login information and such.
You can tell the browser to ask
you the master password either
the first time it is needed, or
every time. It can also be tagged
to a time limit—useful if your
PC is used by multiple users.
Bookmark Keywords
To set keywords (custom
shortcuts to bookmarks):
go to Bookmarks > Manage
Bookmarks (or press [Ctrl] +
[B]) and select the bookmark
you want to set a keyword for.
Click Properties or press [Ctrl] +
You can block pop-ups and create a list of exceptions—sites whose pop-
ups are not blocked
[I] and enter a keyword for that
bookmark. You will be able to
go there by entering this key-
word in the address bar.
Rescue Me
If your old profile has
been corrupted, this is
how you can rescue it:
1. Note the name of the
folder with the old profile.
2. Start the Profile
Manager and create a new
profile. Exit Mozilla (and
also Quick Launch).
3. Go to the profile
folders. Copy all files from
the old profile folder to the
new profile folder, allowing
existing files in the new pro-
file’s folder to be replaced.
4. If you want to copy
your form data and pass-
words: save your form data
and passwords in your new pro-
file. Find the two numbered
files with the .w and .s exten-
sions in your new profile’s
folder. Make copies of the files
with the same extensions in
your old profile folder, rename
them (with numbers matching
those of the files in the new
profile folder. Copy them to the
new profile. Replace the files.
5. Restart the Profile
Manager and start with the
new profile. The contents of
your old profile should now
have been successfully restored
to the new profile.
Add-Ons: Visit http://www.
mozdev.org/projects/active.ht
ml for more add-ons.
Bet You Didn’t Know
Speed Browsing in Mozilla
Go to Edit > Preferences >
Advanced > HTTP Networking
and check ‘Enable Pipelining’.
Mozilla defaults this to ‘off’ as
certain servers and proxies have
problems with pipelining, but
when ‘on’, the browser fetches
everything on the page in a
single connection, rather than
making one connection for
each item, thus boosting
browsing performance.
MozBlog: Blog with Mozilla
while you surf—http://
mozblog.mozdev.org/Mouse
Gesture Support: Navigate the
Web using click-and-drag
mouse gestures http://
optimoz.mozdev/gestures/
Piemenus. A radical way
to access the Mozilla UI,
Piemenus reduces mouses
movements and is easy to adapt
to—http://www.gamemakers.de
/mozillaradalcontext/.