Missing Windows "Show Desktop" shortcut icon

If you by mistake deleted the Windows "Show Desktop" shortcut icon in the QuickLunch, you can get it back by creating a text file named "Show Desktop.scf", and drag it to the QuickLaunch.

This is the content of the "Show Desktop.scf" file, for Windows XP and Vista respectively.

Windows XP

[Shell]
Command=2
IconFile=explorer.exe,3
[Taskbar]
Command=ToggleDesktop

Windows Vista

[Shell]
Command=2
IconFile=shell32.dll,34
[Taskbar]
Command=ToggleDesktop

Disable Vista Welcome Center and Sidebar

Disable Windows Vista Welcome Center

1. Click Start, Control Panel.
2. Select Welcome Center.
3. Uncheck the "Run at startup"option, located at the bottom of the Welcome Center screen (Figure 1).

Figure 1: Disable Windows Vista Welcome Center

Disable Windows Vista Sidebar

1. Right click on the Windows Sidebar icon in the system tray.
2. Choose Properties.
3. Uncheck the "Start Sidebar When Windows Starts" checkbox (Figure 2).
4. Click OK.

Figure 2: Disable Windows Vista Sidebar

How to give name to a thumb drive

Each time we plug in a thumb drive, the PC will assign a letter to it. But, what if we plug more than one thumb drive? How are we going to know which one is the one we that want just by looking at the drive letter.

Fortunately, Windows enable us to give the thumb drive a name.

To give the thumb drive a name, right click on the drive letter, and choose Properties.

In the Properties windows, we can change the name, as shown in Figure 1.

Figure 1: Properties Windows

Open a Word 2007 document in an earlier version of Word

In the previous article, I have shown you how to open a Word 2007 document without having to install Microsoft Office 2007.

However, If you are running Windows 2000 with Service Pack 4, or Windows Server 2003, or Windows Vista, or Windows XP with Service Pack 1, and already have Microsoft Word 2000 with Service Pack 3, or Microsoft Word 2002 with Service Pack 3, or Microsoft Office Word 2003 with at least Service Pack 1, or Microsoft Office Word Viewer 2003, installed, you don't need the Word 2007 viewer. Fortunately, Microsoft had released the "Microsoft Office Compatibility Pack for Word file format", in November 19, 2007.

This pack will enable Microsoft Office 2000, Office XP, or Office 2003, to open, edit, and save Word files using the Word 2007 file format, although you may not be able to change some items that were created by using the new or enhanced features in Word 2007.

For examples, equations will become graphics, themes will be converted to styles, bibliography and citations will be converted to static text, and some charts and diagrams will converted to images. The changes are permanent (unless you didn't save the document).

Download here:
Microsoft Office Compatibility Pack for Word 2007

Disable Windows Autorun

This tip is useful for disabling Windows XP from running the Autorun.inf file.

REGEDIT4
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindows
NTCurrentVersionIniFileMappingAutorun.inf]
@="@SYS:DoesNotExist"

For further information, please go to

Nick Brown's blog

Backup folders with 7-zip command line

The 7-zip command line can be used to do a multiple folders backup. The good thing with 7-zip is that it support many compression method such as bzip2, gzip, zip and of course 7z.

Here are steps for doing a backup on multiple folders on Windows:

1. Download the 7-zip Command Line Version from http://www.7-zip.org/download.html.


2. Extract the content of the zip file to a temporary folder.


3. Copy 7za.exe to your system folder (for example C:\Windows\System32 for Windows XP).
   


4. Create a folder for your backup, for example C:\backup.


5. Create a text file in the C:\backup folder and name it backup.txt.


6. List the full path of the folders that will be backup, each on a new line.


7. Create a batch file in C:\backup folder and name it backup.bat.


8. In the backup.bat file, type
   7za u backup -up1q3r2x1y2z1w2 @backup.txt

To back up, just double click the backup.bat file. A command prompt will be opened and closed automatically when the backup process end.

As a result, you will get a backup file named backup.7z. The u command will instruct 7-zip to update the content of the backup.7z file or create a new one if backup.7z does not exist.

If you don't like the 7z compression method and would like to use the zip compression method instead, just add -tzip switch after the u command.

7za u -tzip backup @backup.txt

Now, the backup file that will be created is backup.zip.

To automatically run a backup at a specific time, please use the Scheduled Tasks feature for Windows XP.