Computer Hardware and Software
Posts tagged cool features
WPC 2010 Virtual Pressroom: Video Gallery
Jul 15th
Demo: The Personal Cloud
Corporate Vice President Brad Brooks shows off how Windows 7, Bing, Windows Live and other services connect to create a connected “personal cloud.”
[Video]
Have you made your decision to be a Mac or a PC?
May 31st
This is a video review of Mac versus Windows which shows both – the good and the bad – sides of PCs and Macs:
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Personally I made my decision to be a PC because I love to have control over every little part of the OS (using OpenBSD, Ubuntu Netbook Edition and various Windows).
What are you? (Mac, PC or both?) Please comment!
New Hotmail design and impressive upgrades!
May 18th
It’s official! Microsoft have just announced that Hotmail is getting a new design and some impressive upgrades!
Wow! Go to the preview website, and also read the announcement, this is good stuff. Hurry up and launch the new Hotmail please! Best of all, Hotmail will now be fully integrated with SkyDrive! This will be really useful. Every time I send or download an attachment in a Hotmail email, I feel there should be a SkyDrive button to go with it.
SkyDrive is rapidly becoming by far the most useful online storage facility, thanks to the new Hotmail, the new Office Live, and of course Office 2010 — all of which are integrated with SkyDrive and able to use this as their file storage system. SkyDrive is becoming my new hard drive – it has everything! (MS’s domination of the market with MS Office gives them an advantage that Google can only dream of. Google are planning to integrate their web-based office apps with their web-based storage, but they have taken too long, and besides the number of people using Google’s desktop publishing apps is negligible compared to MS Office and Windows.)
Here’s my wish-list of the features I want added to SkyDrive… If MS can give us these features, it would make SkyDrive absolutely perfect!
- The ability to upload bigger files (up to 5 GB would be nice)
- The ability to link directly to files on SkyDrive (by providing a permanent URL for a file on SkyDrive)
- A public API for SkyDrive (in fact, there already is an API, but we need it to be made public please!)
The Black Box Recorder
May 3rd
Every developer wishes there was a way that an end-users could quickly and simply record a repro for the problem that they’re running into that is unique to their machine.
Here a little tool from Windows 7 comes to the rescue!
The in-built diagnostic tool ”Problem Steps Recorder” provides a simple screen capture tool that enables you to record a series of actions. Once you hit “record”, it tracks your mouse and keyboard and captures screenshots with any comments you choose to associate alongside them. Once you stop recording, it saves the whole thing to a ZIP file, containing an HTML-based “slide show” of the steps.
It’s a really neat little tool and I can’t wait for it to become ubiquitous on every desktop! The program is called psr.exe; you can also search for it from Control Panel or the Start-Menu search under “Record steps to reproduce a problem”.
The Big Date is comming soon!
Apr 29th
Microsoft plans to release the productivity suite Office 2010 and SharePoint 2010 global on May 12 at 11 a.m. EDT. Now they even released a widget for this event you shouldn’t miss:
Microsoft plans to release the productivity suite Office 2010 and SharePoint 2010 global on May 12 at 11 a.m. EDT. Now they even released a widget for this event you shouldn’t miss:Access Skydrive with Windows Explorer
Apr 24th
Some of you may have noticed that I now prefer using Skydrive service from Microsoft if I want to share files. This free Service lets you use 25 GB of online space for free for storing anything you want for your personal use. You can use this to store your files and can be accessed anywhere anytime using your Windows live sign in username and password adding a considerable amount of security.
Normally You need a Browser to access it using a internet enabled system. Sometime this is not a great way to access your files. Skydrive Explorer is such a tool which can let you access 25 GB Skydrive with Windows Explorer without opening any browser.
SkyDrive Explorer is a free, easy-to-use, but very powerful extension for Windows Explorer. With SkyDrive Explorer you can make any every-day operations with your documents from Microsoft Live SkyDrive™ service (read more..) using Windows Explorer, as if they were on your computer.
Features:
- View the structure and contents of folders in SkyDrive™;
- View files information (type, size, creation date in GMT format);
- Create new root folders and subfolders;
- Copy files into the storage;
- Delete files and folders;
- Copy files from the storage to the computer;
- Copy folders and subfolders from the storage to the computer keeping their structure;
- Use Drag & Drop for files operations;
- Rename files and folders;
- Create links to SkyDrive™ folders on your computer;
- Copy URL of the selected object(s) to the Clipboard;
- Automatic check for the latest version;
- Bidirectional languages support;
- Selection of your preferred interface language;
Give it a try even if you are using other products like Microsoft Live Mesh or from other companies.
PS: The Free version of Skydrive Explorer should be fine for everyone. For rare cases where you would need the paid version, just use the Skydrive Website instead 
Google to begin indexing the internet in real-time?
Mar 4th
In a move that might rewrite the entire search market, Google is rumored to be creating a system that will let allow web publishers to submit content to Google for search indexing in real-time.
This of course follows the introduction of PubSubHubBub by Google, a tool to move syndicated content in real-time to aggregators. PubSubHubBub has become a hit among publishers looking to get their information into the market as quickly as possible.
This move by Google, if it comes to fruition, would be a super-PubSubHubBub, not just moving your content into Google Reader at light speed, but also into the hands of the tens of millions of people searching Google every few hours. It would be a bigger move towards a real-time web than Twitter will ever be.
Of course, this would give Google a strong leg up on Bing, and would tie internet publishers even tighter to the internet giant. Many already depend on Google Analytics and Feedburner in their publications Now with PubSubHubBub and the new tool, publishers not working on a Google platform would still be using Google tools to publish.
Is there no corner of the world where Google will not expand into?
Sure to be lost in any discussion are the internet searchers, who will benefit greatly from having the best data in real-time, all the time. Who loses? Microsoft, and any publisher not smart enough to jump on board.
Marshall Kirkpatrick has an excellent discussion of the technical aspects of the project, which we recommend that you read if you are a publisher.
When will this come out? We are not sure at the moment, but when it does, the earthquakes we resonate in search for years to come.
Windows 7 vs. Ubuntu 9.04 EyeCandy
Mar 2nd
I just found this nice video in Youtube:
You think thats impressive? Me too Looks cool – but do you really need all this eyecandy stuff? I like Windows 7 because it is just the right amount of visual cool looking stuff so you are able to work as efficient as possible. But this varies between each person.
PS: I have UBUNTU 9.10 as second multiboot system and it is really helpfull to impress other people 
Fun with Youtube!
Feb 23rd
No, this is not Photoshopped! Take one more look at the picture..
YouTube. The potential for a little deviance here is obvious. (Hint: click the read more link below…)
Peeking into Windows’s virtual store
Feb 22nd
In the user data area in Windows Vista, Server 2008 and Seven there is a folder called “VirtualStore” which you can find in C:\Users\[USERNAME]\AppData\Local\ .
It is worth having a peek now and again. Here’s part of mine:
image showing my VirtualStore folder
But what exactly is that folder for?
The Virtual Store is a feature of User Account Control, the centerpiece of Windows’ new enhanced security. Read the rest of this entry »