AddictiveTips » Asad

Pin Multiple Folders On Windows 7 Taskbar

Asad — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 18:00:50 +0000

The most noticeable and immaculate feature of Windows 7 is indeed its taskbar. It is as robust as previous versions of the taskbars and offers a new way of interacting with the applications. You can pin any shortcut so that they can be accessed right from the taskbar rather than the desktop or start menu search bar. But like any other things there is one shortcoming, you cannot pin your folders to it, which you might want to if you access them more frequently. Here is a great way to access your favorite shortcuts right from your taskbar in Windows 7.

7Stacks is a small and handy utility for Windows 7 that lets you create stack items which are more like standalone shortcuts. These stacked items behave like executables, which give an added advantage to use as many shortcuts as you want. The application requires only the source path of the folder to pin it to taskbar. Additionally, you can choose to caption the pinned item, select required stack type, create shortcut on desktop, and tweak other settings.

To create a new stack item, browse to the folder you want to use as a shortcut and give it a caption, and it will create a shortcut that you’ll be able to use it as any pinned regular taskbar item. For a change you also have option to view the contents of the folders as Grid or Menu view.

If you think that folder icon is a bit boring, you can also change it to Vista – esque glossy icon by selecting the option of Use – Transparent look from the main menu.

Download 7Stacks

Wasn’t it quite easy notching up the taskbar a bit? Enjoy!

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Firefox: Reset Multiple Accounts’ Passwords Concurrently

Asad — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 19:35:00 +0000

Do you have more than 8 to 10 accounts for signing in to different applications such as Google, Orkut, Facebook, Skype, internet banking etc which makes it difficult to remember each one’s password especially if you keep switching your computer from office or home. A safe practice is to keep all passwords in one secure location so that you may recall any password that you have forgotten or due to long time never login. However many of us tend to risk making the same password for every account in order to remember it easily. The common practice of most internet user has been creating the same password for all you accounts but if you think you regret this decision for security purposes and want to change multiple account passwords then you might want to know about Mass Password Reset.

Mss Password Reset is a Firefox add-on that lets you change passwords of multiple accounts simultaneously, the best thing about this add-on is that you can change the user name and password of a particular account right from your browser instead of going to each website and change the password manually.

It lets you change your passwords either on the basis of domain, username or password. For example you can change password of all accounts under google.com domain or reset the password of all accounts with same id or same password.

For further enhanced security this add-on lets you optionally create a master password to access Mass Password Reset add-on so that anybody that uses your computer may not be able to change your password.

Do keep us updated with your comments and suggestions and don’t forget to share this post with your friends.

Read Firefox: Reset Multiple Accounts’ Passwords Concurrently by Asad on AddictiveTips - Tech tips to make you smarter

How To Block And Filter Out Annoying Ads in Firefox

Asad — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 15:41:43 +0000

Are you annoyed by ridiculous ads that either pops up during browsing session or are displayed in almost all websites or blogs? Advertisements can be effective when they are relative and informative where users can actually get useful information about certain products but with ridiculous ads running all over in the website to generate profit is unacceptable. You may have received marketing messages while browsing either by pop ads or banner ads, despite these service details it gets annoying when random ads are bombarded in the middle of the browsing session. If you hate such kinds of ads, Firefox has a built-in pop up blocking feature. And to further block or filter out ads you can use Adblock plus.

Block Pop ups With Firefox Built-In Feature

Pop up windows can be blocked in Firefox that disables automatic image loading. By default it comes with this feature enables but if this setting has been changed, you can go to the menu bar, select Tools > Options > Content tab.

Check Block Pop-up windows and Load images automatically, if you don’t want pop-up ads to load their images automatically. But if you find certain sites that displays ads relevant to your browsing sessions then you can add an exception by clicking on exception tab and add the relative web address in the list.

Filter Ads Through Adblock Plus

Adblock Plus is an extensive addon and is one of the sole reasons I use Firefox, it blocks banner ads and replaces them with a blank space so that you may never notice an ad was in that place ever. Once user install this extension, they can hover mouse around a web page and point to the banner or ad , right clicking on it and choose Adblock from the menu.

Users can choose a filter subscription. A filter subscription lets users download filters from certain locations on the internet or on their disk automatically. By doing this users can use the filters created by others which will block most of the advertisements completely.

Enjoy ad-free browsing and don’t forget to send your comments and suggestions to us. Enjoy !

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Integrate Firefox, IE And Chrome Into One Browser With Lunascape 5.0

Asad — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 15:01:22 +0000

Do you switch between different browsers for daily activities when some of the sites don’t work properly in particular browser? Then you should consider using Lunascape 5.0(currently in Alpha version) which lets you integrate Microsoft Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox and Google Chrome into one powerful browser. With Lunascape you will have a choice of selecting the rendering engine for various incompatible websites to the other browser which makes switching between browser less tedious. It optimizes the most of the rendering engine that benefits the end user.

One of the best features of Lunascape is that it supports most of the common Internet Explorer add-ons and toolbars and is optimized with enhanced anti-crash technology which is based on JavaScript Execution for best possible performance.

The three rendering engines of all the browsers namely Gecko, WebKit and Trident can be selected by the users weather they open a new tab or a new window. The rendering engine can be changed even in the middle of the browsing session by right clicking on the tab easily.

This browser may come especially useful for web developers when they check the web content for compatibility issues with various rendering engines. This browser will keep on improving because its still in its alpha version but its worth a try if you are annoyed by switching between different browsers.

Got some opinion? Don’t forget to share it with us. Enjoy!

Read Integrate Firefox, IE And Chrome Into One Browser With Lunascape 5.0 by Asad on AddictiveTips - Tech tips to make you smarter

Firefox: Organize Tabs And Free Up Memory Usage

Asad — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 16:21:53 +0000

Do you work using multiple Firefox tabs and want to organize them categorically rather than chronologically? A new tab is opened right next to the last tab, by the time you open too many tabs it gets difficult to sift through to find the right tab, this is where an Add-On called TooManyTabs can come useful. If you have too many browser tabs in Firefox that you might want to categorize to differentiate, this utility will help you organize tabs in special rows and it also help to reduce memory usage by putting some of the tabs in idle state.

It comes up with a novel function to put the tabs which are not in used in an idle state without stalling the processor cycles.

You will also be able to restore up to 20 most recently tabs which might be useful for those who sift through same pages and don’t want to look up to to Firefox history. There is also a feature that allow them to mark different colors to tabs or even pin them for faster access.

This is a handy little extension that can come useful if you are a hardcore internet user. Got any opinion? Leave a comment.

Read Firefox: Organize Tabs And Free Up Memory Usage by Asad on AddictiveTips - Tech tips to make you smarter

Quickly Launch Applications In Windows With JetStart

Asad — Sun, 30 Nov 2008 19:10:53 +0000

Is your Start Menu or Quick Launch bar cluttered with application shortcuts? JetStart is an awesome tool that offers a quick access with categorized Start Menu shortcuts, recently launched programs and system commands. It allows multiple ways to access your applications by categorizing them into five generic categories, either by selecting items from a recently used list or newly added programs or simply search them by keyword etc.

JetStart offers plenty of features to simplify the way you launch your application by offering a Toolbar that allows you to quickly access any Windows application and also let you organize shortcuts with drag and drop functionality.

You can launch multiple programs at once or activate programs even by assigning special hot keys and drag files from Toolbar to Desktop easily. You can also re-order buttons on your Taskbar, it lets you simply drag and drop any Taskbar button to the new location with your mouse.

With more advanced Pro version you can have additional benefits of adding your own categories, controlling auto started application, activating toolbar by holding down both mouse buttons, and you also get to have free updates and priority support but it comes with a price.

Do keep us updated with your comments and suggestions. Enjoy!

Read Quickly Launch Applications In Windows With JetStart by Asad on AddictiveTips - Tech tips to make you smarter

Firefox: Disable Automatic File Scanning After Download

Asad — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 18:55:38 +0000

Firefox automatically scans the file after the download is complete which may cause exuberant amount of time in some low end computers. This function is vital to protect your computer from viruses, but you may find that it takes a lot more time in scanning if the file is huge. You can disable this feature if your antivirus is up to date and you don’t need Firefox to scan the file for you.

To disable this feature:

Type about:config in address bar and press Enter.

Click on “I will be careful, I promise!” button, now in the filter bar type,

browser.download.manager.scanWhenDone

You will see a Boolean value set as true by default just like its shown in the screenshot below.

To change the value to false just double click on the entry and it would change itself automatically.

And you are done. Enjoy !

Read Firefox: Disable Automatic File Scanning After Download by Asad on AddictiveTips - Tech tips to make you smarter

Firefox: Refresh Web Page Directly From Server Without Clearing Cache

Asad — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 18:44:47 +0000

Have you ever tried refreshing you webpage in Firefox and you experienced it displayed the cached version instead of downloading the page from the server? Mozilla Firefox is the most loved browser in the world and its not just the hatred towards Microsoft rather its the support of thousands of little add-ons and tweaks that make it the most customizable and secure browser. To further customize the way your browser behaves you can tweak Firefox to refresh the web page without clearing cache.

You may have experience this often that when you try to reload your webpage, Firefox sometimes shows the cached version instead of directly downloading the new content updated from the server. You can refresh instead of closing all the browser window by Pressing CTRL + F5, this way Firefox will directly request the data stream from the server instead of showing the cached version.

I hope this quick tips would make Firefox experience more seamless. Enjoy !

Read Firefox: Refresh Web Page Directly From Server Without Clearing Cache by Asad on AddictiveTips - Tech tips to make you smarter

Rip And Convert DVD Or Video File To MPEG-4(avi, mkv, etc)

Asad — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 16:48:39 +0000

Do you want to store videos from DVDs to your local drive in your computer without loosing the quality? HandBrake is one software that lets you convert the videos from DVDs without loosing much quality and since it is an open source project, it will always remain in development for further improvement and updates. It lets you rip and convert DVDs or video files to MPEG-4 video formats including .mp4, .avi, .ogm and even .mkv. This application is available for Windows, Mac OSX and Ubuntu Linux.

In order to Rip or convert a DVD image or video file, all you have to do is to browse your DVD disc or Video file, select appropriate format from the list of formats and press Start. It will take some time to convert depending on your computer’s specifications and will list you the converted video file in a designated folder.

HandBrake has been upgraded with newer improvements and enhancements that includes Universal input that accepts any type of DVD, that can be decoded with libavcodec and libavformat from the FFmpeg project as a source. It also includes improved video quality with new H.264 with enhanced picture quality through the use of psycho visual rate distortion and adaptive quantization. It has been optimized significantly to improve the speed of video conversions.

This application takes advantage of as many processors as possible and passes through the exact video framerate of the source instead of smoothing to a constant rate which leads to frames being dropped.

Do let us know your thoughts about this application. Enjoy !

Read Rip And Convert DVD Or Video File To MPEG-4(avi, mkv, etc) by Asad on AddictiveTips - Tech tips to make you smarter

Monitor Your PC Or Laptop Temperature – Windows 7,Vista,XP

Asad — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 21:24:19 +0000

Is your computer restarting itself more than often or is shutting down without any notice? One of the reasons might be that your computer has overheating problem. One of the best ways to monitor is to install temperature reading software that might help you actually know if the problem is causing by overheating. Coretemp is a tiny application which is low on resources and is surprisingly accurate. Intel and AMD’s new technology known as DTS(Digital Temperature Signal) let these applications help monitor the temperature accurately.

It is a tiny but extremely powerful and accurate program which tells you the temperature of each core simultaneously and can be easily installed on Windows 7, Windows Vista and Windows XP.

The best thing about this tool is that it displays the temperature of each core in the tray bar which doesn’t require you to click anywhere in the application itself to look at the current temperature.

You can find out more at AMD’s or Intel’s website about the optimal temperatures of the processors installed on your computer so that you can compare them with your own individual core temperatures easily and if you use over-clocked cpu then this utility should be a top priority!

Another great quality of this application is that it has low footprints on the resources and you can keep it running even if you are doing cpu intensive work.

Read Monitor Your PC Or Laptop Temperature – Windows 7,Vista,XP by Asad on AddictiveTips - Tech tips to make you smarter

Send Free Encrypted And Secure Text Messages Via Email

Asad — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 19:20:01 +0000

A few days back we covered how to send secure and encrypted email messages using lockbin. This service encrypts messages by applying hash functions such as MD5 or HS1, but what if you want to choose and apply different kinds of hash functions and encrypt the text yourself? There is a simple way of encrypting and decrypting text messages by using a free online tool known as Encrypt/Decrypt tool which is provided by WebMax that makes your text message even more secure by letting yourself choose the hash function and send the message to the sender.

This service is pretty direct and easy, all you have to do is to type your message and choose your own choice of hash function from the list which will encrypt the text message in a particular fashion and will look something like this:

When you have your message in encrypted form, you can email this text from any email service account and tell the sender to go to the same site and paste the text with the corresponding decrypting hash function which you used to encrypt the text, in this way your receiver will have the text message reverted back to its original form.

This site is very useful for quickly sending secure and encrypted text through email, text message or even instant message, all you have to make sure is that other than your receiver no one else should get to know about the site and your encryption method.

Read Send Free Encrypted And Secure Text Messages Via Email by Asad on AddictiveTips - Tech tips to make you smarter

Quickly Merge Multiple Music Or Audio Files Into One

Asad — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 18:01:44 +0000

Do you have multiple files in an audio book and you are looking for ways to merge them into one file? Or you have many mp3 files that you would like to join and listen to them all in one go? Merge Mp3 lets you do exactly that. You can use this application to drag and drop audio files into the playlist either change the order or keep the same, listen to it before mixing them all with preview option and convert all of them into one single MP3 even with ID3 meta data.

This software allows you to merge as many audio files as you want and doesn’t restrain you in the size of an audio file. You can sort files by their filenames, date/time and size and can optionally write ID3v1 and ID3v2 tags into the merged MP3 file.

You can also view detailed information about the audio files to be merged including the header and ID3v1 and ID3v2 information. It also display an image embedded into the MP3 files and plays MP3 files from the list.

Do let us know if you find this application useful. Enjoy!

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