Thursday, April 12, 2012

How to Connect Two Computers Without a Router

This guide describes how you can directly connect two computers for sharing files, photos, music and even your Internet connection. This method uses an inexpensive Ethernet crossover cable and doesn't require a router.

Let’s assume you have two computers at home and you want to connect them together so that you can easily share an internet connection between the two machines or transfer photos, music and other files from one computer to another. How do you do this?

Connect Two Computers Directly

There are two options – you can either buy a router or, if you are looking for something more simple and don’t want to spend money on new networking hardware, you can connect the two computers using a commonly-available cable. The latter method doesn’t involve any complicated network settings and you will still be able to share files, internet connection, and even printers between computers.
Things you need:
To set up this basic wired home network, all you need is an inexpensive Ethernet crossover cable and the other requirement is that network cards* (also known as LAN or Ethernet cards) should be installed on each of you computers.
[*] This should not be an issue because network cards are available on most newer machines by default but if you are working with a very old computer, you can either attach an internal LAN card to your computer’s motherboard or go for a USB Network adapter that will turn a USB port into an Ethernet (RJ45) port.




An Ethernet crossover cable looks like a standard Ethernet cable but the internal wiring is a little different. You can purchase crossover cables at Amazon.com or from your local computer store. If you have trouble finding them, you can purchase an inexpensive crossover adaptor and that will let you use any standard Ethernet cable as a crossover cable.

Connect Computers with an Ethernet Crossover Cable

Before connecting the two computers with a physical cable, make sure that both machine are using the same workgroup*. Here is step-by-step guide that explains how you can change the workgroup of your computers.
Changing workgroup in Windows XP – From the Start menu, right-click “My Computer.” Select Properties in the drop-down menu, and then select the second tab that says “Computer Name” from the System Properties window. Now click the “Change…” button, enter a unique Workgroup name and reboot your computer.
1. My Computer - Properties 2. Change Workgroup Name 3. Save Workgroup Name and Reboot

Changing workgroup in Windows 7 or Vista – Open the Control Panel, type “Workgroup” in the search box, and select the entry that says “Change Workgroup Name.” Click the “Change…” button, enter a Workgroup name and restart the computer. Windows 7 users can skip one step; simply type “Workgroup” in the search box in the start menu, and select the first entry, then proceed as above.
1. Search Workgroup from Control Panel  2. Change Workgroup - Vista or Windows 7  3. Assign Workgroup Name
Now that the workgroups are same for both computers, connect the two computers together using the Ethernet crossover cable. Simply plug-in one end of the crossover cable into the network adapter of Computer A and connect the other end of the cable to the network adapter of Computer B.
Windows will automatically recognize the new network, and you can now easily view files and folder that the other computer has shared. Simply open Networks from the Start Menu (or the Control Panel), and you should see the other computer by its name. You can then browse any shared files on the other computer, and can even utilize shared printers.

Troubleshooting – If you do not see the other computer under Networks, you probably have a prompt at the top of your Network window saying that Network discovery is turned off (screenshots below). Select “Turn on Network Discovery and File Sharing.”  In the next prompt, select “No, make the network I am connected to a private network.”  Now you should see the other computer on the home network.
1. Turn on network discovery 2. Turn Off File Sharing for Public Networks
[*] While it is possible to share files between two computers connected with a crossover cable without making them part of the same workgroup, the method will only work if both computers have this network set as a private network, and may still cause problems. It is therefore advisable to have both computers on the same workgroup before sharing files and printers.

Share an Internet Connection Between Two Computers

There are scenarios where you may want to share the same internet connection between two computers. For instance:
Situation A - You have setup a Wi-Fi network at home but your old desktop computer doesn’t have a wireless network card. In that case, you can use the laptop to connect to the internet wirelessly and then share that same connection with the desktop over a crossover Ethernet cable.
Situation B – You have a netbook with a built-in cellular data connection. You can share that connection with any another computer at home through the crossover Ethernet cable.
Situation C – You use a (slow) Wireless USB modem with your laptop computer while your desktop is connected to an ADSL Broadband line and there’s no router at home. For any bandwidth intensive tasks, like when you want to backup photos from your laptop to an online service, you can connect the laptop to the desktop and things will happen much faster.
OK, let’s look at the steps required for sharing an Internet connection.
First, if you only wish to share internet connection and not files, both computers need not belong to the same workgroup. All you need to do is to connect the two computers with the Ethernet crossover cable, and then turn on Internet connection sharing in the computer that already has an Internet connection. The instructions vary for different versions of Windows:

For Windows XP – Select “Network and Internet Connections” from the Control Panel and click “Network Connections.”
 1. Network and Internet Connections 2. Change Network Connection Properties 3. Allow Internet Connection Sharing
Right-click on the network connection you wish to share (the one connected to the internet), select Properties, click on the “Advanced” tab, and then check the box that says “Allow other network users to connect through this computer’s Internet connection.”  Click OK, and the second computer that you have connected to this computer with the Crossover Cable should have internet access now.

For Windows 7 and Vista – Open Control Panel, enter “network connections” in the search box on the top right and select “View Network Connections.”
Vista - Share internet connection 1 Vista-7 - Share Internet Connection 2 Vista-7 - Share Internet connection 3
Right-click on the network connection you wish to share (this must be the one connected to the internet) and select Properties. Select the "Sharing" tab and then check the option that says “Allow other network users to connect through this computer’s Internet connection.” Click OK, and the other computer you have connected to this Windows 7 or Vista computer should have internet access now.

Thankyou@dattu.

Keep your Online Accounts Safe and Secure

You probably use strong and unique passwords do protect your accounts safe but is that enough? This page provides a security checklist and tips to keep your online accounts safe and secure.

online accounts
You probably use strong and unique passwords to prevent hackers from taking over your online accounts but is that enough? Maybe yes but I can’t say that with enough confidence because my Google and Facebook accounts have been compromised in the past despite using very complex passwords that can’t be easily guessed.
Like most other people, I have a few dozen online accounts now and have spent the last few days evaluating the security and recovery options for each one of them. In response, I have taken a few extra steps, listed below, that I think may help improve the overall security of these accounts. If you find anything useful in the list, do try implementing it in your own workflow for better piece of mind.

A Security Checklist for Online Accounts

#1. I have enabled the “Always use HTTPS” setting for Facebook, Twitter, Gmail, Google and all the other online services that support secure HTTP. This is especially important when accessing Internet over a Wi-Fi network because without HTTPS, anyone (and not just skilled hackers) can capture your login details using Firesheep, a simple Firefox extension.
#2. I have a few Google Accounts and they all use 2-step verification now. That means if someone tries to log into my Google account from a different computer, they’ll have to type an additional code that is sent directly to my mobile phone as an SMS text message or over a voice call.
#3. The 2-step verification can also alert you to potential hacking activity. If I ever get an SMS (or a voice call) from Google with the verification code but without requesting one, it is an immediate hint that someone knows my password though they won’t be able to get in without entering the verification code.
#4. I have connected my mobile number with my Facebook account. This is extremely important because I get an instant SMS and an email alert whenever my Facebook account is accessed from a different computer or another mobile phone.
#5. I carefully reviewed third-party sites that have access to my online accounts and revoked access to all the unwanted apps that I no longer use. In case you wish to do the same for your accounts, here are the direct links for Facebook, Google and Twitter.
#6. I maintain two email addresses – one is public that is displayed on the blog while the other email address is known to a select few. Why?
6a. The public email address is associated with services like Twitter, YouTube, Facebook, Foursquare, LinkedIn, Flickr, Tumblr, Posterous, Skype and a couple of other social sites where I want people to find me if they have my email address in their address book.
6b. I use the other “secret” email address with services like Dropbox, Amazon, Google Apps, my bank, my hosting service, Apple iTunes, PayPal and few other places where account security is even more critical and where I am not looking to get social.
#7. If I am testing a new online service, I almost always use a disposable email address to create a test account with that service. Some online services reject disposable addresses to prevent fake registrations but the one I use goes through as it is only an alias (or nickname) of my main email address.
#8. I prefer using a virtual credit card with shopping sites that I am either using for the first time or where the fine print is too long and there’s a risk that I could be billed again if I don’t cancel the account. This also helps keep my credit card safe from relatively unknown sites.
#9. Once in a while, I do mock drill with my most important online accounts to test the various recovery options I would have in case I forget my password or if I lose access to my secondary email address or misplace my mobile phone.
#10. The last point – how do I remember and manage so many different passwords?
Some people prefer to use password managers which are very convenient but at this time, all I use is a simple 1-page document (see sample) to store information of all my online accounts and the corresponding passwords. This file is password-protected and I put it on Dropbox so the information is available on all my computers.
This may surprise some but I also have a hard copy of this file that family members can refer to in case I am travelling and they need urgent access to any of my online accounts. Also, since they would need my mobile phone to access my Gmail or Google account, I have included backup verification codes in the printed document itself – thus the Google account can be used without requiring the phone.
One more thing. If you have two email accounts, never ever set one emails as the secondary (or recovery) email address of the other. That’s because if one of your email accounts gets compromised, the hacker can easily take over the other account as well.

Thankyou@dattu.

Browse the Web Faster on a Slow Internet Connection

Browse the Web faster: If your current Internet speed is very slow and you are living in an area where broadband connections are still not available, here are some tips and tricks to help you download web pages faster on your computer.

If your current Internet speed is very slow and you are living in an area where broadband connections are still not available, here are some ideas to help you download web pages faster on your computer. You may use the same tips to  improve your web browsing experience on a sluggish USB modem.

Surf the Web Faster on Slow Internet

1. Turn off web images, the Adobe Flash plug-in, Java Applets and JavaScript from your browser settings as these files are often the bulkiest elements of any web page.
2. Increase the size of your browser cache. If the static parts of a site (like background graphics, CSS, etc) are stored in the local cache, your browser can safely skip downloading these files when you re-visit the site in future thus improving speed.
3. Sometimes the slow DNS server of your ISP can be a bottleneck so switch to OpenDNS as it can resolve website URLs into IP addresses more quickly. If you aren’t too happy about OpenDNS redirecting your Google queries, follow this simple hack.
4. Finch can serve a light-weight version of any website in real-time that is free of all bells and whistles. For instance, the New York Times homepage with all external resources can weigh more than a MB but Finch trims down the size by 90% so the site loads more quickly on a slow web connection.
5. Flinch (mentioned at #4) is good for reading regular websites but if you just need to check the latest articles published on your favorite blogs, use BareSite. This service will automatically detect the associated feed of a website and render content quickly inside a minimalist interface.
6. The Google Transcoder service at google.com/gwt/n can split large web pages into smaller chunks that will download more quickly on your computer (or mobile phone).
7. Monitor your Internet speed to determine hours when you get the maximum download speed from the ISP. Maybe you can then change your surfing schedule a bit and browse more during these "off peak" hours.
8. You can use a text browser like Lynx or Elinks for even faster browsing. It downloads only the HTML version of web pages thus reducing the overall bandwidth required to render websites.
9. When searching for web pages on Google, you can click the "Cache" link to view the text version of a web page stored in the Google Cache. Alternatively, install this GM script as it adds a "cached text only" link near every "Cached" link on Google Search pages.
10. Move your web activities offline as far as possible. You can send & receive emails, write blogs and even read feeds in an offline environment. Also see: Save Web Pages for offline reading.
11.  You can interact with websites like Flickr, Google Docs, Slideshare, etc. using simple email messages. Uploading a new document to Google Docs via email would require less bandwidth than doing it in the browser because you are avoiding a trip to the Google Docs website.
12. Applying the same logic, you may also consider using tools like Web In Mail or Email The Web as they help you browse websites via email. Just put the URL of a page (e.g., cnn.com) in the subject field of your email message and these services will send you the actual page in the reply.
13. Bookmarklets are like shortcuts to your favorite web services. You neither have to open the Gmail Inbox for composing a new email message nor do you have to visit Google Translate for translating a paragraph of text. Add relevant bookmarklets to your browser bar and reduce the number of steps required to accomplish a task.
14. Use the netstat command to determine processes, other than web browsers, that may be secretly connecting to Internet in the background. Some of these processes could be consuming precious bandwidth but you can block them using the Firewall.
15. Use URL Snooper to determine non-essential host names that a website is trying to connect while downloading a web page. You may block them in future via the hosts file or use Adblock Plus to filter out advertising banners on web pages.
16. If you don’t want to spoil your web surfing experience by stripping images and other graphic elements from  a web page, get Opera Turbo. It will first fetch the requested web page on to its own server and then send it to your machine in a compressed format. Opera Turbo won’t change the layout of a web site but can lower the image resolution so that they load faster on slow Internet.
17. Change the user agent of your desktop browser to that of a mobile phone like Apple’s iPhone or Windows Mobile. This will help you browse certain web sites like Google News, WSJ, etc. much faster because they’ll serve you a light-weight and less cluttered mobile version of their sites thinking you’re on a mobile phone.

Thankyou@dattu.

Take Good Photos with your Camera Phone

You don’t need a mobile phone with a 8-megapixel camera to take good pictures, your existing camera phone with a 3-MP camera can also capture great shots if you follow these simple rules.

camera phone pictureDigital cameras bundled with mobile phones are getting better and better with more megapixels, better quality lenses, storage space, resolution, focusing, video capabilities, facial recognition and flash.
That said, you don’t really need an high-end smartphone with a 8-megapixel camera to take good pictures. A decent camera phone with a 3-megapixel sensor is good enough for that everyday candid, lifestyle shots one tends to take.

The best camera is the one that’s with you
I cannot carry my DSLR everywhere and I am often find myself in such a situation where I see a frame and I do not have my camera with me. As a photographer I am more fearful of losing the moment than fearful of the quality of images that the camera will produce.
I don’t find it embarrassing to take out my Blackberry 8900, equipped with a 3.2MP camera and 2X digital zoom, for clicking a street scene. A good photograph is not always dependent on the device it is shot with. My camera doesn’t make my images, I do. To quote a very popular new media photographer Chase Jarvis – “The best camera is the one that’s with you.”
leisure conversations marine drive
While one cannot argue that smaller censor of the camera makes it difficult to produce sharp, noise free images, there are a few tricks one should learn while shooting with his/her phone camera phone.

Tips for Taking Good Pictures with your Camera Phone
#1. Settings – As a photographer, I do not like shooting in the Auto mode of my DSLR as I do not want the camera to make decisions regarding how my picture should come out. Similarly for a camera phone if you have options of changing the settings try to change them as per your needs.
Turn off the flash when it is not required. I feel the bad quality of the flash ruins the photos most times and hence I do not like shooting with it and try to get additional light sources in and around the subject I am shooting. If you are shooting indoors and your camera phone has a setting for that then experiment with the setting first. Many camera phones have the option of changing the resolution of the pictures. Always shoot in the maximum resolution so you can capture the maximum details.
#2. Lights – Photography is all about Light, the one that lights up your heart. What is photography but play of light? Even while shooting with the camera, one needs to know how to read the available light looking at the conditions around. The best phone camera pictures are taken in plenty of light. Typically that is when one can try and reduce the noise levels and getter better results.

Different lights impact the color in your images in different manner. If your phone camera has the basic white balance features then experiment with them to get the near possible match. Be aware that your phone camera may not have the advanced features of a high end DSLR but a lot can also be fixed with touching up the images late. Most of the photos shot by the Blackberry have used light to its advantage; a couple were shot as backlits in extreme sunlight to bring out the translucent textures of the objects.
#3. Hold it steady – Do you often complain of blurry images while shooting with your phone camera? There is a possibility it has a slow shutter speed and is prone to blurs with a little shake here and there. Often there is a delay between the release of the shutter and the actual click of the phone. That is the moment when a little movement will create bad blurs.
Holding the camera really steady and even after the shutter is released, keep it steady for a few seconds more just to be sure. You could also try supporting the phone on a few books, table, against the table vase and get sharper images. Having said that, take advantage of the slow shutter speed and capture a couple of good motion blurs images. I usually make use of my HTC Tattoo’s slow shutter speed, which is a nuisance otherwise to create abstracts.

#4. Avoid zooming in -  The built-in zoom in most phone cameras are not optical but digital. Hence, it is advisable to not zoom in to compose a picture because you are not really zooming.
Fill up your frame by moving closer to the subject. This is to take care of the issue of subjects looking smaller than usual when shot on the phone which is due to the smaller resolution which is typical of phone cameras. Cropping could be a good solution to that but it can lead to pixilation.

#5. Experiment – Phone cameras allow greater flexibility in shooting. With their compact sizes, they can easily be tucked into that shirt pocket or that tiny clutch. Easy shots at any fashionable get-together or a wedding without carry a big DSLR and appearing clumsy. Experimenting with different angles, compositions is more possible since the device will fit* into any nook or cranny and since a few camera phones have timers it makes it so much easier to get that elusive shot with a little planning.
[*] I have sneaked in my phone when my DSLR wasn’t allowed at the Ajmer Dargah and captured an image sneakily.
Regardless of where I use it I do not miss, ‘missing the moment’ anymore since both my phone cameras given near perfect images whenever I want and depending on how I use them in those light/temperature conditions . These pictures can also be printed on an A4 size paper after proper post processing for optimum output.
The author Paromita Deb Areng is a photographer and an avid phoneographer. She dabbles in People, Abstracts, Fine Art, and Street and Travel photography. 

Thankyou@dattu.

How to Open Files that have Unknown Extensions

How you can identify the format of files that have an unknown extension or don't even have an extension. Also find the associate program to open that file type.

Extensions, or the characters that precede the last period in a file name, help you determine the type of a file (is it an image, a video or something else) and you immediately know which software program is required to preview that file.
However, you may sometimes come across files that either have unknown extensions or don’t have any extension at all. How do you then determine the associated application that is required to open a file when you don’t recognize the file type itself?

torrent file extension

Research Unknown File Extensions with Wolfram

The first thing you are likely to do is “google” for the file extension but there is an easier open as well. Go to Wolfram Alpha and just search for the file extension with the dot (or period) – see example.
Wolfram won’t just reveal the technical details of that file extension – like the developer and MIME type – but also generates a list of software programs that you may use to open that file on your computer – see sample results.

Identifying Files that don’t have an Extension

If a file doesn’t have an extension, you can still identify the format of that file from its signature. All known file types have a standard and unique signature (screenshot) and this data is stored in the file itself. There are programs that can read this signature* and determine the file format even if the extension is missing from the file name.
The most popular program in the category of file identifiers is TrIDNet. First download and unzip the TrIDNet utility and the associated XML definition files in the same directory. Then open the TrIDNet.exe file, press the “Rescan Defs” button to load the file signatures (you only need to do this once) and then drag-drop any unknown files that you wish to analyze.
identify unknown files
It will show the different file types that match with the file’s signature and you can then use Wolfram Alpha again to learn about the different programs that can be used to open that particular file type. Do remember to rename the files after identification (press F2, prefix a dot with the extension).
[*] You can also determine the file signature of any known file format using Wolfram itself – use the query “<extension> file signature” as in this example.

Thankyou@dattu.

The Best Tools for Content Curation

A content curation tool lets you pull videos, images, presentations, tweets, blog posts and other web content into a bundle which you can then easily embed and share on the web.

Let’s say your team has just launched a new product at some conference and they have asked you to collate all the conversations and buzz happening around that product on various websites, blogs and social sites. You have to act fast because the stuff that gets shared on the real-time web often gets buried almost as quickly.
So how should you go about collecting stuff around the Internet? Should you just save everything that’s being said to your browser bookmarks? Or maybe put all the web clippings in an Excel sheet as that would be easy to share? Or how about capturing screenshot images of the chatter?
There are umpteen ways to do this but what you should really look at is a dedicated content curation tool that is designed to capture web content with minimal effort.

content curation

Don’t Bookmark, Curate Online Content

A content curation tool, in simple English, lets you easily pull videos, images, presentations, tweets, blog posts and other web content into a collection which you can then embed, publish or share online. I have been testing a few online curation tools and here’s a quick review of them all to help you pick the right one for your needs.
The way these content curation tools work is quite similar to Evernote’s web clipper. You install an add-on for your browser, or a bookmarklet, and then clip content with a click.
The first tool that I tested is Bundlr available at gobundlr.com. Bundlr can automatically recognize content on YouTube, Flickr, SlideShare, Twitter and a couple of other sites. Alternatively, you may select an image or a text snippet on a page and add it to your bundle. The bundle may then be embedded in another page or you can publish it as a standalone page.

Bundlr makes clipping pages really simple, especially when you are collecting individual tweets, but I wish it supported more services and the overall layout of the bundle doesn’t look all that nice (see example).
Next in the list is curated.by – it offers a Chrome extension that adds a “Curate” button next to every single tweet on twitter.com and you can thus save any of them to your bundle with a simple click – no  pop-ups needed. Curated.by can also be used for curating media content from around the web in the same bundle (see example).
Then you’ve everyone’s favorite curation service called Storify. You can add items to your Storify collection in two ways – there’s the bookmarklet to curate content from any public webpage and then you also have an integrated search where you can add items by simple drag and dropping. For instance, you may search public updates on Facebook or Twitter and drag any of them to your collection without leaving the Storify website. This works with Google search results and RSS feeds as well.
The designers at Storify have done an excellent job with the formatting and this makes your overall collection look really good (see example). You can embed Storify collections as a JavaScript widget but the most-unique part is that you can also “publish” the story to your Tumblr or WordPress blog as a new article (so you also get the SEO benefit).
You may also want to check out the new version of delicious service for curation. They have added “Stacks” which are like a collection of bookmarks but the difference is that stacks can display media content inline without you having to click the bookmark. For instance, if you bookmark a Flickr page, the corresponding picture will included in the stack page automatically and the same is true for YouTube videos or Slideshare presentations.

Unlike any other curation tool, Delicious stacks include a thumbnail feature so if you bookmark a web page, the thumbnail image of that page will automatically get included in the media view (see example). I will however give maximum points to Storify because, other than presenting your curated stories inside a clean and beautiful layout, Storify also lets you easily publish them to other sites.

Thankyou@dattu.

How to Remote Control your Windows PC with Email or SMS

Learn how to shutdown or lock your computer via email, Internet or SMS text messages from the mobile phone. You can take screenshots, terminate process or even download files via simple twitter commands.

It’s a long weekend and you’re happy because you’ll get to spend the next three days with your family. You left the office in an excited mood but as the cab was approaching home, you suddenly realized that you forgot to shut down the Office PC. Oops!
computer worries
It’s a sinking feeling because there’re so many confidential documents on the computer and since most of your trusted colleagues have also left for the day, there’s no point calling them for help.
So what do you do? Drive back to Office? Well that’s not required – just take out your cell phone or switch on the laptop at home, send an email (or an SMS or a tweet) and that will instantly lock your Office workstation. And if you share the same computer with multiple people, you can use another email command to remotely log off or even shut down the computer from anywhere in the world.
twitter commandsThere’s no magic here, it’s the power of TweetMyPC utility that lets you remote control your computer from a mobile phone or any other Internet connected computer.
It works like this. You first install the free TweetMyPC utility on any Windows PC and associate your Twitter account. The app will silently monitor your Twitter stream every minute for any desktop commands and if it finds one, will act upon it immediately. The initial version of TweetMyPC was limited to basic shutdown and restart commands, however the current v2 has a far more robust set of commands, enabling a far more useful way of getting your PC to carry out certain tasks especially when you’re AFK (Away From Keyboard).
Before we get started, it may be a good thing if you can set up a new twitter account for remote controlling your desktop and also protect the status updates of this account to ensure better security.
Protecting the account means that you prevent other users from reading your tweets which in this case are email commands that you sending to the computer. To protect your Twitter profile, log in to Twitter with the credentials you want to use, click Settings and check the box next to "Protect my Updates".
Let’s get started. Install the TweetMyPC utility of your computer and associate your Twitter and Gmail account with the application. It will use Twitter to receive remote commands (like shutdown, log-off, lock workstation, etc) from while the email account will be used for send your information (e.g., what process are currently running on your computer).

How to Send Commands to the Remote Computer

Now that your basic configuration is done, it’s time to set up a posting method. You can use email, SMS, IM, web or any of the Twitter clients to send commands to the remote computer.
By Email: Associate you Twitter account with Posterous (auto-post) and all email messages sent to twitter@posterous.com will therefore become commands for the remote computer. (Also see: Post to Twitter via Email)
By SMS: If you live in US, UK, Canada, India, Germany, Sweden or New Zeleand, you can send associate Twitter with your mobile phone (see list of numbers) and then control your remote computer via SMS Text Messages.
By IM: Add the Twitter bot – twitter@twitter.com – to your list of Google Talk buddies and you can then send commands via instant message.
By Web:If you are on vacation but have access to an internet connected laptop, just log into the Twitter website and issue commands (e.g., shutdown or logoff) just as another tweet.
lock computer shutdown

Download Files, Capture Remote Screenshots & more..

While the TweetMyPC is pretty good for shutting down a remote computer, it lets you do some more awesome stuff as well.
For instance, you need to download an unfinished presentation from the office computer so that you can work on it at home. Or you want to download a trial copy of Windows 7 on the Office computer while you are at home.
Here’s a partial list of commands that you can use to remote control the PC – they’re case-insensitive and, as discussed above, you can send them to Twitter via email, SMS, IM or the web.
Screenshot : This is one of the most useful command I’ve come across after the shutdown command. Want to know what’s happening within the confines of your PC when you’re not around? Just tweet screenshot and TweetMyPC will take a screenshot of your desktop and post it to the web (see example).
ShutDown, LogOff, Reboot, Lock : The function of these useful commands is pretty obvious from their names.
Standby, Hibernate : Don’t want to shutdown the remote PC? Save power by entering standby mode with this command. Or hibernate your PC with a tweet, thereby saving even more power.

Download <url> : You can download any file from the Internet on to the remote computer using the download command. For instance, a command like download http://bit.ly/tCJ9Y will download the CIA Handbook so you have the document ready when you resume work the next day.
GetFile <filepath> : The Download command was for downloading files from the Internet onto the remote computer. However, if you like to transfer a file from the remote computer to your current computer, use the GetFile command. It takes the full page of the file that you want to download and will send that you as an email attachment. If you don’t know the file page, use the command GetFileList <drivename> to get a list of file folders on that drive.
GetProcessList : This is like a remote task manager. You’ll get a list of programs that are currently running on the remote computer along with their process IDs. Send another command kill <process id> to terminate any program that you think is suspicious or not required.

Conclusion:
TweetMyPC is a must-have utility and you never know when you may need it. And if you have been trying to stay away from Twitter all this time, the app gives you a big reason to at least create one protected account on Twitter.
twitter whale gmail whale
That said, there’s scope for improvement. For instance, the app will wait for a minute to check for new messages in your Twitter stream so it’s not "instant". The developers can actually increase that limit because the Twitter API now allows upto 100 checks per hour.
And since the app is dependent on Twitter and Gmail, it will not work during those rare fail-whale moments.

Thankyou@dattu.

Expand the Range of your Wireless Network with any Old Router

This step-by-step guide describes how you can add a second wireless router to your existing home network and extend the range of the Wi-Fi signal. The router will work as a Wireless Access Point.

The wireless range offered by your router will vary depending on which Wi-Fi standard it supports – is it 802.11g or 802.11n compatible? – and whether there are any walls around as that will obstruct the Wi-Fi signal.
The 802.11n routers, also known as Wireless N routers, typically have a higher Wi-Fi range but even if you get one of these, the wireless signals may still not reach certain areas of your home – like the corner study or the bedroom on the first floor – as there are just too many obstructions in the form of walls between your laptop and the router.

Expand your Wireless Network’s Range with an Old Router

What should you therefore do to ensure that the Wi-Fi signals are available in full strength in every corner of your house?
You can easily extend your Wi-Fi network with some additional hardware – like Wi-Fi repeaters and Wireless Access Points – but if you want to save a few bucks, just get hold of an old wireless router that you no longer use and connect it to your existing router using an inexpensive Ethernet cable.
wifi diagram
Our premises is around 100 feet by 200 feet with plenty of walls (see the above illustration) and yet there’s wireless Internet access available in almost every part of the house.
The setup is extremely simple. All I have is a main Wireless-N router connected to the ISP provide modem. Then there’s a second wireless router (Wireless-G) that is connected to the main router over an Ethernet or Cat-5 cable.

Use a Second Router as an Access Point

Let’s call our routers OBAMA (the router that you are already using with your wireless home network) and PALIN (the second router that you want to add to increase your wireless range).

A: Note the Settings of the Main Router

Step 1: First we need to determine the IP address of OBAMA (our existing router). Copy-paste the following command in the Windows Run box and note the value of “Default Gateway.” That your router’s IP address.
cmd /k ipconfig
Let’s assume the router’s IP address is 192.168.30.1. Also make note of the Subnet Mask value which is usually 255.255.255.0.
Step 2: Open your web browser and type the router’s IP address, that you determined earlier, into the address bar. If you are using IE, you might want to add http:// to the address else IE may throw an error.
You’ll now have to provide a password for accessing the router settings. This will vary depending on your router’s manufacturer – just Google for “<brand name> default router password” or try the standard combinations like admin/admin, admin/password and admin/<blank> (no password).
Step 3: Once you are in the settings of OBAMA router, switch to wireless settings and make a note of the Wireless mode, the SSID and the channel.
If you have protected your Wi-Fi with a password, also note down the security mode used (WPA, WEP or WPA2) and your secret passphrase.

B: Configure the Second Router

Step 4: Next we need to configure PALIN, our second router.
First reset the router PALIN to factory defaults by hard-pressing the reset button for about 10 seconds. Now  connect PALIN to your computer using the Ethernet cable. Put one end of the cable in any of the LAN ports available on the router and the other end to your computer’s Ethernet port. Make sure the router is powered on.
Step 5: Open the browser and type 192.168.1.1 – the default internet IP address of your PALIN router. If you are not using a Linksys router, try 192.168.0.1 which is the default for Netgear and D-Link routers.
Once you are in, you need to change the values of the default SSID, Wireless mode, the channel, the security mode and the passphrase such that they match with your OBAMA router.
Then go to Setup –> Advanced routing and change the current mode from Gateway to Router. Next disable DHCP Server since our primary OBAMA router will handle the task of assigning IP addresses to devices connecting to the wireless network.
Finally, change the IP address of the PALIN router to any free address in your LAN. For instance, if the IP address of OBAMA router is 192.168.30.1, you can safely assign 192.168.30.2 to PALIN. Also make sure that the Subnet mask is the same as determined in Step 1. Save settings.

C: Connect the Two Routers

Now that we have configured the routers, it’s time to connect them with wires.
Your existing OBAMA Router probably has five (1+4) ports – the WAN port here (or the Internet port) should be connected to the ISP provide modem as before. Pick any of the available LAN ports on the router and connect it to any of the LAN ports on the PALIN router using an Ethernet cable. That’s it.




router connection

Now that everything is setup, you can connect your computer and mobile devices to the second router using either a wired connection (the three ports are still free) or over Wi-Fi.
Since we have assigned the same SSID and security settings to the second router, you don’t have to configure anything on your laptop as you move around the house*. Also, as we are just expanding the reach of an existing wireless network and not creating a new one, all your shared folders, music libraries, photos, and other files will be accessible from all computers and mobile devices that are connected to the home network.
[*] You may also split your existing wireless network by connecting a router. This method will create an additional wireless network and the two won’t be able to see or talk to each other.

Thankyou@dattu.

Use Scary Wireless Names to Discourage Wi-Fi Theft

Are neighbors piggybacking on your Wi-Fi network? Learn about simple ways to prevent neighbors from using your wireless Internet without permission.

wireless router lightsThe data LED of your wireless router is constantly blinking and none of the family members are using the Internet at home. This might indicate that someone outside – probably one of your neighbors – is enjoying the web using your Wireless network.

Are neighbors using your Wi-Fi network?
If you would like to confirm this, type the router’s IP address in the browser – here’s how to find the router’s IP Address – and open the DHCP Client Table (it is under Status –> Local Network –> DHCP Server for Linksys routers). This shows a list of all devices connected to your wireless network including those of strangers.

What can you do prevent Wi-Fi theft?
You can’t block the Wi-Fi signals from reaching your neighbor’s house but there are several things you may do to prevent them from piggybacking on your wireless network. Some of the well-known techniques to secure your Wireless network include:

1. Setup a password for your Wi-Fi network – Open your router’s admin dashboard and set the wireless security mode to either WPA, WPA2 or WEP (use WPA2-mixed if possible). Now people would have to know the password before they can join your Wi-Fi network.
2. Use MAC Address Filtering – Your laptop computer, mobile phone, tablet and all other gadgets have a unique MAC address. Go to your router’s dashboard and under the Wireless Mac Filter section, add the MAC addresses of all your known devices so that only whitelisted devices can access your wireless Internet.
Discourage neighbors from using your Wi-Fi
Most people in the neighborhood, who are connecting to your Wi-Fi network without permission, could be doing so unintentionally just because their computer showed them that an open wireless network in available in that area.
Mikko Hypponen has a brilliant idea to discourage such people from connecting to your wireless network – rename your network name (SSID) to something scary – like c:\virus.exe – and the non-techies are very unlikely to use your Wi-Fi network ever.

wifi network SSID

To change the SSID of your wireless router, log in to your router’s admin console and rename the network under Basic Wireless setting as shown in this screenshot.
[*] Find the MAC Address of your devices
If you type “ipconfig /all” at the command prompt, you can easily find the MAC address of your computer’s network card – just look for the string “Physical Address.” The Wi-Fi Mac address of mobile devices is often listed on their Settings page.
The MAC Addresses are also listed inside the DHCP Client Table of your router.

Thankyou@dattu.

PowerPoint Presentation Tips – Avoid Last Minute Surprises..

Very much helpful to every one..

Tips for delivering effective PowerPoint Presentations and avoid any last minute problems like missing fonts, PPT not opening, slides getting cut off, fonts too small, etc.

powerpoint tipsThe PowerPoint tips featured here are not about creating better or more effective presentations, instead they help you avoid any last minute surprises that may crop up when an eager audience is waiting to see your slide show.
*They are all based on my personal experiences at a recent BarCamp.

Tip 1: Put the PPT files on a USB Drive
Yes, there’s box.net, slideshare.net and tons of other PowerPoint hosting services where you can upload your PPT files but I still recommend carrying files on a USB drive because there are chances that Internet may be very slow (or unavailable) in the presentation room. With files on the USB stick, you are always in control.

Tip 2: Use Arial or Times New Roman Font
powerpoint fonts The default fonts in Office 2007 programs are Calibri, Corbel, Cambria, etc but unfortunately these fonts are not available on computers running older version of Microsoft Office. If you want the presentations to look the same in the conference room as on your laptop, use fonts like Arial or Times New Roman which are universally available.

Tip 3: Always Carry the Microsoft PowerPoint Viewer
You have designed a great presentation using the latest PowerPoint 2007 but it possible that the computer, where you will run the presentation, is running an ancient copy of PowerPoint 2000. In that case, your presentation will fail to run. not run at all.
Download the free Powerpoint 2007 Viewer, transfer it your USB drive and be rest assured that your slide show will be play just perfect on any Windows computer. 

Tip 4: Print a PDF of your PowerPoint Presentation
You can use Acrobat or the Save as PDF plugin of Microsoft Office 2007 to convert your PPT into a read only PDF file. Some members in the audience will always ask you for a copy of the Presentation slides and if you are not too happy in giving away the source file, PDF is a great alternative – it also maintains the layout, transitions and even the fonts.

Tip 5: Take Care of Margins
If the display properties of your computer do not match that of the projector, chances are that the presentation slides will be cut off at the edges – to avoid this, designate a margin safe area when designing presentations and limit your text or graphics to that area.

Tip 6: Some Presentation Rooms Can Be Very Big
Do not use small fonts as that will make your slides unreadable especially for back-benchers when the room size is large. The minimum recommended font size in PPT slides is around 24-points (more for headings).

Tip 7: Screensavers, IMs, New Email Notifications
Turn Off all these distractions before running the slideshow – they can sometimes be very embarrassing.

Tip 8: Power Management
Some computers (especially laptops) turn off the screen after 5-10 minutes of inactivity. Always turn off this feature using the Power management console.

Thankyou@dattu.

Access Files on your Computer from Anywhere..

Cloud Computing its really a damn boom..

Learn how you can access documents, music and other important files on your home computer from any other computer or mobile phone through the Internet.

Access Files over the InternetThe problem: You have documents, photos, music and other important files on the home computer. How can you “remotely access” these files from your office computer or, when you are travelling, from your mobile phone?
The solution: The simplest solution would be that you copy all your data from the home computer on to a portable hard drive and carry it around but this is obviously a bit cumbersome approach as it requires you to manually sync the home computer and your portable disk.

Access Files on your Computer over the Internet

There are couple of ways by which you can retrieve files stored on your home computer from anywhere else using a regular Internet connection.

Option 1: Using Online Backup
You can use an online backup service like SugarSync, Carbonite, SkyDrive or even Dropbox – they provide desktop utilities that will automatically upload files on your home computer to the Internet and you can then access these files through the web browser of any other Internet connected computer.
The upside is that your files will always be available to you even if the home computer is not running. SugarSync and Carbonite have a mobile optimized website so you can access files from any mobile phone as well.
The downside is that if you are using any of these services for the first time, you’ll to wait until they upload all your data to the cloud and this process may take long if you have too many files on the home computer.

Option 2: Using Desktop Sharing Software
There are free desktop sharing software like TeamViewer and UltraVNC that also let you remotely access your computer files from anywhere else. LogMeIn Pro and CrossLoop Home are some other good options for transferring files from a remote computer but these are paid services.
If all your computers are running Windows, you can use the built-in remote desktop connection feature of Windows (available in XP and later) to access your home computer from another Window computer over the Internet.
With Desktop Sharing software, you’ll always have access to all your files but one big limitation is that it requires that the remote computer stays on. Also, none of these options will help you access files on a mobile phone except LogMeIn which has an iPhone app.

Option 3: Access Files Directly through the Browser
Online backup services, discussed above, will copy files to their own servers before you can access them for anywhere else. Screen sharing services are often slow and they won’t work on most mobile devices. Let’s now explore another set of services that allow you download files directly from the home computer.
Copernic, like Google Desktop, is a popular desktop search software that you may use to find emails, documents and other files on your Windows computer. They have a paid component called myCopernic on the Go that lets you remotely search for content stored on the home or office computer. You can preview the search results and then download them to your mobile phone or remote PC.
With Opera Unite, you can easily turn your computer into a web server and instantly access files and folders on that computer from any other web browser (including that of mobile phones). Opera Unite is a standard web server and therefore you’ll be downloading files directly from the computer – they’re not uploaded anywhere else.
Another option is GBridge that lets you setup a virtual private network using your existing Google Account. Companies use VPNs to let employees access corporate data over a public network (Internet) and with GBridge, even home users can build their own VPNs to access remote files more securely.
Windows Live Sync at sync.live.com is another great choice for remotely accessing files over the Internet. Just install the Live Sync client on your computer and you can then access the entire hard drive of that computer simply through the Windows Live Sync website.
Live Sync is available for both Mac and Windows. The new version of Live Sync is even better and it has integrated online storage (Live Mesh) so you’ll be able to access your important file even if the remote computer is off.
Finally, you may also want to check out HomePipe – this is an extremely easy and free service that lets you access your home files and media from any other computer or mobile phone. Install the HomePipe Agent and all files on that computer will instantly become available through the web. They also have apps for iPhone and Android phones.

Thankyou@dattu.

Wednesday, April 11, 2012

Yes, No, Maybe? Conduct Opinion Polls Over Email using Gmail


Official Website. Customize & Send Surveys For Free!
email polls In some situations, a poll conducted over email may be more practical than running a web based poll because readers can vote through their email clients without requiring a browser.
It’s as simple as replying to any other email and can be done even from mobile phones.


Turn Gmail into a Poll Software
Let’s see how you can quickly setup an opinion poll over email using only your existing Gmail account. The suggested approach will work best for polls that have a single question as in the following examples:
a. Will you buy a Macbook Tablet ? (Yes | No | Maybe).
b. Which is your favorite search engine? (Google | Yahoo | Ask | Cuil | Other).
question In this example, we’ll ask a standard question “What’s your gender” with two choices – male or female.

Step 1: Compose a new email in Gmail, make the question as your subject and put the choices in the message body.
Step 2: Now convert each of the choices into hyperlinks that link to your email address but with an alias.

For instance, if your email address is hello@gmail.com, you can make the choice “Female” as an hyperlink for hello+female@gmail.com as in the image below. Repeat this for the other “male” choice.






gmail filter
 
Step 3. We are done creating the basic poll in Gmail. You can now send this email poll to a mailing list or type the addresses manually in the BCC: field but make sure you don’t exceed Gmail’s limit on sending email.
Step 4: The next step is to create Gmail filters so that email containing votes don’t clutter your main Inbox. Also, filters will save you from the hassle of manually counting the number of responses received for every choice.

gmail poll filters A filter would look something like this:
“hello+female@gmail.com” in the To: field, apply the Label “Poll: Female” and check “Skip the Inbox”.

Create a separate filter for the “male” choice. You are now all set.
And if you are sending this poll to a very large group, consider creating a No Spam filter in Gmail to prevent any valid responses from hitting the Spam folder. Also see: SMS Polls.

Thankyou@dattu.