Windows
Beautiful desktop
Testing on <install.sh> shell script. Goal is to use wget to download the file.
- Github: choose 'View Raw' to get the url for the file. The con is the url will be changed whenever the file is updated.
- Google Drive: cannot get the raw file, only the html version.
Log on automatically on Windows 7 or 8
- Click Start, type netplwiz, and then press Enter.
- In the User Accounts dialog box, click the account you want to automatically log on to.If it is available, clear the Users Must Enter A User Name And Password To Use This Computer check box.
- Click OK.
- In the Automatically Log On dialog box, enter the user’s password twice and click OK.
Network discovery
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/what-is-network-discovery#1TC=windows-7
- Start -> Control panel
- Network -> Network and Sharing Center -> Change advanced sharing settings.
Convert/Save web pages as ebook format
The ebook device uses e-link. It is friendly to human's eyes. Although these ebook devices are usually small for easy to carry, reading pdf articles are not suitable. However if articles are available online as web pages, we can save these pages and read them on devices.
- For Kindle device, we can use bookmartlet from http://fivefilters.org/. After installing bookmarklet, we can click it and send any webpage to kindle device (we have to enter the Kindle email address and add [email protected] to the approved personal document email list from Amazon Account -> Manage Your Kindle. The saved file is in mobi format and it contains images too. However, pages contains tables may be lost (eg this page, but it may be the website's problem). Note that in order to read the article on my kindle device, I still need to go to http://www.amazon.com website -> Your Account -> Manage Your Kindle -> Click 'Actions' from the corresponding book -> Deliver to my Kindle (select one device). No extra charge over this method. See lifehacker's article.
- For Kobo device, one option is to use dotepub bookmarklet. However, it has a limit on the number of images in an article to save. In fact, the http://filvefilters.org bookmarklet has an option to output in epub format. It will download the epub file immediately. It works perfectly.
Create epub or mobipocket format by using pandoc
- http://puppetlabs.com/blog/automated-ebook-generation-convert-markdown-epub-mobi-pandoc-kindlegen
- http://johnmacfarlane.net/pandoc/epub.html
Convert Kindle azw to other format
http://www.the-digital-reader.com/2013/09/15/how-add-kindle-drm-removal-plugin-calibre/#.U022nHVdWKk
Note: it does not work:(
Install IIS on Windows 7/Vista
Burn Windows 7 ISO to USB
http://www.webupd8.org/2010/10/create-bootable-windows-7-usb-drive.html
Create a bootable USB
Uninstall a Linux from dual-boot
Install open-source software
Consider Ninite.
Install ubuntu on my 64GB USB drive
http://www.pendrivelinux.com/universal-usb-installer-easy-as-1-2-3/
$ df -h Filesystem Size Mounted on /cow 3.9G / udev 3.9G /dev tmpfs 1.6G /run /dev/sdb1 61G /cdrom /dev/loop0 672M /rofs tmpfs 3.9G /tmp none 5.0M /run lock none 3.9G /run/shm
If we check the drive's partition table using gpart, we will see the drive has only a fat32 partition.
Internet connection sharing (ICS)
Suppose a laptop can connect to the internt through wireless. We want to use its ethernet port to share internet on another device (e.g. raspberry pi where the device has only ethernet port).
- control panel - network & sharing center
- manage network connection
- right click wireless network connection and select property
- click 'sharing' tab and check 'Allow other network users to connect through this computer's internet connection'. For the home network connection, select 'Local Area Connection'.
- reboot raspberry pi.
When my host machine is xubuntu, the guest machine (raspberry pi) shows eth0 has ip 10.42.0.37 and the host machine shows
xubuntu@xubuntu:~$ ifconfig eth0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:22:19:ea:10:3d inet addr:10.42.0.1 Bcast:10.42.0.255 Mask:255.255.255.0 inet6 addr: fe80::222:19ff:feea:103d/64 Scope:Link UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1 RX packets:284 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0 TX packets:383 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0 collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000 RX bytes:19038 (19.0 KB) TX bytes:85493 (85.4 KB) Interrupt:43 Base address:0x2000 lo Link encap:Local Loopback inet addr:127.0.0.1 Mask:255.0.0.0 inet6 addr: ::1/128 Scope:Host UP LOOPBACK RUNNING MTU:16436 Metric:1 RX packets:972 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0 TX packets:972 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0 collisions:0 txqueuelen:0 RX bytes:90336 (90.3 KB) TX bytes:90336 (90.3 KB) wlan0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:17:c4:62:a0:35 inet addr:192.168.1.153 Bcast:192.168.1.255 Mask:255.255.255.0 inet6 addr: 2601:a:3780:6a:217:c4ff:fe62:a035/64 Scope:Global inet6 addr: fe80::217:c4ff:fe62:a035/64 Scope:Link inet6 addr: 2601:a:3780:6a:a4b9:d314:4790:a0a1/64 Scope:Global UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1 RX packets:6300 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0 TX packets:4812 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0 collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000 RX bytes:6042745 (6.0 MB) TX bytes:659980 (659.9 KB) xubuntu@xubuntu:~$
Proxy
Secure web access from anywhere using secure tunnel
http://www.howtogeek.com/68061/setup-ssh-on-your-router-for-secure-web-access-from-anywhere/
Access cloud storage
Windows Power Shell
Windows command prompt
- rmdir foldername /s /q to delete a folder
- for %I in (.) do echo %~sI to return a short name for the current folder.
Open control panel
- System properties (including environment variables) - control sysdm.cpl
- See microsoft.com for a complete list.
Keyboard shortcut
Windows 8
Keyboard shortcut.
- Win + C: charm bar
- Win + w: search
VLC
- +/-: faster/slower speed
- Alt + arrow keys: skip 10 seconds by forwarding/backwarding
- Ctrl + arrow keys: skip 1 minute
- Ctrl + Alt + arrow keys: skip 5 minutes
- Ctrl + Up/Down: Volume
- M: mute
- F: full screen
- space bar: toggle play/pause
- A: toggle aspect ratio
Windows 8 Gestures
Securely transfer files to Linux on Windows command line
putty
Use psftp or pscp with a script.
Use winscp with script or in command line
See http://winscp.net/eng/docs/feature_index
C:\Program Files\WinSCP\winscp.exe" /console /script=YOUR_SCRIPT_FILENAME
Example from http://winscp.net/eng/docs/scripting#example
# Automatically abort script on errors option batch abort # Disable overwrite confirmations that conflict with the previous option confirm off # Connect using a password # open sftp://user:[email protected] # Connect open sftp://[email protected] # Change remote directory cd /home/user # Force binary mode transfer option transfer binary # Download file to the local directory d:\ get examplefile.txt d:\ # Disconnect close # Connect as a different user open [email protected] # Change the remote directory cd /home/user2 # Upload the file to current working directory put d:\examplefile.txt # Disconnect close # Exit WinSCP exit
See http://wiki.vpslink.com/Automate_Backup_Retrieval_with_WinSCP#Test_WinSCP_Backup_Script for use winscp with Windows scheduler.
Putty with tabs
- Putty nd Works well
- MTPuTTY/Multi-Tabbed Putty Has a problem with cursor
Find public IP address
- http://superuser.com/questions/165986/command-prompt-command-for-external-ip
- http://superuser.com/questions/404926/how-to-get-my-external-ip-address-over-nat-from-the-windows-command-line
Create a VB script text file "ip.cbs" with a content like
Option Explicit Dim http : Set http = CreateObject( "MSXML2.ServerXmlHttp" ) http.Open "GET", "http://icanhazip.com", False http.Send Wscript.Echo http.responseText 'or do whatever you want with it Set http = Nothing
Open a command line and run
cscript ip.vbs
The output will look like
C:\Users\mli>cscript ip.vbs Microsoft (R) Windows Script Host Version 5.7 Copyright (C) Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. 2601:a:3780:5b:b856:6a09:3ea3:5e26
- On windows, open a command prompt. Type 'ipconfig' and look at IPv4 Address. But 'ipconfig' cannot show only one adapter. Another choice is netsh
x <- shell('netsh interface ip show addresses "Local Area Connection"', intern = T) y <- strsplit(x[grep("IP Address", x)], " ")[[1]] y[length(y)] # [1] "xxx.xx.xx.xxx"
PATH copy copy
http://pathcopycopy.codeplex.com/
PATH environment variable
In R, by using strsplit() and shell() functions we can quickly get the information of the PATH environment variable.
> x = shell("PATH", int = TRUE) > strsplit(x, ";") [[1]] [1] "PATH=C:\\Program Files (x86)\\VNI\\imsl\\fnl600\\Intel64\\lib" [2] "C:\\Program files\\MPICH2\\bin" [3] "C:\\Program Files (x86)\\VNI\\imsl\\fnl600\\IA64\\lib" [4] "C:\\Program Files (x86)\\VNI\\imsl\\fnl600\\IA32\\lib" [5] "C:\\Program files\\MPICH2\\bin" [6] "C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Intel\\ComposerXE-2011\\redist\\intel64\\mkl" [7] "C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Intel\\ComposerXE-2011\\redist\\ia32\\mkl" [8] "C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Intel\\ComposerXE-2011\\redist\\intel64\\mpirt" [9] "C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Intel\\ComposerXE-2011\\redist\\intel64\\compiler" [10] "C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Intel\\ComposerXE-2011\\redist\\ia32\\mpirt" [11] "C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Intel\\ComposerXE-2011\\redist\\ia32\\compiler" [12] "C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Intel\\ComposerXE-2011\\compiler\\lib" [13] "C:\\Windows\\system32" [14] "C:\\Windows" [15] "C:\\Windows\\System32\\Wbem" [16] "C:\\Windows\\System32\\WindowsPowerShell\\v1.0\\" [17] "C:\\Program Files (x86)\\QuickTime\\QTSystem\\" [18] "C:\\Program Files\\cvsnt" [19] "C:\\Program Files\\ActivIdentity\\ActivClient\\" [20] "C:\\Program Files (x86)\\ActivIdentity\\ActivClient\\" [21] "C:\\Program Files\\TortoiseSVN\\bin" [22] "C:\\graphviz\\i386\\bin" [23] "C:\\graphviz\\x64\\bin" [24] "C:\\gtk\\bin" [25] "C:\\gtksourceview\\bin" [26] "C:\\libxml2\\bin" [27] "C:\\Users\\USERNAME\\Downloads\\binary" [28] "C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Miktex\\miktex\\bin\\" [29] "C:\\Pandoc\\bin"
An open source program to edit PATH variable is available from http://sourceforge.net/projects/pathtool/
On my computer, I need to open a Windows prompt with admin privilege and then type 'sysdm.cpl' in order to change the PATH variable.
Notepad++
How to increase font size? Just hold Ctrl and use scroll wheel. See here. It even save the status when you restart Notepad++.
And for convenience, we can change the default language to R in Notepad++'s Settings.
Visual Studio 2010
- Create simple form using VS C++ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L8E4C0zbIHA
Cygwin
For something we cannot find a good Windows version of program; for example, cvs client. See my notes in Linux page.
Youtube
Use desktop client like minitube which can eliminate the ads and allows downloading videos.
Powerful usage of VLC
RealPlayer
Toggle mute sound
- free utility called nircmd http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/nircmd.zip
- create a shortcut: "C:\Michal\Code\Mute Sounds\nircmd.exe" mutesysvolume 2
- set up shortcut key by right click the shortcut and choose property
Mind mapping software
- Free mind
- Mindmap (web based)
- MindMup (web based). It can export to Freemind .nm format. No registration is required.
MS-Office
Excel print the header row on each page
http://www.guidingtech.com/17822/print-first-row-column-every-excel-page/
- Click page layout tab on the ribbon
- Switch to the tab for Sheet and spot the section for Print titles. It hosts a row and a column option.
- In the 'Rows to repeat at top', enter '$1:$1'.
Done!
How to freeze a row or column in Excel
http://www.howtogeek.com/166326/how-to-freeze-and-unfreeze-rows-and-columns-in-excel-2013/
Avoid change simple quote to smart quote (autoformatting) in Word
Uncheck two options in Options -> Proofing -> Autoformatting. https://www.simple-talk.com/blogs/2011/11/09/how-to-stop-office-2010-changing-and-to-smart-quotes/
Folder synchronization
cwRsync
https://www.itefix.net/content/cwrsync-free-edition. Just unzip.
rsync from Rtools
- http://cran.r-project.org/bin/windows/Rtools/
- http://cran.r-project.org/bin/windows/Rtools/Rtools.txt
C:\Program Files\R>where rsync C:\Rtools\bin\rsync.exe
rsync from cygwin
Give a permission error when the target is a network drive
Windows sync toy
For some reason, it does not find the missing files so it does not copy files from source to target.
Another bad thing is there is no way to uninstall it.
FreeFileSync
http://sourceforge.net/projects/freefilesync/
For some reason, I cannot download it successfully. If I manually copy it from a linux machine to windows, it just get deleted. Probably there is a security reason.
Unison
http://www.cis.upenn.edu/~bcpierce/unison/
I download Windows binary version. However, it does not work. It depends on GTK but it still complain it cannot find libgtk-win32-2-0.0.dll even I downloaded/installed/change PATH variable.
DirSync
http://sourceforge.net/projects/directorysync/?source=recommended (NO installer is there)
Internet Tricks
View all steps from instructables
Just add ?ALLSTEPS after the url's forward slash. See here
FreeCommander
- Keep tabs open from last session. Settings > Folder Tabs > Tab Management tab, check the box "Keep current tabs if open layout" and uncheck the box "Close all not locked tabs when the program ends."
Back up to external drive or another computer
Turn off Ipod nano 4th generation completely
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z_KprYnP1hA
The steps are
- Center + Menu
- Center + Left
- Sleep, Deep sleep
Hide a Windows program
http://superuser.com/questions/43206/windows-application-to-hide-an-application-from-the-taskbar.
Especially the RBTray program works well. When it was launched, we can use 'right click' on any program's minimize button to minimize it to the tray. To exit the program, just right click on any tray icon created by RBTray and click Exit RBTray in the popup menu. Or run RBTray.exe with the --exit parameter.
Windows XP mode in Windows 7
http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/5460/our-look-at-xp-mode-in-windows-7/
Screenshot Annotation
Evernote Skitch, Snipit, SnagIt (commercial), hotshot GNU written in C++ & Qt, Jing, Picpick (commercial), Paint.net, szoter online annotation, IrfanView, Open office, Shutter for linux.
Record screens
This howtogeek.com guide tells how to record you screen on different platforms (windows/mac/linux/android/ios).
Inkscape
- Tutorial basic
- List of tools shown on the left hand side.
- Tutorial from youtube (tutor4u)
- Transparent text
- Select the arrow key when we want to change an object property (eg enlarge).
- The straight line tool is located two above the Text tool. When we draw a line, we can use ENTER key to stop continuation.
- When we want to enlarge an object, we want to hold the CTRL key so the size will be changed proportionally.
- Keyboard shortcut. For example, Ctrl+d to duplicate selection.
Note Taking
- KeepNote: cross platform (pro: tab for different notebook, export to HTML)
- CherryTree: cross platform (pro: still under development, one file only, recent documents)
- Zim: cross platform
X11 server
Check web change
For those web sites without RSS feed, we can use the following methods
- https://www.changedetection.com/
- Page Monitor chrome extension (we can 'Pick' part of a page)
- http://page2rss.com/ (convert page to RSS)
- https://www.followthatpage.com/
Screenshot of a big webpage
Screengrab add-on for Firefox
Reminder
ReminderFox is an add-on for Firefox
Tile of webpages
TileView is an add-on for Firefox
Download Bing wallpaper
- http://www.bing.com/gallery/#
- http://www.ampercent.com/download-high-resolution-bing-wallpapers-bing-homepage/10998/
Audio out recorder
Total Recorder. The standard version ($18) already allows to record by schedule. The Professional version (+$18) allows to capture streaming audio directly without opening another application.
PDF file
- Convert pdf to word Unipdf
- Edit pdf file PDFescape
- Split/Merge pdfs PDF Split&Merge
Screencast
This article from PCworld.com.
CamStudio
Camstudio works in Virtualbox guest machine too while Screencasting 101 gives me an error. Also the Virtualbox's built-in video capture function does not create videos correctly (I only got a blank/green screen and the video's length is wrong).
Make sure to install Camstudio lossless codec too.
Useful settings:
- Region -> Fix region 1024*720 (screen will create 4 corners when you hit the record button or F8)
- Options -> Video. Camstudio lossless Codec v1.5.
- Options -> Cursor. Highlight cursor.
- Options -> Audio.
- Options -> Program Options -> Keyboard shortcut (F8=record, F9=Stop)
- Toolbar icon -> 6th one is to toggle flv, avi, mp4. Avi is good.
Screenpresso
Camtasia
30 days trial is free to download. It is possible to blue a region with Camtasia. Check out this page or some videos like this.
Kdenlive video editor linux
Create a symbolic link
cd "YourDirectoryContainingSymLink" mklink -d "Foldername" "RealPathToFolderName"
Default location of TurboTax and HRBlock
Documents\TurboTax with a file ext name like .tax2014.
Documents\HRBlock with a file ext name like .T14.