techQE

Using Webcam in MATLAB for Image Acquisition

noreply@blogger.com (pratap vardhan) — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 18:01:00 +0000

Wanted to access webcam via MATLAB, read this.

In MATLAB, you can check if the support is available for your camera. MATLAB has built-in adaptors for accessing these devices.

You must check if you have the data acquisition toolbox in your version. that you have installed.

Just get to the MATLAB Start menu > Toolboxes > Data Acquisition

To get information about installed adapters, type

>> imaqhwinfo

Here, in this case the adaptor is 'winvideo'

To get more information about the device, type

>> info=imaqhwinfo('winvideo')

Now let's see how to use the webcam
1) Connect your webcam to the computer through the USB, or use the intergrated laptop camera.

You can preview the video captured by the image by defining an object and associate it with the device.

>> vid = videoinput('winvideo', 1, 'RGB24_320×240');

2) Open Preview window to view video in realtime
>> preview(vid);

3) Capturing and storing images

1. Capturing an image
To capture an image from the video, define the object vid as described before and use getdata to capture a frame from the video.
>>start(vid);

>>im=getdata(vid,1); % im = getsnapshot(vid); alternative use
>>figure,imshow(im);

2. Storing the image
You can store the captured image as a .jpg or .gif file using imwrite function.
>>imwrite(im,'myfirstimage.jpg');

This image will be stored in current work directory folder.

Now try yourself, add, and tweak.

ASC File Format

noreply@blogger.com (pratap vardhan) — Sat, 28 Nov 2009 12:50:00 +0000

Files with an extension of ".ASC" are usually ASCII text files, similar to the TXT file format. For Windows, while double-clicking an "ASC" file does not normally open Notepad, these files can normally be viewed with such a tool.

Windows users: NOTE that unless you have configured your computer with the file extension viewing tweak, it is possible that a filename that looks like it ends with ".asc", especially one attached to an e-mail message, actually has a hidden OTHER extension, meaning that if you double-click the file, it may actually run a computer virus!

TXT File Format

noreply@blogger.com (pratap vardhan) — Sat, 28 Nov 2009 12:49:00 +0000

A file ending in ".TXT" usually designates that the file is a plain-text file. This can contain virtually any type of text - a recipe, documentation for software, a book report draft, or whatever.

When a file ending in ".TXT" is double-clicked, a text editor, such as Notepad, should appear, allowing you to view and/or edit the contents of the file.

Windows users: NOTE that unless you have configured your computer with the file extension viewing tweak, it is possible that a filename that looks like it ends with ".txt", especially one attached to an e-mail message, actually has a hidden OTHER extension, meaning that if you double-click the file, it may actually run a computer virus!

Viewing File Extensions on Windows

noreply@blogger.com (pratap vardhan) — Sat, 28 Nov 2009 12:48:00 +0000

Depending on how your Windows computer is setup, file extensions may be hidden. Instead of seeing files containing a period and 1-4 character extensions, all you see are the filenames without the extensions. Or, some files may have extensions, but not all of them.

For safety reasons, and to learn more about file formats, you should configure Windows to show all file extensions.

Although the instructions for showing file formats differ depending on the version of Windows you are running, they are generally the following:

1. Open any folder on your machine.
2. Choose "Tools" - "Folder Options".
3. Click the "View" tab.
4. Uncheck "Hide extensions for known types".
5. Click "OK" to close the dialog box.

Recommended FireFox Extensions

noreply@blogger.com (pratap vardhan) — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 09:05:00 +0000

Here are some firefox extensions, which I recommend under MUST category

NoScript : Allows you to control, sites which can execute java/flash or any other script. Best to have for security reasons.
AdBlock Plus : Disables any advertisements on the webpages you visit. (includes blocking of flash adv)
Gmail Notifier : If you are a gmail user, its very handy
Split Browser : If you have a wide screen display ( like TFT display), this is a must, allows to you see multiple pages at same time.
Google toolbar : If you have gmail account and if you are not using a public PC for browsing, this will help you to send any page (or selected content) through gmail. Includes bookmark button which can be accessed globally from any PC.
Foxpose : If you are used to open so many TABs while browsing, this one helps you to show a window with preview of all tabs, easy to find any TAB. (also see Tab scope)

You can find these extensions through google or give a search here https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/

Quick download IEEE paper

noreply@blogger.com (pratap vardhan) — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 08:34:00 +0000

Recently, IEEEXplorer has introduced a STAMP on when you download publications from the site. So everytime you click a link to download/open the pdf in the browser there is a IEEE image banner and the pdf in the bottom frame. Sometimes it has happens that the PDF does not open even after waiting for a long time. So here is a simple trick to download the pdf file.

For e.g : If the link that you are trying to open is :

http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?tp=&isnumber=&arnumber=823551

then just copy that address and paste in the terminal and REPLACE the PART as below

http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stampPDF/getPDF.jsptp=&isnumber=&arnumber=823551

Now use 'wget' to download the file as mypaper.pdf.

[DONT FORGET THE QUOTES around the link] wget

"http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stampPDF/getPDF.jsp?tp=&isnumber=&arnumber=823551" -O mypaper.pdf

For IWL users: It is assumed that wget recognizes your proxy settings (might be through cntlm/ntproxy). Else use konqueror to open the new link, konqueror can directly open/download the PDF.

Proxy-settings for konqueros is in "Tools-Configure Konqueror-Proxy"

TinyURL and Internet Security

noreply@blogger.com (pratap vardhan) — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 17:10:00 +0000

In the previous post we have seen uses of URL shortening service.

http://techqe.blogspot.com/2009/09/how-tinyurl-works.html

So what is the RISK !!

lets take an situation:

If you recieve an email from someone (forum, newsletters, company) telling you to click on link,if the site appears to be Chinese or Russian site you would'nt click on it write (bingo). And obvious if you have good Anti-virus installed, it will detect the links and warn you .

But, if email links point to TinyURL you are in no position to know the identity of the site, maybe it is hacked site or hacker's. And it is not possible for Anti-virus package to detect it.

Tinyurl isn't the only redirection service. Here is a list of sum od them's

tinyurl.com
bit.ly
budurl.com
eweri.com
hex.io
idek.net
is.gd
poprl.com
snipr.com
twurl.nl
ub0.cc

This phenomenon has resulted in many URL shortening services.

Here's what I do or You should :

Use a good anti-virus that scans web pages also.
Be cautious of shortened URLs
Use good web browser (Check the browsers hack list)
And. Services provied by TinyURL like Preview feature

How TinyURL work's !!

noreply@blogger.com (pratap vardhan) — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 16:55:00 +0000

The service tinyurl accepts a long URL string (presumably the location of a web document or something else such) and creates a permanent shortcut for it.

http://techqe.blogspot.com/2009/06/sharing-keyboard-and-mouse-between-two.html

http://tinyurl.com/mzcmys

The question is, how does the service create such a small shortcut for any of the virtually thousands of web URLs out there? Does it compress the URL? Does it store it somewhere?

A little judicious observation can reveal some of the little "secrets" behind this service. The first "obvious fact" is that the shortcut has always a fixed length. In fact, the effective length looks as if it is exactly six (last 6 characters). The second "obvious fact" is that the shortcut consists of only small-caps letters and the digits 0-9.

The above observations quickly lead to the conclusion that the number of all possible configurations of the second part of the shortcut string is bounded above by 366 = (26 letters + 10 digits)6. This number equals 2176782336 and is close to maxlongint (or max int in Java).

Therefore, all one has to do to create such a service is have a Java program with the following (pseudo) declaration:

T=array[1..int] of string;

Considering the maximum length of any string allocated to be 255, an upper bound for the memory of this table will then be 2147483647 * 255 = 547608329985 bytes. That's roughly 510 Gigabytes of storage space and is doable with large capacity drives.

so, TinyURL variations are not limitless but they are close !!!

will have more posts regarding URL shortening services soon :)

How to write HTML code in your post

noreply@blogger.com (pratap vardhan) — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 01:13:00 +0000

When we want to write our HTML code in our post , unfortunately we cannot write the code directly as we type.This is because whatever we write is executed in HTML and PHP form and thereby , making the actual code disappear.

There are coupleof methods and in this post we discuss one of them

firstly we need to convert following HTML parts in our code to the following

Replace all & symbol with &
Replace all <> with < >
and finally all " with "

for example- if we need to post

<code><strong>techQE code</strong></code>

we replace all to get the following code to be written

&lt ;code&gt ;&lt ;strong&gt ;techQE code&lt ;/strong&gt ;&lt ;/code&gt ;

other methods will crop up in later posts .

for any DBTS plz comment

NoKia - unKNOWN codes

noreply@blogger.com (pratap vardhan) — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 22:48:00 +0000

Secret Codes Of Nokia Mobiles:

These special key sequences entered fromkeyboard of phone allow you to get some important information like IMEI number, release date, software version and much more.
You can also choose default language, activatenetmonitor ect.

1610/1630
*#170602112302# (software version)
1610/1611

IMEI number: -*# 0 6 #
Software version: -* # 1 7 0 6 0 2 1 1 2 3 9 2 #
Simlock status: - # 9 2 7 0 2 6 8 9 #

2110
*#9999# (software version)

2110i/2110e
*#170602112302# or (depends on model)*#682371158412125# (software version)

NOKIA3110
*#06# -IMEI
*#3110# -Software version
##002# - allows to turn off voice mail.
*#7780# - restore factory settings
*#746025625#(or *#sim0clock#) - to check if clock of sim (SIM-Clock) can be
stopped (SIM-Clock-stop is akind of standby mode which saces battery)
*#92702689# (or *#war0anty#) -"warranty code:"- you have to enter one of the
following codes:
6232 (OK)displays month and year of production date (ie "0198")
7332 (OK) - displays date of last repair - if there is (ie. "DATE NOT SAVED")
7832 (OK) - displays date of purchase - if there is (ie. "DATE NOT SAVED")
9268 (OK) -displays serial number
37832 (OK) -sets purchase date in format MMYY (MM - month, YY - year)- attention:
you can set it only once, so beware !
87267 (OK)-displays message "Confirm Transfer?" - meaning is unknown (?)
* # 9 2 7 0 2 6 8 9 # -Simlock info
*#31# (call) -sets if your phone no. will be hidden or not (works only in some
networks)
*#76# (call) -sets if target phone number when you call should be displayed (works
only in some networks)
*#77# (call) -(work s only in some networks)
*#33/35# (call -displays message "Service not active".
**31# (call) -your no. will not be showed to others when you make a call

3210
*#06# -IMEI
*#0000# -software version
*#92702689# (or *#war0anty#)- enters service mode.
*3370# -Turns on sound encoding system - Enhanced Full Rate.
#3370# -Turns off sound encoding system Enhanced Full Rate .
*4720# -Turns on battery save mode - saves about 30 % of energy.
#4720# -Turns off battery save mode.
xx# -Replace xx with desired phonebook entry - press # and you will see it on
display.

51XX
*#06# -IMEI
*#0000# - Software version
*#92702689#( or *#war0anty#) Enter service mode.
*3370# -Turns on sound encoding system - Enhanced Full Rate.
#3370# -Turns off sound encoding system - Enhanced Full Rate.
*4720# -Turns on battery save mode - saves about 30 % of energy.
#4720# -Turns off battery save mode.
#pw+1234567890+1 -provider lock status
#pw+1234567890+2 -Network lock status
#pw+1234567890+3 -Provider lock status
#pw+1234567890+4 - SimCard lock status

NOKIA 61XX
*#06# -IMEI
*#0000# ;-*#99 99# (Nokia 6130)
*#92702689# (or *#war0anty#) Software versionEnter service mode.
*3370# -Turns on sound encoding system - Enhanced Full Rate.
#3370# -Turns off sound encoding system - Enhanced Full Rate.
*4720# -Turns on battery save mode - saves about 30 % of energy.
#4720# -Turns off battery save mode.

NOKIA8810
*#06# - IMEI
*#0000# -Software version
*#92702689# (or *#war0anty#) Enter service mode.
*3370# -Turns on sound encoding system - Enhanced Full Rate.
#3370# -Turns off sound encoding system - Enhanced Full Rate.
*4720# -Turns on battery save mode - saves about 30 % of energy
#4720# -Turns off battery save mode - saves about 30 % of energy

NOKIA99OO
*#06# -IMEI
*#682371158412125# -Software version
*#3283# -Displays week and year of manufacture, ie. 1497 means 14th week of 1997.

NOKIA 911O
*#06# IMEI
*#0000# SOFTWARE VERSION
*3370# Turns on sound encoding system - Enhanced Full Rate.
#3370# Turns off sound encoding system - Enhanced Full Rate.
*4720# Turns on battery save mode - saves about 30 % of energy.
#4720# Turns off battery save mode.

NOKIA 81XX
*#06# IMEI
*#8110# Software version
xx# Replace xx with desired phonebook entry - press # and you will see it on
display
*#92702689# (or *#warOanty#)

"Warranty code:" - you have to enter one of the following codes:
9268 (OK) displays IMEI (International Mobile Equipment Identification)
6232 (OK) displays date of manufacture in format MMYY (MM - month, RR - year)
7832 (OK) displays date of purchase
7332 (OK) displays date of repair or upgrade
37832 (OK) sets date of purchase in format MMYY (MM - month, RR - year) -
attention: you can set it only once, so beware !!!
87267 (OK) transmits user data/move data do service PC

How To Take Screenshot Linux ( Ubuntu )

noreply@blogger.com (pratap vardhan) — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 22:16:00 +0000

There are several ways to take a screenshot Linux in general.
If you aren't using GNOME, then the GNOME-specific items won't work.

One way to take a screenshot in Ubuntu is to go to the main menu:
Applications —> Accessories —> Take Screenshot.

How to Take a Screenshot in Linux With the PrintScreen Button

You can also take a screenshot of the entire screen by pushing the
"Print Screen" (PrtSc) button on your keyboard. To get a screenshot of
only the active window, use Alt-PrtSc.

How to Take a Screenshot in Linux With the Terminal (ImageMagick)

If you need a delay before taking the screenshot (for example,
to get a screenshot of a menu that would disappear if you took
a screenshot with GNOME) ImageMagick is the best way.

make sure you have ImageMagic installed: type import -version in the terminal.
If ImageMagick is installed, you will see the ImageMagick version number.
To install ImageMagick in Ubuntu (or any Debian-based distro),
just type sudo apt-get install imagemagick.

To take a screenshot in the terminal with ImageMagick,
type the following line into a terminal and then click-and-drag
the mouse over a section of the screen:

import MyScreenshot.png

GNOME will beep once when the screenshot begins, and once again when the
screenshot is complete. Then type eog MyScreenshot.png in the terminal to
view your screenshot. "eog" is the command to start Eye of GNOME.

To capture the entire screen after a delay (so you can open some menus or whatever),
type sleep 10; import -window root MyScreenshot2.png.
The first part of that line, sleep 10; will give you a 10 second delay before
the screenshot begins. The next part, import -window root,
tells ImageMagick to import the "root" window — that is, the entire screen.
The last part MyScreenshot2.png is the name of your screenshot.

How to Take a Screenshot in Linux With the Terminal (scrot)

To install scrot (on Ubuntu) type:
sudo aptitude install scrot

To take a screenshot in Linux from the terminal with scrot type:
scrot MyScreenshot.png

To get a screenshot and immediately open it in the GIMP, type:
scrot -q 85 -d 5 screenshot.png && gimp screenshot.png &

The -q option sets the quality. The -d sets the delay.
The && means that if the first command is true, then execute the second.
The final & means to run the commands in the background so that you
can still use that terminal for other commands.

How to Take a Screenshot With the GIMP

To take a screenshot with the GIMP,
find the following menu option: File —> Acquire —> Screen Shot.
You will then be offered some options for the screenshot such as length
of delay and whether you want to take a screenshot of the entire screen, or just a window.

How to Take a Screenshot of a Web Page With Firefox

Snapper Firefox Screenshot Extension

to take a screenshot of a section of a web page, use Snapper.

A great Firefox extension for taking screenshots is called ScreenGrab.
ScreenGrab will take screenshots of entire web pages
even the parts that run off the screen.

How to take Screenshots

noreply@blogger.com (pratap vardhan) — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 21:55:00 +0000

This document describes how to capture an image of the screen in Windows (all versions).

Press the PrintScreen key on the keyboard

(generally located in the top right hand corner)
to capture an image of the entire screen and store it in the Windows clipboard.

Press Alt & Print Screen (sometimes labeled as Prt Sc)

to capture an image of only the active window and store it in the Windows clipboard.

When the desired image is stored in the windows clipboard
(only one image can be stored at a time), it can be extracted
by opening a word process program (Microsoft Word, Microsoft Publisher, etc.)
or an image manipulation program (such as Adobe Photoshop or Microsoft Paint),
and selecting Paste from the Edit menu or press Control & V.

In Windows Vista

In Vista (except in Home Basic), there is a tool called the Snipping Tool.
To open it, click on the start menu, type 'snip', then hit enter.
The Snipping Tool opens, and a white mask is applied on the screen.
In the drop-down menu for the 'New' button, choose from a free-form snip,
rectangular snip, window snip, or full-screen snip.
In free-form snip mode, draw around the area you want to be captured.
Drag a rectangle in rectangular snip mode. For window snip mode,
select the window you want to capture. In full-screen mode, just selecting it
from the drop-down menu makes the capture.
The snipped image is then opened within the Snipping Tool, but is also copied
to the Windows clipboard for use in other applications.

Introducing - Computer worm

noreply@blogger.com (pratap vardhan) — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 01:02:00 +0000

In computer terminology, a Worm is a self-replicating threat that travels
through a network and settles in a computer via a variety of online applications
like e-mails, chat clients, P2P clients, etc. A worm does not attach itself to any
program that explicitly needs to be executed for its spread. Instead, it travels
through networked applications and primarily replicates itself up to a point
where the network is clogged with its clones, preventing it from being used by
legitimate applications.

The different types of worms you could encounter are:

E-mail worm:

This type of worm uses e-mail as its vehicle. When an infected e-mail reaches
your inbox, it does nothing unless the e-mail is opened to be read. When you
open the mail, you may see an attachment or a link to a real or fictitious web site.
The moment you click on the link and visit the web site, the worm gets triggered.
Once activated, it starts searching your address book and sends e-mails to your
contacts. It can even fake the sender’s address, so that the recipient assumes that
the mail is not from someone he knows. Clearly, across an office network consisting
of tens or hundreds of users, the numbers of ficticious e-mails traversing the mail
servers grow exponentially over a short time. E-mail worms often bring down
mail servers and clog their functioning.

File sharing network worm:

This worm generally proliferates through a shared folder of a machine.
It creates a copy of itself and masks its intent by using a seemlingly harmless
and unassuming name. The moment you connect to a networking site like ‘kazaa.com’
and your sharing folder gets accessed, the copy of the worm moves from your computer
to other computers in the file sharing network. With millions of computers actively
being used to access files from peer-to-peer networks, these worms can proliferate
very quickly. Another popular type of worm is the instant messaging worm
(similar to the email worm, but uses an instant messenger service as its vehicle).

Trojan:

Trojans are malicious programs that pose as legitimate applications.
When users execute such programs, blissfully unaware of their real intent,
the host computer gets infected. Once on your computer, it may strike in a
variety of ways, ranging from capturing what you see on your screen to logging
what you type. The captured information is then sent to the author of that
malware through the Internet. You could therefore stand to lose precious data,
bank passwords and the like. The different types of Trojans include remote access
Trojans, where others can gain access to and even take over your machine,
data sending Trojans that scan your computer and send data to the author, and
destructive Trojans that simply delete files on the host computer. Trojans can also
infect your computer and you may face denial of service (unavailability of data).
Trojans even have the potential to counter anti-virus software by changing their
coding DNA (a process known as polymorphism), making it harder to detect.
Some Trojans are developed such that they will only be activated on particular
dates, or when certain pre-defined conditions are met by the computer.
These Trojans are known as ‘Time bombs’ and ‘Logic bombs’ respectively.
Spyware Like Trojans, Spyware is also a type of computer application, developed
with the intention of stealing information from your computer. These applications
can steal data including the history of web sites you have visited, passwords that
you have used to access online secure services, etc . However, unlike Trojans and
worms, spyware cannot replicate but it does exploit the host computer for
commercial gain. These include everything from throwing unsolicited
pop-up advertisements, capturing your web browser’s home page and
directing it elsewhere. This type of application cannot spread by itself,
therefore its efficacy depends solely on whether you choose to install the
software. Since users wouldn’t intentionally install applications that are
detrimental to their interest, spyware represents itself as a utility application,
for example, a web accelerator, a free image utility, etc. Spyware often piggy-backs
on to shareware applications found on download web sites or application CDs.

Adware:

Adware is more of an annoyance than a threat. Typically found in applications
downloaded from questionable web sites, it infects the host computer by
downloading and installing other advertising material and displaying it on
your computer via annoying popups that appear while you use Internet applications.
This is where adware generally gets confused with advertising-supported software.
The latter is not malicious and only displays an advertisement within the window of
the application program (such as trial or shareware versions of software). Adware,
on the other hand, displays advertisements randomly, often when you least expect it.

The last call:

This new breed of Internet threats may or may not be harmful to users,
but they do hamper the performance of computers. To protect computers
from today’s digital threats, an anti-virus program is a good place to start.
for application suites that specifically offer protection against all of these
threats and not just ones that offer plain vanilla virus protection. In today’s
world, data security requires blanket protection systems that do it all.
You can also install anti-spyware and adware application like NoAdware,
ErrorDoctor, Spynukke, AdAware, etc. Secondly, it is important to exercise
caution on what applications and fi les are downloaded. This includes your
mail attachments.
Chain mails with attachments (such as .exe, .com, .scr, .bat, or .pif),
download sites that contain links of questionable web sites, applications
that aren’t from trusted sources should all raise a user’s alarm bells.
Most of the time, the battle against malware can be won before
it even begins—all it takes is a bit of vigilance.

Browse faster - simple tips

noreply@blogger.com (pratap vardhan) — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 00:25:00 +0000

For those of you who have slower connections, here are the ways to speed up
your connection.Use the following tips to browse faster with a limited bandwidth.

Always use Firefox and Opera to browse the web: Both FF and Opera are faster
than IE and have got lots of Bandwidth saving features.
For instance, the new version of Gmail pre-fetches the emails for faster performance
which is a bandwidth sucker. It loads all emails including those which you have
no intention reading at that time.

Block unwanted Images:
Opera can block images via a button on the View bar.
A Firefox Add-on ImgLikeOpera does the same on Firefox.Most websites
usually contain lots of animations and images which we don’t even notice.
If you need any images, you can always load specific images
(Right click > View image on Opera and Right click > Load image on FF).
Use "Load cached images" option.

Block Flash and Adsense:
Use the Adblock Plus Firefox Add-on to block Adsense Ads and Flash animations.
A flash ad can be as big as 200 kb or even more! This add-on makes pages load
faster and saves on bandwidth. If you have ever been to Digg, you might have
noticed the number of Ads per page. How fast would the pages load if there
were no ads?

Remove the Bandwidth Intensive Plugins:
Some Firefox Add-on’s like those that bring you the Alexa ranks or Google PR,
connect with their server to bring you the stats. If you don’t need those stats,
disable those plugins. If you need the stats sometimes, but not every now and \then, then create a different Firefox profile with those plugins.

Hibernate Windows instead of Shutting Down:
Hibernation saves your desktop the way you left it
(Microsoft says that even the mouse location is saved).
Save your windows and continue work from last days end.
That’s saves a lot of unnecessary pageloads and saves bandwidth!

Use Desktop Clients like Pidgin and TweetDeck:
Pidgin is an open source chat client that can connect to multiple chat networks
at the same time. Moreover it’s a very light client that doesn’t suck bandwidth
the way Gtalk does. TweetDeck is a must have fo. It makes the twitter
experience more enjoyable by fetching the tweets so that you don’t have
to refresh your pages to see if you have new tweets.

Block Automatic Updates:
Most software have the automatic updates enabled by default.
The software detects when you are connected to the internet and checks
and downloads updates. So you loose control on your bandwidth.
Instead, Disable all automatic updates and all softwares towards
the end of the month, when you know how much usage remains.

Disable Opening of Files inline:
Browsers open PDF files and Video files inline. It might open a PDF without
telling you how big the file is. Worst part, the browser becomes non-responsive
until it completes loading the file.
Result: You waste bandwidth on a large PDF which you have no intention reading.
You can disable that in Firefox Options.

Monitor your usage:
Use a Network monitor to know how much you use and how much
bandwidth remains. It helps in planning things better.
Use a Free Bandwidth meter from ShaPlus. It’s a good one and has the necessary options.

Sharing keyboard and mouse between two computers

noreply@blogger.com (pratap vardhan) — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 00:14:00 +0000

Please check that the two computers you wish to share one keyboard and mouse
between are networked, as this is the only requirement.

Input Director

Input Director is a windows-exclusive program that allows you to control more
than one computer without using more than one keyboard and mouse.
With input director, you simply control both computers with the keyboard and mouse,
and press a certain hotkey to change which computer you would like to control.

You can either use the hotkey method, or just move the cursor off the screen,
and it will appear on the other computer, allowing you to use the keyboard
for that one instead.
please note that the only systems that currently support Input Director are
Windows 2000(SP4), Windows XP(SP2) or Windows Vista.
And the computers you wish to control simultaneously must be networked.

Download : Input Director

10 Must Have Applications in Windows

noreply@blogger.com (pratap vardhan) — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 00:00:00 +0000

Device Drivers

As a first step of computing you should be able to run all your hardware properly.
To do so all, your OS requires device drivers for all the present hardware.

Where to find your device drivers ?
Generally it comes with the hardware you buy as CD / DVD but in order
to extract better performance from your hardware or when you are
changing your OS (eg, Windows XP to Windows Vista), you may need to
visit website of the device manufacturer to obtain the latest drivers

Run-time libraries

Runtime libraries enables us to execute applications developed in different
development platforms. For example, you may need Adobe Flashplayer to
view/ execute flash content which is the building blocks for most of the websites.

Which runtime libraries do you need ?

Few must install Run-times along with their download links would be,
Adobe Flash Player / Sun JAVA / Microsoft .NET Framework (1 / 2 / 3.5) /
Microsoft VM / Silverlight / Shockwave Player.

Security software (AntiVirus / AntiSpyware / Firewall)
As its a Windows installation hence there are hundreds of
Malware (Virus / Worm / Spyware / Adware) waiting to infect you unless
you have proper protection to save your Windows installation.

Where do you get security software ?
There are many security companies offering AntiVirus (AVS) and AntiSpyware
software solutions. For example, Norton Internet Security /
Kaspersky Internet Security / ESET NOD32 / McAfee Anti Virus Solution /
Trend Micro PC-Cillin / Bit-Defender / Microsoft Live OneCare /
Avast (Freeware) / Grisoft AVG (Freeware).

Multi Media Player / Codecs
As a default application, every windows (apart from the “N” versions)
comes with an integrated media player, the famous Windows Media Player.
But in today’s media standards it lacks the ability to play all the different codecs.

What is Codec ?
A Codec is a software / technique that can compress a large media file for
different platforms and enables us to decompress it later on as a playable format.
For example, in the mobile platform, 3GP codec is widely used for video playback,
where as in PMP (Portable Media Player) MP3 is a very popular audio codec.
By default the WMP cant play popular codecs like XVid / DivX / AVI / MKV / MP4.
However if you can provide the WMP with decompression information
(Installing the proper codec packs) about these codecs, then it can play
any available media.

Where to find codec packs ?
Couple of most popular codec packs are, K-Lite Codec Pack / CCCP.
Alternate Mediaplayers !!
Apart from codec packs there is another option for playing media files created
with different codecs is to use alternate mediaplayers.
Players like VLC / Media Player Classic / Real Player can play virtually any
type of media format.
Windows XP users please note, in case of WinXP SP3, the popular most OS nowadays,
comes with WMP 9 series by default which you can update either by downloading
the latest version WMP 11 or via Windows update service.

Office Applications
For office productivity suites the Microsoft Office can be the automatic choice.
However another great free option would be OpenOffice.org.
One can also try the MS Office 2007 free of cost.

Internet Browsers
By default Windows comes with its own integrated internet browser,
the Internet Explorer, however, MS has just come up with its latest version IE8.
Off Late the internet community is focusing on alternate browsers
like: Mozilla Firefox, Opera, Google Chrome, Apple Safari

IM (Instant Messaging) Clients
These are the software tools that help us communicate with others users
(having IM Clients) over the internet.
One can stay in touch with friends and family from any part of our world
via Text / Voice / Video Chat, that too free of cost (ISP charges may apply).
Some popular IM Clients are Windows Live / Yahoo Messenger / Google Talk /
or any universal chat clients like Pidgin.
Via these services one can also do file transferring
.
PDF Reader
PDF is a file format by which most of the documents over internet are exchanged.
This types of files are un-editable so provide more security.
The file format is developed by Adobe and one can obtain the Adobe Acrobat Reader for free.

Download Manager
We always have a default download manager that comes with every browser
installation but that is not just enough with download speeds and download
handling. So getting a download manager or download accelerator to increase
the download speed is much needed. These applications also let us pause the
downloads for a while and resume it later on according to our needs.
Some useful Download Managers are DAP / FDM / IDM / Flashget.

Maintenance Software / Applications
Conducting an uninterrupted computing obviously involves maintenance of
the system. That let us free up hard disc space, clean unused Registry files,
Tune up the PC, optimise the settings to increase the computing speed,
performance as well as stability.
So apart from OS and software service packs / updates, one needs to have
some Maintenance Software / Applications for performing these tasks at ease,
one of which sis, CCleaner, a single click maintenance software along with
Defraggler for defragmenting your hard drive.

One may also tryout these Softwares / Applications :
Advance system care, Tuneup Utilities, System Mechanic Professional
That wraps up our 10 must install Software list but still one may feel some
important apps missing, like CD DVD burner (Nero) / P2P Clients (uTorrent) /
HTML Editors (NotePad++) / Compression Tools (WinRAR) /
Blogging Tools (Live Writer) / Remote Support (Team Viewer) /
Virtual PDF Creator (doPDF) / Gaming Utilities (Demon Tools) /
Multimedia Apps and editing tools (Adobe Creative Suite).

Auto - shutdown at desired time

noreply@blogger.com (pratap vardhan) — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 23:52:00 +0000

1. Right click on your desktop and choose "New=>shortcuts".

2. In the box that says "Type the location of the shortcut",
type in "shutdown -s -t 3600" without the quotation marks and click next.
Note: 3600 are the amount of seconds before your computer shuts down.
So , 60secs*60mins=3600secs.

3. Make up a name for the shortcut and you're done.
You can change the icon by right clicking=>properities=>change icon=>browse

TO ABORT:

To make an abort key to stop the shutdown timer just create another shortcut
and make the "location of the shortcut" to " shutdown -a" without the quotes.

********* METHOD # 2 **************

Here is another trick to shutdown at a specific time,
for example you wish to shutdown at 11:35am.
Type this in

start=>Run

Type Code: at 11:35 shutdown -s

TO ABORT:
Code:shutdown -a

BING - tips and tricks

noreply@blogger.com (pratap vardhan) — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 23:23:00 +0000

Now that Bing is available for use outside Microsoft,
here are some quick tips and tricks that will help you do more with Bing.com.

1. Use the full version of Bing

If you are using Bing outside North America, chances are that you seeing
a localized version of Bing that may be missing some features.
For instance, the Indian version of Bing.com doesn’t have search history
and the image on the Bing home page here is not interactive as in the US version.

To explore the full version of Bing, go to this page and set English - US
as your default region. You can now enjoy all the Bing features from anywhere.

2. Track Companies from the IE Favorites Bar

If you search for a company stock (e.g. GOOG or MSFT), Bing will automatically
create a web slice for that company which you may then add to IE 8 and track
the performance directly from the favorites bar.
You need Internet Explorer 8 to try this feature.

3. Watch Preview of Hulu Videos outside US

Hulu hosts some popular popular TV shows but the problem is that
you can only watch these videos if your computer has US based IP address.

However, Bing lets you watch shot previews of Hulu video even outside US.
Just search for any TV show episode on Bing Videos (see example) and
hover the mouse over any of the video thumbnail to watch a short clip.

4. Save and Email search results

With Bing, you can save your search history on to a local folder inside Bing or
to your Windows Skydrive account. Alternatively, you may send your
search queries to a friend via email or publish them on your Facebook wall
via Bing. You’ll need Silverlight to share queries in Bing.

5. RSS Feeds of Search Results

Unlike Google or Yahoo, Bing offers RSS feeds for their web search results
that you can subscribe to inside any feed reader. Your browser should be
able to auto-detect the RSS feed of Bing pages or you can
append &format=rss to any Bing search URL and convert it into a feed.

This RSS feature is not available for Image or Video search in Bing.

6. Find Pages That Link to MP3 Files or Documents

Bing (and Live Search) supports a unique "contains" search operator
that lets you find web pages that contain links to particular file types.

For instance, a search like susan boyle contains:mp3 will show pages
that are about the British singer and that also link to MP3 files.
Replace mp3 with doc to search pages that contain links to Word Documents.

Connect Two Computers Using a Wi-Fi (Ad Hoc) Connection

noreply@blogger.com (pratap vardhan) — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 23:12:00 +0000

This tutorial will show you how to connect two computers using a Wi-Fi connection.
We will refer the two computers as PC 1 and PC 2.
You will have to configure both the computers as given below:-

PC 1:

1. Right-click My Computer and select Properties.

2. Click on the Computer Name tab and then click on the Change button.
Type the computer name to whatever you want, here we will name it PC 1 and
you will also have to change the workgroup to WG.
(The workgroup name should be the same in both the computers) Now click Apply and close it.

3. Goto Network Connections and right-click on your wireless adapter and select Properties.
Now goto the Wireless Network Tab and click on the Advanced button.
Select Computer to Computer (Ad hoc) networking option.
If you get a window with an SSID box, you can specify the network name in it,
in our example we will use Wi-Fi as the SSID.
Now close the window and click on Add Preferred Networks.

Enter the settings as follows:

Network name (SSID) : Wi-Fi
Network Authentication : Open
Data Encryption : Disabled

4. Tick the “This is a computer-to-computer (ad hoc) network,
wireless access points are not used” option if it isn’t already ticked.
To automatically connect to the network, goto the Connection tab and
tick on the Connect automatically when in range option.
Now, to configure the TCP/IP connection settings, goto the General tab
and select Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) and click the Properties button.
Set the Values as:-

IP Address - 192.168.0.1
Subnet Mask - 255.255.255.0
Default Gateway - 192.168.0.2

5. Click OK and you have finished the steps for PC 1.

PC 2:

1. Right-click My Computer and click Properties.

2. Click on the Computer Name tab and then click on the Change button.
Type the computer name to whatever you want, here we will name it PC 2 and
you will also have to change the workgroup to WG. Now click Apply and close it.

3. Goto Network Connections and right-click on your wireless adapter and select Properties.
Now goto the Wireless Network Tab and click on the Advanced button.
Select Computer to Computer (Ad hoc) networking option. If you get a window with an SSID box,
you can specify the network name in it, in our example we will use Wi-Fi as the SSID.
Now close the window and click on Add Preferred Networks.

Enter the settings as follows:

Network name (SSID) : Wi-Fi
Network Authentication : Open
Data Encryption : Disabled

4. Tick the “This is a computer-to-computer (ad hoc) network, wireless access points are not used”
option if it isn’t already ticked. To automatically connect to the network, goto the Connection tab
and tick on the Connect automatically when in range option. Now, to configure the TCP/IP connection settings,
goto the General tab and select Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) and click the Properties button. Set the Values as:-

IP Address - 192.168.0.2
Subnet Mask - 255.255.255.0
Default Gateway - 192.168.0.1

5. Click OK and you have finished the steps for PC 2.

Now open the Wireless network settings and click on View Available Wireless Networks.
Select your network and you are connected.

Google Ventures - A Venture Fund For All Kinds Of Startups

noreply@blogger.com (pratap vardhan) — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 02:25:00 +0000

Google Ventures.

By the looks of it Google ventures has a very broad investment philosophy.

The google ventures site states and I quote “We’re studying a broad range of industries, including consumer Internet, software, hardware, clean-tech, bio-tech and health care.

We invest anywhere from seed to mezzanine stage and embrace the challenge of

helping young companies grow from the garage to global relevance.”

There is no minimum amount of funding outlined and also no geographies mentioned.

But rest assured given that this fund is lead by Bill Maris who was the founder

of Burlee.com, which he sold to Web.com its almost certain that this fund would

be initially focused on the US markets. Also as their contact address suggests

there is no presence in India.

Google has been known for acquiring startups around the world and has done

very few direct investments. It has though been an investor in the Seedfund

and Ventureast a seed stage venture fund in India. But this new launch of a

venture fund should not affect that engagement as Google ventures clearly

looks like a US focused fund.

Fund to acquire strategy?

Startups looking towards google as a prospective investor might be concerned

on one issue is that Google may be the kind of investor that might fund to acquire.

After all thats what it has been doing the last decade as acquitions have been

the way google has taken to grow its multi billion dollar empire. Its very possible

that google would have an affinity towards investing in startups and technologies

that it wants to acquire at a later date.

Facebook : Enable auto-login using Google , Yahoo etc

noreply@blogger.com (pratap vardhan) — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 02:16:00 +0000

You can now link both your Google Account (including Gmail) and Yahoo ID

with your Facebook profile.

The advantage of linking you other online accounts with Facebook is that if

you are signed-in into any of the above services, you’ll automatically be logged

into Facebook as well. So for example, if you working in Google Docs or writing scraps

in Orkut and then decide to open Facebook in another tab, you won’t see the Facebook

sign-in screen anymore.

To set up this association between Facebook and Yahoo/Google Accounts,

just go to Facebook -> Accounts Settings and click "Add a new linked account".

Facebook lets you link only one account per web service so choose the ID that you use most frequently on the web.

PDF - all about it , few tricks

noreply@blogger.com (pratap vardhan) — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 00:43:00 +0000

Adobe PDF is the best format for sharing documents because they are compact,
the formatting is preserved and most computers / mobile devices / ebook readers
can easily handle PDF files.

Here you’ll learn how to do just about everything with PDF documents without
buying Adobe Acrobat. You can edit PDF files, combine multiple files as one,
add signature images to PDF pages, fill PDF forms online, add clickable hyperlinks
to existing PDF documents and so much more.

To create PDF documents on my computer without Adobe Acrobat?
you can simply convert your word ocument into pdf by –
method 1 .save as document in PDF file format in Microsoft word
method 2. Upload your documents to Google Docs via the browser
and then export them as . PDF files. Simple.

To read powerpoint PPT files using your smartphones
Forward that email message (with the PPT attachment) to pdf@koolwire.com
- they’ll convert the presentation to PDF and email it back to you immediately.
Most smartphones and web enabled mobile phones can read PDF files.

To save a web page as PDF without having to save that page as an HTML file first?
Go to PrimoPDF, type the URL of the web page and
they’ll send you a PDF version of that page via email.

To convert PDF files into other formats like Word documents, images,
HTML web pages, etc.
You can upload the PDF document to Zamzar and convert
it any formats like doc, html, png, txt or rtf (rich text format).
Alternatively, you can convert PDF to HTML using Gmail.

To create a single PDF package by merging files of different formats.
Try Loop PDF - it’s a free service that lets you combine
multiple documents, images and even web pages into a single PDF file. .

What about restricted PDF documents that neither allow printing nor can you select text with the mouse.
Get the PDF Unlocker - its a free Windows utility that will
remove all common restrictions around a PDF file without
requiring any passwords. Alternatively, you may use the
online service at ensode.net that will remove all the
printing or copying/pasting related restrictions from your PDF.

Enabling your visitors download your articles as PDF files.
Add the Web2PDF button anywhere in your website -
it converts web pages to PDF files on demand and also
keeps a track of all PDF conversion related activities on your website.

Reading PDF files online without desktop software
You can open PDF documents in the browser with PDFMeNot
without requiring any software.

To add watermarks or even my (real) signature to a PDF document
A: First draw your signature in Paint (or other photo editing tool)
and save it as an image. Make sure you crop all the blank portion
that lies outside the signature. Now open the PDF document
inside PDF-X Viewer and copy-paste that watermark / signature image. Simple.

To extract selected pages from PDF file book and save it as another PDF.
You can either PDF Merge or PDF SAM (split and merge)
to extract pages from a PDF document.

Setting password to PDF documents
Upload your PDF file to PDF Hammer,
set a security password and export it as PDF again.

Online service(s) uploading PDF files on the web ###
Best is Scribd- it’s a more popular service so your
PDF document would get more viewers.
Next recommendation is Issuu -

How to import and export blogs on Blogger?

noreply@blogger.com (pratap vardhan) — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 23:36:00 +0000

The import and export features on Blogger give your content a whole new range of portability and freedom, allowing you to create copies of your own blogs as well as import them into other existing ones. Best of all-we've made this a very simple process!

Import as a New Blog

To import content as a brand new blog, click Create a Blog from your dashboard.

Then under Advanced Options, click the Import Blog Tool

Finally, choose the Blogger export file (.xml) from your hard drive and fill out the word verification. Click the Upload arrow and your new bog will be created instantly!

Import Into an Existing Blog

To import posts and comments into an already existing blog, start by clicking Import Blog from the existing blog's Settings Basic tab.

Note: Your template will not be affected by the imported content.

Next, choose a Blogger export file (.xml) from your hard drive and fill out the word verification beneath. By default, all of your imported posts will remain unpublished until you publish them from your dashboard later. However, if you would rather have all posts published immediately, make sure to check the box next to Automatically publish all imported posts before you click Import Blog.

If you did not choose to have your posts publish automatically, you will need to manually publish them from the Posting Edit Posts tab before they will appear on the web. You can either publish all the posts at once by clicking Publish all imported posts, or publish individual posts by selecting them and then clicking Publish Selected.

Exporting Your blog

To export your blog, simply click Export Blog from the Settings Basic tab.

Finally, click the Export Blog button. You blog will be stored as a Blogger export file (.xml) file which can be kept as a backup on your hard drive or imported into another blog.

Note: Exported blogs are not deleted from your dashboard or Blogger.com

Accidentally deleted blogs - ?

noreply@blogger.com (pratap vardhan) — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 02:45:00 +0000

Accidentally deleting blogs are not rare occurrences as in the default BASIC tab for Blogger SETTINGS, the DELETE button is just below the SAVE SETTINGS button.

Previously, once you delete a blog, the blog URL become available for anyone to grab, and spammers have automated programs to quickly grab the URL of a deleted blog to use for spam blog (splog), taking advantage of any existing PageRank of a blog rather than starting from scratch. That was the reason for publishing this post - Why you should not delete a blog and what to do when you accidentally delete a blog or change the blog URL.

However, Blogger has wised up to this and now if you delete a blog, the blog URL is reserved for you to claim back later. So if you have accidentally deleted a blog, what you can do is to create a new blog using the old blog URL. Now I myself have not tried this when this was made known to me, and hope to do that one day and report the result at Testing Blogger Beta (now New Blogger). In the meantime, if you had accidentally deleted your blog, try this and please report the result by leaving a comment for everyone's benefits.

blog deleted - what next

noreply@blogger.com (pratap vardhan) — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 02:31:00 +0000

Previously, bloggers are strongly advised against deleting blogs and what happens to the blog URL blog URL if you delete the blog. For reasons, see Why you should not delete a blog and what to do if you change the URL of a blog.

However, because Blogger has been informed of spammers grabbing deleted blog URL for spamming purposes, the practice of releasing a blog URL the moment the blog is deleted has been discontinued. Now if any Google Blogger blogger delete his or her blog, the blog URL is no longer released for others to register, but is kept for the original creator to claim back later.

The reason for this post is because of many questions and requests for help related to the above, and rather that repeating the same thing, if I ever get another question related to this, all I need to do is to point them to this post.

The most recent one is about a very fortunate blogger who wanted a particular blogspot URL which had already been registered by someone else who didn't do anything or didn't do much with the blog and the blog had been left neglected. In this particular very rare case, the blogger was able to contact that blog owner who is very cooperative. The blog owner deleted the blog so the intended new owner can claim it. As expected, she could not do so.

However, not all is lost provided the previous owner is willing to cooperate. All she has to do to to contact the previous owner again, requesting him or her to register that deleted blog again, and then invite the intended new owner to become co-author via Dashboard > Settings > Permissions. Once she has accepted the invitation, the cooperative old owner can make her administrator, and then remove himself or herself. Once this is all done, the blog have found a new, loving owner.