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WinBubbles Lite 2009, Access Windows 7 (and Vista) Customizations easily

2009-08-10T23:08:00.000-07:00

A customization and tweaker designed for Windows 7 (Also works with Vista!). This is a small, light-weight, updatable and Open For All version of WinBubbles.

winbubblelite

In just few clicks, WinBubbles-Lite will let you access the most important Customization functions of Windows 7 (and Vista) easily.

The powerful utility includes a built-in Graphical User Interface designer and programmer called RegDevelop that will let you update the program the way that you want. Add Features that is needed.

ide

Any part on the program can be updated, Not just for the Programmers But For All.

Note: Before changing to IDE mode (update or change the program settings), It is a must and recommended to read first the documentations available regarding RegDevelop.

Features

Branding your new Vista and Windows 7 Machine

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Add or Change Original Manufacturers logo and information
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Separately Customize the Performance Information and Tools Logo
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Change or Customize the Background of Windows 7 Welcome Screen
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Change the Owner Information

More Customizations, Restriction and Tweaks

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Add Message before logon: Read here
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Customize Bubbles Screen Saver - Change to small/Medium size, Metallic Bubbles, remove the shadow and launch in a Black Background.
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Add “Move To” and “Copy To” Right-Click Menu
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“Opened with Notepad” Context/Right-Click Menu
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“Hide this file” and “Hide this Folder” Right-Click Menu – Standard and Run as Admin is included
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No Folder Option (Logoff is needed in Windows 7)
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Disable Regedit
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Disable CMD.exe
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Disable Windows Task Manager
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Disable Changing of Wallpaper
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Disable Control Panel
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Disable USB Drive in Windows 7 (Reboot is needed) and Vista
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Disable Control Panel
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Enter Username before login
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Changing UAC levels launcher and Change the settings to “Prompt for credentials”

WinBubbles-Lite 2009 Design:

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The program was designed for 800 x 600 resolutions and above. For lower resolutions you can access the Apply Button by pressing Alt-A.
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Compared to WinBubble, Because of RegDevelop IDE even if you switch from any resolutions, the vertical and horizontal scroll bar will show. Also, If the window become small or bigger, Just move or drag the program and it will automatically change in size.
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Every settings done by the program will be seen… No more Winbubble Anti-Registry Setting Theft!

For geeks and tweakers who wants to update the program. Read this first and Please share it to us afterwards.

Thank you very much and Enjoy!

*FreewareFiles.com Editors Pick! and *Softpedia 100% Clean Award
*Proudly Listed at Download.com and MajorGeeks.com!

How-to Create a Windows Vista IIS7 MySQL PHP Web Server

2008-01-02T01:30:00.000-08:00

Introduction
This guide shows you how to create a Windows Vista powered web server using IIS7, MySQL, and PHP (WIMP). I know, I know, a WIMP server doesn’t sound too appealing. Trust me, this server is far from a wimp and will blow your socks off if you provide the right hardware.
Note: This is a generic WIMP server that’s capable of running WordPress, PHPbb, and other popular PHP and MySQL powered web sites. You might have to change a few things to get your WIMP server running just right depending on your usage.
The Limitations
Before you go too far you need to know that IIS7 running on Windows Vista is full featured with a few limitations.
Before you right this type of server off because it’s limited you need to realize if you ever reach one of the limitations you’ll have so much traffic you could probably buy an actual server with one day’s pay from the web site.
The Limitations
Request Execution Limit: IIS7 running on Windows Vista Basic, Starter, Home, and Home Premium have a Request Execution Limit of 3. Vista Ultimate is limited to 10. Request Execution Limit is how many simultaneous pages the web server can give out at one time. That means Vista Basic, Starter, and Home editions can serve up to 259,200 pages per day and Ultimate can serve up to 864,000 pages per day!
FTP: FTP is very limited. You can only download files as anonymous. No uploading via FTP to your web server. If this is a problem, check out the FileZilla FTP Server.
Install IIS7
First thing first, we need to install a web server.
Open the Control Panel in classic view.
Double-click Programs and Features.
Click Turn Windows features on or off on the left.
Check off Internet Information Services.
Expand Internet Information Services, World Wide Web Services, Application Development Features, and then check off ISAPI Extensions। ISAPI will be needed later when we install PHP.

Click OK to install IIS7.
When the Windows Features box disappears IIS7 is installed and should be running. Test IIS7 by going to http://localhost in your web browser। You should see an IIS7 test page like the screenshot below.

The root of the default web site is located at C:\inetpub\wwwroot. Your web site goes there.
Install PHP
Now that we have a web server we need support for PHP. In this example I’m installing PHP 5.2.4.
Create a folder called php in the root of the C: drive.
Download the Windows Binaries Zip package from http://www.php.net/downloads.php.
Extract the files and save them in the php folder you just created.
Copy C:\php\php.ini-dist and save it on your desktop so we can work with it.
Rename php.ini-dist you just copied on your desktop to php.ini.
Right-click php.ini and select Edit.
Search for extension=php_mysql.dll and uncomment it by deleting the ; in front of it. This allows php to login a MySQL database.
Now move up in the php.ini code and look for extension_dir = “./”. Change “./” to “C:\php\ext”. This shows php where to load the extension=php_mysql.dll extension you just uncommented.
Save php.ini.
Copy php.ini and save it in C:\Windows.
Open the IIS Manager by typing IIS Manager in the Start Menu’s search box and click Internet Information Services (IIS) Manager in the search results.
Double-click Handler Mappings.
Click Add Script Map located on the right.
Fill out the Add Script Map window like the screen shot below.

Click OK to save the changes.
Click Yes in the window that asks you if you want to enable this ISAPI extension.
Click the back button in the IIS Manager and then double-click Default Document.
Type index.php, with a space behind , in the File names list.
Click Apply on the top right of IIS Manager.
Now you need to copy libmysql.dll from C:\php and save it in C:\WINDOWS\System32. Thanks for the fix Oruba.
Lets test to make sure php is installed and running correctly.
Open notepad.
Type < ? phpInfo() ?> in the blank document.
Note: Remove the space between < ? in < ? phoInfo() ?>. I had to add the space so the command doesn’t execute on this page.
Save it as test.php on your desktop and then move it to C:\inetpub\wwwroot.
Note: A common mistake when saving test.php is to save it as test.php.txt. Don’t forget to select All files under Save as type and then name the file test.php in notepad.
Go to http://localhost/test।php। You should get a php information page similar to the screen shot below. Install MySQL
Before we can install MySQL we need to disable UAC in Windows Vista।

Open the Control Panel in classic view.
Click User Accounts.
Click Turn User Account Control on or off.
Uncheck Use User Account Control and then click OK.
Restart your computer.
Note: You can turn UAC back on after everything has been installed and working.
Now we can install MySQL. In this example I’m going to install MySQL Community Edition 5.0.45.
Download the Windows ZIP/setup.exe version http://dev.mysql.com/downloads/mysql/5.0.html#win32.
Unzip it and save setup.exe on your desktop.
Run Setup.exe.
The welcome window will popup। Click Next.

Since this is a general guide on creating a WIMP server leave Typical selected and click Next.

Let MySQL install in its default directory by simply clicking Install in this window.

Click Next to move through a few advertisements.
Leave Configure the MySQL Server now checked and click Finished.

Click Next at the welcome window.

I’m assuming that you don’t need to configure any advanced MySQL settings. If you did you probably wouldn’t need this guide or you should leave this job to an expert. Select Standard Configuration and then click Next.

Leave Install As Windows Service, the service name MySQL, and Launch MySQL Automatically checked and click Next.

Type the MySQL administrator (root) password twice and then click Next.

This part is VERY important. Hold your mouth just right, cross your fingers and click Execute to configure MySQL. If you did it just right you should get 4 check marks when it’s done.

Note: If you get a Connection Error, click Retry and it should work. This is caused by a slower computer not starting the MySQL service fast enough.
Click Finished.
Now that you have MySQL installed and running lets install the GUI Tools to make managing databases easy.
Download the GUI Tools (Windows x86) at http://dev.mysql.com/downloads/gui-tools/5.0.html.
Install it just like any other software.
Click Start, All Programs, MySQL, MySQL Administrator.
Fill in the fields just like the screen shot below.

Remember: Root’s password is the one you set when you installed MySQL.
Once MySQL Administrator is open, you can create a new database by clicking Catalogs and then right-clicking under test and select Create Schema.

Give it a name and there you go!

Open Port 80
Now that you have a working WIMP lets open it up to the world। All internet (HTTP) traffic passes through port 80. Let’s open port 80 to the world.

Search for firewall in the search box in the Start Menu and click Windows Firewall in the search results.
Click the Exceptions tab in the Windows Firewall Settings window.

Click the Add port button.
Type HTTP as the name and 80 as the port number.

Adjust Vista for Web Server Performance
Because Windows Vista is not meant to be a server out of the box its priorities are backwards when it’s being used as a web server. Windows Vista prioritizes programs like Word before background services like IIS7 to give the end user the best experience possible. Since we’re configuring Windows Vista as a web server background services need to be Vistas priority instead of programs.
Let’s set Windows Vista’s services as a higher priority than programs to squeeze the most speed out of it as we can.
Right-click Computer in the Start Menu and then select Properties.
Click Advanced system settings.
Click Settings under Performance in the Advanced tab of the System Properties window.
Click the Advanced tab in the Performance Options window.
Select Background services.
Click OK and then restart your computer।

Hardware
A web server with low to modest traffic doesn’t have to be a powerful machine to get the job done। Any modern PC with at least 1GBs of RAM (2GBs recommended for MySQL) will do fine. If you become one of the fortunate ones who receives enough traffic to need a high performance web server here are a few hardware tips.

Memory: If you’re expecting any kind of modest traffic (many thousands of hits per day) memory is very important. 2GBs is a good start but 3 or 4 are better.
IIS7: A powerful processor(s) and a good amount of memory are important.
MySQL: A fast hard drive and lots of memory are important for a MySQL database.

The Command Prompt still lives in Windows Vista

2008-01-02T01:07:00.000-08:00

Like many of you out there, my background in operating systems goes way back to the Command Prompt. In those days, all there was to the user interface was a > symbol and a blinking cursor. And the screen was monochrome--either light orange or bright green on a dark grey background. The rest was up to you and your imagination.

We've come a long way since then and are now preparing ourselves for a bright future with Windows Vista's Aero interface topped off with the Glass theme and all the other visual goodies that come with it. However, even though the fancy Windows user interface offers just about everything that I could ask for in an operating system, the old computer user in me still wants to open the Command Prompt and take my aged DOS skills out for a walk around the block. And why not? You can still accomplish some amazing tasks with just a couple of keystrokes. Granted, you have to know about and understand the commands that you have at your disposal.
Well, if you're like me, then you'll be glad to know that the developers at Microsoft have kept us in mind, even as they've been crafting the new Aero interface. The Command Prompt still lives in Windows Vista, the majority of the great command line tools introduced with Windows XP are still available, and there are several new native command line tools for us old timers to investigate. Plus, there are a few tricks that you'll want to know about. Let's take a look.

Opening the Command Prompt
To begin with, you can open a Command Prompt window in Vista in all the same ways that you can in Windows XP. You can use the Command Prompt shortcut on the Start menu or you can type CMD in the Run dialog box. When the Command Prompt window appears, you'll notice the new version number and the fact that the default user profile directory is now C:\Users rather than C:\Documents and Settings. Figure A shows the Windows Vista' Command Prompt window overlapping Windows XP's for comparison.

Figure A

You can better see the subtle differences in the Command Prompt windows when they appear with one overlapping the other.

You'll also notice that the new Command Prompt window takes advantage of Vista's Aero user interface window style with the new the Maximize, Minimize, and Close buttons and rounded corners. In Windows XP, the Command Prompt window uses the Windows Classic style. (Keep in mind that the default color scheme of the Command Prompt environment is still grey text on a black background.)

When you access the Command Prompt Properties dialog box, you'll find that the controls are almost identical. The only difference is that the Options tab in Windows Vista no longer provides the Display Options panel, which contained the Window and Full Screen settings. In fact, I received an error message when I pressed the Full Screen shortcuts keys [Alt][Enter]. It appears that running a full screen Command Prompt window in Windows Vista is no longer possible.

User Account Control (UAC) applies
As you may have guessed, there are command line tools that require administrative privileges and bring up what I'll call the Command Prompt equivalent of the User Account Control (UAC). For example, when attempting to run the Fsutil command from my local user account, which is an Administrator account type, I encountered the message shown in Figure B.

Figure B

There are command line tools in Windows Vista that require administrative privileges in order to run.

While this isn't exactly a UAC prompt like those in the GUI, it did force me to close the current Command Prompt window, return to the Start menu, right-click on the Command Prompt shortcut, and select the Run As Administrator command. I then encountered a regular UAC, as shown in Figure C.

Figure C

In order to run the Command Prompt administrative privileges you must go through a UAC.

While this was an inconvenience the first time I encountered it, it really won't be a big deal in the future, because I'll know that for certain command line tools, I'll have to use the Run As Administrator command. So I still don't mind working around UACs because I appreciate the level of protection they offer.

A few new command line tools
There appears to be quite an impressive list of command line tools in Windows Vista; however, the Windows Help and Support tool is still under construction and the command line tools aren't yet documented here. However, if you turn to the Help command at the command prompt itself, you'll see that all of your favorite command line tools are still available. You'll also find some very basic information on syntax and usage for the new command line tools, as I mentioned earlier.

The first new command line tool I encountered is Icacls, which is like Cacls on steroids. Even though Cacls is still available in Windows Vista, Icacls is designed as its replacement. In fact, when you run Cacls a note appears that reads:

Cacls is now deprecated, please use Icacls.

An odd word choice, I must admit. If Microsoft were actually going to denounce, condemn or denigrate Cacls, I would think that they would just remove it from the operating system.

In any case, Icacls is designed to not only display and modify ACLs but also to backup and restore ACLs for files and directories. In order to perform all these tasks, Icacls comes with a very hefty list of parameters and switches.

The next command line tool, Robocopy, isn't really new at all, it's just never actually been part of the operating system. Robocopy has been part of the Resource Kit toolbox since Windows NT 4.0. As you may know, Robocopy is an extremely robust copy utility that many folks use instead of Copy and Xcopy.

Another new, yet obscure, command line tool is called Mlink, and is used to create symbolic and hard links between files and folders. For example, I could use this tool to essentially map C:\CurrentWork, so that it points to C:\Documents and Settings\Greg Shultz\My Documents\My Work\Freelance\TechRepublic\July 06. This would save my from having to navigate though a long directory tree when working with files in the July 06 folder. Instead I could simply access CurrentWork.

Conclusion
As I experiment with Windows Vista Beta 2, I'll continue reporting on all of the new and improved features in this edition of the operating system. As always, if you have comments or information to share about Windows Vista's Command Prompt, please take a moment to drop by the Discussion area and let us hear.

Supporting Clients Through Windows XP’s Remote Desktop, Part 2

2007-12-30T20:24:00.000-08:00

In Part 1, you saw that there was some prep work that you had to do on the remote machine before you could connect to it. Likewise, there’s also some prep work that must be done on the local machine before you’ll be able to connect to a remote machine. To begin this prep work, click the Start button and then select the All Programs Accessories Communications Remote Desktop Connection commands. When you do, you’ll see a screen that asks you which machine that you want to connect to. This initial connection screen is deceptively simple though.
There are a lot of options that you can set besides just which computer that you want to connect to. In most cases, you can enter the name (or IP address) of the remote system and just go with the default options. However, there may be times when your needs will dictate fine tuning a session.
To set the various options, Click the Options button. When you do, the Remote Desktop Connection screen will expand to reveal an entire properties sheet, filled with connection options. The General tab lets you select a computer to connect to. You can also use this screen to enter a user name, password, and domain for the connection. If you leave this information blank, Windows will prompt you to enter a password after the connection is established. At the bottom of the General tab, there are options that you can use to save all of your settings. This is helpful if you have a remote machine that has special needs, or if you want to set up a custom configuration to use with all of your remote connections.
The next tab that you’ll see is the Display tab. The Display tab is used to control the way that the remote session appears on the local machine. By default, the remote session will take up your entire screen, although you can use the Display tab to reduce its size. You can also select the number of colors that the remote session will appear in. Finally, at the bottom of the screen, there’s an option to display the connection bar when running in full screen mode. I recommend always using this option. When running in Full Screen, the connection bar will provide you with the name of the computer that you’re connected to and the buttons that you’ll need for reducing the session to a window.
The Local Resources tab is typically one of the tabs that requires the most fine tuning. This tab controls the behavior of the remote session. For example, you can control whether sound is transmitted from the remote computer to the local computer or not. Sound consumes a lot of bandwidth, so you may want to disable it. Likewise, the Local Resources tab allows you to determine when you can use keyboard shortcuts, such as Ctrl, Alt, Delete, to control the remote machine. By default, if the remote session is running in full screen mode, then keyboard shortcuts apply to the remote machine, otherwise, they apply to the local machine.
Finally, the Local Resources tab allows you to control whether you want to control the disk drives, printers, and serial ports on the remote machine. By default, you’ll have control of the remote machine’s printers, but not the disk drives or serial ports.
The Programs tab allows you to specify a program that is to run upon connection to the remote machine. For example, you might run System Information upon connecting.
The last tab that you’ll have to deal with is the Experience tab. The basic idea behind this tab is that it allows you to select what amount of bandwidth that you’ll have available during the remote session. By default, Windows assumes that you’ll be connecting via a 56 Kbps modem. Beneath the connection speed option, there are several check boxes that turn various features on or off. For example, during a low speed connection, you probably don’t want to waste bandwidth by displaying the remote machine’s wallpaper.
As you select your connection speed, Windows enables and disables the various options depending on how much bandwidth that you have available. Fortunately, you can override Windows selections and manually enable or disable any setting that you want. For example, I used to know a guy that created a custom wallpaper for each workstation. The wallpaper was an image that told the machine’s basic configuration information. The idea was that anyone who went to work on the machine would have the machine’s vital stats available to them at a glance. If someone were running a wallpaper like this, they wouldn’t want Windows to disable it during a remote session, and would therefore choose to override the default low bandwidth settings. The options that you can enable or disable are Desktop Background, Show Contents of Window While Dragging, Menu and Window Animation, Themes, and Bitmap Caching.
Connecting To A Remote Machine
What actually happens when you connect to the remote machine depends greatly on how you’ve setup the session. If you simply go with the default settings, your remote session will begin by displaying the usual login prompt. Once you’ve entered a password, Windows will lock the remote machine. When this happens, the remote machine will display the same message that the user would see had they pressed CTRL, ALT, Delete and used the Lock Computer option. If the remote user were to press CTRL, ALT Delete and enter a password to unlock their machine, Windows would drop the remote connection.
As for the local user, the remote session behaves exactly as if the local user were sitting at the remote PC (although possibly slower if bandwidth is an issue). The only thing that the local user has to remind them that they are using a remote session is a small bar at the top of the screen that displays the name of the remote PC. This bar also contains the standard minimize, maximize, and close window buttons. These buttons are handy for situations in which the local user needs to access their own machine for a moment. The close window icon can is used to end the remote session, although you can also end the session by reducing the session to a window and then right clicking on the remote session and clicking selecting the Close command from the resulting properties sheet.
Another interesting thing about running a remote session is the way that screen resolution is handled. In my lab, I connected to a machine that was running multiple monitors. Each monitor was running at a much higher resolution than my test machine. When I connected, Windows set up the local machine as if all of the remote machines were running on a single monitor. It also scaled all of the open windows so that they would fit the local machine’s limited display capabilities.
As you can see, Windows XP’s Remote Desktop feature is an extremely valuable helpdesk tool. This is especially true in organizations in which users are geographically dispersed.

Supporting Clients Through Windows XP’s Remote Desktop, Part 1

2007-12-30T20:03:00.000-08:00

A few years ago I was working as a network administrator for a chain of healthcare facilities. Because of the low experience level of the end users, user problems almost always meant that I had to either travel to a facility myself or send someone else. On more than one occasion some of the support staff had to drive twelve hours round trip only to look at a machine, do two or three mouse clicks and leave. Of course these trips incurred costs in the way of travel expenses and lost productivity. They could have easily been avoided if the users were able to more accurately describe the problem or if the IT department could have accessed the machines by remote. At that time though, remote access wasn’t a practical solution because none of the remote facilities had significant bandwidth, and the client machines were running a variety of different operating systems, thus making it impossible to implement a standard remote access package.
If that situation happened today though, it could have been easily avoided. Bandwidth is now much more plentiful then it was a few years ago, and Windows XP has remote access capabilities built into the operating system. In this article, I’ll demonstrate how your support staff can reduce costs by taking advantage of Windows XP’s remote desktop feature. As I do, I’ll show you the ins and outs of how remote desktop works.
The Basics
Remote desktop works very similarly to the Windows 2000 Terminal Services. In fact, the local PC actually uses a cosmetically altered version of the Terminal Server Client to access the remote PC. During a remote desktop session, Windows XP uses something called the Display Protocol. This protocol sends keyboard and mouse movements from the local machine to the remote machine, where the remote desktop code acts as if the keyboard and mouse movements were generated locally. The remote machine then sends screen updates to the local machine to display the results of any actions that are being performed remotely. It’s also possible for the remote machine to send sound to the local machine, but I don’t recommend doing so because of the required amount of bandwidth.
Another thing that you should know is that during a remote session, any programs that the local machine initiates are actually being run on the remote machine. This means that it’s possible for the local machine to run programs that aren’t installed on it. It also means that it’s possible for the local machine to run programs that aren’t compatible with it. For example, suppose for a moment that you connected to a remote machine through a Pocket PC. It would be possible for you to run any application that’s installed on the remote machine because you’re actually using the remote machines resources rather than those of the Pocket PC (which isn’t even capable of running most Windows programs).
The last thing that I need to mention before I show you how to implement remote desktop is that not all versions of Windows XP support it. Only Windows XP Professional can host a remote desktop session. The home version ships with the ability to control a remote PC, but can’t host a remote session. This means that you can use the home edition or the professional edition to control a machine that’s running Windows XP professional, but neither version can control a machine that’s running the home edition.
Preparing the Remote Machines
Before you can remotely control a machine, the machine has to be prepared for remote access. If you’re going to be performing a mass Windows XP deployment, you’ll be able to set the remote desktop settings at the same time that you configure all of the other Windows settings. If you’ve already deployed Windows XP though, you’ll have to implement the Remote Desktop settings on an individual basis. There are a few good ways to accomplish this.
One method is to just go around to every machine and turn the feature on. Another method is to enable the feature the first time that each user calls you with a problem. By using this method, you’ll usually end up installing remote desktop on the machines belonging to the users who have the most problems first, and then gradually to the users who call less often.
To implement remote desktop on a workstation, go to the Start Menu and right click on My computer। Now, select the Properties command from the resulting context menu in order to display the system’s properties sheet. At this point, select the properties sheet’s Remote tab. As you can see in Figure A, the Remote tab contains two check boxes. One check box is to allow users to remotely connect to the computer, while the other allows remote assistance invitations to be sent from the computer.

Figure A

Let’s begin by looking at the option for allowing users to connect remotely to the computer. When you select the check box, you receive a warning that some local accounts may not have passwords and that accounts used for remote connections must have passwords. The warning also tells you that if you’re passing through a firewall, such as you would do if you were accessing the machine through the Internet, then the correct port must be opened in the firewall. Typically, remote desktop is set to use port 3389. Click OK to clear the warning, and then click the Select Remote Users button.
Windows will now display the Remote Desktop Users dialog box. Click the Add button to begin adding users to the list. If you’re in the habit of selecting which users can access a network resource, then this screen may look a little funny to you. As you can see in Figure B, Windows is set by default to work with user objects from the local computer. The reason is that the people who developed this portion of Windows XP assumed that most of the time when you access a remote PC in this manner, you won’t be authenticated into a domain. You can select domain users though by clicking the Locations button and selecting a domain from the list. Regardless of whether you’re working with domain users or local users, you won’t be able to select the users from the list. Instead, you’ll have to manually enter the user name and then use the Check Names button to verify that you spelled the user names correctly.
Figure B

As I mentioned, the reason that this particular feature is so strange to setup is that Microsoft intended it to be used for other purposes. They designed it as a way to allow you to access your PC at the office from home or while you’re on the go. Although there’s another option that’s actually intended for tech support, I recommend going ahead and enabling the remote desktop in the manner that I just described. You should also assign a standard account access to all machines. The reason for doing this is that the remote desktop option that’s actually intended for tech support purposes requires a user to send an invitation to someone, asking for help. If the user can’t figure out how to send an invitation, then they won’t be able to get remote assistance. By going ahead and enabling the type of remote access that I just showed you, you’ll be able to help users by remote even if they don’t know how to send an invitation.
That doesn’t mean that the users shouldn’t be able to send an invitation though. I recommend leaving the option for remote assistance invitations enabled. You can however control the length of time that an invitation is valid by clicking the advanced button on the System Properties sheet’s Remote tab. By default, invitations are valid for 30 days.
Right now, you may be wondering what the deal is with a remote assistance invitation. Remote assistance invitations are a method through which end users may ask for help. Typically, users generate an E-mail message that includes an invitation. However, invitations may also be sent through Windows messenger or through a file. Before you implement the ability for users to send remote invitations, keep in mind that there are some very serious security risks associated with doing so. I’ll be addressing these security risks in a separate article series. For now though, it’s just important to understand what remote invitations are and what they do.
As you can see, setting up remote access capabilities provides the support staff with a low cost way of servicing your end users. This technique is especially effective in organizations that are geographically dispersed.

Repairing The Master Boot Record

2007-12-30T19:50:00.000-08:00

One of the most important parts of your system’s hard disk is the Master Boot Record. Without a valid Master Boot Record or MBR, it’s impossible to boot the system from the hard disk. Unfortunately, many viruses are designed to attack a system’s MBR. Sure, you can usually disinfect the system and it will begin booting normally, but what do you do if a system still won’t boot after a virus has been removed?
To answer that question, it’s necessary to take a closer look at how this particular type of virus works. Normally, the MBR points at a system’s boot sector. When the system is powered up, the hardware knows to look at the MBR, and then the MBR redirects the system to the boot sector so that the boot process can begin.
Most, but not all, viruses that infect the MBR do so by copying the contents of the boot sector to a different file and then overwriting the boot sector with viral code. When you remove a boot sector virus, the anti virus program is usually smart enough to know where the original boot sector was copied to. It then removes the viral code and moves the boot sector code back to the correct location.
Unfortunately, some viruses don’t backup the boot sector code before altering it. Likewise, there are also legitimate programs that can cause boot problems similar to that of a virus. For example, I was recently using a program called System Commander from VCOM. System Commander alters the boot sector so that your system will boot the System Commander program instead of the normal operating system. The program then displays a menu and allows you to boot to a variety of operating systems. However, I had decided to remove an operating system from a computer and System Commander was damaged in the process.
After the damage occurred, the system was unbootable. The system would try to boot to a nonexistent copy of System Commander. Unfortunately, it was impossible to reinstall System Commander because the system was unbootable. As you can see, in such a case, perfectly legitimate software can function exactly like a boot sector virus. This means that whether your MBR is malfunctioning because of a virus or because of a boot program gone haywire, the repair method is exactly the same.
Obviously, the best repair method is to restore a backup or to use a repair disk such as the one created by Norton’s System Works. However, if you don’t happen to have such a recovery tool, you’ll have to do things the old fashion way. You can also forget about reformatting or repartitioning the drive, as these operations don’t effect the boot sector. The method that you’d use to recover from such a situation depends on the operating system that you’re using.
If your system is running Windows 98, use a separate system to create a bootable floppy disk and copy the FDISK file to it. Now, boot the damaged system from the boot floppy. When you’ve booted the system to a command prompt, enter the following command:
FDISK /MBR
This will repair the Master Boot Record and make the system bootable. If you happen to be using a Windows 2000 system, you can boot from the installation disks and enter the Recovery Console. When the Recovery Console loads, you can use the FIXBOOT or the FIXMBR command to cure the problem.

Using Windows CE to Manage Your Windows 2000 Network

2007-12-30T19:18:00.000-08:00

Reprinted by permission from Imagine that you’re in the car driving down a long and desolate interstate, out in the middle of nowhere. Just as you think you’re about to scream from boredom, the phone rings. Someone at your office decided to interrupt your travel to tell you about some terrifying message that’s being displayed on the server. Now, you have two choices, you can either run up your cell phone bill and try to explain to the clueless person on the phone how to fix the problem, or you can pull over, get out the palm top, fix the problem and be on your merry way. Although the idea of having total control of your network from a device that’s small enough to fit into your pocket, all from the comfort of your own car may sound like a fantasy, it really works. In this article, we’ll explain how to use your Windows CE machine to remotely control your Windows 2000 servers.
The requirements
There are some pretty stiff hardware and software requirements for controlling Windows 2000 through Windows CE. First, not just any Windows CE device will work. The PDA style Windows CE machines with no keyboard were never designed for this type of work, and are therefore unsupported. You must have a palm top computer or one of the new pocket PCs. For the purposes of writing this article, we used a Hewlett Packard Jornada 680.
Your Windows CE device must also have some method of connecting to Windows 2000 via TCP/IP. We used a network card in our palm top, but if you’ve got Windows 2000 configured to function as a remote access server (a RAS server), you can dial in and control Windows 2000. The actual connection method is irrelevant as long as you authenticate into the domain that your server is a member of, and connect using TCP/IP.
As we mentioned before, you’ll also need some special software. The server must be configured to run the Terminal services. For the purposes of writing the article, we used Windows 2000 Advanced Server release candidate 2. We also attempted to connect Windows to a computer running Windows 2000 Server beta 3, but had a lot of trouble. That fact is trivial though since there’s a good chance that the final release will be available by the time that you read this.
The Windows CE machine also requires special software. Windows CE must be running the Terminal Server client software to be able to remote control the Windows 2000 server. We’ll tell you how to get this software later on.
Things to consider on the server
Before you set up the server for remote access, there are a few things that you need to consider. The terminal services can take a tremendous toll on the server. The terminal services use memory, the processor, hard disk, and the network card very heavily. The purpose of this article is to explain how to remotely control the server in emergency situations. Therefore, extremely high end hardware isn’t necessarily a requirement. We ran the terminal services on a Windows 2000 Advanced Server with 128 MB of RAM with no problems. However, if anyone else plans on using the terminal server, remember that the amount of power required is directly proportional to the number of remote users, the number of programs that each user runs, and the types of programs that these users run. A generic word processor for example doesn’t require anywhere near the horsepower of a large database or a video game. To run a terminal server for more than emergency administrative purposes, Microsoft recommends 128 MB of RAM with an extra 10 MB to 21 MB of RAM for each user depending on what types of programs that they run. Microsoft also recommends multiple processors, RAID arrays, and fast network connections for multiple terminal server users. There are also many more security issues involved in allowing multiple user access. We’ll publish an article dedicated to allowing multiple users in the future.
Installing the terminal server service
To install the terminal services on the Windows 2000 server, open the Control Panel and double click on the Add / Remove Programs icon. When you see the Add / Remove Programs window, click the Windows Setup button. At this point, the computer may appear to ignore your request. However, if this happens, the Windows Components Wizard has merely opened in the background. Close the Add / Remove Programs window to access the Windows Components Wizard.
When you see the Wizard, select the check box next to Terminal Services and next to Terminal Services Licensing. Click Next and Windows will begin installing the required components. The first question that you are asked is whether you want to install the terminal services in Remote Administration Mode or in Application Server Mode. Select Remote Administration Mode and click the Next button. The next portion of the wizard will ask you about the role and location of the license server. Unless you have a compelling reason to change these options, use the defaults and click Next to continue. At this point, Windows 2000 will ask for the Windows 2000 CD-ROM and begin copying all of the necessary files. When the wizard completes, click Finish. You’ll now be prompted to reboot your server.
Setting up Windows CE
As we mentioned earlier, accessing the Windows 2000 server by remote control requires that you attach to the server through TCP/IP and that you authenticate the Windows CE machine into the Windows 2000 domain. Make sure that you’ve established this ability before continuing. If you have questions about how to do this, check out last month’s article, “Connecting to The World With Windows CE”.
Once you have the ability to connect to the server, use a desktop PC and download the Terminal Server Client for Windows CE. You can download it from www.microsoft.com/windowsce. Once you’ve downloaded the client, attach the desktop to your palmtop via serial cable or infrared port and run the program that you just downloaded on the desktop machine. The program will install the necessary files on the Windows CE machine.
Once you’ve installed the necessary files, select the Client Connection Wizard command from your Windows CE machine’s Start Programs Terminal Server Client menu. The first screen of the wizard asks for a description of the session and the name of the server that you want to control. Enter anything that you want for the description, but we’ve had better luck entering the server’s IP address than its name into the Server Name field. Click Next to continue.
The next screen that you’ll see allows you to log on automatically. This one is up to you. If you want to log on automatically, select the Log On Automatically check box and then fill in the Username, Password and Domain fields. The only down side to logging in automatically is that if you were ever to lose your palm top, who ever finds it could access your server. When you’ve filled in the necessary information, click Next to continue.
The final screen of the wizard asks whether you want to display the server’s desktop, or automatically launch an application. Since the purpose of this configuration is remote administration, select the Display Desktop radio button and click finish. Windows CE will now place an icon on your desktop that you can use to remotely control your server.
Connecting to the server
At this point, you’re ready to connect Windows CE to your Windows 2000 server. To do so, begin be establishing the communications link, whether by dial up networking or via a network card. Once you’ve logged into your network, double tap on the icon that you created earlier. Doing so will connect to Windows 2000 through your TCP/IP link. The login process should be automatic since you’re already authenticated into the domain.
When you connect, the first thing that you may notice is that the Windows 2000 desktop looks different on your Windows CE device. That’s because of the difference in resolution from Windows 2000 to Windows CE. Because Windows CE can’t display the entire screen, some of the icons are temporarily rearranged to make them fit onto the visible desktop.
The next thing that you may notice is that the icons aren’t as responsive as you would expect. The first time that we configured Windows CE to remotely control Windows 2000, we thought that there was a security option that we neglected to set, because half of the icons wouldn’t work. Instead, the problem was that the terminal server seems to require much more accurate tapping than a standard Windows CE session does. It’s been our experience that when double tapping, if the second tap isn’t in exactly the same spot as the first tap, then it doesn’t work. We found this to be extremely difficult. It’s much easier to simply select the icon that you want to use and then press Enter.
We also noticed that some of the Start menu’s sub menus behaved strangely. For example, when we went to Start Programs Accessories, the menu would freak out and take us into My Documents. The solution to this was simple. All we had to do was to make sure that the point of the stylus never came off of the screen when accessing the menus. For example, we would tap on start and then press the stylus on programs. We would then keep the stylus on the screen while selecting Accessories and what ever choice came next.
The last problem that we encountered was that many times the utility that we wanted to use didn’t completely fit on the Windows CE screen. This wouldn’t be a problem, except that there was no scroll bar to access the bottom portion of the screen. Although it’s not perfect, the display works much better if you disable Active Desktop for terminal server clients. To do so, open the Control Panel on the Windows 2000 computer and double click on the Administrative Tools icon. When you do, you’ll see the Administrative Tools window. Now, double click on the Terminal Services Configuration icon to launch the Terminal Services Configuration utility. Now, click on the Server Settings folder in the column on the left to view the configurable settings on the right. One of the options is for Active Desktop. Now, simply right click on the Active Desktop icon and choose the Disable command from the resulting context menu. The changes won’t take effect until the next time that you connect Windows CE with a new session.
Ending your session
When you’re done using the terminal server session on your Windows CE machine, select the Shut Down command from the Start menu. There are two commands on this menu that need a little explaining. The Log Off command disconnects you from the Terminal Server and restores the normal Windows CE desktop. This is the command that you should normally use to disconnect.
The Disconnect command also returns you to the Windows CE desktop, but leaves your session active on the Terminal Server. This means that even though you’re not using the Terminal Server, server resources are still being wasted on the session. Your programs and files are still opened, exactly in the state that they were in when you disconnected. The next time that you attach to the Terminal Server, you’ll be exactly where you were when you disconnected the last time.
Conclusion
In this article, we’ve discussed a way that you can use your palm top computer to manage your network on the go. As we did, we explained all of the necessary hardware and software requirements for doing so. We also discussed all of the unique aspects that you’ll have to deal with because of Windows CE’s limitations.

Mobile Master Professional 6.8.2.2402

2007-12-19T22:35:00.000-08:00

Mobile Master is a Cell phone and handset manager for Windows and synchronizes with a few mouse clicks your contacts and appointments between the handset and your computer. Edit and synchronize calendar entries (appointments and tasks).

Send, read, archive SMS Note: the SMS Servant is included in the Mobile Master installation but requires an extra license. Logo-Editor, modify ring tone. Copy Station for transmitting your address book easily from one phone to the other. Mobile Master Agent: reach always the important functions easily and start e.g. Mobile Master automatically as soon as your mobile phone is connected to the PC.

One click synchronization solution for your mobile phone, edit all you phones data with the computer. Synchronization of contacts and the calendar, Many filter possibilities, AddIns for Outlook, Lotus Notes, Palm Desktop and Thunderbird
Mobile Master synchronizes or just copies all data with/to your mobile phone.Synchronize with: Outlook, Lotus Notes, Novell Groupwise, Palm Desktop, Thunderbird, Tobit David, Eudora, The Bat, Outlook Express, Google calendar, Windows contacts and calendar, iTunes
new cell phone: Mobile Master copies the phone/address book from your old to your new one regardless the manufacturer of the phones new phone number, appointment or note: type it in with your PC and send it easily to the cell phone.
Many import and export filters, e.g. one click to export to excel or open office. Can import e.g. vcf file with more than one contact and that has unicode format
Connection with the phone: serial or USB cable, infrared or Bluetooth, up to COM Port 300 supported.

Features:
- Mobile Master is a handset manager to edit manually or synchronize automatically or on demand
- Quick area for quick and easy access to the main functions
- Comfortable editing of the phone book, calendar and note items
- easy to use user interface
- Setup Wizard for easy configuring
- Copy files, music, photos
- SMS send, archive
- Copy the address book, calendar from one phone to another
- At least one update per month for the phones and devices
- Copy play lists from iTunes and WinAmp to the phone

Supported mobile phones and devices:

- Apple iPod: iPod Video, iPod nano
- LG: KG800 Chocolate, KG320S
- Motorola: RAZR V3r, RAZR V3i, SLVR L7, SLVR L6
- Nokia: Nokia 6233, Nokia 6270, Nokia 6280, Nokia 6230, Nokia 6230i, Nokia 6220, Nokia 6210, Nokia 6200, Nokia 6100, Nokia 6310, Nokia 6310i, Nokia 6820, Nokia 6822
- Sony Ericsson: W880i W880 W710i W710 Z710i Z710 Z610i Z610 K800 K800i K800 W900i W900 W850i W850 W810i W810 W800i W800 W700i W700 W550i W550 W500i W500 W300i W300 D750i D750 K750i K750 K700i K700 K610i K610 K600i K600 K510i K510 K500i K500 K300i K300 F500i F500 S700i S700 T610i T610 V800i V800 V600i V600 Z600i Z600 Z550i Z550 Z520i Z520
- Samsung: Samsung SGH-P310, Samsung SGH-P300, Samsung SGH-D900, Samsung SGH-D830, Samsung SGH-D820, Samsung SGH-D800, Samsung SGH-D600, Samsung SGH-D520, Samsung SGH-D500, Samsung SGH-E900, Samsung SGH-E850, Samsung SGH-E800, Samsung SGH-E770, Samsung SGH-E760, Samsung SGH-E730, Samsung SGH-E720, Samsung SGH-E700, Samsung SGH-E620, Samsung SGH-E610, Samsung SGH-E570, Samsung SGH-E530, Samsung SGH-E500, Samsung SGH-E380, Samsung SGH-E370, Samsung SGH-E350, Samsung SGH-E250, Samsung SGH-X830, Samsung SGH-X820, Samsung SGH-X800, Samsung SGH-X700, Samsung SGH-X670, Samsung SGH-X660, Samsung SGH-X640
- Siemens BenQ: BenQ Siemens EL71, BenQ Siemens E61 , BenQ Siemens S88, BenQ Siemens S68, BenQ Siemens E61 , Siemens S75, Siemens SL75, Siemens CX75, Siemens CF75, Siemens C75, Siemens M75, Siemens ME75, Siemens CX70, Siemens M65, Siemens M56, Siemens S65, Siemens SL65, Siemens SK65, Siemens CX65, Siemens S56, Siemens S55, Siemens M55, Siemens SL55
and more...

Changes in Version 6.8.2 build 2402 - 31.05.07:

*reworked synchronization with motorola handsets:
*added unicode support (contacts and calendar)
*added support for the groups (contacts) and fixed problem
*fixed bug writing phone book and calendar items to the phone
*fixed bug copying phonebook pictures with long filenames
*fixed problem loading backup of a SIM card
*fixed problem reading SMS from some Samsung phones (e.g. E730)
*fixed bug saving the main number to the backup with Nokia phones
*setting of the font size of the calendar view is now possible
*fixed bug in in the last version: in the contact properties dialog sometimes the buttons were not visible
*Samsung D500/D600: sms are now read in text format

Homepage

Size: 13.18 MB

Download

How can I gain access to a Windows NT/2000/XP/2003 computer if I forgot the administrator's password? How can I reset the administrator's password if

2007-12-07T01:05:00.000-08:00

Ok, so you say you forgot your Windows administrator's password, huh? Oh well, it doesn't really matter if you did or you just say you did. The fact is that you need to gain access to a computer and you cannot "remember" the administrator's password.

How can you get out of this situation without formatting and re-installing the operating system?

Windows Key by LostPassword.com - Use this easy tool to reset any Windows local or domain controller password in a minute. Money-back guarantee. Download FREE version now!

One method of gaining access to the system is by trying hard to remember the forgotten password, or a password of another user which has the same level of administrative rights. However I don't think this approach will help you, otherwise you wouldn't be sitting here reading article, would you?)

Another method is by trying to restore a backed up System State (in Windows 2000/XP/2003) or a ERD (in NT 4.0) in which you do remember the password. The problem with doing so is that you'll probably lose all of the recently add users and groups, and all the changed passwords for all of your users since the last backup was made.

A third method might be to install a parallel operating system on a different partition on the same computer, then use a simple trick to gain access to the old system. Read more about it on my Forgot the Administrator's Password? - Alternate Logon Trick article.

Note: If you are looking for password cracking tools that can be used for miscellaneous objectives such as password-protected PDF documents, zipped archives, Office documents, BIOS protection and so on then this pages is NOT for you. See some links at the bottom of this page for hints on where to find such tools, but I can tell you right away that Google might be a better choice for you.

The fourth option is by using 3rd party tools that will enable you to reset the lost password and logon with a blank password.

Update: You can also discuss these topics on the dedicated Petri.co.il Forgot Admin Password Forum.

Translations of this article

There are some translations made of this article. Here are the ones I am aware of (do tell me if you know of another, or if you want to create one in your language):

Portuguese - HERE is an excellent translation of this article into Portuguese (by Bruno Koga - Thanks!)
Serbian - HERE (by Aleksandar Stojilkovic - thanks!)
Spanish - HERE (by Victor Pereyra - thanks!)

Freeware Password Recovery Tools

Here are some of these tools:

Free Windows password-cracking tools are usually Linux boot disks that have NT file system (NTFS) drivers and software that will read the registry and rewrite the password hashes for any account including the Administrators. This process requires physical access to the console and an available floppy drive but it works like a charm! I've done it myself several times with no glitch or problem whatsoever.

Beware!!! Resetting a user's or administrator's password on some systems (like Windows XP) might cause data loss, especially EFS-encrypted files and saved passwords from within Internet Explorer. To protect yourself against EFS-encrypted files loss you should always export your Private and Public key, along with the keys for the Recovery Agent user. Please read more about EFS on my What's EFS? page. Out of the following list, the only tool that will no cause any harm to EFS-encrypted files on your hard disk is the Windows Password recovery system.

Here are 5 of these free tools:

Windows Password recovery - Can retrieve forgotten admin and users' passwords in minutes. Safest possible option, does not write anything to hard drive.
Petter Nordahl-Hagen's Offline NT Password & Registry Editor - A great boot CD/Floppy that can reset the local administrator's password.
Openwall's John the Ripper - Good boot floppy with cracking capabilities.
EBCD – Emergency Boot CD - Bootable CD, intended for system recovery in the case of software or hardware faults.

If you happen to know about other free tools please let me know .

Important note for Windows Vista users: At this time there is only one solution for Window Vista and that is Petter Nordahl-Hagen's Offline NT Password & Registry Editor

Note: These password resetting tools are usually good for local users on a stand alone computer. For Domain Admin password resetting procedures please see the Related Articles section at the bottom of this page.

Note: I'd like to put together all the info you have about these issues. If you have any tips, recommended links or any ideas about how to figure out a lost password - please e-mail me and I'll get back to you .

Windows Password recovery

http://www.loginrecovery.com

This site provides a tool to recover lost Windows XP passwords. It works for administrator and user accounts, it doesn't change the password just tells you the old one. It works with encrypted files (EFS) and password hashes. It even works if no passwords at all are known for the machine (as long as you have another computer with internet access to view this website with).

Author claims it also works with Windows NT and Windows Server 2003 and Windows Longhorn, but the BEST thing about it is the fact that it won't reset your passwords, but simply reveal them for you to remember and then use.

Give it a try. The author would like to receive feedback. There is a free service as well as a priority service that will retrieve your passwords within minutes. The fee for the priority service is very cheap, and is really just to cover server costs.

Note: You'll need a blank floppy to run the process.

Update: Author now offers the same tool as a CD image for those of you who do not have a floppy in their computer.

Usage, instructions and additional information can be found at

http://www.loginrecovery.com

Offline NT Password & Registry Editor (v060213 - February 2006)

Petter Nordahl-Hagen has written a Windows NT/2000/XP/Vista offline password editor:

http://home.eunet.no/~pnordahl/ntpasswd

This is a utility to (re)set the password of any user that has a valid (local) account on your Windows NT/2000/XP/2003/Vista system, by modifying the encrypted password in the registry's SAM file.
You do not need to know the old password to set a new one.
It works offline, that is, you have to shutdown your computer and boot off a floppy disk or CD. The boot-disk includes stuff to access NTFS partitions and scripts to glue the whole thing together.
Works with syskey (no need to turn it off, but you can if you have lost the key)
Will detect and offer to unlock locked or disabled out user accounts!

Caution: If used on users that have EFS encrypted files, and the system is XP or later service packs on W2K, all encrypted files for that user will be UNREADABLE! and cannot be recovered unless you remember the old password again!

Download links:

cd070409.zip (~3MB) - Bootable CD image with newer drivers
bd050303.zip (~1.1MB) - Bootdisk image, date 050303.
sc050303.zip(~1.4MB) - SCSI-drivers (050303) (only use newest drivers with newest bootdisk, this one works with bd050303)

To write these images to a floppy disk you'll need RawWrite2 which is included in the Bootdisk image download. To create the CD you just need to use your favorite CD burning program and burn the .ISO file to CD.

Support and Problems? Don't call me! Talk to the creator of this great tool. He also has a good FAQ set up covering most of the day-to-day questions. Read it right HERE

Author claims that this tool was successfully tested on NT 3.51, NT 4, Windows 2000 (except datacenter), Windows XP (all versions) and Window Server 2003. Notice that it is NOT compatible with Active Directory.

Need to change Windows NT/2000 Domain Admin password? This tool, however useful, will only reset the local administrator's password (e.g. the one found in the local computer's SAM). To reset a password of a domain administrator (or any other user for that matter) you must perform the routine that is described in the following page: Forgot the Administrator's Password? - Reset Domain Admin Password in Windows 2000 AD.

Note: The above trick will probably not work under Windows Server 2003 due to service account security changes. To work around these limitations please read the Forgot the Administrator's Password? - Reset Domain Admin Password in Windows Server 2003 AD page.

John the Ripper (v1.7.0.1)

John the Ripper is a fast password cracker, currently available for many flavors of Unix (11 are officially supported, not counting different architectures), DOS, Win32, BeOS, and OpenVMS. Its primary purpose is to detect weak Unix passwords. Besides several crypt(3) password hash types most commonly found on various Unix flavors, supported out of the box are Kerberos AFS and Windows NT/2000/XP LM hashes, plus several more with contributed patches.

Read more at http://www.openwall.com/john

Download links:

John the Ripper 1.7.0.1 (1.32mb)

A Pro version also exists on the author's site, however that one costs money.

EBCD – Emergency Boot CD (v0.61 - October 2004)

EBCD is a bootable CD, intended for system recovery in the case of software or hardware faults. It is able to create backup copies of normally working system and restore system to saved state. It contains the best system software ever created, properly compiled and configured for the maximum efficient use.

EBCD will be very useful when you need to:

Copy/move files (with long names, not necessary in CP437 encoding) from/to the disk but OS which can handle them (windows, Linux...) cannot boot. In particular, you may create a backup copy of normally installed and configured Windows and later restore Windows from such backup copy. So, in the case of fault OS itself and all software and its settings can be restored in 5-10 minutes.
Perform emergency boot of Windows NT / 2000 / XP. When the loader of this OS on the hard disk is damaged or misconfigured, you are able to load OS using another, standalone loader from this CD.
Recover master boot record of HDD. This allows to boot OS after incorrect uninstallation of custom loader (LILO, for example), which made all OS on your PC not bootable.
Delete, move, copy to file (image) and re-create partition from file. Image transfer over network is also supported: so you may configure one PC and then make contents of hard disks of other PCs same as contents of the hard disk of the first one.
Change password of any user, including administrator of Windows NT/2000/XP OS. You do not need to know the old password.
Recover deleted file, even file re-deleted from Windows Recycle Bin, and, in contrast, wipe single file or a whole disk so that it will be impossible to recover it in any way.
Recover data from accidentally formatted disk. Sometimes it helps to recover data from the disk, damaged by a virus.
Recover data from a floppy disk, which is not readable by OS. Format 3.5" disk for 1.7 Mb size.

Also the disk includes full set of external DOS commands, console versions of the most popular archivers/compressors.

Moreover, emergency boot CD includes minimal Linux distribution (Rescue Linux distribution) which may be very useful to a professional user.

how to find fight keyloggers

2007-12-07T01:02:00.000-08:00

If your computer is accessed by other people (or even if not) you may want to find if somebody tries to steal your private data. One of the most used ways to do this is by installing a keylogger, a software (or even worse hardware) that captures the user's keystrokes (and that means they can see your passwords, credit card data, private conversations, output e-mails...). Here are a few ways you can use to check if a keylogger is installed on your computer:

1. Use up to date anti virus and/or anti spyware software
Typically a good anti virus software will find most of the commercial keyloggers and maybe more. Keep the software up to date and don't forget to enable advanced detection features for best results (for example check "Potentially unwanted applications" in NOD32).

2. Use a special software tool
There are a bunch of anti-keylogger software on the market and you may get better results with those. I recommend you to use them if you think there is a high possibility to have a keylogger installed. For example I found Cyberhawk to be the only software that detected a custom made keylogger. Kasperky does a good job in this area too. Also check anti-spy.info. More examples:

3. Find it yourself
If you are more like an advanced user you can try finding keyloggers by using a few tools like regedit (registry editor) and/or Process Explorer. It will save you some money but it gets harder and harder to find advanced spyware. You can look here or here for more information about using Process Explorer.
You can also try some hot key combination that are used by this kind of software. Examples: Ctrl + Alt + X or Ctrl + Alt + Wondows Key + X

4. Free tools you can use:

PSMAntiKeyLogger
PSMAntiKeyLogger is a real-time protecting software which protects you against Keyloggers. No scanning is needed.
SnoopFree
Freeware antikeylogger that block hook based keyloggers as well as screen captures. For Windows XP.
I Hate Keyloggers
Freeware antikeylogger that block hook based keyloggers. For Windows 2000 and XP.
KL-Detector
Freeware on demand keylogger scanner.

The best way to protect you against keyloggers is to prevent their installation. You can do this by limiting other Windows users accounts. You can find a good guide here. I advise you to try at least step 1 because you can never know...

12Business Skills You Need To Master

2007-12-07T00:40:00.000-08:00

Developing a small business into a successful enterprise demands more than passion. Unfortunately, facts speak for themselves. Over half of new businesses fail mainly because the entrepreneur is unable to translate their passion into practical business skills. Success demands more than hard work, resilience, and expertise in your field. In order to succeed, you need to understand and to become proficient in a set of fundamental business skills.

Running a small business requires that you become a jack-of-all-trades. It is important to know early on which skills that you have and those that you will have to learn or delegate to others. When it comes to the skills that you lack, you can learn these skills over a period of time by yourself, you can hire employees who are strong in specific areas, or you can engage the help of a professional business advisor.

Here are the essential soft skills (people skills or anything that is not a technical skill) that you will need to learn or import to help you to succeed in your business:

• Delegation Skills -- Delegation involves assigning responsibility to other people for the completion of work. The ideal position that you want to obtain is one where your staff carries out all the routine activities of your business. Effective delegation involves achieving the correct balance between effective controls and allowing people to complete their job effectively. The key element is knowing how to make your business work, rather than your business working you!

• Communication Skills -- Communication is an important part of life and is one that is often taken for granted. When you think about it, almost everything you do requires improved communications. To be effective in business, you have to communicate well. When you hire a new employee, good communication skills help you select the right person. When you communicate with your various stakeholders, you need to be clear about your expectations and to be sensitive when dealing with problems. The key is to know how to effectively communicate your vision with passion and conviction.

• Negotiation Skills -- Almost everyone negotiates informally on a daily basis without even being aware of it. Formal negotiation is a skill that can be learned through experience and practice. People who negotiate frequently tend to be more skilled at it than people who have not participated in many formal/informal negotiations. Experienced people are more likely to know what to say, when or when not to say it, or when or when not to make concessions. The key is to know how to develop a win-win approach in negotiations with all parties, but at the same time keeping in mind that you also want to obtain the most favorable outcome possible for yourself.

• Strategic Planning -- Strategic planning is a very important business activity. Strategic planning is a process of defining your company's strategy or direction and making decisions on allocations of resources of capital and people. The key is to know how to project your company's future performance, within a three-to-five year framework or more, supported by your well-defined business plan.

• Leadership Skills -- Leadership is a process of getting things done via people. Leadership, a critical management skill, is the ability to motivate a group of people toward a common goal. Leadership is also the ability to take charge, assemble, mobilize, and motivate teams. The key is to know how to forge long-term relationships with prospects, customers, suppliers, employees, and investors.

• Team Building Skills -- Team-building and teamwork skills are essential for an entrepreneur in today's workplace. People working at their potential in teams generate better solutions and more productivity than individual members working independently. The key is to know how to build teams of employees, partners, advisors, and investors that will help you take your business to the next level.

• Analytical Skills -- Today’s workplace is becoming more technologically advanced and complex. With this rapid increase of technology, the need for analytical thinking also increases. Analytical thinking is the ability to objectively assess the present state of your business, to determine where you want to be in the future, and what to do in order to close the gap between the present and the future growth of your business. The key is to know how to gather, review, and evaluate data that is necessary to formulate and express compelling arguments.

• Sales and Marketing Skills -- Establishing successful sales and marketing methods and policies - from pricing and advertising to sales techniques - are essential in growing your business. The ability to analyze your competition, the marketplace, and industry trends are critical to the development of your marketing strategy. The key is to know how to craft and communicate a compelling message to the right target audience that generates new business, and in turn, builds profitable revenue streams.

• General Management Skills -- Management involves directing and controlling a group of one or more people for the purpose of coordinating activities that will accomplish a goal. Management encompasses the deployment and direction of human resources, financial resources, and technological resources. The key is to know how to develop and implement a workable management system that will manage daily operations, nurture stakeholders, and support business growth.

• Cash flow Management Skills -- Cash flow is generally acknowledged as the single most pressing concern of the small and medium-sized businesses. In its simplest form, cash flow is the movement of money in and out of your business. Cash flow is the life-blood of all growing businesses and is the primary indicator of business health. The effect of cash flow is real, immediate and, if mismanaged, totally unforgiving. The key is to know how to monitor, protect, control, and put cash to work.

• Financial Management Skills --The activity of finance is the application of a set of techniques that individuals and businesses use to manage their money, particularly the differences between income and expenditure and the risks of their investments. The need for timely budgeting and reporting of financial performance is of the upmost importance. The key is to know how to interpret and analyze your financial statements, in such a way, as to identify the items that are adversely affecting your profitability.

• Time Management Skills -- Time Management is a set of related common-sense skills that help you use your time in the most effective and productive way. Time Management is a very important skill to master. Learning this skill will empower you to achieve more and to use your time wisely. The key is to know how to manage your time efficiently and to focus on the activities most likely to deliver value to your business.

Copyright © 2007 Terry H. Hill You may reprint this article free of charge in your newsletter, magazine, or on your website, provided that the article is unedited, and that the copyright, author's bio, and contact information below appears with each article. Articles appearing on the web must provide a hyperlink to the author's web site.

Use windows xp like pro

2007-12-07T00:25:00.000-08:00

If you want your car to perform and look well you have to do some maintenance from time to time: clean it, change the oil, change the tires and so on. Windows XP can be a good performer but, like with the car, you should take care of some things. Most people will tell you that it's performance will degrade over time and you have to do a clean reinstall to get it back. That's not true! Make sure you follow these advices and you'll see.

Things to do only once

Make sure you have a big enough system (C:\) partition. This will make file fragmentation less likely to occur.
Set your swap file to a fixed size. To do this access "Control Panel > System > Advanced > Performance : Settings > Advanced > Virtual Memory : Change" and enter a custom size. Use the same value for the initial size and maximum size (usually 1.5 x physical memory size). A good practice is to defragment the drive before so that Windows can allocate a contigous space for the pagefile.
Disable visual effects. To do this access "Control Panel > System > Advanced > Performance : Settings" and check "Adjust for best performance". This will make Windows XP look a bit uglier but work faster. If you have a new and fast system enjoy the looks and leave the default for this setting.
Disable indexing services. To do this go to "Control Panel > Add/Remove Programs > Add/Remove Window Components" and uncheck the Indexing services. Click "Next" to apply.
Install a good antivirus and leave Windows Firewall on. This should keep viruses and spyware away but you can never be too careful with those.
Disable "last access update notification". Create a new DWORD registry value called ‘NtfsDisableLastAccessUpdate’ in "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\FileSystem" and set value data to 1.

Things to do from time to time

Delete temporary files. Usually you can find them in "C:\Documents and Settings\\Local Settings\Temp\".
Delete your browser cache. For Internet Explorer go to "Tools > Internet Options... : General" and choose "Delete files > Delete all offline content". For FireFox go to "Tools > Options > Privacy > Clear now..." and make sure "Cache" is checked.
Defragment at least your system partition monthly. Make sure you completed the last two steps before and the result should be better.
Use Windows Update every week!!! This is very important. Also make sure your antivirus is up to date.
Check for newer versions of your drivers and software. Your browser, messenger or email client can be vulnerable to attacks even if the OS is updated. Also, updated drivers often bring good performance enhancements.

Things not to do

Do not install applications you don't need. These can bring the most bloat to your system increasing disk space, registry size, number of services, number of DLL's and so on. Make sure you install well-known and supported software. Check this for a list of free software I use.
Think twice before installing software from the internet. Twice!
Do not use memory defragmentation/cache enhancer software. Memory cache system is a key component of Windows constantly improved in the last 20 years and you simply cannot beat it with a 15$ utility.

This is it! And that's how I used Windows 2000 for 5 years without a single reinstall and Windows XP for the last 2 years.

Things you can do to become good

2007-12-07T00:20:00.000-08:00

MOTTO: The greatest discovery of my generation is that a human being can alter his life by altering his attitudes of mind (William James)

Communicate. Employees must be empowered with information so that they can make the best decisions, quickly and without the approval of higher-ups.
Do not think you know everything. Listen to the people around you. Ask for their input when appropriate. Seeking help from individuals with expertise in specific areas is a sign of strength, not weakness.
Delegate. You can't do everything yourself. And even if you could that would not be the most effective use of your time as a manager.
Accept responsibility. A common mistake made by managers is to either delegate blame or simply not accept responsibility for that which happens under their guidance. Eventually, avoiding responsibility will catch up with a manager and usually not bode well for his or her future.
Take time to get to know your people. Learn what makes them excited, how to motivate them, what they fear or worry about. Get to know them as individuals, because that's the only way you can effectively manage them.
Do not try to show everyone who's in charge. Everyone in your group already knows who the new manager is. You don't have to make a big show about being "the boss".
Be human. Just because you are the boss doesn't mean you can't laugh, or show emotion, or make an occasional mistake. Make doing a good job for your company fun.
Protect your people. It's your job to stand up for your people and make sure they are treated as fairly as possible. They will return the loyalty.
Set goals with your employees. Effective performance starts with clear goals. It is up to you as a manager to meet with your employees to develop attainable goals and guide them in their efforts to achieve those goals.
Make the transition from worker to manager. Becoming a manager requires the development of a whole new set of business skills: people skills. Sometimes it is a tough transition, but with the proper tools and assistance, it will be a satisfying transition.
Learn as more as you can. Today, more than at any other time, managers must be ready to change if the situation changes.
Don't fool yourself that you can stop change. Instead, concentrate your efforts on taking actions that make a positive difference in your business life. Learn how to adapt to change and use it to your advantage instead of spending your energy fighting it. But do not change everything. Don't re-invent the wheel.
Don’t get out of balance in your life. Our lives are made up of Seven Vital Areas: Health, Family, Financial, Intellectual, Social, Professional, and Spiritual. We will not necessarily spend time every day in each area or equal amounts of time in each area. But if in the long run, we spend a sufficient quantity and quality of time in each area, our lives will be in balance.
Get enough sleep. For most people, they get the quantity of sleep, but they lack the quality of sleep. If you will plan your day, then work your plan, you will get more done, feel a higher sense of accomplishment, and experience less stress and enjoy a more restful night's sleep.
Take a lunch break. Many do not take a lunch break, working through that time period in the hopes that it will give them more time to produce results. A lunch break, even a short fifteen minute break, gives us a chance to get our batteries all charged up again to more effectively handle the afternoon's challenges.

If you are not yet a manager pretend you are and use these advices. The results will be surprising!

top10linux problems

2007-12-07T00:15:00.000-08:00

Here's an interesting result of a linux a distancia poll. Although there were not too many votes this poll is relevant and even addicted Linux users will agree with some of these problems (like I agree that Windows development process is out of control for example). English (partial) translation:

1. The worse Linux problem: installation of applications
Installation of applications in Linux seems to be its greater problem. People mention problems with the diversity of distributions, dependencies, conflicts with versions, compilation problems, etc.
2. Lack of drivers
Even if drivers exists people have problems in finding the version that corresponds to the distribution which they are using.
3. Deficiency of a standard
In many cases can be a true problem. The people suggested that when they become familiar to a distribution, the next version is totally different. Or when they change the distribution, the files are stored in other locations. Almost all the voters suggest the differences in the interface, differences in the availability of the commands and the differences in the configuration of the applications make difficult the learning of this operating system.
4. Problems with modems
This seems to be the device most complicated to run in Linux.
5. Linux is slow
21 votes mention that Linux is much more slow that Windows XP.
6. “X” applications
17 votes mention the lack of availability of applications for Linux. Particularly they stand out the lack of applications to use for web design, audio production, graphic design, etc. Also there were many commentaries of the type “lack good games for Linux”.
7. The GUI has deficiencies
With 14 votes, problems in the more popular visual interfaces as GNOME and KDE are located in the seventh position. Problems of usability, management, etc. appear in the descriptions of the users. Many people complain that “Linux does not order the icons automatically”.
8. Problems with printers/new hardware
Printer appears like the second device more difficult to use in Linux. Other 13 votes suggest the “new hardware” is practically impossible to install/use in Linux.
9. Linux is seen “ugly”/“is difficult to use”
11 votes suggest Linux is seen “ugly” compared with other operating systems. Other 11 votes suggest simply “is more difficult to use that Windows” without giving too many explanations of the cause.
10. Problems using the scanner/complicated File system
Scanner seem to be another one of the devices most difficult to run in Linux. Finally, 10 votes suggest the Linux file system is “too complicated”.

developer cheat sheet compilation

2007-12-06T23:36:00.000-08:00

Nice compilation of cheat sheets (original post)

Command Line

Databases

Programming

Unix/Linux

Web Development

Miscellaneous Topics

usefull web design and development videos

2007-12-06T23:32:00.000-08:00

A few days ago I found a nice and very useful resource for anyone who has to do with web design or web development. The main content is a series of videos (offered for free by the author) centered around four main topics: CSS, JavaScript, PHP and MySQL. There are very easy to watch and practice lessons and if you are interested in this topics you will not waste your time. Here are the links and my "ratings":

CSS
CSS DIV-Layouts - USEFUL & MUST KNOW THIS
Cascading Style Sheets - Part I - USEFUL
Cascading Style Sheets - Part II - USEFUL
CSS “Absolute” and “Relative” Positioning - VERY USEFUL
Rounded Corners with CSS - USEFUL & POPULAR

PHP
PHP Basics - MUST KNOW THIS
PHP Conditional Statements - MUST KNOW THIS
PHP Custom Functions - MUST KNOW THIS
PHP and Arrays - MUST KNOW THIS
PHP Pagination - MUST KNOW THIS
Inserting MySQL Data with PHP - USEFUL
Query MySQL From PHP - Part 1 - MUST KNOW THIS
Query MySQL From PHP - Part 2 - MUST KNOW THIS
Query MySQL From PHP - Part 3 - USEFUL
Using Cookies in PHP - USEFUL
PHP “Include” and “Require” - MUST KNOW THIS
PHP Objects & Classes - Part I - USEFUL
PHP Objects & Classes - Part II - USEFUL & OOP KNOWLEDGE NEEDED
PHP Objects & Classes - Part III - USEFUL & OOP KNOWLEDGE NEEDED

JavaScript
Home-made Javascript WYSIWYG - I DON'T KNOW
JavaScript Voting Stars - NICE & POPULAR

sitemaps make googlebot aware you have

2007-12-06T23:13:00.001-08:00

"The Sitemap Protocol is a dialect of XML for summarizing Sitemap information that is relevant to web crawlers. For each URL, you can include crawl "hints" like the last modified date and approximate change frequency."

There are many SEO techniques you can play with but this one has some important advantages:

it's easy to implement
shows results in a very short time
it's recommended and offered by Google so you won't get blacklisted

The reason you would want to use a Sitemap is that I'm sure you know your website better that Googlebot does. So why not sharing the knowledge and let it know what you think is important and what is not. I used to underestimate the power of sitemaps until I saw this (Googlebot activity spike) a week after creating the Sitemap for my website:

The first time I tried to use sitemaps I got lost in the protocol specifications that Google provides, the fact that Google Sitemap Generator is not as user-friendly as I expected and in the multitude of options you have for submitting your sitemap. Well, it seems that the whole process is simpler that I thought. Here are the only steps you have to follow:

1. Create or generate the sitemap
2. Make sure it is valid
3. Submit it
4. Update it

1. How to create a sitemap?
The following image shows a Sitemap in XML format. The Sitemap in the example contains two URLs, each of which is identified using the XML tag. In this example, a different set of optional parameters has been provided for each URL.

Due the fact that XML files are just text files you can create them by hand or, if you have a more then a dozen URLs, you can generate them using PHP. So, go write a simple "sitemap.xml" file. Even a small sitemap will help. Repeat the ... block for each link you want to include and don't forget to close the tag at the end of the file.

2. If it's not valid it has no value
The next step is validating your file. And this is a must because XML parsers are less error tolerant than HTML parsers. So if your file has errors it will not be processed. There are plenty of ways to validate your file but the most easy I found is using validome.org. Just upload it to your website and point the validator to it.

3. Let Google know you have a sitemap (or more)
Google has a service called Google Webmaster tools which we will use to upload our sitemap. After you log in (you will need a Google account for that) just go to the Sitemaps section and click "Add a sitemap". Hopefully, if everything is ok you will see something like this after a while:

4. Keep your sitemaps up to date
Your Sitemap is more valuable if it's up to date. That is it points to working URLs and parameters reflect the state of the links. So, don't forget to update them from time to time. This is it, good luck!

16 hidden windows vista goodies

2007-12-06T23:04:00.000-08:00

1. The snipping tool - take freeform screenshots
The snipping tool is used to grab screenshots and save them to common image formats. Open the start menu and just start typing “snipping”. You should see the tool pop up in the search results by the time you get to “snip”. You can choose from four types of snipping areas: Free form snip, Rectangular snip, Window snip, and Full screen snip.

2. Enable/disable startup programs
There are multiple places where an application can register itself for execution on startup, and this makes it hard to retain control over which programs are granted such status. Solution : From the start menu search bar, type System Configuration, and click on the link that comes up. The Startup tab enumerates all the applications that are set to run as startup, regardless of whether they are set in the registry, the user profile, or simply the startup folder. Application are still listed after you disable them.

3. Open an elevated command prompt - FAST
To launch an elevated command prompt, simply press the Win key; type cmd; press Ctrl+Shift+Enter; and then hit Alt+C to confirm the elevation prompt. Type "color 4f" in the command prompt to differentiate this from other non-elevated windows.

4. Use Windows XP drivers
If you have trouble finding a Vista driver try to use Windows XP version. There is a good chance it will work. At least to make your device usable.

5. Recover overwritten documents
If you accidentally overwrite a document, you can use Vista's implementation of Volume Shadow Copy to roll back changes—just click on the file and select "Previous Versions" on the Windows Explorer toolbar.

6. Bring back Start > Run...
If you want to restore it permanently to your Start menu, here's what you do:

Right-click on the Start menu and choose Properties;
Select the Start Menu tab and click on the Customize... button;
Ensure the "Run command" option is checked.

Now the Start / Run command will be restored to its full glory.

7. Open command prompt here...
Right-click on any folder on your Windows Vista machine while holding down the shift key. You'll see an extra context-sensitive menu item there: Open Command Prompt here. Just click on this menu and a command window will open with the current working directory set to the folder's actual location.

8. DPI scaling via DWM (for laptops and Tablet PC)
A screen resolution of 1400x1050 on a 12" diagonal display is about 144dpi, 50% higher resolution than the 96dpi which Windows assumes by default! So, if you're tired of squinting, set your DPI properly instead of scaling down your resolution. You should find that applications work more reliably on Vista when the DPI is set greater than 96. Steps:

Right-click the Windows desktop.
Click Properties.
Click the Settings tab on the Display Properties dialog.
Click the Advanced button on the Settings tab.
Select a dpi setting in the Display frame.
Restart your system to allow the changes to take effect.

9. Enlarge the caret (text insertion point) for Tablet PC
Consider making the caret (text insertion point) easier to see in bright / daylight conditions, by increasing its thickness slightly. You can increase the caret width with this straightforward registry key:
[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop] "CaretWidth"=dword:00000003

10. Take ownership of a file or directory (if you can't access or delete it)
You may find sometimes that you cannot access/move/delete some folders even if you are administrator because their ACLs were set for accounts with SIDs that applied to an old partition. To take them back use:

takeown /f [folder] /r /d y
icacls [folder] /grant administrators:F /t

11. Run QuickLaunch items faster
You can simply use Win+1, Win+2, Win+3 and so on to launch each application from the QuickLaunch menu.

12. Run a command prompt during setup
Simply press Shift+F10 during setup, and you'll be presented with a command prompt. This also works after Windows Vista has rebooted for the first time on an upgrade, although be very careful what you do here - there's almost no good reasons to be interacting with the system at this point in time. (works also in Win200 and WinXP)

13. Zoom in Explorer
If you're looking at a folder with lots of photos, maybe a small thumbnail view works well; for a folder with lots of documents, maybe a larger thumbnail view works better. Now you can use the Views button on the toolbar to modify this - click the button to toggle between views or use the down arrow to get access to the slider - but it's quicker to use a shortcut. Simply hold down the Ctrl key and use your mouse scrollwheel to resize the icons from small to extra large. This also works on the desktop itself. If the desktop has focus, simply do Ctrl+mousewheel and you can go from the regular 48x48 icons to full 256x256 photographic-quality renditions.

14. The oldest component in Windows
It seems that edlin is the oldest program included in Windows. It was the only text editor provided with MS-DOS before version 5.0 of that system. However, Edlin is still available in Microsoft Windows including Windows Vista. If you want to try it here's the edlin command help.

15. Slow down Vista animation using the shift key
This only works if you have the aero interface turned on. You can slow down windows animations by pressing the shift key. This is the the animation you see when minimizing, maximizing or closing windows. To do this:

Open registry editor
Go to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\DWM
Create a new DWORD value AnimationsShiftKey and set it to 1

16. Use Notepad to create a log file
Notepad can be used to make log files. Open it and type .LOG on the first line, then save the file as whatever you want. Now every time you open the file the current date and time will be appended to it's contents.

Get certified on Windows Server 2003 to Windows Server 2008 – today!

2007-12-06T22:48:00.000-08:00

The Windows Server 2008 certifications are part of the new generation of Microsoft certifications, which emphasize primary skill sets and job roles, providing a more relevant, flexible, and cost-effective way to validate core technical, professional, and architectural skills.

Microsoft Certified Systems Administrators (MCSAs) and Microsoft Certified Systems Engineers (MCSEs) in Windows Server 2003 can quickly and easily transfer their skills to achieve Microsoft Certified Technology Specialist (MCTS) accreditation on Windows Server 2008. The MCTS credential enables professionals to target specific technologies and distinguish themselves by demonstrating in-depth knowledge and expertise in those technologies.

A Great Way to Master Active Directory... Watch These Videos!

Have you seen the Active Directory Training videos by Train Signal? I highly recommend this course, as you will learn much more than you will from books (which never seem to have enough detail!). Their learn by doing approach is excellent because it shows you the "ins and outs" of Active Directory instead of reading pages and pages of theory.

-Daniel Petri, Petri IT Knowledge Base

Click Here to Watch Active Directory Videos!

By becoming a Microsoft Certified Technology Specialist (MCTS) on Windows Server 2008 you can help your organization take advantage of advanced server technology with the power to increase the flexibility of your server infrastructure, save time, and reduce costs. Transition certifications are available today for Windows Server 2003 certified professionals, while full certification paths will be available soon after the Windows Server 2008 product release.
Upgrading Your MCSA on Windows Server 2003 to Windows Server 2008, Technology Specialist - Exam 70-648

Professionals with an MCSA on Windows Server 2003 must pass one exam to become an MCTS on Windows Server 2008. If you are an MCSA and pass Exam 70-648, you will earn two distinct MCTS certifications:

* MCTS: Windows Server 2008 – Active Directory Configuration
* MCTS: Windows Server 2008 – Network Infrastructure Configuration

The MCTS certifications earned with Exam 70-648 are credit toward the following Professional Series certifications:

* MCITP: Server Administrator
* MCITP: Enterprise Administrator

Link to the exam info page:
http://www.microsoft.com/learning/exams/70-648.mspx
Exam 70-648 Classroom training

In order to achieve the skills and knowledge required to pass the 70-648 exam, the student should complete the following instructor-led courses:

1. Course 6415A: Updating your Network Infrastructure Technology Skills to Windows Server 2008 (three days)

2. Course 6416A: Updating your Active Directory Technology Skills to Windows Server 2008 (three days)

During the second half of 2008, Microsoft will release a one, 5-day course, that will replace the above courses:

1. Course 6416B: Updating your Network Infrastructure and Active Directory Technology Skills to Windows Server 2008 (five days)

Exam 70-648 topics covered

Exam 70-648 is an upgrade exam that is a composite of two stand-alone exams: 70-640 and 70-642. Exam 70-648 will validate skills related to the core technology features and functionality of Windows Server 2008, from the existing knowledge base of an MCSA on Windows Server 2003.

70-640: Windows Server 2008 Active Directory, Configuring

* Configuring Server Roles (30 percent)
* Maintaining the Active Directory Environment (32 percent)
* Configuring the Active Directory Infrastructure (38 percent)

70-642: Windows Server 2008 Network Infrastructure, Configuring

* Configuring Network Access (49 percent)
* Deploying Servers (51 percent)

Upgrading Your MCSE on Windows Server 2003 to Windows Server 2008, Technology Specialist - Exam 70-649

Professionals with an MCSE on Windows Server 2003 must pass one exam to become an MCTS on Windows Server 2008. If you are an MCSE and pass Exam 70-649, you will earn three distinct MCTS certifications:

* MCTS: Windows Server 2008 – Active Directory Configuration
* MCTS: Windows Server 2008 – Network Infrastructure Configuration
* MCTS: Windows Server 2008 – Application Platform Configuration

The MCTS certifications earned with Exam 70-649 are credit toward the following Professional Series certifications:

* MCITP: Server Administrator
* MCITP: Enterprise Administrator

Link to the exam info page:
http://www.microsoft.com/learning/exams/70-649.mspx
Exam 70-649 Classroom training

In order to achieve the skills and knowledge required to pass the 70-649 exam, the student should complete the following instructor-led courses:

1. Course 6415A: Updating your Network Infrastructure Technology Skills to Windows Server 2008 (three days)

2. Course 6416A: Updating your Active Directory Technology Skills to Windows Server 2008 (three days)

3. Course 6417A: Updating Your Application Platform Technology Skills to Windows Server 2008 (three days)

During the second half of 2008, Microsoft will release 2 new courses that will replace the above courses:

1. Course 6416B: Updating your Network Infrastructure and Active Directory Technology Skills to Windows Server 2008 (five days)

2. Course 6417B: Updating Your Application Platform Technology Skills to Windows Server 2008 (three days)

Exam 70-649 topics covered

Exam 70-649 is an upgrade exam that is a composite of three stand-alone exams: 70-640, 70-642, and 70-643. Exam 70-649 will validate skills related to the core technology features and functionality of Windows Server 2008, from the existing knowledge base of an MCSE on Windows Server 2003.

70-640: Windows Server 2008 Active Directory, Configuring

* Configuring Server Roles (30 percent)
* Maintaining the Active Directory Environment (32 percent)
* Configuring the Active Directory Infrastructure (38 percent)

70-642: Windows Server 2008 Network Infrastructure, Configuring

* Configuring Network Access (49 percent)
* Deploying Servers (51 percent)

70-643: Windows Server 2008 Applications, Configuring

* Configuring Terminal Services (32 percent)
* Configuring a Web Services Infrastructure (30 percent)
* Configuring Security for Web Services (38 percent

10 Ways to Increase Your Arbitrage Power

2007-11-20T01:06:00.000-08:00

The art of arbitrage - I believe - is the key to living smart. It allows you to get much more given the same amount of effort. What you do there is connecting to different worlds and then leveraging the “price differences” between them to your advantage. It’s just like what the merchants do in trading, only in this case you apply the principle to many different areas of your life.

In this post, I’d like to share 10 practical ways to increase your power of arbitrage. I will focus on three kinds of arbitrage: social, knowledge, and culture. Some of them are similar to the way you can increase your mental capacity. I think that’s because increasing your arbitrage power somehow requires you to also increase your mental capacity.

The emphasis is different though. In increasing your arbitrage power the emphasis is on connecting to different worlds, while in increasing your mental capacity the emphasis is on doing something just outside your comfort zone. Connecting to different worlds is the only way to recognize the “price differences” between them which you can then use to your advantage.

Social arbitrage

Join new organizations
Organizations are where you meet new people. The more organizations you are involved in, the more people you can potentially meet. Of course, you should join organizations which expose you to different people, preferably in different worlds as well. It’s useless if you join several organizations only to meet mostly the same people.
Go to new events
Unlike organizations, going to events doesn’t require long-term commitments. You just go there once, meet new people, and you’re done. But since you might not meet them anymore, the degree of your success will then depend on your follow-ups.
Join new online forums
In the Internet age, online forums are also great places to meet new people. Though you can’t meet them face-to-face, you have the flexibility to participate anywhere and anytime you like. Again, the key is meeting different people in different worlds, so you should join forums that expose you to different people.

Knowledge arbitrage

Read books and magazines from different fields
By reading books and magazines from different fields, you will learn the ideas and concepts of those fields. You can then bring the ideas and concepts of one field to another field to give it “fresh” ideas.
Read old books
You can borrow ideas not just from other fields, but also from other ages. By reading old books, you can bring the wisdom of the past to the present. Since most people are focused to learn only the current popular wisdom, your power of arbitrage will get a boost.
Read history
Why should you repeat the same mistakes which have been made by others throughout the history? Reading history allows you to learn from past successes and failures, and prevent you from reinventing the wheel.

Culture arbitrage

Read books and magazines about different cultures
This is the simple first step to learn from other cultures. Reading about different cultures allows you to know how different cultures think and act. Of course, it’s better if you can dig deeper using the other ways below.
Learn new languages
Besides opening your way to read literatures in different languages, learning new languages also helps you experience how people in different cultures think. This understanding gives you new “lenses” to see life through.
Read literatures in different languages
After learning new languages, the door is open for you to read content exclusively available in those languages. There are so many different cultures in the world; how could you possibly understand the world only through the lens of one culture or language?
Travel to new places
Of course, there is no better way to understand and learn from a culture than being in the midst of them. Whenever possible, travel to new places where you can experience different cultures. The insights you get would be priceless.

It may seem that doing all these would take too much time, but the important thing here is the quality of the time instead of the quantity. If you spend quality time on these, you will get all the benefits while still keeping your life in balance.

22 Things You Can Do Daily to Improve Your Life

2007-11-20T00:57:00.000-08:00

There is no such thing as instant improvement in life. Instead, you can only grow yourself. And as you know in agriculture, growth can only happen little by little over time. Bare eyes won’t be able to see the growth of a tree daily, but over the years it will grow to a big tree.

Similarly, you grow yourself little by little everyday. The things that you do daily may seem small and insignificant, but overtime people will be surprised to learn how much you have growth in life.

Therefore, to improve your life, the focus should be on the small things you do daily. The key word here is daily. If you do not have the persistence to do these small things consistently, you won’t be able to see the results over the long term.

So here I’d like to share 22 things you can do daily to improve your life. Of course, you may not be able to do them all at once. Just start with the ones that benefit you most. Or, if you have done many of them, consider doing the ones that you haven’t done yet.

Here they are:

Be observant of what is going on around you. Open your eyes and ears. This way a lot of fresh ideas will come to you.
Take notes of every idea that comes to your mind. Never let any idea goes uncaptured.
Try to learn something from the people you meet. Find something you can learn in their words, their attitude, or even their mistakes.
Bring a book or magazine wherever you go. This way you can use any gap time for reading.
Allocate a minimum of 30 minutes to read a book.
Meditate. It improves your clarity which in turn improves your effectiveness.
Take time to reflect on your day. What have you done right? What have you done wrong? What can you do to improve yourself?
Drink water a lot.
Exercise.
Read a collection of quotes. I like to use Random Quotations.
Choose a quote of the day to ponder and apply. Preferably, it should come from your personal list of quotes which contains the quotes that resonate most with you.
Take notes of every expense you make. This is an effective way to keep your finance under control.
Do something for the first time. Either find something new you have never done before, or find a new way to do something (e.g. taking a different route to work). This is to increase your mental capacity.
Effectively read online articles.
Use timer to help you actually do what you need to do. Actually doing is the key to productivity.
Learn to use a tool, either to improve your skill with a familiar tool or to learn a new tool. A good start is to learn the keyboard shortcuts of the software you usually use.
Take time to review your life purpose and goals, preferably before doing the main activities of the day.
Rise early.
Listen to educational or motivational audio program when you are doing activities which do not need full concentration. Examples of such activities are exercising, driving, and queuing.
Be grateful for your day. Being grateful helps you develop a positive attitude toward life.
Read a random article from Wikipedia to expose you to new things you may never know before.
Have fun. Having fun helps you be passionate about life.

30 Ways to Increase Your Mental Capacity

2007-11-20T00:51:00.000-08:00

If you want to grow in life, increasing your mental capacity is a must. By increasing your mental capacity, you will be able to handle more things and assume larger responsibilities.

It’s just like your physical capability to lift heavier and heavier weight in weight training. People with greater physical capability will be able to lift heavier weight effortlessly while those with less capability will tire themselves out or even not be able to lift it at all. So just like you should train your muscles to increase your physical capability, you should also train your “mental muscles” to increase your mental capacity.

But how should you do that? How should you train your mental muscles to increase your mental capacity? I believe the answer is similar to the way you increase your physical capability in weight training.

To increase your physical capability in weight training, you should train yourself by lifting weight which is just outside your current capability. If your current capability is 100 pounds for example, you can increase your capability by training yourself with 110 pounds. Though it may feel a bit hard in the beginning, you will find it effortless after some days or weeks of training. You can then add a little more weight, and by doing so again and again, after 1 or 2 years you will see your physical capability increase significantly.

The way to increase your mental capacity is similar:

Do things which are just outside your comfort zone.

This - I believe - is the best thing you can do. It introduces some inconvenience in your life, but only in a bearable way. As a result, your mental muscles will grow stronger and your mental capacity will increase.

To help you put it into practice, here are 30 ways to do things which are just outside your comfort zone to increase your mental capacity:

When someone asks you to do something, make your default answer “yes” (but don’t forget to say “no” when appropriate).
In a gathering (class, conference, etc.), sit next to someone you do not know.
Visit a place you normally wouldn’t (museum, monument, national park, etc.).
Eat at a new place.
Try a new kind of food.
Go to a conference or seminar in a topic you are not familiar with.
Email or call an old friend you haven’t met for a long time.
Initiate conversation with someone you don’t know.
Find the most unpleasant task in your to-do list and do it first.
Email or message someone you don’t know to initiate a friendship.
Learn a new hobby.
Learn a foreign language.
Join a new club and interact with the people there.
Practice an art you normally wouldn’t (painting, music, etc.).
Learn a new musical instrument.
Be dare to ask. This is to familiarize yourself with rejection.
Read fiction if you normally read non-fiction, and vice versa.
Read a new author.
Read an old book.
Visit a new genre of blogs.
Find friends from a new country (i.e. a country from which you haven’t had any friend before).
Find friends from different professions.
Volunteer for activities conducted by your social or business group.
Do your groceries at a different store.
Take a different route to work.
Attend an art festival.
Listen to a new genre of music.
In a bookstore or library, browse books in a section you wouldn’t normally visit.
Watch a new genre of movies.
Read history more than news.

30 Practical Tips to Make Yourself Indispensable to Others

2007-11-20T00:46:00.000-08:00

The key to success is making yourself as useful as possible to others. You should make yourself so useful that you are indispensable to them. But how do you do that? How do you make yourself indispensable?

First of all we need to define what is meant by useful, since only by being useful can we become indispensable. Being useful means meeting people’s needs and desires. It is solving people’s problems. Consequently, there is actually just one rule to make yourself indispensable:

Find what people need and meet those needs.

The more you can do it, the more you will become indispensable. The next question is: how do you find what people need? Of course, there are a lot of needs people can possibly have. Fortunately, people’s needs and desires can be grouped into eight categories based on Abraham Maslow’s work. Here they are (quoted from Made to Stick):

Physical: hunger, thirst, bodily comfort
Security: protection, safety, stability
Belonging: love, family, friends, affection
Esteem: achieve, be competent, gain approval, independence, status
Learning: know, understand, mentally connect
Aesthetic: symmetry, order, beauty, balance
Self-actualization: realize our own potential, self-fulfillment, peak experiences
Transcendence: help others realize their potential

These categories allow you to see the full spectrum of human needs. In order to make yourself indispensable, all you need to do is focusing on meeting the needs in these categories. Of course, you should emphasize different categories in different circumstances. In some circumstances, you may be most helpful in Belonging, while in some other circumstances you may be most helpful in Learning. You should always be aware of where you can be most helpful.

In this post, I’d like to share 30 practical tips on how to do that for all of the categories except Security and Physical. These two categories comprise very basic needs which are usually well met in the modern world.

Here they are:

Belonging

Listen to your friends without interrupting nor being hurry.
Send them your warm greetings via e-cards.
Tell them how you miss them.
Send them special messages at their birthday
Comfort them in times of trouble.
Introduce them to your other friends to expand their networks.
Buy them gifts when you are traveling. Even small gifts matter.

Note: You can find more tips in 33 Tips to Become a Well Liked Person.

Esteem

Ask them how they are doing.
Praise them for the good jobs they have done.
Talk with them about their achievements.
Talk about how good they are in front of your other friends.
Be the first person to tell them about good news involving them.

Learning

Send them your favorite quotes.
Take the time to do small research to answer their questions.
Lend them your favorite books.
Spark their curiosity by asking them smart questions.
Tell them your favorite web sites to learn from.
Send them the articles you find that might help them.
Passionately share your learning experiences; it’s contagious.

Aesthetic

Lend them your favorite CDs or DVDs.
Tell them where they can learn to play music.
Tell them where they can learn to draw (Drawspace is a good start by the way).
Share your favorite wallpapers and pictures.
Let them know of interesting cultural events you hear about.

Self-actualization

Encourage them to find their life purpose.
Encourage them to follow their heart more than the expectations of others.
Share with them inspirational stories about men and women who are willing to pay the price to do what matters to them (e.g. Nelson Mandela, Mother Teresa).

Note: You might find the materials in 37 Lessons to Help You a Live that Matters useful here.

Transcendence

Tell them about how joyful it is to help others by sharing your experiences.
Let them know about your favorite charities and why you like them.
When you are involved in a social activity to help others, ask them to join you.

15 Tips to Stay Positive in Negative Situations

2007-11-20T00:43:00.000-08:00

There are times when we must go through negative situations. Maybe people say something negative about us, or they show rejection or even resentment against us. In such situations, it may be difficult to stay positive. We may be inclined to react negatively to them. That won’t do us any good though; doing so will just make the situation worse. People may behave even more negatively to us. Our day would be filled with anger and disappointment. At the end, nobody wins.

Though it’s not easy, it’s important to stay positive in negative situations. Beat the negative situations by staying positive. Here are 15 tips on how to do it; pick the ones that work for you:

Never respond when you are not calm. If you are not sure that you are calm, don’t respond. Take time to calm yourself down first.
Take a deep breath as a first step to calm yourself down.
Speak in gentle tone to reduce the tension of the situation.
Realize that you can find opportunities in negative situations. Albert Einstein said: “In the middle of every difficulty lies opportunity.”
Look at the content of what people say to you for something positive that you can act upon to improve yourself. Don’t just reject the whole messages.
For the rest of the messages which is negative, simply ignore it.
Maintain positive view of the people. Maybe you don’t like their messages or behavior, but that doesn’t mean that you can hate them personally.
Realize that having negative feelings will just hurt you, not them. So there is no reason for you to have any negative feeling.
If you make mistakes, be open to admit it.
If you make mistakes, remember this quote by George Bernard Shaw: “A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable, but more useful than a life spent doing nothing.”
If you can, listen to motivational audio program to feed positive thoughts into your mind.
Talk to a positive friend who can encourage you.
Remember your favorite quotes to give you inspiration and motivation. This is one reason why you should have quote of the day.
Look at the negative situations as your training sessions for real life. The higher you climb in life, the worse the negative situations would be, so you’d better be prepared for them.
Realize that you can’t please everyone. In fact, nobody can. Sometimes you need to just let some people go. Realizing this will relieve you from a lot of unnecessary burden so that you can focus on the people that you can positively interact with.

13 Essential Rules for Investing

2007-11-20T00:33:00.000-08:00

I just finished reading The Bogleheads’ Guide to Investing, and it is the best personal finance book I read this year. The book is very practical with tons of useful tips. It’s also witty which makes it fun to read. It’s philosophy of investing is long term with buy-and-hold strategy, and it proves the effectiveness of this strategy with numerous studies.

Here I’d like to share with you 13 investing rules I summarized from the book. I believe they are essential for successful investing. Here they are:

1. Choose a sound financial lifestyle

This is the first thing you should do before investing. There are three steps you need to take:

Graduate from the paycheck mentality to the net worth mentality.
People with paycheck mentality spend to the max based on their net incomes. Their financial lifestyle is all about earning to spend. On the other hand, people with net worth mentality focus on building net worth over the long term.
Pay off credit card and high-interest debts
Paying your high-interest debts is the highest, risk-free, tax-free return on your money that you can possibly earn.
Establish an emergency fund
For most people, six months living expenses is adequate.

2. Start early and invest regularly

Saving is the key to wealth, so there is no substitute for frugality. And, due to the power of compounding, starting early makes a huge difference.

3. Know what you are buying

Know more about the various investment choices available to you, such as stocks, bonds, and mutual funds. Don’t invest in things you don’t understand.

4. Keep it simple

Simple investing strategy almost always beats the complicated ones. Index investing takes very little investment knowledge, practically no time or effort - and outperforms about 80 percent of all investors.

Instead of hiring an expert, or spending a lot of time trying to decide which stocks or actively managed funds are likely to be top performers, just invest in index funds and forget about it.

However, not all index funds are created equal. Many of them will also charge you high sales commission and high yearly management fee. Do not buy those. Only consider investing in no-load funds with annual expense ratios of 0.5 percent or less, the cheaper the better.

5. Diversify your portfolio

When it comes to investing, the old saying, “Don’t put all your eggs in one basket,” definitely applies. In order to diversify your portfolio, you should try to find investments that don’t always move in the same direction at the same time. A good mix for this is stocks and bonds.

6. Decide your asset allocation

You should decide what a suitable stock/bond/cash allocation for your personal long-term asset allocation plan is. This is the most important portfolio decision you will make.

Investments in stocks, bonds, and cash have proven to be a successful combination of securities for portfolio construction. At times, you will read about other more exotic securities (such as hedge funds, unit trusts, option, and commodity futures). It is advised to simply forget about them.

7. Minimize your investment costs

The shortest route to top quartile performance is to be in the bottom quartile of expenses.
Jack Bogle

Costs matter, so it’s critical that you keep your investment costs as low as possible. It is recommended to avoid all load funds and favor low-cost index funds.

8. Invest in the most tax-efficient way possible

For all long-term investors, there is only one objective - maximum total return after taxes.
John Templeton

Tax can be your biggest expense, so it’s important to be tax-efficient. One of the easiest and most effective ways to cut mutual fund taxes significantly is to hold mutual funds for more than 12 months.

9. Avoid performance chasing and market timing

I never have the faintest idea what the stock market is going to do in the next six months, or the next year, or the next two.
Warren Buffett

Using past performance to pick tomorrow’s winning mutual funds is such a bad idea that the government requires a statement similar to this: “Past performance is no guarantee of future performance.” And market timing (a strategy based on predicting short-term price changes in securities) is something which is virtually impossible to do.

The logical alternative to performance chasing and market timing is structuring a long-term asset allocation plan and then staying the course.

10. Track your progress and rebalance when necessary

Rebalancing is the simple act of bringing your portfolio back to your target asset allocation. Rebalancing controls risk and may reward you with higher returns.

Rebalancing forces us to sell high and buy low. We’re selling the outperforming asset class or segment and buying the underperforming asset class or segment. That’s exactly what smart investors want to do.

11. Tune out the “noise”

Most sales and advertising pitches from brokerage houses and money managers are variations of one single message: “Invest with us because we know how to beat the market.” Far more often than not, this promise is fictitious at best and financially disastrous at worst.

Here is a simple guideline: all forecasting is noise. Believing that “It’s different this time” can cause severe financial damage to your portfolio.

12. Master your emotions

When it’s time to make investing decisions, check your emotions at the door. Things such as blindly following the crowd, trying too hard, or acting on a hot tip will almost always leave you poorer.

Forget the popular but misguided notion that investing is supposed to be fun and exciting. If you seek excitement in investing, you’re going to lose money. Get excited about earning and saving money, but be very dispassionate when it comes to investing.

13. Protect your assets by being well-insured

To be a successful investor requires being a good risk manager. Managing risk means having a plan to cover the downside. That’s what insurance is all about - damage control to prevent the unforeseen from smashing your nest egg.

You need to consider the following type of insurance: life insurance, health care, disability, property, auto, liability, and long-term care.

Three key rules for being properly insured:

Only insure against the big catastrophes and disasters that you can’t afford to pay for out of pocket.
Carry the largest possible deductibles you can afford.
Only buy coverage from the best-rated insurance companies.

Note:
I hope you find these rules useful. I completely agree with all of them, including the “controversial” rule of “tuning out the noise”. A few months ago I read the book Fooled by Randomness which takes different approach but arrives at the same conclusion.

26 Tips to Stay Calm When Situation Goes Bad

2007-11-20T00:28:00.000-08:00

Sometimes situations do not go as expected. A good day may turn bad, everything may suddenly go wrong. Needless to say, it’s difficult to stay calm in such situations. We tend to become confused, panic or even heated by anger. That won’t help you much to get out of the situation though. Handling a bad situation in such condition will just make it worse; you are more likely to make mistakes. That’s why it’s important to stay calm. By staying calm, you will be able to judge the situation wisely and take the appropriate actions.

But how do you stay calm when the situation goes bad? How do you calm your nerves while the world around you is falling down? I believe there are some simple things you can do. Here are 26 tips ; pick the ones that work for you:

Take a deep breath.
Do nothing for 5 minutes.
Take a nap.
Take a shower.
Listen to comforting music.
Listen to natural sounds.
Play music.
Share to a positive friend.
Meditate.
Ask “What’s the next action?” and focus on only that one thing.
Go to nature (mountain, beach, etc.).
Ride a bike.
Talk about other topics.
Drink a bottle of water.
Play games (just for a while!).
Go eat with someone who is not part of the situation.
Exercise.
Read spiritual texts.
Listen to spiritual audio programs.
Unplug the Internet.
Take a cup of coffee.
Say to yourself, “This situation is not as bad as it looks. Many people have handled situations worse than this successfully.”
Be grateful for what you still have (instead of looking at what you don’t have).
Be grateful for what you can learn from the situation.
Take a walk around a park.
Smile.

10 Simple Tips to Be Excited About Your Day

2007-11-20T00:26:00.001-08:00

How many people are excited about their day? Not many, I’m afraid. In fact, when they start their day many people tend to think about all the burden they are going to face. Or they think about how boring the routine they are going to do. Only a few people are happy about their day, let alone be excited about it.

But of course, life will be more wonderful if we are excited about our days. Think about how different it will be if you go through your day with passion and enjoyment. Your enthusiasm will energize not just you, but also other people around you!

But how can you do that? Here are some tips:

1. Get out of the bed right away

You can be excited about your day right from the beginning. Getting out of the bed right away is like saying to yourself that you “can’t wait” to start the day. It sends a message to your subconscious mind to be excited about the day.

2. Exercise

Exercising in the morning before doing your other activities will make you physically fit to face the day. It will boost your energy level and make it much easier to maintain enthusiasm in anything you do.

3. Smile

There mere act of smiling will make you feel better about your day. Believe me, it is more difficult to think about how bad your day is when you are smiling.

4. Find simple wonders

It’s hard to be excited if you are drowned in a routine, doing the same thing again and again. But life doesn’t have to be so routine. Be observant and look at your surroundings. Find simple beauties in the breeze of the air, how the bird sing, or how people do things. Break the routine by looking for simple wonders here and there. There are a lot of them waiting to be found.

5. Watch your body language

Believe it or not, body language influences how you think and feel. If your body language expresses boredom, then your mind and feeling will soon follow. So stand straight, and walk full of energy. Express confidence through your body language.

6. Avoid being around negative people

Whenever possible, avoid being around negative people during the day. They will just drain your positive energy. Have you ever experienced having a good feeling, but after being with someone for some time you end up feeling bad? That’s how negative people could drain your positive energy.

So, be around positive people instead. By being around them, you will end up feel more energized.

7. Do something meaningful to you

It will be much easier to be excited about your day if you do what matters to you. If you do something meaningful, you will have a bunch of reasons to go through the day full of energy. But if it’s not, it will be harder to get yourself excited.

8. Learn to enjoy what you are doing

Sometimes you can’t do things you are passionate about. But you can still be excited about your day by learning to enjoy what you are doing. Even if you don’t like something, you can still learn to enjoy it. Read the tips on how to enjoy what you are doing no matter what.

9. Say something positive

When you say how bad your day is, you will just reinforce the negative feeling you have. Be careful with what you say; watch your words. Even if your day is not so good, talk about it in a positive way. For example, instead of saying “This is a bad day; I made a lot of mistakes” you can say “Well, today I learn a lot of useful lessons”.

10. Greet people first

Think about what an excited person will do when they meet someone. Will she just keep silent or wait for the other person to greet her first? I don’t think so. Most likely, an excited person will greet other people first. They just have too much energy. So do likewise and see how your excitement increases.

33 Tips to Become a Well Liked Person

2007-11-20T00:08:00.000-08:00

Being well liked is what most people want in relationships. The benefits are obvious. You will get the help you need at the time you need it. People will give you information about new opportunities you didn’t know before. Above all, they will really care and love you.

But how could you get other people to like you? How could you become a well liked person? There is actually just one simple rule to follow: you should like other people before they like you. When people realize that you like them, it’s very likely that they will also like you.

Regarding this, I believe that there is one and just one message you need to deliver in your relationships. Delivering this message is the key to strong relationships, and here it is:

You are important to me.

That’s it. No more, no less. Not “your money” nor “your knowledge”, but “you” - as a person - are important to me. Anything you should do in relationships stems from this message. There more you succeed in delivering this message, the more people will like you.

So here I’d like to share 33 tips on how to deliver this message in your relationships. Consequently, these are also tips to become a well liked person. Here they are:

Give your contacts a big smile when you meet them. Make them feel that you are really happy to meet them.
Give your full attention to the people you converse with as if nothing else is important.
When they ask for your attention, leave whatever you are doing.
When they call you, greet them with enthusiasm as if you are longing for their call.
Don’t make them wait.
Print the list of your contacts and look at it in your spare time. It will remind you of whom to touch base.
Always reply your contacts’ emails and text messages.
Reply their emails and text messages in the first chance you get.
Shake their hands with enthusiasm.
Praise them sincerely when they do something good. Make them feel that you are proud of them.
Always return their calls.
Send a message to them on their birthdays. Even better, call them.
Drop your old contacts quick emails or text messages to ask how they are doing.
Remember their names and achievements.
Remember important facts about them, especially the things they really care about (you may want to write them down).
Introduce them to the people in your contact who may help them out.
Actively find the deepest needs they may have (without waiting for them to explicitly tell you).
Take initiative to give them the solutions they need.
Give thanks for them in your session of gratitude.
Mention their names in your prayer.
Talk with them about their life.
Ask them specific questions about things they care about. They will realize that you care enough to remember their facts.
Give them something precious you have. Time is a good candidate.
Go eat with them. Even better, treat them.
When you meet them, don’t look at your watch as if you have something more important to do.
When you talk to them, don’t look over their shoulder as if you are looking for someone more important to talk to.
Send them quick tips or articles you just found which may benefit them.
Message them encouraging words or quotes.
Lend them the best books or DVDs you have.
Talk to them about how you like your other friends. They will think that you may talk the same way about them.
Don’t talk negatively to them about how you don’t like your other friends. They will think that you may also talk the same way about them.
Occasionally mention their names in your conversation with them.
Be creative to give them small surprises every now and then.

11 Sure-Fire Ways to Have a Calm and Peaceful Mind

2007-11-19T23:56:00.000-08:00

The fast pace of the modern world may put our mind in chaotic state. Information comes and goes, we must do this and do that. There are simply too many things that reside in our mind. While it may cause stress or even depression, at the very least it puts us away from a peaceful state of mind. But a peaceful mind is essential for our effectiveness. It keeps us calm no matter how the situation is, and it allows us to stay joyful during the day. At the end of the day, it makes us happier and more productive.

So here I’d like to share 11 ways to have a “mind like water”, a state of mind so peaceful that it’s like a calm water. Pick the ones that work for you:

1. Reduce your use of rational thinking

We need rational thinking, but we tend to overuse it in analyzing our situations and making decisions. That brings a lot of things into our mind which potentially also brings in noise. Is rational thinking really that important? I don’t think so. Even Einstein once said that “I never came upon any of my discoveries through the process of rational thinking.”

2. Listen to your intuition

While you should reduce your use of rational thinking, you should increase your use of intuition. Listen to your intuition whenever you need to make decisions. Your intuition often knows more than you think. Furthermore, since intuition works instantly, it won’t bring a lot of things into your mind. Your mind will remain calm and peaceful. No wonder Einstein said that “The only real valuable thing is intuition.”

3. Listen to your heart

Your heart tells you what is right to do. There is where your deepest value and principles reside. Following what your heart says helps you be true to yourself, and that has a great effect on giving you peace of mind. So learn to listen more to your heart, and do what it tells you to do.

4. Get the stuff out of your mind

This is a basic principle of Getting Things Done (GTD). In fact, the term “mind like water” comes from GTD. You should record the things you need to do or remember on an external system you trust so that they do not occupy your mind. This way your mind will be freed to focus on your current task.

5. Meditate

Meditation is one of the best ways to calm your mind and have a “mind like water”. Even if you do the other ways mentioned in this post, sometimes there is still noise left in your mind. Meditation is a good way to purify it. There are many forms of meditation to choose from.

6. Limit your information intake

Consuming more information often means introducing more noise into your mind. That’s why limiting your information intake is essential to have a calm and peaceful mind. The rule of thumb in consuming information is this: consume information no more than what is necessary. But how do you know what is necessary? Rational thinking may help you figure it out, but I believe that your heart and intuition can help you just as much - if not more.

7. Read spiritual texts

Spiritual texts are among the purest kinds of information you can possibly get. It helps you link together your mind, heart, and intuition. While generally you should limit your information intake, I believe that you can safely consume spiritual texts without introducing noise into your mind.

8. Eliminate unessential stuff

It will be easier to have a peaceful mind if you don’t have too much stuff to worry about. So always look for ways to simplify your life. Eliminate the things which are not essential so that you can focus on the essential. Elimination should be a constant part of your life.

9. Don’t think too much about yourself

We usually think about our own needs and problems most of the time. But self-centered thoughts rarely bring peace into our mind. Quite the opposite, it may make us feel stressed and frustrated. So don’t think too much about yourself; forget yourself for a while.

10. Do something for others

Instead of thinking too much of ourselves, we should think more of others. Think of what you can do for others and do it. There is joy in giving which will give you peace of mind.

11. Slow down

In whatever you do, you do not need to be in rush. Doing so may only bring you faster to the wrong direction. First of all, you need to know where is the right direction to go. Slow down so that you can clearly hear the voice of your heart and intuition.

7 Sure-Fire Ways to Develop Persistence

2007-11-19T23:50:00.000-08:00

If I had to select one quality, one personal characteristic that I regard as being most highly correlated with success, whatever the field, I would pick the trait of persistence. Determination. The will to endure to the end, to get knocked down seventy times and get up off the floor saying, “Here comes number seventy-one!”
Richard M. Devos

There is no such thing as cheap success. If we want to succeed, we have to pay the price. And the road to success is long with a lot of obstacles. No wonder most people stop at one point or another after running into the obstacles. Only a few people have the persistence to keep moving forward, and these are the few people who succeed.

Persistence is essential. In fact, persistence is one of the most important characteristics successful people share in common. There is no other way to succeed but by developing persistence in our life, and here I’d like to share seven ways to develop it. Here they are:

1. Learn the life of successful people

Understanding that successful people do need persistence to achieve success will inspire you to be persistent yourself. So find and read the life stories of successful people throughout the history. While most people recognize them only through their achievements, by reading their stories we will understand the persistence they need on the way to success.

Here are some people you might want to learn about: Ludwig van Beethoven, Abraham Lincoln, Stephen Hawking, and Lance Armstrong.

2. Expect a hard way, not an easy one

One of the main reasons people giving up early is having wrong expectation. They expected the way to be easy, and they are surprised when they find the reality to be the opposite. Their enthusiasm quickly melts and they lose heart.

So start your journey with the right expectation. As I wrote above, there is no such thing as cheap success. Expect a hard way, not an easy one, and you will be mentally prepared when you encounter the reality.

3. Don’t underestimate the amount of time required

Just like you should not underestimate the difficulty of the journey you are about to take, you should not underestimate its length either. Of course, everyone wants to achieve instant success. But this, unfortunately, is not realistic. The journey to success is a marathon, not a sprint, so prepare yourself accordingly.

4. Have a big why

To keep your persistence, you need a strong source of motivation. How else can someone keep trying again and again without strong motivation? And such strong motivation comes from your purpose. You should know why you want your goal in the first place. And your why must be bigger than the obstacles. The bigger your why the better.

5. Know how to handle failure

Since failure is a certainty on the path to success, knowing how to handle it is critical. By knowing how to handle failure you will be able to keep your persistence. On the other hand, not being able to handle it will soon drain your mental energy. So arm yourself with the right tactics to overcome failure.

6. Find partners

Things will be much easier is you have partners with whom you can encourage each other. They can motivate you when you are in the low points of life, and you can do the same to them. Besides, your partners could give you valuable lessons from their experiences so that you don’t need to find them yourself the hard way.

7. Minimize your stress

To be able to keep your persistence for long time, you should minimize leaks on your mental energy. Stress is one such leak you should learn to manage. If you fail to do this, you won’t be able to stay on the track for long. Even if you do, you won’t be able to do your best since you’ve lost a lot of energy. So arm yourself with the tactics to minimize stress and preserve your energy.

How to Live Your Books and Not Just Read Them

2007-11-19T23:31:00.000-08:00

Reading books is one thing, but actually living them is another thing. Many people just read a book without ever living it. But as you know, you can never get full benefit from a book if you just read it without putting it into practice.

Of course, it is easier said than done. Most of us just read a book once to get some ideas, and that’s it. But do you believe that we can completely grasp and apply the principles in a book by reading it just once? I don’t think so. Of course we can get some ideas from the book, but to effectively grasp and especially to apply them, reading it just once is definitely not enough. We need to read and reread it until the principles are internalized and applied in our daily life.

Having “Most Important Books”

While not all books deserve such rereading, there are some very good books that deserve it. These are the kind of books that will make significant difference in your life if you apply the principles in them.

Do you know of such books? I do, and I call them “most important books” (MIBs). These are the books that can greatly improve the way I think, work, or live. So I give my MIBs special attention. I believe the habit of having MIBs can significantly help us in our personal growth. There are two reasons for this:

It helps us internalize important principles for our life, and
It helps us apply those principles

As you may know, application is what makes the difference between 1% people who experience what a book say and the other 99% who just read it without experiencing it. If you want to be in this top 1%, having MIBs - I believe - is a good way to help you.

Applying the MIBs Concept

So how do you put this MIBs concept into practice? Here are some tips:

Make a list of all the books which application you think can significantly improve your life. Do not limit yourself in this step. Just list whatever books that come into your mind.
From the list that you have made, choose at most three books which can make the most significant difference to your current needs.
Have these books handy. Put them in a place where you can easily reach and read them.
Every now and then, when you have spare time, grab one book and read the important parts in it. It will help you a lot if you have highlighted the book before. That way you can just read your highlights, and only read the details if you think they are necessary.
Whenever you read a part of the book, think about how to apply it to your life. Think of some concrete actions you can take. If you want to, you can put them into your to-do list.
Do the same thing with the other (at most) two books which are also your MIBs.
Keep a book as MIB until:

You are satisfied with your progress in applying the principles in the book, or
The book is no longer relevant to your current need.

When you remove a book from your MIBs, you can choose another book by going back to step 1.

Why do I believe that this MIBs concept works? Because, for really important ideas, the key to successful application is repetition. Without repetition, it’s far too easy for those ideas to be lost in our mental attic. Having MIBs is an effective way to make sure that the important ideas will always have the place they deserve in our mind.

How to Get the Most Out of Your Books

2007-11-19T22:50:00.000-08:00

Reading a (nonfiction) book is one thing, but getting the most out of it is another thing. Too many people only reach the surface of the book and never really get into the treasure that is hidden below it. Or maybe they get a portion of the treasure, but they lose the chance to get the whole treasure.

How do you know that you get the most out of a book? You get the most out of a book when it significantly improves your life to the greatest possible extent. Because of that, an important goal of reading books is getting actionable ideas. To get the most out of the books, you should then put those actionable ideas into action.

Here are some steps you can do to get the most out of your books:

Preview the book you want to read
Before spending too much time on a book, you should know whether the book is worth reading. Preview the book by reading its cover, introduction, table of contents, and skimming through the chapters.
Besides helping you decide whether a book is worth reading, previewing also helps you be familiar with the structure of the book. It helps you understand the big picture of the book so that whatever you read later can be put in the right context.
Decide your purpose and the depth of your reading
If you think the book is worth reading, you should then decide your purpose of reading the book. Your purpose states the kind of actionable ideas you expect from the book. Is there a problem you expect to be solved? Is there an area in your life you expect to be improved?
Next, you should decide how deep your reading will be. It deals with the amount of time you are willing to spend on the book. The more actionable ideas you think it has, the deeper your reading should be.
For each chapter you read:

Preview the chapter
Go through the titles, subtitles, and pictures in the chapter. Just like previewing the book, previewing the chapter builds your familiarity with it and helps you put the details you get later in the right context.
Quick read the chapter
Next, you can quick read the chapter. This step fills in the details of the context you build in the previous step while giving you a glimpse of which might be the important ideas.
Reread to highlight important ideas in the chapter
This time you reread the chapter to decide which are the important ideas of the chapter. I’d suggest highlighting the important ideas you find. I personally use two kinds of highlights, one for important ideas and another one for very important ideas.

Create the book map
After reading the whole book, I’d suggest creating a book summary of your own. Creating a book summary helps you internalize the ideas you get.
The first part of such summary is a book map. A book map maps the structure of the entire book. Normally you can just use the table of contents as the book map, but don’t use a very detailed table of contents. The purpose of a book map is to quickly give you a glimpse of the structure of the book. Too much details may distract you from the big picture.
Write the ideas you get from each chapter
Next you can write the ideas you get from each chapter by simply looking at your highlights in that chapter. Remember, your goal is to get actionable ideas, so you should focus on them. Writing the ideas you get helps you further internalize those ideas.
Write the main ideas you get from the entire book
A good books often contains a lot of actionable ideas, so the list of ideas in step 5 may be too long to act upon effectively. You should then have a separate list for the main ideas from the entire book. This list helps you focus on the most important ideas so that it will be easier for you to apply them.
If you use two kinds of highlight I mention in step 3.3, you can get the main ideas of the book by simply looking at your ‘very important’ highlights.
Create next action list
Application is what puts you ahead of 90% or more other people who just read the book but do not apply what they learn. In fact, application is key. Actionable ideas are useless if you do not put them into action.
To help you apply what you learn, decide what actions you will do to apply it. Look at your list of main ideas (step 6) to decide what the most important actions are.
Integrate the next action list into you master next action list
After creating your next action list of the book, you can then integrate it into your master next action list. If you use GTD, I’m sure you have a master next action list. By putting the actions for the book there, the application of the book is now integrated into your daily workflow.

Don’t forget to be flexible. You do not need to apply all these steps to every book you read. For not-so-important books you can eliminate some steps. The more important a book is, the more steps you should use. ‘Important’ books are those which have bigger potential of changing your life.

106 Tips to Become a Master Connector

2007-11-19T20:42:00.000-08:00

To succeed, who you know is just as important as what you know. In fact, relationships should be your top priority. The book Never Eat Alone talks about how to apply the timeless principles of relationships in the 21st century. It contains a lot of practical tips on how you could thrive in today’s world through your relationships. It’s one of the best books I read recently.

To give you the only gems, I’ve summarized what I learn from the book into 106 tips. Put these tips into practice and you will be a master connector who live a successful and fulfilling life:

Make other people more successful
Real networking is about finding ways to make other people more successful. It is sharing your knowledge and resources, time and energy, friends and associates, and empathy and compassion in a continual effort to provide value to others, while coincidentally increasing your own.
Work hard to give more than you get
It’s the value you bring that makes people want to connect with you. All this takes work. It means you have to think hard not only about yourself but also about other people.
Don’t keep score
Don’t think of relationships as finite. In fact, it’s the exercising of equity that builds equity. There is no score to keep when abundance leads to even more abundance.
Remember that the key to success is generosity
The currency of real networking is not greed but generosity.
Find your mission in life
Intersection of your talents and desires is your “blue flame”. Which activities excite you the most, where you don’t even notice the hours that pass?
Be specific about what you want
The more specific you are about what you want to do, the easier it becomes to develop a strategy to accomplish it.
Make setting goals a habit
Something as simple as a clearly defined goal could distinguish you from all others. The kind of discipline that turns a dream into a mission, really just comes down to a process of setting goals.
Create a Relationship Action Plan
There is a process involved in building a network. Your Relationship Action Plan consist of three sections:
1. Your goals up to three years from now in three months increments.
2. Names of people that could help you reach each goal.
3. Strategies to reach the people you list in point 2.
Once you have your plan, post it in a place where you will see it on regular basis.
Create a Personal “Board of Advisors”
It helps to have enlightened counselors who will hold you accountable. They are your Personal “Board of Advisors”.
Build your network before you need it
Reach out to others long before you need anything at all. The most important thing is to get to know those people as friends, not as potential customers.
Start connecting with the people you do know
At the outset, concentrate on the people who are already part of your existing network.
Be bold
Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it. Audacity was often the only thing that separated two equally talented men and their job titles.
Be willing to ask
Nothing in your life could create opportunity like a willingness to ask, whatever the situation. Until you become as willing to ask for help as you are to give it, you are only working half the equation. Remember that the worst anyone can say is no.
Balance your fear
Mustering the audacity to talk with people who don’t know you often simply comes down to balancing the fear you have of embarrassment against the fear of failure. It’s between choosing risk and striving for greatness, or risking nothing and being certain of mediocrity.
Treat people with respect
Treat people with respect up and down the ladder.
Be transparent
Openness has become a valuable and much-sought-after attribute.
Make friends
Those who are best at it don’t network - they make friends. A widening circle of influence is an unintended result, not a calculated aim.
Do your homework
Spectacular achievement is always preceded by spectacular preparation. Whom you meet, how you meet them, and what they think of you afterward should not be left to chance.
Be informed about whom you meet
If you are informed enough to step comfortably into their world and talk knowledgeably, their appreciation will be tangible. The idea is to find a point of common ground that is deep and rich. Then you’ll have an opportunity to bond and impress.
Find out others’ interests
Find a way to become part of those things that are of most interest to them, and you will have found a way to become part of their life.
Don’t eat alone
Food has a unique ability to facilitate conversation. Eating with other people is an effective way to build relationships.
Organize and manage your information
The successful organization and management of the information that makes connecting flourish is vital. If you’re organized, focused, and a stickler for taking names, there’s no one that’s out of reach.
Make lists
Create lists in your own categories (such as potential customers, potential acquirers, etc) that correspond to your goals. When you make such lists, it’s important you name the actual decision makers, and not just an organization.
Know the most important players in your field
To make your goals possible, map the most important players in your field. Write down a list of “influentials” in that field.
List the people you already know
Take time to list the people you already know such as: relatives, current colleagues, people you went to school with, former teachers, former employers, and so on.
Be flexible in organizing your information
The way you organize your lists can be fluid. You could have lists by geographical location, by industry, whether they’re acquaintance or friend, and so on.
Use other people’s lists to make your lists
One great resource for making lists is other people’s lists. Newspapers and magazines do rankings of this sort all the time.
Create “aspirational contacts” list
Another category you might want to add is “aspirational contacts”. These are those extremely high-level people you want to know someday.
Just plunge right in to cold call
When you are about to cold call, your fears will never be completely quieted. The trick is to just plunge right in. Envision yourself winning to win. You have to view getting to know new people as a challenge and an opportunity.
Be persistent
Frequently, people won’t get back to you when you call or write them. You have to put your ego aside and persist in calling or writing. It is up to you to take the initiative. Sometimes, you have to be aggressive.
Make warm calls
Use these four rules for warm calling:
1. Convey credibility: mention a familiar person or institution.
2. State your value proposition: what can you do for them?
3. Impart urgency and convenience: in most instances, the sole objective of the cold call is to get an appointment.
4. Be prepared to offer a compromise: go big at the outset, leaving room for compromise.
Make the gatekeeper an ally rather than an adversary
Treat the gatekeepers with the dignity they deserve. Never, ever get on their bad side.
Never, ever disappear
In building a network, remember: Above all, never, ever disappear. Invisibility is a fate far worse than failure.
Work hard to remain visible and active
Keep your social and conference and event calendar full. You must work hard to remain visible and active among your ever-budding network of friends and contacts.
Clone an event
You have to work hard to be successful at reaching out to others, but it doesn’t mean you have to work long. Clone an event to save time. You clone an event by inviting all the people you want to meet to join you.
Have fun
Building network should be fun, not time-consuming.
Share your passions
Shared interests are the basic building blocks of any relationship. When you are truly passionate about something, it’s contagious.
Emphasize on the quality of time
Friendship is created out of the quality of time spent between two people, not the quantity.
Follow up or fail
When you meet someone with whom you want to establish a relationship, take the extra little step to ensure you won’t be lost in their mental attic. Follow-up is the key to success in any field.
Do your first follow up soon
Give yourself between 12 and 24 hours after you meet someone to follow up. E-mail is a fine tool for dropping a quick note.
Don’t forget to do your second follow-up
In a month’s time, drop the person another e-mail, just to keep in touch.
Spend your time at conferences to meet people
An all-too-common misperception is conferences are places to find insight. Wrong. Conferences are good for mainly one thing: they provide a forum to meet like-minded people.
Be a conference commando
Don’t just be an attendee; be a conference commando. A conference commando is prepared in advance with information on who they were to meet, how, and where.
Give speeches
Giving speeches is one of the easiest and most effective ways to get yourself remembered.
Collect as many follow-ups as you can
Don’t be the persons that shadow their best friends the entire conference. Collect as many follow-ups as you can.
Connect with super-connectors
Some people know many, many more people than the rest of us. Such people should be the cornerstones to any flourishing network. Once you become friendly with a super-connector, you’re only two degrees away from thousands of different people.
Get as many acquaintances as you can
Often the most important people in our network are those who are acquaintances. Why? Because our close friends seldom know information that we don’t already know. The more acquaintances you have, the more powerful you are.
Know people from many different worlds
The key is not only that we know thousands of people but that we know thousands of people in many different worlds, and we know them well enough to give them a call.
Exchange your network with someone else’s
The most efficient way to enlarge your circle of friends is to connect your circle with someone else’s.
Create your own host committees
Politicians have what are called “host committees”: group of well-connected people in their respective worlds. If you want more access to a world, see if you can find a central figure within that world to act as your own one-person host committee.
Build your “verbal fluency”
“Verbal fluency” - the ability to confidently make conversation with anyone in any situation - is a common trait among the most accomplished people. “Getting-along skills,” more than anything else, determined who got ahead.
Be yourself
When it comes to making an impression, differentiation is the name of the game. One guaranteed way to stand out: be yourself. Charm is simply a matter of being yourself. Your uniqueness is your power.
Use the power of vulnerability
Vulnerability is one of the most underappreciated assets in business today. The power of the vulnerability principle in the art of making small talk is surprising.
Talk from your heart
When you realize the best icebreaker is a few words from the heart, the act of starting a conversation becomes far less daunting.
Learn the power of nonverbal cues
You have about ten seconds before a person decides, subconsciously, whether they like you or not. In that short period of time you don’t exchange a lot of words; their judgment is mostly based on nonverbal communication.
Develop conversational currency
Be prepared to have something to say. Keep up with current events. Cultivate some niche interest.
Learn to listen
One should seek first to understand, then to be understood.
Always remember the other person’s name
Nothing is sweeter to someone’s ears than their own name.
Be sincere
The surest way to become special in others’ eyes is to make them feel special.
Try to find out what motivations drive the other person
In your initial conversation with someone, try to find out what motivations drive that person. It often comes down to one of three things: making money, finding love, or changing the world.
Help someone accomplish his or her deepest desires
Initial invitation is just to connect strongly enough with other people to help them address the issues that matter to them most.
Make yourself indispensable to others
Real power comes from being indispensable. Indispensability comes from being a switchboard, parceling out as much information, contacts, and goodwill to as many people - in as many different worlds - as possible.
Start thinking about how you’re going to make everyone around you successful
When someone mentions a problem, try to think of solutions. The solutions come from your experience and knowledge, and your tool kit of friends and associates.
Take the initiative to help
Don’t wait to be asked to help. Just do it.
Be a knowledge broker
Performing social arbitrage when your financial and relational resources are thin is actually not too big a hurdle. The solution is knowledge. The ability to distribute knowledge in a network is a fairly easy skill to learn.
Be interested to others’ success
You can be more successful in two months by becoming really interested in other people’s success than you can in two years trying to get other people interested in your own success (Dale Carnegie).
Ping all the time
80 percent of building and maintaining relationships is just staying in touch (or “pinging”). Pinging takes effort. You have to keep pinging and pinging and pinging and never stop. You have to feed the fire of your network or it will wither or die.
Repeat and repeat again
Becoming front and center in someone’s mental Rolodex is contingent on one invaluable little concept: repetition.
Create a rating system
One way to make maintaining easier is to create a rating system for the network that corresponds to how often you reach out. For example:
1. A “1″ gets contacted at least each month.
2. A “2″ gets a quarterly call or e-mail.
3. A “3″ gets reached at least once a year.
Integrate pinging into your workflow
The important thing is that you build the concept of pinging into your workflow.
Be personal
Always try to make any message as personal as possible.
Don’t forget birthdays
Birthdays should be one of your favorite pinging occasions.
Get anchor tenants for your dinner parties
We all have developed relationships with older, wiser, more experienced people. They are “anchor tenants”. Get them to add a little electricity to your dinner party.
Be interesting
Virtually everyone new you meet in a situation is asking themselves a variation on one question: “Would I want to spend an hour eating lunch with this person?”
Be a person of content
Content involves a much more specialized form of knowledge. It’s your differentiation. It’s the message that will make your brand unique. Have a unique point of view.
Be relentless in learning and presenting your content
What will set you apart from everybody else is the relentlessness you bring to learning and presenting and selling your content.
Acquire content from someone else’s
On some occasions, you can acquire content by simply appropriating another person’s innovative ideas and become a leader in distributing and applying those ideas.
Develop your own content
On other occasions, you have to develop the content from scratch. That means taking all the disparate dots of information and connecting them in a way others have not.
Get the attention
Once a resonating pitch is perfected, getting attention is less of a problem. Simply give the press what they need: great stories.
Be an expert
The easiest route to become content creators is by expertise.Do what experts do: teach, write, and speak about your expertise.
Teach what you want to learn
There’s no better way to learn something, and become an expert at it, than to have to teach it.
Use stories to communicate your content
Powerful content communicated in a compelling story can energize your network to help you achieve your mission. In your stories, use emotion to convince your doubters.
Have a personal brand
A powerful brand - built not on a product but on a personal message - is a competitive advantage. Good personal brands do three things: they provide a credible, distinctive, and trustworthy identity.
Be distinct or extinct
Your brand articulates what you have to offer, why you’re unique, and gives a distinct reason for others to connect with you.
Focus on adding value
To become a brand, you’ve got to become relentlessly focused on what you do that adds value. That means going above and beyond what’s called for.
Develop your Personal Branding Message
What do you want people to think when they hear or read your name? Your positioning message should include a list of words that you want people to use when referring to you.
Package the brand
Looks count, so you’d better look polished and professional. And why not create a personal Web site?
Broadcast your brand
If you don’t promote yourself, no one else will. Like it or not, your success is determined as much by how well others know your work as by the quality of your work.
Start building relationships with the media
You have to start today building relationships with the media before you have a story you’d like them to write.
Trumpet the message, not the messenger
All your efforts at publicity need to feed into your mission, not your ego.
Do collaborative writing
If you have any writing skills at all, you can get close to almost anyone by doing a piece on them, or with them. By writing collaboratively, you’re expanding your network exponentially with contacts that otherwise might have seemed out of reach.
Write articles
Writing articles can be a great boost for your career. It provides instant credibility and visibility.
Be a good writer by keep writing
To become a writer: “Write, then write some more. When you’re done - and here’s the kicker - keep writing.”
Go for the big names
Are you only connecting with field mice? If you are, start turning your attention to reaching out to the sort of important people that can make a difference in your life and the lives of others.
Build trust to get close to power
Trust is the essential element to get close to power; trust that you have no ulterior motives behind your approach; trust that you’ll deal with them as people and not as stars.
Join associations
There is an association for everything. If you want to meet the movers and shakers directly, you have to become a joiner.
Build your own club
Sometimes all clubs that seemed worth attending have their doors closed. There’s no reason not to build your own. Figure out what your unique selling proposition is, and start an organization. Invite those people you want to meet to join you.
Be humble
Arrogance is a disease that can betray you into forgetting your real friends and why they’re so important. Be humble in your hike up the mountain. Help others up the mountain along with and before you.
Reach back to your past
Reach back into your past regularly to touch base with the folks who have meant so much to you since you were a kid.
Find mentors
Finding a talented, experienced mentor who is willing to invest the time and effort to develop you as a person and a professional is far more important than making career decisions based purely on salary or prestige.
Learn from many people
There isn’t just one special person to be all things at all times. Mentors are all around you.
Build a successful mentoring relationship
A successful mentoring relationship needs equal parts utility and emotion. Utility means promising something in return to your mentor. Emotion means your mentor becomes emotionally invested in your advancement.
Find mentees
As much as you stretch yourself by reaching up, be sure you are stretching just as far to reach back and help others. You can learn so much from your mentees.
Hold your principles
Connecting should advance, rather than compromise, your principles. Your determination to connect with others should never come at the expense of your values.
Don’t try to balance your professional and personal life
Balance is a myth. Real connecting insists that you bring the same values to every relationship. As such, dividing your life between professional and personal spheres no longer made sense.
Build close relationships
How many people can walk into your homes and just open up the fridge and help themselves? It is close relationships like these that keep you well-adjusted, happy, and successful.

What is Bridge Master?

2007-11-19T20:07:00.000-08:00

Bridge Master is a computer program for IBM compatible computers. Both Windows and DOS versions are available. Bridge Master is an educational program for improving your declarer play skills. The program presents you with a series of instructional deals to play. You are always declarer. The deals that you play are not randomly dealt. They are carefully constructed excercises designed to illustrate an important declarer play technique. If you take the correct line of play you will always make your contract. If you make any mistake as declarer, the program will defend perfectly and defeat your contract. Each deal is accompanied by an animated bridge movie that will explain the correct line of play as well as the thinking process that leads to the solution.

That fact that you can only make your contract by playing correctly makes Bridge Master a fabulous learning medium. In real bridge (and with other computer bridge programs), a declarer's mistakes are often forgiven by imperfect defense or a lucky lie of the cards. With Bridge Master your mistakes will always be punished. You are "forced" to figure out the correct play if you want to make your contract. In turn, you learn something about bridge in the process. If you play a Bridge Master deal incorrectly, it is best to keep trying again until you get it right. If you give up, however, the bridge movie will make the answer clear. As you read through the bridge movie, images on your screen will reflect the bridge content in the text. For example, if the text reads, "if trumps break 4-1...", a large hand diagram will display the 4-1 break. There is no need to cross out cards or write down end positions. The bridge movie always displays whatever bridge illustration you need in order to understand the explanation.

Bridge Master's instructional deals are organized into 5 levels of difficulty. Skill Level 1 is suitable for new bridge players. Deals on Skill Level 5 are extremely challenging, even for world class players. The deals on Skill Levels 2, 3, and 4 are suitable for most club and tournament players as well as experienced social bridge players.

Bridge Master for Windows comes with 180 lesson deals, 36 on each of the 5 levels of difficulty. Bridge Master for DOS comes with 150 lesson deals, 30 on each of the 5 levels of difficulty. When you have finished with the deals that come with either the Windows Bridge Master or the DOS Bridge Master, hundreds of supplementary deals are available on all skill levels.

There is also a special edition of Bridge Master designed for new bridge players. Audrey Grant's Better Bridge Edition of Bridge Master (both Windows and DOS) contains 117 bridge deals intended as an introductory course on play of the hand. Audrey Grant, North America's premier bridge teacher and best-selling bridge author, created these deals and wrote the text for the bridge movies in this edition. Audrey's 117 deals are all on Skill Level 1. The Windows version of Audrey Grant's Better Bridge Edition of Bridge Master also comes with 30 more difficult bridge deals (6 on each of the 5 levels of difficulty) so that the new player can get a taste of some of the more advanced aspects of the game. By the time a new player has worked through all of the deals in the Audrey Grant Edition, they will have a solid foundation in declarer play. The user will then be ready for more challenging supplementary deals.

In both the Windows and DOS versions of Bridge Master, the user interface has been designed to make using the program as simple and pleasant as possible. Everything is "over-sized" to accomodate those with vision problems. The user has a wide range of color choices. In addition there are several options (particularly in the Windows version) for customizing how Bridge Master will display bridge deals. Bridge Master comes with thorough documentation and the Windows version contains extensive online help. You will find the program so easy to use, however, that documentation is almost unnecessary.

Bridge Master remembers how you played each deal and what your results were. In this way you can track your progress and go back and review deals that gave you trouble. It also remembers your color preferences and display options. If more than one person uses the program, their results and preferences are remembered separately. The Windows version of Bridge Master contains a facility for teaching new players to count the hand.

All of the instructional deals in Bridge Master were created by Fred Gitelman. Fred is currently a member of the Canadian National Bridge Team. He has won two silver medals in World Championship events (1991 World Junior Championship, 1995 Bermuda Bowl). Fred is also an experienced bridge author, whose articles have appeared in The American Contract Bridge League Bulletin, The Bridge World, and several Canadian publications. Some of Fred's articles have been translated into Dutch and appeared in IMP Magazine. The deals in Bridge Master were extensively analyzed and tested by several top experts including Eric Rodwell, a many time World Champion.

Bridge Master is endorsed by many of the world's best bridge players including:

Billy Eisenberg
Benito Garazzo
Bobby Goldman
Bob Hamman
Eric Kokish
Mike Lawrence
Zia Mahmood
Jeff Meckstroth
Eric Rodwell
Kit Woolsey

Bridge Master is the only software product that Audrey Grant, North America's top bridge teacher, is willing to recommend her students. Warren Buffett, Chairman of Berkshire Hathaway Corporation and one of America's leading businessmen, is also an avid Bridge Master user. Matt Clegg, the creator of OKBridge, endorses the use of Bridge Master.

Bridge Base Inc. introduced the DOS version of Bridge Master in 1992. Bridge Master for Windows was released August 1, 1996 and is currently available. Bridge Master has been translated into Dutch and Danish. French and Italian versions are in progress.

Regardless of your level of bridge ability, Bridge Master is certain to improve your game. Order your copy today!