Every Sunday, I perform a set of jobs on all my computers. They help optimize the system, save hard disk space, increase security and privacy, etc.
 
Clean: Using CCleaner, I clean the PCs including all the browser caches and various other application caches. (Read my introduction to CCleaner here.)
Disk Cleanup: I run disk cleanup ($ leanmgr) on all the drives.
Registry: I run a registry cleaner (these days CCleaner itself) to clean the registries, after taking a backup of the current registry set.
Virus Scan: I run an entire PC scan, not just the scan across the “commonly infected areas”.
Defragment: Using …read more

Every now and then a popular website gets hacked and tons of user passwords are published for everyone to see. On one side, it can potentially lead to huge losses to the users whose passwords have been compromised. On the other, security analysts use the data to gain various insights.
In one such recent attack, Robert Graham, the CEO of Errata Security, came to a few startling conclusions based on the passwords published showing what should not be your password:

16% of passwords matched a person’s first name
14% of passwords were patterns on the keyboard
4% are variations of the word “password”
5% of …read more

I use Launchy and so have no need for program launch icons, be it on the Desktop or Quick Launch or Windows Start. I don’t even use the Quick Launch toolbar and all I knew until recently was that you add a quick launch icon by dragging any program (or a shortcut pointing to that program) into the toolbar.\\r\\n\\r\\nToday, when I accidentally deleted one of the quick launch icons of a machine not belonging to me, I found the obscure location of the quick launch icons:\\r\\n
%APPDATA%\\\\Microsoft\\\\Internet Explorer\\\\Quick Launch
\\r\\n\\r\\n(APPDATA is an environment variable which can be found by typing echo %APPDATA% …read more

There are a lot of utilities that can be used to clean a computer. These do something more than the usual “Disk Cleanup” ($ cleanmgr), are easy to use with custom features and are faster too. Cleaning up your computer can improve its performance and ensure greater privacy. For a while now, I have been using Piriform’s CCleaner. It is one of the most comprehensive utilities of its kind.

CCleaner’s primary feature is the Cleaner. First, it will analyze the system, fetch the files that it is going to delete from the recycle bin, browser caches, other application caches, and many …read more

Environment variables are a set of dynamic variables that can determine the environment in which a process runs. While they are more easily visible and often used in Unix-based OSs, they are equally essential on Windows. A little knowledge is especially important to write batch programs (.BAT).
The command env typed in your command prompt or Cygwin terminal will list the entire set of environment variables and their current values. My Computer –> Properties –> Advanced –> Environment Variables will also show you the Windows environment variables divided into two categories: System variables and User variables.

While on cmd each variable can …read more

Especially in systems that are part of an enterprise domain, you may have noticed a warning message after pressing Ctrl+Alt+Del and before the login window. It is called a Legal Notice. While it is irritating most of the times, there is a good reason why it exists.
Especially in labs, for instance, all systems have similar account usernames and passwords for convenience. It is not uncommon for someone to accidentally log into someone else’s system and proceed as though it were his or her own. If you are an administrator of a system which needs restricted access, you can create a …read more

Every once in a while, there is some file that you know you’ve saved but yet can’t find it. Windows Search comes handy at such times but is very slow. Windows Desktop Search, a new utility that is now being shipped with the Windows OSs and being given as an update works using indexing. I think it was started to beat the competition of Google Desktop Search.
IMHO, both Windows and Google Desktop Search consume too many resources.
e.g. Windows Desktop Search recommends Pentium 1 GHz Processor and 256 MB RAM, 500 MB of free hard disk space,… A process that starts …read more

I am two days late, but never mind. Lifehacker, the fabulous site with everyday tips and downloads for getting things done, had its first post on 31st Jan 2005. What a phenomenal success it has achieved in these four years!
On this occasion, the super blog has two interesting posts: Our Best Posts From 2005 to 2009, and Weirdest and Most Controversial Posts.
I am especially thankful to Gina Trapani, the blog’s founding editor, for introducing me to Cygwin and the todo.sh. She used to make frequent posts but has been writing only a weekly column on the blog these days. …read more

The PC boot drive (usually C:) has a few folders, names of some of which don’t make sense. It is not wrong to panic when you see some shady name among them.
e.g. The drive on which you installed Windows usually has the following folders:
Documents and Settings
Drivers,… and similar ones
Program Files
WINDOWS
In addition, I have folders called cygwin, Downloads, and SysinternalsSuite. Until recently, I also had Msocache. Msocache is not always in C: but could be on any non-removable and non-network drive with over 1.5GB free disk space.
The Msocache folder is created during the Microsoft Office installation and is called the “Local …read more

Microsoft offers a suite of utilities called Sysinternals for free for troubleshooting your PC. The suite is far superior to many of the alternate freewares that are available.
Mark Russinovich, now a Fellow in Microsoft, originally developed them along with Bryce Cogswell when they were in the company Winternals Software. The company subsequently was acquired by Microsoft in mid 2006. Initially, many of the tools were not just freeware but were also accompanied with the source code. No longer, of course.
The utilities are categorized under File and Disk utilities, Networking utilities, Process utilities, Security utilities, System information, etc. The Windows Sysinternals …read more