Tips for Friday October 13

Go to this site
for more info on how to remove Fonts from your hard drive.

To completely remove fonts from the hard disk:

1.	Click Start, and then click Run.
2.	Type %windir%\fonts, and then click OK.
3.	Click the font you want to remove. To select more than one font at a time, press and hold down the CTRL key while you click each font.
4.	On the File menu, click Delete.
5.	When you receive the "Are you sure you want to delete these fonts?" prompt, click Yes.

To prevent a font from loading without removing it from the hard disk, move the font from the Fonts folder into another folder. Use this method for troubleshooting purposes. This process does not completely remove the font, because font registry information is not deleted. However, it prevents the font from loading.

WinPatrol (Free Version)

WinPatrol works in two ways. First, when you install a program and it tries to add an icon to the tray at boot-up, you'll get a WinPatrol warning--and a way to nip it in the bud (or kill and remove it afterward). That's important for programs such as AOL, Apple's QuickTime, and RealPlayer, all notorious for adding junk icons. WinPatrol also enables you to stop programs such as Adobe Acrobat that insist on running useless, daily version-update checks; and it prevents programs from changing file extensions willy-nilly. WinPatrol can help prevent spyware, adware, and other unnecessary and unwanted programs from taking over your computer. Indeed, WinPatrol is a MUST HAVE. To learn more about and/or to download WinPatrol, please click here.

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To unpin an item from the Windows start menu, right-click the item and click "Remove from this list". To "unpin" is Windowese for "remove". And, "pin" is Windowese for "add" or "put". And you can pin any application to your start menu (the part that appears in the list when you click the 'Start' button (not the start menu/all programs menu) by navigating to an application (using My Computer) right-clicking on its icon and choosing "Pin to start menu".

You can also increase or decrease the number of items that show on your start menu by right-clicking on your start button, selecting "Properties", clicking the Start Menu tab, clicking "Customize" and changing the number of program by clicking the up and down arrows next to "Number of programs on the Start Menu" - you can choose to show as many as thirty or as few as one. The more you show the less you'll have to click "All Programs" to see all the rest of your programs. Conversely, the less you show, the more you'll be punching away at the "All programs" option. It's up to you. Our job is to show you how, not to tell you what to do :)

Get this set of tools which extend the right-click context menu of Internet Explorer.

Uptime is how long Windows has been running since your last restart. Or, more broadly, how long your computer has been "up and running". So, if it's been awhile since you rebooted or restarted your computer you might be interested in seeing what your "uptime" is, right? Sure! Here's how you do it:

From the Start menu, click Run. Type “cmd” and click OK. From the Command Prompt window, type systeminfo | find “Up Time” and press Enter. The results will tell you how long Windows XP has been up and running. As with many other commands, it is case sensitive so it must be typed in exactly as it appears above or an error message will be returned instead. If that doesn't work for you, you can download a little script that will tell you in minutes how long your computer has been running (i.e. your "uptime"). Just download it and save it to your desktop. Double-click it to run it. It doesn't need to be installed and you can delete it by right-clicking it and selecting Delete. Make sure you choose "Save" when you download it - do not choose "Open" or "Run".

Keyboard vs. Mouse - Today's Winner: The Keyboard (poor little mouse!)
Windows XP Home and Professional (Some work on other versions of Windows too!)

The Windows key brings up the Start menu, but it also does quite a lot more too!:

Winkey-D press it to view your desktop, press it again to go back to where you were :-)

Winkey-M minimizes all windows.

Winkey-E opens the Windows Explorer.

Winkey-L locks your system until you enter your password—or lets you switch active users (if you have Fast User Switching enabled).

Winkey-R brings up the Run dialog.

Winkey-Pause/Break key brings up the System Properties dialog.

Winkey-U opens the Windows Utility Manager, (accessibility program options).

Winkey-S, in Microsoft Word 2002 or later, invokes Windows' text-to-speech engine, which will read either highlighted text or everything from the cursor on. (It's very annoying too.)

Here's some other useful keyboard tips -

Highlight a file or folder and press Shift & Delete keys to delete permanently, bypassing the Recycle Bin.

Alt-Enter opens the highlighted file or folder's Properties dialog.

In Windows Explorer, highlight a folder and press Shift-NumPad Asterisk to open the folder and all subfolders.