Auri's Blog

At MIX ‘09 Microsoft showed off SuperPreview, an incredible tool for Web developers looking to make sure Web sites look the same across all browsers. SuperPreview can cut development and design testing time significantly with these awesome features:

• Preview ASPX, PHP, JSP, and HTML Web pages as rendered by different browsers side-by-side
• Previews can be generated by IE6, IE7, IE8, FireFox, and even Safari!
• Highlight areas in one preview and see them highlighted in the other preview, so you can see where DIVs are having issues
• Overlay previews on mock-ups or on other previews to see alignment issues – way cool
• Save development time and client budget by giving this tool to your design and testing teams
• Much, much more, and it’s FREE

Side by Side Previews:

PHP and ASPX pages in SuperPreview: (note these images came from Microsoft’s SuperPreview Features Page)

There are obviously some limitations, especially since this is only a beta release, but this should be in your development arsenal.

Download it here: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=8E6AC106-525D-45D0-84DB-DCCFF3FAE677&displaylang=en

Microsoft also showed off Expression Blend 3 Preview, with a Sketch Flow feature. Simply “sketch” your site pages with simple WPF controls, and fill in the blanks. Yes, an entire site shell built quickly, with no code. How cool is that? Thanks Microsoft. (to be fair, the Sketch Flow feature was not included in the beta, bummer)

There’s a lot more to be learned, with oodles of videos to watch – just visit the MIX ‘09 site.

Best,

-Auri

Apple’s really been strutting their multi-touch patent power lately. Their legal dogs are on Palm, Google, and maybe even Microsoft. Don’t violate our multi-touch patent!!! But wait… didn’t the movie Minority Report show practically the same gestures? Can Apple patent in 2008 something that’s already been materially presented in 2002, and on the big screen to millions of viewers, no less?

I’d love to hear your comments!

Ok, at first I thought the issue was the fingerprint reading software. That’s not the case, and I have since deleted that post.

The real problem was a process named APOINT.EXE. It was preventing me from selecting multiple items with my Control key.

To fix the problem:

1. Launch System Configuration Manager by going to Start, then Run, then typing MSCONFIG
2. Click the STARTUP tab
3. Uncheck the box next to the item named ALPS POINTING-DEVICE DRIVER and with the command APOINT.EXE.
4. Click APPLY and then OK.
5. Restart your computer. You may have to restart twice.
6. Problem solved!

I hope this helps!

Best,

-Auri

For those of you who want to relive the lost art of keyboard jockeying, here is a great video I found going over useful keyboard shortcuts in Vista and Windows Explorer. Credit to Tech Republic for this great segment.

The link he discusses in the video for the "76 Keyboard Shortcuts in Windows Vista" can be found here.

Are you looking for a great image editing program with some Photoshop-like features, but you don’t want to tip the budget scales? Sure, The GiMP is out there, but it’s hard to use in my humble opinion. My development team introduced me to a great FREE program, and I want to share it with you – PAINT.NET. In fact, even though I do have Photoshop, I use Paint.NET for quick tasks like cropping and blurring. It’s just crazy fast.

Some of its benefits:

• Simple, easy to use interface
• Tabbed document editing, so you can see all the open images at once
• Photoshop-like capabilities, like blur effects
• Doesn’t take half a minute to load like Photoshop
• Fast
• No spyware!

Feel like trying it out? Go to Download.com and get it free.

Another tip: The folks at CNet’s Download.com "certify" their downloads as spyware-free. If a program has been recommended to you, try finding it there first, if you want to make sure you’re getting something reasonably safe.

Best,

-Auri

Are you a Windows Media Center junkie? Do you want to work with those DVR-MS files it creates, but can’t find a tool to help you? Well, I hope this article answers your questions!

Using the free utility DVRMS Toolkit, you can:

• Convert DVR MS files to MPEG for moving to DVD.
• Convert DVR MS files to WMV for playback on your Zune or other WMV capable device.
• Remove all commercials from your shows.
• More!

To get DVRMSToolkit, go to its official Web site. Make sure you download the latest version that’s appropriate for your PC. For example, if you are running Windows Vista 64-bit, make sure you download version specifically marked x64. (Another tip: If you’re running 64-bit Vista, always try to get the 64-bit version of applications…)

Being a free tool written and designed by a developer, the interface for DVRMS Toolkit isn’t shiny and polished like Windows Live Movie Maker. So, a few pointers:

• The program to use after install is DVRMStoMPEGGUI.
• To set the Input file, which is the video you want to work with, simply double-click the white box next to Input File.
• To set the Output file, which is the video file DVR MS should create, simply double-click the white box next to Output File.
• Don’t mess with Process Priority.
• Make sure you set the Profile to the operation you want to perform.
• Keep Use Selected Profile checked.
• You likely won’t have to tinker with the Process Directory tab’s contents.
• You may randomly get messages saying DLLs aren’t registered. I’ve found it safe to ignore these messages.

A few tips about DVRMS files:

• Windows Movie Maker can also work with these files, so you can create videos directly from them.
• Converting files to MPEG makes them easier to work with in many video editing applications, since MPEG is a video standard.
• DVRMS files work a LOT better in Windows Vista’s Media Center than from Windows XP Media Center Edition (MCE). If you’re having a lot of trouble with shows recorded using Windows XP MCE, consider upgrading that machine to Vista Home Premium or Vista Utimate.

A few more tips for Windows Media Center:

• Make sure you use the Windows Media Center instead of Windows XP Media Center Edition. It’s just plain better.
• If you’re looking for a very good over-the-air tuner, get the PC HD TV from Happaugue. It comes with a great antenna, but keep in mind that antenna has a huge magnet weighting it down!

I used this application extensively to create my Superbowl

DVDs. The commercial skip feature works like a champ!

Geeky Developer Note: If you’re a software developer, you can change the program to your liking, and it’s written in C#.

Enjoy!

Best,

-Auri

Sometimes you just want to work on your mobile device without having to hold it in your hand. Seriously, have you ever tried cleaning up programs on there? That stylus sure does get annoying. And, well, for software developers like me, we need to see the device on our computer desktop without having to glance at it all the time.

Luckily, there’s a free program out there that solves this problem. MyMobiler is a free, highly rated application for accessing your Windows Mobile device when it’s plugged into your computer via ActiveSync. It’ll show you the Mobile’s screen and can even magnify the screen for wary eyes.

To snag it, go to http://www.mymobiler.com/

Don’t click through your Start menu to find all those apps you’ve installed! Simply press the Start key and type the name of the app.

A few cool shortcuts, and I encourage you to try more:

• Start + "Windows Live" brings up all the Windows Live apps.

• Start + "Word" brings up Microsoft Word.

If you simply hit the Enter/Return key when the item comes up at the top of the list, it will launch the application. How cool is that? Keyboard jockeys rejoice!

Nowadays, most people keep only digital versions of their files on their computer. Whether it be a laptop or a desktop, it doesn’t matter – having only one copy of important data on only one drive is just asking for disaster.

As hard drives get larger, and you store more data, the risk inherent in loss increases greatly. Do you really want to lose all your photos and music? Do you want to lose all those financial worksheets, tax return documents, resumes?

There is no excuse these days not to back up. Every computer you buy in the store comes with some sort of CD burning program. Many thumb drives and external hard drives come with backup software. Windows Vista Home Edition and beyond come with Windows Backup And Restore Center.

To Access Windows Backup and Restore Center, simply press the Start key and type Backup. The first option will be Windows Backup and Restore Center. How easy was that?

Just tell it what to back up and you’re done. Presto.

Create a Backup Schedule

Backing up is like working out – you need to make it part of your routine and stick to it.

For important documents, such as basically everything inside your Documents folder in Vista, or the non-media folders inside My Documents in Windows XP, back those up at least once per month, and ideally once per week or even more often. I’ll cover backing up music, photos, and video later in this article.

One aspect of Windows Live One Care I really liked was it glowed yellow for "caution" when you hadn’t backed up your files in a specified amount of time.

If You Have Many Computers

Now, that’s for one computer. What do you do if you have many computers across your home? Microsoft has the answer here – Windows Home Server. Just plug a $475 Windows Home Server into your network and "join’ your computers to the server. Every night between 1 and 3 am your computers will back themselves up, automatically. If one fails, simply stick a CD in the drive and the computer will be restored over the network. No fuss. Wow, how cool is that?

(Personally, I have more than the 10 computers Windows Home Server allows, so I bought another one… <grin>)

What About My Music, Photos, and Video?

These three media types tend to take up the most space on your hard drive. True, it’s hard to back up hundreds of gigabytes of media. If it’s to CD, DVD, or even BluRay discs, it takes a LOT of discs, and it’s time consuming. Fortunately, for most of us, each item in our collections doesn’t change all that often – the collection just grows.

Understandably, there’s no reason to back up the media collection every day or week, as you should be for your regular documents. I suggest you archive your music collection to an external hard drive once per month. Oftentimes it’s easy to get that music back if it’s from CD.

There is a gotcha here… the media that you purchase from online services may require you to re-purchase the items if you lose them. It’s important that purchased media be backed up on a regular basis. Just make it part of your routine.

There’s more to share…

I’d like to continue this article a bit more… if you have suggestions on topics I should cover, please let me know.

Best,

-Auri

Do you need someone to look at your computer and help you troubleshoot an issue? Well, sheesh, how do you do that? Well, Microsoft has made this pretty easy:

1. Get Windows Live Messenger (http://get.live.com)
2. IM your friend.
3. From the Actions menu click Actions, then Request Remote Assistance.

   

4. Let your friend control your computer and figure out the problem.
5. Buy your friend dinner.

Enjoy!

Best,

-Auri