Windows registry and other settings: notes

You can change the Frame Controls (the Minimize, Restore, and Close buttons on the top right of every window) using the freeware program Eppie Desktop:
       Web (author) -- http://www.u.arizona.edu/~jepstein/
       Web (program) -- http://www.u.arizona.edu/~jepstein/epdsk/
       (win98 only)

Registry cleaning from woram.com
local copy

Icon and cursor notes
Internet Explorer Content Advisor help, y2k notes, keyboard shortcuts and Windows 98 source code
Internet notes

Accessing a password protected Zip disk
http://www.microsoft.com/TechNet/win98/Reskit/Part7/wrkappg.asp - Keyboard shortcuts from Microsoft
my local copy

DMA stuff from Fred Langa:
langa.txt
Speeding up Internet Explorer

More customization: hacking explorer.exe

The free edition of 98lite (http://www.98lite.net/preview.html) works great on Win98 & WinMe.

If you'd like, I have condensed versions of this page in redneck, jive, Cockney, or Swedish.

Unix: Activate NumLock at boot:

Add this to your rc.local file:
for tty in /dev/tty[1-9]*;
do
setleds -D +num<$tty>/dev/null
done
This worked under FreeBSD and RedHat Linux

bashrc.gz
My new .bashrc file for RedHat Linux, ripped off almost verbatim from:
http://www.welearn.com.au/freebsd/ - Sue's FreeBSD page and the Bash HOWTO.

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Lockergnome:

They say that blinking is a sign of nervousness or lying, but I wonder if the researchers were blinking when they discovered that? You can speed up or slow down the rate at which your cursor blinks. Launch the Registry Editor (REGEDIT), and navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER > Control Panel > Desktop, then in the right-most panel, you should see a String Value named 'CursorBlinkRate' (if one doesn't exist, you can create one). Now, you can change the value to any number between 0 and 65535. The smaller the number, the faster your cursor will blink (and vice versa). You can also tweak the rate via the Keyboard applet in the Control Panel, but the range is severely limited.

It's not easy being blue; when you'd rather be playing in the snow, you're stuck inside -- with nothing constructive to do. For years now, the Blue Screen of Death (BSOD) has been haunting our PCs. Would you rather see the Magenta Screen of Death? What about Cyan? That's doable. Open up SYSTEM.INI and fly to the [386enh] section. Add two new values: 'MessageBackColor=' and 'MessageTextColor=' (without the quotes, but with the equal symbol). You'll need to use ONE hexadecimal "number" for each color; they are as follows: 0 (black), 1 (blue), 2 (green), 3 (cyan), 4 (red), 5 (magenta), 6 (yellow), 7 (white), 8 (gray), 9 (bright blue), A (bright green), B (bright cyan), C (bright red), D (bright magenta), E (bright yellow), F (bright white). I hope you never see another screen of death again.

MODEM MADNESS. If you're plagued, as I am, with frequent disconnects, this might be worth a try. Click on Start|Settings|Control Panel|Properties|Connection Tab|Advanced and in the Extra Settings box, enter S10=50. This supposedly holds the modem connection without a carrier for a period of 5 seconds, allowing compensation for slight gaps of connect time. But then again, maybe not.

This tweak is definitely one to pass along to friends. Windows 98 accesses your swap file (virtual memory) before it runs out of RAM (physical memory) -- which, from a user's point of view, is completely nuts. Virtual memory will always operate slower than physical memory, so why does Windows 98 insist on using both? Frankly, I don't know. According to article Q223294 in the Microsoft knowledge base, this new method is more efficient. Uh huh. Thank goodness they've posted a fix! Yes, if you have more than 64 megabytes of RAM and you're running Windows 98, you'll wanna give this a shot. In your SYSTEM.INI file, under the [386Enh] section, enter: "ConservativeSwapfileUsage=1" (without the quotes). Reboot, and I believe you'll find your system more responsive. Your mileage may vary!

By default (a phrase which has come to scare many a power user), Windows 98 sees your hard drives as though they were on one IDE channel (like most other devices). You may be able to squeeze a few more drops of performance out of those disks by: right-clicking on MY COMPUTER and pulling up its PROPERTIES, selecting the DEVICE MANAGER tab, then opening the HARD DISK CONTROLLERS section. At that point, you should see your device controller at the top of the list (something with the words BUS MASTER in it, most likely); pull up its PROPERTIES and flip to the SETTINGS tab. Select 'Both IDE Channels Enabled' from the drop-down menu, reboot, and see if you've made a difference. Pay attention to the programs which access the swap file most often; they may move faster. YMMV!

Coming from the "Exclusive Access" department, Lockergnomie Kev Priebe pry-proofs his folders from GUI snoops. Do you have documents that you'd rather keep secret? Short of attribing them 'hidden' (and telling Windows to keep them hidden), you should give yourself another layer of protection. Right-click on empty space in a folder and select CUSTOMIZE THIS FOLDER, then choose CREATE HTML DOCUMENT FOR THIS FOLDER. Once the document is opened in Notepad, scroll down until you see <script language="JavaScript"> -- hit [ENTER] to insert a blank line after this string. Now, insert the following text (with hard carriage returns where noted): var pass = prompt("Enter the password") [ENTER] if(pass != "YOURPASSWORD") [ENTER] {window.location="C:"} [ENTER]. Put a password in the place of YOURPASSWORD but leave the quotes. Save the document, exit Notepad, refresh the folder (hit F5), enter your new password, and the next time you try to enter that folder, you'll be prompted for your password.

When you close a door, the door is closed. Makes sense. But when you close a program in Windows 9x, some of its DLLs love to stick around. Some components just never know when to leave, eh? Kick 'em out of memory immediately if you have better things to do with the space. This tweak should benefit those of you who run different programs on a daily basis. Fire up REGEDIT.EXE and navigate to "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE \ SOFTWARE \ Microsoft \ Windows \ CurrentVersion \ Explorer" -- create a new String Value in the right pane and name it: "AlwaysUnloadDll" (sans quotes). Give this new string a value of 1, close the Registry Editor, and reboot Windows. This will eliminate DLL caching; programs won't re-launch as quickly as before, but it'll bring closure to every close. Perfect for low memory systems or programming environments.

Even if you don't frequent casinos, you can still run out of cache in a matter of minutes. Before a Web page can fully load, your browser must first resolve the domain name [lockergnome.com] to its corresponding IP address(es). Since Internet Explorer 4.0, the DNS cache has been resetting itself every thirty minutes. If this time-out setting is way too short for your tastes, then you'll need to fire up the Registry editor and navigate to the HKEY_CURRENT_USER \ Software \ Microsoft \ Windows \ CurrentVersion \ Internet Settings key. In the right-hand pane, right-click and add a new DWORD value. Rename the new entry: "DnsCacheTimeout" (sans quotes). Double-click to edit it's properties, changing the type to Decimal before proceeding. What should 'Value data' be set to? Well, whatever you pick, this is the number of seconds between cache flushings. The higher - the greater the chance of not having the freshest DNS entry. The lower - the more time it will take your system to resolve DNS entries. If you want to return to "normal," you can always remove this user-created key.

Lockergnome
You can submit tips for them to include in a book that you can buy.

I don't know where this came from. The http://www.comedycentral.com/southpark/ underpants gnomes?
Old Pentium bug check:
Calculator -> View menu -> Scientific
(4195835/3145727)x3145727
The result should be 4195835
The buggy Pentium will show 4195579

Add stuff to the 'Find' menu

Multi-column Start menu

FAX 95 TOOLS

Windows 98, 98 SE and ME do NOT include NOR install the good ol' MS Windows Fax tools known to Win95/OSR1/OSR2 users. :( But you can get them back by installing them manually from the original Windows 98 or 98 SE Setup CD-ROM. :) Open Windows Explorer or File Manager (FM = C:\Windows\Winfile.exe) and go to the \Tools\Oldwin95\Message\Us (US English) or \Tools\Oldwin95\Message\Intl (other languages) subfolder located on your Setup CD. (Double)-click on WMS-FAX.TXT first to read it in Notepad, and then install [(double)-click on] the two Win95 Fax tools, in this exact order: WMS.EXE (Windows Messaging Server + Microsoft Mail Workgroup Postoffice) first, and only after that AWFAX.EXE (At Work Fax). WMS is needed ONLY IF using a MAPI (Messaging Application Programming Interface) client used by these Microsoft programs: Exchange, Exchange Server (Client), Outlook, Windows Messaging. NOTE: Do NOT install these tools if using MS Office 2000 or newer!

If you're using Outlook Express, put e-mail into the Restricted Sites zone (Tools -> Options -> Security) .
Change the properties of the Restricted Sites zone to disallow everything listed.
Change the Zone settings:
      Start Menu -> Settings -> Control Panel -> Internet Options -> Security ->
      select the Restricted Sites icon,
      then click the 'Custom Level' button;
      the 'Default Level' button can restore it back to the original unsafe settings.

Poke around at cert.org for the many reasons why, or reread the news stories about the ILOVEYOU virus (and the local variants, the YOURLIKEABROTHERTOME virus and the INEEDMYSPACEYOUPIG virus).

You've been warned.

Linux Notes

chipsets.jpg

Power Supplies

Programs that start up with Windows
local copy

Microsoft Technical Support vs. The Psychic Friends Network

the mst3k inspiration

Two DSL - Roll-your-own articles I've had sitting around:
One
Two

32-bit versions of Windows, Macs & Unix will die on January 18th, 2038 at 19:14:07 Greenwich Mean Time.

This page is for the things I like, and are useful to me. You should not assume your computer will behave as expected. No warranties expressed or implied. Your mileage may vary. Etc.!

This page, and by golly, this website is...well...not exactly copyrighted...um...I should probably deny some of this......howsabout we stick with a standard legal notice


     RIGOR MORRIS
     The cat is dead.

     VENI, VIPI, VICI
     I came, I'm a very important person, I conquered

     VENI, VIDI, VISA
     I came, I saw, I shopped.


"We saw the MacQuarium and said, 'Let's put a bong inside one 
instead,'" Agapornis said. "We were probably stoned." 


      "A society that will trade a little liberty for a little order
             will lose both and deserve neither" - T.Jefferson


"We don't have shelterinis." - Moe


To be prepared for war is one of the most
effectual means of preserving peace.
-George Washington


A good friend will come and bail you out of jail, but a true 
               friend will be sitting next to you saying, 
       "Damn...that was fun!" 


An old saying about business deals... "Never count the other guy's money."





     Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at an Elingsh uinervtisy, it deosn't
     mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny
     iprmoetnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer is at the
     rghit pclae. The rset can be a toatl mses and you can sitll
     raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae we do not raed ervey
     lteter by it slef but the wrod as a wlohe. Qiute ture I thnik

Multiples of bytes
Decimal prefixes			Binary prefixes
Name	Symbol	Multiple	Name	Symbol	Multiple
kilobyte	kB	10³	kibibyte	KiB	2¹⁰
megabyte	MB	10⁶	mebibyte	MiB	2²⁰
gigabyte	GB	10⁹	gibibyte	GiB	2³⁰
terabyte	TB	10¹²	tebibyte	TiB	2⁴⁰
petabyte	PB	10¹⁵	pebibyte	PiB	2⁵⁰
exabyte	EB	10¹⁸	exbibyte	EiB	2⁶⁰
zettabyte	ZB	10²¹
yottabyte	YB	10²⁴

Notes

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Unix: Activate NumLock at boot: