Window 7 is the fastest selling operating system in History and is here to stay for a long time now. It is always very tricky to explore a new tweak or trick when dealing with a powerful OS like Windows 7. Instead of exploring the Windows 7 step-by-step I have compiled a list of simple tricks that will help you make things easy while performing regular operations. So here is the Window 7 Tricks list, read on.
1.Add blank white space on taskbar
This trick involves creating some blank shortcuts to the taskbar. This can be used to have a separator between categorized icon lists on taskbar. To facilitate the process, below are the steps;
1. Create a New Text Document (Right click> New> Text Document)
2. Rename its extension to txt to exe
3. Drag the file you just renamed the taskbar
4. Press and hold Shift Keyboard, right click on the file you just added to the taskbar and select Property from the context menu
5. Click on the button Change Icon and give OK notice appearing later
6. Double click on one of the icons transparent (white space) in the library Shell32.dll
2. Get Hidden Themes back
Windows 7 provides you with location specific themes based on the language and location you pick during installation. Here we will take a look at accessing the other hidden themes from different countries.
When you first installed Windows 7, during the final setup phase, the interactive setup asked for your language, time and currency, then based on your response, it installed wallpaper set and the corresponding themes based on your location. For example, if you choose, English (United Kingdom) for your time and currency format, then the available themes and backgrounds will include a United Kingdom section and its various wallpapers.
Now, the hidden themes, though, are background scenery and themes from other English-speaking countries – Australia, Canada, Great Britain and South Africa. Normally you can’t access those backgrounds or themes.
Here is a simple way by which you can install and use them:
1. Press Windows key + R to bring forward the Run dialog box. Type C:WindowsGlobalizationMCT and press Enter (Note: If your Windows is installed on drive other than C:, use that alphabet instead.
2. Now, Windows Explorer will launch and will show you the list of sub-folders under C:WindowsGlobalizationMCT viz. MCT-AU, MCT-CA, MCT-GB, MCT-US and MCT-ZA. These sub-folders have the wallpapers for a specific country: i.e. AU for Australia, CA for Canada, GB for Great Britain, US for United States and ZA for South Africa.
3. Now, in the search box which is located on the extreme right side of window, type *.theme. After this you would get all the hidden themes with the similar interface as shown:
4. Now, just select all the themes by pressing Control (CTRL) + A and then copy the selected themes to folder C:WindowsResourcesThemes. After that when you would open personalization gallery, there under the installed themes section, you would see all the hidden themes as shown below:
3.Modify UAC (User Account Control)
One of the highly criticized features in Windows Vista is the User Account Control (UAC) which instigates a dialog box seeking users’ permission to continue or stop whenever a system-level change is made. The problem with Vista is that even the default user account which is created during the install, who is a protected administrator (unlike in XP where the user is an Administrator), could not bypass the UAC until it’s pulled off. This created lots of disapproval and the feature which was built to make Vista secure became the most hated feature amongst users.
UAC has been improved upon a lot in Windows 7 so that it’s not as intrusive as in Windows Vista, but you can still tweak it if you like.
Here’s how to turn UAC on or off, and make it less or more intrusive than the default:
1. Go to the Control Panel –> User Accounts and Family Safety.
2. Click User Accounts , then click Change User Account Control Settings.
3. If confirmation password is asked provide it and then move to change the UAC settings. From the screen (as shown below) use the slider to select the level of protection you want. I would now describe all the four levels and what they mean:
Always Notify Me:
This behavior is same like that of Windows Vista – asking user for each and every sytem related tasks which are performed by user or program.
Default – Notify me only when programs try to make changes to my computer:
This is the default Windows 7 behavior, if the user makes a change to UAC, then it leaves you alone, but when a program makes a change to system then UAC prompts for action by you and your desktop goes dark, just like it does in Windows Vista. otherwise, UAC sits there silently.
Notify me only when programs try to make changes to my computer (do not dim my desktop):
This setting is identical to the above setting but with one difference – When UAC prompts you, it will not dim your desktop. Instead it will ask you for permission in normal mode. But this presents a slightly elevated security risk over the default setting, because a program could allow a malicious program to interfere with UAC prompt.
Never Notify me:
In this mode the UAC is turned off completely. This of course is not recommended for most users as it is an insecure option.
After you make the selection, you need to restart your computer for the new settings to take effect.
4.Search the Internet from Start Menu
Most of us access the internet with the help of browsers to perform a query search. What if you can search the internet through the Start Menu? This can certainly save a bit of time as for small single searches, you do not have to open a browser and search separately.
To enable this log on with an administrator account and perform this:
1. In the Start menu search box, type ‘gpedit.msc’ (without quotes) and press enter to run the Group Policy Editor.
2. Go to User Configuration –> Administrative Templates –> Start Menu and Taskbar.
3. Double click “Add search internet link to Start Menu”, and then from the screen that appears, select Enabled. Then click OK and close the Group Policy Editor. See the figure for details”:
4. From now on as soon as you type the item in the search box, a ‘Search the Internet’ link will appear. Just click on the link to launch the search in your web browser with the default search engine as shown in figure:
5.Use Check boxes to select multiple files
What do you do when you want to select multiple files at once in Windows? We have been accomplishing this task by holding down CTRL or SHIFT keys while selecting the files to select multiple files at once. Even though we have got used to this, yet there can be instances when we accidentally click on the blank space resulting in deselecting all the items that you gathered with much effort. That is why many people prefer to use mouse over keyboard particularly when doing this kind of multi-selection.
But, there is a way to select multiple files in Windows 7.
To do it:
1. In Windows Explorer, click organize, and then select ‘Folder and Search Options.’
2. Click the View Tab.
3. In Advanced Settings, scroll down and then check the box next to ‘Use check box to select items’ and click OK.
4. From now on, when you would hover your mouse over a file in windows explorer, a checkbox will appear next to i; click it to select the file. Once the file is selected, the checkbox remains next to it. If you uncheck it, the box will disappear when you move your mouse away. For details look at the screenshot below:
6.Protect the Privacy of your Explorer searches
Most of us don’t want to share what they are searching with other people. Usually people want to maintain their privacy and so if you share a PC and don’t want others to see what you’ve searched for; you can turn off the recent searches feature.
1. Click on the Start Button and type gpedit.msc and right click the gpedit.msc icon to select ‘Run as Administrator’
2. Provide Administrator password or user consent to open Group Policy Editor.
3. Go to User Configuration –> Administrative Templates –> Windows Components –> Windows Explorer.
4. Search for the entry ‘Turn off display of recent search entries in the Windows Explorer search box’ and select Enabled from the screen that appears. Then click OK.
5. Now, the recent searches feature would be turned off.
7.Set a New Windows Explorer launch Folder
We have seen that when you open Windows Explorer, it always opens to the Libraries folder showing you the default libraries. That is absolutely perfect if you are using Microsoft’s default file organization, which designates Libraries as the overall container of your folders. But if you don’t want it? Then you can very well make Windows Explorer to open different folder of your choice.
Here is how:
1. Right click Windows Explorer icon in the taskbar and then right click Windows explorer icon from the list as shown below:
2. Choose properties from the list and move to target field as shown below:
3. Change the value of the target field to folder of your choice as if I want to open a specific folder say C:softwares, then change the value in the target field as %windir%explorer.exe C:Softwares.
4. Change the value as per your liking but make sure that you leave the space between %windir%explorer.exe and C:Softwares.
5. Now, if you want Windows Explorer to open special, pre-set system folders then you want to enter special syntax in the target field.
Computer: %windir%explorer.exe ::{20D04FE0-3AEA-1069-A2D8-08002B30309D}
My Documents: %windir%explorer.exe ::{450D8FBA-AD25-11D0-98A8-0800361B1103}
Network: %windir%explorer.exe ::{208D2C60-3AEA-1069-A2D7-08002B30309D}
6. After you have changed the target field, click OK. Next time you launch Windows Explorer, it will open the folder of your choice.
8.Build your own internet Search Connector
Windows 7, along with many other useful features also has a very useful tool called a Search Connector. This lets you search through a website while remaining right inside Windows Explorer.
With it, you type in a search term and select the search Connector for the site you want to search, Windows Explorer searches the website without opening the Internet Explorer and the result appear right inside Windows Explorer. Click any of the result to head there using your default Web Browser.
You can create this on your own by this simple trick. Just follow these steps:
1. Copy the following text and paste it into notepad. The text you will need to change is in bold:
2. Save the file in notepad, choose UTF-8 from the Encoding drop down list near the bottom of the Save As screen and give it an .osdx extension.
3. A sample search connector (searching Wikipedia) has the above modified code as:
In Windows Explorer, right click the .osdx file and select Create Search Connector. The Search Connector will be created.
You can now use your Search Connector. To use it go to Your_User_Name –> Searches –> Connector.
9.Power / Energy efficiency Report and Diagnostics
Whenever we work on a PC we see how energy efficient our system is? You can get a very detailed report on energy efficiency of the system and the problems associated with it by starting the command prompt and giving the command powercfg -energy.
You can follow the following steps;
After a quick analysis of about 60 seconds, you can review the report by opening the file “C:WindowsSystem32energy-report.html”
10.View hidden files of system through DOS
Many of us are very troubled with the virus that enters our system. Sometimes, it gets really hard to omit them from the system. Virus usually hides itself from the user and for that it marks itself as system file. And usually in our pc the system files are kept hidden for safety. Here is the trick to see those hidden virus files.
Go to Start->run->cmd
Then navigate to desired directory.
Then Type: attrib foldername /s /d -s -h -r
Meaning of these syntax:
+R :- Use the +R option to make a file read-only. Read-only files may be read but they can`t be changed or deleted.-R : – Use the -R option to change the file protection attribute back to normal (so it can be read, changed, or deleted).
+A :- Use the +A option to set the ARCHIVE attribute of a file. When the +A option is used, this flags the file as available for archiving when using the BACKUP or XCOPY commands.
-A :- Use the -A option to turn off the ARCHIVE attribute.
+H : – With DOS Versions 4 through 6, use the +H option to set the HIDDEN attribute of a file so that it will not appear in a directory listing.
-H :- Use the -H option to turn off the HIDDEN attribute.
+S :- With DOS Versions after Version 4, use the +S option to set the SYSTEM attribute of a file. When the +S option is used, this flags the file as a command file used only by DOS. The file will not appear in a directory listing. This attribute is generally reserved for programmers.
-S :- Use the -S option to turn off the SYSTEM attribute.
Note: (Remember before you try this)
User must know how to differentiate between virus files and system files or you may end up corrupting your OS. So do this at your own risk.
