Saturday, January 30, 2016
12 Computer (PC) Tricks You Should Try Right Now

Computers have simplified our life to a great extent. Things that were impossible earlier can now be completed instantly thanks to computers. However, this does not mean that a PC is all work and no play.

Here are some of the best tricks you can try out on your Windows based computer.

Computer Tricks
  1. Have fun with Notepad
    If you think that Notepad is just a basic text editor, then, you will be amazed by its capabilities. You can use Notepad to create everything from personalized logs to harmless viruses that are incredibly annoying.Go see this post to know just how useful Notepad is.

  2. Command Prompt too has some tricks up its sleeves
    If you think that the Command prompt is a boring old program that no one uses, you are making a huge mistake. It can be used for everything from watching ASCII Star Wars to making folders that you cannot delete. See this post to know about all the cool stuff you can do with the Windows Command Prompt.

  3. Use Keyboard Shortcuts to get work done in no time
    If you are tired of having to alternate between your mouse and keyboard to operate your Windows computer, you would love to know these really useful keyboard shortcuts which greatly increase your speed and efficiency. See this post for details.

  4. Make your computer speak what you type
    You can use your PC's built-in features and some VBScript magic to create a simple program that will make your computer speak whatever you input to it. Enter the right words and you could imitate a real conversation. Head over to this post to talk with your PC.

  5. Make your computer greet you every time you start Windows
    A simple modification in the previous trick will make your computer welcome you in its own mechanical voice every time you log onto Windows. This is achieved by placing the VBS script responsible for making your computer talk in the Start up folder. Read this post to have a computer said welcome.

  6. Find your computer's gender
    Want to know if your PC is a male or a female? Simple. Try the previous trick to know if your computer is a 'he' or a 'she'. On a serious note, this depends upon the voice you have selected in Microsoft Text to Speech options.

  7. Lock Folders with password
    If you have important personal files that you do not want other people to see, you can hide them in a password protected folder to prevent unwanted users from seeing them. Go see this post to hide your personal files effectively.

  8. Change your Processor's name
    PC Tricks
    If you are bored of your old processor and want a new one with a staggering name, you will definitely want to see this trick which allows you to change its name to something extraordinary to make your PC special.

  9. Make a Keyboard Disco
    You can use some VBScript coding to create a live disco on your keyboard by making the LED lights flash alternately. See this post to know how your keyboard can turn into a disco.

  10. Recover permanently deleted files in Windows
    If you have ever deleted a file in Windows that you did not want to and now want to recover it, you would definitely want to know about some free tools to recover your deleted files easily.

  11. Use your Keyboard as Mouse.
    You know you can use your mouse as keyboard using the On-screen keyboard utility. What if I tell you that it is also possible to do the reverse? Just read this post to see how.

  12. Disable USB ports to prevent others from taking your data
    Ever wanted to disable your USB ports to prevent others from using their flash drives on your PC? This post explains how to do just that with a simple registry trick. Do note that disabling USB ports will also disable your USB-connected peripheral devices.

These tricks work on Windows 10Windows 8.1Windows 8Windows 7, Windows Vista and Windows XP.
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Surface Pro 4, Surface Book updates: Still no fix for nagging sleep-mode bug

Microsoft has finally rolled out firmware updates for the Surface Pro 4 and Surface Book but hasn't addressed its battery-crippling sleep mode issues.
Microsoft closed 2015 with an apology to Surface Pro 4 and Surface Book owners for the "less than perfect experience" with its flagship hardware.
It also promised that in early 2016 it would fix a nagging power management bug that has been around since October, preventing some devices from properly entering sleep mode and, as a result, draining battery reserves.
Adding insult to injury, Microsoft's support technicians appeared to have admitted the company knew about the power-management issues, which are thought to stem from its Skylake system on chips, before it sold the devices.
That apparent admission sparked recent calls by Microsoft-watcher Paul Thurrott for a six-month extension to the warranty and some form of compensation.
Yesterday, Surface Pro 4 and Surface Book owners were offered the prospect of a solution in the form of Microsoft's January firmware updates, though as Thurrott noted the updates do not address the power-management problem.
According to Microsoft, the update for the Surface Pro 4 does include a new Surface Embedded Controller Firmware, v103.899.256.0, which "adds battery-charging enhancements and thermal tuning".
It also delivers an updated Surface Fingerprint Sensor driver, v2.2.10.6, that should improve its accuracy, as well as a Wireless Network Controller and Bluetooth driver update, v15.68.9037.59, which "improves access-point compatibility and throughput on 5GHz networks".






The January firmware update for Surface Book devices has the same Surface Embedded Controller Firmware and Wireless Network Controller and Bluetooth driver updates, as well as a Surface DTX driver update, v1.3.202.0, which "improves detection of the Surface keyboard to the clipboard".
Surface Book customers who opted for the Nvidia GeForce GPU also received an update in v10.18.13.5914 that should improve the graphics chip's stability.
Despite its promise to do better for Surface owners, Microsoft made a rough start to 2016.
The company only last week recalled some Surface Pro power cables and admitted to botching its Surface 3 and Surface Pro 3 updates with Surface Pen drivers intended for the Surface Pro 4, forcing some devices into a blue screen of death (BSOD).
Microsoft on Wednesday rereleased the Surface System Update from 1/19/2016 and has now offered an explanation for the Surface 3 problems.
"Today we rereleased the Surface System Update from 1/19/2016. This update now includes a Surface Pen Settings driver (version 4.0.112.1 dated 1/23/2016). Installing the System Hardware Update 1/19/2016 will remove the 10.0.302.0 version of the Surface Pen Settings driver if it is installed on your Surface," Jerry, a Microsoft support technician wrote.
"The 10.0.302.0 version resulted in "DRIVER_POWER_STATE_FAILURE" BSOD issue as well as Surface randomly waking from sleep and long boot times associated with this driver being installed.
"Installing the System Firmware Update - 1/19/2016 or System Hardware Update - 1/19/2016 and then restarting (not shutdown) Surface should resolve these issues if it was associated with the Surface Pen Settings driver," he added.

MORE ON SURFACE PRO AND SURFACE BOOK

  • Surface 3, Surface Pro 3 blue screen of death: Microsoft offers fix for firmware update headaches
  • First Surface Pro 4, Surface Book flicker. Now Microsoft faces battery guzzle in sleep mode
  • Microsoft starts shipping 1 TB Surface Book, Surface Pro 4
  • Surface Book, Surface Pro 4 screen flicker? Now Microsoft updates Windows 10 flagships' firmware
  • Microsoft to Surface Pro 4, Surface Book users: Sorry for 'less-than-perfect experience'
  • 2-in-1 decision challenge: Surface Book, Surface 4 Pro, XPS 12 or iPad Pro?
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In true agriculture form, a handful of developers has harvested newly available ag production data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture to produce online applications that help aggies be more successful in the face of climate change.
On Wednesday, the USDA and Microsoft announced the winners of the Innovation Challenge, a Devpost hackathon that challenged developers to create applications that transform new publicly-available data into user-friendly applications for agriculture and the American food system.
USDA provided Innovation Challenge contestants with more than a century of crop and climate data from its Open Data Catalog via Microsoft’s Azure cloud computing platform.
The challenge, sponsored by Microsoft and agtech promotional partners Hortau and BranchFood, was created in support of the President's Climate Data Initiative.  That initiative aims to leverage climate and USDA data in ways that will help secure the U.S. food system and help farmers to produce more with fewer resources (water, land, energy) in an attempt to feed more than 9.6 billion people by 2050.
“In order to do that, farmers have to be smart, have to be more efficient and more effective regardless of what size operation they have,” U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack said in a phone interview earlier this week. 
“The USDA, over the course of many decades, has accumulated an incredible amount of information and data that has been in essence locked away - available to those in universities that were researchers, to use the information,” Vilsack added. “But there’s a democratization of information taking place and we are happy to be involved in that. ... While we ourselves at the USDA are making better use of that data with tools and applications that we’re developing, we felt that it was appropriate and necessary to engage the private sector as well.”
The Innovation Challenge is one of many ways the USDA is urging the private sector to push innovation in agriculture. In all, $63,000 in cash and prizes were awarded in the recent hackathon, which drew 346 registrants and 33 finished submissions from around the world.
Here are the winners:  
  • Grand Prize, Open Source Application Award, and Best Visualization in Time or Space Award: Farm Plenty, submitted by George Lee of San Francisco, allows farmers to analyze USDA data about crops grown within 5 kilometers to make informed decisions about their own crop choices. 
  • Second Prize and Open Source Application Award: Green Pastures, submitted by Khyati Majmudar of Mumbai, India, is a comprehensive dashboard interface that allows farmers to visualize production, economic, livestock and commodity data from NASS, ERS, ARMS, and other sources at a local or national scale.  
  • Third Prize: What’s Local, submitted by Benjamin Wellington of Landscape Metrics LLC in Brooklyn, analyzes the resources required to produce agricultural outputs by using data from the Census of Agriculture in a way that allows urban population centers to connect with local farmers.  
  • Honorable Mention, Open Source Application Award, and Best Student-Made Award: Farm Profit Calculator, submitted by Fernando Napier and Matt Pedersen of Lincoln, Neb., is a mobile application that compares their input costs (fertilizer, seed, fuel, etc.) to regional averages, and finds financial efficiencies where their costs are above norm.
  • Honorable Mention:  Croptrends, submitted by Chaiyawut Lertvichaivoravit and Ta Chiraphadhanakul of Thousand Eyes in San Francisco, can be used for viewing spatial and temporal trends in crop production and yield by country for the entire U.S.
  • Popular Choice Award: VAIS, submitted by Ken Mini of Thallo Tech in Nashville, Tenn., uses NASS data to provide a unique approach to visualizing crowd-sourced pricing data for the U.S. market. 
  • Large Organization Recognition Award: Farmed, submitted by Bryan Tower of Applied Technical Systems in Silverdale, Wash., allows farmers to view crop conditions in their area by using VegScape data from NASS combined with local weather data.
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