Understanding Vista's New Network Connection Icons

Windows Vista's network connected icons that live in the system tray have a new feature: They let you know if you are connected to the internet, or just your local network. These new icons are especially useful when you are connected to a wireless network.

Connected to Internet

Notice the tiny globe, indicating connection to the internet. Mousing over the icon will also show the popup window, which will tell you exactly what you have access to.



Connected to Local network only

Notice that the globe icon is gone, indicating that you can't connect to the internet, but you can connect to local computers.



Not Connected

Maybe you should plug that cable back in ?


Windows Vista is definitely more polished than XP.

__________________
Prasanna Vignesh
MCPD | Web Developer

Great Expose Clone for Windows Vista

The market seems to be full of OS X Expose clones, but this is the first one that I've found that not only works really well, but has a ton of customization options. It's called Switcher, and you might already be familiar since it's been out for a while.

You can switch between the default tiled view that we're all used to:


Or you can go with the Dock view, which shows the current window in a larger tile, and hitting the tab key will switch between the tiles.


The standard customization screen gives you most of the common options, but you can use the advanced screen to let you change just about anything you want.


The default shortcut key is Win+Tab, which replaces the Flip3D key, but you can customize it if you'd like to use something else.

Hint: If you turn off the animation it'll even work really well on older computers.

Download Switcher from Insentient.net

Increase Size of Windows Vista Taskbar Previews

It only took two days for somebody to come through on my offer of a bounty. Reader Shawn wrote in with a link to Vista Thumbnail Sizer, a utility written by Andreas Verhoeven, that performs exactly the features I was looking for. It's not open source yet, but Andreas has told me that he's willing to consider it.

Vista Thumbnail Sizer will let you increase the size of your taskbar preview windows to any size that you'd like. You can even add a fade-in animation.



And here's what it looks like if you crank them up really big. You can make them even bigger if you want. The great thing about this is that Thumbnail Resizer uses the compositing engine built into Vista, so if you are playing a video, the video plays in the thumbnail just like the default ones do.
[
Installation

All you have to do is download, unzip, and launch the application, set the size that you'd like, and the effect takes place immediately.

Note: Because this utility mucks with internal stuff in explorer.exe, use this at your own risk.


There are some requirements for this software to work:

* Software must be started for it to work. (more below)
* Only works in Vista 32 bit edition. (might be fixed later…)
* Must be run with the same privileges as explorer.exe. (Meaning you can't run it as administrator)
* DWM (Aero) must be running. The taskbar previews only work with Aero enabled, and so they won't work in Vista Basic at all.

If you want this effect to happen every time you restart your computer, you'll have to copy the utility into a permanent folder somewhere, and then create a shortcut to avethumnailresizer.exe in your startup menu with the -hide switch. To quickly get to the startup folder, open up explorer and paste the following into the address bar.

Create your shortcut however you'd like (right-click and drag works best for me). Once you've got your shortcut created, open up the properties page and then add the -hide to the end of the Target line, as shown here:



Now when your system restarts, you should always have the previews. If you want to change the size, just launch the utility again and change them.

There are a couple of command line parameters accepted by the Resizer as well:
-kill Kills the application
-show Brings up the dialog window (default)
-nohook Starts the dialog but doesn't add the effects
-hide Start up but don't display the dialog

Download Vista Thumbnail Resizer from Ave's Vista Apps

I'm quite pleased with the results of this experiment… the community responded immediately. I got at least 20 emails within a day of posting the bounty. I may put up more bounties in the future.

Mac OSX Expose Clone for Windows Vista

Expose is an application on Mac OSX that tiles all the open windows with the press of a key, letting you quickly choose between them. Now there is finally a Mac OSX Expose clone application for Windows Vista that runs great! Not only that, but it's open source, so you can improve it if you wanted to.

To install this application, you'll have to run the setup application as well as the Visual C++ redistributable package, unless you have visual studio installed, which you probably don't.

My Expose Download:
My Exposé : new CTP today

Visual C++ 2005 Redist package

Download details: Visual C++ 2005 Redistributable Package (x86)



Once you have it installed, you can just press the F9 key, and you'll immediately be presented with a tiled view. If you have a video playing, it will continue to play in the tiled view.



If you move your mouse to the upper left hand corner of the screen, it will immediately tile all the windows. You can configure the hotspot or the hotkey with the tray icon, although it's not the most user friendly dialog.

There is one feature that MyExpose does not have from the Mac version, and that's to tile only the open windows of a particular application.

What is jusched.exe And Why Is It Running?

If you've looked in Task Manager and wondered what on earth the jusched.exe process is and if you can turn it off, then you are in luck. This process is the Java Update scheduler, which is a process that wastes memory all the time just to check once a month whether there are new updates to Java.

There's a scheduled tasks feature built into Windows for this type of thing… the java update scheduler is obviously not being used for critical updates since it's only scheduled to check once each month. Since I simply can't understand why the process needs to waste my memory, it has to go.



What you'll need to do is open up Control Panel, and then if you are in XP you can click on the Java icon, or in Vista you can click on Additional Options, and then click on Java.

Once you have the Java Control Panel open, select the Update tab, and then uncheck the box for "Check for Updates Automatically"


You'll receive a warning message stating that if somebody finds a security hole in Java that it will take up to a month before you are protected from it:



Does anybody else think that the sentence should read "the fastest and most secure Java" instead of the way it's worded?

After you click the Never Check button above, you'll probably receive this error message if you are in Windows Vista, stating that it also hasn't been properly certified to work with Vista in the first place. Just click that it works correctly.



That does make me wonder… I guess we'll miss the update that fixes the problem with the control panel… or will we? What you can do instead is schedule a task to run monthly using the built-in Task scheduler. If you don't care about updates to Java, then disregard the next part.

Schedule Java Update Check (Optional)

Just type in Task Scheduler into the start menu search box to open the task scheduler, and then click on Create Basic Task.

Follow the wizard along to pick a month and date, and then when you get to the "Start a Program" screen, use this as the path, adjusting if you are running a different version of Java. The key thing is that you run the jucheck.exe in your Java directory.
Now when the scheduled task runs once a month, or whenever you schedule it, you'll get this dialog if there is a new version, or another dialog stating there are no updates to Java.

It's actually somewhat ironic that there's an update to Java on the day that I write this article…

__________________
Prasanna Vignesh
MCPD | Web Developer

Trim Windows Vista's Bloated Window Borders

Windows Vista by default has huge borders, probably to show off the new transparancy. If you'd prefer a more slimmed-down, minimal approach, you can easily configure this setting to make it more reasonable.



Here's the normal window border, that you are probably used to. The borders look even more ridiculously large if you aren't using Aero.


And here's the window border after we've removed the padding. Much less wasted space!

To make this change, we'll need open the classic Appearance Settings dialog. Right click on the desktop and choose Personalize. Then click on Window Color and Appearance:


If you have Aero enabled, you’ll have to click on “Open classic appearance properties for more color options”.

Click the Advanced button, and then change the dropdown to Border Padding. The default will be set to 4. I changed mine down to zero for the second screenshot above.


A setting of 1 or 2 would probably be more reasonable for your system. You'll have to test it out and see what you like best.

View Hidden 3D Benchmarks in Windows Vista

There's really nothing useful about this tip, but it's still pretty cool. There's a utility built into Windows Vista used for benchmarking your system called the System Assessment Tool. What most people don't know is that you can call this utility from the command line and view some cool 3D benchmarks.

You should be able to use a regular command prompt, but you'd have best luck using an administrator mode command prompt. (right-click and choose Run as Administrator). You should also note that it will temporarily disable Aero before running the test, but don't worry, it will re-enable it after.

Here's some mini screenshot examples for your enjoyment, the real thing will run fullscreen. Try the command right above each one to see it on your own computer.



You can adjust the commands on the prompt if you want to try to get different combinations.

__________________
Prasanna Vignesh
MCPD | Web Developer

Understanding Windows Vista Aero Glass Requirements

The Windows Vista Aero Glass interface is one of the major changes in the newest version of windows. What is less clear for most people is what conditions have to be met for Aero to be enabled. If you are sure your system meets the requirements but it's still not enabled, Here's a list of conditions.

* Your graphics card should support DirectX 9. Most decent cards already do.
* The graphics card must support Pixel Shader 2.0 in hardware. This is the critical piece that you will have to check with your graphics card manufacturer. If you have a newer ATI or NVIDIA card, you should be good.
* The driver must be written specifically for Windows Vista. You'll be able to see that your graphics card driver is a Windows Vista Display Driver Model (WDDM) driver by looking at the



* The system must be set to 32 bits per pixel. If you are running at a different color depth, this could be the reason why your system doesn't have Aero enabled.
* The primary monitor refresh rate must be set to at least 10hz. Why you'd have it set to less, I have no clue.
* You must have a graphics card with at least 64MB of RAM in it, although I'd suggest a card with more memory. If you have a lower memory graphics card, you may have to decrease the resolution to enable Aero.
* Your system must have at least 512mb of available RAM. I'd suggest using at least 1GB of RAM in your computer, and preferably even more.
* Aero will not work on Windows Vista Basic edition. For best results, get the Ultimate version.

If you meet all of the conditions and Aero still isn't enabled, you can manually enable Aero by right-clicking on the desktop, clicking Personalize, and clicking Window Color and Appearance.


You should see Windows Aero in the list. Click that, and hopefully Aero will now be enabled.

Use Windows Vista Aero through Remote Desktop Connection

Everybody knows by now about the Windows Vista Aero Glass user interface, but what everybody does not know is that you can use this over a Remote Desktop connection if you've got the right settings enabled on the client and the server.

To make this work, you'll have to make sure that you meet the prerequisite conditions.

* Both systems have to be running Windows Vista
* The system you are running Remote Desktop client on must already have Aero enabled.
* The remote system must have at least 512mb of RAM, and be an Enterprise or Ultimate version of Vista.

If you meet these conditions, you should be able to use the Aero interface through the remote desktop connection. I don't have a screenshot right at this moment, but I'll try and get one soon.

The one question I can't answer quite yet is if you can use Aero on a client machine to a machine that can't run Aero because of video card requirements. If you know if this is possible, let me know in the comments.

This will theoretically work when connecting to a Windows Longhorn server as well, although I have not tested it out.

Using Windows Mobility Center in Vista

Windows Vista includes an extremely useful utility called Mobility Center, designed for laptop users to give you lightning quick access to all functions that a mobile user would need.

Open Mobility Center

Use the hotkey Win+X to quickly launch mobility center. You could also find it in the Start menu.


Windows Mobility Center Features

Mobility Center gives you access to features relevant to laptop users. This is a quick overview.

Display Brightness By default Windows Vista dims the screen when on battery mode. You can easily adjust the brightness here.
Volume You can easily change the volume or mute it entirely.
Battery Change the current power management scheme.
Network Center Quickly turn wireless networks on/off.
External Display Change your external display settings. Just click the Connect display button to choose how you want the display.
Screen Rotation If you have a Tablet PC, you can change the rotation of the screen quickly.
Sync settings Sync offline folders or devices quickly.
Presentation Settings Connect to a projector easily.



Tips

You can use the tab key to navigate through the items, or use the quick access hotkeys. For instance:
Mute Volume Win+X then Alt+M
Change Volume Win+X then 4 Tabs then right/left arrow keys
Change Brightness Win+X then Tab then right/left arrow keys

Enjoy your mobile computing experience!

__________________
Prasanna Vignesh
MCPD | Web Developer