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Maintain Your Laptop Battery Better With BatteryCare (Windows)

How many of you out there know about proper laptop battery care? There are so many urban legends and myths regarding batteries that it is hard to know what is real and what is not.  BatteryCare can help you understand the ways of battery guruness….is that a word? Probably not but hey it sounds good!
Way back when, it was very bad to leave your laptop plugged in and charging after the battery was charged. Nowadays this is not the case because the computer switches to a trickle charging mode when the battery hits 100%. BatteryCare not only gives you a glimpse at a glance of your available power including the time you have left it also does some neat tricks.
After downloading and installing this small application you will have a new system tray icon. Mine is all the way to the left. It tells me that my battery is 95% charged and can operate for 2 hours and 36 minutes at the current rate. This is a HUGE improvement over the normal battery meter you see in the middle of my system tray.

The first trick it can do is change your power settings to a different profile depending on if you are plugged into power or not. These profiles can turn down your screen’s brightness or turn off Bluetooth.
To setup a power profile you can visit your Power Options in your Windows control panel. Once you have them set up or you decide to use the built in ones, click on the BatteryCare icon and open the application. You will see the screen below.

Next up, hit the options button and then Power Plans. Simply check the box that says Automatically select Power Plans. Then choose the plans you want to switch to when you are on battery or AC power. When you are done click accept -  yes, it is that easy!

While we are in the options let’s see what other choices we have.  Under advanced options you can be notified when a Full Discharge is necessary to improve the performance of your battery. The program tells this by noting how many discharges your machine has had since it started running. You can manually adjust this number if you are not running this against a new battery, do this by setting the Discharge cycles count manual adjustment number at the bottom. I set mine to three. When you reach your set number you will be prompted to fully discharge your battery.

By clicking on the detailed information tab you can see the battery manufacturer as well as designed capacity and total capacity, This can tell you if your battery has degraded. Thankfully mine is fine.

Even after leaving the app running for several hours some of my numbers were at zero but for the sheer power of changing profiles on the fly and the detailed battery meter this app is AWESOME!  Thanks guys keep up the great work. Their website also has some awesome information on debunking the battery myths.
We’ve also discussed two alternatives to the Windows laptop battery meter which is something else you can consider.

How to Import Mail from Mozilla Thunderbird in Gmail

With Gmail offering so much space, so useful a search engine and so universal access, why use all this potential on new mail you receive at your Gmail address only? Wouldn't it be handy if the mail you already have in Mozilla Thunderbird were integrated, archived, accessible and searchable as well?
Sure, you can forward the messages, but elegant and fully functional this is not. The messages will lose their original senders, and mail you sent will not appear to be sent by you. Gmail will not be able to do its very useful "conversation" work, putting together emails that belong together.
Fortunately, Gmail offers IMAP access, which turns importing mail into a drag-and-drop affair.

Import Mail from Mozilla Thunderbird in Gmail Using IMAP

To copy your messages from Mozilla Thunderbird to Gmail:

• Set up Gmail as an IMAP account in Mozilla Thunderbird.
• Open the folder containing the emails you want to import.
• Highlight the messages you want to import.
  • Press Ctrl-A or Command-A to highlight all messages.
• Select Message | Copy from the menu, followed by the target Gmail folder:
  • for messages you have received: [Gmail]/All Mail
  • for sent mail: [Gmail]/Sent Mail
  • for emails you want to appear in the Gmail inbox: Inbox
  • for messages you want to show up in a label: the folder named like the Gmail label

Import Mail from Mozilla Thunderbird in Gmail Using Gmail Loader

A little tool (some would say "hack") called Google Gmail Loader also can take your Mozilla Thunderbird mail and move it to Gmail in a clean and seamless way.
To copy your messages from Mozilla Thunderbird to Gmail:

• ›› Step by Step Screenshot Walkthrough

• Make sure you have compacted all folders in Mozilla Thunderbird.
• Download and extract Gmail Loader.
• Double-click gmlw.exe to launch Gmail Loader.
• Click Find under Configure Your Email File.
• Locate the file pertaining to the Mozilla Thunderbird folder you want to import into Gmail.
  • You can find the files corresponding to your Mozilla Thunderbird folders under your Mozilla Thunderbird message store folder.
  • You probably have to make Windows display hidden files and folders to see the Application Data folder.
  • Use the files that do not have a file extension (not the .msf files).
• Click Open.
• Make sure mBox (Netscape, Mozilla, Thunderbird) is selected under File Type: in Gmail Loader.
• If you are migrating sent messages, choose Mail I Sent (Goes to Sent Mail) under Message Type:, otherwise select Mail I Received (Goes to Inbox).
• Type your full Gmail address under Enter your GMail Address.
• Click Send to GMail.

Sending Trouble?

If you run into problems moving mail to Gmail using Gmail Loader, try changing the SMTP server. Try using "gmail-smtp-in.l.google.com", "gsmtp183.google.com" or "gsmtp163.google.com" with authentication not enabled, or enter the SMTP server details given to you by your ISP.

How To Trace An IP Address To A PC & How To Find Your Own

An IP (Internet Protocol) address is as unique to a computer as a fingerprint is to us. An IP address enables one networked device to talk to the next. The downside of this inter-connectedness is that a logical location provided by the IP address is an open arms invitation to spammers and hackers. The art of war necessitates the importance of knowing who your ‘attacker’ is. Being able to trace an IP address to a PC is a direct way to remove the cloak of anonymity from a computer communicating with your own.
An IP address is a series of digits separated by dotted decimals and represented from 0.0.0.0 to 256.256.256.256. Currently we are following the Internet Protocol Version 4 (IPv4), although the successor ‘version 6’ has been standardized.
A good hacker will take steps to prevent his IP from being revealed. A spammer might hide behind a proxy server. It is also important to remember that locating an IP address using online tools does not reveal the physical address of the guy on the computer. The basic tools merely tell us the location of the ISP providing the connection by using publicly available information. To go beyond that and actually nail down the guy sending you the dirty emails would require the law to be in the loop.

Stefan’s post on How to Trace Your Emails Back to the Source is required reading for a very useful application of IP address tracking. An interesting comment has been made by a reader who says that he uses IP address tracing to ‘find out the origin of potential customers who send e-mails and make inquiries through his company’s website’.
In the lines that follow, I am taking Stefan’s post as a stepping stone and extending it by listing sites which serve as tools to trace an IP address to a PC. Any one should be enough but is there any harm in bookmarking a few more?

Part 1: Trace an IP Address to the Country and City of Origin

MyIpTest.com

This web service provides a whole range of geolocation services. Included tools are IP Lookup, Reverse IP lookup Email trace, Traceroute, Ping tool among others. Also of use is a handy link which you can use to get someone else’s IP. Field the IP address in the IP address location box and the results give you the geolocation info behind the address and a marker on a Google Map. A Firefox experimental add-on is also available from the Firefox Add-ons gallery.

Geotool

A single field box for the IP address or host name, and the information follows. Geotool also uses Google Maps to depict the geographical location of the originating IP address. Geotool’s Firefox add-on shows a country flag representing the location of the current IP address (or website) and gives one click quick access to detailed location and web server information.

HostIP

HostIP says that it’s a community driven project to resolve IP addresses. At present it has 8,886,729 entries in its database. You can contribute information to the database and the database is accessible to all. The site’s FAQ goes into the motivation behind the community project. The project is a buildup as an alternative to commercial geolocation databases. The site also provides a Firefox add-on which unfortunately, is not compatible with the latest version of the browser.

DomainTools

This Whois Lookup search service provides a spiffy domain name lookup service along with IP address searching. The information is comprehensive including contact data-like listed telephone numbers and email address of the hosting service. The Whois access is free while other domain tools (the Power Tools) come with the paid options.

Arul John’s Utilities

A simple box and a simple IP address tracking service. You can also add the IP tracker to your website as a Google gadget.

IP-Address

IP-Address has three information pages which are of use to us – the homepage of IP-Address detects your IP, IP-Tracer locates the source of any IP address and Email Trace which nails the location of the senders IP address. With Email Trace, we simply need to paste the email header info in the box provided to get details about the sender.

IP Address Location

The web service provides different web tools for IP addressing. With an input you can find the exact location of any IP address plus the OS used, DNS, IP address range of the country, country code and country flag. The integrated Geolocator and a world map narrows down to the city and country. Also included is a tool to check the validity of an email address. According to the site, its IP database is updated every 48 hours.

Part 2: How to Find Your Own IP Address

An IP address is akin to a home address but really, it is not as simple. Lots of geek speak and networking lingo would be required to explain what’s it’s all about. The 7 online tools covered not only give you the location of a foreign IP address but yours too as soon as you hit their landing page. There are many online services which decipher your IP address in a flash. Here are a few from the swarm -

• WhatIsMyIPAddress
• IP Chicken
• Trace My IP
• IP Address Report
• My IP Address

That’s the quick and easy way. But what if you wanted to do it on your own using just your OS?
Here’s the how for Windows –

• Go to Start – Run. Type in cmd to bring up the command prompt.
• On the command prompt, type in ipconfig/all and hit enter.
  
• Basic information of your network interfaces is listed along with your device’s IP address.
  

(Please note that your IP address may be static or dynamic depending on how the DHCP server that’s assigns the IPs is configured.)
The ISP service provider knows exactly where we are located. With the tools mentioned here, at best we can find the approximate area (even though a city is a large area!). It’s still useful…and sometimes it’s fun too.

How To Send Completely Anonymous Emails

Have you ever had the need to send completely anonymous emails to someone? Perhaps you were trying to prank one of your friends, or wanted to shyly declare your love.
Perhaps you wanted to report illegal activity or abuse, but didn’t want to get caught up in all it. Going to a telephone booth is easy, but how about emails?
There are services on the web – mostly online utilities – that allow you to send anonymous emails. You can send simple messages from, and to everywhere in the world, without having to reveal your true identity.
Today we’ll have a look at those services and present to you the three that stand out, following in no particular order.

AnonEmail

AnonEmail is a service by AnonyMouse. It allows you to send anonymous emails by resending your email several time through random nodes, thus making it impossible to trace back.

In AnonEmail, you can fill in your recipient, the subject, and a short plain-text message. Contrary to many other services AnonEmail does not (seem to) log your IP. However, we do urge you not to use it for anything illegal.

As an extra security measure, AnonEmail will then wait for an unknown period before sending your email along. Why? So no one  will be able to prove your ‘guilt’ based on time/location, or make geographic presumptions based on timezones.
It remains the question whether this particular functionality should be obligatory – as it might be a serious disadvantage if you don’t need it.

Formmail Anonymous Mailer

Formmail Anonymous Mailer, developed by Infinite Monkeys & Company, is a great alternative to AnonEmail.
Apart from the usual functionality, this website allows you to specify a sender’s address as well, allowing you to seemingly send it from a normal mail account. You can also select the specific remailers you want the website to use, from a list of 17 possibilities. Note that the message will take increasingly longer to send when re-rooting it through multiple remailers.
After pressing send, you’ll be able to watch the progress of your message through the different nodes. I used three remailers for a prank mail, and it took about a minute or two to send.

The debatable downside of Formmail Anonymous Mailer is that it logs your IP-addresses to keep you from doing anything stupid. They won’t include it in the emails you send, but if you do anything illegal, they’ll give it up.

Send Anonymous Mail

Like the name implies, this one is a third anonymous mailing utility. Although it lacks the complete anonymity of AnonEmail, and the remailer control of Formmail, this is the most simple one around.
You’ll also be able to specify a sender’s address, a ’supposed’ origin point for your secret message. Nothing else fancy is included, but if you’re looking for simplicity, this is your guy.

Again, this one logs your IP address, so you’ll have another reason not to try anything shady.

punypng : making the web more puny, one png at a time

punypng is a free optimization service that can dramatically reduce the file size of an image by converting it into a highly-compressed, lossless PNG image. That translates to outrageously efficient web page loading, and just makes the web more puny.

FileMenu Tools adds functionality to Windows Explorer

Windows Explorer attempts to serve as the Swiss Army knife of file managers for Windows systems. While there's a lot that it can do, not everything can be accomplished easily. Sometimes add-on applications can help to extend Explorer's functionality in such a way that it becomes even more useful.
FileMenu Tools is one such application. You can do things like tweak the time stamps on files, change folder icons, delete locked files, and all sorts of other handy things. Synchronize folders, delete files without sending them to the Recycle bin, and even shred files to really, really get rid of them.
In addition, it's easy to configure the "Send To" menu, making it easier to open files and documents in non-default applications. Other context menu (right-click menu) items can be configured as well. There's really quite a list.
FileMenu Tools is a free Windows application.

Delete locked files and kill rogue processes

There you are, minding your own business trying to delete a file, but your system says NO! Now maybe it's because your word processing software has the file open and you're writing to it (duh) so your computer is keeping you from shooting yourself in the foot. Okay, that's good.
But maybe it's not so clean. Maybe you've closed all of your apps and you still can't delete that file. Now you have to wonder whether whether you've got some ill-mannered piece of malware that's trying to do bad things to you, or if it's just Windows up to some of its old tricks. Either way, you still want to get rid of that file.
LockHunter may be the tool for you. Find out which process is locking your file, and then decide what you're going to do about it: delete the file, kill the process, or even delete the app that spawned that process. And just in case, you can delete into the Recycle Bin so that if you need to go back and resurrect your deleted file, you can do so.
LockHunter is a free Windows application, and will run under Windows 2000 and later. It's still technically in Beta, so you'll want to be careful about using it for any mission-critical applications.

Control wallpaper and task bars for multiple monitors

If you're lucky enough to have a multi-display system, congratulations. You've now got more screen real estate than you know what to do with. Whether it's bigger images or more pages of code, you've opened up a whole new world of usability on your system. But of course, no good deed goes unpunished, so you also know that your life can get geometrically more complicated through the addition of this extra monitor. A tool like DisplayFusion can help you win control back of your system.
DisplayFusion lets you define individual wallpaper designs for each monitor, or you can use a single image and have it stretch across both (or more) of your displays. In addition, you can add a toolbar to each screen, allowing you to control your system from whichever display you're working on at any moment. You can also move application windows from one display to another, allowing you to make maximum use of your screens at all times.
DisplayFusion is a Windows application. You'll need Windows XP to use it, as well as version 2 or later of the .NET Framework.

Customize your Windows desktop using Rainmeter 1.0

Rainmeter, a Windows desktop modification app, has entered version 1.0, and now comes with the popular Enigma theme as its default skin. Setting up all of Enigma's various widgets on Rainmeter is extremely simple. In fact, Rainmeter is basically code-free. You can enter all of your settings once using the GUI Configuration tool, and they'll be applied to any theme you want to use. It's also now possible to save and load your favorite setups.

Enigma itself has improved by partnering with Rainmeter. There's now a quickstart wizard so you can set up the theme without editing text files, and Enigma can take advantage of some of the new features in Rainmeter, including iTunes and wifi plugins. Also, the new Rainmeter is fully compatible with Windows Vista and Windows 7. Now anybody can set up a well-designed desktop mod without having to edit a single file in a text editor.