Software comes in 3 basic flavors: Commercial applications that you pay for (sometimes following a free trial period), shareware applications that you're asked to pay for if you continue using them, and free-ware applications that are always free. Some of the free applications are open-source while others are proprietary but free. This week we'll take a look at some of my favorites that come with no cost or obligation.
Even if you're running Windows 10, I still suggest downloading and installing Q-Dir because it offers multi-pane file browsing and the ability to save complex sets of favorite locations.
The Windows Explorer has never has been very good. Copying files from one directory to another is harder than it should be because Windows Explorer has only a single column of files. It's possible to open 2 instances of Explorer, but that's just a workaround.
Q-Dir has been around since 2006 and comes with a cautionary message: "WARNING: Once Q-Dir, always Q-Dir." That has been the case for me. Having tried this file browser once, I installed it on every computer and it's in my initial setup for every new computer.
Favorites are helpful. I have one that shows 4 directories that I often use together. Another favorite that shows website development directories from drive D on the left and website production directories from drive E on the right. You can choose the colors that Q-Dir uses for different kinds of files and that's just the beginning of the customization options.
Although Q-Dir is free, the developer offers an option to make a donation.
Windows starts a lot of processes and services at boot time and some of the applications you've installed might start additional processes that run in the Tray or simply exist quietly in the background. Each of these takes a certain amount of time to start. And, when Windows tries to start them all simultaneously, the result can be a considerable amount of contention between the various processes. If that happens, the boot process can become uncomfortably slow.
Faster processors and disk drives, along with more memory, mitigate this problem, but it's possible improve the situation even more. Installing a solid-state disk drive (SSD) changed the amount of time required for my primary computer to become ready from more than 10 minutes to less than 5, but that's an expensive improvement. I had selected an SSD for other reasons (see the accompanying article on SSDs) and finding that I could eliminate Startup Delayer was a plus.
So why am I recommending it? An older, slower office computer continued to need StartUp Delayer until it was replaced by a newer 64-bit system with 32GB of RAM and a solid-state drive.
If you're running anything but the very latest hardware and if you depend on more than a few applications to start when the computer starts, take a look at Startup Delayer. You can specify which programs start and when they start. Delay times can be set to a few seconds, several minutes, or more than an hour.
Download Startup Delayer from R2 Studios.
Writing doesn't necessarily call for using a word processor. In fact, many people make better progress if they work initially in an application that's more like a typewriter. A basic text editor doesn't allow the user to create bold, italics, or underlines; to modify the color, size, or font used for text; or to create bulleted lists, text in columns, or illustrations.
When you're using a text editor, you can do just one thing: write and edit the words. That's one of the reasons that I start TechByter Worldwide in a text editor most of the time. Although I generally use UltraEdit Studio for the task, that's because I purchased UltraEdit for other tasks. If all I needed was a basic text editor, I would use Notepad++.
And Notepad++ is no longer just a basic text editor. Increasingly, it offers features that will be of interest to programmers. Regardless of what you might need a text editor for, it's a good application to consider.
The advantage of using a text editor when writing is that your attention can be focused entirely on the words. Because you can't deal with formatting, formatting isn't a distraction. If you're a programmer, Notepad++ supports 27 programming languages, searches regular expressions, and supports syntax highlighting and folding, synchronized edits and views, and much more.
Notepad++ includes several plug-ins and a plug-in manager so that users can obtain other plug-ins or even create their own.
Download Notepad++ from the developer's website.
Compressed files are everywhere and, although Q-Dir and later versions of Windows Explorer can treat zip files much like a directory, it's still better to have a zip utility installed and 7Zip is the best.
As the name implies, 7Zip has its own (7Z) proprietary format, which offers tighter compression and better security than standard zip files. But because you can't count on most people to have 7Zip, sticking with the standard zip format is wise when you create compressed files.
7Zip can handle any compressed files, including docx (yes, Microsoft office files are really just zip archives). The utility can create and extract files from 7z, xz, bzip2, gzip, tar, zip, and wim archives and it can also be used to extract files from arj, cab, chm, cpio, CramFS, deb, dmg, fat, hfs, iso, lzh, lzma, mbr, msi, nsis, ntfs, rar, rpm, SquashFS, udf, vhd, wim, xar, and z archives.
Although compression ratios depend on the type of data being compressed, 7-Zip compresses to 7z format, which is 30-70% better than zip format and, even if you stick with the standard zip format, 7Zip will provide slightly better compression—around 2% to 10%.
Download 7Zip from the developer's website.
"Cannot delete file: Access is denied." Perhaps you've seen that message or its cousin, "File is in use by another process". All you want to do is delete a file that you no longer need, but you can't. You try closing every application and still you can't delete the file. Finally, you reboot the computer. Then you can delete the file. Sometimes. In other cases, even rebooting won't release a locked file.
It doesn't have to be this way.
Sometimes a file lock remains even after an application has released the file. In other cases, there may be a legitimate need to delete a file even though it is still in use by an application. When LockHunter is running, you can usually delete stuck files without having to restart the computer. In cases where that's not possible, you can have LockHunter mark the file for deletion at boot time.
LockHunter is one of the options you'll see in the context menu when you right-click a file.
Select the LockHunter link and you'll see which program has locked the file. In this case, it's Microsoft Word. I'm being offered options to delete, rename, move, or copy the file. Once you select an action, you specify whether you want to terminate the process that has locked the file or just to unlock the file.
And LockHunter takes care of it. Just be sure that the file you want to delete really can be deleted without harming the system. In other words, if you don't know for sure what a file does and you're not positive that deleting it is safe, leave it alone.
Download LockHunter from the developer's website.
"Add more memory" used to be the standard answer when someone asked how to make a computer faster. For 32-bit systems, that was a good answer up to 4GB because 32-bit systems can't use more than 4GB. With 64-bit systems, you'll run out of money (or memory slots) before you exceed the amount of memory a system can use. Today there are better options.
Depending on what you do with the computer, how memory-hungry are the applications you use, and how many applications you have open concurrently, more memory might or might not help. A 64-bit system with 4 or 8GB of RAM probably needs more; one with 32 or 64GB of RAM probably doesn't unless the computer is being used for high-end video production.
Assuming the system has a reasonable amount of RAM, the best way to speed it now is to add a solid-state hard drive (SSD).
The first thing you notice about a solid-state drive is its packaging. Disk drives that depend on spinning platters and tiny read-write heads that fly microns above the surface are much more rugged than they used to be, but they're still shipped inside a padded box that's inside another box with additional packing materials. SSDs are often just tossed into a padded shipping envelope. That's because the drive has no moving parts.
That's also what makes SSDs fast. Because a solid-state drive is really just a lot of memory, it's more expensive than a standard drive. Nothing moves, so effectively whatever "sector" the drive needs to find is directly under the read-write head all the time. There's no need to position read-write heads; instead, the controller software just refers to the location in memory where the needed data is located.
That's also what makes it so rugged. A couple of things could kill an SSD: A large hammer would probably be effective, or some rampaging static electricity. Otherwise, with no moving parts, there's nothing to wear out and no heads will ever come into contact with a disk spinning at 7500 RPM.
When I replaced a notebook computer a couple of years ago, the model I selected had a 1TB standard hard drive, but no option for an SSD.
In addition to the computer, I purchased a 500GB SSD and a USB enclosure for the 2.5" drive that was in the computer. Many SSDs come with software needed to clone a drive and the process is easy.
In this case, I temporarily placed the new SSD in the USB enclosure, attached it to the new notebook computer, started the disk cloning software, and imaged the internal drive onto the SSD.
The next step involved opening the notebook's case, removing the standard drive, installing the SSD, closing the case, and turning the computer on. If that sounds easy, it was. The computer booted as expected.
What to do with the standard drive? I installed it in the USB enclosure and then allowed it to sit on the desk for a week -- just in case. Any electronic device can fail, but anything that survives for a week or so is likely to continue running. After a week, it seemed unlikely that I would need to reinstall the standard drive, so I formatted it and now use it as a portable backup device.
The computer boots faster, uses less power because there's no need to keep a spinning disk in motion, and is less likely to be damaged by vibration or other physical shock. Solid-state drives in the 120GB range are now commonly available for about $50. You'll also find some drives in the 2-3TB range, but expect to pay $800 to $1000 for them, compared to $150 or so for a standard drive. Drives in the 1TB range are now selling for $300 to $400. This is still far higher than the $80 to $120 you'd expect to pay for a 3TB standard drive.
If speed and reliability are essential, SSDs are an excellent choice. For desktop systems (or notebooks that accept more than a single hard drive), using an SSD as the boot device and standard drives for general storage is often the best possible solution.
Although I heard from one person that his Windows 10 preview computer updated nearly a week before the official release date of Windows 10, the real process got underway as scheduled on Wednesday, the 29th of July. A notebook at the office updated without a problem. I had decided to allow a notebook computer at home to update immediately, but planned to wait a few days for another notebook (used by my wife) and the main desktop system (because several time-sensitive events were scheduled). The notebook system updated Thursday morning, but 4 attempts on the desktop failed.
I'll update the desktop during the weekend and the process should complete without any significant issues.
A few features are missing in the initial flight of Windows 10, but most people won't notice the shortcomings because many of them are Edge functions -- features designed to work with Microsoft's new browser, Edge. Those features will arrive later this year as Microsoft continues to move toward Agile development. The most significant shortcoming is a lack of support for add-ons. Other browsers, including Internet Explorer, can accept plug-ins.
There are a few other minor features that are missing. For example, you can't pin a site to the Taskbar from Edge now and dragging a file into an Edge window for upload doesn't yet work.
OneDrive has been modified so that it will be less confusing. Windows 8.1 users sometimes mistook icons that indicated a file existed on OneDrive for files that existed on the local computer. Much to their dismay, they found out (when the computer wasn't on-line) that the file they wanted to work with was inaccessible. The short-term fix changes synchronization so that all files in a particular directory will be available locally. Microsoft has plans to change the system again provide for more granular file handling, but that feature wasn't ready for the initial release.
Brian Krebs wrote rather breathlessly this week about what he sees as a disaster waiting to happen. A new Windows 10 feature called Wi-Fi Sense, he says "by default", will allow your Outlook and Skype contacts to use your Wi-Fi network. It does this by sharing with those people an encrypted version of your Wi-Fi password. Panic button time!
But does Krebs on Security get this right? I believe that he does not.
First, people in your Outlook and Skype contacts (Facebook, too, if you permit it) are people you work with, people you've done business with, friends, or family. So you're limiting the threat level to include only people you know. But let's take this a step further: To gain access to your Wi-Fi network, a person needs to be within 100 feet or so of your router. That leaves out the car salesman from the auto dealership across town, Uncle Harry in Harrisburg, Sammy in Seattle, and the vast majority of the people you know.
But does Krebs get even that part right?
Again, it seems that he does not. To gain access, the device will need to have Wi-Fi Sense installed.
Microsoft has provided a comprehensive FAQ on its WindowsPhone site. Here's a key point: When you share Wi-Fi network access with Facebook friends, Outlook.com contacts, or Skype contacts, they'll be connected to the password-protected Wi-Fi networks that you choose to share and get Internet access when they're in range of the networks (if they use Wi-Fi Sense). Likewise, you'll be connected to Wi-Fi networks that they share for Internet access too. Remember, you don't get to see Wi-Fi network passwords, and you both get Internet access only. They won't have access to other computers, devices, or files stored on your home network, and you won't have access to these things on their network. You choose if you want to be able to share Wi-Fi networks with contacts—when you're first setting up your phone, you'll select or clear the Allow me to exchange Wi-Fi network access with my contacts check box on the Wi-Fi Sense screen. You will start to get access to networks that your contacts have chosen to share with you, even if you don't share any networks with them.
A much more balanced report on Wi-Fi Sense comes from ZDNet. As much as I respect the work Krebs has done on security issues (and the TechByter RSS feed links to Krebs), I think he got this one 100% wrong.
