If you’ve started using the beta of Firefox 3, you’ve probably already seen the new Smart Bookmarks folder that is created by default. This folder can be useful for looking up sites you just visited or bookmarked… but how do you get it back if you accidentally deleted it?
Luckily there’s a simple about:config tweak that will restore it, requiring almost no work at all.
In case you aren’t sure what we’re talking about, here’s the default Smart Bookmarks folder, which dynamically shows you the “Most Visited”, “Recently Bookmarked” and “Recent Tags” bookmarks:
Type about:config into the address bar, accept the warning message, and then filter by the following:
browser.places.createdSmartBookmarks
You should see a single entry in the list with a default value of true. Double-click on it to set the value to false, restart Firefox, and your Smart Bookmarks folder is now back:
Nice and simple, just the way it should be.
Unhappy with the way the shortcut icons on your desktop look? Here is a quick way to change them to a different icon included in XP.
When you have a problem with your Windows computer, you’ll usually be told to insert the Windows cdrom and then start the Recovery Console in order to fix the issue. So where did you put that XP disc anyway? Why can’t we just install the recovery console to the hard drive?
Have you ever tried to unzip a file to the Program Files directory in Windows 7 or Vista? You’ll get all sorts of permission denied errors, and generally be unsuccessful. So how do we open up the zipfile as an administrator? For that matter, how do you open any file as administrator?
If you’ve ever tried to copy a file that is locked by another application, you’ve probably seen an error message similar to “The process cannot access the file because another process has locked a portion of the file”. So how do you copy it anyway?
Let me start by saying that I have no idea why anybody would want to do this, and it’s perhaps one of the most useless articles I’ve ever written. That said, if you’ve ever wondered how to remove the username from the Start menu in Windows XP, this article is for you.
I’ve got a Wacom drawing tablet hooked up to my computer, and ever since I installed Vista’s Tablet PC utilities, I’ve had this obnoxious onscreen keyboard on the welcome screen that just can’t seem to be turned off through any regular settings. So how do I get rid of it?
If you use Outlook and you’ve noticed it being excessively slow or just having errors, you should probably scan and repair your Personal Folders file for any problems. It’s sorta like checkdisk for your email.
In the pursuit for performance, making sure your drive isn’t fragmented is a regular task. The problem is that Windows XP doesn’t allow certain system files to be defragmented without commercial software. What about free solutions?
If you open up a lot of PuTTY windows just to keep connections open, you might be interested in an updated version that supports minimizing to the system tray. I find this very useful for opening tunnels that I wouldn’t otherwise need to interact with on the desktop.
As regular readers know well, I’m a huge fan of using AutoHotkey to automate my entire computing experience… but in Windows 7 and Vista there’s a serious limitation since you can’t run a script as Administrator by default. This means that your hotkeys can’t interact with windows running in Admin
