How to Add, Remove or Edit Environment variables in Windows 7?

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To add/remove or edit Environment variable in windows 7 follow these steps:

  • Go to Control Panel
  • Click on System and Security
  • Choose System
  • Choose Advanced System Setting in the left side bar

  • In this System Properties window select Advanced tab and click on Environment Variables

  • In  Environment Variable window you can see User defined and System defined environment variables. You can Add/Remove or Edit the User variables. To Add click on New, to remove select the variable and click Delete and to edit an existing variable select the variable and click Edit.

Comments are always welcome :) It helps me keep going.

How to Add, Remove or Edit Environment variables in
Windows 7?

How to enable “call phone” in gmail?

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In the fourth quarter of 2010 gmail launched its newest and most attractive feature “Call Phone” which enable a gmail user to call to any land-line/mobile phone in US and Canada for free (introductory offer). But many of the users just cannot see this “Call Phone” option at all. It looks something like this:

  • To enable this feature you must have audio/video plugin installed on your computer.
  • To install these plugins click on a friend in chat window bar.
  • In the pop up chat window on the top there is a video and audio symbol click on that and it will install gmail audio and video plugins on your computer.
  • You might not be able to see the “call phone” option yet. There is one simple reason for that. This feature is available to the users of US only. That means the default language of your gmail account should be English(US).
  • To set the default languageclick on the “setting” button on the top right of the screen in your gmail window.
  • It will take you to setting page where look for the “language” option and choose “gmail display language” English(US)
  • Save the setting and check your chat window bar. There it is. Happy calling.

Sources: http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/gmail/thread?tid=206e1af8d16ee5fe&hl=en

http://gmailblog.blogspot.com/2010/12/free-calling-in-gmail-extended-through.html

How to download various music links at once using DAP?

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Most of the music download websites provides separate links for all the songs of the same album. You have to download them one by one by right clicking and choosing save target as option. This is very tedious and tiresome.

An alternate and very relieving way to download several music links at the same time is by using Download Accelerator Plus (DAP). You can download the free version of DAP here It also increases the download speed by downloading from several links at the same time. Download and install DAP.

Here I am at songs.pk. And as you can see there are several links for downloading.

  • Now to download all the links, right click somewhere on the page.
  • Choose the option “Download all with DAP“.
  • Now look for the ones which start from “http://link….” if you want click on “verify” to see the size of the file underneath the link.
  • Click on “download now“.
  • All the files will be start to download simultaneously in your default download folder.
  • Enjoy the music.

Java code for GUI of a chat program

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I worked on the GUI of a chat program in Java. I would like to share the experience as well as codes of my program. The code which I am going to share is a stand alone GUI i.e. its not a complete chat program but just the windows without any connectivity. (I’ll also upload the running version of the complete program sometime later).

It consists of three classes, LogInWindow, ConnectWindow, ChatWindow. The features of these classes are as following:

LogInWindow:

It consists the main and the whole code is run by this class. When it runs for the first time it automatically calls ConnectWindow so that user can provide detail about itself like its name, nick name, port number etc. There are (in this example predefined) a no. of users as buttons. Clicking on a user (Buttons) opens a ChatWindow. When you exit the LogInWindow the whole program exits. The window is named “WeChat”. There are two menu option in menu bar. One is to change status and one is to connect and terminate the chat. Various Status option are:

  • Available
  • Do Not Disturb
  • Away
  • Invisible

Connexion consists of two option: Connect and Terminate. Clicking on Connect allows the user to put info about itself in the ConnectWindow (If user has already done it then it shows the previous entries). Terminate deletes all the previous info about the user.

ConnectWindow:

It allows user to put info about itself. Already discussed in LogInWindow.

User can put the following information:

  • First Name
  • Last Name
  • Nick Name
  • Display Name
  • Status Message
  • Port Number

Pressing Ok Button enters these information. Clicking on cancel simply disposes the window

ChatWindow:

Chat Window class provides different facilities for interacting with other user. It has a text field where user can enter chat. All the text is shown in a text area. There are some buttons for Voice and Video Calls as well. The chat transcript can be saved easily by clicking the save button. Closing the chat window disposes it. And it also gives calls a function while closing the chat window (So that it can be used to pass info about the closing the chat window to some other class/module, if needed).


P.S. You can find the codes here (All the code are in word file. You can copy paste these codes in txt file): GUI Code

How to make an ISO file from folder/CD-DVD?

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An ISO image (International Organization for Standardization) is an archive file (also known as a disc image) of an optical disc, composed of the data contents of every written sector of an optical disc, including the optical disc file system. They are stored in an uncompressed format. Any CD or DVD can be archived by .ISO format. It is a true digital copy of the original.

There are a number of freewares available to make ISO image from folders/CD-DVD. I happened to come across this easy to use software . It can be used in 3 simple steps:

  • Start Free ISO Creator, Click “Options” to choose the file system you want to use
  • Click “Add File(s)” button to add files or folders to the list.
  • Select ISO Path (destination folder) to create ISO image file.

 

List of other free ISO creators:

  • Folder2ISO
  • LC ISO Creator
  • DVD Decrypter

Sources: Wikipedia, Free ISO Creator

How to use Subtitles files (.sub)?

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Do you ever feel the need of watching a video with subtitles? Well I often do, especially when I am watching a mystery movie :). (You can download the subtitles form http://subscene.com. ). The best player to play video with subtitles is VLC player. If you place the .sub file in the same folder as the video file, sometimes VLC player automatically plays it. But more often it doesn’t. The way to deal with it is to explicitly give the path of the .sub file. Something like this:

  • Play the video in VLC player
  • Right click on the video
  • Select option “video” and then “subtitle track”
  • Click on “open file”
  • Browse to the .sub file location
  • Here it is ….your video with subtitles :)

How to play .bin and .cue files

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If you got .bin as movie file (many downloaded movie file has .bin extension) then you have obtained a CD Image. The BIN file is basically an entire CD in one file, and the CUE file stores information on the .BIN file that is needed when burning, or mounting to a virtual CD drive. A .cue/.bin image could be anything like a Data CD or  VCD .

One way to deal it with is to use a virtual drive software like PowerISO or Demon Tools. Demon tool lite version is a free to use software. Download it, install it and run it.

When Demon tool ask for the image file browse it to the bin file. Mount it. Now the cd image is in virtual drive. Play it Enjoy it.

P.S. I found a you tube video about the same. If you are not acquaint with Demon Tool, this video will be a great help.

How to synchronize two folders on different drive?

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Recently while trying to install Unix along side Windows, I messed up with Windows and lost all the data. I had a huge collection of Music and Pics which I lost in this unfortunate incident. Though I have a considerable amount of Music and Pics on my external hard disk, I still lost the songs and pics which I added lately and forgot to copy them in the hard disk. Moreover, it is a tedious task to choose the new songs and pics from your computer and then copy it in the hard disk. Windows built-in back up option backs up almost everything in your library which I simply don’t like. Because of this experience I felt the need to synchronize two folders on different drive (including external drive).

I happened to come across this powerful synchronization tool from which stands fully correct on all of my synchronization needs. Its a very easy to use tool and gives you different options for synchronizing. Here is how to do it:

Run SyncToy. And select the pair of folders you want to synchronize.

When you go next, you will have to choose one option out of the available three (this synchronizing option can be changed later as well).

  • Synchronized: Any change in the folder will be reflected in both the folders. Even if you delete file on one folder, will be deleted from the other as well
  • Echo: Changes (and delete) are reflected on the right folder
  • Contribute:This is my favorite and ideal for back-up. Changes are reflected in the right folder but deletion in left folder doesn’t affect files in right folder

Give a name to your folder pair for eg. Music BackUp, Pics BackUp etc. Your folders are ready for synchronization.

How to know whether your processor is x64(64 bit) or x86(32 bit)?

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Have you ever wondered whether your computer is 32 bit or 64 bit?

No…I am not talking about the Operating System. Its very easy to check the OS for 32 or 64 bit. Just go to the System properties and look for System Type. But this is not about Operating System. A 32 bit operating system can run on a 64 bit processor. What about the processor?

Try these methods to check your processor capability.

  • Go to Control PanelAll Control Panel ItemsPerformance Information and Tools (If you cannot locate All Control Panel Item, open control panel and simply copy this path and paste it in the top address bar)

Here locate “View and print the detailed performance and system information”.

Now click on it.  Another window pops up. Here you can easily the details of your system. Look for System Type.

  • Another method: Go to Start and type in the search bar msinfo32. Choose the application. And here look for System Type. If its x64 then it is 64bit and if it is x86 then 32 bit.