Hasta La Gadget!

This article was written on November 06, 2007 by CyberNet.

I just stumbled across a Vista Gadget called Magic Folder, and after seeing that it had been downloaded over 100,000 times I thought it should be something to look into. As it turns out this gadget is really amazing, and can save you a bunch of time.

What it does is add a folder (pictured to the right) on your Desktop or in the Vista Sidebar. Where you put the gadget is up to you. Then when you drag and drop files onto the Magic Folder gadget it will automatically sort through the files according to the file extensions. Images (jpg, png, gif, etc…) will be put in your Pictures folder, documents (doc, xls, ppt, etc…) will be put in your Documents folder, and so on.

Of course this gadget isn’t going to have every file extension pre-programmed the way you want it, so it comes with a fully customizable system where you can specify any extension to be moved to any folder. You can also change where the pre-programmed extensions get moved to.

In case that’s not enough for you Magic Folder can also do one other awesome thing. It creates a “watch” folder in your user directory cleverly called The Magic Folder. When this feature is enabled Magic Folder will automatically scan that directory for new files. Anything it finds in there will automatically be sorted and moved to the respective directories that you’ve specified.

–Settings–

I’m sure one thing that many of you want to see are screenshots of the different configuration options. The developer doesn’t really have any on his site, so I snapped some of my own:

(Click to Enlarge)

Magic Folder Vista Gadget

Copyright © 2013 CyberNetNews.com

This article was written on June 12, 2007 by CyberNet.

For a little while yesterday, Apple had a section on Leopard’s Boot Camp page that discussed a pretty useful feature. It said that Boot Camp was going to utilize the Mac’s "safe sleep" mode (equivalent to hibernation in Windows) to give users a one-click option to restart the computer in Windows.

Here’s what the feature said:

New, faster restarts.
Leopard brings a quicker way to switch between Mac OS X and Windows: Just choose the new Apple menu item â€

Copyright © 2013 CyberNetNews.com

Share this:

• Facebook
• Twitter
• Tumblr
• LinkedIn
• More

• Reddit
• Pinterest
• Pocket
• Email

This article was written on March 23, 2007 by CyberNet.

All sites that mention Apple’s next big operating system release, called Leopard, say that the release will be late April or early May. DigiTimes is going against what the rest of the Internet is speculating by saying that the release date will be in October of 2007. Why such a delay? Vista…

The sources pointed out that the launch delay is not due to software design problems with Leopard but instead is attributed to Apple’s plan to have its new OS support Windows Vista through an integrated version of Boot Camp. Boot Camp is an Apple software application that currently assists in the installation of Windows XP on computers using Apple’s latest OS. The company hopes with support for Vista, Mac computers using the new OS can grab more market share, according to the sources.

To try and squeeze out some more info Mary Jo Foley contacted Apple hoping for an informative response. All she got was this:

We don’t comment on rumors and we’ve made no announcements about Leopard availability more specific than Spring 2007.

Ahh, but wait! Does this mean it is definitely coming in the next few months? Nah, as Mary Jo pointed out that could just mean that only a select few people may know about the delay right now.

I think that getting Vista to work with Boot Camp is important, but probably not initially. Why not just release the new operating system and provide the updates further down the road? I don’t think that Vista compatibility is a reason to hold an entire Mac operating system back from being released…unless Apple is just going to use that as their scapegoat?

Oh yeah, and people are already installing Vista on Mac’s, but a little bit of troubleshooting may be needed. Just hop on over to this instructions page if you need more information on setting up Vista on a Mac using Boot Camp.

Copyright © 2013 CyberNetNews.com

This article was written on August 26, 2008 by CyberNet.

Time Saving Tuesday

One of the things that’s always nice to know is what you can remove from your hard drive to quickly regain hard drive space. Maybe there are some enormous games on your computer that you don’t play anymore, or files you’ve downloaded that have never gotten deleted? By using hard drive visualization tools you’ll be able to pinpoint exactly what is eating up your hard drive storage.

There are a lot of different programs that can be used for this purpose, and we thought it would be better to put together a more comprehensive list instead of just covering one or two of our favorites. We’ve broken them up according to operating system below, and for each one we provide a brief description accompanied by a screenshot. That way you’ll be able to figure out which free app is right for you.

Note: You can click on a screenshot for a full-size version.

–Windows Hard Drive Visualization–

• JDiskReport [Homepage]
  This is a Java-based tool that gives you a few different options for visualizing your hard drive. The screenshot below shows the typical pie graph, but you can also switch to a distribution graph. As you drill into folders it will update the graph accordingly.
  
• WinDirStat [Homepage] [Full Review]
  This free program is pretty cool because of how it breaks up your hard drive into chunks so that you can see at a glance where the large space-hogging chunks are. The various types of files are also color-coded for easy identification.
  
• SpaceMonger [Homepage]
  This definitely isn’t the most glamorous application we’ve seen, but the way it breaks up the view of your hard drive is very intuitive. Just like with WinDirStat the boxes are proportionally sized to the percent of the hard drive they consume, but what’s nice about this is that some of the files and folders are clearly labeled on the diagram.
  
• TreeSize Free [Homepage]
  TreeSize is a more Windows Explorer-like interface for finding those large folders on your computer. As you can see in the screenshot below it puts the largest folders at the top of the list, and you can continue to expand them to see the largest files and folders inside each of those.
  
• OverDisk [Homepage]
  What really makes OverDisk unique is that it’s visualization method looks more like a pie chart that has exploded. You can use the navigator along the left side of the window to traverse through the directories on your PC, and the chart will adjust accordingly.
  

–Mac Hard Drive Visualization–

• Disk Inventory X [Homepage]
  Look at this the same way as the WinDirStat application for Windows above. It has the same visualization technique, and color-codes the files based upon their type.
  
• GrandPerspective [Homepage]
  Yet another block visualization tool. It’s very similar to Disk Inventory X, and both have nearly the same features and interface.
  
• JDiskReport [Homepage]
  That’s right, you saw this program in the Windows section above as well. Since it’s made using Java it’s available on multiple platforms which is a nice benefit. It uses standard pie graphs and distribution charts to plot the data on your hard drive.

–Linux Hard Drive Visualization–

• KDirStat [Homepage]
  This is the original application that used the block-like view many of the different programs mentioned above now incorporate. It also comes with some cleanup utilities to help reclaim the disk space.
  
• Baobab [Homepage]
  Baobab has a clean and intuitive interface for navigating through the folders on your computer. For each line it has a color-coded bar that indicates how much space it is taking up, or you can always switch over to one of the more graphical views. The best part is that this is already included with the GNOME desktop, and is referred to as the Disk Usage Analyzer.
  

–Overview–

So those are the best hard drive visualization tools that we’ve come across throughout the years. Let us know in the comments what you use to find the pesky files and folders taking up all of your precious hard drive space.

Copyright © 2013 CyberNetNews.com

This article was written on January 23, 2007 by CyberNet.

Time Saving Tuesday

Last week I wrote an article on freeware applications that let you arrange your windows in a more organized, and productive fashion. Then in the comments Everton mentioned an application that he found that lets you minimize windows to the System Tray. The only problem was that the link he posted vanished, and he didn’t mention what the name of the program was.

I’ve done a post before about minimizing applications to the System Tray and the popular one was 4t Tray Minimizer. There is both a paid and free version of that application. I also brought up other alternatives like Opera’s built-in Ctrl+H shortcut to minimize the browser to Tray…and you don’t have to install a thing to do that.

Then there is TrayDevil (download mirror): a freeware application that does more than just minimize windows to the System Tray. I’m not sure if this is the application that Everton was talking about in his comment, but when a friend of mine told me about it I couldn’t pass it up. Now that I have had some time to explore the program I thought I would share all of the things that it can do.

–Minimizing Windows–

The primary purpose of TrayDevil is to let you minimize applications to the System Tray that normally couldn’t be. There are all kinds of applications I find this useful for, like Web browsers and file explorers, but if you completely understand how TrayDevil works it will become an amazing tool.

To minimize a window you can do one of two things:

• While holding Ctrl, Shift, or Alt just left-click on the titlebar of the window you want to minimize.
• My favorite way is to simultaneously left-click and right-click on the titlebar which is a one-handed way of minimizing a window.

I would say the most unique thing happens when you have a window minimized to the System Tray. Unlike other tray applications that I have used, TrayDevil will keep the application’s icon in the System Tray even after clicking to maximize it. Of course, that’s only if you single-click because if you double-click it will remove the icon.

If you right-click on a minimized window you will receive the following options:

The Min, Max, and Close button options will disable those buttons on a given window. I haven’t really found this to be too useful quite yet, but I guess it could be if you wanted to make sure you didn’t accidentally close a window.

Then there is the Restore button ( ) which is equivalent to double-clicking on the icon…it restores the window and removes the icon from the tray.

The bottom option that has the up arrow ( ) is equivalent to single-clicking on an icon…it restores the window but leaves the icon in the tray. After a window has been restored the right-click menu option changes to a down arrow ( ) which will minimize the window back to the System Tray. 

–Shutdown, Restart, and More–

So what happens when you right-click on the TrayDevil icon? It provides you with all sorts of options like turning your monitor off or restarting your computer. It isn’t the end of the world if you accidentally click on one of those options while you were on your way to the settings…TrayDevil gives you 10-seconds (or more/less if you customize it) to cancel any of the operations.

–Customization and Settings–

Options, options, options…TrayDevil has them! There are all sorts of things you can finetune with my favorite being the application’s tray icon. Instead of adding another worthless icon to the System Tray (I currently have 16), it lets you completely turn it off or display what day of the month it is. Thank goodness that there are some developers in the world who think outside the box. 😀

There are several other options that can be customized, so I thought I would take screenshots of all the things you can configure (many of which pertain to hotkeys):

–Overview–

As you can see this is one powerful freeware application that offers a wealth of customizability. It handles so smoothly that it is now one of my favorite programs, where I previously used 4t Tray Minimizer (free). The program is very light weight so you don’t have to worry about it taking up resources…go on now, it’s calling your name:

Download TrayDevil from their homepage
Download TrayDevil from our mirror

Copyright © 2013 CyberNetNews.com