BitLocker Drive Encryption

This one is for those of you using Windows 7 Ultimate/Enterprise or Windows 8

Pro/Enterprise. Those of you running a different Windows edition, try one of

these disk encryption alternatives.


Data protection is crucially important and BitLocker is a utility that is on hand

to help you encrypt your drives. Right click your drive, select Turn on 

BitLocker and then follow the instructions to get your files secure. It’s simple,

quick and easy – no third-party tools required.

Please bear in mind that it is vital you never lose or forget the encryption key to

your drive. If you lose this then there’s absolutely no way of getting your data

back. Use this feature with great care

Control User Account Control

Some people find User Account Control quite useful, but for others it is more

hindrance than help. If you’re not aware, UAC is the feature that pops up every

time you’re making an important change to your system.


This feature was introduced in order to better protect users and make them

aware of their actions, but if you don’t need it then you can turn it off entirely.

Perform a system search for user account control, select the result and the  

User Account Control Settings window will open. From here you can drag a

slider to customise your notification settings.

The default option is the second highest, but drag the slider all the way to the

bottom if you never want any notifications. The information section on the

right-hand side will tell you what each notch represents in more detail.

Restore Your Deletions in windows

You probably know about Ctrl + C and Ctrl + V for copy and pasting, but

there’s also the lesser known Ctrl + Z. This will undo your last action, such as

restoring something that you’ve just deleted on the active window.


For example, if you’ve sent a file to the Recycle Bin you can press Ctrl + Z to

bring it back to where it once was. This keyboard shortcut also works

elsewhere; like in text boxes online to bring back deleted words and the majority

of software to revert actions (image editors, word processors, and so on).

Quick Taskbar Open

No-one has time to move their mouse and click taskbar icons! Instead, hold

down the Windows key and press the corresponding number to open up that

program. For example, Windows + 1 will open the first icon from your taskbar,

and so on.


Additionally, click and hold on the icons and then drag them to rearrange their

position on the taskbar. As you do, their corresponding number will change too.

Finally, hold down shift as you click an open window to load up a new instance

of that program.

Shake It Off in windows 7

Have you got loads of windows open at once and find your screen too cluttered?

In Windows 7 and up, click and hold on the title bar of the window you’re

interested in and give it a shake back and forth with your mouse. All other

windows will shrink to the taskbar, leaving the window you’ve made dizzy

remaining open.


This feature is known as Aero Shake. You can get Aero features in Windows 

Vista or XP using third party applications.

Taskkill

Tasks that appear in the “tasklist” command will have an executable and process

ID (a four-digit number) associated with them. You can force stop a program

using “taskkill -im” followed by the executable’s name, or “taskkill -pid” followed

by the process ID. Again, this is a bit redundant with Task Manager, but may be

used to kill otherwise unresponsive or hidden programs.

Tasklist CMD command

The “tasklist” command can be used to provide a current list of all tasks running

on your PC. Though somewhat redundant with Task Manager, the command may

sometimes find tasks hidden from view in that utility.

There’s also a wide range of modifiers. “Tasklist -svc” shows services related to

each task, “tasklist -v” can be used to obtain more detail on each task, and

“tasklist -m” can be used to locate .dll files associated with active tasks. These

commands are useful for advanced troubleshooting.

System File Checker CMD command

System File Checker is an automatic scan and repair tool that focuses on

Windows system files. You will need to run the command prompt with

administrator privileges and enter the command “sfc /scannow”. If any corrupt

or missing files are found, they’ll be automatically replaced using cached copies

kept by Windows for just that purpose. The command can require a half-hour to

run on older notebooks.

CMD command Driverquery

Drivers remain among the most important software installed on a PC.

Improperly configured or missing drivers can cause all sorts of trouble, so its

good to have access to a list of what’s on your PC. That’s exactly what the

“driverquery” command does. You can extend it to “driverquery -v” to obtain

more information including the directory in which the driver is installed.

CMD command Powercfg

Powercfg is a very powerful command for managing and tracking how your

computer uses energy. You can use the command “powercfg /hibernate on” and

“powercfg /hibernate off” to manage hibernation, and you can also use the

command “powercfg /a” to view the power-saving states currently available on

your PC.

Another useful command is “powercfg /devicequery s1_supported” which

displays a list of devices on your computer that support connected standby.

When enabled, these devices can be used to bring your computer out of standby

– even remotely. You can enable this by selecting the device in Device Manager,

opening its properties, going to the Power Management tab and then checking

the “Allow this device to wake the computer” box.


“Powercfg /lastwake” will show you what device last woke your PC from a sleep

state. You can use this command to troubleshoot your PC if it seems to wake 

from sleep at random.

How to Add iOS 8 Widgets

To add an iOS 8 widget to the notification center pull down to see the Notification Center -> scroll to the bottom and tap Edit. Widgets you installed will show at the very bottom of the screen.

How to add an iOS 8 widget and change order on iPhone.

Tap the small Plus icon to add to the Notification Center -> Use the three bars to the right to change position and the minus sign to remove them from your Notification Center. You can add them back in later and change the position as much as you want.

PIX2 For Editing Pics on Iphone 6

iPhone owners have been able to edit their pictures on their iPhone for years,

but until iOS 8 editing them in different apps required switching to separate

apps. No more, PIX2 is one of the first iPhone apps to support direct picture

editing from the iOS 8 Picture app. What that means is that users simply tap Edit

in the Pictures app and the filters and tools from PIX2 are ready.

1Password for IOS8

Including one new iOS 8 feature is certainly great. But 1Password manager

includes more than one. It used to be that managing passwords in iOS was a

pain, the ability for apps to communicate with other apps was limited. In iOS 8

Apple is giving app makers a little more leeway. The new 1Password app uses

Touch ID to authenticate user’s identities. It also integrates directly into Safari

so hopping between it and Safari to enter a password is no longer necessary.