User-Agent Strings

IE9A User-Agent String is sent by browsers when accessing a web server for identifying the type and properties of the browser. In some cases, you may want to force a certain browser to appear to be another (a different version or a totally different browser) for various reasons. You can override parts of the User-Agent String by modifying the registry. Details can be found in these two articles (Article 1 and Article 2).

Problem Downloading from Goolge Play

Google Play

If you experience problems downloading apps (or updates of existing apps) from Google Play on Andriod phones or tablets, try the following:

  • Go to ‘Settings’
  • Select ‘Apps’
  • Select ‘Google Framework Services’ and Clear Data (please only clear data; do not delete Google Services Framework completely)

Re-try the downloading and this may do the magic.

Microsoft is about to take Windows XP off life support

Windows XPOn April 8, Windows XP’s life is coming to an end. On that day, Microsoft will stop issuing security updates to the 12-year-old operating system, and it will end nearly all technical support as well.

You wouldn’t think that killing off an operating system that debuted in the first year of the Bush administration would ruffle too many feathers. But an amazing 29% of computers across the globe are still running Windows XP, according to NetMarketShare. That makes it the world’s second most widely used operating system, just behind Windows 7………….(read the whole story)

BulkFileChanger

BulkFileChanger is a small utility that allows you to create files list from multiple folders, and then make some action on them – Modify their created/modified/accessed time, change their file attribute (Read Only, Hidden, System), run an executable with these files as parameter, and copy/cut paste into Explorer.

How to block Web tracking

Web-tracking-illustration

When you’re on the Internet, there are good reasons to have that eerie sense of being followed. And don’t think you have anonymity just because your service provider gives you a dynamic IP address. At a minimum, visited websites can tell what service provider you’re with and what city or region you are in.

What’s more, any communication with a Web server gives it the opportunity to deposit a cookie on your computer. Benign cookies — small text files downloaded through your browser — simply record information needed to make your Web experience better. That can include sign-in information, where you visited on the site, interface customizations, and the like. Most cookies also keep an identifier for each visitor, so that the next time you connect to a site’s server, it can match you up with its records of previous visits. That way, you won’t have to start from scratch whenever you go to the site.(…..read the whole story)

Windows Media Center – Sleep Problem

Windows 7 Media CenterWakeup and sleep issues are common problems found in Windows Media Center (WMC), from XP to Windows 7 (perhaps Windows 8 as well).  This particular problem is about sleep. The media center PC does not go back to sleep after recording.

Further investigation reveals that the PC can go to sleep properly (according to the power management settings) without WMC running. Using the following shows the culprit, a USB audio device prevents the system from sleeping when WMC is open.

‘powercfg -requests’

The above command, executed under admin rights, states that “an audio stream is currently in use” associated with the USB audio device. I use the following to tell the system to ignore it and go on to sleep after the pre-set time has elapsed.

‘powercfg -requestsoverride driver “USB Audio Device” system’

Be careful when you copy the above command from a web browser and paste it directly on the CMD prompt because the blank space inside the name of the driver is not really a ‘space’ when pasted onto the CMD prompt window.

If you have a different device that is causing the problem, just replace “USB Audio Device” with the exact device name in your case. Click here to see a similar situation.

More Info (July 2014)

There is another driver ‘Legacy Kernel Caller’ that causes the sleep problem after a recent refresh of the Windows 7 system. Apparently this is from the driver of the TV tuner card (perhaps a different version from the previous installation). Just use a similar ‘requestsoverride’ described above and the sleep problem should be fixed.

Windows 8.1’s little changes are a huge improvement

Windows 8.1

Microsoft on Wednesday released its first preview of Windows 8.1, a vastly improved update of its forward-thinking but flawed PC operating system.

On paper, the list of changes that Microsoft made to Windows 8.1 don’t seem all that major. No, the app tiles aren’t gone. Yes, the Start button is back, but not exactly as you remember it …………. (read the whole story)