Windows 95 Tips #1



*1.   THE TITLE BAR BEARS ALL 

Want to know the full path of any open folder window at a glance? Ask
Windows 95 to display this information right on the title bar. 

-From inside any Explorer window, select View, Options. Click the View
tab, select Display the Full MS-DOS Path in the Title Bar, and click OK.
Now, not only does an open window's path appears on its title bar, but it
also shows up on the corresponding Taskbar item (whether the window is
minimized or not). 

(Note: If you have IE 4.0 installed, the full path of any open folder
window appears in the Address bar--assuming you have it showing.) 


*2.   THE DESKTOP SQUEEZE 

Wish you could fit more on your desktop? You could go out and buy a
brand-new, state-of-the-art 19- or 21-inch monitor, but it's a lot
cheaper to increase your desktop resolution. The greater your
resolution, the more Windows 95 squeezes on to the desktop at once.
(It basically just makes everything smaller.) 

Right-mouse-click the desktop, select Properties, and in the resulting
Display Properties dialog box, click the Settings tab. Under Desktop
area, click and drag the lever closer to More and watch as the numbers
under the lever and the desktop preview change. (Note: Available
resolutions will depend on your monitor.) For starters, bump the
resolution up one size. (Any more can be tough on the eyes.) Click OK,
then click OK again and wait as Windows makes the necessary adjustments.
When the new look appears on your screen, click Yes to accept the change
or click No to go back to the Settings tab. 

The new look may seem strange at first, but you'd be surprised at how
quickly your eyes will adjust. If not, you can always consider that
new monitor. 


*3.   THE LIMIT OF THE FONTS ENVELOPE 

January 8th, 1999 

How many fonts can you install on your computer? 

Well, if you're expecting the stock "you're limited only by the capacity
of your hard disk" answer, surprise. Most hard disks these days give you
enough space to install tens of thousands of fonts, no matter how many
other programs you have installed. What's more likely to limit you is the
Windows 95 Registry. The Registry lists all your fonts under the same
Registry key, and the largest any Registry key can be is 64K. What this
means is that if your font names are of average length, you can install
about 1,000 before Windows doesn't let you install any more. 

A thousand fonts are way more than you need, by the way. And the more
fonts you have, the longer it takes the programs that use them to load.
So install fonts sparingly. 


*4.   POW! RIGHT ON THE DESKTOP 

Do you frequently move items to your desktop? Add this common destination
to your Send To menu, and from then on, you can accomplish the move using
the right-mouse button. 

To add the desktop to your Send To menu, simply place a shortcut to the
Windows\Desktop folder inside the Windows\SendTo folder. Open the
Windows folder, right-mouse-click and drag the Desktop folder directly
over the SendTo folder, let go, and select Create Shortcut(s) Here. You
may also wish to rename the new desktop shortcut, now inside the
SendTo folder. 

-From now on, moving an item to the desktop is a simple, right-mouse
operation. Just right-mouse-click any file, folder, or shortcut; select
Send To; and in the resulting list, select Desktop. No clicking or
dragging necessary! 


*5.   DUAL FILE COVERAGE 

By default, Windows 95 opens files of a particular type in a particular
application. For example, if you double-click a *.txt file, it opens in
Notepad. But sometimes--or perhaps many times--you'll want to open files
of a certain type in an application other than the one with which it's
associated. (For example, you might frequently open *.txt files in
WordPad.) Assuming you want to keep the original association intact, an
easy way to streamline this task is to add the secondary application to
the right-mouse menu of that file type. 

Sticking with the same example, here's how to add WordPad to the
right-mouse menu of *.txt files (feel free to follow these same steps
with your own file type and application choices): 

Inside any Explorer window, select View, Options and click the File
Types tab. Scroll through the list of Registered file types and select
Text Document. Click the Edit button, and in the resulting dialog box,
click New. In the text box under Action, type the command name that will
appear in the right-mouse menu, such as "Open with WordPad." Click
Browse, navigate your way to the file that opens WordPad
(Program Files\Accessories\Wordpad.exe), select it, and click Open.
Click OK to exit the New Action dialog box, and you'll see the new
command in the Actions list. Click Close twice. 

-From now on, you can open any *.txt file in WordPad by
right-mouse-clicking the file and selecting Open with WordPad.
(Note: Double-clicking a *.txt file still opens it in Notepad.) 


*6.   STOP THE BOOT! 

If you remove the Windows 95 startup logo (that cloudy screen that
appears whenever you start Windows), you'll see a whole bunch of text
narrating the boot process roll up the screen every time you start your
system. Want to actually read this text? Unless you can read really,
really fast, you'll need this trick: You can bring the boot process
(and all the text on screen) to a screeching halt by pressing the Pause
key on your keyboard. 

All finished reading? Press any key on your keyboard to boot things along. 


*7.   TAB-ULATIN' RHYTHMS 

When you're in a dialog box that includes multiple tabs of information,
how do you move from one to the next? By clicking the one you want. Of
course, anyone knows that. But did you also know that there's a
mouse-free way? Press Ctrl-Tab to rotate to the next tab (to the right)
in the box. If you prefer the other direction, press Ctrl-Shift-Tab to
move back one tab. Who knew? 


*8.   HOW FAST CAN YOU TYPE? 

Want a quick way to select a file or folder in an open
window--particularly one holding gobs of files? Type the first two or
three letters of that file or folder. For example, you might type 

L-E-T 

to get to a file named Letter. If you do pause, Windows will look at
each letter you type separately. So in the example above, you'd end up
at the first item starting with L, then the first one starting with E,
and so on. Basically, this tip's for fast typists only. 


*9.   PICTURE THIS 

Do you ever find yourself opening several *.bmp files to see which is
which? You can remove the guesswork--that is, if you don't mind doing a
little Registry editing. You can have Windows 95 display a small version,
or "thumbnail", of each bitmap as the respective file's icon. (As with
all tips involving the Registry, we recommend backing up your Registry
files--User.dat and System.dat, hidden files in the Windows
folder--first.) 

Open the Registry Editor by selecting Start, Run and typing 

regedit 

Click OK and then navigate your way to
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Paint.Picture\DefaultIcon. In the right pane,
right-click (Default) and select Modify. Type 

%1 

(to replace all the data under Value data) and click OK. Close the
Registry Editor. 

Open a window that includes a lot of BMP files and check out all those
icons. (Their quality will vary depending on your color setting, monitor,
and so on.) You'll never have to guess which is which again! 

*10.   RULES WERE MADE TO BE BROKEN 

When you drag and drop a file, folder, or shortcut from one location on
your hard drive to another; by default, Windows 95 MOVES that item--that
is, unless it's a program file (*.exe). Then, Windows presents you with
a dialog box stating that you can't move the file, but it'll be happy to
create a shortcut to it. On the other hand, if you try to use this
drag-and-drop technique to copy an item to another drive (for example,
to a floppy or another drive on your system), Windows will automatically
COPY that item. 

In many cases, you'll agree with these copying and moving rules, but for
those times when you don't, you'll be glad to know that there are two
easy ways to override them. You can either use the right mouse button for
your drag-and-drop operations or get to know the Ctrl and Shift keys. 

Right-mouse click and drag an item to a destination, let go, and up pops
a menu from which you can choose an operation--move, copy, create
shortcut, or cancel. (Ignore the fact that one of the menu choices
appears in bold--that's just Windows' preference.) 

Your other option is to use the Ctrl and Shift keys. Hold down Ctrl
during a drag-and-drop operation, and Windows automatically copies the
item. Similarly, you hold down Shift to move an item. 
