Little Techie Things

How to Concatenate Date cells with Text cells in Excel

2012-02-10T14:21:00.000-08:00

Ok, I use excel a lot and the formulas anywhere I can to make my life easier. Here is one tip while concatenating date cells to text cells.
In case you did not know what CONCATENATE does is, it combines the content of the selected cells and puts them together in another cell.

E.g.: Consider the below cells. Inserting the below formula gives the corresponding output.

Now you get what concatenate does right.
But when you have something as shown below with dates, your output is not exactly what you'd expect.

To get the dates right, you need to do this.

Now you know what to do. Have fun.

Delay sending emails in Outlook

2012-01-24T13:40:00.000-08:00

Many people I know use Outlook, and everyone has those "oops" moment when they realize they probably sent the email too soon. I usually make a mistake of hitting the Send button early myself.

So how do we fix it?

When you hit Send, your email jumps to the Outbox first, and then is Sent. You can set a delay between Outbox and Sent Items.

Here's how:

Go to Tools > Rules and Alerts.

Click on New Rule.

Select the highlighted option - "Check messages after sending". Hit Next.

Find the option "defer delivery by a number of minutes". If you don't find it immediately, hit Next and you will find it. Check the box ON. Then click on the hyperlink in Step 2 (lower part of the dialog box).

A smaller dialog will open. Set you preferred number of minutes and click OK.

The number you chose is now shown in the previous dialog. Click NEXT.

Set up any exceptions if you want. I prefer this rule be applied to all emails. Hence I did not select any exceptions.

Give a name to your rule, and click Finish.

You're all set. Now all the emails you send will have a buffer time of "x" minutes before they are actually sent. So in case you make any errors (like I usually do), go to the Outbox, look for your email, and you can edit, recall, resend as you wish.

How to de-clutter your smartphone

2011-12-23T13:14:00.000-08:00

Everybody we know has a smartphone now. With an option to download a million apps and games, and all those fancy features that makes life so much easier. If you are one of these smart-gadget owners, you might have observed that over time you phone will become cluttered with photos you click at every step, those trial apps which you don't like or those games you played only once. Yes, I belong in this same category. All these apps you use only once (or never) hog up all the space in your phone, and sometimes can cause some phones to work slowly.

So what's the solution? De-clutter it.
To make your job easier, here are some tips to help you get thru this task you've been putting on hold for some time now.

Make a back up:

This should be your first step. Transfer all the content from you phone to your laptop. Include everything, from contact, calendar, photos, apps, app data, music, videos, phone settings, documents, PDFs etc.

Kill only one bird at a time.

Apps:
Lets start with all the apps you have, because this is going to be the hardest part.
If you phone has an easy uninstaller feature, use it. Uninstall every single app you have not used in 6 months. Most phones/app vendors let you re-install their app if you have purchased from them, so it won't be like you are wasting money over already purchased apps. If you need it you can install them again, but now, its time to uninstall. your phone may need to restart several times, but patience is required. See to it that you phone has a full battery charge all the time.

Games:
Now it time for all those games. Yes, we are not going to remove Angry Birds, if you play it everyday. But again, follow the 6-month rule here. If you've never played it in 6 months, you probably wont again.

Ringtones:
You got it from a friend or it was one of the top 10 songs of the year. Here follow the 3 month rule.You are likely to get bored from hearing the same tune every time your phone rings. So dint-use-it-in-3-months ringtones are all to be gone.

Entertainment:
OK, now delete all the photos, videos and music you have on you phone. Yes, ALL-OF-IT. Why do I say that? Because now its all on your laptop, when you took the back-up remember?

Put it back on:
Now is the time to put things back to your phone.
Photos - some favorite photos you always like to show around, or your wedding pics, and those other funny clicks; transfer them back to your phone. Don't delete the copy on your laptop. Resist the urge to put back everything to your phone again. Use the 20% rule. If you took out a 100 photos, put back only 20%. This way you will have more space on your phone to take that nice moment with your friends.
Videos - this includes the videos you shot from your phone and those video songs you downloaded. If you are likely to view the video or show it to someone, then put it back, else leave it on your laptop.
Movies - really? How many times do you want to watch the same movie. Why not transfer a new movie instead of putting back the old one?

Documents:
Use the 3 month rule. If you've not used it in 3 months, store your word docs, presentations and PDFs else where. I would suggest using an online storage which will work with your phone like Dropbox, Google Docs etc, so you can always have them handy.

Your phone should be clean already. This entire process should take you about 1-2 hours. Repeat this every 6 months to keep your phone always clutter-free.

Insert Time Stamp in Outlook Mails and Tasks

2011-08-01T15:16:00.000-07:00

I'm in the habit of adding date and my initials when replying to emails, or shared tasks, or any update involving groups, or just a note for me for following up on items. Outlook already has the Insert Date/time, but I've to perform 4 clicks. I'm not lazy, but I just want to be more productive. Macros is the way.

OK, this may be a little complicated, so pay attention.

1. Open Outlook. Press Alt+F11.
2. VB editor will open.
3. In the left Navigation for Project, expand Project1>Microsoft Office Outlook Objects and highlight ThisOutlookSession

4. In the editor section, paste the below code. I suggest you first paste it to a notepad, then copy it from there and then paste to your editor (to avoid any HTML tags). Change the name Mickey Mouse to your name or initials.

Public Sub StampTimeComment()

Dim objItem As Object

Dim objNS As NameSpace

Set objNS = Application.GetNamespace("MAPI")

Set objItem = Application.ActiveInspector.CurrentItem

objItem.Body = "[Mickey Mouse, " & now & "] " _

& vbCrLf & vbCrLf & objItem.Body

Set objItem = Nothing

Set objNS = Nothing

End Sub

5. In the Editor, open Tools and select References.

6. Scroll down to Microsoft Word 12.0 Object Library and check it On, click Ok.

7. Close the Editor.

8. Open a new Message.

9. In the Quick Access Toolbar, click on customize and More Commands.

10. Choose Macros from commands and select Project1.ThisOutlookSession.StampTimeComments

11. Click Add.

12. Now you can select the order of the button using the up and down arrow, use modify to select the icon. (This order will help you determine which keyboard shortcut you will be assigning. If it is the first, then the shortcut will be Alt+1, and so on).

13. Click OK.

14. Now in the Message window, you will see this icon on your quick access toolbar.

15. When ever you click on this now, your initials with timestamp will appear on top, and pushing the rest of the message down. Or using the keyboard shortcut of Alt+, where in the number which shows against your icon when you press Alt.

16. To use this in Tasks, follow steps 8 thru 15 for Tasks item.

17. If you prefer your comments to appear below the message than on top, use this code:

Public Sub StampTimeComment()

Dim objItem As Object

Dim objNS As NameSpace

Set objNS = Application.GetNamespace("MAPI")

Set objItem = Application.ActiveInspector.CurrentItem

objItem.Body = objItem.Body & vbCrLf & vbCrLf &"[Mickey Mouse, " & now & "] " _

Set objItem = Nothing

Set objNS = Nothing

End Sub

I appreciate comments from pros, who can probably make this code even better, but this is good enough to serve my purpose, and maybe for a few others too.

Outlook-OneNote Integration: Meeting Notes

2011-07-29T11:01:00.000-07:00

Ok, I confess; I'm crazy about OneNote, totally addicted. Maybe it's time I write a few posts on OneNote, just to display my love to it.

This post is going to be a small one, but will show you a really nice feature when your Outlook is integrated with OneNote. Drumroll.... its the Meeting Notes. What does it do? You'll know by the end of the post.

Open your meeting appointment in Outlook.
Click on the Meeting Notes on top-right corner.
Your meeting details will all the info filled up will open in your OneNote.
There is also a link back to your Meeting in Outlook.
In future, if you want to refer back to your notes, you need not dig in OneNotes to find your meeting. Just go to your Outlook Meeting appointment and click on the same OneNote Meeting Notes. It will take you to your notes in OneNote. Isn't it cool, and easy to organize your meeting notes?

Bonus Post:

Setting up the default Notebook/Section for Meeting Notes

In OneNote, go to Tools > Options > Outlook Integration.
Under Meetings, click Change.
Browse to your Notebook and Section where you want your meetings to show up by Default.
Click OK to Save.
Now when you create Meeting Notes from Outlook, it will open and save in this location. (You can of course move it around in OneNote).

How to insert your digital signature image in MS Word

2011-07-28T15:59:00.000-07:00

In this post, I'm going to show you how you can easily insert your digitally scanned signature in a Word using AutoText feature.

Of course there is another feature in Word which will insert a "signature line", but that is slightly different and hence another post. But for this one, you will need to do a few steps, but just once, and then inserting your signature will be as little as 2 mouse clicks.

How to add the AutoText button on your Quick Access Toolbar

Click the Microsoft Office Button , and then click Word Options.
Click Customize.
Select All Commands from the list.
Select AutoText.
Click AutoText, and then click Add.
Click OK.

This will get the AutoText button on your Quick Access Toolbar.

How to get your signature on Word

Click on Insert Tab.
Click Picture.
Browse for the picture of your signature (either scanned or you can use one of those digital pads sign it on you PC and save as a JPG or PNG).
This will insert the signature as an image in your Word doc.

How to get your signature on AutoText

Select the signature image.
Click on the AutoText button on the Quick Access Toolbar.
Click on the "Save Selection to Autotext Gallery".
Enter the Name and click OK.

How to use your signature on Word using AutoText

Place your cursor where you want to insert your signature, click on the AutoText button on Quick Access Toolbar.
Scroll for your signature and click on it.
Done.

Now every time you need to insert your signature into a word doc, its a breeze.

How to use your Claim Token from Technorati

2011-07-27T13:57:00.000-07:00

This post is to actually claim my blog on Technorati. While I was listing my blog (claiming), I was emailed a claim Token which I was supposed to use to get my Blog listed on Technorati.

So how do you use this token?

Open a new post.
Copy-paste you claim token in your post.
Publish your post.
Wait for your post to appear on feed content.
Go to your Techonorati account and click on Check Claim button.

If everything's fine, then your blog will be successfully claimed. After you have claimed it successfully, you can remove the token from your post.

Giveaway of the Day - Download free licensed software everyday

2011-07-25T11:16:00.000-07:00

Who doesn't like getting things for free? Especially if it is software which you had to pay for otherwise. If you are one of those folks, then this website is perfect for you.

Click on Giveaway of the Day.

OK, let me make it clear. I am not associated to this website in any way; this is a pure I-like-this-site post. They give away a variety of licensed software, one everyday. You can download them and use it. They do have a catch sometimes, like it is licensed only for a year, or no free support, things like that. But most of the software they give away is pretty much a complete version (for which I had to pay if I wanted to purchase it), so I really don't want to complain.

There is no harm in checking out something that's given away for free...!

Desk Essentials - To-Do list and Calendar Desktop Gadgets

2011-07-21T11:00:00.002-07:00

Necessity is the mother of inventions, in my case a discovery. Let me not go into the details of what made me look for something like this but, let me just tell you about one of the apps I recently discovered and started to use on a daily basis.

I am a do-to list person. My favorite for that is Rainlendar (and I can’t believe I don’t have a post on it yet; so I’ll be writing one on it pretty soon, but back to this post…) and I could not have it installed on my laptop. I had to look for a similar app so I could maintain my to-do list. Enter Desktop Gadgets.

I found these two gadgets which are extremely helpful, and eye pleasing, and haven’t found a bug so far (I’ve been using it only for about 2 weeks now, but still point to note).

Desk Essentials

This has a to-do list, a note list and a calculator all in one sidebar.

You can print out your to-do or note list.

Config options.

Complex calculator

Tasks can have due date, priority, project, Title and description.

Pro users can sync with web.

Desk Essentials Calendar

1, 2 or 3 month calendar at a glance.

Add appointment and reminders.

Config options.

Includes reporting and printouts.

Pro users can sync with web.

I haven’t tried out all the features yet, especially the web sync, organizing in projects, reporting etc. So I really cannot comment on them. But they look pretty impressive and most certainly working.

I don’t want to repeat the same features that are on their website. Click on the above links and it will describe all the features on them. There are also download links to on their web page. The apps themselves are in .gadget format, so that means you will need to use them with your desktop gadgets in Vista or Win 7. For laptops with restrictions on installing .exe or .msi files, this can be a good work around.

I did arrange them one above the other on my desktop, and gave them a same color scheme, and it looks just like one single app.

I’m not voting this is the best, of course there are equal and better apps out there, but this one sure serves my purpose for now.

Below are a few screenshots in case you are still wondering what I’m talking about.

Things I do after a factory reset on my HTC HD2

2011-06-01T15:41:00.000-07:00

I sometimes need to reset my HD2. Why? Because I'm usually installing a million apps and doing so many changes on my phone that sometimes, I just need to start back from square one again.

So I made this list for myself, to make my job easier to finish all the setup in a breeze. If anyone has an HTC HD2, or starting on a new one, this list might be helpful. It is not a very well written or detailed post, will write again in detail if there are requests.

Login to accounts
Google Mail - using the add email account
Facebook
Twitter

Setting up Active Sync to Gmail
Enter the Gmail email address and password, when it asks.
Server = m.google.com
Domain = google
Select = Google contacts, Calendar for syncing (I choose to sync only contacts and calendar using Active Sync and use the Gmail account for reading emails).

Setting up Windows
Windows Live
Windows My Phone
Use hotmail account

Other tasks
Personalise home screen tabs
Remove quick links
Add the below quick links
- Camera
- Camcorder
- Album
- Tasks
- Onenote
- Facebook
- Youtube
- Slacker Radio

Other setup
Weather settings - cities
Favorite contacts

Windows Market Place
(all purchased apps will be present already)
No Calls
Droppedboxx
Contact changer
Skyfire
Metric imperial

Apps to install
BSBtweaks
cookie home tab
cht editor
.net framework
srs wow
startmenu grid 5
touch z bluetooth
g alarm + female voice
evernote

Small minor tweaks
BSB Tweak - change settings
CHT editor - change settings

This note was written a very long time back, and not the very updated list of apps I have on my HD2 (WinMo 6.5). I might do another post on the apps I use on my HD2.

Organize desktop icons with wallpapers

2011-04-22T12:30:00.000-07:00

I've talked about how to organize icons using Fences. According to me that is the best free way to organize your icons. But I am tempted to write this post as well because my work laptop does not let me install any programs (yeah! I know the admin rights stuff). So I thought I would design a wallpaper with boundries which can help me organize/group icons. The idea is not new but I just wanted to write it down, so sorry if you've seen similar posts else-where on the web.

How to create the wallpaper:
I've created the wallpaper using MS Paint in Windows 7. I prefer the Paint in Windows 7 because it is so much better than the old MSPaint. And its the easiest to work with and available on all PC. Of course you can use any other software and even go professional with Adobe Photoshop. For me, I don't want to spend a lot of time creating a wallpaper I might want to change every few days or so, or change the layout often according to my needs.

How exactly to do it? It is completely driven by how many boxes you want, what color you want and what size you want. Let your imagination and needs guide you. You can see the wallpaper below to give you an idea. Or you can search the web for inspiration.

Additionally you can add titles on the boxes like - Personal, Urgent, Working, Archive etc to help you.

You can spend as much or as little time on this. The very basic wallpaper you are seeing below was created in less than 5 minutes. You can add photos of your recent vacation or your favorite movie poster.

Another important thing you need to note is that you need to uncheck the option for "Auto Arrange" in the context menu upon right click on your desktop. Also you may uncheck the option for "Align Icons".

Note - some Windows 7 PCs have the issue of re-arranging the icons on reboot. Unchecking the "Align Icons" helps a few.

And obviously you can use this idea on any OS or even your cellphone. I've created a few sample wallpapers. Of course feel free to use (the size may not fit all monitors, this is just a sample). And do write back if you like it or need more wallpapers. I will add more wallpapers in future.

Update [7/26/2011]: More wallpapers...

Security Tools

2011-03-10T19:27:00.001-08:00

I know there are probably at least a few hundred of security tools out there, some free and some licensed. This post is about a few tools that I trust and have installed them and used them. I’m not (or may in the future) going to do a complete review of all the tools listed here, but I’m surely going to write a line or two about each of them.

Anti-Malware Bytes – Searches for malware and similar stuff.

Spybot - search and destroy – Searches for spyware. Really works well, might annoy sometimes when it asks you to confirm for registry entry changes during new software installation. But I think that is configurable, haven’t figured it out it.

Microsoft Security Essentials – Works as a complete antivirus software. Never has a problem with this and best of all, its free.

K9 web protection – I use this for blocking some websites, like parental control. It is not browser specific, so users cannot try to access the blocked site from a different browser. Its free, and highly customizable.

AVG 2011 Free Antivirus – Free antivirus, works along with the Microsoft Security Essentials.

I have multiple antivirus/security software because I do not want to pay for the security, but I want not to be attacked by some virus either. I also have CCleaner and Revo Uninstaller to uninstall applications and clean up the system.

CNET Download Links

Anti-Malware Bytes

Spybot - Search and Destroy

Microsoft Security Essentials

K9 Web Protection

AVG 2011 Free Version

AHK Scripts: Send date and time

2010-04-12T12:41:00.001-07:00

Those who are new to AHK, see my previous post on Autohotkey.

Here are a few Autohotkey scripts for sending Date and Time. Of course they can be customized in any way you want.

The idea here is, when ever you want to enter the date and time (in any format), you can define hot strings to replace the text and insert the current system date and time instead.

If your job requires you to type date and time many times a day, then this job is made a lot easier.

Replace ndate and ]d with any other string you need. When ever you type these strings, the date and time stamp will be replaced instead.
If you want the timestamp to be printed after a space or enter key, then remove the * in :*: which is at the beginning of the code.
Copy-paste this text in your existing AHK script or create a new script just for timestamp. It's completely your choice.

:*:ndate::

FormatTime, CurrentDateTime,, M/d/yyyy h:mm tt  

SendInput %CurrentDateTime%

return

:*:]d::

FormatTime, CurrentDateTime,, M-d-yyyy

SendInput %CurrentDateTime%

return

Autohotkey: Automate mouse clicks and key strokes

2010-04-12T12:32:00.000-07:00

Autohotkey is one amazing program that is a must have. It automates key strokes and mouse clicks. And is entirely customizable.

Although it will take some time to get used to writing scripts, there are many scripts available for most commonly done tasks. I don't want to go into reviewing how good this is. I just want to say, I can do most mouse or keyboard actions.

It sits in the system tray and can be made to run all the time, which I do. Doesn't take up much memory. Easy to edit scripts once you get the hang of it.

Here is the Home page for Autohotkey.

You can also Download Autohotkey from CNet.

I'll be writing more posts about various scripts I use and like. This isn't a big post, but I will probably be writing a lot about the AHK scripts in future.

Google Tasks: Bookmarklet for easy access

2010-03-17T16:55:00.001-07:00

There are lots of places on the internet where you can maintain your To-Do List online, and make it accessible from everywhere. Trust me when I say, that To-Do list is the first thing I see every morning before starting on any chores. And there's only one place where I maintain this list so that I don't have to look through different sites to consolidate and do things.
No surprise, I use Google Tasks.

Reason:
Since I use Gmail, Google Calendar and Google Docs, it makes sense to me that I keep my list with Google since I can link my tasks to my emails, appointments and even documents. I am usually logged in Google all the time, and hence I don't need to enter my user name and password every time I want to add a new thing to my list.

Now if I've to access Google Tasks, I've to either open Gmail or Calendar and then select Tasks from there. Now that a little long process, especially if I've to write down something immediately and don't even want to wait for a second, fearing I might forget it.
And the second reason being, the very process of reaching until Tasks makes me lose the interest to maintain a To-Do List.

Now what I've done is created bookmarklets for Tasks which open in full window and with a very clean interface.

GTasks

Drag and drop this above link in your bookmark bar and you are done!
The Tasks opens up as a whole new window/tab and there is no clutter.
You can see all your tasks in single links and very neatly structured.

Most importantly for me, it's easily accessible.
Hope this helps!

Outlook: Group Conversations in Outlook like Gmail

2010-03-12T09:52:00.001-08:00

If you've been using Gmail, then you probably will know what I'm talking about. I just love this feature in Gmail where all your conversations are grouped together and the newest conversation in the group comes up on the top of the list.

Well as far as I know, that is not available in Outlook right now (correct me if I'm wrong). But there's a setting which can take us a little closer to what we see in Gmail.

In your Outlook inbox, right-click anywhere on the column header (e.g. Subject) and select the option "Customize Current View...".

Now do the following -
Step 1. In the Group By category, select the option "Conversation".
Step 2. Done.

Yes, it's that simple. Well the catch is, it isn't the same grouping that we're used to in Gmail. But Hey, it's a little more like Gmail now.

Hope this Helps.

Compose Gmail: Bookmarklet and Desktop Shortcut

2010-02-08T13:52:00.002-08:00

Gmail is my favorite email client, and probably is for many other people. That's why I try to make gmail as optimized and organized, and very easy to use. And lately I am becoming a fan of bookmarklets. So here is one small tip to compose gmail with a single click.

Drag and drop this bookmarklet in your browser. This will open the compose gmail link, without the other clutter.

Bookmarklet:
Compose Gmail

I've made it even more easier by adding a keyboard shortcut on the desktop.

Go to Desktop.
Right click > New > Shortcut
Paste the below text
https://mail.google.com/mail/?ui=2&view=cm&fs=1&tf=1
Click Next.
Name it as Compose Gmail.
Save.
Now after the shortcut is created, right-click on the icon and go to Properties.
Click on Web Document tab and place cursor in Shortcut Key.
Press any desired keyboard combination you would like to assign to it. I use Ctrl+Shift+g.
Click OK.

Now from any place or window, when you press this combination, the compose mail will open in the default browser.

Hope this helps.

Restore “Hidden Files and Folders” option

2010-01-16T23:18:00.001-08:00

Sometimes due to unknown reasons or tampering with registry or other options, the “Hidden Files and Folders” option in Folders Options might be gone. No need to panic, it can be restored in a simple registry adjustment.

Win+R, open Run Dialog.
Type regedit and press enter.
Navigate to the following registry item.

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\explorer
\Advanced\Folder\Hidden
Look for the entry “Type” and change the value to “group”. If it is not present, then create it.
Be careful while changing anything in Registry Editor.

The Hidden Files and Folders Option must show up now. It’s just that simple. Hope this helps.

CCleaner: Get installed software list

2010-01-12T20:54:00.001-08:00

CCleaner is one of the most popular registry cleaning software used. Any person who does a lot of installing, would probably also have CCleaner installed. But this post is not about how to use it for cleaning our registry or uninstalling. In one of my previous posts, I had mentioned how to get a list of the installed software. You can do the same using CCleaner. It’s very simple to do it.

Run CCleaner.
Go to Tools.
Select Uninstall.
Click on the Save to text file button.
Save the destination location of the text file.
Done.

There are yet many other ways to get the installed software list, we’ll explore them in the coming days.

Download CCleaner.

Getting Organized with Gmail: Part 2

2010-01-09T12:04:00.001-08:00

In the previous part in this series, we saw how we can use labels to get more organized and make it easier to look for mails we receive. In this part we will talk a little more about labels and see how we can use filters to label email automatically.

The next two labels we add are for emails that we think we need in future, or for mails which might have some information.

Now make these two labels -

Someday|Maybe
Use this label to mark email that you might want to reply, act on, plan to review etc, but some other day (when you are free) and you don’t know when.
Reference
Use this label to mark email which you cannot delete since it has some information you might need, but again not at this moment but in future.
Now here, if you have a lot of reference material, it can again get difficult to find what you are looking for. So it’s a good idea to make sub-classes in reference labels.
E.g. Reference|Project, Reference|School, Reference|Paper Research, Reference|Recipes etc.

Now moving on to the filters, I will just show how to set a filter for one item, you can set as many filters as you need in the same way.

Go to Settings and then click Filters. Then click Create New Filter.

In the above example, I’ve mentioned a filter for Chase Bank. As you can see, there are two different from email ids. The reason is sometimes there could be mails from sub-domains and you don’t want to miss them. You can use OR (in uppercase) to add more email addresses.

Now click Next Step.

Now select the options you need and Finish.

You can set as many filters you like and make labeling automatic, so you don’t need to add labels every time you read email.

Getting Organized with Gmail: Part 1

2010-01-07T15:15:00.001-08:00

Gmail is one of the top email providers, and if you are a Gmail user, you must be aware that the number of new features they have introduced over the last year is huge, not to mention the experimental lab features.

Ok, this is not a review of Gmail, but here is an idea how you can use the labels in Gmail to get more organized and efficient, well you know, the GTD stuff.

The first job I would like to suggest is that get your inbox straight without any junk mail or all those messages from websites you didn’t subscribe to, or tons of other reasons why you might be getting mails you don’t need.

It might be easy for you to select all the mails at once and delete, but do you want to do it every day? And imagine the time you are spending to just delete these mails. Instead, you can spend about half hour to unsubscribe from emails by clicking on the links in those mails, and remove these messy mails forever. If you don’t find a link to unsubscribe then you can mark them as spam.

Now you are ready for your labeling job.

Start with these labels. The reason I am adding ‘1’ is to make these labels show up on top, and also to make it easy to identify the most important and most used labels. Mark mails with these labels as required, once the job is completed, then unmark the labels. By doing this, your top three labels are always up-to-date.

1-Follow Up
Use this label to mark all your emails for the follow up job, like calling back the person or replying to the mail, or waiting for a response from the sender.
1-To Do Now
Use this label to mark mails that need immediate action, like by end of day.
1-To Do Later
Use this label to mark mails that can wait for a little time, maybe a few days or even a week or two.

Secondly add these labels and use them accordingly – Bank|Credit Cards, Personal, Bills|Payments.
Now it’s your turn. Add any more labels you need. E.g. Project, Job hunt, School, Office Documents etc.

But remember, don’t add unnecessary labels either. Although it’s not a problem since you can always rename or delete any label, but it’s a good idea not to get carried away by labels.

Plus Gmail has this wonderful feature of adding label by just a drag-and-drop. This is going to make your labeling job a lot easier.

Try this, and let me know if you liked labeling in this way.

μTorrent: Torrent Downloader

2010-01-06T14:10:00.001-08:00

This is a very well known tool for most people who download often, especially torrents. Still, here is an overview of μTorrent, my favorite torrent downloader.

The interface is very easy to use. And there are many options to customize in the Preferences section.

Just download the torrent of the document, audio, video etc to download.
Double click the torrent (.torrent extension files). It is a good idea to set μTorrent as default application for torrent files for ease.
μTorrent will open up and the downloading will begin.
You can pause or cancel download as you wish.
And you can easily see all the other information like speed, downloaded/uploaded, peers, seeds etc.
Plus it does not eat up your PC’s resources.

If you are a big time downloader you must have this tool. You probably already have it. If so, then tell us why you like using the tool.

Download μTorrent.

ShellExView: Clean up Windows Context Menu

2010-01-04T11:56:00.001-08:00

One of my previous article on how to keep your Firefox Context Menu clean inspired me to write on how to keep the context menu clean through out your PC. There are many different tools out there, some freeware and some licensed, but here is one which I found.

It’s called ShellExView. It is a Shell Extension Manager and can be used to customize the context menu across windows.

This is a freeware and stand alone executable, so it does not need installation.

It is very easy to use. Just click on the item you want to enable/disable and click on the red or the green button respectively.

If you are new and only want to customize the context menu, then do this - Sort by type “Context Menu”, then select the item and click the red button.

If you are a more experienced windows user or like tweaking more then you have all the shell extensions at you disposal. Just be careful with what you do.

Here are some of the things you can do with ShellExView -

Shell Folder: Provides special system folders like "Printers", "Fonts", "Recycle Bin", and more...
Context Menu: Provides the ability to add new items to the context menu of particular file type.
Drag & Drop Handler: Provides the ability to add new items to the context menu that appears when you drag a file with right mouse button.
Icon Handler: Provides the ability to dynamically assign icons to file objects.
Copy Hook Handler: This type of shell extension is called when a file is moved, copies, renamed or deleted.
Drop Handler: Provides the ability to control the "Drop" behavior of files.
Data Handler: Provides the ability to copy files/objects to the clipboard.
Property Sheet: Property Sheet dialog boxes.
Search Handler: Provides the ability to create a system search engine (Like the standard "Search For Files or Folders" module)
Column Handler: Provides the ability to add new columns to the details view of Explorer window.
Thumbnail: Provides the ability to display images in "Thumbnail" view.
Browser Helper Object: Provides the ability to customize and control the Internet Explorer browser.
IE Toolbar: Provides the ability to add new toolbars into Internet Explorer (like Yahoo! Toolbar)
Explorer Bar: Provides the ability to add Explorer bars to Internet Explorer.
URL Search Hook: Browser extension stored under Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\URLSearchHooks.
System: All other types of shell extensions that ShellExView utility cannot recognize are categorized as "System" type.

Download ShellExView.

Google Doc Bookmarklets

2009-12-29T12:50:00.001-08:00

Bookmarklets are so cool that they can be addictive. So here are some more. And this time its for Google documents for creating new docs.

I won’t bore you much, just drag and drop these links in you bookmarks menu area. When you click on them they open new document, spreadsheet or a presentation.

New Google Document

New Google Spreadsheet

New Google Presentation

And here is the bookmarklet to upload new docs.

Upload To Google Doc

If you are a regular Google Docs user or otherwise, I hope this helps.

Menu Editor: Edit Context and Other Menu Options in Firefox

2009-12-28T15:21:00.001-08:00

The advantage of using Firefox is that it allows you to completely customize your browsing activities. That's why I love Firefox and have dozens of addons installed. The other face of the coin is that, most addons insert new options in the context (right-click) menu. Sometimes they let you remove, but not all. So, your context menu grows and grows, and before you realize, it's like a tail of an anaconda. And the worst part is you don't even use those options.

Some kind developers, made this beautiful addon Menu Editor, so that every menu option in FF can be customized. Menu Editor lets you customize all the menu options including Context Menu, Tab Context Menu.

There is also an advanced mode where you can customize to your heart's content. Although I've never felt the need to use it, I'm happy to see I've more options.

Now I've just the options I need. The above screen shots shows my new tab context and regular context menu.

If you were annoyed by the countless options in your context menu, then you must try this. Hope it helps.