Using Microsoft Direct Push with Pocket PC

I have been using Pocket PC for a long time and I use HTC TyTN II right now. I have been using the Push technology for getting my emails pushed to my pocket pc so that I can be aware of the emails as soon as it is on my mail server.

How does Microsoft Direct Push Technology works?

Microsoft push technology was introduced with Windows Mobile 5. If you are using Microsoft push then you are always connected to the exchange server and all the changes are synchronized as soon as a change takes place. When ever you receive an email, instantly you get it on you mobile.

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Simple Video Editing software - VideoSpin

I have been playing around with different video editing and compressing software and came across VideoSpin from Pinnacle and its free. Some codecs can be used only for 15 days, but you can buy it if you need to use it. You have basic codecs for free, which is enough for normal use.

You have features to create videos from a bunch of videos, editing timelines, adding sound, titles, almost more than what you have in Windows movie maker. The other option is that you can upload the videos directly to your Youtube account or Yahoo Videos. The file size for uploads are small and optimized. I had uploaded a test video created by VideoSpin at Yahoo which I find good in quality

Video created using Pinnacle Videospin

Got a new software which is free and like Windows Movie maker to create and edit videos. I uploaded the video to Yahoo video this time

Installing Windows XP with Windows Vista

I am using Windows vista on my laptop and I was facing some problems. The biggest problem that I was facing was the disk partition. My hard drive was made to two partition, C drive with 20 GB and D drive with 160 GB. This was a blunder done by the service engineer who installed the OS for me. I was having very less space as Windows Vista takes about 15 GB and when I install any new programs then I need to select Drive D for installation. I tried different tricks to expand my C drive space but nothing worked for me. Other problem that I faced with Vista was some programs were not working properly. So I decided to go for Windows XP and keep the Vista installation intact for the time being.

How to install Windows XP with Windows Vista and configure the dual Booting

Requirements

Windows XP licensed version

Vista Boot Pro

Process

1. Shut down your system and insert the Windows XP CD to computer
2. Make sure that your system first booting is from the CD rom or you can change it by pressing the F10 key while your system boots
3. Install the Windows XP
4. Try restarting, you may not be able to use Windows Vista
5. Just start Windows XP and install Vista Boot Pro
6. Copy boot.ini, NTDETECT.COM and ntldr from the drive where Windows Vista is installed and paste it to the drive where you have installed Windows XP.
7. Run Vista Boot Pro and go to "System Boot Loader" tab and select Windows Vista Bootloader, then in the second option select All drives and click on the Install Bootloader button
8. You are done

Now restart your system, you should find the option to select the operating system

How to use windows live writer effectively

Every software has its own pros and cons and the to make use of all the features are very important if we need to use the application effectively. Most of us use many application, but many do not know about all the features that an application has. I  have been using Windows Live Writer for some time now. There are lots of features available for this application and if we use it, this is an excellent application or I could say a must have application for a blogger.

You can download windows live writer first and install it. This is 100% free and this is updated automatically with windows update

Once you install it, you need to do the set-up as an normal application. Once installed just open the application and the first thing to do is to configure you blog. You can configure any number of blogs. WLW supports almost all the popular blogs like wordpress, typepad, blogger, blogspot, etc.

Adding a new blog to windows live writer

Just go ahead with the instruction to add a new blog and follow the instruction. You will need to provide the URL of your blog and the login credential.

Once the account is set-up the theme is updated to the live writer and you can view the web layout along with normal layout, HTML view and web preview.

This is the snapshot which I had done when I was writing this post.

This is the side pane of the windows live writer. You can find lots of links which are very useful. You can insert an image, hyperlink, tag, table, code, video, map and lots of features as you see.

Creating a new post

Creating a new post is very simple, just click on new and select the write weblog if you have configured multiple blogs.

Saving a post as draft on to the web server

You can publish the post directly or save as draft to you local drive or even post as draft to the web server. You can find the save draft button on the toolbar

Saving images using FTP

If you have problem in saving images to your web server, you can use the FTP feature

1. If you use Writer with more than one blog, on the Weblog menu, select the blog that you want.

2. On the Weblog menu, click Edit Weblog Settings.

3. On the Images tab, click Upload images to an FTP server, and then click Configure FTP.

4. Complete the following settings:
# FTP hostname: The name of your FTP server.

# Username and Password: The user name and password for your FTP account.

# Publish images into this folder: Include the full path to the folder on the FTP server. To find the path, click the Browse button.
# URL of image publishing folder: The web address of the folder where people can view your images. The address should start with http://, not  ftp://.
# Click OK, and then click OK again.

 

Tags Feature

You an insert different tags using the tags feature. You can even create custom tags. By default, you can see wordpress, technorati, buzznet, etc.

Selecting the category

You can find the list of categories inside the category selector, which at the bottom of the page. You can even add new category from your windows live writer.

You can do almost everything that you do when you do a post by using the default posting page of a wordpress blog.

Plugins

You can install the necessary plugins by clicking on the add plugin link which you can see on the right bottom of the screen. You will be take the plugin gallery, just select the needed one and click install. Restart the application and you will find it in the plugin list

You can browse through the WLW Plugins Gallery for some good plugins that you would like to use

Hyperlink Glossary

This is something which I use much. You can save the links in the glossary. Just go to Insert Hyperlink after selecting the text that you want to add a link. If you have already saved this link to the gallery, then you will find the saved information inside the pop-up window, just click ok and the link is added.

Other Features

1. Spell checks
2. Automatic updates
3. Pinging

Windows Live Writer is an excellent tool if you know how to use it.

How to uninstall a program in Windows Vista

I got a new Laptop which is having Vista as the operating system. I am not used to Vista and while I was trying to uninstall a program like we do in Windows XP, but I could the find the Add/Remove icon. Its bit different

First we see the desktop where we can find the control panel shortcut. Click on the control panel shortcut and go to the control panel

 

If its in classic view, just go to control panel home

In the control panel home, you can find the Uninstall program link, just click on that

You will get the list of program that are installed, just click on the program that you have to uninstall, the uninstall link becomes visible

Just click on the Uninstall link and its done, You need to have to login as the administrator to do this