Upload Documents to Google Docs With One Click

Computer Renaissance found this article useful for Google Doc users and would like to share it with you.

Google Docs is a great solution for saving and sharing documents online, but browsing to the site every time is time consuming. Here we look at a Desktop Gadget that lets you upload files with a simple drag & drop.

Install and Upload Docs with the Cloud Drive Gadget

Head to the Cloud Drive gadget download site (link below), and click Download to get started.

This is a 3rd party gadget, so you’ll be asked to verify you want to download it.  Click Installto go ahead and download it.

Once the Gadget is downloaded, run and install it as normal.

The gadget should appear on your desktop as soon as you install it and you can add it from the gadget gallery as well.

You’ll need to add your Google account info before you can upload files.  Click the gear button to open the Options pane.

Now enter your Google account info, and click Ok.  You can also enter an Advanced Key for more features such as previewing your recently uploaded files and one-click access to the document you just uploaded; to get one, you’ll need to make a donation at the developer’s site.

You’re now ready to add files to Google Docs.  Simply drag any document you want to upload and drop it on the gadget.

The gadget will now change to show that it’s uploading your file.

The Gadget will let you know when the upload is finished.  Uploading most documents only took a few seconds in our tests.  Since you can just drag and drop the documents into the gadget, it’s almost as easy as saving a file on your computer or putting it in your Dropbox.

You’ll be able to see your document in Google Docs ready for you to edit online or share with others.  As usual, Google docs will lose some formatting from Word, but this is the same regardless of how you upload documents.

Conclusion

This little desktop gadget makes it very simple to add your documents to Google Docs.  It’s much quicker and easier than logging in to the Google Docs dashboard to upload files, so it should make it easier to keep your files online if you prefer Google’s web apps.  Since it’s just a desktop gadget, it’s also less resource intensive than many other desktop Google Docs solutions.

Links

Download the Cloud Drive gadget

Source:

Turn Any Action into a Keyboard Shortcut

Computer Renaissance thought that this article can help you to increase your productivity by using keyboard shortcuts for any action.

Open source scripting language AutoHotkey may not be one of the most powerful or popular programming languages on the planet, but that's okay—it's not just made for programmers. That's because AutoHotkey is well within the grasp of regular folks like you or me—people who have a fair understanding of computers and are willing to learn just a little to make major strides in productivity. Today I'll show you how to use AutoHotkey to turn almost any action into a keyboard shortcut.

NOTE: I'm not a computer programmer by trade. In fact, I graduated from college a few years ago with a degree in Philosophy of Religion, Arts, and Science (a liberal arts degree I made up). My point is, even if you have absolutely no programming experience, creating simple keyboard shortcuts with AutoHotkey is well within your grasp.

Before You Get Started

First things first: You're an amateur programmer now, so you need to go download and install AutoHotkey. Once you've got that done, open a folder, right-click, and select New -> AutoHotkey Script. Give it whatever name you like, then open it up with your favorite text editor (I recommend Notepad++).

You can also grab a script of all the examples I discuss below here if you'd like to use it as a starting point.

What is a Hotkey?

In AutoHotkey, you can create keyboard shortcuts or remap keys easily in more than one way, but today we're going to focus on one method: Hotkey labels. The syntax of creating a hotkey is very simple, and can be used in two ways.

First, if you want to do something very simple—like remap a key—it looks like this:

hotkey::remapped key

...where hotkey is the keyboard shortcut that will activate the second part—in this case, a remapped key. That may seem rather vague, so let's look at a concrete example. I don't like the Capslock key as is, preferring instead to remap it to my Control key. With AutoHotkey, all it takes is:

Capslock::Control

If you add that small snippet of code to the AHK file you created above and then run the file (just double-click it), you'll notice that your Capslock key now works as a control key instead. Now not only have you got your control key at a much closer, less stressful range for your pinky, but you're not likely to accidentally fire the Capslock key when you don't want it. However, if you don't want to lose the Capslock key altogether—as there are times it can come in handy—you can add the following to your AutoHotkey script (Thanks mc_spanky_mcgee):

+Capslock::Capslock

With this hotkey, the plus sign (+) stands for Shift, so hitting Shift+Capslock will turn on and off the Capslock key so that turning on Capslock requires a much more deliberate process. For a full list of modifiers you can use to create hotkeys, check out this page. For a better idea of which symbols you can use, from Capslock to Tab to the Spacebar, check out the full AutoHotkey key list.

So far so good, right? You can actually remap almost any key in this way—including regular, non-modifier keys. So if you wanted to turn your "k" key into an "i", it'd be as simple as:

k::i

Not that remapping k to i would be terribly useful, but you get the idea. It is terribly simple.

Taking Hotkeys a Step Further

Now that you've got an idea of how to create hotkeys the simple way, we'll move on to slightly more advanced hotkey creation. First, we'll create a simple hotkey that will open Lifehacker when we press Windows-l (who wouldn't rather read Lifehacker than lock their desktop?). Quite simply, it looks like this:

#l::Run, http://lifehacker.com/

In this example, we're using the Run command, which can take any target—from web URLs to files on your hard drive—and, quite simply, open them.

As a result, creating a keyboard shortcut to launch anything at all is a breeze. You can launch any program, document, or web page with a simple shortcut of your choosing. If you were creating an iTunes shortcut with Windows-i (where the Windows key equals the pound sign [#]), for example, it might look something like this:

#i::Run,%A_ProgramFiles%\iTunes\iTunes.exe

You'll noticed I introduced another concept here: variables. The variable %A_ProgramFiles%tells AutoHotkey to look in my default Program Files directory—in my case, "C:\Program Files". I could have just made the command Run, C:\Program Files\iTunes\iTunes.exe, but using the variable means that—assuming I've got iTunes installed—the same shortcut will work on other computers that have iTunes installed to the default directory, even if their home drive is D:\ or F:\. For more on variables, check out AutoHotkey's introduction to variables, along with their list of built-in variables (like%A_ProgramFiles%).

Creating More Complex Hotkeys

So far our hotkeys have been very simple, one-line affairs, but sometimes you need more than that. In those instances, you can create multi-line actions that you want to occur when your hotkey is triggered. This requires a slightly different syntax.

hotkey::
Do one thing
Do more things...
return

Basically, as you can see, it starts out the same way with the hotkey followed by two colons. Then, however, you break to a new line and write your first action, followed by however many you want, and it ends with "return" (which signifies that the hotkey is done executing). So let's put it into practice.

The following keyboard shortcut, Windows-t, will automatically empty the Recycle Bin when I press it. When it's finished, it will show me a message telling me that the trash has been taken out.

#t::
FileRecycleEmpty, C:\
MsgBox, The trash has been taken out.
return

In the hotkey created above, I used AutoHotkey's FileRecycleEmpty command, which takes the drive letter where the bin is located as a parameter. I also used another new concept: the MsgBox command, which displays the text after the command in a window. As you can see, I used it to confirm that the command was run and the trash was taken out.

Restrict Your Hotkey to a Specific Application

Sometimes you want to create a hotkey that will only be applicable to one specific application. In those cases, you need to use the #IfWinActive directive. To use it, you need to place #IfWinActive WindowType (where WindowType is the window or app you want the shortcut to apply to) followed by the hotkey, then followed again by #IfWinActivewithout any WindowType (so that all following hotkeys won't be restricted to one window or application). In the example below, I've set the Windows-o hotkey to open the Options in Firefox.

#IfWinActive ahk_class MozillaUIWindowClass
#o::
Send {Alt}t
Sleep 100
Send o
return
#IfWinActive

So let's dive in and examine this bit of code. First, you'll notice theahk_class MozillaUIWindowClass bit. That may seem intimidating, but all it does is tell AutoHotkey that this shortcut will only work when a program using the MozillaUIWindowClass (like Firefox or Thunderbird) is active. You can grab the ahk_class using the AutoIt3 Window Spy, which you'll find in your AutoHotkey install directory. Just run it and click on the window you want to restrict a hotkey to grab the window class and that's a good starting point.

Next, we've used the Send command, which sends literal keystrokes to your window. The first one I sent was Send, {Alt}t, meaning that the bracketed text, Alt, indicates a modifier (again, go to the Send page for a closer look at modifiers)). If you were to press Alt-t in Firefox right now, you'll notice that the Tools menu drops down.

Then I sent the command Sleep 100, which tells the script to wait 100 milliseconds before going to the next command. I do this just to make sure the computer has time to react to my first command and the Tools menu is open. Then I sent the "o" key to select Options from the Tools drop-down menu. Finally, I ended the hotkey with the return followed by#IfWinActive to ensure any other hotkeys beyond this one aren't limited just to Firefox or Thunderbird (unless that's what you wanted).

Take Your Tweaks with You

The great thing about AutoHotkey is that you can compile your scripts to portable executables that can run anywhere by simply right-clicking the file and selecting Compile. Drop the resultant EXE on your thumb drive and take it with you wherever you go.

Source: http://lifehacker.com/316589/turn-any-action-into-a-keyboard-shortcut

What's Useful in the Safari Extensions Gallery

Computer Renaissance would like to help you to choose some useful Safari Extensions.

Safari's Extensions Gallery has gone live, and there's quite a bit to look through and add to your browser at launch. We took a gander through the offerings and picked out some of the extensions worth noting. Here's the list.

To use these extensions, you'll need to have Safari installed, and have it updated to the latest version. Both Macs and Windows installations have Apple's updating software you can use to grab the 5.0.1 copy, but if you've disabled Apple's Software Update on Windows, you'll need to grab a fresh copy manually.

We've provided links to the extension maker and a direct installation link for each extension we picked out, with each link coming from the extension maker. You may be asked whether you want to Open or Save the file we're linking to (choose "Open"), and if you're sure you want to install that extension ("Install," we presume). To manage these extensions once you've got them installed, head to your Safari preferences and look for the newly-enabled Extensions menu.

Social Networking

Better Facebook: Automatically hides posts you've already read, removes some of the cruft from the site, notifies you of new comments and un-friendings, and more. [Install in Safari]

Shut Up: Kills comments on many sites where you might get sick of them. [Install in Safari]

Bookmarking

Procrastinate: Adds text articles to bookmarking and reading services like Instapaper, Read it Later, and Delicious from an all-in-one toolbar button. [Install in Safari]

Twitter Tools

Twitter for Safari: Twitter's official client for sending tweets, but also reading tweets and seeing Twitter profiles related to the page you're on. You can easily tweet about a page you're looking at, too, with a pre-shortened URL. [Install in Safari]

E-mail

GmailThis: Sends an email through Gmail's compose window, with the page you're on pre-loaded in the subject and body text. Basically, a fancy bookmarklet, but with a nice button. [Install in Safari]

TrueNew Count for Gmail and Google Apps: More than just providing a count of the messages marked unread, TrueNew's counter shows you how many messages are unread since the last time you looked at Gmail or Google Apps. [Install in Safari]

Shopping

InvisibleHand: Like the Firefox and (slightly scandalous) Chrome extensions, InvisibleHand checks the shopping item pages you're looking at to see if the item is offered elsewhere—Amazon, Buy.com, and the like—at a cheaper price. [Install in Safari]

Entertainment

A Cleaner YouTube: Claims to transform YouTube into a "quiet and peaceful place" by cutting out most of everything except the video itself. [Install in Safari]

Turn Off the Lights: As with its nifty Chrome counterpart, this little button throws a shade over everything except the video you're watching on YouTube, Vimeo, or embedded clips. [Install in Safari]

Security

LastPass: One of our favorite universal password systems, LastPass is an elegant little plug-in for storing your passwords, filling them in automatically, and yet keeping them encrypted and available anywhere you go. [Install in Safari]

Web of Trust: Reads out everything the very excellent Web of Trust community knows about the site you're on—encryption, trustworthiness, vendor reliability for various components, and so on. [Install in Safari]

Photos

Awesome Screenshot: Like its Chrome counterpart, Awesome Screenshot handles the capture, annotation, sensitive data blurring, and upload/sharing aspects of grabbing web pages, no extra software needed. [Install in Safari]

Source: http://lifehacker.com/5598524/whats-useful-in-the-safari-extensions-gallery

How To Play Your Favorite Retro Video Games on Your Windows PC

Computer Renaissance would like to show you how to play your favorite retro video games on your Windows PC.

Do you miss the days of playing your favorite games on “old school” consoles like SNES or Sega Genesis? Today we take a look at several different emulators for your PC that will bring back the retro gaming nostalgia.

Note: Here we are covering retro video game emulators so you can play classic games on your PC. We don’t link to any games or “roms” as their called, but Google could probably help you out with finding some.

We tested these emulators on Windows 7 Home Premium 32-bit but they should work with Vista and XP as well. We did however run into a lot of snags running some of them on a 64-bit system.

8-bit Nintendo (NES)

The first one we’ll take a look at is the 8-bit NES emulator FCEUX. It works very smoothly and controls are very responsive. There are a few different NES emulators out there and this on worked the best in our tests. Just download the file and unzip it to whatever directory you want. Then launch the FCEUX executable.

Now you can load a game or go through it’s various settings to tweak it how you like. Click on File \Open ROM…

Browse to the game you want to play and double-click to load it. You don’t need to unzip your ROM files, just load them up. Here we take a look at Mario Bros in a small window which would be useful at work if you run it from a Flash drive.

If you want to change the emulator settings while playing a game you can…and while your making the changes your current game will pause.

It also has a very nice full screen mode…

Download FCEUX

Super Nintendo (SNES)

For playing SNES games we chose the ZSNES project. Download and unzip the ZSNES package and click on zsnesw.exe to start it up…no installation needed.

The emulator will start and you can load a game right away and begin to play…or go through and configure it to your liking.

There are a lot of settings you can customize including Video, sound, the controls, and more.

Ah, the good old days listening to cheesy music and reading a long intro about the story. Luckily it allows you to skip straight to the game by pressing Enter.

Here we take a look at playing the Ninja Gaiden Trilogy. The game play is smooth and controls were responsive. Sometimes the frame rates would slow down but over all it wasn’t too bad.

We’d be remiss if we didn’t show one of the coolest games for the SNES…Super Mario World.

One issue we noticed when closing out of ZSNES from the Taskbar, it was still running in the background. We had to end the process through Task Manager.

If you want to correctly close out of the emulator, while playing a game hit the Esc key. This will bring up the ZSNES menu where you can quit. Of course you can also change configurations and save your progress as well.

Download ZSNES

Gameboy Advance

Remember the Gameboy Advance handheld gaming system? There is a very nice emulator project for that too called Visual Boy Advance. As with the others, no installation is required. Just unzip the VBA file and run the VistualBoyAdvance executable.

Click on File then Open and browse to your game. Again, you don’t need to unzip the ROMS just select them and the game will start.

Here we have a version of Zelda running. Graphics are great and controls very responsive.

If you need to change some settings while playing playing a game, just select them from the toolbar and your game will pause while you make adjustments.

If you have a game that has a long intro, and it doesn’t let you skip it, you can hold down the Spacebar and speed right through it and get to the action.

Download Visual Boy Advance

Sega Genesis

One of the best Sega Genesis emulators we found was Kega Fusion 3.6 which ran great on our Windows 7 Home Premium machine. Again simply unzip the file and launch the Fusion executable file…no installation required. If you have Aero enabled it will need to run in basic mode to work.

When it starts go to File and from there you can load games from the different Sega console versions they used to have out like the MasterSystem.

The select your ROM…you don’t need to unzip the files. In fact that seems the case with all the ones we tested.

The games we tested ran smoothly, the video looked great, and the controls were responsive.

You can resize the window easily including Full Screen.

You can configure the controllers to whatever works best for you. We were even able to get the XBOX 360 Controller for PC to work by assigning it controls.

Being able to customize the controls can really come in handy when you’re playing a game such as the classic Mortal Kombat!

Download Kega Fusion

Nintendo 64

By far the best Nintendo 64 emulator is Project64. It’s had some updates over the years and does a great job of emulating the N64 experience. This one you do need to install…just follow the install wizard as normal.

After installation you’ll find it under Project64 in the Start Menu.

Launch Project64 and select your language…

To load a game click on File then Open Rom…

Navigate to where your game is and double-click to start it up.

There are many neat customizations you can do with the controls. We were able to configure an XBOX 360 Controller for PC on many of the games and they were responsive. Because N64 had such an odd controller, it might be a good idea to take a look at one so you can adjust the buttons correctly.

There are also other options like changing the graphics and audio settings. The settings you can use will be based on your computer’s hardware.

Once you get your settings and controller setup, this emulator is very cool if you were a fan of N64 back in the day. The graphics are great and the frame rate was very smooth on most games.

The games play basically like the originals with previews of the games, intros, and levels.

Download Project64

Conclusion

Using emulators is a great way to re-live the glory days of your youth. Keep in mind that most are still works in progress while others have stopped development. They don’t always run perfectly either, we had problems with several of them on our Windows 7 64-bit system. If you’re worried that they might crash your system, you can always create a Virtual Machine provided you have enough system resources, and run them in there. Here is an example of running ZSNES on XP in VMware Player.

Overall, these are some great emulators that will allow you to play your favorite classic games. Remember they are emulators so some of the games may not run as perfectly as they do on the real system.

Source: http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/22721/how-to-play-your-favorite-retro-video-games-on-your-windows-pc/