Composition: Hyperscore (MIT)

I first encountered Hyperscore on one of the many fascinating TED.com video podcasts. It is a product of the MIT Media Lab and enables anyone irrespective of age, physical conditions or training to compose music in an intuitive and fun way. The software costs US$79 to download, but whether you actually buy it or not, it’s well worth simply checking the Website: http://www.hyperscore.com/. Alternately, you can take a quick look at the TED.com video: Releasing the music in your head (Tod Machover & Dan Ellsey)

Windows: Mouse and Keyboard

Keyboard Speed
You can adjust several settings to suit your preference:

• Repeat rate: A measure of how many times per second that characters are repeated once you’ve held down the key long enough to begin repeating letters, numbers, or symbols
• Repeat delay: A measure of how long you must hold down a key before that character repeats
• Cursor blink rate: This setting doesn’t affect your typing speed. Rather, it controls how quickly the cursor blinks on and off
• To access these keyboard settings, choose Start > (Settings >) Control Panel > Keyboard. Next, choose the Speed tab. You’ll see slider controls for the three settings. Adjust them as you wish.

Mouse Keys
Have you ever wondered if there was a way to move your mouse pointer around without using your mouse?

• Go to Start > (Settings >) Control Panel (this must be done before losing the Mouse) and select the Accessibility Options icon
• Click on the Mouse tab and check the “Use Mouse Keys” option
• Click OK, and press the Alt + Shift + Num Lock buttons and you can use your numeric keypad to move your pointer instead of a mouse

Keyboard Browsing

• You can use the Tab, Shift, and Enter keys to navigate the World Wide Web.
• Use the Tab key to step through links on a page
• When a desired link is highlighted, press Enter to go there
• To step backward through the links (bottom of the page to the top) press Shift + Tab

Copy a File with a Mouse/Keyboard Combo
Drag the file while holding down the CTRL key. A “+” will appear on the icon. When you release the mouse button a copy of the file will be created.

Duplicating the Right Mouse Click
Select a file. Pressing the Shift + F10 key will be the same as clicking the right-mouse button.

Windows: Process Idle Tasks

Running multiple applications simultaneously for long periods leads to a gradual decrease in system performance over time. Often the only option is a restart. Even if you close the application in the Task Manager, the tasks/threads associated with the application are not released completely, depleting the system’s memory resources making the system unstable and sluggish. The following tip is designed to offer fast relief:

1. Right-click on your desktop and select New > Shortcut
2. In the text box enter the command:
   %windir%\system32\rundll32.exe advapi32.dll,ProcessIdleTasks
3. Click Next. In the next screen, name the shortcut: for example, Clear Memory
4. Click on Finish

Whenever you feel that the system is sluggish you can double click on this shortcut and it will take care of the idle tasks by removing them. This can be used before you resort to restarting/rebooting the system.

Windows: The Dark World of CMD

One of the fastest ways of doing things in Windows XP is to use DOS commands. This week’s tip deals with the mysterious command line interface and some of the many things that can be done with it.

• Getting started
  • To open the command prompt: Start > Run…, type cmd and hit Enter.
  • If you need to type lengthy file or folder name, you can drag the file or folder from Windows Explorer directly into the DOS command line interface.
  • If you would like help for any command, type the command name followed by a space, then/?, e.g. dir /?.
• Some useful commandsassoc – Displays which programs will open the file with .xyz extension.
  It can be used either to display or modify file extension associations. If you just type assoc then it will display the list of all file extensions and associated programs used to open that file. For example, assoc .doc will show you the name of the program which the file is associated with.attrib – Displays and changes file attributes (i.e. make hidden files visible).
  It displays, sets, or removes the read-only, archive, system, and hidden attributes assigned to files or directories. For example, if you want to edit a desktop.ini file that’s hidden you can use attrib commands to unhide it and edit it.
  • attrib tips: “+” – adds an attribute. “-” – removes an attribute
    Example: C:\Documents and Settings\d045244>attrib resume.doc +r or C:\Documents and Settings\d045244>attrib rk-resume.doc +a -h
    Key: a = Archive, r = Read-Only, h = Hidden, s = System

  cd – Displays a list of files and subdirectories in a directory and also can change directory or folder (i.e. Directory is called folder in windows world).
  It displays the name of the current directory or can change the current folder.

  • Display the name of the current drive and folder: cd
  • Change directory to another path: cd pathName

  cls – Clears the command prompt window.

  control – Launch Control Panel from command prompt.
  This allows you to launch control panel applets from the command line.

  dir – Displays a list of a directory’s files and subdirectories.
  If it is used without parameters, dir displays the disk’s volume label and serial number, followed by a list of directories and files on the disk, including their names and the date and time each was last modified. For files, dir displays the name extension and the size in bytes; dir also displays the total number of files and directories listed, their cumulative size, and the free space (in bytes) remaining on the disk. Some examples:

  • List the contents of the current directory: c:\>dir
  • Lists contents of a path: e.g. dir c:\program files
  • Wildcards: *
    Wildcard usage: c:/windows/system32>dir *.exe – will display files with .exe extension or c:/windows/system32>dir *.* – will display the file with any extensions.

  driverquery – Displays a list of all installed device drivers and their properties.

  systeminfo – Know your computer configuration.
  It displays detailed configuration information about your computer and its operating system. It includes operating system configuration, security information, product ID, and hardware properties, such as RAM, disk space, and network cards etc.

  tree – It displays the directory structure of a path or of a disk drive graphically.
  Windows XP doesn’t have direct command to print directory content so you can do that by combining following commands together.

  Try this tree DOS command and redirect the output to a text file.

  • tree > directorycontent.txt
  • print directorycontent.txt

  The file will be stored under the location you are currently working in, like C:\Documents and Settings\UserID.

  type – View txt files in command prompt without opening it with Notepad It displays the contents of a text file. The type command is mostly used to view text files without modifying them.

• Related links
  Lots more can be found in Microsoft’s Command-line reference documentation.