The radio show This American Life has a great show When Patent’s Attack about the terrible state of US software patents. Patent holding companies (like Intellectual Ventures and Lodsys) sue and extort money out of small developers. Good stuff. Hopefully some people in Congress hear this.
Speed Up PC
I was recently asked to speed up a slow laptop. Here are the steps that I took:
- Apply Windows Updates: The computer had downloaded lots of updates (including Vista Service Pack 2) that were just waiting to be installed. This was a multi-step process since not all the updates could be updated in one package.
- Run Spinrite: This checks for and automatically fixes hard drive problems
- Remove Browser Toolbars: Google, Yahoo, and other toolbars in Internet Explorer and Firefox just slow down and junk up the browser without any real benefits.
- Remove Google Desktop: This is a redundant desktop search tool that just slows down the computer.
- Open Windows Task Manager, search for processes, and remove unnecessary applications and start-up items. This is done from Add/Remove Programs, from the startup folder and from msconfig.
- Turn off Windows sidebar: This feature available in Windows 7 and Vista by default just loads pictures and a clock which people don’t use.
- Remove some Windows features, as mentioned in 12 Ways to Speed Up and Slim Down Windows Vista.
- Update Firefox: Firefox 4 has significant speed improvements.
- Remove paid Antivirus and install Microsoft Security Essentials which typically uses fewer system resources and is a good and free Antivirus.
- Run Disk Defragmenter
- Update Power Settings: This laptop’s settings were to run the CPU at a max of 50% both when unplugged (to save the battery) and also when plugged in. The max CPU should be set to 100% when plugged in unless the computer is having overheating problems.
- Install Foxit Reader: This is faster and less annoying than Adobe Acrobat which I removed.
Microsoft Safety Scanner
Microsoft recently released Microsoft Safety Scanner, a simple on-demand virus scanning tool that works happily alongside other virus protection software. For example, you can use it alongside the always-running anti-virus offered by Microsoft Security Essentials.
See your iPhone Travel History
iPhone Tracker is a new desktop application that allows people to see where their iPhone has logged it’s travels. My iPhone has kept it’s entire travel history, going back to June 2010 when I got my iPhone 4. iPhone Tracker uses the data from your iPhone backups in iTunes.
It’s a little buggy, but still an interesting way to see your travels.
iPhone Tracker is can be downloaded for Mac and Windows.
It appears that the iPhones (like other phones) keep this data to provide GPS applications with your last location and make it easier to quickly attain your current location. If you want to protect your iTunes backup from divulging this information, go to your iPhone Summary page in iTunes and check off Encrypt iPhone backup.
Print From iOS To Any Printer or PDF For Free
While Apple has technically enabled the printer function on iPhones, iPads, and iPod Touches, printing only works currently on 18 specific models of HP printers.
AirPrint Activator
To enable printing to any printer attached to your Mac, use the free AirPrint Activator (formerly AirPrint Hactivator).
It’s a simple program. I’ve been using a beta of version 2 without problems.
PDF Printing
You can print to a PDF by downloading and installing the CUPS-PDF Installer. Share that printer for it to show up on your AirPrint Activator list.
Automator to Move the PDF / Dropbox
The CUPS-PDF Installer prints to your folder:
/Users/Shared/CUPS-PDF/[your account]
or, for iOS devices, to:
/Users/Shared/CUPS-PDF/ANONYMOUS
Those aren’t easy places to find your PDF, so we’ll automatically move those files when they arrive.
Open Automator (Applications – Automator), then select the “Folder Action” template. This will allow you to choose the CUPS-PDF folder where your printed files go by default. Then drag over the library action “Move Finder Items” and choose where you want the file moved to. You might want to move the file to your desktop. I chose to move the files to a Dropbox sub-folder called CUPS Print Jobs, automatically backing them up and making them accessible to me through the Dropbox app or GoodReader app on my iPhone and iPad.
I set up this Automator action for both my CUPS folders that are printed to, the folder from my user account (used when printing to CUPS-PDF from my Mac) and the ANONYMOUS folder (used when printing to CUPS-PDF from iOS devices).
In order to allow Automator to move files from the ANONYMOUS folder, you need to go to it in the finder (/Users/Shared/CUPS-PDF/ANONYMOUS), CTRL-click on it, select Get Info and add yourself to the permissions for that folder.
Other Options
If these instructions are too much for you and you have $19.95 burning a hole in your pocket, you can do the same thing with Printopia 2.
These features also should be appearing in updates from Apple at some point in the future.