Find Visual Studio Keyboard Shortcuts In VS 2008

As we work on Visual Studio day in and day out, knowing keyboard shortcuts will always save time. I was wondering is there any way Visual Studio Can display the list of keyboard short cuts it supports. Well there is a way..!

Go to Tools>Options dialog box. On the left pan select Environment>Keyboard.

On the right pan you can see List of commands Visual Studio supports and Shortcuts for Selected command. You can filter the list by entering filter string such as “debug.quickwatch” in the “Show commands Containing” box.

You can also download a poster containing all VS shortcuts from this link.

 

Access “Computer Management” even if it is blocked…

Some times security policies specify on blocking few Control Panel items such as “Computer Management”. You will be presented with a message box which says The snap-in below, referenced in this document, has been restricted by policy. Contact your administrator for details.”

But we may have to access it for reasons such as viewing/enabling Indexing services. In such cases you can you can use the following method to open Computer Management.

Go to Start> Run; type cmd and hit Enter Key.

Enter the following DOS command at the prompt

at 10:35am /interactive “cmd.exe”

where 10:35am is the time at which you are scheduling a job to start. Best way is to enter a time which is 1 minute more than the system time. So the job starts once the system time becomes the time you have mentioned.

Another command window opens up at the specified time.

Enter “compmgmt.msc” without the quotes at the prompt on the new command window and hit enter. Voila….! Computer management opens up….!

Use this trick only in genuine situations like the one I mentioned and don’t get in to a mess for violating the policy.If you want more help on “at” DOS command enter “at /?” without the quotes at the DOS prompt and hit enter to see the DOS documentation for the command.

For full list of DOS commands, check this link.

 

Finding a route is easier than ever…!

Last month Google came up with its “Directions” service. Since now there are considerable number of websites which provide directions service, I just thought of sharing my findings on the same.

Now basically there are three major web resources which provide mapping services for free; Google, Windows Live, Yahoo . Of these Google started its directions service recently.

Prior to Google Windows Live Directions was my favorite. Now Google added few more features to the features list which were available with Windows Live. For example You can specify criteria such as Avoid Tolls, Avoid Highways, Directions by Car, Flight, Distance in KM etc…. which are helpful in real time.

Windows Life provides only two options i.e. Shortest time and Shortest distance.

What’s more..? with Google directions you can now find out a way to MG Road (Bangalore) form your place….! Which is not possible with Windows Live or Yahoo.  It seems Yahoo needs to add data related to India; even I could not get a route map for Delhi to Mumbai. Where was New York to Chicago returned a result….!

Bottom line is I will go with Google Maps rather than any other…!

If you want a site specific to Indian Cities then try try http://btis.in/. It provides bus routes, live traffic, directions and so on.

 

Use Notepad to maintain a Diary…

There are many software which can help you maintain your diary, to dos etc… but you can use the windows default editor “Notepad” to do the same.

Open Notepad and enter “.LOG” without quotes as it is and save it with any name and .txt extension. Next time when you open the file, Notepad will automatically insert the date and time at which it is opened.

Don’t you think it’s a good undocumented feature…?

 

Enable Hibernation in Vista…

If you have used Hibernate feature in windows XP and wondering where is Hibernate option in windows Vista… here is how you can enable.

Open start menu and just type “Command” without quotes in the search bar. Vista automatically searches and displays the Command Prompt. Right click on the Command Prompt and choose “Run as Administrator“

 

In the command prompt enter “powercfg /hibernate on” as it is without the quotes and hit enter.

 

That’s all it takes. Now if you open up start menu and click on the small arrow button next to the sleep button you can see Hibernate option.

(I Tried it with Vista Ultimate)

 

Shut Down Vista Tweak…!

If you are new to Windows vista, I am sure you will definitely search here and ther for “Shut Down” option. Beause it is hidden in a pop up menu… Luckily windows provides a way to change the Sleep button that appears up front to Shut Down button. Just follow the procedure…. go to

Control Panel > Power Options > Change Plan Settings > Change advanced power settings > Power Buttons and Lid > Start menu power button

Change the setting from Sleep to Shut Down.

 

Voila..! now you can shutdown windows easily as the button appears up front…

 

Find that Tricky Word to Recall…

Did you ever face a situation where in you have the word’s meaning in your mind but can’t recall it….? Say for example you know the word starts with “imb” and its meaning is “insane” how will you zero in on the exact word..?

 

A web tool called “Tip of My Tongue” will help you in such situations. The tool helps you find words based on the starting, ending, middle characters; based on meaning, length so on and so fourth…

Now onwards whenever you find it difficult to recall a word you can easily gind it out with “Tip of My Tongue”….!

 

Google Bookmark for You…!

I was looking for a good free on-line bookmark service. After a long search on google, I found out that google has its own bookmarking service. The funny part is, search in google will not show link a google’s bookmark service…! 

 You can add all your web links and organize them in different categories. These categories are called as “Labels” in google terminology. You can manage labels as well as the links you have added. You can also export all the links as a html page.

Click Here to reach google bookmarks. Prerequisite is you need to have a google account.

 

Download YouTube Video, The Easiest Way Ever…!

Did you know the simplest way to save those YouTube videos to your Hard Disk? Then here it is… Read on to find out.

Select the URL of the video in the address bar and add the word “kiss” (without quotes) before youtube. For example if your URL is http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=24IR80zJeaE   then change it to http://www.kissyoutube.com/watch?v=24IR80zJeaE and press Enter key on the keyboard. Another page will load which allows you to download the video. This executes a Java applet called kissyoutube so you need JRE (Java Runtime Environment) 1.4.2_xx or higher. You can download the latest version of JRE from here.

Don’t you think this is the simplest way to download your favorite YouTube Video..? Give your comments…!

 

Spell Check in MS Word with Caps Lock on…!

Did you ever wonder why on earth MS word ignores all spelling mistakes if they are in upper case? Didn’t you ever search for a way to make MS Word verify words in upper case also? Then it’s time to do just that…!

If you use MS Word 2003 then Go to Tools>Options>Spelling and Grammar tab. Uncheck the “Ignore words in uppercase” checkbox and click on OK.

If you use Word 2007, click on Office button at the left top and choose “Word Options”. Select Proofing on the left pan, uncheck the “Ignore words in uppercase” checkbox and click on OK. Following image shows how you can do it in Word 2007.

Now onwards MS word will catch that silly spell mistake even if you are typing in UPPERCASE…!