Easily Add Shortcuts in Windows 8 for Shutdown and Restart

I have been using Windows 8 as my primary OS since the past week and am overall quite happy with the various UI improvements. The Metro Tiles interface is primarily designed for the touch screen but it’s equally easy to navigate with a mouse and keyboard.
They got rid of the Start Menu in Windows 8 and as a side-result, there’s no dedicated menu option available to quickly shut-down or restart your Windows 8 computer.

How to Shutdown, Restart or Log Off in Windows 8

The regular approach I this. As there are no “shutdown” buttons in Windows 8, you can switch to the desktop view and press Alt+F4 to bring the Shut Down menu or the other option is that you press the shortcut key Win+C, go to Settings –> Power –> Shut down.
That’s too many steps especially when you are in a dual-boot environment and need to switch from one OS to another.
Wouldn’t it more convenient if you could create simple tiles – like any other metro app – and place them on the Windows 8 desktop so that you can Shut down, Log off or Restart your Windows 8 computer with a simple click (or tap).
Enter createButtons.vbs – this is a simple utility (or rather a script) that will automatically add Shut Down and other related buttons to your Windows 8 screen. There’s no installation required – just download the file to your desktop and double-click to create the various buttons.
Here’s a video demo of the script in action:

Also, here’s the full source code of the VB script in case you are curious to know what it does behind the scenes. It may not be the most efficient piece of code but it will do the trick.

'
' This script will create shortcuts in the Start Menu
' Written by Amit Agarwal - 06/03/2012
' Web: http://labnol.org/?p=20989
' Version: 0.1
'
set WshShell = WScript.CreateObject("WScript.Shell")
strStartMenu = WshShell.SpecialFolders("StartMenu")
set oShellLink = WshShell.CreateShortcut(strStartMenu & "\Shutdown.lnk")
oShellLink.TargetPath = "%systemroot%\System32\shutdown.exe"
oShellLink.Arguments = "-s -t 0"
oShellLink.WindowStyle = 1
oShellLink.IconLocation = "%systemroot%\System32\shell32.dll,27"
oShellLink.Description = "Shutdown Computer (Power Off)"
oShellLink.WorkingDirectory = "%systemroot%\System32\"
oShellLink.Save
Set oShellLink = Nothing
set oShellLink = WshShell.CreateShortcut(strStartMenu & "\Log Off.lnk")
oShellLink.TargetPath = "%systemroot%\System32\shutdown.exe"
oShellLink.Arguments = "-l"
oShellLink.WindowStyle = 1
oShellLink.IconLocation = "%systemroot%\System32\shell32.dll,44"
oShellLink.Description = "Log Off (Switch User)"
oShellLink.WorkingDirectory = "%systemroot%\System32\"
oShellLink.Save
Set oShellLink = Nothing
set oShellLink = WshShell.CreateShortcut(strStartMenu & "\Restart.lnk")
oShellLink.TargetPath = "%systemroot%\System32\shutdown.exe"
oShellLink.Arguments = "-r -t 0"
oShellLink.WindowStyle = 1
oShellLink.IconLocation = "%systemroot%\System32\shell32.dll,176"
oShellLink.Description = "Restart Computer (Reboot)"
oShellLink.WorkingDirectory = "%systemroot%\System32\"
oShellLink.Save
Set oShellLink = Nothing
Wscript.Echo "Created Shutdown, Restart and Log Off buttons"

Listen to Pandora Anywhere Without Using a Proxy

Pandora Radio is a popular online radio station and music discovery service where you can type the name of your favorite song (or artist) and the service will automatically create a station playing similar music. The Pandora service is free (supported by ads) though there’s a premium version as well that carries no advertising.
Pandora’s music streaming service is currently available only inside the United States, possibly due to licensing agreements, and anyone accessing Pandora outside the U.S. is redirected to the restricted page.

How to Listen to Pandora Outside United States

There are workarounds though. Since Pandora uses the IP address of a use to determine their physical (geographic) location, a person outside the U.S. can use some sort of a proxy server or a VPN to fake a US IP address and get around the block.
That involves some work and it is not always easy to find reliable proxy servers so here’s a much simpler workaround:

1. If you are on Firefox, install the HTTPS Everywhere extension developed by EFF and restart the browser.
2. If you are on Google Chrome, install the HTTPS Enforcer extension. Then click the extension’s icon in the Chrome address bar and set the status to enable.
3. Now open the Pandora website in your browser and you should be able to use Pandora just like any other user inside the United States.

The music will stream as long as the HTTPS extension is enabled in your browser. Also, if you are on Firefox, the default settings of the extension are good enough to enjoy Pandora.

These HTTPS related extensions enable secure browsing (HTTPS) on sites that support it (including Pandora) so if you are using http://pandora.com, they will automatically redirect you to https://pandora.com. And as it turns out, the IP address based filtering is probably not active for sites that access Pandora using the secure protocol.
This workaround was originally shared on reddit.com. Picture Credit: @Tsevis.

Smileys & Symbols are just a tap away in Windows 8

Windows 8 includes a new touch keyboard that will help you quickly insert smileys in your chat conversations. The keyboard also contains an extensive collection of symbols that you can add to your documents and tweets with a single tap (or click).
This touch keyboard of Windows 8 is optimized for the tablet screen but you can also easily use it on a regular desktop as well with your mouse.

Adding Smileys & Symbols in Windows 8

To get started, press the Windows Key + R shortcut to open the Run box in Windows 8, type the command tabtip and hit Enter. Alternatively, switch to the desktop view in Windows 8 (press the Windows Key), right-click any empty area in the task bar and choose Toolbars -> Touch Keyboard.

Once the Touch Keyboard is visible on your screen, just tap (or click) the Smiley key on the virtual keyboard and the different alphabet keys will be replaced with emoticons. Tap the arrow keys on the keyboard  to further navigate to the other screens of emoticons and symbols.

Here’s a little video of the new Touch Keyboard of Windows 8 in action. The is much better than the confusing layout of the Character Map utility that currently ships with Windows.

Google’s own Font ‘Roboto’ is Available for Free Download

Roboto is a beautiful sans-serif font that was specially designed by Google for Android mobile phones and tablets.
The previous Android phones shipped with the Droid Sans family of fonts but with the release of Ice Cream Sandwich, or Android 4.0, Google made Roboto the default system font powering the entire Android UI from menus to buttons to on-screen text.

Download Roboto Font from Google

The .ttf (True Type Font) files of Roboto have been available on various file sharing sites for a while but, like all the other Google Web Fonts, Roboto is now “officially” available as a free download on android.com. The font is released under the Apache Software License so you can use the font in pretty much any project.
This brings two possibilities. You can now use Roboto with various Microsoft Office programs and graphic design tools like Photoshop. Or if you have an older Android phone, you can grab an app like Font Changer and set Robot as your default font without upgrading to Ice Cream Sandwich. You’ll however have to “root” your Android device to change the system font which may not be worth the risk for most people.

Google Roboto vs Helvetica Neue

Helvetica Neue is the default typeface of Apple iPhone and some typographers were quick to notice visual similarities between Roboto and Helvetica. [via LA Times]

The Online Edition of Encyclopedia Britannica is Free for a Week

Photograph of the first edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica

The big news of the day is that Encyclopedia Britannica, the world’s best-known and most-reliable reference encyclopedia that was first published more than two centuries ago, will no longer be available in print.
If your budget permits and your bookshelf has enough space to accommodate the 32-volume set, you can still grab the classic printed edition of the Britannica set from Amazon.com but once their existing stock is finished, the encyclopedia will only be available in digital format.

The editors also announced that the online edition of Britannica, available at britannica.com, will be “entirely free for a full week beginning today.” For instance, here’s a detailed entry on Encyclopaedia Britannica about Encyclopaedia Britannica.

The Britannica website follows the WSJ model – you can read the first few paragraphs of any article for free but the full content is only available to subscribers. If you haven’t explored Britannica earlier because of the pay-wall, now be a good time as they have opened the entire archive to non-subscribers for the full week.

Unlike Wikipedia which is ad-free, the online edition of Britannica uses Google Ads to monetize their content. And in case you haven’t seen it before, here’s a TV commercial for Encyclopedia Britannica from the pre-Internet days.

Apps to Manipulate PDF Files on your iOS Device

Your iPad or the iPhone are excellent devices for reading PDF files but if you are also looking for a way to manipulate PDF documents on your iOS device itself, do check out PDF splicer.

With PDF Splicer, you can easily delete pages from a PDF document, combine multiple PDFs into one file or you can move pages from one PDF file into another using copy and paste.

The app can also be used to create PDF documents from scratch using the various images available in your Photo Gallery. While you are in the Photo Gallery app, just copy an image to the clipboard, switch to PDF Splicer and choose Insert External Clipboard Image to put that image into a PDF document.

If you have a scanned PDF file (like a fax) where the the orientation of images is not proper, you can easily rotate those pages in either direction using PDF Splicer and export the changes into another PDF file.

The PDF Splicer app is $4.99 but it’s currently available for free so this is something you should not miss.
Also, if you want to edit PDF files on your iPad /iPhone, an app like Good Reader may be a better choice. Here you have an option to type text directly on PDF pages, you can highlight paragraphs like a yellow marker or annotate pages using the various freehand drawing tools. This is one of my favorite apps for the iPad.

Let Others Contact You Through Your Own Wi-Fi Network

The Wi-Fi network at your home has a public name, also known as SSID, that will often show up on your neighbor’s computer or any other mobile device that is within the range of your wireless network.
The name of a wireless network (or SSID) rarely says anything about the owner of that network and that’s good because most people won’t like the idea of sharing their Wi-Fi network with others. Some have even suggested using scary and unusual names for SSIDs (like “Police Van”) to discourage Wi-Fi theft.

Change SSID to Advertise your Wi-Fi Network

However, if you are on the other side and want people to actually use your Wireless connection – maybe for a monthly fee – a free service like Wifis.org can be of some help.

WiFis.org provides you a unique URL like www.wifis.org/labnol. You need to change your network’s name (SSID) to that URL and it will then show up under “Available Wireless Networks” on other computers that are within your wireless range.

If your neighbors happen to type that URL in the browser, they’ll see a contact form which they can use (“Hi, Can I borrow your Wi-Fi for an hour?”) to directly get in touch with you but without knowing your real email address.

You can also write your WiFis.org SSIDs as wif.is/<username> or <username>.wifis.org.
This is definitely a neat idea though there’s an alternative as well. You can create a special email address to advertise your Wi-Fi network in the neighborhood and then set it as your SSID – something like BorrowMyWifiATgmailDOTcom. In either case, do make sure that your Wi-Fi is secured with WPA2.