Windows XP tips

Windows XP tips (15aug2010)

Favourite fixed width fonts

You develop setting in your editor the 'Courier New' font? Try to use the 'Consolas' fonts (search at Microsoft™ for the 'Consolas Font Pack'), you'll love them

Smoothing fonts

If you have a LCD monitor, may be worthwhile to activate the Windows ClearType^™ feature using the [link]

ClearType PowerToy

Customized folder icons

You can customize Windows folder icons using desktop.ini files: here are some examples:

XP_CustFolders.7z (1843KB)

Windows Script Host

Learn how to take advantege of WSH, see [wsh]

Windows Script Host scripts

Alternative Data Streams

There is a feature of NTFS file system that allows to embed hidden data in a file:

C:\> echo some text content > file.txt

C:\> echo hidden data > file.txt:hidden.txt
C:\> notepad file.txt:hidden.txt

C:\> type program.exe file.txt:run.exe
C:\> start .\file.txt:run.exe

C:\> echo ^<html^>^<body^>^<? echo "worked" ?^>^</body^>^</html^> > x.php
C:\> type x.php > t.txt:x.php
C:\> http://test/file.txt:x.php