It’s happened to everybody at some point—you go to install a new application, and Windows tells you to reboot first. Or reboot after. Or it asks you to close out of every other application first. Why does it do that? In today’s geek lesson we’ll explain exactly why Windows can be so irritating with all this rebooting, and hopefully give you a better perspective into why things work this way....
With all the great hardware we have available these days, it seems we should be enjoying great quality viewing no matter what, but what if that is not the case? Today’s SuperUser Q&A post seeks to clear things up for a confused reader. Today’s Question & Answer session comes to us courtesy of SuperUser—a subdivision of Stack Exchange, a community-driven grouping of Q&A web sites. Photo courtesy of lge (Flickr)....
VirtualBox is packed with features that you may have never used, even if you frequently use it to run virtual machines. VMware keeps many of its best features to its paid versions, but all of VirtualBox’s features are completely free. Many of the features here require Guest Additions installed in your virtual machine. This is good to do anyway, as installing the Guest Additions package will speed up your virtual machines....
Homegroups and network file sharing make it easy to access your PCs file from another PC on the same local network, but accessing your PC’s files over the Internet takes a bit more setup. There are many ways to make files available over the Internet. The real challenge here is finding a secure, easy-to-use solution. TeamViewer RELATED: The Best Tools to Easily Perform Remote Tech Support We recommend TeamViewer as the ideal solution for remotely accessing a PC, whether you’re accessing your own PC or performing remote tech support....
Android, iOS, Windows Phone, and BlackBerry 10 aren’t the only smartphone operating systems vying for a place in your pocket. There are other smartphone operating systems in development — and they’re all Linux-based. Google’s Android operating system is also based on Linux, although it’s very different from typical Linux distributions. Other smartphone platforms — especially Canonical’s Ubuntu Phone — are much closer to a typical Linux system. Firefox OS RELATED: Wait, Firefox is an Operating System Now?...
Apple hides a lot of additional information and useful options in your Mac’s menus. You can access these hidden options by holding down the Option key. In some cases, you may have to hold the Option key before opening a menu. In others, you can press the Option key while the menu is open and see the menu items change. Holding down the Shift key while holding down the Option key may reveal even more additional options in some menus....
Adobe Photoshop has been a paid product for its entire lifetime (unless you sail on the high seas), but now the company is testing a free version accessible through the web. The Verge reports that Adobe has started testing free access to the Photoshop web app, which initially launched in October of last year for paying Creative Cloud customers. Adobe has opened up the web app to free accounts in Canada, which the company describes as a “freemium” experience....
Wi-Fi has become such an ingrained part of our everyday lives that we tend not to give it much thought unless it has stopped working. But what if your family has a newborn baby in the house? Are there any dangers that new parents should be aware of? Today’s Question & Answer session comes to us courtesy of SuperUser—a subdivision of Stack Exchange, a community-driven grouping of Q&A web sites....
Whether it is growing older or other medical conditions that affect our eyesight, we need to make adjustments to our computers or hardware setups to make reading easy and pleasurable once again. But what is the best course of action to choose? Today’s SuperUser Q&A post offers up some advice for a reader in need of help. Today’s Question & Answer session comes to us courtesy of SuperUser—a subdivision of Stack Exchange, a community-driven grouping of Q&A web sites....
Google didn’t announce any shiny new Chromebooks at Google I/O. Instead, they highlighted their two big “platforms” — Chrome and Android. Whether you’re using Windows, Linux, or Mac, Google will be bringing the Chrome OS experience to you. Chrome has always been Google’s vision of the browser-as-operating-system. They’re about to take it to the next level, using Chrome to provide apps that run outside the browser on desktops and laptops....
In this edition of Geek School, we will be helping you understand the powerful PowerShell scripting language that is built right into Windows, and is extremely useful to know in an IT environment. While this series is not structured around an exam, learning PowerShell is one of the most important things you can do as a network administrator, so if there is one thing you want to learn to help your IT career, this is it....
Google wants to get rid of browser plug-ins, but they’re bundling quite a few with Chrome itself. On a clean install, you’ll see at least five different browser plug-ins, from the Widevine Content Decryption Module to Native Client. These plug-ins all use Chrome’s PPAPI (Pepper API) plug-in architecture, which is more modern and sandboxed. The old NPAPI plug-in architecture, still used in Firefox, is being ripped out of Chrome by September 2015....
Google revealed in a blog post, “you can now make multiple text selections at once, and apply actions such as delete, copy, paste, or format to all selections. This will make formatting and editing documents faster by eliminating the need to make repetitive changes, increasing your overall productivity.” The same functionality has been available in Microsoft Word for a while (hold down CTRL while clicking text), but it’s great to see it in Google Docs too....
Google is now selling “Google Play Edition” devices alongside its Nexus devices on the Google Play Store website. These devices are versions of popular Android phones and tablets running different software. They seem primarily intended for Android enthusiasts and developers. Unlike Nexus devices, these are currently only sold in the US. Outside the US, you’ll have to have a US-based friend order and ship one to you or buy from a reseller....
“Connected Standby” is a new feature in Windows 8. At first, only ARM devices with Windows RT supported Connected Standby. Some Intel Atom PCs with full Windows 8 now support it, too — and it will only become more common. This is Microsoft’s attempt to give Windows 8 and 8.1 the “always-on” state people get from iPads, Android tablets, and smartphones. A PC with Connected Standby can’t use other power-management states like Sleep and Hibernate....
When you have just received a nice computer without hardware documentation, how do you find out what type of drive it has without opening it up? Today’s SuperUser Q&A post provides some quick and easy solutions to help a reader find the information he needs. Today’s Question & Answer session comes to us courtesy of SuperUser—a subdivision of Stack Exchange, a community-driven grouping of Q&A web sites. Photo courtesy of Jung-nam Nam (Flickr)....
As phones get more powerful, they also generate more heat. To keep them cooler than ever, we’re starting to see more phones ship with “water cooling.” But what does that mean? Modern smartphones are small computers in your pocket—they’re incredibly powerful, with CPUs and GPUs more capable than full desktop PCs from not long ago. As a result of all this power in such a small space, keeping the hardware cool has become a challenge for device manufacturers....
The ‘time remaining’ estimations on Windows are enough to drive anyone crazy at times, but have you ever wondered how Windows determines those times? Today’s SuperUser Q&A post has some answers for a curious, yet frustrated, reader’s question. Today’s Question & Answer session comes to us courtesy of SuperUser—a subdivision of Stack Exchange, a community-driven grouping of Q&A web sites. Windows 8.1 file transfer window screenshot courtesy of im really famecore....
Portable Wi-Fi hotspots on your Android phone are great, because hotel Wi-Fi usually isn’t, but toggling that hotspot on and off is a pain. Here are several easy ways to add a hotspot widget to your home screen. Chances are pretty good you’ll need to create a portable hotspot on your Android smartphone at one time or another. Aside from the previously mentioned problems with hotel Wi-Fi, there are just places that (gulp!...
The iPhone gets powerful home screen widgets in iOS 14, but the iPad doesn’t get the same powers with iPadOS 14. No matter: There’s still a way to place widgets on your iPad’s home screen. Apple may one day add the iPhone’s powerful home screen widgets to the iPad home screen in a future update to iPadOS. For now, there’s a workaround: You can place the widgets in Today View and keep a widget area on your Home screen in landscape mode....
