Would you like to change the user interface language in any edition of Windows 7 or Vista on your computer?? Here’s a free app that can help you do this quickly and easily.

If your native language is not the one most spoken in your area, you’ve likely purchased a PC with Windows preinstalled with a language that is difficult or impossible for you to use.? Windows 7 and Vista Ultimate include the ability to install multiple user interface languages and switch between them. However, all other editions are stuck with the language they shipped with.? With the free Vistalizator app, you can add several different interface languages to any edition of Vista or Windows 7 and easily switch between them.

Note:? In this test, we used an US English copy of both Windows 7 Home Premium and Windows Vista Home Premium, and it works the same on any edition. The built-in language switching in the Ultimate Editions lets you set a user interface language for each user account, but this will only switch it for all users.?

Add a User Interface Language to Windows

To add an interface language to any edition of Windows 7 and Vista, first download Vistalizator (link below).? Then, from the same page, download the language pack of your choice.? The language packs are specific for each service pack of Windows, so make sure to choose the correct version and service pack you have installed.

Once the downloads are finished, launch the Vistalizator program. You do not need to install it; simply run it and you’re ready to go.? Click the Add languages button to add a language to Windows.

Select the user interface language pack you downloaded, and click Open.

Depending on the language you selected, it may not automatically update with Windows Update when a service pack is released.? If so, you will have to remove the language pack and reinstall the new one for that service pack at that time.? Click Ok to continue.

Make sure you’ve selected the correct language, and click Install language.

Vistalizator will extract and install the language pack.? This took around 5 to 10 minutes in our test.

Once the language pack is installed, click Yes to make it the default display language.

Now, you have two languages installed in Windows.? You may be prompted to check for updates to the language pack; if so, click Update languages and Vistalizator will automatically check for and install any updates.

When finished, exit Vistalizator to finish switching the language.? Click Yes to automatically reboot and apply the changes.

When you computer reboots, it will show your new language, which in our test is Thai.? Here’s our Windows 7 Home Premium machine with the Thai language pack installed and running.

You can even add a right to left language, such as Arabic, to Windows.? Simply repeat the steps to add another language pack.?

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Vistalizator was originally designed for Windows Vista, and works great with Windows 7 too.? The language packs for Vista are larger downloads than their Windows 7 counterparts.? Here’s our Vista Home Premium in English…

And here’s how it looks after installing the Simplified Chinese language pack with Vistalizator.

Revert to Your Original Language

If you wish to return to the language that your computer shipped with, or want to switch to another language you’ve installed, run Vistalizator again.? Select the language you wish to use, and click Change language.??

When you close Vistalizator, you will again be asked to reboot.? Once you’ve rebooted, you’ll see your new (or original) language ready to use.? Here’s our Windows 7 Home Premium desktop, back in it’s original English interface.

Conclusion

This is a great way to change your computer’s language into your own native language, and is especially useful for expatriates around the world.? Also, if you’d like to simply change or add an input language instead of changing the language throughout your computer, check out our tutorial on How to Add Keyboard Languages to XP, Vista, and Windows 7.

Download Vistalizator

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Ever been doing some work at the command line when you realized… it would be a lot easier if I could just use the mouse for this task? One command later, you’ll have a window open to the same place that you’re at.

This same tip works in more than one operating system, so we’ll detail how to do it in every way we know how.

Open a File Browser in Windows

We’ve actually covered this before when we told you how to open an Explorer window from the command prompt’s current directory, but we’ll briefly review: Just type the follow command into your command prompt:

explorer .

Note: You could actually just type “start .” instead.

And you’ll then see a file browsing window set to the same directory you were previous at. And yes, this screenshot is from Vista, but it works the same in every version of Windows.

If that wasn’t good enough, you should really read how you can navigate in the File Open/Save dialogs with just the keyboard—now that’s a Stupid Geek Trick!

Open a File Browser in Linux

For this exercise, we’re going to assume that you’re using Gnome under a Linux flavor like Ubuntu, because that’s the most common. From your terminal window, just type in the following command:

nautilus .

And the next thing you know, you’ll have a file browser window open at the current location. You’ll see some type of error message at the prompt, but you can pretty much ignore that.

You can also use “gnome-open .” if you want.

Open Finder in Mac OS X

All the Mac computers in this office are running Linux, so we haven’t had a chance to verify, but you should be able to use the following command on OS X to open Finder in the current terminal location:

open .

Open Dolphin on Linux KDE4

dolphin .

Got any extra tips to help out your fellow readers? How do you do the same thing in KDE3? What about OS X? Leave your savvy advice in the comments, and maybe we’ll update the article. Or not. Either way, it’ll help somebody!

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Keeping up with the weather forecast can be hard when you are extra busy with work. If you need a simple but nice looking way to integrate weather monitoring into your Taskbar then join us as we look at WeatherBar.

Setting Up & Using WeatherBar

To get started unzip the following files, place them in an appropriate “Program Files Folder”, and create a shortcut.

When you start WeatherBar for the first time you will be presented with the following window and a random/default location. To get WeatherBar set up for your location there are only two settings to adjust (using the “Pencil & Gear Buttons”).

Clicking on the “Pencil Button” will open up this small window…enter the name of your location and click “OK”.

Next click on the “Gear Button” where you can choose the “Update Interval” and “Measurement Format” that best suits your needs. Click “OK” when finished and WeatherBar will be ready to go.

That definitely looks nice. When you are finished viewing this window minimize it to the “Taskbar Icon” instead of clicking on the “Close Button”…otherwise the entire app will close. Left click on the “Taskbar Icon” to bring the window back up…

Hovering the mouse over the “Taskbar Icon” provides a nice thumbnail of the weather forecast.

Right clicking on the “Taskbar Icon” will display a nice mini forecast.

Conclusion

While WeatherBar may not be for everyone it does provide a nice easy way to monitor the weather from your “Taskbar” without taking up a lot of room.

Links

Download WeatherBar

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One of the biggest annoyances with a dual-boot system is having to wait for your PC to reboot to select the operating system you want to switch to, but there’s a simple piece of software that can make this process easier.

This guest article was written by Ryan Dozier from the Doztech tech blog.

With a small piece of software called iReboot we can skip the above step all together and instantly reboot into the operating system we want right from Windows. Their description says:

“Instead of pressing restart, waiting for Windows to shut down, waiting for your BIOS to post, then selecting the operating system you want to boot into (within the bootloader time-limit!); you just select that entry from iReboot and let it do the rest!”

Don’t worry about iReboot reconfiguring? your bootloader or any dual boot configuration you have. iReboot will only boot the selected operating system once and go back to your default settings.

Using iReboot

iReboot is quick and easy to install. Just download it, link below, run through the setup and select the default configuration. iReboot will automatically figure out what operating systems you have installed and appear in the taskbar. Go over to the taskbar and right click on the iReboot icon and select which operating system you want to reboot into.

This method will add a check mark on the operating system you want to boot into.

On your next reboot the system will automatically load your choice and skip the Windows Boot Manager. If you want to reboot automatically just select “Reboot on Selection” in the iReboot menu.

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To be even more productive, you can install iReboot into each Windows operating system to quickly access the others with a few simple clicks.

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iReboot does not work in Linux so you will have to reboot manually.

Then wait for the Windows Boot Manager to load and select your operating system.

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Conclusion

iReboot works on? Windows XP, Windows Vista,? and Windows 7 as well as 64 bit versions of these operating systems. Unfortunately iReboot is only available for Windows but you can still use its functionality in Windows to quickly boot up your Linux machine. A simple reboot in Linux will take you back to Windows Boot Manager.

Download iReboot from neosmart.net

Editor’s note: We’ve not personally tested this software over at How-To Geek, but Neosmart, the author of the software, generally makes quality stuff. Still, you might want to test it out on a test machine first. If you’ve got any experience with this software, please be sure to let your fellow readers know in the comments.

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If you’re doing any work with networking, you probably need to know the name of your computer. Rather than diving into Control Panel, there’s a really simple way to do this from the command prompt.

Note: If you haven’t already, be sure to read our complete guide to networking Windows 7 with XP and Vista.

To see the hostname… all you have to do is type hostname at the command prompt. Go figure, eh?

The same thing works in Linux or OS X, though you can see that most of the time the hostname is part of the prompt anyway. Note: you can also change the hostname by simply typing “hostname ”.

Of course, the easiest way to see your computer name in Windows is to just hit the Win+Break key combination, which will pop up the System pane from Control Panel.

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If you want to change it instead, you can always change your computer name easily through Control Panel.

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If you have a shared computer that your family and friends can access, you might not want them to mess around in the Control Panel, and luckily with a simple tweak you can disable it.

Disable Control Panel with Group Policy

Note: This process uses Local Group Policy Editor which is not available in Home versions of Windows 7. Skip down below for the registry hack version that works on Home editions as well.

First type gpedit.msc into the Search box in the Start menu and hit Enter.

When Local Group Policy Editor opens, navigate to User Configuration Administrative Templates then select Control Panel in the left Column. In the right column double-click on Prohibit access to the Control Panel.

In the next window, select Enable, click OK, then close out of Local Group Policy Editor.

After the Control Panel is disabled, you’ll notice it’s no longer listed in the Start Menu.

If the user tries to type Control Panel into the Search box in the Start menu, they will get the following message indicating it’s restricted.

Disable Control Panel with a Registry Tweak

You can also tweak the Registry to disable Control Panel. This will work with all versions of Windows 7, Vista, and XP. Making changes in the Registry is not recommended for beginners and you should create a Restore Point, or backup the Registry before making any changes.

Type regedit into the Search box in the Start menu and hit Enter.

In Registry Editor navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrent VersionPoliciesExplorer. Then right-click in the right pane and create a new DWORD (32-bit) Value.

Name the value NoControlPanel. Then right-click on the new Value and click Modify…

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In the Value data field change the value to “1” then click OK. Close out of Registry Editor and restart the machine to complete the process.

When you get back from reboot, you’ll notice Control Panel is no longer listed in the Start menu.

If a user tries to access it by typing Control Panel into the Search box in the Start menu…

They will get the following message indicating it is restricted, just like if you were to disable it via Group Policy.

If you want to re-enable the Control Panel, go back into the Registry and change the NoControlPanel value back to “0” then reboot the computer.

This comes in handy if you have inexperienced users working on your machine and don’t want them messing with Control Panel settings.

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If you have to deal with a lot of spreadsheets, you’re probably really bored right now. You also might be wondering how to turn a row into a column, or a column into a row. Here’s how to do it with Google Docs Spreadsheets.

If you’re an Excel user, you’re also in luck, because we’ve already shown you how to turn a row into a column, or vice-versa. It won’t make you any less bored though.

Convert a Row to a Column (or backwards)

The first thing you’ll need is a column or a row of information that you want to convert into the opposite. For our example, we’ve got this set of data that we created by using the Auto Fill options in Google Docs.

Now in another cell, you’ll need to use the TRANSPOSE function, which you can use by simply typing in the following:

=TRANSPOSE(

And then selecting the cells with the mouse, or manually typing in the range of cells you want to copy. The final function in this example was:

=TRANSPOSE(A1:A11)

Finish it off with the final ) character to complete the function, hit the Enter key, and there we are… the column was transposed over to the right.

You can use the same thing to turn columns into rows, or rows into columns—just change the range you are looking for.

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Giving a computer to somebody else? Maybe you’re putting it out on Craigslist to sell to a stranger—either way, you’ll want to make sure that your drive is completely wiped, scrubbed, and clean of any personal data. Here’s the easy way to do it.

If you only have access to an Ubuntu Live CD or thumb drive, you can actually use that instead if you prefer, and we’ve got you covered with a full guide to securely wiping your PC’s hard drive. Otherwise, keep reading.

Wipe the Drive with DBAN

Darik’s Boot and Nuke CD is the easiest way to permanently and totally destroy every bit of personal information on that drive—nobody is going to recover a thing once this is done.

The first thing you’ll need to do is download a copy of the ISO image, and then burn it to a blank CD with something really useful like Imgburn. Just choose Burn image to Disc at the start screen, select the little file icon, grab the downloaded ISO, and then go. If you need a little more help, we’ve got you covered with a beginner’s guide to burning an ISO image.

Once you’re done, stick the disc into the drive, start the PC up, and then once you boot to the DBAN prompt you’ll see a menu. You can pretty much ignore everything on here, and just type…

autonuke

And there you are, your disk is now being securely wiped.

Once it’s all done, you can remove the CD, and then either pack the PC up to sell, or re-install Windows on there if you feel like it.

More Advanced Method

If you’re really paranoid, want to run a different type of wipe, or just like fiddling with the options, you can choose F3 or hit Enter at the prompt to head to the advanced selection screen. Here you can choose exactly which drive to wipe, or hit the M key to change the method.

You’ll be able to choose between a bunch of different wipe options. The Quick Erase is all you really need though.

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So there you are, easy PC wiping in one package. What about you? Do you make sure to wipe your old PCs before giving them away? Personally I’ve always just yanked out the hard drives before I got rid of an old PC, but that’s just me.

Download DBAN from dban.org

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If you want to send an email to a contact or several contacts, you might want to keep some of the recipient email addresses private using the Bcc (Blind Carbon Copy) Field. Here’s how to do it in Outlook 2010.

It’s not enabled by default, but adding it as a field for all future emails is a simple process.

Launch Outlook and under the Home tab click on the New E-mail button.

When the new mail window opens click on the Options tab and in the Show Fields column select Bcc.

The Bcc field will appear and you can then put the contacts in there who you want to receive the mail secretly or don’t want to show a certain email address.

Now anytime you compose a message, the Bcc field is included. For more on the Bcc field check out the blog post from Mysticgeek – Keep Your Email Contacts Private.

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The problem with most system monitoring apps is that they get covered up with all of your open windows, but you can solve that problem by adding monitoring apps to the Taskbar.

Setting Up & Using SuperbarMonitor

All of the individual monitors and the .dll files necessary to run them come in a single zip file for your convenience. Simply unzip the contents, add them to an appropriate “Program Files Folder”, and create shortcuts for the monitors that you would like to use on your system.

For our example we created shortcuts for all five monitors and set the shortcuts up in their own “Start Menu Folder”.

You can see what the five monitors (Battery, CPU, Disk, Memory, & Volume) look like when running…they are visual in appearance without text to clutter up the looks. The monitors use colors (red, green, & yellow) to indicate the amount of resources being used for a particular category.

Note: Our system is desktop-based but the “Battery Monitor” was shown for the purposes of demonstration…thus the red color seen here.

Hovering the mouse over the “Battery, CPU, Disk, & Memory Monitors” on our system displayed a small blank thumbnail.

Note: The “Battery Monitor” may or may not display more when used on your laptop.

Going one step further and hovering the mouse over the thumbnails displayed a small blank window. There really is nothing that you will need to worry with outside of watching the color for each individual monitor. Nice and simple!

The one monitor with extra features on the thumbnail was the “Volume Monitor”. You can turn the volume down, up, on, or off from here…definitely useful if you have been wanting to hide the “Volume Icon” in the “System Tray”.

You can also pin the monitors to your “Taskbar” if desired. Keep in mind that if you do close any of the monitors they will “temporarily” disappear from the “Taskbar” until the next time they are started.

Note: If you want the monitors to start with your system each time you will need to add the appropriate shortcuts to the “Startup Sub-menu” in your “Start Menu”.

Conclusion

If you have been wanting a nice visual way to monitor your system’s resources then SuperbarMonitor is definitely worth trying out.

Links

Download SuperbarMonitor

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