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DADDY BOB'S
COMPUTER Q & A
March 5, 2006 Q. I
accidentally deleted the icon in the Quick Launch toolbar
that shows the desktop. How can I get it back?
A.
Open Notepad and enter this exactly as shown:
[Shell]
Command=2
IconFile=explorer.exe,3
[Taskbar]
Command=ToggleDesktop
Now, click Save As and go to C:\Documents and
Settings\All Users\Application Data\Microsoft\Internet
Explorer\Quick Launch. Save the file with the name "Show
Desktop.scf". Be sure to include the quotations or the file
name will be appended with a .txt extension.
If all that seems a little too difficult, then
to make things easier, I have written a little setup program
(280KB) that
will do it for you. This program will create the
needed file and put it in the correct folder for you. You
can download this program by clicking
HERE.
You can
choose to RUN it or SAVE it. Either way you will be
presented with security warnings about this type of file.
Most browsers will warn about running or opening any .exe
(executable) file that you download from the Internet, and
it is good advice to follow unless you know and trust the
source. Note: DaddyBob is a trusted source :-)
There is also a much easier,
and to my thinking, better way to show the desktop. I much preferred this to using the Show
Desktop icon in the task bar. In fact, to reduce clutter I
delete the Show Desktop icon from the taskbar.
Unless your keyboards
is very old, there is a
key called the Windows key located between
the CTRL and ALT keys in the lower left side of the
keyboard. It will be designated by having the Windows icon on it. There
will probably also be one located on the lower right side of the keyboard.
The Windows logo looks like this
To display or
show the desktop, hold this Windows key down and
press the "D" key. (D=Desktop) Note too that this key press is
a "toggle" type, meaning that if you press it again, it will
restore whatever was on the desktop before you pressed it
the first time.
Another
Windows key press that is similar is
the Windows + "M" key press combination. (M=Minimize)
This will show the desktop, but is not a toggle function
although it can be reversed by holding the Windows and Shift
keys and then pressing "M". Also, Windows + "M" will not close
most dialog boxes and some Control Panel windows, but
Windows + "D" will close everything. To see all the Windows
key press combinations possible click on the "Shortcut Keys"
in the Topics on the left of this screen.
Q. I had an email rejected because it had a
potentially executable attachment "sample.eml". I was
told that this form of attachment has been used by
recent viruses or other malware. If I meant to send
this file then I should package it as a zip file and
resend it. How would I package it as a zip file?
A. To zip a file
you need a zipping program like Winzip, (www.winzip.com)
the most popular one. There are many others, but by
far, WinZip is the best known and used.
However, there is another
way you can send a file like an .eml, .exe, or any
executable file without actually zipping it. Just
rename the file and change the extension from .eml
to .zip. That won't actually zip the file and it
won't actually change it, but it will allow it to
get past most email filters.
Just remember to tell the
person you send it to what you have done, so they can
change the extension back to .eml to view the file.
If you are using a recent version of Windows, as they were installed by default, you won't be able
to see the extension in the file name. A file name
like "sample.eml" will be shown as being just
"sample". Microsoft, in all their wisdom, decided
that letting the end user see the file extension
would be so confusing, that they turned all known
extensions off, so they wouldn't be displayed.
In reality, not seeing the extension is what causes
the confusion. It is possibly to have several files
named the same thing with only their extension being
different. If you have three files called myprog,
they could actually be myprog.exe, myprog.ico, and
myprog.dll. However, they would all appear to be
just myprog without their extensions displayed. To
me, that causes confusion, not lessens it.
So, how do we make Windows show us the full file
name? Open the My Computer folder, click on Tools in
the menu, then on Folder Options. Click the View tab
and scroll down to the item "Hide extensions for
known file types", and uncheck the box in front of
it. Click OK. Now, all the file names will show
their extension. The 'known" in this option
referrers the file being associated with a program,
and thus "known" to Windows, not necessarily known
to you.
By the
way, it is not necessary to click the "Apply" button before
clicking the "Close" button. Both will make the change.
Apply makes the change and leaves the dialog window open for
further changes, while close makes the change and closes the
window. |
