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Call for Windows hackers (_yes_, Windows)

Wintel Love Another in Danny and my ongoing series, in which we basically beg other people to do our work and finish this Godforsaken book for us.

In today’s installment, Danny pleads your help with the one thing we’re both ready to admit we know almost nothing about: cool Windows hacking. (Yes, thanks, I do see the irony of the high and mighty Mac dork asking for help from the people he supposedly scorns [or so spins the long-discredited urban myth]).

So, of course, all the usual admonitions about Windows talk are abolished for this post. It’s Thunderdome, people! The Mac-centric people humbly yield the floor.

Thus, Danny writes…

GREETINGS PEOPLE OF EARTH

Being an O’Reilly book, our fine (and Godforsaken) book contains lots of Deep Geek solutions: Perl and Python scripts, webapp glue, that kind of thing.

I’d really really like it to be cross-platform. One of the Life Hacks rules was that it shouldn’t matter what computer you’re sitting in front of: the tricks, as much as possible, shouldn’t depend on the plumbing underneath.

Which means I’ve got a stack of really neat ideas, implemented using Linux and MacOS tricks: all of which could probably be implemented in a few lines of Windows code too, and would probably make hundreds, nay, zillions of Win users lives better.

That means I’m on the search for a few good VBScript, C#, and just general Wintel modders.If you’re interested, post a note about it here in comments or with a pointer to something cool you’ve done, and let’s talk.

I now return you to your usual programming. Ahaha. Do you see the clever pun I made there?


Like the man says, spill. Got some amazing Windows fu for us?

mattypenny's picture

Not entirely sure this is...

Not entirely sure this is the kind of thing you want, but, especially if you don't have Firefox with its cool custom search box:

MS Deskbar

The MS Search Deskbar is good for searching through Outlook and your files, but is also good for doing abbreviated web searches e.g. type 'go search_string' to do a google search.

To set this sort of stuff up see: http://www.bibleplayer.com/toolbarshortcuts/ and http://beta.toolbar.msn.com/default_suite.aspx?patch=yes

On a similar theme.....

IE Search Prefixes

http://blogs.msdn.com/msnsearch/archive/2005/03/28/403129.aspx explains how to set up search abbreviations that you can use in your IE address box e.g. type 'ms search_string' to search some microsoft site or other.

More interestingly than what the download gives you 'out of the box' though, is that you can then add your own searches.

You have to edit your registry as follows: - open regedit - navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\SearchUrl - click on SearchURL - right click and select New Key - name the key whatever abbreviation you want e.g. 'd' - click on 'Default' under the New Key - right click and select 'Modify' - enter your search string in the value e.g. 'http://del.icio.us/your_delicious_username/%s?setcount=100'

...and thats it. Looks complicated when typed out, and people issue dire warnings about editing the registry, but its simple enough when you do it.

%s is the representation of the search string you enter in the address box.

So, in the above example I type 'd psychobilly+cramps' in my address book and it shows my delicious list of stuff with those tags.

 
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