Interesting Insight into your Win7 System – GodMode Folders

Just finished an interesting article in TechRepublic by Mark Kaelin that discusses a hidden feature in Windows 7 that provides some extra control over your Windows 7 Operating System. The first one that I looked at is called the Monster Control Panel that provides access to 278 items that you can tweak on your system. Microsoft creates these undocumented shortcuts to make it easy for them to test systems.

File Folder Format

To create one of these GodMode files manually, create a New Folder in Windows Explorer, and when it asks for a folder name, type in a name followed by a period and then one of the codes. The resulting file folder will take on the characteristics associated with the code. For example: Monster Control Panel.{ED7BA470-8E54-465E-825C-99712043E01C}

 

Here are 17 other folders that you can create as well.

Monster Control Panel	{ED7BA470-8E54-465E-825C-99712043E01C}
Enter a default location	{00C6D95F-329C-409a-81D7-C46C66EA7F33}
Use biometric devices with Windows	{0142e4d0-fb7a-11dc-ba4a-000ffe7ab428}
Select a power plan	{025A5937-A6BE-4686-A844-36FE4BEC8B6D}
Select which icons and notifications appear on taskbar	{05d7b0f4-2121-4eff-bf6b-ed3f69b894d9}
Store credentials for automatic logon	{1206F5F1-0569-412C-8FEC-3204630DFB70}
Install a program from the network	{15eae92e-f17a-4431-9f28-805e482dafd4}
Choose the programs that Windows uses by default	{17cd9488-1228-4b2f-88ce-4298e93e0966}
Assembly Cache Viewer	{1D2680C9-0E2A-469d-B787-065558BC7D43}
Manage wireless networks	{1FA9085F-25A2-489B-85D4-86326EEDCD87}
Network	{208D2C60-3AEA-1069-A2D7-08002B30309D}
Computer	{20D04FE0-3AEA-1069-A2D8-08002B30309D}
Devices and Printers	{2227A280-3AEA-1069-A2DE-08002B30309D}
RemoteApp and Desktop Connections	{241D7C96-F8BF-4F85-B01F-E2B043341A4B}
Windows Firewall	{4026492F-2F69-46B8-B9BF-5654FC07E423}
Windows Explorer	{62D8ED13-C9D0-4CE8-A914-47DD628FB1B0}
System	{78F3955E-3B90-4184-BD14-5397C15F1EFC}

Hope you find this as interesting as I did.

Video Conferencing on the Cheap

Skype has been around for a long time now and I find that it still is an essential tool in my arsenal daily used applications. It works into our environment at the office even more because our main service ticketing system utilizes will make use of it to dial out from the customer contact pages. It gained even more of my appreciation this past Friday when I spent most of the afternoon in video conference with our public relations person. We have been working on prepping for this weeks video projects about CES and were able to work online, with full video and sound and sharing files back and forth between our computer systems while in our separate offices. Not that this is something recently available, it was just that it was geeky neat! We were able to easily bring different people into our office and review captured video and each of were able to process the work that we each needed to complete and share with each other.

Items needed: Skype Account, Computer, Web Camera, an Internet connection and someone with the same basic setup. If you are connecting computer to computer your Skype account is free. If you want some of the other basic features that are available from Skype like calling to a non-Skype user or a land line, or having a Skype Phone Number then these services make Skype that much more useable.