Computer Tips From A Computer Guy

Import and Export Windows Firewall Configurations
Track Your Sent Gmail Messages
5 WordPress Plugins for Adding Slideshows and Featured Content to Your Blog

Import and Export Windows Firewall Configurations

Posted: 30 Nov 2010 04:44 AM PST

These days, having an anti-virus software alone is not enough for protecting your computer against offline and online threats. It is recommended you also secure your PC by using and effectively managing your firewall system.

Firewalls secure computers by blocking prohibited programs from accessing the system. Only pre-defined and authorized applications are allowed to communicate between networks. The authorization and denial are set according to rules (both classified by the user and computer).

If you're using a Windows-based operating system (such as XP, Vista, and Windows 7), Windows Firewall is the default firewalling program installed on your computer. In Vista, Windows Firewall was greatly improved and stabilized. It was especially tuned to the business environment. One of the changes (and the most useful development) is the application of Windows Firewall with Advanced Security.

According to Microsoft, this system "is a stateful, host-based firewall that filters incoming and outgoing connections based on its configuration". It's a great improvement over the previous versions of Windows Firewall.

Through the Windows Firewall with Advanced Security, you can import and export Windows Firewall configurations to and from other machines using a policy. A policy is composed of several Windows Firewall with Advanced Security settings and three firewall profiles.

By sharing configurations, you will not have a hard time setting several computers. Instead of manually configuring a number of PC's firewall settings one at a time, you can export one policy and import them to all the machines. You can also import a policy to a Group Policy.

To start with, open Windows Firewall with Advanced Security by pressing the Start Button.

Next, type the word "firewall" to the search box.

Click Windows Firewall with Advanced Security (not Windows Firewall).

This is the system's main interface. In here, you can distribute or share a policy.

If you want to import, hit Import Policy.

It's important to note that importing a policy file will delete your current Windows Firewall settings. It will be replaced with a new Advanced Security policy.

Click the Yes button to confirm your action.

Double-click the policy file you want to import.

The distribution process will just take a second to finish. Click OK to close the setup.

On the other hand, if you want to export, press Export Policy.

Name the file and click the Save button. All policy files have the .wfw extension.

Press OK to close the export dialogue box.

After exporting, you can now share this file to other computers using the Import Policy command.

Copyright © 2007
Online Tech Tips.
Aseem Kishore (digitalfingerprint: a59a56dce36427d83e23b501579944fcakmk1980 (74.125.94.81) )

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Import and Export Windows Firewall Configurations

Track Your Sent Gmail Messages

Posted: 30 Nov 2010 03:23 AM PST

Humans are, by nature, impatient—we do not want to wait for a reply to know our emails have arrived safely. Return receipts are one way to verify when emails are read, but since recipients can deny the sending of the receipt, they are largely ineffective.

For Gmail users, there is another verification option. EmailOracle is a plugin especially for Gmail that tracks sent messages. It uses a small graphic to tell whether or not an email has been opened by the recipient—when the graphic opens, obviously the email has displayed on the recipient's screen.

To use the service, click install at the top of the homepage.

Installation directions appear for the browser you are currently using, so long as you are using Firefox, Chrome or Safari. It is not compatible with Internet Explorer. Follow the directions to install the plugin.

Once installed, go to Gmail and log in to your account. Immediately, you will notice a new link on the left navigation panel that says Tracked Emails.

Once you start tracking emails, this link will show if your sent emails have been read. This link also allows you to send reminders if an email has been read, but the recipient has not replied.

To start tracking emails, click Compose Mail, just like as with sending a normal message. Just beneath the subject entry line are two new tracking features. The first allows you to set a reminder if you have not received a reply to your email within a few days. The second option tracks whether or not the email has been read. Check the boxes next to either option to track the email.

Since EmailOracle uses a picture, the EmailOracle logo, to track whether or not the email has been viewed, tracked emails resemble advertisements for the service. To change the image to an invisible one or custom signature, you must upgrade to a paid version of the service. This is our biggest complaint about EmailOracle. Free users are also limited to just 20 tracked emails per month.

The idea of tracking sent emails with Gmail is attractive, and EmailOracle does fulfill what it promises. However, 20 email tracks per month is barely enough to understand the scope of the service, much less entice most of us to pay an extra $10/month for just 30 more tracks.

Copyright © 2007
Online Tech Tips.
Aseem Kishore (digitalfingerprint: a59a56dce36427d83e23b501579944fcakmk1980 (74.125.94.81) )

Post from:

Track Your Sent Gmail Messages

5 WordPress Plugins for Adding Slideshows and Featured Content to Your Blog

Posted: 29 Nov 2010 04:34 AM PST

Using featured content slideshows with your WordPress blog is a great way to add visual appeal. It also gives your readers a convenient way to read specific posts, without having to browse through several pages.

Sites like Yahoo and AOL even use featured content slideshows on their homepages, to hype certain articles. Here are 5 great WordPress plugins for creating featured post slideshows. Hopefully, one of them works great for your blog.

Smooth Slider – Clickonf5

Smooth Slider is an extremely customizable WordPress slideshow plugin developed by Internet Techies Clickonf5. Smooth slider is unique in that it allows for the creation of multiple sliders. It's also one of the easiest sliders to use in terms of adding posts.

Rather than having to select specific categories and enter post ids, Smooth Slider allows you add any post or page to the slider from within the edit posts screen. All you have to do is click the option to "include this post in Smooth Slider." Integrating Smooth Slider into your blog is as simple as pasting the following code:

<?php if ( function_exists( 'get_smooth_slider' ) ) {   get_smooth_slider(); } if(have_posts()) : while(have_posts()) : the_post();    ....(rest of the loop code) ?>

Featured Content Gallery – iePlexus

The name for this plugin says it all. Featured Content Gallery has some of the coolest slide transitions out of all the WordPress sliders. Posts and pages can be easily added to the slider using WordPress custom fields, from the edit posts/pages screen.

Featured Content Gallery is also one of the most updated slide show plugins. Integrating Featured Content Gallery into your blog is as simple as adding the following code:

<?php include (ABSPATH . '/wp-content/plugins/featured-content-gallery/gallery.php'); ?>

Featurific – Breeze Computer Consulting

Featurific is another plugin with a lot of customization options. It even comes with 25 different themes to choose from. Posts and pages are added to the Featurific slider using custom tags. Featurific is available completely free. However, you can choose to upgrade to Featurific Pro, which gives you several additional options and tech support.

d13slideshow – Dave Waller (d13design)

d13slideshow is a great lightweight plugin that has all the basic functionality one would expect in a featured posts plugin, without all of the added bells and whistles. It does however, have a couple of convenient settings such as: adjustable height and width, 10 post limiting, and timing controls.

If you are looking to create a simple, basic slideshow, d13slideshow is a great choice. d13slideshow can be added to a WordPress blog easily by inserting the following code:

<?php d13slideshow(): ?>

featPlug – Huseyin Uslu

featPlug is a multi purpose slideshow plugin used to easily integrate slideshows and banners into a WordPress blog. It is also widget compatible. Meaning, you could add it to your blog simply and easily, in the same way you would add any other widget. It also supports direct call into template using the following codes:

featplug_wp_render()

featplug_wp_render_slideshow()

featplug_wp_render_banners()