List All Files and Folders with DOS tree

I’m constantly amazed by how often I turn to DOS to finish a task. The more Microsoft tries to push us into a graphical world, good ‘ole command line brings us back in. Perhaps this is why so many prefer to run Linux.

Anyway, I recently needed to generate a list of every folder and file that is in a particular directory. Windows XP doesn’t offer a way to do this and I’m not aware that Vista does either. So, to DOS I turned once again to make this list. It only required typing one little command and, when it was done, I had a nice little text file that presented my list in a fully expanded tree. Read more

Adobe Lightroom Workflow – Importing Photos

What? You’re not using Adobe Lightroom? Well, you should be. Lightroom is a very powerful image editor and management system, and since it was created by Adobe then it integrates great with Photoshop. It has quickly become a vital program in my photography workflow and one of the easiest programs to recommend to friends who are looking for a better way to manage and edit photos.

The starting point of any workflow is the importing of the files. (Yes, I know the actual starting point is the creation of the photos, but for the sake of staying within the scope of this article, let’s agree that our starting point begins with the import). This is the foundation of your workflow, getting your photos imported to relevant locations on your hard drive and named accordingly.

This article details the steps I take when importing files in Lightroom. There are no definitive right ways to import your files, so I am by no means preaching the gospel here. I’m just offering suggestions on what has helped me over the past few years in organizing my photos for effective use and archiving. Read more

Mozy Remote Backup

As you know, everyone needs to backup their computer files. Mozy is the first and only full-featured, remote backup system in the world that’s offered for free. And as of this writing, Mozy also offers unlimited backup for just $4.95 a month (or $54.50 a year). If you have files your care about, or files that you can’t replace, there’s really no excuse to not have everything backed up. Mozy makes it easy!

Mozy offers several backup options to help you pick the best plan. Of course, they are best known for their free service, but if you have more than 2GB of files that you want to keep safe (and it’s really easy to do, now days), you can protect everything you care about for less than $5 per month. So, for the cost of a foot-long sandwich, all of your files and precious family photos can be safe and secure.

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Photoshop Tutorial – Change Eye Color

When working with portrait photography, you may want to change or enhance the color of your subject’s eyes. This can be easily done inside Photoshop CS3 and CS4. In this example, I will be using CS4, but this can be done in just about any version of Photoshop.

This technique can also be used for elements other than eyes. You can effectively change or enhance the colors of any object or photo inside Photoshop. For our purposes here, we’ll stick with stick with the eyes. Just keep in mind that you can apply these steps to any object to change its color.

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20+ Cheap Gifts and Gadgets for Christmas 2008

It’s that time of year again when you need to find some cool gifts for office parties, family gatherings, and the poor saps with birthdays this close to Christmas. Sure, it’d be great if you could get everyone on your list an LCD HDTV, GPS device, or iPhone, but not everyone has that kind of dough? (And if you do have that kind of dough, just let me know what I need to do to get on your Christmas list!)

Here are a few of the hottest gadgets of the year (in no particular order) that won’t break the bank, and will definitely earn you some cool points with your geek friends and family members.

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Force Your Computer to Shutdown

Just this morning my mother-in-law called to tell me that her laptop wouldn’t turn off. She had tried the obvious stuff: initiating a shutdown through the Start Menu, pressing the power button. Nothing seemed to work. Her laptop was effectively locked up.

There’s a trick to solving this problem and I forget how few people know about it. I’ve yet to see it fail and, if it doesn’t work for you, you’re either being too impatient or something is seriously wrong with your hardware.
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