What is Wake-on-LAN?

The MagicPacket: How WoL Works

Enabling WoL on Your System

sudo apt-get install ethtool

sudo ethtool eth0

sudo ethtool -s eth0 wol g

Sending WoL Magic Packets

I came across this list and thought I’d share it with my readers. Its a really useful list of RUN COMMANDS

WARNING: ROOT REQUIRED – Dont bother commenting below that “It needs root!.. this article is crap.. blah blah

Disclaimer: Any damaged caused to your phone is your problem… If you lack confidence, buy a nokia This may work on any Samsung

• Buy/Download Root Explorer
• Go to the ROOT of the file system.. keep pressing back or up.. till you see /
• Scroll Down to SYSTEM
• Inside here copy the CSC Folder and the two files that follow ending in CSC to your SD CARD
• Flash your new ROM or Restore the New ROM from your Nandroid backup
• Open Root Explorer
• Navigate to are you saved you CSC files on the SD CARD
• Copy them and navigate back to the root / and then to /system
• Switch the system at the top so that it is in MOUNT R/W
• Paste Files

Windows Software

blindbosskey

clicky gone

dads around

hide browsers list

magic boss key

windows hide tool

Web Browser

minimize chrome

• Compact and easy to use
• Windows automation software
• Record all mouse and keyboard events
• Convenient settings interface
• Using recorded files anytime, anywhere

Image via Wikipedia

Computer software—be it your operating system, your word processor, or your favorite game—is prone to different types of problems, such as unwarranted crashes and confusing error messages. These error messages unnecessarily hamper your work and cause frustrations. Most of the time, when a software error occurs we panic and are tempted to seek the help of external technical support. But, this method is not only time-consuming, but can also be quite expensive.

Fortunately, there are a few simple steps that you can perform to resolve (or at least narrow down the causes of) software errors yourself. Some of these steps are listed below. So, the next time you encounter a software error, you may use these steps to troubleshoot your problem.

1. Close all open programs to free up RAM

   All programs running on your computer need to access Random Access Memory (RAM) to perform various functions. Now, as RAM is expensive, we have a limited amount of it on the system. So, if you are running a large number of software on your computer, your system may slow down and generate errors. If this happens, close all open programs to free up RAM space and then launch the application you want to work with.

   At times, there might be a problem with a software that might cause it to eat up a lot of memory. To identify this software, open Task Manager, and then on the Processes tab, check the Memory Usage column for the application that is consuming the maximum memory. You can ‘End Task’ this application and then repair it—usually by updating or reinstalling it—to resolve the issue.

   Many times, errors such as error code 1311 may generate during a program installation when you are trying to install a new software on your computer. Your antivirus software may be causing this problem. So, if this happens, you must turn off your antivirus software and then continue with the installation.

1. Restart your program

   In case you face problems even after closing all running applications, then you must close and restart your program. If your program is in conflict with some other running application then, restarting the program quite often resolves these issues.

   For instance, ActiveX problems may occur if there is a problem with your Internet Explorer. If this happens, you must try to restart the Web browser and then try to open your Website again. Here, you must also ensure that you allow the particular ActiveX control to run.

1. Reboot your PC

   If you are unable to resolve the error by restarting your program, try to reboot your computer and then relaunch your application. Many program conflicts are conditional and are resolved when you restart the system.

1. Uninstall any newly installed programs or hardware

   If you start encountering software errors soon after installing a new hardware or software, then this new hardware/software might be causing some conflict. If this happens, remove this new product then relaunch your application to see if it works.

1. Uninstall and reinstall your application

   Software errors may occur if there is some problem with the program files of your system. If this happens, you may try to uninstall the application and then reinstall it to repair the damaged files. You must uninstall the application using Add or Remove Programs or a third-party program uninstaller utility. If the application you are trying to remove is very large, you may check for and download its removal tool from the manufacturer’s website. For instance, to remove a Norton product you may download and use Norton uninstaller to completely cleanup all files related to the product you are trying to remove.

Image via Wikipedia

It is not uncommon for computer users to encounter computer errors every now and then. These errors not only hamper your work, but may also cause unnecessary frustration.

Most of these errors are pretty common and can be easily resolved. For instance, the stop: c000021a error is raised by the kernel when it sees that some crucial Windows service is not running anymore.  The sndvol32.exe download error is generated when you are facing some driver problems, and the msvcr71.dll windows 7 error is encountered when the msvcr71.dll file is missing or corrupt.

Whatever your skill level may be, you can solve all these problems by following the very simple steps listed below:

Step 1 – Perform regular registry cleanups – The registry is your system’s master database. It stores all information and settings related to literally everything that moves or lives in your computer, from the most complex software to the mere colors of the taskbar.

As the system gets older, several outdated settings remain behind in the registry, causing a bottleneck in system performance, and also frequent application crashes. To take care of the registry, invest in a good-quality registry cleaner software, which will scan, fix and optimize your registry within minutes. However, it is very important to make sure that you download the software only from a trusted vendor, or else it can backfire as well.

Step 2 – Update device drivers – In case you didn’t know it, device drivers are the most powerful programs on your computer. They sit close to the hardware, and do much of the control and data access. In a sense, they are what the operating system essentially is. Therefore, it is very important that you update them as well.

Now while it may sound like rocket science, believe us that it isn’t so at all. All you need is a good third-party driver-update tool, and it will scan and update the system drivers at the click of a mouse. It is as easy as running any other software.

Step 3 – Perform full system anti-virus scans – While everyone has heard of anti-virus programs, and even most likely has one installed on his or her system, a few words of advice would be prudent here. You shouldn’t rely on free anti-virus programs too much, and should go for a professional anti-virus even if it costs you at the start. The benefits are just too many to list.

You should also have a good internet connection so that your anti-virus tool is updated regularly for the latest in virus definitions and threat databases. At the same time, you should schedule regular scans for your computer, and even check the boot sector for possible viruses. This will ensure that you remain protected from any detrimental viruses or worms.

As we have shown in this article, it is very easy to keep your system free from most of the common errors. As they say, it’s easier to do it, than understand it!

For artistic readers, Photoshop offers digital painting options few other painting or photomanipulation programs can equal. Whether you want to draw for a living, or simply want to paint for fun, learning the painterly side of Photoshop is very rewarding.

Getting Started With the Brush Tool

The Brush tool, shortcut key , is the Holy Grail of Photoshop tools. It is likely the most complex of all the tools in the program, at least in regard to its useage. There are a host of options on the Brush panel, all of which new digital artists should make effort to familiarize themselves with. If you cannot find the Brush Panel, go to Window > Brush to open the panel.

CS5 has yet more options for the Brush tool at the top of the screen, in the options panel. Here you can adjust your opacity and other options—however we’ll return to this in a moment to better illustrate how they work.

You’ll find that right clicking in your workspace opens yet ANOTHER options panel for the Brush tool. For our demonstration purposes, we’ll avoid using the arcane looking brush panel in the first screenshot, and mostly use the options panel and the right-click contextual menu from the last two screenshots. Again, readers are advised to experiment with the complex Brush Panel on their own, and check back for more thorough guides on the brush tool at a later date.

Do I Need a Graphics Tablet?

While they are not absolutely needed for any sort of digital painting, USB Graphics Tablets enhance your Photoshop experience greatly. They are not cheap, although there are some alternate brands or introductory products that cost $100—$200, while the most expensive ones run as high as $2,000.

Many of Photoshop’s best brush features are not usable without a pressure sensitive tablet. The benefit is not simply being able to draw with the pen-like stylus, but being able to draw with pressure sensitivity a mouse does not allow.

WACOM is the most common name in Graphics tablets, but is not the only company that creates them. The tablet illustrated above is the Waltop Venus, from the Taiwanese company Waltop.

Buy (or don’t buy) a tablet according to your needs. If you think you will get a lot of use out of it, then a $100 to $300 investment may be worthwhile to you. There are surprisingly excellent options available, even at the lower costs. In the end, you will know if you will get enough use out of it to justify it; simply don’t be afraid to buy the entry level unit if the more expensive ones are too much of an investment.

Learning the Brush Tool

to create a blank new file. Walk through this experiment to get a better understanding of the brush tools available to you.

This is a decent setting for your experimental brushwork. Right-click to bring up the contextual brush menu and select the first standard brush, “Soft Round.” You can adjust your size here with the top slider, if desired.

A black color stroke with this setting should look like this.

Look to your options panel and set your “Opacity” down to 50%, as shown above.

The same clicking and mouse dragging will now produce this color stroke, as it is painting a more translucent, see-through black with this opacity setting.

Right-click to bring up your brush contextual menu again, and this time pick the second option, “Hard Round.”

Keep your same opacity setting as before.

Notice the smooth line you’ve drawn. “Hardness,” which scales from 0% to 100% affects the “fuzziness” or blurriness of the lines you draw.

Similar to Opacity, is the setting for “Flow.” Return your opacity to 100% and set your “Flow” to 50%.

You can see immediately the line drawn is different.

Zooming in shows us how this same brush is drawn differently, in this repeating pattern. This is the major difference between the Opacity and Flow, and something that confuses even professional Photoshop painters.

“Airbrush Mode” is another fairly confusing option. Nearly every version of CS Photoshop will have this airbrush icon in the options panel. Click it on and we’ll learn the difference.

This is the correct brush setting to use for this demonstration. You’ll need a “soft” brush with a wide tip at whatever size you care to use.

Click in your image and hold your mouse button down. You’ll notice that with “Airbrush mode” on, your dark pigment will continue to paint as long as your mouse is held down. It will also spill out from inside your cursor area.

With airbrush mode off, however, you’ll find clicking and holding the mouse button only gives you a single blot of pigment, not the continuous stream that the Airbrush mode gives. It can be helpful to know the difference, and to experiment with what works better for you.

Drawing with Pressure Sensitivity

Continuing to use the same brush, we break out the graphics tablet and select this far right option on the top panel, “Tablet pressure controls size.”

A brush stroke with increasing pressure creates this mark that starts small and grows. It is uniformly dark through out.

There is another option, “Tablet pressure controls opacity,” which will change opacity with less pressure, allowing for lighter tones for lighter pressure.

This looks like so, with the grayer tones on the left, and the heavier, harder pressure tones on the right.

Below the first row of “basic” brushes are sets that use pressure sensitivity in more interesting ways.

Some of them are strange and unusual, and react to your paintbrush strokes in weird ways. This one reacted to the tilt of the stylus in relation to the tablet.

Others can create nice, naturalistic marks. You can see the opacity setting layering nicely in these brush marks.

In addition to pressure sensitivity, some brushes can be set to follow the direction of the brush stroke.

Others come set standard with the “Scatter” options. A single brush stroke created all of this effortlessly.

Similar to the stars, this leaf pattern scatters, rotates, and even creates leaves of different opacities based on pressure sensitivity.

Digital Inking and Painting with Photoshop

Rather than scanning, it can be quicker to take digital photographs of drawings for digital inking. Here’s a quick look at how to use these brush techniques to create a quick image.

You should work at good print resolutions whenever possible. Once you have your final sketch image, you can go to Image > Image Size to adjust the dimensions.

300 pixels per inch is a fairly standard print resolution. Enlarging this image to 10 inches in width will create a 3,000 pixel wide image, resulting in something over 12 megapixels. Work at whatever size suits you.

Create a solid color adjustment layer on top of your photograph. Any color will do, although light ones work the best.

Selecting a light pink color, change your “Blending Mode,” highlighted blue above, to “Screen.”

Your image is now toned down and ready to be digitally inked.

Create a new layer on top to draw your ink lines in. Select the Brush tool or the Pencil tool to ink your image.

Pressure sensitivity makes inking quick and easy.

A single brush size easily draws all the various line thicknesses.

To add color to the image, it can be helpful to create new layer with  , then creating a new group for it. Be sure to create it underneath your digital ink layer.

The bucket fill combined with the brush tool quickly fill areas of the image with colors or solid blacks.

If you use the bucket fill with multiple layers, you’ll want to check “All Layers” on the right side of the options.

Add new layers for each new color or work in a single layer, depending on your preference.

Sloppy painting while working in layers is easy to work around.

Moving sloppy painting below other, tighter layers can quickly clean them up and save you the effort of being neat.

With flat tones complete, we can move along to painting in shading and a value range to the image.

Reducing the flow and setting the pressure setting to “Opacity,” we can brush on some colors onto each of our layers.

While similar painting can be done with a mouse, the time savings of quick, pressure sensitive brush movements are immense. The entirety of this painting and inking was done in shortly over 20 minutes.

At this point, simply work as you see fit, adding shadows, then highlights.

Some quick brushwork can make the foreground and background feel more complete together.

While she’s hardly perfect, this quick study is a fair showcase of the kind of painting Photoshop is capable of—except this is hardly the extent of what can be done. Experiment with the brush tool for yourself, and find what works best for you.

Photoshop is named “Photoshop” for a reason; it’s for editing photographs.  Take a look through some basic photo-editing techniques and learn how you can improve your own family photographs.

Cropping Images for Better Composition

Oftentimes, when you take a digital photograph, you’ll end up with a lot of information that you may not want. One of the first things you’re going to want to do is learn how to crop your images, and the most convenient way to do this is using the Crop Tool.

Press the  key to select your crop tool. Use your mouse to click and drag, creating a box inside your photograph.

You’ll notice a tick-box in the corners of your crop-box. You can move and resize your crop area to select the precise area you wish to crop.

You can press the  key to release your crop. You can undo with  and redo your crop at any time, if you feel so inclined. Cropping can eliminate areas of your image that you don’t want to see, or can also create a more interesting composition for prints or the web.

Adjusting Contrast with the Levels Tool

Shooting images on overcast days can give you gloomy images that are either too dark or devoid of detail. While the Brightness and Contrast tool is an acceptable way to adjust your images, the best tool to use is usually the Levels tool.

With your photograph open, simply press  to open your levels dialog box. By default, this is what it looks like.

The three sliders (the  arrows illustrated above) represent Shadows (your photograph’s darkest areas), Mid-tones (the middle darkest areas), and Highlights (the brightest areas of your photo). By adjusting them as illustrated above, brighter whites are created, mildly darker shadows, and the Mid-Tone point is moved closer to the shadows, allowing for more space between the Mid-Tones and the Highlights.

Clicking OK will close the Levels and render them. Immediately, we see more detail in the bird, and our sky is less overcast and gloomy. With little effort at all, you can give your photographs a more naturalistic look and bring out detail you might not have known that you even had!

Adjusting Color-Shifted Lighting

One of the biggest problems with taking pictures indoors is that a lot of indoor lighting will be tinted with a yellow, red, or blue cast. Your eyes may not pick up the difference, but your camera “sees” light very differently than our eyes do. Here’s a simple way to remove reduce the color of an overwhelmingly yellow image.

You’ll want to navigate to Image > Adjustments > Selective Color.

Selective Color is a tool that allows you to adjust your image through various primary colors. These are: Red, Green and Blue, the primary colors of light; Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, and Black, the primary colors of printing; and also by Whites and Neutrals.

Since our image has a yellow cast to it, I select “Yellows” from the “Color” menu box. You can use the adjustments illustrated above, or find the ones that work for your image. The basic premise is to reduce the color(s) you wish to remove (in this case, Yellow) and, in some cases, add color to the opposing primary colors (in this case, Cyan, Magenta, and Black.) That’s basically a complicated way of saying “less yellow, more red, blue, and black.”

Compared to the original image, the lighting on this now appears as clear and white as natural sunlight and the original looks aged and yellowed. If you notice this yellow cast on your images and want to remove it, this can often be your best bet.

Sharpen Blurry Photographs without Damaging Color

Sometimes dim indoor lighting can give a warm and fuzzy effect to your photography. Unfortunately, the “fuzzy” bit is a problem, as dim indoor lighting tends to make images come out blurry. There are many Photoshop filters that can sharpen an image, but many can damage color or heavily distort an image. This surprisingly easy trick can help sharpen shots and keep color intact.

Lab color is an alternate color space, like RGB and CMYK. It is unusual and most digital art files outside of the professional photography world will not use it.

In order to switch your photograph to Lab color, to go Image > Mode > Lab Color, as illustrated above.

Changing images to CMYK will give you a color shift—not so with Lab color. Your RGB image remains identical without any sort of color shift. On to the next step.

Flip to your Channels Panel. If you cannot find it, you can always retrieve it by going to your menu Window > Channels.

Pick the “Lightness” channel, which will look like a grayscale version of your image.

If your image doesn’t change to grayscale, try again. We need to work exclusively in this grayscale channel for this tip to work.

Navigate to Filters > Sharpen > Unsharp Mask. Unsharp Mask can increase contrast and tighten edges Photoshop perceives in images. The illustrated values are overdoing it somewhat—find values that work well with your own image.

Still in our Lightness channel,  renders our filter. Oftentimes the Unsharp Mask filter can create to many harsh darks, so for this particular soft image, a round of Level adjustment can help counter the harshness of the filter.

brings up the levels tool. Adjusting the Midtones and Highlights (as in the example earlier) can create a softer look without sacrificing the faux-sharpness added to the image.

Our final result is a fair improvement over the soft-edged original. You can return your image to RGB color by navigating to Image > Mode > RGB and save it as a PSD or JPG file. It’s also a good habit to save multiple versions of your Photographs in order to return to the original, effectively undoing your edits if needed.

Photoshop tips left you confused? Start at the Beginning! Check out the previous installments of the How-To Geek Guide to Learning Photoshop.

via MAKEUSEOF

Photoshop has a huge menu system with options even advanced users may ignore. For today’s lesson we’ll take a quick tour through them and learn which of them will help you increase your mastery of photo editing.

The Top Menu

Your menus are laid out as illustrated above. Let’s take a quick look through these and explain the less obvious menu items.

The File Menu

While this is home to obvious things like “Open” and “Close,” there are less obvious items here to look over. Here are some highlights.

Browse in Bridge: Bridge is a program that comes bundled with Photoshop for visual browsing. It allows users to look through their library of pictures rather than looking at empty filenames, similar to Google Picasa. Bridge is a decent program, but it can be annoying to accidentally open it, as it takes longer than you might want to load.

Browse in Mini Bridge: Mini Bridge is a version of Bridge that lives in Photoshop. Easy to use, but loads slowly. Part 2, Panels touched briefly on Mini Bridge.

Open As: A problematic menu item, Open As seems broken and glitchy. The idea is to be able to open one filetype as another, i.e., to open a layered PSD file as a flattened JPG. Any readers that care to comment on this, let me know of your successes or failures. I think it is broken in CS5 as of yet.

Open as Smart Object: Create a smart object from any file simply by opening it. Smart Objects resize and warp from the original file, so if you plan to resize a JPG or other image multiple times, you may want to open it as a smart object. You may want to learn a bit about Smart Objects first, however.

Share my Screen and Create New Review: Adobe CS Live features only available to Photoshop users that choose to register their copy of Photoshop and create an account on Adobe.com.

Device Central: Launches a separate program for developing applications for mobile smartphones and other similar devices. Not terribly useful for beginner users.

Save for Web and Devices: A wizard-type program launches that helps you compress your files into web-ready JPG, GIF, PNG, or WBMP file formats. In this case, “Devices” refers to the same mobile smartphones, etc, that “Device Central” refers to.

Revert: Reloads your file from the point it was last saved. You’ll lose all changes and your history. However, this is still often useful.

Place: Insert a separate file into the one currently open. Allows you to resize temporarily as a smart object.

Automate and Scripts: Helpful options for advanced users that have to do lots of repetitive graphic work. Scripts, in particular are quite exciting, and are worth a look, even for basic users. They are both deserve articles of their own, on another day.

The Edit Menu

Another fairly obvious menu, the Edit menu is home to some of PS’s most useful features.

Undo, Step Forward, Step Backward: Undo is a single level of revert you are likely familiar with.  is a common shortcut, and you’ll find it will undo your last action as well as redo it. Step Forward and Backward move through your history palette, also covered in Part 2, Panels. This is an another simple way to use the history besides the History Panel.

Cut, Copy, and Copy Merged: You are likely also familiar with Cut, Copy, and Paste, which exist in the edit menu of nearly every program going back to MS Word for DOS. “Copy Merged” is extremely helpful, in that it can copy a multi-layer document as if it those layers were merged.

Fill: Often ignored, Fill is an excellent tool. “Fill” will fill a selection, layer, or channel with your foreground or background color, black, white, or texture, regardless of its content, unlike the bucket or flood fill. CS5 also has Content aware fill, which, given the right file, can attempt to recreate part of your image covered by foreground objects.

Stroke: Creates a linear stroke (read: a line) around your selection with whatever color you care to use. You can adjust line thickness or where in or around your selection you want to draw it. Like fill, it ignores existing content and simply strokes around your selection.

Content Aware Scale: Uses the same technology in “Content Aware Fill” to scale part of an image. Photoshop will make it’s best guess how you want your image to look when you resize with this.

Puppet Warp: New CS5 feature is a very complicated warp that allows users to distort images in complex ways.

Transform and Free Transform: Very useful tools for resizing an image, correcting and creating perspective, and distorting images.

Keyboard shortcuts: A menu for editing and assigning a custom keyboard shortcut for every menu item in Photoshop. Absolutely invaluable for any user.

Menus: Allows users to edit existing menus, hiding features they hate or never use, and highlighting the ones they have trouble seeing, but use frequently. Also incredibly helpful.

Preferences: Many of the quirky problems you have with Photoshop have their controllable settings here. More on the preferences menu and making PS behave better in a later article.

The Image Menu

The image menu allows you to change your color depth and do various other things. What are the most useful options here?

Mode: The color mode is where you set your image to RGB or CMYK, as well as various other types like Lab color or Indexed color, an 8-bit color table based file format. You should never use anything but RGB, unless you care to learn more about image formats and digital imaging.

Adjustments: A sub-menu with areas to adjust Brightness and Contrast, Levels, Curves, as well as Hue/Saturation. There are a host of other options here, all worth exploring. Here are a few of the most important:

Brightness/Contrast: A basic way to adjust lights, darks, and contrast in photographs. Good for beginners and easy to understand. Levels: A more sophisticated way to adjust your value range in photos. Curves: An even more complex way to adjust values and channels, allowing users to adjust targeted values with greater accuracy. For experts. Exposure: Yet another menu for adjusting lights, darks and contrast, this one largely for digital photographers. Hue/Saturation: Adjust the colors of your image, as well as how bright and vibrant they are. Invert: Black is white, white is black. All of your colors are now their opposite value. Posterize: A filter that reduces your image to a limited number of colors. Threshold: Another filter that reduces your image to black and white, completely without gray.

Auto Tone, Auto Contrast, Auto Color: Photoshop will attempt to improve your image automatically by adjusting Tones, Contrast or Color. They are likely inspired by Photoshop Elements (and similar basic photo editors); good tools for beginners.

Image Size: Not to be confused with Canvas Size, Image size will enlarge or shrink your entire image file.

Canvas Size: Will increase the size of the file’s “space” without changing any of your image information.

Image Rotation: Turn your image at 90° or 180° angles, or on “Arbitrary” ones like 21° or -5°.

Duplicate: Create a second open file identical to your file’s current state. Your new file does not retain its history.

The Layer Menu

The homebase for editing your layers, the Layer menu has lots of sub-menus and complex options. Beginner users may wish to look over Part 3 of the How-To Geek Guide to Learning Photoshop, and get a basic primer on using Layers.

New: The sub menu here allows creation of new layers, as well as options for turning your existing layers into your “Background” layer, if you need or want one. You can also “group” layers—similar to putting files in a folder in your OS. This option creates the “folder” for layers to be stored in.

Duplicate Layer: Allows users to make a copy of an existing layer, either in the current document, to a new one, or to another open file.

New Fill Layer/New Adjustment Layer: Two alternate types of layers that are dynamic, and can be edited with numerical values over and over again. See Part 3 of the How-To Geek Guide to Learning Photoshop to learn more about Adjustment layers.

Layer Mask/Vector Mask: Tools for “masking” or hiding part or all of active layers. Do you know the difference between Vectors and Pixels? They are the basic difference between these two types of masks.

Clipping Masks: This “clips” a layer or layers to the layer transparency below it. Difficult to understand without experimentation. Expect later articles on Clipping Masks, Layer Masks, and Vector Masks here at How-To Geek.

Group Layers/Hide Layers: Multiple layers can be selected in the layers panel, and grouped or hidden here. This instance of “Group” bundles selected layers, rather than creating an empty group.\

Align/Distribute: Tools for arranging layers within your working space, i.e., centering an layer to your entire image, or spacing seven buttonlike objects out evenly on a page.

Merge Down: Combine the current layer or group with the layer below it.

Merge Visible/Flatten Image: Combine all layers in your document. “Merge Visible” will ignore all layers hidden in your Layers Panel, while “Flatten Image” will throw them away entirely. Merge Visible will also leave any transparency you have, while Flatten Image will create a non-transparent “Background Layer” out of all your layered information. See the illustration below for an example.

Above: Original file with Layers Panel, showing the existing layers.

Above: File after “Merge Visible.” Note the the layer transparency.

Above: File after “Flatten Image.” Note the white background added where the image was transparent.

Other Important Menus

The remainder of the menus in Photoshop are nowhere near as complex as these first ones.

The Select Menu: Menus that work with the Marquee, Lasso, and Wand tools, as well as the layers panel. Select All, Deselect, and Reselect work directly with these. When you have an active selection, Invert will select the part of your image you do not currently have selected. You can also select layers in your layers panel here, as well as adjust your selections with the “Modify” sub-menu. You can also enter the “Quick Mask” mode here, described briefly in Part 1 of the How-To Geek Guide to Learning Photoshop.

The Filters Menu: The toybox for Photoshop users, Filters allow for all kinds of strange and wonderful distortions of images. Some are useful, many are not. Filters are a big topic, and will require at least an entire article to themselves. Until then, experiment with filters to find some that you enjoy.

The View Menu: The View menu is home to a lot of the more unusual parts of Photoshop, like the ability to change the size and shape of your pixels, as well as basic things like “Zoom In.” Here, you can preview your Print Size (roughly) or quickly zoom to 100% zoom with “Actual Pixels.” You can also turn off annoying things like Snap, Rulers (if you dislike them) as well as clearing your Guides or Slices.

The Window Menu: This is where nearly all of your panels disappear to when they are deleted, including the options panel at the top of your screen and your toolbox, by default on your left.  You can also cycle through your open images at the bottom of the Window menu.

The Help Menu: Last but not least, the Help menu is the basic informational menu every good application should have. Check through it to learn about the tools that elude you, or simply come back to How-To Geek for the next installment of the Guide to Learning Photoshop!

VIA MAKEUSEOF

As one of the hallmark features of Photoshop, Layers are the foundation of learning good photo editing techniques. In this article, we’ll go through their basic usage, as well as cover some basic types of layers.

Your layer panel is one of the most important within Photoshop. Whenever you use Photoshop, you’ll work spend a lot of time working in it.

The lasso tool creates a selection in any shape: in this case, the word “Layer” is drawn in. But the lasso does not create a new layer, even though we can use the lasso tool to move our selection around.

New layers can be created by clicking the  button in the Layers panel. You can also press  for a blank layer.

You can think of these layers as entirely new image files stacked on top of each other in your layers panel. By default, a new layer is transparent.

A simple Edit > Fill fills our selection with black. We’ve put it in a new layer, which will help us understand what a new layer is.

Our black fill exists in a new layer. We no longer need our selection, so pressing deselects it.

While this may look like a ruined image of the Apollo 11 rocket taking off, the drawn “Layer” text exists in its own separate layer, and is editable.

The Move Tool, shortcut key  , illustrated above, is used for moving the layers selected in your layers panel.

The image of the shuttle still exists beneath the new filled layer. It can be moved to any position without destroying any part of the layer below it.

Individual layers can be moved, rotated, and transformed at your whim.

And again, since layers exist independent of each other, they do not have to affect each other.

Returning to a few older How-Tos, we can very simply add objects that have had their backgrounds removed to our image.

Simply use the Move Tool (shortcut  key) to drag images from any open file to the one you’re working with. Photoshop will create a new layer in your target file with the dragged layer information in it.

This image has quickly become ridiculous. Clicking the  in the side of the layers panel will hide any layer you don’t care to see.

Shortcut key  will give you the Type tool, which can create a different type of layer. Live type is editable, and can be changed at any time without disturbing other layers.

Layers also have “Blending Options,” as illustrated in the contextual menu here. Right click on any of the layers in your layers panel to open this menu.

Blending Options takes us to the Layer Style dialog box. Here, we can add shadows and glows, all editable at any time through this same menu.

After adding a stroke to the text layer, other effects can also be added. A soft, white glow can make the text more legible against the complicated background.

Even with these layer effects, these layers are still editable.

The text can easily be set in a different font, with all layer effects staying active.

The layer effects look something like this in your layers panel.

In your layers panel, you can click the  to create a different type of layer, called an Adjustment Layer.

CS5 brings up this “Adjustments” panel. I create a “Photo Filter” adjustment layer to give my image a sepia tone effect.

Adjustment layers also have a position in your layers panel and only affect the layers below. In other words, you can move your adjustment layers to affect the layers below it. I have my text above my Sepia Adjustment Layer, keeping it from turning sepia toned.

There are many options for Adjustment Layers, including the “Gradient” adjustment layer.

Gradients are great as adjustment layers, as they can easily be re-edited and adjusted. You’ll have numerous options for types of gradients, colors, angles, etc.

Adjustment layers can be hidden or edited by double clicking them in the layers panel.

Simple mastery of layers and the layers panel will greatly increase your ability to use Photoshop and get the effects you want to see in your photography.

Via MakeUseOf

There are a few essential steps that need to be taken with any new wordpress install. Obviously not every wordpress blog will be the same but there are some basics that I feel should be done regardless of what kind of blog you’re creating.

Here we’ll go through 10 steps that are essential to preform after any wordpress install including a list of 10 plug-ins that are a must for blogs of any type.

Step 1 – Change Permalink Structure

When you go to Settings > Permalinks, you’ll notice that the default permalink is http://site.com/?p=123. This structure not only isn’t a good idea for SEO but it also doesn’t tell your visitors anything about the link they’re visiting.

I would suggest a custom structure here using only the post title (http://site.com/title-of-article) which will provide some keywords for search engines as well as giving your readers something to go on.

Some people choose to add in the category (http://site.com/category/title-of-article) however, if you want to assign multiple categories to a single post, you will have to work out a way to deal with duplicate links.

To change your permalink structure choose Custom Structure and paste /%postname% in the box. If you want to add the category as well paste in /%category%/%postname%

Step 2 – Set up Authors

Since we want to remove the admin account in the next step for security reasons, it’s time to set up the authors of our blog. To do this go to Users > Add New and fill out the form. Be sure to make yourself an administrator, you will then want to set up any other authors that will be writing for your blog assigning them to whatever role and permissions you want them to have.

Step 3 – Fix Security Issues

There are a few minor security issues that need to be dealt with on a new wordpress install. While these aren’t major risks, it’s good to have every security measure possible in place to keep your blog safe. The last thing you want after taking the time and energy to put your blog together and get it up, is for it to be brought down through an exposed security point that could have easily been avoided.

Disable Remote Publishing: Unless you use an external blog editor I would recommend disabling both Atom and SML-PRC publishing. These settings are under Settings > Writing.

Remove The Admin Account: You’ll want to delete the default admin account that is automatically created when you install wordpress. Hackers know that this account is automatically added by default and is automatically assigned ID#1 making it an easy starting point for them. To do this go to Users, mouse over the admin account and click Delete.

Disable Post Via Email: These settings are also under Settings > Writing. If you don’t plan on posting via email, don’t put any real information in this section.

Create a blank index.html file to hide directories: Put this file in every directory you don’t want people to be able to browse. That way if someone loads a directory, they will just be shown a blank white page instead of the contents of the directory.

Alternatively, you can use htaccess to prevent people browsing your directories if you’re confident editing it.

Step 4 – Set up Discussion Settings

In this section we’ll be focusing specifically on the areas shown in the image below. First navigate to Settings > Discussion

There are a number of areas under the Settings section and most of them are either very intuitive like the General Settings or will just be left on the default settings. However, the Discussions area has some important options that you will set according to your own personal preferences. Let’s take a look at each of these options and what each mean.

• Attempt to notify any blogs linked to from the article – This will notify any other wordpress blogs that you link to in an article with a pingback. I recommend you have this checked since pingbacks can send some pretty decent traffic to your blog.
• Allow link notifications from other blogs (pingbacks and trackbacks.) – This notifies you if any other wordpress blogs link to you and adds a pingback/trackback to the comments of the article that was linked to. I also recommend you have this checked for the same reason.
• Allow people to post comments on the article – This one is totally a personal preference. If you want to allow comments on your blog check it, if not leave it blank. My personal opinion on this is that comments are a large part of what makes blogs great, however, I know of some great blogs that have comments disabled because the author doesn’t have time to keep up with them.
• Comment author must fill out name and e-mail – I recommend having this checked to reduce the amount of spam you get in your comments.
• Users must be registered and logged in to comment – If you have a site where users can register you would probably want this checked to further reduce spam. However, if, like most blogs, you don’t offer registration or don’t want to require readers to register to comments, leave it unchecked.
• Automatically close comments on articles older than — days – Some bloggers choose to close comments for older posts so that they don’t have to keep constantly going back to check for new comments and reply to them. If you want to implement this strategy check this option and set it to the number of days you prefer to leave the commenting open.
• Enable threaded (nested) comments — levels deep – Threaded comments are a new feature in WordPress that I haven’t had a chance to thoroughly explore. If you want to use nested comments, first you need to make sure your theme supports them, then check this box and set the number to the maximum you want shown on your blog. Any more than the number shown will be hidden and the reader will be given the option to view them.
• Break comments into pages with — comments per page and the — page displayed by default. Comments should be displayed with the — comments at the top of each page – If you have a very active blog and get a lot of comments you will probably want to check this option. Using the default settings, if a post has more than 50 comments, they will be split up on multiple pages with the last page displayed and older comments at the top of each page.
• Email me whenever – Anyone posts a comment – If you would like to get an email every time someone posts a comment on your blog, check this option. If you have a high traffic blog, you may not want to do this to keep your email down to a minimum.
• Email me whenever – A comment is held for moderation – If you would like to get an email whenever there is a comment awaiting moderation on your blog, check this option. I recommend checking this one since most people want to get comments moderated as soon as possible.
• Before a comment appears – An administrator must always approve the comment – If you want to have to approve every comment before it goes live, check this option. Some may choose to do this so that they can check for spam or inappropriate comments before they actually show up on the blog.
• Before a comment appears – Comment author must have a previously approved comment – This is the option I have chosen on Arbenting. If the comment author has never replied on my blog before, I have to approve it before it goes live. However, if the comment author already has approved comments on the blog, their comments will post automatically.

Step 5 – Update Your Ping List

To update your ping list go to Settings > Writing and scroll down to Update Services. Make sure that, at the very least, Pingomatic (http://rpc.pingomatic.com/) is in your Update Services box. Other than that I would also recommend adding the following list along with any additional services you would like notified whenever you add new content to your blog.

http://api.moreover.com/RPC2

http://bblog.com/ping.php

http://blogsearch.google.com/ping/RPC2

http://ping.weblogalot.com/rpc.php

http://ping.feedburner.com

http://ping.syndic8.com/xmlrpc.php

http://ping.bloggers.jp/rpc/

http://rpc.pingomatic.com/

http://rpc.weblogs.com/RPC2

http://rpc.technorati.com/rpc/ping

http://topicexchange.com/RPC2

http://www.blogpeople.net/servlet/weblogUpdates

http://xping.pubsub.com/ping

Step 6 – Set up Feedburner

Setting up your feed at Feedburner not only gives you more options than you would have with the default, but it also allows you to keep track of your statistics. Go to Feedburner and set up an account if you don’t have one already. Then type in the address of your blog and hit next to set up a feedburner feed for your blog.

If you need help setting up your account or just want to learn more about Feedburner’s options, Setting Up Feedburner to Syndicate Your RSS Feed is a really helpful screencast on doing just that.

Now anytime you link to your feed, make sure to use your new feedburner address. We’ll finish the Feedburner process in step 10 with the Feedburner Feedsmith plugin.

Step 7 – Upload and Activate your Theme

Chances are you won’t want to keep the default wordpress theme. If you’re a professional blog you’ll probably either want to have a custom theme made or purchase a premium theme.

If your blog is a personal or a hobby blog, you may want to try out one of the many free themes available. Whichever way you choose to go, you will have to upload and activate the theme.

First connect with your host via FTP and go to the folder where you have your blog installed. Go to wp-content > themes and upload your theme. Then, to activate the theme, go to Appearance and click on the theme you want to activate.

This will cause a pop-up window showing you a preview of the theme you are about to activate. Click Activate “Theme” and you are done.

Step 8 – Set up Analytics

Google Analytics is one of the best free statistic tracking services available. To set up your account go to Google Analytics and either log in with your Google account info or in the unlikely event you don’t have one, sign up. Now you just need to add your website.

If you don’t know anything about Analytics and need help setting up your account, How to Use Google Analytics for Beginners is a great tutorial for you.

NOTE: Don’t worry about inserting the javascript into your pages yet, the Google Analytics Plug-in will take care of this for you.

Step 9 – Edit the About Page

By default there is a generic ‘about page’ already in your new wordpress install. However, you aren’t going to want to leave this the way it is. Instead you want to personalize it and actually make it about you or your blog. To do this go to Pages, hover over About and click Edit.

I would recommend putting a bit about your blog, a bit of personal information and a photo of yourself if you feel comfortable. Blog readers like to know a little something about you, so adding this bit of a personal touch to your blog is essential, in making this connection.

Step 10 – Install and Activate the Following Plugins

WordPress is a pretty impressive blogging platform on its own, but add plugins, and you have one of the most customizable blogs available. There are thousands of plugins to choose from that can do pretty much anything you can imagine. The plugins we are going to focus on here are those that I feel are essential to any wordpress installation.

To install these plugins you will need to go to the sites, download and unzip them. Then, via FTP, go to the folder where wordpress is installed and go to wp-content > plugins. Upload any plugins you want to install to this folder.

Alternatively, if you’re using WordPress version 2.7 up you can go to Plugins > Add New in your dashboard and search for the plugin there. You can then click “Install” when you find the plugin and it will copy the files to your server for you automatically.

To activate the plugins you have just uploaded go to Plugins and click Activate for each plugin you want to activate. Any plugins with settings will now have it’s own section under Settings.

Plugin 1 – Akismet

Akismet is one of the best spam filters available for wordpress and is one of the two plugins that comes pre-installed on your blog, so all you will need to do is activate it. Once activated, it will ask you for your WordPress API Key. If you already have one for another site, you can use it here, individual keys can be used on multiple sites.

If you do not have a key, sign up for one at WordPress API Keys. Once you have this go to Plugins > Akismet Configuration, enter your key and click Update Options.

Plugin 2 – Permalink Redirect

Search engines tend to hold it against your site if multiple URLs show up for identical pages. Permalink Redirect makes sure that there is only one URL for each blog entry.

While it is a good idea to install this plugin regardless, make sure to use it if you set your permalinks to blog.com/category/title_of_the_post.

Plugin 3 – All in one SEO Pack

All in one SEO Pack gives you options to optimize your wordpress blog for search engines that the basic wordpress install is missing. For the basic settings go to Settings > All In One SEO and fill in the Title, Description and Keywords for your blog. You will most likely leave the other options on this page set to their default.

The other half of this plugin comes into effect whenever you write a new blog post or page. When you are editing a post or page, if you scroll down to the bottom of the page, you will see a section for All In One SEO Pack where you can add the Title, Description and Keywords of each individual post and page, or disable the SEO altogether for them.

Plugin 4 – WordPress Automatic Upgrade

While upgrading wordpress is not the hardest thing to do, it can be cumbersome and a waste of time that is unnecessary with the WordPress Automatic Upgrade plugin. This plugin lets you know when a new version of wordpress is available and allows you to back up your files and upgrade with only the push of a few buttons.

Plugin 5 – Google Analytics for WordPress

The Google Analytics for WordPress plugin automatically tracks and segments all outbound links from within posts, comment author links, links within comments, blogroll links and downloads. It also allows you to track AdSense clicks, add extra search engines, and track image search queries.

This is also where you will put in the javascript for Google Analytics keeping you from having to edit your theme. Go to Settings > Google Analytics and paste the legacy urchin.js script into the box.

NOTE: It is very important that you use the legacy urchin.js script and not the ga.js since this plugin will not work with the ga.js script.

Plugin 6 – WP Super Cache

WP Super Cache is probably not essential for a brand new blog, but since most people start a blog with the intention of it growing, this plugin may become more of an asset as this progress occurs. The plugin generates static html files from your dynamic WordPress blog. This allows for quicker page loading for your readers, as each additional time the page is accessed, the more compact and less memory intensive static page it has generated will load rather than the fully scripted WordPress one.

Plugin 7 – Google XML Sitemaps

Google XML Sitemaps will create a Google sitemaps compliant XML sitemap of your wordpress blog that you can submit to any search engine. While there are some settings you can change for this plugin, it pretty much just works on its own.

Plugin 8 – No Self Pings

Chances are you are going to want to reference and link to past relevant blog posts in your current ones. By default, when you do this, the post you link to will get a pingback from the new post. No Self Pings keeps wordpress from sending pingbacks from your blog to your blog.

Plugin 9 – Feedburner Feedsmith

Now we can complete the last step to getting your Feedburner feed set up. Install and activate the Feedburner Feedsmith plugin, then go to Settings > Feedburner. All you need to do here is put in the Feedburner feed address you set up in step 6 and click Save. The plugin will now detect all ways to access your feed and redirect them to your FeedBurner feed.

Plugin 10 – WP DB Backup

Always back up your data! The geek’s mantra. This holds true for your wordpress databases as well. Imagine suddenly losing a years worth of blog posts and not having a back up. The thought brings tears to my eyes. WP DB Backup allows you to easily back up your wordpress databases.

Bonus: Delete The Hello Dolly Plugin – This is really an insignificant step but one that I always feel the need to take just to keep my folders as clean as possible. Hello Dolly is a useless plugin that puts random lyrics to hello dolly on your dashboard. It comes pre-installed and since I’ve never had any reason to activate it, I always delete it.

Wrap Up

So that’s my must-do list, the routine I got through after every wordpress install. What are the essential steps you take with your new installs?

One of the best features of Photoshop is one of the worst, as well: you are overwhelmed with options. Have a quick look through the default panels and learn more of what Photoshop can do in your hands.

Adjusting Panels

The default panels are snapped to the right side of your PS window. They are a fine set to begin with in Photoshop, and you can always adjust them, hide them, show them, or whatever makes the most sense to you. Photoshop workspaces are largely about personal comfort and have little to do with the so-called “correct” way to use Photoshop.

Your default set of panels from “Essentials” will look like this. If you lose any of them, you can get them back by going to the  in the workspace area of your menu bar. You should see an option in the contextual menu that says “Reset” which will reset your workspace to the default panels.

The panels can be condensed by clicking the  on the right of the panel. They can further be condensed or expanded by clicking and dragging on the left side of the panels.

It’s also simple to create “Free Floating” panels by clicking and dragging them away from the snapped areas on the left and right.

It can be simpler to edit panels this way, and later return them to the snapped area, grayed out here by Photoshop as they are dragged to become free-floating.

Panels can be added back to the snap area by dragging them to the far right of your PS window. Release your mouse button when your cursor is nearly on the farthest right part of the screen, just within the dark gray window. You should see the blue line illustrated above, telling you you’re setting your new panel set to snap on the side of your screen.

Exploring Default Panels

The “Essentials” workspace is also the default set of panels. These will be what we’ll go over first.

Mini Bridge: Adobe Bridge is an image file browsing program similar to Faststone, XnView, or Google Picasa. CS5 has integrated a smaller version of Bridge to allow more visual browsing of your images within your panels. This can be extremely helpful, although any of the aforementioned programs work just as well, if not better. Bridge tends to be a bit on the pokey side, and uses more resources than you might expect.

Visual browsing within Photoshop, however, is helpful. Bridge loads when you open the panel and ask to “Start Browsing.” Intuitive tools help navigate to folders on your machine; important and frequently used files or folders can be added to Favorites for quick recall later.

When you find an image you wish to load, either double-click it in Mini Bridge, or right click and pick “Open” from the contextual menu.

History: One of the most important features of Photoshop, History allows users multiple levels of undo, allowing you to reverse a long series of mistakes. This can allow you to edit photographs or images more naturalistically, experimenting with effects that may or may not come out correctly.

As you can see, the above image has some random nonsense done to it I’d like to undo entirely.

Opening the History Panel, you can walk backwards through all of the steps you’ve done on your image, or even revert the file by clicking the topmost area, directly below “History.”

You have a great deal more control over your editing with these multiple levels of undo.

Color: A simple panel, color allows you to pick and edit your foreground and background colors without opening the color contextual menu.

You can adjust your Red, Green, and Blue values from 0 to 255. Higher values will give you brighter colors, as you are adding brighter and brighter light to your current color. You can also pick color straight from the rainbow at the bottom of the panel, if that seems more naturalistic.

You can also click the  to adjust options, and pick sliders from different color modes. If you are a beginner, you won’t be interested in this until you learn about color modes first.

Swatches: A good resource for beginners and professionals alike, swatches are a panel of saved colors.

By default, CS5 has a saved palette of 122 colors for you to use.

You can create new swatches from your foreground color by simply clicking the  and selecting “New Swatch.”

Whatever color you have selected will become available as a swatch.

Styles: As a panel of saved “Layer Effects,” styles can be an interesting way for beginners to start experimenting or veterans to save their most common layer effects for reuse.

Simply clicking any of the default styles will apply them quickly to your active layer. You can manually edit them, or click the   to remove all layer effects.

Many of the defaults may appear strange.

Others may have some limited use.

Many may leave you scratching your head. They are not all useful. However, clicking the will allow you to save whatever effects you have on your current layer, which can prove useful.

Adjustments: The adjustment panel creates layers that change and filter your image dynamically. While you can apply Hue/Saturation, Contrast, or Levels to your photograph, it would be permanent. Adjustments creates new layers on top of your image, that can be adjusted inside this panel.

Clicking “Levels” automatically creates a new adjustment layer.

You are given the option to adjust the Levels sliders and change the contrast of my image.

These changes can be undone without using the history or the undo functions.

Multiple adjustment layers can be stacked, each one dynamically editable at any time, even when the image is saved and reopened. Notice how they appear as separate layers in the layers panel.

The example from earlier, now with the Hue/Saturation and Levels adjustments.

Masks: The masks palette is a method for blocking out parts of layers, reducing them to transparency. This is an elegant, non-beginner way to remove a background from a layer without using effective but destructive editing techniques.

The mask panel has features unique to CS5, and can help even beginner users cut out backgrounds from images with little to no effort.

Layers: Layers are the hallmark feature of Photoshop, allowing users to create 2d images in multiple editable parts.

New art can be created in layers without disturbing separate layers above or below.

Layers can be copied and masked, among other things. Adjustment layers are also  created and managed in this panel.

Layers can be stacked on top of one another, giving weird, fun, or unexpected combinations of effects.

Opacity and Blending Modes are also controlled here. Image editing with layers can quickly create rich images, and makes editing easy.

Channels: Digital images display colors in combinations of primary colors, each with values.

These primary colors are viewable separately your color channels. Beginners can safely ignore the channels panel, as there are few uses for beginner or even intermediate users to use channels.

If you care to play with channels, save your image and experiment. You can find a beginner’s primer on channels here, if you care to learn more before diving in. However, you can do worlds of photo editing without using or even understanding them, so use your own judgment if you prefer to ignore them or learn to use them.

Paths: Another difficult area of Photoshop, paths are vector based primitivesoperating similar to the ones in Illustrator. Vectors themselves are not difficult to understand, but the Pen Tool is difficult and frustrating for new users to dive into.

While the path panel is very straightforward, and paths and vectors fairly easy to understand, the Pen Tool and Paths in Photoshop are better left for a more in-depth article.

via HowToGeek

Photoshop is one of the most intimidating programs for any beginner, but has powerful image editing ability for any skill level. Look through a fresh install of CS5, and learn the basic tools and info to help you get started.

Out of the box, this is what your default CS5 installation will look like. It looks even more intimidating than older versions, so let’s spend a few minutes taking a basic look around the program, demystify it, and get you editing your photographs, painting, or whatever you might want to do with your fresh install.

Starting your Custom Workspace

You’re going to want to move your panels and palettes around in an effort to get comfortable with your new install. In this area of your screen, you’ll see various “Workspaces,” which are the various arrangements of said palettes and panels. This can be helpful, because you might want a different arrangement for editing photos than you’ll use if you are also a painter or designer.

CS5 autosaves your changes to your workspaces, so create a new, custom one to play around in. You can always edit your stock Workspaces to fit your liking later.

Click the  to bring up the contextual menu. Create a “New Workspace” and name it anything you like. Use your own name, or anything that suits you. Make certain to pick “Keyboard Shortcuts” and “Menus” as you can edit both of them and tie them to your workspace.

Click your new workspace and feel free to play around in it.

Customizing the Toolbox

The toolbox is where you get all your mouse or cursor-based tools. By default, it is locked to the side of the screen in a panel area. By clicking the  arrow, you can bring up a condensed version in your panel. The  is a toggle, that will switch between the two versions.You can also click and drag the  to create a “free floating” version of the toolbox.

The aforementioned double column format of the toolbox. Now that we’ve identified that we can change the shape of the toolbox, let’s briefly look at what’s available in it.

The Options Palette

At the top of your screen, directly under your menus, you’ll see the options palette. When you select different tools, you’ll have the various options you can edit here. Each tool is complex without these options, and can become extremely powerful with knowledge of its options.

What’s in the Toolbox?

Rectangular Marquee Tool: Shortcut key . The basic selection tool, marquee, AKA “Marching Ants” allows you to select areas of layers or flattened photographs. Shift + M  will cycle through to the various other selection tools, including the ellipse tool. You can hold Shift while drawing marquees to create squares.

Move Tool: Shortcut key  . The basic move tool. Once you select an area, choose the move tool to move it around. You can also move whole layers without selecting them.

Lasso Tool: Shortcut key  . Another selection tool, allows you to draw quick, shaped selections around parts of your image. Shift + L will cycle through the alternate lasso tools, including Polygonal Lasso and Magnetic Lasso tools.

Quick Selection Tool: Shortcut key  . A rough selection tool that works like a paintbrush. Brush around in an area, and Photoshop will read your image and try and guess what you’re trying to select. Press Shift + W to get the indispensible magic wand tool, which is a Bucket Fill or Flood style tool for selections.

Crop Tool: Shortcut key  . Draws rectangular selections, then cuts your image down to the rectangle you draw. Very useful for straightening crooked images. Press Shift + C to pick the Slice Tool and Slice Select tools, useful for creating multiple images from a single one, usually for web content.

Eyedropper Tool: Shortcut key  . Picks a color from any document you have open. Shift + I will cycle through the tools: Color Sampler, Ruler, and Note Tool.

Spot Healing Brush Tool: Shortcut key . Useful for erasing blemishes, scratches or unwanted noise from images automatically by painting over them. Press Shift + J to find the Healing Brush, Patch Tool, and Red Eye tools.

Brush Tool: Shortcut key  . The single most complex tool in the toolbox. Many articles on the brush tool to come, but for now, paint with left mouse clicks, and select different brush styles with right mouse clicks. Shift + B cycles through to the Pencil, Color Replacement Tool, and Mixer Brushes, all worth experimentation.

Clone Stamp Tool: Shortcut key  . Another photo-editing brush, Alt and Click to set a “Source” and then paint with the Left mouse button to copy from your source. Shift + S also gives you the pattern stamp tool.

History Brush Tool: Shortcut key  . Working in tandem with your History Palette, you can paint “back in time,” so to speak. Use a filter, then selectively undo parts of it with the History Brush. The Art History Brush is buried underneath here, accessible with a Shift + Y.

Eraser Tool: Shortcut key . Erases layers to transparency, and locked or Background Layers down to the Background Color. Shift + E will cycle through the Magic Eraser and the Background Eraser tool.

Gradient Tool: Shortcut key  . Clicking and dragging will fill your layer with a basic gradient using your foreground and background tools. The options palette has a lot of different gradients to use. Hidden under the Gradient Tool is the Paint Bucket Tool. Shift + G will cycle through to it. Use the Paint Bucket to fill areas of similar color in your image.

Blur, Sharpen, and Smudge Tools: By default, no shortcut key. These are three photo editing tools that do exactly what they say. Smudge, in particular, can create excellent painterly effects in your images. Left click and hold to bring up the contextual menu and pick the “buried” Sharpen and Smudge tools.

Dodge and Burn Tools: Shortcut key . Dodge and Burn are photo editing tools that lighten and darken images, respectively. This tool is not the zoom tool, as confusing as it may look. Shift + O cycles between the two of them.

Pen Tool: Shortcut key . A nightmarish frustration for beginner users, the Pen Tool is tough to get used to, but a favorite of Photoshop Pros. Similar to the Pen Tool in Adobe Illustrator, works in tandem with the Paths Palette. Shift + P will give you alternate Pen tools related to working with paths.

Type Tool: Shortcut key  . Allows you to set typography, by default horizonally. Shift + T will give you the Vertical Type Tool, as well as the Type Mask Tools.

Path Selection and Direct Selection Tools: Shortcut key . More tools made for editing paths in the path palette. Ignore unless you’re trying to learn the Pen Tool. Path selection picks whole paths, while Direct Selection picks line segments or points within paths. Cycle with Shift + A.

Custom Shape Tool: Shortcut key . Bizarre tool for creating clipart type vector shapes from a library in the options palette. Shift + U will also give you the more helpful tools for rectangles, polygons, and lines, all helpful for learning paths in Photoshop without suffering through the pen tool.

Zoom Tool: Shortcut key . Yes, this is the real zoom tool and not the Dodge tool. Zoom in with left clicks, zoom out with ALT plus Left Clicks. This is likely the most basic tool in the toolbox.

Hand Tool: Shortcut key . Scrolls your document without using the scrollwheel or scroll arrows. Press and hold the Space Bar at any time to use the quick Hand Tool, release Space to return to your previous tool.

Background/Foreground: The active colors you are painting with. The top color is Foreground, the back Background.  swaps the two colors.  reverts them to the default colors, black and white.

Quick Mask Mode: Shortcut key  . An alternate mode for creating complex selections with the Brush, Eraser, and Paint Bucket tools. The Q key toggles to and from Quick Mask Mode.

Article via HowToGeek

What is your computer doing in there? On the exterior it is a mass of plastics and metals, roughly pressed together to provide your PC with a protective case. But is it protecting your PC from the outside, or is it protecting youfrom the strange and arcane things happening inside your PC?

Perhaps it is time to find out exactly what your computer is up to – particularly if your computer is behaving badly. There are many third-party tools that can clean, scrub, and protect your PC, but none of those will help you better understand what’s going on. A program that can help you understand what is going on ships with every Windows PC. It’s called Windows Resource Monitor. Let’s take a look at what it can tell us.

Opening Windows Resource Monitor

Of course, we need to open Windows Resource Monitor before we can do anything. Windows Resource Monitor is a feature that was added in Vista and carries over to Windows 7. As far as I can gather, the only way to open it is through the Windows Task Manager - so press CTRL-ALT-DEL and open it.

Once Task Manager is open, go to the Performance tab. In the lower right hand corner is a button labeled Resource Monitor. Click it, and you’re ready to go!

The Basics

Windows Resource Monitor will, by default, open up to the Overview tab. This provides general, but useful, information about your computer. The best way to start becoming acquainted with Windows Resource Monitor is probably the graphs on the right side of the Overview tab. There are graphs here for your processor, hard disk, network and memory. These graphs will tell you how much of each is being used.

A computer at idle should display each graph as nearly flat. There may be minor spikes in usage, typically due to background processes, but these spikes should be few and they shouldn’t significantly consume system resources.

Other usage scenarios will result in distinct patterns.  For example, it is normal to see high disk activity and high network usage when you are downloading a file. It is also normal to see high disk activity while your virus scanning software is operating.

Sudden (or not-so-sudden), unexplained spikes are not normal. They may be the result of bloatware (unwanted programs that come pre-installed in your system), an inefficent antivirus program, a program that did not close correctly or even malware.

A Deeper Look At CPU Usage

Open the CPU tab of Windows Resource Monitor. When you do so, the graphs on the right will change. You’ll now be shown a graph for each core Windows detects (or two graphs for each core if you have an Intel processor with Hyper-Threading enabled). The total CPU usage graph remains, as well.

But the most important informaton here is not the graphs. What you’ll need to take a closer look at is the text information under the labels of Processes and Services. A process is an active application, while a service is a background application that conforms to special rules (it can run automatically on boot, it can run when no user is logged on, etc).

When it comes to checking out processor usage, however, you’ll organize both using the same tactic. Simply organize the processes or services by the average CPU value. Tada! You now know what programs are taking up your processor’s power. Please note that common processes and services can sometimes appear under odd names in Windows Resource Monitor. Be sure to Google an unknown program and identify it before you close it.

Analyzing Memory Usage

The way your computer uses its short-term memory (RAM) is important to overall performance. If you’re running low on available memory you’ll find that your computer’s performance becomes sluggish.

RAM usage can be found under the Memory tab. A new, useful line graph appears at the bottom of Windows Resource Monitor. This graph shows you how much memory is in use, how much is on stand-by (containing active data, but not actively in use) and how much is completely free.

Ideally you’ll want to see some free memory on this graph. The real problem, however, comes when your in-use memory fills up most of the graph. This means you simply don’t have any RAM left to use! You can free up memory by organzing processes by their Working memory share and shutting down memory hogs. If your system has limited memory, however, you may simply need to add more memory to your PC.

Hard Disk & Network Usage

Most users underestimate the effect their hard drive can have on overall system performance. The speed with which you can download files, install programs, transfer information, and open programs can all be affected by your hard drive’s performance. Sometimes a program, such ananti-virus scanner, will bombard your hard disk with requests for information.

Opening up the Disk tab will show you the Processes with Disk Activity display. This shows you all the active processes that are consuming your hard disk’s time. You’ll usually see a few common Windows processors, like System and svchost.exe, listed here. But you may also see other programs. This may clue you in as to why programs are loading slowly.

Finally, take a look at the Network tab. You will again see a Processes with Network Activitydisplay, which is very useful for tracking down programs that are making unwanted network connections (although nasty malware is often programmed to dodge Windows Resource Monitor or disguise itself as a more innocent process). You can also analyze your active network connections using the TCP connections display.

Conclusion

Familiarzing yourself with Windows Resource Monitor is a great idea. It is a very effective program that can tell you a lot about why your computer is behaving well or poorly. You can track down runaway programs and close them, and you can also see if a hardware upgrade is necessary to use the programs you prefer.

via MAKEUSEOF

The digital age is a dream come true for hoarders and collectors. No matter how much digital data or information you amass, it won’t take up a lot of space. This means you don’t have to control your primal instinct to search and collect, you can give rein to it.

Sometimes, however, there are technical obstacles. If you’re looking for a way to downloadYouTube videos and view them in Windows Media Player, read on. This article will explain how to best extract YouTube videos and subsequently enjoy them on Windows Media Player.

How It Works

YouTube streams content using flash video technology. The respective file format is .flv. To download and view a YouTube video, you basically have three options:

1. Download and playback the video in .flv file format.
2. Download and playback in an alternative file format.
3. Download the .flv file and convert it to another file format for playback.

This article is mainly concerned with how to view YouTube videos in Windows Media Player, regardless of how you obtained the files and what file format they are in. Hence, we can neglect the third option.

Best Download Options For YouTube Videos

To limit the confusion, I have selected only two tools. One is a website, the other a program. Both work flawlessly. You should go with the second one, VDownloader, if you want to download multiple videos in parallel.

Kiss YouTube

Kiss YouTube is a straight forward way to download YouTube videos because you do not need to install any software. In addition, Kiss YouTube can download YouTube videos in three different file formats: 3GP, FLV, and MP4. Paired with ease of use, that’s plenty of great features for an online service.

You can either copy and paste the URL of the YouTube video into the respective field on the Kiss YouTube homepage (see screenshot below); OR you can rename the YouTube URL, adding the word ‘kiss’ between ‘www.’ and ‘youtube.com/…’.

In both cases you will be directed to a page that lets you select your download format.

To proceed, click the download link of your preferred file format.

VDownloader

This is a software option, which is more convenient if you want to download multiple videos or wish to download from more sources than just YouTube. Attention! The installation comes with lots of extra software options and adware, all of which you can opt out of. Be sure to carefully screen all your options and go with a custom installation to opt out of the Ask toolbar and homepage.

Once you have completed the installation, VDownloader is a great tool. As soon as you copy a URL, it is pasted into the program’s > Video URL field. Next select your preferred > Output Formatand hit the > Download button. While your first video is already downloading, you can proceed to add the next one.

The available output formats include .flv (no conversion), .avi, .mpeg, .mp3 (audio), and several more.

VDownloader was also reviewed by Karl in this article: VDownloader – Really Easy Video Downloader Software. Also check out Simon’s article on How To Easily Download YouTube High Definition Videos.

How To View Various Video File Formats In Windows Media Player

Now that you have downloaded your videos, here comes the tricky part. Per default, Windows Media Player only recognizes a limited amount of file formats, the standard video file format being .wmv. However, none of the options above download YouTube videos in that format. So what can you do?

You need to download and install codecs so that Windows Media Player can read all those file types. Don’t sweat, it’s a quick and easy three-step-program:

1. Go to Codec Guide and download any of the K-Lite Codec Packs, the basic one is sufficient.
2. Install the downloaded K-Lite Codec Pack.
3. Enjoy downloaded videos in Windows Media Player.

That’s it.

Also check out the following YouTube-related articles on MakeUseOf:

• 3 Free Ways To Download YouTube Movies To Your iPhone (& Other Mobile Phones) by Jeffry
• 3 Sites to Download YouTube Videos as MP3 Files by Tim Lenahan
• 10 Youtube URL Tricks You Should Know About by Varun

Conclusion

If you’re now wondering, why you would want to use Windows Media Player in the first place, I congratulate you. The answer is, I don’t know. Fact is, it’s much easier to download a media player that naturally supports all these file formats. Obviously, you will save yourself the hassle of installing codecs and trying to make it work with WMP. If you can live without WMP and would prefer an easy option, I highly recommend VLC Media Player.

Here are some more MakeUseOf recommendations:

• Top 5 Free Media Players For Windows by Will
• Kantaris – A Great New Media Player Based On VLC by Simon
• Splayer – A Portable Play-All Media Player for Windows by Jessica

This is the time to fess up! Do you download YouTube videos to your computer and in case you do, what is your reason? Do you mind sharing how many gigabytes the YouTube videos take up on your hard drive?

VIA MAKEUSEOF

They slow your computer down, they ask for your money annually and they rate no better than various free products when compared by AV-comparitives.org. If you have an ongoing relationship with Norton or McAfee, it’s time to break up. Happily, both companies provide free software for doing just that.

Most people who have Norton or McAfee found the software on their computer when they bought it. That’s not necessarily a bad thing – it’s important to get a working anti-virus onto a new computer as quickly as possible – but the default software on your computer isn’t necessarily the best. Just ask any former IE user who today uses Google Chrome or Firefox.

Removing Norton and McAfee’s products has a tendency to leave a lot of crap behind, even if you go through the proper channels offered in your control panel. Both companies acknowledge this, and both offer removal tools for the complete uninstallation. If you’re looking to learn how to remove Norton or McAfee and replace them with something free and effective, you’ve found the right article.

Before you do anything you should probably disconnect from the Internet. Leaving a Windows computer connected to the web without protection can be dangerous. That’s why I recommend you read through the guide, download what you need to download and then follow the steps below.

Getting Started

Both Norton and McAfee recommend that you remove your program through the control panel before running their tools. I’ve found that simply running the tool is enough, but if you like playing by the rules you might as well do this first.

• Click your start button, then click “Control Panel“. Click “Add or Remove Programs” if you run XP, or “Uninstall a Program” if you’re using Vista/7. Find the program(s) you need to remove, then uninstall it!

• This may take a while, or in some cases may fail completely. Don’t panic; we’re only halfway through the process.

Completely Remove Norton

Are you a soon-to-be-ex-Norton-user? Congratulations! What you need now is the Norton Removal tool. The best product Norton offers, this program will completely remove all Norton-related software from your computer (including shortcuts and annoying toolbars).

Click here to download the Norton removal tool, then run the executable. You’ll see something that looks like this:

Follow the on-screen directions, mostly clicking “next“, to rid yourself forever of all Norton leftovers. You may have to prove you’re human by typing a few lines of text, but for the most part this is painless. Best of all: when you’re done there’s no sign left on your computer of Norton’s existence.

Completely Remove McAfee

If you’re trying to remove McAfee you’re going to need a different piece of software: the McAfee Cleanup Tool. This program will remove everything to do with McAfee from your computer, and is by far the best product they offer. It does exactly what it says it will do.

Go ahead and click here to download the McAfee removal tool. Run this executable and it will take care of the rest!

Install Something Better

Looking for a better piece of anti-virus software? I myself really love Microsoft Security Essentials, for three reasons: first, it offers great protection; second, it features a really clean and simple user interface; third, it will never ever ask you for money.

But read the comments below and you’ll quickly discover not everyone agrees with me. Check out their recommendations, and be sure to check out our list of the top ten free anti-virus programs if you still need ideas.

Can anyone offer links to tools for completely removing other annoying bits of software?  If so, please share them below.

Article By MAKEUSEOF

FTP and SSH are both network protocols that run on top of the TCP/IP layer, just like HTTP. In plain English, it’s a certain way for devices to communicate with each other over a network.

Different ways of communication are used in different circumstances. There are different uses and different strengths. But exactly how SSH and FTP relate is unclear to most.

This installment in the Technology Explained series aims to shed some light on the two protocols and their differences.

Shell & Shell Accounts

Let’s get some basic terminology out of the way. To understand the purpose of SSH, you need to be familiar with some of the underlying elements.

The shell of a computer is a piece of software that allows users to directly communicate with the kernel, the very core of an operating system. The shell can have either a graphical or command-line interface (read: text input), or both.

A shell account, on the other hand, is a personal account that gives the user access to a shell on a different computer. They used to be commonplace and supplied by the Internet Service Providers, used to work with file storage, email accounts, newsgroups and more. The common denominator is that a shell account is used to enter commands on a remote computer.

Secure Shell Protocol (SSH)

Just like a web browser uses the HTTP protocol to talk with websites, a shell account needs a certain protocol to enable data exchange (read: communication) between the two networked devices. Meet SSH - Secure Shell Protocol.

SSH uses a public key encryption and was developed to replace Telnet and other insecure shell protocols. The two major versions, SSH-1 and SSH-2, are now the dominating protocols to access shell accounts.

These days, SSH is used to log into and execute code on remote hosts, browse the web using encrypted proxy clients, and transfer files – even setting up a Virtual Private Network.

SSH clients are available for all major operating systems. Unix-based systems, including Linux and Mac OS X, can use OpenSSH. Also check the OpenSSH website for Mac OS and Windows alternatives. PuTTY is one of the most prominent Windows clients.

Secure File Transfer Protocol (SFTP) versus FTP

File transfer and VPN applications don’t run on SSH by default, but make use of SFTP – the SSH File Transfer Protocol. Mind you, SFTP is not the FTP protocol running over SSH, but a different file transfer protocol developed as an extension for SSH-2. SFTP is always used to transfer files over SSH, but it’s actually designed so it can be used in compliance with other protocols. That’s not for this article, though.

Although not in the letter, for the end-user, SFTP can be seen as a secure relative of FTP. The latter transmits all data in plain-text. Packet intercepts can thus reveal crucial and private data, including your user name and password! SFTP, being an SSH-2 extension, uses public key security. This means the data is encrypted when it is being transmitted and potential intercepts are relatively useless.

SFTP as such is included in most popular FTP suites, albeit often without other SSH functionality.

I hope you’ve learned something from this article. If you’ve got any questions or suggestions, head to the comments section below!

Image credit: Shutterstock

Article by MAKEUSEOF

For a lot of people, using a Windows computer isn’t exactly a experience that can be “customized”.  Most people work hard just to figure out how the operating system works. The extent of “customizing” involves things like changing the Windows desktop background or configuring the default email system.

Given, there are plenty of readers that could alter some of the most obscure regions of the Windows OS, but for the rest of you who don’t walk on water when it comes to computers – I’d like to introduce an app that can help.

Here at MUO we’ve previously covered a number of free utilities developed by Fresh Devices. Kyle previously wrote about FreshDiagnose, a useful utility that lets you analyze and bookmark Windows. I also covered Freshview, an app that helps you organize all of your multimedia files. Recently, I discovered that Fresh Devices also offers another utility called FreshUI that will help you quickly and easily tweak your Windows Operating System just like a pro.

When you first install and launch FreshUI, you’ll see that the application is laid out in a way that makes it very easy to learn. All of the areas of Windows that you can customize are laid out clearly along the left pane, and organized in a simple tree view with only six major categories.

Using FreshUI, you can quickly customize all areas of Windows, including standard Windows apps, how hardware behaves and even specific privacy settings that matter most to you. The beauty of this application is that you don’t have to dig through the Windows OS to find them.

Apps that you can tweak include standard Windows programs like Hearts or Notepad, but also some of the deeper apps like the Registry Editor. Now, keep in mind that this app isn’t for changing the options in these applications or modifying typical app settings. It’s actually for customizing the apps by enabling or disabling certain features about them.

For example, within the Internet Explorer section you can tweak each of the available options in the menu of IE.

This allows you to customize the app for all users by doing things like disabling the ability to modify proxy settings or even disabling the ability to close IE itself. These are all settings that you’d have to dig through registry settings or the control panel in order to enable or disable. With FreshUI, some of the most advanced “hacks” are right there at your fingertips.

Beyond applications, you can also customize the behavior for your computer hardware. For example, optimizing your CPU cache, enabling or disabling your CD Player’s autoplay feature, tweaking some of your motherboard memory settings and much more. Obviously, you should only make these changes if you really know what you’re doing – otherwise you could actually do some damage. Side note – always click on File -> Save Windows Settings before you get started so you can always restore the default settings.

Beyond applications and software, you can also tweak some of Windows standard components, like Windows Explorer itself. For example, blocking access to specific drives, modifying the “free space” warning if it’s getting really annoying, or disabling the ability for users to map new network drives. All of these somewhat advanced Windows “hacks” are brought down to Earth when you use FreshUI.

If you’ve always wanted to tweak things like the display or behavior of your task bar or start menu, then you’ll be very pleased when you click on the “Windows Interface” category. There are lots of cool things you can customize here that you probably never even realized were configurable.

Of course, what most people would like to do is tweak the heart of the operating system itself – things like startup and shutdown features or security settings. If you click on the “Windows System” option in the left pane, you’ll see that FreshUI basically opens up the hood and hands you the wrench.

Another very useful area of FreshUI that I plan to recommend to all of my friends who constantly complain about their bogged down computer with a slow Internet connection, is the “Covering Your Track” section of this application.

Here, you can wipe out logs, histories and junk files associated with all of your Internet and Windows usage. You can set up the system so it doesn’t track recent documents or last user, and even the option to clear network history each time you log onto the network.

Whenever you’re finished setting up all of your Windows customizations to exactly what you want, don’t forget to click on File and “Save Windows settings“. The last thing you want to do is lose all of the customizing options you set. If things go wrong, you can just restore the settings that you saved before you made any customizations at all.

Article by MAKEUSEOF