Today, I just found a new way to improve my Vista user experience, by speeding up access to the items of the Control Panel using only the most. If you like what you see below, then you should keep reading, and learn how to do this on your Vista computer too...


Now, let's see how can we do this, shall we?

- First of all, right click the Start Orb, and choose Properties.

- In the Start Menu tab, click on the upper Customize button, as you can see below.


- In the window that opens, check Display as a menu, below Control Panel.


- Click OK, Apply, OK again and it's all set.

Now, you can enjoy your new settings...

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No matter how advanced are going to become the pointing devices used on a computer, I don't see them beating the keyboard soon in terms of speed. Even if your expensive laser mouse has a 2000dpi resolution, an experienced keyboard shortcuts user would work at least 3 times as fast as you...but with a condition: he must remember all those keyboard shortcuts!


<-120x240 Vertical Banner - left->There are a lot of shortcuts available in Firefox, but today I will try to give you 10 that should give you access to the most frequently used functions of Mozilla's browser. If I forget something important for you, feel free to remind me, because I am sure there are at least 3 dozens of shortcuts used on a regular basis by most Firefox users...

10. On the last position, I place the keyboard shortcut used to open a new browser window, Ctrl+N. I know there are tabs, but I also know some people that would rather open a new window, instead of a new tab, so there you have it!

9. I don't like to see the Downloads window every time I download a file, but sometimes I need to check the progress when downloading large files, and nothing is easier than pressing Ctrl+J, checking the current status, and then pressing Esc or Ctrl+J again to hide the Downloads window again.

8. To save the current page, simply tap Ctrl+S and choose the location, name of the file and the format to use.

7. If you have problems viewing small text on a certain page, simply press Ctrl++ to increase its size. To decrease text size, the obvious shortcut is Ctrl+-... and to restore text size, you have to use Ctrl+0.

6. To go to the address bar, you can use Alt+D or F6, so pick your favorite!

5. If you want to go to the search bar, simply use Ctrl+K, instead of reaching for the mouse. It's faster this way, don't you think?

4. To open a new tab, the keyboard shortcut to use is Ctrl+T, while Ctrl+Shift+T will open the last tab you have closed...

3. ...using the Ctrl+W or Ctrl+F4 shortcuts, of course!

2. To navigate between open tabs, you can use Ctrl+1..9 (select the tab having the number used together with Ctrl), Ctrl+Tab (next tab), and Ctrl+Shift+Tab (previous tab).

1. My first shortcuts in today's top are Ctrl+F, for finding text in a page, and F5, to reload the current page.

This is it, I know I said "top 10" and we have more than 10 shortcuts here, but I am sure you won't mind. Before I go, I must repeat - if you have other shortcuts that you're using on a regular basis, please enlighten me, and you'll have my eternal gratitude!

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One of the new security features in Internet Explorer 7 is the Phishing Filter, which was introduced to help you keep your private data the way it should be...private. Unfortunately, once you install Vista and put everything in place, the default settings of the web browser don't activate this feature without asking, so you must do it yourself, and this is "a must".

Since it is possible that you answered "No" when Internet Explorer started for the first time and asked you if you want to enable this feature or not, here's how to make things right...

- Start Internet Explorer by clicking the shortcut in the Quick Launch.


- Open the Tools menu, go to Phishing Filter, and then choose Turn On Automatic Website Checking.


- In the window that opens, choose the obvious option, as you can see below...


- As soon as you press the OK button, the Phishing Filter starts protecting you!

As a final hint, if you find a site that you think it's being used to impersonate another one just to get your confidential data, go to the Tools menu and use the Report This Website action from the Phishing Filter submenu to help Microsoft flag this site as a dangerous one as soon as it proves you are right.

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Yesterday we talked about viewing the current firewall rules, and today the time has come to see how these rules can be changed, using the advanced interfaced introduced in my previous article on this topic. Of course that if you simply allow or deny when the firewall asks you to decide what to do with a certain application asking to create a connection to the Internet, things work pretty well, but what if you block by mistake your email client, for example?

I'll go along with the scenery above, and show you how to change an existing rule. These being said, let's go!

- First of all, let's open the advanced interface of the Windows Firewall by pressing the Start Orb, typing "firewall" in the search bar, and then clicking the item called Windows Firewall with Advanced Security.


- In the window that opens, click on Inbound Rules or Outbound Rules, both located in the left pane.


- Right click an item from the list and choose Properties.

- In the General tab, you can change the action performed by the current rule, as you can see in the screenshot below.


- In the Advanced tab, the Interface Types settings allow you to have different options set for a certain program, depending on the network interface used (for example, you can block a certain program to connect to the Internet, but allow it to create connections on your local network).


- At last, using the Scope tab allows you to apply a certain rule only to specific addresses, both for your computer and the remote location.


Today, we covered another small part of the Windows Firewall topic, but there's still enough to go. Anyway, I'll leave this aside for a while and give you tips and tricks covering the entire Vista universe, because there's a lot to know...

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One of the good things in Vista is the firewall, a huge step forward from the one included in Windows XP. Despite the fact it won't pass all leak tests, this security tool included in all Vista versions does its job pretty well, and since first thing to do is check current settings, before changing them, today I'll show you how to view the current rules...

- To bring up the advanced interface of the Windows Firewall, press the Start Orb, type "firewall" in the search bar, and then click the item called Windows Firewall with Advanced Security.


- In the window that opens, expand the Monitoring branch, located in the left pane.


- Left click the Firewall item and check the list with active firewall rules.


- To get more details, right click an item and choose Properties, but be aware that you won't be able to change anything at this time.

The next logical step is to change these advanced rules, and also add new ones as needed, but this is what we're going to learn in the near future, so stay tuned!

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