Category Archives: Platforms

Use FoxIt Reader in Chrome

Chrome fast. FoxIt reader fast. But by default they don’t work together so well, insisting on PDFs being saved to disk before FoxIt will open them.

Here’s how to get read PDFs inside Chrome using FoxIt reader:

  • Copy the file npFoxitReaderPlugin.dll from C:\Program Files\Foxit Software\Foxit Reader\plugins to C:\Program Files\Google\Chrome\Application\plugins
  • If the plugins directory doesn’t exist, then create it
  • C:\Program Files\Google\Chrome… only exists if you’ve used the Google Pack version of Chrome. If instead you’ve got the version that (oddly) shoves it into C:\Documents and Settings\USER\Local Settings\Application Data\Google\Chrome\ then you’ll need to find the right place under there for it.
  • Restart Chrome

(Source: Chrome forum post, and some fiddling/experimentation)

UPDATE: As commenters have noted, unfortunately the relevant files may be in place only if you installed the Firefox plugin with FoxIt Reader — which may not offer to do so unless it detects Firefox is installed.

The button

The non-profit I volunteer for got an iMac in the office. So lovely. Such clean design, spoilt only by the Post-It note someone had to put on the front of it to tell people to reach around the back to find the power button.

Extracting RAR files online

As a Windows user I occasionally receive .rar files that I need to expand. In the past I’ve had to install a piece of software (I generally went with Stuff It Expander) to extract the contents. Of course every piece of software you install wants to add context menus, program groups and system tray icons – something I wanted to avoid adding to my new machine.

I’ve found www.wobzip.org that will allow me to extract the contents of .rar files online. As my need to do this is infrequent the overhead of uploading the file isn’t too much pay. The beauty of this site is that as well as downloading individual extracted files you can also download a .zip file that can be handled natively by Windows XP/Vista.

Media PC

I recently updated my main production machine and was left with a fairly recent (three years old) machine. After pondering what to do with it I remembered it had a silent power supply and this would make it an ideal candidate for a media PC.

I did some research on open source media software and had almost settled on Media Portal when Microsoft released the Windows 7 RC. The RC is the Ultimate version and has Windows Media Centre included. With W7 being a freebie for the next six and a bit months (before it begins to nag) I thought I’d give it a go.

After downloading the .iso and burning it to a DVD using the free burner program ImgBurn I put it in the DVD drive and rebooted the PC. A fresh install of Windows 7 took about 15 minutes. From memory I only had to make three selections for the entire process. Once the install had finished there were a couple more reboots that added about 10 minutes to the process but once these were done Windows 7 was set to go.

First impression is that Windows 7 is quick. Very very quick. I have Vista running on a Quad Core with 4GB of RAM but Windows 7 on a Dual Core with 2GB seems snappier. It takes the best of the visual elements of Vista and improves the task bar with icons and great preview thumbnails.

Setting up Media Centre was a breeze, all I did was point to the directories I wanted to use for movies and television shows, change the setting to make Media Centre run on start up and it was ready. The interface is stylish and intuitive, although options once are playing a file and you wish to quit can be a bit confusing.

I want to keep the media PC as lean as I can so this meant finding a way of getting content on to the machine without installing uTorrent. The answer was Windows Live Sync. I added a wireless network card to save running CAT6 through the roof and installed LiveSync. Now all I do is add/download the media I want on my main PC and it automatically syncs to the media PC at the other end of the house. It takes about 5 minutes to transfer an hour tv show, about 10 to do an average movie.

The biggest plus is that we may now actually get around to watching all the shows we have stored up. Prior to this we would have to decide what we wanted to watch and either convert them to DivX or create a DVD, burn the DVD and watch it that way. Given the time this takes, and the media we went through (we always seemed to loose the RW discs) we’d just sit and flick through channels instead. Now everything we have is there, ready to watch straight away.

I’m impressed with the set up and Windows 7. I’ll be upgrading my production machine and the media PC once the final version is released. Microsoft certainly seem to have got it right with W7.

iTunes with less bloat

(Part of my project to re-install my main home PC.)

I’ve been re-installing my main home PC, and trying to avoid putting junk on it.

iTunes 8 has blown out to a 70Mb download, up from about 20Mb just a couple of years ago with version 4, 33Mb for version 5, 35Mb for version 6, and 49Mb for version 7.

Part of the reason is that they bundle in a bunch of stuff: Quicktime, Bonjour (for networking), Apple Mobile Device Support (for iPhone and iPod Touch), MobileMe (for syncing with the service previously known as .Mac) and Apple Software Update (automatic updates, but includes shovelling in more stuff you don’t want).

The very intelligent Ed Bott investigated and found the following solution to cutting out the crap.

Download the iTunes setup. Then open it with an archive program such as 7-Zip or WinZip or WinRAR.

For people like me who have only old iPods, Nanos and Minis in the house, all you need is iTunes itself, and Quicktime. So extract and run the following:

Quicktime.msi /passive

iTunes.msi /passive
(For 64-bit: iTunes64.msi /passive )

…and that’s it. Done.

More details from Ed Bott — including what to do if you have an iTunes Touch or iPhone.

Copying your iPod MP3 collection onto a Windows PC via the iPod

I wanted an instant music collection at work, without installing iTunes or anything else, and without individually ripping the CDs. Fortunately all my CDs had been ripped to MP3 on my iPod, so I just took it into work and plugged it in.

Of course you don’t want to use iTunes, as that will mess it up completely, but as long as you can browse around the iPod’s files (eg you’ve switched-on Enable Disk Use), look into the \iPod_Control\Music directory (it’s hidden, so switch Explorer to view hidden files) and you’ll see iTunes has helpfully given random meaningless names to the MP3 files, such as F00\AJUR.mp3

No matter. Copy them to the new PC, and then drag them to Windows Media Player’s media library. It looks at the MP3 tags, which do match the actual artists and track names, and displays those in its library.

Done.

I knew there was a reason I encoded all my songs as MP3 instead of AAC. While there are hacks to get WMP to play AACs, officially it can’t — making it awkward to do on a corporate PC. I figured when I ripped them that MP3s are more widely supported, and perhaps more futureproof.

Saw a guy on the train with an old-style portable CD player. ‘Cos, you know, digital music from real CDs have a warmth that MP3/AAC on iPods just can’t match…

Windows 7 first impressions

I gave the Windows 7 beta a try. I've deliberately skipped Vista, as my PCs are a few years old now, and an upgrade is not a high priority at this stage.

Thankfully it happily installs into a partition of its own, leaving XP intact. Though interestingly once running it didn't seem to even see the original C: drive, but could only see the D: drive it was installed on, but as C:.

To co-exist with XP, it creates a new boot menu, where XP is the “Previous version of Windows”. Not sure how/if I'll be able to get rid of that later when I zap W7.

The installation appeared to go smoothly, but it hasn't recognised key parts of my old PC: the on-board ethernet, the video, and the sound. So apart from there being no net access, no sound, and the video resolution is screwy, it's all fine.

Of course that may all be fixed in the final version.

So I had a play around in it. The new applets (Calculator, Paint etc) are much nicer than the old versions. The whole interface looks pretty nice in fact. And with just the basics installed, it seems to run quite well on my old computer.

Panasonic phone troubleshooting

My Panasonic cordless phone/answering machine (KX-A142 ALM) has been pretty good, though the interface is shocking. Who on earth decided “INT” then “#” should be the sequence to listen to messages?

Anyway, a couple of things were causing me problems.

1. When the clock resets itself, it’s not at all obvious how to set it again.

Eventually I found the manual and did it, but for the record:

  • Press the menu button (the box with horizontal lines in it)
  • Press the Down button until you get to “SETTING BS” (I guess it stands for base station)
  • Press right
  • It’ll say “INPUT CODE”. Rather than input the code… press * to set the time (hh mm), or ** to set the date (dd mm yy)
  • When done, press the menu button again to confirm

2. A couple of days ago it stopped being able to make outgoing calls. It could get a dial tone, but wouldn’t dial.

I fixed this with a reboot, which involves holding the red power button on the handset down for 1+ seconds so it switches off, then again to switch it back on. Voila.

Helpfully, Panasonic has manuals available on their web site.