Vista offers the following controls, in addition to Internet Explorer's built-in Parental Controls:

• Windows Vista Web Filter

This controls what websites, downloads and other miscellaneous web usage is allowed.

• Time limits

This controls time curfews on computer usage, in case you are not around to enforce it.

• Games

This setting allows you to limit what type of games can be played on this particular user account.

• Allow and Block Specific Programs

This setting allows you to prevent any other activity in case it doesn't fall in Vista's guidelines, and for other manual fine-tuning.

Vista also has a feature called Activity Viewer, which will show you the top-ten websites visited, blocked, as well as file downloads and attempted (blocked) downloads, any games played (though web-based games have to be managed through the Vista Web Filter), e-mail and instant-messaging events as well. This feature can be engaged independantly of all other parental controls.

To begin using Parental Controls in Vista, simply:

1. Click the Start Orb and left-click on Control Panel. This will bring up a new window.
2. Within this window, double-left click on User Accounts. The window will change into the User Controls window.
3. On the left hand pane, single left-click Parental Controls. (this is usually found under See Also: Parental Controls at the bottom-left corner of your screen) This may take a minute to load, so be patient. A "User Access Control" window may come up as well, if it does, click Continue.
4. From the Parental Controls window, click on the account you wish to apply new controls to. If one does not exist, here is your opportunity to create a new one via the control at the bottom labeled Create a new user account. Otherwise, click on the account you wish to work on.
5. The controls for that specific account will come up. Most of them will be grayed out, to start. To enable the other controls, simply click On, enforce current settings under Parental Controls.
6. Once On, enforce current settings is enabled, the rest of the window lights up. To go into the details of each feature, simply click on the words that are lit up for that option, and to enable, disable, and customize the strength of each setting to your liking. Also, note that you can come back here any time to customize filtering if it is too strict, not strict enough or if your teenager has just been grounded!

A quick summary of available features:

Vista Web Filter

Beneath this setting you will find the ability to block all, or only some specific, web content. If you choose to block only some, you can then edit a block list to add and remove blocked content. If you choose not to block specific content, you can utilize a built-in web restriction level which will attempt to sort out content for you. If you choose "Custom", you will get a front end that allows you to choose what content the user of this account should and should not be seeing. Note that this is not foolproof as new websites come out every day, but it should block a very high degree of them. Lastly, you can choose to block or allow downloads on this account.

Time Limit

This option will give you a week-style calendar in which you can click to block a specific time period (in increments of one hour). Click that square again to unblock it. This account will not be able to log on during the blocked periods!

Games

This option allows you to choose which installed software may be launched from this user account. You can block all games, or a varying setting based on user age. This works with Vista-capable software to judge what that game's setting is. If you are concerned about a piece of software in particular, you can also block it using this section of parental controls.

Allow and Block Specific Programs

This section defines whether the user can use all programs (with the exception of those listed above), or ones that are specifically allowed, also known as a whitelist.

View Activity Reports

If you've enabled this feature for this user account, you may come back to this section under your profile to view activity reports. This will give you a summary of that user's latest activity, such as web sites visited, attempted downloads, logon times, and programs that have been run.

I sincerely hope that this introduction to Vista's Parental Controls has been helpful to you. If you believe it has, please consider forwarding this website to your friends, so that they too might get the most out of their computer!

I hope you find these tips interesting and useful! I would appreciate any feedback you may have.

Myth #1

You can't do any real web development on Mac OS X, including server scripts such as PHP.

The Truth

You can do the same amount of web development on Mac OS X as you can on any Windows machine; in fact, I have found Mac OS X even easier to set up server scripts. Recently I decided to set up PHP on my Mac at home to find out that Mac OS X Leopard actually comes with Apache2 and PHP5 already installed onto it! All it takes is a few configuration steps to set up PHP5 to work on your computer.

Myth #2

It is much harder to set up the use of web development languages on Mac OS X than it is on Windows.

The Truth

I have actually found it easier to set up different web development languages on my Mac than on my friends Windows computer. A few days after I set up Apache2, PHP5 and MySQL on my Mac I helped a friend do it on his Windows computer. It took at least 3 more hours to get all of them installed on his computer than on mine, and even longer to get MySQL to work because the default configuration file for MySQL on Windows does not have everything needed for it to work.

Myth #3

You might be able to do web development on Mac, but you can't get much further than the things you can do with iWeb.

The Truth

You can do the same scripting on a Mac as you can do on a Windows machine. Saying that you are confined to iWeb is like saying you are confined to Frontpage on Windows.

There are many more myths regarding Mac OS X and web development, but I think that this will help some of you realize that Mac OS X is just as good for web development as Windows is. In the end, the scripting of languages is the same on both machines because the languages do not change depending on operating systems; the only difference I can find is setting up those scripting languages, which I have found to be much easier on Mac OS X than on Windows.

Windows has conditioned us to run updates and download the latest drivers but with Linux you only have to add software if you want. Drivers or software are not required for it to run at its' best. Linux is flexible in many ways because you can put in the software you want instead of install all the component. By not running all the software and updates than Linux uses less disk space. If a hard drive is almost full than Linux still could run because it doesn't take much to run the system. Linux is really a hassle free operating system and the time we use for updates would be time that businesses could use elsewhere. Businesses worry about the security of their systems especially with windows.

Linux is one of the most secure operating systems we have. That means the system is hack free and if I owned a business that would be important. The reasons that the system is secure is that all the software and downloads are free so that your credit card doesn't have to go over the internet. The administrator has the option of letting his employee have access to the files he wants. Instead of an employee hacking into the computer and getting important information the employer can block their access to that file. He can also see who is on the network and how long. It's real nice with payroll and to see what his employees are doing. The cost of Linux is not even comparable to windows.

Windows cost us a lot of money with all the downloads and buying of newer software or the licenses to run the software. But as for Linux, the software is GNU (General Public License) which means that you can start working right away without the worry that the trial period will be over soon. It is much more stable than windows because we never need to reboot Linux to maintain the performance. In the business aspect, time is money and rebooting a lot will cost time and money. The licenses that we pay for on windows usually are for only a single computer while Linux software can be distributed on as many computers as you like without costing a dime. Businesses that use Linux would be Pizza hut, Chucky Cheese and I'm sure there are more. With business that is high volume customers like in the pizza business than Linux would be perfect and hassle free. You would think with all the money that the pizza businesses are saving with Linux than the cost of pizza would be real low.

As you can see, Linux is a better operating system than window or at least cost less. The cost of software and Licenses sure do add up but with Linux you will never have that. Your credit card or important information will never go over the internet. Linux can run for long period of time without being rebooted unlike windows. If I were a business owner than Linux would be the way to go but the most difficult thing is to teach the employees how to run Linux.

Spybot Search and Destroy/Avg Free

These 2 programs are the backbone of my computer security. Each one compliments the other in the sense that one will take care of the malicious software that the other doesn't. First you have Spybot, an easy to use anti-spyware program that has a very useful feature, immunization. Used on both Internet Explorer and Firefox, Immunization stops spyware from entering your computer. Second you have Avg Free, which is a powerful Anti-Virus program that block viruses from entering though downloads or Peer-to-peer traffic. You set AVG free to do full hard drive searches for viruses during times that you are away, asleep or otherwise not at the computer. My only complaint about these 2 programs is that they are memory hogs when they run full searches.

Winamp

Yep, good old winamp. I choose Winamp over many other media players because it can play back a wide selection of media file types, both video and audio. Unfortunately, many people cut it short because they don't realize that Winamp has plug-ins that allow you to run many types you would not expect, such as Real Media (.rm) and Flash Movie (.flv) files.

Firefox

Please for the love of Ra, don't use Explorer. Firefox is a heavily customizable browser that give the power and flexibility needed when doing things like watching streaming media, playing online games or just surfing the web. You can also do some of the strangest things like check the country of the website your on, or color code your tabs. but this is apart of Firefox's unique user base.

Open Office

A good program but I'd only install it if you don't already have Microsoft office already aboard. Open office is a free alternative to the much necessary in the day and age program.

Crimson Editor

A personal choice and it's a bit dated but it's a good replacement for notepad. tabbed for organizing multiple text documents a spell checker for multiple programing languages. It's a great program for those who create web pages from scratch.

FrostWire/BitTorrent

If your into the whole Peer to Peer thing, the FrostWire and BitTorrent combo is for you. FrostWire is a hacked up free version of LimeWire Pro, FrostWire comes with no bundled viruses or spyware. Fairly easy to install, you can use LimeWire to share your favorite (non-copyright) software, games, and more! BitTorrent is the same but for .Torrent files. A word of advice though: You should always seed the files. If you fear the fact that a certain organization (like for instance the RIAA) will come after you, then you already know it's illegal and should never have downloaded the files to begin with. Not seeding is quite inconsiderate and can leave others who wish to have to file, hanging at 5%.

Peer Guardian 2

Good for keeping your Peer to Peer activity and web browsing private from them peering eyes. Blocks the IP addresses of known troublemakers from gaining access to your computer.

IceChat

A Great IRC Chat program for those who know IRC. It's simple to use and has extra features for those who really know what they're doing.

Turn off the Welcome Center startup page.

This is as simple as deselecting the Run at Startup check box. You do not need this to run at startup to enjoy Vista.

Change the sleep time on your computer.

If your computer has already gone to sleep please note that tapping a couple of times on the space bar wakes it quicker than moving the mouse. Go to the Windows start button and select Control Panel. It is the 3rd item from the bottom right. Select System and Maintenance green link, then go to Power options and select the blue link Change when the computer sleeps. You will notice they have it set for a measly 30 minutes, way too short for going to get something to eat and drink while you work at home. Set the Turn off display time to something you can live with, say 4 hours (I set mine to never). Set the Put the computer to sleep time to something you can live with. Save changes and exit out of the power options.

Change the defrag disk parameters.

It comes set to defrag every week and this is overkill for most users. I set mine for monthly defrag although on my old XP Professional system I only defragged once a year. Go to the Windows Start button and select Control Panel, the 3rd item from the bottom right. Select the green System and Maintenance link then scroll down to the category called Administrative Tools. Select the blue link Defragment your hard drive and click on the link. It should come up as Run on a Schedule and you can modify schedule. Do so. Select monthly out of how often, day 1 in days and 6pm or another time suited to you. This would mean defrag at 6pm on the first day of the month. Defragging keeps your files tight and together on your hard drive so they load faster. Of course, you could always take it off the schedule and defrag by going to the defrag scheduler when you want to.

Get on the Internet.

Get with your ISP and hook up to the Internet. Hopefully you do not have dial-up as it is much slower than anything else out there. I use my cell phone as a modem and typically run 7-10 times faster than dial-up for $25 a month. If you are stuck with dial-up but have a cell phone see if this option is available to you. After you connect to the Internet, just let your computer sit idle for awhile….Windows will download some updates and notify you to restart when it is done.

Get rid of PC-cillin by Trend and buy Norton Internet Security 2008 for $49.

If you decide to do this, go to the Start button and select Control Panel. Under the green link Programs select the blue link to Uninstall a program. Select Trend software PC-cillin and uninstall it. After it has done its' job close the Control Panel. Have your Internet up and running and put the CD in the CD player to install Norton Internet Security 2008. Once Norton Internet Security 2008 has been installed, change the scan schedule. It comes set to full scan weekly as did disk defrag, this is also overkill as long as you do a quick scan after every days work is done if you were on the Internet. Double click the Norton Icon and select Schedule a scan. The select Schedule a full system scan. Select month for Schedule Task: and then select The 1st Sunday of every month, select time consistent with when you will be on the computer (You might shy away from 6pm or whatever time you set your defrag to, give full system scan a couple of hours prior to defrag. Select OK to save your changes and exit out of Norton.

Burn your music library to Windows Media Player.

Windows Media Player has been completely revamped and it is well done. Once again make sure the Internet is up and running. This will fill in your album information and your song tracks for you. Place the CD you want to copy songs from in the CD player and it should auto start. You will see a tab on the Windows Media Player that says RIP. This is the tab to copy from CD to computer, they call it ripping now. Select the RIP tab. You should see the list of song titles with them all checked. Deselect the songs you do not wish to copy. Select START RIP at the bottom right. Wait for ripping to finish and then you can close Windows Media Player. Repeat this process for each of your CD's you want to copy from. I have 95 songs from 24 CD's in my music library.

Burn a custom CD for your car from Windows Media Player.

You do not need the Internet up and running to do this. Install a blank CD in your CD-W drive. Open Windows Media Player and select a playlist you have made and want to burn from, or select Play All if you do not have a previously made playlist. Select Play, and then View Queue. You can then Edit Queue which will allow you to select a delete box by each song. Delete the songs you do not want burned to your CD, bearing in mind the CD can only hold 80 minutes of audio. Once you have done this, save the playlist under a new name. Use the Window button to return to the main selection screen and select your new playlist. This time select Burn, if you have too much songs selected it will warn you and you can delete some more. If not, it will merrily burn you a music CD with your favorite music on it.

Change your desktop background to your favorite photo.

You do not need the internet up and running for this activity. Your photo must be downloadable from where it is. I have a digital camera with compact flash card, so here is what I do. I have taken a photo of my son and his fiancée, turned off my camera, removed the compact flash media card and inserted it in the appropriate compact flash reader in my 9 in 1 card reader on the front panel of my computer. I then go to Windows start button, select computer, and select the drive with the media in it. I then select the photos I want copied and copy them to the Sample Pictures folder. This is under C:/users/public/public pictures. After doing this, make sure you expand your right task bar and find the safely remove hardware icon and click on it. It should bring up a yellow dialog box telling you it is safe to remove your media card. Do so and click the dialog box. Go back to the Windows start button and select it. Select the Control Panel, 3rd item from bottom right. Go over to the second column and find Appearance and personalization the second from the top. Go to the blue link called Change desktop background and select it. Browse photo locations if not started in Sample Pictures to Public pictures/Sample pictures which is where you should have put your photo when you copied it over. Just click on your picture twice to turn the background to it. Under How should the picture be positioned select the leftmost button. This stretches the picture over your monitor screen. Select OK and close the Control Panel.

Getting the red eye out of your computer photos using Adobe Elements Studio. You need the Internet up and running if this is the first time you've used Adobe Elements Studio. You will patiently wait at most an hour, unless you have dial-up and then it will be even longer, for an update package to load of 193 Mb. Open Adobe Elements Studio and allow the updater to do its thing. Afterwards, click on the camera icon to load Adobe Elements Photoshop 6.0. Select the Edit button. Once the program has loaded, under the menu heading FILE select open. Navigate to Sample Pictures, or wherever you put the photo with red eye at. Double click the photo to load it. A little past mid-way down the left screen side you will see a “red eye”. Select this tool and then position it over your photos red eye and click it. This however, does not remove the entire red eye-it did not on mine. The third icon down on the left side is an eye dropper. Select this tool and then at the top of the icons set sample size to 3 by 3. Using the keyboard hold down the CTRL key and press the "=" key 2 times to enlarge the photo. Move the eyedropper tool over the part of the eye you want the color to be and click one time. Now switch to the brush tool, it is above the paint can icon on the bottom left. Using the eye drop tool this way causes the paint brush to change to that color. Set the paint brush paint size at the top to a small brush. Then just paint over your red eye and your job is complete. Don't forget to go to the file menu and Save your changes. If you were working on your background picture you will need to reload it or restart your computer for it to take effect.

Burn a movie DVD. Once again, if this is the first time you have used Adobe Elements Video shop 4.0 you need to be connected to the internet. Double click the Adobe Elements Studio icon, and then click the camcorder icon in the middle. If this is the first time, let the updater do its job prior to continuing, the wait could be as long as an hour, much longer if you have dial-up. Assuming this is a new project select the new project icon. Name your new project and the film layout studio will load. Click on the left most tool bar item titled Get Media. Click on DVD on the lists that come up. Select GET MEDIA FROM: to be your DVD player where the movie you want to make a copy of is in. Then click the Get Media button at the bottom of the pop up box. It will load the time clips backwards, if you hold the mouse over the first clip it will be VTS_01.03, the second clip will be VTS_01.02 and the third one will be VTS_01.01 if you have 3 scenes.

When you drag and drop them to the time line make sure you drag them in numerical order so you do not play your movie backwards. After you do this you can press play in the center of the screen to make sure your movie plays in the correct order. Then insert a blank DVD of 2 hours total time and select the green share tab at the top left. Click on disk Burn DVD or blue ray disk. Make sure your Burn To: is set to disc. Disc name should be what you want to name the disc, such as Jenna's Wedding. Burner location is the DVD drive you have the blank disc in, either DVD or Blue Ray drive. Select how many copies you want to make. Leave presets alone. On quality, deselect the Fit contents to available space. The Burn button is in the middle right of the screen. This will start encoding the material for you. It takes about 12 minutes to encode 1.5 hours on my system. After that it burns the disc in about 5 minutes, and if you are making more than one copy each copy will take about 5 minutes. That is all there is to it.

Well yes this notifies you of new gmail message with a pop up like most do. But it also allows you to interact with the new mail without having to visit your inbox! That one little thing is so convenient its great! Look at the screen shot below for explanation on how it works:

As you can see in the above image, it shows the Subject of the email, and also a quick snippet of text from the email. Then there are a bunch of buttons in red between the subject and the snippet of text. The read; Open, Mark as read, archive, Report spam, and Delete. These are great because you can delete archive etc. all from here and not even having to open up a Firefox window and go into gmail. yes its a small feature but its worth its weight in gold for me!

In Order of Importance:

1. Mozilla Firefox - Regarded by most to be the best web browser, fast with lots of available add-ons
2. 7-Zip - Free file compressor/decompressor, supports most formats out there
3. Sun Java - Better alternative to Microsoft Java (you will need this)
4. Adobe Acrobat Reader - Necessary to read PDF files (you will need this)
5. CCleaner - Small, fast app that helps you remove all the accumulated clutter on your system, also has a registry fixer
6. K-Lite Mega Codec Pack - Installs all the codecs you need to view any video file. NOTE: you need to remove all previous codec packs (if you have any) before using this or they will conflict
7. Trillian Instant Messenger - Combines AIM, MSN, Yahoo IM, and many other chat programs into one program
8. Winamp -  Simple music player compatible with most formats
9. Metapad - Replacement for notepad with no filesize limit. After you download it, unzip it using 7-Zip and rename it as "notepad.exe" and place it in your windows folder to replace notepad.