Category: Technology

All things technological

RDP shortcuts

RDP Shortcuts
RDP Shortcuts

Here is a tip I find very useful. I find myself constantly having to log in and out of RDP sessions at work. Recently I realised that it is possible to create an RDP file, that is effectivley a short cust to a session. I have put all mine in a fiolder and linked the folder to my start bar for easy access. To create yourself an RDP file you just need to press the options button in the RDP connection and use the save as option, or if you are feeling adventurous you can create one from scratch in notepad as they are just text files. I created one from the terminal services client then created a template and create new ones from that.

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Google reader

google-reader

Google reader is an RSS feed reader. It is a great way to keep track of multiple websites. The real benefit is that you don;t actually have to visit the websites themselves, and you can keep track of what you have read and what is new. To use it goto http://reader.google.com signup with your gmail account and add some feeds.

The Lumix has landed

lumix-lx3

After a month of waiting I finally found a company that had a Lumix LX3 in stock. I ordered it on Friday and it arrived this morning. It has some great features including 24mm (35mm equivalent) wide angle lens and max aperture of f2.0! The manual is going to take a good read but at first glance the features are endless. No doubt you will be seeing some pictures here later as we are off for a walk with Abida and Connie. Perhaps I should sign up for a Flickr account, and intergrate into the Blog. Here is a picture of the beast.

Office live website

The new website url is ….. wait for it …… http://codsfoot.co.uk not much to show but if you want to buy a book by Neil Baldwin be my guest. I have an Amazon seller account and if I sell enough books they pay me commision.

SELECT * FROM Excel Spreadsheet

Here is how to access data in an excel spreadsheet, from a SQL login.

SELECT * FROM OPENROWSET(‘Microsoft.Jet.OLEDB.4.0’,
‘Excel 8.0;Database=c:table.xls;HDR=YES’,
‘SELECT * FROM [Sheet1$]’)

You can also link the spreadsheet to a table.

SELECT * FROM OPENROWSET(‘Microsoft.Jet.OLEDB.4.0’,
‘Excel 8.0;Database=c:\update_asms.xls;HDR=YES’,
‘SELECT * FROM [Sheet1$]’) x INNER JOIN   invoices o on x.invoice = o.invoice

This means you can update tables based on data in spreadsheet without having to do the import into a table malarky.

sql-query-excel

Free domains from Micro$oft

Micro$oft are offering a doamin for free (.com/.net etc 1 year, or .co.uk for 2 years). I have signed up trying to get a whacky domain. Not sure what I might do with it but free is free. Watch this space for more news and to find out what domain name I have chosen.

Font of your own handwriting

Just found a great web site YourFonts it allows you to create a font of your own handwriting. Basically you fill out a grid with all your letters, which you scan, upload to a web site and they create the font for you. Sounds like clever stuff. I will let you know how I get on. Seeing Helen.M at the weekend she has great hand writing I might ask her to do me a grid.

neil-baldwin-font

SQL query tips

When running a SQL query it is always a good idea to start working on them by using “SELECT TOP 100” it saves you waiting while SQL returns a large dataset. When you are ready to run the query for real you can just add the word PERCENT i.e. “SELECT TOP 100 PERCENT”

Simple Tags

Not sure how tags work so I have installed “Simple Tags” plugin to see if I can make sense of them. I should then end up with a useful tag cloud. It has features that allow you to add tage words and then auto-tag the whole content of your blog.