Windows XP Hacks [Electronic resources] نسخه متنی

Hack 23 Empower Windows Explorer with PowerDesk

Supplanted by this most powerful utility,
Windows Explorer will no longer draw curses or contribute to
increased Macintosh sales.

I'm guessing that you
have a Leatherman multitool. No hacker worth his weight in solder
would leave home without it. In fact, I'll go
further and guess that you have at least two. You probably have a
large one that you keep in your glove box and a small one that you
carry with you at all times, even to weddings (just in case). If
I'm corrector if you're
wondering where to buy such a useful toolthen you will love
PowerDesk.

PowerDesk is the multitool of utilities. This beast is no mere Swiss
Army Knife. There's no unnecessary toothpick,
leather punch, or nail file here; it's a pair of
vise grips with four screwdrivers, a strong blade, wire cutters,
pliers, an Allen wrench, a corkscrew, and a bottle opener.
It's the software that those guys on
Junkyard Wars would use if they put down their
cutting torch and picked up a computer.

OK, maybe I'm being melodramatic, but PowerDesk
really is a useful utility for your computer. PowerDesk combines much
of the functionality of Windows Explorer, the old Windows File
Manager, WinZip, and a host of other programs. If you find yourself
with more than one program open for manipulating files, you probably
need PowerDesk. While many of the features of PowerDesk are available
in Windows XP, PowerDesk puts them all in one convenient location.
PowerDesk also runs on older versions of Windows, which may not have
the advanced file-handling features that Windows XP has.

PowerDesk is available from VCOM at http://www.v-com.com/product/pd_indl.
PowerDesk Pro sells on the VCOM web site for $39.95. You can also
download an evaluation version that has fewer features.

When you install PowerDesk on your computer, the installer will ask
you if you want to associate ZIP and other archive files with
PowerDesk. If you already use a ZIP file manager, such as WinZip, you
might not want to allow PowerDesk to handle these types by default.
After installing PowerDesk, you should not need to restart your
computer.

While PowerDesk is a separate application, it is integrated into
Windows Explorer, so you have access to many of its features even
when you aren't running it. In Windows Explorer, if
you right-click with the mouse you will see a submenu called
PowerDesk, where you have access to many of
PowerDesk's functions.

When you start PowerDesk, you will be faced with a window that looks
similar to the one shown in Figure 3-10. As you
click around PowerDesk, most of the things you see should look
familiar. Those that aren't so familiar are grouped
well, so they are easy to find and understand.

Figure 3-10. The PowerDesk main window

Each of the toolbars that shows up in
PowerDesk is configurable. Use the Options Customize
Toolbar menu item to modify the toolbars as you wish. The bottom
toolbar in Figure 3-10 is called the Launchbar and
is similar to the Quick Launch area of the Windows XP Taskbar. You
add programs by dragging icons onto the Launchbar and dropping them.

When you restart PowerDesk, you are placed back at the location you
were when you left. I find this to be such a simple, yet useful,
feature. If you create a shortcut to PowerDesk, you can force it to
open at a specific location by putting the name of the directory
after the program name in the Target field of the shortcut
properties.

PowerDesk has so many features that we could spend an entire chapter
of this book describing them, and even then there would be things
we'd miss. So, I'm going to give a
brief summary of the coolest features and leave the rest as an
exercise for the reader:

Most of the features of the Windows Explorer are available from the
File and Tools menus. You can open, delete, and rename files. You can
map network drives, format diskettes, and empty the trash.

PowerDesk provides Move To and
Copy To icons on the main toolbar, context menu, and File menu for
moving and copying files to a specific location. You can recreate
this functionality [Hack #27] in Windows Explorer
without using PowerDesk.

The File Finder feature provides many
options for finding files on your computer. You can have PowerDesk
search for Microsoft Word documents beginning with the word
"Hack," modified in the last three
days, and containing the word
"wireless."

PowerDesk has the ability to
find and rename a group of files according to parameters that you
define. For example, let's say you have a bunch of
digital photographs from your trip to Belize. The digital camera
doesn't know you went to Belize, and neither does
Windows XP. Using PowerDesk, select the files you want to rename and
choose File Rename. PowerDesk shows a list of the files to
be renamed and gives you a place to rename the files something like
Belize 2003 Vacation.JPG. The first file will be
named Belize 2003 Vacation.JPG, the second file
will be named Belize 2003 Vacation (1).JPG, and
so on. PowerDesk also has a more powerful group-rename feature that
uses wildcards and pattern matching to find files and choose their
new names.

PowerDesk provides a built-in
FTP
client for transferring files from a remote file server (much like
WinFTP). The connection to the remote server appears as if it were
just another folder on your computer. PowerDesk FTP can even resume
interrupted downloads.

You can convert
image files between the numerous
available formats with File Convert Picture Format.

Security-conscious users will appreciate the
Destroy File feature. This feature not
only deletes a file from the filesystem, but it also wipes the disk
drive where the file existed. Needless to say, using this feature
will also prevent you from recovering the file,
so don't test it out on your favorite photo from the
Belize vacation.

If you are truly security-conscious,
do not use the Encrypt/Decrypt feature of PowerDesk.
Details on the algorithm they use are not available. In the security
world, it's common practice to describe how your
cryptography works and rely on the strength of the key to protect the
data. PowerDesk does allow you to choose 56-bit DES encryption for
your data, but 56-bit encryption is the bare minimum these days. Do
you want to trust your financial data to the bare minimum? I
didn't think so.

PowerDesk manages ZIP file archives
as well as files that are stored using the older UUENCODE format.

For copying files between two locations, use the Dual Pane view. This
view displays two independent file browsers side-by-side, so you can
easily copy files from one to the other without worrying about other
windows getting in your way.

If you find yourself managing the same set of files on two different
disks, the

Compare Folders feature is a
great time saver. Select the folder that you want to compare, and let
PowerDesk find the other folder and compare the contents.

I run a network at home, and not all of our computers run Windows XP.

PowerDesk provides a level
playing field between the different versions of Windows so that I can
always be assured that I have the tools I need on every computer I
use.

There is so much more to PowerDesk than the few pages in this book.
If the things you've read here interest you,
download the evaluation version and try it for yourself.

Eric Cloninger