Scheduling Connecting And Disconnecting From Your ISP

With many ISPs using PPPoE-based connections, and many ISPs havingawkward schemes such as night-unlimited it’s a good idea to schedule your dialling process rather than staying up late at night.Once connected, your downloads canstart. You can also schedule to connect to VPNs.


First we create a batch file. Start Notepad (or any other text editor). Enter the following:
RASDIAL

should be your exact connection name. Save the file using a suitable name such as“DIALNET.BAT”.
Now create a schedule by clicking on Scheduled Tasks in the Control Panel. Double-click on Add Scheduled Task. Click Next. Browse and choose the path of the BAT file. Choose the type of
frequency you want the task to run at.Next set the time and date. Finally enter the password for the account running the dialler. You can further make changes to the schedule by right clicking on the newly-created scheduled task and clicking on Properties.

So why would you want to make changes? Well, many more settings can be applied, and multiple schedules can be allotted. Say you connect between 12 and 8 AM,and then you want it to connect at 1 PM again. Such options are available only once you’re done adding the schedule through the Wizard.Similar to scheduling a connection, disconnection can be done in the same manner. Some alterations in the batchfile creation are needed. First, create anew text file and enter
RASDIAL
/disconnect
Save the file as a BAT file, for
example,“DISC-NET.BAT”.Be sure to enter your exact connection name in place of. Once again, like the connection schedule, create a schedule in the same manner only this time choose the Disconnecting BAT file.

Create A Special Folder In Windows Explorer

We can create a folder like My Documents one that will appear as a system folder in XP by doing the following steps...

1.In the Registry Editor, navigate to HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID. Create a new1 key with a Globally Unique Identifier(GUID). The GUID is a 128-bit identifier that is usually generated by Windows. This can be a random number that is used touniquely identify COM objects. Create a key using this random GUID:{FD4DF9E0-E3DE-11CE-BFCF-ABCD1DE12345}

2.Set the value of the “(Default)” setting for this key to the name of the folder, say “My Personal Data”. Create a new sub-key under the main key and call it “DefaultIcon”. That is, create a key called:HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{FD4DF9E0-E3DE-11CE-BFCFABCD1DE12345}\
DefaultIcon
Set the value of “(DefaultIcon)”to the filename and path of the icon file you want to use for the folder, for example,“C:\Topsec.ico”, without the quotes. If you don’t specify a path to an iconfile, Windows will use its default folder icon instead.

3 .Create another sub-key under the main key called “InprocServer32”, that is, create the
key called HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{FD4DF9E0-E3DE-11CE-BFCF-ABCD1DE12345}\
InprocServer32
Set the“(default)” setting here to“shell32.dll”.Create another string value called ThreadingModel and set its value to “Apartment”. There’s one more: create another sub-key called
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{FD4DF9E0-E3DE-11CE-BFCF-ABCD1DE12345}\Shell\
Open MyFolder\Command
Set the “(Default)” value here to the command that should be executed when the folder is clicked. In this case, it would be “explorer /root,c:\My Personal Data”.

4.There’s more keys to be created:
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{FD4DF9E0-E3DE-11CE-BFCF-ABCD1DE12345}\ShellEx\
PropertySheetHandlers\{FD4DF9EO-E3DE-11CE-BFCF-ABCD1DE12345} and

HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{FD4DF9E0-E3DE-11CE-BFCF-ABCD1DE12345}\
ShellFolder. Under this key, create a new binary value called“Attributes” with the value
“00 00 00 00”.

5.To place the folder in My Computer, add the original key to
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\
MyComputer\Namespace\
So the key value will be
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\
MyComputer\Namespace\{FD4DF9E0-E3DE-11CE-BFCF-ABCD1DE12345}
Now go to My Computer, and you’ll see a new custom folder!

Bypass Windows File Protection in Windows XP

There are two different solutions, depending on whether you have SP2 installed or not.

If you don’t have SP2 installed
Locate the file sfc_os.dll, which should be in your System32 folder. Copy it and name it sfc_os.bak. Open this file using a hex editor such as XVI32,which is an excellent freeware. This is an extremely simple edit and does not require an editor with advanced features. All you need to do is change two values. The location of these values will vary depending on whether you’re using Windows XP without a Service Pack or Windows XP with SP1, but the actual hex values to change will be the same.For Windows XP with no Service Pack installed, go to offset 0000E2B8 (E2B8 hex). For Windows XP with SP1, go to offset 0000E3BB (E3BB hex). At those offsets, change the hex values 8BC6 to 9090.Note: Depending on your hex editor, you may see the value separated by a space, as in “8B C6”. If you can’t find the values, do not proceed. It could be that your version of XP is different. The edit as described here only applies to English retail versions of Windows XP.

If you have SP2 installed
Disabling System File Protection in XP prior to SP2 involved editing the sfc_os.dll file, but the version of sfc_os.dll that comes with SP2 is different, and you cannot disable file protection with it. With SP2, you need to use the previous version of the sfc_os.dll file, which is 5.1.2600.1106 (the one with SP2 is5.1.2600.2180). Open sfc_os.dll with a hex editor and go to offset 0xECE9. The values to change are 33 C0 40. Change these to 90 90 90. Save your changes. Rename the file with a .bak extension (sfc_os.bak). The original exists in two locations: the\Windows\System32 folder, and the\Windows\System32\dllcache folder. Place a copy of sfc_oc.bak in both these folders. Then in the dllcache folder, look for cmd.exe, double-click it, and enter this command: copy SFC_OS.BAK SFC_OS.DLL /Y Next, go to your System32 folder and do the same thing. Look for cmd.exe, double- click it, and enter exactly the samecommand.
Points to remember
* If you have a problem overwriting the files, you can do the copying within the Recovery Console, or you can try Safe Mode.
*The dllcache folder is a hidden folder.
*It is important to copy the file to yourdllcache folder first.
*If you’re prompted to pop in your Windows CD, click Cancel.

Once the files have been copied, shut down your computer and restart it. The final step is to disable System File Protection in the Registry. Go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\
Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon. In the right-hand pane, if it doesn’t exist, create a new DWORD value named SFCDisable. Double-click it and ente “FFFFFF9D”. Exit the Registry Editor and reboot. You’re done.