Tricks4all: October 2011

How to Create Your Own Customized Run Commands

The Run command on Microsoft Windows operating system allows you to directly open an application or document with just a single command instead of navigating to it’s location and double-clicking the executable icon. However, it only works for some of the inbuilt Windows programs such as Command prompt (cmd), Calculator (calc) etc. So, have you ever wondered how to create your own customized Run commands for accessing your favorite programs, files and folders? Well, read on to find out the answer.

Creating the Customized Run Command

Let me take up an example of how to create a customized run command for opening the Internet explorer. Once you create this command, you should be able to open the Internet explorer just by typing “ie” (without quotes) in the Run dialog box. Here is how you can do that.

1. Right click on your Desktop and select New -> Shortcut.

2. You will see a “Create Shortcut” Dialog box as shown below

3. Click on “Browse”, navigate to: Program Files -> Internet Explorer from your Root drive (usually C:\) and select “iexplore” as shown in the above figure and click on “OK”.

4. Now click on “Next” and type any name for your shortcut. You can choose any name as per your choice; this will be your customized “Run command”. In this case I name my shortcut as “ie”. Click on “Finish”.

5. You will see a shortcut named “ie” on your desktop. All you need to do is just copy this shortcut and paste it in your Windows folder (usually “C:/Windows”). Once you have copied the shortcut onto your Windows folder, you can delete the one on your Desktop.

6. That’s it! From now on, just open the Run dialog box, type ie and hit Enter to open the Internet Explorer.

In this way you can create customized Run commands for any program of your choice. Say “ff” for Firefox, “ym” for Yahoo messenger, “wmp” for Windows media player and so on.

To do this, when you click on “Browse” in the Step-3, just select the target program’s main executable (.exe) file which will usually be located in the C:\Program Files folder. Give a simple and short name for this shortcut as per your choice and copy the shortcut file onto the Windows folder as usual. Now just type this short name in the Run dialog box to open the program.
I hope you like this post! Pass your comments

How to Write-Protect Your USB Flash Drive

Many a time, it becomes necessary for us to write protect our USB flash drive so as to protect it from viruses and other malware programs. Because flash drives are so popular and most widely used to move data between computers, they are the prime target for attackers as a means to get infections spread around the computer world. Also, since USB drive is not a Read-Only Memory (ROM), the data inside it can easily be modified or deleted by malware programs.

But unfortunately, most of the new flash drives do not come with a write-protect feature as the manufacturers wish to cut down the cost of production. Hence, the only way to write-protect your USB flash drives is to enable this feature on your own computer.

This can be done by adding a small entry to the Windows registry which acts as a switch that can be enabled to make use of the write protection or disabled to allow write access. Just follow these steps:

1. Open the Registry Editor (Open the “Run” dialog box, type regedit and hit “Enter”).

2. Navigate to the following Registry key:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\

3. Create a New Key named as StorageDevicePolicies. To do this right-click on Control, and click on New->Key and name it as StorageDevicePolicies.

4. Now right-click on StorageDevicePolicies and create a New->DWORD (32-bit) Value and name it as WriteProtect.

5. Double-click on WriteProtect and set the Value data to 1.

Now the right-protection for USB drives is enabled on your computer (no restart required) and thus it would not be possible for anyone or any program to add/delete the contents from your USB flash drive. Any attempt to copy or download the files onto the USB drive will result in the following error message being displayed.

To revert and remove the write-protection, all you need to do is just change the Value data for WriteProtect (Step-5) from 1 back to 0. Now write access to all the USB devices is re-enabled. Sometimes it may seem difficult to remember and follow the above mentioned steps each time you want to enable/disable the write protection. Hence as an alternative way, there are many tools available to automatically enable/disable the write-protection feature.One of my favorite tool is USB Write Protect by Shyam Sunder Saini. Using this tool you can limit write access to your USB drives with just a click of a button. You can download this tool from the following link:

USBWriteProtect

Is your Nokia Cell Phone Original

Nokia is one of the largest selling phones across the globe. Most of us own a Nokia phone but are unaware of it’s originality. Are you keen to know whether your Nokia mobile phone is original or not? Then you are in the right place and this information is specially meant for you. Your phones IMEI (International Mobile Equipment Identity) number confirms your phone’s originality.

Press the following on your mobile *#06# to see your Phone’s IMEI number(serial number).

Then check the 7th and 8th numbers

Phone serial no. x x x x x x ? ? x x x x x x x

IF the Seventh & Eighth digits of your cell phone are 02 or 20 this means your cell phone was assembled in Emirates which is very Bad quality

IF the Seventh & Eighth digits of your cell phone are 08 or 80 this means your cell phone was manufactured in Germany which is fair quality

IF the Seventh & Eighth digits of your cell phone are 01 or 10 this means your cell phone was manufactured in Finland which is very Good

IF the Seventh & Eighth digits of your cell phone are 00 this means your cell phone was manufactured in original factory which is the best Mobile Quality

IF the Seventh & Eighth digits of your cell phone are 13 this means your cell phone was assembled in Azerbaijan which is very Bad quality and also dangerous for your health.

How to Install Windows 7 From a USB Drive

Installing Windows from a USB flash drive has several advantages – First of all, the overall speed of the installation process will increase significantly, carrying a USB stick is much more convenient than a DVD, and finally it becomes possible to install the OS even on those systems that do not have a DVD drive, such as a netbook.

In this post, I will show you how to load the Windows installation on to your USB flash drive and make it bootable just like the DVD.

Tools Required:

1. USB flash drive with a minimum capacity of 4 GB.

2. Windows 7 set-up DVD.

Step-1: Plug-in your USB flash drive and backup all the existing data in it.

Step-2: Open the command prompt. If you are using Windows 7/Vista then open it with administrator rights*.

* Goto Start -> All Programs -> Accessories -> Right-click on “Command Prompt” and select “Run as Administrator”.

Step 3: In the command prompt, type in the following command:

DISKPART

This will start the Microsoft DiskPart utility as shown below:

Now issue the following command:

LIST DISK

This will show you a list of available disks on your system. Disk 0 is usually the hard disk. In my case, Disk 5 is the USB drive (this can be a different one in your case). Now issue the command as shown below:

SELECT DISK 5

NOTE: In the above command, 5 is the USB drive number on my system. If you have a different number on your system, then you need to replace 5 with that number.

Step-4: Now issue the following list of commands one by one as shown below:

CLEAN

CREATE PARTITION PRIMARY

SELECT PARTITION 1

ACTIVE

FORMAT FS=NTFS QUICK

ASSIGN

EXIT

Minimize the command prompt and proceed to the next step.

Step 5: Insert the Windows 7/Vista installation disc and note down the “drive letter” of your DVD drive. In my case, it is “H:”. Now type the following list of commands as shown below:

H: CD BOOT
CD BOOT
BOOTSECT.EXE /NT60 M:(NOTE: M: is your USB drive letter)
EXIT

Step-6: Copy the contents of your Windows 7/Vista installation disk into the USB flash drive.

That’s it! Your USB stick is now ready to boot and install the OS for you. Don’t forget to enable the “USB Boot” option and change the “boot priority to USB device from hard disk” in your BIOS settings.

I hope you like this post. Pass your comments to express your opinion.

List of free sms websites

Multiple Logins of Gmail and Orkut through firefox

Just follow the following steps and you will be able to login in gmail and orkut with multiple accounts. Through this you will be able to make profiles in your firefox.

Step 1:
Open system properties(by right clicking my computer), choose tab advanced, click to environment variables button. in system variables section, click new. type this information to each textbox.

Step 2:
variable name: moz_no_remote (should be all small letter).

variable value: 1

Step 3:
open firefox icon's properties(from desktop and quick launch). add extension -p to command line(like "c:\program files\mozilla firefox\firefox.exe" -p). press ok.
When you will open firefox it will prompt for profile selection create a profile,open firefox login to orkut open once more use another profile login.

How To Hide Files In A Calculator?

Having read the title of this post you may be wondering if it’s really possible. Yeah! It is possible. As the word suggests, it’s a calculator with a safe which is capable of storing and keeping your files and folders safe. The safe calculator looks just like the default calculator in Windows and in fact it can even perform calculations just like any other calculator. When you start Safe Calculator it will look just like the below pic.

The default code/ pin for the safe is ‘123’. So, to unlock you need to type ‘123’ in the calculator and press on ‘MS’, now the calculator will enter into safe mode. Here you can change the default pin if you want by clicking on ‘New pin’.

Now click on ‘+’ and then ‘=’ to confirm and enter into the safe to browse and choose the files you want to hide. Click on ‘Store’ once you’re done.

Download Safe Calculator

Extend(Reset) the Windows 7 Trial

Did you know that you can install Windows 7 without any license key and use it for 30 days? What you might not know is that you can also extend that trial mode to 120 days, without requiring a key.

The basic way this works is that at the end of the 30 days, you’ll need to run a small command and reboot your computer, at which point you’ll have 30 more days, up to a maximum of 120 days. This trick should work regardless of where you got your copy of Windows 7 from.

Extending the Trial By 30 Days

The first thing you’ll want to do is check how many days are left in your trial period. You can do this by right-clicking Computer and choosing Properties…

At the bottom of this window you’ll see how many days are left to activate (29 in my case since I installed this box yesterday).

Now to actually perform the hack that will extend the trial mode, you’ll want to find Command Prompt in the start menu (or search for it), and then right-click on it and choose Run as administrator. (very important)

Next you’ll simply type in this command:

slmgr -rearm

Within a few seconds you’ll normally see this dialog show up, saying that the command has completed successfully, at which point you’ll want to reboot.

Checking the system properties again shows that I now have 30 days left to activate.

Of course you’d normally want to do this near the end, probably on the last day before activation. I’m pretty sure that you can even perform this trick after the 30-day trial expires, although I’m not certain yet.

Make a Shortcut to Lock Your Computer

Leaving your computer in a hurry but you don?t want to log off? You can double-click a shortcut on your desktop to quickly lock the keyboard and display without using CTRL+ ALT+DEL or a screen saver.
To create a shortcut on your desktop to lock your computer:
Right-click the desktop.
Point to New, and then click Shortcut.
The Create Shortcut Wizard opens. In the text box, type the following:
rundll32 .exe user32.dll,LockWorkStation
Click Next.
Enter a name for the shortcut. You can call it "Lock Workstation" or choose any name you like.
Click Finish.
You can also change the shortcut's icon (my personal favorite is the padlock icon in shell32.dll).
To change the icon:
Right click the shortcut and then select Properties.
Click the Shortcut tab, and then click the Change Icon button.
In the Look for icons in this file text box, type:
Shell32.dll.
Click OK.
Select one of the icons from the list and then click OK
You could also give it a shortcut keystroke such CTRL+ ALT+L. This would save you only one keystroke from the normal command, but it could be more convenient.

Use the Remote Shutdown Tool to Shutdown, Restart, or Logoff a Local or Networked Computer

This guide shows you how to use the shutdown command and its various switches to shutdown, restart, or logoff local or networked computers from the command prompt, dialog window, or batch file.
What can the shutdown command do?
The shutdown command can be use via the command prompt, the remote shutdown dialog window, or in a batch file. You can logoff, shutdown, or restart a computer with this tool. You can even set the shutdown tool to perform a task at a certain time on certain days and to many computers at one time using a batch file.
This is a good tool to easily shutdown or restart lots of computers on a network at one time. It can also be handy for helpdesk technicians when fixing remote computers.
Shutdown Command via Dialog Window
Typing commands in a DOS window is not what most computer users want to fool with so I’m going to start by showing you how to use the dialog window to use the shutdown tool.
To open the dialog window click start, click run, type cmd and press enter. A black DOS looking window will open. Type shutdown -i and press enter. A window similar to the one below will popup.

Under computers type the network name of the computer you want to shutdown, restart, or logoff. In this example I will use \\yourcomputer. You can use your computer’s name to try the commands on your computer if you like.
If you don’t know a computers name right click my computer, select properties, select the computer name tab. Your computer name is listed next to full computer name.
To send these commands to other computers across your network you need to have administrative privileges on those computers. An easy way to see if you have administrative privileges on a networked computer is to try browsing to it. Click start, click run, type \\yourcomputer (replace yourcomputer with your computer’s name of course) and press enter. If you are able to access the computer you will be able to send shutdown commands to it. If you get asked for a password or it denies access you don’t have administrative privileges and you won’t be able to send shutdown commands to that computer.
In this example I’m going to shutdown computer \\yourcomputer on my network. Before it shuts down it’s going to show a message for 20 seconds.
The first thing you need to do is add which computer you want to shutdown. Click add and type your computer name in the add computers box.

You can send the command to multiple computers by pressing enter after the name of each computer and typing the name of the next computer on the next line. Each computer needs to be on its own line.
Click OK when you are finished adding the computer(s) you want to send the command to.
Under what do you want these computers to do: tell it to shutdown, restart, or logoff.
If you want a box to popup on the computer(s) you are sending the command to that lets them know the computer is about to shutdown, restart, or logoff in X many seconds leave warn users of the action checked off. If you want to change how many seconds to countdown before performing the action you can change that next to seconds.
You can tell a user on the computer you are about to perform the action on why you are performing that action by typing your message in under comment.
Click OK to send the command to the computer(s).

If you get an error when sending the command it will look like the one below.

Shutdown Command via Command Prompt
The shutdown command becomes more flexible and automated when used from the command prompt. To run the shutdown command from the command prompt, go to start, run, type cmd, and press enter. In the black box (the command prompt) type shutdown and the switches you want to use with the shutdown command. You have to use at east one switch for the shutdown command to work.
The Switches
The shutdown command has a few options called switches. You can always see them by typing shutdown -? in the command prompt if you forget any of them.
-i: Display GUI interface, must be the first option
-l: Log off (cannot be used with -m option)
-s: Shutdown the computer
-r: Shutdown and restart the computer
-a: Abort a system shutdown
-m \\computername: Remote computer to shutdown/restart/abort
-t xx: Set timeout for shutdown to xx seconds
-c “comment”: Shutdown comment (maximum of 127 characters)
-f: Forces running applications to close without warning
-d [u][p]:xx:yy: The reason code for the shutdown u is the user code p is a planned shutdown code xx is the major reason code (positive integer less than 256) yy is the minor reason code (positive integer less than 65536)
Please note: I’ve noticed using a switch with a – sign doesn’t work sometimes. If you are having trouble try using a / in place of – in your switches.
Examples
shutdown –m \\computername –r –f This command will restart the computer named computername and force any programs that might still be running to stop.
shutdown –m \\computername –r –f –c “I’m restarting your computer. Please save your work now.” –t 120 This command will restart the computer named computername, force any programs that might still be running to stop, give to user on that computer a message, and countdown 120 seconds before it restarts.
shutdown –m \\computername –a This command will abort a previous shutdown command that is in progress.
Using a Batch File
You can create a file that performs the shutdown command on many computers at one time.
In this example I’m going to create a batch file that will use the shutdown command to shut down 3 computers on my home network before I go to bed.
Open notepad and type the shutdown command to shut down a computer for each computer on the network. Make sure each shutdown command is on its own line. An example of what should be typed in notepad is below.
shutdown –m \\computer1 –s
shutdown –m \\computer2 –s
shutdown –m \\computer3 -s
Now I’ll save it as a batch file by going to file, save as, change save as type to all files, give the file a name ending with .bat. I named mine shutdown.bat. Pick the location to save the batch file in and save it.
When you run the batch file it’ll shutdown computer1, 2, and 3 for you.
You can use any combination of shutdown commands in a batch file. I just used the one above as an example.

Hacking Wireless Headsets

Those cool wireless headsets keep your hands free - and give hackers the ability to eavesdrop on your conversations

In offices all over the world, users are becomingly increasingly enamored with those wireless "hands-free" headsets that allow the speaker to move around the office while continuing a conversation on the phone. But have you ever wondered how secure those headsets are? So have we. Recently, we had the chance to find out – and what we discovered was downright scary.
If you don't know us, Secure Network Technologies is a penetration testing firm that focuses closely on issues of physical security and social engineering. We were recently hired by a large organization to assess network security and other potential vulnerabilities. Always anxious to try new things, we asked to test wireless signals leaving the building – including wireless access points, radio frequencies – and potential vulnerabilities in those hot little hands-free headsets.
To perform the work, we purchased a commercially available radio scanner. These devices are available at any local electronics retailer at prices ranging from $80 to several thousand dollars. We chose a scanner capable of monitoring frequencies from 900-928 Mhz and the 1.2 Ghz ranges, which is where many of the popular hands-free headsets operate.
We took a position across the street from the facility and started up the scanner. Within seconds of turning on the device we were able to listen to conversations that appeared to be coming from our client's employees. Several of these conversations discussed the business in detail, as well as very sensitive topics. After some careful listening, we determined that the conversations were indeed coming from our customer.
After confirming that the sources of the conversations were on our client's premises, we made a note of the specific frequencies that were used, and locked in on them. We could then record the conversations digitally in the scanner. Within minutes of this discovery we contacted our customer and explained the vulnerability. We felt this issue could not wait for our final report.
To demonstrate the sensitivity of what we discovered, we used the conversations we recorded to social-engineer our way into to the facility. We gathered the names of people mentioned during conference calls, as well as other specifics about each person. We then singled people out that were foreign to the location we planned to enter. We singled out the names of people whom the callers had never met, people who had never been to location, and people who were new to the organization.
Our plan was to assume an identity of an employee who had never been to the office we were testing. Using that identity, we would enter the building, commandeer a place to sit and work, then see how long we could stay inside the building. After zeroing in on a particular employee, we gathered as much intelligence on him as we could. To prepare for the entry into the facility, we printed a business card with our assumed identity. I put on my best suit, and then went to work.
When I entered the building, I was greeted by security. I indicated I was an employee and was in town to work. I handed the security guard a business card and was welcomed with a smile. After escorting me to a cube, the guard showed me where the restroom was, where I could get a cup of coffee, and how to go about getting a building access card.
After getting settled into my new workspace, I plugged my laptop into the network, started my network scanning tool, and retreated to the cafeteria for lunch. Upon my return, I was presented with a card access key to the building. The card was accompanied by a document outlining security policies regarding its usage – clearly, the people who issued it never checked deeper into who I really was.
With card in hand, I started exploring the building. I had almost complete access. In the few places where the card did not work – such as the server room and fitness center – I used additional social engineering tactics to gain access.
By day two, I was already accepted as an employee. In the morning, I was greeted by my would-be coworkers and security folks. I began to take some liberties, such as booking conference rooms, asking for refreshments, and gaining permission to bring in a "vendor" – actually Doug Shields, my partner here at Secure Network. In all, I spent three days inside the building, gaining access to numerous types of information, resources, and technology.
Our social engineering effort was just one exploit – the real danger is the information that was being emitted from the company through the wireless headsets. This technology is convenient, but it is opening companies up to potential calamity. With the data we heard, we could have made a stock play, provided valuable information to a competitor, or gone to the press with scandalous data.
We also noted that when conversations ended, the headsets became bugging devices. Even after calls were terminated, we could hear the headset-wearers breathing, as well as any other conversations that were going on in the office.
We were interested in this vulnerability, so we asked for permission from other clients to test it out at their locations as well. We ended up intercepting communications ranged from financial institutions, health care, and variety of other professions and industries. We heard conversations from administrators of computer network, C-level executives, legal departments, and management teams.
What did we prove? That many companies which fear security breaches and eavesdropping are actually bugging their own offices, and spilling their private content over the open air waves without their knowledge. The problem is not unlike the early days of wireless LANs and WiFi, when the technology became popular before adequate security was developed.
What can you do about it? The first step is to recognize the vulnerability. These headsets generally operate at 900MHz and, as we learned, are not necessarily secured with encryption. Find out who's using the technology and where. Secondly, you should consider doing a scanning test, as we did for our client. It's worth $80 to make sure your corporate secrets are not unintentionally leaking out of the building via wireless headsets.

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Creating the Customized Run Command