Archive for November, 2009
The Gimp – Tutorials
The tutorials at http://www.gimp.org/tutorials/ are very useful. You may come to astonishing results following them. My favourite ones are
- http://www.gimp.org/tutorials/Color2BW/ (How to create good grayscale images from coloured ones)
- http://www.gimp.org/tutorials/Film_Grain/ (How to add film grain to make the image look somewhat vintage)
- http://www.gimpguru.org/Tutorials/FilmGrain/ (dito)
Another nice tutorial that deals with creating vintage look using The Gimp is here:
http://www.linuxjournal.com/article/6750
It focuses on more subtle filtering.
Microsoft Security Essentials: Free AntiVirus and AntiSpyware Software by Microsoft
Finally, Microsoft has released a free Antivirus and Antispyware Suite. It is running on my notebook with Windows Vista and I am quite confident. Actually, it has replaced the Security Suite I had been using until now.
The Suite can be downloaded for free at:
http://www.microsoft.com/Security_Essentials/
BTW, I just learned, that installing Windows Security Essentials will either disable (Vista/Win7) or remove (XP) Windows Defender. Defender is no longer required, because it is being replaced by WSE. However, you really should check if Defender is really disabled/removed. If not, do it.
Resize and limit Shadow Storage of Windows Vista / Windows 7
Windows Shadowstorage is used to store some files, which can usually be removed savely. By default, the maximum size of this storage is unlimited. In case you need/want to save disk space, open cmd.exe in administrator mode and do something like:
vssadmin.exe list shadowstorage
vssadmin.exe resize shadowstorage /on=C: /for=C: /Maxsize=2GB
This limits the storage used for drive C: to 2GB.
