Nothing will stall your workday faster than a dropped network connection or recalcitrant peripheral. There’s a good chance that just a few tweaked Windows settings will get you rolling again. With some luck, the tools built into the OS will be all the help you need. And if Windows’ diagnostic tools come up short, there are some other resources at your troubleshooting disposal.

Diagnose network disconnections in Vista and XP
One of Vista’s most useful new tools is the revamped Network Diagnostics utility. When a Web page won’t load in Internet Explorer, you may be prompted to run the utility by clicking Tools > Diagnose Connection Problems. You can also open the program by clicking the network icon in the system tray, choosing Network and Sharing Center, and clicking Diagnose and Repair in the left pane.

Some problems the program will fix automatically, but it may also display instructions for correcting the glitch manually, or it might simply point to Vista’s Help and Support file. The tool can’t diagnose problems outside of the local PC, such as your ISP’s servers being down, but it helps you determine whether the source is in your system or something else.

XP’s Network Diagnostics tool lacks the troubleshooting chops of its Vista counterpart, but it can help you pinpoint the location of the failure. To run it from Internet Explorer, click Tools > Diagnose Connection Problems. To open it without IE, click Start > Run, type %windir%\network diagnostic\xpnetdiag.exe, and press Enter.

If everything checks out with your PC’s network settings, ping your ISP’s servers to make sure the connection is working. Click Start > All Programs > Accessories > Command Prompt, type ping cnet.com (or any domain name), and press Enter. If your network link is working, you’ll see four lines of replies, followed by a list of ping statistics. A failed ping test indicates a lost connection to your ISP. Before you get on the horn to your ISP, try turning off your router and then turning it back on again. This is sometimes sufficient to reset the device. If that doesn’t reestablish your network link, it’s time to get on the phone to the company’s support line. (To get a more detailed look of the path packets take from your PC to a Web site, type tracert, the domain name, and press Enter to see a list of all the stops the packets make along the way to their destination.) When you’re done, type exit and press Enter to close the Command Prompt window.

Ping a Web site from Windows’ Command Prompt to determine whether the link to your ISP is working. Read more »

Nearly all broadband Internet accounts come with storage on the ISP’s servers, but I’ll wager not one in 10 broadband users ever store anything there. That’s a shame, especially if you find yourself schlepping a USB thumbdrive or rewritable CD full of your personal files from computer to computer. There are dozens of free utilities out there that make transferring files between your local PC and an FTP or Web server as easy as dragging and dropping. The two I’ve been using are the open-source FileZilla FTP client, and 2Brightsparks’ SyncBack, which is also available in a $30 version called SyncBackSE that adds compression, performance, and security features.

Windows’ built-in FTP comes up short
You don’t need any added software to send files to an FTP server from Windows: simply type the server address into Windows Explorer’s address bar and press Enter to connect and view the files, or open a command prompt and type the address there. If you’re working with lots of files in several folders, the Windows approach is like dressing in the dark. FileZilla and other FTP clients give you a clearer view of your file transfers before, during, and after the process.

For example, I use FileZilla to transfer files to a directory on my ISP’s FTP server, as well as to update a Web site hosted on one of the company’s Web servers. I created a profile for each task and can jump between the two simply by clicking the drop-down menu next to the program’s Quickconnect button. FileZilla’s multiple windows let me view the folder trees and contents of the local PC and the remote server side by side.

The free FileZilla FTP program lets you compare the contents of folders on your local PC and the remote FTP server. Read more »

From Adobe

Software Description

Adobe Systems Illustrator CS3 for Windows
Discover new ways to experiment with color; work faster with new drawing tools and controls; and produce artwork for print, web, mobile, and motion designs with Adobe Illustrator CS3 software.
Reasons to upgrade: LiveColor; Integration with Adobe Flash; Drawing tools and controls; Improved operating performance; Control panel; Eraser tool; New Document Profiles; Crop Area tool; Isolation mode; Symbols for Flash.
Features:
* Live Color: Explore, apply, andcontrol color variations using Live Color, which lets you select any artwork and interactively editthe colors to see results immediately. Use the Color Guide panel to quickly choose tints, shades, or harmonious color combinations.
* Integration with Adobe Flash: Import native Illustrator files into Adobe Flash CS3 Professional software, or copyand paste artwork from Illustrator to Flash with paths, anchor points, gradients, clipping masks, and symbols intact. Layers, groups, and object names are also preserved.
* Drawing tools and controls: Draw in Illustrator more quickly and fluidly than ever. Easier and more flexible anchor point selection, improved operating performance, and a newEraser tool help you create artwork efficiently and intuitively.
* Improved operating performance: Enjoy more responsive drawing and editing with improved performance in key operations, including faster screen redraw, object moving, panning, scaling, and transformations.
* Control panel: Discover more options faster and free up screen space byaccessing anchor point controls, clipping masks, envelope distortions, and more from the context-sensitive Control panel.
* Eraser tool: Quickly remove areas of artwork with the Eraser tool as easily as you erase pixels in Photoshop, and enjoy complete control over the width, shape, and smoothness of the erasure.
* New Document Profiles: Create artwork easily by selecting prebuilt profiles for various types of media, and save c

Tags: LINUX/UNIX, MICROSOFT, SOFTWARE, INTERNET