My Must Have Windows ‘Tools’

Here’s a list of my must have tools whenever I setup my Windows machine. These ‘tools’ are freely available for download and use unless specified. They are not ordered in any particular order.

1. Notepad++
   This is one of my favourite text editors. It’s light, fast, and has a fantabulous plug-in called SourceCookifier. Notepad++ is open source and written in C++. It was based on SciTE (SCintilla based Text Editor). It also supports lots of programming languages, providing syntax highlighting.I normally use it to
• write HTML, JSP, JavaScript and CSS codes
• review code
• quickly code something in Java while on the move instead of doing it on an IDE.
2. Katmouse
   Are you frustrated when you have two documents opened side-by-side but when scrolling through the pages, you need to make that window active first? With this utility, you can just hover your mouse over that non-active window and start to scroll. It’s best if you have two files opened side-by-side.
3. Executor
   I love  program launchers. My first experience with application launchers was Launchy. Launchy was great, but Executor is better. It not only is an application launcher, it is a multi-purpose launcher with customary commands. With Executor, I no longer launch applications from the “Start” button, nor clicking on Desktop shortcuts (I have also removed all my Desktop shortcuts after using Executor).
4. Teracopy
   Don’t you think Windows takes a long time copying your files, especially when your files are big? Teracopy can be of help here. It copies and moves files at the maximum possible speed. Now, how does it copy/move files faster? “TeraCopy uses dynamically adjusted buffers to reduce seek times. Asynchronous copy speeds up file transfer between two physical hard drives.”
5. Paint.net
   I think it’s about time Microsoft updated it’s version of Paint to something with more features, example Paint.net. I do hope that Microsoft could contribute (both to the source code and funds) and replace the existing Paint with this one. I normally use this to crop images, and scan images from the scanner. It’s quite a good photo/image editor because most importantly, it supports layering. The other features are limited undo, special effects and other powerful tools.
6. Pidgin
   This is my all-in-one instant messaging application. It supports numerous IM protocols, but I mainly use it to connect to msn, yahoo and gtalk. So it’s no longer necessary for me to install Windows Live Messenger, Yahoo! Messenger and Gtalk on my machine. The few drawbacks I’m experiencing are:
• not able to receive files sent from my buddies
• not able to see Windows Live Messenger’s customized emoticons
7. 7-zip
   This is the only archiver which I install. I find it very much better than others out there. It has no problem opening any type of archive files, even if it’s compress using AIX’s compress command. It’s also able to join multiple archive files which were split. It has a high compression ratio with its 7z format. I use this when I’m zipping my files for backup. It also supports strong encryption (AES-256) in its 7z and zip formats.
8. PuTTY
   This is a program no *NIX system admin should do without. It’s basically a telnet/ssh client.
9. VirtuaWin
   One feature I find very useful in Virtual Desktops/Workspaces are I am able to isolate distractions (emails, social networking sites, etc.) when I am doing work. The way I do this is by using VirtuaWin and have it setup to 2 desktops. The first desktop will have Outlook, google chrome with gmail and social networking sites opened on different tabs, Tweetdeck, etc. The second desktop will have whatever I’ll be using to do work such as notepad++, SQL Developer, WinCVS, JDeveloper, etc.
10. Console
    I started using this after reading a blog post by Scott Hanselman (http://www.hanselman.com/blog/Console2ABetterWindowsCommandPrompt.aspx). Console is an enhancement to the Windows console by providing multiple tabs, PuTTY like text selection and paste, customizable backgrounds, etc. I have Console configured just as how Scott did it, but I have added Cygwin to it.
11. Google Chrome
    Prior to Chrome, I used Mozilla Firefox heavily. As time goes by, indeed it got heavy. Initial loading was slow, and it crashed often especially when I have lots of tabs opened. It began to remind me of IE (minus the bad html/css rendering). Then came Chrome. Chrome is based on the Webkit browser engine, which Apple’s Safari is also based on too. Chrome is fast and each tab is its own processed, which can be killed without affecting the whole browser window. Another plus is I can sync my bookmarks, extensions and themes within the browser itself. Once I use another Chrome on another machine and login using my Google ID, I can see all my bookmarks, installed extensions and also theme
12. Oracle VM VirtualBox
    Basically I use this to boot up my *NIX VMs. Currently I have 2 VMs setup, one running freebsd and another Linux Mint (Previously Ubuntu 11.04). I use the Freebsd VM as a mini server. So booting it up with 512MB memory is not a problem. It was installed with the smallest configuration, which is without any desktop managers. Linux Mint will be used for development work, which is writing code, mostly.
13. CCleaner
    This is a good Windows Cleaner utility to clean up all the ‘rubbish’ accumulated inside Windows (internet histories, cookies, temporary files, etc.) It also has a registry cleaner, but I won’t want to mess up the registry if I were you. And also, instead of running msconfig.exe to enable/disable startup programs, I can use CCleaner too. And, CCleaner can be used to uninstall all the ‘rubbish’ programs you installed previously.
14. Vim
    This is only for people who knows VI (one of the *NIX text editor). I normally use this when I need to edit/view a text file or source code while in the command prompt. It is indeed powerful if you are a VI poweruser, plus it has many plugins (or scripts as they call it). Currently, my setup has the minibuffexplorer, NERDTree and TListToggle plugins installed.
15. FileZilla
    When transferring files via FTP,  I normally use the command prompt. But, when I need to transfer lots of files, I will use Filezilla. It’s fast and also it can be used to transfer via the SFTP protocol.
16. Windows PowerShell
    This is a very good and powerful command line shell by Microsoft. It’s used as a task automation tool. It has a scripting language built on top of it and integrates well with the .Net framework. But for me, I only used it as a *NIX grep command to find string patterns in source codes or normal text files. The command used is ‘Get-ChildItem – Recurse | Select-String “ABCX”‘.

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