DIsable annoying Vista User Account Control

The Mac "Security" ad is accurate, the new User Account Control feature of Vista is poorly-conceived, and ultimately so annoying as to be completely useless.

Here's a link to the MS Technet site where they tell you how to disable it.

Incredibly useful network tool

Try NetInfo, from Tsarfin Computing. It's got a network scanner, and shows all the network connections of the PC on which it is installed, as well as ping, traceroute, whois, nslookup, and other useful tools.

Create a Domain Management PC

If you want to enable a designated user to manage Active Directory user objects, but don't want them to be logging onto a server, you need to download and install the Windows Server Administrative Tools Pack - which I thought was too damn hard to find. So here's a link to the Windows Server 2003 SP1 version of the ATP.

Streaming video from USB webcam

The easiest way to make video available on the internet is by using a webcam with a built-in web server. At work, we sell Axis webcams, but for home users, or people who want to do this on the cheap, the best free solution I have found for getting video to stream accross the web from a USB-connected webcam is the VLC media player/server, available from VideoLan.org.