A reader of my site asked which program I was using to transfer files between my local computer and my dedicated server. The question looks easy to answer at first glance but actually it is not that easy. I'm actually using two ways to connect to my dedicated server depending on the tasks at hand. I use Putty to connect to my dedicated server when I want to administrate it: create new virtual hosts, ftp accounts and the like. I do use WinSCP for all other tasks, mainly for opening a secure connection to my dedicated server which uses SSH.

It is really painful to copy files using the Windows explorer. It only displays one folder at a time and it is often inevitable to open two explorer windows to copy files from one folder to another. This takes lots of time and is not very ergonomic. The software Folder Box is a windows explorer upgrade which adds another window to the windows explorer. This makes it very easy to transfer files from one folder to the other or perform other file operations that require two folders.

We all know that Microsoft decided to add the search function to the Vista startmenu and get rid of the run box by default. You can add the run dialog again but there is a much better way to add functionality to the search box using a little great application called Start++. It adds new commands to the search box which define actions that are executed. Typing "g searchterm" for instance opens the default browser and opens Google search results with the searchterm that you have entered. Eight default commands are already defined and you can add new ones with ease.

Keeping up with application updates can be a very tedious task even if you have only a handful of them installed on your system. If the software has no update reminder you have to manually visit the developers homepage and see if an update is available. Most users simply do not look for updates actively and use old versions that might have security holes or miss important features that have been implemented in later versions. But there is hope..

Microsoft advertises its Anti Spam program Windows Defender with the slogan spyware protection for free but is it really a good alternative to other anti spam and spyware programs like ad-aware and spybot search and destroy. It is only fair to compare Microsoft's anti spyware software which is available free to other free solutions that can be used and downloaded for free as well. Microsoft's Windows Defender came under heavy fire recently as two competitors released studies that were supposed to prove that Windows Defender had - by far - the weakest spyware and spam detection rate.