Slipstreaming a service pack is the act of taking old Windows installation files and creating a new installation that is updated with the latest service pack. For years, I have been manually slipstreaming Windows service packs, but I recently discovered a new tool that takes all of the grunt work out of the process. nLite will walk you through the process of slipstreaming your Windows installation. It even has the ability to include later service packs in the installation, remove unneeded components, create a bootable CD image, and many more features.

The application is free and can be downloaded here. You may also want to check out a tutorial on how to Slipstream Windows XP SP3 CD.

I’ve decided to go green, and I have many ideas for things I can do to reduce waste. Here is my list to scrub the planet.

Eat out less

Eating out is convenient, but it’s amazing the amount of waste it produces. The wrappers, boxes and cups from fast food restaurants take up an amazing amount of our landfills. Making a meal at home can also help me save money.

Use a water filter

No more bottles from bottled water taking up space in my garbage can. Some cities have taxed bottled water because it’s such a problem for landfills. Water filters in your home can give you pure water along with fluoride for healthier teeth.

Set all computers to have sleep mode
Computers can take a large amount of energy. I’ve gotten lazy with just leaving them on all day and night regardless of whether or not I’m using them. Enabling them to sleep after x amount of minutes will save energy and wear and tear on my equipment.

Bike to work

During the summer months, I’m going to bike to work. It’s healthier and saves me money on gas money. The downside of this is that I will feel sweaty and dirty a bit from the ride, and I’m screwed if it rains. I think the savings and health benefit will offset all of that though.

Make trip for necessities once every 2 weeks

No more going to the store whenever I need something. I’m going to buy everything I need to last me 2 weeks. It will save me money on gas while saving the planet.

Switch all lights to energy efficient lights

No brainer here. I’m gonna switch all of my normal lights to energy efficient lighting. I’m also going to invest in the lights that simulate natural daylight. They are energy efficient and have a positive effect mentally.

Use a white noise machine instead of a fan

I like to sleep with a fan on at night, even during the winter just because the sound relaxes me and puts me to sleep. The energy a fan uses can add up over time. A white noise machine can produce a similar sound with much less energy used.

It amazes me sometimes how lazy people are with their passwords, especially when it comes to email passwords. The password to your email account is possibly the most important password you could have. The passwords for all the things you use on the Internet can be reset and sent to your email account. Yet some people set their password to a simple single word without capital letters or numbers. They use the name of their wife, husband or dog which are all easy to figure out. It’s a hacker’s dream.

As a tech, people voluntarily give me their password to their email accounts all the time. It’s a good thing I’m an honest person. I could do many evil things with their information:

• Place orders on Amazon.com and have them delivered to any address I wish.
• Hijack domains and make them my own.
• Access bank account and credit card information.
• Access serial keys to software ordered online.

… and a lot more. Be sure to set your password to using numbers and capital letters. Also be sure to not use dictionary words. Make it as secure as you can. Change it regularly also, you never know when somebody has been looking over your shoulder and figured out what you are typing for a password.

We all know that Firefox is a memory hog. Add-ons and themes can cause these types of problems, but I also discovered from a friend of mine that the amount of sites you have visited can cause issues with memory too. This means every time you visit a different page, you can always click the Back button to go back to a previous page. Firefox keeps saving those pages in memory, thus taking up more and more memory with the more pages you visit. This can add up quickly if you have several different tabs with different histories.

With this tip I started making sure I closed my browser every few hours or so to start with a clean slate. Sometimes the simple stuff makes a huge difference.

So I recently emailed Chris Pirillo because I liked the way he has his site setup on the main page. He has a google ad below the 2nd, 5th and 8th articles displayed on his home page. Like Chris Pirillo, I use WordPress to manage my personal web site and I was wondering how he did this. Chris Pirillo (There, I said his name 3 times so he will appear and see this) unfortunately is way too busy to address my email, so I set out to find out on my own. I wanted to find the plug-in that did this for me, but I couldn’t find anything. I was already using the Adsense Manager plug-in to serve my ads on each page.

After a few days of searching, I finally figured that this isn’t accomplished using a WordPress plug-in. This had to be accomplished with PHP. So I modified the Main Index Template using the Theme Editor. Below the Read More function I put:

<?php if ( $i == 1 || $i == 4 || $i == 7 )
adsensem_ad(’adname’);
$i++; ?>

Now my page looks just like Chris’s and every main Lockergnome page as far as displaying a 250 x 250 ad box after the 2nd, 5th and 8th articles.

If you ever want to change or spoof a MAC address, you can do so by changing a few settings in the registry. There is an easier way though. A utility is available called SMAC that allows you to change the registry settings much easier.

1. Download SMAC here.

2. Run the program and pick the network device that you wish to change the MAC address for.
3. Enter the new MAC address.

4. Click Update MAC.

5. In the Device Manager, right-click the network card and select Disable.

6. Right-click the network card again and select Enable.

The MAC address should then be updated.

Apple has now provided the ability to enable or disable the transparent menu in Leopard with update 10.5.2.

It’s now available as a check box option under the Desktop & Screen Saver Preferences.

1. In iTunes, select the Apple TV icon in the Devices list.

2. Select Sync photos from: . . .

3. Select Choose Folder from the pop-up menu and select the folder with the photos you wish to add.

4. Click Apply and you’re done.

How to export your Firefox bookmarks to a bookmark.html file so that you may import it into another application.

1. Open Firefox.

2. Select Bookmarks > Organize Bookmarks.

3. The Bookmarks Manager opens. Click File > Export…

4. Save the bookmark.html file wherever you wish. I usually prefer the Desktop.

Now you can use the file to import the bookmarks into another program.

Crazy Flash animations are constantly getting in the way of my Internet experience. I once resorted to uninstalling Flash player completely, but I quickly found myself needing Flash to play games and for those stupid web developers that have chosen to make an entire site using Flash without an HTML alternative.

I found an amazing solution that fits my needs perfectly. Using the Block Flash Animations & Advertisements Firefox hack, I can choose when I want to let Flash load in my browser. It turns all Flash animations on a web page into a Click to play link. No more Flash covering what I’m reading. No more obnoxious ads hogging memory. I just click on the Flash animations I wish to see.

All you do is add the following code to your UserContent.css file (create it if it doesn’t exist) in your Firefox Profile folder.

/* Block Flash, using a placeholder you can click to unblock a desired Flash animation. */
/* Doesn’t work for embed tags, which are less common than object tags - bug 190970 */
object[classid$=”:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000″],
object[codebase*=”swflash.cab”] {
-moz-binding: url(”http://www.cs.hmc.edu/~jruderma/flash.xml#obj”); }

I love you like a girlfriend Flash, but like a girlfriend, you’re annoying and always interrupt my web porn hour.