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Replace Vista’s Ugly Shortcut Icon

Sahas Katta — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 03:40:40 +0000

If you use Windows Vista, you might also hate the large and ugly shortcut icon overlays the operating system uses. They seem to cover up almost a fourth of the area of each icon on your desktop. I had found some solutions on some forums, however changing the icon easily and safely without additional applications wasn’t an option. To make things easier I have included a tiny REG file for Windows Vista users which will allow them to change their shortcut icon quickly.

Modifying Vista’s Shortcut Icon Overlay:

Download ‘shortcut-icon-changer.zip‘ and Extract it
Close all unnecessary applications except this page
Copy ‘Arrow.ico’ into the ‘C:\Windows\’ folder
Double-click on ’shortcut-icon-changer.reg’
Say ‘Yes’ to accept the changes being made

The setup is now complete, to see the new icon in action you can either reboot your machine or end and restart the “explorer.exe” process in the Windows Task Manager. If you wish to use another ‘.ico’ icon overlay instead of the one provided, just rename it to Arrow.ico and place it in the ‘C:\Windows\’ folder.

Download: shortcut-icon-changer.zip

Notice: Keep in mind that we only provide tweaks that are safe. If something provided here was to result in damaging your machine, we are not responsible. If you need help or have any questions, just leave us a comment below. We’d be glad to help!

Skatter Tech: Get Your Own Gravatar

Sahas Katta — Sat, 05 Apr 2008 02:41:12 +0000

We recently upgraded Skatter Tech to WordPress 2.5 and along with it we decided to make some changes to the icons that go along with each comment. Previously, each commenter’s icon was based off the favicon from the provided url. Today, we have switched to using Gravatar, “the globally recognized avatar.” Starting now the associated image will be linked to your email instead of the url.

To setup your own Gravatar, visit Gravatar.com/signup. The registration process is as simple as entering your email address. Then just login and upload an image to become your Gravatar. Now the next time you leave a comment on Skatter Tech or any other blog using the Gravatar service, you should see your icon appear! And in case you are wondering about privacy, your email address is kept private by both Gravatar and Skatter Tech so you’ll have nothing to worry about.

Links: Gravatar.com SignUp

Gmail Gets Buddy Icons

Sahas Katta — Fri, 12 May 2006 04:55:15 +0000

Google has constantly been adding new features to Gmail since it originally launched in 2004. Over the last two years they have added over 2GB of storage space, RSS feed reader, virus scanning, chat, and many more features. Their latest add-on allows Gmail users to associate images with each contact (email address), therefore making it easier than ever to identify contacts. Although this may be a “new feature” for Gmail, other email services such as Yahoo! Mail have already been working on implementing custom “avatars,” which are used in Yahoo! Messenger, into their mail services for a long time.

This feature, as usual, is currently only available to a few users; however Google will eventually enable this feature for every account. Once this feature is enabled, the next time you get an email from your friend you may see an image your friend has selected or one that you may have set for him. Check back here for more information, but in the meantime login to your Gmail account and check if you already have this feature.

Links: Gmail | Gmail “Whats New!”
Related: Google Integration | Gmail Anti-Virus