How to customize Windows Start Menu

Are you got bored with the traditional Windows Start Menu? Well, here's a way to customize it.

The shareware tool Start Menu 7 offers a good alternative to the standard start menu; this can be downloaded from startmenu7.com.

According to the developers, Start Menu 7 runs on both XP and Vista in addition to Windows 7 as its name suggests. For installation, double-click on the downloaded file in Windows Explorer and follow the instructions given by the setup wizard.

You must have a user account with administrator rights during the process as the setup routine involves accessing important system files. Once the installation is complete start the Program using the command ‘Start> All programs> Start Menu 7> Start Menu 7’. Now, when you click on ‘Start’ you will not see the usual start menu provided by Windows, but instead, a menu that has an extensive collection of links: It has a different visual effect and enables direct access to all the programs and files on your system in an alphabetically sorted sub-menu format, for instance ‘Programs’, ‘My Documents’ or ‘Computer’. In addition to this, the various entries use additional sorting and display tools.

Thus, for instance ‘Program’ offers the structure known as ‘All programs’ as seen in the usual Windows Start menu and on the other hand, the ‘Program’ links can be found under headings such as ‘Quick start’ and ‘Autorun’. 

You can add your own menus and commands using the option ‘Add entries to the menu’. Click on ‘Options’ and ‘Configuration’ so as to complete the experience as per your own taste. Use the option ‘System integration’ and remove the tick in front of ‘Start the Start Menu 7 with Windows’ if you do not wish to activate the tool automatically at every system start. 

You can add more power management buttons in Start Menu 7 using the option ‘Buttons’; this is done to turn off the computer, to restart it, or to enable the use of power management commands in a time-controlled fashion. For this, click on the corresponding button in the Start menu, select the desired function in a menu, for instance ‘Turn off the computer’, and define the period for action in a simple and an intuitive dialog. Finally, click the ‘Start’ button to save the settings.

Save large websites as PDF and read offline

You visit websites. You like them. You read articles on web. You want to read them later. But how to do so?

The browsers that we use provide us the way to view HTML pages in an ordered look. But when we save them and open them to read again offline, they need an internet connection otherwise content gets disordered. So here’s the option to save webpages as PDF without losing the quality. This service is provided by pdfcrowd.com.

Launch the website. Enter your desired URL in the ‘address’ field of the ‘Convert webpage tab’. Click on ‘Convert to PDF’. It will convert the webpage to PDF and will let you download the PDF. However, it will not work when the required webpage requires you to register.

But still you have a great functionality to save your favorite webpages as PDF to your hard disk. What’s the icing on the cake is, you can upload it to Dropbox, Google Drive etc. and also read it on your Smartphones and tablets.