Columnist Tips by Fred Langa

If you try a lot of software, you'll find Windows collects .DLL's like black clothes collect cat hair. If you want to track down which .EXE a .DLL belongs to, just right-click on any .DLL in Explorer and select Quick View. It will show you a lot of information about the .DLL, often including enough clues for you to see which, if any, applications need it.

If you spend any significant time on the Web, you'll love Win95's "Internet shortcuts," which are available to you if you are using a 32-bit version of NetScape or Microsoft's own Internet Explorer. These shortcuts are small files that contain the URL (uniform resource locator) of sites you want to get back to in a hurry, or sites you want to share with others. (Shortcut files can be mailed. The recipient can just click on the shortcut he or she receives, and get connected to the site it points to. ) Surprisingly, links are just text files. This means you can edit them, or even create them manually. For example, open Notepad or another ASCII editor, and type the following two lines:

[InternetShortcut]

Now save the file on your desktop and name it "Link to HOTSPOTS.URL" (make sure you use the .URL extension), and you'll see an Internet shortcut appear on your desktop. Just click on it, and you'll be connected to my home page.

Don't let your batch-file skills atrophy. Strange as it may sound (given that batch language was invented along with Cuneiform), Win95's new system automation tools and its ability to launch Windows programs from a "DOS" command line mean your batch programs can be more powerful than ever. This isn't something beginners will try, but you can set up whole software factories in Win95, using its automation tools (such as the System Agent in the Plus Pack). One small example: At 12:05AM each day, my Win95 system reads the system date, selects the appropriate Web page for that day (from among a number of known-good pages I've previously selected), copies the day's page into two locations on the WinMag Web NT server, and renames the page so it appears as the "Hot Spot of the Day" on my Web page. Neat!

Maybe I'm a curmudgeon, but to me the Themes feature in the Plus Pack for Win95 seems silly and a waste of space and CPU time. (Themes are collections of screensavers, wallpapers, icons and mouse cursors that create a specific look and feel on your desktop.) Do you really need "dangerous creatures" swimming across your screen or lava lamps (from the '60s theme) on your desk? Despite that, the rest of the Plus Pack is golden: Drivespace 3, an excellent Web browser, the system automation agent and lots more. It's well worth the money—even with the Themes.

Regedit is a powerful, not well-documented tool that lets you directly modify the settings of the system registry, where all essential information our your system is kept and managed. It's a fabulous tool for exploring, learning or problem solving. (For example, you can use it to wipe out all vestiges of an errant software installation.) However, it's also a fine and fast way to completely hose your system if you don't know what you're doing. So, explore Regedit—but with all due caution. To access Regedit, click the Start button, then Run, then type Regedit.

Windows 95 does its best to figure out what to do with CD-ROMs you load. If you insert a music CD, for example, Win95 will automatically assume you want to play it. It will launch the CD applet and start playing the first track. Many data CDs now come with opening screens that likewise will auto-run under Win95. But sometimes you don't want the noise and distraction, or you don't want anything to happen until you're ready. To defeat Win95's autorun feature, hold down the left Shift key when you insert a new CD. When the CD-ROM drive light flashes, you can let go of the key and go about your business normally.