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| Taking Control With TweakUI |
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Beyond The Basics May 2001 • Vol.12 Issue 5 Page(s) 84-87 in print issue |
Taking Control With TweakUI Using Microsoft’s Handiest (& Most Obscure) Windows Utility | ||
 You may not have heard of it before , but there's a Windows utility that's been out there for years that gives you precise control over scores of handy Windows features. Named for its ability to tweak Windows' user interface (hence the UI), it is the most famous of Microsoft's PowerToys, a group of utilities Microsoft programmers originally developed for internal use with Windows 95. Microsoft's attitude towards TweakUI is an interesting one. Although the company will not accept any responsibility for its use, it makes TweakUI available for public download at its Web site. It also distributed the utility on CD-ROM copies of the original version of Windows 98. (NOTE: Before you hunt down and start using TweakUI, you should know that it does allow you to do some rather drastic things to your Windows operating system. As we've already mentioned, it gives you indirect access to the Windows Registry, and making the wrong changes to Registry settings can have dire consequences if you don't know how to undo them. If you're a computing novice and aren't comfortable taking the health of your system into your hands, we'd recommend passing on TweakUI, or at least sticking to its more basic features for a while.)  Acquisition & Installation Win98 users don't have far to go to locate version 1.25 of TweakUI (which, unfortunately, has some bugs); it's stored in the \TOOLS\RESKIT \POWERTOY folder of the Win98 upgrade CD-ROM. An improved and updated version (TweakUI 1.33) which also works with Win95, Win98/98SE, Windows Me, Windows NT 4.0, and Windows 2000 is available at http://www.microsoft.com/windowsme/guide/tweakui.exe. Be sure to use the appropriate version of TweakUI for your system; don't use older, Win95-only versions of TweakUI with newer versions of Windows. Also, we'd recommend backing up your current Registry settings before installing the utility. (For more information on creating backup files, see Cloning Your Data.) Once you've found TweakUI on your Windows CD-ROM or downloaded and unzipped the self-extracting file archive from Microsoft, installing it is a snap. Open the folder containing the TweakUI files (\C: \WINDOWS\TEMP if you unzipped the download file to its default location), find a file named TweakUI.inf, right-click the file's icon, and click Install. The TweakUI installation process can take several minutes because of the many Registry changes it must perform. A progress indicator tells you how the process is proceeding. When installation reaches step 2, "Introducing TweakUI," a TweakUI Help window pops up. Close it to complete the installation.
Start Tweaking To get started, click the Start button, point to Settings (or click the My Computer icon on your Desktop), click Control Panel, then click the TweakUI icon. The major features of TweakUI vary from version to version. In this article, we'll focus on those features supported by the Win98 CD-ROM version (v1.25). Launching TweakUI brings up a dialog box with a series of tabs along the top. Each one takes you to a different set of Windows controls. Mouse. As you might expect, the Mouse tab offers settings you can adjust that pertain to pointing and clicking your way through Windows. The Menu Speed area lets you change how fast pop-up menus appear when you right-click items on your screen. The fields below Mouse Sensitivity let you change your double-click and drag settings. You can also turn your mouse's scrolling wheel on or off, adjust how fast it scrolls through a page, and set your mouse to automatically go to the default dialog box setting (X-Mouse-style). General. Clicking the General tab lets you enable or disable on-screen effects such as Smooth Scrolling, Window Animation, Beeps On Errors, and others. You can even set Windows to display its version number on your desktop for quick reference. Under Special Folders you can tell Windows where to store common program files, and the Internet Explorer area lets you choose which major search engine to use in the Internet Explorer address bar. Explorer. Some of the features on the Explorer tab are less than critical, but they can be fun to play with. The Shortcut Overlay feature gives you several options for displaying shortcut icons, and the Startup area lets you display a Tip of the Day on startup. In the Settings portion of the tab you an adjust case of 8.3 (DOS alias) filenames, change the color of compressed files, save Explorer Window settings, and append a "Shortcut To" label to all shortcut icons. IE 4. Versions other than 1.25 may label this tab simply "IE." It gives you access to Internet Explorer features such as enabling your Win98 Active Desktop, Detect Accidental Double-Clicks, and others. Note that if you use IE5.0 or later versions and your IE tab is labeled IE4, you shouldn't use this tab until you upgrade to the latest version of TweakUI. Desktop. Choose from a variety of special Desktop icons you can save as files to any folder or rename. Check-marked folders are displayed on the Desktop; if you want to hide a folder such as Recycle Bin or Network Neighborhood, click the box to remove its check mark and it goes away. Be careful about removing Desktop icons, as this can cause some Windows features to stop working. My Computer. Uncheck drives you don't want displayed in your My Computer window. Be careful; this option can prevent you from using the Explore or Open commands in My Computer. Control Panel. Add or remove both standard and third-party Control Panel icons by removing check marks or adding them next to the proper .CPL files. Don't use this option to make any changes to Control Panel unless you create a shortcut for the .CPL file first. Network. The Network tab logs you onto any network that uses Client for Microsoft Networks automatically each time you start Windows. Keep in mind that your logon password won't be encrypted if you use this option. It also prevents you from using the Clear Last User option on the TweakUI Paranoia tab (more on this later). If you have any trust issues at home or in the office, we'd recommend skipping this option. New. New controls which types of New documents you can create on the Desktop when you right-click and select New. As with other areas, a check mark indicates an item will appear, clearing it means it won't. Add/Remove. This tab maintains the list of programs you can uninstall from the Add/Remove Programs dialog box in Control Panel. This is a great feature for users who have deleted a folder containing a program and found the long-lost program still displayed there. To remove an obsolete entry, click it and select Remove. To change the parameters for the uninstall option, click on a program, select Edit, and change the description for the program or the path to its uninstaller. Use the New command to manually add a program to the list if you know the path to the uninstall program. Boot. Boot controls startup options such as allowing and disallowing function keys such as F8 to display the Windows menu, enabling and disabling the Windows splash screen, and enabling and disabling Scandisk. Repair. This tab fixes problems with icons, file associations, the FONTS folder, Regedit, system files, your TEMPORARY INTERNET FILES folder, and the URL HISTORY folder. Select the repair you'd like to perform, read the notes, and click the Repair button to perform the option you select. This feature can save you from resorting to the all-purpose "reinstall Windows" option. Paranoia. The most famous tab in TweakUI, the Paranoia tab performs several tasks to hide your activities from other computer users, like clearing your Internet Explorer history and Document history files each time someone logs onto your PC. Paranoia also enables and disables Windows' propensity for playing audio and data CDs automatically, and saves Illegal Operations errors to a file called Faultlog.txt. Changing Your Mind In many (but not all) cases, you can reverse the changes you make with TweakUI with the Restore Factory Settings button on several tabs. Before you make a change with TweakUI, take a look to see if this option is available; some menus don't have it. Overall, the best advice we can offer regarding TweakUI is to tread lightly and avoid making any changes you don't fully understand. If you pay close attention to all its instructions and warnings, TweakUI is a great way to configure Windows just the way you want it.  by Mark Edward Soper |
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