VLC - the cross-platform media player and streaming server. VLC media player is a highly portable multimedia player for various audio and video formats (MPEG-1, MPEG-2, MPEG-4, DivX, mp3, ogg, …) as well as DVDs, VCDs, and various streaming protocols. It can also be used as a server to stream in unicast or multicast in IPv4 or IPv6 on a high-bandwidth network.

Like the name suggests it starts off by displaying everything - that is all files and folders - of a computer system. It eliminates all files and folders that do not match the search query of the user in the instant the key is pressed. What this means is that thousands of file names and folders will be displayed at the beginning, for example 1.5 million on a Windows XP test system.

Entering characters will reduce that amount drastically so that the required files and folders will be left in the end. To ensure that all files and folders have to be added to the index at start. It might take a minute or two depending on the amount of files. The developer mentions that indexing 1 million files will take around 1 minute. The index will be stored on the computer’s hard drive in the same location that the file was launched from. The one million indexed files and folders take up about 5 Megabytes of hard drive space.

The desktop search tool uses between 50 and 60 Megabytes of computer memory and about the same mount of virtual memory while running. The items can be sorted by name, path, data or size.

The search supports Boolean expressions, wildcards and regular expressions. The faq contains a helpful list of the expressions that can be used in the search.

Another interesting aspect of Everything is that it can launch an HTTP server so that users can search for and download files.

Everything will run on Windows 2000, XP, 2003 and Vista and can locate files and folders on local NTFS volumes.

Everything Is A Rather Unusual Desktop Search Tool

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The file management software Belvedere is a portable software program. The source code is provided as well on the program’s homepage. But what exactly are the features of the file management software?

Belvedere in its current stage can be used to define file management rules on certain folders of the system. The software program is capable of moving, copying, renaming, deleting or opening files that match conditions specified by the user.

Conditions for the name, file extension, size or dates can be configured. It would for instance be no problem to create a rule to move all files with the file extension xyz to another folder. Conditions can be combined so that Belvedere will automatically start the process when any or all of the conditions are met.

Belvedere is running in the background and checking automatically if any files meet the conditions set by the user. If that is the case it will automatically start the action defined by the user. A few things are problematic for now which hopefully will be changed in newer versions. It is for instance not possible to copy or move a file into a new folder if a file of the same name already exists in that folder.

Users working with extensions should also make sure to only add the extension and not the dot. Belvedere comes with a test button that can test the rules before they are added which is a good indicator if the rules have been properly configured.

You can download version .3 of the file management software over at Lifehacker.

File Management Software Belvedere

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A third party alternative for Windows XP to Windows Dreamscene is XP Scene. It is an elegant solution that can turn videos into desktop backgrounds in three simple steps. It does so by creating a html file with an embedded Windows Media Player control that can be used as the background in Windows XP.

XP Scene is a portable application that can be run from any location. It displays all three steps of the process in the main interface.

• Step 1: Select the video that should be used as the desktop background. Supported are avi, mpg and wmv videos. The resize mode can also be changed from “keep input aspect ratio” to “stretch video to display size” in this step.
• Step 2: Selecting the output folder where the html file and video will be saved in.
• Step 3: Starting the conversion

Once the files have been created it is a matter of selecting the HTML file as the background wallpaper. This is done in Display Properties > Desktop > Background. The user has to browse to the location where the html file has been saved to and pick it from there.

The process itself demands quite a bit of computer memory and cpu. It can also be quite the distraction most of the time. The right-click menu to change the background again is not working because of the html file that is using all of the space on the desktop.

The only way to change the desktop background back is to go into the Windows Control Panel and select the Display configuration from there.

Use Dreamscene On Windows XP

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