Windows 8 Article Categories

The Windows 8 taskbar has a clean appearance, displaying only the icons of pinned and opened applications group together neatly. From a design perspective, it is light-years ahead of the Windows XP taskbar.  But when viewed from a usability perspective, some may find the missing labels a step backwards. Hidden in taskbar options, is a setting that can give you the best of both worlds by retaining the new look and display labels. 

Jump lists are a major component of the taskbar in Windows 8.  When you right-click on an application icon, you are presented with a number of options relevant to that app. Depending on the app, different items are displayed.  Microsoft Word displays recently opened office documents, Internet Explorer and Chrome display recently visited web sites.  The number of items that display in the list are easily customizable. 

Would you like to display an information or legal message to your users before they can login to Windows?  "Do not shut down this computer," or how about, "By logging into this computer you are accepting the use policy. Unauthorized use is prohibited. "  All of these message can be displayed with the help of a simple security policy edit.

Microsoft built a great interface to customize the colors and lock screen image seen by users after they log in, but they never built an interface to customize the default lock image and color scheme. That is where the Tweaks.com Logon Changer was designed to help. I wrote this free utility to help users of all skills easily change the default logon screen image and customize the color scheme with just a few clicks.

Every time you boot up your PC all computer accounts are normally displayed right on the logon screen. This can be a security risk as it provides useful information to a malicious user attempting to breach your computer.  In addition, if Remote Desktop is enabled, an attacker can remotely identify the user currently logged in as it is listed on the logon screen. The attacker just needs to find your computer's IP address and then start to brute force your password.  It is for these reasons that I highly reccomend what is common practice in any large enterprise, and hide the remove the user list from the logon screen.