How to Stop Your Social Networks From Distracting You

Facebook, Google+, Twitter, and other social networks help you stay connected with friends and family, but it's easy to overdo the connecting and end up distracted and unproductive. Worse, many social networks notify you every time someone tries to interact with you, making it even harder to concentrate on productive tasks. Turning these helpful reminders off can be tricky in some instances, but setting up a way to tune out mobile and e-mail notifications is well worthwhile. Here's how to stop your social networks from distracting you, so you can get your working life back on track. And don't worry--you can still peek at your Twitter page once in a while.

Silence Your Smartphone

The most disruptive and intrusive notifications in my life are the push notifications that my smartphone reports from various apps and social networks. Though I was initially excited to have access to push notifications, I quickly turned them off for almost all of my apps so that I could avoid being pestered by updates that tended to be pretty trivial. The process for turning off mobile notifications varies slightly from OS to OS, but it's usually not too complicated.

Your best bet with an Android phone is to open the offending app, press the Menu key, locate the messaging settings under that menu, and select the apps that you'd like to turn off notifications for. Unfortunately, if you want to kill all of your push notifications, you'll have to do it manually in each app.

Silencing your notifications on an iOS 5 device is both easier and more obtuse, as you'll need to navigate to Settings, Notifications to make the modifications. From there, select an app and set the 'Alert Style' to None. Once again, you'll need to go app by app to turn off all alerts; but they're all in one menu, so it shouldn't take much time--and blocking incessant alerts will help you avoid hours of lost productivity.

Mute Your Inbox

Once you've muffled your mobile devices' alerts, you can turn your attention to removing annoying auto-updates from your email account. Turning off email notifications from Facebook and Twitter is a simple (albeit somewhat time-consuming) matter of finding and editing your notification settings in each service.

To eliminate Facebook email notifications, select Account Settings in the drop-down menu on the upper right side of your Facebook page, and then select Notifications from the menu on the left side of the page, to bring up your notification preferences. Manually select each part of your Facebook account, and unclick each checked box to turn off the corresponding notification e-mail. Facebook's incredibly granular approach to settings means you'll have to uncheck a lot of boxes on this screen, but the arrangement does let you control the email notifications you receive (so you can find out when someone posts pictures of you, but skip all the game invites), and it should reduce the amount of time you spend checking your email.

To turn off Twitter's email notifications about new followers, retweets, and so on, first log in to your Twitter account and select Settings from the upper right drop-down menu; then selectNotifications from the new menu on the left. Twitter has far fewer settings here than Facebook has in its modification options area. Simply turn off the six notification options, and you'll be ready to go on your way.

Is the bright red Google+ notification icon in the top-right corner of your GMail account distracting you? Regrettably, the notification toolbar in Google+ is impossible to kill from your Google settings, and if you're a GMail user you'll often find your eyes drawn to that bright red reminder. If you want to continue to use Google services without having to endure the Google+ notification bar, download Google Chrome and install the Hide Google+ Notification extension.

The Nuclear Option

If you've turned off all of your notifications but find that you still waste most of your day on Facebook and Twitter, it's time to accept that the problem might rest with you as much as with the sites themselves. If you can't help yourself, install a browser extension that blocks distracting sites automatically. As a Chrome user I prefer StayFocusd--a useful extension that completely blocks unwanted sites except during a limited time (the default duration is 10 minutes) each day. That way you can ensure that you don't miss out on important updates, without wasting your whole day on the Web.

Firefox users should check out the similar Leechblock. Internet Explorer users are out of luck, and Safari doesn't have a real alternative either. But Mac users can try SelfControl, an OS X application that lets you create a blacklist of sites you don't want to visit and then blocks access to those sites across all browsers. Congratulations! By adopting these simple measures, you've taken a big step toward shutting out distraction and becoming more productive.

The Best Email Tool You’re Not Using

The best-kept secret of the business world? Email reminder services, which can help turn overloaded inboxes into productivity powerhouses.

Email reminder services such as Followupthen make you more productive.No, really. I’ve been using these services for the past couple years, and I’m constantly amazed at how helpful they are--and how few people know they exist.

See, I use my inbox as a kind of to-do list, marking as unread any messages I don’t have time to answer now or need to act on later.

The problem is, as my inbox fills up with other mail, these messages get pushed lower and lower, until eventually they're forced out of sight--and out of mind.

A reminder service gives you a kind of email snooze button. All you do is forward a selected message to a particular e-mail address; at the designated time, it’ll return to your inbox.

For example, suppose a PR person emails me about a new product launch that’s happening next Monday. I decide to write about it, but not until the actual launch day. Instead of spending a bunch of time setting up a reminder in my calendar or to-do list, I simply forward that email to monday@reminderservice.com.

When Monday rolls around, presto: There’s the email again.

Different services have different syntax for the kinds of delays you can set, but for the most part it’s pretty straightforward: 2pm@reminderservice.com, tomorrow@reminderservice.com,june1@reminderservice.com, and so on.

What’s especially nice is that if an email arrives (make that re-arrives) and you’re still not ready to deal with it, you can click a snooze-delay link right inside the message.

So, what reminder services are available, and which ones are best? PC World’s Liane Cassavoy recently reviewed three free email reminder services: Boomerang for Gmail, Followup.cc, and Followupthen.com. (Keep in mind that “free” gets you just the basics; for more advanced features, you’ll want to look at pro-level accounts. Worth every penny, in my humble opinion.)

I’ve tried all three of these services myself, and while they’re all great, I have to give the nod to Followupthen. That said, I also recommend checking out Nudgemail, which has been in beta forever but continues to be fully free while it is.

Secure Your BIOS

You probably don’t interact with your PC’s BIOS (Basic Input/Output Operating System) much, but it occupies a unique and highly privileged position in your computer’s architecture.

Since the BIOS loads before the operating system--and before you enter your user credentials--malware surreptitiously introduced into the BIOS could activate itself long before any anti-malware software has an opportunity to detect it. A sophisticated and malicious program operating at such a low level could take control of your PC without providing a clue that it was there.

And fortunately, there have been very few confirmed cases of malware infections at the BIOS level. The most famous is 1998’s Chernobyl virus, and the vulnerabilities that enabled that exploit are not present in new PCs. UEFI (Unified Extensible Firmware Interface) and the secure boot mechanism in Windows 8 will make this less of an issue, but that’s a topic for another article.

But it’s always better to be safe than sorry. The first step in your safety plan is to protect your BIOS with an administrator password that must be entered before a BIOS update can occur. We’ll show you how.

Step 1:Boot or reboot your PC. While it’s starting up, repeatedly tap the ‘DEL,’ ‘F1,’ or whatever other special key is required to launch the BIOS. This information is typically displayed onscreen during the boot process, although it might not be immediately obvious.This text, for instance, appears verbatim at the bottom of the screen for just a few moments after we start our computer:

Step 2: Once your BIOS setup menu is loaded, look for the menu item that enables you to set up a password. There might be more than one.

Our BIOS, for example, has provisions for setting up both a “supervisor” password and a “user” password. In our case, you must log in with the supervisor password to make changes to the BIOS. The user password only allows you to see the current BIOS values.

Step 3: Select the menu item for creating the password and enter a password (usually twice, to verify what you typed the first time). If you think you might have trouble remembering the password later, as you’ll access your BIOS infrequently, store it in a password locker utility such as LastPass.

Save your BIOS changes and your computer will reboot. From here on out you’ll need to enter this password before any changes can be made to your BIOS, ensuring malware will have a harder time harming your PC.

Windows 8 Multi-screen

When Microsoft launches Windows 8 Release Preview next month the operating system will have improved navigation features for users who like more than one monitor to display all their applications

The upgrade - the last major tune-up expected before the final version launches sometime this fall - addresses task bars, desktop backgrounds and that no man's land, the common edge shared by adjacent screens, according to the Building Windows 8 blog.

The current problem with that common edge is that when users mouse over to them - for example to hit the minimize button - they sometimes overshoot and wind up on the next screen instead of the screen they started off on. They either have to slow down or adjust the window size so there's a buffer between the edge of the window and the edge of the screen.

With Windows 8 Release Preview, Microsoft has created interface corners that are larger than 6 pixels tall so users can pull up a little short of the edge but still hit the active interface. The active area extends a little beyond the corner itself to present a larger target.

These corners have new uses with Windows 8 that they didn't have with Windows 7. Corners contain access to applications, charm bars and the Start screen.

The active corners have also been revised so they only work for the monitor the cursor is active on. So when the cursor moves from one screen to another, the corners won't initially work on the second screen until the user establishes that that is the screen being worked on. So if users do overshoot the active screen, they won't accidentally click on an active corner on the other screen.

To improve the ability to organize the location of active applications, the Release Preview will add a new keyboard shortcut just for moving Metro applications from screen to screen - Windows key+page up/page down. The shortcut for moving traditional desktop apps remains Windows key+shift+arrow. All apps can be moved from screen to screen via drag and drop as well.

In the upcoming version Microsoft gives more options for the functionality of taskbars on each screen, giving users new options.

The default setting is to make the taskbar fully functional on all screens. Rather than having to manipulate the cursor back to the primary screen and perhaps turn their heads, users can access all taskbar icons from every screen.

Alternatively, they can have the taskbar show icons only for those windows that appear on each screen. The downside is that users have to remember which windows are open on which screens in order to find their icons.

Or users can set up a main monitor with a taskbar that always displays all icons, and other monitors' taskbars show only icons for the windows open on them. So when users are looking for a particular window but aren't sure on which screen it is open, they know they can find it on the master monitor.

The Start button, charms bar and calling up recently used application will be accessible from all monitors. In the Consumer Preview they were available only on one screen.

Microsoft has spent a lot of effort on desktop backgrounds in the release preview, making it possible to put a different one on each screen or to spread a single image so it is displayed just once over all the screens. When different pictures are used, they can be displayed on horizontally oriented monitors in landscape mode or rotated 90 degrees with in portrait mode.

Fifth-Generation Wi-Fi

If your business has kept pace with changes in wireless networking, you've deployed dual-band routers and client adapters that can stream encrypted data over the airwaves at speeds greater than 100 megabits per second at relatively close range.

But no good deed goes unpunished. New hardware based on the nearly finished 802.11ac standard is about to debut, and it will make your existing wireless infrastructure feel as though it's mired in molasses.

Though the standards body responsible for defining 802.11ac hasn't finished dotting all the i's and crossing all the t's yet, semiconductor manufacturers Broadcom and Qualcomm Atheros are already sampling 802.11ac chipsets (Broadcom has labeled its effort "5G Wi-Fi"). Both companies are closely involved in defining the standard, and they promise to deliver firmware updates to correct for any minor changes that may creep into the standard between now and the moment it is ratified (probably later this year or early in 2013).

Wondering how the IEEE moved from 802.11n to 802.11ac? The standards body uses a new letter suffix to identify each new technical paper related to the 802.11 project, so the logical follow-ons to 802.11z were 802.11aa, 802.11ab, and now 802.11ac. The standard is dubbed "fifth-generation Wi-Fi" because it's the fifth generation of the technology that will be certified by the Wi-Fi Alliance marketing consortium. At the risk of muddying the waters, there is an 802.11ad standard in the works, but it's not the next step in mainstream wireless networking. WiGig, as that standard is known, is a short-range, line-of-site technology that uses the 60GHz frequency band to stream media.

Unlike 802.11n networking hardware, which can use either the 2.4GHz or the 5GHz frequency bands, 802.11ac devices will operate exclusively on the 5GHz band. The 2.4GHz band delivers better range, but Wi-Fi data streams that use it must compete with a multitude of other devices that operate at the same frequency--everything from microwave ovens to Bluetooth headsets). The 5GHz band contains many more available channels; and in the 802.11ac standard, each of those channels is 80MHz wide, versus the 40MHz width specified for channels under the 802.11n standard.

Trendnet’s TEW-811DR router will support 802.11ac.

What's more, 802.11ac will use a modulation scheme that quadruples the amount of data that will fit on an encoded carrier signal. The maximum bandwidth per spatial stream in 802.11n is 150 mbps, which means that an 802.11n router outfitted with three transmit and three receive antennas can deliver maximum theoretical throughput of 450 mbps. In contrast, the maximum bandwidth in 802.11ac jumps to 433 mbps per spatial stream, and the maximum number of spatial streams increases from three to eight. So the theoretical maximum throughput on an 802.11ac network will eventually be several times that of gigabit ethernet. First-generation devices, however, will be limited to using either two or three transmit and receive antennas to deliver a theoretical throughput maximum of 866 mbps or 1.3 gbps).

As we've seen with 802.11n networks, real-world throughput will likely be one-third to one-half as fast as the theoretical maximums. Still, even mobile devices outfitted with 802.11ac chipsets and just one transmit and one receive antenna--think smartphones and tablets--should be able to handle more than twice the bandwidth that today's devices with 802.11n chipsets can manage. With bandwidth-intensive applications such as videoconferencing and Customer Relationship Management (CRM) moving from the desktop to smartphones and tablets, 802.11ac networks will become essential infrastructure elements for businesses large and small.

One means of overcoming the 5GHz band's shorter range with 802.11ac chipsets will be to utilize transmit and receive beam-forming technology. Beam forming was an optional and non-standardized element of the 802.11n spec. In the 802.11ac standard, beam-forming will remain an optional feature, but its implementation will be standardized. Most of today's 802.11n devices use omnidirectional signal transmission and reception. Signals propagate in a series of concentric rings, like the ripples you create by dropping a stone in a pond.

With beam forming, the router and its clients develop an awareness of each other's relative location, so they can coherently focus their transmission streams at each other. Without beam forming, reflected signals may arrive out-of-phase and cancel each other out, reducing total bandwidth. A beam-forming chipset can adjust the signals' phase to overcome that problem, thereby substantially increasing usable bandwidth.

The first generation of 802.11ac routers, such as the Trendnet TEW-811DR, will be concurrent dual-band models that support 802.11n clients on the 2.4GHz frequency band and 802.11ac clients on the 5GHz band. These devices are likely to reach the market in the third quarter of this year. Laptops with 802.11ac chipsets should arrive in time for the winter holiday season, with mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets following in early 2013. The Wi-Fi Alliance, which has assumed responsibility for ensuring that wireless networking products interoperate properly, plans to begin its 802.11ac certification program in early 2013.

Storing Pictures in Oracle Tables

Storing Pictures in Oracle Tables

Photographs and pictures and Oracle BLOB data are easy to add to a Oracle table. There are two ways to load BLOBs and CLOBs into the database. The first method uses PL/SQL and the DBMS_LOB package and the BFILE datatype to transfer external LOB files into the database internal LOB structures. The second uses the Oracle Call Interface (OCI) to perform the same function. Let's look at the first method.

To load external LOB data into internal LOB storage using PL/SQL alone you must first use a table containing BFILE locators for the files to allow Oracle to access them.

create table graphics_table (

  bfile_id number,

  bfile_desc varchar2(30),

  bfile_loc bfile,

  bfile_type varchar2(4))

  TABLESPACE appl_data

  storage (initial 1m next 1m pctincrease 0)

 /

Listing 3: Example Use of BFILE datatype in a Table

Notice in the above code that no LOB storage clause is specified. This is because all that is stored in the database is a locator value for the BFILE consisting of an internal DIRECTORY specification and a file name. The BFILE locators are loaded into the table using the BFILENAME function and a standard insert statement.

An example of this process is shown here in Listing 4.

SQL> INSERT INTO graphics_table

  2  VALUES(4,'April Book of Days Woodcut',bfilename('GIF_FILES','APRIL.JPG'),'JPEG');

1 row created.

SQL> INSERT INTO graphics_table

  2  VALUES(8,'August Book of Days Woodcut',bfilename('GIF_FILES','AUGUST.JPG'),'JPEG');

1 row created.

SQL> INSERT INTO graphics_table

  2  VALUES(13,'Benzene Molecule',bfilename('GIF_FILES','BENZNE.GIF'),'GIF');

1 row created.

.

.

.

SQL> INSERT INTO graphics_table

  2  VALUES(30,'',bfilename('GIF_FILES','SHAPIROS.GIF'),'GIF');

1 row created.

SQL> INSERT INTO graphics_table

  2  VALUES(31,'',bfilename('GIF_FILES','SODF5.GIF'),'GIF');

1 row created.

SQL> INSERT INTO graphics_table

  2  VALUES(32,'',bfilename('GIF_FILES','WAVRA-CL.GIF'),'GIF');

1 row created.

SQL> commit;

Commit complete.

Listing 4: Example Set of INSERT Commands to Load BFILE Locators Manually

TIP:

Using a host command to perform a single column directory listing into a file (for example on NT: dir /B >file.lis), then using the UTL_FILE package to read the contents of the created file into the DBMS_SQL package to build the INSERT commands on the fly, an entire directory of LOB datafiles can be loaded at one time into a BFILE table and then on into the internal LOB storage table. For an example see Listing 5.

CREATE  OR REPLACE PROCEDURE get_bfiles

(

                                        

bfile_dir in  VARCHAR2,

                                        

bfile_lis in  VARCHAR2,

                                       

 bfile_int_dir VARCHAR2)

AS

 cur           INTEGER;

 bfile_int    VARCHAR2(100);

 sql_com   VARCHAR2(2000);

 file_proc   INTEGER;

 file_hand  utl_file.file_type;

 file_buff    VARCHAR2(1022);

 file_type   VARCHAR2(4);

BEGIN

 bfile_int:=UPPER(bfile_int_dir);

 file_hand:=utl_file.fopen(bfile_dir,bfile_lis,'R');

 LOOP

   BEGIN

   utl_file.get_line(file_hand,file_buff);

   cur:=dbms_sql.open_cursor;

   file_type:=SUBSTR(file_buff,INSTR(file_buff,'.')+1,3);

   file_type:=UPPER(file_type);

   IF file_type='GIF'

    THEN

        file_type:='GIF';

    ELSIF file_type='JPG'

    THEN file_type:='JPEG';

   END IF; 

   sql_com:= 'INSERT INTO graphics_table '||CHR(10)||

             'VALUES (graphics_table_seq.NEXTVAL,'||CHR(39)||CHR(39)||

             ', bfilename('||

             CHR(39)||bfile_int||CHR(39)||','

             ||CHR(39)||file_buff||CHR(39)||

             ') ,'||CHR(39)||file_type||CHR(39)||')';

   dbms_output.put_line(sql_com);

   dbms_sql.parse(cur,sql_com,dbms_sql.v7);

   file_proc:=dbms_sql.execute(cur);

   dbms_sql.close_cursor(cur);

   EXCEPTION

    WHEN no_data_found THEN

   EXIT;

   END;

 END LOOP;

 utl_file.fclose(file_hand);

END;

/

Listing 5: Example Procedure for Loading BFILE Locators based on an External File List

Once the BFILE locators are set in the BFILE table we can use the DBMS_LOB package to read the external LOB (BFILE) into an internal LOB (BLOB, CLOB or NCLOB). This is shown in Listing 6. The SELECT from the TEMP_BLOB table initializes the internal LOB values so they can be used, otherwise an error will be returned.

CREATE OR REPLACE PROCEDURE load_lob AS

  id         NUMBER;

  image1     BLOB;

  locator    BFILE;

  bfile_len  NUMBER;

  bf_desc    VARCHAR2(30);

  bf_name    VARCHAR2(30);

  bf_dir     VARCHAR2(30);

  bf_typ     VARCHAR2(4);

  ctr integer;

  CURSOR get_id IS

    SELECT bfile_id,bfile_desc,bfile_type FROM graphics_table;

BEGIN

  OPEN get_id;

LOOP

  FETCH get_id INTO id, bf_desc, bf_typ;

  EXIT WHEN get_id%notfound;

  dbms_output.put_line('ID: '||to_char(id));

  SELECT bfile_loc INTO locator FROM graphics_table WHERE bfile_id=id;

  dbms_lob.filegetname(

locator,bf_dir,bf_name);

  dbms_output.put_line('Dir: '||bf_dir);

  dbms_lob.fileopen(locator,dbms_lob.file_readonly);

  bfile_len:=dbms_lob.getlength(locator);

  dbms_output.put_line('ID: '||to_char(id)||' length: '||to_char(bfile_len));

  SELECT temp_blob INTO image1 FROM temp_blob;

  bfile_len:=dbms_lob.getlength(locator);

  dbms_lob.loadfromfile(image1,locator,bfile_len,1,1);

  INSERT INTO internal_graphics VALUES (id,bf_desc,image1,bf_typ);

  dbms_output.put_line(bf_desc||' Length: '||TO_CHAR(bfile_len)||

  ' Name: '||bf_name||' Dir: '||bf_dir||' '||bf_typ);

  dbms_lob.fileclose(locator);

END LOOP;

END;

/

Listing 6: Example Procedure to Load BFILE values into Internal LOBs

By enforcing a naming standard on the external LOB files the loading procedure in Listing 6.6 could be modified to place BLOB types into BLOBs, CLOB types into CLOBs and NCLOB types into NCLOBs based on the file type values that are parsed from the file extensions in Listing 5. Between the procedure in Listing 5 and the one shown in Listing 6 the example tables in Listings 1 and 3 are populated with LOB values located in a specific directory.

Data Mining Techniques

There are several major data mining techniques have been developed and used in data mining projects recently including association, classification, clustering, prediction and sequential patterns. We will briefly examine those data mining techniques with example to have a good overview of them.

Association

Association is one of the best known data mining technique. In association, a pattern is discovered based on a relationship of a particular item on other items in the same transaction. For example, the association technique is used in market basket analysis to identify what products that customers frequently purchase together. Based on this data businesses can have corresponding marketing campaign to sell more products to make more profit.

Classification

Classification is a classic data mining technique based on machine learning. Basically classification is used to classify each item in a set of data into one of predefined set of classes or groups. Classification method makes use of mathematical techniques such as decision trees, linear programming, neural network and statistics. In classification, we make the software that can learn how to classify the data items into groups. For example, we can apply classification in application that “given all past records of employees who left the company, predict which current employees are probably to leave in the future.” In this case, we divide the employee’s records into two groups that are “leave” and “stay”. And then we can ask our data mining software to classify the employees into each group.

Clustering

Clustering is a data mining technique that makes meaningful or useful cluster of objects that have similar characteristic using automatic technique. Different from classification, clustering technique also defines the classes and put objects in them, while in classification objects are assigned into predefined classes. To make the concept clearer, we can take library as an example. In a library, books have a wide range of topics available. The challenge is how to keep those books in a way that readers can take several books in a specific topic without hassle. By using clustering technique, we can keep books that have some kind of similarities in one cluster or one shelf and label it with a meaningful name. If readers want to grab books in a topic, he or she would only go to that shelf instead of looking the whole in the whole library.

Prediction

The prediction as it name implied is one of a data mining techniques that discovers relationship between independent variables and relationship between dependent and independent variables. For instance,prediction analysis technique can be used in sale to predict profit for the future if we consider sale is an independent variable, profit could be a dependent variable. Then based on the historical sale and profit data, we can draw a fitted regression curve that is used for profit prediction.

Sequential Patterns

Sequential patterns analysis in one of data mining technique that seeks to discover similar patterns in data transaction over a business period. The uncover patterns are used for further business 

How to Convert an Old PC into a Modern Server

Your old desktop PC gave you years of reliable service, but eventually it couldn't keep up with modern tasks and applications; so you went out and bought something newer and faster. Now you need to decide what to do with the old clunker.

You could e-recycle it--hand it off to a responsible company that will dismantle it and recycle the parts--but what do you gain from that aside from feeling good about being environmentally responsible? Allow us to suggest another solution: Repurpose the old hulk as a local server. You can use it as a repository for automatic PC backups, or set it up as a file server that you and your employees can access while you're on the road. Those are just two of the roles that an older PC can perform that are of far more benefit to your business than having the machine collect dust or head for the dump.

Best of all, the software--FreeNAS--that will power this machine is exactly what its name describes: a free operating system for network-attached storage. And side from being free, FreeNAS is easy to install, configure, and run. You'll find everything you need to know in this guide.

Installing FreeNAS

Before you begin your FreeNAS installation, obtain a USB thumb drive with a capacity of at least 2GB. You'll install FreeNAS to this drive and boot from it, because you can't run the OS on the same drive that you're using to share files from. Alternatively, you can buy a very small solid-state drive, install FreeNAS on that, and boot the server from it; but investing in such an SSD is an unnecessary expense (unless you're worried that someone might remove the USB drive without realizing the consequences).

You'll need a USB key with at least 2GB of storage for this project.

Once you have the necessary thumb drive, download the latest version of FreeNAS from the operating system's official site, taking care to choose the right disc image (that is, .iso file): x86 if your machine is equipped with a 32-bit CPU, or x64 if it has a 64-bit processor. After downloading the .iso file, burn it to a blank CD and drop it into your server-to-be's optical drive.

Now, power up the computer, tap the key that calls up its BIOSboot menu, and choose the option to have the machine boot from its optical drive instead of from its hard drive. If no such menu exists, you'll have to enter the BIOS itself and change the boot order there.

Choose the option to install FreeNAS to a flash drive.

Once all of FreeNAS's FreeBSD-based Linux commands have done their work, you'll see a simple installation screen that gives you four options to choose from. Select the first--the option to install or upgrade FreeNAS 8 to a hard drive or flash drive--and press Enter. Any storage media connected to your system will appear on the next screen. In that next screen, you'll eventually want to select your flash drive as a target for the installation (the OS will create two partitions on the drive: one for the OS itself and one for future FreeNAS upgrades)--but don't press anything yet.

Make sure that you don't need any of the existing data on your flash drive.

Before choosing the installation destination, you need to be aware that FreeNAS will eradicate the data and partitions on the flash drive that you install it on. So this is your last chance to archive any files that your flash drive already contains, before they vanish forever. When you're ready, choose the thumb drive, select Yes, and press Enter. A prompt will appear when the FreeNAS installation process is complete. Press Enter and then select the option to reboot your system in the main menu.

While your system is rebooting, repeat the step where you chose which drive FreeNAS will boot from by default--but this time specify that you want it to boot from the thumb drive plugged into one of the system's USB ports.

Setting Up Your Storage

Once FreeNAS has finished loading, you'll see a console screen that lists all of the networking options you can set for FreeNAS. At this point, your server is up and running.

Assuming that your system works fine at the default settings--and it should, as long as it's connected to your network via ethernet cable--you'll receive an IP address that you can use to access FreeNAS's primary settings. Type this IP address into the Web browser's address bar on any system connected to your network and press Enter.

Establish admin credentials so that you can manage the server.

The first thing you'll want to do within this Web-based configuration screen is to change your user credentials. Look to the left side and click the My Account menu item to expand it. Now choose an admin user name and a password. Click the button to save your changes. Then click Change Password and do the same. Security first!

To set up your storage volumes, click the Storage button in the upper-left corner of the FreeNAS Web-based configuration screen. From there, click the Create Volume button that appears in the main window. Give your volume a name, select the number of drives you'll want to use to create the volume, and select ZFS as the file system type. You'll find that ZFS delivers a number of benefits that the Unix File System does not. If you're combining multiple drives, you'll have an opportunity at this point to select which RAID type you want to use.

ZFS is a superior file system, offering benefits not available in UFS.

Click the Add Volume button when you're ready. If you want your storage to be a shared resource in your office, so that you won't have any individual user account permissions to manage, click theChange Permissions icon and grant write access to both Group and Other users (be sure to select the Set Permissions Recursively option, too). Press the big Change button to cement your configuration.

Setting Up Shares

You've created a basic storage volume on your FreeNAS-powered machine. Now you need to set up your sharing arrangement so that other users can find and access your drive's contents.

CIFS shares are the way to go if your office uses a blend of Mac, Linux, and Windows systems. If you have a Mac-only setup, you might be better served (no pun intended) by configuring the drive for AFP shares. In the spirit of inclusivity, we'll walk through a CIFS setup.

Choose CIFS sharing if your network is PC-only or a mix of Macs and PCs.

Click the Sharing button in the Web configuration screen's left-hand sidebar, and selectAdd CIFS Share. Give your share drive a name and select your volume by clicking theBrowse button on the 'Path' line. Hint: The name you previously assigned to your volume should appear within the /mnt/ folder. Click it and click the Close button. Make sure that the box next to Allow Guest Access is checked, and then click OK.

Finally, click the Services button on the left sidebar and select the Control Services option. Flip the switch on the main panel's CIFS setting to on. Voilà! Type two bakslashes and then the FreeNAS IP address (for example, \\192.168.0.1), into a Windows Explorer window and pressEnter; your shared drive should appear. Use Windows to map this network drive, and you'll never need to hunt it down with an IP address again.

Use Windows to map the share, so you don't need to remember its IP address.

In covering this series of steps, we've glossed over some configuration options that could play a big role in allowing you to see your shared network drive--such as making sure that the CIFS settings (Services, CIFS) are using the correct workgroup for your network configuration. If you find that this basic setup guide isn't working for you, a network configuration issue is probably holding you back. To resolve the issue, make sure that your FreeNAS network settings basically match those of the other computers on your network.

Our simple share drive is but the tip of the FreeNAS iceberg with regard to features. Options include locking drive access to users and groups, creating recurring snapshots for restoring older copies of files or deleted files entirely, and using the power combination of Dynamic DNS and FTP access to give your offsite workers easy access to the files they need. Now that you've mastered the basics, a world of advanced configurations and scenarios is yours to explore!

Backing Up

Windows 7 Professional and Ultimate allow you to back up and restore your PC over a network.

If you'd like to use your FreeNAS server as a host for automatic client PC backups, you can choose from any number of commercial and freeware applications to run on those clients. If you're running Windows 7 Professional or higher, you can use the built-in Windows Backup and Restore tool (lower versions won't allow you to back up over a network).

Pull up the app within Windows 7 and click the Set Up Backuplink. Select Save on a Network, and use the Browse button to pull up the shared FreeNAS folder you created. If you've already assigned yourself a user account on the FreeNAS server, type in your user name and password; if you haven't, use the default admin user name and password you set up earlier.

Choose which files you want to back up, or let Windows 7 decide for you.

You can let Windows choose the files it thinks are the most important and should be backed up, or you can identify specific files and folders yourself. After that, you should be done with picking options. Your backup will start its first run. When it has finished, click the Change Settings link, and create an automated backup schedule.

Copy a File Path, Show or Hide Extensions

You know those times when you want to upload a new photo to, say, Facebook or Pinterest? The typical browser-based upload tool forces you to click through countless folders until you find the one you want. It's a slow and often maddening dance.

Fortunately, there's an easier way.

If you already have the photo open in Explorer, you can copy its file path to the clipboard, then paste that path into the upload dialog box. Here's how:

1. Open Windows Explorer and find the photo (or document) in question.
2. Hold down the Shift key, then right-click the photo.
3. In the context menu that appears, find and click Copy as path. This copies the file location to the clipboard. (FYI, if you don't hold down Shift when you right-click, the Copy as path option won't appear.)
4. Now, in your browser, head to Facebook or wherever, access the upload tool, and click Browse.
5. Press Ctrl-V to paste in the file location, then click OK.
6. 
   That's all there is to it! No hunting through a bunch of folders to find the file you want--just paste the path and you're done.
   I must give credit where credit is due; I first heard about this clever tip from Windows guru Ed Bott. But it's too great not to share; once you start using it, you'll wonder how you got along without it.

   How to Show or Hide File Extensions

   Recently I've been downloading some audiobooks in MP3 format. I wanted to import them into iTunes for listening on the go, but there's one problem: iTunes (and, more importantly, my iPhone) can't bookmark an MP3 file. Thus, in between listening sessions, it'll be difficult for me to resume my book from where I left off.
   iTunes can, however, bookmark its own audiobook files. So if I convert my MP3s to Apple's AAC format, then change the file extension so iTunes thinks they're audiobooks, I'm good to go.
   The first part is easy. In iTunes, just right-click the MP3 and choose Create AAC Version. That will eventually produce an audio file with an m4a extension. But I need to change that to m4b, the extension iTunes recognizes as an audiobook.
   I had no problem finding the file in Windows Explorer--but the file extension was missing! Or, more accurately, hidden. That's the default setting in Windows nowadays, the idea being to keep you from monkeying with files and causing system problems.
   This kind of monkeying, however, is harmless. I just needed to un-hide the extensions. Here's how:
   1. In Windows 7 (and, I think, Vista), click Start, then type extension.
   2. Click Show or hide file extensions.
   3. In the Folder Options box that appears, clear the check box next to Hide extensions for known file types, then click OK.
   That's it! Now you should see extensions for most common files. And in my case, changing that audio file's extension was as easy as right-clicking it and choosing Rename.
   If you want to hide the extensions again after you're done, just repeat the process and re-check the box mentioned in Step 3.