powertoys on S Anand

Windows PowerToys is my new favorite tool

Wed, 25 Dec 2024 04:07:17 +0000

Windows PowerToys is one of the first tools I install on a new machine. I use it so much every day that I need to share how I use it.

I’ve been using it for a long time now, but the pace at which good features have been added, it’s edged out most other tools and is #4 in terms of most used tools on my machine, with only the browser (Brave, currently), the editor (Cursor, currently), and Everything are ahead.)

These are the toolsI use the most:

Text Extractor (🪟+Shift+T) is a brilliant feature that copies screenshots as text (OCR)! I use it when someone’s screen-sharing presentations, to extract text from diagram images, or when I’m just too lazy to select text.
Advanced Paste (🪟+Shift+V) is another brilliant feature that pastes text as Markdown. Now it also supports converting the clipboard to HTML, JSON, or any other format (using an OpenAI API key).
Crop and Lock (🪟+Ctrl+Shift+T) is another brilliant feature that clones a portion of the screen in a new window. Very useful for keeping an eye on progress, reading notes, taking notes, etc.
Mouse without Borders is another brilliant feature that controls PCs by just moving your mouse across, with your keyboard, clipboard and files!
Color Picker (🪟+Shift+I) helps me find the exact color of a pixel from an image, quickly.
Always on Top (🪟+Ctrl+T) is another useful feature to keep a (small) window always on top of all other windows.
Keyboard Manager helped me a lot when my old laptop’s keys started conking off. I could map one key to another.
Hosts File Editor. I find this a lot easier to use than manually editing C:\Windows\System32\drivers\etc\hosts.
File Locksmith tells you which process has locked a file.
Mouse utilities help you find and highlight the mouse pointer. Useful for screen-recording or sharing.

Tools I don’t use because I have alternatives:

Run (Alt+Space) launches apps. But I use Everything since it opens documents too.
Environment Variables edits environment variables. But I use the Control Panel since my fingers are used to it.
Image Resizer quickly resizes images. But I use Paint.NET for the control it offers (WebP compression percentage, etc.)-
PowerRename renames files. But I prefer bash scripts.

Tools I don’t use because I don’t have a need:

Awake disables sleep for long-running tasks. But that’s my default setting anyway.
Command Not Found suggests a winget package for missing commands. But I don’t use PowerShell.
FancyZones creates window layouts. But I find Windows’ default window snapping enough.
Workspaces creates pre-defined window layouts. But I find Windows’ default window snapping enough.
File Explorer Add-ons preview SVG, MD, PDF, etc. But I don’t use previews.
Peek previews files. But I don’t use previews.
New+ creates files or folders from templates. But I use VS Code, mostly.
Quick Accent lets you type accented characters. But I usually don’t type them.
Registry Preview simplifies editing the registry. But I usually don’t.
Screen Ruler measures pixels on the screen. But I usually don’t.

Things I Learned - 04 Aug 2024

Sun, 04 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

This week, I learned:

Assisted generation uses a faster LLM to generate text and a better (tokenizer-compatible) LLM to validate it. This makes it faster. E.g. Gemma 2 2b with Gemma 2 27b
Power Toys has an Advanced Paste that uses OpenAI to paste as Markdown or JSON!
Interest Turing complete languages:
- find + mkdir, maybe
- sed and awk
- Minecraft’s Redstone Circuits
- Conway’s Game of Life
- Cellular Automata Rule 110
- Magic: The Gathering
- SQL
- Excel
Rev.ai does a good job of diarization. Cost: 2 cents per minute. Update: 6 Jun 2025. Cost: 0.33c/min Ref

Software & Gadgets, 2020

Sun, 27 Dec 2020 04:04:19 +0000

My most-used apps in 2020 were:

Everything. Locates files. Like Finder. Fast and brilliant.
Chrome. But Edge is pretty good, and I’m using it for secondary accounts.
Visual Studio Code. It’s my note-taker, TODO list, outliner, and IDE.
Minecraft. I’m addicted.
PowerPoint. I use it to make & edit videos, not just slides.
Zoom. Thanks to the lockdown. Breakout rooms are great.
Mail. It uses under 50MB. Gmail takes 250MB.
VLC. It still plays all formats, but I’m looking for a replacement.
Seafile. Our private Dropbox.
AutoHotKey. The best macro tool, but hard to use.

The new utilities I started using recently are:

WizTree. Fast visual disk space analyzer.
PowerToys. FancyZones and ColorPicker are my favorites.
WSL. Run Linux on Windows, natively (it’s fast).
ngrok. Expose local web apps publicly.
TabMemFree. Closes unused Chrome tabs, saves memory.

The gadgets I bought this year are:

Casio CT-X9000IN keyboard. Good touch response. I play every day.
HP Pavilion x360. My first touchscreen laptop. Yet to explore touch apps.
Raspberry Pi. But I’m yet to use it 😟
Teqneq S530 Bluetooth earbud. 2% of an airpod’s cost.
JBL Endurance Run Headphones. More durable than Foxbit FX500 / JBL C100SI — but one ear always conks off in a few months.
PureIT Eco. Consumes a lot less water than regular RO purifiers.
Treetop Air Purifier. Fairly quiet, and shows the air quality.