With Chrome nipping at Firefox’s ankles, Mozilla knows it has to perform a drastic overhaul – and it is. Firefox 4 is shaping up nicely, adding tons of new features and addressing many complaints about the current version. Despite that fact, many people will find it difficult to embrace some of the upcoming changes.
Fortunately, Mozilla hasn’t deviated from what’s made Firefox the second most used browser in the world: flexibility. We’re going to look at some tweaks you might want to apply if you’re running the current Firefox 4 beta, such as changing the color of the new orange menu button, moving tabs back to the bottom, getting add-ons to work and more.
Truth be told, many of our staffers were becoming Chrome converts or rather they had already moved completely, but this first Firefox 4 beta is looking particularly solid and in a short time Mozilla has been able to win back a few of us. Haven’t downloaded the Firefox 4 Beta yet? You can do so here (Windows/OS X), highly recommended.
Read: A Compendium of Firefox 4 Beta Tweaks
Be it screensavers, desktop wallpapers or font type and sizes, visual customization at the OS level is usually important to all kinds of users. Recognizing this, Microsoft has made it easier than ever to apply and adjust individual themes with Windows 7. We looked at this last week showing you how to find hidden themes buried in your hard drive as well as sponsored ones available through Microsoft’s online Personalization Gallery.
This time around, we are going to show you how to customize the Windows 7 login screen. There are various methods to accomplish this, with and without third-party software. I understand many people might not want to rely on a third-party application, while others would appreciate a quicker, safer route. First up is the more hands-on approach, and then the utility.
View: How to Change the Logon Screen Wallpaper on Windows 7
No matter what you think of Bing as a search engine, you have to admit that the daily homepage photos are pretty cool. They range from amazing nature photos to holiday sensitive events. Those images now have a new use, being wallpapers for your Windows 7 PC. One of Windows 7′s lesser know features is the ability to download new wallpapers via a RSS feed.
Thanks to the efforts of Long Zeng from www.istartedsomething.com & makeuseof.com you can now do just that.
By using the code below, you can create a live daily updating bing theme.
To create the theme, 1st copy and paste the code below in notepad and save it as “Bing.theme”
[[Theme]
DisplayName=Bing
[Slideshow]
Interval=1800000
Shuffle=1
RssFeed=http://feeds.feedburner.com/bingimages
[Control Panel\Desktop]
TileWallpaper=0
WallpaperStyle=0
Pattern=
[Control Panel\Cursors]
AppStarting=%SystemRoot%\cursors\aero_working.ani
Arrow=%SystemRoot%\cursors\aero_arrow.cur
Crosshair=
Hand=%SystemRoot%\cursors\aero_link.cur
Help=%SystemRoot%\cursors\aero_helpsel.cur
IBeam=
No=%SystemRoot%\cursors\aero_unavail.cur
NWPen=%SystemRoot%\cursors\aero_pen.cur
SizeAll=%SystemRoot%\cursors\aero_move.cur
SizeNESW=%SystemRoot%\cursors\aero_nesw.cur
SizeNS=%SystemRoot%\cursors\aero_ns.cur
SizeNWSE=%SystemRoot%\cursors\aero_nwse.cur
SizeWE=%SystemRoot%\cursors\aero_ew.cur
UpArrow=%SystemRoot%\cursors\aero_up.cur
Wait=%SystemRoot%\cursors\aero_busy.ani
DefaultValue=Windows Aero
Link=
[VisualStyles]
Path=%SystemRoot%\resources\themes\Aero\Aero.msstyles
ColorStyle=NormalColor
Size=NormalSize
ColorizationColor=0X6B74B8FC
Transparency=1
[MasterThemeSelector]
MTSM=DABJDKT
After you save it, just double click on the theme. file and make sure you select “download attachments” in the pop-up window.
That’s it, your bing theme should be good to go. To make sure the photos look their best, select the “Fit” option in the desktop background settings.
Enjoy! 