Visual Controls Updated, Remove Third Party Control Panel Applets

The Windows control panel is one of the central hubs of the operating system. It links to administrative tools, lets you maintain your system or troubleshoot it. Third party applications can – and will – add their own icons to the control panel which in itself is not a big issue. Examples of programs that do that are Oracle’s Java, Adobe’s Flash Player, or Nvidia with its control panel.

When you uninstall those programs later, it can happen that their icons in the control panel stay behind. That’s only the icon then with no functionality attached to it anymore.

Visual Controls was created back in 2008 to give Windows users an option to remove third party control panel applets from the operating system again. You can use the software to remove leftover icons or to remove icons from existing programs that you do not want to appear in the control panel.

You can start the program right after you have unpacked it on your system. It requires the Microsoft .Net Framework 2.0 or higher to run, which is a given on the majority of operating systems it supports The new version is now fully compatible with Windows 7, and Vista, XP and even Windows 2000. The developer has improved compatibility with older versions of Windows as well in this release. Please note that Visual Controls requires administrative privileges to run.

The program lists all third party control panel applets in its interface once you have started the application.

 

Just uncheck the applets that you do not want to see anymore in the control panel, and click the apply button afterwards. Applets are listed in alphabetically order, another change in the new version. Once you hit the apply button you will notice that the selected items have been removed from the control panel. You can add them again at a later time by repeating the same steps.

The developer has added several command line arguments to the app which extend the functionality further. You can use the command –enable-global-mode to disable select control panel applets for all users of the system, and –disable-blacklist to display first party applets as well. Both options can be extremely useful for system administrators.

The developer has improved Visual Controls significantly. Better compatibility, and the command line options are especially noteworthy in this regards.

Manage Additional Control Panel Extensions
Display All Windows 7 Control Panel Tools At Once
Put Anything you want into the Control Panel
Quick Launch Control Panel Items From The Windows 7 Taskbar
Companel, Manage My Computer, Control Panel Items

What Is Carrier IQ, And How To Remove It ?

An Android app developer has published what he says is conclusive proof that millions of smart phones are secretly monitoring the key presses, geographic locations, and received messages of its users.

In a YouTube video posted on Monday, Trevor Eckhart showed how software from a Silicon Valley company known as Carrier IQ recorded in real time the keys he pressed into a stock EVO handset, which he had reset to factory settings just prior to the demonstration. Using a packet sniffer while his device was in airplane mode, he demonstrated how each numeric tap and every received text message is logged by the software.

What is Carrier IQ
Carrier IQ is a small software which is hidden inside some android phones and tablets, there is little you can do to detect  it’s Presence. It logs all Keystrokes, browsing and surfing habits, Google searches, and basically every single thing that you are doing on your phone and every button that you press is logged by this software

How To Check Whether Your Phone Has Carrier IQ

Prerequisites :- Phone should be rooted

You can use Logging Test App To Check Whether Your Phone Has Carrier IQ, The app was developed by Trevor Eckhart the security researcher who exposed the whole Carrier IQ debacle, You can download the app from XDA forums

Hit “CIQ Checks” button in the  Logging Test App, and it will tell you whether  Carrier IQ  is installed or not

How To Remove Carrier IQ
If you want to remove it from your device, you have two choices. Either use a custom ROM that doesn't contain Carrier IQ ( Cyanogenmod - recommended ), or use Eckhart's Logging Test App to remove it. Both solutions requires rooting your phone.




To remove it with the Logging Test App, download the original app and then buy the $1 pro license from the Android Market. Then, open it up, hit the Menu button, and tap "Remove CIQ". This will completely remove it from your device.


Hope this Info Helped You , If you have any doubts Regarding the article please let me know them via comments

Credits - Lifehacker, THN

Remove Corrupt Windows Updates With Windows Update Regenerator

Updates for the Windows operating system can be installed in a number of ways. From using the system’s built-in automatic update feature to downloading and installing updates manually. Automatic Windows updates seem to be the preferred method for the majority of users. We have covered the ins and outs of the Windows Update feature in an overview article previously. If you read it, you should have a solid understanding of how it functions, and of some of the errors that you may encounter when using it.

It can for instance happen that updates do not get installed properly on the system. This can be caused by a variety of reasons, from a crash during the download or update, to a dropped Internet connection or a virus that is preventing updates from being installed.

While it may be possible to reload the update, it can happen that you end up with a broken update in the update list that won’t install, can’t be removed, and can’t be downloaded again.

Windows Update Regenerator is a lightweight portable program for all recent versions of the Windows operating system (that is 32-bit and 64-bit editions of Vista, Windows 7 and even Windows 8) that removes broken and corrupt updates from Windows Update. The program basically regenerates the update listing so that missing updates are no longer blocked by Windows Update because of a corrupt listing.

 

Just run the tool on a system with corrupt updates to resolve the issue. The program displays a short description of what it will do if you press the 1 on the keyboard to start the regeneration:

Repair broken Updates and delete them. After this the system will reboot. You can now search for Updates, new Updates will download and install again. Broken Updates will removed from the Update list, too.

The system will reboot automatically after the operation. You need to start Windows Update manually after the reboot, to check for and install missing updates.

The developer has posted the commands the program is executing.

net stop Wuauserv
attrib -r %systemroot%\SoftwareDistribution /S /D
rd /s /Q %systemroot%\SoftwareDistribution
net start Wuauserv
shutdown -r

The forum thread links to the program download as well. (via Beatmaster’s Winlite Blog)

You can alternatively use Microsoft’s Windows Update Fix-It to resolve common service issues and errors.