How to really make your desktop look good

I’ve been customizing my desktop since I think a year ago, and it started from me choosing a different wallpaper, to arranging my desktop icons and to switching my shell style because the default looks retarded and everybody else is using it. In fact that’s really just the only reason why people customize their desktops. Most of us aren’t really into beautifying our desktops, we’re not Renaissance artists, we’re rebels. We design our desktops differently because that’s the way we want it to be, and not be part of a demographic wherein millions of other people are using the same look.

Want to stand out? Tired of Aero Glass on Vista and 7, tired of that lame Bliss wallpaper and overwhelming blue in XP? Here’s a couple of programs and tips that will help you stand out.

(Linux and Mac users, this isn’t for you, however, I’m thinking of writing a similar article for Ubuntu users. I don’t think I’m going to be writing a similar article for Mac since I’ve never even used one)

The Basics

Sometimes, the basics are already good enough to create an eye-catching and pleasing desktop environment. Here are a couple of pointers you should heed while designing your desktop.

Your wallpaper

DON’T use a wallpaper that everybody else uses. And I’m talking specifically about that wall of Arthas from Warcraft III, you know, the same face they use with the game’s box art. We do not care how much you love or how good you are at Dota.

If you are going to use a wallpaper, make sure it fits in cleanly with your desktop. An orange desktop on your blue taskbar is certainly bad for the eyes, because of the overwhelming color contrast. Try to stick to one color theme, like Cool colors only, Warm Colors only, monochrome, etc.

Choose a wallpaper that fits your style and your personality.

Choose colors that are pleasing to the eyes. High contrasts are generally kept at a minimum.

Where can I get good wallpapers?

There are many ways to start, like DesktopNexus (my personal favorite at the moment), DeviantArt, and Interfacelift, just to name a few.

Your icons

If you prefer icons, and you use them regularly, focus on keeping them organized than having them in a fancy formation.

As much as possible, use a dock instead. I’m not an Apple fan, but I find docks to be more beautiful and organized than desktop icons. Plus they tend to get out of the way. There are many docks available for Windows, one example is Rocketdock.

Advanced stuff

If you really want to customize your desktop, here’s a couple of tips and tricks that could help you design that perfect desktop design.

Windows themes

Since Windows 2000, the functionality of themes were added to the operating system. Themes back then composed of a taskbar style, a window border style, colors for different parts of your interface, and sometimes desktop icons. In Windows 7, sounds were an added feature for themes.

Where can I get good themes?

I don’t know what “good” exactly is, however, if you’re looking for various Windows themes, I suggest searching the Customization > Skins and Themes section of Deviantart and Customize.org. If you can’t find what you’re looking for, Google is your friend.

A word of caution: You will always be required to patch your Windows’ uxtheme.dll, the library that manages your Windows themes. Patching this will allow you to install your user-created themes, because Microsoft insists on users using their created themes. Take note that this involves editing system file – if you’re not used to risking the stability of your system – do not try this.

But you can use Windowsblinds if you’re too scared to patch your uxtheme.dll, however, Windowblinds is proprietary shareware. Its free version does not last for very long, and the full version costs money. Still, if you’re more willing to fish out a few dollars than mess with your system, you can try Windowblinds.

System Monitoring

If you managed to peek into a geek’s desktop (like mine), you probably seen these: moving bars, information about RAM and CPU usage, even animated gears that float above the desktop wallpaper. How do they do that? It’s not exactly magic. In fact, it’s not really that hard to do.

Rainmeter

Rainmeter  is currently the best choice you can get to easily add system monitors and widgets to your Windows desktop that does not involve Windows Gadgets. Currently, Rainmeter has a very enthusiastic and active community, both for development and design, and currently there are a lot of setups you can use or base from. The introduction of rain theme files makes the process of installing Rainmeter themes much easier. I recommend you get it if you’re new.

Samurize

Samurize is currently a geek’s choice when it comes to powerful desktop customization, because with the right tools and skills, you can make it more functional and beautiful than Rainmeter. However, that trait gives it a steep learning curve, and can be difficult for users with little or no experience in coding to use and customize.

If you like to keep your hands dirty in code, Samurize might be up your alley. Currently, Samurize only fully supports XP, but you can use it in Vista and 7 using the compatibility mode.

Bootskins and Logon screens

Bootskins and Logon screens are a big deal. Just a quick tweaking of them can make your computer look like it belongs to the FBI, or the NSA, or whatever government agency you like. Just don’t make your Bootskin look like another flavor of Windows, like those “Windows XP Virus Edition” and “Windows XP: Elite Edition” skins.

Thankfully, Stardock, the ones who created the tools Bootskin and Logon Studio, are offering the two customization software for free. Go ahead and play with it.

NOTE: Bootskin currently supports Windows XP only. If you’re using Vista or 7, there are different methods of altering your bootskin, but they are at most, irreversible. Also, there are separate versions of Logon Studio. There is a Logon Studio for XP, and another for Vista and 7. So please be aware of that.

Shell replacements

Ah, my personal favorite. Shell replacement software, completely replaces your Windows shell, which is the one managing your interactions between yourself and the Windows kernel (the one who interprets your instructions to your hardware and vice versa). If you’re bored with the “taskbar at the sides look” of Windows, LiteStep is for you.

Litestep allows you to customize almost everything on your computer – from your explorer windows, your taskbars, basically everything under the Windows sun could be customized. The only drawback of using LiteStep is that it’s sometimes tedious to code properly to create a beautiful design. There are, however, numerous free Litestep setups available to download on the Internet.

Oh, and did I mention it’s for Windows XP only? Don’t bother using it on Vista or 7. No I’m just kidding. It works – somehow. An alpha build, according to a Google search, has improved support for Vista and 7, it’s just that it’s not perfect. So try it at your own risk.

How the Philippine National Police took the title “World’s Slowest” from Slowpoke.

It’s official guys, the Philippine National Police has officially taken the title of “World’s Slowest Retard(s)” from its previous title holder (who managed to hold it from, say, the beginning of time, I might add), Slowpoke.

This guy.

You see, there happened to be a recent hostage taking that took place somewhere in the Philippines, as you can read here, here, and here. If you’re too lazy to click on those authentic links to real news sites, see the full coverage of the “event” and you just lazily wrote “TL;DR” in the comments, let me narrate the sequence of events to you, in my perspective.

The Crime

Apparently, some pissed-off cop who was recently kicked off-duty from the police force a year ago got tired of not being a cop and all, despite all his friends and family telling him that everybody hates cops. So instead of going into therapy session with other ex-cops and transforming himself into a metrosexual (as most of the squeamish would do), he stood up, put on some massive balls of steel, grabbed an M-16 assault rifle, three magazines, maybe a grenade or two, then went outside.

Everybody ignored him and all his gear because everybody assumed he was a cop, stolling around the streets more armed to the teeth than Duke Nukem. He stopped and thought what would he do to “impress” the folks at the camp and get them to get him back. A tour bus carrying Chinese nationals arose from the distance, and he thought, “Oh well, might as well take this bus, there’s a lot of cover inside plus, I fucking hate Chinamen.”

So he tried to pull the bus over, and it did. The bus driver looked at the cop before him and thought, “Oh great! A cop! Just what I needed! Now I can mindlessly drive around while masturbating and those MMDA folks won’t give me a ticket because I have someone with an automatic rifle on board!” They cruised through a little bit. The people on board noticed that someone who took a time machine to the present from the Vietnam War have boarded the bus, and seeing how much Vietnam war-machines hate people with slanted eyes, the tourists on board immediately shit their pants and put their asses on Guantanamo Bay mode.

Some folks outside saw the bus stopping all of the sudden and some guy with a powerful assault rifle inside, so after a little bit of hesitation deciding whether they were seeing some simulated airsoft match or a real hostage taking, they called the police, who happened to arrive in just a nick of time.

No, not really! The hostage taker actually had time to take a nap before the cops arrived.

They had time for a little bedtime story, too.

The “Negotiation”

When the cops did arrive, they barricaded the place and in a 1970’s Munich Olympics scenario revival, they let the press flood in. You know, people with cameras and crap who tell other people that someone just hijacked a fucking bus.

The hostage taker demanded a lot of things from the negotiators before he lets the hostages free. First he asked for some coffee, because he feels groggy after a long nap waiting for the cops to arrive. Secondly, he asks them to clear his criminal records, the same records that kicked him out of the force in the first place. Lastly, he wants some real policemen to come and get him, because those who came to apprehend him appears to be geeky cosplayers trying to look like Counter-Terrorists from Counter-Strike.

The cops just hanged around a bit, because they were waiting for their “superiors” to make the call. While they were having a pretty quiet excursion in the park in front of the Quirino Grandstand (it’s a nice place by the way), the hostage taker’s brother, who’s also a cop, appeared on scene and tried to approach the bus, where he was promptly taken down and got a nice dosage of ass-kicking.

Seeing on the bus television that his brother was having a bad case forced nightstick sodomy, the hostage taker flipped out, and began to empty his entire magazine into any motherfucker he sees inside the bus.

He must have called them cock-a-roaches too while he was at it.

After that, the cops called in the big guys, and began to barge in and kill the asshole who tried to do a Tony Montana on the Chinese tourists. Just joking! They just lied around the park watching the action.

 

The “Action”

The Philippine National Police must have big love for nighttime rescue missions, because they actually waited for night to fall before they send in the big boys, or, in other words, men with tiny balls wielding guns too big for them to even carry.

Armed with bulletproof vest, kevlar helmets, flashbang and teargas grenades that would make a COD or CS player cry in joy, these guys surrounded the bus to do – you guessed it – absolutely nothing, if you think posing for the cameras while in full gear is doing nothing.

Philippine SWAT team: We may as well look cool for the cameras while we make complete fools of ourselves.

They had a problem though: they had to get inside the bus, but the wise-ass hydraulic door would not break down, even when they tried tying an end of a rope on it, the other on a truck, then pulling it with machine force. They found an emergency door at the back which they could break into, but realizing that they left their tiny balls in the freezer again, they didn’t go in, and decided that chucking in flashbang grenades and tear gas was the only way to go.

The hostage taker then got bored of having his senses consistently disoriented by the endless barrage of flashbangs and teargas being thrown at him, so he stood up, and decided to do the Tony Montana again, this time with shit in his eyes and ears. He did manage to hit some random passerby outside, though.

After all the fun whirling around in circles relieving the scratch on his trigger finger, some wiseguy sniper, who probably earned his job by playing endless hours on Special Force, shot the hostage taker square in the head. That’s right kids. All those hours killing each other with AWPs in Counter-Strike will land you a good job as one of the Philippine’s greatest snipers.

Where sniping legends are born.

The Aftermath

So far, about 13 passengers in the bus made it out alive, but the remaining ones were dead, along with the hostage taker who attempted to play Grand Theft Auto: Philippines Real Life.

Also, the Philippine National Police earned two titles. The first is “World’s Slowest Retard(s)”, where, as mentioned previously, was previously owned by the Pokemon, Slowpoke. The other title they achieved was “World’s Shittiest Police Force”, where they beat the Nigerian Police Force out of number 195.

As for the Philippines, International tourism marked the entire country as “The Best Place to go to when you have a death wish”, and “The Best Country to experience a full hostage experience”. The country earned itself a sweet spot in the trending topics of Twitter, and the front pages of the biggest news sources in the world. Great job, guys!

Ancient Sulatang Tapunan attacked by lazy spambots

I was surprised to see that my already rotting Yahoo Mail account, which I dumped due to the reason that it simply sucks, has received a blitzkrieg of emails in a short succession. About 80 emails with the same subject of “Friendster Blogs: New Trackback on your post “<some post here>” flooded my inbox. The body consisted of the following line:

San diego casinos

And that’s it. Usually another line that says “WIN WIN WIN” follows it. I laughed it off and presumed it was just lazy spambots who managed to penetrate the shitty security of Friendster blogs. I’m really glad I moved out of that shitty excuse for a Blogging platform and moved to Blogger, where it’s much more secure.

I’m thinking of limiting the comments people can post on Sulatang Tapunan’s blog posts, so that I can prevent simple HTML script injection (the one problem unprotected blogs face all day) from trolls. I don’t think I have to worry about SQL injection though, since I don’t own or manage the server Sulatang Tapunan is sitting on, and there are no login forms or whatsoever on the blog.