Windows
Solved: Windows 10 Errors When Trying to Watch Video with HEVC Extension Not Found
WTF! Why Can’t I Play My Video
So you tried to watch an mp4 video in Windows 10 and it threw an error at you that “To play this video, you need a new codec, HEVC Video Extensions and they want you to pay $0.99 for it. If you are like me, you are wondering what the heck is the HEVC Video Extensions and why all of a sudden do I need it to watch an mp4.
Favorite Windows Shortcuts
So many times I watch Windows users spending lots of time doing task that should just take a few seconds but instead are taking several minutes because they are taking the long way around to get the task completed.
Here are some examples that I see people doing and below I will show you how to get them done the easiest way possible.
- Getting 2 programs side by side half screened
- Navigating in Windows Explorer to find the Visual Studio solution or project directory
- Open programs as an administrator
- Just opening up task manager.
Note: All of these shortcuts are built directly into Windows.
Favorite Windows Programs
Developer productivity is not just about maximizing your speed in editor. It also includes additional software to help you be more productive. Below is some of my favorite Windows software that I use.
Password Management
- LastPass - Password Manager. Remembers passwords so you don’t have to. Auto log you into web sites, store secure notes, wifi passwords, etc. Web interface and desktop is free. Mobile device application is premium version at $12 per year.
Readers
- Pocket - Save web pages/rss feed articles for later and view when ready including offline. Way better than keeping a ton of bookmarks around that you never get back to.
- Feedly - RSS Feed Reader with Pocket integration.
Editors
- Linqpad - Scratchpad for .NET. Rich formatted output. Intellisense. If you are a .NET program this is a much have application. Well worth the small amount of money to get the license to use the Intellisense.
- Visual Studio Code - great all around text editor and development environment. Focused on code first.
Planning
- Kanban Flow / Pomodoro - I used Kanban Flow to plan my week and use the Pomodoro technique to work on my tasks. I use the setup that John Sonmez talks about at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W9k0OhJkjQ0
- Todoist - Todo Tasks list. Quick and easy way to add tasks from Chrome or mobile device. Ultimately I import move these into Kanban Flow but it is much quicker on a mobile device to use Todoist.
Utilities
- Chocolatey - Install Windows software the easy way. Take the guess work out of where to download software and how to get it installed.
- Dropbox - sync directories and files between machines. Can either sync all or selectively sync file.
- Greenshot - free utility to take and edit screenshots. has a basic built-in editor, can copy to clipboard or open an office product (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, outlook) if installed.
- Launchy - Forget about the start menu. Launch programs with a few keystrokes. Setup shortcuts for common web sites you use.
- Vagrant - Easily create lightweight and reproducible virtual machines. If you are using virtual machines on your Windows machine, let Vagrant manage the configurations of it. No longer will it only work on your machine. I have a blog series on using Vagrant and Chocolatey together at [{{ “/vagrant-overview” | prepend: site.baseurl | prepend: site.url }}]({{ “/vagrant-overview” | prepend: site.baseurl | prepend: site.url }})
Presentation Environment Setup
One of the first things that you learn when giving presentations is that fonts and font size matters just as much as the content. Below is a listing of the various font settings that I have found to be effective and how to set them in the programs that I use.
If you have other programs that you use, feel free to leave a comment on the font settings that you use.
Windows 8.1 - Powershell Script to Uninstall Default Programs
When I am provisioning a new development virtual machine with vagrant, I do not need all of the Windows 8 modern applications such as bing maps, finance, skype, etc to be installed onto the virtual machine. These applications are nice on a non-virtualized machine but on a virtual machine it just uses extra resources that aren’t needed.
The base install of Windows has all of these programs installed with live tiles turned on that I don’t need. This is a huge amount of clutter.