Daily Battles: Avoid Clicking the Wrong Button (Add to Tasks) in Google Gmail

Google really wanted to promote their Google Task app, so they added a button called Add to Tasks to the Gmail inbox user interface. And they intentionally put it right next to the Move to button (which I use frequently), so people will accidentally click the wrong button and then get sent to the Google Tasks user interface.

THIS IS JUST DRIVING ME NUTS!!!

And guess what, there's NO WAY to remove that button from the menu. Absolutely NO WAY.

Well, since Google removed the "Don't Be Evil" clause from their corporate code of conduct in 2018, this does not surprise me a bit.

Google is in some kind of a hot seat with the recent news of Google firing prominent AI Ethics researchers, and Samy Bengio resigns as a form of protest. So I don't think they'll care too much about my ranting here.

Google UI Sucks!!

And they just forced me to move my Google WiFi into Google Home, and now the UI Sucks Big Time!!

Anyway, back to the main point of this blog. I finally figured out a way to deal with this inconvenience of clicking Add to Tasks by mistake (and then requires multiple clicks to correct it). And I hope for others who feel just as frustrated as me, this can be of some help!

BTW: I tried changing buttons from text to icon. Not really helpful. I still click the wrong icon. But you can still give that a try. Here's what I recommend:

Solution:

The solution is to use customized keyboard shortcuts!

If you click the gear icon on the top right corner of Gmail to go into the Settings screen, find a button on the menu called Advanced and click that. Then find the entry called Custom keyboard shortcuts and enable it. Don't forget to save.

Now if you go back into the Settings screen, you'll see a new button in the menu called Keyboard Shortcuts. Click that to see your current keyboard shortcuts. You can also create your own. I am just happy with the default one, so I can just click the key V to open the Move to dropdown menu and avoid clicking the stupid Add to Tasks button.

Leave a comment if you find my blogs useful. You can also follow me on Twitter for more useful tips and tutorials!

Video of the Day:

30 Days Timelapse from a Cargo Ship

Corporations are just evil. So don't expect them to Do No Evil. 







BTW: The easiest way to remember my blog address is blog.lannyland.com

Daily Battles: How to Reboot Windows Through Remote Desktop Connection

If you have multiple computers and need to remotely control one or more Windows computer(s) (even from a Mac or your phone), Remote Desktop is a great tool you can use to achieve that.

If your Remote Desktop is not enabled, you can follow this link to enable it:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/remote/remote-desktop-services/clients/remote-desktop-allow-access

However, you'll find that through a Remote Desktop Connection, you can't really restart your computer remotely. This is designed to prevent remote users to do damage to your computer. But for someone who knows what he is doing, and actually wanted to reboot the computer, this can be super annoying.

But lucky for you, here's a small hack that will let you reboot your computer at will!!!

Solution:

There's a command line tool you can use called shutdown.
Just open a Command Prompt (click Start Icon and then type CMD), and then type:
shutdown -r -f -t 0
-r means reboot, -f means forcing apps to quit, and -t 0 means do it right now! Just hit Enter to reboot!

 The shutdown command is built in with your Windows Operating System. You can also use this command for other purposes, such as just shutting the computer down or reboot another computer on the same network (I can't use this cause I am on a Mac). Just type shutdown and hit Enter will show you all the available options. I'll list them here for your convenience.

C:\Users\Lanny>shutdown

Usage: shutdown [/i | /l | /s | /r | /g | /a | /p | /h | /e | /o] [/hybrid] [/f]

    [/m \\computer][/t xxx][/d [p|u:]xx:yy [/c "comment"]]

    No args    Display help. This is the same as typing /?.

    /?         Display help. This is the same as not typing any options.

    /i         Display the graphical user interface (GUI).

               This must be the first option.

    /l         Log off. This cannot be used with /m or /d options.

    /s         Shutdown the computer.

    /r         Full shutdown and restart the computer.

    /g         Full shutdown and restart the computer. After the system is

               rebooted, restart any registered applications.

    /a         Abort a system shutdown.

               This can only be used during the time-out period.

    /p         Turn off the local computer with no time-out or warning.

               Can be used with /d and /f options.

    /h         Hibernate the local computer.

               Can be used with the /f option.

    /hybrid    Performs a shutdown of the computer and prepares it for fast startup.

               Must be used with /s option.

    /e         Document the reason for an unexpected shutdown of a computer.

    /o         Go to the advanced boot options menu and restart the computer.

               Must be used with /r option.

    /m \\computer Specify the target computer.

    /t xxx     Set the time-out period before shutdown to xxx seconds.

               The valid range is 0-315360000 (10 years), with a default of 30.

               If the timeout period is greater than 0, the /f parameter is

               implied.

    /c "comment" Comment on the reason for the restart or shutdown.

               Maximum of 512 characters allowed.

    /f         Force running applications to close without forewarning users.

               The /f parameter is implied when a value greater than 0 is

               specified for the /t parameter.

    /d [p|u:]xx:yy  Provide the reason for the restart or shutdown.

               p indicates that the restart or shutdown is planned.

               u indicates that the reason is user defined.

               If neither p nor u is specified the restart or shutdown is

               unplanned.

               xx is the major reason number (positive integer less than 256).

               yy is the minor reason number (positive integer less than 65536).

Leave a comment if you find my blogs useful. You can also follow me on Twitter for more useful tips and tutorials!

Video of the Day:

Kindness doesn’t always work! 😂😂 pic.twitter.com/4Ih2cg8QkE

— Figen.. (@_TheFigen) April 7, 2021

BTW: The easiest way to remember my blog address is blog.lannyland.com

Daily Battles: Can't Change Computer Name in macOS Field Greyed Out

I recently changed my work laptop and migrated all my stuff from the old laptop to the new one. Then I found out that there were many things that were locked up by the company IT department.

One thing that drove me nuts was that I couldn't even change my computer name because the field is greyed out and locked.

This is simply stupid!

Anyway, I finally figured out how to resolve this. However, you do need to have sodu access on your own computer, which is likely! Also your company is using jamf to manage your Mac, which is also very likely.

Solution:

Open your terminal and then run this command and replace Baymac (my computer's name) with the name you want for your computer:

sudo jamf setComputerName -name Baymac 

You can actually also try to completely remove jamf by running this command below. But don't blame me if you get fired. Good luck! 

sudo jamf removeFramework

There are always some battles I have to fight with technology every day! Hope you don't have to fight so many battles OR hope you enjoy your fights and come out triumphant!

Leave a comment if you find my blogs useful. You can also follow me on Twitter for more useful tips and tutorials!

There's always a way! 







BTW: The easiest way to remember my blog address is blog.lannyland.com

Daily Battles: How to Rearrange Icons in your Menu Bar for MacOS Big Sur

I have a lot of icons in my menu bar on my Mac because I use a lot of free programs such as:

• Moom for remembering my windows locations
• BetterSnapTool and Spectacle for auto snapping my windows
• f.lux to change my screen color so I can sleep better
• Irvue to automatically change my desktop backgrounds

I also have a lot of built-in utilities that I access frequently, such as:

• Bluetooth manager
• WiFi manager
• Sound input source and volume control
• Timemachine for backup
• VPN

Then there are programs like:

• WeChat
• Google Hangout
• Android Web Messages
• iOS Messages
• Slack
• VLC
• etc.

As someone with OCD, it is super important for me to be able to group things together the way I want. So how can you do that on a Mac with Big Sur?

The answer is super easy, although took me a while to find:

Solution:

You just hold the command key and then drag the icon with your mouse!

Yep, it's that simple! But if you don't know, you don't know.

By the way, I also am very particular with icons in my Dock and icons on my Mac touch bar. But since other people have provided detailed instructions, I'll just link them here:

How to customize the Dock and Menu Bar

How to customize the Touch Bar on a Macbook Pro

Hope someone finds this blog post useful! Moving on to my next daily battle!

Leave a comment if you find my blogs useful. You can also follow me on Twitter for more useful tips and tutorials!

Video of the Day:

The right way to work!

"We'll try and get the roof finished today, babe." 🍻 🍻 pic.twitter.com/6rIzua4KHS

— 🍺 Hold My Beer 🍺 (@HldMyBeer) March 30, 2021

BTW: The easiest way to remember my blog address is blog.lannyland.com

Daily Battles: Pandora Won't Auto Start on Firefox

I think one thing we all have learned is that after some system updates or application updates, something just stops working. This time, it was my Pandora station not playing after Firefox updates.

You see, I live inside this giant robot called Philip. And Philip is also my sweet smart home assistant. In the morning, Philip would turn on music throughout my home, and gradually increase volume from low to medium to wake us up with beautiful and relaxing and free music on Pandora.

Then, one day, Philip just stopped doing that.

When I finally had a chance to investigate, I found the problem:

Philip uses Firefox to play Pandora in the morning. In the past, when opening Pandora on Firefox, it would just automatically start playing. But now, when I go to Pandora website, I have to manually click the play button to start the music.

So why was it working and not stopped working? Because I updated Firefox. And with a new Firefox, it automatically blocks music or video from playing on all websites. What you have to do is to explicitly enable autoplay on each website as shown below.

Click the lock icon on the left side of the address bar will show a popup menu where you can enable autoplay again. You can also go into the Firefox Preferences page to manage websites where you want to allow or deny autoplay.

To go to Firefox Preferences page, simply type about:preferences in the address bar and hit enter. Then just search for Autoplay.

Well, after this tweak, (and after I fixed the stupid Bluetooth volume control problem in Windows 10 since stupid Microsoft updated my computer AGAIN and then changed the registry setting,) I finally can enjoy Philip's morning natural music wake up ceremony again, and I can finally find some peace again during a pandemic.

Hope this is useful for someone else running into the same problem. Remember, whenever you update, something WILL break. So happy living in a technology world (or inside a giant robot)!

Leave a comment if you find my blogs useful. You can also follow me on Twitter for more useful tips and tutorials!

Video of the Day:

How the kids and their dog worked as a team to evade the coming home dad.

Security camera：kids, dog, and dadpic.twitter.com/T3bcuLvsYf

— 习近彭 (@wakeupfrog01) March 14, 2021

BTW: The easiest way to remember my blog address is blog.lannyland.com