Dell Latitude E6520 Notebook - Unable to Disable Tap-to-Click on Touchpad - Solved

My Dell Latitude E6520 (Windows7) did not have an option for me to disable 'Tap-to-click' on the Touchpad. The available options under the general mouse keypad had no such option included. I had seen similar issues, with other Dell laptop models, and in those cases a BIOS update had sometimes been called for, but in most cases that was like hitting a nail with a sledgehammer, so I figured there was probably an easier way to proceed, and there was.

1) I went to http://support.dell.com/support/downloads/driverslist.aspx?c=us&cs=28&l=en&s=dfb&ServiceTag=&SystemID=LAT_E6520&os=W764&osl=en&catid=&impid= and downloaded and installed the DELL_MULTI-TOUCH-TOUCHPAD driver for Windows7 64-bit.

2) After restarting, the Dell Touchpad icon showed up, in my system tray, but it would not work without the .NET framework installed.

3) I went to Microsoft, got the latest v4 of .NET (client side), and installed it.

3) The Dell Touchpad control now functions and I was able to disable tap-to-click easily.

The addition of the 'Dell Touchpad' tab after installing the Dell update and .NET:

Thunderbird Tip - F and B Keys for True Forward and Backward

    Thunderbird, for some reason I don't understand, has no implementation of true Forward and Backward buttons.  The buttons they have only go to the next or previous UNREAD messages.  There are few to no add-on buttons for that either, for the current v5.0 version of Thunderbird.

    Instead of dealing with shoe-horning a v3 version of buttons into v5, I simply use the F (for forward) and B (for backward) buttons, while reading messages.  This works great and keeps the desktop clutter, and multiple clickings, to a minimum.

Amazon - 5 GB of free Cloud Space to Registered Users

    Browsing on Amazon this morning I noticed they now offer 5 GB of free cloud storage space to their registered users.  Kind of neat.  Although its scarcely larger than my smallest USB flash drive, it's...free.  It's probably not a bad option for storing important files, in an encrypted container (see my 'TrueCrypt' posts elsewhere on this blog), just as a backup.

LogMeIn - Free VPN for Non-Commercial Use

https://secure.logmein.com/ offers a free VPN solution where one can set up one’s own virtual networks.  This means one can link devices, on the Internet, as if they are on the same LAN.

LogMeIn allows one to invite others, to the VPN, and have those connections expire after a certain amount of time, or remain permanent (until kicked off or the VPN is taken down).

For gaming, this means games like ‘Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter 2’ should be able to see LAN servers, on the same VPN, as if they were on the same network.  This should allow players to bypass GameSpy and connect via the old fashioned LAN server option, in -game, just like was possible in older games (where one could type-in the IP address of the game server).

It is worth checking this out.

[Thanks to Marc C. for pointing this out!]

MozBackup - A Free tool to backup and restore your Firefox and Thunderbird settings

    I recently decided to use Thunderbird, on multiple PC's, in IMAP mode (versus POP).  To facilitate the ease of duplicating my Thunderbird and Firefox set up's, on multiple PC's, I backed up the settings, using MozBackup (http://mozbackup.jasnapaka.com/), and then restored the settings to the other PC's.

    Note you can simply use this tool to back up your settings, in case of an emergency.  I back mine up to an external drive, for the day when (not "if") my hard drive crashes.

    Make sure you are running the same versions of Thunderbird and Firefox on each PC to ensure compatibility among your instances.

UPDATE (2011/08/05): I have successfully used MozBackup across Thunderbird and Firefox versions, and it works great. At least as of Thunderbird 5 and Firefox 5, MozBackup works fine going back to at least version 3 of each of the two applications.

Premature Epiphany

I'm coining a new term: Premature Epiphany

Example #1: When you realize where to find a data element, in a database table, to use in a query, only to realize, after testing, that the information is not what you seek, and that you had thought it would be useful due to the lack of a related data dictionary entry for the field.

Example #2: The moment it occurs to you that you can limit the number of TMZ episodes to keep, on the DVR, due to someone in your house having added it with the 'Unlimited' option, only to later realize you could simply have deleted the show's entry instead, because no one really ever wanted it anyway.

Automobile Upholstery Decorator

When I was a kid, before anyone had ever heard of a "DC Power Outlet", we still had great gadgets with which to occupy our time, while waiting for Mom to emerge from the liquor store with a carton of Salem Lights.

Cleaning the garage today, I found such a toy. I remember my Mom's excitement when I fashioned a Micky Mouse head and an Olympic symbol on the back seat of her '65 Mustang. She taught me some new adjectives that day, and if you'd known my mom, you would know how impressive that really was.