Web apps don’t really compare to desktop apps when it comes to features. This is because they rely on your browser and its capabilities to work. Even through browsers continue to improve with each version, they still can’t run desktop apps. That said, web apps aren’t useless and are in fact very capable. Google Docs and Google’s entire productivity suite is a good example of this. Google Doc can open most other document file formats for editing. Here’s how you can open Microsoft Office files in Google Docs.
To be clear, you will open a Microsoft Word document in Google Docs, an Excel sheet in Google Sheets, and a PowerPoint presentation in Slides. The formatting, for the most part, will remain as it is though for presentations, you might lose some audio or video files. For Excel files, you may not be able to execute a function if Google Sheets doesn’t support it.
Microsoft Office files in Google Docs
The trick to opening Microsoft office files in Google Docs is in Google Drive. Google Drive allows you to upload any and all types of files. For many files, Google Drive lets you preview them and open them in other web apps, including one of the many Google apps.
Open Google Drive and click the New button on the left. Select File Upload and then select the document, spreadsheet, or presentation that you want to open. Allow it to upload to Google Drive. Once the upload completes, click the file to get a preview.
At the top of the preview window, you will see an Open With option. Click the dropdown next to it and pick the app, in this case Google Docs, to open the file in.
If the file you uploaded was a spreadsheet, you will have to pick Google Sheets from the menu and if it was a presentation, you will have to pick Google Slides.
Once the files import, you will be able to edit them. The files aren’t uploaded as snapshots. The text and images are all directly editable however, they will save as a copy. The original Microsoft Office file will not be changed. Google Docs cannot save the edits to the same file however, once you’ve made all the edits to it that you want, you can save it as a separate DOCX or XLSX or PPTX file from the File menu.
If during the import process, you lose some data, try adding it directly to the document that you have open in Google Docs and then saving it.
Brightness for screens, particularly for external displays aren’t the easiest to manage. For one, the Windows 10 brightness control will not work for external displays. It only works with internal displays by default. If you have a multiple display set up, you likely have to set the brightness for your displays separately. An easy way to sync brightness across multiple displays is to use an app called ClickMonitorDDC.
Sync brightness across multiple displays
ClickMonitorDDC has both a portable and an installable version. If you don’t have admin rights on your system, the portable version will work just as well. Pick which one you want to use and download it.
Run the app. It will run in the system tray by default where it displays the RGB values, contrast, and brightness values for a monitor. A window will open listing the monitors connected to your system. At the top left, there’s a button that will open the app’s settings.
Before you click it though, you should copy the name of your monitors as they appear. To do that, right-click a monitor and select the Change option from the context menu. In the window that opens, copy the name of the monitor. Repeat this for both(all) your monitors. Now you’re ready to go to the app’s settings.
On the settings window, enable the ‘Automatically use brightness from source monitor’ option. Enter the name of the monitor that you want to copy the brightness level from in the first field. In the second field, enter the name of the monitor you want to sync the brightness level to, click Apply, and the brightness for both will be synced.
Keep the app running and whenever you change the brightness for the source display, the brightness for the second display will change accordingly. More importantly, if you have adaptive brightness enabled, this app will sync the change in brightness from your internal display to the external one. It will basically extend the feature to a display that would otherwise not have it.
This can work both ways i.e., you can sync the brightness from the external monitor to the internal one as well. All you have to do is change which monitor you’ve entered as the source (first field) and which one you’ve entered in the ‘For’ field (second one). The app is set to run automatically when you log on to your desktop even if you’re running the portable version.
Summer is one of the best times in the year to buy software. Sales during this time not only offer great discounts but also last for weeks. If you’ve been meaning to buy a new game, summer is the time to go shopping.
SCDKey has long been a reliable source for genuine, discounted games and even legit licenses for the Windows OS as well as Microsoft’s productivity suite of apps — Office.
This summer, they are offering an 18% discount on Windows 10 Pro keys, and Office 2016 and 2019 licenses as well as an extra 3% OFF on games like Warhammer Chaosbane and The Elder Scrolls Online Elsweyr (which are already discounted by 41% and 35% respectively).
18% OFF for Microsoft software products
Games aren’t the only type of digital content to go on sale during summer however it’s rare for something like operating systems to be discounted. That said, SCDKeys is offering an 18% discount to its already discounted licenses for Windows 10 Pro, and Office 2016 and 2019 licenses.
To avail the discount, use the coupon code ADT at check out. Please note, the links below will not automatically apply the code, you will have to add it yourself at checkout.
Microsoft Windows 10 Pro
Original price: $16.80 Sale price: $13.78
Office 2016 Professional Plus Key
Original price: $40.34 Sale price: $33.08
Office 2019 Professional Plus Key
Original price: $62.76 Sale price: $51.46
Windows 10 keys and Office keys don’t come cheap. Often, your best bet is to buy a laptop that includes a genuine OEM license but not all laptops come with those and out of the box, a license easily costs more than $200 for a single PC. In this case, many users rely on running Insider builds that expire regularly and have to be updated all the time. For those that cannot take the risk of using a potentially unstable operating system, piracy is often the answer and it has its risks.
If you’re looking to purchase a genuine license for either Windows 10, or the Office suite of apps, or both, this is one of the best deals you will get. If you’re interested in a Windows 10 Home key, the Pro one will have every feature that Home supports, and quite a few additional ones. For first time PC builders, or even veteran PC builders, this is a great way to save on the operating system that will run on your PC.
Extra 3% OFF on Game Titles
In order to avail an extra 3% discount on gaming titles, AddictiveTips readers can use the coupon code ADT3 at check out. Please note, the links below will not automatically apply the code, you will have to add it yourself at checkout. The discounted titles, with their original and discounted prices, are;
Warhammer Chaosbane Steam Key
Sale price: $28.80
The Elder Scrolls Online Elsweyr Standard Edition Key
Google has an excellent online photo service. It is unrivaled, and nobody in the tech world offers up something quite as easy to use, or as packed with features. Unfortunately, the Photos tool doesn’t have a native desktop application for Linux users, which means if you want to use Google Photos on Linux to manage your photos, you’ll have to deal with opening up a web browser.
If you’re sick of having to open up the browser to upload a photo or two, this guide is for you. Follow along to learn how to set up Google Photos on the Linux desktop.
Note: to use Google Photos with Imagenes or Nativefier; you’ll need to have a Google account. If you do not already have one, click here to create one.
Method 1 – Imagenes
Imagenes is one of the best ways to get easy access to Google Photos on Linux. To get access to the Imagenes application, open up a terminal window by pressing Ctrl + Alt + T or Ctrl + Shift + T on the keyboard. Once the terminal window is open, you’ll need to follow our guide on how to enable Snap packages on your Linux PC. As of now, Snaps are supported on Ubuntu, Debian, Arch Linux, Fedora, OpenSUSE, Gentoo, and other distributions.
Note: not running a Linux distribution that has support for Snap packages? Consider installing Ubuntu. It has Snap support out of the box, and there’s no need to configure it!
With the Snap runtime up and running, you’ll be able to install the Imagenes application from the Snap store with the snap install command below.
sudo snap install imagenes
Let the app download and install. Once it’s done installing through the store, open up your app menu, and launch the application. Then, follow the step-by-step instructions to get set up with Google Photos.
Step 1: Load up Imagenes, look for the blue “Go to Google Photos” button and click on it to access the login page for Google.
Step 2: Fill out your Google account name, and password into the box so that you can log in to Google Photos in Imagenes.
Step 3: Once logged in, you’ll see your pictures accessible in the Imagenes application. Click “albums” to access your picture albums, or use the search box to find a particular photograph.
To upload photos to Imagenes, launch the Linux file manager, find a picture, and drag it directly into the app window. Or, hold Ctrl down, and select multiple with the mouse if you’d like to upload a few at a time.
Method 2 – Nativefier
Imagenes is a nifty application to install if you’re not interested in building your own Photos app. However, it hasn’t been updated in quite a while, so the UI needs work. Another way to make Photos accessible on the Linux desktop is to create your own with Nativefier.
The Nativefier application can package nearly any website as an electron app. However, you’ll need to install it first, before attempting to use it. To get the latest version of Nativefier, head over to our guide on how to use Nativefier. When done, open up a terminal window and follow the step-by-step instructions to build your own Google Photos app for Linux.
Step 1: Using the CD command, move into the temporary directory.
cd /tmp
Step 2: In the temporary folder, use the mkdir command to create a new build directory for Nativefier to work in.
mkdir -p gphotos-linux-build-dir
Step 3: Move into the new build folder with CD.
cd gphotos-linux-build-dir
Step 4: Using the wget download app, grab the Google Photos icon from Wikimedia.
Step 5: Run the Nativfier command to generate a new Linux Electron binary. Keep in mind that when the app is building, it may fail. If it does, re-run the command.
nativefier -p linux -a x64 -i icon.png --disable-context-menu --disable-dev-tools --single-instance https://www.photos.google.com
Step 6: Rename the Google Photos build directory from “google-photos-all-your-photos-organized-and-easy-to-find-linux-x64 ” to “google-photos”.
Step 15: Open your app menu, search for “Google Photos” and launch it. Then, sign in with your Google Photos account.
Once you’ve signed in to Google Photos in the app, you’ll be able to access your pictures by clicking “photos,” albums by clicking “albums,” or upload new things by clicking the “upload” button.
Screenshot tools are as basic, and common as text editors. Some sell themselves by being simple, others offer complex features such as screenshot scheduling. Most, if not all tools try and take clean screenshots which means they often exclude the mouse cursor. In some cases though, you actually need to capture the mouse cursor in a screenshot and that’s where you run into problems. If you need a free tool that can include the cursor in a screenshot, use IrfanView.
IrfanView is popular as an image viewer but it has quite a few features, one of which is a screenshot feature. It’s highly unlikely that you end up using it as your main screenshot tool but for capturing the mouse cursor in a screenshot, it works great and that too with a hotkey.
Mouse cursor in screenshot
Install IrfanView if you don’t have it already. Run the app and go to Options>Capture/Screenshot from the menu bar.
In the window that opens, select the ‘Desktop area – current monitor (mouse)’ option. The hotkey associated with screen capture is Ctrl+F11. Click the Start button and minimize the app.
To capture the screenshot, move your mouse to the screen that you want to capture (in case you have multiple monitors), and then tap the hotkey. The screenshot will be captured and open in IrfanView where you can then save it, or edit it first.
The advantage of using this app is that it can capture your cursor in most states. For example, I have a custom color set of the cursor which many other apps failed to capture. They only caught the default cursor colors. IrfanView can capture a custom cursor as well. It cannot capture the cursor’s actual size though which is a shortcoming. The cursor in the screenshot above is the default size that you get on Windows 10. In reality, the cursor is bigger than the default taskbar height.
Other options
There are other apps that can capture the mouse cursor in a screenshot but they will only give you the default look of the cursor. If that is sufficient, you can use Greenshot. It will capture the cursor and, on occasion, it’s color as well though the cursor image won’t look very good. The advantage this app has is that it allows you to move the cursor in the captured image before you save it.
Finally, if you happen to have a screencasting app, you can use it to record a short clip of your screen and it will include the cursor. You can then export a frame from the video.
The McMojave GTK theme allows Linux users to transform their desktop environment into something that looks close to the new Mac OS Mojave update. It supports all Linux desktops (so long as they support the latest GTK2 or GTK3), including Gnome Shell, XFCE4, Cinnamon, and others.
McMojave comes with a few variations, including Mojave Light, Mojave Dark, Mojave Light transparent, Mojave Dark transparent, and more. Here’s how to get the McMojave Linux theme pack working on your Linux PC!
Note: the McMojave theme is built with GTK. As a result, it will not work well with the KDE Plasma 5 desktop environment, or the LXQt desktop environment.
Download themes
Each McMojave theme must be downloaded independently, as the creator of the theme does not have a “theme pack” where users can grab all of the different GTK themes in one go.
In this section of the guide, we’ll show you how to get all of the different McMojave themes available.
Mojave Light
The Mojave Light theme is one to install if you prefer the white theme of Mac OS Mojave. To download the McMojave theme, head over to Gnome-look.org and click on “Files” button. Once in the “files” area, search for “Mojave-light-solid.tar.xz” and click the blue button next to it to start the download.
Mojave Light transparent
Like the white look that Mac OS provides but wish it was transparent? If so, get your hands on the Mojave Light transparent theme. It offers up the same style as Mojave Light, but with a see-through twist.
To download Mojave Light transparent, visit the McMojave theme page on Gnome-look.org, click on “Files” and download “Mojave-light.tar.xz.”
Mojave Dark
One of the most exciting things about Mac OS Mojave is the dark theme it ships with. If you’d like to experience this look on your Linux PC, you need to download Mojave Dark. To do this, click here to go to Gnome-look.org. Then, click “Files” and download “Mojave-dark-solid.tar.xz.”
Mojave Dark transparent
The dark McMojave theme looks good, but if you’d prefer the theme be transparent, for added visual effects, consider getting Mojave Dark transparent instead. To download Mojave Dark transparent, click on this link to go to Gnome-look.org. Then, select “Files” and download “Mojave-dark.tar.xz.”
Install the McMojave Linux theme
Now that you’ve downloaded the McMojave theme you’d like to use on your Linux PC, it’s time to install the theme to the system, so that it can be used as the default look of your Linux operating system.
To start the installation process, open up a terminal window. Opening a terminal window can easily be done by pressing Ctrl + Alt + T or Ctrl + Shift + T on the keyboard.
Install McMojave themes system-wide
Installing the McMojave theme system-wide is a good way to ensure that every single user on your Linux PC has access to the themes and can use them, as all these theme files are placed in /usr/share/themes/.
Note: installing GTK themes system-wide involves using superuser. For this reason, be sure that you have access to sudo or su before continuing.
To start the installation process, use the CD command to move into the “Downloads” folder, where the downloaded McMojave TarXZ file is located.
cd ~/Downloads
Inside of the “Downloads” folder, use the tar command to extract the compressed McMojave theme files, so that they can be accessible to the system.
tar xvf Mojave-*.tar.xz
With everything extracted, place the McMojave theme in the theme directory using the mv command.
sudo mv Mojave-* /usr/share/themes/
Install McMojave themes for a single user
To install any McMojave theme for a single user, start out by moving the terminal window from the home directory to the “Downloads” folder with the CD command.
cd ~/Downloads
In the “Downloads” folder, extract the McMojave TarXZ file using the tar command.
tar xvf Mojave-*.tar.xz
With the extraction done, use the mkdir command to create a “.themes” folder in your home (~/) directory.
Note: if your Linux PC already has this folder, the mkdir command will produce an error. This error is harmless and safe to ignore.
mkdir -p ~/.themes
From here, use the mv command to place the theme files into the newly created theme folder.
mv Mojave-* ~/.themes
Enabling McMojave
To use any of the McMojave themes covered in this tutorial, they must be activated. Activating themes on desktop environments are different, depending on what desktop environment, but usually themes are tweaked within the “Appearance” settings of most desktop environments.
Not sure where the “Appearance” settings are on your Linux desktop? Do yourself a favor and check the links below. Each item in the list links to detailed instructions on how to customize and enable custom themes!
Keyboards, whether they’re for a Mac or a PC, have keys that can mute the sound on a computer. What they don’t have is a key that will mute the mic. Mics are only ever used when you chat and rarely for anything else. If you record audio, you likely do not use the mic built into your PC or Mac. All this adds up to there being no way to mute the mic from the keyboard. Mutify is a Mac app that fills in that gap.
Mutify costs $4.99 but has a 7-day trial version. It not only lets you mute the mic from the keyboard but also from the Touch Bar. It works with a whole host of apps including Slack, Skype, Viber and the Messages app. It will also probably work with Facetime as well.
Mute mic from keyboard or Touch bar
Download and run Mutify. It adds a button to the menu bar which, when clicked, will also mute the mic. The keyboard shortcut that will mute it is Shift+Command+0. If your Macbook has a touch bar, Mutify will add a button which, when tapped, will mute the mic.
Muting the mic isn’t the only thing that Mutify can do. It also lets you view how much noise you’re picking up with your mic. It doesn’t do anything to reduce the noise but it does let you know that the noise is being picked up.
To enable the noise level meter, tap the Shift+Command+9 keyboard shortcut. You will see a floating window at the top right. When you use your mic, the little window will indicate the noise level that it’s picking up. The window has a mute button as well which can mute and unmute your mic.
While Mutify is great, it doesn’t let you control the volume of your mic. If you want to change the volume, you’re going to have to go through the System Preferences app. There’s an option to add the volume control to your menu bar but it works only for the speakers and not for the mic.
It’s odd that no matter what OS you use, control over the mic isn’t something that is easy to access. The setting is buried under the sound controls. If anyone were to connect a more sophisticated microphone to their system, one that is meant for professional recording, they’d still have to access it from the system sound settings. Of course, a more professional mic will have its own off switch but that is besides the point.
Need to know when your mic is active? There’s an app that tells you just that.
Creating an icon isn’t difficult if you know how to use a basic image editor that can save a file in the PNG format. The image editor’s own features will determine what the icon looks like. Paint or Paint.net will create basic images while Photoshop can be used to create far better looking ones. If you don’t have the skill set needed to create an image, you can find free to use PNG images and convert them to an icon. That said, if all you need is an empty icon file for Windows 10, Paint.net is more than enough to get the job done.
Create empty PNG image
We’re going to create an empty PNG image and then convert it to an icon file.
Download, install, and run Paint.net. Go to Layers and select the Add new layer option. Also, under the Minimize, Maximize, and Close buttons, you will see a button to show the layers window. Click it to enable the layers window.
After you add the new layer, use the Ctrl+A keyboard shortcut and select everything on the layer. Tap Delete on your keyboard and it will delete everything. Then, on the layers window, uncheck the box next to the Background layer.
That’s all you need to do. Go to the File menu and save the file as a PNG.
Convert PNG to ICO file
That is most of everything done. All you need to do now is convert the PNG file to an ICO file that will work with Windows 10. We recommend using IcoConverter. Upload your PNG image to this web app and then scroll to the very end. Click the Convert ICO button, and then the Download your icons button. Don’t change any of the settings that the app has.
The image that you have is an empty icon file. You can use it for anything that lets you change the icon. The screenshot below shows Chrome except the icon has been changed to the empty icon file that was just created.
The icon file contains multiple sizes of the image so you will be able to use it for just about anything on Windows 10 which is what makes IcoConverter a great app to use.
Remember what you use the empty icon file for. If you forget and find something is ‘missing’ it will take a considerable amount of effort to figure out what’s wrong. Also, move the file somewhere you know you won’t delete it before you start using it for something.
A Mac keyboard has four modifier keys; Control, Option, Command, and Shift. These keys are used to execute shortcuts on the OS level, as well as in apps. If you have a different keyboard set up, one where one or more modifier keys are useless or a problem, you can disable or remap them with some exceptions. You can disable modifier keys on macOS as well as the Caps and Fn keys.
Disable modifier keys
You can disable modifier keys on macOS from the System Preferences. Open the app and go to the Keyboard preferences. Click the ‘Modifier Keys…’ button.
A new panel will open. This will list all the modifier keys that you can remap and/or disable. This panel lets you remap the modifier keys but only to the extent that you can interchange them e.g., you can have the Command key function as the Control key, and vice versa.
Since our focus is on disabling modifier keys, click the dropdown arrow next to the key that you want to disable and select ‘No Action’ from the menu.
To change what a key does, you can select one of the other modifier keys allowing you to use one key as the other. This will effect keys that are in pairs e.g., if you have two Option keys on your keyboard, and you disable them or remap them to the Command key, both will be disabled or remapped. The change takes effect right away.
There is no option to map these keys outside of the given options. That’s not to say it’s impossible, you just can’t do it with the System Preferences app. There are third-party apps that allow you to remap any and all keys on macOS. A free app that lets you do this is called Karabiner. The app is a bit complicated but it’s one of the most recommended apps for remapping keys on macOS.
If you have a broken modifier key on your keyboard, this is good way to work with it until you can have it fixed or replaced. When you disable a key, it stops working completely. It’s not just disabled as a modifier key i.e., it will no longer be recognized as a modifier key when you execute a shortcut but the key press will still register. Instead, it will appear as though the key simply doesn’t exist (or is broken). You can change the keys back whenever you want, and if you want to reset them all at once, click the Restore Defaults button.
WiFi networks used in work places and homes are secured with a password. To an end user, that password is what security looks like. Open or public WiFi networks have no password and hence are unsafe but WiFi network security is more than just its password. The password is used to grant access to the network. Behind the scenes, different types of security are applied to keep the network safe. Here’s how you can check the security type for a WiFi network that you’re connected to on Windows 10.
You can learn about the various WiFi network security types here.
WiFi network security type
There are three ways to check the WiFi network security type on Windows 10. You can go through Command Prompt, the Settings app, or you can go through Control Panel. In all cases, you should be connected to the network you want to check the security type for. For networks that are in range but you’ve never connected to, you cannot find out their security type.
WiFi network security type – Settings app
Open the Settings app and go to the Network & Internet group of settings. Select the WiFi tab and click the network that you’re connected to (there will only be one).
Scroll to the very end of the next screen and look for ‘Security Type’.
WiFi network security type – Command Prompt
Open Command Prompt with normal user rights and run the following command.
netsh wlan show interfaces
The command will return information about the current WiFi network that your system is connected to. Look for the ‘Authentication’ line and it will tell you what security type is being used.
WiFi network security type – Control Panel
Open Control Panel and go to Network and Internet. Select Network and Sharing Center. Click on the name of the network you’re connected to.
In the window that opens, click the Wireless Properties button. A new window will open. Go to the Security tab and the Security Type dropdown will tell you what the network is using.
If you find that the security type being used isn’t the most secure, you may or may not be able to do anything about it. If it’s a work/office network, you will have to talk to the system administrator about improving the network security. If it’s your personal home network, and you know how to change a router’s configuration, you can change the security type used yourself. If the router has been provided by your ISP and you cannot change its settings, consider getting your own router or asking your ISP to change its security type.
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