4NT is a 32-bit Windows NT text-mode command processor that replaces Windows' CMD.EXE. It includes hundreds of new features and capabilities designed to make work at the command prompt simple, productive, and worthwhile. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED. Size: 990,238 bytes.

AutoIt is a high-powered scripting language that lets you automate your interactions with the Windows GUI, going far beyond languages such as VBScript and SendKeys. You can automate almost any task, including:

• Interacting with Control Panel applets
• Installing/uninstalling software
• Configuring preferences in Internet Explorer, Windows Explorer and others
  
  
• Changing your screen saver
• Switching your start page in Internet Explorer
• ...your imagination is the limit...

Just about anything you do repetitively, or that requires a lot of clicking, choosing, and typing on your part is a candidate for AutoIt's automation.
      At the Rugless enclave, we use AutoIt routinely for setting up a new computer or Virtual PC. We quickly and easily configure the new environment and install our favorite applications and utilities, all with just a few clicks. AutoIt can:

• Simulate keystrokes (supporting most keyboard layouts)
• Simulate mouse movements and clicks
• Move, resize and manipulate windows
  
  
• Interact directly with controls in a window (e.g. setting/getting text from edit controls, check boxes and radio buttons, selecting items in drop-down lists, etc.)
• Work with the clipboard to cut/paste text items
  
  
• Create complex user interfaces (build your own GUIs)
• Serve as a general-purpose scripting language for all Windows versions
• Provide a scriptable RunAs function for Windows 2000/XP/2003

AutoIt is freeware. Once installed, it is very small (about 115K), self-contained and will run on 95, 98, ME, NT4, 2000, XP, and 2003 with no "runtimes" required. You can even compile your scripts into EXE files so they will run without AutoIt being installed. Size: 8,405,840 bytes.

Calipers is used to measure objects on your screen, in pixels. Just position the Calipers over the portion of a window you want to measure. To extend the calipers drag the right hand side out. The reading in the text box is the space in pixels being measured. The registered version lets you measure in other units, including inches, centimeters, and custom units. Size: 620,440 bytes.

ClipMate works alongside the regular Windows Clipboard and remembers every piece of data (both text and graphics) that you cut or copy. Once your data is saved in ClipMate, you can select an item and it is automatically placed back on the Clipboard or directly into an application.
      Within ClipMate you can view, print, edit, reformat, convert to upper/lower case, search, rename, and reorder Clip Items, and more. You can create an unlimited number of collections to store your data, and you have full control over how long clipped data is remembered. Size: 5,635,424 bytes.

Everything is a search engine for Windows that is blazingly fast. When you open it, Everything displays a list of all files on all your drives. To search, just type a portion of the file name, and Everything narrows the list accordingly.
      Everything is different from other search engines in that it has a clean and simple user interface, very fast searching, a small installation file, minimal resource usage, a small on-disk database, fast file indexing, and real-time updating.
      As soon as you install it, Everything starts indexing all your files, and it keeps the list up to date as you work. By default, all drives are included, but you can exclude drives, folders and files of your choosing.
      Everything doesn't index file contents, just their names, which is why it's so fast. Freeware. Size: 341,811 bytes.

FileBox eXtender adds two buttons to the standard Windows File | Open and File | Save dialog boxes, letting you jump directly to another folder. One button displays a menu of your favorite folders, while the other displays a menu of the folders you recently accessed through the File | Open or File | Save dialog boxes. You can decide how many recent folders are listed.
      FileBox eXtender can also make your File | Open and File | Save dialog boxes any size you choose. You can also have the Recent/Favorites buttons displayed in Windows Explorer. Freeware. Size: 865,376 bytes.

HandyFile Find and Replace is a powerful tool for replacing text in one or more files in any given folder, and optionally in its subfolders. It allows searches by date and file size, and allows regular expression searches.
     The version on this site is the last free version. On the author's site, there are now three paid versions, offering FTP searching, integration with Microsoft Office, and file renaming. Size: 369,690 bytes.

IrfanView is a compact, easy to use freeware image viewer. You can create slideshows and thumbnails, batch convert from one image format to another, open an image with an external editor, view it in hex mode, rename, move, copy or delete images, scan, tweak and color-correct images, add effects like oil painting, and much, much more. Size: 1,359,360 bytes.

KeyTweak lets you remap your keyboard however you like. Maybe you know that you are going to be doing a lot of numerical data entry and would like to change your Number Pad + key into a Tab key for a little while. How about changing Scroll Lock into a Mute button? I used it to disable my Caps Lock key, because I was always hitting it by mistake while reaching for the Tab key. You can do all that and more with KeyTweak. Size: 162,440 bytes.

ozTimer is a countdown timer that lets you keep track of how much time you have left in any task that has a time limit. Public speakers, instructors and presenters in general will find it useful.
      Set the duration of the task or presentation, or enter a time of day when you want to stop, and ozTimer starts counting down, displaying the remaining time in large digits, along with the current time and the projected end time. When the time has expired ozTimer starts beeping and counting upward to show how much you have exceeded the target time.
      Your remaining time is also displayed on the program's Task Bar button, so you can track your progress even if ozTimer is minimized or hidden by another window. Size: 290,615 bytes.

PDF995 lets you create a PDF file by printing from any application, choosing the PDF995 printer from the printer dialog and entering the name of the PDF file you want to create. Registered version is only $9.95.
      A companion utility, pdfEdit995, is a free download that lets you customize your pdf995 output including: previewing documents, combining files, changing page orientation, adding "Confidential" stamps, creating PDF stationery, adjusting image resolution, summarizing documents, creating batch print jobs from Microsoft Office applications and choosing from several file naming methods. Size: 4,362,741 bytes.

Registrar Lite is a powerful and flexible freeware registry editor offering an abundance of features missing from the Windows registry editors. Some of its features include:

• An explorer style interface
• Clipboard support
• Drag and drop of registry keys and values
  
  
• Background search and replace
• A bookmark editor
• Adding descriptions to registry keys
  
  
• Advanced registry value data editors for all registry data types
• An address bar that lets you access registry keys and values quickly
• Registry key import and export functionality
  
  
• Security features including permissions on registry keys
• More...

Registrar Lite is the freeware edition of an advanced registry manager called Resplendent Registrar. Size: 2,084,888 bytes.

RoboForm fills in online forms and passwords for you, quickly and easily. It saves your online passwords and other form information for a given site in what it calls a Passcard. When you visit that site again, RoboForm offers to fill in the form.
      Passcards also act rather like bookmarks: The Go&Fill command goes to the memorized login page and fills in the memorized login data, The Login command performs the whole login sequence for you: it does "Go&Fill" and then clicks the Login button.
      RoboForm can also fill long non-password forms from your current personal profile, called an Identity. You store your personal data in your Identity and RoboForm remembers it for use on any web form.
      The data you store in RoboForm is encrypted and password-protected. To have RoboForm fill forms you must provide a password, which it remembers for two hours by default. You can adjust that period, and you can force RoboForm to "log you out" at any time, protecting your data if you walk away from your machine for a while.
      We've been using this app here at RGI for a while now, and we don't know how we did without it. Size: 2,955,416 bytes.

RoboType adds a text expansion feature to almost any Windows application. You type an abbreviation, RoboType expands it to something bigger. For instance you could tell it to type out your full address whenever you type the word "addr".
      You can create individual RoboType Libraries of abbreviations. You can have different libraries available for different tasks and switch libraries "on the fly" as you work. Freeware from PC Magazine. Size: 761,000 bytes.

StayLive automatically keeps your Internet dial-up connection alive by periodically sending a small TCP/IP packet to one of several available Atomic Clocks. This keeps your ISP from dropping your connection due to inactivity. StayLive can also update your system's real-time clock at preset intervals. Size: 83,495 bytes.

The TabOrder add-in (from Visual Studio 6's sample apps) lets you reset the tab order of the controls on a VB6 form. Many times when you create forms in Visual Basic, the controls end up in an odd tab order. This add-in allows you to reset the tab order in either top- to-bottom or left-to-right order. You can also move items in TabOrder's list up or down, then apply the changes to the form. Size: 40,960 bytes.

TClockEx enhances the standard Windows taskbar clock, adding the ability to display the date, the time and lots of other information in any format you like. TClockEx is highly customizable, from the format to the font and color, and even the tooltip information. It is not a replacement for the taskbar clock, but is an enhancement because it modifies the appearance of the original clock itself. Size: 194,464 bytes.

TextPad is a powerful replacement for Notepad, a tool for editing web pages, and a programming IDE. Take a look at some of its great features:

Total Commander is a file manager for Windows, a much more powerful tool than Windows Explorer. Total Commander uses two fixed windows, which makes moving/copying files much easier. Some of the MANY other features of Total Commander include:

WnBrowse is a freeware file viewer for Windows 9x/ME/NT/2K. It allows you to look at and examine any file on your system, text or binary.
      WnBrowse is not an editor. You cannot use WnBrowse to modify files. But WnBrowse allows you to launch an editor of your choice while viewing a file.
      WnBrowse can display files in two formats, text and hex. WnBrowse does not provide the ability to display files in their native formats.
      Some of the highlights of WnBrowse are:

AllNetic Working Time Tracker makes it a breeze to track how much time you spend on different projects and tasks. Thanks to precise time tracking and accounting (down to the second, if you want it) you can quickly and exactly calculate the time you spend on each task. You can bill your clients on time based on real reports.
      This app is so cool, it senses when you've been inactive for a period of time and offers to stop the timer, so you don't accidentally keep it running while you're on a long phone call, for example. If you start working without remembering to restart the timer, it prompts you to start it. Tasks can be divided into subtasks, individually timed and with a comment for each. There's much more. You have to try this timer; it's our favorite here at RGI. Size: 1,899,692 bytes.