Naturalization step 2

In response to the Fingerprinting blog post, I received some info from friends who went through similar processes, so I’d like to share the story of one of them. He doesn’t have all the info I would have liked to detail, so some of this is not hard facts. I’ll update this when I have my own experience.

About 3-4 weeks after completing my fingerprinting at the USCIS office in Seattle, I received the interview summons, which was scheduled to about 3-4 weeks later (so, about 1.5 months after the fingerprinting). This was in late 2012, and as loads change over time, your experience might differ. The national average for naturalization is 5 months, with the Seattle office claiming to be at 5.1 months (slightly slower than the average, that is). However, with it being 2-3 weeks from filing to fingerprinting, and another 6-8 weeks, this brings the total to about 8-11 weeks, which is a lot shorter. This means that if you filed on time and you’re lucky, with no holidays to slow down your own process, you might actually be a citizen even before your 5 year period has completed!

The interviews start at 8am at the USCIS office in south Seattle, close to the Boeing museum of flight. I believe the interviews are only scheduled for the morning hours and all are done by noon, though I’m not sure about that. On average, they handle about 60 people there every day (based on regional statistics published by the USCIS), and that’s about the number of people I saw on that day. I believe they were using approximately 10 interview offices, but I might be off, and it’s possible that some days have a different number of offices in use.

After you come in and sign-in, you go to the 2^nd floor of the building, where you wait for your turn. They call you by name, and send you to the interview, which is held in a private office. The officers are nice and the entire interview, including the questions takes about 20-30 minutes. Even though the interview includes a test, the officers are nice and don’t try to trip or trick you. The questions they ask during the test are from a pool of 100 questions, and the officer had his on a printed sheet, so it’s possible that the selection is daily or weekly, though it’s hard to say for sure. Once this is done, you step outside and wait for the ceremony and oath, which is done at noontime. You can ask to have it deferred to another date, but you’d be expected to have a very good reason for that, like some medical situation.

If you don't have a reason to skip the ceremony, all those who passed the interview that day get sworn-in at noontime, in the master auditorium on the 1^st floor, and usually there would be a few people who did their interview before. These “guests” are briefly checked again to see if they committed any crimes since their interview, or spent a significant time outside the US. The ceremony itself takes approximately 1.5 hours, including taking the oath, singing the national anthem, and getting the certificate of citizenship. The USCIS asks participants to dress nicely (no jeans or shorts), so you might as well dress well for the entire day. If you’re the type of person who sweats a lot under pressure, or this happens in the hot days of summer, bringing a change of clothes might be a good idea. Also, if you have any friends or relatives you’d like to have witness the event or take your picture during, make sure they come to the office before noon, so they have time to go through security and find a good spot in the auditorium.

Good luck!

My guide for office productivity

Those who work with me a lot noticed that my response times to mail is very fast, and that I seem to never miss an Email. I do feel that the practices I adopted and developed for handling Email are worth getting to know, so here they are.

 

1.    Keep the inbox empty

The biggest factor, and also the biggest goal of my system are keeping the inbox as empty as possible. The only items that should be there are mail items you are yet to respond to or deal-with. Anything else should be deleted or moved away. The biggest cause of mail loss is items that get old and forgotten because they are buried in a 100 emails.

2.    Use mail folders

Many people have hundreds of emails a day and no one can read all of it. Letting it accumulate in your inbox and trying to find the relevant pieces between the background noise is a recipe for disaster. My solution is to use mail folders, and not skimp. Create a detailed tree with folders like “projects”, “content”, “pending requests”, “Personal”, “Group Mail”, “Performance” and so on, with the purpose of having enough folders so that NO piece of mail can’t fit one of them perfectly.

3.    Use mail rules

Even with the proper folders, moving stuff around can take a long time, so use mail rules. If you’re new to your role, take a few weeks to get acquainted with the traffic, so you can figure out what’s important and what’s not, and then create a bunch of rules. Learn the mail-rule feature of outlook (or your other mail client) and fine tune your rules so that all the junk gets moved into folders. For example, in outlook, for each rule, you can specify an exception that says “only if sent directly to me”, and that’s an effective way to separate everything that was sent to a distribution list from real correspondence you’ve been a part of. Put aside ½ hour a month to go over the rules and fine tune them too, as your group membership and topics of interest may change (for example, maybe you want less filtering during the annual review process).

4.    Store common replies

For most people, at least half our responses are virtually identical. We send the same links to people over and over, or copies of similar documents and procedures. You can save yourself a lot of time by storing common strings and reusing them (referred to as “canned response”). There are plenty of tools for that, and you can also use Outlook’s NOTES folder for that.

5.    Reply intermediately

Often times, you receive a mail, but cannot answer right away. For example, you need to put in a link that you don’t remember, or need to find more details. In those cases, get in the practice of answering something like “Hi. I got your mail, but I need to find more information to give you a proper answer. I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.” This kind of response doesn’t take more than a few seconds to write (less if you have the text stored as noted in item 4 above), but it shows the sender that you care and are attentive to his needs. Then, even if you later can’t reply at all or forget, they would be less offended than if you never replied.

6.    Direct your employees with your attention “settings”

If you are a manager, then you’re probably constantly bombarded by mail from your subordinates, CCing you on every other thing they want you to know. Naturally, most of that isn’t very relevant (not to mention the people who are just attention whores and CC you on *everything*). Instead of trying to deal, conduct a semi-annual meeting with your people, and direct them on the proper etiquette – what items to include you in, and what to keep to themselves. You might need to spend some time with yourself, trying to determine what you want vs. what you need (facing off efficiency vs. control).

7.    Mark items for follow up

When you send out an item, outlook, and most other mail clients have the option of flagging items. When you send items to people who are bad responders, or on topics that might take a while to get a response on, flag them. Then, set yourself a weekly task of going over the flagged items to see which need to be “pinged” again.

8.    Reply privately when unsure

Sometimes, we are part of a distribution list, where any member can/might reply to a certain message. Often times, we ignore these and let others reply, but that can lead to some DLs getting completely abandoned (if people see no one ever responds, they’ll look elsewhere for answers). The common reason for not answering (aside from time constraints) is being unsure of the info, but try to get used to answering the sender privately in such a case. You could say “I’m not sure about this, but in case no one else responds, I think the answer is ______”. This will be infinitely more helpful and efficient for you too rather than seeing the sender “resending” 3 more times due to no response.

9.    Wash your inbox before washing your teeth

When you wake up in the morning, spend the first 10-15 minutes of the day cleaning out your inbox from your Smartphone (I find it hard to believe anybody doesn’t have one these days). The phone is a good way to sequentially view all the new items, and the work you can get done in those 10 minutes would take you an hour if you were in the office (because office-work is always interrupted by stuff, like phone calls, meetings, people stepping in to “just say hi”…). If your phone is not convenient enough to do this easily…get a better phone!

10.  Use your phone when out

On a similar note, get yourself a phone you can actually type on, whether it be one with a physical keyboard (like a BlackBerry or the Motorola Droid Pro XT610) or one with a big-enough screen to comfortably type on (like the Nokia Lumia 9xx series or the Samsung Galaxy S series). Then, use the phone not only to read email, but also to answer the items that you can with a reasonable amount of time. A 10 minute line at the cafeteria can save you 30 minutes of mail-time when getting back to the office after lunch.

Fingerprinting for naturalization

This morning, my wife and I went to get fingerprinted as part of our naturalization process. We sent the naturalization application on Jan 3^rd, and got a confirmation letter about a week later, and a summons for the fingerprinting on Jan 17 (so, two weeks after sending out the paperwork). Surprisingly, my wife got her summons for the 24^th, while I got mine for Feb 7^th. My date conflicted with a scheduled medical procedure I had, so I decided to come with her to hers, and hope that they take me in as a walk-in (internet forum posts said it was almost always OK to do).

We live in Seattle, so our USCIS center is in 12500 Tukwila International BLVD, which is close to the Boeing museum of flight in south Seattle. We got there on time, on a Thursday in January, at 1pm, and the place was nearly empty. The building has a parking lot that charges $7 flat and appears to have plenty of room, though it’s a bit far from the building. We had the standard security sweep at the building’s entrance, and I showed the guard a Leatherman I had. He said he can’t check it for me, so he could either confiscate it, or I could take it to the car. I’m a lazy mofo, so I went out the building and hid it in the front yard, between a set of large blocks. When I went back in, the guard told me that I have to take it ALL the way to the car (remember that the lot is pretty far, incl. a huge flight of stairs and quite a bit of Seattle rain). “We have tons of security cameras around, so we could see you hide it”, she said. A tad embarrassing, but I went back and put the thing in the car. During this, the guard told my wife that most people try to hide their item 3 times on average before giving up and going to the car, so I’m at least a bit better off...

As part of the security scan, the guard asked to see our invitation paper, but didn’t notice that mine was dated differently than my wife’s, and let us both through. After passing the security scan, we went into the fingerprinting hall, where we were given forms to fill (they give you pencils, but I’d advise bringing good-quality pens with you). The forms are a simple ½ pager with name, address, A#, SSN, application number (the NBC* number given by USCIS as part of the application process) and some more generic stuff. You’re supposed to have your Green-Card with you, so the A# and most of the details were easy, but if like many people you don’t remember your SSN by heart, bring it with you. We actually didn’t remember it, but the clerk accepted the forms without it, so maybe it’s not a big deal.

With the filled forms, you go into the waiting hall, which has plenty of room, but other than the two of us, there were only about 5 people in line, so it went through in about 5 minutes. The clerk, a young woman, was nice, and when we told her I was earlier than my scheduled date because I had a conflicting medical procedure, agreed to let me in. She checked our paperwork (invitation letter, form, green card) and took a look at our hands (presumably to see if we have any skin problems or something else that would be a problem for fingerprinting) and gave us each a number. She asked us to come inside the fingerprinting room and wait.

The fingerprinting room has a row of about 8 seats, where we sat and waited our turn. I can only guess that on busy days, some people wait outside for their turn. In the back of the room, they had 4 computerized fingerprinting machines (yeah…no messy ink these days). We waited about 5 minutes for our turn and they called us in separately, as each machine has one operator that has her own queue.

At the machine, the operator (mine was a young woman, and my wife’s an older woman, who said she’s been doing this work for 11 years) sprayed water on a piece of cloth and wiped the finger scanner, and my hand. She scanned my right hand (4 fingers at once) and then my left. She then scanned my fingers individually in a rolling motion that captures more than just the front of the finger, as the flat scan did earlier. As can be expected, some of the scans were a tad blurry, so she had to redo several of the fingers, but the entire process took less than 10 minutes. After the fingerprinting, the operator took my picture (it will be used on your Naturalization Certificate, so better dress nicely, shave and make a nice face). The operator then gave me a booklet that should help me prepare for the naturalization test that I would be taking in the future (also includes an Audio CD!), as well as an extra page that alerts me to some changes in the info that’s in the booklet, following the 2012 elections. She also gave me a feedback card, which I was all too happy to tick with “excellent” on all counts. The entire adventure, from parking to getting back to the car took 40 minutes. Now we wait for the summons for the interview. The same building is also where the interview will be taking place, and it’s also where we’ll be taking the oath and getting naturalized afterwards. Some internet forum posts and friends say it would be about 2 months until then, though the processing times schedule published by the USCIS says its 5 months total. I guess we’ll have to wait and see!

The practical guide to AGT (Americas Got Talent) auditions

If you want to appear on AGT, be prepared to work hard, as it’s not really as simple as it appears on TV. You don’t just show up and perform for the judges. Here’s the real process.

First of all, the show’s producers decide in which cities to hold auditions based on the prospective number of participants. They want to spend their money on cities where they’ll get a good return on investing the huge amount of money it takes to do the process (and also, to give a chance to various cities that may have not been visited before). If you do want to make a difference, sign up for the auditions on their website at least a few months in advance, and select which city you’d prefer.

Once you get a notification of an upcoming audition in your city (or a city you’re willing and able to travel to in order to audition), make sure you clear at least half a day from work, school or whatever work you’re doing. Once you sign up via AGT’s website, they will send you a bunch of emails, and also call you personally a few days before the date to confirm you’re coming (it’s an actual person calling, not a machine). You will be able to select a specific time of day that you want to show-up, and I strongly suggest choosing the earliest. It’s no fun to wake up early, but showing up later might run you into trouble, as delays introduced during the day might cause you to wait longer, or even not make it at all.

After you confirm your audition, you will be asked to prepare some paperwork. They will want you to have a legal photo-ID, and a proof of US Citizenship or residency (Visa, green card etc). They will also want you to print, fill and sign a 6-page copyright/privacy waiver. This is a legal document that allows the production to use whatever you perform as part of the show (even if you’re not selected eventually) and certifying that you understand you actions during the day and performance are not private and may be used in any way they see fit. This is a big deal to the production, because as you may know, the eventual footage might show you in a bad light and sometimes utterly humiliate you, and the production needs a defense against a potential law suit.

If you’re selected time is the earliest, which is typically 9am, do make sure you show up a lot earlier than that, if you want to save time. Generally speaking, you will get to perform even if you show up at 9 sharp, but you might get stuck waiting for several hours in various lines. Also, showing up early makes you more likely to find a decent parking spot. The number of people who actually show up differs from city to city. Some cities have only several hundreds, while others might have thousands. For example, in the 2011 Portland auditions, over 1000 people were already around at 6am. In the 2012 Seattle ones, though, at 7am only 30 performers lined up, but by 9am there were over 400 people already.

Another very important thing to know is that the auditions are NOT the ones you see on TV. These are only pre-screening auditions (as you can imagine, even if an act takes only 2 minutes, there’s still no way for the judges to view hundreds of people in a single day (even with 100% efficiency, a 10 hours day would only accommodate around 100 people). What really happens is this:

After entering the building and lining up, ushers will pass around, and give everyone who intends to perform a numbered sticker, starting from number 0001. Performers will also get a yellow paper wristband, while visitors (performers’ parents, friends etc) get a purple band. The line will probably not have seats, so you can bring a folding chair, or sit on the floor. The facilities in some cities might have the line run outside the building, so you might want to pack up some protection against cold or sun. If you’re very early or late, you might also pack a drink and/or food for the wait. A book, phone or other form of entertainment is also a very good idea. If you have a lot of stuff (including or excluding musical instruments), it’s perfectly fine to have a bag or other form of luggage. Usually, bathrooms will be available. Once you’ve had your number given, the risk of losing your place in line becomes irrelevant, as the call-ins are done by number.

At the set starting time (9am, that is), groups of ~40 will move in for a security check. Naturally, they don’t allow guns, and they will personally check your bags, trunks and other equipment. They also scan your body for weapons with a standard magnetic wand (the beeping kind).

After passing that, there’s a registration line, where you’ll be asked to provide your ID and paperwork (the copyright/privacy waiver you were asked to print, fill and sign earlier). They’ll check your ID and signature on the waiver, and attach a personal questionnaire (1 page) to it, give the stack back to you, and send you to a waiting area. The waiting area will be indoors, and have seats and bathrooms. This is the time to fill in the questionnaire, which would ask you things like:

1.       Your name, age, and more details about the act (like the age-range of members, if it’s a group)

2.       What is your dream (with regards to AGT and your talent)

3.       How did you get into what you’re doing, and how you learned it

4.       What other talents you have

5.       About your supporters (friends, family etc that supported you in your act and to go audition)

The production won’t provide pens, but if you haven’t brought your own, many people will have them, so you can probably borrow one. You would have at least half an hour to delve into the form, so no rush. Make sure you write clearly, though.

Once they start putting people through, they will typically do it in groups of 25, depending on how many auditions halls are available. That will also depend on how many people pre-registered to audition, so the production will typically have more rooms if more people signed up. This means you can expect the time-line to be comparable even if the more crowded cities. Statistically, most of the people who show up to audition are musicians and singers, and the ushers will separate your group to two. One group will be regular singers who do not need/use instruments, and the other group will be singers with instruments, as well as all the other non-singing performers (dancers, ventriloquists, comedians, etc).

The group will be led to an audition room, and wait outside to be called in. The usher will collect the paperwork stack from everyone, and then call in one person at a time. The order won’t necessarily be by name or number, but since the group is relatively small at this point, it will typically all be done within an hour. For some types of acts (the more common ones, like singers), they sometimes call multiple performers together.

Once called in, you go into the audition room. If you have stuff that’s not part of your performance, you can either leave it out with the others, or take it with you (since you’re not on TV yet, and it’s not a stage, it doesn’t hurt to have this with you). Inside the audition room you will meet a producer (sometimes more than one) to whom you will introduce yourself, and perform your act. The producer may want to ask you additional personal questions, such as about your day job, how did you get into whatever you’re doing etc. This producer will be part of deciding your next steps, so try to be honest, respectful, nice, friendly and accommodating. Naturally, don’t go too far with that – they still have to see hundreds of people every day, so don’t make them feel uncomfortable or creeped-out. If you messed up your act and want to start over, that is typically acceptable at this point, though you shouldn’t take this too far either (if they see you as unprepared or unskilled…that won’t improve your odds). Some producers are less interactive or sympathetic than others, so be prepared to perform to a “wall”. For example, if you’re telling jokes, the producer may not laugh or respond at all, and that in itself doesn’t mean you didn’t do well or that you failed. For some types of performances, like comedy or magic, performing with zero reaction can be really daunting, so when you practice your act, try to prepare for that by doing it in an empty room or in front of a friend that can keep a straight face. If you were called in the room with other performers, you will all perform one-after-the-other, and this is done this way to save time, as they do have to weed-out more people from the more common types of acts (again, singers are typically like that). During the performance, you might be filmed (so that your tape can be viewed by others later as part of the decision process), but that’s not always the case.

Once you’re done, the usher will ask you to stick around for a bit, and later on might ask you to stick around some more, or go home. Sometimes, the producers would want to see you again for some reason. One possible reason is that your performance was promising, but they want to see it again, or to see you do something a little different. Sometimes they have a certain number of performers in your category, and they might want to perform another round of screenings on the spot to thin the herd. Sometimes, the producer might be on-the fence about you, and would want a second opinion before making a decision. For the most part, though, you’ll be going home without knowing for sure whether you made it. If you did, the production will call you again (typically, around March) and invite you to the final auditions that would be taped for the show and in front of the real judges. The pre-screening auditions are typically done in November, but the judges get into action a lot later, and the show actually airs in May, so be patient and move ahead with your life. You might want to use that time to promote yourself – setup a website, a blog, a youtube channel etc.  

The perfect case for an eBook Reader

Having received my new Kindle Fire a few days ago, I was astonished to find that a cover/case for it costs upwards of 30$, and even a simple sleeve starts at $25. Instead of throwing my hard-earned dollars at Amazon, I created this contraption, which is both cheap and unique.



The process of creating this is rather simple, and not very time consuming. Here are the steps!

1. Get a book that is the right size and thickness for a 7” reader. You can probably find one by browsing your neighborhood store or the nearest Barnes and Noble store. I felt the most suitable was Beowulf: http://amazon.com/o/asin/1593083831 It’s somewhat ironic to use buy a B&N book from Amazon, not to mention using it to store a Kindle, but perhaps it’s the best one BECAUSE it’s so ironic! The book can used or new for less than 5$.

2. Stick the pages together. This is done with simple paper glue. You should separate the front cover from the rest so it doesn’t stick – just stick some plastic bag between them, or some other plastic sheet.


3. Mix half a tea-spoon of paper glue (like Elmers) with water in a 1:1 ratio. The purpose is to have the glue very thin so it soaks into the paper.

4. Using a brush or a sponge, coat the side of the book with glue generously. We want the glue to soak into the paper, so they all stick together to form a hard edge.

5. Put some weight on the book so the pages don’t deform, and leave to dry for half an hour or so, or until it seems dry and hard.

6. Repeat with another layer of glue, or even two layers, if you have the time.

7. Remove the plastic, and place your ebook on the book’s first page. Mark out around it with a pen.

8. Using a metal ruler and a snap knife, cut through the pages. Be careful not to cut too deep (you don’t want to go through the back cover!). The tricky part is the corners, because when you cut from top to bottom, the angle of the knife prevents it from penetrating through more than a few layers at the bottom corner. To make it better, rotate the book occasionally and “fix” the bad corners.

9. Do this in steps, pulling out a few pages to reveal the pages below them, until you reach the bottom cover. Again, be gentle with the pressure to avoid cutting through the bottom cover. Also, be careful with the knife, as snap-knives tend to snap if you put too much pressure on them. This should still take no more than 10 minutes.

10. Check that the reader fits nicely inside the book. If it does, use the same technique as described in steps 2-5, but from the inside of the hole in the book. This is not absolutely required, but would serve to make the whole thing more stable.

11. Optional: cut out a piece of rubber or felt, and glue it inside the book. This would help the reader stay in place and not move around insid the book box.

12. Optional: get a latch, and stick it to both covers, so you can lock the book closed when not in use.

Congratulations! The same technique would be useful to hide a flask of Whiskey in a book (preferably an Ernest Hemmingway book) or a pistol in a copy of "War and Peace"!

Backup outlook using Volume Shadow Copy

Shadow Copy (a.k.a Volume Snapshot Service or VSS for short), is a Windows feature that can access files even when they are locked. It has many great uses, and this time I want to talk about backing up outlook. When outlook is running, it locks the PST files it uses, making them impossible to backup. One workaround is to close outlook before the backup, but that has several disadvantages, and may be hard to automate. Many backup utilities use shadow copy to help, but what if you don’t want to spend money? As usual, I’m here to help.

To use Shadow Copy, you would need a little utility called VSHADOW. I wish I could offer it as a direct download from here, but unfortunately, you’ll have to download the Windows SDK for that. It’s quite a hefty download – an ISO image that is over 1 GB long and takes FOREVER to install. Once you’re done with that, go to c:\program files\Microsoft SDKs\Windows\v6.1\Bin\vsstools and find VSHADOW.EXE there. It would be a 226K file – run it once to make sure it displays the right version – 3.0:

Copy this file to somewhere safe, and you may now uninstall the SDK to save on some disk space (approx 1.3 GB to be exact). If you had some virtual machine to do this install on, even better.

To actually make a backup, you need to perform 4 steps:

1. Use Vshadow to create a “snapshot” – this captures a drive the way it is at a certain point of time.

2. Mount the snapshot as another drive

3. Copy the files from the newly mounted drive to somewhere else (the backup destination).

4. Erase the snapshot.

Erasing the snapshot at the end is not really critical – you can leave it there for eternity, but since it’s frozen in time, there isn’t much point in making another backup from it in the future. You can mount multiple snapshots, but you’ll run out of drive-letters pretty fast.

To be more technical, here’s what you do:

1. Open a CMD prompt, which must have Administrative privileges.

2. Go to where you saved VSHADOW.EXE, and run the following command. If the files you want to backup are on a drive other than C, substitute it’s letter with c:

Vshadow –nw –p c:

3. On the output of this command, note the line that says SNAPSHOT ID:

If you get an error message like “Access denied”, that means you are not an administrator, or that you have ran your CMD not as an administrator.

4. Run the following command to map the drive letter, using the proper snapshot ID. You can use any letter you want, if J is already in use:

vshadow.exe -el={57b7248c-e086-46fc-848d-f449fb4c0ae3},j:

5. Now, use your favorite file copy method to copy any files you want from that temporary drive to anywhere else. I use ROBOCOPY and copy to my external USB drive, but you can do anything you want, really.

6. Once done with the file copy, use this command to un-mount the temporary drive and delete the snapshot. This does NOT do anything to the original files – just gets rid of the shadow copy and frees up the drive letter and system resources. Note that we are using the same snapshot ID as before:

vshadow.exe -ds={57b7248c-e086-46fc-848d-f449fb4c0ae3}

7. That’s it! Now you are ready to do this again tomorrow.

As you may or may not know, I don’t like to do so many things manually, so I wrote a VBScript to do the same as above, automatically. I use the WScript.Shell object and its RUN method to execute the various commands, and VBScript’s INSTR to find the snapshot ID. Other than that, the script is pretty straightforward:

'Create the Objects set oWshell = CreateObject("WScript.Shell") set oFSO = CreateObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject") 'Create the snapshot oWshell.run "%COMSPEC% /C c:\vshadow -nw -p d: >c:\vshadow.txt", 0, TRUE 'Read the output and find the Snapshot ID set oFile = oFSO.openTextFile("c:\vshadow.txt", 1, TRUE) sOutput=oFile.readall oFile.close sSnapshotID=mid(sOutput,instr(sOutput,"SNAPSHOT ID")+14,38) 'Mount the Drive wshell.run "%COMSPEC% /C c:\vshadow -el=" & sSnapshotID & ",j:", 0, TRUE 'Copy the files. Note that I'm using double-quotes because the path has a space in it wshell.run "%COMSPEC% /C c:\Robocopy ""j:\My Documents"" ""x:\My Documents"" *.pst", 0, TRUE 'Destroy the snapshot wshell.run "%COMSPEC% /C c:\vshadow -ds=" & sSnapshotID, 0, TRUE

You may adjust the script for different drive letters and folders. That’s it! Now, just use the Windows Task Scheduler to run this daily, and you’re done!

Pick it up

A few months ago, I discussed a technique to fix LCD monitors, but since then I received a lot of questions with regards to how to actually OPEN the LCD’s plastic casing. Unfortunately, the front and back plastic shells are usually attached using snap-locking plastic notches, and these can be very hard to open. Here are two techniques that you can use to open such cases.

The basic technique is to simple use force – the plastic notches will come undone if you apply enough force to them, although some of them might break. Before going there, remove any screws that are in place, and inspect the back well to make sure there are no screws hiding under a warrenty sticker, or under the monitor’s leg. Then, place the screen on a table with the screen itself pointing upward, and the “top” of the screen facing you.

With your fingertips (of both hands), grab the plastic panel of the top part and try to slide your fingers underneath it, while pulling towards you. There will be resistance, often significant one, but with enough force, the frame will open. The hard part is to find the right balance so as to not break the LCD panel, so you might want to practice on a screen that you care less about. If you are not an experienced guitarist, expect some finger pain after this process.

Once the top comes open, slide your fingers a bit more inwards, and then slide them sideways towards the corners, still applying force, to open the notches that are in the corner, and then keep sliding along the sides towards the bottom of the screen. A typical screen has about 10-15 clasps along the frame, and they will snap open one by one. The snaps that are along the bottom part of the frame should be the easiest to open, as you should have most of the frame loose by now, and can apply a lot of leverage easily. Note that the monitor’s button panel is usually part of the front-frame, and wired to the main body, so be careful not to rip these wires or panel off when you open the panel. Most monitors’ internal body is separate from the plastic frame, and once you pop it open, the main body will come out easily, but be careful still – in some cases, the main body is connected with screws to the front or back frame, and you need to be careful not to break those.

If applying force, as described in paragraph 3 does not work, or you are very concerned about keeping the monitor in pristine condition, another technique is to pry the snaps open with a wedge. The problem is that the frame is usually soft plastic, so if you apply a screwdriver to it, it will cause very ugly damage. The right way to do it is use a plastic wedge. I recommend using a thick guitar pick – get a bunch of them – at least 3, and don’t get the expensive kind. This procedure might destroy them.

Take one pick, and push it between the front and back frame as much as you can, about 1 inch to the left or right of the middle of the frame (the middle point itself would probably have a snap, so you can push anything in there). The pick will separate the frames a bit, so now you can push another one next to it. Now, slide the 2nd pick sideways towards the corner, and the pressure will pop-open the snaps without causing any damage. You might have to experiment with several picks until you find ideal ones – some might be too soft to force the screen open, and others might be too thick to easily insert between the panels.