Easter Eggs

No, you haven’t time slipped and missed Christmas……………

I’m talking about Easter Eggs , or rather, hidden parts of programs that you may have on your drives.

You’ve probably heard of the Easter eggs that are hidden on DVD’s and maybe even have heard of the software ones as well. Program writers seem to have a compulsion to have these and there are lots to choose from.

Let me give you an example…………

You need Directory Opus 6 for Windows to see this egg (www.gpsoft.com.au)

1. Make sure, in the Preferences, that you have the 'Progress bar speed timer' option turned on for copying files

2. Start a copy operation for a large file, one that will take a minute or so to complete (say from an ftp site)

3. When the progress dialog box opens, the icon for the file being copied is displayed in the top left corner of the dialog box

4. Hold down the CONTROL key and double-click on the icon

If you do this you will see the progress dialog enlarge to reveal a hidden 'tile' game at the bottom (slide the tiles around to put them in order)

 

Here’s another………..

Requires:

Microsoft Excel 2000.

Under file menu, do 'Save as Web Page'

Say 'Publish Sheet' and 'Add Interactivity'

Save to some htm page on your drive.

Load the htm page with IE. You should have Excel in the middle of the page.

Scroll to row 2000, column WC. Select row 2000, and tab so that WC is the active column.

Hold down Shift+Crtl+Alt and click the Office logo in the upper-left.

If you have DirectX, you will be playing what looks like spy hunter. Use the arrow keys to drive, space to fire, O to drop oil slicks, and when it gets dark, use H for your headlights.

Not bad, eh?

Right, this may appear that I have misspent loads of time to find these (I wish).

Now to reveal the truth, these “eggs “ can all be found at http://www.eeggs.com/

The last time I visited, they had over 2000 eggs just for computer software. These range from Microsoft products all the way down to freeware…….

So, feeling bored and decide to try something new, surf over to the site addy above and while away the time looking at any eggs you may have on your drive and didn’t know about!

 

By Ian Urie

PC Technical Editor