Disable WPAD within Windows

The WPAD protocol is designed to allow organizations to provide proxy settings to all devices that connect to the network. The organization can place a WPAD configuration file in a standard place, and when WPAD is enabled, your computer or other device checks to see if there’s WPAD proxy information provided by the network. Your device then automatically uses whatever settings the proxy auto-configuration (PAC) file provides, sending all traffic on the current network through the proxy server.

Within Windows 7, access Control Panel –> Internet Options  -> Connections tab –> LAN settings button –> clear the “Automatically detect settings” check box.

Within Windows 10, access Settings -> Network & Internet –> Proxy –> disable the “Automatically detect settings” option.

Turn Off File Explorer Advertising within Windows 10

To disable advertising dialog boxes from appearing within Windows Explorer with Windows 10, launch Explorer and access View –> Options -> Change folder and search options.  Under the View tab, disable the feature “Show sync provider notifications.”

iTunes Alternatives for Windows

Below are some alternatives for iTunes on the Windows platform.

http://getmusicbee.com/

http://www.mediamonkey.com/

http://www.foobar2000.org/

https://www.clementine-player.org/

http://getnightingale.com/

Posh Web Server

Posh is a web server via PowerShell.  Installation is not required; simply load the module within PowerShell.

http://www.poshserver.net/

Skydive

Skydive is an open source real-time network topology and protocols analyzer. It aims to provide a comprehensive way of understanding what is happening in the network infrastructure.

https://skydive-project.github.io/skydive/

https://github.com/skydive-project/skydive

Raspberry Pi Linux Distro

The company behind the Raspberry Pi hardware units have decided to offer a Linux Distro for x86 computers.  Built on top of Debian, the OS is light enough to run most old machines that have at least 512MB of RAM.

https://www.raspberrypi.org/blog/pixel-pc-mac/

Ubuntu OVA for VMware Horizon

Ubuntu OVA for Horizon is a pre-packaged OVA built on Ubuntu that automates most of the customization and configuration needed for a Linux Desktop Template to be used in a VMware Horizon 7 or later environment.

https://labs.vmware.com/flings/horizon-ova-for-ubuntu

OpenShot Video Editor

OpenShot is a free video editor application for Linux.

http://www.openshot.org/

IPFire

IPFire is a Linux-based security gateway.  Some features include Cache Management, URL filter, DHCP server, Snort IDS (Guardian), SquidClamAV, IPSec, and OpenVPN.  Snort is an add-on, and several more are available.

http://wiki.ipfire.org/en/addons/start

http://www.ipfire.org/