Tech Tips

How to Prevent Dark Mode Notepad++ from Printing Faint Text

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So you’ve turned on dark mode in Notepad++ and are enjoying the experience of working in the dark, without your eyes being casually assaulted by white screens. But then… when you print, you notice the text looks strangely faint, like this: The first time it happened to me, I gave my printer a suspicious glance, and wondered if it was running out of toner. Then I noticed that the line numbers were more legible than the text itself, which seemed to be a clue. I soon began to suspect that this was related to how Notepad++ handled dark mode. When I dug into it, my suspicions were mostly confirmed. So here’s the thing – by default, Notepad++ is configured to … Read more

How to Enable Dark Mode in Notepad++

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If you’re like me – a passionate dark mode user – you’re always looking to make every app follow your system default. After all, when you’re fully immersed in a world of productive darkness, there’s nothing quite like being surprised by a white screen. As demonstrated here: A notable shining light in my dark mode life has always been Notepad++, where I previously struggled to get dark mode working. Turns out, there’s a wrong way and a right way to achieve that – and even in the latter case, there’s a caveat that you need to look out for. I should mention also that what I consider the “right way” is the method that makes the user interface dark and … Read more

How to Upgrade to Windows 11 26H2

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As per a recent Microsoft blog post on September 29th, version 26H2 of Windows 11 is now available for devices running 24H2 and 25H2. Like 25H2, it leverages the “enablement package” technology – meaning there’s a chance it takes as little as 2 minutes and a reboot to upgrade. How to Install the 26H2 Enablement Package via Windows Update As per Microsoft, to be one of the first to receive the update, you have to go Settings -> Windows Update, and then ensure that you have the latest option enabled: “Get the latest updates as soon as they’re available” should be marked as On. Once enabled, I recommend clicking “Check for updates” to install any available updates and repeating this … Read more

How to Unlike Pages You’ve Liked in the Past on Facebook (Android)

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If you’ve been on Facebook for a while, you’ve probably noticed that their news feed typically features a mix of the following content: Naturally, paid ads and suggested content may miss their mark in terms of how useful they are. As users, we have some control – we can tap the “X” in the corner of these posts – and we will have an opportunity to point out why we weren’t interested. That may help Facebook show us more useful content later – but of course, there’s no way to opt out of seeing this stuff, it’s how they make money. What we have direct control over, however, is the friends we’re connected to and the pages we’ve liked. I … Read more

How to Make the Developer Tab Visible in Excel

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When you begin to get into the more advanced aspects of Excel, one of the first things you’re told to do is to turn on the Developer tab. This tab allows you to do a few things, including: creating and editing macros, inserting user interface elements like buttons, and accessing the Visual Basic editor. Those topics are a whole world unto themselves, so let’s start by revealing the tab if it’s missing. To do this, let’s first launch Excel. In my screenshot below, you can see that the “Developer” tab isn’t visible along with the other tabs: “File”, “Home”, etc. Let’s change that! Enabling Developer Mode 1) First, we need to right-click the empty space within the ribbon. In my … Read more