Pause scrolling in TweetDeck

TweetDeck is a great tool for keeping your tweets, mentions and searches scrolling past automatically, but if you want to click on a picture or tweet then you don't want it getting pushed off the screen by subsequent updates. To pause scrolling in a column, select it then scroll down a line or two — automatic updates are still applied off screen, but the column won't move until you go back up to the top.

Link to a particular part of a YouTube clip

YouTube is stuffed with sharing options and features, and you can, if you wish, link to a particular part of a certain video. Click "Share" on the video page, then tick the "Start at" box and enter a timestamp. If you don't want to enter a timestamp manually you can click anywhere on the video's progress bar.

The "Share this video" code is automatically updated with the new information and can be copied and pasted wherever you like, so there's no need for your viewers to sit through the whole of Manchester United's latest game if you only want to showcase one particular goal.

Turn off sounds for Facebook notifications

If you've spent any time around the world's most/least favourite social networking site lately, you'll have noticed that each new notification is accompanied by a cheery sound that jumps you out of your slumber and interrupts your current musical playlist of choice.

To switch these sounds off, click the white cog icon on the toolbar at the top of the screen, select Account Settings and then open up the Notifications page. Click the View link at the top then untick the box labelled Play a sound when each new notification is received. Click Save Changes and enjoy the silence.

Paste text without formatting in Google Chrome

If you're copying text into Gmail or Google Drive (or any other website) while using Google Chrome, use Ctrl+Shift+V to strip out all of the formatting and leave just the text.

Find the Startup folder in Windows 8

Long-suffering Windows users will be familiar with opening the Startup folder from All Programs to spot programs that have decided they should be launching at the same time as the operating system. With the new-look Windows 8, the Startup folder is harder to find, but it's still there. In File Explorer browse to:

C:\ Users\ <Username>\ AppData \Roaming\ Microsoft\ Windows\ Start Menu\ Programs\ Startup

Where C: is the drive Windows is installed on and "<Username>" is the name of your user account. You'll then see the list of shortcuts as normal, which can be edited as required. More changes can be made from the new-look Task Manager, which has its own Start-up tab.

View random posts on Tumblr

Every Tumblr blog has a 'randomiser' feature you can access by appending "/random" to the blog's URL. In the case of my Tumblr, it's:

www.voiceofharold.co.uk/random

You can use the same trick on any Tumblr blog to bring up a random post from the archive. Add a page linking to the URL on your Tumblr if you want to keep it as a permanent feature.

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Welcome to a place where I post various tips and tricks. I'll be covering hardware, software, and of course the Internet.