If you’re not familiar with WinDirStat, you should be.  It’s a fabulous little utility that makes it a cinch to visualize the amount of drive space your files are taking up.  It’s currently listed on Scott Hanselman’s 2011 Ultimate Developer and Power Users Tool List for Windows (and has been on his list of top tools for several years).  Here’s a screeny to get you excited.

At the top you see your folders, sorted by size, largest to smallest.  At the bottom is the really cool part.  Is shows you all of your files represented by rectangles.  The larger the rectangle, the larger the file.  When you click on a rectangle, it finds the file in the top section so you can see what it is and how much space it’s using.  This makes it ridiculously easy to find and delete those huge files that you may have forgotten you have (like old MIX videos for instance).

In the screenshot, the users appears to be running WinDirStat to scan the whole drive, but you can specify a folder name to only search that folder.

This is the part that I felt the need to tweak.  As it is, every time you want to scan a folder, you have to open WinDirStat and fill in the information on that dialog.  What I wanted was a way I could just right-click a folder in Explorer and select a WinDirStat Here command and have it run on that folder.

Here’s how I did it.

1. Go to Start –> Run (or window-R) and run RegEdit (of course, you should already be aware that editing your registry can be dangerous so if something breaks, you were warned).  Drill down to HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Directory\shell. 
2. Right-click on shell and select the option New –> Key and give it a name.  I named mine windirstat.
3. Look to the right-hand side of the window and double click the (Default) string and set it’s name to WinDirStat Here (or whatever you want it to show up as in the context menu).
4. Now right-click the windirstat key and add a New –> Key.  Name this one command.
5. Select the new command key and look at the right-hand side of the window.  Double-click the (Default) value and set it’s Value data to
6. “C:\Program Files (x86)\WinDirStat\WinDirStat.exe” “%1″
7. and include the double-quotes (you may, of course, have to adjust the path to windirstat.exe based on your particular setup).

That’s it.  Now just open an Explorer window and right-click on a folder.

For reference, here’s my exported .reg file containing all of the above.  You can save this in a new text file and right-click it to merge it into your registry (again, you’ve been warned that bad things can happen if you muck with the registry).

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Directory\shell\windirstat]
@=”WinDirStat Here”

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Directory\shell\windirstat\command]
@=”\”C:\\Program Files (x86)\\WinDirStat\\windirstat.exe\” \”%1\”"

We gathered last week over lunch to hear our own Mike Hurd describe his new role in the company which involves managing process for how we do work.

Processes for any company are important; but when you are growing quickly in a fast moving industry like software, More →

This post is intended to help companies and individuals understand their options when they are faced with getting a quality software application/website built on time and on budget using a third party.

This is part 1 of a 2 part series in exploring the advantages and disadvantages associated with local outsourcing, offshoring, nearshoring and onshoring of software development. I will explain what all these terms mean as well as when it’s the right time to use a local company or go offshore/nearshore for building your software application/website.

*Disclaimer – This post is based on my own experiences and observations while working in the business of software development.

The Problem

You have a new software application/website you want to build or an existing application you need to enhance and you’ve chosen to have it built by a third party. Whether your are an established company, small business or an individual, you probably fall into 1 of these 3 categories: More →

The time is here again in Louisville to gather 500 of the best software developers from around the country for a few days in March.

We are a proud sponsor of CodepaLOUsa again this year and are looking forward to hosting 58 guest speakers covering almost 70 breakout sessions. Tickets are going fast, so head on over and get yours while you can. If you are interested in sponsoring, let me know.

Also, a big shout to Jay Garmon at Louisville Digital Association for helping us get the word out to his audience.

You can tell he has studied how Steve Jobs gave presentations.
More →