Games

Step-By-Step: Find Software Easter Eggs

Find Software Easter EggsUncover the well-hidden treats in your software. Happy hunting!Stan MiatkowskiFor a quick break from your serious computer work, try accessing the Easter eggs that programmers have tucked inside many applications and utilities. These hidden goodies range from mundane lists of the program's developers to unusual messages, eye-popping graphics, hidden features, and even entertaining games. All provide a short diversion from your otherwise-productive day.Nobody knows who coined the term Easter egg, but it's a fitting description. All Easter eggs are well hidden, and to find them you must type a series of specific--and sometimes complicated--keystrokes.Below you'll find some examples of the most popular Windows-based Easter eggs and instructions on how to access them. We've mixed the simple with the complex. And we've shown only a couple of screens because part of the fun of finding Easter eggs is in seeing the results.One caveat, though: Easter eggs depend heavily on specific versions of applications. If you've patched or updated the application with a service pack, the egg may be cracked and no longer accessible. So if it doesn't work, don't blame us. To see if your specific applications have Easter eggs, check out Eeggs.com or Egg Heaven 2000. Another popular trend these days involves hiding away Easter eggs in DVD movie discs. You can find out all about them at Dvdeasteregg.com.Stan Miastkowski is a PC World contributing editor. Contact him at stan_miastkowski@pcworld.com. Click here for past Step-By-Step columns.Adobe Photoshop 6.0: Venus in Furs Every new version of software has an internal code name while it's under development. In the case of Adobe Photoshop version 6.0, the moniker was "Venus in Furs." The illustration of Venus (in feline form) is still there, and relatively easy to access. But there's more in this two-part Easter egg: You can also read dozens of "secret messages" from the development staff team that scroll below the cat illustration. To see the cat:
  • Open Photoshop 6.0.
  • Press and hold Ctrl-Alt.
  • Drop down the Help menu and click About Photoshop.
    • To see the secret messages:
  • Follow the steps above to access the cat.
  • Wait a few seconds for the credits below the cat illustration to start scrolling.
  • Press and hold down Alt.
  • Click the cat's big eye.
  • Press and hold down Ctrl.
  • Release Alt.
    •      Microsoft Excel 2000: Racing A full-fledged game is hidden in the first release of Excel 2000. (It was removed in SR1 and SR2.) Follow these steps to access a racing game similar to Spy Hunter.  
  • Open Excel 2000 with a blank worksheet.
  • Select File, Save as Web Page.
  • In the Save As dialog box, choose Selection: Sheet, check Add interactivity, and click Publish.
  • Click Publish in the 'Publish as Web Page' dialog box.
  • Close Excel, declining to save the worksheet.
  • Open Internet Explorer.
  • Choose File, Open, click Browse, and open the file you just saved.
  • Click in the spreadsheet, and hold Page Down to go to row 2000.
  • Click the gray header to select row 2000.
  • Use Tab to move the active cell pointer to cell WC2000.
  • Hold down Ctrl-Alt-Shift and click the Office logo in the upper left corner.
  • If you've come this far, congratulations! Use the arrow keys to navigate, the spacebar to fire, O to drop an oil slick, H to turn on your headlights, and Esc to quit playing.
    • Microsoft Word: Dummy TextA simple programming language comes built into Microsoft Word. One Word Basic command can fill a page with dummy type.
  • Start a new document.
  • Type =rand(x) in which x is a number from 0 to 200.
  • Press Enter, and you'll see the sentence "The quick brown fox jumped over the fence" repeated five times per paragraph in x number of paragraphs.
    •      Netscape: Book of MozillaWe've saved our easiest Easter egg for last. Hidden inside Mozilla-derived browsers like Netscape is the "Book of Mozilla," chock-full of vaguely Biblical-sounding off-the-wall quotations. The quotation you'll see depends on the version of the browser you use.
  • Open Netscape or Mozilla.
  • Click the location box, or press Ctrl-L to bring up the location dialog box. Then type about:mozilla and press Enter.
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