If you’ve spent any time looking at Windows 8’s Defender interface, you’ve likely noticed that it doesn’t include any options for scheduling a scan. While Windows Defender provides most of it’s protection in real-time, if you’re like us, you’ll want a back-up scan occurring regularly. Though the user interface does in fact omit a simple way to schedule a scan, this option exists within the Windows 8 Task Scheduler. Read on and we’ll show you how to get the job done.

Do you need to frequently run applications which require administrative permissions, but each time you run them, you have to go through a UAC (User Account Control) prompt? If that's the case, well... there are several solutions (some more complex than others) which allow you to run these programs without the UAC prompts and without turning off UAC. In this article we will demonstrate a solution that uses the Task Scheduler.

After two articles on how to create a task, for both beginners and advanced users, I continue our series on Task Scheduler with a tutorial about the commands which can be executed on an already created task. More precisely, I will show how to run a task on demand, how to end, disable, import, export and delete an existing task. I will share details on what are the effects of each of these commands, together with usage examples so you can make the best of this powerful tool - Task Scheduler.

In a recent review of Microsoft Security Essentials it was discovered that an option to wake the computer to perform a scheduled scan did not exist. There is a way to force the computer to wake up and complete a scan but it involves editing the scheduled task within Windows 7. This tutorial will take you through the steps required to get this done.

Recently, we've covered how to create a basic task using Task Scheduler's 4-steps wizard. Now it is time to address the topic of creating advanced tasks, for those of you who want to have maximum control. Task Scheduler is one of the most powerful tools that Windows 7 has to offer so, be prepared for a large range of choices which allow you to set up every possible detail about a task.

In my previous article I've shown what Task Scheduler does, how to navigate between existing tasks and see all the properties of a task. The next step is to show how to create a task. Task Scheduler provides you with two ways of creating a task: using a simple wizard or, by setting up all the properties of a task, allowing you to customize more thoroughly the new task. In this tutorial I will guide you through all the actions required by the 'Create Basic Task' wizard, using simple examples.

With this article I will start a small series about the Task Scheduler tool. First, I will present what Task Scheduler is and what it is capable of doing. I will also show how to navigate the interface of the program in order to read and understand information connected to an existing task. In future articles I will show how to do all possible tasks with Task Scheduler. Click on Read more to check out the basics about this tool.