Shorten the path in your PowerShell prompt

Anyone who has used PowerShell is familiar with how it shows the current working directory in the prompt as below:
PS C:\Documents and Settings\Mike\PowerShell\Scripts>
This is all well and good until you’re knee deep in directories (or registry keys, or the structure of any another provider) and the prompt is taking up more than half of the [...]

PowerShell Execution Policy: RemoteSigned

Of the execution policies allowed by PowerShell, RemoteSigned provides the greatest degree of flexibility while still providing a measure of security.  But the implications of RemoteSigned are not well explained by the PowerShell documentation.  I will endeavor to explain this setting fully here.
Downloaded Files
Windows XP SP2 and later and Windows Server 2003 SP1 added the [...]