CoNetrix

Blog: General

Windows has a command line tool fsutil which performs file system related tasks.  You must be an administrator on the local machine to use it.  There are a couple of commands that could speed up disk access.

By default, every time a file is accessed, even read, the last access date is updated.  This can be disabled.

fsutil behavior query DisableLastAccess
fsutil behavior set   DisableLastAccess 1

Every file created with a “long” file name, an 8.3 name is created and stored.  This can be disabled. [more]

fsutil 8dot3name query
fsutil 8dot3name scan /s c:
(check log file for registry entries for applications that might break)
fsutil 8dot3name set c: 1

Help text is available by just entering fsutil.  More complete documentation at http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc753059(v=ws.10).

General, Windows 7,
 

There are various chargers for the iPad, iPhone and iPod. They will ALL work, but chosing the wrong charger will result in extended re-charge times.  The iPad should use a 10W power brick, the iPhone and iPod a 5W power brick. Unfortunately, some of the power bricks that look identical are 5W and some are 10W.  You can read the wattage on the 10W power bricks right on the unit, but the information is light grey on white and hard to read. It will NOT damage any device by using the wrong wattage power recharger, but it will be slower if the recharger does not output the correct wattage( e.g. 10W for iPad, 5W for iPhone and iPod).

Remember that the USB port on a computer typically puts out 2.5 watts. [more]

See the complete analysis at:  http://www.macobserver.com/tmo/article/watt_to_know_about_iphone_ipad_power_adapters/

General, iPhone, iPad,
 

One of our Tandem Software users was having difficulty downloading a risk assessment document.  The download would start, run for a while, and then error out.  The user was able to download other documents in our software and we were aware of no other users experiencing this same problem.  The problematic document does take a little longer than other documents to download, but not much and the user has been able to download this document in the past.  After some troubleshooting on the user’s computer we could see the download GET request being initiated, but it was aborting before any results were returned. 

Internet explorer doesn’t expose a timeout setting through the Internet Options.  However, there is a registry key that can be set to control the timeout.  I checked my system and this registry key was not set.  When I checked the user’s registry, the key did exist and it was set to a relatively low value.  The user did not recall setting the value and since the only way I’m aware of changing it is through the registry we’re not sure how it was changed.  Increasing the value in the registry key fixed the problem.

Here are the steps to add/change the timeout registry key: [more]

1. Start Registry Editor
2. Locate the following subkey: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings
3. If a DWORD entry does not exist named “ReceiveTimeout” then create one.
4. Set the “ReceiveTimeout” value to a number of milliseconds.
5. Restart the computer

General, IE, IE9,
 

In Windows XP there was the advanced file type options which could be changed to open each Excel file in a new instance of Excel. In Windows 7 that advanced option is not available. So, when mulple Excel spreadsheets are opened in Office 2007/2010 on a Windows 7 system, all will open in the same instance. A solution is available, but it involves making lile changes in the registry. I recommend making back up for just in case.  Then follow these steps: [more]

  1. start -> run -> regedit
  2. Go to  HKEY_CLASSES_ ROOT/ Excel.Sheet.8/ shell/Open/command
  3. Double Click on (Default) and write "C:\Program Files\Microso Office\Office12 \EXCEL.EXE" /e "% 1" for Office 2007 or "C:\Program Files\Microso Office\Office14 \EXCEL.EXE" /e "% 1" for Office 2010.
  4. Right Click on Command, choose "rename", and add something to the name (for example 2 (command2))  
  5. Go to HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT/Excel.Sheet.8/ shell/Open/ ddeexec
  6. Right Click on the folder ddeexec, choose "rename", and add something to the name (for example 2 (ddeexec2))
  7. Go to HKEY_CLASSES_RO OT/Excel.Sheet.12/ shell/Open/command 
  8. Double Click on (Default) and write "C:\Program Files\Microso Office\Office12 \EXCEL.EXE" /e "% 1" for Office 2007 or  "C:\Program Files\Microso Office\Office14 \EXCEL.EXE" /e "% 1" for Office 2010. 
  9. Right Click on Command, choose "rename", and add something to the name  (for example 2 (command2)). 

No restart is needed. Excel will now open a new instance for each file opened. I have found that opening mulple .csv files will stay in the same instance, but all .xslx files will open in their own instance. 

General, Windows 7, Office 2010,
 

If you ever need to copy some text from one machine to another and they both have Internet access, then you can use dontpad.com.  Create your own path, save anything there and then copy it anywhere.  Of course there is no privacy policy, service level agreement, or anything like that.  You can also use this to share information with others.  If you want to keep the data private, encrypt it.  Here’s how easy it is on Linux  or Windows with Cygwin installed (and probably OS X):

cat | ccrypt -K <your secret key> -e | base64
<your plain text goes here>
^D

Paste into http://dontpad.com/<any path>, copy to destination.

cat | base64 -d | ccrypt -d -K <your secret key>
<your encrypted text goes here>
^D

General, Linux, Windows 7,
 

I was running out of disk space on the C: drive of my laptop recently. I used WinDirStat to look for some files that could be removed to free up space.  It was immediately apparent that most of my free space had been taken up by a couple of virtual machine images I had been working on. However, I also noticed a large chunk of space being taken up by the Windows 7 hibernation file (hiberfil.sys). 

The hiberfil.sys file is used to dump the contents of RAM when the laptop goes into hibernation, so it has to be almost the same size as the amount of RAM in the laptop (I guess some compression takes place). As we add more and more RAM to our laptops, more and more disk space will be eaten up by hiberfil.sys. For example, a laptop with 8 GB of RAM may have a hibefil.sys file taking up about 6 GB on the hard drive. Since I don’t use hibernation on my laptop (just sleep and shutdown), I searched for a way to get rid of the file without making Windows angry. The answer is pretty simple. You just open a command prompt with administrator privileges and run “powercfg –h off”. Windows hibernation is now disabled. Your hiberfil.sys file will be gone and the “Hibernation” option will be removed from the Start menu (see screenshot below). [more]

General, Windows 7,
 

Since switching to our Lync phones, I have wanted to use my Jawbone Bluetooth headset with the soft phone on my computer. The soft phone could be very useful when onsite with a customer where I may not have a cell phone signal, but can connect to the customer’s Internet. My headset would connect to the built in Bluetooth radio in my laptop, but would not show up in Lync. I had a USB Bluetooth adapter and decided to install it and see if I could then use my headset with Lync. Using the USB Bluetooth radio, I can connect my headset and use it with Lync. It appears that Lync only allows devices connected to a USB or mic/speaker port to be used with the soft phone. Here are the steps I used to connect my Jawbone Icon to my laptop and use it as my mic/speaker for Lync. [more]

  1. Install USB Bluetooth radio (ASUS USB-BT21 – purchased on Amazon for about $10)
    • Install drivers as necessary (may get a yellow warning sign until after step 3
  2. Open Device Manager > Bluetooth Radios > Disable any onboard Bluetooth radios
  3. Reboot PC to activate USB Bluetooth Adapter
  4. Pair Bluetooth headset to USB Bluetooth Adapter
  5. Go to Audio Device Settings
  6. Change the Speaker and Microphone to use the Headset
  7. Test calls several feet away from your computer so you can ensure the voice is not being picked up by the laptop’s onboard microphone
  8. Now each time you connect/power on your Bluetooth headset, you will see in the bottom left corner of Lync and it should be called Custom Device
    • The volume on the headset is controlled by the speaker volume on the computer. The volume will probably need to be turned up pretty high.
General, Lync,
 

One of our users was having trouble opening an e-mail attachment that was sent from one of our software applications.  It looked like some kind of permission problem.  When he tried to preview it, it would just say the file cannot be previewed because of an error in the PDF Preview Handler.  If he tried to open it, it would say that it could not save the attachment.  He was previously able to open them without receiving the error.  I found that when you open Outlook attachments, it usually saves them in a randomly named folder under this path:

%userprofile%\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Temporary Internet Files\Content.Outlook

This location can be changed with a registry edit.  Since that Temporary Internet Files folder is a special folder, you cannot drill down to this; you must paste or type it into explorer (or your favorite command prompt).

I'm sure you've seen how Windows will create a file with a number in parentheses if a file by that name already exists?  The problem in Grant’s case is that the attachments being e-mailed to him were all named Attachment.pdf, so they were being named Attachment.pdf(1), Attachment.pdf(2), etc.  It seems like the limit was 199 of these renamed files on Grant’s machine.  I have not been able to determine how this limit is determined, and it does not seem to be the same everywhere.  Cleaning out that folder solved his issue (at least until he gets the 200th e-mail again).

General, Outlook, Windows 7,
 

I was troubleshooting something on my phone a while back and through the process, I had realized that I should flush the DNS cache on my phone. The problem was, however, I had no idea how to go about doing that. Of course, I could just reboot the phone and be done with it, but that took time and if I had to do it multiple times, it quickly became impractical. Instead, I stumbled upon a much simpler solution: put the phone in airplane mode. This completely disables all network connectivity until you drop out of airplane mode again and has the natural side effect of flushing the DNS cache of the phone.

General, Apple, iPhone, DNS,
 

An article by lifehacker (http://lifehacker.com/5896093/use-an-analog-alarm-clock-to-disable-forced-screensavers) showed how someone discovered a new use for an analog alarm clock.  The second hand registers as movement if the mouse is placed on top of the clock (see picture below) when not in use.

So, if you are inspecting the workplace and see a mouse perched on top of a clock, this may be the reason. [more]

General, website, tools,