Blog: Windows 7

Using Windows Powershell, you can get timestamps for creation, last access, and last write times. 

Examples:

• PS>$(Get-Item ).creationtime=$(Get-Date "mm/dd/yyyy hh:mm am/pm")
• PS>$(Get-Item ).lastaccesstime=$(Get-Date "mm/dd/yyyy hh:mm am/pm")
• PS>$(Get-Item ).lastwritetime=$(Get-Date "mm/dd/yyyy hh:mm am/pm")

Another thing that the Powershell can be used for is setting the timestamps to whatever value you want.  It can be future or past.

Here is an example of setting the last write time of file “test.txt” to 1-1-2020:

• PS>$(get-item test.txt).lastwritetime=$(set-date "01/01/2020")

I recently wanted change the offline files cache location in Windows 7.  Instead of the default location of C:\Windows\CSC, I wanted the offline files to be stored on my D: drive.  After checking around the Internet, I found several articles stating that moving offline files worked in XP, but didn’t work in Vista or Windows 7.  In the end, I found this blog post.  It worked.  However, I made one modification – I cleared the cache prior to moving the cache location and did not delete the original cache location after moving it.  My reasoning was 1) I wanted to clear the cache in order get rid of any residual offline files and 2) taking ownership and deleting a folder in the Windows directory seems like asking for trouble (besides I might need to move the cache back at some point). 

In order to clear the cache, add a DWORD registry key named FormatDatabase to HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\CSC\Parameters, set the key to a value of 1, and reboot.  One word of warning, do not set both the FormatDatabase registry key and CacheLocation registry key mentioned in the blog at the same time and reboot.  Windows blue screened on me during the reboot.  I had to boot into safe mode and remove the CacheLocation registry key in order to avoid the blue screen.  The correct sequence is clear the cache, reboot, change the cache location, reboot.

A customer who has switch completely to PDF format for document storage, has a need to access Tagged Image File Format (TIFF/TIF) documents from prior years. They recently ungraded all their systems to Windows 7 with Office 2007. Previously they used Office 2007 which installed the Microsoft Document Imaging program by default. The default install of Office 2007 sets the Microsoft Document Imaging program to install and run on first use. However, the first use is to access an MDI format file and have installation permission. They do not have installation permission and never access MDI files. Because it is not installed users are unable to reorder, rotate and print individual pages of a TIFF/TIF document. This means in order to print page 20 of a 65 page document you must print all the pages.

To resolve this issue, install the Microsoft Office Document Imaging program. To do this, follow these steps: [more]

1. Click Start, click Run, type “appwiz.cpl’, and then click OK.
2. In the Currently installed programs list, click the 2007 Office version that you have installed.
3. Click Change.
4. Click Add or Remove features, and then click Continue.
5. Expand Office Tools.
6. Click Microsoft Office Document Imaging, and then click Run all from My Computer.
7. Click Continue.

You then need to change the TIFF and TIF file associations to open using Microsoft Document Imaging.

1. Click Start, click Run, type “control /name Microsoft.DefaultPrograms”, and then click OK.
2. Click Associate a file type or protocol with a program, scroll down to TIF and TIFF.
3. Highlight TIF and Click Change program.
4. Click Browse, and  enter “C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\MODI\12.0\” in the address bar then enter.
5. Select MSPVIE.EXE and Click Open, Ok
6. Perform steps 3-5 for TIFF
7. Click Close.

You can then reorder, rotate and print individual pages of TIFF/TIF documents.

Microsoft Office Picture Manager (and iPhoto on the Mac) has a feature which helps organize digital photos.  In order to organize photos it is most helpful to be able to rename them, but renaming them is tedious if you have many photos.

If you are running Windows and have Microsoft Office 2007 installed the Picture Manager should be under All Programs -> Microsoft Office -> Microsoft Office Tools -> Microsoft Office Picture Manager.  In Microsoft Office Picture Manager all you have to do to easily rename photos is open a folder of photos, select more than one, right click on one of the selected photos and choose Rename.  A work panel will open which allows you to enter a name which will be applied to all the selected photos as well as options for defining sequential numbering. [more]

For us in the CoNetrix Information Security group, we have many site photos to store after an audit. This renaming feature allows us to organize the images by branch name (fcblfxx) with the application filling in the “xx.”  Quick and easy.   For personal photos naming will probably involve using a description of an event like “2010Christmasxx” or “10thBirthdayxx.”

When entering commands at the Windows command prompt or creating Windows batch files that run under cmd.exe, you can use the caret character (^) to quote special characters.  This means it can be used at end of a line to continue commands.  This makes batch files much more readable and maintainable.

You can also use an ampersand (&) to separate multiple commands on the same line and every command will be executed.  If you use && between commands, the second command will only be executed if the first command completes with a successful status.  You can also use two vertical bars (||) between commands and the second command will only be executed if the first command completes with a unsuccessful status.

The time would not stay synchronized on my Windows 7 machine.  It looked like it was configured to sync with DC3, but it was not working.  After some research I found a hotfix, http://support.microsoft.com/kb/978714, that fixed it.  I used this command to configure the time synchronization:

w32tm /config /manualpeerlist:time-a.timefreq.bldrdoc.gov /update /syncfromflags:manual

See http://support.microsoft.com/kb/223184 for additional settings in the registry.  This KB article is for Windows 2000.  I could not find a KB article for Windows 7, but I think most of these settings still work.  There are other documents from Microsoft about this, but I just liked this KB article best.

While debugging a problem that required uploading files to a website, one of the files started getting an error at the start of the upload instead of at the end.  This didn’t make sense because the problem being debugged was after the file was uploaded to the website.  This looked like another problem instead of the original problem we were hunting.   We suspected that the problem was connected to the file being uploaded instead of the website.  When we looked for the file on the Desktop it wasn’t there.  This was odd.  Went back to Internet Explorer and the file was displayed in Internet Explorer’s  file dialog.   But the file was not on the Desktop.  We tried closing Internet Explorer and restarting, but Internet Explorer still showed the phantom file. 

It turns out this is an artifact of Internet Explorer’s sandbox implementation on Vista or Windows 7.  Under certain conditions Internet Explorer writes to a virtualized Desktop folder located on the file system at: C:\Users\xxx\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Temporary Internet Files\Virtualized\C\Users\xxx\Desktop.  If you have need to move or remove the files in the “Virtualized” directory, the easiest solution is to open the file browser dialog in Internet Explorer and then move or delete the files from inside that dialog. [more]

More information is available in a article by Mark Russinovich: http://blogs.technet.com/markrussinovich/archive/2009/02/03/3174194.aspx

Bomgar allows us to work on our customer’s desktop if they have an Internet connection. A small applet is installed on their desktop when the session is started and de-installed at the conclusion of the support session. However, with UAC on Windows 7 and Vista, it is frequently a frustration for us to work at the administrator level on their computer. There is a little icon at the top of the screen presented after the connection is established that will alleviate this issue. The following uTube video describes how to instantiate this feature: [more]

www.5min.com/Video/Bomgar-Training-06-Remote-Vista-Support-and-Elevate-to-Admin-39200366

There was a conflict between the Lenovo fingerprint software and PGP whole disk encryption on T400s and T500s.  If the Lenovo fingerprint software is installed, using your domain password at the PGP boot prompt didn't work and you could lock yourself out.  You'd have to use a one time password to boot.
Under Windows 7, fingerprint drivers are native and, if you enable the fingerprint reader and enroll your fingerprints, it works fine with PGP WDE.