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Posted by jpluimers on 2012/05/14
A few tools to prevent your screensaver to run:
Windows (most seem to work with Windows 7 too)
Mac OS X
Note: on Windows 7 this will not prevent the inactivity timer on an RDP connetion!
–jeroen
via: windows xp – How to prevent screensaver – Super User.
Note: no need to write it yourself 
Posted in OS X Leopard, OS X Lion, OS X Snow Leopard, Power User, Windows, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows Vista, Windows XP | Leave a Comment »
Posted by jpluimers on 2012/05/11
The “route print” command in Windows will show you some “On-link” entries in the gateway column. This is from Windows Vista and up. Before that, you would see “127.0.0.1″.
While creating Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008, Microsoft built a “Next Generation TCP/IP Stack” (Wikipedia link) that – apart from adding IPv6 – added many new features and performance improvements.
Since traffic routable through the local machine can have multiple IPv4 and IPv6 addresses, it is not called ” 127.0.0.1″ any more, but “On-link” as the answers to the windows 7 – What does “On-link” mean on the result of “rout print” command? on SuperUser nicely point out:
They are addresses that can be resolved locally. They don’t need a gateway because they dont need to be routed.
Yep, the other three answers are correct: it’s just a route thats directly reachable the NIC is in direct contact with it; on the same subnet. To explain a little further though: by contrast, the routes that have a gateway IP listed must be contacted through that gateway.
Note that sometimes the new TCP/IP stack needs some arm wrestling in order to have it do what you want (for instance to have it honour TCP metrics).
Note that the “default gateway” line is also missing, as it is in the 0.0.0.0 network destination.
A few examples of what route print shows: Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Power User, Windows, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows Vista, Windows XP | Leave a Comment »
Posted by jpluimers on 2012/05/09
A few notes on TLIST.EXE:
This is what I downloaded as I prefer ISO files prefer web-installers:
I got there through these pages (in reverse chronological order)
–jeroen
Posted in Debugging, Development, Power User, Software Development, Windows, Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP | 1 Comment »
Posted by jpluimers on 2012/04/23
Someone forgot to kick the VDI instances in the farm to perform an automatic reboot.
Patch Tuesdays only work when you make sure that mandatory reboots are actually being done.
That also prevents users of getting confused by these System Modal dialogs:
[System Restart Required]
A newly installed program requires this computer to be restarted.
Please save your work and restart your computer. Your computer needs to be restarted by wo 11-4-2012 2:43.
[Restart Now] [Close]
and
[Restart Alert]
A system restart cannot be completed while another software installation is in progress. Please allow the software installation to complete before attempting a system restart.
[OK]
–jeroen
Posted in Power User, Windows, Windows XP | Leave a Comment »
Posted by jpluimers on 2012/04/20
The VDI recently it is driving me nuts with sudden disconnects and messages like these after you have been connected for a couple of hours.
It all looks like there is some sort of Connectra thing in the middle that does deep packet inspection and randomly kicks out RDP or PCoIP sessions it doesn’t like, then doesn’t allow any new sessions to come in.
If I get a connection at all, now I always get a fresh VM, which – because they all are single core – take between 2 and 3 hours of getting below 100% CPU usage.
CcmExec.exe, SMSCliUI.exe, and the svchost.exe instances for RpcSs and BITS hog the CPU scanning for updates and software installs for about about 25% of a working day.
Boy I wish there was something I could do about it.
---------------------------
Remote Desktop Disconnected
---------------------------
A licensing error occurred while the client was attempting to connect (Licensing timed out).
Please try connecting to the remote computer again.
---------------------------
OK Help
---------------------------
Posted in Power User, Windows, Windows XP | Leave a Comment »
Posted by jpluimers on 2012/04/13
Recently I was at a site where the KB2509553 security update on Windows XP would not install because of this error, even after retrying a couple of times:
---------------------------
KB2509553 Setup Error
---------------------------
Setup cannot update your Windows XP files because the languageinstalled on your system is different from the update language.
---------------------------
OK
---------------------------
The error came from the Dutch version of Microsoft Update and the (also Dutch) Autoupdate inside Windows XP.
The solution that seemed easy didn’t work:
Manually download the Dutch version at the KB2509553 download page, and install that one.
Thanks Halima S for mentioning this on the Microsoft Answers site.
So: where should I start looking to get this security update installed?
–jeroen
Posted in Power User, Windows, Windows XP | Leave a Comment »
Posted by jpluimers on 2012/04/04
Thanks to Randy Glasbergen for the debt image
I love this quote from Jeff Attwood on technical debt in 2009:
periodically pay down your technical debt
and the Computer Weekely article about half a year ago:
Short-term speed may come at the price of long-term delays and cost.
Lately, I find that I need to explain Debt in relation to IT and Software Development more and more often.
We now all know what happens with the financial system when we let debt get out of control.
The same holds for your IT and Software Development.
Debts get introduced by not “playing by the rules”. The quotes are there because you can not always play nicely, and the rules are not always clear or known.
Lets give a few examples of rules that – from experience at clients – are more often than not neglected. The examples are based on Windows, but could just as easily be Mac OS X, Unix, OS/400 or anything else.
These few were examples ranged from technically very broad to specific. There are more, but these will give you a rough idea how wide the field of debt can be. Even debt outside the realm of Technical Debt can turn out to be really expensive.
Every time you postpone or skip a Windows version, you collect some debt in the hope (often wrongfully called expectation) that you earn more on the money/resource you just didn’t invest and putting that money/resource to use otherwise. The same holds for any other kind of debt.
The main problem with debt is not the total of the debt, it is the interest rate that makes the accrued debt grows faster than most people and organizations realize.
This is actually one of the main causes of the current world wide financial crisis, the same holds for many IT debts.
And for all kinds of debts, you often don’t know how high the interest rate will be, so the accrued value can be way beyond what you expect.
I’ve regularly seen projects collecting so much debt, that migration costs raised to thousands of hours because of it, resulting into management taking another very bad decision: rewriting the stuff from scratch. Don’t do that: Joel on Software excellently describes what happens when you do that.
What to do about it?
You might say “don’t collect debt”, but you can’t always avoid debt.
So you need to build periods where you pay off accrued debt. And you need to do that regularly, in order to avoid the interest pitfall.
This does not limit itself to software development (though that’s what I normally focus at). It covers a wide range of IT topics.
Sometimes, you can even pay your debt in advance. For instance, I was among the first to switch from Windows XP to the x64 of Windows Vista. I knew it would cause pain, but it immediately payed back by being able to use much more memory, and run more Virtual Machines at the same time. That made me more flexible and productive.
–jeroen
Posted in *nix, .NET, Delphi, Development, Opinions, Power User, Software Development, Windows, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows Vista, Windows XP | 5 Comments »
Posted by jpluimers on 2012/03/15
If you have RDP open on one or more of your computers, you should have patched your machines by now:
vulnerabilities in Microsoft’s implementation of the Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) [...] a Critical, remote code execution vulnerability affecting all versions of Windows. This blog post shares additional information with the following goals:
- To strongly encourage you to make a special priority of applying this particular update;
- To give you an option to harden your environment until the update can be applied.
–jeroen
Posted in Power User, Windows, Windows 7, Windows Server 2003, Windows Server 2008, Windows Vista, Windows XP | Leave a Comment »
Posted by jpluimers on 2012/03/02
About a week ago, version v3.3.4.14431 of Beyond Compare was release by Scooter Software.
For me, this is the ultimate comparison tool as it runs on Windows and Linux natively or under WINE on Mac OS.
It has a massive change list:
-----------------------------------
v3.3.4.14431 February 24, 2012
-----------------------------------
- Notable Changes
- Fixed context menus on newer versions of Konqueror, Thunar, and Nautilus.
- FILE-REPORT (and TEXT-REPORT, etc.) commands will now accept a saved file
compare session name instead of a pair of files. E.g., "file-report
layout:side-by-side output-to:printer MySession".
- Archives
- Fixed extracting files where a single deflate block contains more than 1MB
of data.
- Fixed zips showing non-existent files if a zip contained another zip and
the outer one had additional data after the archive comment.
- Attempting to extract a file from a zip using an unsupported compression
algorithm now shows that as an error.
- Split up zip error messages for "Error during extraction" and "Unsupported
compression algorithm".
- Data Compare
- Fixed "Extract HTML table(s)" handling of UTF-16 files.
- File Formats
- OpenOffice default character encoding is now UTF-8.
- Fixed "COBOL Source" format to include "Identifier" definition.
- "Picture Files" format added CUT, GED, MSK, PFR, and TUB to mask, removed
PAL.
- File Views
- Fixed saving files with paths between 247-259 characters long.
- Fixed foreground selection coloring when using white on blue system colors.
- Added key accelerators to "Save changes" dialog.
- Folder Compare
- Long file operations will now keep Windows from going to sleep due to
inactivity.
- Using "Compare to" to open a file view and then using "Next/Previous
Difference Files" now closes the file view.
- FTP
- Fixed support for FTP listings with filenames containing Chinese
month/year characters.
- Fixed parsing Comau C5G FTP listings.
- Home View
- When editing a session, dropped files/folders are ignored unless they're
on a path edit.
- Expand All and Collapse All commands now affect the shared and auto-saved
sessions nodes.
- Fixed behavior when using "Collapse All" hides the currently selected
session.
- Linux
- Fixed context menus on newer versions of Konqueror, Thunar, and Nautilus.
- Fixed Folder Compare crash when performing rules-based comparisons.
- Fixed clicking the "Next Difference Files" link on the message panel when
using "Next Difference" at the end of a comparison.
- Fixed various comboboxes incorrectly allowing editing.
- Misc
- Fixed menu checkboxes not showing on Vista and Windows 7 when using the
Classic Theme.
- Dropping files/folders onto a path edit no longer changes the edit if the
drop results in a new view.
- Added "RE Examples" buttons to Grammar Item dialog.
- Improved Open/Save dialog handling of file type options.
- Options
- "Customize Commands" dialog's "Default" command now checks to see if
shortcut is already in use.
- Picture Compare
- "Difference Offset", "Flip", and "Rotate" are now persistent session
settings.
- Fixed handling of DIB, MSK, and RLE bitmap files.
- Registry Compare
- Fixed loading .reg files with a '\' before hex data.
- Fixed loading .reg files with a ']' in a key name.
- Scripting
- FILE-REPORT (and TEXT-REPORT, etc.) commands will now accept a saved file
compare session name instead of a pair of files. E.g., "file-report
layout:side-by-side output-to:printer MySession".
- LOG command will now create the target folder if it doesn't exist.
- Fixed support for STRIKEOUT-RIGHT-ORPHANS in TEXT-REPORT command.
–jeroen
via: Beyond Compare ChangeLog
Posted in *nix, Power User, Windows, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows Server 2003, Windows Server 2008, Windows Vista, Windows XP | Leave a Comment »
Posted by jpluimers on 2012/02/08
Most Batch files for detecting Windows versions try to parse the either the output from VER or the output from SYSTEMINFO, but forget that there many Windows installations are not English. Some even use WMIC, but WMIC is only available for administrators and not available some flavours like XP Home.
Languages issues are always important to watch for. The Dutch Windows XP returns Microsoft Windows XP [versie 5.1.2600] which is just one word different from the English Microsoft Windows XP [Version 5.1.2600]. Other languages may differ even more.
This batch file tries to circumvent the language differences, uses VER and works at least with Dutch and English Windows versions of XP and 7, most likely with many other languages and versions as well.
On a Windows XP SP3 machine, it lists WindowsVersion=5.1.2600 and on a Windows 7 SP1 machine it lists WindowsVersion=6.1.7601.
One possible addition would be to detect x64 or x86.
The detection assumes that VER will emit the version in [angle] brackets, and uses two batch file for loops to get the text in between them using the tokens and delims for loop parameters in the first for loop right behind the begin label and the second for loop right after the parse1 label.
Then it splits the remaining text using spaces at the parse2 label, and takes the right most portion using the shift command at the parse3 label.
Many thanks to Rob van der Woude for a lot of interesting batch file documentation. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Batch-Files, Power User, Scripting, Software Development, Windows, Windows 7, Windows XP | Leave a Comment »
Posted by jpluimers on 2012/02/07
When Google searching, most results for the Outlook 2003 Signature Folder Location AppData give you the wrong folder.
They mix environment keys like UserName, UserProfile, but should use AppData as that has been the base since at least Windows XP.
This is the correct folder for any Outlook version (2003, 2010, etc): %appdata%\Microsoft\Signatures
Making sure you use the right environment variable is very important, especially in large Windows based environments that often use roaming profiles and a mix of Windows environments.
For instance, at a client they have a mixed environment of Windows XP and Windows 7, with separate AppData locations for the two on a LAN:
There is a very nice Wikipedia article on the Windows Environment variable that explains this situation in the synopsis.
–jeroen
Posted in Batch-Files, Development, Power User, Scripting, Software Development, Windows, Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP | Leave a Comment »
Posted by jpluimers on 2012/01/06
Currently most software installers have a small bootstrap and during the actuall install will download only the files that are actually needed.
Often that is not convenient: slow or no network connection, repeated installs in a test environment, etc.
Luckily, a lot of software does have an offline installer (a.k.a. standalone installer).
Being no exception Google Chrome has two offline installers: one single user install, and one for all users on the same Windows machine.
It ends up at one of these download pages, each with a download link for the current version (which changes for every new version):
–jeroen
via: Alternate (offline) Google Chrome installer (Windows) – Google Help.
Posted in LifeHacker, Power User, Windows, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows Vista, Windows XP | 1 Comment »
Posted by jpluimers on 2011/12/23
Sometimes you want to know which SP is installed on Windows with built-in tools only.
For end-users the fastest way is to start Winver, it will give you dialogs like these (left: XP with SP3, right: Windows 7 without any SP):
For command-line lovers, the one I like this most is this:
systeminfo | findstr /B /C:"OS Name" /C:"OS Version"
systeminfo can show a truckload of information, and findstr condenses this to what I need.
On Windows XP SP3, it shows this:
OS Name: Microsoft Windows XP Professional
OS Version: 5.1.2600 Service Pack 3 Build 2600
On vanilla Windows 7, it shows this:
OS Name: Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate
OS Version: 6.1.7600 N/A Build 7600
–jeroen
via: windows command line: can I tell Service pack number? – Super User.
Posted in Power User, Windows, Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP | Leave a Comment »
Posted by jpluimers on 2011/12/23
Note that Sharing a Mac folder through VMware Fusion to a Windows VM works, but is:
To configure a shared folder in a Windows virtual machine:
- Launch VMware Fusion.
- Power on the virtual machine.
- Click Virtual Machine > Settings.
- Click Sharing.
- Select Share folders on your Mac.
- Click the + button.
- Browse to the folder on the Mac that will be shared with the virtual machine and click Add.
Shared folders can be accessed via the VMware Shared Folders shortcut on the Windows desktop or the mapped network drive Z:.
–jeroen
via VMware KB: Sharing a folder from your Mac to a virtual machine.
Posted in Fusion, MacBook, OS X Leopard, OS X Lion, OS X Snow Leopard, Power User, VMware, Windows, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows Vista, Windows XP | Leave a Comment »
Posted by jpluimers on 2011/11/25
The Zone.Identifier NTFS alternate data stream (ADS) is appended to Internet downloads by browsers, and inserted by most decompressors when expanding such downloads.
NTFS alternate data streams are a perfect way to hide data, support Mac OS data forks (which used them to support resource fork meta data tagging long before NTFS alternate data streams were introduced), or to append meta-data to files.
It is a known ADS used to show a security warning when you run executable content that has been downloaded.
That warning can be annoying, or hang your application which it is started from a service, so further below is a batch file that kills the stream.
You cannot use type for displaying NTFS alternate data streams, but redirection through more or using notepad is fine.
This shows the Zone.Identifier NTFS alternate data stream for a single file:
more < %1:Zone.Identifier
When you want to see the ADS of many files, then just use NirSoft’s AlternateDateStreams utility.
You should only kill an Zone.Identifier NTFS alternate data stream when you have verified that the downloaded executable content (which nowadays is much more than just an executable) is verified to be safe.
An easy way to kill any NTFS alternate data stream is to copy it to a FAT32 device and back: FAT does not support alternate data streams. Drawback: it modifies the timestamp of your file as FAT has a smaller time resolution than NTFS has.
This batch file kills the Zone.Identifier NTFS alternate data stream using the SysInternals streams tool:
@echo off
if !%1!==!! goto :end
:: use caret before pipe to hide the pipe from the outermost command in the batch file
for /f "usebackq tokens=1" %%d in (`streams.exe %1 ^| find "Zone.Identifier:$DATA"`) do (
goto :kill
)
goto :end
:kill
streams -d %1
:end
and this batch file lists the Zone.Identifier NTFS alternate data streams:
@echo off
if !%1!==!! goto :end
:: use caret before pipe to hide the pipe from the outermost command in the batch file
for /f "usebackq tokens=1" %%d in (`streams.exe %1 ^| find "Zone.Identifier:$DATA"`) do (
goto :list
)
goto :end
:list
streams.exe %1 | find ":"
:end
Note that the $DATA in the above batch files is not part of the NTFS alternate data stream name, but explains what kind of data is in the stream.
I have not found other types yet, but if you do, please leave a comment (preferably with a link).
–jeroen
Posted in Batch-Files, Development, Power User, Scripting, Software Development, Windows, Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP | 1 Comment »
Posted by jpluimers on 2011/10/05
I was wondering about file times like these:
CreationTime....: 5-10-2011 10:00:13
LastAccessTime..: 5-10-2011 12:05:58
LastWriteTime...: 5-10-2011 10:00:10
I found the answer on stackoverflow.
If a file is copied to another file, the new file retains the LastWriteTime of the source but the CreationTime will be the time of the copy.
And indeed: the file had been copied from a local directory to a central network location.
–jeroen
via c# – Windows: How to determine if a file has been modified since a given date – Stack Overflow.
Posted in .NET, C#, Development, Power User, Software Development, Windows, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows Vista, Windows XP | Leave a Comment »
Posted by jpluimers on 2011/09/30
If you use Mac and Windows machines, then – despite the Mac keyboards – it sometimes is handy to use Mac to remote login to a Windows machine.
For that, the Microsoft Remote Desktop Connection Client for Mac 2.1.1 (especially the download <g>) comes in handy.
–jeroen
via: Microsoft Office for Mac Downloads and Updates | Office For Mac.
Posted in Apple, LifeHacker, OS X Leopard, OS X Lion, OS X Snow Leopard, Power User, Usability, Windows, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows Vista, Windows XP | Leave a Comment »
Posted by jpluimers on 2011/09/16
A long time ago I showed a list of PDF printer drivers.
In the mean time, FreewareGenius did a comparison of free PDF printer drivers in june 2011.
Time to go to the BullZip site and try the download of their Free PDF Printer
–jeroen
Posted in Power User, Windows, Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP | Leave a Comment »
Posted by jpluimers on 2011/09/12
Recently I got this error when copying a huge number of files from Windows XP x86 to Windows 7 x64
System error 1130 has occurred.Not enough server storage is available to process this command.
Instead of changing the IRPStackSize as mentioned at
PChucks Network: Server Functionality Affected By IRPStackSize, I just restarted the “Server” service (and the depending “Computer Browser” service) on the Windows 7 system, and everything worked dandy.
–jeroen
Posted in Power User, Windows 7, Windows XP | Leave a Comment »
Posted by jpluimers on 2011/07/15
If you use NTP for syncing your time, then choose pool.ntp.org as your time server:
The pool.ntp.org project is a big virtual cluster of timeservers providing reliable easy to use NTP service for millions of clients.
I use it for instance to synchronize the time on my ESXi servers.
Note: when you run Windows VMs as ESXi guests; let ESXi time-sync them through the VMware tools, and disable Windows’ own time syncing. I didn’t disable it, and my Windows VMs were consistently off by over 30 minutes.
–jeroen
Posted in *nix, ESXi4, Power User, VMware, Windows, Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP | 2 Comments »
Posted by jpluimers on 2011/07/08
Recently I had the NTFS partition table of a 2.5 inch USB disk fail because somehow I didn’t correctly attach the split-USB cable: the disk didn’t get enough power, and Windows decided it should overwrite the partition table.
The free TestDisk tool by GCSecurity came to the rescue: TestDisk Step By Step – CGSecurity.
–jeroen
Posted in Power User, Windows, Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP | 1 Comment »
Posted by jpluimers on 2011/07/01
Unlike most updates marked as “Important Update”, this one requires a manual license agreement confirmation:
Microsoft Office File Validation Add-in
PLEASE NOTE: Microsoft Corporation (or based on where you live, one of its affiliates) licenses this supplement to you. You may use a copy of this supplement with each validly licensed copy of Microsoft 2003 & 2007 Office System Desktop Application software (the “software”). You may not use the supplement if you do not have a license for the software. The license terms for the software apply to your use of this supplement. To read the license terms, go to the “Help” menu in the software. Microsoft provides support services for the supplement as described at www.support.microsoft.com/common/international.aspx.
Though the security advisory was more than 2 months ago, it only got pushed to Microsoft update this week.
Good thing though that finally Microsoft is able to check the integrity of their document formats in Office 2007 and 2003: Microsoft Security Advisory: Microsoft Office File Validation for Office 2003, 2007 Office, and Office 2010: April 12, 2011.
–jeroen
Posted in Power User, Windows, Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP | Leave a Comment »
Posted by jpluimers on 2011/06/16
Sometimes when you want to release a network drive you get an error message that something still uses it:
C:\>net use h: /d
The device is being accessed by an active process.
More help is available by typing NET HELPMSG 2404.
Finding out about that something is the trick.
Luckily, Process Explorer allows you to search for handles pointing to resources that start with \device\lanmanredirector, as ASK-LEO explains.
–jeroen
Posted in Power User, Windows, Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP | Leave a Comment »
Posted by jpluimers on 2011/05/27
Sometimes you want to know the Windows Version and Service Pack number.
A GUI version is very simple: run winver.exe, it will give you dialogs like these ad the Microsoft Knowledge Base article 310104 explains.
A console version can be done in several different ways:
–jeroen
via: windows command line: can I tell Service pack number? – Super User.
Posted in Power User, Windows, Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP | 1 Comment »
Posted by jpluimers on 2011/05/02
Most external USB HDDs you buy are way bigger than 32 gigabyte, and factory formatted with NTFS.
Nowadays, many devices (TVs, modems, routers, etc) support attaching HDDs, but not all of them support NTFS, but most of them support FAT32.
My brother has such a TV. He has mental retardation (they have euphemisms for that; he basically has an IQ < 50, which in his means he can live on his own but needs daily visits from people that help him with the more complex things in life).
I’m his legal guardian (Dutch: curator), so my wife and me take care of some of those things.
This included getting his TV to recognize a USB HDD so he can watch his favourite TV series I recorded for him (Knight Rider, Top Gear, etc).
Windows NT and beyond cannot format FAT32 in an easy way.
They can from the commandline using the format command: use FOMAT X: /FS:FAT32 for that, it is slow and as soon as you add the /Q parameter to speed things up, it imposes the 32 gigabyte limit.
Microsoft suggests botting Windows 98 or Windows Me, but those have too many limitations (lack of USB support, no 48-bit LBA, imposing 137 gigabyte HDD limit, etc).
Luckily, Ridgecrop Consultants Ltd has a FAT32FORMAT tool and accompanying GUI wrapper. They format any HDD using FAT32. Their tools work at least in Windows XP and up (I haven’t tested Windows 2000 and NT 4).
Problem solved: my brother can happily watch his favourite TV series I recorded for him
–jeroen
Posted in About, Personal, Power User, Windows, Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP | Leave a Comment »
Posted by jpluimers on 2011/03/11
A few tools for mounting ISO CD/DVD images:
–jeroen
Posted in Power User, Windows, Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP | Leave a Comment »
Posted by jpluimers on 2011/02/18
Every once in a while I need to copy a bunch of filenames to the clipboard.
This is where the freeware tool ClipName comes in action: it can copy them in various formats (and works much better than the similar ClipPath, which can only copy them as CSV)
Quote from the ClipName page:
ClipName is also a Context Menu extension copying the full pathname of the right-clicked file to the clipboard. This new version supports copy of multiple filenames either as a space separated list or as a CRLF separated list. DOS filenames (8.3) can now also be copied as well as the URL encoded name and the UNC name for remote files. Clipname supports a Copy command for filenames without including any path, URL Encoding for multiple selections and style encoding for Microsoft Word, Microsoft OneNote,… A version running under Windows Vista 64-bit is now available. It also allows to copy the UNC name for local files and folders. Version 1.3 adds the capability of copying the target URL for Internet Shortcuts from Windows Explorer and from within the IE Favorites bar.
It comes both in 32-bit x86, and in x64 versions.
–jeroen
Posted in Clipboard, Power User, Windows, Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP | 2 Comments »
Posted by jpluimers on 2011/02/11
Searching how to increase your Windows XP NTFS partitions of Virtual Machines running under VMware Workstation 7 gets you a truckload of links trying to get you to do all sorts of command-line like vmware-vdiskmanager and such.
That was indeed the case up till VMware Workstation 6.5, but from version 7 on, it has become much easier.
But the links with difficult steps keep appearing at the top of the search queries.
Hence this blog entry: increasing the NTFS partition size in a Windows VM is easy!
The increase is a two step process:
Step 1 has become much easier since VMware Workstation version 7, you can do it from within VMware Workstation now.
Dinesh describes this small process very well in his Expand Disk in VMware Workstation 7 blog post. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in *nix, Power User, VMware, Windows, Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP | Leave a Comment »
Posted by jpluimers on 2011/02/07
Google Chrome integrated a PDF viewer that is far less functional than Adobe Reader.
In fact: if you had Adobe Reader as PDF viewer, Google Chrome will just use their own.
One of the things I use a lot is the multi-page view (2 page next to each other; fits nicely on a 1920×1200 screen).
It is actually pretty easy to switch back: Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Google, Power User, Windows, Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP | Leave a Comment »
Posted by jpluimers on 2011/01/10
ISO 8601 is a great format for date and time (and combined) values.
It allows for both interchange of information, and ease of sorting values.
Recently, I had to create some backup and logging scripts for a 3rd party turn-key installation at a client.
You know: the kind of installation where the 3rd party manages to break their own scripts, but at the mean time close the system so much, that you cannot do anything but standard batch-file scripts.
The system runs partially on a Workstation that is based on a Dutch version of Windows XP, and a server that runs an English version of Windows Server 2008.
Recipe for some twiddling in order to keep the scripts working on both systems, and not to get bitten by localization.
This answer to a StackOverflow question got me a nice head-start: it was said to work in both the English and Portugese versions of Windows.
This post is the process to get correctly function batch-files towards the end of the post.
Of course, we Dutch are persistent enough to have yet different output for the %date% pseudo variable and the date and date /t commands.
The same holds for the %time% pseudo variable and the time and time /t commands.
Read the rest of this entry »
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