The Wiert Corner – irregular stream of stuff

Jeroen W. Pluimers on .NET, C#, Delphi, databases, and personal interests

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Archive for the ‘Power User’ Category

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Dutch parcel tracers

Posted by jpluimers on 2020/10/30

–––jeroen

Posted in LifeHacker, Power User | Leave a Comment »

Making Fujitsu ix500 scanner’s CardMinder Viewer not globally steal the Alt-F3 shortcut

Posted by jpluimers on 2020/10/30

I hate applications that globally install Windows shortcut keys without the setup/install either warn about it or make it configurable.

In this case it is about CardMinder Viewer that ships with the Fujitsu ix500 scanner and installs a global shortcut, by default Alt-F3.

CardMinder Viewer is especially bad because the “settings” are not in the application: the settings are part of the Windows notification area (usually on the lower left of your screen; many people call it “the tray” as it was called tray in the Cairo research that led to Windows 95 and Windows NT 3.5).

So here is how to get rid of the Alt–F3 shortcut to be stolen:

Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in Fujitsu ScanSnap, Hardware, ix500, Power User, Scanners, Windows | Leave a Comment »

Installing Windows software with Chocolatey: a few notes

Posted by jpluimers on 2020/10/28

I will limit myself to software that needs Administrative elevation in order to be installed. This is the default use-case for Chocolatey. It is way way easier than installing software all by hand, but there are a few things you need to know, hence these notes.

Administrative elevation

Since the default use case is installing software that requires Administrative elevation during install, Chocolatey needs to run with Administrative privileges in order to perform these installs.

If you were hoping for a way around this (for instance by having a client/service architecture), then just stop here.

Even though such a structure could technically be created, getting it stable and working it correctly with a truckload of software to be installed (much of which not available as packages during Chocolatey development in the first place) is a task too big.

Think of the size of the Windows Installer team at Microsoft to get installers working in the first place, the extra effort needed by Chocolatey volunteers to get the installers working from the console, then another much more complex layer of getting them running from inside a service and communicating everything back and forth to a non-elevated command prompt would be a nightmare.

I won’t even mention the security steps involved to ensure the non-elevated command prompt has enough rights to send installation instructions to the elevated service.

So the first step is to have an elevated command prompt for Chocolatey.

Being elevated, and Chocolatey needing to download installers requires a local temporary place for them.

By default, that place is %Temp%\chocolatey of the administrative user that elevated the Chocolatey command prompt.

This directory can grow quite big, so dir, so – since there is no choco cleanup yet [WayBack] you need to either:

Install Chocolatey itself

Either the direct one below, or the more secure one (so you can inspect the intermediate [WayBack] install.ps1) at [WayBack] Installation using PowerShell from cmd.exe:

@echo off
SET DIR=%~dp0%
::download install.ps1
%systemroot%\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\powershell.exe -NoProfile -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -Command "((new-object net.webclient).DownloadFile('https://chocolatey.org/install.ps1','%DIR%install.ps1'))"
::run installer
%systemroot%\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\powershell.exe -NoProfile -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -Command "& '%DIR%install.ps1' %*"

If you want to get rid of it, use [WayBack] Uninstallation.

Besides the one above and below, there are many more [WayBack] Installation: more install options

Output of direct install as Administrator (disclaimers apply):

C:\WINDOWS\system32>powershell -NoProfile -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -Command "[System.Net.WebRequest]::DefaultWebProxy.Credentials = [System.Net.CredentialCache]::DefaultCredentials; iex ((New-Object System.Net.WebClient).DownloadString('https://chocolatey.org/install.ps1'))" && SET PATH="%PATH%;%ALLUSERSPROFILE%\chocolatey\bin"
Getting latest version of the Chocolatey package for download.
Getting Chocolatey from https://chocolatey.org/api/v2/package/chocolatey/0.10.11.
Downloading 7-Zip commandline tool prior to extraction.
Extracting C:\Users\JEROEN~1\AppData\Local\Temp\chocolatey\chocInstall\chocolatey.zip to C:\Users\JEROEN~1\AppData\Local\Temp\chocolatey\chocInstall...
Installing chocolatey on this machine
Creating ChocolateyInstall as an environment variable (targeting 'Machine')
  Setting ChocolateyInstall to 'C:\ProgramData\chocolatey'
WARNING: It's very likely you will need to close and reopen your shell
  before you can use choco.
Restricting write permissions to Administrators
We are setting up the Chocolatey package repository.
The packages themselves go to 'C:\ProgramData\chocolatey\lib'
  (i.e. C:\ProgramData\chocolatey\lib\yourPackageName).
A shim file for the command line goes to 'C:\ProgramData\chocolatey\bin'
  and points to an executable in 'C:\ProgramData\chocolatey\lib\yourPackageName'.

Creating Chocolatey folders if they do not already exist.

WARNING: You can safely ignore errors related to missing log files when
  upgrading from a version of Chocolatey less than 0.9.9.
  'Batch file could not be found' is also safe to ignore.
  'The system cannot find the file specified' - also safe.
chocolatey.nupkg file not installed in lib.
 Attempting to locate it from bootstrapper.
PATH environment variable does not have C:\ProgramData\chocolatey\bin in it. Adding...
WARNING: Not setting tab completion: Profile file does not exist at 'C:\Users\jeroenAdministrator\Documents\WindowsPowerShell\Microsoft.PowerShell_profile.ps1'.
Chocolatey (choco.exe) is now ready.
You can call choco from anywhere, command line or powershell by typing choco.
Run choco /? for a list of functions.
You may need to shut down and restart powershell and/or consoles
 first prior to using choco.
Ensuring chocolatey commands are on the path
Ensuring chocolatey.nupkg is in the lib folder

Installing packages

Compressing

If you run out of SSD or VM disk space, you can try compress using compact /c /s *.* in these directories:

  • C:\ProgramData\Package Cache
  • C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\VisualStudio\Packages
  • C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\ClickToRun\ProductReleases

Further reading

–jeroen

PS: always watch the output and logs!

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Posted in Chocolatey, CommandLine, Conference Topics, Conferences, Development, Event, Power User, PowerShell, PowerShell, Scripting, Software Development, Windows | Leave a Comment »

Linux Find Out What Process Are Using Swap Space – nixCraft

Posted by jpluimers on 2020/10/26

Some interesting tips at [WayBack] Linux Find Out What Process Are Using Swap Space – nixCraft

  • pidof
  • pgrep
  • grep –color VmSwap /proc/####/status
  • awk the same information
  • doing the same in loops
  • smem
  • top

Via: [WayBack] Want to find out what process are using swap space? Useful to debug and optimize your app. … – nixCraft – Google+

–jeroen

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Posted in *nix, Linux, Power User | Leave a Comment »

[Random] How to quickly view a binary’s embedded manifest? – MITHUN SHANBHAG’s blog

Posted by jpluimers on 2020/10/26

[WayBack] [Random] How to quickly view a binary’s embedded manifest? – MITHUN SHANBHAG’s blog

Cool! sigcheck -m dumps a manifest if there is one:

C:\>\\live.sysinternals.com\tools\sigcheck.exe -m C:\Windows\notepad.exe

Background information: [WayBack] Sigcheck – Windows Sysinternals | Microsoft Docs: Dump file version information and verify that images on your system are digitally signed.

[WayBack] License to Kill: Malware Hunting with the Sysinternals Tools | TechEd North America 2013 | Channel 9 This session provides an overview of several Sysinternals tools, including Process Monitor, Process Explorer, and Autoruns, focusing on the features useful for malware analysis and removal. These util

–jeroen

Posted in LifeHacker, Power User, Windows, Windows 10 | Leave a Comment »

Prijsdalingen – Tweakers

Posted by jpluimers on 2020/10/26

For my link archive: [WayBack] Prijsdalingen – Tweakers

Via:

–jeroen

Posted in LifeHacker, Power User | Leave a Comment »

WordPress blog URLs using post-ID: Using Permalinks « WordPress Codex

Posted by jpluimers on 2020/10/23

[WayBack] Using Permalinks « WordPress Codex:

http://example.com/?p=N

So for instance https://wiert.me/?p=35558 points to Delphi version info table: C# Builder, Delphi 8 through 10.3 Rio and Appbuilder despite the actual URL not fully matching the title (because I do not like link rot): https://wiert.me/2016/09/06/delphi-version-info-table-need-help-with-these-projectversion-for-c-builder-delphi-2005-and-2006-dllsuffix-for-c-builder-appbuilder-1-13-codename/

–jeroen

Posted in link rot, Power User, SocialMedia, WordPress, WWW - the World Wide Web of information | Leave a Comment »

From the past: figuring out the damage last nights lightning strike at 1060NP caused yesterday evening

Posted by jpluimers on 2020/10/23

[WayBack] Jeroen Pluimers on Twitter: “Trying to figure out the damage last nights lightning strike at 1060NP caused yesterday evening….”

and [WayBack] Thread by @jpluimers: “Trying to figure out the damage last nights lightning strike at 1060NP caused yesterday evening. @LianderNL was very quick to respond and fi […]”

Thread by @jpluimers: “Trying to figure out the damage last nights lightning strike at 1060NP caused yesterday evening. @LianderNL was very qnd and fix L3 from our 3-phase connection: the main fuse before the meter tripped. Damage so far: 1 @amazonDE […]”

This was the first preventive measure fiber cable for galvanic isolation between the parts that can be powered by UPS and the parts that cannot be:

[WayBack] Jeroen Pluimers on Twitter: “New fiber provides galvanic isolation between the parts that are behind the master UPS and the ones I cannot get behind it. Should help contain damage during a future lightning strike.…”

–jeroen

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Posted in Liander, LifeHacker, Power User | Leave a Comment »

Thomann tas voor bekken

Posted by jpluimers on 2020/10/23

Great source for cymbal bags, back-packs and hard-cases: [WayBack Thomann tas voor bekken

More choice and better prices than [Archive.is] Suchergebnis auf Amazon.de für: becken rucksack: Musikinstrumente & DJ-Equipment.

–jeroen

Posted in LifeHacker, Power User | Leave a Comment »

RDP logon while other user is logged on: no way to automate automatic disconnect/logoff

Posted by jpluimers on 2020/10/21

One of the dreaded things when logging on using RDP is that if another user is logged on, you have to first indicate you want to indeed logon (if you don’t, the RDP connection will close after some 15-30 seconds), then wait for their approval time-out before you can logon.

As of writing there is no way around this.

Some links that helped me conclude this:

–jeroen

Posted in Development, Power User, Software Development, Windows, Windows 10, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows 8.1, Windows Development | Leave a Comment »

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