rebelpeon.com

Category: electronics

  • MSDN Downloader Link

    I hate when I go to MSDN and am downloading a large ISO only for something to happen and the download manager closes.  I don’t have a shortcut on my desktop to it, so it is a pain to find.

    In case this happens to you, here is the link load it back up.

    “C:WindowsDownloaded Program FilesTransferMgr.exe”

     

  • IIS Log Analysis

    Some good things to use when trying to do analysis on IIS logs:

    • TXTCollector – This will make all your individual IIS log files into one large file.
    • Log Parser – Write SQL queries against your IIS Log files
    • Visual Log Parser – No command line (but sometimes a pain in the ass to install)!
    • Log Parser Lizard – Visual Log Parser doesn’t want to install anymore, so a new tool it is!
    • Log Parser Studio – Free from MS!

    Some common Log Parser queries:

    select cs-uri-stem as url,
cs-uri-query, cs-method,
 count(cs-uri-stem) as pagecount,
 sum(time-taken) as total-processing-time,
 avg(time-taken) as average,
 Max(time-taken) as Maximum
from <logfile>
group by cs-uri-stem,
 cs-uri-query,
 cs-method
order by average desc

     

    select cs-uri-stem as url,
 cs-method,
 count(cs-uri-stem) as pagecount,
 sum(time-taken) as total-processing-time,
 avg(time-taken) as average
from <logfile>
where cs-uri-stem like '%.aspx'
group by cs-uri-stem,
 cs-method
order by pagecount desc

     

    select top 500 cs-uri-stem as url,
 cs-uri-query,
 count(cs-uri-stem) as pagecount,
 sum(time-taken) as total-processing-time,
 avg(time-taken) as average
from <logfile>
where cs-uri-stem like '%.aspx'
group by cs-uri-stem,
 cs-uri-query
order by pagecount desc

     

    select cs-uri-stem as url,
 cs-method,
 count(cs-uri-stem) as pagecount,
 sum(time-taken) as total-processing-time,
 avg(time-taken) as average,
 avg(sc-bytes),
 max(sc-bytes)
from <logfile>
where cs-uri-stem like '%.aspx'
group by cs-uri-stem,
 cs-method
order by pagecount desc

    UpdateI’m just adding more queries I frequently use, and fixing the formatting.

    select quantize(time-taken,5000) as 5seconds,
 count(cs-uri-stem) as hits,
 cs-uri-stem as url
from <logfile>
group by url, quantize(time-taken,5000)
order by quantize(time-taken,5000)

     

    select
 quantize(time,3600) as dayHour,
 count(cs-uri-stem) as hits,
 avg(time-taken) as averageTime,
 cs-uri-stem as url
from <logfile>
where url like '%.svc'
group by url,
 dayHour
order by dayHour

    select
TO_LOCALTIME(QUANTIZE(TO_TIMESTAMP(date, time), 3600)) AS dayHour,
count(cs-uri-stem) as hits
from <logfile>
where cs-uri-stem like '%/page.aspx'
group by dayHour
order by dayHour Asc

  • Installed Items

    Again, this post is purely for me to remember and it is in no particular order:

    Optional Items (depending on machine):

  • Kindle 3 Reboots

    Every since getting my Kindle 3 for Christmas I have mysterious lockups, restarts, etc.  It has been driving me bonkers, especially since it kept losing my page in the book.  It seemed to be reverting to a previous state all the time, and I couldn’t figure out why.

    So I emailed Amazon support.  Their response was that I should be hitting the “Home” button every time I wanted to stop reading.  Talk about an awful answer, so I emailed them again and said that was an unacceptable answer and that it needed to be fixed.

    I received a similar response back.

    Then the day after sending those emails my Kindle was completely locked.  I couldn’t get it out of sleep (no green light when you slide the power button).  I tried to hold down the power button, but apparently not long enough.  I called Amazon and they basically had me hold it down longer.  At least I was able to use it then.

    I also noticed that it happened more in the cold.  For example, when it just sat around my house I never had a problem, but whenever I went into work with it (barring it to the colder outside) it would always lose my spot and restart.

    Well, it turns out that they symptoms were correct, but my correlation to why it was happening was not.  Turns out it wasn’t because it was cold out, it was because it was getting jostled around more when I was carrying it than when it sat at home.  I am not the only one that is having this issue.  It is all because of the Kindle Cover – Without A Light.

    One of the new things they’ve done is created a cover that draws power from your kindle (lighted cover).  It is pretty slick because the hinge is metal, which plugs into the Kindle, makes contact with a electrical pad, and powers the light.  However, the cover without a light also has a metallic binding, but there is no where for the charge to go and so it just shorts out causing the Kindle to do all sorts of strange things.

    It looks as though Amazon is now aware of the issue as all Amazon branded non-light covers are now not being sold.  However, any other non-light cover that has the Amazon binding seems to be having the same issue (the Kate Spade and Timbuktu covers too).  It should be an easy fix for them, just make the binding some sort of ABS plastic, but talk about a huge oversight.  I mean, common sense.

    Back to my story, I’ve since put packaging tape (thinest tape I could find) over the bottom hook of my binding, and today I haven’t had a restart.  I’ll probably update this story in a few weeks one way or the other.

    Update:

    After using the cover with the fix for 3 weeks, I can attest that the tape fixed the issue.  No more reboots means lots of carefree reading!

    Update #2:

    Over two months later, and still no reboots.  Consider it fixed!

  • Kindle for WP7

    And it is out.  Go and grab it!

    AppsFuze Description

  • Windows Phone 7

    Well, it’s been a few years, and I finally bought a new phone.  I used to have the Touch Pro 2, and while I enjoyed the keyboard, there was a lot not to love to.  Let me count thy ways:

    1. Windows Mobile 6.5 (even with all the hacked ROMs that I used)
    2. Thickness.  Man was that thing a pocket sore
    3. Windows Mobile 6.5

    Pretty much everyone I work with either has an Android powered phone or an iPhone.  While I’m sure either would’ve worked just fine, I was holding out for the new Windows Phone 7.  I loved playing with a friend’s Zune HD.  The interface is just so much more fresh and, I’m not all that into apps, which is what both Android and iPhone seem to be centered around.

    I waited, and I waited (and I was in Singapore for a few months), but I finally received my phone a week before Christmas.  All-in-all, I’m very fond of it, and getting around is so much better.  I ended up with the HD7, since I’m on T-Mobile through work, but I’ve also played with the Focus as that is what all the AT&T guys have.

    There are a few issues which I’ll get to, but talk about a completely awesome overhaul.  The touchscreen is smooth and responsive, the icons are finger friendly, and most of all the integration is very intuitive.  The one thing I was really worried about was moving away from a keyboard.  On all my smartphones I’ve had a physical keyboard of some sort.  However, with the Windows Phone 7 keyboard, I’m able to type just about as fast and accurately.  Also, I never used to use my phone for music, but now I’m using it quite a bit.  The Zune integration is nice, and my (overly expensive) headphones sound excellent on them with no static/electric background noise.

    Overall I am very happy, and I know with all the money that Microsoft has banked on it, it will at least try to become a large player and continually grow.  However, as mentioned there are a few annoyances that I have (there are more comprehensive lists elsewhere):

    • Dialer does not auto-complete names and numbers.  This is something that was great with WinMo 6.5.  In fact WP7 does it for text messages, just not for the dialer.  Boo.
    • No gapless playback with MP3s
    • I’m sure there are other things, but nothing that actively bothers me…

    Microsoft has said that there is an update coming out in January/February timeframe to fix some of the other issues (copy/paste, etc), and I’m sure there will be many other updates to come to fix other issues.  However, right now, I’m glad I jumped on board.

    If you’re interested, here are all the WP7 phones available now.

  • Offline SharePoint

    I’m sure a lot of you have heard about Colligo for offline SharePoint.  Unfortunately, the SharePoint sites that I continually access where for my company have some interesting security setup and therefore I’ve never been able to get Colligo to work.  Since I had originally tried, I never really bothered to figure it out as we were told it simply wouldn’t work.

    However, when I installed Office 2010 I noticed that there was a SharePoint Workspace 2010 which does offline SharePoint too.  Since we only use MS products for security I was very optimistic about getting Offline SharePoint finally working (incredibly useful for working on flights).  Well, I attempted to use it and quickly realized it will only do offline SharePoint for SharePoint 2010.  Unfortunately we were still on 2007.

    Fast forward through a bit of searching, and I ran across a nice KB article that explains how to sync a SharePoint 2007 site with SharePoint Workspace 2010 using groove.  I don’t really care how it works, as long as I can have offline editing and syncing.  Yay!

  • Another Xbox 360 Dead

    That’s right folks, almost exactly three years after my first Xbox 360 died (from the exact same issue), my replacement one has also just bit the dust.  What is hilarious is that is was doing something so complex as streaming a video from my Media Center PC.  Strenuous indeed. 

    While my Xbox is technically out of standard warranty, because I am once again getting the three light, red ring of death, my warranty is extended 3 years which would expire in December of 2010.  Sadly unlike last time, they don’t send you a box, so I have to find adequate shipping materials to send it to them asap.

  • More CSS Fun

    As I am sure you gathered from other recent posts, we are using (read: testing) CSS for a lot of stuff.  Well, we found out a beautiful new issue when creating and editing projects from the command line. 

    When you look at MSDN about adding a filter to a Project, you are presented with the following syntax:

    /Filter “+text1.txt -*.exe -dir1 +…*.jpg”

    Needless to say, that is not correct.  For AddProj, they syntax has to be correct, but for EditProj, syntax is a lot more lax (the below is the syntax for EditProj).  Regardless, everything in the quotes is incorrect.  Instead a filter should look like the following:

    Filter=+“text.txt” -”*.exe” -“dir1” +”…*.jpg”

    They are either updating the MSDN article or creating a KB article about this.

  • Windows Home Server

    With the release of Power Pack 3 for Windows Home Server, I have been thinking about trying it out.  Having an MSDN subscription and a virtual machine host made this quite a bit easier, as I didn’t need to purchase any additional hardware to use it. 

    Prior to installing WHS, I had a Windows 2008 virtual machine that I installed all my stuff on and had shares.  It definitely worked, but some of the cool features of WHS kept me wanting to move in that direction.  Things like automated backups of client machines, a console, better managed and accessible shares, and Media Center tie-ins (I have a Win7 virtual machine as a Media Center and an Xbox 360 as the extender).  All in all, I think it is definitely going to be a move in the right direction, but that doesn’t mean there weren’t issues getting there.  I am going to outline a bunch of them here in the hopes that others can find comfort in the work I have done to resolve them.

    1. Installation – As I mentioned before, I was installing it to a virtual machine.  No big deal right?  Wrong.  My virtual machine host does not have a keyboard, monitor, or mouse hooked up to it normally.  I just have it sitting in the closet chugging a long.  The downside to that is when I am building a new virtual machine, it had better not need the mouse until I can directly connect to the machine or install the integration drivers.  This is because in Hyper-V when you are using Remote Desktop to manage the host, until you are able to install the drivers, you have no mouse.  Well, sadly, with the MSDN version (not sure about pressed CDs), the tabs are not correct with the EULA Accept page.  There is no way for you to accept the EULA to progress through the installation.  Boo.  That means I had to drag a monitor, keyboard, and mouse into the closet to get things working.  It just seems silly that this is an issue for something that is meant to run headless anyways (obviously not during the installation, but still).
    2. Domain Membership – Do not add the WHS machine to a domain.  I know you want to if you are running a domain at home, but don’t, just don’t.  I really wanted to run it as a domain member too, but there are just too many issues, and tricks MS has done to make it not worth your while.  Things such as the machine powering down every 48 hours when it is a member (annoying at best), to the console crashing after adding domain members to the local windows home group manually.  While I know you can work around most of these things (except for the console crashing), what benefit are you really getting?  Just leave it as a member of a workgroup.
    3. Firewall Rules – Much like domain membership, the best answer here is just to turn off the Windows Firewall on the box.  I am not sure if it was because it updated to Windows 2003 SP2 which enabled it by default after the base install or what, but there was nothing but headaches with the Windows Firewall enabled.  Some of the more quality examples were:
      • The website you are supposed to access resides on ports 55000/56000.  That was not allowed in the rules by default.
      • When setting up the Media Center connector, it uses DCOM to connect.  DCOM typically uses a random list of high ports (1024-65535) to do its bidding.  Granted, you can change the ports to only use a few, neither of which is added into the firewall rules.

      Just silly stuff like that, which take awhile to troubleshoot, when they don’t need to.  Turn it off.

    4. Carbonite Online Backup – This is the current beast I am dealing with and it is a fun one.  Carbonite works exactly how I want it to, and I have been using it on my Windows 2008 machine to do online backups for over a year now.  It works.  It isn’t fast, but it works.  Moving it to WHS has been a fun test of intelligence.  In my setup I had 2 drives, one was 80GB (the minimum to get it setup because I just wanted to play at first) and one 800GB.  Everything works great, except for Carbonite.  For the time being, I just wanted to backup the data in some of the shares.  No problem, right?  Just point it to where the share is located on disk (D:sharessharename) and we are good to go.  Wrong!  WHS has a special drive configuration that allows you to simply add drives whenever and whatever size and it will automatically add that space to your shares.  It does this via junctions, tombstone files, and a service that manages where all the files are stored.  I won’t delve into it here, but you can read all about it yourself.  Basically the files in your share are elaborate shortcuts to the actual files, which are spread across all your drives, and then the files are managed by the service, and then could move every hour.  So, when you point Carbonite to D:sharessharename, you are effectively backing up the shortcuts.  Instead you need to point it to the junction point and all the files there (these are hidden system files) at C:fsDE.  As I mentioned, these files are always moving around though based on the service.  Therefore, the only way for Carbonite to work correctly on a WHS is if you have a single large drive, which is exactly what I am going to do.  As soon as you add another one, files could get moved, and your backups will not be complete.
    5. Protocol Mismatch – For the longest time I was receiving the following error whenever I was trying to install the connector on a client machine (Windows 2003, Windows 2008, Win 7)

      Protocol mismatch. This computer uses protocol version 6.0.2030.2, but partner computer [server] uses protocol version 6.0.2030.0. A connection cannot be established

      This was because the http://server:55000/enrollid/id.aspx webservice that the connector uses on the WHS machine was returning the incorrect version.  The only way to fix it that I found was by installing the final build of Power Pack 3.  The beta didn’t work, nor did downgrading to a previous PP.

    Hopefully this little guide helps someone else out there.  As I tinker with it some more, I will probably add additional articles, but it is amazing how long it has taken me to get this silly machine up and running, especially when this is supposed to be an appliance.  I know that MS is learning a lot from this, but the polish is still a bit missing, and this is after 3 Service Packs (Power Packs).