Glenn9999
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Posts posted by Glenn9999
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1 hour ago, jaclaz said:
You don't really want to "backup" your boot CD's, you simply want to make .iso files of them (remember a .iso is a CD and a CD is a .iso)
Your Mileage May (greatly) Vary, lost the specific OS's and requirements you actually *need* or *would like*, and I may point you to more specific info ...
ISO isn't really a very useful file format outside of optical disks. Maybe "preserve the files on the CDs in such a way that they can usefully accessed as boot devices under any and all circumstances" would be better. As for specific OSes, I'm well aware of the assorted requirements and limitations surrounding them. The main problem is getting these three specific disks to be useful outside of the presence of a DVD drive.
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I've run into a question that I can't really find any good answers on. It kind of runs across different topics
1. I'm looking for things on how to make a USB drive bootable for things like DOS/98/Me/XP, but I'm finding a lot more about rigging up install disks for Windows 7, 8.1, and nothing much more than automated "format" programs. One thing I need to pick up...but however...
2. I already have some custom boot discs in storage I made from when I transitioned things from floppy to CD that I'd like to pull out and preserve... then
3. There's this whole disk image format that I see in some of the VMs...
So, how do I proceed on this in order to back up my boot CDs and then be able to use them in such a way that I can install things onto a VM or straight boot from them off of USB drive? Also, is there anything else that I haven't thought of?
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Has whoever done Pale Moon completely redone their code? It was rather horrible the last time I tried it, had to go back to Firefox.
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4 hours ago, Czerno said:
How come neither Microsoft nor, it seems, authors of tweak-all-things type of desktop utilities seem to provide for this simple wish ?
8 minutes ago, Czerno said:Indeed, the regular taskbar entry.
Okay, now that I know what you're talking about . . . this is indeed quite doable from code. Programs that work from the notification area do it habitually. The problem is, you take away the end-user's means to control the application when you just indiscriminately remove the taskbar entry, and the user minimizes the application. Once that is done, all you can do is go through task manager, either hope you can get the app back, or simply kill it. Now there are tweaks that will pull any application from the taskbar to the notification area, but the problem with any approach like this is that there always needs to be a "controlling application" of some kind to handle when the window of the application isn't visible.So, a lot of the answer to this is "it depends on what you want to do and how you're wanting to get there".
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2 hours ago, Czerno said:
Given a running Windows application, having its main window restored (non-minimized), can someone provide help, a tool or method, that either will remove the application's "witness" from the standard Windows "task bar" (without closing the owner app, of course) - or alternatively a tool or method to prevent Windows from even creating said "witness" the moment the app is launched ?
You may want to clarify what you are talking about when you say "witness". Do you mean the regular taskbar entry for the application? Or something else?
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I got the problem knocked down, once I had the time to look at it. After verifying that the recent patches didn't do it, I found out that Mediafire Desktop added a faulty setting. I removed it and the menu works correctly now.
For those that need a solution to this:
1. Download ShellExView .
2. Run it and then sort by date ("File Created Time" or "CLSID Modified Time"). The last settings will be the most recently added. Disable starting from newest and work your way up the list until the problem gets removed.
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I've noticed with my computer, recently, that the Context Menu of File Explorer will disappear within 1-2 seconds, making it unusable.
How do I track down the cause of this (a recent patch, corrupted registry?) and fix it?
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C:\Windows>Call 2.bat
'2.bat' is not recognized as an internal or external command,
operable program or batch file.
what command can I use to execute these batch files probably one at a time. Any help will be appreciated. Thank you
It would help if you debugged your batch files properly. The answer is pretty patently obvious here - 1.bat is simply not finding the others, probably because the current directory is different than the one the batch files reside in.
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So, as I said earlier, a good start to making the whole process simpler would be the creation of a list (a Word table, perhaps) that explains, in a reasonably comprehensible way, just which W7 updates do what, as well as any possible pitfalls, like whether update X causes problems for other updates.
Information on the replacement sequence of superseded updates would also be handy i.e., KB123 was replaced by KB456, which was itself replaced by KB789. So, use KB789.
Supposedly, one could pull a lot of this information out of Windows Update itself. As I mentioned above, they did a better job of documenting their patches once upon a time, but now (especially looking at my Windows 8.1 patch list), they do a copy/paste on a lot of it and leave a lot more of it out. More or less they're saying "we don't care and you shouldn't either". Of course, I mentioned the ability to drop a list of installed updates to text file, which reasonably does update itself on superseded updates. Ironically, the capability to get this information was intended in querying the Windows Update database, but I never pulled back any real information in my tests. Then, the biggest problem I found was the inability to query it for other OSes outside of the one you're running, which cripples Windows update for any serious patch management. One could crack open WSUSSCN2.CAB and process (thinking of trying it) for any OS, but the problem there is making sure the data are unchanged (this is very undocumented by Microsoft, on purpose). Even just making API access to Microsoft Update Catalog (OS KB) would make matters like this so much easier, but we're kind of lucky Microsoft even bothered with an API for Windows Update given their obvious stance against user control of their own systems. At least they did reserve the option to pull patch files off of Windows Update and save them to disk, so that makes it a whole lot easier than manually searching and downloading files or hoping someone's external patch file is correct/updated (IMO the predominant weakness/failure of WUD).
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On that note, I think this whole business of integrating Windows Updates has become unnecessarily complicated and confusing.
I mean, we're only talking about a few hundred Update files, the reason for whose existence is thoroughly documented by the manufacturer, and whose performance, benefits, and\or infamy have been thoroughly explored and documented by thousands of users.
Update-integrating the Windows operating system shouldn't be the trial and error process that it's become.
You know what? It's only as confusing as Microsoft wants to make it. The problem is that they really don't want people evaluating and making choices about updates. They never did. There's very little to no information out there about any of it (your second statement quoted isn't true). The simple statement of it is that what we are seeing with Windows 10 is how Microsoft always wanted it to be. Auto updates, no control of what updates get applied. They couldn't do it for the anti-trust stuff back in the 90's, or just didn't have the cajones. So they make it as confusing as possible to manage the system by yourself. Document nothing, make anything like manual patching or selection of specific patches a nightmare and especially non-uniform. People will just either give up or stop caring, at least their thought until they started cramming things down people's throat.
But such is a monopoly on Desktop OSes like what Microsoft has. Or a mobile monopoly like Google. Or anything of that nature. When there's no alternatives, you pretty much have to take what you get.
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(sigh...) An EXE may *very well have* an MSU *inside* it! Also note *some* updates do *not* directly Integrate and *must* be installed via a Command Script (the OEM way).
I *suppose* I could get the latest, do the downloads, and give you a full list to compare to, but I'm rather busy with another project.
As an *alternative* I could get the ULZ, and strip out everything but the KB# and Description.
(Just a general response and not to any specific person) FWIW, I'm not sure the question at issue anymore. But a number of patch options will serve extra EXE files, which I figure are run as part of the process of actually patching the system. Older patches are EXEs by default, and those EXEs will be served by both WU and MS's public download links. But the newer ones vary depending on whether you get it from WU or download. The variance is whether you get MSU or CAB, which are processed by different patching systems if you have those files (WUSA versus DISM). MSUs are served by Microsoft's public download links (like Microsoft Update Catalog), while CABs are served by WU. A MSU file is actually a renamed CAB file which contains the CAB file served by WU along with an associated data file and any non-file serving EXEs. And if you want to get even more confused, certain KB numbers actually serve a number of patches reflected by still different KB numbers.
If you have a concern of which patch files are actually "current", you can drop a list of patches off of WU or the offline scanner file (WSUSSCN2.CAB) along with file links and compare, which is a function I've been playing with (more off and on). It works well if you want to keep a flash drive of patches off of all the systems you encounter if you want to automate it, but the best you can do otherwise is drop a list to text. For instance (a snippet, edited to keep the forum from serving hyperlinks):
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2016-01-12 Update for Windows 8.1 for x64-based Systems (KB2976978)
Listing of File URLs:
EnableTask - hxxp://download.windowsupdate.com/d/msdownload/update/software/updt/2015/12/enabletask_7323565d9cdc11ab9f0efd489554e7de30fc6e4a.exe(24KB)
windows8.1-kb2976978-v13-x64 - hxxp://download.windowsupdate.com/d/msdownload/update/software/updt/2015/12/windows8.1-kb2976978-v13-x64_2459843122db53d0f4568cf87ce3f11721165f26.cab(3220KB)
Description:
Install this update to resolve issues in Windows. For a complete listing of the issues that are included in this update, see the associated Microsoft Knowledge Base article for more information. After you install this item, you may have to restart your computer.
----------------------------------------------------------------
A lot of where confusion lies is that there's just so many options for those that are technically and nothing particularly uniform.
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I've no idea where W.U.D. gets its files from, but it seems to me that the app is perhaps renaming the files to the shorter version. And, because the Catalog files are each contained in a separate folder, stripping that folder from the file. Is that correct?
When you do a program (full disclosure, I actually did one of those "alternatives to WUD") and download a file, you can control how you save a file - basically save it to whatever you want. AFAIR from when I considered doing a "make a UL" function in mine, I think when someone cooks up a UL a "friendly name" get specified along with the URLs.
The other reason I asked for enlightenment was because of the 'AMD64' prefix of the Catalog-derived files.
Actually what you posted wasn't *quite* right. Intel actually cooked up a 64-bit processor architecture of their own. The problem with it was that it wasn't very 32-bit backwards compatible so it floundered. So basically like a HD-DVD, Blu-ray thing, you had a format war and an eventual winner (AMD64). I don't know what tipped the balance in the end. Anyhow, you'll see patches with IA64 as well in older Windows as well as more modern things like .NET patches.
So it seems sensible that I remove the containing folder from each Catalog download, and perhaps also truncate the long file names to a shorter version.
Most will handle the long file names okay, but if you have something that claims to batch process (NLite or my patcher being two instances), grouping the files into the same folder is almost always best so they can all be picked up at once in a controlled fashion.
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Could someone explain why the naming difference?
Anything directly associated with the Windows Update system, like Microsoft Catalog, will have a checking mechanism, which is the SHA-1 of the file appended to the file name. If you run a SHA-1 of the file, it should match that last part of the named file. You'll also notice this if you obtain the links directly off Windows Update as other alternatives to WUD will do.
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Consider functions like IsWindows10OrGreater(), which can in theory only be used (i.e., successfully linked) if the software is built with the Windows 10 SDK.
Not to steal your thunder in the conversation, but I thought I'd point out that this is a simple macro which calls a function (VerifyVersionInfo) that has existed since Windows 2000.
Edit: FWIW, the only real "issue" I've read about over running things on Windows 10 so far is version reporting functions (GetVersionEx, VerifyVersionInfo, etc). These will not return a correct version number as of the newest Windows 8.1s unless the application is explicitly manifested for those versions. This reflects Microsoft's application compatibility change, which leaves it up to the application for versioning instead of the OS.
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I blame the Home Users who have no clue about funcional OS' and Websites. They all expect Eye Candy.
Actually this has always been a universal. The best comment I got from a coding contest I entered once upon a time was something to that effect. Less functional OS/website, more eye candy in the (required) manual. This really has always been the case, as they explained in any device, product, or artistic endeavor like music or movies (guy related this to his military service at the time in the reports he had to fill out).
Flash > Substance/Talent
Always.
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Wordpress is a mess in about every way these days. Not just in terms of a bloated web design. Most of the tools they've recently reworked are pretty bad, too. For instance, the new editor is neigh unusable if you plan on doing posts that are beyond simple doodles. And yet, they haven't fixed any of the standing issues that have existed in the service for years (fuzzy tracking for instance). Now granted, all the script blockers and things of that sort have pretty much killed that kind of functionality, it's still pretty bad when you have it reporting traffic that you have no clue about in one fashion or another even after you read the report.
Granted, I'm not sure Blogspot or anything else is better.
Edit, since I don't want to double-post: Most of the web pages have a problem with ads, which an ad blocker most always fixes. The problem usually is that most won't begrudge an occasional ad in moderation that won't screw with bandwidth or user-experience all that much, but when someone comes along and gets plain abusive, the ad and script blockers become absolutely necessary. A great example is a page full of flash, style sheets, etc that takes 2 minutes to load on higher end broadband. latimes.com. The current heavyweight champion in my web browsing world with respect to obesity. They ask for their ads to be blocked by pulling this and they deserve it.
This is Ghostify without script blockers and everything else turned off. That isn't even the whole list. This kind of garbage is more the rule than the exception.
Edit 2: IIRC, having that many sites broke Ghostery, too as the UI couldn't handle them all.
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Feel free to try this out. It uses Windows Update to get its downloads so it'll always be up to date.
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>Glenn9999 your batch files don't work it says disknumber is not a valid command
Did you read what I wrote?
"While I'm sure there's a good VBS solution to this, I thought I'd go ahead and post the program since I attempted it.
Looking at attachment: Download count...0.
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While I'm sure there's a good VBS solution to this, I thought I'd go ahead and post the program since I attempted it.
(past all the UAC elevation stuff I had to put in the BAT)
rem ----D:rem grubinst.exe --verbose -t=0 --silent-boot --skip-mbr-test(0)
Seems to be catching the general idea. Though my batch skills aren't the best these days.
@echo offpushd "%~dp0"echo %~d0disknumber %~d0 > temp.txtset /p _DiskNum=<temp.txtdel temp.txt@echo onrem grubinst.exe --verbose -t=0 --silent-boot --skip-mbr-test(%_DiskNum%) pause
But I would say it's certainly a sub-optimal solution, especially if you can get the VBS to go fully. In fact, i'd go ahead and program the call to grubinst.exe within the program or whatever it is I'm wanting to do with the data.
(File Pulled)
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I can't help much on the VBS side, but I notice since I tried this as a program that it requires admin rights to get the file handle to call DeviceIOControl. So it may require you to elevate the script too to work.
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This is not going to be an incredibly easy task. In fact, you may have to go VBS or program for it.
Basically for WMI, you would have to hit Win32_LogicalDisk and then link it to Win32_DiskPartition in order to see what you're getting. Or if you have string testing capability, just checking Win32_LogicalDiskToPartition would cut it if you can get the data out. Microsoft provides an example here.
As for API, you'd have to call DeviceIoControl using IOCTL_STORAGE_GET_DEVICE_NUMBER
But it seems there's no "one shot" answer to this.
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I revisited this recently, since I learned enough to make it handle the way I want now.
Single click to bring up the drive size display window, which should show a relatively unlimited number of partitions. This window should appear next to the system notification tray, where ever you have the task bar. Single-click to turn it off. As you use the system, the window should stay in the forefront while you use it for other things.
Check "Settings" to set the units it uses (bytes, KB, MB, GB), along with the period in milliseconds that it uses to update the stats. (Yes you can copy something to a drive and watch the partition info change on the window.
"Load on Startup?" makes it so the system loads the program upon startup. Clicking the option again should remove it.
As this was a simple little program to do a single task, hopefully this will be enough and there won't be any problems. But if you try it, let me know.
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Did you (or someone else) check whether the compiler indeed uses the Sse or Mmx instructions when the programmer writes like
To review what I wrote above, which answers this question completely: All you can hope for is that the compiler will know the proper instruction sets so the possibility of using those instructions exists. Other than that, you don't know what the compiler will actually *do*. You can get assembler dumps with a number of them to find out what the compiler did, but you can influence what the compiler does incredibly little.
To that end, your original option A is the only option if you want a guarantee of something to happen. The problem with that is as I detailed above too - you need to know that first, it's a CPU bottleneck involving precisely that code at hand, and then your attempt is helping matters and not hurting them. Truth be told, 99.99% of the instances involved make it not worth your time to mess with it, and that's what I was trying to relay up above.
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I have a problem where dbf files will show an incredibly large (not to mention completely impossible) size. Currently, the size reported if I do a listing is over 3 gig. This is obviously wrong since it is stored on a 1gig drive. Any ideas why this is happening or how to fix it?
The file system is corrupted, it looks like. I'd back up any data you can get off the partition safely (i.e. whatever's obviously corrupted) and then run chkdsk or the like and see what happens. It may fix it, or this data may be lost for good. Hard to tell until you try it.
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Windows 10 - Deeper Impressions
in Windows 10
Posted · Edited by Glenn9999
It appears this tool simply uses the WU API interface, and works similarly to mine , which was more designed to simply download updates to be used offline from WU. That said I wonder how well mine works in Windows 10, especially since I haven't upgraded. If it all works fine, I wonder how fruitful it would be to throw together a simple control panel style applet to expose these settings?
Also since I haven't seen it mentioned:
Microsoft wages war on 'crapware' with new Windows 10 tool
Pretty hillarious that they'd cook up some functionality that would have been mildly useful long ago.