Friday 27 December 2013

Kasperky AV support for Server 2012 R2 and Windows 8.1

This is now supported in Kaspersky Endpoint Security 10 Maintenance Release 1.
More info (and download) here:
http://support.kaspersky.co.uk/10578

Word KB2837593 patch causing 100% CPU useage

Updating an image for a VMWare View VDI Desktop, I applied all of the recent Microsoft Office 2010 patches. However, when the desktops were refreshed, all started three copies of Winword.exe running under the System account. One of these copies of Word was using 100% which created mayhem on the VDI platform.

I've removed KB2837593 from the VMWare View VDI desktop image and the platform seems to have stabilised. We aren't seeing this on our Citrix XenDesktop platform, but this also doesn't have the KB2837593 patch applied yet.

Has anyone else seen this? Please feedback if you have.

Saturday 2 November 2013

Unity Tweak now available for Ubuntu

Running the following commands will install Unity Tweak into Ubuntu for you: 
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:freyja-dev/unity-tweak-tool-daily
sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install unity-tweak-tool

Thanks to OMG Ubuntu for the instructions:
http://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2013/02/introducing-unity-tweak-tool

Thanks to PupptLinuxWorld for the heads up:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7SWM4YFO2gA

Tuesday 1 October 2013

Matching users from a CSV against Active Directory using PowerShell

I am trying to match users I have in a CSV with two columns (givenName and sn) against active directory.


The following script produces no output at all, not even an error:
Import-Csv input.csv | foreach {Get-ADUser -LDAPFilter "(&(givenName=$_.givenName)(sn=$_.sn))"}


The components work individually:

  • Import-Csv input.csv
  • Get-ADUser -LDAPFilter "(&(givenName=karl)(sn=foley))"
  • Import-Csv input.csv | foreach {write-host $_.givenName,$_.sn}



I've also verified that there are no extra characters in the csv using:
Import-Csv input.csv | foreach {write-host $_.givenName,$_.givenName.length,$_.sn,$_.sn.length}


What am I doing wrong please?

Thursday 8 August 2013

[all variants] AMD/Intel Hybrid Graphics works

How to setup AMD\Intel Hybrid graphics for Ubuntu:

[all variants] AMD/Intel Hybrid Graphics works:


'via Blog this'

Saturday 3 August 2013

Win8/Hyper-V: “What Works and What Doesn’t” Edition | Rob Seder's Blog - ARCHIVE

Win8/Hyper-V: “What Works and What Doesn’t” Edition | Rob Seder's Blog - ARCHIVE:

Allow Hyper-V on Windows 8 to share your WiFi adaptor for network access.
1. Create an internal switch.
2. Allow the WiFi adaptor to be shared.
3. Connect the WiFI adaptor to the internal network switch.

'via Blog this'

Sunday 28 July 2013

UbuntuUpdates - PPA: GetDeb Apps

UbuntuUpdates - PPA: GetDeb Apps:

I had some problems getting the new version of Vuze to run on Ubuntu 12.04 and after having tried many things came across teh following PPA information.

Vuze wouldn't display web or search content because of missing libraries and misconfiguration. The following lines allow you to install Vuze5 as a package:

wget -q -O - http://archive.getdeb.net/getdeb-archive.key | sudo apt-key add -

sudo sh -c 'echo "deb http://archive.getdeb.net/ubuntu precise-getdeb apps" >> /etc/apt/sources.list.d/getdeb.list'"

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install vuze

More info here:
http://www.ubuntuupdates.org/ppa/getdeb_apps?dist=precise

'via Blog this'

Disable Autodiscover in Outlook

I guess if I was to decribe my email setup in the terms of a relationship, then "it's complicated" would be an apt description.

One major issue that I have is Outlooks Autodiscover feature which is supposed to help Outlook discover the correct Exchange servers to connect to.

This works fine if I am connected to my work LAN or VPN, but if I want to look at my offline cached email, Outlook insists on connecting me to my organisations main email servers. Problem is, my email account is not there, and I have no valid Exchange login for there, so Outlook continually prompts me for credentials which will never work, oh, and the button to "never ask for these credentials again" doesn't work either.

Best or only option I have found for stopping this prompt is to enter a fake autodiscover address into my local hosts file. I enter the following line:

127.0.0.1    autodiscover    autodiscover.myworkdomain.com

You'll have to replace "myworkdomain.com" with whatever matches your work email address.

How does that work for you?

Friday 19 July 2013

Re: FAQ(16): Using HTTP protocol in SDM - HP Enterprise Business Community

Re: FAQ(16): Using HTTP protocol in SDM - HP Enterprise Business Community:

This post explains how to force the use of HTTP with HP SoftPaq Download Manager (SDM) instead of the default passive FTP.

Use the switch /FORCEHTTP.

This solved the errors I was getting with SDM saying it could not access ftp.hp.com with v3.4.10.0.
It immediately downloaded v3.4.11.0, so maybe it's fixed in this version anyway?

Wireshark showed the passive FTP failing with v3.4.10.0.

'via Blog this'

Saturday 6 July 2013

Windows Reading List 0x80073cb

Can't install the Windows Reading List update from the Windows Store in Windows 8.1 Preview.
I'm not sure what it is, why I need it, or why it won't install.
Anyone?

Windows 8.1 Preview - Google Talk will not connect

I use two factor authentication with my Google Apps, and while Google Talk was working fine before the install of Windows 8.1 preview, it stopped after it was installed.

Going to accounts.google.com and generating a new passpharse didn't help, but I found this:
http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows8_1_pr-performance/windows-81-preview-google-talk-will-not-connect/9ec2038f-2dad-444b-a280-1e599cd1900e

I uninstalled Google Talk, and Google Talk plugin for Chrome and re-installed Google Talk from here:
http://dl.google.com/googletalk/googletalk-setup-en-GB.exe

I also reinstalled the Google Chrome voice and video plugin by starting a video call with a contact.

All seems to be working fine now.

Windows 8.1 Preview with Intel Express 4

Looks like Microsoft removed support from Intel Express 4 laptop graphics with the new Windows 8.1 preview as all I was able to get was a standard video adaptor.

I lived with the crippled Intel Express 4 graphics support in Windows 8, as any attempt to run DRM videos failed with the hacked Windows 7 drivers available out there.

However, I tried again and Sky and NetFlix are definately working fine. (Although I'm not to worried about Sky having fallen out with them regarding Sky Go and thier decision to charge for it!)

Thanks to the guys at Eight Forums for the answer:
http://www.eightforums.com/graphic-cards/4418-mobile-intel-series-4-intel-hd-graphics-1st-generation.html

I wouldn't recommend removing the Test Mode logo - That looks like it is designed solely for Windows 8.


Install Windows 8.1 Preview - 0xC1900101 - 0x4000D

Trying to update on-line or with a downloaded CD of Windows 8.1 preview gave me the following problem - Bluescreen on startup follwed by system reverting to Windows 8.

This blog post pointed me in the right direction:
http://iampaulh.blogspot.co.uk/2013/06/windows-81-preview-fails-to-install.html

This site pointed me to an uninstall option for AKSDF.SYS:
http://www.pulsonix.com/faq.aspx?KB090025

 I'm not sure when this was installed (this was originally an update from Windows 7) but the following applications were installed on the same day:


Removing these applications didn't remove the Sentinal SafeNET driver, but thanks to the Pulsonix site, I was able to find a command line uninstaller.
  1. Visit the SafeNet Downloads site
  2. Download the Sentinel HASP/LDK - Command Line Run-time Installer
  3. Extract it
  4. Open a CMD prompt as an administrator
  5. From the extracted files directory, run haspdinst -info and you should see the installed version you have, and the installer version enabled
  6. Run haspdintst -r to remove
  7. Run haspdinst -info again to confirm removal
I didn't try the upgrade by upgrading the SafeNet driver, just removing it.

I'm not really sure what the SafeNet software does, it's all rather vague on the site - Anyone know?

"SafeNet has more than 25 years of experience in delivering innovative and reliable software licensing and entitlement management solutions to software and technology vendors worldwide. Easy to integrate and use, innovative, and feature-focused, the company’s family of Sentinel® Software Monetization Solutions are designed to meet the unique license enablement, enforcement, and management requirements of any organization, regardless of size, technical requirements or organizational structure."

Now, just the Intel Express 4 Video driver issue to crack.

Sunday 30 June 2013

Installing AWS Toolkit For Eclipse (Eclipse v3.8)

I found a couple of pre-requisites for installing AWS SDK for Eclipse 3.8.
Just add the following as software update sources for Eclipse (Help > Install new software...)

Android SDK Plugin for Eclipse:
https://dl-ssl.google.com/android/eclipse/

Data Tools Plaftorm Enablement Extender SDK:
http://download.eclipse.org/releases/indigo/

You can then install AWS Toolkit for Eclipse:
http://aws.amazon.com/eclipse/

Saturday 22 June 2013

Can't connect facebook to online accounts in 13.04 - Ask Ubuntu

Looks like Facebook are pushing external messaging clients to a non-https page for authentication - Not good!

As a workaround, you can add the following line:
<setting name="AllowedSchemes" type="as">['https','http']</setting>

To the file:
/usr/share/accounts/providers/facebook.provider

I suggest you save a copy of the original file first as any small typo will break it forever.

My file now looks like this:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<provider id="facebook">
<name>Facebook</name>
<icon>facebook</icon>
<translations>account-plugins</translations>
<domains>.*facebook\.com</domains>
<plugin>generic-oauth</plugin>
<template>
  <group name="auth">
  <setting name="method">oauth2</setting>
  <setting name="mechanism">user_agent</setting>
    <group name="oauth2">
      <group name="user_agent">
      <setting name="Host">www.facebook.com</setting>
      <setting name="AuthPath">/dialog/oauth</setting>
      <setting name="RedirectUri">https://www.facebook.com/connect/login_success.html</setting>
      <setting name="Display">popup</setting>
      <setting type="as" name="Scope">['publish_stream','read_stream','status_update','user_photos','friends_photos','xmpp_login']</setting>
      <setting name="ClientId">302061903208115</setting>
      <setting name="AllowedSchemes" type="as">['https','http']</setting>
      </group>
    </group>
  </group>
</template>
</provider>


Kudos to Ankit Shah at:
Can't connect facebook to online accounts in 13.04 - Ask Ubuntu:

Not really a long term answer, Facebook need to sort it!

'via Blog this'

Wednesday 19 June 2013

Internet Explorer 9 Navigation blocked due to invalid certificate 1024 bit

Had a problem where IE9 would not open a web page, whereas IE10 would. Web page is the management site for an HP StorOnce B6200 appliance.

Looks like the StorOnce appliance is using a 1024 bit public key, and IE9 doesn't like this. The certificate is self signed, and you get the normal error, but the "Continue to this website (not recommended)." link is not available:


I did some Googling and found this.

I ran certutil -setreg chain\EnableWeakSignatureFlags 8.

I didn't have to reboot, just logged out and in, and the Web page changed:


I will investigate a longterm fix of adding a proper certificate (we have internal certificate servers) or public certificate. I'll also approach HP about icreasing the public key length from 1024 to 2048 bits.

Tuesday 30 April 2013

How IE8 catagorises Top Level Domains

Found an interesting issue between IE7 and IE8 (and above) to do with how IE categorises Top Level Domains (TLD).

Why does this list matter? Because it controls what domains you can use with wildcards in site to zone assignments within group policy.

If your domain is on the list - You can't use it with a wildcard.

You can see what the list is by using the following URL in IE8 or IE9:
res://urlmon.dll/ietldlist.xml

Does anyone know what it is in IE10?

Thanks to the following article for helping us along the road of discovery:
http://blog.gerv.net/2009/11/ie_8_and_the_public_suffix_list/


Friday 15 February 2013

Reason for un-mountability: the original volume has some extents online


I've raised a support request, but thought I'd post this here to see if anyone else has seen the same issue on ESXi 5.1,914609.

We are implementing an HP Cloud Matrix system with ESXi 5.1 as one of the supported Hypervisors. Part of the delivered solution is HP Matrix Recovery Management which allows us to failover services to a DR site that has the VMFS volume synched across two 3Par V400 SANS.

As we understand it, the HP official guide to passing changes from the primary to DR site is to export the configuration, failover the storage, and then import the conifguration at the remote site. There is another way of doing this through the use of storage snapshots (we have tested this fine with Hyper-V):


  1. Create a RW Virtual Volume copy of the RO LUN at the remote site
  2. Unexport the RO LUN from the remote VMWare hosts
  3. Export the RW LUN to the remote VMware hosts
  4. Mount this RW LUN
  5. Import the configuration
  6. Unexport the remote RW LUN
  7. Export the remote RO LUN
  8. Delete the RW LUN


This process works fine on Hyper-V using CSV disks, but has the following problem on ESXi 5.1; When the LUN is changed, it is detected as a snapshot (as expected), but the snapshot is not mountable because the VMHost thinks it is already online:

~ # esxcli storage vmfs snapshot list
51128c21-f07c4a24-4e24-00215a9b20f7
   Volume Name: Vv_prim_vmfs_cloud_repl.02
   VMFS UUID: 51128c21-f07c4a24-4e24-00215a9b20f7
   Can mount: false
   Reason for un-mountability: the original volume has some extents online
   Can resignature: true
   Reason for non-resignaturability:
   Unresolved Extent Count: 1
~ # esxcli storage vmfs snapshot mount -l "Vv_prim_vmfs_cloud_repl.02"
Unable to mount this VMFS volume due to the original volume has some extents online


The only solution we have found is to reboot ALL the VM hosts in the remote cluster. They ALL then report the following, and can mount the volume:

~ # esxcli storage vmfs snapshot list
51128c21-f07c4a24-4e24-00215a9b20f7
   Volume Name: Vv_prim_vmfs_cloud_repl.02
   VMFS UUID: 51128c21-f07c4a24-4e24-00215a9b20f7
   Can mount: true
   Reason for un-mountability:
   Can resignature: true
   Reason for non-resignaturability:
   Unresolved Extent Count: 1
~ # esxcli storage vmfs snapshot mount -l "Vv_prim_vmfs_cloud_repl.02"
~#

We have tried various vmkfstools commands to release the LUN etc, but they don't seem able to see the LUN even though we can see the device for the volume.

Is this something you have seen before?

Is there anything you can suggest?