Supabuh - Ze Frank

Ze Frank on Executing Ideas vs Brain Crack

I sure miss Ze's episodes of "the Show".  I think I watched every single clip and enjoyed [almost] every minute of them.  Thanks to LifeHacker for the recent re-post to remind of Ze.

The Starbucks Economy

From my house, within a rough two mile radius, there are four (4) Starbucks locations, two (2) more within Farm Fresh stores, two (2) more within Barnes & Noble stores, and one (1) inside a shopping mall - making a total of about nine (9) places I can buy a cup of Starbucks branded coffee.  

There are quite a few more in a larger 5 mile radius as well, all within the city of Virginia Beach, Virginia.  With an estimated population of 427,000 (2006 est.), it makes Virginia Beach the single most populated city in the state.  Only two (2) of these locations have a drive-through window.

Because I know some people will challenge my numbers, here's the breakdown:

• S. Independence Blvd near I-264
• S. Independence Blvd at intersection with Virginia Beach Blvd
• Virginia Beach Blvd near Rosemont Rd.
• Lynnhaven Parkway
• Farm Fresh on Virginia Beach Blvd
• Farm Fresh on Holland Rd.
• Barnes & Noble at Town Center
• Barnes & Noble inside Lynnhaven Mall
• Lynnhaven Mall center court

On any given weekday, I pass two on the way to work (but I don't have time to stop unfornuately), and on the weekends I often pass three or four as I run errands.  Wow.  That's a lot of Starbucks indeed.  I average about one cup per week now.  At one time I was consuming about one cup per day (on average), which was fiscally unsustainable for me.  Oh well.  Exuberance has its price, as we're all seeing play out in the current economic news.

For those that scoff at Starbucks as overpriced, "hoity-toity" coffee, all I can say is: everyone has their own opinion.  I like their coffee products.  I like the atmosphere of many of their houses too.  I have tried other coffees, like McDonalds and Dunkin, but they taste like something drained from a colostomy bag to me.  And I would know.  Oddly enough, 7-11 coffee doesn't bother me like those two others.  But I'm odd too.

But I also cannot ignore the fact that they're operating on a fence with competition creeping in from many sides.  And this is competition with diversified operations, so they can afford to take a loss in the short term, especially McDonalds, with their relatively strong revenues and stock values.  With the recent news of additional cutbacks at Starbucks, I expect a few of these nine locations to close up in 2009, but I'm hoping a few stay open, within short driving of my home.  Otherwise, I may give up on coffee entirely, rather than drink cesspool drainage and "get used to it" as if it was actually "good".  I never liked that stuff when I worked construction twenty-odd years ago, and I don't like it now either.  I sound like Andy Rooney, but oh well.  Just a thought.

1981 primitive Internet report on KRON

Classic! Thanks Mike!

Troubleshooting MSI Package Installations

Ok, I need to thank Chris Nacker for thanking Aaron Stebner, who should probably thank his parents, his agent and the academy.  I'm being a smartass, I know.  Sorry.

Anyhow, the instructions Chris shows work great.  I dropped them into a .BAT file and it makes it a little easier to turn on logging, then pause (while you run the msi package, and capture the log file), then press Enter to let the BAT script complete by turning logging back off.  I'm so lazy, I try to automate my laziness.  Even this feels like too much work.

@echo off

reg add "HKLM\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\Installer" /v Debug /t REG_DWORD /d 7 /f 

reg add "HKLM\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\Installer" /v Logging /t REG_SZ /d voicewarmupx! /f

echo MSI logging is ENABLED

echo Run your MSI package now and then return to press ENTER

pause

reg delete "HKLM\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\Installer" /v Debug /f

reg delete "HKLM\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\Installer" /v Logging /f

echo MSI logging is DISABLED

My Thoughts on the Recent Autodesk Layoffs

I found out today from a good friend about the reductions announced at Autodesk.  What I also learned was that someone I really respect and enjoyed working with was one of those unfortunate folks who were let go.  I don't work for Autodesk, but I feel like sometimes I "did".  For those that don't know much about me, I spent almost twenty years working with Autodesk products as a developer of add-on software.  So when things get shaken up in San Rafael, or anywhere throughout their organization, I usually hear about it and I always pay attention.  When I heard that some good people were let go, while some terrible people were kept, I was a bit upset. 

I won't provide any names, but I will say that their choices of who to let go are being noticed by a huge community outside of their company.  Customers are going to notice because some of them (like my company) are getting sick and tired of dealing with the shlock being put in our faces to deal with instead of the skilled folks they keep under lock and key.  Instead of shuffling the deck, they threw out some Aces and kept some bad cards.

Years ago, before Carol Bartz came aboard, Autodesk was focused on customers and developers.  That's how they grew the business.  From the ground up.  Things got stupid in the boardroom and that's why Carol was brought in: to clean house and straighten things up. But she went wrong in two key areas:

1. She shifted the focus away from customers and developers towards shareholders.  Almost to the point of exclusion.

2. She allowed the company to get distracted in too many directions outside of their core competencies.  Remember AutoCAD 2000i?  The home design series?

Lucky timing of a few acquisitions and key licensing deals are what kept their stock prices afloat for so long.  That and squeezing their backroom developers for drips of innovation to meet shareholder demand.  The days of letting them play and invent crazy stuff were drying up because that's too costly and difficult to control.  Shareholder value.

So, almost ten years after I sat in an ADN conference room and listened to the VP tell us all that Mechanical Desktop was being replaced by Inventor, and Architectural Desktop was being replaced by Revit, well, we still have MDT and ADT.  That's execution for you.  I don't blame the developers for that.  I blame the boardroom.  And today's news is also another bad decision I blame on the boardroom.  No wonder our district has endured almost a dozen sales reps in the past eight years.  Who would want to work under that mess?

I know there's little chance anyone at Autodesk reads my rambling mess, but in case someone there does:  Next time you decide to lay off someone, start by asking your customers to rate the Autodesk folks they deal with.  I mean EVERYONE they deal with.  Not just the official boilerplate faces that show up to sign subscription deals and fly off before the ink dries.

Are You Smarter Than an 80 Year Old?

1. The United States of America has what form of governmental system:

a. Democracy

b. Capitalist

c. Representative Republic

d. Socialist Oligarchy

2. Which president served the shortest term in office:

a. Abraham Lincoln

b. William Henry Harrison

c. John F. Kennedy

d. Gerald R. Ford

3. Who was president when the 1929 Market Crash occurred

a. Herbert Hoover

b. Woodrow Wilson

c. Calvin Coolidge

d. Franklin D. Roosevelt

4. Which organization is NOT managed by the U.S. Government:

a. AmTrak

b. USPS - United States Postal Service

c. NOAA - National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration

d. American Cancer Society

5. What famous person tried to save the life of an assassinated president:

a. Benjamin Franklin

b. Thomas Edison

c. Alexander Graham Bell

d. Thomas Watson Sr.

6.  What president did the above person try to save the life of:

a. James Buchanan

b. James A. Garfield

c. Abraham Lincoln

d. John F. Kennedy

7. United States monetary currency was no longer backed by the "Gold Standard" as the result of what historic event:

a. The Davos Accord

b. The G8 Summit

c. The Bretton-Woods Agreements

d. The Great Depression

8. Franklin D. Roosevelt proposed which famous campaign:

a. The Great Idea

b. The New World Order

c. The Fair Deal

d. The New Deal

9. Harry Truman proposed which famouse campaign:

a. The Great Idea

b. The New World Order

c. The Fair Deal

d. The New Deal

10. Which president spoke the following quote: "I like to believe that people in the long run are going to do more to promote peace than our governments.  Indeed, I think that people want peace so much that one of these days governments had better get out of the way and let them have it."

a. Thomas Jefferson

b. Lyndon Johnson

c. Abraham Lincoln

d. Dwight D. Eisenhower

Answers are below...

1. C

2. B

3. C

4. D

5. C

6. B

7. C

8. D

9. C

10. D

Windows 7 at Home: Thoughts, Impressions

In a word:  Wonderful

In a sentence:  Windows 7 is the most promising effort I've seen from Microsoft in a long time.

Is it perfect?  No.  What is?  Show me ANYTHING that is "perfect".  I've never seen "perfect", ever.  But my experiences with Windows 7 on a mix of good and crappy hardware have been very impressive.  One computer, my wife's Dell Dimension 4600C mini-tower, had an issue recognizing the USB Linksys Compact Wireless-G device.  But that was only a matter of sticking the Linksys driver install CD into the tray and pressing Enter.  Beyond that, it's working like a champ, and on 1 GB of memory.  I also have a Dell Latitude C610 laptop with 1 GB of memory that runs Windows 7 significantly better than it ran Windows Vista Business edition.  All of my computers boot faster, login faster, launch applications faster, close them faster, log off faster, and reboot faster.  The interface is cleaner and simpler.  The UAC is simply not an issue anymore.  It's less obtrusive than the implemention on Ubuntu 8.10, Fedora 7 or Suse 10.

While the new Task bar gives me mixed feelings, I'm getting used to it and no longer pay attention to it. Once I set the Taskbar buttons to "combine when full", it's actually very user friendly.  I still don't like IE8, but I have been using Chrome almost exclusively anyway, and it's easy as dirt to download Firefox or Opera or whatever you prefer.

Dave's Proposed Law #2009-01-28-01: Drive Right or Stay Home

Proposed:   Motor vehicles with non-Virginia license plates are not to be permitted on Interstate highways on regular business days of the week, between the hours of 5:00 AM and 7:00 AM.

Normally, on weekdays before 6:00 AM, traffic flows through the I-64 corridor (between Norfolk and Hampton, via the HRBT) at a comfortable 70 MPH.  After 6:00 AM it slows to 60-65 MPH on average.  After 6:30 AM it's lucky to reach 60 MPH for more than a mile at a time. 

This morning's commute sucked.  It seemed that at every turn there was a car going 50 MPH or (maybe, barely) 55 MPH.  Every single one of these vehicles had plates from other states.  Minnesota, Florida, Delaware, Ohio, Michigan, Delaware.  People from other states:  LOOK AROUND YOU.  If others are moving at a faster rate, speed up to match them.  It will benefit everyone.  We will get to our destinations sooner and in a better mood, therefore making us more productive and "customer-friendly".

The next time you're on the phone with a rude, obnoxious customer rep, it may be because slowpokes aggravated the living shit out of them on their way into their dead-end job.  That person you cut off and gave the finger to?  They're probably the same person that called you at 9:00 AM to nag you about not paying your bills on time.  Or maybe they are the cold, emotionless, uncaring support person you're desperately begging for help.  Do us all a favor and drive right or get the f**k off the f**king road.  Thank you for your cooperation.

Cranium Drainium 12: Book Reading, Swag, and Pork

It's been a strange day here in Virginia Beach when it comes to weather.  While just North and West of us, there are many suffering with severe ice and snow storms, and power outages, we hit 68 degrees F today.  Nuts!  It's 56 F right now (8pm) and supposed to drop into the low 30's later tonight.  On top of that it's been raining on and off all day and windy, with a few gusts.  But inside our house it's been quiet.  Unusually quiet.  A family with four kids is rarely quiet.  There's always something going on, usually involving dangerous toys, cats and cooking utensils.

I had a rare window of time to sit down and read again.  I haven't had quiet time to read in, well, over a year.  I can't even remember the last time I had that luxury.  So I scanned our book shelves and pulled out The Great Shark Hunt, by Hunter S. Thompson.  A collection of his works, narrated by himself.  Fantastic and funny stuff.  The very first chapter discusses the fall of the Nixon administration, and it struck me just how similar that period was to the end of the recent Bush administration.  Almost word for word in some cases.  He highlights Pat Buchanan's involvement in that saga in much the same way you could paint Karl Rove today.  Very similar indeed.  The word is irony.   I was pretty young when Watergate was unfolding in the news, but I vaguely remember the cast of characters and Nixon waving goodbye as he borded the helicopter on his final day.  I must say, Buchanan's PR folks have done an outstanding job of distancing his past from his present.

Earlier, I was doing laundry and chores, and I ran across a pile of baseball caps, polo shirts and t-shirts from former employers.  Without hesitation I threw them all out, as if it were leftover pizza boxes laying around the den floor.  I didn't even think about it until after I walked away from the trash can.  I had to smile for some reason.  I still don't know why.  It might be worth noting that we donate a significant amount of clothing, bedding, towels and so forth to Good Will and Salvation Army every year.  Yet I wouldn't think of punishing someone with wearing that stuff.  The trash can was a better place.  If only I had a wood stove...

Reading through the details of the $816 billion "stimulus package" pushed by the new White House administration.  Wow!  Pork Central.  I would expect to hear Mel Blanc's voice doing the introductions of the bill on the floor.   I think that the only reasonable excuse is that the perpetrators of much of this corrupted shopping list assumed it would be rubber-stamped so fast that not even the press would have time to digest and analyze it all.  No shame at all, on either side of the political divide.  If you have only listened to the "news" reports, you're cheating yourself of some real entertainment.  It always amazes me how party-folk line up to defend or attack the exact same crap when it comes from a different side of the aisle.  Nothing new here.  Same crap, new name.

And speaking of "pork", when will the porn industry crank out a video using the "stimulus package" phrase in the title?  They've really been pounded hard by the economy.  Oh, did I just say "pounded hard"?  How juvenile.  :)

CNBC was talking up education stocks tonight.  A lot of discussion was focused on how great of a value that market is right now.  Um.  How can that be?  Where exactly are all those graduates going to work when they finish up?  Roubini was on and delved into the absolute horrors he insists are heading our way in 2009, with a noticable portion of pain coming from student loan defaults.  So, I'm not a financial or investment expert, but how can both of those scenarios work together for a mutually beneficial outcome?  I'm not seeing it.

Governmental Budget Tips

Here's some ideas I think would help cut government costs:

Cut postal deliveries to Mon-Fri.  We don't NEED mail delivered on Saturdays anyway.  It's all junk mail and bills.  Who needs it.

Consolidate our armed forces.  Do we really need so many "land forces"?  Combine the Army, Marines, Air Force Rangers, into a single group.  We only need three segments:  Land, Sea and Air.  The current stupidity is leftover from nostalgia days.  Time to modernize.

Pass a federal law that mandates any "foreign" territory which is occupied or controlled by U.S. forces for more than a year, is to become a protectorate and inclusive of all pertinent federal laws.  That would solve two major problems:  (a) legal disposition of detainees on foreign soil, and (b) provide incentive to GET THE HELL OUT sooner.  Do we REALLY need to maintain Guantanamo Bay?  Why?

Sell American flags to everyone in the Middle East.  They seem to have an insatiable apetite for burning them in front of TV cameras.  Maybe we could capitalize on that somehow.

Charge all meteorologists a hefty federal "fine" when they blow the forecast.  It should be equal to a days-worth of their salary (gross amount, of course).

Anytime someone insists on modifying public school textbooks, FORCE that person to pay for it on their own.  No assistance allowed.

Require all fat TSA agents to run on treadmills to generate electricity to power the scanners at the airports.  That should cover the bill for at least a year or two.

Even though unconstitutional: Charge every voter $1 to vote.  That would collect a crapload of money and the marketing potential is awesome "put your money where your vote is".  "Best government money can buy", and so on.  Oh, and "crapload" is a mathematical term.

Attach a head-mounted contraption to every Senator and Congressman, which links to the jaw bone to generate electricity from the movement of their mouths.  Since they can't seem to shut up for more than a few seconds, maybe we could reduce our dependence on foreign oil that way.

Once a year, charter a PPV channel to carry the new "Nude Legislature" event where our elected officials have to attend a full day of work totally nude.  I'm sure some could garner a few bucks.

Rent out time at shooting ranges for the public to bring their favorite "hated" appliance to shoot to pieces with an array of military weapons.  I'm sure there would be NO shortage of folks who would gladly dish out $100 for 30 minutes with a mini-gun and their crappy old TV set.

Place ads on all of the .gov web sites.  Popups.  Floaters.  Chasers.  You name it.  Collect some revenue at least.

On the LOCAL government side, here's a list of new laws and fines that would surely help restock the budget coffers:

Failure to use a turn signal when changing lanes: $5,000

Driving with an animal on your lap: $10,000

Driving and reading a book, applying cosmetics, applying food condiments, dialing a cell phone, texting, lighting a cigarette, facing the passenger while talking: $10,000

Playing music loud enough to hear through rolled-up windows in another vehicle: $20,000

Driving with bumper stickers: $1,000

Vanity plates that don't make any sense to others: $1,000

Driving while intoxicated: $100,000 and take their car and their license on the FIRST offense

Failing to move out of the way of an emergency vehicle en route to an emergency: $50,000

Maybe if the fines were scarry enough, people would actually heed these laws.

Is IBM on Crack??! Has Print Media Gone Stoopid?

Today I received another monthly installment of tree-killing magazines which I've tried to cancel for (no, I'm not kidding at all) 3 YEARS.  Every issue of eWeek, InformationWeek, and so on, says "Act Now!  This is your LAST ISSUE!"

So I open each to skim through the ads.  After all, there's hardly anything to read in between all the inserts, flyouts, glue-ins and fold-outs.  Once you pull that crap out, the thickness of the "product" falls to less than half of what it was beforehand.  That's a mathematical fact, by the way.

Now I get down to the "meat" of each publication.  The meat is broken down as follows:

   20% old, dated news, already worn out on the Internet

   20% editorializing with only sprinkles of factual foundation

   20% thinly coated marketing shlock painted to appear as a "review"

   40% permanent ads (the kind you can't easily ripout)

Of the 40% ads, in each magazine no less, is a series of IBM's latest puff of the crackpipe marketing ideas:  Going Green.  Yes.  Going Green.  Green in their view must mean consuming trees like a busload of starved football players dumped off at the nearest Golden Corral.  All you Can Eat buffet of trees here baby.   Page after page of glossy, colorful, ink-ridden bullshit ads about how IBM loves nature and is going to prove it by sucking your ozone-depleting budget dry as a bone.

Excuse me, but WTF are they thinking?  Didn't anyone in one of those crackfest big-blue marketing meetings say "hey, guys, um, uhh, do you think this is really a good idea?  Placing six to eight pages of glossy printed ads about going 'green' throughout all the tech mags?"  I'm sure if that person did, they're at home pushing job applications while collecting unemployment.  The marketing team is probably led by the former heads of the wildly successful OS/2 Warp division I suppose.  Or maybe it was those guys that handled the Texas IT outsourcing "issue" with those questionable backups.  Oops.  Sorry guys.

Here's an idea: If you really want to pay for printed ads in tech magazines which focus on "going green", maybe it would be better to print them on toilet paper and include a notice that says you can wipe your ass after reading.  I always knew I should have gone into marketing.

They All Suck - Suckiness Version 2009

Microsoft can't seem to execute on a plan worth a shit when it comes to the desktop or consumer markets.  Windows 7 is showing so much promise, but I'm sure they'll blow something.  They always have.  Apple can't seem to produce a cohesive entertainment device (AppleTV+Time-Capsule+MacMini+AirPort), so we're stuck buying multiple products to "almost" get the job done.  IBM couldn't get a desktop OS out right.  OS/2 was nice, but IBM fumbled that ball on the hike.  HP's compact desktop products look like something two grade-schoolers put together in a garage.  Elegant is NOT the word.  Dell can't decide what market it wants to play in, so it tries all of them and walks away from each one at a time.  Autodesk plugs their ears to the cries of customers asking for a mid-range product that does what they need (at a price they can afford).  Adobe just prices their shit like they're on Pluto and their packaging skills suck horribly (or is "horrifically" a better word?).   Ubuntu and Fedora have stuffed so much crap into their desktop products that they're as bloated and fat as Windows EVER was.  Slow as hell and nothing compelling to show for it beyond "free".  Wow.  I'm not impressed.

This is 2009?  Can't we produce something that works, that we can afford, and ship it on time?

Banning Silent Cell Phones?

Ok, so Boy Genius has an article about the "Camera Phone Predator Alert Act" being proposed by New York Rep. Pete King.  I agree with the notion that a camera phone should make a noise, but cell phones without cameras should absolutely be able to operate without making stupid noises.  I turn the sounds off on all my gadgets.  PSP, Blackberry, iPod, you name it.  I f-ing HATE a gadget having to make clicking and beeping sounds.  As if I don't already know I'm pressing the f-ing buttons!  Stupid.  Just completely stupid.  

Freezing Drizzle Fo-Shizzle

I just got home from a five-mile fast walk around Mount Trashmore park.  It's 38 degrees and drizzly.  I can't think of a crappier day t0 do that, but it was fun anyway.  I'm thawing out.  I listened to No Agenda podcast the whole way around and still have more to go before it's over.  Episode Jan 24 is as always good.  With enough layers of clothing I can walk five miles almost anywhere.  

If Your Dog is Sick, Kick the Cat

We were struggling to find and fix the root cause of an application we were packaging for a mass deployment (5,000 plus computers).  Names have been changed to protect the inept.  Let's just say there's this insanely popular Windows software application product that is used by engineers and architects around the planet.  And you decide to package it, along with about six other products of theirs, to push out using your favorite flavor of desktop management software.  And when you install it, and run it the first time, your users start getting these crazy .NET errors.  You know, the kind that make no sense, like this...

System.Something.Or.Other.Library.Module.Unknown.Whatever.Broken,

System.Something.Or.Other.Library.Module.Unknown.Whatever.Broken,
System.Something.Or.Other.Library.Module.Unknown.Whatever.Broken,
System.Something.Or.Other.Library.Module.Unknown.Whatever.Broken,
System.Something.Or.Other.Library.Module.Unknown.Whatever.Broken,

System.Something.Or.Other.Library.Module.Unknown.Whatever.Broken

... error:  Divide by Zero, invalid integer value parameter passed to module
warning, warning, doom.destruction.countdown...

So, you might go back to the vendor and ask:  Hey, what exactly does this mean and how do we fix it on 5,000 computers?  Their answer is: "We really don't know.  Not sure.  We'll check on it and get back to you."  So you wait about a week and finally ask again.  They respond by opening a support call with Microsoft, who they get to call you and figure it out on the phone.

The answer is this: Open Control Panel, Open Regional and Language Settings, change the region from "English (US)" to something else, like "English (Australia)".  Click Apply.  Then change it back to "English (US)" and click Apply and click OK to close it out.

The application works perfectly now.  The Microsoft support guy was very helpful and quick to locate a support article that cleared this up.  942460.  Go figure.

Wow - Layoff Bonanza?

Home Depot, Caterpiller, ING, Spring, Philips, and Pfizer.  Total headcount is 48,000 plus 26,000 at Pfizer alone!  That's 74,000.  Not all at once obviously, but still.  Holy crap!  That "stimulus package" better be on target and on time or 2009 is going to become a bloodbath.  I'm really lucky to be working for a company that's got a backlog of huge projects and a lot of IT and non-IT positions yet to fill.

Movies

Gran Torino - pretty good

Yes Man - pretty good

Benjamin Button - really good, but similar to Forest Gump

Windows 7 Achillies Heal: IE8

First of all, I'm very impressed overall with Windows 7. It is a huge improvement over Vista and definitely over XP. Everything you read about it is true: faster, cleaner, leaner, stable-er, and so on. But WTF is with IE8?

It seems the IE team is working inside a vacuum. Even a casual look around would make that obvious. Rather than designing v8 to address comeptition, they're choosing a myopic comparison with IE7. Maybe looking at Firefox. But this is 2009. Think about that when you open IE8 next time (if you ever do). In 2009: is that the best UI they can design for a browser? Seriously?

This is probably THE one place they could have put some careful, innovative UI design effort and produced a meaningful impression that Windows 7 is more than just a "Vista 2" update. In most respects, Windows 7 appears to be just that, which is very misleading. But what I'm talking about here is making IE8 *only* for Windows 7. Why bother back-porting it? There is no business case for building a version for XP. Can anyone explain a clear business case for back-porting it? I can't think os a single one. It just seems dumb to me.

YouTube IP Nazis Went on a Blitzkrieg

I logged onto my YouTube account as I often do and noticed that about 20 of my saved "Favorites" had been stricken from the site for copyright violations. These are NOT items I posted. These are items posted by others. They cover music, comedy and even some self-produced clips, which was even weirder. Clips of comedian Brian Regan, George Carlin, Chris Rock, musicians like Frank Zappa, Limp Bizkit, and Cream, and so on. Not even the same publishers or rights holders. All of these clips had been "up" for at least a year. Many for two or three years. Looks like someone got a bug up their *ss.  The Internet is becoming less and less fun to use.

Windows Admin Laundry List

Gleening my dusty notes from my days of doing sysadmin work, and briefly as a consultant.  Some of these are rather obvious to most geeks.  I'm sure it's a summary but hopefully it helps someone.

Keep a log of all Active Directory account or structural changes (renaming OUs, special accounts or objects, etc.).  It will come in handy when you need to do a restore of deleted objects and you can't figure out why the ntdsutil "restore subtree" command fails to find the objects you're trying to restore.

If you're running Windows Server 2003 and have installed SP1 on your domain controllers, be sure to pay attention to the new tombstone feature that allows you to increase it from 60 to 180 days.  Factor this into your backup plans.

Treat your AD schema like it's your bank account.  Don't tinker with it unless you have a ROCK SOLID reason to do so.  If you f**k up your AD schema, you can recover it using a full forest recovery.  I've done it in a lab setup and it works, but it's not without risk.

When installing a new domain controller, use the install from backup option.  It will cut down replication traffic and catch-up time.

Change the DSRM administrator password using NTDSUTIL on a regular basis.  Especially after key personnel changes.

Use Group Policy to configure standard settings on multiple computers or users whenver possible.  Things like restricted accounts, firewall exceptions, remote desktop settings and so forth.  If any particular computers or users need unique settings, put them in a separate OU and still strive to use Group Policy for managing settings.

Capture key file/print/web servers using P2V for "plan B" recovery needs.

Virtualize at least one DC for fault tolerance and recovery.

Google AJAX API Playground

The Google AJAX API Playground is very cool.

Time Off

Studying for a big upcoming exam.  Chores.  Work.  The usual.  Follow me on Twitter if you're really that bored.

Not-So News of Tech

Newsbin Pro 5.5 was officially released after a lengthy beta trial.  I love the way those guys handle their development cycle.  Not too long.  Not too short.  Just right.

KiXtart 4.61 Beta 1 was posted January 2.  The new Replace() function is nice, as are the bug fixes.  If you're still using an older version, my God: get off your butt and move to 4.60 at least.  Geez.  You'll be glad you did.  Tastes great and less filling.

Tech Layoffs galore this past week: Microsoft, Intel, Sun, Disney, TI, Sony, Oracle.  Add to those over the past month or so: IBM, Logitech, EMC, TDK, Motorola, Ericsson, Nortel, Cisco, AMD, Digg (Revision3).  But the most tragic?  Starbucks!!!  Oh my God!!!  I'd rather they lay off government workers than Starbucks people.  Have they no common sense?!?

Apple released an update for their Remote Server Admin Tools.

Question of the Day:  How can anyone juxtapose two seemingly diverse arguments about the impact of Steve Jobs' absense?  That (a) he was an important [if not THE most important] force in the shaping of Apple and its continued success, and that (b) Apple can continue to innovate and succeed without him?

Inspired by the work of Paul Thurrott, I posted my very first Windows 7 Theme Pack (soon to be renamed "Style" pack) for Virginia Beach.  Check it out (if you have Win 7 installed).  It won't bite, but it has a few nice photos I've taken.

Have computers really solved more problems than they've created?  If you answered that question in less than 30 seconds of intense thought, you're fooling yourself.

Transformation Complete

I finally have all of my home computers on Windows 7.  Even my crappiest of crappy hardware: The cranky old Dell Latitude C610 laptop, which ran like a man with no legs, arms or prosthetics on Windows XP, and like a programmer on Skittles and Jolt with Vista.   It hums along very nicely with Windows 7.  I'm impressed. 

Installing Windows 7 Over a LAN Connection

Which is faster and easier?

1. Put the install disc into the DVD drive, share it over the network, and install from the UNC path to the shared drive.  Or...
2. Mount the ISO image file as a drive and share it over the network, and install from the UNC path to the shared "drive".

#2 is by far the fastest and easiest.  "Fastest" is a somewhat conditional term.  Qualifying that would be to say that it does take a little more time to mount the file and share it out than it does to insert a disc and share it out.  But after that minor step, the performance contrast is enormous.  The read/fetch performance of a modern SATA DVD-RW drive is no match for read/fetch performance on an internal SATA hard disk. 

 I wish Windows 7 would have added native support for mounting ISO files as drives.  I was hoping that maybe NET USE or MOUNTVOL would add this capability, but alas, it has not happened.  But fear not, you can use any of several freeware or shareware utilities to mount an ISO file and it's easy to do.  One is UltraISO, another is Virtual Clone Drive, but there are others.

Crashing is Crashing

I was listening to a bunch of nerds talking the other day, and realized something interesting, as it pertains to knee-jerk FUD perceptions about Macs vs Windows.  I normally block those topics from my puny brain because tech-war talk bores the shit out of me.  But something more akin to psychologically effusive stupidity was apparent.

First off, to be fair and accurate (forget "balanced". I don't care for Fox news), you have to restrict all such comparisons to similar versions. You cannot honestly contrast Mac OS 8 with Windows Vista. The same is true in both directions. Compare Leopard with Vista, and so forth.  It just makes more sense that way.

So, the Mac guy says his one Vista machine crashes all the time. He follows up with "that's common with Vista". The Windows guy says "hmmmm", and nothing more. The Windows guy says his kid's Mac hangs a lot. The Mac guy says "that's got to be a configuration problem". I thought: why isn't the Vista issue a configuration problem? Because all the Mac guy has seen is his experiences with his one Vista machine (probably on bootcamp or Parallels), which are hamstrung by limited daily use, compared to his Mac-oriented activities.

The pretentiousness of that is what bothers me most. It's a common perception with Mac fans. My Vista machines (four of them) have NEVER crashed. Ever.  Early alpha builds crashed (prior to b.4074), but that's about it.  I've been running them since it was released and they're on disperate hardware. One is running on pure crap hardware.  Anyhow, back to the story...  So, in the Mac-boy's view (and many Mac fans), because their Windows machines are crap, all Windows machines are crap.  It's shortsighted and dumb.  I don't ever claim OSX is crap or buggy.  It's a fine product.  But my Windows Vista and (more significantly) Windows 7 machines are rock solid, fast and do everything I need them to do.  I'm so tired of the bullshit koolaid drinking fest.  

I couldn't let it go.  I had to speak up.  "Your Vista box crashes because you have a piece of shit box running it.  Go buy a new box like you would for running Leopard."  You wouldn't try to run Leopard on a PowerPC box from 2001 (even if you could).  Run it on what it was designed to run on and then make your opinions based on that.  To the guy with the Mac problems, I suggested  he bring it to the Genius Bar.  After all: They're freaking geniuses.  :)

My Obama Predictions

I will try to look back on this in four years to score my accuracy.

Economy - Initially he may have some positive impact/effect. But short-lived, as remaining derivative credit defaults, commercial real estate, and reduced manufacturing demand remain in the coffers to be deleveraged. I'm going to go with pundit predictions that 2010 will be when things gradually get better, but slowly. Infrastructure improvement programs are the wildcard (good side) as is international conflict (on the bad side).

Health Care - Major impact. I'm expecting sweeping reforms to insurance, entitlements, tort and things like hospice care. Veterans affairs should see marked improvement, as well as low income services. Not sure what the dwindling middle class will see.  Probably more walk-in clinics in our future.

Telecom - I don't expect much beyond some limited Internet expansion (read: wireless), but it may take a back seat to security and other issues. Semiconductor markets will ride the general economic curve since they are not seen as worthy of special consideration compared with telecom markets.  Hardware and software vendors will ride the bus with everyone else.

Security / Defense - I expect a shift of focus from large-scale products (planes, tanks, ships, and subs) to intelligence and mobile weapons systems. Aircraft Carriers and supply ships may be an exception.  Information services may see an uptick, but I'm skeptical it will be anything more robust or worthwhile than the NMCI fiasco.

Legal System - I expect significant reforms to laws which would lower prison demand for non-violent crimes. Minimum sentencing laws could be relaxed as well.  Going to prison for an ounce of pot may be reconsidered.  People do less time for outright fraud than most drug offenses.

Education - I expect some reforms to higher education to make it more accessible and affordable across the board.  Compensation programs for volunteer work may become viable. I don't expect to see any relief for those already being squeezed to repay bloated student loans.

Manufacturing / Housing - 2009 will suck, but not as severely as 2008. If he enacts infrastructure improvement programs along the scale of FDR, Truman, or Ike, it could be a lucrative era but only when those come to fruition in full swing in 2010 or later.

International - I expect improved relations with many countries like Cuba, Iran, and the Middle East in general. Some relations might see added strain after the first year. Such as China (differing civil rights views), Russia (energy issues and NATO expansion), N. Korea (nukes), Saudi Arabia (imperialist leadership vs populist views).

Nothing is certain, obviously. Distractions, known and unknown, can and will change the game at any point. This will be as true going forward as it was for shaping and defining the previous administration. Had it not been for 9-11, who knows how the Bush era would have been. Any, or all, of the following issues will likely shape the next four years and beyond:

Mexico. Afghanistan. Korea. Iran. China. Russia. Venezuela. Taliban. Al Qeada. Rednecks. Corporate leaders with a pro-republican agenda. Nut job groups. Additional economic strains.

Here's to the next four years - cheers!

Cranium Drainium 11: Things that Urk Me

1. Slow drivers
2. Haynes (furniture) TV commercials
3. Rock music with high-pitched male singers
4. NASCAR
5. Drug commercials
6. Western Sushi
7. Microsoft product names
8. Apple fan boys
9. Dead remote controls
10. Missing socks

Virtual Box 2.1 on Windows 7

I couldn't get VMware Workstation 6.5.1 32-bit to install on 32-bit Windows 7 Ultimate.  It just died every time I tried.  Then I tried VirtualPC 2007, same result.  Ugh!

Then I went to run the Virtual Box 2.1 installer (32-bit) and it choked also, but then Windows tossed this bad-boy at me...

Solve a problem with Windows 7 beta

An issue with the Customer Experience Improvement Program (CEIP) client in Windows 7 beta is causing Explorer and some MSI-based installers to stop working properly.

To solve this problem, follow these steps:

1. Click the Start button , click All Programs, and then click Accessories.

2. Right-click Command Prompt, and then click Run as administrator. In the User Account Control window, verify that Program name is Windows Command Processor, and then click Yes.

3. In the Administrator: Command Prompt window, type or paste the following text at the prompt:

   reg delete HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\SQMClient\Windows\DisabledSessions /va /f

4. Press Enter to install the solution.

5. If The operation completed successfully displays, close the Administrator: Command Prompt window to complete this procedure. If "ERROR: Access is denied" displays, repeat this procedure from the top, making sure you clicked Run as administrator in step two.

   
   

   It works!  Now, I'm off to try out Virtual Box...

   
   

   EDIT:  I really like Vbox.  The interface is kind of a best-of-breed between what works in VirtualPC 2007 and VMware Player and VMware Workstation.  Sort of.  Very "web 2.0" looking.  I like it.  It also opens .VMDK and .VHD disks without any problem and boots them just fine.  All of my VPC and VMWare guests work fine in it.

Where Were You?

When the inauguration was going down, will you remember where you were and what you were doing?  Like September 11, 2001.  Or when the Challenger or Columbia disintegrated. 

I was at work, answering one of fifty support requests.  Reinstalling software and talking to customers and telling tired jokes to diffuse their frustration.

Some didn't have it so lucky.  Others had it real good.  Some felt a little pressure.  Some were doing business as usual.  Some were protesting small things in big ways.  Others celebrated big things in small ways.

In the end, it was really just another day.  Another smooth transition from one leader to another.  A continuation of our government and social stability, which is rare in the world today.  Tomorrow will be another day at work, or at school, or in the hospital, or in Iraq or Afghanistan, or sleeping under a box on the street, or making phone calls, or going to the store.  Tomorrow will be the day after all this stuff happening today.  Where are you now?  Where will you be tomorrow?

The Amazing Blizzard Vapor!

Few places on Earth have the concentrated mass of bullshit meteorologists as Hampton Roads.  There's an irony here that I will get to in a minute.  First however, was the media blitz, replete with fancy computer graphics and dramatic theme music, leading into each "weather center" update.  These "segments" dominated the news like nothing else.  Barack who?  Inauga-what?  We got a blizzard coming!   No time to crap your pants, you gotta stay tuned to our over-hyped weather forecast!

I'm not kidding.  Stores sold out of batteries, flashlights, bottled water (jugs mostly), and rock salt.  I'm really not kidding.  The NOAA site also had "1-3 inches of snow accummulation" for the Hampton/Newport News peninsula, the outermost reach of this treacherous storm.  The forecast for the southside (Norfolk, Portsmouth, Chesapeake, and Virginia Beach) was just a tad bit lower than for the Northern edge of North Carolina, which was supposed to be 2-6 inches, depending on whom you listened to.

We got NOTHING.  NOTHING.  It was sunny and cold today.  Not a single flake fell in Virginia Beach or Newport News.  At least not anywhere near anyone I spoke with.  I never saw one.  The sun was shining bright and clear in Newport News.

The pretentiousness of some of our local "chief meteorologist" folks is such that my kids joke about one of them as "the Jeff Lawson show" whenever his face appears.  Not to pick on Jeff here as the only example, they're all bad.  Even worse, when they blow a forecast, they almost always come on the next day and lead off with "as I told you yesterday..." which is a joke.

The irony here is that 35 years ago we had an old barrel-chested retired military meteorologist named Joe Folks.  Channel 13 weatherman.  Never had a single electronic device within 100 feet besides the TV cameras and lights.  He wrote on a white board with a dry erase marker.  His voice was deeper than James Earl Jones.  At the end of each segment, he would put the cap on his marker, slide into his coat chest pocket and salute the viewers, saying "That's the weather".  Always smiling.  NEVER WRONG.  He never blew a forecast.  Never.  All this so-called technology and "advances" in forecasting techniques and they're ridiculously WORSE than Mr. Folks ever was.  There should be a bronze memorial to Mr. Folks.  We're moving backwards.  

Woz - Not Woz - or Woz'nt He?

BoyGeniusReport.com reports that Woz says "Jobs' absence won't hurt Apple". I got news for Mr. Woz: It already has. I guess he hasn't noticed the steady decline in stock price since Jan 5. Sure, its just a fluke. They'll just snatch another person to take Jobs' place. After all: his shoes are so easy to fill. Nobody will even notice. Woz should just buy a sports team and stay out of the news.

It will interesting to see what effect, if any, the earnings call has on their share price.  Especially the prediction that they'll miss the EPS estimates.

Samba vs Active Directory: NFL vs High School?

Don Jones posted a nice blog comment about some of the issues involved with choosing an open source alternative to Active Directory while maintaining authentication interoperability (say that ten times fast!) with Windows clients.  I agree with this comments, but he forgot one of THE most powerful aspects of AD: Group Policy.  

There's nothing truly like Group Policy in the Linux world that I've found.  There are some open source projects that mimick certain aspects, but nothing matches it completely.  People try to put Group Policy into a logical "box" as a one-trick pony.  Usually saying that it's only used to "deploy settings" or "install software", but it's much more than that.  

The integration of Group Policy with LDAP structures (OU's) and object classes, WMI filtering, Inheritence and Blocking, Modeling tools,  RSoP tools, and the more recent addition of Group Policy Preferences and Powershell cmdlets, all make Group Policy a serious force to recon with on its own.  It's unfair, and woefully inaccurate, to compare AD with Samba unless you restrict the discussion to nothing more than authentication (e.g. Kerberos and NTLM, etc.).  I mean, as far as using Samba for AD authentication is concerned: you can, but why?  If you're working in an environment that feels the need for central authentication (and more) and you can't afford a license of Windows Server, you're in really bad shape.

Microsoft Mobile Me?

Ok. I had to bust out laughing over this one. Paul Thurrott reports that Microsoft is readying a competitor to Apple's Mobile Me. Seems a little dumb to me. I suppose Microsoft will give this thing an appropriate Microsoft-style name, like: "Microsoft Personal Software Services Service 2009, Ultimate Premium Extras Edition"

Obama-lama-ding-Dong

To all you Obama fans out there:

Please.  I beg you.  Give the man a few weeks in office before you believe he can walk on water.  Any sports fan will tell you that history is CHOCK FULL of "sure bet" people that didn't pan out.  I'm not saying he will fail.  I sure do NOT want any president to fail.  This is our country we're talking about, after all.  Any American that wishes for their president to fail is (a) an IDIOT, and (b) anti-American.  But for those of you that already believe he can do NO wrong, he can.  He will. He is human.  Humans fuck up.  It's how we're wired.  Sorry to bum you out.

To all you Obama haters out there:

Get over it.  Stop bitching and whining.  Life moves on.

$57 for Two RJ-45 Connectors? Huh?

Stopped at a Radio Shack at a nearby mall and checked out their CAT5e cabling.  Two spools of 100 ft, unshielded.   Same brand.  One with RJ-45 connectors, the other without.  With connectors: $83.  Without connectors: $26.   WTF?  The pricier item isn't listed on their web site.  Go figure.

Betta Fish clue - I get it now

It took a second read through Tim Sneath's post to get this (item #29).  Cute.

Continuity Plans Lacking for Apple

I know I'm not alone in saying this, but Apple has done a lousy job of reassuring their shareholders with a viable continuity plan for the post-Jobs era. This is not a new subject for the tech industry. It happened with Gerster at IBM, and of course Gates at Microsoft. Both of those situations showed the world, and the stock markets, what it means to have a smooth transition plan ready to go. Last minute announcements don't work very well, as Apple's stock price reaction on January 5 clearly showed.

So, now it's been quite a few days since the big announcement that Steve was ill, as well as the bigger announcement that Steve is taking a "leave of absense". But where is the contingency plan? Who at Apple has the charisma and vision, combined, to continue on the momentum they currently have? Tim Cook? Pete Oppenheimer? Phill Schiller? Hell no. No more than anyone can say (with a straight face) that Steve Ballmer is carrying the same momentum Gates did. At least it's possible to say Sam Palmisano has done a fair job of keeping IBM on its feet after the heroic efforts of Lou Gerstner.

IBM learned early on to avoid letting the CEO become the icon of the company. It's risky. It works great while the going is good. But when it ends (and it has to end) it goes badly. Not too many companies have risen by virtue of a singular human icon and lived to prosper during the next generation of leadership. They almost always get acquired or simply whither away.

I'm surprised that Apple (or rather, Steve Jobs) hasn't spent more time planning out their continuity and, even if they have, done a better job of reassuring their shareholders and the media about their plans. I hope Apple does well. I'd hate to see them fall from the ladder they've built so well until now. They've paved the way in so many areas and kept competition alive in the technology and consumer electronics markets. Without the iPod, we'd still be lugging brick-sized Sony crap around to listen to music (forget video). Without the iPhone, there probably STILL wouldn't be any touch-screen phones in mass production. The concept of an "App Store" is another concept they've pioneered in the cell market. They've had their share of duds in the past, but lately, they've been firing on all cylinders and very well. I just hope that if/when Jobs returns to his post, he focuses on who will succeed him and it had better be someone that instills a real sense of "Wow!" in everyone.

DIY - AD by IE

I forgot to post a comment a recent update to my web-based AD management setup which now includes reboots of any computer on my domain within 15 minutes.  The scheduler is still on a 15 minute cycle, so the longest it would wait to run is 14.9 minutes, or something like that.  Very handy when the kids give me lip and think they can continue surfing the web.  I think not. :)

Another Gray, Cold, Drizzly, Crappy Day in Virginia Beach

The fine print says we're not allowed to have snow here. We're not budgeted for snow. We're not even allowed to have fun if it should snow, however unlikely that is. I remember when it snowed here a few years back though. Mount Trashmore was blanketed and became an obvious magnet for anyone with any materials that could be used to slide down the hill sides. But OH NO, can't have any of that here. The police surrounded the perimeter and warning everyone that sliding was not permitted. No fun here! Might get hurt. Nevermind that they have a concrete skateboard park less than 100 yards away, in the SAME park. How they rationalize that I will never understand.

But regardless, we don't have any snow today. Just 39 degrees and drizzle. Crap. Uber crapness. Sheer madening crappiness. Crapativity. Crapulation. Crapaciousness. Crap-a-lap-a-ding-dong.

Ninja Kitty - Still Action

(Thanks to Kevin Rose for pointing this out)

Cat Banned from Post Office for Not Paying Taxes

Domain or Workgroup

Domain

Microsoft SQL Server or Microsoft Access

Microsoft SQL Server

Tab or Comma Delimiting

Tab

Rick Sanchez Busts on Joe the Plumber

Fantastic! I can't believe we give this made-up "Joe" a-hole a second of our time. What buffoon...

Diggnation Clip Show

Installing WSUS 3.0 Sp1 on Windows Server 2008 SP1 SM

Good article with easy to follow instructions. Works great. Lasts long time. :)

Read article

Frozen Lake Photos

It was in the teens (degrees Fahrenheit) last night. At 11:00 A.M. this morning it was 22 degrees. I walked over to the lake near my house to snap some photos of the ice wonders. I will upload more later today if I can. I hope you enjoy!

http://picasaweb.google.com/ds0934/FrozenLake#

The Slingshot Man

Holy crap! I was always good with a wrist-rocket slingshot (when I was younger), but this is ridiculous.

Increased Traffic?

I have been tracking site traffic to the blog since mid-December and so far 310 visits, averaging 15-18 unique per day. Very cool and very much appreciated! Thank you!

Proof that There is No Intelligent Life Here

What's worse: The fool, or the crowd watching the fool? Or is it the crowd that pays for cable or satellite to watch the fool?

Check THIS out and decide for yourself the following question:

If there is intelligent life beyond our little planet, and it watches the link above, is it truly "intelligent" if it doesn't immediately vaporize the planet?

Even More Layoffs

In addition to the post I already made about some recent layoffs, check this out. Circuit City takes the prize with a liquidation and closure totalling roughly 34,000 layoffs. Most of the respected economists insist we are only at the beginning of this mess. About half seem to think the "bottom" will be April or May. Others think it will rebound slightly when the weather warms and then drop again in the Fall before recovering in early Q1-2010. Sheesh.

So I have ask all the mortgage agents, bank execs, credit lending firms out there: Was the greedy short-sighted bullshit all worth it?

More Layoffs

Announced in the last seven days...

Delta Airlines: 2000

Blue Cross: 1000

Saks: 1100

Neiman Marcus: 375

Plantronics: 18% (specific number not given)

Autodesk: 750

Barnes & Noble: 100

Motorola: 4000

Pfizer: 800

source: LayoffBlog.com

More Spring Cleaning

2009 is already shaping up to be a massive house cleaning for me. I've let go of so many things. Tangible and intangible. Feels good. Like a weight lifted off. How long it will last is anyone's guess, or up to God, whichever one believes. Domains and web sites are one thing I'm letting go of. Just terminated another. And one more will die in May without auto-renew. Don't need them. Wasted time and effort. I'll keep one of them, because I run a bunch of automation services from it, for now. Once I find a more suitable offering for my needs I will very likely let it go as well. I've sold off most of my books on Windows, AD and virtualization already. Sold off some hardware too. Lean and mean.

Back into the Frying Pan

I was employed for four-plus years at a large corporation in the IT "division" through the last half of the 1990's. "Big iron" was the staple at the time. PC platforms were just coming into fruition. I left that place to work for a much smaller (almost "tiny") company for the next seven years. I left that company to work for an even-smaller IT consulting firm, doing Microsoft stuff, for about six months - before a surprise downsizing left me on the street. Thankfully I left on good terms with most of my previous employers and was hired back to the "big iron" shop again. I was away for almost ten years.

It's really weird being back, but I'm getting settled in and actually liking it. So much mixing and contrasting of old and new. Things that have changed, and things that haven't. This place has a long history. Much, much longer than I've been alive. Even the IT portion has been alive longer than I've been able to spell "computer". But now it's powered by racks of PC technology, with less big iron to be seen, lurking in the corners.

Today, my boss took our group on a casual tour of the data center on the bottom floor. I work in a cube farm on the second floor above it all. We don't often go downstairs into that area due to (a) being too busy and (b) it being a secure area. It was nice to walk through it all again. I remember going through it back in 1996 through 1999, and again for a quick tour in mid-2007. But today kind of helped me establish a mental picture of where its' been and where it's going. It's truly amazing to see the evolution of our data center.

In the 1980's it was a bastion of IBM hardware. IBM practically lived there. Mainframes covered thousands of square feet, divided into multiple divided rooms, with false floors and Halon systems and command centers, etc. And of course: the ever-fashionable amber-colored short-pile carpeted false flooring squares. Complete with decades of stains. In the 1990's the balance of PC to mainframe was about even.

Today, what is most noticable, to someone having seen it back in the 1990's, would be the drastic reduction in actual hardware. Rather than rows and rows of racks, there are now large open areas of nothing but flooring. The racks are now stocked with blade servers, tied to SANs through neatly bundled cable routes (which used to be a massive cluster-fk under the false floor space). Amazing transformation.

It's easy to become jaded by the sheer horsepower that an enterprise data center holds. But when you leave it for several years to work in smaller areas you soon realize that not everything is as grandiose elsewhere. Coming back is almost like returning from the Moon. Strange. Impressive. Incredible. "Scale" takes on new meaning. And after wondering for so long how people stay engaged, focused and driven, within what seems to be a culture of bureaucratic roadblocks and chokepoints, I finally realized it's this massive juggernaut that keeps everyone's attention. After listening to my boss give the tour and explaining things to the group, it's easy to see his enthusiasm for this. He doesn't read my blog so don't think I'm brown-nosing here.

I remember giving a presentation back in 1999 for an Autodesk partner conference on behalf of this same company. I gave a brief explanation of what we do (build ships and submarines) and showed a few Powerpoint slides of the scenery (cleared by our communications dept of course). When I was done joking around, I looked up and realized how many jaws were slackened. Not by my presentation (I wish), but by absorbing the dimensional and scalar aspects of our industrial capacity. I, too, was overwhelmed. It is amazing. At that time it was about manufacturing capacity. Today it's about information capacity, and the ability to put it to work every day. Powerful stuff. I guess you can tell I'm feeling it.

Cranium Drainium 10

It's been cold as crap here. Everywhere from the Midwest to the East coast it seems.

Jet crashes in the Hudson. Does it make any sound?

Nortel goes belly-up. Apple appears to be imploding. Microsoft appears to be wandering aimlessly in the desert. Google appears to be Googling.

With the incoming Carol Bartz, Yahoo looks like it will merge into Microsoft in much the same way as that chunk of liquid metal absorbed into the foot of the T-1000 in T2. Cool scene. Too bad it won't make Yahoo! anywhere near as cool.

Chrome 2.0 is interesting, and stable on Windows 7 *except* for Google Maps, which seems to make it crash EVERY SINGLE TIME. Works fine with Live Maps and Yahoo! Maps. Go figure. It also hoses up the Edit Posts CSS and Javascript for Blogger. Doh!

It seems to be fashionable to protest IDF reaction to being attacked by Hamas rockets for months. Nobody protests the rocket attacks. I guess that means it's fashionable to wish for Israelis to simple lay down and let themselves be killed off.

Drinking coffee is supposed to cut your risk of Alzheimer's disease. I cant' remember where I read that however.

Is there anyone NOT laying off in 2009?

The ill-conceived and amazingly well executed light rail system, "The Tide", is progressing on schedule through the west end of Norfolk. Too bad it has a crappy design for merging rail and car traffic at the WORST choke points in Norfolk. God almighty. Too bad the Virginia Beach extension is doomed to endless delay while the state and city governments wrestle with horrendous budget cuts.

Titan's Schwartz took the job in Detroit. Poor bastard. Why haven't the Lions moved somewhere else!? If you're familiar with the area around the Superdome, you know what I mean when I say downtown Baghdad is safer to visit. They should have moved to Ann Arbor by now. WTF.

Comparing the cost of riding the bus to driving my car to work every day (64 miles round trip) I discovered that it becomes break-even at $2.10 per gallon of gas. Above that, the bus is cheaper, but only by a little, until it approachs $3.00 per gallon. I guess we will see what happens with OPEC cutting production this year. 1974 version 2.0?

Fish poop is good for the ocean. Who'd have thunk it?

Aero Shake, Shake Yer Bouti

For anyone confused by the title of this stupid post, refer to Frank Zappa's discography for a clue.

Aero Shake is a neat little nifty coolio feature that may seem meaningless, but is actually quite helpful. You simply click and "hold" on the title bar of any open window, and then shake the mouse side to side quickly. It drops all other windows to the task bar and keeps that window open. Sort of like shaking it loose from the other windows around it. If you have Windows 7 installed with Aero support enabled, give it a try. It's pretty cool.

Coolest Job on Earth (or Dumbest?)

High Voltage Cable Inspection
by monnotman

Script Code: Batch Running WUAUCLT "DetectNow"

Suppose you want to reach out and force a bunch of computers to run an Automatic Updates self-check right away. You could:

• Put on some comfortable shoes, grab a drink and start running around
• Delegate this to someone you don't like
• Write a script to do it for you

BAT file using PSExec:

@echo off

c:\pstools\psexec.exe \\pc1,pc2,pc3 "%windir%\system32\wuauclt.exe" "/detectnow"

Save the .BAT file and run it using an account which has local admin rights on each of the computers. The problem with this approach is that the exit code is only returned for the last computer in the list. One way around this is to parse the list of computers and run psexec against each one separately. Then you can capture the exit code to see if it was successful or not.

I could use FOR %% in a BAT script and use the ERRORLEVEL variable to check on the result of each request. But I'm lazy and resort to what I know best: VBScript or KiXtart.

Const computers = "pc1,pc2,pc3"

Const pstools = "c:\sysinternals\psexec.exe"

Const rmtCmd = "%windir%\system32\wuauclt.exe"

Const rmtArg = "/detectnow"

Set objShell = CreateObject("Wscript.Shell")

count_good = 0

count_all = 0

For each computer in Split(computers, ",")

    count_all = count_all + 1

    cmd = pstools & " \\" & computer & " " & rmtCmd & " " & rmtArg

    wscript.echo "connecting to " & computer

    Set oExec = objShell.Exec(cmd)

    Do While oExec.Status = 0

        WScript.Sleep 100

    Loop

    If oExec.ExitCode = 0 Then

        Wscript.Echo vbTab & "process was initiated"

        count_good = count_good + 1

    Else

        Wscript.Echo vbTab & "process failed"

    End If

Next

Set objShell = Nothing

Wscript.Echo count_all & " attempted"

Wscript.Echo count_good & " completed"

You could do this in KiXtart, or Powershell or pretty much any scripting language.

Caveat: Because everything in life comes with a caveat (or three), you need to be aware that any remote scripting requires that you make sure things are in order before it'll work. Firewalls, port exceptions, user privileges, etc. Enjoy!

Meanderings

Carol Bartz has been named as the new CEO of Yahoo! I remember her leadership of Autodesk VERY well. I was an ADN registered developer for many years prior to dunking myself into the "mainstream" IT world. I may be heading back in that direction but I can't say for sure yet. More to come later. Anyhow, Carol was a fairly prominent leader during her tenure. More focused on shareholder value than developer communities, it marked a departure from the history of Autodesk being a Mecca for those that liked to manipulate the product features with their own programming efforts. Packaged solutions were to become the new mantra. That direction appears to be continuing on under Carl Bass. I think it's a little sad though.

I'm not sure I want to continue on with getting an MCSE/MCITP. At 45, and living in an area with minimal prospects, I don't see the benefit. I have my MCSA and MCTS/SCCM 2007, even though they haven't done anything for me. I'm just glad to be employed, and software packaging and deployment isn't the worst job. I work with some really cool people who don't get wrapped up in back-stabbing politics. I had enough of that in previous jobs.

I finally finished my Creatology Wooden Dragon Puzzle. It took two days (totalling about 4 hours, spread out). I used to build extremely details models for a hobby shop store front when I was a kid. I made elaborate dioramas of battle scenes for military layouts, racing cars on drag strips, etc. I remember making bullet holes in the armor of a half-track vehicle, painting it to look like the paint was chipped and rust was running from the rivets on the rear corners. Ah, the good ole days.

Windows 7 is very nice indeed. I have two of our four home computers running it now. I have mixed views on the new task bar, but I really like the rest of it. A big improvement over Vista. It runs great in VMware Workstation 6, and Server 2.0 also.

Two good friends of mine are doing well following cancer treatment. My friend Larry in Texas and Jim in Richmond. Congratulations guys! I'm glad you're doing better and I hope 2009 is a fantastic year for you both.

It's pretty chilly out and the forecast is to get a bit chillier. Still not "cold" by Michigan standards, but it sure smacks me in the face at 5:00 AM on the way to work.

My oldest just turned 18. My youngest just turned 10. I think 2009 will be about spending more time with them. Many of the people I used to hang around with stopped calling or emailing because I don't have time to hang out like I used to. Oh well. That's life, and my four kids are what's most important to me.

I have a few more posts coming and then I'm going to take a break for a while. I think I've run out of things to blog about.

Script Code: Bridging Another Divide

One of the issues I had to address at a previous job was to combine a few features which required using multiple scripting "tools" to accomplish. For example, a logon script that scans for some particular condition, and then opens a web page to alert the user, while simultaneously recording the event somewhere and alerting the IT department. Yes, there are retail products that do this, but it's actually quite simple to do for FREE using tools you already have on hand or can get easily.

This example illustrates a simplified form of a system I built and supported years ago at a former employer. This uses a logon script to do various things (in KiXtart), and would launch a web browser to alert the user if a particular condition was encountered. The URL was to an intranet ASP page that performed additional tasks. The intent of this example is to leverage what works in each toolset, rather than trying to make a hammer out of a screwdriver. You can do this with almost any mix of language tools obviously. This example uses KiXtart 4.6 with ASP and ADO along with a server-side database (MS SQL 2005 in this example).

Logon Script (KiXtart) - Note: I imposed some VBScript-like variables to help non-Kix folks understand the code better. There are no explicit "True", "False", or "Nothing" constant objects in KiXtart like there are in VBScript, so I define those for a little clarity. You don't need to do that of course. You could use the numbers 0 and 1 instead.

;------------------------------------------------------------------

; function.....: OpenWebPage()

; description..: use IE to open specified URL visible or hidden

; arguments....: URL-string, boolean-show

; returns......: nothing

; example......: $=OpenWebPage("http://www.msn.com", 1, $hgt, $wid, $fixed-window)

;------------------------------------------------------------------

Function OpenWebPage($url, $show, Optional $height, $width, $fixed)

    $True = 1

    $False = 0

    $Nothing = 0

    If $url <> ""

        $ie = CreateObject("InternetExplorer.Application")

        If $ie <> $False and @ERROR = 0

            ; opening visible web page in internet explorer

            $ie.Navigate($url)

            If $show = $True

                If $height > 0

                    $ie.Height = $height

                EndIf

                If $width > 0

                    $ie.Width = $width

                EndIf

                If $fixed = $True

                    $ie.Resizable = $False

                    $ie.StatusBar = $False

                    $ie.Toolbar = $False

                EndIf

                $ie.Visible = $True

                Sleep 1

            Else

                ; opening silent web page in internet explorer

                Sleep 1

                $ie.Quit

                $ie = $Nothing

            EndIf

        Else

            ; error - unable to launch internet explorer object

        EndIf

    Else

        ; error - no url was specified to open

    EndIf

EndFunction

; now we would have some code to check for something and set a variable

; such as $someCondition to 1 if the result is positive or true.

; In this example, I will check to see if the current user has admin rights:

If @ADMIN = 1

    $someCondition = 1

EndIf

; next, we would check to see if the variable was set to 1 and open

; the desired web page to show an alert using a fixed-size IE window

If $someCondition = 1

    $result = "true"

    $showForm = 1

Else

    $result = "false"

    $showForm = 0

EndIf

$weblink = "http://intranet/is/services/alertpage.asp?report=admin&result=$result&userid=@userid&client=@wksta"

$=OpenWebPage($weblink, $showForm, 300, 500, 1)

Next comes the ASP web page source code. This example will check the incoming QueryString parameter values and perform some sort of action based on those values. QueryString values in ASP are simply the web address (URL) string values following a question mark "?". Any string information which trails a question is parsed into paired items using the ampersand "&" character. Note that there are KiXtart macros embedded into the $weblink string. The @userid macro will automatically substitute the sAMAccountName username value, such as "davestein", while the @wksta macro will substitute the computer NetBIOS name, such as "DesktopPC1".

Using the $weblink value above, the QueryString value would be:

"report=admin&result=true&userid=davestein&client=DesktopPC1"

Furthermore, this string is automatically parsed by ASP using each ampersand to generate an array containing (variablename, value) pairs. But you fetch them by name, so it's very simple to fetch and read them as you would with passed form values:

reportType = Trim(Request.QueryString("report"))

resultValue = Trim(Request.QueryString("result"))

username = Trim(Request.QueryString("userid"))

computerName = Trim(Request.QueryString("client"))

To illustrate this, we can display the value assigned to the userName variable:

Response.Write "username is " & userName

Which would show "username is davestein"

Because ASP is typically written with VBScript, it can do most of what Windows Scripting Host allows it to do (except for some things like WMI queries and registry manipulation). It can invoke COM interfaces very well, which is a common use for ASP. In this case, I will pass the information into a remote MS SQL Server database table, and then display something in the web page to the user.

To invoke a COM interface, you often find it helpful to import or define a list of constant variables to simplify things. You can "include" or simply define them within the ASP page. There are arguments for and against using includes like adovbs.inc. In this example I will define the constants for simplicity, which appear in purple:

reportType = Trim(Request.QueryString("report"))

resultValue = Trim(Request.QueryString("result"))

username = Trim(Request.QueryString("userid"))

computerName = Trim(Request.QueryString("client"))

If resultValue = "true" Then

    isAdmin = 1

Else

    isAdmin = 0

End If

Const adOpenDynamic = 2

Const adLockOptimistic = 3

Const adCmdTable = &H0002

Const dsn = "driver=SQL Server;server=SQL1;database=ITstuff;uid=User1;pwd=P@ssW0rd1;"

Set objRS = Server.CreateObject("ADODB.Recordset")

On Error Resume Next

objRS.Open "pcAdmins", dsn, adOpenDynamic, adLockOptimistic, adCmdTable

If err.Number <> 0 Then

    objRS.Close

    Set objRS = Nothing

    Response.Write "Error (" & err.Number & "): " & err.Description

    err.Clear

    Response.End

End If

objRS.AddNew

objRS.Fields("computer").Value = computerName

objRS.Fields("username").Value = userName

objRS.Fields("isAdmin").Value = isAdmin

objRS.Fields("dateReported").Value = Now

objRS.Update

objRS.Close

Set objRS = Nothing

Below this code, you could enter some HTML code to display a formatted message. You could also invoke the CDOSys object, to prepare and send an SMTP email message if you want to. There are no rules here. Whatever works for you is fine.

Again, this is just one example of the kinds of things you can do by gluing together parts from different scripting languages. To me, this is all like a big Lego kit.