Local printers not showing up in Terminal Services session

July 1, 2010 – 10:57 am

I was getting frustrated with my Windows 2008 terminal server, as I though it’s redirection of local printers was broken.  I was getting ready to take an axe to it, when a little research revealed that it was doing what it was supposed to… only USB, Parallel and Serial printers will automatically be redirected.  Network printers ans many multifunction devices will NOT be.

So what’s a guy who wants to use his local network servers in a terminal services session to do?  A little registry tweaking will take care of this for you.  In regedit, create a DWORD value named FilterQueueType in HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Terminal Server Client\Default\AddIns\RDPDR and set its value to FFFFFFFF.

Of you cam download a file to make the change for you here.  Unzip it and double click the .reg file to make the needed changes to your registry.

By admin | Posted in Windows, how-to | Comments (0)

Windows Update Stuck on “Checking for the latest updates for your computer…”

July 1, 2010 – 10:46 am

On occasion I run across a computer where Windows Update is stuck on “Checking for the latest updates for your computer…”.   One of the following suggestions has always fixed the problem for me.

1) Clearing Temporary Internet files in Internet Explorer:

In internet Explorer, go to: Tools>Internet Options>General
Under “Browsing History”, press the “Delete” button.
Uncheck “Preserve Favorites website data” if it exists, and check “Temporary Internet Files”.
Press the “Delete” button, and once it has deleted all temporary files, reboot and try Windows Update again.

2)Check that the Background Intelligent Transfer Service to is set to Automatic and verify the Status is Started.

Click Start, Choose Run, and in the Run box, type services.msc, Click OK
Locate the Background Intelligent Transfer Service service, and right-click to select it.
Select Properties, and in the Startup Type list, select Automatic. Verify the service
Status is Started. Click OK.

3). Check that the Set Event Log service is set to Automatic and verify that the Status is
Started

Click Start, Choose Run, and in the Run box, type services.msc, Click OK.
Locate the Event Log service, and right-click to select it.
Select Properties., and in the Startup type list, select Automatic. Verify the Service
status is Started. Click OK.

4)  Register qmgr.dll and qmgrprxy.dll

Click Start, Choose Run and in the Run box, type regsvr32 qmgr.dll, Click OK.
Click Start, Choose Run and in the Run box, type regsvr32 qmgrprxy.dll, Click OK.

5) It is possible that the contents of the SoftwareDistribution folder have become corrupted,
so try Renaming the SoftwareDistribution folder

Click Start, Choose Run.
In the Run box, type services.msc.
Click OK.
Right-click the Automatic Updates service.
Click Stop.
Stopping the service will take a moment.

Rename the “SoftwareDistribution” folder:
a. Click Start, click Run, type: %systemroot%
Click OK.
b. Right-click the SoftwareDistribution folder, and then click Rename.
c. Type SoftwareDistribution.old, and then press ENTER to rename this folder.

Click Start. Choose Run.
In the Run box, type services.msc.
Click OK.
Right-click the Automatic Updates service.
Click Start.
Starting the service will take a moment.

Please note that your update history is contained in the “datastore” folder and when you
rename the Software Distribution folder, the history is lost but it’s not important. You
can if need be, copy the contents back from the renamed softwareDistribution.old folder.
Losing the history of Windows Updates is not important.

By admin | Posted in Uncategorized, Windows, how-to | Comments (0)

Microsoft .NET framework 2.0 cannot be uninstalled

June 10, 2010 – 9:45 am

I had an application that runs on .Net (ACT! 2010) continually crashing.  Tech support promised me that if I uninstalled .Net 2 and re-installed it, everything would be OK.  The only problem was, when clicking on the “Remove” button, I get the error message “Microsoft . NET framework 2.0 Service Pack 2 cannot be uninstalled”.

After hours of reading through TechNet articles, forum posts and the like, I found the very simple answer: uninstall .Net 3.5 and 3 first.  After it’s big brothers were gone, .Net 2 gracefully uninstalled.  Now anyone want to make me a bet if ACT! will start running again with a clean install of .Net?

By admin | Posted in Windows, how-to | Comments (0)

BP underwater robot cam

June 4, 2010 – 9:37 am

I don’t know if this is exactly a “Fun” distraction, but watching the live video feeds from the underwater robots trying to fix the oil leak has been extremely addictive.    So fun score = 0, distraction score = 100.

By admin | Posted in Fun Distractions | Comments (0)

Edit PDFs online for free

June 3, 2010 – 3:21 pm

Whenever I need to fill out a PDF or make minor edits to one, my tool of choice is PDF Escape, an online PDF editor that’s free.

online pdf editor

You can perform such edits pretty easily with PDF Escape, an online PDF editor that’s free and also lets you edit password-protected PDF documents in the browser.

With PDF Escape, you can hide* parts of a PDF file using the whiteout tool or add annotations with the help of custom shapes, arrows, text boxes and sticky notes. You can add hyperlinks to other PDF pages / web documents.

By admin | Posted in how-to, web/internet | Comments (0)

Multiple Remote Desktop connections on Windows XP

June 1, 2010 – 1:37 pm

I was testing a light-weight XFCE Linux desktop that could be used as a front end for users accessing our terminal servers.  I wanted a way to test it off-site but didn’t want to go through the hassle of setting up a 2008 server.  I came up with the idea of using my XP laptop, but wanted to test multiple connections.  I knew there was a way to enable multiple RDP sessions on a XP box, but didn’t realize how easy it was. From http://alonbilu.wordpress.com/2008/05/17/enabling-multiple-concurrent-remote-sessions-on-windows-xp-sp3-patched-file-included/ :

Download the patched version: termsrv_sp3_patch.rar

Installation instructions
1. Go to C:\Windows\system32\dllcache and rename the termsrv.dll to termsrv.dll.bak
2. Go to \Windows\System32 folder and rename termsrv.dll to termsrv.dll.bak
3. Copy the new SP3 patched termsrv.dll to \Windows\System32 folder
4. Run the included registry patch “ts_concurrent_session_patch.reg” (by double clicking it), it will update the relevant registry values which are relevant to the concurrent sessions support.
5. Restart windows.

I found that in addition, I needed to rename and copy the termserv.dll to %windir%\ServicePackFiles\i386, as well as copying it to dllcache.

I also found that if your machine is on a domain, you’ll need to run the registry patch after each logon.  Besides that, it’s working like a charm.  I’ve had 5 concurrent sessions on my box and haven’t even noticed a slowdown from the console.

By admin | Posted in Windows, how-to | Comments (0)

Disabling Java Automatic Updates on a Windows 2008 Terminal Server

May 27, 2010 – 5:03 pm

Users were complaining about getting a Java update pop up window every time they logged into a terminal session.  I had pushed out the appropriate registry settings via GP to prevent this on the desktops, but obviously something special needed to be done for the server.  Aster doing a little research I found that there is a subkey located at HKLM\Software\Wow6432Node that contains the relevant settings for 32-bit applications.

I was able to disable the updates by setting the EnableJavaUpdate key to 0 in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\JavaSoft\Java Update\Policy\

Just to make sure, I also deleted the key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\SunJavaUpdateSched to prevent the update utility from starting.

No more pop up windows = happy users!

By admin | Posted in Windows, how-to | Comments (0)

How to restart Windows from a Remote Desktop session

May 26, 2010 – 1:13 pm

This is one that stumped me for a couple of years when the schools I worked for switched from macs to Windows machines.  I loved the ability to use Remote Desktop to control machines.  The problem I frequently ran into was the inability to restart the machines. When you clicked on the “Start” menu, the only options were to “Log Off” or “Disconnect” – no “Reboot”!

The solution is easy: all you need to do is hit CTRL-ALT-END, then Shutdown, and then choose the Restart option.

By admin | Posted in Windows, how-to | Comments (0)

Office 2003 asking for location of SKUxxx.CAB

May 25, 2010 – 1:33 pm

I was working on a machine at work today and after adding it to our domain and logging in for the firt time as myself, I kept getting errors where Office 2003 was asking for the location of a file called SKUxxx.CAB.  I couldn’t track down the original CDs (this computer has the Small Business version installed on it – I have a million 2003 Professional, but they didn’t work).  I thought I was out of luck and would have to buy another copu of Office to get this machine working when I ran across this tip at annoyances.org:

When Microsoft Office 2003 is asking for the location of SKUxxx.CAB, but won’t find
it when you provide the location of the install CD:

Go into the registry:

HKEY_Local_Machine
Software
Microsoft
Office
11.0
Delivery

Change CDCache to 0  (not 2 or 1)

It worked like a charm, and I’m back to work again!

By T.J. | Posted in Windows, how-to | Tagged | Comments (0)

How to set up a signature in Microsoft Outlook 2003 Email

May 18, 2010 – 2:47 pm

When looking for a guide on how to set up a signature in Microsoft Outlook, all of the guides I found were for Outlook 2007/2010 – so I thought I’d share my writeup for those other lost souls stuck on “legacy” software.

1)      Select “Tools | Options…” from the menu in Outlook
Read More »

By T.J. | Posted in Windows, how-to | Tagged | Comments (0)