Citrix Applications Hanging on Vista

Recently ran into a problem where any Citrix application i ran from home, remotely connecting to the office via Citrix, would hang. The app would load, but then sit there 'Not Responding'.

Solution - stop the Print Spooler service. Not great if you want to pront, but has solved my problem for now. WIll update if i find a full solution.

VMware Virtual Machine does not sysprep properly

Finding information from this log:

c:\windows\temp\guestcust.log i discovered the following errors:

Rpci: Sending request='deployPkg.update.state 4 101 C:\WINDOWS\TEMP\vmware-imc\guestcust.log@The system cannot find the file specified.
'

Rpci: Sent request='deployPkg.update.state 4 101 C:\WINDOWS\TEMP\vmware-imc\guestcust.log@The system cannot find the file specified.
', reply='', len=0, status=1

...which was stopping me being able to 'Deploy Virtual Machine from Template'.

To resolve this I uninstalled the Altiris Endpoint client.

Windows 2008 Cluster loses one node of cluster

Setup in this instance:

2 x IBM x3650 bother containing the following:
2 x Emulex FC Cards
4 x Broadcom NetExtreme II 5709C NICs
2 x Broadcom NetExtreme II 5708C NICs

Issue - building a Windows 2008 Enterprise x64 cluster containing just a Quorum and a test service/applciation, one node would intermittently fail, reporting it lost connection with the quorum

Cause - Trend Micro OfficeScan 10 and SP1 - TDI Driver

Resolution - Disable Startup of TDI driver via the following steps:

Open Device Manager
Select View > Show Hidden Devices
Expand Non-Plug and play devices
Select Trend Micro TDI Driver > Properties
Go to Driver tab
Under Current Status press the stop button (this may or may not work, if not, do next step and reboot both nodes)
Under Startup change the type to Disabled (Uninstalling the driver didn't work, because it was installed automatically at the next boot.)

Do the same on both nodes and reboot.

This has also been discovered to be the case in Trend Office Scan v8 SP1 as per folloing blog:

http://blogs.microsoft.co.il/blogs/dario/archive/2008/12/15/trend-micro-officescan-on-server-2008-cluster.aspx

Program file stopping services starting

I recently ran into an issue where servers were no longer starting any more. The problem coincidentally happened after i'd run a simple batch script on the machine in question. After lots of investigation it turned out the reason for the service no longer starting was a file called:

c:\program

After lots of investigation I found this to be caused by using the full path of c:\Program File in my script (even though it had quotes round it). To stop it doing this I used the c:\progra~1 notation. I also wonder if this was to do with my computer being Windows 2000 rather than XP, as this didn't happen with XP, and not specifically selecting cmd.exe to run the script.

FTP for Apple Mac

I was having problems the other day ploading files to a Windows FTP server from a Mac - MacOS was complaining about insufficient permissions to upload a file, even though the permissions were correct. Now i'm sure there are thousands of ftp clients out there for Macs, but i found this one to be good, so thought i'd give it a mention:

Cyberduck (freeware)

http://cyberduck.ch/

Roaming Profile not Working

If you find your roaming profile isn't working, ensure Offline Files and Folders are switched off on the client pc:

My Computer -> Tools -> Folder Options -> Enable Offline Files (and uncheck the box) - instructions for Windows XP

This link also:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/287566

NT4 Timezone Fix

Only recently realised that the default time for the clocks to change on Windows NT is an hour later than it should be in the UK, meaning that if the clock change to GMT or DST at 2pm, the NT servers default to 3pm. To change this, here's the registry script to do so, plus a link below with some info regarding the variables in the script:

REGEDIT4
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\TimeZoneInformation]
"Bias"=dword:00000000"
StandardName"="GMT Standard Time"
"StandardBias"=dword:00000000
"StandardStart"=hex:00,00,0a,00,05,00,02,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00
"DaylightName"="GMT Daylight Time"
"DaylightBias"=dword:ffffffc4
"DaylightStart"=hex:00,00,03,00,05,00,01,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00
"ActiveTimeBias"=dword:ffffffc4

Pretty sure you need to restart the server for the change to take effect! Bring on the next clock change!

Info: http://www.jsifaq.com/SF/Tips/Tip.aspx?id=0398

Possible Syware - No SystemRoot variable

Had a user the other day who suddenly wasn't getting and drives mapped when he logged onto his computer. When attempting to troubleshoot the problem and jumped onto the command line and typed the usual ping which came back with:

'ping' is not recognized as an internal or external command,operable program or batch file!

This was a bit of a shock as ping is certainly a well known windows app. After ensuring ping did still exist on the user's pc in the correct location, i then (after a bit of a think) tried this:

echo %path% - came back with the correct entries

echo %systemroot% - came back with nothing!

True enough, after navigating to the system environmental variables the systemroot variable was not there - after adding it again all was fixed.

This seemed to be due to spyware as, after a run of CounterSpy, many bits of spyware were removed and has been fine ever since.

Watch and Search Realtime Network Connections via Windows Command Line

I recently discovered a way of watching network connections in Windows in realtime without using a program like Active Ports. Simply run this command:

netstat -o 1

Check out netstat /? for more options, but this will show and update network connections from the local machine every second.

TO make this a bit more useful, use:

netstat -o 1 find "3389" - I use this example to show only connections using the Remote Desktop Protocol.

Useful to use with a server where 3rd party applications cannot be installed.

Restoring an MSSQL 2000 Database and Creating Correct Logons

If you want to migrate/copy an SQL Server database and login/secrutiy infromation then this script is for you...

I was passed on this script that creates a stored procedure on the source sql server and then after being run in Query Analyzer, creates an SQL script to run on the destination server creating appropriate logons and secrurity after restoring/migrating a database to a different server. Note - if moving/restoring a database to another sql server, restore the database first, then run this script. The script itself is as follows:

USE master
GO
IF OBJECT_ID ('sp_hexadecimal') IS NOT NULL
DROP PROCEDURE sp_hexadecimal
GO
CREATE PROCEDURE sp_hexadecimal
@binvalue varbinary(256),
@hexvalue varchar(256) OUTPUT
AS
DECLARE @charvalue varchar(256)
DECLARE @i int
DECLARE @length int
DECLARE @hexstring char(16)
SELECT @charvalue = '0x'
SELECT @i = 1
SELECT @length = DATALENGTH (@binvalue)
SELECT @hexstring = '0123456789ABCDEF'
WHILE (@i <= @length)
BEGIN
DECLARE @tempint int
DECLARE @firstint int
DECLARE @secondint int
SELECT @tempint = CONVERT(int, SUBSTRING(@binvalue,@i,1))
SELECT @firstint = FLOOR(@tempint/16)
SELECT @secondint = @tempint - (@firstint*16)
SELECT @charvalue = @charvalue +
SUBSTRING(@hexstring, @firstint+1, 1) +
SUBSTRING(@hexstring, @secondint+1, 1)
SELECT @i = @i + 1
END
SELECT @hexvalue = @charvalue
GO

IF OBJECT_ID ('sp_help_revlogin') IS NOT NULL
DROP PROCEDURE sp_help_revlogin
GO
CREATE PROCEDURE sp_help_revlogin @login_name sysname = NULL AS
DECLARE @name sysname
DECLARE @xstatus int
DECLARE @binpwd varbinary (256)
DECLARE @txtpwd sysname
DECLARE @tmpstr varchar (256)
DECLARE @SID_varbinary varbinary(85)
DECLARE @SID_string varchar(256)

IF (@login_name IS NULL)
DECLARE login_curs CURSOR FOR
SELECT sid, name, xstatus, password FROM master..sysxlogins
WHERE srvid IS NULL AND name <> 'sa'
ELSE
DECLARE login_curs CURSOR FOR
SELECT sid, name, xstatus, password FROM master..sysxlogins
WHERE srvid IS NULL AND name = @login_name
OPEN login_curs
FETCH NEXT FROM login_curs INTO @SID_varbinary, @name, @xstatus, @binpwd
IF (@@fetch_status = -1)
BEGIN
PRINT 'No login(s) found.'
CLOSE login_curs
DEALLOCATE login_curs
RETURN -1
END
SET @tmpstr = '/* sp_help_revlogin script '
PRINT @tmpstr
SET @tmpstr = '** Generated '
+ CONVERT (varchar, GETDATE()) + ' on ' + @@SERVERNAME + ' */'
PRINT @tmpstr
PRINT ''
PRINT 'DECLARE @pwd sysname'
WHILE (@@fetch_status <> -1)
BEGIN
IF (@@fetch_status <> -2)
BEGIN
PRINT ''
SET @tmpstr = '-- Login: ' + @name
PRINT @tmpstr
IF (@xstatus & 4) = 4
BEGIN -- NT authenticated account/group
IF (@xstatus & 1) = 1
BEGIN -- NT login is denied access
SET @tmpstr = 'EXEC master..sp_denylogin ''' + @name + ''''
PRINT @tmpstr
END
ELSE BEGIN -- NT login has access
SET @tmpstr = 'EXEC master..sp_grantlogin ''' + @name + ''''
PRINT @tmpstr
END
END
ELSE BEGIN -- SQL Server authentication
IF (@binpwd IS NOT NULL)
BEGIN -- Non-null password
EXEC sp_hexadecimal @binpwd, @txtpwd OUT
IF (@xstatus & 2048) = 2048
SET @tmpstr = 'SET @pwd = CONVERT (varchar(256), ' + @txtpwd + ')'
ELSE
SET @tmpstr = 'SET @pwd = CONVERT (varbinary(256), ' + @txtpwd + ')'
PRINT @tmpstr
EXEC sp_hexadecimal @SID_varbinary,@SID_string OUT
SET @tmpstr = 'EXEC master..sp_addlogin ''' + @name
+ ''', @pwd, @sid = ' + @SID_string + ', @encryptopt = '
END
ELSE BEGIN
-- Null password
EXEC sp_hexadecimal @SID_varbinary,@SID_string OUT
SET @tmpstr = 'EXEC master..sp_addlogin ''' + @name
+ ''', NULL, @sid = ' + @SID_string + ', @encryptopt = '
END
IF (@xstatus & 2048) = 2048
-- login upgraded from 6.5
SET @tmpstr = @tmpstr + '''skip_encryption_old'''
ELSE
SET @tmpstr = @tmpstr + '''skip_encryption'''
PRINT @tmpstr
END
END
FETCH NEXT FROM login_curs INTO @SID_varbinary, @name, @xstatus, @binpwd
END
CLOSE login_curs
DEALLOCATE login_curs
RETURN 0
GO

Save as sp_help_revlogin.sql.

As said before, run this firstly on the source sql server in Query Analyzer. This won't show anything outputted to the screen, but will create a stored procedure which can be run by typing: sp_help_revlogin and hitting execute. This will output some sql. Copy and past this sql into the Query Analyzer on the destination server and execute. This will create all logins and appropriate permissions on the destination server.

Stop and Start Specific Websites

Ran into this really useful bit of VBS to stop or start specific websites in IIS:

To Stop (StopSite1.vbs):

Set IISObj=GetObject("IIS://LocalHost/W3SVC/1")
IISObj.Stop

To Start (StartSite1.vbs):

Set IISObj=GetObject("IIS://LocalHost/W3SVC/1")
IISObj.Start

Just copy the lines into a text file, rename to .vbs and run with: cscript StartSite1.vbs or cscript StopSite1.vbs.

Errorlevels and Windows XP

I was recently playing with a script to do some basica automated failover depending on whether a certain service was running or not and came accross an interesting fact that Windows XP and I think any newer Windows OS younger than Windows 98 doesn't see Errorlevel =0 as success, instead the successful errorlevel is 255.

For instance - to check the Messenger service on a remote computer (you obviously need the correct rights on the remote machine);

sc \\ query Messenger | FIND "STATE" > service_state.txt
type service_state.txt | find "4"

IF ERRORLEVEL 255 GOTO Running
IF ERRORLEVEL 1 GOTO Problem

:Running
echo Service is running
goto end

:Problem
echo Service Problem
goto End


:End
exit

Thought this may be worth posting if someone's having a hard time with errorlevels!

RPC over HTTPS Problems

I had a problem that I just couldn't solve - check out my google group post:

I'm absolutely stuck. I've been through almost every knowledgebase
article i've found and along the way fixed every error i've come
across (which has pretty much been all of them). I've got a single
exchange server enabled for RPC over HTTPS. I've got a self signed ssl
certificate created via the IIS resource kit using Self SSL which I
have trusted and is called the same as my external url to my owa
server.

I can navigate to owa without getting prompted with certificate
information, and I can go to http:///rpc where i get prompted for
username and password which fails after third attempt where i get an
error: HTTP Error 401.3 - Unauthorized: Access is denied due to an ACL
set on the requested resource.

I've read that even though this error isn't the standard error i
should get, it should not prove to be a problem. I've done an rpc ping
with the following commands:

rpcping -t ncacn_http -s exch_server_name -o RpcProxy=external_url -P
"user,domain,*" -I "user,domain,*" -H 1 -u 10 -a connect -F 3 -v 3 -E -
R none

rpcping -t ncacn_http -s exch_server_name -o RpcProxy=external_url -P
"user,domain,*" -I "user,domain,*" -H 1 -F 3 -a connect -u 10 -v 3 -e
6002

rpcping -t ncacn_http -s exch_server_name -o RpcProxy=external_url -P
"user,domain,*" -I "user,domain,*" -H 1 -F 3 -a connect -u 10 -v 3 -e
6001

rpcping -t ncacn_http -s exch_server_name -o RpcProxy=external_url -P
"user,domain,*" -I "user,domain,*" -H 1 -F 3 -a connect -u 10 -v 3 -e
6004

all come back fine. When connecting i can see Outlook trying to
connect via port 443 (using Active Ports) but nothing at all happens.
When i run outlook /rpcdiag all i see is it trying to connect, but
nothing else.

The server setup is:

1 x Windows 2003 SBS Server - does have exchange 2003 sp2, but is not
running any part of Rpc over HTTPS - we are slowly decomissioning it.
- DC and GC
1 x Windows 2003 R2 Server - Exchange 2003 SP2 - Rpc over HTTPs server
1 x Windows 2003 x64 Server - DC and GC

<

If you get this far and everything is fine, one thing I didn't check were the firewall rules on the client PC. The firewall was allowing connections out from Outlook, but not back in!!! Such a schoolboy thing to do, but didn't believe it. I was using Kerio firewall, but it just wasn't warning me about incoming connections!!!! Frustrating!!!

Also - if using SelfSSL as with the IIS6 Resource Kit, bear in mind teh default certificate is only for 7 days. You can increase this with the /V switch. Check ou tthis site for a great tutorial:

http://www.visualwin.com/SelfSSL/

Word 2003 Not spell Checking

I got this from:

http://domino.lancs.ac.uk/pub/usghelpdesk.nsf/0/DF1B055703F6261A80256F8F0045EA6C?OpenDocument

>Text Does Not Spell Check - Word 2003
(and possibly Xp Word 2002, 2000, 97)

If the spell checker passes over areas of text and does not pick-up mis-spelt
words it is possible that the text has been marked not to be checked.

To solve this problem do the following:
1. highlight the area which won't spell check.
2. click 'Tools' menu then the 'Language' option, then 'Set Language' option.
3. ensure that 'Do not check spelling or grammar' option is NOT selected.
4. click

The Spell Check should check the area now.
<

With me the case was that this option was selected, but Word was still not spell checking. To solve this, check the 'Do not check spelling or grammar' box, hit ok, and then do the same again and uncheck the box. All fixed.

Windows 2003 Black Screen Blinking Cursor at Boot

I recently had a software mirrored (RAID 1) hard disk fail on a server. On reboot I assumed everything would be ok as windows writes the correct path in the boot.ini to the second hard disk. Unfortuantely when i rebooted, all i was left with was a black screen at the point where Windows 2003 would normally kick in, with a flashing cursor and no error messages.

I checked the boot.ini via the recovery console, also ran fixboot but no luck. Anyway, after reading up on fixmbr, and ignoring the warning it gives, the server booted up off the second drive fine.

Remove Remote Desktop Connection 6

If, like me, after you upgraded to Remote Desktop Client v6 and found it wasn't a good upgrade for you - in my case I still have a lot of Windows 2000 servers to access which can't use RDC v6 authentication pass-through as it does with Window 2003 Server - then here's how to remove it:

Go to Add/Remove Programs in your Control Panel and remove:

Update for Windows XP(KB925876)

Then reinstall the previous version of the RDC.

Vibrating/Shaking Firefox!

Sounds like fun i know, but if it does it all the time, it can get annoying. A friend of mine let me know about this one, it's an actual bug with firefox. Check out the link to find the solution:

http://kb.mozillazine.org/Window_shakes

PS. even though my friend wasn't using the bookmarks toolbar, he still had to do what the article suggested.

Inserting a Signature In Outlook

Came across a strange change when using Microsoft Word as my Outlook email editor the other day. I suddenly couldn't Insert a Signature - I went to Insert -> Signature when composing an email, but the option wasn't there! After a bit of messing around I realised you had to use the standard Outlook email editor to have this back... Seems a bit strange, but hey, that's how it is!

Basic Grep in Windows!

Only just found this, but if you want to grep a directory in windows for a certain string, you can use find:

dir | find "String"

...in this case will ist anythign with String in the name...

Very useful... (I'm sure it can do much more, but i'll add as i find - sorry for the pun!)

Clearing Windows Memory

Here's a nice little shortcut i found off YouTube to clear memory in Windows by the click of a shortcut!

Just create the shortcut with the following command:

%windir%\system32\rundll32.exe advapi32.dll, ProcessIdleTasks

Very useful when you get half way through your working day!