Archive for March, 2009
Display a Start Up Message in Windows XP before logging in.
Mar 12th
Before someone logs into your machine a message can be displayed. This is meant to inform you that you are being monitored or you are bound by some formal code of conduct.
You can use it to display a message in your absence to remind your buddies you are an all knowing Admin. You can do it pretty easily by displaying what Microsoft refers to as a legal notice at system start up.
- GO TO RUN
- REGEDIT
- Navigate to [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\policies\system]
- Change legalnoticecaption”=”Legal Notice“
- legalnoticetext=”AskTheAdmin is watching you.”
obviously you can replace Legal notice or AskTheAdmin is watching you with any text you want. The editors over here are pretty sure you can find some Funny Practical uses for this on your, or a public, PC…
How can I identify my mainboard without opening the case?
Mar 11th
I’ll keep this short and sweet. If you’re re-installing your OS, and need to know the motherboard model number, to grab the drivers online, check out CPU-Z. It beats opening your PC case and trying to find that tiny number hidden amongst the cables and drives :).
Moving Emails from Outlook (Windows) to Entourage (Mac)
Mar 9th
Given:
Microsoft Outlook – created by Microsoft. Platform: Windows.
Microsoft Entourage – created by Microsoft. Platform: OS X.
Requirement:
Move emails from Microsoft Outlook to Microsoft Entourage.
Common sense suggests:
In Windows, launch Microsoft Outlook, export everything to a .pst file. Copy this file to a USB drive or burn it to a disc. Copy it to Mac OS X, launch Entourage in Mac OS X and import the .pst file.
Well, that’s what I thought.
The real solution:
It turns out Microsoft does NOT support email interchange between Outlook and Entourage. I was horrified shocked Not Surprised to learn about this lack of interoperability.
Entourage can only import from it’s own archive format .rge or mbox files (text format files). Unfortunately, Outlook can NOT export to either of the two.
After doing some research and reading about convoluted methods of exporting one folder at a time from Outlook, converting those to mbox format and importing it in Entourage, I stumbled upon this excellent utility.
It’s a Windows application and costs $10. You can download it and pay for it online.
Simply install it on your Windows OS and launch it. It will automatically read your Outlook files and convert them to Mbox format, and PRESERVE the attachments!!
Once the export is over, copy the newly created mbox files and port them to Mac OS X. Launch Entourage and import the files. You will lose Outlook Rules though. Also, the folders will be renamed per ASCII standards i.e. no blank spaces. Blank Spaces will be replaced with underscores.
It’s possible that Entourage may suddenly not recognize mbox files either but don’t worry – there’s a work around. Import the mbox files in iMail. Then, import iMail emails into Entourage.
Another Microsoft horror story? What’s your take.
My internets down help me!
Mar 6th
Well if your Internets down you probably are not reading this. So you might want to save this page locally for a rainy day!
It will also give you a better understanding of what goes on behind the scenes that make your net work… (Get it?)
I need to give you a brief introduction to how your internet connection works. You get a cable modem or DSL Modem from your provider (ISP) that connects to their network either via coax (thick cable) or your phone line. That modem establishes a connection with the ISP’s network. That network has a DHCP server that gives your modem an ip address. That address is accessible from the internet (public IP. If you don’t know what I am talking about read this article on IP addressing first)
Now either you connect your computer wired or wirelessly to that modem or connect a wired or wireless router so you can share your connection to multiple machines/devices.
Are you still with me?
So if you are plugged directly into the modem it will give you an private IP address that is NATed out to the public ip.
If this is your setup it is pretty easy until you want to swap computers. Do to security restrictions you will need to restart the modem to give then next machine an ip address. We recommended getting a router. The router will allow you to swap machines and share net with multiple machines. Now onto how to troubleshoot.
Deep breathe…
What do you mean the Internets down?
So after you go through the normal steps of denial, rebooting, laying blame at your isp, rebooting, cursing…. Check out these steps:
1. Before you do anything else restart your modem wait for it to come back online and then restart your router.
2. If you don’t have a router reboot your computer and then the cable modem.
3.once all the modems lights are lit up and the activity lights are blinking you should have net. If all the lights do not come on, check that all your cables are secure and then call your isp.
4.open a new browser window and try to get to http://www.askTheAdmin.com. If it comes up your good if not continue reading for the command line nitty gritty.
5. Go to Start run and type in CMD
6. Type Ipconfig /all
7. Make note of your default gateway and dns servers.
8. Ping your default gateway. Do you get a response?
9 Ping one of the DNS servers. Do you get a response?
10 type ping www.asktheadmin.com. Do you get a response?
Using traceroute to see where you are getting stuck. We see a lot of network issues when there are two dhcp servers giving out ip addresses. If you have a router you want to make sure it is in the same internal range as the cable mode. If my isp router is 192.168.1.1 i make my router .2. I disable dhcp if possible on the original.
Are those late hours at the office causing your spouse to want to DOS your servers? (Humor!)
Mar 4th
All us Admin’s by profession know all too well how hard it is to balance a healthy, happy relationship and a demanding network (HA!) …
Remember, all those late nights might help you achieve those 6 9′s of up time but, they are making your spouse secretly hate you (Maybe not so secretly in some cases like the one below)…
Consider this a public service announcement for Admin’s world-wide…
Look at the above carefully and maybe next time you will settle for 5 9′s of up time… (Probably not!) Do you think she threw the rest of the letters out?? :)
[Via MakeUseOf's Geeky Fun]
I started writing for GeeksAreSexy.net today. The first article is entitled Recover your Windows Password – so go check it out at http://www.geeksaresexy.net/2009/03/04/how-to-recovering-your-windows-password/ show some love and tell them AtA sent ya!
We also just received a USB Docking station with VGA from StarTech.com it looks awesome. I can’t wait to mess around with it! This one will be given away as well. So let’s start hearing why you want it!
