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376

General Software Discussion / Re: Looking for AsciiDoc editor

« Last post by Shades on August 30, 2019, 11:18 PM »

Update time:

I have been very busy the last 2 weeks converting a document that has been growing for over 15 years. Not only is the document extensive, it is also filled to the brim with internal and external references. Although the document looks rather simple when looking at it in Word, it isn't and I suspect that got PanDoc a bit of it's rocker and produced a pretty big mess after conversion.

So the last weeks I have been busy "taking the document apart in the tiniest pieces, created templates for those pieces, repaired whatever was garbled up by PanDoc and start building it back up again.
 In the mean time I have worked a lot with AsciiDocFX, Brackets (+ asciidoc plugin), IntelliJ Idea (v2019.2 Community edition +asciidoc plugin), Eclipse (+asciidoctor plugin), VSCode 1.37.1 (asciidoc plugin) and Notepad++ with asciidoc extension. The last one is more like a new programming language to be added for colored syntax. There is really nothing more to it.

My experiences so far:
All editors, with the exception of Notepad++, consume a boatload of resources when working on more complex documents. VSCode was the worst of the lot in my case. After 30 minutes or so, it would use around 6GByte of RAM and continuously between 80% and 90% of all CPU resources. Proper previews were a problem as well. Not a success.

Then I tried IntelliJ Idea. That also consumed almost as much RAM and CPU as VSCode did, but that was somewhat justified as the preview worked better, but it would also validate syntax/style and show you where you were making (minor) mistakes. While that last part is very handy when working with more complex documentation, it was still too much of a burden on this PC (A10 APU at 4GHz with 24GByte of RAM).

By that time, I was thinking "to hell with it" and used Brackets. Having tried that editor a few years back and not liking the experience one bit, this time around it was pretty nice to use with AsciiDoc. There is no real-time preview available, so it isn't consuming that much resources. You can however enable a preview at your convenience. The preview isn't as complete as the one from IntelliJ IDEA, but way better than the one from VSCode. There is also a section in the preview that shows you syntax/style errors (rudimentary, but still).

For "funsies", I also tried Eclipse again with the now nearly finished document. The real-time preview functionality in that editor is standing head and shoulders above the rest regarding rendering speed. A very pleasant surprise that was. It takes between 10 and 20 seconds to do a complete re-render of a document that describes almost 600 script commands and some of those are very extensive.

Feature-wise AsciiDocFX is the best, it's real-time preview isn't fast, but also not as complete as others, which limits my use for it. But Brackets and Eclipse were pleasant surprises, each in their own way.

So if you have relatively simple AsciiDoc documents to create, AsciiDocX is probably your best bet. For conversion and/or repair of existing documents (with some complexity), I would say to focus on Brackets and Eclipse. Brackets, if you have grokked enough AsciiDoc syntax and can work without real-time previews. Or Eclipse, if there is a need for a real-time preview that won't slow you down that much.

Oops, forgot about Notepad++. The syntax highlighting works rather well and as it is the least extensive editor of the bunch, it is pretty fast. But without a preview option, you'd better have a pretty firm grasp of the AsciiDoc syntax and have a very clear idea how you want your new document to be structured. That requires a lot of discipline, which people that code for a living have less issues with than other mortals. Its usefulness as AsciiDoc editor is therefore limited for most.


All of the editors discussed in this particular post can be used as a portableApp, if that is a thing for you.


Caveat:
AsciiDocFX can be finicky. I have used it on many different computers with lots of different versions of Windows and never gave any issue, until I tried it at home. There is a continuous error about the JVM not able to start because of max memory allocation. No matter what change I made in those settings, it just refused to start. Yet, IntelliJ and Eclipse are also Java-based and have no issue working on this system. Something I thought worth mentioning for those considering editors.

377

General Software Discussion / Re: some useful but less-known software. share your list!!!

« Last post by Shades on August 26, 2019, 11:08 PM »

Well they have LINE, it just hasn't been updated in a couple of years and won't work with 64-bit yet.  I wish that it would be updated...  http://www.colinux.org/

-wraith808 (August 26, 2019, 08:49 AM)

A real shame that it was never ported to 64-bit. I had pretty good experiences with Portable Ubuntu Remix. But as colinux is only capable of running 32-bit editions of Linux and (as far as I know) Ubuntu doesn't bring out 32-bit versions of their OS anymore. Although migrating it from the 2008 version of Ubuntu till the most current one would be a chore, I would give that a go.

378

General Software Discussion / Re: Goodbye, Bitbucket!

« Last post by Shades on August 23, 2019, 10:43 PM »

Did find some projects on Sourceforge, I think, that were supposed to enable web access to CVS repositories. Also abandoned, just as the client. Whatever was there, I could never make it work. In the version of Jira (issue tracker) that I have running there is functionality to hook CVS up to it. That way it should be possible to have a list of changed files per issue tracked, the CVS comment, the amount of changes inside each file and links to a web interface that shows the actual files and their changes.

Getting the file list overview was not a problem, the amount of changes and CVS comment are also correctly displayed, but never got the web interface where the actual changes could be seen to run.

SCCS originated in 1972!?!? And here I was thinking that CVS was old and feeble...

It has been decided though that GitLab (on a dedicated server) must be used as replacement for the CVS repo.

Been taking a look at this 'Fossil'. Looks interesting enough and likely suffices for a one-man shop or a very small team (caveat: I have been spoiled with am used to Jira). Thanks for that one, though.

379

General Software Discussion / Re: Simple php website for hosting files

« Last post by Shades on August 22, 2019, 01:51 AM »

Not really simple with regards to capabilities, but simple enough to install quickly on the server that hosts the files. Try Nextcloud. User management and (read-only) access to files can be pretty fine-grained. There is a community and enterprise version. i run the community version for quite some time now and it doesn't disappoint.

Caveat: I run it on a Linux server with a 12 year old Core Duo (Dual core) processor and only 2 GByte of RAM. Still, it runs just fine for about 15 people.

380

General Software Discussion / Re: Goodbye, Bitbucket!

« Last post by Shades on August 22, 2019, 01:40 AM »

I keep trying to learn how to use git because it seems like all service providers only support git and I want to take advantage of some of the cool features these services provide. But for one reason or another I get frustrated with git and give up and go back to mercurial.

-Deozaan (August 21, 2019, 04:44 PM)

(G)It doesn't get simpler than with the NitroGit client (not free), although there doesn't seem to be a time limit to their evaluation version. It has a different look than any other application and it would be understandable if that isn't your "thing". But it is simple to use.

Never got into SVN after several attempts, Mercurial I have never tried. There wasn't much time for it as I was bound to CVS (yes, that old beast). But there is talk to convert/upgrade the very active but also almost 20 year CVS repo to Git/GitLab. That will be fun...

Ah well, Git cannot be worse than CVS. The last freely available version of that software is from 2005, the WinCVS client is also from that year and has been stagnant for almost 14 years. Mercurial came and practically went in that time... That puts things in perspective 

381

General Software Discussion / Re: How to convert FLAC albums to tracks?

« Last post by Shades on August 19, 2019, 01:46 AM »

When I was still transferring my CDs to audio files, I used CDex (v1.51 if I remember correctly, it has been quite a while). As far as I know it supports FLAC (and WAV and MP3) and it's freeware.

382

Found Deals and Discounts / Re: VideoProc/Digiarty of WinXDVD Fame - ST FREE 4K/HD Capture/Edit/Download/Convert

« Last post by Shades on August 18, 2019, 10:43 PM »

I can already rip DVDs easily with DVD Decrypter and Handbreak. But they don't allow the option to selectively choose which chapters to include and which to exclude. To be more precise, Handbreak allows you to select a range of chapters to include, but it won't allow you to omit any chapters within that range.

So when I saw that VideoProc had DVD ripping capabilities, and that it allowed me to select arbitrary chapters to include in the ripped video, I thought I could clean up a couple videos I have.

I'm pretty sure it wasn't a problem with copy protection because in actuality the "DVDs" I ripped were actually ISO files that I had previously ripped with DVD Decrypter which I think doesn't include the copy protection in the generated ISO file. I suppose I could try it again using the actual DVDs, but I don't expect any better results, and in fact as you mentioned the copy protection may interfere with it.

-Deozaan (August 18, 2019, 10:18 PM)

Try MakeMKV (which is beta software, but has been stable for the years I have been using it). As far as I know you can use it's DVD ripping functionalities for free, you have to fork over money for the ripping of BluRay discs. If you are familiar with Handbreak, you really have to try and work with VidCoder. That particular software uses the Handbreak code, but adds a lot of functionality using a much easier (to me) interface to do your "thing".
For cutting up (and pasting back together) videos you should get: MKVToolnix.

The problem you describe sounds to me like your software is showing the content of the last buffer frame before the removal of the offending part. DVDs still use tricks to mess up playback in computers. Tricks that do not affect DVD players which you connect directly to your TV. BluRay players are more sensitive to such tricks, but those come with internet connections and enough hardware/software to update themselves with new DRM scenarios, depending on the content of the discs being played with it. So, these shouldn't suffer too much issues either.

So, you better cut out offending content in existing videos. MKVToolnix may not be the easiest software to work with, but it's powerful, hence it will get the job done.

383

Living Room / Re: Buying a 2TB SSD to replace my 2TB HDD

« Last post by Shades on August 17, 2019, 10:35 AM »

Reducing the write cycles on a SSD is still a wise thing to do.

In my system there is boot SSD drive from 120GByte, which is split into 3 partitions. 1 is the tiny one Windows itself creates for it's boot procedure. 2 is the C:\ partition, which is 30 GByte (between 7 and GByte is free), dedicated to Windows itself. 3 is the D:\ partition that holds my portable apps and program files. 4 is a 10GByte section of empty space, to be used by the drive for error management.

Then there is a 3TByte SATA drive for my data, but also a partition that contains a page file with a static size of ((2 x amount of RAM in the PC) + 20%) and a set of portable drives for backup purposes.

Some explaining:
NTFS is the most common file system on Windows. It performs best when it's partitions have between 10% and 20% of free space. But more free space is preferred. Making partitions helps you to achieve that goal.

Also, NTFS is a file system that makes a mess of how it stores files on disk. That is by design. Which is why it needs a relative big chunk of free space and file management (defragging) to keep up performance. This makes it faster than the standard EXT3 or EXT4 file systems on Linux, for example. But only when there is enough free space available. And when there is insufficient free space available, performance drops below the performance of Linux file systems quickly. These Linux file systems fragment much slower and suffer much less performance problems when drives are being filled to the brim. That is also by design.

Severely simplified: NTFS packs files very close together, which results in less 'travel' of the hard disk heads. Which is in essence a good idea, but only with static files. When files grow or shrink, this dense packing results in files being chopped up, making the hard disk head travel more, instead of less. The Linux file systems spread out files, which initially makes the hard disk head travel more. But files don't fragment that quickly this way, because there is room for them to grow or shrink.
 
More modern file systems follow the design ideas of the Linux file systems more closely as these give you a stable performance. And their extra performance comes from better interaction with the operating system and smarter ways to handle the actual reading/writing of files.


Yes, partitions create artificial limits on your drive(s), which may cause you problems along the road if you didn't properly set the partition sizes for the tasks you have intended for the computer. But partitions make the background maintenance NTFS needs much easier on your system. It saves wear and tear on spinning drives and keeps things organized.

There is also another consideration. Especially when virtual machines are being used. Keeping Windows separated from (portable) applications and user data gives you a very clear advantage. Most virtual machines offer you to assign partitions from the host to each virtual machine you create. Installing Windows and especially configuring such a VM can be quite time-consuming. But with portable apps, you can cut out the time spending on configuring. Assign the correct VM drive letter (in my case D:\) to the host partition and every shortcut works just as well on the host as in the VM. You also can continue with your tasks in the VM right where you left them off on the host. It also saves a ton of storage space on the host, which reduces time you need for creating backups considerably as these can be a lot smaller.

Not making partitions makes life easier during setup of your computer. Afterwards it adds (unexpected) complications. You are spending much less time setting up systems than using them, just saying. And yes, Microsoft is hell bent on dumping everything in C:\ . That sense of initial 'simplicity' is a false one, creates lots of opportunities for MS and 3rd parties to sell you software for helping out with complications they created themselves.

[/rant]   

384

Living Room / Re: Buying a 2TB SSD to replace my 2TB HDD

« Last post by Shades on August 16, 2019, 07:37 PM »

And my questions for y'all are these:

• When SSDs first became popular, everyone warned how heavy usage would run them down, but that's a long time ago now.  I'm sure they are more viable now.
• What SSD should I buy?

-BGM (August 16, 2019, 02:44 PM)

• Yes and no. The first models were indeed troublesome. To fix those problems manufacturers started to use better quality components. And that did work out well for the costumers. But better quality components means more costs, so nowadays manufacturers use different techniques to get away with more or less the same service life, but at a much lower price for them. In a way that is good for the consumer as well, as prices dropped significantly. But you should take into consideration how you are planning to use your SSD(s). For some use cases, it is better not to get SSD(s) that use MLC. It won't perform as well and has a shorter service life. The controller on those SSD(s) are decent enough and do make the best use of the capabilities of those SSD(s).
• You hardly go wrong with Samsung drives. But those have a price tag that your budget might not agree with. I have here a few SanDisk SSDs deployed and I must say that those perform good enough for their price. Those are way cheaper than Samsung. I read positive stories about Kingston SSD drives too. then again, you are going to trust your data with those drives, so the more expensive Samsung drives are likely your best bet.

385

DC Member Programs and Projects / Re: SquidGirlCleaner: open source superseded update (re)mover - testers wanted!

« Last post by Shades on August 16, 2019, 01:32 PM »

Same here. 3 Year old Win 10 installation with Office 2010 on it.

But in my case, I go out of my way to use portable applications and if not available, I'll try to make the application 'portable' myself and if that doesn't work, the application will be removed. Having said the above, it does require me to install stuff on a semi-regular basis, so I thought your script to be useful in finding out how much crap remains, even after software has been removed (using Revo UnInstaller). But that is the extent of cleaning I have done on this particular computer.

If it is of any help, your script returned 2 orphans, one of them was: ccc-utility64. The other: Microsoft SQL Server Data-Tier Application Framework (x86).

386

Living Room / Re: Windows 7 always slow after idle

« Last post by Shades on August 15, 2019, 04:16 AM »

You know it is pretty easy to make Windows 10 behave like Windows 7. This article (How-To-Geek) gets you there most of the way. With this tool (NeoWin), you can mimick Windows 7 on Windows 10 even more. And this article (AskVG) discusses how you can enable the glass effect from Windows 7 in Windows 10.

With O&O Shutup you can disable a lot more MS telemetry than the provided options by MS themselves. And with this tool (intowindows) you could exchange the Windows icons that come with Windows 10 for the same icons, but from Windows 7.

That should cover most, but likely not all, reasons to not abandon the Windows 7 bandwagon and jump onto the Windows 10 one. Once you have done all these steps, the experience with your BIOS on your motherboard will be better and you are more likely to get all the intended performance out of by using the Windows version the manufacturer designed it for.

387

Living Room / Re: Windows 7 always slow after idle

« Last post by Shades on August 14, 2019, 10:11 PM »

I can already see this from a mobo vender.. oh hey.. urgent update your bios to mitigate intel's latest cpu vulnerabilities.. oh btw your will lose all your raid configs. 

-Cloq (August 14, 2019, 08:57 PM)

If you are afraid of that, don't use the built-in RAID options of your motherboard. Either get a dedicated 3rd party RAID card or go the software RAID route.

In case you go for dedicated hardware, buy two of the (exact) same cards. That will save you a lot of money when you want to retrieve data from your RAID setup when (not if) it fails. Data retrieval from RAID drives is difficult, time-consuming and therefore really expensive. You think that extra card is expensive? You easily pay 2 or 3 times that price before the data retrieval company even wants to look at the RAID mess you got. Advantage from dedicated RAID hardware is speed. You think you have good speed with the built-in RAID hardware? Dedicated hardware trumps it. Easily.

Software RAID is also quite fast, only slightly less than the built-in RAID hardware. It is more stable, usually relatively easy to repair/reconstruct and won't be affected by a BIOS update. I am running one for over 14 years already (on a Linux machine) and has not failed on me. At one time the original motherboard got fried after the unstable grid fried both the UPS and the motherboard. Maybe I should have said baked the UPS, as there was a small, but nonetheless open fire involved.

It was running on a Intel-based mobo and there was only a spare AMD-based mobo available. Swapped out the motherboards and started the machine back up. It showed warning messages about the different hardware that was detected, then the Linux software downloaded whatever drivers it needed automatically and one reboot later the whole server, including the software RAID, was spinning like nothing had happened. That was the experience I had with Ubuntu Server LTS.

Before I changed to that distro, the company decided that it should run on CentOS as that was the distro other developers were using to develop on. The hours of rebuilding the RAID that were lost after grid "hiccups" with that distro...amazing in a very bad way.

Of course, my experiences are anecdotal, but in this place no more CentOS. Ever.

On a side note: Had to do the same trick on the mail server I run on-premise, only now from AMD to Intel, worked again with Ubuntu Server LTS. Oh, there is something to mention, none of my Linux servers have a GUI installed. I assumed that helped a lot when swapping motherboards/processors.

Anyway, the software RAID does improve the speed and reliability of the data you store on it. And in my experience way more stable than any hardware based RAID solution.

Although, nowadays I wouldn't even consider RAID. The file systems: BRTFS, ZFS and the like, have practically all good qualities of RAID already built into them. Makes RAID redundant (pun intended). Just get fast drives.

Linux and BSD operating systems have the option to install these new file systems, if those aren't already included in the OS. While Windows is still stuck with the NTFS file system. Sure, you have a choice between NTFS and FAT32. Two aging systems. Yes, I am aware the NTFS has gotten a lot of new features over the years, and it is reliable within reason, but having the possibility to add different file systems would have been very welcome by now. When Windows Vista was being developed ("LongHorn", anyone?), Microsoft happily announced they were busy developing a new file system that would do most of what BTRFS/ZFS can do. Yet MS couldn't kill that attempt of progress quickly enough. Instead, only a small subset of those features have found their way into NTFS. Better the devil you know, I'll guess.

[/rant]

388

Living Room / Re: Windows 7 always slow after idle

« Last post by Shades on August 13, 2019, 12:44 AM »

Is the BIOS setup to expect your boot drive to be in a specific (SATA) port on your motherboard, while it is physically connected to a different (SATA) port?

If so, turn your PC completely off and either change the hard disk cable of your boot drive to be in the configured port, or adjust the configuration to expect the drive to be in the port that it is currently connected to. Whatever you feel is the most easy to do.

Some motherboards come with 2 different SATA chip-sets. It might be the case that your hard disk is connected to the one that is not allowed or able to boot from after the BIOS update. It always helps to read the change log from the BIOS update you upload into the BIOS of your motherboard. It might be that lots of people encountered problems when booting with older BIOS versions and that they chose to disable booting from the problematic SATA chip-set.

389

General Software Discussion / Re: Altap Salamander now freeware

« Last post by Shades on August 12, 2019, 01:22 AM »

Not nearly as minimal as your post suggests 

The portable version I got was less than 600KByte to download, add-ons are usually single digit KByte downloads. Customization to any of your specific needs is possible with this one.

390

Post New Requests Here / Re: IDEA: Chiral motion.

« Last post by Shades on August 11, 2019, 05:46 PM »

Caveat: I do not own a laptop and seriously dislike the concept behind the touchpad. Somehow, I always had less issues using the "nipple" on a laptop.

Given the info that I encountered about this subject, I get the impression that Windows 10 has a driver support problem regarding chiral scrolling in general and that it appears to be an synaptics-only feature.

Possible fix for chiral scrolling on Synaptic touchpad in Win 10:
    Navigate to Computer\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Synaptics\SynTPCpl\Controls\03TabScroll\
    Find the items 4OneFEdgeScrollChiralInfoText and 4OneFEdgeScrollChiralCheckBox
    Change the Visibility key of both from 4 to 0
    Open the control panel, go to scroll tab and the option should be available again.

Possible fix for chiral scrolling on ELAN touchpad in Win 10:
    [HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Elantech\SmartPadDisplay]
    "EdgeScroll_Display"=dword:00000001
    Open the control panel, go to scroll tab and the option should be available again.

For ALPS touchpads, barely any info came up during my searches.
    HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Alps\Apoint
    Look for: ScrMethod
    Set the Hex value to 1 and reboot


There are several sites making the recommendation to replace the synaptic driver from Windows 10 with this one: synaptics_v10.2.4.0_allOS_modded_b2.zip (Google that file name to find download links).
Or you can go an even trickier route an replace the current driver for your touchpad with a driver intended for an earlier version of Windows (7 would be the best version to start with). And you might even consider to use the driver from a different laptop manufacturer (after you checked they used the same model of your particular touchpad).

Tool that might make your Synaptics touchpad more bearable again, in case you don't want to mess around with driver software:
- Two-Finger-Scroll

391

General Software Discussion / Re: Altap Salamander now freeware

« Last post by Shades on August 11, 2019, 12:31 PM »

Speaking of freeware file managers, Q-Dir is also very nice and very useful if you have to distribute files into a lot of places.  It is very configurable.

There is also QTTabBar which gives tabs and customizable toolbars to Windows Explorer - this is very nice, too - it makes Windows Explorer actually pleasant.

-BGM (August 11, 2019, 09:21 AM)

For those that like QTTabBar and its specifics, tablacusexplorer is supposed to be a free alternative (after you download and use the 'Split' add-on. There are boatloads of add-on's for it, actually. Including a dark theme, if you are into that. Also as a portable app available.

** edit: added link **

392

Post New Requests Here / Re: IDEA: Convert Radio Frequency scan Data for 3 Manufacturers Data structures

« Last post by Shades on August 06, 2019, 01:05 AM »

Java has support for all operating systems. But might be overkill and an extra software dependency, which may be a problem for some.

There is software that is able to do such conversions. Quite some time ago I had to take look into the Bizztalk Server software from Microsoft to make the output of one piece of middleware to fit into another piece of middleware. While that was a fruitless endeavor (and way too expensive), the concept behind it might actually be helpful in the situation the OP describes.

The Bizztalk software allowed you to create adapters that take the output from one piece of software and "feed" that to an adapter for the other piece of software and have these pieces of software communicating directly. Those adapters could be made with a GUI and once created, they would function indefinitely. Bizztalk could do the same with files and lots of other types of data. Now, Bizztalk is a very expensive proposition, but there is an alternative called: FlowHeater Designer, which does use the concept of adapters and allows you to create them in a visual way. FlowHeater Designer is not nearly as extensive as BizzTalk is, but that is reflected in the price.

From what I understand is that content restructuring in a csv file is required. It would require 3 adapters to be created (one for each Manufacturer) and the FlowHeater software would be able to convert the content between these adapters, each generating a file: content_<manufacturer.name>.csv, ready to be imported into the software from each manufacturer. How to do that automatically within the Mac operating system is up to you. I make it a point to not work with any Apple gear, whenever I can think of a reason no to. 

You can try their freeware version to see if this type of software can actually help out. I have no affiliation with this software and no real experience with it either. But as a concept I do see possibilities.

393

Developer's Corner / Re: Looking for freeware command line text to PDF

« Last post by Shades on August 02, 2019, 07:23 PM »

Pandoc can be quite daunting to get the conversion right. Lots of features and options to choose from. MikTex is another software piece to try with Pandoc. Was a 200MByte download at the time, but worked well enough for what I needed it to do.

At least it wasn't an online installer, which can be affected by anything and waste a lot of time.

394

Living Room / Re: For those with a CrashPlan...

« Last post by Shades on July 28, 2019, 07:55 PM »

As far as I know, Synology has software packages you can add to your NAS for extra functionality. You could try if there is a backup system available on their website.

Regarding SpiderOak:
While it is not a direct option, you might try to use CarotDAV (WebDAV option) to login to your SpiderOak account to circumvent their web-interface and remove crap that way.


That is the CarotDAV interface with the content of my user folder on a Linux based Nextcloud installation I host on my own webserver. Nextcloud does have it's own client and comes with a web-interface as well. But this is the tool I mainly use to access it. Because it is plain simple to use and works fast.


These are the type of connections you can make with it to any server anywhere of that type. For most cloud-based backup solutions, I would try the option 'WebDAV' first.

CarotDAV is free to download as installer, but also as a portable application, if you are into that kind of thing. Author is from Japan.

395

Living Room / Re: Show us the View Outside Your Window

« Last post by Shades on July 27, 2019, 10:40 PM »

In the woods this morning I drove by what looked like a small or a young goat. This was in the middle of nowhere, with no farms around. Completely black.

-tomos (July 27, 2019, 04:34 PM)

You are sure it wasn't a shaved sheep? 

396

General Software Discussion / Re: Windows 7 not able to connect to network shares

« Last post by Shades on July 26, 2019, 08:52 PM »

SMBv1 should be disabled, as it has become very unsafe to use.

Not every computer/network configuration likes that though. Expect trouble with older versions of Linux trying to communicate Windows 7 or vice versa. Can be fixed by upgrading network drivers and/or enabling SMBv2, or even better SMBv3, if the network equipment in your systems has support for that. Not a given with built-in network cards on not that modern motherboards or el cheapo NICs you might have added.

Instructions on how to (temporarily) re-enable the SMBv1 protocol can be found at this link. The instructions are for Windows 10, but the method is valid for most, if not all, versions of Windows.

397

General Software Discussion / Re: Windows 7 not able to connect to network shares

« Last post by Shades on July 24, 2019, 08:57 AM »

You could try to reset WinSock on your computer. One of the better manuals on how to do this (on almost any version of Windows), can be found here.

Removing and re-installing the driver from your networking device (in device manager) can sometimes help too.

398

General Software Discussion / Re: the power of Linkman

« Last post by Shades on July 20, 2019, 09:36 PM »

And sometimes you change 80 to 81, port, but on my latest use of a Windows 7 it was not clashing with Skype, dunno why, so I left everything at port 80 for now.

-Steven Avery (July 20, 2019, 05:37 PM)

On a side note:
Skype hogs port 80 for no other reason than that port being the least likely to be blocked by a firewall of any kind. But this is irritating for those that run a website development server locally. Or any other software that uses port 80. If you run such software as a (background) service, make sure that Skype starts last when you reboot your computer. Skype can use almost any port for its communication and selects one randomly if port 80 has already been occupied.

399

Automatic Screenshotter / Re: Help capturing systray notifications

« Last post by Shades on July 15, 2019, 11:53 PM »

Do you need a screenshot of the error message? Or is the content of the message the goal? In the latter case, practically all of those type of messages are being tracked by the Event Viewer, built into Windows itself. Using the Event Viewer isn't difficult at all, but some might find the interface not so straightforward to work with.

Also, the Event Viewer can be a treasure trove on info, yet also an obfuscating mess. Mileage will vary.

Not sure if the Event Viewer is accessible when using Windows 10 Home edition. It is accessible with Windows 10 Pro and better. 

400

General Software Discussion / Re: Pale Moon as my browser due to the wonderful extensions

« Last post by Shades on July 15, 2019, 09:31 AM »

PaleMoon (ZDNet) has admitted that their download servers have been spreading malware in older versions of their browser.