Recent Posts

576

General Software Discussion / Re: [Win][Suggestions needed] Ensure network shares are connected reliably at login?

« Last post by 4wd on January 06, 2019, 07:09 PM »

Something like that:

Code: PowerShell [Select]

1. $w = $x = $y = $z = $true
2.  
3. do {
4.   if (!(Test-Path W:\)) {
5.     Start-Process -FilePath "net.exe" -ArgumentList "use W: \\NAS\backups /PERSISTENT:YES" -Wait -WindowStyle Hidden
6.   } else {
7.     $w = $false
8.   }
9.   if (!(Test-Path X:\)) {
10.     Start-Process -FilePath "net.exe" -ArgumentList "use W: \\NAS\homes /PERSISTENT:YES" -Wait -WindowStyle Hidden
11.   } else {
12.     $x = $false
13.   }
14.   if (!(Test-Path Y:\)) {
15.     Start-Process -FilePath "net.exe" -ArgumentList "use W: \\NAS\media /PERSISTENT:YES" -Wait -WindowStyle Hidden
16.   } else {
17.     $y = $false
18.   }
19.   if (!(Test-Path Z:\)) {
20.     Start-Process -FilePath "net.exe" -ArgumentList "use W: \\NAS\temp /PERSISTENT:YES" -Wait -WindowStyle Hidden
21.   } else {
22.     $z = $false
23.   }
24. } while ($w -or $x -or $y -or $z)

Haven't tested it but the theory is sound 

577

General Software Discussion / Re: [Win][Suggestions needed] Ensure network shares are connected reliably at login?

« Last post by 4wd on January 06, 2019, 04:49 PM »

This thread was about a similar problem, there didn't seem to be any resolution regarding mapped drives then either.

But who knows, maybe something in there will work better on 10 than it did on 7.

EDIT: Also this old PoSh script I did might provide some inspiration.

578

Finished Programs / Re: SOLVED: Explorer Context Menu to Move Selected Items to Specific Folders

« Last post by 4wd on January 06, 2019, 04:21 PM »

If you want v6.6 for the Move To functionality, it's still available on uptodown.

579

General Software Discussion / Re: [Win][Suggestions needed] Ensure network shares are connected reliably at login?

« Last post by 4wd on January 06, 2019, 03:13 PM »

Sorry, don't know, I've never used mapped drives because the few times I did try them, (back with XP), they've never been as reliable as UNC addressing to the IP.

eg. \\192.168.0.200\folder

Haven't used any program that doesn't understand UNC so it's never been necessary to not use it.

580

General Software Discussion / Re: Move specific file types with original folder path included to another directory

« Last post by 4wd on January 06, 2019, 02:01 PM »

At least you are patient enough to read the blasted HowTo's on Robo.

-questorfla (January 03, 2019, 10:40 AM)

robocopy /?

HowTo's not required 

581

General Software Discussion / Re: [Win][Suggestions needed] Ensure network shares are connected reliably at login?

« Last post by 4wd on January 06, 2019, 01:37 PM »

Use the Task Scheduler to run a script at System Start.

A simple PowerShell or batch file that checks for the existence of the network share, looping every X seconds until it appears.

https://blogs.techne...by-using-powershell/

On my phone atm but something simple like:

Code: PowerShell [Select]

1. for ($i = 0; $i -lt 100; $i++) {
2.   if (Test-Path \\nas\folder) {Exit}
3.   Start-Sleep -seconds 1
4. }

It'll test for the share every second for 99 seconds, exiting if it exists.

582

Finished Programs / Re: SOLVED: Explorer Context Menu to Move Selected Items to Specific Folders

« Last post by 4wd on January 05, 2019, 01:35 PM »

When the thread was active it would have been v6.6 according to the changelog.

FMT v7.5 licences were recently available free as a give away.

https://www.donation...ex.php?topic=46385.0

583

Post New Requests Here / Re: IDEA: Allow display of program output even when Windows Desktop is locked

« Last post by 4wd on January 04, 2019, 01:04 AM »

LowToSleep and set it at 1% CPU activity.

584

Post New Requests Here / Re: IDEA: Allow display of program output even when Windows Desktop is locked

« Last post by 4wd on January 03, 2019, 09:41 AM »

If the output from the cameras is required to be monitored all the time, why aren't they on their own system?
Or, at least, why isn't the policy of the computer set to something suitable for its task.

Or something like a Intel Compute Stick, (or similar), running the vendor program on Windows 10 in kiosk mode plugged into a HDMI port - kiosk mode will allow it to run on top of the lock screen.

585

Post New Requests Here / Re: IDEA: Allow display of program output even when Windows Desktop is locked

« Last post by 4wd on January 03, 2019, 02:28 AM »

Use a splitter on the camera output, feed one to the computer as usual, the other to a spare input on the HDMI monitor, (through any required adapter/converter).
The monitor will auto-switch to the active input when the computer locks.

586

Post New Requests Here / Re: IDEA: Possible Malware Debug - HW laptop back-light detector

« Last post by 4wd on January 02, 2019, 01:23 AM »

How to check monitor state

Possible take the code, loop it every minute with the result being output to a text file with a timestamp - this might enable you to narrow down any possible culprit in Eventlog, etc.

587

Post New Requests Here / Re: IDEA: Possible Malware Debug - HW laptop back-light detector

« Last post by 4wd on January 02, 2019, 12:33 AM »

I thought people were trying to argue that the hardware itself was doing it, not the drivers.

-Asudem (January 01, 2019, 11:49 PM)

Due to the "murkiness" of the original post, eg. "powered down" as opposed to Windows turning the display off. 

First step should still be remove all peripherals, mice, RF transceivers, external HDDs, etc, etc - so we'll see what happens.

That's why I created this thread and hoped some sort of ProcMon like software existed or could exist, to diagnose this issue.

There's also Sysmon which will log to the Event Log.

588

N.A.N.Y. 2019 / Re: micro Tool contribution that list all connected Drives

« Last post by 4wd on January 01, 2019, 10:51 PM »

Interestingly, a manual MBAM scan on the archive yesterday said it was fine, today the scheduled scan marked it as:

MachineLearning/Anomalous.94%

ie. They don't know what it's doing other than retrieving some info.

589

Post New Requests Here / Re: IDEA: Possible Malware Debug - HW laptop back-light detector

« Last post by 4wd on January 01, 2019, 10:26 PM »

Again, left overnight, no forms of Linux seem affected.

-Asudem (January 01, 2019, 05:52 PM)

Saying that Linux is unaffected is pretty close to pointless as Linux won't be affected unless it is a physical hardware issue, (eg. intermittent contact in the keyboard), as that is the only common ground between Linux and Windows.

It would have relevance if Linux used the same drivers and ran the same processes ... but then it would be Windows.  So it still doesn't exclude peripherals from the equation.

It did this the night of the fresh Win10 install on a new hard drive about a month ago. So it survived an entire Hard Drive and OS clean install.

In the absence of information, can we assume that most, if not all, of the Windows telemetry has not been disabled?

Considering this has been occurring since OS installation and the amount of crap that Windows collects and sends back to Microsoft at who knows what times, it might be related to that.

EDIT2: Found this in my security audit. Should I be concerned? Why would chome.exe be in there while I'm using it to read this reply?

It's Google, they along with Microsoft want to collect everything about you, this is common knowledge - since you've knowingly installed Chrome I would have thought you'd expect to see it's grubby little feet trampling through your machine 

Event ID 4798

But if it makes you feel easier, I'm not seeing anything like that for Vivaldi, Iridium, or Slimjet - all based on the same source code.  I don't use any type of browser account for syncing, bookmarks, passwords, etc - so who knows, it may be related to that.

However: None of this can explain what turns my monitor back off after turning it on.

Find what's turning it on since the second event can't happen without the first event.

590

Post New Requests Here / Re: IDEA: Possible Malware Debug - HW laptop back-light detector

« Last post by 4wd on January 01, 2019, 05:14 PM »

You could try setting the screensaver timeout the same as display off timeout and then watch for Event ID 4802 and 4803 in the Security Eventlog.

It may give info about the calling process, it may not - most likely not but it's something to try.

See here:
https://superuser.co...cmd-upon-screensaver

The other obvious question is:
When did you first notice it happening, (and does it coincide with anything else, eg. software install, power fluctuations)?

eg. Until I recently decided to uninstall ~20 programs I no longer use, my computer would not go into Sleep mode, something I had become used to.
Now it does again.

Another experiment, instead of just getting it to turn the display off, have it also Lock the computer.
This will require physical interaction with the mouse or keyboard to have the display turn on.

591

N.A.N.Y. 2019 / Re: micro Tool contribution that list all connected Drives

« Last post by 4wd on December 31, 2018, 05:49 PM »

Bit of everything there: 3 x SATA SSD (C,G,V,P,X), 3 x SATA HDD (D,Q,Z), NVMe SSD on PCIe adapter (T), Cloud sync (E), and RAM drive (K).

592

Living Room / Re: Happy New Year 2019 for the best forum in the world

« Last post by 4wd on December 31, 2018, 07:26 AM »

Happy New Year from Melbourne (40km away)

593

Post New Requests Here / Re: IDEA: Possible Malware Debug - HW laptop back-light detector

« Last post by 4wd on December 30, 2018, 07:55 PM »

Good question, I should have been more specific: In Power Management, you are given a power option for when you would like your screen turned off at what I assume is the hardware level:
[ Invalid Attachment ]

Once my afk has been detected for 5 minutes, I expect my screen to soft-power-down, meaning the lcd pixels and backlighting are turned off on my laptop monitor. I also do not expect the screen to resume until such input behavior is received from only my mouse or keyboard. My linux distros follow these rules similarly without power restoring to my monitor unexpectedly.

-Asudem (December 30, 2018, 03:06 PM)

Much better - so just the normal Windows Display off function and not "powered down".

BTW, "reactivate" the screen = turn the backlight on (with no signal, eg. no Desktop) or completely wake the screen, ie. normal backlight/Desktop ?

Asking because my computer has two monitors connected, when Windows turns the display off one monitor will go into standby, the other monitor display will go black but the backlight is still on.

Are you running the latest chipset/graphics drivers?
Besides a mouse, what other peripherals do you have connected and have you tried disconnecting them all (if you have any)?

Something else to try, turn the display off manually using NirCmd (nircmd.exe monitor off) and see if it wakes up.

594

Post New Requests Here / Re: IDEA: Possible Malware Debug - HW laptop back-light detector

« Last post by 4wd on December 29, 2018, 09:57 PM »

Going back to the OP:

The problem is that my computer will, at seemingly random points in time during the night, reactivate my screen, after it has powered down.

-Asudem (December 24, 2018, 09:19 PM)

If this is correct then it's a hardware issue - reactivating the screen is not the same as powering up and booting into an OS.
What do you mean by "reactivate" the screen?
Turn the backlight on or something more?
How old is this laptop?

Unplug the charger if it's plugged in - this will remove any transient mains power event from affecting the laptop circuits.
Close the lid - besides sending a signal to Windows this sometimes disconnects the backlight via hardware, (depends on the design).

To clarify, what do you mean by powered down?

595

N.A.N.Y. 2019 / Re: NANY 2019: AHK Script Center

« Last post by 4wd on December 29, 2018, 09:16 PM »

I am confused as to why you call it the same name as the already well known AutoHotkey.exe ? I find this weird, even dodgy.

-Curt (December 29, 2018, 02:06 AM)

Confusing?

-Shades (December 29, 2018, 09:28 AM)

It sounds like Curt has confused the included AutHotkey.exe executable as being the compiled script executable when it's just an included copy of the AutoHotkey interpreter which is being used to run the script, (AHK Script Center.ahk).

Which the shortcut properties show:

Code: Text [Select]

1. "C:\Users\?????\Desktop\Mega Test\AutoHotkey.exe" "AHK Script Center.ahk"

It's still too bad the nongs at Microsoft can't let you use relative addressing in shortcuts, would have been so useful since about .... Windows 1.0.

596

Post New Requests Here / Re: How old is this file?

« Last post by 4wd on December 29, 2018, 06:30 AM »

DaysSince.ps1



Shortcut in the archive, (assuming Win10), drop it into C:\Users\<user>\appdata\roaming\microsoft\windows\sendto - you'll need to edit the target path to the PowerShell script if it's different from C:\PoSh (my test folder).

Shortcut target:

Code: Text [Select]

1. C:\Windows\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\powershell.exe -WindowStyle Hidden -File C:\PoSh\DaysSince.ps1

Code: PowerShell [Select]

1. <#
2.   DaysSince.ps1 <file>
3. #>
4.  
5. Param (
6.   $SourceFile
7. )
8.  
9. $fp = (Get-ItemProperty -Path $SourceFile)
10.  
11. $deltaM = (New-TimeSpan -Start $fp.LastWriteTime -End (Get-Date))
12. $deltaC = (New-TimeSpan -Start $fp.CreationTime -End (Get-Date))
13.  
14. $text = "$([io.path]::GetFileName($SourceFile))`r`nTime since:`r`nCreation:`t`t$($deltaC.Days) Days, $($deltaC.Hours) Hours, $($deltaC.Minutes) Minutes`r`n"
15. $text += "Modification:`t$($deltaM.Days) Days, $($deltaM.Hours) Hours, $($deltaM.Minutes) Minutes"
16.  
17. $wshell = New-Object -ComObject Wscript.Shell -ErrorAction Stop
18. $wshell.Popup($text, 0, "DaysSince", 64) | Out-Null

NOTE: I'm running PowerShell 5.x, I don't know if it will work on a lower version.

No doubt there'll be some Windows weirdness that will stop it from running, took ages to work out why it wasn't passing files with spaces in.

And no doubt you'll run afoul of PowerShell's stringent ExecutionPolicy setting, if that happens change the Shortcut Target to:

Code: Text [Select]

1. C:\Windows\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\powershell.exe -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -WindowStyle Hidden -File C:\PoSh\DaysSince.ps1

597

Living Room / Re: silly humor - post 'em here! [warning some NSFW and adult content]

« Last post by 4wd on December 27, 2018, 07:35 AM »

Should the 'I guess' on the shirt not be replaced with 'I'll guess'?

T-SHRTS make spelling grammar mistakes. 

-Shades (December 27, 2018, 05:43 AM)

So do forums apparently.

598

Living Room / Re: Interesting "stuff"

« Last post by 4wd on December 27, 2018, 06:40 AM »

Cheap Photoshop alternative Paint.NET 50% off for a limited time

-Arizona Hot (December 27, 2018, 02:58 AM)

Last time I fired up a calculator it worked out that $4.99 was a fair bit less than 50% off $6.99, (ie. 29%) - even the page you link to shows it as $4.99 in the Store, don't know where they get the $2.99 from.

599

General Software Discussion / Re: The user trap no one ever spoke of in general

« Last post by 4wd on December 26, 2018, 05:45 PM »

If I have left out valid considerations / aspects, please add them.

-ital2 (December 26, 2018, 09:10 AM)

The TL;DR section at the start

TL;DR:

Stay away from data formats that are closed and proprietary.

600

Post New Requests Here / Re: IDEA: Possible Malware Debug - HW laptop back-light detector

« Last post by 4wd on December 25, 2018, 05:37 PM »

It does it even when the lid is closed?