Microsoft Security Essentials Correlation

So Microsoft Security Essentials failed to gain a certification on a recent, well-known  AV test.

That's unfortunate, since it's free, without subscription, and provided by those that make Windows.

Meanwhile, I saw this article, basically saying that the people behind the program AppRemover saw that on 150,000 or so computers, most of them were running Microsoft Security Essentials.

According to the CNET article, AppRemover is using it's data to claim that Microsoft Security Essentials is a “global leader in security suite market share.” 

There's a weird correlation, though. AppRemover is a program that, among other things, uninstalls security software. Presumably, the people using AppRemover have a reason for doing so, such as uninstalling antivirus software that they didn't want. If AppRemover is reporting that a majority of computers that had AppRemover used on them already had Microsoft Security Essentials installed, and the user is running a program that removes antivirus software, it would seem to correlate that the majority of people who use AppRemover on a computer with antivirus software already installed (as reported in the article) are using it to remove Microsoft Security Essentials more than the other antivirus suites?

Either that, or the computers measured have more than one antivirus program installed.

Ubuntu Tales - Custom Printing

When my fiancée asked what to do about wedding invitations, I told her (foolishly, perhaps) that I'd take care of them, instead of having them custom-printed. Fast forward a few months, and I'm deep into getting all the items printed. The problem I've been battling is custom page sizes in Ubuntu.

The documents I'm printing are PDFs sized specifically to the different paper sizes of the invites (5x7inch, 5x3.5inch,etc). I was able to print the actual invite cards without much hassle. The thing that made this so painless is Adobe Reader (and evince) have access to a custom print size called “5x7 photo borderless.” This allowed the document to print with images right up to the edge of the pages (if the printer loaded the paper properly).

The headaches came when I had to print inserts and RSVP cards that were 5x3.5. There's no option for borderless printing at this size. I was able to make a custom size manually and was able to print the pages pretty easily, but there's a few millimeters of border around the images. It's not a deal breaker, but I thought I could do better. Unfortunately, for whatever reason, I could not get my HP 2512 inkjet to print without any kind of margin. I messed with custom page options, and I also messed with the HP device manager, to little avail. If the page size doesn't already exist and have a borderless option, I can't do it.

So I gave up and booted into Windows 7.

Interestingly, I had even less luck in Windows with this printer. I had to go through a big rigmarole to make a custom page size (I had to configure the “print server” with a new “form type”, none of which is intuitive). But even when I did that successfully, Adobe Reader would completely ignore the new page size I created. It would try to print to a 3.5x5, but because of the way the paper loads, I needed it to be a 5x3.5, and it would absolutely refuse my new custom page.

My fiancee's computer (running Windows XP) has a Dell inkjet that I tried out. This printer not only let me print to a 5x3.5, but I was able to do so without any border at all, just by selecting one checkbox, and it did a better job of feeding the cards in, so I didn't have to rotate it. Alas, even when selecting the highest print quality available, the image was not as dark as the invitations I had previously printed.

So the good news is that my headaches printing the custom page sizes weren't necessarily caused by Ubuntu but had more to do with the software and hardware of the printer itself. The bad news is I'm still going to be wrestling with printing the invitations a while longer.

Google Voice vs LG Cosmos

We use Google Voice at work for our on-call nurses. We used to use a third-party call center with live people to handle this. We would tell them each day what nurse was on call, and what message to say. They, more often than not, got it wrong, and we continued to pay for it (the bill to the third-party, and the lost revenue from a patient referral). When I learned about Google Voice, I suggested we give it a go and test it. They were so pleased with it that we canned the call center after only a week. I instructed the clerks how to change numbers and specify which numbers to forward to. And I haven't heard anything out of them for about a year or more.

Until today. We recently hired a new nurse and they were trying to enter her phone number into the list of available numbers to forward to. When you add a number to Google Voice, GV will call the phone number entered and ask you to dial on that phone two digits that are displayed on the computer screen, to avoid abuse of their system. I've never had any issue with this, but this new nurse's phone, an LG Cosmos, would not pass verification.

I suspect the problem was that GV could not properly hear the DTMF ("touch tone") tones. I adjusted the DTMF settings on her phone so that the tones would play longer. No go. I tried using her phone in speakerphone mode. I even tried using a website to play back the DTMF tones into the phone's microphone. Still nothing.

I then tried having GV verify my own personal cell phone. Worked the first time. Both the LG and my phone are both on Verizon. What's the deal? I started doing what I always do when I have no more ideas, Googling for answers, and found more similar complaints than actual answers. Then I ran across a post from someone who had an iPhone 4GS that couldn't get GV to verify the phone, but this person also had a fix - turn up the ringer volume. This seemed strange to me - why should the ringer volume affect the loudness of the DTMF tones? I tried turning up the ringer on the LG and it still failed. But now that I was in the land of trying-things-that-didn't-make-sense, I wondered what would change if the phone thought a headset was attached?

The LG has a standard headphone jack, so I just plugged in my earbuds and tried to verify again. Success! I'm not sure if this a failure of the phone, or Google Voice not being sensitive enough. I don't like the fact that there are no other ways to verify a number, and that I had to resort to a weird hack like this. Still, their service is free, and for a small business like ours, it works better than what we *were* using.

Xubuntu and the Keyring Manager

Whenever I have to use Xubuntu, it's usually because I'm refurbishing an old computer for someone to do basic web, e-mail, and maybe some word processing. Given that, I always set Xubuntu to login automatically. However, the NetworkManager app always gives fits about authenticating against the Keyring Manager when connecting to networks (especially wireless). So it might be an automatic login, but then you're immediately prompted for the SAME password when NetworkManager attempts to connect to a network.

I've Googled a lot trying to find good fixes for it, and there are plenty (some that involve installing a PAM module, which is a good plan, but convoluted). I've got my own, and it's super easy.

Assuming you've already set Xubuntu to auto login and you've rebooted your computer and are logged in, go to the Places menu and go to your Home folder. Go to View and check "Show Hidden Files." Look for a folder called .gnome2, open it, and then open a folder called keyrings. Open this and delete anything in it. Reboot. Once the computer reboots, you'll be asked for your wireless password. After you enter it, it's going to ask for a keyring/encryption password. Just leave it BLANK and choose "save." You'll get a warning that this stores your password in plaintext on your computer. Just say OK.

The ramifications of this are that wireless passwords (WEP, WPA, etc) are stored, but are easily viewable. It means that NetworkManager will work without a fuss, but someone could get on your computer and look at your wireless keys. If this isn't a problem, then this is a fix for the keyring manager problem.

File shares work better with Ubuntu

My boss finally wore out her poor ol' HP Compaq nx9010 and I needed to temporarily transfer all her files to another laptop until her new one gets ordered. I had to wait until the end of the day and take both laptops home with me to work on, so as not to interrupt her. Not having a crossover cable with me, my plan was to get both laptops connected to my home router, set up a shared folder, and copy files over.

However, strange things happen with sharing security when your computers are part of a domain...and you're not connected to the domain. What would happen is I would try to connect to the shared folder of one computer from the other and I'd get a message saying something to the effect of "no log on servers could be found" or something like that. Essentially, even when I was using the local administrator account as my sign in, the authentication would not complete and I couldn't connect. I'm sure there's some kind of fix for this, but I didn't want to fool with it - I had a better, quicker idea.

I stuck an Ubuntu LiveCD in the target laptop (the newer one) and booted it up, leaving the nx9010 still running XP. I set the nx9010 to completely share out the user profile for my boss, and then used Ubuntu to do a Samba connect to that shared folder. It still asked for a login, but logging in as the local administrator account with the workgroup set to WORKGROUP did the trick. Then I had Ubuntu mount the hard drive on the newer laptop and proceeded with copying the files. Flawless!

Again, I'm sure there's a fix or a workaround for the issue I was having, but Ubuntu saved me the trouble of researching it. That makes my day :)

Re-install Windows XP

When you buy a computer that isn't Apple, 99% of the time it's going to come with some version of Windows, whether it be XP, Vista, and soon, Windows 7. Sometimes your computer will come with a few CDs, one of which might be the Windows re-install disc, in case you have to re-install Windows. Truthfully, if you use Windows for long enough, sooner or later you're going to need to reinstall it. Here's the sad part - a LOT of computer manufactures like to save a small insignificant amount of money when shipping your computer and refuse to give you a Windows reinstall disc (Dell being the big exception I'm aware of). Although a lot of computer vendors will give you one if you pay extra for it. Instead of going on a rant about how that is ludicrous, I'm going to explain what your options are if you need to re-install Windows and don't have a Windows reinstallation disc.

Legalities
First, though, a caveat. Remember I said that having to pay extra for the installation disc for an operating system you already own a license for is ludicrous? It gets worse. Because Windows discs are copyrighted material, if you were to back up or make a copy of one of those discs, you're technically breaking copyright and breaking the law. I say technically, because that's what the Digital Millennium Copyright Act says. However, when you get a computer with Windows or buy a copy of Windows from the store, what you're spending money on is the license to use Windows on one computer. So although copying the Windows disc is breaking the law under the DMCA, Microsoft isn't losing money because what you purchased was the license (that little product key that is stuck on the case of your computer). With that out of the way, I'll get into the meat of things - just be aware that depending on how you interpret copyright law, you are probably breaking copyright.

Okay, so you've got a computer, but no Windows disc, and you need to re-install.
The first step is to figure out who made your computer (HP, Dell, IBM, Gateway, etc), what version of Windows you've got (should be on the same sticker as your product key), and if possible, try to find your Windows Product Key (most likely stuck to the case of your computer). For example, you may have a computer from Dell that has a copy of Windows XP Home Edition. The vendor name (in this case, Dell) is important because of a thing called a BIOS lock. A BIOS lock is when a copy of Windows XP is customized to only work on a particular brand of computer. In this example, if you have a Dell and you insert a Windows disc that was designed for a Gateway, you're going to get a message on the screen that "This software only works on a Gateway" and your computer restarts. Welcome to more ludicrous-ness.

Aside: The only justification for this is a technique that some vendors use to customize their Windows installation discs. When you install a Dell customized version of Windows on a Dell computer, for example, you won't be prompted for your Windows Product Key. This is handy, because if you've lost your product key for somehow, you should be able to complete the install anyway (although you probably won't have any way to prove you've got a legal license when the men in suits show up at your door). On top of that...it's theoretically possible to use this trick to install XP on a Dell computer (again, for example), that only has Windows 2000. You don't need a valid product key because Dell's disc doesn't ask for one. Now this is very illegal and you should not do this, because this time you're using Windows without paying for a license. This is stealing, don't do it, blahdeeblah. Just....don't. We good with that?

So you've got your brand of computer, you know which version of Windows you're using (XP Home, XP Pro, Vista, etc), and you have your product key, just in case. Now comes the tricky part. We're going to have to do some searching on the internet for torrents of the Windows disc you need. Yes, again, this is technically piracy and violating copyright, because the contents of the disc are copyrighted. So, if you do this, you ARE breaking the law. However, again, what you paid for when you bought your computer/bought a retail copy of Windows, was the license, so the disc really has no monetary value. Anyway, I'm not going to delve into how to use Bit Torrent. What I am going to tell you is what to look for. Assuming you're doing a full install and not an install-in-place (more on that later), you'll be searching for something like "Dell Windows XP Home" or "HP Windows XP Pro." You need to specify the brand of your computer and which version of Windows you need. If you're doing a full install, it doesn't really matter what service packs are bundled with the torrent (denoted as SP2, SP3, etc). If you do a full install, you can update to the latest service pack later. The important thing is to get a torrent of the Windows disc you need, burn that to a CD (or DVD, if it's for Vista) and see if it works.

OEM
As you're looking for the version you need, you will probably come across versions referred to as OEM. OEMs are discs made for computer manufacturers, but if they don't say a computer brand, then they're not the BIOS locked versions. What this means is if you have a generic computer, or you're having a hard time finding a disc for your brand of computer, it might not need a brand-specific version of Windows. For example, I've had to work on a computer that wasn't manufactured by a big-name brand, and I couldn't find a disc for it. But I downloaded the OEM version and it worked just fine. So something good to know.

Install In Place
There's another trick you can do with a Windows CD, provided you're careful. Most of the time, when you re-install XP with a disc that didn't specifically come with your computer, your only option will to perform a new, full installation. However, if you can find a Windows disc that is the same brand, same version and same service pack, you might be able to perform an install in place. Basically, an install in place takes your currently installed Windows on your computer and replaces all the original Windows files with their original "factory default" files. If all goes well, this effectively repairs your broken Windows instance and usually lets you continue to use your computer as if nothing had happened - don't need to re-install drivers, software, or files. Just make sure to perform a backup, if you can, before you proceed, just in case. I cannot stress how useful this trick can be if you're trying to repair a copy of Windows that has crashed. More on how to do an install in place here

The Installation
After you've got your Windows disc burned to a CD or a DVD, follow your computer's instructions for booting a computer using a CD. If the torrent was good, you should be presented with the Windows installation. Just proceed through the installation (more on that here). Depending on your brand of computer and the disc you're using, you might be asked for a product key during the installation and you might be asked to activate Windows once the install is done. If you try to activate Windows with the product key on your computer's case and it fails, it is most likely the wrong version of Windows for the product key. If you are sure everything's okay, you can try to contact Microsoft and get a new activation code, but double-check that you've got the correct Windows version - if you have a version other than what the product key was designed for, Microsoft isn't going to help you.

And if you're using a cracked version of Windows so you don't have to activate or have a product code, shame on you and may your computer get infected with the worst kinds of nasties.

Eventually, if all went well, the install should complete, but you'll most likely need to get drivers for everything, such as video, network, etc. Depending on where your computer came from, this could be easy (like with a big brand name) or a hassle - try the your computer manufacturer's website (and see if your computer has a service code or tag, or a serial number). Unless you did an install-in-place, you'll have a fresh computer without any programs or files, so you'll have to re-install everything you need. But you'll have a nice fresh installation of Windows. Enjoy. :)

Ubuntu LiveCD helpes with Dynamic Disk

I never know what kinds of issues I'll run across at my office. I may be the one and only tech guy, but there's still plenty of computers that have been at work here longer than I have, and some applications that still behave as "black boxes" to me. So sometimes very unusual issues arise that I cannot explain.

Today, I had to update the AT&T Global Dialer VPN software. Unfortunately, the new version must have a computer with XP or later, and alas, the computer that needed it was running Windows 2000. So while I'm not very happy about this prospect, I begin prep work to get it updated to XP.

Again, there's "black box" software on here, and by that I mean that not only do I not know how to use it (I rarely know how to use our medical software, because then I'd be a clerk or a nurse), but I also don't know how to install it. So in the interests of not breaking black boxes, I opt to do a full XP install and dual-boot with Windows 2000. This should be a cinch. I've done it before. No problem.

Problem.

For some inexplicable reason, the Windows 2000 partition was a "Dyamic Disk" rather than a normal partition, and when I installed XP on a second, unused partition, the boot.ini became unavailable, and rendered booting into Windows 2000 useless, although XP booted fine. Further, XP could not access any files on the Dynamic Disk - the XP Disk Manager saw it was there, but because it was Dynamic, it couldn't do anything with it except wipe it. Which would be bad.

Now I don't have any problem re-installing the regular programs from scratch and restoring people's backup files from the server, but there's this black box software on the computer that I didn't want to break, and now it's, in the words of Jeremy Clarkson, "broken."

Instead of reading up and trying to repair boot sectors and blahdeeblah, I skipped ahead to the last resort and booted up using an Ubuntu LiveCD. Sure enough, Ubuntu was able to mount and give access to the Dynamic Disk without any nagging. I was able to copy the black box onto the server and then copy it back to the Windows XP install and voila - working again.

Once again, Ubuntu/Linux saves the day when Windows doesn't make any sense.