Windows

Other than disabling autorun completely, there is no official way to stop the "You need to format the disk in drive X before you can use it" dialog from popping up every time you connect a drive with unknown (ie. non-FAT/NTFS) partitions, or when you accidentally click on it. Because my external drives are fully encrypted, this message appears every time I connect them, and if you mistakenly press the wrong button you have to be fast to stop it...

I've been using a self written AutoHotkey script to immediately close the dialog as soon as it appears for a few weeks now, and it works great. It sits in my tray, waits for the dialog and then closes it without me even noticing it. It takes virtually no resources, and doesn't do busy waiting thanks to the WinWait command of AutoHotkey. Continue reading "Disable Annoying "Disk not formatted" Dialog on Vista/Windows 7"

I've posted the Microsoft Lifecam standalone drivers a while ago and got a lot of questions regarding how I extracted them from the original setup. I'll explain it based on the latest 64bit installer for that webcam [LifeCam 3.0 downloaded here], but I'll also try to keep this short guide as general as possible. The same method works for all kinds of installers. I very often use it in cases where the driver installation is linked to some ugly software installation. Continue reading "How to Extract Drivers/Files from Installers"

Turns out I was about a year late with my idea about a tipping/micropayment service, where you can give away small amounts (as small as 1 cent) to any URI you like as easy as clicking a button, without going to a tedious process and the requirement of the receiver to sign up first. I even thought about trying to get Y Combinator to seed fund me.



At least it shows that my ideas aren't that stupid after all. I have enough of them left.

I own a Microsoft LifeCam VX-1000 webcam, which is nothing special, but absolutely okay for its price. The only thing that bothered me is that the driver is not available as a standalone download: You need to download a 50MB installer, which then downloads another 150MB: DirectX, the .NET framework and other components required for the (useless) software. Without network connection, you cannot install the driver. Also, (of course) you're forced to install the software, too.

So, I extracted the driver files from the setup. The ZIP file includes drivers for the NX-6000, the VX-1000, VX-3000 and VX-6000. They're working fine without the software.

• LifeCam drivers for Windows XP 32bit (extracted from LifeCam 2.04 installer, 8 MB)
• LifeCam drivers for Windows Vista/Windows 7 64bit (from LifeCam 3.00 installer, 3 MB)

Update: Added standalone drivers for 64bit.

Update: Drivers confirmed to work for Windows 7. After installation, an installer will open and try to download the software, but you can cancel the dialog.

On the Windows 7 development blog, you can find an introduction to the new Windows 7 toolbar. Judge for yourself. Continue reading "Windows 7: The "All New" Toolbar?"

If you've ever used Linux, you probably stumbled over the great concept of package management. When Microsoft revised MSI (now called Windows Installer), they failed to include the simple mechanism for applications to register at a central update management. The crucial point is that while Linux repositories mostly contain GPL software that can be easily packaged by third parties, a Windows package manager needs support from each individual developer - which is not going to happen any time soon without Microsoft stepping in.
I am certain that the Windows world is ready for a "Web 2.0 solution". In times where all our knowledge is being collected for free, people might actually use install scripts supplied by a community, without direct support from the vendor. Continue reading "Package Manager for Windows"

Mark Russinovich, co-founder of Sysinternals and author of many excellent tools (and an excellent book on Windows internals), blogs about troubleshooting a Vista system using Process Explorer and Process Monitor.

Mark's Blog: The Case of the Slooooow System

Over the years, I've grown so accustomed to using many Windows related keyboard shortcuts that I intuitively use them without thinking. Looking at the list of keyboard shortcuts published by Microsoft for Windows XP, I know and use all of them. Lately, I've (re)discovered a few shortcuts that turn out to be really useful (for me), but I didn't know or even think about.

For example, I often use CTRL-LEFT and CTRL-RIGHT to navigate wordwise (and, even more frequently, I use CTRL-HOME/END), but didn't know that you can actually use CTRL-BACKSPACE to delete the previous word!

In the section "rediscovered" (and somewhat awkward to type): CTRL-SHIFT-ESC opens the Task Manager. And: Turns out I lied when I said I use all of the listed Windows XP shortcuts: The one I keep forgetting about all of the time is WIN-BREAK to open the System Properties.

Completely new to me, and another timesaver keeping me from moving my hand too often: WIN-1/2/3/n executes the Quick Launch association at that position (counted from left to right).

What's your favorite "geek" keyboard shortcut that nobody knows about?

On a (somewhat) related sidenode: How did they manage to get Firefox shipped without having a shortcut to close all but the current tab? Opera has CTRL-ALT-SHIFT-W, which sounds worse than it is to type. To get that in Firefox also, I modified an extension - you can download it here.

On a (somewhat) related second sidenode: Switcher is a really nice replacement for the useless "Windows Flip 3D" introduced in Vista (WIN-TAB).

In January, I wrote how you can move both your program files and user data folders using Junctions. I have been doing this for years on my XP installations and didn't expect it to cause so much trouble.
In March, the first Windows Updates failed with error code 80070011. I have posted about how you can fix this on a per-failed-update basis manually.
With the release of SP1, this method didn't work any longer. There was no pending.xml, no matter how many updates failed on me. Reader Jiminaus suggested to update the ProgramFilesDir.

Today, my system drive crashed on me and I had to do a fresh install, so I went a different way: Leaving the program files folder alone, I only moved the Users folder - this time, not using junctions, but by updating the relevant registry entries, as suggested by various sources and computer magazines. Continue reading "Windows Vista: Moving Program Files and User Data, Revisited"

In January, I showed you how to move your program files and your profile folder to a different partition using robocopy and mklink. With NTFS junctions, you (and your programs) can transparently use the folders on your C drive, while the actual data lies someplace else.

Unfortunately, today, some Windows Updates where shipped that try to install on every reboot, but fail with error code 80070011. Using GoogleScroogle, I quickly found out why (and how to fix it manually).

Cause: If files cannot be replaced because they're open, updates write XML commands to \SystemRoot\WinSxS\pending.xml (usually C:\Windows\WinSxS\pending.xml, unless you've installed Windows to a different partition). This file will be processed on reboot. To replace files, updates create hard links at the destination, like this:


This will fail if "Program Files" is on a different partition, as files can only be hard linked within the same partition. I highly doubt that Microsoft will ever fix this, because moving program data to a different partition is not officially supported.

Workaround: If you don't want to move your program files back to C: (like me), there seems to be only one way to fix this: By copying the updated files the the same partition as the real program folders, and by changing all HardlinkFile references to this new location, it will work. alantangcs posted a nice step-by-step guide on how to edit pending.xml (you have to change ownership of the file first).

Because I don't expect this to be the last time an update tries to change Program Files, I wrote a little script that does most of the work: It will provide a copy of pending.xml with all necessary replacements and copy the files to a directory called "WUTemp" on the same partition as your real program files. If you don't supply the real location of your program files by command line, the script will ask for it.

A slightly easier workaround might be to replace the affected HardlinkFile commands by CopyFile (not sure if it exists) or MoveFile (exists, but I don't know how it reacts if the target already exists). That way, the files can stay in WinSxS. I haven't tried this, and be warned: If you mess with pending.xml and Vista doesn't boot, it won't even boot in Safe Mode. Try in a VM or keep some recovery disk handy. Continue reading "Vista: Windows Update Error 80070011 Semi-Automated Fix"