Metrix

Record Counter For Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0

2010-04-06T09:43:00.001+05:30

Andriy Butenko demonstrates a code sample to display number of Records in current view in CRM 4.0 using a Plugin on CRM Team Blog. Click here for the code and article.

Enforcing Leaf Node Selection in Select Subject Dialogue Box

2009-11-20T15:31:00.003+05:30

Alright... it's been a while, I was planning something major and had to stop blogging, anyways now I am back[Hopefully with a bang] and here is a first scriptlet on CRM.

Recently one of my colleague was facing an issue with Subject Lookup dialogue box. The requirement was to enable selection of only leaf-nodes i.e. any node with a child node should not be selected as a Subject. After little R&D I came up with the following

Edit : \CRMWeb\_controls\lookup\lookupsubject.aspx
In function applyChange
just below the following statement
if currentSubject != ""
{
put this script…
try{
if(document.getElementById(currentSubject.Id).parentNode.parentNode.attributes['isExpanded'])
{
alert('saaary.. saary meri vajah se hai..');
return;
}
}
catch(e)
{
alert('Error in sadu logic of leaf node selection.' + e.message);
}

I was in strange mood so I've put some garbage text in messages, basically first message box notifies end user when S/He tries to select a non-leaf node and the second message box says there was some error with the script.

Seriously, I love CRM and the endless possibilities of unsupported customizations. :) I hope you got the message ... to make it clear, this is unsupported customization and if you end up with a dead fish please DO NOT blame me.

CRM 4.0 Hide the date part of a DateTime field

2009-07-19T15:41:00.002+05:30

So this is pretty easy but rare to face scenario. If you check DateTime field's format options, it says Date Only and Date And Time. But what if I want to have Time Only? This is what some one asked recently, and I thought, let me give this one a try. Again, unsupported and all that blah blah blah goes here, just get over with it and get to the good part.

function HidDatePart(targetFieldName)
{
crmForm.all[targetFieldName]DataValue = new Date();
document.getElementById(targetFieldName).childNodes[0].childNodes[0].style.display = "none";
document.getElementById(targetFieldName).childNodes[0].childNodes[1].style.display = "none";
}

just pass the targetFieldName parameter and you are good to go.

Remember you can't remove the date field using DOM operation, as it will start giving you errors.. Also by default time field is disabled, to enable it, it is necessary to add some value in Date Field.

Let me know if you need more help with this.

Removing Activities after entity has been created in CRM 4.0

2009-07-19T15:26:00.003+05:30

Recently, I've started working on CRM bit seriously. Basically, my areas of interest includes .Net and DHTML and lot many other technologies. But CRM was never there in my list till last January. After taking a long break [Trust me anything beyond few hours away from computers, is LONG for me], in January, I realized, that I needed to give it a shot and since then the journey has been AWESOME!!! And here one of the problem I solved recently while helping out someone. If you have worked with CRM, you know how it makes your life really interesting some times. Like you can not disable the relationship between a custom made entity and notes/activities once you have created it. I am damn sure, it was some pressing dead line or/and regression testing would have shown some strange behavior on removal of the same so dev team might have decided to lock it permanently once it is created. And as usual sometimes you might wanna get rid of Activities from your custom relationship as a result of design change or maybe just for a challenge... in that case... here is a hack that might come handy. Only limitation is you will have to delete the entity and then recreate it after a few changes in the customization xml. So if you have any existing data, this is not what you should be doing[You should be looking for the guy or gal who designed your solution right?].

Standard ToCs applies and... yes.. you get me right... if something goes wrong I DO NOT Take any responsibility of any kind of damage that might occur due to this little hack.

Here is what I did to remove activities from my custom entity.
- Export the customization.
- Extract and open the customization xml.
- Open the xml file in Visual Studio or any other xml/text editor of your choice.
- Change
<HasRelatedActivities>True</HasRelatedActivities>
to
<HasRelatedActivities>False</HasRelatedActivities>
- Remove
<EntityMask>ActivityPointer</EntityMask>
- Remove ActivityPointerRegardingName from <DisplayMaskElement>
- Remove following <EntityRelationship> elements.
- _ActivityPointers
- _Appointments
- _Emails
- _Faxes
- _Letters
- _PhoneCalls
- _ServiceAppointments
- _Tasks

- Save the xml file.
- Import and publish the customization xml file.

Let me know how it goes, as I would love to hear whether it worked for you or not.

Adding a Custom Button to Advanced Find in CRM 4.0

2009-06-29T20:42:00.005+05:30

Have you ever observed how powerful Advanced Find dialogue can be in the right hands? Well apart from looking at the customized result set and providing total control to filter the data Advanced Find can be used for some really cool tricks. Recently, I had to face a situation where I needed to turn Advanced Find into some bit simpler find by removing some functionalist and by adding a simple button on the Grid Toolbar.

I managed it somehow in few hours and thought to share it with you, just in case you also fall in the same trap some day. So here it goes, just note that, modifying Advanced Find is NOT at all supported and I DO NOT take any responsibility what so ever if you follow the steps I've mentioned below and end up with any kind of damage[mental\physical\financial\social\...].

Here are steps to add a button to advanced find window
1. Go to CRM Installation directory and navigate to \CRMWeb\AdvancedFind\. Mostly you will have to go to C:\Program Files\Microsoft Dynamics CRM\CRMWeb\AdvancedFind.
2. Take a back up of AdvFind.aspx.
3. Open AdvFind.aspx in any text editor. [Visual Studio is recommended though].
4. locate the first </form> tag.
5. Copy-paste the following line : <input type="button" onclick="Alert('Hey!!!... I am in Advanced Find Window...')" value="Click Me!!!" />
6. Save and Close the file.
7. Go to CRM and click on Advanced Find... Dialogue. You will see a long ugly button on top. Click on it to see the message.
This is a simple approach I've followed. There can be tons of things you can do. You can skin it to look like the real CRM buttons and then replace the alert message with some really useful and complex logic.

Anyways, I took it little further and added the following script and removed the button from the previous step.

and I got this :

Also you might want to add a little delay in the execution of the script by using window.setTimeout method otherwise it will give error in case the grid is not loaded by the time script is called.

Hide Elements on OnLoad in CRM 4.0/CRM 3.0

2009-06-22T20:00:00.003+05:30

I know it is pretty simple to do but I see there are posts popping up here and there for the same. So here it is, a very simple script to hide form elements in CRM during page load. You can call the function from any where any time once you have put it on OnLoad event of the page.

document.HideElement = function(elementId) {
if (document.getElementById(elementId))
document.getElementById(elementId).style.display = 'none';
}

And here how you can use this function to hide various elements when CRM form loads

document.HideElement("_MBcrmFormSave"); // Hides Save button
document.HideElement("_MBcrmFormSaveAndClose"); // Hides Save And Close button

to hide an element say for example : AccountValue, following will be the code snippet

document.HideElement("skynet_AccountValue_c");
document.HideElement("skynet_AccountValue_d");
document.HideElement("skynet_AccountValue");

Will The Real GAC Folder Structure Please Show Up?

2009-06-17T11:23:00.003+05:30

This is taken from a blog here : http://weblogs.asp.net/jkey/archive/2003/02/25/3006.aspx

Just in case the above mentioned blogpost is gone, here is the command to 'mount' GAC as a drive.

subst x: "c:\windows\assembly\gac"

It solves the universal problem for the developers who wants to dissemble .net assemblies which are registered in GAC. Enjoy!!!

Disable Page Close Confirmation in CRM 4.0

2009-06-16T19:23:00.002+05:30

If you have worked with CRM, then you must have observed an annoying popup message whenever you try to close a form once you have made any changes to it. In certain cases, you might like to avoid showing that dialogue. In one of the recent engagements, I had to change some values on the form when it loads but then users started complaining that even if they don't change anything they are presented with the dialogue box asking to save the record. And then what I had to put a crmForm.Save(); statement after I've changed the values[That's lame I know...]. However, I stumbled upon on this unsupported and undocumented function that helps you get rid of that irritating popup. Use it wisely and you will be good to go :

crmForm.detachCloseAlert()

Scrolling Announcements on Home Page for CRM 4.0

2009-06-03T11:04:00.002+05:30

Lately, I've started looking into problems people face when dealing with CRM. Well it is a part of my job and provides me a great learning opportunity.

A day or two before I got this requirement : The end user wanted to scroll Announcements[CRM entity : newsarticle] on top of home page. I made a simple script which can be used. This one fetches all Announcements so you might want to set some filters like expiry date or active on date.

Here are the steps to scroll announcement on CRM Home page. Kindly note that I do not take any responsibility if something goes wrong with this approach.
1. Go to CRMWeb\_root\ and take backup of bar_top.aspx and keep it safe somewhere. In case things goes wrong, you will need it to restore things back.
2. Open bar_top.aspx in Visual Studio
3. Add the following code snippet at the end of the file.

<script type="text/javascript" language="javascript">
window.attachEvent('onload', ScrollAnnouncement);

function ScrollAnnouncement() {
var xml = "" +
"<?xml version=\"1.0\" encoding=\"utf-8\"?>" +
"<soap:Envelope xmlns:soap=\"http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/envelope/\" xmlns:xsi=\"http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance\" xmlns:xsd=\"http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema\">"
+ GenerateAuthenticationHeader()
+
" <soap:Body>" +
" <Execute xmlns=\"http://schemas.microsoft.com/crm/2007/WebServices\">" +
" <Request xsi:type=\"RetrieveMultipleRequest\" ReturnDynamicEntities=\"true\">" +
" <Query xmlns:q1=\"http://schemas.microsoft.com/crm/2006/Query\" xsi:type=\"q1:QueryExpression\">" +
" <q1:EntityName>businessunitnewsarticle</q1:EntityName>" +
" <q1:ColumnSet xsi:type=\"q1:ColumnSet\">" +
" <q1:Attributes>" +
" <q1:Attribute>articletitle</q1:Attribute>" +
" </q1:Attributes>" +
" </q1:ColumnSet>" +
" <q1:Distinct>false</q1:Distinct>" +
" </Query>" +
" </Request>" +
" </Execute>" +
" </soap:Body>" +
"</soap:Envelope>" +
"";

var xmlHttpRequest = new ActiveXObject("Msxml2.XMLHTTP");

xmlHttpRequest.Open("POST", "/mscrmservices/2007/CrmService.asmx", false);
xmlHttpRequest.setRequestHeader("SOAPAction", "http://schemas.microsoft.com/crm/2007/WebServices/Execute");
xmlHttpRequest.setRequestHeader("Content-Type", "text/xml; charset=utf-8");
xmlHttpRequest.setRequestHeader("Content-Length", xml.length);
xmlHttpRequest.send(xml);

var resultXml = xmlHttpRequest.responseXML;

var entityNode = resultXml.selectNodes("//BusinessEntities")[0];
var marqueeHTML = "<marquee class='ms-crm-MastHead-SignIn-User'>";
for (var i = 0; i < entityNode.childNodes.length; i++) {
if (i == 0) {
marqueeHTML += entityNode.childNodes[i].childNodes[0].childNodes[0].text
} else {
marqueeHTML += "    " + entityNode.childNodes[i].childNodes[0].childNodes[0].text;
}
}
marqueeHTML += "<marquee>";

var headerTD = document.getElementById("tdLogoMastHeadBar");
headerTD.innerHTML += marqueeHTML;
}
</script>

4. Check on home page.
You will see a scrolling marquee of the announcements title on CRM Header.

Hiding Menu Items from top menu bar in CRM 4.0

2009-06-01T13:40:00.009+05:30

Here is a little script which you can call to hide menu item from top menu.

Put this script on page load or on any other event where you would like it.

You might also wanna add it as document.HideMenuItem = new function(targetMenu, targetMenuItem) {//code goes here};

function HideMenuItem(targetMenu, targetMenuItem) {
var menuLIs = document.getElementById("mnuBar1").getElementsByTagName("LI");

for (var i = 0; i < menuLIs.length; i++) {
if (menuLIs[i].title && menuLIs[i].title.indexOf(targetMenu) > -1) {
var targetDivs = menuLIs[i].getElementsByTagName("DIV");
for (var j = 0; j < targetDivs.length; j++) {
var targetLIs = targetDivs[j].getElementsByTagName("LI");
for (var k = 0; k < targetLIs.length; k++) {
if (targetLIs[k].innerHTML.indexOf(targetMenuItem) > -1) {
targetLIs[k].style.display = "none";
return;
}
}
}
}
}
}

All you have to do is call it with two parameters first parameter is the text without space so if you have root menu named Sub Test, you should call it SubTest. And the second parameter is the whole text of the menu item you need to hide.

HideMenuItem("ISV.NEW", "Coming Soon...");
HideMenuItem("SubTest", "Test Sub 1");
HideMenuItem("ISV.NEW", "Web Only");

Let me know if you need any more info on the same.

PS: Thanks to Andrew, there was a bug in the previous version of script, which didn't work with all the menus but now it has been fixed.

Hiding Notes Section from Notes tab from CRM Form

2009-05-29T18:29:00.003+05:30

If you hit this post, then most probably you were looking to hide Notes Section/Notes Tab. However there is a CRM limitation of having only 8 tabs per form[It can be overridden though].

So sometimes you might want to use that notorious Notes tab but then you don't want users to see Notes field in there.

So here is a one line of code which takes care of it. Just copy paste it on the Form Load of your entity form and it should do the rest

document.getElementById("notescontrol_d").parentNode.parentNode.parentNode.parentNode.style.display
= "none";

Removing System Locked Section from CRM Form

2009-05-28T20:40:00.002+05:30

This is one interesting and as usual unsupported solution that will help you to remove a system locked section from CRM form. Kindly note that I do not take any responsibility if something goes wrong with this approach.

Please take backup of your customization before you try this. Here is a step by step guide to remove a system locked section.

1. Export Service Appointment entity.[Take a backup of the zip file you just exported].
2. Extract content of the zip file -> customization.xml.
3. Open the xml in your favourite xml editor. You can use Notepad or Visual Studio to keep it simple.
4. locate the following section "scheduling information"
<section name="scheduling information" showlabel="true" showbar="true" locklevel="1" id="<GUID>" IsUserDefined="0" layout="varwidth" columns="11">change locklevel 1 to 0.
5. Once you have done it, import the customization back to CRM.
6. Open the Form.
7. Move Start Time and End Time to a choice of your section. You can Duration and All Day Event as well.
8. Remove the section.
9. Preview and Test.

In case things do not work as expected, use the backup and restore the entity.

Dependent Picklist for CRM 4.0

2009-03-03T00:59:00.004+05:30

It's been a while since I posted anything on this blog and there are good reasons for that. Lately I've been quite busy with an integration project which involves a WCF Proxy and a lot of troubleshooting here and there. It's definitely fun but then I don't get time nor I've energy to do anything once I am home.

Anyways today I could steal some time 'cause of a request to share the code of Dynamic or chained Picklists in CRM 4.0 There is not much rocket science in here just easy to use scriptlets and pure DHTML fun.

I have uploaded it here : https://cid-b6a90e5b5092759c.skydrive.live.com/self.aspx/BlogStore/Chained%20Picklists.zip

The zip has the script file and a helper excel that will make it easier for you to create the Picklist arrays.

If you give it a try kindly let me know how it goes for you.

Microsoft will layoff upto 5000 employees worldwide

2009-01-22T22:06:00.003+05:30

And just came the shocking news... : Ballmer's e-mail to employees regarding layoffs.

Dirty Fox... heading the risky business apps list

2009-01-19T22:18:00.002+05:30

Ah... I thought I will give company to Mrinal.. and here it is.. a link to the article... check it out ... http://www.insidetech.com/news/articles/3605-firefox-heads-risky-business-app-list oh.. hi.. L(inux)users... where are yo?

VS2008SP1 on Win7

2009-01-19T10:02:00.004+05:30

As you all know.. Win7 is out.. and my god it is.. faster beyond my expectations.. and definitely.. faster than my XPSP3(Oh I was so proud... about it :(). And just yesterday, I installed VS2008 SP1 on it nad it works like a charm.. not a single glitch in compiling my existing code and on top of that it looks better than Vista. It has got soft UI elements and somehow.. I felt really comfortable working with them when compared to Vista. Check out the sample running a demo WPF application.

And no matter... what they are saying, it was piece of cake to install VS2008 it took less than 10 minutes and YES I don't want to talk about how long it took to install SP1(I was running some heavy processes in background.. eh.. :P)

Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 Service Pack 2

2009-01-18T14:43:00.004+05:30

Link:

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=5b2c0358-915b-4eb5-9b1d-10e506da9d0f&displaylang=en

Download Overview:

The .NET Framework 2.0 Service Pack 2 provides cumulative roll-up updates for customer reported issues found after the release of the .NET Framework 2.0. In addition, this release provides performance improvements, and prerequisite feature support for the .NET Framework 3.5 Service Pack 1.

Please review the supported operating systems for this deployment package in the System Requirements section. The corresponding updates for Windows Vista and Microsoft Windows 2008 are deployed via the full .NET Framework 3.5 service pack 1.

Just be careful, there is a follow up update patch - KB959209 needed, once you install .Net Framework 2.0 SP2.

CircuitCity short-circuited

2009-01-17T22:10:00.004+05:30

I just came to know about this... very very sad :(
http://www.circuitcity.com/closed.html

Opera... you too?

2008-12-24T13:23:00.002+05:30

Today is a bad day.. really really bad day.. I didn't expect this from Opera.. at least.. if Google does it.. it is in their nature... but Opera you too?

Microsoft has done the same thing in early 90s but they changed and they paid a lot of money for what they did earlier.

What happened is, I got an "There is a new version of Opera available for download." message, and as a die hard fan of Opera, I immediately click on Download and once it downloaded, I started installation. I love my existing settings and customizations in Opera, so I always upgrade rather than clean install. And as usual I was about to click on Next when I noticed a small, pre-checked check box at bottom of the installer. And my instincts told me.... HEY!!!! STOP!!!... and I looked at it.. the check box read ... Make Opera Default Browser..and I was like : Oh my lord.. did Microsoft(Old days) took over or what? or it is Google now? Well.. for those who didn't get it.. that check box will make Opera my default browser.. and yes.. I am no idiot who doesn't understand flexibility of IE.. most of the sites I look at looks the BEST on IE.. and most of the good sites works fine.. with IE.. no problem so far...while Opera.. is the best browser.. for the sites which normal users might not want to give a look.. for me it works.. but Opera as my default browser.. NO NO.. BIG NO!!!... anyways.. I survived the attack(This is a kindda browser replacement attack.. aahh I coined a new term... :P)

This was definitely a dirty move.. and well thought and.. yes.. I can tell it was no accident.. Opera did the same the Microsoft was used to do earlier. But that was a different time.. but now? NO NO!!!! Opera.. 5 cents down.. you guys are.. so next time you install Opera..just be careful.. they are not as good as they were used to be.. anymore..

Google.. does it again...

2008-12-24T13:11:00.003+05:30

I dunno what kind of idiot some one has to be to push an update to a product.. which just changes the version number... I wish I could be that idiot.. and then.. google would have hired me as a Product Manager(Phew.. thank god.. I am smart.. and I won't have to be that guy..)

According to this blog as well as few other trusted resources I just came to know, Google pushed a product update on iPhone that changes the version number... YA... just the version number.. that's it..

Killing a Process running on Remote Computer(The batch file way..)

2008-12-17T19:08:00.003+05:30

This morning when I came to office, I had a set of tasks which needed to be completed ASAP. My current engagement requires me to work on customer server via RDP. Now RDP has an interesting behavior, in certain cases if the server has a limited resources, it will simply refuse to allow RDP access. And unfortunately, it happened to me today. One of my colleague ran a time-consuming, resource-hungry custom code over the weekend so we can work smoothly during the weekdays, however the application could not complete its work during the weekend and was still running and consuming whatever resources were available and in turn caused a DoS (Denial Of Service). I thought to use VBScript/WMI to kill the remote process as I had the name of the process to be killed and have had used it in past effectively. I started working with the script but, I felt it will take too much time to figure out the script that will help me so I decided to search on my favorite search engine for easier and faster options. Within a few minutes I got the pointers to use tasklist.exe and taskkill.exe. I killed the process manually and easily got my access restored. However at end of the day, spending some time one this and making a batch file will come handy as we run into this situation more often. So I spent few minutes in notepad and here is the batch file that I got. This batch file is not polished but should get the job done in time of needs. And as usual I don't take any responsibility of any kind if you use this script and get into some trouble. So use it at your own risk...

@ECHO OFF
@ECHO WARNING : This script will forcefully kill the process and will not ask for confirmation before killing the process.

SET MESSAGE=
SET SYSTEMNAME=
SET USERNAME=
SET PASSWORD=
SET PID=

SET /P MESSAGE=Press any key to continue...

SET /P SYSTEMNAME=Enter target computer name or IP :
SET /P USERNAME=Enter User Name (domain\username) :
SET /P PASSWORD=Enter Password :

@ECHO Please wait while we get the list of processes...

TASKLIST.EXE /S %SYSTEMNAME% /U %USERNAME% /P %PASSWORD%

SET /P PID=Enter PID(Process ID) of the process you want to kill :

TASKKILL.EXE /F /S %SYSTEMNAME% /U %USERNAME% /P %PASSWORD% /PID %PID%

SET /P MESSAGE=Press any key to continue...

Generic Serializer-Deserializer

2008-12-17T18:59:00.002+05:30

Around one and half year back, I was handling an interesting situation. There were few different systems sending in XML messages, and my component had to accept the message, interpret it and take appropriate actions.

It was easy till I came to know about XML message and its elements and alternate messages. The possibilities were unlimited, and it sounded stupid to hand code/hard code XML elements. Rather than that the solution was designed so that we converted XML -> XSD -> CS. After few changes made here and there to fine tune the CS files with XML, we faced another challenge, we had to serialize/deserialize incoming/outgoing messages. After few minutes of R&D I could pull out this. I've listed the method signature and minor code implementation. It is so simple that you can easily get it working in few minutes.

public static string Serialize<T>(
T data
)
{

//Create the Serializer

XmlSerializer xmlSerializer = new XmlSerializer(typeof(T));
//Use the serializer we have just created and serialize the object.
}

the same goes with the Deserializer

public static T Deserialize<T>(
string serializedData
)
{

//check whether the incoming data is not a null string
if (string.IsNullOrEmpty(serializedData))
return default(T); //This can be controversial, so handle with care and as per your requirements, in certain cases you can return null as well, kindly let me know if you have anything that can improvise this code

//create a serializer
XmlSerializer xmlSerializer = new XmlSerializer(typeof(T));

//Use the deserializer we have just created and deserialize the object.
}

I must thank my friend Sidhartha http://IamJunk.spaces.live.com, as he helped me a lot to enhance the code. I've not published the whole code, in case you need it, drop me an email/comment. I will be more than happy to help you out.

All In One Entity for CRM 4.0

2008-12-17T18:38:00.004+05:30

Sometimes back I was doing a research on a script(It is coming soon.. just wait and watch...) and that script required me to try all the CRM datatypes one by one on the form. And trust me, it was a pretty boring job to create the element on a CRM form and then check compatibility of that script with it. Anyway, I thought I can help out my friends out there just in case they face the similar situation. So here is a SkyDrive link :

https://cid-b6a90e5b5092759c.skydrive.live.com/self.aspx/BlogStore/AllInOneEntity.zip
If you find that I've missed out something, kindly drop me a note. Thanks in advance.

Google Launches Themes for Gmail

2008-11-21T11:10:00.004+05:30

Well.. Google's flagship beta(err... hmm.. ya.. for a while..or forever?) product has just got another feature(well.. you can add 31 features a month and remove 17 of them if you are in beta.. ain't it?). It is themes...(Oh and I was thinking they will get me free land line/cell calling from Gmail browser interface :D). Anyways.. I tried.. one and it looks good.. :D.. check out the screenshot below..

Download Yahoo! messenger 9 setup from Yahoo!

2008-11-19T13:33:00.003+05:30

I wanted to install Y!'s new messenger.. version 9... (oh it is beautiful I must say.. check out the screenshot..) on one of the Virtual PC... and I didn't want to connect to Internet for the sake of installing Y!.. so .. after looking here and there.. somewhere... I found that Y! keeps its installation images under http://download.yimg.com/ycs/msg/dl/msgr9/, This path doesn't have directory browsing enabled so you will not find anything there... however if you want to do an offline installation .. all you have to do is.. to click here

You have seen Notepad... XmlPad.. and now... LINQpad..

2008-11-18T14:24:00.002+05:30

This one has been resting in my To-Blog list for a long time. It was not that I didn't want to but since last 40 days for some reasons I was away from work and I could not post this one. We all know how important role LINQ has been playing for .Net developers who deal with SQL as well as other Data Query Interfaces. LINQ is not one stop shop for all(as of now) but it has its advantages. Anyways, this post is not to sing fan-song about LINQ but to make you guys aware of a very handy tool that can help you to be the big boss when it comes to LINQ Development.

LINQpad is a little software and more importantly free one(No.. its not open source you freetard..). It supports LINQ to SQL, LINQ to Objects and LINQ to XML. And yes it also works as a code snippet IDE. It can execute any C# 3.0 or VB9 expression or statement block. One more feature for lazy people out there is LINQpad doesn't need to be installed.. it is "Portable' by design..so what are you waiting for go.. ahead... and download it from here.

Voice or Video Chat? Sign in to Gmail

2008-11-12T15:28:00.003+05:30

Gmail's official blog has this announcement shouting it loud that Gmail now has Voice and Video chat(http://gmailblog.blogspot.com/2008/11/say-hello-to-gmail-voice-and-video-chat.html).

They are providing Voice and Video chat from within Gmail. I was thinking they would have made a breakthrough Flash Web Application as Flash natively supports webcam and audio/video streaming. However Google has done something odd(at least.. it looks odd to me.. seems the innovation drive is slowing down here). Last year Google acquired a Sweden based company : Marratech. Marratech was an e-meeting startup and now Google has come up with the plugin that seems the direct result of take over(source : http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/11/11/google-adds-voice-and-video-chat-to-gmail/).

So instead of a flash application, this one is a .Net Clickonce application(PLEASE CORRECT ME, IF I AM WRONG). I detest running any application on my laptop/desktop that comes from Google so I didn't allow it to run. But when it was being downloaded, the dialogbox was the famous.. clickonce installer dialogbox. anyways..sooner or later some one from my circle will install it and I will come to know what it is all about.

Google has been pretty quick when it comes to rolling out features to its userbase lately, as a result you can see the voice and video option in menu in the screenshot below.

Also as amazing as it sounds and looks, I am not sure how well it will do in India sub-continent. Though bandwidth is comparatively better than previous years and we have decent processing power as well RAM to handle the overhead, I wonder will it be sufficient for this kind of usage or not?... only time will tell.. till then... bbbyye...

Don't be shocked if you see something like this instead of this blog

2008-11-12T09:34:00.004+05:30

I've been getting messages from friends that they are not able to access my blog. Instead of my blog they are getting some biblecollegeonline shit. I am trying to figure it out what is wrong but as of now I am helpless. It looks like DNS Cache Poisoning or something else.. I apologize for any inconvenience caused and all I can ask is to bear with it while blogger staff is working on it.

Windows 7 for Developers

2008-11-11T11:32:00.002+05:30

This guide describes features and includes vivid screenshots from the pre-Beta version released at PDC. Build applications on a solid foundation, enable richer application experiences, and integrate the best of Windows and Web services.

Recorded sessions of PDC 2008 available for download

2008-11-11T11:24:00.002+05:30

I know how important it is to be at a PDC.. however...it is expensive... and not everybody here can attend. No worries..though.. all the recorded sessions and PPTXs are here. Download high quality videos to see what they mean by PDC...

Microsoft Virtual TechDays is back!

2008-11-11T03:05:00.003+05:30

Microsoft Virtual TechDays provides an opportunity to the IT Pro community to dive deep into the latest offerings from Microsoft - SQL Server 2008, Microsoft System Center, Windows Vista, Internet Explorer 8, Essential Business Server, Visio & Microsoft Office communication server. During the 2-day event, Microsoft Experts will conduct 17 LIVE training sessions on how to harness the power and possibilities of these products.

You will be asked for your live id and also once you are logged in you can download recorded sessions and presentations... go ahead... Enjoy!!!

Visual Studio 2010 and .Net Framework 4.0

2008-11-09T22:31:00.001+05:30

One of my friend has been constantly bugging me about Visual Studio 2010.. all I've to say to him till date ..was.. dude.. I don't know when they are gonna release it.. but anyways.. few days back I ran into this newsletter... which clearly mentioned that a CTP of VS2010 is available on Microsoft Downloads.

So... here it goes...

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=922B4655-93D0-4476-BDA4-94CF5F8D4814&displaylang=en

Just check it out.. I am damn sure.. most of you will not dare to download it.. but.. hey.. this is meant for developers who love to stay ahead in the game..so... where do you stand?

Microsoft Announces DreamSpark India

2008-11-04T12:32:00.002+05:30

Here comes a really GREAT NEWS for Indian Students... I mean.. those Indian Students who loves Microsoft Technologies. Do you remember earlier this year, there was a post on Skynet about Microsoft's new initiative called Microsoft DreamSpark? It was limited to some 11 countries initially, and I was wondering when Indian students will get the benefits and now the wait is over, Microsoft launched DreamSparkIndia.com.

As described by Microsoft, Microsoft DreamSpark™ is a program that provides no-cost access to Microsoft designer and development tools for verified students around the world, to support and advance their learning and skills through technical design, technology, math, science and engineering activities. This program equips tomorrow's developers with the professional tools to inspire and create today.

I suggest to go through the site once, and if you read this on or before 5th November, 2008 02.00 PM IST then you might like to watch the live broadcast of Bill Gates speech from New Delhi, India. Click Here to register.

There is a lot more to DreamSpark but we will check it out ... laterz... till then.. bbye...

Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 SDK Update - v4.0.6 is out

2008-09-08T16:44:00.001+05:30

The new version of SDK is out. You can get it from here : http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=82e632a7-faf9-41e0-8ec1-a2662aae9dfb&displaylang=en.

Only difference in the description of this kit is, it doesn't mention that Report Writers Guide will be released with next update so you can hope that this one already includes one.

Embed Image in CRM 4.0 templates

2008-09-05T20:17:00.001+05:30

In my current engagement, there was a requirement to embed images in email template. Now, as it is very well known that you can easily achieve it by copy pasting the HTML to CRM's Rich Text Editor. Most of the times it works fine. But then if it goes normal all the times I won't have to blog about it right? so.. here it goes..

In our case, we had a sample word document which had an image on top and some formatted text. As soon as this came to me, I fired up CRM's web UI and created a blank template. I created an HTML file out of word document. After opening the html file and copying/pasting, it worked fine and template got saved without any issue. Once the template was in place, I tried to apply it to an email activity. It worked fine, I could see the formatted text, the image on top and the layout was also preserved. Happily I clicked on Save button and.... whoooooshhh... it was gone.. the image was gone, everything else was there, but the image was gone. So there I was, the only thing I needed to close today to have a nice weekend was this email template fix. Also one of my colleague was working on this and he did a lot of research eliminating many other possibilities why it won't work. After few more minutes, I made a blank html page, added a nice Windows Live Logo and repeated the copy/paste on the same email template. Once it was done, I applied to the same email and voila.. it worked. So it was pretty clear that it was all due to the HTML that we were using for the template.

I always keep IE Dev Toolbar available, so I fired it up, and clicked on Validate -> HTML. The online HTML validator showed me there were some minor issues with the HTML. I corrected them and removed word HTML tags in which my IMG tag was wrapped. After this I followed the process copy/paste and test and .. there it was a .. working email template with an image.

Also it was very clear that we will have to find out a structured process to do it as there will be more templates coming soon. I might come up with an automation process, if you are interested keep watching this blog or drop me an email, if you need it urgently.

Update : This trick also works with KB Article. Just copy and paste from any Web Page to get images in your KB Article. However, it doesn't work with notes. Notes doesn't have Rich Text capabilities.

CRM 3.0 - Hiding the Delete Button Hack

2008-08-30T18:04:00.001+05:30

My day to day job revolves around supported solutions on CRM 4.0 and Microsoft .Net however as we all know customers some times are demanding and asks for features which doesn't come under umbrella of supportability. And as a solution provider we have to meet it by hook or crook.

In this case, I came across a mail on one of our WW Community. The problem statement was pretty clear : The customer wanted to hide delete button that appears on the CRM GridView for each and every entity(maybe selected entities too). Now they wanted the users to have rights to delete CRM records so we can't just take away their rights(Yeah.. that's the first thing that came to my mind...). But they wanted to do it via some custom applications not from the CRM Web UI. After doing some R&D I found that it can be achieved via the steps mentioned in next paragraph. I would like to declare that this code/method is NOT AT ALL supported by CRM Product group. This is just to demo that certain feature can be disabled in CRM without affecting roles.

1. Locate and back up loader.aspx from CRMWeb folder.
2. Open loader.aspx in Visual Studio or any text editor of your choice.
3. At the closure of the first script tag, copy-paste the following code

<script language="JavaScript" type="text/javascript">
function HideDeleteButton()
{
//Check whether the iframe is completely loaded or not
if(document.getElementById("stage").readyState == "complete")
{
try
{
//Those menu items are part of mnuBar1 span, so we will get the reference of mnuBar1 first
//and then all the SPAN elements(represents individual menu items)
var spanElements = document.frames[2].document.getElementById("mnuBar1").getElementsByTagName("SPAN");

//iterate through the menu items and check whether the title is Delete or not
//if yes, this is the one we are looking for, set its display to none and break the loop
for(var i = 0; i <= spanElements.length; i++)
{
try
{
if(spanElements[i].title == "Delete")
{
spanElements[i].style.display = "none";
break;
}
}
catch(e){continue;}//continue in case of error
}
}
catch(e){}//ignore any other error
}
}
</script>

4. There are frameset definitions at the end of the page, change
<frame name="stage" scrolling="yes" src="<%HttpUtility.HtmlAttributeEncode(homePageUrl, Response.Output);%>"></frame>
to
<frame name="stage" scrolling="yes" src="<%HttpUtility.HtmlAttributeEncode(homePageUrl, Response.Output);%>" onreadystatechange="HideDeleteButton()"></frame>
5. Test by opening up the workplace.

This script might have other side effects which I've not fully explored yet so use it at your own risk.

Microsoft Releases Photosynth

2008-08-22T16:04:00.001+05:30

I just got this mail from one of my colleague mentioning Microsoft Photosynth has just got released http://photosynth.net/default.aspx..

About Photosynth

Imagine being able to share the places and things you love using the cinematic quality of a movie, the control of a video game, and the mind-blowing detail of the real world. With nothing more than a bunch of photos, Photosynth creates an amazing new experience.

I found it ... really... sexy.. have a look... and dont ask me about the requirements.

Developer Ramp up Kit for Dynamics CRM 4.0

2008-07-07T16:06:00.000+05:30

I just got this news about a Dev Ramp up kit on Dynamics CRM 4.0. As a .Net Developer, I know that it can be sometimes, tough to work with CRM. I am sure this will help a lot of Developers around the globe to start looking at CRM 4.0 development from different perspective.

You can access the Kit online on MSDN at : http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc720132.aspx

Summary of the Kit according to MSDN :
This kit is for .NET based developers who want to ramp up and build on the Microsoft Dynamics CRM platform. Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 uses familiar components such as Web Service endpoints, Windows Workflow Foundation, SSRS reporting, and more; making it a general purpose platform for any line-of-business applications. Developers can use their existing .NET skills to take advantage of various features of the Microsoft Dynamics CRM platform. This kit drills into the details of such development and explains how developers can connect, extend, and embed with the Microsoft Dynamics CRM platform. It includes presentations, hands-on labs, and a VPC environment for practicing. This content was delivered earlier as part of the Metro Early Adopter initiative and the video recordings of the ramp-up presentations are included as well.

Familiarity with the .NET Framework, Microsoft Visual C#, Jscript, Microsoft SQL Server and general Web development is recommended.

You can find more info about the kit at :
http://blogs.msdn.com/girishr/archive/2008/07/06/developer-ramp-up-kit-for-dynamics-crm-4-0.aspx

I am back...

2008-07-02T20:39:00.000+05:30

I know, as of now my blog has a very small user base, very few people has visited this blog so far. And mostly are my friends.. hopefully.. guys n gals who will keep visiting me no matter how rubbish my post goes.. anyways... I was in somewhat tight corner and almost stopped blogging as well as stopped actively contributing to my group at : http://groups.google.com/group/skynet

Anyways, coming to the point, I believe my current deliverables plus personal life is in a lot more stable position than before and I can start blogging again.. so here it goes.. and trust me.. I am not gonna hold back...[That message was for freetards... My Windows-Based Friends not need to worry about it.. as long as IE 8 works fine..]

Also in the last one month, I did work on the following..

- Installed Windows Server 2008 and I must say.. it is so damn easy..my 12 year old cousin could do it..

- Cleared my two MCTS 2005 exams[namely Windows and Web Based client development]

- Explored Office Communication Server's Status Message mechanism

- Worked a lot and a lot with CRM 4.0, CrmService and Metadata Service

- Tried to take a shot at exam 30-631: Customization and Configuration for Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 and failed miserably...curse you...non calibrated exams..and curse me to .. not to prepare very well...

- And a lot.. as it comes to mind.. I will update this post...

Google Launches Google Mail Labs

2008-06-07T01:29:00.001+05:30

Sometimes I wonder, how Interesting things these guys keep doing[as they are not looking at real world business problems sometimes :P and also forgets to close the security loopholes, they must get plenty of free time]. Anyways, coming to the point I just saw this birght red link appearing in the top-left nav bar as shown

Here you can read more about this new feature[eh eh... ]. Basically it adds a new tab in your Gmail Settings page that let's you choose various features that Gmail Team memeber have deveoped[I believe some of them are done using 20% free time they get per week]. I found some of them pretty neat while some of them, are.. well let's say .. not that pretty-neat. But overall it is a nice idea to have your user base to do the beta-testing of upcoming features. Here is a screenshot of the few of the features.

CRM SDK 4.0.4 is out...

2008-05-15T12:01:00.001+05:30

If you are in CRM 4.0 Development, a must get for you is CRM SDK. You can get the latest version from here : http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=82E632A7-FAF9-41E0-8EC1-A2662AAE9DFB&displaylang=en.

Overview

The Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 Software Development Kit (SDK) is for developers, system customizers, and report writers.
It contains all new information about creating plug-ins, working with custom workflow activities, using the new Web services, using new data management features, and much more.

This SDK contains information for developers writing server side code, custom business logic, integration modules, workflow assemblies, and more. It provides an architectural overview of Microsoft Dynamics CRM, the entity model, security model, and Web services. Sample code and walkthroughs guide you through the new features.

The SDK also contains information for developers customizing the Web client or Microsoft Dynamics CRM for Microsoft Office Outlook, including scripting, integration of custom Web pages, sample code, and a detailed user interface style guide.

Look for regular updates to this SDK. Future releases will include the ISV Guide and Report Writers Guide.

[31-05-2008]

PS : An update has been released(4.0.5). You can download it from here : http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=82E632A7-FAF9-41E0-8EC1-A2662AAE9DFB&displaylang=en

ASP.Net Interview Question Links - Part I

2008-05-12T08:42:00.000+05:30

As promised earlier, here are some of the interview questions I was used to refer during my early stages when I started hunting for another job i.e. after around 2+ years with ESS. I am not saying these will get you the job for sure but if you have prepared these and related questions you will be atleast make much more sense when you answer any given ASP.Net Interview.

So here it goes[Links are not in specific order] :

- My Personal favourite : http://blogs.crsw.com/mark/articles/254.aspx

- One more : http://www.hanselman.com/blog/ASPNETInterviewQuestions.aspx

- The one that helped winning a specific interview : http://www.techinterviews.com/?p=193\

- http://www.thinkinterview.com/Interview-Questions/c2_ASP.NET-Interview-Questions.aspx

- Something new I recently came across : http://www.geekinterview.com/Interview-Questions/Microsoft/ASP-NET

- from AllInterview.com : http://www.allinterview.com/Interview-Questions/ASP.NET.html

Points to remember

- cross-check answers with your friends, colleagues and other sources

- Do not forget to refer to the comments other readers might have made, these comments sometimes leads you to the right answer or more set of questions and maybe better interview material

- do not rely answers as they are given

- just make sure that you have got the question right, and come up with an answer in your own language, so when you answer you will sound genuine. Not like the copy cat[Aren't you?]

Discussion on this blog-post is welcome at http://groups.google.com/group/skynet. If you have any specific request you can use comments feature provided.

Happy Job Hunting... :)

Installing Microsoft Windows XP SP3 Made Easy

2008-05-08T02:59:00.001+05:30

I will go step-by-step and will assume you have a clean/Legal XP SP2 Installed. I am very proud as my current installation has not failed in last 1.5+ years. It is not only that XP SP2 is really good in its own ways, there are tricks I've learnt over the years that helps me to keep my OS safe otherwise, my old friends, knows, every 6 months I had to re-install OS no matter which one is taken for example.[Soon you will find a post on that..OS I've installed and my experience with them].
So here it starts, Installing Microsoft Windows XP SP3 Made Easy for everyone... not just for noobs.. :)

Get the stand alone installer to keep the whole game simple. I know it is easy for some people to get SP3 via windows update, I think, from an average Indian's Internet access view point, we better get the stand alone installer.
Google as well as DUMB search engine on Microsoft Download[When I got it, it was ranked 20405 in popularity :P] will not get you this one easily, so here is the direct link.
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=5b33b5a8-5e76-401f-be08-1e1555d4f3d4&DisplayLang=en

Also maybe in future you can just use the file name or other details mentioned here from the download page.
File Name: WindowsXP-KB936929-SP3-x86-ENU.exe
Version: 1 1
Knowledge Base (KB) Articles: KB936929
Date Published: 5/6/2008
Language: English
Download Size: 316.4 MB
While the file is being downloaded, I suggest you start taking backup of your files, in unfortunate event of update failure, you might just love me that I suggested you to take this step.
Once the file is downloaded, I would suggest it to move it to your fastest disk drive - it can be the SATA drive you have or the portable HDD or anything that has more than 2 GB of free space to keep things fast[My installation started at 01.28 AM and ended at 01.45 AM with 512MB RAM on T2050 @ 1.60GHz]
Close all unnecessary programs and services[stopping services can be a serious problem so as of now if you are not a PRO I would suggest to leave them intact].
Remove all the removable drives, not the one on which you have the SP3 ofcourse. I would suggest to use a clean HDD and system i.e. Anti-Virus and Anti-Spyware check should have been performed. Also remove any bootable disks from optical drives.
Disable the all the Network Adapters and switch off the WLAN if it is on. This is not a mandatory step and it is upto you to follow it or not. However DO NOT forget that you might drop all the protection you have in place in the very next step and you will be vulnerable to any kind of attack... any time.
Shut down your Anti-Virus, Anti-Spyware and Firewall. Yes, I am not drunk this is to not to hinder with SP installation and to improve performance.
If you are using a laptop, please make sure you are plugged in and also have enough backup power in case of power loss. The same goes for PC, a decent UPS will do the trick for the PC users though.
Launch WindowsXP-KB936929-SP3-x86-ENU.exe, if you have downloaded the file from Internet, Windows XP, as a protection measure, might ask you 2-3 times to confirm whether you want to run this file or not. Click on yes without any fear, if something is gonna go wrong..anyways.. it will go wrong.. neither me..nor you can do anything about it.. ) so chill...
It will start extracting the files, most probably to the best drive/volume[In terms of performance].
Once the extraction is complete, follow the On-Screen instructions to start the SP Installation.
It is a pretty simple thing to do though, internally it takes backup of the files to the location which you mentioned at the startup and then updates the system files followed by a system reboot.
Yes, you must reboot the system once you have applied the update.
Start your Anti-Virus, Anti-Spyware and Firewall and then re-attach the removable media as well as enable the network adapters.
And hoorrrray....we are done...
If you face any problem during the setup...you know where you have to look forward to right? aahh..common... not to http://metrix.blogspot.com ... go to Microsoft Support..huh..

Its time guyz : Getting ready for Interviews

2008-05-08T01:15:00.001+05:30

May... it has all begun, by mid June you will start getting the idea what is next for you, as students will get the results for their final year and already employed people might start looking at other opportunities outside of their current organizations. so isn't it the right time to start something on Interviews and how to crack them?

I am in process to publish Interview material, Important links, Resume formats and more here as well as in my group [http://groups.google.co.in/group/skynet].

I must thank some of Ex-ESS team members as they have helped me a lot to prepare me for interviews. BTW, many times I get carried away for my previous organization[ESS], 'cause there we had an awesome work culture. Something difficult to find in India, and super difficult to find in Gujarat. As a Gujju, I do understand, by nature, Gujjus are many times money-minded, so much that they want their employees to do 'All Work' and they really don't understand the old sayin' "All Work and No Play makes Jack a Dull Boy". Anywayz, coming to the point, such a freedom and brotherhood we enjoyed, that almost every team member helped each other to crack interview.

And many times, ESS team members were used to go for interviews just for fun. And for a good time we never lost any of the team member. There were two sound reasons for it though, 1.Work Environment, 2. Competitive Pay. I will for sure post on ESS in future, but as of now let me stop here.

I am gonna start posting stuff on here as well as in my group, however I would request you guys n gals to actively provide feedback and improve the material I post here including resume formats, general interview questions, company specific interview questions, HR Cracking style, Personality development stuff, Soft Skills development guide, Practical Sessions and more.

Expecting a lot of input from your side...here I stop...:)

Bad Bad Bad News...Microsoft withdraws its hostile bid

2008-05-04T23:37:00.000+05:30

As a shocking news, I got to read this article, Ballmer's e-mail to staff on Yahoo, I was so damn happy when the announcement was made about the hostile bid, I was jumpin... dancin.. rollin.. on floor.. and then.. suddenly...thud.. something hit my face..and that's the e-mail that says... to Y!.. from Steve Ballmer... withdrawing the bid. I feel bad..really bad..the whole world is drowning and I don't see any rescue boat around..aah.. it is so sad...and..yet another thunk..comes and.. I think..hey.. it isn't that bad. It seems good infact. Though I really would have embraced the idea of Microhoo with love and all the warm feelings, however here is another side which other experts have identified about the deal.

In this takeover, one thing I was really afraid of was.. cultural clash, and trust me guys n gals, I've seen what happens when you do this kindda fusion, apart from other issues you have to manage people and their perception. Also many people will feel insecure and might just quit and many of brand loyals will also walk out, uprooting one of the major agenda Microsoft has to get hold of engineering talents of Y!. Also I was wondering, the money involved is so much, Microsoft can take down so many other small and profitable companies[When Wallstreet opens on Monday... what will happen to Y!'s stock? I am worried ..my friends..]. Anywayz, things are different now, for Y! it is must to survive and do something to turn around the scenario they are going through. 'cause if they can't do it, I can see, sooner or later. Microsoft or someone else, will feast on Y! and we all will say... RIP..Amen..:D

Important Tips against phishing attacks from Official Google Blog

2008-05-01T10:19:00.000+05:30

A nice read on Official Google blog about how to keep yourself safe from Phishing Attacks.

http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/04/how-to-avoid-getting-hooked.html

Bang Bang.. on Google..

2008-04-30T04:11:00.000+05:30

Hey ..all.. it's been a while since I've banged Google.. n that's not fair..right guys? so here it is in a short n sweet style.... the overview..

- Orkut, the No. 1 Social Networking site in India, has gone crazy with Google's OpenSocial [yey.. I love Orkut and you can find me over here]. I was thinking.... now what shall I call Orkut.... FaceKut? Or Orbook? :D

- Gmail's crazy AJAX patches are now over the edge, I dunno which one makes my IE 7 frown upon, but lately... I am getting lots of Operation Aborted errors.

For a change, Google has started acting on some bugs, not like old days when it took them years to fix the simple things like this, the one I mentioned here[Gmail-Gtalk April Fool?] is fixed but I dunno whether this is causing the Operation Aborted errors or not?

Yet Another Gmail Bug surfaces

2008-04-21T10:11:00.000+05:30

It seems Google is facing tough time making its email service truly world class. While it is being marketed and bundled with Google Apps, for biggies, Gmail still is a big question as a reliable product. It some times just don't know how to get along with the right things. anyways this time it was some crazy thing with their spam filter[Did you notice, lately few emails are landing to your inbox] which started rejecting some legitimate PayPal service emails resulting in Denial Of Service for customers. It stopped users from getting confirmation emails, setup new A/Cs or reset password on PayPal.

According to officials, the problem affected a very limited number of users, poor those guys on whose servers the patches got deployed for initial testing I suppose. Anyways the issue was closed immediately and customers are happy again now...but for how long? till the next patch comes...right? :D

[Source : http://www.news.com/8301-10784_3-9923338-7.html]

Blogger's made a poo poo..

2008-04-17T12:21:00.000+05:30

Recently, a funny.. ..kindda..video found on YouTube by bloggers and they started doing it..front n back and every other angle they could manage on Microsoft and how uber-shit this video is and how dumb the maker of the videos are and all sort of blog-dung you can imagine. Check out the video here.

and as it turns out to be as, the video was an internal spoof made by Microsoft and somehow it managed to reach the web and this holy-crap disaster for Gizmodo[Internal Microsoft Vista Video is as Painful as Videos Get], Engadget [Microsoft burns our eyes with Vista promo video], CrunchGear [Don't shoot the messenger: Microsoft internal promo video about Windows Vista is hard to watch.] Personally I have been using and endorsing Engadget since a long time... and now I feel like a jack-*** yeah yeah.. I know..but you know..what makes me laugh? How dumb these guys are who believed that this Video can be a promo Video for Vista? As we all know, Microsoft is one of the best player when it comes to market the stuff[Freetards needs to learn a lot but lately I've seen a creative momvement in that arena too], anybody remember the sexy...Office XP advert of old times? :D

Source : http://www.news.com/8301-10787_3-9920713-60.html

Google is ready to penetrate deep...The Web..dude..The Web..

2008-04-17T11:44:00.000+05:30

According to this blog post at Official Google Webmaster central, Google has been exploring the idea to bypass HTML forms and it seems they have done significant progress on the front... so now Google will be able to...search beyond the forms i.e. if a form is looking for some simple answers Google will be able to bypass it and go to the next page, by evaluating the form and filling in random data. I wonder though...how they will bypass CAPTCHA? The blog post has mentioned a lot many sweet things about how they respect robots.txt[A standard file, which is configured by webadmin to tell web crawlers like googlebot, to direct what to search and what not to search on their site]. And somehow.. that tells me... is it just limited to text or they do crawl it and then sell it to the highest bidder? :P..Think..man..Think..

Did gmail made you pull your hair on 16th April?

2008-04-17T11:32:00.000+05:30

Lately.. Gmail has been making news around the globe, let it be the news in middle east due to some caching issue, one guy saw 30+ other people's mailbox, or the scripting attacks but this time they have some thing new.. Gmail's IMAP services faced some technical glitches and lot of customers[ofcourse Google Apps, don't worry..none of the enterprise class customers:D]

one of the angry customer said,
"A huge, if not number one selling point for moving one of our companies over to Google Apps was Google's robust network!" complained one user. "Now that we have migrated over, it seems we are abused children who do not deserve an explanation for why the service we pay for is taken offline. Perhaps it is time to find a new e-mail host."

Now this might stop jumping monkey of SalesForce.com?.. hopefully.. as they are the latest clowns in the google apps bandwagon.

Find the whole story : http://www.news.com/8301-10784_3-9920715-7.htm

Like Gmail? Join the team then...

2008-04-17T11:29:00.000+05:30

Yes interesting..isn't it.. a product that has been the part of your life since a long time and here is the golden opportunity to join the team.

http://mail.google.com/mail/help/join_the_team.html

More info at : http://gmailblog.blogspot.com/2008/04/were-hiring.html

After MacBook Air, Vista Gets Hacked

2008-04-12T04:50:00.000+05:30

Few days back in my post I mentioned that MacBook Air was the first one, of the three competing notebooks at CanSecWest security conference in Vancouver, now the bad news has come... :D not so bad though.. I had this feeling that this is what is gonna happen... poor Vista put its defense down when using some clever JavaScript was applied on a page having a Flash movie. Anywayz, I hope that soon the patches will come out and yes, if you are interested in more you know where to go...right...? here.. ofcourse..

Orkut enhances the Search with Auto Complete

2008-04-12T04:31:00.000+05:30

I don't know how many of Orkut users use the nice Search that they provide on top right corner. I use it a lot, to find old friends, sometime a community and sometimes just to see how good it is.. :D today, I saw something nice has happened to the good ol' search. When I started typing, it came to life[common..its just a code..] and started suggesting me possible results of the Search. It was smart enough to look in to my friends list first and get me their details, and show in a nice overlay[check the pic below]. I really liked the concept, very simple but effective. Anywayz, that's all as of now. And yeah, if you wanna read more about it, here is the official blog entry, check it out : http://en.blog.orkut.com/2008/03/continued-search-for-better-search-in.html

Microsoft Discloses 14,000 Pages of Coding Secrets

2008-04-10T15:35:00.000+05:30

Surprisingly(Not so much though after EU's stand against M$), Microsoft has disclosed 14K pages of documentation that describes underlying protocols for Office 2007, MOSS 2007 and Exchange Server 2007. According to news, this is just a first phase of 3 phased plan. Microsoft will gather feedback from the developer community till June, and then the final version of the documentation will be published.

For detailed news check out this link : http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/04/08/microsoft_posts_protocol_documents/

Google Announces Google App Engine

2008-04-10T01:16:00.000+05:30

On the FAQ Page they have answered the question, What is Google App Engine?

Google App Engine lets you run your web applications on Google's infrastructure. App Engine applications are easy to build, easy to maintain, and easy to scale as your traffic and data storage needs grow. With App Engine, there are no servers to maintain: You just upload your application, and it's ready to serve your users.
You can serve your app using a free domain name on the appspot.com domain, or use Google Apps to serve it from your own domain. You can share your application with the world, or limit access to members of your organization.
App Engine costs nothing to get started. Sign up for a free account, and you can develop and publish your application for the world to see, at no charge and with no obligation. A free account can use up to 500MB of persistent storage and enough CPU and bandwidth for about 5 million page views a month.
During the preview release of Google App Engine, only free accounts are available. In the near future, you will be able to purchase additional computing resources.

Now that is interesting ... isn't it? Only thing.. that I might not like is it is on Python... and that is 'cause I don't know how to code in Python. If you are interested, then hurry up as the invitation is limited to first 10,000 developers as this is a preview release and I've seen Google's launch cycle... and maybe..in a year or two.. you can expect the Beta..:D naah.. I am sure Beta will come soon... just wait n watch, this is something new Google has brought on table and smells like the beginning of the new Era or web based application development is on its way.. BTW...how about an online Visual Studio?... I would take that one for sure.. :)

BTW, Appspot.com didn't work for me..if it is working for you, please let me know...

Microsoft All Set to takeover Yahoo!!! Sends a 3 weeks ultimatum

2008-04-06T01:51:00.000+05:30

Hooooooooooooorrrrrrrrrrrrrrraaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaayyyyyyyyyyyyyy............. After a long period of time, I am so damn happy about something SEXY...that's gonna happen.. Microsoft has sent a letter to Yahoo! Board of Directors saying[aah..ok...very politely..] giving them 3 weeks ultimatum to decide to not to be... or not to be [:D]..yeah either way they are going to be the part of Microsoft[aaahhh..sorry..googletards...did someone show you the big Middle one? :D]. Here is the press pass form Official Microsoft Web Site : http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2008/apr08/04-05LetterPR.mspx and the CNet news link : http://www.cnet.com/8301-13515_1-9912232-26.html.

And yeah, I can assure you...lots of freetards will start whining on this but hey.. what I can do.. except showing them.. :P..you know what..right? :P and yes... for me... I would love to see Google CXXs start shedding tears on Internet freedom and how Microsoft is a big risk for innovation..and blah blah blah..and as the saying goes..Barking of Dogs will not frighten elephants...

On a serious note, I am not sure why... but I have this feeling, there are alternatives to this situation like some interruption might come maybe Google will take over Y![That will be nice though...really.. ;)] or some monopoly lawsuit might come up... let's hope for the best....

UPDATE: 19:01 10-04-2008

There is a rumor about... Microsoft teaming up with News Corp. to do the RIP of Y!, check out this article at news.com Microsoft and News Corp. lock arms for Yahoo bid?

Gmail's Spam filter taking a vacation...

2008-04-03T02:32:00.000+05:30

Nowadays I am facing these strange mails directly going to my inbox, i wonder is Gmail's Spam filter taking a vacation?Is this only me or there are many others? :D Btw... according to some of my friends.. they get Spams in Gmail...everyday..buh buh..

Announcing Google Weblogs (beta) - Nice April Fool Trick from Google

2008-04-02T02:35:00.000+05:30

Nice try guys... but I guess.. it works on on Freetards.. ;)

Never thought that this will happen so soon...

2008-04-02T02:31:00.000+05:30

An article on Slashdot says :

"Zone-H have recently posted the statistical breakdown of the collected website defacements from the last few years. Surprisingly, in 2007 more Linux servers suffered a successful attack than all versions of Windows, combined. Similarly, more Apache installations were successfully attacked than all IIS versions combined. A day after posting this data, Zone-H have questioned the appropriateness of continuing to operate the archive. Despite the valuable information that can be gleaned from the service, it may soon be lost to the world. The natural successor to the now-defunct Alldas archive of defaced websites, Zone-H's archive maintains records of over 2.6 million defaced sites but may be shut down due to the continuous accusations of impropriety leveled against them any time they disclose and mirror a reported defacement."

FlashGet or TrojanGet - Beware FlashGet Users

2008-04-02T02:18:00.000+05:30

I have been using FlashGet since I started working at ESS. One thing about this little bandwidth sucker.. is it ...works... 100% and makes the network admins cry if you know how to configure it and what exactly should be done to improve your share of bandwidth in a given network.[BTW, If your network admin is a really smart guy/gal then it is almost impossible to suck all the bandwidth of your network], Now coming to the point, one of my friend pointed out this post from a forum, that reveals a dirty secret about FlashGet 1.9.xx.

According to the article here, the flaw was pretty basic, but worked like a charm for the smart guy who hacked the developer's website and put the malicious automatic update files on the Server itself. And then FlashGets, around the world downloaded the files according to the update files, which were various trojans. I am so damn happy I never upgraded my FlashGet as I hardly get time to make huge downloads now and mostly I get everything done via Opera.

The major problem here is, the flaw still exists in FlashGet, if someone can change the config file locally, FlashGet will download the new files accordingly... and I am sure someone will figure it out how to do it and yeah, I am really happy that I did not recommend this software to one of my colleagues who was desperately asking for a Download Manager.

Gmail-Gtalk April Fool?

2008-04-01T09:53:00.000+05:30

Google is at large... patching their popular mail service with latest security updates and what not. However after recent patches I've observed certain behaviors, now as long as I know there is a thumb rule to avoid while planning your application security i.e. never screw up your features to provide better security modal, rather improvise on the implementation front and provide Feature + Security.

This time Google has baffled me, I don't know whether it has to do anything with a recent news leak in middle east, where some caching at ISP Side, allowed a user to see some other user's A/C data, or maybe it is to prevent some niche XSS attacks crafted against the Search Giant's mail service. Personally I use Gmail all the times as I find it quiet faster, lighter and most importantly superior than its counter parts, so I have multiple A/Cs on Gmail. One of them is widely user with Friends while another is strictly for business purposes. On both of them chat is enabled so I don't have to rely on Gtalk whenever I need to chat. I saw this strange thing few weeks back, if on a single computer, I login to one A/C say A/C A, at first my chat will be enabled, the moment I launch A/C B, the chat applet in A/C A will die and will start working for A/C B, if I do a page refresh in A/C A, then A/C B chat will be gone with the wind. Now I know many of Gmail lovers will start jumping saying.. oh..its a feature.. you don't know..and blah blah blah... for me...ITZ A BUG....

The Easiest way to make IE Professional

2008-04-01T03:44:00.000+05:30

This is how they define it :
IE7Pro is a must have add-on for Internet Explorer, which includes a lot of features and tweaks to make your IE friendlier, more useful, secure and customizable. IE7Pro includes Tabbed Browsing Management, Spell Check, Inline Search, Super Drag Drop, Crash Recovery, Proxy Switcher, Mouse Gesture, Tab History Browser, Web Accelerator, User Agent Switcher, Webpage Capturer, AD Blocker, Flash Block, Greasemonkey like User Scripts platform, User Plug-ins and many more power packed features. You can customize not just Internet Explorer, but even your favorite website according to your need and taste using IE7Pro.

Some of the shining features that I specially liked[I've read about this, have not used it and NO I am not being paid from these guys]
- Enhanced Tabbed Browsing
- Mouse Gestures[Oh sweet Jesus of Browsing Opera.. like feature..]
- Crash Recovery[I've used IE for years now, and just like all wise people I know how much important it is, and BTW..it is yet again Opera introduced..if I am not wrong, please correct me if you have more info on this]
- Inline Search[Opera...again?]
- Spell Check[Huh... I could use it...really...]

What I was really looking for though, I didn't get it... i.e. Enhanced Memory Management for IE.. :D
BTW, you can try this little thingy [2.24MB] by downloading it from here. And yes..the sweetest thing is.. it is free... and now I doubt... what would be there revenue stream? A browser add-on that can track whatever do with your browser and sell the data to the highest bidder?

Sun to Connect Chips via Laser Beams???

2008-04-01T03:42:00.001+05:30

Nowadays TechTree is serving a role of Trusted Source for IT related information. Just check this out, what they have found out...for our beloved Sun Microsystems.

MacBook Air Hijacked at a Hacker Contest within 2 Minutes...

2008-03-29T12:06:00.000+05:30

Few weeks back I read this article about the CanSecWest hacking contest and I said ...pfff... hmmm... why we don't have these contests in India...?[Microsoft Security Shootout was a nice try in 2006 though...] anywayz, and recently in one of my RSS feed, I got this news, that MacBook Air[Poor thing...was on...solid diet.. I guess..maybe just Air...:D] got hijacked in less than two minutes at the CanSecWest contest by security researcher Charlie Miller [a well-known hacker who was among the first to break into the iPhone]. The other two contenders[The Hardware.. I am talking about here] were VAIO VGN-TZ37CN running Ubuntu 7.10 and a Fujitsu U810 running Windows Vista Ultimate SP1[Hmmm... now I guess.. I know why there was the delay in releasing the SP1] are standing still so far...let's see what happens to them.

For the tech-freaks, the first day of the contest saw contestants trying really hard to break into the laptops over the network; looking for a loophole in the OS itself, and nobody could do it. So on the second day, according to the contest rules, contestants directed organizers to specially crafted Web pages[With not-so-sweet surprise hidden in them :)]. Miller was real quick, in less than 2 minutes, he could get into the MacBook by directing the user to his web page containing magic beans[:P]. And yes.. MacBook did spill the beans..but you know... what? Safari is said to be the culprit here.. and now I understand why Mozilla CEO's rear end was not too happy about Apple Pushing Safari to the end users with iTunes. Check his semi-regular stream of unconsciousness[Dude...get a name...:P]..here..Oh..he was worried about the end user's security and blah .. blah.. blah..I would suggest all the Dirty Brown Fox Lovers to go and check http://www.mozilla.org/projects/security/known-vulnerabilities.html#Firefox.

What??? A Chinese Stealth Bomber? You must be kiddin me...

2008-03-17T00:22:00.000+05:30

Just read this article on CNet.com here about a Chinese stealth bomber... could not believe my self and look at the FEW interesting details... it has a range of 11K KMs non-stop without refuelling[This one scares me... as well as America :D]. It can fly at Mach 1.2 or 1.4[WAKE UP GUYS... that is 1470 KM/H to 1715 KM/H]. It can carry twelve Stealth cruise missiles (each with a range of 3,000 km) on each of the two weapons bays. It could carry an additional three nuclear missiles (350-kilotons each) apart from these here are few more points which makes this one a stealth bomber[Its only second of its class in the world after US].

-high-tech blended wing [Stealth, difficult to trace in radar]

-body design-fly-by-wire controls [Most of the modern air crafts are FBW IE most of the operations are executed by supporting computers]

-angled fuselage [Stealth]

-internal fuel tanks [Stealth]

.-carbon fiber and composite materials[Stealth]

-rotating weapons profile bay

-mapping radar, satellite data links and advanced digital mapping systems

-nanometer coating

Now...let's wait n watch... 'cause this one is something that imbalances the military power equation between China and India and I am really eager what we have in pocket to answer this one.

PS: While making this post, I had to take references from many places as I am not that dude-who-knew-it-all so I opened many IE tabs in one instance of IE... and I have one question to the world : Why IE Sucks?... uhh.. the question is not ended there..dude.. I meant.. memory.. :D

Google officially acquires DoubleClick.Net

2008-03-14T03:11:00.000+05:30

Recently, during a HOT discussion about Privacy and and Google, I LOUDLY said, Google is the biggest thief of personal information. After I said that, immediately it striked my mind, that last year they were trying to take over one of the the dirtiest spy site I have seen so far i.e. Doubleclick.net. I was stunned.. when I came to know that it has not happened yet and I fetl..Oh Great... we all are safe..but naah just two days back it has already occurred. We are already doomed. Check out the link here on official Google blog.

Here is the text I could find, written in white fonts when I pressed CTRL+A on that page.[Between the lines for non-techies]
I'm pleased to share the news that we completed our acquisition of DoubleClick today. Although it's been nearly a year since we announced our intention to acquire DoubleClick last April, we are no less excited today about the benefits that the combination of our two companies will bring to the online advertising market.[And a lot of revenue to us and millions of web users will be doomed. BTW, We wont let M$ take Y! it is matter of future of Internet and blah blah blah and lot more blah here. For me the message reads like : we will steal your privacy information using DoubleClick.Net's existing tools that is ok, that is the future we want to give you. Seriously, that funny blog post reminded me of school days when Jr. High kids were used to crib about Sr. High guys as they could not stand a single chance in anything against them :D]

Because we have been waiting for regulatory approval for our acquisition, we've been limited by law in the extent to which we could conduct detailed integration planning to map our way forward. That work will begin in earnest now. Although we don’t have detailed plans to announce today, we will communicate regularly with you about our progress in integrating our two companies.[We had to wait to outsmart the law and find some loophole in the system so that we can carry on our evil plans]

Wanted to write a lot more here..but then... dont I have a life? :D...Laterz...

Microsoft DreamSpark

2008-03-10T22:06:00.000+05:30

In a recent past, it seems, Microsoft is going towards controlled Openness, while they are not 100% open source, there has been a lot of movement on Open Source. Let it be the sharing with their Application Protocols or let it be the sharing of important code-knowledge of Vista Internals to Anti-Virus developers around the world, add OOXML to it too. One more exciting movement, it is not being open-source though, it is VERY important for all wanna-be Microsoft Developers in Student community across the world.

It is no other than...Microsoft DreamSpark(Literally its gonna spark a lot of dreams in some students out there.. I AM SO DAMN SURE...)

According to the official site of Microsoft DreamSpark "Microsoft DreamSpark enables students to download Microsoft developer and design tools at no charge."

DreamSpark is simple, it's all about giving students Microsoft professional-level developer and design tools at no charge so you can chase your dreams and create the next big breakthrough in technology - or just get a head start on your career.

Who can get this right now?
We are kicking this off in 11 countries/regions, giving DreamSpark to millions of students in the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, China, Germany, France, Finland, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and Belgium.[Unfortunately India is not in the list as of now, somehow I feel we will be the very next one to get it, only problem is we DO NOT have a single nation-wide Student Information System] If you are not residing in one of the countries listed keep checking back, we will be adding more countries throughout the year.

Does that mean that I might not get in?
Possibly, if you are not residing in one of the countries listed, not attending an accredited university or not a member of one of the student organizations that we're connected with. But keep checking back, as we're working on adding more ways to verify your student status all the time.

Apart from attracting more and more students/universities to Microsoft platform I am damn sure this is yet another Sweet Microsoft moves that will give deep impact to the freetards out there. Now think from an average student's mind set. Risk-Free, world class, 100% legal software development product, an AWESOME Server OS and a next generation Database system. Ofcourse following this will come large events, worldwide contest/s to attract more and more student wannabe-developers to Microsoft platform and one dream I have been seeing since a long time, [Kicking freetards and their free-tarts out of the colleges/universities] might come true. Put freetard and other goodies in a same arena where Students learn and see the difference between the two at the same time and see who comes out as a clear winner. I know it will take time.. but you know... one thing .. Microsoft is best at.. Chasing the goal with unmatched Passion. :)

Any thoughts? This post started a furious discussion here

Why Google Labs are not that innovative?

2008-02-13T16:24:00.000+05:30

I have been watching google labs since its incubation few years back. and here are some surprising findings I have that I would like to share with you people.There are some really niche things that has come out of the labs but then there are some really strange apps which needs some light to be thrown at. So here it goes

- Any Trends and search - Though novel, it uses Business Analytics and Intelligence that is quiet popular in Industry, its not innovation, its novel to use analytics on Search Results. I would say re-use.

- Accessible Search - Saw it few years back on Macromedia's(Now adobe and I am not sure whether it is still there) web site using Flash

- Google Page Creator - Good Old Geocities

- Google Web Accelerator - WinProxy, almost 7 years back it provided a lot more than just web acceleration

- Google Reader - thousands of web based feedburner were freely available even before google guys learnt to spell RSS

- Google Notebook - Nothing compared to a niche app called NetSnippets,give it a try you will kick your own A** if you thought Google Notebook is cool.

- Google Docs and SpreadShits - No Comments[:P]

- Google Video - YouTube....

- iGoogle - MyMSN from no other that our beloved(Just Kidding) M$ and yes MyMSN looks million time better than iGoogle from all the angles

- Google Maps - Even before Google Maps came into existence there were Microsoft TerraServer, Microsoft MapPoint and other players. Also, now for India, try using google maps and local.live.com and find the truth...who is the Boss?

- Google Groups - UseNet

If you have more info on somthing that i missed, or I have put and is not correct, please let me know.

Upgrade to Windows XP from Vista - A Nice Article

2008-02-12T18:32:00.000+05:30

Check this one out... http://dotnet.org.za/codingsanity/archive/2007/12/14/review-windows-xp.aspx

And I thought only M$ can make good Ad Campaign...

2008-02-12T16:50:00.000+05:30

A nice video for Lintards from Red Hat
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZtdnZNYN0MM

An Article from :The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs PLUS My Views on Google and Open Source Softwares

2008-02-07T10:01:00.000+05:30

Statutory Warning : If you are Open Source(Freetard), Google(tard) or Linux(Freetard JAI-ASS - Just Another IBM-ASS-ET), reading this article will result in an acute pain in the wrong end of your body. Also this post goes like : Spit on our face and Kick you on your C*

This post is going to be full of hatred and reality from my end. Many of my friends, who are part of this group believes that I hate Google and Linux, this is my answer to them. I don't hate them but I hate their lame attempts to try to look like something they are not. If you are an advertiser stay an advertiser unless and until you have the strength to build enterprise class app. If you are meant for schools/colleges stay there don't even try to come to the enterprise class OS and Virtualization Segment.

Here is the article and PLEASE DO READ ALL THE COMMENTS on the article. It will help you to open your eyes.

Also I have certain points to put forward, if you read the reference links you will enjoy them the most.

- After trying a lot of times to maintain my expenses online I've moved back to Microsoft Office Excel 2007 from Google's featureless-shitlike online excel-wanna-be WebApp, please message me to know why I did it, I will reply on this forum itself.

- After Y! Messenger my favourite IM is Office Live Communicator 2007 reason behind that not even Y! can beat it when it comes to Unified Communication.

- Google is still the best search engine in web segments. I have never tried Google Apps for enterprise so I can not comment on it, however I BEG to find ONE, I repeat ONE implementation where Google Apps is being used by a company serving more than 50,000 end users. I will not take a web page as a reference unless and until it is coming from reliable source(news.com, ZDNet, wired.net, BBC, CNN are reliable sources I guess) and yes we are open to discuss reliability of the source, so please if you find something, post it on the group. So far, for enterprise segment, I have found Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 to be impressive.

- I still love Linux, and you can ask Cody, I still use Linux sometimes, however it is not at all ready to replace a large base of corporate workstations. Sadly, Munich(Germany), city council tried to throw out Windows out of the city, and replaced all the City Council Workstations/Laptops to Linux.

Read on what happened

In 2003, http://www.news.com/2100-1016-1010740.html and then they realized http://www.wired.com/techbiz/it/news/2004/02/62236 and then in 2005, some 14K desktops, http://news.zdnet.co.uk/software/0,1000000121,39195204,00.htm and rumors are heard that now 70-80% of them are running Windows on Linux VM. One more link for the same story :

http://www.techworld.com/opsys/news/index.cfm?newsid=6369

If you have latest news on this project, please let me know.

By the way, here is a success story for Linux but then..hey.. ever heard of this city? http://www.osnews.com/story/12611

Few months back, in my College group, I ran a survey amongst the new batches as well as oldies to choose from Linux and Java, at that time one of my friend started jumping that this survey is like : You like M$ or Not. I did not respond..at that time.. felt..what should I do if my friends...even don't understand what I am trying to tell?

However enough with the silence, at least some of you will understand what I am trying to do here.

I am ending this article here but there is one more coming shortly. This one was originally written almost two weeks back.[Here is a discussion on this topic.]

"How Do I?" Videos for Security from MSDN - Amazing Resource

2008-01-24T06:28:00.000+05:30

Hola!!!! It has been a long time, I've written anything on security, the last post you saw from me(Beware while using GMail) This is a kind of resource I have been looking for years. Many times, due to seer desire to be pure evil or just to have fun of doing something new, I've put my hands in mud of Computer and yes...let me tell you they are dirty. Also I've observed this behavior, especially .Net developers, they tend to ignore one important aspect of any Project Development Lifecycle i.e. Application Security. Reason behind them are mostly lack of awareness at entry level(colleges) as well as Professional level(seminars on security? sounds funny, Project Development, discussion groups etc). I must say that NOT all of the developers ignore security but yes majority of them only do it when a tester finds it out or the project sign off explicitly demands it. Anywayz here is a set of excellent resources that will provide you insight on .Net Security.

Here is the link : "How Do I?" Videos for Security from MSDN

"How do I?" Videos for Security All the videos that explore a variety of security questions for developers, including encryption, handling attacks, security best practices, and a lot more. New videos are added regularly, so check back often.

All the downloads are available in the following formats along with sample code.

Video Downloads:
ZIP WMV iPod MP4 3GP Zune PSP
Audio Downloads:
AAC WMA MP2 MP3 MP4

Some Interesting Videos

Also check out the right pane for all other How Do I series videos.

Why Google Group should still be in BETA!!!

2008-01-24T01:22:00.000+05:30

Many a times people blame me to be a "M$ and rest of the world", while upto certain extent it is true, but then I like to be truthful, I love to go and get the best. For people who don't know me well, my default search engine is Google. Also, after my corporate M$ Exchange A/C, it's Gmail and blogging site I use is Blogger. In discussion groups I use Google Groups and sometimes.. yes sometimes 'cause this is something that keeps hitting me in the face since we have started. The UI is simple..true..but what good is UI if its not working at all? Apart from other dirty problems I face, one thing I must tell you guys is the search within the group, it sucks...so much I don't have words.(Infact, I have but I cant use them here. :P).

Today, I was looking for an old article I wrote on Security on Gmail and Browsers. And out of curiosity instead of having a right term, I put google and then it all started, all the first result sets are...check out the attached video for the surprise. High-Res Video is available here.

Windows Scripting : A Starter Pack

2007-12-27T04:06:00.000+05:30

I've been in love with scripts since a long time and I've got a lot of resources. Depending upon your area of interest and expertise on Scripting,

Here are some starting points you can choose from :

Sr. No.	Link	Comments
1	http://www.microsoft.com/technet/scriptcenter/default.mspx	My personal favourite
2	http://www.microsoft.com/technet/scriptcenter/default.mspx	TechNet Script Center
3	http://www.microsoft.com/technet/scriptcenter/guide/sas_vbs_overview.mspx?mfr=true	VB Script Primer
4	http://www.microsoft.com/technet/scriptcenter/guide/sas_wsh_overview.mspx?mfr=true	WSH Primer

Book Info : The Art of Deception: Controlling the Human Element of Security by Kevin D. Mitnick

2007-12-22T01:23:00.000+05:30

Date: Fri, Dec 21, 2007 at 11:53 AM

When I started my career 5-6 years back, computer security always fascinated me. I don't know why and how but I was always loved reading about computer security - Encryption, System Security, Network Security, Firewalls, Hacking, Cracking and anything else that comes to the mind.

During my stay at ESS(My previous company, a great place to work), one day I was browsing about programming best practices and from one link to another it

took me to a special web page that mentioned a guy called Kevin Mitnick and a small para regarding his work. I said : huh.. interesting...these guy

breaks in to information systems without using any software/technique. And I decided to read his master piece : The Art of Deception. I borrowed the

book from one of a friend and really it took some months before I could start reading it. But yes, when I started, I could not believe how easy it is to

play with Human mind and get things done which will be too difficult to do if we are using standard software attack techniques(Session Hijacking, IP

Spoofing to name a few). I completed the book in few sittings and I must say I am so impressed with it. It is not only the element of surprise that

is being maintained in all the real life scenarios but also the style, sophistication, confidence and smartness of the attacker(Hacker).

There are more than 20 scenarios i.e. 20+ different real life attacks which caused a lot of damage(In most of the cases) to the victims. If you are really interested in

keeping yourself secure I must say this is the one you can start with. This book explains how to keep you, your job/your business and people around

you safe from a different kind of attack : Social Engineering.

Here is what other reputed sources have to say about the book :

The Art of Deception is about gaining someone's trust by lying to them and then abusing that trust for fun and profit. Hackers use the euphemism "social engineering" and hacker-guru Kevin Mitnick examines many example scenarios.

After Mitnick's first dozen examples anyone responsible for organizational security is going to lose the will to live. It's been said before, but people and security are antithetical. Organizations exist to provide a good or service and want helpful, friendly employees to promote the good or service. People are social animals who want to be liked. Controlling the human aspects of security means denying someone something. This circle can't be squared.

Considering Mitnick's reputation as a hacker guru, it's ironic that the last point of attack for hackers using social engineering are computers. Most of the scenarios in The Art of Deception work just as well against computer-free organizations and were probably known to the Phoenicians; technology simply makes it all easier. Phones are faster than letters, after all, and having large organizations means dealing with lots of strangers.

Much of Mitnick's security advice sounds practical until you think about implementation, when you realize that more effective security means reducing organizational efficiency--an impossible trade in competitive business. And anyway, who wants to work in an organization where the rule is "Trust no one"? Mitnick shows how easily security is breached by trust, but without trust people can't live and work together. In the real world, effective organizations have to acknowledge that total security is a chimera--and carry more insurance. --Steve Patient, amazon.co.uk

From Publishers Weekly
Mitnick is the most famous computer hacker in the world. Since his first arrest in 1981, at age 17, he has spent nearly half his adult life either in prison or as a fugitive. He has been the subject of three books and his alleged 1982 hack into NORAD inspired the movie War Games. Since his plea-bargain release in 2000, he says he has reformed and is devoting his talents to helping computer security. It's not clear whether this book is a means toward that end or a, wink-wink, fictionalized account of his exploits, with his name changed to protect his parole terms. Either way, it's a tour de force, a series of tales of how some old-fashioned blarney and high-tech skills can pry any information from anyone. As entertainment, it's like reading the climaxes of a dozen complex thrillers, one after the other. As a security education, it's a great series of cautionary tales; however, the advice to employees not to give anyone their passwords is bland compared to the depth and energy of Mitnick's descriptions of how he actually hacked into systems. As a manual for a would-be hacker, it's dated and nonspecific better stuff is available on the Internet but it teaches the timeless spirit of the hack. Between the lines, a portrait emerges of the old-fashioned hacker stereotype: a socially challenged, obsessive loser addicted to an intoxicating sense of power that comes only from stalking and spying.

NET Web Product Roadmap (ASP.NET, Silverlight, IIS7)

2007-12-14T10:22:00.000+05:30

I've been bit busy with current project and I've kept around 20-25 posts for the group on my desktop/s. However I thought this one is important and must be posted ASAP.

So here it is, from ScottGu's Blog : .NET Web Product Roadmap (ASP.NET, Silverlight, IIS7)

Important reads will be, I must say, the whole article. However all .Net Developers must have a look at : ASP.NET 3.5 Extensions Release and Silverlight 2.0 Release.

Also, Web Developers and Wanna-Bes should check IIS 7.0.

Visual Studio 2008 and .NET Framework 3.5 Training Kit on MSDN

2007-11-25T01:24:00.000+05:30

As you all must be knowing that Microsoft has released .Net Framework 3.5. I was looking for some training material on .Net Framework 3.5 for one of my friend and I ended up here. Just download this, go through the PPT and if you think that you would like to start development on this, please let me know. I will post links to trial version of Visual Studio 2008 and complete download link of .Net Framework 3.5. Current one is the web based stub only, I think I will be able to find the complete package. The Visual Studio 2008 and .NET Framework 3.5 Training Kit includes presentations, hands-on labs, and demos. This content is designed to help you learn how to utilize the Visual Studio 2008 features and a variety of framework technologies including: LINQ, C# 3.0, Visual Basic 9, WCF, WF, WPF, ASP.NET AJAX, VSTO, CardSpace, SilverLight, Mobile and Application Lifecycle Management. Its a 72MB download but then nowadays who cares about the download size? :P

What's Going On My Side

2007-10-18T21:19:00.000+05:30

There were certain updates in my professional life and I thought I should share them with you. so here it goes. Approximately 1 year ago I was sitting in a beautiful conference hall looking at the stage where people were receiving their performance awards and I thought.... sigh....when I will get one of this? And fortunately... things went strange, and before I completed one year in this new company, I got an award for innovation along with other team members for a project I did in June-July. Also, I flied to Bangkok(This city has many good things other than what it is notoriously famous for, I will post it my experiences on my Personal Blog along with photographs I've taken and collected from friends who explored this ancient gateway of Asia), and there I received this award. The same day a composite video that we prepared received great accolade from the audience for being creative and light weight still conveying the message. Along with that there was one PoC we did which was presented there. Also I just completed 1 year with my current company and that makes me feel good as I never expected that I will survive if I leave Gujarat. Now soon I am looking forward to move further but still I've not decided exactly what direction I am headed to.

Brand New Cool Hotmail Domains

2007-10-02T17:45:00.000+05:30

I was surfing.. yeah...at ..5 in the morning what else do you expect?.. and I found that Microsoft has launched this kewl site : http://www.coolhotmail.com/. It allows you to create a Microsoft Windows Live Mail Id with a custom domain name.

I've created a list of all of them and 3 hidden domain names also.(Check out the source code of the page to see what I mean by that). The hidden(but visible in my list below) domain names are : appyfizz.in, gobingo.in and bemyself.in. I am not sure whether this will work for existing A/C or not, but sure its a boon for new users. I also liked the way they have put the UI and color elements. A must see for web developers.

Where I Live?	Who I Like?	Who I Am?	What I Like?	I Don't Fit - I	I Don't Fit - II
bangalorerocks.in	clubaamir.com	iamgood.in	iloveyoga.in	apunkaid.com	ontheedge.co.in
chennairocks.in	clubabhishek.com	iamhot.in	ilovetennis.in	clickass.in	soupedup.in
delhirocks.com	clubabhishek.in	iammarried.in	ilovesoccer.in	coolmail.co.in	clingonbling.co.in
punerocks.in	clubaishwarya.com	iamsingle.in	iloveshuttle.in	samepinch.in	jamnation.in
punerocks.com	clubaishwarya.in	iamsizzling.com	iloveshuttle.com	samepinch.co.in	ufoff.co.in
mumbairocks.in	clubamitabh.com	iamsizzling.in	iloveoldmonk.com	koolmail.in	drunkfunk.in
mumbaimail.in	clubamitabh.in	iamcold.in	ilovechess.in	koolmail.co.in	flemgems.co.in
kolkatarocks.in	clubasin.com	iambald.in	ilovefootball.in	heybaby.in	crazyflamingo.co.in
iliveinmalabarhill.in	clubasin.in	iambad.in	ilovegoafeni.com	gobingo.in	laughterclub.in
iliveingoa.com	clubdhoni.com	martinian.in	ilovegolf.in	bemyself.in	freakyfridays.co.in
hyderabadrocks.in	clubdhoni.in	boscoite.com	ilovehockey.in	charsaubees.com	gumgang.mobi
goarocks.in	clubdravid.com	globallyunique.in	ilovekabbadi.com	individuality.in	hangoveradda.co.in
goarocks.com	clubdravid.in	dangerouslyhigh.in	ilovekabbadi.in	itsaboutme.in	gullidandagang.mobi
goaisbliss.com	clubhrithik.com	bungeejumper.in	ilovecars.in	itsmychoice.in	Ruleatwork.co.in
goagoagoa.com	clubhrithik.in	goballistic.in	ilovebikes.in	iwanttobeme.in	Breaktherules.co.in
emailmumbai.com	clubjyothika.com	imjustadreamer.in	ilovebhavans.in	leavemealone.in	Pindropsilence.co.in
delhirocks.in	clubjyothika.in	slipperysadhu.in	ilovebasketball.in	mememe.in	medco.co.in
metroonmove.in	clubkajol.com	trancemusiclovers.in	ilovebadminton.in	memyself.in	wicom.co.in
delhi4u.in	clubkajol.in	lover4life.co.in	vadapaavrocks.in	mogambokhushhua.com	pinacle.co.in
delhiden.mobi	clubkamal.com	jinxed4ever.net	appyfizz.in	pocketmaar.com	hellstuck.co.in
delhifevers.in	clubkamal.in	partyanimals.co.in	Footballfever.co.in	shri420.in	ringtring.co.in
unwinddelhi.in	clubkareena.com	ndanuts.co.in	stumped.co.in	thatswhoiam.in	Neversaydie.co.in
delhihaatrocks.in	clubkareena.in	ministryofsoundlovers.mobi	hittiewicket.co.in	wassup.co.in	bhaagambhag.co.in
salaamdelhi.in	clubpreity.com	Underpaid.co.in	onetuppie.co.in	freaknetwork.in	headsyatails.co.in
dillidilwaloki.co.in	clubpreity.in	Overworked.co.in	squarecut.co.in	dancefreak.in	mastblast.co.in
dillimanch.co.in	clubrajni.com	Bornleader.co.in	chauka.co.in	feelthebeat.in	iamwhatiam.in
saddidillibindas.mobi	clubrajni.in	Peoplesperson.co.in	pitchcontrol.co.in	coldsweat.in	ilovefuel.com
			rugbyrocks.in	berealistic.co.in	ilovefuel.in
					bhangrarocks.in
					studentzindabad
					shri420.in
					bhangrarocks.com
					gillidandagang.mobi

'Office Live Workspace' Announced

2007-10-02T14:46:00.000+05:30

Hurrray... I was so much tired of Google's Online Spreadsheet.. that I stopped using it... at all..and now... here it comes.. just check it out.. you will have to wait for a while.. but yes.. you can pre-register...so go ahead... hit it hard...I am damn sure that UI is gonna be 1000 time better than the Google one...

Just check out the screenshots for registration and basic info.

Click here to go for Office Live Workspace.

How to prevent a user from launching multiple instances of an application - .Net C# Code

2007-09-13T05:33:00.000+05:30

Recently one of my friend asked me to solve a simple problem. How to prevent an end user from launching multiple instances of your application. Instantly it came to my mind - A Mutex(Very expensive resource though...) can be used and I digged some of my old work and here it is. So enjoy... this is far more better than going into processes list and validating your application is running or not?
using System;
using System.Windows.Forms ;
using System.Collections.Generic;

namespace

Skynet.Apps.NetBuddy
{

static class Program
{

/// <summary>
/// Define the Mutex
/// </summary>
private static System.Threading. Mutex PreviousInstance;

/// <summary>
/// The main entry point for the application.
/// </summary>
[STAThread]
static void Main()
{
Application .EnableVisualStyles();
Application.SetCompatibleTextRenderingDefault(false );
PreviousInstance = new System.Threading.Mutex(true , "NetBuddy");//Create a Mutex
if (PreviousInstance.WaitOne(0, false)) //Check for Existing Mutex
{
Application.EnableVisualStyles(); //Enable XP/Vista Visual Styles
Application.Run(new frmMain()); //Run Main Form
}
else
{
MessageBox .Show("You are trying to launch multiple Instance of NetBuddy." + Environment .NewLine + "This instance will terminate now.", "NetBuddy Warning", MessageBoxButtons.OK, MessageBoxIcon.Error);//Warn User that another instance is running
}

}

GWT - Google Web Toolkit comes out of Beta

2007-09-07T00:09:00.000+05:30

Before you come to read the main topic that is just a link and a paragraph, please read the mail below

------------------

From: Chinmay Patel

Date: May 18, 2006 2:14 PM
Subject: Introducing GWT - Google Web Toolkit
To: Team ESS

Hi All,

As we all know and believe, AJAX has the power to make our Web Apps more dynamic and more user friendly and more likely to Win Apps. However AJAX development is often complicated, with much of the development time spent working around browser quirks (Well... we target the great IE so we've an advantage over here) and the fragility of AJAX components(MSXML, Scripting and the CodeBehind in our case). Trust me, I know the development of our own AJAX apps caused us no small amount of AJAX-induced frustration.

And now, after working a lot on Scripting part of AJAX as well as codebehinds that work with AJAX, Today I see

this in my mailbox, an exceptional toolkit for AJAX Developers - GWT ie Google Web Toolkit.

As they say on official GWT Page:

Google Web Toolkit (GWT) is a Java software development framework that makes writing AJAX applications like Google Maps and Gmail easy for developers who don't speak browser quirks as a second language. Writing dynamic web applications today is a tedious and error-prone process; you spend 90% of your time working around subtle incompatibilities between web browsers and platforms, and JavaScript's lack of modularity makes sharing, testing, and reusing AJAX components difficult and fragile.

GWT lets you avoid many of these headaches while offering your users the same dynamic, standards-compliant experience. You write your front end in the Java programming language, and the GWT compiler converts your Java classes to browser-compliant JavaScript and HTML.

I believe we all will benefit a lot from this toolkit, though its made for Java we've got the skills to make it work with .Net.

So here it is with all the best wishes and faster AJAX Development

Download GWT
--
Thanks,
Chinmay Patel

Free thyself from the past, free thyself from the future, free thyself from the present. Crossing to the farther shore of existence, with mind released everywhere, no more shalt thou come to birth and decay.

------------------

Almost after a year I am revisiting the topic, as last week GWT came out of Beta and now is a Release Product. They've gone through many updates since last year and presents a really nice tool for Java developers as I have not tried it for .Net I won't comment on that part. Any takers?

Here is the link for latest information on Official Google Blog on GWT.

Yahoo! punches back to the spammers

2007-09-05T14:51:00.000+05:30

Few days back, as usual I was tired... bored and thought of killing time so I fired up Y! Messenger and logged in and straightway went to chat rooms...and voila... I was shocked... each and every category I saw... Computer and Internet, Gujarat Global Chat, Gaming, etc was flooded with users. Each room was running on top of its capacity. Instantly I came to know that some massive and pretty smart Bot-Net was in action and was playing Havoc on Y!'s network. Infact there were some funny side effect(This is an assumption, I am not sure about it though), I was getting random users in my Y! popped up and some other random users were seeing me signing in ie even though I was not in their list, they got the notification when I logged in and logged out. It was funny... and not-so-funny for Y!. However within few days this got fixed and I was relaxed. I really don't like strangers asking me question how I popped up on their screen..and for that matter you also will not really like that. So actually I had to log out as it was virtually impossible to locate the room with real people... everywhere there were BOTS and I sighed.. and signed off...

And today... right now I logged in again to the Y! chat and I see one new one-inch punch from Y! for all the spammers and BOTs. No it is not some kind of Digital Martial Art, its a technology that is in use from quite a time and very popular among Web 2.0 outcomes - CAPTCHA. Y! has introduced CAPTCHA for Chat Rooms so whenever you try to go to any of the Chat Room it gives you a link to open when you open this link it presents you a nice interface to enter CAPTCHA information and once you do it successfully it allows you to enter and I must tell you it is working really fine now I see rooms much cleaner then they were ever used to be. And though it looks pretty lame to go to a web browser window before you actually can sign into a Windows based application but for what it is worth, I must say it works like a charm. Though I was wondering maybe this browser based authentication is meant to provide support to non-Y! Messenger chat clients like Trillian(Oh! Only I know how much eager I am for Trillian Astra!), YahELite, Pidgin(formerly known as Gaim) etc.Lets hope that soon they will have some built-in mechanism so atleast you can enter CAPTCHA in the chat client itself and enjoy Y! Chat Rooms.

A bug in Gmail

2007-09-05T13:10:00.000+05:30

I have been using Gmail since its launch and I am really happy with the service they provide and the best part.. its free. Except some really nasty incidents Gmail has been almost bug free. However when you spend a lot of time with something eventually you will start seeing stuff that you might not notice otherwise. So here is a UI related bug and I've reported it two times and still there is no action that they've taken from their side so I thought I must publish it. Steps to reproduce this bug - Open your Inbox. - Check title, it will say Gmail - Inbox(Number of Unread Emails in the Inbox) - Now click on Settings click on the top-right side navigation - It will load Settings Page in the main list pane but now see the title... oops...:P

Microsoft launches Tafiti

2007-08-23T01:14:00.000+05:30

A brand new concept based on Microsoft Technologies(Live Search and Silverlight) http://www.tafiti.com has been launched. Though it is similar to a mashup, GUI is amazing and search is also pretty quick. Please wait while we get more info on this.

What is Tafiti?
Tafiti, which means "do research" in Swahili, is an experimental search front-end from Microsoft, designed to help people use the Web for research projects that span multiple search queries and sessions by helping visualize, store, and share research results. Tafiti uses both Microsoft Silverlight and Live Search to explore the intersection of richer experiences on the Web and the increasing specialization of search.

A snapshot is attached of the tree-view mode. :P

Check out new Y! Messenger built on nextgen Windows Presentation Foundation

2007-08-08T00:37:00.000+05:30

I was roaming around (As usual) and I found this : http://messenger.yahoo.com/windowsvista.php . It seems WPF will make a huge change the way our application UIs are designed today. Let's hope for the best from big giants like MS, Y!, Google, IBM and wait for other rocking implementation of WPF. I am also in process of compiling some nice applications built on WPF\E ie Silverlight. Once I get a good number of applications I will put it in a page.

Boot.INI Options A to Z

2007-08-03T13:26:00.000+05:30

I will not give the names, but many of my friends have asked me some times questions regarding Boot.ini and I have answered them most of the times. Today I found a nice article about Boot.ini which seems to have a lot of content from http://www.sysinternals.com and almost all the answers possibly known to us.

There are number of BOOT.INI switches that are useful for driver developers that wish to test their drivers under a variety of different system configurations without having to have a separate machine for every one. For example, limiting the amount of memory NT sees can be useful for stressing memory loads, and limiting the number of processors for testing scalability. I've compiled a complete list of the options that BOOT.INI currently supports. This list is reproduced in the Startup, Shutdown and Crashes chapter of Windows Internals, where you'll find more information about the boot process. Entries in red were introduced in Windows 2000 and those in blue introduced in Windows XP or Windows Server 2003.

Note: to see what options your system has booted with examine HKLM/System/CurrentControlSet/Control/SystemStartOptions.

/3GB
Increases the size of the user process address space from 2 GB to 3 GB (and therefore reduces the size of system space from 2 GB to 1 GB). Giving virtual-memory- intensive applications such as database servers a larger address space can improve their performance. For an application to take advantage of this feature, however, two additional conditions must be met: the system must be running Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, Windows NT 4 Enterprise Edition, Windows 2000 Advanced Server or Datacenter Server and the application .exe must be flagged as a 3-GB-aware application. Applies to 32-bit systems only.

/BASEVIDEO
Causes Windows to use the standard VGA display driver for GUI-mode operations.

/BAUDRATE=
Enables kernel-mode debugging and specifies an override for the default baud rate (19200) at which a remote kernel debugger host will connect. Example: /BAUDRATE=115200.

/BOOTLOG
Causes Windows to write a log of the boot to the file %SystemRoot%Ntbtlog.txt.

/BOOTLOGO
Use this switch to have Windows XP or Windows Server 2003 display an installable splash screen instead of the standard splash screen. First, create a 16-color (any 16 colors) 640x480 bitmap and save it in the Windows directory with the name Boot.bmp. Then add "/bootlogo /noguiboot" to the boot.ini selection.

/BREAK
Causes the hardware abstraction layer (HAL) to stop at a breakpoint at HAL initialization. The first thing the Windows kernel does when it initializes is to initialize the HAL, so this breakpoint is the earliest one possible. The HAL will wait indefinitely at the breakpoint until a kernel-debugger connection is made. If the switch is used without the /DEBUG switch, the system will Blue Screen with a STOP code of 0x00000078 (PHASE0_ EXCEPTION).

/BURNMEMORY=
Specifies an amount of memory Windows can't use (similar to the /MAXMEM switch). The value is specified in megabytes. Example: /BURNMEMORY=128 would indicate that Windows can't use 128 MB of the total physical memory on the machine.

/CHANNEL=
Used on conjunction with /DEBUGPORT=1394 to specify the IEEE 1394 channel through which kernel debugging communications will flow. This can be any number between 0 and 62 and defaults to 0 if not set.

/CLKLVL
Causes the standard x86 multiprocessor HAL (Halmps.dll) to configure itself for a level-sensitive system clock rather then an edge-triggered clock. Level-sensitive and edge-triggered are terms used to describe hardware interrupt types.

/CMDCONS
Passed when booting with into the Recovery Console.

/CRASHDEBUG
Causes the kernel debugger to be loaded when the system boots, but to remain inactive unless a crash occurs. This allows the serial port that the kernel debugger would use to be available for use by the system until the system crashes (vs. /DEBUG, which causes the kernel debugger to use the serial port for the life of the system session).

/DEBUG
Enables kernel-mode debugging.

/DEBUGPORT=
Enables kernel-mode debugging and specifies an override for the default serial (usually COM2 on systems with at least two serial ports) to which a remote kernel-debugger host is connected. Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 also support debugging through accept IEEE 1394 ports. Examples: /DEBUGPORT=COM2, /DEBUGPORT=1394.

/EXECUTE
This option disables no-execute protection. See the /NOEXECUTE switch for more information.

/FASTDETECT
Default boot option for Windows. Replaces the Windows NT 4 switch /NOSERIALMICE. The reason the qualifier exists (vs. just having NTDETECT perform this operation by default) is so that NTDETECT can support booting Windows NT 4. Windows Plug and Play device drivers perform detection of parallel and serial devices, but Windows NT 4 expects NTDETECT to perform the detection. Thus, specifying /FASTDETECT causes NTDETECT to skip parallel and serial device enumeration (actions that are not required when booting Windows), whereas omitting the switch causes NTDETECT to perform this enumeration (which is required for booting Windows NT 4).

/INTAFFINITY
Directs the standard x86 multiprocessor HAL (Halmps.dll) to set interrupt affinities such that only the highest numbered processor will receive interrupts. Without the switch, the HAL defaults to its normal behavior of letting all processors receive interrupts.
/KERNEL=
/HAL=
Enable you to override Ntldr's default filename for the kernel image (Ntoskrnl.exe) and/or the HAL (Hal.dll). These options are useful for alternating between a checked kernel environment and a free (retail) kernel environment or even to manually select a different HAL. If you want to boot a checked environment that consists solely of the checked kernel and HAL, which is typically all that is needed to test drivers, follow these steps on a system installed with the free build:
Copy the checked versions of the kernel images from the checked build CD to your WindowsSystem32 directory, giving the images different names than the default. For example, if you're on a uniprocessor, copy Ntoskrnl.exe to Ntoschk.exe and Ntkrnlpa.exe to Ntoschkpa.exe. If you're on a multiprocessor, copy Ntkrnlmp.exe to Ntoschk.exe and Ntkrpamp.exe to Ntoschkpa.exe. The kernel filename must be an 8.3-style short name.
Copy the checked version of the appropriate HAL needed for your system from I386Driver.cab on the checked build CD to your WindowsSystem32 directory, naming it Halchk.dll. To determine which HAL to copy, open WindowsRepairSetup.log and search for Hal.dll; you'll find a line like WINDOWSsystem32 hal.dll="halacpi.dll","1d8a1". The name immediately to the right of the equals sign is the name of the HAL you should copy. The HAL filename must be an 8.3-style short name.
Make a copy of the default line in the system's Boot.ini file.
In the string description of the boot selection, add something that indicates that the new selection will be for a checked build environment (for example, "Windows XP Professional Checked").
Add the following to the end of the new selection's line: /KERNEL= NTOSCHK.EXE /HAL= HALCHK.DLL
Now when the selection menu appears during the boot process you can select the new entry to boot a checked environment or select the entry you were using to boot the free build.

/LASTKNOWNGOOD
Causes the system to boot as if the LastKnownGood boot option was selected.

/MAXMEM=
Limits Windows to ignore (not use) physical memory beyond the amount indicated. The number is interpreted in megabytes. Example: /MAXMEM=32 would limit the system to using the first 32 MB of physical memory even if more were present.
For the standard x86 multiprocessor HAL (Halmps.dll), forces cluster-mode Advanced Programmable Interrupt Controller (APIC) addressing (not supported on systems with an 82489DX external APIC interrupt controller).

/MININT
This option is used by Windows PE (Preinstallation Environment) and causes the Configuration Manager to load the Registry SYSTEM hive as a volatile hive such that changes made to it in memory are not saved back to the hive image.

/NODEBUG
Prevents kernel-mode debugging from being initialized. Overrides the specification of any of the three debug-related switches, /DEBUG, /DEBUGPORT, and /BAUDRATE.

/NOEXECUTE
This option is only available on 32-bit versions of Windows when running on processors supporting no-execute protection. It enables no-execute protection (also known as Data Execution Protection - DEP), which results in the Memory Manager marking pages containing data as no-execute so that they cannot be executed as code. This can be useful for preventing malicious code from exploiting buffer overflow bugs with unexpected program input in order to execute arbitrary code. No-execute protection is always enabled on 64-bit versions of Windows on processors that support no-execute protection. There are several options you can specify with this switch:
/NOEXECUTE=OPTIN Enables DEP for core system images and those specified in the DEP configuration dialog.
/NOEXECUTE=OPTOUT Enables DEP for all images except those specified in the DEP configuration dialog.
/NOEXECUTE=ALWAYSON Enables DEP on all images.
/NOEXECUTE=ALWAYSOFF Disables DEP.
/NOGUIBOOT
Instructs Windows not to initialize the VGA video driver responsible for presenting bitmapped graphics during the boot process. The driver is used to display boot progress information, so disabling it will disable the ability of Windows to show this information.

/NOLOWMEM
Requires that the /PAE switch be present and that the system have more than 4 GB of physical memory. If these conditions are met, the PAE-enabled version of the Windows kernel, Ntkrnlpa.exe , won't use the first 4 GB of physical memory. Instead, it will load all applications and device drivers, and allocate all memory pools, from above that boundary. This switch is useful only to test device driver compatibility with large memory systems.

/NOPAE
Forces Ntldr to load the non-Physical Address Extension (PAE) version of the Windows kernel, even if the system is detected as supporting x86 PAEs and has more than 4 GB of physical memory.

/NOSERIALMICE=[COMx COMx,y,z...]
Obsolete Windows NT 4 qualifier—replaced by the absence of the /FASTDETECT switch. Disables serial mouse detection of the specified COM ports. This switch was used if you had a device other than a mouse attached to a serial port during the startup sequence. Using /NOSERIALMICE without specifying a COM port disables serial mouse detection on all COM ports. See Microsoft Knowledge Base article Q131976 for more information.

/NUMPROC=
Specifies the number of CPUs that can be used on a multiprocessor system. Example: /NUMPROC=2 on a four-way system will prevent Windows from using two of the four processors.

/ONECPU
Causes Windows to use only one CPU on a multiprocessor system.

/PAE
Causes Ntldr to load Ntkrnlpa.exe, which is the version of the x86 kernel that is able to take advantage of x86 PAEs. The PAE version of the kernel presents 64-bit physical addresses to device drivers, so this switch is helpful for testing device driver support for large memory systems.

/PCILOCK
Stops Windows from dynamically assigning IO/IRQ resources to PCI devices and leaves the devices configured by the BIOS. See Microsoft Knowledge Base article Q148501 for more information.

/RDPATH=
Specifies the path to a System Disk Image (SDI) file, which can be on the network, that the system will use to boot from. Often used in conjunction with the /RDIMAGEOFFSET= flag to indicate to NTLDR where in the file the system image starts.

/REDIRECT
Introduced with Windows XP. Used to cause Windows to enable Emergency Management Services (EMS) that reports boot information and accepts system management commands through a serial port. Specify serial port and baudrate used in conjunction with EMS with redirect= and redirectbaudrate= lines in the [boot loader] section of the Boot.ini file.

/SAFEBOOT:
Specifies options for a safe boot. You should never have to specify this option manually, since Ntldr specifies it for you when you use the F8 menu to perform a safe boot. (A safe boot is a boot in which Windows only loads drivers and services that are specified by name or group under the Minimal or Network registry keys under HKLMSYSTEMCurrentControlSetControlSafeBoot.) Following the colon in the option you must specify one of three additional switches: MINIMAL, NETWORK, or DSREPAIR. The MINIMAL and NETWORK flags correspond to safe boot with no network and safe boot with network support, respectively. The DSREPAIR (Directory Services Repair) switch causes Windows to boot into a mode in which it restores the Active Directory directory service from a backup medium you present. An additional option you can append is (ALTERNATESHELL), which tells Windows to use the program specified by the HKLMSYSTEMCurrentControlSet SafeBootAlternateShell value as the graphical shell rather than to use the default, which is Windows Explorer.

/SCSIORDINAL:
Directs Windows to the SCSI ID of the controller. (Adding a new SCSI device to a system with an on-board SCSI controller can cause the controller's SCSI ID to change.) See Microsoft Knowledge Base article Q103625 for more information.

/SDIBOOT=
Used in Windows XP Embedded systems to have Windows boot from a RAM disk image stored in the specified System Disk Image (SDI) file.

/SOS
Causes Windows to list the device drivers marked to load at boot time and then to display the system version number (including the build number), amount of physical memory, and number of processors.

/TIMERES=
Sets the resolution of the system timer on the standard x86 multiprocessor HAL (Halmps.dll). The argument is a number interpreted in hundreds of nanoseconds, but the rate is set to the closest resolution the HAL supports that isn't larger than the one requested. The HAL supports the following resolutions:

Hundreds of nanoseconds Milliseconds (ms)
9766 0.98
19532 2.00
39063 3.90
78125 7.80

The default resolution is 7.8 ms. The system timer resolution affects the resolution of waitable timers. Example: /TIMERES=21000 would set the timer to a resolution of 2.0 ms.

/USERVA=
This switch is only supported on Windows XP and Windows Server 2003. Like the /3GB switch, this switch gives applications a larger address space. Specify the amount in MB between 2048 and 3072. This switch has the same application requirements as the /3GB switch and requires that the /3GB switch be present. Applies to 32-bit systems only.

/WIN95
Directs Ntldr to boot the Consumer Windows boot sector stored in Bootsect.w40. This switch is pertinent only on a triple-boot system that has MS-DOS, Consumer Windows, and Windows installed. See Microsoft Knowledge Base article Q157992 for more information.

/WIN95DOS
Directs Ntldr to boot the MS-DOS boot sector stored in Bootsect.dos. This switch is pertinent only on a triple-boot system that has MS-DOS, Consumer Windows, and Windows installed. See Microsoft Knowledge Base article Q157992 for more information.

/YEAR=
Instructs the Windows core time function to ignore the year that the computer's real-time clock reports and instead use the one indicated. Thus, the year used in the switch affects every piece of software on the system, including the Windows kernel. Example: /YEAR=2001. (This switch was created to assist in Y2K testing.)

Thanks to Jonas Fischer for pointing out the PCILOCK and NOSERIALMICE switches. Thanks to Rob Green for information on the FASTDETECT switch.

Microsoft Popfly

2007-08-03T09:07:00.000+05:30

Microsoft has launched Popfly and I got an early invitation to play around it last month but due to a busy schedule I could not post this article. This article was supposed to be posted alongside with the article on silverlight.

Let's see how MS defines Popfly first...

"Popfly is a tool that provides a fun and easy way to build and share mash-ups, gadgets, Silverlight experiences, and Web pages using pre-built "Blocks" that connect to online services. Popfly consists of Popfly Creator, which is a set of online visual tools for building Web pages and mashups, and Popfly Space, which is an online community of creators where you can host, share, rate, comment and even remix creations from other Popfly users."

Well... It sounds good... and looks good.. the UI rocks... but after looking at Flash UI available in market I think this one is no big deal. Anywayz, we have to give the credit as Silverlight is in early stage of development. We can definitely expect a strong contender for Flash when it reaches to Release candidate.
I spent almost entire day around its UI and I have got some interesting stuff. We'll see them one by one...

UI
As I mentioned UI is really cool and nitch, only question that came to my mind is usability or ease of use. I had hard time figuring out what exactly is going on in here. Anywayz it is still fun to play with it.

Accessbility
Not much I could see here, maybe because I didnt pay attention or maybe it was not being taken care of.

Performance
During the test, it made my IE Cry... and eventually my CPU and RAM Usage. I was really feeling bad about this. As we all know, Flash is always described as light-weight(I am not talking about http://www.neostream.com/), Silverlight application that powers Popfly.com was an overkill for my decently configured laptop. I believe if I was not running it with 2Gigs of RAM. it would have been difficult to use the application.

What More?
As of now, I have not much information to share as it will take more time to get into the application and check out things. But you can definitely expect more in near future... till then... bbye...:)

Microsoft SilverLight - Light Up the Web and Adobe Flash Comparison

2007-06-07T11:56:00.000+05:30

Microsoft launched Silverlight formerly known as WPF/E(WPF/E Stands for WPF Everywhere) on 30th April, 2007. By definition, Silverlight is, as per the official website of Silverlight - http://www.microsoft.com/Silverlight , is :
Silverlight is a cross-browser, cross-platform plug-in for delivering the next generation of Microsoft .NET–based media experiences and rich interactive applications for the Web.
On fine morning of 30th April, I was in St. Pete, Florida when one of my colleague told me that MS has released SilverLight and after looking at its definition I was bit worried, worried for my till-this-date HOT Adobe Flash(formerly known as Macromedia Flash) browser Plugin. Silverlight by its definition gives an entire new meaning to this dimension of Web. In this article we'll see how these two technologies differ from each other.

Till this date Flash is famous for its stunning vector graphics, light weight, streaming media support, extensive script library and scripting support, Browser Compatibility and the most important one in my eyes, is Audience. Today as per Market research, Flash reaches 98% of the Internet users in one way or other. Let it be small advertisements, Flash based games, Video Streaming, Rich Internet Applications and much more. Silverlight, after I used it for a day or two in Microsoft Popfly, I believe Silverlight has a potential to do much more than Flash however there are some other factors too. We'll discuss about them at the end of this article.

What I found interesting in Silverlight is

- Backed by Microsoft

- DLR - Dynamic Language Runtime

- Huge Developer community

- Cross-browser compatibility

- Target audience and future plans

As we all know, Microsoft is proposing .Net at large and is literally taking out competitors due to its robustness, architecture, security, ease of use, support and development features. Silverlight is one more step to this strategy as well as to reach the audience which is rather difficult to reach due to diversity in OSes used. I have recently used a site based on Silverlight ie Microsoft Popfly. As of now it is in Alpha Release and you can only access it once you get an invitation. Go ahead and register your any .Net Passport Id so that when next set of invitations are sent you get one. Now coming back to the topic, I saw following things when I was playing with Popfly.

- Extreme memory and CPU usage

- Difficult to use implementation

- 2MB Installation

- Higher bandwidth usage

As such Silverlight is still going through the production cycle so some of the above said cons will be ripped off in the final release, however when I compare it to Flash I see many things as a plus point in Flash.

- Backed by Adobe, one of the largest player in GFX and Multimedia segment

- Powerful scripting support and a matured authoring environment

- Developer and Designer community

- Almost 100% browser compatibility

- Reaches to 98% Internet-aware audience

- Streaming Video Support and industry acceptance

- Security and Mobile Device Support

I would have taken my time and listed cons from Flash's end too, however I would like if someone from the readers can point to cons of Flash and we can discuss it to get the better idea.

Chinmay

PS : This blog post was not copied from anywhere ;)

Microsoft launches the new way to interact with the digital world - Microsoft Surface

2007-05-31T09:02:00.000+05:30

I just got this news and I am so excited about this. All SciFi Hit Matrix Triology lovers would have remembered, in the last movie, when they are opening gates to the last city of Xion, a lady was moving her hands to move certain objects on a transparent screen. That scene left me wondering... oh my god when I will see this in action.. in real life...and today... I cant believe my dream coming true so fast Microsoft has announced Microsoft Surface.

According to Microsoft
"Microsoft Surface represents a fundamental change in the way we interact with digital content.

With surface, we can actually grab data with our hands, and move information between objects with natural gestures and touch.

Surface features a 30-inch tabletop display whose unique abilities allow for several people to work independently or simltaneously. All without using a mouse or a keyboar."

Check out : http://www.microsoft.com/surface for exciting video clips and other information on surface.

The magic of unmaintainable code

2007-05-14T20:16:00.000+05:30

This notorious and famous article was suggested to me by an intelligent colleague of mine during a recent project. Trust me guys its worth reading and also beware of the sarcastic style of writing, this one is full of rather disturbing humor. Here is the link : How To Write Unmaintainable Code by Roedy Green and the original was published on The original was published on Roedy Green's Mindproducts site.


File Name:	WindowsXP-KB936929-SP3-x86-ENU.exe
Version: 1	1
Knowledge Base (KB) Articles:	KB936929
Date Published:	5/6/2008
Language:	English
Download Size:	316.4 MB