Unto the pure, all things are pure

I thought it would be neat to have Hyper-V Server on a notebook, with Windows 2008 SBS as a guest OS, and then load some more legacy OS'es to test a piece of software I was developing. I have a 1.5-year old Compaq Presario (Core 2 Duo) lying around and I used it. I chose to install the Hyper-V Server clean before installing any guest OS'es. That went fine and trouble free. Not a squeak that the CPU was or was not suitable. T Then searched around and found that Hyper-V Manager was needed. I downloaded the version for Vista 32-bit. It installed fine. But it won't connect. Complained with the famous error: You do not have the required permission to complete this task. Contact the administrator of the authorization policy for the computer XXX Did some tedious preparatory steps as indicated in John Howard's blog . But I just did: 1) create the common user, 2) netsh advfirewall ... 3) DCOMCNFG on the client. Hyper-V Manager now connects fine and I can instal...

Now we all know that Bill Gates uses three screens . I have been using Extended Desktop in Windows for coming up to ten years now. I think it's one of the great things that Microsoft has done by making it easy for display adapter drivers to be developed to work in such a manner. My current set up is the 17" 1440x900 built-in of my notebook and a 1680x1050 standalone running off my notebook VGA port, with the external display positioned directly on top of the built-in display. I populate all the places I frequent with the second monitor (same specs), so that I can just plug in when I reach there, just like the power charger. I am not using three displays because: a. I don't know of any notebook that can drive two external displays, not even with the additional video port on a HP docking unit. Using a video adpater reduces the mobility of my notebook. b. I tried using three monitors but find that I spend much time moving my mouse to where I want to go (even though m...

Sending mail is an activity required in many applications. The SMTP protocol is clearly defined in RFC 821 in the last century. It is a beautiful piece of work and this can be acknowledged by the fact that it has remained largely unchanged since. Microsoft's .NET has all the classes in the System.Net.Mail namespace to make sending mail a breeze. You can read through the documentation and Google for the many examples and tutorials if you are new to this subject. What I would like to share today is that sending mail in .NET can be made even easier by configuration. The following two lines of code are all that are needed to send out a mail: MailMessage msg = new MailMessage("x@gmail.com","bgates@microsoft.com", "Test","This is a test"); new SmtpClient().Send(msg); There is no need to embed in your code SMTP server names or passwords. That is bad practice because when you deploy your...

There are times when a user does not have a mailbox in the Exchange server itself. The place to configure forwarding is in ADUC and not System Server. First, in the External Contacts folder in your domain tree, create the destination forwarding address. Then, in the user's Properties, go to the Exchange General tab and select Delivery Options. Check the F orward to option and select the destination address from the list of External Contacts.

Here are the steps: Create a certificate request (CSR). There're lots of documentation for this, mail me if you need help. Basically you do it from the IIS management console. (IIS 7 is different from previous versions by trying to make it "easier" but it assumes the user is illiterate - has lots of pictorial icons.) This will generate a Base64 encoded file, and it will also remember that there is a pending request. If you use a commercial provider, then just copy and paste the contents of the file in your application. If you want to use Windows Server 2003's certificate services, go to the server's website: /certsrv. Either of the above will give you a .cer or .crt file. Go back to the IIS management console server certificate option and use the "Process pending request" option. Das ist alles.

1. A SLR construction does not make a camera better Digital camera marketing has been very successful. Lots of buyers are "monkey see monkey do" paying lots of money without knowing how their cameras work. I can bet that majority of SLR owners do not know what SLR means. Today's SLR digital cameras can produce better pictures because most of them have a larger sensor compared to point-and-shoot cameras. Camera manufacturers would like to keep things this way to avoid fighting on price alone. The ability to change lens does not require an SLR. Thankfully Panasonic has broken this mental block with their latest model. A digital SLR is worse than a point-and-shoot when it comes to having a video viewfinder. Yes, some of us prefer to use the optical viewfinder up close with the camera touching our face. But there are situations where an indirect display is necessary, eg when holding the camera high to shoot over people blocking your view. The SLR was invented ...

I have often clean install HP/Compaq notebooks from scratch, using my own Windows CDs/DVDs, and downloading each driver from HP one by one. This is because when I go for the recovery CDs, they are not useable for whatever reasons: lousy media, scratches, mould, et cetera. Lately, some HP/Compaq notebooks provide the option to create ISO images instead of writing directly to CDs/DVDs. With abundant cheap storage nowadays, you should always use this option. Make sure you back up the images on more than one disks. Burn them onto DVDs only when you need to recover a system. I have just bought a refurbished Compaq 8710p with the original HP 3-year warranty from a HP reseller. When I tried to make a set of recovery DVDs, unfortunately it tells me a set has already created from the system. According to the Help info, this obstruction is because of the Windows Vista license and not the HP drivers. What I actually need is the HP drivers and not the Vista DVD. Notwithstanding that the notebook c...