May 29 2010

Create/Generate multiple files in DOS using FOR command

Category: Scripting,SharePoint — Kamlesh @ 12:40 am

Scenario: To test the SharePoint Document Library Upload functionality and judge the # of files the Upload can really handle!  In another words, look for any limitations of SharePoint.

Problem:  Where do I get bunch of sample files at one easy location (I may need more than 2000 files at single location)

Environment: Windows 7 and a Virtual Machine with Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 (WSS 3.)

Solution: DOS is the BOSS.  The good old FOR command in MS-DOS came to rescue.  You can access this command from Windows 7 Command Prompt:

In the above example:

  • I created a simple Text file named MyFile.txt
  • Ran the FOR command as shown above.
  • %C is the variable which gets incremented during the loop execution.
  • Isn’t the FOR command sounds similar to FOR statement in most of the Programming Languages like C, Visual Basic.
  • DO is the action being performed, where I have used the COPY command.
  • The Newly Copied (Destination) File name is appended with running number ( MyFile1.txt to MyFile2000.txt).

After the command runs, I get total 2001 files in this single directory:

Now, I can try my further experiments with SharePoint Document Library Upload functionality.  I am sure that the New Scripting Languages (like PowerShell) will also have such functionality.  I would be glad to hear from you, if there are any other better options to generate test files like the above one.

May 28 2010

DVB SSU MMIV Loader

Category: Bangalore,DTH-IPTV — Kamlesh @ 11:48 pm

Yesterday, when I returned home from work, my son complained that his favorite Television Channels are not coming on our Tata Sky DTH Service.  Usually, we get “No Signal” problem when its windy/raining outside, which was not the case yesterday in Bangalore.  I switched on the Television and Set-Top-Box(STB) and navigated to Cartoon Network.  Waited for few seconds and got surprised to see Blank Screen with a title “DVB SSU MMIV Loader” and a Progress Bar, which indicated that my DTH Provider is pushing New Software Version to all Customer’s STB.  The progress bar took around 3-5 minutes to complete and then it automatically restarted my DTH.

Its really strange that there is no communication from the DTH provider on this Software Upgrade to customers.  So, what is different now?  Well, nothing much… But the Screen Display which appears at Bottom of screen (when we change channels), is now taking up more space on the screen.  I really didn’t feel happy with this New Feature.

For those who are visiting this blog post for similar topic, below are the System Details (press Organizer -> System Settings -> System Details) for reference:

DigicompSWVersion 1.4.2.001 PRODUCT May 03 2010
Manufac Id: OxCE
Hardware Version: OxE5
Model: OxA7
Driver Version: 01.43.04 Mar 26 2010

Apart from above, there are some more values shown in this screen, which may not be important.  By the way, I am using just Tata Sky with a old STB.  I don’t have Tata Sky Plus.  Please leave me comments, if you have any additional information on this recent Software Upgrade.

May 27 2010

SharePoint 2010 Command-Line Arguments

Category: Microsoft,SharePoint 2010 — Kamlesh @ 6:39 pm

The following are the Command-Line arguments available for SharePoint Setup Executable File.  My below Example shows for SharePoint 2010 Foundation.

Usage:
/extract:path, extracts the content of the package to the path folder
/log[:path to log file], enables verbose logging for the update installation
/lang:lcid, sets the user interface to the specified locale when multiple locales are available within the package
/quiet, runs the package in silent mode
/passive, runs the update without any interaction from the user
/norestart, prevents prompting of user when reboot of machine is needed
/forcerestart, forced restart of machine once update is complete
/?, shows this help message

If you are extracting the files, to manually run the PrerequisiteInstaller.exe, then it is also possible to have Command-Line arguments for Prerequisites Setup file.

***Command Line Options***
/continue – This is used to tell the installer that it is continuing from a restart
/unattended – No user interaction. Exit codes:
0    – Success
1    – Another instance of this application is already running
2    – Invalid command line parameter(s)
1001 – A pending restart blocks installation
3010 – A restart is needed
Other error codes – From the prerequisite installation that failed last
/? – Display this message

The installer installs from the file specified in the command line options below where ‘file’ denotes the file to install from. If the option is not specified, it downloads the file from the internet and installs. If the option is not applicable to the current operating system, it ignores it.

/SQLNCli:file – Install Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Native Client from file
/ChartControl:file – Install Microsoft Chart Controls for Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5 from file
/W2K8SP2:file – Install Windows Server 2008 SP2 from file
/NETFX35SP1:file – Install Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 from file
/PowerShell:file – Install Windows PowerShell 2.0 from file
/KB976394:file – Install Hotfix for Microsoft Windows (KB976394) from file
/KB976462:file – Install Hotfix for Microsoft Windows (KB976462) from file
/IDFX:file – Install Windows Identity Foundation (KB974405) from file
/IDFXR2:file – Install Windows Identity Foundation (KB974405) for Windows Server 2008 R2 from file
/Sync:file – Install Microsoft Sync Framework Runtime v1.0 (x64) from file
/FilterPack:file – Install Microsoft Filter Pack 2.0 from file
/ADOMD:file – Install Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Analysis Services ADOMD.NET from file
/ReportingServices:file – Install SQL 2008 R2 Reporting Services SharePoint 2010 Add-in from file
/Speech:file – Install Microsoft Server Speech Platform Runtime from file
/SpeechLPKDEDE:file,/SpeechLPK:file,/SpeechLPKESES:file,/SpeechLPKFRFR:file,/SpeechLPKITIT:file,/SpeechLPKKOKR:file,/SpeechLPKPTBR:file and /SpeechLPKRURU:file – Install Microsoft Server Speech Recognition Language – TELE from file for de-de, en-us, es-es, fr-fr, it-it, ko-kr, pt-br and ru-ru locales respectively

The above can help Network Administrators to create an Argument File and install the Pre-requisites using a Network Share.

Reference:

Install prerequisites from a network share

May 26 2010

10 Immutable Laws of Security

Category: Microsoft,Security — Kamlesh @ 2:12 pm

Check the this Microsoft TechNet link for more details on above points.

See Also:

Revisiting the 10 Immutable Laws of Security, Part 1

Revisiting the 10 Immutable Laws of Security, Part 2

May 25 2010

The virtual machine is currently using an Intel processor, but physical computer has an AMD processor.

Category: Microsoft Office,SharePoint,SharePoint 2010 — Kamlesh @ 12:59 am

I recently downloaded the 2010 Information Worker Demonstration and Evaluation Virtual Machine (RTM) from Microsoft Site, which is nearly 18.5GB of size.  After extraction, the compressed package created two set of directories -  2010-7a.vhd (41GB) and 2010-7b.vhd (14Gb).  The same download link contains Virtual Machine Setup Guide.docx, which I followed to setup the VM on Windows 2008 R2 (x64).

The initial configuration involves making changes in Hyper-V Manager (instructions available in Virtual Machine Setup Guide.docx).

Creating an Internal Virtual Network Name

Assigning IP address to Internal Network created in above screen

Importing the 2010-7a Virtual Machine

2010-7a Virtual Machine successfully Imported

The next step was to click on Start option to load the Virtual Machine.  When I clicked on Start, after sometime, it throws below error:

Hyper-V Manager

An error occurred while attempting to start the selected virtual machine(s).

’2010-7a’ failed to restore.

The virtual machine is currently using an Intel processor, but physical computer ‘AMDWIN2K8R2′ has an AMD processor.

’2010-7a’ failed to restore. (Virtual machine ID 16DA7423-8C68-43E1-BBF2-2B5737AD3736)

The virtual machine ’2010-7a’ is currently using an Intel processor, but physical computer ‘AMDWIN2K8R2′ has an AMD processor. A running or saved virtual machine cannot be migrated to a physical computer that has a processor from a different vendor. However, you can move the virtual machine to this node if you shut down the virtual machine. (Virtual machine ID 16DA7423-8C68-43E1-BBF2-2B5737AD3736)

The above problem worried me about the difference in AMD and Intel Processors.  The error also hinted that VM can be migrated across processors, but there were no options visible. The state column flashed me that it is currently under “Saved” state, so I used the “Delete Saved State” option (available in RHS menu).  After deleting the Saved State, I again tried to start the Virtual Machine and it worked without any problems.

If you face any further problem of this kind, please refer the Virtual Machine processor compatibility mode article, which has additional information.

May 25 2010

Changes to Microsoft Online Community Forums

Category: Microsoft,Uncategorized — Kamlesh @ 12:24 am

Today, Microsoft Answers shares the same forum infrastructure as The MSDN, TechNet, Expression and Microsoft brand forums. Which means that End-users, IT Pros, Developers and Designers share the same Profile system:

Existing Forums

For Microsoft Answers, targeted at the consumer audience, Forums need to more fully support the consumer Q&A scenario and features and functionalities for the online service businesses like Windows Live.

For the MSDN, TechNet, Expression and Microsoft brand forums targeted at developers, IT Pros and Designers, the focus is to empower and incent the communities to contribute and seamlessly integrate the experience with the rest of the MSDN and TechNet platforms and applications (wikis, blogs, galleries,…).

To sustain growth and provide an avenue for continued innovation around specific audience needs, the Microsoft Answers forums will be moving to a new platform infrastructure:

New Microsoft Forums

With this transition, there will be changes to the user experience for community members that participate on Answers as well as The MSDN, TechNet, Expression and Microsoft brand forums.  There will be no change in user experience for the community that solely participates on MSDN, TechNet, Expression and Microsoft brand forums.

Read the complete implementation plan here for further details.

May 24 2010

Gmail Storage quota exceeded!

Category: Google — Kamlesh @ 8:00 pm

I have to blog this!  Just sent a mail to my friend and I got delivery failure with this message:

Delivery to the following recipient failed permanently:
masked-id@gmail.com
Technical details of permanent failure:
Storage quota exceeded

Do you have any friends, who uses GMail to this extent? :)

May 20 2010

Database Size Ranges – Small Medium Large Extra Large

Category: Microsoft,SharePoint 2010,SQL Server — Kamlesh @ 12:01 am

Many times, Application Developers ask this question to a DBA on how to figure out whether the Application Database is Small, Medium, Large or Extra Large.  Here is the ideal database size range which is defined by Microsoft SQL Server.  The same can be used with other Database like Oracle, IBM DB2 etc.

Small - Upto 1Gb

Medium - 1GB to 100GB

Large - 100GB to 1TB

Extra Large – 1TB and above

The above information becomes handy while arriving effort for Migration/Upgrade activities.  In my next post, I will provide details on various SQL Server Databases used by SharePoint 2010.

Update (14-Mar-2013): A new article related to SharePoint 2013 is available here.

May 19 2010

DOCS – Office Web Apps

Category: Microsoft,SocialNetworking — Kamlesh @ 12:48 am

Now you can discover, create, and share Microsoft Office documents with your Facebook friends. Built using Microsoft Office 2010 – Docs (Beta) for Facebook lets you work from just about anywhere with the familiar Office experience.

To use this service, you need to have a Facebook Account and allow DOCS website to access your Facebook account.  Once logged in, you can SIGN UP for Docs.  After few minutes, you will get a mail with confirmation in your Mail box.

Thanks for your interest in Docs. Our Docs service is expanding, and as a result, you can now create and/or upload your own documents (Microsoft Word, PowerPoint or Excel documents) in the service.

We have already enabled these services for you; just go to http://docs.com/ where you can begin creating and uploading documents to share with your Facebook friends.

We hope you enjoy Docs.

The FUSE Labs Team

To create a new document online (using just your browser), click on Add a Doc and choose Word Document.

Add a Doc menu option

Thats it! You will get a Word Editor with the Ribbon toolbar.  Unfortunately, while typing my Sample document, I encountered this error – “Microsoft Word Web App encountered an unexpected error” (shhhh… its still Beta or something wrong with my Broadband connection!):

Encountered Unexpected Error

Clicked RESTART and lost the typed contents.  After this, created a New Document and saved it.  My New Document name is Hello-Docs and is shared with one of my friend on Facebook now.

Isn’t it a great tool to create/access/share your Microsoft Office Documents online!

May 18 2010

Microsoft is upgrading their Blogging Platform

Category: Blog,Microsoft — Kamlesh @ 9:44 am

Recently, if you have visited any of the MSDN or TechNet Blog Post (e.g. – SharePoint), you will notice that the Comments are disabled for readers.  Microsoft is undergoing an upgrade of their Blogging Platform, due to which the commenting is turned off across all the blogs. All blogs will however remain online and you may see new posts if MS Bloggers have saved articles with future publishing dates before the cut-off time.

This upgrade activity(a very big & long overdue task) is scheduled from Sunday 16-May-2010 9pm PST to 24-May-2010 12pm PDST.  The migration activity has already begun with backing up the millions of posts, users, comments, images, files and profiles to begin the journey to the new platform.

At this moment, it looks like Microsoft is using CommunityServer 2.1 SP1 (Build: 61025.2) as their Blogging Platform.  Its time to watch Sean Jenkin blog for further updates to know more details on the New MS Blogging Platform.

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