ross-o.com

Setting up Database Mail for SQL 2005

nospam@example.com (Ross Olweiler) — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 09:14:09 -0400

http://www.mssqltips.com/tip.asp?tip=1100

Recover a corrupted SQL Server database

nospam@example.com (Ross Olweiler) — Mon, 19 Jul 2010 12:10:12 -0400

Using EMERGENCY mode to access a RECOVERY PENDING or SUSPECT database

CHECKDB From Every Angle: EMERGENCY mode repair - the very, very last resort

Reorder Thunderbird account list

nospam@example.com (Ross Olweiler) — Mon, 9 Nov 2009 12:16:43 -0500

First close Thunderbird, because it writes to the user preferences file on exit.

Then open the prefs.js user preferences file in the C:\Documents and Settings\<username>\Application Data\Thunderbird\Profiles\<unique-folder-name>.default folder and adjust the following lines to the desired order:

user_pref("mail.accountmanager.accounts", "account8,account9,account7,account3,account4,account5,account6,account2,account1");
user_pref("mail.accountmanager.defaultaccount", "account8");

Mackie HR824 tweeter

nospam@example.com (Ross Olweiler) — Thu, 5 Nov 2009 06:56:25 -0500

In my project studio is a fine pair of Mackie nearfied monitors. I use them for recording and mixing music. I bought them almost three years ago from musiciansfriend.com and have had nothing but good things to say about them.

... Until about a month ago.

One evening when I turned them on, I noticed that the sound coming from the right monitor was dull and muffled. After some basic troubleshooting, I determined that the problem was within the monitor itself, and not the line in. Specifically, it sounded like the tweeter was not working.

Not to worry - there was a three year factory warranty on the monitor. I called the number listed on the warranty card the very next day, fully expecting to be given an RMA number and a location to ship the monitor for repair/replacement.

It was not to be.

After waiting on hold for 30 minutes or so, getting dropped, waiting again, getting transferred, another drop, etc., I finally got through to a Mackie support tech, who informed me that Mackie no longer does in-factory warranty work. I would need to call the closest authorized service center.

Fortunately, the closest authorized service center (crownmagnetics.com) was not far away, and I had already done business with them in the past. After a quick call to confirm that they were in fact a Mackie authorized service center, I took the monitor to them for repair.

So far, so good.

A week later, after hearing nothing from Crown Magnetics, I gave them a call. They told me that "yes, the problem is the tweeter" (more specifically, the voice coil), and that the order had been placed to Mackie, but it could take up to several months to receive the replacement part, due to massive restructuring inside the company, and relocation of Mackie's manufacturing facilities to a factory in China.

Troubling. Even more troubling was the news that the Chinese company had just recently filed for bankruptcy. There was not much I could do, though; as the monitor was basically worthless without the tweeter. So I waited. And waited.

And waited.

About a month later, Crown Magnetics called back to inform me that they could not get the part. Oh and incidentally they were no longer a Mackie authorized service center, even though they were still listed as such on Mackie's support website. Furthormore, the part itself had been discontinued by the manufacturer and it was no longer available!

<sigh>

What to do? After some thought, I decided to look for myself. I opened up the working monitor and examined the tweeter. On the side was a label with the following information:

25TAF/G-MD
H 0899-06ohm
Made in Norway. 37/06

I googled this information, only to confirm what the dealer had told me: the part was discontinued.

After calling two more supposedly authorized Mackie service centers, and receiving a less than satisfactory response, I called the service center at fullcompass.com, an online retailer with whom I had done good business with in the past. I talked with a guy named Dennis, who confirmed everything I had learned about Mackie's troubles. Unfortunately, he also informed me that Full Compass was not an Mackie authorized service center.

But ... I felt better, because he was a very nice guy to talk to. And he suggested that I talk with someone in their parts center who could perhaps find me a replacement tweeter, and would I like him to transfer me?

But of course!

The guy at the parts center was equally nice, but he did not really have much more to offer. He did suggest, however, that I call a speaker repair company, that deals with many different brands of speakers. He mentioned one company in particular, madisound.com.

Here is where the story gets brighter. I was soon on the phone with Larry from Madisound, who took down all the information about the bad tweeter, and within a few minutes found a suggested replacement from the same manufacturer, SEAS, with identical dimensions, and even better quality.

SEAS Prestige
27TBFC/G
H1212
Aluminum/Magnesium Dome

The full tweeter cost $43.20, and the voice coil by itself cost $12.00. I decided to get two full replacements, so the monitors would still be perfectly matched. I ordered the parts from Madisound, and they were delivered in two days. It took all of about half an hour to replace each tweeter.

The mesh grill on the new tweeter is cosmetically different, but it is shaped the same, and I cannot distinguish any difference in sound quality or clarity.

In the interest of full disclosure, I should mention that about two years ago during a reorganization of my studio space, the monitor fell about four feet to the (concrete) floor. This may well have damaged the voice coil in the tweeter. So I do not feel entirely robbed out of my Mackie warranty.

But I doubt that I will be buying anything Mackie in the foreseeable future!

Jump video

nospam@example.com (Ross Olweiler) — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 21:35:43 -0400

Luke playing Jump on the Motif:

Interactive Unicode Table

nospam@example.com (Ross Olweiler) — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 12:28:17 -0400

http://www.ftrain.com/unicode

No Not One

nospam@example.com (Ross Olweiler) — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 23:40:02 -0400

Here is a recent recording of mine:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SFYQHATXhZw&fmt=22

SUPER © Settings, to convert the wav file to an mp4 for YouTube:

Creating a self-signed certificate for IIS

nospam@example.com (Ross Olweiler) — Thu, 4 Jun 2009 10:21:56 -0400

Here is the best way to create and install a self-signed certificate for IIS. This method works better than using the Windows 2003 Certificate Server.

http://www.dylanbeattie.net/docs/openssl_iis_ssl_howto.html

Green Earth, Population Control

nospam@example.com (Ross Olweiler) — Mon, 2 Feb 2009 21:37:04 -0500

Here is an article on global warming and overpopulation.

Government green guru Sir Jonathon Porritt calls for two-child limit

Here is a rebuttal.

Limiting Couples to Just Two Kids Is Not the Way to Save the Earth

Windows XP Reinstall

nospam@example.com (Ross Olweiler) — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 16:13:44 -0400

I write this from the trusty little Macbook, while installing a fresh copy of Windows XP on my Dell desktop computer. It is only a year old, but yesterday I downloaded a PDF from the Internet and picked up a virus.

I knew almost immediately that there was a problem, because a window entitled “Antivirus XP 2008” appeared, prompting me to “Click here” to install the program. At the same time, my desktop background changed to a nasty blue, with an advertisement in the center warning me about the risks of not installing the antivirus software.

I did not click the button, but instead opened up the Task Manager, found the rogue window, and forcibly closed it, after which I rebooted the computer. But alas, the window appeared again. And now there were more problems. Suddenly the computer announced that the DCOM Server Process had terminated unexpectedly, and that it would be shutting down directly. This happened a couple times.

After some research, I downloaded a program called Malwarebytes, which was supposed to remove the virus. The download was not easy, because both IE and Firefox were under the control of the virus. I logged out and logged in as the Guest account, which could still browse the Internet (likely because it was not an account with Administrator privileges). I downloaded Malwarebytes, and then logged out and logged in again as an Administrator to run it.

Malwarebytes detected and removed the virus, but my Internet connection still seemed slow, and most of my Google searches were being redirected to less than savory sites. All requests to microsoft.com were being blocked, and the hosts file was being regularly overwritten.

At this point I tried a Windows Repair using the Installation CD, but it only replaced a handful of files in the WINDOWS folder and did not remove the virus. All in all, this was an ineffective waste of time. I should have wised up at this point and performed a fresh installation, but I wanted to know more about the virus.

So I installed Wire Shark, and watched the network traffic, in hopes of getting a clue as to the nature of the virus. I immediately saw HTTP requests going out to an unfamiliar IP address, 67.228.116.96. This resolved to weightlossproduct.net, registered to a cybersquatter. It also resolved to cafedinst.org, registered to someone in Maryland. A PHP server at that address was sending down binary files to my computer.

The next step was to find the actual process generating the network traffic and remove it. For this I installed a Process Monitor from Microsoft. After gazing at svchost.exe processes and a variety of DLLs and threads, it became evident to me that the virus was posing as a legitimate Windows file (or files) and was going to be next to impossible to exterminate.

It was then that I decided to install a fresh copy of Windows XP. Even this did not work the first time, because after it was finished it left a bunch of old files in the WINDOWS folder. So I installed again, this time to a WINXP folder, then deleted the WINDOWS folder, then installed one final time, ending up with a brand-new sparkling clean installation in the WINDOWS directory.

Hacking Google Chrome

nospam@example.com (Ross Olweiler) — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 16:15:42 -0400

I recently installed Google Chrome and I like it. However one thing has been bugging me and that is the way it does not let me save a password for a site, once I have blacklisted the site with the 'Never for this site' button.

However, with a little digging, I was able to figure out how to do it. The steps are below.

Download SQLite Database Browser from here.
Close Google Chrome. If you try to make this change with the browser still open, not only will the change fail to take effect, it will hang the browser and you will have to kill it.
Launch the 'SQLite Database Browser.exe', ignore the Security Warning, and click Run. Open the database located here: C:\Documents and Settings\{account}\Local Settings\Application Data\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default\Web Data
Open the Browse Data tab, and open the 'logins' table. Scroll horizontally to the 'blacklisted_by_user' column.
Find the row having a value of '1' in this column that you want to reset. Double-click on the row and change the value to 0, and click 'Apply Changes'.
Save the database, and close the SQLite browsing window.
Open Google Chrome, navigate to the site, and login. The 'Do you want Chrome to save your password?' bar will appear.

Purify Clip

nospam@example.com (Ross Olweiler) — Sun, 31 Aug 2008 00:37:08 -0400

Purify Clip

For the first time I recorded Luke playing the real drum kit with a single room microphone about 6ft away and 4ft off the floor.

Track 1 - Crowdster acoustic guitar DI caepo 3rd fret panned -50
Track 2 - Crowdster acoustic guitar DI panned +50
Track 3 - Motif XS6 All Bars Percussion organ DI
Track 4 - Zion electric guitar bridge pickup, Ibanez TS9 overdrive Drive=12:30 Tone=3:00 Level=10:00, Fender Hot Rod Deluxe Dirty Channel Drive=4 Master=2 EQ=0 Presence=4, mic'd with single SM57 straight on against the grill, panned -30 with DAW reverb
Track 5 - Zion electric guitar same setup panned 40 with DAW reverb
Track 6 - Mapex Drums with AT3035 room mic
Track 7 - Pedulla Bass into Marshall guitar amp with 2:1 DAW compression above -14dB and parametric EQ

DAW Mastering

Multiband Compressor - Classical Master
Studio Reverb - Mastering Reverb
Stereo Expander - Wider Field

Short Jam

nospam@example.com (Ross Olweiler) — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 22:22:55 -0400

Short Jam

Here is the first recording in the new music room.

Track 1 - Crowdster acoustic guitar DI
Track 2 - Zion electric guitar, neck pickup, Boss compression, Ibanez TS9 overdrive, DL4 Delay, Verbzilla Reverb, Fender Hot Rod Deluxe with More Drive on, SM57 mic close straight center, Audition Stereo Expander Wider Field & Full Reverb Lecture Hall Dry 73% Wet 44%
Track 3 - Nathan Ibanez fretless bass into Fender cabinet, SM57 mic close straight center
Track 4 - Motif XS6 All Bars Percussion organ DI
Track 5 - Yamaha P250 XG Grand Piano DI
Track 6 - Motif XS6 canned drums

I used a much lighter pick on both the acoustic and electric. It was a Jim Dunlop .60mm.

Mastering

Studio Reverb - Mastering Reverb
Multiband Compressor - Classical Master
Stereo Expander - Wide Field

Basement Studio

nospam@example.com (Ross Olweiler) — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 06:41:28 -0400

I reorganized the room in the basement where I play and record music.

It is arranged according to the LEDE (Live End Dead End) design. In this design, the front end of the room is heavily treated or "dead" to absorb nearly all reflections. The center of the room is the "sweet spot" or main listening area. The rear end of the room is partially reflective or "live". Acoustic energy is returned back into the room for ambiance.

Read more on studio acoustics here.

Here are some pictures.

Crystal Report Viewer

nospam@example.com (Ross Olweiler) — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 11:30:21 -0400

Today I figured out how to preview Crystal reports that are populated with a list of POJO objects. Here is the code to do it.

The ReportViewerBean can be found in the Eclipse plugins directory, in the ReportViewer.jar library. Make sure to have the .rpt file available on the classpath, as well as your CRConfig.xml file.

javax.swing.SwingUtilities.invokeLater(new Runnable() {



	public void run() {

		try {

			// create a viewer

			ReportViewerBean viewer = new ReportViewerBean();

			viewer.init(new String[0], null, null, null);



			// create a window

			JFrame frame = new JFrame("Crystal Report Viewer");

			frame.setTitle("Crystal Report Viewer");

			frame.setDefaultCloseOperation(JFrame.EXIT_ON_CLOSE);

			frame.getContentPane().add(viewer, BorderLayout.CENTER);

			frame.setSize(700, 500);

			frame.setVisible(true);



			// display the report

			IReportSource reportSource = report.getReportSource();

			viewer.setReportSource(reportSource);

			viewer.start();

		} catch (Exception exception) {

			System.out.println(exception.toString());

		}

	}

});