Outlook – Error with PDF Preview Handler for Vista

Up until a few moments ago, I was unable to preview PDF files in emails in Outlook using Windows 7 64bit.

The problem is that Adobe have not updated their installer of Adobe PDF reader to allow the correct values to be set in the registry.

However, there is a fix.

I came across this:

http://www.pretentiousname.com/adobe_pdf_x64_fix/index.html

It worked great!

Using TeamViewer

TeamViewer is a remarkable piece of software that let’s you share control of your computer with another person.

It works round any firewall / router complications that Remote Assistance normally has, and I use it regularly to help friends / family with their problems.

Best part is, it’s free for non-commercial use!

Here’s how to use it:

Step 1 – Download TeamViewer

To download TeamViewer, please visit www.teamviewer.com

There should be a little green box on the right hand side of the website that says “download now” or something to that effect.

Once you have downloaded it, double click it.

Step 2 – Running or installing TeamViewer

Sometimes, this box will appear – just click “Run”

On this screen, select Run.
Since we don’t need to install the TeamViewer software, there is no point doing so.
Click next….

Step 3 – Accept License Agreement

Read all the way through it if you really want, however I’ve never come across a EULA (End User License Agreement) that I don’t agree with….

Select the I accept checkbox, then press Next….

Step 4 – Connect / Be connect to….

If you want someone to connect to your computer, to give you help:
See the left hand panel – Wait for session – Simply give the other person your ID and Password.

If you want to connect to someone elses session:
Enter the ID in the box on the right hand panel. Click “Connect to partner”
It will then ask you for their password.

A box, not unlike Remote Desktop Connection will then appear.

Find out information about your processor with CPU ID

I’ve found a great little freeware utility that gives you valuable information about your processor, and other hardware devices on your PC – CPU ID

http://www.cpuid.com/cpuz.php

From their site, heres what information is retrieved:

CPU

• Name and number.
• Core stepping and process.
• Package.
• Core voltage.
• Internal and external clocks, clock multiplier.
• Supported instructions sets.
• Cache information.

Mainboard

• Vendor, model and revision.
• BIOS model and date.
• Chipset (northbridge and southbridge) and sensor.
• Graphic interface.

Memory

• Frequency and timings.
• Module(s) specification using SPD (Serial Presence Detect) : vendor, serial number, timings table.

System

• Windows and DirectX version.

I ran this on my mums’ pc, in order to find out what processor it had, and here’s the results:

How to use MagicISO

MagicISO is a brilliant piece of freeware that I use.

It enables you to mount an ISO file, as an actual drive.
For example, MSDN provides subscribers with ISO images of their DVD’s – We can then mount these files, and they will appear to the computer, as an actual drive, and so, can install the software.

Simply download MagicISO from here – http://www.magiciso.com/tutorials/miso-magicdisc-overview.htm

Install it, and it will provide you with a system tray icon.

Right click it, and select Virtual CD/DVD-ROM – You will notice that in my case (below) F: has no media.

Select Mount, and then select the ISO file you wish to use.

There are many other options – you can configure many virtual drives etc…

In this freeware version, you can’t edit the contents of the ISO files, you’ll need the paid for version of the software to do that.

Upgrading from Navision 4 to Navision 5 – Database Error

This is a tad of a messy blog post, so apologies for that, however it’s mainly for my own reference.

Here at Crocus, we run Navision to handle product inventory, orders, and the like…
We wanted to upgrade from version 4, to version 5.

After following the upgrade instructions, I got this error:

Msg 8662, Level 16, State 0, Line 1
Cannot create the clustered index "VSIFTIDX" on view "Nav5.dbo.Crocus Live$OrderRequestDetail$VSIFT$1" because the view references an unknown value (SUM aggregate of nullable expression). Consider referencing only non-nullable values in SUM. ISNULL() may be useful for this.

Annoying.

There wasn’t anything obviously wrong.
So I opened up SQL Profiler, and re-ran the update process in the Navision client, to capture the exact SQL queries that were causing the error….

I saw it created a view called Crocus Live$OrderRequestDetail$VSIFT$1

Heres the create view script:

CREATE VIEW dbo."Crocus Live$OrderRequestDetail$VSIFT$1"
WITH SCHEMABINDING
AS
SELECT "PaidFor",COUNT_BIG(*) "$Cnt",SUM("Amount") "SUM$Amount",
SUM("AmountIncludingVAT") "SUM$AmountIncludingVAT"
FROM dbo."Crocus Live$OrderRequestDetail"
GROUP BY "PaidFor"

It was failing on the following query:

CREATE UNIQUE CLUSTERED INDEX "VSIFTIDX"
ON dbo."Crocus Live$OrderRequestDetail$VSIFT$1" ("PaidFor")

Problem was:

Some of the columns specified as “boolean” within Navision, were in fact NULLABLE tinyint columns within SQL Server.

I suspect that this was due to some legacy version of SQL not supporting bit columns, or something along those lines…

Anyway, none of the values in the column (close to a million rows within the table) was null, so I changed the datatype to BIT and set NOT NULL. I did this for each of the columns in the table which should of been a boolean (and were specified in the CREATE VIEW statement (in my case was Amount, AmountIncludingVAT and PaidFor)

This immediately solved the “Cannot create the clustered index” problem

OWA Tray – Outlook Web Access notifications

I often use OWA to access my emails where I don’t have Outlook installed (work PC’s for example)

One problem is, understandably, there is no pop-up alert (it is a web-app after all!) for new emails.

Using Growl (for Windows) – OWATray provides this much-missed feature (see below)

Set up is simple. Simply enter your Outlook Web Access settings, and OWA Tray does the rest!

Download OWATray

http://www.owatray.com/

Location of Visual Studio Templates Directory

The location of the Visual Studio Templates Directory (when installed on Vista) is as follows:

C:\Users\<user>\Documents\Visual Studio <version>\Templates

Replace <user> with your username
<version> with the version of VS (in my case its 2008) so my path is:

C:\Users\ABrown\Documents\Visual Studio 2008\Templates

Show line numbers in Visual Studio 2008

I recently reset my settings in Visual Studio which, irritatingly, made my line numbers disappear.

To re-instate the line numbers, there is a simple process:

Click:
Tools > Options > Text Editor > All Languages > General

On the right, under Display section, check Line numbers (see below)

Click Ok.

Reset IDE settings in Visual Studio 2008

I recently acquired a PC at my new job where there was an existing installation of Visual Studio.

This was fine, however it was set up for a VB.net developer.
Whilst I do use VB.net, I didn’t want my VS set up this way.

I wanted to re-instate that lovely screen you see when you fresh install VS (below)

To do this, simply click:

Tools > Import and Export Settings Editor

Click Reset all settings

I didn’t backup my settings as the guy working here before had gone… But this screen gives you the option to.

And there we are.
All settings can be reset to a theme of your choice.

Use Notepad2 instead of original Notepad in Windows Vista

Notepad2 is my favourite text editor.
Eventually, I’ll get round to writing a post all about it.
Until then, you can read the Wikipedia page – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Notepad2

You can download Notepad2 from http://www.flos-freeware.ch/notepad2.html

Step 1)

Find c:\windows\notepad.exe and c:\windows\system32\notepad.exe (use Windows Explorer)

Change the owner of both files to “Administrators”
In case you are unsure…

Right click on notepad.exe, select properties, select the “Security” panel.
Click “Advanced”

In the resulting dialog, select the Owner tab, then click “Edit…”

Highlight “Administrators” and then click Ok.

Then, back in the Security panel (from start of step 1) click on the Edit button (below list of groups)

Select the Administrators group (see bottom left image below) then click the Full control checkbox, which should select all the other checkboxes.
Click ok.

Step 2)

Rename notepad2.exe to notepad.exe.
Fairly self explanatory – rename wherever you have unzipped notepad2.zip

Step 3)

Move the newly named notepad.exe into c:\windows and c:\windows\system32
Replace the existing notepad.exe with the new one.

Done

Windows will now use notepad2 as it would of used standard notepad.