srochford

I don't often read the Al Jazeera website but their TV news is generally pretty good - it's always interesting to see an "international" perspective on news

It's a very interesting experiment. At some point, all the people who provide "free content" have to work out how to pay for it. I'm not sure how the newspapers that have free websites will continue to survive - I don't know how much income they can generate from advertising and promotions on site. Given that most print newspapers are not making much profit they can't afford to pay for the websites for ever. Murdoch, on the other hand, has quite a lot of money. One of the reasons I've heard that News International wants to buy total control of Sky is so that he can use the money from that to subsidise the papers and websites (and eventually he just takes control of the planet!) The issue of comments on a web site is interesting - @jinnantonnix; points out that some people like reading them and this will bring people to a web site. You then have lots of free content to attract visitors (which is partly why Edugeek works so well - the vast majority of content here is contributed by people who do it for free and other people want to read that content because it's good)

I'm sure it is dangerous (not sure how accurate Wikipedia is for this but it seems to suggest that a 1W laser would be in class 4 which is the most dangerous class) but it's certainly not "the most dangerous laser ever created" Without getting into James Bond territory, there are plenty of much more powerful lasers. True, they're not normally sold as toys (the ones used for cutting metal etc can be in the kilowatt range) but it would be nice to have a little bit of accuracy in statements which use superlatives!

But Microsoft don't issue that key to you so they have no way of contacting you - they can contact Ramesys (or whoever) and it's them up to them to contact the people they allowed to use that key.

Oops! the oFile.delete line doesn't need the comma before true: oFile.delete true You can delete files in 2 ways: set ofSO=createobject("scripting.filesystemobject") set oFile=ofso.getfile("c:\temp\test1.txt") oFile.delete true and set ofSO=createobject("scripting.filesystemobject") sFile="c:\temp\test1.txt" oFSO.deletefile sFile, true - the first one doesn't take a comma between the object and the true; the second one takes a comma between the name and the true and I almost always get this wrong :-) Because I didn't want to delete stuff on my PC I didn't actually check the delete bit; sorry! Incidentally, the "true" is just a "force the deletion of this file" flag.

OK; same idea, Save this is cleanfiles.vbs and add it to startup scripts. Edit the sCheckDate line to the list of dates you're interested in - I've used | characters to delimit the dates (because no date will have that character) Run this on a test machine first - it will just show the names of files it's going to delete. Once you're confident it's the right list then delete the wscript.echo line (you don't want any text popping up at machine startup) and remove the ' (comment mark) from the start of the ofile.delete line. Just being nosy - are you in the US? Your dates are all in American format. It doesn't matter but that's why I've got the ShowDate function - like this I know that every date I handle will be year-month-day and I don't have to worry about regional settings. sRoot="c:\" sCheckDate="|2010-06-15|2010-03-20|" set oFSO=createobject("scripting.filesystemobject") set oFolder=ofso.getfolder(sRoot) for each oFile in oFolder.Files sDate=ShowDate(oFile.datecreated) wscript.echo sDate if instr(sCheckDate,sDate)<>0 then 'ofile.delete, true wscript.echo oFile.name end if next Function ShowDate(d) ShowDate=year(d)& "-" & right("0" & month(d),2) & "-" & right("0" & day(d),2) end function

OK; the above is a vbscript - you need to save it as copyfile.vbs (or other suitable name) The best thing to do would be to add it as a machine startup script - use group policy management and add this to the startup scripts for the OU containing machines where you want this to happen Is the C:\example.doc file already on the C: drive for every machine? If so, the script will work as is. If it's not there but you were going to copy it there and then put it in the Appdata folder then just change the C:\example.doc in the script to point to where the file is actually stored (eg \\server1\shareddocs\example1.doc) If you do do it like this then make sure that the folder and share allow "domain computers" read access.

A dictionary containing the correct spelling of drawers :-) (Draw - drawer - Awe)

That's not completely true - eg in the teacher scheme the pension is based on the salary for the last 3 years and it's similar in a lot of other schemes. It's also unrealistic to suggest that there are going to be many street cleaners who will have spent 25 years as a cleaner and will magically become director of cleaning services for the final year of their career (particularly as most of the street cleaning services are outsourced anyway!) Finally, if you look at any organisation, private or public, you'll find that the highest ranking jobs are held by those who are closer to retirement - it's pretty rare for someone to get a job as director at the age of 21 and then work their way down the management chain until they retire!! What we ought to be saying is not "how dreadful, public sector workers get a reasonable pension - we must take it away from them" but "how dreadful, private sector workers get a very poor pension - how can we make sure they get a better pension"

I've *never* known a machine to "lose" NTFS permissions so this sounds like something drastic! Can you give an example of the sort of thing which is changing? eg are sub-folders inheriting parent permissions when you thought that wasn't configured?

Not quite sure what you're trying to do but I think this might get you started. sRoot="c:\documents and settings\all users\application data\microsoft\" sFile="c:\example.doc" sCheckDate="2010-06-14" set oFSO=createobject("scripting.filesystemobject") set oFolder=ofso.getfolder(sRoot) for each oSubFolder in oFolder.subfolders sDate=ShowDate(oSubFolder.datecreated) if sDate=sCheckDate then ofso.copyfile sFile,sRoot & oSubFolder.name & "\" exit for end if next Function ShowDate(d) ShowDate=year(d)& "-" & right("0" & month(d),2) & "-" & right("0" & day(d),2) end function

I would think so but I'm not an expert and I don't think the risk is huge. As I understand it, there are always bacteria in the air and they breed when you get warmth and moisture so a warmish bottle of water could be a breeding ground. Normal tap water in the UK has small amounts of chlorine in it which kill the bacteria but (generally!) don't affect people. One of the supposed benefits of bottled mineral water is that you don't get that chlorine added but that does mean that bacteria could grow. Some countries add more chlorine to the water than we do - this is why the water tastes "funny" but it's normally safe to drink.

The big risk from the windscreen washer seems to be that you have a fine spray which you can then breathe in. Showering (sort of) with warm water isn't going to be such a big deal (you're not breathing in the spray and you're probably not keeping the water at a steady warm temperature so things can breed) I also wonder about the very expensive bottles of mineral water which people leave on their desks all day in the warm weather - how many bacteria are growing in them within a few hours of opening?? Still, at least there are no nasty chemicals in the bottle :-)

Yes, but one of the roles is "PDC emulator" - as far as "old" clients are concerned it is a PDC and it's also a role which matters!

Although 800Mb isn't much (and probably will prevent you installing SP2) it's not the end of the world - as a rough guide you should never drop below 10% free space on any drive so you're well above that but, as others have said, the simplest thing to do is to temporarily transfer the roles to another DC and then fix this server. I wouldn't actually bother resizing the partitions - if it's really only running DC roles then just wipe and reinstall - you get a nice clean install of Windows using the full drive as C: and it won't take much longer than the resize process.

Try the code below (you should be able to use your version with GetDetailsOf but I can't get it to work reliably (and it also returns the domain as part of the owner so that needs stripping out) How many people are likely to use this and how many files each? If the answer is "lots" and "lots" then might want to consider putting the files into folders for each user. 'make script continue if errors (will get errors if file open) on error resume next 'folder to process - make sure it has trailing \ sRoot="c:\temp\elonex\" 'connect to WMI on local computer (\\.\) Set oWMIService = GetObject("winmgmts:{impersonationLevel=impersonate}!\\.\root\cimv2") 'connect to filesystemobject and access folder to process set oFSO=createobject("scripting.filesystemobject") set oFolder=ofso.getfolder(sRoot) 'step through each file in turn for each oFile in oFolder.files 'get the owner sOwner=GetFileOwner(sRoot & oFile.name) 'has this file already been renamed if left(oFile.name,len(sOwner))<>sOwner then 'no, so work out the new name sNewName=sRoot & sOwner & "_" & ofile.name 'and rename it ofso.movefile sRoot & ofile.name , sNewName end if next Function GetFileOwner(sFile) 'use WMI to find the owner of the file Set colItems = oWMIService.ExecQuery("ASSOCIATORS OF {Win32_LogicalFileSecuritySetting='" & sFile & "'}" _ & " WHERE AssocClass=Win32_LogicalFileOwner ResultRole=Owner") 'WMI always returns a collection so get the item from it (will only ever be 1!) For Each oItem in colItems 'and return it to main prog GetFileOwner = oItem.AccountName Next End Function

You're basically describing a home directory - setup the user in Active Directory users and computers to have a home directory at (say) \\server\privateshare\%username% and make sure that the top share exists. The user directory will be created and then mapped to whatever letter you choose. the downside of this is that a user browsing the server will see \\server\privateshare\user1, \\server\privateshare\user2 etc this may not matter - if the permissions are right then they can't access the data but if you want to avoid this then you can turn on Access Based Enumeration - they will then only see their own folder.

Agreed and I really wish more people would use help but I think it's different from being taught the concepts. Styles (which I've liked ever since I found the "gallery" in Word for DOS!) are non-obvious but vital if you want to do word processing properly. If you're just wondering "how can I change font size" then F1 help will get you that but it probably won't ask you "what are you actually trying to do" and point you towards the "right" way of doing it. (what you need is a dancing paperclip saying "are you trying to design a layout that you might reuse or change in the future? If so, you need styles :-)")

As @tmcd35: says it's about looking for concepts and getting those across. A few examples: using styles for formatting (so you never underline a heading, you setup a style for headings which may include underlining and apply that. When you realise that underlining is naff, it's a moments work to change the style for outdented bold or whatever) working with lists (bullets, numbers) and the levels of list using outlining (really helpful to do this with styles and then table of contents) using and managing templates using fields and mailmerging by linking to external data (can be pretty easy; can be very complex) Depending on the level of user you might start this by teaching "this is how you do X in Word" and then moving on to "now find out how to do it in Open Office" or it might be "find out how to set up heading styles in Word, Open Office etc and then attach to these sample documents"

Err; are you sure about the incineration bit??? Pretty sure a key reason for using asbestos was that it doesn't burn ...

No help for XP but this is part of the reason why Vista and Windows 7 use KMS for licensing - if your key leaks it's easy to change the key on the server and every machine gets a new key when it next makes contact.

You almost certainly don't need it. It's a copy of what was previously in sysvol on that server. That ought to be exactly the same as on the other server but replication wasn't working properly so it's not the same - the folder is kept in case there's anything on server2 that's not on server1. If you're pretty sure that replication was OK when you last made policy changes then just delete it (and even if you're not sure you can delete it; there's no easy way to get back the stuff in a usable form!) The time command was shown wrongly in the example above - it should just be: net time /domain /set - you don't specify the name of the domain at all (it doesn't make sense to give a domain name; what you're saying is "find the time source for my domain and set this machine to match"). You only need to do it if there's a time error (w32tm) in the event log. (Incidentally, Server2003 and later support the w32tm command - you just type: w32tm /resync Finally, don't be afraid of dcpromo - provided that you've got at least one good working server as well as the one you're demoting there should be no problem. If you are worried, bring up another server (it can be virtual), dcpromo it so it is a DC and let it replicate. Once that's working OK you know you've got 2 working DCs and you can safely demote the other one. Good to hear it's all OK now :-)

Of course it's a difficult problem but it shouldn't be a "wow, we never thought that could possibly happen" type problem - if you dig a big hole in the ground and extract high pressure oil then there has to be a risk that something will go wrong. As it is, it looks like BP were just taking the mickey when they submitted their DR plan. Now, of course, whichever bit of the US government approved it should have checked it more carefully but ultimately BP wanted to make the money so BP should have been prepared to sort things out. BP might be doing all they can now but, as far as I can see, they weren't properly prepared and that's why it's taking so long. The biggest problem seems to be our old friends the bankers and their ilk. There's no real reason why BP shares should be falling through the floor. The company has huge amounts of money - far, far more than it will cost them to clean this up so there's no reason to expect financial disaster. I'm sure that in the long term it will become more expensive to drill for oil - the companies will have to put in place proper plans to deal with disasters and that will cost money but I don't see the whole oil industry collapsing.

Is any replication happening (eg if you change a user's details does that replicate) - you can check by targeting AD Users and Computers on server 1, making a change and then targeting at server 2 and seeing if the change has gone through. Run dcdiag to see what that says. If all else fails it's quick and easy to just dcpromo server 2 back to a standalone server, wait about an hour for things to settle (probably not necessary with only 1 other DC but if you have a multi-site setup you must wait long enough for all sites to synch) and then dcpromo back. The only time that this is a bad idea is when you have Exchange on a DC - it will break (and I think SQL server also breaks if it's on a DC which you dcpromo down/up) but from what you say there should be no problem.

Why shouldn't he speak out about companies that are destroying the planet? If presidents etc don't criticise the companies that are happy to make profits from oil extraction etc but aren't prepared to sort it out when things go wrong then we end up with situations like Bhopal. Boris Johnson (aka the "Idiot Mayor") was being interviewed this morning and basically said "it was an accident; we should leave them alone" Well, this might be OK when you're talking about kids who "accidentally" kick a football through a window but it's not OK when you're spilling this quantity of oil into the sea and have been doing so for over a month! BP (or whoever they want to sub-contract) should have had a proper disaster plan in place and that plan should have included all necessary equipment - we shouldn't have Tony Hayward wittering on about not having the right tools in the toolbox! It's not as if they're short of the money which would have bought those tools!!