SysMain and Superfetch

SysMain is the new process name for Superfetch (introduced in Windows Vista) in Windows 10. SysMain analyses applications that are frequently used and (pre-) loads them into RAM.  Processor cycles are used up to gain access to "compressed memory". To avoid CPU performance degradation, disable SysMain using services.msc.

Publish a Min SIZED PDF from Word (no DiscLOQ)

Word oft generates massive PDF files.

To generate a PDF of minimum size (and no DLOQ - discernible loss of quality) you can do Save As, select PDF, and More Options.

You will get an option to Optimize for -

- "Standard" as well as
- "Minimum size (publishing online)".

Select the latter and you will see the output file size reduce dramatically.

Change File Associations for PDF Files in Windows 10

Windows 10 automatically associates PDF files with the Edge browser. Unfortunately the Edge browser is not a very user-friendly browser.

To change this, go to Settings and select Default Apps, then Choose Default Applications by File Type. The latter feature takes a while to load. The left hand column thus displayed gives the file extension and the right hand column gives the application. Change Edge to Chrome and you are done.

Print Preview in Word - Control F2

Can be useful in finding mysterious blank pages inserted when saving a Word document as PDF.

Free Coding

Free Coding is analogous to free surfing and is where you just grab an IDE and code freely.

Change VS Theme

Tools -> Options -> Environment -> General -> Color Theme.

Virtualizing Legacy Hardware

Companies like Stromasys specialise in virtualizing legacy hardware. This allows software for DEC/PDP machines, for example, to run on modern Windows servers.

With hardware emulation, the legacy operating system and application(s) continue to run without any modifications or recompilation of code.

VS Live Share - New In 2019

Live Share is a new extension installed by default in Visual Studio 2019.  It can be disabled using Manage Extensions available from the Extensions menu. Live Share currently supports up to 30 people in one session.

Shift-ALT-Enter - The Magic of Full Screen Mode in Windows Forms

Hit Shift-ALT-Enter again to go back into "regular" viewing mode.

Antimalware Service Executable Gorging on CPU

The Antimalware Service Executable is part of Windows Defender. It can consume high CPU and RAM (120MB-140MB is not untypical) and render your machine unusable.

You can check its scheduled runs from "Task Scheduler". You can also gain an understanding of the Conditions under which it runs, from the "Conditions" tab in Task Scheduler. An example (and typical setting) may be "start the task only if the computer is on AC power".

The Microsoft Security blog underlings some of the thinking behind Windows Defender.

Bug Fixed in SSIS in Visual Studio 2019 Update 16.2.3

A bug in loading SSIS packages has been fixed in the latest update of Visual Studio 2019. SSIS refers to SQL Server Integration Services, an upgrade of Data Transformation Services, or DTS.

Handwriting and Voice Recognition Services from CTF Loader

The CTF Loader (which stands for "Collaborative Translation Framework") supports handwriting and voice recognition services and is used by Microsoft Office.

The IronPython Implementation

The IronPython implementation is different from regular Python.

For starters, it's built on top of the .NET Framework (in the same way that other .NET languages are built on top of the .NET Framework).  In this setup, Python stack frames and bytecode objects don't exist. Code objects cannot be pickled.

Another consequence is that C extension modules cannot be used from IronPython.

Mono - It's Come A Long Way!

Mono is a cross-platform open-source implementation of the .NET Framework. It is supported by the .NET Foundation.

Visual Studio Community 2019

This is more "full fledged" than Visual Studio Code, which is just an editor, not an IDE. Toolsets include one for "Data Science and Analytical Applications" using Python and F#. .NET Core Cross-Platform development is another toolset.

Shedding OpenDaylight onto Linux Open-So for Future Win-Impact

As Microsoft increasingly embraces open source as a source of growth rather than as competition, Win Joes around the world are familiarising themselves rapidly and immersing themselves in core open source initiatives which may have future impact on the Windows World.

A short selection:

OpenDaylight
Open vSwitch
OPNFV
OpenStack
Open Container Initiative
Cloud Native Computing Foundation

OpenDaylight is a core component of projects such as ONAP (Open Networking Automation Platform) which in turn is a great example of open collaboration within the telecoms community.

Understanding the Contro over Single Sign On

Single sign on (SSO) allows you to authenticate yourself to a variety of different but related systems.

LDAP is a technology typically used to implement this. LDAP is detailed in a series of IETF RFCs and has its roots in X.500 directory services.

As enterprises generally require different levels of secure access the term SSO has been criticised in favour of the term RSO or "reduced sign on".

Remote Desktop Protocol Vulnerability is Patched

A bug in RDP (nicknamed "BlueKeep") allows an unauthenticated attacker to connect to a system using RDP. This would allow arbitrary code execution on a target system.  Microsoft has released a fix for Windows 7 in Patch Tuesday. "Exploit Wednesday" has been an unofficial term for the window of opportunity post patch release when unpatched machines will be exploitable to cyberattack.

The Reviewing Toolbar in Word

In Word, the Reviewing toolbar appears under the header "Review" in the Ribbon. Changes can be viewed by clicking "Reviewing Pane" -> "Reviewing Pane Vertical" (or "Horizontal").

Is FOSS all its cracked up to be?

Dr Mark Tarver has written a great article on the downsides of FOSS.

Azure Logic Apps

Azure Logic Apps enable automation of business workflow in the cloud.

CRDTs and other Contemporary Distributed Data Types

A CRDT is a "conflict-free" replicated data type. 

The concepts was formalised in 2011 by Marc Shapiro and others. It's basically a data type which you can replicate across computers without any co-ordination (between replicas). Collaborative text editing was one of the motivating application areas. 

The NoSQL ("Not Only SQL") distributed database Redis has a CRDT data type.

"Cannot securely connect to this page" - Internet Explorer Error

This might be because the site uses outdated or unsafe TLS security settings. If this keeps happening, try contacting the website’s owner.  (TLS = "Transport Layer Security").

Hardware Virtualization must be enabled in the Bios, Nested Virtualization and other Docker Errors

Read more here.

"Something happened and we couldn't start the upgrade" - Windows Store

This can happen when upgrading to Windows 10 Pro. You may need to download and install from ISO image.

wsreset.exe

This resets the Windows Store Cache. Something to try if experiencing Windows Store errors.

KTH Prof Nilsson Lauds Go over Python and Java

KTH professor Stefan Nilsson lauds Go over Python and Java. He cites the language as being easier to learn with a specification of only 50 pages. It brings type safety like Java but easy readability like Python. Concurrency is also an integral part of Go supported by goroutines. Docker is written in Go. The background to Go's development is described here.

Windows 10 Pro Virtualization

Hyper-V technology allows you to create and run virtual machines on your Windows 10 PC.  It requires a 64-bit system with SLAT (Second-level address translation) capabilities and 2GB spare RAM. SLAT is a hardware-assisted virtualization scheme that is also known as "nested paging".

Keeping up with Virtualization Trends Impacting Windows Development and Administration

A good resource is Virtualization and Cloud Review. Recent articles have covered trends in SD-WAN (software defined networking in wide area networks).

What is DCIM in Tech?

DCIM can stand for

Digital Camera IMages

or

Data Center Infrastructure Management

Edge Browser Aligns with Chromium

Development of the Edge browser is now aligned with Chromium, the open source project behind Google Chrome and Chrome OS (a Linux kernel based operating system sponsored by Google).

Surface Hub 2S

Surface Hub 2S is a digital whiteboard from Microsoft (blog post here). It partners with a mobile stand from SteelCase. 2S is currently pending FCC approval.

Clear Temp Files in Windows 10

You never know, but you could be wasting about 300 GB of disk space upwards by temp files squatting on your machine. Hit the Windows Key, type in "temp" and invoke the cleanup from Windows Explorer.

Another way of tackling this is to right-click your Windows installation drive (say it is C: drive), go to General and select Disk Cleanup.

The latter technique will help you eliminate "general" temporary files as well as more "specialized" temporary files such as thumbnails, downloaded files, Delivery Optimisation files and DirectX Shader Cache files (files created by the graphics system to speed up load time).

Disk Management on Windows 10

Right click on the Start Menu and select Disk Management. This is a tool produced by Microsoft and VERITAS software. It will display your disks, their capacity and relevant filesystem (generally NTFS).

100% Disk on Windows 10

Superfetch is one source of excessive disk usage (formerly known as PreFetcher in Windows XP).

When it starts up, it preloads a bunch of data from your hard disk into RAM which slows down your computer - however, the intent is to make loading your frequently used applications faster by reducing boot time.

Approach One

To stop it, type in "Services" in the Windows start bar which opens the Services app (it's icon is two gears meshing, one large and one small).  Sort by Service Name (single click the Name column to apply the sort), find Superfetch, stop it and then disable it.

Approach Two

Alternatively, type net stop "Windows Search" at the command prompt. If you stopped it already via Approach One, you will get the message "The Windows Search service is not started".