Mike's Technical Blog

Health Supplements you should be taking

2024-01-20T22:37:00.000-08:00

Hello once again!

Here is a list of supplements you should likely be taking. Note that this is not medical advice, and some supplements are tolerated better by some people than others due to health / genetic factors. Generally, taking excessive amounts of supplements do not increase benefits, so stick to reasonable dosages.

There is some variation between male and female in terms of requirements, I'm more familiar with male physiology and supplementing. There are some supplements I will mention that are not OTC, or are special prescription, which I may or may not take myself, and are not freely available. These supplement types are generally more expensive and less accessible, but I will discuss them also.

Ideally you would start supplementing in your mid to late 20's. Most people only discover vitamins/supplements later in life when they begin to feel run-down, and by that point a lot of 'damage' has already been done to your body, which is accelerated with lifestyle type / activity. I'll also cover what NOT to take and why!

In Australia, many bulk nutrients are available from https://www.bulknutrients.com.au

Ok here is the list of supplements suitable for 30+

-----------

1. Creatine monohydrate.

A cheap / bulk and accessible product.

Dosage, initial loading is around 10g per day (so approximately 5 heaped teaspoons of dry powder mixed into water). Some suggest 0.3g/kg for first 5-7 days but that seems excessive, for a 100kg person that is 30g a day.

After about two weeks, reduce to a maintenace dose of 3-5g or 1-2 teaspoons of creatine monohydrate.

Good effects:

1. Creatine helps supply energy to your muscles via ATP / Adenosine triphosphate (ATP). During intense exercise ATP is rapidly depleted and must be re-synthesized by the body normally in a continuous fashion. ATP performs muscle contraction. Because creatine can increase phosphocreatine levels and therefore increases ATP energy production, it is one of the few supplements that is proven to increase strength and power.

2. There is some evidence that creatine could be beneficial for brain health also. Creatine supplementation can improve cognition and memory, especially in older adults or during times of metabolic stress (i.e., sleep deprivation).

Poor Side effects:

1. The most serious would be that Creatine might worsen kidney dysfunction in people with kidney disorders, creatine doesn't appear to affect kidney function in healthy people. In general it is very well tolerated in healthy individuals even at very high dosages of 50g/day over 5 years.

2. Stomach upset / digestive issues / loose stools etc. Creatine can initially take some adaption by your body, it does increase water retention in muscles throughout the body. (Which is why bodybuilders like the bulking factor to appear bigger). This water retention in the muscle fibres etc. MAY allow nutrients to be better absorbed by muscles and metabolic waste products to be flushed out faster, but that is speculation.

3. Non-responders. Some people may not respond well to creatine, probably due to genetic makeup. The vast majority of people however should benefit however.

Taurine

Taurine prevented weight gain, reduced fasting blood glucose, and markers of liver damage, increased bone density in the spine and legs, and improved the health of their immune system.

Dosage: 1000-2000mg per day (1-2g)

Vitamin K2 + D3

Using Windows command prompt to put a machine to sleep

2020-02-11T19:20:00.000-08:00

I ran into a problem where a machine was no longer responding to the sleep selection in the GUI on Windows 7 Ultimate.

An alternative way to sleep the machine is to utilize the command-line (create a shortcut to a .cmd script that contains the instruction) as follows:

Open an Administration Command Prompt. Hit the “WINDOWS” key once and start typing “CMD”. Right click on the “Command Prompt” item that is displayed and select “Run as Administrator”.

Ensure the machine doesn't hibernate as we're trying to sleep it:

POWERCFG /HIBERNATE OFF

(The above may fail depending on policy if on domain etc.)

RUNDLL32.EXE powrprof.dll,SetSuspendState 0,1,0

With some machines, you may have to briefly press a power button once to wake the machine back up. It should return in a locked state, requiring login/password.

Exciting New Products!

2017-10-20T17:05:00.002-07:00

Amazon have recently released their Echo Dot, it is fair to say these things are selling like hot-cakes currently. All the cool kids have them!

Available in white: Amazon Echo Dot

Or black: Amazon Echo Dot (Black)

Echo Dot (2nd Generation) is a hands-free, voice-controlled device that uses Alexa to play music, control smart home devices, make calls, send and receive messages, provide information, read the news, set alarms, read audiobooks from Audible, control Amazon Video on Fire TV, and more We are also seeing more in-home devices appearing en-mass, like Google Home appear.

Pure enrichment - Ultrasonic Cool Mist Humidifier

Health Supplements, actually worth taking...

2017-06-08T04:26:00.003-07:00

Ok, I take a number of supplements, some might argue too many, but most are carefully thought out and I will point out why. I also don't believe in paying a fortune for supplements where necessary and have narrowed down the ones I believe are still high quality, whilst retaining value.

I'm in my mid 40's these days, and these have kept me going. I'll create a list and describe why I take each supplement or vitamin also:

Vitamins:

Swisse ZINC+
Dosage: One tablet daily during or after a meal. Morning preferred.
Reason: Supports immune function / Healthy skin & Reproductive Health

Nature's Own Mega Potency Men's Multivitamin 60 Tablets
Dosage: One tablet daily, probably best taken in the morning.
Reason: Mega Potency Men's Multivitamin is a concentrated formula of vitamins, minerals, herbs and nutrients designed to meet the specific physiological needs of men.
- Assists with energy production
- Supports cardiovascular health
- Supports a healthy immune system

Additional Supplements

The Malware Museum

2016-03-01T19:38:00.001-08:00

The Malware Museum

by: Mikko Hypponen

Experience what viruses/Malware looked like in the 80's / 90's

The Malware Museum

Restoring car plastic headlights / tail-lights

2016-02-28T04:58:00.003-08:00

Well I picked this up today. Meguiar's PlastX. Clear plastic cleaner and polish. Both headlights had done a bad fade, and one was even a bit yellow-looking and foggy. I was a bit skeptical about these products, and Meguiars sell a full restoration pack that was more expensive, and looked pretty involved. The PlastX was pretty expensive at $27 or so a bottle.

I'd already cleaned the car earlier in the day. Using an old clean woven collared shirt, I applied dabs of this in relatively small circles with a bit of rubbing action, then both clock-wise and anti-clockwise to a thin film. Left it to setup and start drying, then buffed the headlight with a microfibre cloth (well polished then buffed). Just as you would with a car wax/polish really, but with a bit more forceful rubbing action. This resulted in some light yellow/brown left on the initial woven material, which was the oxidation/dirt contamination coming out.

I was blown away by the result, was far better than I had expected. The headlight was immediately cleared, and looked near new. Did both headlights twice, then the tail-lights (which were in much better shape). The result looks like new.

So for removing oxidation and cloudiness from non-coated plastics, I can highly recommend this PlastX stuff. I also used it on some other acrylic I had and a motorcycle windshield. It is great on things like plastic headlights to bring them back to near-new. It is more of a cleaner however, than a polish, it cannot remove light to deep scratching unfortunately, you would probably require something a bit more specific for that, and a lot more elbow grease to get a perfect result.

Overall 9/10 for Meguiars however for a regular faded headlight scenario (non-coated). It is a pretty specific product however, you can't just go dabbing it all over the car, it is for those specific types of plastics and that's about it.

2016-02-08T05:41:00.003-08:00

The Witness Game is released on PC

Finally The Witness has been released for MS Windows and the Playstation 4 as of January 26th 2016 and is now available for download etc. The iOS version is scheduled to release at a later date.

Oh the irony! The game is a homage and inspired by games like Myst (Robyn and Rand Miller, which was developed by Cyan, Inc. and published by Brøderbund in 1993 for the Mac) and Riven. It seems the Apple platform will be the last to receive the game.

2015-12-07T23:28:00.001-08:00

Random life advice blog today:

This applies to men or women, the only disposable razor worth using in my opinion, are the Gillette Blue II PLUS. Sometimes you can pick these up for 0.60c for two on special which is a bargain and a half, equivalent to $1.50 for 5 (Pack of 5 normally sells anywhere from $3.80 - $8.50!).

The new ones are Chromium coated, to try and stop the blade dulling too quickly and rusting. Realistically I'd recommend 2-3 full shaves from these, but some people just keep using them till they start rusting. I figure they're pretty dull by that stage and I hate a dull shave.

These shave so easily and produce an awesome clean-cut result, they have a small pad of material on them that when wet does a good job of lubricating the skin, but use lots of soap, strangely liquid soap works amazingly well...

When using a blade, you will almost always open up tiny micro-cuts on your face, often evidenced by blood spots if you use a paper towel to dry. Only once or twice have I avoided this, even when being extra careful.

Under no circumstances buy the BIC shavers, they are cheap rubbish and will tear up your face, I'm guessing only people with leather faces can use them successfully... stick with the Gillette ones instead.

Trick to getting a great razor face shave:

1. If possible have a 10 minutes or so warm soapy shower first. This causes your facial hairs to absorb moisture and they are way easier to cut, it also gets your skin clean which is healthy due to the micro-cuts mentioned above, preventing bacteria entering your bloodstream etc. Move onto step 2.

2. If not possible, rinse the face repeatedly with hot (not scalding) water. Rub in some soap and shaving cream over all areas you intend to shave. Keep the tap running hot, and dip the disposable razor under the running water, shave, repeat. This flushes the cut hair out of the razor leading to a superior cut.

3. If you intend keeping the razor, rinse it thoroughly with some soapy water, wave it around a bit to air dry it then put somewhere cool and dry to dry out, this prevents it rusting. Razors like this dull very quickly (as they are designed to do), so you will have to experiment to see how many shaves you can get with one, if you have any difficulty shaving with it, dispose of it immediately as it is probably done. The moisturising pad is unlikely to last more than 2-3 shaves.

Windows Time Service

2015-11-02T19:10:00.000-08:00

Time. Particularly important with servers. It is amazing how frequently servers/workstations and other imbedded devices have their time not set, or set incorrectly. These incorrect time settings can lead to very strange behaviour in terms of side-effects, including authentication failures etc.Windows now provides w32tm to configure the Windows Time service.

USAGE:

C:\Windows\System32>w32tm
w32tm [/? | /register | /unregister ]
? - this help screen.
register - register to run as a service and add default
configuration to the registry.
unregister - unregister service and remove all configuration
information from the registry.

w32tm /monitor [/domain:]
[/computers:[,[,...]]]
[/threads:] [/ipprotocol:<4>] [/nowarn]
domain - specifies which domain to monitor. If no domain name
is given, or neither the domain nor computers option is
specified, the default domain is used. This option may be
used more than once.
computers - monitors the given list of computers. Computer
names are separated by commas, with no spaces. If a name is
prefixed with a '*', it is treated as an AD PDC. This option
may be used more than once.
threads - how many computers to analyze simultaneously. The
default value is 3. Allowed range is 1-50.
ipprotocol - specify the IP protocol to use. The default is
to use whatever is available.
nowarn - skip warning message.

w32tm /ntte
Convert a NT system time, in (10^-7)s intervals from 0h 1-Jan 1601,
into a readable format.

w32tm /ntpte
Convert an NTP time, in (2^-32)s intervals from 0h 1-Jan 1900, into
a readable format.

w32tm /resync [/computer:] [/nowait] [/rediscover] [/soft]
Tell a computer that it should resynchronize its clock as soon
as possible, throwing out all accumulated error statistics.
computer: - computer that should resync. If not
specified, the local computer will resync.
nowait - do not wait for the resync to occur;
return immediately. Otherwise, wait for the resync to
complete before returning.
rediscover - redetect the network configuration and rediscover
network sources, then resynchronize.
soft - resync utilizing existing error statistics. Not useful,
provided for compatibility.

w32tm /stripchart /computer: [/period:]
[/dataonly] [/samples:] [/packetinfo] [/ipprotocol:<4>]
Display a strip chart of the offset between this computer and
another computer.
computer: - the computer to measure the offset against.
period: - the time between samples, in seconds. The
default is 2s
dataonly - display only the data, no graphics.
samples: - collect samples, then stop. If not
specified, samples will be collected until Ctrl-C is pressed.
packetinfo - print out NTP packet response message.
ipprotocol - specify the IP protocol to use. The default is
to use whatever is available.

w32tm /config [/computer:] [/update]
[/manualpeerlist:] [/syncfromflags:]
[/LocalClockDispersion:]
[/reliable:(YES|NO)]
[/largephaseoffset:]
computer: - adjusts the configuration of . If not
specified, the default is the local computer.
update - notifies the time service that the configuration has
changed, causing the changes to take effect.
manualpeerlist: - sets the manual peer list to ,
which is a space-delimited list of DNS and/or IP addresses.
When specifying multiple peers, this switch must be enclosed in
quotes.
syncfromflags: - sets what sources the NTP client should
sync from. should be a comma separated list of
these keywords (not case sensitive):
MANUAL - sync from peers in the manual peer list
DOMHIER - sync from an AD DC in the domain hierarchy
NO - sync from none
ALL - sync from both manual and domain peers
LocalClockDispersion: - configures the accuracy of the
internal clock that w32time will assume when it can't acquire
time from its configured sources.
reliable:(YES|NO) - set whether this machine is a reliable time source.
This setting is only meaningful on domain controllers.
YES - this machine is a reliable time service
NO - this machine is not a reliable time service
largephaseoffset: - sets the time difference between
local and network time which w32time will consider a spike.

w32tm /tz
Display the current time zone settings.

w32tm /dumpreg [/subkey:] [/computer:]
Display the values associated with a given registry key.
The default key is HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\W32Time
(the root key for the time service).
subkey: - displays the values associated with subkey
of the default key.
computer: - queries registry settings for computer .

w32tm /query [/computer:]
{/source | /configuration | /peers | /status}
[/verbose]
Display a computer's windows time service information.
computer: - query the information of . If not
specified, the default is the local computer.
source: display the time source.
configuration: display the configuration of run-time and where
the setting comes from. In verbose mode, display the undefined
or unused setting too.
peers: display a list of peers and their status.
status: display windows time service status.
verbose: set the verbose mode to display more information.

w32tm /debug {/disable | {/enable /file: /size: /entries:
[/truncate]}}
Enable or disable local computer windows time service private log.
disable: disable the private log.
enable: enable the private log.
file: - specify the absolute filename.
size: - specify the maximum size for circular logging.
entries: - contains a list of flags, specified by number and
seperated by commas, that specify the types of information that
should be logged. Valid numbers are 0 to 300. A range of numbers
is valid, in addition to single numbers, such as 0-100,103,106.
Value 0-300 is for logging all information.
truncate: truncate the file if it exists.

C:\Windows\System32>

EXAMPLES:

C:\WINDOWS\system32>w32tm /query /status
Leap Indicator: 0(no warning)
Stratum: 5 (secondary reference - syncd by (S)NTP)
Precision: -6 (15.625ms per tick)
Root Delay: 0.3588715s
Root Dispersion: 1.6956445s
ReferenceId: 0x0A2DFB16 (source IP: 10.45.251.22)
Last Successful Sync Time: 2/11/2015 1:07:37 PM
Source: SERVERDC4.corp.somecomp.org
Poll Interval: 15 (32768s)

C:\WINDOWS\system32>w32tm /tz
Time zone: Current:TIME_ZONE_ID_UNKNOWN Bias: -480min (UTC=LocalTime+Bias)
[Standard Name:"W. Australia Standard Time" Bias:0min Date:(unspecified)]
[Daylight Name:"W. Australia Daylight Time" Bias:-60min Date:(unspecified)]

C:\WINDOWS\system32>

C:\WINDOWS\system32>w32tm /query /configuration
[Configuration]

EventLogFlags: 2 (Local)
AnnounceFlags: 10 (Local)
TimeJumpAuditOffset: 28800 (Local)
MinPollInterval: 10 (Local)
MaxPollInterval: 15 (Local)
MaxNegPhaseCorrection: 4294967295 (Local)
MaxPosPhaseCorrection: 4294967295 (Local)
MaxAllowedPhaseOffset: 300 (Local)

FrequencyCorrectRate: 4 (Local)
PollAdjustFactor: 5 (Local)
LargePhaseOffset: 50000000 (Local)
SpikeWatchPeriod: 900 (Local)
LocalClockDispersion: 10 (Local)
HoldPeriod: 5 (Local)
PhaseCorrectRate: 1 (Local)
UpdateInterval: 30000 (Local)

[TimeProviders]

NtpClient (Local)
DllName: C:\WINDOWS\system32\w32time.dll (Local)
Enabled: 1 (Local)
InputProvider: 1 (Local)
CrossSiteSyncFlags: 2 (Local)
AllowNonstandardModeCombinations: 1 (Local)
ResolvePeerBackoffMinutes: 15 (Local)
ResolvePeerBackoffMaxTimes: 7 (Local)
CompatibilityFlags: 2147483648 (Local)
EventLogFlags: 1 (Local)
LargeSampleSkew: 3 (Local)
SpecialPollInterval: 3600 (Local)
Type: NT5DS (Local)

VMICTimeProvider (Local)
DllName: C:\WINDOWS\System32\vmictimeprovider.dll (Local)
Enabled: 1 (Local)
InputProvider: 1 (Local)
NtpServer (Local)
DllName: C:\WINDOWS\system32\w32time.dll (Local)
Enabled: 0 (Local)
InputProvider: 0 (Local)

C:\WINDOWS\system32>w32tm /dumpreg

Value Name Value Type Value Data
--------------------------------------------------------

DisplayName REG_SZ @%SystemRoot%\system32\w32time.dll,-200
ImagePath REG_EXPAND_SZ %SystemRoot%\system32\svchost.exe -k LocalService
Description REG_SZ @%SystemRoot%\system32\w32time.dll,-201
ObjectName REG_SZ NT AUTHORITY\LocalService
ErrorControl REG_DWORD 1
Start REG_DWORD 3
Type REG_DWORD 32
ServiceSidType REG_DWORD 1
RequiredPrivileges REG_MULTI_SZ SeAuditPrivilege, SeChangeNotifyPrivilege, SeCreateGlobalPrivilege, SeSystemTimePrivilege
FailureActions REG_BINARY 80510100000000000000000003000000140000000100000060EA000001000000C0D401000000000000000000

C:\WINDOWS\system32>w32tm /query /peers /verbose
#Peers: 1

Peer: SERVERDC4.corp.somecorp.org
State: Active
Time Remaining: 18415.1477639s
Mode: 3 (Client)
Stratum: 4 (secondary reference - syncd by (S)NTP)
PeerPoll Interval: 15 (32768s)
HostPoll Interval: 15 (32768s)
Last Successful Sync Time: 3/11/2015 7:19:52 AM
LastSyncError: 0x00000000 (Succeeded)
LastSyncErrorMsgId: 0x00000000 (Succeeded)
AuthTypeMsgId: 0x0000005B (NtDigest )
Resolve Attempts: 0
ValidDataCounter: 8
Reachability: 255

C:\WINDOWS\system32>w32tm /query /status /verbose
Leap Indicator: 0(no warning)
Stratum: 5 (secondary reference - syncd by (S)NTP)
Precision: -6 (15.625ms per tick)
Root Delay: 0.4368744s
Root Dispersion: 0.8876993s
ReferenceId: 0x0A2DFB16 (source IP: 10.45.251.22)
Last Successful Sync Time: 3/11/2015 7:20:09 AM
Source: SERVERDC4.corp.somecorp.org
Poll Interval: 15 (32768s)

Phase Offset: -0.0028613s
ClockRate: 0.0156001s
State Machine: 2 (Sync)
Time Source Flags: 2 (Authenticated )
Server Role: 0 (None)
Last Sync Error: 0 (The command completed successfully.)
Time since Last Good Sync Time: 14409.8748353s

C:\WINDOWS\system32>

Windows Management Instrumentation Command-line (WMIC) usage

2015-10-19T01:05:00.000-07:00

Windows nowadays provides Windows Management Instrumentation Command-line (WMIC).

This is a useful command-line driven tool. Here are some usage examples under Windows 7 Enterprise x64, and WMIC usage output:

-------

[global switches] The following global switches are available: /NAMESPACE Path for the namespace the alias operate against. /ROLE Path for the role containing the alias definitions. /NODE Servers the alias will operate against. /IMPLEVEL Client impersonation level. /AUTHLEVEL Client authentication level. /LOCALE Language id the client should use. /PRIVILEGES Enable or disable all privileges. /TRACE Outputs debugging information to stderr. /RECORD Logs all input commands and output. /INTERACTIVE Sets or resets the interactive mode. /FAILFAST Sets or resets the FailFast mode. /USER User to be used during the session. /PASSWORD Password to be used for session login. /OUTPUT Specifies the mode for output redirection. /APPEND Specifies the mode for output redirection. /AGGREGATE Sets or resets aggregate mode. /AUTHORITY Specifies the for the connection. /?[:] Usage information. For more information on a specific global switch, type: switch-name /? The following alias/es are available in the current role: ALIAS - Access to the aliases available on the local system BASEBOARD - Base board (also known as a motherboard or system board) management. BIOS - Basic input/output services (BIOS) management. BOOTCONFIG - Boot configuration management. CDROM - CD-ROM management. COMPUTERSYSTEM - Computer system management. CPU - CPU management. CSPRODUCT - Computer system product information from SMBIOS. DATAFILE - DataFile Management. DCOMAPP - DCOM Application management. DESKTOP - User's Desktop management. DESKTOPMONITOR - Desktop Monitor management. DEVICEMEMORYADDRESS - Device memory addresses management. DISKDRIVE - Physical disk drive management. DISKQUOTA - Disk space usage for NTFS volumes. DMACHANNEL - Direct memory access (DMA) channel management. ENVIRONMENT - System environment settings management. FSDIR - Filesystem directory entry management. GROUP - Group account management. IDECONTROLLER - IDE Controller management. IRQ - Interrupt request line (IRQ) management. JOB - Provides access to the jobs scheduled using the schedule service. LOADORDER - Management of system services that define execution dependencies. LOGICALDISK - Local storage device management. LOGON - LOGON Sessions. MEMCACHE - Cache memory management. MEMORYCHIP - Memory chip information. MEMPHYSICAL - Computer system's physical memory management. NETCLIENT - Network Client management. NETLOGIN - Network login information (of a particular user) management. NETPROTOCOL - Protocols (and their network characteristics) management. NETUSE - Active network connection management. NIC - Network Interface Controller (NIC) management. NICCONFIG - Network adapter management. NTDOMAIN - NT Domain management. NTEVENT - Entries in the NT Event Log. NTEVENTLOG - NT eventlog file management. ONBOARDDEVICE - Management of common adapter devices built into the motherboard (system board). OS - Installed Operating System/s management. PAGEFILE - Virtual memory file swapping management. PAGEFILESET - Page file settings management. PARTITION - Management of partitioned areas of a physical disk. PORT - I/O port management. PORTCONNECTOR - Physical connection ports management. PRINTER - Printer device management. PRINTERCONFIG - Printer device configuration management. PRINTJOB - Print job management. PROCESS - Process management. PRODUCT - Installation package task management. QFE - Quick Fix Engineering. QUOTASETTING - Setting information for disk quotas on a volume. RDACCOUNT - Remote Desktop connection permission management. RDNIC - Remote Desktop connection management on a specific network adapter. RDPERMISSIONS - Permissions to a specific Remote Desktop connection. RDTOGGLE - Turning Remote Desktop listener on or off remotely. RECOVEROS - Information that will be gathered from memory when the operating system fails. REGISTRY - Computer system registry management. SCSICONTROLLER - SCSI Controller management. SERVER - Server information management. SERVICE - Service application management. SHADOWCOPY - Shadow copy management. SHADOWSTORAGE - Shadow copy storage area management. SHARE - Shared resource management. SOFTWAREELEMENT - Management of the elements of a software product installed on a system. SOFTWAREFEATURE - Management of software product subsets of SoftwareElement. SOUNDDEV - Sound Device management. STARTUP - Management of commands that run automatically when users log onto the computer system. SYSACCOUNT - System account management. SYSDRIVER - Management of the system driver for a base service. SYSTEMENCLOSURE - Physical system enclosure management. SYSTEMSLOT - Management of physical connection points including ports, slots and peripherals, and proprietary connections points. TAPEDRIVE - Tape drive management. TEMPERATURE - Data management of a temperature sensor (electronic thermometer). TIMEZONE - Time zone data management. UPS - Uninterruptible power supply (UPS) management. USERACCOUNT - User account management. VOLTAGE - Voltage sensor (electronic voltmeter) data management. VOLUME - Local storage volume management. VOLUMEQUOTASETTING - Associates the disk quota setting with a specific disk volume. VOLUMEUSERQUOTA - Per user storage volume quota management. WMISET - WMI service operational parameters management. For more information on a specific alias, type: alias /? CLASS - Escapes to full WMI schema. PATH - Escapes to full WMI object paths. CONTEXT - Displays the state of all the global switches. QUIT/EXIT - Exits the program. For more information on CLASS/PATH/CONTEXT, type: (CLASS | PATH | CONTEXT) /?
Here is a way to dump lots of system detail. These are two .cmd script text files you can make yourself.
Run these for lots of interesting system details. Of course it is possible to fire these commands by other
methods for programming.

>type wmic_bios_get.cmd echo off wmic bios get BiosCharacteristics wmic bios get BuildNumber wmic bios get CodeSet wmic bios get CurrentLanguage wmic bios get Description wmic bios get IdentificationCode wmic bios get InstallDate wmic bios get InstallableLanguages wmic bios get LanguageEdition wmic bios get ListOfLanguages wmic bios get Manufacturer wmic bios get Name wmic bios get OtherTarget OS wmic bios get PrimaryBIOS wmic bios get ReleaseDate wmic bios get SMBIOSBIOSVersion wmic bios get SMBIOSMajorVersion wmic bios get SMBIOSMinorVersion wmic bios get SMBIOSPresent wmic bios get SerialNumber wmic bios get SoftwareElementID wmic bios get SoftwareElementState wmic bios get Status wmic bios get Target OperatingSystem wmic bios get Version >type wmic_computersystem_get.cmd @echo off wmic computersystem get AdminPasswordStatus wmic computersystem get AutomaticResetBootOption wmic computersystem get AutomaticResetCapability wmic computersystem get BootOptionOnLimit wmic computersystem get BootOptionOnWatchDog wmic computersystem get BootROMSupported wmic computersystem get BootupState wmic computersystem get Caption wmic computersystem get ChassisBootupState wmic computersystem get CreationClassName wmic computersystem get CurrentTimeZone wmic computersystem get DaylightInEffect wmic computersystem get Description wmic computersystem get Domain wmic computersystem get DomainRole wmic computersystem get EnableDaylightSavingsTime wmic computersystem get FrontPanelResetStatus wmic computersystem get InfraredSupported wmic computersystem get InitialLoadInfo wmic computersystem get InstallDate wmic computersystem get KeyboardPasswordStatus wmic computersystem get LastLoadInfo wmic computersystem get Manufacturer wmic computersystem get Model wmic computersystem get Name wmic computersystem get NameFormat wmic computersystem get NetworkServerModeEnabled wmic computersystem get NumberOfProcessors wmic computersystem get OEMStringArray wmic computersystem get PartOfDomain wmic computersystem get PauseAfterReset wmic computersystem get PowerManagementCapabilities wmic computersystem get PowerManagementSupported wmic computersystem get PowerOnPasswordStatus wmic computersystem get PowerState wmic computersystem get PowerSupplyState wmic computersystem get PrimaryOwnerContact wmic computersystem get PrimaryOwnerName wmic computersystem get ResetCapability wmic computersystem get ResetCount wmic computersystem get ResetLimit wmic computersystem get Roles wmic computersystem get Status wmic computersystem get SupportContactDescription wmic computersystem get SystemStartupDelay wmic computersystem get SystemStartupOptions wmic computersystem get SystemStartupSetting wmic computersystem get SystemType wmic computersystem get ThermalState wmic computersystem get TotalPhysicalMemory wmic computersystem get UserName wmic computersystem get WakeUpType wmic computersystem get Workgroup

Silent Boot Android devices to Avoid Startup Sound

2015-10-07T19:57:00.002-07:00

(Because nothing screams high-technology, than high-technology screaming at you...)

Samsung devices have an annoying Windows 98 like startup sound. This can be silenced in most cases by using an app from the Google Play store called Silent Boot by Anton Weber. Install, setup, and enjoy the silence...

Silent Boot application in the Google Play Store

Microsoft launch a direct assault on the Apple MacBook with Surface Book offering.

2015-10-07T18:56:00.001-07:00

A planetary bombardment and ground (Surface) assault commences...

Surface Book Specs

Microsoft have launched their assault on the MacBook / Pro line with their new Surface Book
offering, a quasi-laptop, quasi-tablet with high end specs.

Starting at a price-point of $1499 USD for the i5 / 8GB version. Running Windows 10 Pro of course, with a 30 day Office trial.

If you have a wad of spare cash and nowhere to spend it, you could consider the i7 / 16GB nVidia version for a mere $2699 USD (A whopping $3752 AUD at present)

The Register muses on the Surface Book

Disabling autoplay of HTML5 media / videos in Firefox

2015-10-07T12:30:00.001-07:00

To disable HTML5 auto-media playing for videos etc. on webpages.

In the address bar type "about.config"

Accept the warning if you choose to.

In the Search field start typing "media.autoplay" it should bring up

"media.autoplay.enabled"

This is a boolean and is probably set to "true". Double-click it and it will
change to "false" and will bold the line to show it has been changed.

Close the window, and hopefully enjoy non-autoplaying videos.

This process is also very similar on mobile editions of FireFox. Where by default,
(annoyingly) the setting also seems to be set true.

Note that this covers HTML5 only and not player plug-ins like Adobe Flash.

Using "taskkill" from a Windows command prompt

2015-10-05T23:50:00.000-07:00

Taskkill is a useful windows command-line driven tool for shutting down processes in scripts, or manually via the shell. It can be called using a .bat / .cmd or within PowerShell if desired. Here is the usage instruction for the tool in Windows 7 Enterprise.

So for example. You want to shut down all your Internet Explorer instances because it is chewing serious quantities of memory on the system. Sometimes you will note that in Task Manager (under the Processes tab) there are still iexplore.exe processes present that seem orphaned and are not responding to the application shutdown, even though you've closed off all visible windows.

In this case you could click on say, all 20 iexplore.exe processes in Task Manager and individually kill them (time consuming!). It is also a hard kill in Taskman.

An easier way to do this is via taskkill as administrator in a Command prompt. The first kill is a "soft" kill. I will often send it a second one to give the process a chance to exit gracefully. The third command with the "/F" is a force termination to signal the kernel to really kill that process image (or any bearing it's process name) immediately. "/IM" is the Image Name.. full process name expressed in quotes.

Using the /S and probably /U option you can also execute taskkill on remote machines which can prove useful, obviously care must be taken to hit the right processes.

Source for high-quality Japanese Rubycon capacitors.

2015-10-05T00:28:00.002-07:00

Carefully dissassembled a Pioneer DVD player. Model DV-3022V. I wasn't expecting much but
wanted to scope out the components and assembly method.

The engineering on this thing is to the point, simple and superb for duty with 3 main separate modules. What blew me away was what I found on the power module. Some of the best quality electrolytic caps you can buy, that cost quite a bit from places like RS. Japanese-made Rubycon capacitors, which are highly reliable and not subject to capacitor plague issues.

In total there are 6 small to medium black electrolytic caps of various values on the power module. This is a working DVD unit with no remote. These are a great source of quality caps and people are just tossing them out these days, so they can be sourced for free in many cases.

In addition, many DVD units would spend most of their life switched off or on stand-by so the caps have very likely had a pretty easy life with low power-cycles.

The other caps on the main-board there are called Aishi, or similar. They are probably of reasonable quality, but are no Rubycon, or Nichicon (another good Japanese brand). Pioneer.. take a bow, I never expected to find high quality components in what we would consider a cheap consumer device.

iPhone 6S: Cost to manufacture

2015-10-02T16:49:00.001-07:00

CNN Money reports that the iPhone 6S costs $245 (USD) to build, yet retails for $649 USD or 2.649 times the manufacturing cost.

http://money.cnn.com/video/technology/2015/09/25/iphone-6s-teardown.cnnmoney?iid=EL

Amazingly the Nexus 6 is being pitched as a direct competitor at the very similar retail price point of $669.Presumably it's manufacturing cost is in a similar or even slightly cheaper realm than the iPhone 6S.

These prices are for off-contract outright phone buys obviously. There is the R&D, testing, licensing, marketing, market research involved and store presentation etc. to consider, but if these companies can make 2.5x plus the manufacturing cost of the handsets then there is some significant fat there in profit, and they are not wholly reliant on things like Apple Store or Google Play / Google Apps to make a profit for their high-end handset products.

Skype Outage Info

2015-09-29T15:56:00.002-07:00

Skype Outage Official Update 22/09/2015

Apple Admits To Big iOS 9 Problem

2015-09-23T02:02:00.000-07:00

Apple Admits To Big iOS 9 Problem

iOS 9 is causing some iOS-supporting devices to lock-up during upgrade...

The recommended course of action, is to now upgrade to iOS 9.0.1 instead.

Apple Support Official Warning

Installing PowerShell version 4.0

2015-09-23T00:38:00.006-07:00

Installing PowerShell v4.0

PowerShell v4.0 is not offered as a separate download by Microsoft. In order to install, you will need to install the Windows Management Framework 4.0 at the following Microsoft link:

Windows Management Framework 4.0

Further info on what the files are is located here:

TechNet How to Install PowerShell 4.0

This also ties into Microsoft Windows Powershell Desired State Configuration (DSC) for end-point machines:

This release became available: Version 1.0 - 28/05/2015

Windows 7 x64 (and Server 2008 R2) will require the following package:

Windows6.1-KB2819745-x64-MultiPkg.msu

Prerequisites for Windows 7 include:

Windows 7 SP1
.NET 4.5

Microsoft .NET Framework 4.5 is located here if required:

Microsoft .NET Framework 4.5

Launching a Powershell script from the command-line

2015-09-21T18:53:00.001-07:00

Launching a Powershell script from the command-line

This is assuming that Powershell is already in your path. This can be confirmed by performing:

C:\>echo %PATH%

Within that path, you should find something like this, if the Powershell executable location is missing from your PATH you should add it into into your path in Windows:

;C:\WINDOWS\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\;

I'll often create a wrapper file (.cmd extension) called something meaningful like "launch_installer.cmd". This command file when executed, fires the Powershell command like so:

powershell -noprofile -executionpolicy bypass -command "& {C:\temp\Installer.ps1}"

You can also provide the full path to Powershell if you wish, remember that users could run different PATH variables. It's probably best to define this in it's own variable in the .cmd file if you choose that approach, and realise that you will need to update it, if ever required.

In the above example shown I've also set ExecutionPolicy to Bypass to avoid Powershell ExecutionPolicy errors, without having to actually change the ExecutionPolicy.
NoProfile tells the PowerShell console to not load the current user's profile.

-Command fires a command as if you were in the shell, in this case launching a PowerShell script with the & which instructs PowerShell to execute the command, and not to try to interpret it as a cmdlet or string.

The Witness. Finally a release date for the game!

2015-09-20T16:50:00.001-07:00

The release date is... drum-roll please! ... Jan. 16, 2016 !

(Note: The release date has since been moved out 10 days to Jan 26, 2016)

For PC and PlayStation 4. I've so been looking forward to this game by Jonathan Blow and his team. It harkens back to the days of Myst and Riven which it is clearly inspired by, but the game quality, and their steadfastness, in not releasing the game before it is truly polished, is something very hopeful indeed!

Visually stunning and atmospheric, this puzzle game is suitable for any age.

http://www.techtimes.com/articles/85931/20150920/playstation-4-and-pc-exclusive-the-witness-release-date-revealed.htm

IT Masters - Charles Sturt University Free courses. I Won a voucher!

2015-09-20T16:27:00.001-07:00

IT Masters and Charles Sturt University have been offering some excellent remote study courses which are webinar based primarily:

https://www.itmasters.edu.au/about-it-masters/free-short-courses/

https://www.itmasters.edu.au/about-it-masters/about-it-masters/

This is a great concept, to introduce students to the material, and the University.

I signed up to a number of courses, but due to time constraints (work etc.) haven't been able to participate in much of it, I did get to see some of the material and it was of a very high standard.

In addition, I was selected and won a $50 Amazon Voucher for participating which I spent on books! : ) Very happy, just for participating.

2015-09-20T08:31:00.000-07:00

Amazon Outage. 20th September 2015

According to The Register I.T. news site. Amazon has experienced a major service disruption today, which may be affecting Amazon Instant Video and Books websites, Netflix, Tinder, IMDb and potentially even Airbnb who are also an AWS customer.

This does bring up questions of demarcation / isolation of cloud-based services, and over-reliance upon parts of the cloud, and the inherent design, as these sorts of events have become more frequent over the years, with the ability to impact many business and ultimately end-users with real business consequences.

Cascading issues in certain areas, seem to have nasty, unforseen and unexpected flow-on effects.

None of these higher-level design concept issues are really isolated to Amazon, but Amazon being one of the biggest cloud-providers commercially, sometimes shows the strain quite publicly when events occur.

http://status.aws.amazon.com/

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/09/20/aws_database_outage/

Amazon Summary of the outage

2015-09-18T04:41:00.001-07:00

Samsung Galaxy Tab 4, Android Lollipop update.

Well I've been running the Samsung Galaxy Tab 4 (SM-T530 Wifi only),
for a while now, on Samsung's released version of Android 5.0.2 Lollipop. So far so
good, no issues, if anything, performance seems a little better.

The Samsung Galaxy Note 4 update arrived around the same time, and also performs
well.

Nice to see Samsung keeping device updates somewhat current with Android releases.

2015-09-17T04:27:00.000-07:00

So I had a question, would the true Samsung Galaxy Tab3 10.1 inch screen protector fit a
Galaxy Tab 4 10.1 inch tablet?

I read some mixed responses online with people stating they would not fit, etc.

Answer: Absolutely! There is an extra small hole next to the camera, for a light-sensor on the Galaxy Tab3, that the Tab4 doesn't require, otherwise they are essentially identical screen protectors!

This is great, because you can pick up the Tab3 10.1 inch protectors on sale a lot of the time, as the Tab3 is an older unit, and just fit it to your Tab4 and save some cash.

Target are currently selling them in-store for $10 for a limited time, usually a crazy $20 for two screen protectors, so you can save 50% off there, or $5 a screen protector if you want to think of it that way as there are 2 in each pack.

They are a high quality screen protector by the manufacturer, and come with squeegee, lint-free cloth, and, interestingly, 2 stickers to help you capture rogue dust particles. Very thoughtful Samsung.

If you are the truly daring type, they are very large, and you could potentially cut them VERY carefully (BEFORE peeling the backing away), and make your own screen protectors for smaller devices, like phones if you don't mind the ghetto approach, you could easily make 4 protectors from just one of these, or $1.25 each with some home arts-and-crafts. You would need an exacto-knife or similar for accurate cuts.

My advice is to clean your screen VERY well, do not leave grease from hands etc. as it can be invisible, but will stop the screen protector adhesive bonding properly in certain places, and reduce the life of the protector if it starts peeling away.

When applying screen protectors, keep them up on a table in a dust-free area in front of you, do not hover over them, or skin / hair particles etc. can fall onto the screen, and mess up your application of the protector.

I can also now confirm that Target is still selling the Tab3 covers (which include a very basic built-in stand) for $15. These will fit the Tab4 perfectly, but does read "GALAXY Tab3" on the cover, which may lose a few e-points in style. Otherwise excellent value as most decent covers start off around $30-40 otherwise and this is the real thing.