Developers Corner

Skype & UltraMon

2012-02-12T14:08:00.000-08:00

So Skype has a custom skin for the interface. Skype's entire interface is painted from some sort of proprietary function or method. As such, applications which modify or add extra interface options or buttons may not display correctly on Skype's interface.

UltraMon is just one example. Skype loves this interface so much, they normally hide the ability to disable this "custom skin".

Screen Reader Mode - Disables Skype Custom Skin

Thankfully it wasn't too hard to find in this latest version [5.8.0.154], but was mistakenly listed as "Screen Reader Mode".

Unable to display content. Adobe Flash is required.That setting should read, "Disable Custom Skin" and when checked will result in properly drawn interfaces.

Make your flash media faster.

2012-02-12T13:23:00.001-08:00

Have you ever noticed that some flash media is faster than others? Many people don't know that there are many formatting options that the standard format application may not make available to the end user. One of the more important factors in formatting flash media is the cluster size, or "Allocation Unit Size" as shown in the Windows 7 format GUI. I tried switching that around a few different ways and acquired some very interesting results! Make your jumpdrive/flashdrive faster.

My drive performed MUCH better when running with a cluster size of 4096 kilobytes.

After some research I've found that the word on the net is 4096 is the best option for most drives. Give it a try and see if it improves your drive speeds. Comment below if you found this article useful! :)

Blog Traffic Sources

2012-02-12T12:21:00.001-08:00

Most users coming to this site are running Google Chrome on Windows.

Skype will not open! Help!

2012-02-12T12:03:00.000-08:00

So I noticed a few days ago that Skype would not launch. When I tried, the loading cursor would show for just a second and then... Nothing. I fired up TaskMgr to get a good reading on Memory Usage and the such and noticed that as soon as I fired up Skype it would pretty much load for a few seconds and then close. Naturally, I fire up the Event Viewer to see if Skype is logging anything useful during the crash.

Sure enough, Skype is throwing some access violation faults. Now I don't know about you guys, but the majority of the time when an application complains about access violations it's normally 1 of 3 things... Your RAM is having issues, you have a rootkit, or filesystem infection of some sort. Of course hundreds of other reasons exist, these just happen to be the most common in my experience. So I attempted to fire up Kaspersky's Rootkit Removal tool [TDSSKiller], but it failed with the same access violation.

At that point I knew something was seriously wrong and grabbed my entire Virus Combat Kit. Which is basically composed of GMER, ComboFix, TDSSKiller, and an updated installer for NOD32 to install once the machine has been cleaned. To make a long story short GMER lead me to discovering that AirfoilInject3.dll was being injected into all of my apps to hijack audio. However, I had uninstalled the bonjour service earlier in the week, crippling AirFoil because it depended on that service. Essentially, AirFoil was injecting apps with its crippled system and causing issues in many other apps. If you had read my post about Flash being broken in Google Chrome, you would know it took me quite sometime to trace this as the root cause. The simple fix is to uninstall AirFoil. There are several applications which "hook" into various Windows Features. If these special apps crash or fail to hook properly, they can cause serious instability issues with the system.

FaceBook: Broken or Missing News Ticker

2012-02-07T18:17:00.000-08:00

After submitting 37 bug reports [without status reports nor replies], contacting FaceBook via email 15 times [without status reports nor replies ], and Google'ing several times, I've finally found a very hard to find answer to a long sought question. "Where is my News Ticker?!"

FAQ Snip from FaceBook

I use FaceBook much more than most, especially considering I've made several pages for Businesses and Organizations. I have several friends, I use several social apps, and I've "Liked" a gazillion things on FaceBook. So why, exactly, does my account not qualify for the News Ticker?

Flash broken in Chrome

2012-01-31T23:59:00.000-08:00

If you're like me and you wake up one day to an update that completely breaks Flash in Chrome, then you'll be needing a fix that has yet to be provided. In my case, completely uninstalling and reinstalling Chrome did not fix the issue. I was actually running in the Dev channel so I downgraded to Stable, but Flash was still broken and displaying black squares where Flash content was suppose to be.
I also tried the Nightly/Canary build to no avail. After a few weeks of wasted attempts and randomly working Flash, I decided to tamper with the "gcswf32.dll" myself. First I tried reverting the DLL to earlier versions of Flash 10.1+, but that didn't seem to help at all, oddly. Finally, I replaced Chrome's internal Flash with the current Beta DLL and it worked!!

I've made a patch that will fix the broken Flash in Chrome and do all the heavy lifting for you, you can download it on my Software Page. If you should choose to do the process manually, here are the instructions. <--- On hold. :/

Alternate video link

1.) Close Chrome and make sure Chrome isn't a running process.

2.) Uninstall ALL versions of Flash from your PC.

3.) Acquire the 11.2 [Beta] version of "npswf.dll", which is the main Flash DLL. The only sure-fire way of acquiring this DLL in its untouched state, is to install the 32-bit version of Flash 11.2 from this page. Once installed you can either search for this DLL or navigate to "C:\Windows\System32\Macromed\Flash" and you will see "NPSWF32_11_2_202_197.dll". Those last few numbers might be a bit different by the time others try this "fix".
Here is an alternative download link for that file. :)

4.) Replace the Flash DLL that Chrome uses with the 11.2 Beta. On Vista/7 it should be located somewhere around here...
ex; C:\Users\BinaryBrother\AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\Application\16.0.912.77\gcswf32.dll
Simply move the Beta DLL to take the place of the one Chrome is currently using.

5.) Fire up Chrome and enjoy working Flash. :)

This fix should cause Flash in Chrome to, once again, begin functioning normally. This fix will ONLY fix broken Flash in Chrome and has not been extensively tested. Please comment below if this has helped you.

Update [2/10/2012]
Updated to the latest version of Chrome [17.0.963.46] and it broke Flash again. I simply did the workaround again and it fixed my Flash.

Update [2/12/2012]
Found the root cause and repaired the issue. Read my latest post for more info. :)

All talk and no action [HTML5]

2011-08-02T19:06:00.001-07:00

Why are we all blogging and talking about HTML5 and how it’s almost here? HTML5 is old news and became known in production environments back the first half of 2010...

So far, Google appears to be the only well-known corporation pushing for the web based industry to move forward and advance toward developing by standards, rather than 10 years behind them. We, as developers, should no longer be spending long nights testing clients web content in multiple browser. It’s time to utilize our resources and time towards the progress and advancement of the content we design for our clients, rather than restoring or repairing cosmetic defects with non-compliant or legacy browsers. I, along with many others, currently refuse to support, restore, or repair content issues in relation to legacy browsers. The presence of other bloggers posting similar opinions isn’t hard to find, some have went even so far as to post examples of how to block IE6 entirely or reduce functionality to the user based on the incompatibilities of legacy browsers.

I promise I will fire my next client as a customer who insists on providing support for legacy browsers. I make this promise to myself and on behalf of all other developers who cry themselves to sleep over the matter, as I know I once did. This blog actually breeches the scope of legacy browsers and actually covers my opinion on legacy use entirely. Providing primary support for legacy users is promoting the use of legacy systems or equipment and hinders the technical industry as a whole. Do you even know what the word “legacy” means, when referring to electronics? A legacy system is basically an old system that users still use even though better alternatives have been adopted that are more effective…

As I’m ending this article I want you, whoever you are, to think about a few things. As a client who wants a good website designed by a good developers, asking him to support legacy systems can, will, and should cost you more. Supporting legacy systems can and will hinder the functionality of your site, and will cause your developer to spend time in areas that he/she shouldn’t be spending time in, inhibiting them from spending time in the most important areas; Insuring functionality in supported and standard accepting browsers, as well as cosmetics. Developers, you will spend many a sleepless, underpaid, and frustrated night trying to support legacy, non-standard, and old browsers, set yourself free.

Adopt Standards!

Down with legacy browsers!

Ignorant products that are mass produced

2011-07-13T13:48:00.000-07:00

For all those interested, this entire post is nothing more than the ramblings of a working man...

First, let's start with those tiny straws and stirrers that every company office with a coffee pot has.

Naturally, when you pour your cup and you've added just the right amount of cream and sugar you grab one of the above [or generally similar] to mix your coffee with... The only thing is, they don't work worth a **** because the plastic softens from the heat of the coffee, you might as well try mixing your coffee with a ******* gummy worm... Really? Was this product even tested before mass production? We've all seen those wooden stirrers, why aren't they used more? It's not cost, because I can get 1000 wooden stirrers for under $10. Is 50 cents or less, really worth the frustration of trying to stir your coffee with a **** gummy worm?! To demonstrate [protest], I've been taking the plastic stirrers and building circus animals by the coffee pot... Every time I do this, I'm probably costing the company around 12 cents... Maybe after a few years, they'll get the idea... *You can't build circus animals with the wooden ones without glue... True story.

VIKI [Virtual Interactive Key Ignition] - A personal project

2011-06-16T18:11:00.000-07:00

So I just purchased an 89 Cadillac... This is the type of car you'd see your grandma riding around in, all hyped about the motorized seats... While none of this is specially interesting, it's a fairly fun project idea, but just for the record... I've not actually started on it yet, but I'll post pics when I start... :)

Before I purchased the car I was notified that it was missing the key... Now as you can probably guess this presented quite the problem, so I got my handy screwdriver and went to tearing out the column and finally got the key position over to "ON"... At which point the car politely notified me that it was potentially being stolen and that it would kindly refuse to start. This particular model featured an anti-theft chip in the key, which obviously wasn't present... So after calling in a quick favor from some other tech friends and a box full of resisters and the sort, that issue was fixed. Unfortunately, the car will always think it's on and drain my battery unless I install some custom switches for the Accessory, Ignition as well as some-sort of a manual push button starter. Now comes the fun part.

Nobody likes jerry-rigged equipment, so over the course of a few days I began laying out plans to fit the car with a fully computerized system that controlled anything from headlamps to starting the car, all from a touchscreen interface. It's probably going to cost me a little more then most other projects I've done once it's said and done, but don't worry I'll list everything with detail.

Firstly, I'll need some low-end PC to power this system. I'm going to develop my own software in C#, so I'll probably go with a Windows based OS as well... A stripped down variant of XP should suffice as a decent embedded OS. This part won't cost me anything, because I have both an old junk computer in the basement and an extra copy of XP sitting around. Secondly, I'll need a Relay controller that can easily interface with this PC, for simplicity I chose an 8-Channel USB Relay controller, the specific one I'm purchasing can be found here [Google Shopping link]. I chose to go with EIO because they were cheaper ($60), but by the time you view that link there might be different vendors listed. Now that we have the controlling module and a processing interface, we'll need an input and output of some sort... The most compact method would be a touchscreen so we can simultaneously see a screen and interact with it, without any need for other equipment... I've searched the internet over and found what I want, it's a 9'' USB Touchscreen from DoubleSight Displays, you can see the original model I picked out (DS-90UT) from the manufacturer here. Keep in mind that with some searching, you can always save money, as I ultimately decided to get the DS-90UT from Buy.com here. I probably saved around $40, considering the original manufacturer was going to charge $199 before shipping, and Buy.com's ran $168 after shipping... So far, I'm obviously prepared to invest almost $230. To shave my costs down yet again, I offer to trade an LCD [valued at about $150 retail] I had sitting around in the house to a local computer store in exchange for the $60 relay controller. Which knocks me back down to only needing the touchscreen [$168], unfortunately I don't think I'm going to be able to cut corners with the touchscreen, so I'm just going to invest what I need to get this thing working.

According to the schematics I've put together, I'll be utilizing 100% of the controller's resources... Here is how I'm allocating my relays... Keep in mind, everything I allocate to a relay can be controlled via the touchscreen, also everything that isn't tied to the controller cannot be programatically controlled without a bigger controller board...

1.) Accessory [Same as turning your key back in a car for the radio]

2.) Ignition [Ready to start the engine now - Fuel pump is active]

3.) Trunk Hatch [Trunk opener]

4.) Fuel lid opener

5.) Starter [So I can programatically start my engine without a manual button]

6.) Low-beam [Headlights]

7.) High-beam [Headlights]

8.) Hazard Lights [Really just an extra]

I didn't really know what to use for Relay 8, so I may actually allocate it to the doorlocks so I can unlock my car from my phone or something... We'll just have to see.

I'm probably going to mount the motherboard in a custom aluminum case under the trunk lid so it'll be easily accessible. Without a key, I'm obviously going to need someway to lock my doors so my equipment doesn't get stolen, so I might end up installing some sort of remote lock/unlock system in combination with the computer controlled peripherals. So far, this is as far as I've gotten is planning... Expect updates soon! :)

Room 641A

2011-06-06T15:43:00.000-07:00

Read information on Room 641A to understand this article. This isn't conspiracy, it's fact.

Quick Summery: AT&T created secret facilities to monitor, log, and analyze all information passing through its data-centers. When a former AT&T employee came forward with this information, EFF launched a class-action lawsuit against AT&T for privacy violations. The Federal Government stepped in to intimidate, refute, and object the case, but was denied its success. When the NSA failed to control the case, a Bill was passed by Congress and signed by President George W. Bush that granted AT&T immunity to these violations. The case was swiftly dismissed.

Interested now?

Often times when big companies are taken to court, efforts are taken to keep as much information from the media and press as possible. An excellent tactic is to prolong the case as long as possible so a definitive verdict isn't found by the time the media becomes bored with the coverage and very little information provided over the course of several years. So by the time a verdict is found, the case is old news and often times isn't covered. Today I present to you the verdict of Hepting v. AT&T. I find this particular case interesting because AT&T as well as the NSA were both caught up in an obvious lie and when push came to shove, cheated there way out. While the Federal Government was not specifically assigned a role nor were they included as a party in the case, they still attempted to invoke State Secrets Privilege to have the case barred from court in fear it could compromise national security. AT&T also objected on the terms that this case could compromise the security of its network. So here we have the NSA, a federally backed force to be reckoned with, and AT&T, one of the largest telecommunications companies in the world, working together in perfect unity. Although, Judge Walker took the side of privacy and the people when he decided to ignore both groundless objections. It's nice to see a non-profit organization (Electronic Frontier Foundation - EFF) bring 2 God's of the modern world to their knees. If you've read any of the details of the case, you'll know this wasn't quite enough to stop them... Congress and President George W. Bush allowed a bill to slide into play granting immunity to those who blatantly violated an Act that had already been into play to control situations like this (Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act). In September 2008, Attorney General Michael Mukasey filed a certification pursuant to Section 802 of the FISAAA and the government moved to dismiss the Hepting litigation. While Hepting plaintiffs opposed the motion to dismiss, it was inevitably dismissed on June 3, 2009 by Judge Walker, citing retroactive legislation (section 802 of FISA), freeing AT&T of all charges.