Shailen's (Shay-len's) Blog @shailensukul - Tumblr Blog

Office Groups Calendars

Office 365 Groups a collaboration service which lets you select a set of people and easily setup a shared calendar, shared inbox and document library for collaborating.

I recently decided to replaced shared SharePoint Calendars with Group calendars and have document my experience below.

Create a group

Open Outlook, click on the email tab. Expand the tree until you see Groups.

Righ-click and select “New Group”

Once the Group is created, navigate to Groups and right-click your group, and choose “Add to favorites ...”

Now, click on the Calendar tab and you should be able to see the Group calendar in there.

Issues signing in to Office Apps with Office 365 accounts

I have been struggling with Office 365 for about a month now. Ever since the Creator's Update, I am unable to log into any of my Office 365 accounts. (I can use the Web version). I tried reinstalling the Office software, applying latest updates and signing out. No joy.

Finally, I found an obscure article about an older version of office (I am on Office 365, which is always the latest version of Ofifce - 2016 at the time of this post) and tried to make these changes:

In the registry HCU>Software>Microsoft>Office>16.0>Common>Identity>

Add a DWORD (32 bit value)

Name: EnableADAL Value: 0 (yes definitely 0, not 1 as the article suggests.. through trial and error)

Restart all Office apps Viola, you can now switch accounts, and use services from any Office 365 account!!!

PS: According to Microsoft Support, this should help as well (have not tried it yet)

Navigate to : HKEY_Current_USER > SOFTWARE> Microsoft > Office >16.0 >Common >Identity > Identities

And delete the entries under identities

You can reset Internet Explorer settings to what they were when Internet Explorer was first installed on your PC. This can be useful for troubleshooting problems that may be caused by settings changed after installation. Note that resetting Internet Explorer isn't reversible, and all previous settings are lost after reset.

Close all Internet Explorer windows. Select the Tools button, and then select Internet options.

Select the Advanced tab, and then select Reset.

In the Reset Internet Explorer Settings dialog box, select Reset.

When Internet Explorer finishes applying default settings, select Close, and then select OK. Restart your PC to apply changes.

#office365 #Office-365 #office 365

SharePoint Timer Job Development

Summary Best practice for SharePoint Timer Job development

Downloads

Timer Job Code

Code Snippets

Keywords: SharePoint Timer Job

SharePoint Explorer View Not Working

I had this strange issue at a client site today. They have SharePoint 2010 and it was working with Explorer View perfectly fine until they installed the WebDav role with Keberos.

Suddenly Explorer stopped working for their users using IE 9+. I was able to reproduce the issue and tried the following:

- Restarting the WebClient Service

- Used 32 bit version of IE

Funnily enough, the client found an old XP box and was able to launch explorer view from there. I think it was somehow related to Keberos and possibly a double hop issue.

I uninstalled WebDev and sure enough, Explorer View started working again!

I will investigate further and update this post.

#Sharepoint_2010 #SHAREPOINT

2013 Presentations Roundup

Summary

A summary of the presentations I have delivered this year.

Sharepoint 2013 And Windows8 Apps from Shailen Sukul

SharePoint 2013 App Provisioning Models from Shailen Sukul

SharePoint 2013 Sneak Peek from Shailen Sukul

SharePoint and Azure - A Match Made in the Clouds from Shailen Sukul

Keywords: SharePoint 2013 2010 Presentation Shailen Sukul InfoPath Access Web Services SharePoint Designer Office Web Apps

SharePoint 2013 for Education

I have recently started work with an client in the education sector, managing schools via the Scholaris software built on top of SharePoint, which also integrates with Maze

I have also worked with the Blackbaud system in the past which is a great tool for fund-raising.

From their websites:

Maze is a complete, fully customisable School Management System ideal for schools of all sizes. Schools choose Maze because it assists them in efficiently managing all back office processes in one integrated system.

iScholaris is an easy to use App for Teachers, Parents and Students that is accessible as an App or via a browser.Integrated with your school management system, information is always kept up to date meaning no import / export and data duplication.

Since the education sector presents such a huge opportunity for SharePoint/Office 365, I have often wondered if there are other offerings from Microsoft which integrate more cleanly into Office 365 …… and then I read this tweet: https://twitter.com/bevanstratton/status/401050557906825216

Which piqued my interest and I started to research on “SharePoint 2013 for Education”. This led me to the following links:

http://blog.furuknap.net/sharepoint-education-first-insights

http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/sharepoint/en-US/4851485e-5089-494b-bddd-1362eaebb0bf/education-services-in-2013?forum=sharepointgeneral

http://blog.furuknap.net/sharepoint-education-features-detail

So for the moment (Nov/2013), it appears that SharePoint 2013 for Education was pulled out of the GA of SharePoint 2013 after the RTM release had it.

From the internet chatter, there is hope that Microsoft may rebrand this at some point in the future (but I would not hold my breadth). I will reach out to my contacts to see if I can glean any more information. Stay posted!

#SharePoint_2013 #SHAREPOINT #Education

Installing a Full SharePoint 2013 Load Balanced Lab

Summary

As an MCT and SharePoint Architect, I find myself creating a lot of SharePoint labs over the years and then prepping the labs

with exercises for my students or clients. In addition to that, I have to do the same for my continual studies on the

SharePoint platform and found that I waste a lot of time performing repetitive tasks.

Anyone familiar with SharePoint will know that once something goes wrong in an install, it is often a time consuming task to

find the cause of the issue to fix it. Something I do not want to do only days before I have to deliver a presentation or a class.

So I decided to document the creation of a small N-tier environment of an N-tier SharePoint farm. The rest of the article

illustrates how I went about doing this.

Getting Started

Installing and Configuring Hyper-V

Host

My host laptop has the following specifications:

Brand: Lenovo ThinkPad W530

Processor: Intel Core i7-3740QM Processor (6M Cache, up to 3.70 GHz)

Memory: 16G currently (upgradeable to 32G)

Virtualization Software

I used Hyper-V version 6.2.9200.16384 for my virtualization software.

Preparing Hyper-V

Go into virtual switch manager by right-clicking on your host name and selecting "Virtual Switch Manager…"

Click on "Create Virtual Switch"

In the name field, type "Internal" and select "Internal Network" under "Connection type"

The Topology

The SharePoint farm will share some common components so that I do not have to recreate the same servers over and over

again. The shared components are the domain controller and database servers.

I have also used the "headless" or Server Core install for the database server and the domain controller since it is

less memory intensive and quite frankly, does not need the Windows GUI.

Here is a list of the machines and their roles:

Machine

Memory

Type

IP Address

SP2013-A

3048 MB

Windows 2012 Server Standard Full

SharePoint 2013

10.0.10.131

SP2013-B

3048 MB

Windows 2012 Server Standard Full

SharePoint 2013

10.0.10.132

512 MB

Windows 2012 Server Standard Core

Domain Controller

10.0.10.40

SQLSERVER2012

2048 MB

Windows 2012 Server Standard Core

Database Server

10.0.10.150

Client Computer

512 MB

Windows 8.1 Preview

Client computer

10.0.10.100

Figure 1 : Physical Architecture of SharePoint Farm

Installing the base VMs

Create virtual machines for the machines identified above and use the Operating System versions indicated in the

table above

Once created, log into each machine and perform the following common tasks:

Disable Firewall - Open the PowerShell command prompt and type in this command:

netsh advfirewall set allprofiles state off

Set the IP Addresss by running the following command from the command prompt on each machine.

Remember to change highlighted IP address before running the command:

$NetIPIF = Get-NetIPInterface -AddressFamily IPv4 -ConnectionState Connected | ? InterfaceAlias -ne 'Loopback Pseudo-Interface 1' If ($NetIPIF) { $NetIPIF | Set-NetIPInterface -Dhcp Disabled New-NetIPAddress -InterfaceAlias $NetIPIF.InterfaceAlias -IPAddress 10.0.10.132 -DefaultGateway 10.0.10.41 -AddressFamily IPv4 -PrefixLength 24 Set-DnsClientServerAddress -InterfaceAlias $NetIPIF.InterfaceAlias -ServerAddresses ('10.0.10.40','127.0.0.1') }

Enable the Remote Desktop by doing the following

Type sconfig.cmd on the PowerShell command prompt

Option 7

Change the Machine Name as specified in the table above:

From PowerShell, type sconfig.cmd

Select 2

Enter new computer name (see table above)

For elevated user, type local admin user and password

Set the Host the IP address:

Go to Network Sharing Center on the host machine

Click on "Change Adapter Settings"

Select the adapter for the internal switch. It will be called something like "vEthernet (Internal Switch)"

Right click the adapter and select "Properties"

Select "Internet Protocol Version 4 (TCP/IP) and then click on Properties

Set the IP address to 10.0.10.1 and the subnet mask to 255.255.255.0 and click Ok. The virtual machines can now

communicate to the host and share files and you should be able to remote desktop into the Guest machines from the host.

Common Tasks

This section contains instructions for performing some common tasks throughout this exercise.

Copying files from Host to Guest

Whether the Guest OS is Windows Server Core 2012 or Windows Server 2012 with the full GUI, start with:

Make sure that the Host drives are shared in remote desktop settings

You should be able to browse the shared drive from Windows Explorer on Guest VMs with a GUI

On a guest with a Windows Server 2012 Core OS, all you get is the command prompt. In order to access the Host drives,

you need to map the Host drives to a path. Type this at the command prompt:

Net use * \\tsclient\d

Then you will get a drive letter that you can browse to

Joining a machine to the domain

Open the PowerShell command prompt

Type the following:

Add-computer -DomainName sukul.local -Credential sukul\Administrator -Restart

Wait for the machine to reboot and sign in as a domain user, like sukul\administrator

The Domain Controller

We will setup the domain controller and setup the following user and service accounts:

User Accounts

User Account

Password

Given Name

Last Name

Company

Department

Title

Sallyf

Sh@reP0int

[email protected]

Sally

Fields

Sukul Corp

Admin

Secretary

Ravis

Sh@reP0int

[email protected]

Ravi

Shankar

Sukul Corp

IT Manager

Kimm

Sh@reP0int

[email protected]

Kim

Manners

Sukul Corp

HR Manager

Rahulb

Sh@reP0int

[email protected]

Rahul

Bose

Sukul Corp

Management

Chief Information Officer

Robg

Sh@reP0int

[email protected]

Rob

Green

Sukul Corp

Management

Chief Executive Officer

Service Accounts

Service Account

Password

Notes

SUKUL\Administrator

Sh@reP0int

Setup user

SUKUL\SQL_SRV

Sh@reP0int

Account for running the SQL Service

SUKUL\SP_FARM

Sh@reP0int

SharePoint farm service account

SUKUL\SP_MYSITES

Sh@reP0int

Mysites application pool account

SUKUL\SP_EXCELUSER

Sh@reP0int

Unattended user account

SUKUL\SP_VisioUser

Sh@reP0int

Unattended user account

SUKUL\SP_PerfPointUser

Sh@reP0int

Unattended user account

SUKUL\SP_SERVICES

Sh@reP0int

The default Service Account to be used as the Application Pool account for most Service Applications

SUKUL\SP_PortalAppPool

Sh@reP0int

SUKUL\SP_ProfilesAppPool

Sh@reP0int

SUKUL\SP_ProfileSync

Sh@reP0int

Account used to sync user data

SUKUL\SP_SearchService

Sh@reP0int

SUKUL\SP_SearchContent

Sh@reP0int

The account used for crawling content

SUKUL\SP_CacheSuperUser

Sh@reP0int

Object cache user accounts are user accounts which are given FullControl and FullRead privileges on Web Applications

so items can be cached by ASP.Net to improve performance

SUKUL\SP_CacheSuperReader

Sh@reP0int

Object cache user accounts are user accounts which are given FullControl and FullRead privileges on Web Applications

so items can be cached by ASP.Net to improve performance

Steps

Start the DC machine, which has the Windows Server 2012 Core OS

Type PowerShell

Type: Install-WindowsFeature -name AD-Domain-Services,DNS,DHCP

Copy the DC.ps1 powershell file to the c:\. Refer to section Copying files from Host to Guest on how to do this

Edit the default values in the script to customize it, for ex. like the domain name

From the PowerShell command prompt, navigate to C:\

Type .\DC.ps1 to execute the domain controller script

Repeat Step 8 once more

The Database Server

The database server is a Windows Server 2012 Core install. In order to install SQL Server 2012, the installation must be run in

"silent" mode. Here are the steps:

Join the SQL Server VM to the domain. Refer to section "Joining a machine to the domain"

Before you run the SQL Server installation on Windows Server 2012 Core, you will need to install the .Net Framework.

Otherwise, the installation will fail. To do so, attach the Windows Server 2012 Core ISO image to the DVD drive and run

this command:

Add-WindowsFeature NET-Framework-Core -Source D:\sources\sxs

Edit the "SQL Server Installation.config" file and optionally update the database instance name, service accounts,

product key and password. For more information, refer to this article.

Copy the "SQL Server Installation.config" file to the c:\ of the SQL Server virtual machine. To access the host drive,

refer to the section titled "Copying files from Host to Guest"

From the command prompt, type this to run the command prompt as the Administrator:

c:\ cmd /user:administrator

Then type the following command to run the SQL Server install in silent mode:

Setup.exe /QS /ConfigurationFile=c:\Config.INI

The Client Computer

The client machine will be used to interact with SharePoint. It will have the Windows 8.1 OS and be domain joined. Steps:

Join the client machine to the domain. Refer to section "Joining a machine to the domain"

Install SQL Server 2012 Management studio

Verify that you can connect to the database created above

Edit the hosts file and add the following entries:

# WFE-A

#10.0.10.131 intranet.sukul.com

#10.0.10.131 my.sukul.com

# WFE-B

#10.0.10.132 intranet.sukul.com

#10.0.10.132 my.sukul.com

# NLB

10.0.10.129 intranet.sukul.com

10.0.10.129 my.sukul.com

SharePoint Server(s)

Join the SQL Server box to the domain. Refer to section "Joining a machine to the domain"

Download and extract AutoSPInstaller from here

Download and extract the AutoSPInstaller GUI from here

Download the sample AutoSPInstallerInput.xml config file from here and save it to the "SP\AutoSPInstaller" folder

that you created in step 1

Edit the AutoSPInstallerInput.xml file and enter the Product Key. You may also change any other details at this time.

Mount the SharePoint 2013 installation ISO to a DVD drive and copy its contents to the "SP\2013\SharePoint" folder

The installation is set to offline mode, which means that there is no expectation that the SharePoint server will be

connected to the internet. You will need to download all the pre-requites files to the

"SP\2013\SharePoint\PrerequisiteInstallerFiles" folder and you can use this script to do so from your host machine.

The folder should look like this:

Copy the SP folder containing the config files and the SharePoint installation files to the C:\ of the SharePoint

virtual machine

Open the PowerShell command prompt in the SharePoint virtual machine and select "run as administrator"

Navigate to the "SP\AutoSPInstaller" folder

Type AutoSPInstallerLaunch.bat [InputFile]

Wait for it to finish. If you get an error message, make sure that there are no spaces in the folders names

Repeat on the other SharePoint VM

Verify that you can access the SharePoint urls by uncommenting the WFE-A and WFE-B section and commenting out

the other sections in the Client Computer hosts file

If you have issues connecting to SQL Server and have enabled aliases, try this: Run cliconfig in c:\Windows\System32, you will find the connection aliases. Once you delete them, you can test the connection to the server

by creating a .udl file on the desktop, and specifying server, Windows Auth, etc. and clicking the Test Connection button.

Ref: http://autospinstaller.codeplex.com/workitem/19412

Network Load Balancing

Now that we have the Domain Controller, SQL Server and SharePoint installed across the 2 web servers, we need to load

balance them. We will install the Windows NLB software on both web front ends for this:

Copy the NLB.ps1 file to the c:\ of the first SharePoint server

Open the PowerShell command prompt

Type .\NLB.ps1

Repeat the process for the second SharePoint server

To verify, type the following in the PowerShell window:

Get-NlbClusterNode

You should see this output

In the client computer uncomment the NLB section in the hosts file and comment all the others.

You should be able to browse to intranet.sukul.com and my.sukul.com successfully

#SharePoint_2013 #SHAREPOINT

Restoring Database

Create a database maintenance plan

Click on Manage connections and enter connection information for the source and target databases

From the toolbox, add a “Execute T-SQL Statement Task” and name it “Backup PROD”

Double click on it, set its connection to the source database and enter the following SQL:

BACKUP DATABASE TO DISK='\\server\Backup\.bak' WITH NOFORMAT, INIT

From the toolbox, add another “Execute T-SQL Statement Task” and name it “Kill Active Connections on Staging”

Double click on it, set its connection to the destination database and enter the following SQL:

alter database set offline with rollback immediate alter database set online go

From the toolbox, add another “Execute T-SQL Statement Task” and name it “Restore Staging”

Double click on it, set its connection to the destination database and enter the following SQL:

RESTORE DATABASE FROM DISK=’\\server\Backup\.bak' WITH REPLACE

Connect the success arrows of the tasks in the order added

Optionally, connect the error arrows to a “Notify Operator Task”

Go to the SQL Server Agent, expand the Jobs folder and set a schedule for your maintenance plan

#SQL_SERVER

Adding TypeScript Support to MVC4 Project

Unload your project

Edit your project

Add the following markup:

Reload and compile project

If you show hidden files, you should see a JS file for your TS file

#Javascript

Enabling SharePoint Hosted Apps

Adding this little post to save me wasted hours in the future.

In order to publish a SharePoint hosted app to a site collection the site must be based on the developer site template or have the “Developer” Feature enabled on it. The “Developer” Feature is marked as hidden in its definition so you must use PowerShell to enable the Feature.

Enable-SPFeature e374875e-06b6-11e0-b0fa-57f5dfd72085 –url http://sp.contoso.com

Debugging Memory Leaks in ASP.Net

I followed the diagnosis steps for identifying the memory leak from here and modified it a little bit to come up with the following steps: 1. Install WinDbg from here 2. Open command prompt in Admin mode 3. Run the following command to dump the memory: C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\8.0\Debuggers\x64\adplus -o c:\temp -quiet -hang –p < app pool process id>> 4. After this step, there should be a .DMP file somewhere in the c:\temp folder 5. Open Explorer folder to C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\8.0\Debuggers\x64 and run windbg.exe with Admin rights 6. Load the dump file from above by pressing CRTL + D in windb 7. From the WinDbg command prompt, run the following to load the SOS.DLL extension to analyze the managed memory dump: .loadby sos clr 8. From the WinDbg command prompt, run the following to identify the Type that consumes most of the memory: !dumpheap –stat You should get something like this. Note the id in red for the type consuming the most memory: ..... 654088b4 92811 13736028 System.Data.DataColumn 000dec48 44 13900264 Free 654359c8 31704 32845344 System.Data.RBTree`1+Node[[System.Int32, mscorlib]][] 7912d8f8 320769 47859900 System.Object[] 790fd8c4 827939 186834312 System.String Total 3351270 objects 9. Then from the WinDbg command prompt, type the following to identify what’s holding on it so that it's not collected and be prepared to press CTRL+BREAK to stop the massive output from flooding the screen: !dumpheap -type System.String 10. The output should be similar to this: 057f9364 790fd8c4 4116 057fa4b8 790fd8c4 4116 057fb52c 790fd8c4 4116 057fc68c 790fd8c4 4116 057fd700 790fd8c4 4116 0583fef8 790fd8c4 4116 11. Next you want to start trying to identify the code which is holding on the objects. That can be done using the following command !gcroot 0583fef8 12. This will output like so: 0:000> !gcroot 0583fef8 Note: Roots found on stacks may be false positives. Run "!help gcroot" for more info. … Scan Thread 27 OSTHread e40 DOMAIN(00102980):HANDLE(WeakLn):945e00:Root:19312e44(System.Web.Hosting.ISAPIAsyncCompletionCallback)-> 190c2950(System.Web.Hosting.ISAPIWorkerRequestInProcForIIS6)-> 190c3138(System.Web.HttpContext)-> 190c340c(System.Web.AspNetSynchronizationContext)-> 0cbb80d0(ASP.global_asax)-> 01b3a5b4(System.Web.HttpApplicationState)-> 01b3a610(System.Collections.ArrayList)-> 0a4e4c10(System.Object[])-> 05846388(System.Collections.Specialized.NameObjectCollectionBase+NameObjectEntry)-> 058331c8(XXXXXXXX.Web.UI.WebControls.XXXXXXXX.XXXXXXXX)-> 058333c0(XXXXXXXX.Web.UI.WebControls.XXXXXXXX.Statuses)-> 058333cc(System.Object[])-> 0583fe20(XXXXXXXX.Web.UI.WebControls.XXXXXXXX.Status)-> 0583fee0(System.Object[])-> 05840f0c(XXXXXXXX.Web.UI.WebControls.XXXXXXXX.Style)-> 0583fef8(System.String) 13. Then we can scan the code for System.Web.HttpApplicationState as an example to see which piece of code using that is causing the leak

#ASP.Net MVC #ASP.NET

Starting With SharePoint 2013

Here is a list of resources to look at when starting to look into SharePoint 2013 design and development. Also listing certification goals and resoruces to help achieving it.

Before you proceed any further, bookmark this WIKI. This has proven to be invaluable so many times.

Books

Exam Ref 70-331: Core Solutions of Microsoft SharePoint Server 2013

Exam Ref 70-332: Advanced Solutions of Microsoft SharePoint Server 2013

Professional SharePoint 2013 Development

Microsoft SharePoint 2013 App Development

SharePoint 2013 Development Machine - how to setup a VM

Microsoft SharePoint 2013 Developer Reference

SDK and Code Samples

SharePoint 2013 SDK

Code samples for SharePoint 2013

A sample code project that shows how to configure an app for SharePoint to be autohosted in SharePoint Online.

SharePoint No Code Solutions

Exams and Certification

MCSE: SharePoint: Solutions Expert

70-331: Core Solutions of Microsoft SharePoint Server 2013

70-332: Advanced Solutions of Microsoft SharePoint Server 2013

70-417 - Upgrading Your Skills to MCSA Windows Server 2012

Microsoft Certified Solutions Developer (MCSD)

70-488: Developing Microsoft SharePoint Server 2013 Core Solutions

70-489 – Developing Microsoft SharePoint Server 2013 Advanced Solutions

70-480 - Programming in HTML5 with JavaScript and CSS3

70-486 - Developing ASP.NET MVC 4 Web Applications

SharePoint Videos

SharePoint Videos (by the SharePoint-Community.net)

Further Reading

Software Boundaries and Limits for SharePoint 2013

#SharePoint_2013

HP Envy DV6T Laptop Not Hibernating

Summary

My HP Envy DV6t-7200 recently started having issues hibernating. The OS is Windows 8 PRO 64 bit. When attempting to hibernate, the screen would go blank, the WIFI indicator would go off, but the fan would still spin.

When attempting to get it out of hibernation, the computer would just not respond. At which time, I would have to do a cold boot and essentially lose my saved state. I tried the following to fix it with no avail:

Updated the BIOS

Performed a system restore

Install latest Windows updates, including optional updates

Messed around with the Power Management settings

Went to device manager and checked option to allow device to wake up m computer for keyboard and other peripherals

Followed this: http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/document?cc=us&lc=en&dlc=en&docname=c03383935

I finally stumbled on this solution:

Press WIN KEY + W

Type: "Change what the power buttons do" and select the menu

Click on the drop down menu bedsides “When I press the power button”.

Select shut down from the drop down list.

Click on Save changes

Restart the computer

follow the same steps to select Hibernate from the drop down list besides “When I press the power button”.

Put the computer into hibernate mode

Keywords: HP Envy DV6t Not Hibernating Windows8 Windows 8

Unbrick HP Envy DVT6 Laptop

HP Envy DVT6 Bricked When Updating BIOS

My fan on my HP Envy Dv6t-7200 laptop was making some noise so I checked the HP site and found that a BIOS update would fix it. I downloaded the BIOS installer and ran the exe. After waiting for half a day, I determined that my laptop was frozen so I did a cold boot.

When I did the cold boot, my laptop just would not start. All I could see was a blank screen and hear the fan spinning. Well I searched high and low for a solution and even spent a frustrating hour and half with HP support before thinking about returning the laptop. The only problem was that I had bought it in USA and it would cost me around $300 just to mail it!! I was at my wits end, tired and red eyed after spending 2 days and nights on this when the following procedure worked.

I removed the battery and wrote down my model, product and serial numbers

I had removed my DVD drive to install a SSD for my VMs. I had to put the DVD drive back, presumably because the boot sequence was searching for it.

I took a 16G ScanDisk USB drive and formatted it as a FAT32 partition

I then went to the HP site and searched for UEFI for my product number. I then downloaded the software from this link: http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/softwareDownloadIndex?softwareitem=ob-116962-1&cc=us&dlc=en&lc=en&product=5327887&tmp_track_link=ot_search

Once downloaded, I double clicked the exe to run and selected my USB disk to install it on. This names the volume "HP_Tools" and creates a folder called Hewlett-Packard

I then went back to the HP site and searched for the BIOS for my laptop and came across this page: http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/softwareCategory?os=4132&lc=en&cc=us&dlc=en&sw_lang=&product=5327887#N1130. Since the current version of the BIOS froze my computer, I selected the version before that (F.24). This downloads an EXE file.

I used WinRar to unzip the exe to locate the 01818.bin file. I copied this file to the root of the USB key and renamed it to 1818.bin. Why did I rename it? Well, because the platform.ini file in the unzipped contents listed 1818 as a platform check.

Next, I made 3 more copies of 1818.bin on the root of the USB key and renamed them to: 1818 , 1818.rom and 1818.fd

I also copied 1818.bin to Hewlett-Packard\BIOS\Current, Hewlett-Packard\BIOS\Previous and Hewlett-Packard\BIOS\New in the USB key

Next, I removed the battery and the power cord, pressed the Windows Key and B together and while holding the keys down, plugged the power cord and turned the computer on. I then released the keys.

The LED on the USB key flashed and I let it do its thing for about 5 minutes

Once the activity on the USB key stopped blinking, I removed the USB key and cold booted the laptop

Then I got a progress message that the BIOS was being flashed

Once it reached 100%, the computer rebooted and I was able to get into Windows 8!!

Hope this helps someone else.

Keywords: HP Envy dv6 Model: dv6t-7200 Product: B6C68AV BIOS corrupted flash frozen stuck

Low Budget Broadcasting

Summary

This year I am planning to run a lot of interactive workshops focused on SharePoint 2013 and Azure and needed a cheap and easy way to involve large virtual audiences in my presentations. Since I have an MCT certification, I am fortunate enough to have Camtasia, however, I needed a way to broadcast and screenshare in realtime. Unfortunately, the Live Video option seems to have been removed from Casmtasia.

I had used UStream.tv in the past and upon closer inspection, was able to determine that its free version would suffice for me. In addition to that, I have a Quad Core laptop with a 3rd generation Core i7 processor and 16G of memory and a fast internet connection (20 M).

So, here are the steps to get started:

Signup for a UStream.tv account at http://www.ustream.tv

Install UStream Desktop Presenter to allow screencasting.

You will also need to install Apple Quicktime as a prequisite for UStream Producer

Once installed, you will need to allow port 7272 from Windows Firewall

In order to do screencasting, download UStream Producer from http://www.ustream.tv/producer. The free version was good enough for me. The $199 priced Producer Pro version is tempting since it supports HD and my laptop has a HD camera and their basic plan does not support HD broadcasting. Maybe later.

In order to focus on screen zones, I use ZoomIt

I will update this post as I start applying these tips to actual presentations.

Save Article to Kindle

Saving Articles

I thought it was worth mentioning that Amazon now provide a "Save To Kindle" option for web pages which I have incorporated on the top of the page.

If you want to do the same, just go to http://www.amazon.com/gp/sendtokindle/developers/button

Keywords: Save to Kindle article web page

Retrieve Alternate Email from Exchange

If you have Exchange 2010 and have setup mail accounts with multiple emails; i.e. one primary email address and secondary emails attached to the primary, then any emails that you send to any of the secondary email addresses will be delivered to the primary email. If you inspect the message, then you will find that the "To" part of the message has actually resolved to the primary email address NOT the secondary email it was sent to.

However, there may be cases where it is important to discover the real "To" address that the message was sent to. Read on for a solution.

First, I will use my Office 365 portal to setup an alternate email address for testing.

Go to the Office 365 Online Portal and then click on Manage next to Exchange under Microsoft Office 365

Click on "Users and Groups" on the left hand side and then double-click on an existing user

Under Email, click Add and then add an alternate email address:

Next, we will get the Exchange Web Services API, install it and reference it from our project. You can now create a simple UI to ask for the user's email address and password and try to retrieve some messages from the inbox. Before you do this, send yourself a message and make sure that you type the alternate email in the "To" field.

You can use the EWS helper class to complete the rest your operation:

private void ProcessEmails() { string toAddress = string.Empty; Log("Initializing"); helper.Initialize(txtUserId.Text, txtPassword.Text); Log("Initialized"); if (!helper.exchangeInitialized) throw new ApplicationException("Exchange has not been initialized"); Log("Retrieving email(s)"); FindItemsResults findResults = helper.RetrieveInbox(10); Log("Printing email header(s)"); foreach (Item item in findResults.Items) { Log(string.Format("Subject: {0}", item.Subject)); switch (item.GetType().Name) { case "MeetingRequest": break; case "EmailMessage": var email = helper.RetrieveEmail(item.Id); Log(string.Format("The to address is: {0}", helper.GetToAddress(item))); break; } } }

There you go! Inspect the helper class if you are interested in the details.

Keywords: Exchange, Exchange Web Services, Office 365, Exchange 365, Email, Alternate To, Other To

#Office-365 #Exchange

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