- Blind-sysadmins - lists.hodgsonfamily.org

Re: [Blind-sysadmins] installing applications
by Ben Mustill-Rose 03 Apr '10

03 Apr '10

Whilst we're on the subject of installing applications on new or unprotected machines, a few weeks ago, I started using a service that speeds this process up to the point that you'll be wondering how you coped withinstalling all of the standard apps the old way once you've used this service for a bit. The site in question is www.ninite.com Basicly, all the homepage has on it is checkboxes for popula apps. Go ahead and tick the ones you want and on the next page, ninite will give you a custom installer (Its actually a stub) which will unattendedly download and then install all the applications that you selected. I've got my custom installer on a thumbdrive, so all I have to do is plug the drive in, run the installer and come back in about 10 minutes and its done. I've also used this for friends who to put it nicely might not be able to manage the install of severall applications with out messing it up. I just send them the installer and its done. Hope this helped someone.

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two misc questions on programs and accessibility
by David Mehler 03 Apr '10

03 Apr '10

Hello, I've got to protect a new dell that has come out of the dark days of dialup in to the light of high speed cable. I'm not the primary user of it, but i am the primary supporter. I'm using jfw10 currently, but will be moving possibly to something else which is not certain, assume jfw 10 or 11 for now. I'm wondering this is an xpsp3 box btw, wondering the advantages/disadvantages in terms of accessibility, system performance or sluggishness, features, and for the users' ease of use and false positive detection, Windows Defender and Microsoft Security Essentials. I want to protect against viruses, malware, trojans, rootkits, everything. I'd like to know which is better and less of a system resource holder. Unrelated, is there a way in xp to get the signal strength of a wireless connection or what channel it's on? I've heard suggestions of enabling balloon tips, but that didn't do it. Thanks. Dave.

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avast5 and screen readers?
by David Mehler 02 Apr '10

02 Apr '10

Hello, Is anyone using avast 5 with a screen reader? I've used 4, and like it, i know 5 is out, but have heard both that it is less accessible and that it is great. If anyone has first hand information i'd appreciate it. Thanks. Dave.

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Solved my own problem
by Steve Matzura 01 Apr '10

01 Apr '10

What you have to do in order to successfully change the router address on a DLink DIR655 router is to first revoke all the reserved IP addresses. Then and only then will it let you change and permanently save the change of the router's base IP address! Once that was done, I was back on my old network with my printer and Synology box showing up once again. Yaha!

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Need a Net Nut to Nib a Nasty
by Steve Matzura 01 Apr '10

01 Apr '10

Up until yesterday shortly after lunch, my home network was managed (routed, firewalled) by a Linksys WRT54G wireless router. I never enabled the wireless portion of the device because I don't need it in my little crackerbox palace of an apartment, plus there's far too much metal in the wall studs and other support structures, including the door and window onto the terrace, so I just disabled it to keep things utterly shut tight and secure. Why'd I buy a wireless router in the first place? Suffice it to say, I didn't know the place was that metallic when we first moved into it. Be that as it may, about eight or so years and three firmware revisions later, the thing finally gave up the ghost, as they say, and is now sitting in a truck on the way to a landfill somewhere--I no longer have the device. This is key to understanding my problem and why it cannot be suggested to reconnect the device in order to solve it. Yiskar has been saide. I have buried my dead. OK, the 54G was replaced with a nice new (vintage 2008) DLink DIR655n router, all ports operating at a gigabit, as opposed to 100mb for the Linksys box. The Linksys router's home address was 192.168.1.1, while the DLink's is 192.168.0.1. Two devices on my network have static IP addresses--a printer and a NAS box. Everything else is DHCP and has reserved an address on the new 192.192.0.1 network. This means now that I cannot communicate at all with either the printer or the NAS box until I either change their address or change the rest of thenetwork devices' addresses back to the old address base (192.168.1.*) I thought I would simply change the address of the router itself from 192.168.0.1 to ..1.1. Every time I try to do this, the router does its thing, reboots, and returns with the ..0.1 address. Anyone with experience with the DIR655 router who knows how to get past this, greatly appreaciated to hear from you asap, publicly or privately. TIA

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Unattended installation of Windows Server 2008 r2
by Frank Ventura 29 Mar '10

29 Mar '10

Hi does anyone have a sample unattended installation XML file that works with Windows Server 2008R2 and/or one that works with Windows Server 2008 Std, both 64 bit? Thanks Frank

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importing public self signed certificates via GPO
by Dave 27 Mar '10

27 Mar '10

Hello, This might be a simple question, but googling hasn't revealed the answer. I've got a web server that uses ssl to protect areas. This ssl is enabled by a self signed certificate that i issued from my own CA. I can manually import the CA's public certificate in to each machine then each system will trust the site and not pop up a warning dialog box about an untrusted cert. What i was wondering is if it would be possible for a GPO to be able to distribute the public cert to all domain computers. Thanks. Dave.

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Re: [Blind-sysadmins] Windows Defender
by Frank Ventura 27 Mar '10

27 Mar '10

Oddly enough on the three Win 7 'puters I have in my home office I don't really have an issue with loosing JFW authorizations. However, at work on one of our training computers we routinely loose authorizations. I plugged in a second NIC into it the other day and wham, bam, my JFW authorization just got slammed. Frank -----Original Message----- From: blind-sysadmins-bounces(a)lists.hodgsonfamily.org [mailto:blind-sysadmins-bounces@lists.hodgsonfamily.org] On Behalf Of Andrew Hodgson Sent: Friday, March 26, 2010 7:03 PM To: Blind sysadmins list Subject: Re: [Blind-sysadmins] Windows Defender Hi, There is an issue with JFW auths being lost with the earlier versions of JFW. I only got this sorted myself by completely removing all components of JFW, then using the latest JFW download. Even now, authorisations are a bit sticky, I installed another soundcard last week and lost the authorisation. Andrew. -----Original Message----- From: blind-sysadmins-bounces(a)lists.hodgsonfamily.org [mailto:blind-sysadmins-bounces@lists.hodgsonfamily.org] On Behalf Of Stewart Hamling Sent: 26 March 2010 22:40 To: 'Blind sysadmins list' Subject: [Blind-sysadmins] Windows Defender Since upgrading to Windows 7 and JAWS 11, I have had an ongoing issue with losing JAWS authorisation. For a long time I have had Windows Defender turned off and had no problem. Last night, some how W Defender ran and this morning, JAWS has started saying that it is unauthorised; I am running in demo mode. Has anyone else had an issue with losing JAWS authorisation? Are there any known issues with W defender? Thank you in advance, Stewart. _______________________________________________ Blind-sysadmins mailing list Blind-sysadmins(a)lists.hodgsonfamily.org http://lists.hodgsonfamily.org/mailman/listinfo/blind-sysadmins _______________________________________________ Blind-sysadmins mailing list Blind-sysadmins(a)lists.hodgsonfamily.org http://lists.hodgsonfamily.org/mailman/listinfo/blind-sysadmins

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HP Datavault Home Server
by Andrew Hodgson 26 Mar '10

26 Mar '10

Hi, Had a lot of Dabs points left so picked up 3TB HP Datavault server with Windows Home Server on it. This is very similar to the MediaSmart server, only targeted at small businesses, but with the same software set as the MediaSmart server. The 3TB consists of 2 1.5 TB drives, grate - can consolidate two Buffalo Linkstations plus data on my SBS server onto this box. With Dabs points plus money off vouchers they keep sending me, the unit came in at about £680. I tried to get the MediaSmart server, but it wasn't available through Dabs at any rate. System is a dual-core Pentium (64-bit compatible for future proof, though current WHS is 32-bit). 2GB RAM installed. This box is very small - just over the size of a single drive Linkstation, and it runs very quiet. Lots of impressive lights on the front, very bright! As you may know the console on the WHS boxes is not accessible remotely since it uses some embedded RDP session. The workaround I made was to install WindowEyes 7.11 onto the box itself by using the Remote Desktop connection. I copied the CD contents to the d: drive of the server, then ran the setup program. It is important to choose the following - choosing the wrong option can put the server into an unrecoverable state, I did this and had to reimage the machine with the recovery disk! - Install with no speech. - Choose custom setup. - Enter your name. - Install to default directory. - Choose to use the RDP virtual redirector speech synth - not Dectalk! - No Braille display. - Don't install manual (does it matter?) - Choose default hotkey for startup. - Untick both boxes for WE autostart (very important). - After install completes, don't reboot the system, enable the RDP video chaining driver then reboot. Once the server is back up start WE on the local system, RDP into the WHS box and then start WE on there. You should get speech - the first thing you will get is a warning explaining that you shouldn't go messing around in the various different server consoles. If you run the WHS console from here (via desktop shortcut), you can do most of the items you want using the mouse cursors, including creating accounts etc. Outside the console you seem to be able to do a lot of server functions - i.e., install software, change IIS settings, etc. There is even the option to join the server to the domain, but apparently this isn't in the license agreement, so I didn't join my server to the SBS domain. I get the feeling that there is a lot of custom work on the server installed by both MS and HP, and if you change settings without knowing the workings of the custom software you will break stuff. I created user accounts which matched the passwords of my SBS account, and could access shares on the system fine. The backup feature is very impressive, backing up my Windows 7 machine in less than an hour. Restore unfortunately requires boot CD, so not going to be accessible. There is a remote access feature which is nice. You can remotely upload and download files from the server, and the HTML interface for this works well. You can choose to download whole directories, and you get them as a ZIP file. Uploading caused a bit of an issue for me, though I suspect I will use it mainly for downloading. It tries to get the remote access using UPNP, if you have something listening on a single static IP address on port 80 or 443 don't do this. They force a TZO dynamic DNS service on you, I just cancelled out of the setup for this and it seemed to work ok. There is a nice media converter on here for videos, put the video you want converting into a special share and it gets converted to MP4. There is also a media server running Twonky Media services for all those network players around. Windows Media services is obviously supported natively as well. HP have done the Mac integration piece for this as well, with a special Mac client and a Time Machine server pre-installed. Recovery is a bit of a pita, you have to connect directly to the PC (not using crossover cable interestingly enough), then press the recovery button as the unit starts. By the looks of it this asks the BIOS to boot from a PXE server which your recovery CD on the PC will set up. Once booted into the recovery environment, the wizard on the desktop guides you through reimaging the device. There are options to just reinstall the WHS partition, or to do a full format of the disks (factory reset). This just didn't work for me on my Win7 machine, so had to go and use my XP netbook to do the recovery. Overall am happy with this device, probably won't get another NAS device for ages now :). Apparently there are upgrades due out for the unit, and for older units there were paid upgrades to the latest WHS release, so am hoping they will have an upgrade option available for the next release due out early next year. Only issue with this is Windows domain support. Hope this helps. Andrew.

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HP Datavault Home Server
by Andrew Hodgson 25 Mar '10

25 Mar '10

Hi, Had a lot of Dabs points left so picked up 3TB HP Datavault server with Windows Home Server on it. This is very similar to the MediaSmart server, only targeted at small businesses, but with the same software set as the MediaSmart server. The 3TB consists of 2 1.5 TB drives, grate - can consolidate two Buffalo Linkstations plus data on my SBS server onto this box. With Dabs points plus money off vouchers they keep sending me, the unit came in at about £680. I tried to get the MediaSmart server, but it wasn't available through Dabs at any rate. System is a dual-core Pentium (64-bit compatible for future proof, though current WHS is 32-bit). 2GB RAM installed. This box is very small - just over the size of a single drive Linkstation, and it runs very quiet. Lots of impressive lights on the front, very bright! As you may know the console on the WHS boxes is not accessible remotely since it uses some embedded RDP session. The workaround I made was to install WindowEyes 7.11 onto the box itself by using the Remote Desktop connection. I copied the CD contents to the d: drive of the server, then ran the setup program. It is important to choose the following - choosing the wrong option can put the server into an unrecoverable state, I did this and had to reimage the machine with the recovery disk! - Install with no speech. - Choose custom setup. - Enter your name. - Install to default directory. - Choose to use the RDP virtual redirector speech synth - not Dectalk! - No Braille display. - Don't install manual (does it matter?) - Choose default hotkey for startup. - Untick both boxes for WE autostart (very important). - After install completes, don't reboot the system, enable the RDP video chaining driver then reboot. Once the server is back up start WE on the local system, RDP into the WHS box and then start WE on there. You should get speech - the first thing you will get is a warning explaining that you shouldn't go messing around in the various different server consoles. If you run the WHS console from here (via desktop shortcut), you can do most of the items you want using the mouse cursors, including creating accounts etc. Outside the console you seem to be able to do a lot of server functions - i.e., install software, change IIS settings, etc. There is even the option to join the server to the domain, but apparently this isn't in the license agreement, so I didn't join my server to the SBS domain. I get the feeling that there is a lot of custom work on the server installed by both MS and HP, and if you change settings without knowing the workings of the custom software you will break stuff. I created user accounts which matched the passwords of my SBS account, and could access shares on the system fine. The backup feature is very impressive, backing up my Windows 7 machine in less than an hour. Restore unfortunately requires boot CD, so not going to be accessible. There is a remote access feature which is nice. You can remotely upload and download files from the server, and the HTML interface for this works well. You can choose to download whole directories, and you get them as a ZIP file. Uploading caused a bit of an issue for me, though I suspect I will use it mainly for downloading. It tries to get the remote access using UPNP, if you have something listening on a single static IP address on port 80 or 443 don't do this. They force a TZO dynamic DNS service on you, I just cancelled out of the setup for this and it seemed to work ok. There is a nice media converter on here for videos, put the video you want converting into a special share and it gets converted to MP4. There is also a media server running Twonky Media services for all those network players around. Windows Media services is obviously supported natively as well. HP have done the Mac integration piece for this as well, with a special Mac client and a Time Machine server pre-installed. Recovery is a bit of a pita, you have to connect directly to the PC (not using crossover cable interestingly enough), then press the recovery button as the unit starts. By the looks of it this asks the BIOS to boot from a PXE server which your recovery CD on the PC will set up. Once booted into the recovery environment, the wizard on the desktop guides you through reimaging the device. There are options to just reinstall the WHS partition, or to do a full format of the disks (factory reset). This just didn't work for me on my Win7 machine, so had to go and use my XP netbook to do the recovery. Overall am happy with this device, probably won't get another NAS device for ages now :). Apparently there are upgrades due out for the unit, and for older units there were paid upgrades to the latest WHS release, so am hoping they will have an upgrade option available for the next release due out early next year. Only issue with this is Windows domain support. Hope this helps. Andrew.

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