Norse Technologies Knowledge Base Free Knowledge Articles

Sometimes in testing network settings and authentication ( for instance when setting up a Samba server and users on a CentOS, Ubuntu, or Feroda Linux system) I often find it useful to force my Windows PC client to “forget” the login username and password that it has on record, for the current session, so that I may login again with another username/password combo. Easily accomplished, this Windows trick works on all modern Microsoft operating systems.

The situation: You need to login again to a network share on a Windows file server, or a Linux server,  without rebooting the client computer.

The fix: Disconnect from the shares using the NET command.

1. Open a command prompt. (My favorite way is: Win-R, type cmd, press Enter)
2. Type NET USE * /DELETE
3. It will prompt you for verification, type Y and Enter.

That’s it! Enjoy, and may your login be forgotten!

Courtesy, Microsoft: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/308582

Posted under Microsoft, Network, Software, Windows

Many thanks to Jon Lee at jonlee.ca for this excellent procedure allowing for the automtic login of a session using SSH and puTTY.exe terminal emulator. You da man!

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From his site:

As many web developers can attest to, logging into your server through SSH (Secure Shell) is one of the more common day-to-day tasks (you can even use it as a secure tunnel for your traffic). It only makes sense to automate this process which in turn can save many many keystrokes.

This how-to is written with PuTTY and Windows in mind and requires several other tools that are available from PuTTY’s website. So from their download page, make sure you have these files:

• PuTTY (putty.exe)
• PuTTYgen (puttygen.exe)

Then to automate SSH login, do the following:

1. Run PuTTYgen.
2. Select SSH-2 DSA as the Type of Key to generate.
3. Click generate and move your mouse around to generate randomness.
4. Click “Save Private Key” and save it somewhere on your computer.
5. Copy the entire content inside the box to your clipboard (this is your generated public key).
6. Login to your SSH server.
7. Create the file ~/.ssh/authorized_keys containing the generated public key (from step 3) on a single line.
8. Make this file readable (chmod 755).
9. Then open up PuTTY and navigate to Connection->Data and fill in the auto-login username.
10. Navigate to Connection->SSH->Auth and under Private-key, browse to the file you had saved earlier on your computer.

That’s it! Now you can try logging in to your SSH server and it should login automatically. If it works, make sure you save your session so you don’t have to repeat these steps every time!

Hopefully these steps work for everyone! Let me know if there are any problems.

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Had some problems with a CentOS5 server not accepting keys… found that this server was being finicky for some reason, and used this article on how to generate the keys on the Linux server, and then import the public key to the client Windows box. To make it automatically login simply do not enter any passphrase. This is probably a huge security risk or something like that, but if you’re using it on a secured LAN then perhaps it’s ok.

Posted under Linux, Network

The following is totally copied from myfixes.com excellent article.

This article applies to the following type of errors:

Resolution:

A. Boot the system into the Recovery Console and CHKDSK

B. Perform the System Restore
Inside the Recovery Console type the following commands to change the directory to the system restore directory:

If you get an Access Denied error:click here
If you don’t get an Access Denied error :

If there is no _resto~1 folder or if there are no restore points inside it:click here

If the _resto~1 folder exists, inside it there are several folders named RP1, RP2. These are restore points. RP1 is the oldest restore point. You can use

to view what RP folders are available. If no restore points are available click here. Otherwise choose the most convenient RP folder. Supposing we have RP3 available let’s type in:

Change the directory to snapshot:

Restore the main registry branches. If you are being asked if you want to overwrite type in y to agree.

Type exit to reboot the system. Start the computer normally

Based on:
The support.microsoft.com article:
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=KB;EN-US;Q307545&ID=KB;EN-US;Q307545

The icompute.info article:
http://www.icompute.info/System_restore_from_xp_cd.htm

Posted under Microsoft

In modern Microsoft Windows operating systems and all Unix / Linux systems the system clock time can be set automatically. The computer will connect to a special server on the Internet called a Network Time Protocol server, and get the current universal time, and then adjust it according to the local time zone on the computer. It keeps the computer clock very accurate and corrects drift before it can become much of a problem.

We recommend using a reliable server: pool.ntp.org

A wonderful group of generous folks provide this extremely reliable cluster of computers for us all to use, free of charge. Thank you NTP Pool Project and all the participants!

Posted under Freeware, Linux, WebDev

Trying to access a Windows XP host computer over a LAN (local area network) and get into it’s shared folders.

This little turd of an error can be really irritating. It happens when trying to access a shared folder, or any shares, on a remote, but LAN networked, Windows XP computer. After running the Network Setup Wizard on the host computer, and enabling file and printer sharing, it just won’t go away. In Windows XP Professional, you can go into the explorer view settings, and disable Simple File Sharing, which didn’t fix it either.

The fix ended up being a simple registry edit, suggested by Microsoft: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/913628

Here is the process:

To resolve this issue, set the value of the restrictanonymous registry entry to 0. To do this, follow these steps:

1. Click Start, click Run, type regedit, and then click OK.
2. Locate and then double-click the following registry subkey:
   HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Lsa
3. On the right side, double-click restrictanonymous.
4. Make sure that the value in the Value data box is set to 0, and then click OK.
5. Close Registry Editor.
6. Restart the computer.

This worked like a charm more than once for me.

Posted under Microsoft, Network, WordPress

Assuming you are using Windows XP or Vista, you can use the DISKPART utility to delete these OEM partitions from DELL and other hard drives.

If you have data anywhere on the drive that you will be deleting the EISA partition from, backup that data now.

1. Connect the drive to the computer. If it is an IDE drive then do this with a USB-to-IDE device, or connect the drive directly to the IDE cable. If ti is a SATA drive then do this with a USB-to-SATA device, or connect the drive direclty to the SATA controller on the motherboard. In essence, the drive must be connected to the PC and it must be “seen” by the operating system.
2. XP: Start a command prompt in XP by going START > RUN > type CMD <ENTER>
   Vista: Start a command prompt in Vista by going START > type CMD <ENTER> in the “Start Search” box.
3. In the command prompt type DISKPART <ENTER>. This starts up the DISKPART utility.
4. Type LIST DISK <ENTER>. This shows the all the disks connected to the computer. Decide which one is the one you are wanting to delete the EISA / OEM partition from, and make note of which number it is.
5. Type SELECT DISK n <ENTER> (where n = the number of the disk you noted in step 4)
6. Type LIST PART <ENTER>. This shows the all the partitions contained in the drive you are working with. Decide which one is the one you are wanting to delete, and make note of which number it is.
7. Type SELECT PART n <ENTER> (where n = the number of the partition you noted in step 6)
8. Type DELETE PART OVERRIDE <ENTER>. This deletes the partition you selected.
9. You are done with deleting the partition. If you want to, you may now EXTEND another adjacent partition into that free space you just created.

Enjoy!

Posted under Hardware, Microsoft