Sunbelt Software – Windows 2000 SP4 Anecdotal Problems

First, thanks to all of you that took the time to describe the different problems you encountered. You know who you are. Second, do not see this as an attempt to knock SP4 and tell you to not deploy it. This SP has hundreds of important security fixes, so it is important. The main thing I am emphasizing is that you need to TEST, TEST, and TEST in a non-production environment FIRST.

Here is a nice summary of problems encountered by some users with SP4. In addition to these potential problems, I had a problem with my zip drive.

A better way of entering dates

A better way of entering dates.

The CreativityGoblin dropped in on me today, and as a result I've been tackling the challenge of entering dates in to a web application. In the past, I've used DHTML calendar widgets for this purpose (my favourite is Mishoo's highly configurable, standards compliant JS Calendar) but while widgets like this have a great deal of “wow” factor I'm not convinced that they are the best entry mechanism when it comes to raw user speed. Today's experiment was partially inspired by PHP's strtotime function, which accepts a string in a wide variety of formats and converts it in to a time.

I wanted the same thing but in Javascript, as interfaces like this are best carried out on the client without needing a round trip to the server to check any entered data. Here's a demo of what I came up with (javascript code here). It accepts a number of different input formats and converts them to a standardised mm/dd/yyyy (American style dates because it's for use in an American piece of software) when you move the focus away from the box. Importantly, the date is shown in two places: in the input box itself and in “Mon Oct 06 2003” format as text below the date entry field. This second display serves two purposes. Firstly, by displaying the date in an unambiguous format mistakes are easier to spot (especially important considering the American date format used in the main input). Secondly, it provides a useful place to display error messages should the script fail to parse some input.

The Javascript itself was quite fun to write, and uses a number of interesting idioms I've picked up over the past year. It adds a 'filter' method to Javascript's Array class to better support functional programming (in fact I use it to match partially entered month and weekday names) and an 'indexOf' method identical to the one provided by the String class. The majority of the work is done by a data structure called dateParsePatterns, which defines a set of pairs of regular expressions and handler functions. The regular expressions match a n input style and extract any useful information; the handler functions then create a Date object from the extracted information and return it to the caller.

Finally, the code uses an error handling technique I picked up on Ward's Wiki called the SamuraiPrinciple, which states you should either complete your contract and return a valid result, or throw an exception. This is used by the handlers and the main date parsing function itself, with thrown exceptions only caught by the magicDate function attached directly to the onblur event of the input box.

There are still quite a few improvements that could be made to the code: more input styles (easily added by extending the main data structure), better planned functions and maybe a clean up to move more of the code out of the root Javascript namespace. For the moment though it serves my purpose just fine.

[Simon Willison's Weblog]

This is a nice piece of coding by Simon and a nice article with some good code links. Mishoo is the primary developer of htmlarea. Speakling of htmlarea, the latest development version can include a spell checker.

Traveling through East Ohio

Today I took my son to his hockey games in Huntington, WV. It should of have been a two and a half hour ride but I missed my turn. By the time I realized that I had passed it, I was too far down the rode to turn back. I found a shorter alternate route but we were late. I did get to see a lot more of East Ohio than I planned on. The leaves in the trees have just changed their colors. It was almost picturesque if I could just get over being late for my son's hockey game. I found the road on the way back. The road was smaller than I expected.

Too Much News: RadioExpress!

One of the things that happened when I switched from Radio Userland to Movable Type, is that RadioExpress! went 404

This was a test of RadioExpress. This is absolutely cool! Highlight the text you want to blog, click on the RadioExpress favorite, and RadioExpress fills in the blog post form with the title, link, and selected text in quotes.

Accessibility Internet Rally 2003 Advanced Training Material

James Craig of Cookiecrook has written a very nice tutorial called Accessibility Internet Rally 2003 Advanced Training Material. For those of you trying to improve the accessibility of your websites this tutorial can be very helpful because it collects the recommendations in one spot.  The notes cover such topics as forms, tables, semantics, CSS basics and accessible CSS. If you are the type of person who needs to see a real-life example to help you understand a concept, these notes are available in presentation mode, web page mode or as plain text.

Fixing Minor Problems

As I mentioned in “Fixing Problems” I have an annoying problem on my W2K server. When the SBS Health Monitor reports run a popup message says,”There is no disk in the drive. Please insert a disk into drive \Device\harddisk\Dr1″. I found a reference to this problem on WinXP and it stated the problem was related to the zip drive. Since updating the zip software didn't fix the problem I tried the recommendation in the KB. I put a diskette in the zip drive. Today I did not get the message. The problem is not solved but at least the symptoms are not annoying me.

Jewish World Review.

Doing without

One of the silly things that gets said repeatedly is that I should not be against affirmative action because I have myself benefitted from it.

Think about it: I am 73 years old. There was no affirmative action when I went to college – or to graduate school, for that matter. There wasn't even a Civil Rights Act of 1964 when I began my academic career in 1962.

Moreover, there is nothing that I have accomplished in my education or my career that wasn't accomplished by other blacks before me — and long before affirmative action. Getting a degree from Harvard? The first black man graduated from Harvard in 1870.

The most dramatic rise of blacks out of poverty occurred before the civil rights movement of the 1960s. That's right – before. But politicians, activists and the intelligentsia have spread so much propaganda that many Americans, black and white, are unaware of the facts.

There is a lot of political mileage to be gotten by convincing blacks that they owe everything to the government and could not make it in this world otherwise. Dependency plus paranoia equals votes. But blacks made it in this world before the government paid them any attention.

Nor has the economic rise of blacks been speeded up by civil rights legislation. More blacks rose into professional ranks in the five years preceding passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 than in the five years after its passage.

What moved blacks up was a rapid increase in education. There was certainly discrimination but, in many fields that demanded higher levels of education, there were not that many blacks to discriminate against in the first place.

Thomas Sowell
Jewish World Review


That's what they said

“One way or the other, we are determined to deny Iraq the capacity to develop weapons of mass destruction and the missiles to deliver them. That is our bottom line.”
President Clinton, Feb. 4, 1998

“If Saddam rejects peace and we have to use force, our purpose is clear. We want to seriously diminish the threat posed by Iraq's weapons of mass destruction program.”
President Clinton, Feb. 17, 1998

“Iraq is a long way from [here], but what happens there matters a great deal here. For the risks that the leaders of a rogue state will use nuclear, chemical or biological weapons against us or our allies is the greatest security threat we face.”
Madeline Albright, Feb 18, 1998

“He will use those weapons of mass destruction again, as he has ten times since 1983.”
Sandy Berger, Clinton National Security Adviser, Feb, 18, 1998

“We urge you, after consulting with Congress, and consistent with the U.S. Constitution and laws, to take necessary actions (including, if appropriate, air and missile strikes on suspect Iraqi sites) to respond effectively to the threat posed by Iraq's refusal to end its weapons of mass destruction programs.”
Letter to President Clinton, signed by Senators, Carl Levin, Tom Daschle, John Kerry, and others Oct. 9, 1998

“Saddam Hussein has been engaged in the development of weapons of mass destruction technology which is a threat to countries in the region and he has made a mockery of the weapons inspection process.”
Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D, CA), Dec. 16, 1998

“Hussein has chosen to spend his money on building weapons of mass destruction and palaces for his cronies.”
Madeline Albright, Clinton Secretary of State, Nov. 10, 1999

“There is no doubt that … Saddam Hussein has reinvigorated his weapons programs. Reports indicate that biological, chemical and nuclear programs continue apace and may be back to pre-Gulf War status. In addition, Saddam continues to redefine delivery systems and is doubtless using the cover of an illicit missile program to develop longer-range missiles that will threaten the United States and our allies.”
Letter to President Bush, Signed by Sen. Bob Graham (D, FL,) and others, Dec, 5, 2001

“We begin with the common belief that Saddam Hussein is a tyrant and a threat to the peace and stability of the region. He has ignored the mandated of the United Nations and is building weapons of mass destruction and the means of delivering them.”
Sen. Carl Levin (D, MI), Sept. 19, 2002

“We know that he has stored secret supplies of biological and chemical weapons throughout his country.”
Al Gore, Sept. 23, 2002

“Iraq's search for weapons of mass destruction has proven impossible to deter and we should assume that it will continue for as long as Saddam is in power.”
Al Gore, Sept. 23, 2002

“We have known for many years that Saddam Hussein is seeking and developing weapons of mass destruction.”
Sen. Ted Kennedy (D, MA), Sept. 27, 2002

“The last UN weapons inspectors left Iraq in October of 1998. We are confident that Saddam Hussein retains some stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons, and that he has since embarked on a crash course to build up his chemical and biological warfare capabilities. Intelligence reports indicate that he is seeking nuclear weapons…”
Sen. Robert Byrd (D, WV), Oct. 3, 2002

“I will be voting to give the President of the United States the authority to use force– if necessary– to disarm Saddam Hussein because I believe that a deadly arsenal of weapons of mass destruction in his hands is a real and grave threat to our security.”
Sen. John F. Kerry (D, MA), Oct. 9, 2002

“There is unmistakable evidence that Saddam Hussein is working aggressively to develop nuclear weapons and will likely have nuclear weapons within the next five years … We also should remember we have always underestimated the progress Saddam has made in development of weapons of mass destruction.”
Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D, WV), Oct 10, 2002

“He has systematically violated, over the course of the past 11 years, every significant UN resolution that has demanded that he disarm and destroy his chemical and biological weapons, and any nuclear capacity. This he has refused to do”
Rep. Henry Waxman (D, CA), Oct. 10, 2002

“In the four years since the inspectors left, intelligence reports show that Saddam Hussein has worked to rebuild his chemical and biological weapons stock, his missile delivery capability, and his nuclear program. He has also given aid, comfort, and sanctuary to terrorists, including al Qaeda members. It is clear, however, that if left unchecked, Saddam Hussein will continue to increase his capacity to wage biological and chemical warfare, and will keep trying to develop nuclear weapons.”
Sen. Hillary Clinton (D, NY), Oct 10, 2002

“We are in possession of what I think to be compelling evidence that Saddam Hussein has, and has had for a number of years, a developing capacity for the production and storage of weapons of mass destruction.”
Sen. Bob Graham (D, FL), Dec. 8, 2002

“Without question, we need to disarm Saddam Hussein. He is a brutal, murderous dictator, leading an oppressive regime.. He presents a particularly grievous threat because he is so consistently prone to miscalculation … And now he is miscalculating America's response to his continued deceit and his consistent grasp for weapons of mass destruction… So the threat of Saddam Hussein with weapons of mass destruction is real …”
Sen. John F. Kerry (D, MA), Jan. 23, 2003

[The Braden Files]

Fixing Minor Problems

Today I tried to fix a variety of minor problems. Some fixes worked. Some fixes didn't work.

  1. I have an annoying problem on my W2K server. I started getting this problem after applying SP4. When the SBS Health Monitor reports run a popup message says,”There is no disk in the drive. Please insert a disk into drive \Device\harddisk\Dr1″. I have searched in vain for help using various keywords. Today I found Q330137  when I searched using the keyword “DR1” and it says that some WinXP users occasionally have this problem with zip drives configured as the C drive. Since I remember having funky problems with M$ drivers for the zip drive, I installed Iomega's drivers to see if it would fix the problem.
  2. A person sent in a work around for the PDFCreator font bug. It involves copying part of the file structure of Ghostscript 8.11 so I downloaded and installed Ghostscript. I will check out his workaround tommorrow.
  3. I spent a lot of time trying to get the serial number of my new disk drive for the rebate certificate. I knew I could get it from the disk utilities so I tried creating a floppy disk. I was reminded that my floppy disk has serious problems and I have not fixed it yet. So I tried creating a bootable CDROM. The version of CDBurnerXP I said it could do it. I found out that it could not do it. I downloaded the newest version and it no longer supports ISO images. So I booted up Win98 and created the CDROM using Adaptec's utility. It took me a couple of boots before I figured out I had to put the CDROM into the second CDROM drive. It finally booted but did not run. So I went back to Seagate and decided to run the online disk diagnostic utility. It worked and showed me the serial number. I have vowed to buy a new floppy drive.
  4. I test out PRTG. It is pretty cool but I have noticed a performance hit I haven't noticed before.