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I have seen this problem randomly on my windows 7 computer. After close observation, I found that DRAG and DROP won’t work from low privileged window to High privileged window. I generally run a command prompt with administrator and try to drag drop items from my explorer to the elevated command prompt. Since the elevated command prompt is running in high privilege mode, and my explorer in low privilege mode, drap-drop from explorer to cmd is not working. Whereas same operation to a normal command prompt is working without any issues since it is in the same privilege mode as my explorer.

I hope this small briefing helps you come out of drap-drop dilemma.

Btw, command prompt appears like below when it is in high privilege mode.

Description:

This powershell function helps you pinning the specified program to Task bar in windows 7/Windows Vista/Windows 2008 computers.

Usage:

[PS]:>Pinto-Taskbar -application “c:windowssystem32calc.exe”

The above statement Pins the calculator program to Task bar.

Code:

function pinto-taskbar {

param(

[parameter(Mandatory = $true)]

[string]$application

)

$appfolderpath = $application.SubString(0,$application.Length-($application.Split(“”)[$application.Split("").Count-1].Length))

$objshell = New-Object -ComObject “Shell.Application”

$objfolder = $objshell.Namespace($appfolderpath)

$appname = $objfolder.ParseName($application.SubString($application.Length-($application.Split(“”)[$application.Split("").Count-1].Length)))

$verbs = $appname.verbs()

foreach ($verb in $verbs) {

if($verb.name.replace(“&”,”") -match “Pin to Taskbar”) {

$verb.DoIt()

}

}

}

Microsoft Office 2007 installation in windows 7 won’t create any Outlook Icon on User desktop. This is expected behavior with default installation. If you want to get this icon, then import the below registry information to your system and you should be able to see it immediately.

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREClassesCLSID{00020D75-0000-0000-C000-000000000046}]

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREClassesCLSID{00020D75-0000-0000-C000-000000000046}ShellFolder]
“Attributes”=dword:00000072

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREClassesCLSID{00020D75-0000-0000-C000-000000000046}]
@=”Microsoft Office Outlook”
“InfoTip”=”Displays your e-mail, calendar, contacts, and other important personal information.”

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREClassesCLSID{00020D75-0000-0000-C000-000000000046}DefaultIcon]
@=”C:\PROGRA~2\MICROS~1\Office12\OUTLOOK.EXE,7″

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREClassesCLSID{00020D75-0000-0000-C000-000000000046}InprocServer32]
@=”C:\PROGRA~2\MICROS~1\Office12\MLSHEXT.DLL”
“ThreadingModel”=”Apartment”

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREClassesCLSID{00020D75-0000-0000-C000-000000000046}Shell]

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREClassesCLSID{00020D75-0000-0000-C000-000000000046}ShellOpen]

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREClassesCLSID{00020D75-0000-0000-C000-000000000046}ShellOpenCommand]
@=”"C:\PROGRA~2\MICROS~1\Office12\OUTLOOK.EXE”"

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREClassesCLSID{00020D75-0000-0000-C000-000000000046}ShellPropertiescommand]
@=”rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL “C:\PROGRA~2\MICROS~1\Office12\MLCFG32.CPL”"

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREClassesCLSID{00020D75-0000-0000-C000-000000000046}shellex]

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREClassesCLSID{00020D75-0000-0000-C000-000000000046}shellexPropertySheetHandlers]

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREClassesCLSID{00020D75-0000-0000-C000-000000000046}shellexPropertySheetHandlers{00020D75-0000-0000-C000-000000000046}]
@=”"

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREClassesCLSID{00020D75-0000-0000-C000-000000000046}ShellFolder]
“Attributes”=hex:72,00,00,00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionExplorerDesktopNameSpace{00020D75-0000-0000-C000-000000000046}]

You can save above bunch of keys as reg file and import into the target machine. Obvious thing is that you should take backup of your registry before you import.

Hope this tip helps you!!

[Source]

I started my day with some exciting stuff. Since the time I started working on Windows 7 computers, I always failed to access remote computer’s(windows 7) administrative shares(for example: c$) using computer’s local admin account(this used to work in windows XP as the local admin name and password are same across all systems). I didn’t pay much attention to it as I got domain admin privileges which anyways working. But these days with the increase in my testing efforts on windows 7 computers, the need to access remote shares with local administrator got increased. I don’t want to put domain admin every time as it is a high level account and moreover I need to put in the credentials every time I access a new computer which is waste of efforts.

Well, I got this problem resolved by little registry tweak. Steps follows….

Fix:

1. Go to Start -> RUN
2. Type: REGEDIT
3. Navigate to “HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionPoliciesSystem”
4. Create a new DWORD key with name “LocalAccountTokenFilterPolicy” and value “1″
5. Restart your computer.

This solved the problem and I am able to access the shares of the computers where I made above change.

Thanks to TechNet Forums for directing me to the solution and special thanks to Jammah.com for providing this tip.

Additional Notes:

Well, the registry key fixed the problem but I am curious about the reasons behind this design. I did some research on this topic and understood that, it is a “Security Measure” for UAC(User Access Contorl) enable systems. The whole purpose of enabling UAC is to make administrators work with non-elevated environment to defend the attacks. As part of UAC implementation, the ability for local administrators to elevate their rights from remote computers is disabled by default and can be enabled on optional basis using aforementioned procedure.

More details can be grabbed from:   http://support.microsoft.com/kb/951016

Hope this information helps you.

Windows Firewall is one of the components which is enhanced greatly from windows XP to windows 7. In windows 7 it acts as two way firewall(Inbound/Outbound) with many advanced security features. This is also called as “Windows Firewall with Advanced security” in Window s7.

The more features, the more details you need it for troubleshooting issues. Since this version of firewall acts as a bi-directional one, you need good amount logging to troubleshoot network connection level issues on windows 7 and windows 2008 R2.

This article talks about how to enable this logging, location of log files, and few more options avaiLalble in logging.

Enabling Logging in Windows 7/Windows 2008 firewall.

It is pretty easy. If you want to enable on a single computer, just go to Start -> RUN -> and type  wf.msc , this opens up “Windows Firewall with Advanced Security”.

Now Right click on “Windows Firewall With Advanced Security on Local Computer” and go to properties which opens below page.

Select “Customize” option under logging.

There browse for log files location where you want to place the logs and also choose the size limit for log files.

Your Logging will not start until you select “YES” for one of the following options. 1) Log dropped packets 2) Log Successful connections.

Click OK twice to complete your configuration.

This completes the configuration.

In my next post I will talk about how to analyze these logs files. Hope this information helps you.

Here is the download link. This MSI contains the all the ADMX and ADML files that are applicable to windows 7 and windows 2008 R2 computers.

Download

Have you heard about “GOD Mode” in Windows 7? It sounds like a crazy and exciting stuff, right? Initially I felt the same when I came across this topic in one of technet support forums. After some reading I realized that is *not* exciting but a bit useful stuff.

Basically, when you view control panel, you will get few initial options and selecting one will take you inside and show you few more options which are under it. Basically its like a categorization. But with this “God Mode”, you can view all items in control panel in a single page. Nothing more.

Let’s see how to configure this in Windows 7 computer.

• Create a folder and rename it to “God Mode.{ED7BA470-8E54-465E-825C-99712043E01C}”

That’s sit. It converts the folder Icon to Control Panel Icon and clicking on which takes you to the single page view of all control panel items.

Well story not ended here. After trying above procedure, one question kept lingering in my mind — why it is called “God Mode” while it is not doing any “godly” things. I just replace the “God Mode” with my name — ha ha there is no change in functionality and it is still showing the things which it used to show when named as God mode. So there is no significance in that name and you can use any name you want but you should suffix it with the GUID which is related to control panel. Below is the sample screenshot which shows the view.

Hope this is somewhat informative for you guys…

Microsoft has announced Service Pack 1(SP1) beta for Windows 7 and Windows 2008 R2.

Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1 Beta helps keep your PCs and servers on the latest support level, provides ongoing improvements to the Windows Operating System (OS), by including previous updates delivered over Windows Update as well as continuing incremental updates to the Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 platforms based on customer and partner feedback, and is easy for organizations to deploy a single set of updates.

Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1 Beta will help you:

• Keep your PCs supported and up-to-date
• Get ongoing updates to the Windows 7 platform
• Easily deploy cumulative updates at a single time
• Meet your users’ demands for greater business mobility
• Provide a comprehensive set of virtualization innovations
• Provide an easier Service Pack deployment model for better IT efficiency

To download SP1, first your should register yourself at this LINK and after successful registration it will display the options to update your computer either via Windows update or ISO. The ISO contains the SP1 for both 32 and 64 bit architectures of Windows 7 and 64-bit version for windows 2008 R2.

Source : TechNet

Windows+E opens explorer, Windows+R starts run, and Windows +D shows desktop, etc….. Do you want to know all the keyboard shorts in windows 7? Hmm I also looked for it this morning and stumbled on below link which has the complete and segregated list.

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows7/Keyboard-shortcuts

You will definately find it useful.

OS keyboard(On Screen Keyboard) helps you to type in letters when your physical keyboard is not functioning. This is not a new feature in windows 7, XP also has it but in Windows 7 it enhanced a bit.

To launch OS keyboard in windows 7 just type “osk.exe” in Start->Run. You should see keyboard like below.