Another redesign! Yes, appearantly that's all I ever do on this site. Oh well, I'm pretty happy with this one. CSS is really, really easy, until you get to positioning. Then, you need a Master's Degree in Insanity - because not only is it a relatively in-depth system, but like snowflakes, no two browsers interpret it the same way.

First off, I'd just like to ask that if anyone visits this site and is using the IE7 Public Beta, drop me a line with how the page turns out. I

Second, I've got another early program for anyone to try out. It's a front-end to the completely awesome AutoPatcher. It has every post-SP2 Windows update, but I thought: "Wouldn't this be nice if it was on a cd with Service Pack 2.... maybe with a menu?" So I made it.

I'm still working on that discussion on pen drive applications I talked about. Just kinda busy.

And I'm not ignoring WURT, it's just that I'm at a bit of a standstill - I don't have the time to do any of the really big changes I'd like to make (dialog or web-based, reimplement ipconfig, optimize the reregistration with a data structure), so I'm just working on little tweaks and other programs.

I haven't actually written an article in a while, but I'm working on a short one about running applications from USB flash drives. I plan on touching on the interesting but absurd U3, but then digging into normal applications and getting them to run.

Also, in a side note, I'm in episode 11 of CUBackSlash, and they're even talking about the awesome AutoPatcher, which I found and introduced to the university. I didn't get to stay on the show until they got to talk about it, but I did get to mention this at the beginning.

It's a huge time saver, and the developers deserve accolades for this wonderful program. It contains every WinXP update after SP2, every Win2K update after SP4, or every Win2K3 update after SP1, depending on which version you get. One reboot, and you're done. I highly recommend it, and I may publish a CD front-end that I've created and used internally for it sometime soon.

Just to let you (ie, my fiancee, and anyone who gets horribly, horribly lost on the Web) know, I'm posting a couple of new tools.

RegSniper is a tool that allows you to edit the registry easily. It allows you to type or paste a key in for quicker navigation. It's an early beta, but it's helpful.

GPCTool is a utility to check Windows XP Home machines to make sure Group Policy settings haven't been set to block access to important settings, like the Display Control Panel.

Well, it looks like I'm going up to Montreal, Quebec in March for the CS Games. It's a programming comptetition, and Clarion University's local ACM chapter typically sends a team. It looks pretty exciting, but it's a bit discouraging that the French-Canadian teams took the top three spots - not to slight them, but merely that I wonder if the language barrier may present any issue. I've never been to that part of Canada, so who knows?

And, what the heck is "Extreme Programming"?

Just thought I'd share a quick tip with anyone who may end up here. I've repeatedly needed cheap parts, such as cd drives, memory, and video cards. If you need a really cheap part, try Geeks.com or IsellSurplus - I've used both for a while happily. Both have somewhat higher shipping, but the low used part price makes up for it if you buy in bulk. I'd recommend watching for Geeks' Green Light Sale - it's hard to beat deals like a 32x cdrw / 12x dvdrom for $15.

Newegg should be your next stop. This is all new merchandise, so the prices are higher, but they have cheap per item shipping, so don't worry too much about bulk ordering.

ZipZoomFly often has free shipping, but their prices are much less predictable - often you can do better elsewhere. Still, if you hit NewEgg, check them too.

However, I would avoid a few things:
- Power Supplies - I've been burned by A-Power (big on geeks.com. but also on the other two) and Powmax (mostly NewEgg). Failing PSs are sometimes hard to diagnose, so it's worth getting that Antec - they simply do not fry. Literally.
- Hard Drives - NewEgg is fine, since they're new. But if you go through Geeks or ISell, you are getting a refurb drive most likely, which is a bad idea. Hard Drives develop problems regularly, and I only trust a HD these days if it passes Steve Gibson's SpinRite tool - ScanDisk/ChkDsk is garbage. On a side note, avoid Maxtor - they're cheap and fail OFTEN.
- Mail in rebates - Just skip them. It's not worth most times on the sites above, and TigerDirect will usually stiff you on them. Staples is an exception - their 'Easy Rebate' system is pretty good.
- Motherboards - Don't skimp on the brand. Yeah, a 'BioStar' or 'ECS' may be $20 cheaper than the Giga-byte or DFI of similar specs, but at the latter are much higher quality and often include $20 in cables you'll use. I kinda live by Giga-byte.

A new WURT beta is available at the WURT Homepage. It's a bit redesigned and more stable, and also offers to completely reinstall Internet Explorer. I'm currently recommending anyone using on a previous version to upgrade to it.

Also, you may have noticed the new design on the WURT site. It's only temporary: I'm working on a new design for the entire site, and possibly more content. I've got a couple of little programs in the works, so stop back soon.

I've found an interesting bug in Windows XP Home. It's well known that one of the removed features in XP Home is the Group Policy Editor, gpedit.msc. It's a pretty useful tool, as any administrator will tell you, but it's not necessary for home use.

However, although the editor is unavailable to you, the settings it creates are still perfectly valid. So, if I track the change gpedit.msc makes on a Pro machine, export it, and import it on a Home machine, if that effect isn't specific to Pro, it'll affect the Home machine.

I found this out while scrubbing some systems at work of malware. I've had two in the last week that were XP Home machines that you could not change Windows Firewall settings on from the Security Center. Go into the Firewall control panel, and you'll be greeted with a happy message.

For your security, some settings are controlled by Group Policy.

One of my coworkers figured that it had hit that registry setting, and sure enough, it had. Removing the key fixed the issue. But there are a ton of far-reaching settings in gpedit, and the effects of this could be disastrous. Realistically, Microsoft should either release a gpedit for XP Home, or release a patch (or twenty) for home that disables checks to this key.

If you have a similar issue, the key is:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Policies\Microsoft\WindowsFirewall\StandardProfile\EnableFirewall

1 = firewall forced on
0 = firewall forced off
no key = manual control enabled

I'm going to integrate the ability to disable this key into the next version of WURT. I feel that it's worth integrating and is relatively pertinent. I may also make a tool just to fix this.

WURT .4 Beta should be available in just a day or two. It'll also have a few fixes, although nothing for the annoying History/Temp folder cleaning bug. Most of the changes aren't visible, but it's much more efficient now.

I finally had a chance to reload my home workstation. Win XP Pro doesn't know how long it takes to install! It can be done in nine minutes, yet it's modest in a few aspects. It contains an Athlon 64 3000+, 1GB of DDR 3200 Dual Channel RAM, Gigabyte motherboard, ATI Radeon X300 (Cheap but it has a cool name and great performance for the cost), NEC-3500A DVD Burner, 120GB Backup hard drive, and.... 2 36GB WD Raptor SATA Drives. Put in Raid 0, these things really cook.

I used to like HP. Unlike Lexmark, their printers were reliable and useful, and ink prices were reasonable. In the old days, HP tech support was fast and efficient, and knew anything and everything about the model you called about.

That's not the case anymore.

HP's OfficeJet All-In-One line is absurdly error prone. These are $300-$500 multifunction devices. Your repair option? If it's in warranty, they will often replace it for free. Out of warranty? Well, you can trade it in for up to a 15% discount on a new model. I can understand $40 inkjets being expendable, but printers this expensive should be officially repairable.

Tech support is even worse. The chat option is the only truly viable one, featuring Indian techs with little English speaking capability and reading from prewritten scripts. You tell them that you've already attempted a step that did not resolve the problem? Well, two lines down, they will tell you to do it again and walk you through it. They will ask questions that have no bearing on the issue, but it's not their fault - they know hardly anything about printers and are just reading their lines. They are excellent actors, and always stick to the script. It's not as bad as Dell, but it's close.

I currently own a low-end Epson, and am pleased with it. Cheap ink, separate printheads, no problems. Too bad HP has a stranglehold.

Also, my v555 rocks. More on that later.

I've created an actual page for WURT. You can see it at:

http://software.hitoma.com/WURT/

In other news, this blog has been updated multiple times in the last few days. I'm pretty sure that's a sign of the apocalypse.