I am developing a print monitor in c++. But I'm having trouble getting the file SPL.
After much research I discovered that I had to insert the path of the folder where you store the .spl files in spoolerDirectory key.
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\WindowsNT\CurrentVersion\Print\Printers\'printername'\SpoolDirectory
= c:\windows\system32\spool\printers
The problem that this change only takes effect after restarting the spool service.
As I am monitoring jobs printing, when I restart the spooler i will lose all my objects.
There is another way to solve my problems?
Tanks!
Related
Every now and then, my sleeping disk wakes up, does what sounds like a single read, and then sits idle until it falls asleep again. Sometimes a program that I am using completely freezes for about 10 seconds while the disk spins up, even though that program doesn't seem to need to read from that drive.
Is there an api for listening to file accesses as they happen, or similar, so I can figure out what is read from that drive, so I can move it? If not on Windows, can I do this on Linux?
This is also applicable for figuring out what files/folders a program is accessing in general, so I wouldn't say it only applies to my very narrow problem.
There's a simple tool called What's My Computer Doing? that you can use to get a quick idea of what's causing activity on your computer.
Install and run it, and leave it running in the background. Once you use this tool to narrow down which process is causing the disk activity, you'll want a more comprehensive tool. I use Process Monitor from Sysinternals/Microsoft.
It can be a bit daunting at first, but that's mainly because it is so powerful. It can also alter the behavior of the computer. When it's running, it backs up the huge quantity of data it collects to the disk. So that's why I suggest using the 'What's My Computer Doing?' tool first. Once you know which process is generating the disk access you can add a new filter rule (keep all the defaults, as they mask out a bunch of normal system processes) and select "Process Name" "is" "process_name", or select "PID" "is" "actual_PID".
There are plenty of tutorials like this one that can help you get started with Process Monitor.
Is it possible to cut users' connections to a SAS server programmatically from the server? I know I can kill individual SAS processes by using standard Windows tools such as Task Manager when I have a remote desktop connection to the server, but can this be done programmatically, and moreover, can we prevent any users from connecting?
The situation is as follows:
We have a SAS 9.4 installation on a Windows Server 2008 R2 server. There's a bunch of folders on the server with SAS tables in them, and a bunch of end users who use these SAS tables through SAS Enterprise Guide (that has been installed on their desktops). Now, there's also a large SAS batch run, that we run every day to update all SAS tables. We would like to make sure that no users have any SAS tables opened through EG when the batch run is running; otherwise it might fail because a table is locked. Of course, the batch run is usually done at nighttime, but as its schedule depends on many other things we cannot be 100% certain it is completed before people come to work.
What we want is some kind of a script or SAS setting that would allow us to automatically cut all users' SAS connections before the batch run starts, keep them out during the run, and then allow them to reconnect when the batch run is complete.
Any hints would be appreciated!
Edit: Would it be possible to write a cmd-script using taskkill that would stop all sas.exe processes running under any other user than the current one? Does SAS actually even create a sas.exe process on the server for each user in this case?
You can use the SYSTASK or X commands in (Windows) or (UNIX) . My extract, transform and load (ETL) process runs in the UNIX environment and SYSTASK is a big help for just the reason being asked about. I create the data sets with SAS then use the mv (UNIX) command to replace the existing data set. The file system will override the SAS lock.
As you are on 9.4, I put forward the suggestion that your library should be converted to a read-only, metadata bound library. This should prevent table locks, and negate the need to close user sessions (with potential impact on their productivity through loss of work tables / macro variables etc)
Look into SAS/Share. If that's not an option, then two ugly ideas are:
If the users are connecting using libname statements to a windows share you could just disable the share. Then re-enable it. This could easily be done using command line instructions and the x command.
If they are connecting through a SAS Service, stop the service and restart it. Again this can be done via the command line and x.
After doing either (or both) of the above. Make sure the first thing that happens is that you issue a lock <tablename>; statement to make sure no-one can use those tables again until your jobs are done. You can then restart the service/re-enable the shares.
Once you are finished, make sure that the SAS session that issued the lock command is either closed or clears the lock.
I have one Vbscript which runs continuously on my system to monitor a web page on Internet Explorer.
I have permanently deleted this Vbscript file from its original location on system by mistake, However the script is still in RAM and is still running and monitoring the web page.
This script is very important to me but I have lost it :(
I want to know if there is any way by which I can recover the code of Vbscript file from system's RAM or any temporary file as the script is still running.
I am not allowed to use any file recovery software, so please don't suggest to install any third party data recovery software.
Try using 'ADPlus.vbs' script from WinDbg:
1. http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/hardware/hh852365
2. http://support.microsoft.com/kb/286350
As the code was running, I followed the below process to recover the running code:
Go to Task Manager
Select the process and create dump
Open online dump analyser (www.osronline.com)
Upload dump file
Download the dump analysis
The dump analysis provided almost 95% of the correct code. Code within some loops were distorted or changed. As I was the owner of the code I was able to correct it.
Use HxD, it can view all ram content relative to any process at fly. It is commonly used to hack currently running games etc.
After locating your script, it might be needed to clear alphanumeric mess between your code, N++ and regex knowledge may be useful.
I have a VB6 program running on Windows 7. It is copying a large number of files and sometimes FileCopy fails with an access violation (between every 60 and 500 files).
I cannot reproduce it using a single file, only during such mass-copying operations this problem happens.
It makes no difference, if source/target are on hard disks, network shares or CD-ROMs.
What could trigger this problem?
EDIT: My question might be a little bit convoluted, so here's some more data:
Run 1:
Start copying 5.000 files
Access violation on file #983
Access violation on file #1437
Access violation on file #1499
Access violation on file #2132
Access violation on file #3456
Access violation on file #4320
Done
Run 2:
Start copying 5.000 files
Access violation on file #60
Access violation on file #3745
Done
Observations
The affected files are always different
The number of affected files tends to decrease if the same file batch is copied multiple times in succession.
Running as Administrator makes no difference
The application has read/write access to all necessary file system objects
This problem happens on Windows 7 workstations only!
Best guess: Is it possible that another user/application is using the specified file at the time the process is running? (anti-virus scanner, Win7 search indexing tool, windows defender, etc) You might try booting the machine in safe-mood to eliminate any of the background services/apps and try running the process to see.
Is there any consistency in the file types or size of the files causing the issue?
Is the machine low on resources? RAM/Disk Space
You said it occurs on Win7 – is it multiple Win7 machines or just one. (help to rule out system resources vs. software/OS)
Any hints from the event viewer (control panel > admin tools) – doubtful
Does the process take a long time to complete? If you can take the performance hit you might look at destroying and recreating the FSO object after every copy or every X files to make sure there isn’t some odd memory leak issue with Win7/VB6.
Not necessarily a recommended solution but if all else fails you could handle that error and save the files that trigger it in a dictionary/collection and reloop through the process with any those files when done. No guarantee it wouldn’t happen again.
Not enough information (as you probably know). Do you log the activity? If not, it's a good place to start. Knowing whether certain files are the problem, and if the issue is repeatable, can help narrow it down.
In your case I would also trap (and log) all errors and retry N times after waiting N seconds. You could be trying to copy in-use files locked by another process, and a retry may allow time for that lock to go away.
Really, more data is the key, and logging is the way to get it.
Is there any chance your antivirus program or some indexer is getting in the way?
Try creating a procmon trace while reproducing the error and see what is actually failing. With the trace you can see if there is another program causing the issue or if your app is trying to write somewhere it should't (incorrect permissions) or can't (a temp/scratch directory without enough space).
Check out the presentations linked to on the procmon page or Mark Russinovich's blog for some cool examples of using this tool to solve various Windows/application mysteries.
Is there a a hidden/system file in the directory that is potentially blocking it?
Does running the VB6 App with right-click "Run As Administrator" make a difference?
Is the point where it dies at the max # of files in the directory? e.g. Are you sure the upper limit on whatever loop structure you are using in VB6 is correct (Count vs count -1)?
The problem:
We use a program written by our biggest customer to receive orders, book tranports and do other order-related stuff. We have no other chance but to use the program and the customer is very unsupportive when it comes to problems with their program. We just have to live with the program.
Now this program is most of the time extremely slow when using it with two or more user so I tried to look behind the curtain and find the source of the problem.
Some points about the program I found out so far:
It's written in VB 6.0
It uses a password-protected Access-DB (Access 2000 MDB) that is located a folder on one user's machine.
That folder is shared over the network and used by all other users.
It uses the msjet40.dll version 4.00.9704 to communicate with access. I guess it's ADO?
I also used Process Monitor to monitor file access and found out why the program is so slow: it is doing thousands of read operations on the mdb-file, even when the program is idle. Over the network this is of course tremendously slow:
Process Monitor Trace http://img217.imageshack.us/img217/1456/screenshothw5.png
The real question:
Is there any way to monitor the queries that are responsible for the read activity? Is there a trace flag I can set? Hooking the JET DLL's? I guess the program is doing some expensive queries that are causing JET to read lots of data in the process.
PS: I already tried to put the mdb on our company's file server with the success that accessing it was even slower than over the local share. I also tried changing the locking mechanisms (opportunistic locking) on the client with no success.
I want to know what's going on and need some hard facts and suggestions for our customer's developer to help him/her make the programm faster.
To get your grubby hands on exactly what Access is doing query-wise behind the scenes there's an undocumented feature called JETSHOWPLAN - when switched on in the registry it creates a showplan.out text file. The details are in
this TechRepublic article alternate, summarized here:
The ShowPlan option was added to Jet 3.0, and produces a text file
that contains the query's plan. (ShowPlan doesn't support subqueries.)
You must enable it by adding a Debug key to the registry like so:
\\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\MICROSOFT\JET\4.0\Engines\Debug
Under the new Debug key, add a string data type named JETSHOWPLAN
(you must use all uppercase letters). Then, add the key value ON to
enable the feature. If Access has been running in the background, you
must close it and relaunch it for the function to work.
When ShowPlan is enabled, Jet creates a text file named SHOWPLAN.OUT
(which might end up in your My Documents folder or the current
default folder, depending on the version of Jet you're using) every
time Jet compiles a query. You can then view this text file for clues
to how Jet is running your queries.
We recommend that you disable this feature by changing the key's value
to OFF unless you're specifically using it. Jet appends the plan to
an existing file and eventually, the process actually slows things
down. Turn on the feature only when you need to review a specific
query plan. Open the database, run the query, and then disable the
feature.
For tracking down nightmare problems it's unbeatable - it's the sort of thing you get on your big expensive industrial databases - this feature is cool - it's lovely and fluffy - it's my friend… ;-)
Could you not throw a packet sniffer (like Wireshark) on the network and watch the traffic between one user and the host machine?
If it uses an ODBC connection you can enable logging for that.
Start ODBC Data Source Administrator.
Select the Tracing tab
Select the Start Tracing Now button.
Select Apply or OK.
Run the app for awhile.
Return to ODBC Administrator.
Select the Tracing tab.
Select the Stop Tracing Now button.
The trace can be viewed in the location that you initially specified in the Log file Path box.
First question: Do you have a copy of MS Access 2000 or better?
If so:
When you say the MDB is "password protected", do you mean that when you try to open it using MS Access you get a prompt for a password only, or does it prompt you for a user name and password? (Or give you an error message that says, "You do not have the necessary permissions to use the foo.mdb object."?)
If it's the latter, (user-level security), look for a corresponding .MDW file that goes along with the MDB. If you find it, this is the "workgroup information file" that is used as a "key" for opening the MDB. Try making a desktop shortcut with a target like:
"Path to MSACCESS.EXE" "Path To foo.mdb" /wrkgrp "Path to foo.mdw"
MS Access should then prompt you for your user name and password which is (hopefully) the same as what the VB6 app asks you for. This would at least allow you to open the MDB file and look at the table structure to see if there are any obvious design flaws.
Beyond that, as far as I know, Eduardo is correct that you pretty much need to be able to run a debugger on the developer's source code to find out exactly what the real-time queries are doing...
It is not possible without the help of the developers. Sorry.