Sunday, June 29, 2014

How do you remove the Trust Media View malware?

This ugly malware makes your browser look like this:


It is very easy to notice it if your computer is infected. Three pop-ups and a page-turner effect! That's incredible.

Well, Trust Media View started impacting my browser on my Windows 7 Ultimate x64 bit machine. It's kind of ugly and visually nauseating. The people who made it must be pretty dumb. I do not see why they need to show many of the pop-ups on just one page.

I took the following steps:

I tried Microsoft Security Essentials and it reported no problem. Well should I believe this?
I am not sure how good is MES when it comes to malware removal.

Should XP users worry about Microsoft turning off the spigot to provide malware support to XP. Probably it is no big deal.

Clock is ticking for XP support

Finally I tried to disable the add-on and fortunately I found an entry for it in Manage Add-ons window show here.


I just disabled it and then restarted the computer. It does seem that Trust Media View ads have disappeared. I wonder why this screen cannot be modified to remove it.

If it comes back, I am going to do a System Restore. I am getting pretty good at this!
Mahalo

Thursday, June 26, 2014

What is a snippet and how do you insert a snippet in SQL Server?

A snippet is a template of TSQL code that you can use as a basis for writing your TSQL Statements. There are lots of canned templates that makes it easy to insert statements and modify them to suit your needs.

Steps to insert a snippet:

1. Right click the database (here Northwind) in which you want to create snippet and choose New query and New Query window opens(the pane on the right)


2. Right click inside the SQL Query pane and choose Insert Snippet (CTRD+X, CTRL+K) to display the following:



There are many different snippets you can insert and they are categorized as shown in the above to screen shots.

3. Let us say we want to create a table. In this case we insert a statement for creating a table. Click on (or double click) Table


4. Click on Create Table and a code snippet will be inserted. It takes a little while and the following code will be inserted.



This code has all the required items for the syntax. Albeit a simple table with two columns, it is a beginning. You may want to add more data types, more columns, add constraints etc.

What is a trigger in SQL Server?

A trigger is an event or an action that precipitates other events. However a trigger in SQL Server is a special kind of stored procedure that automatically executes when an event occurs in the database server. 

If you want to know what is a stored procedure, follow this link:
http://hodentekhelp.blogspot.com/2011/06/what-is-stored-procedure.html

There are different kinds of events that can occur in a database server such as the following:
  • Data Manipulation language events such as,
Insert
Update
Delete
statements on a Table or View.
In these cases if a trigger is defined, it will fire (respond to the event) regardless of any changes are made to the rows of a table.
  • Data Definition Language events such as,
Create
Alter
Drop
and certain stored procedures that perform DDL-like operations
  • Log-on trigger
These fire when a session is established by a user.

 

Wednesday, June 25, 2014

How do you install a .VSIX file?

A file with the extension .VSIX is a Visual Studio extension file created by Microsoft. It adds additional capabilities that the Visual Studio IDE can provide. It's a zip file that contains files that extend the functionality of the IDE.

It should be downloaded and installed. The installation can be carried out by going to the extension manager in Visual Studio. You can look for a particular extension or you can browse the internet to get an extension. You will require Internet connection.

You can access the Extensions and Updates screen from Tools as shown.


Click Extensions and Updates... drop-down menu.


In the Extensions and Updates screen you can see all about the extensions:
  • Installed
  • Online
  • Updates as shown.

Thursday, June 19, 2014

Steps you should take to remove the OffersWizard malware

This is an obnoxious malware that somehow gets into your computer (even inadvertently entering the address of an unknown URL). It manifests in the form of putting long rectangular pop-up ads on four sides of your browser besides adding many other obnoxious features like page turnover effects etc. as shown:

 
 
On noticing this you should immediately take some action. Tried to cleanse with these steps in IE 11.0 but did not seem to remove this malware.
 
 
Tweaked the Advanced features some more as shown:
 
 
But this did not help. Also tried Microsoft Security Essentials which validated that the PC is clean, but did not help.
 
 
Finally, did a System Restore to an earlier date and this seemed to have fixed the problem.
 

 
After restore the IE displayed the following message:
 

The lesson is if the Internet Options | Advanced (tab) | Browsing node changes (mostly reset) does not fix perhaps you should restore the computer to an earlier date. You should take steps to remove this malware as soon as you notice it.

Microsoft Security Essentials is a free download available for Windows 7 and Windows 8 OS.
 
Download here:
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows/security-essentials-download

 

Friday, June 6, 2014

Can I use the command AT in Windows 8.1?


No you cannot. AT command has been deprecated(used no more).
Instead you should use schtasks.exe.

How do you use it?

Open up a command prompt window (AKA DOS window) preferably with administrator privileges.

Just type as shown and you should get the help menu.

C:\Windows\system32>schtasks /?
SCHTASKS /parameter [arguments]
Description:
    Enables an administrator to create, delete, query, change, run and
    end scheduled tasks on a local or remote system.
Parameter List:
    /Create         Creates a new scheduled task.
    /Delete         Deletes the scheduled task(s).
    /Query          Displays all scheduled tasks.
    /Change         Changes the properties of scheduled task.
    /Run            Runs the scheduled task on demand.
    /End            Stops the currently running scheduled task.
    /ShowSid        Shows the security identifier corresponding to a scheduled t
ask name.
    /?              Displays this help message.
Examples:
    SCHTASKS
    SCHTASKS /?
    SCHTASKS /Run /?
    SCHTASKS /End /?
    SCHTASKS /Create /?
    SCHTASKS /Delete /?
    SCHTASKS /Query  /?

Thursday, June 5, 2014

How do I see lifecycle events toolbar item in Visual Studio 2013 Express for Windows Update 2?

Normally you would see the Debug menu item which has three options:
  • Debug
  • Release
  • Configuration Manager
Debug Location toolbar may not be available by default.

However, you can enable it from Toolbar menu item as shown.


The Lifecycle events can only be displayed if an app is running. Now no app is running.
 


Now start an application and you will see that the Lifecycle events gets displayed.


The drop-down shows the different events that you can choose.