Some after notes

The housecall Tuesday was uneventful, except for one little bit of annoyance. The client has two XP desktops, an ancient HP Pentium 3 and a newer Dell run by an Athlon 64. Also in attendance is a Vista Home laptop. We installed a new wireless router to untether the laptop to let it run free. Of course, a XP/V network requires that the XP machines have, say it with me now, the Link Layer Topology Driver installed. Thats Microsoft update KB922120. Simple enough.

Except if one of the XP desktops has already been updated to SP3. SP3 shows a later date than the LLTD update, therefore it will not load. It must be loaded by hand. This process is not, in and of itself, too daunting. What made it ever so much more fun was the fact that all three of the PCs were sharing (barely) a single desk, each desktop had a separate keyboard, mouse, and monitor, and the Dell, the one that needed the manual install, was using a track ball set for left handed use.

It was like a Rube Goldberg office. I introduced my gentle client to the concept of a KVM switch. I use one at home to switch between PCs running Server 2008 and XP Pro. When I try to get moving along on SharePoint or Server stuff, I double tap the Scroll Lock key, and there we are.

On a small tangent - the real mind killer, the barrier to connectivity, the wall that didn't need to be there in this whole set up was: Norton 360 Firewall. Yes, I know it can be configured - it can also be turned the hell off and Window FW or ZoneAlarm ploppped in there instead. Hate It - Hate it - Hate it.

Anyway, manual installation of a Windows Update:
1. Copy update to a directory.
2. Open a command prompt, navigate to location of update
3. Run update, use -x:c:\[TargetLocationOfFiles] switch in command line where, obviously the bracketed text is replaced by a directory to XCopy to
4. Put the driver (*.sys) in Win\System32\Drivers
5. Put the installation file (*.exe) in Win\System32
6. Put the (*.inf) file in Win\inf
7. Run the install file from the command line with the -i switch

Put those directions in a safe place as I guarantee this won't be the last time we encounter the situation.

So today, Wednesday, I really have not much going on. I have a lunch meeting, then to the club for the inaugural day of Youth Summer Activities. If it isn't raining cats; its archery tonight, so weather will dictate what happens. I'll set up indoor air rifle and see if any Milan HS kids come by. I need to leave there early to attend a meeting in Ypsi. A store there, Wireless Toyz, is hosting a little get together at which they will disclose some cooperative marketing plans for the area. I have no idea what all that will entail, but I'm curious, so my shadow and I will head over there and drink of their pop and eat of their snacks and listen to their scheme.