Author: Editor

Source for Microsoft ISO's and Install Media

Post author By Editor
Post date September 29, 2017

You'll need to have a legitimate license key to install them, but hard to find install media for Microsoft products, particularly those they may be a version or two past their prime, can be located through the download tool here at heidoc.net.

Now I'll admit I was pretty skeptical about this, but searching on the reputation and safety of heidoc.net raised no red flags, and their tool actually generates download links on the microsoft.com website.Â I even went so far as to cut and paste the link and manually re-type the Microsoft domain address to be certain that there were no character set tricks making a non-microsoft site look like a Microsoft site.

Given that the downloads are coming from Microsoft, I'm calling them legit.Â Remember, if you don't have a legit license key to install them, these downloads give you nothing but bandwidth consumption.

Tags downloads, iso, license, media, microsoft

Database MySQL

Incomplete Dates in MySQL

Post author By Editor
Post date September 24, 2017

Sometimes you can't store the year portion of a date in MySQL because it's not available, such as when people are willing to provide their birthday but not the year of birth.

You can resolve this by entering "0000" in MySQL, but that won't work will all databases.

Another solution is to provide the year 1200 as a placeholder for those dates.

Using the year 1200 works because it it a leap year, so date formatting and calculations that are sensitive to leap years will work, but you'll have to filter out the year for certain queries and calculations.

Converting vCard (.vcf) files to Comma Separated (.csv)

Post author By Editor
Post date April 25, 2017

Sometimes a contact list exports as a .vcf file, which can be difficult or impossible to import into another mail system.

This link provides a way to easily convert it;

http://www.unc.edu/vtoc/

'nuff said.

Tags comma, Contacts, csv, email, vcard, vcf

DOS & DOS Scripting

Batch Parameter Extensions

Post author By Editor
Post date April 12, 2017

These examples use modifiers to modify parameter %1

%~f1 Expand %1 to Fully qualified path name
%~d1 Expand %1 to Drive letter
%~p1 Expand %1 to Path only e.g. \utils\ (ncludes a trailing \) Some commands will interpret this as an escape character.
%~n1 Expand %1 to a file Name without file extension C:\utils\MyFile or if only a path is present (with no trailing backslash\) – the last folder in that path.
%~x1 Expand %1 to a file eXtension only – .txt
%~s1 Change the meaning of f, n, s and x to reference the Short 8.3 name (if it exists.)
%~1 Expand %1 removing any surrounding quotes (")
%~a1 Display the file attributes of %1
%~t1 Display the date/time of %1
%~z1 Display the file size of %1
%~$PATH:1 Search the PATH environment variable and expand %1 to the fully qualified name of the first match found.

You can also combine these as shown below:

%~dp1 Expand %1 to a drive letter and path
%~sp1 Expand %1 to a path shortened to 8.3 characters
%~nx1 Expand %2 to a file name and extension only
%~dp0 The folder from which the script is being run

Reference:

https://www.microsoft.com/resources/documentation/windows/xp/all/proddocs/en-us/percent.mspx?mfr=true
https://ss64.com/nt/syntax-args.html
http://davidthewizard.blogspot.ca/2010/03/better-batch-files-through-command.html
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/5034076/what-does-dp0-mean-and-how-does-it-work