Category Archives: Applications

CherryTree’s Cryptic Is File Blocked Error

I have been testing several notes applications, among them CherryTree.  It has a lot to be said in its favor.  However, it started throwing an error which ended with the phrase “is file blocked by a sync program” whenever a save operation was attempted.

I tried the Googs but only the first two search results were of any value.  The remaining results had somehow gamed Google.  Each contained exactly my search string (without quotes) “cherrytree is file blocked by a sync program”.  One was even titled exactly that (but with a capital C).  The other results were articles with titles such as “Human earwax shows what kind of variation”, “Why am i hungry in the middle of night Why Do I Crave Sweets”, “Cattle Visions” (this from xqtx.mydiabeticfootwear.net so you know it’s legit).

How the might have fallen…

Of course they will likely have fixed this by the time you read these words.  Otherwise, how did you find my article?  Are you psychic?!

Fuck.

Well, I suppose you’d like some insight.  What I can say is that in my case the error was due to a full disc.  Sorted that and solved the matter.  I discovered this only because when I did a save-as I (eventually) was presented a different error message that mentioned disc space.  So… [shrugs]… check your disc space?

Hope that helps.

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So You Wanna Do C++ Programming on Windows

You must update Win10 to the latest version before you will be able to enable the Windows Subsystem for Linux and Ubuntu (which is where you will find bash). It is best to do this over a wired connection as it will go faster and more smoothly.

Enable the subsystem:

  • Hit the Windows key and locate the Control Panel
  • Now locate the Programs and Features panel and double-click on it
  • Click the “Turn Windows features on or off” link on the left
  • Check the box for “Windows Subsystem for Linux” and click the “Ok” button

Install Ubuntu:

  • Hit the Windows key and locate Microsoft Store
  • Search for Ubuntu (“ubu” is probably sufficient)
  • Install Ubuntu (no need to sign in if prompted)

Enable developer mode:

  • Hit the Windows key and click the Settings gear on the left of the Start menu
  • Choose Update & Security (it’s the last entry)
  • Choose “For developers” on the left
  • Choose the “Developer mode” radio button

Reboot:

  • You’ve made some changes; time for a quick reboot
  • Once you are back, launch Ubuntu from the Windows menu and let it set itself up
  • If you let Ubuntu set itself up, these are the same steps as outlined in Setting up Bash

Setting up bash:

  • Open a command prompt (cmd), a PowerShell prompt, or a Terminal in Visual Studio Code (aka VSCode) and type bash
    • (This will cause bash to run through a basic set up.)
  • Enter new UNIX username:
    • Use your Windows username as that’s easiest to remember
  • Enter new UNIX password:
    • Use your login password for Windows again because it’s easiest
  • Retype your UNIX password:
    • Type your login password again so you’re sure it’s correct

If cmd complains bash doesn’t exist…

  • Open the Microsoft Store application
    • Win –> type store
  • Install Ubuntu
    • search for Ubuntu or bash
    • Click the “Get the apps” button in the “C:\> Linux on Windows?” box
    • Choose Ubuntu (free)
    • Click the “Get” button
  • Go back to “Setting up bash” above except you’ll need to locate and launch Ubuntu from the Windows Start menu

Update Ubuntu (the subsystem which is running bash):

  • sudo apt update
    • (you will be asked to invisibly enter your password)
  • sudo apt upgrade
    • (answer y)
  • sudo apt autoremove
  • sudo apt autoclean
  • # or simply use this:
  • sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade ; sudo apt autoremove ; sudo apt autoclean

(Those last two are not strictly necessary but are a good practice to use.  If too much time passes between any of these sudo commands you will be asked to enter your password again.)

Install the g++ compiler:

(This is not required if you are just adding bash to Windows.  It’s an open source C++ compiler.)

  • sudo apt install g++
    • (answer y)

The final piece of this puzzle is the (optional but pleasant enough) VSCode (free community) version of Visual Studio.  You can get that for Windows, Mac, and Linux directly from this site.

Remember to have fun!

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Notes from Possible cifs-utils Bug

Here follow my testing notes concerning a problem which has arisen in the way file shares are being accessed from various Ubuntu client machines.  I am listing behaviors for both the “Connect to Server” function (via Nautilus) and those involving the mount command (especially via the fstab file).

Files and folders used to be accessible and they now are not.  These notes will help determine the exact cutoff point for the failures, though sussing out those points could be exacerbated if there are multiple causes for the errors.

The test scenario is as follows.  There is an Ubuntu server (which happens to be running 10.04 though this is not critical at present).  This Ubuntu server has multiple shares.  Various files and folders within these shares contain (at least) two known effected characters:  the colon (:) and the question mark (?).

When those locations are mounted by mount (whether via fstab or no) using a 12.04 client machine the files and the folders which contain either (or both) of those characters in their respective paths are accessible as would be expected for any such file share.

(It is of interest to note that for this particular Samba configuration, the server is not using “mangled names” (mangled names = no).  Enabling mangled names would eliminate the characters in question and thus make testing irrelevant.)

Below you will find testing results for Nautilus and mount (for each character tested) as well as version information for cifs-utils (used by mount).

(I have tested Nautilus to help eliminate server issues as a concern, but as you will see there appears to be an issue with Nautilus as well.  For my purposes, I am testing with an eye toward fixing the problem with mount and fstab.  Perhaps after I have managed that I will look again at the Nautilus problem.)

Finally, I am not a developer.  I will be doing all the testing I am able and I will file the appropriate bug reports.  I would also work with developers to perform any testing as might prove useful.

From /etc/fstab:

//server/share    /media/share        cifs    guest,iocharset=utf8 0 0

Ubuntu 12.04

  • Connect to Server (Nautilus)
    • ? folders and files function as expected
    • : folders show “- -“, throw error when opened; files play
  • mount fstab
    • ? folders and files function as expected
    • : folders and files function as expected
  • apt-cache policy cifs-utils:
    • Installed: 2:5.1-1ubuntu2
      Candidate: 2:5.1-1ubuntu2
      Version table: 2:5.1-1ubuntu2 0
      2:5.1-1ubuntu1 0

Ubuntu 14.04.5

  • Connect to Server (Nautilus)
    • ? folders and files function as expected
    • : folders show “- -“, throw error when opened; files play
  • mount fstab
    • ? folders show “0 items”, throw error when opened; files error
    • : folders show “0 items”, throw error when opened; files error
  • apt-cache policy cifs-utils:
    • Installed: 2:6.0-1ubuntu2
      Candidate: 2:6.0-1ubuntu2
      Version table: 2:6.0-1ubuntu2

Ubuntu 14.10

** 14.10 is out of service and thus I cannot download cifs-utils.

  • Connect to Server (Nautilus)
    • ? folders and files function as expected
    • : folders show “- -“, throw error when opened; files play
  • mount fstab
    • ?
    • :
  • apt-cache policy cifs-utils:
    • Installed:
      Candidate:
      Version table:

Ubuntu 15.04

  • Connect to Server (Nautilus)
    • ? folders and files function as expected
    • : folders show “- -“, throw error when opened; files play
  • mount fstab
    • ? folders show “0 items”, open but empty; files play
    • : folders show “0 items”, open but empty; files play
  • apt-cache policy cifs-utils:
    • Installed: 2:6.0-1ubuntu2
      Candidate: 2:6.0-1ubuntu2
      Version table: 2:6.0-1ubuntu2 0

Ubuntu 15.10

  • Connect to Server (Nautilus)
    • ? folders and files function as expected
    • : folders show “- -“, throw error when opened; files play
  • mount fstab
    • ? folders show “0 items”, throw error when opened; files error
    • : folders show “0 items”, throw error when opened; files error
  • apt-cache policy cifs-utils:
    • Installed: 2:6.4-1ubuntu1
      Candidate: 2:6.4-1ubuntu1
      Version table: 2:6.4-1ubuntu1 0

Ubuntu 16.04.1

  • Connect to Server (Nautilus)
    • ? folders and files function as expected
    • : folders show “- -“, throw error when opened; files play
  • mount fstab
    • ? folders show “0 items”, throw error when opened; files error
    • : folders show “0 items”, throw error when opened; files error
  • apt-cache policy cifs-utils:
    • Installed: 2:6.4-1ubuntu1
      Candidate: 2:6.4-1ubuntu1
      Version table: 2:6.4-1ubuntu1 500

Ubuntu 16.10

  • Connect to Server (Nautilus)
    • ? folders function as expected; files do not show at all
    • : folders show “- -“, throw error when opened; files error
  • mount fstab
    • ? folders show “0 items”, throw error when opened; files error
    • : folders show “0 items”, empty folder icon when opened; files error
  • apt-cache policy cifs-utils:
    • Installed: 2:6.5-2ubuntu1
      Candidate: 2:6.5-2ubuntu1
      Version table: 2:6.5-2ubuntu1 500

And that is that.  We shall see where this takes me.  Thanks for reading.

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Import into Automatic Pool in VMware Horizon

Importantly there are two kinds of pools in Horizon: automatic and manual.  Automatic pools are pointed to a specific template and spawn new machines based on that template, and manual pools will accept the importation of, really, any viable virtual machine.

But what if you find that you need to move a machine from one location into an automatic pool.  There is no intended functionality for doing this.  However, we are humans and we are clever.

I will lay out for you the procedures I used.  We have a domain and our machines are all domain joined.  You may want to make adjustments for your specific situation, but the essentials here should guide you nicely.

Before you begin, let your user know that there machine will be unavailable for half an hour to an hour and that you will want them to test access once you have made the changes.

  1. Remove the entitlement for that user from the machine and the pool.
  2. Remove the machine from the domain and shut it down.
  3. Delete the machine object from Active Directory.
  4. Use the Clone to Template function in vSphere to clone the machine to a safe template location.
  5. (You may at this point delete the original VM.)
  6. In Horizon, point the destination pool at your newly cloned template.
  7. Add a new machine to the automatic pool from the template you just cloned.
  8. Point the destination pool back to its preferred template.
  9. (You may at this point delete the cloned intermediary template.)
  10. Power on the newly added virtual machine and add back to the domain.
  11. (Move it to the correct OU in AD.)
  12. Entitle the user for the destination pool and newly cloned machine.

It’s a bit of a hassle but it has worked dozens of times for me.

Have fun!

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Clementine DB Error (crashes)

I was having some trouble starting Clementine this morning.  This came after I initiated a reboot.  Reboots and further attempts to start Clementine all ended in Clementine crashing.  Something was seriously misaligned.

I started it from the command line (by typing clementine and hitting Enter).  This also resulted in a crash but did give some interesting output in the Terminal.  Near the end I found this information in an error:

CREATE TABLE directories (  path TEXT NOT NULL,  subdirs INTEGER NOT NULL)

A quick search found this article which did have a viable solution.  It is a rather heavy-handed solution and I do not recommend it unless nothing else works.

Instead I modified that solution into one which didn’t delete all of my playlists and configuration changes for Clementine.  First I simply moved the entire Clementine configuration folder (similar to their deletion except I still have the files):

mv ~/.config/Clementine ~/.config/Clementine_old

Starting Clementine in the usual manner now worked.  So the theory was sound.  Now I wanted to see if I could get my database back.  I closed Clementine and ran this command:

mv ~/.config/Clemetine_old/clementine.db ~/.config/Clementine/clementine.db

When I launched Clementine again I had my database back (including all of my playlists).  Next I wanted to see if I could keep my old configuration file so I again closed Clementine and ran this command:

mv ~/.config/Clementine_old/Clementine.conf ~/.config/Clementine_old/Clementine.conf

This also worked.  So it would appear that it was perhaps not file corruption (as the article linked above suggests) but rather something more subtle and complex.  Regardless, at this point I was satisfied with the success of my fix, but my scientific curiosity was wondering about the other files.  Altogether there were six files in the Clementine configuration folder:

Clementine.conf
clementine.db
clementine.db-journal
clementine.db.bak
clementine-scope-backup.db
jamendo.db

(The clementine.db-journal file may not be present on all systems.)

I have no idea what those other four files do (well, except the jamendo.db folder which is presumably the database if one uses Jamendo through Clementine), but I tried moving each one back into the main folder one at a time (restarting Clementine between each one).  None of them had any effect.  This further supports the thought that it was a problem with file corruption.

I’m still not clear what caused the issue, but this is as far as I am willing to investigate at this time.  Hope this helps you.

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Skype Lacks Win10 Love

Building out new Win10 machines on our network, specifically a master of masters in VMware’s esxi.  Probably this can happen in a bare-metal Win10 installation as well.  I haven’t tested it much beyond what you find here.

I tried installing Skype from the Web.  I suppose there are those who will whine I’m supposed to install it from the Windows Store (or however they have branded their store in Windows 10).  Regardless, since I want to ensure I am getting the full version (and not some stripped down Metro-we-don’t-call-it-that-anymore-and-besides-we-don’t-use-it-but-we-do version) I downloaded and installed from the usual executable.

I tried this and it failed.  I found myself caught in an installer loop.

12-10-2015_[1]
So exciting to get started…
12-10-2015_[2]
Fuck Skype Click to Call. Seriously, who does this?
12-10-2015_[3]
Oh, yes. Just what the doctor ordered. Not!
12-10-2015_[4]
The Moment of Truth
12-10-2015_[5]
This looks like the same installer?
12-10-2015_[6]
Yeah, every time…
Since I have not yet installed using the regular installer successfully, I cannot say whether this is by design.  Which is to say, perhaps Microsoft is attempting to force users to use the installer found in their store.  If this is the case, they are doing a lousy job of communicating this fact.  Regardless I was able to get an installer that worked.

Go get this one instead:  http://www.skype.com/go/getskype-msi

That will work.

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How the Application Experience Service Fux Firefox

I have been having this problem on a VM pool replica master.  Don’t worry about what that means if you are not familiar with machine pools (VMware); it’s not important.  The important part is that I was not able to save certain files I was downloading with Firefox to the Desktop.

The download process would proceed as expected up until the end of the download.  Then when Firefox would merge the two files of the download into the single file which was the actual downloaded file, it would fail.  Every time.

I tried running Firefox in its safe mode (no extensions).  Nada.

I tried using Revo Uninstaller to utterly remove all traces of Firefox (as IE, Chrome, and Opera did not have this issue) from the machine.  After rebooting and re-installing Firefox the problem persisted.

Eventually I found an obscure mention of a service called Application Experience.  If that service is disabled, this sort of thing can happen.  I checked my personal VM and found that this service was set to Manual.

So I changed that replica master to Manual and rebooted it.

No problem saving the 64 bit Java installer downloaded through Firefox to the Desktop.

It’s an odd connection.  Hope this helps you too.

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YUMI and Clonezilla (and possibly others)

We use Clonezilla periodically.  I really like to use YUMI for creating a versatile thumbdrive capable of booting into several operating environments and various utilities (Clonezilla among them).

Recently I ran into troubles with my thumbdrive but only in relation to Clonezilla.  I do not know what caused the misalignment, but I was able to sort out the matter and I am placing a record of that here.

In short, I was getting a host of errors worded similar to this:

failed to load com32 file

It looks like a change was made at some point in the way syslinux functions, but I didn’t dig too deeply into that.  I have a friend who is using the same basic set up and his Clonezilla was working.  I checked his drive out and compared it to mine to see what I could see.

I didn’t see anything worth commenting but I did notice that these four files were in the root of the multiboot directory:

ldlinux.c32
libcom32.c32
libutil.c32
vesamenu.c32

These were also located in the syslinux folder in each of my Clonezilla folders (I have 32 and 64 bit versions installed).  I simply hid those files (in each Clonezilla’s syslinux folder) and it fixed the Clonezilla boot process.

ldlinux.c32.remove
libcom32.c32.remove
libutil.c32.remove
vesamenu.c32.remove

Hope that helps someone.

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