Using Open Office has saved our company thousands in licensing fees. Everyone in our organization uses it and we have yet to run into a compatibility issue when sending files to our clients. Sometimes we’ve found that the spell check doesn’t install properly initially and it is necessary to manually set it up. You’ll need to install the dictionaries and ensure spell check is enabled.

Here’s what we did to get it going. Note: You will need to be connected to the Internet so the dictionaries can download.

1. Go to File -> Wizards -> Select your language -> Click the “Start dicOOo” button.
2. Now follow the prompts until it asks you to restart Open Office
3. Once restarted go to Tools -> Options -> Language Settings
4. Under Writing Aids verify/modify the settings and click OK.
5. Under Languages verify/modify the settings and click ok.

You should be good to go. I had to modify mine in one more spot because my Locale is different (long story).

1. Under Format -> Character -> Font the “Language” setting should match what you set in your Language Settings -> Languages

Now any new document you start will have spell check enabled.

We referenced this forum post, spell checker in openoffice.org, to get us started on the right path.

Download a copy and give it a try! OpenOffice.org

Hope this helps!

In writing a technical summary of a customers network in Open Office 2.4 it became necessary to add a page between two existing pages. The document was already nine pages long and I needed to add a page between page three and four. Unlike some others in the office I am NOT a word processing power user and therefore had to Google to find the answer.

Click in the top of the page you want to be below the new page.

hit <ctrl><enter>

You now have a new page. It was that simple to add a new page in Open Office 2.4. No need to enter a manual page break or import into draw. <ctrl><enter> is all you need to add a new page.

By the way did you know Open Office is free? as in beer? YES! There’s no need to spend the $300 for the other office program. Open Office will handle Word and Excel files no problem. Did you know you can edit and create .doc and .xls files in Open Office? Open Office has come a long ways the last couple years and really you could run your office with Open Office and save the money on the purchase and yearly license for every workstation in your office.

If your using MS Office I challenge you to give Open Office a try. You’ll find that Open Office will handle your day to day office documentation without the need to pay thousands in licensing fee’s. If nothing else it’s a sound business decision that free’s up monetary resources for business growth.

We had a machine come in recently that had a virus.  One of the files we deleted was in the Documents And Settings\<user>\Local Settings\temp\ dir called mousehook.dll. We’ve seen this file associated with Trojan.Dropper/Multi-CN.Process. We used KillBox to delete on reboot. Well upon reboot we logged in, the wallpaper flashed briefly and instantly logged back out to the log in screen. Hmmm…. same story in safe mode. Long story short here’s the fix to the log in and log out immediately problem that worked for us.

1. Boot into your XP cd

2. Select “R” to enter Recovery Console

3. cd to c:\windows\system32

4. Look for userinit.exe

5. If it’s there type the folowing: copy userinit.exe wsaupdater.exe

6. If not type the following: copy dllcache\userinit.exe .

7. Reboot

In our case c:\system32\userinit.exe was gone. In googling the issue we found reference to removing Search Assistant causing this problem. If you did step 5 and NOT 6 then you’ll need to do the following.

8. in Start -> Run type regedit and then hit enter

9. Now find the Userinit key in:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\WindowsNT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon\

10. change the entry: C:\WINDOWS\System32\wsaupdater.exe to read C:\WINDOWS\System32\userinit.exe

11. Reboot

In our case the virus removed the userinit.exe file. Your mileage may vary. The standard disclaimer applies when editing the registry. Always back it up before making any modifications.

**UPDATE 04/03/2009**

We had a laptop come in and userinit.exe was NOT in the dllcache directory. In that case you’ll need to do the following while in the recovery console.

1. change your directory to the CDROM/DVDROM drive.

2. cd i386

3. expand userinit.ex_ c:\windows\system32

After entering the expand command you should see the text “1 file(s) copied”.

Restart your computer and you should be able to log on.

**Update 5/12/2009**

We had a XP Home system come in that immediately rebooted at the Windows splash screen while starting up before it gave us a login prompt. We went into the recovery console and started by doing a check disk.

C:> chkdsk c: /r

We exited and it rebooted to the login prompt. Obviously not the same issue as above but we wanted to throw that out there since it was a simple fix.

We install a lot of outdoor cams for various reasons. Security cameras for construction sites, Several ski resort outdoor camera solutions, and in store security camera systems to name a few.  One of the fun things we’ve done here was a job to play a multi-media loop in a ski lodge. The resort wanted pictures, videos, and live shots from the camera on the hill.

We found an easy solution to playing the live video in mplayer. We used an Ubuntu 8.10 Hardy install on a laptop to drive the presentation that was programmed in python.

mplayer -fps 25 -demuxer lavf -user <cam username> -passwd <cam password> http://<cam ip or dns name>/axis-cgi/mjpg/video.cgi?0.mjpg

This will connect to web based video cams; axis and stardot netcams have been tested.

If you have any questions regarding outdoor cameras for your business or location please call us at 509-465-1234 or visit our main site at http://www.interlinkadvantage.com/all_weather_security_cameras.php

So you’ve installed ICVerify. Your here because you’ve run into some installation issues. We’ve documented a couple solutions to problems that gave us hours of headaches. Simple solutions when you read them but if you’ve never used the software and tried getting help via their support well…. your here. Having said that ICVerify is a decent product once it’s setup and you get the necessary steps down to manage it.

We’re assuming you’ve installed the software on the C:\ drive in a Master\Substation setup. In this setup  z:\ is the mapped drive on the Master station and t:\ is the drive on the subs mapped to the master. This particular installation was in a simple five workstation workgroup not a domain.

The standard disclaimer applies. This was our experience your mileage may vary.

A good one to know.
Connection to MSSQL:
<master workstation name>\icv

Installing the Sub-Station

Install ICVerify for Windows only.

Copy icverify.SET from <master workstation name>(Master)
Map T: to \\<master workstation name>\ICVerify\ICVer403
Multiple Set up change to t: and connect.

In ICVerify options set workstation #, Drive = t, ReqDir = t:\<path to reqdir>

ICVerify Troubleshooting

Problem: Substations cannot connect to master.
Resolution: Verify the icvlm32.exe process is running in the task manager on the master station.

1. Right click on your taskbar and select “Task Manager”
2. If it’s not running run the ICVerify Multi-User program
3. If it IS running click it and hit the “End Process” button at the bottom.
4. Run the ICVerify Multi-User program
1.In the Multi-User program verify the Request Directory is pointed at z:\ICWin403\reqdir NOT c:\ICWin403\reqdir. Note the z:\ and the c:\, c:\ is wrong and the program likes to change it on you. ICVerify at the time of this writing did not know why it does that….
5. Once you’ve verified the path then click the “Initialize” button. Leave minimized on the Master
6. Go to the sub station, log out and close the program if it’s open, and log in again.

Problem: User is already logged in or the program ended unexpectedly. The program thinks the user is “logged in” but they really aren’t.
Resolution: On the master log into the ICVerify User Manager. Select the login tab. You should see that user as logged in. Click on the user and log them off.

Misc. Notes

Master:
All paths in the Master ICVerify programs need to be pointed at the z:\ drive. Z:\ is the mapped drive on the master pointing at the c:\ICVerify directory. Disregard ICVerify support telling you to use c:\. We were told both ways depending on what day we called. Use your mapped drive letter. Trust us.

Sub-Stations:
Once logged into the sub-stations you verify the paths under Edit -> Options -> Substation tab. The “Master Station Drive” should be T. The “Request File Path” should be t:\icwin403\reqdir.