After going through numerous such occasions, I spent some time on Google and found this Free utility, TeamViewer, that can help you take control of a remote computer and do what ever you need to as long as the connection remains active. You just need to have this utility downloaded on both the machines and you will need internet obviously. The connection can be established by putting the auto-generated TeamViewer ID and Password of one system on to the other. Happy troubleshooting… Remotely!!

Link to TeamViewer website

Screenshot:

Prevention is Better than Cure!! Follow these steps to prevent your system from getting infected:

Install a Firewall
Firewalls may slow down your internet browsing a little by throwing in additional confirmations boxes but it may keep unwanted softwares out of your machine.

Install a AntiMalware
These keep a check on computer viruses, worms, trojan horses, most rootkits, spyware, dishonest adware, crimeware and other malicious and unwanted software.

You can download these tools from here: Download Utilities

Update your software

Whether it is your Windows Operating System, Anti-Virus, Anti-Spyware or the Firewall, keep the auto-updates on and update your software as soon as an update is available since this way your armory will be up-to-date to fight against all these Malwares.

Fianlly, browse the internet safely since sometimes what you see is not what you may end up with. Pay extra attention when opening attachments even if it seems to be coming from a friend. Install Active-x controls only from reputed websites.

Have fun browsing!!

To display some HTML code, you need to use escape characters for all the special characters defined in HTML. The following link has a HTML Encoder/Decoder which can generate the code that should be inserted to achieve the desired HTML code form as output.

HTML Encoder

Just input the code you desire to display and copy paste the encoded code in your HTML file.

Enjoy !!

One of the very common reason that I have seen in recent times is if you are using some Security program like Norton Internet Security that has some firewall which prevents a program from accessing the internet. Following are the steps for Norton Internet Security:

Start Norton Internet Security.

1. In the main window, click Norton Internet Security tab.
2. Click Settings.
3. Under Web Browsing, click Personal Firewall and then click Configure.
4. In the left side of Norton Internet Security Options window, click Personal Firewall and then click Program Control.
5. In the Program Column, select the specific program (Internet Explorer or any other browser that you use).
6. Change the Access from Block or Custom to Allow.
7. Click OK.

This should enable the internet access for you. For other programs, visit the following website to learn more:

Firewall Blocking Internet

Solution: Open the Quickset utility and select “Internal Network Card Power Management”. The “Internal Network Card Power Management” dialogue box will appear. Select the option “always activate on battery” and then click “Apply” and Restart your laptop.





Installing PHP can be a mess so here are the instructions are for the following versions: PHP 5.2.3, MySql 5.0 and IIS 6.0

Steps may change a little with other versions.

Installing PHP

Step 1: Create a folder on C: called “PHP” and unzip the files from the PHP download into that folder.

Step 2: Open IIS6 Manager Right Click -> Default Website -> Properties -> Select Home Directory -> Select Configuration. On Application configuration check to see if .php is in list. If not click “Add”. For executable browse to “c:\php” folder and select “php5isapi.dll”. Click “OK” and then “OK” again.

Step 3: In the “C:\PHP” folder copy the file “php.ini-recommended” to your C:\WINDOWS folder. Rename this file to “php.ini”

Step 4: Create a test file in the root of your web folder called “phpinfo.php” and insert the code below:

<php
phpinfo();
?>

Step 5: Click Start –> Run and type IISRESET and press enter.

Step 6: Open Internet Explorer and type “http://127.0.0.1/phpinfo.php” and you should see it give you information about the PHP version.

If you see a page with all sorts of information about your PHP version that means your installation was successful.

Configuring MySQL Server

While running the setup you will need to configur an Instance. You can choose the following options while following the wizard.

MySQL Server Instance Configuration Wizard –> Detailed Configuration –> Developer Machine –> Non-Transactional Database Only –> Decision Support (DSS)/OLAP –> Check Enable TCPIP Netwokring –> Port 3306 –> Standard Character Set –> Install as a Windows Service –> Give it a password –> Execute!!

Configuring PHP for MySQL

Step 1: In the C:\PHP folder copy the file “libmysql.dll” to your C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM32 folder. Make sure you don’t overwrite any existing file in this folder. If file exists, first rename it so you can go back.

Step 2: In the C:\PHP folder copy the file “php.ini-recommended” to your C:\WINDOWS folder. Rename this file to “php.ini” (You already did this.)

Step 3: Edit this file “php.ini” using a text editor like notepad. Find the line where it says “extension_dir = ***”. Uncomment this line by removing the preceding semi-colon. and set it to:

extension_dir=”c:\php\ext”

Step 4: In the same file “php.ini” also un-comment out 2 other where it says: extension=php_mysql.dll and extension=php_mysqli.dll by removing the semi-colon.

Step 5: Click Start –> Run and type IISRESET and press enter.

You are good to go!!

In the head of your document enter the following JavaScript code:

<script language="JavaScript">
<!--
function calcHeight()
{
//find the height of the internal page
var the_height=
document.getElementById('the_iframe').contentWindow.
document.body.scrollHeight;

//change the height of the iframe
document.getElementById('the_iframe').height=
the_height;
}
//-->
</script>

and in the body create the iframe tag:

<iframe width="700" id="the_iframe"
onLoad="calcHeight();"
src="testing_page.shtml"
scrolling="NO"
frameborder="1"
height="1">
</iframe>

This will create an IFRAME of width=700 and the height will depend on the content it stores.

Reference: Guymal Code

Solution:
1. Open the IIS Manager, right click Web Sites on the left panel and select properties.
2. Click on the Service Tab.

3. Check “Run WWW Service in IIS 5.0 Isolation Mode”.
4. If asked to Restart of IIS then click yes else click Start –> Run –> type ‘iisreset’ and press Enter.

Try opening the website again and you will be perfectly fine.

“The messaging interface has returned an unknown error. If the problem persists, restart Outlook.”

Solution:

Disable the TaskPad option
1. On the File menu, click Print.
2. Click Page Setup.

3. On the Format tab, click to clear the TaskPad check box.
4. Click OK to close the Page Setup dialog box.
5. With the Daily Style print style selected, click OK to print the shared calendar.

and u are good to go!!

Follow these simple steps to download videos from YouTube (and other similar websites):

1. You need to install a player for .flv files. You can search on Google for free flv player. Here is the link to the one I use:

FLV Player

2. To download a video from YouTube, just play the video using Internet Explorer. Once it is fully played, go to Tools menu –> Internet Options. Under Browing History, click on Settings and then click View Files. It will open the Temporary Files Folder in your hard drive. You can sort the files by name or size (or even type) and look for a file with name starting with ‘get_video‘ (without any file extension).

3. Copy and paste this file some where in your computer and add an extension (.flv) to it. Play it with the FLV Player you downloaded earlier.

Hurray !!!

Even the videos from other websites, which are in flash format, can be downloaded and played using the above steps. They may already have .flv extension or may not like in case of YouTube.

Tip: If you want to reduce the effort in finding the file in Temporary Files Folder, clean your your browsing history before you play the file. For this, go to Tools menu –> Internet Options –> Delete Browsing History.. and click Delete All and selet the box for Also delete files and settings stored by Add-ons and click yes.

Note: Make sure you follow the copyright guidelines of the material you want to download.

Update 1:
I was having some trouble with the FLV players available so I searched a bit more. Even the famous VLC player can play flv files but dragging the progress bar was putting a stop to the playback. I found a better way. Enable your own Windows Media Player to play these files.

Download and install PlayFLV. While installation, it will ask you to install ffdshow. Install that also. Once the installation is complete, Window Media Player will be able to play flv files as well with all default functions, such as zooming, skipping and full screen view.

Update 2:
Found a very good player that can play most of the files including FLV – GOM Media Player. You can find a link to the download in the Multimedia Utilities page.