OSX VPN Problems

Hello,I’ve noticed this for a while, but finally blogging it to grab peoples attention. I use a Microsoft PPTP server at the office to connect to using PPTP. From Windows it works perfectly fine and i’m able to remain connected and go about my work. However, from OSX,  it works fine for a while – then if there is no activity on the connection, it kinda drops the connection – but not completely. Pinging anything at the office sometimes gives aping: sendto: No buffer space availableafter a while of pinging, it’ll stop and everything will resume. If after i connect, i leave a ping going this doesnt happen.Wonder whats going on…. 

New Leopard Feature…

So, i was working on my new Leopard install on my Macbook Pro and needed to Remote Desktop into a server at my office to start a Scheduled Task.Being a new laptop, i went to www.rdesktop.org, downloaded the source, opened up a new terminal, typed incd Downloadstar -xzf rdesktop* cd rdesktop*./configuremakesudo make installrdesktop servername and i did my work with the scheduled task, apple-w to close and i was done. Hang on a minute. My brain stopped for a second and thought about what had just happened. Did i just run “rdesktop” from the OSX terminal, and go straight into my server? Did Leopard actually spawn X11 for me, and run rdesktop within that ?Wow. Thanks Apple. 

Word 2007 Hanging up on Vista?

Had an unusual problem with Word 2007 and Vista today which lead to Word freezing up after a document was opened up by double clicking on it.

My suspicions were that an “add-in” had gone crazy and taken over Word and wasn’t letting it complete its start up, and to call them out, i’m pretty sure it was Acrobat Professional with their really bad product.

The fix is relatively simple, its a registry edit of one, or possible two keys depending upon the severity.

Open up Registry Editor (windows key+r, “regedit”, enter) and look for

CURRENT_USER/Software/Microsoft/Office/Word
Rename Addins -> oldAddins

Then restart word, if it works, you’re good to go. If it doesnt, edit this other one as well

CURRENT_USER/Software/Microsoft/Office/12.0/Word
Rename Data -> oldData
Rename Options -> oldOptions

That should do it!

TNMailServer 3

Hi,

Just an update. TNMailserver 3, is around the corner. This time its based on Fedora 8 and is much easier to install and keep up to date, but works iwth the same charm as the Slackware version. It will also be renamed to “Techie MailServer”

Quick Funny

A stranger was seated next to a little girl on the airplane when the stranger turned to her and said, ‘Let’s talk. I’ve heard that flights go  quicker if you strike up a conversation with your fellow passenger.’ The little girl, who had just opened her book,closed it slowly and said to the stranger, ‘What would you like to talk about?’ Oh, I don’t know’, said the stranger. ‘How about nuclear power?”OK,’ she said. ‘That could be an interesting topic. But let me ask you a question first. A horse, a cow, and a deer all eat grass, the same stuff. Yet a deer excretes little pellets, while a cow turns out a flat patty, and a horse produces clumps of dried grass. Why do you suppose that is?’ The stranger thinks about it and says, ‘Hmmm, I have no idea,’To which the  little girl replies, ‘Do you really feel qualified to discuss nuclear power when you don’t know shit?’