The Simple Things

This should be an uncharacteristically short post. I mainly just wanted to point out something that seems like it would be pretty obvious, but in practice doesn't seem to be. Sometimes, the simplest things seem to get overlooked as we look for something more complex.

Why do we do this? My guess is that we don't like the idea that we got our butt kicked by some ridiculously simple problem, so we try to look for some massively complex issue that requires a PhD to figure out.

So, what is this simple suggestion? Well, as silly as it sounds....read what's on the screen.

Yep. It's just that easy.

I can't begin to tell you how many times I've heard from users who are having problems with their computers and when I ask them what the error is that they're getting or what's on the screen, the solution is right there in front of them. Whether it is an error message that is clear (I know...a rare treat) or a message that says exactly what is wrong or what needs to be done, most people seem to overlook those types of things.

For example, not long ago I was asked to look into why a user was unable to change their password. When I contacted the user, I asked if there were any errors or messages on the screen after the failed password change attempt. I was told, "Yes, it says 'You are attempting to use a password with two adjacent digits.' "

Hmmm. Maybe...and I'm just going out on a limb, here...but maybe trying a password that doesn't have two adjacent digits will meet with more success.

I've seen people wonder why they're getting "Access denied" messages when trying to open a file or "unknown host" errors when trying to connect to another computer on the network. When you get errors like these, that's typically going to take you a long way toward determining the problem. In these examples, either you don't have access to the file or the computer you're trying to connect to doesn't exist (or at least does not have a DNS entry to identify it's network address).

So, the long and the short of it is...read what's on the screen. You'd be amazed at how often solutions to common problems present themselves when you do that simple thing.

Don't click "OK" or "Close" the moment an error pops up without having read the error and then wonder why that error keeps appearing. Read it. I may tell you precisely what's wrong so you can correct it and avoid the annoying message every time you run that program.

What other examples can you think of where what's on the screen gives you the solution, or at least tells you exactly what the problem is, to a computer issue you're having?

Happy computing!
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Those IBM Servers

For those of you who’s experience with computers are restricted to a home PC, feel free to read this if you’re just feeling completely geeky. Otherwise, this is more directed toward those who work in an environment where there are IBM eServers running OS/400.

I should also mention, this is pretty entry level stuff. So, if you know the OS/400 platform backwards and forwards, I doubt you’ll learn much here. But you are welcome to check me for accuracy.

With all that said, I’ve worked with people who are somewhat tentative when dealing with OS/400. They’re not sure how to get around and navigate the 5250 emulator (also referred to as "green screen”). This short primer is for those people.

One nice, convenient thing about OS/400 is how helpful they are with how to find commands that you need. Unlike many other operating systems, you don’t really need to know a command in order to run it. All you have to do is get close.

Before OS/400 admins worldwide rally to shut down this blog in fear that their users might cause major catastrophe’s on their beloved servers, I should probably qualify that a bit further.

The way the command structure works on OS/400 is that pretty much all commands start with a verb. Usually, the vowels of this verb are removed and the consonants are abbreviate to the three most distinguishing remaining letters of the verb. Let’s give a couple examples as that will probably make this far more clear.

Let’s say, for instance, you want to change a setting or something. What it is you want to do is your clue to how the command starts. If you want to “change” something, then “change” is your verb. Remove the vowels and you are left with “chg” which happen to be the first three letters of quite a number of command related to changing things.

Another thing to understand is that “files” and “libraries” (if you’re familiar with Windows, the closest correlation to a library is a directory…but there are important distinctions) and “user profiles” and even devices are all “seen” in OS/400 as “objects.”

So, how do we put that into practice at the command line?

Well, when you’re looking for a command and aren’t sure what the whole command is, start with what you know and then use the handy-dandy “*” as a wild-card. Let’s see how this works.

We know that “chg” is for “change.” What about “object?” Well, in the case of “object” the letter “o” is a pretty significant character. Remember, I said you “usually” remove the vowels. But not always. Doesn’t that make things easier? So, in OS/400, “object” is shortened to the three-letter “obj.”

If we put those two things together and add our wild-card, we get this:

CHGOBJ*

Now, if you type that on your command line and press Enter, you’ll probably end up with something like this:

Opt Command Library Text
__ CHGOBJAUD QSYS Change Object Auditing
__ CHGOBJD QSYS Change Object Description
__ CHGOBJOWN QSYS Change Object Owner
__ CHGOBJPGP QSYS Change Object Primary Group

This lists all the commands on your system that start with CHGOBJ and tells you a bit about what each command does. How cool is that?

Now, what if none of these is what you’re looking for? Well, another popular verb on the OS/400 is “work.” This is shortened to “wrk.” If you were to input “wrkobj*” you will get a whole different list of commands, including the very popular WRKOBJ.

Some popular verbs to use are:

CHG	Change
WRK	Work with
DSP	Display
STR	Start
ADD	Add
DLT	Delete

Some popular objects are:

LIB	Library
OBJ	Object
USRPRF	User Profile
SYSVAL	System Value
JOBD	Job Description
LIBL	Library List

Another thing to look at is menus. Much of the 5250 interface is menu-driven. This can make things easier for people who are somewhat intimidated by trying to remember commands. If what we’ve covered so far doesn’t help your trepidation, you can use menus.

The way to get to a particular menu can vary. And you’re now thinking, “I thought you said menus were easier.” Well, yes and no. They’re easier to use. Sometimes harder to find. Though, the same principle applies here as with commands. Enter what you know and use the wild-card.

The first part of getting to a menu is actually a command. Yes, you still need to actually know at least one command to use menus so that you don’t need to use commands. Ironic, isn’t it?

The “GO” command will take you to the various menus on your system. So, if you want to go to the Main Menu, you would type this:

GO MAIN

Once you press Enter, you’ll be taken to the Main Menu. If you don’t know the name of the menu exactly, guess at least on letter and use the wild-card:

GO P*

This will bring up a list of menus that start with the letter “P.” If there are hundreds of menus that start with your letter of choosing, you may want to try a couple letters to narrow things down a bit.

Some popular menus are:

MAIN	Main Menu
TCP	TCP/IP Configuration
BACKUP	Backup Tasks
USER	User Tasks
SECURITY	Security Tasks
PTF	PTF Tasks

Now, what about menus that you don’t use “GO” to get to? Well, one of the most popular ones that I use is CFGTCP which takes you to a TCP/IP Configuration menu.

A couple last things I’ll cover here. If you know the command, but don’t know what the parameters are for that command, type the command and press the F4 key. You will see a number of various parameters (use F1 for Help on what they all mean) for your command. Usually, to the right of the input lines are some of the accepted values you can use. And, in many cases, if you press F4 again from a particular input line, it will show you a list of all the options you have. Another thing to watch for is, at the bottom of this screen, you may see an option to press F10 for “Additional parameters.”

For example, if you are creating a user profile (CRTUSRPRF), and you don’t know what “Special authority” there are to choose from, move your cursor to the “Special authority line and press F4 again. It will show you a list of all the special authorities you can assign to any user profile.

Finally, and we’ll end with about the most basic thing just to let you end with something easy, you can repeat any previous commands you’ve run simply by pressing the F9 key. Each time you press F9, it will bring up the previous command reverse order that they were run in. If you keep pressing F9, you will cycle through all the commands you’ve run and when it gets to your first command, another F9 loops your right back to the most recent command and you start again.

So, there you have it. Simple, huh? Well, maybe not. But hopefully at least some of this rather intimidating environment is less intimidating now.

If you have further hints, tips, shortcuts or suggestions to help illuminate some other useful things, please share with everyone. Don’t hoard all the good info.

Happy computing!

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Failure on Multiple Systems

One thing that I recently dealt with was a user who mentioned that several people in her department were unable to connect to any of the seven servers that they normally use on a daily basis. For you techies out there, you’re probably thinking…network issue! That was my first thought, too.

Unfortunately, when I mentioned this, the response that I got was something to the effect of, “We already talked to networking and they said that it’s a server issue, not a network issue.” I was unable to determine how the network admin discerned that the network was not the issue, but it raised another question.

In a situation like this, this scenario begs the question…”What are the odds that seven different servers on the same network all simultaneously have the exact same problem at the exact same time?” Odds are…not very likely. In the end, it actually ended up being a piece of network equipment that needed to be turned off and turned back on again.

Though many home users may not run into this type of thing, I felt that there might be a good learning opportunity here. After all, a similar thing happened to me years ago when my then-fiancée thought that the four light bulbs on a ceiling fan all burnt out at the same time. Once I clicked the pull-chain, the lights suddenly came on! Amazing!

So, when you find that there are multiple systems or computers or whatever that seem to have all somehow failed exactly the same way at exactly the same time, the first thing to look for is…what do they all have in common? If they won’t turn on…do you have a blown fuse or a tripped breaker on that circuit?

Just something to think about.

Happy Computing!

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Network Card Settings

One thing that even many technicians don’t understand very well is how certain network card settings work. If so many technicians don’t know these things, any of you who are not technicians certainly shouldn’t be expected to know them.

 

The settings I’m referring to are called “speed” and “duplex.”

 

To begin with, perhaps a quick explanation of these settings is in order. We’ll start with speed. Typically, there are three common speeds for many network cards to be able to function. The speed is measured in Mbs, or megabits per second. A “megabit” is 1,024 bits and a “bit,” if you’ve ever seen all the 1’s and 0’s, a bit represents each 1 and each 0. The three common speeds are 10 Mbs, 100 Mbs and 1000 Mbs (also called Gigabit).

 

So, speed is really just how fast your network card transmits data. It really is just that easy. It’s not just a clever name. Speed means nothing more than…well…how fast your card sends or receives data.

 

Duplex may be a bit more tricky. For those of you who have been working in corporate America for some years and have ever been on a conference call via speakerphone, you may understand this. You don’t see this as much any more, but back then if you were on a speakerphone and the party on the other end of the call were on a speakerphone, if there was any background noise on your end you would not be able to hear the other party and vice versa.

 

The reason for this is because speakerphones back then were “half duplex.” This meant that they could only transfer data/sound/information in one direction at a time. They could either send or receive, but not both simultaneously. So, if there is noise on your end, your speakerphone was transmitting that “data” and cut out the sound of the other party talking.

 

Nowadays, many speakerphones are “full duplex.” This means that they can transmit and receive data at the same time. This way, the conversation is far more smooth and natural.

 

This makes a similar difference in your network card. So, what is this information that many technicians don’t even know? It has to do with these two settings, speed and duplex, and how they work along with other devices that have these settings. One way the manufacturers of these devices try to make this easier for you and me is to create them with the ability to “auto negotiate.” This means that the network card and the networking device it’s connected to (usually a “switch” but I’m not going to go into what that is…let’s just say it’s how your network card connects to other devices on the network) will “talk” to each other and figure out the best settings that they both can use.

 

As far as the speed setting goes, if the switch can “talk” at 10/100/1000 Mbs and the network card’s fastest speed is 100 Mbs, then they will agree to “talk” at 100 Mbs even though one of the devices can talk faster. For the most part, that makes life much easier because it usually means that your network settings automatically find the best way to communicate and you don’t have to figure it all out.

 

Here is the “hidden” fact about this, though. This whole “auto negotiate” thing can be tricky. In order for it to work properly, both devices need to be set to “auto negotiate.” If one is set to auto and the other is set to 100 Mbs and full duplex, here’s what happens…the device that is set to auto will automatically (no pun intended) be set for 10 Mbs and half duplex!

 

Did you catch that?

 

Now why the heck is that? Well, it’s actually a bit simpler than you might think. Here’s what happens (without all the “geek speak”)…

 

1. The “auto” device sends out a “negotiation” to find out how fast the other device can “talk.”
2. The other device, since it is not set to “auto negotiate,” does not respond because it’s not set to negotiate.
3. The first device, when it gets no response, automatically sets itself to the lowest setting possible to ensure that it is not getting set to something the other device can’t handle. This is because, without the negotiation response, the first device doesn’t know how fast the other device can talk.
4. Therefore, the “auto” device is set to 10 Mbs and half duplex.

So, if you introduce a new PC, a new network card or a new switch and suddenly find that your network is waaaay slower, this could be why.

 

For the most part, you probably won’t see this at home. This will most likely happen in an office environment. But, hey! Just think. Now that you’ve read this, you can help your IT guy figure out what’s wrong and get you hooked up!

 

If this has helped you in some way or you still have questions, please leave your comments below.

 

Happy computing!

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Where’s My Wi-Fi?

Technorati Tags: Troubleshooting,Laptops

Do you use a laptop? Does it have Wi-Fi capability? If you purchased it any time recently enough for it to not be considered a “dinosaur” it probably does. And if you purchased it within the last two years or so, there is a nifty new thing related to your laptop’s wireless networking capability.

Maybe you have a wireless router at your house and you’re connecting to the Internet on your laptop using a wireless connection. Then, one day, it just stops working. You’ve tried all the “normal” stuff like unplugging the power cord to your wireless router, your cable modem, etc. and then plugging them back in. You’ve rebooted your laptop. But it still won’t connect. In fact, it keeps telling you something about wireless devices not even being found!

Now, hopefully, your laptop having this type of problem is not the only computer you have at your disposal from which to connect to the Internet. If it is, then you’re never going to see this most excellent solution that I’m about to present to you until you no longer need it because by then you’ll have figured this out already.

But, if you’re at work, surfing the Internet while you’re supposed to be putting the new cover sheet on your TPS reports, and you’re using company resources to find out why your stupid laptop won’t connect to the Internet at home all of a sudden, your journey may soon be over.

When you get home, pick up your laptop and look around the outside of it. Somewhere, there is likely a button or a switch that will probably have some sort of icon by it that looks like a set of radio waves. Or it may look like a computer icon bracketed by radio-wave-looking-thingies (that’s the technical term…be careful with that). It could have several variations, but you may be getting the idea that radio-waves are likely to be represented somehow.

Find that button or switch and press it or move it to the position that it’s not already in. There may be a good chance that this button or switch was accidentally hit…and this button or switch turns your Wi-Fi device on and off.

I’ve done it many times at home. Put the laptop down on the couch then when I pick it back up, somehow I manage to switch the wireless off. Sometimes, there may be a light that turns on or off to show whether your Wi-Fi is on or not. Sometimes, it may be a slider-type switch. Lenovo Thinkpads, for example, have a picture of a computer on either side of the switch…one with radio-wave thingies and one without. I’ll let you guess which one turns your wireless on or off.

Whatever the case, lots of people don’t realize that this switch exists, so they don’t know how easy it often is to turn this off accidentally. Nor do they know how easy it is to fix this problem. Literally, just with the flick of a switch.

Hopefully, that helps take away some frustration.

Happy computing!

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Spyware, Popups & Other Malware

In the last few years, one of the fastest increasing issues in computing is something called "malware." Malware is, generally speaking, a description of any file, software, virus, program or anything else that can be loaded onto your computer (usually without your knowledge) for the purpose of doing some sort of harm.

This could be anything from using up available disk space on your computer (referred to as a "worm"), viruses (programs that cause your system to fail or have problems), "spy ware" (usually used for stealing personal information such as logins, passwords, account numbers, etc.) or programs that do things like "hijack" your system so that your browser always launches to some weird page that unbeknownst to you is probably downloading one of these other types of malware to your system in the background.


Some useful tools, and where you can find them, to deal with these types of issues are listed below:

• AVG AntiVirus (free.avg.com or www.avg.com)
• Adaware (www.lavasoft.com)
• HijackThis (http://www.trendsecure.com/portal/en-US/tools/security_tools/hijackthis)
• Spybot (http://www.safer-networking.org/en/index.html)

This list is not exhaustive by any means, but this includes the few tools that I have had to use most often. There are many other anti-virus or anti-spyware applications out there from various companies and such. For me, the ones listed above have been able to handle any situation I've run into thusfar.

One thing to note, especially in the case of adware, spyware or anti-virus software...before you scan your system with one of these applications, look for a button or link to perform an update. You want to be sure your tool is searching for all the latest viruses or other malware. The programs have a database of thousands of known viruses and other types of malicious software so that it can identify and remove those items. But if you don't update the software before you run a scan, it may not be able to recognize some of the newest types of malware, therefore it can't help you.

If you know of other tools that you like, please share your comments and ideas on what types of tools you prefer and a brief explanation of why so that our readers can get make a more educated decision as to what tool they will use.

Happy computing!
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Laptop Trouble

Sometimes, laptops just behave weird. It's just a fact. These relatively small, portable devices that try to include all the features and functions of a standard desktop computer can sometimes behave as though they are subject to some sort of demon possession. I don't make this stuff up.

Strangely enough, one thing you can do to try to troubleshoot your laptop when it starts doing weird things (i.e. display shutting off while in use, mouse not working, laptop going into Standby or Hibernate mode, etc.) is to remove the battery from the laptop and connect your A/C adapter for power.

I don't have any data on how a bad battery can cause these types of problems, but I can assure you, that I have seen this before. It's not entirely common, so don't be mad at me if this is the first thing you try and it happens to not work. It's just an idea in case you've checked a whole bunch of other things and are running out of things to try. Not only that, it's a pretty simple, quick thing to test. And, better than that...it doesn't cost you anything.

So, before you throw your laptop or notebook computer like a Frisbee, consider removing the battery as a possible variable (see Troubleshooting: 101) to eliminate. If it doesn't fix or find the problem, at least you've eliminated one more variable. And if it does, you'll end up thinking that I'm a genius. Either way, I look good.

Happy computing!
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