Getting Cortana to work in Australia

Encase you haven’t heard – Windows Phone 8.1 is now available free to developers.  This version is not the final version and there are various warning about installing it.

Blah blah blah….

Okay, maybe like me you got excited about installing the latest shiny on your Lumia windows phone. 

I signup for a free developer account and then installed windows phone 8.1 on my Lumia 720. I had about 3 updates prior to actually getting to actual the 8.1 update – be warned.

Cool.  Okay nice notification centre.
Changed the background image thing with the home page… cool.

Where is Cortana?  DOH.  I hate being a second class citizen to the USA.  Turns out this is another case of if you aren’t in the united states then we don’t care (that’s what it feels like anyway).

Fine.  I will pretend to be an American.  Changed the region and language to United States.  Restarted.  No Cortana still !!!!

Okay so I stopped crying and went to bed as it was rather late by the time I managed to update to 8.1.  I figured some Googling in the morning would reveal the obvious problem.

Read this article outline the steps required to get it working in the UK. http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/two-simple-steps-get-cortana-working-windows-phone-8-1-outside-us-1444771

That’s when I found the missing step. In the settings > Language make sure English (United States) is ABOVE English (United Kingdom).  To move it above press and hold to get a context menu and choose to ‘Move Up’.

A restart was then required and there was the lovely Cortana Icon in the applications list.

So to recap:

• Under Settings > Region - Select ‘United States’
• Under Settings > Language – Add ‘English (United States)
• Once installed make sure the United States version of English is above the United Kingdom version in the Language settings.

Some side effects:

Bing News will no longer report your local news.  It will be United States news.
Cortana will report the weather in Fahrenheit not Celsius.

Good luck and I hope you get it too work on your phone too.

BizSpark - Getting a Helping hand from MS

I'm not sure if you are aware of this or not, but Microsoft has launched a new service/program called BizSpark.

BizSpark is basically a kind of sponsorship program offered to startup companies working with the MS Technology stack.  They offer free access to their MSDN Subscription service for up to 3 years while you meant their restrictions and stick to their TOS.

For our small company this has been a God send.  I can finally get access to the development tools I need to launch our service!

Thanks Microsoft for giving back to the community!

Getting WHS to work!

I don't know about you, but getting computers to connect to WHS (Windows Home Server) can be quite tricky.  In fact it has almost always been that my laptop (Running Vista Ultimate) would connect easily, but my wife's computer (Running XP) just would not play nice.

In the recent reinstallation (which took 3 attempts to get right!) I decided that enough was enough. I WAS GOING TO CONNECT ALL PCs!

It turns out that it was actually easy.  First thing, straight after installing WHS on the Server, Connect all of your PCs.  Don't let the server upgrade anything! (Well at least make sure you have the critical device drivers)

I understand that WHS is meant to be just that, a file storage/backup server.  But it is too hard for a developer to resist using the underlining windows server 2003.

So if you are having problems connecting your PCs, and, if like me, you had tried everything under the sun to connect another computer to WHS.  Try a reinstallation  (I recommend the New Installation) followed by quick connections of all of your PCs

Re-Installing WHS now

Well I've backed up my databases and other shared folders onto another hard drive and turned the server off. 

This is a good time to get your vacuum cleaner out and give the box a good going over.  Especially the inside cooling fans and heat sinks.

This box seems to be more dusty than I would have expected.  And it is quite hot to touch.  I might have to rethink the server location.

Ok, Choosing a New Installation. I can now confirm that the installation WILL format all attached hard drives!  This is important to note as had I not disconnected the backup hard drive it would have been up for formatting.

Estimated time for installation: 50 minutes.

Re installing Windows Home Server

Ok, time to start the reinstallation of WHS (Windows Home Server) process.

From last time, I believe that Windows Home Server is particularly greedy.  Any (and by that I mean ALL) hard drives attached to the computer will be claimed by WHS.  It will potentially format all of the data.

[I will confirm this is the case when I get to this step.]

I believe there is an option to reinstall or new installation.  I plan to go with a new installation as I have previously hacked windows settings.  So in order to do this I need to back up onto a hard drive which I need to disconnect during installation.

To do this you need to remove a hard drive from the current pool used by WHS.  And it is not kidding when it says it can take hours!

This is a worry as this installation of WHS is restarting every hour! (due to expired trial licence)

Ordering Windows Home Server

Well my trial version of Windows Home Server is due to expire in 20 days.  I have order a OEM Copy for my home server which should arrive in a couple of days.

Funny thing, I showed my total ignorance the other day and ordered what I thought was a really cheap OEM copy of Windows Server 2008.  Only to find out it was just a sticker! (5 User licence)

Yeah, live and learn (We hope)

Anyway.  I will upload a blog about the upgrade process.  I have yet to decide if I will do a full reinstall or try and preserve the current installation.  At the moment it refuses to allow new computers to be connected (Connection/Backup service etc) which is a minor problem.

I brought the software from stonebridgecomputing.com.au I recommend these guys for cheap prices and excellent sales support.

IE8 CSS 'Active' hover not working

I'm creating a new web-site layout for my company.  We are targeting the latest most standard compliant browsers (IE7 be damned)...

Anyway.  Has anyone else noticed that the CSS action "Active" doesn't work anymore?  It does in FF, Chrome and IE7 compatible mode of IE8.

What happened to here?

Windows Home Server & IIS Reinstallation

I've been using windows home server as a very cheap way to get a hold of windows server 2003 for one of my production machines, the other day I ran into a Hosting issue with the WCF .svc files not being recognised in IIS 6.0 - The solution? reinstalling IIS.

But this had it's own problems... Windows Home Server needs IIS and had some half dozen virtual directories installed as virtual directories.  All with special privileges and who knows what.

I was prepared to do away with the backup facilities, but I wanted to expose my web-site to the world and to be honest.... I wouldn't have a clue how to setup the router!  WHS (Windows home server) has a nifty facility to do this for you... Only it needs to be functioning correctly in order to do it.

So... back to my original problem... how do I fix WHS after a IIS reinstall?  A quick scan around the web brought little encouragement... Lots of advice that it is easier to reinstall the OS! (What the!)  There was also hints that there is a WHS folder in the main installation drive.

A quick glance and I remembered these all being run during the original installation routine.  They all ran after the principal windows server 2003 was installed. 

I didn't exactly write down which ones I installed. But I believe that I ran at least the following:

• umrabase.exe
• umrahome.exe
• umraremote.exe

So problem solved.

And no OS reinstall required!

WCF and IIS 6.0 Hosting Issue

I've developed a WCF Service which I have tested extensively in the Visual Studio environment.  I have had it successfully hosted on Vista and also Windows XP.

Today when I attempted to install the Service on my windows Server 2003 machine, it refused to display the .svc file.  It would only return a 404 error.

After much stuffing around I found this resource which described the same problem I was facing. (Always nice to know you are not alone!)

The only method that worked for me was uninstalling and reinstalling IIS.  I then repaired my .NET 3.5 SP1 installation and Vola! A visible svc and wsdl file!

Wow what a waste of an afternoon that was!

Copying Files remotely

Today I commenced migrating to our new web-server.  Everything was going well when I stumbled across an Error when copying files via FTP onto the new machine.

I connected via Remote Desktop, and had opened up a new 'Network Places' location, this is a very efficient means of connecting to FTP.  I created a new folder for the Database files and dragged the new files across.  This was greeted by a obscure message from Windows Server 2003:

"Your current security settings do not allow you to download files from this location"

Google wasn't particularly helpful either.

The solution? Simply navigate iexplorer to the FTP location and attempt to download the files from here.  This will bring up the Security Message - with a difference... This one allows you to add the FTP location to the authorised list.

Rare praise for Windows Vista

Can I just say... what is with the constant Vista bashing in the world at large?

I keep on coming across people (Non-IT people mainly) who flat out hate vista.  Most of whom have not even used it or even seen it running.  Is this just a reflection of the numerous articles on the web bagging it?

I have been using Vista Ultimate on my dell laptop since January this year and I have to say I'm very pleased with it.  This machine is my development platform so stability really is my number one priority in it's O/S.  Vista is remarkably stable. 

It seems that Microsoft is caught in an awkward transition from previous security woeful XP into Vista.  People all know that XP has been heavily targeted by virus and had streams of security patches.  And yet they expect that they can just port all of their old programs over onto this new platform?  Windows has had a history of being over backwards in ways that Apple never has had to do in order to accommodate compatibility with ancient product lines.  I think people should have some cost in order to bring a new level of security and stability to their O/S platform. 

In this case that means deciding what is worth more to them: Stability and security? or extensive backwards software compatibility?

Is this the only choice? well no... you can always install a Virtual machine and install your old O/S on top of vista. 

Me personally, I couldn't go back to XP.

Can you remember your last 'blue screen of death?'

I can't say that I have had more than two in the last 8 months.  Now that is a real change from my previous years of experience on the windows platform.