Category Archives: Windows

Microsoft Windows

Where is the iTunes SDK?

Posted on April 4, 2011 by Jeff Fitzsimons

The Apple iTunes SDK (“iTunes COM SDK for Windows”) is astonishingly difficult to find. It can be found on the

Posted in Technology, Windows | Leave a comment

id3v2: Command Line MP3 Tag Editor Compiled for Cygwin

Posted on March 9, 2011 by Jeff Fitzsimons

id3v2 is a powerful command line tool for editing MP3 ID3 tags.  Getting it to compile on Windows under Cygwin, though, took a bit of effort. For the convenience of others, here is id3v2 0.1.12 compiled under Cygwin.  It depends … Continue reading →

Posted in Cygwin, Technology, Windows | 2 Comments

BluetoothAPIs.h Broken in Windows SDK

Posted on January 17, 2011 by Jeff Fitzsimons

Summary The Microsoft Windows SDK versions 7.0 and 7.1 appear to have broken BluetoothAPIs.h header files. Update:  Microsoft has fixed the errors in the Bluetooth header as of SDK version 8.0 for Windows 8. Details So far, I have uncovered … Continue reading →

Posted in Technology, Win32, Windows | 2 Comments

Alternate Data Streams (Metadata) on Files in NTFS

Posted on January 1, 2011 by Jeff Fitzsimons

Introduction Alternate Data Streams (ADS) allow arbitrary metadata to be associated with files and directories on Windows NTFS. Alternate data streams are the Windows implementation of forks. The apparent size of the file will be unchanged, and most applications and … Continue reading →

Posted in C++, Scripting, Technology, Windows | 1 Comment

Console and Cygwin Don’t Show All Files on 64-bit Windows

Posted on December 17, 2010 by Jeff Fitzsimons

Running Cygwin bash or Console under 64-bit versions of Windows, directory listings sometimes differ from results shown in Explorer or cmd.exe. For example, Defrag.exe is visible to the default command shell (CMD): C:\Windows\System32>dir Defr* 07/13/2009 05:39 PM 183,296 Defrag.exe 07/13/2009 … Continue reading →

Posted in Technology, Windows | 1 Comment

Install Windows 7 from USB Thumb Drive

Posted on November 27, 2010 by Jeff Fitzsimons

The Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tool can copy a Windows .ISO file to a USB thumb/pen drive.

Posted in Technology, Windows | Leave a comment

Windows Vista/7 File System Virtualization

Posted on September 9, 2010 by Jeff Fitzsimons

Along with User Account Control, Windows Vista and Windows 7 use file system and registry virtualization to improve compatibility with applications which break Windows development security guidelines. If an application attempts to write to a disallowed location (such as the … Continue reading →

Posted in Technology, Windows | Leave a comment

Cygwin: No Output from Rsync

Posted on July 5, 2010 by Jeff Fitzsimons

I experienced a very strange situation where rsync simply stopped working. It wouldn’t even output anything for rsync –help or even plain rsync. which showed it to be in /usr/bin/rsync as expected. A closer look revealed something odd: $ ls … Continue reading →

Posted in Cygwin, Technology | Leave a comment

Fixing Camcorder IEEE 1394/Firewire Connection Problems on Windows 7

Posted on April 20, 2010 by Jeff Fitzsimons

I’m running Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit on my Toshiba A505 Satellite, which has a Firewire port. If I connected my Sony camcorder (DCR-HC40) I would just get either an endless connect/disconnect cycle, or simply nothing at all. Firewire just … Continue reading →

Posted in Technology, Windows | Leave a comment

IME Functions Fail From Separate Process

Posted on February 13, 2010 by Jeff Fitzsimons

I wanted to change the behavior of the Microsoft IME bar using AutoHotkeys, a utility which can be used to create macros, remap keys, or do any of a variety of other related tasks. This led me to ime_func.ahk, which … Continue reading →

Posted in Technology, Windows | 1 Comment