Category Archives: windows

Printer goes permanently offline fix

software, windows, ,

Scenario:

Whenever you print documents in Windows 8 or Windows 10 they do not print and the printer appears Offline.

Solution:

Often times the printer will go offline and not come back online until you reboot.  Microsoft points to the vendor drivers as the cause and the vendor usually point a Microsoft as the cause.

A temporary work around is to restart the print spooler service.  This will save you from having to reboot.  To restart the print spooler follow these steps:

  1. Open “Computer Management”
  2. In the “Computer Management” window click “Computer Management->->Services and Applications->Services”.
  3. Right click on “Print Spooler” and choose “Restart”.

Is Visual Basic 6 still supported on Windows 8?

programming, windows, , , ,

Question:

Is Visual Basic 6 still supported on Windows 8?

Answer:

Yes and no. Yes, the runtime and extended runtime files are supported on Windows 8 and will likely also be supported on Windows 10. The IDE however is not supported and does not run in Windows 8. Running a Virtual Machine with Windows 7 maybe one of the only options to run the IDE in modern OS’s.

Windows 8: Display bluetooth file transfer

windows, , ,

Scenario:

You want to locate and find the bluetooth file transfer wizard in Windows 8.

Solution:

This maybe difficult to find if you are using a table with the desktop. There is a setting that will put it into the notification dock on the bottom right hand side of the desktop. To do this follow these steps:

  1. Press Windows Key+W then search for “bluetooth”
  2. Choose the “Change Bluetooth settings” option.
  3. On the “Options” tab check the “Show the Bluetooth icon in the notification area” option then press “OK” on the dialog to save.

How do I start Internet Explorer in safe mode (both 32-bit and 64-bit)

internet explorer, software, windows, ,

Scenario:

You want to start Internet Explorer in safe mode with no-addons. You may want to do this in order to see if an add-on or extension is causing issues with your browser.

Solution:

Depending on your version of Windows you could be running either 32-bit or 64-bit Internet Explorer (or you may want to run 32-bit IE on 64-bit Windows). Below I will include both all paths.

32-bit IE on 64-bit Windows

  1. Press Windows Key+R to bring up the run dialog
  2. Enter this (with quotes as listed) “C:\Program Files (x86)\Internet Explorer\iexplore.exe” -extoff

64-bit IE on 64-bit Windows

  1. Press Windows Key+R to bring up the run dialog
  2. Enter this (with quotes as listed) “C:\Program Files\Internet Explorer\iexplore.exe” -extoff

32-bit IE on 32-bit Windows

  1. Press Windows Key+R to bring up the run dialog
  2. Enter this (with quotes as listed) “C:\Program Files\Internet Explorer\iexplore.exe” -extoff

How do I stop Windows 8 and/or Windows 10 from restarting to install updates?

software, windows, , , , ,

Scenario:

Windows 8/10 has initiated the process to install patches and updates but needs to restart. You will receive a banner message box with text such as this:

Restart in 14 minutes, 59 seconds

Your PC needs to restart to finish installing important updates.  If you've already saved everything, you can restart now.  Otherwise, you should take a moment to save your work.

A restart is needed

To finish installing important updates, you need to restart your PC.  If you've already saved everything, you can restart now.  Otherwise, you should take a moment to save your work.  Your PC will automatically restart the next time you sign in.

Solution:

You can use the group policy editor to disable this behavior (you will still have to restart at some point to finish installing patches but it won’t happen automatically). Steps for professional and higher versions of Windows that have the group policy editor included:

  1. Open epedit.msc
  2. Navigate to “Local Computer Policy”->”Computer Configuration”->”Administrative Templates”->”Windows Components”->”Windows Update”
  3. Click on the “No auto-restart with logged on users” policy and change it to “enabled“

Steps for home versions of Windows that don’t have the group policy editor.

  1. Open the registry editor, e.g. start “regedit”.
  2. Navigate to KEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\WindowsUpdate\AU
  3. Create a new DWORD (32-bit) value and name it NoAutoRebootWithLoggedOnUsers. Set the value to “1” (with no quotes).
  4. Reboot the computer after you have entered this.

Windows 8 – Workaround for Printer Appears Offline

windows, ,

Scenario:

The printer stops working after a set period of time.  Rebooting usually fixes the printing issue but after a period of time it starts again.  When you navigate to the active print jobs you will see what you wanted to print but the printer will list as “Offline”.

Solution 1:

Note that is a work around to the real issue.  The first thing you will want to do is see if your printer has updated drivers.  If that doesn’t work often times restarting the print spooler service will alleviate the issue.

  1. Press the windows key to pull up your local search.
  2. Type services and then choose “Services” from the results to open that control panel option.
  3. Navigate to “Print Spooler” in the main window.  Right click on that item and choose “Restart”.

Solution 2:

  1. Press the windows key+R to bring up a run dialog.
  2. Type “cmd” and click Ok to start a command prompt.
  3. Enter “net stop spooler” then press enter, wait for this command to complete.
  4. Enter “net start spooler” then press enter, wait for this command to complete.