Microsoft Windows Vista
Mark--
This may be a slightly different nuance but in using Vista due to UAC I think, I'll go to MSFT pages--even Connect once and have it tell me that the page doesn't have a trusted certificate or I'll get other messages from MSFT saying they don't know the company who issued the page, i.e. MSFT claiming it doesn't know MSFT which LOL I take to be the current argument going on now about
1) when and what to release in RC12) the insane timetable that RC1 would release this week to some testers and then later to CPP and they would slap RTM on it a few days and builds later
The last two were true accurate statements but meant tongue in cheek about the true messages that I did get about MSFT pages when using Vista (UAC).
I remember a workaround I had to use *for a while* * for a particular Vista build in order to get the FTP server to work on Connect where I got an error GTE Unsigned Content Unknown location that has "invalid signatures" when MSFT controlsthe signing process and the approval process for Active X content? A message came up
http://www.genopro.com/ReportGenerator/ActiveContent/
The information bar in Vista is a carryover from XP SP2:
Description of the Internet Explorer Information Bar in Windows XP SP2
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/843017
The workaround was that I had to go to a setting at ToolsTab on My Computer *in order to allow the active X control to run that would bring up the FTP server. Knowing the source of the active X control was MSFT, I suppose, with all the mixed message I didn't consider it a risk to allow for the time I needed to get access to the server.
See:
http://www.winxptutor.com/lmzunlock.htm
"When you encounter a Web page that is trying to run active content on yourcomputer, you will receive a message prompting you to indicate whether youwant to allow this. If you are certain that you want to allow the Web pageto run ActiveX controls or scripts, click Yes in the message box. Byclicking Yes, you allow the active content to run on the Web page you'reviewing, but only on that occasion. If you leave the page and return to itlater, you will receive the message again (because you did not change thesetting that allows active content to run on your computer).
The only question is why a box would come up that says Source UnknownLocation Unknown when the Source is from MSFT and one of its web pages and Ithink it's a bug. Understanding the bug and the workaround makes it easier.
1) There was an issue with Connect for many people that I remember well in one of the builds where many people couldn't get the FTP server up for downloads because this happened--it was a bug that probably got fixed although crazilyy MSFT often gives a "by design" or "resolved" type message and is fixing the bug but communications are muddled from their teams.
2) I have seen many angry messages to the Beta from people I regard highly on bugs that could be reproed time and time again that they falsely said were fixed or by design. They wern't and this wasn't. Communications on bugs remain a mess and remain non-transparent and it's harming the product severely and systemically and I have a collection of MSFT MVP/book authors saying just that I've posted.
____________
The error with the FTP server went like this:
1) Up came an error message that reads: "VBScript: There was an error launching File Transfer Manager.If you are running Windows XP with SP2 or Windows Server 2003 SP1 this installation may have been blocked." If the gold IE information bar is present, please click the bar and install the active X control. For additional assistance, please visit the web site
http://transfers.ds.microsoft.com (which offers absolutely no assistance just a definition of some of the functionality of FTP 5.0
2) Next I click to install Active X just as in IE 6SP2, and I get a blank page that just sits there. I get a pink box first on the Connect page that says "a separate file and transfer Manager will be open." Nothing happens.
3) Next I get a message "Your security settings do not allow websites to use active X Controls. But they absolutely do, and these settings in Vista 5365 are no different than in XP SP2's beta from the day it released December 13, 2003.I have gone over both Internet Security settings and Intranet and they are fine to allow Active X installation.
4) Then I get a referral to Windows Help and Support but like a lot of Help and Support pages still in Vista, the content is not available yet--the page is blank. By the way when Help and Support Searches the web instead of as in XP offering specific articles with links to locations on the OS, and on the right page at the bottom all available MSKB articles, what happened to that in Vista?
5) Then if you click the lock icon that shows up in the IE address bar, a box pops up that is interesting. It says
:GTE Corporation (which is now Verizon after a merger of GTE and Bell Atlantic) how'd they become a part of Vista and Connect--apparently they are a contractor for the Security component of Vista in some way--
On Clicking the locker Icon on the Connect IE address bar I get this interesting info:
"GTE Corp. has identified this site (they don't have anything to do with my ISP) this is part of a Windows error cascade)
http://connect.microsoft.comOwner Unverified The owner is MicrosoftLocation Unverified The location is Redmond, Washington
Limited Information about this website is available. You should send confidential information about this website only if you trust this website."
Come again? Connect and MSFT have limited info on Connect and MSFT?
I remember saying at the time I suppose I can try to workaround by downloading from Connect on my XP boot and sending the download to a folder that I can hopefully use on Connect because it's pretty inconvenient to have to go back to the XP boot every time I want to file a bug report--and the Toolson My Computer" worked fine as a temporary go around. Also in one build, a lot of people were having trouble accessing folders created on an XP boot or with an earlier Vista build.that to quote Ed Bott "has permissions attached to a SID that doesn't exist in the current security environment."
This is a quintissential representation though of the state of error messages in Windows and their ability to convey useful and meaningful information instead of coded log messages and hex messages and reminds me of what you'll see if you go to
http://oca.microsoft.com that has promised to have useful info for many many years.
At the time I wondered
Does this have anything to do with permissions and UAP besides IE security levels which I know are fine for installation of Active X?
Many people said they had bugged it and gotten no answer. Typical and very par for the course of this Beta.
CH
"Mark D. VandenBerg"