darinhiggins.com
type: channel
description: C#, Visual Basic, TSQL with some Javascript, Ruby, and a pinch of Assembly
date: 2025-02-16T23:17:29Z
update period: hourly
update frequency: 1
update base: 2000-01-01T12:00+00:00
generator agent: https://wordpress.org/
items: Easy Command Line Bookmarks
items: Teams, Remote Desktop, and a Jumpy Mouse
items: Repairing a DDRGame Dance Pad
items: Running Visual Studio as Admin Without the UAC prompts
items: Laying Asphalt
items: Hacking Hack
items: Upgrading to WordPress 6.1
items: Starting VSCode from the command line
items: Tiny Icons on High DPI Systems
items: Application Access – Part I

Easy Command Line Bookmarks
type: item
creator: admin
date: 2025-02-16T23:17:28Z
subject: Uncategorized
description: Finally got around to making a quick post about a BAT file I’ve been tweaking for a bit that I find quite handy It’s called “GO” and it’s basically just a Windows BAT file to simplify creating convenient bookmark LNK files for use on the command line (and from other places). There are probably hundreds […]
encoded: Finally got around to making a quick post about a BAT file I’ve been tweaking for a bit that I find quite handy It’s called “GO” and it’s basically just a Windows BAT file to simplify creating convenient bookmark LNK files for use on the command line (and from other places). There are probably hundreds of different ways to “bookmark” folders and files from the command line so that you can quickly navigate back to or open them. This is just my take on the idea. The TLDR; Find the bat file in my github repo. Be sure to grab SHORTCUT.EXE and put it on your path. Then GO! Getting this setup First, you’ll need SHORTCUT.EXE on your path somewhere. The GO.BAT file uses it to read and write Windows LNK files, which is what it uses to store the bookmarks. Get shortcut.exe here GO uses the idea of a “repository” or Repo folder to store bookmarks. You can put that folder anywhere or use the default %USERPROFILE%\.go If you want use a different folder, set the GO_REPO environment variable to the full path name you’d like to use. GO.BAT will automatically create the folder if it doesn’t exist. Usage examples GO -C bookmark {path|file} create a bookmark using the given bookmark name. If you don’t provide a path or filename, GO simply bookmarks the current folder. If you provide a path, GO creates a bookmark for that path. If you provide a filename, GO creates a bookmark for that file. GO -R bookmark remove a previously defined bookmark GO -L list all defined bookmarks GO bookmark If the bookmark is a folder, change directory to that folder. If the bookmark is a file, GO will open the file using whatever is configured as the default application for that filetype. GO -I bookmark displays some information about the bookmark GO -h get a help screen for GO Useful Side Notes GO’s bookmarks are just standard Windows LNK shortcut files. As such, you can edit, create or delete them using Windows Explorer. The GO repo should normally NOT be a part of your PATH. However, if you use an Appli…

Teams, Remote Desktop, and a Jumpy Mouse
type: item
creator: admin
date: 2023-08-14T14:16:28Z
subject: Uncategorized
description: I use a work-supplied laptop for all job-related functions and I specifically do not have any work related stuff on my personal systems. However, coding on a laptop…sucks. Tiny keyboard, tiny screen, trackpad, etc, etc. So I could use a docking station, plug the laptop in there and then have a real keyboard, mouse, and […]
encoded: I use a work-supplied laptop for all job-related functions and I specifically do not have any work related stuff on my personal systems. However, coding on a laptop…sucks. Tiny keyboard, tiny screen, trackpad, etc, etc. So I could use a docking station, plug the laptop in there and then have a real keyboard, mouse, and multiple monitors. But then, if I want to check personal emails, or do a little side project for home automation, I’d have to unplug everything and plug it back into my desktop. Instead, I just stick my laptop on a shelf, powered on, and Remote Desktop into it from my personal desktop. That way, I have my monitors, keyboard, mouse, etc. exactly the way I want, and they can all be used seamlessly when connected to my laptop. When the office standardized on Zoom, this worked perfectly. But then they decided to switch to Teams. Trouble in Paradise Most of the time, Teams works fine. It’s definitely not my favorite app, but it does the job. Except when sharing my screen. Every time I do that, my screen will share, but then suddenly, my mouse starts resetting to a 0,0 position about every second. With the mouse jumping all over the place, it becomes literally impossible to control, and inevitably, I end up having to request someone else on the call to share their screen momentarily to break my share and restore mouse control. A colleague recommended a little app called RegionToShare. That kind of worked, but not consistently, and it was a pain to always have to load that before sharing anyway. The Solution I’d done a little research months ago but hadn’t turned up anything. On a lark, I tried again last night and turned up a post on a Microsoft Support forum. Turns out, this is a known issue in one of the Updates that happens for Windows 10. I’m not sure if it affects Win11 or not. Press Win+R and type gpedit.msc to open the local policy editor Drill down through these nodes: Local Computer Policy Computer Configuration Administrative templates Windows Com…

Repairing a DDRGame Dance Pad
type: item
creator: admin
date: 2023-06-25T20:46:48Z
subject: Arcade
subject: Stepmania
description: A long time ago, I built a MAME arcade machine. I call it the No18 Arqadium Engine. Head on over to http://forum.arcadecontrols.com to see it and a ton of other great arcade machine builds. Over the years, it’s been extended, upgraded, and enhanced in a lot of different ways for a lot of different games. […]
encoded: A long time ago, I built a MAME arcade machine. I call it the No18 Arqadium Engine. Head on over to http://forum.arcadecontrols.com to see it and a ton of other great arcade machine builds. Over the years, it’s been extended, upgraded, and enhanced in a lot of different ways for a lot of different games. Some time ago, I picked up a couple of these soft foam Psyclone Essentials Dance Pad controllers: I couldn’t find the company anymore, so I doubt they’re still in business, but I did find a number of single and dual mat offering on on http://ebay.com so if you’re inclined, I’d head that way. In my case, my intent was always to build my own actual pads and just use the controller boards from the Psyclone mats for the electrical bits. Years go by Well, one thing led to another, and we played the soft mats quite a bit but I never got the time to build up the hardcore Dance Dance Revolution arcade-style pads I’d intended on. And then the dance game craze kind of faded, and my daughter moved off to college, etc, etc. CraigsList strikes And then one day recently, I stumbled upon a great deal on a Cobalt Flux dance pad on my local CraigsList. It included a controller, and… drumroll… it worked flawlessly when I connected it up to the Arqadium! Upgraded the copy of StepMania I had installed and pullled some newer tracks from the interwebs, and we were hooked again on DDR style gaming! No Competition But after all that, I was still missing the DDR style-competition side-by-side danceoffs on dual dance mats. So I hit CraigsList again and within a few weeks turned up a DDRGame pad complete with a handlebar and PS2/USB controller hardware. Perfect! No so fast Got it home, hooked it up and… Nothing. The Select and Start buttons on the actual controller box worked, but nothing on the pad. However, the LEDs did light up when I stepped on an arrow, so I knew it was at least connected and getting power. I played with it off and on for a few weeks. Connected to other computers, Tried …

Running Visual Studio as Admin Without the UAC prompts
type: item
creator: admin
date: 2023-02-19T00:56:17Z
subject: .NET
subject: Visual Studio
description: For several projects I work on, I need to load Visual Studio (2022 Enterprise edition) in “admin” mode. That’s easy enough to do, but I always have to click through the UAC prompts, which is tiresome. Turns out there’s a (relatively) easy way around this. I stumbled across this article by Lowell Heddings on how […]
encoded: For several projects I work on, I need to load Visual Studio (2022 Enterprise edition) in “admin” mode. That’s easy enough to do, but I always have to click through the UAC prompts, which is tiresome. Turns out there’s a (relatively) easy way around this. I stumbled across this article by Lowell Heddings on how to “Create Administrator Mode Shortcuts without UAC prompts” accidentally which clued me in that this was even possible. I highly recommend checking it out. I’ve embellished the technique slightly because I found that VS would end up coming up behind all the other open windows, which is even worse than the UAC prompts. I’ll summarize the process below: Use Task Scheduler to create a new task Give the task a short name (I called mine “Visual Studio 2022”, set it to Run only when user is logged in Use YOUR user Check Run With Highest Privileges Configure for Win 10/11 whatever works for you On the Actions tab Create new Start a program action Specify full path name to devenv (Visual Studio), no args; “C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Enterprise\Common7\IDE\devenv.exe” Get nircmd from here http://nircmd.nirsoft.net/win.html (put it on your PATH) Add another Start a program action Set this action to “nircmd win focus process devenv.exe” On the Settings tab, make sure that the combobox near the bottom says “Run a new Instance in parallel” and not “Do not start a new instance”. That way, you can still launch multiple instances of Visual Studio if you need to. Save the Scheduled Task Create a new shortcut on the desktop For the shortcut path use “C:\Windows\System32\schtasks.exe /run /tn “{your task name from step 2 above}” And that’s it. If everything’s kosher, dblclicking on that shortcut will launch VS in Admin mode, in the foreground, with no UAC prompting.

Laying Asphalt
type: item
creator: admin
date: 2023-02-11T20:50:59Z
subject: Uncategorized
description: I was contemplating having to pave a machine recently, and it occurred to me that it might be a good time to take stock of the “asphalt”, so to speak. In other words, what are those apps and configurations that get laid down first? Those that I use everyday. That it’d be seriously difficult to […]
encoded: <img decoding="async" style="margin: 10px; float: left; display: inline;" alt="Asphalt Paving" src="[binary]" align="left" /> I was contemplating having to pave a machine recently, and it occurred to me that it might be a good time to take stock of the “asphalt”, so to speak. In other words, what are those apps and configurations that get laid down first? Those that I use everyday. That it’d be seriously difficult to do without, even from day one? I’ve followed Scott Hanselman’s List of Tools for years. It’s a great list, and a fantastic place to get ideas for things that might dovetail into your personal workflow, so if you haven’t already checked it out, I heartily recommend it. But it’s huge! I mean, really big. It’s a great reference, but I can’t imagine anyone using near that much on a daily basis. So, what’s my asphalt then? Lets get right to it! File manager – DirOpus. If you deal with files all day long, DirOpus is the first thing you should consider laying down. Fast and infinitely customizable, but it still feels like a Windows File Explorer. Font – Hackd. My own version of LigaHack, which is itself a ligaturized version of Hack. Editor – Visual Studio Code. I’ve used tons of different editors over the years, so VSCode is just the latest. It’s fast, flexible, extensible and customizable. Password – Keepass. Hands down. After seeing news stories of all the commercial “credential managers” out there, I’m convinced high value targets like that are the last place you want to put your keys. Just make sure you back up. Launcher – Flowlauncher. PowerToys Run is right up there, but FlowLauncher is xcopy installable, and super easy to write extensions for, as well as having just about any extension you’d ever want already available. Backup – SyncBackPro + BackBlaze. Both are very reasonably priced. BackBlaze for offsite backup. SyncBack for synchronizing laptops, desktops, phones, etc. Compare – Araxis Merge. I’m doing file or folder compares virtually every hour. …

Hacking Hack
type: item
creator: admin
date: 2022-11-15T16:56:12Z
subject: Fonts
subject: Text Editors
subject: Visual Studio
description: First, the TLDR Download my custom Hackd font here. Unzip, and install the two TTF files. That’s it. On Programming Fonts I’ve long been a fan of dedicated, monospaced programming fonts. I’ve even got a page here dedicated to a breakdown of most of the fonts I’ve had the opportunity to work with and review […]
encoded: First, the TLDR Download my custom Hackd font here. Unzip, and install the two TTF files. That’s it. On Programming Fonts I’ve long been a fan of dedicated, monospaced programming fonts. I’ve even got a page here dedicated to a breakdown of most of the fonts I’ve had the opportunity to work with and review over the years. I’ve used a number of these for a good period of time, including Consolas, Cascadia Code, and FiraCode among others. But, for some time now, Hack has been my goto choice. It’s clear, simple, with good spacing, and excellent readability. Alas… As usual, though, there’s a few things that have always not sat well with me. First, Hack has a peculiar dotted zero. <img decoding="async" style="margin-right: auto; margin-left: auto; float: none; display: block;" src="[binary]" /> That’s just always seemed off to me. Plus, it’s percent sign just didn’t jive with the rest of the font. And then there’s ligatures. The Ligatures If you aren’t familiar with ligatures, they’re basically substitutions of a single, conhesive glyph for 2 or more glyphs places next to each other. For instance, a ligature for “greater or equal”, “>=” might look like this: <img decoding="async" src="[binary]" /> It’s important to note however, that ligatures are just a rendering nicety. They don’t actually change the characters you type at all. So, although it might look like one character on screen, your file’s content will still be “>=” just like it always has been. I realize that there’s a lot of gnashing of teeth online about whether ligatures are worth it or not. In the end, I think it’s completely a matter of preference, and I happen to find them quite nice to look at and helpful during my day to day coding. And Hack doesn’t have ligatures When Monospaced isn’t Monospaced Virtually all dedicated programming fonts are monospaced; every glyph has the same width. But, while a font might say that it’s monospaced, and might have all the right metadata to indicate that it’s monospaced,…

Upgrading to WordPress 6.1
type: item
creator: admin
date: 2022-11-15T03:33:25Z
subject: Blogging
subject: WordPress
description: This site’s been chugging along for years now. I’ve been super happy with my hosting company, NameCheap, and everything has just worked. Until, of course, it didn’t. I used to use Microsoft’s LiveWriter way back when, but then, they quit updating it and it quit connecting to my blog so… I just used the WordPress […]
encoded: This site’s been chugging along for years now. I’ve been super happy with my hosting company, NameCheap, and everything has just worked. Until, of course, it didn’t. I used to use Microsoft’s LiveWriter way back when, but then, they quit updating it and it quit connecting to my blog so… I just used the WordPress editor and continued on. I finally had minute to take a look and realized that I hadn’t updated WordPress is quite some time. So, back up the site, then update… oops, no, I’m using an ancient version of PHP. So, update PHP to 8.1 Update WP to 6.1 Bam! Critical error loading WordPress Oh Joy So I start all the typical stuff. I’m no WordPress expert, by any stretch. Update all the plugins. Nope Disable all the plugins. Nope Clear caches. Reset Themes. Nope, and Nope. This might turn into a long night. So I punt. The guys (and gals) in NameCheap support have pulled me out of a wringer before, so I figured I might give em a shout. The worst they could do is tell me “that’s your programming problem”. Joy So I search the Knowledge Base right quick, come up empty, and finally decide to file a support ticket. Within an hour, I get a message back that they’d had a look at my WordPress log and the issue appeared to be with my theme at line x. No freakin’ way! Open the theme INDEX.PHP up and, sure enough, turns out the old WordPress was more forgiving with PHP files that used <? … ?> instead of the newer style <?PHP … ?> Literally 2 lines of code changed and presto. Entire site back and running! And not only that, the latest OpenLiveWriter (the open sourced version of my old friend), recognized it and loaded up perfectly. I’m even writing up this entry using it!

Starting VSCode from the command line
type: item
creator: admin
date: 2022-10-18T21:36:45Z
subject: Uncategorized
description: I do a lot from the command line, so starting VSCode to quickly edit a file I’m looking at can be a big help. VSCode isn’t automatically added to the path, so it won’t normally be available. Besides, if you’re using the Insiders build, the exe name will be Code – Insiders.exe, which is, um, […]
encoded: I do a lot from the command line, so starting VSCode to quickly edit a file I’m looking at can be a big help. VSCode isn’t automatically added to the path, so it won’t normally be available. Besides, if you’re using the Insiders build, the exe name will be Code – Insiders.exe, which is, um, unwieldy, to the say the least. I know there are other solutions out that that might make more sense depending on your situation, for me, setting up a simple BAT file to start the editor made the most sense. I already have a folder full of utilities and BAT files that I always add to my path anyway. Plus, I like having a bit of flexibility that wrapping VSCode in a BAT file gives me. Anyway, here’s what I’ve ended up with. ECHO off REM Starts VSCODE and returns immediately to the console where it was started from REM Running it a second time just opens the new file in a new tab in the existing VSCode window start /MIN /B "" "C:\Users\darin\AppData\Local\Programs\Microsoft VS Code Insiders\Code - Insiders.exe" %1 %2 %3 %4 %5 %6 %7 %8 %9 >nul Using this, I don’t get “leftover” phantom command line windows, I don’t get random debug logging in the terminal window I started it from, and it all “just works”. Of course, you’ll have to adjust the path if your name’s not “darin” , if you’ve installed VSCode in a non-standard place or if you’re using the normal, not Insiders, version.

Tiny Icons on High DPI Systems
type: item
creator: admin
date: 2022-08-27T13:47:43Z
subject: Uncategorized
description: I’ve been using a triple monitor setup with all three running at high DPI (4k) resolution for some time now, and I love it. I use 200% scaling, so text is reasonably sized, but at 4k resolution, it’s so much clearer and easier on the eyes. For the most parts, apps “just work” at that […]
encoded: I’ve been using a triple monitor setup with all three running at high DPI (4k) resolution for some time now, and I love it. I use 200% scaling, so text is reasonably sized, but at 4k resolution, it’s so much clearer and easier on the eyes. For the most parts, apps “just work” at that scalemode. But every once in a while, I’ll run into one that doesn’t. Take for example, ClipCache: <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="674" src="https://darinhiggins.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/image-3-1024x674.png" alt="" class="wp-image-967" srcset="https://darinhiggins.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/image-3-1024x674.png 1024w, https://darinhiggins.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/image-3-300x197.png 300w, https://darinhiggins.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/image-3-768x505.png 768w, https://darinhiggins.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/image-3.png 1134w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /> Notice how the toolbar icons are tiny! The app’s excellent and I use it all the time, but the developer, while still supporting it, isn’t all that responsive towards updates, unfortunately. But, it turns out there are things to try that might just resolve these sorts of issues without resorting to code updates by the developers. Find the EXE file for the app in question. In this case, it’s Clipc.exe. Right click and choose Properties, then Compatibility: <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://darinhiggins.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/image-4-794x1024.png" alt="" class="wp-image-968" width="264" height="340" srcset="https://darinhiggins.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/image-4-794x1024.png 794w, https://darinhiggins.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/image-4-232x300.png 232w, https://darinhiggins.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/image-4-768x991.png 768w, https://darinhiggins.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/image-4.png 809w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 264px) 100vw, 264px" /> Now click Change high DPI settings. You may have to experiment with the settings here. In …

Application Access – Part I
type: item
creator: admin
date: 2022-08-21T17:04:49Z
subject: Uncategorized
description: I’ve been doing a lot of reflecting lately on how my typical workday progresses and one of my primary realizations is that I spend a lot of time switching between applications. There’s all the typical development applications, Visual Studio, VSCode, Command line, GIT, Insomnia, Web browsers, file search, clipboard stuff, etc. There’s usually an instance […]
encoded: <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://media.istockphoto.com/photos/plastic-black-container-with-many-tools-picture-id949187646?k=20&m=949187646&s=612x612&w=0&h=atLHWA49wJyaAQh8_qhnXhp9FZcnP0ODaer94TGVrE4=" alt="Plastic Black Container With Many Tools Elevated View Of Plastic Black Container With Many Tools On Wooden Table toolbox stock pictures, royalty-free photos & images" width="219" height="145"/> I’ve been doing a lot of reflecting lately on how my typical workday progresses and one of my primary realizations is that I spend a lot of time switching between applications. There’s all the typical development applications, Visual Studio, VSCode, Command line, GIT, Insomnia, Web browsers, file search, clipboard stuff, etc. There’s usually an instance or two of these running, and I often find myself ALT-TABing between them. Then there’s various utilities that I use regularly but not necessarily constantly: putty, SSH, Fusion, Dbgview, etc. Find it, Open it, Use it, Close it, repeat. And finally there’s all the other apps that hang out in the periphery: Word, Excel, Outlook, Zoom, Remote Desktop, VMs and so on. Now, I’ve pinned a few of those to the taskbar, so they’re just a mouse click away. However, there’s only so much space down there. Sure, I could stack some in a folder, which would present as a menu, but then often used items would inevitably end up hidden behind one or more layers of menus. Of course, there’s the Start menu. But after awhile, that becomes large enough to prevent any kind of speedy access. And then there’s the Start Panel, but again, it can begin to get unwieldy fairly quickly for me. Plus, when customizing the Start menu, etc, there’s the issue of synchronizing changes between machines. Google Drive helps, but not really for the Start Menu or TaskBar. As I hinted at above, part of my realization was that there’s three levels of application usage for me. Utility Belt Apps These are apps that I almost always have running. I need to …