Software

Repair: FTP (Main SyncServer) Synch random hang when running sync as a service

Jeremy Brayton — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 13:15:47 GMT

There's been a problem plaguing our SalesLogix install since 6.2x. Our sync service would randomly hang on our Windows 2003 Server box. Eventually it became more well known as more people began upgrading to Win2003 I believe and this confirmed it.

My fix was to either babysit the service by checking MonitorConsole every day for log errors, or waiting until remotes reported a problem which usually ended up being around a week into it being broke, which in today's world isn't really practical or cool.

I heard of a PowerShell script used by one of the BPs for repair if I recall correctly, so I wanted to see if I could build my own. I've decided to release a consolidated version of the script as public domain, with a caveat: the Measure-Latest function is someone else's material and I've linked to the blog post I stole it from (thanks, by the way). It comes in two parts, an XML file called SystemDefense.xml and RepairSync.ps1. You don't have to use the names obviously. SystemDefense is lame but it kind of fit the function of the series of scripts that use the config file.

Thankfully the sync hang issue is a very easy test case, here's roughly the steps the script takes:

Get a list of <Directory> nodes under the SalesLogix/Sync/ root in SystemDefense.xml with the default sync service log directory being C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\SalesLogix\Sync\EventLogs\<Sync Job Name>\
Get the latest filename in each directory and append it to an array
Search the contents of each log file for the string "Sync Cycle completed" which appears at the end of every successful sync
If string contents found, do nothing. Otherwise, update <LastRepairDate> in SystemDefense.xml with FileName.LastWriteTime and try restarting the server. (I use LastWriteTime because it was important that LastRepairDate reflected when it broke, not the date the script ran. That really means I should use LastBrokeDate or some better identifier)
Check to see if service is running or not and output accordingly

To use the script you must change the existing <Directory> node and add each one that corresponds to your sync service profile. You can also change the second to last line to continually retry restarting the service if it detects it didn't restart completely, but I figured that might lead to some problems the next time the script is scheduled to run. I also thought of emailing myself when a repair occurs to have a history in email but I didn't implement that for time reasons, plus I'm not all too interested in knowing how many times it happened in the past year. Though it would likely be beneficial to send daily status emails to make sure a script like this is working properly.

I've scheduled this script to run every 2 hours between our sync window and it has been working reliably since created on 8/22 with our last repair of 10/29, so it hasn't broke yet. If you have any questions I can offer limited support due to my borderline n00b powershell knowledge but I'll definitely welcome any suggestions.

The files are hosted on SkyDrive here.

Herro

Jeremy Brayton — Mon, 02 Apr 2007 22:12:00 GMT

It's been over a year since I last posted and I return with a whiney post regarding work issues. The main reason I stopped blogging regularly was I typically talk to the majority of my readers on a regular basis, and I felt like just about every other post I was complaining about something. Complaints are fine but when you're reminded of nothing but crap you're dealing with, it doesn't exactly make the experience "fun".

What exactly has happened in a year? Obviously I've been playing a lot of the Xbox 360 and I've recently 99% completed building a desktop that will be primarily used for work and XNA purposes. Work has had very little variation. I still mainly do SalesLogix customization and support, with a sprinkle of Everything Else(tm). Sadly, the recent DST update and a couple of other incidents have left me complacent. My knowledge of SalesLogix was gained primarily through trial, error, and a heaping portion of luck (i.e. no formal training). Anyone with the misfortune of using SalesLogix in a small business shares a portion of what I go through and I've got to a point where it just doesn't seem worth it any more. Am I slipping? Is my job faltering in any way? No, but it's definitely a steep uphill battle and I'm growing tired of climbing.

My extra-curricular activities involving XNA and personal projects should provide me with less whiney behavior. I intend on posting more when I have the Internet at home (long story) and my desktop is officially complete. I also intend on actually doing something with my long defunct project ideas considering they’re still in the back of my mind from time to time.

Eventually I’ll try to procure a personal site to move my blog. I have nothing but great things to say about geekswithblogs.net but having never ran a site of my own, I feel like it’s overdue. I want more than just a blog can give me anyway and my ideas really can’t be contained here too well.

[Update: Fixed font issue with last paragraph]

Intellisync for SalesLogix: DST 2007

Jeremy Brayton — Mon, 02 Apr 2007 21:35:00 GMT

I'll sum up this post in the shortest amount of words possible: the DST 2007 update from Microsoft breaks Intellisync for SalesLogix.

I've had an experience with Intellisync outlined here here and considering it's Google's 4th site when searching for "SalesLogix Intellisync" (no quotes), I figured perhaps the "juice" could help me come up with something I can tell the people I work for.

During the preparation for DST changes this year, I did as much research as possible on the impact with regards to SalesLogix. I don't know the exact specifics but SalesLogix would not login after the DST patch from MS was applied. The initial response was a registry hack, which basically reverted the registry to pre-patch conditions and that is never a good sign. 6.2 Service Pack 6 and 7.0 Service Pack 1 were Sage's answer to the DST problem for good so I opted to go the path of least resistance and potential headache, which is to say I went with the service pack.

The problem with this approach is outlined in this ITToolbox posting: http://crm.ittoolbox.com/groups/technical-functional/saleslogix-l/62-sp6-bug-1355381

To sum up a lot of responses, the basic problem is that Intellisync is reporting an error during login, coincidentally the same location the SalesLogix client itself had a problem. Had Intellisync not start up or at least initialize it's sync process I might not think anything of the coincidence but it seems really suspicious. In my response (and my 2004 post), I reported that I believe Intellisync is an engine and ultimately it's the makers of the conduit that are responsible for it's behavior. Since my 2004 post both the engine and conduit updates have been given by Sage so my assessment seems pretty fair.

I didn't write this post to point fingers or play the blame game. As of this point, almost a month after the upgrade, I no longer care. I simply want this answered: Will it be fixed? If so, when?

If the problem can't be fixed, documentation should be updated to report the fact that someone who buys SalesLogix after 3/11/2007 most likely will not have a working Intellisync. It's misleading at best, false advertising at worst. The only 2 entities with the keys to fixing the problem are Sage and Nokia (previously Pumatech). I've heard nothing through official channels to suggest there is even an issue from either party. According to this link, Novell was quick to supply an Intellisync update to deal with the DST issue (scroll down to GroupWiseMobileServerDST.exe or do a search). It's not technically the same as the engine SalesLogix uses but it does suggest that the ball is silently in Sage's court, if a match is even being played (to overuse the metaphor).

Technology Books: Conversation vs. Technical Reference

Jeremy Brayton — Mon, 06 Feb 2006 15:52:00 GMT

My buddy Bill recently has been requesting ideas for his upcoming Speech Server book. He discussed tone of the material and I thought I'd elaborate a little on the difference between a conversational and a technical reference tone.

I remember certain things about my CS (Computer Science) 101 class not because of Pascal (the greatest language EVAR (only because it was the first that turned the development light on)) but because the teacher had a way of relating the material to us in a way we could easily remember it. I even remember his mannerisms and the way he spoke perfectly clear to this day and it's been almost 10 years since I've been in the class.

I think the main problem is there is no category for conversational vs. "Linux man page dry technical" tone. If you haven't had the "luxury" of trying to decipher a man page just to get a working example, consider yourself fortunate. Personally I can't stand that type of material in a couple pages of man much less an entire book of it. Conversations are much easier for me to remember especially if the topic is done correctly. I may have been told 1000 times about Debug.Assert but if done right I usually remember the one anecdotal reference.

The main reason I read blogs is because I can't remember MSDN documentation to save my life. I can however remember what person X said about technology Y and use MSDN as a fall-back mechanism. The beauty and beast of this is it is "pushed" to me but that also means I have to wait for it in most cases. I usually never know I need technology Y until someone explains it in words I can understand. I don't have all day to decipher man pages so in general I skip any technology that can't be explained in terms I understand. If I need certification to begin touching your technology guess what? I'm not interested.

Then again there is that part of me that likes what I call the "transformer effect". I never read instruction manuals even as a kid. When I got a new transformer I would always tinker with it until I figured out exactly how I could turn it from A to B. The only time I ever picked up the manual was when I had a six changer and that's because I found 5/6 and the last one was evading me. That's how I approach technology in general for the most part. I can figure out 5/6 but the last sixth usually requires a manual of some sort. Keep it dry and all I'll do is search for a topic and put it away. Make it a conversation and I'll read it from start to finish like a book. For the record, I've never read a manual from start to finish. The only time I come close is video game manuals and that's because I need reading material when I'm taking a dump and it's just the right amount of material needed to finish the deed.

That was my idea. Really. No, seriously. I thought of it all by myself.

Jeremy Brayton — Fri, 02 Dec 2005 18:22:00 GMT

The title and post is a somewhat inside joke between my friends and I. When we make accomplishments together like beat a level in a single player game, one of us typically says something like “I did that. I unlocked that car all by myself. See that? I just beat the game...” or something completely arrogant yet partially true. Yes we may have made a contribution but it was a team effort that we all willingly condemn.

When I saw this page on the IEBlog: Better Website Identification and Extended Validation Certificates in IE7 and Other Browsers I had an “arrogant moment.” A “I remember thinking of something quite close to that, if not that exactly” kind of thought. So I started digging for my comment and it was just outside my RSS reader's sphere of influence meaning I couldn't just browse the comments for my entry. I had to dig but I didn't have to go that far outside of the window before I found my suggestion:

If the status bar is a bad idea, how about modify the frame around a web page? Unsecure sites would be normal, but you could have say a red or gold ring around a site that is completely secure. A mixed environment could have a completely different color, like half red half gold to say that part of it is secure, but because it's mixed the red says stop.

Of course I don't know how particularly easy this is, but it should be something that is easy to notice and can't be taken away by View > Status Bar. I do think that what we have has been sufficient so far, but take it a little step further for those of us not quite as fortunate to remember the umpteen steps we need to make sure a connection is secure. (It's not umpteen, but it's definately not one and seems to be getting more complex, not less)

My suggestion isn't exactly what was implemented but to make up the difference all you would have to do is introduce a new color (green) and throw the suggestion in the address bar, which is exactly how Apple's Safari behaves for certain things (the address bar shows progress specifically. Don't bash me for not knowing my girlfriend's laptop I barely use). Actually it's a little more complicated than that. My suggestion is somewhat like the green color but the red and “gold” (amazingly not far from the yellow they chose) refer to the Phishing Filter, something which wasn't quite known around April of this year.

So in the spirit of my friends, I say “You stole my idea” in exactly the same arrogant yet partially incorrect way. Since it's not the exact idea I get no kudos, karma, or brownie points today. I'll just chalk it up as a silent “I single-handedly changed your application from teh suck to teh suck, slightly less.” I should get paid for this crap. Really. My ideas are obviously worth more than anyone is willing to pay though, hence no dough.

What's next? I think I'll single-handedly figure out how to cure cancer, AIDS, stop world hunger, and make sure there are no more homeless people. I figure if I start fresh Monday morning I could have that done for ya by mid-day Tuesday. Sound good?

Code Camp: Atlanta

Jeremy Brayton — Sat, 14 May 2005 04:10:00 GMT

http://www.atlantacodecamp.com

Tomorrow, bright and early. I get a chance to hang with my homie Bill, who also happens to be presenting on something I know nothing about: the Compact Framework. Maybe after his presentation I can understand his posts about SqlCE and start to develop an appreciation for those devices I loathe (PDAs and Cell Phones). I suppose it's not so much the device, as it is the OS that I've been in contact with (Palm, ugh!). Cell phones are a whole other subject, worthy of therapy sessions and separate ranting blog posts but I think I'll spare you the drama for now.

Others I know of, but don't know personally are Paul Wilson and Wallace McClure. They'll both be presenting on Database topics which is an area I'm highly interested in, given my CRM background. Even though the Compact Framework interests me about as much as my next bowel movement, I know Bill will make the topic enjoyable.

A quick run down of the sessions I plan on attending:

Paul Wilson - OR
Todd Fine - Avalon and XAML
Brian Walters - Multithreaded apps in C#
Bill Ryan - CF
Wallace McClure - ADO.NET and SQL 2005

I'll most likely post some notes or thoughts I took from each session since I'm sure it'll have me thinking about something.

I have a more recent picture in my gallery here. I have a better picture but I'm too lazy to put it up at the moment. I figured that's enough to tell me from a crowd of 200 or so people, so if I bump into you, “Hi” in advance. If you're not going, you probably have more important things to do or something so I'll let you get back to it.

Intellisync for SalesLogix: Failure in OpenMsgStore

Jeremy Brayton — Mon, 13 Dec 2004 20:07:00 GMT

We've recently switched servers at our office and in doing so I setup a new corporate domain to match our name and the DNS of a domain we actually own and don't do anything with. In the migration I broke a number of things but one of them happened on just one PC: Intellisync for SalesLogix.

SalesLogix comes with this branded version of Intellisync that simply synchronizes SalesLogix data to Groupwise, Notes 4 or 5, and Outlook 2000-2003. From there we use the Palm synchronization tools to synchronize data from Outlook to the various (2) palm devices our remote salespeople use. This is the typical setup of anyone wishing to synchronize SalesLogix data to their palm unless of course you actually paid for the full version of Intellisync which can synchronize directly without using Outlook as a “middle-man.”

I ran into a huge problem on only one of our laptops which was a little weird. Normally I could go through and setup Intellisync and make sure that the tie in from SalesLogix->Outlook was functioning properly. Every time I tried to setup the link to Outlook I would get a “Failure in OpenMsgStore” or “Failure in function OpenMsgStore” or something equally vague. I thought this was just because I had recently switched domains and the user profile was freshly created. I proceeded to go through the steps to correctly reinstall Intellisync for SalesLogix (applies to version 6.x):

Run SalesLogixUninstall.exe in C:\Program Files\Common Files\PUMATECH Shared\Connectors\SalesLogix
Open regedit and delete the key HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\SalesLogix\SLX_Intellisync
Delete User and User.CFG directories from C:\Program Files\SalesLogix\Intellisync
Reboot
Run SalesLogixInstall.exe in C:\Program Files\SalesLogix\Intellisync
Setup everything as if you just installed SalesLogix because everything is blown away

I went through this process about 10 times varying my methods each time to hopefully find the “magic bullet“ that effectively killed this software. A glance at a help file would point out the obvious point of failure:

Supported versions
Intellisync for SalesLogix supports Microsoft Outlook versions 2000 and 2002(XP).

That meant that while SalesLogix is fully compatible with Outlook 2003, Intellisync for SalesLogix was only compatible up to 2002. Outlook 2003 introduced a new kind of PST file that uses Unicode and a couple of other important additions. I setup the user's profile to use the newer Outlook 2003 PST file instead of the 97-2002 PST file because it defaults to the newer format. The only reason it was working previously is because it was upgraded from Outlook 2000->2003 and I let it keep all of the profile and PST file settings.

Abridged answer:

If you are using SalesLogix 5.x->6.2 and Outlook 2003 and you would like to synchronize between the two, do NOT use the default Office 2003 PST file. You MUST use the 97-2002 PST file or it simply will not work at all, period. You will not pass go and you will not collect $200.

Who's gonna fix it?:

That's a good question. Intellisync sells their “engine” that is then branded by companies like SalesLogix. SalesLogix could have an older engine that handles the Outlook connection. If the engine itself is what handles Outlook 2000, 2002, or 2003 then the engine needs to be upgraded. If SalesLogix codes the connections and they hastily forgot to include a version that works with 2003 then the problem is with SalesLogix.

What do I think? I think either way SalesLogix is to blame. Most likely Intellisync's engine has been updated but updates cost money. SalesLogix either didn't bother to upgrade the engine because it would cause more work for them or they didn't bother updating their code because it would also cause more work for them. Office 2003 compatibility wasn't introduced until 6.1 Service Pack 1 even though they had enough time during beta to release it with the release of 6.1. I suppose they don't like using beta products to spec out code but Microsoft RARELY drastically changes products from say Beta 1 to Beta 2 then RTM (usually never a Beta 3). They could have used beta 2 and had it ready for the shipping of 6.1 but I won't go there.

SalesLogix is more than adequately priced to upkeep certain things like this. If you want a price comparison go here: http://www.blytheco.com/saleslogix/price.asp. The version we own is the “Advanced Customization & Security CRM Suite” which starts at about $7,250.00. We have maintenance plans that are roughly $1-2k a year that make sure we have every new version as it comes out. To put it simply: SalesLogix makes more than enough money to fix stuff like this. A coder with a Porsche is still a damned coder that has to earn the money the product is worth.

I think I seem grumpy like someone I know when I write this but I really am not. I just have a problem with companies that develop software that don't seem to put in the effort required to produce a decent product worth the cost. I said the same for HP here even though HP is an exception since their software comes bundled for FREE with their scanners. With SalesLogix there's simply no excuse.

Hotmail vs. Gmail and Gmail clients

Jeremy Brayton — Mon, 18 Oct 2004 20:30:00 GMT

Hotmail vs. Gmail

I have used hotmail extensively before I got a gmail account and I still use it as my primary personal email box for spam purposes. I've yet to receive spam in my gmail inbox, so I've made it a point to use it as wisely as possible. Hotmail has a huge limitation in their free service: 2mb storage. I subscribe to a SalesLogix discussion group which fills up those 2mb in roughly 2 weeks give or take a couple of days. Every so often I would archive all of the messages using Outlook's tie-in to Hotmail and that was the only way I could keep the messages. Sure every email is available through the discussion group's website search but I want to have all emails just in case I need to access them quickly. Add to that the horrific moderation policy and I really wouldn't trust the discussion group itself, though the users that make it up are some awesome individuals to say the least.

Hotmail is going to lose my service soon as my primary personal email provider. The reason is they are charging people to use the Outlook->Hotmail tie in because people were using this to spam from multiple hotmail accounts. Since I believe there's enough advertising on their site to pay for this and anything else they would ever want, I don't see the need to pay for such a “service”. The only way they could keep my service is if I pissed off the moderators of the discussion group so that my email address gets blacklisted. Their extreme moderation policy has made me come close to just that, or unsubscribing to the group altogether but I really don't see that happening anytime soon.

I'll always use Hotmail since I need a passport id/email address to use MSN and access anything and everything Microsoft. I don't see myself never using it, though it will greatly diminish as it's usefulness has slowly faded. The elimination of archiving my messages will be the straw that broke this camels back though one would highly question why someone would want to archive some of the messages I save. The speed of Gmail is a plus in their favor as well, as Hotmail has issues because each click opens up an entire HTML page. Images distort or don't show, font is all screwy until you hit refresh, and a couple of other “bugs“ make it almost useless. Add to that the insanely dumb advertisements that take up most of the real estate and you get an extremely bloated product. You'd think with all of those ads they'd be able to afford giving us free users a little more.

None of this is really my concern any more. The only way I would ever go back to Hotmail full time is if google charged for their service. I don't need 1gb of email, but if I could get maybe 10-100mb it would be 5-50x better than Hotmail. I just don't see the point in paying for something that has enough advertising to cover their costs and then some. Then again that's probably why I'm not trying to make money off advertising.

Gmail Client

I'd like to be someone who thought of this first but most likely I didn't. Back when I first heard of and started actually using Gmail I knew that I would always want to archive my email messages. Regardless of the 1gb of storage, some of those messages deserve to stay on my computer. I want to categorize and store them for my reference only, especially in the event that Google decides to charge an arm and a leg for the service (though I highly doubt they will).

I thought I would be cool and develop one of the first Gmail clients for Windows. I was wrong. There was already a Gmail API specification found here: http://www.johnvey.com/features/gmailapi/. This page has the API and a proof-of-concept application that already has a good bit of functionality. Recently I discovered an application that is bound to be a full-blown client for Gmail. You can find that here: http://gmailerxp.sourceforge.net/. I thought about contributing to the open source project but I realized that my thoughts on the application will never be their thoughts. I'm a little too lead oriented to be given a sideline position and it's taken this long for me to really understand that part of my OCD.

My thought was to utilize the Gmail API developed by Johnvey Hwang and extend it to suit whatever need I have. The API specification is the best I've seen and outlines exactly how Gmail functions under the hood. Most likely I would start out with the API then trim things down to suit my needs a little more closely. I don't like external dependencies that I can't control (more OCD) so I think by the time it's all over with I'll have my own “version” of the API to suit my needs. I've yet to contact Johnvey about it, but that's because I haven't actually started coding against the bits.

I haven't really tried gmailerxp to know how well it works. It looks okay but I suppose it will be polished as it grows and more functionality is added. My thoughts were to make something more like RSS Bandit. The client would house everything, but you could keep IE windows within the client itself. This way if you ever wanted to do something “normally” you could but it kept everything as crystal clear as possible. I guess part of the reason is I use RSS Bandit a lot and making something that has that feel is more of what I'm used to. I may even decide to just code the functionality into RSS Bandit and extrapolate my changes into a plug-in that everyone can use. I haven't quite decided how I'm going to approach it though it's not like I actually have the time to do so right now. I'll probably end up abandoning the idea unless I really can't stand any of the other products out there.

I don't know how licensing plays into any of this. I don't want to violate anything by what I'm doing, but at the same time I believe whatever is in my Inbox is mine even though it is housed on Google's servers. In the end I want a client that I can use to archive stuff in the event that I actually use Gmail from here on out. I don't really want to archive messages just because I'd have to pay for the service, but that is something I would do regardless since I'm such a cheap bastard.

More RobOS and a little cleanup

Jeremy Brayton — Tue, 05 Oct 2004 17:55:00 GMT

I decided to clean up the areas of my blog that don't actually have content in them. I had a lot of categories but nothing was quite filling up everything I thought I could touch base on. I removed categories from the articles and links. I also moved RobOS to it's own category: Operating Systems. This gives it easy access and readability because now if you ever want to read an article you can just click on Operating Systems under Articles and you'll be taken to the list.

I posted 2 new articles last week. One article uses a firewall analogy to basically list how operating systems are in a “allow all, deny some“ approach which leaves them vulnerable to attacks. No OS is safe in this approach but Windows gets hit hard simply because it has more coverage. Linux and OS X can be targeted and exploited relatively easily, so I don't really consider them that more secure than Windows (if at all, they're right about equal). The direct link can be found here: http://geekswithblogs.net/jbrayton/articles/12029.aspx

Another article explains the usage optimization techniques that I've been contemplating. In my very first article I had comments on this which sparked a slightly deeper approach than I was taking initially. The sad thing about these articles are that I've brainstormed about them months ago and I'm just now getting to a point where I can expand on what I was trying to say when I scribbled ideas onto my notepad. This article can be found here: http://geekswithblogs.net/jbrayton/articles/RobOSUsage.aspx

I won't claim full credit for these ideas though as nothing is really new here. I'm just trying to conceptualize how I use an operating system and how I can make one more user friendly without sacrificing security or productivity. To use a programming term, I'm refactoring the existing operating systems into a more productive design (at least it seems more productive). It's a little more than that because like Voltron or Transformers, I want to combine what works in the existing operating systems to build a giant that is capable of handling all of their strengths and none of their weaknesses. The conceptual part is the easiest, it's going to be rough trying to build this all out myself though I firmly believe it can be done.

I plan on posting 2 more articles very soon. One article deals with process management and how processes on the computer are tied with processes humans perform. Another article is going to deal with a conceptual way to scan code for known exploits or problems to make sure that it's safe for the OS to run. In theory this is a great idea but I don't know how practical it will be once I start trying to produce it.

I specifically leave comments on in articles because I want feedback. I want to know if my thinking is flawed but with computers, for the most part, whatever you think up you can do eventually if you're willing to commit. I just don't want to run into any brick walls if I can help it, but I suppose that's part of the fun.

Windows XP Service Pack 2 breaks HP PrecisionScan Pro's network scanning ability

Jeremy Brayton — Mon, 04 Oct 2004 04:11:00 GMT

Upon installing Service Pack 2 on Wednesday night, 2 programs decided to give me trouble. HP PrecisionScan Pro 3.01 and WinFax (more specifically the NetSatisFAXtion connector) basically died on me. WinFax I figured is possibly hopeless for 2 reasons:

WinFax is 10.0. It's technically not “XP compatible“ and to make it so would requiring purchasing it all over again. I loathe the product to begin with, so I'm not about to purchase 10 more copies so that it can go from 10.0 to 10.03 (ooh such a big version change).
NetSatisFAXtion's subscription ran out in January 2002. It would require purchasing a year of support for about the same cost as upgrading 10 WinFax clients.

There may be some way I can make it work again by basically obliterating all of the security enhancements SP2 introduced, but I'm not about to compromise security for one application. Both applications will be obsolete very shortly anyways and all I can say is good riddance to both.

I had a point to this post and it was that HP PrecisionScan Pro's shared scanning stuff over the network breaks when you install SP2. It's due to the security enhancements placed around RPC and DCOM but since I only have to modify 1 machine to make this work (rather than a possible 10 for WinFax), I think I can handle the security risk.

On Wednesday I was doing some web searching for the problem and the best hit I could come up with calls it HP LanScan which I suppose is what they call the network scanning portion though this only runs on the host machine. The solution was laid out in the newsgroup post I found here. The author, Patrick Philippot outlined a potential fix but claimed that he didn't test each individual area to find the magical combination. Rather than expose the one computer to more security problems, I thought it would benefit our company if I were to test each thing individually to find the combination that actually works. These settings must be performed on the host computer only but aren't required on the clients.

Windows Firewall:

Click Start | Control Panel | Windows Firewall in Classic View or Security Center | Windows Firewall in Category View.
Click the Exceptions tab | Add Program | Browse. Using the default directories for PrecisionScan Pro 3.0 it can be found here: C:\Program Files\Hewlett-Packard\PrecisionScan Pro 3.0\hpscnsvr.exe and will be added as Share Scanner.
Click Change Scope and select My network (subnet) only or Custom list to narrow down who can access the scanner.
Exit Windows Firewall by clicking OK.

Note: These settings are required if the Windows Firewall is turned on.

Component Services:

Click Start | Control Panel | Administrative Tools | Component Services in Classic View or Performance and Maintenance | Administrative Tools | Component Services in Category View. You can also get there by Start | Run | dcomcnfg.
Expand Component Services and you will probably get a firewall pop up about Microsoft Management Console. Click Ask Me Later. (I don't think it should pop up because you can do anything you want without requiring the firewall to allow it)
Click on Computers then right click on My Computer and select Properties.
Click on the COM Security tab.
Under Access Permissions click Edit Limits.
Add Authenticated Users. You don't have to do anything else because the default is set to Local Access which is all that you need. You can add specific users from the domain or a group if you'd like.
Click OK to apply changes.
Close the Microsoft Management Console.

Regedit:

Click Start | Run | regedit to start the registry editor
Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows NT.
Right click on Windows NT and choose New | Key. Name it Rpc. You could skip this step if you have this key but none of our computers did.
Right click on Rpc and choose New | DWORD value. Name it RestrictRemoteClients and hit enter. Leave the default value of 0.
Close regedit.
Reboot

Note: Editing the registry must be done with extreme caution. I'm not responsible if anything happens, yadda yadda which is why this would be an unsupported patch. Microsoft or HP should be the ones issuing the patch, I just simply stated the steps needed to make it work for now.

The reboot is essential only for the Rpc registry key. I played with the DCOM settings by tweaking a little, restarting the MS DTC, playing with the software, then repeating the process until I found the right combination. The Rpc registry key is a necessity as well as the Access Permissions.

The group policy steps Patrick defines are not needed. They duplicate the Access Permissions and Launch and Activation Permissions and when defined actually prevent you from clicking the Edit Limits buttons. If you enable them in group policy you can disable them by deleting every entry and leaving the section blank. Reopening group policy shows that it's “Not configured” but it still leaves rogue entries in the registry you have to clean up unless you want the Event Log whining. The settings are found in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows NT\DCOM. These were the only settings in the key so I removed the key entirely (our computers don't have it, it gets created by group policy). I forget what they're called, but if you have other settings there look for the 2 string values that are blank and most likely those are the ones you can delete.

Heavy duty Rant Disclaimer: The following is highly critical of the problem and the parties involved. This isn't really meant for public consumption as it's mainly me venting steam. If you read the below contents, you have been warned and express that you probably really don't care all too much. Hopefully an official fix will be made and I can shut up.

<BeginRant>
According to Patrick, HP claims this problem is a firewall problem. In an earlier post, he claimed that they said it was Microsoft's problem because SP2 is what broke it. SP2 introduced security enhancements. HP's software is making my computer less secure. Microsoft has given enough warning and documentation about the changes so there's no excuse why HP wouldn't conform to SP2 unless they're just too lazy to update the software. While we're on the subject, why use DCOM in the first place? Are you crazy? I would think passing a scanned image would be better handled by another technology that is actually slighly more up to date. I guess they want to make sure it runs on Windows 95 and ME. The funny thing is, everything scanned is an image. Even if you scan to Word, all it does is insert the image into a Word document. There is no OCR with this software, so why on earth would you use DCOM when using another network transport layer makes much more sense. They probably banged it together in VB5 in an hour and called it a day.

Honestly though, HP cares basically nothing about it's software, probably because it's always bundled free with something. I'm sure the developers get paid, but they probably take a morale hit when they have to make changes to a product they consider dead from the beginning. HP makes great scanners and printers, but I wouldn't trust them with anything else, period.

I guess I'm ragging harshly on HP right now but if I have to be the one to figure out your problem, you've already lost my business. I've done this way too many times and it's just plain annoying now. I can find better things to do with my time than to play the “point-the-finger-and-do-nothing” game. I left that crap back in 3rd grade where it belongs.

I made this post so that hopefully when people search for what I did they can find an actual fix with the precise steps to fix it. I triple checked my tweaks and made sure this is the exact minimal steps to fix the problem. Hopefully others who find this “feature” “broken” can fix it as quicker than I did.
<EndRant>

Update:

Updated instructions to provide a break down of each section involved. I also included the program I previously marked by ____ which I forgot to add before publishing the post.
Added “Heavy duty Rant Disclaimer“ and the BeginRant and EndRant tags. I was a little annoyed when I wrote this and it doesn't really need to be read if you are actually going to perform the steps. The only groups that should really care about it are HP, and myself. I don't retract things I say probably in the hopes that I can go back and realize how human I really am, not the pseudo-robotic entity I perceive myself to be sometimes.