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Questions and Answers from the Computing HelpdeskCollected by the IT/User Services Team Nicole Crémel (Editor) , IT/User Services Abstract
This is a collection of Questions & Answers that have been treated by the Computing Helpdesk managed by the User Services group. N.B. The number in parentheses refers to
its relative numbering in the "Question-Answer" database, at URL:
Windows Support -(Hannes Schwarzbauer IT/User Services)Question (QA 691) - Public folder inaccessible I want to access my colleague's public folder where I *know* there is some data that is important for my work. However, the folder doesn't seem to have the necessary 'read for everyone' permission anymore, and my colleague is absent now. Who can change the access rights?
Answer -
CERN official statement:
----------- starts ------------------- The case of access to data under the account of someone who is absent is specifically addressed in OC5 section IV, 18 vi). Requests are usually sent to the CSO and should come from a Division Leader or Head of Experiment with a justification of the serious impact on operations. ------------ ends --------------------Conclusion: The fact that a folder is called 'public', doesn't mean it *has* to be available on read-only for everyone, although this is the default CERN setup for filesystems like AFS or NICE. This means that in any case the user's decision whether or not to make/leave his public folder readable for everyone has priority. The above procedure should therefore be applied in case of the owner's absence, after which a system responsible will set the necessary access rights. Question (QA 734) - Scratch disk space on NICE How can I obtain temporary scratch disk space on NICE?
Answer -
Use the web mechanism, reachable from:
http://winservices.cern.ch
In the "Services" area, select "Scratch Space", under "Storage Service". You will be prompted for your login/password on NICE, and then you should obtain a page where you can request some scratch space. This mechanism allows the users to specify if they want a public or read protected directory. This scratch space is located on \\CERNSCRATCH02\SCRATCH which is mounted on \\cern.ch\dfs\scratch. Please note: files kept in the scratch areas are NOT backed up and will be DELETED after a few days. Question (QA 795) - Windows XP support from NICE Is there NICE support for the OS Windows XP and/or its components, like Office XP?
Answer -
Unfortunately, and until further notice, Windows XP and all that
comes with it, is not supported by the NICE team at the moment.
Please note: Windows XP is an enhanced version of Windows 2000. Or even more precisely, with Windows 2000 being Windows NT 5, Windows XP is really Windows NT 5.1. Question (QA 800) - Error codes on Windows - Explanation Windows NT or Windows 2000 brings up an error message, like e.g.: An internal error has occurred, reference xxxxxx, logon User Code=1234Where can I get help or documentation on these code numbers?
Answer -
The error description is mostly short and does not offer a problem solution, but it can give a good clue of what is going on with your PC. Question (QA 810) - Extend sound recorder time I would like to have the Sound Recorder available for a duration of far more than the 60 seconds that seem to be the default. Trying out to decrease the speed gives unsatisfying and inconsistent sound quality, and I didn't find anything obvious in the registries either (but there might be something hidden in hexadecimal/binary/whatever code).
Answer -
By default, the Microsoft sound recorder offers a duration of 60
seconds.
It seems we could not find an equivalent registry entry, but this is a workaround:
Question (QA 837) - Find large files on Windows How can I quickly find out/display the biggest files I have on my PC, be they on my hard drive(s) or on the home server?
Answer -
Windows 95 / NT 4.0:
1. Press Start / Find / Files or Folders. 2. On the Name & Location tab, enter *.* in the Named: box. 3. Select all your hard drives in the Look in: box or select the J: drive. Check "Include subfolders" (NT). 4. On the Advanced tab, select At least in the Size is: drop down and type the number of kilobytes in the KB box (and select "All files and folders" for W95). 5. Press Find Now.Windows 2000: 1. Press Start / Search / For Files or Folders 2. Enter *.* into the Search for files or folders named: box. 3. Look in: should already have selected all your hard drives. If you want your home directory, select "My Documents". 4. Check the Size box and At least should be selected. 5. Type the number of kilobytes in the KB box. 6. If you click Advanced, you will notice that Search subfolders is checked. 7. Press Search Now.
UNIX Support -Question (QA 1631) - Login problem on Unix (Lxplus) I cannot login to LXPLUS, although my password has been reset by the Helpdesk.
Answer -
The first thing to check is the status of the registration for your
PLUS account. You can do it yourself with the command
"xwho" on Unix providing your AFS login, or with
http://consult.cern.ch/xwho on the web providing your
name, or the Helpdesk can check your registration in CCDB. Most
probably, your PLUS login has been blocked, maybe after the last
computing review (if no feedback has been provided by your computer
administrator). With "xwho" or
http://consult.cern.ch/xwho you can see it if a
'*' is preceding the account line.
You need then to send a mail to Note: there can be many reasons why the login shell is failing. On all Unix machines you can check the account registration in the system file /etc/passwd. E.g. on Lxplus, with a "grep" on the login name, you can see the status of the login shell: [lxplus013] ~ > grep pjs /etc/passwd pjs:x:13787:1307:Paul Sellin:/afs/cern.ch/user/p/pjs:/blocked.zshIf the shell is not valid (e.g. /usr/local/bin/tcsh) then login will fail (/blocked.zsh means that the login has been blocked). In the case you manage to login but you see strange behaviour, you can use the CERN-made "uco" command to reset your user environment to the default one. Type "uco -h" and "man uco" for more details. Question (QA 613) - LSF batch system not responding Trying to use the LSF batch system, I get the message: batch system daemon not responding ... still trying
Answer -
There are several reasons this happens: the LSF system master can
really be in trouble, or it can be temporarily undergoing a
reconfiguration.
If the problem persists for more than 15 minutes then contact the Helpdesk who can check with the operators, and submit the problem to the Unix system administrators. Question (QA 755) - Linux installation on Laptops Where can I get information for installing Linux on my PC laptop ?
Answer -
There is a web page dedicated to laptop support for Linux at URL:
http://cern.ch/linux/laptop/
Please note that if the machine is not one of the CERN standard systems then the installation procedure can fail. Question (QA 775) - AFS token and Kerberos Ticket What is the difference between AFS token and Kerberos Ticket ?
Answer -
In order to edit files etc., you only need an AFS token (see QA 365 for token
expiration). Sometimes (e.g. to use a CVS repository with
kserver access, or to login via ssh to a
different host without specifying the password, etc.) you also need
a "Kerberos Ticket Granting Token" (or "krbtgt").
Note: a normal login to Lxplus, or the In order to check whether you have what you need use the
" Question (QA 1690) - Invalid character in Unix filename
I have a Unix filename which starts with a hyphen ('-'). None of
the unix commands like How can I at least delete this file?
Answer -
Assume the name is -thename. In this case all Unix
commands will take the hyphen as indicating an option, so you must
"fool" it by providing an "empty" option. One solution (for
removing the file) is to use the command:
rm -- -filename Question (QA 1599) - Changing default shell How can I change my default shell on CERN central machines (e.g. Lxplus) ?
Answer -
A user himself can change his own shell on PLUS servers (lxplus,
sundev, etc):
Note: the CCDB tool
Mail Support -Question (QA 988) - Many questions on mail - CERN Mail service FAQs Where can I get help (written documentation) on the CERN Mail service ?
Answer -
A lot of documentation is available on the web, starting from:
http://mailservices.web.cern.ch/MailServices/.
The Mail service team is also maintaining a collection of FAQs
at URL:
On March 2002, the list of questions - with detailed answers - was: Managing you Mail Account Obtaining a Mail Account Registering Service Accounts Checking and changing your Email address How to handle your password Managing mail forwards Setting a vacation message Filtering your mail Out of quota ? Reducing your inbox size Archive your mail I have accidently deleted some mails. Can I get them back? A PST file takes a lot a space on the hard disk (outlook) Unsolicited e-mail (Spam) / Viruses How to report Spam What do we filter ? Dangerous attachment names that are rejected Other Main Netscape issues Attachments, enclosures, MIME problemsTo get answers to all these questions please go to the MailServices faq web page as mentioned above. Question (QA 579) - Outlook and Outlook Express What is the difference between Outlook and Outlook Express?
Answer -
Outlook Express is an e-mail client and newsreader which
comes for free with Internet Explorer. That's just about it.
Outlook (current version 2000) is part of the M/S Office
package and is therefore not free.
So, Outlook Express is a basic tool for a single PC, whereas Outlook 2000 is more sophisticated and desirable for LANs, networking functions, the like. Please note: the CERN mail service is only supporting Outlook. Question (QA 123) - Subject in vacation message ("I'm away") Is there a way to change the traditional "I'm away" used in the subject of a vacation message?
Answer -
This text is taken from the "Subject" line you put in the file
.vacation.msg where you edit your vacation message. However it
is necessary to include a blank line just after this "Subject" line
(and before the mail body).
The variable $SUBJECT can be used in your vacation message and it will be replaced with the subject of the original message when the reply is sent; thus, a .vacation.msg file such as: Subject: I am on vacation I am on vacation until July 22. Your mail regarding "$SUBJECT" will be read when I return. If you have something urgent, please contact...will include the subject of the message in the reply. Question (QA 761) - Migrate address book from Netscape to Outlook 2000 I would like to migrate my address book from Netscape messenger on W95 (or WNT) to Outlook 2000 on W2000. How to do it?
Answer -
This is well explained in the "Using Outlook 2000" documentation
provided by the Winservices team, at:
Web Support -Question (QA 833) - Internet Explorer and link to Office files Internet Explorer on NICE is configured by default to "host" documents for Office programs that are installed on the computer. Then, when clicking an HTML link to a Microsoft Office file (such as Excel or Word document), Internet Explorer opens the file in Internet Explorer, instead of opening the file in the appropriate Office program. Is it possible to change this behaviour ?
Answer -
Yes, you can change this default behaviour. Go to
\\cern.ch\dfs\Applications\CERN\Nice2000 Useful\OFFIEexecute the file IEandOffice.vbs and answer 'Yes'.
N.B: If you want to retrieve the default behaviour, run again this file and answer 'No'.
Text Processing and Desktop Publishing -Question (QA 821) - Office 2000 spell checkers How can I get Office 2000 spell checker in other languages than English or French, for instance German and Italian?
Answer -
Select Tools - language - set language and specify German,
Italian, etc. Click on "spell checker" which should then click in.
For this recipe you must have Microsoft Office 2000 Proofing Tools installed. Proofing Tools can be installed from : control panel - add/remove programs - Add New Programsand category: Office Tools Full documentation is available at: http://cern.ch/WinServices/docs/Office/Proof/ Question (QA 947) - MS Download Center (Viewers fro PowerPoint, Word, Excel) I have to read and review some presentations at home over the weekend, but I do not have PowerPoint, nor an ACB connection to CERN.
Answer -
To get PowerPoint (or any other CERN licensed application, to that
matter) one has to mirror or install it on the CERN site.
However, if a user only wants to read a presentation, (s)he can download the PowerPoint Viewer for free from the Microsoft "Download Center" web site at URL: http://office.microsoft.com/downloads/2000/ppview97.aspx This viewer allows to read and print a presentation, but editing is not possible. Its size is fairly small, compared to PowerPoint itself. Microsoft also offers Viewers for Word and Excel from its site. Question (QA 565) - LaTeX Error: File `isolatin1.sty' not found When running LaTeX on LXPLUS for a file that was sent to me, I get the error message: LaTeX Error: File `isolatin1.sty' not found.
Answer -
This file is, in principle, not needed and it should be possible
just to make an empty file by, e.g., the command
"touch
isolatin1.sty"
Explanation: the file is a leftover of pre-latex2e history,
where 8-bit input was not easy (or impossible). By default on Linux
accented input (e.g., in German or French, with accents) is the
default and the Question (QA 1434) - LaTeX at CERN Where can I find CERN specific information for LaTeX (latest version, access, tools, etc.)? Who is providing support ?
Answer -
All information related to LaTeX at CERN is available at URL:
http://wwwinfo.cern.ch/asdoc/textproc.htmlThere is no "official" support for TeX or LaTeX. Questions can be sent to Helpdesk@cern.ch and will be treated on a "good will" basis.
Miscellaneous -Question (QA 753) - Character case for login (username) Is the login-id (or login name) case sensitive ?
Answer -
It depends on the Operating System:
Question (QA 840) - New entry in CERN's phone book Some new data has been successfully entered into the HR data base, but I cannot see it in my PC's phone book.
Answer -
New entries are reflected the very same day in HR, but you should
wait 24 hours until this data is propagated into the CERN phone
book database and application.
This is true for all Windows operating systems at CERN, and also for the Unix command "xwho" (or the web version at http://consult.cern.ch/xwho). About the author(s): Nicole Crémel is working in the User Services group and, with Roger Woolnough, is responsible for the supervision of operations of the Computing Helpdesk. Editing and revising the "Question and Answers" database is a daily task of most members of the group. |