Tweak Windows 10 Privacy Settings With Spydish

Grab a copy of Spydish and tweak your Microsoft Windows 10 privacy settings. Take control of your PC.

Install Raspbian on Raspberry Pi B+

This will guide you through installation and configuration of a Raspberry Pi B+ with the Raspbian operating system so the device will be accessible on your network. Readily available for around $35, the Raspberry Pi ecosystem is fast-becoming a hobbyist workhorse.


Download Raspbian zip file from www.raspberrypi.org/downloads/raspbian. This example uses "Raspbian Buster with desktop" of February 2020.

Download the Etcher program from www.balena.io/etcher.  Etcher will write the OS zip file image to the SD card.

Insert an 8 GB (or more) microSD card in to the card reader on your Windows PC. This example uses a 32 GB card. In Windows Explorer you should see the SD card.

Use the Etcher program to write the zip file OS image to the SD card.
 

After writing the image, the SD card will be unmounted. Physically eject the card from your PC, then reinsert it. Determine the drive letter by looking in File Explorer.

Let's tell the OS image to allow ssh login. Press the Windows Start button, type
cmd
and start the Command Prompt application.
In the command prompt, go to the drive letter of the SD card. In this example, type
F:

Create a zero length file named ssh. In the command prompt, type
type nul > ssh

If you will use a hard-wired ethernet connection from the device to your router, you will not need to configure wifi. To configure wifi, create a file named "wpa_supplicant.conf" with your wifi connection information. The file should only have the suffix ".conf" and the contents should not have Windows-like newline characters. It is important that newline characters are not added to this file. It should be a plain text file. Add the following to the wpa_supplicant.conf file.
country=US
ctrl_interface=DIR=/var/run/wpa_supplicant GROUP=netdev
update_config=1

network={
scan_ssid=1
ssid="yourWifiSsid"
psk="yourWifiPassword"
}

Type exit to leave the command prompt.

In Windows File Explorer, right-click on the drive and choose EJECT. Physically eject the SD card from the PC.

Plug in the microSD card to the device, and insert the power connector cord in to the device. Don't yet plug it in to power.

Open your router configuration page, and look for the area which shows the current connections. You will looking for either a new DHCP client or a new MAC address. Now that you have opened your router configuration to the appropriate page, plug in the wall power for the device and turn on the power  switch.
Watch the router page for a new connection. If using wifi and it doesn't connect to the router, use the ethernet cable method. Note the IP address.

Press the Windows Start button and open a command prompt. In the Windows command prompt, connect to the device using the IP address as seen in your router.
ssh pi@192.168.1.101
Accept the key fingerprint warning by typing yes.
The password is
raspberry

You should be logged in. Change the password.
$ passwd

Modify settings such as locale language, host name, and maybe enable VNC. Start the handy configuration tool. I changed the locale and the host name.
$ sudo raspi-config

If wifi didn't work or you want to enable it, become root and edit the file.
$ sudo su
$ sudo vi /etc/wpa_supplicant/wpa_supplicant.conf

Reboot the device.
$ sudo reboot

The router page will show the new host name.

For installation of an operating system on bare hardware, this was a smooth and pleasant experience. The teams who put together the custom OS and configuration tools have done superb!

Another good guide for how to install Raspbian OS is at Tom's Hardware.

OneDrive Automatic Update and Autoruns Application

In Microsoft Windows 10 task manager, I noticed the OneDriveStandaloneUpdater task running, and was curious about it. This led me to the excellent Autoruns application by Sysinternals. Autoruns shows everything that is set to start in any way possible.

Download Autoruns. Using File Explorer, uncompress the folder. In the uncompressed folder, run "Autoruns" application.

In the Autoruns filter box, type: one

Uncheck the box on the appropriate line.

You may additionally uninstall the program (command prompt, then: %systemroot%\System32\OneDriveSetup.exe /uninstall), or rename the program at C:\Users\_username_\AppData\Local\Microsoft\OneDrive\OneDriveStandaloneUpdater.exe

Short Guide To Configure Linux X On Microsoft Windows

This post contains minimal instructions to run X programs on Microsoft Windows from a Ubuntu Linux machine.


On Windows, install PuTTY from https://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/putty/latest.html

On Windows, install Xming from https://sourceforge.net/projects/xming/?source=directory
or http://www.straightrunning.com/XmingNotes

On Windows, run XLaunch (was installed by Xming) and go through prompts:
Display Settings "Multiple Windows"
Session Type "Start no client"
Additional Parameters "Check Clipboard box"

On Windows run PuTTY.
Load a session profile or create a session profile for a Linux machine.
In left panel, go to Connection, SSH, X11.
Click "Enable X11 Forwarding"
X display location "localhost:0.0"
Save that connection profile in PuTTY, so the X11 configuration will be there tomorrow.

On Windows, run Xming. It will run in the background without a Windows display.
On Windows, open the configured PuTTY connection that was previously configured for X11. This should open a command-window on the Linux machine. Enter the following in the command window:
$ echo $TERM
xterm
$ echo $DISPLAY
localhost:10.0

Test X by typing "xclock". A GUI clock from the Linux machine should display on the Windows machine.
Typing "xclock&" will allow you to continue to type in the command window while the xclock GUI also runs.

SkypeHost.exe on Windows 10

Anyone who does not use Skype and who is looking through Task Manager may be frustrated to observe a task named SkypeHost.exe. While it may have "Suspended" status, some users would like to completely remove the task while not affecting Skype for other users on the PC.


SkypeHost.exe will restart if it is killed through "End task" in the Task Manager. The following instructions will remove the task, while allowing Skype to continue to function for other users of the PC.

The process is to open the Skype application and log in.  Then choose "Options" and uncheck "Start Skype which I start Windows" and "Sign me in when Skype starts".


 The process will end, and it will not restart the next time you log in.

Tuning I/O for Ethereum

At a high level, the I/O request goes from the running program to the operating system. Then from the operating system to the appropriate file system driver, then to the disk controller which writes to the disk.

It is usually important to match the I/O length (the amount of data being written) in each step of the process. Disks and the disk controllers typically write large stripes of data, such as 512KB. The file system may be set up with RAID, which can have stripes of 512KB or 1 MB. The operating system may default to a size of 16 KB (NTFS default has been 4 KB). To complicate this further, the operating system may implement file compression, which can pack more data into each I/O. And remember the filesystem may have logging, and may also frequently update inode access times which can cause contention.

It is typically difficult to change RAID settings after it has been implemented. RAID 5 will often be slow. It is typically impossible to change disk controller settings.

Therefore, let's concentrate on tuning a high I/O workload with commonly available settings in the filesystem and the program.

Increase the filesystem block size to a reasonably large value such as 64 KB. This is set when formatting a partition. While larger block sizes can lead to some wasted disk space, this is not typically a problem with modern large disks.

For tuning the program, if possible increase the program's (database or geth) cache size and match the logical I/O to the filesystem I/O size. For geth, it is possible to set the cache size with the --cache flag:
.\geth.exe --cache 512

The default geth cache is 16 MB, so 512 MB is a large increase. Set this lower than the amount of real RAM in the system, to avoid creating a swapping situation. Monitor this with Task Manager, using the following examples. Note 1.6 GB of real RAM is available to avoid swapping, which is a safe margin of error in case the program data increases.



Using the geth default of 16 MB, the maximum observed I/O was about 3 MB per second. Using geth's cache of 512 MB increased the maximum I/O to about 12 MB per second, a significant increase.

Move Microsoft Windows pagefile.sys

Moving the page file off the system disk can lead to reductions in disk I/O contention, which can lead to a quicker-feeling system. Systems which have small system disks can regain some disk space by moving the pagefile. These instructions for moving the pagefile to another disk are for Microsoft Windows 10.

Open a command prompt or Windows PowerShell.  To open PowerShell, press the Windows button and search for (start typing the words) "powershell". Click on PowerShell. (You may want to right-click and pin PowerShell for easy access in the future.)
With Windows PowerShell running, type> systeminfo
(PowerShell systeminfo displays the same information which is available through Control Panel, Administrative Tools, System Information.)
Note the "Windows Directory" and "Page File Location" are both on drive C.


This example computer is several years old, so drive C is relatively slow. The new drive is F, a three terabyte internal drive. The new drive has much better seek times and data throughput, so the system will likely feel more responsive if the pagefile is moved to drive F.

List the drives & volumes in powershell with > GET-WMIOBJECT win32_logicaldisk | format-table


Move the pagefile to the faster drive, F.

Show the virtual memory by opening Control Panel, System and Security, System, Advanced System Settings, Advanced tab, press Performance Settings... button, Advanced tab, press Change... button. Note the virtual memory is currently managed by the system and on drive C.


Create a pagefile on drive F with a Custom size by clicking on the new drive (F) and choosing Custom Size. Most users will choose a virtual memory size equal to real RAM or a multiple to the real RAM in the system. Press the Set button.
Select drive C and choose No Paging File and press the Set button. Press OK and the system will prompt for reboot. Reboot the system.


After reboot, verify the pagefile has moved correctly.


Using PowerShell to verify the pagefile, type > wmic pagefile list /format:list

AllocatedBaseSize=4096
CurrentUsage=0
Description=F:\pagefile.sys
InstallDate=20160512202132.760466-360
Name=F:\pagefile.sys
PeakUsage=1
Status=
TempPageFile=FALSE

Notice the PeakUsage is low, as it is a new pagefile.

Simpler PowerShell command, without formatting, is > wmic pagefile
 

Dell Fast Pics

PC users who run the Dell printer software, may encounter "Dell Fast Pics" popping up upon insertion of a USB stick or drive.  It monitors drives and prompts to transfer photos.  Dell's printer program monitoring drives for pictures is annoying.


Several Dell printer manuals describe the Fast Pics program.

Dell V515w Printer User's Guide by George Arellano

If you are not interested in using that program and you do not want it monitoring your drives, look for file dleamon.exe.  Either disable it from starting up or rename the file in the printer directory.
Those using Microsoft Windows 7 or earlier can look at the startup programs by running msconfig.exe
In Microsoft Windows 8 start the Task Manager and look in the Startup tab for "Printer Device Monitor" and ezprint.exe.
You may also look for file "[Windows drive]\Program Files\Dell Vnnn-Vnnn Series\dleamon.exe" and exprint.exe.