Introduction
Any module installer that is created using distutils (bdist_wininst) is very likely to produce this error. The problem is that it only detects 32bit installations of Python on 64bit Windows machines. Or more technically, 32bit versions of Python create the following registry path

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Wow6432Node\Python\PythonCore

while 64bits versions create a slightly other registry path which is

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Python\PythonCore

When any 32-bit module setup is started (with a Python 64-bit on your system), it first checks whether the first path exists, while instead it should check the second (which does exist).

There are basically three ways of solving this:

• You can install a 32-bit Python version
• or install a 64-bit version of your module
• or adjust the registry such that it really sees that a 64bit Python is installed

I will of course elaborate on the last two options.

Install a 64-bit version of your module

You can find many module binaries here. Choose a 64-bit version and install it. This is the most clean way of fixing the problem.

If your module is not in the list, then try the alternative below.

Fix by adjusting the registry

So the dirty way is to do the following adjustments in the registry:

1. Run regedit.
2. Locate the path: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Wow6432Node\
3. Create keys in this path: Python\PythonCore\2.7\InstallPath
4. Modify the “(Default)“, which is initially empty, to the path where Python is located, for example “C:\Python27\”.
5. You are done. Exit and retry the setup that gave the error.

You can alternatively create a .reg file (for example fix.reg) that will do the above steps automatically. Put exactly the following in it:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Python\PythonCore\2.7\InstallPath]
@="C:\\Python27\\"

If you are lazy, then you can also download this file, unpack the registry file and just run it.

I needed the lxml library on a machine for some python script that I coded earlier. I tried using easy_install by doing

easy_install lxml

but then I got the following error:

Searching for lxml
Reading http://pypi.python.org/simple/lxml/
Reading http://codespeak.net/lxml
Best match: lxml 2.3.3
Downloading http://lxml.de/files/lxml-2.3.3.tgz
Processing lxml-2.3.3.tgz
Running lxml-2.3.3\setup.py -q bdist_egg --dist-dir c:\users\edin\appdata\local\
temp\easy_install-9sxhlm\lxml-2.3.3\egg-dist-tmp-pjbtkm
Building lxml version 2.3.3.
Building without Cython.
ERROR: 'xslt-config' is not recognized as an internal or external command,
operable program or batch file.

** make sure the development packages of libxml2 and libxslt are installed **

Using build configuration of libxslt
warning: no files found matching 'lxml.etree.c' under directory 'src\lxml'
warning: no files found matching 'lxml.objectify.c' under directory 'src\lxml'
warning: no files found matching 'lxml.etree.h' under directory 'src\lxml'
warning: no files found matching 'lxml.etree_api.h' under directory 'src\lxml'
warning: no files found matching 'etree_defs.h' under directory 'src\lxml'
warning: no files found matching 'pubkey.asc' under directory 'doc'
warning: no files found matching 'tagpython*.png' under directory 'doc'
warning: no files found matching 'Makefile' under directory 'doc'
error: Setup script exited with error: Unable to find vcvarsall.bat

I tried installing libxml2 and libxslt, but it resulted in similar errors.

Searching for libxml2
Reading http://pypi.python.org/simple/libxml2/
Couldn’t find index page for ‘libxml2′ (maybe misspelled?)
Scanning index of all packages (this may take a while)
Reading http://pypi.python.org/simple/
No local packages or download links found for libxml2
Best match: None
Traceback (most recent call last):
File “C:\Python27\Scripts\easy_install-script.py”, line 8, in
load_entry_point(‘setuptools==0.6c11′, ‘console_scripts’, ‘easy_install’)()
File “C:\Python27\lib\site-packages\setuptools-0.6c11-py2.7.egg\setuptools\com
mand\easy_install.py”, line 1712, in main
File “C:\Python27\lib\site-packages\setuptools-0.6c11-py2.7.egg\setuptools\com
mand\easy_install.py”, line 1700, in with_ei_usage
File “C:\Python27\lib\site-packages\setuptools-0.6c11-py2.7.egg\setuptools\com
mand\easy_install.py”, line 1716, in
File “C:\Python27\lib\distutils\core.py”, line 152, in setup
dist.run_commands()
File “C:\Python27\lib\distutils\dist.py”, line 953, in run_commands
self.run_command(cmd)
File “C:\Python27\lib\distutils\dist.py”, line 972, in run_command
cmd_obj.run()
File “C:\Python27\lib\site-packages\setuptools-0.6c11-py2.7.egg\setuptools\com
mand\easy_install.py”, line 211, in run
File “C:\Python27\lib\site-packages\setuptools-0.6c11-py2.7.egg\setuptools\com
mand\easy_install.py”, line 434, in easy_install
File “C:\Python27\lib\site-packages\setuptools-0.6c11-py2.7.egg\setuptools\pac
kage_index.py”, line 475, in fetch_distribution
AttributeError: ‘NoneType’ object has no attribute ‘clone’

In one of my previous posts I pointed out how you can solve a similar problem with a missing vcvarsall.bat error, but unfortunately that approach did not solve my problem. Compiling the sources from the ground up was a too intensive job (which I might try to figure out in the future), so I chose the easy path.

The issue was solved by installing these packages from this site which lists a lot of (unoffical) Windows binaries for Python. Everything suddenly started to work as it should.

There might be several reasons as to why you can’t install the .NET Framework. I had the problem while installing the framework via the Windows Update.

Symptoms
While trying to install Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 Update for Windows 7 x86 (KB982526), Windows Update told me that the update was unsuccessful and gave me the following “useful” error:

“WindowsUpdate_800F081F” “WindowsUpdate_dt000″

You might also get several other errors similar to the following:

• an error of type 0×643
• Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5 (x64) ‘package’: [2] Error: Installation failed for component Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5 (x64) ‘package’. MSI returned error code 1601
• Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5 (x64) ‘package’: [2] Error: Installation failed for component Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5 (x64) ‘package’. MSI returned error code 1603
• Microsoft .NET Framework 3.0SP1 (x64) (CBS): [2] Error: Installation failed for component Microsoft .NET Framework 3.0SP1 (x64) (CBS). MSI returned error code -2146762496
  
• WapUI: [2] DepCheck indicates Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0SP1 (CBS) is not installed
  

“WindowsUpdate_00009C47″ “WindowsUpdate_dt000″

Solution(s)
It strongly depends on the situation and your system but you might try one of the following solutions:

• You can first try to install the System Update Readiness Tool for Windows 7 which is an August 2011 release (KB947821 - 32-bit (x86)) at this moment of writing. This should solve any inconsistencies in the Windows servicing store which may prevent the successful installation of future updates, service packs, and software. There is also a 64-bit version for Windows 7. Windows Vista: 32-bit (x86), 64-bit (x64).
• If you’re not using Windows Update, then you can try to download and install the framework manually: Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5 Service Pack 1.
• There is also a newer version of the framework which most newer applications use which might also suffice: Microsoft .NET Framework 4 (Web Installer).
• Another thing that you can try on top of all the above is to first remove all the existing .NET framework versions. Do it via Add or remove programs from the Configuration Panel. You can also try the .NET Framework Cleanup Tool.
• Do the following: Start > Run > type “services.msc”. Now check whether the Startup Type of Windows Installer is set to Manual.
• Go to Start > Control Panel > Programs > Turn Windows features on or off. Check now that the Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5.1 is checked on.
• Disable any security/antivirus software while trying to install. Usually this shouldn’t give problems, but it’s worth a try.

Got this compile error from LaTeX today and I really don’t have any idea what is exactly going on.

This is pdfTeX, Version 3.1415926-1.40.10 (MiKTeX 2.8)
Running miktex-pdftex.exe...
This is pdfTeX, Version 3.1415926-1.40.10 (MiKTeX 2.8) (INITEX)
entering extended mode
("C:\Program Files\MiKTeX 2.8\tex\latex\config\latex.ini"
(C:\Users\Edin\AppData\Roaming\MiKTeX\2.8\tex\generic\config\pdftexconfig.tex)
("C:\Program Files\MiKTeX 2.8\tex\latex\base\latex.ltx"
("C:\Program Files\MiKTeX 2.8\tex\latex\00miktex\texsys.cfg")
./texsys.aux found

\@currdir set to: ./.

Assuming \openin and \input
have the same search path.

Defining UNIX/DOS style filename parser.

catcodes, registers, compatibility for TeX 2,  parameters,

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
! You are attempting to make a LaTeX format from a source file
! That is more than five years old.
!
! If you enter <return> to scroll past this message then the format
! will be built, but please consider obtaining newer source files
! before continuing to build LaTeX.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

! LaTeX source files more than 5 years old!.
l.545 ...aTeX source files more than 5 years old!}

No pages of output.
Transcript written on latex.log.
miktex-makefmt: miktex-pdftex.exe failed on latex.ini.
initexmf.exe: The operation failed for some reason.
initexmf.exe: Data: C:\Program Files\MiKTeX 2.8\miktex\bin\miktex-makefmt.exe
I can't find the default format file!

However, I did find a workaround that seemed to solve the problem and I decided to share it. Perform the following steps:

1. Open “C:\Program Files\MiKTeX 2.8\tex\latex\base\latex.ltx” (or wherever your latex.ltx resides). One alternative path that is different from mine is “C:\Program Files\MiKTeX\miktex\bin\tex\latex\base”.
2. Find “\ifnum\count@65>” and change it into “\ifnum\count@>100” (or some number larger than 100)
3. Save the file.

The real problem is not fixed, but at least you should now be able to compile your files.

Note that in Windows Vista and Windows 7 you’ll have to have administrator access to be able to overwrite this file since Program Files is a system directory. One way to accomplish this is to simply copy the file to let’s say the desktop, edit it, and then overwrite the original file with the edited file.

Introduction
In some strange situations it might occur that you want to recover your Outlook Account Settings from an old drive or partition on which you are unable to boot in Windows (or you just don’t want to). Unlike the Outlook mails which are stored in a PST file, the Outlook account settings are located in the Windows Registry. If you haven’t deleted your Windows files it is possible to access certain registry keys so that you can export all the account settings information and import it in your current registry.

This tutorial applies for Outlook 2007, but it might also be usable for Outlook 2003 and Outlook 2010.

Warning
Since we’ll be playing with the registry it is wise to first create a backup of your registry before continuing. You can do this by running Regedit and then exporting everything to a file or you can simply make a restore point with System Restore. Google will also be your friend if you want to try other alternatives.

Note that I’m not responsible in any way for any consequences that may occur after performing the ahead mentioned steps.

Access the registry
To access the from the second drive, partition or windows version you need to be able to access the ntuser.dat file (HKEY_CURRENT_USER). This file is user-account specific and is usually located in a fixed directory. Note that in the rest of the article I will assume that your system drive is “C:\” to keep notations simple.

In Windows XP usually:
%SystemDrive%\Documents and Settings\%UserName%\NTUSER.DAT

And in Windows Vista/7:
%SystemDrive%\Users\%UserName%\NTUSER.DAT

When you open Regedit (%SystemDrive%\Windows\regedit.exe) you’ll only see your local registry. To access the external registry file, we need to hive it under the hive HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE. This can be done by selecting the latter and then from the file menu selecting “Load Hive…” (see figure below).

Now we should locate the file. Try to find the ntuser.dat file in the locations mentioned earlier. Note that the ntuser.dat is a protected system file that is hidden by default. Before looking in the above folders you should first make sure to unhide protected system files (see figure below). One other way is to manually type in the ntuser.dat file while you’re in the specified folder or type the full path (eg. “D:\Users\YourName\ntuser.dat” or “D:\Documents and Settings\YourName\ntuser.dat“).

When opened Regedit will ask you to enter a “Key Name“. You can in principle enter any name as long as it is not used by some other key (use for example “ntuser“).

Now that you have loaded your registry file, we need to dive into the exact registry key and export the corresponding values. So now open your new key, let’s say “ntuser“, and then browse to

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ntuser\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Windows Messaging Subsystem\Profiles\Outlook

If you open the last key Outlook, you’ll see various alphanumeric keys. Between these keys there is a key, usually key “9375CFF0413111d3B88A00104B2A6676″, that has other sub keys which contain all the values we need.

Open the mentioned key (or try to find a key that has some sub keys) and you should see something like in the figure below. If that’s the case, then we have successfully found the information we were looking for.

Exporting the registry keys and values
Now that you have managed to access the keys, we need to export them to a .reg file and import them at the right location. Right click on our “9375CFF0413111d3B88A00104B2A6676″ key and click on Export. Save it to some file and open the file with some text editor, for example Notepad.

Since we have hived our ntuser.dat file under “HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ntuser\..“, the keys are exported with the same key path. We are now concerned in changing this key path to our ‘real’ path. This is simply done by replacing every occurence of

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ntuser\

with

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\

That way, we have ensured that our settings will be imported in the right location under our current logged in user (if you want to import the settings under a different account then you should switch over to it). Save your reg file and please make sure you have backed up your entire registry before continuing! In case anything goes wrong, you will be able to revert the changes.

Importing the registry keys and values
Things become easy now (make sure your Outlook is not running). After having done all the replaces in the right way and backed up the entire registry, you can now just open the reg file and after confirming the dialog, the settings should be imported. Open Outlook and check under Tools >> Account Settings which accounts were added. If everything went right, you should see all your accounts listed.

Last notes
The imported settings do not include the password that is needed to access your mail (the password is not stored in the registry but encrypted with the Windows CryptoAPI)! But if you remember your password, as you should, this will not be a problem. When connecting to the mail server with the stored settings, Outlook will ask you to type in your password for each account.

Hopefully you have recovered your settings now.

Introduction
Here I will describe how to recover lost or deleted partitions with a cool tool called TestDisk that I recently found with which

I successfully restored my own broken partition. The tool is OpenSource and is licensed under the terms of the GNU General Public License (GPL).

Symptoms and problem description
You are not able to boot your hard drive because the partition is damaged or deleted and you want to recover all your files.

Multiple recover options
There are a few ways to fix the problem since it depends on your specific situation and what options we have available.

If your lost partition is on a second drive that is also plugged in, like it was in my case, or you have a working partition on your hard drive that you can boot normally (while the damaged/deleted partition is on the same drive) , then read Recover partition from a booted working partition.

It is very possible that your only partition that you used to boot became corrupted and you don’t have a second working hard drive available. In that case you can use a Live CD by following the steps described in the part Recover partition by a Live CD.

Recover partition from a booted working partition
Your best way to recovery is from an already booted OS (Windows/Linux/Mac). You can download TestDisk from here. In the following description I will use TestDisk version 6.11.3 and show the recovery steps that may include some Windows specific details. This should be analogous to other versions and OS’es.

1. After you have extracted the downloaded file, run TestDisk from your extracted testdisk folder (win/testdisk_win.exe).
2. Now follow the TestDisk Step by Step instructions that are described on the TestDisk wiki page.

Recover partition by a Live CD
You might not be able to boot anything since you don’t have another working partition. In that case you can use a Live CD that will basically boot in memory after which you can start TestDisk without having to boot an operating system. Hence:

1. Download and then burn the TestDisk Live CD on an empty CD, insert it in your machine and boot from it. *
2. Now you can basically follow the same TestDisk Step by Step instructions as if booted from an OS.

* Note that you have to setup your BIOS such that your first boot option is your CD/DVD drive. In case your first boot option is your hard drive, the Live CD will not boot up!

Keep in mind
Keep also in mind that you have to be careful when performing the above described operations. Don’t overwrite or fully format the partition if you want to be able to recover your partition and files. Also note that there may be various situations that you can encounter that are not covered by this tutoriol, and hence I cannot be held responsible for any consequences that might occur after you decide to use the tool. It should not get dramatic, but keep in mind anyway that you use it at your own risk.

Today I started my desktop PC and when I wanted to login I got an unexpected Windows message:

“The referenced account is currently locked out and may not be logged on to.”

I retyped my username and password without thinking much about it, but it showed again the same message. Even after rebooting the PC, the same message was visible every time. A few minutes I sat and thought about it, but then suddenly I figured out what the real problem was.

Some time earlier I was testing some stuff and changed the domain and computer name of the PC to that of my laptop. So basically, both machines were connected to the network with the same name on the same domain, and that was the obvious problem.

So the problem was clear, and the solution simple. I just had to change the computer name and everything should be fine again, but the problem was that I was unable to login on my PC since my laptop was also running. I switched off the wireless adapter of the laptop, but it didn’t help. I had to switch off the PC wireless adapter, restart the machine and login. After changing the computer name and restarting again, the problem was resolved.

To summarize everything, if you get the same error, it might be the case that two machines are using the same name on the same domain, as was in my case. You should proceed as follows:

1. If you cannot login to Windows because you are getting the above mentioned error, switch off the wireless adapter, unplug your Ethernet cable or turn off the router and then (re)start your machine and login to Windows (so the machine shouldn’t be connected to the network/internet).
2. After you have logged in, make sure to change your computer name to some unique name that is accepted by the domain (or fix some other issues if you are experiencing another similar problem).
3. Now connect again to the network/internet and restart your machine.
4. You should be able to login again as usual.

Introduction
It is now exactly a year ago since I released Windows Live Messenger Uninstaller and mentioned planning to build a “more general remover for the Windows Live series“. The time has finally come for a public release of Windows Live Essentials Uninstaller. But first, a few things I have to mention about WLMU.

Windows Live Messenger Uninstaller was an unexpected success and showed that many people were experiencing the same stated problem and were looking for a decent and quick solution.  Almost everyone that I got a reaction from, either through mails, comments or other sites, claimed to have successfully solved the problem by removing Windows Live Messenger with WLMU.

Until now I have tracked some statistics about the downloads on WLMU and can proudly say that in a year time, the tool has been downloaded more than 30.000 times from my site alone! I’m very glad to see that so many people have found the tool useful. This was one of the main reasons for me to publish a follow up tool, which I will describe in some detail below.

Windows Live Essentials Uninstaller
Windows Live Essentials Uninstaller scans the system and tries to find Windows Live Essentials products that were installed during the setup. If any products were found, it presents them in a list from which you can choose to remove or repair such a product.

WLEU is hereby published as a first public version 1.2.1 and is, as I mentioned earlier, a direct follow up of the tool WLMU. WLEU is built on the same principles as was the case with WLMU and therefore again uses the product’s CLSID with Windows Installer to accomplish a clean removal. Refer to the changelog below for specific changes that were made.

Download
You can download the tool from the following link:

Download Windows Live Essentials Uninstaller 1.2.1 (837kB)

MD5 hash: 1512df1cadd7c804957d2d83f380659b

Usage
The tool is very simple to use. If it finds any WLE components it will give you a list from which you can select the component you want to uninstall/repair.  You will also get a generated command that you can use to manually remove it. When you press UNINSTALL or REPAIR,  the tool will run the command automatically for you.

Note: This software comes with absolute no warranty! By using this program you agree that I am not responsible for anything caused by this software whatsoever.

Future releases
If you have any comments, suggestions or bugs, please put them here in the comments or contact me by mail. If it is useful/serious I will add/fix it in the next release.

Changelog
{First public version 1.2.1}
+ Added new WLE component trace scan
+ Added uninstall finish confirmation
+ Added Setup, Boot and Display options
+ Added component information: Version, Install Date, Local Package, Install source and Product ID

The story
I’m currently automating a certain process with a Python script that needs to call external programs with some specific parameters. An additional problem is with this letter s in the word parameters, for my external call requires an execution with more than one argument.

I tried the os.system call but unfortunately it didn’t work on my system because the function was apparently not present. This conclusion followed after I got the error “ImportError: No module named system”. Instead of resolving this error, I  decided to dig into google for some alternatives.  And I did succeed, when I met the lovely miss subproccess.

Let subprocess do all the calls
To keep it short and skip the syntax explanation, learn from the following example:

import subprocess
subprocess.call(‘expand catalog-web.cab -F:* -r’, shell=True)

As you can see, the magic only happens when you pass the string (your complete command) together with the shell=True option.

Happy Python calling.

In short
To extract Microsoft CAB files, you can use the expand command in command line as follows:

expand cabfile -F:* path

which will extract all the files from the cabfile in the give path. For example

expand en-catalog-web.cab -F:* c:\expanded

Single files
I experienced problems with extracting a cab file where within a single xml file was stored. I found out that renaming the files after extraction can solve the problem. This is done by doing the previous example with an -r option:

expand en-catalog-web.cab -F:* c:\expanded -r

Extracting all the files to the current working directory can be done as follows:

expand cabfile -F:*  -r