Nasty DLL conflict: Office 2003 + Project 2007 + Sharepoint 2007 + IE 7 add on manager = IE 7 crash

This is the most obscure bug I’ve solved in recent times. It showed up a few days ago in my work place where we have to use Office 2003 and some 2007 modules. I assume it’s been triggered by some recent update but it’s an old problem.

If you try to edit in Sharepoint 2007’s [1] “Datasheet” view using Internet Explorer 7. IE 7 crashes instantly. You may see a similar problem with editing Office documents in SP 2007.

The crash details mention MOSS.DLL, but various net resources point to a conflict between two Office 11 and Office 12 DLLs: OWSSUPP.DLL and MOSS.DLL. In particular IE 7’s add-on manager causes it to load the wrong copy.

Yes, DLL Hell again.

Useful references include:

• Groove Advisor The Groove Blog Microsoft Office Groove 2007 with Office 2003
• Office XP integration problem
• SharePoint - IE Crashes when opening Office documents (most complete discussion)

I followed the advice to rename OWSSUPP.CLL in the Office 12 directory. That fixed my problem and Project still loads.

After I did that I found this post: SharePoint - IE Crashes when opening Office documents recommending a repair using Microsoft Diagnostics. That post refers to the Office 2007 SP1 Hotfix package, but that’s hotfix is too old to use now.

I would suggest trying the Diagnostics repair first. If that works please add a comment to this blog post. If it doesn’t work, then rename the Office 2007 DLL as above.

I will update this post as a I learn more.

[1] Microsoft calls Sharepoint “MOSS”. They sure know how to name things.

Daring Fireball likes OpenDNS again

I've been thinking of signing up with OpenDNS for the built-in phishing and access controls.

I hesitated due to some concerns about their business practices, best described in Wikipedia. Also, DF was unsure about them.

Now DF has come around:

Daring Fireball Linked List: Using OpenDNS for Phishing Protection

...The other thing about OpenDNS is that it is fast, fast, fast — for me, it makes web surfing noticeably faster than using the default DNS servers I get from Comcast. I was on the other side of the fence about OpenDNS’s “DNS ” a few months ago, but I’ve come around again...

I'll give them a try. Since my machines get their DNS information from my router, I'll make changes there.

Update: I tried to create an account, but it didn't do anything. No error message, but no action either. Weird. Turns out their server was done. I was able to create one later that night.

Update 8/28/08: Our home network consists of an Apple AirPort Extreme connected to a Qwest DSL "modem". I changed the DNS settings on the Qwest DSL "modem" to use OpenDNS, the AirPort gets its settings from the Qwest modem and all the machines get theirs from the AirPort -- so this moved everyone over. I enabled filtering and logging (kids), but I haven't bothered with the DynamicDNS notifier -- my IP address doesn't seem to change much.

Network locations in Mac OS X

One of the minor mysteries of OS X - newly explained:

Using network locations in Mac OS X: ...A 'location' is a set of network preferences...

It might have been better if they'd called the tool "custom network preferences", but Locations does have a smoother sound. Most of us rarely need to use anything but Automatic these days, but if you want to experiment with OpenDNS (example: block problem addresses) you can create a custom OpenDNS location.

Unknown Error during iPhone app install or update

Update 9/14/08: Fixed.

I'm getting this error with the iPhone I was given when my original white 3G phone cracked.

Unkown Error On The iPhone | DamienKomala.com

... Ok so every time I try and update or upgrade an application on my iPhone I get this “Unknown Error: 0xE800002E. After some adjustments I was able to find a method to resolve, or at least update my apps. Here’s the key ...

Damien suggests selective installation (see post for details). This worked for me:

1. Delete app from iPhone
2. Delete app from iTunes
3. Click to download. iTunes says I already own the app, offers to redownload.
4. Sync
   

I wonder about an iPhone hardware problem, but I'm hoping it's a corrupted download problem. Re-downloading might fix that.

Update 8/11/08: I'm now seeing the same error with every application update that appears. I think that either my iPhone has a hardware bug or restore from backup doesn't work properly. I hope, and suspect, it's the latter.

This time I tried Damien Komala's tip. I deleted the app from the iPhone, then did a selective app sync with the app unchecked, then checked it.

GrandDialer: will this help my phone bill?

AT&T charges me a fortune to call Canada.

But what if I could use my GrandCentral account to call Canada, then GrandCentral connects me in?

GrandDialer would make that easier:

GrandDialer, an iPhone app for GrandCentral - The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW)

...GrandDialer (iTunes link) allows you to use your iPhone to call people using your GrandCentral telephone number....

This is using the GrandCentral "Click2Call" feature.

8/8/08: It works. Inferior voice quality and some echo, so I don't know how well it will do for my elderly parents. Good lord. This could pay for my iPhone data plan. It appears to be completely legal, but one suspect a bill will appear someday.

Except that the GC site doesn't mention how Click2Call is charged for long distance calls.

Not surprisingly, other folks noticed this a long time ago. Actually a lot of other people.

No wonder people envy me my GrandCentral account.

It's hard being an elder geek -- I miss out on the tricks the youngsters know.

Now I think I know why Google has been moving very slowly with GrandCentral. It sure makes a good club when you're in discussions with telecom companies.

Update 8/18/08: I've been doing this for 2 weeks. Sometimes the voice quality is excellent, sometimes it's weak -- but it does work.

Update 10/19/08: Still works, has saved me about $100 or so. The quality is very good 25% of the time, very poor 25% and marginal 50%. The marginal quality sort of works for my mother, but is worthless for my father. GrandCentral's VOIP quality is on the high end of what I've seen in my prior experiments; VOIP startups just can't get the quality I need (one suspects the phone companies aren't exactly helpful). So it's a good service for free, but they really couldn't charge much and still be worthwhile for me. If I get a bad connection now I just call back with a regular line, I don't retry the GrandCentral connection.

Update 12/3/08: The quality has improved dramatically in the past few weeks. It's now very similar to landline quality. I wonder if Google is getting ready to do something interesting with VOIP. Maybe the phone companies have displeased them ...

Fewer posts, more shared items – Google Reader changes my memory management

My iPhone purchase forced me to move from Bloglines to Google Reader. I don’t regret the move; Bloglines was fine but they were clearly running out of steam. Their inability to produce a mobile version was a sad sign that their day has passed. This is a tough industry.

Among Google Reader’s many great features is a convenient way to share feed items with optional annotations. 

Here’s my list. It’s not obvious or obviously documented, but this share list itself appears to have a feed [1].

I see a lot of things I’d like to keep track of. Some of them get posts here, some don’t. Now that I’m using this mechanism I’ll reduce the number of “pointer posts” here, and instead periodically point to interesting items I’ve shared – with annotations. Since my shared list combines technical and political, pointers from here will filter out the political.

It is not accidental that this mechanism of sharing works very well with Google Reader mobile on the iPhone.

This is, most interestingly, an extension to my memory management strategy. Google works in mysterious ways.

[1] So if you share items from the shared feed …

How to steal my Google account

My old friend Brendan would know the answer to this Google password change security question:







Yes, to steal my Google account, my primary digital identity, all you need to know is my first phone number.

It's ok to sob quietly now. I understand.

I'm 187 years old, so not that many people know my first phone number any more. Only hackers who've broken into other security systems that ask the same question, and about a dozen other people. For anyone under 25 though, this isn't that hard to learn.

Ok, so I'm not a complete idiot. The answer I stored in Google for that question is a a 200 character hex string taken from GRC secure passwords. So you really would be better off stealing my primary password.

Google, on the other hand, is behaving like a complete idiot. Why is this?

That's the interesting question. It leads to some noteworthy conclusions ...

1. Passwords are a complete fail. Schneier has been saying this for years. We are now into the realm of madness. We need multi-factor authentication devices that handle our secondary authentication for us. Yeah, it's not perfect, but, really, this is s#$!@# insane.
2. We live in the age of the tyranny of the mean. Even the vast majority of geeks aren't going to figure out how to sync 1Password with an iPhone. Regular folks are going to use one password everywhere and then forget it. Google, like everyone else with these asinine security question is bowing to the reality that humans didn't evolve to live in a digital world. We're maxing out right now.