Wednesday, 24 September 2014

Sage Payroll keeps prompting with an older update

Sage Payroll 2014-15 v20
Every time we exit from Sage Payroll 2014-2015 tax year - version 20.02.203 - it prompts to install an older v20.01 update 1. Choose ok and nothing happens, or leave it (and nothing happens!) but you'll get prompted again for the update next time round.

Tried manually loading the update from a download - no luck - tried using Run as admin - no luck - tried editing the version number in the PayrollVersion.dat file - no luck.

So after 15 mins on hold to sage support, here's the trick ...

Look in C:\Programdata\sage\SBD Software Updates
and delete the files
   softwareupdates.dat
   SoftwareUpdateSettings.dat

Restart Sage Payroll and no more prompts, yaaay!

Friday, 19 September 2014

Can't Empty Deleted Items in Outlook, until synchronization with server is complete

Using Outlook with Microsoft Exchange. It looks like a damaged email in Outlook, stuck in the Deleted Items offline folder, which then fails to complete the Empty Deleted Items action. You get this error message:



"Outlook is synchronizing local changes made to items in this folder. You cannot remove this folder until the synchronization with the server is complete."

You can remove the problem item by right-clicking on the Deleted Items folder, then Properties, and choosing the Clear Offline Items button. Press F9 to run a sync

Monday, 1 September 2014

Adding mutiple DNS servers with "netsh int ip" batch command in Windows 8.1

I needed a CMD batch file to change DNS servers for some testing but couldn't find the correct syntax to add more than one DNS server, eg set a primary DNS and a secondary DNS.

The basic command (don't forget to use an elevated Run As Administrator command shell or batch file) is
   netsh int ip set dns "Ethernet connection" static 8.8.8.8

I'm sure on older versions of Windows you could specify multiple servers in one lines using a space or string or comma (or something like that) - maybe I made that up. I googled and tracked down an index option which let you specify a secondary dns server - but not in Windows 8.1 unfortunately. That option is no longer recognised.

Trick in the end was to use set for the primary and add for the secondary, eg.
   netsh int ip set dns "Ethernet connection" static 8.8.8.8 primary
   netsh int ip add dns "Ethernet connection" 8.8.4.4

HTH

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