Handy .bat file...

I hadn't written a DOS batch file in years, but the following three-liner is pretty handy at "unsticking" a print queue when the spooler refuses to delete a job.

net stop spooler
del c:\windows\system32\spool\printers\*.* /Q
net start spooler

The first line stops a service called the print spooler, the second line gets rid of the data waiting to be printed (the /Q makes the operating system skip asking "are you sure?"), and the third line restarts the spooler.

I saved the three lines in a file called deleteprintjobs.bat in the directory that pops up when I click on Start|Run... and enter cmd as the program to run. In the window that appears, I type the name of the batch file, wait for it to complete, and then type exit to close the window.

Mouse addicts can attain the same goal by

• clicking on Start|Control Panel,
• double-clicking Administrative Tools,
• double-clicking Services,
• scrolling down to Print Spooler,
• right-clicking and selecting Stop,
• right-clicking again and selecting Start, and
• closing the Services and Administrative Tools windows.

EIther way, it sure is a handy thing to know if you're running Windows XP.

Cheers...

Controversy update...

I just read Anton Nossik's recent post addressing the ongoing kerfuffle, and came away with two points.

First - and this is my bad - when I posted my translated excerpt from the Izbrannoe interview, I forgot that pretty much anything appearing in the Russian press (at least online) is suspect from the word "go." So when Nossik says the published piece was "a freeform abstract of a 2-hour long phone conversation," I can believe him, and what was published may not be exactly what he said, or reflect how he said it.

Second, the claim that "what Izbrannoe published was my personal opinion of a veteran Russian LJ blogger" [sic, "of" should probably be "as"] doesn't wash, regardless of how poorly Izbrannoe mangled Nossik's words (unless they simply made that part up), because evangelists don't have personal opinions, at least in my experience. Said another way: company evangelists always speak ex cathedra, whether they like it or not.

I for one agree with the last line in the post, and would hope that all this crap can be left in the dust.

Cheers...

A waste of 25:18...

Journalist Lyudmila Telen has made a 25:18 audio of a conversation with Anton Nossik available (a link to the audio is here). I downloaded and listened to it and posted the following comment on ljspeaks:

I did not hear the word шантаж ("blackmail," but which back-translates as "intimidation," too), and the one time I heard the word идиот ("idiot"), it was said at 23:39 in the file, in the context of "there was an effort in the past to get users to call advertisers and have them pull their ads... what kind of idiot would call?"

The audio starts with the interviewer, who initiated the call, doing the standard journalist thing of asking a question that gets a rise out of the interviewee and assures a denial: "So, there aren't any more free accounts on LJ, right?"

Cheers...

DISCLAIMER: I listened to the audio once, and what I have quoted in the message above is based on notes made while listening and should be good enough to convey the meaning.

Without getting all forensic about it, the published interview pretty much corresponds to what I heard in the audio, though obviously not word for word.

The elephant nobody in either corner of the Russian side of the room seems to be interested in talking about - at least that I am aware of - is the issue of altering, or censoring, or what-have-you of community interests to exclude subjects like fanfiction, though as I understand it, this wrinkle has been undone and may therefore be considered by some to be a dead letter.

Cheers...

UPDATE: I went back a little while ago to ljspeaks to look more closely at a response to my comment, and read some others that have been posted since then. I stand corrected on not having heard шантаж (at 21:55), which, as noted above can mean both "blackmail" and "intimidation," but I have to say that, in my opinion, the cacophony of outraged voices there is such as to make Nossik out to be the new Don Imus, when in fact the arguments used to "prove" their case are pretty weak (e.g., "there's a passage that can be considered as [if] he is calling folks idiots," referring to why anyone would want to downgrade from a Paid or Plus account to a Basic account). Tedious.

Also, FWIW, there seem to now be at least two audios out there, since mention is made of a remark made at 34:47 of the recording (mine was only 25:18).