The Old New Thing

August 2012 - Page 3 of 3 - The Old New Thing

Of what possible legitimate use are functions like CreateRemoteThread, WriteProcessMemory, and VirtualProtectEx?

August 8, 2012 Aug 8, 2012 08/8/12
Raymond Chen
There are a bunch of functions that allow you to manipulate the address space of other processes, like and . Of what possible legitimate use could they be? Why would one process need to go digging around inside the address space of another process, unless it was up to no good? These functions exist for debuggers. For example, when you ask ...

Microspeak: planful

August 7, 2012 Aug 7, 2012 08/7/12
Raymond Chen
Every year, Microsoft invites its employees to fill out a poll which asks questions regarding all sorts of things. One of the things Microsoft employees are asked to evaluate is whether they think that their vice president is acting planfully. The tricky part about that question is that nobody knows exactly what the word planfully means. ...

Why is the desktop treated so special in window ordering?

August 6, 2012 Aug 6, 2012 08/6/12
Raymond Chen
Clipboarder Gadget wants to know why the desktop is treated so special in window ordering. Specifically, when you double-click a folder icon on the desktop, and the immediately close it, why does focus not go back to the desktop? Instead it goes to some random window. Actually, it's the other way around. Focus is going to a random window ...

Get your Contoso-branded merchandise while you can

August 3, 2012 Aug 3, 2012 08/3/12
Raymond Chen
Long-time observers are familiar with Contoso, the fake company name used in Microsoft samples and demonstrations. The Windows Phone folks have started running with the joke and creating their own line of Contoso-branded merchandise. (Of course, if you get the Contoso mug, you should fill it with Fourth Coffee...

FORFILES, for your fancier batch file enumeration needs

August 3, 2012 Aug 3, 2012 08/3/12
Raymond Chen
Crack open open the champagne: Batch File Week is finally over! Variations on the will let you repeat an operation on the contents of a directory, possibly even recursively if you add the option, with some basic attribute-level filtering if you add the or /a- flags. For your fancy recursive file operations, there's a tool called which...

You gotta fight for your right to parry

August 1, 2012 Aug 1, 2012 08/1/12
Raymond Chen
(The headline was stolen from one of my cleverer friends.) I'm taking time out of my busy vacation to draw your attention (if it hasn't been already) to the story of South Korean fencer Shin A Lam, who got screwed out of her trip to the finals of the women's individual epeé.¹ The story is heart-wrenching, and the photojournalism ...

How do I find the most recently created file in a directory from a batch file?

August 1, 2012 Aug 1, 2012 08/1/12
Raymond Chen
We've reached Hump Day of Batch File Week. Remember, nobody actually likes batch programming. You merely tolerate it. Today, we'll find the most recently-created item in a directory. (For example, we have a server that holds our daily builds, and you might want to write a batch file that automatically installs the latest build.) There may...