Month: January 2012

Solution to PlayStation Home D4001 Error

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I had a PlayStation 3 a few years ago, but I didn’t use it all that much.  I thought PlayStation Home was a neat concept, but apart from that, I didn’t do much with my PS3.  So, after a while, it just gave up on itself.  It froze up and never worked again.  Recently, I went out and purchased a PlayStation 3 “Slim” model…  mostly for BluRay!  But when I got it, I wanted to see what advancements had been made in PlayStation Home.  So I downloaded the installer file and when I tried to connect, BAM.  I got the D4001 error.  It wasn’t helpful or useful, it was a generic error code with no additional information.  I posted in the official PlayStation forums for support multiple times over, never to get anywhere.

Finally I sat down late at night and decided to crack down and figure this one out.  When you read the solution you might roll your eyes, but continue to the bottom to understand where the underlying problem was.  After literally months of frustration and hours of constant troubleshooting, I found my problem.  It seems as though the DNS I had set as my primary (PSU.edu’s 128.118.25.3) was not working correctly (appears to be entirely offline).  My secondary DNS (Google’s 8.8.8.8) was working for PSN, but for some reason PSHome ignores the secondary DNS setting!

In my network connection settings of my PS3, setting my PRIMARY DNS to 8.8.8.8 and leaving my Secondary DNS as all 0’s has resolved the issue, I am signed in to PlayStation Home for the first time in over a year.

Why didn’t it work when I used the easy / auto-config?  Because auto-config settings on the PS3 pull their settings from your home router.  My router had been set up with the same default DNS structure, 128.118.25.3 was my primary, preferred DNS!!  I was creating my own problem.

I have since moved not only my PlayStation but my router and my entire home network on to OpenDNS and have had no problems.

This may not be the solution for everyone, but I sure hope it helps a few of you out!

Goodbye, Joe Pa

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Alright, this is my personal blog, believe it or not. I try not to get too in your face personal, but today I’m going to. I’m a Penn Stater. A 2007 graduate of a branch campus in Erie, Pennsylvania: The Behrend College. I am a Delta Chi fraternity brother, I bleed Blue and White.

When Joe Paterno lost his position at Penn State, after 61 years with the team, it was no doubt a shock. The man had been coaching at Penn State longer than I’d known what a university even was. When I was learning how to potty like a big boy, Joe Pa was taking Penn State to back-to-back undefeated regular seasons. Too many people used the cliched “evil triumphs when good men do nothing” tag-line in the weeks following the Penn State scandal. While I in no way wish to belittle what happened and what has come forth about Sandusky, but I have been livid since Joe Paterno was dismissed. Penn State asked him to step down from his position in 2004 amid poor performance, and Joe Paterno refused. To be ousted like this? Shameful.

Mike McQueary allegedly witnesses Jerry Sandusky in the locker room with a young man. McQueary tells Paterno. Paterno tells his supervisors. Paterno loses his spot with the team before McQueary. Even if Paterno had gone to the police with what he had been told, at that point, it’s hearsay, inadmissable in court. Paterno had so little to do with the overall case – if and when this whole thing goes to court, Paterno would likely not even be able to be called as a witness! Yet there he was, the man literally bronzed into Penn State’s community, tossed from his position as Head Coach in the middle of the night. With nothing left to fight for or live for, Coach Paterno died from complications due to lung cancer a matter of weeks later.

As a Penn Stater, it hurts. As a Penn Stater, I know a lot of oter Penn Staters. I have snipped just a few comments from friends’ social netorking pages, just to share with you how we feel. After all… We Are… Penn State.

“No one deserves a million dollars just to coach a football team” -Joe Paterno after turning down a coaching offer from the New England Patriots in 1972. Mourning the loss of JoePa has nothing to do with being a Penn State fan, its about celebrating the life of a man that didn’t have a selfish bone in his body. Rest in peace coach, the world has lost a true gentleman.
-Steve S.

Wore my white long sleeve “400 wins” T all day and a PSU ball cap (thanks to the rain)…. while at the grocery store, almost everyone I made eye contact with gave me this look that simply said “I’m sorry” – complete strangers… the cashier asked me some details on his death and shared his sorrow and anger over how his career and life had to end. Joe just brings people together: Penn Staters and Non-Penn Staters alike.
-Heather B.

Penn State Behrend’s flag was at half mass today in honor of Coach.
-Shantel M.

We are a student body. At the end of the day, it doesn’t matter how many football games we won, or how many students we have. We could have the best program out there, but without the support and pride of our student body, we are no better than any other school. Joe Paterno knew this and strived to make all Penn State students know this, because without us, Penn State becomes just an average state school. I know I speak for Joe Paterno when I say “Fight on State, Fight on.”
RIP Joe Paterno
#PennStatePride
-Derek K.

“‘His life is Penn State through and through,’ Scott Paterno said, speaking of his father in the present tense. ‘He understood that and it never once occurred to him to be bitter toward Penn State.'”
-Adam W., quoting an article featuring Scott Paterno’s words.

Not perfect by any means…but who is? Hopefully his legacy will be remembered more for the good he did than for what he did not do. His debt is paid. May he R.I.P and his family be given the comfort, privacy and respect they need and deserve at this time…
-Eden R.

I don’t want to talk about it. And if you’re from Penn State, you already know what I mean.
-Me, minutes after official sources broke the news of Paterno’s passing.

Big Camera Button

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Years ago, the term ‘MySpace Whore’ was invented, to describe the people who put pictures they’ve taken of themselves on MySpace. The pictures, generally speaking, were… we’ll say provocative. And almost all of them were taken by holding a camera or phone at arm’s length, and looking away from the camera, as if you had no idea you were about to take this picture of yourself.

While this program feels like it might have been a few years past the time when it was most needed, it’s not entirely uncommon that a person or group of people may want to take pictures of themselves. Maybe you’re somewhere where nobody else can take your picture, or you’re at a sporting event where people probably take the time to take your picture, etc… that’s where Big Camera Button comes in to play.

The app is very straight forward in concept. They’ve added features since the debut, but the primary function of Big Camera Button is to make it easier when taking pictures of yourself. Most Android phones don’t have a dedicated “camera” button. Taking a picture of yourself means holding your phone out, then touching ‘just the right spot’ on the screen while the phone is turned around and you can’t see what you’re touching. This can be frustrating. So download this handy little app and get yourself back to 2006!

Adding another user's mailbox in Outlook, using BPOS & Office 365

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This week’s post is another slightly more advanced one, so I apologize, but if you share this with your IT department, they’ll have no excuses! So you want full access to another user’s mailbox. It can be done, and has been done, with Exchange servers around the world. However if you need to do this in Microsoft’s Busness Productivity Online Suite (BPOS), then how in the world do you do it?

It used to be you could go to your Exchange server, find the user who is going to share their info with another user, and give them Send-As or Full-Access permissions. But where is that option in BPOS? It’s nowhere, that’s the problem. But that doesn’t mean you can’t do it.

First off, any user who is an Administrator in BPOS already has access to anybody’s mailbox under their domain. Meaning you can open up your Outlook client, go to your account settings, click Change, click More Settings, go to the Advanced Tab, then click ADD, and type a user’s name. It’s that easy.

But I haven’t answered your question, yet. WHAT ABOUT BPOS? Here’s the scoop. I figured this one out a few days ago and have only tested it in Business Productivity Online Suite. However, a support rep from Microsoft has “confirmed” that these commands should work in Office 365. Your mileage may vary.

Let’s say I have two users, Vera (vera@whutsit.com) and Dave (dave@whutsit.com). Vera needs full permissions to Dave’s email. She will be using the simple steps above to add Dave’s mailbox to her Outlook, however Vera is not a domain administrator, so a special permission will need to be created in the system. This is surprisingly easy to do.

An Administrator must run command in the Migration Command Shell (which was set up, at some point, during your migration to BPOS).

EXAMPLES

Enter the following cmdlets as ONE SINGLE COMMAND (any line breaks are due to web-design):
To GIVE Vera access to Dave’s mail:
Add-MSOnlineMailPermission -Identity vera@whutsit.com -TrustedUser dave@whutsit.com -GrantFullAccess $True

At some point down the road you may need to REVOKE that access:
Remove-MSOnlineMailPermission -Identity vera@whutsit.com -TrustedUser dave@whutsit.com -RemoveFullAccess $True

Note how the commands differe: the “Remove” not only at the beginning, but the end ofthe command, rather than “Add” and “Grant” respectively. I’m by no means an expert with this, but I certainly hope this helps someone out there!