Category: Microsoft
Category Archives: Microsoft
Access to Outlook Classic
HOW CAN I ACCESS MY OUTLOOK CLASSIC MAIL ETC TO EXPORT?
YOUTUBE VIDEO FOUND IS RUBBISH.
ANY AND ALL HELP WILL BE VERY MUCH APPTRRECIATED!
MORE COUNTLESS HOURS NEEDED TO SORT OUT MICROSFT STRANGLEHOLD ONM USERS! YOU HAVE NO CHOICE – YOU WILL DO WHAT WE SAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
HOW CAN I ACCESS MY OUTLOOK CLASSIC MAIL ETC TO EXPORT? YOUTUBE VIDEO FOUND IS RUBBISH. ANY AND ALL HELP WILL BE VERY MUCH APPTRRECIATED! MORE COUNTLESS HOURS NEEDED TO SORT OUT MICROSFT STRANGLEHOLD ONM USERS! YOU HAVE NO CHOICE – YOU WILL DO WHAT WE SAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Read More
Synchronize any of the folders to the windows explorer interface.
Hello
Please i need your help on this issue.
I can edit all of the files using the Sharepoint web interface. But I can’t synchronize any of the folders to the windows explorer interface.
Hello Please i need your help on this issue. I can edit all of the files using the Sharepoint web interface. But I can’t synchronize any of the folders to the windows explorer interface. Read More
Azure PostgreSQL, Entra ID Authentication and .NET
I’m currently working on a project in which we are using Entra ID rather than a traditional Postgre username and password. This is a great way to secure your database and ensure that only the right people have access to it.
Note: For the purpose of this article, I’m going to use Entra ID to refer to a user identity, as well as a managed identity such as a service principal, as the approach is the same in this context here.
The above linked documentation covers how you would setup the Azure resource with Entra ID as the authentication mode, so I won’t go over that here (also, you can configure that when you initial create the database, or using a Bicep script), instead I want to look at how we use that in a .NET application, because when you’re connecting using Entra ID you don’t have a password to use, or at least not in the traditional sense.
For this, I’m going to use the Npgql library, which is the most popular PostgreSQL driver for .NET. It’s a great library and has a lot of features, and integrates nicely with Entity Framework Core and .NET Aspire.
What makes connecting different
Before we look at the how of connecting, we need to understand why this is a little different to using a username/password approach. When working with a PostgreSQL database that uses a username/password, you would have a connection string that looks like this:
Server=myServerAddress;Port=5432;Database=myDataBase;User Id=myUsername;Password=myPassword;
But when connecting using Entra ID, it looks like this:
Server=server-name.postgres.database.azure.com;Database=postgres;Port=5432;Username=<Entra ID>;Ssl Mode=Require;
Notice how there is no Password field in the connection string. This is because when you connect using Entra ID, you don’t have a password to use. Instead, you need to use a token that is generated by Entra.
Generating a token
When you connect to the database using Entra ID, you need to request an access token from Entra that you can use to authenticate. You can see this in action using the Azure CLI:
az account get-access-token –resource-type oss-rdbms
Which returns something like this:
{
“accessToken”: “<nope!>”,
“expiresOn”: “2024-05-31 17:52:59.000000”,
“expires_on”: 1717141979,
“subscription”: “<nope!>”,
“tenant”: “<nope!>”,
“tokenType”: “Bearer”
}
If you extract the accessToken from the JSON you can then plug that into the connection string for PostgreSQL in the Password argument and you’re good to go.
But it’s not really practical to be running the Azure CLI every time you want to connect to the database, especially since this token is only short lived (you can see the expiry date in the JSON above). Instead, we’re going to want to do this in .NET, and for that we’ll use the Azure.Identity NuGet package.
Using Azure.Identity
Azure.Identity is a library that provides a way to authenticate with Azure services using the Azure SDK, and it contains a class called DefaultAzureCredential that can be used to authenticate. This class is actually a roll-up of a number of different authentication sources, such as Managed Identity, as well as the Azure CLI, Visual Studio, and a bunch of other sources (check out the docs to see all the sources).
To use DefaultAzureCredential you need to install the Azure.Identity NuGet package:
dotnet add package Azure.Identity
Then you can use it in your code like this:
using Azure.Identity;
var credential = new DefaultAzureCredential();
var ctx = new TokenRequestContext([“https://ossrdbms-aad.database.windows.net/.default”]);
var tokenResponse = await credential.GetTokenAsync(ctx);
Console.WriteLine(tokenResponse.Token);
The important part here is that we’re providing a specific scope to the TokenRequestContext of https://ossrdbms-aad.database.windows.net/.default, which grants access to the Azure PostgreSQL Flexible Server. It’s what is being done with the az account get-access-token call and the –resource-type oss-rdbms argument. With this in C# though, we’re able to get the token and then use that to connect to the database.
Handling Token Expiry
One thing to note is that the token that is returned by DefaultAzureCredential is short lived, and will expire after a certain amount of time (24 hours service principal, 4 hours for a user token). This is fine for, say, a console app that is only running for a short period of time, but this becomes a problem if you’re using the connection string in something that is long running, like a web app, since the NpgsqlDataSourceBuilder, the type that is used to build the connection string, should be a singleton.
Thankfully, the authors of Npgsql have given us an approach to handling token refreshes in the box using a Periodic Password Provider. With this feature, we can provide a callback function to be run that will retrieve the password when a connection is opened, and then cache that password for a certain amount of time. This means that we can use the DefaultAzureCredential to get the token, and then use that token to connect to the database.
NpgsqlDataSourceBuilder dataSourceBuilder = new(builder.Configuration.GetConnectionString(“Database”));
dataSourceBuilder.UsePeriodicPasswordProvider(async (_, ct) =>
{
DefaultAzureCredential credential = new();
TokenRequestContext ctx = new([“https://ossrdbms-aad.database.windows.net/.default”]);
AccessToken tokenResponse = await credential.GetTokenAsync(ctx, ct);
return tokenResponse.Token;
}, TimeSpan.FromHours(4), TimeSpan.FromSeconds(10));
On the dataSourceBuilder we call the UsePeriodicPasswordProvider method, passing in a callback function that will get the token, and then two TimeSpan objects that represent the refresh period and the failure refresh period. The refresh period is how often the token will be refreshed, and the failure refresh period is how long to wait before trying to refresh the token again if the token retrieval fails.
Connecting it all up
Now that we know how we can retrieve a token to act as the password for our connections, let’s look at how to connect it all up for a local dev or Azure deployed app:
WebApplicationBuilder builder = WebApplication.CreateBuilder(args);
var connStr = builder.Configuration.GetConnectionString(“db”);
NpgsqlConnectionStringBuilder csb = new(connStr);
if (!string.IsNullOrEmpty(csb.Password))
{
builder.AddNpgsqlDataSource(“db”);
}
else
{
builder.AddNpgsqlDataSource(“db”, dataSourceBuilder =>
{
dataSourceBuilder.UsePeriodicPasswordProvider(async (_, ct) =>
{
DefaultAzureCredential credential = new();
TokenRequestContext ctx = new([“https://ossrdbms-aad.database.windows.net/.default”]);
AccessToken tokenResponse = await credential.GetTokenAsync(ctx, ct);
return tokenResponse.Token;
}, TimeSpan.FromHours(4), TimeSpan.FromSeconds(10));
});
}
// and the rest of your app code
Here we’re getting the connection string and creating a NpgsqlConnectionStringBuilder from it so that it gets parsed for us. If the connection string we have has a password, then we can just use that as normal, but if it doesn’t have a password, then we can use the UsePeriodicPasswordProvider method to get the token and use that as the password.
This means we can run locally against a database that uses username/password style access (since we don’t have Entra ID locally), and then deploy to Azure and use Entra ID without having to change the code.
Conclusion
When porting an app that uses PostgreSQL to using Managed Identity I was expecting that it would be quite a lot of work to manage the token retrieval and expiry, initially I thought that it’d require doing a bunch of work to discard the singleton for the NpgsqlDataSourceBuilder and then recreate it when the token expired. But thanks to the UsePeriodicPasswordProvider method, it’s actually quite easy to manage the token retrieval and expiry, and it’s all handled for you.
Microsoft Tech Community – Latest Blogs –Read More
Can’t Unlock Account
My wife’s Hotmail account has recently been locked (we don’t know why). She usually logs-in using her IPad which auto-logs-in but it recently asked her to answer the security questions then locked-it. I’ve also tried from my desktop Outlook and can’t get in either. The problem I think is that she has had this account over 25 years and the two security questions and meaningless to us now. It’s very frustrating as we know the password, we supply the security code (which goes to my email) but it still won’t let us in (we just get an email saying “the information you provided was not sufficient for us to validate your account ownership”). Yes I agree we should have supplied security questions which were more memorable but that’s hindsight and doesn’t help.
We have tried a number of phone-numbers and website links we’ve found online but not of them work. It’s very annoying that there isn’t a contactable support system.
Any help at all in solving this problem will be very welcome.
Thank you.
My wife’s Hotmail account has recently been locked (we don’t know why). She usually logs-in using her IPad which auto-logs-in but it recently asked her to answer the security questions then locked-it. I’ve also tried from my desktop Outlook and can’t get in either. The problem I think is that she has had this account over 25 years and the two security questions and meaningless to us now. It’s very frustrating as we know the password, we supply the security code (which goes to my email) but it still won’t let us in (we just get an email saying “the information you provided was not sufficient for us to validate your account ownership”). Yes I agree we should have supplied security questions which were more memorable but that’s hindsight and doesn’t help.We have tried a number of phone-numbers and website links we’ve found online but not of them work. It’s very annoying that there isn’t a contactable support system.Any help at all in solving this problem will be very welcome.Thank you. Read More
GROUPBY yields a #VALUE! error in the [filter_array]
GROUPBY yields a #VALUE! error in the [filter_array]
Can you help me?
GROUPBY yields a #VALUE! error in the [filter_array]Can you help me? Read More
b26100 – Creating archive – additional options – no progress bar on large operations
When compressing larger files with the new create archive options there will be no progress bar, until File Explorer really finished and writes the file to disk.
The dialogue will show “not responding” meanwhile. Only mouse cursor “busy” and taskmanager reveals that something is still going on.
When compressing larger files with the new create archive options there will be no progress bar, until File Explorer really finished and writes the file to disk.
The dialogue will show “not responding” meanwhile. Only mouse cursor “busy” and taskmanager reveals that something is still going on.
https://aka.ms/AAqogye Read More
b26100 – Feedback hub does not allow repro steps – greyed out
Problem Steps Recorder is installed in Optional Features.
In Feedback hub “repro steps” on WS 2025 b26100 is greyed out. This way it is hard to provide actionable / quality feedback. Anyone else?
I believe this is not intended. The general issue around PSR and feedback hub is appears to be unresolved for Windows Client / Server. Thank you for looking into it.
Problem Steps Recorder is installed in Optional Features.
In Feedback hub “repro steps” on WS 2025 b26100 is greyed out. This way it is hard to provide actionable / quality feedback. Anyone else?I believe this is not intended. The general issue around PSR and feedback hub is appears to be unresolved for Windows Client / Server. Thank you for looking into it.
https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/windows-server-insiders/problem-steps-recorder-deprecation-what-does-this-mean-for/m-p/4022944
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/steps-recorder-deprecation-a64888d7-8482-4965-8ce3-25fb004e975f
Read More
How can I use the Microsoft Developer 365 ?
How can I use the Microsoft Developer 365 ?
How can I use the Microsoft Developer 365 ? Read More
Help! I’m locked out of email because full. But it’s not! Support gives error messages
Help, I am locked out of my main email (hotmail) account. If I try to send email I get:
This message can’t be sent because your mailbox is full.
But I have purchased basic 365 and when it checks it says I’m only using 24% storage.
When I try to contact customer support via web chat I get an error message. I’ve rebooted twice, still stuck.
Any help greatly appreciated!
Help, I am locked out of my main email (hotmail) account. If I try to send email I get:This message can’t be sent because your mailbox is full. But I have purchased basic 365 and when it checks it says I’m only using 24% storage. When I try to contact customer support via web chat I get an error message. I’ve rebooted twice, still stuck. Any help greatly appreciated! Read More
AI COMMUNITY CONFERENCE – NYC 2024
Exciting Announcement: Join Us for a Cutting-Edge AI Community Event in New York City!
Exciting Announcement: Join Us for a Cutting-Edge AI Community Event in New York City! Read More
Cannot access my files in Sharepoint
Hello
Please i need your help on this issue.
My business partner and I can no longer access our business documents in SharePoint Site.
We are getting access errors “Hmmm… can’t reach this pageCheck if there is a typo in netorgft10970333.sharepoint.com”.
We’re concerned our account has been hacked as we haven’t changed anything on our side
Hello Please i need your help on this issue. My business partner and I can no longer access our business documents in SharePoint Site. We are getting access errors “Hmmm… can’t reach this pageCheck if there is a typo in netorgft10970333.sharepoint.com”. We’re concerned our account has been hacked as we haven’t changed anything on our side Read More
Missing msiserver
Running Win 11 Home. windows insider program. MSISERVER is missing, making it unable to install programs requiring that installer.
Running Win 11 Home. windows insider program. MSISERVER is missing, making it unable to install programs requiring that installer. Read More
I am getting a #Name error
I am getting a #Name error. I need help. I have try trim removing any extra spaces. I am not sure what to do.
Thanks You
I am getting a #Name error. I need help. I have try trim removing any extra spaces. I am not sure what to do. Thanks You Read More
Problems to join Debian/Ubuntu machines to a domain
Is not posible to join Debian/Ubuntu machines to a domain based on Windows Server 2025 (using realm at least) this is the error:
! Couldn’t set password for computer account: XXXX$: Message stream modified
adcli: joining domain c2electronics.local failed: Couldn’t set password for computer account: XXXX$: Message stream modified
! Failed to join the domain
realm: Couldn’t join realm: Failed to join the domain
Domain is discoverable vía realm:
root@lnms01:/home/administrator# realm discover xxxx.local
xxxx.local
type: kerberos
realm-name: XXXX.LOCAL
domain-name: xxxx.local
configured: no
server-software: active-directory
client-software: sssd
required-package: sssd-tools
required-package: sssd
required-package: libnss-sss
Tested on WS2025 build 26227 and Linux 6.1.0-21-amd64 x86_64, Linux 6.6.31+rpt-rpi-v8 aarch64 and Linux 6.8.0-31-generic x86_64.
Those 3 versions of Linux joined to another doman based con Windows Server 2022 without issues.
Is not posible to join Debian/Ubuntu machines to a domain based on Windows Server 2025 (using realm at least) this is the error: ! Couldn’t set password for computer account: XXXX$: Message stream modifiedadcli: joining domain c2electronics.local failed: Couldn’t set password for computer account: XXXX$: Message stream modified! Failed to join the domainrealm: Couldn’t join realm: Failed to join the domain Domain is discoverable vía realm:root@lnms01:/home/administrator# realm discover xxxx.localxxxx.localtype: kerberosrealm-name: XXXX.LOCALdomain-name: xxxx.localconfigured: noserver-software: active-directoryclient-software: sssdrequired-package: sssd-toolsrequired-package: sssdrequired-package: libnss-sss Tested on WS2025 build 26227 and Linux 6.1.0-21-amd64 x86_64, Linux 6.6.31+rpt-rpi-v8 aarch64 and Linux 6.8.0-31-generic x86_64. Those 3 versions of Linux joined to another doman based con Windows Server 2022 without issues. Read More
Microsoft Teams High Contrast Mode Missing Feature in New App
What are people with vision impairments supposed to do when classic Teams is shut down by Microsoft?
I tried the new Teams but cannot tell which messages are read or unread in Dark mode. In ‘Classic Teams’ Read messages are Yellow and unread are White.
In the new one, there is a tiny dot and difference in bolding, but it is all white and I cannot see the difference without getting really close to the screen and using reading glasses. I use Teams a lot at work but will have to move my team to a different platform if I cannot tell which messages I have opened.
What are people with vision impairments supposed to do when classic Teams is shut down by Microsoft? I tried the new Teams but cannot tell which messages are read or unread in Dark mode. In ‘Classic Teams’ Read messages are Yellow and unread are White. In the new one, there is a tiny dot and difference in bolding, but it is all white and I cannot see the difference without getting really close to the screen and using reading glasses. I use Teams a lot at work but will have to move my team to a different platform if I cannot tell which messages I have opened. Read More
Tab in microsoft teams
Hi All ,
i have added a tab in microsoft teams channel to check my emails from outlook , but nothing is shown
Hi All ,i have added a tab in microsoft teams channel to check my emails from outlook , but nothing is shown Read More
365 OneDrive is not saving ongoing work
Hello all. Relatively new to the World of 365 and Cloud work.
Experience: after 3 days of intensive editing on a large document that is resident on my OneDrive, I closed it. It simply disappeared, apparently unsaved for the preceding 3 days. (Yes, depressing.)
I thought ‘saves’ to the OneDrive folder were automatic and continuous; I even tapped the ‘save’ icon before closing, just in case.
What am I doing wrong? The problem isn’t connectivity (home WiFi is fine and strong; computer is working fine). Any suggestions of things to check, defaults, settings — anything? Thanks. DR
Hello all. Relatively new to the World of 365 and Cloud work.Experience: after 3 days of intensive editing on a large document that is resident on my OneDrive, I closed it. It simply disappeared, apparently unsaved for the preceding 3 days. (Yes, depressing.)I thought ‘saves’ to the OneDrive folder were automatic and continuous; I even tapped the ‘save’ icon before closing, just in case.What am I doing wrong? The problem isn’t connectivity (home WiFi is fine and strong; computer is working fine). Any suggestions of things to check, defaults, settings — anything? Thanks. DR Read More
How to load unstructured data using ssis
I have a requirement to process unstructured files using ssis.
Input File Format:
ID*Name*Sal*Details~*~
1*ABC*100*Validation Success~*~
2*BDC*200*validat
success
Faild~*~
3*FGT*300*Failure~*~
Output:
IDNameSalDetails1ABC100Validation Success2BDC200validat
success
Faild3FGT300Failure
I have a requirement to process unstructured files using ssis.Input File Format:ID*Name*Sal*Details~*~1*ABC*100*Validation Success~*~2*BDC*200*validatsuccessFaild~*~3*FGT*300*Failure~*~ Output: IDNameSalDetails1ABC100Validation Success2BDC200validatsuccessFaild3FGT300Failure Read More
Email not recieved
I am unable to revieve my email containing my upgrade password from Dusan Balara email address removed for privacy reasons I can and have received replies to my email to this address. They have sent three emails to my lammid@rcn. address and they are not in my inbox or spam box. It seems that the program is blocking this specfic email. I have also received an email from this address announcing the upgrade but with not attachments to me specifically. How can I unblock this so I can get my upgrade password?
I am unable to revieve my email containing my upgrade password from Dusan Balara email address removed for privacy reasons I can and have received replies to my email to this address. They have sent three emails to my lammid@rcn. address and they are not in my inbox or spam box. It seems that the program is blocking this specfic email. I have also received an email from this address announcing the upgrade but with not attachments to me specifically. How can I unblock this so I can get my upgrade password? Read More
Many pages with insufficient content
“It is important for SEO to ensure that web pages have enough words because search engines use the content of a page to determine its relevance and quality. Pages with very little content may be seen as low-quality or thin content by search engines, which can negatively impact the site’s SEO performance”
I am convinced by that statement from Bing Webmaster Tools. Pages do not have to have a high volume of content. They might be very little, like workable examples or a short but clear explanation. They are still relevant and perceived as of high quality.
What others think about it?
Thanks,
Cezary Tomczyk
”It is important for SEO to ensure that web pages have enough words because search engines use the content of a page to determine its relevance and quality. Pages with very little content may be seen as low-quality or thin content by search engines, which can negatively impact the site’s SEO performance”I am convinced by that statement from Bing Webmaster Tools. Pages do not have to have a high volume of content. They might be very little, like workable examples or a short but clear explanation. They are still relevant and perceived as of high quality. What others think about it? Thanks,Cezary Tomczyk Read More