How To Kill Windows Processes That Won't Die

Ever have an application that just hangs and never returns to normal or terminate?

So you open up Windows Task Manager, find the application process, right click on it and select End Process.

Nothing happens! The process is still running and the dead application continues to cause high CPU utilization to the point where you can't do much with your computer.

You repeat the process. Nothing again. One more time…that process just won't terminate and die.

Now what?

Well, having pesky processes, that refuse to terminate and continues to hog CPU cycles, can be frustrating to the point where you just want to hit the power button and shut down. But that's too risky and more times than not will cause loss of data or system boot problems.

What you need is a utility that can kill and terminate stubborn processes, the first time, using PsKill from Microsoft Sysinternals.

PsKill requires no installation and is a stand alone executable that is run from the command line. It can kill process locally or remotely. PsKill is bundled with Sysinternals PsTools which is a collection of command line tools for Windows computers.

To use PsKill, you want to get things setup first:

• Download PsTools from Microsoft site, and unzip to your desktop.

• Open the PsTools folder and copy pskill.exe to your System32 folder. The reason for this is that pskill will be in your executable environment path so you can just type the command, with out specifying the full path to the folder and file location.

• Next open Task Manager (right click on the taskbar then select Task Manager ) and make sure the PID column is visible (may need to use horizontal scroll bar to scroll to the right to see PID column).

If it is not visible, click on View \ Select Columns… and make sure PID (Process Identifier) is checked and select OK.

• Now the next time you have an application that is hanging, and it's process will not end from Task Manager, make note of the process PID number in Task Manager.

• Then open up a command prompt (click on Start \ Run and enter cmd in the run box) and type the following command:

pskill 1680

(just substitute 1680 with your PID number that you want terminated).

The process WILL terminate freeing your computer from application hell.

You should be able to re-open the application again. But be careful, killing processes this way may cause data loss with the application that was terminated (such as if you were using a text editor or Microsoft Word).

At least you won't have to reboot

Networking and Windows Vista Tutorial

As we briefly discussed earlier, the network interface for Windows Vista seamlessly integrates into many different types of connections. Regardless of how the Vista machine connects to the internet, the setup is quite simple. For instance, if the Vista machine connects to a router or hub, then the network should appear automatically if the Network Discovery feature is turned to On. Let’s check to ensure that is the case.

1. Open the Control Panel.

2. Select the Network and Sharing Center.

3. Check to ensure the green light is on for Network Discovery.

4. If it is not, turn on Network Discovery.

5. Enter the administrator password or click Continue if you are logged in as administrator.

The computer should automatically connect to any Network with the same workgroup name, but can also connect if the workgroup name is different. If an established network is in place at home, then the computer should use the same Workgroup name.

How to Change the Workgroup Name

The default Workgroup name for new installations is WORKGROUP. If for instance, the home network has a Workgroup name of SALLYSNETWORK, then we will want to change the Vista machine’s workgroup name to that.

1. Open the Control Panel.

2. Select the Network and Sharing Center.

3. Select the next to Network Discovery.

4. Select Change Settings next to Workgroup.

5. Click continue if logged in as administrator, or enter the administrator password.

6. Click the Change button, where it says To rename this computer or change its domain or workgroup, click Change.

7. Change the Workgroup name at the bottom of the screen.

8. Click OK.

The Workgroup name has successfully been changed. Once this is done, the Network discovery should automatically detect any shared folders and printers on the Network.

Let’s check to make sure we can see other folders and printers available on the Network.

1. Double click the Network Icon on the Desktop.

2. The available devices on the network should be accessible from this menu.

3. Double click any device to see the shared folders on that system.

Sharing Files in Windows Vista Tutorial

File and printer sharing in Windows Vista has intuitive features and can be easily configured. As with many households or businesses, certain computers control printers, while others store documents. Sharing between these computers can be helpful and is painless in Windows Vista.

Accessing File and Printer Sharing

1. Open the Control Panel under the Start Menu.

2. Select Setup File Sharing under the Network and Internet heading.

3. Be sure the options you wish to use are turned to ON in the Network Discovery area.

The Sharing and Discovery menu enables printer, file, media, password, and public folder sharing. If the feature has a lit green light and labeled on, then those features are working. To see the consequences of turning on and off each feature select the down arrow to view more about the settings.

Network Discovery
Turning this feature to On, enables the automatic detection of Workgroup computers on a network. Windows Vista automatically connects to these computers, allowing them to see the Vista machine and to interact.

File Sharing
By turning on this feature, users on the network can access files and printers current shared.

Public Folder Sharing
Turning this feature on allows users on a network to access publicly shared folders. The settings can be adjusted so only those with user account access can share files.

Printer Sharing
Turning this feature on enables users to have access to printers attached to this computer.

Password Protected Sharing
This option allows for only users with accounts to access the shared files and printers.

How to Share a Folder

There are many reasons why you may wish to share certain folders across your home network. For instance, the folder may hold your important documents that you wish to access from both your desktop and your laptop. Rather than keep the files on two separate drives, accessing the files and modifying them over the network makes changes and updates that much simpler.

The files you share with someone on the network or locally can be altered if you give the new user access to do so. However, you can limit the remote user’s access to only read the file and not have permission to write to the file. This is accomplished through the Share functionality.

1. Open the Windows Explorer (Start menu, then Computer).

2. Find the folder you wish to share using the folder tree on the left.

3. Click the folder.

4. In the preview pane on the right, select the folder with a single click.

5. Select Share from the toolbar on the top.

6. Choose the users who you wish to access this folder. If you want it accessible to anyone on the Network, then you must change the Network settings.

7. Select the type of Permissions for the added user: Reader, Contributor, or Co-Owner.

8. Click Share and wait for the sharing process to complete.

9. All the files are shared! Other local users or network users can now access these files.

NOTE: to undo file sharing, reverse the process, starting with selecting the folder and click on Share.

Vista Windows Meeting Space

Windows Meeting Space is a new feature of Windows Vista that lets users easily create secure sessions for sharing files and collaborating on work together. In this article I will also explain how administrators can lock down and manage this feature in an enterprise environment.

Windows Meeting Space (formerly Windows Collaboration) is a new feature of Windows Vista designed to make it simple for users to collaborate. Using Meeting Space, a user can share documents and applications with another user and even share use of their desktop. Collaboration sessions can be established over wired or wireless networks, and can even be established between two wireless hosts without the presence of an access point i.e using ad hoc wireless communications (Meeting Space is built upon peer to peer technologies and therefore does not require the presence of a server to operate the way Microsoft NetMeeting did). There's no intrinsic limit to the number of hosts that can participate in a session, but practical considerations limit collaboration to roughly ten hosts, each of which must be running Vista (Meeting Space is not available on Windows XP or earlier platforms and is not compatible with legacy collaboration tools like NetMeeting).

Setting Up Meeting Space

Let's do a walkthrough of setting up a Meeting Space session between two Vista computers. Note that the procedures outlined below are based on pre-release versions of Vista, so things may change a little when the final release version appears. Our test environment will consist of two Vista computers joined to a Windows Server 2003 domain, with user Bob Vista (bobv@test.local) on the first machine and Sue Vista (suev) on the second. Both are domain users but Bob is a standard user on his Vista computer while Sue is an administrator. This difference only means that different UAC prompts may be presented to each of them i.e. Bob will have to supply an administrator password while Sue can simply click Continue.

Bob will begin by starting a new Meeting Space session. But before we do this, let's look at the exceptions currently open in Windows Firewall on Bob's machine (Figure 1):

Figure 1: Firewall exceptions on Bob's machine

Bob now clicks Start, then All Programs, and then Windows Meeting Space. This opens the dialog box shown in Figure 2:

Figure 2: Bob is prompted to start some services and open some firewall exceptions on his machine

Bob now clicks Yes to the dialog prompt in order to set up Meeting Space on his machine (a UAC prompt appears so he'll have to enter the password for an admin account on his machine to continue). A new dialog appears asking him to confirm that he wants to set up People Near Me on his machine (Figure 3):

Figure 3: Bob is warned of the privacy considerations of enabling People Near Me on his machine

Warning:
Two users using People Near Me can have the same display name, so be careful using this feature in an unsecured environment to collaborate.

The Windows Meeting Space interface now appears, and Bob is initially asked if he wants to join an existing session. However, as shown in Figure 4 below there are no sessions open yet:

Figure 4: No sessions are open yet to join

Before we create a new session, let's see what exceptions have been opened in Windows Firewall to enable Meeting Space to work (Figure 5):

Figure 5: Exceptions have been opened in Windows Firewall

Three new exceptions are listed:

• Windows Meeting Space
• Windows Peer to Peer Collaboration Foundation
• Connect to a Network Projector (not visible in Figure 5 above)

Tip:
If you want to know which TCP and UDP ports have been opened for these three exceptions, open Windows Firewall with Advanced Security (under Administrative Tools in Control Panel), select either Inbound Connections or Outbound Connections, and use Filter By Group to select the exception you want to examine.

Note that some additional services have also been started at this point, and using the sc query command before and after performing the steps above shows that the following services have now been started on Bob's machine:

• Peer Networking Identity Manager (ptpimsvc)
• Peer Networking Grouping (p2psvc)
• Peer Name Resolution Protocol (PNRPsvc)

Anyway, Bob wants to start a new meeting so he clicks Start A New Meeting and specifies a password (Figure 6):

Figure 6: Starting a new meeting

Note:
Password requirements defined in domain policy will be enforced if Meeting Space is used in a domain environment.

The main Meeting Space interface is now presented to Bob, who can now invite others to join his meeting, start a shared session, add a handout, and so on (Figure 7):

Figure 7: Bob is ready to collaborate

Let's switch to Sue's machine now and go through the initial configuration steps for setting up Meeting Space. Once she's done this, her Meeting Space interface will display the meeting started by Bob but she won't be able to join it unless Bob invites her or provides her with the password for the meeting he started. Bob can send Sue an invitation as follows: Bob clicks Invite People in his Meeting Space interface (see Figure 7) and this opens an Invite People dialog (Figure 8):

Figure 8: Bob must invite Sue to the meeting he started

Bob now selects Sue's name and clicks Send Invitations. Note that by clicking Invite Others he can also send invitations by email or instant message. For example, Bob could create an invitation file (*.wcinv file) for the meeting, save it in his user profile folder (select Desktop then Bob Vista in Windows Explorer) and then share the file out for Sue or others to read it. Sue could then browse the \\computername\Users\BobV share on Bob's machine, double-click on the invitation, and join the meeting. In either case, once Sue has accepted the invitation she now shows up in Bob's Meeting Space interface (Figure 9):

Figure 9: Sue has joined Bob's meeting

Using Meeting Space to Collaborate

Once Sue has joined Bob's meeting, they can start collaborating. For example, Bob can send Sue a note by right-clicking on her icon in his Meeting Space interface and selecting Send A note. This opens the Send A Note window on Bob's machine (Figure 10):

Figure 10: Bob is sending Sue a quick note

When Sue receives the note, she can reply and continue chatting with Bob.

If Bob has handouts to share with Sue, he can click the Add button on his toolbar. When he does this a dialog appears saying that only one participant at a time will be allowed to modify the handout, that any changes made to the handout by any participant will be automatically made to each participant's copy of the handout, and that the original handout will itself not be modified during this process. For example, Bob can share the Budget.rtf file in his Documents folder, and when he does this it appears in everyone's Meeting Space interface (Figure 11):

Figure 11: Bob shares the budget with Sue

Or if Bob and Sue have mobile PCs, Bob can use his budget document to do a presentation. To do this, he right-clicks on the document in his Meeting Space interface and selects Share To Meeting.

Or by clicking on Share A Program Or Your Desktop, Sue can allow Bob to access an application running on Sue's desktop or even access his entire desktop using Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP). For example, if Sue is current running Microsoft Paint on her desktop, she can share this application for Bob to use. Once she's done this, Bob can see the program as shown from Figure 12, which illustrates Bob's desktop at that point:

Figure 12: Bob can see Paint running on Sue's computer

As shown by the menu bar, Sue is currently in control of Paint, but by clicking on the bar and selecting Request Control, Bob can ask Sue to relinquish control of the program to himself so he can run the program remotely.

Locking Down Meeting Space

Finally, if you're an administrator in an Active Directory environment, you can control Meeting Space using the Group Policy settings shown in Figure 13:

Figure 13: Group Policy settings for Meeting Space

In the ADMX files of my current Vista build, these policy settings are found under both Computer Configuration \ Administrative Templates \ Windows Components \ Windows Collaboration and under User Configuration \ Administrative Templates \ Windows Components \ Windows Collaboration, so you can control this feature either per-user or per-machine. The policy settings of interest here are:

• Turn on Windows Collaboration: Lets you enable or disable this feature for users or computers in targeted OUs.
• Turn on Windows Collaboration Auditing: Lets you enable or disable logging Meeting Space events to the event log.

Conclusion

Windows Meeting Space is an exciting new feature of Windows Vista, and administrators should start getting familiar with it now. Mobile users will especially find this feature useful for ad hoc wireless collaboration in business environments.