The Windows Installer service could not be accessed

I always got this type of message in Windows XP when installing with MSI:

The Windows Installer service could not be accessed

But this occurs on my friend's PC. So, I tried to start the service Windows Installer service. And the message shown:

Could not start the Windows Installer service on Local Computer.
Error 1053: The service did not respond to the start or control request in a
timely fashion

And read the Event Viewer for more information. But I don't have any idea. So, search around it from internet, and found this forum.
So, the solution is

Double click on the service, click on the Log On tab, select "Local System Account" and "Allow service to interact with desktop". [source]

Adding the AddThis button in post

I just tried out adding the AddThis button in the post. If you want to create the AddThis button, just go to AddThis, and follow step by step and you will get a code for AddThis button.

Managing your data

I really like Unix philosophy:

Data dominates. If you have chosen the right data structures and organized things well, the algorithms will almost always be self-evident. Data structures, not algorithms, are central to programming. [link]

Yes, I used to install all the programs to the Windows > Program Files. And I found that the data is always saved in My Documents. And the settings of the programs are stored in user profile application data. This is very annoyance when I needed to format and reinstall the Windows. Because My Documents is in C:. Though we can move My Documents to other location, I did not do so. Because not everything in My Documents is what I want. Most of them just created by the programs. Very annoyance.

Now, the technology is changing. More and more portable applications developed. So that, we can bring the applications to anywhere using flash drive. Besides that, I do not need to backup the data before formatting the drive. But I found that, there is still another problem. Because the data is stored in the directory of the program. When performing the backup, not only the data is scanned, but also the programs. Programs are seldom updated, but data is often modified. Backup should target only to the data.

Just like the bookmarks we collected. We can use any web browsers, but the bookmarks are our own data. And that is why, Unix-like OSes use the different type of file system. They store all the commands in "bin", and the data in other locations. Because, data is important.

Applying this principle to the programming, that is why I prefer C programming, though C++ is easier to use because it is object-oriented programming. C makes the programmers focus on the data, and the algorithm is developed because of data.

爱与被爱

当你感觉被爱（被动式）的时候，正是你爱（主动式）的时候。

The growth of PortableApps.com

If you like portable applications, surely you know about PortableApps.com. I think the most prominent projects of the website are OppenOffice Portable, Firefox Portable, and GIMP Portable. But recently, since I subscribed the RSS, there are more and more new applications in PortableApps.com, such as the game like "Frets on Fire", the online game "The Mana World", etc.

This is very interesting. Portability is a very convenient feature because this allows us to bring our applications by using a USB pendrive. And sometimes, we need administrative privilege to install the applications. But portable applications just let us extract it, then we can run the applications anywhere.

The growth of PortableApps.com shows that the open source applications are growing. Not only that, portable applications are also growing. More and more people will prefer portable applications.

Firefox "reformat"

Previously I said that Firefox is just like an OS (Operating System), with the add-ons like the applications. If this is the metaphor, then all the bookmarks will be the important files that we own.

Sometimes I will reformat the harddisk and reinstall Windows due to some error, registry corruption, virus infection, some unexpected performance, etc.

And recently, I found that my Firefox have some problems. When the Firefox opened for a long time, 2 or 3 hours, there will be a high CPU usage. Which hinders me to work properly. I don't know what happened, may be add-ons. I tried to uninstall some of the add-ons, but the problem still there. So, the final solution is "reformat" it.

But unlike Windows, we no need to reinstall the Firefox. Just go to "%USERPROFILE%\Application Data\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles", delete the profile, and run the Firefox, everything will be fresh.

But remember, always backup the data: bookmarks. Besides that, since I got some add-ons, I need to export some of the setting, so that I do not need to set everything after reinstall the add-ons.

Another thing I used for backup is FEBE. So that I can install all my add-ons later offline.

Once start the fresh Firefox, go to "Tools>Add-ons", then just drag-and-drop all the add-ons backup(ed) by FEBE to the Add-ons dialog. So, all the add-ons can be installed in one go.

Restart Firefox, then setup for our own preference.

Now, my Firefox is faster than before.

COMODO Firewall uninstall problem

A very bad experience for me to upgrade COMODO Firewall. The update was slow. So I decided to download the latest version installation file.

Then tried to install from the latest version. And the installation detected the existing of the older version. I was asked to uninstall the older version. Right, I uninstalled it. Then I was asked to restart the computer. But I didn't restart. (I know, this was my fault). Then I continued installing the latest version. Finally, restarted the computer.

Okay, the problem came. Could not run the firewall. Could not go online. $#*!

Then, I used Sysinternal Autoruns to disable all the COMODO related services and startup.

Yeah, I could online again.

But, when I wanted to install the firewall, it still detected the old firewall, and asked me to uninstall it. But I could not uninstall it. I was asked to uninstall using the "cfpconfig.exe -u" command. But there is no "cfpconfig.exe" in the COMODO folder.

I knew it is related to the Windows registry. But I was not dare to remove anything. Afraid that I make another mistake. Since I could online, I searched from the net and found this forum.

The forum got a link to download CFP3 Registry Cleaner.

Download it, run it. Yipee! Now I can install the firewall.

Conclusion: If upgrading a product, follows the instruction properly. Besides that, COMODO Firewall should have a better design in the upgrading feature.