So I noticed the keen-sounding Tablet Button Profile Manager on a few Tablet PC blogs, and wanted to try it. Problem is, when I try to launch it, I get the warning message that I must install .Net version 2.0.50727.

I take a look, and sure enough, my Tablet has the .Net 2 Beta (2.0.5215.322). But also version 1.1, plus a 1.0 Hotfix and a 1.1 Hotfix. OK, this doesn’t look good.

So hey, how about using Windows Update to update .Net? Nope, Windows update refuses to let me update the .Net framework to 2.0. Beta 2. Update failed.

I figure I should remove the 2.0 Beta and then I can install the 2.0 Final. Sure, so when trying to remove it, I see “uninstalling might cause other programs to stop working correctly….are you sure?” Well, yeah.

Another pop-up: the uninstall cannot continue because it might affect other applications that are installed. For more information see http://support.microsoft.com/support/kb/articles/q312/5/00.asp. Except it isn’t a link, it is text in a VB dialog box. Meaning I have to type this in a browser.

According to the KB article, it turns out there is something called WinFX Runtime Components 3.0 Beta 2 installed on my system.

This problem occurs because the .NET Framework is part of the WinFX technology. WinFX will not function correctly if you remove the .NET Framework 2.0.

Ohh-kay, let’s remove WinFX (now renamed as .Net 3.0).

Great, that worked. Now on to the .Net 2 Beta removal.

Easy! Now, back to Windows Update for the .Net 2.0 final release.

Hmm, it seems to be stuck in the download phase. I cancelled the update and Update tells me it completed the process. Very strange.

I rebooted just to be sure, and re-ran Windows Update and .Net no is longer listed as needing to be updated. Using the DotNet VersionCheck utility I see I now have 2.0.RTM version 2.0.50727.42. That seems lower that the “Beta” I had before. Still, I consider this progress since there is no “beta” anymore.

Now, to re-run TBPM …. and …. it worked!

Seriously, this should not have taken so much effort to update dot Net. I have to admit, I don’t remember installing the .Net 2 beta or WinFX beta. I probably did just to run some piece of software. So I can’t totally blame Microsoft. I am sure the ELAs said something about using the betas at my own risk and causing compatibility issues.

Still, I should just be happy my system didn’t crash during this.

Yeah, I’m good with that thought.

The AP is reporting that Project Gutenberg and World eBook Library will team up and make a third of a million e-Books available for a month, starting July 4, 2006.

Get your download managers ready folks. I can’t imagine that anyone would need that many texts, but why not?

Read more: Post-Gazette.com.

An off-topic story:

I don’t think I mentioned it here, but my eMachine died 3 months out of warranty. Go figure.

Of course, the “e” in eMachine stand for “eeeeevil.” It made this horrible clicking sound, which turned out to be the machine trying to access the floppy drive over and over. But I could not get to a command prompt. This was bad.
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