Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category
Windows Vista was, from an objective standpoint, a major flop.
This isn’t a new experience for Microsoft. Windows ME was a terrible disaster which cost Microsoft tens or hundreds of millions of dollars, years of development time, and an incredible amount of public embarrassment. It was unofficially renamed “Windows Mistake Edition.”
When Windows XP was released, it united Windows 2000 and Windows ME and brought relative peace and stability back to the Windows product line.
And then Microsoft tried something new with Vista — and failed. The most common user question regarding Windows Vista has been “How do I uninstall Windows Vista?”
This environment of frustration has create a storm of interest in Windows 7. Microsoft customers want something new and most are anxiously awaiting Windows 7.
Many customers are now trying beta versions of Windows 7 and reporting mostly positive results. But, of course, beta software can be a source of constant frustration.
My friend Kamal recently created a Windows 7 Forum where Microsoft customers can find news and information regarding the new release — and technical assistance making the new release work and work optimally.
If you are testing Windows 7 now, or if you plan to run Windows 7 in the future, give the forum a visit to make your path easier.
The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) recently filed an emergency motion with the Newton District Court in Boston on behalf of a Boston College Student who was accused of criminal wrong-doing and had all of his computer and electronic equipment seized.
The warrant was issued based upon the “evidence” that the student was seen using a command line instead of the Windows GUI they teach at Boston College.
You can read the whole sad story at Boston College Campus Police: “Using Prompt Commands” May Be a Sign of Criminal Activity.
I think that anyone considering either attending Boston College or hiring a graduate of Boston College should think about how miserably low academic standards there must be if students in the Computer Science program are considered “hackers” if they have the skills necessary to use a command line.
SourceForge and Freshmeat are both great web sites for finding obscure open source software packages.
Both are very old and authoritative web sites; Freshmeat was started in March of 1998 and SourceForge came along in August of 1999.
SourceForge has a larger database of projects to search, which is a major advantage. SourceForge also has a better search feature, in that you can filter your search results by meta data fields such as Development Status, License, and Programming Language.
Unfortunately, once you find the list of projects which meet your criteria, SourceForge falls down. SourceForge presents very little data about each individial development project and the current SourceForge design makes it very difficult to find the real homepage of the development project. SourceForge is attempting to trap visitors within SourceForge’s limited environment. This makes SourceForge almost useless.
Freshmeat doesn’t have a search feature with the sophistication of the one you will find at SourceForge, but when you find an open source project at Freshmeat, it gives you all the data you need — including the real homepage of the project — with a far superior user interface.
So what am I stuck with? I go to Freshmeat and search for projects. If I find too many or too few results, I go to SourceForge and repeat the search. But then I take those search results back to Freshmeat to find useful project descriptions.
Freshmeat, please improve your search feature; SourceForge, please stop trying to trap visitors within your horrible new user interface.
Evil Science has just published Internet Explorer vs Firefox vs Opera vs Chrome vs Safari, which contains the results of an extensive competitive speed test between five popular web browsers.
The author is an Opera user who discovered that his favorite browser has slipped to the #2 spot for performance.
The author rates each browser in nine different categories. The final totals are:
I’m running Ubuntu Linux here, so Google Chrome isn’t really an option for me. Firefox’s stability and performance issues have become serious enough that I may switch back to Opera.
Have you ever been interested in how a web site like The Tech FAQ gets built and promoted? Now you have an opportunity to find out.
The creator of The Tech FAQ has recently started a forum for webmasters where he shares the knowledge he gained while building and promoting this web site.
If you have an interest in helping to build the World Wide Web, Net Builders will be a great place to learn.
Bootable Linux distributions are quite popular right now. Just by booting from a DVD or other media, they allow you to possess a dedicated security auditing or forensics workstation.
Usually though, I don’t want to reboot just to use a different set of applications. I want all of my applications available to me all of the time.
I normally use Synaptic Package Manager to add each application to my Ubuntu system manually. This is time consuming, but eventually allows me to create a system with a rich set of security tools.
A better approach is to call apt-get directly. This is much quicker than using the Synaptic GUI. Then, all available Ubuntu security tools can be installed with one shell script.
secbox is that shell script. With a single command, secbox installs every Ubuntu security tool supported by apt-get. secbox isn’t sexy, but it is very convenient for me — and for pretty much anyone who uses their Ubuntu machine for security work.
Download secbox Now
The Washington Post printed a story about the Islamist terrorists who recently went on a murder spree in Mumbai India, with an interesting technological twist.
The bad guys used technology heavily:
- They trained using satellite images and video footage of their targets
- They used GPS navigation equipment on the boat they hijacked to get to Mumbai
- They used high-resolution satellite images stored on CD
- They carried Blackberry phones for communications
- They switched SIM cards between cell phones to make it difficult to intercept their communications
- They watched television to monitor police response
- They used satellite phones and VoIP to communicate to their leaders in Pakistan
- Their leaders in Pakistan used email to communicate to the news media
The Indian police, on the other hand, don’t have the financial support that Islamist terrorists benefit from. They lacked basic modern military technologies which would have provided them serious advantages in this conflict:
Technologies like cryptanalysis and nuclear weapons helped us defeat the Nazi’s and Imperial Japan. Similarly, technologies like GPS, night vision gear, and radio communications are proving invaluable against Islamists in Afghanistan and Iraq.
The technologies needed to defeat Islamist terrorism may not even exist today. Only the future will tell us what technological advances will be developed in the next few decades to help defend modern civilization against the barbarian hordes.
If you’ve dropped your cell phone in water, or just gotten it wet, then you’ll want to make sure you follow a series of steps to ensure it will continue to operate.
Remove the phone from the water source
If you are able to quickly remove the phone from the water, then you’re likely to be able to restore it. Most phones have a tight, sealed outside layer that will help keep out water for a short period of time. The key is avoiding contact between the water and the phones electronic components while they are powered by the cell phones battery.
Begin to dry the phone and remove accessories
You should quickly work to get rid of the excess water by draining the phone and then using a towel to clean off external moisture. Resist the temptation to use a hair dryer on the internal components, as this may cause damage to the circuitry, even at a low temperature. Instead, you need to use a suction source such as a vacuum, but be careful to keep it out of direct contact, otherwise static electricity might come into play. Once you have removed the water that you can directly, you should use a dessicate to absorb water on the phone.
Allow the Phone to Dry and Test It
After you have following the aforementioned steps, allow the phone to dry naturally dry. After 24 hours you should test its operation. If it’s still not working, you should visit your cellular carrier store to see if they can help replace or restore the phone.
This guest post was written by Stanley Richardson, who is an expert on cell phones. Stanley can be reached by combining his full name and adding [at] cellphones.org
It’s Christmas shopping season again and I have a recommendation for the best gift to buy your favorite techie.
Heart diseases is the number one cause of death in the United States. Diseases of the heart cause 28.5% of all U.S. deaths, even more deaths than cancer.
Many of these early deaths are preventable with little more than proper weight control. Weight control relies on two components: diet and exercise.
Personally, the only diet which has worked well for me is the low-carb Atkins Diet. The Atkins Diet works well for me because it keeps my insulin levels in check while still allowing me to keep my weight down.
Exercise is hard for techies. Most of us enjoy our work, which means that most of us work long hours. We don’t have a lot of time to go to the gym or join a softball league.
Worse, the nature of the Internet has led most of us techies to develop very short attention spans. We can’t force ourselves to jog or lift weights for half an hour, because there is just not enough mental stimulation during that time.
So what does this have to do with Christmas? My recommendation for a Christmas gift is the Wii Fit from Nintendo.
The Wii Fit is a specialized controller for the Nintendo Wii gaming system. The Wii Fit turns the Wii gaming system into a high-tech exercise system.
The Wii Fit isn’t just hardware, it comes with software which manages an entire exercise program. This software is designed to work with the attention span issues endemic among true technophiles.
Using the Wii Fit to get into shape doesn’t require extensive scheduling or coordination with groups of people.
Your favorite technie can take a break from his computer, jump on the Wii for 15 minutes, and then get right back to the Internet.
And best of all, the Wii software makes it all seem like a computer game.
Our friends at Qualys are offering free copies of the electronic version of Vulnerability Management for Dummies.
Vulnerability Management for Dummies:
- Explains the critical need for vulnerability management
- Details the essential best-practice steps of a successful vulnerability management program
- Outlines the various vulnerability management solutions - including the advantages and disadvantages of each
- Highlights the award-winning QualysGuard vulnerability management solution
- Provides a ten point checklist for removing vulnerabilities from your key resources
