Grand Stream Dreams

USB memory sticks are getting cheaper and more common. The options are expanding for doing much more with them besides just acting as glamorized "floppy drive replacement" storage media.

This list of ten cool ways to use your USB drives has an added bonus...once past the price paid for the USB drive all these items are free! And if you got your USB stick as a "gimmie" prize, then the whole shebang is free!

The List

1. Load it up with Claus's Portable SysAdmin Tools - Build your own portable System Administrator's toolbox. -via Grand Stream Dreams (Shameless plug #1)

2. Install the PortableApps Suite - This Standard grade package includes: ClamWin Portable (antivirus), Mozilla Firefox - Portable Edition (web browser), Gaim Portable (instant messaging), OpenOffice.org Portable (office suite), Sudoku Portable (puzzle game), Mozilla Sunbird - Portable Edition (calendar/task manager) and Mozilla Thunderbird - Portable Edition (email client) all with a handy launcher. Lite and Base editions also available for the under 512MB crowd.

3. Build a Bootable WinPE USB Key - Really cool way to boot a system for recovery and troubleshooting...all from a USB key (assuming your motherboard supports it). -via WIndowsConnected/Josh's Windows Weblog.

4. Install Damn Small Linux to a USB Flash Drive - Probably even cooler than a WinPE USB boot key as you get a full-features operating system and a plethora of applications as well. This cool thing is a bit more advanced, but still within the realm of accomplishment. More DSL information. See also Pen Drive Linux » Boot and run Linux from a USB flash memory stick, as well as Linux bootable USB key HOWTO - OpenFacts for more USB bootable Linux builds and How To's.

5. Install a PC Repair System - Put a nice collection of useful tools and software in the space of 32 MB all in one handy-dandy zip package. -via Daily Cup of Tech.

6. Take an Introduction to USB 101 with a series of great articles from Daily Cup of Tech:

• My Philosophy of the USB Drive
• Setup and Configuration of My USB Drive
• USB Drive Applications Part 1
• USB Drive Applications Part 2
• Limitations, Challenges, and Resources

7. Make a Portable and Secure Medical Record File for your family. - via Grand Stream Dreams. (Shameless plug #2)

8. DemocraKey: Browse the web anonymously off a USB stick.

9. Use it with Vista for ReadyBoost - Increase your Windows Vista performance by using a USB key with sufficient minimum requirements. See also this ReadyBoost Q&A FAQ by Microsoft insider, Tom Archer and the father of ReadyBoost, Matt Ayers.

10. Run a virtual Windows CE session from USB. Although it is a work in progress, it is pretty clever. --via Steve Makofsky's Weblog (MSDN)

Have fun!

Claus

Bonus USB Fun:

Top 10 weirdest USB devices ever - fosfor gadgets

Even Wackier USB Devices - PC World

It was a long day of house-chores, blogging, pestering Alvis to clean her room and "after-school" book areas.

One of Lavie's co-workers ended up giving me a job and a half to complete.

Car Care Completed

She thought that she saw some fluid on the parking slot that Lavie had just earlier pulled out of and called me to check it out.

So Friday night when I got home I crawled around under Lavie's Altima and made sure everything was good. (It was.)

No leaky fluids anywhere...what her friend say may have been condensation runoff or there from another vehicle.

Lavie is really fortunate to have a friend like this one. She is a transplant from Pittsburgh and although they have other local friends, they have a great relationship. Not many people I know would take the time to call another friend's husband (after not getting Lavie) just to make sure things are ok and safe. Pretty kind, in my book. Anyway....

No fluid spots on our concrete. No drips or runs.

Although, I gotta hand it to Nissan. It's no small task trying to wedge oneself under for a good look at the undercarriage on an Altima. It's lowered pretty far, even for a standard suspension package (maybe five or six inches clearance). And the amount of plating and framework underneath would probably rival the heft of a Hummer and the aerodynamics of a NASCAR racer. I forgot just how tight and packed it looked under there. Wowzers.

But during the under-hood inspection I noticed that there was some "scub-corral" like growth around the positive terminal. Bright blue-green. Oh no.

So this afternoon I went down to the auto-parts store, got some terminal cleaner (works better than cola) and a new clamp assembly (just in case).

I've seen a few clamps get so corroded you can't get the bolt off, or maybe the metal gets so thin it fractures....so I wanted to be prepared.

Lavie's battery is still the original Nissan one. I was surprised to notice it had the "caps" on it. As a kid I remember Grandpa pulling the caps off the battery and getting this little eye-dropper looking thing with colored plastic balls in it. He would take a sample and see how they floated and then add water accordingly. Me, I'd just buy a new battery if it came to that.

Luckily, my fears were unfounded (darn those Nissan engineers).

I had gotten out my mechanic's toolbox (a gift from my dad about when I was getting out of college), a roll of paper towels, the can of acid neutralizer, a can of WD-40, a brass wire brush, my terminal brush, a bowl of water and Alvis was in tow.

I began with a heavy soaking with the acid neutralizing spray and many paper towels later I had the battery casing clean along with most of the acid formation--pretty as it was. I was surprised to find I could get both clamps off with minimal fuss, even with the buildup. I disassembled all the clamps (the positive terminal clamp was a six or seven piece affair) bushed them clean with some wire brushes. All the metal parts, including the bolts, threads and nuts were still in great condition under the buildup and gunk. That was really unexpected! I cleaned the terminals with the terminal brush (Alvis was fascinated by that). Sprayed the bolt threads with WD-40 and reassembled.

It started fast and strong. Awesome.

Job well done. Anybody have a vanship I can work on?

But is victory short-lived?

Alvis had got her report card and gotten all A's and one B. Not too shabby!

We decided to take her out to the mall pick up a manga for work well done.

I told Lavie that I still wasn't too pleased with the fit of my latest pairs of jeans. (Oh no!) And would probably be open to looking for a pair or two. Maybe. If she was up to it. Of course, going jean shopping is right around the very bottom of the list of things I would do only if my life depended on it.

It usually never turns out well.

Setting the Ground Rules

Lavie said she was, but expected a few rules to be followed.

1. I had to keep a positive attitude. (check)
2. I had to be open to her suggestions and feedback. (reasonable enough)
3. I had to come all the way out of the dressing rooms and model the fit for her. (Umm. really?)
4. I had to keep a positive attitude. (didn't she already say that?)

OK. I promised to behave.

So off we went.

We tried a few department stores, but I began getting dangerously close to breaking a few of her rules already.

In the end, I wasn't happy with any of the selections or the fit on my skinny-boy legs, nor was Lavie happy with the fit on my seat. We were both getting, well, bummed.

Alvis alone was happy, having found her copy of a new manga series Kitchen Princess. (I was secretly hoping for a fourth volume of Yotsuba& (still waiting for the Stateside release...) or volume two of Rizelmine (not out yet either)).

Finally in a fit of desperation, I suggested maybe we could try a nearby western-wear store. Surely they could have jeans that could fit a skinny-legged dude.

Did I just fall into the Rodeo?

We asked the tall sales kid, Cowboy Dan for help. He sized me up and marched us down to the end of the jean wall and began pulling jeans like a cowboy pulling lambs out of the herd.

Before I knew it he and Lavie had herded me down into a wood paneled changing stall fit for barn and were tossing the jeans over the top like hay bales into a barn.

I was stunned to find they fit. Really, really good. First time up. Wow.

Lavie made me come out and parade around in front of her, Alvis and Cowboy Dan.

And the Blue Ribbon goes to...

All the judges seem pleased with the fit.

We walked out of the western-wear store with five new pairs of damn-fine-fittin' jeans in several shades of indigo.

Lavie was happy and Alvis was amused. And I?

I guess this life-long Texan city-boy has to finally fess up and admit it; he has a cowboy's body and heart after all.

Who knew?

Now if I could just figure out if horses are as easy to work on as Nissan Altima's....

--Claus

Lavie and I were watching a recent episode of the CBS Television show Numb3rs.

In this one (like many) the crack F.B.I. team traces (real-time) the location of a bad-guy's Internet access and manages to locate his to a specific home, building, or neighborhood.

This makes for great and exciting TV and while I'm quite confident there are a lot of things law-enforcement (especially the federal agencies) can do, quite speedily, overall I'm not entirely convinced enough to get out my tinfoil hat just yet.

When one connects to the "Net", wirelessly or hard-line, it is through an IP (Internet Protocol) address. That IP address made up of numbers separated with dots tells the data packets where to go and how to get back to you.

Knowing an IP address can generally provide you a fair bit of knowledge about the owner and location of a server.

IP Addresses and WHOIS

Want to know a little bit about, say, Mozilla?

Open a command-prompt box and type the following --> PING www.mozilla.com

You should get something like this:

C:\>ping www.mozilla.com

Pinging www-mozilla-com.glb.mozilla.com [63.245.209.10] with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 63.245.209.10: bytes=32 time=67ms TTL=241
Reply from 63.245.209.10: bytes=32 time=66ms TTL=241
Reply from 63.245.209.10: bytes=32 time=76ms TTL=241
Reply from 63.245.209.10: bytes=32 time=67ms TTL=241

Ping statistics for 63.245.209.10:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 66ms, Maximum = 76ms, Average = 69ms

That number 63.245.209.10 is the IP address of the server.

Now hop over to ARIN: WHOIS Database Search and put in that IP address in the search field and you will get some information on the owner.

The information here is only as good as the ISP requires and (especially on shadier web sites) may contain limited or bogus info...but it is a start.

More? OK!

Trace the Route Between IP Addresses

Going back to my Windows XP command-prompt box, let's run the following command

C:\>tracert 63.245.209.10

It should spit back a number of details of each router system the information request is passing through on its way to the destination.

This is great information for troubleshooting and seeing where you are headed.

traceroute - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Want pretty pictures instead?

Hop over to the VisualRoute traceroute server web page and enter in the IP address.

Here you get a wide-view map, some performance graphs, and some analysis information for the TraceRoute between their server and the target IP address.

Visualware also provides a Lite Edition free for personal use. It's a great, fun little application that could be useful when troubleshooting home networking issues with your ISP Help Desk. It does lack the map and some other feature that the paid versions include, but it is a good place to get started.

I also like using Foundstone's Trout application to perform traceroute and Whois lookups. It is small, fast and can be kept on a USB stick. It also supports constant pings to monitor traffic times, good for dealing with a flaky network connection.

View an IP Address on a Map

Want to see a closer view of where an IP address is located near?

Drop the IP address into My IP Address Lookup and you can get a nice Google map and some summary information of the ISP's (Internet Service Provider) location.

You can even see a wide-view by street, satellite image, or both, thanks to Google Maps.

This is pretty cool stuff, but depending on how the ISP has set up it's system, most likely will only get you into the general neighborhood area of where the ISP's routers for that IP address are located. Still not at a specific street or building level.

Reality Check

You may not be aware of it, but besides the activity logs on your Net access kept by your ISP, many websites, servers and others may log your IP when you post a comment, upload/download a file(s), register for a user account, etc.

Though generally harmless to you, you could have to face some consequences if someone pulled those logs and came after you for illegal activity.

And that is where the real power of law-enforcement lies. Not so much in the "flashy drama" of real-time network activity tracing, but in the "gum-shoe" detective work of getting an IP address, getting a court-subpoena, and getting log records from an ISP for a particular IP.

Using an IP address, coupled with a MAC (media access control) address, and time-logs, a pretty good case could be made.

Yes, IP and MAC address can be spoofed (for more information see links: IP Spoofing and MAC spoofing), but it's only a matter of time and resources for a determined someone to unravel the Web woven.

Anonymizing tools can help make that task more difficult, but aren't fail-safe.

What following anonymizing tools will do (basically) is to give a different endpoint IP address for your browsing session instead of your "local" IP connection address. For most users...that is usually sufficient.

Going "Covert" with your Browsing

There are some free browsing tools to make it much more difficult to trace an IP from a web-browser session.

TorPark - This is application I am most familiar with from Torrify. Downloaded, it is a specialized build of Firefox (currently v1.5.0.7) that is portable for use directly on a Windows pc or off a USB drive and uses the TOR network for web anonymity.

OperaTor - This is a specialized version of Opera v9.10 that combines TOR and Privoxy. It also is portable.

DemocraKey - This is a new "suite" of secure browsing apps, packaged with a slick auto-launcher. It contains Clamwin for free anti-virus scanning, Thunderbird with GPG email encryption, and the TorPark DemocraKey Mod--a security enhanced version of Firefox 2.0 using TOR. Great for USB key based web-browsing. Be aware, it is not a small package, however.

OS Level Anonymous Browsing

Anonym.OS Live CD - This is a Linux "LiveCD" distribution put out by the kaos.theory group. Based on the OpenBSD 3.8 LiveCD, it comes set up with additional tools for anonymizing and encrypting network connections. More details in this good ArsTechnica review.

Phantomix Live CD - This is another Linux "LiveCD" based on the popular Knoppix distribution.

The benefits of these approaches is that the entire operating system is configured to support anonymous browsing and Net activity. Plus they don't touch the hard-drive of the local machine, so you shouldn't leave as many "footprints" behind, especially on a machine that is not your own.

Performance Drawbacks

Because of the way it works, and network traffic at any given time the biggest drawback to using any of these solutions is speed.

These networks can run very slow as information requests hop all over the place. Sometimes REALLY slow.

Even if you have a really fast bandwidth connection and a very fast machine, they can be slow to render pages.

And I really wouldn't consider using them to download files. Slow.

But for general web-browsing, comment posting, and the like, they are pretty serviceable and get the job done.

So Am I Really Anonymous?

Depends on how you define "anonymous."

As I mentioned before, what these anonymizing tools will do is to give a different endpoint IP address for your browsing session instead of your "local" IP connection address.

Tech Guy Leo Notenboom posted a response to a question that these programs could be used by individuals or groups for nefarious purposes. In it Mr. Notenboom does a fantastic job of pointing out the limitations of "anonymity" with these applications:

Now, conceptually that's all very simple. But there are issues...

• Your IP address is visible to the anonymization service: that's required for your connection to work. You are trusting that they are not logging your connection and logging who you're connecting to. You're further trusting that they won't reveal any of that to anyone else.

• The service's IP address is visible: possibly making it obvious that you are using an anonymization service. That might make it look like you have something to hide.

• Your IP address may not be the only thing that identifies you (#1): there's often other information included when you make a request that could identify you or could at least help distinguish your visits from someone else. Torpark addresses this by actually including Firefox to be used in conjunction with Torpark. Other services may, or may not, address this at all.

• Your IP address may not be the only thing that identifies you (#2): as we saw with the recent search data "accidentally" released by AOL, you may not need an IP address to be identified. Many individuals were identified solely by the search queries that they made. As always, be careful with what information you provide as you browse; search terms, URLs, form information - individually they might mean nothing, but taken in aggregate you might be leaving an identifiable trail.

SANS-ISC had a post last year Hacking Tor, the anonymity onion routing network. In it, it provides a brief discussion on how a local IP can be confirmed via "track-back" use of a cookie as well as a link (PDF) to the paper "Practical Onion Hacking" by Andrew Christensen. (Another view from SearchSecurity.com here.)

So while TOR is a very good approach, it isn't fail-safe.

Beware the Wrath of Network Admin's

Another side to the "anonymous browsing" discussing regards compliance with any network policies that may (or may not) be in place.

Using any of these anonymizing software solutions at home should mostly be fair-game. But what if you use one from your work computer or laptop behind your employer's network? Or what if your kid uses one at school to bypass network filters and firewalls? Maybe you work for higher education or the government? Do you think they would care?

You might be surprised to find that they just might care, very much indeed. And not in a positive manner as well.

Case in point, Bowling Green State University assistant professor Paul Cesarini visit by the campus police after a Tor session: The Chronicle: 2/9/2007: Caught in the Network

To summarize, Mr. Cesarini got a visit from a campus network-security tech along with two campus police detectives. Mr. Cesarini had been using Tor to become familiar with it for a course lecture.

However his unusual traffic set off alarm bells with the network security and prompted the visit.

That use alone--regardless of purpose for use--was enough to make everyone nervous and initiate a checkup. They couldn't say what he had viewed, and the logs were not entirely accurate to his own usage (apparently another TOR user was active on the campus as well) but there were logs and they were enough to lead to his door.

So non-home users...know your company's policy very well before even considering using a TOR enhanced browser in your employer's network.

System Administrators and Network Policy Drafters...make sure you have updated your policy to include coverage of this area of network technology software and usage.

The Good with the Bad

As Mr. Cesarini, Mr. Notenboom, and countless others have pointed out, anonymous Web activity can clearly be used for ill by those with criminal intent. The nature of it the technology makes tracking that activity difficult (though not necessarily impossible) for law enforcement.

However, there is much good as well bundled with these tools.

Besides the obvious use by citizens of repressive governments to express dissent, maybe a corporate whistle blower has something to say, or someone wants to send a valuable tip to a newspaper or crime-stopper organization. Then there could be the user posting discussions in a controversial Web forum, or someone wanting to do web-searches on very private and personal health issues (remember the AOL search-data fiasco, anyone...). Heck, even undercover law-enforcement officers and detectives may find beneficial use of these technologies so their undercover work doesn't have their cover blown by someone tracing the IP they are using back to their headquarters.

There still remain many fair and valid reasons that support the good use of this technology.

And I am confident that hard-working law-enforcement officers are working hand-in-hand with the brightest network security specialists (and the ISP's via court orders) to get the network traffic information they need for their investigations, when they need it to keep us safe.

Just be aware of the issues and limitations and use the power responsibly.

--Claus

Related Links:

• Tor (anonymity network) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
• Tor homepage
• Security Now! podcast discussing TOR
• Tor wiki with FAQs & HOWTOs
• HowTo Anonymity With Tor and Privoxy
• Squid cache - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
• Squid Web Proxy Cache
• Privoxy - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This morning I was checking out progress on the new PCLinuxOS 2007 release.

PCLinuxOS is the version of Linux that Alvis runs on her pc.

It has a LiveCD version, or can be installed directly to a local hard-drive.

I first came across it re-versioned as Wizard's Kid-Safe LiveCD. See my earlier post for details on this great solution for introducing your children to Linux. The host link is now dead, but you can still find copies of the iso floating around.

Anyway, I was so impressed with PCLinuxOS via Wizard's that I just ended up installing the full version of PCLinuxOS proper on Alvis's older, hand-me-down pc system. It handled all the old hardware along with the latest LCD monitor just perfectly. I was sold and my daughter is quite happy.

So when I saw word that the developers were going to be releasing a 2007 version I was ecstatic.

I've played with the beta versions via LiveCD format and it has blown me away. This team has slicked up the GUI as well as worked hard under the hood. This isn't your version 0.93 stuff any more.

Tuxmachines.org has a nice review of the PCLinuxOS 2007 Beta 2 version covering many of the important changes.

So I'm eagerly awaiting the Final release soon so I can upgrade it on Alvis's pc.

But that's not why I'm really posting...(as cool as this is!)...

My Name is Up

See, when I was on the PCLinuxOS's homepage, I noticed my "real-name" was in an donation solicitation ad in the left-hand column.

What?

Coincidence? I think not!

While it didn't freak me out...it did get me curious to figure out what was going on...how did PCLinuxOS know (on my Windows machine) what my name was?

Well, it's not very deep or complicated. It was almost too simple to even mention, but as an example, I thought I would post it anyway as a lesson about logging off sites when you are done...

The Ad

The ad itself displayed "Hi (your name)...PCLinuxOS. Click to Pay."

This is an Amazon Honor System ad that allows easy payment of a donation to the crack-PCLinuxOS development team. That's a "Good Thing™".

But how was it snagging my name?

The Snitch

I had a pretty good idea that it was because I may not have "logged out" of my Amazon account after a recent anime-goodness purchase last week.

Clicking the "Learn More" link in the ad took me to this page about the Amazon Honor System.

How does the Amazon Honor System paybox know my name?
When you look at a Web page, the words and pictures you see actually may come from several sources. Your browser software assembles the pieces and displays them as a single page. On the Web site you were visiting, most of the content you saw was transmitted from server computers used by the site's operator. The image made up of the paybox and your name displayed within the paybox was different--we sent it to you directly from Amazon.com. This allowed us to recognize you by name just like we do when you visit the Amazon.com Web site. Because Amazon.com's servers transmitted the image containing a paybox and your name within the paybox directly to your browser software, the site owner never saw the paybox or your name and never received any information about you.

Well, that is really nice...but in simpler terms...Amazon uses the "cookie" set on your computer and that retains information about you to be accessed by their own ads served by them, but placed (via code) on other web-site owner's pages. This is good for you and Amazon as the info is shared between the both of you and NOT the third-party site. According to Amazon, they also don't track or log which websites you roam across that use the "Amazon Honor System" payboxes.

Taking the Snitch out of Service

There are two easy methods to prevent your name appearing in the "Amazon Honor System" ad boxes when you surf.

Amazon explains that you can prevent your Amazon name display from appearing by logging into your Amazon account and updating your communication preferences.

Or (and my preferred method) is that you can just remember to log out of your Amazon account when you get done shopping there.

Despite the amount of attention I give to secure on-line shopping and browsing habits, the Amazon site continues to give me "problems". Once you have completed a shopping session you seem to be returned back to a personalized Amazon "home-page" and it is very easy to forget you are still logged into your account.

I only wish they would make a clearer transitional page after your order has been completed. One that offers to return you to shopping in your account or to log out of your account.

Once I went back to the Amazon website and "logged out" of my account (done by clicking the link at the top that says to check it if I am not me) I browsed back to PCLinuxOS and my name was no longer displayed.

No Harm-No Foul (this time)

Let me be crystal clear; I'm not griping or complaining or questioning Amazon or their security. Amazon is one of a handful of online-shopping merchants that I have used for a very long time with trust and confidence. I haven't yet been burned by them or any of their associate merchants.

And it is clearly my responsibility to remember to log out of my own accounts on-line.

I'm not fussing about their "Amazon Honor System" either. It's pretty cool and a great revenue generator for smaller, donation-supported projects.

I just wanted to bring this small matter to your attention and wish for Amazon to make a more prominent "Log Out of Account" button instead of their "Click if you are not me" method.

Cross-site (XSS) Vulnerabilities

What this does do is give a good example of how a cookie could be utilized for malicious gain.

Suppose (for example) a hacker wanted to gain access to information located in a cookie on my machine set by a merchant I conduct on-line business with. Obviously it could contain some goodies.

By exploiting a potential vulnerability in my browser and maybe getting me to visit a malicious (fake) website, they could manipulate the code to extract information from a cookie or cookies on my machine, or change the information on it...although it is not limited to just cookie exploitation and account theft, but may include sensitive page content or other objects as well. Even (depending on what data is stored in that cookie) to the point of being able to hijack my account, drain it or collect secure information about me or my account from it.

There are several readable papers and pages on this issue worth looking into:

• Real World XSS - Introduction - Sandsprite.com
• Cross-site scripting - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
• Cross Site Scripting (XSS) questions and answers - Cgisecurity.com
• The Anatomy of Cross Site Scripting - (PDF) Whitepaper from Net-Security.org
• Cross Site Reference Forgery - An introduction... - (PDF) ISECPartners.com
• Advanced Cross Site Scripting by Gavin Zuchlinski ... - (PDF) Whitepaper from Net-Security.org
• XSS (Cross Site Scripting) Cheat Sheet - ha.ckers.org (know thine enemy!)

Avoidance

Protecting oneself from XSS is a difficult, but not impossible task. There are some basic pointers you may want to follow:

1. Always log out of secure web accounts when you are done conducting business. With the exception of one or two "tossaway" accounts on a tech-blog page or two (or Amazon when I forget) I never leave any account that I have to log into without logging out.
2. Keep your web-browser fully patched and up to the latest version.
3. Avoid following links, site unseen. By that I mean if you are viewing a website and it links off-site to another link, type the homepage of that site into your address bar and browse from within the home site. Of course, this takes away most of the fun (and function) of web-surfing, but there you go.
4. Turn off JavaScript in your browser, or only enable it on trusted websites. See the NoScript - Firefox Add-on.
5. Set your browser's Internet security settings to "High". That might make your fun web-browsing very challenging as well, however.
6. Be careful on what you click on. Examine what and where you are about to go. If the link in a web-forum or "guestbook" says "Click here to see puppies" but when you hover over the link, your browser displays information showing the link goes to someplace like www.hollieshouseofpuppyhorrors.com (not a real site, BTW) then you probably want to think twice before following that link.

Be Safe.

--Claus

I'm surprised to be making this blog post.

I hadn't expected it to come so soon, but today Microsoft released Virtual PC 2007 out of Beta.

Microsoft Virtual PC 2007 - Home Page

I don't think anyone who has been playing with the Beta versions of this version will see much new.

CyberNet Technology provided a nice rundown of the feature highpoints, if you aren't already acquainted with them.

Supported Host Systems

Supported operating systems remain the same: Windows Vista Business, Windows Vista Enterprise, Windows Vista Ultimate, Windows XP Professional, or Windows XP Tablet PC Edition. (Product Specifications).

One interesting (mistake?) on that page is that although it lists the supported Host operating system versions above, if you look in the current page's first example at the bottom it says:

To run Windows 95 as a guest OS on a Windows 2000 host requires 500 MB of free disk space and 128 MB of free memory (96 MB for the host and 32 for the guest).

But Windows 2000 (as is XP Home) isn't in the supported software versions listed on the same page. Ooops?

Will it Install and Run on XP Home?

As many of my readers know, I have been running Virtual PC 2007 Beta's on my XP Home systems, even though it isn't "supported": Microsoft Virtual PC 2007 RC, Running on XP Home!

I never did get it working on Windows 2000 Professional. So keep a copy of Windows Virtual PC 2004 around if you intend to run VPC on any of those systems.

I was really curious to see if the Final version would work on XP (Home)

I made sure none of my virtual machines were in a "paused" state. Then I uninstalled VPC 2007 RC.

Looking to see what Microsoft may have done to appease the few XP Home users out there clamoring for Virtual PC 2007, even it isn't "supported" I took a gamble and ran the setup.exe installer without going through my "hack" technique.

After a long pause the installer displayed that this was v.6.0.156.0.

With great trepidation, I clicked "Next" and got a really dire and scary sounding warning that VPC 2007 wasn't supported on this OS. I clicked OK anyway. No idea what was about to happen.

Imagine my surprise when the license agreement appeared! I said "OK" and kept going.

Next up was a customer information window, with a license key already inserted. (Next).

I clicked Install for a final time and the installation formally began.

After what seemed like a very long time, the installer finished.

I launched the VPC 2007 icon from the Program Folders list.

My saved DSL-Linux, Windows 98 and Vista (RC 5600 build) were all there and all worked great.

I've still got to go back and uninstall the Virtual machine additions from the two Windows OS's and install the new one. I don't know for sure if it was changed at all in the final version, but it wouldn't hurt.

Yes! Microsoft Virtual PC 2007 Runs on XP Home ... What about the hack method?

Then on my second XP Home machine I went through the detailed steps listed in the How to run Virtual PC 2007 on XP Home post.

This time the installer again complained about not being on put on a supported system. I continued clicking through the installation and it seemed to take fine. When I ran it, this time it complained about not having MS XML 6 installed. Hmm. I ran the MS XML 6 installer setup file extracted from the setup.exe file and it went on fine.

Now when I re-launched the Virtual PC 2007 it complained one more time about not being on a supported system, but offered a box to check to not remind again. I selected it and it was happy.

My virtual version of Vista fired up fine and stable on my XP Home system. OK!

So at this point, I can say that the "hack" still works, but with the additional step of manually running the included MS XML 6 installer this time.

Skip the Hack - Just Run setup.exe

As much as the "hack" method is fun, there doesn't really seem to be any need for it now.

The Virtual PC 2007 final release's setup.exe file seems to give fair warning about putting it on a XP Home system, but otherwise it goes on fine, just like Virtual PC 2004 did. So in all honesty, I can't say I would recommend the hack now. As long as it goes on fine, you should be good to go.

I'm happy to see that Microsoft programmers have now allowed Virtual PC 2007 to go on XP Home systems with minimal fuss. That's cool if they don't want to "officially" support it. I understand, but appreciate them allowing it without needing to jump through hoops to make it work.

I never did get the hacked version of the Beta working on Windows 2000 Professional, and I don't have one handy right now to test it on. I'll do an update when I find out for sure. In the meantime, just keep a copy of the installer for Virtual PC 2004 handy for those machines.

--Claus

I've finally upgraded our main pc system's email client from Thunderbird 1.0.5.9 to version 2 (beta 2).

I like the message tagging (great for e-bill management), and the default theme is nice. I'm not sold on the usefulness of the forward/backward buttons but there they are (once you add them with by customizing the toolbar). Folder views are customizable as well. The email alert popup contains much more useful information, I'm happy to see that change. There are a number of other features as well. I am really looking forward for the final release.

When you install the Thunderbird beta 2 version, it installs in its own folder, to avoid overwriting your original build. That hasn't been a problem as they both seem to use the same profile folder/settings so reconfiguration is kept to a minimum.

I ran into only two minor drawbacks--not Thunderbird's fault. First, when I would launch one version after the other they would keep offering to make itself the default email tool. I finally told one of them "No" and set it to not check for the being the default. Harmony reigned.

The other issue was with incompatible themes and extensions. I just use one or two "custom" themes and really don't use any Add-ons for Thunderbird at all. I just uninstalled the one v 2.0 incompatible theme and was fine. Mozilla's Lightning (integrated calendar program) seemed to not even blink an eye between each version. Nice.

It seems quick and nice.

To the Customization!

I'm sure there are a lot of customizations one can do in Thunderbird, besides the use of Themes and Add-ons.

I'm focusing on the Thunderbird start page (pane).

The start page (if enabled) is the window pane that usually appears beneath your inbox message pane.

Normally it has a nice, plain, welcome to Thunderbird logo and message.

However, if you go to the Tools, Options, General tab, you will find you can set this to any other location that uses a supported file format.

By default it uses: chrome://messenger/content/start.xhtml

You can use others like a HTML or JPG file.

If you get something messed up, just press the "Restore Default" button and all will be back to normal--this is pretty safe stuff, even for noobies.

Me, I wanted to see a pretty face waiting for me when I opened up my email.

Picking a graphic

I decided to use this pretty picture of Love Hina's star, Naru Narusegawa. The colors seemed to compliment the pastel-washed ones of the default Thunderbird theme. And there was lots of room for cropping (that is important).

Once downloaded I wanted to crop and resize it to fit the start page window of Thunderbird without generating those scroll bars.

I almost never bother resizing my email client. So since I leave it at the same size, the first thing I needed to do is to see the pixel dimensions my final image file needed to take.

Screen Measuring

There are all kinds of ways to measure elements on your windows.

For this, I chose to use the freeware screen ruler application from PegTop called "PMeter". It installs quickly and is very powerful yet very intuitive. JR Screen Ruler is another freeware utility very similar. I consider either tool a "must have" for web page work, bloggers, or graphic designers. Firefox has a great Add-on as well called MeasureIt. Also nice.

Launching Thunderbird and making sure that it was sized correctly, I then ran PMeter and took a pixel measurement of the width and height of the start page pane area. Mine worked out to 850x350 rounding downward to leave a bit of whitespace around my final image. I wrote that down.

That will be how big my final image dimensions will need to be.

Image Manipulation

For quick image cropping and resizing I don't think that there is a better utility than FastStone's Image Viewer. This free-for-personal-use application is tops in my book for quick image editing and I would highly recommend it to any blogger who works with images.

Here is an Image Viewer PDF Tutorial that covers version 2.7. It pretty helpful.

I opened up the downloaded file of Naru in Image Viewer and then began by resizing it. to match the width I needed. This meant locking the aspect ratio and bringing the width down from 1024 to 850. Done.

Now I needed to get the height worked out. This was a bit harder. I had to do some careful cropping on the image to make sure I included enough of the character's image and features to make the image pleasing. Once I got it fined tuned (the cropping tool allows a lot of adjustments on the fly) I was almost done.

(Note you may decide that cropping first, then resizing works, or maybe just cropping. The best technique depends as much on the image you have chosen as well as your skill working with these programs.)

Last thing I did was just slightly increase the brightness level to give it a bit more of a washed-out effect to better match the muted colors of the Thunderbird theme.

I saved the file as a JPEG format with 100% (highest) compression in my My Documents\Pictures folder for safe keeping.

Calling the Custom Image

Now, we are almost done.

Going back to Thunderbird, I went to the Tools, Options, General tab and entered the following path in the Start Page location line:

file:///C:/Documents and Settings/Claus/My Documents/My Pictures/Hina_TB.jpg

Note carefully the proper syntax to use when calling to a local file: file:///(location)

Also notice the "slashes" lean to the right instead of the left, as they appear in the Windows address bar.

ClipPath is a great Windows Shell utility that can help speed that process of copying a file name in the correct format.

Save your change, make sure the option to show the start page is checked, then restart Thunderbird.

Your custom start page changes should be pleasantly in view!

Additional information

Start Page for mail - MozillaZine Knowledge Base

--Claus

Why is it that when I'm sitting on a pile of links for 4'ish posts in progress...all I can seem to do is collect non-related links and increase the contents of my link bin?

Oh, I am SO easily distracted.

So here are some freeware/Open Source software offerings you might find free and useful.

Free Flight Simulator

FlightGear Flight Simulator - FlightGear. Multi-OS support: Windows (v0.9.10), Linux, Solaris (sparc/x86), sgi, Mac OS X, and FreeBSD.

Take a look at these Screenshots, a list of Places to Fly, get a world-wide Scenery expansion pack. Like aircraft? Take a look at all these! Including Santa's sleigh, paragliders, a Sopwith Camel, the X15,

They even offer a Live-CD version. Boot your pc directly from the CD and it doesn't touch your hard-drive.

How cool is that!

There is also an active and thriving community around this software.

More reviews and screenshots at Flying high with FlightGear - Free Software Magazine.

Taking a Global View

Before we come back down to earth, here are two free global mapping software applications you might not be aware of.

Google Earth - OK. This one you may have heard about. Take a tour around the globe and zoom in and out. You spin me right-round baby!

NASA World Wind - This one you might NOT have heard of. Developed by NASA using a number of different satellite data, it is quite spectacular.

For more information, here are some links to help you sort them out: Main Page - World Wind Wiki, World Wind - Introduction Wiki, and Google Earth comparison - World Wind Wiki.

Don't forget ET

I've posted about these before, but seems a good place for a reminder:

Stellarium - Planetarium software. Easy setup. Fast data generations. Screenshot captures. Lots of options.

Celestia - 3D astronomy modeling program. Zoom around the galaxy and venture to worlds unknown.

Looking for World Domination?

Freeciv - If science isn't really your thing and civilization building is, consider Freeciv.

Although it has a single-player mode, it really runs strong in a on-line multiplayer environment. Supports Windows and Mac.

Be Organized

allsnap - This is one of those tiny little system tools that you don't realize you probably need until you find and use it. Most Linux systems have this "feature" already.

Allsnap automatically "snaps" your open windows to either the edges of the screen or the edges of other windows. That's it. Nothing fancy, but quite useful.

You can set several options like the "snap-zone" (how close a window needs to be to an edge before "snapping" occurs and some advanced fine-tuning features.

It is simple, light and quite nice.

Bonus tip: to quickly cascade all the windows on your Windows pc, just right click on the task-bar and select the "Cascade Windows" menu item. All your windows will form up in a nicely-sized cascade stack! Who knew? (tip via technofile)

Be Artful

Inkscape. Draw Freely. - Probably the most popular Open Source vectoring software out there. I love it, and each release just gets better. Current version now up to .45 Windows, Mac, and Linux friendly.

Think vector graphics are just about lines and solid colors? Take a took at Brazilian Luciano Lourenco's photo-realistic creation with Inkscape. Wow. Luciano's making good use of that new Gaussian Blur capability in Inkscape.

Illustrator John Bintz shows how to use Inkscape for comic rendering.

Paint.NET - Free Photo Editing Software for Windows - My favorite choice for quick and fast graphic editing when I need to work in layers. Easy learning curve, yet powerful enough for most jobs.

GIMP - The GNU Image Manipulation Program - Yes.. I know. I would be remiss for leaving this one out.. I don't use GIMP much, but I know it has a very active following. More high-powered than Paint.NET. Works with Linux, Windows, and Macs. See also: GIMP Portable | PortableApps.com - Portable software for USB drives.

Be Clever with Code

Komodo Edit - My latest find in the quest to find a good HTML coding tool. . It has tabs, supports Perl, PHP, Python, Ruby, JavaScript, CSS, HTML and XML. Syntax checking and coloring is built in with tips on the fly. Works with Linux, Windows and Macs. Free from ActiveState software! (found via mykzilla: Three Things I Love About Komodo)

Similar software I have previously blogged here:

• Microsoft XML Notepad 2006

• Aptana

• NOTEPAD++

• NVu

• PSPad

• EasyHtml

• Notepad2

Interesting Free Software Links

Not all free software sites and link pages are alike. Some are trustworthy, but there are too many on the Web that may be dishing up files of dubious quality and integrity. These are some of the select-few I trust.

• Free Software Magazine

• OgasaWalrus.com

• The Portable Freeware Collection

• PortableApps.com

• File Hippo - Download Free Software

• TinyApps.Org : Home

Happy and Safe downloading!

--Claus

I've had a 4G iPod for a while now. I feel I've been quite proficient with it's management.

I can make playlists.

I can apply custom album art.

I can sort.

I can handle the radio and podcast features with aplomb.

I can even quickly and easily purchase music from iTunes.

...or so I thought.

Why does something Apple seems to pride itself so much on be so difficult?

Maybe it was just me.

The Adventure Begins

I have an iTunes account already established and have bought the odd-single for Alvis. Nothing near the level of investment that my brother has apparently contributed, but I'm quite conformable with the process.

Heck, it's even easy.

Oh how wrong I was...little grasshopper me.

For Valentine's Day, Lavie and Alvis gave me a $15 iTunes gift card.

I've had a hard time picking out what music to get.

I was very close to putting up a post asking (based on my genre likes) what 15'ish songs my dear blog friends would recommend; to get an fun eclectic mix. I may still do something like that soon.

I was about to spring for the new Nora Jones album Not To Late, but then inspiration hit...and my problems with iTunes began.

The Heartless Bastards...

See, I remembered one of my fav up-and-coming bands, The Heartless Bastards, had recently released a new album. There's just something about vocalist Erika Wennerstrom's rough and edgy voice that makes this band great. Might iTunes carry it?

A quick "Browse", no that doesn't help me...a quick "Power Search" and I've got the album in my sights! Just $9.99! Score!

It took me three attempts to scrape off the covering of the iTunes "pin" number...each time requiring a harder and sharper grade of metal. I was set!

I was already logged into my iTunes account, so I clicked the "Buy Album" button and it warned I was about to purchase the music.

No request if I wanted to use my iTunes card? Hmmm.

I backed out and tried again. Same thing.

What? I can use my iTunes card right? Isn't that how it is to work?

Because the iTunes purchase message looked pretty clear and firm, I decided I needed to check into whether I was using my iTunes card correctly.

I ran a Google search and came up with this handy Apple iTunes help page: iTunes Store: How to redeem an iTunes Gift Card

I scanned the steps and had done all the steps, but apparently I needed to find the QUICK LINKS window on the iTunes Store homepage...then go to the "Redeem" link. Ohhh.

So I have to redeem my iTunes gift-card first, THEN I can make a purchase decision.

Well that was clear...as mud.

Wonder why other stores don't use this awesome gift-card model? Wouldn't Amazon be such a better on-line store if they required their customers to redeem all their credits BEFORE making a purchase, instead of during the checkout process? Got a gift card for Joe's Crabshack? Gotta give it to the hostess first to redeem before being seated at the table and getting your menus.

Anyway.

iTunes Redeemed

Once I got it redeemed, I did notice (pleasantly) that Apple tracks your "store-credit" in a little window up at the top-left of iTunes by your login name.

Back to The Heartless Bastards album page. Quick-click purchase done and in less than five minutes I had it downloaded.

That (sincerely) is a nice touch....and a constant reminder of how much you have waiting to spend. Alvis noticed that I had a balance remaining and sweetly asked if she could have a song....Five for Fighting's "The Riddle". Sure. I like that one too.

So now I know what do do with my iTunes cards now....redeem it, then spend it.

I've got about two or three songs left of credit. I'm not quite sure what I will do with them.

I'm likely going to try one or two of the few Japanese albums the US iTunes carries.

iTunes Japan

If you really love Japanese music, you can head over to JBOX and pick up some Japanese iTunes cards, then log into the iTunes Japan website. As long as you use the Japanese iTunes cards, you can purchase and download music once logged into the iTunes Japan site.

Now I know.

--Claus

Dad worked for many years in the oil industry. Lavie's father did as well.

Just about everything we had growing up was paid for by the income our parents earned in their long careers with local oil companies.

Even today, my brother works for an oil company and my dad still does consulting work in his "retirement" years.

So it is safe to say that we were both surrounded by oil-insiders and it pervaded much of our childhood years.

This morning I was cruising the web and came across a game over on Retro Thing that jogged something in my brain: Retro Thing: Tug Boat Board Game.

Now, we didn't have the Tug Boat board game, but the mechanical-type design instantly, reminded me of an oil-themed board game named King Oil.

King Oil - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

It was really fun.

There were a set of three stacked platters under it that each had holes. Before the game started, you would spin each platter setting the holes randomly. They clattered quite loudly as they spun.

As the game progressed, you would buy land, spend money to drill holes. Then came the best part.

There was a large plastic "oil-derrick" that you would place in a hole you intended to drill. Depending how the hidden holes in the platter lined up, a metal rod would be able to drop clear through resulting in a dry well, to it not getting past the top platter resulting in a "gusher".

The tiny plastic 3-D pieces were really fun. There were sheds and well caps and oil derricks. There were pipelines to set...all kinds of stuff. Pictures via Board Game Geek

It was a lot of fun and we played it a lot. I even remember playing it in the backyard some days.

GamePart sells the whole game now for $75, as well as assorted parts. (Sold out currently. Don't know if eBay has it....)

Seems kinda dated now in light of our current PC attitudes to the oil industry. Can't imagine this game making a popular appearance at the toy-store shelves.

It was more a game of the times, when the oil business still had a bit of "glow" to it and less the complicated love-hate affair it seems to have become.

I wonder if mom still has it somewhere....

Obviously, it didn't indoctrinate me at all as I didn't choose to go into the "family business." But it was a lot of fun, and I can see why my parents would have picked it up off the shelf.

A Grandpa Story

Which then reminds me of a fond story about Grandpa.

He owned a super-big, bright-red early 70's Lincoln Continental with a bright white vinyl roof. Lots of chrome, of course. He would always wear a straw cowboy hat and wore boots on his feet. And he loved wearing "bolo" style neck ties.

He looked like a "King Oil" Texan if ever you saw one on Dallas.

One day he was driving around and someone pulled up next to him and was obviously impressed by his look.

Through the window of their car they asked him if he owned any oil-wells.

Grandpa says he just looked over at the other driver and slowly raised his hand. He spread apart three fingers wide and clear and just grinned as he slowly pulled away.

Grandpa never owned any oil-wells, but he loved Texas and a good joke.

Other oil-games

Big Oil: Build an Oil Empire for PC - Oil exploration and production SIM game. Didn't get a great review on this site.

OIL: The Great Adventure - Very "old-school" style boardgame. Very detailed and according to the web-site author, provides a pretty realistic (for the 70's) review of the oil production process. Surprisingly, it seems to have been originated in Sweden and manufactured in Australia.

--Claus

For many years I used to be a moderate fan of NASCAR racing. Most Sundays (or the occasional prime-time Saturday night) I could be found camped out in front of the television watching cars go around in circles for hours.

Lavie sometimes would watch with me.

Generally I stuck with the Nextel (Winston) Cup races of the big boys. I didn't really follow the Busch series. And the Craftsman truck series comes on at some really weird times so I never followed that.

I even had a NASCAR sticker on my pick-em-up truck (when I owned one).

The year before last, my attention to NASCAR began to drop. I caught maybe a race a month.

Last year I didn't watch a single race. Although, I still tried to follow the points race and drives when they made the news.

So this year, the Daytona 500 begins again. Controversy swirls the air around the track better than the wind generated by the cars running at full-throttle. Michael Waltrip's team has been devastated by allegations of cheating and rule breaking. Even wonder-boy Jeff Gordon got caught up when his car was found to (accidentally as it stands now) have been using parts causing it to be lowered by 1-inch.

So why my attention again?

Well, for starters, Toyota is bringing a car to the table this year. For the first time in many years, we have a true underdog trying to eat at the food-bowl with the big dogs of Ford, Chevrolet, Dodge, and Pontiac. And a foreign one to boot!

Imagine that!

I wonder if Nissan or some of the German thoroughbreds will be looking to get in on the meal soon.

So I'll be watching the Toyota team performance with interest. They have a long uphill battle ahead and I don't have any high expectations, at least for the first part of the season.

Time will tell.

I like it when the pot gets stirred.

Besides, now that Lavie has her laptop, I can knock out my blogging needs during the race in front of our nice TV set....heck...my Sundays might get more productive now.

Now to get that laundry sorted and in the washing machines....is that jet-fuel I smell on somebody's jeans?

Go fast, turn left...indeed.

--Claus

Post Race Update: This year's race turned out to be quite fun. Long race stretches with a minimum of yellow flags. Some action in pits. The "Big Ones" in the end were quite spectacular--luckily, no-one got hurt very bad. Dale Jr. got his car creamed...too bad. The Toyotas finished in 22, 30, 34, and 40th place. Lavie didn't stick around during the race with me, but Alvis did (playing her GameBoy DS). Occasionally she would act the part of the interested daughter asking, "Where's Jeff (Gordon) at?"

Like most other people, I have my share of "bad-habits."

I can make quick, decisive decisions while at work, but can take several hours in a mall trying to decide which polo-shirt I want to buy.

I've been known to walk out of a mall after more than three hours, with Lavie not-so-silently muttering under her breath, without finding a single pair of jeans that I thought felt right.

I will go a week without eating lunch, so I can save the budget money to buy a new anime DVD.

I am compelled to toss out any leftovers more than two days old.

I don't go to bed without making sure all the dirty dishes have been loaded in the dishwasher.

I'd rather not wear my glasses in the house, rather than admit it is time to dust again.

But one of my hidden "bad-habits" is my Pocky.

Pocky. Those chocolate-covered, overpriced, demon-snack sticks loved by otaku. And if you believe the Pocky marketing blitz, is a really popular snack in Japan as well.

I have boxes stashed all over the house; in the study, in the living room, in the bedroom, at work, and in my car.

I can't go to the grocery store without buying at least two boxes, even if I have 10 unopened ones already.

I also have a Giant Pocky box the girls found for me one year.

Pocky are (generally) chocolate covered crisp-stick snacks. They are very thin and very good.

Please, Mizuho...Can I have some more?

I blame my addiction on Mizuho Kazami. Onegai (Please) Teacher was my first anime series to collect and fall in love with. It is sweet, tender, and deeply romantic. It was also how I managed to get Lavie hooked on anime with me.

In the series, Mizuho consumes vast quantities of Pochy. We soon learned that was a homage to Pocky snack-sticks and were both searching for boxes to see what the fuss was about.

Before we knew it we were hooked.

As our love of Pocky and anime expanded, we began to see it cropping up in cameos within other anime we watch; Eureka Seven (Precky), Please Teacher (Pochy), and Spirited Away (Pock). It's a fun game now. And we can't watch any Onegai Teacher episodes without a box or two nearby to munch on.

Pocky Picks

Pocky comes in a variety of flavors. The Pocky Gallery lists 30 types and flavors, some more hard to find than others. I'm looking to find the "Men's Pocky" flavor, as it is made with a darker chocolate than the standard Pocky which I usually get. Alvis prefers the strawberry flavored Pocky. Lavie likes the Almond-Crush Pocky best. I'd also like to try the Green Tea Mousse Pocky as well as I like green teas.

Glico's Pocky Chocolate Lineup page. (Japanese)

Which Flavor Pocky are you?

Blogthings has a number of silly/fun quizzes. Including one for Pocky: What Flavor Pocky Are You?

Lavie and I took the quiz (independently) and both came out as being "Green Tea" Pocky flavored folks.

You Are Green Tea Pocky

Your attitude: natural and zen Peaceful yet full of life. Deep and thoughtful. You're halfway to tantric bliss!

You Are Strawberry Pocky

Your attitude: fresh and sweet Comforting, yet quirky ... quietly hyper You always see both sides to everything

• Pocky Kurogoma- My favorite. Melding a traditional Japanese feel to a modern pop beat. Kawaii!

• Pocky Girls - Yummmy. Gotta go eat me a box right now!
• More Pocky Girls Goodness! - I'm moving into my second box!

• Pocky - Dance Stripes - Get up and burn those calories! Yui Aragaki is so kawaii!

• Pocky Hypnotism - It worked for me....I'm now a slave!

• Nakama Yukie needs a Pocky - Cool, slick composed...oops!

• Mousse Pocky - Dark and sultry-smooth.

• Kiss Me, Pocky! - A young couple alone in their room..suddenly...the door opens!

• Kiss Me, Pocky, II - Will the couple's kiss be finally fulfilled?

• Pocky Rings up a Storm - Beware wet women ringing your doorbell.

• Pocky Wedding Bells - Wonder how those arranged marriages work out...

• Yui Aragaki - Pocky 101 - Pocky eating class in session! (Had to stick her in here again!)

• Yui Aragaki - Pocky 102 - Remedial Pocky eating class!

• Love and Pocky Hurts! - Don't mix love and Pocky, someone might get hurt!

• Rocky Pocky - What Rocky Balboa would eat if he ate Pocky.

• Pocky and the Undead! - Satomi Ishihara - Terror strikes!

• Morning Musume Pocky - Reminds me of a Target commercial for some reason.

• Morning Musume Pocky, II - Here we go again! If only Alvis had that much energy in the morning.

• Pocky DANCE DANCE - Longer, high energy ad featuring JPop group ORANGE RANGE.

• Pocky Decore - Wedding cake Pocky -- kinda makes me want to puke, it's so sweet (the ad).

• Pocky Super Ninja Style - Can eating Pocky make you a super-ninja? Maybe!

• Club Pocky - Short and vibrant. Like a teenager.

• Trailer
• Episode 1: "The Goods"
• Episode 2: "The Pocky Problem"
• Episode 3: "The Junkie"
• Episode 4: "The Underworld"
• Episode 5: "The Catgirl"
• Episode 6: "The Goods II"
• Episode 7: "The Otaku"
• Episode 8: "The Gateway"
• Episode 9: "The War"
• Episode 10: "The Impact"

Google Video and WMV format links here.

Pocky Idol Street

Just so ensure you leave with a sweet taste again:

Glico's Pocky Idol Street. -- It's not just the chocolate that makes Pocky so sweet!

Yui Aragaki's Pocky Note blog. (Did I mention how "kawaii" she is? Yes? Sorry!)

Pocky Girls blog

So go buy a box of Pocky.

Who knows, that might be Claus and Lavie you run into fighting over the last box on the shelf!

--Claus

Friday morning was a bi-weekly trash-day pickup.

We don't generate that much waste each week, so I usually can get by setting out our two cans once a week. Sometimes I don't even have to put out a can. Just a bag will do.

This morning I set out a pair of my Justin steel-toe work-boots. Finally. They weren't well worn. On the average, I might wear them once every two months. This was a very uncharacteristic move, as I usually work hard to wear out a pair of boots. These looked quite new...and that was the problem.

When I bought them several years ago, I was doing lots of work installing heavier items, 100lb UPS batteries, installing new server racks, etc. Seemed like a good idea at the time. I'd had steel-toed boots before with great happiness, so finding a brand that looked good and felt pretty comfortable made me quite happy.

"Pretty comfortable".

That's what got me into trouble.

See, my feet are in that zone that, like jeans, makes it challenging to shop for. They don't seem to be fully "wide" but a normal width usually feels a bit tight at the end of the day, but a wide size seems way too roomy. I usually try to buy my boots and shoes at the end of a long day on my feet so they have spread enough to be representative of how my feet would really fit in them.

Anyway, turns out that these really nice boots ended up being a bit tight on the arch just before my toes. It didn't have anything to do with the steel toe-cap. That was very comfortable...but each time I put them on to wear getting ready in the morning, I would inevitably end up changing them before I left the house.

Maybe I didn't give them a chance, but it's not a good sign when I'm self conscious of how my feet feel in the morning before I leave for work.

So I decided to pull the trigger and "permanently retire" them.

It was for the best.

Nothing hurts worse than a toothache or a pair of uncomfortable work-boots.

Now I have to find a replacement pair....and the search begins anew....

Like those boots I had been holding onto, here are some links I need to set out on the curb for your enjoyment....

SourceForge Goodies

Top 25 SourceForge Projects - Daily Cup of Tech - There were a number on the list that I am familiar with and use often: 1. Inkscape (vector graphic editor), 5. Azureus (a bittorrent client), 17. 7-Zip (file archiver utility), 19. FileZilla (FTP client), and 24. Notepad++. Not bad coverage across the list.

A few on the list I hadn't been aware of but look interesting were OpenXML Translator (ODF Add-in for Word), OrangeHRM - Human Resource Management, and Open Computers and Software Inventory.

Windows File System Cleaning

Computer Zen has a tip on how to Clean up your Temp Files from the command-prompt.

Since we are on the subject of pc file cleaning. For some heavy duty "Brillo-pad" work, try CCleaner (freeware). Use with caution, because it can clean more than you may want if you aren't careful. USB-friendly "portable" version here.

XP has it's "Disk Cleanup Tool" as well, if you are less-adventurous but want to still shake out the rugs....screenshots and more info here (--via TheElderGeek).

Don't forget that Windows 2000 systems also have a very similar tool.

Ever wonder How To Defragment a Drive From The Command Prompt? Well, Daily Cup of Tech has that covered as well! I don't know if it runs any faster than the GUI method, but it does work. As an added bonus, some guidance is provided for setting up "batch-files" for custom defrag runs. I've tried several freeware defrag tools, but always end up going back to the XP/2000 system installed defrag programs.

• DIRMS and Buzzsaw,

• Contig (Sysinternals) and Power Defragmenter GUI (eXcessive Software),

• O&O Defrag 2000 Freeware Edition (only seems to be hosted on Major Geeks)

• Diskeeper Lite 7.0 (Freeware version hosted on Major Geeks--trial versions at DiskKeeper Corp.)

• DefragNT

• PageDefrag (Sysinternals) Specifically for defragging your paging files or Registry hives.

• Auslogics Disk Defrag

Sweet Suite

Sysinternals has some of the best Windows utilities on the planet. And they are free. I usually use one or two daily in my job or at home. If you have a hard time picking which ones you need, just hit the "Easy" button and download them all at once! Sysinternals Suite (--via Lifehacker)

BlackBerry Patch? Yes! Don't get Poked!

At the moment, I don't have the pleasure (or pain) of being assigned a BlackBerry device at work. We do use them in our environment however, and have to install and support them for our VIP executives.

So if you are a BlackBerry user, be warned that BlackBerry has now posted a patch to help manage the Daylight Saving Time changes. Go see if you need it, unless you plan to switch it over manually. (--via downloadsquad)

Firefox Self-Patching

Michael Zalewski found a vulnerability in the Firefox 2.0.0.1 code that could allow a malformed URL served by a malicious website to misdirect under a URL that appears to be legit as well as messing with your cookies under certain conditions. (See how your Firefox browser fares in a test site he created here.) This could be a serious problem, depending on your surfing habits.

There are two "workaround" techniques to disable the vulnerability.

Mozilla Links offers a solution by adding a new line in the about:config preferences:

• Enter about:config in the location bar to access Firefox’s advanced preferences.

• Right click on any preference and select New>String.

• Enter capability.policy.default.Location.hostname.set for the preference name.

• Enter noAccess for the preference value.

• Restart Firefox.

heise Security suggests the following technique.

• Close Firefox and browse to the profile folder for Firefox.

• On my XP system it is located in the following location...yours may differ slightly
  C:\ Documents and Settings \ cvalaca \ Application Data \ Mozilla \ Firefox \ Profiles \ 91t462tw.default \

• Look in that last folder location for the prefs.js file and open it with notepad.

• At the very bottom, on a new line add the following text:

• user_pref("capability.policy.default.Location.hostname.set", "noAccess");

• Save the file.

• Restart Firefox.

Either one will accomplish the same thing. Pick which seems easiest for you.

When you are done and have restarted Firefox, go back and check the test page again to see if it is now safe.

It isn't clear if Firefox 1.5.0.9 builds are impacted...and no word if this will be fixed in the Firefox 2.0.0.2 release coming soon. So do this now.

Mozilla Add-on Page Redesign

If you aren't a big Firefox fan, you may not have noticed that Mozilla is redesigning their Add-on site.

Firefox Extension Guru has been working hard, covering the changes quite extensively in a number of ongoing blog-post installments: [Part 1] [Part 2] [Part 3] [Part 3.5].

To summarize: Mozilla has been removing a large number of "marginal" and no-longer-maintained Add-ons, as well as those only offered for older Mozilla application versions. Additionally, Add-on's are going to be placed in a "discussion and review" sandbox before being added to the site. Trusted Add-ons will go directly to the public once updated, while new ones and "untrusted" add ons will need to be reviewed and discussed before made public on the "official" Mozilla Add-on site. Take a look at the excellent flow-chart diagram at that link.

Developers can always continue to offer their Add-on's to Firefox and Thunderbird from their own personal websites. Mozilla isn't restricting that at all. They are just trying to deal with an "extension-bloat" issue that has made it difficult of late to sort out the "wheat from the chaff" on the "official" Add-on site of late.

I think it is a smart decision, as many new Firefox users will turn to Mozilla's Add-on site as their primary source for Add-on's. If they get burned by a bad or less-than-useful extension obtained here, that might leave a bitter taste in their mouth for the Firefox/Mozilla experience. Think of it as Quality Control.

Mozilla Build Goodies coming soon?

Firefox Extension Guru also tips us to cryptic Mozilla Firefox 3 status meeting notes indicating that at least Bookmarks on Places seems to be targeted for inclusion in Firefox Alpha 3.

Places is to be a new design by Mozilla for storing bookmarks, history and other related page information. It was much anticipated to be included in Firefox 2.0, but missed the cut. Tentatively it now looks to appear in Firefox 3.0.

Also seen in those notes, is discussion to nominate some current popular extensions for inclusion in Firefox. That is a bigger deal than it appears, as Firefox has always been touted (among other things) as being small, fast, and light. The whole "extensibility" of Firefox makes it a popular alternative to Internet Explorer--add what you need and leave out what you don't.

Extensions currently being nominated for evaluation/inclusion are: URLFixer (auto-corrects URL typos), LocationBar² (improves URL address bar readability), Firebug (page code inspection tool), Console² (replaces JavaScript Console), Site Specific Prefs (force pages to display the way you want them to), maybe a revised download manager, Print Hint (alerts for printer-friendly webpages), and TableTools (custom-sort, filter, or copy any HTML table).

All of these look quite nice and useful, some would be helpful for "regular" users, while others would be powerful tools for "power" users.

A New World? -- Functional Offline Web Apps!

Finally, in a curiosity-feeding Read Write Web report, Mozilla developer Robert O'Callahan commented that Firefox 3 will deliver support for off-line applications. And he uses Gmail, Google Docs & Spreadsheets, Google Calendar as examples. (See his additional comment for more details.)

Would you find Firefox support for off-line usage of web-apps a helpful feature? I bet a lot of folks would.... (--via Google Blogoscoped)

I did some comment reviewing and then came across this related application:

The Dojo Offline Toolkit

What is the Dojo Offline Toolkit? .

"The Dojo Offline Toolkit will be a small, cross-platform, generic download that enables web applications to work offline."

To get an idea of what it will look like in action check out the post: Offline Gmail and Blogger Using the Dojo Offline Toolkit. It provides a look on how it could work with Gmail, Blogger, and a corporate portal site.

They even now have a demo-page "Moxie" up to illustrate and test their progress. (Related blog post: New Dojo Offline Release: Offline Files + Automatic Network Status) Moxie demos an online/offline web based word processor. Still very early in development, but the concept is fascinating.

Bonus points for their nicely crafted Lab page!

I'm adding the sitepen blog to my RSS feed list to keep an eye on!

I think the field of offline web applications is area that has the potential to grow into a very strong and healthy supportive branch of the overall web-browsing experience and it may just help redefine what the "Web" is down the road.

Until then, it will be fun to watch what happens!

--Claus

Lifehacker posted a wonderful tip on how to back up your (new) Blogger blog posts.

Normally, I fire up HTTrack Website Copier (freeware) and in a while, eventually have a copy of my blog tucked away on my hard-drive, ready for off-loading to a CD-R disk. Only thing is that if I forget to set the link depth correctly, I end up scraping a copy of each linked page along with it. While interesting to see which ones have gone MIA, it can take a bit of time.

The Lifehacker gang found the following tip over at Google Operating System blog's post: How to Backup a Blogger Blog

The Backup

So, if you have a (new) Blogger blog, or have converted your old Blogger blog over to the (new) Blogger blog, just use one of these, replacing the "blogname" with your blog's name:

To display in a single page view the last N posts from your blog, use the following URL:
http://blogname.blogspot.com/search?max-results=N

Example: If your blog has less than 1000 posts, you can save this page:
http://blogname.blogspot.com/search?max-results=1000

Once you have the page loaded up, just save it to your drive.

For Firefox, just select "File", "Save Page As...." and give it a name (I use a name-date combo) and a place to save. Done!

For IE7, same thing, "File", "Save Page As..." and give it a name.

Both Firefox and IE7 offer several formats to save it in. I just chose the "complete" format method.

Google Operating System suggests using the Firefox Add-on DownThemAll to grab photos uploaded to your blog as well.

Don't forget to back up your Template as well

Now would also probably be a good time to download a copy of your Blogger template file as well.

Go to the Template tab from your Google Dashboard. Then select the "Edit HTML" sub-tab link.

Then use the "Download Full Template" link under the Backup/Restore Template and save it locally as well.

The Restoration

Restoring a saved template file is easy. Just go to the same place in Blogger you saved your template from and use the upload file feature to put it back.

Unfortunately, there isn't any explanation given on how to restore your blog posts with your saved file.

Here are some suggestions:

Open the local file in Firefox, select the post you want and copy the source-code, then paste it in your post-editor (HTML-mode) and repost. The date would be off, however.

Open the local file in a brawny notepad-editor program--like NOTEPAD++ Dig into the code and find your post. Then, again, copy and paste the selected code into your post-editor (HTML-mode) and repost. Again the dates would be off.

Reality Check

This really isn't a great technique if you are really trying to capture a mirror image of your blog to then restore--with perfect date returns.

I would gather this would be more for someone who is afraid that a bored night-watchman at Google decides to press that small green button on his security desk that doesn't have a label. You know, the one that mysteriously deletes GMail archives?

This would allow you to quickly and easily save the "meat and potatoes" of your blog post content and formatting. In the event of data loss, you would still have something to work with in a relatively easy HTML code-preserving format.

Google also has their "Official" Blogger blog backup plan solution, although it doesn't seem quite as easy, nor does it provide "restoration" support either.

I like this single-page blog post generation trick. It is quick and easy enough to do with a minimum of fuss.

Bonus tip:

Once you've created your "custom" Blogger 1000 post page generator URL, save it as a bookmark!

Just one click on that bookmark to generate the page, and a few more to save it. Pretty Easy!

Happy Blogger Backups!

--Claus

Boston got caught by a wicked "false-positive."

Austin didn't: Cartoon Network Stunt Didn’t Cause Problems In Austin.

Apparently Texans are either too savvy to panic at a finger-flashing LED display or too busy to notice.

As most of us are not highly trained law-enforcement personal like Jack Bauer, it can be difficult to really assess if a object, person, or action is a real hostile threat going about our daily lives.

Honest mistakes can happen....

Recent Schneier on Security Highlights

• Non-Terrorist Embarrassment in Boston - Security guru Bruce Schneier takes a hard look at the Mooninite invasion.

• The Psychology of Security - Essay in Progress by Bruce on how our brains work and fail at assessing security threats and "...why our feeling of security so often diverges from reality."

• Dave Barry on Superbowl Security: Super security: Bad guys don't stand a chance - Very funny

New (to me) Security Blogs

I've mentioned before that I try to do a daily review of RSS feeds on computer security topics and websites. This helps to get me focused on the right frame of mind as I begin my workday. From time to time I will be able to identify either a growing threat and/or solution and share it with the "powers that be."

Two new computer security blogs I've added to my RSS feed list recent are Mark Curphey's SecurityBuddha.com and .:Computer Defense:. Both bloggers have a really down-to-earth style of writing that avoids the try techno-speak.

Thanks to Computer Defense, I was led to a newly-birthed blog, A Random View of an Insecure World. It looks to be off to a interesting start.

Network and Computer Threat Portals

So there, I learned about rpoppa's views on global computer and threat trend pages (he has some points) and particularly the Arbor Atlas - Global Summary Dashboard threat portal.

Overall, it is a well designed threat-page. It provides a global map of active threats, summaries of current threats, a vulnerability risk index, top scanned services, and top threat sources.

Not a bad place to check in at periodically.

That got me looking and reviewing for more:

• SANS Internet Storm Center - Still my number one place to check daily for network and computer related security tips, techniques and threat information.

• ATLAS Dashboard: Global Summary - mentioned above.

• Postini: Stat Track - Resource center with information about Directory Harvest Attacks (DHAs), spam activity levels, virus frequency, and they have maps too!

• McAfee Threat Center - Good information about breaking threats, current malware, potentially unwanted programs (PUPs), spam activity, Top Phish scams, and vulnerabilities. Yep, maps here as well.

• Vulnerability and Virus Information - Secunia - I like this site a lot. Security highlights, advisories, information and statistics. No maps.

• FrSIRT - Security Research and Cyber Threats Monitoring 24/7 - Security highlights, advisories, and malware alerts. Color coded to stress you out.

• Welcome to CERT! - Security Alerts, current activity lists, and vulnerability resources at a glace.

• Virus Bulletin : Independent Malware Advice - provides quite a lot of virus, malware, and spam-related information, reviews and analyses. Free registration is required to access their informative archives and content.

New Anti-Malware Products

Released: Sunbelt Software's CounterSpy v2. A well updated program that has a long and solid history of helping home user's keep their pc's clean. More details on the enhancements at the SunbeltBlog. Free 15-day full-version trial. Low consumer-friendly price.

In development: Lavasoft is working on its latest version of the popular anti-spyware product Ad-Aware SE Personal. According to a February 5th post on the Lavasoft Blog, the new version will be named Ad-Aware 2007 and come in both Free, Plus, and Pro versions. Currently they are looking for folks willing to become a registered Lavasoft beta tester. So if you can't wait for the spring targeted release, and are willing to put up with beta software, this might be a good opportunity.

Did you know that Lavasoft offers some extensions, tools, and themes that can plug-into Ad-Aware?

• FileSpecs - for Ad=Aware Pro only - gives additional data on files located during the scan.

• HexDump - view information on files - such as cookies - like who the originator was.

• LSP Explorer - view active Layered Service Providers (LSP's) on your system.

• Messenger-Control - disable the Windows Messenger Service.

• OE/W Messenger-Control - disables the Windows Messenger Service from running if you use Outlook Express.

• Tweak SE - Tweak items and features of Ad-Aware. Handy tool to customize the program.

• Skins (free) - Yellow Sky, Greyscale, Medium Blue, and the Default

Keep safe,

--Claus

Every now and then I have to get wiggy with the command-line.

Its actually kinda fun now with the highly-modifiable, tab supported Console (freeware) utility.

I remember pouring over an old DOS 6.22 booklet that came packaged with one of our agency's x486 systems many, many years ago to prep for an IT technician's job. I didn't get the job then but it ended up coming in handy down the road.

While I wouldn't consider myself an expert-level command-line guy, I've got the handful or two most used command-line commands down pretty well.

Being proficient in command-line environment is a real plus. Yes, most everything you need to do can be done with a GUI-based application or utility. But sometimes you can be even more efficient by using the son-of-DOS.

Here are some more useful command-line resources, for the curious to the masters.

XP/2000 Command Line Tip List

• 14 Windows Command Line Tricks - well documented list of some not-so familiar commands that can be quite useful in a pinch. -via Daily Cup of Tech

• Windows XP Commands - nice, plain and A-Z formatted list of commands. Good when you know what you want to do, but can't remember the exact command name.

• Windows XP/2000 Commands and Tools - a number of commands particularly focused on network administration tasks. -via NetworkClue.com

• The Windows XP Command Line, Batch Files, and Scripting- Using the Command Shell - good primer material on command-line issues, topics and techniques.

• Microsoft Windows XP - Command-line reference A-Z - Where better to get the details on all these commands, the command syntaxes, and the power of their switch parameters than from Microsoft itself?

• Windows 2000/XP Command Prompt - Cheat Sheet [[PRINTABLE]] - print it out and keep a copy in your bag.

• Beginners Guides: WindowsXP Command Prompt - PCSTATS.com - user-friendly intro into understanding what the command-line is and some basic commands to become familiar with.

• Learning DOS - Really, really basic commands. For those who want to stay in the kiddie pool. -via NetworkClue.com

Making Batch Files

Once you have progressed into feeling comfortable with the power of the command-line, you can leverage that power by creating batch-files. These files are constructed of a series of logical steps, loops and commands. I use a simple batch-file I wrote in Lavie's XP laptop's startup folder to release and renew her IP address to make sure she gets a good IP connection.

• Batch File Help - Quite possibly my favorite guide for making batch files.

• Beginners Guides: Understanding and Creating Batch Files - PCSTATS.com - A well written multi-page introduction to batch-file concepts.

• Creating DOS Batch Files - Fast text page with highlights to illustrate the structure and methods that batch files work under.

• DOS Batch Programming - Eric Phelps provides some good tips and techniques on batch file writing.

• Microsoft Windows XP - Batch files - Again, nice detailed information about batch file operations and structure.

Windows PowerShell - The Next Generation

I'd love to have the time to learn how to really use the power of the new Windows PowerShell.

It's like the command-prompt on steroids.

• Windows PowerShell - Microsoft

• An Introduction to Windows Power Shell (Monad) - The Code Project ... nice, approachable introduction into PowerShell fundamentals.

• Windows PowerShell Team Blog - Get the latest news from the team that created it!

• Scripting with Windows PowerShell - Scripts, tips, virtual labs, books, and articles. Wow!

• Windows PowerShell Getting Started Guide - MSDN Library resource.

• PowerShell Managed Reference - MSDN Library resource.

Bonus Prize - FrontMotion Login

Not command-line related--and very cool!

Seems that with some tweaking with the tools at FrontMotion Login, you can have a custom Flash-animated XP log-on screen. (More in the forums.)

Who knew?

Animated XP logins with FrontMotion Login - via Download Squad

Enjoy.

--Claus

While I am not quite a "Monk", I do tend to pay attention closely to the small things; in life, with technology and systems, with operations and logistics.

It's one of the things that makes me very good at my job, and drives Lavie crazy.

While she can remember just about everyone she went to school with since kindergarten, I can remember just about six or seven folks. I'm terrible with names, and not much better with faces. But ask me to recall a registry key setting, or where every Exxon gas station is in town, or where Alvis last tossed a particular belt in the house, and I can probably tell you. It's a blessing and a curse.

At work this pays off well in writing documentation and technical process descriptions. Contingency plan development is another area that I am strong in. Where the Boy Scout motto is "Be Prepared," for some reason my motto seems to be "Be Prepared, with a supportable answer."

Paying attention to the details when working with technology systems and computers is very important. If the integrity of a network or computer has been compromised, the damage to self and others (not to mention the data represented) can carry a terrible cost.

That's one reason why I spend so much time focusing on trying to provide reliable home-user security tips to others. It's not so much that I think I'm some expert or anything, there are others who know tons more that I do regarding network and system security, it's just that for many pc users, it can be very difficult getting good information out of those experts and figuring out how easily apply it to their systems.

Give me a system, and with the tools I use, I can usually tell pretty well if something "malicious" is going on. In many cases I can restore its integrity. Sometimes I cannot and to do so, will recommend (or require) a restoration of the operating system from scratch. That just may be one of those things needed to bring back trust to a system.

In "real-life" this attention to detail can have benefits as well.

Catastrophic Failure Denied...

For instance, over the last four days or so I began to notice a very tiny "shimmy" in my steering. It seemed to get a bit more pronounced over 30mph. But it was only noticeable when I drove with one hand on the steering wheel.

For the first two days I thought that it was just because I had a bit too much air in the tires and I was getting more road-feedback than usual.

On day three I decided I was going crazy and "Monking out" again, it was so slight I was kidding myself.

Yesterday on the way to and from work I decided that the "shimmy" must really be happening and that I likely tossed a wheel balancing weight, causing the slight wobble in the steering.

I checked out the tires and rims and thought I saw where it looked like the adhesive remained from a flat "stick-on" counter-balance weight remained on one of the rims.

So I took it into my tire-shop for a re-spin and balance.

Imagine my surprise when they told me that it wasn't a balance issue at all.

One of my front tires had began to have the outer tread-belt separate from the core; in multiple places! Yowsers!

I asked to take a look and on the inside edge of the affected tire, the failure was quite visible...and frightening. It would have been very hard to spot while the tire was mounted on the axle...obviously I didn't see it earlier. The tire shop manager said it was a defective tire. Sounds good to me based on what I observed.

I shudder to think what the consequences of ignoring that very slight "wobble" might have been while speeding down one of our freeways at 70mph had the tire picked that moment to catastrophically fail.

They other tire had sufficient tread-life on it, but I decided to replace it anyway as well. I got the same brand/model (again). So I now have the two almost-new tires on the rear that I had purchased about 6-months ago, and the two brand-new ones on the front. (Being a detail freak, I hate the thought of having a mismatched set of tires on my car.)

I will be going with a different make/model tire when these four are worn down. I had bought a set of Yokohama's for Lavie's car over a year ago and I positively love them. They feel and handle beautifully...unfortunately when I got hers, they didn't come in a size that would have fit the stock rims on my Saturn and I didn't want to get new rims. Maybe I'll get lucky next time.

So, because I pay close attention to how my car feels, drives, sounds and performs, I was able to pick up a slight "odd" feeling that just seemed out of place. I (eventually) went with my hunch and investigated it further. That probably saved my life and others sharing the road with me.

Taking care of your computer is not much different. If something starts acting funny, sluggish, or just seems off, stop and take a look at what is going on. Run some tests and try to pinpoint the issue. Trust your hunches...no matter how small. If something doesn't look right, don't keep on blindly clicking on!

If you can't figure it out but still have that same feeling, go ask an expert.

Who knows what catastrophe you might avert?

Do me a favor...

And while we're on it, please do me a favor and check all the tires on your vehicles this weekend. Make sure they are inflated properly according to your car owner's manual or the tire inflation sticker on the frame/glovebox/wherever.

Don't be shy, carefully crawl around them and feel the edges, especially the inside and make sure they are wearing evenly and feel normal. Turn the steering wheel all the way to the left and visually inspect the inside edges, then turn it full-stop to the right and check them again. If something looks or feels off, take it in to be looked at. Most tire places will inspect them for free. All tires have wear-bars built into them. If the tread surface has reached the wear-bar, replace them.

• Checking Tire Footprint with a Chalkline - neat tip.
• Safercar.gov - tire FAQ's
• The Penny Test - Car Care - Motor Trend

A periodic tire inspection shouldn't take more than a few minutes to do, and it just might save our lives.

Thank you kindly.

This public service message reminder has been brought to you by Claus.

I've been crunching numbers for work and am done with it.

Here's some stuff I've seen today but am just too darn tired to deal with much more:

Google Webmaster Linking Stats Reports!

I've been using Google Analytics to get a good picture of how many visitors have been dropping in. However, while it has some strengths, finding out where folks have made links to my pages here is a bit of a challenge. On Tuesday, Google released a great companion tool to Google Analytics to dig that information out. Me Likey! It is easy to set up. Free. And provides the stats in a very easy to obtain manner! Wow!

Official Google Webmaster Central Blog: Discover your links

Official Google Blog: Who links to your site?

Google's webmaster tools and also at Webmaster Tools

Ignoring Enhanced Online Banking Security Features: Technology or User Weakness?

So my bank was one of these that recently changed the online login process for authentication. Besides all kinds of complex passwords, I also had to pick an image (from a limited set) to recall. When I log in, I should be presented with the image. Basically, if I don't see my image, then I should bail out as the site might be a phishing attack and not really my bank. OK. Fine. Whatever.

Well, a recent study found that a set of participants kept on clicking, even when HTTPS indicators were removed from the browser (indicating a secure session was active) or when they failed to see their authentication image, or when security certificate warnings were presented. Yikes!

The researchers are reported to have concluded that image-authentication security methods in use by banks is ineffective.

I was going to write a long fuss about this...not so much the study as I think it is pretty well on the mark, but how the real issue isn't with the technology, but how users fail to follow safe computing/surfing rules... It doesn't seem to be a technology issue, but (again) a user compliance and understanding issue.

But then, HTZRegz over at .:Computer Defense:. did a much better job putting it into words.

The study however isn’t my concern… my concern is with the NYT article… It’s misleading to readers… There’s no flaw in the websites of major banks… and if I were these banks I’d be rather upset at the NYT for the equivalent of slander right now… As I said in the title this article could have been called “Common Knowledge: Users Regularly Click-Thru”… This is where the problem lies. Users will common click next.. Call Tech support, what do they say, “Click next until you’re done” (This is negligence on the tech support companies part)… Instructions on websites will commonly say, click next until you’re done… Users have come to accept, “Click next until you’re done” as the standard… in an effort to make computers easier for the average user… we’ve made them more vulnerable… we’ve been complacent in our duties to keep the end user informed…. to pass along knowledge… Basically, we’ve failed them.

The problem now is how do we re-educate them… The NYT should be addressing and answering that question… addressing the issue of users that “Click-Thru”… This study is alarming but not for the reasons that the NYT addresses… it’s alarming because so few users know how to act and respond… They want the ease of use…

Quoted from .:Computer Defense:. » “Study Finds Security Flaws on Web Sites of Major Banks” or “Common Knowledge: Users Regularly Click-Thru”

Study: Users ignore bank security features - Network World

Yeah, what he said.

About that Vista Firewall...

I haven't had the time to really play much with my RC1 Vista build. I haven't and probably won't load it on any of my XP systems here at home until at least near the end of the summer. So I can't speak with any amount of authority on the Vista firewall, just yet.... But until then, here is some stuff to chew on. Sounds like Microsoft is trying to make some progress, but....well...you decide.

» Screen Gallery: When is a firewall not a firewall? When it’s Vista’s built-in firewall | Berlind’s Testbed | ZDNet.com

Vista’s Windows Firewall with Advanced Security - via Dozling.com

And while we are on the subject....

Microsoft OneCare fails virus test - vnunet.com

Bummer. Although once I got to reading the article, OneCare (and some others) actually seemed to have failed on malware detections...which isn't (to me) quite the same thing as viruses. On the other hand, it did seem get 99.91 percent of the threats...so that must be one high-bar test to jump over to pass. And if I am reading it all correctly, the test consisted of 37 malicious programs. Hmmm. I'm confused now...I think I will just click on through, and click on through, and click....

Windows Live Writer Group..it's almost like a backstage pass!

I'm waiting for the next release version of Windows Live Writer. I love the current version, but there are a number of features I want to see!

According to discussions at the Windows Live Writer Group the next release is still a while in coming, but to gain some insights into the development process for WLW, go read the posts. --via CyberNet News

PCLinuxOS 2007-- Looking Wicked Cool!

I've tried the Beta1 version out and love it. Really love it. It has been completely redesigned and seems faster, cooler, and more polished than ever before. Once it goes "final" I'll be loading it on Alvis's pc as soon as the burned ISO file cools.

In the meantime, check out this review over at tuxmachines.org: PCLinuxOS 2007 Beta 2 (Test 1)

More to drool over...

Screenshots - PCLinuxOS 2007

PCLinuxOS: News

Make it BIGGER! You know you want to!

Yeah, I know that sounds like a bad-spam subject line...

God bless Scott Hanselman's Computer Zen - How to change the width of the text insertion cursor

I never realized that one could make the blinking insertion point cursor wider. I just needed to tweak mine one notch, but it makes a world of difference when editing documents.

Who knew it could be that easy?

Texas, Oh Texas....Home of wide open....software documents?

Slashdot | Texas Bill For Open Documents

I just spotted this over on Slashdot. I work for the State of Texas. I'd like to consider myself a proponent of open-source software and all the benefits that go with it. However, as an technology insider...I'm not sure how I feel.

So for now I will just quote Yossarian from Joseph Heller's Catch-22:

"I suppose I have an ambivalent attitude toward it."

Yep. That describes my feelings about it pretty well for now.

Better than Web 2.0...Create a Useless Account!

Feeling left out? Didn't get on the wagon in time for the latest Web 2.whatever?

Don't fret!

Go right now and create your very own Useless Account.

Heck, create as many Useless Accounts as you want!

Then leave them behind and never go back to them again.

It's guiltless fun!

No web-developers will be upset for once at the inflated sign-up numbers, but brought crashing back to earth when only a handful of users end up sticking around, long-term.

-via Download Squad

Yawn...Is it time for breakfast yet?

--Claus

To be honest, I had never planned on being a father.

I really didn't want to be one.

It wasn't because I was selfish and wanted to spend all my money and time on pursuing my own interests...that's not really me. I just didn't think I would do a good enough job with all the responsibility that entails.

After Lavie and I got married, she worked hard to help convince me she believed in me enough to want to try.

Then after all that soul searching and personal growth, it looked like we wouldn't be able to have children at all.

Amazing.

So we gave up on the idea, kind-of. Lavie asked me what I wanted for my upcoming birthday and I told her I would be happy with either a baby or a dog.

We settled on the breed. A Schipperke.

We had a breeder picked out and a puppy waiting. We kept its picture taped on our bedroom mirror.

As my birthday neared we were all set to make the trip up past Tyler to get it.

Then one afternoon, Lavie came home and gave me a present.

Turns out I wasn't going to be getting a dog for my birthday, after all.

I wasn't going to be a doggie-daddy.

We were going to have a baby. I was going to be a baby-daddy. Our baby. The baby who would become Alvis. A mysterious thing known as a daughter, which brings delight and pride and confusion to fathers everywhere.

Our home is filled with her artwork and pictures and love. She is our joy.

I'm not a perfect father, but she and Lavie say I'm doing a good job so I guess that's something.

John "flagrantdisregard" Watson posted his musings on being a dad: Where’d my baby go? and particularly how quickly children grow up.

For me, two recent facts have oddly forced me to realize I have a daughter, growing.

First, her blouses and shirts and coats no longer will fit on her children's sized hangers. No matter how hard I try or what techniques I use, they keep sliding off. And I am going to have to deal with it and go buy her full-size hangers.

Secondly, I got the honor of taking her out to buy some new pairs of jeans this weekend. We had a great time and actually succeeded in finding some.

Only, we had to get them from the junior's department and they were size 1's. She isn't even a teenager yet and we are shopping in the junior's department...because she is so tall.

Geesh.

And I remember when we could put stuff on the kitchen counter to keep her out of it.

Gone are the days.....

On the other hand, while we were burning time together, we checked out the latest mice and keyboards in the office supply store. Alvis showed quite a bit of her geek discussing her opinions on the finer points of ergonomic mouse and keyboard feel with me.

Maybe I'm doing something OK after all.

--Claus

I've provided several lists of home/personal PC security software resources users may find helpful in scanning, securing, and cleaning their Windows based computers of rootkits, malware and spyware, viruses and trojans, and rouge processes:

• Grand Stream Dreams Post: Anti-Rootkit Tools

• Grand Stream Dreams Post: Anti-Malware Tools

• Grand Stream Dreams Post: Anti-Virus Tools

• Grand Stream Dreams Post: System Process Tools

I almost always have a copy of most of my tools and the setup and installation files for my most preferred utilities and applications in these categories on an ever-present USB stick. That's important, because if I am asked to look at a user's pc, and it has been compromised, I may want to disconnect it from the network to do my work, severing any malicious activity from the network. Or maybe the network connection has been damaged or destroyed by the malicious file. In these cases, I might not be able to otherwise download one or some of these programs from the Net to the local pc.

Having a copy on my USB stick (set to read-only to avoid cross-contamination of my USB volume) is very useful.

Because of this, I don't usually see a daily need to run an on-line scan of a system to look for the presence of malicious software. No Net access means these options don't work. Also, dial-up users may find the time required to run these may be prohibitive. Broadband access users wouldn't likely see that issue.

However, there are times when the the option of running an online scan of a Windows system might be better than nothing.

Or in the case of a few online scanning services...they are dead-useful resources when working with a potentially compromised file that may not be registering with your installed anti-virus application, and you want peace-of-mind before opening it.

Or you might be getting what you think is a false-positive return of a file you a very sure is legitimate...but want a second opinion before progressing.

There are a number of lists out there like this one. I've tried to collect them together and group them by subject in an informative way.

Services and providers presented in alphabetical order.

Note: Some services use ActiveX controls to work, therefore can only be run from Microsoft Internet Explorer. I've tried to indicate these where possible.

Others are more Firefox/Opera friendly.

Some services will scan your entire system while others require the upload of a suspicious file to their service to scan. Reports may be provided via the web or via return email.

Primarily virus/trojan related online scanners

• Authentium - ThreatMatrix - (ActiveX required) - Free system virus scan

• Arcabit Online Scanner - (ActiveX required) - Free system virus scan

• BitDefender Free Online Virus Scan - (ActiveX required) - Free system virus scan of memory, files, folders, and drives' boot sectors with cleansing option.

• Computer Associates eTrust Antivirus Web Scanner - (ActiveX required) - provides virus scanning, curing and deletion support.

• Dr.WEB Anti-Virus - upload a file to scan for malicious software (look on page's sidebar)

• F-secure Online Virus Scanner - (ActiveX required) - Free system virus scan

• Freedom Online Scanner - Free system anti-virus scanner. I cannot tell if it will also remove identified files.

• eTrust Antivirus Scanner (requires MS Internet Explorer)

• HouseCall (Trend Micro) Online Scanner - (Java or ActiveX) - Checks for viruses, spyware or other malware/grayware. Also performs additional security checks and assists with detected item removal. (Windows, Linux, Solaris systems supported.)

• Kaspersky On-line Scanner - (ActiveX required) - Does not remove threats, only alerts user to the presence of a malicious file.

• McAfee Free Scan - (ActiveX required) - Free system virus scan

• Microsoft: Windows Live OneCare Free Online Scanner - (ActiveX required) - scans for and removes viruses, spyware and other potentially unwanted software and vulnerabilities.

• Panda Active Scan Online Scanner - (ActiveX required) - Scans for viruses, trojans, spyware, malware and provides support for removal of virus, worms and Trojans.

• Panda SpyXposer - (ActiveX required) - Scans for malware presence. Does not offer removal support.

• Symantec Security Check: Virus Detection - (ActiveX required) - "Virus Detection checks for known threats, including top threats identified by Symantec Security Response. Virus Detection provides an analysis of your results and offers suggestions for further action. It does not examine compressed files." -- from Symantec's service description.

Single-File Upload Scanners

• avast! OnLine scanner - upload a single file to check.

• CWSandbox - Laboratory for Dependable Distributed Systems University of Mannheim, upload a single file to check file behavior in a "sandboxed" system. Very cool behavior reporting. More information at the CWSandbox.org site. (added to list 02/07/2006)

• FORTINET - Online virus center - submit a single file for review.

• FRISK (f-prot) Software virus lab - submit a single file for review.

• IKARUS Software Vienna - Upload sample file for analysis and response is via email.

• Kaspersky File Scanner - upload a single file to check.

• Norman SandBox Information Center - SandBox Live - Upload sample file for analysis and response is via email.

• Sophos - Sample submission form - Upload sample file for analysis and response is via email.

• Sunbelt CWSandbox - Sunbelt Software's free automated malware analysis. Upload a single file to check file behavior in a "sandboxed" system. From website description, "CWSandbox not only analyzes the given malware, but also all other processes that are started or infected by the malware." More info here. (added to list 02/07/2006)

• Virusbuster - submit file to VirusBuster labs for review and feedback.

Malware (spyware/adware/etc.) Online Scanners

• a-squared Web Malware Scanner - (ActiveX required) - Free system scans for trojans, backdoors, worms, dialers, keyloggers, rootkits, hack-tools, riskware, tracking cookies.

• eTrust (Computer Associates) PestScan - (ActiveX required) - Free system malware scan and removal tool.

• ewdio (Grisoft) Anti-Spyware Scanner - (ActiveX required) - Free system malware scan and removal tool.

• Tenebril - Free Spyware Scan - (ActiveX required) - Free system spyware scan

• X-Cleaner Micro Edition - (ActiveX required) - FaceTime Security Labs malware scanner.

• ZoneAlarm Security Scanner (Check Point) - (ActiveX required) - ZoneAlarm Labs malware scanner--will not remove any malicious files by itself.

Online "single-file" Multi-Scan Test Websites

• Jotti's Malware Scan - Utilizing 15 different scan engines: AntiVir, ArcaVir, Avast, AVG Antivirus, BitDefender, ClamAV, Dr.Web, F-Prot Antivirus, F-Secure Anti-Virus, Fortinet, Kaspersky Anti-Virus, NOD32, Norman Virus Control, VirusBuster, VBA32.

• Virus Total Scan - Utilizing 28 different scan engines: Aladdin (eSafe), ALWIL (Avast! Antivirus), Authentium (Command Antivirus), Avira (AntiVir), Cat Computer Services (Quick Heal), ClamAV (ClamWin), Computer Associates (Iris, Vet), Doctor Web, Ltd. (DrWeb), Eset Software (NOD32), ewido networks (ewido anti-malware), Fortinet (Fortinet), FRISK Software (F-Prot), Grisoft (AVG), Hacksoft (The Hacker), Ikarus Software (Ikarus), Kaspersky Lab (AVP), McAfee (VirusScan), Microsoft (Malware Protection), Norman (Norman Antivirus), Panda Software (Panda Platinum), Prevx (Prevx1), Softwin (BitDefender), Sophos (SAV), Sunbelt Software (Antivirus), Symantec (Norton Antivirus), UNA Corp (UNA), VirusBlokAda (VBA32), VirusBuster (VirusBuster)

Software or System Security Vulnerability Scanners

• Dr. Web Link checkers service - plugin for Opera/Firefox/Internet Explorer. Scans file or web-page prior to opening to verify it is not malicious.

• McAfee WiFiScan - "McAfee Wi-FiScan surveys your current Wi-Fi^® connection, your wireless equipment, and local environment to assess security risks introduced by your wireless network." - from McAfee's service description.

• Secunia's Software Inspector - "Detects insecure versions of applications installed, verifies that all Microsoft patches are applied, assists you in updating your system and applications, runs through your browser. No installation or download is required." - from Secunia's service description.

• Symantec Security Check: Security Scan - (ActiveX required) - "Hacker Exposure Check - Checks whether your computer allows unknown or unauthorized Internet communications; Windows Vulnerability Check - Checks whether basic information about your computer, including your PC's network identity, is exposed to hackers; Trojan Horse Check - Checks whether your computer is safe from Trojan horses; Antivirus Product Check - Checks whether you're protected by a commonly-used virus protection product; Virus Protection Update Check - Checks whether you're safe from the latest viruses. Applicable if you have a virus protection product." -- from Symantec's service description.

Not Quite "Fully-Online" Based Software or System Security Vulnerability Scanners

A few of the products/services noted on other lists are included in their online scanner lists, but actually require download and execution of a exe (executable) based file on the local pc or download and running of exe (executable) based file from memory. While technically these might be considered "on-line" scanners, they are not so in the manner of the ones listed above.

I have chosen to include some of these products in this post, as they may be otherwise beneficial for interested parties to explore further;

• Aluria Software (EarthLink) Spyware Scanner - scans and identifies malware on the local pc.

• Computer Associates's Resource Center: (eTrust Pest Patrol, Optimization Scan, Privacy Scan) - download the appropriate tool and execute.

• Microsoft: Malicious Software Removal Tool (for Windows XP and 2K) - targets only specific threats, included in Microsoft Critical Updates, so you may already have the file (MRT.exe) on your system: It is usually located in the C:\Windows\System32\ folder on XP systems or in the C:\WINNT\System32\ folder on Windows 2000 systems.

• Webroot Enterprise Spy Audit - Generate a unique code, download the audit tool executable, find results.

Primary Sources:

I did quite a bit of work hunting these tools down, and then checking the links to get more information about the conditions they ran under and what category they would best be placed under. However, these links were the most helpful in providing me the services noted.

• Computer Cleanup : Free Online Scanners

• MikeAlao's Blog: Free Online Virus and Spyware Scanners (including updated links)

• NIST IT Security: Free Online Antivirus, Spyware, and Firewall Scanners Review

• VIRUSTOTAL - Hispasec Sistemas's list of participating companies

• jotti - list of participating companies

Just another class of security tools to keep you safe!

--Claus

Post updated on 02/07/2007 where noted. Big Thanks to Computer Defense blog for pointing out the additional scanner links!

I usually collect a number of links and topics during the week.

I let them stew and simmer and reduce until the weekend.

Then I toss in a bit of herbs and seasonings and then serve up free bowls of link-soup on Saturdays and Sundays.

Self-Serve Buffet

I'm not sure how this weekend will turn out...Mom's hard at work to move back to town from the Hill Country.

She's temporarily laid claim to my brother's flat for the past week, and that may stretch into another week (sorry bro! The parking rules here are murder!).

After a few false-starts, she thinks she has located a new-home floorplan she really likes and wants her two sons to give their feedback and blessings before she inks the deal.

So this afternoon might be busier than usual. And you all know what tomorrow is for all us red-blooded he-men?

Right?

Hack the Dolphin's Website Day? ---- no, no, no!

Laundry, grocery, dusting and generally clean the house day!

If I work really hard....I might watch some commercials Sunday night....(I'll update that link when Google updates their page!)

On to the steam tables....

Paul Alan Freshney's Periodic Table - v2.9.0 (freeware) - a wonderfully fascinating tool to help kids young and old alike explore the elements of the Periodic Table. Three serving sizes: Standard (contains small images), Extra (contains high-res images) and Mini (for the diet conscious). Alvis has been using this heavily in a recent science project. It's portable and can be kept on a USB stick if desired. Really cool facts, views, and history of the elements.

Console - (freeware) provides a tabbed interface for Windows command-line. You can easily change the fonts, background, window transparencies, etc. Again, I really find the tabbed interface beneficial when running ping or tracert on several routers in our network. More screenshots and details over at CyberNotes: Using one Console for all your Command Prompt Needs.

Thunderbird 2 News - So far it looks like Tb2 will get a final release in March. I'm still waiting for an RC release version before converting our primary email desktop to it, but last week I did convert Lavie's laptop email to it. She uses Tb to download her Gmail to her local pc with it. The upgrade went very smoothly and integrated with Lightning perfectly. I added a new theme and she is very happy. No crashes. I haven't had time to play with any of the new features, but it looks to be a nice improvement from the current version.

Favicon Picker 2 - Firefox Add-on - I have a quick-link on my work pc to Gmail. I don't usually check it during work, but sometimes I do. Only the Google default favicon is pretty plain. I did a screen-capture of the Google "M" envelope graphic and turned it into a custom icon. Then I used Favicon Picker 2 to change the icon on my Firefox toolbar from the plain icon to the custom one I made. Nice!

Virtual drive mounting tools - ComputerZen sensei Scott Hanselman got a Thinkpad and while doing his load-up of it, tossed on Daemon Tools (ISO-mounter). It blue-screened his system. I know that other users out there either seem to love Daemon Tools or think it is 3vil. I've always had great luck with it on all my systems. Anyway. Scott did some troubleshooting and worked around the issue, but he got a number of suggestions in his post comments on alternative virtual drive/ISO mounting tools:

• Daemon Tools - (freeware) love it or hate it. Very popular - Running on my XP Home systems.
• SlySoft's Virtual CloneDrive - (freeware) Pretty nice! I've switched my XP Pro laptop to use this one. Very light and simple. Who doesn't like an angry sheep? No toolbars or "extras". It just works!
• MagicDisk from MagicISO - (freeware) I really, really like this tool. It has a wealth of features for virtual ISO mounting. I'm running it on my Windows 2000 Pro system. It did BSOD my XP Pro system when I tried to put it on there, but I never took the time to really puzzle out why. And I had had Daemon Tools installed on it prior, so there may have been some driver mojo going on there. So I rolled it back to Daemon Tools before I switched it to Virtual CloneDrive. Next laptop, I think I am going to try it immediately after getting the fresh image on.
• Alcohol 52% - (freeware) I've used Alcohol 120% in the past and really was impressed with it. This is a "light" version of it with freeware. Installs a toolbar that can't be removed during the install process (unlike Daemon Tools), but you can then uninstall it in the add/remove programs list.

One commenter mentioned that Alcohol and Daemon tools are closely related (somehow) and the technologies they use are very similar, so what is a problem for one, might also be a problem for the other as well. Also, it has been said they both use a "secure" SCSI transport driver (SPTD.sys) which might help them get around some disk copy-protection schemes. This might lead to driver conflict issues on some systems.

So if you use these tools for more mundane tasks like I do (ISO image build testing with virtual machines) and not to krack dizks, MagicDisk or Virtual CloneDrive might be more than sufficient for your needs. If you are making "backups" of disks (software or otherwise) to run virtually and avoid keeping the plastic pizza's in your CD/DVD tray, you might need the beef of Alcohol or Daemon Tools. Your mileage may vary...

Zooomr - Online photo sharing website. Since I pulled the rip-cord on Flickr, I've been looking for an alternative. That led me to Zooomr. It does have some neat features...multi-lingual, illustrate location on maps, add sound, note people shown in photos (community building), private photo sharing....free basic accounts. Take a tour and see what you think...

Busing the Tables

I really don't mind much of the web-advertising I encounter on the Net. I understand that advertising helps underwrite much of the free and quality content I enjoy and depend upon. Cool. I do prefer the advertising to be as unobtrusive to the primary content as possible (like the ads/sponsor pieces on PBS). I don't like pop-ups, pop-unders, audio-driven ads, and hover-boxes. And if a blogger or website decides to add a little extra $ to their pockets with ads, I respect that and wish them luck.

A number of technology websites I frequent also have advertising content that I truly despise. Advertising that is intrusive and (in my opinion) seriously interferes with my ability to read the content. There are a number of advertising providers who do this, but two that I encounter more times than most others are IntelliTXT and Snap.

These advertisers have done a very clever job in trying to make their partner's products clear to potential customers in a nice way. More power to them. They just seem intrusive to me so I recently found a way to deal with them, at least in Firefox.

The folks at Snap seem to get it. I must give them props because to stop the popup ads (sorry...Snap Previews) from appearing in your browser, just browse over to their site and click a link to set a cookie that tells the Snap advertisements to go-away. Classy! Thank you Snap.

As for IntelliTXT I'm not aware that they have such a feature. So for Firefox users:

1. go grab the AdBlock Plus add-on for firefox

2. then add the string *Intellitxt* into the custom filter list.

3. Done!

Time for Dessert!

Like your sweets?

DannyChoo has finalized his new site "mascot" Mirai Suenaga. She is pretty cute! I'll be adding one of his banners soon. I can't wait to see her in some of the costumes he has sketched out!

Tokyo Times - usually pointing out the more "odd" elements in Japanese life, brings my attention to a grinding halt on some more Perky PCs. These Small Form Factor PC's (which look exactly like my Shuttle system--sans the graphics) are too, ummm, kawaii to pass up! I've done a custom anime-themed front-piece for my system, but the sides are all bare. Looks like I have some design work to do!

A Word of Thanks

My little bro passed on some swag to me a few months ago. He gave me two pieces of sweet hardware that I am enjoying very much:

Seagate 5GB USB 2.0 Pocket Hard Drive - Although just slightly smaller and lighter than a hockey-puck, it has all the head-room I need to keep two massive sets of portable software and utilities for troubleshooting and repairs, while leaving more than enough room to store user-data at work when I am pulling old machines off desks and putting new systems into play. Awesome!

Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi XtremeMusic PCI card. - I've always sufficed with on-board sound with all of my systems. Never had a need for anything less. However, this is a pretty high-end card and when he gifted me with it, I wasn't really convinced I needed it. I'm not a hard-core gamer, nor do I listen to much media directly on my system. It generally stays pretty silent. Last week I finally added it into my system--have freed my single PCI slot of its dial-up modem card some time ago when I replaced my failed Shuttle PSU. Wow! The difference in the sound quality is amazing! I'm still just running two speakers and a sub-woofer (no surround-sound stuff) but even with this simple arrangement it is very nice.

Thanks Digger!
--Claus