Wide-Open Linkfest

Just got back from a mid-day shopping run. 

That’s the Breaks

Somehow I managed to break the clip off my Blackberry 8830 holster.  The clip is kinda “cheap” so a standard glue-fix wouldn’t work.  The break happened right at a stress point.  I may still try to over-fix it by pinning in in place with some well-placed drill holes and a few super-tiny nail-shanks However, I don’t think it will be worth the effort as the plastic is very thin and even if I was able to drill pinning holes aligned perfectly in the top/bottom halves, the remaining plastic on the sides would be micro thin.

In the meantime I picked up a Blackberry Curve holster. It is a tad-bit smaller than the 8830 holster, but the device does fit securely in it with not too much pressure. And the top-flap does close.  So for now I’m covered.

Somehow I’m disappointed.  I bet John Wayne never broke one of his holsters….

GameTime on a Budget

We (Alvis and I) stopped by the local GameStop store to see if we could find any used bargain PS2 titles.

As proof that a good review on the Web translates into marketing power, I was sufficiently intrigued by Wired’s GeekDad recent post You Let Your Kids Play What? Shadow of the Colossus PS2 game that I picked up a copy for about $10.  I also grabbed Disney Golf for family multiplayer fun sessions.  Alvis—in a surprising mood—selected both ATV Offroad Fury and Hard Hitter Tennis.  Finally, not wanting to leave Lavie out of the gaming, we grabbed Pinball Hall of Fame: The Williams Collection.

Walkout price for the five titles was about $60.  Not bad considering that would be the price of two new PS2 game disks.

I’ll try putting in some game reviews for kicks after we have gotten some play-time in.

Linkfest

Truecrypt Updates to v6, Hides Your Subversive Plots Even Better! - Download Squad – Yep. The most fantastic (and free) tool to manage and secure data on your HDD or USB memory device just got better.  Miscellaneous fixes are rolled up in this version.  TrueCrypt really rocks…including the ability to actually use TrueCrypt to encrypt an entire partition or drive on the fly. A fantastic solution for laptop users.

I also discovered two great posts that take slightly different techniques for automating use off a USB stick.  Check them out as well:

• it’s my blog: Encrypted thumb drive and autoplay howto
• Securing your USB Thumdrive with TrueCrypt

heise Online releases the heise SSL Guardian – Heise Security provides yet another tool for web-citizens to use to inspect the overall security of SLL keys.  Supports IE and Outlook Express. Not compatible for Firefox or Opera…oh bother.  Download Heise SSL Guardian from heise Security UK, freeware.

Secunia Personal Software Inspector RC3 0.9.0.4 – Works great and adds in a few more bug-fixes.  You have to uninstall older versions first, though rest assured your configuration settings will be retained after uninstall/reinstall. For an overview on why all Windows users MUST have this on their system check out this post of mine; Secunia Personal Software Inspector RC-1: Wowzers!

NOTEPAD++ – freeware – just got a version bump to 5.0. Mostly behind the scenes fixes but still, certainly one of the best “advanced” notepad/code-editors there is today.  While not the only one I keep handy, it is the one I use the most. For a short-list of alternatives, see my Notepad Replacements post.

Track Gmail Activity And Remotely Sign Out – CyberNet News – Google has now added a security feature that allows you to quickly see if someone else has been accessing your Gmail account, or maybe you left yourself logged in by mistake over at your brother’s pad.  It’s not easy to spot on the your main Gmail inbox page. Look at the bottom right below the storage-report line and you will see the IP address of where you are logged in at and when that was.  If you click the “Details” link, you will get a list of recent session activity with date/time/IP’s.  You can also “sign out of other sessions” to kill those remote Gmail logins you (hopefully) forgot about.  For more details see this Gmail Blog post: Remote sign out and info to help you protect your Gmail account.

Sunbelt Personal Firewall - (free/$) – This newly released version brings some under-the-hood performance gains, packet filtering, hardening against leak-attacks, and most importantly, is now fully Vista compatible.  I used Sunbelt Personal Firewall for a long time on my XP systems before making the jump to Comodo Firewall Pro.   See Sunbelt Blog’s post New version of Sunbelt Personal Firewall posted for more details as well as CyberNet News’s post Sunbelt Personal Firewall for Vista for their perspective.  Certainly still recommended as a good firewall alternative to Vista’s default firewall.  For other free Vista firewalls see this older post of mine: Free Vista Firewalls: And then there were five.

Windows Incident Response: Deleted Keys in the Registry – Harlan does a very awesome post that should be a must-read for any Windows technician.  Turns out that, like Access, when you delete a registry key, you don’t visually see it any longer, but tracks still remain which can, in theory and practice, be recovered.  I wondered to Harlan if a registry defragger would kill the ability to recover the key and it seems that in initial tests, that is indeed the case.  This is really cool stuff.

Foxmarks Introduces Sync Profiles – While I am awaiting my Firefox 3.0 bookmark syncing solution of Mozilla Weave 0.2 there is a large fan following of the add-on known as Foxmarks. It is quite polished and looks to be up to the task for those who can’t wait or (like me) are currently copying an exported bookmarks JSON file between systems manually. For more see Foxmarks Introduces Sync Profiles over at CyberNet News.

Partition Find and Mount – freeware – looks to be a very handy solution for damaged (but not nuked) hard-drives and partitioning issues.  One of our network analysts was playing with an ImageX image for a desktop system and following my in-house guide. Worked like a charm. Almost.  Only the system couldn’t boot.  Turns out that while he followed the steps perfectly, the drive had been securely wiped, so even though he was able to use Win PE 2.0 disk to format the drive, there were no active partitions set so the files copied but it couldn’t be booted.  A quick round of DiskPart commands from the Win PE 2.0 disk and all was well.   While Find and Mount won’t repair the problem partition, it will allow you to snag data off it once mounted.  Almost good enough. This is a must-keep toolbox item for sysadmins.  Go ahead and also snag Parted Magic,  Ultimate Boot CD, and GParted.  I understand BootIt Next Generation ($) is also a standout tool.

Java Version 6 Update 7 – Just released this week.  Get the latest version of Java on your system pronto.  While you are at it, be sure to delete the older version via Add/Remove programs.  If you really want to be on the cutting edge of Java, and are a Firefox 3.0/Opera 9.5, then try out the Java Platform, Standard Edition 6u10 Binary Snapshot Releases – Build 27.  These are bleeding edge Java versions with some extra features that those browsers can take full advantage of.  I’ve been running both versions (Version 6 builds and the Version 6u10 builds) at the same time on my XP Pro, XP Home, and Vista Home Premium systems with no ill-effects.

ColorfulTabs :: Firefox Add-ons – just got this one installed and lovin’ it.  It colorifies your tabs in Firefox.  Pretty and a bit easier to pick out when that tab-bar is crowded with opened tabs.  Firefox 3.0.x compatible.

Now….off for some PS2’in game fun bonding with daughter-unit!

--Claus

Visual Joys

I got a new set of eyeglasses this week.

I've been fussing about apparent chronic eye-strain in my left eye and finally got to the family ophthalmologist for a checkup. The whole process took about an hour to complete.

Turns out it has been almost three years since my last vision checkup. I had to look up that post on my Blackberry to verify the date during the office checkup. Wow.

Good news was that my eyes are 100% healthy outside of the ocular performance.

I was told that the Rx I had been issued by a last-minute optometrist during my last visit was a bit too strong. So he dialed back the strength in one eye a bit and boosted in in my left eye a tad, also tweaking the astigmatism adjustment in it a bit as well.

I had to pick out my new frames by myself this time. After about twenty minutes of looking through the selections at the local mom-and-pop optical store we love and use in town I went with the very first set of frames I picked up; Adidas's "Inspired full rim model a787" in brown.

They look quite sporty yet refined. I went with the full-rim this time as these are very sturdy and rugged feeling, but the modern style compliments my personality and lifestyle pretty well.

Lavie and Alvis loved them.

There is a bit a curvature to the lenses in a wrap-around style and optically it is taking my eyes a bit of time to adjust, but now-where near the issues I encountered with my last sets.  These frames also have a polarized sunglass clip that I got allowing me to cut-down on the price of getting a 2nd pair of Rx sunglasses.

My left-eye still feels a bit strained but considering it's been working overtime for the past three to six months, and I still have to adjust to these new optics, I can see much better now right out of the box.

Visual Linkfest

Welcome to A Moment of Luxury - Lavie and I have started watching this new PBS series. The host, William Stubbs, turns out to be a local Houston boy and has a very pleasing presentation of his style. Yes, it is about interior decorating primarily but it is very classy and enjoyable. He reminds us of a mix of Lavie's dad and her uncle.

Flickr: Lost America's Photostream - there are some wicked-awesome visual treats in this flickr collection. Great colors and lighting at night for abandoned Americana materials and locations.

I found this King Kong NY wallpaper over at Social Wallpapering that has become my favorite Vista widescreen notebook wallpaper of the moment. It's a graphic from the King Kong movie and the colors and patterns work great for me for the sparse icons I have on it. Still looking for something for the dual monitor desktop....  I also like this wallpaper Heritage Flight 2 especially for the colors of the P-51 Mustang. However the colors of the buildings in the background are too vivid so I will have to do some color work to mute them out a bit first.

BLDGBLOG has had a number of great posts lately:

BLDGBLOG: Buildings and books - from whence I found the Lost America's photostream on flickr.

BLDGBLOG: Sounding Rooms - which essays on hidden rooms and the mysteries they bring to mind.

BLDGBLOG - bonus: this mini-post links to a public-domain book Secret Chambers and Hiding-Places by Allan Fea which provides some creepy and fun stories on hidden rooms. Oldie but goodie!

Arch Daily - Really neat new architectural blog that has loads of stunning modern designs. Lots of great supporting images with the posts.  Every day a new post comes up it is a joy.  I want to be an architect in another life. One of my college buddies played on the UH football squad and was in the College of Architecture program. He was always working on these models. Quite the contrast the big stocky football player and his delicate construction-board design models..Sample post: The Barn House / Buro II.  I love it!

Kong - freeware - For some reason this post has a Kong undercurrent. Kong is a freeware online/offline overhead shooter game with spectacular play and visuals.  Really fun. I spotted this one over in a review at freewaregenius.com. Seems to play well on our laptop/desktop systems.

--Claus

C-64 Madness

My home computing days began with a Commodore VIC-20. We upgraded to a C-64 a few years later.

I remember getting buying the coding magazines off the store racks, racing home and typing in reams of code to try to get a game to run.

If I did everything perfectly and no debugging was needed, it might just work. More often than not I would have to wait for next month's issue to see where they made a printing error to get it to work once and for all.

My dad and brother build a voice synthesizer from plans and parts from Radio Shack. That was pretty cool.

I even remember shopping at our local K-Mart (back when they had a lunch counter in there that we could get hot-dogs, grilled cheeses, drinks, etc.) one day and having just enough summer chore money to get a tape cassette program of the game Super Zaxxon. Man that was fun. Never beat the game but nothing was more thrilling than popping in the cassette tape, loading the game to the C-64 memory, and blasting away.

Ahh the good ole times.

So today I found the site c64s.com.

It contains a bazillion retro C-64 games, all served up in Java for entertainment all over again on your modern computer system.

Games that I used to play, and now I can let kick my butt all over again!

Super Zaxxon

Blue Max

Scramble

They have categories for action, adventure, arcade, flight, platform, puzzle, racing, shootem ups, sports, strategy, and many, many betas.

Some are funky, some are weird, some are just plain scarry! All are chock full of retro goodness

What an amazing website.

--Claus

King Oil

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

Tips, Transformations, Utilities, and Fun - Open for adoption

So here are the handful of sites that I collected, that I wasn't able to include in any of my previous week's post.

While I could spin a post on any of them, in their own right...my week's focus primarily on Blogger and security topics has left them lonely.

So I figured I'd give 'em a bath and blow-dry, then put them out there together for adoption. Take a couple of them home with you...they're potty-trained.

Tips

Got Firefox 2? Having trouble getting to a favorite secure website? It may be running under SSL 2 Protocol...which doesn't appear to be enabled now by default. Fix it: Firefox Extension Guru’s Blog Firefox 2.0: SSL 2 Tweak

Still not working? Tweak it more! Firefox Extension Guru’s Blog: Fx Not Accessing Secure Sites

Did you hear about the 60 (or so) Gmail users who had all their on-line email deleted? Bummer. What can one do to protect oneself? DownloadSquad tips readers on setting up your local email client to back up your Gmail account. I've had mine set up that way, and it's good to know I've got a backup...just in case.

I know I break some grammatical writing rules. It's hard remembering all the finer points of English from high-school and college. I was too busy with, um, other pursuits... So with that in mind, Steve Rubel tips us to colleague Dan Santow's new blog: Word Wise. I hope it gets updated frequently as the current post list is light, but the content is wonderful.

Transformations

I'm quite happy with using the new Zune Theme for Windows XP by Microsoft. I don't usually want anything other than a stable system with just a touch of eye-candy. However: if you want more from your XP themes, check out this great tutorial post: CyberNotes: How to Install Unsigned Themes in Windows XP

Ryan then thoughtfully provides some links to XP themes that mimic (to a better or lesser degree) Windows Vista.

Want to go up one notch on your XP transformation? Hope over to Windows X's Shrine and pickup their Vista Transformation Pack 6.0. It can provide an uncanny update to XP's look.

Want to go up to notches of XP transformation extreme? Get the Flyakite OX X pack. It is an amazing package of several applications that will transform your XP system into a visually (and behaviorally) functioning OS X skin. Wow! Even their website mimics an Apple OS X desktop experience.

Utilities

Deploying a new image of Windows is always a pain. When I must, I get the system all configured, add in my Microsoft updates, delete unnecessary applications and overhead, then run Microsoft's Sysprep tool for XP or 2000 systems. Finally I take an image of the prepped system and get it burned on CD/DVD's for distribution.

Another solution is to use nLite - Windows Installation Customizer. It is very GUI based and very simple to use. Lots of options...and it can optionally make a book image ready for burning to CD or for testing on virtual machines.

The good folks have been hard at work and now also have a version called vLite - nLite for Windows Vista...so if you are already planning Vista image deployments (you brave souls!) your work just got easier! It's still in beta, but with some work, they claim you can get the minimal Vista image down very close to a CD size. That's something!

I've posted before about backing up the drivers you currently have installed on your system. Nothing is a bigger pain then having to do a system restore from the original disks, then finding out you don't have all the updated drives you've accumulated over the years.

Driver Collector 1.2 has a simple interface to help you collect 'em up. Then save to a CD. When you need them...they will be there for you. (via Lifehacker)

More driver backup utilities. - via Grand Stream Dreams blog!

InstallPad is a little, customizable freeware utility that will allow you to make "software install lists." (Note: Requires the included Microsoft .NET 2.0 runtime)

Check the apps you want, and it will download from the source, and run the setups! Done.

You can go with the default list of offerings, or make custom lists (as many as you want) to use instead--say Games, or Utilities, or Productivity Software. In fact, the fine-folks at Lifehacker have already taken the time to put together some custom lists for you already!

Fun

I really liked the updated Solitaire game build in Vista. The cards are beautiful and the game-play smooth. The version in XP no longer satisfies. There are many good third-party solitaire software games out there, but I just haven't found one to make me happy...until now.

Check out David Mayne's freeware game Patience and prepare to be amazed. It comes with over 200 variations of the classic solitaire game, nice card themes, sounds, and scorekeeping. One set of of cards is "girlie" like your the deck your grand-dad kept in the wood-shop...nothing too scandalous--but be warned--you can/should delete that set out of the file set if you want to take the game to work (portable style) on your USB. Heck...it even comes with a utility to use your own images to make card-decks! Now...which anime ladies should I pick........

GoogleX - What the classic Google search page should have looked like...if they weren't scared of Apple's lawyers for using a look-a-like Dock effect.

It works just fine so you can use it instead of the original if you want. I just can't say what privacy risk you may be taking--as the page is not hosted by Google (this is a mirror of their original hosted by Tech info Blog!), although the results are. See also:GoogleX 22 - not quite as smooth. Wikipedia post.

Find anything?

--Claus

Kid Stuff

Life seemed much simpler when I was Alvis's age.

Although we lived in the city, across the street from our newly built house was a vast forest of undeveloped area. It stretched at least a mile long and was a half-mile deep. At one end was a road that folks used to drive down and dump their bulk-trash at. Good for finding tires to bring home, odd appliances, great "boy" stuff.

"Mom. I'm going out into the woods."

"Be back in time for dinner. Watch for poison ivy!"

So off I would go, "cutting trails" though the underbrush. Collecting hardware to build an imaginary rocket-ship. At the far-back side one would come out to a super-sized drainage ditch.

I could disappear for hours in there, Lewis and Clark style.

Back then a kid could ride their bike forever and a parent wouldn't freak. I'd often ride miles away from home.

On these slow summer bike rides, I would keep an eye out for glass pop-bottles. The ditches were often full of them. Sometimes I would have to brave a fire-ant nest that had sprung up around them, but for a diligent kid, an hour's work would net a good haul. Next stop was the local grocery where I could turn them in and collect on the deposit stamped on the bottle.

That often gave me just enough spare change for a "splurge" at the adjacent mini-mart.

My friends would often head over to the video games and drop some quarters into the machines. I almost always had money to spend instead on the latest candy choices. Pop-Rocks weres big. You could still get candy cigarettes. Bit-O-Honey's were my favorites. Every now and then I would have enough to buy a new Delta kite and string (I always seemed to be loosing mine in the trees.) Or maybe one of those balsa wood rubber-band powered airplanes. Those were cool.

Anyway, I never really was a (quarter-eating) video game buff as a kid. I was good at Tempest. That was it. I could go through a roll of quarters on almost any other video game out there in record time. I was bad. Embarrassingly bad. Fortunately I recognized this fact and had a reasonable head on my shoulders to understand eating candy, drinking Frosty root-beers, and playing with flying toys was a much more entertaining waste of my time and money than obsessively/compulsively plunking quarters into video games.

Even to this day, while I still play some PS2 games with Alvis and enjoy a good "exploration/adventure/puzzle" style quest game, it still doesn't fully entertain me.

I recall these childhood memories because RetroThing had a recent post: Play Vintage Williams and Midway Games Online.

The screenshot was from Defender. I had a personal animosity towards that game in particular as a kid. It took too much of my root-beer money growing up. Finally Victory would be mine!

I hopped the link over to the Midway Arcade and a Shockwave update later was blasting away at human-snatching aliens in this classic side-scroller!

And in 10 seconds or less I was out a virtual quarter, having been destroyed way too quickly to even process. Now, however I could beat it!

Twenty minutes later, I had a realization that comes from age and maturity and time spent in the Information Technology trenches.

"Damn...I still suck at these games. Suck really, really badly."

Must be why I was never asked to become The Last Starfighter growing up.

Probably a good thing anyway, or humanity would have been exterminated...or something like that.

--Claus

Links, Rants, and Net Karma

It's Sunday and I've got a real mis-mash of stuff to spit out. Bear with me I'm tired.

That brings me to my first problem.

Sudoku:

See, I've known about this puzzling pastime for some time. Grandma was a crossword puzzle gal. You could always find an almost completely finished crossword puzzle anywere she was. And she did hers in ink, baby! No dictionaries or "cheats" for her. I love words, but ain't dat l33t with the crosswords. Anyway...Alvis kindly left two "medium" Sudoku puzzles she brought home from school (busywork) on the side-table. Friday night nothing much was happening on TV and I'd already seen the brilliant Aggassi/Baghdatis match replayed a million times (man, Agassi is still my hero! Even without his former flowing golden locks!) so I picked up the half-completed page and set to work.

But I just wasn't getting it.

So I hopped on the net and found these two Sudoku tutorial pages:

How to solve Su Doku: tips The mathematics of Su Doku, and

Sudoku (getting started, making progress, reaching out, raising numbers)

OK. Back to the pages. Twenty minutes later I had my "Eureka" moment. A (very late) hour later, both puzzles were done! Fun!

So last night I found the following:

WebSudoku - Billions of puzzles in Easy, Medium, Hard, and Evil flavors. (Easy-peasy, I can now handle the mediums!)

USA Today's daily Sudoku puzzle.

I found I could do some screen area captures of the puzzles, resize them and get about 6 pasted on a PowerPoint page for easy printing. Now I'm teaching Alvis what I learned. I was up until 1am ish I got 5 done in about 2 hours. (I prefer doing them on paper, not the pc.)

And it's all Avis's fault for leaving her stuff around....

Art Class:

While we are talking math: Math, art, and the Droste effect. Pretty Art!

Want to learn how to ink your art? MAD Magazine's illustrator Tom Richmond provides a detailed two-part video tutorial on inking. Part One, Part Two.

Just plain fun:

That crazy Aussie Dan (of Dan's Data) posts a wonderfully entertaining article about the joys of "Wicked Laser's "Nexus" green laser" I got a great science lesson and learned all about the 3vil fun one can have (with pictures) with a high-powered green laser! Muhhaaaahhaaahaaa!

BldgBlog has a neat article about a 1.6km-long carbon ribbon in the skies above Arizona. Yes, another space-elevator lifting concept.

Software Tips/Tools/Techiques/Oopsies:

ComputerZen's Scott Hanselman gifts us with his updated "2006 Ultimate Developer and Power Users Tool List for Windows" Awesome tool list covering many categories. And I thought I posted long blog posts. Bookmark this post, Stat!

LiveAmmo Security News Blog provides a wonderful roundup of A Collection of Rootkit Removal Tools. Bookmark this one as well. Many I know about, a few new ones make an appearance. All but one are freeware.

Computer Associates (eTrust Antivirus) updated their DAT signatures to include the Windows Lsass.exe process. Ummm. Yeah. And if a user set their AV setting to delete the file, the system tanked at boot. Bummer. Hate it when a false positive kills a system.

Mark Russinovich (formerly of Sysinternals) is now blogging at a new address: "Mark's Blog" over at technet. Go feed it. He is already on a tear!

Looking for XP help, support and tips? Bookmark this site: John Barnett Computer Journalist--XP Help and Support FAQ. Nice. Helpful pictures. Great place for finding 128 reminders about the detail tweaks that seem hard to remember.

Gmail Tip:

How to filter Gmail image spam. via Lifehacker. I've been seeing a few more of these slip pass Gmail's strong anti-spam filters lately. This is a great Gmail tweak to address that problem!

Rants:

The recent changes over at Blogger seem to have broken Firefox's ability to remember your login name/pw. Period. Looks like they figured it out and rolled out a new login method. Firefox is now remembering my login credentials again. Thanks Blogger! That was annoying.

I seem to have a rogue Firefox extension on my system. It is rendering cut/paste, arrow keys, and home/end keys temporarilly useless--as in dead and unresponsive. I know it isn't my keyboards as the problem is the same on both my USB and PS2 connected boards and happens on my laptops and desktops here at home and at work. Drivers are fine. Since the only commanality to all seem to be my Firefox loads and extensions, I need to do some work. When I close out Firefox the keys behave again. Sometimes it is fine and othertimes not. It's a real pain trying to copy/paste or navigave around in comment fields on the web and those keys just not work. Sometimes I can get around it by copy/pasting into notepad, then copy/pasting back into the web form field. Weird.

UPDATE--looks like it was either the extension Copy Plain Text or Copy URL+ causing the issue, or maybe the combination of both. I've uninstalled them both and my keyboard arrow keys and "Control-key + (whatever)" key combos are working fine again in web-forms and the like. Go figure.

My little bro. just emailed me last night to notify us he bought a Cannon Digital Rebel SLR.....I'm so jealous. I guess we have the same genes as that's the same one I've been lusting, drooling over for months and almost put on plastic (but I was disciplined and good).

Adobe Acrobat Professional just ticks me off! I have to use it at work for publishing tasks. And it puts this annoying little Adobe PDF creator toolbar in ALL of my Microsoft Office product toolbars! Yes I can remove it, but it returns again next time I re-open the program. I can "hack" a method to remove it, but then some of my Office products alert me that it can't find the removed Acrobat toolbar (Visio). And, it takes the first place on all the toolbars and forces the others a line down. Crappers! And yes, I am aware of quite a few alternative PDF document "producers". I'll post those soon.

Adobe Reader (freeware) is probably the premier application for viewing PDF files. It is nice and everything, but can be a bear to load. Possible solutions?

1) Foxit Reader (freeware) -- allows you to view and print PDF documents.

2) eXPert PDF Reader (freeware) -- allows you to view and print PDF documents.

3) Sumatra PDF (freeware) -- this is a new one I've just come across recently.

4) Keep Adobe Reader, but remove the plug_ins folder from the application's folder. Speeds launch-time.

Karma:

For the longest time I felt like an Internet leach. Taking and learning and consuming the wonderful freeware, tips and techniques the Web has to offer. As this blog progresses, I've been able to begin to give back and share. Lately I've been posting helpful tips and such on my blog (besides my second on-line home over at the Chonicle's TechBlog), and into comments I've ran across:

Digital Master Photographer Thomas Hawk has had some frustrating issues with his pc. I've joind in the tech-support team he's created and left a long list of (hopefully) helpful advice for him.

Digital Master Photographer Thomas Hawk has had some frustrating issues with his Blogger RSS feed going from "Full" to "Short" even though it was set to "Full". So have I. My Blogger RSS feed work-around is to: 1) publish post. 2) go into my Blogger account Dashboard and then select the "Settings" tab, 3) Select the "Site Feed" option. 4) Verify that "Full" feed option is selected (it always is), 5) Save the setting again. 6) Republish the Index. And the full feed returns to my RSS feed view. I've been doing this after EVERY post I've made to retain the "Full" feed and keep it from going back to short.

AndrewLee of PortableFreeware has been wrestling on what to do with the IE browser wrapper app "Browzar" which purports to clean an IE session as your surf. Scott Hanselman doesn't feel Browzar lives up to the bill and the BBC (and others) seem to agree. My recommendation? Stay away and if you MUST use this kind of app for your, umm..."research"....use PortableTorPark instead.

Quick Notepaper generators:

The other day, I had to dash out to a project design and planning meeting. I didn't have a steno-pad handy and needed somthing to take notes on, quick. I popped over to Lifehacker and found their post on Taking great Notes. In it they link to several sites that can custom generate printable note-taking paper sheets:

Notepaper Generator --via simson.net Simple and fast, adds nice little calendars to the top.

Cornell Method PDF Generator --via Study Smarter. Lots of configuration options. Holes/No holes, ruled, graph (grid), or blank and Advanced options like: alternative page size formatting, and line darkness adjustment, and user guide printing options.

Notepad Generator --via Michael Botsko. My ultimate selection. Custom header/footers, Font choices, lines in extra fields, line-height adjustment, and the every handy "Notes" and "Action" boxes for doodling--um--process charting.

Bookmark 'em all, just in case you have to dash to a meeting. That way you come to class prepared!

Whew!
--Claus

Tiny Tools for Techies

Don't I have anything better to do with my time than keep feeding the animals?

Yep. (Alvis and I are playing Zoo Tycoon together today...)

Here are some tiny tech tools that just might make your pc life a little bit easier and more productive.

Replacing Start Run - The Quest Continues via Scott "Computer Zen" Hanselman.

These applications he shares are alternatives for digging into that Windows Start Menu button system; including such gems as Slickrun, Colibri, Find and Run Robot, and my favorite, Launchy.

Check out Pegtop's PStart as well. I've recently switched to Pstart from Remora USB Quick Launch as my USB file launcher of choice. If you're just a little bit clever, you can also use PStart to auto-launch CD-R contents on auto-play.

Do you do a lot of copy/pasting of file/folder path-names? I do. Enter Suresh Online's Clip Path. This is a handy little Shell Extension program that allows you to capture the entire path to clipboard simply by right-clicking on a target file or folder. Nice! Just download the zip, unpack it and right-click the .inf file and select "install." Then it's good to go. Via Lifehacker.

I found this cool little Microsoft toy the other day: Microsoft Exchange Server Error Code Look-up

"Use the Error Code Lookup tool to determine error values from decimal and hexadecimal error codes in Microsoft Windows operating systems. The tool can look up one or more values at a time. All values on the command line will be looked up in Exchange's internal tables and presented to you. If available, informational data associated with the value or values will also be shown."

What that means is that if you have this tool, and come across some strange hex-code error hash in a Microsoft app, just feed it into this app via command-line and it will spit out some (hopefully) more useful error code description. The title and Supported OS say it is for Exchange and Windows 2000, but I've found it works just fine for XP as well. More examples of usage here on Valery's Blog and over at The Tech Republic.

PlacesBar Editor. Mad Dog Sofware (freeware). Tired of being forced by Microsoft to use those "handy" commonly used locations when you are opening/saving a file? Mine are "My Recent Documents, Desktop, My Documents, My Computer, My Network Places." Only I don't use two of those, ever. This mini-app allows you to select ANY folder and exchange it for ANY of those listed (must have five). Nice!

Got a big text (.txt) file (say.....AOL data?) and your notepad app is choking on it trying to open it because it is just so big? You need to look into JR Split File. Handy tool to chop up those houmongal .txt files into custom-sized pieces.

And how does one handle renaming the pieces into a better format? Pick any of these clever file renamer tools. Many can handle batch processing of files as well.

ReNamer
Rename Master
WildRename
Ant Renamer
Oscar's File Renamer

And if you need a renamer application more geared for image files, check out FastStone's Photo Resizer

My two favorite file management utility programs (I almost never use Windows Explorer any more) got updated recently: A43 and FreeCommander. Check them out.

OK, now let's leave the tools and check out some games.

Like space adventure/campaign games? Check out Vega Strike. Think retro-quest adventures like you played on your Commodore are still cool? Then you want the King's Quest games. More of a side-scroller? Sound's like Atomic Butcher [Das Humankapital] is the game for you. More? Boats, Submarine Warfare, Mutant Camels, and tossing paper wads.

That should keep you pretty productive.

See you in the skies,
--Claus

Like Trains?

Like trains?

Dad had lots of scale model railroad sets when we were growing up.

He did lots of very detailed model work. I don't remember getting the chance to run them very much, but I do remember one scale model table he had built in my early childhood home. It seemed to take up over half the room in my child's mind. That was the same room that would become my brother's nursery-room.

The detail on them always fascinated me.

I never really got bit by the model-railroad bug, but later on my brother and dad would build a small-scale train table together.

One of the first games we picked up in the 1990's for a newly purchased Apple Mac was A-Train. It was a black and white railroad line sim game. It was really fun, but I never really got around to playing it very much. College classes and all that.

So as I was surfing around the other day, I came across Simu-trans.

It's a well developed railroad simulator. Not of the "Railroad Tycoon" or Microsoft's "Train Simulator" type. This is more a "Zoo Tycoon" type of build. Alvis would feel really at home with this thing.

The download is a 18MB zip file. Just unpack the file and run the .exe The graphics quality is very nice (for the type of game it is). And there are also a large number of custom add-on packs you can install as well. Unpacked size is about 53MB so if you have a really big USB flash drive, you can take your trains to work! Just don't blame me if you get caught.

Oh yeah. The game is 100% freeware! Windows OS. (Other OS's are supported in an earlier version.)

There is a really large fan-community supporting this game with tons of help guides, pictures, and statistics. Take your time looking around the website. Take it all in!

Go play with some trains.

--Claus

Add & Remove Program Helpers

I try hard not to have too many unnecessary applications fully installed on my pc.

Whenever possible I prefer "standalone/portable" applications that can run from a program folder or off a USB stick but don't need to be "installed" in the normal sense. However, Lavie and Alvis both have quite a few "must keep installed" applications and there are even more of my own I cannot get to run any-other way.

The end result is that when I try to open my Add/Remove programs list from within the Control Panel, it takes a long time to build the program list. It takes even longer if the option to show Windows Updates in enabled.

I've been using two clever little programs for some time now to work around this problem and generate almost instant listings of programs. I simply keep shortcuts to them in my Start Program listing.

SARARP - Small And Fast Add/Remove Programs - Freeware. Nice

Uninstall Tool 1.6.6 - Freeware - I am using this one just a touch more now. I like the GUI layout just a tad more. From CrystalIdea Software. Also has an option to allow you to view "hidden installation" elements that don't show up in normal listings. Handy

More linkage:

RipIt4Me: Back up those pesky protected DVDs - I haven't tried ripping a copy of a DVD yet. I really don't have a need, but just in case you are interested, this little gem proposes to help you with the toughest DVD nuts. via download squad.

Warp Forest - Flash based arcade/puzzle game. Starts easy but gets mentally challenging fast. You must work out proper event sequences to advance to the next level.

Like playing Flash-based games, but not always connected to the Net?

If you use Firefox you can usually capture the .swf Flash file to your pc locally.

1) Open/launch the Flash game/file by clicking on its link.
2) Then right-click around on the page with the Flash window displayed. Eventually you should find a spot (usually near an edge) and get Firefox's context menu.
3) Select the "View Page Info" button.
4) Then in the Page Info window, click the "Media" tab and browse the "Type" column to find "Embed."
5) Look at the address listed and find the file(s) ending in the ".swf" format.
6) Next click that line once and then click the "Save As" button to save to your favorite location.

Then use Swiff Player - Freeware - to play the Flash files "standalone" mode whenever you want. Clever!

See you in the skies,
--Claus

Winter Sonata Madness

I had previously mentioned I was watching a South Korean drama lately. It's called (Stateside) Winter Sonata. I chanced across it a few weeks ago late one mid-week night. It really grabbed me and in 30 minutes I had been hooked.

Its a 20 part mini-drama of 1 1/2 hour episodes. Lavie kept asking me what I was staying up late watching (running from 10-11:30pm weeknights on AZN cable channel). I told her it was kinda like a soap-opera, but not really. As I explained the dramatic plot to her she thought it sounded like a soap opera--it is, but isn't.

I finally convinced her to stay up one night and watch it with me. Less than thirty minutes later she was hooked also. I had to tape it since she isn't a professional late-night TV watcher and before we knew it, Alvis was hooked as well. So now all three of us are living day-to-day on a emotional roller-coaster because of the crazy drama.

I follows the lives of a star-crossed couple. Tragedy separates them in high-school (he kinda dies--bummer), but 10 years later she runs into a guy who she feels instantly in her gut looks just like her former first love. Except it isn't. He is a famous architect who grew up in the US. She goes to work for him and soon loves is blossoming. Great, except for the fact she is sort-of engaged to this jealous guy. Except, see, it really is her true love after-all. He really was alive but just got horribly hurt in a car accident and his mother told everyone he was dead and moved away and had a false memory given to him (for her own reasons....). Wow. Now he has broken up with his girlfriend, At this point is gradually getting his memory back and she has broken her engagement off as well. Wow! And we are just two-thirds into the series. Yikes! Something "Shakespearian" is going on with all their parents as well. I think there is yet another layer to this thing we haven't peeled off yet.

I'm finding many very compelling things about this drama. First, it is filmed "real-world" style. Many of the shots take place outside on the street. You don't ever feel you are watching them play in carefully constructed sets like U.S. soaps. The actors covey a real sense of warmth in their roles. There is also a certain "sweetness" to the angst. Lots of melancholy. The conflict is written a little over the top, but the situations and pain and suffering and love seem very believable.

The dialog is slow paced, almost poetic. And the camera compositions are real works of art. This series is really pulling at our jaded American hearts and ripping them up. Lavie and I are hooked. We are both kinda weepy and been hugging on each other much more frequently.

It's a rare thing to find something that really portrays love and tenderness and the mixed up real-life conflicts that come with it in such a respectful and kind way. This one really hits the mark.

Here's some more linkage, in case you are curious:

Winter Sonata - Wikipedia.
Winter Sonata Fever
Why is Winter Sonata a Big Hit in Asia?


Moving on:

Google Cheat Sheets (Version 1.05) This is a very handy link that provides links to the mryiad of Google sites, tips, tweaks and little known "hacks" that can really increase your power-Googleing skills. Well worth printing out. As an added bonus, if you use the PDF version, all the links are "hot" and work.

Google released SketchUp, a 3D modeling software program. I haven't had a chance to download and play with it, but I can already think of many good uses for it.

Want to add a TV tuner to your laptop or pc, but don't have the room for the extra card? Take a look at the USB device known as the V-Gear MobiTV Global. Neat and for about $100, very attractive!

How does cramming 16GB of storage in the space of about two credit cards sound? Sounds amazing to me. Hope it won't break if you sit on it....

Since we are talking about small things....take a look at the "Space Cube." it claims to be the smallest pc on the market at a little over 2 inches cubed. I'd love to load a really stripped down version on Linux on it and see what it could do. Think carrying a USB stick on your keychain is cool? What if it was an entire PC?

If you are like me, you almost never read the manual for anything you buy. But then when you finally need to figure something out, you never can find it. UsersManualGuide.com archives a large number of manuals on-line. Now you don't have any excuses for not setting the time on your VCR...

How much do you love your blog? Do you love it enough to publish it in paper form? Some publishers are betting you and others would. "Blooks"--how lame is that word? I'm not wholly impressed with the idea. I can only think of a handful of blogs I visit that I would care to enjoy that much. And the whole linkage things kinda gets "lost in translation."

'Course, good old Kent Newsome points us to a new debate by the blogging elitists that seem to suggest that real bloggers shouldn't link. Sorry. Grand Stream Dreams blog will never be link free. I want my linkage! How else can I trick you into wasting your time with me?

Portable Freeware offers two freeware strategy games that port to your USB drive nicely: Battle for Wesnoth and Vega Strike. What the boss don't know.....

Paul Stamatiou shares up his ideas of Windows XP Must-Haves (free/$$). Coming from a Mac guy, the list seems pretty well-rounded. I like his selections and have used quite a few myself.

Do you like those "old-school" cartoons? The original Loony Tunes, Woody Woodpecker, Merrie Melodies stuff? If so, then you have to take the time to explore Golden Age Cartoons website. Man, there's some interesting stuff here.

Lifehacker passes on a tip for the bulk renaming of files in Windows.

I was visiting over at flagrantdisregard and ended up being shown the Wikipedia link to Rock, Paper, Scissors. Did you know there are actually rules, strategies, gambits, etc. to this thing? Wow! Maybe Condoleezza Rice should sit down with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and just have at it with this game. Looser has to back down and concede. Save a lot of time and energy wouldn't it....

Tokyo Times shares with us the latest thing in sending of a newly married Japanese couple: the Bear Blaster. I know I was picking white-rice out of socks, shoes and underwear for days...well, a couple of hours...after Lavie and I got married. At least the bears would haven't been as irritating on the drive to our honeymoon destination...

The AppleGeeks web-comic squad have been doing "guest illustrations" for Piro over at MegaTokyo for some time. I really like their urban style. Check em out. Then again, maybe you don't want to...you might get hooked.

Now, do I want to play BLACK, watch some more Winter Sonata, or maybe Eureka Seven?

I just don't know....Decisions, decisions, decisions. Saturdays are great!

See you in the skies,
--Claus

Black no More

Whew.

Yes I'm still here.

Work has been very busy. And I've gotten hooked on a South Korean "drama" series that runs very late at night. I've gotten Lavie hooked on it too (hehehehe).

But I want to talk about Black--that #(*&@(#*&$)(^ FPS game I've been playing for several months now.

Last night, Alvis went to a sleepover so I had the PS2 to myself. Lavie was under the weather so I had free reign. I was stuck on the final mission for weeks--stupid lack of save points. Anyway. I played for like 3 hours last night. Got to a sweet checkpoint (final battle room). And had to hang it up. To keep my position I had to "pause" the PS2 game and leave it on overnight. Finally after about 2 more hours of game time I finished out the final mission. Game Over! Woot!

The game guide was helpful for finding items and the maps kept me from getting too lost, but the battle techniques weren't very helpful. My approach is pretty cautious. I like to creep, shoot, creep and shoot. Full frontal attacks are not my thing.

So what did I do as soon as I beat the game?

Yep. Started over--on the next higher level...what can I say. It's fun, my confidence is up and now I want to unlock some of those "silver weapons" with unlimited ammo.

I really need to put this one on the shelf now that I have played through and turn my attention to our Kingdom Hearts game--but I don't know if I can....just yet. Smacking black gobby things with an over sized key and goofy shoes just isn't as satisfying....

More posting to come this afternoon.

Got to get the "real world" missions done (laundry, kitchen, grocery shopping, lawn mowing...).

--Claus

A Black Mood

Ahhhhgggghhhh!

So I'm playing BLACK for the PS2. I'm on my final mission. For the whole game.

I start in and play (pretty well) for about 2 hours. Slowly making my way through.

Doing good.

Tossing frags.

Sniping shock-troops.

RPG-wreckage galore.

Nearing the final game climax.

Getting excited. Gonna' beat this thing!

Blast a hole in a bunker.

Got to get through it to go on.

Climb through.

Great.

Now I'm stuck.

In the wall.

Can't move.

Nothing to shoot at.

No one to kill me so I can return to a checkpoint. Where's an enemy shock-trooper when you finally need one?

Empty my grenades (on myself)--minimal damage.

Unload my automatic. Draw patterns on the wall with the shots. Pretty.

Still stuck.

Unload my shotgun.

Empty.

Still stuck.

After more than two hours.

In my final mission.

Stuck.

Have to abandon the mission.

Abandon all the checkpoints I've cleared.

After more than two hours.

Stupid programmers.

Stupid game-designers.

I'm really in a black mood now.

Won't play this game again for a week or more now. That ought to teach them....(yeah, right...)

(Reboot)

--Claus

Dazed and Confused Confessions

Confession #1: I've been kinda "out of it" for the past couple of weeks. The "wreck" and a special project at work have been eating my lunch.

Worn out. I've even been too busy to drop many comments in over at the TechBlog, my virtual pub hangout with the regulars.

See, because of my l33t 5killz I've been placed on a special project at work. It has almost nothing to do with networking or computers or any of that stuff. And to be honest, I don't have much experience at all with this other system and its hardware. Plus it involves supporting a new customer's system so we want to look good. So I've got binders of stuff I'm trying to understand. New offices to find and visit, and new customers who are so happy to see us when we show up, but are confused when we leave without fixing anything (still don't know how!).

Frustrated. Because it is hard leaving my zone of security (desktop/network support) to do something completely foreign is stressful. While I could spend 30 minutes solving a very challenging computer issue, I am spending hours working out how to troubleshoot something I know should be a 10 min. fix if I only knew the system and the commands.

If anyone knows of any good Nortel Meridian PBX system virtualization software out there (if such a thing even exists), I'd love to hear about it from you. Doesn't have to be very new--heck, I don't think Nortel even supports the Meridian systems we have any longer. So crashing a 400+ user PBX system because I don't know the right commands to manage it would be a bummer. I really need something I can practice on and see how all the parts work together.

How tired am I? Our IT team was issued new laptops last week. Our former laptops had to have been between 4-5 years old. These new ones are easily at least four times as powerful (and fast) and instead of being excited, I just got irked that I had to take the time to set it up. I want to be excited about it, really. It is pretty nice. I'm just so stressed out right now I can't find the time to enjoy it. I need to find some removable stickers/labels to put on it (flames?) to pimp it out. Maybe that would help...

The body shop returned my poor car to me this week. It was amazing! Total damage done was close to $2000. I had to pick up the deductible +rental upgrade. I was very nervous about how it would drive being a front wheel drive and them having to straighten up the front end frame. Tracked perfectly with no drift or pull. They even cleaned it up better than when I drove it off the lot new. I did have to adjust the air-pressure in the tires. I keep them a few pounds of pressure higher then recommended so I don't pre-wear the outside edges of my tires (tire-shop tip). They did an awesome job. The family at Kopriva Body Works has had to fix my car twice now, and each time I've been thrilled. It's nice to have my confidence in my car restored so wonderfully. Good folks and wonderful craftsmen. Now if I could just say the same about having trust and confidence in other drivers I share the road with....

Random Links I've collected this week:

The Narrow House -- [an englishman in Osaka] -- Looks kinda cool to me. Something about small and efficiently designed architecture really inspires me. Not for everybody.

Six Studio Ghibli movies to re-air in May on Turner Classic Movies - Set your Tivo today. I highly recommend them all, but that "Pom Poko" one is kinda weird...

Airstream travel trailers teamed with Nissan to design a model called the Basecamp. Looks really nice. I have only the fondest memories of Airstream trailers as we grew up with Mom's parents traveling all over the States in one. Every weekend grandpa would be found on his ladder polishing and waxing the thing.

I haven't really even started playing Kingdom Hearts yet on our PS2. Now comes word that that the sequel Kingdom Hearts 2 is out. Yikes! I better get busy!

ComputerZen master Scott Hanselman takes folks through a walk-though of hunting down a trojan on a system. Good technique to know.

Get some useful Windows XP Command-line tips from Amit Agarwal over at his Digital Inspiration site. In fact, knowing your way around the Command-line interface really can give you an edge with working on your XP/2000 desktop. It's well worth the time to practice using them. Microsoft's XP Command-line reference page, and Windows 2000 Command-line reference page.

New to home networking? Check out Network Magic. Freeware/$$ verisons available. This well polished application helps you to set up and manage a home network. The site has some really good documentation and previews on how it all works. Well worth a look if managing a home network is something you want to do, but don't know where to begin. Seen across many posts, including over at Download Squad.

Confession #2: Guilty blog reading pleasure--Bored Housewife. You go, girl!

See you in the skies,
--Claus

Computer Forensics and other Linkage

Back on track now.

Turned the compost and found a major-big red fire-ant nest in there. I was really conflicted. If I apply ant-killer pesticides I might harm the good earthworms and other creepy-crawlies. If I don't, The nest will get bigger and they will spread into the lawn. So I skipped that area, and turned the rest of the compost. After an hour (to let them settle down) I went back and treated the mound. I also found the starts of 5 more mini-nests throughout the backyard. I guess it begins...

Lavie makes fun of me because generally, I will try to capture spiders and crane-flies and then toss them outside. (In fact--Lavie thinks this Kleenex video is me in action!) She doesn't approve of this method of disposal. She likes the SMASH-SQUISH-WIPE-FLUSH method of insect removal from inside the home. I just have an empathic feeling for the little guys...except fire-ants and roaches. Those two groups of creepy-crawlies get the BLACK ops technique: Search and Destroy with Extreme Prejudice.

Digital Forensics Department:

I don't know if Computer Forensics is your cup of tea. Grandpa was an FBI man so I always found this sort of thing fascinating from a technical point of view. I don't get to do "forensics" work on any of our systems...we have an Office of the Inspector General for that sort of work. We just recover the drives and duplicate them for the OIG team if requested. However, if you are interested in this sort of thing here is some linkage.

Helix, "Incident Response, Electronic Discovery and Computer Forensics" is a Live Linux Boot CD that has just released version 1.7 last week. It is really packed with goodies. It also has an auto-run menu of software for the Windows side. But it's real power is on the Linux boot. Check it out.

Penguin Sleuth Bootable CD was one of the first Linux Live Boot CD's I came across. It hasn't been updated in quite a while, but is still useful.

Other Linux Live CD's that are targeted for Forensics and Data Recover that I am aware of: Plan-B, FIRE, Portable Linux Auditing CD (48MB), and FCCU GNU/Linux Forensic Boot CD.

So where do you figure out how to use this stuff and hone your l33t forensics skilz? Two favorite places:

My first is the team over at LiveAmmo Security News. Their blog has quite a few good items of note. The real goodies are their podcasts on Digital Forensics and Hacking Investigations. Go get some!

My second favorite hangout is over at SecurityFocus. They have extensive white papers on security and forensics. Really a great place to learn and do research using case studies.

Not quite forensics related--but informative and fun: Security Now Podcast with Steve Gibson and Leo Laporte. (I think I've already mentioned this one recently.)

Have fun! Now onto the Linkage Backlog:

Anime and Manga Department:

R.O.D.-The TV is now out as a boxed set. Kinda pricey though....I will have to eventually pick it up.

R.O.D.-The Manga is now being re-released Stateside. One more series to get hooked on here.

GhibliWorld.com (a.la Howls, Spirited, Kiki, Totoro...) News and Production website.

Software and Hardware Department:

In other news...Damn Small Linux released its Live Linux CD now at V 2.3 RC1. I REALLY like this build. It has one of the fastest boot-times for a Linux Live CD I have ever come across. Even running in QEMU virtual session. Nice work. And it still is just under 50MB in total. Sweet.

Big List of Useful Windows Software, nicely categorized by the SH/SC Wiki team.

101 Free Windows Games, arcade level quality over at the 1up.com site.

Also fun, Retrospec designs and creates awesome Retro-inspired versions of games. For starters, check out Head over Heels. Great screenshots!

Ever wanted to put Internet radio songs on your iPod? Use StationRipper [via downloadsquad].

Mark Rusonovich of Sysinternals shows us how to use his powerfully awesome Process Explorer application to run just about any application in a protected-mode wrapper. This is well worth the read.

The ISC-SANS teams gives us some good security thoughts on the risks of using a personalized website portal as your start-page. Also worth the time to read.

TweakHound shares Windows XP Backup Strategies for Home Users.

Tips on managing your Outlook email Inbox from ComputerZEN master Scott Hanselman.

Quake3 on 24 LCD monitors (thats 10240x3072 resolution!). Wicked!

Science Department:

Emilio Gonzalez discovers two more asteroid impact craters. Much to the amazement of geologists...he did it using Google Earth!

Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter appears to have successfully inserted itself into Mars orbit.

KV 63: A Look at the New Tomb. All about the newest find in Egypt's Valley of the Kings.

Blog Enhancement Department:

28 Things to put in your Blog's Sidebar: [via listible.com]

The Performancing Team is developing a blogging statistics service. Looks promising.

Other Department:

Steve Rubel over at Micro Persuasion reports that ABC will be offering ad-supported versions of some of their ABC television shows for free. I could support that. Save me the trouble of VCR'ing LOST when I'm too busy.

Ok, enough fun for now.
--Claus

The Odd Day Off

Ok, today I get a day off. It's Texas Independence Day. Even if it is a mid-week break, I'll take it. I checked and found I have accumulated a garmoungous pile of linkage for blogging--so I need to clean house. This may get long, but you might be able to find some gems in here.

Last post I mentioned that Lavie got a new laptop. It (and she) are humming along nicely, thank you very much. What I didn't mention is that a day later Claus had to get himself a new toy as well. See, our 14 year old VCR began to give up the ghost. It still worked, but replay of tapes were starting to show a funky split-screen view on playback. Sometimes I could fix it by popping in a commercial tape from our vast Disney VHS tape collection, but this trick was working less and less. So I went to get a new one.

I soon discovered that VCR's are hard to find. Oh, I had no trouble finding a VCR embedded in a TV unit, and there were LOTS of VCR/DVD combos, but I already had both a TV and DVD so I didn't need one more of either. I finally checked a local big-box electronics store and they had two (JUST TWO!) VCR models. I grabbed the Sony SLV-N750 model. At first I thought I was settling, but soon found it had a ton of features. It does some wicked-fast high-speed tape winding. It has some auto-search/skip features and to my surprise, it is even able to decode some carrier signals to display program names and times--kinda like basic TiVO. Neat! I'm not against DVR's like TiVO, in fact, I'd really like to try building my own some day. But we have that vast collection of Disney VHS tapes I just can't let go of, and it's hard enough to watch the few shows we VCR anyway. Overall, I'm very pleased with it. My first experience with VCR's was when my parents got a Betamax unit--although I can't remember if it was a Sony or Zenith. It was great. The tapes were small and the quality of replay high. The very first movie we rented for it was STRIPES. I really loved that movie. Bill Murray still rocks. He should have got an Oscar for his work in Lost in Translation. He was robbed!

On to the pile....

Update Headaches:
My iTunes (v6.0.1.3) reported (internally) that the new update version from Apple was 6.0.3. Time for an Quicktime Player iTunes update, right? Well, not so fast there partner. A little more checking found that the newest version was 6.0.4. So I downloaded directly from Apple and ended up getting version 6.0.4.2.

Next I checked ZoneAlarm. My current version was 6.1.737.000 and an internal check for updates found none available. Yet ZoneLabs has v6.1.744.000 now available for download--which I did. What gives?

So, dearest readers, what's Claus's tip for knowing the latest versions--even when the applications don't seem to know? I RSS feed a handy site called VersionTracker.com. Go check it out and add it to your feeds. Now you will never be behind the software times any more!

Gamage:
Unlike my brother, I don't usually go for FPS's. I tend more to circuit racing games, puzzle games, some fantasy quests. But I am going to go get Black for our PS2 next visit to my software dealer. Matt Brett gives a good review that is in line with most others I've read. Mowing down baddies full-auto looks to be a good stress reliever after beating my head against IPX frustrations.
If your tastes run to the more peaceful side, Stuff offers a freeware UNO cardcame simulator. We have about 10 different versions of this game in our house and it never stops being fun to play.
Neave Games offers some fun on-line (Java?) retro-arcade games including Asteroids, Space Invaders, Simon, Snake, Tetris, and Frogger is coming soon.
Sudoku on-line at the chron.com. [via JimThompson.org]
KatamariDamacy wallpapers galore.

Graphic Arts:
GLASHAUS - The Portfolio of Peter Hoffman. Beautifully Modern/Modernly Beautiful.
Mom had a couple Da Vinci sketches beautifully frames. So when I came across The Da Vinci Lode [via Drawn] I just had to share.
Tutorial - how to clone people (in Photoshop) [via energyface]
Paint.net - an incredible freeware app started by Washington State University and mentored by Microsoft. It has some very "Photoshop-like" tools, layers, etc. But is great for users who don't want to RTFM. (Note requires MS's .Net software.)
WetPaint - contains some very nice tutorials to show you some basics in using Paint.net. Worth a look. I hope to see more in the near future!
More OpenSource graphic applications (I've mentioned many before): GIMP (image editor/manipulator), Blender (3d modeler), Inkscape (vectors), Scribus (desktop publishing/layout), Xara (vectors/rendering). [via Libre Graphics Meeting in Lyon, France]
TypeNow - Free tv/movie themed font sets. (Like you don't have enough fonts already...)

Software Goodies:
100-downloads.com - A giant list of categorized freeware. Great reference link.
Partition Saving -- DOS level partition copy program. [via downloadsquad]
EarthView - dynamic desktop wallpaper/screen-saver. Shows earth with the solar terminator. Neato.
Clack Graphical Router Project on-line tutorial (JAVA) on how Internet hardware and protocols work. Kinda cool and geeky fun. Nice way to teach the in-laws.

Web-world/Google'ishousness:
Firefox Extension Development Tutorial -- Tired of using other's extensions for Firefox? Learn how to make your own!
gMail adds smart replying feature [via Lifehacker] Could be handy.
Tutorial - gMail guide for Webmasters (With more than one Email Address)
Google Page Creator [via Google Blogoscoped] (new accounts currently on hold due to popular demand--of course.)
Create your own favicon for your website. [chami.com] I'll be adding this to my blog later today--now, what picture to use.....
Take a peek into the facility at Google Japan! love those Japanese vending machines!
Box.net -- another free online file storage site. I signed up for this one. Paul Satamatiou gives a fantastic review of this service. It seems that bloggers could use this service to share files (keep it legal!) with readers. Use my referral link to sign yourself up for a box.net account and maybe I can get an upgrade! I'll let you know what I experience with it.

Anime/Manga:
New Ghost in the Shell related anime announcement. [via Anime News Network]
Sudio Ghibli annouces reopening of Totoro House.
Tenchi Muyo-Ryo Okhi volumes two and three coming in Fall '06 (FINALLY!)
Fred Gallagher (MegaTokyo) annouces DC Comics will publish Volume 4. Great interview and picture of the Volume 4 cover over at Comicon.com PULSE

PodCasts-IT Security:
LiveAmmo Security News Blog has Part 2 of a Podcast on Digital Forensics and Hacking Investigations up. Not for everyone, but some sysadmins may find it interesting.
Security Now podcasts Wonderfully informative content provided by Steve Gibson (GRC) and Leo Laporte (former TechTV host). Great stuff for everyone, not just sysadmins.

Odds at the End:
Ryugyong Hotel - Pyongyang, North Korea [via GoogleSightseeing] more info here. Kinda creepy.
Benjamin Franklin's Virtue Chart: More Info here.

Parting Thought:
NewYork City Union Square Pillow Fight. [via Rocketboom] Now if we could just work our our world-differences this way instead of spending bazillions in defense spending and wars......

See you in the skies,
--Claus