Messages

26

Living Room / Re: Could someone convert a .png into an .ico for me?

« on: February 09, 2012, 07:01 PM »

It'll be done in a few minutes, from 512x512 to 16x16. The file size will probably be quite larger than the png. And I'll probably see if GIMP will let me export a 512px ico. If it won't, I have some other things I can try.

27

Living Room / Re: Could someone convert a .png into an .ico for me?

« on: February 09, 2012, 06:54 PM »

would you like one of the multi-resolution icons, eg 512, 256, 128 ... etc all in one, or just 512?

28

N.A.N.Y. 2012 / NANY 2012 Release: Uncle Cody's Dice Game

« on: December 31, 2011, 10:57 PM »

NANY 2012 Entry Information

Application Name	Uncle Cody's Dice Game
Version	1.00
Short Description	An addicting dice game that will have you playing for hours! Or at the very least an entertaining distraction for a few minutes...
Supported OSes	Any OS that has a Web Browser capable of JavaScript
Web Page (visit this to use it now)	http://krishean.dcmembers.com/dice/
System Requirements	Computer Internet Connection Web Browser JavaScript Enabled Brain
Author Info	Krishean
Special Thanks	Mouser, for suggesting the game and assisting with it's creation.
Description	In Uncle Cody's Dice Game, your goal is to accumulate the most points over the course of 5 rounds.
Features	Uncle Cody! Snakes! Coins! Fun!
Screenshots	None available at this time.
Using the application	Read the instructions on the page.
Known Issues	No known issues at this time.

29

General Software Discussion / Re: Smartphones, Tablets, E-Readers Become Physically Heavier With More Data

« on: November 07, 2011, 12:30 PM »

But consider the amount of data being transmitted around the world, such as through broadband cables, datacenters and ISPs. Does this make the world substantially heavier?

No, because the energy being used to create all this data is converted from matter on earth. The only way the earth gets heavier is because of energy from the sun and stars, and matter from comets and meteorites. And every time we send up a satellite or broadcast a signal into space we slightly reduce the weight of the earth. While it may be true that the energy stored in devices makes them heavier, it has no effect on the weight of the earth.

30

General Software Discussion / Re: Product Key Finder (Excellent & Free)

« on: October 27, 2011, 06:48 PM »

I use ProduKey from NirSoft. Looks like it's a little more extensive with options and command line parameters than the one you linked to, but it only works for a few microsoft products. The other one I used to use was The Magical Jelly Bean Keyfinder. It used to be open source but they seem to have closed the sourceforge site. I still have the last source code and binaries that were available if anyone is interested. There are still closed-source binaries available on the site, but I'm not inclined to trust them.

31

Living Room / Re: Hard drive shortage

« on: October 27, 2011, 06:26 PM »

I'm not sure if Seagate was affected, but I'm glad I built my NAS and upgraded my gaming machine before the prices went up.

32

Living Room / Re: How many slaves work for you?

« on: October 03, 2011, 07:13 PM »

I don't think its very accurate at all, although most of my answers were "that looks about right, I don't care that much." I picked whatever the most gadgets was and the rest was fairly minimalistic, that said I got a 22, even with the ridiculous amount of tech surrounding me, I'm still in the same range as app103 and Renegade? Also, I used chrome and found the amount of effects used somewhat unnecessary.

33

General Software Discussion / Re: Firefox 7 is out

« on: September 27, 2011, 09:36 PM »

http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/7.0/releasenotes/:

What’s New in Firefox

The latest version of Firefox has the following changes:

• Drastically improved memory handling for certain use cases
• Added a new rendering backend to speed up Canvas operations on Windows systems
• Bookmark and password changes now sync almost instantly when using Firefox Sync
• The 'http://' URL prefix is now hidden by default
• Added support for text-overflow: ellipsis
• Added support for the Web Timing specification
• Enhanced support for MathML
• The WebSocket protocol has been updated from version 7 to version 8
• Added an opt-in system for users to send performance data back to Mozilla to improve future versions of Firefox
• Fixed several stability issues
• Fixed several security issues

Please see the complete list of changes in this version. Web and extension developers should also view the curated list of platform changes. You may also be interested in the list of changes in the previous version.

Edit: formatting+links

34

Living Room / Re: Who else is sick of difficult word verifications on the web?

« on: June 01, 2011, 07:10 PM »

beware the Combining Cyrillic Millions character, it warps text.

on a separate thought, i ran into this gem quite awhile ago: http://ejohn.org/blo...-nets-in-javascript/
it breaks megaupload captchas using javascript, neural nets, and ocr in a greasemonkey script. the author has kept it fairly up-to-date, but i have no idea if it still works. the script is hosted here: http://userscripts.o...g/scripts/show/38736

35

General Software Discussion / Re: How can I delete over 6,000 recursive directories?

« on: June 01, 2011, 05:56 PM »

tried this command?

rmdir /S /Q dirnamehere

i have also seen too many nested directories cause filesystem damage

36

Living Room / Re: Microsoft Announces Support of System on a Chip Architectures

« on: January 06, 2011, 10:43 AM »

depth and breadth... and mabe choice

Spoiler

i see they changed the wording in the second paragraph of the linked press release, i'm glad josh caught it before they did...

37

Coding Snack Guidelines / Re: rename files according to a list - not the usual rename - please read on!

« on: December 21, 2010, 09:29 PM »

Code: Javascript [Select]

1. function exit(a){return WScript.Quit(a);}
2. function echo(a){return WScript.Echo(a);}
3.  
4. var fso=WScript.CreateObject('Scripting.FileSystemObject');
5.  
6. exit(main());
7. function main(){
8.         var tmp=[];
9.         // read list
10.         if(fso.FileExists('list.txt')){
11.                 try{
12.                         var list=safe_split(file_get_contents('list.txt'));
13.                 }catch(err){ // there was an error while reading list.txt
14.                         echo('Error: Unable to read list.txt!');
15.                         return 1;
16.                 }
17.                 // parse list
18.                 var rExp=/^(\d+)\s+([ \w\d]+)$/i;
19.                 var line=1;
20.                 for(var i=0;i<list.length;i++){
21.                         list[i]=trim(list[i]); // trim off excess whitespace from beginning and end of lines
22.                         if(list[i]=='')continue; // don't process blank lines
23.                         if(rExp.test(list[i])){
24.                                 var obj=rExp.exec(list[i]);
25.                                 if(String(obj[1]).length<2)obj[1]='0'+obj[1];
26.                                 tmp.push([obj[1],obj[2]]);
27.                         }else{
28.                                 echo('Error: Unable to parse line '+line+' of list.txt');
29.                                 return 1;
30.                         }
31.                         line++;
32.                 }
33.                 list=tmp;
34.                 tmp=[];
35.                 // read directory
36.                 var e=new Enumerator(fso.GetFolder('.').Files);
37.                 for(;!e.atEnd();e.moveNext()){
38.                         var fname=e.item().Name.toLowerCase();
39.                         // don't attempt to rename itself, or list.txt
40.                         if(e.item() == WScript.ScriptFullName ||
41.                           fname == 'list.txt')continue;
42.                         for(var j=0;j<list.length;j++){
43.                                 // compare filename
44.                                 if(fname.indexOf(list[j][1].toLowerCase())!=-1){
45.                                         // create the new filename
46.                                         var newname=list[j][0]+' - '+list[j][1]+'.'+
47.                                           fso.GetExtensionName(e.item());
48.                                         tmp.push('"'+e.item().Name+'" => "'+newname+'"');
49.                                         // rename file
50.                                         e.item().Name=newname;
51.                                         break;
52.                                 }
53.                         }
54.                 }
55.         }else{ // the script wasn't able to find a list.txt file in the current directory
56.                 echo('Error: Does list.txt exist in the current directory?');
57.                 return 1;
58.         }
59.         // output a message saying whether files were renamed or not
60.         echo(tmp.length>0?'Files that were renamed:\n\t'+
61.           tmp.join('\n\t'):'No files were renamed!');
62.         return 0;
63. }
64.  
65. function safe_split(s){return s.replace(/\r\n/g,'\n').replace(/\r/g,'\n').split('\n');}
66. function trim(s){return s.replace(/^\s+/,'').replace(/\s+$/,'');}
67.  
68. function file_get_contents(filename){
69.         var ptr=fso.OpenTextFile(filename,1,false);
70.         var str=new String(ptr.ReadAll());
71.         ptr.Close();
72.         return str;
73. }

line 25 adds one leading zero if there are less than two characters in the number
i can also have it strip characters other than letters/numbers/spaces, but that may have unforseen effects

38

Coding Snack Guidelines / Re: rename files according to a list - not the usual rename - please read on!

« on: December 20, 2010, 10:58 PM »

you can add as many digits to the <number> as you want
the only ways i think it would miss a file is if there was an error parsing the line from list.txt, or if it didn't match the text in the filename exactly, however theres a quick fix for that:

Code: Javascript [Select]

1. function exit(a){return WScript.Quit(a);}
2. function echo(a){return WScript.Echo(a);}
3.  
4. var fso=WScript.CreateObject('Scripting.FileSystemObject');
5.  
6. exit(main());
7. function main(){
8.         var tmp=[];
9.         // read list
10.         if(fso.FileExists('list.txt')){
11.                 try{
12.                         var list=safe_split(file_get_contents('list.txt'));
13.                 }catch(err){ // there was an error while reading list.txt
14.                         echo('Error: Unable to read list.txt!');
15.                         return 1;
16.                 }
17.                 // parse list
18.                 var rExp=/^(\d+)\s+([ \w\d]+)$/i;
19.                 var line=1;
20.                 for(var i=0;i<list.length;i++){
21.                         list[i]=trim(list[i]); // trim off excess whitespace from beginning and end of lines
22.                         if(list[i]=='')continue; // don't process blank lines
23.                         if(rExp.test(list[i])){
24.                                 var obj=rExp.exec(list[i]);
25.                                 tmp.push([obj[1],obj[2]]);
26.                         }else{
27.                                 echo('Error: Unable to parse line '+line+' of list.txt');
28.                                 return 1;
29.                         }
30.                         line++;
31.                 }
32.                 list=tmp;
33.                 tmp=[];
34.                 // read directory
35.                 var e=new Enumerator(fso.GetFolder('.').Files);
36.                 for(;!e.atEnd();e.moveNext()){
37.                         var fname=e.item().Name.toLowerCase();
38.                         // don't attempt to rename itself, or list.txt
39.                         if(e.item() == WScript.ScriptFullName ||
40.                           fname == 'list.txt')continue;
41.                         for(var j=0;j<list.length;j++){
42.                                 // compare filename
43.                                 if(fname.indexOf(list[j][1].toLowerCase())!=-1){
44.                                         // create the new filename
45.                                         var newname=list[j][0]+' - '+list[j][1]+'.'+
46.                                           fso.GetExtensionName(e.item());
47.                                         tmp.push('"'+e.item().Name+'" => "'+newname+'"');
48.                                         // rename file
49.                                         e.item().Name=newname;
50.                                         break;
51.                                 }
52.                         }
53.                 }
54.         }else{ // the script wasn't able to find a list.txt file in the current directory
55.                 echo('Error: Does list.txt exist in the current directory?');
56.                 return 1;
57.         }
58.         // output a message saying whether files were renamed or not
59.         echo(tmp.length>0?'Files that were renamed:\n\t'+
60.           tmp.join('\n\t'):'No files were renamed!');
61.         return 0;
62. }
63.  
64. function safe_split(s){return s.replace(/\r\n/g,'\n').replace(/\r/g,'\n').split('\n');}
65. function trim(s){return s.replace(/^\s+/,'').replace(/\s+$/,'');}
66.  
67. function file_get_contents(filename){
68.         var ptr=fso.OpenTextFile(filename,1,false);
69.         var str=new String(ptr.ReadAll());
70.         ptr.Close();
71.         return str;
72. }

changing line 43 as such makes it case-insensitive, so it isn't as picky when matching
i also added in notices for when it can't parse a line in list.txt

39

Coding Snack Guidelines / Re: rename files according to a list - not the usual rename - please read on!

« on: December 19, 2010, 07:16 PM »

list.txt:

[Select]

01 Put You in a Song
02 You Gonna Fly
03 All for You
04 Long Hot Summer
05 Without You
06 Georgia Woods
07 Right on Back to You
08 Shut Out the Lights

rename.js:

Code: Javascript [Select]

1. function exit(a){return WScript.Quit(a);}
2. function echo(a){return WScript.Echo(a);}
3.  
4. var fso=WScript.CreateObject('Scripting.FileSystemObject');
5.  
6. exit(main());
7. function main(){
8.         var tmp=[];
9.         // read list
10.         if(fso.FileExists('list.txt')){
11.                 try{
12.                         var list=safe_split(file_get_contents('list.txt'));
13.                 }catch(err){ // there was an error while reading list.txt
14.                         echo('Error: Unable to read list.txt!');
15.                         return 1;
16.                 }
17.                 // parse list
18.                 var rExp=/^(\d+)\s+([ \w\d]+)$/i;
19.                 for(var i=0;i<list.length;i++){
20.                         list[i]=trim(list[i]); // trim off excess whitespace from beginning and end of lines
21.                         if(list[i]=='')continue; // don't process blank lines
22.                         if(rExp.test(list[i])){
23.                                 var obj=rExp.exec(list[i]);
24.                                 tmp.push([obj[1],obj[2]]);
25.                         }
26.                 }
27.                 list=tmp;
28.                 tmp=[];
29.                 // read directory
30.                 var e=new Enumerator(fso.GetFolder('.').Files);
31.                 for(;!e.atEnd();e.moveNext()){
32.                         // don't attempt to rename itself, or list.txt
33.                         if(e.item() == WScript.ScriptFullName ||
34.                           e.item().Name == 'list.txt')continue;
35.                         for(var j=0;j<list.length;j++){
36.                                 // compare filename
37.                                 if(e.item().Name.indexOf(list[j][1])!=-1){
38.                                         // create the new filename
39.                                         var fname=list[j][0]+' - '+list[j][1]+'.'+
40.                                           fso.GetExtensionName(e.item());
41.                                         tmp.push('"'+e.item().Name+'" => "'+fname+'"');
42.                                         // rename file
43.                                         e.item().Name=fname;
44.                                         break;
45.                                 }
46.                         }
47.                 }
48.         }else{ // the script wasn't able to find a list.txt file in the current directory
49.                 echo('Error: Does list.txt exist in the current directory?');
50.                 return 1;
51.         }
52.         // output a message saying whether files were renamed or not
53.         echo(tmp.length>0?'Files that were renamed:\n\t'+
54.           tmp.join('\n\t'):'No files were renamed!');
55.         return 0;
56. }
57.  
58. function safe_split(s){return s.replace(/\r\n/g,'\n').replace(/\r/g,'\n').split('\n');}
59. function trim(s){return s.replace(/^\s+/,'').replace(/\s+$/,'');}
60.  
61. function file_get_contents(filename){
62.         var ptr=fso.OpenTextFile(filename,1,false);
63.         var str=new String(ptr.ReadAll());
64.         ptr.Close();
65.         return str;
66. }

create the two files in the same directory that you want to rename the files
the format for list.txt is: <number><space><string> just as shown above
run the script and it should work

40

Coding Snack Guidelines / Re: rename files according to a list - not the usual rename - please read on!

« on: December 19, 2010, 05:57 AM »

i could easily do this with a script, the only limitations would be:

1) the formatting of the list.txt file (i'm assuming you would want "<track number> <title with spaces>")
2) the track name in the list.txt file would have to match the track name in the filename exactly (letter case would not matter, and the case used in list.txt would be used when renaming)

41

Living Room / Re: [email protected]

« on: October 03, 2010, 06:46 PM »

over the past few weeks i've been getting that login page for random pages all over the *.microsoft.com domain. kind of annoying for pages you know don't require a login. i wish they would stop fixing something that wasn't broken in the first place

42

Living Room / Re: Do virus scanners need to get stupid again?

« on: September 11, 2010, 12:51 AM »

submitting firefox.exe itself is probably going to turn up nothing, as long as it hasn't been altered to include malicious code. i have seen other antiviruses request common programs to be submitted for analysis myself (MSE requested that i submit a beta version of 7zip for analysis once)

you would have to submit the malicious extension for anything to be done about it.

additionally, signature-based approaches are ineffective, thousands of new malware variants are released each day, and creating signatures for all of them is impossible (see the second half of my post here for a better explination with links to articles)

i also agree that the heuristic approach is flawed, and needs to be drastically improved before it will be of any use. false positives (and also "potentially unwanted programs") are particularly annoying.

43

General Software Discussion / Re: ComboFix=GREAT rootkit cleaner. (Kaspersky failed me big time).

« on: September 02, 2010, 11:01 PM »

Unless you are confident you have the skills and usage habits to avoid or manually remove any threat that comes your way, I wouldn't recommend going commando. I have a background of years in computer programming, ranging from (my favorite) javascript all the way down to assembly code. I've manually removed hundreds of viruses/malware from friends' and clients' computers. I have so much computer experience, I do a lot of things that would probably horrify other computer users, but since I know what I'm doing, I don't give it a second thought.

So, unless you could say the same you probably should keep the antivirus on duty.

edit: If you are looking for a antivirus that is light on system resources i've had pretty good luck with Microsoft Security Essentials. Its free, and as far as i've seen does its job just as well, if not better than the big subscription-based antiviruses that will slow your computer to a crawl (looking at you norton, mcafee).

44

General Software Discussion / Re: ComboFix=GREAT rootkit cleaner. (Kaspersky failed me big time).

« on: September 02, 2010, 06:33 PM »

As SKA said, ComboFix is a dangerous program that should only be used when all other options have been exhausted. Improper use can hose your system completely. It does do its job tho I have to say, I've used it several times and it usually fixes the problem.

On the subject of antiviruses, I personally don't run one on my main computer [see note 1], I have them installed on a bunch of my secondary computers, and I install one as part of maintenance on other people's computers, but my main computer is optimized for performance. I know what it should behave like, and any behavior out of the ordinary will be dealt with. Unknown processes will be investigated, I have sandbox and virtualization software installed so I can test programs before installing them. (A windows xp virtual machine with an antivirus installed is a nice thing to have) I also have software/tools installed for disassembling/analyzing computer programs so I can see what they are going to do before running them at all. I always have process explorer running 24/7 to keep an eye on whats running. It dosen't matter if you only visit trusted sites or not, advertisers have bluntly stated they are not responsible for their clients' content meaning visiting a trusted site can get you infected just as easily as a questionable site. Firefox is locked down with noscript and adblock, and firebug and a bunch of other extensions for website analysis. Its been more than 6 years since I (unintentionally) got a virus on my computer. I have run viruses in virtual machines to analyze their behavior and learn how to remove them manually - sometimes because (lol) the antivirus dosen't work on them. Also a lot of the time the antivirus will not remove all traces of a virus, registry keys and non-infectious data files may be left behind.

Its nice to be able to boot up in 30s flat.

Another thing about antiviruses, they are only as effective as their latest definitions, they are powerless againt a virus that does not match any of the definitions. There was an article a few months ago (similar ones linked below) stating that modern antiviruses are fighting a losing battle, and their "definitions" approach is rapidly failing. Creating definitions that match billions of viruses, with little or no false positives is an impossible task. That said, its more important than ever to know how to manually remove a virus. Another recent newsworthy event was mcafee making a false positive on windows xp sp3's svchost.exe, which caused quite a commotion.

Signature-based antivirus is dead: Get over it
RSA: New threats could make traditional antivirus tools ineffective
Eighty percent of new malware defeats antivirus

note 1: I'll say this right away (sort of), if you want to badmouth me about not running an antivirus read the rest of the post and don't bother. I'm confident in my ability to identify problems and fix them on my own without the aid of an antivirus and nothing you say will change that. I know what a computer should behave like, and no virus is without side effects. Even the most stealthy rootkit is going to cause some kind of activity that will get my attention. I say this because every time I say that I don't use an antivirus, some bigmouth has to take a shot at me.

45

Living Room / Re: List the crappiest websites you know here. (warning: potentially NSFW)

« on: August 30, 2010, 10:31 PM »

weather.com, if you view source on any of their pages its apparent they have a horde of programmers that have no idea what they are doing, its a mish-mash of coding styles all cobbled together, and its a wonder it loads at all

they should fire their entire programming staff and hire a team of monkeys, their pages would load faster and contain less 3rd party code

edit: it looks like they have switched most things to yahoo-ui, but its still a mess, they have a ridiculous amount of extra newlines, and the code formatting is terrible, there might as well be no formatting at all

46

Living Room / Re: HOSTS File for malware prevention

« on: August 21, 2010, 03:47 PM »

to answer your question, yes firefox and opera are affected by the hosts file. the hosts file is used to alter domain name resolution in windows, and affects anything that uses windows for networking (if a program uses its own network driver than i think it can get around anything in the hosts file anyway)

the problem with using the hosts file for malware protection is that it ONLY affects domain name resolution. so its good if an entire domain is dedicated to malware, but if a site is infected with malware through an ad (example: http://techcrunch.com/2010/03/23/yahoo-top-ad-malware-distributor-says-its-not-their-problem/) or some other attack, its not going to block that, and as malware domains are constantly changing on an hour-by-hour basis, keeping an updated hosts file is next to impossible

also if a program does not use dns resolution and uses an ip like 173.194.33.104 (www.google.com) or if malware comes from an ip (http://173.194.33.104/) the hosts file is not going to block it

EDIT: that said, i do use the "immunize" feature of spybot s&d, which does add entries to the hosts file (in some cases i have it seen it ignore the hosts file tho), because it doesn't hurt (unless of course one of the sites in the hosts file is legitimate and you are trying to go there, it makes it unplesant to diagnose why its not working)

EDIT2: i should probably explain how the hosts file works exactly. when you click on a website, for example www.google.com, "www.google.com" is meaningless to a computer, computers only understand ip addresses (173.194.33.104) so before you are able to get to google, your computer must first contant a domain name server to look up the ip address of the domain name. the domain name server tells your computer the ip address of google and your computer then contacts google and you go on your merry searching way... however, if www.google.com is in your hosts file your computer skips the step where it contacts the domain name server and uses the entry in the hosts file. so if you put "127.0.0.1 www.google.com" (DONT DO THIS) in your hosts file, instead of going to google your computer would try to contact 127.0.0.1 (which is a local address for your own computer) and this would not work. thats how the hosts file works, it reassigns domain names to some other ip address.

47

General Software Discussion / Re: NEED: Microsoft Word (doc/docx) to text converter.

« on: August 18, 2010, 02:34 AM »

i believe openoffice can do what you ask
awhile ago i had to do something having to do with converting one format to another, and this article came in handy: http://www.oooninja.com/2008/02/batch-command-line-file-conversion-with.html
it may be a little outdated, but the concept still holds true. and openoffice 3 supports reading microsoft's docx formats

EDIT: theres also a command line utility here: http://odf-converter.sourceforge.net/ for converting between office open xml formats (docx) and openoffice formats (odf)

48

General Software Discussion / Re: Which archive software are we using in 2010 (and why)?

« on: August 09, 2010, 09:57 PM »

i use 7zip because its free and does everything i need. if i come across a strange archive format that it can't handle, i'll usually track down the software for that archive format (such as certain mac archive formats that i will not name)

49

Living Room / Re: Sleep/hibernate problems in Windows 7

« on: July 27, 2010, 06:35 AM »

The issue with windows 7's hibernate not working after installing Linux is not caused by the partition resizing, its caused by windows not liking that its not in control of the boot process anymore (grub being installed). Its a known issue and there are a few threads about it (see here, but ignore the "Answers" section, that's just microsoft PR BS and is not helpful at all).
It can be fixed by having windows chainload into grub using this program: EasyBCD. Its a little tricky to set up, and you have to change grub from being on the mbr to whatever partition the Linux is installed on (/dev/sda2 in my case) and get windows' bootloader reinstalled.
But after all of the work hibernate works perfectly again (although it may or may not work in Linux lol)
I did all this on my netbook so windows 7 would have hibernate.

I'm not sure if any of this will help with the HP laptop tho, in the past I've had computers that simply refuse to hibernate at all, but in recent years they have gotten better.
Some things that have prevented hibernate for me are chipset/wifi/network/sound/video drivers, the drivers will usually want to manage the power state in a stupid way, also HP loves to do stupid things to the bios that could affect hibernate (removing the menu item for changing the hdd controller mode from ahci to ide so you could get the XP installer to recognise the hard drive comes to mind)
You might want to check if HP has some "recovery" system inserted in the boot process (same problem described above)

50

Living Room / Re: Which came first? The Chicken or the Egg? Scientists say: The Chicken

« on: July 14, 2010, 09:40 PM »

i have to disagree with their findings, perhaps there once existed an animal that we would not call a chicken, that could also produce this protien, which laid an egg which hatched into an offspring which had certain mutations that would qualify it as a chicken? thats just my opinion.