Messages

5826

Living Room / Re: PLEASE, Host Your Own DNS Server

« on: August 11, 2009, 10:20 PM »

Um... My home network = domain->MS DNS->Web root servers.

Fer plain folk I'm with f0dder on OpenDNS or EarthLinks servers work just dandy pretty much anywhere in the US.

As far as tracking goes, what difference does it really make if your logged for a DNS lookup or a web server visit. Everything gets logged, tracked, parsed, sorted, cataloged and sold to the highest bidder anyhow...long as it doesn't hamper my travels, I couldn't care less.

5827

Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Free WinUtilities 6.2!

« on: August 11, 2009, 05:51 PM »

  Am I missing something, or did the spambot just dis itself?

5828

Living Room / Re: PLEASE, Host Your Own DNS Server

« on: August 11, 2009, 05:40 PM »

*Shrug* We're a Windows shop so both DNS servers are MS DNS servers. One is a caching server that forward to OpenDNS (to keep the crew honest). The other one (is for IT...) forward to the (windows default) internet root servers. So 90% of the lookups are (local) instantaneous, the other few (first timers) might actually take a whole second ... but so what.

Given that most ISP DNS's suck (for one reason or the other) I generally always either go with the MS DNS default web root servers, or for small workgroups I tend to use (depending on mood & customer request) either OpenDNS or EarthLinks two main DNS servers as they've always been rather reliable.

5829

General Software Discussion / Re: Using a Desktop Search through the network

« on: July 31, 2009, 06:21 AM »

Ironically I almost never use it, but the office staff does and they haven't had any complaints (which is odd for an office staff...). But for a test I queried a list of all of last years service tickets for client X, and it took about 2.5 seconds to pull the 20 test client tickets from the 7,000 other tickets.

Unfortunately I don't have time to strip the company identifing stuff out of the code. But I originally started it with a C# code sample/demo I found at www.CodeProject.com - Currently logged in user creds are used, & you can connect to and query either a local or remote catalog db.

5830

General Software Discussion / Re: Using a Desktop Search through the network

« on: July 30, 2009, 07:13 PM »

20 machines running (constantly reindexing) a "desktop" search across the wire?!? Zoikes!

When letting the Xerox rep talk us into using their ScanFlowStore software for our paperless service ticket system I was actually stuck with the exact same question. It seems Xerox (the SFS people actually) had spent their time creating a truly flexible metadata based document indexing system ... and just not gotten around to doing a search app just yet. The rep suggested we use Google Desktop, which I politely told him was a totally retarded idea.

What I did do was leverage the completely included with Windows (and fairly customizable) indexing service to create a single index catalog on the file server which can be searched in either a plain text or SQL-esq fashion using the Query the Catalog part of the Indexing Service MMC snap-in. I did end up having to write a small search GUI for the office staff to connect to the remote catalog but the system has been working perfectly for about 3 years now.

5831

Living Room / Re: DRM hits a new low as Amazon hits the delete key

« on: July 18, 2009, 11:08 PM »

Now the thing I find intriguing is that everybody seems to think this kind of behavior on the part of the draconian media copyright types, is new. It isn’t. There was a time back when (before the internet) that anyone with a dual cassette deck rig (like me) could knock off tapes by the dozen, for all their friends. These folks were too difficult to prosecute … however others were not so lucky.

During these arcane (pre-interweb) times I owned a small (dive) biker bar. In said bar, we occasionally had “bands”, which is a term I’m using loosely considering it was typically just some (half-lit) hick with a guitar. The bar legally seated approx 50 people. E.g. we’re not talking about a huge operation here.

Enter BMI (Broadcast Music Inc.). On one fine spring afternoon (hehe) a pair of large dark sedans flew into the parking lot, the doors flew open and the occupants then stormed the building. Two stood watch by the outer doors; one yanked the door open and held it for their “leader” and remained there for the duration of the “visit” while the rest came goose stepping in. They then formed semi-circle around the “leader” which was I’m guessing to be an impressive (and intimidating) “display” of themselves.

They then proceeded to explain that I was to be fined at a rate of $25,000 per person, per song (sound familiar?), if I continued to have live entertainment without an entertainment license. Okay… The license was however $20,000 per year.

So… crucifying little guys that are easy to find is perfectly normal behavior for these “people”. I can testify to that from experience.

Incidentally there was another group of assholes that made the exact same entrance. Pickup trucks flew into the parking lot and a bunch of folks in paramilitary gear jumped out and stormed the building. Two stood watch by the outer doors; one yanked the door open and held it for their “leader” and remained there for the duration of the “visit” while the rest came goose stepping in. They scattered propaganda leaflets everywhere and then joined their “leader” which was I’m guessing to be an impressive (and intimidating) “display” of themselves. Who were these jagoffs? Well we are in the south here, and it was indeed the Klu Klux Klan.

Neither group got what they wanted, but both did leave me glad that I carry a gun.

5832

General Software Discussion / Re: Command line e-mail checker

« on: July 17, 2009, 04:29 PM »

I'm assuming you've tried this already

http://bobpeers.com/...ical/telnet_imap.php

, yes?

5833

Living Room / Re: Send Yourself To Mars!

« on: July 17, 2009, 01:22 PM »

Certificate #: N2M400329213

5834

General Review Discussion / Re: Opinions on remote PC control software

« on: July 16, 2009, 07:18 AM »

The thing that seems to give the best speed is Microsoft's own Remote Desktop. Even UltraVNC with the GDI mirror driver isn't as fast, lags a bit even on a LAN. Most VNCs have been pretty slow for me - bearable on a LAN, but not elsewhere. The official RealVNC client is somewhat better than most of the others, but pretty duh; it's commercial software.

It's been a while since I tried any of the dedicated "remote control" applications, but back then most suffered the same problem as the VNC clients: they poll and grab screenshots.

By the way, Remote Desktop and VNC should *always* be used through VPN or a SSH tunnel. *always*.

The problem with Remote Desktop is that, unless you're on a terminal server, it will log off the active user (well, switch-user on XP).

-f0dder (May 23, 2006, 05:47 AM)

True but, Logoff user only applies if using a client OS (XP/Vista/7) the servers allow (technically) 3 sessions in TS "administrative mode" one for the console & 2 Remote sessions.

Why the VPN requirement for RDP? Granted while not the default, RDP natively supports FIPS (which is AES based). Depending on the nature of the deployment (e.g. how prone to be targeted it is) I see no problem with using RDP with the FIPS required setting on a bastard port.

5835

Living Room / Re: From the BBC science desk: Cats 'exploit' humans by purring

« on: July 16, 2009, 06:20 AM »

Once again proving that we are not the smartest animals on this planet.

5836

General Software Discussion / Re: IDEA - User timer and lock out

« on: July 03, 2009, 08:20 AM »

Most of what you are looking for is built into Windows. If you do a Google search on Windows Parental Controls there are a ton of tutorials available on setting time and content limits for the kids accounts.

Sorry I can't be more specific but I'm shot on time & don't have kids at home anymore.

5837

General Software Discussion / Re: Is it time to start a new AntiVirus/Internet Security Suite review thread?

« on: July 02, 2009, 01:00 PM »

Worst virus I ever saw only screwed up the machine half as bad as a typically failed Norton uninstall.

5838

General Software Discussion / Re: Windows XP Pro x64 (64-bit) Edition - Favorite Software Compatibility Thread

« on: July 01, 2009, 07:42 AM »

welcome to the site -- 1st clock is quality software 

-mouser (June 30, 2009, 05:22 PM)

Granted I'll continue to use mine out of principal ... but damn that thing is nice! I love the popup time zone & docking features.

5839

General Software Discussion / Re: Search with Bing

« on: July 01, 2009, 07:32 AM »

I tend to search for part numbers and other obscure bits of information frequently. So I've been pitting Google & Bing against each other for a week or so to see who gets the most relevant hits. Bing has been ahead about 40% of the time. showing less total results but having more truly relevant hits bubbling to the top of the first page list.

Last weekend I use it to find some break parts (complete with printable OEM manuels & pricing) for my Harley (middle of page 2), which Google had burried on page 7 using the same query string.

5840

Living Room / Re: Giampy... how does it sound?

« on: June 29, 2009, 08:49 AM »

It would help to know your location so folks can decide if they're foreign or not...but if you like the name then it's all good.

5841

General Software Discussion / Re: Is it time to start a new AntiVirus/Internet Security Suite review thread?

« on: June 29, 2009, 07:12 AM »

Interesting thing to note from the article is that they eliminated all of the FP's from all of the test group if they involved a key-gen/crack/etc. ... So if the AV company was trying to regulate morality, they don't get penalized for it (I still haven't really decided how I feel about that behavior).

Any how (that being said...) I used a production machine that GFi LANGuard said had some suspicious looking ports open on it.

A quick scan turned up nothing in about 10min.

(Assuming nothing had been found I did not rerun LANGuard at this point)

A full scan turned up about 30 items, but took 11hrs. ...Mind you it had 250Gig of files to scan, 35 of which were .iso's which it did scan inside of ... but Damn! 11 Hours!?! *Sigh*

Being that I let it scan everything, it managed to find all of my hacking tools (Duh!)...and it managed to (IMO) FP on Angryziber.com Angry IP Scanner ...But, everybody seems to do that which annoys me to no end.

The interesting part was that it did not react to any of the other network scanning utilities some commercial & some of my own that were on the drive. It also did not react to a line stressing ping utility I wrote that includes (for diagnostic purposes only...) a Smurf attack option. Which in earlier versions (which are archived on the drive in question) used the original Smurf attack source code. Now you'd think that kinda thing (Smurf.exe) would be easy to spot.

(Back to the results) So GFi Languard said there were 5 suspicious ports open. MSE's scan results found 30 items to question 25 were actually bad files collected from various places & 5 were FP's. None were active running evil files on the machine. However a rescan of said machine with GFi LANGuard...gave the machine a clean bill of health. So what it pulled from where without saying anything about it, is quite odd.

It is delightfully idiot simple to use, and there is no perceivable difference in machine performance. Hay if I gota bust out a stopwatch & a slide-rule to find a difference ... Then there ain't no difference. Even during the full scan (where most AV apps bring a machine to it's knees) I had no problems using the machine via RDP.

The machine in question is a Dell Dimension E521 with SATA HDDs, an Athlon 64 X2 3800+ (2.0Ghz) CPU, & 2GB of RAM running 32bit Vista Business Eddition.

End result being I'm impressed with it's tiny foot print, curious but optimistic about it performance, and completely baffeled with its results ... as it appears to have worked, but I'm not sure how (and appearently neither is it).

5842

General Software Discussion / Re: Let's really fix Outlook

« on: June 28, 2009, 08:57 AM »

I lost interest the moment my eyes came across "email marketers".

Wonderful....let's 'fix' all the email programs so it's easier to send out spam that's even more annoying than one used to be able to do.

-Innuendo (June 27, 2009, 10:01 AM)

Amen!

5843

General Software Discussion / Re: Is it time to start a new AntiVirus/Internet Security Suite review thread?

« on: June 28, 2009, 08:53 AM »

However in the same report MS had the best score for the least FP's out of any of the tested products. Which begs the question; are the others really better (more accurate) or are they just jumping blindly at anything?

Trust must factor into the assessment, and if the scanner is just flagging anything that confuses it then it's really more chicken little then trusted companion. Especially when it's hogging massive amounts of system resources like Symantec or McAfee which scored high on said accuracy test.

5844

General Software Discussion / Re: Is it time to start a new AntiVirus/Internet Security Suite review thread?

« on: June 27, 2009, 08:59 AM »

I jumped onto the beta DL (which now appears to be closed) and grabbed all 3 (32, 64, & XP) and will be playing with this later this weekend. From the video it appears to have been brilliantly done (simple, quick, & straight forward).

5845

Living Room / Re: What annoys you to no end?

« on: June 26, 2009, 04:23 PM »

I'm with you. Anybody who has ever had to deal with the way I speak and write will tell you I'm the first to wing it, either for effect, to make a joke, or just to be sure I'm getting my point across. Once, when criticized for his way he constantly misspelled words, President Andrew Jackson retorted, “It's a damn small mind that can think of only one way to spell a word.” I'd be inclined to go a step further and say the same goes for blind adherence to arbitrary rules when they get in the way of what we're trying to convey.

 

BTW: Did any of that make sense?

-40hz (June 26, 2009, 03:51 PM)

To me yes ... but that's probably a bad thing.

On a side note...I had to google preposition *Shrug* and found this site which seems to fit the current debate. http://www.uottawa.c...itcent/hypergrammar/

...Apearently Canada is how far north you have to go to find folks what speak English proper.

5846

Living Room / Re: What annoys you to no end?

« on: June 25, 2009, 07:05 AM »

..... they should turn lose of the kind of quality programming they (used to have).....

-Stoic Joker (June 24, 2009, 02:09 PM)

Uh oh, you've just made mrainey's hit list by doing the opposite

-4wd (June 25, 2009, 05:13 AM)

I'm using the "the spell checker did it" defense

5847

Living Room / Re: What annoys you to no end?

« on: June 24, 2009, 02:09 PM »

My second example is an easy pot shot....a channel specializing in science-fiction has no gosh-darned business airing programming consisting of reality shows and professional wrestling!

-Innuendo (June 24, 2009, 09:10 AM)

Damn Straight! ...That ones been bugging the hell outa me since it started.

-Stoic Joker (June 24, 2009, 01:23 PM)

That's exactly what it is ... business.  They have to get enough funding to keep it going to air the sci-fi stuff that we do like.  ECW brings in a lot of money.  Would you rather they took the high road, then went out of business, and we have no outlet for that stuff?

-wraith808 (June 24, 2009, 01:37 PM)

*Shrug* …If it’s got to be…it’s got to be… So, yes I would. Either way I end up with a useless channel. Seriously, how many SciFi fans really watch that crap? Not me. I go look for other programming that doesn’t either suck or insult my intelligence (which is a bitch these days). Instead of wasting our collective time tossing tons of long ago dead programming in the hopes it will stick (people to their seats…which it never did, hence why it was originally canceled), they should turn lose of the kind of quality programming they (used to have) are holding in reserve for “next season” (what the hell ever that is these days.; what are they up to 7 seasons a year now?).

I haven’t watched SciFi in months … Si it’s already dead as far as I’m conscerned.

5848

Living Room / Re: What annoys you to no end?

« on: June 24, 2009, 01:23 PM »

My second example is an easy pot shot....a channel specializing in science-fiction has no gosh-darned business airing programming consisting of reality shows and professional wrestling!

-Innuendo (June 24, 2009, 09:10 AM)

Damn Straight! ...That ones been bugging the hell outa me since it started.

Another TV habit of late is the Channel logos overlaid on the screen during the show are not only getting bigger but are displaying advertising for all sorts of nonsense. It's bad enough that the 1hr time slot contains 20min of commercials...now they gota run the damn ads during the show too (good luck reading any captions, they're covered).

Cripes! ...We pay good money for entertainment ... not to be bombarded with advertising! <...or so I thought...)


lol ...Looks like 40Hz beat me to the punch!

5849

General Software Discussion / Re: Is it time to start a new AntiVirus/Internet Security Suite review thread?

« on: June 24, 2009, 06:22 AM »

If anybody is interested Microsoft has released a beta version of their new AntiVirus program (Microsoft Security Essentials). More information is here:

http://www.microsoft...security_essentials/

You can sign up through Microsoft Connect to download a beta version of it. They have beta versions for Vista/7-64, Vista/7-32, and XP-32.

5850

Living Room / Re: Zaine's avatar

« on: June 19, 2009, 04:29 PM »

Damn Straight ... I almost screamed the other day when it scrolled into view.