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...I was thinking about this - how one's mind can confuse itself - when I was helping my daughter with her "computer science" studies homework tonight. She's writing her first computer program - it's in Python 3, with which I was not familiar.
I was having to learn the rules and syntax by implication, as she didn't have a reference manual and was just using an online Python code editor/interpreter on a trial-and-error basis. So it was edit, run, stop on error. It would spit out the errors progressively, incrementally and individually (one at a time), stopping at each error and waiting for you to correct that (edit) before it moved on to the next error (run again from the beginning), and so on. Painfully tedious and confusing, but potentially instructive if one understood the need to to focus on being pedantic and trying to understand the hidden/implicit logic (grammar) of the language being parsed. ...
____________________________-IainB (April 05, 2017, 12:53 PM)
I absolutely agree that, as you put it, "No pun is obvious, awkward, or stinky enough to escape being pressed into service when the need arises.", and I apologise if I seemed to be implicitly criticising the making of the pun. That was not the case - I wasn't intending to. The pun was perfectly valid as it stood and worth making. Punning humour is a highly desirable art form as far as I am concerned, and long may it live.I saw the cube/cubicle bit, but that seemed a kinda obvious and awkward punNo pun is obvious, awkward, or stinky enough to escape being pressed into service when the need arises.
______________________-IainB (April 05, 2017, 12:53 PM)
______________________-MilesAhead (April 05, 2017, 01:33 PM)
(Enquiring minds need to know.)...Go to BAJ --> Settings and uncheck Allow Bad Ad Johnny voice prompts.Yes, thanks. I had known that. I like to have the audio stay enabled as it is quite amusing! (BAJ has "bad attitude".)
__________________________-panzer (April 05, 2017, 04:17 PM)
For much the same reason, I like to have Talking Moose running - see Talking Moose - Mini-Review
(If you follow the links, you will see that TM is alive and well, all-improved and supported and has gone "3D" now.)
Audio can be very useful: For example, I also have xplorer² use audio when it reports an error alert, as the alert itself is transient and appears as text in the Status Bar at the bottom of the xplorer² window and the visual cue is thus quite easy to miss if one is in a hurry. So the audio is a rather nifty ergonomically useful option.-IainB (April 06, 2017, 01:24 AM)
...Go to BAJ --> Settings and uncheck Allow Bad Ad Johnny voice prompts.Yes, thanks. I had known that. I like to have the audio stay enabled as it is quite amusing! (BAJ has "bad attitude".)
__________________________-panzer (April 05, 2017, 04:17 PM)
...I'm not a "coder" and the only thing I've ever built in my life was a garden wall with my late father many years ago. ...Building a garden wall (one that actually stays up) is an exercise and a half in itself. Been there, done that. You were fortunate to have had your father helping you.
____________________-solaris65 (April 05, 2017, 06:51 AM)
So, after the rectification/cleaning up of the hard drive and OS, and before replacing the hard drive with the SSD, bootup time was less than 1 minute?(without SSD < 1 min)That was correct. I was referring to the time the system needed to boot after
cleaning everything up but without installing the new ssd.
________________________-highend01 (April 05, 2017, 09:27 AM)
Random User-AgentNicely spotted - thanks!
___________________________-panzer (April 05, 2017, 05:39 AM)
...This thread is about a political issue...
_______________________-f0dder (April 04, 2017, 12:05 PM)
Disturbing report from Falkvinge.net:
With shock appeals ruling, the United States has effectively outlawed file encryption
(Copied below sans embedded hyperlinks/images.) ...
________________________________-IainB (March 28, 2017, 10:42 PM)
It looks like the report might be correct. File encryption has effectively been outlawed - just like that.
I didn't think that a judicial system could do that.
Got news... Under existing US laws, you already may be arrested and held indefinitely - without trial or charges, and at the discretion of the executive - if you are deemed a threat to US national security. The determination is solely that of the executive and applies (according to the wording of the law) to any person of any nation, anywhere in the world, and at any time. And such action is not subject to any form of judicial review or oversight in any real sense of either word.
__________________________-40hz (April 04, 2017, 07:37 PM)
I think I am going to have to start making file encryption apps.- then one may well discover that one risked being arrested for doing something illegal, or for inciting others to do something illegal, and it would be a federal offence. One could be putting a noose around one's neck. So that's not likely to help.-c.gingerich (March 31, 2017, 08:56 AM)
New pressures are causing ever more people to find their main satisfaction in their consumptive role rather than in their productive role. And these pressures are bringing forward such traits as pleasure-mindedness, self-indulgence, materialism, and passivity as conspicuous elements of the American character.He might have said that, but, not being an American, I couldn't possibly comment.
-- Vance Packard
__________________________
When I worked at IBM we all sat in these:Yo no comprendo. Sorry to seem obtuse, but what the heck is in that picture?
_________________-MilesAhead (April 04, 2017, 04:31 PM)
Wayback Machine:
https://chrome.googl...adcjpehmlllkndpkmiak-panzer (April 04, 2017, 10:26 AM)
...For academia, that is. Our friendly three-letter agencies haven't got the same resource constraints, nor a drive for public glory. ...- it seems to be based on requirements from your perspective that might be somewhat purist/stringent and thus a tad over-the-top for the kind of domestic situation that I postulated for the average Joe:
_____________________-f0dder (April 04, 2017, 10:37 AM)
However, for the purposes of securely encrypting the typical user's portable bits of personal/private/confidential HTML and text-based data - e.g., to protect against (say) the event where the device holding the data is lost/stolen - with the ability to sync/share it across several devices (all having java and browsers), and between specific trusted people, it seems that FrogTea could potentially be rather useful.Indeed, it still does seem true that "...FrogTea could potentially be rather useful" - in that niche.
_______________________-IainB (April 04, 2017, 03:10 AM)
...If one wanted to explore this further, it could be interesting to know how xTEA has been broken, or something, and where that is documented, and how easy that might be to replicate for the average laptop/smartphone thief.- because that is arguably likely to be the typical use case that could be most relevant/applicable for the average Joe. However, it would be incorrect to interpret that - as you seemed to do - as meaning that the requirement was necessarily a "...hard requirement of no other requirements than a browser (e.g. no executables)".
____________________-IainB (April 04, 2017, 03:10 AM)
Text encryption
- This is a base64 enhanced version of the original encryption routine, found here. TEA
- The strong encryption with JavaScript implementation of David Wheeler & Roger Needham's Block TEA (Tiny Encryption Algorithm) by Chris Veness is done only on the client computer browser with JavaScript. Information is not sent or stored anywhere during encryption or decryption.
- The Tiny Encryption Algorithm is strong encryption. It is one of the fastest and most efficient cryptographic algorithm in existence. It's public domain. The code is lightweight and compact, which makes it practical for JavaScript implementation.
- The JavaScript source code of this program can be easily viewed as the source code of this HTML page. Security specialists do not recommend using encryption for which source code is not available for analysis.
- If the password is lost or forgotten, there is no practical way to recover the unencrypted text from the encrypted text.
- Check the laws of your country to determine if you can use strong encryption legally.
- This site is for illustrative purposes only and is not intended to be a TEA encryption service. There is NO warranty, expressed or implied as to the suitability for any purpose.
Don't use FrogTea - I've posted some reasons in the other thread.
What on earth is it supposed to help with, anyway? You're suggesting a product that's technically inferior to modern crypto, while not solving the issue at hand which is a politics based one.
__________________-f0dder (April 03, 2017, 10:46 PM)
Oh, so its apparently not of much use then? I had not known that.-IainB (April 03, 2017, 11:09 PM)
...What on earth is it supposed to help with, anyway? etc. ...
________________________-f0dder (April 03, 2017, 10:46 PM)
Regarding the matter of what alternatives there might be to addressing some of the potential problems/issues raised in the context of this discussion thread, this might be helpful/useful...and in the FrogTea discussion, I obliquely referred to the potential illegality of such technology in some (unspecified) countries.
_____________________-IainB (April 03, 2017, 08:55 PM)
FrogTea?
Frog Tea
A Proper Cup of Tea by Peter Merich
What is FrogTea? FrogTea is a free, Windows based, encryption utility which allows you to create a secure*, stand alone, self-decrypting HTML archive which may contain either html or plain text content. These self-decrypting archives may be decrypted on any device which has a javascript capable browser. see Wikipedia: xxTea
While it will be a feature of the next release of NoteFrog Professional, we're also offering a stand alone utility which enables you to create secure* "FrogTea" archives of any text/html content you wish.
The encryption and decryption is done on your computer or mobile device. None of your data is ever sent over the internet.
Since it's secure* you may share the encrypted file with others - only those who have the password will be able to access the data content. You may load your encrypted html file on any device having a web browser which supports javascript, and decrypt it anytime you wish by opening the HTML file in the browser and decrypting it - right there in the browser - no internet access is necessary - no data is ever transmitted over the internet.
(Note: Since the self-decrypting file is totally self-contained, any references to external files or data must be fully qualified. If your decrypted content contains links to external web-based locations, clicking on those links WILL attempt to access the internet, but the only data transmitted from your device will be the URL request. If your decrypted output fails to access links or external data, look for non-qualified references in your original input file.)
To see it in action select this self decrypting file and decrypt it using the key "A Proper Cup of Tea" - try other keys if you wish.
FrogTea User Guide
- Start FrogTea, if it's not already running.
- You may obtain the completely stand alone utility here FrogTea beta. There is no installation. No system changes of any sort. Just download to a folder and run. (It's beta only in the sense of the user interface. The encryption is tried and proven (corrected) "Block Tea" - see Block TEA Tiny Encryption Algorithm. )
- tea window
- You may either select an html or text file to encrypt or use the current text contents of the clipboard. If you are using the clipboard content, you may elect to have line feeds/ new lines replaced with an html linefeed, otherwise your text may appear as one long line.
- Once you've selected an input option, click on the "Lock".
- If you've chosen to select a file, you'll be asked to select an input file. We're going to use a NoteFrog self-publishing stack export.
- Now assign a key. A key of at least 8 characters is recommended. Remember your key. It is not stored anywhere or available from the encrypted content.
- Re-enter the key for verification.
- You may enter an optional password "Hint", which will appear on the output HTML page.
- Now, select an output filename and location.
- The self-decrypting output file is created in the location specified. It is also opened in a browser window for verification.
- You may enter the key and verify the resulting output.
______________________________
*How secure is xTea?
- The published criticism is theoretical: http://eprint.iacr.org/2010/254.pdf - In fact, xTea has not been broken in practice. (The underlying data may be accessable if the user employed poor password technique, in which case ANY data encryption is vulnerable. Guessing a password is not breaking an encryption method. You should employ good password selection for all sensitive data.)
- http://en.wikipedia....her_security_summary No demonstrated attack. Theoretical attack with 259 chosen plaintexts - that's 576,460,752,303,423,488 or half the size of all the printed material in the world.
- Simon Shepherd, Professor of Computational Mathematics Director of the Cryptography and Computer Security Laboratory, Bradford University, England. and http://www.tayloredg...matics/TEA-XTEA.pdf- How secure is TEA? Very. There have been no known successful cryptanalyses of TEA. It's believed to be as secure as the IDEA algorithm, designed by Massey and Xuejia Lai. It uses the same mixed algebraic groups technique as IDEA, but it's very much simpler, hence faster. Also it's public domain, whereas IDEA is patented by Ascom-Tech AG in Switzerland. IBM's Don Coppersmith and Massey independently showed that mixing operations from orthogonal algebraic groups performs the diffusion and confusion functions that a traditional block cipher would implement with P- and S-boxes. As a simple plug-in encryption routine, it's great. The code is lightweight and portable enough to be used just about anywhere.
- http://www.safemess.com/faq.php - How secure is the encryption? The encryption is secure enough for personal usage unless you have a government agency breathing down your neck.
- http://derekwilliams...8-TEA-Encryption.pdf - In a practical sense, modified TEA (XTEA) with proper keys and adequate rounds is quite strong as an encryption algorithm. In an academic sense, as noted above, unmodified TEA has a published related key weakness that reduces the effective key length from 2128 to 2126 and could result in a partial attack with 234 chosen plaintexts. Unfortunately, this often gets misrepresented that TEA is inherently weak and should not be used.
- My important passwords are stored online in an xTea encrypted archive at My xTea passwords - click the "random" button.
- © htconsulting 2012
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