Computer Tips -Tech Info

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  • Creating Strong Passwords that are Also Easy to Remember

    Making up passwords is something we have to do almost everyday it seems. Banking web sites, forums, email accounts, webhosting accounts, mail lists, etc. But it seems that making passwords is one of the things that some people have the hardest time doing. Maybe it’s not that it’s hard to make a password, but hard to make a GOOD password. First off, what’s a good password and what’s a bad password? Anything that is a dictionary word (even in another language) is a BAD password. Personal names are usually very bad choices. Why?

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  • Thank you NC department of revenue…

    I heard on the local news last night that the North Carolina Department of Revenue has lost a laptop that had ~30,000 state taxpayers information on it. Social Security numbers/etc… The report I saw that the state has setup a hotline to “teach citizens about identity theft” and have sent letters to those affected. Thanks… lose a laptop with 30,000 and then teach US about identity theft. How about teaching employees with sensitive information about encryption? ……. so I looked into it a bit further this morning.

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  • Google will allow downloads of out-of-copyright books

    It’s certainly a brief story, but to the point…. Google will allow pdf downloads of the books in their book search that are already out of copyright. Of course, copyright law is a strange and peculiar thing to many people, so this doesn’t mean that EVERY edition of “The Canterbury Tales” is now freely downloadable. So, it may take a bit of digging to find the free downloads for some of the titles you’re searching for, but they can be found and downloaded. They do categorize by “limited preview” and “full view” books. It’s possible to JUST search “Full view” books as well.

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  • Network Security guide for the home or small business network – Part 20 heterogeneous networks

    One thing I’ve already mentioned in this serious is using alternative programs like Mozilla Firefox instead of Internet Explorer, or Thunderbird, Eduora instead of Outlook Express. Even if you’re not using alternative software as your primary web browser, email program there are advantages to having networks with mixed software, operating systems and even mixed network hardware. Back when the blaster worm hit, there were stories of businesses paralyzed when every Windows XP machine in the place (read – EVERY machine in the place) could not stay up long enough to download a fix. In order to get a fix they had to get online to find out about it and it was crashing within 30 seconds of booting.

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  • Scheduling tasks in linux cron

    Windows has scheduled tasks which most people are only halfway aware of. Linux has very powerful scheduling capabilities coming from it’s unix heritage. cron is the daemon that deals with scheduled tasks under most linux distributions. There are a couple ways that you can schedule cron tasks. The first is from the command line.

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  • Network Security guide for the home or small business network – Part 9 – Know your network

    Once more into the breech… Ok you’ve taken account of the software and services on your pc. The next thing we need to talk about is knowing your network. Do you have any wireless access points? Not sure? Print servers? How many pcs? Are any of them portables? Public access? Are all of them secured?

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  • Home Linux terrabyte backup system

    This is something I’ve wanted to build for some time. I hadn’t actually thought about a terrabyte of storage, but… linux journal has the article on making your own home network backup storage solution using an old pc, linux and relatively cheap discs. The concept of any backup system is redundancy so that a single failure doesn’t take out your data.

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  • Lawsuit to block the release of Windows Vista?

    Betanews.com is reporting on a move by a public interest lawyer (who is running as a Republican for the Governors Office of Illinois) who is attempting to block the distribution of Windows Vista. He intends to ask Microsoft for an unconditional warranty that the operating system is free from major bugs that could lead to security vulnerabilities. (Good luck with that one…)

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