Classic Tech Tips Archive

Ok, the last post got a bit long with the hijackthis log, but I wanted to include the whole picture. I put a few comments in, but thought it might be useful to include the notes I took at the time. F…

Sunbelt has this warning about yet another fake security site. This one is laid out a bit different than the others we've seen in recent days. It's not quite the same spoof of the Windows Security Ce…

Beta news is reporting that Internet Explorer 7 will use the same Icon for RSS feeds that Firefox currently uses. What's more they say they'll continue to work with Mozilla on consistency between the…

I had someone call and start by saying she bet me a dollar I'd never heard of this before.... She said she was doing something (adjusting font size?) and all of a sudden everything on her screen went…

I'm writing this from the laptop. Having run Mandriva 2006 without any real significant bumps for a couple weeks I've come to a point where I'm ready to take the plunge on the desktop. The desktop is…

This is the first in a several part series documenting the cleaning of an infected PC. The only real noteworthy item is that it was a dial-up only connection and was rather infested for that. (On par…

Do I really need a hardware firewall? I'm running XP Service Pack 2 with the built in firewall? (or norton, or zonealarm?) Well, personal firewalls (the name that software firewalls go by) are good f…

When I saw a story on incidents.org with the title PCI Compliance, I wondered what SANS was doing covering a hardware standard.... oops. PCI in this case means Payment Card Industry. It turns out tha…

I saw this earlier today, but had thought it was an issue already covered (just before Thanksgiving there was an opera security update I think.) Anyway... Secunia has an advisory on a security vulner…

For a long time I really disliked seeing USB network adapters. The main reason is the performance. USB 1 can only do ~ 12Mbps which compared to a 10/100 ethernet controller "significantly limits your…

Sans has the tip that information on the critical Windows updates expected tomorrow from Microsoft has started to be released. MS 05-54: Cumulative Security Update for Internet Explorer This will hop…

Lookes like VMWare has officially released the first version of their VMPlayer. The previous was a pre-release preview/beta. It looks like it's now officially a 1.0.0-final. VMPlayer of course, is a …

Now, it can be useful to run several versions of the same program at the same time (especially if it's a web browser.) I've accomplished this under linux with internet explorer, but didn't realize th…

This is another "wolf in sheeps clothing" alert. The Sunbelt blog has information and tips on a number of other sites that are posing as either the Windows security center page, or a page not found e…

For those of you new to linux and using a debian based distribution... here is a good introduction to the world of apt-get. Apt-get is a tool for installing software, updating software, uninstalling …

This would be a good thing for clamantivirus. eEye is considering "adopting" clamav for inclusion in their Blink product. The idea is that they would improve clamantivirus and then start integrating …

It sounds like Microsoft Windows Vista will not support old DVD drives when it ships. By old, I'm talking about drives that don't support the region selection limits that newer drives have. (In other…

Computers can communicate over networks. (Surprise!) That's how you're reading this post. The machine that this site is hosted on is listening for requests for connection. When it receives a request …

OK, this is an ambitious idea, but the two articles on Titan Rain and the lack of IT security training has planted a bug under the saddle so to speak.... I don't know how many parts will be in this s…

Earlier this year there was an article or two about a rumored "hack attack" that was ongoing against US Government (and contractor) computer systems. The stories claimed that the attacks seemed to be…

In another move that will frustrate millions... The recording industry is set to take on sites that provide lyrics (or scores) of licensed songs. I know I've searched for song lyrics many times becau…

Linuxgangster.org (??) has a good article up on the powerful grep command. GREP is one of the most useful command line tools in linux (really, there are so many it's hard to choose, but this is one I…

Good luck Jim... this message will self destruct in 40 seconds... A UK mobile (cell) company says it's developed self-destructing text messages. In the spring they hope to introduce self destructing …

This is the first of a few articles that will highlight some of the tools/gadgets/gizmos that I find useful. I'm starting off with one that's almost essential. External USB hard drive adapter. Recent…

This may not be useful to many people, but I thought it was interesting. If you do web design and use css you'll probably like this... I found this post at leftjustified.net about a neat way to "rese…