Latest telecom threat: Red Sox fans
A few World Series tickets went on sale - by phone only - here in Boston exactly at 3 p.m....
October 22, 2004
Risk management and you
Mike Rowehl says a good computer-security professional eventually realizes that security just is not absolute - you have to assume...
October 22, 2004
If I don't post anything tomorrow
It's because I've either collapsed in exhaustion or I'm in the coronary unit. Boy, the Sox sure don't make it...
October 20, 2004
Dear AT&T Universal Card
I've been a customer of yours for several years. I'm a big fan of your online account-management system. So it...
October 20, 2004
Networking in time of war
You probably won't ever have to set up a wireless network while facing enemy fire, but a recent military exercise still offers some useful lessons.
October 19, 2004
If Compendium feels sluggish today
You'll have to forgive me. I've had to stay up late the past two nights - I'm a Red Sox...
October 19, 2004
We're all in the Matrix now
matrixdump is a utility that takes network data and displays it floating down the screen, just like in the movie:...
October 18, 2004
The evolution of social software
Christopher Allen charts its course, from Vannevar Bush's 1945 Memex article to 1990's groupware to today's wikis and SocialText. Via...
October 18, 2004
In a BIND
One of the people who built BIND takes exception to it being called a critical security problem.
October 15, 2004
The great thing about standards ...
... Is how many of them there are. OK, somebody shoot me the next time I try that stupid crack....
October 15, 2004
Firsthand view of eBay fraud
Terry Heaton discusses why, even on eBay, if it looks too good to be true, it probably is. However, he...
October 14, 2004
You can't pay for coverage like this
Not a good week for payment gateway - the companies that handle monetary transactions for Web sites, Netcraft reports: While...
October 14, 2004
Spending more, getting more
In Technology Review, Eric Brown discusses Making Peace with the Phone Bill: Sure, long distance costs are way down, but...
October 13, 2004
It's not a bug, it's a pigeon
Guy comes home to see pigeon feathers scattered about his apartment and his cats looking guilty. Then he hears scratching sounds from inside his server rack ...
October 12, 2004
Registering 950,000 domain names at once
Netcraft reports on a controversy surrounding a company called Sipence that attempted to register some 950,000 .info domain names all...
October 12, 2004
True confessions
Sun CEO Jonathan Schwartz is in Australia and confesses that not only did he try kangaroo meat, he found it...
October 12, 2004
Murder, he wrote
We learn today that high tech is not just filled with boring, nose-to-grindstone nerds: A federal judge ruled Thursday that...
October 08, 2004
Interesting anti-spoofing tool
SpoofGuard is an Internet Explorer plugin that tries to keep users from spilling their personal information to phish sites: SpoofGuard...
October 08, 2004
Faxes? How quaint
Dennis Kennedy prepares an annual set of technology predictions for the legal community (the 2005 one will be published in...
October 08, 2004
More to P2P than music downloads
Simson Garfinkel surveys the various ways peer to peer networks are being used these days, from IP telephony (think Skype)...
October 07, 2004
Hack a day
Like to tinker? OK, silly question. Of course you do. Hack A Day promises a new hack, mod or DIY...
October 07, 2004
IBM's real software competition: eBay and Amazon.com
By rolling out Web services that people actually want, i.e., the ability to quickly buy books and, um, stuff, the two companies are positioning themselves to rule the roost of Web services in the future, David Longworth argues
October 05, 2004
Torturing a server
The Server Load Test Page describes a couple of simple shell scripts you can use to ground a server down:...
October 04, 2004
So your boss is a crook
Informit has posted a chapter from a forensics book on: The Role of Computer Forensics in Stopping Executive Fraud This...
October 04, 2004
When the inmates run the jail
Dave Piscitello cannot believe that a German firewall vendor has hired the author of the Sasser and Netsky worms: Everyone...
October 01, 2004
The new cabal: bloggers
Iran claims bloggers are out to destroy the country.
September 30, 2004
Occupational spam
Forget the phish. What about all your employees who hit "Reply to All" on every message?
September 30, 2004
The bar is now open
Open Bar is a new organization for people concerned about the legal ramifications of open-source applications: Open Bar is a...
September 30, 2004
The newest threat: camera phones
Daniel Taylor discusses the implications of all those mobile devices with built-in cameras: ... As I talk to more and...
September 29, 2004
A sad goodbye to dial-up
Martin Geddes discusses dial-up and his toddler: ... Last night the LED on my DSL modem stopped blinking and turned...
September 28, 2004
Spyware as a money maker
A direct money-maker, that is. First, recall that Amazon.com and other online retailers have "affiliate" programs, in which other Web...
September 28, 2004
Belated apologies
Last Friday, I posted a link to what was a mildly funny use of PowerPoint (guy using it to break...
September 28, 2004
A strong motivator for application development
LinuxQustions.org interviews Rob Flynn, one of the people behind the gaim open-source instant-messenger app. He discusses how he got involved...
September 27, 2004
Backing up on storage
Bowulf describes his NetWare shop's transition from Tivoli Storage Manager to CommVault Galaxy 5.0. To put it kindly, the experience...
September 24, 2004
Not a happy customer
David wanted to buy Microsoft Visual Studio, Enterprise Developer Edition. He really, really wanted to buy it. He describes how...
September 24, 2004
Routing around censorship
The government of Iran wants to block access to Weblogs it doesn't like? The bloggers have ways around that.
September 23, 2004
When the inkjet runs amok?
No, but it looks like that. Raymond Chen has kept every single piece of spam and virus-laden e-mail he's gotten...
September 23, 2004
Does 3G really threaten Wi-Fi?
Some analyst firm says the European telcos are getting ready to use 3G to mop up the floor with Wi-Fi. Could it happen here?
September 22, 2004
Does anybody know what time it is?
Brad Knowles discusses why it's important for a network to have the right time and why he has issues with...
September 22, 2004
Yet Another Thing to Worry About
Pagejacking is when your evil archenemy puts up pages with meta refresh redirects to your pages, then hopes that Google,...
September 21, 2004
The home computer of 2004
As envisioned in 1954 by the chrome-domes at the Rand Corp.
September 20, 2004
That didn't take long
Last Tuesday, Microsoft warned us about a potential hole in Windows XP related to JPEG images. Two days later, BugTraq...
September 20, 2004
Just the FAQs, ma'am
Eric Brill, a senior research at Microsoft, has been trying to figure out how to take search engines to the...
September 17, 2004
Some new intrusion-detection resources
We've added several new tools to the Intrusion detection downloads page, including rootkit detectors and forensics tools. Check 'em out,...
September 17, 2004
Category 4 panic
Run for cover! The JPEG hole from hell wil destroy all life as we know it! Ya think?
September 16, 2004
PHP and Domino
PHP works well with MySQL. What about Domino data?
September 16, 2004
SIP: Not just for VoIP anymore
EarthLink SIPshare is a protoype app showing how you can use SIP for peer-to-peer applications: The emerging ubiquity of SIP...
September 16, 2004
VoIP security
A new guide from NIST discusses the unique issues involved in securing VoIP systems.
September 15, 2004
Good summation of the comment-spam issue
OJR article: Bloggers Declare War on Comment Spam, but Can They Win? over at Online Journalism Review will tell you...
September 15, 2004
That was no tree, that was my wife!
Fraud Frond.com is a site devoted to cell towers disguised as trees: There are 130,000 cel towers in the USA...
September 15, 2004
Forget Wednesday's child
In Japan, every desktop operating system has its own big-eyed little girl to represent it.
September 14, 2004
Getting RSS overload under control
All that RSS traffic is beginning to cause bottlenecks. Would a P2P network be the answer?
September 13, 2004
Hot or not?
Rate my network diagram starts out with a warning that it's not just a place to vote on how hot...
September 13, 2004
Blog scaling
When everybody's blogging, how do you manage the massive blogflow - both from the enterprise side and from the perspective of the end user looking for interesting stuff?
September 10, 2004
Should I be posting links to cracking tools?
You can count on JoatBlog to posts links to all sorts of interesting security resources; it helps me keep our...
September 10, 2004
When CEOs blog
CEO Bloggers' Club is a blog about CEOs who blog....
September 10, 2004
The armies of the night
The Internet Storm Center reports that a Norwegian carrier discovered and shut down an IRC-controlled zombie army of 10,000 nodes....
September 09, 2004
The anti-pop-up backlash
Phil Wainewright discusses the dilemma of anti-pop-up tools such as the Google toolbar and Windows XP SP2: sure, they block...
September 09, 2004
We're shocked, shocked
When the government didn't like a Web poll showing singer Tom Jones as a Welsh "hero," it ordered the results changed, a former IT manager claims.
September 08, 2004
Are area codes irrelevant?
In an era of mobile phones and VoIP, codes tied to specific areas are fast losing their meaning.
September 07, 2004
Well that didn't take long
Dave Winer reports his first pop-up since he installed Windows XP Service Pack 2 (you'll recall it includes a pop-up...
September 07, 2004
Any OS/2 users out there?
Time to move. IBM has been posting articles on porting your OS/2 apps to Linux, which it says is "evolving as the predominant operating system of the new millennium."
September 03, 2004
Don't you just hate it when that happens?
Mike McBride loves his end users, but sometimes ... ... One of our department heads had numerous conversations and meetings...
September 03, 2004
Blocking my Chinese fraudster friend
I posted my weird HTTP-requests-from China query on a Drupal mailing list (since the queries were coming in through a...
September 02, 2004
Weird Web hacking nonsense from China
When I go home at night, I usually spend some time working on a non-networking related Web site (so, yes,...
September 01, 2004
When one isn't enough
A company called Orion Multisystems yesterday announced a desktop workstation stuffed with 96 processors.
September 01, 2004
Sun's fulltime blogger
Sun has just given Dave Johnson a fulltime job developing and deploying its Roller blog aggregator. Johnson is also in...
August 31, 2004
Gmail as file system
So what do you do with a gig of storage? If you're Richard Jones, you figure out how to use...
August 31, 2004
Longhorn sounding like Cairo
David Card of Jupiter Research wins the award for best reaction to Microsoft's announcement that it is scaling back Longhorn:...
August 31, 2004
Feelings, nothing more than feelings!
"Who should work with whom?" is an article that posits the notion that personality may be more important than technical skills in determining the success of large software-development efforts.
August 30, 2004
Sound familar?
Bryce Yehl makes a trip over to OfficeMax to pick up some cheap shelving for the *five* more used servers...
August 30, 2004
So the sky didn't fall yesterday
Vmyths explains how some comments at a press conference by a Russian anti-virus exec turned into a Death of Internet...
August 27, 2004
The ultimate shoot-em-up game
You're In Control is a new interactive game developed at MIT that might just piss you off: The You’re In...
August 26, 2004
Where's my heli-car?
Will Life Be Worth Living In 2,000AD? is a reproduction of a magazine article from 1961. Some of the predictions...
August 26, 2004
The Google browser?
Take Mozilla, add some JavaScripty goodness (Gmail is built on it, at least on the client side) and voila: the...
August 26, 2004
Not banking on it
Why aren't banks doing more to protect their customers from phish?
August 25, 2004
Today's best waste of time
Crunch Time is the game to play when your co-workers are getting just a wee bit out of control: You...
August 24, 2004
Why he didn't go to Microsoft
Werner Vogels is leaving the academic confines of Cornell for a new job building distributed applications at Amazon.com. He reports...
August 24, 2004
Free Wi-Fi almost leads to arrest
It almost sounds like the start of a joke: So this guy's sitting outside a library with a laptop ...
August 23, 2004
Not-so-SmartFilter?
Seth Finkelstein notes an interesting story out of Wales: County officials began getting complaints when users of the local libraries...
August 23, 2004
And thank you for flying Python ...
Frequentis, a company that makes software for air traffic controllers, explains why it used Python for one of its suites...
August 20, 2004
Tracking a report
VoweWiki: RadicatiGroup is an attempt to chronicle everything that happened after the Radicati Group issues a report comparing Microsoft's and...
August 19, 2004
That's a lot of feeds
RSS can be a time saver - until the number of feeds in your aggregator starts climbing toward the millennium mark.
August 18, 2004
Can you spot phish a mile away?
Prove it. Take MailFrontier's phishing IQ test (for the record, I got 90%, which sounds good, but given the damage...
August 18, 2004
Not a capital idea from Wired News
Oh, ho, so Wired News will no longer use a capital I when referring to a certain globe-spanning computer network:...
August 17, 2004
Programs that won't work with Windows XP SP2
Here's the official list from Microsoft, which also has some workarounds. Interesting that some of the programs are enterprise-level anti-virus...
August 17, 2004
For you Scrooge McDuck fans
Is the Business Software Alliance's new anti-piracy mascot all it's quacked up to be?
August 16, 2004
0, baby
Microsoft Windows: A lower Total Cost of 0wnership is the shocking title of a comparison of Windows and Linux. Well,...
August 16, 2004
Searchstreams
John Batelle discusses searchstreams - those collection of search terms you use to triangulate yourself to information when your first...
August 16, 2004
Today's most useful software
Light Speed! is a graphics application that simulates the appearance of objects as they approach the speed of light. Complete...
August 13, 2004
Routing around a change in XP2
SilverStr discusses a change in nmap that will let it get around the way Windows XP service pack 2 tries...
August 13, 2004
SP2 first impressions
The Seattle Post-Intelligencer is linking to online comments about the XP service pack. Via Scripting News....
August 12, 2004
Perl as GUI builder?
Ayup! Check out Using advanced widgets in Perl/Tk: "Perl is one of the most popular languages out there, and is...
August 12, 2004
New offshoring page
Our new Offshoring research center brings you the latest news on companies moving jobs overseas and legislative efforts related to...
August 11, 2004
Keeping it simple
Adam Bosworth, late of BEA, now of Google, discusses why simple is often far better when it comes to things...
August 10, 2004
Hacking RFID
RFDump is a Java tool for reading data off RFID chips (when connected to an RFID reader device). Its author...
August 10, 2004
Surfing at work
Surf away, but cause any network problems and you'll have one angry network guy to deal with.
August 09, 2004
Networking your IP phone
Omar Shahine provides instructions for connecting a Vonage VoIP system to a Windows home network. Via Greg Hughes, who adds...
August 09, 2004
Duct!
Apparently, in Doom 3, you can either hold a flashlight or a heavy-duty gun, but not both. And even though...
August 09, 2004
Two wheels are so redundant
What do you do after you've built a cheap knockoff of a Segway? Get rid of one of the wheels, of course.
August 06, 2004
User to Microsoft: No thanks
Edward Mitchell reads a story in which Microsoft asks everybody to turn on Windows XP automatic updating for the upcoming...
August 06, 2004
Know your enemy
Read up on a plan for bypassing all those pesky firewalls, proxies and content filters you're so busy running.
August 05, 2004
Yogurt lids and inner tubes
Trygve Lode describes how he set up a data center with ordinary household items, including yogurt lids and inner tubes...
August 05, 2004
So, should Sun buy Novell?
One observer wonders if Sun might not better use its cash reserves to shore itself up first.
August 04, 2004
The PC-Bake Oven
ThinkGeek strikes again, this time with the PC EZ-Bake Oven: "Now the computer savvy among us can relive the fun...
August 04, 2004
Taking Notes
At last: Web-services and Notes programmers find peace, love and harmony. Or something.
August 03, 2004
Now that's support!
Mike Pope gets his home broadband from Comcast. He reports Comcast POP server was down for 48 hours" "... I...
August 03, 2004
Clear plastic raincoats
Jeremy Zawodny reports from an eBay techie user meeting: "The eBay API BoF tonight was dominated by a guy who...
July 30, 2004
Power to the people
Jeff Schneider, CEO of Momentum Software, likes service-oriented architecture. And yet, he argues that large enterprises that want to quickly...
July 29, 2004
Wireless at the Democratic convention
Ninja Stu has been chronicling his efforts to make sure that bloggers and other wireless users can go online at...
July 28, 2004
Wi-Fi's cookin' now!
Pringles Can antennas are so last week. From New Zealand comes the $5 Chinese cookware parabolic antenna.
July 28, 2004
Making RSS scale
RSS is great for users, but possibly not so great for sites that suddenly find themselves barraged with endless feed...
July 27, 2004
Pining for IE (sorta)
Scott Mace installed his first Firefox browser patch: "I missed Windows Update! The Mozilla/Firefox patch mechanism essentially requires users to...
July 27, 2004
SSH brute-force password attempts
Martin McKeay reads a SANS advisory about possible SSH crack attempts and comments: "I'm waiting to see more specific information,...
July 26, 2004
Who designed this thing?
Last week, I wanted to find a press release from New York State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer. So I headed...
July 26, 2004
Auto-validation of XHTML pages
Fiddle around a lot with XHTML and want to make sure your pages are still valid, but you can never...
July 23, 2004
The IE blog
Microsoft's Internet Explorer development team has a blog....
July 23, 2004
Where is Steve?
Where is Steve? gives you more information than you probably need to know about just where Steve is at the moment (well, more specifically, his cell phone)
July 22, 2004
Cisco volunteers
Cisco has set up an online tool for non-profit groups that could use a hand with networking: "As an Internet...
July 22, 2004
Open source BPM
Open source workflow and the BPM-market: "This article gives a compact overview of the open source projects, standards and commercial...
July 22, 2004
Making the switch
Switching to Linux is an effort to create a comprehensive guide to everything you'd need to know and do to...
July 21, 2004
Public and private bugs
Microsoft has set up a bug-tracking system for Visual Studio. Scott Mace notes an interview on the Microsoft developer site...
July 21, 2004
Extreme networking
Strong Angel II is a DARPA-funded effort to develop network technologies that can survive the roughest conditions (yeah, yeah, we...
July 20, 2004
Review of "I, Robot"
Jeremy Wright counts himself as an Asimov fan, so he found himself pleasantly surprised by the movie: "All in all,...
July 20, 2004
Computers that feel your pain
Rather than trying to figure out how to make software more reliable, a Taiwanese researcher has studied ways to reduce the odds that frustrated users will simply toss their PCs out the window.
July 19, 2004
Really into your Nokia phone?
The Nokia Content Syndication Program lets you create RSS feeds to keep up with the latest comments from the Nokia...
July 19, 2004
Back!
That's right, I didn't really drop off the face of the earth! Apologies to those of you still reading for...
July 19, 2004
How Microsoft could beat Linux
Free and low-cost tools could be its newest weapon against the Linux onslaught.
July 01, 2004
Nerds hate change
Bowulf has a new boss: "I am currently in an adjustment period with a new boss, which is always tough....
July 01, 2004
Some new Fusion resources
New for your drill-down enjoyment: Research centers on CRM, ERP and networking standards. All three feature the latest news and...
June 30, 2004
Apple as predatory as Microsoft?
That's what Om Malik says about a proposed Mac OS add-on that pretty much copies an existing third-party app called...
June 30, 2004
The Heisenberg-uncertainty database
The Justice Department says one of its databases would be destroyed it if tried to make a copy of it.
June 29, 2004
Telcos and fiber to the home
Jim Stewart discusses fiber to the home and wonders if, in a few years, LECs will know what hit them.
June 29, 2004
Take two Tablets and call him in the morning
Greg Hughes points to an interesting article on how Microsoft field-tested its Tablet PCs before their launch - in trials...
June 29, 2004
Social networking? Who cares?
Never waste time at a conference session on social networking again. Just read David Hornik's transcription of one such discussion....
June 28, 2004
Help route around censorship
Adam Morris lives in Tianjin, China. He reports that China is stepping up its 'Net censorship: "We are in throes...
June 28, 2004
Escaping this mortal coil
Bob Bemer, the father of ASCII and the escape key died earlier this week....
June 25, 2004
Wireless disintermediation
Martin discusses some innovative ways people are beginning to get around restrictions placed on them by cellular carriers - some...
June 25, 2004
DNA in XML
Just when I think I might be getting over my fixation with people applying biological techniques to computing (viral immunity,...
June 25, 2004
Suggestions on comment spam?
Our Weblogs run on Movable Type, and over the past few months, MT-Blacklist has proven an invaluable tool for combatting...
June 25, 2004
It's not dead. It's resting
News that Comdex has been cancelled this year but might return reminds one of an old Monty Python sketch: Customer:...
June 24, 2004
Just-in-time network upgrades
Riedesg works at a university, where major system upgrades have to be planned around the academic calendar (i.e., they can...
June 24, 2004
Microsoft owns you
Microsoft has just won a patent for using the human body to transmit power and data: "Abstract:Methods and apparatus for...
June 23, 2004
New convergence pages
File this under "drilling down." We've set up a bunch of new research centers under Convergence for folks who really want to get the latest on certain specific areas.
June 23, 2004
Spam hip hop
Get your Flash client ready and your sound turned up and then go to U Got Spam for the best...
June 23, 2004
The problem with end users
Douglas Chick discusses why phishing works: Because users keep responding to the e-mails, no matter how many times you tell them not to
June 22, 2004
The phishers get smarter
One of the "problems" faced by phishers in trying to suck out your bank-account info is that their URLs, should...
June 21, 2004
Ancient Irish hacking
Sean McGrath presents evidence that the Irish have been hacking for at least 6,000 years. Via Diego Doval....
June 21, 2004
Finally, working servers?
Bowolf has been chronicling his woes with some IBM xSeries 345 servers (as in: they don't work). He now reports...
June 21, 2004
How to fry an egg in a PC
How to fry an egg on an XP delivers what it promises: A photo-essay on how to use your computer...
June 17, 2004
The no-points-of-failure myth
Diego Doval wonders: Sure, the routers will stay up, but what about the services?
June 16, 2004
Imagining DDos on a VoIP net
Arrigo reads that BT plans to go all IP by 2009 and isn't happy: "People expect a phone to work...
June 16, 2004
Zap: There goes a little piece of the Web
Back in days of yore, Dave Winer's UserLand Software let people set up free Weblogs on its weblogs.com site. On...
June 15, 2004
Iranian encryption
Bruce Schneier has some interesting speculation about the Ahmad Chalabi telling the Iranians we'd broken their codes story: "Whatever the...
June 15, 2004
SOA Editor
Cape Science has released a free SOA Editor "which enables programmers to rapidly create, view and edit Services using Web...
June 15, 2004
Paying for RSS
Is advertising the end of RSS as we know it?
June 14, 2004
A tempermental beast
Bill Manning was working until 11 p.m. this past Saturday. He explains why on Sunday: "... WebShere is such a...
June 14, 2004
Findory Blogory
With a name like Findory Blogory, you know it has to be good. Findory Blogory is an interesting effort to...
June 14, 2004
Flock this
Remember flashmobs? Yeah, they sure were fun for, oh, ten minutes or so. Get ready for the wireless version: flocking.
June 10, 2004
It was a dark and stormy net
Darknet is a project to help you monitor malicious traffic on your network: "A Darknet is a portion of routed,...
June 10, 2004
Scamming an eBay scammer
The Powerbook (P-P-P-Powerbook) is a long, funny discussion of how one guy managed to put one over on a foreign...
June 10, 2004
Not happy with IBM xSeries servers
Guess we won't be seeing Bowulf in any of those snazzy IBM TV ads. He continues to chronicle his problems...
June 09, 2004
Not happy with HP support
Mike Gunderloy has an old HP Jornada PDA. The battery leaked, basically welding itself to the inside of the unit,...
June 09, 2004
The right tool for the job
Stonyfield Farms, a New Hampshire yogurt maker, has started a barnyard of blogs on yogurt-related topics. One guess which blogging tool they're using.
June 08, 2004
Fluid information architectures
Mike Rowehl writes that Web services and service-oriented architectures sound cool, but they do them little good when he can't...
June 08, 2004
Desperate for Gmail
Why are people so anxious to get an account?
June 07, 2004
Sun, the universe and everything
Blogs for Sun is an aggregator that will show you postings from every blog written by a Sun employee: "This...
June 07, 2004
Open source won't save e-voting
Eric Rescorla explains why he doesn't think open-source systems are necessarily better than proprietary ones for ensuring electronic voting systems...
June 07, 2004
Wireless Unleashed
Wireless Unleashed is a group Weblog (by "Stupid Networks" guru David Isenberg, wireless doyen Kevin Werbach, former AT&T Labs...
June 03, 2004
Possible Google time saver
Lushe.net is a JavaScript "bookmarklet" for IE and Mozilla that lets you search multiple sites at once via Google. What...
June 02, 2004
Death of 'Net predicted
Film at 11? "People For Internet Responsibility (PFIR) is pleased to announce an 'emergency' conference aimed at preventing the 'meltdown'...
June 02, 2004
Password issues
So you think you have problems convincing your users to use hard-to-crack passwords? Bruce Blair recounts what happened when then...
June 02, 2004
Liquid computing
No, it's not computing underwater. Nor is it using flasks of liquid to do computations. It's BEA's new service-oriented architecture strategy.
June 01, 2004
Yakking it up over Wi-Fi
Earlier this week, the BBC had an interesting story about a wireless network in Nepal that is helping remote yak...
May 28, 2004
Not happy with Linksys
Tim A. chronicles a fruitless, month-long attempt to get help from Linksys with a product problem: "... April 29 -...
May 27, 2004
Finally, a reason to switch to Mozilla
Pornzilla is a suite of tools for users of the Firefox variant of Mozilla: "These bookmarklets and extensions makes it...
May 27, 2004
XP security better, but not good enough
Preston Gralla says that while Microsoft's impending XP Service Pack 2 does have some security enhancements, Zone Alarm far outpaces them.
May 26, 2004
Protesting oneself
Following up on yesterday's posting about the anti-Semite using a legitimate site to build up his Google page rank, Seth...
May 26, 2004
Security testing exercises
Jeremy Wright is writing a proposed set of security excercises to help a company test its defenses. He's looking for...
May 26, 2004
The problem with anonymous comments?
Seth Finklestein notes the latest wrinkle in the Google "Jew" controversy: Seems another Jew hater, possibly jealous at all the...
May 25, 2004
Exchange clustering
Running a big Exchange installation? Evan's WebLog, by Microsoftie Evan Dodd, is all about Exchange clustering. Via Paul Robichaux's Exchange...
May 25, 2004
Remember when the Web was new?
Ed Costello was IBM's first Webmaster, and he recalls ibm.com's launch ten year's ago: "... This was actually the subject...
May 24, 2004
Building up your immunity
So we have researchers using the models of disease epidemics to make large-scale database systems more efficient. Why not study...
May 24, 2004
The impending end of big telcos?
Martin discusses the commodification of telecom services: "Perhaps we're heading towards a future where instead of a dozen large vertically-organized...
May 24, 2004
So who wrote Minix?
Andrew Tannenbaum wrote Minix, a Unix-like OS that came before Linux. In this essay he shows how Linus Torvalds wrote...
May 21, 2004
SIP interoperability
Joel Snyder helped put together the SIP interoperabilty testing at the recent NetWorld+Interop. In this audio interview, he discusses SIP....
May 21, 2004
Technology as the death of us all
A chance encounter with a colleague whose DVD burner has, well, burned out, gets Greg to thinking about the impact...
May 20, 2004
Best headline ever
I would RTFM if there was an FM to FR - in which the author decries the sad state of...
May 20, 2004
And Henry Ford didn't start Ford?
GrokLaw notes an interesting story: The Alexis de Tocqueville Insitution says Linus Torvalds didn't invent Linux. As GrokLaw notes, the...
May 19, 2004
Honeypot on a disk
Honeywall CDROM is a bootable honeypot that lets you see what would-be intruders are up to: "You simply boot off...
May 18, 2004
BitTorrent: Akamai for the masses?
Linux Magazine has a BitTorrent overview that explains how this many-to-many ad-hoc network could change the way large files (yeah, video, but also things such as Linux distributions) are distributed
May 17, 2004
Low IQ?
Bruce Schneier says he's a bit wary of IQ Networks - a European security concern: "... IQ Networks claims to...
May 17, 2004
Visio stencils
If you're a Visio user, here's a site for sore eyes.
May 14, 2004
Movable Type and eating
So yesterday I grumped about the cost of new licenses for Six Apart's Movable Type tool. Timothy Appnel says buck...
May 14, 2004
The cost of blogging
Six Apart has come out with the pricing for Ver. 3.0 of its Movable Type blogging tool (sorry, for their "publishing system"). Ouch.
May 13, 2004
Live comment spammers
Scott Johnson, CEO of Feedster, has a blog, but he's using blogging software that doesn't have a way to automatically...
May 13, 2004
Web-enabled garage-door opener
Mr. Blog explains the usefulness of being able to control his garage door from the comfy confines of his house.
May 12, 2004
Dear Paypal phishers
If you're going to try to scam me out of my account information, couldn't you come up with a better...
May 12, 2004
Bloggers to Google: We're watching you
So Google now has its own blog. On Monday, it had an item about how Google's hiring. So? The original...
May 12, 2004
The Fusion OPML file
Get your Network World Fusion OPML hot from the oven.
May 11, 2004
Don't blame the worm
Add Greg Hughes to the list of people who think there was no excuse for companies to be shut down...
May 11, 2004
Remember the giblets!
Larry Osterman reports on a talk by Michael Howard, the author of Writing Secure Code. Howard, Osterman says, left his...
May 07, 2004
Hiring as information warfare
Can who you hire be as effective as corporate espionage in learning what your competitors are up to?
May 06, 2004
Fixing a wireless problem
The continued growth of wireless use means more interference, because few people bother (or know how to) change the channels...
May 06, 2004
Latest trend in Indian outsourcing
They click and the click and then they click some more. They are India's secret army of online ad clickers.
May 04, 2004
Anti-censor tool winds up censoring
So last fall, the U.S. government's International Broadcasting Bureau (think Voice of America and Radio Free Europe), signed a deal...
May 04, 2004
Fire in the hole!
Alexander Scoble has been documenting his progress in buying a fire-suppression system for his server room.
May 03, 2004
Wi-Fi as a GPS replacement
Mark Frauenfelder, discusses Quarterscope, a company that says it has a way to use wireless access points to see where...
May 03, 2004
The Google IPO
Notes from all over on the Google IPO.
April 30, 2004
Rule Britannia
The BBC reports the arrest of some geek for phishing: "Police have said a 21-year-old man is the first in...
April 30, 2004
Best use of Linux, bar none
Bar Monkey is a home bar set up that uses Linux to help mix and pour drinks for you.
April 29, 2004
A couple of interesting security links
Both via joat, who does an excellent job of collecting such things: WormRadar is an effort to build a distributed...
April 29, 2004
Epidemic networking
We've already adopted the "virus" paradigm from the biologists, so why not use other natural phenomenon to describe - and improve - networking?
April 28, 2004
Social networks: The Next Big Thing?
It's a long essay (I'm about halfway through it myself), but Smarter, Simpler Social provides a good overview of efforts...
April 27, 2004
Anti-phishing tool for IE
SpoofStick, a browser plug-in that prominently displays the real URL of any site, is now available for Internet Explorer (previously,...
April 26, 2004
Wireless Braille
The normally sober BBC breathlessly reports on an effort by some German researchers to translate wireless text mssages into tactile...
April 23, 2004
A dead process
Just when you think the InterWeb can't possibly get any more useful, along comes something like Died Online.
April 22, 2004
Time for Time Warner to cut AOL loose
John Battelle says Time Warner is screwing itself when it comes to AOL and needs to just spin it off:...
April 22, 2004
JavaScript and us
About those JavaScript errors you might be getting on our pages.
April 21, 2004
RSS in ten words or less
RSS is one of those "standards" (Mark Pilgrim has identified at least nine different variants) that nobody seems to be...
April 21, 2004
Knock it off
Jeremy Zawodny likes how people use instant-message software to let people know if they're available. However, he cannot stand people...
April 21, 2004
Being one with the access point
Instead of hunting for wireless access points, why not just wear one on your back?
April 20, 2004
Why national ID cards won't work
Cryptography expert Bruce Schneier wonders why we want to spend billions on a security program that won't work. He notes...
April 20, 2004
Charles Colson on technology in the church
Nowadays, he's a born-again Christian who ministers to the prison set - which includes writing a regular column for Prison Fellowship. His most recent column addresses the consequences of over-ambitious, over-budget technology spending.
April 16, 2004
Fiber to the home
Jim Stewart's been thinking about fiber to the home - he looks at why we'll need it and who should...
April 16, 2004
Gaming your life
Intel's IT Manager Game is what The Sims would be like if all the Sims worked as IT managers in shops full of sluggish, annoying end users whose productivity will collapse unless you upgrade their desktops and network gear ...
April 15, 2004
Amazon's new search engine
Well, make that: Amazon's sorta new search engine. A9, unwrapped in beta yesterday, basically consists of Google's database and algorithms...
April 15, 2004
Clueless California lawmakers
So Google gets all this attention for its beta GMail, which the company plans to pay for by incorporating ads...
April 15, 2004
Warts and all
If you gave an infinite number of monkeys an infinite number of HTML editors, would they eventually create pages with...
April 14, 2004
IE to get makeover?
IE 6.x was supposed to be the end of the IE line. But Microsoft is hiring developers ...
April 13, 2004
Cut Google some slack
Diego Duval wonders if the complaints about privacy in Google's GMail miss the point. Sure, Google isn't guaranteeing 100% privacy:...
April 13, 2004
The cable companies must love it
One observer says Verizon is playing chicken with its future by threatening to cancel a major fiber project.
April 12, 2004
On the Cisco LEAP hacking tool
Mike Rowehl reacts to the news that somebody's released a tool for automating attacks against Cisco's LEAP wireless encryption: "......
April 12, 2004
Wi-Fly: Faster than DSL
Ami Ben-Bassat reports: "On Friday, March 12, 2004, a group of several dozen Internet addicts from Israel and abroad, gathered...
April 09, 2004
The exciting world of computer security
Ejovi Nuwere, a security researcher (and co-founder of InfoSec Daily), brings his kid brother into the office: "... Unfortunately computer...
April 09, 2004
Small-town wireless giveaway
Wheat Wireless is giving away $100,000 in wireless gear to a small town: "The town selected for this grant will...
April 08, 2004
Now cut that out!
Why people should stop citing stupid queries as proof that Google is dying.
April 07, 2004
Smacking spoofers
Phil Libin has posted a cool little widget for reducing your odds of being phished. His SpoofStick is a free...
April 07, 2004
Why he's not a lawyer
The vice president of legislative affairs at Mike McBride's company asks him for a consult on a proposed anti-spam law...
April 06, 2004
Online payment insanity
Jeremy Zawodny rants about certain online payment schemes: "You know, I really can't wait until all these stupid little on-line...
April 06, 2004
GMail review and notes
As with everything else Google, people are talking about its new GMail Web-based messaging service.
April 05, 2004
Google: The comment spammer's friend
Well, in one small way, at any rate. Every morning for the past couple of weeks, I've opened up my...
April 02, 2004
Standards Watch
The great thing about standards is that there are so many of them (did I just hear a snare drum out there?).
April 01, 2004
New RFC aims to combat piracy
Our very own Scott Bradner has just released RFC 3751 - the Omniscience Protocol, whose goal is to figure out...
April 01, 2004
Diebold gets a new CSO
Avi Rubin, a Johns Hopkins researcher who keeps punching holes in electronic-voting systems, today writes he is taking a job...
April 01, 2004
Catching insiders
It's one thing to snare the outside script kiddies. But what about security violations by your own people?
March 31, 2004
The problem with Java
Russell Beatie says the problem with Java isn't the language itself but the too-clever computer-science majors making it too complex.
March 31, 2004
What's it called?
An IM situation that happens to me far too often must have a name ...
March 30, 2004
Candygrams?
Lookee here: Not only can you still send a Western Union telegram, you can order one online. The obvious question,...
March 30, 2004
Virtual reality for cancer patients
A study at the Duke Comprehensive Cancer Center showed that some breast-cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy experienced less fatique and fewer side effects when hooked up to virtual-reality systems during treatments.
March 30, 2004
Computers suck
It's one thing for your computer to crash when you're sitting at your desk. It's quite another to have it crash when you're 45 feet under water.
March 29, 2004
Webcams work!
Why you should install a Webcam in your house right this second.
March 29, 2004
Mongrel Web services spec
Phil Wainewright discusses why he thinks a new Web services spec from IBM and BEA is a dog.
March 26, 2004
Ultimate Boot CD
The Ultimate Boot CD is a project to cram as many (open source) diagnostic and recovery tools as possible onto...
March 26, 2004
IM policies for the enterprise
David Marshak of the Seybold Group writes about "Instant Messaging at Work" - and provides some guidance on establishing IM policies:
March 25, 2004
An indexing index
Jeremy Wagstaff provides a handy listing of desktop indexing applications, i.e., apps that will help you keep track of all...
March 25, 2004
What's old is new again
The Speak & Spell Emulator is exactly what it sounds like. ...
March 25, 2004
A handy household tool
And you thought Python was only a Web scripting language!. Andrew Koenig writes on how Python helped him design his new kitchen.
March 24, 2004
Upgrading to Windows XP Service Pack 2 RC 1
Kayode Okeyode provides lots of links to people who have detailed their experiences upgrading to Windows XP Service Pack 2...
March 24, 2004
Fiber-seeking cable operators
We all know about the disruptions caused by fiber-seeking backhoes. Al Bonnyman writes about an equally bad above-ground problem.
March 23, 2004
Ow, my head
I spent a good part of yesterday working on an events calendar module for our upcoming community platform (more on...
March 23, 2004
Bill Gates snares free-software biggie
From Slashdot comes the news that Free Software Foundation founder Richard M. Stallman today moves his office into the new...
March 22, 2004
Centralized identity for the blogosphere
Six Apart, the company behind Movable Type, plans a centralized identity management system called TypeKey. Users of the planned Movable...
March 22, 2004
Spam: What goes around comes around?
Seems that China has become the world's second largest recipient of spam: "The Internet Society of China (ISC) said that...
March 19, 2004
Sex addicted IT director sent to jail
The former IT director for the town of Leesburg, Va., will be spending the next four months in jail for...
March 19, 2004
Physical security
From aerogels to questionnaires, some things to think about for your data center.
March 18, 2004
The real threat
Viruses and worms get all the pubilcity, but IT needs to start spending a log more time worrying about security...
March 18, 2004
Beating up the hackers
Security vendor says it's time to take the intrusion wars into the hackers' homes.
March 15, 2004
You'll eat it and you'll LIKE it
Bob Congdon digs into the origins of the phrase eating their own dogfood and discovers it's more than just a...
March 15, 2004
When variables go bad
Bad Variable Names is a fun discussion about programmers who use, well, bad variable names: "On an old VB project,...
March 12, 2004
Infinite loop
When I pick up food at our local Chinese take-out place, my daughter likes coming along because the places has...
March 12, 2004
When India calls
Michael Broschat gets two calls from an Indian call center to try to sell him AT&T service: "What's a kick...
March 11, 2004
How to crack code
Michael Giagnocavo has started a series of articles on cracking .Net code, in an effort to show how crackers think...
March 08, 2004
Becoming one with the users
Anil John says he runs his Windows XP Pro machine as a non-Administrator: "... In developing as a non-administrator, I...
March 08, 2004
Learning my way around Drupal
Still playing with Drupal as a possible community platform. It's pretty cool, and so I'm starting a series of notes...
March 08, 2004
Putting locks on bagles
Is Bagle the future of worms? Don't count on it, one security pro says.
March 05, 2004
Unix as flowchart
The Unix history chart shows the interconnections between every last one of the Unices. Via Kayode Okeyode...
March 05, 2004
Needed: IQ test for e-mail users
Brandon Fuller works at a large company. He reports on the fun related to the most recent spate of virus-infested e-mail.
March 04, 2004
Web services as disruptive technology
Phil Wainewright notes a report that a London brokerage has downgraded SAP's stock rating because of the potential impact of...
March 04, 2004
Googling as a Supreme Court argument
US Solicitor General Theodore B. Olson claims he found more than 6.2 million free-porn links when he Googled "free porn"...
March 03, 2004
Exploding money
You can hardly bump into a Weblog this week without reading something about $20 bills exploding in microwaves because of...
March 03, 2004
Hey, Microsoft, protect this!
Bowulf helps his aunt remove tons of spyware from her Windows XP PC and in the process finds the spyware...
March 02, 2004
Every language war ever
Bill Stilwell deftly summarizes every debate you've ever had about computer languages. Sample: Idiot 1: Your Favorite Language is bad...
March 01, 2004
Offshoring debate
There's an interesting discussion about application-development offshoring at Ask Joel....
March 01, 2004
Wireless as the death of us all
One of the Scripting Guys at Microsoft discusess that now common phenomenon: people working on their wireless-connected laptops during meetings....
February 27, 2004
I hear you knocking ...
Port Knocking is a site devoted to an interesting way of securing a network: An outside node seeking access to...
February 26, 2004
The latest academic discipline
Ludology - the study and theory of videogames. No, really, could I make something like that up? Take one entry:...
February 26, 2004
Microsoft's embedded anti-virus service
Mixed feelings out there on the news that Microsoft is looking to incorporate anti-virus technology into the next Windows XP...
February 25, 2004
Elephants with cell phones
The Kenyan government is using GSM technology to try to preserve the country's elephants. The Nation, a Kenyan newspaper reports...
February 24, 2004
Forum RSS feeds
I've set up an RSS feed for our forums. Right now, it's not terribly sophisticated - it's RSS 0.91 and...
February 23, 2004
Spam from MIT
A friend, let's call him Deep Packet, is not surprised that he's gotten spam relayed from an MIT server. Hey,...
February 23, 2004
Finally: Proof Macs are the work of the devil
Richard Paley, who, among other things, teaches "theobiology," writes that Mac OS X is the work of godless evolutionists: "The...
February 20, 2004
The new Yahoo
Do a search on Yahoo today and the results come from its own search engine, rather than Google. Diego Doval...
February 19, 2004
What a mess
A site called bash.org is holding a competition to find the messiest computer work area. Via /usr/bin/girl....
February 19, 2004
Not a smooth upgrade
Last Thursday, Bill Manning bit the bullet and began upgrading his Cisco call-center software from Windows NT to Windows 2000....
February 18, 2004
Spim attack
Was it only a couple of weeks ago that we were writing about the impending flood of spim - spam...
February 17, 2004
Log analysis
LogAnalysis.org is a site entirely about, surprise, firewall log analysis: "Log Analysis is one of the great overlooked aspects of...
February 12, 2004
What's that smell?
Bowulf learns the importances of properly securing processors in blade servers: "... I turned on the 6 servers, which were...
February 10, 2004
FrankenPIX
Want a challenge? Why not build build a clone of a Cisco PIX device? That's what Bill Bradford just did:...
February 09, 2004
Smile, you're on riot camera!
You may have heard that Boston had a little of the old ultra-v following the Patriots' Super Bowl win last...
February 09, 2004
You canning spam?
The CAN-SPAM law has been in effect for about a month now. Noticed a dramatic reduction in incoming spam? Noticed any reduction?
February 06, 2004
Yo mamma
Top 11 Yo Momma Insults for Coders, including: "Yo momma's so stupid, she leaves possible buffer overruns in a 'Hello...
February 06, 2004
The lab vs. the real world
Web-site redesigns are always so much fun. And the absolute bestest part is when you go live and all that cool new code that looks great behind the firewall slooooows your site to a crawl.
February 05, 2004
Don't click that link!
In which a geek descends into computer hell with just one click.
February 04, 2004
A broadband plan that stinks?
The New Orleans water and sewer board figured that when it upgrades downtown sewers soon, it could make some money...
February 04, 2004
Mouse clicks are so 2002
Microsoft's latest advice on avoiding malicious URLs - type in URLs yourself.
February 03, 2004
Kid 2.0
A guy in Michigan somehow convinced his wife give their new son a version number: "Jon Blake Cusack talked his...
February 02, 2004
Collateral damage in the war on spam
Kasia discusses what happens when innocent people get caught in the spam war, i.e., folks who suddenly find their e-mail...
January 30, 2004
Why I love Movable Type, redux
As mentioned earlier, we're going live with a redesigned Fusion on Monday. We use Movable Type for both traditional Weblogs...
January 29, 2004
MyDoom counts
First, let's get this out of the way: Whenever I see a mention of the virus, I think of Victor...
January 28, 2004
Electrocuted TV news crews
File this under "who knew?" Ed Mitchell discovers a common workplace hazard among TV news crews: electrocution when their mobile...
January 28, 2004
Designing a new Fusion
It's coming Monday to a Web site near you! Better research centers, easier navigation and a cool new Weblog called...
January 27, 2004
Yo, anti-virus vendors
You're making me get all Travis Bickle - yes, I'm tawkin' to YOU! Could you kindly shut off the "feature"...
January 27, 2004
BEA and APIs
In this article, BEA deputy CTO Benjamin Renaud is quoted as saying that Microsoft must adhere to industry standards, but...
January 26, 2004
Weblog DDoS
Bloggers are now unfortunately very familiar with comment spam - in which spammers try to bolster their search-engine rankings by...
January 23, 2004
Where have I heard that scream before?
Listening to some of the Howard Dean remixes (yes, of course people have put his speech to music), something about...
January 22, 2004
Novel methods for defeating viruses, porn
Proof that high tech pervades everything, including religion: First, a photo, showing Japanese businessmen holding "a service aimed at fending...
January 22, 2004
Stop the madness
Raymond Chen says doesn't want phone books - he looks numbers up online. But Qwest keeps delivering them - he...
January 21, 2004
From the romance help desk
Desperate writes the help desk: " Last year I upgraded from Boyfriend 5.0 to Husband 1.0 and noticed a distinct...
January 21, 2004
Collaborative software that saves lives
Michael Helfrich spent a month in Iraq last fall and writes about the value of a collaborative GIS app (based...
January 20, 2004
My first LinkedIn spam
A couple of weeks ago, I signed up for LinkedIn mainly just to see how this Friendster for the corporate...
January 20, 2004
Cisco bloggers
When it comes to some companies, you can hardly toss a dead cat without hitting bloggers who write about them...
January 16, 2004
Celebrating today
Why? Because today is officially Personal Firewall Day: "If you are a computer expert, share your knowledge with those around...
January 15, 2004
Curses, foiled again
When Chris Kirk's friends wanted to pull a prank on him, they did it in style - over five days,...
January 15, 2004
Thanks for writing
A few months ago, I complained about a p.r. company spamming an off-hours forum I run. Naturally, I took the...
January 15, 2004
Take a SIP
SIPIntro is "An Introduction to the SIP Protocol for the Impatient Technologist" and is an overview of how to use...
January 14, 2004
Why is Palm bad at networking?
Mike Rowehl says he doesn't understand why Palm seems to make it so hard to network its devices: " ......
January 14, 2004
Sanity checks
Jeremy Zawodny was trying to help a co-worker with a database problem - the server kept running out of steam...
January 13, 2004
OSI must die
David Chappell is getting really tired of the seven-layer model: "Reviewing a manuscript for a book on service-oriented architecture (SOA)...
January 13, 2004
Another Movable Type intranet
Last year, we re-built our corporate Intranet using Movable Type, which is best known as a blogging tool, but which...
January 12, 2004