Bandwidth Bandit

Yes, it is time for me to buy new hardware. I have been using a Dell XPS m1730 which is pushed as a Desktop replacement and if you ask me, this is exactly what this beast is! You don’t want to carry this thing around with you, you want to put it on your desk and leave it there! i also think that with all the carrying around it is starting to kill itself slowly, which is both scary and sad since it is just under two years old. So this leaves me with the chance now to get a new computer / laptop.

I first off need to say that there is nothing like the power of a desktop PC. Laptops will always try and catch up, but the physical limitations that a laptop design has rules it out of the power race. I however work in a dual location (work and home) and lugging a big box around, although technically i have been doing it for two years is not practical anymore. Also, the power supply that comes with the beast weighs in just under 2Kg’s and it is a pain in the rectum to carry around! Battery life is ok, but the need for a power source is there because no-one works for less than 3 hours at a stint and my battery lasts just under 2.

So i decided to draw up a quick list of things that i need as a result of lessons i have learnt with my previous hardware.

• at least 500Gb 7200RPM Drive preferably a solid state and another drive
• at least 4 gigs of RAM or more (large disks means virtualization so probably 8 gigs)
• Intel 2.6ghz or more with 6mb cache
• 15.4 screen with (1600×1200) display
• VGA out and or HDMI
• A battery or combination of batteries that give more than 3 hours work time
• Decent weight

I also have had to face facts that the type of work i have to do is changing. I used to sit and code, design and partially document for a good 9, 10 hours a day and this machine was good for that. Of late i am having to give more presentation, do a lot of planning and project management (the latter of which is like eating wet popcorn) and so i need a versatile device rather than a single purpose built one. I would really like to try and move towards a goal based approach in my work rather than single incident type style that i am currently working on at the moment. This style of work has me in the office all day and when i am away from my desk in meetings etc i need to come back and start from where i left off, which i admit is a dumb way of working.

So for the next short while it is going to be drawing up processes etc to almost get my team i manage in a self managed mode so i can start to expand into new area’s again. Oh and a Mac is not out of the equation….

One of a new features in Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 is the ability to boot from a VHD.  It is pretty simple to enable this feature and have it ready at your disposal!  Before you begin you should note the following…

• You can only boot a Windows 7 or Windows Server 2008 R2 VHD
• You must configure the boot editor from a Windows 7 or Server 2008 R2 install
• You cannot use a Virtual PC VHD, I suggest a Hyper-V VHD
• You need to start with a clean slate, don’t try and reuse an old VHD

I am sure this will change as Windows 7 goes through the beta and RC stages on its way to RTM and we’ll update this as necessary but here goes…

Start by launching a Command Prompt and be sure to run as Administrator, once that is done run the following commands…

bcdedit /copy {current} /d “Boot_From_VHD”

Copy the CSLID that is displayed and then run…

bcdedit /set {CLSID} device vhd=[C:]\vhdname.vhd

bcdedit /set {CLSID} osdevice vhd=[C:]\vhdname.vhd

bcdedit /set {CLSID} detecthal on

You can replace [C:]\vhdname.vhd with the path and name of your VHD.

Once that is complete reboot and you will have the option to “Boot_From_VHD”!  You can verify the bootloader is configured correctly with the bcdedit command which will list all the boot options.  If you want to delete the entry make note of the GUID listed in bcdedit and use the following command…

bcdedit /delete {GUID} /cleanup

The Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS) has undoubtedly made a significant improvement to the security of cardholder account numbers and other sensitive information within the payment card infrastructure. The standard lays out a strong set of requirements that merchants, acquirers and processors must follow.

However, complying with PCI DSS should not be considered a silver bullet for protecting information and battling fraud. Consider that many of the companies victimized by data breaches in the past several years were, in fact, found to be PCI-compliant prior to the breach.

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Shortly after Google announced the partially successful cyberattack on Gmail, the company said it will activate by default a secure network technology for its e-mail service.

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Overview

At one time or another, a software developer is faced with a potential troublesome issue. When all the programming is done, and it’s time to distribute the actual program, the question arises: How do I protect my intellectual property from being misused, changed and sold by a potential user of my program? Of course there are Copyrights, but not all users might be aware or care about it. Continue reading

Overview

OpenID is an open, decentralized standard for authenticating users which can be used for access control, allowing users to log on to different services with the same digital identity where these services trust the authentication body. OpenID replaces the common login process that uses a login-name and a password, by allowing a user to log in once and gain access to the resources of multiple software systems. The term OpenID can also refer to an ID used in the standard.

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Overview

Currently, most websites log you in the same way: You enter a username and password, the web-server hashes the password (generally via MD5(), or SHA1()). This hash is then compared to the one stored in a database – if it matches, the user knows the original password, so it logs them in.

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Overview

GNU Privacy Guard (GnuPG or GPG) is a free software alternative to the PGP suite of cryptographic software. GnuPG is compliant with RFC 4880, which is the current IETF standards track specification of OpenPGP. Current versions of PGP (and Veridis’ Filecrypt) are interoperable with GnuPG and other OpenPGP-compliant systems.

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If your Kindle fresh out of the box doesn’t connect you can try the following. In the Menu type 311. The kindle will then scan for avail networks and present the menu back to you. You are then able to select the network you choose to use since Automatic doesn’t work. The Kindle will then retry the connect to the network. Typically something to note, if it can see the network doesn’t always mean that you can connect and use the data network….

Some more settings you can use in the menu are,

411 show diagnostics data
511 run loopback call test
611 diagnostic data service call c/e/s
126 Lab126 team members