The Calorie Lie

Disclaimer: The following post is a thought exercise. It is not intended to provide medical or nutritional advice. In general, you should probably not believe anything you read in this post unless you have verified it with your own doctor or to your own satisfaction.

The premise:
Calories as a measurement in food means very little to the point of almost nothing.

The caveat:
This doesn't mean that you can eat as many calories as you want. This means that calories aren't the number you're looking for to control weight.

What's a calorie?
Basically, it's the amount of heat required to raise one kilogram of water one degree Celsius (or its equivalent value of food when converted to energy in the body.)

Why is that considered important to diet?
Here's the problem. A person is considered to "consume" calories. A person doesn't consume calories. A person consumes fat, fiber, protein, carbohydrates, vitamins, minerals, etc. Calories are merely a byproduct (or measurement) of the consumption. Calories burned can tell you how much time/effort it takes to convert the amount of fat, fiber, protein, carbohydrate, vitamins, minerals, etc into heat (supposedly, therefore not into fat). In essence, you aren't burning calories. You are converting food into heat/energy. How much heat it would take to do that ... that is calories.

What's the point?
In short, there are probably two numbers that make any difference to diet (weight loss): Carbohydrates (minus fiber content) and Fat. Keeping both numbers low (carbohydrates minus fiber in the 40-50g range per meal, for instance) would substantially reduce calorie count anyway (which, if one is counting calories, this would be bonus.) Following along, it's easy to see that raw fruits and vegetables (not grains like corn and wheat) are an easy accompaniment that can fill the "hunger" void without adding to the fat and carbohydrates numbers.

Bypass transparent squid proxy smoothwall

vi /etc/rc.d/rc.firewall.up

find #squid
before #squid, use the following (all one line, ie RETURN is after -j on the same line):

/sbin/iptables -t nat -A PREROUTING -i $GREEN_DEV -p tcp --dport 80 -d yourBypassProxyDomainHere.com -j RETURN

save and exit

Run this to restart iptables

/etc/rc.d/rc.netaddress.down; /etc/rc.d/rc.netaddress.up

done.

OK, *I* wasn't done, because I'm using Full Firewall Control addon, which basically negates anything done in rc.firewall.up (the source code for FFC itself says flush iptables before parsing FFC list.)
So, to bypass proxy for specific addresses in smoothwall via Full Firewall Control, ping the [domain to bypass dansguardian] to get the ip, and set it up as GREEN from anywhere, port 80, to RED (ip address of bypass domain) method TCP Allow. Funny, that seems easier than I'd have thought.

DNS Blackhole.conf update

This information is probably 2-3 years old by the time you see this, but I'm recording it for posterity.

In Smoothwall 2, there's an application that updates /etc/blackhole.conf, but it hasn't done that in a while because the old site www.bleedingthreats.net doesn't provide spyware blacklists updates.

A replacement can be found from malwaredomains.

Simply edit:
/usr/local/bin/blackhole.pl

Change $host entry to www.malwaredomains.com
change $get entry to /files/spywaredomains.zones

That's all.

DNS lookups failed for a specific site

I've been using Sprint Embarq CenturyLink DNS IPs for my business network (Windows Server, but it's the provider fault, not the server config):
204.117.214.10 199.2.252.10 and they failed resolving my own (personal) domain. My DNS settings of my server forward there, and I really didn't *want* to change to higher, but it seemed to do a better job choosing a higher level DNS: one of 4.2.2.1, 4.2.2.2, 4.2.2.3, 4.2.2.4, 4.2.2.5, 4.2.2.6 (or I could probably have tried OpenDNS...)

Props to EddieOnEverything for his post.

ComboFix *not* currently down

You can google this, but essentially, it appears that a certain rootkit *might* cause combofix to delete all system files. You shouldn't use combofix.exe until it reappears on bleepingcomputer.com. Also, please don't attempt to host combofix.exe yourself.

I'm posting as a service because I've suggested using combofix in the past. I have no other association with sUBs or combofix or bleeping computer.

Updated 10/16/09 14:25:
There has been released a BETA that apparently doesn't do the bad things... I suggest following BleepinComputer for updated info.

Updated 12/28/09 18:05:
Apparently, combofix has been erm... fixed. Thanks for stopping by.

Windows 7 x64 RDP connection fails to 32 bit XP or 2000

Problem: RDP/Terminal service connection hangs when connecting Windows 7 64 bit to windows XP 32 bit or Windows 2000 Terminal Services.
Quick answer: turn off audio forwarding in the Windows 7 64 bit RDP client under "experience".

A global warming rant

Read: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/copenhagen/article6956783.ece
And yet, nobody actually tells us what it will take to increase the arctic ice. Given that CO₂ is a lagging indicator (some say it's a feedback to global warming. Nobody explains why it's not simply a by-product.)

I think they're saying if the entire world shuts down for a few years we could get the ice back. But I thought the CO₂ was there for 3000 years? I submit that anything that will happen in 5-10 years is going to happen regardless of whatever is accomplished at Copenhagen. It will take that long before most things get implemented and/or effective. And then what? What if the earth is simply doing what it is doing to get rid of humanity? Won't that simply fix its own problem?

ThinkGeek :: Scrolling LED Name Badge II

ThinkGeek :: Scrolling LED Name Badge II

Posted using ShareThis
This scrolling LED badge was a hit at a recent Christmas Party. Be sure to store multiple messages (up to 6) before heading out!

Trouble installing Java - Unable to verify the security integrity

Let's say you get this error:

---------------------------
Error - Java(TM) Update
---------------------------
Unable to validate security integrity on the file. File is either corrupted or unsigned.
---------------------------
OK
---------------------------

And you go to www.java.com and do the "Free Java Download" ... installing it gets this:
---------------------------
Error - Java(TM) Installer
---------------------------
Downloaded File C:\Documents and Settings\username\Application Data\Sun\Java\jre1.6.0_17\jre1.6.0_17-pfrom15.msi is corrupt.
---------------------------
OK
---------------------------

What to do?
Go to the Manual Download section and download the Offline install (second link) (It should look similar to jre-6u17-windows-i586-s.exe)

If that doesn't work, drill down and find the jre .msi file and install that.

Another reason to use the Private Browsing mode

I'm sure there's a good reason (ahem, shopping? really?) to use the Private browsing mode in Firefox and IE (note: you're not completely private in these modes. Proxies and other man-in-the-middle snooping are still possible) ... but if you use a shared/public/library computer, it might be worth it to go "Private" while checking your mail or going on facebook. When you return from "Private", it forgets all of your logged in status while in Private mode, so it's less likely that the next someone can hit (back) and see you still logged in. Just don't start bookmarking while in private mode...

Background images not showing up in IE or Firefox

If you turn on High Contrast Mode in Windows, it will disable loading background images in both IE and Firefox. You won't be able to see ANY background images, either CSS or <body> tagged. This is incredibly difficult to troubleshoot if you don't know about it. It's not a virus, it's not a BHO (Browser Helper Object), it's simply just a "feature" of the Accessibility option.

Read more here.

AVG Not running this week? Try upgrading

The weirdest thing. I installed a noisy firewall and suddenly I notice my antivirus wasn't running. Coincidence? Yes, actually, it was. AVG silently (in my case) stopped working, but opening the interface told me why: it's time to upgrade to version 9. I did and now I'm happy again. Perhaps this might help someone else.

Phantom Recipient in Outlook Meeting Request

A user emailed me that she was sending a meeting request to another user via Outlook but it bounced because it was also being sent to a user who was no longer in our system.

It turned out that the recipient's Outlook client Tools, Options, Delegates still had that old user listed, which was then removed.

Remove a dll attached to WinLogon

From this thread, the best answer given was essentially to remove inheritance and all permissions to the file, then reboot, then delete the file. (Mitigating factor: if it self-heals permissions).

The next best answer was to boot from an XP CD in System Recovery mode.

The third best answer (from *MY* point of view, because it *is* that simple) is to boot from a LiveCD, mount the file system as writeable and delete the file. The down side is a *possibility* of messing up NTFS file systems, but IMO that is not a huge risk.

I had to do this to fix an m.exe autorun.inf USB dropper that had a dll that stuck to winlogon notify.

32 bit? 64bit? Maximum RAM?

The question is posed: Why is a 32bit system limited to 4GB and what is the limit of RAM in 64bit systems?

The answer is based upon binary, the ones and zeros:
32 bits can be represented by ones and zeros up to
1111 1111 1111 1111 1111 1111 1111 1111
The value represented by this is 2^32-1 or 4,294,967,295 (4 gigabytes)

64 bits represented by ones and zeroes is obviously twice as long:
1111 1111 1111 1111 1111 1111 1111 1111 1111 1111 1111 1111 1111 1111 1111 1111
(Spaces don't mean anything. They're simply used as a separator inasmuch as a comma is a separator in decimal notation.)
but the value in decimal notation is 2^64-1 or 17,179,869,184 gigabytes

Read more here

OTRS My FAQ.

Q: How to do LDAP/Active Directory integration?
A: LDAP Integration is adequate.

Q: How to change the Notification Master email address?
A: Admin, SysConfig, Framework, Show, click Core, Find and change NotificationSenderEmail.

Q: How to use OTRS like Spiceworks Tickets Anywhere?
A: First, take a look at Spiceworks' command list
Then, for each thing you'd like to implement, in Admin, Postmaster Filter, type in a filter name, then use the top half of the right window to provide the search (Body, #close) and use the bottom half of the right window to set the field (eg, X-OTRS-State, closed successful).

Vista Start menu forgets to open with keystroke

This isn't an issue with start menu never opening. It's just an issue with Start Menu not opening with either Windows key or Ctrl-Esc. Apparently, the "fix" is to open task manager, end task on Explorer.exe, and run Explorer.exe again.

MapPoint and Perl. Basic code to get driving directions.

I'm not a perl guru. I dabble. However, this is the code I've been working around to provide automated queries versus a MapPoint install so as not to bother the online web-based map providers with large amounts of queries:

First, you can get a demo of MapPoint 2013 Here ... It's a 14 day fully functional trial except it bugs you to activate every time you start it. Not good for automation, but decent enough if you want to test this.

use Win32::OLE qw(in with);
use Win32::OLE::Const;
use Win32::OLE::Const 'Microsoft MapPoint';
$Win32::OLE::Warn = 3; # die on errors...

my $MapPoint = Win32::OLE->new('MapPoint.Application', 'Quit');
my $Map = $MapPoint->NewMap();
my $Route = $Map->ActiveRoute();
my $Results1 = $Map->FindResults("Start Address");
$Route->Waypoints->Add($Results1->Item(1));
my $Results2 = $Map->FindResults("End Address");
$Route->Waypoints->Add($Results2->Item(1));
$Route->Calculate;
my $distance;
for ($count=1; $count<$Route->Directions->Count; $count++)
{
print $Route->Directions->Item($count)->Instruction . " ";
$distance=$Route->Directions->Item($count)->Distance;
if ($distance < 0.1) {
printf "%6.2f yds\n", ($distance*1760)
} else {
printf "%6.2f mi\n", $distance;
}
}
print $Route->Directions->Item($Route->Directions->Count)->Instruction



$Map->{Saved} = -1;

Kyocera Mita or other copiers SMB connect failed because of case sensitivity

I had a problem where SMB connection failed miserably. Well, two problems concurrently.
1) Slow resolution to domain name (solution: fix dns)
2) Connection failed immediately. I knew it should have worked. KNEW it. But it was case sensitive for the path and therefore failed.

spoolsv.exe crashes instantly

Print spooler was crashing on Windows XP client. spoolsv.exe and the c:\windows\system32\spool\printers directory was empty.

mkdir c:\prtspool

Pop open regedit,
go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\WindowsNT\CurrentVersion\Print\Printers
and change the DefaultSpoolDirectory to the new c:\prtspool
net start spooler
it works.
Don't ask me why or how. I don't rightly care, but then I'd probably want to run scandisk or something.

psftp, sftp, ftp put *filename

Because I saw this through my referral logs, just wanted to post that to put (or get) multiple files, you should use the mput or mget command when sending or receiving multiple files from psftp, sftp, or ftp.

MySQL Query to check if a birthday is upcoming in 7 days

Someone probably has done this before, but in case it hasn't been done, here's my query:

$result = mysql_query("SELECT FirstName, LastName, DATE_FORMAT(birthday, '%M %d') as bday, CONCAT(IF(MONTH(birthday)=1 AND MONTH(CURRENT_DATE())=12, YEAR(CURRENT_DATE())+1, YEAR(CURRENT_DATE())), DATE_FORMAT(birthday, '-%m-%d')) AS fakebirthday FROM birthdays WHERE CONCAT(IF(MONTH(birthday)=1 AND MONTH(CURRENT_DATE())=12, YEAR(CURRENT_DATE())+1, YEAR(CURRENT_DATE())), DATE_FORMAT(birthday, '-%m-%d')) BETWEEN CURRENT_DATE() AND DATE_ADD(CURRENT_DATE(), INTERVAL 7 DAY) ORDER BY fakebirthday;");

What it does (this is PHP code, but the stuff in double-quotes is the real meat.):

1. birthday is stored in datetime format
   
2. The SELECT AS is relatively straight-forward. I don't want to divulge age/years of this list, so I'm only reporting month and day (January 1) in the result
   
3. I'm making a fakebirthday calculation in order to sort/Order by. Unfortunately, I can't use the fakebirthday in "WHERE" clause, so I repeated the calculation to do my "WHERE".
   
4. The idea is to check for the next 7 days, and cheat by prepending *this* year on the birthday's month and day. Unfortunately, if this month is December (12) and the birthday is in January (1), this won't work, so add 1 to this year and prepend it to the January birthdates -- but only when running this in December.
   
5. of course, check if it's between today and 7 days from today
   
6. and sort by the "fake" birthday because it's easier to sort this way so that January comes after December
   

Oh, I know it's ugly code. It's probably slow, too. However, the idea is this should run once a day (once a week?) on fairly small amounts of data (office active employee records).

Smoothwall/Firewall check for spambot on lan

More or less, this is a placeholder until I get more information.

You have smoothwall or other linux based firewall proxy.
type this
tcpdump -qt port 25
on the proxy server.
ctrl-c to abort

Microsoft Outlook won't connect to Exchange Server

I was troubleshooting an issue where the Outlook client wouldn't connect to Exchange Server. It wasn't a ping issue (I could ping the server) and it wasn't domain resolution. I also could view the one user's Outlook Web Access Account. It simply wouldn't connect Outlook to Exchange, either hanging on profile creation, or giving an error on connect.

To fix this, I went to c:\documents and settings\username\local settings\application data\microsoft\outlook and added a new folder "old" and moved the stuff in outlook folder to "old" and tried again. This apparently cleaned itself up.

Computer sluggish? Check your path

After decommissioning a server, it was found that certain machines were DOG slow. This apparently was because an app changed the PATH variable to point to a directory structure on the now defunct server. To fix this, the best way is to go to Windows System Properties, advanced, Environment variables, Path and remove the errant directory structure.

This may very well affect other pieces of software, such as your antivirus program on startup.

Changing hard drives with Clonezilla

For whatever it's worth, System Restore on Vista didn't know the "new" c: drive that I upgraded to, and system restore failed.

Right-click My Computer, Properties.
System Protection (left side)
Uncheck anything said as (Missing) and make certain C: that is (Local) is checked, apply, (yes) ok.

Now System Restore functions properly. Also, you can use this to put System Restore on an optional other disk.

ComboFix fixes UACD.SYS

I love me some malwarebytes, but when it doesn't work ComboFix does. More info here: bleepingcomputer.com

Outlook quick-launch idea

Look, it's an idea. If someone else has it, this is notification that I haven't seen this implemented in this way before.

The implementation of the icon for Outlook 2007 is .. well, it's meh, ok?

Here's what I'd like to happen:

1. Outlook that's minimized disappears from the taskbar, but can be re-opened from the status icon (by the clock)
   
2. The Outlook status icon is a launching pad for what Outlook does, navigation/popup withOUT clicking:
   
   
   
   1. Inbox (New#)
      
   2. Calendar
      
   3. Tasks/Todo List
      
   4. Contacts
      
   
   

The idea is that you'd hover your mouse over the clock icon, and left-to-right above the icon, you'd have the above list a-d in a single horizontal row. Hovering over each of those would have a context-sensitive pop-up above that bar.
For Inbox, that would be a brief list of the 10 most recent emails: From, Subject, Date, first line of email.
For Calendar, that would be a month calendar over a scrollable list of itinerary (like Google Calendar's applet for iGoogle). Perhaps this may or may not be in combination with Tasks/Todo lists
For Contacts, that would be some painless way to get that phone number or write that email.

In addition, there should be some underlying "search everything for what I'm looking for".

Create words following a heart in Gimp

Again, I am not the one you should be reading a tutorial on Gimp from, but since you keep coming here looking for it, here's how to make that heart and words following the design.

1. Make a Path using Bezier curves (B).
   Look, don't make this too hard. You only need 3 points to make a heart. Sure, you can use more, but Bezier makes nice curves and frankly, don't strain yourself making this.
   
   Start at the bottom of the heart, click-place an anchor. Above that, click-place your divot mark where you want the "V" of the top of the heart. Then, place an anchor near your beginning.
   
   Then, starting about two-thirds up, drag out your heart bumps. It's not important how perfect you get it, this is your heart.
   
   
2. Write your text (T)
   Whatever is suitably sappy and from your heart, that's going to be on your heart. When you're ready, click Text along Path and watch with glee. You may have to Undo, resize, retype, etc. to get the message length to match your heart size, but there you are. Don't forget the "space between letters" setting that can help as well.
   
   
3. Hide your text
   
4. Select your background layer
   
5. Select from path
   
6. Bucket fill your color of choice
   
7. Select none
   
8. (Optional) Colors, Color to Alpha (OK)
   

Save result as a .png and you can use it on any background color you want.

Old School mod_perl to mod_perl2 conversion

Because someone brought something up to me, an old application set for Apache->request under mod_perl might need to change to Apache2::RequestUtil->request under Apache2/mod_perl version 2.

Fun with Clonezilla

I had to resize my hard drive.

I used clonezilla to back up the partitions to an external USB Hard Drive. (Partition mode, not disk mode).

I then replaced the hard drive with a factory new one.

Clonezilla would not restore to the factory drive without partitions.

I used cfdisk to make partitions like the original hard drive (bigger, of course).

I restored clonezilla partitions to the new hard drive.

Windows didn't see the whole NTFS partition (dir said it was the same as the original. That's not what I wanted!). (Disk Management, yes, dir no).

I downloaded Easeus Partition Manager and SLIGHTLY decreased the partition (by about 10 MB). The large partition didn't miss the difference, but the entire space was now available when looking at "dir".

All this software was free, by the way.

Active Desktop fix recovery

Active Desktop white screen, "restore active desktop" retrieves a script error referencing Desktop.htt

Fix:
right-click, Properties
Desktop, None
[Apply]
find c:\documents and settings\current username\application data\microsoft\internet explorer\desktop.htt and rename/delete it

Change the picture in Desktop. Active Desktop error is gone.

Here is another link with a registry adjustment (in the comments) that seems to work.

How to extract the files from a .deb in Windows

I'm using ZipGenius, but 7-Zip may also work.

1) rename the .deb file or append .bz2
2) Extract with ZipGenius or 7-Zip

The .deb file has likely a few files in it. You want data.tar.gz ... extract it.

In my case, I needed firmware-bnx2_0.14+lenny1_all.deb\data.tar\lib\firmware\bnx2-06-4.0.5.fw

ASSP with MailArchiva

Oh, this is so cool and fast:

ASSP gets a facelift when coupled with MailArchiva. Set up MailArchiva (separately is ok, and perhaps even the Open Source version) and make certain that the Listen for Exchange/SMTP requests is turned on. Then in ASSP configuration, sendAllSpam to USERNAME@DOMAIN and sendAllDestination to mailarchivamachinename:8091 (or whatever port you're listening to in MailArchiva).

Apply changes, and now ASSP's spam goes to a different location, doesn't pollute your main mail archival, and yet users should be able to self-retrieve "missing" emails. Even still, I'd likely recommend upgrading MailArchiva to Enterprise Edition if only for retention purposes.

iastor.sys BSOD

I had it, and I had a bad hard drive in my SATA RAID. I turned that drive off and the RAID booted.

LVM upgrade on non-LVM system

I did a strange thing. I *wasn't* using LVM, but I think I accidentally installed it and device-mapper went all bonkers and decided to take all my drives away so I couldn't mount them:

fsck.ext3: Device or resource busy while trying to open /dev/sda1
in boot log. It appears that device-mapper usurps the /dev/sda# ... my old fstab won't work. But I'm not going to wipe it out!

What *finally* fixed it for me:
fdisk -l | grep "Disk" | grep -v "identifier"
This gives me a list of devices I *can* mount and what their sizes are. I ignored the "doesn't contain a valid partition table"
nano /etc/fstab
and changed my /dev/sda# to /dev/dm-# according to my carefully hand-written notes that compared the sda* to the dm-*. NB: the number after dm- does not necessarily map with the number after /dev/sda. My sda# skips 3 and 4. My dm-# does not skip, and also starts at 0.

Dansguardian access.log summarizing, counting, unique

I have a dansguardian access.log file in smoothwall. I'd like to get a list of unique domains in use, and who'd be a sample IP address to check on.

This, my first effort, is good as far as it goes, which is to simply alphabetize the domains and give an IP address for *someone* who has accessed it:

awk "{ split (\$5,a,\"/\"); print \$4 \"\t\" a[3]; }" access.log | sort +1 -u


Of course, if I needed a date or time, I could add it in the print statement.


But now I think to myself, what about seeing how popular a domain (front part of url) is?

awk "{ split (\$5,a,\"/\"); print \$4 \"\t\" a[3]; }" access.log | sort +1 | awk '{a[$2] = $0; b[$2]++ } END {for(i in a){ print a[i] "\t" b[i]};}' | sort +1


This gives an IP address that has accessed the domain, and how many times that domain has been accessed. It DOES NOT mean that the IP address has accessed that domain that many times. If I wanted to do that ...


awk "{ split (\$5,a,\"/\"); print \$4 \"\t\" a[3]; }" access.log | sort | awk '{a[$0] = $0; b[$0]++ } END {for(i in a){ print a[i] "\t" b[i]};}' | sort


Further, you can use the above to see who "hogs" the web...
awk "{ split (\$5,a,\"/\"); print \$4 \"\t\" a[3]; }" access.log | sort | awk '{ a[$0] = $0; b[$0]++ } END {for(i in a){ print a[i] "\t" b[i]};}' | sort -r -n +2 -t " "

Inside the " " Linux users would use, in vi: ctrl-v, then Tab to put the real tab character. This puts the biggest numbers on top, so piping through more or head would be ideal.

I would argue that using these scripts is faster than most any other log analysis program, or use it in conjunction with your log analysis program.

I'm not ranting on Lauren

So, OK, I am, but in defense of Lauren ...


and bless him, Seth Weintraub makes good points, but in the end, it doesn't matter.

Look, I get it that the AMD processor isn't top of the line, nor is the RAM not super fast, nor is the LAN 100Mbps and the WIFI 802.11g. On the other hand, when Lauren starts getting online to the Internet from her ISP at greater than 8Mbps or starts moving files between her server and her laptop... Oh, wait. I get it that more could be had for the price, but did Lauren choose poorly because of any of the above? That, my friends, is in the eye of the beholder. Is Lauren likely to play Crisis? Probably not. Is Lauren going to be connected to any source that provides gigabit? Probably not. Yes, yes, it's nice to have the assurance that it's there when you could use it, just like Garage Band is. I use Vista Home Premium. It's not that horrible. I connect to my domain, use Outlook, even Terminal Services.

There are people who demand more. Those are the people who will choose their own operating system and supplier. There are then the other people who don't care. They buy what they can afford, and walk obliviously through the realm of techdom because they can, and to them, it works. Because it's just what they think they'll ever need.

Installing Java 6 release 13 on ubuntu

For Firefox (sudo su):

mkdir java6
cd java6
wget http://ftp.mgts.by/ubuntu/pool/multiverse/s/sun-java6/sun-java6-plugin_6-13-1_i386.deb
wget http://ftp.mgts.by/ubuntu/pool/multiverse/s/sun-java6/sun-java6-jre_6-13-1_all.deb
wget http://ftp.mgts.by/ubuntu/pool/multiverse/s/sun-java6/sun-java6-bin_6-13-1_i386.deb
dpkg -i *.deb


Parent Pager Blank Screen

If you're using Parent Pager, here's a 1024x768 "blank".

(If you want to customize Parent Pager background, you simply change C:\Program Files\Acink Corp\Parent Pager\ParentPager.ini and edit the Background= line to point to your new background. )

Dansguardian schedule an exception during the day.

So, you're using dansguardian and would like to schedule an exception...

I created two scripts:
_start_.sh

cp /etc/dansguardian/exceptionsitenoon.noon /etc/dansguardian/exceptionsitenoon
/usr/sbin/dansguardian -g


_stop_.sh

cp /etc/dansguardian/exceptionsitenoon.normal /etc/dansguardian/exceptionsitenoon
/usr/sbin/dansguardian -g


And added this line in /etc/dansguardian/exceptionsitelist:

.Include </etc/dansguardian/exceptionsitenoon>


Then, crontab -e

min hr * * * /path/to/_start_.sh
min hr * * * /path/to/_stop_.sh


And, of course, made a file /etc/dansguardian/exceptionsitenoon.noon that had a list of the domains I wanted to allow (for my case, at noon) and another /etc/dansguardian/exceptionsitenoon.normal that was empty. The reason I used the .Include option was that I wanted to keep the permanent exceptions separate and manageable from the temporary exceptions -- If not, I'd have to make updates to both "noon" and "normal" lists every time I needed to make a permanent exclusion.

Sort GMAIL FREE with mail2web.com

You'll kick yourself how easy this is: www.mail2web.com
Login: youremail@gmail.com
Pass: yourgmailpassword
It'll give you sort (From, To, Size, Subject) without hassle. Plus you can delete.

ETA: On second thought, maybe it's not so special. It's incredibly slow. Well, at least it's an online option. I got it up and then it stopped working for me when I started sorting. I tried IMAP4, and it is sluggishly moving.

This Operation Can't Be Performed Outlook Web Access

This operation can't be performed:
Can't add a calendar item in Outlook web access. For one person. He has exceeded his send/recieve quota and therefore can't add via OWA because it's an email via OWA.

XP Home won't remember network passwords

Easy "fix": Create a file, login.bat and put it on your desktop and (optionally) shortcut in Startup


net use h: \\servername\sharename /user:domainname\username password


or to have it ask your password:

net use h: \\servername\sharename /user:domainname\username *


change h: to whatever drive letter makes sense. Once the password is entered, it should affect all connections to \\servername including printers.

CAVEAT: of course password is in PLAIN TEXT so, you know, if you lose control of your PC, you lose your security.

Open .rm files in Real Player, not totem in Firefox 3 beta 5

Install Real Player from here
Inside Firefox, Tools, Add-ons, Get Add-ons, mediaplayerconnectivity (or click here
for .rm/Real Media files, you'll want to point to the path to realplayer that you installed.

Depending on your settings, you might have to click *again* the link in the black sidebar.

Maintain contact anonymity when adding facebook game friends

Did you know you could add people to additional groups and not just "All friends"? If you aren't interested in sharing your personal contact information, you can choose to allow friends except for a group to view your information.

For instance, I friend requested Scavenger Hunt Friends, and at the same time, added the request to Scavenger Hunt Friends group. Then, I went to my profile and for each padlock, I edited it and chose "Only Friends" Except "Scavenger Hunt Friends". I hope that helps a bit if you want a bit of anonymity while randomly picking people to befriend.

Otherwise, thanks for adding me!


(Also, it helps to know why this person you barely know is in your friend list.)

Upgraded Gutsy to Hardy, lost sound in mythtv

Do this:
sudo apt-get remove mythtv

sudo apt-get install mythtv

I upgraded Ubuntu Gutsy to Ubuntu Hardy and got no sound on my mythtv with my WinTV PVR-150. There was no audio.

After lots of dead ends, I tried the above and it fixed it for me.

Now if I can figure out how to get mysql to stay loaded during reboot...