I'm the lucky owner of an modded Xbox (1), and use it for a number of tasks. The only problem I have with it is that it makes too much noise. It's like having a computer running in my living room (yeah, I know it _is_ a computer).
It's not the harddrive that makes all the noise, it's the fans. But why are the fans there? Because the XBox is hot. Why is it hot? Partially because of the harddrive.
So dropping the harddrive is nice; IF there is way to get the machine up and running something ala "XBox Media Player". My network and my computer would provide me with all the content I would ever need.
It would've been really neat if we could play games from the network too (legal copies of course), because gigabit ethernet provides all the bandwidth needed for such a task.
Don't you remember the transistion from DOS to Windows? I almost laughed at the thought of Windows games in the Quake 1 and Duke Nukem 3D era -- but now it's defacto standard.
A company in norway called film24.no is renting out unlimited (I think) movies (DVDs) on a per monthly basis. You can rent as many as you want from their listings; and you get them mailed.
When you return them, all you have to do is put them in an envelope that follows them (the shipping is free) -- and post them
Seems like a better idea than these "This DVD, will self-destruct in one play"-kind of package. All you have to do is to click the movies you want to play the following days, and wait for them at your postbox.
The price is 179 NKR (about 25$) a month.
This business idea is made possible by the fact that a DVD is very light, and fits a envelope.
Linux is getting closer to the easy desktop. I think it's ready as a base-system; but what gives the guys in Redmond the upperhand is the application portfolio that have been added to the Windows OS over the years. The day we get native versions of Photoshop, Dreamweaver and the other major apps on Linux - it'll be very hard to resist it. We also need Outlook/Exchange-killers. Evolution is great; but we still have a way to go.
I still haven't recommended Linux on the desktop for any friends of mine, because I know who'll get the call when they can't install their new webcam etc. (You guessed right, me). It won't be long before they ask me I hope; when they see my slick desktop -- and how well everything works. Then I'll help them.
We have KDE 3.2, Gnome 2.6 and kernel 2.6 lurking. We see more and more user friendly distros; and a rise in live-cds.
Still, when I hear people get viruses and such I can't help myself but comment it with a little: "Nope, no viruses. I use Linux."
How did Microsoft find out that the domain name sounded like Microsoft? Do they have some software that monitors the domain registry, or was the site getting popular?
I guess they figured he was a easy target, but it seems like David wins against Goliath?:)
In my eyes it seems like the overpaid lawyers that Microsoft keeps in it's stable wanted to give the impression of actually doing something:P
Could have been worse in Q4 2003. Couldn't it?
on
The Future of Security
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
I tried to explain a co-worker of my father how insecure the net really was in the last quarter 2003. I told him that if a virus writer had wanted to, he could've pretty much put the whole society to it knees (corporations and such; hopefully not infrastructure and critical services).
Look at it this way; the viruses and worms that haunted the net at the time was more or less friendly, concept-like viruses. It could've been much worse. What if the viruses that roamed the the net would:
Destroy your data / the operating system silently (shredding your files so that they can't be recovered).
Mail your documents to everyone in your contacts-registry. (Eg. mailing corporate files to competitors)
Hopefully; the reason why the viruses wasn't dangerous was because: If you have the skill to write such a virus, you can probably imagine the consequences.
Yeah, it's somewhat large. The hole consist of two holes actually:).
I hacked this without thinking much about making it pretty. I guess it's possible to cover the hole with a hard plastic cover, but I haven't gotten to that yet. (I usually watch the monitor when I'm in my room:).
I've got a empty room besides mine, and some months ago I got the idea of putting the computer in the other room (while having the monitor, keyboard, mouse etc in my room). So I drilled a hole in the wall, and bought extension cables for the monitor, keyboard and usb. On my end I've put a USB-hub, so my extension cable give me four usb inputs (nice if you've got memory card readers, joysticks etc). I've been thinking about buying an USB2 CD-writer, but since I already own a cd-writer it seemed like a better idea to somehow get my cd-writer inside my room. I managed to get an IDE-cable through the wall, and I now only have to reach a little to use the cdrom drive. I've also put an own power switch on my side (extended), so that I don't have to leave the room to restart my computer.
I tried putting the computer back, just to check the difference. It's huge!
Because I have my workstation in the same room as I sleep, I can set some downloads for the night (eg. Linux ISOs) -- and sleep:).
I'm sure it works, but it's still a hack on a hack. Thinking like this ("it works, why fix it") will surely cause problems in the future. It will be a real mess, or rather a bunch of hacks rather then a clean implementation. I hope I don't get to be here when we hit the roof:)
NAT (ups and downs):
- Too much configuration needed.
+ Security (we _know_ that some OSes really aren't ready for being 'naked' on the world wild web (Yes, I know it's wide) - in the sense of not having a firewall.)
Another reason why we should go over to the IPv6 standard as soon as it's mature. If everyone wants VoIP we have to get more IPs.
The hack called NAT can probably be hacked even more to do this, but it would've been a lot easier if we used the almost infinite pool of IPs accessible through IPv6.
A new domain should also arise dedicated to naming of IPs. Easier with name + city, instead of those nice long IPs?:)
I'm not very familiar with VoIP, so correct me if I'm wrong.
With all the patches these days, wouldn't it be possible to recreate Windows almost entirely from service packs and patches?
Make a bootable linux-cdrom that contains all the references to the files. Download them, stich them together and add artwork. Voila, your own Windows;)
I have the same player. It's great, but I too would like to modify the source. It would've been cool to add network functionality using the PCMCIA-slot etc.
I've downloaded the ROMFS. The root contained these files (and some images etc):
fileplayer.bin, fipmodule.o, khwl.o, linux.bin.gz, minimod, mpegplayer.bin
Seems like the 'real' (custom?) system is contained in/bin/init (binary). (The strings output of that file makes me believe so)
khwl.o (using strings):
EM85xx driver module/project/liteon-release/v0.02.27/uClinux-2.4/
2.4.17-uc0
Proprietary. Copyright (c) 2002 Sigma Designs Inc. All rights reserved.
So maybe they use a stock uClinux kernel, some proprietary modules, and a custom init system?
If the init system doesn't contain any GPL-code, do they have to release it? How about the legality of including proprietary modules? If it's ok, don't they only have to say: "Get the source for the kernel at uClinux.org"? - and make it pretty much unhackable?
You can get the ROMFS I used at Kiss-Tuning's download area. By the way, the links-section contains a list of players using embedded linux.
I've updated the player with the latest beta-driver (they had it on the website for a little while). It's great. It adds directory browsing to the system. Subtitle-support. Smoother avi-playing (think they've increased the use of buffer/cache). It can even play videos and music from the CF-card reader. (Very nice)
I visited the site, but it only index channel names. Not discussions.
Eg. you can't search for: "Cannot open/dev/dsp" +quake 3
I should've mentioned it; but I meant searching past discussions.
This can prove to be very useful. If I have some problems doing something, or get an error in Linux I can search the linux-channels for a quick answer.
A lot of people get support from IRC, and now it's possible to "do a google" on a channel before asking. People use IRC because of the instant feedback, and the ability to do real-time troubleshooting. Because of this a lot of questions that get answers on IRC, never gets published on the www/forums -- so different people ask the same question over and over again.
Google has always been an innovator. Keep up the good work google!
Yes, or you could use three-way switches to add some difficulty to it, without too many switches. -- Btw, I only added four to show the concept without showing off too much ascii-art:) (I've heard rumours about a lameness-filter:))
I had an idea, and I almost realized it. It's very simple, but effective (not against someone who _really_ want to get inside your computer though).
Think about Duke Nukem 3D. There were simple codelocks on some of the doors (on/off-switches). What about modding a row of switches (on/off) onto the front of your cabinet, and lead the cable for the almighty Power On Switch through them? So that they have to be aligned correctly for the computer to turn on. That way you have an effective way to keep people from using the computer when you don't want them too, and you have a little casemod:)
A simple scheme:
0 0 -0--0-\ #---1--1-/ 1 1 \ #-----------------O <- power on switch
what about loop-connecting an optical cable -- tech it a little and use that as storage?:).
When we're speaking of ideas -- have anyone developed a torrent-style mp3-radio? That would make it cheaper and easier to set up a mp3-radio? Or how about streaming video? -- that would've been cool:)
Slashdot Mirror
In other news:
:P
Users report that 486to586.exe actually works.
"It works, it really works", "My machine feels much faster" was some of the comments from the happy users.
Karma whoring: But after some investigation, it was identified as a renamed copy of loadlin.exe
I'm the lucky owner of an modded Xbox (1), and use it for a number of tasks. The only problem I have with it is that it makes too much noise. It's like having a computer running in my living room (yeah, I know it _is_ a computer).
:).
It's not the harddrive that makes all the noise, it's the fans. But why are the fans there? Because the XBox is hot. Why is it hot? Partially because of the harddrive.
So dropping the harddrive is nice; IF there is way to get the machine up and running something ala "XBox Media Player". My network and my computer would provide me with all the content I would ever need.
It would've been really neat if we could play games from the network too (legal copies of course), because gigabit ethernet provides all the bandwidth needed for such a task.
So to me, this might be good news
Btw. I included "Linux", to remove irrelevant hits. Hopefully, it scaled down evenly.
Don't you remember the transistion from DOS to Windows? I almost laughed at the thought of Windows games in the Quake 1 and Duke Nukem 3D era -- but now it's defacto standard.
Times change.
A company in norway called film24.no is renting out unlimited (I think) movies (DVDs) on a per monthly basis. You can rent as many as you want from their listings; and you get them mailed.
When you return them, all you have to do is put them in an envelope that follows them (the shipping is free) -- and post them
Seems like a better idea than these "This DVD, will self-destruct in one play"-kind of package. All you have to do is to click the movies you want to play the following days, and wait for them at your postbox.
The price is 179 NKR (about 25$) a month.
This business idea is made possible by the fact that a DVD is very light, and fits a envelope.
Linux is getting closer to the easy desktop. I think it's ready as a base-system; but what gives the guys in Redmond the upperhand is the application portfolio that have been added to the Windows OS over the years. The day we get native versions of Photoshop, Dreamweaver and the other major apps on Linux - it'll be very hard to resist it. We also need Outlook/Exchange-killers. Evolution is great; but we still have a way to go.
:)
I still haven't recommended Linux on the desktop for any friends of mine, because I know who'll get the call when they can't install their new webcam etc. (You guessed right, me). It won't be long before they ask me I hope; when they see my slick desktop -- and how well everything works. Then I'll help them.
We have KDE 3.2, Gnome 2.6 and kernel 2.6 lurking. We see more and more user friendly distros; and a rise in live-cds.
Still, when I hear people get viruses and such I can't help myself but comment it with a little: "Nope, no viruses. I use Linux."
In the end: It's hard to beat free
How did Microsoft find out that the domain name sounded like Microsoft? Do they have some software that monitors the domain registry, or was the site getting popular? I guess they figured he was a easy target, but it seems like David wins against Goliath? :)
:P
In my eyes it seems like the overpaid lawyers that Microsoft keeps in it's stable wanted to give the impression of actually doing something
Look at it this way; the viruses and worms that haunted the net at the time was more or less friendly, concept-like viruses. It could've been much worse. What if the viruses that roamed the the net would:
Destroy your data / the operating system silently (shredding your files so that they can't be recovered).
Mail your documents to everyone in your contacts-registry. (Eg. mailing corporate files to competitors)
Hopefully; the reason why the viruses wasn't dangerous was because: If you have the skill to write such a virus, you can probably imagine the consequences.
What are your thoughts on the subject?
Yeah, it's somewhat large. The hole consist of two holes actually :).
:).
I hacked this without thinking much about making it pretty. I guess it's possible to cover the hole with a hard plastic cover, but I haven't gotten to that yet. (I usually watch the monitor when I'm in my room
Had some spare time right now, so I took some pictures:
The computer in the other room
The entry-point (hole) for the cables
Desktop , usb connected devices
I have a totally silent workstation.
:).
;)
I've got a empty room besides mine, and some months ago I got the idea of putting the computer in the other room (while having the monitor, keyboard, mouse etc in my room). So I drilled a hole in the wall, and bought extension cables for the monitor, keyboard and usb. On my end I've put a USB-hub, so my extension cable give me four usb inputs (nice if you've got memory card readers, joysticks etc). I've been thinking about buying an USB2 CD-writer, but since I already own a cd-writer it seemed like a better idea to somehow get my cd-writer inside my room. I managed to get an IDE-cable through the wall, and I now only have to reach a little to use the cdrom drive. I've also put an own power switch on my side (extended), so that I don't have to leave the room to restart my computer.
I tried putting the computer back, just to check the difference. It's huge!
Because I have my workstation in the same room as I sleep, I can set some downloads for the night (eg. Linux ISOs) -- and sleep
Cost: ~60 bucks. (usb hub included)
Value: Great!
The "ostehovel" as we call it here in norway is much cooler ;P
Image of the ostehovel. It's a norwegian invention too.
Seriously, we use it almost every day to put cheese on our bread.
A direct download for my fellow geeks :)
I'm sure it works, but it's still a hack on a hack. Thinking like this ("it works, why fix it") will surely cause problems in the future. It will be a real mess, or rather a bunch of hacks rather then a clean implementation. I hope I don't get to be here when we hit the roof :)
NAT (ups and downs):
- Too much configuration needed.
+ Security (we _know_ that some OSes really aren't ready for being 'naked' on the world wild web (Yes, I know it's wide) - in the sense of not having a firewall.)
Another reason why we should go over to the IPv6 standard as soon as it's mature. If everyone wants VoIP we have to get more IPs.
:)
The hack called NAT can probably be hacked even more to do this, but it would've been a lot easier if we used the almost infinite pool of IPs accessible through IPv6.
A new domain should also arise dedicated to naming of IPs. Easier with name + city, instead of those nice long IPs?
I'm not very familiar with VoIP, so correct me if I'm wrong.
With all the patches these days, wouldn't it be possible to recreate Windows almost entirely from service packs and patches?
;)
Make a bootable linux-cdrom that contains all the references to the files. Download them, stich them together and add artwork. Voila, your own Windows
- I don't know how legal it is though.
I have the same player. It's great, but I too would like to modify the source. It would've been cool to add network functionality using the PCMCIA-slot etc.
/bin/init (binary). (The strings output of that file makes me believe so)
/project/liteon-release/v0.02.27/uClinux-2.4/
2.4.17-uc0
Proprietary. Copyright (c) 2002 Sigma Designs Inc. All rights reserved.
I've downloaded the ROMFS. The root contained these files (and some images etc): fileplayer.bin, fipmodule.o, khwl.o, linux.bin.gz, minimod, mpegplayer.bin
Seems like the 'real' (custom?) system is contained in
khwl.o (using strings): EM85xx driver module
So maybe they use a stock uClinux kernel, some proprietary modules, and a custom init system?
If the init system doesn't contain any GPL-code, do they have to release it? How about the legality of including proprietary modules? If it's ok, don't they only have to say: "Get the source for the kernel at uClinux.org"? - and make it pretty much unhackable?
You can get the ROMFS I used at Kiss-Tuning's download area.
By the way, the links-section contains a list of players using embedded linux.
I've updated the player with the latest beta-driver (they had it on the website for a little while). It's great. It adds directory browsing to the system. Subtitle-support. Smoother avi-playing (think they've increased the use of buffer/cache). It can even play videos and music from the CF-card reader. (Very nice)
I visited the site, but it only index channel names. Not discussions. Eg. you can't search for: "Cannot open /dev/dsp" +quake 3
I should've mentioned it; but I meant searching past discussions.
This can prove to be very useful. If I have some problems doing something, or get an error in Linux I can search the linux-channels for a quick answer.
A lot of people get support from IRC, and now it's possible to "do a google" on a channel before asking. People use IRC because of the instant feedback, and the ability to do real-time troubleshooting. Because of this a lot of questions that get answers on IRC, never gets published on the www/forums -- so different people ask the same question over and over again.
Google has always been an innovator. Keep up the good work google!
You could use a padlock on your cabinet. A lot of cabinets have support for that :).
Yes, or you could use three-way switches to add some difficulty to it, without too many switches. -- Btw, I only added four to show the concept without showing off too much ascii-art :) (I've heard rumours about a lameness-filter :))
I had an idea, and I almost realized it. It's very simple, but effective (not against someone who _really_ want to get inside your computer though).
:)
Think about Duke Nukem 3D. There were simple codelocks on some of the doors (on/off-switches). What about modding a row of switches (on/off) onto the front of your cabinet, and lead the cable for the almighty Power On Switch through them? So that they have to be aligned correctly for the computer to turn on. That way you have an effective way to keep people from using the computer when you don't want them too, and you have a little casemod
A simple scheme:
0 0 -0--0-\
#---1--1-/ 1 1 \
#-----------------O <- power on switch
Here the "code" is "1100". (#=pins on mainboard)
Ettercap can do stuff (replace words etc) live on a normal or switched LAN using the man in the middle principle.
Pretty neat, but I don't know how well it would've worked in a larger environment.
Pornolize -- let's you add a little "spice" :)
Thanks for a good answer
what about loop-connecting an optical cable -- tech it a little and use that as storage? :).
:)
When we're speaking of ideas -- have anyone developed a torrent-style mp3-radio? That would make it cheaper and easier to set up a mp3-radio? Or how about streaming video? -- that would've been cool