What the Photon?

7 IT New Years Resolutions

2012-01-20T21:02:18Z

I'm writing a long piece on computer security. It might be a book or it might just be an incredibly long blog post, I don't know yet. But the core message can be summarised thusly;

1. Passwords. Get better with passwords, change them and don't use the same one on all your web sites.

2. Anti virus. Remove obsolete products, get current ones. Microsoft free being my pick for Windows and nothing at all being my pick for Mac. You are still more likely to GET a virus by trying anything on your Mac than if you leave it alone. A lot of the anti-this-and-that software on Mac is actually a virus in disguise.

3. Backup. Make an off site backup. 321. 3 copies, 2 different types of media and 1 off site. eg. External hard drive, DVD, Carbonite (or Dropbox or Crashplan).

4. Clean up your hard drive. Remove obsolete programs. Use Windows control panel add/remove programs. Mac users just delete the icon from your Applications folder.

5. Clean your keyboard, mouse and screen. Destroy a few billion germs. Turn it off, use an Iso-wipe or one of those hospital wipes in the little packet. You could consider stealing one next time you visit a friend in hospital. I am sure you can buy them somewhere...

6. Realistically evaluate if you need a new computer. The answer is probably No.

7. Be more productive and spend less time doing IT stuff. You bought your computer to get work done didn't you?

8. Write more blog articles, or at least publish more of the stuff you wrote. (oh, that one was for me)

Did RSA do something wrong?

2011-10-20T08:37:05Z

RSA is a security company. They make those cute little tokens with the LCD window that displays a random number every 60 seconds, ever changing. Your bank (or similar) uses RSA tokens to provide a second factor to your login. You need your username and password (something you know) and the token (something you have) in order to login. This two factor authentication is much more secure than passwords alone. Even if someone guesses your password, they can't login without the token.

The most sacred information RSA holds is the database of cryptographic keys to every token they have ever made. The keys are the only way to know what magic number will appear on your token at any given time. That's the keys to the kingdom.

Well RSA got hacked. Apparently a secretary opened a malicious PDF in an email and her PC got infected. Nothing new there, happens every day. What happened next is her PC had access to this super secure database and the bad guys got the database.

What the bloody hell was the database doing on a network that can even spell Internet, let alone be connected to it? That is what RSA did wrong, very, very badly, wrong.

There are other brands of tokens out there and they are not affected, only RSA branded ones.

So if you have an RSA token, time to get it replaced. The keys are out there. If a thief knows the serial number of your token, they can calculate the magic numbers at any time. Serious.

RIP Peter Neilsen

2011-10-20T08:33:21Z

I first met Peter in the late 80's when he signed up as a customer for my bulletin board system (BBS). This was part of a full featured global network with email, files, forums and social networking, all years before the Internet became a public thing. It all ran on dial up modems and at 33k (modern broadband is 256-5000k typically) it ran well and rarely seemed slow. The cost of telephone lines, phone calls and the computers meant most BBS operators begged a subscription from their customers. Peter was my first subscriber and the most generous, taking the "premium package" without question.

We chatted online for hours before we ever spoke on a phone or met in person. We became the most unlikely of friends. Peter was a devoted Christian and of course I'm a Pagan. But religion never got in the way, in fact later on his church were most accepting and never made me feel unwelcome or uncomfortable. I continue to support them to this day through donations of computers.

Peter was practically house bound. There were a number of heart attacks and increasing "turns" where he blacked out, sometimes for hours, sometimes for a day or more. Apart from his insistence that chain smoking was the only thing that kept his synapse firing, Peter never complained and soldiered on. He often told me The Lord wasn't ready for him. Despite the differences in our beliefs, I have to admit this one made a lot of sense.

Later we started a business together around '94. I had a pile of used computers thrown out by my IT customers. They needed them removed, wiped and disposed of appropriately. This was years before anyone talked of e-waste or recycling. Peter suggested we re-furbish them and sell them to those that couldn't afford the latest and greatest. Peter was heavily involved with the Uniting Church and the Wesley Mission. He knew poor people. But rather than prey on them for a few bucks, Peter wanted to offer computers to those that couldn't buy one, but at a price they could afford. The sale price always reflected what they could afford. Many computers were "sold" for no money at. This was never a problem. Although we did trade a Mac which I wanted to blow up and Peter talked me out of it. (funny how my attitude to Macs has changed!)

Being the generous Christian he was, Peter helped out many less fortunate than himself. His wife Beryl became a minister and when she was posted to Queensland, Peter stayed, preferring the cold climate which better agreed with his medical condition and their husky dog.

A neighbour experiencing some kind of psychotic break attacked Peter with a knife, nearly killing him. Peter insisted on turning the other cheek and I believe no charges were ever laid. Beryl did step in and Peter joined her in Queensland.

Given his poor health and the years that followed, awful as it is to admit, I had assumed The Lord had Peter some years ago. News of his passing reached me a few weeks ago. So Jonathan and I will take a lunch in Peter's honour and remember our friend, the generous, the undefeated Peter the Great.

RIP Steve Jobs

2011-10-20T08:32:36Z

At the risk of Google deciding my blog is all about obituaries, I can not let the passing of Steve Jobs go un-blogged. Others have eulogised the man, his work and done a better job than I can hope for. But it is Steve Jobs the presenter that was my hero.

The presentation style of Steve Jobs is something for all (those that ever have to speak to another human being) to study and learn from. He was in my opinion the best orator, showman and speaker of our time. In an era dominated by (woeful) PowerPoint, Steve showed us a better way. His annual MacWorld keynote address was the highlight of the IT calendar for many years. He took the stage with the trademark black turtleneck and blue jeans, with no bullet points, a few simple images and stories that captured the world's imagination.

He put 1000 songs in our pocket. He promised to sell 10 million iPhones (in the first year) and went on to sell 13 million. He made technology sexy and changed the fortunes of geeks.

The presentation techniques that I teach are pure Steve. His style and methods translate to any subject. Effective communication will do that.

So long Steve, love your work.

There's an iPad for that.

2011-09-30T01:00:57Z

I just didn't think I had an 9.5" hole in my life. Although the iPad is sexy and cool and full of Apple goodness, I had resisted getting one as I just couldn't see a use for it. Then my normally gadget conservative wife decided she wanted one for taking notes at meetings. What's good for the goose is good for the gander so I got one for me too. I had prepared a bit for this purchase with some background research. When I re-jigged our broadband setup, I got a Telstra wifi broadband device. This gets its Internet from the mobile broadband (3G) and provides a wifi hotspot so you can connect any wifi device to it. I use it for my laptop and iPhone. My thinking at the time was such a device is more useful than inbuilt or USB broadband which would be tied to a specific device. The wifi can provide Internet to anything that needs it. Even a friend's laptop. Certainly an easy way to get Internet on a potential tablet. Hence when purchase day came, it was the cheaper wifi iPad that we got.

The story of the purchase experience is also interesting too. I had long enough waiting unattended, unserved and unloved in Next Byte to try out the iPad and check the prices online and discover that JBHIFI had the best deal. At no stage was I bothered by a shop assistant. When I had finished my research I dutifully left and went to said JBHIFI and made my purchase in record time. I did make a point of holding it up and smiling through the window of Next Byte as I walked past. The "you wouldn't serve me so I bought it elsewhere" look!

Having a 16Gb iPhone which I haven't filled up made me think a 16Gb iPad might suffice. So basically I bought the cheapest model. Very unlike me. Most of my data lives in the cloud so local storage wasn't a priority either. I can save to DropBox. The power of the iPad is in the applications, the Apps as they are called. There are apps for just about everything. Apple makes a portable version of Pages, their word processor. There is Dropbox of course. That is the cloud storage and synchronizing app that runs on desktops, laptops and portable devices. Store something in Dropbox and it's available on all your devices.

You can certainly use an iPad for all the tasks you currently do on a laptop with the exception of really heavy data processing or tasks involving add on hardware. An iPad won't drive a USB data logger or a cash drawer for example.
There's a brilliant book by David Sparks called iPad at work if you want a practical guide to doing anything with the iPad.

I had thought of the iPad as a book reader. Having recently moved house, the concept of hundreds of actual paper books is a problem for me. The bloody things weigh a tonne literally. We are still to host yet another garage sale to divest the house of books we can't physically fit. So electronic books make so much sense to me. Both Amazon and Apple have excellent ebook stores. Loads of titles and instant delivery. Much of the science fiction I like has to be ordered in from the USA. You just can't find good books here in Tasmania. Our trips to Melbourne are punctuated with pilgrimages to our favourite shops - Swords and Science (books), DFO (clothes), Max Bremer (all things chocolate ), Allans Music and Myer. To name a few.
The promise of ebooks is good. International availability, instant delivery and no reinforcing the floor or costly book shelves.

My next discovery was that the iPad is like the worlds best portable DVD player. Whilst you can't play actual DVDs, you can rip DVDs or play downloaded movies and tv. The iTunes store has loads of movies and tv for rent or buy. And most stuff you've already downloaded will play too. A lot of my stuff is avi format and an app called CineXplayer plays them nicely. The quality is stunning and the movie doesn't skip if the car goes over a bump. For long car trips with kids this is bliss. Velcro the iPad to the back of the car seat and you have a complete in car entertainment system.
Oh and it plays games too. Lots of them.
So having held out for a while I see now resistance is useless I have been absorbed into the Borge that is iPad.

Cisco vpn client won't work with Lion

2011-07-24T06:48:49Z

Yes, the Mac will connect to a Cisco vpn with no Cisco software to install. That's right, you do not need to download or install anything.

Go to System Preferences, Network, and hit "+" to start a new network connection, change Interface to VPN, VPN Type to Cisco, and the Service Name is whatever you want o call it.

If you have a PCF file supplied by your IT, everything you need is in there. Open it with TextEdit (right click the PCF file, open with and select TextEdit).

The IP address is next to "Host="

The group name is next to "GroupName"

Your username is probably next to "Username="

And your password is hopefully something you know already.

Now the problem is the Group Password (enc_GroupPwd=) will be encoded so you can't see it. Its a secret remember? So before you can type it in, you need to decode it. If your IT people are kind they might tell you what the group password is, or they might roll on the floor laughing at you, which is most likely what they will do. Panic not, you can decode the password easily, just go to this web site and copy/paste the encoded password in and it will decode it for you. Then paste the decoded password into the "Shared Secret" box.

This guy has an excellent article on how-to.

Being too quick to shoot the Lion

2011-07-23T04:39:36Z

What is it with the world these days, Apple releases a new version of their operating system and the world goes nuts? Heck I remember when Windows 95 was released, there were people sleeping overnight in the queue at Harvey Norman. Ah, those were the days.

I installed Mac OS X 10.7 ("Lion") on the first day it came out. I wasn't going to, then I just caved in and went for it. Installing any new operating system on Day One is risky. You always wait for everyone else to get the bugs out before you switch. I think I forgot that. Oops.

There are plenty of glowing reviews of Lion out there. Every skilled journalist worth the ink is writing them. Feel free to read Macworld and the likes for the technical stuff. Here's my experience.

The download is huge. Something like 1.5Gb, but frankly now I have real broadband, I just didn't notice. If you are on wireless or limited download, this will be an issue for you. And no, you can't buy Lion in the shops or on CD or anything else, you have to download it.

Installation is easier than you can possibly imagine. You just go to the Mac App store, click on Lion and hit "buy", $32 Aussies later it starts downloading. Then you get a pop-up and the actual installation part begins. Go have dinner, this bit takes about 30-45 minutes. You are not required, you did your bit already.

On first boot up, everything has changed. The login page is grey instead of blue,prettier, but grey. The photos are round instead of square and I'm sure there are other visual differences, but heck, I just want to log in and see if all my stuff is there or not.

Next comes a video lesson on scrolling with the mouse. I'm sorry, are we saying I don't know how to drive a mouse? Excuse me? But wait! I can't drive a mouse. I scroll down and the text goes the wrong way! What the photon? Oh, this is the new "natural scrolling" - hate it. 10 seconds later, I'm in System Preferences, Mouse and "bull crap scrolling" is turned off.

The first time I open iTunes, it does some conversion and all my stuff is where I expect. Looks prettier and I think slightly faster/smoother. Main thing is it works. Podcast downloading works, my Internet is fine, I'm happy.

Safari is good, but there is no right click to get 1Password. Oh crap, how do I log into my blog? A quick trip out to 1Password, an upgrade and push the Safari plug-in again, nothing. Google to the rescue and Oh crap, Agile haven't down that bit yet. Yep, there is no right-click. Not happy John. Yes, I can still click on the 1P icon on the menu and it fills my passwords, but that isn't how I roll.

The biggest shock is that my "server" is not showing up on the desktop or in the Finder side bar. It is saying "wrong password" but several attempts with the right password, still nothing. Crap! Again Google and the answer is bad, really bad. Apple has upgraded the NFS (Network File System) and I need my NAS people to upgrade the firmware to keep up. And 3.2 of Synology is in Beta still so no NAS. Luckily I can still fudge my way to my files with SMB (Finder, Go, Goto Server, SMB://SERVER )

Most show-stopping was my Cisco vpn no longer worked. I absolutely have to have this to connect to work. If I don't fill in my time sheet, I don't get paid. As I don't get a company laptop (I prefer my Mac) I need that vpn and I need it now. This was the one app I forgot to check for Lion compatibility. I can't believe I did that, so stupid. The bigger bummer is that Cisco keep their software behind a login and I don't have a password. No corporate contract with Cisco, no software. One desperate email to a friend later and he politely reminds me that a Mac can do Cisco out of the box, no software required. Duh! (Makes Homer Simpson noise) Sure enough the networking section under System Preferences has Cisco as an option and scant minutes later I am vpn'ing without Cisco, thank you Andrew. There is a little trick and I'll blog the how-to shortly. See This article. during the meanwhilst.

My last gripe is that no one told me the mouse will no longer wake up the Mac when it has fallen asleep. You have to hit a key on the keyboard. This is like the scrolling thing, a muscle memory I just do without even thinking. When I walk in to the office, I wiggle the mouse as I sit down and the Mac wakes up, but alas no longer.

People bruise Apple for being the dictator, making you do things their way or the highway. And I suppose you could get that impression. I'm not out for a conspiracy theory with every thought about every Apple product. I've got plenty of conspiracy theories in my life (don't get me started about Kennedy or the Moon landing) so I just choose to believe that Apple doesn't really care what I think and so they are not really out to get me. They just want it to be better and if a few of us don't like that, sorry, we can put it back to the old way if we must. I could be wrong.

Bottom line, Apple clearly has done a lot of work on making the Mac easier to use. They have made it faster (yes folks, this is an upgrade so it runs faster on the same hardware. They have made it prettier. In short it is better.

Should you upgrade yet? No. My advice is for you to wait a few weeks. I had done my homework (to as much extent as I could) and then I foolishly jumped early, I still don't know why. It could have been ugly, my Mac could have stopped doing stuff I actually need it to do on a daily basis. I could have been stuck with a dud. I do not suggest you take this gamble today. But you are going to love it when you do.

Don McAllister had a great screencast on preparing for Lion. Beyond the obvious precaution of doing a backup, he went into great depth about what to expect and what to check for. That prepared me and maybe that was the reason I popped my cork a bit early. It pays to have friends.

Talking of friends, I had an email from Carbonite (my online backup) that went like this;

"Dear Carbonite Mac user,

We noticed that you’re using the new Mac OS X Lion (10.7). At this time, Carbonite is not yet compatible with Lion. Any files previously backed up by Carbonite that have not been modified since switching to the new operating system will remain safely in your backup. However, it is likely that any files you’ve created or modified since upgrading to Lion may not be backed up. We expect to release an update to our software in the next few weeks that will address the issue and automatically back up the files you’ve created or changed since upgrading to Lion. This update will occur automatically and we will notify you when it happens.

In the meantime, we recommend that you use an alternate form of backup (such as a USB drive or external hard drive) for any files you’ve created or modified since upgrading to Lion.

We value you as a customer and regret this inconvenience. In appreciation of your patience as we work towards making Carbonite fully compatible with Lion, we will automatically add a free month to your subscription.

Please visit our Mac OS X Lion FAQ page for more information about using Carbonite with Lion.

Sincerely,

 The Carbonite Team"

Now there's good customer service for you. Someone else breaks their system, they fess up straight away, warn me of the danger, tell me what they are doing about it and give me a gift. 11/10 Carbonite!

Always best to finish on a good note, so I will.

Welcome, Hello World, What the Photon happened to John's blog?

2011-06-26T00:36:55Z

Welcome to John's new blog. If you read the articles below, you'll find out what the photon happened. Basically I changed everything. Shark mentality, keep moving or die. The podcast is off the air for a short time, until I get it together and come up with something better. I'm learning as I go, sorry. The archive articles will show up gradually over the next little while. I'm reviewing what I keep and what I drop. The net result should also be an improvement. Your suggestions welcome.

Hosting?

2011-06-22T08:45:10Z

Yes, the demise of iWeb is official see here. I have 12 months to make other arrangments.

Several things have cropped up with my proposed move to Squarespace. In fact I was going to link that first sentence to the previous article until I realised I didn't know how to do that yet and had to learn.

Hosting with MobileMe has made podcast publishing a one-button affair. Once the podcast is finished in GarageBand, I just hit "publish" and it sends the episode to my iweb site and updates the RSS automatically. I do nothing more than one click. But once you get away from the Apple ecosystem, there is all the background stuff to do manually. More work. Yurgh. Is this what real bloggers do?

Then there's the hosting. Squarespace has unlimited storage but individual files must be less than 20Mb. They are clearly in the web publishing not content delivery business. Most of my podcast episodes are 70Mb or more. If I do video, the files are much larger again. The Squarespace help pages suggest hosting them on Libsyn or similar. I'm fine to host my video on Youtube or (preferably) Vimeo, but where do I put the audio? This exercise is starting to get expensive.

Libsyn seems out. At $5 for the classic plan, I would get only 50Mb of new podcasts per months, that's less than one. The $15 plan has 250Mb but that seems a bit steep.

Podbean is slightly better at $4.95 for 150Mb per month which is roughly two episodes.

Any way I jump, it is very clear I need Feedburner to hide where the actual podcast files are saved from my audience. This is invaluable if you have to move the files for any reason. Basically, iTunes points to Feedburner and feedburner points to the files. So changing hosts doesn't affect iTunes, it still sees the same thing.

My domain registration at GoDaddy includes hosting, 10Gb and unlimited bandwidth, so I think I'm using that for now. Given the SquareSpace plan was a little more than I anticipated, I think free hosting is in order.

Squarespace?

2011-06-18T09:55:41Z

Steve Jobs indicated that iWeb will probably go away or at least lose hosting on iCloud when it replaces MobileMe. The pundits say this is a minor inconvenience as hardly anyone hosts on MobileMe. Bugger, I'm in the minority.

For all its bad press, MobileMe and iWeb are so incredibly easy to use and integrated with my Mac that I love them. But it looks like I need to find another blogging platform.

Leo and Co are always ranting about Squarespace and from everything I can see, it is the premiere web hosting platform out there. Sure Wordpress and Blogger feature highly, but Squarespace seems to aspire to be better. Every now and then you hear of a Wordpress exploit or some bug or the bloody thing goes down. I'm just not into that. I have no time at all for technology that does not work first time, every time.

So the issues I now face are;

Learn Squarespace.

Decide if I should start again or try to keep my current web site/blog articles and move them across. I think the answer is moot - I have to keep my best stuff and take the opportunity to dump the crud.

Re-design site for better usability;

Search
Comments
Links
Photos
Tagging
Related articles

Separate out the "core" message stuff (computer usability for normal people) from the more personal human interest stuff. (Since we don't own alpacas anymore that might be a time to drop that stuff?)

And if this is starting to sound more like a "think out loud" project plan than a blog article, you might be right. The in's and out's of getting my articles out of iWeb are immense. It has no export. I knew this going in but I never thought I'd need an export. Curiously enough Blogger and Wordpress don't have export either from what I can see. Squarespace does. I think this is good.

I think I'll have to go through every article I ever wrote and decide if it is still valid and if so export it. Yurgh!

Next issue is Markdown. Well opportunity I suppose. If I export the articles I need a format to export them into. I could just grab the text and bung it in Word or something hideous like that. But I would lose the formatting and links. And be reliant on Word saving valid HTML which isn't a place I want to be. I could export to HTML but who can read raw HTML? That's a job for web browsers not humans. No, I want a WYSIWYG format. Enter Markdown, a human readable text format that also converts easily to HTML or anything else. Yep geeky, but allegedly intuitive. Do I have the brainspace to take on a new language?

While I've been writing this article, I've been researching Squarespace. Google is your friend. The phrase "squarespace sucks" doesn't yield anything too nasty. The worst complaint I could find was years old and about SEO. The snake oil salesmen think Wordpress is more SEO friendly. Whoopee do. Certainly no service complaints, no outages that lasted days and no one demanding their money back. So far so good.

Ok, so I think I'm decided. Yeah, bugger it, let's go for it. Any nay sayers should speak now or forever hold your typing fingers.

Suggestions welcome.