Published by KC August 1st, 2007
in Internet, Question, Evil and Security.
Since security is one of my biggest concerns, this question is great. Fortunately, the mainstream web browsers make it easy to detect scam and phishing websites. There are also some plugins that can be installed to assist in detected phishing sites. Phishing websites are sites that look like your bank, Paypal, Ebay, or another financial based website but your username and password is sent to a criminal. See this Wikipedia entry on phishing.
Mozilla Firefox 2 has phishing protection built in. Firefox 2 downloads a list of phishing websites automatically and on a regular basis. If you browse to one of these sites, the browser warns you and steers you away from them. More details are available here.
Microsoft Internet Explorer version 7 has something similar. The browser downloads a list automatically and warns you if you visit one of these websites. Unfortunately, it isn’t included or enabled by default. This Microsoft website explains how to get it.
Knowing when you’re going to a bad site it good. But how do you know if your information, like bank account or credit card numbers, is being encrypted? The best way to tell is by a little padlock image either in the status bar at the bottom of the browser, or in the address bar on the right hand side. The position varies by browser but the image is nearly always the same. Another way to tell is by looking at the actual web address. While http:// is the normal beginning of a website address, secure websites should start with https://. Make sure that it’s there BEFORE you type in your password. If you don’t see the ’s’ with the http, try adding it yourself and hitting enter. If you get back to the same page, it should now be secured.
Remember to trust your instincts, too. If you think that the site looks a little shady, try googling the address. Often if the site is bad news, the Google results will reflect complaints, reports, or warnings.
Published by KC August 1st, 2007
in Shortcut.
The Windows Key is fantastic. It’s not just to bring up the Windows menu. One of the additional shortcuts is Win+E, which starts Windows Explorer as if you had just opened up “My Computer.” It’s a quick and easy way to navigate to all of your files.
Published by KC July 12th, 2007
in Shortcut.
Today’s shortcut is nice and simple. If you have multiple programs running on your computer, you can cycle through each one quickly to switch between them. While holding Alt, each press of the Tab button will cycle through one program. A little display pops up with a quick description of what program is currently selected. Letting go of both buttons will bring the focus back to the currently selected program. If you hold Shift+Alt while pressing tab, the programs are cycled through in the opposite direction. This is useful if there’s a long list and you accidentally pass by the desired program.
Published by KC July 9th, 2007
in Shortcut.
The shortcut for today is another that helps in the realm of word processing and email composing. Ctrl+Del behaves similar to the normal delete function, but deletes an entire word rather than a single character. You might be noticing a pattern developing with the Ctrl button. There are plenty of shortcuts that use the Ctrl button for moving the cursor, deleting words, etc. The Ctrl button essentially extends the functionality to the next highest unit. E.g. from a letter to a word, from a line to a paragraph. I’ll be covering more of these shortcuts in the future, so just hang on tight!
I’ve started a new project that should cut my bills down by a little more than $80 a month. I’ve heard a lot about building a DVR using a computer, essentially building a Media Center PC at home. I want to take it a step further and completely eliminate my cable TV bill. Most TV stations now broadcast over the air in Digital TV, including HDTV, in preparation for the mandatory switch over in 2009. What most people don’t know is that the frequency remains the same, only the TV tuner needs to change. This means that the basic, run of the mill, $15 TV antenna is perfectly fine. All I need is the ability to record my shows and watch live TV when I feel like it. Enter the MythTV box.
MythTV is a Linux based program that schedules and plays back TV programs, plays live TV, plays Music, and a few other cool things that are useful in a Media Center PC. Best of all, it’s free! On inspiration from a friend and Episode 2 of Systm, I’ll probably use KnoppMyth, a quick and easy installation of Knoppix and MythTV.
So here’s my plan:
- Build an HDTV capable computer
- Use MythTV
- Every night, move any recorded shows to the network file server but leave a link behind so that MythTV can still play them back.
Step 3 can be achieved using a task scheduler and a custom script that tests if the file is a shortcut or a real video file. If it’s a video, move it to the file server and then leave a shortcut with the same filename behind. Now, to build the actual computer…
Someone just moved out of my building and threw away a computer. Of course, I salvaged it. As a reminder, review this post about hard drive security. While the hard drive in this computer was dead, I could easily have looked at the data had it not been. I had an extra hard drive laying around, so this wasn’t a big deal. I did find out that the processor is a 2.4GHz Pentium 4, which is the bare minimum for live HDTV, but that’s ok. The video card works, the RAM works, and one of the two CD drives works. I bought an AverMedia A180 on ebay, which should be here shortly. It was very cheap, and it’s known to work with Knoppmyth. In a few days I’ll come back with a synopsis on the process and talk some more about over the air DTV.
