30 January 05 - 11:21How Not Using IE Could Get You Arrested
Something that all at once makes me want ot laugh at loud and worries me at the same time...
It would seem that an idiot sysop at BT decided that a donation to s
tsunami relief website via Lynx (text mode browser used by blind people
and others that just like a lightweight experience) running on Solaris
as a hacking attemp.
After being arrested by men with guns, and newsies in tow, he is now out on bail.
Boing Boing has
it. I'm sure you will see udpates there before I post it
here. hey - I'll be GETTING it from there... ;) The
BBC has the more official version. If Boing Boing is right then this trial will get interesting to be sure!
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29 January 05 - 12:16Googler Stuffup
A blog by a brand new Google imployee who ovbiously doesn't read
employment contracts... The blog entries got pulled, but are
still in the
Yahoo Cache for now and at
bloglines for longer I would think
He bitches about terrible the relocation plans are, and even complains
that he will be reimbursed... then about how terrible the
employee benfits are, and how pathetic his pay packet is - but its
better than MS. Why work there at all?
If he complains this much in a public forum then I'd hate to work next
to him! Maybe I do have the guy wrong - I've never met him -
however he certainly can't complain that this blog was misrepresenting
him...
Obviously Google still thinks he's worth it as they still seem to have
him employed. (I would guess after a long talk about keeping sensitive
information "in the family")
I found out about this on
John's blog and he found it
here
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28 January 05 - 23:27mySQL Worm
Just a quick note today about a new mySQL worm that only attacks
windows installations. It has some serious limitations that will
(in my opinion) only do in the careless - or possibly the hapless user
of some slack software utilising mySQL.
In other words, while I'm not really a fan of mySQL, I can't blame the server too much for this...
It does seem that thousands of PCs are infected - easily seen by
checking the IRC channel that they all the zomebied machiens check into
and there is a bit more traffic on the default mySQL port.
For the official details see the
mySQL security post.
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26 January 05 - 16:14Video Search and VLOGing
Google are getting close to launching there TV search. They've
been working on this since (mid?) December. For the official
notes check the
Google Blog post. I first say this on
Johns Search blog
While not quite the same thing, Yahoo just launched their
video search (out of beta) a couple of days ago. Look for the
video
tab on the main page. They also were involved in getting a
new Media RSS format started. They are certainly starting to get
the jump on Google in some areas.
There was also the first
vloggercon held a few days ago. How many variations can there be on blogging...
Should be interesting to see the market evolves with this new media
delivery channel. Besides - Video Blogs sound very cool! A
video blog and a camera phone...
I'll certainly be digging into vblogging.
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24 January 05 - 13:39Linux Video Editing
Previously, I have been involved in supporting NLE (non linea video editing) Most recently with an RT2000 and Adobe Premier on Win2k. (that dates things a little...)
It was very annoying when - having been used to iron the bugs out of it, a new version - RT2500 - was released without even an upgrade price as thanks for the hassle that users went through... The combination of Matrox RT2000/Premier was abominable - a constant state of crashes and corruped projects on a dedicated system. Whilst I have heard the RT2500 and above, and Premier as it currently stands - is now fantastic in terms of reliability.
Anyway - what has this got to do with Linux? Well, I'm not a zealout (though I am a fan) of Linux. I am a fan of using the right tool for the job, whatever it is based on.
There was a slashdot post today that eventually pointed me to the linuxartist site video section. What used to be Broadcast 2000 when it was younger seems to have matured very nicely into Cinelerra. It looks extremely functional. I would be interested in poeoples thoughts on it however.
I like the renderfarm idea that goes with it.
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23 January 05 - 15:17More google developments
Interesting day today for the blogs I'm reading...
The smart people at
researchbuzz stumbled
accross this nugget: You can now do 32 keyword searches - instead
of the old 10, which I have repeatedly run into for years...
Also (getting a bit old now but I just found it today...) from Jan 7 on
searchenginelowdown:
You can now search the Google Adwords adds only. I'm not sure how
this effects search impressions and hence CTR for the adds.
Curiously enough, when I searched for a term I appear at the top of
(very useful term - I have my max advertising set so that my adds
always show (and they do in normal searches - in fact they appear
accross the top) howver after much refresing of resutls they didn't
show in two pages of PPC results.
To check this feature out go here:
http://www.google.com/sponsoredlinks
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22 January 05 - 15:37YAGA - Yet Another Google API
A lot of us will be watching with keen anticipation to see exactly what
we can do with a new API from google. Its purely for Google
Adwords people, that apparently allows a much greater control of add
delivery.
Of course you would want to automate such control as much as
possible. Hence delevery of this control via an API. Those
who ebrace this quickly will surely get an large advantage on the
"Classic" only users of Adwords.
Keep a keen eye for out a beta or public release on of this soon!
Thanks to
Silcon Valley Watchers for this scoop.
UPDATE: Oops - should give a thanks to
John Battelle's Searchblog where I first found the story.
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22 January 05 - 15:27Now you can use Google to track everything
Just a quicky this time...
This is really cool. Been secretly wishing for this for some
time. Basically they have extended the google AdWords system to
allow tracking of non-adwords traffic/sales.
You can find
the details here
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22 January 05 - 14:41AOL Search open
Got excited when I heard a few days ago that AOL was entering the SE
market, and practically ending their (strange in my opinion) declining
"members only" model.
However at the end of the day they are using DMOZ directory data, and
Google search engine at the back end. They are seeding the
results with their own media content.
What it does do for web marketers is enchance the value of exisiting positions in DMOZ and Google...
For a more indepth look, try
John Battell
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21 January 05 - 16:55PostgreSQL 8.0 is now out
I have been running the release candidate on my XP Pro box for a little while. The windows installation is a DREAM to use. It quickly installs everything you need on the windows platform, and configures the basic database too.
As delivered, PostgreSQL is the only open source database to inlude point in time recovery of data.
It does not have the limitations that I run into when using MS SQL, like max tables in query limit of 256. (this includes all implied tables from views, and tables created internally when linking things together)
Really the only thing missing in my opinion was the native windows executable, and a good windows installer. They have both been supplied and a LOT more. This is a very impressive release.
You can find more information on the PostgreSQL Site
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19 January 05 - 23:49A Solution to Comment SPAM...
Well - of course its not a complete answer...
If you want Google and other SEs to not follow, not rank (ie PR et al) etc links then put this in the link tags:
rel="nofollow" It
will be in effect very quickly. How does this fix
things? Well if blogging comments as posted by your
favourite blog software have this tag until you vett the comments, then there is little point to the exercise.
Of course with the automatic bots roaming that fact that it will only
work 1/10 times will still make it worthwhile... It is a start
however, and when combined with blacklisting and so on will really make
a difference (I think)
For more info check
Google's Blog, and
Search Engine Watch.
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16 January 05 - 18:28PHP Directory Software
From an earlier post you would have heard me complain about not finding any GPL or similar web directory software in PHP. Seems I couldn't see the forrest from the trees (I expected as much)
I have found the following as a short list:
- My Threads
- PHP FFA Proj
- PPH Hoo
I will eval all of these soon to see what I think is best. Results will be posted here.
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16 January 05 - 18:10Infrared Solar Cells
I actually saw this pop up yesterday.
First solar cells to convert a decent amount of IR energy - instead of
just mostly visible light that is only half of what we recieve from the
sun. Its in a paint on form - seems it would make sense to cover
clothes in it to power your mobile phone, and you could have an
electric car that completely charged itself. It seems it the
product of nano technology.
Hope we get this soon (and not in 5 years...) For the full story chech the
National Geo Article onine.
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15 January 05 - 17:01Attack on Google?
As I write this, the Google Adwords servers are down. They have
been down for about an hour now (I was using them when they dropped off
the map). This only seems to effect the servers that advertisers
use - adwords themselves seem to be functional.
After about 20min I started getting a "mainenance" page instead of
time-outs. What's interesting is that the overture search
suggestion tool was timing out 4 times out of 5 this morning.
Almost completly useless. Coincidence?
Update: As of now (6.30pm AEST) the servers are up again.
That means they were down for about 2.5Hrs... Now I can get
some work done again.
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15 January 05 - 14:51MSN Beta - reverse engineeering
Thats a big statement but I don't see how you can't do exactly that.
One of the neat features I saw last night on the msn search beta was an
Search Builder -> Results Ranking button that allowed you to tweak the result generation paramaters. There is a slider for:
- Updated Recently
- Popularity (I assume link popularity ala PR)
- Approximate-Match - Exact Match
While this is really handy/cool, surely if you repeat the same query
repeatedly with different slider positions you can get a run down on
how there algo ranks pages.
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14 January 05 - 12:25Quick post on the all imporant NAME
After recieving thousands of requests, I can now happily release to the
world the following - previously confidential information.
Permission is hereby given to distribute this text as long as it is
published in full.
The origin of the my blog name is none other than mpot - the techie
formerly known as Martin Pot. You can find his page here:
http://martybugs.net
Please hassle him into setting up a blog of his own... He's a bit
of a guru on wireless stuff and you will find some good info on the
topic his site.
ps - ok I confess: I only got one request to release this
information - but that doesn't sound anywhere near as earth shattering
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13 January 05 - 22:33MSN Search and RSS feed
Wasn't going to post anymore today, but this caught my attention
Something really cool: MSN Search is apparently playing with
providing an RSS feed for searches. They had a hidden link on the
search page for a few hours and sombody saw it (naturally).
Anyway, you can see this in action by putting "&format=rss" on the
end of a search query URL. For the source of this information
look at this post by
Gary Price
Of course MSN are not the first SE to have an RSS feed. For
example Gigblast have had this for some time. They allow you to
reuse the feed in your own site/SE results - unlike MSN which restricts
to personal use.
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13 January 05 - 12:30Further on Search Engines
I realise that things over time become more commercialised, and the
marketplace more consolidated. However its amazing how many
previously free search engines are now "pay to submit" or totally PPC
based.
Even in the last 5 months a lot more SEs have switched
over. If this keeps up then the only general true search
engines left will be Google, Yahoo and MSN. Not that I'm anti-PPC
- I actually use PPC daily in my webbusinesses. Bit of a concern
though - or maybe just an opportunity to fill a widending gap in the
market.
I have seen it mentioned a few times that the way forward is many
niche search engines. Time will tell if this is so or not -
though it is easy to see that its simpler to dominate a niche than
compete with the whole 'general' SE market place. (no I do NOT
think its easy to compete with google on that basis - who has access to
enough money/bandwidth ton index the billions of pages
requried??? And can they give some to me?!
Till next time
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13 January 05 - 12:19Directories and Search Engines
Every tryed searching for a PHP based web directory? (Hint: what do you think will come up when you search for "php directory" - its quite commical in a way)
I would be interested in any decent GPL directory management software - ala thd ODP.
If you search for search engines instead then you will get a number of hits. The first that comes to my mind being
phpdig. Seems like its not designed for indexing millions of pages, but is ideals for hundreds-thousands. You could check
this forum post if you want to see the helpful people on that project.
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12 January 05 - 07:02a new start...
So I finally got round to actually doing a "real" blog....
Been doing bits and pieces but this is the first one I'm doing just for
myself. This blog is pretty much whatever interests me with my
programmer/techie background. Hope you enjoy it!
The first thing I would point to is this blogging software -
Pivot. If you are looking for an easy to use php
based GPL alternative to WordPress, this is it.
This is how long it took to install this blog:
8.43 - started copying files
8.49 -8.53 chmodding files
8.53 - 8.56 - set admin details
8.56 - rather empty looking blog published
It support all the "good stuff" you should expect from a blogging tool
- like anti-spam (okay - not quite installed here yet I was in a hurry)
and moblogging.
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Linkdump
