Zac Garrett

Most security experts agree that javascript should be disabled in your browser as well as any other client side scripting languages. These languages have many security flaws in them and you should not allow sites you do not trust to run code on your computer. Something good about Internet explorer is that it has different internet zones and you can add sites you trust to allow them to have javascript while all others do not. Firefox does not have this nativly built into the program, but there is a great extension to do this, noscript.

I have been using noscript for about a week now and have to admit it
is not all that bad. At first glance it is quite nice, around 95% of
the ads blocked because they use javascript to display them. On the
other hand, there are quite a few sites that totally depend on
javascript, especially for menus. One site that I found recently that
totally dies without it is the Seattle Seahawks

site. The page just does not load any content, its just a white page.
The reason is that the site uses javascript to redirect to their actual
index page rather than a server side language. It is just bad
programming.

Another issue with turning off javascript is all of
these new ajax sites. To get these sites working you have to whitelist
them. The add-on allows for permanent or temporary whitelisting. If you
trust a web site and visit it often you can add it to the permanent
list. This will allow you to visit the site without any restrictions.
It will still block any external javascript files that are loaded from
sites different than the one you are on. These files are usually ads
and can be safely blocked. You can also whitelist on a temporarily
basis. This works great if you only want to give a site access for one
visit.

All-in-all surfing without javascript enabled by default
can be done and it is easy to work with for a technically advanced
person. The issue is that most people who should be running without
javascript do not know how to setup the whitelisting. They will just
whitelist everything similar to software firewalls. If everything is
whitelisted then the whole point of the software is null.

VMware is a very neat product if you want to run any operating system without reformatting or using a spare computer. It allows you to create a virtual machine that runs inside your native system. So, if you run Linux and need to use one or two programs under Windows this allows for just that. Another popular reason to run this software is to test out Linux before installing it onto a computer. One of the best parts is that they offer this neat product for free!

A virtual machine is a great way to improve security along with its
other benefits. It allows for an enclosed environment for any virii or
other badware. Many anti-virus companies use this type of software to
test different virus’s effect a system. If you surf the net entirely
inside a VM then you do not have to worry near as much about something
infecting your system. This is truly a way to secure your system
without all that much work.

Now that we know of a few reasons
to use VMware lets take a look at getting it up and running. The
install of VMware was fairly simple under Linux, just extracting the
tarball and running vmware-install.pl. The installer asks several basic
questions and should be very easy to figure out the settings. Under
Windows it is a very basic installer that asks the same questions. It
is just as easy to use if not easier as it has a GUI to help with the
install.

After the install you are given a screen that allows
you to mount a pre-installed virtual machine (VM) or install your own.
They offer many several Linux distros in what they call appliances.
These are operating systems that someone else has installed and usually
have the default settings. This works very well if you quickly want to
try something and not wait for it to install.

Since what I am
looking for is Windows on top of Linux I have to install it myself as
they can not legally provide it. The XP install was almost identical to
a normal desktop install. The only large difference is that is was
slower, I mean a lot slower. You are installing Windows on top of
everything that is already running on your system, meaning that it does
not have all of the system resources. One of my main problems was the
lack of a ton of RAM. My system is a laptop with 512MB of RAM which I
split in half — 256mb to VMware and 256 to Linux. The ideal setup for
VMware would be a host machine with at least a gig of RAM.

Once
XP is installed it works just like it would under a normal install. I
install firefox and get shockwave working without issues. Now I am able
to play those shockwave games that you cant normally play under Linux.
For just this reason Vmware is worth the install. I install a few other
applications that only run under windows, such as Visio with no
problems at all.

After a few days of using VMware I tried to
install a Creative Zen V I got from someone and this is when the fun
begins. First off, this mp3 player is not good if you run Linux as it
uses the Music Transfer Protocol or MTP which is not natively supported
under Linux. There are a few programs out there that support other
Creative products, but unfortunately not this one. The next logical
option is to install it under VMware. The install of the software was
flawless, but USB support is severely flawed. To get the VM to see the
USB drive it has to be plugged in and powered on prior to starting up
the machine. This is not a big problem, more of a hassle to remember to
do this each time you want to sync your mp3s. The problem comes in when
you try to sync the devices for the first time — the VM blue screens!
Thats right, you can get a blue screen under Linux!

I had to test this multiple times to figure out exactly what the problem
was, but with a little googleing I found out that VMware does not
support USB2.0. I am not sure what is more amazing, the fact that it
doesnt support this protocol which is many years old or that it blue
screens when you try to use it. After trying to find a solution the
VMware provided option is to use a USB 1.1 hub between the device and
your computer to control the speed. This is outragious, they don’t
provide a decent software workaround, instead they want you to use
another piece of hardware to provide the solution. If they told me that
the fix was in a non-free version I would probably upgrade to it, but
from everything I’ve read this is a problem with every version of
VMware.

This software does amazing stuff and should at least be
tested out. It does have its quarks, such as the whole USB 2.0 issue,
but its a free piece of software so it is very hard to complain. I
highly recommend this software to anyone who wants to play with
multiple OS’s and have a bit of RAM. It works much better than wine (Linux) or cygwin (windows) and supports much more software.

For the last year and a half or so I have been managing a Linux Virtual Private Server or VPS for short. During this time I have found several tools that have came in quite handy and sometimes even saved money.

Most of these tools should work on any Linux box that is setup in a similar fashion as a virtuozzo VPS.

VPS Info

This tool allows you to monitor the status of your VPS via the web. The
script puts a ton of tools into an easy to use web based interface. It
was created by Doug Robbins along with the servint staff.

Please note
that this tool should be in a password protected directory as it has
quite a bit of information that a malicious person could use against
you.

loadavg
Another
tool created by Doug Robbins that monitors the load average on the
server. Its quite handy to see exactly when your server is loaded down
so you can monitor the status when you are away. You can quickly find
problem times for your server and it helps diagnose the issues.

vnStat
If
you need to monitor bandwidth usage this tool can quickly and easily to
it. It is a command line program that has many options to monitor
bandwidth usage at any point in time.

APF and BFD
Advanced
Policy Firewall (APF) and Brute Force Dector (BFD) are truly a
necessity in todays world of technology. These tools will protect you
from getting hacked and just secure your server in general.

You can find a good tutorial on installing these at webhostgear.

I may update this list and add some other neat Linux tools to it to help keep your server secure.

I have been using Firefox since sometime in 2003 when it was still called Phoenix. At that point there were only a few people using this “new” browser and therefore did not have many extensions. I got used to running the browser in its default state without any add-ons. I did not know what I was missing until recently when I started playing with the different extensions that people have built. I now have found a select few extensions that allows firefox to run fast and securely.

NoScript
Most
people do not realize that having javascript enabled on a browser is
very insecure. If you go to a malicious web site they can do just about
anything to your computer without your knowledge. Most people have seen
the scare tactics with javascript where a site shows your internal IP
address to you. This in and of itself is harmless, but when combined
with the ability to scan your entire network for anything they want it
is harmful. More on this security hole can be found in the security now
netcast #52.

I used to use flashblock

to block annoying flash from autoplaying, but with NoScript it has the
ability to do the same thing and also any embeded files — flash, java,
and video files. If you want to surf securely in firefox you need to
turn javascript off, this adds the abiliy to white list certain web
sites so that they will still function if you trust them.

AdblockOne
of the most annoying things about the internet today is ads. With
adblock you can stop them from loading and make most sites load quite a
bit faster. NoScript will block most ads as they are loaded from
external javascript files, but there are always sites that try to get
around that and host them locally. This extension will allow you to
block them with a few clicks.

There are extensions out there to automatically update to block ads automatically in adblock, such as Filterset.G. I find these to block too much and impede on a sites valid content. I prefer to block only certain items I find annoying.

Fasterfox
If
you ever feel that firefox runs too slowly install fasterfox. This
extension tweaks the firefox settings to provide the fastest experience
possible. There are quite a few articles out there on how to speed up
firefox by editing the about:config, but editing this is like editing
the Windows registry — a pain.

Since I run my own server I find
that fasterfox in its default settings can cause problems with a small
server such as my own. That is why I choose the “optimized” setting
rather than “turbo charged”. This helps the speed of the page load
without compromising the server at the other end.

Web Developer
If
you do any sort of web development then this extension is a must have.
It has so many neat functions that its just something you should look
at to see if it has something that will be handy to you. Some of the
features I use is the HTML and CSS validation buttons and the outlining
tools.

Nightly Tester Tools
I
originally got this tool to test the beta version of firefox 2. It
provides the ability to install extensions that are not compatible with
the version of firefox you have. It has so many other geeky options
that I kept it installed after firefox 2 was released.

Greasemonkey
This
extension allows you to use javascript to customize a page. The issue
with this extension is that if you use NoScript to block javascript on
a page this extension will not work properly. It works great on trusted
pages, but not on untrusted ones.

The neatest part about
greasemonkey is all of the scripts that people have already created.
They have an entire web site dedicated to them userscripts.org. One of the scripts I use adds a link to duggmirror on all digg posts so you can easily go to the mirror if the site goes down with traffic.

Add n Edit Cookies
Allows
you to quickly edit cookies in firefox. I use it primarily to change
the expiration date on sites that log you out after a certain amount of
time.

IE Tab
While
using Windows I prefer to open a new tab with Internet Explorer rather
than opening up IE in its own window. This works great for sites like
Microsoft updates which only works in IE.

Reload Every
Reloads the page at set intervals. I find this to be quite handy when trying to test web design functions.

Extensions I no longer use
These are extensions that I used at some point but no longer use for various reasons

Foxytunes
This extension was great while I use Windows as my primary OS. Since I no longer use Windows to listen to music and control xmms in gkrellm I no longer need this extension.

Live PageRank
I
used this for a while until I found out that the extension was tracking
my every move on the internet. Talk about creepy spyware.

Forcastfox
When
I used to have to go outside for work I used this extension to know
what to expect. I how have an office with a window and can just look
outside.

Fireftp
This
adds the ability to have a FTP client inside firefox. I found it to be
buggy and it would crash firefox. I have not used it in a while and
they have probably fixed these issues, but I just would rather fire up
an actual FTP program.

FlashGot
Allows
you to download a ton of stuff in one click. I just do not have a use
for this extension at this point. I don’t save all that much to my hard
drive anymore.

Final Note
Extensions for
Firefox should represent yourself and not someone else. If you do not
use an extension remove it as it can slow down Firefox if you have too
many extensions installed. Don’t be scared by extensions, it is very
easy to add and remove extensions so try various extensions out until
you find a combination that you like.

One of the most common things I hear about a computer company is the fact that their tech support sucks. The main reason for this is the fact that most support is outsourced and the techs are not understandable. On top of that these people are not good techs, but read prompts on a screen. When you tell them exactly what you have done before they do not skip these prompts, but continue to ask you question after stupid question.

What it all comes down to is money. A good tech is not cheap,
they want to make decent money and if they can’t they will move to
something else. It is very hard to keep someone on tech support when
they can have more fun and make more money doing something else. Most
companies outsource their tech support to India to save even more
money. They can pay a fourth of the price or less and still provide
support to the users.

There are very few companies that still
have support that is in the United States. Two examples of companies
that still have tech support locally are godaddy and Sun Microsystems.
These are a small percent of the companies out there today who do not
outsource their support. When a company’s only objective at the end of
the day is to earn money outsourcing is the way to go. They forget that
the customers will follow the company that does not out source their
support because dealing with someone with an accent that is almost
impossible to understand is a hassle.

Most people who are calling
tech support are already in a bad mood as something is not working. It
is just more aggravating to have someone that you can not understand on
the other end of the line. This causes the customer to not want to use
that product any longer and look for something else. The issue with
this is that almost all companies outsource. So, the customer is the
one losing out.

I do not like to use Microsoft products as they have a proven track record of not caring for their customers. They create a beta grade piece of software and release it to the customers as a final product. One example of this is Windows XP; To most of the industry it was a very insecure and unstable OS until service pack 2 (sp2). This operating system was going to be the most secure OS that Microsoft had ever released, it was worm heaven until sp2 which installed a firewall by default. The entire Anti-Virus industry thrives off Microsoft’s bad code.

Microsoft forgot about Internet Explorer (IE) for a good six
years before they decided to patch all of its security holes. This was
great for the anti-virus industry, which would not exist if Microsoft
would keep their code clean. I don’t believe that Mozilla Firefox

would be as large as it is growing to be if Microsoft had just kept IE
secure and up to date. They have finally released a new version of the
browser which is a step in the right direction, but are they now done?
With their current track record I do not expect any future updates to
the software for another six years.

Many people think that I
am anti-Microsoft, this is not necessarily true. What I am against is a
company releasing a product which costs a good hunk of change and then
forgetting about its users. Take for example if a company who makes
TV’s makes a product that crashes at random intervals and anyone can
see what the person is watching. Everyone would be complaining and
would not purchase the product. This is exactly what Microsoft does and
history has proven it time and time again.

I keep waiting for
Microsoft to change its mind on updating its software, the company is
too large at this point. Their focus is so broad that it is hard to
keep everything up-to-date. They are one of the worlds largest and most
successful companies in the world, this is great if the company uses
the success for improving its products. From my experiences Microsoft
does not do this and that is why I choose not to use Microsoft
products.

I currently manage two virtual private servers or VPS’s of very similar stats, but one is Windows and the other is Linux. Both servers use around the same amount of bandwidth each month. Yet, the Windows server takes more work to keep it working. I spend at least 10 hours on Windows to one on Linux, most of the time on Linux is for optional upgrades and not necessary management.

The Windows server is far less stable and is constantly having
problems. IIS’s application pools have so many problems its not funny,
they really are not made for servers with a small amount of RAM. The
server uses up 90% of the memory at almost every second, its nuts.
Windows eats memory on the servers just like on the desktop.

On
the other side of the coin there is Linux. Apache with php and mysql
works great with a small amount of RAM on a server, it is optimal for
this situation. The server’s only major problem was when a database for
user tracking was not being cleaned out. This was my fault and not the
server. Once I found the problem was resolved it sped right back up and
runs like a charm.

It takes about twice as many resources to
run the same traffic on Windows than on Linux. This does not even take
into account the price of the software, only the hardware necessary to
support the server. There might be some settings I am missing on
Windows, but I have read just about every article I can find on the
subject. Thats another factor, you have to read much more for Windows.

I
can see why network admins like Windows, you have to always be around
because the servers crash. With Linux once the server is up and running
you can almost forget about it.

There are people who think that Sony computers are top of the line because they are more expensive. This is far from the case. Yes, they are more expensive, but they are filled with horrible hardware. They think they are special and do not follow the industry standards for hardware. This means that if you want to replace a component you have to purchase their hardware only, which is price around double what the industry price is.

Besides the hardware there are other issues, one is spyware. About a
year and a half ago my Dad purchased a Sony computer without my
advice. He got the very best Sony desktop the salesman could sell him,
probably $5k in total. The computer came loaded with spyware and
horrible hardware.

As soon as I heard about the new computer I
has them scan it for spyware, around 60 pieces in a 3 day old system.
None of which were from browsing the web, all pre-installed. I don’t
see how a computer for $5k can come with so much junk on it, it’s
outrageous.

Once the computer was cleaned up during a 3 hour
Zac-support call the computer was up and running. Well, it ran for
about 6 months until the hard drive started making funky noises. After
running a few tests I decided that the drive was dying quickly. Since
the computer was so new it was still under contract which included on
site service. Within not all that long a tech was out to replace the
hard drive. They did not offer any backup services, only to replace the
drive and start a format. The tech did not stick around long enough to
wait for Windows to finish installing. They had to finish the install,
not that unusual in tech support, but nothing special for an expensive
computer.

Another few months go by and another funky sound –
this time I found out that it was the graphics card. Instead of having
them try to deal with Sony to get a new graphics card I just had them
purchase one from the local computer store. The install went fairly
easy for them and the computer was back up and running, at least for a
while.

It was not much long after that the hard drive started
having problems again. This time everyone was mad enough at the
computer to replace it. The computer was in service for approximately a
year and a half and was replaced with a Dell that was less than half
its price.

This is just one of my experiences with Sony
computers. I have had many others that have turned out just about the
same. The horror stories with Sony far outweigh the success.

This
along with the recent rootkit event with Sony music CD’s makes me
really wonder what Sony’s intentions are. They clearly do not want to
make a superior product when it comes to their computers.They have made
a decent product with the playstation 3, but I can only imagine that
they use bad hardware in them as well. I do not have any experience
with them, but that is the conclusion I would draw in my other Sony
experiences.

I think that Sony just has too many buns in the
oven, they have so many different products that they are unable to
produce all of them very good. They have done a good job with their
TV’s, but they are overpriced and nothing all that special. I just
prefer not to use any Sony products if I have the option.

I have been running beryl for a few days now and I have to admit, I don’t like it. I have ran it in both AIGLX and XGL modes and they both put a huge load on my CPU. My main system is my laptop which is a AMD 1800+ with 512mb RAM. I run XFCE not because my system will not handle KDE or Gnome, but because I prefer its speed and in my opinion ease of use.

My main problem with beryl is the fact that is eats away at my CPU.
For example, I am away from my computer all night and I get back on
with a 1.75 load. Without this software the load would be in the 0.01
to 0.05 range. I am not sure if I do not have a setting right or what,
but I followed the wiki’s on the project’s site.

Everything
with beryl looks very glassy in all of the themes, it looks a lot like
Vista. There are probably quite a few people who like this, I am not
one of them. I guess that I am someone who prefers function over
beauty. I found the program to be more limiting than helpful. By
default when you right click on a link in your browser it will wiggle
for what feels like an eternity. Its easy to turn this off in the
manager, but by the time you get everything running quick you are just
about back to your default window manager settings.

One really
neat feature was when a window was not active it would go slightly
transparent. This makes it very easy to find out what has focus.

For
me, the cons highly outweigh the pros for Beryl and its glossy windows.
At this point I would not recommend it to anyone unless they are
looking for the beauty in the system and not functionality. I think
this will be great for the OS X or Vista converts, but for us who have
been using Linux happily for years its just annoying.

You can find my previous post with screen shots here.

With the recent release of Intel’s quad-core for desktop systems it is making me wonder what they are thinking. Desktop systems in their current state can barely use two cores in their entirety, much less four. The issue with multi-core systems is the fact that no program for the desktop is made to utilize this feature.

Most people do not really know what cores are, much less what they
really do. The easiest way to think of a core is in its single-core
stage, the core is the part of the processor that handles the function
of processing. By this I mean its the thing that follows the
instructions given by a program to execute a task. In most cases the
more cores you have the slower each of them become. This is just a
limit of the technology of today.

One my think, “great, so
having more cores that follow the instructions things should get done
faster!” I really wish that was the case, but there are limits. In its
most basic state a program or process loads once and the instructions
can only be handled by one core. The problem becomes the fact that if
the program is processor intensive it is only handled by one of the
cores. This is wonderful if using a program that will create multiple
processes, also called threads. Most good server technology was
designed to work to work this way while the desktop is not.

Take
for example most games, they are not multi-threaded so the program will
do no better having multiple cores. In actuality they will normally
preform worse as the core speed is slower in a multi-core system.

There
are some situations where dual-cores do help in desktop computing. One
of these is if you are a multi-tasker. Each program you run has its own
thread so if one program is a resource hog the other core will handle
the other operations.

So, in all reality if you are buying a
multi-core system without a specific task in mind you are wasting your
money. There will be a time where multiple cores are necessary to run
programs, but that is in the future. The good thing I see with the
quad-core systems for the desktop coming out is that the price of all
other processors should be dropping.