So should I pay $14.99 a day for Wi-Fi at the hotel, or enable tethering on my blackberry for $30.00 for the month…. HMM…

After doing some research, I found that it is very easy to make your own mobile hotspot. This is part 1 of a little hacking experiment. Imagine this. You are at your local “Starbucks” and you want to steal some people packets. Why not share your Ev-do connection and name it “Starbucks” fire up wireshark and start munchin on some packets.

Here is how you do it in vista.

Install your necessary drivers and software for your air-card.

Next, go to Control Panel\Network and Internet\Network Connections

Right Click on your dial-up (Broadband) connection and select properties

Once in, check the box that says “Allow users to share…”

After this, make sure all of your devices are set to automatically receive DHCP.

Reset your broadband connection (disconnect, reconnect) 

Next go back to Network and Sharing Center and click “Set up a connection or network”

Click “Set up a wireless ad hoc…”

Setup what you want your SSID. Make sure security type is set to no authentication

Click Next

Click Close

Lets see what comes up on the other clients

The reason that I set this up was to have Wi-Fi in the hotel room. Maybe later we will try to see what we can find out on the streets with our Mobile Access Point and Wireshark.

Ideas?

Till Next Time

No Worries

TH

Edit: Forgot Last Pic

Interesting timeline of Operating System Interfaces. Hope You Like.

Link


TH

For now the new site is in beta, and being hosted from my house.
Check it out

www.tjhouston.com

and check out the forums as well

http://forums.tjhouston.com

Look foreward to new content soon

TJ

Scott is Traveling for spring break to Belize and caught this picture at the airport. Can you say Adobe Flash Fail?  LOLZ

We are looking to add a mail list (list server) to our district in order to save on costs with mailing newsletters and what not. After looking over open and closed source projects we decided to go with list-serv light, the light version was more than enough to support our needs.

Installation was very easy, with the use of their user manual found here: http://www.lsoft.com/manuals/1.8d/userindex.html

Also this is a good manual for moderator’s administrators as well":

http://www.usy.org/yourusy/communications/listserv/USY%20Listserv%20Manual.pdf

If you know all of your ip addresses for your mail server and have an idea of how your network setup is a snap. The only issue that I ran into was the “wa.exe” script that is used to run the whole listserv. To save you some time, what you need to do is open the httpd.conf (in the bin directory within the apache folder) and find the line that has “#AddHandler cgi-script .cgi”. This line is commented out (#) delete the # sign and this will add the cgi support which is needed to run the list serv.

Other then the issue with the CGI script, the install was pretty easy.

Any questions feel free to email me: Magicdude1@gmail.com

Till next time

Carpe Dium

Seize the Day

At work we have an Ubuntu server that we use for imaging with FOG. With fog, you never really need access to the machine, just the web interface will suffice. Recently we were looking to update fog as well as install a list-serve since the imaging really is not that resource intensive, well lo and behold, we did not set it up to be one of our default passwords that we use, hmm…

After some Googling around and a couple of failed attempts, I found a really easy way to change the admin password in Ubuntu Desktop. When logging into the server click escape to get into the different boot options, scroll down to the recovery option and hit enter.

The next menu is the recovery menu. Here you want to scroll down to root, this option will give you access to a root shell prompt.

*Warning: you can really screw up your computer being in this elevated shell*

When you get the blinking cursor type:   passwd root

(This command also works for other users)

After this you will be asked to enter a new Unix Password twice.

After this is done restart your pc. Mission Complete

“The quieter you are the more you hear”

With the X-Serve we have here, there is not video card. So no direct connection to the unit is available. This really sucks when the server crashes and will not boot. Here are a few things to try to see if you can get it back up and running.

First, just let it set. There has been many times when I was having issues with the unit not booting up at all. Just flashing its lights mockingly at me. Letting it set for 15 minutes gives it the time it needs to gather its thoughts and get back to work.

The next thing I found was from Apples KB.  On the front panel, you see the status lights (Blue), they can help you interface directly with the unit. Here you can clear the nvram, put the X-Serve into diagnostic mode, boot to cd, as well as Net Boot. Below is the link on how to interface with the front panel.

http://support.apple.com/kb/TA26930

Hope this helps you guys keep your servers up and running.

Till Next Time

Adios

TH

When you sign up for all those little restaurant giveaways and what not on the internet, you never expect to win, but you do it anyway. Reality is all of these businesses want, well, your business. Below are a few of the sites that I signed up for that paid off.

My birthday is soon approaching (Feb 16th), no special plans, school, work, the norm. Recently I started receiving emails for various food establishments wishing me a “Happy Birthday”. So far I have a free appetizer, desert, a medium pizza, a free entree, and a free burger. Not bad for the 3 minutes it took me to sign up for these things.

Here is the list:

Dairy Queen- Various buy one get one free coupons throughout the year, and a free blizzard for my birthday

Red Robin- Multiple free appetizer deals throughout the year, various holiday free treats, and for my birthday a free burger and as a bonus I signed up for this offer and they gave me a 3$ off coupon.

Hungry Howies- Multiple good pizza deals throughout the year free bread sticks for Halloween and such, and for my birthday I got a free medium one topping pizza.

I will update the list throughout the month I'm hoping I get more so I can eat free for the next week.

Just a thought… we all have more then one email… I'm sure we can change the birth date… Hmmmm…

Till Next time

Carpe Noctum

TH

Recently I have been noticing a couple different issues with my Blackberry Curve (Verizon). These problems include the speaker stops working, email account stops working, Web Browser will not load web pages and gives error message regarding Service Books. Below are a few things that have helped me fix my issues with my blackberry and there is a good chance that it will fix yours as well.

First issue that I have had happen, is the earpiece stops working, I spent a little bit of time on the phone with Verizon tech support. They had me resend the service books, didn’t fix it. They then asked me when was the last time that I sync my blackberry, well never, everything I need is over the air. Well apparently Verizon pushed out an update that has made my curve so much better, it runs smoother, faster and it seems much more dependable. The updates software also installs “Docs to Go” which gives you the ability to open Word documents as well as PowerPoint presentations.

2nd Issue: Your blackberry just decides to stop retrieving e-mail. I found that re-sending service books (Service Books) fixed the issue. Service books are basically just config files that tell the Blackberry how to interact on the network. To resend your service books, click email settings, service books, then cli ck Send Service Books.

Although theses methods are not full proof, they are a good place to start. I hope this helps you get back up and running with your Crackberry.

Till next time

Carpe Noctum

Seize the night

I know its been a while since i have posted, Life happened lol. I have been very busy with School and working two jobs. But today i am going to share with you some of the best places to find Apps, Themes, Ring tones and other cool things for the blackberry

Themes, because the normal theme just gets boring.
http://www.plazmik.com Offers a theme builder to create your own Themes for your CrackBerry

Bored at meetings? Download some games to play while the boss man isn't looking.
Although not free, http://www.bplay.com/ , http://www.magmic.com/ both offer some really cool games that would def. keep you busy during that next budget meeting.

And finally what everyone loves, ring tones, http://www.tuneusin.com navigate your BB browser to this address scroll down and click the song, save, enjoy

IF you guys have any other suggestions for BB apps email me @ magicdude1@gmail.com

Thanks

TJ

The quieter you are the more you hear

Windows Home Server is now on the market and finding its way into homes all over. Windows home server takes the confusing aspects of enterprise servers and puts an easy to use central data storage point for your home. "With Windows Home Server, you can easily back up, access, share, and store all your family's digital media." (Microsoft's Website) A 120 day trial can be ordered from Microsoft’s Website. Lets get down to business and break down windows home server.

The installation of home server took roughly 45 minutes. Not bad compared to the 2 hrs it took to install server 2008.

Today during the Thanksgiving Day Parade, on national television, all who watched were Rick Rolled. The Foster House puppets were singing a bubbly little song. All of a sudden the music came to a halt and Rick Astley popped out on the float singing his hit "Never gonna give you up."

Scott and I have been in the process of adding more content as we promised. Lately we have been developing a new site for the college geeks out there. We have been recording podcasts, and also will have live feeds on stickam. If you have any ideas, or would like to participate in our podcasts/ development please E-mail us at smalltowngeeks@gmail.com. Thanks for reading...

T.J. and Scott

Small Town Geeks

At last the wait is over. Mobile-Me has finally arrived. Ever since WWDC we have been anxiously awaiting the all new interface for .Mac. It is here.

The new interface for mobile me is a huge improvement over what .mac used to be. It seems like this service is finally worth the money. The big test for this service is handling so much traffic from the mobile world. As long as it can hold up to that I think this service will be a huge hit.

I look forward to building photo albums for my family and friends and enjoying this new service from apple.

I guess I will step up to the plate here and defend the iPown.

3G:
Saying that the phone should have been 3G in the first place is debatable. From an American consumer point of view even I myself wish that it hadn't taken this long to provide consumers with a 3G Apple Phone. But after the keynote speech, if we step back and see that there are going to be around 70 countries operating on a 3G network.

So why should I give a crap about the geeks in Egypt and whether or not they get 3G while they climb around on their pyramids?

It's all about the future. Apple as a company saw the need to hold out on geeks here in the States in order that they could deliver a product literally to the world. Now there will be people around the world working on new applications. Adding to the troubleshooting process by having more users available to identify potential problems such as issues with updates or other software. Also it develops a user network. Now there will be a product that is going international(significantly more than previously). With more countries serviced means more income which means more advancements in products.

I will let my inner geek shine for one last minute. 3G is too slow. Let's keep the technology going. We've conquered 3G. What can we do next to make mobile connections faster, smaller and better. Whether it's the iPhone, Blackberry, Palm or other Smartphone(and I use that term loosely) I strongly believe consumers will see a lot of new improvements in mobile technology
within the next 4-5 months.

Peace,
Scott

In the next few weeks you will see the site dramatically change. I want to add more media to the site. I want this to be a place where people can come to learn about new technology as well as read reviews of new tech. My main focus is going to be mobile computing. I love having the ability to be connected everywhere. Keep checking back for new additions to the site in the coming months. You will also see new faces around here writing articles. I am in the process of adding more geeks to the blog so we can gain more content. Thanks for reading…


T.J.