Category Archives: Computing

SSH Tunnels

Posted by Alex on

I wish somebody told me 5 years ago that I could make an Microsoft Remote Desktop connection from a MacBook at home to the Windows Server at the office without the VPN client software and all the limitations of the implementation used. See, I’m a network geek, I need to get data from point A to point B, I need to do it quickly and reliably. And of course without spending any money.

BEHOLD! OpenSSH!

I use this command:

[1334][alex@Virus-Container:~]
$ ssh -C -R 2210:localhost:22 -p 222 -i .ssh/id_rsa.pub alex@haxcess.com

Who do I boycott now? Piracy wins again.

Posted by Alex on

I am pretty pissed about this. I thought “surely there must be a reason to spend my hard earned money on a legit legal copy of a game.”

I bought Fallout 3 for my Playstation3. And it was FUCKING AWESOME!!!!!1 So I blew some more money purchasing a couple addons and they were approximately if not equally as awesome as the vanilla game. So I figured I would buy the other expansions, one of them being Point Lookout. Now I immagine other PS3ers with F3 know where this is going…

I can’t play Point Lookout. It doesn’t work. I spent the money, it installed and now I can’t play the game at all. It crashes, freezes, hangs, locks up, fails. I figured surely if it’s been published and available for a few months it has to at least work, right? FUCK NO! What a ridiculous assumption! Clearly I’ve done something horribly wrong, something so clearly amateur. The disk must be fatally scratched (nope), maybe I accidentally peed all over the PS3 (nope) or dropped it out of a moving vehicle during installation (nope again).

So I deleted everything; DLC data, Vanilla data, saves, porn, EVERYTHING. Start from scratch – This is what years of using Microsoft products have taught me. AND re-install in published order. Surely, somebody play-tested this product before releasing it into the paying customer base. Well apparently not; I’m only the latest customer to be fooled by Sony and/or Bethesda Softworks.

It still crashes. After spending the maximal amount of money on this product it will not work. Like getting that final light-bulb in your house and now the electricity just won’t turn on. Like getting that final touch of salt and pepper on a fine filet mignon and the entire meal turns to stone. Like winning a backstage pass to your favorite band and being kicked out of the stadium.

Except in those cases I could probably get my money back, or in the case of the restaurant just refuse to pay for stone when I ordered Mignon.

In this society, we exchange credits or money for goods and services. I gave Sony money, and not only have they failed to deliver the promised entertainment, but taken it away. And I’m not the only one! The forums are rife with complaints! And not a word from Sony or Bethesda.

All I want is to play some Fallout3, shoot some swamplurks and make some moonshine. What do I have to do, who do I have to give money to? You know what – I don’t have to part with money. I’ve already downloaded a cracked Game of the Year edition and installed it on my trusty Mac.

That’s right, piracy just works. If the product offered by pirates is a BETTER and more complete product than the one I can pay for, then the pirates win. The only way to fight piracy is to offer a better product.

Hacking Securom with UNIX

Posted by Alex on

I found myself in a situation: Securom error 1000. Or, “we don’t like you because you don’t fit our corporate model of the ideal consumer.”

Disclaimer: This is a lesson in overcoming corrupt read-only media.

I wanted to install a piece of software that didn’t like my particular set of software installed. More specifically, I was having trouble installing Oblivion GOTY because the Securom protection doesn’t like that I run Windows virtually within OSX with Parallels. Or maybe it’s the disc emulator software installation. However the case, this post is how I circumvented that difficulty using UNIX WIZARDRY and a patched setup file. Users win every time.

Continue reading →

MacBook! Again!

Posted by Alex on

Well it arrived, and I didn’t have to pay any duty! So I looked into how Apple did this… Turns out they ship to their warehouse in Ontario, repackage and ship again to the consumer. Clever…

Anyways, really, I am never using a Windows machine again if I have the choice. For work, we have no choice. But I can’t see any reason anybody would actually use Windows machines in their spare time. They are great for learning all the shitty things about personal computing, which is good if you’re in the business of fixing peoples shitty Windows computers. Microsoft really has created a million jobs in that respect. They even enabled countless other businesses, like antivirus and malware protection.

To those that say Macs can’t game, well I’ve been playing Call of Duty 2 and 4, Battlefield 2142, The Sims 2 and some others on my Mac, in OSX. I also installed Vista on my Mac. Vista runs awesome on a Mac. Why can’t Dell or HP make a machine that can run Vista?

Even the graphics are amazing. The screen is sweet, the colors rock. Looking at my Dells is embarrassing now.

MS Office 2008 is available for Mac if you’re too stoned to use Pages – which is by the way, fucking fabulous. I’ve never seen a more professional or easy to use word processing program.

Price. People say Macs are expensive. I went to Dell and priced out a system with the same numbers. Also, since it’s Windows you need all the Antivirus and security software you can find. Don’t forget a disaster recovery program. And what do you find? A Dell is more expensive than a MacBook pro.  And it includes Windows. The only way I use Windows is if I’m getting paid to do it.

I’ll post pictures soon.

DRM Sucks

Posted by Alex on

Okay, as a nerd I read countless articles on just about any topic, including DRM.
I don’t understand DRM. Who does it benefit? What is the return on investment? As a business leader, you’d think the corporate big-wig types would think about this little detail when spending billions trying to implement it. Continue reading →

Cisco Password Recovery

Posted by Alex on

So you have a cisco device that is password protected, perhaps it is a mission critical core device and you lost the password. It doesn’t matter why, but maybe when you recover it, take note of it this time.

So what I present here is a method for actually recovering the MD5 hashed “Enable” password through a dictionary attack (and physical access). Continue reading →

Social Messaging

Posted by Alex on

Let’s pretend you’re not like me and actually want to talk to somebody. How then do you go about doing this? Do you put an ad on Television saying so? How about the radio, or Time Magazine?

That’s a rhetorical question. Of course you don’t use such public mediums for a private conversation. You call them on your cell phone while riding the bus of course! Or better yet, write on their FaceBook Wall. Because somehow that’s different. Continue reading →

Microwave Timer

Posted by Alex on

The timer on my microwave is cofused. When I enter 33, it runs for 33 seconds. 67, it runs for 67 seconds. 94, it runs for 94 seconds. 99, 99 seconds. Notice a pattern? I think that it would be great if the device kept this neato pattern, because I like seconds. They’re pretty long anyways. So what comes after 99? 99+1 = 60. 100 means 60 seconds. If I wanted 60 seconds, I would enter 60, not 100.

Stupid microwave.