Year: 2008

When wireless networking (Wi-Fi) was introduced to consumers in the late 90s, it included a security feature called Wired Equivalent Privacy, or WEP. There was, however, a fundamental flaw in WEP that allowed hackers to easily hack wireless networks. So if you secure your wireless router with the WEP protocol (even today, several years later), a hacker can break into your wireless network in less than 2 minutes using only a modern laptop and some freely available software… and start downloading illegal music, warez or kiddie porn.

WEP was so bad, in fact, that a new protocol, Wi-Fi Protected Access (WPA) was quickly rolled out. WPA is much more secure than WEP. In fact, many thought that WPA would last as long as current 802.11b and 802.11g hardware. Sadly, this didn’t happen. A couple of researchers have found a hack that renders WPA almost as pointless as WEP.

Sort of. The hack actually affects the Temporary Key Integrity Protocol (TKIP) that’s used with WPA. And here’s the good news: most routers will let you switch between WAP-TKIP and WAP-AES encryption. So to make your home network secure again, just log in to your router and change the encryption settings from TKIP to AES and you should be aces. Even better: this hack was only just announced this week, so if you can’t get around to changing your settings for a few days… you should be OK.

Read more about the “AES workaround” here.

I bet you didn’t know that Microsoft still sold Windows 3.11. Or at least they did, up until November 1, 2008.

Although almost no one uses it as a desktop operating system these days, Windows 3.11 was a popular choice for “embedded computers” – that is, computers dedicated to single tasks like cash registers and information kiosks. Because it was so easy to program for, and so reliable when configured as an embedded OS, there are still millions of computers out there still running Windows 3.11. Computers that control alarm systems. Computers that control sprinkler systems. Computers that control heating and air conditioning systems. Computers that control industrial machines (I know of at least one company in Charlotte that uses a Windows 3.11 computer to control a machine that cuts sheet metal). And until very recently, Windows 3.11 powered the in-flight entertainment systems of Virgin and Qantas airlines.

Released in May 1990, Windows 3.11 required a minimum of a 10MHz processor, 640KB RAM, seven megabytes of hard drive space, and a graphics card that supported CCA, EGA or VGA graphics. Contrast this with Windows Vista, which requires a 1GHz processor, 512MB of RAM, 20GB of hard drive space, and a graphics card with at least 32MB of memory and you can see why a company making thousands of cash registers might go with 3.11 over Vista or even XP Embedded.

So long, sweet prince! We’ll miss you and your Hot Dog Stand theme!

If you’re like me, your friends and family use different Instant messaging (IM) networks. Most of my Atlanta friends, for example, use MSN Messenger, while most of my Charlotte friends use AIM. My best friend from high school uses Yahoo! Messenger, and I have a business need to use a Jabber client.

For years, “all-in-one” chat programs like Trillian and Pidgin have allowed you to use multiple IM networks at once. I have been (and still am) a huge fan of Pidgin, a lightweight app that lets me keep in touch with everyone and not have have to run six different chat programs simultaneously. But that loyalty is wavering in the face of a new client: Digsby.

Digsby allows you to connect to the AIM, ICQ, MSN Messenger, Yahoo! Messenger and Jabber Networks. Nothing new there, really. But Digsby also allows you to receive notifications from social networking sites like Facebook, MySpace and Twitter. So when someone posts something on your Facebook wall or MySpace profile, a small pop-up will appear, telling you who did what. You can even hover your mouse over the social networking icon and get a summary of what’s going on, so there’s no need for you to launch a web browser just to see what’s going on with Facebook or MySpace. Digsby also supports email notifications from Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo! Mail and AOL mail, as well as any POP or IMAP account, so it’s got you covered there, too.

Digsby has been around for almost a year now, so it’s not really “new”. What is new is that newer versions of the app are much better behaved than earlier ones, which tended to be resource hogs. After being scared off of it by reports that it used up to 200MB of RAM, I’ve finally given it a shot… and I like it! One thing I especially like about it over Pidgin: it keeps like log files in the “My Documents” folder instead of hidden away like Pidgin does; this makes for easy backups with Mozy.