Blogging India

Hello all,

A week ago, Wordpress released a patched version of version 2.3, which included a couple of security patches. Its highly recommended that you update to Wordpress 2.3.2 if you’re running on 2.3.1.

WordPress 2.3.2 is an urgent security release that fixes a bug that can be used to expose your draft posts. 2.3.2 also suppresses some error messages that can give away information about your database table structure and limits and stops some information leaks in the XML-RPC and APP implementations. Get 2.3.2 now to protect your blog from these disclosures.

Go to the Wordpress blog announcing the release for more information. To download, go to the Wordpress download page. Additionally, you can also view the list of fixed bugs, and changes introduced from 2.3.1 to 2.3.2.

Since this is a security release, its highly recommended that you update to the latest version. You might find the Wordpress Automatic Upgrade plugin useful

[tags]wordpress, wordpress upgrade, security release, wordpress automatic upgrade, wordpress 2.3[/tags]

Hello all,

I’ve often been asked which was my favourite AV player. Five years ago, I used to respond with "Winamp" or "Power DVD". But now, I should say, my opinions have changed. And thats why I laugh when people say that their favourite player is Real Player, or QuickTime. Right now, after having used most of the available audio/video playing software, I have formed a few of my favourites. And I thought that I would share them with you…

# 1 – Mplayer

Mplayer – an audio/video player for Linux, comes in as my all time favourite AV player. It can play as many video or audio clips as you want simultaneously. It has never crashed for me. It can play semi downloaded files, files with the wrong extension, and once, it has even played a zipped file! Any file with an audio or video track can be played with Mplayer. On Windows, you need to do a manual install, with a Send To shortcut to make it work. It does not have a GUI, but its amazingly powerful. Visit the Mplayer website for more information. Information on how to install and use Mplayer in your Windows system coming up in my next post.

# 2 – VLC Player

Almost as powerful as Mplayer, with a neat GUI, ladies and gentlemen, in second position comes VLC Player. Cross platform support and freeware – 2 words which make VLC magical! It can, like Mplayer, play isolated DVD files, all sorts of music and video files. But sometimes, especially in case of a defective DVD video file, your system hangs. If you like power, and no fancy stuff, but still a GUI, go in for VLC Player.

# 3 – Windows Media Player 11

Stylish and hot, WMP 11 creates a whole new AV experience for Windows users. Free to install for "genuine" Windows users, this awesome looking player is a complete package for any home user. Vista looks, audio/video tweaking, library feature, sync with music players, stable performance etc. are the main features of WMP 11. It comes in as # 3, even above iTunes, because of its fast and stable performance, cool looks, and easy to use sync feature. You can download WMP 11 from the Microsoft website.

Yes, thats my top 3. I hope that you’ve found this post useful. And no, Real Player, QuickTime etc. are not among my favourites. In fact they feature at the end of my favour list… Just below my top 3, comes DivX, iTunes, Powe DVD etc.

[tags]top 3, audio video players, audio players, video players, audio software, video software, av software, top 3 audio video players[/tags]

Hi all,

The Online Games blog has listed a very good list of the top 10 3D Linux based games in a blog post which came up today. Typically, like these Top Blah Blah stuff get top clicks in socially promoted content, like in Digg, reddit etc., this Top 10 also got featured on the Digg front page. Owing to the fact that he/she’s hosted on Blogger, ths site hasnt crashed yet. The images are on flickr, so we can expect the blog to withstand the Digg effect.

Anyway, the reason why I point to this post is that, unlike all other Top 10 stuff, this post seems to be written with more than one aim.

• One aim is definitely to get onto Digg and receive a lot of Digg Juice
• Another aim, which I feel is relevant, is that everyone was downtrodding Linux for the fact that Linux didn’t have many good games to play. This seems like a plea from the heart of a hardcore Linuxian that Linux isn’t all bad.

The post was an eye opener for me. I, like many others, had believed that Linux didn’t sport many good games. But after seeing games like America’s Army and Nexiuz on the list, I’m forced to change my opinion. I never knew that these were available for Linux!

Ok, so I’m not a certified Linux geekie. I love my Photoshop and Dreamweaver and Flash and so on and so forth. I can’t part with all these… And GIMP is a substitute for MS Paint, not Photoshop!

But I don’t have anything against Linux, and I have Ubuntu on dual boot back home. But still, I never knew that there were such good games available for Linux.

So by this post, this guy got on the Digg front page, and enlightened 20,000 Digg visitors about the best games available on Linux. Keep up the good work buddy!

[tags]linux games, 3d games, 3d linux games, games, linux[/tags]

Hi all,
    The PCWorld reports that a faster version of the Universal Serial Bus ports are on the cards… Intel, spearheading the movement, along with other companies, are working together to promote USB 3.0.

    USB 3.0 is said to deliver 10 times the speed of USB 2.0. The data transfer rates for USB 3.0 are charted at 4.8 Gigabits per second (Gbps) (the speed of USB 2.0 being 480 Mbps).

Intel stated that the USB 3.0 specification would be optimized for low
power and improved protocol efficiency. The USB 3.0 ports and cabling
will be designed with both copper and optical cable capabilities,
meaning even higher speeds will be possible in the future.

    Intel has already unveiled a Wireless USB transfer format, operating at 480 Mbps.

    These improvements, as usual, will mean a lot of implications…

• USB 2.0 obsolete
• USB 2.0 cheap as hell
• Increasing dependency on USB… Maybe even for local networking?!!
• Damn fast pen drives!!!

    Hopefully, we’ll see USB 3.0 by next year. Cheers

[tags]USB, USB 3.0, Universal Serial Bus, speed, fast pen drives[/tags]

Hello all,
    Associated Computers International Asia Ltd (ACi), which had earlier given a shock to the Indian tech community by introducing notebook PCs for Rs 20,000 ($500), is now all set to shock it yet again, by bringing out an ultra budget laptop for as low as Rs 15,000/- ($375 USD)! They are preparing to raise their current production to 1,00,000 pieces a year. They are also planning to start retail outlets all over India, and to tie up with major computer outlets to reach to the common man.

    They are planning to go into production early next year. The secret behind the low costs lie in the novel-aluminum body which ACi laptops sport, unlike fibre or plastic frames used by the other laptop manufacturers.

    Will we see yet another landslide of laptop prices? I don’t think so. The laptop prices right now, and here to stay, with maybe a decrease of another 5-10% in the next one year. And they’ll stay that way until they become obsolete. Laptops promoted by ACi, OLPC and Asus are low cost, low quality laptops, which will have a maximum life of around 2 years, with its best periods of life over in 1 year.

    Lets wait and see…
[tags]ACi, Associated Computers International, $375 laptops, notebooks, low cost notebooks[/tags]

Allright guys, this time, Greenpeace has really gone bonkers! Remember the last time Greenpeace went on about toxic substances on an iMac? Well, this time, they’ve hit the iPhone. Well, its pretty funny. Let me take out excerpts.

But before that, a general overview. Greenpeace is protesting about the use of a certain group of organic chemicals called phthalates, which are reportedly used in the vinyl plastic earphone wiring in the iPhone. According to Greenpeace, the levels of usage are more than at levels that are prohibited in young children’s toys in San Francisco and the European Union.

Ok, excerpt fun time!

"The phthalates found in the headphone cords are classified in Europe as ‘toxic to reproduction’ because of their long-recognized ability to interfere with sexual development. While they are not prohibited in mobile phones, these phthalates are banned from use in all toys or childcare articles sold in Europe. Apple should eliminate the use of these chemicals from its products range," said David Santillo, senior scientist at the Greenpeace Research Laboratories, who coordinated the project and deconstructed the iPhone for analysis.

Could someone please answer me : what are iPhones for? I could be wrong, but I thought iPhones were for humans above the "child" age group, for making phone calls, listening to music, and for all other uses a PDA might be put to use. Why would anyone buy a $500 USD item, so that its headphone cable might be utilized by their 2 year old child to jerk off???!!!

Ok, now wait for the fun fact. It seems that Greenpeace has got a missing link somewhere, since Wikipedia, the world’s largest online encyclopedia, claiming to be marginally more accurate than Britannica Encyclopaedia, says -

Phthalates are also frequently used in nail polish, fishing lures, adhesives, caulk, paint pigments, and sex toys made of so-called "jelly rubber."

Uh, sex toys made out of sexual development inhibitory chemicals? Are the people manufacturing sex toys sadists or something? But wait, the article went on to say -

The Dutch office of Greenpeace UK sought to encourage the European Union to ban sex toys that contained phthalates.

Wait a second! Can we look at the first Greenpeace announcement excerpt again?

Chemicals in the Cupertino-based company’s (NASDAQ:AAPL) device include "phthalates" in the vinyl plastic earphone wiring at levels that are prohibited in young children’s toys in San Francisco and the European Union, Greenpeace said.

Taking the basic arithmetic principle a=b, b=c, thus c=a; is Greenpeace suggesting that sex toys are young children’s toys????????!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Has somebody seriously messed up at Greenpeace? Or is it a lack of coordination between the PR wing and the Action wing? Or is it just a journalistic error?

So let me sum up the implications of the Greenpeace announcement -

1. Sex toys are young children’s toys.
2. The iPhone’s headphone wire contains toxic substances which hamper a child’s sexual development. They should be replaced.
3. iPhone’s headphone wire is primarily used for jerking off by kids. This could hamper their sexual growth.

Greenpeace really needs to review their press releases! Oh, by the way, here are my sources -

News report in San Jose Business Journal (Oct 15, 2007) containing the Greenpeace announcement – http://sanjose.bizjournals.com/sanjose/stories/2007/10/15/daily9.html

Wikipedia entry of Phthalates – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phthalates

Cheers

[tags]greenpeace, phthalates, iphone, toxic, bonkers, jerk off, kids[/tags]

Hi all,

In a phenomenal technological breakthrough today, Hitachi announced that they created the technology to fit in more than 1 Terabyte of space (1 TB = 1024 GB) in a square inch of disk. They promised 4 TB drives by 2011.

Just imagine what sort of content these future drives could hold! An average song is 4-5 MB. Thus, 1TB will hold about 2,33,000 songs! WOAH!

Read more on the topic at Ars Technica.

[tags]hitachi, breakthrough, drives, terabyte[/tags]

Ladies and gentlemen,
    I came across a new phenomenon, kindly put to my attention by Avinash. I found myself face to face with a plugin for blogs which displayed the IP addresses of the last 10 people to visit the site.

    IP addresses (Internet Protocol Addresses), as you might know, is the network address of a particular user, on the internet. The address will point to the continent, country, region, city, ISP and port you use. In other words, a person can track you down with your IP address.

    Because of this, many people use proxies to hide their own IP addresses. These people hunt for IP addresses they can use, as a cover for their malicious activities. So you can guess the dangers of having your IP address revealed, and being used by such a person. Any online crime committed by the person will point not to him, but to you.

    Thus, displaying IP addresses is considered a big breach of privacy.

    Now, a certain number of bloggers and webmasters are proudly displaying a list of the IPAs of the last 10 visitors to their sites. It seems to be a plugin. They are displaying this information, thinking that the visitors will be happy to see their own IPAs, but in fact, it is a big breach of privacy. Just think, a IPA stealer will get 9 IPAs for his use by this ‘harmless’ plugin, from a single website.

    Now isnt that a breach of privacy? Just because you visited a site, is it fair that your IP address can be displayed in public for anyone to see and use? Is it fair for a webmaster to care so less for his/her visitor’s privacies?
    I don’t think its very fair.

    A web surfer has his or her right to protection of his or her privacy. Though the mass displaying of IPAs is not illegal, it is certainly unethical. So like Avinash, I would like to humbly request you to stop using such plugins, if you do use them. Also advise others to stop using such plugins. Instead, why not go in for something like mybloglog? Or display the countries from which the last 10 visitors were from (Geotrack plugin).

    Cheers, and lets join hands. Thank you Avinash for starting this movement.

[tags]ip, ip address, display, wordpress, ip address display plugin, ip display plugin, show your visitor ip address, visitor privacy, privacy[/tags]

Hi guys,
    As you all know, Ubuntu Linux offers free shipping of its Linux versions. The latest Ubuntu version (7.10 – Gusty Gibbon beta) is now available with free shipping at the Ubuntu shipping website. So if you have a slow internet connection, and would like to get a copy of Ubuntu 7.10, hop over to https://shipit.ubuntu.com/ .

    You will need to create an account to request CDs. Oh, and it might take around 2-3 weeks for the package to arrive.

    Cheerios…
[tags]ubuntu, 7.10,  ubuntu 7.10, gusty gibbon, free shipping[/tags]

Hi all,
The w32.USBworm, or commonly known as the Orkut Mozilla Hater Virus, has been spreading its malicious fingers all over India. The worm, quite a tricky one, is most commonly seen when it displays messages like, “I DNT HATE MOZILLA BUT USE IE OR ELSE…”, “ORKUT IS BANNED, Orkut is banned you fool“, “The administrators didn’t write this program guess who did??“, “youtube IS BANNED,youtube is banned you fool” and “The administrators didn’t write this program guess who did??`r`r MUHAHAHA!!,30“.

This worm has been around for around 4 months now, with scattered responses, and many bloggers posting different methods of removing it. Here, I’ve compiled the instructions from a few of those blogs, and added my own few failsafes into them.

What it does

• Runs in the background, invisible to antiviruses
• When Mozilla Firefox is opened, it displays a message (I DNT HATE MOZILLA BUT USE IE OR ELSE…) and shuts down Firefox
• When the site Orkut is accessed, via any browser, it shows yet another message out of a few listed above, and shuts down the browser.
• Same when YouTube is accessed.
• Copies itself automatically onto USBs, iPods (yes!), Digicams etc. when connected to the PC
• Copies a copy of the virus from the USBs, iPods etc. to any other PC its inserted in.
• Disables the “Show Hidden Folders” option

How it functions

• It runs an executable file named svchost.exe in the background
• All virus files located in a folder in the C:\ drive
• The folder is hidden, and disables the option to view hidden folders
• Comfortably carries out its malicious activities and also makes the computer dead slow

Why its dangerous

• It makes the computer slow.
• No antivirus to date has been able to remove or detect this virus. A few antiviruses, like AVG, NOD32 and Avast, were able to prevent its entry.

Removal

The removal of this virus requires a manual procedure. It may take anywhere around 5-10 minutes. It has 4 main steps -
1) Removing the virus from the task manager
2) Deleting the virus files
3) Deleting registry entries
4) Editing the registry to restore the “View Hidden Files” option

I – Removing the virus from the task manager

1. Hit Alt+Ctrl+Del to bring up the Task Manager
2. Click on the Processes tab
3. Click on Image Name to arrange the processes according to their names
4. Scroll down a bit until you reach a number of SVCHOST.exe processes listed
5. All, but one, of these SVCHOST.exe processes will be listed under the usernames of SYSTEM or NETWORK SERVICE
6. Find the SVCHOST.exe which is listed under YOUR username. i.e. If your username is anoop, find the SVCHOST.exe listed under with username anoop. Select that process and click End Process.
7. Click Yes to successfully end the process.

(Picture credit : Sujith)

II – Deleting the virus files

1. Browse to your C:\ drive, or whichever drive you’ve installed Windows.
2. In the address bar, type in heap41a after the C:\ and press Enter. i.e. In the address bar, type C:\heap41a  and press Enter.
3. Mercilessly delete every file in that folder. Muhahahahhahahahaha! You’ve now deleted the virus!

III – Deleting the registry entries

1. Go to Start>Run (or Windows key + R)
   
2. Type in regedit and hit Enter
3. Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE,SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\
   CurrentVersion\policies\Explorer\Run and delete the winlogon key. This will prevent any remnants of the worm from starting at booting.

IV Editing the registry to restore the “View Hidden Files” option

1. In Regedit, navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\
   Explorer\Advanced\Folder\Hidden
   
2. There, navigate to NOHIDDEN
3. In NOHIDDEN, change the CheckedValue to “0″ and DefaultValue to “1″.
4. Go one step back, and navigate to SHOWALL
5. In SHOWALL, change the CheckedValue to “1″.

Thats it

Prevention

1. Be careful when you insert any pen drive/iPod. Delete any file named autorun.inf and any .exe file inside a folder, carrying the same name as the folder name.
2. Update your antivirus. Switch to Avast!, NOD32, AVG or Norton.
3. TechSupport Forum has uploaded a disinfectant, which you can download and use.

Thats it ladies and gentlemen. Beware of the w32.USBWorm. If you find any computer displaying messages like “orkut is banned!” or “I DNT HATE MOZILLA”, remember these steps and blast that worm to where it came from!

I’ve compiled my instructions from Harish, Sujith and Mahesh. Thanks guys!

Cheers, and enjoy

[tags]orkut, mozilla, youtube, hater, virus, w32.USBworm, removal, cannot view hidden files, unhide option not working, fix[/tags]