Puzzle globe

After more than 10 h of work (distributed in about 2 weeks) I managed to finish the puzzle globe from Ravensburger.

Here is the entire set of pictures:

puzzle globe

And here is just one (because I might delete the set sometime):

They have arrived …

No, not the aliens…
The tickets for the Magic Circle Festival.

Here the tickets and the flyer look like :

And a ticket:

Looking forward to attend even if we have to drive for four hours to Loreley.

Potential Threat through Opera Unite, Part II

Together with Dirk Knopp I published an update to the Opera Unite – Everybody is becoming a Web server which is called : Potential Threat through Opera Unite, Part II.

I have written some details about the P2P networks and about how Opera is using the concept.
I am thinking now to build a honeypot running Windows and Opera Unite without any passwords.

Opera Unite and Security

Have a look at the article that Dirk Knopp wrote in the Avira Techblog.

This article was referenced here : http://www.h-online.com/security/Opera-says-Opera-Unite-web-server-is-not-a-security-problem–/news/113719

His concern is that a lot of malware can be now served directly from user’s computer. And he is right.
Even more, if there is a flaw in the Opera and somebody can alter the mini HTTP-Server (why mini, it is a full blown server) then, theoretically, it can access the user’s private files. That’s not good !!!

Here is what the CEO of Opera says:
“Today, we are opening the full potential of the Web for everyone. Technology moves in distinct cycles. PCs decentralized computing away from large mainframes. Opera Unite now decentralizes and democratizes the cloud. With server capability in the browser, Web developers can create Web applications with profound ease. Consumers have the flexibility to choose private and efficient ways of sharing information. We believe Opera Unite is one of our most significant innovations yet, because it changes forever the fundamental fabric of the Web.”

And as reply to our concern in the Blog, he says :
“When you’re hacking a single system, if you have everything that belongs to everyone in one location, you only need to break in once,” he said. “If you have it in different computers it’s a little more complicated. If you get into one Web server and everyone’s data is in there, that’s easier than getting into a million computers.”

Gee…. Mr. Tetzchner , have you ever heard of P2P networks ? What about Botnets ?
Any parallel between the two ?

That’s the whole idea … you have just created probably the biggest botnet that ever existed.
And this with user’s agreement. You have my respect… but I still don’t think that this is a good idea.

Manowar in Romania and singing in Romanian !

Yes, they were in Bucharest !!!

Here is the call !
Yes, they had some technical problems

YES, THEY SANG IN ROMANIAN !!!!

MANOWAR are the greatest !!!

This is the song in Romanian, called Tata (Father):

Just installed Firefox 3.5

Yes, I got it

PRO: it is better in rendering, it is faster. Zooming a page works perfectly this time.
CONS: I think it eats more RAM than its predecessors.
One single TAB requires 100 MB RAM and 78 MB VM. Firefox 3.0.11 needed about 80MB RAM with the same plugins and theme.

New post in Avira blog: Spam Through Sourceforge.net

http://techblog.avira.com/2009/06/29/spam-through-sourceforgenet/en/

New post in the Avira Techblog: A Japanese scam with some twists

A Japanese scam with some twists

When marketing doesn’t read what they send via email

I am subscribed to the TAROM (Romanian Airlines) Newsletter which is sent approximately once a month.
Each month I receive the same corrupted email which looks like the one in the picture:

tarom's newsletter

Why is this happening ?

Simply because they add some newlines in the wrong places. Actually, it is enough only the first one to ruin everything.
See the red arrows ? Those newlines shouldn’t be there.

Badly formatted newsletter

I wrote to Tarom (newsletter@tarom.ro) and they didn’t reply back. And they also didn’t fix the problem.
This could’ve been avoided very easily if they just preview the newsletter before they mass mail it.

wifi everywhere in the Politehnica University Bucharest

While waiting for my Phd.
professor in the P.U.B. ,
i started the PDA and enabled the wireless connection.
surprisingly, three wifi nets
were available. two were secured,
one not. i connected to it and …
surprise… i am online

and i am writing this message from the pda, sitting on the stairs …

i feel like a student…
in a way it is cool …