Trivia Question

Known for his current role as Spencer Reid on TV's Criminal Minds, Matthew Gray Gubler is also known as the voice of this animated creature (put your answer in the comments).

After your guess click HERE

Cold War Story

So here is a little story for you. No, it is not as dramatic as some of those you will see this weekend on AME or The History Channel, but it does have to do with a menace the US had to deal with in the 1980's called The Red Army Faction.

It's 1987... the Red Army Faction had promised additional attacks against US concerns in Germany; threats you had to take as serious after they set bombs at PX and Commissary facilities.

So it is the holidays.... of course all the married sergeants and officers got to go be with their families. Those of us who were not married or had children got to set-up a defensive perimeter around Coleman Barracks Mannheim, Germany.

We didn't take it too serious; after all - our location didn't have women and children. I was the Non Commissioned Officer in charge. Which means I have to be the one to keep everyone on their toes. Count the three-rounds everyone was issued while on patrol at the end of their shift and make sure they didn't fall asleep. (The three-rounds thing is another story).

I'm out checking everyone and making sure they are in their correct locations and being vigilant. I find one soldier sleeping. I'm reading him the riot-act... standing above his fighting position with one hand on the chain-length fence when a shot rang out.

It nicked the the fence and went through my hand.

Another half-inch to the right... into the side of my head.

Half-inch to the left ... into my sholder.

As it was it went into my hand... right through it. The scar isn't so much today but that night it was a big deal.

It went right through an artery and "squirted" in rhythm with my heart.

By the time I got through the aid station and into an ambulance on my way to a hospital did I loose consensus, but luckily I'm here today to relay the story.

Don't dismiss any of the "cold war" soldiers who gave their all during this Memorial Day weekend. The demise of the USSR and fall of the Berlin Wall are just some of the examples of what we accomplished.

If you know someone who served during 'peace time' thank them too. It wasn't a walk-in-the-park.

Sony hasn't identified its hackers - NYPOST.com

Sorry folks…. their focus should not be “who” but “how”.

Who cares who hacked their systems, but what actions have they taken not to let it happen again.

Sony hasn't identified its hackers - NYPOST.com

Computer security breach sends Honda scrambling | CanadianBusiness.com

Will the day come that some hacker is so smart that they can bring the entire US to a halt because we networked our automobiles?

Computer security breach sends Honda scrambling | CanadianBusiness.com

Report: Major weapons makers see networks breached by hackers | Security - CNET News

Your kidding me.

As a stupid retired knucklehead from the US Army Signal Corps this is totally unacceptable.

Report: Major weapons makers see networks breached by hackers | Security - CNET News

It The I.T. World - Timing Is Everything

In 2006 Microsoft introduced the Ultra PC to the world.

The hand held device had a touch screen, ran Windows XP, was under two pounds and would accommodate a 60 GB hard drive.

It had a ton of other features.

The downside was the battery life and the price.

Cybersecurity and the Federal Government

According to article on The Hill our House of Representatives will begin debating the pros and cons of a Cybersecurity law.

It will be aninterestingg debate. Just how much power (or responsibility) does the federal government want to give the Department of Homeland Security?

There is a wide variety of considerations:

• Intellectual Property inside private-sector networks
• Considerations for online poker players
• Home Networks
• Enforcementt

Having been in the business of programming Internett applications for over twenty years now I have witnessed a number of attacks. I can tell you from this experience that the attacks come from places where our federal government has no jurisdiction.

I personally believe that although their hearts are in the right place, there is really little if anything the federal government can to to protect our technical infrastructure by just passing a law.

It is up to network engineers to secure their networks and programmers to write code to ward-off attacks.

Add A Caption

Use the comments area to share what you would put as a caption for the picture.

Creating a WSDL Service

I’ve done my best to put a step-by-step method for building a Web Service using ColdFusion.

This will allow other websites to make queries against the data you have and display it on their website as their own.

This is the technology web based companies like eBay can display items for sale on their website and have it appear on your web page.

If your web application manages data that can be used by others take a look at the guidelines  I’ve written.

Creating a WSDL Service

IBM Worth More Than Microsoft

According to the Business Insider website IBM has surpassed Microsoft as far as their market cap is concerned.

Those in the know say that the reason is directly reflected in the move of bringing in Lou Gerstner as their CEO and are wondering if Microsoft should consider changing Steve Ballmer.

Personally, I think a lot of it had to do with a game show called Jeopardy and the inclusion of the Watson computer. I think that one week of television coupled with the fact that IBM did a wonderful job of making sure everyone knew about it that it returned to the thoughts of decision makers.

BOOM: IBM Is Now Worth More Than Microsoft

New Malware Simulates Hard Drive Failure

This is not new, regardless of what the article says.

Please folks, any time you open a webpage and it starts acting like it is checking your ‘system’ stop… believe me it can’t be reading your hard drive – it’s a trick to get you to give them permission to install something (like an ActiveX control) onto your computer so they can look at your system.

If ever you click on a web link and the next web page that opens says something like….

Windows Security Center Alert!

Stop… don’t fall for it …. close your  browser.

It isn’t really running a security scan… it is just some images that make you think they are  reading your computer’s hard drives and such.

Any company that needs to resort to something like tricking you so you’ll buy something from them does not deserve your money.

People fall for this all the time.

Ask anyone who repairs buggy systems – if you computer is running slow and not responding don’t install multiple virus protection programs, that is just going to make it run even buggier and slower (but that is a subject for another day).

New Malware Simulates Hard Drive Failure

How I Got Into Cold Fusion

I’ve been programming applications for the Internet for over 25 years now. I know that seems like an exaggeration to some but it’s true.

I put together a ‘how I got into ColdFusion’ story on my “I love me” site: www.cf-toolbox.com  .

Oh the picture? It’s from the page, thought I’d use it here too.

I was so “cute” then… wonder what happened.

How I Got Into Cold Fusion

The Best Web Color Pallet

This is perhaps the most comprehensive web color pallet you’ll see. I put it together not as a simple list or graphic showing all the colors and their codes, but I wanted to also show how the progression of the alpha-numeric values could be used by those who are programming web sites to ‘tweak’ the look of their designs.

Click the link below and bookmark the page.

Web Color Pallet

The End Of The World... Am I The Last To Know?

OK... so I'm watching the news and apparently tomorrow the world will end.

So I'm going to watch the Mets v. Yankees, have an adult beverage and relax.

What is Your Personal Password Policy?

With all the information about password managers being hacked over the past few weeks I thought I would take a moment and and ask my friends and neighbors if they have a personal password policy.

A personal policy you ask?

Of course....

Think about all the things you have passwords for - email, your company intranet, your computer sign-in, and many, many more.

• Last Pass Possible Hack
• Corporate Passwords Exposed

So what are your password policies? Here are a few thoughts:

1. Don't use the same password on everything. If a person cracks just the one then they will have everything.
   
2. Figure out a way to make thefamiliarar to you. For example all your gmail email account could be something like "PostalG123" and your Yahoemailal "PostalY456".



3. Think of a sentence like My Cat's Name IWhiskersrs and turn it into a password: "CatIsCalledWiskers". This way you aren't using justWhiskersrs" which someone may guess.

I realize that some of these are simple, but the purpose of this post is not to suggest how you make-up your passwords, but to encourage you to create your own system, one that is yours. Decide what parts should capitalizedzed and where you are going to put a number or two (beginning, middle or end).

So if you have an idea for others take a moment and comment on this blog entry. Maybe your idea will help others.

Symantec spends $390M for Clearwell, discovery - Storage Soup

I realize that not a lot of people who read this blog know what eDiscovery is, but I thought some of you might find it interesting why all the big data companies are buying software that does something called “eDiscovery”.

Those of you who work in large corporations will hear this term more and more.

“eDiscovery” uses technologies that are constantly crawling all the computers on your company network and indexing all the documents, emails, databases, everything.

Think of it as Google for your company.

This gives those who manage your company the ability to search for anything.

• Who worked on that project three years ago?
• Did that person work for a particular supervisor during a certain time frame?
• What were the details of the contract negotiations and final agreement?

The ability to index all this stuff is a result of lawsuits (believe it or not). During these court procedures the person or persons suing your company has the ability to do what is called “discovery”.

So let’s say it is a '”wrongful termination” suite.

The lawyers representing the person suing has the right to ask for their employment agreement, all the employee reviews, emails between the person, their supervisor(s) and co-workers.

The ability to use the technologies used to pull all that information together quickly is called “eDiscovery”.

So all these large data companies are buying the technologies so they can sell the services of not only the software to do the searching, but the data storage stuff to. Or to reverse that, companies who use their data storage services will want to buy the eDiscovery software as an add-on product.

I’ve seen this consolidation first had.

Two years ago the number of eDiscovery vendors at the New York LegalTech were too numerous to count. Last year the consolidation of this space alone was a part of the reason the amount of space for all the vendor booths went from three floors to two.

Anyway, a link about one of the big software companies buying an eDiscovery company is below.

Symantec spends $390M for Clearwell, discovery - Storage Soup

Legal Directions

Just an introduction to a bit of programming some might find interesting, at least those of you in the legal industry.

A while back the owners of my company were approached and were offered a ‘service’ to have live news headlines appear on the LAWTRAC.com website and inside the LAWTRAC application.

I thought the cost was something that was really out of this world, so I threw this together over a weekend to show them that the technologies that were being offered for something that was over $200 a month could be done for free.

This site brings in news targeting the legal industry from many sources around the internet and taps into government news and regulations information releases.

Check it out… perhaps you can suggest an improvement or two.

Legal Directions

Progress

Easy Contract Management. It has the power of the contract management module in the LAWTRAC application used by major corporations to record their contracts and send out reminders to key individuals when the contract needs attention.

If you have any ideas on what features you think should be included please feel free to drop me a note.

Easy Contract Management

I'm putting the final touches on a new web application - EasyContractManagement.com.

The URL isn't active yet, but when it is your small company will be able to leverage the same tools that the large corporations use to manage their contracts.

Companys like FedEx, United Technologies, major defense manufacturers, even Oprah.

What does your small company look for in contract management? Web access for everyone to remind themselves of the contract details? Email notifications when the contract needs to be reviewed or is about to expire?

Do you need to retain licensing agreements or non disclosure contracts?

Let me know what tools you need and I'll do my best to incorporate them intapplicationpplicaiton.

Is this really a problem?

Yes, I'm confused.

Why the New Guy Can't Code

Jon Evans wrote on May 7th an interesting piece for TechCrunch essentially talking about hireing practices by large companies.

I must say that I appreciate his observations and his advise to only hire coders who can point to their past accomplishments as proof that they can in-fact write code.

Give his article a read.

I also like his observation about women who write code... I too have never meet a female programmer who wasn't a very productive employee.

Game Time

For those of you who watch the Yankees game tonight, keep your eyes open for the good-looking one catching all the home-run balls.

LT Online (a.k.a. LAWTRAC) Corporate Locations

Corporate Locations Map

Anyone Else Wonder This?

I'm curious if anyone else has considered this.

Why was Hilary Clinton in the situation room during an active operation?

Is she not the Secretary of State? Our number one person in charge of diplomacy? Should she have been in the room?

My Mother

A picture of my mother. I didn't have a picture until last year. The last time I laid eyes on her was the summer between kindergarten and first grade. She passed in 2010.

I encourage any and all to take advantage of knowing your mother, father, siblings, anyone; not just on a special day, but everyday.

It was just a matter of time: Now CA Offers New Law

Now California is getting into the act.

 

Proposed new laws that feed off the fears of the population and not the actual problem.

 

This article appeard on The Mac Observer via my Google News Feed (read here).

 

The tools to safeguard what sites you visit are already in your browsers, regardless of which type you are running.

 

I find it fascinating that the federal and state governments think that by passing a law problems individuals are experencing will magically go away.

 

First, consider a conversation you might have with a co-worker or even a stranger at the local pub during happy hour. What can that person lean about you?

• Your name?
• If you are married?
• What you do for a living?

If individuals were to apply the same concept when they are online our lawmakers could focus on more important things.

Some tracking of what you do online is good. For example if you are into doing geneology work the fact that the websites you use can work with you to provide better information is a good thing. If your intrest is collecting coins or stamps or salt-n-pepper shakers and the 'internet' knows this as you  poke around you will actually get more out of your daily surfing.

It is the malware that traps your passwords and other key strokes you might be making (like your checking account or credit card number) that we need to be vigilant about.

The law that my native state of California and the proposed federal law I wrote about yesterday do nothing to address the real problem.

My advise to you is NEVER give out information that you would not in a normal conversation with a person at church, the pub or in the bleachers at a ball game.

Keep your anti-virus software up-to-date to protect against those little snippets of programming people try to put onto your computer (malware).

Don't be afraid to tell the internet you are looking for that 1963 Franklin Half Dollar in Proof condition to complete your 20th centry type set (for you coin collectors out there).

And remember - if I'm in New York (which I am) and California passes a law that says I can't put a cookie on your computer from a site hosted in (for example) Texas... what is the California Attorney General going to do? Ask me to please check into Folsom Prison?

Don't waste taxpayer's dollars creating new laws and then additional monies trying to enforce them. Focus on the real problems like benefits for vetrans and incentives that create jobs.

 

Shortcut - Lock your computer

Lock Your Computer

Passwords... Good Advice and Bad

CNN... a recognized authority because of the name, interviewed a guy named Graham Cluely, Senior Technology Consultant at the software security company, Sophos. (article here)

This is the first time I've been exposed to the company "Sophos". That really isn't the point herearticleartical had a good piece of advise - how to create passwords. Take a phrase like "I Like Coffee On Sunday Mornings" and make that into a password like ILcoffeeOnSunday. Easy to remember and long enough to satisfy most password rules.

The point I take exception to was the portion that advised everyone to use a "Sophos" service that retains and maintains your passwords.

Don't do that....

Just this week we have yet another Sony hack... but two of those kinds of services were hacked and everyone who used them now has to change all their passwords.... banking, facebook, email... OMG.

DON'T use these services.

Love that the articel had good password creation advice, kind of upset that the just of it was a push to use a service to record your passwords. It's better to put them on a post-it-note on your monitor rather than put it in a place hackers are trying to get it on a daily basis.

Your Security While Online - Think About It

Computer World reported yesterday (May 6, 2011) that Senator John Rockefeller (D-WV) is going to introduce an online do-not-track bill.

The Senator was quoted in the article, "Consumers have the right to know when and how their personal and sensitive information is being used online..."

I take exception to that statement by the Senator, especially when it comes to 'personal and sensitive'.

First, the obvious. Personal information is Sensitive information. Putting those two words into the same sentence only serves to play on people's fears.

Second, people need to understand there are three levels of personal information. I break them down as such:

First level - what a person could learn about you sitting next to you in a bar, coffee shop or the break room at work. They could learn your first name, what town you live in, maybe your phone number. An easy way to look at this first level is whatever they can find out about you by looking your name up in the telephone book.

Second level - what your friends know about you. Your friends and family know your spouse’s name, the names of your children, birthdays, stuff like that. Your friends would also know if you served in the military where you went to college and where you work.

The last level is the level that can cause the most heartache in your life.

Third level - this is stuff only you and your spouse know. Account numbers, social security numbers, health information things like that.

Senator Rockefeller's Do-Not-Track Online Act only serves to play off the fears of the public.

Frankly I don't care who tracks what I do on the Internet, but then I have nothing to hide. I don't care if they know I searched Google for a product or service and then show me a little ad for that exact thing a few days later on ABC news website. Better than seeing an ad for something I'm not interested in, like a little blue pill or something.

Consider the three levels of information above. Think about what it is you give-up while you are online.

I'm not fully convinced that we need yet another law that will only serve to confuse people even more.

CFMeetUp

Great meeting today. Ray Camden is reviewing ColdFusion Builder 2 which is no longer in beta.

Not sure if my group is going to convert from Dreamweaver to ColdFusion Builder. Both have advantages.

I am a ColdFusion Programmer

For the past fourteen years I have had the pleasure of doing what I love for a living... writing web application using a mark-up language called ColdFusion.

It has been a great ride.

I've been in a unique position to watch the technologies used to drive content contained on web servers and inside databases be delivered to user's browsers.

I will from time-to-time use my little soapbox here to talk about my experiences, share some insight and hopefully get some feedback from others who too will share their experiences.

If you would like to read more about how I got into Internet programming and how I started using ColdFusion CLICK HERE.

First Entry

Here it goes - This blog is going to be used as my personal soapbox. I'll talk about politics, ColdFusion Programming, my job and more.