Notes and Ramblings

Ice Tower Web Cam - Alaskan Alpine Club: "Alaskan Alpine Club.... The 05-06 Twin Towers Web Cam"

Security Now! weekly audio security column & podcast by Steve Gibson and Leo Laporte.

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Quick Vibrating Lockpick
Often when it comes to true invention and discovery, crossing the line of ethics of the day leads to great discoveries. There seems to be several areas of humanity that create social boundaries preventing discoveries of all types. Lets all take a moment to reflect on the nature of humanity.. Ok that was enough of that! Supposed ethical boundaries have often stymied the progression of insight both to our surroundings, but also into our self's. It is in one of these perceived dark recesses of humanity that I have felt like delving into with this project. Any type of project that effects perception of security and stability of life is never popular. While lock picking is nothing new, for those who know nothing about it, it often shocks and scares people with its ease and sharp reality.

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The blog where I stumbled across this had a comment to the effect that "it's okay for cheap padlocks, but wouldn't have much success with something like a door"...
I beg to differ. As someone who has been capable of picking locks for the past 20 years, I am downright positive that this tool would be even more effective and quicker on the typical doorknob or deadbolt. The technology is the same. I have even used a standard pick to open car doors to retrieve keys - the pin-and-tumbler design is everywhere.
If Magnum P.I. had had one of these, the Ferrari would have been much easier to acquire.

top 10 sites you should know about
[quote]#1 http://www.meebo.com - A small upstart company that has brought trillian (http://www.trillian.cc) like features to the web. You can access Yahoo! Messanger, Jabber, Gtalk, AIM, ICQ and MSN directly through the web in a desktop like enviroment that supports multiple connections to different IM networks much like trillian.

#2 http://www.rememberthemilk.com - Another cool web 2.0 creation. If you are like me you tend to forget to do things. Also if you are like me you are connected to the world in some fashion no matter where you go (my cellphone has yet to leave my side in years). Remeberthemilk is excellent because it supports reminders via cellphones, email and instant messaging.

#3 http://www.blinklist.com - Blinklist is another bookmark management site competing for attention ever since the success of del.icio.us. However Blinklist has a snazzy look and a bunch of awesome features that make del.icio.us dull in comparison. Make sure to check this site out to see all the different features it sports.

#4 http://www.digg.com - Some might call digg.com the slashdot.org killer. It might well be. Digg.com is an excellent technology news source that has put editorial control back in the hands of users. Digg is worth a look, or a blink (see #3).

#5 http://www.clusty.com - Clusty.com is a nifty little search engine that will most likely always live in Google's shadow but is worth a look all the same. Clusty like its name implies clusters your search results into different categories which makes finding the desired information you are searching for easier. There are a bunch of other small features that make this search engine worth checking out.

#6 http://www.writely.com - Word processing on the web? It was bound to happen eventually. Writely is the perfect for firing up that word document in the library or ... well I'm not sure how often you run into a computer without word processing. Regardless of its usability it still is pretty cool.

#7 http://www.last.fm - Last.fm is kind of hard to describe. It is part social music tagger, part personal radio and well I guess you have to check it out to figure out the rest. Basically if you find yourself listening to lots of music while you are at your computer Last.fm might well become your best friend... well a new site you check out lots at least.

#8 http://www.pixel2life.com - Is the haven for all things tutorial. Its huge database offers a range tutorials on anything from Perl to ColdFusion to Microsoft Outlook. The tutorials are all computer related (you won't find out how to install the plumbing here).

#9 http://www.blummy.com - Blummy.com offers a unique approach to keeping and sharing bookmarks (something that seems to be all the rage recently). Check it out if you have more bookmarks then you know what to do with.[/quote]
I swapped their #11 into the #10 slot though,[quote]
#10 http://www.hipcal.com - Hipcal is a web 2.0 online calendar and to-do list.[/quote]

Portable USB Apps - TheInfoBox.com
Version 2.1 with more games, OpenOffice.org 2.0, FireFox 1.5 and more!!! Also, I just released my Essential Software Collection CD. Be sure to check it out!

Portable USB Drive Apps - /dev/whatever

While there have been a log of pages circulating the Web lately of lists of applications that may be run straight from a USB drive, I thought I'd add my own into the mix. What makes mine different is that I carry a 20GB USB Hard Drive with me, so I have a lot more room for data and such. I'd highly suggest a high-capacity drive, since they are getting smaller in size and are exponentially more useful (in my opinion). But I digress. Here's the list (all freeware, btw):

Longitude and Latitude Finder
Using Google Maps technology, just click on a map location and you're rewarded with the Latitude and Longitude of that locaton.