News archive 2001 - Koos van den Hout

My own 19 inch rack at home (more nerdpoints!) with pictures of the installation.

I'd like to meet a nice woman someday, but not as demanding as [link expired] Kay Hammonds..

Christmas time is here.. with Last Christmas played a bit too much on the radio. Best wishes for all the visitors and remember: Je bent een rund als je met vuurwerk stunt.

Seal of Approval voor Spare Rib Express.

The Linux advanced routing and trafficshaping howto now has The Ultimate Traffic Conditioner: Low Latency, Fast Up & Downloads for assymetric home connections (ADSL, cable). Go read it!

[link expired] Snowboarding gets fun this way ;-) do read [link expired] the article about the protest by Sabina Blassnig (German article).

Dug up stuff about a project from ages ago, hipradio, transmitting mp3 over broadcast/multicast (we were playing with this in 1997!)

- Hit 3 ducks and win a prize
- Apartments.com
- Hit 3 ducks and win a prize
- Hit 3 ducks and win a prize
- Hit 3 ducks and win a prize
- Hit 3 ducks and win a prize
- Hit 3 ducks and win a prize
- Hit 3 ducks and win a prize
- Hit 3 ducks and win a prize
- Chello.nl
- AT&T wireless

Banner ads. The main reason I see why they wouldn't work is that
I'm not stupid enough to go to a "you are a winner" site. Or to a
site which only advertises apartments in the US. Or to a site for
a Dutch broadband provider which will tell me they don't serve my
area, but only after giving them all the data they need to spam me
until the end of time.

Somewhere back in time, people told that banner ads could be easier
targetted. There are places where this works. Slashdot for example,
where there are seriously interesting banner ads leading to places
that are dangerous to my credit card like Thinkgeek or banner ads
for interesting hard- and software.

But in general, and I notice this especially on unitedmedia, the
banner ads are quite stupid and aimed at their very general of
visitors, a somewhat higher-educated American. Although "you are
a winner already" sounds more like aimed at a dumber person, the
rest seems to aim at people with enough income to be able to
contemplate the idea of an apartment in a city.

No, I have not used the doubleclick 'opt_out' option for the browsers
that I am seeing this on. The 'smart targetting system' could by
now have figured out that I don't live in the US (nor plan to start
doing so), that I am smart enough not to react to "you are a winner
already" and that I know that chello.nl is not going to deliver cable
to my city this century.

Seeing all this, I am not surprised banner advertisment isn't selling.
The advertisers are telling that they deliver to the right audience, but
what I see is a lot of very misdirected stuff.

Maybe only the operator of a niche-group site can select advertisers for
him/her self and have fitting advertising. I had no problem finding a load
of pet-related advertisers via commission-junction for pussy.idefix.net.

After succesfull connection of the adsl a shutdown and removal of the cablemodem. As a last action I tested how fast one can break the monthly 4 Gb limit of Casema with a 64 kbps connection: about 17 hours. Since I transferred an archive of nearly 16 Gb I broke it several times, but Casema didn't threaten to disconnect me... I disconnected it myself ;)

Ik loop op de [link expired] HCCdagen rond waar we ook een webserver met webcam hebben. (Link weg omdat de server weer uit is en de stand afgebroken)

ccvi.ccxxiii.xxxvi.lv has address 206.223.36.55

The Internet is broken! archie.doc.ic.ac.uk does not exist anymore! And I only managed to find one gopher server with real content.

Playing with digital camera. Pictures of office, Vlekkie the cat, Vlekkie next to TV, Vlekkie watching TV, Moppie eating, table, Vlekkie acting weird, drinking cats, sharing the couch with a nice female, my toes, Moppie using the couch as soon as I get up. I'll build a photo-website as soon as I get around to it :) Took a bit of hacking to extract pictures from the cam using gphoto2 and the usb driver.

De administratie van de vereniging van eigenaren van mijn flat besloot dat de overgang naar de euro een goeie aanleiding is voor een verhoging van de servicekosten.

Slight update to the Using Dynamic DNS for your dynamic IP micro-howto about what not to use it for. Given some interesting traffic on my cablemodem-IP I wanted to share this.

A complete set of URL exploits (134 in total) found in the webserver logs. None worked. But I guess it works nice as a list of stuff you don't want to have on your server. Or feed the list to your IDS and get a nice report of who tried to break in to your system.

Almost having a cold sucks.

Browsing logs of referrers to my old home page I ran into [link expired] Jen Savage's website linking to the nudie pixel page. The nudie pixel page still attracts loads of visitors even after being gone for ages.

The new true enemy of the US.. [link expired] read all about kettle corn.

More fun with Linux: on a system with ATX powersupply and a networkcard that supports wake-on-lan get a recent kernel and ethtool and then add a line in the script that brings down your network interfaces to configure wake-on-lan on the card (after the 'down' part). Get the ether-wake program (from scyld.com which also has other great linux network drivers). And then: wake-up call for your systems!

Fun with Linux: on a system with an ATX powersupply and the right kind of systemboard, enable ACPI modules (ospm_busmgr ospm_system ospm_button ospm_processor), get and install acpid and now the powerbutton on the front of your computer also works as immediate shutdown button (just like a Sun Ultra 10)

Added an explanation of how I use dynamic dns for my ever changing cablemodem IP. Available as Using Dynamic DNS for your dynamic IP micro-howto.

Kabelaanbieder zat kwa aanbod televisiekanalen? Kijk ook eens bij Astra digitaal.

I got an ipv6 tunnel from xs4all over my adsl link. Getting it to work was the more interesting part..

Received the adsl stuff from xs4all.. more bandwidth for a better price (and xs4all as ISP-with-lots-of-clue). Xs4all uses the Mxstream network with Alcatel Speedtouch ADSL modems with PPTP as transport between computer and modem. So I use the Linux pptp client to log in and stay online.

Back from a weekend in Schotland. Pictures online but you'll have to ask nicely for the URL.

The latest and greates in worms for Windows (this time using all available transport mechanisms) can be filtered in sendmail too (only the spreading via mail of course). Ben Gertzfield wrote a filter based on my earlier filters.

After the recent events in the US (events that shocked me a lot)
security at airports has been 'beefed up' a lot. No more 'curbside
check-in', better ID needed and a lot more visible security personnel
at airports.

Given the fact that the terrorists boarded the planes with correct
identification (for as far as is known at the moment) this change
in security policy might not have prevented the attacks.

But it might be that the interest is in a better feeling of security
and not in security by itself. Peoples sense of security has been
shocked because of the recent happenings. Since the WTC bombing in
1993, no foreign terrorist attack has happened in the US. People
felt safe in the US, only seeing terrorist attacks on TV news
happening in foreign countries (and not seeing much of it since US
newsreports don't have as much foreign event coverage as I am used
to in the Netherlands).

It is important for people to have a sense of being secure in their
daily lives. It makes our environment predictable and a predictable
environment takes a lot less energy in dealing with it.

So people like the extra checks that happen, giving them a feeling
that a repeat of the events is not very likely.

But, given time, when all the recent events have faded, people will
be annoyed at the amount of time needed to check into a plane.
People fly because it's a fast way of getting from A to B. Especially
in the US where it is the fast way of getting across any large
distance. There are people in the US who commute by plane.

This is where the 'security' versus 'ease of use' pops up again.
In a 'security' sense I'd like the computer I am typing this on to
make sure at every keypress whether the typing fingers are mine.
In a 'ease of use' sense I'd like the computer to be ready for my
typing as soon as I pull up my chair.

The solution I use is somewhere in the middle, my screensaver
automatically locks my screen when I am not using it for 5 minutes
and I manually lock it when I'm walking out of my office. At this
moment this level of security satisfies both my wish for security
(I don't want anyone to be typing as me) and my wish for ease of
use.

Airport security and computer security are a bit alike.

Before I go further on this: I do not want to compare the (possible)
results of a computer break in with the results of a airplane
security breach as we saw last week.

Airport users and computer users want ease of use. The airport and
the owner of the computer only want to let in authorized users with
no malicious intent. They both want to serve the valid users and
please them. The airport owner has a commercial interest in letting
his customers return. The computer owner does not want his users
complaining about the idiot security measures.

Security is a dynamic process. At this moment airport users want
the extra security measures. In a few months they will be calling
for 'curb-side check in' to be restored.

The Irregular about Security versus ease-of-use in computers and airports.

Today will live on in history as a day of planned attack on the heart of the US.

I started writing a sort of column which I named The Irregular.. the first one is about truth being stranger then (cartoon) fiction.

The European Parliament has released their report on Echelon.

This is my irregular writing, just because I sometimes like to
write down something. It might be about work, it might be about
something that happens to me or something I observe. The language
may be Enlish or Dutch depending on what I feel like and what the
audience may be.

I like to watch cartoons. A few years ago I got a steady diet of
cartoons on Cartoon Network, including a lot of Dexter's lab and
Cow & Chicken. TV schedules changed, my interests changed so I
don't watch them as much as I used to. (Depending on who you ask
this may be a healthy development :)

In one Cow & Chicken cartoon is a big machine which is for as far
as I can recall named a 'planet demolisher'. It grinds down entire
trees into small chips of wood with a high speed. Chicken drives
it around in the cartoon since he thinks he saves everyone from a
horrible fate, demolishes the surroundings of the school. The result
is that Chicken is grounded for the rest of his life and finds out
the big machine was busy for the swimming pool of the school.

This 'planet demolisher' seems to be a product of the deranged minds
of the cartoon writers.

But, a few days ago I got this feeling of truth being stranger then
fiction (isn't it always) when I saw a big machine behind the
Galgenwaard soccer stadium chipping the remains of the trees that
were there. Quite big trees were picked up and fed into a large
woodchipping installation that had no trouble at all grinding down
those trees. I watched for a while to see whether any of the larger
trees could stall the machine but it ate through everything (the
operator probably knew very well what he was doing).

A few days later I saw an even bigger version of that machine that
delt with the trunks of the tree. With no problem those got grinded
to little woodchips too.

So, the conclusion seems to be that truth is stranger then fiction,
even with cartoon fiction.

The cute feature of the webserver at home is that a nice dynamic dns hack is used in order to update the dns (since casema likes giving out very random dynamic addresses).

I started collecting Friday Afternoon URLs (vrijdagmiddagurls) so you can all enjoy them!

I'm back from HAL which was really great! Have a look at all the picture archives. And especially the pictures of the fact that we turned out to be not so bad after all.

Today marked the end of idefix version 2.. idefix version 3 lives on.

Someone really liked my IRC picture and linked to it from [link expired] a post on a messageboard.

If you like mutt you might want to have a look at my .muttrc to see how I configured it.

Worked on the 'restore a Volvo' project today. Went well although the car needs more work before it can drive the streets again.

A simple sendmail filter to stop the current version of the SirCam mail virus.

Music for HAL2001, the [link expired] Spam album.

End of an era: the 2-wire leased line giving me a fixed IP and a 33k6 link at home shutting down.

The Register has the [link expired] details on how to disable WinXP/IE/Office smart tags in your webpages.

I found an old document listing all the [link expired] hostnames on the Internet when such a listing fitted on one page.

Wat je nog eens tegenkomt op Internet, kamervragen en antwoorden over grootschalig afluisteren van telecommunicatie in Nederland (type Echelon). Interresant leesvoer.

On the same day I got my casema account data so my cable modem is now working and the news that xs4all ADSL will be available in September..

The cable modem is connected.. but no login data yet so I can't start a session. Duh. Extra blinkenlights in the house. And the installer had to find out by trail and error that my cablemodem is connected to connection number 34. The records of the cable company Casema (aka Ziggo) are that lousy!

Updated the helper script for playing shoutcast streams to randomize the server and work with realplayer for Solaris.

Belgium does exist and I was on a camping trip there in the weekend. Visited Han-sur-Lesse and the caves there and the shipworks at Ronquières.

Belgium doesn't exist.

Finally.. on June 7th they will (try to) install a cablemodem at home. I originally ordered that on March 7th. Let's see how it works.

RFC3098, How to Advertise Responsibly Using E-Mail and Newsgroups or - how NOT to $$$$$ MAKE ENEMIES FAST! $$$$$

A new job! Starting next Tuesday I will be a senior sysadmin at the computer science department of Utrecht University. Yes, that is right across the street from where I left a year ago...

Peace man!

Idefix is going to move to a new home! Rejoice!

The Bergen Linux User Group in Norway has done the worlds first implementation of rfc 1149, A Standard for the Transmission of IP Datagrams on Avian Carriers.

*sniffle* *tooooot* *sniffle* Bad cold! Stuffed head! Using a metric buttload™ paper hanky's.
A metric buttload is smaller then an imperial buttload.

Slight optimization of the php source for the homepage so I don't have to keep typing all the html for the boxes. It looks the same, but it is a lot less typing for me.

My Volvo 440 failed the APK (car checkup) completely and repairs would be more expensive than the current value of the car according to the workshop. With some help I may be able to get it fixed. I hope.

Finally managed to get a Linux dhcp client working with the weird Terayon DHCP server. The fix: set a client identifier using '-i "MSFT 987"' thus faking a win98 dhcp client. Terayon really tests their equipment using the 'hey, it works with windows' mentality.

I have new glasses on my nose.. picture available.

Been busy with sysadmin-like stuff at home. First I got the amanda backup system working.. not a big deal in itself, it's just a bit of rtfm and grokking it. Then I took on a bigger challenge, getting a one-time-password login working. I found OPIE and pam_opie but both weren't that well-documented and showed 'test software' and 'not very well maintained lately'. Being stubborn I still managed to configure and build it all and make it run as planned. I am writing down how I did that so other people can share the solution.

Idefix needs a new home and that will probably have to be in a rack somewhere so I'm reallyreally looking for a rackmount case. Hints leads tips welcome.

Small update to the GSM/GPS page. According to this report (Dutch) law enforcment does use gsm logs as evidence in cases.

I spent part of my sunday at a friends house trying to fix the Netgear RT314 Cable/DSL router not talking to the DHCP server of the cablenetwork using Terayon cablemodems. Conclusion: Terayon DHCP is 1. used to allow access to the outside network and 2. really broken.

Indyra finally has a website so you can read what we do and how.

CompTechWorld has the Mustek 12000SP scsi scanner on sale, so I bought one, fiddled for ages until the settings of the Adaptec 1540B controller weren't conflicting with other cards (ISA days are here again) and then installed Sane (Scanner Access Now Easy) so I can scan my holiday snapshots without leaving Linux. (The controller that comes with the scanner is not supported in Linux 2.2.18)

I'm back from a week of snowboard fun in Avoriaz.. my left ankle didn't enjoy all of it but I had great fun there. The weather was great, the slopes are great and it's a nice (car-free) town.

Microsoft must have hired a new cleaner who used the wrong socket to plug the vacuum cleaner in...

Iced snow in a curve of the road sucks. Saturday evening my car suddenly lost track and hit a parked van. Dent+scratch on the right side of my car :(( a good reason to look harder for a digital camera so I would have been able to take some pictures of the situation.

The webserver at home now tells the (inside) temperature and airpressure..

Fun for all the family, have a sing-along with The Internet Songbook. Bring earplugs for the rest of the family.

It's C-c-c-c-c-c-cold outside this week. Temperatures around -9 C last night.

Looking for stuff on WAP Location Based Services (LBS) you need MPP (Mobile Positioning Protocol).. found after some hard searching at The Ericsson Developers' Zone where you can download tools and specs.

Spent an hour yesterday snowboarding on real snow (indoor at SnowPlanet).. fun, but I do need more practice.

Found in wired news, the US department of justice rules on searching and seizing computers and obtaining evidence.

I want some more bandwidth at home and it seems I'll have to wait months for Cistron ADSL to roll out here and XS4ALL adsl skips my phone exchange completely so I will get Casema cable Internet.. let's see how that works nowadays.

If you come to these pages looking for "Free sms massage" you really overrate the possibilities of the vibrate mode on your mobile phone. Found several times in the searchterms in the logs.

Decided to restyle the homepage of the webserver at home. The same style as this and other pages (hey, it works for me). I also added some really useful information only available at home.

Gevonden in de archieven, leven na de hip

Someone really likes filling in koos@xs4all.nl as e-mail address for websites (gaming sites, porn, software registrations) which is highly annoying. I'm hoping to at least find out who.

Found some very cool snowboarding pictures. No, I'm not that far with snowboarding..

I have been playing with IPv4 multicast.. cool stuff, great possibilities and the longer you play with it the better it starts to look. The idea is to make a multicast version of HIPradio.

It looks like the domain-name-trouble is 'fixed' at this moment with a return letter I wrote and help from a lawyer.

Happy Newyear!!