Disco ball
Month: June 2007
Hack-a-day shows another electronic voting machine insecurity
In case you’d forgotten the security issues with current electronic voting machines, here’s a video that Hack-A-Day highlighted recently. In it, we see someone get into an electronic voting machine and swap the ROM in about 60 seconds.
Yes, this is not some surefire way to control the votes, since it is highly susceptible to getting caught. Still, there are sure to be some places where this could be pulled off without anyone being wiser for it. Security in electronic voting systems is not easy. But until the vendors at least take the concept seriously, we’ll not have electronic voting systems worth using or trusting.
[tags]Controlling the votes, Electronic voting insecurities, Security, Hack-a-Day[/tags]
Game Boy history
Over at Portable Video Gamer, you can read a brief but informative history of the Game Boy gaming line from Nintendo, including the Game Boy Advance, the Nintendo DS, and variants of these handheld consoles.
On January 10, 1989, a patent was filed that would lead to the creation, distribution, and ultimate enormous success of the world’s most popular videogame machine: the Game Boy portable gaming series. Nintendo’s previous handheld experience with the Game & Watch (a watch that included mini-games for quick play), led to the invention of a fully-developed, portable gaming system. Many people imagined the Game Boy would play just like the Game & Watch systems, with different games available for purchase but featuring little differences amongst them. Surprisingly, the Game Boy allowed for development of sophisticated games of many styles and genres. The Game Boy has had many different variations over time and eventually led to the creation of the Nintendo DS. Hop along as we explore the history of the Game Boy franchise and take a look at how things have changed along the way.
. . .
GAME BOY POCKET
40% smaller than the original, with AAA batteries and longer lasting life, a truly gray and not yellowish screen, and the disappearance of the battery life LED marker, the Game Boy Pocket was a big change. Released in 1996, it was first available on a limited-edition platinum color.
. . .WIDE BOY
The Wide Boy was available to developers and the gaming press only. It would play Game Boy games on the NES.
I’m surprised at how many of these I have owned or currently own. I sometimes forget how much of a gaming-stuff purchaser I am, given how little I buy any more. Pretty cool backgrounder information on the entire line of hand-helds, and a link off to speculation on the future of the series.
[tags]Game Boy series history, Gaming, Nintendo, GBA, NDS[/tags]
GIMP tutorials
Since I’ve been learning GIMP recently, I’ve been looking for good tutorials when I can
LinuxChix teach you
As I expand my free and open source software use, I’m finding that I like seeking out tutorials, tips, tricks, books, articles, and whatever else I can find to learn these tools as quickly as possible. One of my recent finds is the LinuxChix courses. Courses are available for C Programming, Security, LaTeX (I bet most of my readers have never even heard of LaTeX), the Unix filesystem, and several more computing topics. If you are looking for some online coursework, you should at least check out the full list of tutorials from the LinuxChix.
[tags]LinuxChix, Online courses, Linux tutorials[/tags]
Plasma pong
Try Plasma Pong – pong with a fluid dynamics twist
Congressional Research Service reports
The Federation of American Scientists make some interesting Congressional Research Service reports available for free (normally not available to the public)
See, this is what Vietnam did to our soldiers
Ahhh, Vietnam. That much maligned military engagement from over a quarter century back. Not all the stories of Vietnam are brought out, though. Check out this tale of what one Vietnam vet recently did to another living creature.
A 62-year-old Vietnam veteran said he was acting on instinct when he strangled a rabid 25-pound bobcat that attacked him on his back porch.
Dale Rippy endured the bobcat’s slashes and bites until it clawed into a position where he could grab it by the throat. Then he strangled it.
Rippy said it was clear the crazed bobcat had to be stopped.
Yup. That’s what Vietnam did to a man – turned him into a bad-ass. Some folks might read that and see 25-pounds and figure “Big deal!” But even a little 5 pound cat can be a beast that’s tough to handle in the wrong circumstances (ever try to give a cat a bath?). Mr. Rippy saw that the crazed bobcat had to be stopped, and decided he was tough enough to do it. Hit the full article for pictures of Mr. Rippy, the dead cat, and commentary from animal services. Hats off to Mr. Rippy – that’s a feat to be highly regarded.
[tags]Bad-ass of the week, Vietnam vet strangles living creature[/tags]
Wow, such a pretty kitty
Not really. It’s a pretty gaudy kitty. But I know some folks have a serious boner for “Hello, Kitty” stuff. And I get my chuckles out of posting these so people can go “zOMG!” in response.
If I’m reading the page right, that’s nearly 200,000 yen, which runs a bit over $1600 at current exchange rates. Of course, since I can’t actually read the page, I’m guessing that price is in yen.
[tags]Hello kitty, Itty bitty pretty kitty lappy?[/tags]
Home inspection nightmares part 2
More scary home inspection findings from the folks who do inspections
The robots are building their assault base
It’s been a while since I’ve pointed out the coming robot insurrection. I haven’t really seen new evidence of the uprising that warranted alerting both of my readers. But now, I find the robots have infiltrated the military, getting DARPA to fund their growing power development and putting us all at risk!
The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency plans to develop a fleet of robots that soldiers can deploy in urban combat settings as they move through houses and along streets.
The program, dubbed LANdroid, envisions miniature autonomous drones that can form a network capable of relaying radio traffic in a setting often considered challenging for communications equipment.
According to a notional image of a LANdroid included in a DARPA pamphlet, each robot will be about the size of a deck of cards, and must be rugged, lightweight and able to operate for seven to 14 days, the agency said.
Clever critters, aren’t they? The military and US government may think that the humans are in control of the robots, but we all know better, don’t we? I’ve seen the trailers for Transformers. I know how deceptive (AHA!!!! The decepticons are behind this) the size of the robot can be. Don’t be fooled, folks. Do. Not. Be. Fooled.
[tags]The coming robot insurrection, Robot uprising, Robots, LANdroid[/tags]
GPS users disengage brains?
I have insufficient proof to consider this an absolute truism, but I think that there is evidence to make one think that users of GPS systems operate them by turning off their brains.
A 20-year-old student’s car was wrecked by a train after she followed her sat nav system onto a railway track.
. . .
“I put my complete trust in the sat nav and it led me right into the path of a speeding train,” she said.
“The crossing wasn’t shown on the sat nav, there were no signs at all and it wasn’t lit up to warn of an oncoming train.
Unfortunately, if you read the full story, you’ll see that it is conceivable that this was more than just blind faith in the GPS. The rail crossing was unmarked, it was dark, and manual manipulation of the cross gates was required to cross. But that’s not all my evidence. You can see more examples if you keep reading.