Yay, the old dog (G4) gets a new battery. Wish my thinkpad got the same upgrade.
https://support.apple.com/ibook_powerbook/batteryexchange/
Computer model |Battery model number | Serial number range
12-inch iBook G4 | A1061 | ZZ338 - ZZ427, 3K429 - 3K611, 6C519 - 6C552
12-inch PowerBook G4 |A1079 | ZZ411 - ZZ427, 3K428 - 3K611
15-inch PowerBook G4 | A1078 and A1148 | 3K425 - 3K601, 6N530 - 6N551, 6N601
I've been using mozilla/firefox for a good chunk of time. I've also been with the same company for five or six years, and change laptops more often than some folks see the dentists. Between a mix of operating systems and frequent hardware changes I ended up using Microsoft's Webmail client rather than the 'thick client' outlook. Bonus (for me) is Firefox would store my passwords so when IT cranked down the time between logins, no worries...
Until I did a fresh install of Firefox 1.0... then no more 'save password' dialog on Webmail. If I logged into OWA with firebird
Today, I figured out what was going on. Looks like Firefox 1.0.x implemented the HTML 4.0 AUTOCOMPLETE="off" specification, which OWA uses. It also does not looks like there is a handy way to ignore the 'forced' autocomplete flag at the site level.
http://www.squarefree.com/bookmarklets/forms.html#remember_password
works. Like to have a nicer plugin, and might just roll up my sleeves to do just that (now that I know why and a way to work around it) I love the smell of a fresh install in the morning!
Wow. Just wow. One of those things that could be locked down, but I doubt is by most folks. Nice writeup at http://www.pandora-security.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2093
--- snips ---
I will now walk you through the process of obtaining SYSTEM privileges.
To start, lets open up a command prompt (Start > Run > cmd > [ENTER]).
At the prompt, enter the following command, then press [ENTER]:
C:>at
If it responds with an "access denied" error, then we are out of luck, and you'll have to try another method of privilege escalation; if it responds with "There are no entries in the list" (or sometimes with multiple entries already in the list) then we are good. Access to the at command varies, on some installations of Windows, even the Guest account can access it, on others it's limited to Administrator accounts. If you can use the at command, enter the following commands, then press [ENTER]:
C:>at 15:25
Lets break down the preceding code. The "at" told the machine to run the at command, everything after that are the operators for the command, the important thing here, is to change the time (24 hour format) to one minute after the time currently set on your computers clock, for example: If your computer's clock says it's 4:30pm, convert this to 24 hour format (16:30) then use 16:31 as the time in the command. If you issue the at command again with no operators, then you should see something similar to this:
When the system clock reaches the time you set, then a new command prompt will magically run. The difference is that this one is running with system privileges (because it was started by the task scheduler service, which runs under the Local System account). It should look like this:
You'll notice that the title bar has changed from cmd.exe to svchost.exe (which is short for Service Host). Now that we have our system command prompt, you may close the old one. Run Task Manager by either pressing CTRL+ALT+DELETE or typing taskmgr at the command prompt. In task manager, go to the processes tab, and kill explorer.exe; your desktop and all open folders should disappear, but the system command prompt should still be there.
At the system command prompt, enter in the following:
C:> explorer.exe
A desktop will come back up, but what this? It isn't your desktop. Go to the start menu and look at the user name, it should say "SYSTEM". Also open up task manager again, and you'll notice that explorer.exe is now running as SYSTEM. The easiest way to get back into your own desktop, is to log out and then log back in. The following 2 screenshots show my results (click to zoom):
(more...)
My bride hates the frilly scrap booking stuff. Unfortunately for her, my grandmother's will is strong - and it would seem the 70-90 year old ladies team for the upcoming family reunion want to do just that. Several letters and follow up phone calls (just in case she thought she might be off the hook with 'grandkid' status), she comes to the conclusion she is not getting out of this. Fortunately, she missed the idea that I might do it too - but does not make her any less crabby.
So she pulls out the photo albums, selects a dozen pictures that capture key moments in mine, her, and our little ones life. Rather than make copies of the photos to be pasted/stickered onto a sheet, she does a high res scan and starts "scrapbooking" with her Adobe kit. Photoshop/Illustrator/In Design/ drive to Kinkos later... Yes, it looks very professional and meets every requirement forced upon her. I suspect it does not match the spirit of what they were after. (I also suspect she might beat someone if they even hint cutting up her pages)
Heh. Been a while since I've seen her this riled up.
To a Darwin award... http://www.startribune.com/462/story/559332.html
Minivan crashes during drivers' switch
FULDA, Minn. -- It's probably not a good idea to switch drivers while the vehicle is moving.
That's what some young people discovered in southwestern Minnesota.
The State Patrol says the three were in a Chrysler Town and Country minivan on Hwy. 59 Monday when they tried to switch drivers while the cruise control was set.
During the exchange, the van went out of control and overturned, sliding into the ditch.
The 19-year-old driver from Worthington was airlifted to a Sioux Falls hospital with possible internal injuries.
The two passengers -- 16 and 24 years old -- were sent to the Murray County hospital with head injuries.
So my new(ish) Thinkpad started acting up in DC last week. Not a huge deal as my 9600 baud CDMA card and blackberry still worked - but I thought it was just a wifi problem at the hotel.
Got home, no such luck. Three feet from my linksys box, nothing is getting detected on the wireless. All other laptops just work. Today I got serious about fixing the issue. Drivers updated, chicken blood smeared on the registry, nothing worked... The wifi utilities kept insisting the bios or another program had locked the 802.11g card.
Barnacles... I had recovery media and only a couple weeks invested on the drive, so I pulled out Thor's hammer and restored the machine back to factory condition. Same problem - wireless does not seem to be turning on, claiming a BIOS or hardware issue. Three hours on hold, with elevator music on the speakerphone I googled up a clue. Seems they put a on/off switch on the front of the t60p, and I switched it off putting it into a laptop bag. They never did pick up the phone, but at least I got to hear a muzac version of 'enter sandman' - just wrong...
Reinstalling everything. Argh.
So I was visiting family this weekend. One of them pulled out a gorgeous 17" macbook pro. A quick look and I noticed it was also running windows. When I asked, he responded the guy who set it up for him had not finished doing the OSX part. Odd, but whatever. He was a windows guy who had a 30" and two 24" Apple displays on his PC workstation, so seeing him with the macbook pro was not a huge shock.
I had my T60p - in theory, both dual core XP machines were pretty evenly matched. A perfect opportunity to do a little benchmarking and find out what things were like in practice. I pulled out a DVD, ripped it, and encoded it. 8 minutes, 32 seconds. The macbook did it in 13 minutes, 48 seconds. Wow, I rule! Did another test with about the same results.
While I was poking around on his laptop, I saw a couple weird popups and thought to run a quick scan. 94 trojans later... I gave a hand de-lousing it, but still - a few of those buggers are hard to remove. Still don't know how fast the macs are.
Minnesota banned fireworks years back. Growing up in North Dakota, we had no such asinine laws - and understood mortars are the proper way to launch fireworks. Lucky me, end up living in the Minneapolis area. Brother-in-laws and I were talking about what to do this year as my father-in-law does not want the cops showing up on his doorstep. Come to discover the small community that one of them lives in has one peace officer who will also be on holiday today.
Heh... (wicked grin)
With all launch tubes functional, it is still going to take hours. Seems everyone went out and picked up a case or two of mortar rounds. Perfect weather to boot.
Happy Independence Day everyone!
It rained here, so we didn't get to any of the parades.
I'll probably pass on the fireworks tonight, as I have to get up at 5:00 am tomorrow.
Since our little one is seven, she was old enough to sign her up for Kung Foo sessions. My Bride tagged along and eventually joined up as well - but that is another JE.
After a couple sessions, things went from checking it out to full participation. The instructor announced a round of exercises for the group - to which my little one let out a 'awhhh...'. She was then instructed to perform a handful of pushups and nothing more was said. Ten minutes later the instructor announced another set of tasks, which my little one made another very vocal moan and got to perform another set of pushups.
About twenty minutes later another set of exercises was announced. She paused, then let our an enthusiastic "Yay".
Slow, but I think she figured out what the lesson may have been about...
Within 20 minutes of the laptop HDD starting to make noises - boom, it is gone. Only was able to get a handful of files off the bloody thing. Just like that, a hard two weeks worth of code, etc., just gone since I did not have a net connection handy while on the road. The 'important' stuff is in subversion, but gah... all those scraps, urls, notes, and fixes are just gone. The kicker? It hit me as I was trying to back stuff up this weekend, so I had no backup....
So much for a long weekend and a nice break. Worked through last weekend just so I could take time off on this one.
[todo: strong expletives go here]
How hard is it to make a decent wireless adapter for a desktop machine? I've got three or four laptops running anywhere in the house without issues. Her machine? Unless the tower is twisted with the antenna facing the router, it fluctuates between a solid connection and wondering who the heck my access point is. I was also informed that the back side of a full tower is 'not pretty', so reversing it was not an option. A second $60 wireless card did not sort the problem.
Screw it. This weekend I drilled holes, pounded holes in drywall, patched holes in drywall, painted, and now have a lovely gigabit LAN connection wired all the way to my bride's desktop.
I shall be rewarded...
About a month ago I noticed a lump where there should be none. I waited, hoping that whatever it was it would go away, but it was slowly getting larger. My stepfather passed away from cancer that started in a similar location a couple years ago, so I won't pretend my imagination was not running wild. My focus narrowed to just surviving and a bit of darker contingency planning. By the time I figured I should see a doctor, I was thinking I was in deep weeds. (to put things into perspective, I never went into a clinic when I picked up an enteropathogenic e coli in Mexico)
After a bit more research on the net, I figured I better get my sorry butt over to Mayo and find out if it was still a chance that chemo and/or surgery work. The longer I waited, the more my chances decreased. Also did not want to scare my Bride, so I kept all of this to myself. Made things a bit awkward as it look a couple days to locate my medical cards and the BCBS stuff from work. Her filing system works for her, but it reminds me very much of "It was on display in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying Beware of the Leopard." She could tell something was bothering me immensely, but assumed it was work related (as I led her to believe that).
So yesterday I get a physical to kick off the process. The doctor finally got around to asking, "so anything in particular worrying you?" I fessed up about the lump. A quick examination later, he tells me it is just an enlarged blood vessel and to eat more fiber. Yah, I feel stupid... but no longer have a sword hanging over my head. Time to pet the dog, hug the child, and kiss the wife. Life is so precious.
System going down in 5 minutes.
