fear of (a) average mind

Inky pHAT images - 212x104

2019-04-14T12:31:00.001+00:00

Made some geeky images (212x104) for the Pimoroni Inky pHAT:

Enjoy.

Selfie Stick of DOOM!

2017-09-10T08:45:00.000+00:00

My 360° selfie stick (for my Xiaomi Mijia Sphere 360) is pretty cool.

Parts list (affiliate links):
Manfrotto Compact Xtreme 2-in-1 Monopod and Pole £39.00
Ulanzi ST-03 Metal Smart phone Tripod Mount £18.88 (I did originaly get a Manfrotto Universal Smartphone Clamp but it's cheap and nasty)
Threaded Screw Adapter £4.50
CAMVATE Super Clamp £13.53
Total = £75.91

As the Manfrotto Compact Xtreme has 1/4" threads on both ends I've got these two on order so I can spike it into the ground (will report if it works):
Ground Stick Stake Mounting Holder £2.38 model B
Stainless Steel Tripod Monopod Spike £3.83 + Fotga 6 in 1 1/4" 3/8" Camera Tripod Screw Mount £3.99

I hacksawed the long bit off the CAMVATE Super Clamp and put a keyring on it and made a paracord lanyard from watching this vid: Rock Paracord - How to Make a Duck Call Lanyard

Parts.

Assembled.

Using.
Enjoy.

Xiaomi Mijia MI SPHERE 360 Camera rugged case

2017-08-13T14:13:00.000+00:00

I'm quite happy with this little case I made. I used a Peli 1020 Micro Case and some closed cell foam.
It's off to one side because the Peli case has a little rubber bump in the centre that might touch the lens.
I was going to leave a gap to one side for a USB cable but the foam moves around and touches the lens.
The bag that comes with the camera keeps everything nice and tight in there and it is useful when shooting to protect the camera.

Hope this helps.

Quick and dirty RasPi security camera

2016-08-22T19:34:00.000+00:00

RasPi + camera + WiFi adapter + power supply + internet accsess

● Detects when a door is opened
● Notification on phone/tablet via PushBullet
● Records 10 sencond videos (3 of them) and uploads to Dropbox

Install python pushbullet:

pip install pushbullet.py

Install Dropbox-Uploader:

cd ~
git clone https://github.com/andreafabrizi/Dropbox-Uploader/
chmod +x ~/Dropbox-Uploader/dropbox_uploader.sh
cd ~/Dropbox-Uploader
./dropbox_uploader.sh

SecCam.py

import RPi.GPIO as GPIO
import time
import picamera
import subprocess

from pushbullet import Pushbullet
from time import sleep

camera = picamera.PiCamera()
camera.rotation = 270

pb = Pushbullet("YOUR KEY HERE")
localtime = time.asctime( time.localtime(time.time()) )

GPIO.setmode(GPIO.BCM)

GPIO.setup(13, GPIO.IN, pull_up_down=GPIO.PUD_UP)

while True:
    input_state = GPIO.input(13)
    if input_state == False:
        print('Door activated')
        push = pb.push_note("Door opened", localtime)
        print('Start video 1')
        camera.start_recording('/home/pi/1.video.h264')
        sleep(10)
        camera.stop_recording()
        print('Stop video 1')
        time.sleep(2)
        print('Start video 2')
        camera.start_recording('/home/pi/2.video.h264')
        sleep(10)
        camera.stop_recording()
        print('Stop video 2')
        time.sleep(2)
        print('Start video 3')
        camera.start_recording('/home/pi/3.video.h264')
        sleep(10)
        camera.stop_recording()
        print('Stop video 3')
        time.sleep(2)
        subprocess.call("/home/pi/copyVID2DB.sh")

        print('Videos uploaded to DropBox')

copyVID2DB.sh

#!/bin/sh

NOW=$(date +"%m-%d-%Y")

/home/pi//Dropbox-Uploader/dropbox_uploader.sh upload /home/pi/1.video.h264 /YourDropBoxFolder/$NOW.1.h264
/home/pi//Dropbox-Uploader/dropbox_uploader.sh upload /home/pi/2.video.h264 /YourDropBoxFolder/$NOW.2.h264
/home/pi//Dropbox-Uploader/dropbox_uploader.sh upload /home/pi/3.video.h264 /YourDropBoxFolder/$NOW.3.h264

rm -rf /home/pi/1.video.h264
rm -rf /home/pi/2.video.h264
rm -rf /home/pi/3.video.h264

If you want it to run at startup put this line in /etc/rc.local:

sudo python /home/pi/SecCam.py &

Now connect wires to PIN 13 and a ground and make them connect when the door is opened.

Ortlieb Front Roller Classic + Specialized AWOL front "pizza rack"

2016-08-19T15:44:00.000+00:00

Just a quick post to confirm the Ortlieb Front Roller Classic panniers do indeed fit fine on the Specialized AWOL front "pizza rack".
You just have to flip the bottom rail, which is quite easy (see the second pic).
Couldn't find a pic anywhere of the two together when researching so I thought I'd make this post for anyone wondering.

Hope this helps.

SSH into RasPi2 without a WiFi network (sort of).

2015-06-01T17:17:00.000+00:00

I use a TP-LINK TL-MR3020, an awesome little travel router (also used for the PirateBox/LibraryBox projects). The MR3020 is also powered by USB so as you can see you can just use one USB wall-plug (or a portable power solution, maybe solar).

This is good because you can SSH into you RasPi without relying on a WiFi network, i.e., out in the field doing a time-lapse. The MR3020 is an AP which you can just connect to with a tablet or laptop, connect it to your RasPi via the ethernet cable and SSH into it.

Connect to the MR3020 with your laptop and browse to http://192.168.0.254/, the name/password are admin/admin (of course you will change this). Here you can change the name of the AP if you want.
A useful thing to do is assign you RasPi a fixed IP when connected to the MR3020.

Connect the RasPi to the MR3020 via the ethernet cable.
Connect and login to the MR3020 with your laptop (over WiFi).
Click DHCP on the left then Attached Devices.
Copy the Mac-Address of your RasPi.
Click Reserved Addresses then Add.
Paste in the Mac-Address and give you RasPi an IP (something like 192.168.0.176).

This way when you SSH into your RasPi you will have an easy to remember IP.
I use JuiceSSH on my NVIDIA SHIELD to SSH in (ConnectBot is a free app).

Movies

2015-02-10T21:21:00.003+00:00

movies\action

Children.of.Men.divx
Crank.divx
Dead.Mans.Shoes.divx
Ghost.Dog.The.Way.of.the.Samurai.avi
Hawk.The.Slayer.divx
Leon.The.Professional.avi
Sin.City.avi
The.Girl.With.A.Dragon.Tattoo.avi
The.Sweeney.avi

movies\action\Cracker-To_Be_a_Somebody
To.Be.A.Somebody.01.avi
To.Be.A.Somebody.02.avi
To.Be.A.Somebody.03.avi

Sherlock.Holmes.(2009).mp4
Sherlock.Holmes.(2011).avi

The.Purge.Anarchy.mkv
The.Purge.mp4

movies\asian\action

Blood.The.Last.Vampire.divx
Crying_Freeman
Godzilla.(2000).avi
Gojira.(Godzilla_1954).avi
Moon_Child

The.Raid.(1).Redemption.mp4
The.Raid.(2).mkv

movies\asian\anime\movie

5.Centimeters.Per.Second.mkv
Angel's Egg.mkv
Appleseed
Blood.-.The.Last.Vampire.avi
Hotarubi.no.Mori.e.mkv
Jin.Roh.mp4
K-ON!.Movie.mkv
Metropolis
Pale.Cocoon.mkv
Paprika.avi
Rakuen Tsuihou Expelled from Paradise .mkv
REDLINE.mkv
Summer.Wars.mkv
Suzumiya.Haruhi.no.Shoushitsu.avi
TAMALA
Tekkonkinkreet.divx
The.Wolf.Children.Ame.and.Yuki.mkv
The_Garden_of_Words
The_Girl_Who_Leapt_Through_Time
Tokyo.Godfathers.mkv
Urotsukidoji Legend of the Overfiend.mp4
Yobi,the.Five.Tailed.Fox.mp4
Giovanni's Island.mkv
Hoshi wo Ou Kodomo (BD 1280x720 x264 AAC 5.1ch).mp4

Appleseed.Ex.Machina.mkv
Appleseed.mkv

Genius_Party
Genius_Party_Beyond

Gedo.Senk.A.Tales.From.Earthsea.divx
Grave.of.the.Fireflies.avi
My.Neighbor.Totoro.avi
Spirited.Away.avi

Vampire.Hunter.D.-.Bloodlust.avi
Vampire.Hunter.D.mkv

movies\asian\anime\series

Aria
Armitage_III
Azumanga_Daiou
Bartender
Bubblegum
Cowboy_BeBop
Cromartie_High_School
Denno Coil (2007)
Ergo_Proxy
Eve_no_Jikan
FLCL
Ghost_Hound
GitS
Gunslinger_Girl
Kimi_ni_Todoke
Madoka
Mushishi
Neon_Genesis_Evangelion
Nichijou
Patema
Planetes
Psycho_Pass
Samurai_Champloo
Serial_Experiments_Lain
Shigofumi
Sketchbook_full_color
Sora_no_Woto
Starship_Troopers
Tengen_Toppa_Gurren_Lagann
Urusei_Yatsura
Welcome_to_the_NHK!
Yojou-han_Shinwa_Taikei

movies\asian\general

Chungking Express (Wong Kar-Wai, 1994)
Lovely Rivals Full Movie.mp4
Suspect_X
Trainman

movies\asian\horror

Cult.(2013).mp4
Eat_The_Schoolgirl_(1997)
Ghost.Of.Oiwa,(1961).mp4
POV
Reincarnation.avi
Shutter
The_Cat
The_Host

Battle.Royale.avi
Battle.Royale.II.avi

Curse
Curse2
Grudge
Grudge2

Ringu_0_Birthday
Ringu_1
Ringu_2
Ringu_2.5
Sadako_3D

movies\asian\kung

Kung_Fu_Hustle
Master_Of_The_Flying_Guillotine_(1975)

movies\asian\weird

2046
Tetsuo-The.Ironman.avi

movies\gen

Hard.Candy.avi
Realtime.wmv
The.Night.of.the.Hunter.avi
The.Snowman.avi
The.Wizard.Of.Oz.avi
Thriller.-.A.Cruel.Picture.(1974).avi

movies\funny

Amelie.divx
Flight.of.The.Navigator.avi
Kick-Ass.2.avi
Kick-Ass.m4v
Kung.Pow.avi
Napoleon.Dynamite.avi
Passport.to.Pimlico.avi
Scott.Pilgrim.Vs.The.World.m4v
Team.America.avi
The.Kentucky.Fried.Movie.avi
The.Substitute.flv

movies\horror

Creep.avi
Cronos.avi
Death.Line.avi
Dog.Soldiers.avi
Evil.dead.2.divx
Let.the.right.one.in.avi
Mask.divx
Razorback.mkv
Salo.avi
Severence.divx
The.Bone.Snatcher.avi
The.Call.Of.Cthulhu.avi
The.Thaw.avi
The_Legend_of_Hell_House

Daywatch (DVD)
Nightwatch (DVD)

Quatermass.and.the.Pit.(1967).avi
Quatermass.Xperiment.(1955).avi

Silent.Hill.avi
Silent.Hill.Revelations.avi

The.Descent.2.avi
The.Descent.avi

movies\gen

Betty.Blue.avi
Donnie Darko (The Directors Cut)
Funny.Games.divx
Le.Hane.divx
Slacker.avi
Sububia.divx
Wuthering Heights (1939).avi

movies\SiFi

A.Sound.Of.Thunder.avi
Android.avi
Chronicle
Elysium.mkv
Ender's.Game.avi
Inception.avi
Looper.avi
Moon.avi
Pacific.Rim.mp4
Primer.mp4
Prometheus.mp4
Red.Planet.divx
The.Andromeda.Strain.avi
The.City.of.Lost.Children.avi
The_Troll_Hunter
TRON.Legacy.avi
District 13.avi

A.V.P.divx
Predators.(2010).avi
Predator_2

(1).Cube.avi
(2).Cube.2-Hypercube.avi
(3).Cube.Zero.avi

Halo.Landfall.flv
Halo.Legends.mp4
Halo.Wars.flv
Halo_4_-_Forward_Unto_Dawn

Captain.America.avi
Dredd.mkv
Green Lantern - Emerald Knights (PSP, iPod, Zune)
Green Lantern [2011] Extended 480p BRrip x264 SmartGuy Silver RG
Iron Man 2 (PSP, iPod, Zune)
The.Avengers.mp4
The.Dark.Knight.avi
V.For.Vendetta.avi
Watchmen.divx
X-Men_First_Class

Dawn.of.the.Planet.of.the.Apes.avi
Rise.of.the.Planet.of.the.Apes.avi

The.Thing.(1982).mkv
The.Thing.(2011).avi
The.Thing.from.Another.World.(1951).avi

PirateBox dark theme

2014-08-04T19:55:00.003+00:00

Been working on a dark (live in your mom's basement) theme for the PirateBox.

Think this is better for the imageboard, reversed the background gradient .

CD album covers

2014-08-01T17:40:00.003+00:00

Ripping CDs recently and there were a few album covers that were hard to find with a google image search. So i dug out a crappy HP scanner i found on the street and scanned a few, in case anyone needs them.

7 Magazine - Buzz Chart CD:12 - Cat:70301

Out There (A Selection of the Weird and Wonderful from Warner Music)

Ministry Presents Sex Trax

Everything But The Girl - Walking Wounded (CD Single)

The Observer - Björk

Massive Attack - Protection - four track sampler from the forthcoming cd/tape/vinyl "protection"

Enjoy (:

i would be...

2013-09-10T22:13:00.002+00:00

Cool SciFi radio.

2013-09-10T21:42:00.002+00:00

A few Kindle screensavers

2012-10-29T00:07:00.000+00:00

Right-click / Save Link As...

Seems i like anime (:

Debian, beep when loaded.

2012-09-19T15:56:00.001+00:00

i screwed a PC to a plank and installed Debian minimum on it. It's headless, not in a closet but hanging on the wall next to me. i wanted a way to tell when Debian had loaded so i could SSH into it, so...

apt-get -y install beep

nano /etc/rc.local

Add beep -r 2 before exit 0

Done.

smbmount + Mobile LanDisk (External Net Storage)

2012-09-13T16:43:00.000+00:00

i needed a external USB HD enclosure and on a whim i got a very generic one from Maplin with NAS, why not. icabod very kindly made a blog post with a lot of info for those Googling it so i decided to make a post about how to mount it in Linux with smbmount. It does the job via USB no problem, but i wanted to use NAS.

It worked fine in Windows:

Login to LanDisk web interface (default IP 169.254.0.1 in browser, default username/password is admin/admin).
Click "SMB Server" and share a folder.
Click Status and make note of Host Name (something like Storage-1234).
In Windows make shortcut or map network drive to \\Storage-1234\SHAREFOLDERNAME (1234 will be different for you).
Easy.

Had a few problems mounting the SMB shared folder from Linux/Debian with smbmount. Kept getting:
mount error 5 = Input/output error
Refer to the mount.cifs(8) manual page (e.g.man mount.cifs)

To begin with, this is the command that worked:
smbmount //192.168.1.11/SHAREFOLDER /mnt/LanDisk -o nounix,noserverino,sec=none,rw
The nounix is what fixed it.

Everything on my network has a static IP so in the LanDisk web interface/IP Config i changed the IP to 192.168.1.11. Which means to login to the web interface i put 192.168.1.11 in my browser. i won't go into setting up your network IPs in this post but just make sure you know your LanDisk IP as it's easier than using the Host Name (Storage-1234) which wouldn't resolve for me.

Install Samba:
apt-get -y install smbfs

Make mount point:
mkdir /mnt/LanDisk

Mount with:
smbmount //192.168.1.11/SHAREFOLDER /mnt/LanDisk -o nounix,noserverino,sec=none,rw
(changing 192.168.1.11/SHAREFOLDER to the IP and share folder name you use)
*NOTE* sec=none if you didn't set a password in LanDisk web interface/SMB Server so you won't be prompted for a password. If you did set a password replace sec=none with password=YOURPASSWORD or just remove sec=none to be prompted for a password.

To mount at boot time:

Make mount point:
mkdir /mnt/LanDisk

Edit fstab:
nano /etc/fstab

Add:
//192.168.1.11/SHAREFOLDER /mnt/LanDisk smbfs rw,nounix,noserverino,user,noauto,sec=none 0 0

Mount with:
mount /mnt/LanDisk

Easy:
ls -a /mnt/LanDisk

Read/Write                                 rw
LanDisk don't do Unix:                 nounix
Client generates inode numbers: noserverino
Let users mount the LanDisk:              user
Network isn't up yet, LanDisk not on:     noauto

Hope this helps.

Fast (CLI) posting to twitter with cURL and identi.ca

2011-12-24T23:17:00.007+00:00

i got sick of not having a fast way to post to twitter. Twitter, it seems, doesn't like external programs posting anymore. i used to use Pwytter Portable but that seemed to have died. There is Echofon but that stopped working with twitter a while back and they didn't fix it for months, also it's a Firefox addon and the less things to slow down firefox the better.

i'm a bit of a joiner and when the micro-blogging thing was taking off i made an identi.ca account. It's just like twitter, maybe better, it's just twitter was the one to take off.

It is dead easy to add a twitter account in the identi.ca settings, so anything posted on identi.ca is cross posted to your twitter account, cool.

The reason i'm going on about identi.ca is i found this. You used to be able to post to twitter from all sorts of places but as they want you on the site (so they can advertise at you), they put a stop to most of them.

Make an identi.ca account, link it to your twitter account, get cURL (i used: Win32 7.23.1 binary SSL enabled Dirk Paehl), stick it in a folder:

Make post.cmd:

@echo off

color 0a

set /P tweet=Tweet what:

curl -u YourIdenticaUsername:YourIdenticaPassword -d status="%tweet%" http://identi.ca/api/statuses/update.xml

exit

As you can see, a simple batch file. The /P in

set /P tweet=Tweet what:

opens a prompt window:

assigning what you type in to tweet, it's then posted in: status="%tweet%"

Don't forget to change YourIdenticaUsername:YourIdenticaPassword to your identi.ca username and password.

It's fast, you don't have to open a browser, log on to any web-site or any of that crap. You have a thought, click the shortcut (linked to post.cmd), type what you want, press enter and BOOM! it's done, it takes seconds.

It's quick and dirty but i like it (:

My Dad's Dead Man

2011-07-21T13:04:00.002+00:00

i was recently forced into the company of humans for a while. This place is mandatory attendance for the unemployed and i had to sign in. Most times in front of the signing in book there was an unemployed person standing there trying to figure out how to write their name. i would wait patiently.

One day there was a man standing in front of the book, leaning on it, talking to the receptionist, he wasn't signing in. When i want a member of the human race to pay attention to those around it and maybe move aside so other human can pass, i ask politely, in not a loud voice but by no means a low voice, "excuse me". i never put aggression into it or weakness, i am simply asking a human to move aside for a moment in a firm but polite voice.

As this man wasn't signing in i said "Excuse me Sir", at that he raised the volume of his voice at the bit in his sentence where he said "...my father died" turning to look at me. Lighting fast the thought flashed into my mind *Good, then he can't breed any more retards like you*. i couldn't help but smile at this thought my brain had come up with and he said, "What are you laughing at?". He hadn't turned his body or anything, it was impotent rage. Thinking his dead dad gave him the power of entitlement. i just kept on smiling, didn't even look at him. Signed in (he had moved at this point, he actually moved straight away) smiling all the time and walked away to get coffee.

i promises you there was no aggression in my voice or anything, i can make "Excuse me Sir" sound friendly but disinterested.

Later in the day i thought of a new superhero called "My Dad's Dead Man", his superpower, his dad died that day. Bank robbers holding hostages, police standoff, flying in he would land in front of the bank, cape flappin', and shout to the robbers, "MY DAD DIED TODAY, YOU MUST COME OUT WITH YOUR HANDS UP!". Drug deal gone wrong, machine guns blazing from both sides of a warehouse, he would land in the middle, both sides stop and like WTF? "MY DAD'S DEAD, YOU MUST GIVE YOURSELVES UP!".

Hell is other people - Sartre

+1 individual Blogger posts

2011-07-09T10:57:00.004+00:00

i did it, with help from WEBADO over at Google Webmaster Central.

Put this code in your byline:

<g:plusone size="small" count="false" href="<$BlogItemPermalinkURL$>"></g:plusone>

Put this code just before the close body tag, i originally put it in my head tag but that didn't seem to work:

Now your readers can +1 individual posts, pretty cool (:

EDIT: Silly me, forgot to put a link the the make your +1 button page.

Peter Amundsen gets out.

2011-06-18T01:26:00.002+00:00

Peter Amundsen, 57, will get out sometime this year. What will he make of this new world?

Chilled pad

2011-03-30T10:23:00.003+00:00

This post is really just a test to see if ping.fm is working.

Gypsy Unit

2011-03-09T14:49:00.002+00:00

A friend of mine is in this band (Kezza) and it's good shit.

Gypsy Unit

SoundCloud

get some.

a sound file

2009-10-01T06:04:00.005+00:00

Download (you know, the right-click thing)

Firefox: Foobar Controls for a dark theme

2009-08-07T23:33:00.008+00:00

i love the Foobar Controls add-on for Firefox by Ben Basson. As you can see from the above pic i like the dark themes. Although it's a cool add-on the buttons are a bit flat, this post will tell you how i got the dark theme 3D buttons for this add-on.

i did a Google search for dark foobar buttons and i found this: Foobar2000 Buttons by sawb (site), a nice set of dark theme buttons for foobar.

After installing the Foobar Controls add-on i had to change the buttons to go with my dark theme. As i had a set of cool dark buttons i looked in the add-on folder (C:\Documents and Settings\your user-name\Application Data\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\extensions\{weird number}\chrome\content\) and found foobar.png. It's a single pic with all the buttons on, cool all i had to do is change this pic... right?... no. The "Foobar2000 Buttons" were bigger than the ones in the foobar.png so this would need a bit of work.

Looking in foobar.css in the add-on folder i saw that it points too foobar.png and i realized i could use Stylish (or you could use your userChrome.css) to override this, cool. i fired up Photoshop and put the Foobar2000 Buttons on foobar.png all equally spaced out and saved it as foobar2.png:
(use this one if you want as i've done all the work (:, right-click/Save Link As...)

Put foobar2.png in the add-on folder, this is cool as you don't even have too change the original foobar.png, CSS is cool. An important note is when the Foobar Controls add-on updates you will need to put the foobar2.png back in the add-on folder as updating deletes it, as we are using Stylish to use this png the update doesn't effect the code. This is the code i put in a new style in Stylish:

@namespace url(http://www.mozilla.org/keymaster/gatekeeper/there.is.only.xul);

/* foobar controls - modz */
.foobarcontrol{list-style-image:url("chrome://foobar/content/foobar2.png")!important;}
#foobar_prev,#foobar_next,#foobar_play,#foobar_stop,#foobar_paus,#foobar_rand,#toolbar-menubar image{padding:0!important;margin:0!important;border:0!important;}
#foobar_prev:hover,#foobar_next:hover,#foobar_play:hover,#foobar_stop:hover,#foobar_paus:hover,#foobar_rand:hover{background-color:#aaa!important;}
#foobar_stop,#foobar_stop_item{-moz-image-region:rect(1px 19px 17px 3px)!important;}
#foobar_stop:hover,#foobar_stop[checked="true"]{-moz-image-region:rect(1px 19px 17px 3px)!important;}
#foobar_paus{-moz-image-region:rect(1px 41px 17px 25px)!important;}
#foobar_paus:hover,#foobar_paus[checked="true"]{-moz-image-region:rect(1px 41px 17px 25px)!important;}
#foobar_play{-moz-image-region:rect(1px 64px 17px 46px)!important;}
#foobar_play:hover,#foobar_play[checked="true"]{-moz-image-region:rect(1px 64px 17px 46px)!important;}
#foobar_prev{-moz-image-region:rect(1px 86px 17px 69px)!important;}
#foobar_prev:hover,#foobar_prev[checked="true"]{-moz-image-region:rect(1px 86px 17px 69px)!important;}
#foobar_next{-moz-image-region:rect(1px 108px 17px 91px)!important;}
#foobar_next:hover,#foobar_next[checked="true"]{-moz-image-region:rect(1px 108px 17px 91px)!important;}
#foobar_rand{-moz-image-region:rect(1px 130px 17px 114px)!important;}
#foobar_rand:hover,#foobar_rand[checked="true"]{-moz-image-region:rect(1px 130px 17px 114px)!important;}

Through trial & error i discovered i just had too add 4 to a few pixel values to accommodate the larger buttons, you can use this code, if it works cool, if not just play with numbers until it looks good, it's not hard.

recap:
download foobar2.png
put in add-on folder
put code in Stylish
have cool looking dark foobar controls
(:

Firefox Lock-down

2009-07-10T02:34:00.010+00:00

Zapping around the internet these days is nasty business, you have to assume every site you visit wants to track you (or help their partners track you) or infect your PC. Here are a few things i do to make my FF a bit more secure and private:

NoScript

Of course the first one is the great NoScript, you know what it is. Doesn't allow sites to run java-scripts unless you allow them. Simple and it works.

CookieSafe

CookieSafe is the NoScript for cookies, no site is allowed to place cookies on your PC unless you allow them. A lot of companies track your browsing habits though the use of cookies and partner companies web-sites. They say they profile you to better serve you ads but who knows what they do with these profiles of you.

i have come across a few sites that do not work unless you let them place a cookie on your PC, they go into a weird loop where as soon as you arrive at the site your browser is redirected to a "no cookie" script which then redirects to another page (probably because you haven't allowed scripts for this site) which then loops back to the no cookie page, it is stupid to see. Any site that forces you to accept a cookie just to view the site is dodgy.

If you join a site, say... You Tube then of course you are going to let YT put a cookie on ya PC, it's how it knows it's you when you log on, but just to look at a site (not join) then it wrong. Whenever i get to a site like that (cookie needed just to view site) i stop, copy the URL and put it in my hosts file thereby making it impossible for my PC to ever go to that site again (more on the hosts file later).

BetterPrivacy

This is where cookies get really nasty, in XP look in: "C:\Documents and Settings\your user-name\Application Data\Macromedia\Flash Player\#SharedObjects\random code\", oh look cookies, WTF are these (other locations here). These are flash cookies or "Local Shared Object" (that's a nice name isn't it). These are cookies that any site that uses flash can put on your PC, i only found out about these recently and i was shocked, all this time i was blocking HTTP cookies and every site with flash on (and some without flash) were planting these cookies all up in my PC.

Just as i started this post i went to PortableApps for a little look at what was going on over there, funny new app, Billy Mays Caps Lock 1.0, lol cool, on that page that was a link to John T. Hallers blog. On his blog i found this, Warning: AddThis Puts Flash Tracking Objects on Your Website. You have got to be kidding me, i use AddThis (it's the little icon down there below this post with the plus sign on), well i used to, that icon used to be red, now it's blue because i now use AddToAny instead of AddThis. ClearSpring bought AddThis and used it (it is java-script after all) to plant LSOs (Local Shared Objects/flash cookies) on the PCs of anyone who visits a web-site using the AddThis widget. It is a coincidence that on the very day i start to make a post about how nasty flash cookies are i find out my own blog has been planting them on peoples PCs without my knowledge, ClearSpring are worms.

Anyway back the the subject, BetterPrivacy dose not, like CookieSafe, block LSOs, it lets flash cookies get planted. What it does is delete those cookies when you open/close Firefox. Unless these cookies stay on your PC permanently they are useless (:

Man, i am so pissed off about ClearSpring/AddThis. Seriously, ClearSpring are fucking dodgy cunts.

RefControl

i like this one. When you go to a web-site it knows what site you came from by using the HTTP referrer header. This could be use to track you browsing habits by a site.

RefControl lets you set which site the site you visit thinks you came from, i set mine to the Wikipedia Referrer spoofing page so now every site i visit thinks i came from that page :D

It can break on some sites but RefControl let you set sites you trust to see the normal referrer.

Stylish + Ad Blocking FiltersetP

i don't use Adblock Plus as i always have Stylish installed and Ad Blocking FiltersetP does the same job without the overhead of having another add-on installed.

SSL Blacklist

This one just informs you if a site uses the unsafe MD5 algorithm for RSA signatures.

hosts file

Not really Firefox but the hosts file is a useful little chap, in XP it is in: c:\windows\system32\drivers\etc\. As you know all site have a IP address. When you put www.google.com into your browser it uses DNS to tell which IP address is associated with www.google.com.

It used to use the hosts file (when the internet wasn't that big that all the web-site addresses could fit in a text file). Your browser still looks at your hosts file first before DNS. If you haven't edited it it should just have: 127.0.0.1 localhost (this is your PC and you shouldn't mess with this line). 0.0.0.0 is an invalid IP address so if i put: 0.0.0.0 www.google.com in the hosts file and typed www.google.com into Firefox it would look in the hosts file (before DNS) and see it as an invalid IP and not go there.

So you could put in something like: 0.0.0.0 ads.example.com, you can still go to www.example.com, Firefox just would not (could not) connect to their ad server so no ads. You can google around for lists of nasty sites to copy/paste into your hosts file.

It's hard work surfing the internet these days but i hope these few things make it a bit safer/private for you (:

All-in-One Sidebar

2009-06-14T13:38:00.001+00:00

If your All-in-One Sidebar disappears just go to
View > Toolbars > All-in-One Sidebar Toolbar
and it's back.

about:config tweeks i like to make

2009-05-26T15:28:00.010+00:00

Here's a few about:config hacks i like to do (typing about:config into the addressbar of Firefox and you will get to a page where you can change a lot of the FF preferences):

browser.xul.error_pages.enabled - true
When browsing a page with a lot of pix on it i usually middle click the pix (to open the pic in a new tab) to look at after i have read the page. If for some reason one of the pix fails to load FF snaps me to that tab with a dialog box, not just any dialog box but a modal dialog box. A Modal dialog box freezes FF until you click OK or something, very annoying. This setting changes it from a dialog box to an error page, more importantly it doesn't snap you from the page (tab) you are on to the error tab so you can go on reading the page you are on even if a pic didn't load.

extensions.newAddons - false (right-click and make this Boolean preference if it is not there, it probably won't be there)
This one stops the add-on manger popping up after you restart after installing an add-on. So annoying, "Yes Firefox, i know i just installed an add-on, thank you very much".

browser.tabs.closeButtons - 2
This one takes the close (X) off the tabs. i middle-click (scroll wheel) links to open them in a new tab and i middle-click the tabs to close them, i don't need the X.

browser.tabs.tabMinWidth - 72
The default for this one is 100. It sets how small the tabs can be (in pixels) before scroll arrows appear on the right of the tab bar. The add-on FaviconizeTab helps here as you can set it to shrink certain site tabs down to the favicon, a lot of sites don't give very useful information in the tab text so shrinking them down to just the icon saves space.

noscript.firstRunRedirection - false
Stops the page loading after a NoScript update. There was quite a little war about this recently.

view_source.editor.external - true
and then...
view_source.editor.path - V:\PortableApps\Notepad++Portable\Notepad++Portable.exe
Set to true then specify the path to the editor you want to use when you right-click/View Page Source on a web-page.
As i run my FF portable always from a truecrypt container mounted to the V:\ drive i set my path to the very cool Notepad++, you can set it to whatever editor you would like to use.

browser.urlbar.maxRichResults - 0 (default = 12)
Turns the "awesome bar" off. Whenever i try to change anything in the URL bar my FF freezes and the HD start working hard, this is the awesome bar doing it's thing. The first thing i do with a new FF install is remove the search toolbar as i use Quicksearches so i type in the URL bar a lot and the awesome bar freeze is very annoying.

This post is also a reference for me. i have been using the same install of FF for about two years now because it is portable and i can just copy it around to new PCs. If i ever did need to make a new FF install it's nice to have a place to reference all the tweeks i made, these are my main ones.