yon Leveron blog

remote port forwarding

John — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 03:36:42 +0000

This is an interesting VPN concept, perhaps to allow you to run a home https web server, but to make your content available to users stuck behind the Great Firewall, etc.

https://blog.perfect-privacy.com/2009/06/30/perfect-privacy-remote-port-forwarding/

Though from long work in the security arena, keep in mind that “no solution is 100%” . . .

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Now playing: Godsmack – Whatever
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PuSHPress for wordpress.org

John — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 06:07:55 +0000

PuSHPress: A PubSubHubbub Plugin For WordPress

Posted in 3 Mar 2010 9:49 am Joseph Scott

PubSubHubbub, or PuSH, is now supported on all WordPress.com blogs. For those running sites using the WordPress.org software the PuSHPress plugin is available to do the same thing. The big difference in this plugin compared to the other PuSH WordPress plugins is that it includes a PuSH hub built in.

A little bit of PubSubHubbub background

Like rssCloud, PuSH adds a line to your feed to let clients know where they can send PuSH subscription requests. In the RSS2 feed this looks like . . .

(c.f. http://josephscott.org/archives/2010/03/pushpress-a-pubsubhubbub-plugin-for-wordpress/ for the rest of the good news )

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Now playing: The Beatles – Sie Leibt Dich
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pretty cool micro-torrent

John — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 08:24:19 +0000

µTorrent for USB

a (very) tiny BitTorrent client on a (very) tiny USB

µTorrent for USB combines a special edition of the world’s most popular BitTorrent client on a tiny microSD powered USB for ultimate portability and convenience.

No installation required

μTorrent for USB is a pre-installed special edition of µTorrent that runs directly from the USB. There’s no installation or administrative privileges required to use the client.

Self contained downloads

All application files (µTorrent executable, configuration files, temporary files) and file downloads (torrents, data files) stay on the USB, not on the host PC. In addition, there are no leftovers on the local hard drive or the Windows registry.

Transportable

µTorrent for USB is a fully portable torrent client that enables torrenting anywhere you go. Stop your download at any time and take the USB with you. Next time you are at a PC, just insert the USB and pick up where you left off. With µTorrent for USB, take your torrents anywhere you go – home, school, cafe, work.

Available NOW in 8GB or 16GB

Choose the size of USB that fits your lifestyle. Each USB is fully functional as a traditional storage drive with the added convenience of microSD. Downloaded content can be copied or backed-up to other disk and USB flash memory or its microSD card is compatible with many TVs, STBs, and mobile phones.

Product contents

USB Flash Memory drive adaptor
microSD flash memory card (8GB or 16GB)
Pre-installed µTorrent for USB application and configuration files

System Requirements

Windows XP, Vista or 7
For Macintosh, µTorrent will not work. You can use as USB memory.

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Now playing: Rollins Band – Liar
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back from the sick, the lame, and the lazy . . .

John — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 05:23:14 +0000

OK, severe bronchitis was not kind to me at all. This is still alive, I just had other issues to attend to. Ahem.

In that vein, I bring you The Specials.

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Now playing: The Specials – Enjoy Yourself
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Ramdisks live on – performance in Win7

John — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 17:45:49 +0000

Good bits, highly recommended ! A 10g ramdisk did wonder for my transcoding, since it was i/o bound from Raid 5, under Win7 x64.

http://memory.dataram.com/products-and-services/software/ramdisk “From DataRam”

Speed up Internet page load times
Control what files and programs are stored into memory (loaded at boot time)
Create temporary disks for added security
Speed up disk-to-disk activities such as video encryption and audio ripping
Accelerate databases
Reduce compile times

RAMDisk features:

Freeware version (up to 4 GB disk size). Please register with Dataram for larger disks (there is no charge).
Universal version for WindowsXP/2000, Vista (32 and 64-bit) Home Basic, Home Premium, Business and Ultimate, Windows Server 2003 Standard, Web and Enterprise Edition
Up to 32 GB disk in Vista and Windows 2003, 2008 Server (registered mode)
Save and load features allow RAMDisk to appear as persistent storage even through reboots
Supports Windows 7

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Now playing: Queen – Bohemian Rhapsody
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some new intel 32nm chips to support hardware AES acceleration

John — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 05:00:40 +0000

(this next bit can affect everything from certain web transactions, to VoIP, to full disk encryption . . .)

AES-NI Performance Analyzed; Limited To 32nm Core i5 CPUs

2:00 AM – 02/02/2010 by Patrick Schmid and Achim Roos

Security is an important topic these days. However, it’s typically only recognized as important by professionals. If security were to suddenly turn into a mainstream selling point, though, then perhaps it’d make more sense for companies like Intel to promote it.

The Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) has already been adopted by the United States government—including the NSA—along with many other institutions. Intel’s 32nm Clarkdale-based CPUs (only the Core i5-600-series, so far) now promise significant performance benefits for AES encryption and decryption via new instructions. Today we’re looking at the real-world benefits of Intel’s AES-NI functionality, comparing a dual-core Core i5-661 with AES New Instructions (AES-NI) to a quad-core Core i7-870, which lacks the new encryption acceleration capability.

Encryption is used much more intensively than you might suspect. Consider Internet sites that hold you sensitive personal information, or utilize sensitive data for transactions. They all use protocols like Transport Layer Security (TLS) or Secure Sockets Layer (SSL). VoIP, instant messaging, and email may also be protected with these protocols. Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) and electronic payments are other popular encryption applications.

However, TLS and SSL are cryptographic protocols for secure communication, while AES is a general-purpose encryption standard. It can be used to encrypt individual files, data containers, archive files, entire drives (including thumb drives), and even multi-drive volumes. AES can be implemented in software, and there are products based on hardware acceleration as well, since encryption/decryption represent a rather significant workload. Solutions like TrueCrypt or Microsoft’s BitLocker, which is part of Windows Vista and Windows 7 Ultimate, are capable of encrypting entire partitions on the fly.

(for the rest of the first page, and all the other pages, hit up Tom’s)

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Now playing: Men At Work – Crazy
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How to run your own SFTP server under Windows

John — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 04:11:07 +0000

Credit : Nicholas Fong, who also has many other helpful articles at his site.

For the latest version of his accumulated guide / information, please see the authentic SFTP server under Cygwin article at http://pigtail.net/LRP/printsrv/cygwin-sshd.html )

It worked fine for me in Windows 7 on the first shot. While I’d already been using Cygwin, the instructions were clear, though I did follow the Vista section at step 5. The version I used was dated November 18, 2009.

Good luck!

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Now playing: Disturbed – Down With The Sickness
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More cross platform crypto – javascript hashing functions

John — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 23:56:10 +0000

About

jsSHA is a JavaScript implementation of the entire family of SHA hashes as defined in FIPS 180-2 (SHA-1, SHA-224, SHA-256, SHA-384, and SHA-512) as well as HMAC. Despite JavaScript not natively supporting 64-bit operations, SHA-384 and SHA-512 are even implemented! jsSHA is also 100% cross-browser compatible.

jsSHA Security Blog

Got feedback on jsSHA? Want to read about how to use jsSHA? Check out the developer’s Blog and leave feedback!

Newest Release / Download

As of 22 July 2009, the newest release is v1.2 and can be found at SourceForge

Demos linked at end of this entry

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Now playing: Emerson Lake & Palmer – Peter Gunn
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Javascript for advanced functions

John — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 00:17:45 +0000

Pretty nifty use in javascript : http://point-at-infinity.org/jsaes/

Also nice : http://point-at-infinity.org/ssss/ and http://point-at-infinity.org/seccure/ (also both crypto related . . .)

N.B. I was sorely tempted to post an image relating to the futility of trying to contain crypto / ideas that was penned on flesh, in an image titled “howto-export-crypto-system-from-usa.jpg” (!)

But I resisted, as I try to keep this site friendly even to the most prudish families, etc.
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Now playing: System of a Down – BYOB (Bring your own Bombs)
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SSD upgrade for the desk

John — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 13:41:05 +0000

Upgrade a Desktop Machine to SSD : The Future Arrives

By William Van Winkle , published on January 22, 2010 at 3:10 PM

I relish making changes to my primary work PC only slightly more than dental surgery. Things can go wrong. My productivity vanishes. I’ll deal with work-arounds for months before cracking open my case for an upgrade.

And yet, I just published a story called “Can Bargain SSDs Give Windows A Quantum Performance Leap?” for Tom’s Hardware, and what I’d found when doing that story blew my mind. I was used to measuring Windows startup times in minutes, literally being able to make lunch in the time it took to go from power off to having all of my normal apps loaded. I built a similar configuration on my bench, placed it on Western Digital’s VelociRaptor (the fastest SATA hard drive around), and got a full load time of 65 seconds. Then I cloned the configuration to Kingston’s entry-level SSDNow V-Series SSD and saw the load time plummet to only 27 seconds. Feeling like Will Smith at the controls of some fresh alien tech, I hollered, “Oh, I have got to get my Windows 7 one of these!”

We heard a lot of off-the-record praise from readers after publishing our recent feature on laptop SSD upgrading. Experienced users tend to populate our forums, but those who have never done a hands-on system upgrade tend to hang out invisibly in the background and it seems they appreciated a step-by-step guide to the upgrading process. It’s primarily for this latter group that we’re returning now with a companion piece on how to take your desktop PC through the same process…only I’ve added a new twist, as you’ll see below . . .

(See the rest at Tom’s)
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Now playing: Neil Diamond – Shilo
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