Buy online @ your own risk?

Over recent years buying online has become a popular alternative to wandering down to the local shops. Not only do you often see substantial discounts and have goods delivered to your front-door, but you also save on shoe-leather and valuable travelling time. There  is of course a downside for shops, but what the hell, buying online is the future … isn’t it? (more…)

So why do I want an xPad?

Yes indeed, why do you? The answer; usually because of all the marketing hype! That’s not to say however that the hype has no substance! (more…)

Android Invasion

So I guess the big product news story of this year has be to the tablet ‘coming of age’, notably in the form of the ‘iPad’. Everybody seems to want one, not everybody is sure why they want one, but they want one anyway.
Indeed it’s been said that people don’t actually want a tablet, what they actually want is an ‘iPad’, the layers of ignorance compounding ignorance are almost unbelievable.
Obviously there are other tablets out there, but Apple’s marketing has done it’s work and selling anything other than an ‘iPad’ seems a little difficult, to the extent competitors seem in many cases to be slashing prices .. which is good if you know what a tablet is and why you want one. (more…)

Linux, the US DoD, and Online Banking

The US. Department of Defence (DoD) has seen the benefits of a Linux LiveCD for secure connections from non-secure computers… ie. when browsing the internet from home or public access PC’s, and have released the Lightweight Portable Security LiveCD/LiveUSB based distribution for this purpose.

Lightweight Portable Security (LPS) is part of the Anti-Tamper Software Protection Initiative (ATSPI)… the DoD Anti-Tamper introduction webpage carries the official seals of the US Department Of Defense, the  US Air Force Research Laboratory, and the Anti-Tamper Software Protection Initiative.

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Big Red earns it’s new name …

Over the years IBM has acquired the nickname “big blue”, although the theories as to why this is the case vary somewhat.

In recent times however, it’s not so difficult to see how Oracle’s came by it’s new nickname, and it’s no reference to “Hell Boy” (after all, “Hell Boy” is generally seen as a bit of a hero!)

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Building a Beast!

This is another step in my evolutionary quest to build Linux based server from cost-effective generic components that can rival the performance of some of the best expensive commercial systems on the market.

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Double your RAID1!

Over the years I’ve tended to prefer RAID5 as this has always seemed to be the recommended solution when it comes to combining resilience and speed, however recently, with larger less reliable drives I have noticed a few problems with RAID5. While looking at these problems, I’ve also noticed RAID5 is no longer the recommended solution!

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eCrime Wales!

Did you know that Wales is a World leader in the fight against eCrime?! Today was their annual conference and there were some real gem’s to be had, and all at a bargain price for the tax-payer!

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Tip: building from source

Ever reached a point where you simply have to compile a given application from source, but you find that to compile it you need all sorts of libraries that aren’t installed on your system? Do you then find you’ve no idea which packages contain all the libraries you want?

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