Managing multiple email accounts with Thunderbird

If you are like me , then you probably have more than one email account.  And really, who doesn't these days.  You may even have more than one Gmail account, which can be hard to manage unless you have multiple sign in enabled in you Gmail settings.  But by far the easiest way to manage all of your email accounts in one place is with Thunderbird.  Thunderbird is an email client by Mozilla, the makers of Firefox.

Whether you run Windows, Mac or Linux, Thunderbird will work for you.  The newest version of T-Bird makes setting up accounts really easy.  You don't have to enter the name of your email servers anymore.  When you go to make an account, it will ask for your name, email address, and password.  Thunderbird figures out all the rest and finishes setting up you accounts.  It also has a feature called unified folders.  This  lets you view all your in-boxes, sent mail, trash, and archived mail from all your accounts together.  Of course you can still view them separately if you prefer.  Another handy feature of T-bird is the search feature.  Most other email clients have the search buried in some menu, but T-bird puts it right on the main page where it's easy to get to.  You also don't need to choose filters anymore before searching.  And, just like Firefox, Thunderbird has an extensive library of extensions if the vanilla program doesn't do everything you need it to do.  There are lots of extensions which add all sorts of functionality, including calendars, contact management, and news reading.  I use the Zindus contact sync extension to synchronize my contacts back and forth between my Gmail accounts.  This is useful when I have to log into the Gmail website from another computer, because all of my Thunderbird contacts will show up in Gmail.  Of course, these are just a few noteworthy features of Thunderbird, but there are many more.

If you are looking for a better way to read your email, try Thunderbird.   It is available here at Mozilla's website.

Catalyst 11.1 Drivers now available for ATI/AMD video cards

The long wait is finally over, as AMD has released its new Catalyst 11.1 driver.  This driver brings native Linux support for the Radeon 6xxx series.  Sadly, my card still does not seem to be recognized by the driver properly.  I will have to do some digging in order to find out what is wrong here.  The driver also offers performance improvements on Left 4 Dead 2 on the Radeon 6xxx series under Windows, although I have not been able to confirm this yet.  As soon as I get a reason to boot back into Windows, I will get some performance numbers.  Download the new driver here if you have an ATI/AMD card.

Strange New Worlds

No, I am not talking about exploring outer space or visiting alien planets.  What I am referring to is the world of open source software, and more specifically, Linux.
I had previously rejected Linux as being a viable replacement for an everyday desktop operation system, but now that I have been using it for a while, I realize just how wrong I was.  Windows fanboys will claim that the average user won't like Linux because the average user does not want to use a command line.  Or because it doesn't run their favorite programs.  The thing is, the average user doesn't have to use a command line, and Linux doesn't have to run their favorite programs.

Wifi Hacking Part 1: Breaking WEP keys

In a previous post, I mentioned that I would provide tutorials for some of the things I am learning to do.  It has been said that one of the best ways to learn something is to teach it.  Today I will demonstrate how to crack a WEP key for the purpose of gaining access to a WEP protected wireless network.

Note:  This tutorial is intended for educational purposes only.  I do not encourage nor endorse the use of these tools for malicious or illegal use.  Do not go steal your neighbors wifi!

To perform this the operations detailed in this tutorial you will need the following:

• A compatible wireless adapter.  I use the TP-Link TL-WN321G.  It's only ten bucks and works out-of-the-box with Linux.
• Aircrack-ng suite--  This comes preinstalled on BackTrack 4, or can be acquired on Ubuntu by typing sudo apt-get install aircrack-ng
• A wireless network to perform these "attacks" on i.e. one that you own or have permission to use.
• GNU Macchanger-- also preinstalled on BT4 or can be aquired on ubuntu by typing sudo apt-get install macchanger
• A computer running some flavor of Linux.  Either the aforementioned Backtrack or ubuntu will work just fine.  Others will also work, but those are the two I have used.

The Most Powerful Security Tool

Judging from the title of this post, one may presume that I am going to recommend some great new anti-virus software, firewall, or password manager. But that presumption would be incorrect. What most folks do not realize is that the best security tool available is free and can be used by anyone. I am talking about knowledge. The best way to protect yourself and your data is to educate yourself about the tactics used by attackers.

Too many people believe that they are secure just because they have a piece of software installed that said "Protects from viruses and hackers" on the back or the box. The problem here is, that most of the real cyber-security threats today do not exploit computer code, but rather exploit a user's lack of knowledge. It is these social engineering threats that one must be aware of. Scams in the form of phishing emails are the most prominent example of this. Do not click links in emails from people you don't know. Do not click on those "videos" that a "friend" posts on your Facebook wall asking you to download a special video player. I think you get the idea. When in doubt, do not click.

Another extremely dangerous threat and all-too-common threat to the user, is the user itself. Too many times do people use the same password for every website that they create an account at, and too often is it some easily guessable piece of information, such as a pet's name, phone number, or birthday. Creating good strong passwords is an excellent place to start for anyone looking to increase security. For example, anyone who has had their Facebook, YouTube, Myspace, or email accounts hacked, probably used a poor password made of readily available personal information. A good rule of thumb is that any password should be at least eight characters long, and should contain at least one number, punctuation and uppercase letter. Skimping on password strength is the easiest and most surefire way to get yourself "hacked."

Please take this advice into consideration next time you get a strange looking email, or need to create a new online account. Don't expect some piece of software or some company to save your cyber-bacon. Just remember that it is up to you to make sure your digital assets are protected.

Hacking to Learn

These days the word hacker carries a negative connotation for most people. Whether its a misconception caused by the mainstream media, or an individual's own experience with data theft, most non-geeks think of hackers as being some kind of criminals. While it may be true that there are some hackers out there that use their skills for personal gain, most geeks like myself see hacking in a different way.

For the non-criminal geeks, hacking is something to be taken as a challenge to prove one's skills. Knowing how to crack a WEP key for someone's wireless network can be used for both good and bad. Of course you could leech Wi-Fi from your neighbors, but the opposite argument also applies. You could instead use your skills to show your neighbors that they have a security issue, and that you can fix it for them. That is the essence of offensive security. In order to be able to defend a system from penetration, one must know what that system's vulnerabilities are. Consider this. Most people believe that their houses are secure, but if locked out of their own houses, could probably find a way in. The same principle applies to network security.

I have taken it upon myself to learn this other side of security, and have been coming along with it within the last few weeks. I have already learned how to crack WEP using aircrack-ng on Linux and am currently tackling WPA cracking. If you are a geek and have an interest in learning these tools, I encourage you to use them for good. Backtrack 4 is the best way to start, as it contains almost every cracking, hacking, and penetration tool one would ever need. Please don't hack anyone's networks without permission, or sniff passwords at a coffee shop, because both of these could land you some jail time.

I will write follow-up articles, and possibly tutorials on how to use these tools, so please continue to follow my blog if you are interested.

An Analogy to Explain Computers to Novices

Imagine that the inside of you computer is an office cubicle. The office cubicle has a few items of interest. In the office sits a desk, a file cabinet, an office worker seated in a chair, and a special fax machine. First of all, the file cabinet represents your hard drive. This is where all information is stored. The desk represents the memory or RAM of your computer. This is where all the files currently in use are at. Next, the office worker represents the CPU of your computer. He is the one that does all the real work around here. And lastly, the special fax machine represnts a graphics card. When the boss needs to see something, the worker puts a paper on the fax machine and it comes out on the other end of the line as a picture.

Cranking up the heat

It has been quite a while for me, but I have finally got my computer back to running Folding@Home. Folding@Home (F@H or Folding for short), is a distributed computing project maintained by Stanford University, which benefits disease research. The program uses you CPU or graphics card to simulate protein folding, hence the name. Anyways, I recently purchased an Nvidia 8600 GTS graphics card from a friend. While I current graphics card is faster than the 8600, I intended to use them in tandem for different purposes. My faster ATI card drives my displays that I uses for games and work, and the 8600 runs Folding non-stop. This gives me the advantage of using a graphics card for Folding, which is faster than regular CPU folding, but at the same time be able to do all of my normal work without lagging. Although I could settle for the 1800 points per day that my graphics card can manage alone, I don't want to. In a quest for more folding power, I have created two virtual machines running Ubuntu Linux to run on my ultra-fast CPU. You may ask, why go with virtual machines? Isn't that slower than running a program natively? Yes and no. In this case, I choose to run the Folding client in Linux because the Linux version can make use of more efficient F@H (a2) cores which are much faster. However running the a2 cores in a virtual machine is slower than running them on an actual Linux machine. Now when I fire up both virtual machines and the GPU core, I can fold about 6000 points per day. With all those processors running, I end up with a lot of heat. My 8600 GTS card averages 70C folding, and my Core i7 CPU averages about 58C.

Arnold Schwarzenegger Research Paper

I have just finished writing a research paper on Arnold Schwarzenegger. The topic of the paper is how an athlete, in my case Arnold Schwarzenegger, has contributed to society. Now that it is finalized, I have chosen to release the paper under Creative Commons licensing. It is free for the taking, modification and publication. The paper in PDF format can be found here. The Open Office Document format can be downloaded here. They will also be found under the files link on my blog.



Arnold Schwarzenegger by Benjamin Daschel is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 United States License.
Based on a work at dl.dropbox.com.

Links to machinima...Finally

Here is the link to part One.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SIw6eDwot0I
And the Link to part two.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KuL0O_z-c5E

New Machinima Series

What started as a class project, has now been poised to become a machinima mini series. Most likely to be the purpose of my blog from now on, is to post links and director commentary about my videos. This video series is called Deception. Episode One starts out with the introduction of the main character in an unfortunate way. He and his team have been sent to an alien planet to ambush a convoy. However, they are attacked, and his team is killed. He is able to get away. Then, the episode becomes a recap of the events leading up to the original mission. After the purpose of the original mission is revealed, the episode switches back to the present to show the protagonist getting away. But he stumbles upon a strange something...
[edit] The original post failed because it was too long sorry. Re posting with two separate videos should do the trick. I will post links when they are both up.

Core i7 photos

Here are a few photos of my recent core i7 build. I know that the cable routing is pretty messy, so I don't want to hear about it.

Upgrading to Core i7

Nearly two years ago I bought myself a gaming computer. Since then, I have been upgrading it here and there. I finally decided that the single core gaming computer was outdated and that it was time to move up. So I bought myself a Core i7 920 processor, an Asus P6T motherboard, 6 gigabytes of DDR3 1333, and a Cooler Master Cosmos case. I recycled the power supply, graphics card, hard drives, and the optical drives from the old computer and used them in the new build. Later I will post some pictures and possibly some benchmarks from the new box.

ATI Now Offering Radeon Drivers for Windows 7 Beta

Recently, ATI has released a Windows 7 specific driver package for Radeon graphics cards. The download includes the Catalyst control center and the driver version 9.3 . They are also offering a 64 bit version in case you have an x64 edition of Windows 7 beta like myself. Download at http://game.amd.com/us-en/drivers_catalyst.aspx. Keep in mind of course that along with a beta operating system comes pre-release drivers.

Firefox 3.1 beta 2

I enjoy beta testing new software, especially when it is something that I might actually use. That is why I got the latest beta version of Firefox. There have been a few changes under the hood, but the only noticeable change to me is the private browsing feature. When this is enables, history, forms, and searches will not be saved. If you already have Firefox, installing the beta is great. It loads your bookmarks, history, and compatible add-ons and themes from previous Firefox versions. If you want to try out some new cutting edge browser, but don't want to stray to far into the unknown, consider the Firefox 3.1 beta.