These are my links for July 25th through August 10th:

• Social Plugins – Facebook Developers –
• Matt Damon’s 5 Best Unscripted Political Moments | Pajiba: Reviews, News, Quotes & Cultural Commentary –
• WEB BROWSER COLOR MANAGEMENT Tutorial –
• Mizar – Self sufficient dental care –
• Magic Lantern Firmware Wiki –
• The Mission to Get Osama Bin Laden –
• Developer’s Guide – Google App Engine – Google Code –
• AMD OpenCL™ Coding Competition – zero copy buffers
• Bitcoin P2P Virtual Currency –
• Allied Star Police – Owain’s Wish – Owain Weinert designed this game with the help of Popcap and Make-Wish foundation.
• OSX Lion connection error with Time Machine fix –
• Telnet Console for netgear –
• The Hot Violinist –

These are my links for May 10th through June 4th:

• AOJ Outdoors Tip – Eliminate Yellow Jackets With This Non-Toxic Homemade Yellow Jacket Trap! –
• Regrets of the Dying –
• The "How-to" for making an Arduino controlled smoker –
• Zuckerberg goes on a diet: Only meat he eats is what he kills – San Jose Mercury News – They all want to learn how to do it; they want to come in and watch us cut it up, because I think these days people who have the means to kill their own food want to see exactly what they're eating
• China used prisoners in lucrative internet gaming work –
• Confirmed: Google Wallet NFC payment system launches tomorrow, retail partners in tow –
• Banks launch clearXchange transfer system to rival PayPal –
• The Highly Sensitive Person –
• Roll a D6 – This is a spoof music video of ;Like a G6" by Far East Movement.
• Eternal Earth-Bound Pets –
• Everyday, No Days Off – Gun Blog –
• Linux Commando: How to disable SSH host key checking –
• KnifeKits.com Designer Knife Kits – Knife Making Supplies – Sheath and Holster Making Supplies –
• Grinder – getting started –
• Far Horizon Traders Home Page –

These are my links for April 19th through May 7th:

• Missing The Point: It Doesn’t Matter If Torture “Works” –
• Transistors go 3D as Intel re-invents the microchip –
• DSLR Mirror Lock-Up – Worth the Effort or Not? –
• Take Shape For Life –
• A Keyboard and a .45 –
• Oleg Volk Photography –
• CrimeReportSearch –
• The First Zombie-Proof House –
• OOSChecker: The Ultimate iPad2 Treasure Hunter –
• Affordable Weekend Getaways and Vacations – LivingSocial –
• Texas3006.com –
• Corps Lakes Gateway: Texas –
• Lily Ponds Cottage – New Ulm, Texas –
• Google Encrypted Search –
• Portal 2 and Steam on PlayStation®3 –

These are my links for February 25th through March 12th:

• GT Distributors – America’s Law Enforcement supply specialist –
• Dihydrogen Monoxide Dangerous! –
• Belts by The Belt Man –
• 1930 Art Deco Henderson –
• SIG forum –
• Garrison Brothers Distillery Texas Bourbon –
• Proposed Cuts Strike Teachers as Attacks on Their Value to Society – NYTimes.com –
• Gun Safes | Home Gun Safe | GunVault –
• STARSHIP PEGASUS :: SPACE AGE FUN FOR THE ENTIRE FAMILY! –
• Monolithic — Home of the Monolithic Dome –
• Hand-Guns –
• SCP into Theory workstations from outside –
• Simple howtos –
• TxDPS – Applicant Fingerprinting Services –
• Mount&Blade/Companions –

These are my links for August 18th through August 19th:

• How to Interview a Programmer –
• Getting the Interview Phone Screen Right –
• Microsoft Interview Questions –
• Intel agrees to buy McAfee, decides that security matters –
• Steam Game Performance Improvements in Latest Mac OS X Update –

Apple fanatics have one less tic mark to their list of all that is good.

Linux fanbois can continue their chest pumping, however.

Apple users tend to be a fanatical lot, often expressing their choice in pre-fabricated computing platforms as if it were a religious experience. There is no sense running down comparisons or arguing any points, it’d be just like arguing religion or politics.  This is really odd considering it is just an electronic device. Even if it comes in a pure white candy shell.

One of the common things to hear supporting the halo around Apple is that “Macs don’t have viruses”.  Apple even proclaims it in one of their Mac vs. PC ads, and on their website. Of course, this is false, but don’t try explaining that.  They also state that because they use a Unix base for Mac OS X, that there are little to no vulnerabilities.

But Thursday, in an international security conference called CanSecWest in Canada, there was a little hacking competition waged. The “PWN 2 OWN” competition featured a $10000 grand prize to hack into a laptop and steal a file. First one wins. Charlie Miller did it in 2 minutes.

The machine was running the latest Mac OS X version with all security patches. Due to agreements at the conference, the way he hacked it will not be revealed until after Apple has been fully notified of the breach. But the contest had stipulations that the contestant could only use software pre-installed on the system.  So, the likely vulnerability was Apple’s Safari web browser.

The thing is, he could have gone after any OS, as the three laptops offered for exploiting were one each of the Mac OS X, Windows Vista, and Ubuntu Linux varieties. Why did Miller choose to target the Mac? Because it was the easiest.

• What are your obsolete gaming skills? » Has the advance of time rendered any of your videogame abilities redundant?
• Lest We Remember: Cold Boot Attacks on Encryption Keys » Contrary to popular assumption, DRAMs used in most modern computers retain their contents for seconds to minutes after power is lost, even at operating temperatures and even if removed from a motherboard.
• ‘Perry Bible Fellowship’ Comic Is Ending »
• Google Lunar Xprize » Google is offering $30 million to the first people to put a robot on the moon.
• Portal 2 Confirmed » On tonight’s episode of X-Play, lead designer for Portal, Kimberly Swift, confirmed that there will be a Portal 2. Video of interview at the link.
• Gene research may help explain autistic savants » Mice lacking a certain brain protein learn some tasks better but also forget faster, according to new research from MIT that may explain the phenomenon of autistic savants in humans.
• Austin Czech Historical Association »
• Self-healing rubber bounces back » A material that is able to self-repair even when it is sliced in two has been invented by French researchers.
• GetByMail » Remote Access & File Sharing by Mail
• Making your windows folder smaller!  »
• LitePC Technologies » trim Windows operating systems
• HDDVD is Dead – Toshiba Press Release » Toshiba Corporation today announced that it has undertaken a thorough review of its overall strategy for HD DVD and has decided it will no longer develop, manufacture and market HD DVD players and recorders.
• Samuel Adams Hop Sharing Program » Samuel Adams beer is selling their hops to microbrewers at just above their cost, to help alleviate the strain of the hop shortage on microbreweries.

• Lux Bakery & Cafe » New Cafe that took over the space of Chooby Doo in Austin. I haven’t tried it yet, but I just noticed it last week.
• eEye Digital Security »
• WP 2.3 Related Posts « WordPress Plugins »
• Firefox 3 Beta 1 now available for download »
• Hackers Use Banner Ads on Major Sites to Hijack Your PC »
• Privacy Rights Clearinghouse »
• Joopz » free web to phone to web text messaging

Microsoft unleashed a suite of critical patches today for Windows XP and Office. Four for the former and two for the latter. They fix some potentially nasty security vulnerabilities. Probably ones that weren’t widely known about, but that everyone knows about now. So patch up people, and keep your system from becoming a zombie box.

If you are a non-IE user (like me), a great way to patch is to use WindizUpdate. Yeah, it sounds kinda hokey and the site almost makes it look like a bait for virii, but I’ve heard enough about the site to feel reasonably safe about using it (although, I accept no responsibility for anyone that chooses to use it). They have a small plugin you download and then you can use their site to download all the windows updates and install them automagically. This also allows you to ignore Microsoft WGA stuffs that borders on spyware.