Kosmix: The Ultimate Health Search

An Internet search engine for health matters, hope it stays clean of "truck toys" if you know what I mean.

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Chatters beware: Rootkit-Wom Hitting AOL's IM Network

Dubbed W32/Sdbot-ADD, the worm is being passed through instant messages within AOL chat rooms. FaceTime said it spreads when users clink on a message reading, "HILARIOUS!!!" or "See thing!!!", again, curiosity killed the cat.

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New use of technology: potty break tracking

Somebody thaught it would be great for the business if they keep track and control the break you take to go to the bathroom, well Ford said yes to that but Chrysler no. Is 19th century all over.

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Cool Halloween graphic adventure

This adventure a la maniac mansion will keep you busy for a little while. You can print the link on a card and pass it to the trick or treaters, anyhoo Happy Halloween.

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Payments with cell phones rocking Japan

No need for more plastic cards, Japanese cell phones with smart card chips handle your payments at major retail stores. Now, losing your phones have never been so critical.

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FREE Tron game

This is a great light cycles games based on Tron, it is full 3D and has network playing option.

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Halo 2 Hacks

Some examples of Halo 2 hacks from the book Halo 2 Hacks.

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Yahoo hacks

Seems just a few keep "yahooing", for those that still know the existense of Yahoo, here are some great hacks examples from the new book Yahoo hacks.

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Students put satellite into orbit

With the little help of a Russian booster rocket, some students put a washer machine size satellite into orbit. Free TV or INTERNET maybe in the future?, lets hope so.

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The Barcode Scanner made of LEGOS

Expanding the posibilities of all those gears and parts here you have another tutorial to put those LEGOS in use.

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Pac Man will have a voice on the next PSP game release

After so many years of pac-man namco has decided to give him a voice, what does he have to say after all these years?.

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Hackers resort to guerrilla tactics

Hackers are more likely to make regular, small-scale attacks on networks instead of trying to cause complete system shutdown, according to new research. Find more about this here.

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Need a job? Don't use a Mac

Ok before Mac users start flaming me read the article first, is kinda true if you don't work in the design and media areas.

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Jack-O-Lanterns stencils galore

Running out of ideas for this Halloween's Pumpkin?, here you have a lot of stencils that will appeal to most tastes, hobbies and politic opinions too.

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Finding the right girl ain't that easy

Else ask these couple of guys that created a funny video about it.

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Avoid remote controlled systems hacks US top priority

Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition or A.K.A. SCADA is a technology that is employed in many critical industries, some of those facilities can be accessed and controlled remotely and seems chances to cause doom like scenarios are very high, read about what the US is doing about this.

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Slot car with wirelesss video camera

Make your own too fast too furious video without risking time in prison, a camera and a slot car and you are good to go.

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HOW TO - Build a Flight Simulator Motion Cockpit

A cheap but great option to complement your M$ Flight Simulator. Is a $15 purchase but they give you 4 free chapters for you to try out.

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Funny video on evolution theory

So you want alternatives to the theory of evolution huh?, well here is the best (and funny) example.

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Create mayhem at your local cybercafe

Learn why wireless networking is not that secure after all, render images or messages on others browsers at your local cybercafe and watch their reaction with this great tutorial.

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My Jack-o-LED

See this guy doing a Jack-O-Lantern illuminated by LEDs.

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Build a flying ghost

This is something that will scare the kids at your door this halloween. Being something they don't see for sale at the stores surely will increase the fear factor.

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Sun building next generation of DRM

Sun wants to lead on the creation of new digital rights management technology. Read what their plans are and don't get caught by surprise.

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Track major airports activity on the web

A good resource of airports that show their current activity with a cool java applet.

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Google Tests its Reputed eBay Killer

Google purchases seems to be the name of the new service from Google.

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Boost your brain power at work

These are great tips on enhancing your creativity and potential to be more productive and acertive.

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The best signatures for your email or forum alter ego

You know how so many people try to look smart signing their emails and forum posts with smart people quotes, is time to beat them (or confuse them) on their own game with this wacky quotes from "famous" people.

(On September 17, 1994, Alabama's Heather Whitestone was selected as Miss America 1995.)

Question: If you could live forever, would you and why?

Answer: "I would not live forever, because we should not live forever, because if we were supposed to live forever, then we would live forever, but we cannot live orever, which is why I would not live forever,"

--Miss Alabama in the 1994 Miss USA contest.

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"Whenever I watch TV and see those poor starving kids all over the world, I can't help but cry. I mean I'd love to be skinny like that, but not with all those flies and death and stuff."

--Mariah Carey

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"Smoking kills. If you're killed, you've lost a very important part of your life,"

--Brooke Shields, during an interview to become Spokesperson for
federal anti-smoking campaign.

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"I've never had major knee surgery on any other part of my body,"

--Winston Bennett, University of Kentucky basketball forward.

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"Outside of the killings, Washington has one of the lowest crime rates in the country,"

--Mayor Marion Barry, Washington, DC.

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"I'm not going to have some reporters pawing through our papers. We are the president." (we are????)

--Hillary Clinton commenting on the release of subpoenaed documents.

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"That lowdown scoundrel deserves to be kicked to death by a jackass, and I'm just the one to do it,"

--A congressional candidate in Texas.

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"Half this game is ninety percent mental."

--Philadelphia Phillies manager, Danny Ozark

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"It isn't pollution that's harming the environment. It's the impurities in our air and water that are doing it."

--Al Gore, Vice President (DUH !) and he wanted to be
President!!!!!!!!!

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"I love California. I practically grew up in Phoenix." does he know where he almost grew up???.....

--Dan Quayle

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"We've got to pause and ask ourselves: How much clean air do we need?" (I say all we can get, I'll take his clean air)

--Lee Iacocca

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"The word "genius" isn't applicable in football. A genius is a guy like Norman Einstein." -

--Joe Theisman, NFL football quarterback & sports analyst.

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"We don't necessarily discriminate. We simply exclude certain types of people." (Oh, well that's different, I think)??????

--Colonel Gerald Wellman, ROTC Instrutor.

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"If we don't succeed, we run the risk of failure." (really???????)

--Bill Clinton, President

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"We are ready for an unforeseen event that may or may not occur."

--Al Gore, VP (damn he's smart)

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"Traditionally, most of Australia's imports come from overseas."

--Keppel Enderbery

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"Your food stamps will be stopped effective March 1992 because we received notice that you passed away. May God bless you. You may reapply if there is a change in your circumstances."

--Department of Social Services, Greenville, South Carolina

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"If somebody has a bad heart, they can plug this jack in at night as they go to bed and it will monitor their heart throughout the night. And the next morning, when they wake up dead, there'll be a record."

--Mark S. Fowler, FCC Chairman

10 Reasons Trick-Or- Treating Is Better Than Sex

10. Guaranteed to get at least a little something in the sack.
9. If you get tired, wait 10 minutes and go at it again.
8. The uglier you look, the easier it is to get some.
7. You don't have to compliment the person who gave you candy.
6. It's OK when the person you're with fantasizes you're someone else, because you ARE someone else.
5. 40 years from now, you'll still enjoy candy.
4. If you don't get what you want, you can always go next door.
3. Doesn't matter if kids hear you moaning and groaning.
2. Less guilt the next morning.
And the Number 1 Reason Trick-Or-Treating is Better Than Sex...
You can "do" the whole neighborhood!

Pimp your IBook

So you got an IBook from the Henrico county "Battle of the $50 Ibook"?, never it's been a good time to get into notebook modding with this cool tutorial.

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Plane with virus samples crashes in Canada

This ain't no movie plot, is real life, a FedEx planes crashed in Winnipeg, it was carrying six vials of research viruses, although it seems everything is fine this is just an example of how a trivial delivery could spell doom.

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3D games and drama for PSP

Remember the virtual boy?, well the PSP will implement that old idea to bring 3-D games to life.

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Learning About Transistors and LEDs

Almost all mods you read about on Digg include LEDS and Transistors, this is a good read to expand your knowledge about them.

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Free videos for your PSP

Some free videos ready to upload to your PSP, is a short library but seems it will grow.

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Quackwatch, our Guide to Quackery, Health Fraud, and Intelligent Decisions

'Quackwatch, Inc., which was a member of Consumer Federation of America from 1973 through 2003, is a nonprofit corporation whose purpose is to combat health-related frauds, myths, fads, and fallacies." . This is a great link for many seiniors in America and other places, spread the word.

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Incredible themes for your Pocket PC

Make your Pocket PC come to life with these great themes. And yes they are F R E E.

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Cool Halloween Props and Projects

You can go to your big box retail store and get all the Halloween props you want or you can create and build your own, remember that kids see all those props when they go shopping with their moms but what if they find something they haven't seen?.

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More Halloween props

More Ideas to make cool decorations for this time of the year.

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How to build a helmet-mounted camera for mountain biking for $35

"When I first saw the CVS disposable camera, I knew that it would be hacked soon. I also knew that as soon as it was, I would have to buy one, and I knew exactly what I wanted it for: Mountain biking.". Next sure we'll see dudes with cameras mounted on their skateboards.

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Make Google Maps Easily

This object provides a simple interface to plot markers onto Google Maps by using a simple XML file. The interface allows the user to write a few of lines of Javascript to provide this cross-browser functionality. It has been tested and works on MSIE 6, Firefox and Safari.

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Haiku on PowerPC Hardware Offer

If you know how to write Haikus this is your change to bag in some free hardware.

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The number 7 blocks Belgian ATM machines

The Dexia Bank ATM machines are experiencing a curious problem. The machines stop functioning when someone enters the number 7, if your pin contains a 7 you cant access your account, if you need to pay your bookie $700 before he cuts your thumbs off you are screwed.

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No Summer Slump For Google

Summer is considered a slow season for advertising, hence the reason so many re runs on TV, but for Google all was a fairy tale, keeping a strong performance seems there is no obstacle for Google's growth.

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Program a virtual robot with a flowchart

First you draw the flowchart, then you run the program and watch the robot executing your program. With RobotProg you can learn programming bases by means of gradual levels. At the last level, you may program several robots playing games on the same ground.

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Video Camera Stabilizers

This is the way to get a steady cam for your video camera. These camera stabilizers reduce the shaky pictures and with some practice, you can get really cool continuous shots.

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The Answer to Life, the Universe, Everything and LOST

Yes, you know what I'm talking about, the answer to life, the universe, everything lies on the mural inside the capsule of your popular series: LOST.

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Using SMS to end Relationships

We live is a fast world and SMS is just an example of it, from "I quit" to "I think we must start seeing other people", learn the tricks of ending relationships via SMS.

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Spammers face jail in Nigeria

Nigeria, home to some of the world's most notorious cyber crimes, has proposed a law making spamming a criminal offence for which senders of unsolicited e-mails could be jailed for at least three years.

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How eBay Uses Metadata to Enhance Its Web Services

The eBay Web Services schema defines the services that are exposed and the data types that are used when interacting with those services.

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Hitting the Street With a Satellite TV Phone

This phone is the latest model from Samsung to support the satellite Digital Multimedia (DMB Broadcasting) service offered by TU Media. THIS is ass kicking phone service.

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PHP catching on at enterprises, vying with Java

PHP has caught on in enterprise-level Web deployments and is beginning to compete with Java, according to speakers at the Zend/PHP Conference & Expo 2005 event on Wednesday. Word to SUN: developers, developers, developers.

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JSci - A science API for JavaTM

This is a free set of Java packages. The aim is to encapsulate scientific methods/principles in the most natural way possible. As such they should greatly aid the development of scientific based software.

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Publishers Sue Google Over Scanning Plans

Just weeks after a leading authors' organization sued Google for copyright infringement, the Association of American Publishers has also filed suit against the search engine giant's plans to scan and index books for the Internet.

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Apple updates PowerBooks with new displays

At a special event in New York today (October the 19th), Apple Computer Inc. introduced updated PowerBook G4 15- and 17-in. models with new, higher-resolution displays and up to one hour of additional battery life.

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The truth about Blue Öyster Cult's cowbell player

Remember the cowbell player on that famous SNL sketch?, read about him and what Eric Bloom (the lead singer from Blue Öyster Cult) has to say.

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Tecno Geek Dog

Geek out your dog with these high-tech accessories, including a talking dish and a GPS-trackable collar

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Anonymous P2P

Anonymous-P2P.org is a starting point for people interested in anonymous file sharing and communication. There are informational pages for each program and tutorials to help you get started using them.

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Beware of Ordering Credit Reports On-line

As more consumers learn about a new federal law that entitles every US citizen to obtain a free copy of their credit report each year, requests are up, but so is the number of bogus websites. There are now an estimated 233 imposter domains with almost identical spellings as the domain of the only official website.

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ATK - Attack Tool Kit

The acronym ATK stands for Attack Tool Kit. It was first developed to provide a very small and handy tool for Windows to realize fast checks for dedicated vulnerabilities. In the meanwhile it is a combination of security scanner (e.g. Nessus) and exploiting framework (e.g. MetaSploit).

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Tape It Off The Internet

An innovative way to download TV show off the internet and socialize about it, join the hordes of TV shows fan that surely will make the difference between the words, cancelled and new season.

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A day in India's Silicon Valley

What is it like to live and work in the fastest growing technology market in the world? Spencer Kelly has been following tech workers Dipti Kothari and Sachin Bedare at a small company in Bangalore, known as India's Silicon Valley.

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Prison Break: Germany

From 1940 to 1945, Allied prisoners of war engineered spectacular escapes from Colditz Castle, the Nazis' most impregnable prison. Will the plots for FOX's Prison Break lie here?.

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Don't break my heart, literally

The electromechanic heart is here, a science breakthrough that will save the live of many. Don't let your loved one break it with some EMP cheating.

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Bombing America

It was all about activism through terrorism or simply genius gone wrong, read how science has helped to stop bombers in America.

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Battle of the X-Planes

Which is gonna be the next ultimate fighter jet, is not about which company is all about the ultimate technology to dominate the air space.

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18 ways to make a baby

Although science takes all the fun out of it, some times science is the last resort, but with multiple options, for the fathers to be.

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Using the Palm TX as an iTunes Remote

A simple way to control iTunes on your Mac with a Palm TX, VNC client and server applications, simple and neat.

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How to draw Manga

Some basic tips on how to draw Manga characters.

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The ultimate eBay search tool

You don't have to suffer Ebay's clumsy search tool anymore, this tool will deliver results and nothing else. It implements AJAX and is a good example of a great user interface.

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AJAX FAQ for the Java Developer

The questions every java developer has in his/her mind but never dared to ask about them in public.

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Bureaucracy is blocking next WI-FI generation

The answer to the where is my 802.11n hardware? question is bureaucracy, read the story about how committees and standards can keep you out of technology advances or delay them without any justification.

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OpenOffice is 5 years old

The projects that freed some of us from paying ridiculous "fees" for the software we need day to day is 5 years old and counting.

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Install a web server in an old PC

You can use that old PC you have lying around as a web server instead of using your high end rig. Lightweight servers are an alternative to Apache, which can be too much for old systems.

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Space Shuttle Pathfinder

Is you saw the last episode of the Amazing Race maybe you wondered: "I thought I knew the whole Space Shuttle fleet?". Learn about the Space Shuttle Pathfinder, one of the pit stops on the Amazing Race 8.

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Javaranch a friendly place for java greenhorns

This ought to be one of the most original pages realted to the use of a programming language, feel the warmth and happiness of the country in a page full of tips, tutorials and discussion in the many areas around development under Java.

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Create your own windows based camera surveillance system

Looking on the net for a solution to create a webcam based surveillance system I came across many options, none of them really free and others just Linux based. I was looking for a way to capture webcam images in regular intervals with motion detection included, the software that came with my webcam didn't have those options.

After some hunting I found Dorgem, a windows application created by Frank Fesevur, browse his site and see some live demos of this applications in the users area.

Some basic configuration

After downloading the installation executable dorgem210.exe and before running it, you must make sure your webcam drivers are installed, follow the manufacturer's instructions and install the drivers before connecting the cam to your computer.

Once you install it, run it and you will be presented with the main screen:

Click the preview button and check if you get any picture, if you don't click the format button.

Change the pixel depth and compression to something your camera can provide, in my case I used RGB 24, also you can change the resolution of the picture to something your camera is capable of.

Go back to the main screen, click options and you will see a screen like follows, in the general tab you can set up the motion detection feature, what is does is to resume the capturing process when something steps in front of the camera or "movement" is detected, this will save you some processor cycles and hard drive/remote directory space.

In the AVI tab you will be able to store the captured picture frames into a single uncompressed AVI file, very convenient for later viewing of all the events that could appear as a single movie. If your camera will run for several days, check the new file at midnight box to create a new file each day.

On the Next tab you will find a webserver, this is one of the greatest features of this little application, publish your web cam online from your computer, no subscriptions and no extra requirements, just click the Server type drop down list and select still images option, select a refresh rate like 10 seconds, click ok, point your favorite web browser to localhost:8080 (like in this example, you can change the port to whatever you want) and you will be able to see your web cam from across the internet, for the router/firewall owners remember to open/enable and forward the port you set.

Other feature of this application includes is the ability to impress text and images on the frames, dynamically or statically, also you can include time stamps (more on this later). Go to the main screen and click on caption settings, you will see the next screen:


Click add to include as many text/image captions as much space you have on your frame.


If you select text, the next screen will show up, give a name to your caption (just for management of your titles), in the text box you can type any message you want, including tags for time stamping. The file box will let you browse for a plain text file with content you want to draw on the frames, this text file can be dynamically generated to change the message from time to time, think of a weather report system or a news ticker. Finally you can adjust all the parameters around the displaying of text, like font front color, background color, type and position on the screen



An example of the use of tags in the text field:

Using "Hello the current time is %t" will yield the a current system time message like "Hello the current time is 22:45" drawn on each frame. More tags and info on tags in the application documentation.

If you select a bitmap as a caption you'll get the following screen, write a name for your caption, enable it, browse for a bitmap to draw on your frames (think of a CNN like logo image), in the type drop down list you can select between transparent, multiply and copy (don't select multiply or copy they crashed my system a couple times), when transparent is selected you can click on the Transparant button on the right and choose what color you want to be transparent, like the image's background. The position button will let you align your picture at will.


There is one more option I want to write about and that's the storage settings, these will let you write captured frames to your local system, remote systems through http, ftp and https or even feed the frames to external applications, you will be able to send copies of the images to multiple targets at once. On the main screen, click on the storage setting button and then add, select what type of storage you require and write in the text boxes accordingly. Remember to go easy with the intervals for writing the captured frames mostly with the http and ftp options, the net speed connection can fluctuate and the results can be undesired. Also remember the passwords for the http and ftp options will go in clear text over the network, use this options for LANs behind a firewall and in case you want to send the images across the internet use the https option (make sure the server receiving the images is able to receive files under this protocol). A cool idea could be the creation of cron or task jobs on the remote server to process the images to even more customized solutions like email or web sites.




Finally I want to say this application supports multiple cameras to create a multi angle views of the area of interest, you can pickup cheap web cams on ebay and USB hubs to create a fortress like control room, I could not test this option though.

A shout to Frank Fesevur for creating this great application.

DIY Star Wars props

Great ideas to add to your Star Wars costume, made from really simple objects you can find very cheap.

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Steve Ballmer Details Microsoft’s Security Strategy

"... Ballmer announced Microsoft’s plans to release Microsoft® Client Protection, a solution to help protect business desktops, laptops and file servers from current and emerging malware threats.". Deja vu, maybe something is broken in the Matrix.

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Microsoft to pay RealNetworks $761 million settlement

Microsoft now pays Real some big money to settle an antitrust suit, maybe was bad karma for M$ after kicking Real out of major deals like the one it had with CNN. But hey remember Bill Gates didn't become millionaire writing checks, read the details of the payments.

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PSP firmware 2.50 is Out

Sony has released v2.50 of the PSP’s firmware. Do not upgrade to 2.50 if you want to play homebrew. Also the named "location free" option has been added, this will bring conectivity between the PSP and the PS3.

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Metasploit Tutorial

Metasploit is known as the ultimate tool to exploit computer systems vulnerabilities with an "all under one roof" approach. The cool dude from Irongeeks presents us a tutorial on how to use it.

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DIY el cheapo Nintendo DS cards holder

Clean, easy and neat mod to carry your Nintendo DS games around safe and sound.

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The Operation Board Game costume

Sure, you can go and buy a "made in china" costume from your local retailer but for the geek a made one is more challenging and rewarding, but if the costume is about the operation borad game you'll sure will become the center of attention.

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DIY Holograms with a laser pointer

Is kinda elaborate to make but doing it with an off the shelf laser pointer makes it interesting.

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Cool life size duck hunt model

Speking of free time, this dude made a real size model of the ducks you find the the olde but good game from nintendo: Duck Hunt.

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Nitrozac and Snaggy's Mac O'Lanterns!

This is what you get when you cross your traditional Jack O Lantern with your beloved "Mac characters".

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DIY Catapult

Nothing says Halloween like a big Pumpkin hurled over your neighbor's fence or across your back yard. For defense of your domain or just plain fun, this project will teach you a thing or two.

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Prepare yourself for a X-mas full of gadgets

X-mas is around the corner and what better gifts for a geeks than a cool gadget see what will be hot here. I like the "old school" Nintendo micro, check it out.

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Break the ice with the gals inviting them to play....video games

Catch the interest of females by playing the games they play, this article shows what kind of games the ladies dig.

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Do We Really Want Our ISPs To Protect Us All The Time?

Antiviruses, traffic scanning, port scanning and more are part of the current activities your ISP most probably "provide" for you for your own protection, but, how much we really need it.

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Cops smash 100,000 node botnet

The cyber-dragnet has fallen on kinda of big bot network, but as the war on drugs, when a lord falls another rises.

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Koffice.org: Koffice 1.4.2 Announcement

"The KDE Project today announced the release of KOffice 1.4.2 for Linux and Unix operating systems. Support for the OpenDocument format, .... Karbon, a vector-based drawing program, has also seen a lot of development lately, and many fixes have gone into it."

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A behind the scenes at Wallace and Gromit latest movie

Good article on what is behind this cool animation movie, it sure takes more than patience and a close to serial killer perfectionist to get a great final product.

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Don't miss any Simpsons gags and visual clues again

You have seen the Simpsons, you know each episode is full of visual gags that sometimes is impossible to catch them all, you wait for the DVDs, read the newsgroup reviews, listen to the the commentary track or pause your VCR/DVD like crazy. Read how you can catch all those gags without straining your sight or loosing your mind in the process.

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CNN special on on-line security

Full of tips, videos and the interview to Kevin Mitnick (as shown here on digg few days ago).

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10 things you shouldn't buy new

"Why waste money on shiny packaging and a fancy store when you can get it 'pre-owned' for a fraction of the cost? Here are your best buys."

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Digg can't display mistery solved (somehow)

Well seems ye 'ol digg is blocking my ip address and redirecting me to sort kind of blank page, is easy to by pass though, I'm not quite sure if it is an IP block redirection or my specific IP, well it is solved. cheers.

This is the screen shot of what I see when I go to digg.com using Firefox.

Want to write for O'Reilly?

If you are savvy on what you do for a living and that thing has to do with computer maybe you have a chance with O'Reilly publishing, see what it takes here.

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Wireless robotics: Fast robot prototyping

Great guide to prototype your bots with cheap materials you'll sure have at home.

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Kid-Tested Haunted House Tricks

Time to give some use to all the electric motors, toys and gadgets you have lying around, Halloween is coming!!!.

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A view to google in 2084

If the internet does not evolve into something better thi would be the Google's front page.

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Yet another police beating caught on tape

God bless techonology, else abominations like this could go unpunished.

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The smallest MP3 player

This is one of the smallest MP3 players around.

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Close ports 139 and 445 on windows XP

For those that don't know it, port 139 and port 445 are open by default in your windows XP installation, no need to say how bad could it be for your computer (google it and you'll find out), even with firewalls and router/firewalls you can never be safe from an attack to those ports so close them unless you need them very bad.

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Best bumper stickers

Don't risk hitting the car in front of you trying to read the bumper sticker, here is a group of the you can find out there.

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Cool background shadow effect made with CSS

This effect also called drop shadows is what you see in some web pages when the background color fades from top to bottom, if you want to learn how to implement it, you are just a click away.

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All in 1 codec pack

Stop the hunting and testing of codecs, this pack contains the most popular codecs you'll need.

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What's the price of that Jumbo Jet please.

For those with big pockets and a big private air strip here are the prices for the plane of your dreams, air conditioning and DVD player are extra.

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Your name in Japanese

This will get you a great signature for forums or web pages. Just in case remember to check what it says with Japanese speakers, else you would end up in a tatoo fiasco that was shown here on digg.

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Advertising in games

The over bloated budgets to develop games is pushing the industry for more funding and advertising seems to be answer. From the article: "Advertising saturation is a major factor in the destruction of TV and radio audiences in the US", could this happen too for the gaming scene?.

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USB in a nutshell, all you wanted to know about USB

USB is everywhere, serial ports will be thing you'll find only at museums, get with the times and learn about it here. This guide is ultimate candy for moder or hardware hacker.

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Displaying Chinese characters in Firefox the simple way

Hi there, trying to display Chinese characters in Firefox proved to me being no simple task at all, googling for a solution I found a myriad of "guides" that involved the installation of large files and other tweaks, at the end I found an answer that was simple and clean, hope you find it useful.

All you have to do is to install a font that contains the Chinese symbols, for that download the Bitstream Cyberbit font set, one place you can get it is HERE.

You have to unzip the file and install the font, if you know how to do it in Windows XP skip the installation steps and go to the end of the document.

Follow these simple steps to install the new set of fonts:

Open the control panel, start->control panel and click on Appearance and Themes.

On the next screen click on the fonts link on the upper left side of the window.

Next go to the File->Install new font, browse for the location where you unzipped the file, select it and hit OK, let installation finish and you are done.



Now go to a page like THIS

See if the Chinese characters display all right, else check in Firefox Tool menu, select options, then press the general icon, click on fonts and colors, select simplified Chinese in the drop down list, it should look like follows, else make the proper adjustments.




Hope you liked this super mini tutorial. A shout to Darren form Hak.5.

Make your Firefox browser talk to you

FoxyVoice is a Firefox extension that provides text-to-speech functionality using Microsoft Win32 Speech API (SAPI). With FoxyVoice you can listen to the page being read; or browse on one page and listen to another page being read for higher degree of sensory overload.

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25 Words That Can Hurt Your Résumé

Great article if you want to polish your resume. Seems that all the BS words are reserved for your future employer mission and vision mottoes, weird huh?, anyhoo, seems that most contracting managers can't swallow their own lies so won't let you shovel them down their throats. The more you know.

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Anarchy at your local Walmart

This site shows a series of pranks performed at Walmart stores.

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Nmap Video Tutorial 2: Port Scan Boogaloo

Our Irongeek friend is up with a new video, now on how to use Nmap.

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Nircmd, hack your windows box from the command line

NirCmd is a small command-line utility that allows you to do some useful tasks without displaying any user interface.You can write and delete values and keys in the Registry, write values into INI file, dial to your internet account or connect to a VPN network, restart windows or shut down the computer, and more..., As shown in Hak.5 episode 3.

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Get the Tech stuff for the slacker XML feed here

If you wanna subscribe to the RSS feed just click button below:

XML Feed

Or copy and paste the following URL:

http://bonlebon.blogspot.com/atom.xml

Symantec identifies Trojan targeting th PSP

Security software experts identified a malicious program targeting Sony Playstation Portable systems that marks the first so-called Trojan found in video game devices, Symantec Corp. (Nasdaq:SYMC - news) said on Thursday. Is ye olde scare tactics to stop downgradings and hacks.

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Vote for Cartman's top 25 South Park episodes

You either love or hate one of the most controvertial animated characters in history, now you can vote for the top 25 South Park greatest momemnts starring Eric Cartman.

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True Friendship

Are you tired of all those sissy "friendship" poems that
always sound good, but never actually come close to reality?
Well, here is a series of promises that really speaks to true
friendship:

1. When you are sad - I will help you get drunk and plot
revenge against the sorry bastard who made you sad.

2. When you are blue - I will try to dislodge whatever is
choking you.

3. When you smile - I will know you finally got laid.

4. When you are scared - I will rag on you about it every
chance I get.

5. When you are worried - I will tell you horrible stories
about how much worse it could be and to quit whining.

6. When you are confused - I will use little words.

7. When you are sick - Stay the hell away from me until you
are well again. I don't want whatever you have.

8. When you fall - I will point and laugh at your clumsy ass.

This is my oath...I pledge it till the end. Why? You may ask.
Because you are my friend.

Send this to 10 of your closest friends, then get depressed
because you can only think of two and one of them isn't
speaking to you right now anyway.

Remember: A good friend will help you move. A really good
friend will help you move a body. Let me know if I ever need
to bring a shovel.

HBO Attacking BitTorrent

HBO is poisoning bittorrents left and right, if you wanna get rid off them is gonna cost you extra.

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Is Netflix really worth it?

If the question of keeping going to your local video store or joining Netfilx is in your mind, read this little article and see how much you save or not.

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Tiny C compiler

TinyCC (aka TCC) is a small but hyper fast C compiler. Unlike other C compilers, it is meant to be self-relying: you do not need an external assembler or linker because TCC does that for you.

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Make your windows XP box talk the talk

This is a great utility to make your computer read any text you copy from your web browser, edit application, etc, neat for those looong articles that show now and then here on digg.

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Blender 3D: Noob to Pro

Blender is a good 3-D CAD software than won't put you in the poor house with exhorbitant licensing fees. Learn how to use it with this great on line book.

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Razer's Copperhead Gaming Mouse

Read about the newest mouse for gamming in the Razer's family.

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Bush's Speech Creator

Your parents told ya you could be a president, but what is a president without a good speech?, now you can create presidential grade speeches from the comfort of your PC.

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How to Create a Restore / Recovery Disc and Partition

No boot disk to recover for your actual system configuration?, having to re install 100s of packages and drivers?, no problem, create an easy snapshop of your current system with this guide. Remember to practice safe Hex, keep a backup of your working setup handy.

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Configuring an OpenSSH Client

Neat guide on how using an OpenSSH client under Linux.

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Sending SMS Messages Using Windows XP

Neat trick to send SMS directly from your XP box, no email required.

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TIVO and other PVR owners at edge of massive heart attacks

Twenty members of Congress are calling for the reinstatement of the "broadcast flag," a controversial form of copy prevention technology for digital TV broadcasts. Time to go back to analog (while it last) and work from there.

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Making a Multiple-Boot CD

You can have several versions of Linux boot images on the CD - versions with support for journaling file systems, repair utilities, various breeds of Linux or BSD, or even QNX, Plan9 and more.

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Using Java and Linux to crack the DES challenge

What this article intends to show is how weak the actual DES strength is, and how and what a determined attacker can do to break it using the new Java programming language and the Linux operating system.

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AJAX Driven Web TV Listing

Yet another great example of AJAX in action.

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New Mission Impossible Movie logo

LEGO CAD software, first you create then you build.

LDraw™ is an open standard for LEGO CAD programs that allow the user to create virtual LEGO models and scenes. You can use it to document models you have physically built, create building instructions just like LEGO, render 3D photo realistic images of your virtual models and even make animations. The possibilities are endless.

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Digg tips

Greetings, I've decided to publish a couple of tricks I've been using lately on digg to deal with editing posted stories, hope you can learn something for you to add to your bag of tricks.

Dealing with the "There was an error updating your item"

So you found a grammatical error in your post and you went for the edit option to fix it.

Remember, you have something like 5 min from the moment you posted your story to have access to this option, after that, it goes the way of the Do-Do and your story is casted in stone on digg.

After pressing edit you should get access to a screen like follows, write in your corrections in the proper fields.


When you got your changes done you press the update button on the bottom left side of the screen:


Then press the confirm button on the bottom left side of the screen:


But you get:

After cursing your feelings about how frustrating this was, you can hit back on your browser and press the confirm button again, some times is a matter to give the system a chance, MAYBE too many transactions on the database won't give you a "lock" on your story record, so give it a try a couple of times.

When going back and forth doesn't work, you can try changing the category of the story, this can be done as a temporary fix, when it works you go to the edit option one more time and change to your original category, this is weird as you may think but has worked for me.

From

To


Press update.


Press confirm again.

And finally you should get:

Praise your lord and forgive the programmer and his/her relatives for once.

Changing the URL of your story

You can indeed change the URL your story links to a better link or a non broken one.

Yo go to your submitted stories, press edit, remember this option is available for limited time, seriously.

When you are presented with the screen:

Select all the text in your description and cut it leaving the whole description in blank.


Click update


And voila. access to the URL, change it at pleasure, click update then confirm your changes and off you go.



Hope you liked these couple of tricks, if anything shows up my way I'll sure post it here on my blog, thanks to all the digg community and crew. A shout to AlPacino.

Create Instructional or Help Videos under Linux

This site is about xvidcap, a small tool to capture things going on on an X-Windows display to either individual frames or an MPEG video. A video is worth 1000000s words (I think), so instead boring users with looong man files treat them with a video. his item was featured on TWAT's podcast, link in the comments.

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Record your desktop session to flash movie

Vnc2swf is a screen recorder for Flash movie. It captures screen motion through VNC protocol and converts it into a Shockwave Flash (SWF) file. This is a great wink alternative and runs in multiple platforms. This item was featured on TWAT's podcast, link in the comments.

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What is Web 2.0

The most concrete and simple explanation on what Web 2.0 is, great if you don't want be bored to death by the many definitions out there.

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Web applications list

A good compilation of applications you can run from your web browser, no more downloading, installations or crashes the web will deliver what you need to run when you want it.

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LCD projector from a slide projector

In your way to getting a cheap LCD projector for your cheapo home theater, yet another advance has been made.

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It's made from cans

No, I'm not talking about over expensive recycling, this is about creating stuff with a smart arrange of cans. See it like the cheap way to Legos.

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Default Passwords for almost any hardware vendor

Maybe there was a way to stay secured if you bought products by not well known vendors without web precense, well, those days are over, you will find a neat list of default admin passwords for a lot of hardware vendors here.

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