Commodore 64 Basic V2

Not A Good Day

2011-02-11T13:50:00.001-08:00

I'm at work. Doing my job. I'm stressed. I'm tired. I'm sad. I'm depressed. This is not where I want to be in life. My wife and I have grown apart which saddens me even more. My time is occupied by work and work doesn't care about me outside the company. Does this sound familiar?

I'm sure I'm not the only one. Can I change things? Of course, but when? I still need to keep up on the mundane tasks of life...commute, job, commute, laundry, dishes, kids baths, etc. I get about 1.5 hours after work to spend with family before it's time to put the kids to bed. Then shower and sleep for 4-5 hours only to do the whole thing over again. Pure insanity? Heck yeah! So how do I change things around?

Keep a Child Alive Campaign

2010-12-01T14:14:00.001-08:00

You've probably heard about the "Keep a Child Alive" campaign where
several stars (Seacrest, Kardashian, Timberlake, etc.) have photographs
of themselves "dead" in a coffin and will not update Twitter or Facebook
until $1M in donations has been reached. Personally, I understand why
they're doing this and still, tend to agree a bit with Danny Bonaduce
who thinks they're going about it in the <a
href="http://www.philly.com/philly/entertainment/20101201_Bonaduce_berates_celebs_over_Twitter_deaths.html">wrong
way</a>.

However, my personal problem is with the photographs. If you want to
make a point, make the photos show accordingly. Scroll them <a
href="http://buylife.org/browse-sacrifices.php">here</a> and notice how
many of them are not in "death" positions (the ones in coffins). Small
point, sure. But if you're going to claim a person is "dead"...show
them as such. Don't have them holding cell phones, making peace signs,
or layed out as if they're doing an underwear ad. These bogus
positions, in my mind, make a mockery of imparting onto people the
impact a human being has on this world!

Be Safe!

--C64Whiz

When Love of Humanity Risks Penalty Results in Idleness

2010-11-24T11:23:00.001-08:00

I'm sitting here at work doing my job in the computer security field
helping a large corporation protect its product which it
sells to make huge profits. I look over at the cube next to me and
see the employee surfing Facebook, checking out baby forums, viewing
shopping sites, and much more. All of a sudden I feel sad.

I recently made the realization my focus in life is to protect kids
and their families both online and off in order for them to have a
safe, secure environment. With that in mind I'm watching this
coworker risk her privacy by exposing personal data about herself to
the employer. Yet if I say anything to her to help, I get the
critical eye on me as a person who "searches for circumventions" or
"watches over her shoulder" regardless of intent. So...I did
nothing.

Employers today, this one for sure, takes measures to "ensure no loss
of proprietary data". However in doing so, the employer monitors web
habits such as Facebook, Twitter, and any other sites that do not use
secure surfing methods. As a result, the coworker is making herself
and her loved ones vulnerable to the unknowns of a corporation that
has its own agenda. Don't get me wrong, the corporation is not trying
to steal her data and use it for its own use, but they are a
corporation and they are looking out for #1. Futhermore, there is no
telling who has access to this collected data and if they are
pure in their job efforts.

This is a very scary world and corporations are taking measures to
protect themselves even at the cost of their employees. Most, dare I
say all, companies with security policies have some clause to the
effect "...employee shall have no expectation of privacy". Yet so
many employees don't know this and are unaware of their lack of
privacy. So in the spirit of my life's focus, keep this in mind
when you're at work. Unless you know exactly how your employer's
network operates and/or know your privacy limitations and what you're
willing to have the company store and view, you should keep your
personal web surfing for home. I know company networks are faster
and, being we're at work all day, more convenient but you need to
consider the serious tradeoffs of using your company's network for
personal web use.

Be safe and Happy Thanksgiving.

--C64Whiz

Researcher Cracks SHA-1!!! Ok, Now Calm Down...

2010-11-19T15:31:00.001-08:00

The Register
(http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/11/18/amazon_cloud_sha_password_hack/) posted
an article about a German researcher who

"...claims to have cracked all the hashes from a 160-bit SHA-1 hash
with a password of between 1 and 6 characters in around 49 minutes.
The process would create a rainbow table, allowing short and therefore
automatically insecure passwords to be matched to their hash. It
wouldn't work for longer length passwords. Even so, the bigger point
that rentable computing resources might be used for password hacking
still stands."

But calm down folks. Take note the second to last sentence, "It
wouldn't work for longer length passwords". If you're password is less
than 6 characters, you have lousy passwords in the first place! By
today's standards, a minimum length of 10-12 characters should be your
starting point.

The other thing to take note of is the last sentence. This was more an
illustration of ease to crack such large numbers of hashes with little
cost.

Personally, I think the threat is real, but with these additional
techniques existing, we as users need to take security more into our own
hands and not rely on the corporations to protect us. For some reason,
they are falling short on their end. The bad guys get better and
corporations are not keeping up.

Stay safe!

--C64Whiz

When Love is Lost...

2010-11-17T13:24:00.000-08:00

Tomorrow I have to take my little dog to the vet to be put to sleep. It's ripping me apart and worse, I have to try and explain to a 4yr old why his little friend is no longer going to be around.

This is one of the most wonderful dogs in the world and she was a heart-send as we got her just before my first child was born. She was perfect as gentle, small, and oh so loving.

It sucks. I found her when she was roughly 9 years old so we only got 4-5 years with her. Not nearly enough with such a wonderful animal. For those of you with animals which are so much more than pets but rather family...go hug them. Give them a little love to honor a little dog which made my and my family's lives richer, warmer, and brought joy each and every day.

We'll miss you little pup. Remember, you will always be a member of our family. I don't know where you were before 5 years ago or what happened to you. But you are now part of our family and will be forever more. We love you!

--C64Whiz

Firesheep vs. Blacksheep

2010-11-10T12:15:00.001-08:00

I'm sure most of you have heard of the Firefox addon Firesheep which can
hijack a persons Facebook (and others) logins with a click of the mouse
on open WiFi networks. Well, now there is an additional addon which
will warn you when someone on that open WiFi is *using* Firesheep. That
plugin is called Blacksheep.

Personally I think the illumination Firesheep was intended to bring is
great. I also think a warning mechanism is also good for those not in
control of the open Wifi but need to use it. However, it does make me
wonder at what point does our web browser turn from web browser to
internet security warrior.

Think about it. We have addons meant to control javascript, sniffing,
cookies, SSL, etc. Think about Firesheep, BlackSheep, NoScript,
AdBlocker, HTTPS-Everywhere, SSL-Blacklist, BetterPrivacy, FlashBlock,
Long URL, and many others. What about all the additional "helpful"
addons people use for Facebook, Twitter, Amazon, bookmarks, proxy
switching, user agent IDs, RSS Feeds, etc, etc, etc.

I love Firefox but I do wonder when my web browser begins to morph into
a programming framework more than an internet web site rendering
machine. Hmmmm....I wonder if Google has already reached this point and
thus...{wait for it}...ChromeOS.

Just my $.10.

--C64Whiz

Input Welcome...

2010-11-06T13:17:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone. I'm going away for a "support function" for a weekend and I'm feeling quite uneasy about it. The "support" I've received so far I'm not real happy with as the group says and teaches things I don't entirely agree with. Now with the weekend, I feel I'm going to need to "protect/defend" myself against them when/if my opinions differ (which they will).

It's not a required retreat...I could bail on it. However I do think it has potential and may be an opportunity to grow. My problem with it is if you have a different opinion on a topic, they seem to gang up on you and take an approach that you either change your mind, or there's nothing they can do. How can you help someone grow if you just tell them to change their views to your own? It doesn't help the individual learn about themselves, how they are, how to change, and how to achieve their goals. It just says, "My way worked for me, so you better do it my way else you're going to fail".

What do you guys think? I'm interested in feedback. Take care of yourselves and I'll keep you posted.

--C64Whiz

Where Am I?

2010-11-05T15:38:00.000-07:00

Wow, I just noticed I haven't posted anything since July! Sorry about
that. I just wanted to re-connect with you and let you know the posts
will be coming a little more often. I want to see this blog grow.

If you want to chat, I'm on Twitter @c64whiz, email c64whiz {at} gmail
{dot} com, dailybooth (C64Whiz), and I'm not considering Youtube. We'll
have to see about that one. :) Take care!

--C64Whiz

Basic Backups on Windows

2010-07-29T12:02:00.001-07:00

Ever wanted to do a basic backup of some files on a Windows machine?
(I'm more of a Linux guy, but backups on Linux are a lot easier.) My
personal solution is to backup files using the 'xcopy' command. My
solution provides 'full' and 'incremental' (sort of) backups.

Basically, the 'xcopy' command has switches which will copy only files
with the "archive" attribute set. If you clear the archive bit only
files which have been changed or modified will have that bit set again.
This tells you which files need to be backed up and thus provides a
form of incremental backup.

For full backups, I use the 'attrib' command to set the archive bit on
all files and directories I want to backup.

Finally, the 'xcopy' command has a switch "/exclude" which allows us to
specify a file which contains a list of directories we do *not* want
included in our backups. This is useful if you have 5 directories but
one of them is temp files you don't care about so there is no need to
back them up.

So, let's say I have a directory on my hard drive I want backed up.
We'll call it "c:\source". For the backup, we'll copy it to an external
hard drive (USB perhaps) which is mounted on drive "H:" and into a
folder called 'destination'.

First, we need to create the destination folder:

mkdir h:\destination

Next, create a file on H: to contain the list of directories we don't
want backed up. If you want everything backed up, you can ignore this
file *AND* leave off the switch. Else, create the file but don't put
anything in it.

copy con h:\backup.exclude
{Cntrl-Z <ENTER>}

will create an empty file.

Now we copy. The 'xcopy' command I use looks like this:

xcopy c:\source h:\destination /M /E /V /C /I /H /R /Y
/EXCLUDE:h:\backup.exclude

all on one line. If you issue the command 'xcopy /?', you'll be able to
see what all those switches do.

Now remember, this will only copy files with the 'archive' bit set. To
do a full backup, you first need to go through the entire 'c:\source'
directory turning on all the 'archive' bits. The attrib command works
for this:

attrib +a c:\source\* /s /d

Again, 'attrib /?' for the switch meanings. When you launch the xcopy
command after the attrib command, you'll have a full backup.

Finally, putting these commands into batch files (.bat) allows you to do
full or incremental backups with an icon click. To do a full backup,
here is my "full_backup.bat" file:

(NOTE: as seen here, the 'xcopy' line was line-breaked. The command
goes from 'xcopy' to include 'backup.exclude' on one line.)

attrib +a c:\source\* /s /d
xcopy c:\source h:\destination /M /E /V /C /I /H /R /Y
/EXCLUDE:h:\backup.exclude
pause

'pause' waits for a key press when the copying is done.

My incremental backup batch file is this:

xcopy c:\rdata r:\rdata /M /E /V /C /I /H /R /Y
/EXCLUDE:r:\backup.exclude
pause

Notice the only difference is the 'attrib' command is missing on the
incremental backup batch file.

Lastly, again, if you have a folder "c:\source\temp_files" you don't
want to backup make sure the "h:\backup.exclude" text file contains
"temp_files" on a single line. Yes, the list of directory names in
"h:\backup.exclude" is *relative* to "c:\source". So if you have 3
directories you do *not* want backed up, "h:\backup.exclude" will contain:

temp_files
next_directory_not_to_backup
and\the\last_directory\not_to\backup

Good Luck and email me if you have questions or problems.

--C64Whiz

Another Walk Down

2010-07-13T15:03:00.000-07:00

So I've been trying to get walks in more often now. I use <a
href="http://www.jogtracker.com/">JogTracker</a> on my <a
href="http://droid64.blogspot.com">Droid</a>. If you use it as well,
add me as a friend. I'd love to share my efforts with others. It's a
great little app, nothing fancy but it keeps me wanting to walk. I even
jogged a little today. We shall see....

Who is, C64Whiz?

2010-06-24T00:30:00.000-07:00

Some of you may be wondering who I am. I've been tweeting more lately and now have some followers I have no idea why they're following me. Nevertheless, glad to have you join the conversation.

As for who I am, I'm just a guy with a tweaked sense of humor, living life, stumbling at times, shining at times, and all in all trying to improve myself. It doesn't matter how old I am. I can converse with the best of them, joke with the masses, or even offer thoughts of ponder and words of inspiration when needed. I'm not a religious person but was raised under one particular faith. No, I won't mention it as I don't want to bond or alienate anyone based on religion.

As for my interests, you may have guessed already computers is the big one. I'm not really into sports, I enjoy intellectual pursuits more. However, sometimes being just plain silly is just the stress reliever the doctor ordered. So don't expect all scientific and mathematical talk. I can still knock-knock joke with the best.

Family? I'm happily married though going through a very rough time at the moment. We have kids whom I adore and we have animals...plenty of them. So if you're a dog lover, cat lover, bird lover, whatever...I can relate. I'm constantly fighting with my oldest cat for *my* bed pillow.

Location? Doesn't matter. I live in the USA, let's leave it at that. Whether your West Coast, East Coast or somewhere in-between, we all live in the USA.

A bit of trivia about me? My real name is not C64Whiz. It's actually C64Genius but that didn't fit on my license plate. ;)

Take care everyone. Don't forget to vote in the poll on the left and feel free to join the Twitter conversation. You can find me @C64Whiz. Goodnight.

SYS 64738

Reminiscing About Yester-year

2010-06-09T11:38:00.001-07:00

I don't know why, but I was sitting here on the computer and felt
something I haven't felt in a long, long time. (No not that...I'm still
waiting for that.) I'm talking about the love of hacking and programming.

It seems like so long ago when we use to have only text screens and
command lines to accomplish all we wanted. We got excited when our name
scrolled around the screen like a ball bouncing off the borders. The
thrill of writing code to make a complex piece of machinery do what you
command! Ahhh...

What I don't understand is why it came back to me for only a moment. I
still code, I still use the command line more than anything, so why did
that feeling ever leave? Sure I grew up and got responsibilities but I
still love the thrill of the hack, the excitement you feel just before
you execute your code, and immense frustration just before you solve the
algorithm complexities of sorting methods.

{sigh} Why isn't that feeling still here? I long for it and wish I
could hold on to it as it gives me inspiration and drive me to do better
at my job. Thoughts?

About This Blog

2010-06-02T17:13:00.000-07:00

This blog really doesn't have a purpose per se. But I do hope you'll find some interesting tidbits about anything and everything. So why the Commodore 64 persona? I grew up with it. It was my first real computer that I truly found my calling with.

I remember wanting to learn machine language so I joined a local Commodore Club hoping someone could teach me. Unfortunately no one knew ML but one person did have a beginner book from which my ML world took off. It was then I knew computers were where I'd be spending my career.

However, I'm not narrow-minded. I do have opinions on other topics, other issues, and know how to do other things. This blog is where I'll be sharing it. So feel free to subscribe to the RSS feed or at the very least, follow me on Twitter @C64Whiz.

See you around the 'net...