Re-purpose ancient hardware - part 1

An ancient Compaq Evo N115 is still working, however the concern is how: AMD Duron 1.2GHz processor, 64KB cache, 384MB RAM, 20GB hard drive, 13.3" 1024x768 TFT display ... manufactured some 10 years ago!

After some googling, I landed on the Webconverger page  The 450MB ISO image can either go to a USB stick or be burned to a CD; the boot is rather fast and takes you to the Webconverger registration page via the Iceweasel browser.

The concerned notebook is equipped with a RJ45 Ethernet jack, but the aim is to have it working on Wi-Fi by the means of a Netgear PC Card; unfortunately Webconverger does not seem to give the chance to personalise that much your setup. The card works well with MS Windows drivers; my copies are stored here.

There is Puppy Linux derivative named BrowserLinux, a 93MB only Linux distribution, current version is 501.

There is an install-to-disk feature, but it has failed :( thus I keep the boot-from-CD coupled with the save-session feature; the latter saves a file on the hard drive (light encryption, at least, is recommended). Three re-boots are needed to have everything working: Firefox profile sync, Wi-Fi drivers working (download and save them somewhere in the hard disk, e.g. /mnt/home/home), Wi-Fi key stored. The re-purposed box boot is rather fast, navigation and (ordinary) page rendering are smooth, although Firefox version is 5.0.1 only.

Testing of some builds from susestudio are under way...

Brand new Gmail priority inbox

Mozilla Firefox 4 has updated to beta 4

Last night I left the browser open and it updated itself from beta 3 to beta 4, an automated feature introduced since beta 2. At the first sight, the change is the tab-bar moved up

Furthermore, a new button has appeared on the far right-hand side of the tab-bar giving the chance to re-organise your tabs

Firefox sync is now included by default, the number of supported languages has increased, and it still loads itself in a reasonable time, though Google Chrome seems to be a bit quicker.

Full changelist from beta 3 is here.

Top viruses in July 2010

(Source ZoneAlarm by CheckPoint)

1. Trojan-Downloader.JS.Pegel.bp

Secretly downloads malicious script from a remote server, installs and redirects users to further malicious websites.

2. Exploit.Java.CVE-2010-0886.a

Allows attackers to download and execute arbitrary Java on vulnerable PCs by luring victims to malicious sites.

3. Trojan-Downloader.VBS.Agent.zs

Downloads and installs new versions of malicious programs, including Trojans and AdWare, on victim PCs.

4. AdWare.Win32.FunWeb.q

Displays unsolicited pop-up ads which do not appear to be relevant or associated with the user's browser sessions.

5. Exploit.JS.Agent.bab

Uses a Microsoft Internet Explorer vulnerability to silently install malicious software onto the user?s computer.

Privacy heat map

Interactive Data Protection Heat Map (Source: Forrester Research).

Mozilla Firefox 4 beta 2 is out

The new update to Firefox 4 beta is available here (9.06MB).

Once again the installation procedure is terribly fast. At the end, you get Beta 2 beside Beta 1 and stable version (actually 3.6.8). I'm testing it on the same computer as Beta 1: loading time is shorter than Beta 1 and almost one third of 3.6.8, while memory consumption is some 40,000K more than 3.6.8 (according to MS Windows Task Manager, same sessions).

Extensions are still a sensitive issue since some are disabled because not compatible, however I'm sure updates will come shortly.

MS Silverlight doesn't need to be re-installed as it was for Beta 1.

A new feature introduced is App Tabs, a different way to manage tabs by saving space on the bar: right-click on tab and choose Make into App Tab

and tab is shrunk on the left side

New features are described here.

Government(s) and the Internet

Washington wakes up to internet age broadcasted by Euronews.

Poyozo for Firefox

Poyozo is a Firefox extension aiming at collecting and organizing the various data streams from your virtual life.

Data sources are:

• Firefox browsing history
• IMAP e-mail
• Facebook
• Google Calendar
• Gmail
• Local Weather
• Twitter
• Dopplr
• Foursquare
• Last.fm
• Flickr
• Wesabe
• Skydeck
• RSS

The extension (atomate.xpi) is available starting from Firefox 3.6 and can be downloaded and installed from mypoyozo.com (of course authorisation is needed: click the [Allow] button on top of browser window).
It refuses to install on Firefox 4 beta.

Once the extension is installed and configured upon your needs, you get two new buttons in the status bar (list.it and atomate) and an extra icon (list.it) in the navigation toolbar.

Clicking on [atomate | poyozo] button takes you to a calendar-like page showing clouds; choosing a day opens a stats info

Extension response is rather slow.

Rich text signatures - Official Gmail Blog

Rich text signatures - Official Gmail Blog

Mozilla Firefox 4 beta - first impression

The beta version of the new Mozilla Firefox can be downloaded from this page. Once you download the 8.96MB file, the installation procedure goes smoothly and Firefox 4 beta is installed beside your previous browser version, and you are asked to close the running instance of Firefox before opening the new one.

I'm testing it on an old Compaq EVO (Celeron 1.6GHz; 736MB RAM) running MS Windows XP Home Edition SP3.

The browser is loaded and running in half the time if compared to Firefox 3.6.6.

I have 15 extensions enabled on Firefox 3.6.6, 9 of them are disabled on Firefox 4 beta

• AddThis 3.0.1
• Firefox Showcase 0.9.5.5
• Firefox Synchronisation Extension 7.3.2.26
• Forecastfox 0.9.10.2
• Google Shorcuts 2.0.6
• Microsoft .NET Framework Assistant 1.2.1
• PDF Download 3.0.0.1
• Read It Later 2.0.6
• SearchPreview 4.4

 while Feedback 1.0rc1 has been added. I guess updates will come shortly.

A website heavily based on MS Silverlight like www.rai.tv/dl/RaiTV/diretta.html (live tv broadcasting) required to re-install the plug-in, then everything works.
I've surfed to several web-sites and all of them are rendered properly, though I'm not feeling improvements in terms of speed.

According to MS Windows Task Manager, Firefox 4 beta (8 websites in different tabs on one window) sucks from 10,000 to 40,000 K more memory than Firefox 3.6.6.

Coming back to Firefox 3.6.6, it inherits the last session of the last browser.

A specs comparison between Firefoxes is here.

Password security II

Another quality checker here.

Password security

Check it here.

Google Voice is open

The service is now open only on the western side of the Atlantic (or eastern side of the Pacific Ocean).

15 Noteworthy Websites That Changed the Internet | Web 2.0

15 Noteworthy Websites That Changed the Internet | Web 2.0