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Sharing thoughts and ideas on business, security and photographyDaniel Cuthbert presenting at ISACA KZN Chapter meeting at Deloitte on 15 July 2011
Posted on June 28, 2011The next meeting of the ISACA KZN Chapter will be held on Friday 15th July at Deloitte’s offices on La Lucia Ridge. Please spread the word and make every effort to attend.
KZN regional chapter meeting
- Date : 15 July 2011
- Venue : Deloitte’s offices on La Lucia Ridge
- Speaker : Daniel Cuthbert
- Topic : “Doing it for the Lulz : Why Lulzsec has shown us to be an ineffective industry.”
- Daniel will be talking on current activities in information security, web hacking and how to protect yourselves.
- ISACA Website link : http://isaca.org.za/other.asp?page=Event&eId=188
Confirmation of attendance
As always, please confirm your attendance with Nadine on 011-803 0803 or admin@isaca.org.za a few days ahead of time.
Don’t get your hopes up, your mobile device probably won’t be supported by Drifta anyway
Posted on June 23, 2011A lot of people having been waiting in (vain) hope of being able to watch DSTV on their mobile phones (other than iPhones). Information and updates on progress on getting the promised clients for Nokia, Blackberry and Android has varied between slow and non-existent. The “promises” of 1 April 2011, 30 May 2011, Early 2011 etc have all been broken and no new real information or deadlines provided.
A user by the name of “eel” posted on the 13th June on the mybroadband.co.za forum (link here) : (slightly edited)
- There is an Android client in the works (no timeline yet)
- There is a blackberry client in the works ( no time line yet)
- There is a Nokia S60 version in the works (sooner than the other 2, but will only be ready when the coding is done). This version will utilise the Drifta with wifi support but the CPU needs to be above 700mhz.
I don’t know who “eel” is or how reliable his information is. However, if it is true, then it will come as a shock to many Nokia users, myself included. Very few Nokia’s run at a speed of 700mhz or above. In fact, I am not sure that ANY released before the Drifta itself was released in fact run at that speed.
The Nokia E71 runs at 381Mhz, the N95 at 330Mhz, the E72 runs at 600Mhz, N97 runs at 434Mhz. So speed requirement is true, then only Nokia S60 phones released in late 2010/2011 like the N8 and E7 (only 680Mhz) may well work with the Drifta.
So I don’t hold out much hope then as my E71 is well below the requirement. Wish they had just told me this long ago.
This also makes me worry about which Blackberry Devices will be compatible with the Drifta. The 8520 runs as 512Mhz, as does the 8900. The 9700,9780 and Torch all runs at 624Mhz. Maybe they will just be able to squeeze this to work? Still, most people have the 8520 so this doesn’t look promising.
A lot of the current Android devices run at 1Ghz or more, so it is far more likely that Android users will have a happier experience if the client gets released for them.
I wish DSTV would just come out and say what is planned. The waiting sucks when after the wait you still probably won’t be able to use the device you want when the clients eventually get released. Maybe that is the plan after all? If you wait long enough the devices people have will have caught up with the specifications you actually require but never told them? Too much conspiracy theory in there, but don’t say I never said it.
Buying eBooks in South Africa
Posted on June 19, 2011There are a number of different eBook stores you can make use of in South Africa and abroad. Here we look at some of the features and pricing of these stores.
I list Angry Robot first as they are DRM free, and then the rest of the SA based bookstores. Amazon can never be excluded as so many have Kindles (awesome reader) and their reach is so wide (Kindle software works on so many devices).
- Angry Robot (UK Based) – Good source of Sci Fi books. The only one of the stores listed that don’t DRM your books (big big plus). You can read them on any of your devices (use Calibre to convert them if you need another format). Support them.
- Kalahari.net – Wide range of books, including local South African titles. Prices not always great, do a match with Amazon first before buying. Mostly in ePub Adobe Editions (DRM) format. They have their own “Beta software” reader which you are pushed into using. It’s OK but nothing special and not close to the Kindle.
- Amazon.com (USA Based) – Wide range of books, not too many South African books. We are relegated to buying from the “Africa” region store which prices books $2 about the USA price and restricts us from buying many of the latest titles. Titles come in Kindle format, with DRM. Many devices support kindle software, including iPad/phone/touch, Android devices, Blackberries etc.
- Exclusives online – Mixed selection of ebooks. Also uses Adobe DRM, though you use the standard Adobe client rather than a customised version (as per Kalahari). Seems slightly cheaper than Kalahari. See examples below.
- Little White Bakkie – A site focussed on African ebooks. Again it uses Adobe DRM through digital editions and like Exclusives you use the standard Adobe client. Our test book , The Girl who kicked the hornet’s nest, was not available and books seemed to generally sell for between R120 and R200 which is a little pricey for ebooks, though on par with Kalahari.
- eBookDiva – A site focused on Romance fiction. Yes, they have Mills & Boon, as well as all sorts of other romance novels. Prices range from R210 for a set of 3 Mills & Boon to much cheaper less known authors. They have 1615 titles under R45 and 165 under R20. If this is your thing check them out. It also seems you can write your own books and get them published. Haven’t checked this out in any detail. As with most of the other South African sites their books are in the Adobe (DRM) ePub format.
Converting your ebooks to read on your kindle
Posted on June 18, 2011Those who read my post from yesterday will know I was frustrated with the process for buying books on Kalahari.net and with the frustration of having to use their proprietary “Beta” software reader which would only work on my laptop but not on my Kindle. I wanted to read “Killing Kebble” on the kindle and couldn’t (Update 13 July, it’s now on Amazon). Here is how to do it.
I am a long time fan of Calibre as an “iTunes for Kindle” application that will manage your library of books and covert them into the required format for most devices you can think of. It also handles downloading of web sites and making them into “mini magazines” for you to read any place any time. Really great software.
How does this help?
Well when buying books from non-Amazon stores they could be delivered in a number of different formats. epub is a common format for online publishers. Just be careful though. Not all epubs (or ebooks) are created equal and many that you buy will have embedded DRM that stops you using them when where and as you please.
A case in point, ebooks from Kalahari.net and Exclusive books online make use of an Adobe DRM solution.
There is however a solution. Read the rest of this entry »
When the simple isn’t – Buying ebooks on Kalahari
Posted on June 17, 2011For a while now I have been wanting to read Mandy Wiener’s “Killing Kebble”. Having just finished Lauren Beukes’ two books, Moxyland and Zoo City on my Kindle it was time.
Lauren’s books weren’t available on Amazon for Kindle, but she provided a useful hint in that the eBooks can be purchased from AngryRobotStore.com for £4.49 each, so around R100 for the pair. They come down in epub format and are quickly converted to work on the Kindle using the excellent Calibre (best friend of every Kindle owner). Simple, quick and you can be reading in just a few minutes.
So.
Killing Kebble is available from Kalahari.net as an e-book in epub format. Yay. Or so I thought. I paid the R105, got the sms on my phone confirming they had the money, and waited. Scavenged, looked. Mmmm. No download link, found a link to my “Library Box” where I found my purchased. Happily flagged with a status of “new”. Yes, I just bought it so I guess it is new. Still no download link, I click the “show only products to download”, nothing shows up. Odd I thought. Clicked the “More information” action button to be instructed to download Kalahari’s (Beta) e-reader, create an account on adobe.com and a whole lot of stuff.
Bugger. I just bought a DRM’ed book. What the heck. Ok, so I want to read the book, let’s see how this works. I downloaded the 20 Meg reader, installed it, had a failed Adobe Air install. Loaded the reader, Air installed again and worked. Created the account on Adobe.com (do I really need to give them ALL my personal details, so many people have been hacked recently I am more nervous to hand these out). Finally all installed and ready and …
Minor update for Microsoft Image Composite Editor now at version 1.4.4
Posted on June 09, 2011A few days ago Microsoft Research Labs released a small update to Microsoft Image Composite Editor (MS ICE), now available as 1.4.4. The “new features” listed on the website are a little misleading and are the features listed are unchanged from the previous 1.4.3 release.
From the release notes in the forums the follow changes are noted for 1.4.4 :
- Installer checks for minimum version # of C++ runtime
- Fixed issue with videos that contain a crop rectangle
- Color manage the thumbnail image for Upload to Photosynth
- Added “(Windows 7 only)” to video panorama menu item
- Added % done indication in the progress bar
As can be seen nothing major has been changed, mostly cosmetic and install related matters.
Update : It seems a number of users are experiencing problems using the tool after the update, the problems range from it not loading at all to having poor results with the stitching. These have been reported in the forums and are still be worked on. Probably best to hold off on the upgrade until these have been resolved unless you are prepared to uninstall and moved back to 1.4.3 if you experience the problems.
If you haven’t used MS Ice before take a look at my previous posts on the tool.
- Info on release 1.4.3 and some tests of the awesome video panorama feature (click here)
- View from my lounge (click here)
- The Gautrain station in Sandton, taken from a Blackberry Bold (click here)
You can read the new frequently asked questions (FAQ) posted here.
I know I have said it many times before, but this really is an awesome tool, and for the price (FREE) you cannot beat it. It is simple to use and produces stunning results. Give it a go, it is really impressive, especially with used in conjunction with Photosynth.net.
Have fun.
Drifta client 1.3.1 released : Includes Mac OS X client?
Posted on June 08, 2011DSTV Drifta client version 1.3.1 has now been released. This time there is no associated firmware update. Compared to version 1.2.11 there is one interesting difference.
When opening up the .zip file downloaded, there are two folders
- Decoder_1.3.1
- _MACOSX
Not having a Mac I wasn’t able to install this and see whether there is relief to those Mac users out there who have been begging DSTV to provide a Mac client without any luck. Someone want to give it a go and see if it works?
Update : After a bit of googling and playing with the zip file it seems that the .ZIP was created on a Mac, and OSX creates the _MACOSX as a internal (hidden Mac) file for storing attributes. Sadly doesn’t seem to actually contain the OS X installer. False alarm, damn. Bit of a stretch to assume that the developer is using a Mac and therefore a Mac version is soon to be delivered, but hey, we can hope.
Update 2 : I have seen and played with the OS X version. It is real, it is coming soon 🙂 Little more info here : http://j-j.co.za/2011/09/a-most-interesting-hour-with-the-dstv-mobile-team/
Other than the MacOSx folder, the Windows installer folder now has a .DS_Store file in it (haven’t yet worked out the purpose of this – another OS X hidden file it seems) and the windows decoder.exe has been updated (Dated 27/5/2011). There are no firmware or any other changes.
You can download the new version here : http://apps.dstvmobile.com/decoder/windows/Decoder_1.3.1.zip
P.S. There is also a new version of the iOS client available on iTunes (V1.01.02). The FAQ section has been updated with a link to a patched version to allow it to work on Jailbreak devices.
Pure Speculation : New DSTV Drifta decoder to be launched? #in
Posted on June 04, 2011Updates :
- The new version is released : As predicted, new DSTV Mobile Decoder released (USB Device)
- Unboxing of the new USB drifta
- Review to follow
A new version of the DSTV Drifta software was released recently (1.2.11). Doing some simple sleuthing around in the install reveals some potentially very interesting news. Is a Drifta2 about to be launched?
The following were the only files updated / added in the new installer:
1.2.11 vs 1.1.0
Existing files:
- Decoder.exe 2011/05/10 06:57 1 512KB
- infcopy.exe 2010/12/06 02:34 79KB
- tvnb.bin 2011/04/20 08:39 8 288KB
New files:
- IPSetup.exe 2011/03/18 06:21 58KB
- tvnb_usb.bin 2011/05/03 02:09 5 840KB
The really interesting bit is in the new tvnb_usb.bin file.
The tvnb_usb.bin has an interesting identification string “Drifta2(DVB-H) 2.1.277 2011/05/03-14:09:23 ” vs the older style tvnb.bin identification string “Tivit(DVB-H) 2.1.266 2011/04/20-17:03:51”.
Is this a hint at a new Drifta decoder to come?
Share your thoughts, on or off the record.
Traffic twitterers and pig spotters
Posted on May 07, 2011There are quite a number of different twitter accounts which can help you keep up to speed with what is happening on the roads around the country. Following a collection of these accounts really can make your life a whole lot more comfortable and relieve a lot of frustrations.
I have created a page listing my favourites. Since I am based in KZN most of the ones listed are from that region. Please feel free to leave more in the comments and I will add them to the list to keep it up to date regularly. For your convenience you can find a combined twitter list here : http://twitter.com/#!/jjza/traffic
The full list is here : www.j-j.co.za/pigspotters
Am I registered to Vote on the 18th May
Posted on May 06, 2011Update : The local elections are now tomorrow, time to go and make your choice count and stand up for what you believe in. A spoilt vote is no vote at all, it is better to vote for the best of a bad bunch than to make no vote at all. Even if you think you aren’t registered to vote, use one of the methods below to check. If you have ever voted you are likely to be on the voters’ roll and can cast your vote. Each of our votes count, use it.
Original post :
With the Elections almost upon us (just 12 days away) it is useful to confirm the registration status and where exactly that voting station is.
In a previous post I had mentioned an SMS number you could send your ID number to that would tell you your registration status. There are also other ways to do this.
There are three ways to do this :
- you can send an SMS with just your SA ID number to 32810 (at a cost of R1/sms) and you will receive a reply giving your registration status and the voting station where you are expected to vote.
- you can check on-line here : https://www.elections.org.za/content/Pages/AmIRegistered/AmIRegistered.aspx
- or you can call the IEC toll free (from a landline) on 0800 11 8000
Once you have those details you can use the interactive voting station finder to see where you need to go on the day. Don’t forget you need a valid green ID book to vote, if you don’t have one get to Home Affairs asap to see if something can be done to help you.
Thanks to the IEC for making it all so easy and for using the technology available.
voting station finder
Sony PlayStation Network hacked, the mea culpa letter and some tidbits
Posted on April 29, 2011Update :
So now it turns out that Sony have been hacked again, this time it is the turn of Sony Online Entertainment (SOE), the publishing division responsible for maintaining Sony’s numerous online gaming titles, like EverQuest, EverQuest II, DC Universe Online and Free Realms. This affects 12,700 credit card numbers and 24.6 million accounts, including accounts in Austria, Germany, Netherlands and Spain.
Read more here : Source: http://www.lazygamer.net/#ixzz1LIYYzCK4
A copy of the press release can be see here : http://www.soe.com/securityupdate/
After the previous PR disaster Sony have been quicker to react this time around, their situation does however go from bad to worse. The Sony PSN is supposed to be coming back online shortly, along with a few “freebies” to say sorry to all their users. If you are still willing to trust Sony with your info there may be some goodies in there that interest you (the specific ones available to SA haven’t been announced yet), and 30 days free use of PSN+.
Out of interest, there are over 100 000 SA users of PSN : http://www.maxconsole.net/content.php?45820-Revealed-PSN-account-numbers-broken-down-by-country
Original post :
After days of hearing about the Playstation network breach on Sky News and on various sites, and reading about it on various hacking sites, that elusive mea-culpa email finally arrived from Sony.
It says a lot without really saying it. We might have lost your credit card details? Watch your statement?
This really isn’t good enough. Currently being out of the country for a few days, having to cancel a credit card and get another issued would be a real real pain, apart from being rather expensive. There is no talk of compensation for loss in the mail, but then I guess if you have managed to “lose” the details of millions of customers that could be a rather expensive exercise. My card replacement fee is in excess of R150. 7million x R150 = over R1 billion just for card replacement fees, before any fraud claims. Expensive mistake? Sony do claim that the database had an encrypted table of credit card details, with no CVS numbers or expiry dates, so perhaps the risk is not all that high of widespread abuse.
It shall be interesting to watch what happens from here on in, and see how the class action suites already being filed play out. Sony has already lost a lot of support and goodwill with the “OtherOS” fiasco and the GeoHot saga. Neither of which are really satisfactorily resolved.
Out of interest, it seems that when Sony first found out about the hack, it was more in the context of people being able to access paid for content without paying. Seems they had insecure methods of requesting that content, and the changing of a simple flag meant you didn’t need to pay. Hackers had produced custom firmware for the PS3 which allowed these changes to be made. It seems that there wasn’t a whole lot of security in the client/server requests. Read some of these here on IRC logs. No certainty on the validity, but sounds plausible enough.
Mocking of Sony abounds on the net (Source: tweet by @mxatone (Thomas Garnier) : http://img.clubic.com/04217086-photo-hack-psn.jpg):
Would you like to download some credit card details?
For those of you who didn’t get the mail (lucky you), here it is :
This is an email from Sony Computer Entertainment Australia Pty Ltd. If you can’t see the images in this email, please click here (link removed)
Valued PlayStation Network/Qriocity Customer:
We have discovered that between April 17 and April 19, 2011, certain PlayStation Network and Qriocity service user account information was compromised in connection with an illegal and unauthorized intrusion into our network. In response to this intrusion, we have:
- Temporarily turned off PlayStation Network and Qriocity services;
- Engaged an outside, recognized security firm to conduct a full and complete investigation into what happened; and
- Quickly taken steps to enhance security and strengthen our network infrastructure by re-building our system to provide you with greater protection of your personal information.
Fun with Segway at Spier wine estate
Posted on April 19, 2011A while back there was a special on at the group buying site Wicount* (signup code Justin-5h) for Segway tours of the Spier wine estate in Stellenbosch. For those who don’t know, the Segway was the gyroscopic based two wheeled personal transporter invented by Dean Karmen and introduced back in 2001. There was a huge amount of hype around the device and it was touted as being able to change the world. A huge expectation was built up around it and when the launch came it was a bit of damp squib. Read more on the history etc at Wikipedia.
I have seen the transporters around in South Africa, mainly used by security guards in shopping complexes and the like, and while it has always looked intriguing there hasn’t really been the opportunity to test one out.
Struggles in getting Garmin Live traffic activated
Posted on April 14, 2011Update (16 May):
Today I received another email from Garmin. The online activation is working, no really, this time it really is. And low and behold, a visit to the site shows that indeed the under construction banner is gone and you can do an on-line something. I can’t test it since mine was manually activated a while back. Glad it’s finally working, really poor show Garmin in taking so long to get it sorted, but glad its finally done.
Update (26 April) :
I received a mail today from Peter Smith at Garmin today in reply to my very first website request to them for activation. In the mail he suggests that the online activation is (finally) working. I went back to garmap.co.za/traffic and found the same link to the same in under construction page. I mailed him back, he mailed back and suggested I shouldn’t go to that link. “Please go to www.garmap.co.za since that link you have does not work anymore . The webpage was redesigned . Go to products , Live Traffic and follow the pages”. I tried this and end up with the same page, tried refreshing, different browser etc. Not sure where the problem is or why Garmin thinks their new site is live when it isn’t. Anyhow, seems it is perhaps a bit closer to being live, though why they would mail customers to say its live when it isn’t is beyond me. Did let Peter know, as well as suggest that if they are replacing the garmap.co.za/traffic page the least they can do is put an automatic redirect in place as this is the page referenced on the hard copy product documentation in the retail channel. We await further progress.
Original post :
I had a break-in back in November and after lots of disputes with ABSA they finally paid out. I used some of that payout to replace my GPS and with my dislike of traffic and being stuck in it opted to get a Garmin with Traffic adapter. After some further delays the company nominated by the insurance assessor delivered the goods to me. This was around 6 weeks ago.
I unboxed all the goodies and tried plugging it in. The traffic adaptor was recognised by the Garmin and it said it had a USA subscription that would be activated when it picked up the signal. I scanned a few times, no luck, time to read the instructions. Eventually found them and saw that South Africa has it’s own unique activation method. Ok.
Off to the website as instructed (http://www.garmap.co.za/traffic/), clicked on the traffic activation link, only to find this wonderfully helpful (not) graphic :
Garmap - Under Construction
Read up some more, nothing of use, other than having a minor wobbly when reading on the site that the service is only available in Johannesburg, despite it being sold to me in Durban. Google then showed up press releases saying it was now active in Durban, clearly it was just the official website that was out of date.
Quick thoughts and test: New version of Microsoft Image Composite Editor (ICE) 1.4.3 (Updated 14/4/2011)
Posted on April 12, 2011As any regular reader of my blog knows, I am quite a fan of Microsoft Image Composite Editor and regularly use it to create panoramas and photosynths, and have quite a few synths hosted on www.photosynth.net.
A couple of days ago (7th April) a new version was released, 1.4.3. Get it here. There is also a nice demo video there.
Back last year there was some pre-release information around this new release, the most exciting was that it could now take video input and use it to create the panoramas and synths. I have been looking forward to this release every since so was quite excited at the news.
The new features (as taken from the website) are :
- Stitch directly from a video (only on Windows 7)
- Automatic lens vignette removal
- Improved blending engine
- Options dialog to control memory usage and scratch disk locations
I don’t know why the video option is Windows 7 only, however my laptop runs Windows 7 so I was very keen to try out this new feature. With limited time I just took my blackberry, made a quick (1 minute) low resolution (around 2 Meg) video (.3gp format). (Update : It works on Windows 7 only as it makes use of some new video API that is present only from Windows 7 onwards).
I chose the composite video option in MS ICE, selected the file and it in, asked about clipping the frame, which I declined to do. MS Ice then analysed the video and selected 66 images which it then stitched together. It created a final image 2560 pixels x 426, covering 360 degrees horizontally and 56 degrees vertically, just 1.09 megapixels. This was a little disappointing since I had tried to get at least 90 degrees vertically and large sections of the video appeared missing (you can see part of the roof and not others). The room was a little dark and the blackberry camera isn’t great in low light conditions, I guess I temper my expectations until I try this out properly with the Canon EOS 550D or the Ixus 210. They at least do HD (and full HD) video.
The end result can be seen below. Very dark and more than likely not doing justice to the new features (my fault I’m sure). I hope to upload more examples soon, but in the meantime check out the first attempt.
Update :
Tonight I took a similar video clip using the Canon Ixus 210 in HD (720p). The result looked much better onscreen and MS ICE also did a much better job with the source footage. Many more images were picked from the video (110 selected, 109 stitched) covering 360′ horizontally and a much better 130′ vertically. This produced a final image 6144 pixels by 2165, giving 13 megapixels. The end result as uploaded to Photosynth is much more pleasing then the Blackberry version and gives a much more complete view of the room.
This video option is definitely one I will play around with a whole lot more. Next time out the Canon Eos 550D to do some full HD (1020P) video.
Getting what’s due in terms of the Consumer Protection Act
Posted on April 06, 2011The new Consumer Protection Act came into effect from the 1st April 2011. To quote from the DTI website : “I know my rights. Do you know yours? you have rights as a consumer. understand them. enforce them.”
On the plane on Friday night I read in the paper (don’t remember which one, think it was one of the Cape local papers) that as consumers we now have the right to cancel an advance booking, and that the supplier may deduct a fee if we do so, but that they cannot refuse to provide a refund. Over the weekend I was looking at airline tickets and found that Travelstart have a policy which is in contravention of this. Simply put, unless you pay extra for a “Cancellation policy” you cannot get a refund for a ticket cancellation. This appears to me to be in contravention of the Act so I mailed them as below :
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