borg.org

borg.org, the nobody reads it blog.

  • Bitching about the Obama economy is like telling Captain Sully: "The Hudson was the wrong destination! And why am I all wet!?"

    Our economy nearly died, and you are griping about it being too sluggish? We almost had to rename the Great Depression! World War One got renamed.  It started out as The Great War, the “war to end all wars”.  But a few years later we had an even bigger war, and we had to rename […]

  • Sony Passwords: Now do you believe you should not reuse passwords on different sites?

    Sony has been cracked.  Multiple times.  It seems Sony employs nerds who know nothing about security.  Now, sonypictures.com has had a million username and passwords (and other information: DoB, e-mail) scooped up and made public. Are you on that list? The Playstation breaks would have been even more users.  It hasn’t been posted public, are […]

  • Write Down Your Passwords

    Recently someone pointed out that an Ubuntu mailing list will e-mail a forgotten password back to you.  And that this is wrong.  Well, I agree, but… I am never bothered when a mailing list sends me a plaintext password. But I do something Extremely Radical: I don’t reuse passwords. If a mailing list password of […]

  • Python Command Line Arguments

    For quite some time I have thought I shouldn’t parse my own command line arguments in Python, but each time I looked for the “right” way to do it, I turned back. Today, I decided to persist. Now I know why I turned back, the libraries were terrible. I want to have: mycleverprog.py mycommand –nifty-option […]

  • Android Pattern Unlock Insecure

    When I first saw the pattern unlock feature in Android phones I thought: Cool! And I used it on my Nexus One.  Until I realized that it is a really stupid idea if I want my phone to be secure.  Don’t do it. The problem is that the phone screen gets smudged.  And when you […]

  • To Release or Not Release bin Laden Photos: A Most Productive Argument

    Nice to have a few things go right. Sure, the initial reports of the raid on bin Laden’s hideout were a bit confused and got corrected, and will get further corrections, but, if I may parrot others in this cliché, that’s why they call it the “fog of war”.  Even when things go stunningly right, […]

  • The '00s Are Over!

    Culturally the ’60s didn’t begin until about 1963 and lasted until about 1973. A powerful decade even with sloppy dates. The ’00s have more precise dates: September 11th 2001 to May 2nd 2011. Not everything in that decade is so tidy. Obama’s Cairo speech on June 4th, 2009, was a preview of the ’10s just […]

  • Obama Not Entirely Honest about Birth Certificate — and Will be Reelected

    Let me tell you the truth about this: the White House is not being entirely honest here.

  • Falling Cats

    I get behind on my podcast listening, but last night I listened to the recent Radio Lab short (http://www.radiolab.org/blogs/radiolab-blog/2010/nov/29/vertigo/) that brought up that old claim that cats which fall from New York apartments have minor injuries if they fall from low floors, do not fair well from higher floors, and did well again if they […]

  • Nexus One and LM961 Bluetooth Bracelet

    I recently got an LM961 Bluetooth bracelet to use with my Nexus One phone. Pretty cool, here are some observations: The diameter of the metal bracelet is big.  I couldn’t figure out how to take out extra links, so I brought it to a local watch repair shop just before closing and asked them to […]