Get your Zero Day Fixes here.

Posted on October 2, 2006 by Harish Venkatachalam
In the tragic, and from my perspective hilarious saga of Microsoft Security, we now have security vendors who are beating Microsoft to the punch when it comes to patches to its own operating system. This is truly pathetic, but when confronted with zero day exploits left and right, I guess many companies can’t sit around and wait for Microsoft fixes and have to take matters into their own hands.

Remember folks, Vista is just a few months away and this is the same company that claimed you can trust Vista on Day one. I am sure all these security issues will magically disappear the day Vista gets released sometime next year. šŸ™‚

An interesting sidebar to the above linked article is the following quote by Ballmer. Microsoft is “at the beginning of 12 months of the greatest innovation pipeline we have ever had.” That link is from October 2005. Quick – name 3 things Microsoft has “innovated” in the past year. Heck, name just one.
Heh … I thought so.
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The Face of a Murderer

Posted on September 26, 2006 by Harish Venkatachalam
This murderous bear was responsible for over 2500 deaths !
Just look at those eyes. Pure Evil I tell you.

Heh … My wife is gonna kill me for posting this. She is a sucker for cute looking teddy bears.

From an AP story I saw at CNN.

MILFORD, New Hampshire (AP) — A teddy bear has been implicated in 2,500 deaths — trout deaths, that is.
State officials say a teddy bear that fell into a pool at a Fish and Game Department hatchery earlier this month clogged a drain. The clog blocked the flow of oxygen to the pool and suffocated the fish.
Hatcheries supervisor Robert Fawcett said the bear, dressed in yellow raincoat and hat, is believed to be the first stuffed toy to cause fatalities at the facility.
“We’ve had pipes get clogged, but it’s usually with more naturally occurring things like a frog or even a dead muskrat,” he said. “This one turned out to be a teddy bear and we don’t know how it got there.”
The deaths prompted Fawcett to release a written warning: “RELEASE OF ANY TEDDY BEARS into the fish hatchery water IS NOT PERMITTED.”
He said it’s not known who dropped the bear, but urged anyone whose bear ends up in a hatchery pool to find a worker to remove it. “They might save your teddy bear, and keep it from becoming a killer,” he said.
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Trees don’t move

Posted on September 25, 2006 by Harish Venkatachalam
My wife Kimmie was one of the casualties of the heavy storms over the weekend. She was driving down Lovelaceville road on Friday afternoon to run some errands not realizing how bad the road conditions had deteriorated over the morning. She hydroplaned, crossed both lanes and hit a tree head-on on the opposite side of the road. Luckily she was wearing her seat belt and there was no oncoming traffic. She had also slowed down considerably due to the road conditions or it could have been disastrous. Both the driver and passenger side airbags deployed so it was a pretty good impact. She ended up in knee deep water in a ditch but was conscious and was able to extricate herself from the car. You hate to receive that phone call about your wife being in an accident, but I was glad that it was Kimmie calling me about the wreck and not a police officer. Having been with the Rescue Squad for many years, I know that if someone is talking to me after a head on collision, it is a very good thing. But even with all that experience my heart still jumped to my throat and I only calmed down after I spoke to the Medic on scene on the phone.

As of today Kimmie is doing well. She is badly bruised and is very sore but no broken bones. She has a badly bruised left forearm which I believe was from the airbag deployment. We had just celebrated our 1st wedding anniversary a couple of weeks ago and when things like this happen, it always makes you take stock of what’s important in life. I would like to thank the Lone Oak Fire Department and Mercy EMS for their prompt and wonderful response. You can find more pictures of the car /aftermath on my iweb page.

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Another Day Another Exploit

Posted on September 19, 2006 by Harish Venkatachalam
From an eweek article.

“The newest zero-day flaw in the Microsoft Windows implementation of the Vector Markup Language is being used to flood infected machines with a massive collection of bots, Trojan downloaders, spyware and rootkits.”

We are talking about the most secure OS ever built, right? Then again hadn’t we heard the same line about Windows XP many moons ago?

I especially love this line at the bottom of the article.
“Microsoft has added signature-based detection to its Windows OneCare anti-virus product. A formal security advisory with pre-patch workarounds will be posted within the next 24 hours.”
Time to pay up your subscription dues if you want to be protected from Microsoft’s own flaws. Sickening. But hey, if you choose to run Windows, you are getting exactly what you deserve.
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Brown

Posted on September 16, 2006 by Harish Venkatachalam
Moe Szyslak from the Simpsons once said …

“I’ve been called ugly, pug-ugly, fugly, pug-fugly, but never ugly-ugly.”

Now this is UGLY-UGLY.

And the accolades have come pouring in. šŸ˜‰

Motley Fool
CNet

Even the numero uno MS butt kisser Enderle called it a “design mistake”. You don’t see a link to that quote as I refuse to link to that asshat and give him more hits. And the much ballyhooed wireless sharing is a dud as it only works 3 times before expiring. Did the Zune team even bother consulting with the XBox 360 team?

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September 11, 2001

Posted on September 11, 2006 by Harish Venkatachalam
I canā€™t write anything here more than what will be written by countless others today. But I agree with George Pataki that remembering this day is not a choice, but our solemn obligation. I know that not only will I remember this day forever, but I will do my part to remind the generations to come as to what happened on that fateful day five years ago.

The following is a collection of photographs of those killed during the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, and the reason for remembering this day.

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Crikey!

Posted on September 5, 2006 by Harish Venkatachalam

Stephen Robert Irwin (February 22, 1962 ā€“ September 4, 2006)
You will be missed, Mate.
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One Year Ago

Posted on August 29, 2006 by Harish Venkatachalam
A year ago at 11:25 p.m. CDT on August 28 Hurricane Katrina made landfall as a Category 3 hurricane with sustained winds of 125 mph near the tiny fishing village of Buras-Triumph, Louisiana. Sometime during the early morning hours of August 29, the Levees protecting the City of New Orleans failed causing one of the worst natural disasters in U.S. history which killed over 1,800 people.

A year later the Army Corps of Engineers has rebuilt the 169 miles of Levees and flood walls that were breached due to Katrina and Rita. They have been rebuilt to Pre Katrina design specs, and although use of better materials and construction has made them technically stronger than what existed before Katrina, they are designed at best to the low end of a Category 3 Hurricane. Katrina was a Category 5 Hurricane but by the time it made landfall it was a Category 3.

To me, the simple pragmatic lesson learned from Katrina is this. In the immediate aftermath following a big disaster, donā€™t expect the government ā€“ be it state, local or federal to do anything soon. The size and inertia of government by its very nature prevents immediate action. ā€œBe preparedā€ – as the Boy Scout motto states. For a while at least, following any disaster, you will be on your own, and your survival and that of your loved ones depends on it. And remember, the bigger the disaster, the longer the time you will have to depend on your self.

Secondly, heed the warnings. They are given out for a reason. Thatā€™s one arm of the government that did its job, and did it well. Hereā€™s the infamous NWS warning. When trained professionals at the NWS give out warnings like this, it is indeed time to run for the hills. Of course, for so many in New Orleans that fateful week a year ago, it was already too late.

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And then there were Eight.

Posted on August 24, 2006 by Harish Venkatachalam

It’s official. Pluto got the boot.

Send your hate mail to the IAU.

I guess we just couldn’t leave well enough alone. This is probably what the World War 9 will be fought over 100 yrs from now. That’s when the representatives from Pluto will finally get here! :-p

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Microsoft loses another one

Posted on August 23, 2006 by Harish Venkatachalam
Microsoft, that stalwart defender of ā€œIntellectual Propertyā€ and master of innovation loses yet another court battle on Patent Infringement. This company couldnā€™t innovate their way out of paper bag with a 100 page instruction manual. I have said this before ā€“ everything Microsoft has been bought, borrowed or outright stolen.

Lest we forget, hereā€™s a list of lawsuits Microsoft has faced over the years. And for all their bluster and $60 Billion in the bank, I can only think of one that they actually won. That ought to tell you something. Then again, maybe it’s the substandard software their Legal Department is forced to use. šŸ˜‰

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