Keep Passwords Secure with Encryption

Using a text file for passwords has always been handy. It's portable and you can send it whenever you need it. But it is inherently insecure. There are a lot of tools that can help you secure your valuable passwords, especially in these days of hack attacks and prevalence of intrusions.

One tool I recommend to friends is Keepass. KeePass is an open source project that encrypts your passwords to keep them protected from prying eyes. It supports AES (Advanced Encryption Standard) and Twofish algorithm to encrypt passwords. These are considered 2 of the most secure ways to encrypt data. In addition, Keepass encrypts all data it keeps and not just the passwords, so even your usernames are protected. It also features on-the-fly encryption, which means even if your computer freezes while you're using it, your data is safe. Keepass is also portable, so it doesn't need to be installed in a particular computer. That means it doesn't leave any traces on a computer you use. Convenient, especially when you have Keepass on a USB stick and you ask to use a friend's computer to access your accounts online. No worries from keyloggers as well. While it is running, you can press a hotkey and Keepass can automatically fill in the password when it detects your logging in with a username you saved in it. You can also generate very hard-to-crack passwords by using its random password generator. Since your using it already for keeping your passwords, you need not worry about remembering a difficult password. Keepass has a ton of advanced user features as well. You can check them out here: http://keepass.info/features.html. Best of all, it is free!

Did I get your attention now? Here's how to start using Keepass in 4 easy steps:

1. Download the portable version of Keepass from http://keepass.info/download.html:

2. Extract the files from the .ZIP folder:

3. Click on KeePass.exe from the extracted files:

4. Start typing in your passwords!

If you need something more robust to work across multiple devices, there are other options. For one, Keeper Data Vault. Keeper Data Vault is compatible with PC, MAC and Linux operating systems and apps for mobile devices like the iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad, BlackBerry(r), Android, Vodaphone 360/Symbian are available. It's available in English, Chinese, Spanish, French, German, Greek, Italian, Japanese, and Portuguese. It uses also uses 128-Bit AES cipher encryption and syncs your data across all your computers and devices. A random password generator comes standard and is aptly called 'Dice'. Keeper also supports automatically filling in usernames and passwords, convenient when using mobile touchscreen devices like iPhones and Android phones.

The most robust security feature on it has to be the Self-Destruct Mode. If set to that option, Keeper erases all data after 5 unsuccessful login attempts. If you tavel a lot and you have your passwords stored in Keeper on a mobile device or laptop, this has to be the single-most important security feature if ever you loose your device or laptop. So if you happen to leave your phone or your laptop on the train or taxi, you know your passwords are still secure. You also don't have to worry about your data on your other computers or devices either. Even with Self-Destruct turned on, your other devices are not affected. Since Keeper syncs data, everything can be restored by using the secure backup & restore features.

If you're interested in trying out Keeper, you can get it here: Keeper 50% Off. If you use that link, you can get a 50% discount by using the code KP50 at checkout.

So keep your passwords safe and download these 2 applications. Be careful out there.

Hello World in Geek

1Hello World is an innocent enough phrase, but it actually means a lot more to geeks. In programming, a Hello World program is the first thing aspiring programmers are taught to write. Their introduction into programming often starts with the exercise of piecing together a set of instructions to make their programs say Hello World. Writing it allows a new learner to grasp the basic rules in authoring programs. It does something simple enough, it just displays the message Hello World. That's it.

Want learn more? Head on over to The Hello World Collection to see samples of code that explore Hello World in all it's simple geek glory.

Racks for Geeks

Dell Power Edge

The word 'Racks' has been around in slang for quite a while. A 'nice rack' is often a reference to a slightly more than adequate bosom. Racks can also be a reference to food. Ribs are also called racks. But alas, to geeks it means not an indulgence in ogling or eating. Racks mean servers. Yes! Rack servers or rack-mounted servers as they are properly called, are the kind of computers your ISP or large companies have. It basically serves data to other computers. Much of the work it does is to decide which computer gets what data at what time. It can also serve as storage, the way most enterprises use them. If you're blogging or using social networking sites, they're hosted from servers that store their data. When you browse a webpage, much of what you see gets dished out by a server.


Water is stored by the dam and released only to the level needed to meet the demand. Servers behave in a similar fashion. It acts to control the flow of data or store it. From acting like web traffic controllers to storing the bits and pieces of your favorite websites, servers get a lot of work done in the background without you knowing it. With so much technology in these things, it's no wonder that geeks have a natural attraction to racks. 


Some famous racks are even tourist attractions. Take for example the servers that hosts different open source projects in Oregon State's Open Source Labs. Visiting geeks have their pictures taken with the racks serving their pet projects. LOL!


So the next time you overhear a geek say, 'Nice Racks!' better be on the look out for a geek checking out hardware of the computer kind.

Grumbling Geyser

In a spiteful, vengeful act of spring clearing my desk drawer, guess what I found? I had to stop scorching the earth to admire a relic from the good past. I found an old copy of Hoary Hedgehog! I've actually been around since Warty Warthog, but I don't have any CD's anymore. I must've given them away. I was always on a frenzy back then, ordering like mad, wanting to give away the CD's to leery friends who started avoiding me. Well, anyway, I'm glad I kept a copy around just for old times sake.

Ah, those were the days! Way before they started scheming to go by the alphabet for the order of the version nick names. Back when downloading anything close to the size of a full CD meant days on end on a dial-up connection. Frustrating was it to find your download interrupted by something as trivial as a call coming in. Back in dial-up age that meant starting over. So when a friend told me that there was this distro that was shipping CD's free-as-in-beer to anyone anywhere in the world, I was esctatic! Back in those days, I'd order a pair of discs the day they announce the release and eagerly await the three weeks it would take to get them in my sweaty palms.

It's wonderful to romanticize about the old days. Sad to say as the years pass I begin to be less enthused and more bemused. Everything goes by so fast these days. Probably because i have so much to do and only 24 hours every day. Along with that dilemna comes less time in front of the computer. Well, not really. I meant I spend more time on the computer now than 5 years ago, except these days it tipped over to work related things instead of tinker time.


With Natty Narwhal barely a few weeks old and Oneiric Ocelot peeking over the horizon, I tend to wonder if the whole scheme of releasing a new version every six months is still relevant. Probably because by the time I had  afforded myself enough use-time to get comfy with one release, here comes another. And there something to be said about really customizing a linux install to the tweaks that you want. I mean when you hit the sweet spot, it's just in time for the next release. Reminds me of "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" and how a lot of long-time linux users will find a version that is stable and feature-sufficient enough for them and stick with it until they really have to upgrade. I mean really need to.  Like probably when the repositories for that version already go offline kind of have-to.


So gleaming from that wisdom and after weighing the history I've had with Ubuntu, I've decided to just go with what works for me. I installed Natty, but then I couldn't get used to Unity. I will go back to Maverick and will probably stick with that until I really need to (have to) move on. Maverick was the last thing I got excited about and it worked great with the tweaks that I added. I'm starting to feel old already just admitting that I prefer the older stuff. I mean I'm starting to love older things all of a sudden. Someone send me an Ubuntu shirt with the old logo!!!

Broadband Jitters

Been noticing the past few days that our PLDT DSL connection has gone flaky. Well, I guess it's just the way it is. When you complain, they give you the whole tirade the advertised speed is "up to" and not a guaranteed, consistent speed like it is with big corporates. True. But things should get better for consumers too, right?

Curious about the actual numbers, I tried different sites to kind of gauge how slow  my connection was. Speed tests on the web are actually not that accurate in my experience. ISP's now allow super speedy bandwidth on short bursts, optimized of small packs of data. Speed tests usually send and receive small amounts of data. Those short bursts of speed help them perform better in speed tests. Some people call it a tweak, others term it as a cheat. However you prefer to call it, it still doesn't give you, the consumer, an accurate assessment. What's better? Right now I'd say ping tests.

Here're the results of a ping tests I did using Pingtest.net. I used different volunteered servers from different ISP's for comparison's sake. Notice how fast it is when it's pinging PLDT servers and how atrocious the packet loss was when it crossed ISP's...

Sky Broadband:






Globe Enterprise:






Bayantel:






PLDT: