Shimmer

This is a method to hide your application ports

shimmer works by cryptographically changing a set of 16 ports (one of which forwards to the real service, and 15 others that lead to a trap to blacklist attackers). The 16 ports change every minute frustrating an attacker, but a legimitate user with access to a secret shared between the client and server can determine the real port, avoid blacklisting, and get a connection.

Goodbye, cruel Word

Both Steven Poole and Virginia Heffernan in the NY Times have written great pieces about how they are pissed off with the huge bloat that is MS Word and how they have gotten around it.

One option is to use WriteRoom which presents you with a blank screen with text. Which is kind of… it. Old School, blank screen with text. Oh, you can configure the colour of the text. And the background. Anyway, it keeps you focussed on the actual writing part of it.

The other option is Scrivener. Not only does it allow you to word process, but it manages your writing as a project.

Both save their documents as .rtf / .txt / .xml which means they’re open formats you will be able to use forever. Unfortunately, Scrivener is only available for the Mac…

Happy alternate writing!

Vista4Experts

This freeware disables all the little things you hate about Vista, making it slightly less crap:

Vista4Experts is kind of a treat for computer experts who don’t want security center notifications, User Account Control dialogs, automatic Windows Defender scannings, automatic update installations (which cause you to reboot your system if you don’t react quickly enough). People who want MSDN (or google) set as default search engine in the Internet Explorer search bar, who want the start menu power button to shut down the system instead of hibernating it, etc.

Tablet PCs

Tablet PC’s come in all shapes and sizes. This is a quick look at tablet PCs on the market without keyboards and without potentially breakable hinges.
Electrovaya Inc. has the Scribbler SC-3100

Ace Asia Co., Ltd. has the T201

Fujitsu has the Stylistic ST5100

Itronix offerts the rugged Gobook Series

Motion Computing offers 3 different types of tablet PCs

of varying sizes and accessories

tabletkiosk offers a selection of tablets – they’re actually more UMPCs but come in varying degrees of price and capability

[Update]TabletKiosk is upgrading their line in 2008 with a modular unit and more grunt.

DRS-TS has a few imaginitively named portable tablets, such as the Hammerhead Xtreme

Then there’s the ulimate in ruggedised: the Xplore Technologies iX104C3Plus series

Then Amtek has this iTablet T221 going for around EUR 1,552.

The Axiotron Modbook is a modified Macbook. It’s the only tablet mac and the specs look very good – it’s fast and sensitive and has a 12800*800 resolution, so it’s useable as well. Of course, you should be able to install Vista on it too…

TabletPcTalk.com is a good site to keep track of what’s happening in this market

7″ Tablet PC running Windows CE has some fair specs. Would be good to see it running Linux!

LapBuddy

Sometimes a product comes along that’s so simple you wonder why you’ve never spotted it before. This is one of them. Wide enough for a keyboard and a mouse or a laptop and a mouse:

Made of lightweight material, the Lap Buddy’s design dissipates heat from a laptop computer, conforms to anyone’s lap, and our patented mouse pad will keep your mouse from slipping off at up to a 30-degree angle

The 30″ model is by far the most useful, as it is wide enough to accomodate your keyboard and mouse with plenty of room to spare – nobody wants to have their mousing area restricted when playing their favourite game.

Comes in 2 colours

Without the balding guy (hopefully)

When you lose a database

The UK has managed to lose two CDs with lots of very private information on around 15 million of its subjects. These CDs contained the personal information of all people collecting child benefits and were lost as a result of them being sent untracked by courier. They never arrived at their destination and were sent without a tracking number.
The potential for identity theft related crimes is huge.
And this is the government that wants you to entrust even more of your private data to them with national ID cards.