Windows 7 officially supports logon UI background customization

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Although this functionality was designed with OEMs in mind, it is pretty easy to turn on and off using regedit and some images lying around your hard drive.

First, a check is made to determine if the customization functionality is enabled or not. More precisely, a DWORD value named OEMBackground in the HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Authentication\LogonUI\Background key is checked. Its data, of Boolean type, defines whether or not this behavior is turned on, i.e. 1 for enabled, 0 for disabled. This value may not exist by default, depending on your system.

Afterwards, if customization is enabled, the primary monitor’s screen height and width are retrieved via calls to GetSystemMetrics. These values are used in the computation of the screen width (w)/height (h) ratio. For example, my desktop resolution is 1920×1200. The ratio, computed by the division of w/h, is 1.6:1.

The result of this computation is looked up in an internal table that drives what image to load on disk. Although I don’t have a large enough monitor to test, it appears resolutions higher than 1920×1200 will force the loading and zooming of an image of closest compatibility (i.e. same ratio, smaller image).

As this is an OEM feature images are derived from %windir%\system32\oobe\info\backgrounds. Like the registry value, this folder may not exist by default. The following files (sorted by width-to-height ratio) are supported in this folder:

  • backgroundDefault.jpg
  • background768x1280.jpg  (0.6)
  • background900x1440.jpg  (0.625)
  • background960x1280.jpg  (0.75)
  • background1024x1280.jpg (0.8)
  • background1280x1024.jpg (1.25)
  • background1024x768.jpg  (1.33-)
  • background1280x960.jpg  (1.33-)
  • background1600x1200.jpg (1.33-)
  • background1440x900.jpg  (1.6)
  • background1920x1200.jpg (1.6)
  • background1280x768.jpg  (1.66-)
  • background1360x768.jpg  (1.770833-)

NOTE: Images must be less than 256kb in size. Thanks for pushing me to investigate, Jay C.

The backgroundDefault.jpg image is loaded and stretched-to-fit when a resolution/ratio-specific background cannot be found. The other resolution/ratio-specific files are self-explanatory. If the background cannot be loaded (e.g. image physically too large, incorrect ratio, etc.), the default SKU-based image is loaded from imagesres.dll. You’ll see a Windows Server-themed grayish background in there, too, suggesting this functionality is not specific to client SKUs.”

Windows 7 to officially support logon UI background customization – Within Windows.

Dutch Gov’t Has No Idea How To Delete Tapped Calls

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“The law in the Netherlands says that intercepted phone calls between attorneys and their clients must be destroyed. But the Dutch government has been keeping under wraps for years that no one has the foggiest clue how to delete them Google translation. Now, an email PDF from the National Police Services Agency KLPD has surfaced, revealing that the working of the technology in question is a NetApp trade secret. The Dutch police are now trying to get their Israeli supplier Verint to tell them how to delete tapped calls and comply with the law. Meanwhile, attorneys in the Netherlands remain afraid to use their phones.

via Slashdot Your Rights Online Story | Dutch Gov’t Has No Idea How To Delete Tapped Calls.

iPhone 91 PC Suite

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The PC Suite is also available for Windows Mobile and Android and offers and alternative way to handle your phone. For the iPhone it offers a way out of itunes and gives you the ability to mass SMS, back up your entire iphone (including cydia apps), a ringtone community and maker, a file explorer and a whole lot more.

In order to make it English, you may have to rename some language files in the directory C:\Program Files\NetDragon\91 Mobile\iPhone\LangPack (all except the en-US.lang – if you don’t rename, the updater will try to redownload them)

PandaApp.com | manage your smart phone easily and safely!.

Reverse Image Searching

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In this form of searching, you upload an image, sketch or 3D object, and you get results based on where the image comes from, where else the image is placed and if (and where) there are similar images on the net.

Image Searchers:

TinEye
RevIMG
retrievr – search by sketch / search by image
Sauce Nao

3D Model Searchers:

Prinecton 3d model search engine (also for sketches)
an article about the Purdue sketch / 3D searcher
Im2GPS Estimates geographic information from a single image

keywords: pictures, photos

Raise the speed limit!

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As an example, Peterson pointed to changes made along a section of Interstate 496 outside of Lansing, which accounted for 40 percent of reported incidents of aggressive driving in that area. When the speed limit was raised from 55 mph to 70 mph, incidents of aggressive driving dropped to zero.

“The low speed limit frustrated many drivers, so they drove over the speed limit. This caused problems for other drivers who were driving at the limit. The speed differential caused the tailgating, passing, and speeding that were reported as ‘aggressive’ driving,” Peterson said.

His data also showed accident rates in that area also fell when the speed limit was raised.

Surprisingly, the higher speed limit also improved traffic flow, nearly eliminating all symptoms of rush hour congestion along that stretch.

via Road rage’s causes and prevalence debatable | detnews.com | The Detroit News.

UK: CCTV snooping becomes a game

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Yup – someone had to think of a way to turn those CCTV camera’s into something that everyone had access to! In an internet game, people are encouraged to use the CCTV network to spy on people in the street. Whoever catches the most “criminals” (say litterers or jaywalkers) gets GBP 1000,- every month! Have fun participating in the spy state!

Internet game that awards points for people spotting crimes on CCTV cameras is branded ‘snoopers paradise’ | Mail Online.

Pirate Bay continues

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The whole Pirate Bay saga continues: after strange court orders, dodgy sales, bans on Google, etc, etc, here is the  latest:

Pirate Bay’s Peter Sunde has gone to the Dutch police and has charged the Brein organisiation with fabrication of evidence and fraud.

Pirate Bay doet aangifte tegen Brein en Kuik – update 2 | Webwereld.

Brein has been trying to get the Pirate Bay down globally – due to Brein suboepna’ing the 3 mere conduits for the IP range they use:

Brein blokkeert Pirate Bay wereldwijd – Webwereld

That block has been circumvented by a Dutch guy working for a German host

Nederlander helpt Pirate Bay weer online – update – Webwereld

Never a boring moment with these guys!

Default Contact Country

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Oh the idiocy of it all!
In the Apple iPhone 3.0.1, you can set the default contact country by going to settings -> general -> International and then changing the region format. This means that even if you won’t see the country name in the contact, when you look it up in Google Maps for the location, it’ll add that country name to the address bar. (NB Not fixed in 3.1)

Outlook 2007 suffers from the same lunacy – In Control Panel -> Regional and Language Options -> Formats Tab – this is where outlook gets the country from when adding new contacts. No, it doesn’t use the country in the you would have thought this is obvious ‘Location’ tab.

Not a big deal? So what if you’re an expat? Say you’re an Englishman living in Malaysia or Belgium or Holland. Yup, all the addresses you add will be in those countries, but you’ll manually have to set the country every time.

Wireless network modded to see through walls

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the way radio signals vary in a wireless network can reveal the movement of people behind closed doors. Joey Wilson and Neal Patwari have developed a technique called variance-based radio tomographic imaging which processes the signals to reveal signs of movement. They’ve even tested the idea with a 34-node wireless network using the IEEE 802.15.4 wireless protocol

via Technology Review: Blogs: arXiv blog: Wireless network modded to see through walls.

Carrier Command: Gaea Mission

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Carrier Command: Gaea Mission is a rebuild of the excellent classic Carrier Command, which allows you  to command from the deck of a futuristic aircraft carrier. Your job is to colonise islands as manufacturing, defence or mining and build up a logistics base for your carrier. You can launch ground vechiles (Walrusses) and UAVs (MANTA’s) to go about scouting your way, building colonies and attacking the enemy carrier which is trying to block your way. At the time, the original was an awesomely fluid 3D engine using filled vector graphics. The new version adds troops and looks awesome, as well as true to the original. You can download the original here, I’m very much looking forward to it.

The only game that has come anywhere near to this was the very very buggy Battlecruiser series by Derek Smart.

Dutch passports require unsecure fingerprints

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We should all know by now that the fingerprint biometric is a bad one: not only can you duplicate it fairly easily using just gummy bears, or increase the risk of having your finger cut off for you, they also give too many false negatives; some people will never be able to use fingerprint scanners.

The problem here is that because they have to automate the fingerprinting process, you get a lower level of accuracy in the scans. No two prints by the same finger are ever exactly the same. This is corrected for by error correction codes, which adds information to the prints to allow the computer to correct for these disparities. If you can get to these codes, you can find out information about the original fingerprint and the amount of data loss that is expected. So searching through the error correction code database allows you to find a fingerprint that is similar to yours and has a large correction. This means you can become this other person fairly easily.

Vingerafdrukparanoia is terecht (opinie) | Webwereld.