I posted a picture of my geeky aweosme car on picasa a while back and just went back to check it.. almost 100k views and lots of comments. a few asking how to attrib me. so im making this post to show off my geeky Mazda 3. w00t!

Not really, I just love sensational titles! So there’s allot of noise being made recently about the IPv6 changeover; when it should happen, how, etc. and the consensus is that we’ve already waited too long and we are pretty much boned. That is to say, we don’t have enough time to make the IPv4 to IPv6 transition go smoothly.
For those of you unfamiliar with how ip addressing and the internet works, more specifically how the numbers are handled. that job falls to the NRO (Number Resource Organization) which was formed by the RIRs (Regional Internet Registries) to “protect the unallocated Number Resource pool, to promote and protect the bottom-up policy development process, and to act as a focal point for Internet community input into the RIR system” which basically means, they’re the guys who release IP blocks and addresses to the IANA (Internet Assigned Numbers Authority) who then hands these over to the RIRs, who will distribute them to the LIR (Local Internet Registries – usually an ISP), who then gives you the end user your ip address.
Sounds like a big mess but each step is very important for managing our addressing space. So here’s the bad news. The NRO warns that only 10% of the IPv4 addressing space is unused. Meaning, there’s very very little room for more addressing under our current system. DOOMED!!!!!

Well not entirely. IPv6 is here to save the intarwebs! It allows for a possible 340,282,366,920,938,463,463,374,607,431,768,211,456 addressed. So we will not have any issues like this anymore. The next problem will be the conversion. Which if you’re reading this you probably have no control over; this is a job for the big guys to sort out: the ISPS and backbone folk. But one thing is for sure, the transition should already be underway if it was going to go unnoticed. It’s going to be a bumpy road, but by 2012 you should have a whole new IP address to memorize!

Some more pretty IPv4 useage history and IPv6 info can be found here

This is going to be another “Mike fucking loves Google!” post so brace yourselves for another Google fanboy moment.
i downloaded the new Picasa 3 desktop client after seeing it on Googles twitter feed. i am really amazed with the improvements! The software went form an easy way to look at pictures and manipulate them, to a social picture management application. adding the ability to Geo tag, face tag, keyword tag and multiple uploading. its hella spiffy.
What amazes me most, and what caused me to make this poorly thought out post was the built in image recondition of both the desktop software AND the web albums! It was able to go through my web album in less than 15 mins scanning faces and compiling lists of similar faces for tagging, one particular instance made me LOL

That is our good friend John Travolta whose face can be found in the Pulp Fiction poster that was in the background of 2 pictures, it will recognize any face it seems, and match it perfectly with other faces. but thats enough about that. the Geo-tagging will allow you to select multiple (or single) pictures, click the “Geo Tag” button, then just point to a place on the map. makes it wasy as hell, no more screwing with the long-lats. and from my understanding (although i havnt seen it yet) it makes the public photos viewable on google maps.
If your looking for a place to host pictures, or a software to manage pictures. I strongly recommend picasa web albums and picasa 3! beats the hell outta flickr any day!

Short story before we start, i was aw Quakecon 2009 earlier this month and the network would not allow steam connections to cut down on bandwidth abuse, but my Steam install had not updated in a while so i could not play any of my Steam games on the LAN. if i had setup this Tethering solution all of my problems would have been solved. if you have an android phone id recommend you get tethering setup even if you don’t think you will need it. because when you do its already too late.
So this is how to setup your android device to act as a proxy for connectivity to the Internet, or Tethering!
First off, like most unconventional solutions, you need to enable installing non market android apps. To do this Hit Menu then settings then Applications, then check the Unknown Sources box. While your in that area we will also need to enable USB Debugging to do that go to Menu then Settings, Then Applications, then Development, then check the USB debugging box. Now we are ready to install the app to allow for Tethering. To facilitate this I’ve generated this handy QR code. Just open the Android Barcode Scanner and scan this:

We are done with the Device settings for now. next we will need to turn to the computer you want to use tethering with, usually a laptop but it can be any computer. You should already have the android driver installed, If your have an up to date Windows or MAC computer you can skip that, but for a Linux compy you’ll need to go Here to install the Android Driver.
Now you’ll want to install the Android SDK! Quick and easy install, but its a 100MB+ Install Mac, Windows, and Linux installs can be found Here. When your done installing, plug your phone into the computer, and run the app we installed “Proxy app”.Press the “Start Proxy” Button. Now open a Command prompt in the folder that you uncompressed the SDK. Navigate to the location of adb.exe.For example mine was “C:\Documents and Settings\Username\Desktop\android-sdk-windows-1.5_r3\tools” as the folder containing the file. so i hit start, then run, then cmd, then typed “cd c:\Documents and Settings\Username\Desktop\android-sdk-windows-1.5_r3\tools”. once your there type “adb forward tcp:8080 localabstract:Proxy” for a windows box, or if your on a Linux or mac “./adb forward tcp:8080 localabstract:Proxy”. This will start the Proxy server running on port 8080.
This is the easy part, set firefox to use a Proxy server to do that go to Tools > Options > Advanced > Network > Settings > Manual proxy Configuration, and fill in the HTTP proxy as localhost, and the port as 8080. Hit OK and your done!
You can now access the Internet on your computer through your Android Phone! Enjoy!

Another quick tip for google chrome users. If you want themes for your google Chrome browser you will need to update to the new Beta 3 version. then go to the themes page and go wild! However when I and many others did this we would get the following error when trying to apply themes.

Invalid value for theme images – tints must be decimal numbers

A real pain in the ass. the way to fix it is just uninstall chrome and reinstall from the beta install. im told the next beta willnot have this issue, but this is a quick fix. Enjoy Chrome themes!!

Ive been using the Google Chrome browser since launch. and it was awesome to begin wiht, i mean its made by Google what else could it be? but alot of issues started cropping up recently. something i didn’t even thing about… is to frackin update the thing. The issues with Copy and paste in google chrome are all solved by the newest update. aswell as alot of chromes spell checking problems. To update it just to go tools and click about chrome, it’ll check for an update and get you to the newest version. just thought i would pass on that nugget of info.

Well first off i dont have a wave account yet (Hint Hint Google!) but as soon as i get one ill update this page. Heres what i think will be awesome about google wave:

The first thing that should be said is thisa isnt just Google Wave, It’s Wave. like Gmail is to Email. Its a whole protocol they are coming up with to build a new foundation for online communication! so even if your a google hater, most other companies will probobally make Waves shortly after the wave protocol is finished. and the way google is designing it all waves should be compatable (but microsoft will prob fuck it up).

So what wave is, new communication platform, poised to replace standars instant messaging and email. kinda takes most current forms of online communication and combines them. From email to picture sharing to online gaming, even some twitter like features. It seems like a much more naturual form of communication, kinda like how email would be, had we invented it today. As i type this im finding it Extreemly difficult to convey more information about what it is without making this post a mile long. so ill just post the video from Google IO, and hope i get a Wave account soon so i can elaborate.

If you have an android phone, and are awesome, then you have already paid the measly $2.99 to get the Bartor app! if you haven’t you are missing out. it is the second app that I’ve considered worth the money (the first is open home) and it turned out to be worth way more than it costs

What it does: Bartor allows you to scan the barcode of a movie/cd/book/game, find the torrent for the product you want, and sends the torrent to your computer for downloading. I went to blockbuster the other day and almost filled my harddrive. i always see cool stuff that i want to download, but forget by the time i get home. the only qualm i have with the software is the lack luster help and setup documentation. most of the issue isn’t on the side of the software, but the side of setting up your home computer to receive the torrents. so im going to give a run though of how to set it up. ill be using utorrent in this example, but the same basic steps will be obvious (or ill post links or help to get other clients working aswell)

Step 1, the Utorrent setup: What we are going to do here is get utorrent installed, and the web interface configured. first step in this process will be grabbing utorrent from here. install it. After the install open up utorrent, click options, then preferences. go down to “Web UI” and check the box to “Enable Web UI”. Change the authentication UN/PW to something you can remember then check the “Alternative listening port” box and assign a reasonable port. (nothing that is already used by other stuff, like 8080,21,80 etc..) i chose port:666 (props to Id software) That’s pretty much it for utorrent config! next step is to make sure that you can access it from the outside. Find your outside ip address (You can find that Here), and type this in your browser “http:\\YourOutsideIpAddress:PortNumber/gui” if you don’t get a login prompt there is a problem. could be any number of things but most commonly your on a network, behind a router, and your router has no idea where to direct requests on that port! which leads us to the next step.

Configuring your router for port forwarding: Some of you may not need this step, if the previous instruction worked then skip this section. First off login to your router, if your using a linksys router with all defaults (your retarded) it will be 192.168.1.1 or some variation on the 192.168 network. the easiest way to find the ip address to login to your router is to use your gateway. now that your loged into your router click the “Applications And Gaming” tab. Type in the application name as bittorrent set the range as the port you chose in the Utorrent setup. put that port number in the beginning and end fields. Select protocol as both, and change the last octet of the IP address there to the IP address of the computer that is running utorrent. to do this, click start, run, type CMD and hit enter. this will being up a command prompt. then type “ipconfig” and hit enter. your ip address will be the 192.168.1.X number. type the X number into the blank. and check enable, then save settings. Congrats! you have successfully forwarded a port. Now the link in the last segment should work!

That link should be working now, and you should be able to access the utorrent web interface! now we are ready to configure the android app to send torrents to this interface! this is the easy part, just open BarTor, Hut the MENU button on your phone, hit settings, click the “Client Sites” tab, then click Add. Here you will type in your Outside IP address (again you can get that Here), The port number you chose when setting up the Utorrent web interface (the one we port forwarded) and the UN/PW that you chose in the Web UI setup. hit ok, then click the entry you just made to highlight it. that selects it as the default client site. just hit the back arrow key and your ready to start scanning! If you have any questions feel free to post them in the comments section, and have fun!

Scan this barcode with your G1 to install Bartor!

Update: just heard from the creator(s) of Bartor and they will be adding torrent montiring features soon!!! thats the only thing the free ones have over this tor client (that and the free ones are great at taking up system resources!)

I’m working to get torrent monitoring up and running in BarTor, but I want to make sure that I do it right and that it works well in all supported clients and not just uTorrent

Hurray!

Ok, if your name is “Mike Norman” please quit reading now…. totally not for you, this cannot help you in anyway.. also throw your computer away. the rest of you, this is a quick and easy way to make your Google profile a higher result on the profile search!

First off if you have not done so create your google profile. to do so login to your google account then click this link. then click “Create a profile“, and fill out all the info as best you can. link as many other accounts as you can so that people searching for you find those and vice versa. id also recommend clicking the allow people to contact you box and of course the box to have you listed in the search results.

the next one i had to do an odd way, they may have fixed it by the time you read this. Were going to verify your name! this will add the Verified tag to your profile and improve its standing amongst the results for your name. you’ll need either a cellphone or a credit card (i used cell phone). go to google knol and login. Click Preferences at the top right, then click the Name Verification tab and the “Verify name by phone” button, follow the simple instructions, reply to the text they send, and bam your name is verified!

If your a web admin or work for multiple companies you would like to be assosiated with your name(and vice versa) i would also recommend verifying all the domains you have! to do that go to your google profile and click “Verify another email address“. Type in the email address you want verified, hit add email, wait for the confirmation email and repeat for other domains you may have. Lastly change your profile URL to something that’s not just numbers.

That’s pretty much all you can do on the google profile side, but to help out i would recommend social networking the shit outta that link! tweet it, share it on google reader, facebook it, just go crazy! that should get you on the way to having the top result for your name on a google profile search! but at the end of the day its still a popularity contest, Good luck! (unless your name is Mike Norman…)