If it's Monday, it must mean Internet access is down. And so it goes. This will be posted when it get's posted.

Who Could Have Known?

Up to now I've made no comment on what the President may or may not have known ahead of the September 11th attacks. And actually, I don't plan to now either. Not because, as one administration mouthpiece incorrectly alleged, that this is time of war (things would be different if the President had sought and received a declaration of war from Congress), but rather because it would serve no good purpose to do so.

What I will comment on is another administrator saying, "Who could have known?" If you are ever in a position of leadership, never, ever, say those words. For as soon as you say them, the hunt begins to find someone who did in fact connect the dots and put the picture together. And don't think no one did because I'm sure there's an analyst somewhere who was able to see the connections and come to the correct conclusion.

The analogy being used by some commentators is Pearl Harbor. This, perhaps unwittingly, is an apt example because the attack was in fact foretold, in chilling detail. Everything was laid out, down to the day of the attack (Sunday) and the direction of the attack (from the North). So what happened to the person who raised the alarm? He was court martialed, of course. His main problem being he said things as they were, not as the power brokers thought (or wanted) them to be.

So, if the time ever comes, remember that just because you couldn't come to the correct conclusion, doesn't mean someone else couldn't.

Red Hat 7.3

I was finally able to download the three ISOs for Red Hat 7.3 (Valhalla) over the weekend. It took something like three hours to get the approximately 1.8GB of data so I hope it's worth the time and effort. Of course, if you only have a dial-up, I would just buy a copy since it would probably take longer to download that much than to drive down to your local computer store and get it.

"A truly brilliant man would find a way not to go to war." - Japanese Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto, after being congratulated on his brilliant attack on Pearl Harbor. - Aloha!

Red Hat 7.3 Install

So I was able to install Red Hat 7.3 yesterday (and again this morning, more below). The GUI install is fairly straight forward as long as you know what the refresh frequencies of your monitor are, what brand of video card (and how much memory is on it), what brand of keyboard, and what brand of mouse (including whether it is a PS/2, serial, or USB). The first time through, I made a mistake in choosing the MS Intellimouse with a PS/2 connection. What I should have chosen was the USB connection since that is what I am now using. This mistake meant I had no mouse recognized in KDE. Not a Good Thing.

I tried changing the mouse via /usr/bin/mouseconfig and also /usr/X11R6/bin/xf86config but had no luck. I guess I did something wrong (like not knowing if it's /dev/input/mice or /dev/usbmouse or something completely different). In either case, KDE refused to start. In fact, I could not even get the login screen. So, this morning I reformatted the drive and started over.

Note that the default workstation install, not including the boot and swap partitions takes a little over 2GB of storage (a full on kitchen sink install could take almost double that). I also chose the KDE and Gnome environments. Note also that some of the packages, like WINE for instances, are on the third of three install CDs so remember to download all three ISOs, even if you will only need about 5MB of the third 550MB ISO (unless you won't be using the DOS/Windows emulation program WINE).

Otherwise, things are now running and I will let you know how well at a later date.

For everyday work, my Linux client is 99% promise and 1% delivery. - Doc Searls, Senior Editor, Linux Journal - Aloha!

Home Improvement

There is the age old problem of what kind of changes to your home can you expect to pay for themselves at the point of sale (especially if the sale is within a year or two)? While the answer is dependent on where you live and what price range you are in, you can follow this link here to some general recommendations based on data from across the US. The top two changes are to add a new heating system or do minor kitchen renovations. The bottom two are to install new landscaping or to finish a basement. So before you start swinging that hammer, think about what your return on investment will be.

Netscape 7.0 PR1

If, for whatever reason, you want to download preview 1 of Netscape 7, feel free to follow this link here. I'm not sure why you would want to do that since I think you could get a newer version by downloading Mozilla 1.0 RC2 here. But hey, whatever turns your crank.

If 50 million people say a foolish thing, it is still a foolish thing. - Anatole France - Aloha!

Seventh Seal

Well, not really. But almost. It seems Toyota may be getting into NASCAR truck racing (see the story here). NASCAR and Toyota? While I don't watch truck racing (it's kind of like watching hippos having sex. There's a lot of sloshing around but it's not much fun watching it and probably even less fun for the hippos), I guess some people like this stuff.

Speaking of Heavenly Bodies

No, not that kind. Over on the Big Island of Hawai'i, the International Astronomical Union's Symposium on Brown Dwarf Stars is discussing the discovery of an object (SOri70) which may be a brown dwarf or a planet (see the story here). Astronomers using the Keck I telescope atop the volcano Mauna Kea discovered the object in December of 1998. Further observations by the Herschel telescope in the Canary Islands confirmed it was either a brown dwarf or planet by the presence of methane gas.

The best way to predict the future is to invent it. - Alan Kay - Aloha!

It's Friday!

Judgment Day

Sort of. I have a presentation to give today on courtroom security. The audience is about 20 judges and court administrators. What? Me worry? I'm not an expert in the area since the Planner who left for the private sector a few months ago was assigned to that subject. But since he left, I by default got the job of doing the research and giving the presentation. I'm sooo lucky. Not.

Lets Be Careful Out There

Thanks to JHR for the InfoWorld link here on the average time to compromise of systems put on the net. Or at least, default systems without firewalls. The article says a default install of Red Hat 6.2 will be compromised within 72 hours. Going on further, columnist Andress indicates a default install of Red Hat 7.1 was compromised within six hours. My own experience is that if you put up a default NT based server, you'll be rooted within minutes because of all the scanning being done. You may also want to check the information over at http://project.honeynet.org/ which was the basis for the article.

The morale of the story is to use a well configured and installed firewall regardless of the operating system you may use for your server(s) or client(s). And then layer your defense with a well secured operating system and detection/logging systems to sound the alarm should they get past your other defenses.

By the way, when you are setting up a new installation, whether on a server or client, do not be connected to the Internet unless you are behind a firewall. Otherwise, you will be rooted so fast the kiddiez will have their kits installed before you have a chance to finish your own installation.

If you must be out there without a firewall, at least have all the security updates for your OS burned on a CDROM before hand and install them before connecting to the Internet. Even then, you should be vigilant. And even then you should have a firewall. YMMV.

Have a Great Weekend Everyone - Aloha!