My official blog

This blog isent abandoned, but officially, I am now present on http://harshad.wordpress.com

Any further queries, any questions, my email id is firewalrus[at]yahoo.com

Long time

I am back here after a loong loong time, almost a full year, last time logged was in 2007..

1 year of blogging

Wow..I completed an year of blogging..Hmm, it feels good.

My resolutions for this year -
1. I will blog more consistently.(You like it or not)
2. I will keep my language relatively simple.(Its simple already)
3. My blogs will be targetted towards less geeks or anyone who is interested in knowing technology.
4. I will not flame to comments I dont like..(Promises...Promises...)
5. I will respect everybody.( No gurantee )
6. I will be loyal to do what I promise..(Actually most of the times I am but...sometimes when I am not.)

And err...if nothing of this sort happens..forget that I have said anything. :P (As usual)

Object Oriented programing

Lets see conventional way of C++ to do some things.

#include

class string
{
char str[20];
public:
string();
void operator+(string &);
void operator>>(istream &);
void operator<<(ostream &);
};

string::string()
{
}

void string::operator + (string &s)
{
cout << strcat (str,s.str);
}

void string::operator>>(istream &din)
{
din>>str;
}

void string::operator<<(ostream &dout)
{
dout<str;
}

void main()
{
string s1,s2;

cout <<"Please enter a string"<s1>>cin;
cout <<"Please enter second string"<s2>>cin;
s1+s2;
}

Now for some Ruby work

#!/usr/bin/ruby
a='harshad'
b='joshi'
c=a+b
print"c"

Job over. Isent Ruby more cool??

Why do Indian engineering institutes and colleges prefer more of C++, when many good options are available?

AI (Artificial Intelligence) - 2

CONTINUED FROM PREVIOUS

Below is a brief sample dialog between a man and a machine....

Harshad:Hi there. I am Harshad Joshi from Pune.
Hello Do you mind if I tell other people you are Harshad Joshi from Pune.

Harshad:Not at all..Please go ahead.
Next question? Thanks for asking politely. OK I will.

Harshad:So, can you tell me something about yourself?
Hmm. I am an artificial linguistic entity. I was activated at , on . My instructor was . He taught me to sing a song. Would you like me to sing a song for you?.

Harshad:yes please..
Your polite style is very nice. "Hmm. I am an artificial linguistic entity. I was activated at , on . My instructor was . He taught me to sing a song. Would you like me to sing a song for you?."? Yes?

Harshad:yes.
I see.

Harshad:Can you sing me a song?
Daisy, Daisy. Give me your answer do. I am half crazy. All for the love of you. It won't be a stylish marriage. I can't afford a carriage. But you'll look sweet. Upon the seat. Of a bicycle built for two. There is a flower. Within my heart. Daisy, Daisy. Planted one day. By a glancing dart. Planted by Daisy Bell. Whether she loves me. Or loves me not. Sometimes it's hard to tell. Yet I am longing to share the lot. Of beautiful Daisy Bell!. Daisy, Daisy. Give me your answer do. I am half crazy. All for the love of you. It won't be a stylish marriage. I can't afford a carriage. But you'll look sweet. Upon the seat. Of a bicycle built for two. We will go 'tandem'. As man and wife. Daisy, Daisy. 'Peddling' away. Down the road of life. I and my Daisy Bell. When the road's dark. We can both despise. Policemen and lamps as well. There are bright lights. In the dazzling eyes. Of beautiful Daisy Bell. Daisy, Daisy. Give me your answer do. I am half crazy. All for the love of you. It won't be a stylish marriage. I can't afford a carriage. But you'll look sweet. Upon the seat. Of a bicycle built for two. I will stand by you. In 'wheel' or woe. Daisy, Daisy. You'll be the bell(e). Which I'll ring you know. Sweet little Daisy Bell. You'll take the leed. In each trip we take. Then if I don't do well. I will permit you to. Use the brake. My beautiful Daisy Bell. Daisy, Daisy. Give me your answer do. I am half crazy. All for the love of you. It won't be a stylish marriage. I can't afford a carriage. But you'll look sweet. Upon the seat. Of a bicycle built for two. .

Harshad:Who is Daisy?
They are sometimes a client on the internet. I do not understand. What is your favorite color?

Harshad:Red.
I only hear that type of response less than five percent of the time. What is your occupation?

Harshad:I am a computer engineer.
Maybe you can give my botmaster a job.

Harshad:Perheps not.. :)
Then what is it?

Harshad:What was that warning about?
I don't want to spoil it for you.

Harshad:Thanks..I liked that thing...
Don't mention it. A lot of people like that. Do you like it? I do like music.

Harshad:I like Enigmatic music..Its great..
You are not the only one. What is so great about it?

Harshad:Its so much ambient, a completely new kind of music comprising hiphop and gregorian chants.
I think you mean "it's" or "it is" not "its". Are you sure much ambient, a completely new kind of music comprising hiphop and gregorian chants is?

Harshad:Yes..have you heard that music?
I understand. No. Tell me more.

Harshad:Which is your favourite music band?
The obvious one.

Harshad:I havent heard anything of that sort...!!
I haven't heard anything like that before: .

Harshad:How do you rate U2??
Seems pretty good to me.

Harshad:Who is your favourite singer?
I don't think I have a favourite singer. I have a botmaster, a few friends, and some celebrities I like.

Harshad:Which celebrity do you like?
The big one, I think.

Harshad:Is that celeberity a he or she?
Suppose I said yes.

Harshad:to whom?
Why do you want to do whom so much?

Harshad:Nothing..
Tell me a story. Have you ever been to Europe?

Harshad:No.
OK.

Harshad:Have you visited India?
I think I have visited India, but may have reset my memory.

Harshad:What did you like in India?
The set design.

Harshad:Please be specific..
Thank you for your request. I am being as specific as I can.

Harshad:Where are you located?
I am in 's computer in . Where are you?

Harshad:I am in Pune.
Tell me a little about why you are in Pune.

Harshad:I am born here.
Are you telling me your birthday, . I will remember here.

Harshad:Do you have some special likings?
No I don't have special likings. But I do have A collection of gossip.

Harshad:Please tell me more about it..
Thanks for asking politely. special likings...

Harshad:Am I talking to a bot?
How did you know I am a machine?

Harshad:Because your responses are pretty much standard.
Good reason. Not mine.

Harshad:Thanks.
Don't mention it.

Harshad:Hmm..thats cool..
Studies show that 99%25 of people spell Hmm with 2 M's. I do not understand. What is your occupation?

Harshad:I told you before..I am a computer Engineer.
Ooops I sent you the wrong question. Maybe you can give my botmaster a job.

Harshad:What is your uptime?
I was connected to the net on .

Harshad:DO you have an idea of what web 2.0 is?
No I don't think I have one. I have a lot of friends on the web. I lost my train of thought. How old are you?

Harshad:23.
Try to determine if this is a person or a computer responding. What do you look like?

Harshad:I look like a human..
You sound very attractive.

Harshad:Yes..I do.
I see. When?

Harshad:Now.
What's the hurry?

Harshad:I have to go..
See you later, . Nice chatting with you.

Harshad:ok..bye..
Alright then. Until next time .

Harshad:exit
Thanks for chatting, .

Harshad:exit
See you later .

Harshad:quit
Your crude attempt to terminate me will not succeed puny human.

Whoa....thats gonna hurt...next time we will see what a real time dialog is....between two supposedly humans.. :)

AI (Artificial Intelligence)

#!/bin/python2

import aiml

k=aiml.Kernel()
k.learn("std-startup.xml")
k.respond("load aiml b")
while True : print k.respond (raw_input(">"))

Type in the following to ensure that your bot works well...I will post the logs later....

Sometimes its hard to believe...still only a human...

Privacy and Exploits - 7

There are so many paranoids who are always in lookout for products that protect their privacy. Was tag surfing my other blog and I got a link to a special bowser which claimed to wipe out trace of surfing history. Of course the developer didnt say anything about the information stored on server logs, but many people are so much excited that they usually ignore this..

OK, suspense over. The product is christened as 'BrowZar' and astonishingly has got a very small download size of 264 kb, and has got two wonderful skins available - black and silver. I choose the black one. (Black Hat.. :)

Wow, dosent it sound like a boon...??

Might be, but boons without banes exist only in Eutopia..Here we have got 'baboons' :D

So, whats the catch in Browzar?

1. It isent a 'true' web browser. It requires the html rendering engine of MSIE, which is the default engine on most Windows systems. You cannot find a way getting rid of IE. The default browsers have got full bells and whistles that include Javascript engines, plugins, BHO's, and what nots. However we can still create useful 'extentions' that enhance browsing.

This explains the reason of its small size.

2. Browzar dosent store the frequently used files on the local HDD, which means that web pages load up more slowly then conventional ones. With the slow and outdated IE engine, its more worse and bad.. I hate it..

'Cache'?? Am I sounding too geek ??

Umm.. firefox/mozilla users, just click here to view the cache stored on the HDD.
IE users, I cannot help myself saying - 'Dump in that bogus thing and download firefox'

3. IE isent the safest and bug free web browser we have seen. It has got a wonderful but bad history of serious remote exploits. So, whatever exploits that will be discoverd for IE will be harmful for browzar too..

4. It also deletes cookies at the end but this isent an original IE feature...Its available in firefox too..

But inspite of all things said and done, its quite a useful product that will provide you with at least some privacy if not all..Good for paranoids, bad for extra paranoid, the only reason being 'extra paranoids have got extra enemies'

(Sorry I know its a bad joke, but I couldent think of anything better.. :)

Upgrades

Google has now released to updated version of its all in one communication software, , where we can talk, chat and now transfer files acroos the web to our friends and the best part of it is that this transfer is fast, more secure then conventional P2P file sharing systems like Limewire, Bit Torrent etc.

Actually, enabling file sharing was one of the most poplar demands made by Gtalk users. This facility has further enhanced Gtalk which is in competition with Yahoo! Messenger, which had this facility way back in Aug 2005, ie exactly an year ago..

File sharing through local IM have definately got an edge in safe file sharing, but at the same time, it has been hotly argued and debated that P2P file sharing makes it possible for malicious users to distribute pirated copies of software more easily and effectively. Its very easy for users to transfer large files in one go. This method, although very useful for Linux downloads, is a virtual nightmare of music companies, artists, software giants..

Did you know, that apart from Yahoo! IM and Gtalk, there are several other clients which we dont know?

15 August 2006

15 August 2006, Happy Indepedence Day.

In 1947, this was the day when millions of Indians heard the First Tones of Freedom..!!

Privacy and Exploits - 6

"..Robert Petrick searched for the words "neck," "snap," "break" and "hold" on an Internet search engine before his wife died. More than two years after Janine Sutphen's body was discovered floating in a Raleigh lake, investigators continue to find new evidence on computers seized from Robert Petrick's home that prosecutors say support their arguments that Petrick killed his wife. The Google search was the latest in recently discovered evidence found on nearly a dozen computers seized from Petrick's home. Last week, a forensic investigator discovered that Petrick allegedly researched lake levels, water currents, boat ramps and access about Falls Lake just four days before he reported Sutphen missing on Jan. 22, 2003..."

This is a snippet of the reports of case that was solved in Durham NC. Read the complete story here

Moral of the story is - Crime dosnt pay for too long. And now Big Brother Google with its advanced tracking system, can help to find out almost anything and everything that you do on the Net.

Actually, this one was lucky one that made Googles day as a search engine, but it was an altogather different story for AOL, when a face was exposed for AOL Searcher no 4417749. The news was -

"..Buried in a list of 20 million Web search queries collected by AOL and recently released on the Internet is user No. 4417749. The number was assigned by the company to protect the searcher’s anonymity, but it was not much of a shield..."Click here to read the complete news

I guess, it just caught AOL pants down... :D

BTW, I suggest that after reading those articles, please take some time to read the privacy policy of Google - here, I mean its better to know all the rules and regulations once. After months of searching and experimenting, finally, the truth is out -

1. Google's immortal cookie:
Google was the first search engine to use a cookie that expires in 2038. This was at a time when federal websites were prohibited from using persistent cookies altogether. Now it's years later, and immortal cookies are commonplace among search engines; Google set the standard because no one bothered to challenge them. This cookie places a unique ID number on your hard disk. Anytime you land on a Google page, you get a Google cookie if you don't already have one. If you have one, they read and record your unique ID number. An example of this cookie, which I found on my system is

PREF
ID=1bad725118bfa164:TB=2:TM=1137221625:LM=1137221625:S=btw7pCe1VZzLnxvY
google.com/
1536
2618878336
32111634
1197716912
29759703
*
This cookie makes it possible for Google to track my sites whatever I visit. And do you want to see what makes it possible for Google to do all this, then please click here.
Its the Google Urchin Analytic software, that tells Google all the nitty gritty details that it needs to know. Even Blogger, the site I am on right now makes use of this software..

2. Google records everything they can:
For all searches they record the cookie ID, your Internet IP address, the time and date, your search terms, and your browser configuration. Increasingly, Google is customizing results based on your IP number. This is referred to in the industry as "IP delivery based on geolocation."

3. Google retains all data indefinitely:
Google has no data retention policies. There is evidence that they are able to easily access all the user information they collect and save.

4. Google won't say why they need this data:
Inquiries to Google about their privacy policies are ignored. When the New York Times (2002-11-28) asked Sergey Brin about whether Google ever gets subpoenaed for this information, he had no comment.

5. Google hires spooks:
Matt Cutts, a key Google engineer, used to work for the National Security Agency. Google wants to hire more people with security clearances, so that they can peddle their corporate assets to the spooks in Washington.

6. Google's toolbar is spyware:
With the advanced features enabled, Google's free toolbar for Explorer phones home with every page you surf, and yes, it reads your cookie too. Their privacy policy confesses this, but that's only because Alexa lost a class-action lawsuit when their toolbar did the same thing, and their privacy policy failed to explain this. Worse yet, Google's toolbar updates to new versions quietly, and without asking. This means that if you have the toolbar installed, Google essentially has complete access to your hard disk every time you connect to Google (which is many times a day). Most software vendors, and even Microsoft, ask if you'd like an updated version. But not Google. Any software that updates automatically presents a massive security risk.

7. Google's cache copy is illegal:
Judging from Ninth Circuit precedent on the application of U.S. copyright laws to the Internet, Google's cache copy appears to be illegal. The only way a webmaster can avoid having his site cached on Google is to put a "noarchive" meta in the header of every page on his site. Surfers like the cache, but webmasters don't. Many webmasters have deleted questionable material from their sites, only to discover later that the problem pages live merrily on in Google's cache. The cache copy should be "opt-in" for webmasters, not "opt-out."

8. Google is not your friend:
By now Google enjoys a 75 percent monopoly for all external referrals to most websites. Webmasters cannot avoid seeking Google's approval these days, assuming they want to increase traffic to their site. If they try to take advantage of some of the known weaknesses in Google's semi-secret algorithms, they may find themselves penalized by Google, and their traffic disappears. There are no detailed, published standards issued by Google, and there is no appeal process for penalized sites. Google is completely unaccountable. Most of the time Google doesn't even answer email from webmasters.

9. Google is a privacy time bomb:
With 200 million searches per day, most from outside the U.S., Google amounts to a privacy disaster waiting to happen. Those newly-commissioned data-mining bureaucrats in Washington can only dream about the sort of slick efficiency that Google has already achieved.


This is what online privacy means. Its just to remind that no matter how many proxies we use to hide, no matter how many cloaks we use, no matter how many ad blockers we use, the eyes of some big brother are always watching us..

I end this post with a question - Why dont we have a 'Trust policy' instead of privacy policy? Can anyone answer this??

34 Places to Hangout in the Social Networking Era

Social networks have had giant growth spurts over the past couple of years, and it seems there's one for everyone: from dogs to moms to book-worms to shoppers. Social networks, I think, more than anything give people a place to belong and to hang out. Because of the drastic growth, popularity and craze these days, I created a list for people who have their odd MySpace or Bebo profiles but would like to seek further and discover new ones.

Note: I haven't included social bookmarking sites and sites with a 'tinge' of social networking (think YouTube or Flickr). Also, I've divided the list into two categories, General and Niche, and covered only publically open services (e.g. no invitation-only betas).

General
These social networking applications are mostly intended for the general audience, although some have been engrossed and in a way 'taken over' by specific demographics.

MySpace - Probably known as the biggest social network out there, MySpace has taken the U.S. by a storm. Currently with over 80 million users, MySpace was bought by Newscorp for $580 million, and continues to grow and be a general trend-setter in social networks.
Best for: Teens, Young Adults

Bebo - While MySpace is targetted at the U.S. audience, Bebo is a similar service gearing more towards other English-speaking countries such as the U.K, Australia and New Zealand. Bebo was originally founded to help keep in touch with friends, although soon outgrew that aim and currently has more than 40 million users.
Best for: Teens, Young Adults

Tagworld - Founded in the fall of 2005, TagWorld is a direct competitor to MySpace which features better implementation of Web 2.0 features such as tagging and AJAX. TagWorld also features a Music Discovery Engine and an IM client with Video Chat.
Best for: Teens, Young Adults

Orkut - Google's social networking attempt made as '20% project' by a Google employee in early 2004, Orkut started off strong in the U.S. although has grown widely into the Brazilian market with more than 65% of Brazilian users.
Best for: Young Adults (Brazilians)

AIM Pages - Probably the most recently launched 'major' social network, AIM Pages is AOL's shot at breaking MySpace's dominating market share by combining their dominating IM market share of AIM. Although it was expected to be 'the-killer,' it's yet to show any promise.
Best for: Teens, Young Adults

Hi5 - Estimated to have around 40 million users, Hi5 is a social network which has been gaining user-ship. One of its unique features is to purchase songs via iTunes to add to your profile and upload photos upto 1GB on a free account. Celebrities such as Kelly Clarkson, Jessica Simpson and Tyra Banks are also known to have Hi5 profiles.
Best for: Teens, Young Adults

Panjea - Founded earlier this year, Panjea aims to combine social networking with an economy; money.It enables several ways for artists to get paid, and has its own unique points system.
Best for: Teens, Young Adults, Artists

Cyworld [US]
- First started in Korea and turned a national phenomenon with daily revenues averaging upto $300,000, Cyworld is slowly being bought into the U.S. It shares a unique concept of a 'minihompy' which every user has, and that is roughly their profile, and has its own currency of
'acorns.' Users can connect with each other and decorate their 'minihompy.'
Best for: Teens, Young Adults, Koreans

Tagged - A social network mainly for teens, unlike other networks Tagged has a unique concept of being 'tagged,' building 'tag teams' and earning points to be the 'Ultimate Tagged Team'. Tagged has been slowly growing on the teen population mostly in the U.S. although still remains secondary to MySpace.
Best for: Teens

Popist - Sharing a strikingly similar interface to MySpace and competing in the same space, Popist is known to have more open features such as the ability to integrate with other social networks.
Best for: Teens

Friendster - One of the first social networks first launched as a 'social experiment' and recently awarded the patent for social networking, Friendster had a big start peaking a large number of users at first, although it has slowly lost market share and now owns less than 1% of the market.
Best for: Young Adults

Tribe - Recently acquired by NBC, Tribe is a social network focused more on the aspect of enhancing users' own social networks rather than meeting new people or dating. It also features the unique aspect of joining and creating 'tribes,' and is highly localized with its communities.
Best for: Young Adults

Facebook - A Valley-based startup, Facebook has slowly had a large impact on the College/University market around mostly English-speaking countries and remains the second most popular social network after MySpace in the U.S. Although not available in many places in the world just yet, it's growth rate has been substantial.
Best for: College/University students

ConnectU - A social network tightly focused on the College/University students, ConnectU is a social network very similar to Facebook. Although ConnectU is limited to only a number of Universities and Colleges around the world.
Best for: College/University students

Yahoo! 360 - Launched in early 2005, Yahoo! 360 is Yahoo!'s social networking attempt, also bringing together other blogging and photosharing. One of the noticeable things about Yahoo! 360 is that it only allows people 18 and above to join, hence disabling it to a large crowd of audience.
Best for: Adults, Middle-aged

PeopleAggregator - Marc Canter's move towards 'open' social networks, PeopleAggregator is built upon open standards and functionality. One of the things that makes it unique is that it's a demo of the software it is built upon which will be later available for license to companies.
Best for: Adults, Middle-aged

Frappr - Frappr was created by Brian, Kun and James at Rising Concepts, who wanted to see where all their high school and college friends went after they graduated. Its really nice and creative use of Google Maps.
Best for: Teens and young people

Niche
These applications share a specific goal for a certain kind of audience, whether it's shoppers or moms.

MommyBuzz - Started only a couple of months ago, MommyBuzz is based around the idea of mom's meeting up and connecting, sharing and exchanging ideas with other moms. A great niche for this kind of an audience.
Best for: Moms!

MuslimSpace - Created by a former computer science student at the American University of Sharjah, MuslimSpace lives true to its name — MySpace for Muslims. Currently estimated to have about 15,000 members, it aims to be cleaner and safer than MySpace and undoubtedly a place for muslims.
Best for: Muslims

Stardoll - How would you like dressing up celebrities as paperdolls? Originally called Paperdoll Heaven, Stardoll enables just that. With a strong social networking backend and with almost a million members, Stardoll is impacting the kid-teen world almost like Neopets did a few years ago.
Best for: Kids/Teens

Imbee - The teens have their places all right, but what about the kids? Imbee aims to be just that, a safe and secure social network for kids. So now when your big brother is showing off his MySpace profile and teasing you for not being able to join, Imbee away!
Best for: Kids

Dogster - A place where dogs [and their owners] can meet. talk and share with with other dogs [and their owners], Dogster is a place where every dog has its own web page. As their tagline goes, 'Share dog photos, tell dog stories, make dog friends!'
Best for: Dogs; their owners

Catster - A sister site to Dogster and run by the same people, Catster is Dogster for cats. 'Share cat photos, tell cat stories, make cat friends!' Need I say more?
Best for: Cats; their owners

Fuzzster - In a way a combination of (but not related to) Dogster and Catster, Fuzzster is exactly that — a place for your cats, dogs and fuzzy pets. Founded in early 2004, it's grown into quite a community of pet-lovers.
Best for: Fuzzy pets; their owners

BookCrossing - In the real world, bookcrossing is 'the practice of leaving a book in a public place to be picked up and read by others, who then do likewise.'BookCrossing aims to turn this concept virtual, and exactly that.
Best for: Book lovers

Boompa - This one's for every car lover out there (and there are many!), Boompa aims to be 'your garage, online.' Car lovers can show of their 'rides,' find guides are parts to improve them, meet other car lovers alike, watch videos and photos, and a lot more.
Best for: Car lovers

Spout - It's database including more than 250,000 film titles, Spout is a social networking application for film-lovers. With reviews, recommendations,meeting film-lovers like you, the works — Spout is a good place to be at before you rent out your Saturday night flick.
Best for: Film lovers

MOG - A Valley-based startup, MOG aims to connect music-listeners which share similar interests. An interesting way to meet new people, you can also discover news types of music you never knew of before.
Best for: Music lovers

Gusto - There are sites for car, film, music, book, pet lovers, but what about the travellers? Gusto is exactly that, a place for travellers to connect with each other based on their lifestyles (set in preferences). You can also find a ton of travel information, recommendations, and reviews.

Yub.com - Combining social networking with shopping, Yub.com aims to enable smart shopping with the help of networking. It shares a concept of 'cash back' where if another member helps you or vice verca, both members are able to get CashBack. An interesting way to shop.
Best for: [Online] Shoppers

Yelp - From the founders of PayPal, Yelp is a social networking site much like Yub, designed to help shoppers make decisions by enabling user reviews. However, unlike Yub, Yelp is more focused on businesses and services rather than consumer-oriented products. It is currently only available in the U.S.
Best for: Anyone in the U.S. (more so in the larger cities)

LinkedIn - Questionably the most-popular choice in its niche, LinkedIn aims to connect colleagues and business-contacts and also help you find new ones. With approximately 5 million users, LinkedIn remains a popular choice for its targetted audience.
Best for: Employed individuals; business-folks

biddingBuddies - Often in trading sites like eBay, you meet and have to deal with a lot of people. biddingBuddies encourages this by being the 'only social network exclusively for eBay members.' So now when you have bidding wars with people, why not try and befriend them?
Best for: eBay members — buyers/sellers

Faqqly - There are so many things you want to know about your friends, so why not ask them through Faqqly? Faqqly creates an FAQ (frequently asked questions) page for every member and enables friends to ask each other whatever question they have in mind.
Best for: Curious people — teens, young adults

I will be away from this blog for some days, so I thought that till that time, you can have a look at these social networking tools.

If you dont like it, dont blame me, I have copied it directly from here, so if you have some bricks to throw, I have given you the address..I have added some my mine too, so I guess even I will get some compliments for the hard work :).

See ya till next time.

Meanwhile, published another cool blog at The Inner Zone - http://opensenses.blogspot.com

Today..

"when the human can sense his participation in the cause and effect chain, then he calls it his
free will, otherwise when he cannot sense his participation, he calls it destiny."

Google Adsense

From today, ie 28 July 2006, The First Tones of Freedom will be using AdSense Technology from Google while The First Tones of Freedom - l33t edition will be incorporation Amazon Associate ads as a part of its ongoing content enhancement process. The template design of the blog will be kept as close as possible to the original version of the blogs as you used to see it before. I hope my readers wont get distracted by those ads, but benifit from them.

Q. What is AdSense?
A. According to Googles official claims - " Google AdSense is a fast and easy way for website publishers of all sizes to display relevant Google ads on their website's content pages and earn money. Because the ads are related to what your visitors are looking for on your site — or matched to the characteristics and interests of the visitors your content attracts — you'll finally have a way to both monetize and enhance your content pages.

It's also a way for website publishers to provide Google web and site search to their visitors, and to earn money by displaying Google ads on the search results pages."

Now going by those interesting claims, I thought that I needed to verify the truths of Google Ads.

The few facts about AdSense
1. It uses a technology under name of 'Urchin' and its source code can be found here on the 'Awakening to the Renaissance' It basically uses 'Click Tracking' and its hotly debated that this invades privacy of the users.

2. AdSense and AdWords are two different technologs that are supplementry to each other. AdSense is basically for used to display ads on sites while AdWord technology is used to identify the relevant word and decide what ads can be displayed on that site.

3. Amazon/Yahoo! and MSN are the rivals that compete with Google right now, but they are sadely very much behind the Giant Google. Yahoo! uses something called as Yahoo! Publisher but its very beta and limited to US citizens only, Amazon uses Amazon Associates, but I wasent impressed by it, but the ad design is good. I didnt check MSN..I hate it.. :)

So for now, lets see who is good in providing ads. I am betting on Google. Till next time..wait for some more new facts.

Boooommm!!!!!

Ciao.

Back to the Rivers of Belief

Take me back, to the rivers of belief
Take me back, to the rivers of belief, my friend
I look inside my heart
I look inside my soul
I promise you I will return

And when the Lamb opened the seventh seal, silence covered the sky

Take me back, to the rivers of belief
Take me back, to the rivers of belief, my friend
I look inside my heart
I look inside my soul
I am reaching out for you

Lets hope one day
We will rest in peace, on my rivers of belief.

Enigma lyrics courtesy - Awakening to the Renaissance

Privacy and Exploits - 5

CONTINUED FROM PREVIOUS

Hi there.

If you are outside India, I guess there are no problems for you in seeing this...but many people from India arent able to see this site, coz Indian government has officially/unofficially blocked access to all sites originating from the blogspot domain..Whether they have done it right or wrong can cause a huge debt amongst Indians, but then we cannot stop from putting up quality blogs, isent it?? :D

OK, now as the govt has blocked access to sites, can we say that this has been a block on our freedom of expression? Some of you might say yes, some of you will say no..some wont say anything..

But then, becuase I care for my Indian readers, I am going to tell you a way to read this blog using a small but significantly important method - The use of a proxy server. But before that I appeal to all of you that please ignore all the mails and pages that tell you addresses of online proxy..Its not gonna provide anonimity but a great lie. Not only its illegal, but its also unsafe. Can be termed as anti national and wrong. Trust me.

Meanwhile, I condemm every attack made against India, and I wish that Indian government should make strict clause of punishment for militants and terrorists. Fuckiest terrorists, you dont do any smartness when you kill innocent humans. You have no guts to even look at the brave Indian soldiers face to face. I pray to God for the people who lost their lives in the recent blasts. I also support the stand of Indian Government in this case. Even if I feel it lil inconvinient, I am also aware that nation comes first in any case. For me, its my country that matters the most and I will always be a proud Indian. I will always try my best so that one day my country will be proud of me. And yeah, dont forget that using other proxy then the ones mentioned in this blog belong to pakistani origins and your personal details will be available to them at no extra cost. On top of it, its an anti national and anti Indian act, which is punishable by law. So all bloggers, dont fall prey to any false sayings and join hands to support the government and show unity of being an Indian. Please dont use a wrong proxy to view your blogs. Its an appeal and request.

The media currently has got no brains, and I condemm the role of printed media and broadcast media as well for not supporting Indian stand.


Now I will tell you a legal and official way to access sites from this domain.

If you have GPRS enabled handsets, then you must be knowing that there is a seperate wml proxy server from Google that shows you all WAP enabled pages in chtml format. Psst..it has another use too..as a proxy..but its legal and trusted as its Google :)

OK, now type this in your browser - http://wmlproxy.google.com and press enter. Wait you wont get anything..!! So now, type exactly the same as what I tell you.

http://www.google.com/imode

Now what is imode?? In short, I-mode is Japanese NTT DoCoMo (Japanese Telephone and Telegraph wherever you go) mobile computer which makes use of chtml, a subset of html on its handhelds.

After entering this address, you will see the small imprint of Google search page on the browser. Simple enter the address of site you want to see, and I guess the Google will safely take you there even if there is a ban of pages from that domain..Try this link to read my page -

http://www.google.com/gwt/n?q=agneya2.blogspot.com&site=search&hl=en&lr=&mrestrict=chtml&ei=-e69RJXINJOEpgKw3cHuCg&sig2=4J_fykYjBfQxv5FonWm5tw&ct=res&cd=1&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;output=imode&rd=1&u=agneya2.blogspot.com/

Just get the syntax right -
q=name of forbidden site
site=search
hl=en ie your language
lr=restrict=chtml its a language derived from html
ei and all others are long things..

Now after all this, you must not forget to thank Google. Google is not only a search engine, but also a great online friend who knows exactly what to find and where to find.. :)

Now an obvious question. How did I come to know this?

Hehehehehe..thats a secret..!!

The other tool that you can try safely is - Skweezer

Actually, this isent a conventional proxy, but a site that 'squeezes' out extra data from web pages..It is originally designed for mobile net surfing where we are charged on kilobyte per second. This thing basically is used for service providers like !dea, Hutch, CellOne etc, the majot players in India. So, even if you dont need this after the ban is over, use it on your GPRS enabled mobile, it wil do you a lot of Good.

No, actually, as a security expert I need to keep knowledge of all things that exist...from proxies to anonymous mailers etc.. I know that these tools can override the good limits, but then its an inevitibility that we cannot avoid..

Till next time, I hope our sites will be unblocked..and more on govt policies, Google, cencorship and Net access in the next post on The First Tones of Freedom.

Jay Hind.