Ravings fromthe Shell

The Ammonyte hopped around the kitchen, boing boing boing! Hoopdetoodle and fiddlemedee! Anyone peeking in the window would have thought that he had turned into a Tigger. The Ammonyte was happy beyond belief, because he had just received an invitation from The Princess and the BFG (Big Friendly Gary) to go and visit them and their friend the W.W.W. (Wise Wizard from the West) at their Magic Castle near the Shining Towers of the East, to test some Magic Potions.

So the following day he bimbled down to town and waited for a Shiny Wriggly Caterpillar to take him off to the Big City, remembering the curious feeling in his tummy that his previous adventure on the Caterpillar had engendered. Within what seemed like a very short time he tumbled out of the Caterpillar into the Big Town. The Parks were as he recalled them, full of trees and people having fun. The Very Big House still had a lot of people waiting out side, but the Very Tall Clock didn’t have anyone shouting at it, so he thought it must be happy.

Crossing the widest river he had ever seen the Ammonyte bimbled along the riverbank past an enormous wheel that spun and spun but never went anywhere. “What possible fun could that be?” mused the Ammonyte.

Big Wheel, Keep On Turning

He bimbled further along past a curious grey building with odd splashes of colour. Nearby strange people tried to be even stranger people, wriggling or not wriggling to curious music. Eventually he reached an enormous metal boat moored in the middle of the river, as he stared at this he noticed a shop selling potions, so the Ammonyte decided the only sensible response was to have a potion called “Cumberland Ale” and very nice it was too. Feeling rather light-headed he bimbled on, crossing the river again, down now familiar lanes, till finally he arrived at the potion house next to the Magic Castle. Inside sitting next to some big boxes on wheels was a man who introduced himself as the W.W.W. Over a large magic potion the WWW told tales of the amazing magic potions that were made in a country far away to the West. Suddenly! the BFG appeared and suggested the WWW stow his big boxes on wheels at the Magic Castle. So they all bimbled across the moat into the Magic Castle, the WWW stowed his boxes on wheels and then the Ammonyte the BFG and the WWW, went up onto the roof of the Magic Castle and looked upon the Shining Towers of the East

The Shining Towers of the East, the WWW and the BFG

Just then, The Princess arrived home so the BFG suggested returning to the magic potion selling house as there were some very special potions from a small town in the East which were supposed to be Very Very Good, and needed some serious testing, so by the time The Princess got to the magic potion house, very many potions had already been tested. The Ammonyte, emboldened after several large potions told the WWW that he had taken up making Magic Potions. Thw WWW said that he would like to try one of the Ammonyte’s potions. The Ammonyte’s heart did back-flips! if The WWW gave his approval to his potions! Oh My!

The Princess said that enough potions had been consumed and that they should go to the Shop of Delicious Delights down the lane, so off they all wandered. And My! The delights were most delicious. The Ammonyte had a fish, the like of which he had not heard of before, for it clearly did not swim in the streams that flowed through the woods near the Ammonyte’s abode. Alongside the food some more potions were consumed, the names of which sounded like Strange Snakes from the East.

Somehow the party arrived back at the Magic Castle, and the BFG announced that they should all play a game called “Guitar Hero”, but the Princess said he had a shiny new talky thing called an “ayefone” that she needed to introduce to her ‘puter, so the WWW, the BFG and the Ammonyte played “Guitar Hero” on a thing called “a wee”, which was made much more difficult by a special potion called ‘Vanilla Vodka”.

Suddenly! It was the next morning. The BFG and the Princess had vanished to rule their fiefdoms in The Big City. The Ammonyte was happy to see that the WWW had suffered as much from the after-effects of the potions as he had done. The WWW loaded up his magic boxes on wheels and he and the Ammonyte set out for the river bank, where after a non-magic potion they got on a boat that traveled back up the Big River, the Ammonyte literally boggled to see the Big City from a boat on the river. Then they took a Shiny Wriggly Caterpillar that went underground like a worm, until they arrived at the house where the Shiny Wriggly Caterpillars that would take the Ammonyte home, lived.

Finally the WWW and The Ammonyte arrived at the burrow where the Ammonyte lived. Nervously the Ammonyte poured a cup of his own Magic Potion for the WWW to try. The WWW considered. “Not bad, not bad at all” was his opinion. Well! Well! The Ammonyte could have jumped the Moon! For it was well known that the WWW was a most discerning and experienced judge of potions. So it was with a heart full of happiness and sadness that the Ammonyte took the WWW and his boxes on wheels, upon his cart to meet The Fluffy One who was to care for the WWW until the Big Shiny Bird took him back to the far, far West.

And so he came back up the hill, as day was ending once more. And he went on, and there was yellow light, and fire within. He drew a deep breath. “Well I’m back,” he said.

Formula 1? You gotta love it. I like it for the science, technology and engineering. The actual racing itself is boring and the results are often contrived. (Though I think Bernie and Max read my earlier blog, and adjusted accordingly). Not that things were any better in the ‘good old days’ when there were fewer lawyers around, and things were agreed with a nod a wink and a handshake. The ‘Good Old Days”, that’ll be when Max and Bernie were running teams and not the whole sport.

Recently all eyes have been on the Renault ‘Spygate’ scandal, and this morning it emerged that a ‘Witness X’ had put nails in the coffin of the defense. Now I am not suggesting any connection, but I find it curious that both Ron Dennis and Flavio Briatotre, whom it was rumored to have been behind Max Mosley’s ‘outing’ have both been punted out of F1. Max tidying things up before he leaves, perhaps? And who was ‘Witness X’? Fernando Alonso was called to the hearing at short notice, and it would be inconceivable that a driver of his experience did not want to know why he was put on such a strange race-strategy.

Well the next performance of the circus is in Singapore this coming weekend, and is taking place at night to facilitate better TV audience ratings. Let’s hope it’s not scheduled against the X-Factor.

I was rather pleasantly surprised to read that Michael Vaughn, probably the best England Cricket Captain of recent years, has been retained to coach and mentor young cricketers in the “mental aspects of cricket, decision-making and captaincy.”

My mind travels back to 1981, when Mike Brearley was recalled to the role of England Captain when the current incumbent, Ian Botham, resigned the captaincy due to the adverse effect it was having on his playing. At the time Brearley would never have made the side on his cricketing skills (he probably wouldn’t even have done so a few years previously in his “pomp”), it was purely down to his cricketing brain, and especially his leadership and man-management skills, which allowed him to get the best out of people like Botham, David Gower and Bob Willis. The appointment was clearly a stop-gap measure, and it is here that the MCC (who ran the England team back then) clearly missed a trick.

David Gower was clearly marked out as the golden boy and FEC (Future England Captain), but was seen as too young and inexperienced. What should have happened is that Brearley should have been taken to one side and told “Gower is the future, teach him all that you know”. What did happen is that Keith Fletcher, another older player but experienced county captain, was called into the side, lost a series against India and a test against Sri Lanka before being dismissed. Bob Willis succeeded Fletcher, but combining the roles of fast bowler and Skipper are notoriously difficult and on the 1983/4 Winter tour to Pakistan, Gower took over after the first test. Three years of bumbling around could have been avoided. Now, I am not being wise after the event, since both myself and wiser counsels thought as much, back in ‘81.

Fast-Forward to 2009. Developing England Captains is even harder. The England Cricket team is now run by the ECB (England and Wales cricket Board), who retain the top players on “Central Contracts”. This means that once you are an England Player you very rarely play for your (handsomely renumerated) County. While this may allow better management of the players, by preventing them being flogged to death playing out dull draws in front of the proverbial three men and one dog on the County circuit, it does mean that young players in the England set-up don’t get a chance to develop the leadership skills associated with Captaining their county. And by definition, most county captains haven’t made the grade as an England player. (e.g. Robert Key who was suggested as a candidate to replace Kevin Pietersen before Andrew Strauss was appointed). Therefore there is clearly a need to inculcate young players in the England setup with the necessary skills. Shame it has taken someone 218 years to sort this out.

I’ve frequently been asked about the difference between viruses, trojans, spyware etc, and whey we need different programs to detect each, so I thought I’d write a short primer.

Viruses, Trojans and other nasties.

Virus
A program or code that replicates, that is, infects another program, boot sector, partition sector, or document that supports macros, by inserting itself or attaching itself to that medium. Most viruses only replicate, though many do a large amount of damage as well.

Trojans
Unlike viruses, trojans do not self-replicate. They are spread manually, often under the premise that they are beneficial or wanted. The most common installation methods involve system or security exploitation, and unsuspecting users manually executing unknown programs. Distribution channels include email, malicious or hacked web pages, Internet Relay Chat (IRC), peer-to-peer networks, etc.

Malware (malicious software)
A malicious program. Viruses and Trojans are examples of malware. Potentially unwanted programs (PUPs) are not considered malware.

Adware
Programs (usually free) which make money for their writers by displaying adverts or redirecting people to particular websites, or collecting information about your browsing habits to allow targeting of adverts. Closely related to spyware and malware, there is a grey area where the activities of adware cross-over with malware and particularly, spyware.

Spyware
Software whose function includes transmitting personal information to a third party without the user’s knowledge or consent. This usage is distinct from the common usage of spyware to represent commercial software that has security or privacy implications.

Root Kits
A root kit is a set of software that consists of a program or combination of several programs designed to hide or obscure the fact that a system has been compromised – that is hide the infection from Anti-virus and anti-malware programs. Because they exist at such a fundamental level on the computer they can be very difficult to detect and remove, and there are examples of root kits which can survive a complete re-formatting and re-installation of the Operating System (OS) on the computer.

Continue reading ‘Internet Security Primer’