Everyone that owns a cat should know these basic observations:

Mr President from LL Cool J and Boomdizzle on Vimeo.

What do you think? 1st amendment introduces the song, before some questions are asked. Lyrics to follow.

Dear Mr. President with all due respect,
I wish we could have a conversation.
I‘ll take a trip down to your residence,
We can talk about the state of the nation
Mr. President, I would ask you about the war,
Really and truly what is it for?
When an IED makes a soldier fall,
is he dying for something above us all?
Is it all about oil at end of the day?
Is the pledge of allegiance something to say?
I hope not ‘cuz I love The USA
In spite of all drama we have today.
Mr. President are you aware
Our Flesh and blood is dying over there
When the coffins come back, do you care?
When only the poor kids die, is it fair?

If I can talk to the President would he pay attention, really listen?
If talk something intelligent would he be willing to change his position?
Now it’s time time time,
To speak my mind mind mind.

Don’t get me wrong, I respect the flag
But it hurts to see a kid in a body bag
He fought for his country with all he had
Now we have a family without a dad
Lil mama crying and the kids are scared
9/11 why were we unprepared
Mr. President, are you aware:
Unless you’re rich, you have poor health care.
It makes you scream and want to pull out your hair;
Discharged from the hospital soon as you get there.
Mr. President: Truth or dare
Terrorists are hiding, do you know where?
Illegal immigrants are everywhere
Isn’t really their fault they wanted to come here?
I respect you, please be clear
But talk with me, show the people you care

If I can talk to the President, would he pay attention really listen?
If I say something intelligent, would he be willing to change his position?
Now it’s time time time,
To speak my mind mind mind

What am I to do
I’ve been waiting here near you
Tell me something that just makes sense
You sent us off for war
Please be honest what it’s for
Doesn’t matter if it’s life or death
Yeah

I’m not republican or democrat,
I’m independent and I want the facts!
When are the soldiers coming back?
Are we prepared for a terror attack?
Late at night I watch CNN,
It gets so bad I might stop breathing.
Middle East hates us, what’s the reason?
Mr. President, My heart is bleeding.
I tuck my kids in every evening;
Try to teach them to keep believing,
Hoping my government won’t deceive them,
Tellin’em set some goals: you can achieve them.
Mr. President
I have to know if die for you
What will have to show?
Will it really and truly help our country grow?
Waiting for your answer, Let me know!

If I can talk to the President would he pay attention, really listen?
If I say something intelligent would he be willing to change his position?
Now it’s time time time,
To speak my mind mind mind

Now it’s time time time,
To speak my mind mind mind.

I really want to know how much is true versus how much is false… public records, not opinions! Ignore the obvious plugs for McCain’s campaign… focus on the rest.

If Obama had anything to do with the creation of this economic situation like this video claims, he should be crucified (not literally) by the media for it. Democrats always claim to look out for the poor, but all this has done has pushed them out to the curb. Someone present me with some facts I can feel better about… this seems all too good to be true.

Before you read any further, get this straight: I DO NOT OWN THE DOMAIN. It is still unknown who purchased the domain.

I’ve got the knowledge that should squelch any thoughts otherwise by any logical person. Admittedly, I found it amusing and slightly humorous, if for no reason but it was grounds for a great lesson in DNS and Domain Registration.

–Original Content Omitted–

I love my job and the technology I get to deal with on a daily basis… It’s amazing what some people will believe without understanding how the internet, browsers, email clients, and servers work when presented with partial evidence.

Erroneous Claims

All of the sites claiming or inferring John McCain’s campaign owns the domains and registered them privately to dodge the possible scandal are making up what they think is news without actually checking the facts. The truth is it could be anyone that registered the domains (including Sarah Palin herself) but the proof can only be obtained with a subpoena to the Private Registration holder DomainsByProxy. DomainsByProxy happens to be used by GoDaddy and Network Solutions, the biggest domain registrars on the internet. I have used DomainsByProxy for a couple of my domains in the past (and on a somewhat unrelated note I started receiving credit card offers in the mail shortly after I discontinued using their services). That doesn’t mean that my domains were once owned by John McCain’s campaign does it? To reiterate: for the record, I DO NOT OWN THE DOMAIN. It is still unknown who purchased the domain.

So How Did it Happen?

The shell of the situation is this… When a user would type VoteForTheMILF.com/.net/.org in their respective browsers they would get John McCain’s website (JohnMcCain.com) and in most cases, a special message from his running-mate, Sarah Palin.

Here’s where people started making the assumptions that John McCain’s campaign purchased the domain and specifically pointed it to the Sarah Palin intro. We all know what happens when you assume, right? So let me explain how this prank is pulled off… but first you need to have a little knowlege about how web browsers, DNS, and servers play into the mix. I’ll quote the important part again for you:

The web browser communicates with a domain name server (DNS) to find out the IP Address for the website. All communications on the Internet use IP Addresses for communications. The website names that we know and love were invented just to make it easier for us to find the websites we need.

So, the web browser talks to DNS servers to find out what IP address to look for the requested resource. DNS servers are maintained by numerous ISPs, web hosting companies, and in this case are handled by the registrar (a sign of laziness by most Administrator’s standards). These servers hold records of where to point numerous domain’s mail (MX), address (A), canonical name (CNAME), additional name-server (NS), and various other more advanced records.

Some Facts

–Original Content Omitted–

The NS records for voteforthemilf.com are left up to domaincontrol.com’s Name Servers, and who is the operator of those Name Servers? You guessed it, DomainsByProxy, acting as the registrant. From there, the A Records were pointed to the same IP address that JohnMcCain.com uses. It just so happens that the way the website was originally set up it will respond for any hostname (web address) that is directed to its IP address, which is why this prank was able to happen.

–Original Content Omitted–

In creating the redirect, I simply edited some of the Apache server’s directives to forward all incoming requests from the VoteForTheMILF domains (and will be adding others that gain momentum) to google. Then I redirected to a wikipedia article on DNS, specifically Domain Registration in the hopes that some people would read what they were presented with and understand that it was an internet prank… I could have just as well redirected it to YouTube or a hardcore porn site, but I figured it would be best to educate people. Now I have it redirecting here, to explain it as it should. It has since been redirected back to Google because the first amendment wouldn’t save my job, or the company I work for if the campaign didn’t look favorably at my attempts to provide evidence to wash their hands of this.

What About the Direct Traffic to palin.htm?

Some people still found it interesting that they were greeted with a message from Sarah Palin when they “landed” on VoteForTheMILF’s address. If it was their first time visiting (or there wasn’t a tracking cookie from a previous visit) they would be redirected to the introduction page for Sarah Palin. This is entirely by design.

If you have any more questions and you ask in a non-trolling manner, I’ll do my best to answer them. If I missed anything, feel free to present what you feel I missed.

Updates!

Here’s some more relevant links and comments:

• This has happened before with other companies/organizations.

• I just found this in my SEO checks… Here’s the full article from WashingtonPost.com Brian Rogers of the McCain Campaign officially denounces the VoteForTheMILF.com/.net/.org domain, and answers with the same facts I presented you.

The McCain campaign says no. “We did not. We had nothing to do with it,” McCain campaign spokesman Brian Rogers tells the Sleuth.
In an email, Rogers explained that someone or some persons bought the domain name - anonymously, of course - and set it to direct users to the McCain campaign Website.

As proof that the McCain campaign was innocent in the voteforthemilf.com-morphing-into-johnmccain.com mystery, Rogers pointed out that the domain servers for that Website are different than the domain servers for johnmccain.com, as you can see on the Network Solutions site by clicking here for the milf site information and here for the McCain site information. But, of course, that still doesn’t prove they are unaffiliated, does it?

You match up well with…

	Barack Obama - 57% You must be ambitious and idealistic, like Barack Obama. Obama is a liberal democrat who, unlike his rivals, opposed the Iraq war from the start. With only 3 years in the Senate, his inexperience worries some and sometimes reveals itself in the debates, but he also has the charisma and popular support that the others lack.
	Sam Brownback - 54% As an “economically, fiscally, and socially compassionate conservative,” Sam Brownback is the candidate for you! You should consider our second choice, though, because Brownback dropped out in November 2007. The fiercely right-wing Senator from Kansas lets his religion guide his policy agenda- especially towards foreigners. He is best known for his unrelenting crusade against the genocide in Darfur and world-wide sex-trafficking. In a moment of particular compassionate, he co-sponsored a 2006 bipartisan immigration bill that branded him “Amnesty Sam” by critical conservatives and he later abandoned the cause. But there’s no compassion for homosexuals, the porn industry, or women seeking abortions. Brownback’s high-profile war against these groups has also put him in the spotlight.
	Tom Tancredo - 54% You must be REALLY concerned with immigration, just like Tom Tancredo. You’ll have to find another right-winger, because your top match dropped out in December of 2007. As stated, Tancredois almost obsessively preoccupied with the issue of immigration (illegal or not) and wants more than just fences and laws to keep out foreign workers. He also opposes birth-right citizenship and wants to deploy American troops along the US-Mex border. But aside from immigration, Tancredero has advocated for bombing Mecca to get back at Islamic terrorists, formally called for the elimination of public schools, and resists the President Bush’s big-government agenda. You might like him, but his own party thinks he’s a disaster- Tom DeLay told him that ‘you cannot think of making a career in [Congress]‘ and even Karl Rove told him that he would never ‘darken the doorstep of the White House’ again.

Q. What bandwidth tiers are going to be offered?

A. We have not finalized our product sets or tiers at this time. We do expect to have multiple bandwidth offerings, ranging from 6 Mbps up to 20, 30 or even 50 Mbps, depending on demand. All customers will have dedicated bandwidth which means that it isn’t shared with other customers, and the customer who is paying for the connection is always getting the speed they subscribe to.

Q. Is bandwidth going to be symmetrical upstream/downstream?

A. Upload and download speeds will be symmetrical.

Q. Is a basic subscriber (like most subscribers) going to be NAT’d behind one EPB router, or are we going to be given a static or persistant dynamic IP address? Some of us may wish to port forward some things through our personal routers so we can utilize the resources of our connection for server roles (Email, Web, VoIP, Game, SQL, etc.).

A. The system will use a combination of public and private IP addresses in our network core. Static or persistent IPs will be available but we may require a separate service. We are in vendor negotiations now and this may be dependent on the vendor we end up choosing.

Q. Will our p2p bandwidth be throttled or even cut off (like Comcast’s “Sandvine”) or will non-abusive p2p/torrent (legal distribution) traffic be allowed by default?

A. We believe our customers know the importance of respecting others and policies that ensure fairness. For that reason, we will likely determine a usage policy that will be very favorable to the average to slightly-heavy user. Users who exceed these caps may be required to pay for additional usage.

Q. How does EPB feel about Net Neutrality? If EPB doesn’t have an official stance, how about the board of directors? Does EPB stand on the side of their potential customers (net-neutral) or their investors(whatever it takes to make more money)?

A. Our current ISP network is operated on a network neutrality basis. All ISP traffic is given best effort priority. As long as we operate a non-congested network, best effort for all users allows us to meet the bandwidths being purchased by the customer. It is not our intention to allow network congestion that would lead to prioritizing use for any user.

Q. Did EPB take notes from our Tennessee Valley neighbors in Dalton, GA (Dalton Utilities) on their “OptiLink” Service?

A. We have visited many FTTH providers and have tried to incorporate best practices learned from each.

Firstly and most importantly, I have my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry 8830 “World Edition” phone. After using a generic LG flip phone for two years, when my contract was up for renewal I had come to the conclusion that I was ready for a smart phone or PDA. Research In Motion had a new, fairly powerful, handheld and what appeared to be the most capable for what I wanted to be able to do; so far it’s done a great job.

So what was I looking for in a new handheld? Firstly, a QWERTY keypad. You don’t understand the want for this until you’ve been using “T9″ or some other predictive text on a standard numeric keypad for two years and have a chance to toy with a friend’s QWERTY keypad. The next thing I looked for was a fast Internet-enabled phone. I was wanting to be able to have the ability to do quick wikipedia, imdb, Google, weather, or various other queries. I also wanted to be able to receive email for my quickly moving DJ business so I could stay on top of bids and questions as they came (quick response is the easiest way to capture clientele). Thirdly, I wanted to have a phone that was supported well and extendable for Google Apps powered domains because everything except the actual website for RockShow DJ is hosted on Google servers (Calendar, Documents, Email). The possibility of travelling outside the country or the possible need for a second phone number made the World Edition a versitle choice. I sacrificed the ability to use it as a camera, but any place I go that I need to take pics I’ve got my work cell with me (hacked Moto Razr V3c), but typically if I’m wanting to take pictures I’ll carry my next gadget with me.

My DSLR is a Nikon D100 I bought used in great condition. I’d been looking for a decent, well-priced camera for a good month before I came across a good deal on ebay for a used D100. As a photography nerd, my only issues with it are totally my fault. I don’t have any good lenses for it (the lens I use is a 35mm-70mm Nikon lens used with my dad’s N8008). However, I have a few on my Amazon wish list I’m looking at that would cover the bases. The features built into the new lenses will make it a lot easier to use on the DSLR, for one the aperture is a pain in the ass on the old lenses and digital compensation doesn’t help it much. A lot of my current photos are either over or under-exposed without any healthy mediums to make it look as good as what the camera is capable of.

Of all the other gadgets I have there’s really only one more that “keeps me going” and I’d say it’s a laptop I’ve got on loan from my girlfriend. Dell released a super small form factor laptop in their Latitude series, model “X1″. I’ve got it dual-booting the latest updates of Ubuntu Hardy Heron and Windows XP SP3. I don’t carry it around much, but it’s great for sitting on the couch watching tv and Stumbling, watching for email, or  working on my server during commercial breaks.

Now, for all the Computer and Web Applications I use daily or multi-weekly at least.

1. Mozilla Firefox - Tabbed browsing, StumbleUpon, reliable browser
2. Mozilla Thunderbird - Email client I’m comfortable with.
3. Pidgin.im - Open Source AIM/GTalk/Yahoo/MSN/IRC client
4. Putty - SSH/Terminal client
5. SQLYog - MySQL Query and Database GUI
6. Visionapp Remote Desktop - Tabbed RDP client, great for managing multiple Windows servers.
7. XFire - Tracks my gaming (I’m a stats whore)
8. Cacti - RRDTool MRTG-like frontend (more stats whoring). To see my home server’s stats you can use the login guest:guest home.n00tz.net/cacti.
9. Google Analytics - Web Visitation Stats for n00tz.net, daltongamers.net, and thatmollygirl.com (STATS STATS STATS!)
10. Torrentflux - torrent management via web interface (I like Azureus’ webGUI better, but this is better for multiple users)

Got something you can live without? Let me know!

I did some searching and there wasn’t anything super awesome out there that would keep me away from using the command line interface of VLC. So, the first step was to install vlc. I also use screen so I can log out of my SSH session and just use the web interface available on VLC, so I’ll include steps for using screen.

sudo apt-get install vlc screen

During or after installing vlc, you might as well set up the port forwarding on your router for access to the web interface. Log into your router and open up port 8080 to your server. If you are not trying to stream over the internet or don’t have a persistant dynamic or static IP address, you can skip this step. Check http://www.portforward.com/english/routers/port_forwarding/routerindex.htm for information on how to port forward on your router.

The next step was to get into screen and start the media daemon.

screen
 vlc -I http

You can then press ‘CTRL’+'A’ followed by pressing ‘D’ to detach from your screen instance and log out of your server (this is the glory of screen). You can reconnect to screen later by entering ’screen -r’ at the shell of your server. I use screen for all of my console-based server daemons or anything I want to have run while disconnected from the SSH session I’m in (HLDS, SRCDS, VLC, ‘apt-get upgrade’, ‘tail -f’).

Then browse to your server by going to http://your.server.ip:8080/ . You should be greeted with an html representation of the VLC interface you may be familiar with on your computer. It will look something like this:

At this point you can toggle the Stream Output by clicking on the icon that has three staggered arrows pointing to the right (on the default theme). From here you want to check the ‘UDP’ box enter your external IP and a port (default is port 1234 on VLC UDP client) to use for streaming. This method makes it easiest for connecting the client side for streaming, which in most cases is ideal. If you’re going to set this up for less savvy users simplifying their end makes it easier on you as the admin, TRUST ME.

Next, open up UDP ports 1234 on the client router forwarding it to the viewing computer again this won’t be necessary over LAN and won’t be possible from a NAT’d server. Start VLC on the client computer and open Network Stream (CTRL+N) and click OK.

Back on the Web Interface, open the file and play it. If you don’t have any port forwarding or NAT issues, you’re done!

UNLESS-
The first 2 episodes I have are not encoded with anything special, so I was able to stream them without adding any extra codecs to my server. However, episode 3 needed xvid codecs.

Here’s the steps to add the “non-free” w32codecs:

sudo wget http://www.medibuntu.org/sources.list.d/hardy.list -O /etc/apt/sources.list.d/medibuntu.list

sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install medibuntu-keyring && sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install w32codecs

Restart the vlc daemon and you’ll be able to play xvid (and I assume divx as well).

61% Geek

Created by OnePlusYou

Before I even get going, there are a couple of things I’m assuming you’re doing already to keep your car in shape and at the best operating potential. These include: using gas grade per instructed by your manual, changing your oil (with the type intended for your engine) every 3000-5000 miles, checking your air filter to make sure it’s clean, and keeping your tires inflated to their proper pressure. If you weren’t doing that already, you may see a significant increase in your gas mileage just doing that (an estimated 5-20% depending on the amount of change).

The next step is to change your habits about when you choose to drive. Instead of driving on a whim when you realize you forgot to pick up milk or cream cheese at the grocery store when you were out last time, wait until you’re going by the store next time around. If you’re needing it right then, before you head out make a list of other items you may need.

I don’t totally endorse getting a new, more efficient vehicle mainly because that’s a significant investment and the idea behind getting better gas mileage for me has nothing to do with “saving the environment” and is more about saving my money.

Now, onto the ways to drastically increase your gas mileage.

1. Go the speed limit or just under it, unless you’re drafting (see below).
2. Don’t accellerate from stop as quickly as you usually do. Take it easy, hard acceleration is the quickest way to lose your average mpg.
3. When accelerating onto a limited access highway while on an inclining ramp, do your best to estimate the amount of power you will need to apply to reach the speed limit at the time you will be merging onto the highway. Doing so will allow you to appeal to traffic behind you, while conserving the most fuel.
4. Coast downhill for 80% of a decline, the last 20% or so should be used to boost your speed to make it up the next hill without having to downshift (*note* On longer uphill drags, don’t be afraid to downshift if it means keeping within 10 mph of the speed limit, you will be making up for plenty of gas mileage if you stick with the rest of my tips). Coasting is best done in Neutral so your engine isn’t stealing the energy from the coast. Automatics typically have a neutral position on one side of the “D” position. Manual transmissions can just be pulled out of gear, or clutch engaged for the duration of the coast.
5. Make the most of turns in the road when changing lanes. If possible, change lanes when you’re already going around a bend in the road. Forcing your tires away from direct parallel of each other takes energy away from moving forward and puts it into heat caused by friction on your tires. To realize how much this effect has, find an empty flat road and coast for the distance of it once. Do it again but weave back and forth across the lanes. I can assure you your vehicle won’t make near the distance it did before. This effect has a larger impact on those of us with wider/softer tires.
6. Draft off of bigger vehicles. BE CAREFUL AND ALERT. This is the absolute best way to make drastic improvements in gas mileage, but it doesn’t come without consequence if you aren’t paying attention. Drafting requires that you stay inside of the wind braking available from the vehicle or trailer ahead of you, and thus you will be well within safe limits for an immediate braking situation. I am able to “feel” when I’m at the maximum distance to still receive the benefits of drafting when I drive in my Nissan Pathfinder as it tends to get pushed in the turbulence behind the trailers I am drafting off of at my back end. Drafting off of trailers has allowed me to increase my gas mileage by nearly 50% over short highway distances (less than 30 mile trips). Make sure the truck driver can see you once every mile and a half so he/she doesn’t get paranoid.

Check back later for a possible part 2 as I check some more theories.