Portable Apps

All Portable Apps at this site: http://portableapps.com/
List of Apps: http://portableapps.com/apps

The list goes something like this :)

Applications

Accessibility

• Firefox Accessibility Extension - Make Firefox more accessible
• On-Screen Keyboard Portable - Easily access an on-screen keyboard
• Virtual Magnifying Glass Portable - A full-featured screen magnifier

Development

• Notepad++ Portable - A full-featured text editor with syntax highlighting
• Nvu Portable & KompoZer Portable - The easy-to-use Nvu web editor
• XAMPP - Apache, mySQL, PHP, phpMyAdmin, etc in one package

Education

• Stellarium Portable - portable planetarium

Games

• DOSBox Portable - classic DOS games to go
• Jooleem Portable - simple and addictive puzzle game with great music and visuals
• LBreakout2 Portable - breakout-style arcade game similar to Arkanoid
• Mines-Perfect Portable - a classic hunt-for-mines game with advanced features
• PokerTH Portable - classic Texas Hold Em style poker at its best
• Sudoku Portable - the wildly popular and addictive puzzle game

Graphics & Pictures

• GIMP Portable - Photo and Image Editor

Internet

• FileZilla Portable - the full-featured FTP client
• FireFTP Extension (for Firefox) - a lightweight extension
• Miranda IM Portable - chat with AOL, MSN and Yahoo users in a customizable interface
• Mozilla Firefox, Portable Edition - the award-winning web browser that's safe and secure
• Mozilla Thunderbird, Portable Edition - the handy email client
• Nvu Portable & KompoZer Portable - the easy-to-use webpage editor
• Pidgin Portable - chat with AOL, MSN and Yahoo users in an easy-to-use interface
• PuTTY Portable - lightweight telnet and SSH client
• Sage Extension (for Firefox) - A full-featured RSS extension
• WinSCP Portable - SFTP, FTP and SCP client

Music & Video

• Audacity Portable - A simple audio editor and recorder
• BonkEnc Portable - extract, convert, and encode audio
• CoolPlayer+ Portable - Lightweight, fast, easy-to-use audio player
• MPlayer Portable - Full-featured movie player with support for most video formats
• VirtualDub Portable - video processing and capture utility
• VLC Media Player Portable - An easy to use media player that plays most audio and video formats

Office

• AbiWord Portable - a lightweight word processor compatible with Microsoft Word files
• GnuCash Portable - accounting, expenses and financial management
• Lightning Extension (for Thunderbird) - A lightweight extension for your calendar and tasks
• Mozilla Sunbird, Portable Edition - Calendar and task management with a familiar interface
• Mozilla Thunderbird, Portable Edition (Address Book) - Email client's built-in address book with import/export functions
• OpenOffice.org Portable - word processor, spreadsheet, presentations with Microsoft compatibility
• PDFTK Builder Portable - split, collate, watermark and password protect PDF documents
• PNotes Portable - stick notes to go
• Sumatra PDF Portable - a lightweight PDF viewer
• Task Coach Portable - to do list and task manager

Operating Systems

• Mac-on-Stick - Run Mac OS Classic 7 portably

Utilities

• 7-Zip Portable - File archiver and compressor
• ClamWin Portable - Antivirus on the go
• Command Prompt Portable - Simple link to a customizable command prompt
• Eraser Portable - securely delete files and data
• InfraRecorder Portable - full-featured CD and DVD burner
• JkDefrag Portable - Disk defragmentation and optimization
• KeePass Password Safe Portable - Secure, easy-to-use password manager
• PeaZip Portable - Easy to use file archiver and compressor
• PortableApps.com Backup - integrated backup utility bundled with the platform
• PortableApps.com Menu - integrated start menu bundled with the platform
• Toucan - backup, sync and encrypt for advanced users
• WinDirStat Portable - disk usage analyzer and cleanup tool
• winMd5Sum Portable - check md5 sums to verify files on the go
• WinMerge Portable - file comparison and merging

Analytic Functions

Kichu has been telling for quite some time about the power of Analytic Functions.
Today, saw a few sites explaining them. Here are they

• Analytic Functions by Example 
• Analytic Functions - an Introduction 
• The Power of Analytic Functions - An Overview 

Hope to try them soon and truly feel better for knowing about them.

Your Work and Your Money

Here are two useful, personal productivity, websites (both from the same founders, I guess).
I spotted via the TechCrunch blog.

1. An expense register - Expensr
2. A work log - that is sharable - iDidWork

Of the two, I think iDidWork is pretty much in infancy. For example, you can't log that an event happened at a given time. You can only log a duration. Like, for example, you can't log, I met him at 4.30.

But I liked Expensr a lot. The interface is very good, with a lot of cool features, like recurring trans and auto-categorize. Have always thought such a website would be great.

C#

While browsing to get hands on something which can help learn C#, found few sites, which contain tutorials in a palatable way.

• Tops the list: MSDN (Web) It contains tutorials - Videos, Transcript, Project Code Files, Study Guide and Exercises with a link to download everything. It is divided into 3-Tiers. 1st Tier is for beginners, 2nd Tier for inbetweeners, and 3rd Tier for Advanced Skilled persons
• A Blog
• Tuts on ASP .NET. This site even contains some Starter Kits and some projects which can be embedded into our projects

Vlog

All of us have heard of Blog which is a sandhi for WeB+Log. Similarly, there has been generation of new terminologies (like Vhishing, an upgrade for Phishing logged as an update at this post).

Vlog is a Video Blog. On further dissemination, Video Blog is Video+WeB+Log all together. When a Video is embedded as a post on Blog, it becomes a Vlog

Speed-up Menulist-population in Windows

Want a faster loading Menu (like All Programs), you need to just change one value in Registry, shown below and done!

If you're at all unsure of yourself in the registry editing arena, it may be a good idea to back up your registry. (Once you're in the Registry editor, just hit the File menu, Export to make a backup copy)

1. Hit the Start button, Run .

2. Type: regedit 

and hit Enter (or click OK if you prefer)

3. Navigate to: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop 

Once you open the Desktop folder, scroll down to the " MenuShowDelay " item on the right.

(If you don't see a " MenuShowDelay " item, you can make one. Just right-click a blank area in the right hand pane. Select New, String from the resulting menu)

Next, type in: MenuShowDelay

Exactly as shown. Once that's done, you can proceed to the next step:

4. Double-click the " MenuShowDelay " item and change the value to a lower number (default is 400 or 500 depending on the system). I like 100 myself (enter 0 for instant menus). Oh, those numbers are in milliseconds, in case you were worried about it. Be sure to enter something here if you had to create the value using the special note above! 

5. Hit OK , exit the registry editor, and restart your computer .

Now check the performance :)

SQL: GROUP BY CUBE(column1, column2,..., column n)

Had one query where we have to give count of Surgeries done in the order of Speciality (Department), OT type, OT Category, OT Sub-Category. We wrote a simple SQL Query with Group by clause. So we were getting records like: (Example)

Speciality         Type             Category            Sub-category                 count
CTVS      Closed Heart      Congenital        Interrupted Aortic Arch        456
CTVS      Closed Heart      Congenital        Ventricular Septal Defect      678
CTVS      Closed Heart      Ischemic           Interrupted Aortic Arch        123
CTVS      Closed Heart      Ischemic          Ventricular Septal Defect       465
CTVS      Open Heart        Congenital         Interrupted Aortic Arch        138
CTVS      Open Heart        Congenital        Ventricular Septal Defect       615
CTVS      Open Heart        Ischemic           Interrupted Aortic Arch        513
CTVS      Open Heart        Ischemic          Ventricular Septal Defect       908


So, how to get Counts at all the three levels: Type, Category and Sub-category?
The trick was in use of CUBE
Syntax: group by cube(column1, column2, column3,...,columnn)
and then it gave the output, the way we wanted

Speciality         Type             Category            Sub-category                 count
CTVS      Closed Heart      Congenital        Interrupted Aortic Arch        456
CTVS      Closed Heart      Congenital        Ventricular Septal Defect      678
CTVS      Closed Heart      Congenital................................................... 1134
CTVS      Closed Heart      Ischemic           Interrupted Aortic Arch        123
CTVS      Closed Heart      Ischemic          Ventricular Septal Defect       465
CTVS      Closed Heart      Ischemic...................................................... 588
CTVS      Closed Heart......................................................................... 1722
CTVS      Open Heart        Congenital         Interrupted Aortic Arch        138
CTVS      Open Heart        Congenital        Ventricular Septal Defect       615
CTVS      Open Heart        Congenital.................................................... 753
CTVS      Open Heart        Ischemic           Interrupted Aortic Arch         513
CTVS      Open Heart        Ischemic          Ventricular Septal Defect        908
CTVS      Open Heart        Ischemic....................................................... 1421
CTVS      Open Heart ........................................................................... 2174

Cool...So, now no more struggling with multiple totals :)

Spammers blast Social Networking Sites

An article on how bots are being used to create fake accounts on Social Networking Sites, starting with AOL in mid 1990s, and then phishing with user's data. A fair article here

Security Jargons: Bots, Zombies, Virus, Worms, Trojan Horse & Phishing

Bots: A bot is a type of malware which allows an attacker to gain complete control over the affected computer. [SOURCE]

Zombie: Computers that are infected with a bot are generally referred to as zombies. [SOURCE]

Virus: A computer virus is a small program written to alter the way a computer operates, without the permission or knowledge of the user. A virus must meet two criteria:

• It must execute itself. It often places its own code in the path of execution of another program.
• It must replicate itself. For example, it may replace other executable files with a copy of the virus infected file. Viruses can infect desktop computers and network servers alike.

Five recognized types: File infector viruses, Boot sector viruses, Master boot record viruses, Multipartite viruses, Macro viruses [SOURCE]


Trojan Horse:
Trojan horses are impostors—files that claim to be something desirable but, in fact, are malicious. A very important distinction between Trojan horse programs and true viruses is that they do not replicate themselves. Trojan horses contain malicious code that when triggered cause loss, or even theft, of data. For a Trojan horse to spread, you must invite these programs onto your computers; for example, by opening an email attachment or downloading and running a file from the Internet. Trojan.Vundo is a Trojan horse. [SOURCE]

Worm:
Worms are programs that replicate themselves from system to system without the use of a host file. This is in contrast to viruses, which requires the spreading of an infected host file. Although worms generally exist inside of other files, often Word or Excel documents, there is a difference between how worms and viruses use the host file. Usually the worm will release a document that already has the "worm" macro inside the document. The entire document will travel from computer to computer, so the entire document should be considered the worm W32.Mydoom.AX@mm is an example of a worm [SOURCE]

Virus Hoax:
Virus hoaxes are messages, almost always sent by email, that amount to little more than chain letters. Following are some of the common phrases that are used in these hoaxes:

• If you receive an email titled [email virus hoax name here], do not open it!
• Delete it immediately!
• It contains the [hoax name] virus.
• It will delete everything on your hard drive and [extreme and improbable danger specified here].
• This virus was announced today by [reputable organization name here].
• Forward this warning to everyone you know! [SOURCE]

Phishing:
Phishing is attacks using “spoofed” e-mails and fraudulent websites with the attempt to trick unsuspecting Internet users into divulging confidential personal information such as credit card numbers, account usernames and passwords, social security numbers, etc. [SOURCE]

Update-1

Vhishing:
In a vishing scam, people are sent spam mail, as in Phishing, but instead of being directed to a Web site, they are given a phone number to call. If one calls the number, it will seem like one is calling the company that sent you the e-mail. They have all of the automated messages, hold music and even long wait times. When one finally reaches a representative, they will ask one for ones' account information.

CAPTCHA

CAPTCHA stands for "Completely Automated Public Turing test to Tell Computers and Humans Apart".

Official CAPTCHA site is http://www.captcha.net/

In simple words, CAPTCHA is a program that can generate and grade tests that:

• Most humans can pass, BUT


• Current computer programs can't pass

Quite sometime back, I had read a general article on how people broke of Yahoo Security by creating automated bots to read these captachas and create innumerable mail ids. Today found some very good site with analysis, where Gmail has got hit. All the articles and links below.



Gmail CAPTCHA busted: Very informative article, completely describes the CAPTCHA hacking process, their discovery of the host machine, use of two bots than one since Gmail CAPTCHAs are tougher than others, etc. etc. (implies spam coming from Google's IP addresses!) Spammers are able to create still only with 20% success rate (I realize its quite huge, but compared to Hotmail at about 60%, this is better)

An article on Breaking Gmails' Audio CAPTCHA



Yahoo CAPTCHA security broken. Another article on Yahoo security broken. One more here.



Hotmail CAPTCHA cracked. Another good article: Hotmail CAPTCHA broken in 60 secs



Accidentally, found this site: WebSense which has its SecurityLabs. In its own words:

"Websense Security Labs discovers, investigates, and reports on advanced Internet threats that traditional security research methods miss."

This seems to be a site which needs frequent revisits from now on. Especially after observing their analysis on Breaking GMail Captcha.

IBMDeveloperWorks

This site gives tutorials in multiple areas. I have gone through some tutorials like LPI & Regular Expressions. The authors write it very clean, in simple language making it very easy to understand. First site to go to, to get any tutorials.

Site: http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/

Knol - a Unit of Knowlege: Google

Google has got Knol, its answer to Wiki and About.com, out of beta last wednesday. They claim the feature that takes home win against others is Authorship. An author is stated against each Knol, which can have multiple authors. Other features include rating of knols, featuring of best-rated knols on homepage, etc. etc. Many exist that can be explored with a Knol account.

It supports three licensing for knols.

• Creative Common Attribution 3.0 License
• Creative Common Attribution Non-commercial 3.0 License
• All rights reserved

A post on Google's Official Blog about Knol.

Now this is interesting - Wiki on Knol.

There exists a community on Knol for exploring, discussing, learning and taking advantage of Knol, Googles' Open Encylopedia. It is http://knolstuff.com/

Past: This was the post made at TechCrunch in December regarding its conceputalization.

Naams may like 'other knols by this author' feature, which I remember he seemed to miss in Community on Orkut (as other posts by this user).