Encryption in your software without key pairs

Posted by Frank - January 30, 2009 - For techies

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Any discussion of encryption from a programmer’s perspective almost inevitably leads to public key encryption. This elaborate handshaking process ensures a totally private connection between two distinct parties, and is the basis for SSL/TLS encryption. The most common encryption programs are GnuPG and OpenPGP. However, what about when the only party involved is yourself? Ever [...]

Extract email addresses from tags

Posted by Frank - January 15, 2009 - For techies

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Ran into another cool hurdle today for my Fwd:Vault development. When I grab the message content to archive it in the system, first thing I do is scrub it out to ensure that (a) it displays properly, and (b) there are no misbehaving characters. I grab both plain text and HTML email formats (if present), [...]

Versatile random string generator

Posted by Frank - December 18, 2008 - For techies

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A cursory glance around the web will reveal a ton of PHP-based random string generators. With enough looking you’ll find generators that do any of the following: Strings with letters Strings with numbers Strings with letters and numbers Uppercase, lowercase Fixed, variable length strings Option to include symbols Problem is, none of them ever incorporated [...]

Smash bugs, don’t treat symptoms

Posted by Frank - December 12, 2008 - For entrepreneurs, For everyone, For techies

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I previously discussed why certain “automagical” features can sometimes facilitate the creation of crappy code. However they only create a possibility of crappy code. Today I want to warn you against a practice that will create crappy code 100% of the time. First a scenario – you have written a program in your language of [...]

Why DRM will always be a bad idea

Posted by Frank - October 13, 2008 - For everyone

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As if you really needed to hear this, but in case you… Don’t know what DRM is Are a music/movie industry person suffering a cranial-rectum issue Are a moron (most likely a #2 in denial) …here’s a fancy visual:

Automating SSH or SFTP in scripts

Posted by Frank - September 29, 2008 - For techies

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Recently I needed to automate copying a MySQL database to a backup server. We keep a copy of our site and DB on this box in the event that our main systems go down, or there’s a problem with our internet connection. It’s kind of like a poor man’s colocation setup. I actually prefer the [...]

Turn off AVG e-mail signature

Posted by Frank - September 2, 2008 - For everyone

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I am a huge fan of AVG Anti-Virus Free Edition. It provides the same level of virus protection as the pay-for packages—don’t be fooled, the differences are bells and whistles—and because it’s trimmed down it eats up less resources. I always install it as part of a comprehensive approach using several free Windows security tools. [...]