Archive for the ‘Internet’ Category
Happy birthday, TCP/IP!
Thanks to Google's reminder, the start of 2008 also marks the twenty-fifth birthsday of TCP/IP.
For ordinary people this new year Google logo means no more than new year celebration. But when you look closer on the bottom parts, you can see the coloured dots form a set of letters"SYN,SYN,ACK,ACK".
That is the handshake message of TCP/IP protocol, 25 years ago this day, the protocol was first implemented on U.S ARPANET. It is one of the basic protocols that, how to explain this, a basic language that enables computers on a network to find and communicate to each other.
Almost all internet communications today are based on TCP/IP.
I never fully understood how it works (it's not my field), but if you want to know more, the Wikipedia is always there.
Windows Vista OEM reactivation
There are rumours that people won't get their OEM Windows Vista reactivated when they upgraded their motherboard. M$ considers a new motherboard means a "new computer", and a separated license is required.
I own a Home Premium OEM, and was quite worried about that, too; but actually that rumour was quite untrue.
My family need a spare lower end computer so I upgraded my computer to retire the old platform. Only things I took from my original computer with Vista OEM license were CPU and graphic card ... and monitor if that counts as a significant part.
The reactivation process was actually quite painless. You just need to call Microsoft and tell them you upgraded your computer and need activate your computer again. Only question asked was some thing like "how many computers this copy is running on."(Yes, they don't even bother whether your vista is oem or retail version), sure, ONE(I'm not lying, the spare lower end computer uses xp).
Then get your activation code.
I guess the key is, you only answer what they asked, and don't volunteer any information about your upgrade, especially the motherboard bit.
need space for your blog/small website?
To recover some of my costs to purchase this space on dreamhost, I'm planning to share some of this space to others.
Not to mention that 150g+ of hard disk space is surely a waste to me.
To avoid use too much CPU time on this host, I'm only planning to take two other parties. There is already one person shared10g of space with me for NZ$3 mo to host his blog and other stuffs. I'm planning to take one more with same $3 a month plan, or we can negotiate for other options.
If you are interested and would like to know more, please contact me at arctosia at gmail.com, for people in Auckland only, thanks.
Also I'm willing to provide free host space for one non-profit charity/communitry organisation in New Zealand. Some requirements: static pages only, 500M web space, and reasonable small amount of traffic per month(not affect rest of us).
A universe to explore
Google Earth has just been updated early this week. Apart from new satillite images, Google added a new "sky view", like this:
An illegal number
13256278887989457651018865901401704641-1=?
WARNING: FINISH THE CALCULATION AND/OR CONVERT THE RESULT TO A BINARY NUMBER ARE BOTH ILLEGAL.
I actually don't against Digg's decision to took all that number out. It is always a hard choice between business interests and individual conscience. If I was in the position, I would choose the second one, but I fully understand the people who went for the first one.
Here has more information.
Also there is a coverage of this story in Bear's Blog China(in Chinese).
Holiday nearly end
But I still have lots of work to do...
Thursday:receive my new computer
Friday:Essay writting
Saturday:Visit to Ponsonby.
Sunday:Visit to Avondale
I'm so glad that I can finally get over my 40 gigabyte harddrive computer today. Its my first computer in New Zealand and Fourth in my life.
But it is still a huge improvement from my first one: 1 gigabyte harddrive, Pentium 133Mhz and a poor little 33.5kbps modem. The modem was quite expensive at that time and slower than all the current modem today, but it was your only way to get online.
I'm just amazed how technologies changed in just little over 10 years, and sure ... a decade passed fairly fast: I still remember those last decade's things like yesterday.
Because lack of time in this weekend and possibly next week, I'm going to disappear for about a week, or possibly shorter than that.
You can still reach me by email.
