Happy New Years 2012 -- Shamelessly re-shared from Scott Kelby's Google+ Post

The best word that I can think of in regards to this year, is interesting.  We’ve had some really huge ups and downs, so we’re praying and crossing our fingers that 2012 won’t be so… interesting.

As paraphrased from one of Lena’s recent facebook posts:

Ich habe in diesem Jahr: gelacht, geweint, gelebt, vieles akzeptiert, vieles verziehen, selbst Fehler gemacht, verlorene Freunde, angefreundet.  Aber all dass, ist Teil des Menschens der ich heute bin!!!!!

Rough translation (via Google Translate):  I have this year: laughed, cryed, lived, accepted much, forgiven much, owned mistakes, lost friends, made ​​friends.  But all that is part of the person I am today!!!!!

Either way, I wish everyone a Happy New Years and only the best for the up coming year. And most of all, BE SAFE!

P.S.  What’s the best way to start out the first hour of the year?  The Doctor Who Christmas Special that I hadn’t had a chance to watch yet!

Cheers,

Jason Mock

Scott Kelby’s Post can be found here, since I don’t feel like trying to fix the caption.

WordPress.org describes the following changes:

• Various security hardening by Alexander Concha.
• Taxonomy query hardening by John Lamansky.
• Prevent sniffing out user names of non-authors by using canonical redirects. Props Verónica Valeros.
• Media security fixes by Richard Lundeen of Microsoft, Jesse Ou of Microsoft, and Microsoft Vulnerability Research.
• Improves file upload security on hosts with dangerous security settings.
• Cleans up old WordPress import files if the import does not finish.
• Introduce “clickjacking” protection in modern browsers on admin and login pages.

On another security related note, some researchers at Standford University have reportedly found a way to circumvent audio based CAPCHA.

The accessories concern mainly comes from the fact that I’m a very fast typist, and I have doubts as to whether I’ll ever be able to type as quickly without a physical keyboard.  Additionally most users have grown accustomed to having access to additional storage, especially in the form of flash based media.

In regards to the operating system, and the user experience, we’ve all seen that customers are willing to try something different.  Both iOS on Apple devices, and Android have taken center stage leaving the likes of Palm, and Microsoft in the dust. At the same time, once you start increasing your screen real-estate to the same as a netbook, I think your going to find users yearning basic for features found in full-featured operating systems like Windows and Mac OSX.  I don’t think users will be completely satisfied with tablet devices that use the same exact interface as found on cell phones and multimedia players.

So, with the recent release of the Android Honeycomb devices, and my increase interest after being exposed to a Kindle that I bought Lena for Christmas, I’ve decided to jump in the mix by purchasing an Android 3.x tablet.  While the iPad 2 is a perfectly capable device, I think that as a power-user I would be increasingly annoyed by the overly simplified set of features provided by iOS 4.x.  Just the fact that the device has to be teathered against a computer with iTunes is enough to turn me away.

So after going through a piles of reviews, and comparing specifications, I’ve decided to go for the Asus EEE Pad Transformer.  The combination of the dockable keyboard, turning the tablet into a netbook like form-factor, is great in my opinion.  That coupled with the acclaimed IPS display, and one of the lowest price points for a device of it’s class, the Transformer quickly jumped to the top of my list.

Unfortunately, due to it’s unprecedented popularity, the Asus EEE Pad Transformer has experience similar availability issues as the iPad 2.  So it might be some time before I have a chance to actually get my hands on one.  Either way, I plan on sharing my experiences with the tablet and with Android Honeycomb once I finally have the chance.

Petey

At first, he quickly figured out how to pop his cage open, so because we didn’t quite trust him yet we started leaving him outside.  When he was outside, he slowly damaged the back door and he’d dig at every gate around the back yard.  All of this seemed fairly manageable, and also seemed to improve over time until our trip to Colorado for Christmas.

A couple days after arriving, we decided to go to a C.C. Tigers Hockey game.  Because we were worried about how he’d respond, and because it was a little cold outside, we left him in my parents garage.  When we got home, we found the garage trashed.  Initially we said that was enough, but through contacting rescuers we started to get an idea of what might be going on.

From the rescuers perspective, the piddling was due to an alpha-male submission response.  Most rescuers had seen this, but it usually only occurred in situations where the dog had been abused.  One described this as an alternative to exposing their tummy for scratching.  Additionally they all described the issues with being alone as a form of separation anxiety disorder.  One rescuer said that they saw this in rescued dogs quite regularly, but some dogs get over it better than others.

At this point, we took the suggestions from the rescuers and immediately implemented them to see what kind of effect they’d have.  With the piddling, it seemed that if I rough housed with the dog then he seemed to understand that I’m not going to abuse him.  This worked most of the time, with the occasional - yet manageable - accident.  However, the separation anxiety never really improved.

Over the past could of weeks, we finally made the incredibly difficult decision that we just weren’t the right kind of family for Petey.  With that we took Petey back to the original rescuer back in Weatherford to ensure he was in a safe place.

Returning Petey was incredibly traumatic for us.  In fact it seemed as thought Lena and I had a harder time with returning him than the kids did.  At that point I’d imagined that we wouldn’t last too long without a dog.

Today proved my instincts correct.  We went by the Greenville Animal Shelter during my lunch and absolutely fell in love with a corgi they had.  Despite being worried about the corgi only being three months old, I also thought that this would be a perfect opportunity to instill the behaviors that we’d like to see out of the dog.

So, we went ahead and adopted him.  This evening we agreed on the name Spots.  So with that I present to everyone Spots:

A call to action:

If you know of an animal that is being abused, please report it to your local ASPCA as soon as possible.  They don’t deserve it, and it needs to be stopped!

We are now faced with the fact, my friends, that tomorrow is today. We are confronted with the fierce urgency of now. In this unfolding conundrum of life and history, there is such a thing as being too late. Procrastination is still the thief of time. Life often leaves us standing bare, naked, and dejected with a lost opportunity. The tide in the affairs of men does not remain at flood — it ebbs. We may cry out desperately for time to pause in her passage, but time is adamant to every plea and rushes on. Over the bleached bones and jumbled residues of numerous civilizations are written the pathetic words, ‘Too late.’ – MLK Jr.

This seems to really hit home at the moment, and I agree with Chase that I’m taking it to heart and trying to do something to keep me from allowing my time to be stolen…

Chalk that on up for my lightning fast security response time

FYI, If you haven’t already done so it’d probably be a good idea to pull this update since it corrects a potential XSS vulnerability.

During our research, Lena came across a great site called Petfinder.com where rescuers can post about the dogs they have available.  While going through the site we contacted a rescuer about a certain dog, only to find out the dog had been primarily raise outdoors.  However, the rescuer did have a medium sized Blue Heeler, Beagle mix that had all the traits that we were hoping for.  While one would think that those two breeds together would result in an excitable dog, the rescuer described exactly the opposite.  So, that weekend we headed for the other side of the DFW area to pick up the new family dog:

Petey

So far, Petey has been absolutely wonderful.  He’s just a calm, easy, silly dog that loves attention.  We were really worried at first that there would be some grief between the cats and Petey, but even they’ve gotten along quite well.  We’re still working on some adjustment issues with eating and water, but we’re pretty confident that it will pass as time goes by.

I think this is going to be really good for the kids, because we’re trying to make this an educational experience in responsibility.  The cats haven’t ever really had too much of an impression in that area, because it’s fairly easy to give them food and water every day.  It’s another thing to have to walk the dog every day, and make sure he’s had an opportunity to go to the bathroom regularly.  I guess I could have the kids take care of the kitty litter, but I really prefer not having poo on the walls.

Either way, Petey has been pretty good so far, and I believe that we’ve made an excellent decision by adopting him.  I’m really looking forward to the new chapter in our family’s book as we add Petey to the family.

On Saturday evening I had the pleasure of attending the Software Freedom Day event held and sponsored by Dallas Makerspace.  This actually marks the first Open Source / Linux related event that I’ve had a chance to attend since I’ve moved to the Greenville area.  Here’s some of the pictures from the event.

Simply add the following to your kernel options:

i915powersave=0

Note:  From what I gather, this may be an issue with anyone that has a laptop with the i915 video chipset.