So let’s get started with a fresh install of 8.04.2 with all the updates.

1. sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get upgrade
2. sudo apt-get install build-essential
3. sudo addgroup –system qtss
   sudo adduser –system –no-create-home –ingroup qtss qtss
4. cd /usr/local/src/
5. Download the latest version at http://github.com/lstoll/dss/tree/master
6. tar -xvf lstoll-dss-984a1365251f36ebf3f60f0d0175fa895a30b9a9.tar
7. cd lstoll-dss-984a1365251f36ebf3f60f0d0175fa895a30b9a9/
8. ./Buildit install
9. cd DarwinStreamingSrvr6.0.3-Linux
10. ./Install
11. If you see Setup Complete! message, you are good to go. Logon to http://servername:1220/ using your browser. Username and password is the ones you entered at step 10.

Ok, now you have Darwin Streaming Server installed on your Ubuntu Hardy box.

Here’s a sample init file for DSS:

#!/bin/sh
#
# chkconfig: 35 92 12
# description: Quicktime Streaming Media Server
#
# Slight tweak of file create by Larry Underhill 05/20/02
#
# init script to start up the quicktime (Darwin) streaming server
# tested on Redhat 7.2, Fedora Core 4 and CentOS-4.3

# source function library
#. /etc/rc.d/init.d/functions

case "$1" in
start)
if test -r /var/lock/dssd
then
echo "Lockfile /var/lock/dssd exists. Server not started."
failure
else
echo "Starting Darwin Streaming Server: "
/usr/local/sbin/DarwinStreamingServer && touch /var/lock/dssd
echo "Starting DSS Admin Console: "
/usr/local/sbin/streamingadminserver.pl
echo "DSS and DSS Admin Console started..."
fi
;;

stop)
echo "Stopping Darwin Streaming Server: "
[ -f /var/lock/dssd ] || exit 0
echo "stopping..."
killall DarwinStreamingServer && killall streamingadminserver.pl
#ps ax | awk '{print $1" " $5}' | awk '/DarwinStreamingServer/ {print $1}' | xargs -r kill -9 && success || failure
#echo "Stopping DSS Admin Console: "
#ps ax | awk '/streamingadminserver.pl/ {print $1}' | xargs -r kill -9  && success || failure
rm -f /var/lock/dssd
echo
;;

restart)
$0 stop
sleep 1
$0 start
;;

*)
echo "Usage: $0 [start|stop|restart]"
exit 1
esac
exit 0

Save this file in /etc/init.d/dss

Make it executable chmod +x /etc/init.d/dss and make it auto start when booting:

update-rc.d dss defaults
Adding system startup for /etc/init.d/dss …
/etc/rc0.d/K20dss -> ../init.d/dss
/etc/rc1.d/K20dss -> ../init.d/dss
/etc/rc6.d/K20dss -> ../init.d/dss
/etc/rc2.d/S20dss -> ../init.d/dss
/etc/rc3.d/S20dss -> ../init.d/dss
/etc/rc4.d/S20dss -> ../init.d/dss
/etc/rc5.d/S20dss -> ../init.d/dss

Now that we have already installed DSS on Ubuntu Hardy box, next thing is how to broadcast mp3 and video through it. Well, that’s a next post coming up. Enjoy!

DSS Admin Console

These two types of hosting are quite similar in many ways but there are still a few differences that could be worth mentioning. Firstly though, one mistake that many seem to do is focusing too much on the operating system rather than picking web host because of its services and features. We have already mentioned that Linux hosting comes very cheap (so does Windows hosting) and all the features that almost always are included makes the hosting plan even more impressive. Take a look at the Linux hosting plans offered by the largest hosting providers on the market – we are sure that you will like what you see.

Ok, Linux hosting and Windows hosting are quite similar in many ways but is it possible to say that one is better than the other? Historically has Linux been regarded as the stronger alternative among webmasters and it still seems as if it is their top alternative. One reason for this could be that Linux hosting has narrowed its ease-of-use gap and functionality.  Windows hosting is of course not a bad alternative and it can boost with full allowance for use of ASP and ASP.Net. You are probably better off with Windows if you feel more comfortable with ASP when creating websites. If you are not particularly fond of ASP we would like to recommend you picking Linux hosting.

If we look into web servers in Linux we have Apache, lighttpd, nginx and many other open source servers. They are 100% open source and free. For big websites you can have complicated setup like clustering and failover.

In Windows hosting we have IIS. Mostly it is used to host .NET (old same ASP). Unlike in Linux, in IIS you are more or less stuck with .NET and there’s not much chance to scale.

Most of the successful websites run free and open source servers and applications. Good examples will be Google, Facebook, Flickr, Twitter, Yahoo and such.

So if you are buy web hosting consider linux hosting as an alternative. If you don’t have any particular reason for going windows hosting go for linux hosting!

Active Endpoints is the world’s first all-in-one, standards-based visual orchestration system.

Active is the only SOA-based process orchestration and business process management (BPM) system that allows enterprises and developers to:

1. Automate business processes
2. Collaborate across IT and business boundaries
3. Control the overall state of the business
4. Adapt rapidly and easily to change

Ok, so what’s SOA? What’s BPEL? What is Business Process Management?

SOA – Service Oriented Architecture provides enterprises a design framework to deploy new application in a more faster and economic way. You can say that SOA is a bunch of different business services that can communicate with each other.

Web Services Business Process Execution Language(BPEL) – Web service interactions can be described in two ways. Executable business processes model actual behavior of a participant in a business interaction. Abstract business processes are partially specified processes that are not intended to be executed. An Abstract Process may hide some of the required concrete operational details. Abstract Processes serve a descriptive role, with more than one possible use case, including observable behavior and process template. WS-BPEL is meant to be used to model the behavior of both Executable and Abstract Processes. ( taken from Wikipedia )

Business Process Management, well in short it’s a process where organizations satisfy their clients by studying and enhancing their products or services.

Now Active Endpoints let’s you do all these three things. There’s a free trial, you can download it at http://www.activevos.com/download-trial.php by filling out some forms.

If you opt to purchase the software, they give you two options:

1. You buy the software for Development Environment. ActiveVOS is $5,000 per CPU socket.
2. You buy the software for Deployment Environment. ActiveVOS is $12,000 per CPU socket when the Deployment licenses are ordered with a first-time purchase of Development licenses. Subsequent ActiveVOS deployment purchases are $25,000 per CPU socket.

Support is given at annual fee of 20% of total license fees. If you need training,  a 5-day skills transfer program geared specifically to your project teams needs. Includes 5 days on site for $10,000 plus travel and expenses.

You can follow them via their online blog at http://www.vosibilities.com/

1. OpenDNS – http://www.opendns.org – pretty much solid dns servers, highly recommended by many people.

2. ScrubIt – http://scrubit.com – Haven’t used myself, found in the net.

3. gtei.net – nosite – One of the advantages of these servers –> IP numbers easy to remember!
a) 4.2.2.1
b) 4.2.2.2
c) 4.2.2.3
d) 4.2.2.4
e) 4.2.2.5
f) 4.2.2.6

Cool, ah?

Others you can get at http://www.dnsserverlist.org/

Before we proceed any further let’s take a look into different WP layouts.

This one will be most common layout used among bloggers. It’s very basic layout, designing and customizing this kind of theme is much easier than the most.

This is what we call two column WP layout. Because you have two columns – Main and Sidebar.
It has a header, where we usually put our logo, blog name and tag lines. Also it’s a common practice to put navigation bar there as well.

Then a sidebar, its where we have blog categories, blogroll, may be some ads and things like that.

The main part is where we have our blog posts shown, it will contain posts with details like date published, author and if there are comments to the posts.

Lastly we have footer, usually people want to put some Copyright/Copyleft, site credits.

Also we have another popular layout with three columns. This one can be in two variations, it differs from each other on the sidebars positions.

In the first layout, we can see that sidebars are kept at both sides, so that the main part(the part where you have your blog posts) is kept in the center.

And the second layout is where we like to have our sidebars on the right or the left side of the blog.

So these are more or less standard WP theme layouts you will see in the blogosphere. These types of layouts are common ones but of course there are other types.

So, I have covered basic WP layout types. My next blog post will be about WP theme files and their functions.

Please make sure you have the following:

1. Working WordPress blog installed. It can be on your workstation(local webserver) or hosted in the internet.
2. Basic HTML and CSS knowledge.
3. Your favorite text editor. You can use Macromedia Dreamweaver or any kind of IDE tool at that point. As long as you are comfortable and can manipulate text.
4. Graphical FTP client or knowledge of command line FTP.
5. Covered my previous posts

If you have any other tips or suggestions please drop your comments, I really appreciate your feedback!

Reminder: This post is a 2nd post in a How to create WordPress Theme series. If you want to get updated make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed at http://www.jusupov.com/feed/

At the same time I will be taking notes, step by step and publish a series of posts on designing your own custom WordPress(WP) theme.

Enough said, let’s get right to it.

Folks at WP did a fairly awesome job at simplifying installation process. However, let’s take a brief look into installing WP.

1. First you need to download the latest version of WP, another good point from developers that they always keep the latest version available to download at http://www.wordpress.org/latest.zipUnlike many other open source softwares/scripts where you need to go through versions pick mirrors etc, WP is made simple to download.
2. Unzipping latest.zip(it can also get wordpress-version-number.zip name), you find folder wordpress created. Inside this folder you will find wp-config-sample.php, rename this to wp-config.php file name.
3. Edit this wp-config.php file. Enter your MySQL details here.
4. Now upload everything that is under wordpress directory to your web server. Make sure you upload into a directory that is accessible from outside, it is something like htdocs, public_html or www directories.
5. Fire up your favorite browser and point it to your domain where you uploaded the files.
6. Once you will see WP setup screen, it will ask you to enter the blog title and admin E-Mail address. Once you have done so, it will generate you random admin password. In case you forget to change the random password, WP will email password details to the E-Mail address you provided during the installation.

Now that we know how to setup WP , let’s take a look into WP themes locations. Themes are located in wp-content/themes directory and they are under named folders. To edit or modify WP themes, you look into those folders.

You can see from the left image the basic WP theme structure.

So, in this post we learned how to install WP, and we know where to look and what too look for in WP themes.

This is the first part in a WordPress theme series. Please subscribe to my RSS feed to get updated.

I have used RapidOne package for like 8 months now, 5GB space, 100GB bandwidth, 2 IPs, 128RAM(burstable) and CPU of 100Mhz out of 8Ghz(also burstable I suppose). When I was looking for a VPS, main criteria was that it has to be cheap.

Looking through the forums and blogs I found RapidVPS, I tested it for a month, played around with it, installed different kinds of distros and what not… After a month of testing I moved my blog and other domains. The move was done quite ok, by that time I was already using EveryDNS outsourced DNS services. This means there will be little or close to no down time at all.

I have to admit that I don’t usually have funds in my paypal account, when I don’t have funds I email RapidVPS explaining the situation and they have no problem at all giving me some time to get funds in. So this is quite good.

Also I liked Rick, I think he is the main guy over there. He put his efforts and personal touch into RapidVPS which is really awesome!

Ok, so what exactly is nice about RapidVPS?

1. It’s cheap! With $9.95 you can get an OK VPS to start off with.
2. You get an awesome useful control panel. You can reboot, shut down, reinstall OS(multiple choices), view your invoices and bills and other cool stuff.
3. If you prove yourself serious and continuous in their VPS services you can negotiate late payments.
4. Great affiliate program! Introduce your friend to RapidVPS and get a free month for yourself!
5. Great support via E-Mail/Wiki/Forum. I’m not so sure about phone support.
6. As with any VPS, you can customize your applications to meet your exact needs.
7. Wide range of Linux distro choices.
8. Good uptime, they never go under 99,5%. Which is quite OK.

I’m sure you can add more to it when you find yourself hosted with RapidVPS.

So after over 8 months good journey with RapidVPS I am moving on to a dedicated server. I have already moved my blog and most of other critical websites. If you are looking for a quality/price combination VPS – then look no more, RapidVPS is for you.
Thank you RapidVPS and thank you Rick!

But most starting bloggers think that they should try to make money online with free platforms such as Wordpress.com or Blogger and if they are successful they eventually move to a seperate domain. Ades has blogged of the common mistakes of a new blogger and I must say that I totally agree.

So, if you are a starting a blog, moving from free blogging platforms leave your name and your email address and you will be counted in the contest.

The prize is domain name of your choice( Sponsored by Ades ) for two years and a free webhosting ( sponsored by me ) for two years as well.

Contest link

Here’s the screenshot of it:

This means that Google is to improve their already good anti SPAM filtering. Thats good news for all of us! Let’s celebrate New Year with less viagra and free porn sites

• OYH3 – $3 off / $6.95 any .COM (renewals too… just used it)
• YH1 – 10% off whatever
• BTPS7 – 20% any order of $50 or more
• BTPS20 – 25% any order of $100 or more (expires Dec 21st)
• BTPS4 – 10% off anything
• OYH2 – $5 off a $30 purchase
• chill1 – 10% off
• chill2 – $5 off $30
• chill3 – $6.95 .coms
• hash1 – 10% off
• hash2 – $5 off $30
• hash3 – $6.95 .com registration
• gdd1101c – 10% off any order of $40 or more

Well, this means:

1. TM has issues with spammers. Be it zombie machines with trojans, viruses and spywares.
2. All the local businesses that run internal E-Mail servers will have to find other ways.

It’s not a big deal actually, but again if you are doing this kind of things that means something out of your control is happening and you have to block it. Otherwise I believe it’s a very widely used port.

The TM’s corporate users, the one who has fixed IPs do not have to worry, since this does not effect them.

For the home/soho users I will be writing a nice how-to on this matter in a few days time.

To conserve bandwidth, switches direct traffic to a specific port based on the target MAC address (as opposed to hubs which simply broadcast all packets to all ports). This allows multiple peer-to-peer conversations to occur at the same time as each conversation only requires two ports (whereas in a hub each conversation occupies all ports!) Hence, bandwidth management; not security .

For a switch to know which port connects to which MAC addresses, the switch creates and manages a CAM table (a simple mapping between port and MAC address(es)). If no Port Security, this table is dynamic and changes over time (to allow for hosts to appear, disappear and move between ports). The switch learns the CAM table mappings by monitoring the source and destination MAC addresses in packets that it directs.

Now look at the Port Stealing slide. Send layer 2 packets with “source address equal to victim host address” and “destination address equal to its own mac address”. Taking these in reverse order, the switch will direct the packet to the port mapped to the destination address, the attackers “own mac address”; i.e. the packet will return to the attackers host (so no other hosts will notice the packet). At the same time, the switch will record the source address of the packet against the port it came from in the CAM table; i.e. the victim host (MAC) address against the attacker’s port. If you looked in the CAM table, you’d now find the attackers port mapped to both the attackers MAC address and also the victim’s MAC address.

The switch will now direct the next packet targeted at the victim’s MAC address to the attackers port (based on the CAM table entry) – the port is ’stolen’.

To relay the packet to the correct port (so that the conversations can continue uniterrupted), the attacker needs to get the CAM table back to the original state, i.e. with the victim’s port mapped to the victim’s MAC address. This is achieved by issuing a broadcast ARP request for the victim’s IP address. Broadcast means the request will go to all ports (including the victim). When the victim responds, the switch will record the new CAM table mapping (back to where it was originally). The captured packet can now be resent by the attacker and correctly directed by the switch to the victim’s port.

Now (and this is the scary bit) to get and relay the _next_ packet, the attacker needs to repeat the entire process. It looks like a lot of work and is why I raised queries about whether or not packets would be dropped. NaGA says ‘not necessarily’ which is fair enough.

URL: http://ettercap.sourceforge.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2329 

Here’s my firefox plugins, they help me a lot and save lots of time. What are your plugins? Please leave in the comments.

Well, the news is Gmail is to provide IMAP protocol for its users(Google Apps for your domain too). It’s a great feature to have for those people who are not comfortable using Gmail’s popular webmail interface or any webmail, preferring those to E-Mail clients like Outlook or Mozilla Thunderbird. Also it’s also creating a way for gadgets and phones like iPhone, BlackBerry or any kind of PDAs out there.

So go ahead and configure your E-Mail client, PDA or phone to synchronize with your Gmail account.

For those who doesn’t know what does IMAP mean read it here.

How do I enable IMAP?

You can retrieve your Gmail messages with a client or device that supports IMAP, like Microsoft Outlook or Apple Mail.

To enable IMAP in your Gmail account:

1. Log in to your Gmail account.
2. Click Settings at the top of any Gmail page.
3. Click Forwarding and POP/IMAP.
4. Select Enable IMAP.
5. Configure your IMAP client* and click Save Changes.

1. Ades – Abdylas from AdesBlog. A close friend of mine, always there to help and support me. His blog covers tips for bloggers, making money online, web2.0, SEO, web things and stuff like that. Did I mention that his blog  is one of the very few bloggers who have PR7?

2. Satans – I don’t speak Chinese, so I’m not sure who he is and what is his blog about. But thanks anyway for visiting me! Visit his chinese blog one and two.

3. 88michael – Michael is the author of three blogs http://techcentreme.blogspot.com/ , http://techhelpvideos.wordpress.com/ and http://mmomethods.blogspot.com on Technology. His blogs cover security, video editing and stuff, also make money online. Thanks!

4. Christopher from http://www.techchee.com is ablog where he has got some good advices for those who want to get high tech gadgets.

5. Calvyn from iCalvyn is an IT Officer in hotel industries. His personal blog covers his experience in IT as well as making money online.

I made some other queries, microsoft.com was one of them. I was surprised to see the outcome. Check out the whois information for Microsoft domain!

arstan@blacky:~$ whois microsoft.com

Whois Server Version 2.0

Domain names in the .com and .net domains can now be registered
with many different competing registrars. Go to http://www.internic.net
for detailed information.

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.ZZZZZZ.MORE.DETAILS.AT.WWW.BEYONDWHOIS.COM
IP Address: 203.36.226.2
Registrar: TUCOWS INC.
Whois Server: whois.tucows.com
Referral URL: http://domainhelp.opensrs.net

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.ZZZZZ.GET.LAID.AT.WWW.SWINGINGCOMMUNITY.COM
IP Address: 69.41.185.194
Registrar: INNERWISE, INC. D/B/A ITSYOURDOMAIN.COM
Whois Server: whois.itsyourdomain.com
Referral URL: http://www.itsyourdomain.com

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.ZZZOMBIED.AND.HACKED.BY.WWW.WEB-HACK.COM
IP Address: 217.107.217.167
Registrar: ONLINENIC, INC.
Whois Server: whois.35.com
Referral URL: http://www.OnlineNIC.com

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.ZZZ.IS.0WNED.AND.HAX0RED.BY.SUB7.NET
IP Address: 207.44.240.96
Registrar: INNERWISE, INC. D/B/A ITSYOURDOMAIN.COM
Whois Server: whois.itsyourdomain.com
Referral URL: http://www.itsyourdomain.com

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.WILL.LIVE.FOREVER.BECOUSE.UNIXSUCKS.COM
IP Address: 185.3.4.7
Registrar: MELBOURNE IT, LTD. D/B/A INTERNET NAMES WORLDWIDE
Whois Server: whois.melbourneit.com
Referral URL: http://www.melbourneit.com

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.WILL.BE.SLAPPED.IN.THE.FACE.BY.MY.BLUE.VEINED.SPANNER.NET
IP Address: 216.127.80.46
Registrar: TUCOWS INC.
Whois Server: whois.tucows.com
Referral URL: http://domainhelp.opensrs.net

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.WILL.BE.BEATEN.WITH.MY.SPANNER.NET
IP Address: 216.127.80.46
Registrar: TUCOWS INC.
Whois Server: whois.tucows.com
Referral URL: http://domainhelp.opensrs.net

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.WAREZ.AT.TOPLIST.GULLI.COM
IP Address: 80.190.192.33
Registrar: KEY-SYSTEMS GMBH
Whois Server: whois.rrpproxy.net
Referral URL: http://www.key-systems.net

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.TOTALLY.SUCKS.S3U.NET
IP Address: 207.208.13.22
Registrar: ENOM, INC.
Whois Server: whois.enom.com
Referral URL: http://www.enom.com

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.SMELLS.SIMPLECODES.COM
IP Address: 207.44.234.34
Registrar: GODADDY.COM, INC.
Whois Server: whois.godaddy.com
Referral URL: http://registrar.godaddy.com

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.SHOULD.GIVE.UP.BECAUSE.LINUXISGOD.COM
IP Address: 65.160.248.13
Registrar: GKG.NET, INC.
Whois Server: whois.gkg.net
Referral URL: http://www.gkg.net

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.RAWKZ.MUH.WERLD.MENTALFLOSS.CA
Registrar: TUCOWS INC.
Whois Server: whois.tucows.com
Referral URL: http://domainhelp.opensrs.net

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.OHMYGODITBURNS.COM
IP Address: 216.158.63.6
Registrar: DOTSTER, INC.
Whois Server: whois.dotster.com
Referral URL: http://www.dotster.com

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.MORE.INFO.AT.WWW.BEYONDWHOIS.COM
IP Address: 203.36.226.2
Registrar: TUCOWS INC.
Whois Server: whois.tucows.com
Referral URL: http://domainhelp.opensrs.net

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.LOVES.ME.KOSMAL.NET
IP Address: 65.75.198.123
Registrar: GODADDY.COM, INC.
Whois Server: whois.godaddy.com
Referral URL: http://registrar.godaddy.com

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.LIVES.AT.SHAUNEWING.COM
IP Address: 216.40.250.172
Registrar: ENOM, INC.
Whois Server: whois.enom.com
Referral URL: http://www.enom.com

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.IS.NOT.YEPPA.ORG
Registrar: OVH
Whois Server: whois.ovh.com
Referral URL: http://www.ovh.com

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.IS.NOT.HOSTED.BY.ACTIVEDOMAINDNS.NET
IP Address: 217.148.161.5
Registrar: ENOM, INC.
Whois Server: whois.enom.com
Referral URL: http://www.enom.com

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.IS.NOT.AS.COOL.AS.SIMPLECODES.COM
IP Address: 207.44.234.232
Registrar: GODADDY.COM, INC.
Whois Server: whois.godaddy.com
Referral URL: http://registrar.godaddy.com

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.IS.IN.BED.WITH.CURTYV.COM
IP Address: 216.55.187.193
Registrar: ABACUS AMERICA, INC. DBA NAMES4EVER
Whois Server: whois.names4ever.com
Referral URL: http://www.names4ever.com

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.IS.HOSTED.ON.PROFITHOSTING.NET
IP Address: 66.49.213.213
Registrar: COMPUTER SERVICES LANGENBACH GMBH DBA JOKER.COM
Whois Server: whois.joker.com
Referral URL: http://www.joker.com

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.IS.GOD.BECOUSE.UNIXSUCKS.COM
IP Address: 161.16.56.24
Registrar: MELBOURNE IT, LTD. D/B/A INTERNET NAMES WORLDWIDE
Whois Server: whois.melbourneit.com
Referral URL: http://www.melbourneit.com

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.IS.A.SUBSITE.OF.SWEETCOUPLE.NET
IP Address: 208.109.8.2
Registrar: GODADDY.COM, INC.
Whois Server: whois.godaddy.com
Referral URL: http://registrar.godaddy.com

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.IS.A.STEAMING.HEAP.OF.FUCKING-BULLSHIT.NET
IP Address: 63.99.165.11
Registrar: THE NAME IT CORPORATION DBA NAMESERVICES.NET
Whois Server: whois.aitdomains.com
Referral URL: http://www.aitdomains.com

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.IS.A.MESS.TIMPORTER.CO.UK
Registrar: MELBOURNE IT, LTD. D/B/A INTERNET NAMES WORLDWIDE
Whois Server: whois.melbourneit.com
Referral URL: http://www.melbourneit.com

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.HAS.ITS.OWN.CRACKLAB.COM
IP Address: 209.26.95.44
Registrar: DOTSTER, INC.
Whois Server: whois.dotster.com
Referral URL: http://www.dotster.com

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.HAS.A.PRESENT.COMING.FROM.HUGHESMISSILES.COM
IP Address: 66.154.11.27
Registrar: TUCOWS INC.
Whois Server: whois.tucows.com
Referral URL: http://domainhelp.opensrs.net

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.FILLS.ME.WITH.BELLIGERENCE.NET
IP Address: 130.58.82.232
Registrar: CRONON AG BERLIN, NIEDERLASSUNG REGENSBURG
Whois Server: whois.tmagnic.net
Referral URL: http://nsi-robo.tmag.de

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.DRINKS.LISTERINE.NET
IP Address: 66.33.206.206
Registrar: SPOT DOMAIN LLC DBA DOMAINSITE.COM
Whois Server: whois.domainsite.com
Referral URL: http://www.domainsite.com

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.CAN.GO.FUCK.ITSELF.AT.SECZY.COM
IP Address: 209.187.114.147
Registrar: INNERWISE, INC. D/B/A ITSYOURDOMAIN.COM
Whois Server: whois.itsyourdomain.com
Referral URL: http://www.itsyourdomain.com

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.ARE.GODDAMN.PIGFUCKERS.NET.NS-NOT-IN-SERVICE.COM
IP Address: 216.127.80.46
Registrar: TUCOWS INC.
Whois Server: whois.tucows.com
Referral URL: http://domainhelp.opensrs.net

Server Name: MICROSOFT.COM.AND.MINDSUCK.BOTH.SUCK.HUGE.ONES.AT.EXEGETE.NET
IP Address: 63.241.136.53
Registrar: DOTSTER, INC.
Whois Server: whois.dotster.com
Referral URL: http://www.dotster.com

Domain Name: MICROSOFT.COM
Registrar: TUCOWS INC.
Whois Server: whois.tucows.com
Referral URL: http://domainhelp.opensrs.net
Name Server: NS1.MSFT.NET
Name Server: NS2.MSFT.NET
Name Server: NS3.MSFT.NET
Name Server: NS4.MSFT.NET
Name Server: NS5.MSFT.NET
Status: clientDeleteProhibited
Status: clientTransferProhibited
Status: clientUpdateProhibited
Updated Date: 10-oct-2006
Creation Date: 02-may-1991
Expiration Date: 03-may-2014

>>> Last update of whois database: Mon, 13 Aug 2007 07:38:28 UTC <<<

NOTICE: The expiration date displayed in this record is the date the
registrar’s sponsorship of the domain name registration in the registry is
currently set to expire. This date does not necessarily reflect the expiration
date of the domain name registrant’s agreement with the sponsoring
registrar.  Users may consult the sponsoring registrar’s Whois database to
view the registrar’s reported date of expiration for this registration.

TERMS OF USE: You are not authorized to access or query our Whois
database through the use of electronic processes that are high-volume and
automated except as reasonably necessary to register domain names or
modify existing registrations; the Data in VeriSign Global Registry
Services’ (“VeriSign”) Whois database is provided by VeriSign for
information purposes only, and to assist persons in obtaining information
about or related to a domain name registration record. VeriSign does not
guarantee its accuracy. By submitting a Whois query, you agree to abide
by the following terms of use: You agree that you may use this Data only
for lawful purposes and that under no circumstances will you use this Data
to: (1) allow, enable, or otherwise support the transmission of mass
unsolicited, commercial advertising or solicitations via e-mail, telephone,
or facsimile; or (2) enable high volume, automated, electronic processes
that apply to VeriSign (or its computer systems). The compilation,
repackaging, dissemination or other use of this Data is expressly
prohibited without the prior written consent of VeriSign. You agree not to
use electronic processes that are automated and high-volume to access or
query the Whois database except as reasonably necessary to register
domain names or modify existing registrations. VeriSign reserves the right
to restrict your access to the Whois database in its sole discretion to ensure
operational stability.  VeriSign may restrict or terminate your access to the
Whois database for failure to abide by these terms of use. VeriSign
reserves the right to modify these terms at any time.

The Registry database contains ONLY .COM, .NET, .EDU domains and
Registrars.
Registrant:
Microsoft Corporation
One Microsoft Way
Redmond, WA 98052
US

Domain name: MICROSOFT.COM

Administrative Contact:
Administrator, Domain  domains@microsoft.com
One Microsoft Way
Redmond, WA 98052
US
+1.4258828080
Technical Contact:
Hostmaster, MSN  msnhst@microsoft.com
One Microsoft Way
Redmond, WA 98052
US
+1.4258828080

Registration Service Provider:
DBMS VeriSign, dbms-support@verisign.com
800-579-2848 x4
Please contact DBMS VeriSign for domain updates, DNS/Nameserver
changes, and general domain support questions.

Registrar of Record: TUCOWS, INC.
Record last updated on 01-Feb-2007.
Record expires on 03-May-2014.
Record created on 02-May-1991.

Domain servers in listed order:
NS1.MSFT.NET
NS2.MSFT.NET
NS3.MSFT.NET
NS4.MSFT.NET
NS5.MSFT.NET

Domain status: clientDeleteProhibited
clientTransferProhibited
clientUpdateProhibited

The Data in the Tucows Registrar WHOIS database is provided to you by Tucows
for information purposes only, and may be used to assist you in obtaining
information about or related to a domain name’s registration record.

Tucows makes this information available “as is,” and does not guarantee its
accuracy.

By submitting a WHOIS query, you agree that you will use this data only for
lawful purposes and that, under no circumstances will you use this data to:
a) allow, enable, or otherwise support the transmission by e-mail,
telephone, or facsimile of mass, unsolicited, commercial advertising or
solicitations to entities other than the data recipient’s own existing
customers; or (b) enable high volume, automated, electronic processes that
send queries or data to the systems of any Registry Operator or
ICANN-Accredited registrar, except as reasonably necessary to register
domain names or modify existing registrations.

The compilation, repackaging, dissemination or other use of this Data is
expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Tucows.

Tucows reserves the right to terminate your access to the Tucows WHOIS
database in its sole discretion, including without limitation, for excessive
querying of the WHOIS database or for failure to otherwise abide by this
policy.

Tucows reserves the right to modify these terms at any time.

By submitting this query, you agree to abide by these terms.

NOTE: THE WHOIS DATABASE IS A CONTACT DATABASE ONLY.  LACK OF A DOMAIN
RECORD DOES NOT SIGNIFY DOMAIN AVAILABILITY.

Here’s the list of RSS readers I tried using:

• Google Reader
• Liferea
• SharpReader
• Opera
• Thunderbird

If you are reading blog via RSS, you lose the personal touch/feeling that the author has put into his blog. I believe blog is popular because of this personality unlike news portals. So when you are reading blog posts via RSS you kinda miss that thing.

Although, I agree that follow up with 50 or more blogs on a daily basis is a tough thing, I think partially RSS readers would help a lot. But again, if you are reading blog posts from RSS – get out of the standard RSS layout and further more go online and leave comments on the posts!

Update:
My appologies to Kevin and Mani from Blogging Tips, I had no bad intention.

Personally, Blogging Tips is one of my top reading blog. I respect Kevin and other authors’ contributions and I do learn a lot from them. Thank you for keeping up a great blog!

And I am really sorry for my unacceptable mistake. I will try to be more careful next time.

Using 103bees I found out that some of my posts are ranked pretty awesome by Google. For example if you search for how to setup an office infrastructure my blog will be the first that shows up. Second search result is from Microsoft website.

I must admit that Wordpress rocks! Way to go!

First Data Independent Sales, Inc. offers not only online merchant account but also services for the following business types:

• E-Commerce
• Restaurant
• Retail
• Wireless

The application is very easy, you can apply it online. If you have questions and doubts you can browse through their website or ultimately call their number (866) 889-5909.

They also have other free services as setting up your shopping card, gateway software, reprogramming, shipping and 24/7 support. I believe supporting merchant accounts is very crucial, you are selling software/service/product and everything goes ok and at the end you can’t charge the customer’s credit card. This is the last thing you would want to face. So again support is important.

What caught my attention is the wireless merchant account, this is very flexible! Imagine you can promote your products and services touring the country and you don’t have to worry setting up POS terminals, phone lines etc etc…

The bad news is, online pre application is for US based businesses only. At least that’s what it says on their website.

As for the month, the period around week 27 has the most traffic.

May has the highest peak in the year graph.

We have got around 60 staff, half of it have laptops and travelling and/or on the client site. They do VPN a lot, connect to our internal webmail, submit bugs to our bugzilla and do other stuff while they are away from the office.

The other half has desktop workstations and surf a lot.

Previously, I used to have problems with Aztec ADSL modems. After a day or so it would just freeze and I had to go take out the power cable by hand and connect back. This was irritating since some of the staff would come early and find no internet connection in the office. The problem was solved by buying Linksys ADSL modem and setting up Endian Firewall to dial PPPoE to my ISP.

After some time, I enabled squid proxy that comes in a box with the firewall. It helped me a lot from preventing duplicate downloads from the Internet and thus saving my bandwidth.