borg.org

Month: May 2011

  • Write Down Your Passwords

    Recently someone pointed out that an Ubuntu mailing list will e-mail a forgotten password back to you.  And that this is wrong.  Well, I agree, but… I am never bothered when a mailing list sends me a plaintext password. But I do something Extremely Radical: I don’t reuse passwords. If a mailing list password of […]

  • Python Command Line Arguments

    For quite some time I have thought I shouldn’t parse my own command line arguments in Python, but each time I looked for the “right” way to do it, I turned back. Today, I decided to persist. Now I know why I turned back, the libraries were terrible. I want to have: mycleverprog.py mycommand –nifty-option […]

  • Android Pattern Unlock Insecure

    When I first saw the pattern unlock feature in Android phones I thought: Cool! And I used it on my Nexus One.  Until I realized that it is a really stupid idea if I want my phone to be secure.  Don’t do it. The problem is that the phone screen gets smudged.  And when you […]

  • To Release or Not Release bin Laden Photos: A Most Productive Argument

    Nice to have a few things go right. Sure, the initial reports of the raid on bin Laden’s hideout were a bit confused and got corrected, and will get further corrections, but, if I may parrot others in this cliché, that’s why they call it the “fog of war”.  Even when things go stunningly right, […]

  • The '00s Are Over!

    Culturally the ’60s didn’t begin until about 1963 and lasted until about 1973. A powerful decade even with sloppy dates. The ’00s have more precise dates: September 11th 2001 to May 2nd 2011. Not everything in that decade is so tidy. Obama’s Cairo speech on June 4th, 2009, was a preview of the ’10s just […]