Microsoft seems to be doing quite a bit of it since Windows XP came out. Their failures at stopping users from using their software in ways that Microsoft does not approve of are reaching comically epic proportions.

First was the authentication process which was supposed to keep people from using a copy of Windows on more than one computer which Microsoft dubbed Windows Product Activation (WPA). Supposedly Microsoft was going to generate a unique authentication key for each computer with a copy of Windows XP installed on it. The key would be based on the hardware installed in your particular computer and, once registered, would keep that copy of Windows from being installed on other computers. The idea was that one copy of Windows would only be installed on one computer at a time. (Make sense? If not, don't worry. There's much better explanations of WPA at the end of this entry.)

The WPA scheme was broken in manner of days after XP was released to the public. German hackers wrote a small program which generated unique authentication keys for all versions of Windows XP. This effectively broke Microsoft's efforts at stopping people from installing the OS on multiple computers. Want to install your one copy of XP on your other computers? Just generate a new authentication key.

Now mind you, Microsoft's WPA system didn't just stop people sharing their copy of Windows with their buddies. It also stopped people from re-installing their own legal copies of Windows on their own computers. Let's say you wanted to upgrade your computer and you changed several pieces of hardware. Since the authenication key was based in part on the hardware installed in your computer, once you restarted your computer Windows would no longer work. If too many components in your computer changed, Windows thought it was being installed on an entirely new computer! If this happened to you, then you had to call Microsoft to get permission to re-install your legally acquired software on your updated computer. And we all know what a joy it is to work with tech support over the phone. There were legitimate reasons to want to generate your own authentication keys.

Well, after four years of rampant piracy - you can see Microsoft is going bankrupt from all those unauthorized copies of Windows out there - they decided that if you were in fact using one of those cracked versions of Windows XP to get around WPA that they weren't going to let you download updates for Windows through Windows Update anymore. Microsoft called the new anti-piracy program Windows Genuine Advantage (WGA). What advantage we're supposed to be getting from yet another hurdle to our legitimate use of software we've paid for, I'm not sure.

Now, when a computer accesses Windows Update a small program will be installed on your computer and will check to see if you have an authentication key installed on your computer that Microsoft approves of. If not, Windows Update will not allow you to download any updates and will invite you to buy an officially sanctioned copy of XP, as well as tell them everything you know about how you ended up with a pirated copy of Windows on your computer to begin with.

Windows Genuine Advantage was hacked within 24 hours.

How do you get around it? Simply by typing the following line of code into your browser's address bar before using Windows Update to scan for needed updates:

javascript:void(window.g_sDisableWGACheck='all')

That's all it takes to disable Microsoft's latest attempt to stem the tide of piracy driving Steve and Bill to bankruptcy court.

Now mind you, I've got no issues with Microsoft wanting to get paid for their products. But it seems to me their efforts at stopping piracy are so incompetent and ham handed that it does more to alienate legitimate users than it does to stop the illegal users. My question is this: at what point does Microsoft stop making itself look like an ass with all these half hearted anti-piracy schemes? If you can stop people from copying your software then go for it. But so far all they're doing is spitting into the wind. Every time Microsoft comes up with a new system to authorize their software, the hacking community takes it as a personal challenge to see how fast they can produce a work around. So far they're batting a thousand.

A couple of links if you're interested:

• View the original blog entry with the javascript work around for Windows Genuine Advantage (WGA) here.



• View an article regarding the hacking of WGA here.



• View an article regarding the initial implementation of WGA here.



• View the official Microsoft press release regarding WGA here



• A couple articles about the initial breaking of Windows Product Activation (WPA) by German hackers here, here, and here.



• And finally, a much better explanation of WPA than I can offer can be found here, here, and here.

I added a favicon for the site. Nothing earth shattering, and if you're using IE then you probably won't see it anyway because IE doesn't handle favicons correctly. Kind of ironic really, since Microsoft is the company that invented them.

Regardless, if you're using Firefox it should display quite nicely. You'll notice a little red "MR" in your URL display and in your bookmarks if you bookmark the page.

And if you're using a different browser? I don't care if it displays correctly or not. I don't have time to modify my site to work in every last obscure browser out there. You want support? Start using a mainstream browser . . . browser snob

. . . and it's not so we die hot and heavy, as the joke goes!

You may have heard about this story in the news recently. U.S. Army medic PFC Stephen Tschiderer of Mendon, NY, was on patrol in Baghdad when he was shot in the chest by an Iraqi sniper. Because he was wearing body armor, he was only knocked to the ground. The whole incident was caught on tape as the Iraqis were filming their attempt to kill him from the van they were hiding in 75 meters away.

Schneider later caught his attempted killer and, after subduing him, treated the sniper's wounds. You can read about the incident here and here. You can also read the official press release from the 256^th BCT here.

You can view the video taken by the insurgents here.

On a side note: you may notice that after shooting PFC Tschiderer you can hear one of the snipers chanting "Allah Akhbar" over and over, which means "God is great" or something to that effect. Meanwhile, PFC Tschiderer regains his wits, gets up, takes cover and later captures his would be killers.

This is why the U.S. invaded and occupied Iraq in three weeks. Iraqis are more interested in celebrating a minor success than in making sure they've accomplished their mission all the way. This is also the challenge we face in trying to reconstruct the country. The Iraqi people do things half way then stop and leave the rest for Allah. Luckily for PFC Tschiderer, Allah doesn't carry a rifle. Unfortunately for the rest of us working on the reconstruction effort, Allah doesn't rebuild roads or operate the commercial power grid either.

I posted a couple of video links to the OIF page. Also reformatted some text to change the aesthetics of the site a bit.

. . . you may be asking yourself. (Conversely, if you're not asking yourself that then you can ignore the rest of this post.)

Anytime you see a green underlined word it indicates an acronym or term that I think most readers may not be familiar with. Generally I try to find good links to add to each post as needed when I use terms that people may not know, but sometimes there just isn't an online resource to help out.

With the new green highlighting, if you move your mouse over the word (no need to click) a small window will appear that will explain what the word or term means. If you move your mouse away, the pop-up window will go away.

Try it here.

Regular links that take you to another page will continue to appear as non-underlined blue text. Like this.

The new thermometer has arrived! Pretty cool little thermometer too. Digital reading, gives it in Fahrenheit or Celsius. Even gives the indoor AND the outdoor temperature. High speed!

Check out the OIF page to keep up on the meteorological developments at ANTB.

Outstanding article over at Time.com.

A short essay from a Muslim scholar about the Islamic community owning up to Islam being used as a pretext for violence.

I wish I could meet more Christians as thoughtful as the essayist.

And why, pray tell, would I buy crap? And further more, what kind of crap did I buy? I think you might need a little back story to answer that question.

There is a little website called Woot.com. "What kind of name is woot" you may ask? I don't feel like explaining it, so read the link. Anyway, Woot.com is a website which sells only one item a day at bargain basement prices. That's it. One item. Once they sell out, they're done selling for the whole day. The next item is placed up for sale for the next 24 hour period at midnight central time. You get the picture. One item at a great price every 24 hours. A very good explanation of the site can be found over at Wikipedia.

Well, they have these special events periodically, and one of them is called a BOC - short for Bag of Crap (or Bag o' Crap if you're so inclined). A Bag of Crap is just what it sounds like. Woot finds random items lying around their warehouse that they want to get rid of; typically junk or old, worthless inventory. One dollar per piece of crap, three max per customer at a time get put up for sale. When you order, you get a bag of some sort (generally a computer bag) with one to three random items of dubious value. So, for $8 you get a bag and three random items from Woot.com's offices ($1 per item, $5 shipping).

Why would I want to buy Woot.com's crap? Ahhhhhh, here's the fun of it all. Some of the BOC's actually have valuable stuff in them from past items that did not sell out. Stereos, speaker systems, juicers, what not. So for $8 you may get a true Bag of Crap, but there is the possibility that for $8 you will get something much much better. A Bag of Cool Stuff if you will.

BOC's are naturally very popular at the site. They don't come along very often, and the lure of getting surprised with something super cool for $8 is evidently tempting to many people. You don't know when the BOC is coming. You don't know what will be in the BOC. And if you're one of the lucky ones you get something worth much more than $8.

Phew! OK, so now that we're all on the same page, here's what happened today. Woot.com had a BOC for sale and as difficult as it was (their servers get swamped whenever a BOC is put up for sale) I managed to get through and order one. 4500 BOC's went in 45 minutes. You do the math, but that's a lot of users trying to access their shop to plop down their $8 for a Bag of Crap. Somehow I managed to get through all the server errors with my crappy Iraqi internet connection at the last moment before they sold out.

Now, I wait. Will I get a good BOC? Will I get run of the mill crap? If so, what kind of crap? Is it crap but still cool crap? Who knows!! That's the fun of it. For the cost of a movie ticket you get the fun of anticipating your BOC for the 3 or 4 days it takes to ship to your home.

So stay tuned. I'll let you know what is in the Bag of Crap when it arrives. Maybe if we all think really hard on it our combined mental energies will cause them to put something good from past sales into my BOC. Back me up people!! I need your brain waves . . .

Well, Kelley had her birthday yesterday, so if you missed the occasion be sure to wish her a happy 26^th!! birthday. I got her a LCD monitor for her computer. She bought a new Dell a little while ago, but it came with this honkin' monitor that took all the space on her desk. She barely had room for her keyboard. I thought she might appreciate that - although I must say I was unsure because, well, an LCD monitor isn't terribly sentimental. But she says she likes it, so I'll have to take her word for it *lol*

I also made arrangements for a whole bunch of people to call her and wish her a happy birthday. Not sure how many people actually did it, as I was only able to email people and ask them. I haven't heard back from Kelley yet either so I don't know how many calls she received. I'll be curious to know if she was inundated with phone calls.

On the Iraq side of things, we (and by "we" I mean me) are still working out the kinks in the new network. The IP phones we installed were conflicting with an IP somewhere else on the network which kept them from connecting. And of course the phones were all locked down so I couldn't get into them and change the IP addresses. No biggie though, as the network tech came out and fixed the issue. Turns out therre's two devices both supplying IP's for the network (which didn't entirely make sense to me, but hey, I'm not getting paid to design the network. I just supervise it.)

It's definitely getting warmer here. I can't do any kind of work outside without soaking through my uniform. Not sure the actual temperatures, but I can feel the sun much more intensely. Dad is sending a new thermometer which hopefully I won't break this time. The weather updates should be back up in the coming weeks. Although, pretty much every day is hot and sunny with wind. We had a decent little sand storm roll in the other day but even that's not really all that exciting. It's just like being in a thick fog, but instead of water vapor it's dust.

I find myself lately trying not to think about getting back home, but with the end approaching it is becoming increasingly difficult for me to keep focused on the task at hand. I guess I subscribe to the "A watched pot never boils" school of deployment strategies. If you don't think about it then the time goes a heck of a lot faster. But man, once you start to get within spitting distance it gets harder and harder to fight off that short timer's attitude! *lol* I keep fantasizing about what it will be like to get on that Blackhawk for the last time and watch the LZ and the mosque grow smaller and smaller as I head for Baghdad. But, soon enough I suppose. For now, I have work to do.

In case you haven't heard, I broke the thermometer. So, weather updates are suspended until I can get a hold of a new one.

Just assume every day is sunny and hot, mostly windy, with gusting sand and dust. There's not much variation from that lately.

Man, I've had a busy weekend. A team from Baghdad came down Friday to install a new line of sight wireless network, giving access to various other buildings around post.

Until now we had been operating the whole post on one decent system (ours) and one hideously slow system. Of course, this has led to much weeping and gnashing of teeth because people didn't have internet in their own buildings. American soldiers just HAVE to have their internet (how did we win wars without email?)

Now, they've installed a 1 Mb internet connection in a centrally located building and installed an omni-directional antenna on the roof. In each of the 6 other buildings getting internet they've installed a directional antenna which connects those outlying buildings to the central building so they can all share the same internet connection. So, that's what I've been doing all weekend. Climbing onto the roofs of buildings, putting up antenna masts and directional antennas, drilling holes through concrete for the cabling. You know, normal computer stuff.

But finally, all the antennas are up. Now it's just a matter of getting it to all talk to the internet. Luckily, the team is still here to figure out how to make that all work, because to be honest with you I don't have the foggiest idea. It will be nice once it all works. Next job? Wiring up each of those buidings so their computers can hook into the network! Can you say "CAT5", "Crimpers", and "T-568B wiring standard"?

I posted a bunch of new videos over at the OIF page. Check it out if you feel so inclined!

Here's wishing everyone a fine July 4^th! It falls on a monday too, could it get any better?

For those of you who might have lost your full appreciation of what the 4th is about, here's what the Iraqi's have to celebrate on July 4^th - dust, litter, and debris. A short video of a drive through downtown An Numaniyah from the windshield of a Humvee.

Enjoy your day off! Maybe I'll get a steak or burger or something tonight. I think they've got a barbecue planned for dinner. I don't think there'll be any fireworks though. Makes people jumpy.

OK, so I've been slacking on the weather updates. Sue me.

I've got an excuse though. Actually, a couple of excuses:

1) My computer picked up some kind of script or something and had slowed down to a crawl. The hard drive was running constantly. I mean, sounds were skipping, the mouse was stuttering. I just couldn't operate like that. I have no patience for an unresponsive computer. My sister is still using my old Pentium II 300 MHz. She must have the patience of a saint. Anyway, I had to spend half a day backing up, wiping, and reloading my computer.

2) The AC keeps turning off over at our cell phone switch. When that happens, the shelter that contains all the switching equipment over heats and they equipment stops working. When I got over there this time, it was 146 degrees in the switch. The racks were so hot I couldn't even touch them. I managed to get everything cooled down and working again, but that took a little time.

3) The contractors to put in our new satellite internet system finally arrived. For the last two and a half days I've been tied up taking care of them and making sure everything went ok. The up side? We now have VoIP phones! w00t!! More details when I get the whole network up and running.

Plus, we picked up 25 more computers that will need to have anti-spyware software installed, anti-virus updated, and all the other third party software to ensure Windows is secure (Security initiative? What security initiative?) So that should keep me busy for a while as well.

If the weather isn't updated, just remember - weather.com can't give you any weather reports for Numaniyah and they're the professionals. Cut me a little slack ;-)