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Sat, Nov 7 2009 15:24

Why .NET apps keep crashing on your Tablet PC

I’ve been struggling with this issue for some time. I have a small, simple .NET application I wrote in Visual C# a few months ago – I’ve tentatively titled it “ iFetch ”, because it fetches radio shows from the BBC iPlayer . It really is very little more...
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Thu, Dec 25 2008 13:52

Running out of disk space? How’s your logs?

I ran out of disk space today. This is not entirely a new issue for me, because I like to listen to BBC Radio from back home, and my only way to do that is to download the shows overnight so I can listen to them the next day. [I’m not allowed that sort...
Posted by Alun Jones | 5 comment(s)
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Tue, Dec 9 2008 20:52

Redmond Report says “Vista Kernel Flawed”

This is just some lovely reporting: Vista Kernel Ready To Pop? Vista, due largely to its lockdown of user rights, is far more secure than XP. But it's not 100 percent safe. In fact, the kernel itself has an issue that could lead to buffer overflow...
Posted by Alun Jones | 2 comment(s)
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Tue, Oct 14 2008 10:41

Windows 7 officially has a name

So, what’s the scoop? It’s going to be called “ Windows 7 ”, according to Mike Nash posting at the Windows Vista Blog . [Is it just me, or does Mike Nash look a little like the chef who got into trouble for inflating his resume in the opening credits...
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Sun, Oct 12 2008 21:36

HTML Help in MFC

I recently got around to converting an old MFC project from WinHelp format to HTML Help. Mostly this was to satisfy customers who are using Windows Vista or Windows Server 2008, but who don’t want to install WinHlp32 from Microsoft. (If you do want to...
Posted by Alun Jones | 1 comment(s)
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Sat, Oct 11 2008 17:49

Weak point against Vista

First rule of demonstrative writing – lead off with an undeniable example of the point you’re trying to make. Case in point – Dan Lyons’ article in NewsWeek on “ A Gloomy Vista for Microsoft ”, meant to be a piece defining how bad Vista is. “Last year...
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Mon, Aug 25 2008 23:22

My MP3 player demands to administer my system

Thanks to the excellent http://www.woot.com , I upgraded to a new MP3 player - this one, the Sansa e250 from SanDisk , has a little screen and shows video at an almost completely unacceptably small resolution. But I don't mind that, I didn't really...
Posted by Alun Jones | 5 comment(s)
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Fri, Jul 25 2008 2:03

Kaminsky Black-Hat Webcast: "By Any Other Name: DNS has doomed us all."

Okay, so the talk’s official title was “ Dan Kaminsky’s DNS Discovery: The Massive, Multi-Vendor Issue and the Massive, Multi-Vendor Fix ”. Arcane details of TCP are something of a hobby of mine, so I attended the webcast to see...
Posted by Alun Jones | 3 comment(s)
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Mon, Jul 21 2008 22:09

Whoops - Information Wanted to be Free Again.

Picture the scene at Security Blogs R Us: "We're so freakin' clever, we've figured out Dan Kaminsky's DNS vulnerability" "Yeah, but what if someone else figures it out - won't we look stupid if we post second to them...
Posted by Alun Jones | 2 comment(s)
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Sat, Jul 19 2008 0:02

DNS Server Reserves 2500 Ports.

After applying the patch for MS08-037 - KB 953230 (the multi-OS DNS flaw found by Dan Kaminski ), you may notice your Windows Server 2003 machine gets a little greedy. At least, mine sucks up 2500 - yes, that's two thousand five hundred - UDP sockets...
Posted by Alun Jones | 14 comment(s)
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Thu, Jul 10 2008 22:07

Vistafy Me.

I have a little time over the next couple of weeks to devote to developing WFTPD a little further. This is a good thing, as it's way past time that I brought it into Vista's world. I've been very proud that over the last several years, I have...
Posted by Alun Jones | 6 comment(s)
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Tue, Jun 10 2008 21:17

The difference between liking and hating UAC?

Totally unscientifically, I have carried out a poll of people who like UAC (okay, a few security geeks like myself), and those who hate UAC - mostly my wife. Something struck me as both a surprising common factor, and also a rather obvious explanation...
Posted by Alun Jones | 5 comment(s)
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Thu, Apr 24 2008 16:47

UAC - The Emperor's New Clothes

I heard a complaint the other day about UAC - User Account Control - that was new to me. Let's face it, as a Security MVP, I hear a lot of complaints about UAC - not least from my wife, who isn't happy with the idea that she can be logged on as...
Posted by Alun Jones | 6 comment(s)
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Tue, Feb 26 2008 11:55

CS-RCS Pro on Vista

I've been trying back and forth to get CS-RCS Pro , a version control suite, to work on Windows Vista. I like CS-RCS Pro for a number of reasons: Files stored in CS-RCS Pro are kept in a simple format, open and well-documented. As a result, if I ever...
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Thu, Jan 24 2008 21:19

Vista's Secret Windows Firewall hole

First, the good news - it's not a flaw in the operation of Windows Firewall on Windows Vista. It's a design feature, it makes sense, and it fits in with the principle that the firewall should keep out unsolicited traffic. It's not really a...
Posted by Alun Jones | 3 comment(s)
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Thu, Jan 17 2008 21:24

Waiting for Vista SP1?

In a previous article, I wrote about how to sound stupid by saying " let's wait for Service Pack 1 before we deploy Windows Vista ". Now here are a few ways to sound clever, by pointing to specific issues that will be fixed by Windows Vista...
Posted by Alun Jones | 5 comment(s)
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Fri, Jan 11 2008 21:03

Why you don't run as root

[... or administrator, or whatever] I like Roger Grimes, he's a nice guy, and he generally makes me think about what he has to say. That's a good thing, because otherwise he'd either be part of the same choir as me, or he'd be the sort...
Posted by Alun Jones | 4 comment(s)
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Sat, Dec 29 2007 11:23

Is a NAT a security device?

I've been working lately on a couple of IPv6-related projects. First, there's a chapter for an upcoming book, and second, there's the effort to make WFTPD and WFTPD Pro work on IPv6, since it's enabled by default in Windows Vista and Windows...
Posted by Alun Jones | 7 comment(s)
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Mon, Sep 3 2007 20:51

Why complain about UAC prompts?

Jesper's article in TechNet Magazine on the purpose and future of UAC in Windows Vista and beyond reminded me that there's a whole slew of behaviours more annoying than UAC's prompting (which, as Jesper points out, is only the most visible...
Posted by Alun Jones | 2 comment(s)
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Thu, Aug 30 2007 6:08

Let's just wait for Service Pack 1

Every so often, I'll hear it said, and frequently not in jest, "let's wait until Service Pack 1 before we deploy Vista", or sometimes "Server 2008". While it's true that Microsoft has indeed announced plans to test, and...
Posted by Alun Jones | 10 comment(s)
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