August 22nd, 2008 / No Comments » / by Travis Cunningham
One of my friends a few weeks ago passed away from unknown causes. It was very sad, and he’s a guy that will be remembered forever by people in Mooresville, Indiana. He made a huge impact on us, and I can’t believe he had to go. Keep his family in your prayers.
Here’s the newspaper article on Ben that was front page.
He was a soccer beast and a really cool person. I wear that blue wristband, and I wont forget him.
August 21st, 2008 / 1 Comment » / by Travis Cunningham
In this tutorial I will show you how to get onto the administration console for unsecured networks, in which you will gain admin priviliges allowing you to change any of the settings on the router.
First of all, if you have a wireless card and you live in an area with many wireless networks, you might know that a few people keep their wireless networks unsecured.
Here's an unsecured network
It is very illegal to connect to a wireless network that is not yours or you aren’t supposed to have permission to. In this tutorial I have permission from the owner to connect to this wireless network.
To get started, find an unsecured network and connect to it:
Me connected to unsecured network
Next, find the web administration console web address (Almost every router has a web interface for controlling the router settings from other computers on the network) by right clicking on the wireless network connection icon in the system tray, then Status, click Support, then Details. You should see a value for “Default Gateway”:
Web Interface IP
Next, open your web browser and type in the IP address you just found in the URL bar:
Router Login
Somewhere on the login screen you should see what model the router is, either in the title bar, or the dialogue box that comes up asking you for your login. Now remember what that model is, because you will need it for the next part.
Now in your browser, go to this address (http://www.phenoelit-us.org/dpl/dpl.html). Scroll down until you find the model you just saw on the login screen, and you should find a default username and password for that router (If the router is unsecured, they must not know how to login to the router and change the password, which means they probably haven’t ever used the web interface and the default login should still be intact):
Router Model Search
Now login to the router with the credentials you have just learned:
We're In!
This works most of the time on newbs who have not secured their router…. If your router is unsecured, you should probably secure it before you get hacked (Unless you are like me and have a dedicated wireless network where all internet usage is routed to my computer, and my computer is the default DNS and DHCP server, where I can monitor all of your internet usage). From this panel, the router can be exploited by anyone.
Disclaimer: I am not responsible for any damage done. I cannot be blamed by any illegal activities. Everything in this tutorial was done legally with owner’s permission.
August 21st, 2008 / No Comments » / by Travis Cunningham
Album Art XUI is a free album art downloader for Windows that searches your any of your music folders and searches for an album art image, and if one is not found, it searches it from over 10 sources on the internet for artwork and asks you which one you would like to save to that album. It is over 95% accurate on the artwork, which increases the chance that you are actually downloading the right one.
Here’s a few screen shots of the program (http://sourceforge.net/project/screenshots.php?group_id=187008).
I recommend you only run 3 simultaneous album artwork finders (You will see this option when you launch the program) or else it will take up a lot of memory (I checked after running 20 for about 5 minutes and it had eaten up about 300mb of my memory). Also, Minimem will not do you much good if you try to run it with Album Art Downloader because it also uses virtual memory and Minimem does not clear virtual memory.
Definitely an easy way to get your artwork if it doesn’t come up after you download *cough* rip the CD to your computer.
It is written in the C# programming language, which means it requires the .NET Framework 2.0. Here’s the download link (http://sourceforge.net/projects/album-art/).
August 21st, 2008 / No Comments » / by Travis Cunningham
Have you ever noticed how much memory some of your applications use? Web browsers often take up lots of memory, especially Firefox. These programs have horrible control for their memory, but theres a way to clear the “unused” memory of individual applications. Minimem does this for you.
Minimem - Afree memory optimization program
It is freeware for Windows XP and requires the .NET framework 2.0. I saw great results while using it with Firefox, Digsby, and Safari. Here is the download link (http://minimem.kerkia.net/).
August 18th, 2008 / No Comments » / by Travis Cunningham
I have 1.5GB of ram and I use 900mb at the most on a regular basis. The rest of it I never use. So I found this program called Eboostr that takes your most recently requested files from your hard disk and loads them onto your RAM. And since your RAM is faster than your hard disk, you will see a huge difference in how fast your programs and other system files load up.
I dedicated 512mb over to it and I can definitely see a large difference in speed. It also supports flash drives along with your RAM, but you must have a fast one in order for it to work properly. Another advantage to having this program - up to 4 cache devices, 4gb a piece.
(Click Image for Larger)
Unfortunately the program is not free, but I will tell you that it is worth your $40. You don’t have to pay if you participated in the beta. But if you do have $40 laying around, you should buy this program for your computer. As a matter of fact, you can try it out, so go do that after you get done reading this.
You can get the trial here: Eboostr Download
August 18th, 2008 / 3 Comments » / by Travis Cunningham
It’s time for a cut down in costs, which means we need to do something about it a little bit at a time. Yes, there is a way to do this. In America, prices on oil are very high and so are the prices of many other common items.
We need to cut the demand for things to make the supply cost go down. The world is using lots of resources and that is increasing quickly.
So first of all, let’s make our computers green. A way to do this is to adjust your system settings to use less power when you are away from your computer. Edison (http://www.verdiem.com/edison/) is a great program that will adjust your settings according to your work setting and what you are doing. I recently installed this on my computers to cut down on some costs here at home. It will even estimate how much money you are saving annually on that computer.
Second, shut of the lights when you aren’t in the room. It’s not like there’s anyone in the room, so when you are going out, just remember to flip the light switch. Its simple and it could save you some money. You should also do this on any other device you aren’t using, including your T.V., your stereo, or your DVD player. Its just simple.
Third, lets use less gasoline in our cars. On a green light after a stop, don’t accelerate too fast…. It burns up a lot of gasoline that you don’t need to lose… unless you are street racing (and I’m not talking about the wannabees). If your car gets less than 15 miles to the gallon, you should probably buy a different car with better gas mileage. Your car will pay for itself after a few months of use after you buy a new one because of the high gas prices.
Fourth, turn up the temperature in your house and keep your A/C off. Open the windows and get some air in your house, but keep your A/C off, or at least keep it a little warmer than normal to keep your A/C off. You aren’t going to die because your house is 10 degrees warmer than usual. This will dramatically cut costs.
This stuff is so very simple and can do quite a bit of good for you and the rest of the world. So let’s go green… for real.
Edit 11/27/08:
Here’s something that will save you a few hundred bucks every year. Get a programmable thermostat. So you will spend about $50 or $60 on it, but it will save you a lot of money. The reason a programmable thermostat will save you money is that it will cut down on the heat or your air conditioner when you aren’t home, and at a preset time, it will kick back on again. Its kind of pointless to heat a house that nobody is in, isn’t it? You can create a configuration that meets your needs - In the winter, turn down the heat at night while you are sleeping (its not like you are gonna care when you are sleeping), and when you aren’t home, cut the heat down. My family has one of these, and it’s a really good investment.
August 18th, 2008 / No Comments » / by Travis Cunningham
Its been a while since I’ve made a blog post… I haven’t had a lot of time because I’ve been busy with non-computer related things.
We (mostly Jimmy and Colum) are working on a new feature for Zotag called Zotag Uptime that will monitor your DNS, SMTP, POP3, IMAP, HTTP, and HTTPS servers and will give you reports on when they go down and when they go online. It will even send custom reports directly to your cell phone if requested. It is sort of like Service Uptime; actually it pretty much is that. You can also receive data output from Zotag Uptime in many different formats, including CVS and Excel spreadsheats, as well as charts and graphs informing you of your server’s uptime.
The backend will consist of multiple computers checking your servers, which in the future might be custom software I will create in C#. It is always reliable, and will have great customer service. When you talk to customer service, you will be speaking directly to one of the administrators instead of a lower level person for better help.
Not only do you get reports to the administrator of your server, you can also enable public stats to show others how long your server has been online and when it has gone down or offline. Image outputs are also available, giving a percentage of how long your site has been online.
Free? Duh! Most of the features Zotag provides and will provide in the future will be completely free. Paid services in Zotag Uptime include a more frequent server check and will allow you to check more servers than the given free account. The free account still lets you add many servers, but the paid is for a more business type plan.
But we need your help - you guys need to help get this started and tell your friends about this site. It has a great future and is easily expandable on the front and back ends. You can also help us by putting our banner’s on your site to tell people that you are using Zotag Uptime.
The site is online currently, but as of 8/18/08, registration is disabled due to construction of the site. If you would like to see it in it’s alpha stages, you can look here: Zotaguptime.com
July 13th, 2008 / 1 Comment » / by Travis Cunningham
When the newest iPhone was released, Will it blend? took it to the test.
pwned :p
July 10th, 2008 / No Comments » / by Travis Cunningham
Feel like pulling a prank to someone else’s computer just for fun? Well I’ve made guide of a few computer pranks for Windows users.
1. Take a screenshot and set it as their background
This will make everything on their screen *unclickable*. They will think their computer is frozen and they will freak out.
First press the “Prnt Scrn” button on your keyboard, then paste the screenshot into Paint, save it, then set it as their desktop background by clicking File > Set As Background (Centered) in Paint.
Second, right click on a freespace on taskbar next to the Start button, then click Properties. Next select “Auto-hide the taskbar” and press okay.
If the user is smart enough they will move their mouse to the bottom of the screen and reveal their real task bar and will be able to undo it.
2. Make their computer shutdown on startup
Now this one is pretty mean and it takes an advanced user to fix this one, but is reversable like all the other pranks. This will make the users computer restart, shutdown, or logoff (I’ll show you how to do each) as soon as they login to their computer.
First open up Notepad, then choose from one of the following codes below and paste it into your text file:
Next, save the file as “prank.bat” or any file name you want with the extension of “.bat” on the desktop. Now go to “C:\Documents and Settings\(the persons username here)\Start Menu\Programs\Startup” or go to Start > All Programs, then right click on “Startup” and click “explore”. Now drag the batch file you created into that folder.
The next time that person logs in, their computer will perform that task.
The way to fix this problem is to press Ctrl-Alt-Delete right after you login, go to the “Processes” tab and delete “cmd.exe” right when it executes itself by pressing Delete > Enter really fast. Then you will have to go into the startup folder and remove the program we stuck in there. Another way to fix it is to shutdown the computer and put in a Linux live cd and remove that program from the folder by browsing through the hard disk.
June 22nd, 2008 / No Comments » / by Travis Cunningham
I was bored the other night and decided to write some math functions in PHP that might be helpful for your school’s science class. I wrote 4 functions, so if you need a quick way of finding the answers, stick these PHP snippets on a PHP web server and run the scripts with the needed variables edited for your needs.
This script calculates the effects of gravity on an object and how long it will take for it to fall in PHP.
<? //Calculates effect of gravity on objects from height in centimeters (defined in the variable H) $H = 1000; $multiplication = 2 * $H; $division = $multiplication / 980; print("Seconds taken to fall from $H centimeter(s): "); echo(sqrt($division) . "<br />"); ?>
This script calculates potential energy in an object in PHP.
<? //Calculates Potential Energy (M defines mass in KG, G defines gravity, H defines height in meters) $M = 58.9670; $G = 9.8; $H = 50; $multiplication = $M * $G * $H; print("Potential Energy in object $M kg with $G gravity from $H meters high: "); echo(($multiplication) . " Joules<br />"); ?>
This script calculates the momentum of an object in PHP.
<? //Calculates Momentum (M defines mass in KG and V defines velocity) $M = 58.9670; $V = 25; $multiplication = $M * $V; print("Momentum of an object with a mass of $M and a velocity of $V : "); echo(($multiplication) . " Newtons<br />"); ?>
This script calculates the kinetic energy in an object in PHP.
<? //Calculates Kinetic Energy (M defines mass in KG and V defines velocity) $M = 58.9670; $V = 25; $velocitysquared = $V * $V; $division = $M / 1/2; $finalmultiply = $velocitysquared * $division; print("Kinetic Energy in $M kg with a velocity of $V meters per second squared: "); echo(($finalmultiply) . " Joules<br />"); ?>
Don’t run all this code in the same file because it will result in a PHP error.
My name is Travis Cunningham, I'm 14 years old, and I am a web developer from Indiana. Here's a little more about me: About Me. Feel free to contact me below.
AIM: creaturemn6
Email: travis.cunningham94@gmail.com
Twitter: Follow Me (travisc94)
Public Dir: /public
I write these posts for your pleasure and for showing other people my developments and progress with this website. So enjoy!
