Twitter for Week of 2 November 2008
These are my annotated tweets for the week of 2 November 2008. Follow my microblog on Twitter at http://twitter.com/conrad_halling, then come here for the expanded version.
The Election
2008-11-02: @feministchemist Bill Clinton was Arkansas attorney general for 2 yrs and Arkansas governor for 2 and 10 years, way more exp. than Palin.
2008-11-03: I’m sick to damn death of political ads that lie. Politicians will do anything to get into office. It’s no wonder no one respects them.
2008-11-04: @feministchemist I, too, was disappointed that Obama didn’t pick a woman for VP. Granholm, McCaskill, or Gregoire would have been good.
2008-11-04: I’m off to vote. We expect a record turnout in Massachusetts, which was ignored by presidential candidates because we’re solid blue.
2008-11-04: I waited in line for 20 minutes to vote this morning. For once, I have voted for the winner in every race and initiative.
2008-11-04: John McCain’s good side came out during his concession speech. Too little, too late, after his despicable behavior during the campaign.
2008-11-04: Congratulations, Barack Obama! I wish I were in Chicago to help celebrate. I’m feeling hopeful for the future of the United States.
2008-11-05 12:14 AM: What a great speech Obama is giving. This is such a wonderful change from the horrible Bush years. Counting the days to January 20th….
2008-11-08: “Yes we did!” crows moveon.org (of which I’m a member). But I think moveon is premature; the real work starts now.
That was a good election, even though the counting is dragging on and on. The Bush/Cheney administration caused real, lasting damage to the United States that will take years to heal.
Recreation
2008-11-02: We enjoyed a beautiful autumn day by taking the dogs to Revere Beach. That is the end of vacation; it’s back to work tomorrow morning.
Dogs are allowed on the beach after summer is over. The beach is so empty that we let our dogs off their leashes, and they have a good time sniffing seaweed and chasing their tennis ball.
SQL
2008-11-02: I feel like an idiot. I just learned that you can GROUP BY more than one field in an SQL statement, a solution I couldn’t figure out myself.
2008-11-03: @gotgenes In my opinion, SQL was not well designed. A language should be consistent in its syntax, and it should help, not hinder the user.
2008-11-04: I spent my afternoon taking doses of DayQuil and writing SQL queries. I will probably have to rewrite the drug-addled queries tomorrow.
2008-11-05: I wrote a lot of SQL commands again today. I feel like I’m becoming an SQL master.
I’m getting better at SQL by having to use it daily.
Phishing Example
2008-11-03: I posted a link to a phishing page as an example of what one looks like, but then deleted it because I might be violating the twitter TOS.
2008-11-03: The story about the phishing page is at http://tinyurl.com/6g5sgs. Firefox 3.0 blocks access to the page, but Safari does not.
I thought this was interesting, having never seen a phishing page before. It’s a pretty big giveaway when the page asks for your social security number. What I found interesting was that the phishing site got most of its content directly from the akamai.net servers that support Apple’s site. I made the following comments on the MacInTouch web site:
I examined the HTML source code for the phishing page. It is full of links to authentic apple.com material (style sheets, JavaScript code, and image files) hosted at https://a248.e.akamai.net/. If akamai.net checked the referring host for these requests, it could easily detect that the requesting page is not hosted by apple.com, and it could block the request. This would disable most of what makes the phishing page look authentic. I think akamai.net is making it too easy for the phishers.
For entertainment, without having filled in the form, click the Continue button. A very ugly graphic appears that pretends to process the submission, followed by forwarding to a real apple.com page. Firefox 3.0 blocks access to the phishing page, but Safari does not.
New MacBook Pro
2008-11-05: This morning I ordered a new MacBook Pro, the older matte screen model, which is still available for $400 off from macconnection.com.
This will be my wife’s new laptop, which she uses for her business. We went to the Apple store and looked at the new models, and she doesn’t like the glossy screen on the new model.
TED
2008-11-06: I just learned about TEDTalks. It’s like going to a conference but in the comfort of your own home at no expense.
The only drawback is that I have a backlog of about 70 talks I want to watch; this will take about 35 hours.
What Is That Song?
2008-11-06: I heard a song at Flat Top Johnny’s in Kendall Square this evening that is familiar, but I can’t remember the artist. I need music search!
@neilfws recommended that I try http://www.melodyhound.com/. Unfortunately, by the time I received his tweet, the tune had gone out of my head.
November 09 2008 09:51 pm | Microblog
