This is what happen..!

Un video qui me fait toujours rire. Ca remonte le morale!

Wed, 07 Jul 2010 20:45:51 -0400

Un video qui me fait toujours rire. Ca remonte le morale!

iPad land

Wed, 30 Jun 2010 21:09:56 -0400

So I bought a new iPad yesterday. I wanted to get the 3G model. My previous one worked great, but I needed to use it while not in a wifi coverage area. Having the 3G gives me a lots of freedom.

I’ve been using it for 2 days and I already passed the 250 megs cap… A good thing that I took the 5 gigs data plan. I never thought that I would use that much data.

iPad case

Mon, 14 Jun 2010 14:00:00 -0400

I’ve had my iPad since launch day. I’m in Canada, so I bought one from a fellow who went to the States to get one.

I didn’t have any protecting case for 2 month. I didn’t wanted to order one online and I was able to wait for supply to come to Canada. In that time, my iPad mostly stayed at home that whole time. I did find some pretty nice cases on the net. One of the best cases that looks like a Moleskine and without any bad reviews is the DodoCase, a real nice book kind of case that are made by hand in California. They cost 50$US, almost the same price as other well built case. but the thing is it takes 4 to 6 weeks for delivery. And I can’t wait that long! ;-)

So I went out and bought Apple’s own case. It protects the iPad ok, it’s thin, it converts to a typing position. It’s well built… BUT… I don’t like the way the edge are finished. It doesn’t look like it was made by Apple as some details are not well polished. And it cost 45$CAN which is almost the same price as the DodoCase.

I don’t exactly know if I’m going to keep Apple’s case. I might buy a DodoCase and wait for it to arrive. I do have protection at the moment that should help me to wait.

But I still need to think about this.

iPad apps

Mon, 14 Jun 2010 13:49:21 -0400

I might start making posts about iPhone / iPad apps that I’ve bought. I don’t normally buy a lot of apps, but these apps are so good and are cheap that I don’t see why I wouldn’t buy them.

Reeder - Best iPad news reader app. It sync with your Google reader account, nice interface.

AirVideo - Best way to share video from your computer to your iPad / iPhone, it does conversion on the fly.

Logmein - This one cost an arm… But It’s so much valuable. If something doesn’t work on the iPad, I can always connect to one of my computer, fast and works great, way better than any VNC apps out there.

Photogene - A cool picture / photo processing app. The iPad should include something like this.

Photo Transfer App - Creates a wifi network so you can transfer photo from your iPad / iPhone / computer wirelessly. Take a picture from your iPhone, send it to your iPad for processing.

Instapaper Pro -I’ve used the free version on my iPhone, but they haven’t done any free version for the iPad. The new interface is nice and you can send article from mobile safari.

Pinball HD - In need of some entertainment, this is a cool and fast casual game.

Color Splash - An other picture / photo processing app. Turn your apps B&W and only add color to an object.

As of right now, I’m only missing an IM app. There are a lot of apps for the iPhone, but none too tempting for the iPad. I’ve only seen Beejive IM, but at 10$, I would like to have more choice before taking a decision.

I do have more apps installed on my iPad, but for now, this post is about paying apps.

"For a long time, iPhone felt like a Lexus while Android was more like a Kia. With recent upgrades,..."

Thu, 10 Jun 2010 13:50:48 -0400

“For a long time, iPhone felt like a Lexus while Android was more like a Kia. With recent upgrades, Android has transformed into more of a Honda. But with iPhone 4, the iPhone is now an Aston Martin. But the crazy thing is that the iPhone is an Aston Martin with a Honda-price. Meanwhile, Android remains a Honda at a Honda-price — it’s a good deal, but it’s not an iPhone-deal.”

- MG Siegler

(via daringfireball.net)

(via ericmortensen) (via mikehudack) (via dpstyles)

Android Land

Thu, 27 May 2010 08:32:00 -0400

“Android Land” will probably be a series of post regarding my finding / hints on Android based phones.

I just purchased a new Nexus One. It’s my second one as I had the T-Mobile, aws band version when it got out. I now have the AT&T version that has 3G working in Canada.

With my first one, I had some anoyance with the fact that SMS notification didn’t vibrate at all. I had look everywhere in setting to find nothing. Well this morning I found where to look for. As this is not really intuitive and kind of proves that Android was built by engineers. Here how you enable vibration with SMS.

Open “Messaging” -> Menu Button -> “Settings” -> Vibrate option is at the bottom of the list.

Oh, and this is a pattern, same thing for email. You need to go in the email settings to enable vibration for incoming email.

Open “Gmail” -> Menu Button -> “More” -> “Settings” -> Vibrate option is at the bottom of the list.

I dipped my toe in Android land

Fri, 19 Feb 2010 10:06:40 -0500

I’ve been using a Google Nexus One phone since 3 days. I’m using it exclusively, keeping my iPhone 3GS without a sim card and power off at home. This is a nice experience because I was always curious about this new phone os. I never tried version 1.x, so I can’t tell how much it evolve since day one. What I can say for now, I like it. But there are a few things that I would like to point out.

Keyboard layout needs a bit of getting use to. This is probably due to the fact that I’m coming from an iPhone and I’m used to it’s layout.
This one bugs me a lot, I can’t change the language while in a text box. I speak french and english, and I write email / im / sms in both language. While typing, the dictionary / replacing tends to slow me down.
Android market, there is a lot of good apps, not as much a on the iPhone, all seem free at first. I found out that some apps have a pro version, but where do I buy..? It looks like every dev needs to sell their apps from there own website.

Other than that, I’ve been using DoubleTwist to drop music and video from my iTunes. And it works great.

Weewar Stats

Sun, 31 Jan 2010 19:03:05 -0500

For almost a year, I’ve been playing Weewar, an online game based on Advanced War for the Nintendo DS. It’s a turn base game that you receive email when it’s your turn to play. It got chat, around 12 types of units, air, land and sea, it’s really cool and fun. You should try it. I’m “optikz” in the game, friend me up and let’s play.

This post is not to gain friends on the game, but to promote a web app that I’ve been working on. I used to use a Greasemonkey script to gather stats while playing. This was nice, but I sometime played from other computers that I do not fully control. That’s where my new web app comes in handy. It gives me almost the same stats as de GM script, but on a website with an iFrame at the bottom with the game I’m playing.

It’s been really fun to work on, I hope it will gain popularity.

Here’s the link: http://weestats.com

Jolicloud on my Sony Vaio P

Tue, 19 Jan 2010 15:48:49 -0500

Well my Vaio P has been gathering dust from quite some time now. I’ve stop using it as it was too slow and even in Linux, I wasn’t really satisfied. I’ve been waiting for some time to try something new on it, but the Intel GMA500 video card is kind of keeping me away from a lot of distro / options.

Jolicloud looked promising, but it took them like 2-3 month to release a GMA 500 compatible version. I’ve installed it Sunday and I’m quite pleased with it. It’s basically a Ubuntu Netbook Remix branded with Jolicloud and using their Social featured package management. I haven’t tried UNR 9.10, so I can’t tell if this is the reason why everything is working. But it’s fast, and my hardware is fully supported. I can even use the hotkeys to set the sound and britghness. Their package management is full of usefull web apps. They use something like “Fluid.app” on OSX to create native looking web apps.

I’m happily using my Vaio P again, and in 3 months when I’ll visit Hong Kong and Beijing, I’ll probably be bringing it with me instead of my Macbook Air. On vacation, it will probably be the best weight / size notebook to take on the other site of the world. =)

Inspiring video..! A must watch.

Sat, 02 Jan 2010 20:30:25 -0500

Inspiring video..! A must watch.

2010 resolutions

Fri, 01 Jan 2010 12:12:00 -0500

This year, I’ll make things simple… As making a list of things I want to achieve is probably one of the worst thing you can do. Last year I only did 3 things out of 9. Maybe 9 was too much. Thinking about it, it should not, cause you have 12 month to do stuff. You could spread it all over evenly and be able to do one thing a month. But history says it doesn’t work. So let’s do it 3 things on do it great.

Loose some weight; (this can be tricky, but achievable)
Get one security certification; (work on doing my cissp, I need this for consulting)
Work on my consulting cie. (I got my first gig, beginning January 4)

That’s it, 3 things, 3 easy things.

Happy New Year peeps! Be safe.

Looking back on 2009

Tue, 29 Dec 2009 19:14:49 -0500

Let’s have a look back at the big highlights of 2009.

Olivier my second child (last one) was born on the August 31.

I’ve bought a house in Montreal.

I’ve lost a job, but I’ve reinstated my personal company and started to work for myself. This is good as I found a consulting gig 2 weeks down the road. I will now work on stuff that matters to me.

As for my 2009 resolutions, here is what I have achieved out of 9.

I did start drinking more tea. By the end of the year, I was drinking tea 2 times a day. It feels really good.
I did de-clutter a bit. This is probably due to buying a house and moving in. The more I packed / unpacked, the more I threw away.
I worked on a sleeping schedule, but I lost it after my new born got home.

That’s about it for my old resolutions… I did lost some weight, but I got it all back and some more. I’m not proud of it… This will probably be what I need to work on next year. Starting January, I’ll be planning and working on what I eat.

I’ll definitely do a 2010 resolution post, stay tuned!

That is some funny sh*t! ;-)

Fri, 11 Dec 2009 21:07:33 -0500

That is some funny sh*t! ;-)

Haitus

Fri, 27 Nov 2009 10:41:47 -0500

Wow, it’s been a pretty long time since I wrote anything on my blog.

All I can say is that I’ve been busy. New baby, buying a new house and all. If you want some updates, you can follow me on Twitter.

iPhone 3.0 tethering over bluetooth on Linux Ubuntu 9.04

Thu, 25 Jun 2009 17:27:25 -0400

This is a repost from ubuntuforum.com from Cooperlees. I’m posting it on my site so I can find it easier and I like to spread the word.

Ubuntu iPhone 3.0 Bluetooth Tethering with uit.sh

If you would like to use your iPhone 3.0 with your bluetooth capable Ubuntu 9.04 PC then uit.sh (Ubuntu Iphone Thethering) is for you. This script installs all required conf, allows you to enable and disable your iphone tethering and even uninstall the conf if you no longer need it. I do expect NetworkManager to eventually support this out of the box.

Thanks to http://xn—9bi.net/2009/06/17/tether…o-ubuntu-9-04/ blog post which assisted me in knowning what configuration was needed.

Usage:
— Ubuntu iPhone Tethering (uit) Version 0.1 - Cooper Lees —
Usage: ./uit.sh options
- This script will install, uninstall, enable and disable iPhone tethering with iPhone 3.0 Software.
- It has been tested on a upto date (patched) box as of 20090623.
- !! Be careful, this script will ask for your password to get root privledges to your system!

OPTIONS:
-h Show this message
-i Install required configuration
-u Uninstall required configuration
-c Connect Tethering
-d Disconnect Tethering
-m [] Set iPhone’s MAC Address (to /home/USERNAME/.uitrc)
-v Verbose

Install Guide:
Avaliable from: http://us.cooperlees.com/download.php?F=uit.sh.gz

- Inital installation requires an active Internet Connection to get required dependancies through apt-get. Current dependancies = ‘bluez-compat’
- Only the install requires you to sudo the script, other areas apropriately sudo where required.

Install Process:

Open terminal
wget http://us.cooperlees.com/download.php?F=uit.sh.gz
gunzip uit.sh.gz
chmod 755 uit.sh
[OPTIONAL] Move the script into your sbin - ‘sudo mv uit.sh /usr/sbin’ (This will allow it to be in your PATH)
Run ‘sudo uit.sh -i’ (You will need to have your iphone in discoverable mode with Bluetooth on)
You will be notified if it all sucessfully installs.

Connect Process:
- Ensure Bluetooth is on and paired with your system (use the GNOME Bluetooth tool to pair). Also make sure Internet Tethering is on.

uit.sh -c

- Once connected you will see the iPhone come up with a blue bar stating ‘Internet Tethering’ is activated.

Disconnect Process:
One command will disconnect from the iphone tethering - You should see the blue notification text dissapear.

uit.sh -d

Uninstall Process:

uit.sh -u

- This will remove conf from files and also make backup of files modified.

Hope you enjoy it as much as I am. Finding the bluetooth a little slow. But still very handy and good. Thanks Apple.

Password security

Sun, 21 Jun 2009 22:58:20 -0400

I had a talk lately about password. People are asking me, what are good password? Well let me tell you how I create my random password that I use. I have 3 rules to create them.

It needs to be longer than 8 chars. 10 chars is a sweet spot.
It needs to contain numbers, extended chars and letters. All of those!
Extended chars and numbers need not to be use to end the password, some of those chars needs to be in the middle of the password.

With those guide lines, you need to make a password. The best password are those that are not words. They are easy to crack with a dictionnary attack. Even if you change some letters for numbers. Like l33t speeking. Well I hate to pop your dreams, but now, almost everyone knows that trick.

When I took my CHFI class, we came to conclusion that the best password are made from a phrase. Something that has a meaning to you but not others. Lets try this.

Lets say that I ate a KFC at lunch time, it was good, I had a great meal. My pass phrase could look like this: “I love kfc, f**k the world!” With a pass phrase like that, my password would look like this:

i<3kfcftw!

Ok, I got an extended char at the end, but I do have one in the middle, so it doesn’t count. I got a number, and this password is not a dictionnary word.

It’s easy like that. Keep in mind that remembering a phrase is quite easier than remembering random letters and numbers.

I bougth some new Vibram FiveFingers shoes. update: I...

Sat, 09 May 2009 19:08:00 -0400

I bougth some new Vibram FiveFingers shoes.

update: I haven’t use them that much, I broke my pinky toe. (I wasn’t wearing my vibram)

Safari 4 tabs

Sat, 09 May 2009 09:58:56 -0400

I didn’t want to come to this, but Safari’s tabs on top is getting on my nerve. If you ever miss the X to close the tab and double click, it minimize the browser window. That happen so many times a day that I stop counting.

Here is what to do to get the old look and feel back.

defaults write com.apple.Safari DebugSafari4TabBarIsOnTop -bool NO

That’s it, problem solved.

http://www.newswire.ca/en/releases/archive/May2009/05/c8261.html

Tue, 05 May 2009 11:17:23 -0400

http://www.newswire.ca/en/releases/archive/May2009/05/c8261.html:

This is great news! I will be receiving Twitter’s SMS again.

Gmail Sandboxing

Fri, 24 Apr 2009 18:33:34 -0400

Gmail Sandboxing:

Using Google Mail as a Sandbox for reading insecure files.