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The Mouseover DOM Inspector

Published on July 12, 2005 in Design

A little slow on this but SlayerOffice’s Steve Chipman has released version 2.0 of his Mouseover DOM Inspector bookmarklet. His MODI “allows you to view and manipulate the DOM of a web page simply by mousing around the document”.

Wi-Fi Stealing Is a Crime

Published on July 11, 2005 in Web

Police have arrested a man in St. Petersburg, FL recently for using someone else’s wireless Internet network charging him with “unauthorized access to a computer network, a third-degree felony”.

There are many ongoing conversations about this issue. Many want to argue that since the man was only using wifi and not really stealing anything, no real damage was done or law broken. We are not dealing with any gray area of the law here, it is pretty simple. While there is no exact law dealing with this issue the law that should be applied to this matter is as follows. The U.S. federal computer crime statute, Title 18 U.S.C. 1030, makes it a crime to knowingly access a computer used in interstate or foreign communication “without authorization” and obtain any information from the computer. The man was “piggybacking” a WiFi signal to access a device that was providing an Internet connection. Secondly, it seems safe to say that routers, gateways and access points all constitute computers under federal law.

The second objection being raised revolves around if you do not want people using your WiFi access, protect it. The law on this matter seems also simple. A wireless network is private property. Since a wireless network is private property others must obtain permission, form the owner to be on it. Thankfully, one needs not secure their property in order to keep it. Private property must be respected.

We have way too many laws on the book as it is, let’s not write more laws. Let the law be simple. The man did not have authorization to access the computer network. Right or wrong, that’s the law, and he broke it and thus should be charged under the law. If you do not like the law, work to change it.

Web Developer Cheat Sheets

Published on in Design

Todd is suggesting some “link love” for Dave Child’s web developer cheat sheets. They include CSS, Mod-rewrite, MySQL, and PHP. These quick reference guides are another way to make your life easier.

Our Thoughts and Prayers to Those in London

Published on July 8, 2005 in General

Our thoughts and prayers go out to the families of those who and were injured in the London terror attacks. It is saddening to see another example of the death and destruction caused by extremists who are trying to defeat freedom across the world.

As Tony Blair said:

“It’s important . . . that those engaged in terrorism realize that our determination to defend our values and our way of life is greater than their determination to cause death and destruction to innocent people in a desire to impose extremism on the world.

Whatever they do, it is our determination that they will never succeed in destroying what we hold dear in this country and in other civilized nations throughout the world.”

Facer Pro Nuvola Theme

Published on in Palm

I have created a new theme for Facer Pro called Nuvola. All icons are based on the excellent icon theme created by David Vignoni at Icon King. This theme is free and can be downloaded from the skins section of PDA Shine. Let me know what you think or how it can be improved.

As an aside: For all of you ZLauncher nuts, a ZLauncher theme is coming soon.

A screen shot:
Facer Nuvola Theme

ZLauncher Updated to Version 5.3

Published on July 7, 2005 in Palm

ZZTechs has updated ZLauncher to version 5.3. Major changes include:

1. A new plugin. ZLPluginStatus can display the status of Bluetooth and of System sound.

2. Sound capababilty added. Wav can be used to control sounds for different options in ZLauncher.

Hit With the T3 Double Whammy

Published on in Palm

It seems that my two year old Palm T3 has just developed its two most talked about problems: a mad digitizer not aligning itself along the bottom part of the DIA and the slider screws mysteriously becoming loose and falling out.

The digitizer problem was easily fixed for now. I downloaded a program called DigiE which calibrates the whole screen on the T3. Worked like a charm.

Two important notes when running DigiE on a T3.

1. DigiE must be ran in full screen mode. Before running DigiE you need to open the T3slider and hide the DIA, then start DigiE and calibrate.

2. For whatever reason DigiE has a bug which can prevent the T3 from turning off if the program is stored on your Palm. After calibrating move the program to your SD-card for later use.

Now on to finding replacement screws. I am aware the PDA Parts sells replacement screws but am going to try to find replacements at the local hardware store first.

Who Am I?

Leslie Franke Profile

Leslie Franke:[les-lee fran-key]; 1. Husband and proud dogowner; 2. Seventh-day Adventist; 3. Web Designer; 4. Atlanta Braves Fan; 5. Northeast Ohio Native; 6. Bottle Caps Lover; 7. Certified 'Freakonomic';