Linux Fu: Simple SSH File Sharing

If you have more than one Linux computer, you probably use ssh all the time. It is a great tool, but I’ve always found one thing about it strange. Despite having file transfer capabilities in the form of scp and sftp, there is no way to move a file …read more

Exploring The Clouds Of Venus; It’s Not Fantasy, But It Will Take Specialized Spacecraft

By now, you’ve likely heard that scientists have found a potential sign of biological life on Venus. Through a series of radio telescope observations in 2017 and 2019, they were able to confirm the presence of phosphine gas high in the planet’s thick atmosphere. Here on Earth, the only way …read more

The ZX Microdrive: Budget Data Storage, 1980s Style

An enduring memory for most who used the 8-bit home computers of the early 1980s is the use of cassette tapes for program storage. Only the extremely well-heeled could afford a disk drive, so if you didn’t fancy the idea of waiting an eternity for your code to load then …read more

This Week In Security: AD Has Fallen, Two Factor Flaws, And Hacking Politicians

The big news this week is the huge flaw in Microsoft’s Active Directory, CVE-2020-1472 (whitepaper). Netlogon is a part of the Windows domain scheme, and is used to authenticate users without actually sending passwords over the network. Modern versions of Windows use AES-CFB8 as the cryptographic engine that powers Netlogon …read more

Closely Examining How A PG&E Transmission Line Claimed 85 Lives In The 2018 Camp Fire

In 2018, the Camp Fire devastated a huge swathe of California, claiming 85 lives and costing 16.65 billion dollars. Measured in terms of insured losses, it was the most expensive natural disaster of the year, and the 13th deadliest wildfire in recorded history.

The cause of the fire was determined …read more

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Watch A Fast Sand Plotter Plow Patterns At Speed

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By Donald Papp | September 22, 2020

Most of us have probably seen a video of a sand drawing table at work, in which a steel ball — magnetically-coupled to a gantry under a layer of sand — lazily draws geometric patterns with utter precision and zen-like calmness. That’s all well and good, but [Mark Rehorst] thinks …read more
SpaceX Sending Tom Cruise To The Space Station In 2021

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By Tom Nardi | September 22, 2020

Several months after NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine confirmed the project was in the works, sources are now reporting that Tom Cruise and director Doug Liman will officially be making the trip to the International Space Station in October of 2021 to film scenes for an as of yet untitled movie. …read more
Second-Hand Television SHINEs, Takes Down Entire Village’s Internet

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By Dan Maloney | September 22, 2020

We occasionally get stories on the tips line that just make us want to know more. This is especially true with tech stories covered by the mass media, which usually leave out the juicy tidbits that would just clutter up the story for the majority of non-technical readers. That leaves …read more
Linkage Inferring Software Handwaves Away The Hard Stuff

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By Joshua Vasquez | September 22, 2020

Jokes aside, manually designing linkages that move along specific paths is no easy task. Whether we’re doodling paper sketches or constraining lines in a CAD program, we still need to do the work of actually “imagining” the linkage design. If only there were some sort of tool that would do …read more
Inputs Of Interest: BIGtrack Mouse Might Make You Squeal

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By Kristina Panos | September 22, 2020

You know me, I like to get my feet involved when I use my computer, which happens pretty much all day every day at this point. My cache of pedal inputs keeps growing like mushrooms in the darkness under my desk: every upper case letter in this post and dozens …read more
A Digital Guestbook Is A Perfect Hacker Wedding Gift

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By Lewin Day | September 22, 2020

With his brother’s wedding coming up, [Sebastian] needed a wedding gift. Rather than purchasing something, he elected to build a digital guestbook so guests could share their well-wishes with the happy couple.

The guestbook has a simple web-based interface, which was accessible over a domain name [Sebastian] registered with the …read more
Remoticon Tickets And Workshops Just Dropped

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By Mike Szczys | September 22, 2020

Hackaday Remoticon happens November 6-8 worldwide! The weekend will be packed with virtual activities, and most of them are hands-on workshops that you can participate in from the comfort of your home, lab, garage, basement, lair, or other socially distanced location of your choosing.

The news today is that everyone …read more