Author: Eliot

1332 Articles

Cracking WEP

May 15, 2005 by 62 Comments

ivlist

Tom’s Networking is running a two part series on how to crack WEP. WEP was pretty much broken from the early days of wireless networking. For starters the key length is misleading; a 64-bit key only has 40 unique bits. Some manufactures implemented poor random number generation. The seeds for the numbers are also reused which would never happen in good cryptography. This article covers the techniques the the feds used when they cracked a WEP key in three minutes. This works by grabbing a properly encrypted packet and then constantly sending it back to the access point generating more traffic. The more traffic you can capture the faster you can crack the network. Check out the article. I’ll be trying this out in the future when I get a Prism2 card and that DirecTV antenna wired up.

Continue reading “Cracking WEP” →

Dive Into Greasemonkey

May 14, 2005 by 18 Comments

bookburro

I don’t think “nuisance breeds innovation” was ever a common phrase, but that is exactly how greasemonkey, the firefox extension, came into life. Greasemonkey lets users add their own scripts to web pages they visit. Yeah, I didn’t really jump out my seat when I heard that in January, but then I started to see people apply it. Sure there’s the standard “remove all advertising” hacks and the slightly more interesting “skip full ad pages”, but there is so much more you can do. You can beat stupidly designed web pages into submission: force Ain’t It Cool News headlines to use reasonable font sizes and turn off that stupid highlighting crap, clean up Slashdot’s ugly section colors, replace Pitchfork’s flash menu with text links. Greasemonkey can do so much more though. It can be used to combine the information of multiple sites like some sort of magical duct tape (not that duct tape isn’t already magical). Check out the screenshot of Book Burro above. You can also imbed information from IMDB into your Netflix pages or vice versa. Of course all of this rampant page modification hasn’t gone unnoticed. Greasemonkey and its scripts are really easy to install (falling down the stairs level of ease). So, there is no reason not to try it out. Check out the excellent free online book Dive Into Greasemonkey to get started.

Continue reading “Dive Into Greasemonkey” →

HOW-TO: WRT Client Mode

May 13, 2005 by 53 Comments

 

The Linksys WRT54G is probably the cheapest and most widely sold embedded Linux device in the world. It is also incredibly fun to play with. A lot of people don’t want to take the full plunge into Linux for fear of screwing up their computer. Why not screw with your router?! Your S.O. probably won’t even notice, until you break it? so try to blame it on the cable company if you can.

I’ll be walking you through installing the openWRT firmware onto a Linksys WRT54G. This is followed by setting the router up in client mode. Client mode lets you connect the computers on the wired side of the router to another router wirelessly, it doesn’t even have to be yours! Read on to find out how simple this process is.

Continue reading “HOW-TO: WRT Client Mode” →

Planning Your Xbox Retirement

May 12, 2005 by 32 Comments

xbox cluster

I know this isn’t new, but today is a special day: the new Xbox is going to be officially revealed tonight on everyone’s favorite music-free music channel. This post is about what to do with your soon to be obsolete Xbox.

Xbox-Linux installs have become fairly easy; You no longer have to crack open the case. You can buy or build a simple usb adapter to upload a 2MB file on to the Xbox by using an exploit in MechAssault.  After that you can boot a live Linux cd.  Even after this your Xbox will still be able to play games. 

What you can do with it is up to you imagination. 

The best place to start on this journey is the xbox-linux wiki.

Continue reading “Planning Your Xbox Retirement” →

Lab Power Supply

May 11, 2005 by 27 Comments

powersupplyfinal
Here is a great power supply project. No, it isn’t just some simple case mod with binding posts. A lot of thought was put into this, plus a lot of disclaimers. I wouldn’t be too scared though, Andy Batts has got a lot of information covering most everything you need to know: Dell’s weird wiring, expected current, using a sandbar load, and not poking around inside while the thing is plugged in. I’m going to do this to a couple power supplys because it is sure to make future projects a lot easier.

[thanks momotarosan]

Continue reading “Lab Power Supply” →

Asterisk Pbx On Wrt54g

May 10, 2005 by 10 Comments

wrt54g hack
the linksys wrt54g has been the target of many hacks taking it far beyond its original intended mode of operation; now going so far as becoming a personal telephone company. David DeLauro has set up an asterisk pbx system on top of the the openwrt firmware package. asterisk is a fully featured pbx system. in theory this set up could allow you to wire your whole house through one voip connection. you can even script the dialing sequence so that certain prefixes are handled by different carriers. the router has limited storage space, but you could probably use the voicemail features by mounting network storage. with enough ingenuity you should be able to pipe all of your communications and entertainment over ethernet.

Continue reading “Asterisk Pbx On Wrt54g” →

Fully Submerged Cooling

May 9, 2005 by 81 Comments

oil bath computer
Markus Leonhardt has taken the shortest route possible to liquid cooling.

  1. throw motherboard in fish tank

  2. cover in vegetable oil

  3. there is no step 3

Markus has been using this system for over a year. it is quiet and is cooled by the still functional fans circulating the oil. he has swapped components and even successfully used pulled hardware in other pcs. the pages are in the process of being translated to english, but the english forum is already up with links to other projects. I’ve got some extra hardware and fish tanks are cheap, so I’ll give this a try some time. I doubt my roommate will feel this is an improvement over my plan of just nailing the motherboards to the wall.

Continue reading “Fully Submerged Cooling” →