A short remark...

Greetings to everyone, I have a short remark here.

As usual, I only write when I've something to share. Therefore, I rarely update this site.

Meanwhile, I would suggest you to subscribe for updates by typing in your e-mail address in the text box provided at the side bar so that you will receive the updates once I'm back. Don't worry, no spamming. :)

Just chill while waiting for some interesting topics or issues.

Sunday, December 24, 2006

Merry Christmas!

To all my fellow friends, teachers, lecturers and everyone....

Let me wish you a ...



Enjoy your holidays ya...

Friday, December 15, 2006

INFOSEC.my Knowledge Sharing Session

Wow... once again a FREE seminar knowledge sharing session.

This session is mainly focused on Information Security.

I can't say much. However, you may find more information from here:
http://niser.org.my/infosec-my/index.html

At the same time I would like to introduce a VERY interesting website where you can find the up-to-date info on national ICT security. The National ICT Security and Emergency Response Center (NISER). There are LOTS of published research papers and statistics here.
http://www.niser.org.my

Most probably, I might not be attending this event. :(
If you are going, PLEASE share with me what they've said.

Tuesday, December 05, 2006

Recovering from disaster, Zone Alarm

All the while I was happy that Zone Alarm freeware was doing great jobs.

It will notify me whenever there are some unauthorized access comming to my computer.

It even blocks the LAN ports such as file and printer sharing. I can't even 'ping' to my own computer. It was great.

Until one day the program starts to show some abnormal characteristics. I booted my computer as usual and noticed that it REALLY slow!. I had no idea as this was my first encounter with program.

So, I waited for some time and take a look on the Windows Task Manager and it shows that the program vsmon.exe was the culprit. Consuming exessive memory until too much of virtual memory being consumed.

The image below shows the system's status after ending the VSMON.EXE process.


This problem really gave me a bad time... :( I can connect to internet and browse for nearly 15 minutes only. After that, the HTTP port will get blocked and I cannot browse anymore. But, I can still chat on YM and MSN....

Then it took me sometime to know that what is this and why is this happening. Finally, I learned that Zone Alarm is the main cause of this problem. The program VSMON.EXE is actually the service so-called TrueVector Internet Monitor.

Therefore, I hope that Zone Alarm will fix this bug in the comming versions.
Well, I can't say much because afterall this is a freeware.

Further info:
http://www.neuber.com/taskmanager/process/vsmon.exe.html

Monday, December 04, 2006

Blog: Updated (1.1)

Alhamdulillah, finally I managed to update the interface of my funny blog.

Among the updates:
- I've selected a new template
- A sneak preview on my photo blog
- Feeds via e-mail (Subscribe updates)
- New links
- More links to my friend's blog(s)
- New feed methods (eg. add to Google, My Yahoo, etc)
- ShoutBox (Feel free to leave messages..) :P

Well, I'm planning to add more useful stuffs.
Its just a matter of time investment.

Feel free to give me your comments and suggestion.

Wednesday, November 29, 2006

PhotoBlogging: Started

For the past few weeks, I've been snaping lots of pictures using my camera-phone. I think, camera is one of the best function that have been intergrated in mobile phones.

As usual, I don't want to 'miss' any of the invaluable moments on earth. Therefore, for the first time in history, I'm uploading the some of the pictures in my new PhotoBlog:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/mdihsan/

Please bare with my photography skills since I'm a noob.

Same like you, I'm in the process of learning too.....

Feel free to teach me some new skills....

Friday, November 24, 2006

Assisgnment tension... [MCIT]

For the past three semester, as usual we had successfully completed our assignments in a very relax mode.

But, this time the assignment was quite different. It was something about mathematics. Mathematics for IT is a killer module for me.

Well, other than tension due to the complexity of questions. Rushing to complete assignments in a class which consist of a large number of students, it was quite exciting and thrilling to compare answers, teaching and learning with "strangers" while rushing to complete it as soon as possible.

I would say that this is the first assignment that made me feel VERY tensed up and EXCITING as well. Even the project on library management system didn't give me such tension because I wasn't confident enough that I will be able to complete it.

So, finally end up doing some question after some GOOD friends taught me how to do some of the challenging questions among the deadly questions.

Some pics:
All very busy...


Serious discussion...
(while searching for "victims")


Palm in action... (actually this picture taken after submission)


Our messy table...


Alhamdulillah, finnaly I and my friends manage to submit my assignment. However, I got to catch up a lot in maths...

Credits:
1. Pte. Neu for staying late to work with us and sending me & Amiri to our destinations.
2. John for lepaking with me, accompanying me to convinient shop.
3. APIIT Library Assistants & Management team for baring our noisy discussion.
4. Fellow smart brains of TP1F0605/09COM.

Sunday, November 12, 2006

Is Palm OS dying...?


(Image from Palm Treo 750v's Official Website)

I've been a great fan of Palm OS for the past five years. I successfully bought my first Palm PDA, m100 in 2001 when I was in form 2. It was a great discovery for me at that time because I don't have any close friends, relatives or contacts using PDAs at that time. Controlling TV/VCR using PDA, keeping contact details and retrieve them within seconds, reading e-Books and playing games on board was nice excitement.

After two years, in 2003, my father bought a Palm Tungsten T as a reward for my achievement in PMR examination. Since then, I spent most of my time using Tungsten. Obviously, same as other Palm users I also wanted to keep my self updated with the latest Palmtop, but I decided to take a break because there is no concrete reason for me to use a Palmtop.

Anyway, I still keep my self updated with the usual Tech News by reading In-Tech and Computimes. Recently a shocking news gave me an earthquake, for the first time in the history of PDAs, Palm launched a PDA running Microsoft's Windows Mobile. But, I wonder why on earth Palm need to use Microsoft's OS....? May be due to the demand, I think... :(

Well, I hope that they will use Windows Mobile for Treo series only. Who knows, may be they use Windows Mobile OS for Treo because it gives greater support for SmartPhones...?

Btw, I've some links here for those who are interested on PDAs.
Malaysian PalmX Group (Full of HOW-TOs)
My PDA Cafe (Including Pocket PC and Symbian User Groups)
The Independent Malaysia's Symbian Usergroup


Long live Palm!
Oops, I mean long live Palm OS

Tuesday, November 07, 2006

Calling the cars for The Xtreme NIghts


(Taken from the official website of The Xtreme Nights)

As usual, today (7th Nov 2006) I was comming out of the Bukit Jalil LRT station and saw a cool banner stating about the competiton of modified cars.

Since I only get the chance to see this kind of cars once in a blue moon even if you are lucky to see them on road, you can find one or two only. I feel that this is a great oppoturnity for those who loves to see normal cars that have been modified into superb and cool cars.

Well, it's just another hobby for those who loves nice cars but have low budgets.

I hope I can go.
Btw, it is also a great chance for noob photographers like me to learn how to take pictures of cars. :P (Not the models )

The competition will be on 10 & 11 November 2006 @ Bukit Jalil from 5pm till 12 midnight.

You can get more information from their official site:-
(Click on the image below)

Thursday, October 26, 2006

Any other better blogsites?

I've solved this problem.

Recently after such a long time, I was chatting with my ex-classmate Mr. Wong Seng Yue who is currently studying in Monash Malaysia.

Somehow, we came to the topic of blogging and I told him about my this site.

After a while, he was back on MSN and told me that he had just created an account just for the sake of replying my posts here. Then only I noticed that this BlogSpot requires users to sing-in using their BlogSpot username and password.

This is quire irritating because I feel like talking to a wall. There were few replies only, which means that it defeats the purpose of me having a blog.

I wanted to highlight to people about certain things and get their point of view regarding those things.

So, now I'm looking for some other better blogging site that supports anonymous replies.


So, anyone anyidea? Thank you.

(May be you can consider to getting an Blogspot ID just reply this post as a last reply here, please.)

Tuesday, October 24, 2006

Selamat Hari Raya

[Edited: Flash card has been removed]
Assalamualikum everyone, :-)

The time has arrived....

I would like to take this oppoturnity (of having a blog) to wish my dear Muslim friends, teachers, lecturers and everyone, Selamat Hari Raya.

Please forgive me if I would have done anything wrong in the past. I hope I will improve myself. So, Maaf Zahir & Batin.

Okay, happy holidays. Attention for those who are driving for long distance, PLEASE becareful while you are driving.

"Driving a car is dangerous than piloting a plane."


Ref: My E-Card...

Wassalam

Saturday, October 21, 2006

Happy Deepavali

Well, time flies.

I would like to wish those who are celebrating Deepavali.

I've sent some e-mails and testimonials with the link to an e-card that I've prepared for my friends, lecturers and teachers.

The Deepavali E-card that I've prepared.

Tuesday, August 29, 2006

Malaysia Boleh, You Boleh Ke?

Merdeka! Merdeka! Merdeka!

First of all, let me wish to my beloved country, Happy Independence Day! What do I mean by my beloved “country”? You will know later. :-)

Where ever I go, I often hear people say that "Malaysia Boleh!" but, I also hear people saying "Malaysia boleh? Apa boleh?" Therefore, I hope that those people who really look down at the potential of their own country in such a negative perspective will realize that indirectly they are criticizing themselves as well! Try to think, what is Malaysia? Who is Malaysia? It’s all I, you, we, they... It’s all about us!

Some people often loves to compare our country with other developed countries and finally conclude that Malaysian mentality is bad la, that la, this la. As a normal civilian, what I hope is that every Malaysian should try to improve the patriotism and performance of themselves and the people surrounding them. That’s all. If every one can successfully do develop the people around them to produce great performance in business and indirectly increase their patriotism then, the negative thoughts in the public will automatically disappear.

So, please realize that it’s all on your hands.
If you boleh, Malaysia sure boleh!

After this if anyone say "Malaysia boleh? Apa boleh?", ask him back "You boleh ke? Apa boleh?" .

Tuesday, May 30, 2006

Cyber Terrorism (CT) and Cyber Crime (CC)

This short article that I wrote will be focusing on how serious CT and CC can be. It is slightly target for large companies because I know that one day you one of the top guns in a company.

I'm not introducing something new to the world right now. It is the same thing of what those old-time techies keep on mentioning about, cyber terrorism and cyber crime will be raising due to the importance that we give to the information technology in this modern era. As usual, people like to sabotage your most important asset. For instance in a war, the first thing that military will do is attack the most important place such as the military camp in order to cause greater suffocation to the victim.

My definition of cyber terrorism is, exactly same as terrorism but it is done in the cyber world also can be said a cyber war. The same goes to cyber crime as well, it all comes under crime using the modern day communication tools specifically computers. By the way, cyber terrorism is more dangerous compared to cyber crime where cyber terrorism includes larger amount of people.

Therefore, it is not impossible for someone to cause a serious damage in the IT world. Once cyber terrorism happens, it can cause serious communication failure that might lead to the malfunction of the whole organization. Cyber terrorism and cyber crime can happen anywhere. For example, in business environment, people could steal all your financial information thus create a network failure by attacking your company servers. Obviously, your network administrators might have done backups, but it will still take some time for your network to recover because your network administrator and computer emergency response team (CERT) need to do some analysis to know how it happened. In this gap, your company's e-mail will be down causing a communication barrier between you and your customers (applied for large operations).

What about SOHO and SME/SMI users? Well, you are still vulnerable for CT/CC attacks. Hackers can use your bandwidth and information to go anonymous in the Internet. Once they go anonymous, then, they can do anything because no one knows their identification.

Other worst-case scenarios (WCS): These are only few funny examples.

1. Setting up malicious codes in the computers at Jabatan Pendaftaran Negara causing it to automatically edit individuals’ information such as religion and gender silently. After some time, the religion and gender of the entire Malaysians will be different E.g. All Malaysians are Christian and the gender is female. This will cause serious havoc. (CT)

2. Steal health information for business purposes. For instance, the companies hire hackers to steal people’s health information from hospitals and clinics to make a decision whether the candidate can be employed or not. (Business CC)

3. Attack the TM Net Streamyx connection centers (those high-end switches) to disable internet connections for all the streamyx subscribers. This also can cause a massive lost for businesses and organizations. (CT)

Note: I’m not giving you ideas conduct CT or CC okay?

Obviously, the network administrators can detect these kinds of things but hackers still can find ways. I personally feel that these things are possible.

The problem is, as days pass by, we are giving more importance to information technology. Nowadays, everywhere we go there must be a computer for instance schools, clinics and logistics. All these are the goldmines for the hackers out there. Companies are investing large amount of money in it. However, I’m not denying the fact that computers are efficient and essential for corporations but at the same time it is vital to play safe. So, it is good to invest on security as well. For example, the usage of VoIP can be easily captured almost by anyone. Yet, most of the companies are using VoIP because it’s getting more reliable.

No matter who you are, you still have to find a solution for this problem because you are exposed as well. I repeat, a kid who knows how to use Google might cause million dollars loss to your company one day.

Remember:
“There is nothing impossible in the cyberworld anymore!”
(Mohamed Ihsan, 2006)

Thursday, May 18, 2006

Is your password hack-able?

Yeah, once again I managed to crack another password. Now, it's a password belongs to one of the Technical Assistant (TA) in my college. I able to crack it not because I'm smart or whatever but it's due to the TA's weak password.

Therefore, this posting focuses on how to have a strong password.

The following are the characteristics of a strong password that will take years to crack unless the cracker use a supercomputer to crack it. Your password:

  • Has to be more than eight charcters
  • Shall not be a word
  • Must be the combination of UpperCaSe, $ymbol$ and numb3r5.
The typical password cracking will be something like this:
  • Searching the dictionary to get the same code that belongs to the password (Hash)
  • Brute-force cracking: Running combinations with numbers.
  • If the hacker still can't get it, the last choice will be using brute-force method with the character set including alphabets, numbers and symbols (The longer it is, the more time it takes, probably year(s) except using supercomputer.)
How ever social-engineering also is another manual method. Therefore, no matter what it is, NEVER accidentally give your password's charcteristics to anyone. E.g. the hacker might ask some questions to know more about your password.

Therefore, please follow the guidelines provided. You're identification is very valuable even if you are not in higher positions.

I'm not a hacker. Even a kid who knows how to use Google can be a hacker.

Tuesday, May 16, 2006

Lost & Found: Pen Drive

I say man..... Such a bad experience with a very happy ending. I was sitting in the Computer Lab 3 (Previously Lab1), my position was between Wen Tau (Right) and Wei Kit (Left). I wanted to go to the EPSON Lab. Accidentally, I couldn't find it, so I was searching for it from Epson Lab until Lab3. But failed to find it.

Then, I thought may be Wei Kit and Wen Tau took it for fun. But finally I found it under the chair. The lanyard stuck to the chair's wheels therefore I couldn't find it earlier.

However, I feel that there is a moral behind the story. The following are some of it:

  • Big problems might have simple solutions
  • Always backup your pendrive, if possible encrypt the data using with passwords to avoid data from being stolen.
  • Never blame others, always blame yourself. We are humans, we do mistakes.
  • Eventough we can never be perfect, we must try our best to be.

May be this posting sounds funny and dumb. But, just try to think in a different perpective. Things do happen....

IndiaMuslim.org

I have been thinking of developing a portal for the Malaysian Indian Muslim community for a long time. I got the idea when I was in form four.

Due to extenuating circumstance (normal la right?) such as lack of knowledge on PHP programming, no free time and bad internet connection, I failed to make that dream come true. :-(

However, I was quite happy when one of my relative, Azri from Penang told me about the existance of such a site: http://www.indiamuslim.org

Btw, when I joined the site as member, my first impression was very good. However, after some time, I notice that most of the topics are very boring because most of the members just copy and paste those junk e-mails that they receive in their inboxes.

Anyway, I can't comment too much about the site because the admin also have done a good job. The GUI of the site is quite nice with some prayer times, pictures, statistics and downloads.

Therefore, I would like to thank the admin and moderators for developing the portal and I hope that they will make it better and more interesting.

Monday, May 15, 2006

7th Malaysian Open Schools Karate Championship

Oooh man, after so long, once again the SJIKC team went for another competition. Since I wasn't prepared for it, I didn't want to join. However, I was choosen to be one of the Team manager for the participants from Honbu and St. John dojo.

I really gain lots of experience from this duty. First of all, I managed to improve my communication skills, I have to meet strangers and argue with them in order to make sure that my friends get the right resources such as the chance to be in the ring, lunch and some freebies like t-shirts.

Other than that, I also managed to improve my teamwork skills, for example, we have to delegate the work among our selves, therefore some of the people that I worked together were, Sensei Wan, Sensei Admond, Suharin and Inderan.

This was also another oppoturnity for me get closer with Puchong students such as Inderan and his juniors.

However, I made some mistakes in carrying out my duty and I hope that I can improve further.

Thanks for Shihan George, Sensei Wan, Sensei Admond and my fellow friends for helping me to carry out my duty.