DEV Community: Chris C

Convert an old PC into a network-attached storage (NAS) using open-source software!

Chris C — Mon, 18 Jan 2021 02:56:55 +0000

https://openmediavault.readthedocs.io/en/5.x/

This is a fun experiment to try at home for building a media device, backup storage, or anything you'd like! E-waste can be mitigated by refurbishing old (but good) hardware as the DEV community already knows 🌱

The image is Debian 🐧 based with good support available online. Note the requirements above.

A few tips: you may need legacy BIOS available as an option, in order for the OS bootloader (grub) to install correctly. Configuring remote network settings, IPv4 management, and software updates are further maintenance steps. Happy Monday! 🤜🤛

SASE: Secure Access Service Edge podcast on scaling out your cloud config securely

Chris C — Mon, 20 Jul 2020 23:47:11 +0000

https://open.spotify.com/episode/4fO97ZBkrSVMbJ1TP0kmYX?si=rSLJFYDLQ9CEXX8R1eQ6Fg&context=spotify%3Ashow%3A0ygXSwK8d1kqNM7fjar2dq

Students: Want to win a cool System76 Desktop PC? Enter your dev project. Open to high school or undergrads (ends 5/29/2020)

Chris C — Mon, 18 May 2020 01:14:44 +0000

Create and share an open source project that addresses climate change and/or pollution. Must be licensed under a standard free software license such as BSD, GPL or MIT.

https://themadbotter.com/2020/04/22/earth-day-2020-contest/

Rules below::

Your solution must be posted to a publicly accessible Github repository with the appropriate license included.
You must be a US high-school or undergraduate college student.
If you are below the age of 18, you must provide written parental consent to have your submission considered; this can be done via email.
In the event that you win, The Mad Botter INC is granted the right to post a picture of you in the winning announcement and other applicable venues; if you are below the age of 18 your parent or guardian also provides permission for this by consenting to your entering the contest.
The winning entry will be the one that shows the most practical potential and creativity and will be selected by The Mad Botter team.
All submissions should be sent to sales@themadbotter.com and include a brief bio, explanation of the solution and a link to the Github repository.

Tag me if you win! The System76 Thelio Desktop is slick! Alas, I am not a student

Submissions will be accepted until 5/29/2020.

A helpful cyber-security game for parents/kids in 2020

Chris C — Thu, 16 Apr 2020 20:42:03 +0000

DEV network,

I do not have any children myself. Only some plants and a 100 pound German Shepherd (who is a little too addicted to eating snow if you ask me).

But I have a fairly extended family/friend network who are parents & my immediate community is extremely family-friendly. Many of us may be working and schooling from home for the foreseeable short term.

This means that young (read: malleable) minds WILL be spending more time on social media, on school chats, on zoom meetings (where we know that strangers can pop in), church service chats, podcasts, video game chats, TikTok, etc...

Critical election campaigns are also ramping up for the next 6 months.

Online traffic is flowing at exponentially higher levels than when you and I were kids (if dial-up was still feasible in 2020, every Quinceañera or Bar Mitzvah should mark a 1-year custom where Junior must survive on a dial-up modem connection as a rite of passage). Tradition! OK enough chattering from me.

Google has kindly developed a fun game to teach people the tenets of Internet Safety, malware/phishing attempts, pyramid schemes, and develop critical thinking skills::

https://beinternetawesome.withgoogle.com/en_us/interland

Research indicates that during heightened global instability (and more vulnerable circumstances) there are spikes in cases of extremism/recruiting/discrimination efforts online: https://www.american.edu/centers/university-excellence/research.cfm

My job is not to tell you how to censor what your children consume as digital media. Or to give up unprecedented loss of our personal liberties/privacy through legislation::
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/03/earn-it-act-violates-constitution

But there are useful content blockers (think OpenDNS or Quad9) for devices to block malware/spam, adult content, etc. We all have that elderly family member who is even more naive about the Internet than the 12 year-old. So a lot of lessons can even be learned in old age. I am astonished at the intelligence of many younger generations who learn new code languages and IT in general. I started an interest at a young age myself but the strides they make today is a welcome sight.

My last soapbox stanza here will be on "disconnecting". As fun as Netflix is, as fun as playing Prince of Persia can be (cool reference bro, [I know]) ...

I fully believe you need to disconnect to play with the cat/dog/alpaca, go on a trail walk by yourself, plant a garden, volunteer to help a vulnerable community in any capacity, play an instrument, write a journal, or work out at the makeshift home "gym". We will get through the fog while we need to learn/endure some difficult lessons. Be easy on yourself and on each other.

Other privacy/security tools are pinned to my profile for further information. Also, can't wait for the DEV podcast!

Does the DEV community have any house/garden plants they want to show off?

Chris C — Sun, 05 Apr 2020 23:41:10 +0000

I will admit I'm not a plant expert by any stretch of the imagination but in permanent remote settings, it can get cumbersome at the home office.

Studies indicate that plants (and other living things that are not exotic wild jungle animals) 🐅

https://hside.org/plants-improve-mental-physical-health/

What plants (or pets) are you all taking care of during this time?

My asparagus fern is great in humid places (like the bathroom)!

Edit:: my fern is upside down 🧐 🤷🏻‍♂️

Want to be part of a botnet that could potentially provide new medical information on COVID19 RNA? There's an app for that

Chris C — Mon, 23 Mar 2020 03:32:49 +0000

https://foldingathome.org/start-folding/

99% of the time, you would not voluntarily join a botnet. But this software runs on idle machines and uses their GPU/CPU processing cycles to help scientists and academic institutions run calculations.

They study several diseases and now we have a new one to add to the list.

If you configure the software properly you will volunteer your electricity and hardware as a "bot" in a network of other volunteers (Thus my cheeky use of the term). The devs do not refer to their project as such.

You too can help debug this new pest and contribute to a COVID19 antivirus! 🤠

One of the founding fathers of the Web is working on a new project to manage how your personal data is shared

Chris C — Mon, 02 Mar 2020 03:50:29 +0000

https://solid.mit.edu/

Tim Berners-Lee is directing this. Known as SOLID: for "social linked data"

How important is it to build protocols from the ground up with privacy in mind?

How realistic is it that the majority of web infrastructure will adopt/enforce something like this?

🙂

My Research paper on the 2017 Equifax Breach and potential AWS solutions

Chris C — Fri, 14 Feb 2020 17:26:05 +0000

You may have read this week that on Feb 10, 2020 the United States DoJ charged Chinese military members with hacking into Equifax and stealing consumer PII.

This paper was written 1 week before the US Government announced formal criminal charges.

AWS offers a few possible solutions to prevent another cyber attack of this scale.

Link to the document since I am unable to attach non-image files:
https://send.firefox.com/download/1dccfbee428a0f80/#tRA8765ylfKgyaYijLy4nw

How much effort should be put into e-mail?

Chris C — Wed, 22 Jan 2020 23:12:06 +0000

If you're like me and have inbox anxiety on more days than you would like, I find concise messages that are formatted properly work best in about 7/10 messages. No crazy cursive fonts and walls of text.

Embrace Teams or Slack. They all have potential flaws at times but can be more convenient than email.

Use Outlook rules to auto-sort what you want.

Measure twice, send once, and all that jazz!

What other e-mail tips, etiquette, and user interfaces do you have to share? <3

Seeking any help/resources for MacOS logging using Splunk

Chris C — Wed, 18 Dec 2019 04:40:14 +0000

We need to index system logs from about 100 Macs using Splunk. I have more experience with iOS mobile device management rather than logging with Mac.

If anyone has any pointers I'll post updates here. Thanks!

Update (January 2020)::
Apple has an entirely new binary, database format for logging their os. This prevents other parties (like Splunk) from reading logs and the daily log can exceed several GB in size with 20 million log entries!

Solution: script tasks using native utility LOG to extract logs you need. I'm still not able to get this in a human readable format but slow progress is better than none I suppose.

We will only be able to use bash scripts so if anyone has a hobby of working with bash on Mac I'm all ears🤗

If you want to develop Linux applications, an article on how Linux apt package management works:

Chris C — Wed, 13 Nov 2019 18:25:38 +0000

https://devconnected.com/apt-package-manager-on-linux-explained/

Git on Windows for Sysadmins

Chris C — Tue, 29 Oct 2019 02:56:38 +0000

Found this blog on Git basics (if you lean more on the Sysadmin side of things like myself).

https://www.ciraltos.com/git-for-system-admin-scripting/