How to write a paper in college/university

Damn damn damn, all this below sounds exactly like I used to do things back in the day… funny as hell tho…

[Via Alex N]

1. Sit in a straight, comfortable chair in a well lit place in front of your computer.

2. Log onto Gmail and ICQ (be sure to go on away!). Check your email.

3. Read over the assignment carefully, to make certain you understand it.

4. Walk down to the vending machines and buy some chocolate to help you concentrate.

5. Check your email.

6. Call up a friend and ask if he/she wants to go to grab a coffee.  Just to get settled down and ready to work.

7. When you get back to your room, sit in a straight, comfortable chair in a clean, well lit place.

8. Read over the assignment again to make absolutely certain you understand it.

9. Check your email.

10. You know, you haven’t written to that kid you met at camp since fourth grade. You’d better write that letter now and get it out of the way so you can concentrate.

11. Look at your teeth in the bathroom mirror.

12. Grab some mp3z off of kazaa.

13. Check your email. ANY OF THIS SOUND FAMILIAR YET?!

14. MSN chat with one of your friends about the future. (ie summer plans).

15. Check your email.

16. Listen to your new mp3z and download some more.

17. Phone your friend on the other floor and ask if she’s started writing yet. Exchange derogatory emarks about your prof, the
course, the college, the world at large.

18. Walk to the store and buy a pack of gum. You’ve probably run out.

19. While you’ve got the gum you may as well buy a magazine and read it.

20. Check your email.

21. Check the newspaper listings to make sure you aren’t missing something truly worthwhile on TV.

22. Play some solitare (or age of legends!).

23. Check out bored.com.

24. Wash your hands.

25. Call up a friend to see how much they have done, probably haven’t started either.

26. Look through your housemate’s book of pictures from home. Ask who everyone is.

27. Sit down and do some serious thinking about your plans for the future.

28. Check to see if bored.com has been updated yet.

29. Check your email and listen to your new mp3z.

30. You should be rebooting by now, assuming that windows is crashing on schedule.

31. Read over the assignment one more time, just for heck of it.

32. Scoot your chair across the room to the window and watch the sunrise.

33. Lie face down on the floor and moan.

34. Punch the wall and break something.

35. Check your email.

36. Mumble obscenities.

37. 5am – start hacking on the paper without stopping. 6am -paper is finished.

38. Complain to everyone that you didn’t get any sleep because you had to write that stupid paper.

39. Go to class, hand in paper, and leave right away so you can take a nap.

The five stages of DRUNKENNESS

Stage #1 — Smart

This is when you suddenly become an expert on every subject. You know all and greatly wish to xpress this knowledge to anyone who will listen. At this stage you are also always right. And of course the person you are talking with is very wrong. You will talk for hours trying to convince someone that you are right. This makes for an interesting argument when both parties are “smart”. Two people talking, in fact, arguing about a subject neither one really knows anything about, but are convinced that they are they complete authority on the subject makes for great entertainment for those get the opportunity to listen in.

Stage #2 — Handsome/Pretty

This is when you are convinced that you are the best looking person in the entire room and everyone is looking at you. You begin to wink at perfect strangers and ask them to dance because of course they had been admiring you the whole evening. You are the center of attention, and all eyes are directed at you because you are the most beautiful thing on the face of the earth. Now keep in mind that you are still smart, so you can talk to this person who has been admiring you about any and all subjects under the sun.

Stage #3 — Rich

This is when you suddenly become the richest person in the world. You can buy drinks for the entire bar and put it on your bill because you surely have an armored truck full of your money parked behind the bar. You can also make bets in this stage. Now of course you still know all, so you will always win all your bets. And you have no concern for how much money you bet because you have all the money in the world. You will also begin to buy drinks for all the people in the bar who are admiring you because you are now the smartest, prettiest, and richest person on the face of the earth.

Stage #4 — Bulletproof

You can now pick fights with the people you have been betting money with because you cannot be hurt by anything. At this point you would go up to the boyfriend of the woman who had been admiring your beautiful self all evening and challenge him to a battle of wits for money. You have no worry about losing this battle of wits because you know all, have all the money to cover this bet, and you obviously win a fight that might erupt if he looses.

Stage #5 — Invisible

This is the final stage of drunkenness. At this point you can do absolutely anything because no one can see you. You can get up and dance on a table; you can strip down to your underwear, to impress the people who have been admiring you all evening, because the rest of the people in the room cannot see you. You are also invisible to the person whom you have picked a fight with earlier in the evening. You can walk through the streets singing at the top of your lungs (because of course you are
still smart and know the tune perfectly) and no one will think anything of it because they can’t see you. All your social inhibitions are gone. You can do anything, because no one will know.

And you certainly won’t remember !

[via Alex N]

Show them to me…

Read the subtitles, watch the video, and enjoy Rodney Carrington’s “Show them to me

🙂

[ via junk @ BEST ]

Artist: Carrington Rodney
Song: Show Them To Me
Album: King of the Mountains

Oh it seems to me this whole world’s gone crazy
There’s too much hate and killin goin on
But when I see the bare chest of a woman
My worrys and my problems are all gone
No one thinks of fightin, when they see a topless girl
Baby if you would show yours too, we could save the world

Show them to me, show them to me
Unclasp your bra and set those puppies free
They’d look a whole lot better without that sweater baby I’m sure you’ll agree
If you got, two fun bags,
Show them to me

I don’t care if they don’t match or ones bigger than the other
You could show me one, and I’ll imagine the other
Even if you’re really old, theres nothing wrong
Don’t be sad your boobs ain’t bad, they’re just a little long

Show them to me, show them to me
Lift up your shirt and let the whole world see
Just disrobe, show your globes and a happy man I’ll be
If you got, dos chichi’s,
Show them to me

I’ve met a lot of them, but never one I’ve hated
Even if you’ve had thirteen kids and you think they look deflated
Theres no such thing as a bad breast, I believe this much is true
If you’re a big fat man I’m a titty fan and I’d love to see yours toooo

Show them to me, show them to me
Just like the girls gone wild on T.V.
Just lean back and show your rack and I’ll be in ecstasy
If you got two casabas
Show them to me

All the world will live in harmony
It’ll do you good, it’ll give me wood, we’ll make history
If you love your country, I’m gonna say it one more time,
I said if you love your country yea
Then stand your ass up and show them big old titties to me

Nintendo Wii!

I was visiting a friend last night, Dan Berte, who just returned to Cluj, and we had some catching up to do, and I noticed near his TV a Nintendo Wii console. Pretty cool thingie, I loved it last year when I first saw it, in the Netherlands, and I wanted to get one but then I realized I didn’t have a TV set and abandoned the idea.

There are people who don’t like the Nintendo Wii, they prefer Microsoft’s X-Box or Sony’s PlayStation but I think it’s quite different. I like what they did, I would get one for the fun, and I don’t really think you can compare them…

Anyway, I saw today a video on YouTube about it, and it was waaay to funny not to post it here. So here you go!

Twitter and SMS updates

Apparently, twitter will no longer update all it’s users via SMS messages, but they will try and start local deals with local operators. For Romania, they had a UK number, and I can bet it wasn’t cheap for them to send all those SMS’s. We will still be able to update via the UK mobile number, and they are suggesting a variety of mobile software for browser enabled phones in the official mail sent a couple of hours ago.

m.twitter.com works on browser-enabled phones
m.slandr.net works on browser-enabled phones
TwitterMail.com works on email-enabled phones
Cellity [http://bit.ly/12bw4R] works on java-enabled phones
TwitterBerry [http://bit.ly/MFAfJ] works on BlackBerry phones
Twitterific [http://bit.ly/1WxjwQ] works on iPhones

I’ve been saying for a while now that twitter is going downhill, and I was expecting this move but at the moment, I think reconsidering part of the problem, will allow them to cut some costs and invest that money in another part of their business.

So, Good morning Twitters, wherever you are, this is GOOD news! Follow me on twitter by clicking here.

DNS vulnerability

Guys and girls, get your nameservers secured ASAP.

The DNS vulnerability everyone was talking about leaked on the internet, and I’m sure someone somewhere is already writing up code to take advantage of it…

Full story here.

Paul Vixie, the CEO of ISC (developers of bind/named), developer of CRON, who writes every so often on his circleid.com account made a short FAQ about the vulnerability:

Reactions have been mixed, but overall, negative. As the coordinator of the combined vendor response, I’ve heard plenty of complaints, and I’ve watched as Dan Kaminsky has been called an idiot for how he managed the disclosure. Let me try to respond a little here, without verging into taking any of this personally.

Q: “This is the same attack as <X> described way back in <Y>.”
A: No, it’s not.

Q: “You’re just fear-mongering, we already knew DNS was terribly insecure.”
A: Everything we thought we knew was wrong.

Q: “I think Dan’s new attack is <Z>.”
A: If you guess right, you can control the schedule, is that what you want?

Q: “I think Dan should have just come right out and described the attack.”
A: Do you mind if we patch the important parts of the infrastructure first?

Q: “Why wasn’t I brought into the loop?”
A: Management of trusted communications is hard. No offense was intended.

Full article here.

And you can check your ISP’s nameservers from this page: https://www.dns-oarc.net/oarc/services/dnsentropy You need to look at that test for port randomization, and you need to be above average to be safe. Beware that refreshing the test page will not show up *new* results, even if you make changes to your nameservers, so you need to go back to the prior link, and click on “Test my DNS” again.

This is serious folks!

The winamp tag… again.

I avoided it the first time it came, but this time I can’t. Ania decided it would be best that I had it again, and actually reply to it. OK, here it goes:

1. Put your music player on shuffle.
2. Press forward for each question.
3. Use the song title as the answer to the question even if it doesnt make sense. NO CHEATING!
4. Tag 5 people
5. Bold the questions and with the answers, give your own comments on how it relates to the questions.

1. How are you feeling today?

Vama Veche – Armata

kind of bulls eye. No, I’m not joining the army, but the feeling is kind of the same. Long story.

2. Will you get far in life?

Omul Cu Sobolani – 312 – Dau Si Primesc

I’ll be all alone… that’s the message of the song isn’t it?

3. How do your friends see you?

M.O.P. – Cold  As Ice

WTF?! I used to be Lord|ce on IRC… funny huh?!

4. Will you get married?

Rammstein – Du Riechst So Gut (Rmx By Sascha Konietzko)

I smell good, and it’s a remix… Does that mean I’ll marry more than once? or that I’ll try more than once?

5. What’s your best friend’s theme?

Smash Mouth – All Star

Nice bulls-eye!

6. What is the story of your life?

Vama Veche -M-am saturat

Auch! Sometimes I feel like that. Today is one of those days…

7. What was high school like?

Rammstein – Te quiero Puta

Works for me… I was always in love, and made the best out of it!

8. How can you get ahead in life?

Pasarea Colibri – Nu-i nimic, asta e

I’m optimistic 🙂

9. What is the best thing about your friends?

N.O.H.A. Tu Cafe

Yeah, I…  I can drink coffee with them ; – )

10. What is in store for this weekend?

Linkin’ Park – Crawling

Yep… Working this weekend…

11. What song describes you?

Wilson Simonal – Nao Vem Que Nao Tem

Good good! Chillin chillin…

12. to describe your grandparents?

Pasarea Colibri – Futurist

Aha…

13. How is your life going?

Rotting Christ- Cold Colours

Hell yeah!

14. What song will they play at your funeral?

clannad – i will find you

The question is who will find me? and where…

15. How does the world see you?

Cafe del mar – Heidi -  Mandalay – Beautiful (7 inch Canny Mix)

Beautiful? OMG!

16. Will you have a happy life?

Marilyn Manson – Sweet Dreams

I can dream about it at least…

17. Do people secretly lust after you?

James Brown – I got you (I feel good)

Really?! I think the god of Winamp was mistaken today…

18. How can I make myself happy?

Omul cu Sobolani- Vara Pe Olita

I’d rather want a jacuzzi, but who am I to want? (Who knows my green T-Shirt?! Yeah… that one!)

19. What should you do with your life?

Helloween – If I could fly

I would… if I could! I WILL!

And the tag goes to Claudiu Antohi, Siropel Laurentiu, Ariel Constantinof, Tudor Salomie and Max Marele. Of course, you can take it if you want…

[PLESK] removing/modifying open_basedir in plesk

Let’s think about a situation where you have a subdomain and you want it to be able to access files from the domain httpdocs directory. You cannot do that by default in Plesk, because of open_basedir. You can edit the httpd.include file in:

/var/www/vhosts/domain.com/conf/httpd.include

but that will only work until the next plesk restart or major modification.

But, the httpd.include file that manages a domain and subdomain explicitly says:

# ATTENTION!
# DO NOT MODIFY THIS FILE OR ANY PART OF IT. THIS CAN RESULT IN IMPROPER PLESK
# FUNCTIONING OR FAILURE, CAUSE DAMAGE AND LOSS OF DATA. IF YOU REQUIRE CUSTOM
# MODIFICATIONS TO BE APPLIED TO THE CONFIGURATION, PLEASE, PERFORM THEM IN THE
# FOLLOWING FILE(S):
# /var/www/vhosts/domain.com/conf/vhost.conf
# /var/www/vhosts/domain.com/subdomains/subdomain-name/conf/vhost.conf

So, disabling open_basedir is *usually* as simple as editing the vhost.conf file (or create it if it does not exist), and adding:

Entire HOWTO here.

 
 
 
 

How do you blog?

A few weeks ago, I read on DailyBlogTips a nice guest post by Joshua Clanton about blogging like a Klingon. Yes, you heard me right, blogging like a Star Trek Klingon. In his opinion “In the world of Star Trek, Klingons are known as a warrior people, formidable in battle, fierce in their passions, and concerned with honor above all. But the life of a Klingon has lessons for humans, even for that sedentary class known as bloggers. Here are three proverbs that can help you learn to blog the Klingon way

If you think that was interesting, a few days ago, he came up with a second part of that post, bloging like a Vulcan. And believe it or not, everything he wrote there, makes complete sense, and like in the first post, he uses Vulcan proverbs to put blogging in perspective: “Of all the aliens in the Star Trek universe, Vulcans are probably the most well-known, thanks to Mr. Spock. Vulcans, by and large, are a people devoted to logic and suspicious of human emotionalism. As a result, they tend to be highly practical and place a great deal of trust in scientific methodology. Over the centuries, they have developed certain precepts to guide their thoughts and actions. Here are four which can be applied to blogging…

The two posts can be reached by clicking on the appropriate image below, I suggest you read them, and think about them, and use them the best you can.

[Credits – Copyright – Source]

The Daily Blog Tips is one of the few RSS feeds (about 5) that were not placed inside a category in my RSS Reader. They are just in the root, and I can barely expect to read what they write next.

Joshua Clanton is a freelance web designer who blogs about design, productivity, and creativity. He’s also quickly approaching his long-term goal of watching every Star Trek episode ever made.

The images were created by Eli from PhotoshopStar.

[/Credits – Copyright – Source]