Configuring Trixbox for Skype Connect

Fri, 30 Dec 2011 17:23:17 +0100

Using Skype Connect as both an Inbound and Outbound Trunk

This document is intended to provide some basic guidance in configuring Skype Connect as a bi-directional SIP trunk in Trixbox. I have...

Setting Up your New PC Cheaply

Wed, 28 Dec 2011 17:37:20 +0100

I recently reinstalled Windows on my home desktop, and I got to thinking about folks who do not know a lot about their computers other than how to basically operate them. I'm talking about the user who...

Installing pfSense on the Toshiba Magnia SG30

Wed, 28 Dec 2011 17:22:42 +0100

Required hardware:
A PC with at LEAST TWO network interfaces.
A 2.5" laptop hard disk adapter, either USB or an Internal type.
If you use a USB adapter, make sure your PC can boot from a USB...

Example of the Fall of the BBS

Fri, 02 Dec 2011 16:31:12 +0100

I saw this article, which has open redistribution rights, on a Synchronet announcements list. While it was originally meant as an April Fools' joke in 2006, it is a legit article written by...

A Real World Encounter with Conficker

Wed, 23 Nov 2011 18:47:02 +0100

I recently had a massive war with one of the most notorious viruses of the last 3 years, and this is how we handled it. Hopefully it will be of some help to others.

How it began

At one of the fac...

Windows and the PC Dead? Dream on.

Sat, 24 Sep 2011 14:11:35 +0100

What would be the point of getting rid of the Windows user interface as we know it, entirely? I predict Microsoft will certainly not do that at all. Metro will be a part of Windows, but I speculate tha...

The Future Windows Metro User Interface

Fri, 16 Sep 2011 19:23:49 +0100

Microsoft held a special developer's conference, called BUILD Windows, over the last three days. (Sept. 13 to the 16th, 2011.) Their main topic is the future user interface, or UI as geekdom r...

The Atari Game I Remember Getting New

Mon, 29 Aug 2011 17:26:34 +0100

When I was in fifth grade, or perhaps the summer just before (my memory is getting fuzzy nearly 20 years later), my mom's family had a yard sale.

Of course, I'm sure I was forced to go whether I l...

Adding External Storage to the IBM eServer 325

Mon, 22 Aug 2011 21:18:48 +0100

I have been part of a project as of late that involves adding a large amount of storage to an older 1U rackmount server. The server is an IBM e325, which I believe was manufactured for I...

Sony CDP-CE535 VFD Display Repair

Sun, 14 Aug 2011 20:57:34 +0100

Today, while running sound at church, we had a singer in who required accompaniment tracks from two separate CDs. No big deal. Except that after the service had started, the VFD Display on our Sony CDP...

Android and Dell Streak 7 are SWEET!

Sat, 23 Jul 2011 15:31:32 +0100

I recently was lamenting about how much I no longer seemed to find much joy in computing in general, whether I was using a gaming console, a PC, or any other processor/display driven piece of gear.

Th...

Why Mac Malware Is a Possiblity

Fri, 06 May 2011 21:55:54 +0100

Ed Bott wrote an article on May 2nd and a follow-up article on May 5th about the future possibility of Mac malware.

Just as Ed mentioned in one of his artciles, I'm not writing a Windows-vs-Mac articl...

ZDNet Turns 20

Mon, 18 Apr 2011 21:46:57 +0100

ZDNet, a website that I frequented often in college around the turn of the last decade, and again as I've worked in IT for the last few years, is turning 20. Originally a subscription-base...

Good Open Source DVD Playback Software

Tue, 05 Apr 2011 22:40:48 +0100

Recently, I upgraded my home PC to Windows 7, as I wrote about in my Dell Dimension 2350 Article. I had a copy or two of Dell-supplied Cyberlink Power DVD from both the original purchase of this Dell, ...

Microsoft Campaign to kill Internet Explorer 6

Mon, 07 Mar 2011 22:30:00 +0100

As long ago as June 2009, I was touting loudly how terrible Microsoft Internet Explorer had become, both in terms of suspectability to Spyware/Malware and in standards compliance.

I didn't notice it m...

Windows 7 on the Dell Dimension 2350

Fri, 18 Feb 2011 12:27:07 +0100

In June 2003, I purchased my first brand new computer. All the other computers in my life had been purchased by others (while I lived at home), or they were 3+ year old hand-me-downs from others (for w...

Microsoft disables autorun in Windows XP to fight Malware

Thu, 10 Feb 2011 09:42:13 +0100

Yesterday (2/9/2011) Microsoft released what I consider to be a major change in functionality to Windows XP, Windows Vista, and Windows Server 2003.

When Windows XP came out (which no...

A Definition of Cloud Computing

Mon, 07 Feb 2011 09:50:43 +0100

Cloud computing has been a trendy term tossed around over the last couple of years by the industry. I have noticed that many people outside the IT industry have caught onto it and seem...

Tech on TV in 2000

Sat, 15 Jan 2011 01:28:58 +0100

Beginning with this article, I would like to chronicle a selection of tech TV commercials from the most recent decade, which I have lately seen referred to as the ‘naughts (00 = “naugh...

Sonic The Hedgehog 4

Tue, 11 Jan 2011 00:18:29 +0100

I have been generally out of the loop in modern video games, until earlier this year when we broke down and invested in a Wii. It was the first new console I had since at least the Sega Genesis. I’m ...

What Comes After the Multicores?

Mon, 18 Oct 2010 23:28:04 +0100

I remember the clock speed wars. (Flashback time!)

It was 1996. I had just gotten my first computer, a blazing fast IBM Aptiva desktop with an Intel Pentium 133, with 8MB of RAM and a 1.2GB Qu...

A Windows XP Rant

Thu, 07 Oct 2010 06:59:00 +0100

This is a tale of a software vendor that cannot keep up with the times. I shall, hereafter, have to allow one of these vendors to remain nameless as to protect the business I work for.

As of t...

Winzip: A Deceitful Niche Market

Mon, 23 Aug 2010 23:48:17 +0100

I get requests often at work to install Winzip. Change must be hard for some people.

I recently had to install Winzip on an end user’s computer. At this facility, Winzip has been the norm fo...

The XL-500S: Good Times, New Beginnings

Fri, 25 Jun 2010 00:00:00 +0100

There was a time I didn't know how to ride a motorcycle, but desperately wanted to learn to do so. It was late 1994 or early 1995. I was in the 8th grade. My dad had his old 1971 Honda SL-125 up in my ...

An Ultimate MySQL Reference

Sat, 12 Jun 2010 17:23:27 +0100

I found this tutorial on yolinux.com, which touts itself as a linux information portal, supremely beneficial over the last couple of years. While I'm sitting here waiting on a large FTP transfer of a s...

Why I Passed on a Macbook

Tue, 13 Apr 2010 05:00:00 +0100

In February, I had the opportunity to purchase a new laptop for work use. I strongly considered a MacBook, since the price wasn't out of line with what some might spend on a brand new laptop at my full...

Protecting Your Own

Fri, 09 Apr 2010 23:25:00 +0100

Occasionally I will enter random URLs to see if they exist. As I do a lot of atari collecting, I thought I'd see, for no reason at all other than that the address popped into my head, if atarisucks.com...

Has the internet become boring?

Fri, 26 Mar 2010 05:00:00 +0100

I was sitting here during a down moment and tried to find something interesting to read on the internet. It donned on me that perhaps the internet
truly has become boring. To many, the internet isn't th...

The Realm Cam

Mon, 08 Mar 2010 15:04:23 +0100

So, for years I've wanted to have myself a web cam on the site, though I don't know why. Mostly because I'd never done it before. So I broke out the cheapo Veo webcam I bought at the old local Wal-Mart...

The Definitive History of Backwood Realm Systems: 2009

Tue, 16 Feb 2010 13:52:50 +0100

O V E R L O A D ! ! !

If there is one term to sum up '09, that's it.

Still, I've kept plugging away. There was a time when this adventure that is "The Realm" was easier on me, and when my adventures ...

Ghetto Tech #3: Logitech Trackman Vista (1995)

Sat, 06 Feb 2010 17:36:11 +0100

Long before Windows Vista, there was another Vista in the computer world. It is the Logitech Trackman Vista trackball. I first laid my fingers on one in 1996. It's thumb click layout for the left mouse...

Firefox 3.6 Released

Sat, 23 Jan 2010 15:49:02 +0100

The Mozilla project has just released the next evolution of Firefox, Firefox 3.6. It adds a few new features, including some of the new upcoming HTML 5 specification tags, "Personas" that allow you to ...

Windows 7 on the Dell Optiplex GX260 PC

Fri, 15 Jan 2010 19:56:34 +0100

Every so often, some of us decide to try things that others might not try. If anything, we try it simply because someone else hasn't done it. That's how I often view trying to put an operating system o...

The Modern BBS Sysop

Sat, 12 Dec 2009 02:49:38 +0100

Back in 1996, my first experience with any sort of computer-to-computer communication on my first home computer was not through the internet, but via a direct modem connection to a local Bulletin Board...

Downloadable Quick & Dirty LAMP Server for MS Virtual PC 2007

Tue, 08 Dec 2009 15:50:19 +0100

[UPDATE 8/26/2010: Since I wrote this article last year, I discovered that VPC 2007 does not run on Windows 7, it has been superseded by Windows Virtual PC. This information should also work for Window...

Arvin 87R79 - $6 Find!

Sat, 07 Nov 2009 15:46:48 +0100

My brother Todd was recently out hitting the flea markets and ran across several transistor radios (and an Atari 2600 for that matter.) After an over-the-phone description, I had him pick this Arv...

Windows 7 - The Early Review

Tue, 03 Nov 2009 23:05:00 +0100

Windows 7 is here. The operating system that Microsoft is using to sweep it's Windows Vista troubles under the table. I have been using it, release candidate build 7100, for about two months now, at fi...

Mac OSX: My First Take

Sat, 12 Sep 2009 16:56:23 +0100

I was recently over at Abel's place, and he had picked up several 1999 Apple PowerMac G3 computers from a local school auction. I had remembered seeing these machines when they were released, and I h...

Emulating Daytona USA

Wed, 02 Sep 2009 19:23:48 +0100

For many years, I have loved Sega's 1994 arcade game "Daytona USA". Several sources list it as being the highest grossing arcade game in the history of video games, including old classics like Pac-man ...

8 Year Old Linux Kernel Security Hole?

Fri, 14 Aug 2009 12:36:12 +0100

I was reading my morning IT news from "The Code Project", (who have a great daily mail of aggregated stories related to IT from across the web), and came across this article published earlier this morn...

IE6 is Holding the Web Back

Fri, 17 Jul 2009 10:17:40 +0100

Here is an excellent article on how dated and terrible Internet Explorer 6 is. I'm pretty sure that making Twitter, Facebook, and Google not load in it is the only way to get some of you to get rid of ...

BRS Bar Clock v2.1 released

Thu, 02 Jul 2009 19:44:35 +0100

I recently found an open source project that is concentrating on creating a compiler for old QuickBASIC code that converts it to C++ and compiles it that way, all in turn while using an IDE that still ...

Microsoft's Bing.com running on Linux servers?

Wed, 01 Jul 2009 12:42:07 +0100

Apparently, Microsoft's new search engine offering, "Bing", is being hosted on Linux servers of an unknown flavor. One would have thought, or at least assumed as I did, that they would run on the lates...

My Golden Era of Gaming

Sat, 13 Jun 2009 16:13:52 +0100

It has often been said that the golden era of home video games was the era roughly between 1977 and 1982, the era that was strongly ruled by the "original Atari", as most people knew it, the Atari 2600...

Get rid of IE6 Already...

Thu, 04 Jun 2009 12:46:52 +0100

Internet Explorer 6.0 is now, due to it's age, an absolute piece of crap. There was a time that I actually LIKED IE 6.0...mostly because I wasn't doing deep level web development at the time. Back in 2...

30 Years of Compact Disc

Mon, 11 May 2009 14:12:48 +0100

Seems that back in March, the CD turned 30 years old. The original prototype of the Compact Disc was introduced to the world by Royal Philips Electronics on March 8th, 1979. This was amazing technology...

Goodbye GeoCities...

Fri, 24 Apr 2009 11:44:26 +0100

Back in 2003, when I first launched "The Backwood Realm" in it's v2 format, I did it with Yahoo GeoCities. I eventually purchased my first paid hosting and domain with them. Granted, within 2 years I h...

Atari 2600 still schooling game designers

Fri, 10 Apr 2009 16:42:30 +0100

Check out this great story on cnet.com about the Atari 2600, my favorite system to collect carts for. Looks like the book is worth a look too, that might be one I need to pick up.
http://news.cnet.com...

Pac-Man Jr. in the works for Atari 7800

Thu, 02 Apr 2009 17:43:16 +0100

It is a fine day in classic video game junkie land.
Released falsely yesterday on atariage.com as a "long lost prototype", Bob DeCrescenzo's (aka PacManPlus in the Atariage Forums) Pac-Man Jr. prototyp...

Displaying Windows version on workstation desktops

Mon, 23 Mar 2009 13:59:04 +0100

In an environment like the one I work in, you sometimes have multiple versions of Windows operating systems in the same building. Sometimes, if your updates go haywire, you'll even have different servi...

Internet Archive to unveil massive Wayback Machine data center

Sat, 21 Mar 2009 19:09:24 +0100

One of my favorite sites, The Internet Archive Wayback Machine, recently announced that they were migrating to an awesome new data center. It's not crazy fast now, though they specify clearly that the ...

Microsoft Releases Internet Explorer 8

Sat, 21 Mar 2009 18:37:52 +0100

Microsoft has recently released Internet Explorer 8 for Windows XP, Vista, and Server 2003/2008. This release is, in my eyes, a major milestone for IE simply because it is much more CSS standards-compl...

Sega Saturn Review

Fri, 13 Mar 2009 19:53:20 +0100

   Last spring, I obtained a used Sega Saturn with nine games. I have owned many gaming consoles over the last decade, but this is one I had no experience with.

   Since, for some reason, I have a s...

Building a WiFi dish antenna

Fri, 13 Mar 2009 05:00:00 +0100

Back in the late 90s, I got myself an RCA DirecTV "DSS" system (as we used to call them.) Eventually, it was turned off and I just sort of held onto the dish itself, thinking someday that I might actua...

I'm not a Vista hater, but...

Thu, 12 Feb 2009 00:00:00 +0100

I've run Windows Vista virtually since it hit the shelves, and I've grown fond of the UI features that everyone else runs screaming from. Still, last August, I got perhaps the most amusing error an ope...

24 Years of Notepad

Wed, 04 Feb 2009 15:21:32 +0100

   There are only a small handful of items that made it into the Original
version of Microsoft Windows (v1.01) in 1985, and one of them was Notepad.
One of only two applications still with us today in ...

Windows "DOS Shell" command to *NIX Bash Conversion Chart

Sat, 31 Jan 2009 18:51:37 +0100

This is a little chart I started a while back to help me use my proficiency (and preference) for configuring Windows workstations/Servers via the command prompt for working with Linux in a Bash shell.
...

Review: DOSBox 0.72

Wed, 21 Jan 2009 20:15:37 +0100

When I first got into computers, DOS games were still in full swing. They were slowly beginning to decline with the advent of DirectX and Windows 95, but the new games in the era I began p...

Classic Search Engines

Thu, 15 Jan 2009 17:22:41 +0100

When I was a teenager, the Web was just coming into it's own. This was the 90s. Before Wikipedia, eBay, and Facebook. Even before Google.

I first experienced the World Wide Web when I...

The Definitive History of Backwood Realm Systems: 2008

Tue, 13 Jan 2009 22:06:49 +0100

Year of the Realm....part 2?

I used to refer to 1998 as "The Year of the Realm", and in fact that's the title of the 1998 section right here. While that was certainly a year of great...

Welcome to TBR!

Mon, 12 Jan 2009 19:06:10 +0100

What's here?

The Backwood Realm BBS - Accessed by clicking here. This is a Telnet-based bulletin board system. You don't need a telnet client to try it out, there is a flash-based telnet client t...

Web 2.0?

Mon, 12 Jan 2009 18:51:13 +0100

What is WEB 2.0?

That's a fine question. I have viewed this term very cynically over the last year, as I didn't understand it's context. Wikipedia defines Web 2.0 as "The historical context of web bu...

The Definitive History of Backwood Realm Systems: 2007

Mon, 01 Dec 2008 01:49:21 +0100

It's ABOUT TIME!

Now, to start where I left off...in January, I was called out of the blue for an interview with the manager of IT at Cook Inc., as well as the supervisor over IT...

The Definitive History of Backwood Realm Systems: 2006

Mon, 01 Dec 2008 01:48:04 +0100

10 years of what? FUN!

December 27 of 2006 marked 10 years of my first use of the name "Backwood Realm" on anything computer-related. The first use was as the name of my BBS, ...

The Definitive History of Backwood Realm Systems: 2005

Mon, 01 Dec 2008 01:45:09 +0100

Did anything happen this year?

2005 has been a slow year for BRS...I didn't really accomplish anything new. I seem to have taken back my theory ...

The Definitive History of Backwood Realm Systems: 2004

Mon, 01 Dec 2008 01:43:24 +0100

Marks of Accomplishment

Outside my window here in Fayetteville blows one of the biggest, deepest snowstorms on record as I update this little history p...

The Definitive History of Backwood Realm Systems: 2003

Mon, 01 Dec 2008 01:42:18 +0100

Having watched my prized creation go unfinished in 2002 due to a BAD incident with ANOTHER Linux installation gone bad, I lost my latest code for Livin' In Buddha, which was slated to ...

The Definitive History of Backwood Realm Systems: 2002

Mon, 01 Dec 2008 01:41:16 +0100

2002 didn't necessarily have any new software releases, due to LIB FE (3.0) falling through because of the hard drive failure.

2002 did, however, bring us the first versio...

The Definitive History of Backwood Realm Systems: 2001

Mon, 01 Dec 2008 01:39:59 +0100

"TERDreader!? Why would you call it that?"

2001 was a WEIRD year, a year of even bigger change. I still had the idea of being a programmer in my sight...

The Definitive History of Backwood Realm Systems: 2000

Mon, 01 Dec 2008 01:38:26 +0100

Slowing down and changing directions (or speeding up?)

Y2K. The bug didn't bite. Well, if you were running MS-DOS (Pre Win9x, anyway) your date would r...

The Definitive History of Backwood Realm Systems: 1999

Mon, 01 Dec 2008 01:36:18 +0100

"Livin' In Buddha" Dominance

In 1999, I began my senior year of high school. I also began a two-period class at the NL Vocational Technical Cent...

The Definitive History of Backwood Realm Systems: 1998

Mon, 01 Dec 2008 01:34:12 +0100

"The year of the Realm"

1998 was the most significant year in the "QBASIC" days of BWRS. I took my first formal training in programming ever, or...

The Definitive History of Backwood Realm Systems: 1997

Mon, 01 Dec 2008 01:31:58 +0100

"If you have any more questions, then you have no business owning a computer." -Matt Abel, in the "Mechanical Man Simulator" install program, October 3, 1997

Wow, 19...

The Definitive History of Backwood Realm Systems: 1996

Mon, 01 Dec 2008 01:16:42 +0100

For the first time since January 2003, I've decided to update and/or rewrite large portions of this history document, which basically covers all of my adventures in Information Tech...

Ghetto Tech #2: The IBM PS/2 Model 55 SX

Mon, 23 Jun 2008 00:00:00 +0100

In the magical aura that surrounds the 1980s computing scene, it's easy to forget a line of PCs that IBM basically only released to try to re-corner the PC market. They did this ...

How to find out your system info quick in modern Windows versions: MSINFO32.EXE

Thu, 19 Jun 2008 00:00:00 +0100

Back when I was a short Timmay in '96 or '97, I was ignorant of how to generally use a computer. (Okay, I admit, I was the same height, but not the same girth, LOL!) It was suggested, at one...

Ghetto Tech #1: "Scanimate"

Sun, 15 Jun 2008 00:00:00 +0100

In the spirit of my seemingly endless for-no-good-reason pursuit of the technology that preceded and built what we have today, I have decided to cover, in short articles, the more odd and unusual t...

Firefox 3 Beta 5 "Gran Paradiso" vs. Internet Explorer 8 Beta 1

Sat, 12 Apr 2008 00:00:00 +0100

I recently noticed a CNET post about the in-dev version of Mozilla Firefox, a browser I had used on occasion, mostly under Linux. I was aware that it was the popular alternative to MS Inter...

Google Earth, memory leech by default

Mon, 29 Oct 2007 00:00:00 +0100

I was running Google earth the other day on my laptop, while running other applications I use daily. All of the sudden, system performance became super unstable. You know, one of those mome...

First official technology quasi-bashing blog...and it fails!

Fri, 19 Oct 2007 00:00:00 +0100

HD radio...huh. How silly.

I listen to lots of big-market (ie: Indianapolis) radio stations on the way to work. Most of them, especially Entercom Indianapolis LLC owned sta...

Riding both sides of the OS Fence

Fri, 12 Oct 2007 00:00:00 +0100

I've had quite the split personality as of late, unable to determine if I'm a "Windows" or "Linux" tekkie. See, when I first tried Linux, it was the night of my High School graduation. A ...

Bulletin Board Systems today?

Thu, 04 Oct 2007 00:00:00 +0100

I found a website today that makes me want to revive somdething deep in the past of my PC experimentation...the bulletin board system. A little site called “The BBS Corner” (http://www.dmine.co...

Tim's 1925 Atwater Kent 20 "Big Box"

Tue, 28 Mar 2006 00:00:00 +0100

Sometime in the timeframe of 1924/1925, my great grandfather, Doyle Wray, purchased an Atwater Kent 20 model 4640 "receiving set", one of the earliest AM broadcast ...

The Backwood Realm

Hyper-V Horror Story

State Of The Personal Computer 2012

Deep Thinking on Windows 8

QB64 Review

Trendy Tablets

The Only IT Pro With No Smart Phone

Modern Firefox on IBM OS/2 Warp?

Actually Speeding up your Windows 7 PC

Configuring Trixbox for Skype Connect

Setting Up your New PC Cheaply

Installing pfSense on the Toshiba Magnia SG30

Example of the Fall of the BBS

A Real World Encounter with Conficker

Windows and the PC Dead? Dream on.

The Future Windows Metro User Interface

The Atari Game I Remember Getting New

Adding External Storage to the IBM eServer 325

Sony CDP-CE535 VFD Display Repair

Android and Dell Streak 7 are SWEET!

Why Mac Malware Is a Possiblity

ZDNet Turns 20

Good Open Source DVD Playback Software

Microsoft Campaign to kill Internet Explorer 6

Windows 7 on the Dell Dimension 2350

Microsoft disables autorun in Windows XP to fight Malware

A Definition of Cloud Computing

Tech on TV in 2000

Sonic The Hedgehog 4

What Comes After the Multicores?

A Windows XP Rant

Winzip: A Deceitful Niche Market

The XL-500S: Good Times, New Beginnings

An Ultimate MySQL Reference

Why I Passed on a Macbook

Protecting Your Own

Has the internet become boring?

The Realm Cam

The Definitive History of Backwood Realm Systems: 2009

Ghetto Tech #3: Logitech Trackman Vista (1995)

Firefox 3.6 Released

Windows 7 on the Dell Optiplex GX260 PC

The Modern BBS Sysop

Downloadable Quick & Dirty LAMP Server for MS Virtual PC 2007

Arvin 87R79 - $6 Find!

Windows 7 - The Early Review

Mac OSX: My First Take

Emulating Daytona USA

8 Year Old Linux Kernel Security Hole?

IE6 is Holding the Web Back

BRS Bar Clock v2.1 released

Microsoft's Bing.com running on Linux servers?

My Golden Era of Gaming

Get rid of IE6 Already...

30 Years of Compact Disc

Goodbye GeoCities...

Atari 2600 still schooling game designers

Pac-Man Jr. in the works for Atari 7800

Displaying Windows version on workstation desktops

Internet Archive to unveil massive Wayback Machine data center

Microsoft Releases Internet Explorer 8

Sega Saturn Review

Building a WiFi dish antenna

I'm not a Vista hater, but...

24 Years of Notepad

Windows "DOS Shell" command to *NIX Bash Conversion Chart

Review: DOSBox 0.72

Classic Search Engines

The Definitive History of Backwood Realm Systems: 2008

Welcome to TBR!

Web 2.0?

The Definitive History of Backwood Realm Systems: 2007

The Definitive History of Backwood Realm Systems: 2006

The Definitive History of Backwood Realm Systems: 2005

The Definitive History of Backwood Realm Systems: 2004

The Definitive History of Backwood Realm Systems: 2003

The Definitive History of Backwood Realm Systems: 2002

The Definitive History of Backwood Realm Systems: 2001

The Definitive History of Backwood Realm Systems: 2000

The Definitive History of Backwood Realm Systems: 1999