All posts by Emre

RawCap: A new network sniffer for Windows without winpcap dependencies

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Netresec released a new Windows network sniffer tool that looks promising: RawCap. It has no winpcap dependencies and with its small 17kB foot print it does not require installing. (Having said that you still need .NET Framework libraries and DLLs.)

Here are the properties of RawCap from their webpage:

  • Can sniff any interface that has got an IP address, including 127.0.0.1 (localhost/loopback)
  • RawCap.exe is just 17 kB
  • No external libraries or DLL’s needed other than .NET Framework 2.0
  • No installation required, just download RawCap.exe and sniff
  • Can sniff most interface types, including WiFi and PPP interfaces
  • Minimal memory and CPU load
  • Reliable and simple to use

For downloading and some screenshots and more information click here.

Airlink Ultra Mini USB Adapter with Linux

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We recently bought this Ultra mini usb wifi adapter for our laptop that had it’s internal wifi card fried. Since this laptop was acting really bad with Windows XP, we installed Ubuntu on it.

At first Ubuntu couldn’t recognize the adapter. Then I wanted to try ndiswrapper. All I had to do was to install ndisgtk (sudo apt-get install ndisgtk). It installs ndiswrapper-utils package as a dependency. Then point the ndisgtk to the .inf file of the driver.  (net8192cu.inf)

Here is a more detailed write-up for generic ndiswrapper configuration from ubuntu.

The ID for this adapter is: 0bda:8176
When you run lsusb it shows as: Bus 001 Device 002: ID 0bda:8176 Realtek Semiconductor Corp.
The manufacturer id is: AWLL5088

Google doesn’t know better?

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When google first released their Nexus One, I wanted to buy one badly. But I lived so many frustrations with the buying experience, I decided not to and went ahead and bought a Nokia n900.

Google “listened” the frustrated buying experience, and pulled the plug on selling phones. When they announced that they are going to release the new Nexus S with Best Buy, my initial reaction was: WTF? You buy a Google phone built by Samsung with a T-mobile plan at Best Buy?

I understand Google needs a retail partner to sell their product to a bigger market, but why not do like others and sell it through your carrier “partner”? They already have agreements with big retailers like Best Buy, Walmart, etc…

At this point I already have a very good Data+Voice plan, I don’t have a contractual bound with T-Mobile, I’m ready to commit to a 2 year plan. But I still cannot buy this phone without paying some $10-$30/month over the $199 with two year agreement, and here are the screenshots to prove it.

WTF Best Buy?

Also what about releasing another “Google” Phone (G2) with T-mobile at the same time? If I was T-Mobile, I would be pissed off and refuse to sell any Google product… It’s like Google really doesn’t want people to buy any of their phone…

I think I will pass on Nexus S and continue with my n900…

Capital Bikeshare

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Today I had a chance to test out the Capital Bikeshare. It’s a project funded by Arlington County and DC to build a better bicycle sharing system than what DC built 2 years ago (Smart Bike). Right now they have more than 100 stations and 1000+ bikes.

The system has three memberships. Daily, Monthly and yearly, $5, $25, $75 respectively. (Currently they have a discount on yearly membership: $50). Each time you check out a bike the first 30 minutes is free, then they start charging per usage.

The system is designed and priced to go from one point to the other and not to rent a bike per day. It’s a great commuting option for those who live in DC Metro area.

My test today was the daily membership. I paid $5 and got the bike from behind the Pentagon City mall (Pentagon Row). I rode it to the station at 18th and M st NW. Since I work close by it was the best option for me. It took me a little over 20 minutes.

The bicycles are cute and look like typical city bikes. They have tall and thick wheels, 3 gears on the right, a bell on the left handle. They also have a rack on the handlebar to carry some small bag or jacket, etc..

Renting them is easy. If you got one day membership, you swipe your card and it asks you your phone number and your zip code. Then it gives you a number that you punch on the left side of any bike you like on the rack. When the light turns green, you pull the bike from the rack and you pedal away. Monthly and annual members use their issued token to do the same thing.

My metro ride during rush hour is $2.45 each way. It means close to $5 per day. The commute with Capital Bikeshare will be around $1.50 and healthier. 🙂 So it’s a win/win situation! Emre approved…

Here is me doing silly videos on my first Bikeshare ride:

Creating random files.

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Here is a bash script to create 100 random files with random sizes smaller than 400KB. I needed this to quickly generate 100 files to use it on a stress test.

for ((i=1;i<101;i++)); do
size=`expr $RANDOM % 400`
dd if=/dev/urandom of=/tmp/testfile.$i bs=1024 count=$size
done

Explanation:

The for loop is pretty straightforward, it counts from 1 to 100.

size=`expr $RANDOM % 400`

This line generates a random number between 0 – 399

dd if=/dev/urandom of=/tmp/testfile.$i bs=1024 count=$size

This line generates a file with blocksize (bs / not bullsh!t) 1024 times the random number that we generated. The input for that file is the special urandom device in linux. (It’s the random number generator for the linux kernel)
The name of the file is also straightforward.

Voting abroad and document distribution chaos.

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In Turkey we are approaching a referendum for a major constitutional change. I’m not going to write about what the change is and how it impacts citizens’ lives, that’s my father’s job 🙂 Instead I’m going to write about how voting abroad for Turkish ex-pats is handled.

I’m only living abroad for ten years and I know before I left Turkey, there was a concept of voting on the border (which includes consulates and physical borders.) About ten years ago us, the Turkish ex-pats, were not allowed to vote anymore for any elections or referendums in Turkey. It looks like this is changing now for better I hope.

For the last few months emails are being forwarded between ex-pats, some major Turkish political, cultural organizations, web sites are spreading the word about this new right to be able to vote abroad. But the way this “spreading the word” is done in such a weird way that I am  feeling very uncomfortable to follow what is really going on.

So far I got 4 different emails pointing to 4 different web sites and none of them are official government web sites. When I go and read the content of the news about this, none of the articles are pointing to an official governmental word about voting abroad. Instead they unanimously talk about filling a form, and mailing it to your local consulate or the General Directorate of Civil Registration and Nationality of Turkey.

The distribution of that form is the main issue here. You are filling a National Form that requests every bits of your identity. Especially this form has to be distributed by only Turkish Government. How can I trust a form that I download from any site?

All the sites I mentioned above, host the form and link to their version of the form. One site hosts it in MS Word format as a .doc file, the other hosts it in Adobe Acrobat format as a .pdf file. One site has a version with pretty graphics, the other one with straight text format… Come on!

(When I was trying to find different versions of the form on different web sites I realized one of those web sites was already hacked by a Turkish hacker group. Now can you trust this?)

I worked pretty much 4 years of my life trying to fix that type of issues with the Turkish government between 2000-2004, it looks like nobody learned anything on electronic government practices.

It’s time for Turkish government to create a central, secure repository for documents, and standardize all government related paperwork. Anything close to this is e-Konsolosluk web site (which was down when I was writing this entry) and that is only for consular services. How to do this is another topic which I will be writing in the near future.