Views of a Patzer!

I downloaded some songs from 35mb.com. It asked me to install an applet which does the actual download. Since, there is no other way to download w/o that applet, I clicked OK to install that applet. There started my problems!!

I started getting all kinds of popups. Ahhhhh....irritating. I decided to root cause it. I installed both Ad-Aware SE and SpyBot S&D. They found lots of common objects like DSO Exploit, Doubleclick & Alexa, but removing them didn't solve the problem. So, it looked something new. Then, I opened the startup list (using msconfig.exe) and there I found a new entry -- "C:\WINNT\IExplore.exe". IExplore.exe is the main EXE of Internet Explorer. But, it is, by default, installed to "C:\program files\internet explorer", so what is this file? A quick search in Google gave me the info. It could either be Backdoor.Aphex or a 35mb.com ad popper.

I searched for more info reg the 35mb.com applet. I have given some links related to this:
http://www.solid07.net/forums/index.php?act=ST&f=4&t=51143
http://www.solid07.net/forums/index.php?act=ST&f=5&t=51168
http://soompi.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=200297
and a complete list of discussions pertaining to this:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&safe=off&q=35mb.com+problem

The gist of the above is: 35MB.com furtively installs a program that runs in the background and produces these popups. And, if you read there policy, they hint at doing something like this !!!

How did I remove this?

I got a list of IE Objects using HijackThis! utility. There, I saw the CAB downloaded from 35mb.com still sitting in my IE download folder. I deleted it first. Then, I renamed c:\winnt\iexplore.exe to c:\winnt\111iexplore.exe (Deleting this file is preferrable. I wanted to analyze this file later. So I just kept it in my HDD. But, if you do not want to do that, just delete this file). Using MSCONFIG.EXE, I removed the startup entry for "C:\winnt\iexplore.exe" and rebooted.

NOTE: Iexplore.exe (the 35mb.com AD popper) runs in the background. So, even if u delete it using msconfig.exe it will recreate that entry. But, once you reboot, it cannot load during the startup as we have renamed iexplore.exe to 111iexplore.exe. Now, you can safely remove it from the STARTUP list.

Kramnik retained his World Championship title by drawing the match 7-7 with Leko. He was trailing Leko by one point at the end of 13th game. He had to win the last game lest lose the title to Leko. Kramnik rose to the occasion and outplayed Leko soundly. An impressive display, in deed. Before Kramnik, only Lasker, Botvinnik and Kasparov have done this feat of beating the challenger in the last round to retain the title.

Leko chose to go for a Caro Kann 5)...Bd7 variation. Click here for some games on Caro Kann. Kramnik got a space advantage and pushed Leko in to passive defense, before blowing him off the board. This game will surely go down in the Chess history/tutor books as an example of how to play on both sides of the board. Kramnik's 21) b4 is really instructive. After this, Kramnik got a chance to create a Knight outpost in d6. Kasparov once said that if only White could get a Knight outpost in the enemy territory and a rook in the 7th rank, Black could safely resign. Kramnik - Leko (14th game) is an example for that.

Kramnik,V (2770) - Leko,P (2741) [B12]
WCh Brissago SUI (14), 18.10.2004

1.e4 c6 2.d4 d5 3.e5 Bf5 4.h4 h6 5.g4 Bd7 6.Nd2 c5 7.dxc5 e6 8.Nb3 Bxc5
9.Nxc5 Qa5+ 10.c3 Qxc5 11.Nf3 Ne7 12.Bd3 Nbc6 13.Be3 Qa5 14.Qd2 Ng6 15.Bd4 Nxd4 16.cxd4 Qxd2+ 17.Kxd2 Nf4 18.Rac1 h5 19.Rhg1 Bc6 20.gxh5 Nxh5 21.b4 a6 22.a4 Kd8 23.Ng5 Be8 24.b5 Nf4 25.b6 Nxd3 26.Kxd3 Rc8 27.Rxc8+ Kxc8 28.Rc1+ Bc6 29.Nxf7 Rxh4 30.Nd6+ Kd8 31.Rg1 Rh3+ 32.Ke2 Ra3 33.Rxg7 Rxa4 34.f4 Ra2+ 35.Kf3 Ra3+ 36.Kg4 Rd3 37.f5 Rxd4+ 38.Kg5 exf5 39.Kf6 Rg4 40.Rc7 Rh4 41.Nf7+ {Leko resigned} 1-0

Now, the unified match is fast becoming a distant-dream. If Kasparov beats Kasim in their upcoming match, I am not sure whether Kramnik will agree to play Kasparov for the title. In fact, he doesn't have to. There is no binding agreement that the winner of this Dannemann World Championship has to play the winner of Kasparov-Kasim. So, having an unified champion may not happen at all. Anyway, what is a Unified championship with out involving World #2 player, Anand?

I am seeing a lot of good reviews for SAW. From what I read, it seems, it is about 2 persons who are taken captive by a serial killer "JigSaw". They need to use a set of clues to solve some problems and then escape. Did they both escape? (surely not) I think the story line resembles Cube, though there was no serial killer aspect in that film. The trailer looks good and the main movie site compares SAW with SEVEN..hmm..I hope I get this film's VCD soon ! In the mean time, I suggest you go to the main site and have a look @ the trailer.

After I got the DSL, I haven't really bothered to go out and rent VCD/DVDs. Oh, don' t get me wrong, I am not downloading all movies as DivX. With the always-on option available, you can really spend time doing this and that, not necessarily productive things, you know, kind of channel surfing in your TV and killing time.

But, yesterday I went out and got 3 VCDs: Exorcist, the beginning (ETB), Shark Tale (ST) and Sky captain & the world of tomorrow (SCATWOT). I was reading all bad things about ETB, looks like no body liked it and now I know why :) Really, c'mon, this is supposed to be a sequel to (technically, the story happens before the original Exorcist time. so, this is a "prequel" ) Exorcist, the movie that frightened even the die-hard horror movie watchers! This film certainly didn't make me afraid and sweating. This doesn't even come close to the first Exorcist. It is a "not bad" kind of film. Go ahead and see it if you are a big fan of the Exorcist film. It would only make your respect for the original Exorcist grow :)

Shark Tale (ST) was also a let down. I loved "Finding Nemo" (FN), so naturally I was looking forward to watching this, even though ST more or less created a feel of FN part 2. ST is certainly not FN 2. It is all about how a little fish lies that it killed a shark and its consequences. Will smith doesn't impress with his voice for the lead character (little fish). He obviously didn't see how good Eddie Murphy was in Shrek series of films. Infact, thinking of that, why didn't the producers/director of ST choose Eddie Murphy for that little fish? The graphics was good, typical stuff from Dreamworks. But, poor screen play and uninteresting characters put this film in to "skip this" category of films.

SCATWOT was good with all its graphics and visuals. But, it fails to captivate the audience like any comics/fantasy film is supposed to do. It is all about Sky Captain and how he saves the world from an evil scientist. It looks more like a mix of some James Bond (girls drooling over Sky captain) and some part of Avengers (1930s feel & the scientists). BTW, Avengers is one of my favorite films. This film doesn't even come close to that. But, do see this film, it has many unique characteristics - except the actors, everything else is CGI produced, the 1930s look charms you sometimes, the dogfight against giant robot in the streets of New York and more importantly, it has both Gwyneth Paltrow and Angelina Jolie!!

It is always irritating to talk with some guys. You know you will regret talking with them in the end and sure you will. Some of the fellows I know fall in this category. They have either these irritating mannerisms, asking dumb & dumber questions, stupid grins.....AAHHH!.just thinking about them makes me want to puke! These fellows always find ingenious ways to annoy you (I always had wondered how they can be "ingenious" here !)...They see you do something, learn from it and try to teach you the same thing some days later...They don't open their wallets for *anything*, you will be spending for them and they will ask for more...They always remain in the background, forcing you to make decisions for them also, only to blame you later for the same...They have this supercilious nature lurking around in them, popping now and then to make your conversations with them something to "remember" for a long time to come....They have this knack to get credit for things you did for them...At the end of all these, they tell you the philosphy of life and how to deal with difficult people!! suckers !

[Update (18/10/2004): Sorry if the above post seemed too rude. I couldn't control it, I was in a kinda level-3 irritation when I wrote this! Thx to those who took some time to tell me this post looked quite odd coming from me and prob I shd remove it. I guess I will just let it be there, just as a reminder for me not to write these things out, again. ]

Have you ever wondered how many key presses you make every day? What if you can calculate how many characters you type across weeks, months and even years? Try this link.

http://dolphin.twistification.net/
You need to download and install the Pulse client and create an account with them (all free). It sits in the background and counts the number of characters you type. Now, we can know when we are gonna get CTS....


Links to nearly all subjects in programming
http://www.geocities.com/kannanmr/extpgml.htm

Links to help you prepare for interviews (Found in SriHari's blog)...

General Category:
1. http://www.cetus-links.org

C/C++ Interview Questions:
1. http://www.softcorp.demon.co.uk/c++2.htm
2. http://www.onesmartclick.com/interviews/interviews-programming.html
3. http://www.cpuniverse.com/newsite/archives/1999/mar/c++.html
4. http://www.oneparticularharbor.net/sam/interview.html

Microsoft Interview Questions:
1. http://halcyon.usc.edu/~kiran/msqs.html
2. http://www.4guysfromrolla.com/ASPscripts/PrintPage.asp?REF=/webtech/012700-1.shtml 3. http://www.sellsbrothers.com/fun/msiview/default.aspx?content=question.htm
4. http://www.acetheinterview.com/qanda/microsoft_interview.html

Puzzles(For Entry Level):
1. http://www.techinterview.org/archive/
2. http://puzzle.dse.nl/index_us.html

Operating Systems Notes:
1. http://williamstallings.com/Extras/OS-Notes/notes.html
2. http://www.ibilce.unesp.br/courseware/opsys/ostart.htm

Software Testing Notes:
1. http://louisa.levels.unisa.edu.au/se1/testing-notes/testing.htm
2. http://hebb.cis.uoguelph.ca/~dave/343/Lectures/testing.html

Mathematical Puzzles(For Entry Level):
1. http://thinks.com/webguide/mathpuzzles.htm
2. http://www.syvum.com/teasers/
3. http://www.eduplace.com/math/brain/
4. http://www.brainbashers.com/

Online books:
1. http://www.hk8.org/old_web/
2. http://www.llnl.gov/computing/tutorials/workshops/workshop/pthreads/MAIN.html#Mutexes 3. http://uhaweb.hartford.edu/nandigam/list.htm
4. http://pweb.netcom.com/~tjensen/ptr/pointers.htm
5. http://javafaq.nu/cgi-bin/url.cgi?name=http://www.scism.sbu.ac.uk/jfl/jflcontents.html
6. http://www.c-for-dummies.com/lessons/chapter.15/01/index.html
7. http://www.intelinfo.com/cat2-2.html#Critchie
8. http://www.cprogramming.com/tutorial.html
9. http://www.cs.umd.edu/~mount/420/
10. http://www.nist.gov/dads/

for more links, click here (Thx Srihari)

How many times have you been to a site to read/get some info and got irritated because it asked you to register? If your answer is "more than once", read on.

http://www.bugmenot.com/

This site provides you with a username/password for all those pesky sites. If you have one username/passwd, you can submit them here too. How convenient!

There used to be a site (http://www.mailnator.com/) which gave you some random valid e-mail addresses for using in those registration pages. But, I guess, nowadays they are outta business.

Started a Tamil Blog @ http://chathurangam.blogspot.com. I'd be happy if you could check it out & may be post a comment or two!

This is for my Tamil speaking friends...

[TAMIL]
எனது வலைப்பூ http://chathurangam.blogspot.com/ என்ற இடத்தில் உள்ளது. நேரம் கிடைக்கும்போது பெரியவங்க நீங்க அங்க வந்து ஒரு பின்னூட்டம் போட்டீங்கன்னா சந்தோஷப்படுவேன்.
[/TAMIL]

One of my elder brothers has started learning computers, you know, all the basic stuff that everyone goes through when first exposed to computers - "Using DOS/Windows", "Microsoft Office applications", "Fox pro" et al. Yesterday, he was exploring my old machine (1 GHZ Celeron, 384MB SDRAM, 2 x 40GB + 17GB HDD, nVIDIA TNT2 64M) and was bragging about how his instructor goofed up one of the practical sessions and how he corrected him (typical statement from a person who has just entered in to Computer-adolescence! ;) ). Usually I do not allow the conversation to go in to subjects that I don't remember or I usually suck at! But, probably because of the heavy lunch I had just before this conversation, I answered "Yes" when my brother came up with "BTW, Kanna, Foxpro theriyuma unakku?" (BTW, Kannan, do you know Foxpro?). Immediately, he opened Fox pro 2.6 and asked me to explain how to do this, that, blah blah...

Gosh, that was one hell of a test for my poor memory. It got stretched beyond all sane limits :) But, I really enjoyed talking about those old beasts once again. Kind of hanging around with your school friends !

Here are some interesting links about those neanderthals we dealt with in our past life.

Some generic things

• Bill Gate's interview to Playboy

Software museums

• Borland Developer Museum
• Online Software Museum
• Click here to see a list of all active Abandonware sites
• All SideKick versions are available here for sale. Just grab the covers :)

Some Fox pro stuff (v2.6). Hope my brother reads this. Naren anna, ithu ungallukkaga.

• Check out this Fox pro books list :)
• Can anyone get a job with their Fox pro 2.6 skills?
• Decompiler for Fox pro 2.6 compiled modules - http://www.softpile.com/Development/Databases_and_Networks/Review_22778_index.html

Got a DSL @ home (Courtesy: my current company). It is a 512Kbps, 1.25GB/month beauty  :8. This is my first post from home. Gotta go now, need to pack for the Chennai trip tonight.

Peter Leko won yesterday's game as Black against Kramnik, in the Dannemann World Chess Championship. Kramnik allowed a Marshall Gambit & was soundly beaten. Peter Svidler, who is one of Kramniks seconds, is a big fan of this line and should have looked it up for Kramnik. But, alas, Svidler seems to have overlooked something Leko's seconds didnt! :) I wonder which one of Leko's seconds specializes in Spanish lines..Is it Tkachiev or Akopian? BTW, Chessbase has a report on round 8 here.

I have to admit that Leko didn't look that formidable as compared to Kramnik, at the start of this championship. Of course, he was a child prodigy and all those things, but still Kramnik is K R A M N I K, right? It seems now Leko has a good chance of winning this and getting a shot at playing Kasparov (provided Kaspy wins against Kazimdzhanov, which many have started doubting!) for the Unified World Chess Champion title...One thing is for sure: Whoever wins that unified title will be crushed by Anand, if he can maintain his current form till that time ! Also, the way Leko came back from his first round defeat is really commendable! Go Leko, go!!!

After hesitating for a long time, I subscribed to CBM 2 months back. The Jubilee DVD that came with CBM 100 was the thing that really encouraged me to go for it :)

Jubilee DVD, for those of you who haven't heard of it, contains a collection of randomly picked video reports from the previous chessbase magazines. You get to see Kasparov's expressions when he lost to Anand in the Credit Suisse Masters Tournament, Tkachiev explaining how he sees Chess everywhere, Kasparov self destructing himself against Deep Blue, a 17 year old Leko explaining how important was a drawn game against Kramnik (makes an interesting viewing, with the current Brissago world championship) and many more interesting reports.

Some things strike you as odd: First of all, what are the Klitschko brothers doing in these reports? They are not even class A players. Second one: Why are there so many girls in the videos and pictures? Of course, Almira Skripchenko and Kosteniuk can play brilliant games, but so can some 100+ more GMs. (On a side note, Judith Polgar, we miss you here. Come back soon!! )

When I ordered a subscription, CBM 100 was the latest one. But I didn't get it first, because of some customs problems blah blah. Chess Mate, who are the Chessbase dealers in South India, shipped me CBM 101. I got CBM 100 only last week. I'd say it was worth waiting for !

Today I found the excellant TamizManam website. I have been thinking of starting a Tamil blog for quite sometime now, so naturally, when I saw this site, I got excited. As per the instructions given there, I installed e-Kalappai, pressed alt-2 and typed happily in Tamil in Notepad!! Not everything was smooth with IE, which ofcourse, I use for blogging in blogger. Blogger's "New Post" edit field refused to accept the TSC fonts...I saw only junk, like this - «õÁ¡ «ôÀ¡

In Word, If I choose one of the TSC fonts then everything looks fine...but how do I do that in Blogger? Should I specifically mention the font directive everytime?? What to do if I use of the blogger software available, like w.bloggar? What does Murasu's "Convert to Unicode" feature do? I guess I will lose interest in Tamil blogging by the time I make this work!

I have a poster of Kasparov in my cube. He always has been a "King of Kings" for me. But, nowadays, he is not even acting like a king, leave out "King of Kings"...

If you are wondering what I am rambling about, see this Chessbase report. Kasparov lost to Rublevsky. Last year in European Club Championships, Kasparov was showing a performance of 3000+ in the first 4 games, but lost in the final round to Huzman. That was a simple tactical shot overlooked. This time, Rublevsky soundly overplayed Kasparov in the endgame (Rook Pawn ending). Though there are valid reasons for Kasparov losing (age 40+, rusty, blah blah), obvioulsy Kasparov is past his peak. It is really sad to see that there is no one to replace Kasparv; Kramnik & Anand are very strong players, but they *cannot* replace Kaspy!! If only Kasparov can shake off the rust and concentrate more on Chess (He is going for the presidentship, btw :) ), I am sure we will see the old lion roar & reign the jungle for atleast a couple of years to come.