Last weekend I decided to clean up my computer. No, not the dust inside it (I did that 2 weeks ago). My Windows installation was a bit slow and it was time to do a full clean.

I decided to install Windows Vista and Ubuntu Linux. It’s time to jump to the new operating system, I was still using XP. With Service Pack 1 and software houses already optimizing their software for Vista I think it is now the time to install it. Regarding Linux, from all the distributions available, I think Ubuntu is the best one for me. Clean interface, easy to use and update/install new software and good enough to use as a multi purpose server.

So, after I installed Windows and Ubuntu all was running perfectly. I even started to use Ubuntu as my preferred OS to play music, movies and to download from torrents. If you haven’t tried Linux yet, Ubuntu is a very user friendly that “almost” replaces Windows. I say almost because Windows has much more software support. So if you’re a gamer you probably want to stick with Windows (or buy an Xbox 360 ). But of course it all depends on your field of expertise and what you enjoy using. Some say Linux is the way to go, some say Windows and I had a friend of mine saying that Solaris is the one . I chose Windows and Linux.

Today I ran Media Direct (included in DELL laptops) and had an error. Running for a second time was ok (weird). This has caused my Grub boot loader not to start and to give an Error 17. There are lots of information out there about it. I actually spent around 2 hours researching how to get rid of it and to have my boot menu back.

This is how I got rid of the Grub error 17:

1. Boot from Live CD
2. Open a terminal session
3. Run “sudo grub” – It runs Grub with root permissions
4. In Grub prompt type “find /boot/grub/stage1″ – this will tell you where Grub was installed so that we can fix the boot
5. Still on Grub prompt: “root (hd?,?)” – Replace the ‘?’ with the values from the point 4 result. First ‘?’ is the hard drive, the second is the partition. This tells Grub that its files are on that specific partition.
6. Type “setup (hd0)” to install Grub into the MBR (Master Boot Record)
7. “quit” to exit Grub
8. You can now reboot and check if this fixed your Error 17. You should be able to boot properly now.

This has fixed my specific issue. If it didn’t help you, try reading the following articles which helped me understand what was going on. All of these can be found using “grub error 17″ on Google.

• http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=224351 - The one I used to fix my issue
• http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=442945 - A nice forum discussion about Error 17
• http://users.bigpond.net.au/hermanzone/p15.htm - Useful information about the Grub loader
• http://users.bigpond.net.au/hermanzone/SuperGrubDiskPage.html - Supergrub application
• http://www.iknowkungfoo.com/blog/index.cfm/2008/6/16/Stupid-solution-for-Grub-error-17 - Quick fix for some Error 17 issues

It seems people (including scientists — they’re also people) are a bit skeptical about Kaminsky findings. There is some speculation regarding if this DNS/Internet bug story is really true. It seems that an almost identical bug was already found around three years ago. But, in the meantime, Kaminsky it getting all the attention from, at least, Internet security companies. And hey… Internet security seems ‘a bit’ related to his field of expertise. This last sentence could have two meanings…

Read the full article on Yahoo News.

 The Internet… That vast universe of bits and bytes (more like Terabytes now) have now a patch. That is a bit weird isn’t it? The Internet having a patch? It seems like I’m talking about some piece of software.

But it’s a fact. The Internet had a huge bug in the DNS protocol (Domain Name System) and was discovered by accident by Dan Kaminsky, which works with IOActive. He is also a former employee of Cisco Systems.

This bug seems to be quite bad, it would allow someone (a hacker?) to redirect all wanted traffic to a specific point. Imagine you are accessing your bank account through your bank’s online system and that someone forwards you to a clone of that site that does not belong to your bank. It would be possible to get all your bank account details and codes without you noticing, which would not be good news for you.

Hopefully this bug is now being fixed and the Internet will be healthy again.

Read the full article in Yahoo! News.

Scientists have developed robots that can climb a multitude of different surfaces. These tank-toy-shaped robots use electrostatic power to be able to stick to the wall.

“In some ways it is similar to rubbing a balloon and sticking it on the wall, except we carry our own power supply and are able to control the adhesion.”

The scientists are now trying to develop insect robots using the same technology. Well, another science fiction theme coming to life.

Read the full article on BBC NEWS.

I’ve just received a confirmation from Vodafone (Portugal) that I am in the queue to buy an iPhone. It’s great to be on a list to spend some money

It seems that finally I got some confirmation of what the price will be for the iPhone here in this little country (but lovely) called Portugal.

Here is the table that I got on that same email:

So, this means that to get the iPhone 3G without robbing a bank you need to obtain a 24 month contract. The table already contemplates a €10 deduction if you give them an old phone. This is a promotion operators are doing in Portugal (almost worthless, but good if they recycle the phones).

To be eligible for a best iPhone contract you also need to be on the Vodafone network for at least 6 months.

Ok, so what kind of money is Vodafone asking you per month? If you don’t want (or are not eligible for) a best iPhone plan you need to spend €3 per day to enjoy surfing the web and read emails. In this plan you only have 20MB per day to use. If you use more than that Vodafone automatically start a second day tariff. I reckon this tariff is only for people that don’t use that much the Internet on the iPhone (what’s the point then?). Or you can add the iPhone extra (aditivo iPhone) for €9.90 per month to have 250MB allowance with €0.08 per extra MB. To be able to use this extra you need a plan other than Vitamina Shock, Vita Clube, Vitas ao Segundo, best iPhone, best Total ao Segundo, Vodafone Directo and Vodafone Casa. All these are not eligible to have this extra.

For the ‘best iPhone’ plans the monthly tariffs are as follows:

The number you see on the plan is the minutes/sms allowance you have monthly.  Per aditional minute/sms you pay 0.149, 0.129 or 0.099 according to the plan you choose. In the best plans you will have a 250MB allowance per month and you pay €0.06 per extra MB.

You can also check the page https://loja.vodafone.pt/homephone/iPhone/tarifario/ to see for yourself the plans and prices available (in portuguese).

Well, I remember someone saying that the iPhone wouldn’t cost more than $199 on any country. Yeah sure, put all the huge monthly bills of the tariff and you will get that right. For the ones that don’t know how much the euro is compared to the dollar all I can say is that €129.90 is $204.34. This is the cheapest price you will get for the 8GB iPhone 3G in Portugal. For this price you will need to pay €64.90 monthly for 24 months. Cheap…

Pioneer has just come up with some “big” news. 400GB in an optical disk. It’s 16 layers of data in one DVD size disk. Now that Blu-ray has won the battle of HD formats Pioneer comes and tells us that they have a better technology (derived from DVD). That makes us think that Blu-ray doesn’t quite appeal with the current capacity. We want more… yes we do…

Read the Pioneer Press Release!

(Article found through TrustedReviews)

Blizzard has now opened the Opt-In for the Wrath of the Lich King Expansion Beta. You just need to go to your account management screen and choose “Wrath of the Lich King Beta Opt-In” option in the bottom of the page.

Opting in doesn’t mean you are going to be able to play the beta, but you will be added to a list of potential beta testers. After that you just need to wait until Blizzard releases the beta.

Billy Mitchell of Hollywood, Florida, has finally reached the end of the game without loosing a single life. wow. That’s 256 levels of dots and ghosts and dots and some fruit and did I mention dots? It took him 6 hours of boredom but he did it. Woohoo

Read Wired article here.

I would bet that he is now trying to do the same for Ms. Pacman. Go go Billy!!!

Apple just released Mac OS X 10.5.4. This new version brings only bug fixes and minor changes. No awesomeness here but a good update for Mac users. 

10.5.4 Fix List:

General

• Includes recent Apple security updates.
• Resolves an issue with saving and reopening Adobe Creative Suite 3 files on a remote server.
• Includes additional RAW image support for several cameras.
• Addresses an issue that may result in a partially installed X11 application.
• Improves L2TP VPN client reliability.

AirPort

• Addresses AirPort reliability issues with 5GHz networks.
• Addresses AirPort issues that may result in slower performance in Logic Studio or MainStage.

iCal

• Improves overall iCal reliability for meeting requests, cancellation notices, delegation, and syncing with iPhone.
• Resolves an issue that prevents deleting an iCal event without notifying the creator.
• Addresses an issue in which events in all calendars affect availability. A checkbox now enables information-only calendars to be transparent from free/busy lookups.
• Resolves a UI issue preventing delegated calendars from showing up as a separate window.
• Addresses an issue with copying and pasting attendees from one event to another.
• Resolves an issue in which iCal may not delete events after a specified time interval, even when set to do so in iCal preferences.
• Addresses an issue in which To Dos cannot be marked private.

Safari

• Addresses a potential performance issue when loading secure web pages.
• Resolves issues that may be encountered when accessing secure web pages with client certificates that reside on a smart card.

Spaces and Exposé

• Addresses an issue in which switching from a space with a Finder window keeps the Finder as the active application instead of the application residing in the destination space.
• Fixes an issue in which dragging an application from the list of application assignments in Spaces System Preferences does not assign the application to the desired space.
• Resolves an Exposé issue that may result in only a subset of windows being shown.

Source: Trusted Reviews