Little-Wonder.Net

27 July, 2007

Three days worth of agony.

23:55:18 | Web Stuff | writebacks (8)

The internet connection has been a little warped as of late.

For the past three days, the connection was barely accessible. In fact, I had to restart my router for almost every other link I click on. Upon each restart, the connection is all peachy perfect once again for at most two minutes before it goes all wonky again.

The best part?

I go to my internet service provider’s website in search of support, and some script running on the main page caused my entire firefox window to freeze.

The next thing I knew, I was greeted with a lovely error message which read “Firefox.exe has encountered an error and has to close” - and I happened to have some unsaved work in another tab which I could no longer access, or save, for that matter.

Starhub, starhub, what in heaven’s name are you doing?

And uh, you really know you are a geek when you find yourself getting all riled up over something as trivial as an internet connection and even dedicate a whole weblog entry to it.

Or perhaps not.

Because I don’t think I am entirely a geek, I shall just dedicate half this entry rambling about broken connections, routers and error messages.

Although, I must say that the state of the internet connection does accurately reflect it’s owner’s uh, mental state.

You see, when the internet connection gets cranky, the owner gets cranky too. (One has to sit aside and observe in wonder at the amount of colourful expletives I use when I have to restart the router countless just to jump start the whole thing all over again.)

On the other hand, when the internet connection achieves stability, the mental state of the owner stablizes by a great deal too - characterized by the sudden disappearance of the expletives and how she’s happily leaning back in her seat, contented once again as she surfs from weblog to weblog, website to website.

Additionally, the faster the connection, the happier she gets. (Due to her very limited level of patience.)

Oh darn, perhaps I am a geek after all.

You know it is so when you find yourself getting all riled up over something as trivial as an internet connection, write a weblog entry all about it, and even draw parallels between the friggin’ connection and your behaviour.

Perhaps mankind is really doomed to be ruled by computers in the near future.

————

Anyway, the bottom line of this entry is - Starhub better get it’s act together and fix the bloody connection in my residential area before this dissatisfied customer blows a fuse.

20 April, 2007

All spam must die.

16:10:19 | Web Stuff | writebacks (4)

All email forms, and the guestbook on this site has been temporarily disabled because there was an attempt to flood by some useless, nothing-better-to-do bum this afternoon at around 16:06, GMT +8.

It wasn’t just flooding, but there was an attempt to execute harmful code on the server as well. I’m currently doing a bit of investigative work now. (Hmm.)

Comments are still open, though.

Additionally, if anyone has secure PHP web form scripts to recommend, please drop me a line as well.

—–
Edited @ 10.15PM:
Interestingly, all the spam came from a single IP address, and upon doing a search on the IP address, I’ve managed to track down the ISP to be that of Pacific Internet.

Not to mention the organization and the address the offender is from.

Mmmmm, this is going to get interesting.

02 April, 2007

I love SMU

23:41:18 | School Life, Web Stuff | writebacks (6)

One final exam paper coming up tomorrow evening. Followed by yet another week of studying before the next two (and final) final exam papers next Monday.

Following which, yet another internship interview - which caught me by surprise when I received the notification email this afternoon. Much as I would like an internship, I really do not like interviews because they make me really uncomfortable.

And then another heavy project due by the end of next week.

Golly gee, please let me survive. All of a sudden, I feel like a clown who is juggling far too many things at one time.

I shall not ramble on too much about what needs to be done, and what has yet to be done and what I’ve already done. (Yes, yes. This statement itself is already rambly. But since when am I ever not rambly?) - Ah, see? There you go. I’m rambling again.

(Then again, I did ramble my way throughout my previous internship interview as well. Little wonder they didn’t want me.)

Before I continue, let me reiterate - Despite how much I whine (and yes, ramble) about the ever-increasing workload and the usual classroom-related angst, I still love the hecticness that school life brings.

There you go. I’m again, bubbling with optimism.

—–

On to another topic.

Recently, a podcast poking fun at my school (SMU) has been uploaded on the internet. Despite being an individual who loves my school quite a fair bit (which is strange, considering how it puts me through the grinder every term), I found myself more or less agreeing with the entire podcast.

I’m still pretty much undecided whether I ought to frown or laugh at the contents of the podcast, although I’m more inclined towards the latter.

Basically, what the podcast tried to imply was that SMU tends to overdo it when it comes to their marketing strategy (I admit, they sometimes over-exaggerate statistics just to make the school sound good), plus the many many MANY talks on EVERYTHING career-related - which is true.

I’m serious. They come almost monthly! Talks on career skills, lifeskills, networking (in real-life , not IT) and the most classic talk of all - “How to be a good SMU citizen”.

Boy, talk about propaganda!

Of course, I am not denying that attending talks on career skills will benefit us in the long run. However, when the content of the talks starts becoming repeated, add on the fact that such talks are usually mandatory, you’d seriously rather be somewhere else doing something more productive than being stuck in the auditorium listening to a monotonous speaker ramble.

Besides, when it comes to career skills, I feel that it is much better acquired through real life experience. No point sitting there and listening to 32794728974927 talks it does not bring you anything remotely worthwhile other than “Wheeee! I survived another one of those talks without falling asleep!”

Whatever it is, that podcast had hit the nail on the head. Go and listen to it if you can. It should bring about a couple of chuckles.

And ohhh, I must mention that during the final seconds of the podcast where SMU students were portrayed to be “backside pokers” - I was imagining myself with a ridiculously huge needie and sticking it up the arses of everyone in sight. (Heeheehee.)

Other than the above, I still have no regrets coming to SMU.
(And no, this is not a marketing strategy. SMU did not pay me for this statement!)