Metro 2033 for FREE on PC!

Go over to this Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/MetroVideoGame?sk=app_395840630491782 , like the page, download the file, and then grab the free key to unlock the game on Steam!

Happy gaming - it's a fantastic game!

Duke Nukem 3D for free!

Santa has come early for PC and MAC users!

Go over to this page and grab for yourself Duke Nukem 3D: Atomic Edition for free for a limited time only (expires 14:59 GMT today).

Here's the 'blurb on YouTube:

A trick to get free delivery on TAKEALOT.COM

If you're into your online shopping as much as I am*, you'll probably do the odd purchase (or not so odd ;-)) from TAKEALOT.COM. The most frustrating part of the purchase is knowing you are going to have to pay R35 for delivery if your order is under R250; sometimes this doesn't make the purchase all that much appealing or even worthwhile (> 10% of the total purchase being added on as the delivery fee alone feels a bit steep).

The good news is if you do a frequent (or at least once every three years) shop at TAKEALOT.COM, you can spruce up your total to the required R250 minimum qualifier for free delivery by buying yourself TAKEALOT.COM vouchers!

I know this seems a bit silly to tie your money into TAKEALOT.COM, but if you are going to buy from them again in the future you may just be saving yourself that R35 delivery fee. Think about it after considering this example:

You want to buy a R150 item but will have to add on R35 for delivery (that's more than 20% of the actual product cost being added on as a delivery fee). If you buy a R100 voucher, your voucher is valid for 3 years and you don't pay for delivery now.

When you buy your next order six months later, you redeem your R100 from the voucher, and if your new order is over the R250 threshold, your delivery is free, so you won't need to buy another voucher, and in fact have spent less on the second order because of the redeemed voucher, and have realised the R35 saving from before!

I know this seems a bit like hard work for a saving but every bit counts, and if you are regularly buying under R250, you're essentially wasting R35 on each delivery.

I'm just saying, think about it. Be creative. You could end up saving yourself enough money from delivery fees (R35 per order) to pay for that R150 original order if you make four purchases a year!

* not that I do a lot of online purchases! My last order from TAKEALOT.COM was in June (that's almost six months ago)

Xbox LIVE is 10 and to celebrate here's your FREE cupcakes!

Xbox LIVE turns 10 today and to celebrate, Microsoft is giving away some freebies (well, Wreckateer for 48 hours) and some half-priced games, depending on your zone.

Check out the full list of discounted titles here:

• UK Xbox LIVE users
  Castle Crashers
  Fruit Ninja Kinect
  Full House Poker
  Geometry Wars Evolved
  Bastion
  Peggle
  
• South Africa Xbox LIVE users
  Castle Crashers
  Fruit Ninja Kinect
  Full House Poker
  
• US Xbox LIVE users
  Castle Crashers
  Fruit Ninja Kinect
  Full House Poker
  Geometry Wars Evolved
  Bastion
  Peggle
  Battlefield 1943

FREE Tribute to 80's New Wave music download

Thanks to a tip-off from my buddy Graeme, here is a link to download a bunch of covers of classic 80's New Wave songs...

coma-online.com:

It started with this idea: the goth/industrial scene was highly influenced by the 80's New Wave scene and some of the bands in our little band of misfits even started out playing New Wave. Therefore, it only seemed natural to pay tribute to the music of the 80's New Wave ...

http://coma-online.com/?p=18036

FREE games (again) - Faerie Solitaire and Battlefield 1942

When there's the word "free" in a title, it always grabs my attention. Heck, as I've probably said countless times before I even buy fat free yoghurt because I don't want to have to pay for the fat when I can get it free.

There are two free games available now - one for a limited time only, so let's begin with that one:

• Faerie Solitaire activated on STEAM - go on over and buy it before it expires (8 November 10am Pacific Time which is around 8pm South Africa time). Get it now, keep it forever.
  
• Battlefield 1942 is also free now, forever (AFAIK). Go to ORIGIN, hit the demo section and claim your free copy! Still a great game IMHO.

Telkom ADSL speed upgrades - manual prodding

Telkom has been long overdue in upgrading the entry-level DSL speeds in South Africa but thankfully, finally, the upgrades are here. Entry-level is now 1Mbps, up from a ghastly 384kbps (in 2012? You've got to be kidding me... even 1Mbps is ... well, let's just be grateful for the upgrade at all, shall we?).

 In my experience, I've had to manually request my lines to be upgraded once the exchange was upgraded, and here are the steps to follow. Note that this applies to 384kbps (up to 1Mbps) and 1Mbps (up to 2Mbps). A head-nod goes to HandyTechTipper (and in turn, Michal Mierzwa, for pointing out this strategy in the MyBroadBand forums).

Besides the obvious reason of wanting to get the higher speeds as soon as possible, you probably want to jump the queue just in case they end up oversubscribing the service and you end up without any available ports on the new exchange!

How to make sure you get your line speed upgrade

1. Run a speed test on your line:http://speedtest.mybroadband.co.za/ or http://speedtest-rba.isdsl.net/
   
2. Check that your line speed has increased at your exchange http://www.telkom.co.za/checkadsl by entering your telephone number
   
3. Depending on the results, call 10210 (toll free from a Telkom land line)
   
4. Go to the DSL technical guys
   (the prompts are as follows, in case you want to bulldoze the buttons and skip the voices and waiting)...
1. 1 for existing customer
2. Enter your 10 digit phone number
3. 2 for more options
4. 1 for DSL Technical support
5. 3 for DSL Technical support
   
5. Ask them to increase your line speed (you may have to explain to them that your exchange supports the high speed but your line is sync’ing at a lower speed)
1. I've done this remotely, without being at home, and the first technician (or should I say, call centre agent) configured my line upgrade without me being at home to reset the router. That's all you need to do anyway; they 'flip a switch' and then you reset your router. This was done while I was at the shops and when I came home it was up at 1Mbps.
2. Another incident occurred where the technician (ahem, call centre agent) insisted I need to be by the router when they do the upgrade because it can't be connected. I told them this wasn't necessary but they argued with me and eventually I had no choice but to relent (what do I know anyway, right? :)) and make sure the router was disconnected before they did the line speed upgrade. In this case they even had the audacity to check the connection was off before they ticked a checkbox. 
3. The moral of the story is: rather do it from home if you can, and prepare yourself for some uncooperative agents!
   
6. Check your speed again:http://speedtest.mybroadband.co.za/ or http://speedtest-rba.isdsl.net/
   (or go to the router console and check at what speed it is synchronising) 

I’ve gone up from 384kbps to 1Mbps ‘for free’ so I’m a happy camper.

Stop Zombie Mouth with this Halloween freebie!

You can read my full EL33TONLINE blurb here, but the basic gist of it is PopCap Games and the ADA (American Dental Association) recognise how important our teeth are during this sweet-consuming season and they've teamed up this year to redefine what a Halloween "treat" can be by deciding to give away FUN instead of candy!

As their site (www.stopzombiemouth.com) says, "[they're] giving away Plants vs. Zombies download games as a sugar-free alternative, and you can join in the fun."

Grab yourself a free coupon (attached) and while you're at it, stash up a bunch in your reception area of your home so that when you get beset upon by miniaturised zombie-wannabes you can give them the gift of gaming instead of the prognosis of halitosis.

Miffy cheese?

Usually when I refer to something as 'miffy', that's not a good thing ...

Transfer big files with Wetransfer.com

Simple solution for all those users that struggle to get big files shared with multiple recipients via email: www.wetransfer.com.

No need for 3rd-party software to be installed on any client machines, and you can send a file (up to 2GB in size) to up to twenty recipients. The nice part is, each recipient receives an individual email so they can't see whom else is included and it's pretty simple to use.

Nice for transferring big files without cluttering up e-mail queues.

Exchange 2010 Access is Denied EMC and EMS

There are plenty of reasons why an administrator could be denied access to the EMS or EMC.

One fairly unique problem that besieged me prevented me from accessing the EMC or EMS. Rebooting didn't fix it either.

After plenty of regular troubleshooting strategies I discovered that the WINHTTPS proxy had been set to something else besides the default and it was preventing me from accessing anything.

netsh winhttp show proxy revealed a proxy was configured, so I ran netsh winhttp reset proxy and then it was fixed! EMC and EMS back online!


Current WinHTTP proxy settings:

    Direct access (no proxy server).


Hope this helps someone out there...

Installing certificates on MS Forefront 2010 with Threat Management Gateway

This post is pretty much a no-brainer but in the context of the hassles I had with this site I've decided to include it here to close the chapter (and seeing that it had two other senior engineers stumped; one a network guru and the other an Exchange guru, it seems worthwhile to note).

After running all the certificates for MS Exchange 2010 and getting the Certificate Revocation status verified, all internal access to Exchange 2010 was secured via SSL. The challenge was now getting the remote users secured.

Note this is a solution pertaining specifically to a Threat Management Gateway and you don't need to do this if you aren't using Forefront.

I had dotted all the i's and crossed all the t's but the darned thing still gave a certificate error when accessing remotely. Checking the TMG's firewall properties I verified that Outlook Anywhere, ActiveSync and Exchange Web App's Listeners for HTTPS were using the correct certificates but it still wasn't working.

Then I noticed that the certificates inside MMC snap-in were showing plain old certificates without the embedded private key; so I tried this:

• On MS Exchange 2010 server, export the Exchange certificate WITH the private key
• In the TMG MMC Snap-in, import the Exchange certificate WITH the private key
• Go to the Forefront TMG dashboard, Firewall Policy...
• Select each service (Allow Outlook Anywhere; Allow Exchange Active Sync; Allow Exchange Web App) and ...
• Properties à Listener à Properties à Certificates à Select Certificate à Choose the new one à OK
•   Apply changes to TMG
• SOLVED!
  

Renew Exchange 2010 Certificate generates a binary file - conversion to base64 tips

When renewing an SSL certificate for Exchange 2010, the process is fairly straightforward and there are plenty of sites to give advice on how to do this. Two sites to consider would be Technet and Go Daddy and the steps are summarised as follow -

1. In the console tree, click Server Configuration. 
2. Select the server that contains the certificate, and then select the certificate you want to renew. 
3. In the action pane, click Renew Exchange Certificate. 
4.  On the Renew Exchange Certificate page, select the services you want to assign to the renewed certificate. The services that are checked are currently assigned to the certificate. 
5.  When you click Assign, the Progress page will confirm your selections and try to renew the certificate. 
6.  Click Yes to overwrite the existing certificate with the renewed certificate. 
7.  The Completion page will display the status of the request in addition to the syntax of the cmdlet needed to renew the certificate. 

Of course, it's never this easy and in my experience running a certificate renewal in Exchange 2010 generates a binary file (.req) that can't be easily copied and pasted into a web interface on the CA's side. In the past one would simply use Open With --> Notepad to get the certificate information but now Exchange 2010 generates the REQ file as binary and typically the file contents look like this:

Binary format:

0é♦k0é♥S☻☺ 0[1

When they should look something like this:

Base64 format:

-----BEGIN NEW CERTIFICATE REQUEST-----

MIIEazCCA1MCAQAwWzEaMBgGA1UECgwRd2VibWFpbC5wZmsuY28uemExITAfBgNV

BAsMGERvbWFpbiBDb250cm9sIFZhbGlkYXRlZDEaMBgGA1UEAwwRd2VibWFpbC5w

ZmsuY28uemEwggEiMA0GCSqGSIb3DQEBAQUAA4IBDwAwggEKAoIBAQDLjyTxu5Z/

<snip>

LndlYm1haWwucGZrLmNvLnphghhwZmtkYm5leGNoMDEucGZrc2EuY28uemGCGGF1

dG9kaXNjb3Zlci5wZmtzYS5jby56YYIWYXV0b2Rpc2NvdmVyLnBmay5jby56YTAM

BgNVHRMBAf8EAjAAMB0GA1UdDgQWBBSdCGqQh1ui1NbZZ2bMEZNz5Q7MujANBgkq

hkiG9w0BAQUFAAOCAQEAjyY0tEQvX3JLI0cVULQdX7lX1I9rR7R5qivVMtRoiwYS

+HVdK7odmzTuDAlCisX1qCmdUpmtIK1/ldMEF3yTgNqrvtttxofxpkqg3NGec3cr

<snip>

jhwHn51Sv3hbkUIU30swTP3T7dkhgMxj2JX2AhilqA==

-----END NEW CERTIFICATE REQUEST-----

In order to get the binary to base64 you need to convert it. There are various methods to do this and I have used both online tools and websites and the Command Prompt to achieve this, with the Command Prompt certainly being the far easier method to accomplish this (especially since it inserts the "BEGIN CERTIFICATE" and "END CERTIFICATE" header and footer automatically... making it a much more 'pure' conversion).

---

Using Base64 Online decoder and encoder (online method).

1. Just upload the file, upload the .REQ file, click convert to source data button and grab the output. 
2. Paste contents to your favourite text editor
3. Add the header and footer (both must be on separate lines) and then you're good to go!

The header must be a line on its own at the top as so:

-----BEGIN CERTIFICATE-----

And the footer must be a line on its own at the bottom as so:

-----END CERTIFICATE-----

---

Using the Command Prompt (preferred method):

certutil -encode (req filename) (target filename)

e.g. 

You can then copy this file's contents and paste it to the appropriate CA's webform to complete the certificate request!

Sign the petition to protect Rimsha

My blog doesn't receive much traffic nowadays because I don't have much useful stuff to say (and that's the truth, isn't it :)) but occasionally something comes along that I feel I need to post on my blog. The story of Rimsha in Pakistan is just one of these things.

This little girl has Down syndrome and she is to be burned alive on blasphemy charges. On so many levels this story affects and touches me; I consider how inhumane this whole situation is, and then I try to emphathise with the family. I just can't accept oppression on grounds of religious beliefs and when it comes to a mentally handicapped person - a child! - this sort of evil reaction is totally unjust. I have often considered what I would have done had I lived in a time or place where my daughter would have been taken away from us (and possibly murdered) because of a condition she had no choice about.

Not sure how much impact this petition will have but if you don't sign it, you're just allowing it to happen without putting up a fight.

First they came for the communists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a communist.

Then they came for the socialists, 
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a socialist.

Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a trade unionist.

Then they came for me,
and there was no one left to speak for me.


SIGN THE PETITION NOW!
http://www.avaaz.org/en/pakistan_save_my_daughter/?bCiCibb&v=17431

"Invalid Argument" when trying to delete files - VMware

Recently I tried to delete some files in the VMware shell and I got an "Invalid Argument" error...

In order to resolve this, I tried chmod 755 * and it didn't work. Individual file deletions, not working. Short of a reboot (which would have been a drastic step given that this is a production host) I instead tried to overwrite the file contents with new data to see if it would somehow unlock the file locks (which seemed to be the issue here).

This is what worked for me from the working directory with the files (this command will write the "a" character into each file as a new file, so all previous data will be lost - make sure you are in the proper working directory!!):

echo "a" > *


The files were then unlocked and I could do my usual rm * and it was done. Hope this helps someone else out there!