'Hack' Explained

Many of my students commented in the Facebook, 'Sir, You really went and hack?' I am not sure whether this is hacking or not. But this how I did it.......

The attacker, I named him 'Mr Idiot.' Apparently, Mr Idiot has created a website with domain name 'www.myskyfruit.webs.com' and trying to phish away my customers. He has attempt to use my banner (myskyfruit.com) on his website. What He dis, is that he hard-coded his website to load the banner direct from my website - www.myskyfruit.com/iamges/banner.jpg Mr Idiot tried my people believe that they are our associate.

However, recently, a lot of people tried copying and downloading images from my website. So, I redesign my website and convert all the images from JPG to SWF (Flash). SWFs, unlike the JPGs are not easily downloaded. And, the banner in SWF is named as 'banner.jpg.swf' Normally in Windows, the extension is hidden. So, it cause the user to believe it is a JPG.

Since our banner is in SWF format, I created a fake JPG image with the same name but with extension JPG. After discussion with my son, we decided to put error messages in the JPG banner.

Since Mr Idiot links his website to my banner with JPG extension and guess what.... My fake JPG banner will displayed on his website.

The moral of the story are:
1. DON'T THINK THAT YOU ARE THE SMARTEST.
2. DO NOT LINK YOUR PROGRAM TO UNKNOWN EXTERNAL OBJECT.

What The %$#@&*?

That day, I was having my lunch in a Chinese restaurant near my my college. Near me, there sit 2 middle-age men chatting with each other. They were talking loudly like nobody's business.

In their conversation, I can heard all sort 'mother' words and 'f***' words. I do not know whether they feel shame or not. Do they realized that there are children and other people in the restaurant. It is an ulgly scenario. Sometimes, no matter how professional are you, whether you are CEO or any big-shot... Once those words are out from your mouth, people will look down on you. How disgraceful! It is NOT cool and it is NOT ok. Stop damage yourself and your image by STOP speaking foul-language.

You may say, 'Never mind, I am a teen and I will speaking when I grow older.' I tell you....you will not be to stop... It will be a habit fowever.

I don't know about you all. I felt very disturb when people speaking foul-language in fornt of me. So, my students and friends, stop using foul-language in my presence (claases, gatherings, etc).

IT IS NOT COOL TO SPEAK FOUL-LANGUAGE!

Be Careful of What We Say

Back in the college day, we like to gather around and going to places in group.

One day, we were talking about flowers. And this girl said she likes yellow roses. I, then jokingly, said that 'Yellow Roses are for sicked people and you will only get them when you are in the hospital.' Walao! Was it painful..... That girl whacked my head with her bag. Later, I learned that she don't fancy my joke.

Some people are very sensitive. So we must be very careful when we say something. Our tongues may be sharper than a two-edges sword. Sometimes, we may hurt someone by saying something. At time, I choose to be quiet or it will erupt a war.

The moral of this story is BE CAREFUL OF WHAT WE SAY.

Do Not Talk Bad About Others, You May Need Their Help One of These Days

This happened many years ago when I am still in college. While I was doing my Diploma in Telecomunication and Computer Enginnering in KDU in the 80s, I was asked by Engineering Department Co-ordinator to teach software PCB design software to my juniors.

However, one day I was writing on board, I heard a voice saying "他有什么资格教我们." (What qualification do he has to teach us.) I recignized that voice of the student. He thought I do not understand Mandarin because I normally don't speak Mandarin last time. So after we graduated, we went our separate ways.

However, one day we crossed path again. The company I worked, happened to supply harddisk to his company. And, he required me to help him to exchange a damaged harddisk.

The moral of the story is DO NOT TALK BAD ABOUT OTHERS, YOU MAY NEED THEIR HELP ONE OF THESE DAYS.

5-Mark Makes A Difference

It is always sad to see myhe diploma students that failed the module. However, sometimes I think they deserved to fail. In diploma module, normally the assessment is divided into the following:

Tutorial x 4 (5 marks each) = 20%
Assignment x 1 (10 marks) = 10%
Mid-Term Exam x 1 (20 marks) = 20%
Final Exam x 1 (50 marks) = 50%

Many of these students think that the 5-mark allocation for each tutorial is insignificant. Therefore, some of them did not attempt the so-called 5-mark-tutorial. What they don't realize is the tutrials can help to get marks easily, provided they do them correctly. If they have completed the 4 tutorials correctly, they have already conquer 20% of the total module assessment mark.

A fairly good student should be able to obtain about 7 - 8 marks in his/her assignment. To obtain such a good mark in their assignment, students should never attempt to 'copy-and-paste', plagiarize or collude. Lecturers will have tools like TURNITIN.COM to check for plagiarism. Normally, if a student being caught with plagiarism, he/she will get zero mark. Again, if you do the assignment correct, you will get 8%, adding up to 28% of the total module assessment mark.

Say, you did not do well in your mid-term exam. You only get 10 out of 20 marks. So now, your total module assessment will be adding up to 38%.

And you will only need min 12 out of 50 marks. In other word, if you only manage to pass your final exam (which is 25 out of 50 marks), your total module assessment will add up to 63%. AND YOU ALREADY PASS THE MODULE.......

So, think....5-Mark Makes A Difference