Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Computing/2011 January 5

= January 5 =

is there a name for this type of computer hacking/stalking?
it focuses on collecting information, such as personal information about people. starts with easy methods, such as google and social media, resorts to hacking when needed. motive is mainly for fun (sometimes to know the people better), not for financial gain, not to harm people. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 218.186.8.241 (talk) 01:17, 5 January 2011 (UTC)
 * What you describe sounds a bit like Social engineering (security). But the goal is usually the same as other forms of hacking, some sort of gain and not just getting to know people.  Dismas |(talk) 01:54, 5 January 2011 (UTC)
 * White hat social engineering? Besides stalking your girlfriend or Lindsey Lohan, I doubt many people would do that...Res Mar 03:40, 5 January 2011 (UTC)

Troubleshooting sound problems
I recently sent my 5.1 Surround Sound HPA2 Turtle Beaches (Product Page) in for repairs. So I switch to a couple of somewhat crappy single-jack headphones I have laying around. But for some reason, the computer doesn't even recognize them when I input the jack - no response. How should I troubleshoot? Thanks, Res Mar 03:04, 5 January 2011 (UTC)


 * First thing is to check that the jack is all the way in. Then check the various volume and mute settings.  StuRat (talk) 21:02, 5 January 2011 (UTC)


 * Done. No luck :/ Res Mar 23:58, 5 January 2011 (UTC)


 * OK, next step is to try the headphones elsewhere and try other headphones on that computer, to isolate the problem. StuRat (talk) 22:00, 6 January 2011 (UTC)

WEP Password Revelation
Hello. I'm looking for either open-source software or atleast freeware which is compatible with Windows 7, and can reveal the password of a WEP network without resetting or modifying the password. The target WEP router is my own - if it something gets screwed up, I can just reset the router and start over. This is for my own personal interest, not for bandwidth-stealing or any other illegal activity. Thanks everyone. Rocketshiporion ♫ 05:39, 5 January 2011 (UTC)


 * I've not tried it (Who still cares about WEP?), but Aircrack-ng seems to be popular. APL (talk) 05:52, 5 January 2011 (UTC)


 * You will find that you will encounter number of roadblocks in your attempt. Firstly, not every adapter is capable of monitor mode that is required for an adapter to be able to capture packets without being associated with an access point. And if it is it may not be capable of packet injection which forces the AP to generate new IVs (weak breakable packages). Without this and with low to no network activity, you may be looking at weeks of gathering required number of IVs even if you have a card capable of monitor mode. And even if you have a card with all of those it can be hard to tell the exact model because manufacturers do not like to make such info easily attainable and user compiled lists are often incomplete or even inaccurate. And on top of all of those, even cards capable of one or the both functions often do not have Windows drivers. Therefore if you are not willing to dabble into Linux and command line you will find you have next to no chance of breaking the WEP encryption. If however you are willing to do that and obtain an adapter that works if you do not own one, you should probably grab a copy of BackTrack 4. This is a live Linux distribution, containing above mentioned Aircrack-ng, easily the best wireless cracking suite, and drivers for most wireless cards capable of monitor mode and packet injection.


 * Assuming you satisfy all of above condition, it's just a matter of booting up BackTrack and running few commands. Google it, it is everywhere and also the official documentation for Aircrack-ng has been most useful for me. With all of that you can crack virtually any WEP network within 10 - 15 minutes (only factor out of your control is if the AP does not generate first IV which can happen if there is absolutely no traffic on the network). And with some luck and crappy password on the target's part, with the same suite you can crack WPA and WPA2 passwords too. --110.174.117.185 (talk) 21:51, 5 January 2011 (UTC)


 * If you have a connection to the router or have a ethernet cable so you can connect then you can probably log on as most routers never have the password changed for inside access. I just had a look at my router by looking at http://192.168.0.1 and the wireless password has stars in the box. However when I saved the configuration and looked at it with a hex editor the password was there with a simple xor of each byte with a constant to obscure it - so one could find it by hand. Dmcq (talk) 22:32, 9 January 2011 (UTC)


 * If you have a laptop that may still have the password for the network stored, try WirelessKeyView, it'll give you any WEP/WPA passwords remembered from connecting to wireless networks. Dhoare12 (talk) 22:24, 10 January 2011 (UTC)

Kaspersky Antivirus Services Could Not Start
We are using kaspersky antivirus Business space securety

kaspersky antivirus 6.0 install properly but services is not start

Please help me about this

Transferred from Language Desk. Richard Avery (talk) 08:04, 5 January 2011 (UTC)


 * Contact Kaspersky technical support here.--Shantavira|feed me 11:41, 5 January 2011 (UTC)

When was 'bigint' introduced as a data type in Microsoft SQL Server?
I'm having some difficulty finding an answer to this question. MSDN seems to be a sea of unrelated documentation without an effective index of SQL Server developer guides for older versions of the product. So can anyone provide me with an idea of when bigint (64-bit integer) was introduced as a datatype in SQL Server? - for example, is it supported in SQL Server 2000? How about earlier versions?

Also, are there any recent versions of SQL Server which do not support bigint? Thanks. Astronaut (talk) 10:27, 5 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Having just tried it, I can confirm that bigint is supported in SQL Server 2000 - I don't have access to anything earlier. AndrewWTaylor (talk) 14:58, 5 January 2011 (UTC)


 * I googled your question and the third result is a book that says: SQL Server 2000 introduces the 64-bit integer (bigint), ... --Sean 15:44, 5 January 2011 (UTC)

Connecting to internet on my laptop via mobile data-cable
I've managed to connect to the internet on my laptop via my mobile phone's bluetooth connection. But after getting a data-cable, I can't connect to the net via the cable (using a dial-up connection) unless both my lap's and my cell's bluetooth are switched on.Is keeping bluetooth on mandatory for connecting to the net? Doesn't that kind of defeat the purpose of having a data-cable in the first place?? Is there any way to connect to the net without switching on my lap's/cell's bluetooth? Thanks in advance!117.97.129.0 (talk) 13:24, 5 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Are you sure you are actually connecting with the cable? F (talk) 00:05, 7 January 2011 (UTC)

Yeah. I'm absolutely sure, because when I connect via bluetooth, it shows the bluetooth connection status as "connected", and when I use my data-cable, it shows the dial-up connection status as "connected". 110.225.188.86 (talk) 09:13, 7 January 2011 (UTC)

android phone site
Is there a website that lists the android phones available? I'm looking for one and the wireless carriers have disgustingly sad websites that cannot do something as simple as "show me the android phones with a full qwerty keyboard and wifi". -- k a i n a w &trade; 17:51, 5 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Comparison of Android devices APL (talk) 17:55, 5 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Found what I wanted: http://pdadb.net -- k a i n a w &trade; 15:04, 6 January 2011 (UTC)

Backing up Hotmail
When I asked about this a while ago, it was suggested that Mozilla Thunderbird could be used to back-up Hotmails email to my HD. Please could you tell me 1) if this leaves the emails still available online, and 2) if it is possible to back up the emails a section at a time (eg the last months worth for example), as backing up the several years of them at once may cause problems due to the bulk involved?

I don't know anything about the technicalities of emails, and would prefer not to have to get involved with anything complicated. If there is anything that can backup Hotmail emails just by clicking a button, or which is simpler to use than Thunderbird, then I'd be very interested to hear about it. I would likely only use it for backing-up, no other purpose. Thanks 92.15.1.103 (talk) 20:22, 5 January 2011 (UTC)


 * With Thunderbird, you can easily create a local folder (a folder on your local computer) and copy emails to that folder. You have the option to move or copy.  Moving removes it from the server.  Copy leaves it on the server.  You select what you want to copy.  You can copy one email.  You can copy a month's worth of emails.  You can copy all of the emails. --  k a i n a w &trade; 20:48, 5 January 2011 (UTC)


 * The answers for both questions 1) and 2) are "yes." Using Thunderbird to copy emails to local folders (as Kainaw described) will not delete them from the server.  Thunderbird also has the capability to sort all mails by date; or to browse certain folders.  Here are instructions for setting up Hotmail in Thunderbird and here are some illustrated instructions for saving local copies of emails from Idaho State University and from University of Southern California.
 * Unfortunately, backing up from Hotmail with a single click of a button is a bit tricky; it's not something that Hotmail is designed to do easily. Many other tools and programs do exist, but I am hard-pressed to think of any that would be easier than Thunderbird.  Most will require complicated setup, or the use of the command line, and because they are less commonly used programs, there will be fewer illustrated how-to guides.  Nimur (talk) 20:54, 5 January 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. The first two links are outdated, but the last one is still current. 92.24.188.182 (talk) 20:06, 6 January 2011 (UTC)

Webcam for a mac
Hi. I have a little 12 inch powerPC G4, running macosX 10.5.8. I want to buy a USB webcam for use with skype, and am worried that new webcams will only work with intel models. Can anyone recommend a budget webcam that is known to work on my hardware? Thanks, Robinh (talk) 21:38, 5 January 2011 (UTC)


 * You should be able to find requirements on online retailer listings, like at this one on Amazon, which says "Mac OS X 10.4.11 or higher…G4 800 Mhz or higher". You can get real-time suggestions and confirmations on IRC in places like irc://irc.freenode.net/mac, irc://irc.freenode.net/hardware, or irc://irc.freenode.net/electronics. ¦ Reisio (talk) 00:40, 6 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks Reisio. I guess I was being a bit overcautious. Best wishes, Robinh (talk) 08:23, 6 January 2011 (UTC)

finding diffs in sound files
I have sound files from field recordings that I recently found are not identical to their back-up copies. (I discovered this when I scanned my comp for duplicate files.) I'm afraid that some program I used to listen to them may have made changes, though I never saved anything. This won't matter if it's metadata, but I need to keep the sound quality as good as possible, and am not sure which copy to rely on. Is there any free/shareware out there that will show me where the differences are? — kwami (talk) 22:59, 5 January 2011 (UTC)


 * Surely the modification timestamps no longer match? ¦ Reisio (talk) 00:42, 6 January 2011 (UTC)


 * No, that's what's so weird: the timestamps do still match. I opened these files with SoundForge9, and I wonder if that's the issue. Or perhaps one of the files got corrupted after archiving, or when transfering to backup, but I have no way of knowing which one. (There are dozens of such files [out of hundreds which are still bit-for-bit identical], and any changes are evidently relatively minor. But when every syllable counts, even minor defects can be a problem.) — kwami (talk) 09:39, 6 January 2011 (UTC)


 * If you're on something Unixy, converting them to something lossless and uncompressed like wav and then doing a "cmp --verbose file1 file2" will tell you which bytes are different. You can then load both files into something like audacity and look for the changes at those locations. --Sean 14:07, 6 January 2011 (UTC)


 * I am also seeking a program that can strip ID3 tags and compute a hash of just the MP3 data. (Alternatively, we could actually do a correlation or a signal residuals comparison between the decompressed audio, but that'd be more computational effort).  I have many duplicate files in my library that are unmodified except for ID3 data, and these duplicates are very difficult to track down.  If anyone knows of existing software that can strip ID3 data, I might throw a script together to streamline the process.  Nimur (talk) 22:14, 6 January 2011 (UTC)


 * http://id3v2.sf.net/ ¦ Reisio (talk) 21:32, 7 January 2011 (UTC)


 * Sorry, I'm not on Unix/Linux. Win7. — kwami (talk) 02:27, 7 January 2011 (UTC)