Having released Opera 9.5 and Opera 9.6 in 2008, the Norwegian browser maker is now offering the first taste of Opera 10.0. While Microsoft and Mozilla are laboring to hit the Release Candidate stages of Internet Explorer 8 (now at Beta 2) and Firefox 3.1, respectively (now still at Beta 1, and on the verge of Beta 2), Opera is also cooking the next iteration of its browser. The first Alpha development milestone for Opera 10.0 is now available for download.

“It seems like yesterday we released Opera 9.6 and now you can all get your hands on Opera 10.0. Rather than ramble on, here's a quick list of what's new: Presto 2.2 Engine; performance boost; 100/100 and pixel-perfect on the Acid3 test; auto-update; inline spelling checker; Opera Mail improvements, including rich text composition and delete after X days; Widget Improvements on Linux,” revealed Adam Minchinton, Opera Mac developer.

Opera has tweaked and optimized the core of the browser, and has taken Presto up to version 2.2 from 2.1 in Kestrel. In this context, now Opera 10.0 Alpha 1 passes the Acid3 Test for web standard support to perfection, the browser maker claims. At the same time, the evolution of the engine has delivered a new level of performance, not only in terms of speed, but also in regard to how the broser handles CSS, XML printing, and RGBA and HSLA support.

“The long awaited auto-update functionality is here! That's right, Opera will now update itself as new versions are released. And for those of you who want every single snapshot release just enable the 'Download All Snapshots' setting (opera:config#AutoUpdate). Please be aware that if you do so, you will be upgrading to all snapshots - and, as you know: snapshots contain the latest changes, but may also have severe known issues, including crashes and data loss situations. In fact, they may not work at all,” Minchinton added.

Opera 10.0 Alpha 1 for Windows is available for download here (Link 1), here (Link 2), here (Link 3), here (Link 4), here (Link 5).

Opera 10.0 Alpha 1 for Linux is available for download here (Link 1), here (Link 2), here (Link 3), here (Link 4), here (Link 5), here (Link 6).

Opera 10.0 Alpha 1 for Mac OS X is available for download here (Link 1), here (Link 2), here (Link 3), here (Link 4), here (Link 5), here (Link 6).

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MySQL Administrator is a powerful visual administration console that enables you to easily administer your MySQL environment and gain significantly better visibility into how your databases are operating.

MySQL Administrator now integrates database management and maintenance into a seamless, single environment, with an intuitive and clear graphical user interface.

By using MySQL Administrator you will be able to:
- Achieve higher database availability through improved management
- Reduce errors through visual database administration
- Lower database administration costs through improved productivity
- Deliver a more secure environment through easier privilege management

MySQL Administrator enables developers and DBAs to easily perform all the command line operations visually including configuring servers, administering users, and dynamically monitoring database health.

Other common administrative tasks such as monitoring replication status, backup and restore, and viewing logs can also be performed through the MySQL Administrator graphical console.

User Administration in Minutes
Administering users, granting privileges and viewing user privilege information has never been easier! Now you can leverage the full power of MySQL's user management and privilege capabilities to fully protect your MySQL server host using an integrated graphical user administration console.

For example, a form-based interface provides a simple method for adding users, assigning passwords and including user profile information. Plus, assigning and revoking global, database, and table/column privileges is as easy as adding and removing privilege items from an available list. Finally, an explorer interface provides a hierarchical view allowing you to easily view user privileges by privilege type.

Single View Dynamic Health Monitoring
Dynamic health monitoring gives you an immediate view into the key indicators of the health of your MySQL environment. Dynamic graphs enable you to easily view percentage of memory usage, connection usage, hit rates, as well as the number of SQL queries on an ongoing basis, as your system runs.

The Disk Health tab gives you an overview of the amount of hard disk space, tablespace, and log files being used. You can also use the visual health monitoring feature to get a hierarchical view into status and server variables such as the number of outstanding connections, number of bytes sent and received by clients, buffer allocations size and more.

Quickly Optimize MySQL
MySQL Administrator now allows you to easily view and setup key parameters so you can quickly optimize the performance of MySQL. Using a graphical forms-based environment, you quickly fine tune general and advanced parameters. For example you can set memory usage parameters and configure server start-up parameters related to the MyISAM and InnoDB table types.

Rapid Disaster Prevention and Recovery
Now you can rapidly create consistent backups and restore data by simply visually selecting the schemas and tables you want to back/restore from your hierarchical data directory. The graphical environment gives you additional visibility into Tabletype, Rows, Data Length, and Update time.

Server Information At-a-Glance
The server information section of MySQL Administrator allows you to quickly view basic information about the server and client. This view gives you immediate visibility into items such as server status, client and server version numbers and IP address, as well as connection information.

View Replication Status
Now you can quickly set up replication to increase the robustness and speed of your MySQL environment. The replication features within MySQL Administrator allow you to easily view the network topology of your replication master and slaves. Plus, the graphical environment provides additional visibility into IP addresses and logfiles.

View Server Logs from a Centralized Administration Environment
Now you can view all the MySQL log files including error logs, binary logs, and InnoDB logs from a single, centralized administration environment so you can diagnose server problems quicker and track database changes.

Service Control
Gain complete control of service creation and overcome the time consuming task of installing and setting up services. Plus, start and stop MySQL servers and view corresponding log messages.

Browse Catalog
Browse your catalog and view corresponding tables with columns, all indices and users with privileges to access selected databases. From here you can monitor and optimize tables.

Cross Platform
MySQL Administrator will initially be available for Microsoft Windows and Linux, and be compatible with MySQL version 4.0 or later.

MySQL Administrator for Windows 5.0 r10 is available for download here (Link 1)
MySQL Administrator for Windows 5.0 r10 is available for download here (Link 2)

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RapidShare CAPTCHA has always been hacked no matter how tough they made it. Usually whenever RapidShare updates their CAPTCHA, it only took a few days for third party download tools to auto recognize it. One of the toughest CAPTCHA was with cats and dogs in them and it took 3-4 weeks to be cracked. A few days after the cats and dogs CAPTCHA has been cracked, RapidShare installed a new CAPTCHA system called TEABAG_3D.

The TEABAG_3D is developed by OCR Research Team and they are a bunch of CAPTCHA hackers too. They claim that after defeating several CAPTCHAs, they decided to make a CAPTCHA which is hard to break. I’ve been in communication with the developers of CryptLoad and jDownloader to keep track of the progress in defeating the latest 3D CAPTCHA in RapidShare. They were in 50% progress and suddenly RapidShare decided to eliminate the captchas to simplify the use of RapidShare’s free services significantly but with a catch that the download speed limit has been limited to 500kilobits per second, that is only 62.5KBps.


1. CryptLoad
- The interface is in English and configurations is not complicated. Other than downloading from RapidShare, it can also support downloading from many other One-Click hoster such as megaupload, gigasize, depositfiles and etc. Currently CryptLoad can only run on Windows with Microsoft .NET Framework and the next major update version 2 should support Mac OS and Linux as well. Supports automatic updates.
[ Download CryptLoad ]


2. JDownloader
- This tool has not been mentioned here before but I now tell you that this is a really good downloading tool for one-click-hosters website. JDownloader is open source, platform independent and written completely in Java. It simplifies downloading files from One-Click-Hosters like Rapidshare.com or Megaupload.com - not only for users with a premium account but also for users who don’t pay. It offers downloading in multiple parallel streams, captcha recognition, automatically file extraction and much more. Of course, JDownloader is absolutely free of charge. Additionally, many “link encryption” sites are supported - so you just paste the “encrypted” links and JD does the rest. Because it is written in Java, you can run JDownloader on Windows, Mac OS and Linux. Support automatic updates. Try it and you’ll love it!
[ Download jDownloader ]


3. CandiSoft Load!
- Load! also has not been mentioned at this blog before. The interface is in German but it shouldn’t be too hard to understand as some words are pretty similar to English. You can always make use of Google Translate to help you translate from German to English. Runs on Windows and supports automatic updates. It also supports other one-click-hosters such as megaupload, netload.in, uploaded.to and etc.
[ Download CandiSoft Load! ]


4. RS Downloader
- This tool has been mentioned at this blog before and the interface is in German. It runs on Windows, supports automatic updates and can only download from RapidShare. Can also automatic decrypt and recognized encrypted rapidshare links using YouCrypt plugin.
[ Download RS Downloader ]


5. Universal Share Downloader (USDownloader)
- USDownloader is another popular and powerful one-click-hoster download manager. It supports a lot of free hosting services, including the most popular ones like RapidShare, MegaUpload or YouSendIt. You can select up to 26 types of languages for the program’s interface and it runs on Windows. When want to do an update on USDownloader, you’ll have to use the server http://usd.cap-cap.ru/ because the one in the list doesn’t work. [ Download USDownloader ]


Source: raymond.cc

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Many companies have adopted Internet protocols for their local-area networks; these `Internist' may or may not connect to the Internet. By restricting Intranet access to company personnel only, some of risks described below are decreased. You must keep in mind, however, that threats exist inside the company as well as outside; and normal computer security procedure and personnel screening are still necessary.

Word-wide access vs propiertary information. Unless your company is running a completely closed network, you must assume that anything published on the Web can and will be accessible to the world. The UNIX operating system that controls most network servers is insecure by design, and recent attempts to overlay protection have been only partially successful. Password and user authorisation schemes in Web pages stop the casual Web surfer, but they will not stop the CGI scripts and other programs that search the Internet for specific kinds of information. A recent trend toward dynamic Web pages (created only when the user passes the authorisation routine) provides some relief. In general, if your information is business sensitive, don't make it accessible on the Internet.

Many companies use `firewalls' to protect their internal networks from unwanted external penetration. The firewall is a piece of software that intercepts all incoming and possibly outgoing transmissions. It accepts or rejects the transmission based on an approved list of Internet services. Many firewalls are programmed to allow all e-mail traffic through, but to reject FTP and Telnet requests. In effect, the company picks and chooses which Internet services to allow based on its business needs and risk tolerance. Like any piece of network software, a firewall can be defeated by clever hackers.

Security of transmitted responses. The growth of electronic commerce on the Internet has created a profusion of line catalogues, some allowing you to complete an electronic order form. When the form is transmitted back to the vendor, the data is not encrypted or protected to ensure provacy. Since the information may be transmitted through many network nodes, there is always the chance that it will be intercepted by an unintended receiver.

Recent attempts to add encryption to the Internet have suffered from technical failure (as in the case of public key encryption schemes) and government resistance. such resistance is exemplified by the demand for a `Clipper' chip that allows law enforcement eavesdropping and export ban on the privately developed `Pretty Good Protection' encryption scheme (which was good enough to defeat government attempts to crack it!).

With a few identification numbers, an individual can tap into extensive marketing databases and learn about someone else's financial and personal history. if they also have a credit card number, they can transact business in someone else's name and disappear. until encryption becomes the rule, it is inadvisable to ask for credit card numbers, social security numbers, and other personal information from your Web page. In addition to being a courtesy to your audience, it also protects your company from losses due to fraudulent electronic transactions and potential third-party liability for such disclosures.

Help systems vs. HTML. The simplicity, flexibility, and universality of HTML make it a strong candidate for use in building computer-based training (CBT) and help systems. HTML competes with existing authoring packages and help-file creation software, offering lower cost and potentially wider distribution while sacrificing some advanced features and the familiar `look and feel' of existing help systems. Companies that use the Internet or other wide-area networks to maintain communication among geographically diverse offices and companies that don't have an existing investment in other help systems or CBT technology may find the use of HTML and the Web particularly attractive.

Technorati Tags: internet

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As in the case of the inhouse competition between Windows XP and Windows Vista, due to its prolonged support strategy, Microsoft is also one of its most fierce and stubborn competitors on the browser market.

The XP vs. Vista race translates here into the face-off between Internet Explorer 6 and Internet Explorer 7. IE6 has become inherently associated with Windows XP SP2, while IE7 is delivered for XP SP2, Windows Server 2003 and Windows Vista. There was a time when Microsoft referred to the IE7 component on Vista together with a "+" label, but the practice has been dropped.

IE7 was introduced in October 2006 for XP SP2 and in November, 2006 and January, 2007 with Windows Vista. Without a doubt, Internet Explorer 7 is, by all means, a superior product to its predecessor, starting with the graphical user interface and ending up with the security mitigations built into the pr

oduct. And Microsoft has went ahead and compared the number of fixed vulnerabilities in IE6, IE7 and IE7 in Vista, for the first year on the market.

"Microsoft shipped Internet Explorer 6 SP2 in August 2004 and in the three years since then has fixed a total of 79 vulnerabilities – 50 High / 24 Medium / 5 Low – or an average of about 2.1 per month. Microsoft shipped Internet Explorer 7 in October 2006 for Windows XP SP2 and in November 2006 as part of Windows Vista. In the nearly one year since release, Microsoft has fixed a total of 17 vulnerabilities in IE7 – 14 High / 3 Medium – or an average of about 1.4 per month. Only 14 of the vulnerabilities have affected the Vista release, so that rate is slightly lower," revealed Jeff Jones, Strategy Director in the Microsoft Security Technology Unit.

Just take a look at the adjacent image in order to make an idea of the sheer volume of security flaws impacting the three versions of the browser. From Jones' IE vulnerability counting game it is clear that IE7 in Vista, and IE7 for that matter, is an apex of security for the Internet Explorer line-up of products. "The data indicates that the latest version of Internet Explorer has improved security in terms of fewer vulnerabilities than previous releases, with the Vista version being a bit better than the XP SP2 version," Jones added.

Technorati Tags: Windows Vista,Internet,Microsoft

source: news.softpedia.com

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