Expense Tracker

This is a simple light weight expense tracker created in Microsoft Excel.
Click here to download.
NB:Contact me if you want this to be customized for your use.

How to Connect using proxy IP

Connecting using proxy ip

Open Internet Explorer.
Select: Tools>Internet Options>Connections>LAN Settings

Now tick "Use a proxy server.." and provide a proxy address and port.
You will get it from many sites. eg www.hidemyass.com. (http://www.hidemyass.com/proxy-list/)

I used the IP address from UK. So when i took Google, its displaying as Google UK.

Controlling PC remotely

Easy way to control your PC remotely from another PC or even smart phones over Internet.

This is possible using a software called TeamViewer. Click Here to download.(downloaded from TeamViewer site. www.teamviewer.com)

On your Desktop

After installation and signing up, you will get an ID and Password.

On your smartphone or laptop
Now download TeamViewer on your smart phone or on laptop from where you need to access your desktop. Enter your partner ID(ID on TeamViewer installed on desktop), select Remote control and press "Connect to Partner". Enter partner password(Password on TeamViewer installed on desktop) when it asks. You will soon get remote access to your desktop. Enjoy!!!

Changing Logon screen in Windows 7

Changing logon screen in Windows 7

Step 1: Modify the registry value.
Open the registry by typing "regedit" on windows run (windows key + r).

Go to:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE>SOFTWARE>Microsoft>Windows>CurrentVersion>Authentication
>LogonUI>Background

Select OEMBackground and change value to "1"

Step 2: Copying background pic
Copy the pic which you want to make as logon background to C:\Windows\System32\oobe\info\backgrounds
(Make sure the pic is less than 250kb in size.)

If the folder info/backgrounds is not there, please make it.
In case you are not able to copy the pic to the mentioned destination, try using Administrator account.
(Click here to know how to enable Administrator account).

Now when u log off of or lock you user account, you can see the logon background has changed to new one.

Activating Administrator account in windows

Activating real Administrator account in windows

Run command prompt as administrator.
Type the command: net user administrator /active:yes

Now you can see the administrator account on the login screen

This account will have all the access on your machine.

Now to disable this account, use the command: net user administrator /active:no 

Changing "Send to" menu in windows

How to change "Send to" menu in windows?

Open this location.

%APPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows\SendTo

'

Copy shortcut to this folder and exit.

Now if you right click any file, you can see the new shortcut appearing in the "Send to" menu.

Unauthorized access to windows machine

How to access files in a Windows machine when you don't know the username and password?

Method 1:

The machine should be running on windows operating system.

STEP 1: Place a bootable windows installation CD\DVD.
STEP 2: While booting choose the option, boot from CD\DVD.
STEP 3:  You will find a command prompt when you select repair.

Using this command prompt, with basic knowledge on how to work on DOS you can access the files, copy files to/from pendrive etc.

Method 2:

Use a normal Linux live CD and you can access the files.

Method 2:

BRUTE FORCE using ophcrack live CD.

Download ophcrack live CD. Click Here

Boot using this live CD

It will take some time but it will eventually boot and you will see windows login screen.

It will notify you when it finds the password or when it couldn't find it.

How to connect two computers using LAN cable and start networking

Why do we need LAN?
At home, we can connect PC's so that we can

• Share movies 
• Share internet
• Share printer
• Play multiplayer games
• And many other uses

What do we need to start networking at home?

Two computers with network interface cards and a LAN cable is all you need.

Setting up network:

You need:

1. Physical Connection
2. Logical Connection

Physical Connection: It involves connecting two PC's using LAN cable.

Logical Connection: It involves setting up the IP addresses and subnet masks on both the machines.

Setting up IP and Subnet:

Step 1:
Type "ncpa.cpl" on Run and press enter

Step 2:

Select the LAN connection ("Local Area Connection") and Press "Enter".

Step 3:

Select "Internet Protocol Version 4(TCP/IPv4)" and click "Properties".

Then choose "Use the following IP address"

Now Assign IP address and Subnet Mask and press "OK"

NOTE:

The IP address should be unique in a network. i.e it should be different for both the machines in this case.

The subnet should be same for the machines only then it will be in the same network.

Here subnet mask is 255.255.0.0 i.e 11111111.11111111.00000000.00000000.

For both the machines to be in same network, IP addresses of both of them should have the same bit for all the bit positions in subnet mask which has '1'.

That is if i give 192.168.0.1 for one machine, then the other machine to be on same network should have the IP address as 192.168.x.x (because we are having 255.255.0.0 as the subnet mask i.e first two octets as '1').

On the other machine, give IP as 192.168.0.2 and subnet mask as 255.255.0.0

Now that we have setup both physical and logical connection, we can start sharing files, printers or start network gaming.

We can verify that connection is established by pinging each other.

IBM MQ

What is IBM MQ
IBM MQ popularly known as Websphere MQ is the messaging tool from IBM family,

Need for a messaging tool like MQ
It facilitates Distributed Application integration. That means, different applications can be independently developed and integrated using messaging tools. Different applications can also be upgraded independent of each other which makes development easier. MQ also takes care of securing the communication between different applications using SSL.

How MQ facilitates Distributred Application Integration?
Using MQ, queues will be created for each application. Each application will input messages to the queues defined for specific purpose, for some target application or workflow. MQ takes care of the transport of message from the input queue to destination queue at the other end. Application just needs to put messages in the respective queues defined for the purpose.

SSL Security

SSL is Secure Socket Layer
It is used to secure the communication between two end points in a network using public key encryption.

Why we need secure communication?
Long ago, pigeons were used for communication. An intruder can catch the pigeon and read the secret message and also he can replace the message with his content and sent to the intended recipient who gets the altered message. Then came, various wired modes of communication like, telegraph, telephone. In that also intruder can intercept the message. To prevent this intrusion and alteration of the original message, some security mechanism had to be formulated.

From this thought, synchronous encryption was employed. For synchronous encryption, a single shared key will be used for encryption as well as decryption of the message. The shared key needs to be shared between both the end points. The drawback of this is that anyone who gets the shared key can actually read the message and can also alter it.

This led to the development of asynchronous encryption or public key encryption. Here a key pair(public key and private key) is used. Private key is not shared with anyone and public key will be shared with others. If A needs to send message to B, then A will encrypt data using public key of B and will send. B can decrypt the message using its private key and no other person can decrypt it as its private is not shared with anyone.

One way public encryption method

Here the question is when A is sending message to B encrypting using B's public key, is A sure that B is actually B and it's not any impostor pretending to be B?i.e can A trust the public key send to it as B's public key. In order to make sure A is actually A and B is actually B, some third person needs to certify A and B. i.e certify that A's public key actually belongs to him and not someone else and B's to him. This is the key concept behind digital certificates.

If A wants to send messages to B, then A will request B's certificate. It will contain information about B, its Certificate Authority's information, B's public key, expiry date. A will then validate B's certificate using the signer information of the certificate. A will use B's public key in it's certificate after making sure that the certificate is valid, i.e the public key actually belongs to B.

How SSL works?
SSL employs both synchronous and asynchronous encryption methods and also certificates.
Synchronous encryption is faster than Asynchronous encryption so it is used to encrypt messages and Asynchronous encryption for encrypting the shared key(its used to encrypt the messages for that session). Also to make sure the message is not altered by anyone in between, the sender will send the encrypted message digest(hash value) along the with message.

SSL Handshake