This first round of seminar-style presentations seemed to have gone very well. It’s the final year and it is a relief to see the scattered class bonding together. Like in the words of the Ping – paraphrased – it is a miracle; this seminar-style approach to educating every one works for o’three. Throughout this week, a lot was covered – from Wisdom of the Crowd, Mobile Revolution to Facebook.

Search engines throw out their web spiders to collect information via HTML around the vast internet – as WP presented it. I thought there were only the spiders but turns out not; ants and worms are part of the act too! And the text of mankind – be it font-size 12 or 40; lorem ipsum or twit language – collectively form the Wisdom of the Crowd. No wonder Google struck it rich: they were quick to leverage on this opportunity hence created one of the most widely-used search engine today.

I was singled out in the demonstration of that theory. And it did prove – my level of wisdom, however intelligent I may think of myself to be, could not stand up to the class as a whole. Think about it, in actuality, this is more or less along the lines of logic and common sense – the comments and opinions of others, who have come from different background and possessed different interests, are considered more objective than one soul’s point of view. To add on, you will be spoilt for choice and faced with thick walls of dilemma from having to come to your decision. Always remember, the opinions and/or comments of others are just suggestions – the ultimate decision is yours; just compare, contrast and run it through your heart. In other words, be discerning even when seeking the almighty advice from Wisdom of the Crowd.

Let me sum up Mobile Revolution in a line: The advancement in science is unbeatable, though fairly foreseeable, technology will continue to renew with greater things and maybe even realise the reality of ‘Alien v.s. Predator’ causing chaos like in ‘Left 4 Dead’.  Hence in a way, no biggie, revolutions will eventually become passe over time and more will come.

On the topic of ‘Left 4 Dead’ – here’s an interesting treat (rated NC-16):

Facebook? It’s so popular now that it does not need more text in this post.

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And this song rocks. I’m super excited. I am a pretty big Clazziquai fan anyways, but I love love love the sound of this song!! It sounds FANTASTIC!!! If the album stands up to the standard that “Ping” has set, it is going to be epic!

Here it is. What do you think of it?

Have a wonderful day everyone and a happy Thanksgiving!

Clazziquai’s comeback song ‘Ping’ has been revealed! =D The MV should be coming soon, so stay tuned! ^^

November 24, 2009 A GROUP of transsexual sex workers in Chow Kit are using pornographic films to distract clients before robbing them, reported Harian Metro.

Members of the group would seduce the victim while another sex worker would try to steal belongings like wallets and handphones.

In a recent incident, a client known as Ping said he was asked to lie on the bed before choosing a free DVD pornographic movie to watch as a “warm-up”.

“The sex worker told me to take off my pants. It was then placed on a chair nearby,” said the 33-year-old chef.

Ping declined to elaborate on what happened next, but said he reached for his pants only to find that his handphone was missing from the pocket when he heard loud noises that sounded like a fight outside the room.

“I was even more surprised to find that my wallet, which was originally in my pocket, was moved to the top of the television set. Some RM400 was also gone,” he said.

After Ping repeatedly demanded the sex worker to return his valuables, she finally agreed to give them back, claiming that her friend had stolen them.

New track off After School’s 2nd single, ‘When I Fall’ is out! It’s a really nice RnB track ^^

Clazziquai will be releasing a new remix album, and the new song is called ‘Ping’. They released a MV teaser. YAYZ for Clazziquai =DDD love them

Rain/Bi under the cut

Rain/Bi in the Alps for his brand Six to Five. LOOOOL at 3:10 XDDD For some reason, the audio disappears after a certain point o.O ah well the main point is to look at him anyway LOL

This article is about measuring network throughput and performance using a Linux box, in a very approximate way.

There are many network performance benchmarks and stress-tests which measure the maximum bandwidth transfer rate of a device – that is how many bytes-per-second or bits-per-second a device can handle. Good examples for such benchmark tests are NetPerf, Iperf, or even multiple Wget downloads which run simultaneously and save the downloaded files to /dev/null, so that we eliminate the hard disk throughput of the local machine.

There is however another very important metric for the throughput of a network device – its packets-per-second (pps) maximum rate.

Today I struggled a lot to find out a tool which measures the packets-per-second throughput of a network device and couldn’t find a suitable one. Therefore, I tried two different methods both using the ICMP echo protocol, in order to approximately measure the packets-per-second metric of a remote network device which is directly attached to my network.

Method #1: The old-school “ping“. Execute the following as root:

ping -q -s 1 -f 192.168.100.101

This floods the destination “192.168.100.101″ with the smallest possible PING packets. Here is a sample output:

--- 192.168.100.101 ping statistics ---
20551 packets transmitted, 20551 received, 0% packet loss, time 6732ms

You can calculate the packets-per-second rate by dividing the count of the packets to the elapsed time:

20551 packets / 6.732 secs ~= 3052 packets-per-second

Note that this is the count of the replies at 0% packet loss. Which means that the same count requests were sent too. So the final result is:

3052 x 2 = 6104 packets-per-second

Note that if you run multiple “ping” commands simultaneously, you will get more accurate results. You need to sum the average values from every “ping” command, in order to calculate the overall packets-per-second rate. For example, when I performed the measurement against the very same host but using two or three simultaneous “ping” commands, the average packets-per-second value was settled to 8000.

Method #2: The much faster and extended “hping3“. Execute the following:

taurus:~# time hping3 192.168.100.101 -q -i u20 --icmp|tail -n10

This will bombard the host “192.168.100.101″ with ICMP echo requests. After a few seconds, you can interrupt the ping by pressing CTRL+C. Here is the output:

--- 192.168.100.101 hping statistic ---
67932 packets transmitted, 10818 packets received, 85% packet loss
round-trip min/avg/max = 0.5/7.8/15.6 ms

real 0m2.635s
user 0m0.368s
sys 0m1.160s

If the packet loss is 0%, decrease “-i u20″ to something smaller like “-i u15″ or less. Make sure to not decrease it too much, or you may temporarily lose connectivity to the device (because of switch problems?).

The calculations for the packets-per-second value are the same as for “ping” above. You need to divide the received packets to the time:

10818 packets / 2.635 secs ~= 4105 packets-per-second

Because the calculated packets-per-second represent the rate of successful replies, we need to multiply it by two, in order to get the actual packets-per-second, as the count of the replies is the same as the count of the successfully received requests. The final result is:

4105 x 2 = 8210 packets-per-second

The calculated value by “hping3” is the same as the one by “ping”. We are either correct, or both methods failed…

Some notes which apply for both methods:

• You should run multiple instances of the ping commands, either from the same or from different machines, in order to be able to properly saturate the connection of the machine which is being tested.
• The machines from which you test have a hardware rate limit too. If the host being tested has a similar rate limit, you surely need to run the ping commands from more than a single machine.
• You should run more and more simultaneous ping commands until you start to receive similar results for the calculated packets-per-second rate. This indicates a saturation of the network bandwidth, usually at the remote host which is being tested, but may also indicate a saturation somewhere in the route between your tester machines and the tested host…
• The ethernet switches also have a hardware limit of the bandwidth and the packets-per-second. This may influence the overall results.
• If the tested device has any firewall rules, you should temporarily remove them, because they may slow down the packets processing.
• If the tested device is a Linux box, you should temporarily remove the ICMP rate limits by executing “sysctl net.ipv4.icmp_ratelimit=0″ and “sysctl net.ipv4.icmp_ratemask=0″.
• If the tested device is a router, a better way to test its packets-per-second maximum rate is to flood one of its interfaces and count the output rate at the other one, assuming that you are actually flooding a host which is behind the router according to its routing tables.

Thanks to zImage for his usual readiness to help people out by giving good tips and ideas.

Clazziquai Project is set to release their new remix album “Mucho Beat” (Volumn 4.5) on the 26th! If you aren’t a follower of this project group, you really should check them out. They are amazing, always coming up with something new and interesting. I love almost all of their work! They recently released a new teaser for the album and I am sooooo excited. It is hot! Please enjoy!

Have a wonderful day!

Keanu Reeves: Photo Courtesy of keanu.org

In this week’s premiere of New Communication Technologies (NCT) class, our great lecturer, Ping, showed us Minority Report. I was beginning to think whether it was a coincidence (Ping could have been intending to recruit Keanu Reeves fans like herself) or that there was a more significant agenda – to let the ignorant children trapped in the protective environment of this classroom open their eyes to what could be the future of the universe!

We have the usual adventure story – good guy, righteous and all, wronged by the bad guys hence set out to clear his name… by kidnapping a bald-shaven and pale woman – who can barely communicate well with her stutters, which is good because it prolongs the storyline and the air time.

Alright, who am I kidding?

The crux is this – the technology used and displayed in the show is beyond the present. However, many revolutions have passed through the centuries and the sci-fi in Minority Report could just be the next in line.

And current technology seems to be edging towards the Minority Report reality. Compare the following:

Today’s technology – a man interacting with a projected surface using his fingers:

(click on image for video)

Minority Report – Keanu Reeves interacting with holograms using his fingers:

Keanu Reeves: Photo Courtesy of flixster.com

Aren’t those two most alike? Not forgetting location-based services are personified as the Precogs (ones who are capable of telling the future) in the movie as well. It is indeed amazing to see the human race mingle with science to create possibilities and bring about what seems to be convenience to the society.

However, things appear too perfect. And too-perfect things can be flawed in some way or another.

Think about this – one of some other problems that may surface: what will happen to the privacy of each individual if tracking whereabouts of individuals were as simple as a click on a system – especially with the impending proliferation of location-based services?

Do privacy and convenience with technology possess an inverse relationship? Think about it while you tweet, facebook, plurk, stumbleupon or use that android application.

]]> http://longislandprivateinvestigators.wordpress.com/2009/11/23/cell-phone-ping-helps-police-narrow-searches/ Mon, 23 Nov 2009 07:06:32 +0000 Long Island Private Investigators http://longislandprivateinvestigators.wordpress.com/2009/11/23/cell-phone-ping-helps-police-narrow-searches/

By Charles McMahon
cmcmahon@fosters.com

Thursday, November 12, 2009

PORTSMOUTH — The ability to track someone’s cell phone signal to a specific area may not be something new for fans of CSI and other TV cop dramas but the use of the technology became very real this past week as police searched for a little girl abducted by her father.

Maine authorities issued an AMBER Alert on Monday afternoon to find 38-year-old Gary Traynham after he allegedly assaulted his two-year-old daughter’s mother and fled the mother’s Sanford, Maine, apartment with little Hailey in a stolen pickup truck.

The U.S. Justice Department’s Website describes the Amber Alert Program as “a voluntary partnership between law-enforcement agencies, broadcasters, transportation agencies, and the wireless industry, to activate an urgent bulletin in the most serious child-abduction cases. The goal of an AMBER Alert is to instantly galvanize the entire community to assist in the search for and the safe recovery of the child.”

And that’s what happened right after Hailey was taken. The airwaves were saturated with reports about her abduction.

Through witness reports and information received indicating that Traynham had ties to the Lakes Region, police began to scour communities throughout Central New Hampshire. Signs of the alert were visible everywhere, from the state, local and federal authorities positioned along Route 11 on Tuesday to the electronic construction signs that displayed messages about Traynham’s license plate number.

Hours into the eventual 30-hour manhunt, police caught a break when they were able to determine Traynham had made a phone call with his cell phone and the signal had “pinged” or transmitted off a communications tower in Alton.

Sanford Police Chief Thomas Connolly told WMUR that authorities were able to get an idea of where Traynham may have been headed when they received information his cell phone had used the signal from the tower.

“They were able to draw an arc on a map and said information from the cell phone indicates Traynham and his little girl were somewhere in that arc,” Connolly told WMUR. “Son of a gun they were found right in the middle of that arc.”

Hailey Traynham and her mother were reunited Tuesday night in Sanford, Maine, after a deer hunter spotted her and her father in a pickup truck on a logging road in Milton.

An unrelated incident in Portsmouth on Wednesday offered further proof that tracking cell phones for law enforcement purposes can be life-saving and in some cases an important precaution.

According to radio communications, around 10:30 a.m. local police were on the lookout for a possibly suicidal Connecticut man believed to be in the area. Radio transmissions indicated Connecticut authorities had received information that the man’s cell phone had last “pinged” off a tower in the Portsmouth area.

Police were then asked to be on the lookout for the man at area hospitals and eventually found him at a friend’s residence unharmed a short while later.

Portsmouth Police Community Relations Capt. Mike Schwartz said the effort in tracking someone’s cell phone is a team effort with law enforcement and phone service carriers and is only used in situations deemed to be an emergency. When police determine a situation necessitates using the technology, Schwartz said they contact the cell phone carrier, identify themselves as law enforcement and request a trace of the last known signal used.

Schwartz said the service is then able to tell authorities the last tower the cell phone signal “pinged” off.

“It’s for emergencies and there is tight criteria on it,” said Schwartz. “Every now and then we get people who say they lost their phone and ask, ‘can you ping it?’ We have to tell them ‘no,’ that’s not an emergency.”

The tracking is also not always 100 percent, said Schwartz, but does give law enforcement agencies a good starting point.

Michael Murphy, New England public affairs spokesman for Verizon Wireless, also acknowledged the relationship law enforcement and cell phone carriers have when it comes to potentially harmful situations.

“Verizon Wireless maintains a Law Enforcement Resource Team (LERT) that is ready and available 24/7 to assist authorities with life-threatening situations,” Murphy said.

Call ICORP Investigations regarding GPS tracking systems – Toll Free 866.984.2677

ICORP Long Island Website

1. http://topicexchange.com/RPC2
2. http://1470.net/api/ping
3. http://api.feedster.com/ping
4. http://api.feedster.com/ping.php
5. http://api.moreover.com/RPC2
6. http://api.moreover.com/ping
7. http://api.my.yahoo.com/rss/ping
8. http://bblog.com/ping.php
9. http://bitacoras.net/ping

10.  http://blog.goo.ne.jp/XMLRPC

11.  http://blog.youdao.com/ping/RPC2

12.  http://blogdb.jp/xmlrpc

13.  http://blogmatcher.com/u.php

14.  http://blogping.unidatum.com/RPC2/

15.  http://blogsearch.google.com/ping/RPC2

16.  http://bulkfeeds.net/rpc

17.  http://coreblog.org/ping/

18.  http://cullect.com/feed/ping

19.  http://mod-pubsub.org/kn_apps/blogchatt

20.  http://ping.amagle.com/

21.  http://ping.bitacoras.com

22.  http://ping.blo.gs/

23.  http://ping.blogg.de/

24.  http://ping.bloggers.jp/rpc/

25.  http://ping.blogmura.jp/rpc/

26.  http://ping.cocolog-nifty.com/xmlrpc

27.  http://ping.exblog.jp/xmlrpc

28.  http://ping.feedburner.com

29.  http://ping.myblog.jp

30.  http://ping.rootblog.com/rpc.php

31.  http://ping.syndic8.com/xmlrpc.php

32.  http://ping.weblogalot.com/rpc.php

33.  http://ping.weblogs.se/

34.  http://pinger.blogflux.com/rpc/

35.  http://pingoat.com/goat/RPC2

36.  http://pingqueue.com/rpc/

37.  http://rcs.datashed.net/RPC2/

38.  http://rpc.blogbuzzmachine.com/RPC2

39.  http://rpc.blogrolling.com/pinger/

40.  http://rpc.britblog.com/

41.  http://rpc.icerocket.com:10080/

42.  http://rpc.newsgator.com/

43.  http://rpc.pingomatic.com/

44.  http://rpc.tailrank.com/feedburner/RPC2

45.  http://rpc.technorati.com/rpc/ping

46.  http://rpc.weblogs.com/RPC2

47.  http://rpc.wpkeys.com/

48.  http://services.newsgator.com/ngws/xmlrpcping.aspx

49.  http://signup.alerts.msn.com/alerts-PREP/submitPingExtended.doz

50.  http://trackback.bakeinu.jp/bakeping.php

51.  http://www.a2b.cc/setloc/bp.a2b

52.  http://www.bitacoles.net/ping.php

53.  http://www.blogdigger.com/RPC2

54.  http://www.blogoole.com/ping/

55.  http://www.blogoon.net/ping/

56.  http://www.blogpeople.net/servlet/weblogUpdates

57.  http://www.blogroots.com/tb_populi.blog?id=1

58.  http://www.blogshares.com/rpc.php

59.  http://www.blogsnow.com/ping

60.  http://www.blogstreet.com/xrbin/xmlrpc.cgi

61.  http://www.imblogs.net/ping/

62.  http://www.lasermemory.com/lsrpc/

63.  http://www.newsisfree.com/xmlrpctest.php

64.  http://www.popdex.com/addsite.php

65.  http://www.rssfwd.com/xmlrpc/api

66.  http://www.snipsnap.org/RPC2

67.  http://www.wasalive.com/ping/

68.  http://www.weblogues.com/RPC/

69.  http://www.xianguo.com/xmlrpc/ping.php

70.  http://www.zhuaxia.com/rpc/server.php

71.  http://xmlrpc.blogg.de

72.  http://xping.pubsub.com/ping/

73.https://phobos.apple.com/WebObjects/MZFinance.woa/wa/pingPodcast

You’ll find an abundance of tools to test your internet connection speed but what if you want to test the quality and reliability of the connection? Pingtest gives you feedback on your connection.

Pingtest allows you to select servers from around the world and test your connection to them. Your connection is graded based on packet loss, ping time, and a composite of all the ping tests called jitter—an indicator of how much variation exists in your ping times.

If the screenshot above looks familiar that’s because Pingtest is brought to you by the same company behind the wildly popular Speedtest—a web-based tool for checking the speed of your internet connection.

There is more after the jump.

Of course, your ping will depend on the server you are pinging.

So I tried pinging a US server. (Where most of our gaming/other servers are located.)

Result:

Now, I try a server in San Francisco:

Now, to try a very random server in say – Nairobi, Kenya

Also, one I did from school. (Pings are restricted so its unable to measure packet loss.)

Do your own test here – Pingtest.net

Post reference:

@Gizmodo who found it via @Tip of the Day

Like Fergie says,  ”I be up in the gym just workin’ on my fitness” the past few weeks. Today I woke up and saw the list of everything I had to do to finish fall quarter classes and prepare for exams I felt so stressed. The only way I can really deal with stress productively is to sweat it out. I changed into my workout gear ( I am a big fan of Nike and Under Armour), grabbed my iPOD and headed to Ping.

As I walked to Ping, I realized how many opportunities there are in Athens for recreational activities.

This past summer I worked and took classes in Athens. At night I would have down time and took advantage of the weather. I hate to work out inside when it is so nice outside. It is like a waste of a gift. I would wait until seven or eight at night and hit the streets of Athens. I had a certain route that I would run. I loved these runs. I explored neighborhoods and side streets, I ran on the Bike Path past the O’Bleness Memorial Hospital and through the empty greens. Here is what my route looked like:

View Larger Map

Later on in the summer my friends and I bought roller blades and started to spend evenings blading on the Bike Path. The Bike Path is 19  miles long and runs along the Hocking River on the former Hocking Valley Railroad bend to Nelsonville. The Bike Path originally stretched from the Athens City Recreation center on East State Street to the Athens City Ball Fields on West State Street. Many use the bike path for running, biking, roller blading and walking. Lights accompany the path for those enjoying the path at night. Benches line the path as well and I have seen people practicing instruments, reading or sitting thinking as they look out at the Hocking River. “I like running on the Bike Path because it is really pretty. There are no hills, which is nice because I have knee problems,” says runner Adrienne Johnston. “It also helps me to track the distance I run and know my mileage.” Another regular user of the bike path is student Samantha Tiller. “I love blading on the bike path because it’s a fun way to get daily exercise,” she says.

Another opportunity is the Ohio University Golf Course. It has nine holes and also sits on the Hocking River. It is fairly inexpensive for students to play-$10 to play and $15 with a golf cart. Student Craig Schenck enjoys playing on the course. “It is well maintained and all the holes are unique…It is very inexpensive and never busy,” he says.

For indoor activities, Ping offers a ton of options. One of the latest things Ping has done is to Green Power at Ping. They added 20 elliptical machines with the ReCardio System by ReRev. This allows students to generate alternative energy while working out. The kinetic motion of exercising is converted into renewable energy that is then converted into electricity. A 30-minute workout  produces 50 watt hours of carbon-free electricity that can power a incandescent bulb for 45 minutes, a laptop for one hour  or  a desktop computer for 30 minutes.

Ping also has a rock climbing wall in addition to basketball and volleyball courts, multi-purpose courts, racquetball courts and a four lane indoor track. Ping is one of the largest rec centers in the country covering 168,000 square feet.

After a student employee swiped me in, I headed to the second floor to join in on Green Power and workout for a half hour. My iPOD was stocked with good jams to keep my motivated. These are the top 3 songs that I basically have on repeat:

1. I Can Transform Ya-Chris Brown

2. Yes-LMFAO

3. Defying Gravity-Wicked

I left Ping, endorphins flowing through me and felt nostalgic so I decided to take a detour and walk home on the Bike Path, enjoying the weather and slight breeze. It was a much needed workout and I was able to take advantage of both the indoor and outdoor opportunities and pass others doing the same. However, I did almost get run over by a swarm of inexperienced roller bladers…

wordpress.comの画面ではpingが飛んでるのかどうか分からない。ping先設定の画面が無い？とりあえず

ブログを検索エンジン (Google、Bing、Technorati など) やアーカイブも含め、誰にでも読めるようにする

はチェックオンを確認済みですが。やはり出来れば手動で切り替えをしたいところです。

Heute kam per Post mein bei Watterott.com bestelltes Arduino Shield – Ethernet. Hierbei handelt es sich um ein zusätzliches Shield für den Arduino Duemilanove, das man einfach auf den Arduino steckt. Auf dem Shield befindet sich ein Netzwerkkabelanschluss (RJ45):

Shield also draufgesteckt und erstmal angeschlossen. Dann Arduino.cc – EthernetShield angesehen und die Referenz zur Bibliothek studiert.

Herausgekommen ist ein kleiner Sketch, der dem Arduino die IP 192.168.2.20 im lokalen Netzwerk zuordnet und den Arduino als Server fungieren lässt:

#include <Ethernet.h>

byte mac[] = { 0xDE, 0xAD, 0xBE, 0xEF, 0xFE, 0xED };
byte ip[] = { 192, 168, 2, 20 };

Server server(80);

void setup()
{
  Ethernet.begin(mac, ip);
  server.begin();
}

void loop()
{
  Client client = server.available();
  if (client) {
    server.print("Und der Arduino ist im Netz...");
  }
  delay(10);
  client.stop();
}

Bei der Wahl der MAC- und IP-Adresse sollte man darauf achten, keine Konflikte im lokalen Netz zu erzeugen. Also erstmal auf “Upload” gedrückt. Dieser dauert gefühlt ein wenig länger als bei Offline-Sketches.

Arduino pingt jedenfalls schon mal zurück:

Nun mal schauen, ob auch im Browser was zu sehen ist:

Um den Arduino mit der dem Heimnetzwerk von dessen Provider im Internet zugewiesenen IP-Adresse anpingen und -surfen zu können, muss jetzt noch je nach Router ein NAT (=Network Address Translation) eingerichtet werden, so sieht das z.B. beim Telekom-Speedport aus:

 Me gusta la noticia que ha publicado Amingui en su blog (noticia). También me gustó mucho la galería de fotos de Barrio Sésamo publicada por Eduardo.

La primera entrada de Lourdes aquí.

With the help of Abhas Bhaiyya, I could write this shell script which checks if an ipaddress can be pinged.

#!/bin/sh

if [ `ping -c1 192.168.31.31 >/dev/null; echo $?` -eq 1 ]
then
echo “not able to ping”
fi

/dev/null is used here so that the output of the ping command is not compared with 1.
$? gives out the return code of the command.

I created my own rootfile system for linux.Opps!! I am not able to ping to my own system but I could ping others

Posted by mohammadthalif on November 12, 2009

This happens in the embedded very often when you are desingning your target file system fom scratch or modifing the exsisting one. I came accross same situation. and thinking why and finally figured out root for problem.

#ifconfig eth0 192.168.1.5 netmask 255.255.255.0 up

Now my interface is up. So to check it I do a ping to some system ( my network gateway )

# ping 192.168.1.1

Ping is sucessful. Now ping my own IP 192.168.1.5

#ping 192.168.1.5

Now it fails…. what could be the problem for this. ? I was looking around the kernel configs, driver etc,. but no solution.

And finaly I did type just ifconfig alone in the prompt and found there is no loopback interface up. I brought up the interface up and now I am able to ping by own IP.

#ping 192.168.1.5

Now passed.

I am a PC gamer. I am a huge fan of COD4, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, I think it’s the best FPS PC game ever released and its sales figures back up that claim. As with all games of this genre, while the single player experience is fun, the multiplayer mode is why you buy the game and what gives the game its replay value. In this regard, COD4 is awesome, absolutely without peer, IMO.

So, as you might imagine, ever since they announced a release date for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, I have been waiting in eager anticipation. Now, imagine my surprise when it turns out that Activision/Infinity Ward, in MW2, has stripped out all the multiplayer features that made COD4 such a success. Not only is this a major multiplayer experience downgrade (which they’re charging $10 more for), but it seems that this was done deliberately, as a slap in the face to the PC gaming community!

Modern Warfare 2: The Battleground for PC Gaming?

Every once in a while (every 10 minutes or so), the death knell of PC gaming is cried out by someone or other. And once in a while, it seems like they might be right. PC gaming is not, however, going anywhere. With such an open platform that allows anyone to get in without buying a dev kit, there will always be something to play. Nonetheless, the release of Modern Warfare 2, to me, signals one of the loudest shots fired from the bow of a major publisher against PC gaming.

Freelancer Mitch Dyer commented on his twitter feed earlier today that he was ranked one million something in Modern Warfare, meaning that in just 12 hours, the game has sold over a million copies on one platform. Any doubt that this game would be huge should be a distant memory by now.

The two console versions are pretty much feature-identical, as far as I know. It comes down to preferences for controllers and online service. Beside that, they’re the same game.

But then there’s the PC version.

The thing about PC gamers is, they expect certain things out of their games, things that have always been there as far back as Quake. First and foremost is the exclusion of support for dedicated servers. Back in the Quake II days, I remember logging into the same server (Nostromo) every night over the summer to play deathmatch over dial-up. On the 360 and PS3, matchmaking is an accepted part of the platform.

To not have that, as little an inconvenience as it may be in reality, seems like a major affront to PC gamers. Having the option to get familiar with a server and the group that shows up there has always been one of the benefits of the game, along with having the option to vote users off the server if they’re being disruptive without having to wait for an admin to get to it. Also, when the game isn’t hosted by a player, no one gets the home field advantage and no one affects the game when they pull the plug mid-match.

Of course on the publisher side, you get problems like servers with weird settings that encourage cheating and most importantly, servers that don’t verify that your copy of the game is legal. That’s the big thing. By having the entire online game run through a service, you force all your users to verify their copies of the game if they want to play online. Even if it means no clan home servers and worse, no local play.

Another missing aspect is the lack of console access. The best way to describe a PC gamer, to me, is to compare them to those car nuts that build hot rods from scratch. PC gamers build their systems, know the specs of every part in their computer, and have everything set-up just the way they like. Check out their World of Warcraft interfaces when they get to higher levels, and you’ll see something that barely looks like the same game. Similarly, some gamers like to have their shooters set-up just-so. Tweaking the field of view settings and sensitivity of the controls are things gamers expect to have the option to do as necessary. Instead, Infinity Ward has told gamers that they’d like them to play the game as they designed it, regardless of any user preferences that may not conform to what the publisher thinks is important.

Other limitations include restricting the maps to 9v9 (when the first Modern Warfare allowed games with 16v16) and the exclusion of the lean move, in the name of not having to recalibrate the maps. That lower team limit is a major thing for all the clans that formed on Modern Warfare servers trying to make the jump to the sequel. Split the team up? Have Alpha and Bravo teams? Not play the new one?

I won’t even mention that the PC version of the game is selling for the same price—$59.99—as the console equivalents. Oops, I just mentioned it.

All this together makes me think Infinity Ward/Activision is excluding expected features in hopes of discouraging PC users. Maybe not discouraging them, but taking away many of the advantages that have drawn PC users in the past while doing as much as possible to combat piracy. Of course, where there’s a will there’s a way, and there’s always a will in PC gaming, and I won’t be surprised if we see dedicated servers with 16v16 games within a few months.

Whether the mad geniuses of the mod world come up with a solution, Activision’s decision strikes me as a very clear message that PC games—or at least hardcore PC gamers—do not play a large role in their equation. While indie gaming and MMORPGs thrive, I have a feeling that some of the bigger publishers are going to give the PC less and less attention when they have a much more reliable option available.

See also:
Modern Warfare PC compared to Modern Warfare 2 PC
Modern Warfare 2 PC User reviews low…
PC Gamers Fear Modern Warfare 2 Is A Console Port [Video]
Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 PC Multiplayer Capped at 18 players
Modern Warfare 2 (PC) Capped at 9v9
PC Players Revolting Against Modern Warfare 2
PC Modern Warfare 2: it’s much worse than you thought
Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 PC review
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 PC Review
Activision Not Concerned With Modern Warfare 2 PC Negativity
Modern Warfare 2 Hacks Already Available on PC

Needless to say, I’m extremely dissapointed and conflicted by this fiasco. I was really looking forward to playing this game but, on the other hand, on principle, I don’t want to financially reward Activision/Infinity Ward for their blatantly arrogant and hostile treatment of loyal PC gamers. They expect us to pay more for an inferior product after we’ve already seen that they’re capable of putting out an excellent multiplayer game like COD4. It sucks.

/for now, I guess I’m going to sit back, think about it some more, and wait and see how this controversy plays itself out

There I was, enjoying a quiet moment with my family, when my husband prods Miss Q, “Tell Mummy what we did on Warcraft yesterday.”  I hold my breath, waiting for a bloody fight scene to be recounted by our two-year-old.

Thus far, her Warcraft exposure has been, as previously stated, watching his toon jump, dance and blow kisses.  With Miss Q on his lap, they’ve taken his toon and his toon’s mount – usually the cat – exploring through the villages and along the countryside.

He’s always kept her far-far away from the real Warcraft, i.e. the fighting, monsters, trolls, whatever else lurks within the dungeons.  But as of yesterday, he’s one step closer to his dream of her playing alongside him.  (One day in the distant-distant future.)

For, yesterday, unbeknownst to me, he created a Warcraft character for her.  I tell you, in our house, prolonged silence is suspicious.

“She looks like me,” my animated child says proudly.

“And, tell Mummy what else you have.”

“A penguin.”

“For real?”  I try to glare and be excited at the same time.

My husband and daughter both hold the same dopey grins.  I can’t believe he suckered her into his gaming world.  But then again, this is the same child who showed her grandpa how to get to the pod-casts on Daddy’s iTouch over Thanksgiving weekend.  She’s two-and-a-half.

Naturally, she’s growing up in a different world, technology wise than her dear ol’ mum, whom herself remembers panic, during first year of college, when teachers expected you to own a computer.

We don’t want to deny her experiences.  Miss Q soaks in everything the world offers.  She loves running, but sits for hours being read to; she creates interesting artwork and the most disgusting mud-pies.  So why do I feel a ping when I hear that she has added a toon and pet penguin to her repertoire?

Maybe it’s a ping of jealousy: she and my husband now share a bond to a world that I don’t want to be privy to.  Maybe it’s a ping that she’s growing up too fast.  How could it be that only 2.5 years ago she was a babe in arms?  Or maybe it’s a ping of  bemusement: he finally did it.

“He follows me wherever I go.”  Miss Q says of her new virtual pet.

At least we won’t have to stockpile fish in the  deep-freeze.

navigation: Tools | Options | Ping Servers
paste undernath ping servers urls

http://rpc.technorati.com/rpc/ping
http://blogsearch.google.com/ping/RPC2
http://ping.feedburner.com
http://rpc.icerocket.com:10080
http://services.newsgator.com/ngws/xmlrpcping.aspx
http://api.feedster.com/ping.php
http://rpc.pingomatic.com

The #twatch has a simple ICMP (ping) server that shows if the #twatch is alive and kicking on your network, and how long it takes to respond.

First, get the #twatch IP address from the LCD screen or the announcement packet.

Next, start a ping client and ping the #twatch IP address. Windows has a built-in ping client that’s available from the command prompt (Start->run. Type ‘cmd’, press enter. Type ‘ping’, followed by the IP address).

The ping results show basic statistics like how many pings were successful, and how long the #twatch took to reply.

If you’re using an OpenVPN Server to surf in Ubuntu, maybe you experienced this strange problem : you can connect but you cannot surf !    This how to fix it...

Before we start check your current IP online and save it.

The first thing you have to know is that you shouldn’t use NetworkManager Applet to configure your OpenVPN Connexion, it seems that there’s a problem with vpn connections when using this applet (atleast with Intrepid), you can connect but traffic isn’t redirected correctly, so let’s first make sure you’re correctly  connected ! The best thing to do is to download the configuration files from the OpenVPN Server’s website (just look in the forum if you don’t find it, it’s generally an archive file with a *.conf file and a *.crt file, this last one is the certificate) and use’em directly in a shell console.

Copy the archive content files to

/etc/openvpn/

Type :

cd /etc/openvpn && sudo openvpn yourserver.conf

Enter your login and password and wait till you see :

Initialization Sequence Completed

It means that you’re in.

Now to make sure that you’re not facing a routing problem, just type :

route -n

If you see tunX connections with new IPs, it’s OK you’re connected, if one of your web connected peripheral connections (ethX, athX…) is showing the IP of your OpenVPN Server as a destination you’re correctly routed.

Now try to ping the tunX IP with a gateway, if you’ve got this message :

ping: sendmsg: Operation not permitted

You got the fix ! It’s a SIMPLE FIREWALL PROBLEM !

To solve it, you have to edit :

/etc/firestarter/user-pre

First thing to do is to make it writable (it’s a read-only file) then paste these lines and save the file :

# Allow OpenVPN traffic
$IPT -A INPUT -i tun+ -j ACCEPT
$IPT -A OUTPUT -o tun+ -j ACCEPT

Restart Firestarter :

sudo /etc/init.d/firestarter restart

It should work now ! Just re-check your Online IP to see if it changed !