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§ Actiontec M1000 DSL modem security

I used to use an Actiontec GT701 DSL modem.  Since my entire livelihood depends on my internet access, I got a little nervous when some odd things started happening.  As it happened, a friend was having trials with the phone company getting her DSL to work, and was advised to try the Actiontec M1000.  Still no go, so I tested her modem here and it worked nicely.  (That was all the phone company's fault, and after getting escalated a few times, I believe they were a bit embarrassed.)  So I looked around and found a slightly used M1000 (with wireless) for about $30!  (I don't want the wireless - I use Airport.  Being an Apple product, it's actually comprehensible to mere mortals like myself.)  But after a few days, weird things started happening with the M1000...

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§ Don't AJAX an image!

Using AJAX is fine when you need it, but I've used AJAX to simply reload CAPTCHA images.  Boy, some people are dumb!  Me, in particular.

UPDATE:  I'm dumber than I thought...

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§ Adventures with Ubuntu 9.10 on G4 Yikes!

I have an Apple G4 Yikes! (or PCI Graphics) that I've loved for years.  I ran Jaguar, then Panther, and it currently runs Tiger well enough to suit me.  I got a G5 a while back, so this box got sort of retired, until I picked up some contract work doing websites.  Since I had a whole new set of emails, chat sessions, VOIP, invoices, etc., etc., I turned on my trusty Yikes! and devoted it to all of that stuff for that job.

When I stopped working that contract, my poor old G4 started getting lonely again.  So, the other day I thought maybe I should use it to try Linux again.  I've looked at Linux a number of times through the years, for various reasons, including on old Macs, but never quite got sucked in to being a convert.

"I keep hearing good things about Ubuntu," I thought, "so I think I'll try it; this'll be fun!"

That depends on your definition of fun...

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§ Software that leaves a mess

The other day, my WinXP machine kept bringing up the "let's clean up your hard drive" wizard, which I kept closing.  I finally realized that Explorer claimed that I had 0 bytes available on my system drive!  "Impossible," I thought, "what's wrong now?!  A virus?"  Not quite...

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I don’t hold myself out as a role model generally, but I think the world might be better off if more people accepted responsibility and dealt with consequences.
David Drake, Author's Note to In the Stormy Red Sky