kudin

New Update

2005-12-23T12:09:00.000+08:00

Dear all,

I have updated my blog to allow comments to pass in. It will be moderated because anybody can pass their comments so I would not let just anybody comments fill in. Because I don't want some vulgar words occured.

I got some very good article from the Internet.

http://www.certifiedsecuritypro.com/content/view/154/90/

It has some arguable points.

P2P misconception

2004-07-24T13:02:00.000+08:00

Finally, I have a website that I can just write about anything. Anything that come across my mind.

Actually I wanted to talked about why I hate how some people do their job. Some people they just simply do their job as long as it run and at the same time, I could not do that because I have to make sure that the network is up and running 24x7.

It is like politics. You could not critics, but others can critic your job. That is what we called

office politics

I mean it is not fair while you could not critic but at the same time if anything happen to what you maintain just because you simply do it like that person, you are to be pointed out. And I'm not critic because to show that I'm good in Networking but because I do know the best solution and I did not want people to give the wrong solution. Because in the end, I will be the one who have to solve it if the wrong solution fail in long term, unless if everybody know IT hands-on. And that is why I said that many people in my department are having misconception about many things and this is one of them.

I mean, if you simply think that for any project, we just make sure that it run and no need to make it as prefect or complete. And you say that the important thing for you is as long as it run. Errors, weakneasses, bugs and everything can be troubleshoot later. Well, at the same time you said that the server must be 24x7 ? And "kernel panic" is actually make the server crash. And kernel panic is also because we did not install the server properly.

Like for example using RedHat Advanced Server 2.1 with RAID 5 ? Hey RHCE out there, can you tell me whether is it stable running RHAS 2.1 with software RAID 5, and Oracle database using filesystem ext3 and at the same time, you backup from one partition to another in the same server is definitely stable ?

Believe me, we have crash 3 times at every friday and each one of them told that it is kernel panic.

And secondly, when the client DB are slow when accessing the Oracle DB in the server via a P2P, you are trying to suggest that we should take a look of what spyware that it tries to access ? I mean the internet access and the P2P is using different lease line.

I mean come on, let us try to think harder. In each client PC, you should know 3 routing table that is most important and it is sort in a way like below:-

Routing to network 192.168.21.0 using gateway 0.0.0.0
Routing to network 192.168.3.0 using gateway 192.168.21.2
Routing to network 0.0.0.0 (anywhere else), using 192.168.21.1

So, usually spyware would send information on the users PC to their company server which is located in the Internet. Let say the spyware would try to send it to gator.com.

In the Internet, these range of IPs definitely is not available anywhere because they are reserved IPs:-

10.0.0.0 - 10.255.255.255
172.16.0.0 - 172.31.255.255
192.168.0.0 - 192.168.255.255

(resource: http://www.iana.org/faqs/abuse-faq.htm#AllocationofIPAddresses)

Therefore, IP 192.168.3.0 would definitely not belong to any company, organization or even dinosaur in the Internet. And that's include companies that developed spywares and run the server that the spywares wanted to send those informations.

Therefore, there is no way that the spyware could be able to send anything via the P2P line.

In fact if you understand what is the reserved IPs, I don't think it would be difficult for you or anybody to understand that actually no spyware can go through the P2P line because usually P2P implementation only used private/reserverd IP such as the one aboved unless if the P2P is also using for Internet access or DNS query, which is not.

Only virus can spread through the P2P line. But that also can be minimized by configuring ACL inside the router at both P2P side, so that only port 1521 (Oracle DB) and 1383 (remote admin) can go through.

In fact, if we able to set up a firewall separate the labs and users who can access the P2P and the users who could not, I don't think any illegitimate traffic can go through. And to add more security, only users whom their PC have been configured with the correct routing can access the P2P. Users who did not, could not get any traffic go to the P2P, unless he intentionally wanted to do so.

Thus, I do not think P2P have any issues or even the client PCs.

And that is why we should concentrate the effort on troubleshooting the Oracle DB server only.

There are many other things that I wanted to explain but I think it is better if people understand first about Linux and networking before I can explain further, otherwise we will keep getting misunderstood. If you don't believe me, I am more than happy if you could asked your local IT expert on this matter.

My Family

2004-07-24T11:56:00.000+08:00

A'kum.

Alhamdullilah, I have a supporting wife, a 2 year old beautiful daughter but yet sometimes funny, sometimes troublesome.

Though on this year I often argue with my wife, but that because of the pressure not to always have my wife beside me. She is on teachers training at the moment until end of this year.

The teachers training was previously run for 3 year but the college cut it to 1 year only. And because of that (according to their lecturers), they have lots of assignment and projects. Most of the times my wife did not have enough sleep. Just 1 week ago, she got a high fever and until today she has yet to recovered. The doctor said probably because she did not get enough rest or sleep. But that is something that neither she nor myself can do anything about.

Before she went to college, she was a very kind person and supportive except that she have a little bit difficulty to understand my nature of job.

Talking about my job, I think you should go to my blog on "Computers and my Work"

Computers & my Work

2004-07-24T11:55:00.000+08:00

I work at a company in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

My work is directly involve with data centre, network and servers such as the one like at blogger.com probably.

I have started working since January, 1998. Since then I have change my job 4 times already. For some of you who do not know me, I only got Diploma in Computer Science. I do not have any higher qualification other than that.

For some of you that already know me as a family, relatives, friends, collegues, you might think that I change job because I do not have a degree or higher qualification so I could not accept stress.

I think you have to understand more about why I like computers, why I like working and how do I do my job.

I started to learn computer since I'm 15 years old. At that time my brother had a small kind of Commodore keyboard+CPU connected to the TV. It is not Commodore, but it is as the same type as Commodore. I did not remember the name. I always forgot things. And that have reason also. You want to know why I always did not remember things ? Ask your local Ustaz/Ustazah (you local Islam teacher) why a young man like me can be a forgotten person.Usually people with 60+ year old would started to forgot things. And if you do, please do not post your comment and tell other people why. Because at "Akhirat" Allah will probably tell your weaknesses also to other people.

Anyway, back to the computer that I'd learn. In those days (when I was 15 years old), I did not "like" computer at all. I only like it because at that time I'm like searching for myself. So, I admire my 2nd brother very much, even until now. I have 2 brothers and 2 sisters. I'm number 3. This is because from all of us, he is the most intelligent and the most successfull. He has his own company now, he is one of the few IT people in Malaysia who have these skills:-

Know where to get IT business, because he has strong links and sometimes he can easily get business
A good IT leader (because I have worked part time under him and I overheard his subordinate talked within themselves while I was sleeping)
An expert in Linux and networking. He always "in front" when comes to IT knowledge and experience even if compared to other IT people that I have met so far.
Even if he did not know, he can learn quite fast. Unlike other IT people. And he also like to learn.

He got all of the skills above most probably because he has a very good friend since he was still 13 years old. His friend have rich parents so my brother learn from his friend. Last time I heard that his friend work as a Sun engineer (or is it consultant ?) at a public-listed IT company. If you can list down a list of public-listed IT company I might probably call up the name of the company.

Anyway, my 2nd brother was also one of my Linux Sifu. I've learn quite a lot from him though he did not actually taught me directly.

My other Sifu was Obelicks, Wyse, 3-Suku (actually Ramli), Hasbullah and many others from BBS bbs.rindu.net. Thanks guys for teaching me a lot of things in network. Most of the time, I log into the BBS, and keep it idle, just looking into what the Sifus talking about, and tried to learn from them. I miss you guys. Hey where the bbs.rindu.net now ?

They are really expert, apart from my brother. In fact, sometimes they know more than my brother. :-)