A Blue Star

February 29 is a date that only occurs once every four years, and is called leap day. This day is added to the calendar in leap years as a corrective measure, because the earth does not orbit around the sun in precisely 365.000 days.
The chance of being born on leap year day is about 1 in 1,500, there are about 4 million people worldwide with February 29 as there birthday.

This is the algorithm that I used to determine if a given year is a leap year or not. I’m not sure where I got it from but it comes in handy when creating calendar applications.

if (year % 4 == 0) && ((year % 100 != 0) or (year % 400 == 0))
then leap
else no_leap

I’m sure there are more interesting things about leap years that I don’t know.
I suggest that you check out wikipedia.org page on Leap_year

OpenDNS is a custom DNS server that you can use instead of using your IPS’s DNS server.
It checks any address that you lookup against its own list of bad sites (phishing scams, and other things) and redirects you accordingly. It also provides a simple way of enabling/disabling blocking of adult websites.

It often used in schools and big office networks because it allows you to enter in your own black list of sites to block such as YouTube, MySpace and Facebook. (Note: If your school or work blocks MySpace, Facebook, or YouTube, you might be able to regain access by changing your DNS address to different public DNS server or use a public proxy) It also provides trending stats on what web pages are visited most, how often, how how long each visit was. (Great for network techs)

A side effect of letting you black list domains is that it lets you disable most ad network, by disabling the DNS look up of there domain. (great for people that hate ads)

The service is great, lots of features, flexibility, its free and easy to use. I will probably install on my parents computer BUT!

How does OpenDNS make money?
OpenDNS makes money by offering clearly labeled advertisements alongside organic search results when the domain entered is not valid and not a typo we can fix. OpenDNS will provide additional services on top of its enhanced DNS service, and some of them may cost money. Speedy, reliable DNS will always be free.

When you type in a bad domain instead of returning “domain not found” error message it forwards you to a search page with ads on it, this is how they pay for this service. A lot of my applications that I write rely on this “domain not found” error message. I been getting an increase in the amount of support calls from people that are use this service and because it disables the 404 error and my free utilities. I now have to update some my utilities to support DNS servers that don’t support “domain not found” error message.

Great service but it has one fatal flaw, it tried to make money.

The OpenDNS Name Servers are 208.67.222.222 and 208.67.220.220.

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Update:
John Roberts from OpenDNS contacted me via comment asking me for more details on this problem. I’m always impressed when support staff search the internet for reviews, questions and comments about there products.I have included two Wireshark log files nonopendns.txt, opendns.txtIn the first file nonOpenDNS log in frame#2 in the DNS section it read

Flags: 0×8183 (Standard query response, No such name)

In the second file the OpenDNS log in frame #3 in the DNS section it reads

Flags: 0×8180 (Standard query response, No error)
Answers
xxxxxxxxxxnothere.com: type A, class IN, addr 208.67.217.130

The open DNS server redirected the response from a dead address, my utilities can not longer find out if a domain is valid or not and no longer work. I’m in the process of creating a work around and it shouldn’t be too hard.

I should also mention that I am by no means an expert at DNS stuff. Most of knowledge comes from hacking together what I needed when I needed it.

There are various reasons to disable your anti virus temporarily.
AVG 7 does not make it easy to disable it.

 Instructions 

1. Right click on the AVG icon in your system tray (bottom right next to the clock)
2. Select “Launch AVG Free Control Center”
3. On the Security status page, you should see a list of items with green check boxes next to them.
4. Right click on “Resident shield” and select “Properties”
5. Un check “Turn on AVG Free resident Shield protectio”
6. Click OK

Remember to re-enable the virus scanner when you are done doing what ever you are doing.

This is a mild but spicy chicken soup (it can also be made with shrimp, pork, beef or mushrooms), flavored with the very unique flavor of galangal (”kha” in Thai) which creates a heavenly taste when combined with hot chile peppers, coconut milk, lime leaves and lemongrass.

Ingredients

• 16 fluid ounces soup broth (chicken stock)
• 4-5 kaffir lime leaves, shredded
• 4 or 5 2 inch pieces fresh lemongrass, bruised to release flavor
• 1 inch cube (or a bit more) galangal sliced thinly.
• 4 tablespoons fish sauce
• 2 tablespoons lime juice
• 4 oz chicken breast cut into smallish bite sized pieces
• 5 fluid ounces coconut milk
• small red Thai chile peppers, slightly crushed (to taste)
• coriander (cilantro) leaves to garnish.

Note the number of red peppers is a personal choice. It can be as few as half a chilli per diner, to as many as 8-10 per diner, but the dish should retain a balance of flavors and not be overwhelmend by the chili peppers. We suggest about 8-12 chili peppers for this recipe.

Method

Heat the stock, add the lime leaves, lemongrass, galangal, fish sauce, and lime juice. Stir thoroughly, bring to a boil, and add the chicken and coconut milk, then the chile peppers. Bring back to the boil, lower the heat to keep it simmering and cook for about 2 minutes (until the chicken is cooked through). Enjoy!

Not really intended to be eaten as a separate course, we like it served ladled over a bowl of steamed Thai jasmine rice. This quantity serves 4 with other food, but is probably only enough for two if eaten separately.

If you would like to have a decent-tasting tom kha without spending the time to prepare above, we also suggest you try our convenient Tom Ka Paste (click to see description).

This is a list of torrent sites that I use regularly. Ranked by popularity

• http://www.mininova.org/
• http://www.youtorrent.com/
• http://thepiratebay.org/
• http://isohunt.com/

My favorite bit torrent client is http://www.utorrent.com/