iPad Network Settings Corruption

I had a problem with connecting my ipad to my VPN, I was getting authentication problems or connection problems, after searching for a couple of hours with no hint of a solution I came across a reference to a tip offered by an Apple tech which was to reset network settings and what do you know it worked! I guess network settings are corrupted now and again or the upgrade to 4.2 and the jailbreak broke something . It requires a reboot so beware tethered jailbreakers. You'll also have to re-enter all your network settings including WiFi keys. Simply go to General and select the reset menu :



Then select reset network settings from the next menu :




The ipad should then reboot.

Linking To A YouTube Video Timeline

To link to a YT video that starts a specific point in the video append the YouTube url with #t=MMmSSs where MM=minutes and SS=seconds : e.g. : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DFM140rju4k#t=1m24s

Redcar.NET

Currently working on tidying up redcar.net for my brother, just making a bit easier to navigate (and moderate) and generally improving it. It has a userbase of around 16,000 members mostly locals but many from around the world.

Bad Company 2 Lag and Disconnects

Had a problem recently with Bad Company 2 (BFBC2) on the XBox360 giving an error on connection : "Unable to connect to EA Online", all other online functionality worked, along with World at War. After trying multiple fixes, opening DMZ on the router for the XBox's IP and pretty much everything else and three days later I had a thought that perhaps the network card in the 360 may be causing the problem, turning off by the standby button obviously wouldn't help because if the construction is similar to a PC then the NIC would still be taking standby power and as the 360 is able to be 'woken' by the wireless controller then that is likely to be the case. I removed the power lead from the back of the console to completely remove power and magically after so much messing about I was instantly able to connect again. Ridiculously simple but it just never occured to me that the NIC would specifically affect one game. Something to try if you found this by Google.

Android Shortcuts

A few useful Android commands / shortcuts

To enter recovery mode from power off : Home + Power
To Mount the SD card from terminal use : ums_enable
To exit console use : reboot

Restoring Or Adding Ringtones To An Android Phone.

To restore or add ring-tones and other audio to an Android phone either post or pre-root.

First download audio-resources.zip from here : http://www.cyanogenmod.com/downloads/audio-resources/

Create a folder called 'Media' in the root of the SD card if it doesn't exist and then a folder called 'Audio' inside that folder and extract the four folders in the zip into that folder.

















Once copied, the phone may take a while to acknowledge their existence, if they don't show up in your settings options, leave the settings menu and wait for a couple of minutes and retry.
The G1 is a little slow in scanning new audio but it gets there eventually.

The only problem with the above procedure is the ring-tones and notifications won't be accessible when the SD card is mounted for computer access, if this is a problem to you then you'll need to download the SDK and use the following procedure under 'internal memory install'

http://wiki.cyanogenmod.com/index.php/How_to_install_more_audio_ringtones_and_alerts

Backing Up Passwords in Firefox

When needing to completely re-install Firefox after problems with plugins, file corruption or just a new OS install; backing up cookies and bookmarks is fairly straight-forward but I was having to manually copy my passwords and re-enter after re-installation. I decided to investigate the problem and discovered the passwords are stored between two files:




















Browse to the Firefox profile folder : Application Data\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\ and copy the key3.db and signons.sqlite files.

About this blog :

If anyone happens to stumble upon this; I made this as a notebook/diary as a way to remember general PC stuff and also as something of a diary.

A little about me:

My name is Michael, I'm 42, I live in Redcar on the North East coast of England, Middlesborugh is just up the road and Newcastle a lot further up the road ;). I'm not married, have no kids. I don't work due to suffering depression/panic attacks for the last few years although I'm at the point where I'm ready to try to go back to work again.

I'm a standard nerd, as Denholm Reynholm would say. My current interests in no particular order are : Poker, COD on the XBox360, Satellite TV (not the sky variety), Graham Linehan, Bill Hicks (inspiration for the name of the blog), Pink Floyd/Roger Waters, Pet Shop Boys, New Order and PV's (personal vaporisers commonly known as e-cigs or e-cigarettes).

I spend way too much time repairing and cleaning up other peoples computers and have been a nerd since 1980 when I got a Philips G7000 for Christmas.