The C++ Programming Language by the creator of C++

Just started to wade through the tome that is the above book by non-other than Bjarne Stroustrup himself.

I am looking forward to it - but his opening assertion that C++ is 'fun' is already something I have taken issue with :-)

It should make for interesting reading when stacked up against the C++ Coding Standards (101 rules, guidelines and best practices) which he was also involved in writing.

Finally...

..got around to completing "C++ for Dummies" as mentioned on Feburary 10th of this year!

Now to proceed with completing the following

"C++ Coding Standards - 101 Rules, Guidelines and Best Practices"

So far I am at point 18. There is a lot to C++ !

Finally got OpenVPN and Firestarter to play nice

My last post indicated there were web pages out there you could refer to to get Firestarter and OpenVPN to work together.

However the following link provided me with the details for MY situation (your own may obviously be different)

http://ignore-your.tv/2006/08/03/openvpn-and-firestarter/

So, for me I had to update the user-pre file with details of my tap interface. Thus I added the following:-

$IPT -A INPUT -i tap+ -j ACCEPT
$IPT -A OUTPUT -o tap+ -j ACCEPT

To find out if you must add details for a tap or tun interface, run the command 'ifconfig -a' from your command line and look for the 'tap0' or 'tun0' (or similar text). Note, this of course will only show up IF your VPN is already up and running - but not working (due to Firestarter ;-)

Security - Linux style

Maybe it's because I have been left scarred by my use of Windows or maybe it's simply good sense but I am adding a firewall and virus checker to my Fedora install.

• Firestarter (firewall)
• clamAV (virus checker)

Life in the Old Dog yet?

Seems I could have been a bit premature on the future of the Palm Pre. HP are certainly talking up entry into the smartphone market with the Palm and webOs leading the way.

The OS (in my opinion) is at least the equal of the iPhone OS in most regards and better in others (true multitasking from the word go on webOS).

Now lets see how HP takes on Apple in the coming months!

The big advantage for HP/Palm is the community of developers out there who love to develop on the webOS platform.

Palm Pre

I am very much enjoying using the Palm Pre. Unfortunately it looks like the days of the Palm are numbered. Little or nothing has been heard of potential onoing developments for webOS devices since the takeover by HP.

If anyone has heard of anything from HP in terms of a roadmap for webOS and future smartphones from Palm/HP I would be very much interested in hearing about it....along with every other Palm Pre owner!

Linux kernel and Linksys USB wireless adapter

I had problems with my Linksys WUSB54GS wireless adapter when I tried to use it with Ubuntu (v9.10 Karmic Koala and v10.04 Lucid Lynx) and Fedora (Fedora Core 2 and Fedora 12).

Sometimes it would work and find my network. Other times it would not. This seemed to be related to issues with its driver (rndis).

I purchased a new TP-Link wireless adapter from e-bay. This worked straight out of the box with Ubuntu 10.04. This uses the rt73 driver (I think).

Anyway, the up-shot is I am finally certain that I have a wireless adapter I can reply on and I can recommend it - for Ubuntu 10.04 at least. I am going to re-install Fedora 12 and see what happens there.