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From 1993 till 1996 I worked for Control Data Systems (CDS) in the Netherlands. CDS was the systems integrator spin-off of mainframe manufacturer Control Data Corporation, once one of the largest computer companies in the world, behind IBM of course. An often used line was: “IBM and the BUNCH”, bunch being Burrows, Unisys, NCR, Control Data and Honeywell. I visited their HQ in Minneapolis-Saint Paul (the Twin Cities) once and had a good time there. Back in 1993 we had a 9k6 leased-line from Holland to the corporate network, and a public IP on the desktop (cdh.cdc.com sub-domain). You could download a new linux kernel (sourceRead More →

Bremen Überseestadt - Tweaking tech - klop.solutions

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In 2012 I moved from the Netherlands to Bremen, Germany. Both countries being part of the European Union, a work permit is not required. Obviously, a lot of things are different in Germany and many information regarding this subject is available on the Internet. I found that many sources just repeat each other, and are not written by someone who actually did this. My information might help others with working and living in Germany. 1. Have a job arranged up front, without it, forget it. For me this part was easy, but make sure you speak the language “sufficiently”. I found that making language errors is notRead More →

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When accessing the network of my company over VPN, the connection to the remote access infrastructure is initiated through my browser. Actually, the browser downloads and runs a piece of software from Juniper called Network Connect. Juniper also provides a standalone client software called Junos Pulse. An IOS version of this software is available as well. I find the Junos Pulse client to have some advantages over the “browser” method. Most importantly, the Junos Pulse client handles suspend/wake of your PC or Mac correctly, meaning that after closing/opening the lid of your laptop, the remote connection is resumed without the need to log in again.Read More →

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One measure to harden WordPress is to disable PHP execution in specific folders. WordPress and several blog posts mention the wp-content and wp-includes folder. After disabling PHP execution on these two folders, the visual editor broke, not showing my post while the editing toolbar was gone as well. This problem not immediately relates to PHP execution being disabled since everything else worked perfectly fine.. I make notes of every change and my “Admin Logbook” (some might call it “Captains Log..”) showed the last change being this hardening change.  After I enabled PHP execution on wp-includes only, the editor worked again. Note that you have to clear theRead More →