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I obtained the following information from an image scan of a Yaesu document.  This information has been available for some time, although I have yet to find it anywhere in plain text so I am providing it here.  Any typos are surely mine, although I did fix what I thought were some typos in the original document.  In any case, if there is a conflict of information between this version and the original, the original should be assumed to be more  accurate.

This came out of research into a software mod for the FT-897 and FT-857 radios.  I know based on my memory map where to write the data, I just wanted that data to be easier to figure out what is proper and what is not.

About 1998 I started writing a book entitled Hackers and Super Spies.  This was an attempt to document non-internet based threats to data security.  There were several motivating factors associated with this, however, the largest was that I had noticed most people were focusing on internet based threats and ignoring all others.  Much has happened in the last 12 years, I have even learned some new techniques.  The biggest thing that has not happened is I have not finished my book.  I got distracted with several things, have moved a few times to a few different countries, and generally let my ADD get the better of me.

I had intended on publishing this book in print format, available at finer book stores.  The lack of progress on the book has lead to no publisher wanting to talk to me.  I only have some notes cobbled together and they usually want at least 2 finished chapers and a table of contents.

Instead of trying to go the book publishing route, I have changed my mind and decided to publish the material here, when I am less lazy and my ADD does not get the better of me.  Since this is a blog, it is much more suited to random notes and it would ultimately be less work for me to put the notes into some format that would be useful here.

There is a breaking news story about a group of hacker types that broke into a computer system, obtained some emails (about 200 megs worth) and released that information to the public.  The institution that was broken into was the University of East Anglia’s Climatic Research Unit, who provided the key data for the UNs IPCC, shows they suppressed evidence that for the last 10 years climate change is not occuring.  They also discussed ways to discredit and silence dissenters who do not agree with the IPCC report or in climate change on various levels.

This is good news because if it is proved true, and so far confirmations are starting to pour in that the data is in fact true, then all of the doom that was predicted for the planet is completely false.  This means that we are not facing total extinction, sea levels will not rise and flood the coastal areas, crops will not die, we will not experience droughts of epic proportions leading to lack of water and food causing wars (why Al Gore won his nobel peace prize, for helping to prevent hundreds of wars over resource exhaustion related to climate change), and more.

I have an Asus 1000HE eeepc.  I like it, mostly its battery life.  I installed eeebuntu not being a big windows fan and was displeased when I discovered that you could not directly install to a root cryptofs.  I did it anyway, although it takes a round-a-bout method to accomplish.

For those that do not know, cryptofs is a whole disk encryption solution in linux.  It is transparent to the user, aside from having to enter a passphrase (which can be very long) when you mount the disk.  Making / (root) cryptofs requires some modification to the initrd so that it will load the appropriate modules, set up the proper pseudodevice entries, and then mount the disk.  Swap can also be made encrypted making it even more difficult for anyone to get anything out of your system should it fall into the wrong hands.

Unlike some of the other tutorials out there I do not require you to do an intermediate temporary install, this means that your entire disk except /boot can be encrypted in one go.

The zombies have attacked, infrastruture is down, there will be no more cigarette deliveries made.  How will you get your nicotine fix?  I recently started smoking electronic cigarettes, they are composed of a tip which you add a couple drops of nicotine infused oil to, an vaporizer which heats the oil into a vapor, and a battery.  The whole thing looks like a cigarette, smokes like a cigarette and provides nicotine like a cigarette (which helps my legs, I have RLS and PLMD which about 10% of the population has to some degree).

Smoking can also give away your position due to the odor given off, electronic cigarettes give off water vapor so they do not pose the fire hazard, but also they do not have the odor, as a result no one will be attracted to the smell of them, ensuring at least a little bit of safety.  There was an FDA report that came out, it said that some manufacturers (but not all!) contain some potentially bad chemicals, some contain nothing deemed harmful.  Some have twice the normal amount of nicotine, but most are accurately labeled.  The biggest complaint appears to be the flavors, they come in chocolate, cherry, vanilla and more.  The claim is that they only make these flavors to get kids to smoke therefore the entire industry must be banned.  Its insane logic at best.  Electronic cigarettes do not have a tobacco tax since there is no tobacco, they also do not have tar or about 4000 other chemicals that are present in regular cigarettes, while this is still fewer than normal air, things like carbon monoxide are not present which makes it somewhat healthier.

I wrote a letter to the ARRL asking if there were any new NPRM (notice of proposed rule making) by the FCC or a campaign in the ARRL to ask the FCC to reconsider the wording of FCC rule 97.117.  What I got back suprised me, and indicates that the ARRL does not want this type of communication to occur.

Specifically I used Email from services like winlink, IRLP and Echolink as examples of how 97.117 “gets in the way”, however this subject also applies to emergencies that cross borders.

If there is an emergency on the US/CA or US/MX border it is likely that ham radio operators would be involved on both sides of the disaster.  However, their relief efforts are hindered by 97.117.  To illustrate why I will quote 97.117.

As some of you are aware I dabble in FreeSWITCH development. Last night in a fit of insomnia, I wrote an event scheduler in LUA for FreeSWITCH that is capable of allowing multiple nodes to process the events without duplication. This speaks to the power of FreeSWITCH that something trivial can add such functionality.  This means that you can have a cluster that can all process the events without assigning specific events to each switch.

Potential applications for this include “hotel style wake up calls”, “blind date rescue calls” and even the infamous “get out of a boring meeting fast call”.  You just need to insert a small row in a MySQL database which includes the API command to run (such as originate) and the timestamp to run it at. 

About 15 years ago I bought an optoelectronics scout frequency recorder.   I thought it would help me find fun and interesting things to listen to on my radio, and it has not let me down.  After 15 years however the nicads that came in it were showing their age and it would not operator for more than 15-20 minutes on a charge.  I looked for a replacement battery and optoelectronics wanted $40 for one, and other vendors were not much better.

I decided there had to be a cheaper way.  After a trip to Fry’s electronics, I got everything I needed for $10 including tax.  Here is a brief explanation of what I did.

The other day I shined a light on the marxist ideals that the world wide preppers network is putting out there, and I wanted to elaborate a bit on their misconceptions.

These ideals are the same ones SEIU, ACORN and even the Obama administration is pushing now.  While they are entitled to their opinions, I wanted to discuss why they are factually incorrect and based upon false premises.  Doing away with the banks is step one to marxism, and what will replace the banks?  The government of course.

An example of how banks (and thus bankers) are inherently evil was provided to me like this:

There are 5 people on an island, a banker, a farmer and 3 others whose job is irrelevant.  The farmer borrows $100 to buy some chickens, feed, fencing and related items.  The farmer now owes $110, principle and interest.  The farmer will not be able to pay this back to the bank because the only money that exists is $100.

I wanted to talk for a minute about why internet linked repeaters and radios are somewhat detrimental to ham radio.  This is not to say there is no benefit, or that the systems should be scrapped, instead I think the rules should be changed, where applicable.

First, let me explain what I mean by internet connected repeaters and radios.  Systems like EchoLink, IRLP, and similar are software solutions that bridge a repeater or a radio to a distant point via the internet.  The audio is sent via some type of VoIP, and often there is signalling information sent as well which will tell the radio to transmit or not.