Saturday, April 6, 2024
Apr 6 (Sat) – Update
Yesterday went like this:
I ran around with Kyle, helping him get things squared away re: his car. I also found time to finish the computer project I’ve been working on. I also managed to get the lawn mower out of storage and mow the back yard. It’s was well over a foot tall in a few places. I also raked and bagged some of the clippings so they won’t smother the grass. It was dusk when I finished so a busy day..
The computer project I’ve been working on is a VPN monitor. It’s a small chunk of code that periodically checks a few things and notifies me if any of the checks fail. My preference is to check on things from time to time instead of trusting that they’re working.
.
The VPN monitor first checks to see that two required software utilities are installed. It then checks if the computer is connected to the LAN, and that there’s an internet connection. It sends a pop-up message to a corner of the computer screen that tells me if any of those checks fail.
.
If they’re good the monitor moves on. It checks to see if my VPN is connected, that one and only one ‘internet phone book’ is being used to look up internet addresses, and that the phone book it’s using belongs to my VPN service and NOT my internet service provider. All those checks are done silently in the background. To be thorough, it does ten random phone book lookups, one second between each one. It sends a pop-up message to a corner of the computer screen if any of those checks fail. Failure may mean there’s ‘a leak’ that personal data could get through.
.
The monitor then rests for one second. After resting it repeats everything I just described, over and over as long as the computer is on. This may seem like paranoia or that I’m psychologically unbalanced (at least in that regard) but it’s simple, really. Some of our most important possessions are being taken from us without permission and without compensation and I’ll do what I reasonably can to limit my exposure to such shenanigans. And because I have some level of mistrust in my computer I’ll keep an eye on it as well..
It’s time for breakfast. Cheers.