How to access blocked sites

Lemme start this post with a note to system / network administrators who blocks internet access only because they can and they themselves surf the sites unblocked : Information is free and you cannot block it .. People will find out ways to bypass in time .. Now another note to people who wants to access blocked sites : If your school has blocked Orkut, then they have done it for your own good .. Orkut is addictive and you should find better ways to utilize your energy .. And if you want to access blocked sites from office .. Try completing whatever your boss asked you to before reading on ..

And now that the sermon is over, lemme write some tricks to bypass evil administrator’s evil policies to access what they think is bad for you .. 😀 :

1: The domain that you want to access is blocked ..? No problem .. most administrators block the domains by their domain names and they forget there is something called IP Address … 😀 .. Find out the IP address of the site that you want to visit and put it in the address bar and viola .. You can access it .. How to find out IP address of a website ..?? Just Whois it .. 😀 . .. You can use services like DomainTools or NetworkSolutions , Robtex… This works for websites which are on a dedicated server .. So sites like ICICIDirect can be accessed like this ..

2: First trick not working for you ..?? Try WorkFriendly .. It will let you surf the website you want in a Microsoft Word like interface to save you from your boss’s peering eyes .. Or try these language tools :

One more site that I may recommend is Google Mobile Search .. This one is useful when you are dying to find out the score and all cricket sites are blocked ..

3: Second tip is useful for static pages but if you want to dynamic websites like Orkut, you need to use a proxy site… : These are proxy sites that I’ve used and liked :

  • KProxy : This is the most famous and most used proxy website .. :D.. Goto KProxy and type in the address that you want to surf and click on Surf .. 😀 ..
     It wont be long before KProxy will be blocked .. So afterwards try their secure connection.. Most cocky administrators do not block secure sites as they do not know how to block them.. 😀 ..

  • Y11: Y11 is another secure proxy which isnt blocked by many filters .. Use it while it lasts .. 😀

  • Fumo2 : Fumo2 is a nice and fast proxy .. And as its url doesnt contain word “proxy” it has less chance of getting blocked .. Fumo2 has some more aliases like BakaAdmin and IpSite.net which you can find on their home page itself ..

  • IceKeeper : IceKeeper is another great proxy that used to help me surfing Blogspot when it was blocked in my office .. Very fast too ..

  • LuckyCRM : Found this one searching for proxies online .. Turned out to be a nice one ….

  • Melap : Recommended by one of my friend .. Nice and fast too ..

  • CountryCodes : Another proxy that has a deceptive name so less prone to be blocked ..

There are many more .. Believe me, I’ll tell you how to find a new proxy .. 😀 .. First check the next tip :

4: Most of these proxy sites have aliases so you can use the alias in case the main domain is blocked.Here are the aliases to KProxy .. So if KProxy is blocked, try any of their aliases such as wpc1964.amenworld.com … To find alias of proxy sites, goto Robtex , type in the web site that you want to search alias for, click on Go .. In the results page, the address that are listed as ‘a’ are aliases to this domain .. So use these aliases ..

5: Actually this is combination of first and third trick .. Find out the IP address of the proxy website and then use it for surfing .. Simple .. 😛

Now the last one .. How did I get all these proxy websites ..?? 😀 .. I used a simple query on Google which does not include any keywords that will make your system administrator think that you are searching for proxy sites .. 😀 .. But you will get a list of proxy sites that are using PHProxy which is the most common proxy software used on web servers .. and do not worry .. this list is huge .. and will keep on increasing .. 😀 ..

.. .. . . ..

Now that I’ve found a way to vent my anger on evil system administrators I feel relaxed .. I dont see logic behind blocking Hotmail or Gmail or Yahoo which are default email address for most people .. To my readers, I’ll like to request .. : If you are benefited by this write up and / or you know some more proxies or tricks that you use, please leave your comment so that others can benefit .. And book mark this page so that you can find out more updated content .. .. And if you are one of those evil administrators whose job I just made a bit more difficult, how about sharing some tips on how you are going to stop users from accessing blocked sites ..? This will improve both of us .. …

Over and all .. !

How never to get lost in Mumbai anymore..

      Since I’ve got Lost fever again, I wanted to write something about it but seems I m gonna write something else .. 😛 .. Anyway, here I am going to talk about people who get lost time and again in Mumbai because they are new to the city and / or never remember the stations or bus numbers and / or too lazy to find out .. All the above mentioned qualities are present in me .. 😀

     So necessity is the mother in law of plagiarism ( Heheh … that was a good one ) .. I wanted to goto Lamington road to get some computer parts .. But Lamington road is so far from here as Andaman n Nicobar are far from New Delhi .. Some desperate calls to my longtime friend Ashish yeilded some results but that included changing trains or taking train to CST and then coming back by bus .. So much for a lazy brat like me .. Continue reading How never to get lost in Mumbai anymore..

[HowTo] Restore your lost broadband password ..

This tutorial has its origin on a thread at Digit forum where a member asked if we can restore lost password from router. I decided to put my CCNA skills to use. And indeed after some adventures with ATMOS commands, I figured it out. So here it goes.

The problem this guy had was this: He had an Airtel connection and Huawei MT880 Adsl router. His ISP username and password is saved on the router and it gets connected when he turn on the router. Now he forgot his password and wanted to change it. And couldn’t because it was saved in the router. Using those asterisk removing utilities didn’t work too. So he was stuck there. Now if you have the same story, you could try this too :

You will need your router password to reset your ISP password. This is different from your ISP acount’s password. On most routers, the default username / password combination is admin/admin or admin/1234 . If you have changed your router password and forgot it too, then I cant help you. You can though reset router password with Reset slot in your router.
I’ll be using HyperTerminal for Telnet as it has got some nice functions. You can use other telnet utils too… So lets start:

  • Run HyperTerminal by Start > Programs > Accesories> Communications > HyperTerminal.
  • Enter any name for the Connection. Click on OK.
  • In the Connect Using combo box, select TCP/IP (WinSock) and enter 192.168.1.1 as Host address. (192.168.1.1 is usually your router’s address ). If you have customized your router’s ip address then enter the customized address. The Port Number 23 is fine, no need to change it. Click on Connect.
  • You will get a login prompt. Enter your router username and password here. If all goes allright you will get a prompt saying “Login Successful”.
  • Now on the console, type this:
  •       console enable {Press Enter}
  • You’ll get a prompt like this:
  •       Quantum>
  • Now on the prompt, type this:
  •       Quantum> fm {Press Enter}
  • The prompt will change to Quantum fm>.
  • Now in HyperTerminal, click on Transfer > Capture Text. Enter a location to save the settings file. For example My Documents\mysettings.txt .
  • Click on Start. You will be back to the router prompt.
  • Now type this:
  •       Quantum fm> cat im.conf {Press Enter}
  • This is quite a big file and it will take a while to list. Just wait until the listing is complete and you get back to the prompt.
  •       Click on Transfer > Capture Text > Stop.
  • Now the tough part is over.
  • Type these commands on the console to quit telnet:
  •       Quantum fm>home {Press Enter}
  •       Quantum>exit {Press Enter}
  •       >user logout {Press Enter}
  • Now you can quit HyperTerminal .

Now open the file we saved in Notepad and press Ctrl F.
Enter weLogin in the string to find.
And here you can see your ISP login details in clear text. 😛 …

I have tested this on Huawei MT880 and MT 882 routers. I cannot guarantee that they work on other routers too. But Atmos commands are usually same on all devices so they should work on other routers too.. And finally, you shouldn’t try it if you aren’t comfortable with command line usage. Don’t hold me accountable if you screwup doing things you shouldn’t be doing. Hope this helped… !

Yahoo Emoticons for MSN Messenger..

This is a long overdue post 😛 .. I was busy with CCNA and some other things so I could post it earlier.. Anyways, Here it is.

Being a Yahoo Messenger user for years, I am used to Yahoo Messenger emoticons. And after some of my friends decided to shift to MSN messenger, I had to become a regular on MSN Messenger too .. But I missed Yahoo’s emoticons. And add to it that MSN Messenger’s emoticon looks ugly to me. So I decided to utilize MSN Messenger’s Custom Emoticon feature to add Yahoo emoticons to MSN Messenger.
I have released it as a custom emoticon pack, and if you want to import Yahoo emoticons to MSN Messenger, you have two choices. The first is to manually copy and paste custom emoticons to your messenger folder OR Use MSN BackitUp. I’ll explain both methods one by one:

  • Method 1: Manual Copy Paste:
    1. Download and extract the archive. You will get a folder called CustomEmoticons with around 80 .dat files. Right Click on the folder and select Copy.
    2. Now in your Windows drive ( C: on most systems), navigate to Application Data folder. For ex: C:\Document & Settings \ YourUsernameOnTheComputer \Application Data\ Microsoft\ MSN Messenger\ ARandomNumberString\.
    3. There may be more than one folders in your MSN Messenger directory if you have multiple MSN IDs on the same computer. You have to open the folder which corresponds to the ID that you wanna have Yahoo Emoticons.
    4. Paste the CustomEmoticons folder here that you downloaded.
    5. Run MSN Messenger .. 😛 .. You have YMSN Emoticons as your custom emoticons.
  • Do NOT use this method if you already have many custom emoticons as this may overwrite your existing Custom emoticons.

  • Method 2: Use MSN BackUp:
    1. Download and extract the archive. Note that this one is different from the archive above.
    2. Download and install MSN Backup. Its a great program to backup your MSN Messenger settings. We’ll use it to import custom emoticons.
    3. Run the program and enter your MSN Id in the textbox given. You will need to be running MSN Messenger too.
    4. In the right hand pane, navigate to the folder where you extracted the downloaded archive.
    5. It will take a while to load all the custom emoticons. After they have loaded, Enable the checkbox next to Emoticons in the right side pane.
    6. Click on the Install Objects button. The custom emoticons will be imported within in a minute.
    7. You may get one or two errors and two or three emoticons out of total 82 wont be imported. (I have no idea why some of them does not get imported..)
  • Most emoticans use the same format as Yahoo Messenger but for some emoticons you will need to put an extra : to make them work. For example use ::| for 😐 .

    I’ve tested it with Windows Live Messenger and I hope they work with previous version of MSN Messenger too. I hope you will like it. 🙂 …

    And yeah .. These emoticons are copyrighted by Yahoo. So you should agree to their terms of use if you wanna use these emoticans. ….

Growing Up …

      For most people, growing up is synonymous to getting older. But after living for almost a quarter of century, I look upon my life and realize its much more than just getting older.. Its about getting more experience, getting more ideas , its about getting mature (I seem to hit upon the exact word ) ..

      So here I am, with my life before me … So much time seems to have passed .. I have lived my life as it came .. played, laughed, cried, teased, run, fell, got up, hurt, got hurt, learned, unlearned , forgot , remembered .. I have done it all .. and I liked it … If I’d given chance to life again, I’ll still make the decisions I made, I’ll go from those paths that I went ..

      So what did I learn from all my life’s experiences ..? When I compare myself from what I was 10 years ago, I find many changes in myself … The most prominent one: becoming deliberate from being spontaneous .. Now I think before I act .. and I am no more impatient ..I am now more content then I was ten years ago .. and I am more aggressive .. Perhaps those are the signs of maturity … I now know that maturity isn’t something you’d gain just by being old .. You’ll have to interact… think .. feel … act .. I now know that world isn’t perfect — it was never meant to .. I don’t expect perfect outcomes now .. because if you become perfect, you wont have any chance to improve — which is imperfect in its own .. Over the years I feel becoming more self centered .. which I think is a by product of maturity – or vice versa .. Here too I am talking about myself from the start .. I now feel more confident in being honest about things I feel .. which is a nice thing as I have said everything about myself without any hesitation and without any lie .. Over the years I have seen people’s expectations from me growing .. sometimes I find it choking me .. sometimes I find it very stimulating … I have learned that if you fear something it will keep you haunting for ever .. and if you face it firmly you will conquer it .. .. Be it a memory of someone

      I stopped celebrating my birthday long ago as I don’t see the logic in people congratulating you on something to which you have no credit .. I’ve been very less emotional from start and I feel birthdays are just like other days .. But I still love the surprise feeling of answering some long lost friends’ call .. Hey .. thats the reason I remember all my friend’s birthdays .. 🙂 ….I dont believe in making resolutions becuase I don’t need any resolution to do something …

      Hmm… I wanna end this monologue now .. So when I look at my 11 year old cousin who now dreams to become a pilot, I get reminded of myself … One can draw his inspiration from anywhere .. and thats why I believe that this is a continous process .. I have yet to see more .. and experience and explore …. Life is meant for learning .. and growing up .. these years will keep coming and going … what counts in the end is how you utilize the time alloted to you …

[Listening to:Why does it always rain on me by Travis]

A User’s Guide to Instant Messengers – II

To continue with my earlier post , Now I will discuss what I want to have in the Instant Messenger of my choice .. Though some proceedings made me to modify my original post. Earlier I had decided that I will point out features separately for both messengers, but now as both Yahoo Messenger and MSN Messenger will start supporting each other’s networks, I guess the ultimate messenger program they will release around June 2006 will support both program’s features . . .So I will make an ambiguous list that is relevant to most clients. 
A disclaimer: People like me usually chat on text mode. This partly due to chatting with many people at once, being a fast typist and, not wanting to appear as I am talking to my computer for that matter :D..
So, most of the features that I want are related to text conversations …
Continue reading A User’s Guide to Instant Messengers – II