Thinking aloud: Azure, AWS, DevOps, cars and opinion from Alex Neihaus

  • IRS tax scam calls: dangerous and laughable

    Just listen to the voicemail I received from a spoofed DC phone number today: Chilling, ain’t it? There are so many red flags in this message. Anyone who’s ever tried to contact the IRS knows it’s positively Kafkaesque trying to get someone on the phone. And even if you could get someone from the IRS…

  • I am not an attorney and I don’t play one on TV

    Patriot Act: BAD. Section 215 very bad. We’ve known this for a long time (thanks, Snowden). But now the appeals court for the Second Circuit has ruled that the bulk collection of phone metadata is illegal. Finally. I’m emotional about this because the executive branch has used a bad law to threaten dire consequences and force people and…

  • How my BMW 335i’s collision warning system avoided a nasty accident and redistributed the hummus

    Today, on the way home from grocery shopping, my BMW 335i’s forward collision warning system prevented an accident — and may have saved Tricia’s and my life. We were traveling east on Route 9 in Westborough. We were in the right lane and had stopped for the light at Lyman St. Once the light changed…

  • A love affair that just gets better and better: WordPress 4.2

      Source: WordPress › WordPress 4.2 “Powell” On the off chance that you don’t know how much I am smitten by WordPress, this short ode to WordPress 4.2 should do it. Conversely, you all know by now how much I abhor Drupal. So, recruiters, stop sending me Drupal contracts, OK? Just because my blog comes up when you…

  • AWS: the best thing since sliced bread?

    At AWS re:Invent last November, I was invited to a marketing panel in which AWS sought customer feedback. I’ll never forget the developer on the panel who kept proclaiming his “love” of AWS — the answer to every question he was asked was, essentially, that AWS is the best technology ever invented. I think even…

  • How to kill your Windows Server in EC2 with one click…and how to get it back

    This is unlikely to be the most technical post I’ve written lately. But it might be among the most important. Here’s a rule for you: don’t ever disable the only network adapter in a Windows Server machine running in the cloud.  Most of you are now saying, “Well…yes” and “Duh.” Just for the record in case it…

  • yobyot.com gets SPDY

    Did you know that there’s a huge change happening in the way browsers communicate with web servers? And that change is gonna make the web go faster than ever? Google is behind this sea-change, which they originally called SPDY (pronounced “speedy”). Well, now SPDY is about to become the new HTTP/2 standard. By the end of the…

  • Connect two AD FS federation servers

    AD FS setup and configuration

  • Why everyone should pay $10 for Amazon Echo

    Everyone has an opinion about the Amazon Echo; here’s mine. Amazon Echo is the best $10 kitchen radio and timer ever invented. Nearby you see my Echo pictured. It’s banished to the least desirable part of the kitchen: the odd corner where you can’t fit a countertop appliance. Totally out of the way in this…

  • Thinking aloud goes 100% SSL (TLS)

    I am very pleased to announce that this blog, Thinking aloud, is now 100% SSL (actually, TLS). I did this for a couple of reasons. First, it was a great learning experience. Thinking aloud runs on an Azure virtual machine. That allows me complete control of the web server and its settings. Setting up the Apache ciphers,…

  • How to use Amazon.EC2.Model.Filter with PowerShell to identify EC2 instances

    PowerShell arrays of hash tables

  • Dumb and dumber Alex

    Over the Xmas-New Year’s holiday, I decided to move this blog from GoDaddy (feh!) to an Azure virtual machine. There were two reasons. First, I wanted to compare AWS to Azure (Azure is classic MSFT — they are far behind. But they have enough money to catch up and a long history of doing so and then…