- 2024
- May
- 22
Finding old wereboar posts in search engines?
While I’ve submitted the site indexes to both Bing and Google, you probably have a better chance of finding something here using Bing, or those sites that use it like DuckDuckGo. For all the grief Microsoft gives us, their indexing system is quite friendly. Submit pages via their console and it goes “Sure thing! Let me index that for you.” and a few days later - there it is.
Google, on the other hand, complains. “You have a redirect! I can’t index that!” Where? It’s a static page with a link on it. There are lots of things in the index queue that were rejected and I’m not even sure where it’s getting them - it looks like it’s own temporary files are being indexed and then tossed out because they’re not there anymore. it complains about invalid pages but give no reason as to why, just that they aren’t.
Regardless, for all the crap - Bing works best if you’d like to find an old post from a search engine. Use https://www.bing.com … =site%3awereboar.com and you’ll get a pretty good list of things here on wereboar. Bing feeds other sites like DuckDuckGo and Yahoo!, so you can use those sites if Bing isn’t to your liking.
If you’d like to stay on wereboar, you can use the built-in popular post page to see an index of all the pages, and how many times they’ve been viewed. Check that out right here: https://wereboar.com … projects/popular.php
And finally, the third way you can “search” the site is to use the sitemap. This one is just a text file with all of the important URLs on wereboar. There are no titles, so this is probably not an ideal thing to use - it’s primarily so search engines can find the URLs. However, if you’d like to see it, it’s here: https://wereboar.com/about/sitemap.txt - and the auto-gen’d XML version lives here: https://wereboar.com/about/sitemap.xml.
While I can’t take suggestions here due to the large amount of spammers, please feel free to connect with and talk to me on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin … an-walker-525b41223/ - I’d love to know what you think, and would like to know if there’s something you’d like to see more (or less!) of here on wereboar.
Thanks for checking out my place. See you soon with more goodies from shows and junk I’m working with.
- 2024
- May
- 19
I’ve had a few questions about the images here.
If you’d like to save a picture, use “open link in new tab” on a picture to get the full size image, otherwise you’ll save the preview. Once the image opens, you can save it from the new tab. You can do the same thing in a gallery. Just as a note, the gallery will cycle into the next post if you keep going forwards (or back, depending on where you are.)
If you’d like to use any of the images or text, they are licensed CC BY-NC-SA. You’re free to copy them, use them, display them, remix them, etc. - as long as you give attribution, it’s not for a commercial work, and your work is licensed the same way. This is barring any images I give to places for use, I follow their license and only ask for attribution.
Attribution is “Courtesy of https://wereboar.com/projects/”
I try to reciprocate on that when I can. I have many things saved, and if I can’t remember where I got it I will say so.
That’s all! Thank you to everyone reading this little pig’s works, and I hope you enjoy what I find.
- 2024
- Apr
- 30
MFJ has announced they are closing their doors.
For anyone that’s been in amatuer radio for more than a few years, the name MFJ is probably one that is quite familiar to you. From being the current owner of venerable names like Hy-Gain, to producing a wide range of custom electronics geared towards the radio operator, MFJ has showed up in every facet of ham radio.
On April 25th 2024, Martin Jue - the owner and founder - announced his retirement. The manufacturing portion of the business will close, removing their reasonably priced antenna, tuner, and other options from the market. From reports I’ve seen, certain imported products already sold by the company will continue forward.
This is quite a loss for the community. While MFJ has gathered nicknames over the years - Mighty Fine Junk being one of the more ‘polite’ ones, their products are cheap enough for the amateur amateur, but useful enough for the pro.
There have been reports that MFJ turned down some offers to buy the company, with other more hushed reports stating that it was because the business needs to stay where it is, physically. That may not be possible as other companies are going to want to consolidate to reduce costs - and as one QRZ commenter said “Don’t rule from the grave.” There’s still a chance someone could pick it up and continue operations, but that remains to be seen. All of that is just forum say-so, take it with a lot of salt. It’s possible that rising costs and other unknown factors make acquisition impossible.
Regardless, MFJ’s departure will be felt by many, even though the familiar red logo will continue to be at sales and fests for the rest of our lives.
Martin’s letter to the community: https://mailchi.mp/6 … 99/a-heavy-sad-heart
The QRZ thread: https://forums.qrz.c … ay-17th-2024.911452/
- 2024
- Apr
- 29
A new LinkedIn scam.
For a while, I was getting these odd connection requests where it was a strange picture and a bunch of unrelated jobs and universities all around the world. The person would always have a job of “shareholder” or somesuch nonsense, and they were always an entrepreneur, and they were a jet-setting, globe-trotting executive that had time to take a wedding dress photo on the beach for their profile. They were also Chinese, even if their photo wasn’t. You could usually reverse search the image and find it on the page the person lifted it from. Nope, right in the bin.
The new one seems to be people who have no profile picture, no jobs listed even though their headline may clearly state multiple job titles that kind of but don’t really relate, and one entry in their history - usually a university from 10 years ago. It’s always “I am very interested in your career and would like to work with you” in the introduction in-mail. Sometimes they have a job, but it’s vague or “self-employed.”
Mark, why are you a Chinese woman?
Report them as not a real person, and they’re usually gone in a day or two.
It’s nothing but a scam, and you have to be on the lookout for these bad actors. If you’re in a job that may have access to sensitive corporate or government info, it’s even more prudent that you refuse anything that even smells just slightly off. It’s not going to cost you anything to hit the block button, but could cost you a lot if you take the request and start talking.
- 2024
- Apr
- 29
If you’re planning on going to the Dayton Hamvention…
You still have time to mail order tickets if you’re in the USA, Canada, or Mexico. All other tickets can be ordered online, but are being held will-call.
Because of the non-promptness of the mail, I’d suggest sooner rather than later!
- 2024
- Apr
- 7
Tip Plugs for older test equipment are still purchasable.
They seem to be available from just about any one of the major electronics dealers, and run between $1.50 and $2.00 or so, depending on color and type. These are what you’d find on old test equipment like signal tracers and other devices where you’re inputting audio or other low frequency signals.
A current data sheet usually available from the vendors if you need one.
I usually get parts from Mouser.com, just because I’ve had good experiences purchasing parts from them over the years, and you can get small quantities with no minimum order penalties.
Solderless
105-0301-001 White
105-0302-001 Red
105-0303-001 Black
105-0304-001 Green
105-0310-001 Blue
Solder
105-0771-001 White
105-0772-001 Red
105-0773-001 Black
105-0774-001 Green <— This one is hard to get.
105-0780-001 Blue
- 2024
- Mar
- 29
No amount of whining will get you that information.
I may be alone here, but I’ve always found being asked for my “last three manager’s names, phone numbers, and email addresses” to be kind of odd. They don’t have time to be pestered by your questions, and what are you going to ask them? I can show you a W-2 to prove I worked there.
Beyond that, I don’t have contact with any of those people. It’s been too long for most of them, some of us parted ways long before places like LinkedIn were even a thing. That answer would usually satisfy most callers, especially when I pointed out they were asking for information from 1995. Do you remember your manager from 1995? Sure, I remember the guy’s name, but where is he - I have no idea.
One caller decided to be a little b**** and snippily asked me “Why don’t you want to give me these names?” Well, I just told you that I don’t have contact with them. “Well, I still need their contact information to proceed.”
Ok, sure. If you want to go nuclear, I have some nukes as well.
“You recently moved to a new job…”
“Yes, company was bought out. Technically, I still work there.”
“Uhhhhhhh, ok…how about the job before that?”
“My last manager was Bobby Blankspace.”
“Ok, well how do I get hold of him?”
“He’s dead. Heart attack after his wife left him.”
Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaawkward.
“Well…how about at this job?”
“That was 20 years ago. That company doesn’t exist now. It was old and tired when I was there and most of the people were retirement age. If they’re still alive, I doubt they would do more than tell you where to go and quit bothering them because if I were retired and 85 that’s what I’d tell you. I used to have contact with one of my former supervisors, but he was fired for cocaine use and I lost track of him.”
Double Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaawkward.
“And before you go on to the next one, that was even farther back. I lost track of that person in 1995 when I left. The division closed and he followed what was left to Tennessee. He’s probably long since retired by now, and would be in his 80s if he’s still alive.”
…
“In fact, the only job I can reliably give you a contact for is the one where I was a freelancer, and my boss was me.”
…
…
…
The person was still snippy but shuffled me off the phone as quick as they could when it became apparent I couldn’t play their game.
I don’t want to be impolite, but when I tell you I don’t have any contact information for these people, and they probably won’t talk to you anyway - I’m not being nasty. It’s just the way it is when you’ve been doing this for 30 years.
The age of some of the callers made me think that, as they had grown up in a world where social media always existed, it’s completely alien to them that you wouldn’t have all of these people in various contact circles - not quite realizing that some of us were working before your parents graduated high school.
More likely?
Contacts of potential hiring managers mean more people you can market to.
That’s all. You’ll get names when we’re moving forward, not on a cold call where you just want to chat.
- 2024
- Feb
- 11
I guess making a complaint does work.
I recently wrote about my experience with a large enterprise that still had an email system that didn’t meet changes made in 2014. I wrote an email to their DMARC reporting addresses explaining the situation - those bounced with full mailboxes. I wrote an email to Contact Us and got boilerplate back. I didn’t expect anything else.
I poked at their system one last time with mxtoolbox, and it looks like they actually did fix it. I’m not sure when they did so, as of Friday they were still being sent to quarantine by my provider, so it must have been after hours or something - perhaps my email system was still prejudiced because records hadn’t propagated yet.
Who knows. But I guess that goes to show, sometimes making a complaint does work. It just amazes me it took 10 years and someone not getting a single email to fix it.
- 2024
- Feb
- 4
Multiple email SPF records? Yeah, go away kid, we don’t care.
I’ve written about email security and having the proper records set in the past, but last week I ran across probably one of the most interesting (and really bad) ones to date.
I use an email service that I pay for, simply because I like having my own domain name - as you can probably tell by the links that pepper my posts, and the fact that you’re reading this on Wereboar.
Sunday, I (was supposed to have!) received an email from a large corporation that contained information that I paid for. Didn’t get it, so I logged in to my email maintenance console - and there they were.
They were quarantined in a way I’d never seen before. All text and links were struck out. Nothing could be clicked. You could move them around, but they would never pass into visibility in any IMAP folder. The only thing I could do is delete them in the maintenance console. The system would not release them - they were so suspicious that they just wouldn’t. Period.
The first thing I do is check the company in question’s email records using mxtoolbox - and there it is. Two SPF records. While this was acceptable at one point, a change to the way email worked - IN 2014! - made having multiple records of this type a red flag, and any email system worth it’s salt will, at minimum, dump these into spam.
SPF is a text record set in an email service that tells the email server who is allowed to send mail. You’re allowed one. Having more than one means that someone else could have set one without your knowledge - and that leads to all kind of interesting scenarios, the least of which is lots of spam being relayed through your email server.
The change that allowed only one SPF record was made in 2014. That means this large multi-national corporation has had 10 years to make this simple fix to their email system.
My email service didn’t put these in spam, it simply said “Nope, not going to let you have these, they’re suspicious beyond compare.” The fact that it’s a world-wide operating company that many use on a daily basis is even worse. They have the time and resources to take 10 minutes and set their email server up properly. I made a complaint. Will they change it?
No. They literally don’t care. Send an email to the ones set in their other security record (DMARC) and it comes back “mailbox full.” No one is even looking at issues.
So, did I get my information? Yes. I keep a couple of old Gmail addresses for whatever reason - nostalgia I guess. Gmail used to be the gold standard for consumer email service, but now it’s the library book of email services. It accepted the malformed records without complaint, which it absolutely should not have done.
What do you need to take away from this? As email becomes more and more weaponized, you’re going to have more systems rejecting your email. Fix your $&#&$! crap. If you don’t know how, hire someone to do it for you.
If you don’t, there’s going to be a time when you can’t get your email through. And that’s going to be purely your fault.
Don’t wait. Fix it. Now.
- 2024
- Jan
- 23
All of the documents currently in wereboar’s archive - Part II.
I’ve added a few more documents to the Wereboar archive on both the previous entry, as well as this (new) entry. More will be added as I gain more manuals for equipment featured here. These are hosted by my webhost’s cloud storage system, OXDrive.
Original document archive post:
https://wereboar.com … n-wereboars-archive/
The Knight KG-690 and 83Y135 Signal Tracer (Same chassis, different cabinet):
https://privateemail … 11cf/1/8/NDY/NDYvMTU
Radio Shack “Science Fair” 28-177 Crystal Radio Kit Owner and Assembly Manual: https://privateemail … 8376/1/8/NDY/NDYvMTY
All of the documents currently stored in the wereboar archive, as of April 8th 2024 (165MB zipfile) - anything below this is not in this archive:
https://www.dropbox. … w2v18oho5tib9vu&dl=0
The EICO Model 540 Readi-Tester:
https://privateemail … ed43/1/8/NDY/NDYvMTc