Using Snadboy's Revelation

Using Snadboy's Revelation can help you in some situations, but it doesn't always work.

Just a quick update on my A+ Certification training, because I couldn't think of which blog to put it in!

Last week I began my A+ Certification training which my company is paying for. I'll blog more about that in a different post. Anyway, the instructor showed us a tool for recovering passwords that a client/user has forgotten because it has been automatically saved into their software.

Scenario: You have been asked to move the email for your client from their old computer to the new computer and finish setting up the software. Problem is, the client doesn't remember the password.

Solution: With Snadboy's Revelation, you can reveal the password that is hidden in a password text box (hidden by asterisks). Its quite a simple tool, accept I haven't got it to work yet.

The demonstration in class was simple enough. Very handy. Last night at home I downloaded and installed it on a USB key (the only files you need are the .dll and .exe). I tried it on my Google Notify window, but it would reveal the password. Ok, so its not perfect.

I tried it at work this morning because I have another actual use for it.

Scenario: I have a number of websites configured in Dreamweaver, and they all have the password save into the server settings. One site I haven't updated in a long time and I recently started updating it and I wanted to be able to update it from home. Except I don't remember the password. So that would leave me with only being able to update it at work, which isn't too useful. (The story is more complicated than that but I'll leave it at that.)

So I installed my USB drive to try and run the program and a dialog box said "File not found" appeared. I checked behind the dialog box after closing it and sure enough it was gone. Turns out my Symantec Antivirus deleted the file off my USB key because it treats it as a Hack Tool!

I went into settings and the default action for HackTools is to Quarantine the file. I tried changing it to "Leave Alone". Then I installed the utility again on my hard drive, and again Symantec deleted the file!

Luckily, I just tried playing with Symantec again and I was able to restore the file, but who knows if it will get deleted again.

(NOTE: I don't have full control over Symantec, its installed remotely be our IT people)

Wedding plans and classes

If you didn't know it already, I'm getting married in June of this year and the planning is well under way.

This weekend we met with the photographer and went over the order of the photos, and the meeting only took half an hour. It took us 1h45min to get there! That's ok though since we had dinner with the in-laws, which are really great people, I'm very lucky... and so are they! Yesterday we picked up some shower gifts that my parents and sister had sent down (they live 5 hours away) since the shower is in 2 weeks so that was fun. Had to go back a second time because the guy at Home Outfitter forgot one of the boxes! But we did get a nice rug for my computer room here in the rec room.

Then we addressed all the envelopes and put together all the invitations. Most were already made we just had to add the reply card and envelope, but even that didn't take very long so the invitations should go out in the mail tomorrow. And that means we didn't have to mess with them today!

But we did have to do yard work today :( Finally time to get outside when it wasn't raining. We didn't get all the weeds but at least the garbage is gone and the leaves are raked... and even the front flower beds are done.

Next week should be good, but it will be busy. Classes are finally over (I work at a university) but I'll begin my Comptia A+ Computer Hardware/Software Technician certification training. For the next 17 days or so, my afternoons (12:30 - 4:30) are dedicated to learning how to fix, install and troubleshoot computers! No big deal, I've been doing it for years, even though its not technically part of my current duties. But there is a chance I could create a new course after this and teach it to some of our computer students! So nothing wrong with upgrading skills that could lead to better pay in the future. Or something like that anyway.

I've heard the tests aren't that hard, and I already know most of the material, but the tests have been updated as of 2006. I've already gone through some of the readings and it is a mixture of old and new stuff but I feel even the old stuff is still relevant... I've had to work with it in the past so I know what's out there.

Even got a computer from my future father-in-law that will be donated to my future wife's museum (she works at one) so I get to practice my computer technician skills on it. Actually, right now it won't boot of the Windows XP Home CD without keyboard interaction, and the only keyboard I had around is my Apple USB keyboard and unfortunately, the USB ports don't kick in when it tries to boot of the CD or the floppy. So I'm going to download a Linux LiveCD and see what I can do.

Wish me luck! What brand of Linux do you use? Leave feedback in the comments!