Iain

Thank you for the tips. I managed to find an article that showed exactly what to do. Here's the link, just in case anyone else needs to do this.

I have set up Ubuntu 12.04 server in an office and I also installed KDE. We have an application that we would like to run and display on the desktop of the server and would like to be able to access the desktop remotely. I thought that I could install xrdp and then use Windows Remote Desktop to access it but it opens a new session and the original desktop isn't shown remotely. I've done some googling and it seems that an option is to use VNC but I've tried several "walk-through" instructions and they all fail to bring the remote desktop to my PC. Is this really the way to do it? Does anyone have any other suggestions? I thought about using TeamViewer or LogMeIn but, as far as I know, these are better suited to a WAN, rather than LAN, situation. Thanks in advance.

I'd forgotten about all the goodies that come with a QNAP. As you say though, they're not cheap! I'll put this into the equation but suspect that the cost will rule it out.

Thanks - the red rectangle shows: "-6 Neutral" now!

I don't know if this was evident previously but I never saw it. I looked at my profile and saw a red rectangle in the top right with -7 in it. When I hovered over it, it said "Iain has -7 likes". What does this mean? I have never had any warnings. Is it a glitch or do I *really* have -7 likes?

@MRGRIM: That's useful to know. I don't know if this will HAVE to be a Windows/IIS project (if an off the shelf solution isn't used) and I would hate to do all the hard development work using Linux/MySQL to find that I had to start from scratch for the Windows migration! @alex_m: I had no idea that FreeNAS had a built-in media server. I'll check it out. Thank you for the comments.

I have been asked to look into some options to allow a small number of users in a business to upload videos that have been taken "in house" to a server and allow all users to download them. There must be the facility to add keywords to the file that can be used to search for the video. The file name will not be sufficient as a search term. The videos could be up to 500MB in size. My gut feeling is to use web pages with PHP (and possibly JavaScript) to upload files across the LAN to a server and have the file path, keywords etc. stored in a SQL database. Users would interrogate the SQL database via a web page to obtain a list of matching videos and a link to be able to download them. I have some experience with Linux/Windows/xampp but there might be a desire within the organisation to use Windows/IIS/MS SQL (I have negligible experience of IIS and MS SQL). I have two questions: First: Is there an off the shelf solution, such as a media server? If so, which one? I've heard of Sharepoint but don't know if that would work or if it would be overkill. Second: If I go with a bespoke solution (PHP, HTML, JavaScript, mysql) and develop this using Windows/xampp but the decision is made to run this on Windows/IIS/MS SQL, how easy would it be to transfer everything to the production system? Thanks in advance.

That's great - thank you.

Would you mind posting how you got this to work? I'm almost certainly going to go down a similar route within the next few weeks so your instructions will save me a lot of time!

I have MinGW and find it very easy to use.

I seem to recall that iexpress.exe can merge files and have them both run, though I can't be 100% sure about that because I've never played with it. It's built into Windows XP.

Hmm Jason - that's an interesting idea. I didn't think about copying the string from one to the other. At the moment, it's really an academic exercise. I started reading about pointers, * and & and just didn't understand why it's so easy to determine the address of a string if it's defined in one way but impossible to derive it programmatically if it's defined in another way. An alternative that I thought about (and still have to investigate) is to step through the code using OllyDbg (or similar). I've seen the actual address of the string in a register when defined as char[] so I thought about having some inline assembly to pull the value of the register and deliver it to a variable (outside the inline assembly) that could be printed using printf or used elsewhere in the code.

Thank you Jason. So, if I want to print the address of the location of the string in the .rdata section from within the program (rather than obtain it using OllyDbg), how would I do that? From what you said, it's the address of the char array. I can obtain the address of the stack location but that's not what I want.

I'd like to be able to retrieve the address of a string, but am finding it confusing. Here's the code that I'm using: //Compile using <g++ hak5.cpp -o hak5.exe> #include <stdio.h> int main() { char * Pointer_to_First_String = "hello"; char * Pointer_to_Second_String = "HELLO"; char amessage[] = "hello, world"; printf ("\nPointer to first string\t\t= 0x%08x\n", Pointer_to_First_String); printf ("Pointer to second string\t= 0x%08x\n", Pointer_to_Second_String); printf("\nThe value of amessage is \t= 0x%08x\n", amessage); printf("The value of *amessage (hex) is = 0x%08x\n", *amessage); printf("The value of *amessage (dec) is = %d\n", *amessage); printf("\namessage is:\t\t\t %s\n", amessage); amessage[0] = 'H'; amessage[7] = 'W'; printf("amessage has been changed to:\t %s\n", amessage); return 0; } The code compiles fine and returns the addresses of the first two strings (as confirmed by examining the .rdata section in OllyDbg) but the address returned for the final string is 0x0022ff2b. However, when I review the .rdata section in OllyDbg, the address of this final string is actually 0x0040316c. Is it possible to return this value programmatically? It seems that 0x0022ff2b is the stack of the main thread and I realise that this changes as the program runs. Thanks in advance.

Thank you for the further tips. I've started using MinGW and find it a very useful tool. It's certainly a lot easier than when I used to use Dev-C++ but maybe I'm just a bit more experienced in coding nowadays!

That's a nice tip to have in my "back pocket" in case I need to do the same. Please feed back your results, whether good or bad!

I'm grateful for the further input (and apologies for not having responded earlier). That's a bit more for me to digest and investigate further.

Isn't that the only way that we learn? I've lost count of how many people I've recommended to keep a backup, let alone keep it safe. It's almost as if everyone thinks "it won't happen to me" ... until an IT glitch comes around and bites them on the a$$! Needless to say, I count myself in the group who thought it would never happen to me.

I heard about this scam quite some time ago. You were fortunate because you are computer-savvy. Just imagine if the recipient had been a 70-year old (I don't mean to be ageist!) who had just managed to get online to exchange e-mails and holiday snapshots with his grandchild who lives 800 miles away. He may have been taken in hook, line and sinker!

Someone beat you to it: http://forums.hak5.org/index.php?showtopic=20442&pid=181673&st=0entry181673

Thanks for the response. As far as I know, if I have some "Hello World" code and compile it on Linux, it will only run on Linux. If I have the same code and compile it on Windows (using Borland), it will only run on Windows. I'm interested in being able to compile it on Linux, but have it run on Windows. I'll look at the links that you posted.

I've started to use Linux recently and have found just how easy it is to compile C++. When I compiled C++ on my XP PC a while ago, it was a real nightmare to determine exactly what settings I needed in order to compile correctly and not spew out a massive .exe file. Does anyone know if I can compile C++ for a Windows executable on Linux? If so, what software should I use? As far as I know, I can't just use gcc on my Ubuntu or BT4 system.

Check out the BackTrack Forums. There are loads of posts there about various teething problems that folks have had with BT5. There are also very useful tips and tricks for everyone, from novice to expert.

I'm astonished by just how quickly he churns out such informative material, and for FREE! Of course there are many videos on YouTube (etc.) that simply show how to do a particular attack but Vivek clearly knows his stuff and expains exactly what's happening at the packet level. Such detailed information and complicated maths may not be for everyone but this approach suits me. I wonder if he could be enticed to work with Darren and Snubs on a segment in an episode? Maybe I'll fire a message to them to ask about this.

I'm sure that many here will be aware of SecurityTube. Vivek has been busy creating 13 (at the latest count) instructional videos that deal with the basics of WLAN security and building upon that to develop methods of bypassing it. I'd urge anyone who has an interest in this field to check out his site. Disclaimer: I do not have anything to do with SecurityTube but am just an avid follower!