Posted by Ty Clifford »
1 Comment »Maybe you don’t have much space on your hard drive, or you’re just a clean freak, or OCD kicks in and you’re pulling your hair out over all these random files that mean nothing to you. Enough said, we all want our PCs to perform to their fullest potential. (and)Believe me, clogged hard drives can impact the performance of a computer more than some think.
I’ve recently come across an all-in-one free spacer tool called BleachBit.
BleachBit quickly frees disk space and tirelessly guards your privacy. Free cache, delete cookies, clear Internet history, shred temporary files, delete logs, and discard junk you didn’t know was there. Designed for Linux and Windows systems, it wipes clean 90 applications including Firefox, Internet Explorer, Adobe Flash, Google Chrome, Opera, Safari,and more.
I’m going to demonstrate and share my thoughts.
Install BleachBit
Installing BleachBit was simple for me. I installed it through the Debian Software Center. You can probably install it on your distribution’s software center. Or download it from the website if you’re using Windows. Continuing on..
Start BleachBit (Normal. Not “as root”)
You’ll be presented with a pleasant screen asking which “drives” (directories), and if you’d like to overwrite these files after deletion. Basically, it’s going to not only delete, but will also shred them so it makes it a lot harder to recover them in the future. Valuable to those have crazy ex-partners. Kid, I kid.
I went ahead and also selected “Overwrite files to hide contents,” too. Then hit close.
The selections
Now is the part where you’ll need to decide what you wish to clear. You must do this carefully as you may accidentally delete all of your bookmarks. You definitely don’t want that.
I selected some simple elements. Notice I left out “places,” in Firefox, as that relates to Bookmarks. If you have your bookmarks backed up, then go ahead–Though that just defeats the purpose of keeping bookmarks inside of the web browser.
The more touchy
Now that you’ve selected the obvious files, it’s time to move onto the more touchy. System files, and Package files (for Linux).
I’m not recommending that you mess with any of these. Though I did select “Clipboard,” and “Recent Documents.”
Preview Your Deletions First
It’s time to review what you’ve did. You can click the “Preview” button at the top left to see what exactly this program will delete, based on your selections.
This is the basics. If you’re running Debian that is, or something similar. It’ll vary from distribution to distribution. Also it’ll most likely look different on Windows.
Permission Error Time
If you’re satisfied with the Preview, go ahead and select “Delete.” You’ll get this nifty-little screen..
You can safely click “Delete” if you have not messed with anything else in-between Previewing, and clicking Delete. If you have, then I recommend Previewing the deletion selections again, then coming back to Delete the files. Note: You’ll also need to have any programs that may be accessing these files closed. Aptitude, Synaptic, Google Chrome, Firefox, Pidgin, and any other programs you’re telling BleachBit to clean. As it can conflict due to other permission errors.
Re-open “as root”
Before, as I didn’t point out, I also selected an APT clean. Which, because I was not running BleachBit as root it did not work. You’ll need to close the current BleachBit, after everything besides the APT clean, and re-open it as root.
It’ll might ask you the same things, go ahead and select “Overwrite files,” too. Then re-select the APT fields (or whatever your package manager may be) again, and hit Preview. All OK? Good, go ahead and “Delete.”
If all goes well:
Nice? I hope so.
I’m shocked I haven’t came across this sooner! This is a great tool to have for the quick free’r. If you have any tips, suggestions, etc, feel free to let me know. Remember this is also on Windows.
Download BleachBit
Posted by Ty Clifford »
3 Comments »Don’t look at me! Better yet..
For some time now I’ve been using proxies on and off–heck, I even host a proxy server for myself, and a few of my friends. But who is to say that maybe one day their information could be leaked? I wouldn’t betray them, but… what happens if they didn’t know me? Do you think they would trust me as much?
The last few months I’ve been pandering on just how private proxies really are. I’ve came to the conclusion that proxies are no more private than not using a proxy. That just seems crazy doesn’t it?! Let me lay it out…
Without a Proxy
Obviously people will have your real IP and will be able to tell that you are you. That to some people is just fine. You can go anywhere on the Internet and still be singled out at any given time–you are completely fine with that. Besides, your ISP has a hawk-eye on you too.
With a Proxy
Ok… so now you want to become hidden in such a way that you cannot be identified by IP–that’s completely fine. At the same time what exactly do you think you’re hiding? If you can’t answer that with 3 simple reasons then I suggest reconsidering using a proxy.
If someone wanted to be completely evil to you, that proxy host (server) could possibly redirect you, phish you, … shall I say more?
OR: You are doing some online banking. Do you REALLY want to use a proxy?! I’d rather only my ISP know where I was.
With the bare effects
Okay so, yes, proxies are needed on some occasions, but things like VPNs have more usability, and offer more than just a jacket over your chest. Proxies are often used for caching too (if you didn’t know that). And also for reversing connections… so on, etc.
I just wanted to blurt out that random information. I’ve seen quite a few people go all-out with proxies recently – and had some people ask me a few questions about proxies awhile back.
Posted by Ty Clifford »
1 Comment »For some time now I’ve been watching and reading the stories on copyright holders that have become upset at people who pirate their materials, and governments that have been taking privacy and piracy to a new level.
For the people you have been taking to court and sued for linking programs, distributing programs, etc, what crime is in that? If you ask me (which I don’t care if you do or not, this is my website I’ll say it regardless), I say that the people who help distribute programs are the ones who help the programs gain popularity. Especially for music artists.
Music artists and governments say they are losing money because people pirate their material? Are you kidding me? Half of P2Prs would’ve never heard of half the artists they have on their hard drives if it wasn’t provided free to begin with. Most of the people I know say that if they download something for free, and they like it, they will buy it to show their support – If they don’t like it, they trash it and don’t buy it.
With the governments wanting to take control of users activities on the Internet just goes to show that they didn’t use our money the right way to begin with (the first time) – So now they’re just pissed and taking people to court to gain what they thought they lost.
Music industries are also mad because they are facing having to live like the majority of people. Making less than $100,000 a year. Because they don’t make $5,000,000 and only make $3,000,000, they decide to take a few people to court and gain what money they have greed over.
Why don’t I ever see citizens taking the media holders to court? Why aren’t ISPs being sued for allowing P2Prs? Seriously, if The Pirate Bay is trying to be put in jail, why isn’t AOL, Comcast, Verizon, BT, Telstra, etc being taken to court? Why isn’t GM, Ford, etc not being taken to court for not making automated seat-belts that force themselves on the driver? Why isn’t Google being hassled & courted for indexing torrent sites? It’s the same damn thing!
I remember before this whole “Lets Kill the Pirates!” season, I used to see tons of people in the stores purchasing TV Shows, Music, Movies, etc. Now? Not so much as I used to. They raised the prices in some areas that I know of that drove some people away from buying at the store. I’m not surprised either.
Privacy
Oh, my opinions don’t stop there.
With the governments wanting to be able to record all communications with people/between people (like they probably haven’t already), that just makes me think:
What would they say if WE wanted access to their computer? What if we wanted to see who they were texting behind to their friends? Or what person they were viewing on a social networking website?
I’m sure you can guess.
