Many folks seem to be stuck with their Unifi Passwords. It’s actually quite simple.

For the most part, most Shops and Restaurants that provide Free Wi-Fi via Unifi don’t change their Router Password allowing easy access for a nefarious intruder to logon and gain access to the router. Once inside, they’ll be able to do lots and lots of damage, including opening up a permanent backdoor to the router for continuous malicious fun!

Don’t be afraid though, for the most part iPhones are pretty invulnerable to network attacks, ‘most’ Androids as well. However, a small select few who choose to roots their phones and install non-standard pieces of software may be susceptible to.

If you’re on Unifi and find yourself ’locked’ out of your own router, try these password combinations:

Username : admin Password : <blank>

*<blank> means don’t enter anything and leave the field blank

Username : admin Password : telekom

Either of these should get you into your router. If you’re still unable to log onto your router, don’t despair. This is actually a good opportunity for you to practice your newly found skills. The guys over at Unifi Athena have actually come up with a way to find your router password through some very simple and easy steps, check out their tutorial here.

Coming just days after an announcement from Maxis, Celcom is looking to launch their own LTE network. I really don’t understand what all the fuss is about, only a handful of phones in the market will actually be able to ’enjoy’ the faster speeds of LTE, but I do remember my American Colleagues telling me that LTE is America is faster than the fibre connection they have at home–so be prepared people these things as blazing fast.

A couple of days back, I decided to buy a Christmas present for my wife. In my usual lackadaisical procrastinating style however–I only decided to buy on the 21st of December, which is barely 4 days from Christmas.

In my defense,  I already had a great Christmas present in mind–it was something called the fitbit, a full fledge pedometer that not just records your steps everyday, but also your sleep time and tracks your daily activity. The best part is that the fitbit stores your data on the cloud, where you can analyze it to your hearts content. Not a bad present for a wife whose far more physically active than me :). (does blogging while standing count as a physical activity??)

There was however one problem–the fitbit isn’t available in Malaysia. I tried and I tried, but I couldn’t even find a lowyat seller who had it in stock. Now we really did have a problem.

Fortunately, I found one on Amazon–and Amazon did ship to Malaysia. So after a couple of credit card details were punched in (and a full USD30 for shipping) I manage to place my order on Amazon. The Amazon website promised 2-4 day delivery time-frame but stipulated in no uncertain terms that the order would not reach me before Christmas.

>register their patrons’ personal details based on their MyKad or MyKid identification cards. >use transparent and untinted glass so that what happens inside can be monitored; >have an open layout with no “blind spots” so that illegal activities like cyber gambling cannot be carried out without being easily noticed; >have brighter lighting to give the perception of a “Healthy Cyber Cafe” instead of being dark and dingy; >operate a minimum of 40 computers in urban areas, and 20 computers in rural areas.

Youths who qualify for the RM200 rebate will be able to purchase 'selected' 3G smartphones costing up to RM500 from selected dealers and agents appointed by service providers. With the rebate, they are expected to pay no more than RM300 to own a new 3G smartphone. “The idea is to spread the incentive across to those who do not yet use smartphones. We really want to help those who cannot afford to change phones to upgrade from their old 2G phones to a basic 3G smartphone.

This is a tech blog, so let’s talk about tech.

Let’s about the technology behind the term geo-engineering. According to wikipedia  “The concept of geoengineering (or climate engineering, climate remediation, and climate intervention) refers to “the deliberate large-scale intervention in the Earth’s climate system, in order to moderate global warming”. The techniques of geo-engineering are based on science, but applied on scale that exceeds even my imagination.

Techniques of geo-engineering include things like injecting metallic substances into the upper atmosphere to reflect the sunlight and thus reduce the earth temperatures, or on the more audacious side of the spectrum we have engineers proposing we install cooling pipes into the ocean to mix the cooler deeper water with the warmer surface water to cut-off (or at least slow down) a hurricane. Slowing down a hurricane might sound ludicrous to you, but if you understand the concept behind the creation of a hurricane, you’ll soon realize the solution is solidly based on science, and all it boils down to is an engineering challenge on a never-before-seen scale. It also helps that the company pioneering the hurricane halting technology is currently applying for a couple patents and is supported by the big thinker himself–one Mr. Bill Gates.

It has its sceptics and critics, but then again there were many sceptics when President Kennedy propose to send a Man to the Moon and bring him safely back in 1969. Till this day, some still are sceptical that the United States actually sent anyone up to space in 1969, and even more are critical of the amount of government funds spent on the Space Program–just nobody tell Neil DeGrasse Tyson.

Malaysian wireless reports on an SKMM study done in the first half of 2012 to compare dropped and block call rates for the 3 major telcos in Malaysia. At the moment it’s still unclear why neither YES or uMobile have been studied but the study is a move in the right direction towards providing concrete data on call quality for Malaysians to make inform decision about the telco. Incidentally, SKMM also offer a form you can fill if you’ve experienced a dropped call–for some unknown reason the form is hosted on Google Docs, one can only think SKMM didn’t want to fork out cash to host the form  on their own servers.

First off, I’d like to point out that while I can see the report and search for direct links to the PDF version of the reports online. I can’t seem to locate any link to the report from the SKMM website, which is strange, it also appears that only Malaysian Wireless has reported on this particular study. With other blogs seemingly unaware of the study.

In essence, the study is rather simple:

According to the MCMC drive test report, the assessment was conducted with following criteria:

• Tests were carried out in moving vehicles (Drive Test).
• Call duration lasts for 60 seconds, with 10 seconds interval between calls.
• Phones were set on roam-free environment between 2G and 3G networks that simulates the experience of user in making voice call using phone supporting both technologies.
• The results of the study only reflect the behavior of the networks on the locations and time of the measurements.

Although, the methodology isn’t clear, and there are missing details, the study is a great starting point to confirm if the telco you’re currently on is providing you top notch quality. The 2 key measurements from the study were the drop call rates and blocked call rates, defined as follows:

a. Dropped Call Rate (DCR) Dropped call means a call where a connection succeed, that is, the network is accessed, call set up is successful and traffic channel has been assigned, but is disconnected due to abnormal call release. Dropped Call Rate is calculated based on the percentage of number of dropped call over total number of call attempt.

b. Blocked Call Rate (BCR)  Blocked call means a call is not connected after call attempt due to unavailability of free traffic channel. Blocked Call Rate is calculated based on the percentage of number of blocked call over total number of call attempt.

So the best telco based on these definitions is the one with the lowest DCR and BCR.  A high BCR means calls don’t get connected in the first place, and a high DCR means calls get disconnected once they’re connected. A good telco should strive for the lowest possible numbers on these 2 parameters. While the study was conducted nationally in each and every state, I thought KL would be a good place to dissect the data and provide a benchmark for the nation, if you’d like to know how your telco fared in your home state, head on over to Malaysian wireless who have all the details broken down by state.

As I read more about the sad state of affairs of Science Education in Malaysia, I can see glaring areas for improvement, and some areas that surprise me. All of this data is readily available in the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) that is actually a benchmark our very own Malaysian Government uses to gauge the success of the National Education blueprint. It’s a wonder that while me make it priority to score in the top third of this benchmark, no one for either side of the political divide seems to bother to read the report–merely taking the final score and politicizing it.

If they actually took time off to read even the one report for science–albeit the 520+ page long report. They’d find some rather interesting data.

Take for instance the controversial topic of Homework. There’s a huge Malaysian inclination to load our children with homework, with the noble aim to familiarize themselves with the subject matter and hence improve their test scores.In fact, in all countries surveyed by the TIMSS study, Malaysian students are given the most homework. The MOST!!

Yet we score in the bottom third of the study. Too much homework is bad, but just how much is too much?

The actual data from the TIMSS study, suggest that the optimal amount of science homework to give a child should be no more than 45 minutes per week per subject. You heard that right–in fact, across all the countries in the study, anything more than this and the test scores start to DECREASE.

About 2,000 delegates representing major telecommunication industry players, experts and representatives from nearly 200 member countries of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) assemble here to discuss the International Telecommunication Regulations (ITR) at theWorld Conference of International Telecommunications 2012 (WCIT).

Shouldering the responsibility as a member of the ITU Council for Asia- Pacific, Malaysia is expected to highlight the important issue of telecommunication network security and the right to protect the sovereignty of a country.

Breaking news. That new iPhone that you lined up overnight for outside KLCC–won’t have LTE support, and quite possibly–never will!!

So before you plonk down your dough on the next big thing, you might want to consider how you’d feel if within 6 months everybody else on your block had next generation 4G speeds–except you!

LiewCF reports that :