Have you done anything big: start a business, climb a mountain, build your own house?

KeepItSimpleStupid said:

They used to do it with a person and balls flying around

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A long time ago there was a lottery scandal here with the flying ping-pong balls in a chamber. The winning number is blown out of the top of the chamber. Somebody had put a bit of moisture in some of the ping-pong balls, making them heavier by a small amount. Just enough to skew the odds so they had a statistically good idea what numbers would likely be selected. Somehow they got caught.

Rich D. said:

A long time ago there was a lottery scandal here with the flying ping-pong balls in a chamber. The winning number is blown out of the top of the chamber. Somebody had put a bit of moisture in some of the ping-pong balls, making them heavier by a small amount. Just enough to skew the odds so they had a statistically good idea what numbers would likely be selected. Somehow they got caught.

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Hmm, it is amazing how clever the fraudsters are. I bit there are many cases where the scams has not been discovered.

spec

Coded image recognition with Fortran in the 60s.

Coded a database system from scratch with a mixture of Fortran and assembly in the 70s, in 72 hours.

Ran a children's theater. Ran a Haunted House for a school fundraiser (raised $28,000 in six hours) in the 80s.

90s were a bust.

Built a retirement house on a lake in the 00s.

djsfantasi said:

Coded image recognition with Fortran in the 60s.

Coded a database system from scratch with a mixture of Fortran and assembly in the 70s, in 72 hours.

Ran a children's theater. Ran a Haunted House for a school fundraiser (raised $28,000 in six hours) in the 80s.

90s were a bust.

Built a retirement house on a lake in the 00s.

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You have been busy DJ- some impressive achievements. You must have been a God-like figure to have known about programming in the 1960s.

spec

spec said:

You have been busy DJ- some impressive achievements. You must have been a God-like figure to have known about programming in the 1960s.

spec

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God-like is a little much. Just happened to be in the right place at the right time and fell in love with coding.

djsfantasi said:

God-like is a little much. Just happened to be in the right place at the right time and fell in love with coding.

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In the UK at the time anyone who could speak computer and programming was also capable of walking on water. They were megga beings indeed- but maybe not so in the Boston USA area.

spec

I was actually better at designing applications and finding bugs. That was sometimes harder. A guy finished his thesis and asked me to check out his "terminal handler". I thought about it for a few minutes and went to a logged out terminal and typed 3 characters and the system crashed.

In high school, the school system had a mini-computer that was timeshared. Well, I could crash it at will. I had to fess up and not do it again or tell anyone how. It made potentially 16 or 32 users very upset. The crash dump ratted on our school, since the school had an account and not the individuals. Later I worked for them.

Yes, you are right Keep, finding faults can be very difficult.

Talking about computer systems, it is beyond me to understand how, as happens from time to time, a kid with a computer can possibly hack into the supposedly most secure systems- there is something wrong somewhere.

spec

spec said:

Talking about computer systems, it is beyond me to understand how, as happens from time to time, a kid with a computer can possibly hack into the supposedly most secure systems- there is something wrong somewhere.

spec

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It's actually quite simple and I saw it with me. For very little $, you can occupy that abundant time on your hands at that age with no money with something challenging.

When you get older, you don't have the time to spend.

How do you think I learned how to open simple combination locks and even safes? I took them apart and studied them. There is some trial and error involved, but it's more of a method.

KeepItSimpleStupid said:

It's actually quite simple and I saw it with me. For very little $, you can occupy that abundant time on your hands at that age with no money with something challenging.

When you get older, you don't have the time to spend.

How do you think I learned how to open simple combination locks and even safes? I took them apart and studied them. There is some trial and error involved, but it's more of a method.

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The point is that it is so simple which highlights a major drop-off in the design of computer systems, in spite of a fortune being spent on security.

I have no knowledge about your lock-picking activities.

spec

Lock picking is two types. Brute force, or feel. With feel you see in your mind what the tool touches, when a drops inside the lock, you feel it on the pick. Or you wiggle mad and apply a bit of pressure, its more rewarding to feel and see in your mind what is going on.

I'm saying combination locks. I could do it with a little bit of feel and some mathematics. The locks have to be a simple left-right-left or right-left-right type of lock. Not one of the 2 turns this way 3 that way etc.

Little Ghostman said:

Lock picking is two types. Brute force, or feel. With feel you see in your mind what the tool touches, when a drops inside the lock, you feel it on the pick. Or you wiggle mad and apply a bit of pressure, its more rewarding to feel and see in your mind what is going on.

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Or you could build a device that allows you to hear the tumblers click into place.

KeepItSimpleStupid said:

I'm saying combination locks. I could do it with a little bit of feel and some mathematics. The locks have to be a simple left-right-left or right-left-right type of lock. Not one of the 2 turns this way 3 that way etc.

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You need a little basic knowledge of they type you are attempting to crack.

JoeJester said:

You need a little basic knowledge of they type you are attempting to crack.

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Almost 100% true. I've done suitcases and copy machines on the first or second guess.

I have seen briefcase combinations locks, done real quick with a IR led and webcam with the IR filter removed.

Is it geeky to admit to having a lock collection? I love the mechanics behind the designs.

Little Ghostman said:

Is it geeky to admit to having a lock collection? I love the mechanics behind the designs.

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I had one two at your age. I still have it.

Probably goes with the "rock garden" (a square meter space) which is the rocks collected over time when digging in the yard.

Little Ghostman said:

Is it geeky to admit to having a lock collection? I love the mechanics behind the designs.

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I had one too at your age!

I hate someone saying this but, this time I will: I know a quite effective way to find out the key for briefcases but I will refrain myself to make it public. Sorry.

Lets see now...
Built a commercial Car alarm as a final year Eng project.
Published twice in Computes' Gazette in 1990 & 93 for C-64 assembly programs sold to the magazine.
Published in Lightwavin magazine for doing liquid mercury 3D animation (amalgamating into a logo) on TV back in the 90's when that was novel.
Designed and manufactured 'delay kill' circuits for automotive antihijack - made it look like u had no gas (zeroed the gauge) and stuttered the coil .
Ran a faux stained glass business on a process I developed.
Developed a low fat, egg less cheesecake and supplied restaurants. The chocolate fudge ripple is dangerously close to heaven.
Earned 7 innovation awards since 2012 for various proof of technical and commercial concept inventions.
Developed and sold a few gadgets & E-kits on Ebay.
Currently learning about RF/UHF, IoT, VSWR, having acquired Spect Analyzers, Vector Network Analyzer, NF meter, Comm. Analyzer and a bunch of esoteric components like tunnel diodes and all kinds of vintage Tektronix gear that's related.
And most recently, my daughter placed first in two A' level subjects in the Caribbean and 4th in a 3rd subject out of 4 subjects taken (out of about 20,000 students) . Sadly she didn't do Physics and has no interest in my workshop.